Remy couldn’t believe his ears. He’d thought the Garden had been destroyed countless millennia ago, when the gates were slammed closed and it snapped away from reality.
“But that’s impossible . . . isn’t it?” Remy asked. “I thought that once it had been severed from its connection to Heaven that . . .”
“Did you honestly believe you would ever see me again?” Malachi asked.
“Got me,” Remy said with a smirk. “Like so many others of our ilk, I thought you had been a casualty of the war.”
There was a stone bench beside the stream and Malachi went to sit. Remy followed, listening as the elder explained where he had been.
“The war,” he said sadly. “I watched it from a distance with a disbelieving eye, never imagining the horrors that transpired. Here were the beautiful creatures that I helped to create, slaughtering one another with such abandon, jealous of their Lord . . . jealous that He did not love them enough.”
Malachi stared off into the man-made jungle, reliving what he had experienced.
“I could no longer stand the sight of it and left,” he said, disgust in his tone. “So I headed out there . . . into the universe. What I was searching for, I did not know.”
Remy could understand what the elder had felt, for he had experienced it as well, though his personal search had not taken him to the stars, but to the Earth below.
“I found nothing out there to assuage my feelings of sadness, of disgust,” Malachi said.
“So you came here,” Remy stated.
“I wandered the planet for some time, hiding myself away, observing the Earth as it evolved,” Malachi answered. “I found myself drawn to him . . . to Adam. . . . Like a light far off in the distance, I went toward it, searching for purpose.”
Malachi stood up from his seat, walking toward the life-support unit, his back to the detective.
“And I found it with him, and those who care for him. I believe it has something to do with his . . . our connection to the Garden,” the elder said. “Somehow his impending death is calling Eden here . . . to this plane of existence. To make things complete again.”
Malachi was silent as he stared within the life-sustaining case at the first of humanity.
“We have a bond, he and I,” the elder whispered. “And as the last of his days draw near, I want to grant him his final wish.”
“And what would that be?”
“He wants to go home,” Malachi said as he slowly turned to face him. “He wishes to be laid to rest beneath the soil of Paradise.”
“It was where he was born.”
Malachi agreed with a nod. “And where he wishes to finally die.”
“And you need a key to get in . . . to open the gates that I closed.”
“The key is in two parts,” Malachi explained, holding up two slender fingers. “Adam is the first section of the key, with his mate providing the other.”
“His mate? You mean Eve?”
“The temptress,” Malachi said with a distant smirk. “I had a sense after her creation that she would be trouble, but never imagined how much.”
“I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but from my understanding, Eve is dead.”
Malachi cocked his head to the left and looked toward the clear coffin as if hearing something. “Yes, we’re aware of that, but the key remains in her bloodline. There is always one who carries the knowledge.”
“And this is the key that you need me to find.”
“Precisely,” Malachi said. “With the two halves a whole, all that is needed to turn the lock will be present.”
Malachi left the clear coffin again to approach Remy.
“They are both the lock and the key,” the elder explained.
“I’m not sure I’m following,” Remy said honestly.
“It is their repentance to God, and their forgiveness of each other for the sin committed in the Garden so long ago, that will open Paradise to them again.”
The enormity of what was being asked of him gradually crept up into his lap like an affectionate elephant.
“Let me see if I’ve got this,” Remy said. “The Garden of Eden is going to manifest on Earth, and you need me to find the other part of the key . . . a descendant of Eve . . . so that the gates into the Garden can be opened again. And this is all so that you can bury Adam in his place of birth. Am I missing anything?”
“Very good, Remiel,” Malachi said, clapping his hands together in silent applause. “I now see why Adam requested that it be you.”
“I’m flattered, but I haven’t a clue how to begin.”
Malachi looked confused.
“You need me to find somebody . . . a specific descendant of the first woman . . . of Eve. That’s like asking me to find a needle on the planet of the haystacks.”
“Planet of the haystacks?” Malachi repeated, not understanding his amusing way of getting a point across. Remy was sure that Francis would have laughed at that one.
“Forget that,” Remy said. “All I’m saying is that it would be nearly impossible for me to locate this woman without some kind of lead . . . a trail that I could follow that might eventually take me to her.”
“A trail to take you to the needle on the haystack planet,” Malachi said.
“Right,” Remy said. “I’m good, but I’m not that good.”
Malachi considered the situation.
“We might be able to assist you with this,” the elder then said.
“I’m all ears,” Remy stated. “Anything to narrow things down a bit would be greatly appreciated.”
Malachi turned to Adam again. “If you will excuse us,” he told the withered figured inside. He then proceeded past the bench and into the jungle. “Follow me.”
Remy hesitated for a moment, his attention on Adam.
“I’ll do what I can,” he told the first of humanity, and then reached out to lay his hand upon the clear plastic cover. He then left the silent figure to follow Malachi farther into the man-made jungle.
He found the elder angel standing at a metal door, waiting.
Without a word, Malachi opened the door to reveal a set of steps that traveled down into a muted yellow light. Remy followed, one set of steps after another, until they reached a second door.
There was a loud buzz, followed by the opening of an electronic lock, and Jon stepped out to greet them.
“Hello again, Mr. Chandler,” he said, holding the door open.
It was warm inside this room as well, probably warmer than the jungle Remy had just left, but it didn’t take him long to figure out why.
There was a tree growing in the center of the room.
But not just any tree; it was a young version of the Tree of Knowledge.
“Is that what I think it is?” Remy asked, noticing that the sapling was hooked up to all manner of machines, rooted not in soil, but in some sort of clear fluid.
“It is,” Malachi answered. “Grown from a single seed from the fruit of the original. The Sons had it in their possession for countless millennia, never realizing the potential it carried.”
The elder had approached the platform, studying the growing tree with a scrutinizing eye.
“Multiple lifetimes have gone by as we tended the sapling, hoping that someday it might provide for us answers to the questions that have haunted the first of humanity, and his offspring.”
Remy could see that a single piece of fruit hung from the spindly branch. He remembered the actual Tree, and the overabundant bounty of life that dangled fat and ripe from its branches, and this wasn’t even close.
“Seems unhealthy,” the detective commented.
“We’re lucky that it looks this well,” Jon said. “It took close to fifty years to find the proper nutrient solution to feed the tree, and even that is a far second to the soil of Paradise.”
Malachi stood close to the tree and reached out, his fingers wrapping around the body of the single piece of fruit. “But our time has finally run its course,” the elder ominously said as his grip tightened, and he gave the fruit a sharp tug, separating it from its branch.