by mike Evans
Joseph was so intent on finding his long-lost friend that he didn’t seem to realize the miracle happening before him. The skeletons who had already been having a horribly difficult time walking towards them exploded, sending their bones in a million different directions. Their moaning ceased, and the magnificent blue light disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. The two priests let out a long-held breath, looking around in shock and joy, seeing not even one of the dead still walking the grounds.
Michaels said, “It… it was a miracle. It was him, wasn’t it? He stepped in… I didn’t think he ever did such things; not because I’ve never had a prayer answered, but because there are so many things he must deal with regularly.”
Joseph felt his heart to see if it was going to explode and found a tree to lean against. “I don’t know what to tell you, Father Michaels. I can’t say that I have been able to experience such a feat as this prior, but I would say there are many things I’ve had to deal with for a first time today. The voice that I heard was familiar, but not one that has touched my ears in many, many years.”
“Could you be a little more specific, Father Joseph?”
“I am not trying to be cryptic. The voice is that of my mentor, from when I was not much older than you. He was there by my side until the day I lost him. I am wondering if he was brought back to help me fight… no—to help us fight. You are in this for the long haul now, my friend. This is truly a miracle; I am having a hard time wrapping my head around this. He sounds the exact same as all of my memories can remember.”
A hand clasped his shoulder, Father Joseph jumped, spinning around to see Father Andrew smiling. Father Michaels walked away, unworried about what their new guest could do. “Holy St. Christopher! What—no, wait… Who are you? How are you…?” Michaels questioned.
Andrew smiled, walking forward. “You need to have more faith my son. You have a very able mentor here. I pray for your sake that you are paying attention to the advice that he is bestowing upon you.”
“I am… I mean—I will; I can… I don’t know what to say.”
“Just do your best to find your own light. You will not regret it. Faith means giving into your fears.”
Joseph said, “It is good to see you, Andrew. I won’t lie, it is difficult to grasp what is happening, how those things came to be, or how you are standing before us. We were on our way to the house of the Parkers’.”
“You are too late.”
Michaels dropped to his knees, not understanding what he meant. “They are dead… whatever those things are, got them. This is horrible.”
“You need to teach your disciple when to listen, and when to shut up. Of course, no one can say that you caught onto that immediately either, now, can they?”
Father Joseph didn’t intend to waste any time. “What are you speaking about, Father Andrew? You make no sense.”
“They are alive; at least Billy and James are. I am unable to see the house and what is happening within its walls.” Andrew said.
“Thank you for saving us.” Joseph said.
“It was only a side effect of why I am here.”
“What do you mean?” Michaels asked.
“The demons have taken bodies. They are taking the children of the city just as quickly as they can break them down. Do you understand what I am saying?” Andrew questioned.
“I have no idea what you are talking about,” Michaels exclaimed.
“The demons of the city, they aren’t secluded only to the Parker house. They’ve made their way out; they are taking over the youth and causing them to get killed.”
“Why?”
“Because they know it is the only way in which they can get into heaven. They are trying to get through the gates; they are trying to-”
Michaels and Joseph both said, “They are trying to take over heaven?”
“Yes, and God is not pleased. You know how he feels about children. The words in the good book are not depicted in error. He truly loves them and he wants nothing horrible like this to happen to them. They think that they can make their way to heaven through their bodies.”
“Thank the Lord, he is able to stop them,” Michaels said.
“Yes, he is, but we can do nothing for the souls of their parents and family that he will leave in the children’s wake. They will want for nothing and be given a free reign of heaven to enjoy as they please. But we do not want them to kill anymore; it is not fair to the children.”
“What can we do to help?” Joseph asked.
“You can open one of the bottles of holy water and break it. Smash it on the street. God is going to make it pour as if Noah’s ark will be needed very soon.”
“I don’t understand what you are saying, I'm sorry,” Michaels said.
“It’s very simple, Father Michaels. We are going to bless the street and spread it across the city. Whatever is left will be indoors, and it will be up to the two of you to send it back to hell where it belongs. I need you to move now, or I fear we will be too late. One will slip through and it will not be a good thing for any.”
“And what of the bodies that you have left in your wake?” Joseph asked.
“They are of little importance right now. But the time is now, and we need to use it. The souls that are still above ground are the ones we need to care for now. Father only hopes that it will work.”
Michaels didn’t need to wait for the miracle to happen. He pulled the second jug from his bag. Father Andrews nodded and Michaels ripped the plug off and turned it over, letting its blessed contents spill out. Before the first drop ever got to hit the ground, a torrential downpour begun like none they had ever seen before. The winds began to howl and scream; even their cheeks were shaking in the wind—all but Father Andrews, who stood in place with no issue looking up at the sky. The blue light that they thought they had witnessed before was only a sparkler compared to what was happening now.
Michaels yelled, “How long will this last?”
Joseph fell to a knee, holding his heart and worried that he wouldn’t be able to handle it. But as quickly as the wind had begun, everything stopped instantly. The blue light that had been blinding went back to normal, the sky moved on, and birds began to chirp. Michaels helped Joseph to his feet. “Are you okay, Father Joseph? Are you fine?”
Joseph nodded, feeling the pressure on his chest slowly going away. “Too many years in New York eating unhealthy, I fear, will be the end of me before demons.”
Father Andrew placed a hand on his shoulder, his spirit holding him tightly. “It was very good to see you again, my long-lost friend. I truly mean that. Take your time making your way to heaven, but I long for the talks we will be able to have. I promise, once you get peace, that it will not be very often we are summoned to fight again.”
Michaels cleared his throat. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but what about the house? What about the Parkers? Are you able to accompany us to their home? Are you going to fight by our side?”
“I'm going to stay by your two’s side for as long as I am allowed to. Are you ready to depart?”
The two priests walked out of the graveyard slowly, trying their best to not step on the dead. They looked at their bones, realizing that they were just barely still doing it, but they had the faintest of blue light coming from them. Joseph said, “Well, you don’t see that every day now do you?”
Michaels was going to answer, but Father Andrew’s ghost floated past them and in front of them. He realized there were a lot of things that they weren’t used to seeing. He looked in his bag, seeing they had but one jug of holy water left and said, “Is this going to be enough?”
Father Andrew looked at it, shrugging. “This is the first time I’ve been sent back to Earth to deal with demons and the dead. We won’t know until we are there.”
As the two exited, they saw Billy and James staring in awe at the scenery in front of them. “What in the world happened here?” James asked.
They both jumped back a foot when they sa
w the blue ghost of Father Andrews. Billy held up a shaking finger, pointing to the priest floating towards them. “Wha… wha… what is that? What is that? It’s behind you!”
Father Joseph held up his hands, smiling lightly. The boys looked at the two priests and thought that they wouldn’t have looked much better had they just finished the Chicago Marathon. “He’s okay, he is with us.”
“He is with you? How?” Billy asked.
Joseph looked at the ghost trying to think of how to explain such a thing to him. “He is the one that taught me back when I lived in New York City how to do this.”
“How to do what?” Billy asked.
“I send demons back to hell where they belong, son. I’ve been doing it for longer than the two of you have been alive. Shoot, I’ve been doing this almost as long as Father Michaels has been alive.”
The two boys both whistled in unison. Father Michaels cleared his throat and said, “Hey boys, I'm not that old, all right?”
Joseph continued walking towards Billy’s home. “We don’t have time to sit here and talk; who knows what is happening in that house. We need to get there and we need to do it now! You two go to the church and stay there until someone comes for you. If you see any of the priests, you can tell them we need help, but you are probably going to get some strange looks.”
“I don’t understand.” James said.
Joseph never turned back, he yelled it over his shoulder. “If you run in midday and tell a priest that you saw a blue ghost, a light beam from the sky, and you have demons running loose in your house, then he’s probably going to either call your parents or the nut house. I don’t think you’ll want either of those things.”
The two boys were nodding as they started to walk away. They looked at the path they needed to take to go to the church, and the one that led back to their homes. Billy yelled, “Wait, I just remembered—there were kids; they had red eyes… like, crazy red eyes. I don’t know what they were thinking, but they started jumping into the street and went right in front of this bread truck. It caused a huge accident and they all got killed. I think there was something wrong with them.”
“Yes, they were possessed. They will be okay. That rain that hit a few minutes ago was pure holy water, forced out across the city with the use of faith and God’s unquestionable power. The only demons that should be left should be those that were inside of the home, or homes, given there was more than one of them in the city. With the force that happened, I would not be amazed if that was the case. They are trying to get souls into heaven that are filled with the demon’s ways. God is smart and ever-knowing; he was able to catch what was happening and stop it just in time. They sent demon zombies for us, trying to kill us in a graveyard filled with souls who had never found God before passing. You are lucky that you did not enter here on your way home before the miracle of light happened.”
When the two priests started to walk faster, the two boys thought about it for a very short time, and jogged up walking quickly next to them. The four of them marched quickly down the street with Father Andrew floating behind them, hoping that he would be allowed to stand by their side when the time came.
Joseph said, “I appreciate your will to want to help, but the two of you are going to get yourselves killed.”
“Father Joseph, it’s my house, and my family that is being affected, sir. I’m not going to stand by and let someone else get hurt for me. I don’t mean to be disrespectful, but I just couldn’t stand to sit and worry about everyone when we got back. Besides, I can show you the men that you need to watch out for.”
“Men?” Father Joseph asked.
“Yes, there were two men that we had chasing us. I thought that we’d never get away from them, but the—probably by just dumb luck—we got out of there. One of them got hit by a truck, but then they came right back. Or they didn’t but it's like they jumped into the man that hit them. I don’t know how to explain it,” Billy said.
Father Joseph looked to Michaels, who had no experience, and to Father Andrew, who was motioning for them to keep going. Father Joseph whispered, “They got possessed. Hopefully the holy water was enough to cleanse them of the demons running through their veins.”
Michaels said, “Is there anything that holy water isn’t capable of doing?”
“Just curing disease. But I’ll take it getting rid of demons with a smile on my face. I guess demons who aren’t in a skeleton, right?”
They made their way towards the boy’s house, not particularly pleased that they were being accompanied by two children. The idea of them getting hurt—or even worse, killed—was making both of them sick. When they made it to the street that Billy resided on, they started walking slowly. The boys pointed to men and women who, just ten minutes ago, looked like they were going to lose their minds. James said gesturing, “These kids were dead. I mean they were dead. What happened to them?”
Joseph smiled but Andrew answered. “When God did the holy water monsoon, He must have also saved all of those who had been wrongfully killed by the demonic possession.”
Billy, who still wasn’t completely okay with the thought of talking to a ghost, even if he was a priest, had to ask: “So, if they are dead and brought back, did that extract the demon from their body, sir?”
Andrew looked at the children. The red glow that he knew would reside in those controlled by demons was not there. He thought about how the blood was now clean from their skin. There were no tears, because there was no pain. The men and women were screaming, hands clasped and shaking them towards the sky. Joseph looked to Andrew and said, “I haven’t seen an act of faith like this since the day that we lost you. That is one of the best and worst days at the exact same time that I’ve ever had to experience before.”
Andrew patted his shoulder. “There is no pain in heaven my old friend. You have nothing to feel guilty about. You were trying to save the mother that was worth my death a thousand times over. It would have been nice had they not killed her though, but you had no clue that such a thing was going to happen.”
They made their way down the rest of the street, keeping vigilant of everyone that they were passing and unsure if demons possessed those among them. As they approached the house of the Parkers, there were no longer many bystanders. The thickest had been only where the children—who had miraculously come back to life—were located. The crashed truck was still in front of the home, and the ambulance had long since came and collected the body. The people who had been out front had dissipated, and only Mrs. Anderson stood in the doorway; but she looked as confused as anyone they’d ever seen before.
Andrew headed out in front of them, surveying the area. When he had made a lap, he had found nothing in the back of the home. He’d found the man who’d been run over by the truck, but no one had seen him yet.
Father Andrew went to the front of the Parkers’ house, sitting out front for a moment and waiting for the rest to come up. There were two men both holding pipes in their hands; neither of them were talking nor moving, just guarding the door. Father Joseph said, “I’m going to need to ask you two men to move please. We have business in that house.”
Al stepped forward, letting the pipe scrape on the ground. The garbage man—whom was now possessed with Earl’s demon—walked behind them. Their eyes both glowed red. “You have no purpose in that house maggot. Leave, and do so now, or I shall send you to your maker with a smile on my face.”
Joseph looked at Andrew, realizing that neither of the men could see him. Their faith was strong; he felt that was the reason why they could see Andrew. The men practically walked right through him as they began their approach. Joseph said, “You boys might want to reconsider your options. I feel there are powers greater than the two of you at play on this day, and you will seriously regret what you are doing today if you do not find another place to loiter,” Joseph suggested.
The boys looked at each other, not quite sure what he was saying, but they were both pretty sure it was a threa
t. “You see their eyes, Father Joseph? You might want to just pluck their demons before you decide to send them off into the city even further. They can do more than you can imagine, I promise, Father,” Billy advised.
Michaels was going to say something when the two demon-possessed men bent their knees ever so slightly and launched themselves into the air. The four had to crane their necks to see them before they disappeared out of sight. Billy yelled, “That’s what I was talking about, Fathers! That’s what we were trying to warn ya about!”
Joseph put up his hands, unsure what he was going to do with them, but it seemed like the only thing that he could do that made sense. Al was bringing the pipe down as he was nearing the ground. His teeth were exposed and his muscles were very tight. Just before he and the garbage man hit the ground, Andrew made the smallest gesture with his hands. The two men seemed to stop midair. Andrew spun them into a circle and into the brick wall behind them.
Both men hit hard, but neither so much as uttered a noise of pain. “You have to hit them with a truck, guys, that’s the only thing that has killed any so far. But don’t let them touch you, they just jump bodies! You don’t want that inside of you, I don’t think. No, I don’t think—I know!” James yelled as he and Billy were slowly backing up.
Andrew gave the kids a thumbs up and the pipes clattered to the ground. He motioned for Michaels and Joseph to come near. Michaels said, “What is it, Father Andrew? What do you want us to do? Please, we’ll do anything to make this day over.”
“Send these demons back to hell.”
Joseph stepped forward, grabbing the last jug of holy water and splashing it on the two men. They both screamed at this and the smoke—or whatever was in the two of their souls—began to weaken. Joseph pulled out a cross, punching the first one and then the second in the face. “Go back to hell. I command thee: go back to hell. Go back! Go back to hell!”
Josephs face was bright red and the lights in the two demon’s eyes were beginning to go away. The color of skin was starting to show. The man clasped onto Joseph’s shoulder, pulling him near, mouth wide open and the brightness was starting to grow back. A fist came from nowhere, holding a cross of its own.