Leviathan

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The people of Blithe were vomiting—and Aaron imagined he knew exactly how they must feel. No, he didn’t have some crablike creature living inside his chest, but he had just received the very first pieces of information he had ever learned about his real father; that the prophecy had something to do with his father’s sins, and that he had his father’s eyes. He thought he might be sick.

Aaron, Camael, and Gabriel moved through the winding passage that led up from Leviathan’s lair, to one of the many chambers that had been excavated out of the rock by the townspeople under the sea monster’s thrall.

“Gross,” Gabriel said, and Aaron couldn’t have agreed more. The people, who up until Leviathan’s demise had been busily clearing away tons of rock and dirt in an attempt to free the beast, had stopped their work. They had dropped their tools and were bent over in obvious pain—their bodies racked with vomiting and throwing up the horrible things that had crawled inside to control their actions.

“Are they all right?” Aaron asked, wrinkling his nose in disgust at the repellant sounds of people in the midst of being sick.

“Their bodies are rejecting Leviathan’s invasive spawn,” the angel warrior said, rather blasé. “I would imagine they will be fine—as soon as the dead creatures and their nests are expelled from the body.”

The floor of the smaller chamber was puddled with all manner of foulness, and the already decaying remains of the spiderlike things that had taken up residence in their bodies.

Aaron wasn’t exactly sure how he felt about what he had learned; it wasn’t as if he had been given a phone number or a home address. The identity of the man—angel—that had sired him was still a complete mystery, and one that he really couldn’t afford to think about right now. He decided that he would deal with it later, when things had calmed down—when things were back to normal. He laughed to himself, as if his life could ever be that way again.

“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 runnel that would he hoped take them to the surface.

“So this is something else I can be blamed for?” Aaron asked, feeling the dirt pathway of the tunnel beneath his feet begin to slant upward. They continued to pass the people of Blithe, many of them passed out from the exertion of purging the foreign invaders from their bodies.

“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 running up ahead. The dog was as sick of being underground as they were, Aaron imagined, and wanted nothing more than to breathe in some nice fresh air.

They emerged from the tunnel out into the main excavation in the heart of the former boat factory. Aaron noticed that the heavy digging machinery had been silenced, and the only sound that could be heard throughout the air of the place was that of retching. Everywhere he looked, somebody was being sick or incapacitated as a result of being sick.

“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 inner workings of a human being. “To most, it will become the distant memory of a horrible nightmare.” He let Kevin’s face go and proceeded to the door. “Such is the coping mechanism of the mortal brain.”

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 connected to the sins of my father,” Aaron said to his angel companion as they reached the padlocked gate.

“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 unnecessary,” he said.

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.

Camael studied the quaint house with squinted eyes. “And you say that the old woman attacked you?”

“Yeah,” Aaron said as he combed his unruly hair with his fingers. “I knocked her out and put her in the cellar. I didn’t want to take the risk of her letting the other people in town know I was on to them.”

“I’m very hungry after being inside the belly of a monster,” Gabriel declared, and hurriedly headed up the walk to the front door. “I wonder if she’ll have any meat loaf?”

“Not if she’s been locked in the basement all night, pal,” he said, coming up behind the dog and reaching for the doorknob.

It was unlocked, and Aaron swung the door wide—and was immediately hit with the smell of something cooking, something that made his belly ache and come to the realization that Gabriel wasn’t the only one who was very hungry.

“Mrs. Provost?” he called out, looking around the foyer and the area around it. Strangely enough, it showed no sign of their struggle. They all moved toward the kitchen, toward the wonderful smell of breakfast cooking, Camael backing up the rear.

“Mrs. Provost?” he said again as he came around the door frame and saw the older woman at the stove. She was wearing an apron and was frying up some bacon. The old woman turned momentarily from her cooking to give him a smile. “Morning,” she said, reaching up with a white bandaged hand to brush away a stray wisp of white hair from her forehead. “Knew the smell of cooking would get you in here.” She went back to work, carefully favoring the injured hand.

“What happened to your hand?” he asked her, knowing full well that she had burned it on his sword during their scuffle. She was placing some strips of bacon onto a folded paper towel on the stove, and Gabriel went to her, tail wagging. She was careful to finish up what she was doing before petting the animal with her good hand.

“I’m not really sure,” she said, rubbing the dog’s ears. “Think I took a bit of a spill down the cellar steps last night,” she said kind of dreamily, straining to recall what had happened to her. “Must’ve knocked myself senseless and touched something hot on the furnace.”

She peeled some more strips of the breakfast meat out of the package and laid them in the greasy pan. “Even found a way to lock myself inside,” she said with a laugh. “Good thing I found a spare skeleton key down there or I’d still be locked up.” The old woman was making sure that the bacon was lined up straight in the pan. “Probably should go see the doctor to rule out concussion or anything,” she added. Gabriel lay down on the floor at her feet, gazing up at her adoringly.

Aaron turned and looked at Camael behind him. The angel had been precisely right. Mrs. Provost’s brain had done exactly as he described. It had attempted to rationalize the bizarreness of the situation, steering clear of anything that would be too difficult to explain or comprehend.

Mrs. Provost placed her fork down and walked to the refrigerator, all the while under the watchful eye of his Labrador. “I was just about to cook up some eggs,” she said, pulling on the fridge door to open it. “My father always used to say that a big breakfast could cure what ails you,” she said, removing the carton of fresh white eggs. “Thought today might be a good day to take his advice.”

Camael had not willed himself invisible this time, and Aaron caught her staring at the large, older man behind him—too stubborn to ask his identity. She would wait until he got around to explaining who Camael was.

“This is my friend,” he said in introduction. “The one who had some business up in Portland?” She nodded slowly, remembering the conversation that they’d had the first night over supper. “He just got back this morning,” he explained.

Camael was silent, studying the old woman just as she was studying him.

“Is he staying for breakfast?” she asked, taking the eggs with her to the stove.

Aaron was about to answer for the angel, when Camael suddenly spoke for himself. “I will have French fries,” he said, stunning Aaron with his answer.

Mrs. Provost completely unfazed by the angel’s request, reached down to the stove and pulled it open. A new delicious aroma wafted out of the oven with a blast of heat. There was something cooking inside on metal sheet.

“Don’t have any French fries, but how about home fries—will they do?” she asked. “My husband, God rest his soul, used ta tell me that I made the best home fries in New England.” She used an oven mitt covered in a pattern of bananas to remove the hot pan of browned, chopped potatoes from the stove.

“If you like French fries, you’re going to love these,” Aaron told the angel, his mouth beginning to water.

“Then I will have—home fries,” he said, eyeing the breakfast dish now resting atop the stove.

It was all pretty strange and quite amazing, Aaron mused as he finished up giving Gabriel his breakfast and watched the kindly old woman expertly crack the last of the eggs into the frying pan, making breakfast as if it were just like any other day of the week. It was hard for him to wrap his brain around the concept. Less than two hours ago he had been fighting for his life against a force that could very well have threatened the world—but here he was now, about to sit down to a big breakfast of bacon, egg and home fries. The realization that his life had dramatically changed was again driven home with the force of an atomic blast—and with every new day, it seemed to change more and more. Aaron wondered if he’d ever get used to it, if it would ever seem as mundane as sitting down to eat breakfast.

Shaking some salt onto his eggs, he watched the angel Camael take a tentative bite of home fries and begin to chew. A look that could only be described as pleasure spread across his goateed face, and he greedily began to eat.

Would his life ever seem so mundane again? he wondered, watching as an angel of Heaven consumed a plate of home-fried potatoes beside him.

He seriously doubted it.

Miss you. Love Aaron.

Aaron sat back in the desk chair, contemplating the last words he had typed in his e-mail to Vilma. Is it too strong? he wondered, fingers hovering over the keyboard as he tried to decide. His feelings for the girl back home hadn’t even come close to changing, and the more he thought about her, the longer he spent away from her—the stronger they seemed to become.

An all too familiar sadness washed over him as he wondered if he would ever see the pretty Brazilian girl again. He knew it was for her own good that he stay away—Verchiel would certainly think nothing of using her to get to him—but a selfish part of him wanted to be with her, no matter the consequences.

Aaron read through the e-mail again, smirking at how boring it all sounded—if only he could write even a portion of what he’d been experiencing.

Miss you. Love Aaron.

He wondered what Vilma was doing just then. It was early Sunday morning, and he guessed that she probably wasn’t even up yet. He wouldn’t have been, either but they had to get going and continue his search for Stevie. He always loved sleeping late on Sundays, reading the Globe with a big glass of milk and a couple of Dunkin’ Donuts that his foster dad would buy. But that was then.

Aaron read the e-mail one last time and deemed it perfectly fine. What do I have to lose? He clicked on the Send button and watched his letter disappear into the electronic ether. No turning back now, he thought, in more ways than one. There was only the road ahead of him now, and at the end of that road he hoped to find his little brother, and maybe a chance at a normal life—if fulfilling an ancient prophecy didn’t get him killed first.

Gabriel and Camael had started loading the car. Aaron was just about to shut the computer down when Mrs. Provost appeared in the doorway to the tiny office. “Don’t shut that off right yet,” she said. “I was thinking of maybe sending a note to my son.”

Aaron got up and motioned for her to take the chair. “That would be nice. I’m sure he’d like to hear from you.” He suddenly wondered if it could have been Leviathan that had kept her from leaving Blithe all these years.

“Damn thing’ll probably blow up in my face,” she said, scowling at the computer as she took a seat in front of the monitor.

“You’ll do fine,” he said. He then remembered that he hadn’t paid the woman yet for his stay, and reached into his pocket for the money there. “Oh, before I forget,” he said handing her the stack of bills. She took it from his hand and began to count it.

“Gave me too much,” she said, handing back more than half the cash.

“You said that it was—”

“Are you calling me a liar, Corbet?” she interrupted with a scowl worse than the one she had given the computer.

Aaron knew he was on the edge of real trouble here. “No, it’s just that you said—”

“Never mind what I said. This is plenty.” She held up the money she had kept, then folded it and stuck it inside the front pocket of her ancient blue jeans. “I enjoyed your company—and your dog’s, too, even though he’s a bit of a pig, if you ask me.”

Aaron laughed. “You don’t have to tell me! The boy’s been like that since he was a baby. His stomach’s a bottomless pit.”

They both laughed.

“Well, I gotta hit the road,” Aaron said. “You take care of yourself, Mrs. Provost,” he said, waving good-bye as he left the office doorway.

“Same to you, son,” she said. “You and that dog of yours stop by again sometime, and bring your handsome friend along too.”

Aaron headed for the front door, listening to the old woman’s fingers tentatively moving on the keyboard. It sounded as though she was doing just fine, but as he opened the door, he heard her curse and threaten the computer with being tossed out with the trash. Laughing softly to himself, he stepped from the house to join his friends.

Aaron was passing beneath the flowered archway to go to his car when he saw Katie McGovern. She was dressed in a baggy white T-shirt and some running shorts. The vet was patting Gabriel, checking out his bite wound. Aaron noticed that her hand was bandaged as well. “Hey,” he said, approaching them and his dog.

“Hey, back,” she answered. “Was out running and saw Gabriel in the yard. He begged me to come pet him.” “Healed up pretty fast, didn’t he,” she pointed out, running the flat of her bandaged hand along the dog’s flank.

“I didn’t tell her anything,” Gabriel grumbled, looking at him guiltily, tongue lolling.

Aaron ignored the dog. “I don’t think it was as bad as it looked—and plus, he had the best vet in town looking after him. How could he do anything but miraculously heal?” he asked, chuckling. They were both patting the Labrador now, and the animal was in his glory.

“So you’re leaving, huh?” she said, eyeing his vehicle. He looked where she was staring and saw that Camael had already taken up his place in the front seat, patiently waiting.

“Yeah, got some things to take care of,” he said, stroking Gabriel’s side. “Thought I’d get an early start.”

“Is that the friend you were waiting for?” she asked, motioning with her chin to the car, and the back of Camael’s head.

“That’s him. Got back from Portland yesterday,” he lied.

“Nothing I could say to get you to stick around and help Kevin and me with the practice, is there?” she asked halfheartedly, already expecting that she knew what his answer would be.

“You and Kevin, eh?” he questioned, a sly smile creeping across his face.

“Yeah,” she said, now rubbing Gabriel’s ears. “Since he got back, we’ve been spending a lot of time with each other and have decided to give it another go.” Katie shrugged. “We’re taking it a day at a time—see what happens. So I guess your answer’s no?”

Camael turned around in his seat and gave him an intense stare. Even an angel’s patience has its limits, he thought, moving gradually toward the car. “Sorry,” he said, opening the back door of the Toyota for Gabriel. “Still got something I have to do, but thanks for offering.” He thought of his little brother still in the clutches of killer angels and he felt his pulse rate quicken. The dog jumped into the backseat, and he slammed the door closed.

“You’re good, Aaron,” she said, hands on her hips. “If you ever need a letter of recommendation for school or anything, be sure to look me up, okay?”

“Thanks,” he said, opening the driver side door. “You take care now. I hope everything works out between you and Kevin.”

Aaron sat behind the steering wheel and was just about to slam the door of the Toyota closed when Katie abruptly stopped him.

“The other night,” she said, her eyes wide. She licked her lips nervously. “You know what happened then—don’t you?” Katie nervously played with the bandage on her hand.

Aaron looked into her eyes and told her that he didn’t know what she was talking about, but he suspected that she didn’t believe him.

“There’s a little voice in the back of my head telling me that I should be thanking you for something—but for the life of me I don’t know why.”

He turned the key in the ignition and started up the car. “You don’t have to thank me,” he said, shaking his head, feeling a little sad that he was leaving. The town of Blithe had really started to grow on him. His own little voice—the selfish one again—was telling him that he should turn the car off this instant, accept Katie’s offer, and take up permanent residence in the now peaceful town—to turn his back on the prophecy.

“Never ignore the little voice in the back of your head, Aaron,” she said, leaning into the open window and giving him a quick peck on the cheek. But he knew that it wasn’t to be; that if he had listened, it would be no better than the false peace that he had known in the belly of Leviathan.

“Thank you,” she said as she withdrew herself from the car.

“You’re welcome,” he responded, and she turned from the car with a final wave and continued with her morning run.

He had responsibilities now, he thought as he watched Katie recede down Berkely Street, duties that extended far beyond his own personal satisfaction and happiness. It was a lot to cope with, but what choice did he have, really? He’d tried to deny it, to keep it locked away, but that had almost got him killed. Begrudgingly, he was beginning to accept it was all part of what he had to do—the job he had been chosen for.

“I like her,” Gabriel said as Aaron put the car in drive, beginning the process of turning the car around on the dead-end street. “Even if she is a vet.”

“I like her too,” Aaron said in the midst of completing a three-point turn, his mind already elsewhere. He thought about his brother, and the dangers that were obviously to come—and he thought about his father.

He began to drive up Berkely Street, and on reflex turned on the radio. Paul McCartney and the rest of the Beatles were singing “Yesterday.” It had always been one of his favorite oldies, and listening to the words now, it had new meaning for him. He turned the volume up a bit and felt Camael’s burning gaze upon him.

“I want you to listen to this,” he said, glancing over at the scowling angel as he took a left off Berkely and headed back through the center of town. “Don’t think of it as a song—think of it as poetry.”

“I despise poetry,” the angel growled, looking away from him to gaze out the passenger window at Blithe passing by.

“Bet you thought you hated French fries too,” Aaron said, chuckling.

Would his life ever again be filled with lazy Sundays reading the newspaper, drinking milk, and eating doughnuts? Aaron had no idea what the future held, but he did know it would certainly be interesting; it was in the job description.

What else would one expect as a Messenger of God?