Chapter 17

While Abby slept in my arms after our joint experience in the afterworld I puzzled over her involvement. What could the underworld want from Abby that was worth the trouble? How could I protect her? Was the universe on my side, or neutral?

One thing I knew for certain was that I was conveniently murdered in Terry’s body so that I could return in Mark’s, which had to mean that I was supposed to take care of her. How does one protect a mortal from hell’s demon death? The whole thing seemed out of my hands and beyond my ability to comprehend. All I could think to do was hang on and be brave when the time came for the showdown that was coming. Somehow I had to be hell-on-wheels, against hell. If that wasn’t enough confusion or one lifetime, I didn’t know what was.

Taking a break from worrying about Abby, I relaxed enough to enjoy watching her sleep. She looked so innocent and helpless. My whole body reacted to her purity and kindness. Even asleep she looked like an angel ... One of God’s rare angels was sleeping beside me and I was tied up in knots because Satan’s soldier seemed to want hurt her.

What does one bring to a battle against a demon?

That single thought got me started down the right road.

I had an idea and a plan for how to protect my love.

The universe took my loves away, one after another. Now it seemed that the universe wanted me to protect the life of my current love. That was a task I was willing to die for.

But first I had to define the enemy and the battle.

It was a long, boring, tiring search, but I seemed destined to take on the devil Death and beat him in his own home. The universe seemed to be pushing me into the middle of a battle as old as time, and big as the universe itself. Why would some ... thing ... as infinite as the universe choose a weak mortal to carry the fight for Abby’s soul?

No matter how many ways I invented to ask the question, the answer was always far beyond anything I could grasp. It seemed that the universe wasn’t in the habit of explaining itself to mere mortals. My job was to be present and do what was possible when the time came.

After a while I decided to search the Bible for a hint as to what I was about to tackle. I found my first hint in Ezekiel 28:13-15, where the prophet describes Lucifer as a ‘precious stone’ that was “The anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou was perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.”

If my pathetic understanding was correct, the devil was once great in the universe, but was forced out of heaven because of his behavior. That was something I could grasp, because the demon Death, if that was Lucifer, was a bad actor. I could testify to that. I wrestled with all of the permutations of the demon Death until exhaustion took me away. With my mind relaxed the universe began to download the facts about the forces lined up against me.

As I drifted off to sleep, my mind was snatched away by the universe to a plane of existence far beyond mortal comprehension. I knew I was going away, but I also knew that part of me remained in our bed, right beside my bride. The speed with which the universe moved me had to far exceed the speed of light, because I was aware of epochs passing before my essence slowed and finally stopped.

In that never-never land beyond the five senses, I saw a vast battleground. On one side was the rising sun. Those warmed by the sun seemed strong, fast, and very skilled. Their clothing looked molten. Their skin seemed to be made of very fine bronze to protect them from the sun’s scorching heat. The number of those lined up before the rising sun appeared to be in the millions, if not billions. They seemed to be suspended, as if waiting for a command to come to life and attack the enemy.

Far off across a very wide, dangerously laid out plain, I saw the enemy. They had to be my enemy, because their bodies were grotesque. Their eye sockets were empty hollows where putrefying rats were eaten by ugly, vicious, demons the size of a gumball, with fire and smoke belching from their mouths.