Daisy Lane and Okura lifted their eyes towards the dreadful skies. The monolith towered above their heads, crested by the rusted pentagram. Hell’s Cathedral oozed an evil so deep the black power held dominion over all Los Angeles.
Okura frowned. He zipped up the yellow jacket he wore. “My God, how high is Hell’s Cathedral?”
Daisy Lane lowered her head, a chill slid down her back. “Too high.”
Daisy wore black jeans and a long leather jacket with heavy motorcycle boots. Her golden hair, tied back in a ponytail, hung down her back. Her nose ran from the smoke filled air, she swiped her hand across her wet nostrils to no avail. She surveyed the shattered landscape. People ran into the fresh madness. Gunfire echoed off the destroyed buildings.
Okura pointed a finger upwards. “A pentagram?”
“Yes,” she said. Daisy glanced up again. She did not enjoy her nearness to the cathedral. Its powerful evil coated her soul like dirty motor oil. In the distance, screams echoed off walls.
Lunatic filled laughter rose from a detached voice and moans dragged out within the broken city. She frowned at the incredible stench. Death and roasted flesh, a combination so powerful her stomach lurched. The meager sunlight waned and brought a sour dread into Daisy’s lower belly she did not care for.
Smoke curled into the air as the two stood on a hill with the city spread out beneath their gaze. The freeways lay choked with dead vehicles strewn about helter-skelter. People crossed the battered cityscape to approach the cathedral like humble churchgoers. The mortals and dead who pledged their souls to Satan tormented the people who tried to flee.
Okura slid his hands into his blue jean pockets. His eyes squinted against the dying sun. The crimson orb sank beyond the western horizon, dragging hope and peace to other countries yet affected by Hell’s brutal hand. “The sunset is disheartening, Daisy.”
Daisy opened her mouth. The words she tried to say clotted her throat. Somewhere among the shattered buildings and madness, her family and friends remained either alive or dead. Her heart filled with a terrible ache at this knowledge. Despite her protesting heart, her priority sat high in a tower and not amongst the apocalyptic city.
“Madness, Okura. This is how the world will become if they conquer us.” She glanced at her partner. “And imagine, some people want to live like this and not reach the Eternal Kingdom.”
Okura stretched out a hand towards the bleak land below. “For some this is easier. One rule, serve the black prince.” He shook his head. His eyes raked the cathedral from its wide base to the battlements. The horrors perched around the pentagram remained dead still. “Do we wait for nightfall?”
“Complete darkness, Okura. Once dark, we go down invisible. We will be unseen to the mortals, but the living dead will glimpse our shadows. So be careful.”
Okura nodded and sat on a shattered concrete bench. Rusty rebar jutted from the masonry like the legs on a dangerous spider. He drew his knees to his chest, crossed his arms over his shins and began to rock back and forth. “I’m surprised people are still leaving the city.”
“A few tried to hide and are now coming out. Some will escape, most won’t,” Daisy Lane said. She squatted on her haunches. A breeze blew her long coat behind her like a cape. She took in the scenery with detachment. She wanted to save the people who ran and died before her eyes.
Okura closed his eyes, his lips pressed together in concentration. “I can’t sense the Key,” he said.
“I also tried several times with no luck.”
Okura opened his eyes as the final sunlight flickered out behind the rust red horizon. “Like a fallen Samurai, I think the sun will never rise again. Its beauty marred by this insanity.”
Daisy leaned forward and scrutinized downtown Los Angeles. With no power below, the humans used fire or generators. Flames popped to life amongst the ruins. The undead did not need such comforts. “General Temeculus can’t make the sun stay forever. How pathetic his followers are.”
Okura gasped as darkness shrouded Los Angeles. Blackness darker than molasses crawled from the cathedral and poured into the city.
“The evil,” Okura said.
Darkness ensued.
A pure blackness so deep, the angels shivered from its presence. Below, the fires sputtered and recoiled against the night. The screams died off as the two angel’s eyesight pierced the darkness in white light. Escapees ran for cover. The ones who approached Hell’s Cathedral did so in the blind and picked their way ahead.
A few flashlights broke the darkness with white light. Others used the scant light from cell phones and lighters as they called out to each other in fear of what lurked in the blackness.
Okura stood to his feet. He untied his white hair and allowed the mane to fall over his broad shoulders. His white Samurai armor appeared in sections over his muscular frame minus the helmet.
Daisy Lane changed and donned her silver helmet upon her head, its white bladed plume made her look fearsome. “Let’s go,” she said.
The two angels turned invisible and floated from the hilltop like feathers from a dove. They moved in silence. People hid in corners, prayed, and shivered against the cold brought on by the unnatural blackness. Their angelic feet did not touch the rubble-strewn ground as they moved through buildings and pillars, pass the sleep and awake, the frightened and the bold.
Hell’s Cathedral sat against the gloom. For the uninitiated, their eyesight became useless against the dark. Both angels picked out the undead Roman soldiers hidden in the shadows. They sought the darkness to feed, and feed they did, on both the living and the dead. Disembodied screams rose again and echoed to horrible crescendos in the long black night.
Okura narrowed his eyes as he floated past a building. He did not think angels became sick to the stomach, yet when he came upon a Hell soldier with a dead baby in hand, bitter bile rose in his throat. He seized his beautiful sword hilt until Daisy Lane’s armored hand closed over his sword hand. He glanced up. Daisy shook her head. The soldier slurped and smacked his lips as he ripped into the delicate flesh.
The monster’s head jerked upwards, its lower face glistening from the juicy meal. A plump thigh in his hand jiggled. He sniffed the air.
The angels moved on and covered a large distance until they settled behind a deserted mini mall. Daisy remembered the mall well. She entered the donut shop the morning Hell’s Cathedral erupted from the ground. Now Pete’s shop lied under tons of rubble and twisted metal.
Daisy paused. “Wait,” she said.
She crept ahead, checking each empty shop. She stopped and peeked around a corner, and up towards Hell’s Cathedral. With superb eyesight, she spotted the horrors encircling the pentagram.
She feared they might have to fight the Screamers on their escape from the gruesome cathedral. To her front, no soldiers stalked the gate. Nervousness flirted through her lower stomach. Enemy soldiers crept about in the night, as if they hunted for food, or a more dangerous foe. They walked with their swords drawn, and backs hunched low.
Daisy caught Okura with his sword drawn, he crouched against a burnt out police cruiser. His eyes scanned the area around him. “Psssst...”
Okura’s head lifted up.
Daisy motioned him over. He approached in a low duck walk.
“Are they expecting us?” Okura said. His silver blade flashed against some unseen light. “They are scattered about like they’re hunting.”
“Seems so,” Daisy said. She pointed her finger towards a particular tower. For a quick second, she thought a pale figure filled the tower’s black window.
“The Key.” Okura whispered low in his voice.
“I can’t tell because the body is too fuzzy.”
Okura shrugged his shoulders. “Well, only one way to find out, Daisy. We must go up.”
Daisy contemplated the move. Her heart beat hard in her chest. She gave Joan a hard time in Washington, D.C. about fear. Now she regretted her careless words. Daisy Lane pressed her lips together
, and took a breath.
The figure appeared in the black window again and gazed out over the loathsome landscape. Its head turned and peered down at them. Its hands pressed against the face followed by a frantic wave.
Okura’s keen eyes zoomed in on the same figure. He gritted his teeth in impatience. “Daisy, we need to rescue her.”
“Shush,” Daisy said. Something scampered along the ground before them, rocks rattled. The hairs on her arms stiffened, her senses heightened. The pulse near her ears throbbed so loud its dull thump resembled a tiny drumbeat. “How can you be sure? This is not right, Okura.”
“Make a decision in seven breaths, Daisy Lane. Or go home.”
Daisy snapped a gaze at Okura. Her eyes flashed a radiant jade green. “I’m no coward.”
“I didn’t say you’re a coward. We go or we don’t.”
Daisy frowned. “We go, but move in silence.” Daisy swallowed. She stood along with Okura and prepared her mind for battle.
39
Daisy and Okura floated from the shadows. They kept hidden behind battered cars and tanks, buildings, buses, and jack knifed semi-trailers. The black night clung to their skin like leeches. Both angels held their swords ready in hand. They traveled over the deserted 110 freeway shrouded in eerie darkness.
Once they reached the black wrought iron fence, the two floated up along the horrid wall in silence. Their eyes beheld the skulls and crushed bones crowded into the cathedral wall as mortar.
As Daisy approached her destination, the figure in the window moved away, replaced by blackness with a hue dark enough to rival the innards of a closed casket. She floated up and through the window, followed by Okura. The Samurai stepped to her right once inside the small dark cell.
Okura said, “Where is she?” The gloom closed in on them.
Daisy’s grip tightened on her sword hilt. “Lucia,” she whispered into the thick blackness. A dim voice rose from within the cathedral. “The voice of the Key,” she said.
Okura scanned the cell. “She’s warning us.” He spun to face the window to their rear. Skulls filled up the empty space, blocking their escape.
The heavy wooden door to the cell shattered into dust and splinters. Before the two angels stood undead Roman soldiers. Wrath’s huge body loomed behind the fearsome soldiers. His mouth filled with white sharp teeth dropped open.
Okura drove his head through the skulls packed into the window. Once the bone powder cleared, he faced the Screamers crowded in behind each other. Their teeth gnashing in fury sickened his stomach. A high-pitched screech rose from their throats like nails dragged over a chalkboard. He jerked his head back just as a Screamer lunged to bite him.
Romans piled into the cell with Wrath trailing the unholy group.
“Drop through the floor. Now,” Daisy Lane said.
The two angels dropped through the floor. They plunged down into solid mortar built from crushed bones and dried blood. They came out through a high ceiling and landed on an obsidian floor. Both scrambled to their feet, eyes wide with swords held at the ready.
Daisy waited for the Key’s voice to rise again. Her radiant green eyes swept the large chamber decorated in furniture made from bones. Bones covered the walls along with skinned bodies. Some still moist and glistening against the red torch lights. A black stone table sat in the center with a pale leathery sheet stretched across the top.
Okura turned to the table with his weapon ready. “Daisy, It’s a map, on a stretched human skin.”
“Kill me please.” A weak plea rose from the table. “I’m in so much pain, and they keep me alive. I’m a Marine general. They made me into this thing, and I’m still alive. Please kill me.”
Daisy started at the voice. The head with thin white hair trembled. “You talk. Tell me, and I will grant you your wish, you will live in our Father’s kingdom forever?”
“Anything,” the general moaned. “Please.”
Daisy neared the table as Okura stood watch. Seconds for them ticked away. “Where is the Key? Have they talked about a Key to the back door to Hell?”
“Yes, a young girl. He dragged her into his chamber.” General Wells shifted his red teary eyes at the ironwood doors ten feet to their front. “Beyond those doors.”
Daisy recognized a human soul in great torment. Some how General Temeculus kept this man alive. The general’s hair fell out in patches upon his head. His flesh still rotted and the stench knotted her stomach. Tears welled up in her eyes. She reached out and touched his rough face. “Be at peace.”
“Thank you,” the general spoke.
Daisy lifted her beautiful sword above Wells’s head. She laid a hand over his weak eyes with black circles underneath. In one merciful stroke, she chopped off the general’s head. The head tumbled to the floor with a soft thud and came to rest at her leather bound feet. She looked up at the doors to where Temeculus dragged the Key.
Okura replaced his Samurai sword and headed to the doors. With both hands, he grasped each iron handle and pulled. The huge doors swept open to reveal a larger room with a transparent glass floor, and walls made from black volcanic glass. Beneath the floor, roiled flames and the souls tossed into Hell. Across the room sat a tremendous throne made from bones.
Upon the throne sat the nine-foot giant, General Temeculus. The Key sat on the floor before him, with eyes half-mast and her long black hair splayed over her face.
Daisy’s breath caught in her throat. The huge general glared down at the angels akin to an adult facing children. Daisy stepped into the black throne room with Okura. By some unseen power, the heavy doors closed behind them.
40
Daisy steadied her sword and nerves. “General Temeculus, by the Kingdom of Heaven, and the power of Jehovah, you and Satan have violated the sacred laws of God. Hand over Lucia and return to Hell posthaste.”
Temeculus stood from his throne. His eyes flashed red sparks and flames. He clapped his hands upon his muscled thighs covered in the blue jeans he wore.
The general stepped down from the throne and stood above the Key who sat on the floor in a trance. “You dare come into my house without saying hello, and demand I turn over something I worked hard for, Daisy Lane.”
General Temeculus ambled forward like a bow legged cowboy, a thin straw appeared between his lips and he flicked his long white hair from his face. “…and, Okura. I thought you Japanese believed in honor, you of all people. I expected this blond haired biddy to be more ornery than you.”
Daisy’s thighs stiffened. She closed her eyes and concentrated on her powerful legs. For a moment, she thought her lower body plunged into quicksand. She opened her eyes. Temeculus’s red eyes pulsed, a thin smile played over his angular face.
Daisy tried to take her eyes off him, but couldn’t. His voice slowed down the dangerous reality around them, and inhibited her reaction time to his planned attack. Her legs tingled, and pain exploded from her ankles up, as if a thousand needles pricked into her flesh. She wanted to scream but the muscles in her mouth clamped down like a vise. Her heart rate pattered in quick beats. She fought to remain calm and regain control.
Satan perfected the black art Temeculus applied on her. With words, he reached into the victim’s subconscious mind and numbed the thoughts. She needed to deal with General Temeculus before her head ended up on a plate before him.
Okura drew his katana and attacked. General Temeculus changed into his black armor in a mad blur. With his right hand, he slid his sword from its scabbard and drew the serrated weapon across his wide chest and over his left shoulder to strike down the angel who went after the Key.
Daisy sensed Temeculus’s power over her waver as he turned upon Okura. The invisible concrete he encased her legs in cracked. She moved in as Okura diverted Temeculus’s attention. She raised her blessed blade and slipped between Okura and the general. She blocked the general’s serrated sword and redirected the blow to her left. She drove her blade towards his chest covered in thick black armor.
Okura seized the Key by both arms and shook her until her eyes fluttered open. Above, General Temeculus engaged in a fierce duel with Daisy Lane. The two fought hard against each other, red sparks flashed from their swords as they lunged, parried, ducked, and tried to cut each other down. Okura yanked the Key to her feet and hauled her to the closed ironwood doors.
Daisy swung her sword against the giant demon. Her blade glanced off his armor. Her face twisted in a grimace, her golden braided hair underneath her helmet whipped about as her sword crashed against his. With her left hand she drew an axe and plunged the bladed edge into Temeculus’s side.
Temeculus grunted from the blow. He fought on with a crazed energy. Anger poured from his body in hot waves.
Okura pushed open the massive double doors and dashed into the war room with the Key. He ran full tilt towards the balcony, dragging the dazed Lucia along the way. Behind him, Daisy remained locked in battle with the general. He stared into the Key’s glassy eyes. “Can you fly?”
“Yes,” she said. “But I’m frightened, Okura. They might chase me down.”
Okura pursed his lips. He held his left hand out and cupped the palm. A silver tipped golden spear flashed into his grip. He drew back his arm, aimed for the space between Temeculus’s helmet where his red eyes sat, and threw true.
Daisy ducked a blow from the general’s heavy sword. A golden spear cut the air above her head with a musical whistle. The silver warhead plowed into the general’s right eye socket and broke through the skull and out the back. The silver tipped spear dripped Temeculus’s foul blood.
The general yowled in pain and dropped his sword. The weapon struck the glass-covered floor with a heavy clang. He grasped the spear shaft with both hands. The spear turned black once Temeculus touched the Heaven made weapon. His voice rose so loud Hell’s Cathedral shook from the foundation.
Angels of War (Angels of War Trilogy Book 1) Page 17
