An Unholy Alliance

Chapter 27

“Naomi, I need to talk with you,” he said.
“I heard,” she said. Naomi felt like she was being sort of cold towards him but they weren’t exactly on the best of terms. “What is it?”
“You’re not special.”

His bluntness felt like a punch to the chest.

“What?” asked Lucifer. Naomi was glad, she felt sort of… numb. “What do you mean?”
“Abigail has two powers as well, it’s not unique.”
“Mine and yours?” asked Lucifer, eying Michael suspiciously. He glanced at Abi.
Michael shook his head. “No. Raphael and Gabriel.”
Lucifer muttered something under his breath. “Prove it,” he said. “Prove it to both of us right now.”

Michael was silent for a moment and then turned to Abigail. He asked her to teleport something for them. She looked nervously at them and then to Michael. His glasses vanished and reappeared in her hand. She then held them out to Michael who took them and put them back on.

“Is that good enough?” he asked as he pushed his glasses up.
“No,” said Naomi, knowing Lucifer wouldn’t be satisfied by that display alone. “That’s just one.”
“What’s the other then, what great gift of healing does she have?” said Lucifer. He sounded rather irritated.
“Well, she has nothing to heal.” Michael smiled smugly.

Lucifer gave his brother a sickly sweet smile in return as he pulled the celestial blade from his jacket and held it out to Michael.
“Who has the honour?” he asked. Michael’s smile dropped. He offered his arm out and pulled up his sleeve. “Guess it’s me then.” Lucifer cut a large but shallow cut on his wrist. Naomi furrowed her brow as she watched them, it was like they had done it before. Although, she wouldn’t have been surprised if they had.

Michael’s wrist bled a little and Abigail looked confused and scared at the sight of Michael bleeding. Within seconds, the cut started healing up and sealed, leaving only a faint trace of blood as the evidence it had happened.

“So she can do two,” said Lucifer. “So can Naomi, so what?” Naomi stared at Abigail. It felt like a second punch to her gut as now there was proof she could do both. She really wasn’t as special as Lucifer thought.

“I think Father is doing something,” Michael said quietly.
“He’s always doing something,” said Lucifer through gritted teeth. “So what? Why is different to any other time?”
“I don’t know but I can… I just know something’s going to change.”
“Are you a Prophet now, brother?” Naomi noticed that Lucifer had dropped the ‘dearest’ he usually said with ‘brother’. “Whatever it is, we’ll find out eventually.”

“I don’t think it’ll end well for us.”
“For us?” he repeated, furrowing his brow at Michael. Naomi had to agree, Michael was sounding a little ridiculous.
“I think they’ll replace us.”
“The two of them?”
“No,” said Michael, shaking his head. Naomi felt bad for Abigail a little, she looked so scared as she clung to Michael’s arm. “The next two, if they had Samiel and Azrael and Uriel and Ariel’s powers between them, I think they’ll replace us.”

“I know your power is knowledge but this is sounding rather far-fetched at the moment,” said Lucifer as he stared at Michael. He took a step back and finally put the celestial blade back into his jacket.
“Is it really?” asked Michael. Naomi had no idea but it sounded possible and a little plausible.
“Why would God want to replace the archangels?” asked Naomi with a shrug.

The two brothers just stared at each other for a few moments. Naomi spotted Ozzo around the corner, staying out of the entire exchange. She couldn’t blame the demon, she’d have done the same if she could.
“We’ve caused a lot of mess together,” said Lucifer. “Maybe that’s why.”
“Because Naomi hasn’t caused any trouble,” muttered Michael with a sigh.
“I’m still here,” she said, narrowing her eyes at her former guardian.

“The point is,” said Michael, glancing at Naomi, “that something is happening. I think we should tell the others, all of the other archangels should know. At the very least Raphael and Gabriel, those two are going to be the ones to look after Abigail.”
“Don’t you mean, you’ll tell them,” said Lucifer as he looked down. “It’s not like they’re going to pop down here for some cake and a cup of tea, is it?”

Michael looked away, his nails dug into the palms of his hands. “This is serious, Lucifer. He might wipe us out or worse. And all you can do is joke about it?”
“What else do you want me to do from down here?” he snapped. “I can’t exactly stop anything, if Father wants it to happen, it’ll happen and we’ll have no say in it. As much as I hate it and as much as I’ve rebelled against it, it won’t change.”

Michael said nothing as Lucifer looked up. His eyes were an orange-red colour for a few seconds and then they started flicking between that colour and his vessel’s blue eyes. That didn’t seem good but the two brothers held eye contact for an uncomfortable amount of time before Michael looked away.
“I think you should leave,” said Lucifer. Michael took a step back. He held Abigail’s hand and they both vanished.

“That wasn’t very fun,” muttered Naomi. Lucifer looked to her and shook his head.
“No, it wasn’t,” he agreed. Ozzo finally approached them. They looked more nervous than usual.
“That didn’t sound good at all.”
“It wasn’t,” said Lucifer. He went to take a step forward but stumbled. “I need to rest.”
“Sounds like a good idea.”