Archangel Evolution (6 page)

“Show me now,” Taylor demanded.

Gabriel shrugged. “I guess it could only help
at this point.” He moved to the floor, a narrow space of shag
carpet between his bed and desk. Pulling Taylor after him, he
instructed: “Sit cross-legged, arms out to the side, hands open and
relaxed meditation-style.”

Once in position, Taylor instinctively closed
her eyes before being told. “Now what?”

“Clear your mind.”

Damn, that might be a problem.
Taylor
had never been good at this meditation crap. Anything that required
intense concentration and thought control was difficult for her.
She had given up on meditation, prayer, and even yoga a long time
ago. Now, even as she tried to focus, all she could think about
were rabbits: brown ones with floppy ears; white ones with black
spots and twitching noses; big ones, small ones, cute ones, ugly
ones; some were hopping, others eating carrots and chewing on
grass. She even spotted a giant Easter bunny, complete with a
basket full of painted eggs. As she watched the lumbering animal
hop towards her, it opened its mouth to reveal several sets of
razor sharp teeth. Two or three mauled rabbits hung from its lips,
dripping blood and contorted grotesquely. Taylor shuddered at the
thought and opened her eyes.

Gabriel was staring at her oddly as if he had
seen into her thoughts. “Not able to clear your mind, huh?”

“You don’t wanna know,” Taylor said.

“It gets easier the more you practice. Try
this. Close your eyes again…” Obediently, Taylor snapped her eyes
shut and waited for the furry freaks to reappear, but for the
moment they had disappeared. Gabriel continued: “If you can’t clear
your mind, you can think of things that have a similar effect. For
example, try imagining yourself in a well-lit room. I’m the only
other person there.”

To her surprise, Taylor was able to conjure
up the image. It was the hotel-like room that Taylor stayed in
whenever she visited the Lair. She pictured herself sitting on the
couch next to Gabriel. “Now, imagine there’s a bed in the room,”
Gabriel said.

“It’s already there. Hey…wait a minute…you’re
not trying to seduce me in my thoughts are you?” Taylor asked, her
eyes snapping open.

Gabriel sighed. “No, Taylor. Can we
continue?”

Taylor stared at him for a few more seconds,
trying to detect a lie. Finally, she closed her eyes and reimagined
the picture that Gabriel had painted.

Gabriel said, “Now watch as I turn off the
lights. It is completely dark now.” Taylor saw the Gabriel-thought
in her head stand up and walk to the wall. He flipped the light
switch and all went black.

“Okay,” Taylor confirmed.

“Good. Now, think about feeling your way over
to the bed in the dark. What do you feel?”

Concentrating hard, Taylor thought about how
she would stand up, reach with her arms, and take the three steps
required to get to the bed. On step two, she felt a pain in her
knees and then she was falling, falling, crashing, tumbling,
hitting her head, and coming to a stop against the foot of the bed.
“Ouch!” Taylor yelped.

“What happened?” Gabriel asked, a
high-pitched twinge of alarm creeping into his voice.

“Just my uncontrollable brain working
overtime again. I tripped on something.” Gabriel laughed and Taylor
said, “Shut the hell up.”

“Yes, ma’am.” With sarcasm added, Gabriel
said, “Okay, now pick yourself up and dust yourself off from your
imagined fall, and then get into bed.”

Taylor daydreamed how it would feel to
clamber onto the bed and snake-crawl her way to the pillow. It felt
awkward, but the bed was soft and warm and cozy. Weariness overcame
her, as if she hadn’t slept for days. She could feel the
overwhelming pull of gravity on every bone and muscle in her
body.

Gabriel said, “Now imagine falling asleep and
dreaming about only good things that have happened in your past.
Like birthdays, family holidays, first kisses, love, friends, that
kind of thing.”

Into Taylor’s head screamed an unwanted
vision: She was in a car, in the backseat; someone else was
driving. A woman—her mother, Nancy Kingston. Her mom was humming
along to some old tune playing on the car radio. Taylor didn’t
recognize the song. It was dark out, but her mother seemed wide
awake, snapping her fingers and driving with one hand. The car
approached a familiar T-intersection; the light was green. As they
peeled through the crossroads and gradually turned left onto the
adjacent road, something caught Taylor’s attention out the left
window. A dark and sinister monster bore down upon the four-door
sedan, staring at them with pale, gleaming eyes. Tires screeched;
someone screamed; metal shrieked and crunched and ripped and tore.
All was silent, silent, silent. And then knocking. On the
passenger-side front window. Taylor turned her head. A teenage kid
was pounding on the window. His bike lay tossed aside on the cement
sidewalk. A witness to the accident. He was shouting, but Taylor
couldn’t make out the words. Remembering her mom, Taylor climbed
over the front consol. Her mother was slumped in the driver’s seat,
her body pinned to the leather upholstery by a tangled mass of
metal from her door. Flakes of shattered glass coated her like
sprinkles on a cupcake. A deflated airbag served as a blanket,
pierced in three or four places by plumes of metal. Then she saw
the blood and her breath caught in her throat. There was so much
blood. She realized her mom’s eyes were open and that she was
staring. But when Taylor followed her gaze, she saw that she was
looking at nothing; her eyes were blank, lifeless, unrepresentative
of the previously full of life orbs that had once laughed, cried,
reprimanded, and empowered. Her mother was dead. Again.

Taylor was suddenly aware of arms holding
her, warming her. She opened her eyes but her vision was blurred by
fountains of tears welling from tiny ducts, spreading their salt
along warm riverbeds.

“It’s okay, Taylor,” Gabriel said. “It’s
going to be okay. We are done practicing for today.”

Taylor pulled her boyfriend close and for
once allowed herself the luxury of being vulnerable, of being held,
of being protected, of being cared for. Eventually the tears
stopped and she used the shoulder of her shirt to wipe away the
residual wetness. She looked at Gabriel. “Thanks,” she said. “I
saw…”

“I know,” Gabriel said, cutting her off.
“Next time, you might want to try using something more pleasant,
although your technique of thinking about the saddest memory will
technically also work to keep Dionysus from penetrating your
dreams. You have to practice this every night if you want to be
successful.”

“Will I dream about the things that I was
just thinking about?” Taylor asked numbly.

“Not necessarily, but it will allow your mind
to block any unwanted intrusions.”

“Okay.”

“You should rest.”

“Yeah.”

“Want me to stay with you?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay.”

Gabriel helped Taylor to her feet and then
scooped her up and set her on her back at the far side of the bed,
against the wall. He slipped in after her and pulled the covers
over both of them.

Taylor smirked. “What?” Gabriel asked.

“Just because you ended up in bed with me
doesn’t mean you successfully seduced me.”

Gabriel laughed. “I know that. But the result
is the same.”

Taylor nodded. She kissed him deeply while
clawing at his shirt.

S
amantha cleared her
throat. She said, “Cliff, there must be some way that we can move
the planning phase along a bit quicker. People are getting hurt out
there.”

Clifford smiled at her; it was a fatherly
smile. He liked Sam and she knew it. And she milked it for all it
was worth. No one else could get away with calling the head of the
Eldership of the demons by a shortened version of his first name.
But Sam could. In Clifford’s eyes, she could do no wrong.

After Sam and Chris had learned of the
unfortunate attack on Hell’s Angels, they had talked for a long
time. Taylor and Gabriel had left to visit Sampson and to do who
knows what else and it gave the couple a chance to think about
things. Despite her generally peaceful nature, Sam was of the
opinion that the only choice was to take the fight to the angels
immediately, and not stop until Dionysus was either captured or
dead. Chris didn’t think it was that simple, but he agreed that a
plan needed to be finalized—and fast.

Once they were in agreement, Chris had
teleported them to the Lair and they had requested a special
audience with Clifford, which had been granted almost immediately.
Given his rapid rise through the ranks of demon leadership, Chris
was entitled to certain privileges. They were in Clifford’s office,
sitting side by side—the top demon was on the other side of a wide,
thick, wooden desk. Clifford sat in a tall, plush chair that was
adorned with gold plating and jewels; it was reminiscent of the
seat you would expect someone of the same stature as King Arthur of
Camelot to rest his buttocks upon.

Despite the fact that he had aged well,
Clifford appeared ancient next to Chris, with deep lines in his
forehead and around his eyes. A dark mop of hair sat upon his head
like a toupee—and Sam wondered if a strong enough gust of wind
would knock it straight off. His black eyebrows were as bushy as
raccoon tails, as if they had been growing unchecked for decades. A
well-trimmed beard coated his cheeks, chin, and just under his
nose. Every time Sam saw him she thought of Sean Connery, although
Clifford was a much darker, more mysterious version of the aging
actor.

Clifford said, “We have to be patient.” Sam
had heard him say this single phrase so many times she was
beginning to think it was his personal mantra. “The incident today
was unfortunate, but we lose dozens of demons every month—sadly,
casualties are a major part of war. But we can’t overreact each
time it happens.”

“I understand that, Cliff, but this is not a
normal time for the War, don’t you agree?” Sam said.

“I do, and that’s why we are close to
finalizing our strategy for what we hope will be the final act of
this grand play.”

“Let’s be honest, Cliff, you’ve been saying
that for a week. How close are you really?”

“It’s classified,” Clifford said.

To this point Chris had been silent, despite
Sam’s agreement to let him do most of the talking. Finally, she
turned to him, giving him a beseeching look.

He said, “C’mon, sir. You’re going to tell me
eventually and then I will tell Sam, you know that.”

“I do, which is why I have kept you out of
the loop thus far.”

“Why does it matter if Sam knows?” Chris
asked.

Sam frowned. She was missing something.
Something important. The pieces to the puzzle were on the table,
but either she couldn’t figure out how they fit together, or she
was missing one. Chris was always privy to the latest war news,
especially the crap involving strategy. And, of course, he always
told her what he knew. But now he was being blocked out because of
his relationship with her. But why?

It clicked.

Her eyebrows rose and her eyes widened.
“Taylor is involved! Seriously involved! Let me guess: You’re
sending her on a highly risky mission, one that she may never come
back from—alive that is.”

Clifford sighed. He stroked his dark beard
and looked at the ceiling. Without saying a word, he had as much as
admitted the truth of Sam’s guess.

Sam’s elation at having solved the mystery
gave way to nagging frustration. “I’m not some child that needs to
be told her dad’s on a business trip when he’s actually abandoned
his family, that he’s never coming home, that birthdays and
Christmases and track meets will be a broken-family affair. She’s
my friend—no, my best friend—yeah, but it’s not like I would try to
stop her from going or something. Not if that’s what she wanted to
do. But I deserve to know what she’s doing, especially when her
life is in danger, before she is brought home in a body bag—or
worse, not brought home at all.” Having not taken a breath during
her rant, Sam paused to suck in a swell of air. It gave Clifford a
chance to respond.

“Sam, please. I know you’re not a child, but
I was only trying to protect you. I was going to tell you, or have
Taylor tell you, but I wanted it to be nearer to the start of the
mission. That way, you would be able to enjoy your friend’s company
without worrying about her.”

The sincerity in his eyes, in his voice—the
fatherly concern—caused Sam’s narrowed eyes to widen and her mouth
to form into an
O
. “Oh,” she said. “Oh, Cliff, I’m sorry. I
didn’t mean to—”

“I know, my dear. I know. You were right, I
should have just told you. And you, Chris.”

Chris said, “It’s okay, sir, we all make
mistakes. So….what is this mission exactly?”

Sam immediately imagined the worse. Maybe
Taylor would be sent alone, directly into the belly of the beast,
on a suicide mission with the best case scenario being that she
would kill Dionysus just before being killed herself. Or perhaps
she would be traded for Gabriel’s brother, David, and left to be
beaten, brainwashed, or slaughtered, vulnerable to the whims of a
madman. Sam held her breath.

Clifford said, “She will be part of a special
task force with one ultimate goal: to kill Dionysus and the
remaining Archangels—Johanna, Sarah, and Percy. We hope that if we
cut off the head, we might be able to subdue the rest of the
beast.”

Sam let out a stream of breath, her lips
puckered like she was giving someone a kiss.
A task force.
That sounded like a team—in other words, not alone. Team was better
than alone. Sam said, “Who else will be on the task force?”