Angelic Vengeance
By: Tim McPhee
“Stu’s down!” shouted my best friend, Jim, over the din of the battle.
“Where are the Angels of Mercy?” demanded Anthony as he descended from the smoke-filled air to cover Jim’s flank from the attacking hordes of demons.
“Damned if I know,” responded Jim, driving his sword deep into the gut of the demon before him. My vision became more and more hazy, my friend and comrade fading to blurry shapes of light against the dark figures of the demons they were battling.
A trumpet blared in the distance signaling retreat.
“Fall back,” ordered Anthony, as he parried a demon’s thrust and moved back.
“But what about Stu?” asked Jim. “We can’t just leave him here.”
“We’ve been ordered to retreat, the demons have already advanced past his position,” said Anthony. “We have no choice.”
With that, I saw the blurry shapes of light spread their wings and take off into the hazy air above. Ignoring the pain of my shattered wings, the throbbing concussion of my head, and the sucking chest wound, I tried to rise, but failed. As the demonic shadows that failed to pursue my comrades closed in on my prone form, I asked myself one question.
“What the Hell am I doing here?”
It was a very good question.
I had lived a relatively normal life, for a mortal growing up in Alberta, anyway, until that fateful night of my eighteenth birthday. My friends had taken me out to get drunk since I was finally old enough to do it legally. I can’t remember exactly how many there was of us, but by four in the morning, I found myself in the passenger seat of Jim’s Ford Bronco, tearing down the Calgary Trail at about a hundred and eighty kilometres per hour. I should have realized that something was wrong when the headlights of other vehicles were approaching us from the front and swerving to pass us on both sides while honking their horns. Unfortunately, it wasn’t until I saw the “Wrong way” sign when it occurred to me that something was amiss.
“Hey, Jim,” I slurred.
“What, man?” he asked, turning to look at me.
“Keep your hands on the wheel, man!” I shouted, grabbing the wheel.
“Oh, yeah,” he said as he also clutched the wheel. “These damn cars are on the wrong side of the highway, man.”
“I just saw a sign that said ‘Wrong way’, man,” I said with effort. “I think we’re on the wrong side of the road, man.”
“Aw, man! You mean we’re not in England yet?”
“I think you have to take the Trans Canada for that, man,” I said, apologetically.
“Hey, look at that car,” Jim said, laughing. “It’s got six headlights all along the three lanes.”
“Jim, man,” I said, “I don’t think that’s good.”
I couldn’t even remember the crash. The next thing I recalled was the feeling of floating up. Jim was beside me. We were in a tunnel, floating towards a bright light at the end of it.
“Come to the light,” said a voice.
“Stu, man,” said Jim, “I don’t think we have a choice.”
Noticing that I had no control over the fact that I was floating toward the light whether I liked it or not, I nodded my head in agreement.
As we got closer to the light, we noticed it was shining out of a gate made of pure gold, nestled between walls of ivory and seated upon a feathery cloud. We landed on the cloud and found it solid enough to support our weight. Neither of us were surprised by that.
“I think that car with the six headlights killed us, man,” said Jim.
“It was three separate cars, you drunken moron,” I said, irritated that Jim had gotten me killed. I was surprised I was only irritated. I always thought I’d be really mad if somebody were to kill me.
“Peace, my sons,” said a very deep voice from behind the gate.
“Who are you?” asked Jim.
“I am the Lord,” responded the voice.
“What happened to Saint Peter?” I asked, having always thought that he was the one who greeted souls at the gates of Heaven.
“He has been destroyed,” responded God sadly.
“That can be done?” asked Jim. “Who can destroy a saint?”
“There is much to be discussed,” said God and the gates of Heaven opened. “Enter and be informed of the dire state of your eternity.”
“That didn’t sound good,” whispered Jim as we entered Heaven.
I just shook my head in disgust at him. I couldn’t believe my best friend had gotten me killed.
We followed a ball of light that God told us to follow until we came to a large coliseum filled with people, all young-looking. We sat down at an available bench beside a man with rather bad teeth.
“How’s it going?” asked Jim, extending his hand.
“Pretty good, considering I was just killed by a chainsaw wielding maniac,” he responded with an English accent while shaking Jim’s hand. “I’m Anthony.”
“I’m Jim, and this is Stu,” said Jim.
“How’d you two die?” he asked casually.
“Some extra wide hummer was coming down the wrong side of the road and smacked head on with us,” answered Jim.
“Damn drunk drivers,” said Anthony.
“Tell me about it,” I said, shooting Jim a dirty look.
“Attention, please,” came another deep, yet beautiful voice. All heads in the coliseum turned to look at the speaker and saw a man great grace and beauty with large, white wings. “My name is Michael,” he continued, “And I’m sure you all want an explanation as to why you are sitting here instead of enjoying your eternity like you should be.”
He paused as a murmur spread through the rather large crowd of people. Looking around, I found it difficult to estimate exactly how many of us there were.
“Two days ago, we were attacked by the forces of Hell,” continued Michael. “The demons attacked and overwhelmed us.”
“I thought that there was supposed to be millions more angels than there are demons,” I whispered to Jim, recalling a documentary I saw on the Arts and Entertainment network. Jim shrugged.
“They slaughtered many of our saints, angels, and most importantly, the free spirits of deceased mortals,” Michael’s speech continued to ring throughout the coliseum. “Our forces fought valiantly. For every angel that fell, five demons fell with it. But it was not enough. Eventually I found myself fighting back to back with God against the demonic horde. We beat back the weakened monstrosities, but not before they took all they could from Heaven.
“God declared on that day that seven days hence there shall be retribution. The Lord has ordered me to wreak vengeance upon Hell. This I shall do, but I am but one angel, the last angel. The Lord saw this and told me to collect the free souls of the deceased to fight with me. All seven hundred thousand of you were killed since that terrible attack two days ago. You are all we have to save Heaven.”
Michael paused dramatically.
“I have four days to train you to become angels and fight alongside me on the seventh day to avenge the loss of all the good that God has created in Heaven. If we fail to cripple Satan’s forces on that day, then the dark prince will regroup his forces and attack again, this time destroying The Lord and all he has created for you and I.”
“I thought God had some master plan to prevent this from happening,” whispered Jim.
“It appears the church was incorrect,” Anthony whispered back.
“I cannot force you to fight with me,” continued Michael, “but if you do not, it will deplete our own forces and decrease our chances of crippling Satan’s horde. If need be, I’ll descend into the depths of Hell myself to confront Lucifer and all his minions of darkness. So who wants to lay down their soul to Satan and who wants to come with me?”
There was a slight pause as all Michael said sunk into our minds. Then I found myself to be the first to stand up.
“I’ll go,” I shouted.
“Let’s kick some demon ass!” yelled Jim rising next to me.
Soon we were standing in the largest coliseum imaginable with seven hundred thousand people shouting for the blood of demons. All I was thinking was what the Hell was I doing?
Once Michael had calmed us down, he commenced with the first part of training. For the remainder of that day, he taught us all that was expected of angels of God. We were to be noble, yet humble. Caring, yet detached. Pacifistic, yet violent. It was pretty oxymoronic to me. Our first loyalty was to be to God, then Heaven, then humankind, then ourselves. We were not to judge people based on anything. We were told to regard all people as equals until God judged them. We were to be the sworn enemy of demons and to kill them on sight. Few of us had problems with that one.
On the second day, we were divided into two groups: The Angels of Vengeance and the Angels of Mercy. Anthony, Jim, and many others, and I were sent with Michael to become Angels of Vengeance while the rest were sent to God to become Angels of Mercy. The Angels of Mercy were to become healers, while we were to become warriors.
We were given steel swords. They were sharper than the katanas crafted by the Japanese master smiths. We convened on a great plain of cloud. Michael taught us the rudiments of sword fighting and soon we were sparring with each other. I, like everybody else, found myself learning at an incredible rate.
As we progressed in skill, we were told to take our swords to a sacred stream where we dipped the blade in the crystal clear water. The blades glowed slightly for a moment before returning to their metallic luster. Michael dipped his own sword in, then swung sharply at Anthony. Anthony’s block wasn’t fast enough and Michael’s blade passed through his neck. We all gasped. Then Anthony rubbed his neck and found himself whole.
“Your blades have been blessed by The Lord,” announced Michael. “They shall not harm a creature of righteousness and shall strike with even deadlier force against the foes of The Lord.”
We spent the rest of the day perfecting our fighting techniques in large melees where we could slash each other without inflicting damage.
On the third day, we were given our wings. I had always thought that an angel was supposed to earn his wings by good deeds, but our forces needed the mobility provided by them. We spent the remainder of the third day learning to fly and all the tricks, such as barrel rolls and how to pull out of a nose dive, that went along with it.
On the fourth day, we combined our flight capability with our fighting prowess and became, according to Michael, the deadliest force in the universe. I only hoped he was right. Tomorrow, the seventh day since the demonic attack, we would find out.
Tomorrow became today and Michael gathered the Angels of Vengeance on the cloudy plain.
“Today, is the day,” he proclaimed. “For four days you have been training. I know none of you believe that four days was enough, but it was. Because you have abandoned your mortal hindrances, four days was more than enough to mold you into the righteous soldiers you all now are. Today we shall descend into the depths of Hell, followed by the Angels of Mercy, to confront Satan. Should you see the Prince of Darkness, do not engage him. He cannot perish until he faces me in Heaven. We are only to engage his minions and significantly diminish their number. Should you fall, do not worry. The Angels of Mercy will tend to your wounds so you may continue your glorious wrath upon the dark horde. This shall be our most glorious day until our day of judgment. May your swords sing of the glory of God.”
With that, the clouds parted and Michael flew through them, followed by the Angels of Vengeance. We saw ourselves approaching Earth, a volcano on Earth, to be exact. Michael dived into it. We all followed.
The heat was intense, but not as overwhelming as I had thought it would be. After hours of descending in a dive into the centre of the Earth, we saw our first action. A swarm of half-vulture, half-woman beasts assaulted us, coming out from nooks and crannies in the rocks.
“Harpies,” I muttered, remembering their description from mythology.
A huge aerial melee ensued as I saw five harpies coming at Jim and I. Without hesitation, Jim charged. His wide swing sliced through all five of them, but left himself open to a counter attack. A harpy was diving at him from his left side. Seeing that Jim had no time to move his sword back into a defensive position, I intercepted and skewered his assailant. I then saw him regain composure and thrust his sword through my chest. The scream of a harpy behind me relaxed my mind from the belief that Jim had tried to kill me for a second time.
The unholy sounds of defeated harpies and angels rang throughout the vertical cave as they fell into the depths below. I found myself hovering beside Michael.
“Do not worry, my friend,” he said, noticing my look of concern for our fallen comrades. “The Angels of Mercy should be along to help them. Until then, we must cover them from the unholy.”
He gave the signal for advance and continued his dive. I followed and found myself flanked by Jim and Anthony. Soon, we reached the bottom.
We found the prone forms of many harpies and a few angels. There was a large wooden gate with double doors on which were written: “Abandon all hope ye who enter here.”
“That’s fairly ominous,” said Anthony.
“You expected something uplifting?” I asked.
Michael ordered a small group to stay behind and defend the wounded, then kicked open the gate of Hell.
“Remember,” he yelled, “move fast and strike anything demonic!”
With that, he charged and we all charged with him. It wasn’t long before we were ambushed. As we entered a large cavern, demons rose out of the ground, walls, and ceiling. The combat that followed was even more fierce than before. Many angels took to wing and engaged in aerial combat while others remained on the ground to deal with the wingless horrors. I elected to stay on the ground with Jim while Anthony took off into the air. Time had no meaning as Jim and I fought back to back against the seemingly ceaseless horde of demons. Then it happened. The body of a beaten angel fell from above and hit me in the right shoulder, knocking me to the ground. I tried to get up, but it was too late.
“Jim!” I yelled as the demons swarmed over me. Seeing my plight, he turned to help, using his wings to buffet enemies from behind.
“Stu’s down!” he shouted over the din of the battle.
The rest remained all too fresh in my memory. My friends and comrades were retreating. Was this to be my fate? Was I to die in Hell defending the glory of God?
It appeared so.
Then I saw the worst sight yet. I saw Satan.
To say he had red skin, dark hair, goat legs, horns, and a goatee would be technically accurate, but it wouldn’t describe the aura of fear he created. My vision cleared enough to see the swarm of demons part before him as he approached me.
He stopped in front of me and surveyed the destruction caused by our attack. I heard the moaning of many, many other wounded angels coming from all around me.
“You were the first to rise up and join Michael,” said the Prince of Darkness, his voice so horribly evil that it chilled me to the bone, despite the heat. “You shall be the last to die. Abandon your hopes of rescue by the Angels of Mercy. The horde of demons I sent attacked Heaven right after you left. It won’t be long before my High Fiends hunt down and destroy Michael before they begin feasting upon humanity. God has failed.”
He turned and walked away, leaving me in the clutches of his sadistic minions. It had been two days since I had gained my wings, now they lay shattered by my sides. I had fallen from grace and was now forced to watch the demise of those who fell with me before I, too, met my oblivion. If Satan was telling the truth and had destroyed the Angels of Mercy, then all hope for Heaven must surely be lost.
I sighed my final sigh before consigning myself to the will of the darkness.
“I tried,” I whispered through a broken jaw.
If only trying had been enough.
But my heart was lifted as my mind realized something important about the master of my tormentors. Satan was the Prince of Lies.