The Awakening of the Gods (Forgotten Ones)

by M. H. Hawkins

  Puzzled, Raven attempted to think through what happened, what was happening. I was dead, but for some reason, they didn’t desecrate my corpse—not that there should have been a corpse in the first place. Reapers don’t leave corpses… but I did, somehow. And I was untouched, and dead… for three days. And now, I’m here… Somehow, I’m alive again.

  “Go.” Raven lowered his blade and jabbed his chin at his attacker, instructing him to step away. “Go,” he repeated.

  Puzzled and thinking it was a trick, the giant outcast backed away, slowly and suspicious. It’s a trick, he thought, it has to be. Reapers don’t show mercy, not this one at least.

  The other outcasts must have thought the same thing because they seizing whatever weapons they had nearby or pulled out whatever weapons they had on them, and they readied themselves for battle. The mob of emerald-eyed fallen angels was about to pounce on the resurrected… creature.

  “Calm yourselves,” shouted someone, a woman voice reaching out from far behind a crowd of bunched up outcasts. Hidden in the shadows and emerging from the sea of emerald eyes, Raven could see her pushing through, but he still could not fully see her. She attempted to lower the tension again and said, “Lower your weapons. If he was going to attack, he would have already down so.”

  Finally entering the dim light shining though the broken windows, Raven caught a glimpse of her, her hair at least. Bright red, long, and wavy; its brightness contrasted with dark clothing and manner of the mob and almost looked like a painting. Her bouncing red locks appeared and disappeared as she weaved through the mob of outcasts.

  ”Make way, come on now,” she said. Her voice was compassionate yet commanding, and the masses listened. “Spread out. And I know I said, ‘lower your weapons.’ So, come on, lower your weapons… Thank you.”

  The crowd was large, and she was still trying to reach the front. Her wavy red hair swayed between the mass of emerald lights and swaying shoulders of the larger outcasts. Finally reaching the shallow-end at the front of the crowd, Raven saw her continuing to settle her clan with shoulder squeezes and calming words. Less authoritarian now, her voice turned cool and calming, and her words seemed to be soothing their aggressions. “Don’t be so stubborn, spread out… No more grouping; we discussed this… No more attacking without discussion, remember?”

  No names. Once they were cast out, fallen angels relinquished their names and never spoke of them. This, he knew… somehow. Yet, as Raven watched the woman and the way everyone reacted to her, he had no doubts that she was one of the older ones, and she, most likely, knew her clan members very well. And most likely, she knew their unspoken names as well.

  Odder still, as she neared the very front, she paused and sighed with frustration. Casually enough, she paused, turned to the side, and began to pull on an old fashion magazine clenched in the tightening hand of a frightened woman in a long-sleeved black-and-red shirt that had thumbholes and was moth eaten—a short, cute brunette with shoulder-length hair and fear-filled eyes. The red-headed woman smiled at her and tugged on the magazine. She squeezed the woman’s shoulder with her other hand. “C’mon. You don’t need that—not right now. No more latching onto the past, right? Like we talked about. That’s what we agreed on, right?”

  The frightened woman nodded reluctantly and let go of the magazine. Knowing that the outcasts found it difficult acclimating to their new lives and still longed for home, the red-headed woman offered a smile and her understanding to the frightened woman. “There you go. Very good. We do the best we can, right? Right?”

  Stepping forward again, the red-headed woman handed the magazine to a different outcast, a large man in a ratty pea coat. “Here. Put this back where it belongs. Please and thank you. Then I want you to take five others with you and man the alarms on the south end, alright?” She patted his shoulder and smiled. And continuing forward, she stopped almost immediately. Knowing that outcasts were notorious for their herding behavior, she knew that she would need to clarify—or else she’d have a herd of outcasts leaving, migrating to the south end o man the alarms. “Hey,” she said, grabbing the man’s shoulder. “Hey, I said five, alright. Five, okay? Five—no more than six. Okay? Alright—I mean it.” She smiled and nodded then stepped forward again.

  Finally reaching the front of the crowd, she addressed the resurrected reaper. “So you live. You’re alive… again.”

  “It would appear so,” Raven agreed, raising an eyebrow before he began examining his hands. They looked foreign, they felt foreign. These used to be claws. I used to be different. “What happened?” he blurted out before realizing a more pertinent issue. The very large crowd surrounding him was still holding a good number of sharpened weapons. Yet the red-haired woman seemed… overly casual, at least as cool and calm as he was. “Why aren’t you—”

  “—afraid of you? If you were going to attack us, you would have already done so… and a good number of us would already be dead.” She pulled the knife from behind her back and said, “And I’d be sticking this where that sword of yours was stuck… or I’d be vigorously trying to do so.”

  Raven pursed his lips and nodded a few times. Good answer, makes sense. “So what happened?”

  “Well, you were dead, and then you weren’t. Over a good, many years, I’ve seen more than my fair share of dead reapers, but you… you’re the first reaper-corpse that I’ve ever seen, and as a bonus, the first resurrected one I’ve ever seen as well.”

  Raven smirked. That’s funny. “Lucky you. A two-for-one deal.”

  “How?” she asked. “Dead reapers, they always dissolve… they turn to ashes and dust. Dead reapers don’t normally stick around.”

  “No. No, they do not.” Neither do dead angels, outcasts. Not even the ones that I’ve killed. Eying the crowd and eying their weapons, Raven soon knew—he remembered—why they were armed. I’m their enemy. Just days ago, I slaughtered them… but that wasn’t me, was it? And somewhat confused, he said, “You don’t need those. I not going to… harm you.” He was going to say kill but caught himself.

  Now they were the confused ones. Angry and befuddled, they clenched their weapons even tighter and shared looks with each other, each hoping that the other had an answer to what was happening. Just days ago, they watched as Raven slaughtered their brethren and slashed through them without even a hint of remorse, until the Dark One, Vincent Blackwell, intervened… for some reason.

  But now, the blood thirst reaper was back, back from the dead. Granted that the now-living corpse didn’t look identical to Raven, he looked enough like him—a resurrected version of him—to warrant an extra measure of elevated caution.

  Amidst the growing mumbling amongst her clan members, the red-haired woman raised her hand up into the air. “Calm—I said calm yourselves,” she said, raising her voice while stepping even closer and into the light.

  And finally, Raven got a better look at her. She was a gorgeous woman with fiery red hair. Her face was pale with a thin nose in the center, and her cheeks were full but smudged and sprinkled with dirt. Her thin, moth-eaten clothes were baggy and swallowed her tall, sleek, slender body with each footstep. And despite her calming demeanor, she was still clenching that rust-spotted butcher knife of hers.

  A strange, sad stand-off seemed to be developing between the two. Despite Raven’s prior actions, he seemed different—and looked different. He looked sad. And after giving it a second thought, the red-headed woman tucked her knife into her back-pocket and took another step forward. And after licking her thin, well-crafted lips, her confidence gave way to sadness. “You… You slaughtered us, our people. You… why did you attack us? Reaper, why did you hunt us down? Why did you kill my people?”

  “Reaper?” Raven mumbled to himself as he touched his face. It felt strange as well. “A reaper? A raven? No, no… I am… a god… And I am a reaper as well… I think.” As he spoke, his face seemed to shift between Raven’s and Blackwell’s before settling on a blend of both.

  “So y
ou are the reaper?” she said. “Or are you the other one… the Dark One, the god of death?”

  “I am and… I am both.” Still confused and disoriented, he rolled his eyes towards the sky, deep in thought. Then, deeper in thought, he lightly bobbed his head from side-to-side. Nonchalantly, he finally sheathed his katana. “Both. I am both of them, the reaper and the god—parts of both, yet neither one completely. And you are?”

  “I am an outcast… a mistake birthed in heaven.” She gave him a confused look. The outcasts never spoke of their names, not since they lost their wings, not since they lost their identities, their purpose, their pride… not since they lost everything. Surely he must have known.

  “A mistake?” Raven said, disagreeing wholeheartedly. “No, I am quite positive that you are not a mistake. And I am unbelievably sure that you are so much more than you are giving yourself credit for. Much more than a mistake.”

  The red-haired woman forced a smile, a heavy smile that didn’t last long.

  “And your name?” the resurrected man asked. “Surely you have a name. Outcast or not, you have a name. And names are important.” After sighing, he sadly said, “Even if it has been a while—even if it has been too long, you should remember your name… And you should say it, so that it is remembered forever and echoes through time.” The Egyptians believed that names were required for the afterlife, he remembered, if your name was forgotten, you died—the final death. A random thought, though he didn’t know where it came from.

  “My name is…” she said, her words deflating in hesitation. The rest of the outcasts shifted their attention to her and were now staring at her with complete anticipation. Should she? Should she say her name? Almost defiantly, she huffed and raised her head with some renewed confidence. Then, with a hard look and harder tone, she said, “Jessica. My name is Jessica.”

  The rest of the outcasts gasped in shock, their mouths left hanging open. Unsure of what to say or how to react, they began whispering to each other, their voices becoming a jumble of judging gossipers.

  But the resurrected reaper smiled at the red-haired woman, Jessica, through his hand up to the side, approving of her reclaiming her old name. “There you are! A pleasure to meet you, Jessica.” He didn’t try shaking her hand or approaching her. She looked sad again, and he understood why. She still saw him as the killer he was, before he was resurrected.

  His smile faded too, and he began looking around the factory before finally spotting an exit, a battered door with a battered exit sign half-hanging in the way of the doorway. He started towards it. Two steps in, he stopped and spun around. “Jessica, don’t feel so bad. You aren’t the only one who needs to readjust to their name. As I am neither… being that I was before, I don’t think that any of my prior names would be particularly appropriate anymore. And as such, it would appear that I need to reclaim my name as well.”

  He started to notice the crowd again, and as his eyes drifted over the crowds, they seemed to deaden the outcasts’ whispering. The outcasts: all of their eyes were darted between him and the red-haired woman who dared to break tradition. While they seemed to be watching him fearfully, they seemed to be looking at Jessica as if she were Hester Prynne and had a scarlet “A” hanging from her neck… or like she was lunch.

  The large abandoned warehouse became all but silent. As the resurrected reaper started walking towards the exit again, the loud clacking of his shoes echoed through the factory. Still, he could feel that their eyes were still on him, and he could sense the growing uncertainty of the mob of outcasts. And as he watched their nervous hands—hands that were holding sharp weapons—start twitching anxiously, he knew that Jessica’s courage had come with a cost. And whether he was now a reaper or a god, he didn’t need to be a genius to see that this was going to end badly for her.

  So he decided to do something about it. Sliding on the balls of his shoes and turning around, his trench coat flipped behind him and revealed something very dangerous, his katana. He tucked his trench coat behind the hilt of his katana then rested his hand on it, tapping his finger on its thin, black tsuba (its handguard). “Now,” he said. “When I leave, I hope that none of you get any crazy ideas and that you all stay on your best behavior. Because… I would hate to find out that my new friend Jessica accidently fell on something sharp—like a bunch of rusted knifes—or mysteriously ran away, or fall victim to any one of a hundred different unfortunate accidents. Because, if that happens, I might forget about the gesture of kindness and restraint that we all shared today. And if that happens, regardless if any of us decide to use our names or not, we are all going to be dealing with something much worse, like a lot of sharp objects flying through the air and at each other.”

  “You see,” he said, holding up his index finger before lowering it and resuming to use it to tap on his katana’s handguard. “This is me trying to be subtle. And obviously, I’m not very good at it, but I’d rather not spell it out you. So, I’m going to assume that you all are catching my drift. Are you catching my drift?” As the mob took a step backwards and their shoulders sank down, it seemed that they had.

  Just as his bravado erupted, a strange feeling followed just as swiftly. Guilt. Before he died, he killed so many of them. Buckets of blood were on his hands. The bloodlust. He was a monster. He turned to Jessica and said, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for killing your friends. It… It won’t happen again.” And he hoped that it was the truth.

  CH 2: Highway to Hell

  Throughout the world and over time, many places have been claimed as being gateways to hell. And in another time and another place, many were. But over the ages, one way or another, most were eventually closed. Now the one-time gateways to hell are nothing more than over-hyped, troublesome tourist traps with above-average rates of missing persons—most of them are, the older ones.

  And over time, as the old gates were closed, new ones emerged. With no rhyme or reason to their location, they appeared all the same, and new legends of old myths were reborn. So far the newer gates hadn’t proved very troublesome, not at all. Despite remained open, all in all they were quite quiet, relative to the prior ones anyways. Seven gates in all, all spread across the world.

  Yet one was located in the oddest of places; Collinsville, Illinois. Not twenty minutes from Baysville, Illinois laid one of the mysterious openings to hell. While the gateway, in itself, is referred to as the Seven Gates of Hell, it was only the last one that was really worth a damn. And this gateway to hell—the Seven Gates of Hell of Collinsville, Illinois—consisted of seven sets of stone overpasses that ran over seven poorly-kept back-country roads, that traced and ran around fields of wheat or corn.

  The urban legends vary, but most claim that the gates were meeting grounds for Satan worshippers, or the location of an old Satanic church, or that they’re haunted by dead children, or haunted by dead women, or cursed, or that they’re the dwelling ground for some other ghost, demon, or any other supernatural being that you could think up.

  Thus, the legend of the Seven Gates of Hell became a hodge-podge of every other urban legend ever known—all wrapped up and bundled into seven convenient locations. But as the legends became more outlandish over time, the convoluted tales became nothing more than a joke amongst the locals and (the gates’) fame never even grew in to the stature of the smallest of tourist traps. But still, like most urban legends, the tales about the Seven Gates of Hell contain a mustard seed of truth.

  And like most urban legends, they bared the markings of brightly-colored lies, just as the gates themselves bared the markings of once-brightly colored, now-faded, graffiti. Though most people thought that it was all a joke, not everyone mocked the urban myth. Tonight it was a car full of drunken teenagers.

  On this pale Tuesday night and in a drunken bout of ignorant courage; a car full of brave, foolish teenagers—who themselves were full of cheap liquor and the liquid-courage that came with it—set out to test the legend and to see the other side.

  The car
was a wild steel container of chaos. Loud techno-music rattled out of the rolled-down windows of the speeding demon—a 98’ Toyota Tercel, and the hard-beats and industrial pulses shouted into the night’s sky while drowning out the wooing, laughing, and cursing coming from within. And while the music blissfully blared into the ears of the drunken teenagers, the demons watching from the corn fields didn’t seem to appreciate it as much. In fact the acid-remix of Scrillex’s latest hit just seemed to attract more of the demons and make them angrier. And as the car whipped down the old-country roads with its music blaring and kicking up clouds of loose gravel, more and more blinking red eyes appeared in the cornfields it passed.

  The teenagers didn’t care. Drunk, high, and wild; they didn’t notice and couldn’t have cared less about their surroundings. They laughed as the car skid onto the graveled-shoulder of the road and back onto the pavement. And with each hard corner the Toyota Tercel took, the drunk teenagers bounced into each other and laughed as they splashed cheap liquor over one another. Drunk and invincible, they were… or they were too foolish to care. Between snarky tweets on their cellphones, snarkier comments, and behavior too coarse and clichéd to mention, the teens didn’t need to see the Gates of Hell to be hell bound. Too young and too juvenile to consider the consequences—sixteen and eternal, demons and drunk driving were not their concern—chalk it up to youthful rebellion. You could, but the creatures watching them—the ones with the glowing red eyes—didn’t. And as the car slid and swerved over the country roads and through each one of the Gates of Hell, the creatures tracking them slid through the fields right along with them, creeping closer to them, stalking them, hunting them. Each sliding curve and every industrial, artificial beat brought them closer to their destination.

  The careless teenagers were oblivious to it all, and they were still squealing and talking over each other, even as death stalked them through the fields of grain. So far their luck had held out, and they had dodged both death and demons well enough, and the night continued. And between the swigs of cheap vodka and the thousand other distractions, the car was still swerving and weaving through each gate, untouched and one-by-one. Three, four, five. But with each passing gate and each flashing cellphone screen and swipe of social media, they teetered ever closer to the edge of death.