“Come on First Shirt, you can’t be serious,” Corporal Williams said, shaking his head in disbelief. “First off, don’t they have to go somewhere real?”
First Sergeant Wilcox took a large breath and said, “You’re part of a clandestine government operation that locates terrorists by using quadriplegic and paraplegic agents who run reconnaissance operations through out of body experiences and have encountered angels and demons in the ether.”
“Hmm,” was all Corporal Williams could say.
Angela tilted her head in thought for a moment and then said, “Let’s say Hell really exists. If it does, why can’t we go there too?”
“Well, who else can’t we find?” Billy asked.
“What?” Angela asked.
“Aren’t we supposed to be able to jump to the location of anyone we have a picture of in our mind? Who else have you ever tried to find and couldn’t?” Billy clarified.
“Only dead people,” Angela said.
“There you go. Robert Dante is dead. I hope he is in Hell,” Corporal Williams said slinging his weapon behind him and heading for the door. “Who wants to go to the chow hall and get a piece of cake?”
“All Guardians and Angels report to Heaven immediately,” someone said over the intercom. Everyone looked up to the observation windows but whoever it had been had already moved away. Corporal Williams reluctantly came back to Angela’s couch and began arranging her legs so he could transfer her to the wheel chair that waited nearby.
“Seriously, I don’t think he’s dead. I think Rabdos took him to the one place he knows where we can’t follow.” Corporal Williams picked her up and moved her to the chair. In the process Angela looked passed Billy, then set her jaw. “You see, Theliel agrees with me.”
Billy spun around looking back and forth for the angel, but no one was there. He straightened up and turned back to face Angela as Corporal Williams finished setting her legs in the supports. “That’s not funny, Angela.”
“What? She does. Rabdos is in Hell hiding Dante from us. The question is why?” she asked as Williams began wheeling her toward the door. Everyone fell into step with Angela as she moved through the room and out the door.
“But we can’t do anything to him. Why would he need to hide?” Billy asked.
“I don’t know,” Angela said as they reached the elevator. The doors slid open and everyone moved inside. Billy wasn’t sure if he believed this idea that Dante was hiding in Hell. He did notice the topic of conversation stayed noticeably away from Angela and her ability to heal, or her inability to heal herself. Billy really wondered about that part. If she could heal as Theliel said, why couldn’t she fix her own legs? The door to the elevator slid open and a cacophony of sound from the control room washed in on them.
“Good, we’re all here now,” Colonel Peters said as the four of them exited the elevators. The activity in Heaven ceased as soon as the colonel began speaking. “I want to reiterate one more time the importance of the chain of command and following orders. I will institute non-judicial punishment for anyone who disobeys me again. Is that understood?”
The room echoed with a forceful chorus of ‘yes, sir.’
“Good. Now. For some reason we cannot reacquire our target, Robert Dante. Sergeant Sanchez, you are in charge of figuring out why our gear isn’t working. No, no arguments. This stuff is cobbled together from crap you found. Assume it’s a gear issue until you hear otherwise,” Peters said.
“Yes, sir,” Sergeant Sanchez replied.
“Cheung and Hendrix, figure out where that girl and man in white came from and whose side they’re on,” the colonel ordered.
“Her name is Theliel and he’s called Mihr,” Billy added.
“Fine. Find out where Theliel and Mihr are from and if we can trust them or not,” Colonel Peters added, looking hard at Billy for the interruption.
“Masters, find out why Guardian Three’s data spiked in there,” he said taking a step toward Angela. “We all saw what you think you did in there, but until we can figure out if those two beings in the ether are even real I want to find out as much as I can about that incident.”
Angela silently nodded her agreement.
“Domenich and Johnson, you’re tasked with evaluating the telemetry and data to find out where Dante went. I know it’s a long shot but do what you can. Sergeant Sanchez, you’ll work in shifts twenty four hours until the glitch is found or we find Dante. Everyone not immediately on an active task get some rest because you’ll be relieving everyone else in two hours. We work this continually until we find something people. Dismissed.”
Billy wasn’t sure what they would find if they didn’t believe their own eyes. He replayed the healing episode and Dante vanishing with the little demon in his mind’s eye again. Even he had to admit it sounded wild, but perhaps Robert Dante really had been taken to Hell by a demon. Nothing else seemed to make sense.
Guardians of the Herald is a weekly serial published and copyright by The Cavalier, Mark Malcolm. For more information about this story please join us on our Facebook page community at www.facebook.com/firstchevalierbooks.
