LotS/The Story/Between Heaven and Hell/If Angels Fight (2)

If Angels Fight (2)

"...the amateur footage shows a brawl between members of the Electric Angels and Fallen Angels, Roy."

"A disturbing turn of events, Mindy." The anchor's happy smile didn't diminish one iota. "Were there any fatalities?"

The words "Death Count" appeared in the corner of the screen, beneath a rolling number display which showed a sequence of zeros. The length of this counter indicated that someone was either absurdly pessimistic or ghoulishly optimistic.

"No. The violence resulted in over a dozen injuries requiring medical attention, but none were life-threatening."

The graphic disappeared with a sad pop.

"That's fortunate for the population of Jerusalem Maior," Roy said. "Bloodshed could have quickly spread across the planet."

"They can thank a few good Samaritans for that. The vids show a group of bystanders intervening to prevent the fight from getting out of hand. And they've been identified as Talia Ryx..."

A picture appeared on the screen. It showed a sports stadium, where a woman wearing emerald armor was in the process of smashing a large man's jaw with a flying knee.

"...captain of the Sian Dragons thugby team, Ragnar Ragnarsson..."

Another picture replaced the first. This one was also of a sporting arena, though it contained a ring instead of a field. A hulking Niflung stood on the canvas, cleaving a man's head in two.

"...a notorious mercenary, Prince Telemachus..."

The third picture contained a young boy with a bright, merry face. He wore a conical party hat on his head, and brandished a laser-edged chainsaw from which wrapping paper hung in ruined scraps.

"...the ruler of Gallea, and a robot named Lu Bu..."

A fourth image supplanted the third. It showed a long chamber lined with tiers of plush green benches, teeming with hordes of politicians. Some had their backs turned, whilst others looked on in horror as a robot incapacitated one of their number with a jujitsu hold.

"...seen here assaulting a Novocastrian politician."

"But what effect has all this had on the upcoming negotiations, Mindy?"

"Sky Commander Bethany of the Archangels, the faction in control of Jerusalem Maior, was quick to respond. Just minutes after the incident ended, she released a statement promising that the talks would go ahead as planned."

The newscast turned to other matters of apparent galactic importance, such as the arrests of mediocre TV stars and the increasing demand for penguins on Pluto. The woman in the stateroom let this babble wash over her unheeded.

She stood before the chamber's large window, gazing out into the void.

Jerusalem Maior floated in the distance. Shoals of spacecraft hovered beyond its atmosphere, forming a glittering belt. She could just make out the clustered Electric Angel and Fallen Angel fleets.

It was almost time.

God's Is The Quarrel

Sunlight fell in glorious golden waves, filtered and directed by the chamber's windows so that its illumination shone upon each of the frescos which adorned the walls. Angels flew, fought, and prayed there -- captured by an artist's brush and vision, laid out in celestial wonder and the style of Earth's Renaissance.

The aureate luminescence fell on angels of flesh and blood too, sat around a table. They were wingless. Those appendages had been relinquished for comfort and convenience, as they always were at such gatherings. Diplomacy flowed better without sudden movements leading to the buffeting of arms and heads.

The other angelic attendees were clad in their finery. Blue energy flowed and throbbed beneath the transparent areas of Arianus Zelb's armor. Intricate patterns of silver circuitry decorated the opaque white plates he wore alongside them. Even his cybernetic eye gleamed. Vanessa, the woman who called herself "the Lamenter" in lieu of a surname, wore black tears of animated anguish. They dripped down her cheeks in an eternal stream, unending sorrow. An ornate halo, a black crown of twisted thorns, floated above her night-black locks.

But Sky Commander Bethany was dressed in sparring armor. It might have been the very same suit she wore when she challenged Master Wu, and later as she spoke to the assembled journalists. If so, it had been cleaned and polished since then. Yet it remained a simple, Spartan affair at such a gathering.

Wu Tenchu pondered this. The Archangels held the power. Jerusalem Maior was theirs to control, however much the others yearned for it. Was her choice of dress a gesture of humility? An attempt to avoid the appearance of arrogance? Or did Bethany intend her martial aspect to remind the others of her faction's superior military prowess?

The mandarin had elected to dress in modest fashion himself, albeit for other purposes. He was an observer and mediator. It would have been unseemly to arrive in any of the luxurious robes that filled his prime ministerial wardrobe. Thus he and the sky commander were a matching pair in their austerity. He hoped this wouldn't be regarded as evidence of illicit collusion.

Bethany began by formally introducing Wu Tenchu to the others, as though his private meetings on the previous evening had never occurred.

"Thank you, Prime Minister Wu, for lending us your impartial wisdom and political acumen."

Such pleasantries were fleeting. Their echoes had barely died before the quarreling began.

"We're willing to repeal the Third Jerusalemic Proclamation," Bethany said, "and allow both Electric Angels and Fallen Angels to make pilgrimages here. If they pledge not to disrupt the religious activities of other pilgrims with unwelcome proselytizing, or attempt to destabilize planetary order, theological disagreements need no longer-"

"And the Grand Temple?" Vanessa asked. She waved her hand to the side, encompassing the room in which they sat.

"The Archangels would of course retain control of it. But certain areas could be opened to outsiders on specific-"

Arianus Zelb's cybernetic eye flashed.

"Then the temple's..." He glanced at Wu Tenchu, before looking back at the sky commander. "...contents would be sealed away from us?"

"You have no right to claim them as your own, sky commander," Vanessa said. "Those..."

She too looked at the prime minister.

"...items belong to all the faithful."

"This is vexing, Bethany," Zelb said. "Did you request Prime Minister Wu's presence here to prevent us from speaking openly? So we couldn't talk of the most sensitive matter before us?"

Bethany stood, and planted her hands on the table.

"That was never open to negotiation. The temple's treasures must-"

Arianus Zelb leapt up, as though enraged by the sky commander's words. But neither his natural eye nor its cybernetic counterpart were focused on her. His left hand was cupped against his ear.

Communicators blared, emitting emergency signals. The door flew open and an Archangel ran into the chamber, a blaster in his hands.

"Sky commander!" he said. "We-"

Zelb shot him in the face.

Tree of Knowledge

"What the hell was that?"

Saiton Miyoto, captain of the Tesla Storm, followed his words onto the bridge. There a huge screen displayed a larger, closer, more terrible view of what he'd seen in miniature through the window. It answered his question and stole his breath.

Explosions bloomed in the blackness of space, triggering phantom sounds of hellish destruction from the captain's aural implant.

"It's the Unutterable Equation, sir!" Jasma Sunnhar, his second in command said, in tones of utter disbelief.

But Captain Miyoto had already recognized their flagship's beautiful contours and mighty engines. They were as distinctive as a friend's face, even in death. Burning fragments floated from the wreckage. The void ate their flames.

"Who fired on us?" the captain demanded. "The Fallens or the Archangels?"

"I don't-"

Sunnhar gaped at the screen. Another fiery detonation had burst into being, this one in the depths of the screen -- beyond their dying vessel. She slid her hand over her console and the image zoomed towards it.

Aural implants boomed and roared once more.

A sleek black spacecraft, like an ebony blade, was perishing beneath the weight of a dozen explosions. It was the Tears of Nazareth, Vanessa the Lamenter's flagship.

Saiton Miyoto jabbed at his command panel and opened a channel to the rest of the Electric Angel fleet.

"Who initiated that attack? Who-"

The entire bridge shuddered.

"We've been hit!" Sunnhar cried.

"Return fire!" the captain ordered.

The picture on the big view screen had zoomed out again. Now it displayed a tableau of darting ships and glowing streams of weapons fire that lanced across the void in all directions.

Three fleets clashed in the dark heavens above Jerusalem Maior.

Screams and explosions rang through the Grand Temple's corridors. Groups of Archangels ran towards the sounds of devastation, their panoplies clattering, wings unfurling, weapons ready to inflict retribution.

In the midst of the chaos, a woman in dark, wingless armor stepped from a side passage. A man walked a short distance behind her. The Archangels in the broad corridor let out a cry at the sight of their leader and her bodyguard. They hurried forward for information.

"Sky commander!" one of them yelled. "What's happening? Our coms are down!"

"The Electrics and the Fallens are attacking! Defend the temple!"

There were cries of anger and outrage. Then the warriors saluted her, before running off to execute her orders. Her bodyguard moved so his back was close to the wall, giving them a wide berth. After the angelic soldiers were gone, the woman smiled. She and her companion went in the opposite direction.

An ornate door opened to the woman's touch. Its security systems detected nothing more amiss than the soldiers' eyes had. The man turned side-on before he followed her inside, as though the entrance were half its breadth.

Luxurious frescos decorated the chamber's walls. One showed a blinded man driving powerful hands against the pillars of an ancient building. Another depicted a small, lithe warrior who wielded a sling as he faced off against a hulking brute who taunted him and brandished a spear. A third held the image of a verdant tree which bore blue fruit. It was to this latter painting that the woman strode.

Celestial War

Mindy Mazmarth was already screaming. Just seconds before, her camera-drone tech's head had exploded -- hit by a stray round that burst his skull and scattered gore over the reporter. Bits of his brain oozed in her hair. A tenacious eyeball clung to her forehead.

So when she looked up, into the sky where winged forms did battle, and a blast of energy zapped down towards her, she merely continued the scream that was already rushing out of her mouth.

Something crashed into her. It struck Mindy in the side and knocked her down the street -- sending her an impossible distance through the air. It was several seconds before she understood that she was being carried on a woman's shoulder.

Her rescuer set her down in the doorway of a building.

"You're Talia Ryx!"

"Yeah. So next time you report on my matches, say something nice."

"But-"

"Get in there and take cover!"

The captain of the Sian Dragons was already running down the street, snatching up a wailing child.

Mindy almost tripped as she scurried inside. One of her camera-drones bobbed through the door after her, like a loyal puppy.

The reporter paused. This building had thick, sturdy walls. No doubt that was why Talia had left her here. She was safe enough... So with brains in her hair and a third eye that made her look rather like a Vlarg, she activated the feed.

"This is Mindy Mazmarth, reporting from Jerusalem Maior -- where the entire planet has been plunged into chaos..."

Father Jonathon Neuhaus dropped onto his knees beside the Archangel and pressed his hands to her wound. Hot, sticky blood ran between his fingers.

"No good, father," she murmured. "No good..."

The woman's eyes fluttered and her warm breath rippled through his hair. He murmured a prayer.

"Pathetic heretic! Prepare to be destroyed!"

Father Neuhaus whirled round and pulled back at the same time. He fell on his backside next to the Archangel's body. A Rylattu in Electric Angel armor hovered a foot off the ground, his blue wings spread, a rifle in his hands.

"Wait! I'm not a soldier!"

The Rylattu pointed his weapon down at the priest's face. Jonathan stared into the barrel from whence his death would come, and whispered the beginnings of another prayer.

"Our Father, who art in heaven-"

The Rylattu's body landed in a heap. Lu Bu stood over him, his sword bloody.

"Are you injured?" the robot asked.

"N... No..."

"Then come with me. I'll take you to safety."

They were already down the street by the time the priest spoke again.

"Lu Bu..."

"Yes?"

"I still don't believe you have a soul. But I'll pray for you anyway."

Jonathan Neuhaus would never be certain, but he thought he heard the robot warrior laugh.

Three black forms descended in the same instant, surrounding Ragnar with flapping ebon wings, tear-streaked faces, and bobbing halos. Whips and swords pulsed with purple energy in the Fallen Angels' hands.

"You broke my nose last night!" a woman hissed. "This is payback!"

She raised her sword. The Niflung growled. This was what happened when you let your enemies live...

The angel thrust. And shrieked. Her blade was buried in another Fallen Angel's back. Ragnar had grabbed him by the throat and brought him in front as a human shield.

A horrendous blow crumpled her other ally's face. The ruined, smeared wreckage of his features blinked at her as he fell. And then she was alone with the Niflung.

This time Ragnar dealt with her properly.

"Get away from the windows!" the teacher said. "Stay under your desks!"

But Jerome had to see. The boy clambered onto a table and lifted his head over the windowsill. His gasp of awe and terror was lost amidst the teacher's cries, the children's sobbing, and the din of combat.

The big courtyard in front of the school, where the children had been playing no more than an hour before, was a scene of battle and bloodshed. Winged soldiers clashed in the sky above. Bodies fell from the air like broken birds, armored forms twisting, wings whirling and clawing. Smashed, cleaved, and blasted corpses littered the ground. The fighting had spilled to there as well, among the dead. Angels ran through the carnage, zapping and slashing.

An Archangel fired her weapon at a Fallen Angel. He darted aside and let the blaze of energy sear its way past him. A window shattered somewhere below Jerome. There was a scream. It was echoed by his own, turned into a chorus when the other kids joined in. But the boy stayed at the window, unable to even look away.

"Hey!"

The voice was a child's. It came from just outside the school. Jerome pressed his face against the glass and looked downwards, wondering in horror which pupil had ventured out into that maelstrom of

destruction.

A big orange form stomped its way forward, between the building and the combatants.

"Hey!"

The voice grew louder, projected from the mech's speakers. It was accompanied by a scything beam of energy fired from one of its arms. The beam cut through the heavens like a glowing blade, forcing the angels to scramble and scatter in all directions. One of the Electric Angels ran at the mech, swinging a sword. But he backed away when a huge laser-edged chainsaw whirred into life on the war machine's other arm.

"This is a school! Kill each other someplace else or I'll cut you in half!"

Perhaps it was the threat. Maybe the epiphany his words brought, the knowledge that they'd thrust young children into danger. But the angels dispersed, spreading in all directions like a flock of startled geese.

Blood of Angels

"We've been betrayed!" Arianus Zelb was shouting, his left hand still clamped against his ear. "To battle! All of you, to battle!"

"Was it the Archs or the Electrics?" Vanessa spoke into her communicator, and the voice emerged as a shriek. "Then-"

Zelb whirled round and fired. The Fallen Angel threw herself onto the floor, putting the thick table between her and Arianus, keeping the communicator pressed to her ear.

"Vanessa! What's-"

The device went dead. She stared at the screen. The signal... Some kind of interference?

"Zelb!" Bethany raised her hands, palms outward. "Listen to me! We-"

His blast hit her in the abdomen and threw her against the wall. Crimson sprayed across a painted cerulean sky.

Vanessa the Lamenter drew her sidearm. She leapt to her feet, ebon tears streaming down her cheeks, righteous fury burning in her eyes. Across the room, Bethany sprawled against the wall, her armor bloody. Wu Tenchu was crouched in front of her, shouting at Arianus and blocking his shot.

"Lower your weapon!" The Mandarin was reaching for something. "We have to find out-"

Zelb's head jerked to the side. His flesh and cybernetic eyes fastened on Vanessa. He spun round, aiming his weapon. There was a blinding discharge. Both his eyes disintegrated, replaced by charred, blind, weeping holes. He toppled over and crashed into a chair as he fell.

Vanessa flew backwards and bounced across the floor.

"Wu!" The sky commander leaned back against the desecrated fresco. "Are they..."

"Zelb is dead. I don't know about Vanessa." His dexterous fingers were probing her wound.

"What happened?" She pointed to her communicator, which lay a few feet away. "The wing commander said-"

"Attacks on the fleets in orbit? Communications lasting just long enough to spread panic before being cut off? Someone desires a war."

The sky commander's eyes flicked to one side and then the other. But the table's mass hid the other leaders from her.

"Their shock and outraged seemed genuine," Wu said. "Whoever's faction initiated hostilities, I don't believe either of them had a hand in it."

Bethany gasped.

"The vault!" Her bloody hand clutched at the mandarin's robes. "I have to get to my office! Now!"

"You require medical attention..."

"You don't understand! That's what they want... The Electrics, the Fallens... Whoever the hell it is! Help me!"

She tried to struggle to her feet, and fell back against the wall. Wu Tenchu took hold of her. The sky commander stared at him with wide, desperate eyes.

"There are artifacts hidden under the temple. Some of them are weapons!"

"What kind of weapons?"

"I... Just get me there. Please!"

Master Wu pulled her arm around his neck, supporting her weight, and helped her to the door.

Vunlac

Raphael's will had been strong. Even under torture he wouldn't have revealed anything, even confirmed the little that General Ialtha already knew, if it hadn't been for alien technology and a psionic assault beyond the limits of even his powerful mental defenses. But the Sian Emperor's mind had been strong as well, and Ialtha had managed to implant psychic conditioning deep into his brain. No man or woman was truly unbreakable.

The former sky commander's death hadn't been discovered yet. A doppelganger's charade continued unsuspected. By the time anyone learned the truth, it would be too late. Because Ialtha was within striking distance of her goal.

Flaming swords flew down the metal-walled passage, blazing towards the general. She pressed a device on her wrist. The floating weapons came to a halt. Their flames flickered away. And they clattered to the floor.

Her companion grunted behind her, in what Ialtha took to be approval. Perhaps pride. The mercenary's technology had allowed this. With the knowledge she'd extracted from Raphael's brain, it had simply been a matter of devising the appropriate countermeasures.

Metal clanked behind them. They turned round.

"The elevator!" she said. "Someone's coming!"

"Then they will be destroyed," her companion said.

His entire body shimmered. A disguise that was part holographic and part psionic evaporated -- and the armored man's form seemed to stretch and expand in all directions.

The elevator doors opened.

Bethany swore. Master Wu's eyes widened.

A metal corridor stretched ahead of them. At its far end, a huge, thick door was opening inwards. And a woman was slipping into the chamber beyond. But the mandarin's gaze only darted to her in passing, before coming to rest on the hulking alien who faced them in the passage.

Much of his tall, broad body was armored in heavy blue plates. But bare patches of skin revealed hard, yellow, almost reptilian flesh. Green eyes stared at them from a monstrous face. A Besalaad...

Weapon sleeves encased both of the alien's hands and forearms. His left ended in the barrel of a blaster, the right in a shining energy blade. He raised the gun and opened fire.

---

Bethany's pistol blazed away, throwing a barrage of gunfire on the mandarin's left. The Besalaad fired one shot at Wu Tenchu -- who jumped over it with a swiftness and agility that would have made his fellow politicians gawp -- before turning his weapon on the sky commander.

Her head and arm slipped back inside the elevator. The alien's shot burst against the armored metal doorframe.

That cover fire and distraction gave the prime minister all the time he needed.

Master Wu yanked his top off, muttered a word in Chinese, and hurled it at the alien. The garment flew with impossible speed for mere fabric. It hit the Besalaad warrior square in the face. And magnetized weights sewn into the material fastened it against the alien's armor, locking it in place, enveloping his skull.

The Besalaad's arms flailed towards his head out of instinct, but they fell away thwarted. Both his hands were encased in metal, trapped within his weapons. He couldn't pull the garment off...

His gun blasted, sweeping the corridor with blind fire. His energy blade slashed left and right. But the anticipated attack slipped past the onslaught.

A slim blade appeared in the mandarin's hand. He dodged the alien's blasts, jumped at him, and thrust the weapon through fabric, eye, and brain. Wu Tenchu was no longer the assassin he had once been. But his skills and blade were still sharp enough.

There was a heavy thud. Metal rang on metal.

General Ialtha shot a glance over her shoulder. The Besalaad mercenary was down, sprawled lifeless on the floor of the corridor. And her pursuers were advancing. Sky Commander Bethany, the woman whose likeness Ialtha had coopted, was raising her pistol. Wu Tenchu was taking aim with a small, dark weapon of his own.

No! Not when she was this close!

Ialtha ducked her head and ran across the room. Countless treasures flashed past her on either side, wealth and wonders that spanned the entirety of human history. But she didn't even glance at them. Her goal was on the wall opposite...

She wove out of instinct, trusting to the sixth sense which had never failed her before. Gunfire passed her first on one side and then the other. The blasts scorched the metal of the wall in front of her -- near a heater shield, which bore the image of a blue dragon and a pitchfork.

"Hold your fire!" Bethany shouted. "We'll damage the artifacts!"

Fast footsteps sounded behind the general. But she was already at the wall. Her hand slapped against the device on the shield, and the hidden doorway opened. She dashed into the small, dark room beyond. The general turned in time to see Wu Tenchu's face, just a few yards away. Then the entrance sealed itself and hid him from her.

General Ialtha laughed.

She was trapped in a small, dark room. But thanks to Raphael, and the secrets pillaged from his brain, she knew what rested in the chamber. Power. Inconceivable, incredible power. Enough power to destroy her enemies and rebuild the Centurian Collective.

Her fingers brushed her cheek, where the tattoo marked her flesh and her allegiance.

A spotlight flashed on. It cast down a cone of brightness, illuminating the object in the middle of the room. The general strode over to it.

Stolen memories flew across her thoughts. Raphael, standing before this same artifact. The lid opening. Golden light flooding forth. A feeling of immense strength and warmth flooding through the angel's body.

General Ialtha grasped the lid.

Wu Tenchu reached towards the shield, as he'd seen the woman do mere seconds earlier.

"No! Wu, no!"

Bethany grabbed his arm and pulled him away with strength that was irresistible in spite of her wounds.

"But-"

The mandarin's voice fell silent. Beyond the hidden door, past the shield and the azure drake, the woman screamed.

"What a mess..." Talia sighed.

Covered corpses were laid out on one side of the plaza, each faction's dead placed together for collection. Dozens of injured angels sat or sprawled on the ground. Medics tended to them, administering treatments to Archangels, Electric Angels, and Fallen Angels alike.

The battle had been bloody. But in the end numbers had told. The Electrics and Fallens on and above Jerusalem Maior had been faced with the choice of accepting a ceasefire or being wiped out. They'd thankfully chosen the wiser course.

"How long until they're killing each other again?" Ragnar asked.

"When they know what really happened..." Telemachus said.

"Even if Master Wu is able to convince them of the truth," Lu Bu said, "so much bloodshed will still have ramifications."

Talia nodded. She didn't envy the politicians who'd have to sort this all out. The gunslinger gazed at the dead and wounded, while something faint bleeped.

"Talia," the prince said, "that's yours."

She blinked, reached for her communicator, and put it to her ear.

"Barra? This isn't a good time. We..."

The Piscarian spoke, and the gunslinger's face grew pale.