But still we smiled upon our work, and knew it to be just and good. I like to think this was the angel’s thoughts, my angel’s satisfaction, but I’m still not sure. I wanted to kill these awful things, these monsters who shared the same mother as I. I didn’t want to think I had anything in common with them, but I did, I did. Angel or no, I was as much a monster in what I did then.
We followed the retreating creatures, all the way into the heart of the Nightside, and there was Lilith, sitting on a pale Throne, waiting for us. Her surviving offspring crouched and huddled around the Throne, and at her pale feet. She didn’t look at them. All the power of her dark gaze was fixed on Suzie, and on me. The buildings were very tall, impossibly heavy and impressive, and I couldn’t tell of what substance they were made. They just were, drawn out of her mind and stamped onto reality by her will, in this place that was not a place, hidden within the real world like a parasite deep in a man’s guts.
Lilith watched unwaveringly as Suzie and I stepped unhurriedly into the courtyard and approached her throne. A dozen kinds of blood and offal dripped from our hands. Lilith’s gaze was steady, her dark mouth unmoved as her wounded offspring surged restlessly around her feet, crying put for vengeance. Suzie and I came to a halt a respectful distance before her, and Lilith gestured sharply with one long-fingered hand. The clamour about her fell silent. She gestured again, and the creatures slunk away, fading into the dark shadows of the surrounding streets and alleyways. Until there was only Lilith and Suzie, and me.
“I see angels in you,” Lilith said calmly. Her words came clearly to me, perhaps because they were filtered through Baphomet. “You carry Heaven’s and Hell’s restraints within you. I should have known they’d find a way to sneak into my perfect paradise. All I wanted was a world to play in, one world for my very own. A fresh start, I thought, but no; we have to follow the old ways, even here. So, which of you is the snake and which the apple, I wonder? Though I’ve never seen that much difference, between Heaven and Hell. Both so certain, so limited, so … unimaginative. Just bullies, determined to make everyone else play their depressing little game.
“Still, it doesn’t matter. You’ve come too late. I have made a new realm, separate from both of yours, and what I have done here can never be undone, except by me. And you have no power to force me to do anything any more. The very nature of this city limits and diminishes you, while I… have designed this body to be very powerful indeed.”
I could feel Baphomet boiling and churning within me, enraged by her words, desperate to unleash its power and follow its programming. But I was still in charge and pushed it back. There were things I needed to ask, needed to know.
“Why are Heaven and Hell so concerned about this place?” I said, and my voice sounded very normal to me. “Why do they see your little city as such a danger?”
Lilith raised a perfect dark eyebrow. “That isn’t the angel talking. You’re … human, aren’t you? I’ve seen your kind, in visions. What brings you here, so many years before your time?”
“Is it the concept of true free will they find so threatening?” I persisted. “Why are they so scared of a place where freedom is more than just a word?”
“Your thinking is very limited,” said the angel Gabriel, through Suzie’s lips. Her mouth, its voice. “We do not care about Lilith or her city. It is the creatures and powers this freedom from responsibility will someday produce that are our concern. They will be more terrible and more powerful than the rightful inhabitants of this world were ever meant to have to face. Humanity must be protected from such threats if it is to have its fair chance. Unlike Lilith, we take the long view. She has only ever cared about the here and now.”
“Here and now is certain,” Lilith said calmly. “Everything else is guesswork.”
“She must be destroyed,” Baphomet said suddenly, forcing the words through my lips.
“That is not what was agreed,” said Gabriel, through Suzie.
“Lilith is here and at our mercy,” said Baphomet. “And we may never have a better chance.”
“Our orders… are more important than any local agreement,” said Gabriel. “We must destroy the outcast while we have the opportunity.”
And just like that, the two angels changed our deal. Using all their strength and will, they pushed Suzie and me aside, forcing us into the back of our heads so they could take control of our bodies and complete their mission. They were supposed to stop her, not destroy her; but their nature would not let them miss the chance of disposing of such a notorious enemy of Heaven and Hell. Lilith didn’t move. I could sense the weakness in her, her strength drained by how much of herself she’d had to put into creating her Nightside. I could have sat back and let the angels kill her. I could have watched her die, knowing it would ensure the Nightside’s safety in the future, even if it meant my own death, through not being born. I could have. But in the end, I had to do something. Not only for me, but for her. I couldn’t let her die because of something she hadn’t done yet and might never do. Humanity had to have its chance, but so did she. Making decisions like this is what Humanity is for.
I surged forward in my head, taking Baphomet by surprise. I forced my hand out towards Suzie, and her hand came jerkily forward to grab mine. And together, inch by inch, we took back control of our bodies. The angels raged every step of the way, but there was nothing they could do. I smiled at Lilith, and spoke with my own voice again.
“I have to believe in hope,” I said to her. “For you, and for me.”
You cannot defy our authority, said a small voice in the back of my head. You have no power without us.
“I’m just exercising the free will I was given,” I said. “And you two are more trouble than you’re worth.”
Defy us, and Heaven and Hell will be at your back and at your throat for the rest of your life.
“Get in the queue,” I said. “You only possess us by our will, and by our consent. You broke the agreement. And this is the Nightside, where you have no authority at all. So, get out.”
And like that, Suzie and I thrust Gabriel and Baphomet out of us. They shot up into the night sky, great wings flapping frantically, then they shot up like living fireworks, fleeing the city before it destroyed them. They couldn’t risk being destroyed before they could report what had happened there, in that spiritual blind spot.
Losing the angel’s power was like having the heart ripped out of me. It felt such a small thing, to be merely human again.
Suzie quietly let go of my hand. I nodded, understanding. And then we both looked at Lilith, still sitting in state on her pale Throne. She considered us, thoughtfully.
“So,” she said finally. “Alone at last. I thought they’d never go. You are humans. Not quite what I was expecting.”
“We’re what humans will be,” I said. “We’re from the future.”
“I thought you must be,” said Lilith. “Without the angelic presence to mask it, you’re dripping with Time. Thousands of years of it, I’d say. Why have you come such a long way to be here, speaking a language you shouldn’t be able to understand, knowing things you shouldn’t know?”
Suzie and I looked at each other, wondering how best to put this. There really wasn’t any diplomatic way …
“I envy you your travel through Time,” said Lilith. “That’s one of the few things I can never enjoy. I had to imprint myself so very firmly on your reality, in order to exist here … and even I dare not risk undoing that. Tell me—what dread purpose brings you here, from so many years ahead, to murder my children and destroy my pretty city?”
“We came here to stop you from destroying the Nightside, in the far future,” I said.
“The Nightside?” Lilith cocked her head on one side, like a bird, then smiled. “A suitable name. But why should I wish to destroy my realm after I’ve put so much of myself into its creation?”
“No-one seems too sure,” I said. “Apparently it’s tied in with me. I am, or will be, your son.”
/>
Lilith looked at me for a long moment, her face unreadable. “My son,” she said finally. “Flesh of my flesh, born of my body? By a human father? Intriguing… You know, you really should have let those angels destroy me.”
“What?” I said.
“I have put too much of myself into this place to be stopped or side-tracked now. By emissaries of the great tyrants of Heaven or Hell, or by some unexpected descendant from a future that may never happen. The Nightside will be what I intend it to be, here, and in all the futures that may be. I will do what I will do, and I will not accept any authority or restriction over me. That is why I was made to leave Eden, after all. You may be my son, but really all you are is an unexpected and unwelcome complication.”
“You have to listen to me!” I said, stepping forward.
“No, I don’t,” said Lilith.
She rose suddenly out of her Throne and surged forward inhumanly quickly to grab my face in both her hands. I cried out, in shock and pain and horror. Her touch was cold as knives, cold as death, and the endless cold within her sucked the living energy right out of me. I grabbed her wrists with both my hands, but my human strength was nothing next to hers. She smiled as she drained the life out of me, and into her. Smiled with those dark lips and those dark, dark eyes.
“I gave you life, and now I take it back,” she said. “You will make me strong again, my son.”
I could no longer feel anything but the cold, and the light was already fading out of my eyes, when Suzie Shooter was suddenly there. She stuck her shotgun right into Lilith’s face and let her have both barrels. The shock of the blessed and cursed ammunition at such point-blank range drove Lilith backwards, jerking her hands off my face. I fell to my knees, and didn’t even feel it as they slammed against the ground. Lilith cried out angrily, her face undamaged but blazing with rage. Suzie knelt beside me, her arm around my shoulders to stop me falling any further. She was saying something, but I couldn’t hear her. Couldn’t hear anything. I felt cold, distant, as though inch by inch I was slipping away from life. And all I could think was, I’m sorry, Suzie… to have to do this to you again.
She shook me roughly, then glared at Lilith. Some of my hearing came back, though I still couldn’t feel Suzie’s arm around me.
“How could you, you bitch! He’s your son!”
“It was easy,” said Lilith. “After all, I have so many children.”
She beckoned with one pale, imperious hand, and from all sides her monsters came creeping forward again, crashing and slumping out of the streets and alleyways from which they’d been watching. There were lots of them, even after all those Suzie and I had killed, more than enough to deal with two foolish humans. I fought to keep my head up, watching helplessly as the monsters circled slowly around Suzie and me, laughing in their various terrible ways, forms hideous and powerful beyond hope or reason, monsters from the darkest pits of creation. Some of them called out, in awful voices I could still somehow understand, boasting of the terrible things they would do to Suzie and to me for the destruction of their kindred and because they could. They promised us torment and horror, and death so long in the coming we would beg for it before they finally chose to release us. They would hurt us and hurt us until we couldn’t stand it any more; and then they’d show us what pain really was.
And I thought, Not Suzie… I’ll die first, before I let that happen…
She drew a slender knife from the top of her boot, and made a long shallow cut along the inside of her left wrist. I gaped at her stupidly, and she slapped the cut wrist against my open lips. Her blood filled my mouth, and I swallowed automatically.
“Werewolf blood,” said Suzie, her face close to mine, her voice sharp and insistent, cutting through the fog in my head. “To buy us some time. I can’t save us, John, and there’s no-one here to act as the cavalry, this time. Only you can save us. So I’ll fight them, for as long as I can, to buy you time to come up with some last throw of the dice. A miracle would be good, if you’ve got one about you.”
She put the knife away and stood up to face the crowding monsters. She held her shotgun with familiar ease and sneered at Lilith, back sitting on her Throne. Suzie Shooter, Shotgun Suzie, stood tall and defiant as the monsters surged forward, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen a braver thing in my life.
And maybe it was the werewolf blood, or maybe it was her faith in me, but I stood up, too, and looked at Lilith. For the first time she looked surprised, and uncertain. She opened her mouth to say something, but I laughed in her face. And using the very last of my reserves of strength, I forced open my inner eye, my third eye, my private eye, my one and only magical legacy from Mommie Dearest; and I used my gift for finding things to detect the familial mystic link between me and Lilith. The very same link she’d used to draw my life out of me. And it was the easiest thing in the world to reach back through the link, seize her living energy, and haul it right out of her. She cried out in shock, convulsing on her Throne as the strength flowed out of her, and back into me.
The monsters stopped their advance at Lilith’s horrified cry and looked around, confused. My back straightened and my legs grew strong again. My head cleared, and I laughed again; and something in that laugh made the monsters draw back even further. And still the power roared out of Lilith, and into me, for all her struggles. Suzie grinned at me, her single blue eye shining. Lilith cried out again, in rage and horror, and fell forward from her Throne, sprawling inelegantly on the ground before me. Her monstrous children were silent now, watching in shock at their powerful mother brought low. I smiled down at my helpless, thrashing mother, and when I spoke my voice was every bit as cold as hers.
“One day,” I said to her, “all your precious monsters will get together and turn on you, banishing you from your own creation. When that happens, do remember that I made it possible, by weakening you here and now. They’ll throw you out because, deep down, the only freedom you believe in is the freedom you dispense to others. You could never allow anyone else to be truly free, free of you, because then they might some day grow powerful enough to have authority over you… You’ll lose everything, and all because you never could play nicely with others.”
She looked up at me, with her eyes darker than the night. “I will see you again.”
“Yes, Mother,” I said. “You will. But not for thousands of years. In my time, on my territory. Still, here’s a little something, to remember me by.”
And I kicked her in the face. She fell backwards, and I turned my back on her. I looked at Suzie, and she grinned and pumped one fist in the air victoriously. I grinned back, and using the power I’d drained out of Lilith, I broke Time’s hold on us, and we rocketed back through history, all the way back to the future—and the Nightside, where we belonged.
Epilogue
Back in Strangefellows, the oldest bar in the world.
She said, “So, what do we do now?”
I said “We put together an army of every Power and Being and major player in the whole damned Nightside, and turn them into an army I can throw at Lilith’s throat. I’ll use my gift to track down wherever she’s hiding herself now, then… we do whatever we have to, to destroy her. Because that’s all there is left, now.”
“Even though she’s your mother?”
“She was never my mother,” I said. “Not in any way that mattered.”
“Even with an army to back us up, we could still lay waste to most of the Nightside, fighting to bring her down.”
“She’ll do it anyway, if we don’t do something,” I said. “I’ve seen what will happen if we don’t stop her, and anything would be better than that.”
I didn’t look at her scarred face. I didn’t think of her half-dead, half-mad, come back through Time to kill me, with the awful Speaking Gun grafted where her right forearm used to be.
“What if the others don’t want to get involved?”
“I’ll make them want to.”
“And end up just like your m
other?”
I sighed, and looked away. “I’m tired, Suzie. I want… I need for all this to be over.”
“It should be one hell of a battle.” Shotgun Suzie tucked her thumbs under the bandoliers of bullets that crossed her chest. “I can’t wait.”
I smiled at her fondly. “I’ll bet you even take that shotgun to bed with you, don’t you?”
She looked at me with her cold, calm expression. “Someday, you just might find out. My love.”
Simon R. Green, Paths Not Taken
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