by Nana Malone
“But she can touch others?” Elisabeth asked.
“Yes,” Azrael said. “She keeps her power firmly under control. But her physical form was not destroyed as mine was when she learned to harness the power of the void. It took her brother billions of years to figure out how to do it on his own from scratch.”
“Oh,” Elisabeth said, disappointed. “Billions of years? So … um … how long does she think it will take you to become … solid?”
“I don’t know,” Azrael sighed, staring off into the jagged mountains off in the distance. He bent down to pick up a pebble and threw it into the gully. “I can hear the Song of Creation. Faintly. She doesn’t understand why I haven’t been able to use it to recreate my physical form.”
“I thought that’s what the fires in hell did?” Elisabeth asked.
“The fire alters your essence so you can’t directly manipulate the atomic structure of the material realm,” Azrael said. “It’s some sort of safety feature. To prevent Moloch and his Agents from simply using the matter here to escape. To rebuild your physical form, you have to know how to access power that transcends the material realm.”
“Like … prayer … or something?” Elisabeth asked.
“You have to love somebody so deeply that you’d be willing to sacrifice your very existence just to be with them.” Azrael's expression grew intense. “Only the most worthy are chosen by Ki to hear the Song of Creation.”
Memory of the anguished look on Azrael’s face when he’d suddenly materialized in front of her, stopping the bullet that had been coming for her, intruded into Elisabeth’s mind. The memory which had haunted her dreams ever since that day. Was Kadima right?
“Nobody’s ever loved me like that.”
Azrael’s mouth opened and closed without speaking. Platitudes? Or had he been about to profess he had feelings for her? The intense expression disappeared behind the cautious, shy one.
“Archangels have to be very careful who they become involved with,” Azrael took a stick and pretended to be interested in jamming it into the rocky soil instead of making eye contact. “If our mate's love is false, it can kill us. Most have been unable to find mates because Moloch wiped out the Seraphim home world.”
“How sad,” Elisabeth said. “But I can’t blame this Ki-goddess for being cautious. An evil bull-god who devours children can’t understand what it means to truly love somebody.”
“No,” Azrael's dark wings drooped dejectedly. “He can’t. But sometimes I feel … oh … I don’t know!”
Elisabeth understood.
“You feel like maybe you’re not healing because somehow you’re not worthy?” Elisabeth guessed.
Azrael looked up, nostrils flared as he used his other senses to make up for his inability to touch. Beautiful. Elisabeth had never met a more breathtakingly beautiful creature than the chiseled angel who had shadowed her since she was a child. A plethora of emotions danced across his obsidian features. Angst. Remorse. Anger. Sorrow. Like a fine Grecian statue. Too beautiful to be real.
“You’re not the only one who’s ever had to pick yourself up off the ground and start from scratch, you know?” Elisabeth said. She reached towards him and stopped when he pulled away. She neatly laced her fingers together in her lap lest he jump up to maintain a safe distance.
“I know,” Azrael said. “Watching you struggle has reminded me I’m not the only one who suffers because of somebody else’s actions.”
His black eyes were so full of sorrow that Elisabeth wanted to take him in her arms and give him a hug. How she longed to give him the simple reassuring hand on his shoulder like she’d given the sick Private back at the infirmary. Comfort she could never give. Elisabeth touched the scar which ran from her temple to her lips.
“I begged the General to remove that when he healed your spine,” Azrael traced it in the air, a foot from her face. “He said it is a badge of honor. That you met Death and defeated it. Not a punishment.”
“I hate it,” Elisabeth said. “It makes me ugly.”
“The one you call Saint Michael wished the world to see how special you are inside,” Azrael said. “He, himself, keeps the scar over his heart healed by his mate even though it is within his power to remove it. He said he likes to look in the mirror each morning and be reminded every single day is a gift.”
“He sounds very wise,” Elisabeth touched the gnarled pink flesh that sank into her cheek. “I had no idea the scar had significance.”
They sat there together, staring off at the distant craggy peaks, in a companionable silence. Azrael’s notebook sat between them, still open to the page with the goat until an errant gust of wind blew it to another page. Elisabeth stared down at a sketch of herself staring back from the page. Scarred. But the scar had an ethereal quality about it. As though it were a beauty mark. Was this how he really saw her?
Azrael looked mortified. He silently grabbed the book and tucked it back into his cloak. Elisabeth stared off into the distance, pretending she hadn’t seen. Her dark watcher was a man of deep emotion and few words. Pressing the reclusive angel about his art would cause him to recede back into the woodwork.
“Tell me about heaven?” Elisabeth asked, picking a neutral topic.
* * * * *
Chapter 37
Their associate-gods
Have made the killing of their children
Seem fair to many idolaters,
Quran 6:137
Earth - AD March 18, 2003
Dora Farms, Baghdad, Iraq
Azrael peered uneasily through the binoculars at what otherwise appeared to be another henchman’s palatial home tucked into one of the most densely populated neighborhoods in Baghdad. He’d sent in tendrils of his consciousness, trying to ascertain the position of the squatter, but some sort of force field surrounded the compound. Although several species had developed dampening technology, humans had not yet progressed that far. Unauthorized technology was worrisome.
The rustle of somebody moving through the tree-lined walls, muttering curses under his breath, clued Azrael that Samuel Adams was on time for their rendezvous.
“Our intelligence says he’s in there,” Sam grunted as he shook leaves out of his collar. “There are guard vehicles hidden amongst the trees so they can’t be spotted by satellite.”
“Saddam Hussein?”
“No,” Sam said. “Chemosh. Moloch’s highest ranking Agent. We don’t know how the fuck he did it, but he escaped from Gehenna.”
“Chemosh?” Azrael asked. “I’m afraid I’m not up on my prehistoric Moloch history. Which one was he?”
“A really, really bad one,” Sam said. “Another god. Big. Like Shay’tan. Not just a run-of-the-mill ascended bad guy. Chemosh needs a fairly evolved host to interact with this realm. But he’s not as limited as Moloch.”
“Still not ringing a bell,” Azrael said. “I thought you had the worst ones sequestered into their own level of Gehenna so they can’t interact.”
“This one’s clever,” Sam said. “The General knew him by the name of the host he seized. Zepar. The technological genius who wired up Lucifer’s brain to make him compliant enough to use as a host for Moloch without tipping off Hashem he had a squatter in the palace.”
“Oh.” Azrael felt a sinking feeling in his gut as he put two and two together and realized why he was unable to pierce the compound. “That one. Does Lucifer know?”
“Oh, yeah,” Sam twitched his tail. “And he’s pissed. We still haven’t figured how the hell he got out. It takes a power surge big enough to fry all of Europe to open up a portal large enough for the big ones like him to escape. The two emperors haven’t registered anything that massive from Ceres station.”
“That’s not good,” Azrael furrowed his brow. “That means they tampered with Shay’tan’s monitoring equipment. It wouldn’t be the first time.”
“The last time Chemosh got loose,” Sam said. “He helped Moloch waste one universe and then punched a hole into ours. I
f it wasn’t for the General’s partial immunity to void-matter, we’d all be on the sacrificial altar.”
“Oh … joy,” Azrael muttered. “Perfect timing … the Regent is with child again and the Dark Lord is still on sabbatical. Why do –I- always have to be the void-creature du jour?”
“Because you’re so good at it, my boy,” Sam said. “The mere mention of your name gets them quaking in their boots.”
“All hype,” Azrael snorted. “Few teeth. Compared to the Regent or He-who’s-not, I’m just a baby.”
“A baby who can take out an entire platoon of bad guys without breaking a sweat,” Sam said with a wolfish grin. “Waah! I’d sure be crying if I saw you coming for me when you do that black thundercloud thing.”
Azrael gave Sam his sternest ‘knock off the dark humor’ look. “So … who’s Chemosh using for a host? Some scumbag with delusions of devil-worshipping grandeur?”
“Just some civilian!” Sam threw his arms up in exasperation. “Our intelligence says he stumbled across a genetically compatible host a year and a half ago. Chemosh performed a frontal lobotomy to kill his higher brain functions. They seized the guy's entire family as potential hosts.”
Azrael noted the agitated thump-thump-thump of Sam’s tail escaping his trench coat as he spoke. Sam was usually pretty careful about not revealing his … differences … while out on the field. He must be really upset to be so careless.
“So what do you need me to do?” Azrael asked. “Take out the squatter before the Americans and Brits get here? They’re about to invade this country.”
“Yes.” Sam pointed to the lights gleaming even in the middle of the night at the farm. Men with guns herded several women, children, and an elderly man towards the guard vehicles tucked under the tree line. “Look … they’re getting ready to flee. If Chemosh goes underground, we’ll never find him. We need you to ensure that doesn’t happen.”
“You said the host he’s using is an innocent,” Azrael said. “If I take Chemosh, the host will die as well.”
“He’s already as good as dead,” Sam said. “It’s not like Lucifer where he was more useful to them as himself than as a permanent host because the Emperor can spot a squatter. The poor guy is trapped. He can’t cross into the Dreamtime because he’s not dead. But what kind of life will he lead without his higher brain functions? Word has it the guy is a vegetable whenever Chemosh steps out. Can’t even feed himself.”
Trapped betwixt and between? Like him? Azrael struggled with what Sam asked him to do. It wasn’t Sam he was wary of trusting, but Lucifer. Lucifer had a grudge against the Agent who’d recruited him as a teenager to be Moloch's meat-puppet.
“I want to see for myself when we go in,” Azrael said. “Then I’ll decide. Elisabeth has shown me many injured we once wrote off for dead are capable of surviving. I refuse to kill an innocent man just to get at a guilty one.”
Only one creature could knock an Agent out of its mortal shell without killing it if the host-consciousness wasn't powerful enough on its own to evict the monster. The Eternal Emperor. Unfortunately, the Emperor had not stepped foot on Earth in over 5,500 years.
“Chemosh will get away…” Sam warned.
“The Coalition is about to bomb the crap out of this entire country,” Azrael flapped his wings with annoyance. “How far can he go? Elisabeth’s staging a medevac unit in Kuwait.”
“Elisabeth, huh?” Sam gave him a knowing grin. “So that’s where you’ve been off to lately. Somebody’s got it bad!”
Azrael didn’t justify the comment with an answer. He’d been warned the Sata’an-hybrids enjoyed a good wager. Especially when it revolved around relationships. For all he knew, he was the hottest betting topic in the Valley of Jehoshaphat right now and Sam was fishing for insider information.
“Whatever,” Sam said with an indifferent shrug. “Go ahead. Don’t talk to me. In case you forget, it was me who watched over your girlfriend while you took your little sabbatical to study … what was it … pond scum? On some remote planet … where? East Buttfuck?”
“Pre-sentient primate-like mammals,” Azrael ruffled his feathers with feigned indignation. “And it was a solar system too close to Earth for anyone else to study them without violating the terms of the Armistice. It was worthy work that needed to be done!”
“This is worthy work needing to be done,” Sam flashed his slightly pointy teeth that otherwise looked normal. “That was you getting dope-slapped by reality! Human females are a lot more earthy than the frigid Angelic chicks Hashem has cruising around the galaxy in his cushy command carriers.”
“They shouldn’t waste time on the wrong person!”
“Whose fault was that, Mister Silent Lurker?” Sam jaunted. “If you don’t let them know you’re interested, they go looking for affection elsewhere.”
Azrael studied the compound, ignoring Sam's knowing look. His appraisal of the situation was accurate. Both situations, actually. Elisabeth had gotten involved with Tommy hoping it would ease her loneliness. Loneliness caused, in large part, because he had backed off so far she couldn’t sense him anymore. She’d thought he was gone for good.
“The quarry is getting ready to move out ahead of the expected American invasion,” Azrael neatly deflected the topic of conversation. “We need to move or we’ll lose them. How many men do you have with you?”
“Just me and two others,” Sam said. “There … and there. See?”
“Just two?"
“Been a stretched a bit thin since human medicine advanced to the point our young people can pay some hack doctor to cut off their tails against their parent's wishes,” Sam said. “We don’t have the manpower to babysit everything Moloch’s agents do anymore. Pretty soon, you guys will be on your own!
“That’s a scary thought,” Azrael said. “The two emperors are so busy proving the other one is wrong that they’d sacrifice this world to one-up the other in a heartbeat. Ki knew what she was doing when she had her Agent entice Lucifer into caring.”
“Lucifer may be an ass,” Sam said. “But he’s an ass who loves humanity in all of its flawed, fucked-up glory. Absolutely adores them. Especially their vices!!!”
“That’s for sure,” Azrael said. “Their self-destructive nature has both emperors scratching their heads. Lucifer is the only one who understands them.
“What’cha guys going to do when there’s no more demons to guard the gates to the underworld?” Sam taunted. “Roll up your sleeves and get your pretty wings all dirty?”
“I’ll be happy for you,” Azrael looked at his old friend. “It’s not right, your people having to hide because some dominant gene keeps cropping up in your offspring to make you just a little bit different than humans.”
It wasn’t so far in the past that he’d viewed the Sata’an-human hybrids with contempt. Demons. When had that perception begun to change? More importantly, why had that warped perception even started in the first place? Propaganda? Yes. Propaganda. Neither emperor wished their armies to be lured into rebellion by Lucifer a second time. Dehumanizing the descendants of the soldiers who’d rebelled discouraged others from Falling.
Was that what was happening to him? Falling? Was Azrael one of the Fallen because he’d fallen in love with a human? Or did it take more to arouse Hashem’s eternal condemnation? Yes … it took more. The General's mate had once been human and it was reported most Leonids were descended from a single human male.
“Heck … you’re more human than I am!” Azrael added. “You’re like, what? Fifty-five generations removed from the Sata'anic Fallen who rebelled against Shay’tan?”
“Fifty-nine,” Sam said, exasperation in his voice. “And every single generation of my family since then has made damned sure they intermarried with humans, not other Sata’an-Fallen, trying to eradicate the gene.”
“The humans would accept you, I think,” Azrael said. “Especially now. They’re big on affirmative action in the western nations.”
“I know th
ey would,” Sam said. “Their ancestors accepted our great-grandsires once they stopped exploiting this planet for Shay’tan and started protecting it against Moloch. And those guys really were lizards!”
Sam shuddered at the mention of his own lizard ancestors. Sata’an descendants divided themselves socially according to who appeared most human. ‘Demons’ who could blend in simply by donning a trench coat and contact lenses, such as Sam, were at the top of the hierarchy. On the other end, those unfortunate enough to inherit more lizard-like characteristics were shunned. The poor things existed in the shadows, never daring to walk amongst humans lest an inadvertent sighting give the two emperors cause to pounce on this planet like a tasty morsel.
Azrael had studied such visual pecking orders amongst Anglo-Indo populations in India and African-Americans in the United States. What a Sata’an descendent wouldn’t give to be born with Sam’s handsome chocolate complexion and tightly curled afro! Amongst Sata'anic Fallen females, Sam was the alpha male. The golden boy. It was too bad Sam wouldn’t have them. He was holding out, waiting to find that ‘right’ human female who would accept him for who he was.
“One day,” Azrael said. “Your species will finish assimilating into humanity as the Fallen Alliance hybrids did.”
“Scary thought,” Sam said. “Then Lucifer will be the only one left to safeguard them. Do you trust Hashem to not screw things up? At least Shay’tan has a history of upholding his bargains.”
Azrael didn’t answer. He loved the Eternal Emperor with all of his heart, but he suspected when that day came, Earth would be in trouble…
“Lucifer in charge of humanity,” Azrael said. “It still makes my brain hurt just thinking about how that even happened! He’s so … so ... so …”
“Over the top?” Sam said with a grin. “Flamboyant? In-your-face anything-goes debauchery? He gives Shay’tan conniption fits over his lifestyle. Doesn’t want Lucifer giving the Sata’an full-bloods ideas. Although at least the old dragon seems to trust him to keep his end of the bargain so far as the Armistice is concerned. Lucifer forced the Fallen Alliance hybrids to treat the Fallen Sata’anic citizens fairly back when our species were first forced to work together. Wouldn’t tolerate one snooting down their noses at the other.”