The Wrath of Jeremy

by Stephen Andrew Salamon

  “What, did you find a mirage?” asked Gabriel in sarcasm.

  “No, it’s better than that,” he answered. David started walking back to where he saw the mirage and they followed, walking in his footsteps up a sandhill and saw him pointing his finger outward. “Look, is that what I think it is?”

  They looked out. In the distance, yet in relatively close proximity, there was a fresh new village in their sights.

  Their eyes paused, glowing with relief at the village that gave them a breath of hope and faith. “Yes, David, it’s Israel,” Mary spoke before they started running toward it. They ran for the village with great speed, and happiness was what brought their feet up to such a great momentum. Once reaching it, before they entered it, Mary and Sam grabbed the cross again and watched it give out three separate lights that gave a purple light to its glow, a new color that each of them knew was some form of a warning that they were very close to what they wanted. One shined to a small building, the other to a little house, and the third one pointed toward a tavern that was directly in front of them.

  “Well, which one should we go to first?” Michael asked.

  Without answering his question, they all walked toward the house where the second light shined on, with Mary letting go of the cross and letting Sam hold it, seeing the lights vanish instantly.

  “Listen, you guys, this is ridiculous. We’re going on a wild-goose chase in the middle of a desert. This isn’t a game, we could die very easily out here,” Mary brought up with stress, great stress that was carried on by her nearly dying.

  “Well, Mary, right now I’d rather go on the wild-goose chase in order to find a cure for my sickness and end this. Jesus told us we would be cured, and I’m not going to believe that Jesus would lie to us,” said Jeremy.

  They then heard laughter and saw that the giggles were coming from David’s voice. “You really believe that we’re here because of that?” asked David, laughter in his words.

  “Well, I don’t know what to believe anymore, David,” Jeremy answered defensively.

  After Jeremy’s words, they entered an old house where they saw an old lady sitting, rocking back and forth in a rocking chair, with flames from her fireplace giving a red glow to the darkened room. They didn’t know what to do, being that they were entering without knocking, each of them stood silent and watched the old lady rock back and forth, wondering which person should speak to the old lady first. “I’ve been waiting for you,” the old woman silently grunted with a smile. Jeremy closed the door behind them and they all stared at each other in fear. “Please, sit down, make yourselves at home….”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Looking out of an airport window, Jeremy’s mother wiped her hundredth tear away from her eyes, sensing chills running up her spine, holding thoughts that exhaled through her weeping loudly. “You’re trying to tell us that our sons are in Amman, Jordan?”

  She and her husband waited impatiently in a petite room of the airport, seeing all the other parents waiting as well, demanding to know the same answers that she was demanding. “Yes, Mrs. Daven, your sons somehow managed to trick our airport staff into believing the plane was set for Amman. You see, the airplane was set for Europe, not Amman: we don’t know how or why they tricked them. Believe me, I am just as upset as you are. We found two of our stewardesses that were on that plane lying dead in the ocean. If it weren’t for a fishing boat that saw them fall to their deaths, they would have probably been eaten by sharks. Right now, all I know is the plane did land safely,” the airport owner said, when suddenly the door to the room opened. “Oh, here’s the pilot of the plane. Jack, these are the boys’ parents, please explain to them what exactly happened!”

  “Are our boys okay?” Michael’s mother asked while she smoked her twelfth cigarette, her hands shaking with tremendous speed from the nervousness she felt.

  “Well, I really can’t tell you that,” Jack replied. The sounds of screaming came from outside the room, causing their bodies to lift from their seats and head toward the doorway. They all ran to the main part of the airport, following the screams, yearning to know what was causing them. They then saw people standing and watching through a big window, staring at the runway. They stopped and watched as the other people, who were screaming, stood there with amazement in their eyes, watching through the window.

  “What are you all looking at?” demanded Jeremy’s mother, pushing her way through the crowd to have a look at where their eyes were pointing. Fighting and yelling, she pushed her way all the way up to the window and looked through the glass, perceiving something falling from the sky. As she looked closer through the window at the darkened runway, she stood in awe and silence, with her heart pumping faster and her blood flowing quicker. Horror took over and lay across each of her nerves. Her eyes widened in terror as she screamed out, “Oh my God!”

  Birds, birds and more birds on top of them fell from the sky, plunging from the darkness as they piled on the ground. “This is a sign,” a man yelled out. “A sign that the end is near,” he added, watching more birds falling from the sky like raindrops.

  The parents stood in dread, and Jeremy’s mother watched in bafflement, not knowing what was happening, yet saying in a dismayed expression, “Where are you, Jeremy? Where are you?”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The old woman handed Jeremy a piece of cloth, resembling a doily, and said, “Protect this piece of cloth, I’ve been guarding it for a long time, waiting for the arrival of all of you.” He turned it around and noticed a tan part of a human face, staring at it hard as the old woman, wearing old, torn sheets for her clothes, added, “Yes, Jeremy, that’s his face. The face of Jesus, the one who was born a man, a great man with an endowment, a gift of healing, who became the God to all, the King of Man, who was and still is the God to all.”

  “How did you know my name?” he gasped, suddenly filled with tears of mystery, caused by his eyes capturing the God as he knew, staring at his God’s face that was robust, energetic. His eyes couldn’t believe, couldn’t accept it. He blinked twice and still when they opened, seeing the image before him that, deep inside of him he knew no one should ever see until death. Awe burst in his veins, but then a small innocent grin formed through his bafflement, as if the eyes on the cloth calmed down his pores and pupils, telling him it was okay to look, it was okay to see. Jeremy then handed the cloth to Michael, and waited for the old woman to speak, while Gabriel, Mary and Sam looked over Michael’s shoulders to have a look at the cloth. Once Jeremy stared back at the old woman, his grin melted into a straight glare, and his eyes shot out with suspicion as they caught the glance of the old woman.

  “For many years I’ve been guarding that cloth for Veronica. Veronica is my great, great, great—well, let’s just say she’s my great-grandmother. When she wiped Christ’s face, his image came upon it, that cloth that you hold before you. After they crucified him, many people wanted a piece of memory of their king’s presence. Seven days later, as soon as people discovered that my great-grandmother had his image on her Kerchief, they went to her house and began grabbing it away from her. They ripped it into three shreds and pulled two of the shreds away from Veronica. After they tore it, the Lord rose from the dead and went to Heaven again. You see, by them tearing his image they released him and forced his body to rise. Now, you have to bring him back with his father by sewing up the three pieces to make one great Kerchief, the Kerchief that has the image of thy Lord,” the old woman explained. Sam grabbed the Kerchief and looked over it, hearing the old woman add, “As soon as the pieces are sewn together, the Lord will speak to all of you and tell you your mission!”

  “Who are we?” Jeremy asked, developing tears that shielded his brown eyes of misery.

  “Well, as soon as you find the other two parts, bring them here and it will tell you. I don’t know where the other two parts are, but I’m sure God has given you some sort of a map or guidance tool to follow,” she answered, seeing Jeremy taking the Shroud f
rom off his neck and placing it on the table.

  “Well, so far we’ve retrieved this map, but I don’t understand Hebrew,” said Jeremy. The old woman saw the writing on the Shroud and looked at it with amazement as Mary put the cross on the table.

  “No, Jeremy, she means the cross,” Mary stated.

  “You have completed three signs so far. You have allowed Grewsal to be vanished, you’ve retrieved the Shroud, and now you have touched the first part of the Kerchief,” the old woman spoke in amazement.

  “Signs? How many signs are there?” Gabriel questioned with force, showing by his tone that he was fed up and angry at the old woman for being so vague as to what the boys really were.

  “There are eight signs all together. You see, these are the signs that allow the sinners and the saviors to know that Judgment Day is imminent, the day when the Lord shall touch his feet on the earth. After you retrieve the other two parts to the Kerchief, you will have already completed five signs.” Suddenly the old woman began coughing, ceasing her words for a bit to catch her breath.

  “What are the other three signs?” Sam asked.

  Before the old woman could answer, Mary stepped in and threw her tone, saying with a strong attitude, “Excuse me, I don’t mean to be rude, but I don’t believe that the Lord would waste his time by giving us signs. I mean, he’s God, for crying out loud: if he wants the end to come, then he’ll do it without any warning!”

  A grin came to the old woman’s wrinkled lips, stretching her lips so much that they cracked from being chapped, and bled. Still smiling, the old woman turned to Mary and explained, “No, young woman, there are eight signs, and I’m afraid that the Lord cannot end the world whenever he wants, but that part will be explained to you at a later time. Now, you must hurry, I don’t have much time left till the Lord does judgment on me. Retrieve the other two parts, and hurry back to my home!” Jeremy grabbed the Shroud, but the old woman added: “No, leave the Shroud here, and leave the first part of the Kerchief, I will protect them for you!”

  Jeremy then let go of the Shroud and Sam handed the torn part of the Kerchief to the old woman. Sam grabbed the cross and ran out of the house with the rest of them, heading across the street to the small building that the second light from the cross shined to. Before they entered it, Jeremy looked back at the old woman’s house across the street. As his eyes glided toward it, he perceived the ground all around him was covered with dead birds of all kinds. His eyes paved the ground all around, and saw nothing but birds and feathers, lying still, filled with death that gave out a strong stench that made the rest look and see what smelled so ghastly. Their eyes caught the same thing as Jeremy’s, but they all ignored it, and turned around to face the door. Jeremy ignored it as well, and ran into the house first. They all entered it, slowly, and Mary and Sam grabbed onto the cross and watched the light point to the back room of the building. They ran to the back room and stopped immediately once their eyes caught sight of two people sleeping on a bed. The girls grabbed onto the cross again and watched as it shined directly down to the brown carpet of the floor, causing perplexity to set into their minds again. They were afraid to wake the two people sleeping in the bed, and were anxious as well that their confusion as to the direction of the light wouldn’t lessen in time before the two people awoke.

  So, very slowly, they all searched the room, when suddenly Mary whispered, “My God, they must have sewed it into the carpet. That has to be it.” So the search began, with Gabriel searching behind the bed while the rest of them searched in the front of it, concentrating on the carpet, trying to see if their eyes could capture some difference in its design. Sam then noticed a small part of the rug that was a lighter shade of brown while they still searched in their spots, leaving her there in amazement. She looked more closely, noticing that it was the other piece of the Kerchief, shining out with another part of Jesus’s image. Sam ripped it off, tearing it gently, and ripping it like dried bread due to the carpet being so old and worn out. Once the rest of them noticed what she was doing, they hurried over to her spot and saw her eyes looking at a piece of rug in amazement, seeing her holding the piece in her hands and smiling at it. Sam found the other part of the Kerchief, and they all joined in and watched as they tried to imagine what he looked like before they put the puzzle together.

  “All we have to do now is find the upper part of the Kerchief, the part where they show his eyes and hair,” said David.

  They rose up from the ground and exited the room slowly, heading toward the front part of the building quietly. “Hey, David, if you don’t mind me asking, why don’t you use your powers and read the Shroud? I mean, you must understand Hebrew, you surely do speak it well,” Gabriel mentioned, entering the front room of the small building.

  They exited the building, noticing the sun had set and night had fallen quickly. David turned to Gabriel and replied, “I know, I could read it, but, like I told you before, I can’t tell you anything. Listen, I don’t know anything else except who we are and why we’re here. As soon as you find out, then you’ll be able to read the Shroud yourself, so get off the subject. What time is it?”

  “It’s 11:54 p.m. American time, so I guess it’s morning here,” Michael replied, trying to search in every direction for the sun’s body. The darkness was complete, to the point where not even a heavy cloud could be that thick for the sun having it as a hiding place. They rubbed their eyes over and over again, trying to come up with an explanation for the sun’s disappearance, but all they could see was darkness.

  “Where’s the sun at?” Gabriel asked, looking through the darkness and feeling the dead birds under his feet as he walked slowly with them all.

  “That’s what I would like to know,” said Jeremy. He unexpectedly noticed a small gush of wind hitting his body, feeling stronger wind that followed almost immediately. “This must be one of the signs,” he added, noticing the wind beginning to blow harder, as if something was trying to stop them. Their feet forced their bodies to rush over to the tavern where the last piece of the mystery to Jesus’s image was at, ignoring the wind, the darkness, and the birds that lay dead on the ground and rooftops. Their eyes were only set on one thing: the mission that still seemed like they had an eternity to finish.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  The sunlight gazed across the sandy beach, and great wind floated through the air and traveled with great speed toward Jeremy’s mother’s face. It dried her newly formed tears, as she looked out at the sand, afraid to look up, not wanting to see what the people around her were seeing. As she gawked at the sand, she overheard a red-haired man saying to a television camera, “There is a perfectly reasonable explanation for this!” The boys’ parents were all standing on the beach looking out at the ocean in awe, and Jeremy’s mother was still hunched over toward the beach, crying silently upon the grains of sand, with each grain being the only witness to her tears of great struggle and misery. The wind grew stronger, hearing people around her screaming in fright, screeching to be heard, whining and weeping out their worst fears, and she still gaped at the sand, still afraid to look up and see what they were seeing, to feel what they were feeling from their eyes capturing something of great terror.

  “I don’t want to see what they see. It can’t be true,” she cried to herself, holding onto her husband’s hand tightly, rubbing his fingers up and down. It was as if her love was too great, too grand for him to just have her hand in his and do nothing else but hold onto it. She then glanced at his eyes, and saw him looking out at the seas, hearing his thoughts, feeling his fright, causing her to look down again at the sandy beach and see her puddle of tears and how they hit the sand and vanished into its brown texture. She then caught sight of another pile of tears that dropped in the grains. So she followed the tears, leading up to her husband’s face, falling from his eyes, as he still gazed out at the seas. Without another thought, she knew she had to see what he was seeing, what the crowd was perceiving that caused their nerves to fry. With the w
ind growing so strong, blowing some of those who were weak down to the ground, Jeremy’s mother finally looked out at the ocean’s body, and widened her eyes with amazement.

  “The ocean must’ve sprung a leak or something,” she overhead the red-haired man say to the television camera. She watched the ocean, its water being no longer in it. She stared down at it, till she saw darkness in its abyss, distinguishing the canyons, reefs and abysses that the ocean withheld without water flowing over them. As the wind blew into the ocean, a great titanic canyon without water, it made a whistling noise, a sound that frightened the people, noises that sounded like children screaming.

  “My God, Frank, what’s happening?” Jeremy’s mother cried, watching the darkness of the ocean give out a cold feeling to her flesh.

  “Is it also true that the sun is in a form of hibernation?” a journalist asked, pointing at the sky, all of their eyes seeing the sun being covered slowly by a great black cloud. The cloud wrapped itself around the sun, covering every inch of its rays; the people felt the coldness already that the sun protected them from.

  A man who was being interviewed by the journalist who pointed at the sun, shook his head while answering, “Listen, I’m not a scientist of astrology, I’m just an oceanographer!”

  Suddenly the wind caused the lights on the television cameras to burn out. The people ran away, grasping fear in their bellies and in their minds. As they ran, Jeremy’s mother yelled out, “Jeremy, where are you?”

  “I can’t believe it, this is amazing! I would have never thought I would see the day when the ocean is no longer an ocean. This is one big land now,” Jeremy’s father said, holding onto Jeremy’s mother in his grasp.