Mean Streets

It felt as though he’d been walking for days, but he knew that wasn’t the case.

The chamber went on, and on, up and over hills of ice older than recorded history, the only source of illumination being the divine fire that burned around his hand.

Dripping stalactites, like the teeth of a giant beast, hung over his head as he slid down from the other side of a black rock wall and onto a path that seemed to be taking him even deeper into the cavernous surroundings.

At first he had not the slightest idea what it was that loomed out of the darkness in front of them, believing it to be another enormous wall of rock and ice, an obstruction that could very well prevent him from going any farther.

Remy lifted his burning hand, staring at the obstruction, and realized that he was looking at something else altogether.

Remy nodded in satisfaction, taking it all in, absorbing the sight of the ancient craft that appeared to have become part of its rocky underground surroundings.

It must’ve been swallowed up by changes in the Earth’s surface. Pulled farther and farther beneath the ground as time passed, he thought as he looked upon what was left of the ark.

Over the passage of time the wood had ossified, becoming like stone, blending with its geological surroundings. The front of the once gigantic ship protruded from the stone as if sailing through a monstrous ocean swell that had been frozen in time.

It made sense that this was where they’d be, Remy thought as he was drawn toward the ancient transport. Denied passage on the great craft, but now . . .

Wedging his fingers deep into cracks between the rock and ice, Remy started to climb, the gentle voice of the Mother driving him on.

The answers are inside, Remy told himself, the all-too-human flesh of his fingers feeling the rigors of the harsh elements.

From the beginning, when Sariel had first come to him, he had sensed that something wasn’t right, that he wasn’t getting the entire picture.

It was all so much bigger than what the Grigori leader had cared to share.

Remy reached the top of the ark, jumping from an icy ledge to the side of the craft, and climbing over onto what had once been the deck. Countless millennia of shifting, geological change had done its job on the ship, holding the vessel in its cold, rocky clutches like a prized toy in the mouth of a playful dog.

There were gaping holes in the surface of the deck, and Remy could feel the tingle of something ancient and magickal wafting up from the darkness below.

Moving toward one of the holes, he peered down into the ship’s hold. Memories from days long past exploded inside his head, of the ship’s bowels filled to bursting with life of every conceivable size and shape.

No real thought went into his next action. The Mother was waiting for him, and he simply lowered himself through the hole and into the waiting darkness below. Using protrusions of rock and ancient, ossified wood, Remy climbed down into the ship’s limitless hold.

Touching bottom was like being on the ocean floor, not a lick of light to be found. He let the fire of divinity burn brighter from his hand to light the way.

He walked where they had kept the animals, remembering how it had looked then: the pens, primitive tanks, corrals and stalls, as far as the eye could see, built to hold the myriad varieties of life that the old man and his family had been instructed to save.

“Yes,” he said aloud, walking farther into the cavernous belly of the ark.

Remember the days long past, when the Maker’s world was young.

As he trudged along, images flooded his mind, rapid-fire pictures across the surface of his brain as the Mother began to show him.

He saw the world as it had been, young and vibrant, fertile with life. A dark, indigo-skinned people—the Chimerian—made their homes among the rocky hills of the primordial world. They were a beautiful people, their skin the bluish color of dusk.

Somehow they knew that the Maker did not favor their continued survival, and they begged Him to have mercy on them, but the All Powerful had already made up His mind, already created something to replace them.

But the Chimerian did not give up hope, continuing to pray, and to make sacrifices in hopes that their Maker would not forsake them, that He would see that they were worthy to live.

And they believed themselves saved when the emissaries came, living among them. Living like them.

But the emissaries had come only for their own selfish reasons, immersing themselves in the earthly pleasures of food, drink and carnal acts, knowing that it was only a matter of time before the Chimerian were extinct.

Remy saw the emissaries inside his mind, saw their leader in the midst of revelry as he and his brethren partook of all mortal excesses.

And then he saw a Chimerian woman, her belly swollen with life.

It cannot be, the Grigori leader ranted, and the woman cowered. Your kind were supposed to be barren.

And she looked to him with hope in her eyes, hope for her and all her kind, as well as the children to be born of Chimerian women and fallen angels.

A gift of our union, the beautiful woman with the night-colored skin said to Sariel.

She reached out, took Sariel’s hand, and placed it on her stomach.

A final image was burnt into Remy’s mind: it was of the Chimerian women, clad in hooded cloaks stitched from animal skins, clutching bellies swollen with life.

They stood upon the rocky hills as the rain fell in torrents, and the waters rose, watching as those deemed worthy to live filed aboard the ark.

Remy came away from the sad vision in an area of the ark darker than even the light of the divine could illuminate.

He knew that she was here, somewhere in the ocean of night, hiding herself away.

The feeling inside his head was immediate, like a long, sharp finger slowly pushing into the soft gray matter of his brain, but he did not fight it. Remy let the answers come.

It was like looking out through dirt-covered windows, the scenes unfolding, desperate to find a place inside his already crowded skull.

Remy stumbled and fell to the ground, fighting to stay conscious.

The Chimerian people bobbed upon the waters, one by one taken by the merciless sea. But some survived, the women of the tribe, those who had been touched by the Grigori. Somehow they had been changed by their experiences with the fallen ones, their bodies evolving, making them able to endure the catastrophe.

The impregnated women clung to the side of the great ark, their bodies enshrouded—protected—by thick cocoons made from magick and sorrow.

And they survived like that, hiding from those who wished them gone, sleeping through the passage of ages, waiting for a time—a safe time—to emerge.

Through a thick gauze of webbing Remy watched as a man clad in heavy winter garb, protected from the harshness of the elements, moved toward them.

Sensing changes in the world, and in him, they had reached out, drawing him to their hiding place. And begging their forgiveness, he pulled them from their womb of shadow.

Remy felt the hold on him released, and he peered again into the limitless depths of the darkness, searching for the one who had called to him.

He got to his feet and moved farther into the nebulous embrace, the light of his hand nearly useless in the supernatural environment.

The Mother responded to Remy’s request; her form, as well as the forms of the other Chimerian survivors, gradually moved into focus.

It was as if they were lying in a great nest crafted from the stygian gloom, six of them, several still pregnant with the fruit of their union with the emissaries. They appeared to be asleep, but their minds were active.

Remy could feel them all reaching out to him, attempting to communicate, but one voice remained the loudest.

He looked down into the nest, and for a moment he saw the love of his life as he had watched her so many times, fast asleep.

The picture of a sleeping Madeline quickly changed to that of the Chimerian Mother. She appeared smaller than the others, having already borne her young.

I felt you out there, the Mother whispered wearily. A compassionate consciousness to hear our plea.

“What would you have me do?” Remy asked, kneeling down beside the nest.

Will you speak for us, warrior of Heaven? she asked. When we are at last gone, driven from existence, will you remember us?

“I’ll help Armaros,” Remy told her. “We’ll continue what Noah began and—”

Too late for that, she said resignedly. Our time draws near. Tell me that you will remember us for what we were, and not as some blight upon the early land.

“I’ll help you,” he said, the words leaving his mouth just as the Mother began to scream.

Remy didn’t know what to do. Reaching down, he took her hand in his. “What’s happening?” he asked.

The other women began to moan and writhe, as if held in the grip of some terrible nightmare. The smell of magick was suddenly in his nostrils, and Remy turned in the darkness.

Something was appearing behind him, a jagged, lightning-bolt tear was ripped in the shroud of shadow that had protected the Chimerian women. Remy sensed the danger at once, rising to his feet and allowing the warrior side of him to bubble to the surface.

The Grigori spilled from the open wound into the chamber, their eyes gleaming with bloodlust.

“No!” Remy screamed in the voice of the Messengers, his wings of feathered gold spreading from his back, forming a barrier between them and the Chimerian women.

And then he felt her touch again, pulling him back. Drawing him down.

They were at the Maine cottage, standing inside the extra room. Wearing the image of his wife, she attempted to console him.

“There’s nothing that you can do,” she said, standing before the open window, the wind pulling at her clothes. It had become like night outside, the air electric with the coming storm.

“Don’t let them do this,” Remy said, unable to keep the tremor of emotion from his voice.

“We always suspected that it could end this way,” the Mother, wearing the guise of Madeline, said. She reached out and cupped the side of his face.

Remy awoke to the smell of blood. He could still feel the Mother’s touch, restraining him from the inevitable.

But Remy did not want to believe it, fighting the grip that held him. In the womb of darkness, he heard the sounds of their excitement, and looked to see the Grigori attackers, their fine Italian suits spattered black with blood as they murdered the defenseless survivors of the Great Deluge.

Something snapped inside Remy, and the power of Heaven rushed forward with a terrible fury. He let it come, letting it trample his humanity in its excitement to emerge.

The light thrown from his body burned like the heart of the sun, and he heard the Grigori squeal like frightened animals as they were driven back, away from their murderous acts.

But it appeared he was too late. The Chimerian women were dead, their defenseless bodies bearing the bloody wounds of the fallen angels’ shame.

He turned to see Sariel coming toward him through the darkness, a pale hand raised to shield his eyes from the heavenly light.

In his other hand the Grigori held a sword, an ancient blade that had been forged in the fires of the Lord God’s love, and had once glowed like a star, but now was only a thing of metal, tarnished and stained by needless violence.

“What have you done, Sariel?” Remy asked, barely able to contain his emotion as he looked upon the women savagely brutalized by the Grigori.

“We suspected you might be in danger,” Sariel spoke. “And came at once to your aid.”

The Seraphim laughed, a low, rumbling sound more like a growl.

“Your concern for my well-being . . . is touching,” Remy said.

“You used me, Sariel,” he said, repressed fury dripping from every word.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” the Grigori leader responded indignantly.

“You made me part of this,” Remy hissed. The glow from his body had dwindled, the darkness of what had transpired draining away the intensity of his light.

“Don’t you see, Remiel?” Sariel asked. “You were part of our test.”

All Remy could do was stare at the sight of something once holy, now but a twisted reflection.

“The Almighty provided you for us to complete our penance,” the Grigori leader went on. His brothers stepped cautiously into the light to join their leader. “You were a tool of our redemption.”

“Redemption,” Remy said, the word like poison on his lips. “You actually believe that after all you’ve done . . .”

“The Lord God provided us with a way to consummate a task that had remained incomplete for countless millennia,” Sariel continued to explain. “How could we not respond?”

“He has been avenged,” Sariel proclaimed, raising his sword as if in victory.

“You murdered him,” Remy raged. He turned his gaze back to the Grigori master; the fire of Heaven burned in his stare.

Sariel started to speak, but Remy did not want to hear it. He charged at the fallen angel, grabbing the lapel of his suit jacket and pulling him closer.

“You killed him in a fit of rage,” Remy accused, his teeth clenched in anger. “You beat a defenseless old man to death with your fists.”

“I lost my temper,” the Grigori admitted, followed by a sigh of exasperation. “He was just so damned stubborn. Wracked with guilt over what he believed he had done . . . you should have seen how excited he was when he thought that he’d found them.”

Remy felt himself becoming sick as the fallen angel attempted to justify his twisted actions.

“He didn’t see the danger no matter how hard I tried to explain it,” the Grigori said, his words fervent. “He told me that he was going to beg God to let them live . . . that because they had survived the flood He should allow them to exist. That they had earned the right to life.”

Sariel actually seemed to believe what he was saying, and that Remy found even more disturbing.

“Here was our chance, Remiel,” the Grigori leader emphasized. “Something to bring us that much closer to going home . . . to be allowed back to Heaven.”

“But you killed him,” Remy reminded the Grigori leader with a shake.

“Yes, I did,” Sariel admitted. “Not sure exactly how that will be received, but at least we’re finishing what the flood began. That has to count for something. I wasn’t about to allow anything to prevent me from completing what should have been finished ages ago.”

“It’s done, Remiel,” Sariel said. “This is how it was supposed to be. For us to finish what had already been put in motion; it was a test for us, penance for one of our greatest . . . misjudgments.”

“Misjudgments?” Remy asked, scorn in his words. “But the children . . .”

Sariel looked to the corpses, distaste upon his pale, perfect face.

“An error better left forgotten,” he snarled, removing Remy’s hand from his suit coat. “They were twisted things, Remiel, neither of Heaven nor Earth.”

He searched the fallen angel’s eyes, looking for even a small sign of mercy or compassion. It was like staring into a deep, dark hole. There was nothing there, and Remy knew that Sariel and his Grigori brothers were lost.

What they believed of the Chimerian was true of them—there was no place for the Grigori in Heaven, or on Earth.

Remy heard a sound, a howl of mourning from the throats of children born of Grigori and Chimerian women. He turned toward the song to see them, squatting at the edge of darkness, clinging to one another as they ached over the fate that had befallen their Mother.

The Chimerian lament filled the shadows, becoming louder, and their sadness became palpable. One by one, the Grigori dropped to their knees, supremely affected by the woeful song.

The Grigori leader looked upon his brothers with horror. “Get up!” he screamed, but either they did not hear him over the sad song or they chose to ignore his words, for they continued to kneel upon the ground soaked with the blood of innocents.

“Listen to it,” Remy yelled over the forlorn sound. “Listen to the pain you’ve caused.”

Blood started to seep from Sariel’s ears. His body grew stiff, and began to tremble. Slowly his knees began to bend, bringing him closer and closer to the ground.

“I . . . ,” Sariel grunted, stabbing the blade of his sword into the ground to halt his progress.

“Hear . . .” He fought the gravity of sorrow pushing down upon him, to struggle to his feet.

“Nothing!” And he sprang across the floor, murder in his gaze as he raised his tarnished blade to strike at those who would keep him from achieving that which he most desired.

Remy sprang into Sariel’s path, grappling with the fallen angel and driving him to the cold, hard ground. The Grigori flailed, lashing out with the pommel of his sword, striking Remy across the temple with a savage blow.

There was a searing flash of pain and color as Remy felt the Grigori squirm out from beneath him. He fought back the descending curtain of oblivion, flapping his powerful wings to rise to his feet.

The Chimerian babes had ceased their song as they watched the scene unfold with wide, frightened eyes. They hissed, baring razor-sharp teeth as Sariel loomed, sword raised above his head, ready to fall.

The Seraphim emerged with a roar, pushing aside the fragile shell of humanity Remy wore, burning it with the fire of Heaven. And Remy let it. He was tired of all the pain and death, tired of being manipulated in others’ pursuits of Heaven.

With hands burning white with divine heat, he grabbed the Grigori leader, pulling him back away from his objectives.

Sariel struggled in the grasp of the Seraphim, and his fine suit and the flesh beneath it burned with the supernatural fire. He spun on Remy, swinging his sword with a cry of fury and pain.

But the Seraphim was not impressed, capturing the blade in midswing, causing the weapon to warp and bend, and finally to melt.

Sariel’s screams were entirely of pain now as his immortal flesh blackened and smoldered, but the Seraphim held him tight, refusing to set him free.

Allowing the power of God that seethed at his core to flow through him and into the fallen angel.

“You wanted to see Heaven again, brother?” the Seraphim spoke in the language of God’s first creations. “See it now.”

The Grigori leader still lived, but his body had begun to crumble, pieces of charred angel flesh breaking away to drift on the air like black snow.

And soon the angel Sariel was no more, as the last of him was consumed by the voraciousness of Heaven’s fire.

The Seraphim flapped his powerful wings, dispersing his fallen enemy’s ashen remains, and turned his attention to the others. They had risen to their feet, weapons in hand, staring at him with intense hatred.

And the Seraphim’s mouth twisted in a cruel smile that told he was ready to share their master’s fate with them. None moved.

Having no fear of them, the Seraphim Remiel turned his back on the Grigori to face the children of the deluge. They looked away from him with a hiss, the intensity of his light searing their sensitive eyes.

Diminishing his holy glow, he knelt upon the ground, opening his arms to them. Without hesitation they came to him, the three orphans crawling into the safety of the angel’s embrace.

Its penchant for violence more than satisfied, Remy was able to usurp control from the Seraphim, putting the genie back into the bottle for another time.

He didn’t know how much longer he could continue to do this, for the essence of the divine grew more powerful each time it was called upon. But that was a worry for another time.

He had the safety of the children to concern himself with now.

Walking through darkness in the bowels of the ark, he held the quivering offspring tight, consoling them with words that everything would be all right, having no idea if he was lying to them or not.

Stopping, he allowed the fire to burn from his hand again to see how far they’d come. To say that he was shocked by the sight of dead Grigori bodies strewn about the ground was an understatement.

“Hey,” the former Guardian angel said. He clutched what looked to be a Bavarian Warhammer in one hand, while supporting Armaros with the other. “Sorry I’m late, didn’t think they’d start the party without me.”

Armaros pulled away from Francis and opened his arms to the Chimerian orphans.

“You saved them,” he said as the three children leapt from Remy’s arms to go to the Grigori.

Francis was staring at the Chimerian children, and by the look on his face, he clearly was not sure what to think.

Francis nodded, then reached out a tentative hand to pat one of the bald Chimerian heads. The child growled, swatting at the offending hand with its razor-sharp claws.

“Cute,” Francis said as he quickly pulled his hand back. “He has his daddy’s charming disposition.”

“He was going to kill them,” Remy said, speaking of Sariel. “Because they had the audacity to survive.”

Francis nudged one of the Grigori corpses with the toe of his shoe.

The wayward Guardian then sighed, and slung the medieval weapon over his shoulder. “So what now?” he asked. “Anything else that needs to be killed?”

“Sariel is dead, but the Grigori still live,” he said, holding the Chimerian children. They were falling asleep, their large heads bobbing. “They won’t give up that easily. We’re going to need a safe place until some of this dies down.”

“Troublemaker,” Francis said from the side of his mouth, his comment directed at Remy.

“Where will you go?” Remy asked Armaros, who had already started to turn away from them.

“Perhaps it is better that you don’t know,” the fallen angel said, carrying the sleeping orphans farther into the darkness. “Perhaps it’s time for the Chimerian to again become lost to the world.”