ARCHANGEL

by Bernard Lee DeLeo

  “It ain’t nothin’ like that, Chuck.” Frank backed the Saturn down off his flatbed. “These folks were just worried about the family being stranded and then coming back to find out their Saturn was gone.”

  “Good Samaritans, huh?” Chuck stared up at Abaddon. “You don’t look too friendly, mister. What’s your problem?”

  Abaddon, who had been glaring at the bearded man from the moment he walked out of his trailer, shook his head and shrugged his shoulders.

  “I apologize if I seemed rude. It is very hot out here.”

  The bearded man named Chuck laughed, nodding in agreement. “Yeah it is. No good deed goes unpunished. Why don’t you folks take off and leave the Sheriff’s department to find the owners. They’ll turn up. You big boys need to get out of this heat although I don’t see no real sign the temp’s botherin’ you none. Your lady friends are soaked though. It ain’t that dry of a heat, is it, girls?”

  “Can we wait around for a while to see if the family shows up?” Angelina asked politely, absently wiping the sweat from her brow.

  Chuck hesitated, gauging his answer before speaking.

  “Suit yourselves but it ain’t likely they’ll come around today.”

  “I have to hit the road, Chuck. Sign this receipt and I’ll be on my way.”

  Chuck took the clipboard Frank handed him after getting settled into the truck. He made a quick scribble on the paper and handed it back. Frank gave a little wave before driving away toward the main road. Chuck looked at his four visitors uneasily, inadvertently glancing at the warehouse. Abaddon reached out and gripped the man by the throat, lifting his bulk off the ground.

  “He is not a demon, so he must be a toady,” Abaddon announced. Chuck ripped at Abaddon’s wrist with both hands ineffectively.

  “You are right, my brother. Chuck is evil. Do not kill him until he tells us where the others are.”

  Abaddon shook the red faced Chuck slightly before releasing the man. Chuck fell gasping for air and clutching his injured neck. He rolled on the ground with his chest heaving in panic. Angelina kicked him in the kidney area, causing Chuck to jackknife outward, croaking in agony.

  “You better tell us real quick where those two miscreant buddies of yours took that family,” Angelina warned. “Otherwise, I am going to stomp your liver out on the ground.”

  “I…I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, lady.” Chuck groaned, rolling away from Angelina. “Jesus Christ, you folks are insane. What…”

  Chuck screamed again as Angelina ran forward and kicked him in the stomach.

  “Don’t use the Lord’s name in vain, toady. Start talking or my friend will give you a quick preview of hell.”

  Chuck gasped, rocking in pain as he clutched his midsection. He kept his eyes squeezed shut, pretending pain beyond his ability to speak. Raphael nodded at Abaddon. The Archangel of the Abyss knelt next to Chuck and gripped the man’s arm. Chuck’s bare arm began to blacken and shimmer in the sun. The man’s body convulsed uncontrollably under Abaddon’s unrelenting grasp. Catherine covered her ears and turned away from the unending screams, picturing the family of four they saw leaving in the Saturn. Abaddon released Chuck, letting the man roll around in abject misery for a moment. Raphael knelt down. His touch healed Chuck’s wounds, leaving him in shock.

  “Tell us where the two demons are and the family,” Raphael repeated, “or my brother will give you your pain back. Soon, you will tell us what we wish to know.”

  “He…he’ll burn me anyway. I felt it,” Chuck whimpered, cringing as Abaddon reached for him.

  Raphael shook his head and Abaddon paused.

  “We will turn you over to the authorities but you will have to tell all. Otherwise we will find you wherever you are and end your miserable existence in hellfire.”

  Chuck looked up at Abaddon again, his mind leaping through options he did not have. Abaddon dropped his human guise. He hovered over Chuck, his gleaming black wings spreading outward. His soul scars pulsed with a radiant glow. Reaching down, Abaddon plucked the screaming Chuck up effortlessly.

  “It would be best if you told us right now, Chuck,” Raphael said.

  “They…they’re in the warehouse,” Chuck cried out. “I…I’ll take you to them. There’s a hidden entrance to a secret basement beneath the floor of the warehouse.”

  Abaddon released Chuck reluctantly, willing his human guise into place. Chuck stared fearfully at the transformation.

  “Wha…what are you?”

  “An angel.” Angelina put her arms around Abaddon’s waist, drawing away the fury radiating from the Archangel as only she could.

  “You have a gun I’m sure,” Catherine said. “Let’s go get it. I have an idea.”

  With Raphael and Catherine following, Chuck went into his house trailer and pointed at a drawer in the cluttered kitchen.

  “It’s in there.”

  Catherine opened the drawer and took out the Smith and Wesson .357 Magnum revolver. She opened the chamber and emptied the shells out. Catherine handed the empty gun to Chuck. He looked at it uncomprehendingly.

  “What do you want me to do with this?”

  “I want you to take us down to the demons as if we were your prisoners.” Catherine exited the trailer with Chuck and Raphael.

  “Very good, Cat.” Raphael urged Chuck forward with his hand. “We may yet be able to lure the demons clear of the family before you expel them.”

  Catherine quickly filled Abaddon and Angelina in on her plan.

  “I’ll go first, with Cat right behind me, then Raphael, and between Chuck and the rest of us, Abaddon,” Angelina suggested. “That way, if Chuck gets any bright ideas or doesn’t play this to the hilt, he gets toasted immediately.”

  Abaddon put an arm around Chuck, eliciting a cry of fear.

  “The toady will do exactly as we tell him or he will scream for death. I will burn him for what will seem an eternity. Do you understand your part, toady?”

  “Yes…yes, I’ll do anything you want!”

  “Let’s go.” Catherine strode toward the warehouse. “There’s no telling what those monsters will do.”

  They walked into the poorly lit warehouse of discarded auto and truck parts piled in sections relating to the vehicles they were pulled from. Cement flooring with small puddles of spilled oil and other debris incongruously appeared in excellent repair. In places where the flooring had not been covered with parts or debris, the gray epoxy sealer looked in very good shape. With Chuck in the lead the group wound their way to the furthest corner of the warehouse. There, a makeshift office was partitioned off from the main warehouse. Chuck opened the door to the office. It housed two dilapidated file cabinets and an old scarred desk littered with papers. Chuck threw the rug in front of the desk over to the side, revealing a metal trap door. He looked at the Archangels and nuns expectantly.

  “Tell us again what you are to do.” Catherine ordered.

  “Take you down like you’re my prisoners. They’ll be suspicious ‘cause I ain’t ever done anything like this.”

  “Do you ever go down there?” Raphael asked.

  “Yeah, but only when they invite me down. I get to…”

  “Shut up!” Angelina ordered. “Let’s do this before I fix Chuck here myself. Don’t worry about how they react. They’ll be curious. They’ve seen us already so this won’t seem as goofy as Chuck thinks it will.”

  Angelina gestured at Chuck. He opened the heavily reinforced door with some effort. Immediately, they could hear screams of agony echoing up from down below where a well maintained staircase dropped at an angle for what Angelina thought must be at least fifty feet. She turned suddenly, reaching around Catherine and Raphael to grasp Abaddon’s left hand where it was tensed into a fist at his side.

  “Steel yourself, my love. Do nothing until Cat can get the demons clear.”

  Abaddon nodded his understanding, unable to fully relax even with Angelina’s soothing touch. The nearness of the hell spawn,
coupled with tortured cries from below were awakening the avatar of the Lord as nothing else had to this point. Abaddon hesitantly patted Angelina’s hand with his.

  “I will wait, but hurry, Sister Angelina.”

  Angelina turned without another word and led the group down the steel stairway. As Angelina turned the corner where the stairwell emptied out into an enormous makeshift dungeon, she involuntarily cried out at the sights and sounds before her. The entire underground complex was painted in glossy white, including the flooring. An array of bright florescent lighting built into the ceiling provided illumination. Along the white dungeon’s walls were cages painted red with only the barred doors fronting outwards. The smell of human misery permeated the place, hanging in the air as if it were a living entity.

  Extending from end to end down the middle of the room were metal gurneys and wheeled carts with surgical instruments. Spaced at ten foot intervals throughout the center of the sloped flooring were drains. Angelina could see they were stained red. Screams, tortured gasps of pain, and squeals of insanity rebounded off the walls in a steady torrent of unending agonized sound. Angelina stumbled backward in shock, her hands clasping the sides of her head. Catherine hugged her tightly from behind.

  “Courage, Sister Angelina,” Catherine whispered close to her ear. “The Lord’s Avatar has come to redeem this hell.”

  Chapter 20

  Mutants

  Angelina straightened, rage beginning to creep up from the core of her being. She gritted her teeth to keep them from chattering. The two demons in human form, stripped to the waist, bent over a naked woman. The woman jerked spasmodically, her head thrown back, screaming for mercy. They were flaying her alive. It was only when Angelina led the group to within ten feet of the demons did they look up, blood staining their bodies from head to toe. Dropping the razor wire homemade flaying whips they held, the two picked up surgical wipes near them and began wiping their hands. Smiling and making shushing sounds at the tortured woman, the two demons took their time cleaning off.

  Approaching side by side, grinning happily, as if they were welcoming old friends into their home. The two pseudo Sheriff’s deputies halted in front of Angelina. Kostas reached out and stroked Angelina’s cheek. It took all her willpower and Catherine’s soothing hand on her arm for Angelina to endure the demon’s touch stoically. Stevens looked at Chuck.

  “What’s all this?”

  “They followed Frank Ketchum over here when he towed the Saturn,” Chuck answered. “I asked them to leave and let the Sheriff’s office handle it but they wouldn’t go.”

  “We’ll have to settle with ol’ Frank for being so careless,” Kostas replied, his grin dissolving into a wicked thin mouthed line. “I ain’t too happy with you either Chuck.”

  “I…I didn’t know what to do.”

  “It’s okay, Chuck.” Stevens walked over and put an arm around the man. “Don’t be so hard on him, Gary. I imagine they drove that big, beautiful Hummer over here, didn’t they?”

  “Yeah, they did, Jack, and it’s real nice,” Chuck answered quickly.

  “These folks don’t look very impressed with our little inner sanctum, Jack,” Kostas commented suspiciously. “These two bitches should be coming unglued by now. Their two asshole boyfriends are acting like they get held at gunpoint everyday. I don’t like it.”

  “We know they were going to Las Vegas,” Stevens reasoned. “If Chuck didn’t see any other vehicles approaching, I doubt we have much to worry about. Smartass there at the front probably decide to stick her nose where it didn’t belong. Besides, before we saw those tasty treats along the side of the road we were going to invite these four down here to play anyhow.”

  Kostas smiled at Angelina. “I’ll bet you’re right, Jack. How about it, girlie? You the one decided to be little Miss Busybody?”

  “I’m not afraid of you two cretins.” Catherine tugged on Angelina’s arm and moved in front of her.

  “Oh, another smartass, huh?” Stevens sighed happily, moving over closer to Catherine and Kostas.

  Catherine grabbed the two startled deputies’ arms, expelling the screaming next generation demons from the men’s bodies. Angelina wrapped her arms around Catherine as Raphael shielded them from what was to come. Abaddon backhanded Chuck the moment Catherine grasped the deputies, propelling the man nearly twenty feet in the air to the concrete floor where he lay unconscious.

  The Kostas demon flailed immediately at Catherine, only to encounter Raphael’s shield. It immediately grabbed the demon which had exited Stevens’ body, dragging its hellish partner backward with him across the room as if to regroup. The Archangel of the Abyss stood in front of Raphael’s shield, eyeing the two clamoring demons with intense anticipation.

  “Do you see what I see, my brother?” Abaddon asked without turning away from the demons.

  “Except for the claws, scales, and feet, these two resemble their hosts a little too closely,” Raphael replied, glancing away from the demons and down at Kostas and Stevens. The deputies were rendered unconscious by the shock of separation. “Stay back away from those two, Sisters. I need a moment to allow this separation to dissipate.”

  Abaddon watched the demons with interest. They seemed lost without their hosts. “I should be cutting these two into pieces but something more is going on here. They look too much like the deputies for my taste.”

  The facial resemblances between the demons and their human hosts had Catherine and Angelina looking back and forth between the demons and humans in amazement. The prisoners in the cages were crying out from behind the bars. Abaddon walked over to the tortured woman the demons had been flaying. He grasped the crying woman’s arm, healing her. Without looking away from the two watching demons, Abaddon tore the straps off the woman. He picked her up in his left arm and retreated. Raphael opened his shield to accept the healed woman. Catherine and Angelina immediately took charge of her from Raphael.

  “I do not like this, brother. They have no soul swords and they appear confused.” Raphael moved between the nuns and the bodies of Kostas and Stevens. “They don’t seem interested in attacking you. Perhaps you should wait.”

  “Wait for what?” Abaddon growled menacingly. “I saw what the woman experienced through her eyes. I hesitate only because I wish to figure some way to make their deaths last.”

  “Who are you, brother?” The Kostas demon called out questioningly to the black winged Archangel. “Why do you come here?”

  Abaddon’s body tensed.

  “Have a care, brother,” Raphael whispered. “Play along with them. We may find out something important.”

  “I am Abaddon, Archangel of the Abyss,” Abaddon stated in tight-lipped fury. “I am the avatar of the Lord.”

  “Tales for children’s nightmares.” The Stevens’ demon cackled in delight, nodding at his companion more confidently.

  Moving slowly away from each other and forward toward Abaddon in a circling pattern, the demons ducked slightly to avoid hitting their heads on the nine foot high ceiling. Abaddon smiled happily, the feeling of completion and purpose surging through him like an electric current.

  “We thought you another demon wanting to steal some of our action,” the Kostas demon said with an arrogant condescension which reminded Abaddon of the demon’s human counterpart. “Take the women and go.”

  “If you leave now, we will not harm you,” the Stevens’ demon added. The two demons drew nearer.

  “And if I don’t?” Abaddon strode forward in between the approaching demons.

  “We will rip you to pieces and make you watch as we skin your women alive,” the Kostas brother threatened.

  “Let me know how that works out for you,” Abaddon whispered.

  “Wait!” Kostas had regained consciousness under Raphael’s watchful eye. He stood with his hands against the inner shield surface. “What of us?”

  Stevens joined his companion at the inner shield wall. “Our power… our power is gone. What happened? What
did they do to us?”

  “We expelled the demons from your bodies,” Catherine answered from where she held the woman Abaddon had healed with Angelina at her side.

  “What the hell did you do that for?!” Stevens yelled back angrily. “We were like Gods. Can you put them back?”

  “These two are evil, Abaddon,” Raphael said. “It answers many questions. In answer to your question, Deputy Stevens, I imagine your two demon buddies could meld with you two once again. Fortunately for the human race they will not be joining anyone ever again.”

  “Why?” Kostas asked turned to face Raphael. “This ain’t none of your business.”