If God Doesn't Show

by R. Thomas Riley

  “Want something done right you gotta do it yourself.”

  Blount powered up the Blackhawk. As the chopper’s rotor whirred to life, identical voices whispered in his head: Rugby Rock, North Dakota. The twins came to him as they always did. Their spirits guided him just as they said they would, letting him know the next step of his mission.

  The vessel sleeps in Rugby Rock. Hurry, Blount. Time is fleeting.

  “You got it.” Pulling away from the island, he soared over the waters of the Pacific. They were right. There was no time to waste.

  He noticed the fuel gauge and frowned. There were some tankers out there in the ocean, but he was unsure of their location. He hoped some form of communication became available when he got farther away from the island.

  * * *

  Blount checked his SAT phone again and, as if in answer to his prayers, it relayed that he had a weak signal, so he used his speed dial.

  “Yeah, it’s Agent Blount. I need a location on all available tankers in the Pacific…yep you bet. I also need a friendly port hidden or not near the borders of New Mexico.”

  With the world going to hell, Blount was sure a lot of tankers and destroyers would be out in the oceans right now, on high alert. He would have to show a damn lot of clearance to get his chopper fueled time and again, but he had no choice.

  “Roger that. Say again? Mexico is under water, huh? What about New Mexico? Okay, well gotta hope I find the part that’s dry before I run aground. Over and out.”

  The Blackhawk approached the first of the four tankers, but he couldn’t raise anyone on his radio. “To hell with it.” He landed any way.

  Laced with the smell of soot and death, the ocean breeze slapped him across the face as he stepped out. Not a sound could be heard on the tanker. It was a ghost town. He walked around the deck, searched the immediate area, and found no signs of life. The surface of the tanker leaned at an uncomfortable angle. A tsunami must have rocked the platform, but miraculously it had withstood the assault. The platform yawed with a stomach-clenching sound.

  Get fuel and get out of there.

  “Alright girls, calm down.”

  He started for the generator and the pumps. A clanking noise resounded as he worked. Lifting his head, he watched as the tanker’s cabin door slowly opened. A chorus of moans filled the air.

  Swarms of dead men came lumbering out of the cabin. Shadow beings wriggled ahead of them, leading their hosts on a bloodthirsty rampage toward the only living human onboard.

  “Great freakin’ timing guys!”

  Blount ripped the hose from the fuel tank just as it finished. He didn’t bother to fire at the oncoming crowd of dead, as one stray shot would end his mission right then and there. He gave the first two men that reached for him the boot as he climbed back into his chopper.

  Within moments he was back in the air, where he swerved about and launched two missiles at the tanker, turning it into a fireball that ignited the horizon in an orange glow.

  He headed to New Mexico, hoping for the best.

  * * *

  Blount landed for fuel one last time at what remained of an air force base. He turned his back on the smoldering bodies all around him and hurried over to the refueling station. As the chopper fueled, he kept his attention on the sky and surrounding horizon for any signs of the shadow creatures.

  “Human,” a gravelly voice spoke from the darkened confines of one of the aircraft hangars.

  Blount whirled and trained his pistol on the opening, but no target readily presented itself. “Who’s there? Identify yourself!”

  A laugh drifted from the darkness and something massive shifted within. Sweat sprouted on his forehead and ran into his eyes, but Blount didn’t attempt to wipe it away. He was about to challenge again when the voice spoke once more.

  “It’s been a long time, Blount. A long time.”

  “Well, come on out and show yourself, so we can catch up.”

  The creature emerged from the hangar and spread its wings in the fading light.

  He sucked in a breath. “Abdiel.”

  “Adrian Blake.” Abdiel sighed.

  Blount shuddered at the memories washing over him. It had been many years since he’d dwelled on what happened so long ago in the town of Amber Creek. It’d been even longer since he’d thought of Sarah, or the person he used to be.

  * * *

  The town was covered in a black haze. Yet, it was more than that. It was more like the cloud inhabited the town, as Adrian and Sarah topped the hill. Finger-thin shafts, mingled with log-sized tendrils, caressed the town like a familiar lover. Adrian held his tongue. He waited for his wife to scream out at the sight of the anomaly, but she sat beside him, humming a church hymn, oblivious to the black cloud. Thoughts of cancer and rot came to his mind when he looked at the monstrosity.

  He tightened his grip on the reins. The horses snorted against the pressure and came to a halt. Something was at the apex of the black, swirling cloud. Just a hint of something huge, but its features were obscured. It faded in and out of existence as it hovered over the town.

  As Adrian looked on in horror, flames engulfed the town, obliterating it right before his eyes. Figures traveled down from the black miasma, obscured in its darkness. Adrian was thankful they were shrouded in the swirling mist. To see more would mean madness, he sensed.

  “Darling?”

  As soon as his wife’s voice invaded his thoughts, the entire illusion dissipated. Not all at once, like a hallucination might, but gradually, like watching time flow backwards. Now, the anomalous mist was all that remained.

  “Don’t you see that?” He hoped the horror remained invisible to her.

  “See what, silly goat?”

  “Nothing, love. Just feeling a bit queer, I reckon.”

  Adrian was not a religious man, but what he’d just witnessed couldn’t be described in any other terms. What he’d seen was pure evil. It was lying in wait for his town. There was only one person who might be able to help him with what he witnessed. The priest, Father Nathan Carpenter.

  He pulled to a halt in front of the general store, waving to the flock of children that erupted from the doors, each clutching a stick of rock candy. Softly he soothed the startled horses with calm words.

  “You run along, Sarah. I’ve got some business to discuss with Nathan. I’ll join you shortly.”

  He blew a kiss to his wife as she turned to glance back at him. She appeared troubled, but as soon as Adrian blew the kiss, her face lit up. She made as if to grab it, pretending to pocket it for later. Her laugh drifted off, as he clicked to the horse and the wagon lurched away.

  Adrian glanced up as he neared the middle of town. The shape was directly above him. It blotted out the sun, casting a graveyard shadow across the town. No one else seemed to notice the phenomena. For a moment he questioned his sanity, but he knew he wasn’t crazy...yet.

  He watched as two small girls jump roped, oblivious as their feet splashed in a puddle of blood. Their shoes were painted red-black, and splotches clung to their bare legs. One of the girls carelessly pushed a hand through her long blonde tresses, staining the locks a dusty red. As he rolled past, the girl glanced his way. Half of her face was gone. A ragged hole leered at him. He gasped and closed his eyes in horror. When he reopened them, the girl was normal. She giggled and called to the horses.

  Movement caught his eye from the rooftop to his left, and he saw the first one. It was hunched, clothed in fire, leathery wings wrapped around its hairy, muscular frame. A disturbing amber glow obscured most of the creature’s face, but its eyes were what struck fear in Adrian’s heart. They were oval, vacuous wells of malevolence. One’s massive wolf head swiveled in his direction, and the creature looked right at him.

  As the past faded, one last scene entered his mind. It appeared a memory but it couldn’t have been his, for it seemed to occur before the dawn of man. In a sea of black waters, he witnessed a monstrous creature rise with a tempest. Its tent
acles writhed in lashing winds. Tattered wings unfurled against a black, star-lit sky.

  Across the sky a great army of angels raced. Armed with magic and maces, they descended on the beast with a fury. Agonizing screams pealed through the air as heavenly beings fell into the waters, while others ripped swollen flesh from the monstrosity and spilled its ichor. Inhuman carnage like nothing Blount had ever seen waged before him, and leading the attack on the beast, brothers in arms, were Abdiel and Azazel. No this was not Blount’s memory—this was someone else’s. The voice of the angel pulled him out of the vision and back…back…

  * * *

  “I haven’t gone by that name in a long time,” Blount said.

  The angel smiled and nodded after the shared memory. “You haven’t changed much.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “We have been summoned. My brothers and I.” Abdiel shrugged.

  “I banished you and your brethren.”

  “Indeed, you did.”

  “Where have you been since?”

  “Where you banished us.” The bitterness in Abdiel’s tone was strong, potent. “In the void. You have no idea.”

  It all clicked for Blount, and the pieces fell into place with a heavy thud. “What do you know of the island?”

  “Island?”

  “Don’t play stupid with me. What do you know of the island?”

  “All I am aware of is being yanked from the void by a powerful spell. One moment there was blackness, nothing. The next, I was here.”

  “And your brethren?”

  “The spell only called forth the most prominent of us. The rest? They are somehow stuck in the in-between. This world is riddled with holes, so to speak. Just like a house has a space between its walls, so does reality.”

  Blount’s tongue resisted, but he pushed the name past his lips, “Azazel?”

  Azazel, formerly Asiz. The Metatron. A being necessary because it was impossible for True God to communicate or associate with man. So high-ranking and so holy was he, he was authorized to go by YHVH’s very name, could be treated, regarded, received, even worshiped as True God himself. Lucifer’s greatest victory came when Azazel sided with him, and it was God’s greatest loss. His heartbreak at Azazel’s defection was said to have filled the ocean.

  “He is near,” Abdiel said. “As well as Camael. They have joined forces and ruled what they could in the void. There was something else in there.” Abdiel’s voice grew soft. “Something we never saw, but sensed. There was much debate as to what this creature might be.”

  “And?”

  “I believe it was the Ouroboros.”

  The name stirred some primal memory in Blount. He said the name, as if savoring its meanings. “I was on the island. The presence I felt there was not the Ouroboros. The being was not unlike the Ouroboros, but somehow not the same. I sensed something god-like.”

  “God is dead,” Abdiel said. “Azazel told me so himself.” The angel’s voice faltered at this.

  “And you believed that liar and murderer?”

  “What choice did I have? There is no evidence of HIM. The Ourboros moved to stabilize the fractures. The snake that eats itself. When Father All and his abode vanished, time as we know it fractured into parallel. I know this, as you do. We were both present.”

  “Now, we are all servants to the Ouroboros. Whatever I am, I have seen much during my lifetimes, and though some of the Dark Ones and the Old Ones I’ve faced claim He was slain, I tend to doubt that. Existence is His Being. The wheel has continued to turn, so I believe Father All has not been slain. Our remnant holds to this hope. Many times we have failed. Destined? Perhaps...yet we persevere. Father All is watching, and when things fall into perfect harmony, He will return and reward the faithful.”

  Abdiel unleashed jeering laughter. “Humans. You have always been so full of faith. Where I was banished? No God would have ever created such a place. The void, and what lurks there unseen, is no God.” The angel leaned down until he was almost nose-to-nose with Blount. “What lurks there…is more than a god…it is a devourer of planets, of universes, of galaxies.”

  “Cthulhu.”

  Abdiel shrank back as if Blount had physically struck him. He hissed and glanced around warily.

  “That name means something to you?”

  “I know the name,” Abdiel said. “I wish I did not.”

  “The island rests upon his form. His consciousness is elsewhere.”

  “The two cannot be joined.”

  “Why?”

  “They MUST not be joined,” Abdiel said. “All will be lost if this happens. Even the Ouroboros will not be able to repair the damage if this occurs.”

  “So the shadows manipulating the dead are Azazel’s minions,” Blount said.

  “Not exactly. He is teaching them how to possess the living now. At first they were only adept at controlling corpses.”

  “That’s why all the suicides,” Blount said. “They wanted the bodies.”

  “Yes, but now Azazel has taught them to go straight inside the living human form.”

  “Nice. So no one is safe.”

  “Not everyone is susceptible. It’s a weak hold at best. It all depends on the human’s will or enlightenment, or mental stability. The shadows can control any corpse they wish. It’s a strong hold that grounds them. But a living entity is a constant internal struggle—a war of wills so to speak. A battle that wages in the mind.”

  “What is this all about?”

  “Azazel’s ego. He is using the shadows for his own personal war on Earth, against the coming Old Ones. They’ve promised to fight for him in exchange for the knowledge of possessing the human body.”

  “Fight who?”

  “Anyone he wishes. You don’t understand—not even half of it. There is something else I must tell you.”

  Blount was filled with curiosity and apprehension. Somehow, he knew he wasn’t going to like what he was about to hear. “I’m all ears.”

  “This is bigger than all of us. Azazel wants this world. He will do anything to get it. We overthrew the Old Ones so long ago. At the dawning of time, when this world was nothing but darkness and without form. With the help of God, we attacked Cthulhu and the others and defeated them. Then God brought the light. They wanted this space for themselves, but we stole it. Cthulhu and the Old Ones are enraged. They will crush the entire universe for our crimes. Now that God is gone, there is nothing to stop them. You cast us into the void with their spirits. Now that the void has been ripped open, the island raised, Cthulhu’s spirit has been placed into a vessel by the ignorant cult.”

  “Casey Archer.”

  “Daughter of a mortal. The joining must be stopped. We cannot do this alone. God has been missing for some time. Without Him we have no hope of defeating Cthulhu and the Old Ones he will resurrect. Ironic…we shared the void with Cthulhu and all his rage, but he could not touch us. Not without his body. Now…”

  “What of Azazel?”

  “He is a fool. He is going to try to stop Cthulhu anyway. He will fail and we will perish with him. He must be stopped as well.”

  “What are these shadow creatures Azazel is trying to command?”

  “Many forms inhabit the void,” Abdiel said. “The spell the cult cast unleashed the shadows to wander in the in-between—the grids. It was like a floodgate opening. Some entered your world, some got lost in the in-between. As they find their way out, they will continue to ravage this world. Cthulhu is still in the in-between, latched onto Casey.”

  “So, I’m dealing with two different scenarios.”

  “It would seem so.” The angel shrugged.

  “Great. Just great.”

  Blount turned his back on the angel. It was the first time in all his lives that Abdiel was so upfront with him, without all the riddles and posturing. He felt the angel’s eyes on him as he hauled himself back into the Blackhawk. Abdiel was scared, Blount sensed, and feeling human for the first time in a millennium. Bl
ount actually felt the fear in him, and that’s what frightened him most.

  Somewhere Over North Dakota

  The spirit is here, the twins’ voices filled his mind.

  Blount cried out and clutched his head. Once the pain subsided, he spoke.”Where is Azazel?”

  He just left Outlook, Montana. The base there is overrun with shadows. Azazel slaughtered all the people within. He is heading for Rugby Rock. Cthulhu grows stronger.

  Blount sensed the time was close. He had a decision to make, but either decision held its own set of consequences. He lowered his altitude and studied the vast, empty stretch of land below. Somewhere down there a god waited to be born in human form.

  A sobering thought struck him, and he gasped as he considered the ramifications. What if Azazel was actually serving Cthulhu, not warring with him? The demon would have his ulterior motives, but both entities desired the same thing: the destruction of God’s creation.

  He peered below and scoured the moonlit landscape for any signs of life. “What do I do, girls?”

  Cthulhu is more important.

  With a sigh, Blount nodded. The twins were right, of course. Still, he longed to battle Azazel, and the urge was strong—a deep boring in his head.

  “Where? Show me the way, girls.”

  A pinpoint of light shot up from the prairie and shone brightly into the sky. Blount maneuvered the chopper in that direction and prepared his mind for the coming battle. He sensed the cameras hidden around the entrance to the bunker and avoided approaching from the front. Instead, he circled the entrance and came up from behind. He recognized the configuration as an underground missile silo, and knew from previous experience there was an alternate escape/entry access located a few hundred yards to the west. After making his way there, he stood before a much smaller door set into a boulder. Behind this door would be a rapid elevator.