She wondered if she failed to wash her hands before she ate and ingested some PCP. The stench doubled, her white teeth clinched, her lungs burned as if she breathed in pure ammonia.
Snakes hissed, joined by a buzz deep inside her head. The noise reached an intolerable pitch until pressure squeezed her temples as if caught in a vise. Pain mounted upon pain in waves throughout her skull. An unmistakable aroma filled her nostrils, rotten human flesh, sweet, heavy, and sour. Her eyes blurred.
Daisy pushed open the driver’s side door and staggered from the cruiser with both hands held to her head. Her ears picked up more underground noises as pipes ripped open and water gushed from somewhere far below her. She fell to her knees, lifted her head to the sky, opened her mouth, and screamed.
The ground underneath Anna Marie Sanchez exploded in concrete, dust, and water. An incredible boom followed. Anna vanished and the corner evaporated. Cars, people, and masonry went everywhere. Windows along the street packed with traffic shattered.
The tall buildings swayed. People ran in one huge crowd to escape the blast. The terrible event happened so sudden, many people near the explosion died from heart attacks, dropping like rag dolls upon the ground. The terrible concussion threw bodies and vehicles into high-rise windows. Car alarms wailed. The ground sank and opened a tremendous crater in the street once packed with vehicles and people.
Officer Daisy Lane jerked at the explosion. Her patrol car rocked. Her car radio squawked indiscernible gibberish as she stayed on her hands and knees. The noise in her head began to subside. Saliva mixed with snot ran from her nose and mouth and oozed to the dirty ground.
Daisy rose on weak knees. Her long thighs trembled. Orange and blue spots danced before her eyes. She stared at a sky filled with smog as black smoke roiled up from behind the high-rises she faced.
Emergency sirens blared throughout the city joined by shrill screams. She stumbled into her cruiser, started the engine with a shaky hand and sped off to the scene with lights and sirens on full blast.
Officers continued to scream over each other on her unit radio. The communication came out the speakers in high electronic squalls. She switched channels and the same incoherent noise assaulted her ears. People stepped from buildings, their heads lifted to the sky choked with black gloom. The cloud grew in size over the city. Traffic came to a halt along Highway 110. More people poured outside buildings and cars to witness the sudden pandemonium spread throughout downtown Los Angeles.
Frustrated, Daisy killed her sirens and lights. To her front, people and abandoned cars jammed the streets. She stopped the cruiser in the stalled traffic, snatched her shotgun from the rack, and stepped into the crowded street. She pumped her weapon to load a slug into the chamber and decided to walk to the chaos instead.
Daisy’s heartbeat drummed hard in her chest as the black haze poured into the sky like ink into water. The cloud twisted and swelled as if alive. Whispers started in her head, soft whispers, as if the speaker wanted to talk to her.
Daisy shook her head and kept up the street towards the dark billow. In the distance, cars blocked the streets and avenues. People ran a lunatic’s marathon between the abandoned vehicles as the ominous black mass gushed from the ground.
The black smoke exploded at its top with flames. She halted. A lump formed in her throat and for a moment no air slipped into her lungs and her thoughts became fuzzy. Orange and red flames plumed from the smoke’s crown and spread against the sky. Black ash rained down upon the horror stricken people. The black cloud took on a dark thunderstorm quality and defeated the thick rush hour smog.
The gawkers around her froze. Black lightening flashed out in jagged arcs, striking buildings, setting them on fire. One high-rise shattered and crumbled into the smoke filled rent in the earth. The onlookers broke from their shock and ran.
“Listen, Daisy.” A voice in her head said with urgency.
“Listen,” she said as people bumped into her. A private plane plowed into the black mass above her and vanished. “Listen to who?”
“To me.”
Daisy turned around in a complete circle in an effort to find the speaker. People continued to run and scream. The cloud exploded again. Reddish-orange flames fell from the sky in Mini Cooper sized balls. One slammed into a crowd. Their bodies blackened and melted before her eyes, their bones burned into ash. Her green eyes grew wide, her police training and experience never prepared her for the madness she faced.
“Run,” the voice said to her.
Daisy stood frozen and overwhelmed by the scene spread out before her. The cloud blotted out the sun, darkness fell, shrouding her world to a deep purple.
“Run where?”
Things started to fall from the unnatural black sky. Big as Pomeranians, they resembled tiny naked men with black bat-like wings and sleek white skin with scorpion tails. Shocks of long white hair clung to their horrible heads. Vicious teeth shown from their mouths, and their large, lifeless black eyes displayed an animalistic madness. They fell fast and screamed like a million beaten babies.
“Run.”
The voice shrilled inside Daisy’s head. She winced, and the crowd around her screamed, but the monsters from the black clouds screamed much louder. They fell from the sky by the thousands as their black wings beat hard against the wind.
Daisy ran. The voice inside her head became a presence in her mind. Daisy Lane wanted to get away from the madness. Basic survival instincts swept her up in the contagious fear the crowd created. The horrors from the sky shifted like Vaqueros and herded the crowd toward the wide Grand Avenue.
Daisy pushed the strange chatter inside her head away, and ran.
9
Daisy turned her green eyes towards the skies. The small monsters dropped down in waves. A woman dove into a car for safety. A little monster landed on the roof, ripped the steel open with razor claws and bored in. The woman scrambled to the backseat, her fat stubby legs kicked around until blood exploded against the back window.
The other monsters screamed in like mutated hawks, shredding people apart while others carried their victims into the dark clouds above.
The little monsters shrill screams shattered windows as they snatched people off the ground and tore them apart in midair. Daisy turned and a Screamer dove at her head. Its tail adorned with a scorpion’s stinger whipped about. The Pomeranian sized beast struck Daisy across the back with its tail. The powerful blow threw her into a truck.
Her body struck and dented metal, shattered glass sprayed down on her. The Escalade leaned on two wheels a few inches and settled to the ground hard.
Dazed, she lifted herself up against the dented Escalade. The Screamer spun on her. She aimed her shotgun and fired two slugs. The rounds went through its sleek flesh. The horror remained unfazed by the shotgun blasts.
The presence in her head yelled at her to get up and run for safety. The creature shot forward like a viper, metal claws sprang out from its boney hands as the beast lunged for her head. She ducked and the Screamer’s claws ripped into the truck.
Metal and glass flew in shards. Daisy aimed the shotgun and squeezed off her last two rounds into its slender back with no results. She tossed the shotgun at the little monster and bolted up the street to join the thousands who ran in their fear driven escape.
Daisy Lane ran on until another painful blow whacked across her back. Her feet left the ground. Her body sailed through the air. She slammed head first into a plate glass display window, crashing through to land on the floor amongst the sharp shards. She scrambled to her feet, tears pouring from her eyes. The Screamer stopped at the damaged window, spun around in midair and snatched another victim who dashed by.
Daisy stood at the shattered window bloodied and shaken. Her disheveled yellow hair glinted with broken glass. Blood ran red streams down her face from a lacerated scalp. She turned to face a large family gathered behind her. An old woman with a wrinkled brown face knelt in a corner, her eyes skyward as she crossed hers
elf and mouthed a prayer.
“This can’t be the end,” Daisy said.
Above her head a faint white smoke gathered near the ceiling. She turned toward the broken window as shock ebbed away, replaced by fear. A sudden realization struck her. Earlier she crashed into a huge truck and bent the frame, and now, she broke through a glass window.
As an afterthought she patted her body down expecting to find broken bones. The screams outside the window raged into a horrible crescendo.
Daisy slid a blood-smeared glass sliver from her thigh and tossed the shard to the floor. Her eyes widened as the wound healed, leaving a bloody rip in her blue uniform pants. “I must be going crazy.”
“No, not yet,” the voice in her head said. “But you must leave the city and wake up, Daisy.”
“I’m awake dammit.”
“Don’t argue, Daisy. Listen to me,” the voice said.
Daisy gave a frantic nod and continued to remove several glass shards embedded in her skin. Her hands shook as she ran her fingers through her tangled hair filled with glass and wet with blood.
“God forgive me please, if this is the end, please forgive me,” she said.
Daisy turned to the old woman still on her knees. She wore a black shawl draped over her head and hunched shoulders. Her wrinkled right hand motioned the cross over her bosom over and over. Other family members clustered around her and prayed. Mother Mary’s picture sat on the wall above them, a small wooden crucifix sat nailed beneath Mary’s somber painting.
Daisy approached the group and knelt in prayer. “Hail Mary full of grace. The Lord be with thee...”
Her right hand moved fast, forehead, center abdomen, left and right breast, kiss the fingers. She placed her hands together as incomprehensible voices mumbled their prayers around her.
“Don’t pray with those people, Daisy Lane. Get up, fight, and remember who you are,” the voice said.
Daisy paused, her mouth dried. Above her a white haze thickened as if the room became crowded with heavy smokers. One Screamer came to the window, joined by four others. Their huge black eyes gazed above Daisy’s head. Her eyes flicked up to stare at the mist. For a second she thought an arm or leg formed amongst this new apparition.
The four Screamers at the window attracted four more. Their mouths yawned open to reveal fiendish teeth slick with blood and torn flesh, their razor sharp claws grew longer. Daisy got to her feet. Her green eyes searched for an escape route.
“Too late for a clean escape, Daisy Lane,” the voice said. “Now fight.”
Daisy forced herself to calm down and listen to the voice in her head, even if the idea seemed crazy. Too many unreal events overloaded her senses for her to make a rational decision.
“Ma’am let’s go.” Daisy bent towards the old woman. She glanced back over her shoulder. More Screamers crowded the window. She realized the street behind the monsters emptied.
“Ma’am, let’s go now.” Daisy grabbed the old woman’s thin arms and eased her up to her feet. She faced family members who stood from their knees and huddled around Daisy. A few tried to push Daisy away with brown hands. One pulled out an aluminum baseball bat and drew back to strike, his eyes wide with fear and anger.
Daisy Lane’s world, once filled with her simple pleasures in life, manicures, tanning salons, sweet sex with her husband, became complicated beyond her sanity. Her life took a new turn, and she needed to accept the uncanny change or die.
10
Officer Daisy Lane forgot how many times she found herself in tight spots. Her problems reached its pinnacle as the nightmarish madness unfolded before her in haunted screams and blood. Inhuman and devilish horrors floated at the window. They gnashed and flashed dangerous razor-sharp teeth with ripped human flesh caught between them. Above her head, a white cloud formed.
She refused to die in this place. The sudden insanity broke with reality, a dizzy hallucinogenic twist slammed into her mind and the crazed world around her started to close in one inch at a time.
The things at the window should have caused her to pass out in shock, but she stood her ground. The presence in her mind stepped away from her like a mixed martial arts coach who slipped out the ring to let her prized fighter wrangle against a bigger and meaner opponent.
Daisy released the old woman’s arm. The man to her right lowered the bat. She approached the window and opened her hands and heart. The Screamers at the window formed a tighter group as the door the voice tried to unlock opened on its own. The knob turned, the old door swung wide and what spilled out surrounded Daisy Lane with bright golden light.
Double axes appeared in each hand, silver armor covered her body, and a silver helmet graced her head. Her hair, now in two golden braids, hung from underneath her helmet, each braided tip secured by a golden ring.
She found no time to be surprised at her sudden transformation. The silver armor she wore fitted her body with perfection, from the silver Roman Praetorian helmet embossed with a lion’s head beneath its bladed white plume, to her cuirass embossed with a lion’s head centered above her breasts and armored abs.
She wore a pure silver skirt with silver greaves strapped to her shins and forearms. Her broad sword sat sheathed at her left side, a silver loop sat on each hip to hold her battleaxes.
Love and protection filled her up like warm milk and sunshine. She opened herself to the experience, did not debate or fight against her change as Joan did hours earlier. Madness showed its hand and she accepted the rushed violence. What other choice did she have? Life or death depended on her actions.
Death would wait.
Daisy attacked. She hacked through the Screamer’s ugly flesh as they crammed their way through the broken display window. Near the ceiling, the white forms transformed into winged people dressed in white robes armed with long thin swords. Guardian angels sent to protect their clients. She understood their presence but where the thought came from baffled her. Distant memories echoed their existence to her.
“Take the family out. Just take them out the back door,” Daisy said to the guardian angels.
The Screamers outnumbered them. Yet Daisy, assailed by their terrible stench and squeals, fought on. Liquid filth splashed her beautiful armor as her help swung down from the ceiling. The guardian angels lacked the stamina for a drawn out fight, but they fought hard enough for their people to escape harm.
“Hold them off, I’ll get them out.”
Daisy spun towards the family. “Run and we will protect you,” she said in Spanish.
The family turned and hustled out the building’s rear exit. Daisy followed them into the cold air. The Guardian angels guided the family along an invisible path to escape the Screamers.
The Screamers stopped their chase and refused to go beyond a certain distance from the black cloud above their horrible heads. A half-mile out from the angelic skirmish, people ran on. The guardian angels made a path for the family with Daisy Lane close behind the group.
Daisy followed the family until they reached safety. The guardian angels retreated from the battlefield once the angel herded the family together in a mini mall parking lot. The beings from Heaven stared at Daisy in shock. Some smiled. Others cried and flew off to find their clients. A few settled down around her.
Overhead the dark cloud continued to spread. Red explosions rolled from the clouds, lightening flashed and the Screamers formed a huge perimeter above the downtown Los Angeles area.
Daisy faced the beautiful creatures from Heaven. She fought to catch her breath. Her armor stained in blood still gleamed. “My God.”
“Come to me,” the voice said in her head. “Come to me, this is not over.”
Daisy’s eyes fell upon the winged beings around her. They wore the purest white robes with wide gold sashes around their waists, not armor like the one she wore. Long thin swords hung at their hips, their faces remained serene. One reached out and touched her shoulder.
“Do not think, this is only a dream,” Daisy said.
“No Dream, Daisy. Now hurry, time is running out,” the voice said to her.
Daisy turned to survey the ruined city. Buildings burned in the distance. Acrid smoke filled her nostrils and the Screamers overhead ceased their horrific noise. They floated in the foul air, their black eyes lost in some dark abyss. The streets, once crowded with rush hour traffic, sat choked with abandoned vehicles and ripped bodies. Blood drained into the gutters by the gallons.
Daisy turned away from the apocalyptic scene. She weaved through the angelic crowd who gazed at her in awe. She placed her axes in their loops at her waist. Her actions came natural as distant memories bubbled up from her mind. She wanted to get away from the madness, gather her senses and come back to kill them all.
Daisy sprinted off. Her white wings outstretched from her back. She jumped into the air and took flight. Tears fell from her eyes. Below her, people continued to run. The clouds overhead, dark and bleak, sent a cold wind fouled by sulfur against her face. She banked and headed east, headed to find the voice and the answers for the sudden change in her once simple life.
11
United States President Raymond Judd Wallace vomited. He frowned at the bitterness in his mouth as he knelt over the clean porcelain toilet. He coughed, and his stomach tightened. He heaved a second time. Raymond lifted his head, dizzy and light from the toilet. Tears slid from his hazel eyes and rolled over his cheekbones.
He stood and fought to regain his composure before he entered his war room to face the terrible, unbelievable news from California.
Raymond reached into the medicine cabinet for the mouthwash. He opened the plastic container with shaky hands, poured the frosty green liquid into his mouth, and gargled until his inner cheeks burned. He spat green froth into the sink. In the mirror, he checked his pale face with swelled pouches underneath his eyes. He would order the presidential makeup artist give him some color to make his pale jowls appear robust and confident.
Angels of War (Angels of War Trilogy Book 1) Page 4