by Rex Jameson
Chapter 1
An Earthly Imprisonment
“So, what brings you to Nashville?”
“Lookin’ for the devil,” Michael said after downing another swig from a Yazoo pale ale.
Adrian, the bartender, leaned in close enough to whisper. “How will you be able to tell him from the rest of the room?”
“Horns, red body, the usual …”
“I would have remembered that kind of guy,” Adrian laughed as he sloshed a wet rag down on the polished wooden bar, picked up some left over pilsners, and wiped away the condensation rings. “But this is Music City, and we get people slinkin’ in from all over.”
Michael watched four males enter The End of the Line bar and recognized each of them immediately. His brother Lucifer and uncle Batarel cast sidelong glances at the TVs as they looked for four open seats, while his runt of a brother Sariel bumped into just about every woman at the bar, offering apologies and the promise of a drink to make up for it. Azazel, Lucifer’s bodyguard, looked directly at Michael, causing him to divert his gaze for a moment.
“Toss me another beer,” Michael called to the bartender.
“You got it.”
The demons wore leather jackets, t-shirts, and jeans, but their human disguises couldn’t fool Michael. Lucifer came so close to him that Michael could have run his hands over his brother’s stubbly brown hair, and Sariel came even closer as he managed to press a woman into Michael during his search for a number. A couple of the women pulled at Sariel’s long, wavy brown hair, but he made excuses and caught up with his brother.
Batarel’s shaved head and assorted facial scars attracted a lot of looks and even a few praises from drunken men for his service to their country. He smiled and nodded in return but followed closely behind Lucifer, as did Azazel, who was wearing a baseball cap and eyeing everyone around him warily.
The demons weren’t the only ones incognito. Michael knew that none of his family members would recognize him without using pattern magic. Jehovah had raised Michael from the Hall of Souls into the body of a forty-year-old human, so he looked nothing like he used to. But this was no ordinary body; it had all the strength of his old demon form, and he could feel the tendrils of his wings moving under the skin of his back.
He looked around at the many humans who drank and partied, unaware they were in the midst of a civil war—a conflict rooted in millions of years of disagreement, politics and strife between parents, siblings and cousins.
“The Apocalypse is almost here,” Lucifer said, draping his arm around Sariel and grinning from ear to ear. “Just one more year until we’re out of here.”
“Keep your voice down,” Batarel said, shaking his head.
“Yeah, Luke,” Sariel said, pointing down at a large belt buckle that said Everything’s bigger in Hell. “Subtlety, brother. Subtlety.”
Lucifer put Sariel in a headlock, gave him a noogie, and pulled him toward the back of the bar. “After 200,000 years of being trapped on this rock, I can’t help but be excited. We’ll finally be able to look our father in the face and tell him that we avenged his son’s death.”
Michael laughed. His brothers hadn’t avenged anyone—least of all him. Michael was alive and well, reincarnated through the Hall of Souls, and everything was going according to Jehovah’s plan.
Yet here his brothers were, once again, over confident in their abilities and mouthing off about their success in thwarting Jehovah. The last time they had bragged about besting him, Lucifer had inadvertently released all of the shadows of the Order Primal into Earth’s stratosphere. Of course, it was Jehovah who had the last laugh when 25,000 demons of the First Legion burned to dust when they tried to leave the atmosphere and hit that supernatural shadow barrier. And in the blink of an eye, Michael had been joined by the confused spirits of thousands of new recruits in the Hall of Souls.
He wondered if Lucifer would have that same bewildered, shattered look when he realized Jehovah had beaten him again. He imagined Sariel’s smirk vanishing when the assassin grasped that this armageddon the demons had launched would be the harbinger of Chaos’s doom. He chuckled at the thought of his brother sobering, but then he remembered that Sariel was a lost cause.
If his younger brother wasn’t plotting to kill someone for the Council, Sariel was almost assuredly drinking and taking liberties with the wives and daughters of important, dangerous demons in Alurabum. That had been his life for almost a million Chaos years before getting himself trapped on Earth. As royalty in Chaos, his antics had been tolerated. Since then, Michael had watched him cavort with the wives and daughters of unimportant, impotent humans instead. In truth, Sariel was as eternally corrupt and devoid of responsibility or righteousness as Jehovah was unerringly meticulous and tenacious.
Many biblical scholars have pointed out that the image and temperament of the devil had likely been borrowed from the Greek Bacchus, the god of wine and debauchery, in order to help with conversions from the Greek and Roman faiths. In a way, that is true, but the underlying truth was a bit stranger. Bacchus was directly based on Sariel’s time of drinking and debauchery amongst his more depraved outings with the Greeks.
So, the Christians were right that Bacchus/Pan was on the wrong side of Jehovah, but they were wrong that this was the devil, the ultimate target of their god, and not just a very irresponsible, demented demon who thought it was humorous to dress like a goat when he slept with married women. In their attempt to convert Greeks and Romans to the Christian faith via bringing low the God Bacchus, the humans had given Lucifer the ability to hide amongst them completely undetected. They expected pure, deformed evil based on a several thousand-year-old party costume. What they should have been looking for was a pampered, royal brat with a short hair cut who left destruction and death in his wake whenever he felt cornered or angry.
And just as no demon was as pampered and coddled as either of his brothers, no one was more brilliant and calculating than Jehovah. Soon, the other sons of Ostat would have another refresher course in humiliating inadequacy—lessons Michael knew only too well. But even as much as he resented the favor and prestige that Lucifer had always enjoyed as the Crown Prince, this was one time Michael didn’t want Jehovah to fully succeed. Chaos was still his home, even if he never planned to return.
Batarel caught him gawking, so Michael nursed his drink and pretended to look elsewhere. His scarred uncle motioned the others to a nearby table, and Lucifer shook off a couple of seating suggestions before pointing to a table at the far corner of the bar.
Between Lucifer’s group and Michael were a dozen patrons, all of whom were oblivious to the fact that four demons and an archangel were within feet of them. Along with these humans, trillions of creatures throughout the universe would be collateral damage when the apocalypse hit. As an immortal, he steeled himself to the losses as they all did. In a universe where a common supernova tended to destroy multiple solar systems, trillions of deaths were the norm.
“Doesn’t matter,” Michael said to himself. “They’ll be back again soon enough anyway.”
“What’s that?” Adrian asked.
“Was just talking about something on the TV.”
“Want me to turn it up?”
“No, that’s all right,” Michael said as he downed the last of his beer. “Just grab me another Yazoo when you get a chance.”
“On it,” the bartender said as he popped the top from a longneck and slid it down the counter. “So, where you from?”
Michael twisted round on the stool to face his brothers. “Far, far away from here, friend. Hey, actually, there is something else you can do for me. I’d like to buy a round of drinks for those fellows over there.”
“Not a problem. What’ll it be?”
“Whatever they want. The tall one will want whiskey, though.”
“Friends of yours?”
“I doubt they’d feel that way.”
“Loosen ‘em up with liquor first, eh?”
“
Something like that.”
The bartender sent over a waitress, who interrupted Lucifer in mid-sentence. He was irritated for a moment but nodded toward Michael as the other demons made their orders. They resumed their private discussions, and Michael watched them closely.
Lucifer did most of the talking, as he’d done for millions of years, and Sariel looked over some of the numbers he had grabbed from his casual encounters with women at the bar. Neither of them had changed a bit. Batarel feigned interest in his nephew’s words but appeared to be mainly watching the television screen that hung from the ceiling in front of them. Azazel stared back at Michael.
“I’m going to take my tab over to that table,” Michael told the bartender.
“OK.” Adrian punched a few buttons on a touch-screen display. Michael dropped a few dollars in the tip jar, thanked him, and headed toward the back corner of the bar with his tasty longneck.
The demons looked up as Michael approached and Lucifer made room for him by sliding to his left and pushing Sariel with an elbow. Sariel rolled more than scooted across the booth, but Batarel stopped his momentum cold. Michael tried not to look at his uncle, who still managed to intimidate him even though Michael knew he had nothing to really fear while he was still on Earth. Azazel went back to staring at his drink.
“Hello,” Lucifer said, breaking Michael from his contemplation of Batarel. “Thanks for the drinks. What should we drink to?”
Michael raised his beer. “To the Apocalypse!”
“To the Apocalypse!” they all replied.
Michael took a mental picture of the demons smirking and winking at each other. He looked up at the monitor, which was displaying news about Earth’s recent near miss.
“Mind if I turn this up?”
“Not at all,” Batarel said.
Michael pressed the volume button on the front of the monitor until the woman’s voice drowned out the laughter and clinking glasses.
… the third comet to strike a planet in our neighborhood within the past seven months. The scientific community is abuzz with theories about what this unprecedented series of events might mean. Could Earth be next? Is this all just some cosmic coincidence? And what really triggers these comets in the first place? We’ve brought in noted scholar …
“Speak of the devil,” Michael said, looking directly at Lucifer. “The Apocalypse is almost here.”
“Do I know you?”
“My name is Michael.”
Azazel refocused his attention on the forty-year-old man in front of him. Sariel stopped looking at phone numbers, and Batarel flexed his hands next to his drink like a man getting ready to arm wrestle.
Sariel stretched his arms around and behind his brother and uncle. He was the only person at the table who seemed to not have a care in the world. “Common enough name around here.”
“Well, this is the Bible Belt,” Michael said.
“No doubt about that,” Lucifer mumbled as he traced a fingertip across the veneer of the table. “So, Michael, what do you think of the events on the television?”
“I think the End of Days is approaching,” he said, pulling a cigarette from his pocket and lighting it. “You guys want one?”
Sariel took one and let Michael light it for him. Azazel feigned interest in someone at the main bar, but his eyes never strayed far from Michael.
“That stuff will kill you,” Lucifer said, leaning back against the booth’s leather cushion.
“If it really is the End of Days, a smoke is the least of my worries.”
“Amen.” Sariel smiled as he blew smoke at Lucifer.
Lucifer waved a hand in front of his face to disperse some of the smoke and elbowed Sariel hard in the ribs. “One person’s End of Days is another’s new beginning.”
“I couldn’t agree with you more,” Michael replied, “but some new beginnings …” he blew a smoke ring that floated past Lucifer and into a nearby ceiling fan, “are better than others.”
Lucifer noisily traced a fingernail across the table and Sariel’s posture changed once more. He slowly brought his arms back down to his sides. Michael wondered if he was retrieving his daggers. He also noticed that his uncle still hadn’t touched his drink. Batarel probably thought it was poisoned, or maybe he was just too busy studying Michael’s every word and mannerism.
“What about you?” Batarel asked. “Where will you be when the Apocalypse happens?”
“Heaven,” Michael said. “Same as all of us, right? Nobody but saints at this table …”
“What about those who are bona fide sinners?” Lucifer asked.
Michael looked at the TV as a professor from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology tried to make sense of all the activity coming out of the Oort cloud at the edge of the Solar System.
“They’ll soon find their whole universe shattered around them,” Michael finally answered.
Sariel spat out his drink, but Lucifer didn’t seem to even notice the wetness on the back of his hand. Azazel choked on a pretzel, and Batarel remained impassive. A chill went down Michael’s spine. Batarel was still scary.
“Why did you buy us drinks?” Batarel asked.
“It was the least I could do.”
“Who are you?”
“I am Michael. I already told you that.”
“Why are you here?”
“That’s an interesting question—one that I was never really allowed to ask when I was younger, thanks to a certain government body. The perils of public education and all that …”
“And now that you have had the chance to ask it of yourself?” Batarel asked. He didn’t seem fazed by Michael’s attempts to get under his skin.
“Most rules against progress are meant to be broken, and farcical organizations that make such rules to limit their own people have no reason being there in the first place.”
Batarel steepled his fingers below his nose and stared coldly into Michael’s eyes. “Is that a threat?”
“An observation,” he replied. “The threat comes from someone else.”
“Someone we know?”
“Unless you are suffering from Alzheimer’s …”
“Jehovah?” Batarel asked.
Michael didn’t respond.
“What does he want?” his scarred uncle asked.
“The destruction of the Courts of Chaos and the Council of Wizards.”
Red tendrils shot out of Lucifer’s back and crawled up the wall behind him, cracking the paneling as they snaked their way around an Elvis statue and dislodged a framed and signed Dolly Parton picture. After the glass face shattered on the floor, Sariel and Azazel’s eyes darted around the bar looking for any humans that realized what was going on, but Lucifer’s luminescent demon wings blended in with the flashing neon lights of the bar’s many beer advertisements.
Michael smirked as he watched his brother’s red wings spread across the wall. In response, one of Michael’s white tendrils climbed above his head to form a halo. White was Jehovah’s color. Michael still knew how to get under his twin brother’s skin.
Lucifer flipped the table over on its side and pushed Michael across the floor, parting human bystanders like Moses did the red sea. Michael tried to roll the table away from his neck, but he didn’t attempt to fight back against his brother because that would have been futile. Lucifer hadn’t lost a duel in a million years. When the sturdy, fixed bar stood between Michael and any further progress across the polished wood floor, Lucifer bent him over it with the table between them and looked down at his brother from inches above his face.
“Hello, Michael.”
“Hello, ingrate.”
Lucifer retrieved a six-foot-long black blade from the ether and pressed its broadside against Michael’s face.
“Maybe I should finish what Jehovah started,” Lucifer said.
The barrel of a shotgun jammed into Lucifer’s temple. “Get off ’im or I’ll blow your damned head off,” Adrian said
from behind the bar.
Lucifer’s wings grew dark red and danced like agitated cobras from the back of his leather jacket.
“Maybe you should mind your own business, human!”
One of Lucifer’s wings knocked the gun aside as it discharged a shell, launching an innocent bystander into Batarel before the man crumpled to the floor. Lucifer plunged his blade into the bartender’s chest and pushed his brother and the table farther down the bar with his free hand. Chairs clanked and scooted, and bodies thudded against the hard floor as men and women struggled to get out of the way of the table and Michael’s whip-like wings.
“You’re going to pay for what you’ve done!” Lucifer snarled.
“Killing me gains you nothing,” Michael said. “Letting me live at least gives Chaos a fighting chance. I have something to tell you—something very important. Our parents’ lives hang in the balance. Listen to me or watch Chaos perish. It’s entirely up to you. You know full well that I don’t care anymore.”
Lucifer threw aside the table and picked his brother up by the throat.
“Put him down, Lucifer,” Batarel said. He placed a hand on his nephew’s back.
Lucifer growled and looked at his uncle from the corner of his eye. “He’s lying. Something is up.”
Sariel put his thumbs under his belt buckle and walked casually toward his brothers. He winked at a woman who was cowering under a table. “It’s gonna be all right there, miss. Me and my brothers are just havin’ a bit of a tiff. You just sit tight there, li’l’ lady. I’ll be right back.”
His uncle frowned at him and Sariel kicked at the ground. Sariel had been Batarel’s apprentice for over a million years now, and while other wizards on the Council might beat their students for something like this, Michael had never seen Batarel dole out anything more than disappointed looks.
That was Batarel, though. Michael had never seen him angry, but he had seen his uncle kill thousands of immortals without even raising a finger.
“Fine, fine.” Sariel said, turning away from Batarel to look intensely at Michael.
Michael immediately felt a sharp, driving pain in his brain, like someone drilling in his skull. Despite the torment, he refused to give his brother any satisfaction. He kept his eyes open and never uttered a grunt or moan.
“He ain’t lying, pilgrim,” Sariel said as he shut one eye and cocked his hand like a pistol at Michael. He dropped the thumb hammer down and blew at the barrel. Azazel shook his head and chuckled as he intentionally bumped Sariel while the latter walked away from Michael like a gunslinger from an old Western. Sariel shot a few invisible rounds at Azazel in response.
“The Council of Wizards really wants me to let such a traitor live?” Lucifer asked.
“If he can give us some answers,” Batarel said. “We know just about as much as you do about the primal pattern Jehovah has created here—which is nothing.”
Lucifer dropped Michael to the ground, red wings coiling and snapping through the air, and Michael smirked as one of them brushed against his face. The night had only just begun, and Lucifer was already riled up.
“Thanks,” Michael mumbled as he got to his feet.
“Go screw yourself,” Lucifer said.
“That’s enough.” Batarel held up a finger between the twins. “Take him to the warehouse.”
Sariel and Azazel grabbed Michael by the arms and began to force him toward the exit, but he fought against them with each step. Before he knew it, he was launched fifty feet across the room and into the wall beside the front door. Remarkably, it hurt less than Sariel’s mind-probe earlier, but he turned around to see who had hit him. Batarel stood with his feet firmly set on the floor and his hands extended. Damned pattern magic!
“I’m not in the mood for this,” Batarel said. He conjured a small, swirling sphere of multi-colored energy to stress the point.
“Fine, OK. Whatever. I’ll come quietly,” Michael said. He raised his arms to shoulder level and Sariel and Azazel grabbed hold of him once more.
“Thank you,” Batarel said as he looked around at the humans playing dead under the tables. Puddles of urine were now making their way toward Michael’s feet from their hiding places.
“Should I take care of them?” Lucifer asked.
“I wouldn’t worry, Luke,” Batarel said. “Let’s just bring him back to the warehouse and gather the others. As Crown Prince and highest ranking military officer here, you have the ultimate say with prisoners of war. I will of course support you in whatever you decide when we get back to Alurabum.”
Lucifer’s wings shifted in color from deep scarlet to a lighter shade of red and gyrated around him less viciously as he breathed in deeply. He turned his back to Michael and edged closer to Batarel. Michael strained his ears to listen in on their whispered conversation.
“You’ve been by my side for millions of years, Uncle,” Lucifer said, “and I will always trust you with my life. Your advice is sound, and I can do no better than to follow it.”
A frightened man got up and started running toward the door. One of Lucifer’s wings whipped out in front of the man and smashed him into the mirror behind the bar where he slumped on top of the murdered bartender. The loud crash caused Michael to miss some of Lucifer and Batarel’s conversation.
“Worrying is something I simply must do,” Lucifer said as he watched blood drip down the mirror. “Even if these human weapons can’t end our lives, a mob could hamper our escape.”
Batarel nodded and began rolling up his sleeves, but Lucifer waved him off.
“You guys go on,” Lucifer said as his eight bright red wings worked themselves into a frenzy like the tails of a litter of kittens exposed to catnip. “You just make sure Sariel and Azazel make it back to the warehouse with the prisoner. I’ll clean up here.”
“We’ll have to leave the car tonight,” Azazel’s raspy voice called to Sariel as he pulled Michael through the doorway. “He’s too dangerous to trust in such a confined space. Better to just carry him back to the warehouse.”
Sariel yawned. “Let the humans think we’re UFOs, you know, swamp gas or something. I’m sick of hiding. It’s not my style.”
“You don’t say?” Azazel asked jeeringly, nodding at Sariel’s belt buckle. “Ready?”
“Yup.”
Sariel’s purple wings and Azazel’s red wings whipped out of their bodies and slammed into the concrete below, crumpling and destroying large sections of pavement. With their hands, they still grasped Michael, but with their wings, they pushed and pulled their way across West Nashville, toward their warehouse.
Michael looked back over his shoulder to see Batarel and his purple wings bringing up the rear. Just behind Batarel, Lucifer shut the door to The End of the Line bar. Even with a few hundred feet of separation and a solid door between them, Michael heard the screams echo into the night.
His only comfort came in knowing that these humans would soon enter the same Hall of Souls that he had been sent to when Jehovah had killed him hundreds of thousands of years ago. They would be reborn, and life would go on long after his brothers and uncle had left Earth.
