by Eden Crowne
Evie nodded, “Good enough for me.”
Spreading her wings, she drew her sword and flaming with golden fury, flew after them.
It took only moments to overtake and pass the speeding vehicle. Shedding her glamour, fully visible, she came down a hundred yards in front of the car on the empty street, sword blazing. She could only imagine what the murderers inside the car thought as a winged angel, haloed in magnificent light, clothed in white (courtesy of a slightly slashed top sheet) manifested directly in front of them.
To Evie's disappointment, this heavenly vision did not bring on an epiphany to end their evil ways, stop the car, fall to their knees and beg for forgiveness while simultaneously dialing 911and pleading to turn themselves in. No. Instead the wretched bastards accelerated, determined to run her down. With a crooked smile, she sheathed her sword. Digging in, Evie stood her ground, both hands stretched out straight in front of her. The car rammed into the Angel at probably around seventy miles an hour.
The laughing, twisted faces of the murderers turned to shock when they realized not only was she still standing; she was pushing back. The driver gunned the engine, revving the motor higher and higher. Instead of roaring away, the car came to a stop as Evie began pushing it up the street, one barefoot step at a time.
She could hear both men cursing even over the roar of the engine. The driver slammed the accelerator to the floor. Plumes of smoke engulfed the street as the screaming tires spun, fighting for traction. Evie clearly saw the goon in the passenger seat aim a massive handgun – a Magnum by the look of it – and open fire, shattering the windshield into thousands of jagged fragments. Keeping one hand firmly on the hood, she swatted the bullets aside like bugs with the other.
Time to end this.
Drawing her sword with her free hand, she sliced effortlessly through the entire front end of the car, severing the engine block. There was a burst of flames and a terrible twisted shriek of metal as the car spun away in two parts, spewing oil.
The men scrambled out of the wreck, guns blazing. One of them had a shotgun now as well as the handguns. Evie sighed. These guys were not going to give up. Stepping between time, she easily dodged the bullets. At this moment, she was moving so quickly they could not even see her.
Confused, both men stopped firing to look around, waving their guns this way and that, staring wild eyed.
“Where is she, goddamn it!” The man who'd been driving snarled.
“Right here,” Evie whispered.
Reappearing directly in front of him, the Angel plunged her bright sword to the hilt in his chest.
Blood bubbled from deep in his throat making a gurgling sound. His eyes locked on hers. The murderer's heavy features, mottled with dark stubble, broken blood vessels and old scars, sagged as if gravity itself was pulling him from the top down into the grave. Using her sight, Evie looked into his soul. Just as she thought, there was such evil there. Stepping away, she let him fall in a broken sprawl onto the pitted concrete.
The other man screamed in fear, the note of hysteria unmistakable. Finally realizing he was in a situation a gun could not get him out of. Throwing his shotgun to the ground, he tried to run. Fool. With a single downswing of her wings she caught up and grabbed a fistful of his long, dirty brown hair. Spinning him around to face her, she easily lifted the man off the ground as her wings beat the dust and leaves into a whirlwind.
“No wait, wait,” he screamed. “I repent. Mercy, have mercy on me!”
She smiled. His soul was just as tainted and dirty as the other man's.
“Sucks for you, buddy. Wrong sort of Angel. Mercy is so not my mandate.”
She was still smiling as she ran him through.
Both men lay at her feet. The police would find no mark on them when they came, nothing but a scorched bit of cloth where her sword entered their bodies. “Heart attack,” the corner would say about the burst organ. Evie watched as their dark spirits began to crawl out of their skin. What was coming for them was far darker still. She could feel it in the air, smell it getting closer. Evie did not know exactly what would happen to them; she hoped for the sake of the girl's murdered parents, it would be very bad.
She glanced at the wreckage of the car burning fitfully, the dark smoke rising up to smudge the sky. That was not going to be so easy for the police to explain. Especially the precision cut directly through the center of the engine block. Oh well, give those college guys and gals in the forensics department something to work on.
Sheathing her sword, she walked to the other side of the wrecked car. The girl had managed to drag herself out of the back seat and lay half in the gutter and half on the sidewalk.
With a whoosh of air in the wind, the girl's Guardian Angel arrived.
'Better late than never,' Evie sighed to herself.
He took Evie's hand and held it reverently to his forehead. “Thank you.”
She glanced at the girl. The poor little thing was in bad shape, shaking uncontrollably. Evie automatically reached for the cell phone in her pocket to call the police. That's when she remembered she was only wearing an over-bleached hotel sheet tied roughly around her. McKitrick had taken her phone along with her clothes. Damn him.
“We need to call 911. I lost my cell. Do you have yours on you?”
He looked at her blankly, “Do Angels carry cell phones? Is that even possible?”
She rolled her eyes, “Just how new at this are you?” Guardian Angels, in her opinion, spent way to much time in the Otherwhere.
Nothing for it but to go through the bodies. A darkness was drawing in around the corpses, icy cold and bleak. Sidestepping the ooze, which had no interest in her anyway, she felt in their pockets.
“Got one!” She held the cell up for him to see and he stared back, still wide-eyed and clueless.
Of course the dispatcher wanted to know their location and Evie had no idea beyond a street full of dark and shuttered doorways. They were in one of those commercial/residential blocks where people didn't want to know what was going on beyond their double-locked front doors. Slipping once again into stealth mode, she spread her wings and flew over to the corner to see where the hell they were. 911 call completed, she held onto the dead guy's phone, he certainly wouldn't be needing it. Back at the scene of the crash she found the Guardian Angel crouched by the girl, invisible to the mortal now, just like Evie. The Angel extended his wings, gathering her up in his embrace. His wings were beautiful, Evie noted, shades of brown and cinnamon with streaks of white, like a falcon's.
The girl's eyes were open, unfocused with shock. She probably wouldn't have seen the Angels even if they manifested right in front of her in all their heavenly glory. Brushing the skin lightly with his fingertips, the Guardian Angel closed her eyes before allowing his power to manifest. Waves of healing energy flowed through his fingers into the girl. She gave a little gasp that eased into a sigh as the pain began to ebb. The terrible lines of suffering twisting her face relaxed as she slipped fully into the Angel's healing embrace. There would still be scars, mental and physical, but they would not destroy her. Guardian Angels were gentle souls. Too gentle, Evie thought ruefully. That did not mean they couldn't summon powerful magic when they chose to.
The boy stroked the sleeping girl's hair, his eyes never leaving her face.
"What's her name?"
"Stef. Stephanie. Stephanie Chen. Her Dad is Vietnamese and her mother is French Chinese. Was. Were."
“You know, all Guardian Angels fall in love with their charges,” Evie's voice was gentle.
His eyes flashed up to hers, face flushed as though he had been caught doing something shameful, dirty.
Evie kneeled down beside him, “What's your name?”
“Josh.”
“Josh, it's okay to love Stephanie. In fact, that's how this is meant to be. You don't have to be ashamed. There is one non-negotiable prerequisite for this job. You can't be an Angel without love in your heart. A lot of love.”
His e
xpression mirrored the confusion and doubt of his and Evie's actions. “But I received no orders to interfere. What if I have changed her destiny, or someone else's through this event? Remember, there's no 'I' in Angel.”
She looked at him.
He stared back, apparently completely sincere.
Despite the two dead men and gathering darkness roiling up from the Otherwhere to take them, despite the burning car and injured girl, Evie laughed out loud. “Please, tell me your trainers didn't really give you that line after your transition? Not really.”
“No 'I' in Angel,” he said the words again, like a child reciting a lesson.
She cut him off before he could say anything else. Though no matter what he said, it couldn't be as stupid as that. Reaching over she loosened his tightly knotted black tie. Josh was dressed like all the Guardian Angels – man or woman – she had seen: black suit, a little too tight across the shoulders, starched white shirts and, of course, the slim black tie. They looked like extras from the “Men in Black” movie series.
“First of all, this tie is so tight it's cutting off oxygen to your brain. There, that's better. Now, take a deep breath and stop beating yourself up. Listen carefully. What are the odds that an Avenging Angel,” she pointed at herself. “Equipped with a golden sword,” she waggled the sword in its scabbard, “would be winging it over the wrong side of LAX at the precise moment on this night to hear you crying? Believe me, it's been a helluva' day and I never expected to end up here.”
He seemed to consider what she said. Answering finally with a cautious nod.
“Exactly. Very long odds indeed. I'd say since you couldn't or wouldn't take matters into your own hands, a way was found. I mean a 'way', you know? Things worked out pretty much as they were meant to and the poor thing did not meet a terrifying death. Though I wish you had taken out those two bastards before they shot her parents.”
He gave her a stricken look and his wings tightened protectively around the girl.
“Not everyone has their very own Guardian Angel. Unfair, right? To compensate, you,” she pointed at him, “are supposed to quietly multitask and keep an eye on those less fortunate. Sometimes destiny means just going out and kicking some righteous ass. Orders or no orders. Okay, Josh? If the Otherwhere wanted blind obedience in their Guardian or Avenging Angels, they wouldn't choose humans. They'd animate mannequins for those jobs or squirrels or something.”
That got a smile out of him.
“Neither you nor I are Celestials and somehow that is how this gig is supposed to work."
"So I may interpret the events and act accordingly if I have no orders to the contrary?"
That question had no easy answer. "Faith does not preclude analysis and judgment. Sometimes we make the right mistake for all the wrong reasons and vice versa. Destiny and free will get intertwined like two long-tailed black cats in a brawl. Hard to tell where one ends and the other begins. Just like in life, we can only do what we think is right and hope for the best."
His reached over to stroke the girl's hair again, "What if I, um, you know, get fired?"
Actually that was a possibility. Even as an Angel, your contract was always up for review.
"Isn't she worth that chance?"
Evie waited with him until the ambulance and police cars arrived, using the time to give young Josh some much needed advice on interpreting his Angelic mandate and Guardian-related ass kicking. She wasn't quite sure if she was qualified to play Yoda to the kid. Really, was she any wiser in the ways of the 'force'? And maybe that wasn't such a good analogy since things hadn't turned out so well for the Jedi as she recalled. Still, somebody had to do something and Evie was right here, right now. Standing by and doing nothing had never been an option she was comfortable with. Besides, if she was reading this young girl's aura right, Stephanie Chen was destined for something important and going to need a lot of guarding. Josh would have to man up, and fast.
Chapter 5
Once the Angel was hustled off with his charge, she spread her wings and decided to head home. Home in the Mortal world was above the garage at St. Jude's Church in Torrance. Celestials believed Avenging Angels needed to be among the living. The passions and urgency that drove mankind, after all, played a pivotal role in their mandate. Which suited Evie just fine. Though she didn't have to eat, she liked to. Ditto for sleeping. And all the other little pleasures of life, she thought to herself with a slightly wicked grin. Just because she was dead didn't mean she was beyond life. In fact she'd had some very satisfactory, if short lived, liaisons since her transition.
St. Jude was the patron saint of lost causes, which always made Evie smile. She thought it was probably a not so subtle lesson from her bosses. The rundown church stood in a nice part of Torrance near the sprawling Del Almo Mall. Though St. Jude's had long ago stopped holding regular services, Father James Cortez kept the nave open for prayer and was always ready to talk with anyone in need of counsel. Human or supernatural. Mostly the place served as HQ for acolyte activity in the Western United States and Cortez the man who kept it running smoothly.
Offices for the humans that served the Otherwhere, coordinating whatever it was they coordinated, sat in the old social hall. Evie was not exactly sure how they chose or were chosen for this kind of work. They were a bit reclusive. She either phoned them or left little post-it notes on the acolytes' office door when she needed money, information, use of a car or whatever. In return, they called or left little post-it notes on her door above the garage detailing where/how she could pick up the item. Though she'd caught glimpses of the very normal looking men and women a number of times, they seemed terrified of her. Scuttling back into their offices and locking the door if they so much as saw her shadow. You'd think she was Medusa the way they ran and hid.
Not so their boss. Well, their earthly boss. After Evie was dropped off on his doorstep, a bewildered newborn Avenging Angel, Father Cortez had lifted up his hands and given a heartfelt prayer of thanks. Not so much for the blessing of an Angel in their midst as the addition of a strong pair of hands to help him keep his fruit and vegetable garden in order. The church had quite extensive grounds and the Priest a green thumb. Enviably green. They were in the middle of a drought (weren't they always in SoCal?) yet somehow the priest's garden thrived and flowered. Apricots, plums, green apples, lemons and limes hung heavy on the many fruit trees. Father Cortez had no problem confronting her at all whenever he needed weeds pulled, pests dealt with, rose bushes trimmed, rows dug, leaves raked, fruit picked or branches in the taller fruit trees pruned. Her wings coming in especially handy for that.
Tonight, except for a lone light in the acolyte's office, the church was dark. Hopefully Father Cortez was asleep and not waiting to leap out, thrust an oversized bag of fertilizer in her hands and tell her to get to work.
Mouser, the church cat, lay in a fuzzy, ginger-colored lump in front of her door. They were good pals, she and the cat. Scooping him up, she kissed him on his furry head and he breathed a sleepy meow.
“Hello, Evie.”
Evie jumped at least a foot, dropping Mouser in her surprise, her wings popping straight out.
Father Cortez stood at the other end of the landing, flashlight in hand. He was wearing pajamas, a UCLA sweatshirt and rubber boots.
There were two sets of stairs to her apartment. One from inside the church building and the other from the garden. Evie generally just swooped in and hopped the railing as she had tonight.
“Jeez, don't do that!”
The priest squeezed by one wing in the narrow space as Evie tried to get them back in order.
“Sorry, Evangeline. Mole hunting duty. Before dawn is best. Purely catch and release.” He gave her a wink. “Saw you swoop in. Could you...”
She held up both hands, “Oh Father, can the mole invasion please wait until another day...night...morning?”
Moving forward, Father Cortez pushed open the door to her little home. Mouser trotted in with an impatient lash of
her tail as though to say, 'finally!' heading for the bedroom and the pile of soft blankets and pillows there. Evie followed, nearly tripping over her sheet which had become somewhat tangled during the flight home.
“I did not come up here to recruit you for mole duty.”
The priest clomped across the hardwood floor in his rubber boots, looking at her expectantly. She followed him inside.
“From the way you were flying I could tell all was not well in Avenging Angel land.”
“You mean I fly with emotional resonance?”
“Yes, you do. The set of your wings is very revealing. Now sit,” he pointed to one of the two easy chairs in the small living room. “And talk. Especially about why you look like the statue of Columbia in that movie studio logo, minus the torch.”
With a sigh of resignation, Evie flopped down into the chair and explained in a slightly disjointed fashion the progress of events over this very unusual day-into-night-into-day again.
Father Cortez listened in silence, fingers pressed together, elbows on his knees, chin resting on his thumbs, watching her closely.
“...and then they shut the doors on Stephanie and Josh. Who assures me he will be guarding more assiduously from now on and I flew back here...” She trailed off as her narrative wound down and the priest continued to say nothing. “You know, to change clothes...”
“Well,” he said at last. “A Fallen Angel. How extraordinary. Truly. I myself have not encountered a Fallen for a very long time.”
Evie couldn't hide the surprise on her face. As far as she knew, he never strayed far from the church and she could hardly see a Fallen showing up in Torrance. West Hollywood. Yes. Torrance. No.
“You need not give me that look. As though I am only an old parish priest. My life has been very much one of service to the higher powers. Very active service for many years. In the late seventies an entire cadre of acolytes disappeared in Mexico City. Just vanished. Poof. Ten souls gone without a trace, the offices left apparently untouched. That is when and where I met her. The Fallen one.”