by Nana Malone
Azrael followed. He realized the moment he emerged on the other side it had been a mistake.
“Malak al-Maut,” Mahmud laughed. “Our god has prepared a welcome feast in your honor! He shall dine upon what’s left of your life energy as soon as he uses it to escape!” Mahmud threw himself through a small portal and slammed shut the hatch.
Azrael tried to follow and realized, for the first time since he’d become a creature of the void, that he couldn’t simply pass through the wall of the chamber. The walls were shielded like his … cloak? The chamber vibrated as power built to its apex. He was trapped inside a nuclear power plant. A nuclear power plant retrofitted with a tachyon particle accelerator. Saddam Hussein’s palace had been a ruse to lure him into a trap.
“Oh … crap!”
Billions of tachyons slammed him into the wall. Particles tore through his consciousness. He had physical mass? When had he begun to develop physical mass? Azrael realized he now possessed fragments of DNA.
It hurt! It hurt! He reached for the reservoir of primordial chaos he sometimes fed upon and realized he was cut off by the shielding chamber. The energy released by his own pain caused a putrid green circle to open up behind him. Particles tore at his hand, the place where the mass he’d begun to accrue was densest, and began to tear him apart. The portal grew larger. Azrael desperately clung to the sides of the particle accelerator, trying to keep his consciousness from getting sucked in. In his injured state, he’d be easy prey!
“Elisabeth!” Azrael screamed as he realized why he had physical mass, who she was, and what she had carried across time.
Laughter rang though the particle accelerator as the Agent gloated at Azrael’s foolishness in thinking he’d remain invulnerable forever.
“Elissar…” Azrael's consciousness began to fray, destroyed by the very anti-matter he wielded as a creature of the void. He wrapped his tentacles around the tiny, broken fragment of his DNA, the memory of which was all she’d been able to carry with her when she’d come back to find him.
“Ki…”
Azrael sent out the mental plea as his consciousness began to dissipate. All that mattered was he hang onto that tiny fragment of DNA and the slender tendril of consciousness which connected him to the twin-spark who’d been searching for him for 2,300 years, but because of the cruel rules of this universe, had been forbidden to remember him.
The reactor shuddered. A deeper, more powerful vibration rattled the chamber. A horrible, terrifying sound.
An explosion.
The sensation of being torn apart was suddenly gone. Its power source eliminated, the portal disappeared. The chamber dissolved into primordial goo. Azrael shot out like a cannonball and splattered against the wall. He peeled off like a pancake and plopped on the floor, tentacles in a jumbled mass. He writhed in pain as he realized who Ki had sent to free him.
“You dare prey upon my prodigy?”
The bat-winged Regent hovered over Azrael’s limp form, more beast than human as her flesh turned black with power. Molecules vibrated with each flap of her bat-like wings as a singularity of destruction began to throb within her. Clawed fists clenched in lethal anticipation as she bared her fangs.
And people thought HE was scary …
She stalked towards the Agent like a panther moving in for the kill. Her razor-sharp scorpion tail rose above her back like an arm wielding a sword, ready to strike. With each step her visage grew larger, more terrible than even Moloch himself. The ground trembled, as if the Earth understood the Regent could uncreate it with a single thought.
Azrael twitched, unable to regain control of his tentacles. He’d heard the sister of the Guardian was terrifying, but he’d never seen it. The others went to great lengths to keep her calm … and humanoid. Now he understood why.
“You are forbidden to interfere,” Mahmud squeaked in terror. “The Armistice says all you can do is lock me in Gehenna.”
The Regent stared at the petty god with her pitiless black eyes. “Your laws do not apply to the Lords of Chaos. I enforce the ancient decree. All who upset the balance shall be uncreated!”
Her scorpion-like tail twitched like a cat stalking a mouse. She fed upon the Agent's fear the same way Moloch fed upon the consciousnesses of his victims, rustling her wing-spikes to increase his terror. Unlike Moloch, her food-source was not the life-energy of the young and innocent, but those consciousnesses too old, too tough, too powerful and depraved to be digested by the other gods who sought to keep the balance. She was a carrion bird, come to feast upon all that was cancerous.
“No!” Mahmud shrieked, trying to leap out of her path.
The Regent struck out with one leathery wing and skewered him upon a deadly wing spike. He begged for mercy as she bit into his neck, tearing out chunks of consciousness with her enormous fangs. Mahmud received the same mercy he'd just given to Azrael … none. Consciousness spurted onto the walls like blood until Mahmud finally stopped screaming. Although she could have simply uncreated him with a flick of her wrist, the Regent, it appeared, preferred her destruction up close and personal.
‘What have I done? Please. Stop. You’re scaring me.’ Azrael twitched helplessly, unable to give voice to the terror screaming through his damaged mind.
The Regent lifted her head and howled, a deep, horrible sound, a lioness heralding her kill. She dissipated the chewed, bloody mass of what had once been Mahmud into primordial nothingness and absorbed its essence, causing her to grow larger and even more terrifying than she had been before. Azrael tried to reach towards her and realized it was a mistake. His sorry condition only fueled her rage.
“Not enough!!!” she screamed. Her voice caused the ceiling above them to shudder and disappear, exposing the dawn. “I am hungry and I need to feed.”
Azrael felt the Song of Destruction in her voice grow louder, causing the damaged reactor to whine in harmonic resonance with her anger. Concrete buckled as the rebar became malleable in answer to her song. The molecules which made up the walls released their sub-atomic bonds and melted into puddles like a Salvatore Dali clock, bending towards her as she summoned their essence to feed her growing rage.
The Regent pulled twin-swords from her back, her mortal weapons of choice, and two more arms sprouted from her torso as though she was one of the four-armed Cherubim. Her horns grew longer and sharper, every aspect of her being a deadly weapon. She grabbed a chunk of steel rebar from the destroyed reactor and, with a wave of her hand, reshaped it into a scythe. Kalika. The Dark Mother, preparing to walk the Earth.
If Azrael had attempted to wield that amount of power, the entire galaxy would have already been destroyed. He tried to form words. To soothe her. To rein her in before she wiped out the planet.
‘Ki! Help! Please? What did I unleash?’
The Regent lifted her head to the rising sun and howled, every shred of her humanity fleeing as she opened the reservoir to her brother's power. The Earth shuddered as it ceased spinning clockwise and, with a jerk most mortals would mistake for an earthquake, caused the rising sun to slip backwards beneath the horizon.
“Mo ghra [my love],” a voice called. “Azrael is still with us. You’re frightening him. Le do thoil, gra [please, love]. Let me comfort you and dry your tears.”
Azrael recognized the voice of the General, come to soothe his mate. The Regent crouched, tail twitching, ready to spring away and resume her killing spree, more animal than humanoid.
“I grow weary of these pathetic games the other gods play with Moloch,” the Regent snarled, twitching her spiked tail to dissolve some rubble into primordial nothingness. “I shall awaken my brother and we shall destroy him together.”
“You brother has not yet found his true mate,” the General stepped before the enormous beast which towered over him like a behemoth. “Without the bond, he can no more control his power than you can. Would you deny your brother the chance to find the love that we have found?”
“Moloch devours Earth’s children!”
the Regent cried out, not anger in her voice this time, but sorrow. “If we don’t find a way to destroy him, eventually he will succeed!”
“Yes, my Queen,” the General agreed. “We shall find a way to destroy him. But not today. Today … our daughter who grows in your womb has been forced to know your power before she is ready. Our children wait just beyond the wall, upset their mother is so angry. And Azrael lies badly injured on the floor. He needs you to help him heal.”
Black tears spilled forth from her eyes like rivers, dissolving the floor. They fell on the General like gentle rain, dissolving the armored vest he always wore over his heart at her insistence and exposing the scar everyone knew about, but none had ever seen. Her tears destroyed all they touched, but he was unharmed. It was as though, with each teardrop, she cast off the power she was loathe to control. Rivers of blackness formed upon the floor as she shimmered and shrank back down to her normal size, still a four-armed creature, but small enough to seek comfort from the Archangel who stood before her. With a sob of anguish, she dropped her swords and flung herself into her husband's arms.
"It's okay, mo ghra," the General soothed his mate. "You got here in time. Azrael is saved."
“He won’t take my healing!” the Regent wept, great black tears streaming down her ebony cheeks. “He never would. I don’t understand why?”
Azrael knew why. He tried to speak and failed, but the involuntary flailing of his tentacles brought his efforts to the General's attention.
“Azrael … tell us what you need,” the General asked.
Azrael could no longer form sounds, but he knew what he needed. The question was, would she help him? Or would she run screaming in terror? Reaching a tendril of consciousness towards the Regent, the only person he could touch without killing, he projected the single thought into her mind.
“Elisabeth.”
* * * * *
Chapter 51
‘Tis a fearful thing
To love
What death can touch,
To love, to hope, to dream,
And oh, to lose.
A thing for fools, this,
Love,
But a holy thing,
To love what death can touch.
For your life has lived in me;
Your laugh once lifted me;
Your word was a gift to me.
To remember this brings painful joy.
‘Tis a human thing, love,
A holy thing,
To love
What death can touch.
Judah Halevi or
Emanuel of Rome – 12th Century
Earth - AD April, 2003
Kirkuk, Iraq
“Elisabeth!” Kadima urgently tugged at the back of her uniform.
“Kinda busy!” Elisabeth fished shrapnel out of the leg of a carpentry/masonry specialist unfortunate enough to drive over an improvised explosive device. “This gal was lucky. The armor plating they welded to the floor took most of the shrapnel. She’ll be on her feet shooting bad guys in a matter of weeks.”
“Oh … my …” Mary stammered.
Elisabeth had a bad feeling about this patient. Or something. It felt as though she wanted to crawl out of her skin, but she was so damned busy she hadn’t had a chance to focus on what the hell was giving her pins and needles. It didn't help that, around twenty minutes ago, birds had fallen from the sky and every dog for twenty miles had started yowling after the explosion … or earthquake … or whatever the hell it was had hit.
“Holy shhh … uh … I mean … um…” Lucy sputtered.
“Elisabeth!” Kadima hissed again, tugging at her shirt. “Somebody is here to see you!”
Elisabeth looked up into the most unearthly blue eyes she’d ever seen. More than seven and a half feet tall, the massively muscled Archangel stared down at her with an emotionless expression. Rather than the medieval armor churches depicted angels wearing, he wore the remnants of a military uniform that looked as though someone had dripped battery acid onto it, exposing bare skin which looked every bit as mortal as any other soldier running around the base outside Kirkuk. It was the ornate insignia on his otherwise tattered shirt which clued her she was speaking to a very high ranking Archangel, indeed.
“Come with me, please,” he reached out one hand to take hers.
Elisabeth stared up at the mountain of a man who dominated the tent. Fair-skinned, dark-haired, dark-winged, with beautiful, chiseled features that looked like an older version of Azrael, the archangel stared down at her from a massive height. There was no emotion in that face, not even that 'you'd better obey me or else' look sported by higher-ranking military officers. Elisabeth glanced down at the soldier in whose leg her hands were buried.
“I’m in surgery, Sir!” Elisabeth snapped. “What is it with you guys? You think you can just barge in and I’ll drop everything?”
“Azrael has been badly injured,” the Archangel said, a shadow of concern crossing his face. “He needs you.”
“Injured?” Recognition of that terrible feeling forced Elisabeth to pause fishing shrapnel out of the patient's leg. “I thought…”
“Azrael has been badly injured,” the Archangel repeated. “The Regent thinks you may be able to help him. Will you come with me?”
“Go!” Kadima hissed. “Don’t you know who this is?” She made the Islamic gesture of respect and greeting, touching her hand to her forehead, lips and heart and murmured something in Bosnian.
“I thought … we couldn’t touch you?” Elisabeth warily looked at the enormous hand which reached to take hers.
“Only those harnessing the power of the void must be cautious about who they touch,” the Archangel said. “We must hurry. It’s not good to leave the Regent alone when she is this upset.”
“Let me finish,” Elisabeth said. “Please. And then I’ll go. I can’t just leave this soldier to bleed out on the operating table.”
The Archangel placed both hands upon the leg Elisabeth had been picking chunks of shrapnel, floor board and rock out of for the past half hour. The room felt as though they were standing near high-tension power lines, but the sensation was pleasant. His stern features softened as he transformed from soldier to healer, giving him a bit of a tender, vulnerable expression. Slivers of shrapnel worked their way to the surface as the leg-wound began to close up, scab over, and scar as though she were watching a high-speed video of the natural healing process.
“S-s-saint Michael?” Elisabeth blurted as the insignia of rank finally clicked. “Um … Kadima? Could you please make some excuse why I’m not here and make sure this soldier is taken care of?”
“Of course,” Kadima said. “Now go! Harold isn’t going to believe this!” By the tone of her voice, it wasn’t a question as to whether her husband would believe her, but rather that the General himself had made an appearance in their ranks.
Elisabeth reached up to take his hand, marveling at how enormous he was compared even to Azrael. Larger than life. That was how Azrael described his famous commanding officer. He wasn’t kidding!
“It won’t hurt,” the General reassured her. “I’ll bring you to him now.”
Except for the hum of energy, the General’s hand was every bit as warm and human-feeling as hers, not cool like she remembered Azrael’s had been. Elisabeth didn’t have time to gulp with fear before there was a moment of nothingness, as though she free-floated in space and she was space as well, and then she was someplace else.
The General held her hand firmly until she caught her balance. She was in a concrete bunker?
No … mangled equipment sat in the center of the room. The roof had been torn off and, just at the horizon, the sun was beginning to rise, not the middle of the night as it had been in Iraq. To one side a second angel kneeled on the floor, caressing an enormous black squid and speaking to it in a soothing language she couldn’t understand.
Elisabeth startled as she realized that was no angel. The woman was as dark as Azrael, with enormous
spiked wings, horns, a spiked tail, and four arms. Strapped to her back so they crisscrossed between the juncture of the wings sat twin swords. A scythe lay on the floor beside her.
“Kalika,” Elisabeth whispered, recognizing the image from a small statuette Nancy had kept on the mantle of her house. Destroyer. The Black Madonna. The woman Azrael called 'Regent.'
The Dark Mother looked up, her bottomless black eyes swirling with vast power. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she clutched a tentacle to her chest and wept.
“He won’t let me heal him,” the Regent sobbed. “I’m not sure how it happened. He can’t … touch … you. You usually … you have to … he didn’t … you couldn’t. But … somehow … it happened. He bonded with you and only you can heal him!”
“I don’t understand,” Elisabeth said. Horror dawned on her as she realized what, or more accurately, who, was crumpled in a tangled mass of tentacles on the floor. “Azrael? Is that you?”
“He can’t answer you, child,” the General said. “I warned him it was not wise to taunt Moloch by leaving a calling card. The Evil One decided to make an example of him.”
Elisabeth stared at the pool of black sludge shuddering in pain. She’d seen his natural form once before. It wasn’t pretty. But watching how tenderly the Regent clutched his tentacles to her chest convinced her it really was him.
“It’s instinctive for their species to bond with the one they love,” the Regent said. Black tears dissolved the floor beneath her. “He won’t let me heal him because he’s chosen you to be his mate.”
“M-m-me?” Elisabeth stammered. “Really?”
Her heart did a little flip-flop as the Regent voiced the words that had been very much on her mind lately. She was unable to hide the hopeful lilt to her voice.
