by A. L. Mengel
His skin started to regenerate.
Slowly, bit by bit, as the light moved over his body, the musculature returned as the cells regrew and multiplied; as the light wrapped around his hands, and quickly moved to another area, Delia saw movement. His hand balled into a fist, flexed, and released.
She looked at his eyes. They were still closed, but she could see his eyes moving beneath the healing eyelids.
A plume of light filtered down as Delia raised Antoine higher and offered him to the heavens.
“He was the true War Angel,” Tramos said.
*****
The clouds parted as Delia looked downwards.
The planet below looked bright; green and blue; so fresh, so very new. It as if she were floating in the celestial heaven, but not in the dark vastness of space. For there was only light. And color. And song.
As she listened, she felt she could hear the babbling of a stream.
And it did not matter how far she was from the surface – for as soon as she looked towards a location, it zoomed up to her, instantly painting a crystal clear image: bright, colorful tropical foliage. Oranges, pinks, yellows, smattered amongst brilliant green plants and towering trees. After standing amidst a tropical forest, she heard a familiar voice.
“Is this the new planet? The new age?”
She turned around and her mouth dropped open. Her eyes welled with tears.
“Antoine!” she said.
He was smiling a brilliant smile, he was vivid, clean, youthful and vibrant.
He stood in a clearing in the forest and looked up towards the sky. She looked down and saw his face, his eyes as open and wide as they had ever been. The days back in Lyon, Badulla and Miami seemed a distant memory.
“It’s a new Earth,” she said. “Do you see? A physical world. The sense of familiarity is still there.”
Antoine nodded. “Yes…yes I see. So fresh. Uncontaminated.”
“But here…everyone is immortal. And you will live in complete harmony and happiness throughout eternity.”
“There will be no war?”
She shook her head.
“And no famine?”
“No. Everything will be perfect.”
“I won’t need sleep?”
“No. Unless you want to sleep, then, of course, you can.”
Antoine sat at the edge of the brook and looked at the water.
It was crystal clear, bubbling.
And after a few minutes, he saw a colorful school of fish swim by. He raised his arm up.
It was the same familiar arm that he always remembered from before. But it was somehow different.
Glowing
Yet still physical.
“This is your new physical body,” she said. “You are a human. You are not a monster. You are not a demon. And you don’t have to run from them anymore. But you are still immortal. You will always be immortal, Antoine, in the light, and in great love. A physical immortal who will never, ever die.”
THE END
9/14/16 10:16pm ---- 10/14/16 1:17pm final correction run.
VIII
PURGATORY
ASHES: BOOK ONE
Present Day.
Antoine gathered his equipment - a shovel, brown tarp, pickaxe (in order to pry open the casket) and a flame oil lantern; carefully and quietly he entered the graveyard through a layer of swirling, early morning mist - the type of white cloudy mist that would leave a layer of dewdrops on the earth like a cool, wet blanket. The plot Antoine headed toward, located in the center of the graveyard, housed Darius’ casket, encased for two centuries now in layers of earth - sealed by six nails, and placed in a thick cement liner with a crest of a lion on the marble-topped cover.
It was Antoine who put Darius here two centuries ago, and Darius has been in this graveyard ever since. In this cemetery and dead, yes – Darius was dead. But Darius had been dead before Antoine had ever put him there. And when the coffin was nailed shut, when the darkness enveloped satin interior, there was more of changing a state of existence.
It was Darius who had heard the nails being pounded into the edges of the casket; he had felt the shaking as the coffin was picked up – most likely with ropes tied below the bottom, but he couldn’t know for sure – and lowered into the deep, dark grave. He had felt the sides of the coffin scraping the cold, hard earthen walls. The dirt fell onto the lid of the casket – each shovel of earth inundating the coffin further with a deep clump.
Blackness.
The sounds from above now seemed more distant. The coffin had been buried. Darius knew that. He even felt the weight of the dirt above him, as if the entire casket would fall on top of him in a cascade of splintering wood and falling sand. But it held. The coffin was holding fast against the pressures of the earth, and would prove to be his holding place for…how long?
The stagnancy of the air inside the small confines grew more insistent, as the heat overtook the darkness and caused him to cough and choke on the thickness of the air that was so quickly fading. But Darius knew. He knew that no matter how fast the air would dissipate, no matter how faint the sounds of the earth above would be – no matter how dead he would be – he would be just that.
Dead.
But death is just a state of existence. And Darius knew - all too well - that his death had been many, many years ago – and not so recently in his foyer. His death had been much earlier when he was a very young man passing into his newfound immortality. Not at the hands of Antoine.
As time passed, he became more aware of his surroundings, although all he saw was total darkness. He could feel the softness and smoothness of the satin liner, the pillow at the head of the casket - which grew hard and cold over time and dusty with mold.
Above where he lay, Darius on occasion could hear the faint, muffled voices above the cold ground expressing words of condolence, the grating of a casket being lowered into a freshly dug grave, or the pitter patter of children’s feet; ceremonial instruments would play from time to time, signifying the passing of a loved one. All this, he experienced, lying in the cold darkness of the casket, as time passed by above.
Time passed with an eternal slowness until Antoine returned.
At one point, Darius knew the time had come. He continued to lie in the casket as he felt and heard snippets of the outside world over time, but there was one quiet day when he heard those familiar footsteps; the methodic, determined stomps coming closer and closer to his unmarked resting place. The footsteps stopped, just above. Darius could sense it. He knew who it was. No one knew of his grave except one soul. Only one.
Antoine.
*~*~*
Topside, Antoine reached the grave.
It was the only unmarked grave in the entire cemetery. Located under a tree, the plot was not originally used as the caretaker had been afraid that the roots of the massive tree would grow to a size so immense as to unearth a coffin. But that did not deter Antoine. It had been the perfect resting place for Darius.
It had been Antoine who dug the grave, in the middle of the night, so many days ago. But even then, as he had been digging, Antoine knew that a day of resurrection would come. Even as Darius burned into ash, even as Antoine drove a dagger directly through his steadfast heart, he knew that the day would come that he would need to channel Darius once again and ask for his assistance...no, expect his assistance…and receive the help and guidance from the one who created him so long ago.
And now, deep in the night, Antoine set down his tools. The tools were just as dull and rusted as they had been the night he buried Darius. He paused to the left of the grave, and looked to the sky. Night held steady.
I have come for you, Darius. Yes, the day has finally come. The day has finally come when I need you, I need you by my side. But please, please don’t come to me with malice or ill-will for putting you here. I love you, Darius.
The moon burned brightly and cast a blue glow on the headstones, illuminating them like tiny, square lights a dark, dank sea
. Opening the brown cloth bag, Antoine grabbed the shovel, trying so desperately to pull the tools from the bag in silence. His head snapped towards the direction of the woods as the shovel clanked against the other tools in the bag.
But he rose to his feet and pointed the shovel towards the earth, shifting his weight and breaking the ground. He stopped for a moment as he tossed the first bit of dirt to the side.
Darius…will you ever forgive me?
And then he dug - he dug and dug, hoisting shovelfuls of earth, one after the next, to the right of the grave, next to the bag of tools. The digging continued for quite some time, as Antoine broke through roots and clay. Darius had been deeply buried.
Bury them deep, Darius had once told him. If you are extinguishing an immortal, bury them deep.
Antoine finally felt the scraping of the grave liner, the impenetrable cement beneath the thin layer of caked dirt and sand. A black snake slithered from the side of the earth, slinking across the grave liner and re-entered on the other side. Antoine stood above the grave for a moment and looked down at the liner, and then scanned the area around him. The sky began to show the faintest hints of light blue, signifying that he needed to hurry, hoist the casket out of the grave, and head to safety.
The swirling mist was subsiding as the night was ever so gradually waning and giving to the very first peeks of the eastern sun, which slowly yet surely revealing itself way on the far horizon. Antoine had been digging for the better part of the night. He estimated that he had another hour or so of semi-darkness, and then the sunrise would occur. The sky was surely awakening.
Antoine jumped down into the grave and stood on the liner. He just was able to see over the threshold of the earth, and reached out and grabbed the pickaxe. He swung it down into the hole and smacked it against the lock on the grave liner, with a loud clank! which reverberated against the quiet early morning silence. But the one assault had not been enough to break the seal of death. He had to break the silence and take another risk of possibly being discovered by a mortal, and again clank!
With the second rap, the lock gave. It amazed Antoine that it had still held so prominently after so many years, and despite it being covered in rust, dirt and grime.
Antoine tossed the pickaxe out of the grave, and winced as it clanked against the other tools in the bag. It was time to open the casket.
The grave liner was caked with dirt and mud, the insignia was rusted out, but overall it was still intact (as was the lock) and it held together like an expensive grave liner would be expected to. As Antoine shifted the lid with a deep grating and rumbling, the small, wooden casket slowly came into view – rotted from years of decay. And there, beneath the six nails, beneath the wood and satin, would be Darius.
THE QUEST FOR IMMORTALITY: BOOK TWO
Stephen died on a Tuesday.
It was his destiny with death.
But still, he got his wish.
He didn’t die in a hospital connected to machines.
He was in his backyard in the bright warmth of the sunlight, surrounded by his family and friends, and, just as he had requested, at the moment he passed and his death was declared, a flock of white doves was released, flying upwards towards the sky. Stephen’s body lay on a large lounge chair, spread out and overlooking the expansive gardens that he had tended before his health had failed him.
Now that he was dead, the eyes that overlooked the yard saw nothing, but in essence, the presence of his body still took command of the gardens. And as the doves flew ever farther away, and spread out towards the blue heavens, there was a silence that fell over the small group on the terrace that sunny morning. As Stephen’s closest family members fell into each other’s arms in tears, not far from the lounge chair, Darius stopped and stared at his friend. He looked down at the frail arms, the sunken cheeks, and the sullen eyes.
He knew that Stephen had been ready for a long time.
For Stephen had been angry with the world since he contracted his disease, and ever since they had formed their friendship and fought together, he got another reason to live, to forage on, and to get just one more day in the world, even if the ending was inevitable.
*~*~*
The morning sun kissed the sky two days after Stephen died.
The warm rays touched the sidewalks and evaporated the morning dew, the orange fiery beams of light awakened the world, as the sky to the west gradually transformed from black, to blue, to pale to brilliant – and then to the growing shadows that ensued elongated; the warmth and the heat, the sweat and the caffeine.
The sun warmed the city during the midst of a wintertime cold front. It was a rare presence these days, and the citizens of Miami were out and about reveling in its warmth and hospitality, even treasuring the cooling shadows that each building formed as the sun rose farther into the sky. Some shoppers would find respite in the cool shadows, others sought the ocean and the beach. But there was one shadow that formed throughout the morning, somewhat separated from the others.
But it was there, and many didn’t take notice of what created the shadow until they didn’t want to face it.
It was the shadow of the Heavenly Slumber Funeral Home. It wasn’t terribly large, considering it was a one-story building. But it was imposing nonetheless. And the shadow covered cars as they passed by. The shadow successfully blocked the sun, and, when one were to look at the front doors, one might wonder if there were a permanent shadow.
Stephen’s body had arrived at Heavenly Slumber Funeral Home just before dawn from the Morgue. Ned McCracken was clutching the autopsy report in a manila folder in one hand, as he hovered over the body of Stephen Henry Drake. The report contained some hastily written notes, but what stood out to him was the cause of death, Pneumonia as a Complication of AIDS.
Ned McCracken grabbed a white coat, grabbed some rubber surgical gloves from the kit and placed them on each hand, paused and looked at Stephen’s face.
The man looked at peace.
Very smooth skin on his face, thin lips, and manicured eyebrows. The eyes were already closed, but Ned secured them anyway with white medical tape, by placing a strip across each eyelid. He picked some cotton from a jar on the counter next to the preparation table, and pulled it apart into wispy strips. He stopped a moment at the lips.
The man seemed to be smiling.
Was he?
Ned looked throughout the preparation room.
The pale green tiles were the same that they always were. The room felt very clinical. Like it could have been in a hospital. There was the cold and dusty tile on the floor, the heavy, steel door with the small window in the center, and the stark, steel countertops.
The chill was always there.
The striking smell of alcohol, mixed with the stench of rotting flesh, and the overpowering scent of formaldehyde.
It was always there.
Everyday.
And when he left each night, he carried the smell with him on his clothes.
The smell of death.
He couldn’t get away from it. It followed him everywhere. But he knew this was the life that was he was meant to live.
And then Ned looked down at the body again. At Stephen.
What did you do, my friend? To get something as devastating as AIDS?
But the man seemed to be at peace.
He longed not to disturb that peace, but he needed to fill the cheeks. They were sunken dramatically on both sides, to the point where the cheekbone was highly visible through the thin layer of flesh. This man was clearly dying for a long time.
Ned shook his head and paused for a moment. He took a deep breath and exhaled. Some of these cases were some of the most complex. AIDS, Cancer. They were all wasted away. And it was his job to make them look like they did before they got sick. So he fished for some gloves from the box on the counter, and started to pry open the lips.
Dead skin.
The cold, hard, uninviting flesh of the corpse. Tough, firm, cold.
It
was so difficult to manipulate, to form into something that wasn’t horrific.
He knew that he had to handle the face with care. For if he didn’t finish this task soon, the face would freeze in a state of surprise and that just wouldn’t do. The time to manipulate the skin and flesh and prep the body for viewing was very finite. And Ned knew that he couldn’t waste any time with this one. The corpse came in wasted away, and he had to fill the fill and get it ready for display.
That was the everyday task at Ned McCracken’s job.
As he stood over the body, bending down towards the face, he took great care in parting the lips, and the jaw, using both hands to pry each layer of lips and teeth away from each other, he placed a wad of cotton in the left, and then the right cheeks. He removed his hands and let the jaw close.
He stood back for a moment and looked down at Stephen.
Ned nodded for a moment, and reached down to adjust the chin. He stood back again and studied the corpse. His forehead wrinkled and he reached up and stroked his chin. “More to the right,” he said, and reached down again, pried open the jaw, and stuffed some more cotton on the right side of the mouth.
“There.”
He stood back to admire his work.
The cheeks looked noticeably fuller. The man now looked like he could have been sleeping. But there was a large, purple lesion at the base of his hairline above his right eye. Ned reached for his makeup kit, and searched for a foundation that would match Stephen’s skin tone.
It was pale, but he had a camouflage crème that would work. He searched through the plastic box and found a shade that might match Stephen’s skin tone. He knew that the family would be wanting to view their deceased loved one as if he were sleeping; sometimes, Ned achieved that goal. His mind started to wander as he started to apply the makeup to Stephen’s forehead.
