69 – Army of God
“Children of God!” Gabriel was perched atop a tortured pillar of granite. The army was hurrying forward, grouping in the grassy clearing at its base. “Remember that though death has taken you it has not claimed your souls for the Lord God has need of you. Though thy spirit be willing, thy flesh is weak-yet, there is a great strength you should gain from the Lord’s choice of thee. Remember the words of God to Samuel. When in his judgment he did not choose the mighty Eliab, son of Jesse to be King of Israel-‘do not look at his appearance or at the height of his stature, because I have refused him.’
“For the Lord does not see as a man sees; man looks at outward beauty, but the Lord looks at the heart. Just so. Do not look at your own state and say: Why would my God choose me to stand in his army? I am dead. How can my dead hands do for him what the living would find difficult?” Gabriel spread his wings slightly, folded them. Updike noticed his shield-bearer do the same. “The Lord your God has chosen you-not for the strength of your arms, but for the strength of your faith.”
Updike watched the Angels. The creatures radiated power. When he first arrived, Gabriel had looked at him. A smile leapt across his beautiful face. Updike felt warmth-the pain in his head buzzed and went mute with the smile, before returning with a vengeance, leaving him with the incongruous afterimage of the word “eavesdropper” in his memory. The Angel greeted Stoneworthy with a similar smile.
Was this the Angel he had listened to for so long? The Angel’s grand appearance attested to Updike’s sanity. All those years of doubt washed away. He was not crazy at all. Angels were real. He had been called to do the Lord’s work. The last nagging doubts began to leave him. The Army of the Dead was without fault, moving decisively for God.
“As Commander of the Army of God,” Gabriel continued, “it is my duty to lead you into battle. The skirmish you have just survived was a test of your faith and your strength. Where this army goes shall test it further still. For the Devil commands the Defenders of the City, and they are prepared to bring about Hellish calamity for you- destruction awaits at the hands of Infernal powers.
“But the Lord has foreseen this, and sent me to ward over you in the coming battle. Only the power of God can deflect the dark forces that are set against you, and I have great knowledge in that way. Fear not. The Lord has sent you a legion of his Angels. They do not come among you now, so great and awesome is their power that to witness it would incapacitate.
“They shall watch and ward you from the skies, and at the crucial moment, join you in battle!” A great cheer rose up from the Army. Updike’s spirits climbed. The pain in his face and head were unwelcome memories in Gabriel’s company. With a legion of Angels to help make war on the City, their cause could not fail!
A flutter of the Angel’s wings silenced the gathering. Gabriel surveyed the cheering army. His expression was unreadable as he continued:
“And yet, the battle shall test us all. For the journey to salvation is a long and arduous one. The Defenders of the City, who hoard wealth as they do life, will be hard-pressed to give it up. It is all they have, for their faith left them with the Change. So covetous are they with it that they have cavorted with the Infernal forces of Lucifer. They have fornicated with Demons. The City must Fall!” Updike looked over to Able Stoneworthy. The minister’s dead features dropped and then rose glimmering with internal righteousness and vigor.
The struggle was plain. For the City to fall- his Tower must fall. Stoneworthy had spent a century building it and creating its deeper mandate. Yet Updike saw the disappointment wash from the minister’s face, replaced by Divine purpose. Truly, Stoneworthy possessed enormous capacities for faith and sacrifice. Updike-weakened by his prolonged exposure to pain-had come to hesitate and question his own. To see the minister’s face as a determined bulwark of Divine inspiration encouraged him and set his own passion for service aflame.
The Archangel said, “You do this because you are in service to the Lord your God, and he commands it! You do this because God’s will is truth. It is the word in action, the word in form. And yet, we are God’s children. We are his beloved. He sacrificed his son for your sins, and now he asks you to sacrifice yourselves for him. But there is more!
“As we stoke the fires that shall set the blaze of Apocalypse, we must remember his love for us. We must remember that through our sacrifice we assist him in his work. And what is his work?” The Archangel paused after the rhetorical question, as if to study the resolve and restraint of the Army. “As you have risen once from your graves, so the Lord plans to call you up again; but not as soldiers in the pivotal war of earth. He shall call you up again and make you new. He wishes your return to Eden. God wants his children to come home where he can care for them. Where they can share the wisdom of the ages!”
The Army cried approval. Too long had they spent in their dead bodies to restrain themselves! They wailed and wept. Eden was theirs, re-grown, to share with their comrades in arms, the Eden of Genesis. Updike joined in the exuberant cry!
Oliver Purdue wrapped his arms around him. Stoneworthy straightened where he stood-a ramrod of purpose for a spine. Atop the granite column-Gabriel watched and waited, his shield-bearer standing at his side. They had taken on the sharp-edged silhouettes of eagles-their wings, hard knife strokes against the moonlit sky. A glow appeared around the Angels’ heads, a warm corona of light that spilled over their shoulders like gold leaf. Growing in intensity, the show of power brought a swelling cry from the Army.
“We shall come when the battle is hot upon you. Be steady-be good of heart-we shall come. Your faith will be rewarded.” He surveyed the army from his perch, chin lifted skyward-his eyes focused on some distant and unseen force. “Behold Lucifer! Behold! You see here the Army of God! Let its righteousness strike fear in your Infernal heart. Let its faith send quivers through the chains that bind you to this prison earth. Judgment Day is near-and this Army of God puts you on notice. Your reign is over!” The Archangel set his horn to his lips and blew a great blast. The sound vibrated through every cell in Updike’s body-touched deep in the center of his brain.
He screamed: “ Triumphant Lord!”
“Your Reign is Over!” Gabriel shouted and he blew another great blast-this one smote Updike’s ears like thunder-caused adrenaline to pound in his heart, his head to throb. “Your Reign is Over!”
Gabriel bellowed this like the final verse of incantation and then flew upward with his shield-bearer. He set his horn a final time and blew a triumphant blast toward the City. Suddenly, their power burst forth and glowing white-hot the Angels rocketed into the sky like stars. They tore through the hole they had opened around the moon, and were gone.
The Army of God cheered, embracing each other chanting and wailing of hope and faith. Updike hugged Oliver, grabbed Stoneworthy and pulled him into their combined embrace.
“Peace brothers!” he wept. “His reign will end by our hands.” As his comrade’s dead bodies shook with happiness, Updike watched the moon. The clouds around it began to close. Its rays illuminated the Army-the world-a moment longer, and were gone.
“God is Love!” Stoneworthy pulled back from Updike, slapped the Captain on the shoulder. The impact traced along the man’s nerves-up his neck and into his skull. A dull throb splashed his brain like molten steel. Worse than before, each ringing ache that followed was more painful than the last. Before the pain could draw a curtain over his joy he croaked, “ His Reign is Over!”
70 – On the Run
Dawn could barely contain herself. She knew they were still in great danger but to have Mr. Jay with her-to have her fingers entwined with his after everything that had happened, everything she wanted desperately to forget. She just wanted to run and never stop. She felt the presence of her grownup voice quietly approving of the action and accessing the situation. The forever child had to get away from the darkness of the Tower.
The Nightcare fighters moved with military precision-ran and operated as a precise machine for killing and defense. A weapon honed over many decades, they formed a protective wedge around Mr. Jay and Dawn. The Quinlan boys covered the left and right flank with their swords in hand. Their light machine guns swung from their shoulders, ready for use. They kept in contact crossing the distance with sassy comments from Pearface to
