Chapter 27
It all happens in a blur. One moment, we’re standing there in formation, weapons drawn, muscles taut and ready to spring, and the next we’re in the thick of a flood of similarly armed angels of all castes and types. Our two sides are so close to each other at the town line that the enemy soldiers blend into our battalions almost immediately. It only takes a second for almost most of my soldiers to become lost to my line of vision amid the onslaught of the invading army. All I can see are the angels in front of me and beside me, and sense the ones directly behind me. If Jonathan’s soldiers weren’t wearing their distinctive black uniforms, I wouldn’t even know with any certainty who is one of us and who isn’t.
My seer instincts kick in swiftly in the melee, and I cut down foe after foe with relative ease. Of all the weapons we’ve used in practice, the sword is still the one that comes easiest to me, though I’m skilled enough with the others. As one enemy angel after another comes at me and I run them through with my magic-infused blade, I crane my neck this way and that to try to spot Sam, Ella, my brothers, or anyone I know. It’s useless. They’re lost in the sea of battle, and it appears for all the world as if I’m fighting the enemy on my own.
Soon, they’re coming at me two and three at a time, trying to take down the powerful seer who is quickly amassing a pile of their dead and wounded brethren around her. To my surprise and delight, I find it’s just as easy to take on groups of them as it is to do it one on one. I’m almost an army on my own, and seeing a noticeable reduction in the size of Jonathan’s forces is gratifying. However, I’m getting tired of not knowing where my loved ones are. If any of them are hurt, I need to get to them. The only way to do that is to clear this crowd out a little, just enough to gain some viewing space. Right now, it’s nothing but a sea of soldiers.
I know it’s stupid, but I sheath my sword. This is going to require two hands and some concentration, if I can do it at all. This is an un-tested power I’m about to deploy, and one I only know of from the intuition pushing at the front of my mind, telling me to do it. So, as another wave of Jonathan’s soldiers come toward me, I hold out both arms straight at either side, and reach deep inside myself to find the flowing energy of the universe that’s always moving through everyone. Few ever know it, much less manage to access it. I believe I can.
Once I feel it, which I do quickly, I grab onto it with my mind. It’s pure power, all full of possibilities, creativity, and brash kinetic force. It demands to be released, but I must do it in a controlled manner to get it to do what I want it to do. Concentrating, I move it down my body and force it out through my palms. I feel the warmth in my palms as the energy builds up behind them. Unfurling my fingers, I let it go. White light shoots from my hands, knocking down the soldiers to my sides as far away as a dozen feet from me.
Holy crap, it worked! Nice work, Intuition.
I immediately turn ninety degrees and do it again, taking down the soldiers in front of and behind me. I don’t know if they’re dead or just stunned, and I don’t care. I just want to see some of my own people. I specifically target the energy to identify Jonathan’s army and only take them down, so my own soldiers will be unaffected by it.
My trick is effective, but it doesn’t go unnoticed. I no longer need to look around for my people. The battle has stopped, and everyone, I mean everyone is staring at me. In fact, they seem frozen in place, their weapons raised mid-fight. But their faces are all turned toward me.
Well, I got their attention. Good. Maybe the enemy will realize this is one army that isn’t to be trifled with and go home.
The clang of swords, swoosh of arrows, and clacking of spears of just a moment ago is gone. Absolute silence hangs heavily over the town. Even my own soldiers didn’t expect this, though they’ve seen me do similar things in practice. It was always accidental when I released the universe’s energy in the past, though; this time, it was deliberate. Sam said I would learn to control it, and when it really counted, I did, and it was like the most natural thing in the world. Sam’s always right about these things.
My people look visibly thrilled at this new development. Jonathan’s soldiers, on the other hand, look horrified. Excellent.
With the lull in activity opening up the crowd a little bit, I spot Sam quickly. He is about three dozen feet away, locked in battle with Jonathan himself, swords pressed against each other high above their heads. I should have expected no less. Of course Jonathan was going to go for Sam and leave the rest of us to his soldiers. I can see now that he is reconsidering the wisdom of this strategy.
Sam, like everyone else, is visibly surprised by my nuclear blast, but he’s also beaming with pride. Jonathan looks like he’s just seen the Lock Ness Monster.
Ella is not far behind Sam, battling a random soldier, and I see my brothers and other friends doing the same. We’ve lost some people, both humans and angels, but no one I know very well. It doesn’t make it any less upsetting; I feel a twinge of sadness at each bloody body I see that belonged to one of our soldiers. But, we knew to expect casualties when we began training. It’s only mildly gratifying to see we’ve managed to take out more of them than they have of us. I hate to see anyone die needlessly, and this all seems immensely needless, all this suffering and devastation because of the ambitions of one insane angel and those scared or crazy enough to follow him.
It’s time to take advantage of the break in the fighting.
“Remember me?” I call out to Jonathan, whose gaze is boring into me with a malevolent, almost physical force. He raises his eyes to meet mine full on, and for a second, the angel blue of them flashes a deep black. OK, that was weird. I shudder a little. I’ve never seen an angel do that, and I’m sure it can’t be good.
He lowers his head slightly, as if he’s about to charge me. “You,” he hisses, drawing the word out long and lightly, like a snake. Well, now I know where the inspiration for the serpent in the Garden of Eden came from…if it wasn’t Jonathan, it was an angel an awful lot like him.
“Yes, me,” I say, defiance creeping into my voice, suddenly so over this whole thing. I’m angry. This wanna-be super villain has disrupted my life, put my family and friends in danger, and is threatening not only my planet, but my whole universe. Who the hell does he think he is? He’s no better than any other angel. Why are so many of them following him?
“You recognize me?” I shout back, furious now. “Good! Don’t ever forget this face, Jonathan. It will be the last one you ever see, trust me. Maybe today, maybe not. But when the time comes, it will be. Memorize it.”
“You took my blade,” he growls, low and grumbly. He apparently means to sound threatening, but I just laugh. Drunk on the dizzying power I just harnessed, I’m becoming bold.
“I did,” I admit, openly. “You remember my energy signature, too. I was hoping you would.”
“What are you?” he asks, shaking his head, his expression a weird mix of wonderment and disgust. Slowly, he lowers his blade and steps away from Sam, slinking carefully toward me, taking each step as soundlessly as he would if he were approaching a dangerous predator and trying to keep it docile.
“I’m a seer. Really, Jonathan, I thought you would be able to spot the obvious. The only humans here are seers like me.”
“Not like you,” he insists, coming nearer. “Not like you at all. There’s something different about you. Something I’ve never encountered. You took my blade. No one can get that close to me without me noticing. Even if you changed your vibration level, I would have known. And what you just did with your hands….”
He trails off, at a loss for words.
“What’s so special about me, then, Jonathan? Tell me. You’ve been from one end of this galaxy to the other. What makes me so different from any other being you’ve encountered?”
“I don’t know yet,” he says, his voice taking on a dangerous edge, his eyes blue again and glinting like steel. “But I’m going to find out. And then I’ll make you a weapon for me.”
r /> I shake my head, amazed at his arrogance. As if I would fight for him. “Not. Going. To. Happen.”
“We’ll see about that.” He turns to the soldiers nearest me. “Take her alive, and bring her to our camp.”
Sam teleports directly in front of me.
“No one’s touching her, you villain,” he snarls, wilder than I’ve ever heard him. He raises his sword and holds it completely vertical, directly in front of him, indicating he means to defend me.
Jonathan just glares at us and watches. A contingent of his soldiers moves in on either side of me, not wasting any time in following their leader’s orders. Sam turns to face the ones coming up on my right, and I sense Ella moving closer to the ones on my left.
I appreciate their protectiveness, but it won’t be necessary. Not today, anyway.
Using the power I still feel flowing through me, I leap high over the heads of the contingent on the right, landing neatly on the other side, and turn to face them. This puts both contingents in front of me. They rush at me, intent on eliminating Ella and Sam and taking me prisoner. They won’t get anywhere near us. Still harnessing that universal energy, I wave my hand at them, and they all freeze in place. Every last one of them, and it looks like there’s about a dozen.
I can feel the molecules that make them up stop moving and quiver instead. The molecules in the atmosphere around them do it, too. They’re like ice statues, frozen mid-stride.
Oh, man! I knew I almost froze time the other day! I was sure that’s what I was feeling building up behind my hands. Now, it seems I was right. What a cool power. Of all of them, I think this most recently discovered one is my favorite. I can imagine a hundred or more ways it will be useful.
How long the frozen angels will stay that way, I don’t know, but for now, I seem to have sufficiently cowed the other enemy soldiers. None of them seem willing to approach me. In fact, the ones closest to me who can still move all take a few steps back.
Ella and Sam gape at me, eyes wide. Still, they move in toward me, flanking me on each side.
“Got anything else?” I ask, turning back toward Jonathan, Ella and Sam moving with me, swords raised.
He nods toward the four archangels in his army. These are part of the most powerful angel caste in the universe. They are infinitely stronger than Jonathan. Why they’re following him is a mystery to everyone, including the two archangels on our side.
The archangels approach me on Jonathan’s command, and I freeze them as easily as I froze the others.
“I can do this all day, Jonathan,” I say with utter confidence. But really, can I? I have no idea. Best to just keep putting up a good front. As long as he thinks I can keep it up, there’s a better chance he’ll go away and take his soldiers with him.
“This presents an interesting challenge,” he muses, his voice slick and oozy like oil. It’s kind of sickening. If evil has a sound, I’m pretty sure that’s it. I wonder if the truly evil people who have walked the earth, people like Vlad the Impaler, Ivan the Terrible, and Ghengis Khan sounded the same.
“Just get out of here while you still can,” I say, putting an extra dose of exasperation into my tone, as if I have better things to do than fight his army and can’t be bothered with it one second longer than necessary. “Take your people and go, cause us no more trouble, and maybe I’ll let this all slide.”
“It seems to be the prudent course of action for now,” Jonathan agrees, sounding not angry now, but intrigued. “It isn’t what I would prefer, but it is plain we must come up with a new strategy. One that involves figuring out what you are and how to control you.”
“What I am is one pissed off seer you don’t want to mess with, and as for controlling me, you never will.”
“We’ll see about that.”
Then, quick as lightning, he lunges toward Sam, sword pointed directly at him. Sam is just as swift on the draw and is moving toward Jonathan in an instant.
Jonathan raises his sword in the air and begins to bring it down toward Sam’s neck. Sam lifts his own sword to parry the thrust, but I’m not willing to risk the chance of him getting stabbed, or even nicked, with that deadly weapon.
“No!” I scream, and fling my right hand outward, telekinetically tossing the sword from Jonathan’s hand.
“That’s what I thought,” Jonathan says with satisfaction.
Sam puts his hand to his neck, thoughtfully fingering the chain on his pendant. He knows he wasn’t in any real danger, and I know it, too. It was pure instinct that caused me to jump to his defense.
It was a noble move, but a tactical error, and we both know it. I feel nauseous. Jonathan now knows I have a weakness, and that weakness is Sam. He’ll look for a way to exploit this and use my love for Sam against me.
I just don’t expect him to do it so soon.
“Retreat!” he calls, and instantly, all of his soldiers disappear, leaving only the ones I’ve frozen. We’ll interrogate them later.
Jonathan remains behind. I’ve got him in my sights. Why not freeze him, too? Taking him as a prisoner in the first battle may make the others think twice about engaging us again.
I throw my hands out toward him, but the time freezing energy bounces off of him and up into space, where it dissipates. I try it again. The same thing happens. What the hell? It’s like he’s wearing some kind of magic shield.
“You didn’t think I was just any Earth Angel, did you, seer?” he sneers. “Come now. I haven’t traveled the galaxy and no returned with more powers than when I left. You’d be amazed at the beings who are out there, and what they can do. Some shared their knowledge with me willingly. Others required more ‘convincing.’”
I’m stunned. What has he done to himself that my time freezing power works on archangels but not him?
Once again, he levels his gaze on me. “I didn’t get your name,” he says, exceedingly politely. “I would like to know what to call my adversary. If you don’t mind.”
I look to Sam for his blessing. He nods back at me, indicating there’s no harm in it. He clearly believes Jonathan is going to leave us alone for the time being, so he doesn’t even bother moving away. What more can Jonathan do at this point, after all? I can take any weapon away from him, even if freezing isn’t an option.
Sam stays in place, sword drawn, defending me against any last minute attempts at shenanigans from Jonathan. Ella moves in even closer to me, her defensive posture indicating she’s acting as defense for both me and her brother.
“Lucy,” I say, proudly, quickly recovering from my momentary consternation. “Lucy McDonald. Something else besides my face I hope you won’t forget.”
“Oh, believe me, I won’t, Lucy McDonald” Jonathan replies, his voice hard and determined. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have places to go and angels to torture.”
“Wha…” I begin, but before I can get the word out, he produces a diamond wrist cuff seemingly from nowhere, slaps it on Sam’s arm, and disappears, taking Sam with him. It all happens so fast, I don’t have time to react until it’s done. Not that I could have done anything to stop him, anyway. He and Sam were too close to each other for me see what he was doing until he did it. Sam obviously wasn’t expecting it, either.
Oh yes. Jonathan tested me. And I passed with flying colors. Sam is no longer his target. It’s me. And he knows the way to me is through Sam.
What’s worse, Sam is now Jonathan’s prisoner. God knows where the bastard took him. Sam’s gone, and it’s my fault.
I crumple to the ground and sob.