“No… I mean yes, but I didn’t want it handed to me. I wanted to earn it.”
“Shep, honey, you did earn it. You earned it all… only He took it away. He took me away. He took our daughter away. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. And do you know why He took it from you?”
Shep felt the blood rush from his face. “Because I took it for granted. I didn’t appreciate it.”
“Nonsense. Of course you appreciated it. Sure, there were moments you slipped, but who doesn’t? Even the fight we had over this house… I knew you still loved me. We’re soul mates, after all.”
“We are soul mates. I swear it.”
“The truth is, I was the lucky one. Look at how you suffered after we died. All that pain, all that emptiness. Have you experienced a single moment of joy since we were taken away?”
He pinched away tears. “No.”
“War… famine. Endless suffering. Is that how a loving parent is supposed to treat his children?”
“No, it’s not.”
“Life isn’t about suffering, it’s about indulgence. Ask the rich and powerful if they’re suffering. This beach house is a perfect example. Had I listened to you and allowed you to buy it, your daughter and I would have never been on that plane. You were right and I was wrong, and you paid the ultimate price for our ignorance.”
“Oh, God…”
“Forget God. God is nothing but a concept… a fictitious figure sitting upon a throne, always asleep at the wheel. We never needed God. The Adversary has grown strong in His absence. The Adversary offers us his gift of immortality without any of these hidden tests.”
“What do I have to do, you know… for us to be together again?”
“For one thing, stop worrying. There’s no violence involved, you don’t have to kill anyone. Simply join me in a toast.” She reached for a carafe of wine, pouring the red liquid into a gold goblet.
“A toast? To who? Lucifer?”
“Baby, you have got to stop watching so many horror movies.” She straddled him, still holding the goblet of wine in her right hand. “Remember that course in Latin we took together as sophomores? Do you know what Lucifer translates to in Latin? Light-bringer. Lucifer wasn’t a fallen angel, Shep, he was sent to bring Light into our world through our actions. I mean, seriously, baby, does this look like Hell to you?”
“No.”
“Drink with me. Let us get drunk together from the fruit of the vine and connect with the Light.”
Connect with the Light…
Shep’s heart raced as his mind replayed a similar conversation he’d had with Virgil hours earlier in the cemetery. “Noah made one last mistake, the same mistake Adam made. The fruit that tempted Adam was not an apple, but a grape, or the wine that comes from them. Wine can be abused, placing man in touch with levels of consciousness that cannot sustain a connection with the Light…”
He pushed the goblet aside. “And when I’m lying here, drunk, will you castrate me?”
She forced a smile. “Shep, honey, what are you talking about?”
“You know… the way my son, Ham, castrated me when he found me lying drunk and naked on the ark.”
Her expression hardened, her eyes spewed daggers. “Drink the wine, Patrick.”
“You drink it, soul mate.” He stood, tossing her from his lap, the goblet spilling wine across her face and down her neck and cleavage—
— the liquid melting the flesh, exposing an ancient skull, darkened with age, the eye sockets fluttering with a thousand eyes!
Their surroundings shattered like a hall of mirrors, revealing a dark, massive pit, the skeletal remains of the World Trade Center looming overhead. Shep was standing on a frozen lake, surrounded by thousands of animated heads, the bodies trapped beneath the ice. Treacherous traitors of humanity, babbling in tongues. Each garbled word generated a tiny spark of light that floated through the rank air like a firefly, the accumulated specks absorbed by the massive creature frozen dead center in the lake.
Lucifer was being held chest high in the ice, and still his shoulders and three heads towered ten stories above the frozen surface. The winged demon was terrifying to behold, yet it appeared oblivious of its surroundings, as if it were a front — a giant balloon puppet. Animated by the sparks of negativity generated by the babbling heads of the tortured.
Hovering over Lucifer’s left wing was the Grim Reaper.
On the demon’s right was the Reaper’s soul mate.
Santa Muerte was dressed in purple satin robes, her hooded skull adorned with a wavy ebony wig. The abomination snarled as she saw Shep. Gripping her scythe in her bony fists, she advanced, swinging the deadly blade like a pendulum.
Shep attempted to run, only he slipped on the ice and fell. He looked up as the curved blade looped downward from its arc, slicing through his deltoid and lopping off his new left arm in one brutal motion.
He dropped to his knees on the frozen lake, the searing pain pushing him toward unconsciousness — only Santa Muerte was far from finished with him.
Raising the scythe once more over her bony shoulder, she swung the instrument of death downward, the bloodstained blade whistling through the air—
— its lethal blow intercepted by the scythe belonging to her male counterpart. The Grim Reaper stood over Shep, protecting him from the assault.
And then a golden beacon of Light reached down from the unseen heavens—
— whisking his consciousness out of Hell.
PART 5
Transformation
Day’s End
The three MH-53J Pavelow-III Air Force helicopters flew east in a staggered formation over Jersey City, en route to Manhattan. Large and unwieldy, the “Jolly Green Giants” specialized in rescuing downed pilots and providing support to Special Operations troops. Their selection for this morning's mission was based on their ability to operate in bad weather — along with the airship's rear ramp, a deployment feature that allowed for the dispersal of a special payload.
First developed in 1958, the neutron bomb was opposed by President Kennedy and later postponed by Jimmy Carter, only to be jump-started again in 1981 under Ronald Reagan. Designed as a tactical weapon, the bomb’s purpose was to eradicate troops while maintaining the targeted area’s infrastructure. Unlike standard enhanced radiation weapons, the three ERWs loaded aboard the Pavelows were chemical incineration bombs designed for underground bunkers. Formulated to combust on contact with oxygen molecules, the conflagration would burn out every square inch of airspace before suffocating itself.
At precisely 8:03 A.M., the three helicopters would drop their payloads at their designated locations above the carbon-dioxide cloud hovering over Manhattan. Passing through the man-made insulating ceiling, the neutron bombs would detonate—
— incinerating every biological — dead or alive — in New York City.
A frigid wind whipped across New York Harbor, driving the dark surface into froth. Liberty Island was visible in the distance. The statue beckoned.
They had gathered by a concrete boat ramp close to the water’s edge. The Patels and the Minoses. David Kantor and his daughter. The frail Tibetan monk who seemed bothered by nothing, and the female assassin who was angry at the world. The students and freed sex slaves stayed warm in the school bus. A Scythe incubator rendered moot by the arrival of dawn.