Our room on the ship was very cosy, definitely like nothing I had ever experience before. The mattress on my bed was fluffy and soft and I sank down quite a bit when I first sat on it. Morgan had stretched out on his bed and immediately went to sleep, pulling his cap down over his face to block out the light. Liandri was tucked away safely in the stables below, seemingly happy to be around plenty of other horses. I hoped she would be alright down there, it would be a week before we reached land and I wasn’t entirely sure she’d be able to stand being cooped up for so long.
“So what’s this book you were talking about?” Annette asked, sitting on the bed next to mine, her legs crossed and clutching her pillow.
“Oh! Right, the book.” I leant down over the edge of the bed and rooted through my bag to pull it out. “Here it is. It’s called “Lie of Lies” and is basically about how when Judgement Day comes that only the tiniest number of people will be saved and the rest will be left to rot here in the darkness.” I started flicking through the pages. “I’ll only read out certain bits now, but you can read the whole thing while we’re on the boat.”
The demon and the angel stood facing each other, staring out over the city. Michael stared angrily at the Lord of Hell while Lucifer just stared right back, his face betraying no emotion whatsoever.
“Heed my words Michael, all will not be as you think it will once the day of judgement arrives,” he said. He looked up at the skyscrapers, the cold metal structures seeming like they would never end. “When that day comes, of all the souls that exist on this Earth, only a few will be chosen. The rest shall remain and the darkness shall fall. It is a darkness even I do not want to face, it is like nothing even we have ever seen.” He smiled suddenly, but it was bitter. “Such a shame that all the souls of time on Earth have been forced to remain, not ascending like so many humans believe they have. Life and the Afterlife are the precious Purgatory that they fear so much. The reward only comes at the day of Judgement. Well…it’s hardly a reward is it? Many will leave the ones they love, not knowing what will happen to them.”
Michael stared at the fallen angel, wondering if he dare even consider what was being said.
“Alright. Say I believe you, say I believe that all the good people shall rise once the day comes. What would happen when that day finally arrives?” he asked before he could stop himself. He felt stupid for asking, for even considering that what Lucifer could be saying was true, but curiosity got the better of him. He had to know, he just had to.
“Well, when that day arrives, the few who are going to be saved will suddenly feel absolute true peace, and they will be bathed in a faint golden light, visible only to us of course. The others will get the feeling of the end and will be covered in black. When those feelings finally arrive, all will have only 2 hours more to spend with each other, saying things they wished they could have said before, saying goodbye, then the chosen will “die” and their souls will rise. The rest will be left alive to face whatever darkness comes.”
“And just what is in this darkness?”
Lucifer didn’t say anything for a moment, instead shifting his gaze to a couple who were playing with their child in the nearby park.
“What is in the darkness,” Michael demanded.
“I do not know. All I know is that the world will crumble. The grass will blacken and disappear, the sky will turn dark. Buildings will crumble, people will die. Or so it seems.” Lucifer returned his gaze to the archangel, showing nothing but uncertainty. “This darkness…whatever it is, it will alter these people and this world forever. There’s a power in this darkness, and it will slowly change these people into who knows what, but I know for certain they won’t be demons. They’ll lose themselves, give in to whatever primal desires awaken within them, further destroy this world.” The fallen angel closed the distance between the two of them in 3 large steps. “This world will become an abyss, a place of darkness and despair. It is worse than Hell, because while they may forget who they were, they will remember that there was no bigger plan for them, that they can die, but they can never move on. Even we are wary, even I don’t know what will happen to the beings in Hell, whether we too shall change or if we shall remain where we are.”
Michael stared at Lucifer and saw something in his eyes which he didn’t recognise immediately. Fear. Lucifer was scared, scared of what would happen to him once the darkness fell, what it would mean for him and his kind.
“How do you know this?” he asked eventually.
“…I don’t know…call it a gut feeling,” Lucifer said softly before fading away like smoke in the wind.
“Oh…that’s certainly unnerving,” Annette said. She was now curled up, still clutching the pillow but now resting her head on her knees.
“I know, but you can see why it’s so gripping,” I said, flicking through the pages again to find the next part. “It gets worse though.”
“Well shut up and read it then,” Morgan mumbled. We both raised an eyebrow.
“I thought you were asleep,” Annette said.
“I was. I haven’t slept deeply since before my training started. Can’t afford to when I’m protecting people. Just keep reading already,” he said, rubbing his nose. I rolled my eyes but looked back down at the pages.
Impossible. This couldn’t be right, it just couldn’t be! The day of Judgement had arrived no more than 3 weeks after Michael had discovered the Lord of Hell on Earth. It was strange that he had been there at all, he wasn’t allowed to leave his prison, yet he had been there. To make it worse, his prediction had come true.
Michael stared around him. The two hours were up and the few people with golden light were dropping to the ground, their bodies going limp for eternity. Everywhere he looked, the gold light was rapidly disappearing, leaving only the people drenched in black. His gaze fell on a group of 3 girls, two with gold light, the third with black. One of them ascended, her body falling, leaving only the other two. The black one picked up her body and moved it onto a wooden bench that was nearby, setting her down gently. He thought it strange that her face was dry while the gold one was weeping openly. The black one then turned to her friend, the gold one then rushing into her arms. They remained that way until the gold one gasped suddenly and went limp in her friend’s arms. Michael kept staring as the gold left the body, leaving it an empty shell. The black one didn’t let go of her friend’s body for a while, as if she were still saying goodbye, then get up and gently set the body next to the other. He then watched as she looked around at all the other people who were weeping and screaming, wondering why they hadn’t been chosen.
“I wonder how she remains so calm.” Michael jumped at the voice which suddenly appeared. He glanced to his left to see Lucifer materialise, looking rather grim. He wasn’t enjoying what was going on either.
“This is sick. All these good people being left behind! How…how could He allow this to happen?” Michael asked weakly, hating that Lucifer had been right but hating it even more that God was allowing this to happen. Lucifer looked over at a little Christian girl by the bodies of her parents and older brother, shaking them and crying, begging them to come back or wait for her, but it was obvious she knew nothing was going to happen. He sighed a little as he felt her faith in God disappear in an instant. He then looked up at the sky which was still the same, but he knew it wouldn’t be that way for long.
“You should leave now. It won’t be long till things get bad. And trust me when I say that you don’t want to be here when that happens, because you too will be trapped and changed, just like the rest of them,” he said The two stared at each other for a moment, they weren’t an archangel and a demon lord at that moment, just two celestial beings who couldn’t believe their creator would allow something so heartless to happen to so many people who didn’t deserve it.
I looked up from the pages to see Annette now looking away from me, staring at the door. Morgan hadn’t moved, but his posture seemed more slumped than before.
“Is that all?” he asked after a while. I flicked through a couple of pages.
“There’s one more bit,” I said. “I won’t read it if you don’t wa-“
“Just read it. We’ve already heard the other bits, might as well hear it all.”
I gave a small sigh and stared at the words for a moment, wondering if even I wanted to read it again.
The window looking onto Earth was small, but it allowed Michael to see what was happening. He had remained for a while longer but left quickly once he felt the air change suddenly. He knew that what he was seeing was all sped up, the events that had shaped and changed the world into a dark and twisted place over thousands of years. He finally managed to tear his eyes away and looked up at God.
“How could you allow this,” he said. “How could you?! These people had done nothing wrong, most of them even worshipped and loved you! And this is what they get in return?!”
His voice had risen to a shout and he could feel anger coursing through his veins, yet God remained the same, silent, merely watching. This angered Michael even more.
“Well? Say something!” he yelled.
“Michael! Please, just stop this already,” Gabriel pleaded, grabbing onto his arm. He turned to face her. “This is how it must be. Just…please, don’t do this.”
“It isn’t right,” Michael said, managing to get his voice under control again. He took deep breaths, steadying himself, then looked up at his creator high on his throne. “This isn’t right and you know it. You’ve always said that we should protect these people, YOUR people, yet now you’re condemning them to this? For the first time in my entire life, I’m beginning to question if everything you do is good.”
Michael pulled his arm away from Gabriel and went over to the window again, his eyes widening as he saw the girl who had taken the time to properly wrap and bury her friends despite the pain she had gone through, now a twisted monster with a huge maw and bloodied eyes. He looked away and covered his eyes with his hand.
“Please…make this stop. It’s…it’s just not right,” he begged. God remained silent, giving no answer at all yet doing the opposite. His silence made Michael realize that He believed this was right, that it had to be done. But Michael knew that it was as Lucifer had said, this was all it would be for eternity. An abyss of pain and shadows. Michael paced for a while, wondering if he dared to defy his creator, to go down and save as many as he could while it was still possible. He was about to reach for his sword when God finally spoke.
“If you leave now, you will not be able to return ever. You will change and become like them, and even I cannot save you from that.”
Reluctantly, Michael put down his sword and stormed away from the window before he threw himself down there with the people. Hearing that answer, he wasn’t sure if he minded that he’d change.
I closed the book and looked from Annette to Morgan. Morgan had rolled onto his face, showing me his back and burying his face into his pillow while Annette had done the same with the pillow on her knees.
“Listen, I…I shouldn’t have told you about it. If I’d known that you would’ve reacted like this…” I stammered, suddenly incredibly guilty for reading it to them.
“It’s alright. It’s just…it’s given us a lot to think about,” Annette said, her voice muffled in the pillow.
“It sure is an eye opener. That could actually happen for all we know,” Morgan said, his voice less muffled than Annette’s was meaning he wasn’t fully pressed against his pillow like I’d thought.
“I think it already is,” I said quietly. Morgan suddenly sat up and stared at me hard.
“What makes you say that?”
“Well…the Shadow War. What were those things? They weren’t demons, they still seemed too human to be Hell beasts. And where did they come from? Certainly not Hell, we all saw those gates opening, they were nothing like the gates of Hell,” I said. He stared at me for a moment longer, but then I doubled over, clutching my stomach and groaning.
“Are you…alright?” Morgan asked. I heard him get up then saw him kneeling in front of me.
“No,” I said in a small voice. “Seasickness. I’ve…I’ve never been on a boat before. I feel horrible.”
I felt Morgan’s fingers lightly under my chin as he tilted my face up. He stared at me for a moment, his eyes darting around my face.
“You do look rather pale. Let’s get you outside. The air might help a bit and you can always puke over the edge of the boat if you have to,” he said, helping me to my feet. I fell against him as the boat lurched wildly and couldn’t help but press my face against his shoulder for a moment.
“Must be real rough seas today, I’ll go and see if I can find some crystallised ginger for her while you’re with her,” Annette said, pulling on her boots. Morgan nodded and gently pulled me out of our cabin into the hallway. The boat was fairly big but there was also a door leading out onto the deck at one end of the hallway, and our cabin had to be the one closest to it.
The salty sea air hit me straight away when the door was opened and it did not help my stomach at all. We staggered over to the edge of the boat and I clamped my hands down tightly on the rail, leaning over the edge enough to make sure I wouldn’t throw up on anyone.
“Take deep slow breaths, they’ll be better,” Morgan said. “Don’t stare at the water, stare out at the horizon.”
I started taking deeper breaths and lifted my gaze a bit so I wasn’t looking at the dark crashing waves below us. I felt something heavy fall on my shoulders and I realized it was his jacket.
“Aren’t you cold?” I asked shakily, looking at him. He smiled.
“Of course I am. It’s freezing out here, but us men must suffer to make the women feel more comfortable,” he said. I couldn’t help but laugh at that.
“Good God, could your views on men and women be any more old fashioned? Go back to your own time period,” I laughed, cutting myself off to hold my breath as the boat suddenly lurched to one side.
“Yeah, I guess they are, but even if none of this had happened I still would have believed it was my duty to protect women. I mean, without you I wouldn’t even be alive right now. And I doubt I could have survived with just my ridiculously strict father if my kind mother hadn’t been there to keep me sane,” he said with a small smile.
“But what was that comment about a woman not being able to protect another woman back in Bristine?”
His smile faltered.
“I do not believe that. The General…you have to agree with his views or he punishes you. I swear, maybe 15 of all the men in Bristine actually share that view. The others all think a woman is perfectly capable of taking care of another woman. That’s what mothers do all the time, isn’t it? And you, you can take perfectly good care of yourself, so why the heck shouldn’t you be able to take care of someone else?”
I sighed in relief and looked back out at the horizon.
“Good. Otherwise I would have thrown your sexist ass over the railings by now. I still can’t believe men still think that way! It’s 2019, not 1872. Then again…look how far back things have been thrown since the war. People using horses instead of cars, the TVs that work are all really old and barely work. No one’s had a computer since the first invasion, but I have to admit it was pretty funny to see so many people panicking without the internet,” I smiled.
“Yeah, my next door neighbour went absolutely mental. He’d been in the middle of an online deathmatch game.” I saw him shake his head from the edge of my vision. “He was always so obsessed with those kinds of games, it was weird to see him holding an actual gun. Scary as well.”
“Why was that?”
“He was only 12.”
I didn’t say anything else. I knew that kids as young as 12 had to take up arms, things had been that bad. It made me think about all the places in the world where there had been so many people, large cities overflowing with people, now barren wastelands where there’s still smoke from the fires and burnt bones cover the roads. The population of the world, it had been so big before, and now there were just small villages and towns in a handful of places. As far as we knew, Panaethene was the biggest town in the world with around 5,600 people living there. Everywhere else there were maybe a few hundred people, the odd thousand sometimes if the town was lucky enough.
“So…feeling any better?” Morgan asked after a short and very uncomfortable silence. I paused before answering.
“Yeah…yeah I think so…no, no I’m not,” I said and then leant as far over the edge of the railings as I could as I emptied to contents of my stomach into the sea. I stood there coughing and retching for another couple of minutes before I sank to my knees, shivering. Morgan knelt down beside me and pulled his jacket around my shoulders even more.
“Feeling better now?” he asked softly. I nodded. I definitely felt better now there was nothing to rock around in my stomach. I felt that my cheeks were wet as well from the tears that had sprung when I’d thrown up. I still never really understood why that happened but I’m sure science had some explanation for it. I was about to bring up my hand to wipe them away when I felt Morgan’s hand on my face, lifting my face up then wiping the tears away gently with his thumb. We just stared at each other for a moment. I’d hated him when I’d first met him because of how he was, but now…I didn’t hate him, but I was still wary, despite his reasons for his behaviour and despite the fact that he had lost someone precious to him in the same way which would cost me my life if we weren’t quick enough.
“Good grief, I can’t leave the two of you alone for 10 minutes without you falling madly in love, can I?”
We both looked away from each other quickly to see Annette staring down at us with the biggest grin on her face and a paper bag in her hand. Morgan went slightly red and helped me to my feet.
“Don’t be so stupid Annette. I am NOT in love with her or anyone,” he said, sticking his hands in his pockets and pouting slightly at her. Her smile widened.
“Why’s your face all red then?” She came over to me and offered the bag before he could answer. “Here, crystallised ginger. Great for helping with seasickness. One of the other passengers has a son suffering as well and she was kind enough to give me some. You’re supposed to suck on it I think.”
I reached into the bag and pulled out a lump of ginger. It looked like a jelly sweet but I ignored that and popped it into my mouth.
“I want some too,” Morgan said, reaching over and snagging a few lumps.
“What, you get seasick too?” Annette asked, crossing her arms.
“No, I just like crystallised ginger,” he answered, smiling cheekily and sticking a lump into his mouth. Annette sighed and rolled her eyes.
“God, you really are childish aren’t you. Quite different from when you’re Captain,” she said.
“Well I don’t have to be in charge of Bristine’s soldiers right now, do I?” he countered. “It’s one of the reasons why I wanted to come with you. I want to be a normal guy for a change, not the Captain of Andreas’s soldiers. I want to see the world through my own eyes, not the eyes of war.”
“How’d you get to be Captain anyway? You’re only 20,” I said. He turned his smile to me.
“I’ve held this position for 3 years now. I was 15 when I started my training in 2014. 2 years after, I got into a rather nasty fight with our Captain which results in me begin held by the arms by two of his closest guys, blood streaming down my face from my nose and him getting ready to really break me. Thankfully, it turns out the General had seen the whole thing and he replaced me as the Captain. Said that I had a look of determination not to step down that he hadn’t seen in years and that he’d also noticed how others followed my lead. The previous Captain got the boot, was moved to kitchen duty. And that’s all there is to it,” he said, looking rather smug but pained at the same time. “He was a good Captain, really he was, but he was just way too arrogant for his own good.”
I looked away from him and stared back out at the sea.
“Wow. I never thought you'd have gotten the job that way,” I said.
“I never expected to get the job regardless. I'd always thought I'd end up as just another soldier who'd probably die on the battlefield. But becoming Captain of Bristine's soldiers...that's a really big deal, especially since the closer the Captain's are to the General, the higher their overall position. So basically, aside from the General himself, I have the most authority over all the soldiers and other Captains in the other towns. It's...it's a lot of responsibility,” he said with a sigh. I glanced over at him and saw him run a hand through his hair, making it slightly messy. “Anyway, if you're feeling better than can we please go back inside? I'm freezing my ass off out here without my jacket.”
“Yeah, it is pretty freezing out here,” Annette said, scrunching up the paper bag and sticking it into her pocket before Morgan could eat any more.
“So what’s this book you were talking about?” Annette asked, sitting on the bed next to mine, her legs crossed and clutching her pillow.
“Oh! Right, the book.” I leant down over the edge of the bed and rooted through my bag to pull it out. “Here it is. It’s called “Lie of Lies” and is basically about how when Judgement Day comes that only the tiniest number of people will be saved and the rest will be left to rot here in the darkness.” I started flicking through the pages. “I’ll only read out certain bits now, but you can read the whole thing while we’re on the boat.”
The demon and the angel stood facing each other, staring out over the city. Michael stared angrily at the Lord of Hell while Lucifer just stared right back, his face betraying no emotion whatsoever.
“Heed my words Michael, all will not be as you think it will once the day of judgement arrives,” he said. He looked up at the skyscrapers, the cold metal structures seeming like they would never end. “When that day comes, of all the souls that exist on this Earth, only a few will be chosen. The rest shall remain and the darkness shall fall. It is a darkness even I do not want to face, it is like nothing even we have ever seen.” He smiled suddenly, but it was bitter. “Such a shame that all the souls of time on Earth have been forced to remain, not ascending like so many humans believe they have. Life and the Afterlife are the precious Purgatory that they fear so much. The reward only comes at the day of Judgement. Well…it’s hardly a reward is it? Many will leave the ones they love, not knowing what will happen to them.”
Michael stared at the fallen angel, wondering if he dare even consider what was being said.
“Alright. Say I believe you, say I believe that all the good people shall rise once the day comes. What would happen when that day finally arrives?” he asked before he could stop himself. He felt stupid for asking, for even considering that what Lucifer could be saying was true, but curiosity got the better of him. He had to know, he just had to.
“Well, when that day arrives, the few who are going to be saved will suddenly feel absolute true peace, and they will be bathed in a faint golden light, visible only to us of course. The others will get the feeling of the end and will be covered in black. When those feelings finally arrive, all will have only 2 hours more to spend with each other, saying things they wished they could have said before, saying goodbye, then the chosen will “die” and their souls will rise. The rest will be left alive to face whatever darkness comes.”
“And just what is in this darkness?”
Lucifer didn’t say anything for a moment, instead shifting his gaze to a couple who were playing with their child in the nearby park.
“What is in the darkness,” Michael demanded.
“I do not know. All I know is that the world will crumble. The grass will blacken and disappear, the sky will turn dark. Buildings will crumble, people will die. Or so it seems.” Lucifer returned his gaze to the archangel, showing nothing but uncertainty. “This darkness…whatever it is, it will alter these people and this world forever. There’s a power in this darkness, and it will slowly change these people into who knows what, but I know for certain they won’t be demons. They’ll lose themselves, give in to whatever primal desires awaken within them, further destroy this world.” The fallen angel closed the distance between the two of them in 3 large steps. “This world will become an abyss, a place of darkness and despair. It is worse than Hell, because while they may forget who they were, they will remember that there was no bigger plan for them, that they can die, but they can never move on. Even we are wary, even I don’t know what will happen to the beings in Hell, whether we too shall change or if we shall remain where we are.”
Michael stared at Lucifer and saw something in his eyes which he didn’t recognise immediately. Fear. Lucifer was scared, scared of what would happen to him once the darkness fell, what it would mean for him and his kind.
“How do you know this?” he asked eventually.
“…I don’t know…call it a gut feeling,” Lucifer said softly before fading away like smoke in the wind.
“Oh…that’s certainly unnerving,” Annette said. She was now curled up, still clutching the pillow but now resting her head on her knees.
“I know, but you can see why it’s so gripping,” I said, flicking through the pages again to find the next part. “It gets worse though.”
“Well shut up and read it then,” Morgan mumbled. We both raised an eyebrow.
“I thought you were asleep,” Annette said.
“I was. I haven’t slept deeply since before my training started. Can’t afford to when I’m protecting people. Just keep reading already,” he said, rubbing his nose. I rolled my eyes but looked back down at the pages.
Impossible. This couldn’t be right, it just couldn’t be! The day of Judgement had arrived no more than 3 weeks after Michael had discovered the Lord of Hell on Earth. It was strange that he had been there at all, he wasn’t allowed to leave his prison, yet he had been there. To make it worse, his prediction had come true.
Michael stared around him. The two hours were up and the few people with golden light were dropping to the ground, their bodies going limp for eternity. Everywhere he looked, the gold light was rapidly disappearing, leaving only the people drenched in black. His gaze fell on a group of 3 girls, two with gold light, the third with black. One of them ascended, her body falling, leaving only the other two. The black one picked up her body and moved it onto a wooden bench that was nearby, setting her down gently. He thought it strange that her face was dry while the gold one was weeping openly. The black one then turned to her friend, the gold one then rushing into her arms. They remained that way until the gold one gasped suddenly and went limp in her friend’s arms. Michael kept staring as the gold left the body, leaving it an empty shell. The black one didn’t let go of her friend’s body for a while, as if she were still saying goodbye, then get up and gently set the body next to the other. He then watched as she looked around at all the other people who were weeping and screaming, wondering why they hadn’t been chosen.
“I wonder how she remains so calm.” Michael jumped at the voice which suddenly appeared. He glanced to his left to see Lucifer materialise, looking rather grim. He wasn’t enjoying what was going on either.
“This is sick. All these good people being left behind! How…how could He allow this to happen?” Michael asked weakly, hating that Lucifer had been right but hating it even more that God was allowing this to happen. Lucifer looked over at a little Christian girl by the bodies of her parents and older brother, shaking them and crying, begging them to come back or wait for her, but it was obvious she knew nothing was going to happen. He sighed a little as he felt her faith in God disappear in an instant. He then looked up at the sky which was still the same, but he knew it wouldn’t be that way for long.
“You should leave now. It won’t be long till things get bad. And trust me when I say that you don’t want to be here when that happens, because you too will be trapped and changed, just like the rest of them,” he said The two stared at each other for a moment, they weren’t an archangel and a demon lord at that moment, just two celestial beings who couldn’t believe their creator would allow something so heartless to happen to so many people who didn’t deserve it.
I looked up from the pages to see Annette now looking away from me, staring at the door. Morgan hadn’t moved, but his posture seemed more slumped than before.
“Is that all?” he asked after a while. I flicked through a couple of pages.
“There’s one more bit,” I said. “I won’t read it if you don’t wa-“
“Just read it. We’ve already heard the other bits, might as well hear it all.”
I gave a small sigh and stared at the words for a moment, wondering if even I wanted to read it again.
The window looking onto Earth was small, but it allowed Michael to see what was happening. He had remained for a while longer but left quickly once he felt the air change suddenly. He knew that what he was seeing was all sped up, the events that had shaped and changed the world into a dark and twisted place over thousands of years. He finally managed to tear his eyes away and looked up at God.
“How could you allow this,” he said. “How could you?! These people had done nothing wrong, most of them even worshipped and loved you! And this is what they get in return?!”
His voice had risen to a shout and he could feel anger coursing through his veins, yet God remained the same, silent, merely watching. This angered Michael even more.
“Well? Say something!” he yelled.
“Michael! Please, just stop this already,” Gabriel pleaded, grabbing onto his arm. He turned to face her. “This is how it must be. Just…please, don’t do this.”
“It isn’t right,” Michael said, managing to get his voice under control again. He took deep breaths, steadying himself, then looked up at his creator high on his throne. “This isn’t right and you know it. You’ve always said that we should protect these people, YOUR people, yet now you’re condemning them to this? For the first time in my entire life, I’m beginning to question if everything you do is good.”
Michael pulled his arm away from Gabriel and went over to the window again, his eyes widening as he saw the girl who had taken the time to properly wrap and bury her friends despite the pain she had gone through, now a twisted monster with a huge maw and bloodied eyes. He looked away and covered his eyes with his hand.
“Please…make this stop. It’s…it’s just not right,” he begged. God remained silent, giving no answer at all yet doing the opposite. His silence made Michael realize that He believed this was right, that it had to be done. But Michael knew that it was as Lucifer had said, this was all it would be for eternity. An abyss of pain and shadows. Michael paced for a while, wondering if he dared to defy his creator, to go down and save as many as he could while it was still possible. He was about to reach for his sword when God finally spoke.
“If you leave now, you will not be able to return ever. You will change and become like them, and even I cannot save you from that.”
Reluctantly, Michael put down his sword and stormed away from the window before he threw himself down there with the people. Hearing that answer, he wasn’t sure if he minded that he’d change.
I closed the book and looked from Annette to Morgan. Morgan had rolled onto his face, showing me his back and burying his face into his pillow while Annette had done the same with the pillow on her knees.
“Listen, I…I shouldn’t have told you about it. If I’d known that you would’ve reacted like this…” I stammered, suddenly incredibly guilty for reading it to them.
“It’s alright. It’s just…it’s given us a lot to think about,” Annette said, her voice muffled in the pillow.
“It sure is an eye opener. That could actually happen for all we know,” Morgan said, his voice less muffled than Annette’s was meaning he wasn’t fully pressed against his pillow like I’d thought.
“I think it already is,” I said quietly. Morgan suddenly sat up and stared at me hard.
“What makes you say that?”
“Well…the Shadow War. What were those things? They weren’t demons, they still seemed too human to be Hell beasts. And where did they come from? Certainly not Hell, we all saw those gates opening, they were nothing like the gates of Hell,” I said. He stared at me for a moment longer, but then I doubled over, clutching my stomach and groaning.
“Are you…alright?” Morgan asked. I heard him get up then saw him kneeling in front of me.
“No,” I said in a small voice. “Seasickness. I’ve…I’ve never been on a boat before. I feel horrible.”
I felt Morgan’s fingers lightly under my chin as he tilted my face up. He stared at me for a moment, his eyes darting around my face.
“You do look rather pale. Let’s get you outside. The air might help a bit and you can always puke over the edge of the boat if you have to,” he said, helping me to my feet. I fell against him as the boat lurched wildly and couldn’t help but press my face against his shoulder for a moment.
“Must be real rough seas today, I’ll go and see if I can find some crystallised ginger for her while you’re with her,” Annette said, pulling on her boots. Morgan nodded and gently pulled me out of our cabin into the hallway. The boat was fairly big but there was also a door leading out onto the deck at one end of the hallway, and our cabin had to be the one closest to it.
The salty sea air hit me straight away when the door was opened and it did not help my stomach at all. We staggered over to the edge of the boat and I clamped my hands down tightly on the rail, leaning over the edge enough to make sure I wouldn’t throw up on anyone.
“Take deep slow breaths, they’ll be better,” Morgan said. “Don’t stare at the water, stare out at the horizon.”
I started taking deeper breaths and lifted my gaze a bit so I wasn’t looking at the dark crashing waves below us. I felt something heavy fall on my shoulders and I realized it was his jacket.
“Aren’t you cold?” I asked shakily, looking at him. He smiled.
“Of course I am. It’s freezing out here, but us men must suffer to make the women feel more comfortable,” he said. I couldn’t help but laugh at that.
“Good God, could your views on men and women be any more old fashioned? Go back to your own time period,” I laughed, cutting myself off to hold my breath as the boat suddenly lurched to one side.
“Yeah, I guess they are, but even if none of this had happened I still would have believed it was my duty to protect women. I mean, without you I wouldn’t even be alive right now. And I doubt I could have survived with just my ridiculously strict father if my kind mother hadn’t been there to keep me sane,” he said with a small smile.
“But what was that comment about a woman not being able to protect another woman back in Bristine?”
His smile faltered.
“I do not believe that. The General…you have to agree with his views or he punishes you. I swear, maybe 15 of all the men in Bristine actually share that view. The others all think a woman is perfectly capable of taking care of another woman. That’s what mothers do all the time, isn’t it? And you, you can take perfectly good care of yourself, so why the heck shouldn’t you be able to take care of someone else?”
I sighed in relief and looked back out at the horizon.
“Good. Otherwise I would have thrown your sexist ass over the railings by now. I still can’t believe men still think that way! It’s 2019, not 1872. Then again…look how far back things have been thrown since the war. People using horses instead of cars, the TVs that work are all really old and barely work. No one’s had a computer since the first invasion, but I have to admit it was pretty funny to see so many people panicking without the internet,” I smiled.
“Yeah, my next door neighbour went absolutely mental. He’d been in the middle of an online deathmatch game.” I saw him shake his head from the edge of my vision. “He was always so obsessed with those kinds of games, it was weird to see him holding an actual gun. Scary as well.”
“Why was that?”
“He was only 12.”
I didn’t say anything else. I knew that kids as young as 12 had to take up arms, things had been that bad. It made me think about all the places in the world where there had been so many people, large cities overflowing with people, now barren wastelands where there’s still smoke from the fires and burnt bones cover the roads. The population of the world, it had been so big before, and now there were just small villages and towns in a handful of places. As far as we knew, Panaethene was the biggest town in the world with around 5,600 people living there. Everywhere else there were maybe a few hundred people, the odd thousand sometimes if the town was lucky enough.
“So…feeling any better?” Morgan asked after a short and very uncomfortable silence. I paused before answering.
“Yeah…yeah I think so…no, no I’m not,” I said and then leant as far over the edge of the railings as I could as I emptied to contents of my stomach into the sea. I stood there coughing and retching for another couple of minutes before I sank to my knees, shivering. Morgan knelt down beside me and pulled his jacket around my shoulders even more.
“Feeling better now?” he asked softly. I nodded. I definitely felt better now there was nothing to rock around in my stomach. I felt that my cheeks were wet as well from the tears that had sprung when I’d thrown up. I still never really understood why that happened but I’m sure science had some explanation for it. I was about to bring up my hand to wipe them away when I felt Morgan’s hand on my face, lifting my face up then wiping the tears away gently with his thumb. We just stared at each other for a moment. I’d hated him when I’d first met him because of how he was, but now…I didn’t hate him, but I was still wary, despite his reasons for his behaviour and despite the fact that he had lost someone precious to him in the same way which would cost me my life if we weren’t quick enough.
“Good grief, I can’t leave the two of you alone for 10 minutes without you falling madly in love, can I?”
We both looked away from each other quickly to see Annette staring down at us with the biggest grin on her face and a paper bag in her hand. Morgan went slightly red and helped me to my feet.
“Don’t be so stupid Annette. I am NOT in love with her or anyone,” he said, sticking his hands in his pockets and pouting slightly at her. Her smile widened.
“Why’s your face all red then?” She came over to me and offered the bag before he could answer. “Here, crystallised ginger. Great for helping with seasickness. One of the other passengers has a son suffering as well and she was kind enough to give me some. You’re supposed to suck on it I think.”
I reached into the bag and pulled out a lump of ginger. It looked like a jelly sweet but I ignored that and popped it into my mouth.
“I want some too,” Morgan said, reaching over and snagging a few lumps.
“What, you get seasick too?” Annette asked, crossing her arms.
“No, I just like crystallised ginger,” he answered, smiling cheekily and sticking a lump into his mouth. Annette sighed and rolled her eyes.
“God, you really are childish aren’t you. Quite different from when you’re Captain,” she said.
“Well I don’t have to be in charge of Bristine’s soldiers right now, do I?” he countered. “It’s one of the reasons why I wanted to come with you. I want to be a normal guy for a change, not the Captain of Andreas’s soldiers. I want to see the world through my own eyes, not the eyes of war.”
“How’d you get to be Captain anyway? You’re only 20,” I said. He turned his smile to me.
“I’ve held this position for 3 years now. I was 15 when I started my training in 2014. 2 years after, I got into a rather nasty fight with our Captain which results in me begin held by the arms by two of his closest guys, blood streaming down my face from my nose and him getting ready to really break me. Thankfully, it turns out the General had seen the whole thing and he replaced me as the Captain. Said that I had a look of determination not to step down that he hadn’t seen in years and that he’d also noticed how others followed my lead. The previous Captain got the boot, was moved to kitchen duty. And that’s all there is to it,” he said, looking rather smug but pained at the same time. “He was a good Captain, really he was, but he was just way too arrogant for his own good.”
I looked away from him and stared back out at the sea.
“Wow. I never thought you'd have gotten the job that way,” I said.
“I never expected to get the job regardless. I'd always thought I'd end up as just another soldier who'd probably die on the battlefield. But becoming Captain of Bristine's soldiers...that's a really big deal, especially since the closer the Captain's are to the General, the higher their overall position. So basically, aside from the General himself, I have the most authority over all the soldiers and other Captains in the other towns. It's...it's a lot of responsibility,” he said with a sigh. I glanced over at him and saw him run a hand through his hair, making it slightly messy. “Anyway, if you're feeling better than can we please go back inside? I'm freezing my ass off out here without my jacket.”
“Yeah, it is pretty freezing out here,” Annette said, scrunching up the paper bag and sticking it into her pocket before Morgan could eat any more.
