Angels and Wormholes

Ashes to Ashes

Nigel took a step forward. He locked eyes with Zoojin. "Are they okay?"

Zoojin opened his eyes and stood, placing an alien hand gently on Nigel's shoulder. "I can help them."

"Sorry to interrupt" -Lujain's gaze was fixed on a point in the distance- "but we got company." She raised a robotic hand and pointed. "That way."

Their heads swiveled. A cloud of dust obscured the view to where she pointed, between two large piles of rubble in the distance.

"What do you see?" Wojtek slung the energy rifle off his shoulder and aimed into the cloud.

"Four robots," Lujain reported. "They're armed."

"I think I see 'em." Wojtek focussed into the distance. Within the billowing dust, four silhouttes came slowly into view. The figures marched steadily forward, each with a folded pair of wings rising up from their shadowy outlines. They emerged from the shroud: two male angels and two female, athletic bodies sculpted from metal, with white mechanical wings extending from their backs. Each brandished a long spear, the tips glowing bright with outlines of pink energy and rippling halos of purple plasma.

"You think they're comin' for us?" Wojtek asked Lujain.

The lead angel leapt forward, his wings extending far to the sides. With an explosive flap of the mechanical feathered appendages, the angel sent himself hurtling toward them, a cyclone of dust in his wake. Wojtek trained his rifle on the incoming blur. Lujain braced for combat, popping open her forearm panels and extending the plasma blades within. Her weapons lit up with hissing blue energy as the angel landed a spear's length from her position, crashing down onto a single knee with a shockwave of dust. Nigel felt the tremor of the landing, and shut his eyes against the assaulting wall of dust.

Forearm extended protectively across his face, Nigel felt three more impacts as the other angels landed. He opened his eyes, squinting through the dust and ash billowing up. The angels each stood in shallow craters in the earth, glowing spears leveled threateningly towards them.

The lead angel edged forward. "Who are you?" He spoke in a foreign tongue, gibberish to Nigel but understood by the others. "What are you doing here?"

"Just stoppin' by." Wojtek pointed his energy rifle at the robot's chest. "Why don't you tell me who you are?"

"You speak its language?" Nigel looked at Wojtek with surprise.

"It's Aramaic." Wojtek kept his rifle aimed and eyes forward. "It's in the database."

"Language chip." Lujain tapped on her metal skull, keeping her attention on the angels ahead.

"I am Nereus Zebulon Jair," the lead angel said. A tint of blue was visible on Nereus' silver body as the dust settled.

One of the female angels stepped forward. "Kandake Keren-Happuch." Her frame was polished silver, reflecting the pink-purplish light from the energy spear she held menacingly forward.

"Shiphrah Helah," the other female angel spoke her name. Flecks of red and gold covered her metallic body.

"Ophir Japeth, Sharar Lael." The fourth angel stood a foot taller than the others.

"You are in our land," Nereus said, "and you will answer our questions."

"Who are you?" Kandake stepped forward, brandishing her glowing spear. "Demons?" She glanced to Zoojin, the strange blue alien.

"No." Zoojin stepped forward. "We are not demons."

"If not demons, then what?" Nereus shouted at Zoojin. "You are neither men nor angels."