by Nana Malone
“Full-blooded lizards aren’t so bad,” Azrael said. “They’re just people. No different than you or I. I’d gladly grow a tail if it meant I could touch somebody without killing them!”
“You think that gal of yours would be so interested in you if you had one of these instead of them fancy wings?” Sam thwacked his tail against the ground. “Every time I seen one of us depicted in one of their religious icons, it’s us getting crushed beneath the boot of one of yours.”
“I served time with the full-bloods on Ceres station before my accident,” Azrael said. “They were a lot more affable than my own citizens. I was kind of a nerd back then.”
“-Was- a nerd?” Sam teased with a grin. “As in … past tense?”
“Hey,” Azrael feigned indignation. “Watch it! I’m supposed to be the most feared Angelic in the galaxy! Whooooooo! One touch and the boogey man will get you!” Azrael did his best Hollywood-movie impersonation of himself, reaching up one arm to silently point at Sam as though he were being singled out to be dragged to hell.
“Every time I see you,” Sam laughed. “You’ve either got your nose buried in a book, or you start spouting some obscure scientific theory that nobody else is smart enough to even understand! Much less discuss it with you! It’s like … you start talking and it’s nappy time!”
“Okay…“ Sam’s levity alleviated the vague sense of unease he’d felt ever since he’d teleported into the Baghdad suburb. “So I’m still a nerd. In a perfect world, I’d follow humans around all day studying their behavior and figuring out what makes them tick instead of doing this stuff.”
“Especially one particular human,” Sam guffawed. “A certain pretty blonde nurse, perhaps?”
Azrael hid his guilty smile and looked back to the compound they were supposed to be getting ready to raid, not making small talk about wooing human females. Sam’s radio crackled. He put in his earpiece and answered in the Sata’anic language.
“My guys are now in position,” Sam said. “The only target Lucifer really cares about is Chemosh. Anyone else is gravy.”
“I’ll grab the squatter,” Azrael said. “You and your guys secure the perimeter. As soon as you hear shooting, you’ll know they’ve seen me. Move in and grab the hostages so they don’t kill them.”
“Or abscond with them,” Sam reminded him. “Granny and the kids are potential hosts as well.”
“Got it,” Azrael said. “Ready? Three. Two. One…”
He flashed between the dimensions into the room where a larger-than-ordinary consciousness dominated the humans. The room had several adult males all meeting the description Sam had given of the host. Which one was Chemosh? The dampening field inhibited his ability to tell one from the other!
“Malak al-Maut!” The agents dove for their weapons.
“Our esteemed guest has arrived at last," a man wearing a white ghutrah said, holding up one hand to indicate he wished for his men to hold their fire. "Tell me, young void creature. Do you feel up to the task of taking on a god?”
Azrael froze. This wasn’t how things usually went down.
“I don’t see any gods in this room,” Azrael replied, carefully sending out tiny, invisible tendrils of consciousness into the room to get a gauge for just how big this Agent’s consciousness was before he made a grab for it. He could sense the lesser agents moving into position. Hostages were pushed to the forefront. Human shields. No matter which way he extended tendrils of consciousness, all he could feel was that damned dampening field Chemosh must have deployed to mask his presence.
“Let’s not play games, little one,” Chemosh said pleasantly, projecting a sense of calmness and ease along with his words. “You’re a cute little void creature. I’d really like to study you.”
Azrael felt the compulsion in Chemosh’s voice. Powerful. Much more powerful than Lucifer, although these days Lucifer usually only used his gift to seduce women.
“No,” Azrael resisted the image Chemosh projected into his mind of the two of them conducting fascinating scientific experiments together. “I prefer to work alone. But if you’d like to validate my research, you’re welcome to look up any of the non-classified studies I’ve published in the Journal of Galactic Sociology. You can peer-review any one you wish.”
Shit … this guy could read him like a book! The Regent had taught him to shield his thoughts, but he’d never really had to do it against such a powerful being before. Lucifer was a cake-walk next to this … thing! Chemosh's body movements were deliberate and slow as he moved towards the human shields.
“Pity,” Chemosh said. “I do so enjoy picking things apart and figuring out how they work. I rather looked forward to working with you. We could really use somebody like you.”
Azrael felt Chemosh’s consciousness sizing him up even as he did the same thing. Shit! This … thing … was huge. It extended beyond the walls of the compound and out into the city beyond. No wonder he’d felt uneasy the moment he’d teleported into Baghdad! That was no dampening field! That was Chemosh cramming his enormous consciousness into a human host! How the hell had he not put two and two together?
Because, until now, the only full-fledged god he’d ever encountered up-close-and-personal was Hashem and the Regent, and she kept tabs on him no matter where he was in the universe. It hadn’t occurred to him to even look!
Azrael moved into position to make a grab. “I’ve heard stories about the kind of experiments you like to conduct on the species you enslave. I think I’ll pass.”
“But Moloch insists,” Chemosh projected an overwhelming urge to trust him into Azrael’s mind. “You’re exactly the kind of ally our beloved god has been looking for if you ever figure out how to piece your body back together. Let us help you.”
For the first time since the day he’d taken on Moloch to save his friend, Azrael remembered what it felt like to fear for his own existence. Moloch had wanted him then, and he still wanted him now. There was a reason the Regent insisted Archangel novitiates exist within the safety of the Cherubim monastery until they became powerful enough to resist Moloch and his agents.
“It’s better to be consumed by the fires of Gehenna,” Azrael said. “Than to spend a single day being possessed by filth such as Moloch.”
“Ahh…” Chemosh purred, projecting images of a reasonable, sycophantic friend who only wished to help. “But being without form is so lonely. Isn’t it, young void creature? Especially for you, poor thing. Such a sensitive soul to be so feared! How terrible it must be, to never know the touch of another creature.”
Chemosh was right. He was a young void creature, still learning to control his own power and not at all comfortable wielding it. This monster, on the other hand, was nearly as old as Moloch himself. Older than this universe. This wasn’t going to be an easy grab.
“We are alike,” Chemosh's voice was hypnotically reasonable. “Victimized by Ki. Why … I didn’t ask to be stripped of my body any more than you asked to be stripped of yours.”
Chemosh stepped up to one of the hostages, a teenage boy, and caressed the fearful child’s cheek. Tears welled up in the boys eyes.
“You’re not a creature of the void,” Azrael said. “And neither is Moloch. Just because you lost your body doesn’t make us alike.”
“Don’t be afraid, my son,” Chemosh crooned in Arabic to the son of the host he currently occupied. “Papa will make everything all right.” He turned to Azrael. “Isn’t that true, my young void creature? Oh … I forgot. You don’t have a father!”
Chemosh plucked the image of an old childhood fear out of Azrael’s mind, amplified it, and shoved it back into his mind, insinuating the reason he didn’t have a sire was because he’d been rejected at birth.
“That’s it!” Azrael launched himself at the malignant old god. He was reasonable, not unfeeling. Innocent host or not … nothing could host that filth and remain untainted.
He realized his mistake too late…
Chemosh stepped to one side an
d pulled the boy in front of him, right into Azrael’s flight path. Azrael twisted mid-air and frantically flapped his wings, trying to land somewhere, anywhere, but where he was aimed. He almost made it. Almost. But not quite. A single feather brushed the boy's arm. His eyes locked with Azrael’s even as his mortal shell fell to the ground.
“Nooo!” Azrael tucked his body into a roll as the boy dropped dead from his touch.
Chemosh laughed. “So gullible, little void creature!”
Azrael exploded into his true form, the tentacled creature of nightmare. Static electricity electrocuted those agents he didn’t actually touch as he bolted after Chemosh. The malignant agent didn’t even bother trying to run.
“You can’t drag me back to Gehenna!” Chemosh laughed. “You’re too small!”
Azrael wrapped his consciousness around the physical form of the host, jolting Chemosh out of the former cafeteria worker’s body. The body dropped to the floor. Khalid’s consciousness stood, perplexed, as he looked around the room.
“What did you do to my boy?” Khalid wailed. “He was innocent!!!”
“He killed him!” Chemosh accused, his consciousness assuming his original form of some type of angular, slug-like creature. “Not me! -I- wanted to keep the boy safe!”
Khalid wept as he reached towards his son. Azrael wrapped thousands of tentacles around Chemosh to drag the bastard back to Gehenna. The old god didn’t budge. He was too large. Azrael couldn’t even wrap his consciousness around the evil thing, much less teleport it anywhere.
But Chemosh was big enough to wrap his consciousness around Azrael!
Oh … crap!
“Come, little void creature,” Chemosh laughed, clawing at Azrael’s consciousness. “Moloch is very anxious to meet you. It’s too bad you have no physical shell. You’d make such a fine host.”
“Screw you!” Azrael hissed, reshaping his form so that he had the thick, powerful tentacles of an octopus instead of the millions of microvilli he normally used to sense the world around him. He worked one tentacle into the clawed ones Chemosh was using to pin Azrael against him.
“Whatsamatter, little void creature,” Chemosh taunted. “Bite off more than you can chew?”
‘Yes,’ Azrael thought silently in his own mind.
“No!” Azrael shouted aloud. Bolts of static electricity shot off of him as he gave up trying to hold any semblance of a form. He allowed himself to become one with the void. Thought did not exist in this state. Only … hunger. An absence of love unlike any he’d ever felt before.
An absence of light.
Darkness.
Pure … void.
He hungered to fill the gaping absence of love with … something. With … Chemosh. The molecules in the room began to vibrate as Azrael lost control.
“He’s summoned the Guardian!!!” one of the other agents in the room screamed, believing him to be He-who’s-not.
“Not so fast,” Chemosh crooned. “This isn’t the Guardian. He’s a spunky little devil? Isn’t he? But this one is still a baby. Too small to destroy the likes of me!”
Chemosh rammed an image into Azrael’s mind of being picked up by the scruff of the neck like a kitten and carried off to Gehenna to be devoured by Moloch. The Agent's main power seemed to be his ‘power of persuasion.’ Well … the Regent had taught him how to resist that gift.
‘Wanna bet?’ Azrael allowed his anger to increase the instability of the molecular structure of everything around him.
The walls of the compound begin to dissipate.
Hunger. So hungry. He drew the primordial nothingness which underlay all matter into his own consciousness as he destroyed the housing compound, making himself grow larger. Neutrinos. Quarks. Higgs-bosons. Leptons. His power grew. The hunger grew. The malignant consciousness in front of him began to resemble a tasty snack.
“Uh-oh!” Chemosh said. “Looks like the little guy’s finally feeling his oats. Everybody … out! It’s time to go!”
Azrael grabbed at the fleeing mortal agents, not just jolting their consciousness out of their physical form, but dissipating their bodies completely. He sought not just to reap, but to destroy them.
“Sayonara, little void creature!!!” Chemosh taunted as he teleported between the dimensions.
The building collapsed, dissolving into primordial nothingness as Azrael used it to feed his hunger. His rage. He fed … indiscriminately. There was matter beyond the walls. He would consume that as well.
A small voice cried out in terror.
The boy.
His consciousness was still here.
Azrael had killed an innocent boy … and then left the terrified spirit here to fend for itself while he destroyed everything around it.
This is wrong!
Azrael fought to regain control of the hunger consuming his reason. Hunger. Why hadn’t the Regent warned him the hunger was all-consuming?
“Please don’t hurt me!” the boy cried.
“I can’t … control it!” Azrael gasped. “Please … go!”
The Regent hadn’t warned him because he hadn’t told her he’d begun having trouble with the molecules in the room vibrating whenever he got angry, that’s why. He’d meant to. But he’d been so busy he’d never gotten around to it. Control. How did the Regent regain control of her dark gift when it began to spiral out of control?
An image of the General opening the palm of Regent’s hand and giving it a kiss popped into Azrael’s mind. The General helped her subdue her gift. But Azrael had no mate.
But he did have a friend who he wished could be more. He pictured her as she had been the day he had first met her. Dime store wings splayed on the snow beneath her. Golden curls darkened with blood, curling endearingly around her face. Her beautiful, silver eyes as she’d looked up and curled her small hand around his. Touch. He could feel, even now, what it had felt like when she’d touched his hand. The only touch he had felt in 2,300 years.
She had smiled at him and told him she was the Angel of the Lord.
The hunger began to abate.
Sanity prevailed as Azrael got his dark gift under control.
Azrael looked around as he reshaped his physical form into that of an Archangel once more. The compound looked like it had been bombed, only shattered walls remaining where he’d indiscriminately lashed out and fed. The Agent’s bodies were gone. Absorbed into his own essence which Azrael could sense had grown larger from the feeding. The host's body was gone as well. His consciousness was nowhere to be found.
And neither was the boy’s…
“Aban?” Azrael called, using the name which had leaped into his mind when he had brushed against the boy.
There was no answer. “Khalid? Aban?” Azrael called again, feeling sick to his stomach. “Are you okay? I’m not going to hurt you.”
Nothing. The boy was gone. And so was the father.
Although the heart Azrael had learned to fashion to go along with his preferred shape wasn’t real, he had taught it to beat like a real heart. It indicated emotion like a real heart. And right now, that heart raced in panic as he realized the boy had gone missing and he couldn’t remember whether the boy had escaped along with his father, or been consumed along with the agents. He darted between the dimensions, to the gateway to the Dreamtime where he usually guided the souls of the deceased until they crossed over.
Nothing.
Not a peep from the other side. The room was dark and empty. There was no indication the boy's loved ones had gathered there to welcome him. Or that he’d even found his way there at all.
“What have I done?” Azrael choked.
With a cry of grief, he threw himself between the dimensions to search for the spirit of the child he’d just murdered.
* * * * *
Chapter 38
I opened to my beloved,
But my beloved had withdrawn himself;
And was gone.
My soul failed when he spake:
I sought him, but
I could not find him.
I called him, but he gave me no answer.
Song of Solomon, 5:6
Earth - AD March 24, 2003
Nasiriyah, Iraq
Fiery arms reached up to tear her out of her bed and pull her down through the mattress. Pain. The sensation of being shoved inside a gigantic maw and eaten alive. Shattered. Darkness. Light. Terror. She was falling. Falling faster and faster as the flames consumed her. She looked up and saw a black-winged blur speed into the fire after her.
“Azrael!!!” she screamed and reached up for his hand.
He grabbed her and refused to let her go as she pulled him down along with her into the fire. He pulled her against his body and tried to shield her as it solidified into molten lava.
‘I’ve got you,’ he whispered, wrapping his wings around her. Protecting her with his life.
With his very soul…
The bull-god tried to rip her from his arms and failed. A cello sounded, mournful and beautiful as the fires of Gehenna exterminated the shell she’d assumed for this lifetime. He hadn’t abandoned her!!! The connection they’d formed, although tenuous and new, was strong. Stronger than the other, broken bond she’d hoped to repair. She could hear the Song, faint, but clear. It was too bad she’d been taken before this shell had matured enough to consummate it. She had a choice to make. She strengthened the connection to the one who hadn’t abandoned her.
"Eosphorus…"
Hands reached down to grab her, urging Azrael to expend his lifespark so he could push her to safety. She fought, not wishing to leave him behind. She’d searched too many lifetimes to find him! He pushed her up out of the fire, sacrificing himself to save her.