As I Lay Dying (7): The Front (1268 hits)
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Submitted by Axolotl || ltoloxA (View user info) at 2006-10-02 10:28:45 EDT
Several days passed for Adam and Elizabeth since they had experienced the travels through the universes. The beautiful but icy Opaiosaita took care of them, finding them food and keeping them occupied with walks through the boggy English countryside and occasionally bringing them back things from their own world.
Amaliel was always out doing things for Higher Up, as he affectionately called his superiors. Neither Adam or Elizabeth had ever seen a higher angel than Raphael, the grim humorless spirit that ran the building.
It was the hottest days of August, and Adam and Elizabeth were walking around the perimeter of the building, Elizabeth trying to acquaint Adam with her technology.
"Press the button, Adam, it's not going to electrocute you," Elizabeth said in teasing exasperation. Adam clicked the iPod play button, and grimaced as grinding electric guitars shocked his ears.
"What is all that screaming?" Adam said, pulling the buds out. "Don't you have Mozart in your world?"
"Don't you have guitars?"
"Not electrically amplified ones," Adam said, as Jackie McCoven and Jean-Claude d'Aphrodite came into view, rifles slung across their backs. Elizabeth laughed, switching to something more mellow.
"Higher Up is coming by today," d'Aphrodite said. "Stay near the building, and don't wander off."
"When are they coming here?" Adam asked.
"Go and find Opie," Jackie said, gesturing absent-mindedly toward a clearing fifty yards from the structure. "She'll be looking for you,"
Adam and Elizabeth walked onward toward the bower of trees, hearts racing in the excitement of finding someone from Higher Up. As they marched onward, Opaiosaita flitted out, moving at an incredible speed, her unearthly eyes scanning every blade of grass, finding the two of them.
"Come—Adam, Elizabeth—" Opaiosaita said with a tone of stress neither of them had heard before. She grabbed their wrists and pulled them effortlessly through the air and toward the glen. As Opaiosaita whirred through the air particles with the two, they saw a shimmering light, and fifty angels of the base gathered around a figure.
The angels were bowing to a glorious figure of light in the center of the clearing, brighter than the sun and terrible to behold. Through the iridescent rays Adam and Elizabeth saw an angel with six wings, naked and cruel, pure light emanating from every fiber of its spirit. Around him were a host of similar angels, strong and mighty in their form.
The central seraph scanned the area around him and as if proclaiming the setting acceptable, lessened his glow and took on a human form, his body changing tone and shape. The angels around him followed suit, and the unearthly light faded, replaced by twenty male and female angels, all with spears and swords.
Raphael saluted boldly, standing up and stating, "Enoch, son of Jared, son of Kenan, son of Mahalalel, son of Enoch, son of Seth, son of Adam - welcome to the front."
Enoch stood forward, and looked around, his eyes stopping on Adam and Elizabeth. His face was haughty and cold, and he opened his silvery lips and said, "I understand these are our human friends."
"Opaiosaita and Amaliel have taken care of both of them," Raphael said, gazing at the humans, speaking to Enoch with an affection of superiority. Adam and Elizabeth felt small, in the presence of giants.
"Their carers will be richly rewarded," Enoch said. His voice was rich and deep, an earthy growl along the airwaves. Opaiosaita nodded, and Adam noticed she was averting her eyes from Enoch.
And Enoch approached the two, and Adam and Elizabeth lowered their heads, their hearts filled with the aura of the angel. His power radiated as palpably as the glow illuminating him from the core of his every atom, and he spoke to them softly.
"Children...Adam, Elizabeth...do you want to know why you are here?"
His tongue cleaving to his mouth, Adam strove to look up, and nodded timidly.
"Opaiosaita, let me take them for a second to my kingdom," Enoch said. "Come with me."
Enoch laid his hands on Adam and Elizabeth, and they felt themselves being dragged through tiny holes, as though going down a drain. They breathed, but there was no air, or any material, just their hands holding tightly and the fingers of Enoch on their heads. The lights went out.
* * *
They were on a broad plain, flat and barren. The sky was grey and stormy, and the ground beneath them was bumpy farther out, covered in brown grass. There was an eerie humming in the air, and lightning hissed above, splitting the cloudy dark sky.
Across the cold, deserted plain was a row of ashen mountains, upon which a great city stood, towers upon towers, octagons of strength and authority. Adam and Elizabeth looked out beneath Enoch at the City, rising to a high point thousands of feet above the lowlands.
"Those are angels," Enoch said; Adam and Elizabeth noticed for the first time that some of the lighter clouds were packs of angels—millions and billions of them, flocking like birds. Angels flittered speedily high over the plain, and in and out of the city towers.
"The City of Angels," Enoch said. "The Kingdom of Heaven. This is my world, and the world of El. El is He that controls all, and all comes to Him. He is the ancient of days, the Lord, the Father of Israel."
"No..." Elizabeth muttered. Enoch pointed at the city's greatest tower, a tremendous structure of black stone and icy crystals.
"Inside the heart of the crystal, El resides."
"He's God..."
"Believe what you want," Enoch said. "Adam, in your world the Magesterium controls most of life in your planet. The Vatican Council, the Inquisitorial Court, the Consistorial Assembly, the College of Cardinals, the College of Pastors and Doctors, the Department of the Holy Spirit...all arms of a many-armed Magesterium."
"It's in my world too," Elizabeth said, transfixed by the crystal tower.
"It's powerless in your world," Enoch said coolly. "The goal of El, and the Angelic Council—Higher Up—is to install a Magesterium in every world, more powerful than any before. It's been done. The Magesterium has taken over a world already, a world of humans. We want one in every world."
"It would be a dictatorship," Elizabeth said fearfully.
There was a pregnant pause. The angels miles away across the plane whirred around the dark crystalline city, the towers pulsating with bitter lights as though it was powered by some dark force.
"A Kingdom of Heaven on Earth," said Enoch with a degree of pride. "A kingdom of peace, run by infallible, righteous angels and their selected humans."
"I don't know—" Elizabeth said, her heart racing.
"And I want you and Adam to be our human heads of the Magesterium," Enoch breathed.
Elizabeth's mouth stalled, and Adam looked up at Enoch, his eyes sincere and transparent. Enoch looked down at Adam and Elizabeth and said, "Our idea is to create an empire of peace and love across millions of Universes, controlled by El and his angels, and headed by two humans. A king and a queen. You."
"You."
"Of course," Elizabeth whispered hurriedly, her fingers trembling.
"You're going to make us kings and queens," Adam said softly, breathing in the thick air of the world. The smell of roses and ozone tinged his nose.
"We will take you, and train you to be leaders of men," Enoch said fiercely, excitement detectable in his voice. "To rule all worlds with a rod of iron. You will live far beyond the normal span of years, and have the might and audience of El and all the angels, and perhaps, be angels yourselves."
"I will, lord, let me do it, I can do this," Elizabeth said, compulsively hugging Enoch's midsection.
"I...can do it..." Adam said, knowing that nothing remained for him back in his own world.
"Adam...we don't know if it should be you or another boy, around your age, in another world," said Enoch calmly. "You both should come and find him, so we may see."
"It might not be Adam?" Elizabeth asked, looking past Enoch's chest at Adam's crestfallen face.
"We'll come and see, he's in another world," Enoch said. "Come away now. We're leaving the Kingdom."
They held onto Enoch, and faded back through the multiverse. Adam's atoms slipped away and for a single, fleeting, glorious moment, his mind was totally blank. Still, as he reentered the previous world, his mind was flooded once more with the solitary worry—he might not be Enoch's chosen one. And if he wasn't, he had nothing left for him.
AS I LAY DYING
(1) Unto Dust, and story information: http://www.ubersite.com/m/92393
(2) Pillar http://www.ubersite.com/m/92560
(3) The Balances of Justice http://www.ubersite.com/m/92621
(4) Lilies of Sharon http://ubersite.com/m/92934
(5) Messengers http://www.ubersite.com/m/92996
(6) The Front http://www.ubersite.com/m/93187
User Reviews
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2006-12-18 14:11:59 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by JoeyG (user info) at 2006-10-25 14:01:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-16 22:47:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by MyNameIsTim (user info) at 2006-10-16 22:27:26 (#)
Ranking: 2
there better be some sweet adam/elizabeth sex scenes at the end
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Adam's 17 and Elizabeth is 16----->child porn sex scene
Submitted by MyNameIsTim (user info) at 2006-10-16 22:27:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
there better be some sweet adam/elizabeth sex scenes at the end
Submitted by ripple (user info) at 2006-10-03 12:01:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-02 15:52:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-10-02 11:53:12 (#)
Ranking: 2
Still loving this series.
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More to come.
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-02 15:52:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by The_taste_of_Monkeys (user info) at 2006-10-02 14:05:09 (#)
Ranking: 2
STOP
WRITING
SO
WELL
you spotty little pleb, go back to your wand and cape and Harry Potter books, CURSE YOU!
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BUT HARRY POTTER 7 DOESN'T COME OUT UNTIL NEXT YEAR
WEEP
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-02 15:51:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-10-02 10:39:52 (#)
Ranking: 2
what an exceptional kid you are. i imagine you wearing a suit and tie, feeding ducks at the park while playing chess with your grandfather.
only your grandfather is actually bigfoot and you're more of a debbie snack cake.
not the kind with the jelly though. those are gross. more of a swiss roll or a starcrunch.
um, anyway. good post.
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My great x 28th grandfather is Walter de Beauchamp: http://www.renderplus.com/hartgen/charts/de-beauchamp-de-braose_2.htm
Submitted by The_taste_of_Monkeys (user info) at 2006-10-02 14:05:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
STOP
WRITING
SO
WELL
you spotty little pleb, go back to your wand and cape and Harry Potter books, CURSE YOU!
Submitted by MouthSore (user info) at 2006-10-02 13:58:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-10-02 11:53:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Still loving this series.
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-10-02 10:39:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
what an exceptional kid you are. i imagine you wearing a suit and tie, feeding ducks at the park while playing chess with your grandfather.
only your grandfather is actually bigfoot and you're more of a debbie snack cake.
not the kind with the jelly though. those are gross. more of a swiss roll or a starcrunch.
um, anyway. good post.
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-02 10:29:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
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