Ragnarok: The Fate of Gods

by Jake La Jeunesse

  He knows what he must do.

  Zeke raises a finger to the gash on his chest, remembering a wound healed long ago. Ages ago. An entire lifetime. He draws a finger down the gash, remembering how Metatron did it in Pusan. The flesh burns shut.

  He stands.

  The angel turns, his image taking shape behind him.

  Zeke holds out his sword. He stabs the angel in the chest. Metatron stumbles back, impaled on the blade. You can’t defeat me, comes his fearless, but flat voice. You would have to slay all the parts of God at once. I can’t be killed.

  “I don’t need to kill you.”

  He holds out his hand. A strong wind starts to blow through the void.

  “What is this?” The angel’s voice is no longer psychic. No longer fearless. His body becomes pale. Thin. Stretched. He roars out in pain. Then he explodes.

  Not in a burst of light, but into a hazy mist.

  Soldiers rally around Ariel’s body. Monsters close in on all sides. The fighters fend off draugr, hitting them with empty rifles. Daniel fires ceaselessly at the oncoming malak.

  The monsters hiss and scream excitedly. Soldiers fall. Draugr leap on their bodies, poking, prodding, biting and licking, trying to devour every last drop of blood.

  Suddenly, it all stops.

  The malak and the draugr shake violently. They howl in pain. Their bodies stretch, then burst into mist. The cloud rises in the air, mixing with the volcanic ash.

  Samael inhales, readying another blast.

  Then his breath stops, shallow. His solar-sized body contorts in pain. He screams in the void of space.

  The Destroyer explodes, shattering into a massive cloud of mist.

  The cloud streams toward Earth.

  The wind on the battlefield picks up. Monsters everywhere explode. Draugr lift off the ground. Malak melt into nothing. Dragons vanish from the sky.

  Soldiers stand up, relieved, but cautious. They look around. The cloud begins to recede into the gate.

  Ethereal wind blows violently. Zeke stands firm, unaffected. Mist materializes around him. It enters his body from every direction. He stands with his arms out, absorbing every bit of it.

  Taking the hosts of God into his own being.

  After a long time, it stops. Metatron and the mist are gone. Zeke’s body goes stiff.

  Soldiers watch as the gate inhales the remains of the monsters until nothing is left. The dark, stormy sphere collapses in on itself until it vanishes from sight.

  Then it explodes violently, sending a shockwave through the battlefield. The handful of jets that are still airborne are thrown off balance. Soldiers on the ground dive for cover. Others don’t make it and fall.

  Everyone braces themselves against the blast for several minutes.

  Then the force stops.

  The storm continues, but less violently than before. It slowly begins to die.

  Daniel stands at the center of a ring of soldiers and cooling lava. He looks up. The gate is gone. “Zeke . . .”

  Zeke sat up.

  He looked around. He was still in the ethereal plane. Stars surrounded him in every direction, and he sat on an invisible surface. He held out his hand, feeling dazed. The motion left a blur behind it. His limb seemed to change form for several moments, then it settled back into its original shape.

  “You’re the caretaker now. You’ve got quite a responsibility to face,” came a voice. He couldn’t make out who was speaking. He turned. A figure stood behind him, staring off into the void.

  “Metatron?” He took a few steps closer. No. It wasn’t even a malak. It was a human.

  Micah.

  He was dressed in a plain, grey pinstripe suit. It seemed very much unlike him, but perhaps it was very much in character for the Karellan.

  He kept staring in the distance, his back to Zeke.

  “There was once a monkey who was exceptionally strong and brave, so the other monkeys made him king. One day, he decided to travel the world and become stronger. He learned many things and eventually became immortal. However, when he went to Heaven to take his place with the gods, they did not accept him as one of their own. They fought him. The monkey defeated all the angels in Heaven and the demons in Hell, but he still did not earn his place among the gods. Instead, they asked the Buddha to imprison him beneath a mountain to do penance for five hundred years.”

  The story was very much how Zeke remembered his friend. “It’s over,” he said.

  “I know it is. It’s over. The battle is won, and you . . .” he paused and turned around, smiling cheerfully. “You are now the caretaker of the universe. How does it feel?”

  Zeke waved his hand slowly, watching the blur trail behind it. “I don’t know. It’s a lot to absorb all at once.”

  “You’ll be fine. I always did think you’d make a good leader.”

  “Are you going back?”

  Micah turned away again. “I can’t. The world may be a better place. I may have even had a hand in that. But I’ll leave it to future generations to decide whether the end justified the means. I have committed unpardonable sins. And the only being who may have forgiven me was god.”

  “I can forgive you,” Zeke said softly.

  There was a long pause. “I can’t go back. It’s your world now. It’s your universe. Make of it whatever you wish.” He smiled.

  “I’m sorry.” Zeke struggled for words. He had just inherited the power of a god, and he still didn’t know what to say to Micah. Not after everything that happened. “You know. Sorry that things didn’t turn out the way you hoped.”

  He grinned. “Oh? What makes you think they didn’t? For all you know, this is exactly the paradise I envisioned.”

  There was a long silence. Zeke sized him up, trying to interpret this comment. Even with his new god-like powers, he didn’t know.

  “Please, take care of Ariel,” Micah requested. “Just a little longer. Until we can be together again.”

  “I will.”

  Daniel stood motionless on the battlefield.

  The storm had died, the lava cooled. The field was quiet and dark. The only light came from the stars and a few fires. Medics tended to wounds. Healthy soldiers lined up corpses. Others dug graves.

  He looked down at Ariel’s body. Then he looked up in the direction of the gate. The former gate.

  “I’m sure he’s all right,” said Jack. Daniel turned to see the pilot coming toward him. “He’ll find a way to come back.”

  “Yeah.” His voice was soft.

  Jack handed him a small box with a red cross on it. Together, they bent down and began to clean Ariel’s body. They wiped off dried blood. They patched up wounds. They made her look more dignified.

  The two men worked diligently for a half an hour, but the best of work would not bring her back to life. Still, they kept at it until something distracted them. Something strange. Unexpected.

  A ray of light shot over the horizon.

  They stopped and stared east. Curious. The light grew. Daniel shielded his eyes. Someone approached from the east. The figure was indistinct in the light. The light, however, was unmistakable.

  A sunrise.

  Soldiers began to notice. Their voices were carried by a gentle breeze. Excitement and relief swept across the field.

  Daniel focused on the man approaching them.

  Zeke.

  Unharmed, but not carrying his sword. His familiar kenpo gi shirt and hakama pants were no longer dark black, but now pure white. He smiled gently.

  “You’re safe!”

  “Of course I am. Do you think a little thing like the end of the world is going to do me in?” Zeke laughed.

  “I’m glad,” Daniel said quietly.

  Jack stepped forward to greet him. He put a hand on Zeke’s shoulder. “It’s good to see you again. Things didn’t go so well out here.”

  “How did your battle with Metatron go?” Daniel asked.

  “It’s over. There’s not much more to be said.”


  Jack laughed. “What more needs to be said?”

  The world was rid of monsters. The line of tyrants had ended. Men no longer needed to hide in caves or fortresses for safety. The sun rose for everyone today.

  But something didn’t seem right. As Daniel looked at Zeke, there was a hollowness in his smile. Something strange in his eyes. He took a step back. “Wait . . . There’s something different. About you. I can feel it.”

  “Yes. I know. I got these new duds,” Zeke replied, showing off his shirt. “And quite a bit more responsibility now.”

  Daniel eyed him curiously. “All the monsters turned to mist, just like when Metatron . . . and now he’s gone . . . and . . .”

  “Daniel, is there something you want to ask me?”

  “This may be a strange question but,” he paused, awkwardly searching for the words. “Zeke, are you . . . God?”

  “No.”

  “Then what . . .”

  “There is no ‘god. ’”

  “No god?” Jack scoffed. “There’s going to be a lot of unhappy churchgoers when that news gets out. Might put a damper on the Christmas pageant.”

  “No god.” Daniel reflected for a moment. “Nothing to believe in. No guidance. No hope or faith that there’s something stronger out there, existing to protect us.”

  Zeke lectured softly. “Humans have lived too long for the purpose of others. Too long under someone else’s will. They’ve spent too much of their lives devoted to the ideas of their gods. Now it’s time they simply lived for themselves.”

  Jack stretched his hands behind his head. “Living life for yourself? Sounds good to me.”

  “Live for happiness, right? Our lives are no longer dictated by Fate.” Daniel sounded uneasy. Not happy or sad, but unsure.

  “Humans don’t live forever. No sense living in pain or suffering, just for the sake of their higher power and faint promises of an afterlife. The idea of God was never a good thing when so many horrible acts were carried out in his name. I think it’s better this way.”

  “So what are you going to do now?” He sensed something was wrong. Something Zeke wasn’t saying up front. “Where do you fit into this new world?”

  “I don’t,” he answered. “I can’t stay long. I have to leave.”

  “What? You’re leaving?”

  “I know it’s a lot to ask, but I want you to understand. I have to do this.” He rested his hand on the boy’s shoulder for a moment, then crossed behind him to Ariel’s body. “But I had to come back. For her.” He gently picks her up.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t get to her in time.”

  “Don’t worry. She will be fine. And she’s overdue for a meeting with a very old friend.” He turned to face them.

  “That’s it?” Daniel asked quietly. “You’re just leaving us?”

  Zeke remembered his life ten years ago. Back when Micah left him. He was another person then. Full of anger. Full of violence. Unsure of himself. Daniel was different. Not much older, but far stronger. He could handle it.

  “I have to. I can’t interfere. This is your world now, Daniel. Make of it whatever you wish.”

  A calm energy radiated from Zeke’s body. Six bright wings sprouted from his back. The energy continued in a circle, spreading outwards on the earth. As it expanded, the ground revived. The cold, dead world vanished. It became green with life.

  Zeke rose up into the sky with Ariel and vanished.

  The sun shone brightly.

  Epilogue

  Daniel walked through the green field of the Battle of Ragnarok. The sun glowed through the clouds. The wind ruffled the grass. It seemed like an entirely different world.

  He climbed up the slope of what once was a crater, heading back to the hill where he first found Zeke. Before the fighting.

  On the ground lay a thick coat and a large pack. Beside it was a polished black katana sheath. He picked it up. He knew he wasn’t coming back, he thought.

  Shink!

  The soft sound of metal in earth resounded quietly behind him. He turned.

  Zeke’s katana stuck gently in the ground, wavering gently. Daniel approached it and pulled. The sword came easily out of the ground.

  He held the sword gently, looking up into the sky.

  But of course he saw nothing.