A Deafening Silence In Heaven

  “Remy.”

  But there was a power behind it as it made its way out into the universe, floating upon the cosmic winds, drifting up into the maelstrom of creation, to fall upon the ear of the one who was the Creator.

  “Remy.”

  He almost did not recognize the name being called, so far was he from what he once had been, but the voice . . . the voice . . .

  “Remy.”

  The pieces of his identity slowly, gradually fell back into place.

  A being of Heaven . . . an angel in the Heavenly host Seraphim . . . Remiel . . .

  • • •

  “Remy.”

  He turned his gaze to a facet of a world in transition, drawn to the sound of a voice with a power as great as the one that now coursed through his body.

  In that voice was the power to heal and to transform, to take something once cold and heartless and make it—

  Human.

  In the world before, that power had belonged to a force of nature called Madeline, whose voice had been silenced by death. But that same power would not—could not—die.

  Fighting to remain who he had been, Remy focused his attention on a particular portion of reality in the midst of transition. It was from that area of the maelstrom that he’d heard his name called, brought back from the brink by the power returned.

  The power born again in the form of another.

  “Linda,” he said from the center of it all.

  Searching for his love from within the eye of creation.

  • • •

  Linda had never believed that she would be around to see the end of the world, never imagined being a part of it.

  She had swum out into the turbulent waters as far as she could go, trying to keep her eyes on the spot in the sky where she’d thought she’d seen something.

  Seen him.

  But it was all chaos now, with the lightning and the thunder and a wind that raked across the water with its claws of air, driving the ocean into spasms of agony.

  A small speck upon the vastness, Linda refused to let the elements have her, even though the wind tried to snatch her up from the water, and the great, angry sea tried to swallow her up. She remained afloat, eyes rooted to the spot where she thought the sky would be, and thought about the man she loved and how she had tried so very hard to save him.

  And then it was time for it all to end.

  There was no difference between the ocean below and the sky above. It had all turned to chaos. Yet still she managed to hold on to her thoughts, refusing to acknowledge the terror that now gripped her as the end of her existence drew near.

  She thought of Remy, and how if he had been there he would have taken her in his arms and told her . . .

  “Everything is going to be all right.”

  She heard him say it, and a smile came to her lips even at the end of her reality. She was brave enough to open her eyes to catch a glimpse of the final death throes of a world, and in her delirium she thought the impossible, that Remy was there, a calmness at the center of the storm.

  And then she felt the strength of his arms as he drew her to him, and the beating of his heart as he pulled her so very close, and she had no idea if it was real or the peace of death.

  But at that particular moment, either one was fine with her.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  The bedroom door wasn’t going to hold them back for very long, even though Squire had rammed a dresser from across the room up against it.

  “Be sure to add this to the list of things that we’re going to need to reimburse Remy for,” the goblin said with a crooked smile.

  “Fuck you,” Mulvehill responded, hauling out the heavy wood drawers of the dresser and stacking them on top to give the obstruction a bit more height. It had grown quiet on the other side, the Bone Masters probably regrouping, trying to figure out how they were going to get through.

  Squire stepped out of the closet with some heavy Samsonite suitcases. “Do you think he’s gone?” He grunted as he tossed them on top of the drawers.

  “Who, Assiel?” Mulvehill asked. He’d gone to the closet as well, coming back with two smaller cases. “Yeah, I think he is.”

  The pair stood back, admiring their work.

  “It ain’t the Great Wall, but it’ll have to do,” the goblin said.

  Mulvehill went to the bed and stared at the figures upon it, deep in the grip of unconsciousness.

  “Maybe we should throw them up onto the barricade,” Squire suggested. “Least that way, they’d be serving some purpose.”

  “They’re serving a purpose,” Mulvehill retorted, looking first at Ashley, then at Linda, and finally at Marlowe. “They have to be someplace . . . doing something.”

  “They’re doing something, all right,” Squire grumbled. “But it ain’t doing squat for us.”

  “They’re doing their thing, and we’re doing ours,” Mulvehill said. “It’s what we agreed to.”

  “Do you think they’re actually helping him?” Squire asked, motioning with his chin to Remy lying in the center of the bed.

  “Yeah,” Mulvehill answered. “I do. I have to; it’s the only positive thing I’ve got to hold on to.”

  “You’ve still got your health.” Squire shrugged with another of his crooked smiles.

  “Have I told you to go fuck yourself recent—”

  There was a sudden pounding on the door, and the sound of splintering wood.

  “Ah, showtime,” Squire said, as he picked up the small battle-axe that he’d gotten from Francis’ place.

  Mulvehill checked the clip in his gun for what could have been the hundredth time, thinking how awesome it would have been if the ammunition fairy had been by to replenish his bullets, but no such luck. He still had less than a full clip remaining. Every shot was going to have to count.

  Again something slammed against the door, and he could see the cracks through their makeshift barricade.

  “You ready for this?” Mulvehill asked, his gaze now focused entirely upon the door.

  Squire spun the axe in his hands. “Oh yeah, this type of bullshit has become old hat.”

  The door, and the things stacked in front of it, shook again, and Mulvehill could hear the sound of wood splintering and falling away. It wouldn’t be long now.

  The bangs and crashes were coming closer together now.

  “Let me take the first crack at them,” Squire said, hefting the axe. “If it looks like they’re gonna get past me put a bullet in their eye. How’s that sound?”

  “Sounds good,” Mulvehill said, feeling the tension in the room escalate with each new assault on the door. He was about to check his clip again, just to have something to do, when he heard the sound, a soft sigh of exhalation, and spun around to see. . . .

  “They’re awake,” Mulvehill announced, going to the bed.

  Ashley slowly sat up, looking around at the room, confusion on her face. “Where . . . ?” she began.

  Something pounded savagely on the door, and one of the drawers crashed to the floor.

  “Jesus Christ!” she exclaimed, eyes wide as the realization of the situation began to sink it.

  “How are you doing?” Mulvehill asked her, wanting to make sure that she was all right but also wanting to keep an eye on the door situation.

  Marlowe had awakened as well, and he appeared just as confused.

  “We’re good,” Ashley said, patting the dog’s head and looking over to the still-slumbering Linda, and, of course, Remy.

  “Nice to see ya back, kid,” Squire said. “I’ve got to go take my place near the door to hold back unwanted company.”

  “You do that,” Ashley said.

  Marlowe was sniffing at Remy and Linda.

  “Did it work?” Mulvehill asked her.

  Ashley looked at him and then back to Remy and Linda. “I really don’t know what we did in there.”

  The door was being slowly hacked apart by their attackers, holes now appearing.

>   “So I’m guessing he won’t be back,” Mulvehill said, feeling a nearly overwhelming sadness envelop him. He hadn’t realized how much hope he’d placed in the three saving Remy and somehow bringing him back.

  “I don’t think so,” Ashley said, tears running from her eyes. “I don’t know about her, either.” She reached over to take hold of Linda’s hand. “Maybe they’re together.”

  Mulvehill wasn’t about to let the sadness cripple him; he forced himself to replace his moroseness with a growing anger toward their aggressors. “That would be nice,” he managed, then turned away to join Squire in front of the barricade.

  The dresser slid forward, revealing the door, its wood broken away in strips. They could see their attackers on the other side. Squire stepped forward, battle-axe ready for first blood. Mulvehill’s finger twitched upon the gun, eager to squeeze the trigger.

  “I’m going to use this, okay?” said a voice from behind him.

  He turned his head to see Ashley and Marlowe standing behind him. She was hefting a short sword.

  “Yeah,” he said. “Are you sure?”

  She nodded. “I’m sure. . . . Where should I stand?”

  • • •

  Remy had found his love, snatching her up from the maelstrom and hugging her to him.

  He had no idea how she could be where she was—in this place—but it did not change the fact that she was indeed there with him.

  She trembled convulsively as he clutched her to his body, taking her away from a world in the midst of disarray. The reality below them had gradually come undone, as one reality was erased to be supplemented with another.

  In the center of it all, he held Linda tightly, using the love he felt for her as his focus. It would be so easy to let it all go, he thought, his identity slowly dwindling as he infused himself into the very universe he was creating. No longer would he be only who he was.

  He would be everything, and everything would be him.

  “Remy.” Linda whispered his name once more. He looked down at her and into her eyes.

  “Is it really you?” she asked.

  Feeling the tug of a universe upon him, he hesitated only briefly. “Yes, it’s me,” he said, pulling her up to him, and they kissed.

  As a universe took shape around them.

  • • •

  Linda awoke with a gasp, having witnessed the birth of a universe.

  For a moment she simply lay there, in a kind of shock, as she attempted to adjust to her new reality. Her body felt stiff, achy, and she rolled over on the bed, onto the body of her lover, who was incredibly still.

  And cold to her touch.

  She couldn’t find the words as she looked at him, the memories of what she had done and why rushing back to her now.

  “Oh, Remy,” she said, bringing a hand to her mouth to stifle the flow of emotion.

  It was the sound of a single gunshot that brought her fully back to the moment at hand. She looked away from the body of her lover to the front of the room, staring in abject horror at the sight of her friends as they attempted to keep monsters from forcing their way in.

  She looked back to Remy, saying a silent good-bye before bounding from the bed to help her friends. Having just witnessed the birth of a universe, she was filled with a sense of wonder the likes of which she had never experienced before, and was not yet ready to surrender.

  Desperate to hold on to the life that still remained for her.

  • • •

  Floating in the midst of creation, Remy began to truly understand how God worked.

  For great things to happen there is always a catalyst, something that jump-starts the process of change, a spark struck to the gasoline.

  Unification was to be the start of something glorious, the next phase of something amazing that began with creation itself.

  But for that next chapter to begin, for the new to be ushered in, the imperfections in the old plan must be found.

  The flaws—those nasty bugs—those annoying defects that seemed to arise whenever the process of change began.

  They had to be driven into the open, drawn from the shadows, and once exposed . . . destroyed.

  As dramatic as it all was, as reality took shape around him, Remy understood the method to God’s madness.

  And his place at the head of the asylum.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Mulvehill’s bullets were gone, but that didn’t mean the gun was useless.

  Holding the .45 by the barrel, he used the weapon as a bludgeon, cracking skulls and faces and any other appendages that might be broken with a solid strike from the gun’s grip.

  He was painfully aware of the direness of their situation; it wouldn’t be long at all until they were overrun. He couldn’t speak for the others, but he could feel himself growing tired, his brain becoming fuzzy, his response time slowing. He chanced a quick glance at Ashley, seeing her stab the short sword into the throat of a Bone Master that was attempting to crawl into the room between the legs of another. It went down gasping, clutching at its throat, but still managed to make its way farther into the room. Marlowe leapt upon it, pinning the demon to the floor, and then Linda stepped forward, jamming the sharp end of a broken drawer into the Bone Master’s eye, taking it out for good.

  It was good to see her back as well. If only Remy . . .

  Mulvehill pushed the sad thought aside, returning to the moment at hand. They were like a well-oiled machine, he thought, watching a blood-soaked Squire hack limbs away with abandon, but he, too, looked as though he might be slowing down.

  But he couldn’t think like that. They had to keep fighting—fighting for Remy.

  He chanced another look over his shoulder to the bed, where his friend lay, wishing that he would miraculously wake up and save the day, but he knew that wasn’t about to happen.

  About to turn back to the battle at hand, something caught his eye, and he hesitated. A shadow passed before the window in the corner of the room that looked over the small backyard. Mulvehill’s addled brain immediately began to search for what it could be: a bird, a piece of trash blown by the wind, a cloud formation drifting past . . .

  The shadow was back, and it was larger now; then it crashed through the window in a shower of glass and wood.

  “Fuck,” Mulvehill screamed, already on the move. “I’ve got this,” he announced to the others, who more than had their hands full.

  He raced around the bed as the Bone Master assassin rose to its full height, a cord tied about its waist that it’d used to swing in from atop the roof. Their eyes met, and the killer smiled as it drew the six-inch blade from a scabbard on its leg and turned its attention to the unconscious Remy.

  Mulvehill knew this killer. He’d spoken with it in the kitchen, before the siege on the Beacon Hill brownstone had begun.

  And Mulvehill also knew that this one was here to finish the job.

  • • •

  It was absolute chaos, and it took everything Linda had to hold on. The room was filled with the stink of blood, piss, and shit, and the floor of the bedroom where there had only been the most lovely of memories—lovemaking, lazy Sundays reading the newspaper and sipping coffee—was now slippery with the blood of demons.

  She was exhausted and not sure how much longer she could hang on.

  The demons that managed to get by Squire and Ashley and Marlowe were her responsibility, the jagged piece of pine proving to be far more effective than she had thought it could be. She stabbed it into bodies again and again, even going so far as to grip the leg of one of the demons as it attempted to slither back out the door and drag it back, jamming the wooden spear into the back of its pale neck until it no longer moved.

  A tiny, scared voice in the back of her head asked, What are you doing? Another, louder and far scarier, voice answered, Surviving any way that I can.

  It was like being in a dream, things seeming to move in slow motion. Looking up from her kill, she was ready for whatever would come at her
next, and she glanced toward the broken door. Most of the panels were missing; only the actual framework remained. She looked into the hallway and saw with horror that there were still far more killers out there than there were already dead in the bedroom, and it seemed that more were heading up the stairs.

  “Shit,” Squire said, obviously seeing what she did.

  But the strangest thing happened. The Bone Masters at the door began to yell in some strange foreign language and turned their attentions—their fury—upon the newcomers.

  “What’s happening?” Ashley asked, her pretty face spattered with blood. “What’s going on?”

  Linda didn’t answer, transfixed by what was happening outside the door. The newcomers that she had mistook as Bone Master reinforcements were not that at all. In fact, they were attacking the Bone Masters with knives, guns, and clubs.

  But who were these mysterious saviors?

  Were they friends?

  Or were they some new foe?

  • • •

  Mulvehill threw his empty gun, the spinning projectile connecting with the demon’s face and causing it to stumble back. Taking the opportunity, he dove, tackling the monster and driving it away from the bed.

  The Bone Master still held the knife, and Mulvehill put all his attention on that arm, taking it in his hands and using his waning strength to bend it back and away. But the demon was stronger, and Mulvehill felt the arm begin to come around. The detective reacted in the only way he knew how, driving his forehead down into the demon’s face. He saw stars from the blow, and felt a gash open in his face, but he did it again, and then again. For a moment, he thought he might have had an advantage, but that was short-lived as the Bone Master yanked its arm free, driving its elbow into Mulvehill’s throat.

  The homicide cop began to choke, reaching up to his neck as he tried to catch his breath. His legs suddenly went out from beneath him, and he sat down hard upon the wooden floor. The blood from his head wound streamed down his face, obscuring his vision. Through a scarlet haze, he saw that the assassin had recovered and was making its way toward the unconscious Remy, knife still in hand.

  Mulvehill tried to cry out to the others, but his voice was little more than a croak, and besides, his friends were already a bit busy. His eyes fell on the cord that trailed in from the broken window, the cord that was attached to the killer’s waist. He leapt on it, pulling the assassin back and away from its prey.