Az

by A A Bavar

  Suddenly, there it was; the old, blue sedan and harbor of killers. It was the perfect vision of a hunted beast in flight as it swerved in and out and dashed past other similar beasts in a frantic attempt to elude the unavoidable. The car was still a good distance away, but I could see the killer frantically looking from side to side in his metallic shell while the driver desperately tried to put as much distance as possible between them and me. Somehow, it was satisfying to see that, and I focused my attention fully on my prey. Instantly, my mind was present in that deathtrap with them; sometimes it pays to be omnipresent when the whole world is not crying out in despair.

  The killer was sitting half-cocked on the edge of the backseat with his head twisted upward as he looked out the rear window and repeatedly scanned the skies. He used his sleeve to wipe the blood from his face, the peck holes still bleeding.

  The driver quickly glanced over his shoulder at the killer. “What the hell was that?” he shrieked.

  “How the hell should I know? The ground blew up and this freaky thing with wings flew out. And it just floated there, staring over the dead girl, and then the windows started exploding.” The killer wiped his face again and grimaced as he saw his reflection in the rearview mirror. “And then that goddamn freakin’ bird. It almost tore my eyes out! Christ, look at my face!”

  The driver looked back again. “What the hell? Are those holes? Where the hell is Charlie?” He slammed the palm of his hand on the steering wheel. “Is he dead?”

  “I don’t know! I don’t know!” yelled the killer, his face chalk white.

  “Will you get your ass in the front seat before I crash the damn car? What did we get ourselves into?”

  “How the hell should I know? I told you, I had no choice,” said the killer, as he climbed into the front passenger seat. “Things were going good until that freaky girl started with the kung-fu crap. It was all Jackie Chan shit. Damn, she beat the life out of me and Charlie. But then I got her good.” The killer passed his fingers through his hair in frustration and momentarily pressed his eyelids. “Just get us back to the garage. I made the deal with the wrong dude, ‘cause if that thing finds us,” the killer said, motioning to the window with his head, “we’re dead.”

  I had heard enough. I’d show him freaky. And yes, he made the deal with the wrong angel, because now he owed Lucifer his soul, but I would be the one tearing it from his body. I spread my arms wide and let myself fall forward into a dive with my chest out like a shield; my timing perfect. Just instants before the collision, I flipped into a crouch with my fists clenched and ready for impact. I landed on the front of the sedan with a deafening crash, my right knee and fists crushing the hood into a distorted mass of metal.

  “Azrail smash!” I shouted, and grinned.

  The roaring beast under me swerved wildly from the brutal impact as the driver tried to regain control. The terrorized screams coming from inside its shell were sweet melody to my ears. It was no secret that my purpose there was wholly malefic.

  “All work and no play makes Az a dull boy!” I smiled the smile of a thousand demons. “Heeere’s Aaz…” Nothing good ever comes from saying that. Mr. King made sure of it.

  With a deafening blow, I punched through the windshield with my right hand and grabbed the driver by the coat. He screamed, eyes wide open and arms flailing in the air like a cockroach on its back as he repeatedly tried to pry my hands away. What a joke. The killer just sat there and stared like an idiot while I dragged his buddy out through the hole, broken glass cutting his clothes and skin everywhere as I pulled him through. It was time for accountability. When you run with the wrong crowd, you pay the price.

  I pulled the driver up close to me, our faces just inches from each other, and our eyes locked fleetingly. In that instant, I saw his soul. But no amount of love, compassion, or kindness that I had witnessed in Kay, could veil the hatred that was me. The dead cannot seek justice. It was my job now. With a flick of my wrist, I threw him away like an insignificant bug. The car continued speeding forward out of control as thunder and lightning exploded through the skies, and rain beat down on the shattered windshield. The killer was still staring at me, dumb as ever. I smirked and pointed at him.

  “Sit tight. I’ll be back ‘cause your ride hasn’t even begun.”

  The driver landed on the wet sidewalk with a gruesome, bone crunching thud. I watched him bounce and roll over repeatedly, his body punished in every way by the hard concrete. For an instant, it seemed like he would never stop, but it wasn’t amusing enough to keep me waiting. When your sight is on dessert, the main course loses its charm. I jumped from the car and landed in front of him, allowing his body to violently crash into my iron-like legs and come to an abrupt stop. I heard the breath leave him and he fell limp, half unconscious. Sometimes, even the most ferocious animals go against their instincts and let curiosity get the better of them. I had seen it happen many times, the lion on the hunt losing its dinner because the prey played dead. It was ludicrous. But there was no escape here, because I wasn’t just a predator. I was the messenger of death, the taker of souls.

  I stood there momentarily looming over the battered driver, then picked him up and threw him over my shoulder like a rag doll. He struck the wall of the building behind me and fell to the ground with an almost inaudible grunt. I turned and looked down at the messy heap and for a brief moment felt a tinge of sadness. In a killer’s moment of greed, I had lost what took Kay years to help me find; my humanity.

  What came next was pure resentment and frustration. My body glowed blue like a neon light, and my hands erupted into intense flames as I looked up and spread my arms towards heaven and pleaded for justice.

  “Do these souls deserve deliverance? Forgiveness? I cannot do this! I cannot stand by and do nothing. Not this time!” I stood there staring and let the raindrops pelt my face. “Father, please!”

  Suddenly, there was a low and deep rumble. The kind that slowly rolls and rolls until it makes it into your gut and starts churning your insides. But gradually, it got louder and more intense until a barrage of thunder and lightning mercilessly thrashed the night sky. I had my answer, it was a loud and resounding no! There would be no justice as I saw it or wanted it, and once again I was on my own. I was going to transgress the only law that could rip me apart and strip me, or any archangel for that matter, of my position.

  I dropped my arms and looked at the driver sprawled on the ground at my feet. He was on his side groaning in pain. His eyes were red, and he had a deep gash above his left eye. The rest of his face was covered with smaller cuts, and blood mixed with rain dripped freely.

  “Get up,” I growled.

  The driver didn’t make the right move. Instead, he curled up into a tight ball and closed his eyes. There is nothing in God’s worlds that I detest more than a spineless coward; to be brave when you feel safe to attack the weak, and then whimper and flee like a chicken when the fight comes to you. I never imagined that I could feel so much contempt for something so little. Not even Lucifer, with all his lying, trickery and conniving ways had made me loathe him to this extent. This was a weasel, a coward, a worm. The fire engulfing my hands intensified as I bent down and grabbed the driver by the lapels of his coat and yanked him to his feet. He screeched in pain as my fiery hands scorched the sides of his neck.

  “Your soul may be safe for now, but I’ll be back sooner than you think,” I hissed, and backhanded him across the face, branding him with the mark of the serpent.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  The light in me was dead, and all I felt was outrage. A far more oppressive darkness had engulfed my soul and brought out in me the angst of anger, fear and sadness. Hulk angry, Hulk smash was a joke compared to what I wanted to do. His anger was momentary. Mine was eternal and unrelenting.

  I dropped the driver and shot into the air. A part of me wanted the hunt, the chase for the killer, to engage in a game where the outcome was obvious to me but yet unsettled for him. I wanted Kay’s kil
ler to live in fear, to know that he was the hunted and I the hunter. To allow him a brief escape, a light where he would find hope like Kay had, and then hound him mercilessly until he begged me for death. But another part of me simply wanted the catch, the immediate sentencing and execution of a worthless existence, and that’s what I went for. My redemption to Kay.

  From my vantage point, I saw the killer’s sedan race in my direction and knew he felt exhilarated thinking that he had escaped. He believed that I mistook the driver for him; how foolishly stupid. His thought, his last thought, better him than me. I’m sorry Jesus, but Man still hasn’t learned that to find life he has to lose it, sacrifice it. And this one would wish that he had done unto others as he wished done to him.

  It was time to quench hope, to rip it out from every possible crevasse of the killer’s being. With the car only a few hundred feet from me, I allowed myself to fall through the sky like a massive meteor – a streak of hot blue, and landed in the street with a loud explosion. Chunks of concrete flew everywhere, denting cars, crashing into buildings, and smashing windows. It was a pre-apocalyptic moment and I enjoyed the Hulkish theatrics of it all, especially when I saw the look on the killer’s face. I was on my knee like a football player waiting for the punt, the ball being the car that was shooting towards me. I smiled at the killer and he, in return, tried to do the only thing that he could; run me down. It was the perfect ending, the fight between metal and flesh. I heard the beast’s engine wail as it lurched forward, succumbing to its commander’s final order, and deliberately got to my feet. As the eternal harvester of souls I would forgo my existence to become the harvester of one life – the spoils of my war. And for that, I needed a majestic moment. I pushed back my wet hair and opened my arms wide in a great embrace. My wings, seldom used in the new world, snapped open behind me in a semicircle, their appearance even to me, magnificent; a pattern of inky-black feathers with tips of silver. I stood there squinting, momentarily silent and motionless, my eyes serpent-like in their narrow slits. Not that I needed a specific moment of advantage for my attack. What I wanted was to see the white of the killer’s eyes, and I did. With our eyes locked, I forcefully brought my hands together in an ear splitting clap that sent out a thunderous shockwave in the direction of the speeding sedan. Cars flew to the sides and crashed into poles and walls while trees were ripped from their roots. Windows in the buildings on either side of the street exploded one after the other as the wave rippled its way to the killer, clearing the path for our final encounter. I didn’t want anything in our way.

  “You freak of nature!” were the only words the killer could muster before our worlds collided.

  The impact was brutal but quite unlike what the killer expected. Metal bent, twisted and screeched as the sedan tore apart around me, its momentum relentlessly pushing it forward. I didn’t flinch or move a muscle, but kept my eyes on my prize while the car ripped in half. But this wasn’t the ending that I wanted for the killer. It wouldn’t be that easy, generous or forgiving. I wanted him to suffer, to feel the agony and pain of loss. As soon as he was within my reach, I grabbed him and pulled him into my chest, my wings surrounding him in a protective cocoon. The protection, however, was momentary and from immediate physical damage. I wanted him to feel the agony I bore inside, what I had endured for him and his brethren throughout existence and how Man, he, had repaid that sacrifice. To bear one’s own burden in silence is to accept loneliness, but to do it for mankind?

  I opened the gateway to my soul and let everything loose, knowing well that his soul could not take it. The killer’s eyes opened wide in horror as scenes from thousands of years of human carnage and atrocity flashed by in a violent slideshow. However, it wasn’t the pain of war and destruction that drained the life from his body and made his heart wither like a prune. It was the towering feeling of loss, desolation and hopelessness that pulled at his being and finally swallowed him. But he only fell into complete darkness, the death of light and hope, when he saw the life-movie of the girl he had shot dead. My Kay. My little one.

  “No, no, no! I had no choice…” his mind shrieked in silence. “What can I do to be saved?”

  I looked down at his contorted face. Black veins had webbed their way from his temples and forehead to his eyes, ears, and cheeks all the way down to his neck. His skin was leathery-old and decrepit, and his eyes filmy and no longer vivid with the spark of life. Tears rolled down his cheeks in a continuous and uncontrollable stream. Dr. Who would be proud of my weeping angel.

  “Nothing.” That offer was not on the table.

  I once argued with Michael about justice and punishment. The dangers of wanting to always see the good in Man and forgiving him in the hope of change. But what about the incorrigible ones? How could we justify their existence to the ones they wronged and the ones that they would wrong? No! All we accomplish by sparing the guilty is to threaten the innocent and plant the seed of chaos. Not anymore.

  The night sky was angry and the storm clouds swirled and collided, unceremoniously unleashing Father’s expression of violent displeasure. There was, however, nothing that He could do that was worse than what I had already committed myself to. I grinned, and with the killer still held hostage in his winged cage, leaped to the edge of the tallest building on the street. For a moment, I stood there and took in the miles and miles of city that spread out before me. To me, it was an inferno of lost souls, but soon they would no longer be my problem. I looked over my shoulder, and for an instant, was disappointed not to see Michael. I guess some part of me wanted him to be there, to challenge me so that I could justify myself. I turned, opened my wings and released the killer to the night air, but before he fell, grabbed him by the collar and held him over the ledge like a kitten in a cat’s mouth. He was limp and swung from side to side with the growing wind. I thought that I had overdone it. That he wouldn’t even be aware of his death, but cockroaches don’t die that easily, and he opened his red, bulging eyes and looked at me. I took Kay’s necklace from my pocket and swung it in front of him like a pendulum before slipping it around his neck. At that instant, Bran landed on my shoulder and pecked me gently on the neck. He was telling me that he had my back and giving me the good-to-go.

  “Please… please… I’m sorry… I had no choice…”

  As if having or not having a choice meant anything to me. Who you are is not defined by what you believe or what you say. Ultimately, it’s the legacy you leave behind defined by what you’ve done and the choices that you’ve made because of your circumstances. So, yes, he did have a choice and so did I. “As promised, tonight you die,” I hissed.

  I guess it was at that moment that Father fully realized that I was not going to stop. That Lucifer would finally have me and become my lord and keeper. For a split-second, the sky became darker than black, a complete void, and there was no angel made of gold to stop me. My ground shook as Lucifer reveled below in his palace of fire and stone, and then my world was mercilessly assaulted by lighting after lightning as I slowly opened my grip and let the killer drop.

  “Father, we can try and try, but in the end our souls cry for what we truly are, and I can’t change who I am. Please forgive me even though I know what I’ve done.”

  TWENTY-NINE

  The hooded figure was impassive. No comment, no sigh, no goddamn anything. Maybe she was just like me, hard and careless, and counseling wasn’t part of her job description. Or maybe I wasn’t a good story teller, and what I hoped would move her to understand why I did what I did wasn’t reason enough. Or, it was simply because she was a woman; harder, harsher and more determined. Either way, it didn’t matter because now we were in it together, and she would be the one to have to deliver me to my fate.

  “It’s time. He’ll be here soon.” I paused, but the trend continued and there was no sign of any interest to find out who. No concern, no desire, no curiosity. Maybe she was a statue, but interestingly enough, now her absolute disinterest made me smile. She was simply better s
uited than me for this job, and I admired that – more broken and callous from the get-go. This, unlike me, gave her a chance to survive because in the beginning I did care; and ultimately at my core I never stopped caring. I stood up and hesitated, then picked up the leaf with my initial on it and put it in the pocket of my overcoat. I couldn’t quite see, but knew that the hooded figure was intently watching my every move. Her focus was the leaf, her first and possibly most significant assignment. She probably wanted to keep it as a memento; maybe I would give it to her later if she said pretty please. But then, surprisingly she did something quite uncharacteristic by looking up at me. It was a fleeting moment, and in that instant I thought I saw the shimmer of what looked like tears, but then she stood and her face was once again lost in the blackness of the room.

  I walked around the table in silence, heading for the hall she had come from. As I reached her, I smelled the distant fragrance of jasmine and roses. It was a jolt to my system. I froze, but before I could say anything she turned and walked away. I followed her, my heart and mind ablaze. Was this a punishment for my actions? Was she to bear my cross because of my defiance? Had I defined and sealed her fate? As these thoughts bludgeoned me, we entered the Room of Candles.

  The room, with its innumerous rows of living candles, was eerily dark, and shadows swayed and danced everywhere. I stopped in the middle of the room and watched the hooded figure make her way to the far wall where my scythe was resting in the shadows. I guess the moment had come for me to truly step down by passing on the one thing that I had made but which ultimately defined me. I waited and watched, expecting her to simply take it, but she didn’t. She stood there with her back to me, her arms weighing beside her and her head bowed in what seemed to be more shame than respect.