until nothing came out, then leaned on the wall, wiping cold sweat from my forehead. My eyes found the ceiling, which was painted like the Sistine Chapel. Accurate. Michelangelo’s angels dressed in armor, raising swords and killing. We’d witnessed their fury when they came.

I tilted my head. There were nude bodies everywhere. Oh, the irony of so much nudity and sexually suggestive poses in the heart of the Catholic Church. A thought occurred to me. How did this painting survive? Wouldn’t this painting trigger memories the way my asking for money had done on the street? It looked real. I wouldn’t put it past Michael to have the ability to move the entire chapel, make some alterations, and call it his…bedroom.

As I took in the room, I discovered a giant bed with a massive white headboard. Holy crap, he’d taken me into his bedroom. Michael had commanded all my attention so that it hadn’t occurred to me to look around the room until now.

With the back of my sleeve, I wiped my eyes, then my mouth, groaning at the mess on the floor. “I need to clean up,” I whispered.

Light flickered, and a man materialized before me.

I grabbed the knife from the back pocket of my pants. Not there. Crap. Holding out an empty hand, palm up in the stay away sign, I asked, “Who are you?”

“I’m a light bender. We guard the private chambers.”

He was medium height, built thin but not too thin, nude and hairless, and he blended with…everything in the room. “Did the commander make you sick?” He winked and made kissing noises.

No wonder I hadn’t seen anyone before. He was invisible. There by the chair on the floor, I spotted my knife.

The male’s gaze followed, and he moved as if allowing me to pass and get it.

I did. I skirted past him and grabbed the knife, contemplating if I should put it in my back pocket.

As if knowing what I was thinking, the male said, “I am in the commander’s service. Feel free to put away your weapon.”

Nodding, I put it away. My head still pounded, and I needed to get to the infirmary. But first I searched for the bathroom in an attempt to find a rag that I could clean the mess with. There was no bathroom or even a closet. Michael’s chambers, as the light bender, who might or might not have a name, called this place, was a single large room with a large bed and a white suede chair awkwardly placed as the centerpiece before windows spanning across the entire wall. They offered a view of the city, above which an unusually large number of angels flew in tight formations. They formed flocks, like birds. One flock flew in a triangular shape, then spread out in a perfect line and flew slowly, barely batting their wings. Several of these line formations flew back and forth from the Command to the sea.

“What are they doing?” I asked the light bender.

“I don’t know.” He stared at the vomit on the floor.

“I’ll get that cleaned up if I can find a rag. Where is the bathroom in the commander’s suite?”

“He doesn’t need one.”

“What do you mean?”

“Angels don’t poop.”

“Do they pee?”

“No. They’re perfect heavenly bodies that expend no extra energy or waste time reading the paper while taking a shit.”

“I had no idea.”

“Now you do.”

“Right. Do you…expend extra energy?”

“I’m barely corporeal.”

Is that a no? But I pressed no further.

“Go,” he said in the same way Michael would order me to approach, but more gently. “I will get a rookie to clean up the mess.”

“I am a rookie.” I hopped over my mess and tried the door, fearing it wouldn’t open. But it did, and I took a right for the stairs. “Hey, where’s the infirmary?” I asked and looked back. Nobody was there. The light bender either hadn’t followed me outside or had followed but quickly disappeared into the light or wherever these creatures came from. I knew so very little about this world, and I grew sick of not knowing.

On the ground floor, the first thing I did was search for Georgia, who’d know about the infirmary. I found her on her way up. “Hear you have a headache,” she said and held a plastic instrument in front of my face.

I reared back. “Oh, I don’t have a fever.”

She perused me with the instrument. “I know, silly. The commander sent an order for you to take meds.”

I looked from her gaze to the thing she held up in front of my face. On instinct, I opened my mouth, expecting her to dispense meds onto my tongue. When nothing came, I stuck my tongue out.

Georgia stared. “What are you doing?”

“I have no idea.” Yup. No idea. The instrument looked like an ear thermometer, but surely wasn’t. It didn’t dispense medicine onto my tongue, so now I was out of ideas on how to take meds. I needed more than a map. I needed a guide, or better yet, my parents to re-raise me in this world.

“Um, when you see the green light, you inhale.” Georgia spoke slowly, as if to a child or a dumbass.

She pressed a button on the side, and the instrument gushed air. I inhaled. Pleasant fresh minty air opened up my airways and prickled my nose. “Thank you.”

“Welcome. Do you feel better?”

Weird. Didn’t medicine take time? “Yes,” I lied. I didn’t want her fussing over me.

I mentioned the mess in Michael’s bedroom. Georgia said Virginia, Michael’s maid, was on her way up. Their names couldn’t have been a coincidence. Apparently, Michael had two maids, though I didn’t get the other one’s name. If she were Nevada, I wouldn’t be surprised.

Georgia and I parted in the foyer, she heading outside, while I took a right for the office, which I found deserted. Great. I took my sweet time searching for the map of the entire Court of Command. Besides the ancient map on the wall behind the desk, I couldn’t find another.

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