“Shut up, Slater,” growled Lubbers. “You’re lucky I don’t have you fired after your little disappearing act. I should have known you were holding out on me at the HeadJAC meeting.” He managed to point something like a smile in Christine’s direction. “You must be the reporter,” he said. “Temetri.”
“Yes, sir,” said Christine, trying not to sound as frightened as Jacob. “I’m afraid I don’t know what this is all about.”
“I think you do,” said Lubbers. He held up a thick, dog-eared stack of papers. On the first page, just above what appeared to be tire tracks, was written:
To Your Holiness the High Council of the Seraphim,
Greetings from your humble servant, Ederatz,
Cherub First Class,
Order of the Mundane Observation Corps
“What is that?” Christine asked.
“Well,” said Lubbers, regarding the cover page intently, “obviously it’s a report to the High Council of the Seraphim.” After a moment, he put down the report and leaned forward, holding out his rough, stubby hand to Christine. She shook his hand uncertainly.
“Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI Dirk Lubbers,” he said.
“I’m Christine Temetri,” said Christine. “And this is Jacob Slater. But you know that, I guess.”
Lubbers nodded. “I do. When Slater’s name came up on a flight from Nairobi to Paris, it raised some alarms. When we discovered he was traveling with a reporter from Los Angeles, we looked into you as well. It seems you’ve had quite the adventure lately, Ms. Temetri.”
Christine shrugged. “I seem to be at the epicenter of the Apocalypse for some reason.”
“The Apocalypse, yes,” said Lubbers thoughtfully. “Between you and me, I’m aiming to be National Security Advisor someday, and that’s not going to happen if I let the world end on my watch.”
Christine stifled a laugh. “And just how do you plan to stop it? It’s not as easy as it sounds.”
Lubbers was suddenly very serious. “By any means possible,” he said. “For starters, you and Slater are going to tell me everything you know about Heaven. Specifically about any defensive systems they have in place.”
Christine regarded him coldly. “Do you even believe in Heaven?”
“I didn’t when I got out of bed this morning,” Lubbers replied. “I’ve received some new intel since then.” He patted the stack of papers on his desk. “Between this intercepted report, Agent Slater’s suspiciously accurate assessment of the Anaheim Event, and the implosion of the moon, I’ve had to adjust my thinking a bit. In this job, you’ve got to be adaptable.”
Slater said nothing. He seemed to be frozen in fear.
“Just like that?” Christine asked. “You’re a believer?”
Lubbers shrugged. “I believe there’s a race of beings who call themselves ‘angels’ living in a place they call ‘Heaven.’ I believe that these beings have made occasional contact with human beings. I also believe these facts go a long ways toward explaining all the superstitious bullshit that a lot of people believe.”
“Hang on,” said Christine. “You’re presented with hard evidence of the existence of Heaven and angels and your reaction is to dismiss religion as superstitious bullshit?”
“It’s pretty clear from the intel that these angels are a far cry from the godlike beings found in the Bible,” replied Lubbers. “Hell, if I didn’t know better, I’d think this whole report was a joke. I mean, angels doing magic tricks? Bombs that look like glass apples? An interdimensional portal disguised as a linoleum floor in an unsuspecting reporter’s breakfast nook? Ridiculous.”
Christine paled at the mention of the portal. She had hoped that the report left that part out.
Lubbers chuckled. “You know,” he said, “I had actually pegged that last part as bullshit, but seeing the look on your face, I can tell I’ve hit pay dirt. So, tell me about this portal.”
It was pointless to deny the portal’s existence now, so Christine took another tack. “It’s guarded by angels,” she said, trying not to picture Ramiel and Nisroc in her kitchen, bickering over the proper way to cook SpaghettiOs. “You’d never get past them, and even if you did, you’d be stuck in the planeport. The security there is insane. Cherubim with flaming swords...” She trailed off, realizing that the cherubim with flaming swords was pretty much it for security, as far as she could remember. How would they hold up against a team of Special Forces commandos armed with assault rifles and grenade launchers? She tried to change the subject. “Why would you want to attack Heaven anyway?”
Lubbers leaned back from his desk, holding up his hands. “Nobody’s talking about attacking anybody,” he said. “I’m just gathering intel. I have a meeting with President Babcock in twenty minutes.”
Christine’s jaw dropped. “You’re meeting with the president? Of the United States? About this?”
Lubbers smiled. “Christine, the moon was attacked by beings from another dimension. This is the sort of thing that the president likes to know about.”
“Attacked?” said Christine, taken aback. “Nobody attacked the moon.” She looked to Jacob for help, but he was sitting quietly with his hands in his lap, eyes staring ahead, as if he were facing a rattlesnake about to strike. She turned back to Lubbers. “What does that report say, exactly?”
“About the attack on the moon?” replied Lubbers. “Nothing. This report seems to only cover events up to about six weeks ago. It’s pretty obvious, though, that the device used on the moon was of the same type as the one used in Anaheim—although a lot bigger, of course. Clearly somebody intentionally detonated one of these ‘anti-bombs’ on the moon. That’s something the president needs to know.”
“No, wait,” said Christine desperately. “It wasn’t like that. The bomb was going to go off; there was no stopping it. Mercury had the idea of flying to the moon—”
“Mercury!” exclaimed Lubbers. “Yes, where is this Mercury? He figures prominently in the report. He seems like the sort who could be swayed to see our point of view.”
“He’s...” Christine started. “I don’t think anybody really knows where he is. He sort of disappeared.”
“Figures. I’d have gone underground too if I were in as much trouble as he is. Sounds like everybody in Heaven and Hell wants to see him strung up. For his sake, I hope we find him first.”
Christine was momentarily puzzled by this statement, but then she remembered that the report Lubbers was reading didn’t cover Mercury’s turning himself in to Uzziel. As far as Lubbers knew, Mercury was still wanted by Heaven for his role in undermining the Apocalypse.
“All right, I’ve got to go,” said Lubbers. “Anything you want to add before I talk to Babcock?”
Christine didn’t think it would do any good to tell Lubbers anything else. She got the impression that anything she said would be used to build a case against the angels.
Lubbers put on his jacket and walked to the door. When he opened it, Christine saw that Agent Daltrey was standing at attention in the hall.
“Agent Daltrey will take you and Slater to your hotel.”
“Our hotel? What hotel?”
“Someplace safe. And nearby. You’re not leaving Washington for a while.”
NINE
Circa 1800 BC
It was shortly after Job was afflicted with festering sores that Mercury entered the story. Tiamat’s reign in Babylon had just ended, and Mercury had been recalled from his assigned duty of surveilling her.
Mercury sat across a large walnut desk from his nominal boss, Uzziel, director of the Apocalypse Bureau, trying to appear nonchalant while Uzziel shuffled through a stack of papers in front of him.
“Got a new assignment for you,” said Uzziel, not looking up from the papers. “This one’s a favor for Cravutius. Some special committee he’s set up. Have you heard of Job, the Uzzite?”
“I don’t get down to Uz much,” replied Mercury.
“This guy’s reputation has spread far pa
st Uz,” said Uzziel. “He’s like a living legend. He’s the richest...well, was the richest man in the East. You’ve never heard of him?”
Mercury shrugged. He had been pretty busy dealing with Tiamat and the ziggurats.
Uzziel set the papers down and leaned back in his chair, eyeing Mercury. “The details are classified, but the assignment should be pretty straightforward. You just have to keep an eye on Job and report back to me if he does anything, well, questionable.”
“Define questionable,” said Mercury. “Are we expecting him to invent leg warmers or something?”
“Oh, nothing like that,” said Uzziel. “Mostly I need to know if he’s cursed God.”
“Cursed God? Why would anyone do that? Seems like asking for trouble.”
“Job’s hit a spot of bad luck recently,” replied Uzziel. “Like I said, I can’t get into the details, but it’s important for us to know whether he curses God or not.”
“Whatever,” said Mercury. “I’ll take the Megiddo portal. Should be in Uz in a couple of hours. I’m assuming I’ll be able to find the legendary Job easily enough?”
“Yeah, that shouldn’t be a problem,” said Uzziel. “He will be the guy sitting in a pile of ashes scraping his sores with pot shards.”
“Scraping his...Hang on a minute,” said Mercury. “Did Job do something to piss off Heaven? Why is he sitting in ashes, scraping sores? I thought you said he was rich.”
“Classified,” said Uzziel. “Even I don’t know all the details. Your job is just to watch him and let me know if he curses God.”
“So I get to sit out in the sun in a pile of ashes with some guy who is scraping his sores with a pot shard? This is the top-secret assignment you were telling me about?”
“I can put you on flood cleanup if you’d prefer.”
“Ugh,” said Mercury. “How long do I have to do this?”
“I’m not a hundred percent clear on that. I’m assuming I’ll be informed when you’re no longer needed. Of course, if Job curses God, that’s pretty much game over. Once he curses God, there’s not much point in watching him anymore, as I understand it.”
“Uh-huh,” said Mercury. “So as soon as he curses God, my job is done?”
“Don’t get any ideas, Mercury,” said Uzziel, scowling. “Your job is to observe. You need to stay at least fifty paces from Job at all times. You are not to interfere in any way. If I hear that you’re coaching Job to curse God just to get out of this assignment...”
“Fine, fine,” said Mercury. “No interference, got it.”
He found Job as promised, sitting in a pile of ashes scraping his sores. Mercury took a seat under a nearby palm tree just over fifty paces away, where he could observe Job. Job took no notice of him. Mercury hoped that when Job cursed God he did it loud enough for him to hear it. It would suck if Job cursed God and he missed it.
After about twenty minutes of waiting in the hot sun, with the palm tree providing only nominal shade, Mercury was exceedingly uncomfortable and bored. His only entertainment was in the form of a little boy who would periodically leave his hiding place behind some rocks to run over and poke Job with a stick. He would then run screaming back to his hiding place as if Job were a monster that he had just awoken. Job seemed to take no notice. After three hours, even this started to lose its novelty.
“Hey, kid,” whispered Mercury to the boy as he crept out of his hiding place for the fiftieth time.
“What?” said the boy, stopping to look at Mercury.
“You want a mango?”
“What’s a mango?”
Mercury held up a ripe, round, yellowish fruit. The boy’s eyes widened, and he stepped forward to take the mango from Mercury.
Mercury pulled the fruit back. “First, I need you to do something for me. Get me some cloth. At least three feet square. Something lightweight. Silk would be best, but a light cotton will do. Also, some string. Got it?”
The boy nodded and ran off toward Job’s house. The place had been overrun by thieves and vandals, who had absconded with the silver and gold and left the less valuable items lying strewn throughout the rubble. Mercury figured the kid wouldn’t have much trouble finding what he needed. Sure enough, a few minutes later he returned with a stained silk tablecloth and a spool of string.
“Excellent!” said Mercury. “Now just one more thing. I need your poking stick. And three more just like it. Straight, like that one.”
The boy nodded and ran off again, returning shortly with three perfectly straight sticks, each around four feet long.
“Perfect!” exclaimed Mercury, handing the mango to the boy. The boy sat down next to Mercury and began to eat with gusto, mango juice running down his chin.
“What’s your name?” asked Mercury.
“Elihu,” said the boy between bites of mango.
“Nice to meet you, Elihu. I’m Mercury.”
Mercury pulled a knife from his pocket and began whittling at the sticks. When he had gotten them to the desired length, he cut notches in them so that two of them fit together in a right triangle, with the other two sticks arranged perpendicularly to each other inside the triangle. Then he wrapped string around the joints and tied them off. He stretched the silk across the frame, secured it with string, and then tied the remaining length of string to three points on the bottom of the frame. When he was finished, it looked like this:
“What’s that?” asked the boy, his face sticky with the remnants of mango.
“You’ve never seen a kite before?”
The boy shook his head.
“Hours of entertainment,” Mercury said. “We just have to get it airborne.”
“How do we do that?” asked the boy.
“Here,” said Mercury, handing the kite and the spool of string to the boy. “Hold it like this, above your head. Got it? Then run and let go of it. When it starts getting some air, let some string out. Just a little at a time. Keep the string taut so it doesn’t crash.”
The boy took off running. He let the kite go, and it fluttered around a few inches above his head, barely retaining its modest altitude.
“Keep running!” Mercury shouted. “You’ll get it!”
Unfortunately, the slight breeze that was blowing while Mercury was building the kite had died down to nothing, and he didn’t have the heart to tell the kid that he didn’t have a chance of getting the kite more than five feet into the sky. Still, at least it would keep him occupied for a while.
Job still sat silently, occasionally coughing or scraping one of his sores.
Mercury dozed off, awakening hours later with a start. “What’s that?” he exclaimed, thinking that he had heard Job say something. But it was just the boy.
“Wheeeee!” yelled the boy, running circles around Job, the kite still fluttering just inches above his head.
Mercury took a deep breath and leaned back against the tree. He tried to remember if he had ever had a worse assignment than this. Even working for that scheming megalomaniac Tiamat had been leagues ahead of sitting in the sun all day waiting for some diseased fool to curse God.
“Seriously,” he said to no one in particular. “What have I done to deserve this? No one deserves this sort of treatment.”
Job swatted absently with a pot shard at a fly that was buzzing around his head.
“Wheeeee!” yelled the boy again. Seeing that Mercury was awake, he ran over to him. “You got any more of those mangoes?”
Mercury handed the boy a second mango, which he devoured furiously in a matter of seconds. He then returned to his tireless running with the kite.
An hour or so later, Mercury thought he heard something behind him and turned to see three men approaching. He stood to meet them.
“Greetings,” said one of the men. “I am Eliphaz. These are my friends Bildad and Zophar. We have come to comfort our friend Job. Is he around?”
Mercury’s brow furrowed. “You didn’t notice the guy sitting over there in the ashes, scraping his sores with pot
shards?”
The men’s eyes went wide. “Holy shit,” said Eliphaz. “That’s Job? I didn’t even recognize him. He looks awful.”
“Well, yeah,” said Mercury. “I mean, I didn’t know him pre–oozing sores, but I’d have to agree, he’s not the picture of health.”
“Has he said anything?” asked Zophar.
“Like cursed God, you mean? I don’t think so. He might have muttered some anti-God sentiments under his breath, but nothing I was able to pick up on. I hope you guys can talk some sense into him.”
“What do you mean, talk some sense into him?”
“Er,” said Mercury, “I meant, I hope you guys can give him some small measure of comfort. He’s been through so much. A lesser man probably would have cursed God by now, you know? Really loudly too, so that there would be no question about it.”
The men muttered confusedly among themselves and left Mercury so they could go sit in the ashes by Job.
Mercury’s hopes for a quick resolution of his situation were not met. Eliphas, Bildad, and Zophar sat in silence for a full week, commiserating with Job. At last Job spoke, but not loudly enough for Mercury to make out what he was saying.
“Hey, kid!” Mercury whispered to the boy, who was, incredibly, still trying to get the kite airborne. The boy ran over to Mercury.
“Tell me what he’s saying. Quick!”
The boy ran over and perched behind Job. After a moment he ran back to Mercury. “He says, ‘May the day of my birth perish, and the night that said, “A boy is conceived!” ’ ”
“OK,” said Mercury. “He’s still talking. Tell me the rest.”
The boy ran over to listen and then returned again to Mercury. “He says, ‘That day—may it turn to darkness; may God above not care about it.’ ”
“Got it,” said Mercury. “Go!”
The boy ran over again to listen and returned. “He says, ‘May no light shine on it. May gloom and utter darkness claim it once more; may a cloud settle over it; may blackness overwhelm it.’ ”
“Utter darkness,” said Mercury, nodding. “OK, go!”
Mercury Rests Page 7
