Chapter 37
The Earth cracked like an egg, and hellfire erupted from where the surface pulled apart in every nation.
At the heart of Babylon, where death and disease roamed as the blood in its veins, yet another thing pierced through the ground, rising far above all the other buildings, as if trying to claw at the red-tinted sky and reach Heaven.
Satan’s tower, the Tower of Babel, returning to Babylon; there remains a story to tell of how the Tower of Babel landed in Satan’s hands, how the demons brought it to Hell — but it’s a simple one.
Before Christ, but after the flood, the Lord and the devil had a mutually beneficial relationship; Satan gave God a reason to rage, and God raged.
The Lord had said, ‘Aid in halting the construction of Babel, and you may take the tower.’
If it weren’t for God and Satan having their children, maybe their little game would have continued, but perhaps He’d grown bored as gods so often do.
And now, Satan panted as he adjusted his footing, lifted himself off the ground heavily.
One hand planted on the cool glass of a window to hoist himself back up, then with heavy eyelids, he stared out into the Earth, his Earth, and his nails scratched the panes.
The chaos of the human city was unlike anything he’d ever seen before — worse than all the wars he’d witnessed.
Hell had risen to the very Earth — scorching every running person, grown or young alike, to dust and shrieks of agony.
Behind Satan, demons groaned and many of them hurried, toward windows as well or to other levels of Satan’s home, perhaps looking for the safety of their friends.
The armor would have saved many, and the impossibly tall tower could fit most if not all of the demons — but this had all happened without warning.
Not everyone had made it in time. Turning slow, Satan saw Baal pressed against the wall beside the window, gasping still for breath, then he saw someone sitting on the ground, pressed to a pillar.
Rosier, silent, holding an amputated arm, eyes wide and utterly empty.
Trying to halt his trembling, Satan said, “Baal, I need you to scout the area. Keep… your armor on. It won’t be perfect against bullets, but it’ll be enough.
” He wondered if Babylon could still organize its military, but he was sure that it could.
The empire dies far before the war does; a lifetime that spanned every human century had taught him this. “And tell me if you see any angels.”
Baal said, “Lucifer.” Hushed, weak. “I think Asmodeus is dead.” The devil noticed his wide eyes and his terror. “There might be others— But— Asmodeus is dead. I saw it— the fires.”
Satan swallowed, thick, his gaze flickering to Rosier before he could stop himself, but the demon of fruit wasn’t responding, as if he were made of stone.
And something hurt inside of Satan, like a harsh scrape.
He recalled the sounds of Asmodeus’ voice.
‘You told me that everyone was waiting for me outside. You told me I was as beautiful as they all said.’ But Satan had grown to despise him.
‘I told Rosier to leave you to be eaten by animals in the woods after the fall. Because of what you did. Because of everything.’
“He,” Rosier whispered hoarsely, the light in his eyes still dead, “gave me his helmet.”
Trying to speak through the tightness in his chest, Satan dismissed: “He protected you. You're safe. That’s what he would have wanted. We should—” voice almost cracking, but he picked at the glass of the window pane once more, ignored the burn in his mouth, ignored Baal’s pained, regretful eyes, and Rosier’s emptiness.
“We should look for any other casualties and think of what can still be done.”
Baal’s voice was quiet, tense. “Is that all?” He looked at Satan darkly. “Is that all you’ll say?”
A flare of anger, burning away the grief, the confusion, the denial, with irritation.
“You want me to grieve?” But his voice still shook.
“For someone who hated me almost as much as I hated him? I don’t shed tears for anyone; I’m like God.
And he chose this. ” Looking away, Satan felt Baal bristle.
“And unless we act now, we’ll lose more of us. ”
But Baal didn’t submit. “He fell, Lucifer, because of you.”
“He fell because of what he did.”
“We all fell because of you.”
“Baal,” Satan said, stricter. “Now isn't the time.”
Hollowly, Rosier stared, peering at the devil through his dark fringe, fingers drenched in red as he continued latching onto Asmodeus’ hand, but there was nothing in him except confusion, loneliness.
Almost childishly, he wanted to ask where Asmodeus was, when he'd be back.
‘Let him return soon. We have a home to find and live in.’ Where was Asmodeus?
Where was the voice Rosier heard as often as his own?
Where was Asmodeus? In his grip, as just an arm.
Armoni, suddenly, broke through some of the crowding ahead, hurried toward Rosier without paying any mind to Satan or his regent in a quiet, furious standoff.
He lowered himself, touched Rosier, who twitched in half-recognition; he was seeing Asmodeus’ face, he was hearing his voice.
‘Darling Rosier, let’s marry again.’ He didn’t move; he dreamed awake of a demon of lust, a fallen angel, who’d dragged him down from Heaven with him.
But the blonde angel whispered, “Moloch told me— He saw what happened—” A gasp shot out of his mouth at the sight of the arm in Rosier’s hands.
“Oh no. Oh no…” When he took Rosier gently and began tugging him upward, the demon hardly felt it. “Come, come with me.”
He continued to ignore Baal and Satan, wrapping his arms tighter around the demon of fruit; and as Armoni led Rosier away, the devil didn’t stop them.
In Heaven, Michael learned of the devil’s tower rising to the Earth from Enoch, who’d heard it from God.
Then, he’d made his way through a destroyed, quiet Heaven to the barracks, though not without fastening flasks of the Lamb’s blood to his hip.
He did it to tell Phanuel that he would be in charge of the injured angels and the wreck the demons had left of the city.
“You know why I’m leaving this in your hands.
” Just as he opened the same door that his old friend had left unlocked for Baal to barge in and kidnap Satan, Michael heard Phanuel step closer to him.
Michael twitched, then turned back as if Phanuel could see him through the helmet.
“No,” said Phanuel, simply, in the same hoarse whisper as always. “No, I won’t do that.”
“I’m,” the archangel replied, “your chief prince, and you will listen. If I were crueler, I would step out and tell everyone, all the angels of God, what you’ve done.”
“Go, Michael,” urged Phanuel instead. “Go to Earth. I don’t want to hear from you now, and no one outside these barracks wants to hear from you either.
” He stepped closer, and he leaned in with a stern, irritated face, added, “How many times should I try to reason with you? When I saw the devil, strung up inside the room next door, I didn’t see Satan, Michael. I saw Lucifer.”
“He deceives you,” Michael hissed. “He’s the devil, Phanuel!”
“You can’t be reasoned with,” Phanuel said, then he shook his head, a flash of pain passing over his ivy-green eyes that made something within Michael shift uncomfortably.
“The devil is more honest than you. Even when my own face was torn off, Satan didn’t try to make me believe that he did it righteously.
But you, Michael? You’ve destroyed Heaven and Earth and dared to try and convince us that any of this could be good. ”
“It is good!” Michael insisted in a sudden, shrill panic, shoving his friend back so harsh that the forgiving angel was thrown against the stone wall, and he let out a hack of pain.
“That is what you don’t understand, Phanuel!
I follow God, and His word is good. If you think that goodness comes from anything other than His word, then you’ve come to believe Satan! ”
Phanuel shuddered, and his jaw tightened, before he replied: “It’s my heart that I believe, and it’s a heart that has ached more than loved ever since the war.
It aches to see what you have done and what the Lord has allowed to happen.
How much longer must I hurt for God to be pleased, brother?
And how much love can the Lord ever offer for us to forgive His apocalypse?
How can any promise make up for this atrocity? "
Michael clenched his teeth, frustration a furnace in him. “I must leave,” he managed to grit out, “but when I return— You will pay penance for what you’ve said."
“There’s no need. I will never speak again,” Phanuel promised.
“Goodbye, now, prince. I hope you finally rid yourself of guilt by killing Satan and yourself. I hope you will find peace. I wish that for the both of you.” Shoving Michael aside, so hard that even the strongest angel of all stumbled, Phanuel stepped out of the barracks, into the eternal light of Heaven, the divine paradise with bullet casings littering the ground.
Angels collected them curiously, asking one another what they were, what the demons had wielded.
What is all this that the humans have made? What have they done?