Crossroads

by Alexie Aaron [Aaron, Alexie]

  “Ah, I see that I’m going to have to break this down for you.”

  “I’m a little slow, aren’t I?”

  “No, you’re not. Unfortunately, you see fidelity as sexual, but it’s more than that. Altair wants to guide you. He wants you to listen to him without question. He wants to protect you from the hurt you’re going to have just living life as a human.”

  “But how will I learn?”

  “Exactly. Be honest with me, does Baxter tell you what to do?”

  “No. He asks me when I blunder what would have been a better action to take or words to use. He understands that I’m this freak who didn’t grow up with normal childhood friends, dates, or parental concern. I’m a piece of coal who wants to be a diamond. Baxter doesn’t want to make me a diamond but give me the skills in order to choose the right tools. And the most important thing is, he shows me how to properly use them.”

  “Tell me about your chess games with Altair.”

  “I’m not sure if that’s not breaking confidences?”

  “You are fiercely loyal, aren’t you?”

  “I wouldn’t tell anyone what you and I’ve said. Even though I know everything I say goes right to Michael.”

  “You were given free will. I was made to be obedient.”

  “Yet you would have lain with me.”

  “I have lain with women before you and since.”

  “I thought you feathered dudes have to be chaste.”

  “No. We aren’t priests. We just can’t reproduce.”

  “Oy.”

  “Mia, honestly, you don’t know spit about angels, let alone archangels.”

  “The information I have is spotty. Altair uses chess to discuss my life. Every piece is someone I choose to have in my life. Who my bishops are seems to be a concern.”

  “Because they are evil,” Sariel determined.

  “That’s a great point. Altair did bring that up.”

  “Why have you chosen evil beings to give you counsel?”

  “No offense, but they are smarter than the good entities. This is how they survived. I listen to what they have to say and then make up my own mind. Just to be straight, I do listen to good bishops too.”

  “You don’t listen to me.”

  “I don’t trust your counsel.”

  “Why?”

  “You left me.”

  “That’s old news. Get over it.”

  “I can’t,” Mia said and sprouted her wings and took off.

  Jake looked at Ted who was busy working on a problem. He weighed whether Ted should know that Mia flew off after having an argument with Sariel. He couldn’t hear anything that was said because Sariel had a way of killing the sound recording whenever he was near. The fact that he let Jake see him in the camera was interesting. Jake figured that Sariel didn’t want Ted to think there was anything untoward happening. But Ted wasn’t watching Mia; he was working on something else.

  “Ted, Mia left.”

  “She texted,” Ted said, lifting his phone up to the camera. “Going to check on the explosion site with Sariel.”

  Sariel caught up to Mia at the top of the world. She was just drifting there with her back to him. He turned her around, and her face was wet with tears. His heart broke. He thought they had put this behind them. From the moment he saved her from the soul eater in New Orleans, he felt a bond with her. But he was an archangel and loyal to his general Michael. It was who he was, and he couldn’t and wouldn’t change that.

  “I’m drifting here, having a pity party for one. I’m trying to think of anyone who hasn’t left me at one time or another. Everyone has. My children will eventually leave, and that’s the way it should be. Ted left me. His mind was screwed up, but he still left me, instead of fighting with and for me. Altair has left me so many times. The reasons you hightailed it away from me were for the most part noble. Angelo has a hundred reasons, you a thousand. Michael left me with Lucifer. Lucifer left me because I’m going to die one day, and he can’t look at me without seeing Michael.”

  “Mia, it’s your upbringing that is coloring your thoughts right now.”

  “Excuse me, who invited you? This is my pity party.”

  “Neil Hansen didn’t leave you. Neither did Lobo,” Sariel reminded her. “Death took them.”

  Mia’s face showed that she was listening.

  Sariel saw an opening. He continued, “Your godfathers have never left you. You left them. When Acalan pushes for you to pose for him, it’s not because he doesn’t have you memorized, but he wants to hang around with you. Stephen…”

  “No, not Murph! He fucking called me a whore and all but tossed me off the pirate ship.”

  Sariel didn’t know this. What else had happened on that ship? The GSD held a lot of secrets.

  “Mia, I didn’t know. You were so thick with the birdmen then.”

  “The birdmen will leave me soon. I’ve accepted primal demon genes. I will no longer be able to have children. I will not be their brood mare.”

  “Was this a sacrifice to move The Balance? Mia, there had to be another way.”

  “No. I have all the children I want to bear. I’ll adopt children if that is what fate needs from me, but this factory is closed.”

  “Good for you,” Sariel said.

  “Now watch the birdmen leave…” Mia said. She put her hands together and imitated birds. “Bye-bye, birdies.”

  “There has to be more of a reason. You already had the ability to make yourself sterile. What happened with Mbengar?”

  “I was invited to swim in the Second-day Sea. I think that’s where your race came from. I saw angelic creatures swimming with me.”

  Sariel angled his head and studied her. “So, what is the advantage of embracing primal demon genes?”

  “Roumain, Abigor, and Lucifer will have no dominion over me.”

  “You’re free,” Sariel said in awe. “You’re stronger.”

  “I have to be stronger to use the blue-star energy. I nearly fried myself saving you. I would like to caution you that unless Raphael was able to extract it from you, a little of Nyx flows through your veins.”

  “I’m aware. Raphael told me that he felt that, as long as I didn’t bond with the goddess of the night, it wasn’t going to hurt me.”

  “You mean Michael won’t hurt you.”

  “Mia, I wish you would have more compassion for us creatures who were made to be obedient.”

  Mia looked at Sariel. “You’re right, I have been biased. I expected more from your group. I didn’t realize that you don’t have free will unless…”

  “We fell like Altair did. The reason he has never felt fully accepted into the squadron is because he has free will, and we’re all jealous of it.”

  “Not even Michael?”

  “Not even Michael. The big cheeses have a certain amount of flexibility because they must be able to see the big picture. But if God says to jump.”

  “You jump. I would jump too if God was talking to me.”

  “Mia, God talks to everyone. You just have to learn how to listen.”

  Mia moved closer to Sariel. “If I’m this machine put together from this and that, am I still a child of God?”

  “It’s not your outsides. It’s your soul. I’m not talking your reincarnated soul. Euthymia has only memories to give you. I’m talking, what made you love a geeky beaked genius, a prudish ghost, and most everyone you’ve come across. This essence was so strong that it pulled me from the heavens to pull you out of danger. Your soul is acceptance, nurture, and fertility. Wait.” Sariel held up his hand. “Listen, I’m not talking fertility in the guise of human reproduction. I’m talking about the fertility of ideas and goodwill. This makes you a child of the universe or, as Father Santos would claim, a child of God.”

  “I had forgotten what good counsel you have given me,” Mia admitted. “In my fear and rage, I forgot all the good things.”

  �
�Hell has a way of doing that.”

  “How much is Hell still controlling me?”

  “After your dip in the Second-day Sea, I’d say nil. Beware, they are going to wonder why and send someone to find out.”

  “Is Michael going to flip out because I’m embracing the primal demon?”

  “In my experience, most likely. Can he do anything about it? No. He is a tactician and will eventually see you as an asset. But he will distance himself from you.”

  “Is this a bad thing?”

  “You may be on your own down here. No more Sariel to upset you.”

  Mia stuck out her lower lip. “Just when we were getting along.”

  “This too shall pass,” Sariel said, lifting an eyebrow. “I have to go and report to Michael.”

  “Did you mean us getting along will pass or Michael…” Mia didn’t finish because Sariel was already gone.

  Mia landed under the cover of the woods on the other side of the river. She saw Chambers parked and walked over to him. “Hello, Vinnie, what’s going on?” she asked, looking in the sedan’s window.

  “Big explosion.”

  “I felt the ground shake in Big Bear Lake. Was that this?” Mia asked.

  “Yes. You’re kind of a woman in the know…” he started.

  “Am I?”

  “Cut it out, I know you’re special. Tell me what you think went on up there.”

  “I won’t know until I see it for myself.”

  “PEEPs were just in talking to Gloria Monroe. She issued a complaint against Burt Hicks for fraudulently interviewing her.”

  “Burt?” Mia questioned.

  “I take it you weren’t there.”

  “I wasn’t invited.”

  “What’s going on, Mia?”

  “Well, I know that Gloria was looking for something. There are ground test trenches all over our side of the river. I suspect she had a hunch that there may have been natural gas up here. I think the Monroe company may have been thinking about buying more land. How else would you explain the holes?”

  “You make a good point.”

  “Also, why clear this area of trees? Why be so secretive that they tried to kill a photographer?”

  “Damn, you’re really making sense now.”

  “Remember, Vinnie, I have an overactive imagination,” Mia cautioned.

  Vinnie’s radio came on. “Deputy Chambers, are you speaking with Mrs. Martin?”

  “Yes, Sheriff.”

  “Please escort her over the river.”

  “Yes, Sheriff.”

  “Damn, am I in trouble again?” Mia asked.

  “The sheriff just wants to speak with you.”

  “If I leave here in cuffs, I’m going to be cross with you.”

  “Come on, be brave.”

  Mia walked over the bridge. She noticed that it wavered a bit. “This thing is no longer sound.”

  “I think the crash loosened up a few old rivets.”

  Mia walked to where the area had been crime-scene-taped off. She noticed that further up the road there was a road-closed sign. “There goes the shortcut to the hospital.”

  “Cooper!” Tom called.

  Mia ducked under the tape and carefully walked towards him. As she got closer, her mouth dropped open. “What the fritter is this?” she asked, looking down into what looked like the remnants of a community of some kind. She looked at the impossibly tall doorways and mosaics. “Have you found Atlantis?” she asked.

  “Dork,” Tom said. “No, but maybe you might ask your old man to come up here for a looksee.”

  “Ted?”

  “Cooper, think.”

  “Oh, my father. Sure. I’m surprised he’s not already here. He can sniff artifacts from a mile away.”

  Tom laughed. “This is a crime scene, so he can’t take anything.”

  “So said the tape.”

  “Where were you at nine fifteen this morning?”

  “Is that when the ground shook? If so, I was in Acalan’s store. I walked outside to see Andy Carmichael running to the volunteer firehouse.”

  “Did he see you?”

  “I don’t know, but I was with Noah, Adam, and Varden. Dieter was there too and Acalan. I have a receipt. You’re not trying to pin this on me, are you?” Mia said, driving her finger into Tom’s chest.

  “Ow. Ease up. I still have to ask.”

  “Why?”

  “Because…” He held up an evidence bag with an ID lanyard that had seen better days. On the end was a picture of a familiar brunette.

  “That’s Gloria Monroe or whatever she is calling herself these days,” Mia identified.

  “If memory serves me, we arrested her for kidnapping.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  “Because kidnapping is a federal offense, we had to hand her over to the Feds. The bastards let her go.”

  “And she ends up here. Where were you at nine fifteen, Sheriff?”

  “Mom had me packing Paula’s things, Constable Cooper.”

  “I love’s me a mommy’s boy,” Mia said. “Is this Gloria somebody dead?”

  “There’s a body over there by the crushed SUV. It appears to be female.”

  “Want me to look?”

  “There is a ton of rock on her… Oh, look. Sure.”

  Mia approached the area where an arm was exposed. Mia shook her head. “This body is too young. That ring is too cheap to be Gloria’s.” Mia felt sick. Was it Stephanie?

  “She was holding this ID,” Tom explained.

  “This girl is in her early twenties. Look at her nails. Permission to touch her?”

  “Don’t leave any fingerprints.”

  Mia was going to keep her gloves on regardless. Mia knelt and picked up the hand. She picked up an image that the corpse may have brushed up against. It was a stack of plastic bottles. Maybe not Stephanie. Mia dialed Burt. “Pick up, pick up.”

  “Mia?”

  “Where is Stephanie?”

  “Rockford, I think.”

  “Make sure and call me back.”

  Mia walked around and looked at the pile of stones from the other side, trying to see if she could see any ash-blonde hair.

  Burt called back. “She’s in Rockford with her grandmother. I just talked to her.”

  “Thank God.”

  “Why?”

  Mia explained where she was and what she was looking at.

  “Give your phone to Tom,” Burt ordered.

  Mia did so.

  “Hicks.”

  “Sheriff, when I went to interview Gloria Monroe, she had an intern. Young thing, brunette hair, and she had a twisted pinky ring which caught my eye. She introduced herself as Amy Burnette.”

  “Where were you at nine fifteen this morning?”

  “Harvey’s U-Haul, returning a truck.”

  “Thank you.” Tom handed the phone back to Mia.

  “Sheriff, we found someone else,” an EMT called.

  Mia followed Tom down a ladder into the open area and then into what looked to be a cavern before the ground above it was blown off. They followed the EMT to his partner who was standing over the slightly charred, open-eyed body of Gloria Monroe, floating in a dark pool of water. Mia reached in and touched the woman and confirmed that Gloria was long gone.

  “Where are her ghosts?” Mia asked, looking around. She heard a click and saw one of the convict ghosts holding a gun.

  Chapter Forty

  Tom instinctively pushed Mia down and pulled his weapon. Marty fired. The bullet ricocheted off a spectral axe blade, moments before the very same blade sliced through Marty, who then disappeared. The gun fell to the ground.

  The EMTs, who didn’t see Marty, were confused about where the gun came from.

  “Did anyone see who fired that weapon?” Tom asked, covering for he and Mia.

  “No, Sheriff.”

  Mia sat up. “There is a history of bad stuff
going on up here. Maybe the place is boobytrapped.”

  “I think you’re right. We should recover this body and then do a thorough search before allowing any other civilians in the crime scene area,” Tom said.

  Tom helped Mia to her feet. “Cooper, I think that bullet was for you.”

  “I think so too. Thanks for the assist.”

  “Speaking of assists, where is Murphy? I’d like to thank him. That bullet was headed for my gold star.”

  “He’s probably hunting down the other ghosts.”

  “He is amazing.”

  “He once stopped a bullet inches from my face,” Mia bragged.

  “You’re very lucky, Cooper.”

  “I know. I’m glad there are lots of broad-shouldered men around to protect little ole me.”

  Tom blushed slightly.

  Chambers came down the passageway with evidence bags. He was followed by the coroner.

  Mia excused herself and walked back. She stopped at a gray soot-covered wall. She brushed off part of it with the corner of her T-shirt and stopped when she saw the hilt of a very familiar sword depicted. “It can’t be?”

  “Mia, I’d like you to go home,” Tom said behind her.

  Mia flattened her back against the wall. “I may know why the ghost fired on me.”

  “We’ll talk later,” Tom promised. “Go home.”

  “Yes, Sheriff,” Mia said and rushed out of there. She saw Murphy staring at something on the ground. “Watcha doing?”

  “I think that’s a key. Too modern to belong to anything down there,” he said. “Why would anyone keep a rusty key?”

  “Because a ghost can’t use it.” Mia stooped, picked it up, and dangled it in the sunlight. She took off one glove and lay it in the palm of her hand. She was assaulted with hundreds of images. She managed to control the vision and turned and looked at the SUV half buried under rocks. “Somewhere in there is a rusty metal box. Under that is a casket. The young woman who last held this key was contemplating world domination. I think we have to get to that box before anyone else does.”