by Steve Alten
Shep hugged Trish, holding her tight. “I love you.”
“I love you.”
Virgil waited patiently until they separated.
“One last question… why me? I’m about the farthest thing from a righteous man.”
“As were all the great sages. The greatest Light, Patrick, comes from the greatest transformation.”
Shep maintained his grip on his soul mate’s hand. “There are no accidents, are there, Virgil. You set this whole thing up.”
“No, son. You did.” He took their entwined hands in his. “Just remember, free will works both ways. Noah failed to restrict himself in the Malchut and was castrated. Should you fail to restrict yourself in the supernal realm, the forces of darkness will corrupt you so that even the Light and love of your soul mate will not be enough to rescue you from this self-induced purgatory.”
Patricia squeezed his hand… then let go, her aura fading into the light.
“Are you ready?”
“Yes.” Shep swallowed hard. “Any last spiritual advice you want to impart, Virge?”
The old man took him by the hand and led him toward the Reaper, the being’s body now bathed in the light of a rainbow. “Always remember, your soul is forever connected to the Light of the Creator. At times, your actions can veil this connection, but it can never be severed. Never.”
“Thanks. Hey, about that lousy parent remark—”
“Unconditional love is unconditional, Patrick. Embrace the chaos. Use it to eradicate the negative traits within you, and you will hasten your transformation into a true tzadik… a holy man.”
Shep took a deep breath. Then, reaching out, he touched the Grim Reaper’s bony hand…
Battery Park
7:58 A.M.
Armed with his newborn son, his certainty, and a mangled steel prosthetic limb, Paolo Salvatore Minos reentered the frigid waters of New York Harbor. So focused was his mind that he no longer registered the cold. The water rose past his knees… still nothing happened.
Think of it as a baptism. He continued on up to his chest, the thirty-seven-degree surface mere inches from the baby’s blanket—
— sound and sky were suddenly blotted out as he stepped off the unseen concrete ledge and plunged underwater!
His heart pounded in terror as his left hand felt for the baby’s nose, his fingers pinching his son’s nostrils. He forced a panicked stride—
— his left foot relocating the perch. Using the steel arm as a crutch, he regained his balance and headed back up the ramp to save his child. But as his head cleared the surface, and he released the infant’s nose, he saw that he was not standing on the concrete boat ramp; he was standing on a hunk of ice!
The harbor had not parted; instead, it was progressively freezing all around him, at least some of it is — a ten-to-fifteen-foot-wide swath that appeared to be stretching southwest across New York Harbor.
He exhaled a frozen breath, his body trembling, tears pouring from his swollen red eyes. Turning back to shore, he was met by his teary-eyed wife, who gathered the crying infant in her arms, wrapping him in a dry blanket. “Paolo… how?”
“Certainty.”
David and Pankaj looked at one another, unsure of what to do.
The Tibetan monk gripped them both by the elbow, jerking them back into the moment. “Do not analyze the manifestation; use it to get everyone off the island!”
“Take Gavi, I’ll get the others!” David sprinted back to the school bus to awaken the children while Pankaj and Manisha helped Dawn and Gavi climb onto the edge of the ice floe, which bobbed yet managed to maintain its buoyancy.
The children hurried off the school bus, racing to the water’s edge, as the three helicopters crossed the Hudson a mile to the north.
“Let’s go, let’s go, everyone move! We have to hurry!”
David and Marquis Jackson-Horne passed the children to Pankaj and Manisha, everyone holding hands, forming a line behind Paolo and Francesca, who quickly led the exodus across the harbor. The middle schoolers and former sex slaves helped the younger children, hustling them across the slippery surface. David climbed onto the floe, rejoining his daughter.
The Elder stopped Marquis. “Choose the course for the rest of your days now.”
His little sister nodded.
Reaching into his waistband, the gang leader removed the 9mm and tossed the gun into the harbor. He followed his sister onto the ice.
The Elder climbed after him, bringing up the rear.
Sheridan Ernstmeyer waited until the thirty-six men, women, infant, and children were a good thirty yards offshore before she convinced herself to follow, gingerly stepping onto the frozen surface. “This is crazy.”
Ahead, Paolo and Francesca slid their feet along the slippery opaque surface as if skating. Liberty Island was less than a quarter mile ahead, the Statue momentarily disappearing from view behind a white mist that formed around the frozen path, concealing the exodus from Manhattan — the frigid fog serving to obliterate their heat signatures from the Reaper drones’ thermal sensors. Paolo focused on the advancing ice floe as it continued to form and harden several yards ahead of him, even as he registered a sudden bone-deep chill that raced down his spine, causing him to shiver.
Glancing to his right, he saw the dark form appear out of the haze, standing along the path like a sentry.
The hooded figure was cloaked in black, the scythe held within the bony grip of the being’s left hand. The Angel of Death was standing on the edge of the newly formed ice, signaling for them to advance.
Averting his gaze, Paolo led his procession past Death, gripping the prosthetic arm even tighter. “Keep moving, keep your eyes on the path! Look at nothing else.”
Ignoring the warning, Dawn looked up at the Grim Reaper and smiled. “Thank you, Patrick.”
David Kantor’s eyes widened. The Elder swept the former Army medic and his teenage daughter along, restricting his own gaze, though he sensed the supernal being’s weighty presence.
Sheridan Ernstmeyer did not see the Grim Reaper until she was almost upon it. “What the hell are you supposed to be?”
The Angel of Death grinned—
— as the ice beneath the female assassin’s feet cracked open, and she plunged feet first into the unforgiving depths of the Hudson River.
Governor’s Island
8:01 A.M.
Her legs were moving, but she could not feel them, the numbness of fear making her trek across the compound feel like an out-of-body experience. The two guards half carried, half dragged her past the courtyard and out a small gate in the fortress wall.
Leigh Nelson stared at the fog-enshrouded harbor, her limbs trembling uncontrollably. She thought of her husband and children. She prayed they would remain safe from the pandemic.
The guard on her left placed the gun to the back of her skull—
— and collapsed… dead. The second man’s eyes bulged out of their sockets in terror, then he, too, joined his comrade in death.
Leigh looked around, giddy with relief—
— her legs buckling, her mind taken aback by the tall figure in the hooded cloak, his eye sockets aflutter with three pairs of seeing eyes. Floundering on all fours along the frozen ground, she looked up, terrified. “Please… don’t… hurt… me.”
The Reaper spoke, his voice a familiar rasp. “I have a basic rule: I never take a good soul after Wednesday.”
“Shep?” Leigh Nelson’s eyes rolled up into her head as she fainted.
* * *
High over Manhattan, the three military helicopters reached their designated drop zones. Praying for forgiveness, the distraught pilots released their payloads…
VA Hospital
8:02 A.M.
The corridors, rendered powerless, were vacated and dark. The interior was autumn cold, disrupted by an occasional chorus of coughs and moans coming from wards harboring the forgotten. Shown respect in words but never compensated for their sacrifice, the veteran
s of foreign wars remained yesterday’s problem — a burden to society, like the crazy uncle who never received an invitation to the wedding or mourners at his funeral. Dealing with amputees and cancer-ridden returning soldiers was a depressing reality to the “patriotic masses” and remained a very low priority for the members of Congress, who receive greater “fulfillment” by funding a new weapon of mass destruction than by cleaning up the “mess” left over from their two ongoing wars.
Of course, those who made it their life’s work to bring light into a wounded veteran’s life know different. And yet Scythe had chased even these stalwarts of spirituality away.
Having emptied the hospital of its staff, the plague had stalked the antiseptic halls like a hungry wolf. Desperate to feed, it had acquired new life when a fleeing member of the maintenance crew had failed to secure the vacuum seal on the doors leading into the VA’s wards, summoning the beast to the banquet.
Open wounds and immobilized victims. Fresh meat lined up like sausages.
Twelve hours later, there was nothing left but incubators of death.
* * *
The life sign resonated like a flower blooming on a desert pampa, its isolated bubble energized by a self-contained battery pack. The newborn, an auburn-haired girl less than twenty-four hours old, slept peacefully under the watchful eye of her mother.
Mary Louise Klipot stared at her daughter, yearning to hold her… to give her the love and affection that she was denied by her own parent. She looked up as a dark silhouette reflected off the neonatal intensive care unit’s Plexiglas incubator. “Go away, Death. You’re not stealing my baby. Santa Muerte protects her.”
The Grim Reaper slammed the wooden handle of his scythe upon the tile floor, the sledgehammer-like impact opening an eight-inch fissure that divided the room in half.
“What is it you want? Not my child!”
“You must answer for the ten thousand infants your actions stole this day. You shall reap the pain you’ve sown through all eternity, and your child shall be part of the harvest.”
“No!” She threw herself over the incubator, begging for mercy. “Please don’t compound my sins by stealing another innocent life! God, I know you are out there… please forgive me… have mercy on my daughter’s soul.”
The Reaper stared at the innocent newborn. “Renounce Santa Muerte, and I shall spare your child.”
Mary looked up as a brilliant white light filled the city outside her room—
“I renounce her!”
— the intense heat melting the scream from her larynx, liquefying the flesh from her bones.
* * *
Paolo and Francesca gingerly stepped off the ice and onto the pier at Liberty Island. The teens and children ran past them, everyone hurrying up a paved sidewalk leading to the Statue of Liberty.
David Kantor kicked open the sealed doors at the base of the monolith, and they entered the pedestal’s observation level—
— as a brilliant white burst of heat ignited to the northeast like an expanding bolt of lightning.
Governor’s Island
8:12 A.M.
President Eric Kogelo opened his eyes. The pain that had wracked his head and internal organs over the last six hours had ceased, the fever gone.
He stole a prolonged moment in bed, enjoying the sheer joy of simply feeling well again, until an overwhelming sense of dread forced him into action. He sat up, disoriented and still a bit weak, surprised to find himself alone in the isolation room, the door bolted from the inside.
A sudden jolt of icy fear sent the president scrambling over the side of the bed.
The gaunt figure in the ragged hooded robe was standing in the corner of the room, watching him through eye sockets flitting with hundreds of tiny pupils. The being’s scythe, held upright, dripped blood from the curvature of its olive green blade.
The skeleton animated, approaching the foot of his bed.
“Help! Somebody get in here!”
A burst of frigid air emanated from the Reaper’s mouth as the ancient skull spoke. “There is no one here to help you. The ark your people built to isolate your failed leaders has been breached. Plague has taken every living soul on this island, save one.”
“Oh… God.” The president gasped to catch his breath, then gathered himself and stood in defiance of his impending death. “Just tell me one thing before you take me… will humanity perish as a result of our stupidity?”
“That remains to be seen.”
“Will my death serve a greater purpose?”
“No. But your life can still bring Light to the world.”
Kogelo’s skin tingled with adrenaline. “You’re sparing me?”
“You are a righteous man born in a time of greed and corruption, tasked by the will of the masses to bring peace. You have not gone far enough. You have struck deals with the dark forces and been manipulated in the process. To unveil the Light, you must end war. To end hatred, you must make peace with your enemies.”
“It’s not that easy. Ending two wars… there were loose ends in Iraq. Afghanistan is complex, we’re dealing with Pakistan. There are issues… we’re making progress. I could set a new timetable—”
“Should ten more innocents perish in Iraq, the eleventh shall be your wife.”
“What?”
“Should ten more innocents perish in Afghanistan, the eleventh shall be your child. This is my timetable.”
Kogelo collapsed to his knees. His throat constricted. “Please don’t do this. Take my life, I don’t care. Not my wife and daughter. I beg of you.”
“Cause and effect. You hold the power over life and death. Reap what you sow.”
Fueled by desperation, the president stole courage. “I will end the war. But there are enemies about… entities who prefer the darkness. How do I bring peace when all they want is war?”
“For those who seek to harm others, Judgment Day has arrived. This is my covenant to you.”
The Grim Reaper extended its skeletal right hand—
— the bony appendage instantaneously wrapping with blood vessels and nerves, tendons and muscles, all sealed within a layer of warm Caucasian flesh.
For a brief second, Eric Kogelo swooned, then he willed himself to shake the offered hand, gazing up into the face of its owner.
The man who looked back at him was in his thirties, bearing Jim Morrison features, his long brown hair matching his eyes. The dog tags around his neck identified him as a US soldier. Kogelo squinted to read the inscription. Sgt. Patrick Ryan Shepherd…
Shep pulled back, releasing the president’s hand… and his own humanity—
— casting his soul to the underworld.
"Greatness is not what you have achieved
but what you have overcome.”
— Eliyahu Jian
“Are you going to get any better or is this it?”
— Earl Weaver, Baltimore Orioles manager, to the home plate umpire.
Lost Diary: Guy de Chauliac
The following entry has been excerpted from a recently discovered unpublished memoir, written by surgeon Guy de Chauliac during the Great Plague: 1346–1348.(translated from its original French)
Diary Entry: September 13, 1348
(recorded in Avignon, France)
Time has passed. So much has happened, and yet I am at a loss to account for everything. Perhaps that is best.
When last I recorded an entry, I was worse than dead… a hapless soul, drifting in and out of torturous pain. In my delirium, I prayed to my Maker to take me.
Death finally paid its visit one wretched night in May.
My confines were stifling, my fever refusing me a moment’s respite. Perhaps it was an incessant blood-soaked cough, perhaps divine intervention, but at some juncture I opened my eyes to the night. At that moment, the cloaked figure emerged from the shadows of my bedroom, his ragged garb blending with the darkness. The candlelight flickered in his presence, its orange glow revealing a scarred skull ti
nged brown with age, as if the bone had been left to rot in a pond. Or, by its overwhelming stench, perhaps a cesspool.
The room cooled noticeably as he spoke, his French twisting in an Asian accent. “I was once like you, a slave of the flesh, born in a time of greed and corruption. In my early years I bore witness to unaccountable bloodshed delivered by my own father’s blade, and many a man suffered by my family’s rule. But I turned away from the violence following my first battle as Emperor in order to pursue the mysticism of the spiritual realm. Instead of war, I waged peace, and in doing so, I changed our sworn enemies into allies, bringing prosperity to our entire region. But the knowledge I sought eluded me. And in my final hour, I was visited by Death, and he, too, offered me what I now offer you — the secrets of creation… the path to immortality. Agree to my terms by your own free will, and I shall extend your days in this world, and the knowledge of the ages that abandoned me shall be yours, bringing joy to the rest of your days… and beyond.”
I sat up in my deathbed, my mind waging a war with my own sanity. “And if I accept your offer… what then? What is to be my end of this covenant?”
“When the natural end of your days transpires, and you have taken your final breath, you shall relieve me of my burden as the Reaper of Souls. Complete this spiritual task, and you shall be forgiven all your earthly sins and be guaranteed a place in Heaven’s endless fulfillment.”
“And how many days,” I asked, “must I wander the Earth as Death?”
“Time is not measured in the spiritual realm, monsieur. But fear not, for a worthy soul, tarnished by his own past deeds, even now awaits his next rebirth. Together with his soul mate, they shall relieve you of your future burden as you shall relieve me of mine.”
He left me then, this Angel of Death, to ponder whether his visit was real or a delusion brought on by the fever. But soon after, my symptoms improved, and by summer’s end, I was my old self.
But while I was gone, how the world had changed.
