Angel Evolution (26 page)

C
hris and Sam watched anxiously from their hiding place behind a large rock. Sam wanted to rush out to try to help Taylor when she first screamed in pain, but Chris wisely held her back and told her that they would be able to best help her if they were patient; they would only have one chance to rescue her.

Even when the weapon was fired, Chris held his ground, waiting for the perfect opportunity.

When the wall of angel defenders crumbled and they began fighting the demons, Chris sprang into action, charging out of hiding at full demon speed. Reaching her in seconds, Chris touched her and instantly teleported back to where Sam remained hidden.

He scooped up Taylor’s limp body and reached his hand out for Sam to grab, which she did, and the three disappeared. The rescue had taken all of three seconds and all but two of the angels were oblivious that anything had even happened.

Gabriel had been grappling with Dionysus when they heard the yells from the attacking demons. They were right on top of them. They both saw the circle around Taylor open up to reveal her lifeless body on the ground. They were both about to rush to her side—Gabriel to try to protect her and escape with her, and Dionysus to ensure she was still alive enough to be used against the demons—when Chris appeared out of thin air and was gone even quicker than he had come.

“Noooo!” Gabriel yelled, dropping to his knees.

Dionysus glared at him. “This is your fault, you will be charged with treason. Guards! Arrest Gabriel.”

The demons had fallen back now, rushing back towards their mountain in retreat. They were likely already aware that the girl had been rescued. Many angels and demons had been killed during the battle, but most of the casualties had been from the single death blast. There was no evidence that they had ever even existed, their bodies having been disintegrated.

Two of the angels that had previously been defending Gabriel and Taylor, responded to Dionysus’s command by grabbing Gabriel and lifting him to his feet. He didn’t struggle. There was no point. He had failed the only person that he had ever truly loved and if by some miracle she was still alive, she would never forgive him.

C
hris had a license to breach the normal teleportation rules within the demon complex, and so he reappeared with both girls in the midst of the medical corridor. “I need medical assistance NOW!” he yelled.

Before Chris had said a word, the staff were already rushing a cart over and preparing a room. They quickly, but carefully slid Taylor’s limp body onto a backboard and then moved her to a rolling cart.

Sam was hysterical, tears rushing down her face. “Oh God, I don’t think she’s breathing, please save her, please…” She passed out in mid-sentence, but Chris was there to catch her before she hit the ground.

He set her gently on another bed and asked a demon nurse to take care of her while he checked on Taylor. He went into Taylor’s room, where the doctors were performing CPR on her. Sam was right,
she wasn’t breathing
. “Her pulse has stopped,” one noted. “Charge the panels.”

They applied defibrillator panels to her chest and her body convulsed when they shocked her. Nothing happened. “Prepare for a second charge!”

After the second shock, Taylor gasped, her eyes opening wide.

“We’ve got a pulse. It’s quite weak, but she should be just fine.”

Chris breathed a sigh of relief. Taylor’s eyes had closed again and her breathing was slow and steady. “Can she hear me?” he asked the doctor.

“Probably not, she really just needs to rest.”

“Please let me know if anything changes.” Chris left Taylor’s room and rejoined Sam, who was now awake after receiving a heavy dose of smelling salts from the nurse.

“Is she…?” Sam started to ask, her body tensing as if preparing for bad news.

“She’s fine,” Chris said. “The doctor thinks she’ll make a full recovery.”

“Thank God.” Her body relaxed and she hugged Chris warmly, her head relaxing on his shoulder.

T
en days later, Taylor, Samantha, and Christopher were lounging in the recreational room in the Lair. Taylor
had
made a full recovery in only three days and the girls had enjoyed a week of relaxing, exploring the caves, and talking about what had happened.

However, no one had talked about Gabriel, and Taylor could tell that Sam and Chris were avoiding the subject. She could also tell that they were trying not to look too much like boyfriend-girlfriend, clearly afraid that it would upset Taylor. Eventually, Taylor had enough of avoiding the hard topics.

“I can’t believe that Gabriel was lying to me all this time. He was just a puppet for the Council. I don’t think he ever really loved me,” Taylor said.

Sam looked at Chris. Chris replied, “I think what he did to you is despicable and awful, but he was in an impossible situation and in the end, he tried to do the right thing.”

Taylor’s voice rose quickly. “The right thing? The right thing? He served me up on a platter to those angels who tried to suck the life out of me!”

Chris put his arms up in surrender. “Whoa, hold on, Tay, there’s something you should know. We saw the whole thing. Gabriel had another plan in mind and he tried to save you. He was about to grab you and fly you to safety, but Dionysus stopped him. While they were fighting each other we saved you.”

Taylor was confused. “What? But I didn’t see…He was right next to me when my aura was being used.”

“Did you see him?” Chris asked.

“Well, no, but that’s because I was too busy being torn apart by those damn sadistic angels.”

“Tay, what Chris is saying is true. I saw it too. I think he really does love you,” Sam said. “He was about to betray his own people when Dionysus grabbed him.”

Taylor’s face softened. “He does love me,” she repeated. “What will happen to him?”

“Our lookouts saw him being arrested and taken back into the mountain. He will likely be charged with treason and executed.”

“No, no, that can’t happen! We have to do something!” Taylor’s head was a whirlwind. As soon as she had found love, it was going to be ripped away from her. A rush of happy memories of Gabriel flew through her mind. The next thing she knew she was curled up in a ball on the couch, sobbing uncontrollably. Sam was by her side, rubbing her back.

“It will be okay, Tay. Chris will think of something. We’ll get him out, I promise.”

After ten minutes, Taylor had exhausted herself from crying and the tears finally dried up, as if someone had turned off the faucet. She sat up and hugged her friend, so glad that she was with her and that she didn’t have to keep secrets from her anymore. They held each other for a long time.

Taylor tried to make sense of it in her head. Before the battle, she had vowed to be true to herself from now on, even if it meant breaking up with Gabriel. Her heart said that she loved him, but her head said that she was being a stupid little girl and that everything she loved about him was a lie. The truth might be somewhere in between, she reasoned. In any case, if the demons couldn’t rescue him, then it wouldn’t matter.
Not knowing whether it could have worked would be the worst
, Taylor thought.

Chris, who had apparently left when the crying started, came back. “We have a plan,” he announced. “But first we have to get you girls back to college.”

“What?” Taylor and Sam both said at the same time.

“I’m not leaving until we’ve tried to save Gabriel,” Taylor said.

Chris sighed. “I understand why you would think that way, but please just hear me out. Do you trust me?”

Taylor thought it odd that she was actually considering trusting a demon. It was difficult to change her thinking after everything that Gabriel had told her about demons. Maybe that’s why it was so difficult for Gabriel to go against the angels. But she
did
trust Chris. “Yes, I trust you,” she said.

“Thanks, Taylor. That really means a lot. Okay, we can’t just ignore the fact that you have normal human lives outside of all of this. You have families—people that care about you—and if you skip classes and final exams, they will demand real answers that make sense. So we need to get you back to do all that.”

Taylor frowned. “Two questions: First, won’t I be a sitting duck for the angels to just come and kidnap me again? And second, won’t Gabriel be dead before the semester is even over?”

Chris replied, “Both good questions. The demon Elders have put into immediate effect a protection order for both of you no matter where in the world you are. They take this very seriously so you will have top-notch bodyguards around at all times who will ensure the angels don’t try anything. Trust me, the Elders didn’t go through all of that trouble to rescue you just to give you right back to the angels.

“On your second point, we have some inside information that Gabriel’s life is not in immediate danger and that there is some contention within the Archangel Council about what to do with him. It seems that they don’t all necessarily want to kill him straight away, at least not without a proper trial. It has been agreed that he will remain in prison until January, at which time he’ll be officially put on trial for his ‘crimes’.”

The girls fired additional questions at Chris for a few more minutes, slowly coming to the same conclusion that he was right. Arrangements were made for them to be teleported back to the campus as soon as possible to ensure they didn’t miss any more classes.

The next few weeks were torture, as neither of them were able to concentrate on assignments or studying for exams after all that had happened, but miraculously, they were both able to get by with reasonably good grades in all of their classes.

It had already been arranged for them to return to the Lair shortly after the end of the semester. They would each tell their parents that they were going away to a beach house in Florida that they had rented with a group of friends for Christmas break. The demon budget paid for the beach house, but no one would ever set foot in it.

Taylor’s dad arrived early on the first day after final exams. He honked his horn in greeting as he pulled up. He had arranged with Sam’s father to drive them home and then Mr. Collins would return them after the four week break. She and Sam were waiting with their bags. Sam had said goodbye to Chris earlier, worried that Eddie might ask too many questions if he saw her kissing the darkly handsome boy before they left.

“Hey, princess, how was your first semester of college?” Eddie asked, stepping out of the car.

“Interesting, Eddie,” she said. “Very different than what I expected.”

“How so?” he asked.

“I’ll tell you all about it on the drive home.”

He shrugged, firing off another question in his normal style. “So, where’s this Gabriel fellow I’ve heard so little about? I was hoping to meet him.”

Pangs of pain shot through Taylor’s chest. “Oh, sorry, Dad, he left yesterday. Perhaps you can meet him next semester.”

Eddie looked disappointed as he loaded the girls’ luggage into the trunk, but once in the car he turned to Taylor and said, “I’m just glad that you’ll be home for a few weeks.”

Taylor glanced at Sam in the backseat who was trying not to laugh. Now was not the time to tell him about their little vacation. “Uh, yeah. Me too, Dad…Me too.”

Smiling, Eddie started the engine and headed for the highway. Taylor stared out the window, but didn’t even see the landscape flashing by. She was wondering if she would ever see Gabriel again.

H
e stared at the dark, damp stone wall in misery. Gabriel had been in the angel prison for fourteen days, but with no sunlight, it could have been one hundred and fourteen days for all he knew. Not that he cared.

He had lost everything.
If Taylor was dead he would never see her again. If she was alive and in the hands of the demons he would never see her again. Bottom line: he would never see her again.

He had never experienced this kind of sadness and it had sent him spiraling into a deep depression. His only hope was that the Archangel Council would charge him with treason and sentence him to a quick and painless execution. It’s what he deserved. Death would be a relief.

These were his thoughts when a ray of hope pierced through the gloomy dungeon. It was in the form of a crumpled up piece of paper that an invisible hand slipped through the air hole in his cell door. It was written in block letters to hide the handwriting. It read:

DO NOT DESPAIR

SHE IS ALIVE AND STILL LOVES YOU

HELP IS ON THE WAY

INSTRUCTIONS TO FOLLOW

DESTROY THIS MESSAGE

Gabriel read the note three times, faith and hope entering his heart for the first time since he lost her. Determination coursed through his veins as he pledged to himself that he would never give up, that he would fight to see Taylor again, and that he would hold her in his arms once more before he died.

###

The saga continues in other books by David Estes available through the author’s official website:

http://davidestes100.blogspot.com

or through select online retailers including Smashwords.com.

The Evolution Trilogy by David Estes:

Book One—Angel Evolution

Book Two—Demon Evolution

Book Three—Archangel Evolution

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About the Author

After growing up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, David Estes moved to Sydney, Australia where he lives with his wife, Adele. When he’s not writing, he’s enjoying the sun and surf at Manly Beach.