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Offspring were often mentally handicapped, but prone to exhibit paranormal talents associated with those of an angelic nature.
The man turned to look at Remy, that same simple smile again forming on his face. “Do you know the tongue of the Messengers?” he deftly asked, speaking in a language fashioned before the inception of humanity.
Remy was taken aback by the fluent use of the angel-speak, remaining silent until another sound filled the room, the whining sound of a motor, followed by a voice he’d heard briefly only minutes ago.
“Neal is such a show-off,” the obese figure confined to the electric wheelchair said as he carefully maneuvered around the computer table and rolled toward them. His words were slightly distorted, and Remy could see the reason. He held a long stick in his mouth, likely what the man used to punch the keys of his computer keyboard. The stick dropped from his mouth into his lap, and a tiny monkey balanced on his shoulder obediently dropped down to snatch up the tool. It then leapt down to the floor, scampering off to place the stick on a small tray with a brush, handheld mirror, toothbrush, and toothpaste, before returning to its master’s shoulder.
“How’s it rolling, Mason?” Francis asked with a wiggle of his eyebrows.
“Blow me, Francis,” the man said with disgust. “I don’t even want to talk to you; it’s your friend that I like.” Mason brought his wheelchair closer, staring at Remy with round, watery eyes. “Magnificent.”
Remy had heard stories about Mason Aronoff, born with spinal muscular atrophy, a neuromuscular disease that caused the degeneration of the motor neurons in the spinal cord, which relay signals from the brain to the muscle cells. When these neurons fail to function, the muscles deteriorate, leaving the afflicted nearly paralyzed. The man had been this way since childhood and had attempted to take his own life on more than one occasion to escape his suffering. These near-death experiences—these multiple glimpses of an afterlife—had somehow served to give the handicapped man a special kind of sight.
Mason could see things in the world that no one else could; he could see the unearthly beings that walked hidden amongst them. The handicapped man could see beneath the masks.
And he could see Remy for what he actually was.
“Why on earth would you want to look the way you do now,” Mason said in a whisper, “when you actually look like that.”
Remy could feel his Seraphim nature stir, eager to emerge to greet the man, but he wouldn’t be having any of that.
It was silent in the storage facility except for the sound of Southie, muttering from one of the bins, as he continued to unload cartons of cigarettes.
“Do you know how hard it is to buy shirts with a sixty-foot wingspan?” Remy asked, finally breaking the silence with a joke. He then held up the pizza boxes.
“Anybody interested in lunch?”
They’d opened the boxes of pizza and laid them on the end of the computer table.
Remy had just finished a slice and was considering another as he stood watching the man in the electric wheelchair and his simian helper.
The capuchin monkey stood up on the man’s expansive lap, holding the slice of pepperoni pizza up to Mason’s slack, but hungry, mouth. It was a fascinating process to watch. The monkey would give the man a bite, set the piece of pizza down, use a napkin to wipe the grease off the man’s mouth, and then begin again.
“She’s something, isn’t she, Remy? I can call you Remy, can’t I?” Mason asked, noticing that he was staring.
“Sure,” he answered, startled that he’d been caught in his observation.
“Her name is Julia, and I don’t know what I’d do without her,” he said as the monkey softly chattered to itself, licking some of the pizza grease from its little digits.
“Without her you’d have to depend on Ichabod here, or Mr. Sunshine, to feed you your lunch,” Francis commented, referring to the Offspring, Neal, and Southie, who had gone to separate corners to eat their pizza slices.
“I wouldn’t trust them to wipe their own asses,” the crippled man commented nastily. “If it wasn’t for the fact that they occasionally have their moments, I’d have monkeys doing all their jobs.”
Julia threw her tiny arms around Mason’s face and licked his forehead. The man started to giggle, his flabby body undulating in the electric wheelchair like a plate of Jell-O whacked with a stick.
“You’re such a naughty girl,” he said between laughter as the monkey chirped and squeaked.
Remy didn’t have the heart to tell the man that based on what the capuchin was saying, it was only enjoying the saltiness of his skin.
“It looks like you two might want to be alone, so why don’t we take care of business so you can get on communing with nature, or whatever the fuck you’ll be doing as soon as we leave.”
Francis snatched up one of the napkins on the table and wiped his hands fussily.
The monkey stopped licking Mason’s face and glared at Francis. It squeaked something—the monkey equivalent of fuck you—and climbed up onto its owner’s shoulder, a scowl upon its furry features.
Neal started laughing, likely understanding what the monkey had just said. Remy didn’t have to guess about at least one of the angelic talents this Offspring had inherited from its fallen sire.
“Francis says you might have some information for me,” Remy interjected before things got any nastier between the disabled man and the former Guardian.
“Antique weaponry, Remy?” the man asked, a crooked smile upon his doughy features.
“That’s what I was told was stolen.”
Mason’s flaccid hand manipulated the controls of his wheelchair, moving him closer to Remy. “Francis said these weapons could well be the legendary Pitiless.”
“It’s a possibility,” Remy said, turning to glare at Francis.
“So shoot me.” The Guardian threw up his hands. “I’m excited.”
Mason closed his eyes, a twisted smile spreading across his doughy features. “I’d pay a small forture just to look at them,” he said, a trickle of saliva begi
Julia had returned to the man’s shoulder and was now grooming his hair, in search of something to snack upon.
“And if they’re as valuable as you say, I doubt you’d tell me if you did.”
Mason’s smile broadened, the drool flowing like a river. “It depends on whether or not the person who retained your services was offering a comparable reward, and to be perfectly honest, Remy, I’m not too sure I’d really care to have these priceless objects in my possession. They have a bit of a history. A nasty history.”
“They’re like the ultimate weapons,” Francis said, taking a congealed piece of greasy cheese pizza from the box and bringing it up to his mouth. “What would you expect?”
Moving his chair in the Guardian’s direction, Mason responded. “Lore states that death is the end result of anybody who possesses the accursed weaponry,” he explained. “It is said that they were not meant for human hands, but for Death itself.”
Francis waved the claim away. “Death doesn’t need a fucking sword or a pistol. He just has to look at you to get the results he wants.”
The capuchin eyed Remy from her perch upon Mason’s shoulder, bored with grooming his stringy hair. Tensing her legs, Julia leapt.
“Then who… or what were they made for?” Remy asked, catching the flying monkey, allowing her to climb up onto his shoulder.
Mason looked panicked, staring at his simian helper, who seemed perfectly at home on this stranger’s shoulder. “That is the mystery,” he said, making noises with his mouth, attempting to call the monkey back to him.
Julia squeaked no in her primitive tongue.
“Some writings say that they were weapons meant for gods,” Mason continued. “And for any other to possess them was to seal their fate.”