“Yeah, I know … he was once the Almighty’s right hand man. General Number nine holds the keys to the abyss and it would be nice if I knew who the hell it is so I can give him a head’s up that he’s next.”
The angel’s eyes narrowed as he glanced at me again through the rear view mirror. I scowled right back at him and then sunk back into the seat to gather my bearings.
“Sariel,” I said, trying to hide the sense of dread in my voice. “I know how all this ends – I’ve seen it. The killer wants to wipe out the world of man. After that, he plans to rise up against you-know-who.”
The angel took some time to contemplate what I’d just revealed. After a few seconds of silence, he opened his mouth. A yellow-gold light appeared as a mist, sparkling and twinkling with heavenly energy and that’s when he made his move. Sariel spun around and reached between the seats with blinding speed, his hand digging into my neck and cutting off my windpipe. I struggled to breath as a surge of force swept through me. My host’s heart began to race – I could hear the irregular pulse in my ears, as I grabbed the angel’s arm and tried to pry his claw-like hand off my neck.
“You’re smarter than you look, death-dealer,” he growled, his voice sounding like some kind of unearthly feral animal. “Perhaps there is far more to you than that of your kind. You claim souls, but soon there will be no more souls to claim. This stinking world is going to burn and there’s not a single thing you can do to stop it. And we’ve got a nice little plan for the girl that you seem to care so much about. Her cries for help will be transformed into screams of pain when we flay the skin off her body. Perhaps you’ve heard her calling to you already. Help me! Help me!”
Holy shit. That voice calling to me back in my flat. It was Amy’s terrified voice calling out through time and space – reaching to me, begging me to save her even before I’d ever met her. Her cries filled my ears and I tried with all my strength to pry his hand away from my throat, but it was fixed in place like it had been welded to my skin. His power coursed through me like a hurricane, seeking out the ancient energy that fueled my existence. I tried to blot it out, but his power burned through my consciousness with an intensity of a supernova. If I didn’t break free quickly, his angelic power would destroy my essence and there’d be one less grim reaper to worry about.
I twisted and turned my body as the angel struggled to hold me in place. I flailed away like a fish caught in a drift net as he maneuvered his torso over the back of the front seat until I was lying flat on my back. Somehow I was able to swing my legs to my chest. I started kicking Sariel in the face with the heel of my shoe as I fought back. If he was experiencing any pain amid my feeble attempt to break free, the angel wasn’t showing it. I drove my heel into his right cheekbone and that one connected because I heard a loud crunch. His grip lessened, but only briefly. I drove my other heel into nose, summoning every last bit of strength there was inside Scott Richter’s body. Another crunch and the angel screamed in an unearthly voice that shook the entire frame of his cab. He reeled back into the front seat roaring with mixture of rage and extreme pain. An explosion of sound burst forth, shattering every single window in the cab and showering me with tiny cube-sized shards of auto glass.
I’d bought myself enough time to try and escape. I scrambled out the back window and tore across Quinpool Road, hoping to put some distance between us. I nearly barreled over a pair of seniors out for an evening walk as I dashed into an alleyway behind a supermarket. I glanced over my shoulder to see if Sariel was anywhere near and to my horror I saw a flash of golden light through the corner of my eye. The air filled with a percussive thumping sound, like the blades of a helicopter slicing through the air. I gazed up into the sky and there he was, resplendent in all his glory. His massive wings outstretched like a canopy as holy light filled the darkness of the alleyway. Sariel’s face was smooth and featureless, but his eyes burned like a bonfire at midnight.
I darted between a pair of old wood-frame houses that had been converted into flats and dove over the hood of a car as I raced for cover. But what kind of cover is any good against a freaking angel? Sariel aimed to destroy me and I didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell unless I could find an edge: something that could give me enough strength to endure whatever he threw at me.
The Halifax Common. I had to make it to the common because an angel in a murderous rage with a hate-on for humanity wouldn’t give a rat’s ass about smiting innocent bystanders and there wouldn’t be anyone there at this late hour. The only problem was the common was about eight blocks away.
My heart pounded like a jackhammer as a knot of pain formed in my left shoulder. Scott Richter, cardiac patient, was about to drop dead for a second time in as many hours if I didn’t stop running. It was time for a desperate and probably stupid move, but I didn’t have a lot of options. I decided to call the angel’s bluff.
I stopped in the lane behind the houses and called out. “When I’m done with you, I’m going to find the bastard to took Amy and peel his divine flesh from his bones! Come down here and face me, Sariel, if you’ve got the balls for it. Who knows, if you win, I bet you’ll have rock star status when you morons create the new heavenly order!”
I’d clearly struck a raw nerve because the angel swooped down like a bird of prey, grabbing me by the armpits and lifting me off the ground like I was his next meal. My feet crashed through the uppermost branches of a chestnut tree as he carried me higher and higher into the night sky, his wings thumping against the air.
“You think you’re clever, death-dealer,” he snarled. “I think you’re too clever by half and it’s time to teach you to respect your betters.”
I gazed down to see the treetops blowing past me at breakneck speed and I wondered if Sariel’s plan was to drop me into the ocean. The fall from a few hundred feet in the air would destroy a normal man and I guessed that he didn’t know about my regenerative powers. Of course, I didn’t know how much damage a fall from a great height would do to my new host or even if I’d have enough time to draw on the living energy surrounding me to conduct any repairs. I’d succeeded in getting the angel away from innocent bystanders, but I had the sinking feeling that my time was nearly up. In a mad panic, I decided to do something even more desperate than calling the angel out.
I flung my arms up and clasped his neck with all my strength. I raised my power and was immediately rocked by a surge of energy the likes of which I’d never experienced. I shut my eyes tight, forcing my essence into the angel’s body. He struggled to block my will as I pushed deeper and deeper, searching for a way to reach his mind. I intended to infect his thoughts like a virus in hope that I could force him to withdraw or better still, tell me where I might find Amy.
We broke into a dive, the air current buffeting against my body like I was a crash test dummy. His mind cried out, screaming with rage that I’d done something so vile, so utterly evil as to leech Holy power from the divine. I felt his fingertips begin to give way. I clamped down on his neck harder this time, my hands tearing into his flesh. I probed his thoughts with every ounce of energy I could muster, brushing past images of golden temples, past a host of His servants singing praise to the Almighty in a unified voice that shook the heavens. Then I saw a celestial battlefield, the ground littered with the broken bodies of angels who’d clashed when they rose up against the creator. I could taste the blood in the air as an image appeared showing a distraught-looking angel brandishing a golden sword. His face was concealed by a shock of yellow-golden hair and he was kneeling down before the mutilated corpse of another angel. I could feel his anger shaking the air when he stood up and gazed out at the dead and the dying. It was Ezekiel, the Angel of Death and Transformation. He glanced at the golden sword he’d used to slay so many of his brothers when a voice laced with unimaginable power called out to him.
“Ezekiel,” the voice commanded. “Know that you carry my spirit with you. Be at peace with what has transpired for it is not of your doing.”
&
nbsp; The angel knelt in obeisance but I felt the tiniest fragment of resentment swelling inside his heart. I knew that he blamed Him for the carnage. I knew that he tried to bury his anger, but when he brought his sword down upon the first of those who rose up he was forever changed. Nothing would ever be the same again. How could it.
“Holy shit,” I choked, as we plummeted from the sky. “Ezekiel … is he the killer? Is an angel possessing human souls and killing his own freaking kind!”
Sariel tried desperately to release me, but I was still clamped onto his neck, still downloading his memories of a battle before time began. I could see open ground about three hundred yards below me and I knew the angel intended to drop me from the sky like a stone. I held on tighter with the plan of releasing my grip when we reached a survivable height for me to fall. Of course, nothing ever works out as planned. The angel drew on his reserves and shook me like a rag doll. I tried with all my strength to maintain my grip, but it was a fruitless effort because in seconds I was falling. The cold night brushed against burning skin but offered little in the way of comfort when compared to the realization that I was in a free fall and the ground was approaching fast.
“This is gonna hurt,” I groaned, as I crashed through the treetops.
And then I was gone.
23
The kind of shit that goes through your mind when you’re plummeting to Earth can be a bit surprising. I should have been screaming madly because there was a real chance I’d wind up splattered all over the ground and instead, I asked myself one simple question: Was Ezekiel the killer, because if he truly was responsible for the deaths of those angels then I should have seen it from a mile away. The prick had tempted me with a chance to rejoin those of my kind and temptation is the exclusive domain of the guys down below, not the freaking Holy host!
I came to with a mouthful of pine needles mixed with blood. My heart was still racing and I was more than amazed that my host’s body hadn’t yet given out. I tried to move when a sharp blast of pain coming from my pelvis shot up my spine. I spat out a big gob of blood as I raised myself up onto my elbows to survey the damage. It wasn’t pretty. My legs were twisted in an unnatural shape, but I could move my toes. At least my host’s spinal cord hadn’t been severed in the fall. Lucky me. I gazed up through the canopy of blue spruce and spotted a neat, man sized hole offering a tiny peek at the clear night sky.
Waves of nausea rolled through my host’s stomach as I tried to sit up. I clenched my jaw tightly and ran my hands down along my waist and onto my hips. Nothing felt out of place, but the fiery currents of pain that brought tears to my eyes told me that I’d probably crushed my pelvis. I wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
And that suited the angel Sariel just fine as he appeared out of the thick overgrowth of spruce and Scotch pine with a look of pure, unadulterated murder in his eyes.
“It takes a great deal of effort to destroy you,” the angel rumbled in the darkness. “I’m half-wondering if He isn’t working through you because you should be dead.”
I ran a sleeve across my eyes as his wings folded back over his shoulders like a cape and he stepped over a small culvert. Sariel’s hands crackled with living energy – hundreds of tiny snaps of lightning arced white-hot as he readied his next volley of power, the one that he was going to use to destroy my essence.
“Haven’t you heard? I’m death itself, you dumbass. You might even say that I’ve never even lived.”
He laughed. It was a cold, spiteful, empty sound that echoed through the woods. “Everything that exists will eventually come to an end, even you, death-dealer.”
“What about your maker?” I spat. “Even the one from whose breath the stars were formed? The one who created those in His own image – you truly want to destroy Him?”
The angel stopped in his tracks. He gazed up at the sky and for a short moment, I could have sworn that I saw him shiver. “I have not said this, death-dealer. Those are your words.”
Another spasm of pain hit me like a sledgehammer and I squeezed my eyes tight to blot it out as I dug my fingers into the ground. “Think about it, Sariel,” I said, trying desperately to buy some more time. “One of your kind has been killing both angels and the Fallen. My bet is that it’s Ezekiel and you’re on his payroll. I haven’t a freaking clue what kind of gripe you guys have with the Almighty, but it’s a pretty ancient gripe. How someone like you, a noble servant of God, could be recruited into a plot for some wild idea of a new divine utopia is beyond my understanding. Angels are supposed to be a reflection of His grace and for crying out loud, you simply can’t destroy the creator of all things! Do you think for one moment that His servants who haven’t turned their backs on him are going to just sit back and let you guys take over?”
“Be silent!” he roared as he sent a blast of supernatural power careening through the darkness. It struck me square in the chest with the force of a battering ram. I fell back into the ground, my head hitting the earth like an anvil.
But his blow didn’t kill me. Why hadn’t Sariel destroyed me yet?
He could have vaporized my body and destroyed my essence when we were soaring over the city and instead, he dropped me after I’d tapped into the Holy energy that fueled his body. He could have summoned a divine sword to chop me into dog-food sized chunks, and instead, he was standing before me in a thick forest on the outskirts of Halifax mincing words about Ezekiel’s plan.
“Listen to me,” I groaned amid another series of painful spasms. “Whatever you’ve been promised, it cannot happen. You can’t unleash another war against the Almighty – you’re only setting yourself up for an entirely new generation of fallen angels.”
His features hardened and I sensed that he was gathering his power for another volley. White hot energy gathered around his hands lighting up the blackness of the woods. I was seconds away from becoming little more than a scorch mark on the ground.
And then something inside me just snapped. I’d been screwed over by angels and demons for the past three days. I’d seen a priest wind up with his head blown off because of his association with me. Carol Sparks had stuck her neck out for me and Amy was gone because I couldn’t protect her. I’d simply had enough.
I grated my teeth together as I began to draw living energy straight out of the ground beneath me. I could feel the warmth of the earth chill at my touch and all around I could hear the life force of the trees, the grass, and those creatures that live beneath the earth cry out in unison. I opened my eyes and gazed out to see Sariel no more than twenty feet away from me readying his next blast of power, and I closed my eyes again, reaching out further than I’d ever pushed myself before. I could feel Sariel’s life force humming like a giant wind turbine. I pushed harder until I’d latched onto Sariel and he screamed in a voice that shook the ground beneath me. I opened my eyes and clenched my jaw tightly, willing my need for power straight into the angel while all around me every living thing was dying to fuel assault on the angel.
I could feel crushed bones in my pelvis knitting back together as my legs worked their way back to their original position. My essence crept forward like a monstrous shadow. The grass, the trees, all living things turned the colour of ash as my essence overtook Sariel and he dropped to his knees. A purifying force washed over my body, a sense of peace and contentment refreshed my senses as I slowly got back to my feet, all the while still tapping the living energy from my surroundings.
Sariel gazed up at me. The murderous look in his eyes was now a distant memory as I trudged across the dead and dying ground until I stood before him.
“You cannot destroy the divine,” he croaked. His face began to wither like fruit rotting on some god-forsaken vine. “You are just a lowly death spirit and you can’t kill me.”
“I’m not killing you, Sariel,” I said, my body now completely regenerated. “You killed yourself when you decided to hook your wagon to a psychopathic angel with delusions of grandeur.”
“There … there was
to be a reckoning,” he gasped. His voice was as dry as sandpaper. “I’ve been promised so much. It was said that we would reunite with our fallen brothers and sisters and we would begin again.”
I don’t know how I’d managed to defeat an angel but the desiccated shell in front of me now resembled a weathered old statue instead of divine creature of Heaven. And this wasn’t the same thing as claiming a soul – power that I’d never known existed within me caused this. For the briefest of moments I thought about the Holy sword and considered the very real possibility that He had been working through me all along. I’d scoffed at the notion when this whole gong show started, but what I’d just accomplished was a feat far beyond my ability.
I placed my hand on the dying angel’s shoulder and shut my eyes again as I pushed my essence through to the very last reserves of his living energy.
“There’s always a reckoning, Sariel,” I said as I tapped him out completely. I opened my eyes and looked on the brittle remains of the now dead angel. “This was yours.”
I raised my right leg and gave the desiccated shell a small kick that immediately disintegrated into a cloud of dust. I searched my pockets for a cigarette, forgetting yet again that I was no longer in my old body.
“Shit.” I grumbled.
***
It turned out that Sariel had dropped me smack dab into the middle of Point Pleasant Park, the largest forested area on the Halifax peninsula and a spot with an breathtaking view of the Atlantic Ocean. It had been hit hard a few years back when Hurricane Juan destroyed a large swath of the natural spruce forest. I’d just made it worse by sucking the life out of a huge patch of land that had to be a mile in diameter. I’d have felt bad about it, too, but if I couldn’t find Amy and somehow stop Ezekiel, the damage I’d caused wouldn’t even be a blip on anyone’s apocalyptic radar.
Immortal Remains: A Tim Reaper Novel Page 19
