The Watchers

by Mark Andrew Olsen

  He stopped firing and stared at what was taking place. The monks were rolling away from a single direction—that of the women, their loud prayers and their outstretched hands. One of the men even faced the group and held out a hand like someone begging for mercy.

  Reuven looked around. The entire group was either dead or incapacitated by this bizarre madness.

  “Dylan!” he called out. “What in the world is going on here?”

  Up on the rooftop, Rulaz did not dwell on the victory unfolding below, but immediately turned back to Abby.

  “Where were we?” she asked the young American.

  “Please tell me about these enemies of ours. I’ve found them to be vicious and resourceful. And they seem incredibly intent on killing me.”

  Her host stared at her with a sudden, cold fire. “Abigail, do you truly wish for me to tell of such evil? I will tell you: it is not something I discuss, ever. I do not wish to invite darkness of that kind into my mind.”

  Abby thought about it for a while. “No, I believe that if I am to solve this mystery, I need to know.”

  “Fine. But first let us pray for protection, even as I merely speak of these things. We are exposed out here, and we need as much cover as our Lord will grant us if such words are to leave our lips.”

  They both prayed briefly, individually.

  A few minutes later, Rulaz asked, “Have you ever heard of the book of Enoch?”

  Abby shook her head slowly, searching her memory. “I might have heard of the person, but not a book.”

  “That is most people’s response. Enoch was a well-known figure.

  But the book that bears his name happens to be one which my church, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, includes as Scripture. Even many conservative Protestants regard Enoch as a most unique member of the noncanonical writings, or books not voted to be part of Holy Scripture by the Council of Laodicea. By the way, that council voted it out of the canon because Enoch had been rejected by the Jews. However, the Jewish scholars had rejected it only because it contained prophetic references to Jesus Christ. Anyway—many of the early Church Fathers quoted from the book of Enoch, from Tertullian to Clement of Alexandria. Enoch is even quoted in the so-called canonical Scripture, the book of Jude.”

  “I never heard any of this before,” admitted Abby.

  “But the reason I bring it up is because the first part of the book of Enoch is titled The Book of Watchers. It describes how, early in history, God had ordained a special group of angels to watch over the affairs of mankind and teach us many of the most glorious artistic and technical innovations. These were the original Watchers. However, at one point, the Watchers became enamored with the beauty of earthly women and conspired to take them as their wives and lovers. This they did, in violation of every command of God, and you might cast a blanket over the consequences by saying simply, and without fear of being vulgar, that all hell broke loose. God cast the Watchers down and condemned them to wander the earth forever, without the ability to possess or interact with human beings as before.”

  Rulaz paused and leaned forward, and as she did it seemed her face visibly darkened.

  “That is what Enoch’s book says. Now hear what we believe happened after that. It is well known that demons have a desire to inhabit human form, which makes any human lust or hunger seem microscopic by comparison. And that was denied to them forever. So it turned out the only way these wandering demons could slake their great hunger, and their lust for human contact, was by gorging themselves on human suffering itself. Think of it as a refined form of spiritual nectar, a concentrated byproduct. Yet the only suffering powerful enough to satiate them was that of the dying process. So these condemned demons made contact with a small group of renegade soldiers, and then deceived these men by inducing them to kill others in exchange for some of the great secrets and lore of the ages. That is how the Brotherhood of the Scythe was born. And that is their primary purpose: to procure the evil nourishment these foul beings crave.”

  “If these wandering Watchers can’t possess humans, then what just happened down there? Why were so many cast from those men?”

  “Those were other, opportunistic, even ordinary demons, if you will. Think about it. You cannot devote yourself to sadistic murder without opening yourself up to, and being driven by, profound evil.”

  “How does this relate to our group called Watchers?”

  “I believe the earthly Watchers, by which I mean us, were ordained by a new angelic host of Holy Watchers, as the faithful of their heavenly ranks were called, in order to assist the unfallen angels in resisting and destroying this horde wherever possible. We have always opposed them. We have always sought them out—even in the Sisterhood’s most far-flung and isolated clusters. Over time, we have become mortal enemies to each other. And so it seems fated to always be.”

  Abby reared back in her sitting perch against the wall. “I can’t believe all this,” she said. “It’s almost too much to digest, let alone how it all relates to my mystery.”

  “Tell me about your mother,” Rulaz asked gently.

  Abby’s face fell and a pall of sadness came over her features. “I never really knew my mother.”

  She went on to explain how her mother had disappeared during her childhood, how her father had later divorced her mom in absentia and remarried, and that he’d long urged his daughter to let go as it concerned her mom, and to move on with her life.

  Rulaz fixed Abby with a fierce gaze. “That is where our healing lies, my Sister. For you, and for us all. Heal the rift. Go to her.”

  “I can’t,” Abby replied. “I don’t know where she is.”

  “Please,” Rulaz insisted. “Try to find her. I can’t tell you why, but I feel God telling me that it will lead to the breach you seek to heal. Everything depends on it . . .” She looked at the sky and winced. “What a fouling of this beautiful city.”

  Abby finally gave in to her curiosity and looked out above her, feeling her Sight almost beckoning her.

  She almost fell backward. What assaulted her spiritual senses reminded her of a word she’d learned that year in an art appreciation class—chiaroscuro, or a sharp contrast between light and shadow. Blinding white light shot and waved all over the sky as intoxicatingly beautiful angels waged battle, punctuated by horribly distorted pockets of sheer blackness which, if she cared to focus, would resolve into the forms of ghastly and nightmarish beasts, grappling and struggling furiously.

  She turned away. Even a moment’s look seemed to have sucked all the strength and initiative from her body.

  “Look over there,” said Rulaz, pointing to the side, down toward el-Takiya Street.

  The second group of so-called monks had now entered the horrific scene. Their elderly leader’s arm was pointing upward, straight at them. The men ran over to the metal staircase and began sprinting up its steps.

  Then a shout rang out. It was Brother Brehan, bounding toward the rooftop gate, shouting deprecations as he ran. “Nooo!” He launched himself over the wall and onto the metal staircase’s top landing. The first Scythian stood only five feet below, his blade waving before him.

  Brehan turned toward the wall and with two mighty yanks pulled a pair of ancient, rusting bolts out of crumbling limestone.

  Rulaz threw her hands over her mouth and closed her eyes.

  The staircase bent cruelly at the top, made a loud metallic creak, and collapsed. Brehan and the leading edge of Scythians were tossed mercilessly to the ground.

  In the square, the remaining number turned about and glanced at their leader. Behind them advanced a row of emboldened Watchers, all of them holding out their hands and praying loudly.

  Suddenly the elderly leader let out a guttural sound. He stiffened, and his followers mimicked him exactly.

  He raised his sickle across his own throat, resting the blade tip just below his far earlobe. Eight more did the same.

  He drew the scythe down in a fast, hard, swiping motion.

&
nbsp; The men behind him performed the same motion in a single, precise rhythm.

  It was Abby’s turn to gasp at the horror below as nine bodies fell as one. Blood began spreading out across the plaza.

  Rulaz turned to her, touched her forehead, and muttered a parting blessing. “It is time for you to go now,” she said in an urgent whisper. “Find Dylan. Return to America.”

  “I thought it would end here,” Abby lamented.

  “It has not. And these men are defeated today, but not for good. They will keep coming after you. But it will end soon. Now go, while the fog of battle is still upon the Old City. There is another stairway that leads down from this place, right over there. Godspeed, my Sister.”

  CHAPTER

  _ 66

  OLD CITY JERUSALEM

  Abby crossed the rooftop and fled the Abyssinian compound as swiftly as she could. Once she reached street level, she found Dylan, pulled him aside and told him what Rulaz had said.

  After saying good-bye to Reuven, Dylan and Abby began sprinting down what they figured to be the least demon-infested street. Just minutes later they encountered a thick crowd along the narrowing lane where they felt it was safe to slow down.

  The pair had vacated the Holy Sepulchre plaza with only seconds to spare. Only a moment after they had run from the site, two Israeli Shin Bet soldiers had ascended to the Deir es-Sultan rooftop.

  There they found the nun known as Rulaz reclining as always, appearing only hours away from death. And yet, in a bizarre paradox, the barely living one struck the killers as the most vibrant person in the whole place.

  They had intended to detain Rulaz and wait for orders over their cell phones. But a strange compulsion fell upon them. An unexplainable discomfort took hold of their extremities, and they began to shake so violently that they almost did not make it back down the steps and out into the street, where the symptoms immediately subsided.

  From the apparent stupor of her weakened-again state, Rulaz smiled mildly and whispered a loving prayer of thanks.

  KING DAVID HOTEL

  Back in their East Jerusalem hotel room, Abby lay on the bed, trying to combine recuperation with brainstorming on their next step, which both of them knew had to take shape soon.

  Very soon.

  “Do you know what’s strange?” she asked Dylan. “I never did tell Rulaz the highest likelihood is that my mom’s dead. I don’t know if that’s denial, or some kind of deeper instinct, or what. It feels strange.”

  Dylan stiffened, the evidence of a new idea blossoming on his face.

  “Look. I have an old friend at the FBI. Looks like for all its failings, my old life is turning out to have its advantages. Let’s just see if he can run her name through their databases and come up with something definitive.”

  “All right,” she said, her voice filled with dread. “Here’s the phone.”

  She handed him the set and he swiftly dialed a number from memory. He waited almost a minute, then broke into a wide grin.

  “Robert! Hey, it’s Dylan Hatfield. Did I wake you up? I’m sorry, man, and you know better than to ask me where I’m calling from, but suffice it to say it’s across the pond a ways. As if you couldn’t find out . . .” He laughed awkwardly. “Actually, Robert, that’s kind of why I called.”

  Dylan paused and listened for a moment.

  “Well yeah, you heard right, or at least on the surface it’s right. I mean, yes, I have gone off the rez, my man. Left the old company store, as it were. But you know me, Robert. You and I go . . . how far back? Twenty years now? Anyway, you know that I have more conscience than half of those guys put together. Right?”

  He laughed.

  “I thought you and I would agree. So here’s the deal: I’m willing to pay good coin for a little of your telecom expertise. I need a domestic name run through the databases. Could you do that? This is very important, a life-or-death honest-to-goodness big deal. Freedom, the flag, all that good stuff. All right, the name is . . .”

  He held out the phone to Abby.

  “Susanne Louise Sherman.”

  Dylan broke out into a huge smile. “Did you hear that? Great. Thank you, buddy. I appreciate it.”

  He hung up, pumped his fists in the air, and cheered.

  Within an hour a name appeared in Dylan’s e-mail account, sent from an unknowable and untraceable web address.

  St. Stephen’s Home for Mental Health and Recovery, St. Louis, Missouri.

  ST. STEPHEN'S HOME FOR MENTAL HEALTH AND RECOVERY —THREE DAYS LATER

  Reverend and Mrs. Paul Skinner of Matewan, West Virginia, had arrived without appointment, with no records and, most of all, without the troubled and ailing teenaged son for whom they were “checking out” the St. Stephen’s facilities.

  However frowned upon by government regulations, such drop-ins were not a problem to the St. Stephen’s staff. Turned out most parents did pretty much the same thing when first sniffing around, prior to the pain of involuntary committal. No one wanted to appear too serious before it was necessary. One understood such things in the mental health business.

  So when Reverend and Mrs. Skinner arrived, the missus clearly distraught over the mere consideration of such an act as committing her boy to an “asylum,” as she insisted on calling it, their impeccable dress and laudable concern warmed them to the facility staff.

  The Reverend and Mrs. Skinner quickly discerned during their tour that Booneville was, despite occupying only a middle-tier status among private institutions, a most respected and well-managed private mental hospital. Its grounds featured one of the finest and largest specimens of Kentucky bluegrass of any place not already a horse farm, and its amenities were clean, non-odorous, and clearly above the norm. If the staff was somewhat less than stellar, and the success rate actually far below the national average . . . well, that only made for warm, long-standing relationships.

  After they described their son as unusually strong-willed, physically strong, and resourceful, it seemed perfectly acceptable that the pair paid close attention to the home’s security systems. The reverend, as most men of the cloth often did, protested a complete deficiency in technical matters and seemed lost when the home’s director described to him the intricacies of the intensive ward lighting and locking grid.

  But like most, he seemed mighty glad that the system was in place, whether understood or not.

  The only disappointment to the director was that, as they left, they pointedly ignored three requests to leave their name and address in the brand-new contact-management system. They seemed sincere when they pledged to come back, but the hapless director now found himself, after the investment of an hour-long tour, completely unable to follow up with the decent couple.

  He also wanted to express his goodwill to the poor wife, who seemed to be seeing ghosts, or some kind of frightening apparition, at nearly every turn of the hallway. He had never seen such a skittish woman. In fact, if he had been a suspicious man, he might have believed that it was she, and not some alleged son, who was the real object of their visit.

  CHAPTER

  _ 67

  ST. STEPHEN'S HOME —LATE THAT NIGHT

  The perimeter lighting, which for most of the evening had kept the entire forty-acre grounds awash in an electric glow, blinked off at eleven o’clock, as promised. As a result, the cloudy winter night sank its unrelieved darkness down upon the campus like a thick black pillow.

  The result? Conditions were almost too optimal for the man and woman, dressed in form-hugging black, as they scaled the high-brick wall and leaped inside. The two were so well disguised, they almost couldn’t see each other.

  Straining to spot his companion in the dark, Dylan almost wished he had skipped the black attire. If not for the ambient lighting from exit signs and night-lights inside the nearby building, there would have been no illumination at all.

  That is, until the motion detectors set off a lawn spotlight. It was a windy night, so Dylan knew it would alert no one. As for the
security guard who was parked in a truck on the other side of the campus, if he was awake at all he would attribute the spotlight to trees waving.

  Finally he spotted Abby. She was standing still against the wall.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, approaching her slowly to avoid causing a fright.

  “I don’t know if I can do this,” she said, breathless.

  “You mean, breaking in somewhere?”

  She shook her head violently. It wasn’t that. “It’s the spiritual activity here. You wouldn’t believe it. Things weren’t this thick earlier today.”

  “Do you want to pray? We’re not exactly on a time crunch, you know.”

  He couldn’t believe he was hearing himself volunteer this, at last. Part of him, the perverse and heedless male, chided himself for capitulating to such a female-dominated perspective. Religion’s for chicks, and the guys they’ve whipped into submission—something like that.

  Amazing how quickly, once back in the United States, parts of him could begin to forget everything he had seen and learned overseas.

  But another part of Dylan had forgotten nothing. Oddly enough, that inner guide was the same part of him that embraced discipline. That remembered to observe the tactical rules when on an op. That observed total operational control in following a plan, handling a firearm, heeding orders. The part of him that cared about the truth and took pride in doing what was right.

  It was the part of him that never forgot what he had experienced, no matter how much time had elapsed or how many miles had flown by. . . .

  Healings, angels, blinding flashes of light, prayers answered miraculously . . .

  So yeah—it felt a little strange to kneel down on a mission, with a girl beside him, on-site, in full operational gear, and talk to someone who wasn’t visibly around.

  But Dylan was a different kind of warrior now.