by Rex Jameson
Chapter 3
The Heist
Sariel paid little attention to his brother pacing around the corridor. Lucifer could get as angry as he wanted, but Sariel had to know the truth. Unlike the rest of his body, Sariel’s wings could be at the Council Archives in seconds.
“Are you listening to me?” Lucifer asked.
“No. I’m busy. Shut up for a second.”
Lucifer’s dark mutterings faded into the background as Sariel rummaged through bookshelves in a library. This particular archive was inside of the Chaos Primal, which gave him ready access from almost anywhere in any dimension.
“Assassination … Goblin Realm …” Sariel mumbled as he passed over parchments and orbs.
“Azazel is dying,” Lucifer reminded him. “Stop whatever you are doing and think.”
Sariel’s disappointment came through him in the form of a deep sigh. He would have to look for the viewing orb later.
“What about a space shuttle?” Lucifer asked. “We could pump all the air out of it. Our lungs would certainly stand the pressure.”
Any heist plan immediately got Sariel’s attention, but there was a major problem. They had tried this before in the 1960s and lost one of their closest guards, Beelzebub, in the process. Despite the human successes with busting through the atmosphere, the demons never tried to escape in a manmade spacecraft again. They had decided to wait out the apocalypse.
Lucifer appeared to see the concern on Sariel’s face. “They’ve gotten better. There hasn’t been a major catastrophe in years.”
Sariel shook his head. “That’s not the point. We have no idea if Beelzebub being in the cockpit caused that catastrophe, or if it was a mechanical failure. The Ruskies destroyed all evidence of the launch before the debris even touched down on Earth. If we just wait a couple of years, the black holes will suck out the atmosphere, and we should be able to lift off from the back of the planet in time to avoid the event horizon.”
“It has always been a shaky plan, brother, and Azazel doesn’t have two years.”
“Don’t let me die here,” Azazel groaned, looking up from his bloody bed of gore on the floor. “Don’t let him take my soul.”
“I’ll be right back,” Lucifer said, as he pushed himself through the doorway and into the warehouse. He returned to the corridor with the damp towel that Azazel had tossed him and wrapped it around Azazel’s torso to cover the wounds. He pushed both hands down on the wounded demon’s chest.
“Do you have a better option?” Lucifer asked Sariel.
“No.”
“Then let’s hijack a shuttle launch.”
Sariel’s impish grin told Lucifer there would be no protest. Lucifer shook his head and looked at Azazel, who choked on some blood as he laughed.
“There’s one set for tomorrow at Cape Canaveral in Florida,” Lucifer said. “Might be our last chance to target a fully fueled one for several months.”
“I’ll get some more towels for Azazel,” Sariel said. “Should we bother packing?”
He knew the answer before he had even asked the question. He looked through the warehouse doorway at the accumulated resources he and his brother had acquired over thousands of years playing the markets. Millions of dollars of wealth in just this room alone. Oh well. It was just a game to bide their time here anyway. Beating humans at anything wasn’t much of a challenge. Bigger games were afoot in Alurabum, the capital of Chaos, and this was their chance to finally get back home.