… I never showed you the love you gave me.’
‘Shh… I love you.’
‘I love you, too.’ Tears stream from his eyes. ‘Stay back… stay close to the tree.’
‘Jake, what are you going to do?’
‘Fulfill my destiny.’
Dominique starts to say something, then gags, the noxious fumes of Devlin’s sentry causing her mucous membranes to sizzle. She cowers behind the alabaster tree, pressing the seal of her nostril hoses tighter.
The demon faces Jacob, its two pupilless eyes blazing burned yellow, staring right through him. The cruel slit seems to smile as if in triumph, allowing a black goo to dribble from its anthropomorphic mouth.
The being’s poison-tipped sickle-shaped claws slice the air, warning Jacob away from the calabash tree. Jacob tightens his grip on the sword.
Suddenly a gray blur-moving at him with unfathomable quickness-as the creature launches its attack.
Jacob ducks-the demon’s razored claws whistling past his scalp, as the Hunahpu warrior rolls forward and whips his sword around and down, slicing through the back of one of the being’s thickly muscled legs.
The creature cries out, swearing in an incomprehensible language.
Jacob regrips the sword in both hands. For over a decade he has fought a holographic simulation of this being within the nexus. Now, every instinct in his body tells him to remain free of the higher dimension.
The demon circles slowly, biding its time. Mustard yellow ooze gushes from its wounded leg as it plans its next bull rush.
Another blur of gray-the being’s bladed fingertips slashing through the carbon-dioxide-heavy air.
Jacob parries the blow with the blade of his sword, then, executing a flawless pirouette, he whirls around and hacks through the being’s left arm, just above the elbow.
The wounded demon howls in its native tongue, cowering off-balance as the Hunahpu launches his own attack, his sword cutting the air in blurring waves of unyielding figure eights, the sizzling double blade hacking through silicon flesh, the mustard yellow pus spraying both combatants as Jacob mercilessly shreds torso and limb.
A flutter of wings, followed by a warning shout from Dominique.
Jacob wheels about and drops, stabbing upward, catching Devlin in the abdomen as the Seraph assails him from above.
Devlin flies off, landing awkwardly several feet from the edge of the glowing pit, clutching his ruptured flank.
‘Jake!’ Dominique points.
Blue-tinged blood is gushing from beneath his body armor along the left side of his rib cage, the sentry’s talons having shredded flesh and muscle.
‘Stay back!’ Jacob sucks deep lungfuls of air from his mouthpiece, trying in vain to fight off the effects of the poison. He is lathered in blood and sweat and yellow phlegm, his muscles trembling.
Eyeing Devlin, Jacob turns to the mutilated sentry groveling by his feet. Bellowing a guttural warrior’s cry, the Hunahpu raises his sword and, with a mighty two-handed downward chop, cuts off the demon’s hideous head.
Devlin snarls by the edge of the pit but does not attack.
The frightened Nephilim continue to inch toward the calabash tree by the thousands.
Jacob drops to his knees, Dominique catching him as he collapses. ‘Jake, no… oh God, please-’ She clutches his dying form to her bosom. ‘Jake, don’t leave me.’
Unable to speak, he points feebly to the trunk of the alabaster tree.
*
Michael Gabriel’s mind is drowning in an abyss of evil, the Abomination’s scarlet eyes dragging him deeper into her icy soul. Her whisper echoes into his consciousness. The battle is over, cousin. I shall drain your life force, then carry First-Mother’s carcass over Hell’s threshold.
An eternity of pent-up emotions explodes from the depths of Mick’s crumbling being, piercing the walls of his protective domain-‘Dominique!’
The whisper of her name reverberates in her mind like a tuning fork.
Jacob rasps, choking on his own blood, ‘Free him.’
She lays her son’s head down gently and stands. Grips his sword in both hands. Staggers to the calabash tree, its glow fading fast – and thrusts the blade into the trunk with all her might.
The Siren’s scream echoes in Mick’s mind, and suddenly the haze lifts.
The Succubus is clutching her side where a stream of black ooze sprays outward like oil. She wheels around, her demonic vermilion eyes spewing hatred at Mick.
No! Impossible!
Michael Gabriel smiles triumphantly. Never underestimate the power of love.
Another wound bursts open, this one in her throat. She flops on her back, gagging on her own excrement – as an eternity of shackles are stripped from Mick’s being.
*
The heavenly glow of the calabash tree increases its brilliance as white bark melts into gobs of mucuslike goo.
Thrashing about within this rapidly liquefying mound are two figures. One is Lilith, her pale flesh gushing an oily excrement; the second is Michael Gabriel, his torso held from behind, the Succubus’s fingernails digging into his back.
‘Get off my man, bitch!’ Dominique lashes downward with the sword, severing Lilith’s arms at the elbows.
Devlin circles overhead, but refuses to get nearer to the painfully brightening light.
Dominique drags Mick’s lifeless form from the tarry ooze. ‘Jake, he’s not breathing!’ She removes her mouthpiece and forces it past her soul mate’s blue lips and into his mouth.
‘Come on, Mick-breathe!’ She shakes him, then starts mouth to mouth, but is unable to resuscitate him.
‘Oh God, no… not after all this.’ Removing a pony bottle of air from her exoskeleton, she straps it over Mick’s face, then begins CPR – as a second white light appears at her back, its unearthly glow warming her skin.
Dominique turns. Her jaw drops open, releasing the regulator. ‘Jacob?’
The brilliant light-force that is Jacob Gabriel rises from his deceased physical form, casting a heavenly glow throughout the spiritual dimension.
En masse, the Nephilim gravitate toward the source.
‘Like moths to a flame…’ Dominique whispers.
The energy from Jacob’s soul bathes their skin, miraculously washing away the gray soot, revitalizing their flesh. Limbs are restored, the torturous orbs dropping from their rejuvenated bodies.
Dominique’s mind is in a daze. And then Evelyn Strongin’s words, spoken so long ago, are whispered into her consciousness.
There is a Hell, Dominique, but it is not a real place. Those who enter the afterlife possessing negative energy reside in their own self-imposed Hell. Judgment, blame, and guilt can distort or destroy one’s own sense of self. Unless we allow love to purify the darkness of our souls, Hell can be a very forbidding place.
‘Love…’
Tears of joy pour from Dominique’s eyes as, one by one, the lost souls of New Eden’s colonists, held so long within their self-imposed purgatory of guilt and shame-smile… then disappear in a blink of heavenly white light.
Devlin hovers above the melee, flapping his wings, screeching at the top of his lungs. ‘No! Get away from him! Leave him be!’
The remaining Nephilim push in tighter, desperate to embrace their newfound savior.
And then they are gone, all but Jacob, who moves toward her, bathing her in his loving light.
The alabaster ooze from the calabash tree melts like snow as it is kissed by Jacob’s angelic glow, restoring Lilith’s earthly beauty, healing her wounds.
Jacob kneels by Lilith. Touches her face.
Lilith opens her eyes, now filled with a childlike innocence. She looks up at Jacob and smiles.
Jacob takes Lilith’s hand, then turns to his mother. He points to Mick, who is now breathing on his own. ‘Be happy.’
Dominique chokes on the lump in her throat. ‘I love you.’
Jacob smiles. And then he and Lilith are gone.
Mick groans.
Dominique rushes to his side. She strokes his thick mane of silver-gray hair and stares into his brilliant, azure-blue eyes, recognizing the look of schizophrenia. ‘My poor baby, what did they do to you?’