Archangel Passage

212 Pages·2008·2.23 MB·English

by  Josh Pace

The Archangel Passage
(Unfinished, work-in-progress)

Written by
J.D. Stiver

Plot by
J.D. Stiver & Steve Reeves

© 2007 J.D. Stiver. All rights reserved.
J. D. STIVER/STEVE REEVES
Prelude

Moscow, August of 1560

The final vestiges of his humanity peeled away when he saw
Anastasia lying still in the pallid moonlight.
He wrapped his arms around his chest and shook, lost and
scared, as if he were still a child, wandering the halls of his own
palace like a beggar. And there, floating through his heart from the
vast memories of her, he could hear her laugh warmly, an echo
from a time when their future together was a possibility and a
promise.
Those memories turned to poison within him as he gazed upon
the remnants of that shattered promise. And he knew, in his grief
and budding madness, that the relic he had accepted was somehow
responsible for the turn of his fortunes. He now realized that it
would be an abomination on his land, and that he, also, would
become a blight without her kind and gentle influence.
The room was pale, like all of Moscow. Tomorrow, he vowed,
the streets would run red. Tomorrow the streets would spill over
with the blood of his enemies.
Anastasia was dead. And Ivan would be terrible.

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THE ARCHANGEL PASSGE
I

THE INVOCATION:
Warsaw, Poland, April 23, 1943

Sariel came into the world in an underground bunker brimming
with the smells of smoke, human waste and blood.
It was a cold world, filled with the sounds of people crying; huddled
together in the dark; suffocating; bleeding; and surrounded by corpses.
Some cried for vengeance. Others wept for deliverance. For many, that
deliverance never came. For them, the bunkers they had hoped would
offer a small measure of protection would ultimately prove to be their
tomb.
“Marek, I cannot believe what I have seen,” someone near Sariel
proclaimed. “Truly, you have learned well from the secrets of
Hekhalot.”
“We shall see,” an elderly man, presumably Marek, replied. “We
shall see if this is the one I have summoned. What is your name,
anielica?”
Sariel was lying on the floor in pain. His lungs burned from the
smoke and the stench, but he did not cough. His body felt heavy with
weight as he struggled to adjust to sudden gravity. The language the
two men spoke were strange to him, and he did not understand what
they asked. But even if their words were foreign, he did, however,
recognize the voice of the one who had freed him from the furthest
reaches of exile.
Sariel opened his eyes and saw what the world had become. Gone
was the beauty and splendor of perfection, and in its place he saw a
dark, underground world of stone, blood and pain. Above, the sounds
of explosions thundered and shook the earth. Fires raged and the smoke
continued to seep into the underground sewer tunnels, as well as the
bunkers they connected.
“Hand me the scalpel,” Marek said to the other man.
The man did as he was told.
“Are you certain this is wise?” he asked. “What if he resists?”
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J. D. STIVER/STEVE REEVES
“He cannot,” Marek replied. “There are ways that are older than
even him.”
Marek was an elderly man with a long, gray beard who wore a
kippot on top of his head and a heavy frock coat to hide his painfully
thin frame. This set him apart from the others in the bunker who were
much younger and wore tattered pants and shirts, all of them stained
with grime, dirt and blood.
Marek was old, malnourished, and possibly ill, but his hands did not
tremble when he took the scalpel and began to carve intricate and secret
writings into Sariel’s chest. The cuts were not deep, merely deep
enough to leave scar tissue, like beautiful, pale calligraphy etched
forever into Sariel’s flesh.
The markings, Marek explained to the man as he worked, were
from a language all but forgotten. They were spells that would keep
him hidden from the others of his kind, and one that would allow
communication—a reversal of the kind of magic used at the Tower of
Babel.
When he was finished, Sariel stood, trembling, cold and naked. The
small wounds on his chest had already closed and healed. He was tall,
broad-shouldered and muscular. His hair was a deep black and his eyes
were like pools of tar floating on a calm, white sea.
He no longer had wings.
“I am Sariel of the Grigori,” he said. “You have freed me from my
captivity.”
“Holy God,” said the man to Marek, obviously reconsidering the
wisdom of what they had done. “This is one of the Watchers, an angel
of the Second Fall.”
“So it would seem,” Marek replied. “You are not who we attempted
to summon, anielica. Nevertheless, you are compelled to obey me, is
this not so?”
“It is,” Sariel answered, after a lengthy pause.
Marek removed his coat and wrapped it around Sariel.
“Button it,” he ordered. Then he gestured toward the man. “This is
Icchak, a man with whom I am indebted. I have summoned you on his
behalf. Icchak, go now and fetch some clothes for our friend, yes?”
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THE ARCHANGEL PASSGE
Icchak paused, reluctant to do this. He knew there was only one
place where clothes could be obtained, and that was from off one of the
corpses.
“If he is to do what we ask, then he must not be without clothing,
eh, Icchak? He must not draw undue attention to himself.”
Icchak departed from the shelter into one of the darkened, smoke-
filled tunnels. His pace was quick because time was short.
“Icchak is a good, young man,” Marek said. “A good, young man
like my grandson.”
Marek’s eyes had a faraway look when he mentioned his grandson,
and Sariel knew that he was no longer alive.
“What would you have me do?” Sariel asked, his strength beginning
to build inside of his new body.
“We have fought—sometimes bravely, but more often,
desperately—to struggle against our fate,” Marek said. “Today, we
began our final struggle, but all seems lost. My grandson,” he added,
pausing on the words. “… my grandson was struck down in the latest
siege, and Icchak risked his own life to get medicine to lessen his
suffering. I am in his debt. I would never have summoned you, but for
him.
“I knew the dangers in doing so,” he continued. “And now, because
death is certain, I have granted his request.”
“And what am I to do on his behalf?”
“Take his brother, Kazik, to freedom. Protect him for the remainder
of his days. I charge you with this task.”
“And what of you?” Sariel asked. “Am I not to help you, as well?”
Marek gazed upward in contemplation. “The Germans stand
between God and I,” he said. “But one so young as Kazik should have
more.”
Icchak soon returned with clothing and with a young boy of about
eight. The boy trailed behind him silently, like a shadow. He was
painfully thin, like the others, from years spent in squalor. He was pale
and sickly from living in conditions that fostered illness, but his eyes
were bright and alive. The fight had not yet been beaten out of him.
Those eyes widened when he saw Sariel.
“Is this … is this an angel, Icchak?”
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J. D. STIVER/STEVE REEVES
“Yes, Kazik, I saw him appear from out of thin air, with my own
eyes. We have called him to protect you while we fight our hated
enemy.”
Kazik knew what that meant. He looked up, defiantly, but did not
voice his protest.
The sounds of explosions grew louder and the smoke became
thicker. More people were beginning to cough inside the tunnels, and
suffocation seemed certain if they stayed.
“The Germans are filling the tunnels with gas and shelling the
buildings, Kazik,” Icchak said. “We will die from the heat and the
smoke if we stay. We will die at the hands of the Germans if we leave.
But you, Kazik, you will live because this one here will protect you.”
While they talked, Sariel dressed himself in the tattered clothing
they gave him. They felt soiled and putrid against his skin. When he
dressed, he observed the strange weapons that Icchak carried.
He had never seen a firearm before.
“I need a sword,” Sariel said.
“We have no swords,” Marek replied. “But we have these.”
He went over to the corner of the bunker and unwrapped a dirty
towel. From within the towel he produced two machetes and handed
them to Sariel.
“We have freed you from your torment so that you may protect
him,” Marek said. “Remember this.”
“You have freed me from my captivity, not from my torment,”
Sariel replied. “But I will remember what you have done.”
Icchak decided that he would take a group of volunteers up to one
of the buildings above ground and lay down suppressant gunfire near
the closest escape tunnel. This would likely mean certain death because
the Germans were shelling all of the buildings, but it could buy them a
few moments distraction.
“No!” Kazik screamed. “I will not leave you!”
“Take him!” Icchak ordered Sariel. “Leave! Now!”
Sariel picked up the boy and dragged him against his will into the
outer tunnel. There were scores of people fleeing the smoke, and Sariel
carried Kazik in the direction they flowed.
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THE ARCHANGEL PASSGE
The smoke and the stench of the rotting bodies inside the sewer
tunnel was horrendous, and people were screaming and gagging as they
rushed to the exit in a blind panic.
After some minutes, he could see beams of sunlight up ahead.
People were clustered near the exit, afraid to venture upward because a
handful of German soldiers were shooting anyone who attempted to
leave the tunnels.
He sat Kazik down and then kneeled beside him so he could address
the boy.
“Your brother honors your life,” he said. “And you must honor his
sacrifice. Do you understand?”
Kazik’s eyes burned with anger at the Germans, but Sariel could
also see understanding.
“I hate them!” he said. “I want you to kill them! All of them!”
“That is beyond my abilities,” Sariel responded. “But I promise that
those who stand in our path will fall this day. Stay close to me, young
one.”
Sariel took the two machetes, one in each hand, and began making
his way toward the exit.
“Stand aside,” he said to the people in his way. “All of you who
want to live will follow me.”
They didn’t know who he was, but there was something in his voice
that caused them to believe his claim. They moved aside and allowed
him passage.
Sariel hid the two machetes in the sleeves of his coat and proceeded
upward. The sunlight was blinding.
There were ten soldiers guarding the exit. Sariel made their
positions.
“Filthy Jew,” one of them said. Then he shot Sariel in the head. The
back of his head exploded and his massive body fell limp three feet
from the exit tunnel.
“Drag his body with the others,” one of the Germans said.
Two soldiers grabbed each of Sariel’s arms and began dragging him
to a pile of bodies that had been collected twenty feet away. They
dragged him only about twelve feet before they heard a strange sound
coming from his body. When they looked at his head, they both
dropped his arms, shocked to see that his wound had regenerated.
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J. D. STIVER/STEVE REEVES
Sariel opened his eyes and stood up, a machete in each hand. He
was able to slice the jugular of one of the soldiers before he could call
out to the others. He jabbed the second in the heart, but the German
was able to fire off a shot in the seconds before he died.
The others turned in horror to see Sariel still alive and standing over
the bodies of their fallen comrades.
They aimed their weapons at him. Quickly, he grabbed the soldiers’
bodies, one in each arm while still holding the machetes, and he held
them in front of himself as a shield.
The German bullets riddled the bodies. As they fired, Sariel charged
their position from behind his makeshift shield. When he was close, he
dropped their mangled corpses and began slicing at the remaining
Germans guarding the exit, almost as if it were a graceful dance. He
would slice, pivot and lunge in a series fluidic movements, almost as if
battle were an art form.
They continued to fire at him, even as their numbers began to
dwindle and their comrades fell, one by one. In less than a minute, only
two soldiers remained. They were not standing close to one another, but
they were still close enough to him. He threw the machetes
simultaneously and struck them both, one in the forehead and one in the
chest.
Down the street, a German tank began approaching his position.
Sariel had never seen anything like it, but he knew it was likely the
thing that was causing all of the explosions he’d been hearing. He also
knew that even if it fired at him, he would heal, but those near the exit,
including Kazik, would be lost.
Then he heard gunfire from a nearby building. It was Icchak and his
volunteers. The lower level of the building was on fire, and there was
probably no escape for them, but still they fought, firing on the tank to
create the diversion they had promised.
The tank turned toward the building.
“All of you!” Sariel called down into the tunnel. “Come now, while
there is still time!”
The people inside the tunnel ran for the exit, and Kazik ran with
them. Sariel scooped him up and fled from the area. As he did, Kazik
saw the tank fire on the building his brother was in. He could see his
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THE ARCHANGEL PASSGE
brother’s eyes as the building exploded in a maelstrom of fire and
death.
A mere handful of survivors were able to escape from the Warsaw
Ghetto that day. The uprising did not bring the success the thousands
who struggled for survival had hoped for. And yet, as Kazik looked
deep into his brother’s eyes when he died, he could see that Icchak
believed he was one of the few who had known victory.

•••
Baltimore, Maryland, September 25, 2004

Dr. David Weiseman was learning his fourteenth language from a
book he’d checked out from the library when he heard a knock at the
door. He looked up, paused for a moment to consider who it might be,
and then concluded there was only one way to find out for sure.
He would have to open it.
He stood from his bed and carefully treaded the cluttered path of
books, notes, tablets, pottery, and ceramic statuettes that lined his
cement floor. He approached the giant metal door, reached down for
the handle, then lifted. The door slid up to reveal a man he had never
met before.
To that man, the act of lifting the door also revealed that Dr. David
Weiseman did, in fact, live in a storage facility, which explained why
he’d been so difficult to track down these last few months.
That man knew who David was at first glance. He had conducted a
background search on him, which included paying his government
contact to obtain David’s personnel record. He had also complied an
extensive file, complete with detailed employment, education and
medical history—all of which he had familiarized himself with over the
last three months.
David is thirty-six. He’s handsome (in a bookish sort of way),
slightly thin, tall, tan, and has thick brown hair that always looks
uncombed, even when he makes a prolonged attempt to comb it.
He wears silver-rimmed spectacles over pale blue eyes that are both
innocent and intelligent, and his entire wardrobe consists of suits that
are slightly older than him.
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