Leviathan

“I wonder how long those things have been inside them?” Aaron asked to distract himself as they proceeded from the smaller cavern, his level of disgust quickly on the rise.

“Most likely since Verchiel wholeheartedly abandoned his holy mission and became obsessed with preventing the prophecy from becoming a reality,” Camael said as they walked a ru

“So this is something else I can be blamed for?” Aaron asked, feeling the dirt pathway of the tu

“In a way, yes,” the angel said. “By ignoring their tasks, the Powers have allowed the forces of chaos to take root in the world, growing in strength unabated. I shudder to think of what other malignant purveyors of wickedness are hiding in the shadows of the world.”

“Great,” Aaron responded with a heavy sigh. “Wouldn’t want to be let off easy or anything. I wonder if I have anything to do with global warming?” he asked, his words dripping sarcasm. “We might want to look into that.”

Gabriel ran up ahead of them and had begun to bark excitedly. “We’re almost to the surface,” he cried, waiting until they caught up, and then ru

They emerged from the tu

“This is just too much,” Aaron said, taking it all in. “Those things must have been living inside just about everybody in town.”

An angled road of dirt had been constructed on the floor of the dig so that trucks and such could be driven down into the hole, and Aaron and his companions used the packed-earth path to ascend to the lip of the excavation at ground level.

As the three moved toward the door that would take them out of the factory, and walked around the violently ill, being careful to step over the reeking puddles that contained the decomposing corpses of Leviathan’s children, Aaron caught sight of Katie McGovern and went to her. “Katie,” he said as he approached. “Are you all right?” His guess about the filthy man in the cave veterinary clinic had been correct, for her former boyfriend Kevin was with her, and they both gazed at him slack-jawed, their bodies racked with chills. Aaron saw no recognition in Katie’s eyes, and he began to feel afraid.

“What’s the matter with them?” he asked Camael, who now stood by his side staring at the two as he was.

“Shock, I’d imagine,” the angel said. “Their minds are attempting to adjust to the horrors they have experienced. The human mind is a wondrous invention indeed,” he said as he stepped closer to Katie’s former fiancé. Camael reached out and grabbed the man by the chin, looking deeply into his eyes. “By the morrow they’ll have only the vaguest idea that something had happened to them at all,” he said, as if attempting to get a glimpse of the i

Aaron and Gabriel followed the angel out into the early morning dawn. Outside the door, Chief Dexter leaned against his patrol car. He had thrown up onto the windshield, and it looked as though he wasn’t quite finished yet. Aaron quickly looked away. “So they won’t remember any of this?” he asked the angel who was now striding toward the parking lot.

Gabriel sniffed around the tires of the parked cars, completely disinterested in their conversation. There was valuable sniffing time to be recouped.

“They’ll remember, but their minds will shape the event into something that they will be able to accept—no matter how odd or unlikely,” Camael answered. “It’s how their minds work—how they were designed. And those that do remember the reality of the situation, and dare to speak of it, will be ostracized and labeled as insane.”

“Nice,” Aaron said, a little taken aback by the angel’s cold interpretation of the human psyche. He was silent for the moment, digesting the angelic warrior’s words, and decided that he didn’t buy it. “If that’s how our poor human brains work, than how come I didn’t chalk up all this angel crap to eating bad tuna or a high fever due to some rare African virus?”

The angel stopped and turned to stare. “You are Nephilim,” Camael said, as if that would be more than enough of an answer.

“Yeah, but I’m still human, right?” Aaron said, staring at the angel and gazing into his steely gray eyes.

On the outskirts of the parking lot, he waited for the angel to respond. Camael remained silent—but the lack of an answer spoke volumes.

“What are you trying to say?” Aaron asked nervously.

It was then that the angel spoke. “You were sired by an angel. You are no more human than I am.”

It felt as though he’d been struck. Even though deep down inside, Aaron already knew this, hearing it come out of Camael’s mouth was like a whack with a two-by-four between the eyes.

I’m not human, he thought, letting the concept rattle around inside his brain. Could his life be any weirder?

He again heard the Archangel Gabriel’s final words to him—before the angel had taken the express bus to Heaven. The words about his father.

“The Archangel Gabriel said that what I was doing—the prophecy?—was somehow co

“Yes,” Camael said as a sword of flame came to life in his hands and he severed the chain with a single slice. “And he also said that you have his eyes.” Camael pushed open the gate and strode through onto the road.

Aaron held back, waiting for his dog to finish up sniffing around a patch of weeds.

“Do you know who he is, Camael?” Aaron asked as his dog trotted over to join him. “My father—do you know who my father is?”

The angel had continued to walk up the road, but he stopped and slowly turned. “I do not, no,” he said, shaking his head. “But what I do know is that he must have been an angel of formidable power to have sired one like you.” Camael then promptly turned away, continuing on his journey.

“I think he just paid you a compliment, Aaron,” Gabriel said as he walked alongside him.

Aaron smiled slightly. “I think you might be right there, Gabe.”

Berkely Street was deathly quiet in the early morning stillness, as was the rest of Blithe. Aaron removed a pair of sweatpants and shirt from the backseat of his car and prepared to put them on over his filthy and ripped clothing.

“I think I might have an extra sweatshirt,” he said to Camael, gazing at the angel’s filthy suit with a wrinkled nose.

“That will be u

And Aaron watched with amazement as the accumulated dirt and grime on his companion’s suit faded away before his eyes, leaving it as if it had just come from the cleaners. The angel then adjusted his tie, glancing casually in his direction.

“Let me guess,” Aaron said as he pulled the sweatshirt down over his head. “I could do that, too, if I just applied myself.”

Camael was about to respond, but Aaron put up a hand to silence him; he didn’t have the time or energy for a dissertation right now. He finished putting on the rest of his clean clothes and checked out his reflection in the side mirror of his car. It would have to do for now. That was all he needed, for Mrs. Provost to see him looking like he’d been through World War III. It was going to be hard enough to explain what had happened and how she had come to be locked in the cellar.