TF- C - 00.00 - THE FALLEN Dark Fantasy Series: A Dark Dystopian Fantasy (Books 1 - 3)

by Steve Windsor

  Rain hopped and flapped down from her perch. And when she did, everyone in the room could see the words on the throne, reminding them that she was no longer Salvation and Jump’s innocent child.

  Rain walked down a couple of steps, tightening her own wings behind her back.

  The guardians both stepped forward with her.

  Then Rain stopped—one step above Salvation—and she cawed in a tone that was unmistakably defiant. “I was unaware that I was required to inform you of all of my duties and decisions,” she said. “Regardless, it is not people.”

  Salvation didn’t hear the last part. She leaned forward and shook her head a little, pointing her finger at Rain. “Oh, don’t even—don’t take that tone with me,” she said. “I’m still your mother.”

  Jump took half a step forward. “Don’t talk like that to—”

  But a quick look and an angry squint from Salvation cut off Jump’s warning. Then she said nothing. Two eternities in, if her husband didn’t know by now, he’d be reminded when this was all over.

  Jump raised his eyes in surprise at her and held up his hands in front of him. “What?” he said. “She can’t talk to you—I’m trying to help!”

  “Don’t,” was all that Salvation had to say. And that was that. She turned back toward Rain, now floating in the chamber, just like they had all seen Life do at the Battle of the Books. “Stop that,” Salvation said to her. “This is serious, Rain. It’s not some—those two are the most conniving creatures you can imagine, and if that bitch can resurrect—this is so bad. You have no”—she shook her head—“we could have helped! Maybe prevented any of this from ever happening in the first place. Now we’ve got—Faith is shooting at us, Fury is missing with a bunch of our hatchlings, and now this? You’re playing with fire and that bastard is made out of it. Resurrection? … Jesus Christ!”

  One of the benefits of being chosen as Protector was gaining access to the historical Library of Lambs. A huge hidden hallway surrounding the throne chamber of the Protectors like a moat. The outside edge of the circular stone tunnel was packed with rows and rows of scrolls and books, and parchments of all shapes and sizes.

  The fruits of authors and scribes—stories of long-past eternities, and those not that far gone—stood at attention like soldiers of wisdom past, floor to ceiling on the stone-chiseled shelves, silently waiting for those with the will to command their wisdom.

  In preparation for the first time that Rain was to sit on her new throne, she had cleared her chamber of all but her most trusted advisor—her friend. She was a little nervous at first. The weight of the responsibility of being Protector had her apprehensive that she would not be able to shoulder the task, much less wield the power of the position to the benefit of all.

  “To the Benefit of All.” That was the edict of the Protectors, chiseled deeply into the granite on the stone shield that formed the back of the throne’s perch. And that was the double edge of the Sword of Power. It was the task that came for those who sat in judgment on the throne—the power and the responsibility of gods.

  After the sun set on the end of Life’s eternity and at the very dawn of her reign, Rain had walked up the steps, tentatively at first, silently excited and afraid at the same time. It was a scary thing for a young Protector, so she was also quietly happy that she was not alone.

  Rain—Amy Blake—had felt so powerless in her life, constantly under the watchful wing of her father, while assaulted on all fronts with situations and people she had no idea how to handle on her own. She had only had a glimpse of her powers at the end of the Battle of the Books, but to go from that to all-powerful god? “How will I do it?” she had held the hand of her confidant and asked.

  “To the Benefit of All.” … It was the “all” part that confused Rain the most. What did that mean? For certain, it was difficult to misconstrue a word like “all.” However, “benefit” was a term open to wild interpretation. One man’s benefit—or woman’s or angel’s, for that matter—was sure to affect another’s. So what prosperity could she bring to one that would not bring poverty to another? The “win-win” result that her father sarcastically joked about was lost in her understanding of how to bring it to reality.

  “All…” It was like a hammer that swung wildly, over and over with the intention to hit a spike on the head. And yet Rain missed each attempt to understand the point. She had stared at the words on the shield of the throne with her friend … for minutes it seemed before either of them spoke. “What … what does it mean?” she had asked herself as much as her companion.

  “I’m sure I don’t fucking—uh … I have no idea,” her friend had said, failing at practicing her new ruler’s cursing covenant. “Why don’t you just like, sit on it?” she had suggested. “See how it feels.”

  Rain hesitantly let go of her companion’s hand, slowly climbed the remaining steps, and then tentatively flapped her wings and landed on the throne’s shining silver perch. Her head had immediately jerked up toward the ceiling and great clouds and lightning formed above her, and her eyes rolled back and turned a darker shade, and her eyelashes fluttered and then the feelings all blasted her mind at once.

  Empathy and contempt, sadness and joy, and confusion and … understanding came down in little jolts of electro from the clouds over her head, like the bolts from the former Protector, Life. And blinding light blasted Rain’s thoughts, and self-awareness and knowledge melded with her soul.

  Rain’s friend had rushed up the steps to the throne to come to her aid. But there was no help that her new ruler needed in swinging the sword of power. What was happening to her was the point.

  So when her friend grabbed onto Rain’s arm, a small bolt of lightning knocked her back down the steps. Rain lowered her head and looked at the angel, doubled over in pain on the floor of her chamber. Rain shouted, “You mustn’t touch!” Then her head jerked toward the ceiling again and she shook for what seemed like minutes, at least.

  When it was over, Rain’s eyes returned to normal and she lowered her chin all the way to her chest, staring down at her hearts, and she did understand … more than she ever wanted to.

  When she raised her head slowly and looked at her friend, Rain had changed … forever. Gone was the frightened and frail girl of her eternity as a Man-monkey in the garden, left behind was her youthful naiveté as a newly-crowned Protector, and lost was her innocence and folly of youth. And she understood her own nature and that of the garden and the natures of all of the creatures in Life’s eternity. And Rain knew what she must do to ensure that the failures in that god’s realm … did not repeat in her own.

  There was no way she could explain it to the only confidant she had ever trusted. Regardless, Rain knew it was not something to be explained to an archangel, much less a fallen one from Hell. Rain’s responsibility was a godly duty … and only gods could understand it.

  So when she looked down from the throne at her friend and smiled, Rain’s face was different … but the same. “I am prepared.” It was all that she had said to her confused and frowning friend.

  But before either of them could say another word, the Throne of Judgment began to slide. And its great granite legs ground rock against rock, sliding back the full depth of its legs, slowly revealing the treasure beneath it.

  Rain stared down from her perch at the front feet of the throne, into the black hole and the steps down to the dark. And then she looked up at her friend and smiled a knowing and playful grin.

  Her friend stared back, uncharacteristically silent for a few seconds. But seeing the comforting smile on her newly-empowered Protector’s face did nothing to quell her quivering feathers. And the angel shook her wide wings and pushed out her plumage. “What,” Fury squawked a little and asked, “in the motherfuck … is that?”

  Fury had been a little hesitant to follow. She tiptoed her way down the stairs under the throne like she had snuck out of her loft back in life. But safely beneath Rain’s chamber, the two of them stared at the seemin
gly endless supply of books and, more to Rain’s purpose, knowledge.

  “Humph!” Fury said. Then she crossed her arms and peered as far down the tunnel as she could—to the point that the passageway bent in an arc and she could see no farther. “I guess now you’re gonna like, say we have to read all this shit. I’m not—”

  “Not all,” Rain had cut her off and said. “For now, only the most important … of this shit,” she giggled at Fury. Then Rain closed her eyes and pushed her thoughts toward the book.

  And Fury got a guilty look on her face, one she usually reserved for her mother back in life. Then she scrunched up her face, turning it into the look that she reserved for her treacherous father, “Look, I’m sorry I—”

  “Shhh,” Rain put her finger to her mouth. She didn’t open her eyes, but she smiled. “I’m being all-powerful,” she giggled. She never opened her eyes, but she knew. “And stop frowning, it makes you look mean.”

  “He,” Rain replied to Salvation’s Jesus slip, “though I’ve warned you of this blasphemy countless times in the past.” She frowned at both of her parents. “What shall I do with the two of you? It is not just that you so openly defy my words, while others choose to follow them willingly…”

  “Stop talking like that,” Jump said, “it’s driving me nuts. Thee-thou all-powerful, omniscient bullshit.”

  Rain giggled at her father.

  And Salvation frowned back at her. “This isn’t a game, Rain,” she said. “Those two are evil and they don’t play games.”

  “Oh, I would beg to differ, Mother,” Rain said.

  Jump rolled his eyes, but remained silent. It was obvious that his daughter—once Rain started speaking like that, she usually couldn’t be persuaded to stop. But it smelled like she had some devious plan up her benevolent sleeve, so he listened. He would stop her if it got too annoying.

  “Beg to differ?” Salvation said. “Beg to differ, what?”

  “It is all a game,” Rain replied. “Only the consequences and the stakes vary.”

  Salvation thought about that for a moment. Rain understood many things, but salvaging her out from under Lived’s snakes—it was just too disgusting a thought. “He almost—you were naked!” she shouted.

  Rain understood more than her parents knew, even if she had not endured the “talk” with her father. “And yet here I am—blossom intact, with the information I needed.”

  “Oh, my—” Salvation said, wide eyed, but still trying to control her blasphemy. Then she looked over at Jump. “This is Fury’s doing,” she said to him. “That girl—”

  “What did I tell you,” Jump said.

  “She is not a girl!” Rain said a little too loudly.

  It startled Salvation and she turned back, readying another reprimand.

  But Rain gave her a wild look and Salvation held back whatever she was going to say. “She is an archangel of the fallen,” Rain said. Then she looked at her father. “A faithful hound of your Hell, in case you have forgotten your place in all of this. And it was your duty to protect her, and now … now she is lost!

  “She is fallen again at the hands of that evil creature, and I had no idea—none—that Life had this power. Fury will have to fight for the very essence of her soul in order to get back. And neither of you even knows what that means. So … we can sit here while you reprimand me for my actions,” Rain’s voice became more urgent and commanding, “or we can help Fury find her redemption!”

  Once the aftershocks from Rain’s reprimand died down, she and Salvation and Jump came to the understanding that Rain was more worldly than her parents knew.

  “It is the only reason to send someone back,” Rain said to them. “Put their faith on trial to bring them to a better judgment—save their immortal soul from Hell, bring them to redemption and faith and—”

  Jump frowned at Rain. It was his now and the place wasn’t that bad. “What the hell’s wrong with Hell?” he interrupted. “I’ve cleaned the place up. All the damn hypocrites and liars are in Heaven anyway. Why would she want to—?”

  Salvation gave him another look. “Enough,” she said, “that’s not helping anyone. Maybe Fury doesn’t want to be in Hell anymore. Did you ever think of that?” There was something in Rain’s voice before. And it had popped up again as she explained the consequences for an archangel who had lost faith in both Heavens. Without redemption when she was judged and condemned, Fury had ended up in Hell. But there had to be a reason that she wanted—“You’re saying she went down there and asked them … to send her back?”

  “Free will,” Rain said. “It is the only way. She has put herself back on trial for her sins.”

  “Oh shit…” Jump muttered. He’d heard enough. If everything they were saying was true…? “This shit again. What the hell did she—she didn’t do anything wrong. So she’s in Hell, so what? It’s not like that anymore. It’s a perfectly fine place to spend eternity. What could she have possibly done to ruin her soul anyway? And don’t go talking about that cleansing the garden shit, either.” He pointed to Salvation. “We all did that. And it was a good thing, too. Place was a shithole headed for worse than what we gave it. You know they were going to eat each other, right?” He pointed at Rain, then Salvation. “Either of you want to go through that? We did that place a favor!” Then he pointed back at Rain, shaking his finger several times. More angrily than he should shake it at the almighty. “And all her new creatures are better off for it. Jesus, guilt-guilt-guilt, it’s like walking around with a cross on your back. What’s the point? How does anyone get any shit done up here?”

  “Wait,” Salvation interrupted her husband’s rant. It was getting them no closer to a solution. His part would come soon enough, she knew that. She also knew that she wanted no part in another “clean crew” mission. It would take more than one eternity to get all of the garden’s blood off of her feathers. “What is she—what does Life get out of this?” she asked. “Or her bastard boyfriend? They aren’t going anywhere.” She looked at Rain with the question in her eyes. She asked it anyway, “Are they?”

  Rain’s explanation was more of the same. Rules and regulations in some book, beyond the average angel’s comprehension.

  “So,” Jump interrupted Rain, “if you’re the only one who can resurrect yourself, then it doesn’t matter. So why are you so fired up about it? I’ll go down there, teach them both a lesson, then we get Fury’s little ass back here—badabing—sick little game over.”

  Rain scrunched up her face when her father mentioned Fury’s body. “Disgusting,” she muttered. She looked at Salvation. She could see that her mother understood what she had meant. Rain looked back at Jump. “That is not what I said.”

  “That’s exactly what you said.”

  “No,” said Rain, “what I said was, that only a Protector can resurrect herself. If she feels that she has been unjustly—”

  “Yeah,” said Jump, “and what I said was, since that’s you, then—” And then he finally figured it out. And he looked at his wife. The answer was written all over Salvation’s face. “You’re kidding me! How in hell’s she gonna do that?” He shook his head. “She just won’t die.”

  Jump’s continual blasphemy and cursing didn’t seem to be riling her daughter up like it normally did. Salvation could see that Rain was letting her father’s uncontrollable irreverence slide for the moment … and that was curious. She tucked the thought away for another time, because if what Rain was saying was true, the situation was worse than just one lost archangel, towing a pack of most likely panic-stricken purgatory hatchlings.

  It sounded like Fury was in real trouble. Salvation knew the girl’s life had been pretty miserable, and if she was going back to face all of that… But that was nothing compared to the havoc that Life would wreak on everyone if she somehow got back into power. “I just don’t understand how she’s going to do that,” Salvation said.

  Jump did … understand. There was nothing real back in life, or the land of the unloving, fo
r that matter, that existed outside of someone’s belief in it.

  “I do.” It was all he had to say.

  To Salvation, short and not-so-sweet answers from her husband meant things were about to get serious. Jump would rant and rage all day about nothing, or really dangerous things. It didn’t matter, precious little actually happened while he was blustering. But when he was about to put on his uniform … before, or dress up like an ordinary citizen to go out into the night … after—when neither of them were sure if he was coming back or not—the answers got quick and choppy, and there was no more hint of his ornery self.

  Salvation knew Jump was steeling himself for whatever he had to do next. “Spill it, then,” she said to him. She motioned her finger in a circle, pointing to her husband’s face, which was slowly turning to a granite slab. “Because I know what all that means.”

  Jump held out his hand toward Rain and waved his fingers quickly a few times, motioning for her to hand it over. “The book,” he said. It wasn’t a request.

  Rain protested briefly before Jump gave her his look—the one he rarely used with her, in life or after. “You’re in charge,” he said. “There are no rules … so give it to me.”

  Rain handed her book to him. “It is—”

  Jump grabbed it a little rougher than he wanted to. Then he thumbed through the parchment on the pages. After a few moments of silence while he read, he said, “Seems to me…” The writing was more of the same unrecognizable gobbledygook in a long-forgotten language, but he ran his finger across the text like they all knew to do now, and the sounds of the ten billion former inhabitants’ souls of the garden wailed out the translation for him. “…there’s a few holes in your little story.” He paused and turned to Salvation. “Can’t anybody write a goddamn book that makes sense anymore?” Then he turned back to reading without waiting for an answer or a reprimand for his blasphemy—he hadn’t wanted either one. He moved his fingers across the text again, continuing to translate as he read, “Thee, thou, shall,” he muttered. “Same shit, different damn deity.” When he was finished, he looked up at Rain and said, “So that’s it, she says this prayer, and she can send anyone back she wants?”