by Paula Guran
Is heaven a dark place?
The angel extended a hand, its talons flexing. The sheets over its belly stirred as Brian drew closer. Amy took her husband’s hands, easing him onto the bed. He gripped her shoulders, squeezing them too tightly. “I’m sorry,” he said suddenly, surprising himself. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Once he began he couldn’t stop. He said it over and over again, so many times it just became a sound, a sobbing plaint, and Amy pressed her hand against his mouth, entwined her fingers into his hair, saying, “Shhhh, shhhhh,” and finally she silenced him with a kiss. As they embraced each other the angel played its hands over their faces and their shoulders, its strange reedy breath and its narcotic musk drawing them down to it. They caressed each other, and they caressed the angel, and when they touched their lips to its skin the taste of it shot spikes of joy through their bodies. Brian felt her teeth on his neck and he bit into the angel, the sudden dark spurt of blood filling his mouth, the soft pale flesh tearing easily, sliding down his throat. He kissed his wife furiously and when she tasted the blood she nearly tore his tongue out; he pushed her face toward the angel’s body, and watched the blood blossom from beneath her. The angel’s eyes were frozen, staring at the ceiling; it extended a shaking hand toward a wall decorated with a Spider-Man poster, its fingers twisted and bent.
They ate until they were full.
That night, heavy with the sludge of bliss, Brian and Amy made love again for the first time in nearly a year. It was wordless and slow, a synchronicity of pressures and tender familiarities. They were like rare creatures of a dying species, amazed by the sight of each other.
Brian drifts in and out of sleep. He has what will be the last dream about his son. It is morning in this dream, by the side of a small country road. It must have rained during the night, because the world shines with a wet glow. Droplets of water cling, dazzling, to the muzzle of a dog as it rests beside the road, unmenaced by traffic, languorous and dull-witted in the rising heat. It might even be Dodger. His snout is heavy with blood. Some distance away from him Toby rests on the street, a small pile of bones and torn flesh, glittering with dew, catching and throwing sunlight like a scattered pile of rubies and diamonds.
By the time he wakes, he has already forgotten it.
Come to Me
Sam Cameron
What if airport security checks were really searching for the supernaturally sinister as well as harm from human sources? And a reminder: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.” – James Madison, The Federalist No. 51, 6 February 1788
In other news today, the Transportation Security Agency is under public fire for the treatment of an elderly, wheelchair-bound grandmother with leukemia. The 92-year-old woman was flying to a family reunion in Boston when she was subjected to a TSA pat down, scanned with a portable backscatter unit, and then forced to remove her adult diaper. So far, the official government response is that the treatment of the elderly woman was “appropriate” and “within federal guidelines.” – NBC 4, Columbus
Elsa knew from sad experience that most hotel gyms weren’t worth the time it took to swipe a card key. Usually she exercised alone in her room. With the furniture arranged just right, she could mambo left and grapevine right without bashing into anything. Exercising alone was lonely, but it wasn’t as if she was looking to make friends. She was in the business of constant travel. She had one small suitcase, very efficiently packed, and spent much of her time in the clouds.
But the very nice thing about this hotel at the Columbus airport was that it had an indoor swimming pool, and she’d bought a bathing suit in an overpriced shop two airports ago. Fifteen minutes after checking in on a gray Tuesday afternoon, she was sticking her toes into the blue-green water and taking the plunge.
Warm, but not as warm as bathwater. Chlorinated, but not so much that her eyes stung. The maximum depth was only three and a half feet. It was designed for recreation, not lap swimming. The area was empty except for herself, the water, some fake palm trees, and white deckchairs. Elsa swam east to west, then north to south – maybe twenty-five yards total. She figured she could get a mile done in thirty-six circuits.
She had just passed the quarter-mile mark when the glass door opened and a woman in a white bathrobe came in. Her long dark hair was very curly, and her heart-shaped face open and friendly. Elsa met her gaze, nodded politely. The woman smiled back with dimples that made Elsa dead jealous – she’d never had dimples, herself. Just acne-prone skin and a tendency to sunburn.
The other guest slid out of her bathrobe. Underneath was a very nice green bikini clinging to a very nice body – tall but shapely, not so skinny that you’d want to sit her down and force-feed her a plate of pasta. Elsa could think of more enjoyable things to do with her, frankly. Which reminded her she hadn’t had a date in seven months, and that she had to work tonight, and wouldn’t it be better to just get her swimming done? She didn’t hook up with strangers in hotels.
“Is it cold?” the woman asked. “It’s usually cold.”
Elsa shook her head.
The woman stood at the top of the steps and stuck one perfectly manicured foot in. Purple toenail polish. Long leg, smooth and muscled – a runner, maybe.
“I’m a wimp when it comes to cold,” the woman confided, wagging her foot. “I think I was supposed to have been born in the tropics. Near those fruity drinks with umbrellas in them. And those thatch buildings you drink the fruity drinks under. What are they called?”
Elsa stopped swimming. “Tiki huts?”
“Tiki huts,” the woman said, and those dimples showed themselves again. “I’m a big fan of fruity drinks, tiki huts, and sunsets. All of which are sadly far away from Columbus, Ohio.”
“We are at an airport,” Elsa pointed out. “You could get on a plane.”
“I’ve heard of these things called vacations, but they don’t exist in my world.” The woman stepped down and let the water rise up to her knees, then her firm, smooth thighs; perhaps five or six feet away from Elsa now. She wore no jewelry, and only a little make-up to accent her dark brown eyes. “What about you? Don’t tell me Columbus is your idea of a relaxing retreat.”
Elsa was torn between chatting and continuing her swim. She glanced at the clock hanging over the complimentary towels. Her crew wouldn’t pick her up until midnight. There was time for chatting and maybe even dinner, and was that hope flaring in her chest? A little romance? No, probably just heartburn from swallowing chlorine.
“I’m not on vacation,” she said. “Just passing through.”
“Then you’re lucky.” The woman stuck out her hand. “I’m Lisa-Marie. Like Elvis’s daughter.”
“I’m Elsa, like the British actress.”
Lisa-Marie’s face brightened. “Elsa Lancaster! She was in Mary Poppins.”
“Most people wouldn’t know that,” Elsa said, amused.
“Most people don’t have a five-year-old niece who watches it at least once a day, even when you beg her not to, because how many times can one person endure ‘Chim-Chim-Cheree’ without going crazy?”
“That’s a rhetorical question, isn’t it?” Elsa asked.
“Absolutely.” Lisa-Marie showed her dimples again. “I have no intention of subjecting you to Dick Van Dyke or any faux Cockney accents. But as a long-time resident of Columbus, I feel terrible for anyone stuck eating hotel food when there’s a great Italian restaurant nearby. How do you feel about fettuccini?”
Now it was Elsa’s turn to smile. “Love it.”
Near midnight, an unmarked black util
ity van pulled into the hotel parking lot. Andrew popped the side door for Elsa and she climbed in. He was sucking on the straw of an empty Frappucino cup and had cinnamon frosting on his chin.
“We stopped for breakfast,” he said, burping. “Late-night snack. Whatever.”
“Saved you one,” said Christopher, from the driver’s seat. He always drove, because he liked being behind the wheel. As opposed to flying, which he hated. Andrew always teased him about that: a guy who hated to fly, and his job was to fly around and fix things.
Elsa said, “I had dinner. A real dinner. With vegetables. You’ve heard of them?”
Andrew burped. “Filled with radioactive fallout from that Japanese reactor. It’s spread all over the world by now, carried by the winds. Seeps into the earth. You’re much healthier with artificial food substances.”
Christopher checked his rear-view mirrors, though traffic was non-existent at this hour. “You look different. Did these vegetables happen to come with some extra-friendly companionship?”
“None of your business,” Elsa replied.
“You scored!” Andrew grabbed the last cinnamon roll. “We’re proud of you.”
“Shut up,” she suggested. “I didn’t score anything. Ships that pass in the night. I’m never going to see her again.”
Which was a shame, really, because Lisa-Marie was bright and funny and they’d had a fabulous dinner. She lived with her parents, grandmother, sister, and two nieces because her job with the Legal Aid Society didn’t pay much. One of her former clients was a night manager at Elsa’s hotel, and whenever she needed to escape the noise at home, he let her crash in one of the empty rooms. Lisa-Marie was a good flirt, but Elsa was accomplished at dodging. The dinner had ended with no promises, no exchange of phone numbers, but Lisa-Marie had sounded very sincere when she said, “Next time you’re in Columbus, you should call me.”
It had been the nicest dinner Elsa had experienced in quite some time, and if the memory of Lisa-Marie’s bright eyes and pretty face still gave her a warm little glow, there was no harm in that.
While Christopher circled the airport, Elsa pulled on a brown jumpsuit that smelled like laundry detergent. The airport IDs were still warm from the laminator. The service parking lot was empty except for some cleaning vans and three airport security cars. Their local TSA contact was a big, unhappy-looking woman named Dorothy Armstrong.
“I wish you guys could do this earlier,” she said. “I’ve got to be back here at 6 a.m.”
Elsa sympathized, but all she said was, “Not our rules, ma’am.”
“Less chance of nosy tourists,” Andrew added, eyeing the empty food kiosks.
Midnight was actually early for them. Elsa preferred 2 or 3 a.m., but scheduling this job had already been hard – Christopher was due to fly to Memphis for a cleaning there, and Andrew had to travel out to San Francisco to train some new technicians. Their jobs paid well, but the travel was grueling; at the lower levels, employee turnover was high.
Port Columbus International Airport had three security checkpoints for passengers. They headed directly for Concourse A, which had already shut down for the night. Four screening lanes, typical formation, with four traditional scanners and two enormous backscatter units. The machine that had alerted was a model AXB-78-09-DZ, one of the best, but sometimes a little temperamental. Christopher powered it up, Elsa plugged her laptop into the control panel, and Andrew unpacked the containment unit.
Dorothy Armstrong was still complaining. “I don’t understand why a software update can’t be done remotely. I mean, does it really take three people?”
“It’s very complicated machinery,” Elsa said. “It’ll take about an hour if it goes well. You don’t have to stick around, if there’s something you’d rather be doing.”
“I’d rather be sleeping,” Dorothy Armstrong said. “I’ll be in my office, how’s that?”
Elsa nodded. “Sounds good.”
It was a relief when she left. Not that Elsa couldn’t handle curiosity and questions, but the process went faster without distractions. She popped on her goggles and started scanning the AXB’s memory. Thousands of images flickered by, naked or nearly so – the vacationing grandmothers and grandfathers of America, the harried moms and impatient husbands and frazzled business travelers, the teenagers who’d forgotten to unpack their MP3 players. The images captured pacemakers, artificial hips, metal pins in bones, and other surgical remnants. Sometimes she saw people who’d had transgender surgery. Or people wearing sex toys. The screening was more invasive than most people knew, and always uncomfortable for Elsa.
The Class B image popped up. The passenger was a tall woman with nipple rings. Her body was shaded white against the black background. Elsa inverted the image. Black on white now, which highlighted the second image right behind her – a large, gray shape with two ominous wings, like a two-foot-wide bat.
“That’s a biggie,” Elsa said. She pulled off the goggles and toggled the view for Andrew and Christopher.
“Pretty girl,” Christopher said.
Andrew glanced up while he screwed a transfer cable into the port under Elsa’s right hand. “Sweet demon.”
“Only you could call a soul-sucking destructive force of the universe ‘sweet’,” Christopher complained.
Elsa glanced around. It was just the three of them, and no one could possibly be eavesdropping. But loose lips sank ships, or so her father liked to say.
Gleefully Andrew said, “You’re violating your security clearance.”
“Tell the mice in the wall,” Christopher said. “How long’s she been in storage?”
“The demon is not a ‘her’,” Elsa said. “Don’t be sexist. Seventeen hours.”
“Okay. Should be lulled into a nice sleep by now. Send her down.”
The AXB hummed. The containment unit, which was the size of a large upright vacuum cleaner (and did a similar job, Elsa often thought), beeped as it began to work. Elsa switched to a view of the interior of the storage unit just as the winged creature began to fade. This was the best part of Elsa’s job. Knowing the technology that perplexed and aggravated so many travelers was, in fact, performing its job exceptionally well. Keeping the plane safe and other passengers from infection, and preventing innocent people from who-knew-what disaster down the road.
The demon went into storage in just under twenty minutes. It took another fifteen for Elsa to match up the passenger record with a report for the Department of Homeland Security and file the necessary paperwork. It wasn’t the woman’s fault that she’d been a carrier, but her home environment would have to be scrutinized. Agents would break in during the day while she was at work and scan the place. Had to be done; the woman would probably never even know she’d been investigated.
Fifteen minutes after the report went in, Elsa and her team departed the terminal. Christopher and Andrew would take the containment unit to the nearest storage facility for indefinite safekeeping.
She thought about that sometimes: locked up forever, no chance of reprieve. Not exactly in keeping with the American justice system or any concept of human rights. But demons weren’t Americans or human.
Tonight it was more satisfying to think about Lisa-Marie, and wonder if she was sleeping well, and imagine what she was sleeping in. Silk pajamas, maybe. Or a lacy gown, tight in all the right places. Maybe Lisa-Marie spent time that night thinking about her, too, because when Elsa woke, there was a note and email address attached to the receipt under her door.
Elsa took the email address with her to Boston, and then to Tampa, and then back up to Syracuse. But she didn’t email Lisa-Marie. Dinner had been nice, but she never expected to see her again.
More complaints were voiced today about the TSA after a five-year-old girl was separated from her parents for a backscatter X-ray. This video shows the girl growing upset and crying while her parents voiced their objections. A TSA spokesman today said that all passengers, regardless of age and size, are required to comp
ly with government regulations for national security. – WCVB, Boston MA.
Orlando was a tricky airport for extractions. An abundance of international and delayed flights meant a lot of late-night arrivals and departures at over one hundred and twenty gates. Even late at night, people were milling around – janitors, maintenance workers, security guards, stranded passengers in plastic chairs. This particular checkpoint still had two lanes open when Elsa’s crew arrived. The conditions were not optimal. But the Class A had already been trapped for twenty-six hours, and the specs called for thirty hours tops, so here they were, Elsa and Christopher and Sam, who was a last-minute fill in. Elsa didn’t like Sam. He was cocky and rushed through jobs. She preferred Andrew, but he was stuck overnight in Houston with indigestion.
Their TSA contact was a short, stocky guy in rumpled white shirt, garish orange tie and pants that needed to be hemmed. His name was Robert Henderson Clark and he talked a lot.
“These machines need more maintenance than my car, and that’s saying a lot,” he complained. “When taxpayers bitch about their money being wasted, I know what they mean. I should buy stock in the manufacturer. Or your company. You guys are the only ones who service them, right? Big monopoly?”
“I don’t know much about the back-end,” Elsa said vaguely.
Clark kept talking. “I hear that half of Congress owns stock in these machines. Easy for them, right? They all fly private jets and don’t have to listen to the complaints I get.”
“Hmm,” Elsa said.
The image playback stopped at the scan of a woman about Elsa’s size. The woman was wearing a clunky necklace and had a tampon inserted in her vagina. The Class A behind her had an extra-wide wingspan, but what was extraordinary, really, was the fist-sized head with hooded ears. Elsa hardly ever saw heads on demons.
