Authors: Kristen Selleck
“Hail
Mary, full of grace. Blessed art thou among women,” Seth began again, watching
Father Andrew with his eyebrows raised. The priest joined in, looking for a
way to bring the performance to an end. He stooped and picked up the book.
“By
the intercession of St. Michael and the celestial Choir of the Powers, may the
Lord protect our souls against the snares and temptations of the devil. Amen.”
Sam
arched her back again and screamed. On the couch, Chloe wrestled against
Seth’s grip, kicking her legs, whispering something in fast inaudible words.
“Our
Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name,” Seth and Andrew recited in
unison.
“Let
go, let go, please let go,” Chloe cried.
Seth
winced as though in pain, but still held firm, and kept praying.
“Get
it off me!” she cried. “Help, George! They found me, they’ve got me, George
come back!”
“Hail
Mary, full of grace. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of
thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the
hour of our death. Amen. Hail Mary-” they continued.
Sam
shook her head wildly from side to side, she shrieked again, and then froze,
perfectly still, her body a contorted statue. With the eerie quality of a
black and white Dracula rising from his coffin, she sat up. Turning her head
with the same mechanical movement, she fixed her gaze on Father Andrew. She
studied him intently, and one side of her mouth snaked upward in a cruel smile.
“Against
our
science
, your religion is worthless!” she hissed. “Better you pray
to Newton, for all the good it will do!”
Father
Andrew frowned and prayed louder.
“Hail
Mary full of grace, blessed art thou among women-”
“You
want to believe in something real?” the harsh voice of Sam whispered at him.
“I’ll show you something real! The power of the
human
spirit! The
strength of a
human
will!”
“By
the intercession of St. Michael and the celestial Choir of Virtues, may the
Lord preserve us from evil and falling into temptation. Amen,” the priest
prayed.
Sam
screeched again and leapt to her feet. Chloe’s body went slack on the couch.
Seth dropped her wrists and wrapped an arm around her body. Burying his face
against her shoulder he prayed the Our Father with the priest.
The
room felt smaller to the priest, confining and hot-- and becoming ever more
so. The figure of Sam stopped her pacing and again turned toward him, her
hands on her hips. She smiled, a ghastly mimicry of happiness. With the slow,
determined upward curve of her lips, the room drew in around him. Air,
breathable air was leaving, his lungs seemed to collapse inside his chest. He
gasped, and his words faltered.
“Now…believe
in this!” Sam commanded.
A
full force gale of wind shrieked though the sitting room. Originating from the
figure of Sam herself. The floor lamp near the couch wavered and blew over
onto its side. The pages of the prayer book he held fought against his
restraining fingers to rip away and flip in that wind. Inside his living room,
inside his home…
And
it was enough.
Father
Andrew was a man who believed in the first place. Any sign, any token…it was
enough. It could only strengthen a resolve he already held. Father Andrew
cleared his throat. The Devil would have done better without theatrics, he
would have fared almost well if he had hidden himself behind the bodies of a
couple of drunk college children. Now, if Father Andrew had anything to do
with it, he would face the full wrath of God!
“By
the intercession of St. Michael and the celestial Choir of Principalities, may
God fill our souls with a true spirit of obedience! Amen!” he called.
Sam
laughed. Thump! A loud bang against the wall. Thump! Thump! Thump! The
knocking sound raced across the far wall, like an invisible force behind the
plaster was running along it, banging it’s fist as it went. Thump! Thump!
“Our
Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come-”
Thump!
Thump! Thump! Sam laughed hysterically, clutching her sides. Nearby, Chloe
groaned and, breaking free of Seth, began clawing and slapping at her legs.
Seth for his part, struggled to regain his grip on her wrists. He didn’t seem
to notice the hurricane winds, or the demonic knocking on the walls. His focus
rested solely on the girl whose body was trying to twist off the couch.
Whatever the girl was experiencing, her face a perfect mask of fear now, was
mirrored in his own, his voice breaking as he recited the Hail Mary, yet
again. Finally, he caught her wrists. He held her back down, wincing at every
cry she made, though never failing to recite the words.
“By
the intercession of St. Michael and the celestial Choir of Archangels may the
Lord
give us perseverance in faith and in all good works in order that we may attain
the
glory
of Heaven. Amen.” Father Andrew intoned.
Sam
gasped, and leering, she took a step nearer to the priest.
“Man
of Faith…” her voice a stage whisper that carried throughout the room. “Do you
not think it strange that He would let such things pass? Couldn’t he stop this
with one thought, one nod of his all-knowing head? Can you not see that
science is the answer to his silence? Can you not see that the spinning of the
cosmos into being from the force of a bang is just as beautiful as your
storybook words of a garden? Can you not see that the cosmos is the garden?
That a force without self-awareness is your God? Can’t you see? You want to
live forever? You think the reward for blind faith is heaven? The only thing
your people got right was purgatory!”
The
knocking was louder now. It ran up and down the walls, all around…dozens of
invisible hands…knocking…banging. Thump. Thump. Thump. Tink. Tink. Tink.
The knocking flashed up and down the window.
Father
Andrew shook his head. The devil had never been more off target in his memory
than now. These were adolescent threats. This was weak, unworthy of the
advisory he had always envisioned. But then…maybe it wasn’t directed at him.
“By
the intercession of St. Michael and the celestial Choir of Angels may the Lord
grant us to be protected by them in this mortal life and conducted in the life
to come to Heaven. Amen.,” he prayed.
Tink…Tink…Bang…Bang…Bang…
The
window seemed to bow inward with the unseen pressure of the force banging on
it. And then…it didn’t just seem to…it actually did. The window curved into
the room. Once…twice…and shattered, spraying glass fragments more than a dozen
feet forward. Seth covered Chloe’s body with his own. It was a needless
sacrifice. The shards didn’t go anywhere. They hovered. They levitated,
spinning in the air at different points, tracing the path of whatever had
broken through the window. The wind came from outside now. It howled through
the empty frame, spinning the tiny, jagged barbs of sparkling debris where they
floated, defying gravity. As they prayed, the wreckage slowly converged,
forming a sphere, a mirror ball of reflecting lights.
“Hail
Mary, full of grace. Blessed art thou among women,” Father Andrew prayed,
watching the jagged glass ball that watched him back, with a thousand of his
own eyes.
While
they prayed the Hail Mary, three times, the ball elongated. An oval first, and
then an oval with two growing appendages, leaking away from the bottom. Sam
collapsed on the floor, A dropped puppet, white-faced…a discarded doll. The
ball grew two more elongated lines. It was a ball no longer, it was a torso,
one with growing arms and legs, and then the glass shard ball of a head rose
from the chest. A body…a glass shard body, and it took one step and then
another towards the priest. And how the wind howled then, how it blew and
whistled around the unholy figure. The glass man and the priest.
“O
glorious prince St. Michael, chief and commander of the heavenly hosts,
guardian of souls, vanquisher of rebel spirits, servant in the house of the
Divine King and our admirable conductor, you who shine with excellence and
superhuman virtue deliver us from all evil, who turn to you with confidence and
enable us by your gracious protection to serve God more and more faithfully
every day,” Father Andrew prayed, setting his book gently aside and facing the
glass man.
The
horrid apparition took another step, and then another. It stretched out one
hand towards the priest, a thousand jagged points threatening in it’s gesture.
Father Andrew didn’t flinch.
“Pray
for us, O glorious St. Michael, Prince of the Church of Jesus Christ, that we
may be made worthy of His promises. Almighty and Everlasting God, Who, by a
prodigy of goodness and a merciful desire for the salvation of all men, has
appointed the most glorious Archangel St. Michael Prince of Your Church, make
us worthy, we ask You, to be delivered from all our enemies, that none of them
may harass us at the hour of death, but that we may be conducted by him into
Your Presence. This we ask through the merits of Jesus Christ Our Lord. Amen!”
The
glass man took one more step, it’s barely formed fingers faltering towards the
priest’s immoveable face.
And
then it crashed.
With that one last step, the force animating the spiky ruins seemed to melt
instantly into the floor. As it went, the glass fragments rained down. A
waterfall of sparkling sharpened threats, hitting the carpet with the force of
a downpour. The wind ceased, and the boy spoke. Crouched down next to the
limp body of the girl on the couch, cradling her head in his large hands, his
lips close to her ear, he was whispering.
“Come
back, Clo. Come back to me. I’ll fight next to St. Michael or anything else
that’ll keep you safe. You and me, Kiddo. You and me, I’m right here next to
you. I have been right along…I always will be.”
* * *
Chloe
felt like she was losing herself. What was it George said? Something about
the soul popping out of a body and spreading, dissipating into nothingness.
Right now she was spreading. All inside of her was black, the scene from the
strange, dimly lit room was a tiny picture. So far away it couldn’t be
reached. Whatever strange molecules made her up were quickly leaking away into
the dark.
“Oh,
no, oh no, oh no, please stop,” she begged herself.
The
one thing that reminded her of being, of shape, was the strange,
penetratingly, cruel squeeze of the Thing, on what was once her legs.
In
her fear of nonexistence, Chloe ceased to be afraid of the thing. It was, at
the very least, a point, a feeling, an experience that gave her a concept of
pinpointed terror. An experience she could identify as her own.
This
is me, it’s trying to hurt me, I am afraid of it, she reminded herself. The
room came back into focus. And so did the grip of the Thing.
“It’s
not real,” the dreamed up words echoed around her.
“If
it’s not real…I’m not real,” she decided quickly. “Very well, it IS real.”
The
thing squeezed tighter, her ‘somewhat’ knees bent inward.
“Why
does it always have to be fear that I can believe in? Monsters in the dark?
Pain…rejection?” her own thoughts chastised her. “There has to be a REAL good
too, doesn’t there? For every action, an equal and opposite reaction. For
every evil a good, for every negative…a positive. If that wasn’t so, by the
laws of physics, the world should go spinning off it’s axis and crash into the
sun, shouldn’t it?”
The
thing dug it’s mostly real nails, into her mostly real legs.
Pain…fear…it
reminded her.
It
didn’t really matter, did it? What was she really? What was one human being?
“Everything!”
shot back the dark hurting Thing, forgetting it’s purpose in the fervor of it’s
belief. “Why it’s everything! The individual is stronger than death itself!
We are all God! We are all a meaning! Every soul a flame, not put out in the
dark, the strong continue to burn. We don’t need something greater, some
beneficent force to meld us into one, to take us back into itself. There is
nothing more than this. One flame, two flames, three flames…they start a fire
in the dark, they burn and burn and burn. The fire is us, the ones who aren’t
fooled.”