The Paradise Prophecy

31

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

Finding a new skin was always a problem for him.

Had he been like his sister, Belial, he’d simply tempt, seduce and lie his way into getting what he wanted. But over the years he had formed a personal code. One he did his best to follow.

No subterfuge, no games.

He would get what he needed simply by asking.

So his choices were limited. There weren’t too many humans out there who would willingly give up their bodies without the promise of some kind of reward. Which was why he found himself in Central City East, a section of downtown Los Angeles known as “the Nickel” or skid row, just blocks from the Angels Flight-a hillside rail tram that had only recently reopened for business.

The body he occupied-the body he was now forced to replace-had been found right here, a young man in his mid-twenties who had been a heroin addict since he was seventeen years old and had no qualms about leaving this world behind.

The young man’s speech had been slurred by drink and drugs, but he was cognizant enough to know what was being asked of him. Rewards no longer mattered. He had simply wanted a change, and was more than willing to take his chances in the afterlife.

“What’s it like out there?” he had asked.

“Like nothing you’ve ever known.”

“Will I see God?”

“I can’t give you any promises, but I can tell you that what you’ll see is a world created by God. What you make of it will be up to you-and it won’t be without its dangers.”

“I’m willing to take my chances.”

“Are you? I don’t want to do this unless you’re absolutely sure.”

“I’m sure,” the young man had said. “There’s just one thing I want to know before we start.”

“Ask.”

“Your name. I need to know your name.”

He remembered resting his palm on top of the young man’s head and thinking that, despite appearances, this was a good soul who would do well in the otherworld. Telling him his name was the least he could do.

“Michael,” he’d said softly. “They call me Michael.”

But that was then and this was now.

After the fight in the alley and the severe loss of blood, the young man’s body was no longer useful to him. So Michael had patched up his wounds, gotten some much-needed rest, then used what little strength he had left to make his way back to skid row.

He hadn’t felt good about leaving Jenna behind. His instinct was to stay with her, keep watching her-especially with Zack still on the loose. He hadn’t intended to lose an entire day and much of the night, but what choice did he have? She seemed to be in good hands at the shelter, and with any luck he’d be back listening to her song before morning.

He began roaming the streets, feeling the life draining out of him with every step he took. He could, of course, abandon this body where it stood, but traveling through this world without a host was difficult and would only complicate his task. And he found it much easier to communicate with these beings when he looked and sounded like them.

As always, skid row was crawling with the wasted and the disenfranchised. Old and young, male and female, each one of them victim to human prejudices and often to their own mental or emotional weaknesses. They carried a sense of hopelessness so deeply rooted in their psyches that they saw no other remedy than to give up and give in. They drank and drugged themselves into oblivion, waiting and hoping for that final release.

Was he wrong to exploit that wish?

Maybe.

Maybe it made him no better than his brethren.

But his intent was pure. That much he knew for certain. He was here to help humankind, not hurt them. A cause he had dedicated himself to long ago.

He was a good hour into his search when he found a candidate. Older than he would have liked-late fifties or possibly early sixties-but there was a natural muscularity to his frame that couldn’t be disguised by the oversize shirt and the ill-fitting jeans.

The man lay sleeping under the marquee of an abandoned movie theater, huddled close to the boarded-up ticket booth, his hair long and gray, the equally gray stubble on his chin making the transition to full-grown beard.

He looked physically healthy and didn’t seem to be suffering the ravages of booze or drugs, so Michael had to assume he was mentally ill.

Which was both a blessing and a curse.

A blessing because his body wouldn’t give out so quickly, yet a curse because it was difficult to explain to someone suffering from mental illness why you want him to make the ultimate sacrifice.

A dilemma that Michael would just as soon avoid.

So he continued on, moving past the old man and dismissing him from his mind.

Half a block up, however, he felt a stab of pain in his side and realized that his stitches had torn loose and he was bleeding again.

He didn’t have much time.

Staggering to a bus stop, he sank onto the bench and checked the wound, doing what he could to stop the flow of blood. The moon hung low in the night sky, nearly close enough to touch, and as he sat there, holding his side, he thought about what was coming in just a few short days:

The last phase of the lunar tetrad.

The fourth in a quartet of full eclipses, unbroken in sequence, over the span of a single year. The last of four moons sliding through the umbra, turning a deep shade of copper.

A blood moon.

There were those who believed that consecutive eclipses were a signal from God. A sign that his son would soon return to the earth, that the dead would be resurrected and final judgment passed.

But there were others who knew better. Those-like Michael-who had been here from the beginning and had witnessed the creation of man and the world he inhabited.

Those who wanted possession of that world.

The dark rebels who had once been Michael’s friends.

The rebels had always thought of themselves as the heroes of the story. The bringers of light, the purveyors of truth, the bold few who had dared rise up against a tyrant to make their world a better place.

But history is written by the victors, and when the War in Caeli came to an end, those who had dared defy their father were beaten down and broken, labeled traitors, exiled to the belly of Abyssus.

To the world at large, they were seen as infernal spirits. Dark angels.

Daemones.

To their minds, however, the only thing that separated them from the so-called angels of God was their allegiance to individual freedom. They did not believe that their father, the creator of all things living, was infallible. Nor did they believe that he was fair or just or kind. And when he took it upon himself to create a colony of slaves, giving the poor hapless creatures the illusion of freedom, the rebels felt it only proper that they show him just how fallible he was.

These mindless beasts-these homo sapiens, as they would later come to be known-were weak willed and violent, superstitious and easily corrupted, susceptible to the ever-changing and often conflicting mythologies their creator had conjured up in order to mollify and manipulate them.

The rebels decided to exploit these weaknesses. What better way to expose their father’s arrogance than to lure his precious slaves into the endless fire? To tempt them into joining the New Rebellion?

Perhaps if he had treated these creatures with more dignity, this would not have been possible. But he had made a mistake in telling them that they were free to choose, only to punish them if they defied his will.

The contradiction did not go unnoticed.

While history would continue to be written by his followers, painting the rebels as evil and self-serving-using fear as a common motivator-the rebels worked quietly and with purpose, forging their own kingdom amidst the fires of Abyssus and doing all they could to undermine his authority.

Lucifer, a formidable warrior who was once God’s most perfect angel, had demonstrated a capacity for ruthlessness beyond all others. He rose among the ranks to become the leader of the rebels, urging them to return to Caeli to fight again. To conquer their father’s kingdom and take back the dignity he had stripped from them.

But on the night of the fourth moon, at the end of the first lunar tetrad, news of this rebellion reached their father’s ears and he lashed out preemptively, showing the rebel king no mercy.

Too cruel to simply kill Lucifer, he instead banished him to the City of the Seventh Gate, locking him in a cell of fire to forever contemplate the consequences of his deeds.

And this was where Lucifer resided to this day. Forever in agony.

Although they considered their cause a noble one, the remaining rebels disbanded, fearing their father’s retribution. They began fighting among themselves, dividing into clans, each clan led by the strongest of them.

Belial. Moloch. Mammon. Beelzebub.

Michael.

And as time wore on, as century after century flew past-their spirits dampened and their memories blotted by war and greed and heartbreak-they forgot why they had come together in the first place. They themselves became tainted by their ever-growing thirst for power and the desire to control the playground their father had created.

But these earth creatures, these humans, turned out to be more resilient than they had expected, and that playground could not so easily be dominated.

Beelzebub, first brother to Lucifer, called for a meeting of the clans in Pandemonium, the one city in all of Abyssus that had not been marked by partisan politics-a neutral ground, built by the great Mulciber, where the leaders had no fear of a surprise attack.

And in that meeting, an alliance was formed. An agreement made.

A blood pact.

It was said that their father and his angels in Caeli had long ago turned their backs on the world he had created and had found other amusements to occupy their time.

No longer fearing his retribution, the clans would now work together for a common goal. If they could not return to Caeli, they’d create a heaven of their own. Their love for Lucifer had not waned, and because his fate had been cast under the bloodred light of the fourth moon of the tetrad, they would use the power of that moon to bring about the Final Conquest. They would open the seven gates of hell, release King Lucifer from his eternal bonds, and rule over their new paradise, forever enslaving these feeble humans as symbols of their father’s indifference.

Only Michael objected to this plan.

Perhaps, he told them, there was another way to achieve their goal. Perhaps if they honored their father, stayed true to the original intent of his creation, they could work together with the creatures of earth and live in harmony.

Michael, however, was ridiculed by the others. Even his sister Belial called him naive, a fool to believe that honoring their father would bring them anything but more heartbreak.

But Michael could not be deterred. As the others continued to corrupt mankind, harvesting souls, which together with the power of the moon would open the seven gates and bring forth their beloved king, he worked quietly and with purpose, undermining them at every turn, urging peace among the humans, using the mythologies his father created to help persuade them to remain good and pure, untainted by the rebels’ corruption.

And with each new lunar tetrad, he managed to beat back the forces of the alliance and prevent them from achieving their goal.

But it wasn’t easy, and Michael’s resolve began to weaken. In desperation, he called out to his father, insisting he listen, demanding that he pay attention to the world he had abandoned and bring it back to the light.

Then one night, when he was all but convinced that his call had gone unheard, his father came to him, amused by his demand.

“Look at this world you covet,” he said. “The people who inhabit it are as corrupt and self-serving as Lucifer and his creed. Why should I care what happens to them? Why do you care?”

“Because I remember what it was to live in the light of your grace. And I want these people to know that feeling. Here on earth.”

“They had their chance.”

“But don’t they deserve a second one?”

His father considered this. Then he said, “I’ll do better than that, my son. Look to the skies, and with each new lunar tetrad these creatures you so believe in will be granted another chance. During that time, you must listen for the song, the song of the Telum.”

“Telum?”

“A miraculous weapon so powerful that it will either give these creatures the peace you seek for them, or destroy them forever. And on the night of the fourth moon, whoever takes control of that weapon will control the fate of the world.” He paused then, staring grimly at Michael. “But be warned, my son, I won’t make it easy for you. That song will not be easily heard, and your enemies will know about this weapon as well.”

“But . . . why?”

“Because they are my children, too.”

Thirteen lunar tetrads had come and gone in the last several centuries, yet nothing had changed. Michael had failed time and again to hear the true song of the Telum, and with each new blood moon, the rebels drew closer to their goal.

But it would be different this time.

It had to be.

Because the rebels were closer than ever now, and he sensed that this was his very last chance.

Ashout interrupted Michael’s thoughts. A burst of laughter.

Keeping his hand clutched to his side, he turned and looked back toward the movie theater. Three men had stumbled out of a nearby bar and were eyeing the old man, working their way toward him.

All three were the size of college football players. Military haircuts.

Michael considered for a moment that they might be drudges, but he didn’t think so. The vibe they gave off was all too human-even from this distance.

“Well, well,” one of them said as they came to a stop in front of the box office. “Check out Gandalf. He ain’t lookin’ so good.”

“Isn’t that your pops?” another one said, and he and the third one doubled over in drunken laughter.

Unamused, the first one moved up to the old man and nudged him with his toe. “Hey, dirtbag, what do you think you’re doing sleeping in my spot? I got this suite reserved.”

The others laughed again.

Awake now, the old man flinched and cradled his head, muttering incoherently as he curled into a tight fetal ball.

The first guy nudged him again. “Get that dick outta your mouth and speak up, buddy.”

A renewed wave of laughter overtook the other two, but the first one still didn’t join in. He was an angry drunk, and the hate and disgust in his eyes was difficult to ignore.

But the old man was trying. Kept muttering to himself.

Michael got to his feet then, feeling the sudden need to reassure him. He didn’t normally do this-it was against his code-but there were always exceptions.

Always.

It’s all right, he said, burrowing his way into the old man’s brain. I won’t let them hurt you.

But the old man didn’t seem to hear him, his mind rapid-firing-

– Count to ten and they’ll go away. Count to ten and they’ll go away. Count to ten and they’ll go away. One two three. One two three four. One two three four five. Count to ten and they’ll go away-

But they didn’t go away. The angry one crouched in front of him now, poking a finger into his shoulder. “You hear me, you stupid shit?”

– One two three. One two three four. One two three four five-

“Come on, Jimmy,” the third one said. “This guy’s a wack job. Let’s get out of here.”

But Jimmy shook his head. “Fuck that. I didn’t spend six months in the desert so this asshole could collect welfare and wallow in his shit all day and night.” He poked the old man again. “Where were you when I was chasing towel heads, you ungrateful prick? Sucking off Uncle Sam’s tit?”

– Count to ten and they’ll go away. Count to ten and they’ll-

“Come on, Jimmy, give it a rest. He isn’t bothering anyone.”

“You might want to listen to your friend,” Michael said.

He was standing less than three feet away from Jimmy now. Just off to his right side. The jump had been difficult in his condition, but he’d made it anyway.

Jimmy wheeled around and stood up. “Where the fuck did you come from?”

“That’s a longer story than we have time for. But I’ll tell you where you’re going.”

“And where’s that?”

“Away,” Michael said. “Right now. Whether or not it’s voluntary is entirely up to you.”

Interfering directly in human affairs was well beyond his boundaries, but he couldn’t help himself. The old man had enough troubles and Michael couldn’t stand there and watch this idiot treat him this way.

Jimmy did a slow burn, looking him up and down. “What are you-king of the bums or something?”

“Something like that.”

Jimmy glanced at his two friends. “You believe this asshole?” He gestured. “Look at him, he’s bleeding all over the goddamn sidewalk.”

That much was true. The stitches had all ruptured now and the gash in Michael’s side was widening. “You will be, too, if you don’t walk away.”

Jimmy stared at him. “You got balls of steel, buddy, I’ll give you-”

Michael delivered the punch hard and fast, bloodying Jimmy’s nose and knocking him on his ass. Then he turned to the other two, who had sense enough to back away.

“This isn’t your fight,” he said. “Pick your friend up and get him out of here. I really don’t want to have to-”

The blow came from behind, delivered directly into the wound in Michael’s side. It made a sick, sucking sound on impact, as pain radiated up through his central nervous system, nearly paralyzing him on the spot.

He grabbed at the wound and fell to one knee, knowing that Jimmy had once and for all rendered this body useless to him. He suddenly felt no connection to it, had no real control. And before he knew it, the three gorillas were standing over him, showering him with punches and kicks, Jimmy’s the most vicious of all.

Then Michael was on the ground, staring into the frightened eyes of the old man-

– Count to ten and they’ll go away. Count to ten and they’ll go away-

But Michael knew they wouldn’t go away. When they were done with him, Jimmy would again turn his drunken fury on someone who wanted nothing more than to be left alone.

So Michael did what had to be done. Once again violating his code, he burrowed his way into the old man’s brain.

Let me in and I’ll free you, he said. Let me in and all of this will go away forever.

– One two three four five. One two three four five-

Let me in and they can’t hurt you. No will ever hurt you again. It’s the only way. You know it’s the only way.

He had no idea if the old man was listening, and as the blows continued to rain down on him, Michael felt darkness closing in.

When the bum stopped moving, Jimmy spat on him and said, “Guess your balls ain’t so big after all, are they, asshole?”

Cuddy crouched over the guy, feeling for a pulse. “Jesus, Jimmy. He’s dead. We fuckin’ killed him.”

Jimmy shrugged. “Self-defense. Besides, he was already halfway there. We just gave him a nudge.”

“You think the cops are gonna believe that?”

Jimmy saw a bulge in the guy’s back and bent down, pushing his jacket aside. There was a Glock 20 in his waistband. “You see? Fucker was packing. And I don’t see any reason to get the cops involved.”

Cuddy’s eyes were wild. “We’re just gonna leave him here?” He turned to the old bum by the box office, who was still cradling his head. “What about this asshole? He saw the whole thing.”

“Forget him,” Weasel said, starting to back away from them. “He won’t say nothin’. He’s a wack job, remember? He won’t do shit.”

Jimmy pulled the Glock from the bum’s waistband and stood up. “Maybe not. But I’m not willing to give him that chance.”

“What’re you gonna do,” Weasel said, “shoot the guy?”

“I ain’t gonna take his temperature.”

Cuddy shook his head and let loose a nervous laugh. “Jesus, Jimmy, that’s some cold-ass shit.”

“Think about it. I shoot this asshole, put the gun in the other one’s hand and we got a bum fight gone wrong. Case closed.”

Checking the magazine in the Glock, he snapped it back into place and stepped over to the box office, staring down at the old man.

What a waste of fucking space.

Jimmy pointed the Glock at him. “Better say a prayer, dirtbag, if you believe in that kind of thing.”

“Oh, I believe,” the old man said. And to Jimmy’s utter surprise, he pulled his hands away from his head and looked up at him with unnerving clarity. “And so will you before I’m finished.”

Then he shot a hand out, grabbing Jimmy by the ankle, pulling his feet out from under him. Jimmy brought the Glock up, but before he could fire, the old man had hold of his wrist. He felt the bones breaking and dropped the gun as he cried out in pain, begging for the old man to let him go.

He heard footsteps on the asphalt behind him, but they were headed in the wrong direction and he knew that Cuddy and Weasel were running away.

Now the old man was standing over him, a foot pressed against Jimmy’s chest, an odd, amber tint to his eyes.

“You should’ve walked away when you had the chance.”

Michael left the guy there by the box office. Not dead, but probably wishing he was. And once the police found him, good old Jimmy would have a lot of explaining to do about the badly beaten corpse that lay only feet away from him.

What was it he’d said?

A bum fight gone wrong?

Moving down the street, Michael flexed his hands and rolled his shoulders. The punishment he’d doled out had been a good warm-up, but it would take him a while to break in this new body.

He’d have to do it on the run, however.

It was time to get back to Jenna.