by Mark Romang
Maddix tried to lift his head, but could hardly budge it from the cave floor. It felt so heavy. He maneuvered his elbows underneath him and raised his head a different way. He looked down at his right leg.
His mouth dropped open. A guttural scream from deep within his soul fled his lips and echoed through the cave. His right foot, ankle, and shin were gone. Hanging just below his knee was a bloody stump, a gruesome tangle of serrated flesh and amputated bones and ligaments. Maddix slumped back down. He stared at the cave ceiling.
I want to die.
In the next instant his teammates were there and looking down at him. Dismay and pity jostled for dominance in their eyes His injury was horrific. Viewing it firsthand would shake up anyone. But then their professionalism took over and they began treating him for blood loss.
Already experiencing the first stages of shock, Maddix drifted in and out of consciousness. When he came to he could feel Petty Officer Webb applying pressure to his femoral artery. He could also feel Petty Officer Daniel Pettis—the team medic—clamping a tourniquet around his upper leg. Something about the tourniquet wasn’t working right. Pettis swore a string of profanities and started applying a second tourniquet.
Maddix could hear Lieutenant Kirkland radioing for a helicopter. The franticness in Kirkland’s normally serene voice told Maddix he didn’t have long. But he didn’t seem to care much. Even as his date with death approached, a surreal calm settled over him.
His eyelids fluttered shut.
“SEALS never give up, Mad Dog! They never ever give up! Don’t you quit on me!” Webb exhorted.
Maddix tried to hang on, but his body was shutting down. Clammy sweat pooled on his face. A weighted blanket of weakness covered him. His body felt like it was sinking through the cave floor. He couldn’t stop its descent.
As he sank into nothingness, scenes from his past life flashed before him. He was suddenly a teenager again, representing his school at the state championships. His coach and teammates were mobbing him. He just took first place and broke the state record in the 100 meter butterfly. Flashbulbs were going off everywhere in the stands. Everyone was yelling his name, slapping him on the back and tousling his hair. It was perhaps his best day ever.
But in a flash the happy scene turned ugly. He found himself at home, sitting at the dinner table and arguing with his parents. He’d just told his mom and dad he was turning down a full- ride college swimming scholarship to join the Navy and pursue his dream of becoming a SEAL. There was a lot of shouting and door slamming that day, ugly things were said in the heat of the moment. His shaky relationship with his parents disintegrated. They told him he wasn’t welcome at the house anymore. He’d thought they were only joking. He was wrong.
His parents didn’t attend his graduation from Navy boot camp, or even call and congratulate him after he passed the hellish 24 week BUD/S school and 28 week SQT program. He’d become a major disappointment to them, an embarrassment. His parents were peaceniks who wanted him to become a doctor, not an elite soldier. He was almost the enemy now.
Maddix wondered now if they would attend his funeral.
The flashbacks mercifully stopped when his heart jerked to a halt. Almost at once he felt a strange new sensation, a complex sensation difficult to describe. There was a feeling of detachment between his body and his soul. Like a snake shedding his skin, he sloughed off his body.
The feeling enamored him. He’d never felt so free, so liberated, and so alive. Gravity couldn’t hold him down anymore. His spirit kept rising until he bumped up against the cave ceiling. From here he looked down at his buddies as they tried to revive his breathless body.
He could see everything so clearly now from this higher position. It was as if he were watching his resuscitation in HD. Pettis had stopped messing with the tourniquet. He was giving him chest compressions now. Webb was still putting pressure on his femoral artery and pleading with him to never give up. And Lieutenant Kirkland was running wildly down the cave tunnel complaining about poor radio signals, a satellite phone stuck to his ear.
Maddix wished he could tell them it was okay. He wished he could make them understand how amazing he felt right now. And he wished he could make them understand that life truly begins at death.
He was still reveling in his newfound freedom when the cave suddenly filled with a warm shimmering light. The intense light pushed away the black-as-spades darkness. Like a moth drawn to a porch light, Maddix stared unblinking at the luminescence. The light drew closer to him. As it approached it grew brighter, hotter. Golden shafts from the light’s core swirled and danced on the cave wall in kaleidoscope patterns. The muted red and brown sandstone cave walls gleamed like gold doubloons under the glare.
Awestruck, Maddix noticed that pleasant aromas preceded the light. He recognized some of the fragrances. An ex-girlfriend of his once made an ill-fated attempt at designing and marketing her own line of perfumes. Despite his lack of interest in her business endeavor, he became an expert at scents. Right now in the cave he could smell cinnamon and saffron, and possibly nard and frankincense as well. There were other pleasing scents as well, but ones he didn’t recognize.
Maddix yelled down at his buddies, wanting them to experience the ethereal light as well. But they couldn’t see it. They were still wearing their night-vision goggles as they worked on him.
Maddix noticed a form beginning to take shape inside the light. Starting at the light’s core and spreading outward to its edges, the light became three-dimensional. Maddix made out legs and arms. A head and a set of…wings? Although far from a religious person, Maddix was astute enough to recognize holiness.
An angel stood before him!
The angel’s head nearly touched the cave ceiling. He wore a beautiful flowing robe made from an exotic material that couldn’t quite hide his symmetrically perfect physique. Cerulean eyes—bluer than a cloudless sky—bejeweled an oval face and burned through Maddix. The flaxen-haired angel held out a hand toward Maddix. “Come, Andrew. I need to show you something,” he said, his powerful voice projecting a melodic timbre.
Maddix looked at the hand, marveled at the flawless skin, skin that could never age or decay. He then looked down at his SEAL buddies still working heroically to save his life. He had to decide between them or the angel. It was a simple choice. He didn’t hesitate.
He reached out and clasped the angel’s hand.
Chapter 20
Perdition Canyon
Underneath her fleece jacket and shorty wet suit, Sara Kendall’s skin crawled.
Sloshing slowly through thigh-deep water, her nerves coiled tighter and tighter with each furtive step. Her heart raced faster than a metronome dialed to an allegro setting.
It was so isolated and dark at the bottom of Perdition Canyon that her night-vision goggles had trouble capturing and amplifying electromagnetic radiation. She wished she could use a flashlight to light her way through the canyon’s narrow corridor. Back at her store she sold a flashlight made by Wicked Lasers that put out 4100 lumens. She’d give anything to have it in her trembling hands right now.
She’d explored Perdition Canyon many times, but never at night. Maneuvering narrow passageways in darkness this smothering upped the danger factor by at least ten. A twisted or broken ankle was but a misstep away.
She couldn’t imagine traversing the canyon on a prosthetic leg. But she knew she would never hear Maddix complain about it. He didn’t let his handicap slow him down one bit. If anything, his prosthetic leg motivated him to try harder than everybody else.
Sara stole a look upward. Far above her head, perhaps 700 feet or more, she could faintly make out a tiny streak of sky and stars. It calmed her shuddering nerves a bit to see the heavens. Anything to keep her focus on God and not herself or demons was something to cling to with all her might.
Never in her wildest dreams could she ever have imagined she’d be doing this. But now that she was she felt somewhat at peace. She’d been searching for her purpos
e for so long. Tonight the mystery unraveled.
She discovered who she was. Her former identity shattered like plate glass hitting a stone floor.
Secreted away in the farthest recesses of her mind, and sequestered in the darkest antechambers of her soul was the knowledge that she was created for this. God didn’t create her to be an accountant or Olympic kayaker or canyon guide/store owner. He created her to be, of all things…a demon huntress.
She didn’t know how she should feel about this revelation. It was so audacious she couldn’t comprehend it. Right now she felt terrified out of her wits. She had to fight off an almost irresistible urge to free climb the canyon walls and run for her life. Stay strong, Sara, she kept telling herself. God brought you this far. He’ll see you all the way through.
Good thing her parents were dead and gone. If alive, they would have admitted her to a psychiatric hospital by now. If she were honest with herself, she wasn’t so certain she shouldn’t already be there. Her mind struggled to stay lucid.
Sara gripped her flame gun tighter, cradling its nozzle in her arms. She went over and over in her head the firing instructions Maddix gave her yesterday during their walkthrough.
One second bursts. Seven to ten seconds of total burn time. Don’t waste your fuel.
She silently chanted this mantra repeatedly as she looked all around. A sense of evil permeated Perdition Canyon. Foreboding oozed from the sandstone walls and she didn’t want to be holding an empty flamethrower, essentially weaponless against agents from hell.
Sara’s teeth shattered. It was cold in the canyon. As soon as the sun sets in the desert the temperature drops precipitously. Despite wearing fleece and a wetsuit, her body shook as she skulked along the watery canyon floor through a sizable pothole. But she didn’t know for sure if it was the chilly temperature that brought about her shakes. Fear might have something to do with her trembling limbs.
Sara looked ahead and spotted Webb. She supposed she should check in with him. He traveled in front of her about forty yards ahead. Other than an occasional pothole of water where the canyon widened, the sandstone walls were too narrow for them to travel side by side. Sara had to be careful to maintain this critical distance between them. Otherwise Webb would be in range of her flamethrower.
She didn’t know what to think of Webb. She knew he was Maddix’s friend and an ex-SEAL and war hero. She knew he loved America and was a true patriot. But he was so cocky and full of himself. He liked to flex his muscles and crack jokes. She didn’t care for him much, and would be glad when this was all over and he went back to Provo.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden breeze hitting her face. The hot breeze only lasted three seconds or less, but it brought with it a repugnant aroma. Her nose crinkled up.
She’d smelled the odor before and recently. She remembered smelling it at the exorcism. A sulfurous cloud burned her nose and clung to her hair. Not only was the scent out of place, but so was the breeze. There shouldn’t be any wind down here, she thought.
Sara stopped in her tracks. She cocked her head and listened intently for several seconds. For a moment she thought she heard pinging sounds. The sounds were metallic in nature, like rain or hail thrumming on a metal roof.
She was about to resume her stalk when she heard the sound again. Only this time it was much closer to her. “Did you hear that pinging sound, Webb?” she said into her helmet mike.
“I did. There’s definitely something weird about this canyon. Tell me, Sara, do people hike through this canyon much?”
“Not as much as the other slot canyons. But yeah, some of the more daring canyoneers like to come here.”
“And they make it out alive?”
“As far as I know they do.”
“Then we don’t have anything to worry about, Sara. There are no demons down here. Not even a bogeyman.”
“I hear it again, Webb. Did you hear it this time?”
“Holy crap, that was close!”
“What is it, Webb?”
“I know what’s causing the sounds. We’re being shot at. Arrows are raining down on us.”
Sara peeked out from behind an outcropping. Through the green hue of night-vision goggles she scanned the nearby canyon walls, boulder heaps, and logjams for enemy archers. She didn’t see any archers but she did see arrows. Volleys of arrows rained down toward her and Webb, clattering against the sandstone walls and slipping silently into the water.
They were under attack.
Despite hiding behind a boulder, several arrows flew right through the giant rock and struck her. Sara yelped at the stinging sensations and looked down at her chest and stomach. Four arrows penetrated her torso. She looked like a pincushion.
But strangely enough she was in little pain. She moved her hands toward the arrow shafts to pull them out. But right before her fingers encircled the arrow shafts, the arrows vanished. Sara plunged her hands into the sixty degree water and felt around for the arrows that had missed her. Her fingers groped and scraped against rocks of varying sizes and shapes, but never found any arrows.
This is weird. Maybe the arrows are simply an illusion. Mind games meant to confuse me.
Emboldened that the arrows posed little danger, Sara stepped around the boulder and slogged toward Webb, all the while studying the canyon walls. There could be no doubt that their enemy inhabited Perdition Canyon. Demons were here, hiding and observing, waiting for the right moment to strike.
And they just fired the first shot.
Sara halted. A few feet in front of her lay a keeper pothole filled with deep water. She would need to swim this section. She hurriedly pulled her dry bag off her back and wriggled out of her fleece jacket. She stuffed the fleece into the dry bag and repositioned the dry bag back over one shoulder next to the flamethrower’s fuel tanks.
She didn’t know if the flamethrowers would work if they got wet. All she knew was that Webb and Maddix said the flame guns were finicky and not always reliable. So she turned and squatted down, and began backstroking across the pothole, keeping the flamethrower’s nozzle above the water’s surface. She found the going hard. Her tensed muscles and the apparatus on her back made for a difficult swim. She tried not to splash, tried not to give away her position. Maintaining cover was a premium she wanted to pay. But deep down she suspected the enemy knew exactly where she was at all times.
Sara reached the escape end of the pothole. The vertical sides of the pothole leveled off to where she could climb out. She looked around but didn’t see Webb. The canyon narrowed significantly into what canyoneers call a Mae West, a slot canyon so narrow that it is impossible to pass through.
Sara looked up and appraised the chimney. The crack was narrow at the bottom but then widened near the top like a funnel. She would have to use a climbing technique called chimneying to ascend the crack. Apparently Webb knew how to perform this technique. He was nowhere to be found.
Sara reached up with her right hand and placed it on the sandstone. She then raised her left foot and placed it on the opposing side of the crack and levered herself up into the chimney. She then placed both feet on the left side of the chimney and her back on the right side and slowly ascended. Using her back, hands, and feet in an odd-looking levering motion, she slowly ascended the crack. The chimney was filled with small chockstones that she had to maneuver around. Some of the wedged rocks tumbled free with a small tug of her hands. Others remained stubbornly in place.
“Webb, what’s your status?” she finally mouthed into her helmet mike as she climbed. “Where are you?”
“I’m right above you. The chimney empties out onto a shelf.”
“Okay, I’ll be there in a sec.”
Sara continued to climb using the chimneying technique. She was mad at herself for forgetting to pack her climbing gloves. A mistake usually made by rookie canyoneers, not seasoned veterans like her. The abrasive sandstone shredded her palms. Fortunately she’d exit the chimney in another minute or two.
The crack all at once became so narrow that Sara had to turn her face to the side to keep from rubbing her nose on the opposing wall. For a moment she worried that the added bulk of the fuel tanks on her back would allow her to become wedged tight, unable to ascend or descend. But Webb made it, and he was much larger. Sara brushed aside the worry and continued upward.
Gradually the crack widened little by little until it expanded into a broad chimney. Sara stopped using the chimneying technique and stemmed the rest of the way up to the shelf, placing a foot and hand on each opposing wall of the chimney. She soon reached the ledge. Grabbing the ledge with both hands, she raised her right leg up over the lip and levered herself up onto the shelf.
Webb waited for her. He placed a finger over his lips and then pointed downward with his other hand. Sara trained her eyes down a steep gully littered with scree.
At first she saw nothing but shadows. Shadows piled upon shadows. But then one of the silhouettes moved ever so slightly. Despite the need to remain silent, Sara screamed.
The two hideous beings turned their ugly heads and looked up. They trained their eyes—glowing like embers from a dying campfire—onto her and Webb. “Time to roast some demons,” Webb muttered under his breath as he pulled the triggers on his flamethrower. But scorching flame failed to erupt from the nozzle. Only a weak hiss escaped the flame gun. The fuel wouldn’t ignite.
Sara all at once remembered Webb was using the unreliable M-1 flamethrower—the prototype flamethrower with ignition issues.
Webb swore and pulled a Zippo from his pant pocket. Sara didn’t wait for Webb to get his flamethrower lit. She pointed her M-9 flamethrower toward the demons. The fallen angels—charred black from head to foot, and reeking with smell of brimstone—flapped their singed wings and took flight.
The giant beasts flew straight for her and Webb.
Pull the firing trigger. Pull the igniter trigger. One second bursts, she told herself. A giant flame billowed from her gun and hit the demons dead center in their muscular chests. The demons screeched in surprise. Horrific, otherworldly groans filled the canyon hallway.
