The Archangel’s energy form straightened as he gave another look around the crowds. Gabriel adopted a more neutral posture and nodded at Itishree. She turned and yet again began to walk down the center of the street.
In fifteen minutes they had reached First Avenue. And with her was Gabriel, Griffin, and a few hundred random New Yorkers who had been caught up in the moment. Itishree could hear car horns in the distance. No doubt protesting the few hundred cars left stranded in her wake.
Together, Gabriel and Itishree walked straight out into First Avenue’s afternoon traffic. Again, tires squealed against pavement. A new chorus of car horns protested from angry drivers. But when they caught sight of the Griffin/Gabriel enigma, their horns fell silent, car doors opened, and more people gawked. Itishree and Gabriel stood for several long moments in stopped traffic. Itishree realized, finally, Gabriel wanted as much attention as possible before moving on. They both struck poses more as superhero’s than religious icons. Once First Avenue fell as silent as West Thirty Third, Itishree continued north, heading for the United Nations Headquarter’s Building.
On First Avenue they were walking with traffic. The throngs of people falling Itishree and Gabriel clogged the street from curb to curb. They stayed back fifty feet behind Gabriel, obviously worried as the intention of the Angelic humanoid hybrid. Itishree walked two paces ahead of Gabriel. Ahead of Itishree, First Avenue emptied of traffic. Its river-like sources of cars cut off behind them. The monolith of the UN Building loomed ahead and to the right. Itishree noted they were also near the water and a cooler breeze was being drawn to the water.
In front of the UN south gate a police car was permanently parked in cases of emergencies or the occasional disobedient New Yorker or pissed-off tourist. Itishree saw the officer notice the lack of traffic and check both his mirrors. The police cruiser’s driver door opened and the officer pulled up his belt and trousers, weighing the crowd walking toward him, the UN locked front gate, and guard shack. She saw him reach for his shoulder radio mic and key in an urgent call. Momentarily, he ducked back into the cruiser. Itishree saw the car’s roof lights come to life. And the officer exited the car again, and slammed the door.
“Don’t kill him, Gabriel,” Itishree said. “Please don’t kill him.”
Gabriel made no sign he acknowledged her request.
Three things happened at once. The officer unsnapped the restraint from his weapon holster. Itishree took in a breath. And the officer’s car was smashed flat with an explosive detonation. Glass, metal, and rubber was blown into the street in all directions. The officer jerked his head toward his car and saw Gabriel’s mid section. His energy form towering over him. The officer’s gaze ran up Gabriel’s chest and onto the Archangel’s face. Gabriel reached out to the drawn weapon and the breeze carried the gun away within a cloud of black dust. Without taking his stare from Gabriel, the officer turned and just walked up the street. Gabriel looked back at Itishree and smiled.
Itishree felt a hand fall onto her shoulder. She wasn’t startled. She turned to see Griffin smiling at her. Itishree turned back to face the guard shack and held out her hand to her side. Griffin took it. They walked up to the thick glass, hand in hand, facing the guards inside. The guards were half hunkered down trying to use the shack wall as cover. They were visibly afraid of Gabriel but Itishree could see they didn’t know how to react to the omnipotent Archangel. Sirens wailed in the distance, Itishree heard. More interference would be here shortly.
“Excuse me, love,” Itishree said to Griffin as she dropped his hand and headed to the squashed patrol cruiser. The crowd that had followed them was forming a semi circle around the UN gate complex. Itishree knew she only had one chance at addressing the crowd before going in, or having more police arrive. She walked to and then stepped up onto the cruiser. The crowd of faithful saw her standing head and shoulders above them. In unison they stopped and quieted.
Itishree looked over them for long moments. She saw the nun many rows deep in the crowd. Her tears were gone, replaced by a warm smile. See nodded towards a business man dressed in an expensive suit. He too wore a friendly inviting smile. Itishree imagined the reason they were here and the emotion swimming through their hearts was that this was the only truly meaningful event these people had faced in years.
Itishree scanned the crowd and found the German Shepherd that had come up to her many blocks back. When she made eye contact with the dog, it gave her a single bark. Itishree felt the dog understood too. The crowd was made up of people from all walks: rich, poor, all races, young workers, and aged folk who had been driving around for, up until now, reasons that seemed important. Itishree saw nurses, three firemen, and other city workers. Only a few people held up their smart devices, taking photos or video. The common factor amongst them all was that they wanted to be here in this moment with her, and they waited for her to speak.
“People,” she said and cleared her throat. “Friends, I must be brief.” she started over increasing the volume of her voice.
Gabriel walked up next to the smashed cruiser and looked out over the crowd. Even with Itishree standing on the crushed roof, he was two feet taller still.
“You have wondered for your entire lives, why are we here? What is the meaning to this?” She made a gesture to the city behind them with both her arms. “You’ve asked your religious leaders, why? You’ve questioned your life and your place, here.” Itishree pointed to her feet. Now she grasped her hands in front of her and took another moment reviewing the crowd. They remained transfixed on her. Obediently silent. But, the sirens grew louder.
“Due to the greed of our leaders, and the misleading writings or long dead theologians, we have been lead into this state of uncertain misery, we call life.” Itishree said with a grim expression.
“I have been given the task to replace your misery with truth. I am here to answer those questions and more. In short, we must relearn to trust one another. To work together.” Itishree paused letting her words sink into the crowd. “The next few years will be awful. Our leaders will inflict harm upon us resisting this change. Many of you will suffer. I am sorry. Mankind has drifted far from the design of God and our place in this universe. We are being given one last attempt to right our human nature.” Itishree made a simple motion towards Gabriel. “Or, we will find our end.” Gabriel held out his left arm to the sky and small bouts of lightning made crackles from his opened hand. A large ornate horn appeared, and Gabriel took it from the air. The horn was made of a silver metal which wound into two complete circles within itself. Multiple tassels of metal beads were tied off near the horn’s over sized mouth piece. The crowd nearly bolted. Some cried out, knowing the instrument in Gabriel’s clutch.
Itishree had been watching Gabriel but made no sudden movements. She faced the people again.
“But I will not let this happen. God has given us this one last chance. I will be your teacher.” Itishree said. Then she turned and hopped down from the wrecked car, and held out her hand for Griffin. He took it, and together, they walked toward the locked black gate. Gabriel vanished from the street. The horn vanished with him. The gate dissolved into dust and piled onto the marble and concrete entrance. Itishree and Griffin stepped over the gate’s remains and into the UN compound.
Itishree and Griffin walked into the UN office complex building, up the long ramp to the second floor, and turned left down a long wide hallway filled with busy well-dressed people. Gabriel was not with them. Few of the people in the hall took notice of the pair. Itishree could feel Griffin’s grasp squeeze tighter. She glanced over at him and gave a warm grin of adventure, and laughed. She felt great, connected, grounded. She knew this is what she was meant to do. The feeling swelled within her, threatening to produce her own tears of pride.
“Father,” she whispered to herself. He would be proud, she knew. Her father would understand the way she felt.
They turned and walked through a connected series of offices which opened up onto another
wider, open space. Beyond this space lay multiple sets of double doors. Itishree could hear the amplified voice of an orator as random doors were opened and closed. The clipped accent was too heavy for Itishree to understand.
“Hey,” Itishree heard Griffin call out in a whisper. She hadn’t realized she had stood, paralyzed, in the open atrium. She looked over and hurried into the room. It was a nearly empty space. The room held only a small desk with two uncomfortable looking chairs. Two additional chairs were against the back wall. Itishree imagined the room was available for ad-hoc discussions off the UN floor.
“We can wait here until the speech is over,” Griffin said.
Itishree craned her body outside the door ensuring she could hear the orator and would estimate its end. She darted back inside when she noticed the small spheres of light closing in around the office Griffin had chosen for them to hide. So much for the secret, she thought. Looking out through the door, Itishree saw she hadn’t been the only one to see the dancing spheres. She huffed and withdrew back into the office, closing the door. Gabriel fused into Griffin’s body. The effect seem to make Griffin shudder. The meld seemed to be different this time, Itishree thought. She saw the familiar change of eye color and knew Gabriel had taken control of Griffin once again.
Suddenly, Griffin jumped toward her, pulling her behind him. Itishree crashed against the back corner of the office. The office door exploded off its hinges and was flung back smashing out one of the office windows. Its metal blinds spewed fractured shards of glass onto the floor. In ran six guards. They wore heavy body armor and held their weapons drawn, focused on Griffin and Gabriel. The guards were screaming all at once. A ragged chorus of “Don’t move!”, “Hands in the air!”, and “On your knees!” was intimidating, but mostly, confusing. Five fanned out in a semi-circle around Griffin. The sixth pulled Itishree off the floor and onto her feet. She had thrown herself down, behind the desk instinctively, when she heard the door blast open.
“Who are you people?” the guard holding her yelled into her face. Itishree had been assaulted by too many influences in too short of a time span. She found she couldn’t react at all to the guard screaming and shaking her violently.
Griffin drew a up a hand palm up. What Itishree saw happen she would never forget. A pestilence spread across the room turning the guard’s flesh into ash. The effect swam left to right across the room. The last guard on the right was the only one who witnessed the oncoming death. He had just enough time to form his mouth into a scream when his visage puffed into ash. A muffled scream was snuffed out next to her. She turned and screamed herself as she saw the weight of the guard’s helmet crush the ashes that were once a man’s head. Itishree jerked away. The motion caused the pile of ash to dump onto the floor. The guard’s armored glove still attached to Itishree’s arm.
The bodies of the other guards made slow cascading tumbles onto the floor. The next few moments the room was waist deep in ash soot dancing from the air generated from the fallen figures.
Itishree looked to Griffin to see if he was all right. He seemed to be folded in on himself, gathering an inner force. His body uncurled and Griffin let out a long scream, “Noooooooooo”.
Gabriel was hurled from Griffin’s form. The Archangel’s energy force filled the opposite half of the room like a quickly filled balloon. The Archangel’s back was against the ceiling. His gigantic face inches from Griffins. Gabriel was in his thirty foot form bent over at the waist. His hands and lower arms were on the floor. The light coming off the Archangel was blinding. But Griffin wasn’t turning from the Archangel.
“No more killing!” Griffin screamed out each word as if each made its own sentence. “I cannot stand to feel another life ripped from their body, Gabriel. I can’t do it again. You must find another way. No more death. No more.”
The Archangel’s light flared from the challenge coming from Griffin.
The two stared at each other for a long moment. Griffin was red faced and angry as hell, Itishree saw. Gabriel’s expression would have made all of Moses hair go white, she imagined. The Archangel was just as pissed as Griffin. It was Gabriel who gave way first. His form slowly shrank down to the nine foot form Itishree knew best. Gabriel eyed Griffin, and then nodded once. Griffin returned the nod as Gabriel vanished into a cloud of tiny dancing sprites.
“Come on,” Griffin said to Itishree. “We have to hit the General Assembly Hall now. We have little time.”
Change
Griffin and Itishree stood inside the darkened corner behind and to the left of the marble lectures. The alcove was created by the circular shape of the General Assembly Room and the second floor entrance flat entrance. The excitement they had caused had cleared the second atrium. But the ruckus had not spilled into the General Assembly proceedings. The two looked out onto an ocean of the planet’s delegates. The room itself was impressive enough to frighten all but a few. Now, full of delegates, the task they were about to partake seemed impossible. They were twenty five steps from the speakers podium.
Itishree and Griffin stood leaning onto the rail and looking out, both mouths agog. Itishree was too busy with her own fear to wonder how Griffin was doing.
“You go first,” Itishree joked.
“No, you.” Griffin joked back.
“Make me,” she said.
Griffin turned on Itishree with a serious smile. He said nothing but stared. She turned to face him and knew the joking was over. They hadn’t been paying particular attention to the speaker but the floor was getting restless. The speech was coming to an end. From the closing words Itishree made out the speaker was from a country effected greatly by climate change. His closing statements urging passage of an upcoming vote on carbon decreases, or something along those lines. His needs didn’t seem as grave as everyone’s concern was about to become, she knew.
The speaker cleared the podium and walked down the few steps to take his place in the crowd. There was a respectable level of applause while the speaker, an ambassador they both knew now, was stopped with handshakes every five paces. Congratulatory nods sprang about in the crowd like wild flowers in an autumn garden.
A well dressed middle-aged man rose to walk to the podium. As he stepped around his isle of arced tables he expertly placed a set of fine reading glasses upon his nose. He was glancing through a folder he carried with him, making the practiced walk toward the podium. Paying little attention to where he walked. The chairman had taken these steps dozens of speeches over his tenure. He stopped suddenly and looked up from the folder. Light popped into existence and washed over him, level with his sight. Itishree watched and knew Gabriel was making his entrance. She nudged Griffin down the rail toward the steps, leading them down onto the Assembly floor.
The light grew, and took shape. First of a man, then of an angel. Gabriel jutted out his wings to their full width. As he grew his wings grew. Many representatives took to their feet. Itishree saw many pointing. Many shouted out in reaction. Slowly the Archangel grew past his nine foot frame. He was increasing in size. Itishree knew the Archangel was going for the maximum attention and wouldn’t stop growing until, maybe his thirty foot form. She was almost pushing Griffin along now, using the distraction to make their way to the podium.
The chairman hadn’t moved the few moments since Gabriel had formed. His gaze was rolling higher and higher as Gabriel grew and elevated himself above the Assembly floor. When the Archangel came to his full thirty foot height, Itishree saw Gabriel give the chairman a back-handed signal to ‘begone’ from his general area. The chairman compiled, backing away and never taking his eyes from the angelic form.
Griffin stopped at the closest edge of the podium and tried to appear casual. Itishree grinned touching him on the shoulder with a small act of affection. She climbed the last two steps of the raised platform. Itishree took her notepad out and placed it upon the lectern. She cleared her throat and looked out upon the Assembly hall. Gabriel was menacing the planet’s representatives. The hall had b
ecome a gathering of terrified clumps of people. Smart devices collecting video and still images. Flashes plumed here and there. Itishree tapped the dual microphones with her fingers. She could barely hear the dull thunks over the cries of panic.
“Mr. Gabriel, please join me at my side,” Itishree said. Her voice squeaked a little, almost cracking.
The Archangel looked over it’s left shoulder, then turned and walked to the podium. He only required three steps at this massive size. Gabriel stood over Griffin enveloping the vessel in his energy.
Itishree found her place in the notes she had written on the train. Her heart lept into her throat but she forced it back down.
“Father, lend me your strength,” she asked the heavens to herself.
Itishree relaxed and spread her feet shoulders width and inhaled her last breath as an unknown mortal.
“The words of God,” Gabriel boomed over the hall’s intercom system. It was Griffin’s voice. But he was no where near an open microphone, Itishree thought. Since Gabriel had backed away and had not slaughtered anyone in the hall, the ambassador’s and other attendees had drawn closer to their original seats. A few had taken seats wherever they felt safest. Most stood, ready to flee.
“People of Earth,” Itishree began. “Over the modern history of man, since the advent of recorded time, the Archangel Gabriel has delivered the word of God. There have been spans of time between his travels to us. Sometimes centuries, or longer. When Gabriel spoke to Abraham the message was of faith beyond reality, courage, trust in your creator, and the demands of God. This message was forgotten. Moses brought the imprisoned people hope, taught mankind that slavery was an ugly sin, established the most basic laws of God, and gave clear demonstration of God’s power over man. This message forgotten.”
Itishree looked out over the assembly again, pausing to moisten her throat. She pushed away her fears and she vowed to never be afraid again. This is too important, she thought. “Be here now, be the love,” she heard her father say.
Divine Destruction (The Return of Divinity Book 1) Page 27
