Demonic Designs (To Absolve the Fallen)

by Babbitt, Aaron

  “It worked, or I should say works, like a set of fluctuating guidelines. The goal was basic, primal: existence. In order for a species to exist on an ever-changing planet, it also had to change. This much will happen before the first mutation; then the new species would begin a path. That went on for several billion years, producing all manners of interesting and beautiful creatures on many worlds. Suddenly, to everyone’s surprise, God determined that the latest species was the one. I don’t think I need to tell you which species that was.”

  “You’ve been around for billions of years? I thought you said that you had been around for tens of thousands.”

  Jeremiah lit a cigarette. “You wanted to know. Now, let me finish my story.”

  “Okay,” Alex agreed, as he sat back on the bed.

  “I’ve been around for a little over thirty-seven thousand years. Actually, you could say the human soul and I have something in common--our birthdays. All humans gained free passage to ascension when they died. It didn’t matter what they did; it didn’t matter whether or not they even believed in God; it didn’t matter if they loved or hated Him. The only defining characteristic they had to have was a certain strand of amino acids—a soul, so to speak. With that, they could get into Heaven.

  “Many angels were very confused, to say the least. This point is what most of us refer to as the beginning. It was at this point that Lucifer fell, but he wasn’t the only one. As you may recall from Sunday school, one third of Heaven’s angels fell with Lucifer, but it had nothing to do with him leading them. They had no intention of following ‘the Morning Star’ over God; at least, not until after the Fall. No angel in his right mind would side with another angel over the Creator—one of the many flaws in humanity’s mythologies.”

  “Why didn’t Lucifer want us to get into Heaven?”

  Jeremiah considered the question. “I’m not sure that he didn’t want you to get into Heaven. It isn’t insubordination that gets an angel cast from grace. How can one fight the plan of an omnipotent being? If an angel ceases to have faith, or if the faith falters for long enough, the angel will fall. Something about the exalting of humans over other animals didn’t make sense to Lucifer and the others. They doubted, and they fell. That’s all there was to it.”

  Alex’s head was spinning. “Then, there never was a war in Heaven. They, or you, fell and that was it.”

  “No, there was a war—not in Heaven, though. And I had not been created quite yet. In fact, it was at this point that God brought another angel into the equation. It seemed apparent that someone needed to watch over the growth of the human soul. Ergo...me.”

  “So when did you lose your faith?”

  Jeremiah smiled. “Well, I was given charge of a young boy, not too different than yourself. He was bright, charismatic, and above all innocent. I was informed that I--” He stopped abruptly and looked toward the door. “Stand away from the door.”

  “What?”

  Jeremiah stood up, and he roared. “Now!”

  Alex had no choice but to follow the order. The door to the room flew open. Four people, heavily armed, rushed in, and Jeremiah burst into flames.

  Before Alex could react, there was a pillar of fire between him and the gunmen. The others stopped as they entered the room; they must have also been alarmed by the presence of someone on fire, waiting patiently for all of them to file in. They didn’t raise their guns. They, like Alex, could only stare.

  Alex was in shock from the whole ordeal. He didn’t know whether or not to try to extinguish Jeremiah or let him burn. He put his hand up slowly in Jeremiah’s direction, and he could feel no heat. His hand went into the fire, and it didn’t burn. The demon seemed to take notice of neither the fire enshrouding him nor the presence of Alex’s hand.

  Peering around the column of fire, Alex saw another frightening figure enter the room. It looked like it may have been human once, but now it was completely desiccated and hairless. The withered frame was disconcerting. But, more than that, its reddish-brown skin was bubbling, leaving holes in the skin that would reveal patches of muscle before filling in once more.

  Alex interpreted the look on this walking corpse’s face as one of surprise, though none of the expressions this thing was making looked recognizably human. It did, however, halt for a moment to take in the situation.

  “Jeremiah,” it hissed, “I was led to believe that you were dead. I guess it doesn’t really matter. You’re outnumbered. There’s no viable escape. Your allies,” he said, pointing to the ceiling, “have not come to your defense. Give us the boy without incident; there’s no need for us to quarrel, brother.”

  Jeremiah walked up to the speaker; his hand shot out of the fire and retracted so quickly that Alex barely even made out any kind of movement. He didn’t know that anything had happened until the head of the bubbling guy exploded in a mist of red and gray. The body fell to the ground, and shortly thereafter it was consumed by flame.

  That action must have shocked the other three out of their confusion and terror. They leveled their guns at the fire. A kick sent one of the foes into the far wall. Flaming hands grabbed the other two weapons and aimed each towards the adjacent hired gun. When the men fired, they only succeeded in debilitating the other. Then, both guns were in the hands of Jeremiah. By this point, the man who had been kicked was getting up, but a bullet in the head put him back down again. All of this happened so quickly that Alex could only comprehend it later when he reflected on what he had seen.

  Jeremiah waved his hand, and the dead man burst into flame. Then, the fire around Jeremiah died down, revealing, once more, a human figure. He no longer looked like that pale, red-headed young kid that he was before. Now, his hair was jet black, and his skin was bronzed. He stood a little taller and looked to be in his late twenties or early thirties.

  He turned to Alex. His eyes were that steel gray that Alex had seen before. “You should step outside for a moment,” he said. “I need to talk to these two.”

  Alex moved toward the door, watching the two surviving intruders very closely. He wasn’t sure what had just happened, but he knew he needed to get out of there before he vomited all over the floor. He ran out of the room thinking of nothing but escape. The would-be assassins didn’t take their eyes off of Jeremiah. As soon as Alex exited the room, he could feel a force closing the door behind him. From there, he could see another door, this one with moonlight shining through a window in it. He twisted the knob and flung the door open just in time to lose what was in his stomach, mostly bile, all over what looked to be a front porch. He noticed, absentmindedly, that most of his mess was going through a hole in the porch where planks had once been. Strangely, it was a slight consolation to him that the mess he’d made would be hidden. Then, the screams began.

  Looking into the fields around the house, Alex thought about running. Perhaps, he could make it back to some civilization and call the police. Or maybe there were more men with guns lurking not far away. And what if Jeremiah caught him?

  After what felt like twenty minutes, there was only silence. Prior to that, Alex couldn’t think of anything he wanted more than for those screams to stop, and when they did, he just put his head into his lap and cried. He cried out of anger and frustration because of his helplessness in this situation. He cried out of fear. But, most of all, he cried because he felt utterly broken down, and crying seemed like the only reasonable thing to do.

  ***

  Matt looked around at the four other men at the table. At a mere twenty-one, he was the youngest person there by at least fifteen years, yet everyone eyed him with suspicion and fear. His reputation preceded him, and no one wanted to anger his boss.

  “This could be very lucrative for you gentlemen,” Matt pressed them. “Jeremiah has a lot of money to pass out to folks who can get what he needs. And we are in constant need of hired guns, which is where the four of you come in. You know, better than anyone, where I can find some good mercenaries who don’t mind a little extra pay t
o keep their mouths shut. So, want to help me out?”

  “What are you trying to do, kid,” one of the men, an older one with a Brooklyn accent asked, “invade a country? This is the second time this month that you’ve come to us, looking for ex-military guys.”

  Matt’s eyes narrowed. “Yet, all I’ve gotten recently have been overweight, stupid, petty thugs. I don’t need mafia hit men. I need Green Berets and SEALs. You can deliver and have. What’s with the resistance?”

  The other guy answered with a shrug of his shoulders, “The supply is too little, the demand too great. What, do you think that soldiers come home from duty and get right back into killing people?”

  “I command more than two hundred such men,” Matt affirmed. “That is exactly what I think. Obviously, not all of them have the desire to return to battle, but some of them do it so long that they don’t know anything else. They may as well work for us. And what’s more, you’ll get tremendous profit from the deal.”

  Another man from the table cleared his throat and sat up a little straighter before he responded to Matt, “We don’t just work for you and your boss. We have opportunities that could prove to be much more ‘lucrative’ than what you have to offer.”

  It was then that Matt’s head began to tingle. The situation had become clear to him. He had been lured into a trap. These men had sold him out to a demon, which was probably the better business they were talking about.

  Matt got up from his chair abruptly and backed toward the nearest exit. The four men looked at each other and also made to get up. They were reaching for their guns, but Matt was faster. He had drawn two guns and fired four precise shots, one into each man’s forehead, before they had completely stood up.

  He looked regretfully at the bodies slumped over the chairs and table and sighed. “I guess further business with you gentlemen is completely out of the question now.”

  Wasting no more time, he ran to the exit. Within seconds of that, he reached the stairwell he’d come up to get to the floor where the meeting would be held. There were about fifteen steps between each landing, but there was no time to calculate the distance.

  He grabbed the handrail and jumped over. His footing wasn’t steady when he hit the next level of stairs, and he tumbled to the next landing. Rolling down the stairs hurt like hell, but he knew he couldn’t think about the bruises that were already forming. He stood up, and confident that he hadn’t broken any bones yet, grabbed the hand rail and propelled himself over once more.

  This time, he landed solidly. The tingling in his head was stronger. His enemy was closer. Two more times, he jumped over the railing before making it to the bottom. The last time, something broke in his right foot, and he fell again, tumbling down six more steps to the ground floor.

  A grunt escaped him as he hit. The wind was knocked out of him, and his guns went sliding across the floor. He thought he may have also broken something in his left forearm in that last roll down the stairs.

  Only barely acknowledging his newly acquired injuries, Matt deftly moved to retrieve his guns. He ran, as well as he could with the injuries he’d sustained, to the door he’d come in. His car should only be about thirty feet from the exit. Provided no one was waiting for him there, it should provide a pretty easy getaway.

  The door was open when he got there, casting an eerie glow of moonlight into the room. He couldn’t remember if the men who had brought him in left it open or not. It seemed a little too inviting. With a .45 in his right hand and a .38 in his throbbing left, he approached cautiously. Matt wasn’t sure he could fire straight with his arm messed up, but he might have to at least bluff it.

  As he feared, someone was standing at his car. The man who now leaned against the passenger side of the car was at least six inches taller than Matt, had dark hair, sported a drab gray overcoat and a pair of glasses, and peered at Matt through them with intensity. This was, undoubtedly, the cause of Matt’s mental alarm.

  A deep voice, devoid of warmth and a human soul intoned, “Matthew Hartley, I presume.”

  Matt leveled his guns at the demon and walked slowly toward his car. “How the fuck do you know my name?”

  “I’ve heard of you,” the other retorted blandly. “And you fit the description,” he added, looking Matt up and down. “You’re 5’9”. You weigh close to one hundred seventy pounds. Your hair’s light brown, and your eyes are blue. You’re also—I must say—dressed to kill. But the most telling fact is that you are walking out of this building, armed with no less than three guns and a hand grenade. What, no blade? You also have a little blood on your shirt from one of those four mafia goons you just gunned down. Now, how about you give me a chance, huh? All I want to do is help you.”

  Matt laughed and stopped where he was. “You want to help me? You have three seconds left on this earth, motherfucker; you better do what you can. Since you know me so well, you probably know that I’ve killed every demon who’s come to me looking for a fight.”

  Without missing a beat, the other replied, “Jeremiah has lied to you.”

  “What?”

  “I see my time has been extended. Jeremiah is using you and others to accomplish something that he is unable to do himself. He will try to make himself king, and the three of you will be lucky to make it out alive. I know Jeremiah well. I used to work very closely with him. He cannot defeat what he is up against by himself, so he is recruiting fodder. Even in the very unlikely chance that he should win, he would probably kill you. He might let you live, but do you really want to take that chance?”

  “Who are you?”

  “My name is Patheus. I’m surprised that he has never spoken of me.”

  “You’re a demon. Why should I trust anything you’re telling me?”

  Though it was hard to see in the soft glow of the street lights, Matt could make out that Patheus rolled his eyes. “If I didn’t think you could be saved, I would have already killed you. I’m sure that Jeremiah has probably promised some pretty impressive things. However, I’ve decided to offer you a better deal. Do you mind putting those guns down now?”

  “No,” Matt said. “I think I like them fine where they are. I still don’t trust you.”

  “Oh, really?” And then the demon was gone.

  Matt spun around, aiming the gun in every direction, but as far as he could tell, there was nothing out there. When he turned back around, there was a movement, and something slammed into him hard, knocking him to the ground. His guns again went flying in different directions once more. A large, clawed hand took hold of his throat and was lifting him off the ground.

  Matt found himself staring at a creature that seemed to be shrouded in complete darkness. There were no discernible eyes at all. The sockets just looked like openings into black holes. The face and arms resembled the shiny blackness of onyx, and they seemed almost translucent. There was movement beneath the surface of the “skin,” like the pulsing of black blood.

  The voice swept over Matt like a breeze on a frigid day. “It would be wise of you to reconsider whom you trust and whom you do not. Up until this point, I had not been hostile, and you repay that by threatening me at gunpoint. Where I come from, that’s considered uncivilized. And your guns won’t do much to me, anyway.”

  Matt was losing consciousness. He knew if he didn’t do something soon, he would be dead. Jeremiah had given him something special for a situation of this severity, and it was no surprise that Patheus hadn’t identified it along with all the other weapons. A knife sprang from a hidden sheath strapped to Matt’s forearm. Mustering what remained of his consciousness and energy, he shoved it up through the demon’s arm; it cut so easily, and the knife’s point appeared through the top of the monster’s arm. The skin around the knife began to sizzle, and tar-like blood oozed out of the freshly created wound.

  Patheus bellowed, and his grip on Matt’s throat weakened. Matt, taking advantage of the opportunity, pushed his foot against Patheus’s chest and propelled himself backward away from the
monster, ripping the knife loose. As soon as Matt hit the ground, he had drawn yet another gun, a second .45, from the waistline of his pants, but once more, there was nobody there.

  “Didn’t see that one coming, did you?” Matt whispered to the air.

  He retrieved his weapons, returned them to their holsters, and ran to his car like his life depended on it—for good reason.

  ***

  Jeremiah walked out of the house, still looking like he did after the battle; Alex couldn’t tell if his demeanor was solemn or contemplative. And, with the background of night, Jeremiah looked truly ominous. Alex did not feel that he had completely recovered from what he’d witnessed, but he decided he might be ready to continue his mental battle with a fallen angel who only dealt in ambiguities and riddles.

  “Finish the story,” he told the demon.

  Just then, a ringing of a cell phone came from Jeremiah’s general area. Jeremiah held up one finger to tell Alex to hold on for a minute, but Alex wasn’t going to have it.

  “No. You brought me into this...this...I don’t even know what this is. I don’t know how long I’ve been gone, and my parents probably have the FBI out looking for me.”

  “Your parents think you’re dead. Your car was found in a lake bed almost seven hours ago, and it was reported that the body in the car was a positive match for you—down to the last detail. The body your parents viewed obviously wasn’t yours, but I paid good money to make it seem that way. They’re grieving as we speak. Now, please, I really have to take this call.”

  He pulled out the phone, flipped it open, and answered, “Yes?”

  Alex just stared at him in awe.

  Jeremiah stood there for a second, not saying anything. Alex could hear someone speaking in very raised tones on the other end. “Settle down,” Jeremiah said. “You’re not dead, which surprises me....What is it with you people thinking I’m a liar?...Uh huh....Patheus? Really? I didn’t expect to hear from him so soon. Don’t underestimate him—he’s not working alone. I will guarantee that someone is pulling his strings....It’s a little late in the game to be thinking that I will betray you. He played the oldest trick in the book—a demon offering you the world for a change of heart....Well, did you get me more mercenaries?... A trap, huh? In that case, I guess you killed them.... Probably a good thing.... Yeah, I told you it’s a special knife.... Listen, I’ve got some things I have to take care of. Go back to where the two of you are staying, and see if Liz knows anything. Remember that I will be meeting up with you shortly.” With that, he flipped the phone closed, hanging up without even giving the other person a chance to respond.