by Greg Curtis
Mikel ripped the door off its cloth hinges, partly angry at the thought of how badly they’d tricked him, but also knowing in his very bones he didn’t want this door to shut behind him. Even with Sherial’s comfort and wisdom, he was still frightened of what lay within. It was just that he could finally control his fear.
Mikel wanted as much light in there as he could find. Bending low he switched on the fluorescent panels he wore around his neck, instantly glad for their comforting light. Developed on some world where the biological had been harnessed as technology, he suspected they were really some sort of fungus. But whatever they were they glowed brighter than a torch for many hours on end, needing only a little sugar water to power them.
On hands and knees he crawled through the first part of the tunnels, hoping that none were close enough to him that they might attack him while he was so vulnerable. Sherial told him he was safe, that the fallen would run from him as though he were their worst nightmare, which he was. But still, crawling in a dark, putrid, cave, surrounded by nameless though real horrors; it was hard to accept. The crawling became a test of faith and will power, but one he passed. The hundreds, perhaps thousands of pendants he wore, jangled as he crawled, an almost pleasing noise against the silence of the tomb he was entering.
Up ahead he felt the approach of the first of the demons. It was like a skittering sound where there was only silence, a smell instantly revolting, and a stain somewhere in his vision. Yet his eyes hadn’t even seen a thing. It was Sherial’s senses, working without the limitations of mortal flesh, working through him, and granting him their wisdom.
It was a two way deal. As Sherial could see, could understand what he couldn’t, he too could know and see things she couldn’t. He knew, though Sherial wouldn’t have noticed, that this time the demons were dealing differently with him. This time they had sent their scouts out ahead, worried by the reek of goodness that shone through him. This time they were cautious. That suited him perfectly.
He reached the end of the narrow tunnel and stood quickly, not wanting to be caught on his hands and knees before the might of hell, and hastily scanned the passage way ahead. It was black, it stank, and somewhere ahead, beyond his vision, was one of the fallen, hopefully staring at him with as much fear as he had of it. Looking at it through Sherial’s mind, he suddenly understood the creature was in some way the focal point of the entire legion of the damned. All their eyes, through it, were on him. Through Sherial’s understanding he knew the time had come. He had them.
“Go.” The word never passed his lips, barely even touched his thoughts, but the angels heard him and set the others to their tasks. Mikel was certain now that he held the demons’ attention. From here on he hoped they wouldn’t notice a nuclear bomb blast, let alone the nearly silent mining operation. The touch of Sherial that shone through him was far more dangerous to them.
“You lose, Shithead.” He felt no obligation to be polite to the monster that stood ahead just out of his sight, and he wanted to scare it. Yet warning bells sounded deep within his soul. It was important to the mission that he strike fear into the demons, anything to distract them from the truth, but there was more than that need in his words. From somewhere deep inside he wanted to terrify them. He ached to make them fear and suffer. He needed to make them hurt. To punish them for what they had done. It was only with difficulty that he squelched down on the primitive in him, and kept his mind on the job. Fear is not the only mind killer.
“You will take me to the prisoners, now.” He still couldn’t see or hear the little monster, but somehow he knew it heard him. Heard and feared. Mikel knew it wasn’t alone. Though there was only this one near him, all were listening, and all were afraid, bluster though they might. This human had shrugged off their strongest possession, walked boldly into their demesnes and shone with that horrid goodness that threatened them. He was dangerous, he was terrifying, and they were not brave. How could they be? They were not good.
Yet there was still danger in being too hostile, though not from them. The true danger was that he might drive Sherial away with his violence. She could understand his pain and suffering, she felt his anger and his need to hurt them, but she could never go along with that terrible rage. Deep down Sherial felt nothing but sorrow for these pitiful wretches. Desperately he squeezed down on the primitive hatred and rage that moved through him, knowing that no victory here could be worth driving her away even for a second.
The little darkness scuttled somewhere ahead of him, not knowing his inner turmoil as he battled for control, but knowing fear. He heard it move as fast as its legs could carry it, and knew it cried out to others as it neared. Mikel followed at a distance, unhurried. For his purpose in being here was not to rescue the prisoners. It was to distract the fallen so the others could tunnel undisturbed.
Even now he knew, the gigantic lasers Hermen had brought were turning rock and soil into red hot gases, while Mya and the hundreds of protective devices they’d obtained from so many other worlds were making sure that none of that gas exploded back in their faces or rolled through the prison. Grould was holding a psychic shield around all of them and the rapidly growing tunnel designed to make even those things that they couldn’t control, seem invisible. People and demons alike, in fact anything with a mind, would not notice anything even if every alarm system went berserk in front of them.
Not to be forgotten Sabrina and the other angels guided the tunnelling equipment for them, more accurate than any radar. Lea and Abrax waited elsewhere, preparing for their own diversion, if and when the demons got wise. Lea’s animals roamed freely around the perimeter, another diversion for any demons watching the outside. And when the time came, they would act as guides for the escapees. Their courage gave him strength. Young and stupid like him they might be, but the villagers had greater courage than any army in history.
Then there was Atal the titan, their greatest ally and protector. True he wouldn’t fight, he didn’t even seem to understand the concept, but he kept the party safe against any attack the demons could launch. He also served as a focal point for everyone else, holding them safe, guiding them, reassuring them. Mikel’s plan, which had seemed a terrible gamble at first, with Atal’s support had become almost a sure thing. Almost.
Mikel once would have done this alone, improvising and preparing against everything he could imagine. He would have failed. He had failed. Now here in the middle of hell, following a demon to a meeting with who knew what, he had more hope and chance to win than ever before, and all he had had to do was share his plan. Go figure!
Ahead the passage became a cavern and in it Mikel could sense the presence of others of the dark. Many others. He swallowed nervously, but never slackened his pace or showed any sense of fear. He didn’t want to give them any hope.
The cavern was dark as he’d expected. The fallen lived in the dark for more than just the simple reason that it inspired fear in others. It also hid the reality of who and what they were from themselves. Even now, not having truly seen them, he had an understanding of that.
Mikel walked easily to the centre of the space, drawing on Sherial’s comfort like oxygen, for a drowning man. He was still scared but through Sherial knew that they were too. And if they were scared now he thought with a smile, they’d be terrified soon. He released the first of his beacons, a light source that somehow glowed right throughout his entire body. From what world it had come, or what knowledge it was based on, he hadn’t a clue, but it did everything he asked of it.
It was as if the sun had come out in the middle of hell. His entire body glowed like a fluorescent light, even clothes becoming translucent against the light that simply blasted from his skin. Screams came at him from all sides and he heard the sound of running feet. Thousands of them scuttling for all they were worth.
Yet he didn’t celebrate too soon as he was granted once again the gift of sight. For the first time he could see the fallen around him. There were hundreds of them there, hundreds and
perhaps even thousands, crammed into a not overly large cavern. Many were no larger than a cat. They looked terrible to his eyes, both repulsive and pitiful, frightening and sad. For a while he saw with the double vision of both his own understanding and Sherial’s. But slowly the two became one.
Where once he had seen insect like horrors, complete with stingers and pincers, now he saw them as horribly deformed and withered people. Wingless angels, shrunken and rotted with age and decay. For looking at them he realized, he had seen insects once because he had always had a fear or repulsion of them. They had used his fear against him. His fear, his weakness was always their strongest weapon.
Now looking at them he understood Sherial’s pity. Racked with sickness and decay, deformed and pitiful, surely they must be in terrible pain to live like this. Yet it was not him they truly hid from; it was from themselves. He had been shown what they had done, he knew their terrible deeds, the loathsomeness of their minds, the rot of their souls, and he finally understood that all their evil had backfired eternally. They had hurt themselves far worse.
Finally the fallen had reached the far walls and were forced to stop, their withered forms pressed against the stone and each other, while their eyes all stared at him. Mikel understood that they were afraid, and a raft of mixed emotions went through him. He knew relief and triumph at the thought, and the terrible reality that he was hurting them. He would never in his entire life have imagined feeling sorrow for a demon, but he did. Still it was necessary, both for the plan, and for them. It was the only way they would grow.
“Would you like to release the prisoners now? Or would you like me to stay?” The words just flowed out of him, a mix of his own and Sherial’s thoughts. Logical and direct to the point, he almost knew hope from the start that they would surrender. That they would do anything to make him leave. But it wasn’t to be.
Another larger form moved into his vision and he knew without even looking, who or what it had to be.
“Dear God.” The words were torn from his throat by the sight of the fallen. Yet he hadn’t broken the Lords commandment. He meant it as a prayer.
He stared at the dark man, and the foulness that it was stared back at him.
Mikel was afraid. Terrified would have been closer to the truth, but even in the centre of this hell hole he still felt Sherial’s love in him where it counted, and that gave him strength. Her strength coupled with her vision gave him the ability to see the dark man much as he might not want to, and what he saw was putrid beyond his understanding.
For he was neither a man, nor an angel. He was more a puddle of putrescent slime that had somehow managed to hold itself together in a roughly human shape. How in heaven’s name could he have managed to continue living like this, Mikel asked himself? If you could call it living. How could it endure? His thoughts weren’t the only ones echoing that question.
In one hand, though it wasn’t really a hand, the demon held some sort of mechanical device, of a design Mikel had never seen. He understood from the way he held it, that it was a weapon, but not an Earthly one. No doubt it was something Hermen would understand, and maybe just maybe, his deflector would work against. In the other the creature held something else, a glowing orb turned black with his evil. It too he was certain, was a weapon, but this time he had no idea whether it was something technological, magical or psychical. Or it could be something completely other. Again he just had to hope that his comrades, their angels and the entire choir of other young angels, had been prepared for this thing. It seemed like a good risk.
The creature was surrounded by others of his kind, each more revolting than the last, each larger than their kin against the far walls, though all of them smaller, much smaller than him. In a flash of intuition he understood that these creatures were feeding off each other, and that the dark man was merely the strongest of them. Therefore he was the largest. The others against the wall were simply at the bottom of the food chain.
‘I will not serve.’ As he truly saw the dark man, those words came to him. For this was either Satan, or a close relative, and that was his original sin. That was his lie. He who Jesus had called a ‘murderer from the beginning’, had been shown the glory of the Lord, yet had turned his back on it, somehow daring to believe in his own perfection instead. Now he stood before Mikel, and Mikel could see no sign of perfection. Nothing of all the gifts the Lord had bestowed upon him. He had truly lost everything.
“Why?” It was the only thought that could come to his mind.
But even as he asked, he knew the answer. Hunger. This creature fed on the power and glory of lesser creatures so that it could survive. Far from the demigod status it claimed, it was in fact a bottom feeder, finding the weakest prey it could catch, and devouring their life. Through Sherial he felt pity for this foulness, for he knew now that once this creature had been an angel, one of the many that had fallen. And it had fallen farther than most.
“Why would you have given up so much to become this?” The question came from his mouth almost without his thought. Perhaps it wasn’t truly his. He couldn’t understand how the darkness could have thrown away so much for so little, neither could Sherial, for which he knew he should be eternally grateful. To be able to understand this thing’s reasoning would be to be able to become it. Yet he had the feeling that others, many others guided his words, the question so basic to all of them.
“For power.” And the creature spoke in the tongue of mortal man, unable to speak as it once had. Mikel through Sherial, suddenly understood why this creature could no longer use the tongue of heaven. For the mortal tongue could lie while the language of angels held no such room for untruth. And this creature lied. It lied to everyone. Most especially it lied to itself.
“To be a God.”
“Have you looked in a mirror lately?” The quip sprang out of him almost by itself, the stress of looking upon the monstrosity almost beyond his ability to bear. But surprisingly it brought no real rise from the foulness. Either it had looked and not seen, or else it hadn’t dared look at all. He suspected the latter, for how could any creature lie so terribly to itself?
“Silence, mortal. For I am Belial. I am the end of the world, the end of mortal man and the end of your futile existence. You will obey me in all things or you will die in screaming agony after a million years in Hell.” And the creature meant it. But while Mikel knew the foulness could kill him, he understood now it could never do anything more. Not while Sherial was with him. His soul was clean. He laughed, the sound only slightly hysterical.
“Try it slime. You have no power over me. You have no power over anybody who does not grant it to you.”
On cue a blast of pure hatred left the creature’s decomposing body. It was blacker than black, stank like a million sewers gone bad, and screamed like a billion banshee’s wailing their dead. Mikel’s skin crawled, and his tongue tried to flee back into the safety of his throat, and he wanted to curl up into the tightest foetal position possible. But even as it encircled him he knew it could not harm him. Sherial’s love told him so, as did the goodness of heaven which permeated him. He stood his ground and the evil vapour evaporated leaving nothing but air.
“Like I said, you have no power.” The dark man gave no sign that it feared his words, or its own failure to defeat him. It just stood there like a statue made of black goo.
“Now you will release the prisoners.” Still the creature did nothing, perhaps trying to frighten him, perhaps unable to do anything. Its weapon of hate and evil had failed, the human was untouched and still glowing unbearably in front of it. Perhaps it truly had no idea where to go from there.
“The robots are at the first of the dungeon walls.” The message came to him via Sherial and faced by Hell itself he still knew sudden joy. The robots, Hermen’s of course, were carrying the delicate equipment that would allow them to break open that last of the walls between the dungeons and the tunnel, and also enough of the same artefacts he wore to hopefully avoid all detection from
every system the demon’s had acquired.
Best of all, they were close.
“You threw away everything that you were, everything that you could have been for the illusion of power?” It was more a question he directed at the empty air, for the creature he knew, would not listen, could not understand. To acknowledge what it had become would be suicide for it.
In his mind Mikel suddenly saw how it had been. How the angels had been divided when mortal man had come upon the scene. How many had felt rejected, bitter and hurt, fearing that the lord had finished with them and that the humans would take over as his favourites. And from that early jealousy had come hatred. They had slowly stopped hearing the voice of God, knowing his glory and love, and had left or fallen out of heaven. They hadn’t been cast out. They had simply left of their own pride and stupidity. Pride and hurt feelings went before their fall. And from there it had all been down hill.
Once living in the world of mortals, they had disintegrated. Physically, spiritually, mentally, and in every possible way. For their powers had always been at the behest of the lord. Without him, they could be nothing.