by Greg Curtis
Everything around him was changing, and without exception for the better, yet he couldn’t trust it. Change, any change he didn’t control was an anathema to him, and this – well it went beyond anything he could even understand let alone control. Actually it was somehow the exact opposite of control. He’d spent ages - years - building his life, shaping every single part of his home to his own needs, buying and maintaining his plane and cars, until he knew intimately every single nut and bolt. Now, it was as though he knew nothing about them at all. No matter how keenly they welcomed him, they were not what they once had been.
Sherial still watched over him as he slept, something that rattled him every time he awoke, but also something that made waking every morning a delight. Sherial made sure she was the very first thing he saw each morning as his eyes opened. It seemed to be a point of pride with her.
She was there before his mind came on line, sometimes standing beside him, sometimes hovering above. It all seemed to depend on whether he awoke on his side or back. He had discovered one thing above all else, the sight of a glorious angel hovering only a few scant feet above you when you first awaken, is surely the most awe inspiring sight in the universe. And the most disorienting.
White wings larger than his room surely, beating gently above him. The beauty of her face, the perfection of her form, and the shear overwhelming power of her love. It was as though his body and soul woke up long before his reason. Many mornings it took everything he had to get out of bed at all, when all he wanted to do was to stare and glory in her. Only the countless hours of training and years of suspicion managed to get his mind functioning at all, and even then only slowly. One day he had the horrible feeling, he might not get out at all. He might just lie there staring at her. A vegetable with eyes.
After weeks of investigation he still had not a single clue as to how she entered his room. Nor after endless questioning, even why. He had asked, and then he had asked again when he didn’t understand the answer. Yet every time it was the same, the need she had to understand him. What for the thousandth time he asked himself, could she learn from him as he slept? That he snored? His paranoia constantly told him she was brain washing him, driving her image deeper into his sub-conscious, making him her slave so that he had to do as she said. Yet, logical as that thought was, it still didn’t seem right. She wouldn’t do that.
The only time he had managed to work up the presence of mind to ask her not to be there first thing, she had flatly told him no. That had shocked him. It was the only thing she had ever refused him, and he knew it was absolute. She would be there when he awoke and that was all there was to it.
The tone of her thoughts however, was far worse than the denial. She was stunned he should have suggested such a thing, surprised and hurt. Mikel almost broke down and begged her forgiveness on the spot for having suggested something so hurtful, so shocking was her response. He actually felt guilty for asking to be given some space, and for the rest of that day wandered around like a lost child. He didn’t understand what he’d done wrong, but he knew he had done wrong, and that he had hurt Sherial, and that was truly horrible.
Later, much later, he decided that he must be, like a vexing child, her responsibility. He was somehow her assignment. That she had to look out for him, like the mother he could barely remember. It was in many ways a nice thought, the idea of being her special assignment, but then it was also humiliating and suspicious. And as a recluse and a criminal he had to suppress the blast of fear that followed every time he thought about it.
But regardless of anything he could say or do, she was there every morning when he awoke, and he knew, she would always continue to be.
Sherial had also consistently demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of the concept of privacy. Several times he had turned around in the shower to find her there, watching him. Locked doors were no barrier to her, nor was modesty. A couple of times she’d actually handed him the towel, wondering no doubt why he covered himself desperately with his hands and looked more than a little like a rabbit in the headlights. At least he’d managed to keep her out of the toilet. Again she didn’t understand the reasons, but at least she picked up something of his desperate distress.
Part of the problem he suspected, was that Sherial was in a very real way, not of the physical world. She didn’t seem to have bodily functions. She ate like any woman, and with pleasure, but never once had she used the toilet, at least to his knowledge. So unless she used the fields, which sometimes he wondered about, her digestive system defied yet more laws of biology.
Then too, neither in all the time she’d been with him, had she once washed her shift. She had no spare changes of clothing, no iron, no clothesline, but it was always immaculate and the only scent he could ever pick up from her was that of wild flowers and fresh cut grass. Either she didn’t sweat, another biological no no, or her dress continually cleaned itself, a minor miracle any number of drycleaners would love to be able to perform.
He hadn’t spotted her with a brush or comb either, yet her hair was always perfectly arranged in golden cascades down her shoulders. No more had he seen a toothbrush, but her teeth always sparkled with their alpine whiteness and her breath was fresh as a mountain spring.
Sherial also continued to do the impossible on a regular basis. She held court with the local wildlife daily, something he was almost getting used to. She’d even managed to persuade the crowd not to eat most of his garden. Though there at least she hadn’t been totally successful. They were fine when she was around, but every time she went away, they quickly forgot and started munching. But that at least was a comfort. Each time they ate his garden, he knew again there were limits to even her divine power. It might be a minor thing, but seeing their disobedience had given him some hope against her.
She often flew overhead, sometimes like a butterfly, sometimes like a jet, but always in a way that defied all the laws of gravity and aerodynamics. More, she flew in a way that turned what should be impossible into an exquisite aerial ballet. Sherial not only flew, she flew far more naturally than he breathed.
On a couple of occasions she’d been joined by others of her clan? / choir? He’d watched them flying around like birds playing far overhead, their aerial acrobatics an expression of joy that left him speechless. Never however, did those others come to visit. It wasn’t their place so she told him. Apparently he was still her specific responsibility and no one else’s.
Singing was another one of her many talents, though unlike a human one, he was sure she’d never worked at it. It was as natural for her, as was breathing for anyone else. He suspected she often sang almost unconsciously, the song simply bursting from her of its own will. Whether or not she might have one somewhere, Sherial didn’t need a harp. She was her own accompaniment. No orchestra could have done her justice.
Sometimes he’d turn on the stereo and blast a few of his favourites through the tranquil air, and often Sherial would join in. It didn’t matter the song, the tune, the style. Rock, heavy metal, classical and new age, she sang them all. Moreover she seemed to love them all, finding joy in the musical talents of every artist. It was unbelievably strange to watch her dancing to Fleetwood Mac and Chopin, singing Billy Idol and Carole King, positively revelling in The Corrs and ABBA, and even accompanying the Eagles.
Of course he realized, the words meant nothing to her, only the music. Her voice was the sound of a choir made of the entire forest, all the birds and beasts of the field one and all. Yet it always matched perfectly the tune he was playing, somehow adding to it, making it everything it could have been and more. Every record producer in the world would have committed mass murder to record even one afternoon’s worth of Sherial’s singing. They couldn’t have succeeded though. Sherial sang as and when the mood took her. No matter how he tried to explain the stereo to her, she wouldn’t use it by herself. Only when he was playing it would she join in.
Sherial continued to speak in the language of the beasts of every
field and communicated in the way of the spirit, little of which he actually understood. But the more she did so, and the less he understood, perversely the more he seemed to learn. Somehow she taught him without ever fully communicating.
As always his failure to comprehend much of what she said had driven him to the edge of his sanity. He wanted to understand her. He should be able to. He was a bright guy, well versed in studying people and their actions. He spoke several languages fluently, and could muddle through many more with patience. It should have been easy. Instead it was impossible. What she told him, for the most part was simply impossible, or incomprehensible. What little he did pick up, he didn’t really need, and often didn’t remember her telling him about it. It answered none of his questions and yet told him more than he could accept.
In the end he’d been forced to accept his inability to understand her, or go mad with frustration. To commemorate his failure he’d found a quote by Lichtenburg and pasted it on the wall above one of his workshop benches.
“If an angel were ever to tell us anything of his philosophy I believe many propositions would sound like 2 times 2 equals 13.”
Now and then he looked at it as he worked, trying to accept its truth to his heart. Whatever she said, he was still only human and therefore unable to understand.
Above all else Sherial ensnared him in her web of desire. There was no doubt in his mind that she was a trap, one he simply couldn’t avoid. On his bad days he often felt as though she was really only reeling him in; he’d already taken the hook, and the outcome was certain. It was just a matter of time until he stopped wriggling. On his good days it was the same.
She dominated his attention whenever she was there, usually to the point where he couldn’t even think straight and had to flee or face losing all control. Yet her absence was worse.
At his very core he hated the very thought of being her pawn, of being in some way so dependant on her, and he rejected her charms with all his might. But the second she was gone her absence made the world seem empty and cold as it had never been. He felt something deep inside shriveling with her departure. What would he do when all this was over and she was gone? It was too horrible to think about, and yet it was his goal. It had to be if he was to survive this nightmare. If he was to have a life afterwards.
He was he realized, in some way becoming dependant on her, something he would never have considered possible. She was like a drug, clouding his mind, destroying his independence, and yet so infinitely sweet. So completely addictive. Something that was completely unacceptable. The very thought of relying on anybody else was an anathema to him. He shouldn’t need anyone. Ever. Yet without whips and chains she was still somehow enslaving him, no matter how he fought it.
In his worst moments he knew that it was an ongoing process, one he could only lose. For not only did Sherial overwhelm him, she destroyed his ability to defend himself against her. Against anyone. Many times as he practiced his mantras, as he trained his body and mind for conflict, he found a simple and yet terrifying question invading his thoughts, ‘Why?’ It was wrong to resist, wrong to fight her. Yet if he couldn’t fight, he was defenceless. Naked against his enemies, should they find him. That thought terrified him down to his toenails and he always suppressed it in seconds. But it was still always there, somewhere, hiding at the back of his mind.
At the moment Sherial was away, making his world a bleak miserable place and it took strength even to concentrate on the task at hand. Yet Sherial was only away for a few short hours doing whatever angel things angels did, and it was at his own request. Deep within he ached for her to return, and clamped down savagely again and again on those errant feelings, not entirely successfully. But at least in between his lapses he could concentrate on the task at hand. And he needed to concentrate.
Mikel carefully wound up the explosive heads on the grapplers, knowing that it was probably going to be the last step in his preparations. He always left this part till the very last. It made him edgy having hair trigger sensitive explosives around, no matter how useful. Even though this time it looked like there would be no buildings to scale, he still saw uses for the grapplers. In fact, judging from what Sherial had shown him, they should be extremely effective in biting the stone of the cavern ceilings and letting him swing unseen over the heads of the enemy. He hoped.
But that was the problem with the entire exercise. It was something he’d never tried before, and he was going against an enemy he’d never encountered. How could he possibly know what they had in store? What defences they kept? He knew from Sherial that they used technology as well as other knowledge, and so he prepared as best as he could.
Chief among his weapons was the suit he’d built. Woven in with every technological innovation he could think of it was designed to hide and conceal. It would allow no body heat to radiate, no light to reflect, not even sound in case of sonar. It was precisely neutral in terms of electric charge and completely non-magnetic and non-metallic. In theory, in the darkened cavern he should be as invisible as a ghost. In theory.
Uncertain of his ability to stay hidden, he had included more than just invisibility in his bag of tricks. In his back pack he had the closest thing he’d ever had to an arsenal in his life, just in case. He had hundreds of grenades for concussion, smoke, ultrasonics, tear gas, and simple detonation, all miniaturized to the size of the smallest joint of a thumb, and yet all far more powerful than their conventional equivalents. He had a vast range of paralysing and knock out gases, all matched to his nose plugs. To cut the bars he had everything from a hand laser to strips of thermite. Then there were the more usual things; lock picks, laser goggles, holo projectors, electrical jamming equipment, multiple tool kits. In short he was better prepared for this job than any thief in history.
So why had he gone to the extremes of sanity? Like the holy water carefully packed into little shell casings. Surely it would only work in movies. And yet when he’d thought of confronting demons in Hell it had been at the top of his list. Along with a cross, wooden of course, worn beneath his suit, a bible and recordings of the Lord’s prayer. It was insanity, and yet when he suggested it to Sherial she considered them among the best ideas he’d had. And how could he deny her knowledge? She was real, she was an angel and she knew something of what he was up against.
Still, if he was going to use these things, at least he’d made sure he was going to use them his way. Sherial had almost died laughing when he suggested putting the holy water into little plastic bullets, the better to spray into the demons. And using a recording of the Lord’s Prayer she’d thought was inspired. At least that’s how he interpreted what she thought.
He just hoped and prayed, literally, that he never had to use them. He had no faith in them at all. The sun flares however, were a different story. Brighter than the midday sun those flares should blind anybody or anything not wearing reflective lenses. Regardless of whether demons could stand the light of day, they should blind any enemy of any species. As long as they had eyes.
But now, as he had been for the last few days, he was constantly in the mode of wondering if there was anything else he could think of. If he had forgotten anything. It was a waste of time, his and the prisoners, and yet he found it almost impossible to declare himself ready. There was nothing else he could add to his kit, nothing else he could do to prepare himself, but still he wasn’t sure.
Needing a break from his inner turmoil, Mikel decided to take a walk down to the jetty. Walking was something he didn’t do enough of, concentrating as he always did on more extreme forms of exercise that left him drained.
The day was fine and sunny, as it nearly always was, the sky a perfect blue and the grass matching perfection in green. It was autumn, just past the intense heat of summer, and one of the best times of the year to be outside. Soon the specially imported grass would die back, preparing for the cool of winter, and the sea would become rough and cold. He didn’t get out often enough.
On the way to the
jetty the pains in his legs started to ease off. They’d been cramped ever since the mornings weight session, and it was a relief to finally feel them relax. Of course that still left the pain in his arms, back, stomach and every other single milligram of flesh. It was the curse of constant, extreme exercise.
He’d lived with pain for decades now, almost welcoming it as a constant companion, yet he also knew that the pain was there for a reason. It told him he had a problem. His body was stressed, very stressed and not just occasionally. It was surely only a matter of time till it started to give way.
Sooner or later it had to call it a day and leave him unable to work. He’d known that since the very start, always wondering not if but when, his body would call it quits on him. It was his greatest fear, yet largely only because it would retire him. Cripples do not make good thieves. And he couldn’t imagine not being a thief.
Yet whenever he’d considered the alternatives, slowing down, taking off rest days, holidays and the like, he’d never been able to. Relaxation was something he simply couldn’t do. Not when there was always another villain to destroy, more money to steal, and more people to help. Not when there was always the danger of being caught if he slowed down even a little. An hour of relaxation was as much as he could stand.