Judgment (7 page)

              I had no answer. But Joe did. “This is a pretty sick plan if you ask me. This is more suffering than it is a process. What about all the suffering in the world that I've watched all my life? Abused children and animals, torture, murder, rape? Is that all part of God's ‘process' too?”
              “You can't blame all the evil deeds of men on God. Those are human actions that we took upon each other, aren’t they?”
              “So this is punishment then, for how bad we are?” asked Jennifer.
              “The end of days was always foretold. I don't think it has anything to do with how we’ve behaved. Judgment Day was to come eventually regardless. I think whether we are good or bad only affects our judging and what happens with our soul.”
              Margie spoke next. “But what about Noah and the Ark? When it rained for forty days and forty nights and God wiped out the world with the great flood. That wasn't Judgment Day; that was a punishment for human behavior, right?”
              The priest pondered her words for a while. His answer wasn't comforting. “Yes. The great flood was sent to cleanse the world of the wickedness that flesh had become. I suppose this could be punishment as well. I just don't know for sure. How can anyone know?”
 

              I felt like I was simply becoming more confused. “Father, there’s something I’ve never understood. All the things the bible says are evil, we are all born with. Lust and hatred and coveting, those are all natural and instinctive. And if we were created in God’s image, and those are part of our creation, how can they be bad? They're just part of human nature. Why make those things a part of us if you're going to punish us for it? And there has to be lust to ensure we procreate and continue the species. So how can that be wrong? I just don't get it.”
              Father Donovan stared directly into my eyes again, and I had a strange feeling as if there were some connection between us that I didn’t understand. He paused and sighed heavily before he spoke, and when he did speak it was like a parent giving strong experienced advice to a child. His words hung heavily in the air, and I would carry them with me for the rest of my days. “Perhaps the crime is not what is in us. Perhaps the crime is not the tools we were given. Perhaps the crime was how we used them.”
              The room went silent for many seconds. There was wisdom in the priest's words, even if not all the answers were there. It seemed like there were no more questions to ask, until Steve spoke suddenly. “So, if this is punishment, is it just for the bad people? Do we all have to die? Maybe we will be okay?”
              Joe laughed. “Really Steve? You think you didn't make Santa's naughty list? You just think about everything you've ever done when you were completely alone, every thought you've ever had in your mind that you can never tell anyone about, and you tell me again which list you're on.”
              Steve said nothing, except to put his head down shamefully.
              The sound of wings outside came quickly. Like pigeons suddenly coming into a rooftop roost. Quick fluttering at first, then slower flaps, then silence. There was no cooing of pigeons though, only the slow creak of the church doors being pushed open. A slight rush of air came in to the church as the door opened, pushing in swirls of dust that danced in the beams of sunlight now bursting through the gap.
              As the door swung fully open, a surreal silhouette stood in the doorway, dark against the bright sun behind it. The shape suggested male; tall, and broad shouldered. Most noticeable was the enormous wings that protruded from his back, rising up well above his head, now folding inward upon themselves to fit through the doorway.
              At first we all just stood where we were, paralyzed by the moment. We were frozen with fear; bewildered by the spectacle. Steve began backing away towards the back of the church. Jennifer seemed to be trying to duck down behind a pew.
 

              As the angel walked further into the church, the light filtering in through the windows illuminated the rest of him. He was perfectly chiseled in face and body, like a Greek statue. He wore no clothing of any kind, his full male anatomy on display. His bare feet made a slight noise on the church floor, like the pads of cat’s paws.
              Behind him similar silhouettes began to appear, their great wings blocking out the light in the doorway. Moments later there were four Judges inside the church. I felt the panic building up inside of me, the adrenaline, and the urgings of fight or flight. I heard the voice of Father Donovan behind me.
              “Run. Get out of here. Out the back...through the hall. Go!”
              I turned to see him pointing at an open doorway behind him, across the pulpit. Steve and Jennifer were already running for it. Margie and Joe were transfixed on the angels, like deer staring into car headlights. The Judges were moving slowly toward us, not with haste, but with purpose.
              “Look at their eyes,” I heard Margie say, almost in a whisper to herself. The angels' eyes were strangely inhuman. They were a golden color, with no white or colored pupils. You couldn't tell specifically where they were looking, if not for the direction of their heads.
 

              Father Donovan came forward and grabbed Margie by the shoulders, spinning her around. “Go girl!” he yelled as he shoved her towards the back hallway. Snapping out of her daze, I saw her glance quickly at me and then disappear through the back door following Steve and Jennifer.              

              Out of the corner of my eye I saw Joe's stance changing. Looking his way I saw him raising his wrench, a look of defiance growing on his face. “This can't be real,” he shouted. ”There's no fucking way.” Something in him snapped, and he moved forward to confront the closest angel.

              “Get back!” I urged him, but the wrench was already swinging. The weapon hit the Judge directly in the jaw with all of Joe's adrenaline-fueled strength. I saw the angel's head turn slightly from the impact, but it had no other effect. As Joe reared back for another swing, the Judge's wings spread out wide and his arms reached out and grabbed Joe by the shoulders, pulling him in. Joe squirmed and struggled against the Judge's embrace as the large wings wrapped around them both. The wrench drop to the floor with the clunk of rusted metal on old wood, and I watched Joe’s feet suddenly go still.
              I felt Father Donovan pulling on my arm. “Come on son, get out!”
 

              I turned and ran with him just as the other angels were closing in on us. Up onto the pulpit, across the platform and into a side hallway we ran. At the end of the short hall the morning sun was streaming in through the open back door, and I could see Jennifer and Margie outside. Father Donovan's voice was urgent in my ear. “Go son; get them to somewhere you can hide. You can't fight this, you can't beat it. You can only hide for as long as you can.”
              I turned to see him just standing there in the hall, not following. “What are you going to do? Come with us.”
              There was a sudden look of defeat, of surrender on his face. “I need to face up to my faith; to live up to my oath. If God is calling me to Heaven, I must answer.”
              “No. That's bullshit.” I moved back towards him and grabbed his shoulder. “Come with me, come on!”
              He pushed my hand off, pointing outside as he stepped backwards towards the pulpit. “Go. This is not your time yet. Take your friends away from here.” He turned and left the hallway, entering back into the church. I glanced back towards Jennifer and the others, but I couldn't leave yet. I moved back to the pulpit door and looked into the church. Two Judges were now up on the pulpit with Father Donovan kneeling in between them.

              The cross around his neck he was now caressing in his hands, and he was praying out loud, quickly, with a voice of fear. I could tell he had begun to cry. With each phrase of his prayers, his voice grew louder, more panicked. In the midst of his now almost shouted words, I saw a Judge place a hand upon his shoulder. Father Donovan went silent, and looked up at the angel. He calmly stood, and never moved as the great wings came around him and he disappeared behind a veil of feathers.
              I felt a chill run up the back of my neck as the second Judge saw me in the doorway and began to walk towards me. Just before I turned to run, I glanced over to the middle of the room where Joe had been. That Judge was now headed towards me also, and behind him on the floor I saw Joe's wrench, half buried in a pile of gray ashes. Just as I turned to leave, I saw the ashes fall where Father Donovan had been standing, and I watched a lightly glowing wisp of smoke rise towards the ceiling of the church and disappear.
              “Adam...come on!” Margie's voice dragged me down the hallway and out the back door into the sunlight. Outside, Jennifer, Steve, and Margie were standing in a very small cemetery surrounded by an old iron fence. There were only a dozen or so graves marked with very old tombstones. At one particular grave, a small dog was barking and furiously digging at the ground. It ignored us as we ran past, and in between its barks I heard a strange thumping in the ground. I stopped for a moment, listening. The priest was right. Under my feet, and all around the small cemetery, I could hear faint shouts and thumping coming from underground.

              The dog looked up at me and whimpered a couple of times, and then following his ears, ran over to a different grave and began digging again. A chill ran up my spine as I imagined the rotting corpses below me, waking up in the dark confines of their coffins, trying to get out.
              Steve's voice pulled my attention away. “Adam, help her over!” Looking towards the others I saw Jennifer struggling to get over the fence, her mini skirt caught on an iron spike. Margie and Steve were already on the other side. “What about Joe?” Steve asked as I pushed Jennifer over the fence. I just looked at him and shook my head. I saw him glance curiously back towards the door of the church. “And Father Donovan?”
              “Let's just go,” I answered, and the four of us began running up the alley behind the church, never looking back.
 

Chapter 5

Soulmates Unmated

“For a time is coming when all who are in their

graves will hear his voice”

~ John 5:28

              We found ourselves somewhere in Brooklyn, surrounded by a brownstone jungle. Our paths were always the same, littered with cars and dust, and mostly barren of life. Tired and hungry, I had little desire to go any further, particularly when we had no real direction or purpose. Throughout the morning and into the early afternoon we had made our way through the streets, always heading south away from Manhattan where it seemed this had all started. But in reality, while it may have begun in Manhattan for us, I knew this was a worldwide phenomenon and running anywhere would simply be more of the same no matter where we went.

              Angels flew above us sporadically all morning; fleeting shadows briefly blocking out the sun, causing us to duck into a doorway or store just long enough to think “this isn’t safe enough” and move on again. At one point we rested for a little while in a bakery, filling our guts with stale bagels and donuts and day-old burnt coffee. A stray dog had followed us for a while, gladly sharing a bagel with me. I had noticed quite a few animals along our path throughout the morning. Dogs, cats, and frequently rats, seemed to be more prevalent now that humans had mostly vanished from sight. The animals seemed to be immune from the attention of the Judges, and wandered the streets freely and fearlessly in the absence of their human handlers. 

              We had seen a few more people that seemed to be dead, but still weren’t somehow. They were few and far between, but extremely unnerving when encountered, and we simply did our best to avoid them. I began to realize as we wandered our way through the streets of Brooklyn that the shadows were growing longer, the day getting later, and we really didn’t even know where we going. The evening would be coming soon, and I didn’t want to be on the street after dark. “Margie, where are we going?”

              “I don’t know; away from the city. Steve wants to check his daughter’s place, and if we can keep going south we can get to Staten Island where my brother is.”

              “We need to get off the street before dark though, Margie.” Margie stopped and the four of us huddled on a stoop of a brownstone building for the moment. Steve was breathing heavily, making little wheezing sounds.

              “You okay Steve?” Jennifer asked him.

              He took a deep breath before answering. “Asthma; I’ve got asthma and the dust is making it really bad.”

              We had all been breathing in the ash all day. It was gross and had us all coughing frequently. Margie would often pull her T-shirt up across her face, but the rest of us didn’t have clothing that would work that way. “I say we hole up in one of these buildings for the night. I’m sure we’ll find food, water, maybe some fresh clothes. Jennifer can find some shoes I bet.”

              With that thought Jennifer reached down and began rubbing her feet, picking little stones out from between her toes and checking the cuts and scratches. “Yeah, that would be good,” she mumbled. We sat on the steps of the brownstone apartment building for a few more minutes, looking up and down the block. All the buildings looked exactly the same, just rows of old and tall tenement buildings. It was eerily quiet and completely deserted. Sitting made our tiredness catch up to us. We all sat quiet and motionless, staring around into nothingness.

              I heard a dog bark off in the distance and then suddenly came the flapping of wings. It startled us back into alertness, and we all looked around to find where it was coming from. Two Judges appeared overhead, coming from behind our building. They flew over the street and landed on the roof of the tenement directly across from us. It seemed as though they hadn’t noticed us yet.

              “Holy shit. Inside, right now!” I said in an urgent whisper. Scrambling, yet half squatting and ducking down, all four of us hurried through the front door of the building that we had been sitting in front of for the last twenty minutes. Quietly but quickly I closed the door behind us. We stopped just inside, huddled in the foyer; certain death outside, and the unknown ahead of us in the dark corners of the old tenement.

              It was fairly dark inside, only a few lights working in the main hallway which was little more than a set of steps up to each floor and a landing and hallway just big enough to walk to each apartment door. Noticeably there was no dust inside. We remained quiet for a minute or two, listening both for the Judges outside, and for any movement inside. Somewhere in one the apartments somebody’s alarm clock was going off steadily, and probably had been all day. From somewhere upstairs the static sound of a TV or radio drifted down through the stairwell. Beyond that, there were no signs of life, only silence.

              “Let’s go upstairs,” Steve said through heavy gasps of asthma. “I’d feel better higher up, off the ground level.”

              “Yeah, sounds good,” I answered, and we all began quietly ascending the stairs. Each landing looked the same; small, old, and deserted. We moved past the second and the third, each lifeless and bland. I noticed a couple of cockroaches on the third floor landing that quickly scuttled away from our feet. Just as we began to head up to the fourth floor, I heard a doorknob and the creak of a hinge behind us. Turning I saw the first door on the third floor, closest to the stairs, cracked open about an inch.

              Peering through the small gap I saw an eye and part of a face. It looked like a man’s face, and very old. We made eye contact just for a second, and the door slowly pushed shut again. I heard several deadbolts slide gently into place, and a small worthless chain ease into a metal groove. Leaving well enough alone, I turned and headed up the steps to catch up to the others.

              On the fourth floor we went apartment to apartment. Each was completely empty of both life and ash, except for one where we found a couple of cats. One greeted us happily at the door while the other ran to hide in a back bedroom. Each home was a treasure trove of loot, full of clothes, shoes, food, water; everything we needed and then some. It all felt strange, and in every apartment I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was going to be caught by the owner or the cops at any moment. But it wouldn’t be like that anymore. This was a new world, where the only law was outside sitting on the rooftops with huge white wings and golden eyes.

              In one unit Jennifer came gleefully trotting out of a back bedroom with a pair of sneakers on. I teased her that they didn’t quite go with the skirt, which prompted her to go into another apartment looking for other clothes. Steve and Margie were in another unit across the hall sitting in front of an open refrigerator having a feast. It seemed as though the entire fourth floor was ours, and at least for now we had some refuge from the madness; something we needed desperately, both mentally and physically.

              I was feeding the friendly cat when Jennifer entered the room in a new pair of shorts and a green Philadelphia Eagles Jersey. “Much better,” she announced as she began rummaging through the fridge. The smell of cat food drew out the other cat, and soon I had both cats eating with me in the kitchen. We all ate until we felt sick, then we collapsed on the couches of other people’s living rooms.

              Keeping the lights to a minimum and staying away from the windows were the rules of the night. We had to minimize the chance of Judges seeing us from the rooftops. We took turns taking showers, the comforting flow of water washing away the ashes and at least for tonight, the nightmare world that waited for us outside. The electric clock over the stove said 10:49pm when Margie started falling asleep on the living room floor. Steve’s own wheezing was keeping him awake, but it was improving slightly now that he was rested some and breathing the cleaner air indoors.

              Margie announced that she was going to find a bed to sleep on. We all agreed that we should stay close together and be in the same apartment for the night. I took first watch, and Margie headed for the back bedroom. Steve followed close behind, closing the door to the second bedroom behind him. Jennifer checked the deadbolts on the apartment door, and then sat next to me on the couch. The only light in the room came from the hood over the kitchen stove.

              Jennifer and I sat in silence while I stared out the front window to the rooftops across the street. Twice I saw Judges moving around on top of the buildings, looking down into the street searching for people. Several times it sounded like angels had landed on top of our roof just above our heads. It was a strange feeling to be hunted, to have to hide for your life. I wondered how long we would be able to survive. 

              I thought Jennifer had fallen asleep, until she suddenly spoke. “Were you married a long time?”

              I didn’t really like having this conversation most of the time, but something about Jennifer’s comforting nature made it feel okay right now. “Fourteen years or so I guess. I feel like she’s still always with me though.”

              Jennifer sat forward, setting a near empty coke can on the coffee table. “I think it’s wonderful that you still wear your wedding band. I always assumed you were going home to her every night.”

              “I promised her I would never take my ring off. Every Saturday I go to her grave, bring her flowers and talk to ….”

              Oh my god.

              “Adam? What is it?”

              Oh my god.

              “Hey...” Jennifer insisted, “What is it?”

              I quickly stood and walked across the room, pacing back and forth. I felt a sudden urge to vomit. Jennifer stood. “Adam what’s wrong? Did you hear something?”

              I faced her, fighting to put the words out smoothly. “My wife, she’s in the cemetery.” I paused for a second to fight back the puke. “Do you understand?”

              In the dim light I saw Jennifer put her hand over her mouth when she realized what I was saying. “Oh God Adam, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

              I paced the room stunned for a moment by my realization. I pictured my wife, waking up in a body that had been dead for a year, finding herself in a dark coffin six feet underground. I sat back on the couch when I felt my knees weakening and I felt like I was going to black out. I leaned back and sat deep into the couch, staring out the window into the darkness. Jennifer sat next me, close but not too close, and she reached over and took my hand.

“Are you okay?” she asked me.

              I couldn’t answer her. I looked at her and tried, but the tears began to fall and my throat closed up. For the first time since this all began, I came unglued, and I needed someone else to be strong for a moment. Jennifer leaned towards me and pulled me in, and I wept on her shoulder until we both fell asleep.

              *   *  *  *

              A week of scavenging and hiding in the brownstone went by before I could no longer hold myself back. I had counted the days as best I could, and I was pretty sure today was Saturday, leaving the apartment as soon as I woke up. As the others lingered in sleep, I grabbed a baseball bat that Margie had found and quietly snuck out, leaving a note that simply said “I’ll be back.” I left my backpack behind since I had no plans for scavenging today. This trip was for something else.

              The sky had a crisp clarity to it, seemingly untarnished by the events of late. Somehow even the specter of an apocalypse couldn’t tarnish the beauty of nature, yet somehow humans had always found ways to do it.

              I broke the rule of going about alone. But I had to for this; I didn’t want anyone else at risk for what would be a very personal and selfish reason. I moved along the street as we always did, carefully scanning around for Judges and the maledicted. At least for the moment the street was deserted and the rooftops seemed empty. The maledicted seemed to be changing over time, as if their brains became more crazed and insane as they rotted. Before, running into one was disturbing; now it was becoming outright dangerous. The odds were more likely now that they would attack you on sight, like a rabid dog. Being alive seemed to anger the dead. It also seemed as though the Judges became less obvious, less visible, as the days went by. It’s a big planet, and I assumed once the cities had been mostly cleared of their human trash, there were a lot of other places to go to do God’s work.