Heaven

Sebastian Gloom
Part Fifteen

The tunnel twisted and turned as it threaded its way through the final barrier between Heaven and Earth. Ahead of them they saw a pure, white light, and they all held their breaths as they drew close to the Blessed Realm. They passed a final bend, and suddenly the tunnel vanished, leaving them in a gloriously beautiful landscape of trees and meadow, with a sparkling river flowing through a wide valley and a sun shining down out of a cloudless blue sky. It was so perfectly beautiful that people cried out in wonder and astonishment, as well as exclamations of anger that they had been denied this for so long. The very air was like nectar in their lungs, filling their bodies with strength and nourishment, and the fragrance of flowers was carried to them by the very slightest of breezes. In the distance, Gloom saw a small group of people dressed in bright summer clothes running away in terror. They raced towards a pretty countryside cottage, dashed in through the front door and slammed it behind them. That's it, thought Gloom. The cat's out of the bag now.
“Heaven,” said Sammael as he dropped low to the ground and finally released the human souls he had carried there. “The image is as much an illusion as the flames of Hell. Those who dwell here have no feet to walk in the grass and no hands to pick the flowers. They are creatures of pure spirit, as are you. Nevertheless, it is a pleasing illusion, is it not?”
“Very pleasing,” said Gloom to himself, but he wondered whether the beautiful scenery eventually lost its ability to please in the same way that the flames of Hell had eventually lost its ability to torment the damned souls. Did the nightmare of eternal boredom wait to torment them as well? No, surely not. God would have found a way to save His chosen people from that fate, and it was to force God to share that solution with them that they were here, whether the majority of them knew it or not.
“Stay together!” warned the demon as the damned souls milled about uncertainly. “If we separate, we will be picked off individually. Only by the weight of our combined numbers will we prevail.” Many of the souls paid him no attention, though, and were running off into the utopian landscape. Selfish, opportunistic creatures, the true criminals who had truly belonged in Hell. They didn't care about noble causes or the need to correct injustices. They only saw an opportunity to gratify their desires immediately and were abandoning their fellows to seize it. Gloom had expected it, and so had the demon apparently because it made no great outcry, merely repeating its warning for the others to stay together. Gloom was rather surprised to see how few deserters there were, though. He estimated that less than a quarter of the souls that Sammael had brought there were abandoning them. The vast majority were standing fast, and Gloom felt a surge of real hope for the first time.
The hope lasted for maybe ten seconds before it was overwhelmed by a sick wave of fear as a vast cloud of radiance filled the sky. It looked like a thundercloud, but it shone as if composed of a titanic cloud of fireflies, and it moved with terrible purpose that made the gathered human souls tremble with apprehension. They sensed anger from it. Terrible anger so great that even the land and the sky might quail before it. It was as if a force of nature had been wakened to fury by their presence, and it was so large that even Sammael, whom they’d thought was a titanic, monstrous creature, was dwarfed by it. “Behold!” thundered the demon. “Netzach approaches!”
“Well, here we go,” said Benson, and Gloom was delighted to see his former manservant standing by his side once more. “This is where the fun starts.”
“Sammael thinks we can take it,” replied the investigator. “Maybe it's just pretending to be confident, but we have to at least try if we're to face the rest of eternity with any self respect at all.”
“Right,” replied Benson. “Here's to trying.”
As it approached, the angel took on a more human form, becoming a huge man dressed in a shining white robe, his face stern and terrible. It had two pairs of wings spreading wide behind it, each larger than the largest airship, and in its hand it was holding a sword that blazed with white fire. It hung in the sky above them, it’s very size seeming to press down upon them, withering hope and casting despair like a shadow. More damned human souls fled from it, all thought of defiance crushed by the mere sight of the loyal servant of God.
“Hear my words, ye damned,” it spoke, and its voice trembled the ground and echoed back from the hills and buildings around them like thunder. “Return to Hell. Thou hast no place here. Return of thy own free will, or thou shalt be returned by sword and fire.” It raised its sword as if there had been any doubt about what it had meant.
“Netzach,” said Sammael, rising to hang before the angel with a few beats of his great black wings. “Join us. You have seen the cruelty and injustice of God. Help us to end it...” Before he could complete the sentence the angel swung the sword, which left a trail of fire behind it as it flew through the air. It sliced through the demon's dark, scaly body, severing an arm and opening a huge gash in its side. Sammael cried out in pain and launched itself at the angel, sprouting more arms as it did so and using them to grab hold of its opponent like a dark octopus, pinning two of its wings to its sides. Its weight caused the angel to drop towards the ground and the human souls below tensed up in apprehension, but Netzach gave a great flap of its two free wings that sent it high up into the air again.
Sammael's injury was already healing and he reached out for the angel’s remaining wings with more arms, but Netzach swung the sword again, severing half of them and bringing another cry of pain from the demon. Sammael released its hold on the angel’s wings and reached for its sword arm instead. Netzach gave a grunt of effort as it tried to wrench itself free of the demon's grip, but Sammael had a firm hold of the angel’s wrist and twisted it hard in an attempt to make it drop the sword. Instead, though, Netzach reached around with its other hand to take the sword from its trapped hand and swung it a third time, aiming for the demons head. Sammael ducked and the flaming blade passed harmlessly over its head.
“Enough!” cried the angel. “Cease this pointless stupidity!” Sammael ignored it and released its grip on Netzach’s wrist, which allowed it to make another grab for its wings. This time it ensnared three of them in its long, black limbs, sending a flurry of white feathers drifting down to the ground, and the angel sank back down towards the sunlit meadow. Gloom and the other human souls gathered beneath it, reaching up ready to grab hold of it, but Netzach looked down and saw the danger. Seeing the need to free itself from the demon, which was now riding on its back in a position where it couldn't easily reach it with its sword, it instead opened its mouth and spoke a word that hit Sammael and the human souls like a flash of lightning.
Gloom felt the word tearing at him, sending a spike of agony through him as great as the first touch of the flames upon his flesh when he'd arrived in Hell. The Name of God, he somehow knew. The angel had spoken the Name of God, which had the same effect on any damned creature as a splash of acid on bare flesh. He became aware that he was lying on the ground, that he and all the other damned souls were writhing around in pain and confusion, totally incapable of any kind of coherent action. It's over, he thought in despair. Just like that, It’s over.
Sammael wasn't quite ready to give up, though. It had heard the Name of God before, during the first rebellion, and it quickly recovered from the initial shock and paralysis. Netzach had used the time to grasp the demon with its right hand, though, and pull it free from the grip it had had upon it. It held the demon in front of it, glaring at it with anger and contempt, and lifted the sword, ready to deliver a blow that would cut the demon entirely in half.
Sammael lifted several arms in at attempt to ward off the blade, and the descending sword cut through them, sending severed limbs and a shower of gore to fall on the still helpless human souls below. The blade had been deflected from its path enough for it to miss the greater part of the demon’s body, though, and only grazed its side, opening a great strip of black, scaly hide. The demon then reached out with its only remaining limb and grasped the blade, losing clawed fingers as it tried to hold onto the divinely sharp edge. At the same time, though, it opened its fanged mouth and uttered a word that cast a pall of darkness across Heaven and that made the angel give a gasp of shock and repugnance.
The Profane Word had a revitalizing effect on the human souls below, who had been recovering in any case, and Gloom leapt to his feet as his head immediately cleared. He saw Sammael taking advantage of the angel’s momentary discomfiture, tearing itself free from its grasp and making a third attempt to find the angel’s wings with a new cluster of arms that sprang from its body. This time it succeeded and Netzach dropped further, crying out in fury and frustration. Several of the human souls found one of the angel’s legs just above their heads and reached out, grabbing hold of a colossal sandal and being pulled off the ground as Netzach fought its way back into the air.
More damned souls grabbed the first around the legs before they were pulled too far out of reach, and were in turn grabbed by others as they were also lifted into the air. Netzach looked down in annoyance at the daisychain of souls dangling from its foot and shook its leg in an attempt to shake them off. Several souls did indeed fall back to the ground, but the momentary distraction allowed Sammael to consolidate its grip on the angel’s wings, tangling them up in a profusion of arms that burst from its body like a nest of snakes. The angel fell again, hitting the ground hard, and the massed human souls swarmed all over it.
The angel reached around with a perfect white hand, seized Sammael by the scruff of the neck and wrenched it free, allowing it to spread its wings again, but by then it was held down by the mass of human souls clinging to whatever part of its body or clothing they could reach. Netzach struggled back to its feet and brushed hundreds of souls from its body with a sweep of its hands. They fell to the ground and immediately ran to climb back aboard. Sammael, meanwhile, launched itself back at the angel and clung to its sword arm. Netzach cried out in fury, but Gloom thought he could detect a trace of uncertainty in its voice now. It opened its mouth wide again, preparing to utter the Name of God for a second time, but Sammael saw it in time and rammed a long clawed hand deep down its throat.
Netzach gagged on the hand and bit down hard, its perfect white teeth cutting through flesh and causing demonic blood to spray in all directions. More souls were climbing onto it all the time, though, and it began to bow down under the weight. Gloom found himself clinging to the legs of the young woman above him while others hung onto his own legs and shoulders. Human bodies were packed all around him, squirming and shifting, the pressure making it hard for him to breathe until he remembered that he no longer needed to breathe. The entire mass of bodies lurched to the side as the angel shifted under them and several fell away. He felt his own grip on the shapely legs beginning to slip and tightened his hold, hearing the legs' owner gasp with the effort of holding onto the person above her.
Sammael had wrapped itself tightly around the angel’s sword arm now and bent its head down to bite its wrist. Netzach bellowed with thunderous anger but was thoroughly pinned beneath the mass of human souls now and could do nothing as the demon bit through tendons and bone. A moment later it had severed the angels’s hand, and although the stump immediately began to heal, growing a new hand, Sammael had the sword now, the white flames dancing on the blade burning as brightly as ever. The demon angled it towards Netzach's chest, where there was a gap in the mass of human souls, and thrust the blade into the angel up to the hilt.
Netzach bellowed with pain and gave a mighty spasm that threw most of the human souls off it, including Gloom. He rolled on the ground and struggled back to his feet to see Sammael swinging the sword, bringing it down in a savage arc that cleaved Netzach's shoulder blade and cut the angel almost in half. The angel immediately began healing, but Sammael kept swinging the sword, inflicting one terrible injury after another faster then the angel’s body could recover. The human souls still clinging to Netzach dropped away and retreated to a safe distance, those that had suffered injuries cradling broken limbs and spilled entrails while they healed.
“We have been victorious,” said Sammael as it delivered yet another cut from the sword. “I will remain and hold Netzach here. You must go on and assist your fellows who may not be as successful as we.”
“Which way?” someone asked.
“North,” replied the demon, taking a moment from the torment of Netzach to point. “That way lies the Throne of God. You will find many Powers and Dominions between here and there. Many of them may already have been subdued. If not, you must assist those of your fellows who continue the effort.”
“How long can you keep that up?” asked Gloom, moving to the front of the crowd.
“Forever,” replied Sammael. “God created us to be able to perform a task forever, such as moving the sun across the sky, without weariness or complaint. I can hold Netzach here forever unless another angel intervenes. Go now. Time may be precious.”
Gloom wasn't happy about leaving the demon after all it had done for them, but he could see the sense in what it was saying. “He's right,” he told the other souls gathered around him. “We have to go. The war's barely started.” He led the way in the direction Sammael had indicated, Benson and Nacoma beside him once more, and the other souls fell in behind.
They soon saw other angels being held in place by victorious demons, some repeatedly jabbing at their opponents with captured weapons, others simply binding them with rubbery limbs wrapped around their arms and wings, all of them looking as though they were willing to continue doing so for the rest of eternity. They joined up with other bands of damned human souls until Gloom estimated that there must have been over a million of them in their group alone, and he guessed that there were others, equally large or larger, converging on the Throne of God from all directions. Their movement seemed to be gathering an unstoppable momentum and Gloom began to hope that victory would soon be theirs.
Then they saw a wall of men ahead of them, standing in their path like an impassable barrier. They were glittering in the sunlight, and as they got closer Gloom saw that it was because they were wearing armour and carrying steel weapons. Blessed souls, the rightful occupants of Heaven, standing ready to repel the invaders. The damned souls, still naked and weaponless, wavered uncertainly. They outnumbered the blessed souls several times over, but the weapons carried by their opponents gave them the advantage and Gloom's imagination conjured up a nightmare scene of damned souls being repeatedly chopped to pieces, a scene that he knew was being repeated in the minds of everyone around him. They’ll give up, he thought. They'll just turn and run, all the way back to Hell.
The blessed souls jeered and shouted, waving their weapons in the air in an attempt to intimidate the invaders, and then they came marching forward, chanting words in praise of God as they came. Many damned souls turned and fled, and most of the others took steps backwards, expressions of fear on their faces. Despite their experiences in Hell, where they'd learned that pain was an illusion and physical injuries were only temporary, they still had an Instinctive fear of sharp steel that logic and reason was incapable of defeating. They backed away as the defenders of Heaven advanced, therefore, giving back the ground they’d taken, and Gloom knew that as soon as they reached the first of the defeated angels behind them the blessed souls would release them, further increasing the odds against the forces of Hell.
They have to be stopped, thought Gloom, but how? Well, there was only one way, open battle. The damned souls would have to fight the blessed souls, bare hands against swords and spears, and hope that sheer weight of numbers would be enough to defeat them. “We have to fight!” He shouted therefore. “Prepare to charge!”
“You're mad!” said a man beside him. “We don't stand a chance against them!”
“Do you want to go back to Hell?” said Benson. “If we want this...” He gestured around at the beautiful countryside around them. “Then we have to fight for it! So what if they chop us up? We heal fast. You’ve all seen that!”
“And they can keep chopping us up forever!” another man protested. “We can't win! We were crazy to think we ever had a chance!”
“Go back to Hell then!” said Gloom contemptuously. “I'm going to fight! Who's with me?”
A few half hearted voices promised their support, but the majority just glanced fearfully at each other as they continued to retreat. Gloom cursed under his breath. He'd just have to do the best he could with whoever would follow him. He strode forward, therefore, trying to look as confident as he could, Benson and Nacoma by his side, and a pitifully small group of damned souls followed behind, grimly determined to do what they could against the enemy. The rest remained where they were, watching to see how the unequal battle went and ready to flee when the expected rout took place.
As they advanced the leaders of the blessed souls angled towards them, raising their weapons. As the distance closed Gloom got his first look at the enemy, and he saw sneers of contempt on their faces. Smug, callous, holier than thou b******s, he thought angrily. How long have they enjoyed the pleasures of Heaven, knowing and not caring that uncounted millions were suffering in Hell, some of them for the most trivial reasons? And not simply not caring but actually celebrating their torment, while praising the God whose malice and cruelty was responsible for it. They reminded him of the little children in the school playground who become friends with the school bully so that he won't beat them up. All you have to do is worship God and He won't punish you, he imagined them saying, except that in his mind he substituted the little boy saying that they only had to give the bully their lunch money and he wouldn't beat them up. He felt anger rising within him, rage that the judgement of mankind was ruled by this kind of perverse, twisted logic. It has to change! he thought, and the way to change it is on the other side of that army!
“I suggest the three of us all tackle one man,” said Benson. “I'll impale myself on his sword, then you two tackle him to the ground. If we can get his sword away from him...”
“Good idea,” said Gloom, “except that I'll be the one to impale myself on the sword. You're an old army man, you know how to fight.”
“We should all do the same thing!” agreed a man beside Nacoma. “We arrange ourselves into threes, each three tackles one enemy. We get their swords and armour...”
“And what will the rest of them be doing in the meantime?” asked another.
“Yes, we’ll have to be fast. Perhaps if we can lure some of them away from the rest...”
“Gloom!” A voice suddenly rang out. “Sebastian Gloom! I should have known you’d be a member of this contemptuous rabble!”
Gloom gave a start of surprise, then searched around for the source of the voice. It had seemed to come from the enemy army, and to his astonishment a familiar face was emerging from their ranks to stand ahead of the rest. “Father Anthony!”


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