God School

by Scott Kinkade

  “So it’s like that expression we had in the previous universe: ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’,” Aphrodite said.

  “We are most certainly not friends,” Shinigami said. “But in this one instance, we are not enemies.”

  “So you’re gonna help us stop Belial, and then we can go back to fighting one another,” Atlas said, summing-up the situation.

  “Correct. Make no mistake; Zero Grade will achieve its goals, one way or another. This is merely a temporary truce which will not last to tomorrow.”

  Brandon merely said, “Whatever. Let’s just get to the TV station and stop Belial.”

  * * *

  “Six more Nephilim have fallen,” Maya remarked stoically.

  Belial couldn’t help but laugh. Everything was going exactly as he had planned. Even the deaths of the heavenly giants were part of his plan. Then again, it didn’t matter who died, as long as more blood was spilled.

  “Look at those dumbass wannabe gods carving a trail of blood right to my front door. They have no idea they’re playing right into my hands.”

  Her expression betrayed no emotions. She could have been thinking about hamburgers for all anyone could tell. “How many more are needed?”

  “Oh, I’d say a dozen or so more bodies. Once enough blood has been shed, I’ll use the key again.”

  Maya went back to being quiet. Even Belial didn’t know what she was thinking, and though he hated to admit it, that bothered him. He was, after all, her lord and master. He should have known what went through her head after all these years. Oh, well. It’s not like I need her thoughts. I just need her blind obedience, and that’s something I will always have.

  * * *

  Ev and Jaysin ran like hell up the street, away from their intended target of the TV station. They had all arrived in Stiftung together, but quickly caught the attention of the Nephilim. In fact, it seemed as if the giants had been waiting for them.

  They were currently in the industrial district in the southeast corner of the city. Factories and processing plants flew by as they ran from the Nephilim that was currently chasing them. It was gaining speed and would be on them in a few moments. Worse, they didn’t have the luxury of a bus to help them escape this time.

  They suddenly rounded a corner into an alley between warehouses. “Now!” Ev yelled.

  As the Nephilim charged in after them, Daryn leapt out of the shadows with his giant hammer. He struck the giant in the knee with it, sending the behemoth into the clutches of gravity. As it lay on the ground, he massaged its injured leg and cursed at them in a language they had never heard before.

  CiCi, who had also been waiting in the shadows, charged in and slashed the Nephilim’s neck with her chakrams. An enormous amount of blood spilled forth.

  The four students quickly exited the alley and got back on course for the TV station, unsure if the giant was still alive.

  As they ran, Jaysin said, “CiCi, you’re being awfully quiet. Anything wrong?”

  “It’s just…we may have killed that thing. I’ve never killed anything before, especially something that looks human. I feel so…dirty.”

  “We did what we had to do,” Daryn said. “This is war. And in war, people—or whatever—die. That’s just the way it is.”

  “You seem to know a lot about this sort of thing,” Ev said.

  “I come from a military family. My father’s a general with the Tru Army down south. Growing up, he taught me a lot about fighting.”

  “That experience is already coming in handy. After all, it was your idea to set the trap for the Nephilim,” Jaysin said.

  “I just hope we don’t run into any more,” Ev said. “The more we get bogged down fighting them, the less chance of us getting to the TV station on time.”

  “I just hope Maya’s still there,” CiCi said.

  They could have gotten to their destination much faster if they could have flown. However, by the time they reached Stiftung, they were mentally exhausted from the effort required to stay in the air, and they felt they could only continue on foot.

  Eventually they got within sight of the TV-SDS building. Basically a narrow rise of windows, it was bigger than any other building in Stiftung by a wide margin. They had to crane their necks up in order to see the top.

  “How are we supposed to find Maya in that place?” Ev said.

  “I guess we’ll just have to ask someone,” CiCi suggested.

  Suddenly a towering shadow appeared in front of them. They turned around; a Nephilim had somehow snuck up behind them. This one was a dark-skinned female with long black hair.

  “Shit!” Daryn said. They had been taken by surprise. Obviously this was an embarrassment to the strategy-minded ginger.

  The giant opened her mouth. A bright light appeared within. “Hit the deck!” Jaysin yelled.

  They scattered just as searing orange flames erupted from the Nephilim’s maw. It melted the pavement where they had been standing. “They can breathe fire?” CiCi asked, astonished.

  “I take it that’s a rhetorical question?” Ev ran behind the giant to hide from her all-too-real flame breath. The behemoth spun around, spewing fire in a 360-degree arc.

  “Maybe this thing’s some sort of specialized Nephilim,” Jaysin speculated.

  “Whatever it is, we have to take it down before we can enter the TV station,” Ev said.

  “Just go for the legs again,” Daryn said.

  They summoned their weapons and tried to get within striking distance of the giant. However, she had a seemingly endless supply of fire at her disposal, and they couldn’t get close. Meanwhile, the buildings and streets around them were melting down due to the heat. The gods-in-training could take it, but they feared direct exposure to the flames could prove fatal.

  They ran behind a nearby building to regroup. “What do we do?” Ev said. “We can’t get close to that monster as long as it keeps spitting out flames.”

  Daryn pondered this for a moment. “We need some sort of shield.”

  “But that Nephilim will melt anything we put in front of it,” CiCi said.

  “We need something that won’t melt,” Daryn said. “At least, not right away.” He looked up at the sign in front of the building they stood next to. “Bethos be damned! I must be a yurring idiot. Of course!”

  The sign read, “Erste Bank der Stiftung.” First Bank of Stiftung. It all made sense now. “If it’s a bank, it must have a vault,” Ev realized.

  “We can use the vault door to shield ourselves from the Nephilim’s fire breath,” CiCi said.

  “How do we know it’ll work?” Jaysin asked nervously.

  Daryn shrugged. “We don’t. But right now, it’s our only option.”

  They ran into the bank, just barely dodging a fresh stream of napalm—or whatever the Nephilim was using for fuel. The giant had found them and was now in hot pursuit.

  The students hurried past the now-abandoned desks of the bank employees and headed straight for the vault which was thankfully open. The staff must have evacuated posthaste if they didn’t shut it.

  They each took hold of the thick, incredibly heavy door. “It will probably take all of us to rip this thing off. On the count of three. One…two…three!” They channeled their god-energy into their arms and pulled with all their might. At first the door wouldn’t budge, but as they applied progressively more strength, it began to creak, loudly protesting their attempt to make it do something it wasn’t designed to do.

  Meanwhile, at the entrance, the Nephilim had started smashing her way in. The doors hadn’t been constructed to accommodate her massive size, so she was busy forcibly resizing it.

  After a supreme effort by the students, the vault door came off its gargantuan hinges. It hit the ground, cracking the tile. They maneuvered it in front of them.

  “Everyone understand the plan?” Ev asked. They nodded. “OK, here we go.”

  With the door in hand, they marched towards the entrance where the Nephilim had
now made a hole big enough for her to get through. When she realized they were coming with the vault door as a shield, she again spewed fire breath at them. The heat was almost unbearable, and the barrage slowed them down, but the door held.

  When they finally got within a few feet of the giant, Ev, Jaysin and Daryn angled the door upwards, giving CiCi enough room to get a shot at the target. She dropped to her belly and threw her chakrams at the Nephilim’s legs. They didn’t cut all the way through, but they did take a good chunk out of them. The giant cried out in pain and fell backwards into the street. The flames stopped.

  Without wasting any more time, they slammed the door onto her head with all the force they could muster. There was a satisfying crunch, and the Nephilim ceased to be a threat.

  * * *

  “Ouch! That’s gotta hurt.” Belial continued to survey the battles being fought in the city using his god-sense from atop the TV-SDS building. “Right in the face! Maya, are you seeing this?”

  Maya, in fact, was lying down with her back on the roof, soaking up the sun. “Not really.”

  “You should check it out. After all, it’s your former friends.”

  “What?” She leapt to her feet and ran over to stand beside him. “Why would they come back here? I thought they’d get the message when I put arrows in them.”

  Shrugging, Belial said, “Told you you should have killed them.”

  “You said I didn’t have to! And...” She looked away. “They didn’t deserve it. They’re good people.”

  “Just so you know, if they become a problem, we may have to ice them. For now, though, they’re doing us a favor in shedding blood for us. Only a few more bodies to drop, and we can proceed to phase two.”

  She became silent again as she pondered having to face her former friends in battle. Of course, Belial was more than willing to eliminate them on her behalf.

  * * *

  The students entered the main lobby of the TV-SDS building. They saw a sign on the far wall that read “Otto Ernst Denkmal Gebäude.” Otto Ernst Memorial Building.

  “Who’s Otto Ernst?” Ev said.

  The others just shrugged. “Probably some important Stiftung guy,” CiCi replied, stating the obvious.

  The lobby was empty except for a lone security guard who approached them with his weapon drawn. “Hold it right there! Who are you?”

  In response, Daryn used his god-speed to rush in and knock the guy out. “We don’t have time for this.”

  According to a business registry on the wall, the TV station was located on the 77nd floor. They entered the elevator and hit the button.

  “What are we going to do if we run into Belial?” Jaysin asked. Ev hadn’t thought about it.

  “We kick his ass,” Daryn said.

  “But he’s a god,” CiCi pointed out.

  “Doesn’t matter. He’s the enemy. We defeat him by any means necessary. And in case you hadn’t noticed, we’re pretty capable ourselves.”

  “Look on the bright side,” Ev said. “There’s only one of him and four of us.”

  “Unless Maya decides to get involved, an event I consider to be highly likely,” Daryn said.

  “Let me deal with her,” was all Ev could say. He didn’t have a plan in mind.

  When they got off on the 77nd floor, they were shocked by the insanity that greeted them. Instead of the fluorescent lighting they expected, the place was lit by candles. Drapes had been placed over the windows, blocking out most of the sun’s rays. All over the studio people had ripped the sleeves off their shirts and tied them around their heads like some sort of ceremonial attire.

  Nielz Goddard and Professor Mankamp were once again behind the desk. The cameras continued to roll as if nothing had gone wrong. “Welcome back to the Belial Worship Hour, the home for the worship of our new lord and master, Belial. For those just joining us, this may all look strange to you and you may think what you are seeing is very wrong. Rest assured, nothing could be farther from the case. To sum up the events of the day, the one true god has revealed himself to us. His name is Belial, and he desires nothing more than our love and eternal devotion. He has promised to restore peace to Stiftung if only we give ourselves to him body and soul. But don’t take my word for it. Professor?”

  The camera cut to Mankamp. “Nielz, originally I claimed this was to be a day of judgment. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Belial isn’t here to judge us. He’s here to love us. But only if we love him back.” He held up his Bibliographa. “You might think I wasted my life reading this book. But I did not. You see, I was simply reading it the wrong way, misinterpreting everything in it. The Bibliographa wasn’t trying to espouse the glory of Bethos. It was written to warn us to warn us about him. Lord Belial has informed us that, in fact, Bethos is actually the Antibelial. Belial’s disciples wrote the book to show us what kind of fraud Bethos really is. Yes, there is a Bethos, but he’s a snake masquerading as a god. As a matter of fact, there is a whole pantheon of impostor gods trying to fool mankind into worshipping then. But never fear; we of the First Church of Belial will continue to spread His word of love and understanding, starting with the destruction of any who refuse to bow down and worship him.”

  The students moved to the desk. “Hey!” Ev said to Goddard and Mankamp. “Where is Maya Brünhart?”

  The two cultists exchanged bewildered glances. “Who?” Goddard said.

  “Maya Brünhart. She’s being manipulated by Belial into doing his bidding.”

  “Oh!” Mankamp said. “You mean the First Disciple. She is convening with the Lord on the roof.”

  Ev nodded with satisfaction. “Great! Then that’s where we’re going.” On the way in, they had spied a fire escape that led to the roof.

  Without warning, though, they were quickly surrounded by the oddly-dressed TV crew. “No one is allowed to gaze upon the Lord without his express permission,” Goddard said.

  The cultists seized them. “Let us go, nutbags!” Ev yelled.

  “The sinners must be punished!” Mankamp said.

  “We have to get these guys off us!” CiCi said.

  From somewhere in the throng, Jaysin said, “We could do it easily if we used our powers.”

  “But we might kill them,” Ev cautioned.

  “They’ve aligned themselves with the enemy,” Daryn said. “They’ve made their choice.”

  To Ev, that wasn’t a good enough reason to take human life. “They’re just scared. They don’t know what to do.”

  “So what? They’re standing in our way, and we need to get rid of them.”

  “At least let me try reasoning with them.”

  Daryn let out an exasperated sigh. “Fine. But make it quick.”

  Ev cried out, “Everyone, listen to me. We are, in fact, disciples of Belial.”

  The cultists loosened their grips slightly. “You are?” Goddard said.

  “Yes. We have important things we need to report to him, and you’re stopping us from doing that.”

  That seemed to sway many of them for a moment. Unfortunately, Mankamp then said, “Not so fast! Remember what the Lord said to us. He said his enemies would be coming to oppose him. These kids are clearly those enemies.”

  The throng resumed shouting angrily at the students. Now they added shoving and hair pulling to the mix. “Ev, we tried it your way, and it didn’t work. Face it—we’ll have to use force here,” Daryn said.

  Ev knew he was right. These people weren’t going to listen to reason, not with a violent, narcissistic god that needed pleasing. That only left one option. “All right, all right. On the count of three. But try and be gentle, OK?” Jaysin, CiCi and Daryn agreed. “One…two…three!”

  Using as much energy as they needed but no more than that, they threw the humans off of them. The ones on the outer edge of the throng went sailing into the walls, but it didn’t look like there were any serious injuries. Most of the TV crew simply fell to the floor.

  “Stop the heretics!” Goddard yelled. Fortun
ately, his brethren seemed to be having second thoughts. They got up and backed away from the students they had so seriously underestimated.

  “We have made a grave mistake,” Mankamp said. “The enemies of a god aren’t mere mortals. We are powerless to stop these four.”

  Goddard was a little bolder than his compatriot. “But if we don’t try—”

  “We did try. It’s futile.”

  Goddard hung his head in shame, staring at the floor. After a few moments he turned to face Ev. “If you confront Lord Belial, will you tell him we did our best to stop you?”

  Ev nodded. “Don’t worry; we’ll tell him you put up a hell of a fight.” Goddard looked satisfied by this. He had the vague beginnings of a smile on his face.

  “Now let’s get to the roof,” Daryn said.

  Chapter XV

  The Divine Protector Academy/Zero Grade team got ambushed again a block from the TV station. This time it was a group of ten Nephilim, all of whom had control over the four elements of earth, wind, fire and water. Surrounded, it was all the gods could do to dodge their attacks.

  One of them bore down on Freya. “Look out!” Shinigami said, shoving her out of the way. The Nephilim unleashed his fire breath on them. It was a wider arc than Shinigami had expected, and Freya remained in the line of literal fire. Shinigami jumped in front of her and shielded her from the blast. Despite everything, he was still a god of death, and it was not yet Freya’s time to die. Perhaps his years in Zero Grade had made him forget, but at this moment he knew his duty.

  “Shinigami!” she shouted.

  In spite of the unimaginable pain, he stood a resolute wall before her. His clothing was incinerated, followed by his outer layers of flesh and then internal organs, until finally, only a skeleton was left standing.

  “Bastard!” Hera charged at the giant and used her blades to take his head.

  Another Nephilim charged in and brought its enormous foot down upon her. She raised her weapons and skewered it. Nevertheless, he continued to force it down upon her, inch by inch, through the cold steel.