“The sword of the messenger,” something bellowed from within the darkness of the cave, and then it leaned toward him, revealing itself, its tubular body so large, it was barely able to move. “I would have thought it impossible for one such as you to wield a weapon so mighty.”
Though his body continued to protest, Aaron held the blade tighter as the black-scaled monster loomed above him. He studied the details of the creature that could only be Leviathan. Its body was covered in fine, interconnecting scales, like chain mail, and it swayed snakelike above him. Repulsed, Aaron could see things living beneath its body armament, familiar spidery things that would have liked nothing better than to crawl down the throats of every living thing upon the planet.
It lashed out at him with a tentacle as thick as a tree trunk, and Aaron scrabbled quickly over the cave floor. It was like the deafening crack of the world’s largest bullwhip, the fleshy appendage fragmenting the rock where he once had stood.
Leviathan shifted its great size within the cavern to follow Aaron’s progress, the top of its head rubbing against the ceiling as it attempted to maneuver its enormous mass in the confining space. “Where are you going, Nephilim?” it asked in its horrible, thunderous voice. “You cannot escape me. Surrender to the inevitable.”
Some of the black-shelled spider things fell from the monster’s body and eagerly scuttled across the cave floor to get at him. The blade of the messenger—as Leviathan had called it—made short work of the crawling things.
As he dispatched the spawn of the monster, something began to bother him. Since awakening within the digestive sack of the monster, he had not felt the presence of his angelic power. As he destroyed more of Leviathan’s pets, he tried to remember when last he had felt the force, always so eager to be unleashed. It had been back in the tunnels, when he had been attacked by Katie McGovern and the residents of Blithe. It had screamed to be free and he had rebuked it, pushing it away as he had done since that first battle with the angel Verchiel.
Leviathan squirmed its bulk closer. Had the great monster somehow sucked it away? Aaron wondered as another of the Leviathan’s tentacles reached down to ensnare him in its grasp. He swung at the muscular appendage, and it recoiled from the blade, hovering in the air before him like a cobra waiting for its opportunity to strike.
“Where are you?” he whispered to the presence that should have stirred inside him. “I really could use your help around now,” Aaron said, alert as the monster’s tentacle again attacked. There was no answer, and Aaron felt a wave of despair wash over him as he threw his diminishing strength into fighting the plentiful appendages that reached for him. He brought the blade down and watched as it dug deep into the black, muscular flesh of the beast.
“Yarrrrggghhhh,” Leviathan roared as it violently pulled the injured limb away—and with it, the sword of the messenger. Aaron watched dumbfounded as the tentacle thrashed, dislodging the annoyance—sending it hurling across the cave, far from his reach, where it disappeared in a blinding flash. Panic set in. Without any contact with the angelic nature, is it still possible for me to defend myself? he wondered frantically.
He pressed his back to the cave wall and attempted to conjure a weapon of his own creation. Aaron breathed a sigh of relief as a blade of fire, puny in comparison with the splendor of the sword of the messenger, began to form in his hand. At least that power had not been taken from him.
Leviathan wasted no time and again attacked. The behemoth twisted within the confines of the cave, bringing its enormous mass down toward Aaron. The sword of flame sprang fully to life in his grasp, and he was raising the blade to defend himself against this latest onslaught, when his attention fell upon the many, fleshy sacks that hung obscenely from the front of the descending beast.
Aaron froze as he stared into the contents of the sea beast’s numerous stomachs: the missing Camael, his poor Gabriel—one of the ugly little creatures that had attacked them on their way to Blithe—and so many others, all trapped within the bellies of the beast. The horror of it all was almost too much for him to stand.
“The sight of me—of my magnificence—it fills you with wonder,” Leviathan said, reaching down to claim Aaron as its own.
Its writhing body shifted, and a rain of tentacles fell from above to ensnare him. Aaron slashed at the relentless onslaught, the fiery weapon severing many of the limbs. The beast shrieked in pain, but still it attacked.
And as he fought, Aaron could not help but return his gaze to a mysterious being he saw floating within one of the digestive sacks. He knew—somehow, instinctively?—that this was an angel, but that same something also told him that this was an angel of enormous prestige and power. An archangel. Through the opaque skin and milky fluid he could see the ornate armor that hung from the emaciated body of the heavenly being.
“Look upon those that fell before my might, Nephilim,” gurgled the monster, assaulting his ears and mind. “He was the Archangel Gabriel—the messenger of God, an extension of the Creator’s Word—and he was vanquished as easily as the others.”
Aaron’s mind was suddenly filled with images of the monster’s battle with God’s messenger. He saw the winged warrior descend from the heavens, his golden armor glistening beautifully in the dimness of the primordial world. The angel dove beneath the churning waves to confront his quarry, wielding the awesome sword of light.
The battle that Aaron bore witness to could only be described as epic in proportion: a force of the purest light against unfathomable darkness—two opposing powers coming together in a conflict that quite literally rocked the world. The ocean waters around them boiled and churned, kicking up rock, dirt, and silt. Great undersea mountains quaked and crumbled, then the ocean floor split apart, a yawning chasm appearing beneath the opponents, still lost in the midst of conflict. And they tumbled into the gaping abyss, swallowed up by the cataclysmic fury unleashed by their struggle.
The vision came to an abrupt end with the disturbing and final sight of Leviathan engulfing the diminished angel Gabriel within its cavernous mouth. The messenger of God struggled pathetically as he was gradually drawn down the gullet of the beast—immured within one of the behemoth’s many stomachs; eternal food for the beast, trapped in a cave, far beneath the sea.
Leviathan laughed within Aaron’s mind, a low, gurgling sound, filled with a perverse confidence. Not even a messenger from God Himself could defeat the monster, Aaron thought as he continued his battle with the writhing tentacles. What chance do I have? he wondered, his efforts against the behemoth beginning to slow. He knew this was what the monster wanted, but he couldn’t shake the sense that his struggles against the beast were not going to be enough.
Leviathan’s attack was relentless, and it wasn’t long before one of the tentacles ensnared the wrist that held his weapon of fire. He tried to pull away, to somehow use the flaming blade against the slimy black limb, but it was to no effect. There was a sudden sharp snap and blinding pain as his wrist was broken. Aaron cried out in shock, watching the sword fall from his grasp, evaporating in the cold, damp air of the cave before it could even touch the ground.
Aaron struggled in the monster’s grasp as tentacles wrapped themselves around his arms, his legs, and waist, constricting almost all movement. He found himself lifted from the ground and born aloft.