Rise of the Nephilim Read online

  “Her name was Inanna,” Jude answered quietly, his eyes averted to the floor in wistful remembrance, as the sting of loss resurged. “She said the Nephilim were openly taking more people, because they were planning a large scale operation soon. The Grigori decided they needed to train us to fight the invasion, so they sent her to do so. That’s why we held the Many Faiths conference. Father Gallo, no, Azazel killed her and Emily, the woman whose body she was sharing.”

  “By the Architects, I should have guessed it was Inanna! She was always eager to get involved, even if she was afraid to reject the core doctrine of the Grigori,” Leo said solemnly. “She was one of the first of us to help civilize the human race in Mesopotamia, so of course it makes sense she would be the one to volunteer for such a large-scale humanitarian mission. I can’t believe she pushed herself so far, though. I’m so sorry for your loss, Mister Sullivan. It seems you were close to the both of them. As for Azazel… This is troubling. If he has laid aside his normal subversions for such a public maneuver, then he is either sure of a victory or incredibly afraid of what you might have accomplished.”

  He pushed his plate away and walked toward a bay window overlooking the lake and the setting sun, as he continued speaking. “We won’t let her sacrifice go unanswered. I may have been out of contact with my kind for a long time, but I still have some power left in this aging body. Eva, my dearest, would you care to fight the devil?”

  She clasped her delicate hands together. “How could we not?”

  “Well then, gentlemen,” Leo addressed Eric and Jude, “whatever resources are at our disposal are now yours. First, I suggest we get you out of Europe and back to the States. From there we can work on getting you back in contact with the Grigori and better fitted to combat the Fallen.”

  “Thank you so much again for your help,” Jude spoke emphatically. “I don’t want to think about where we would be without you right now.”

  “Thank me when we get you to safety,” warned Leo, as the four cleared out of the kitchen. “We are still on our own for a little while longer.”

  “You know, I’ve been wondering…” Eric chimed in. “Why can’t we just talk to the Grigori now? Aren’t they supposed to be watchers? They should know where we are, right?”

  Leo laughed at him over his shoulder, as they entered into a cedar and cream-colored billiards room, “They could follow you around, sure. While we are at it, would you like to fly a blimp over our heads? My kind isn’t omniscient, but we can certainly detect each other’s presence when the conditions are right. No, the safest way to meet is to go somewhere we aren’t being sought after.”

  He picked up the cue ball and rolled it into the pre-set rack of others at the end of the table, breaking the formation along a multicolored network of vectors. “Now rest up, we leave for the nearest airfield first thing in the morning.”

  Eva extended her hands to both Eric and Jude and led them out of the billiards room to the bottom of the staircase. “You can take the first two bedrooms on the left. Each one has its own shower and toiletries, but if you need anything, just let us know. I’ll see if Leo has any clothing for you to change into. Now… up with you both and sleep tight.

  Eric was already halfway up the stairs by the time Eva had finished. Jude lingered a bit longer to thank her once again for the hospitality and followed suit. Once in his room, he ventured into the marbled bathroom and took a hot, relaxing shower to wash away the grime of the day. He stepped out, quickly toweled himself off, and dropped onto a king-sized cedar bed replete with a sigh-inducing memory foam mattress and matching pillows. He lay there on his back on top of the covers, allowing himself the luxury of meditating on the heat radiating from his body as it cooled itself from the near scalding water. He closed his eyes and let himself drift into the inky blackness of his subconscious. Slowly, he wafted down little by little, until he faded into slumber.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Early the next morning, the group was up and travelling through the Tuscan countryside to the town of Grosseto located west of Lake Bolsena. Leo promised them he had private transport that would be able to get them anywhere along the US eastern seaboard, and that was enough for Jude and Eric. The two passed the time on the drive through the hills of Italy by gawking at the various farms and wineries that littered the landscape. Jude had always meant to vacation here and sample the bouquet of experiences the area had to offer, but now he wondered if he would even live to see his own home again.

  The morning news had turned his stomach sour with apprehension. He expected more coverage on the search for his whereabouts, but the focus had turned to a major UN Security Council raid on the Vatican. Dozens of influential cardinals and priests were on the suspect list as co-conspirators in the Geneva bombing. It was obvious to him that Gallo was behind the claims, but his friend’s position with the church and his charisma made it impossible for doubters to remain skeptical for long.

  What had horrified Jude the most was that Vicar Savelli had been named as one of the originators of the plot also. Eva and Leo had been especially upset. Unfortunately, they were powerless to help the Cardinal. All they could do right now was keep running.

  An hour and a half after they left the villa, they reached the outskirts of Grosseto. Eva took up the role of tour guide and told them of the town’s history and historical attractions as they passed through. “Grosseto has been fought over by Prussian emperors, the de Medici families, and even Papal troops. It has always been an economic crossroads of sorts in the northwestern part of Italy, which has kept it just strong enough to constantly vie for independence from its rulers. The city caused so much trouble for its overseers during the fourteenth century that Pope Clement IV actually excommunicated the whole area in retaliation for its insubordination. Today, the city is a tourist destination to see the Medici walls and fortress, as well as a number of churches, including the Cattedrale di San Lorenzo located near the center of the old city.”

  She continued her lecture through the interior of the antiquated città. Once they passed the western edge of the township, the clusters of buildings thinned out and gave way to a large, flat valley filled with farmland. The primary road leading out of the city ran alongside rows of tomato plants, heavy with bright red and gold fruit, for about a half mile. The farm abutted against a chest-high stonework wall surrounding the local airport. They followed it for a few hundred meters until they reached an open gateway with a small road leading out to the tarmac. The facility was a rural affair with a small terminal suited for the light passenger traffic that utilized it. The main purpose of this particular airport, according to Leo, was commercial fare for the large amount of agricultural exports the area produced.

  Leo drove down a service road alongside the tarmac and slowed to a halt in front of a beige, corrugated steel hanger about halfway down the runway. “This is our stop,” he informed them, as he engaged the brake and opened the car door. He pulled a secondary pair of keys out of his jacket pocket and approached the entrance to the hanger. He disappeared into the building for a few seconds, before the larger bay door began to slide away. Eric whistled in admiration at the sleek, ocean-blue business jet parked inside.

  “Now this is how you flee an active manhunt!” he said enthusiastically, as he circled the vehicle for a better look.

  “What do you mean?” Jude asked. Very rarely had he flown anything other than commercial. Any time he had needed to take a smaller aircraft, it had been some prop charter to get to a remote location for a shoot or investigation. The tipped-wing jet in front of him was a mystery.

  “It’s a Gulfstream G450,” Leo answered with pride, “one of the best that money can buy in its class. It can hold up to four people, plus crew, comfortably for trips up to eight thousand kilometers. I bought it specifically for trips to America. Are you ready to fly?”

  “More ready than I’ve ever been,” Jude said emphatically. “Where are we going?”

  Leo answered, as he pulled down the s
ide entryway of the craft and extended the stairs, “We are flying to New York City to make contact with a group of such individuals and seek their assistance. They are what you might call revolutionaries. Not all of us identify with the Grigori or the Nephilim, believe it or not. I have a few favors I can call in at an airport just outside of the city, so we can hopefully land without scrutiny.”

  He paused to extend a hand to his wife, as she approached the stairs. “Ladies first, my dear. Would you make sure the bar is properly stocked, while I begin the preflight checks?” He beckoned the other two to board and ventured forth toward the cockpit.

  Jude stepped into the cabin and stood agape. The inside of the plane was awash in soft white light. In fact, the entire cabin was white with sparse accents of polished cedar. Four plush Italian leather seats greeted him at the fore of the cabin, two to a side. Each pair faced each other, sharing a pull-out table top with small flat screen televisions facing each seat. Further down the aisle, a leather couch was secured to one side, while a big screen LED television sat opposite. Near the back was a bar, where Eva was currently taking inventory. Past her, at the aft of the vessel, was the door to the restrooms. It was currently ajar, and Jude swore the restroom looked almost full-size.

  “I see what you meant,” he said softly to Eric when he boarded. “Have you flown in one of these before?”

  “It’s one of the rare perks of VIP security missions,” he smiled. “Governments aren’t the only ones that use PMCs.” He pushed past Jude and sank into one of the chairs with a contented sigh, before he began playing with the screen in front of him.

  “How do you like it?” Leo asked Jude, as he came up behind him.

  “I don’t think I can ever fly commercial again,” Jude lamented.

  Leo winked knowingly, “If I’m going to travel, I’d rather do it in style. Eva will have to entertain you for the next hour or so, while I get us up in the air and out of troubled airspace.”

  “You know how to fly too?” Jude exclaimed, impressed at Leo’s versatility.

  Leo patted him on the shoulder with a fatherly air and let loose a small static shock as if to remind him of his alien half. “Flying a jet is as simple as flying a kite when compared to the things I’ve experienced. Now go sit down. I want to leave as soon as possible. I pre-scheduled our flight yesterday, so we have permission to leave when we are ready. The longer we tarry, however, the greater the danger grows.”

  Jude gave him a firm nod and slid into the seat opposite Eric, his back to the cockpit. Eva minced back toward them with a couple of brown bottles of pale ale. “Birra, gentlemen?” She asked, as she handed the beverages to the two. They gladly accepted her gift.

  She managed to secure her own spot, as the aircraft backed out of the hanger and onto the service way. The engines emitted a series of whines, as Leo taxied slowly toward the end of the airfield. They turned onto the runway and waited patiently for clearance from the control tower.

  Jude could hear Leo talking over the radio in Italian. His voice began in a bored, almost routine tone, but slowly escalated to a belligerent and defiant one. He couldn’t make out much from where he was sitting, but he knew he heard the word fuggitivi over the roar of the superheated air screaming through the jet’s nacelles. The argument carried back and forth for a couple of minutes before he cut the radio. “Architects take you all!” he yelled at the inert communications device, as he slammed his headset down in frustration.

  Jude bent down to peer through the port hole and looked toward the airport. Two security vehicles were driving toward them, yellow lights flashing at an angry frequency. “Damn,” he muttered in a thick southern drawl, his normally suppressed accent emerged to betray his distress.

  “Hang on, everyone!” Leo yelled into the intercom, as he thrust the throttle all the way to maximum. The Gulfstream lurched, catching Jude off guard. He fell forward and slammed into the corner of the small television fixed in front of him. The impact left his head swimming and vision blurry. That, combined with the sudden sensation of the plane lifting off of the ground was too much for his addled consciousness. Darkness ate away at the edges of his vision. Before it enveloped him completely, he smelled the sharp, acrid odor of vomit and felt the growing wet sensation it made, as it ran down his pant leg. After that… nothing…

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  He woke from his stupor cold, wet, and, from the way the blood ran down into his eyes, certain he was suffering from a gash on his forehead. He managed to force a smile through his swollen face and coughed the same phrase he had been repeating for hours, “Io ti perdono. I forgive you.” His captors were growing impatient and agitated, as he managed to endure hours of mental and physical assaults.

  “Come now, Vicar,” coaxed Azazel,” how long do you think you can keep this up? If I were in your situation, I would just divulge Jude’s location. Is it worth dying over? All this pain and suffering is so… barbaric.” He pointed up toward the ceiling of the catacombs where they were conducting their torture. “I’m sure you would rather be up there in your office going about your daily life. What do you say?”

  He reached his right hand out as a peace offering toward the injured clergyman. Savelli looked him in the eye for a moment, as if contemplating his offer, then promptly spat in his open palm. Azazel cursed, as he shook the saliva off and gave the man a quick left hook to the jaw. “Fine!” he hissed and motioned to his guards. “I tried to be nice. Now, it’s time to show you just how demonic we can be.” He began to speak in a language not born of the Earth. Underneath the alien syllables undulated a pressure wave from infrasonic sound waves undetectable by the human ear.

  It hurt Savelli’s already aching head, but he could not block his ears due to his bondage. Azazel stopped and affixed an evil smirk on his face. “I tired of playing with my food long ago, but some of my subordinates still revel in it.” An amorphous mass of shadow spilled down from the ceiling like fog and pooled around the Vicar’s feet. He felt a sharp chill, as the spirit swirled around him. It slowly began to make its way up his shaking legs. The sensation of a thousand tiny needles pricked him, as the mass surrounded him and sucked away at his life force..

  “What do you think you are doing?” Savelli asked, as panic rose in his voice. “I’ll never bend to you or your minions.”

  “Oh, Padre,” Azazel said in mock sympathy. “I never truly expected you to. I’ll have to get my information some other way.” He addressed the darkness growing around Savelli’s feet. “Let his very existence become nothing but suffering, until he tells us what we need to know.”

  The spirit shook and sighed in response to his commands, just as one of Azazel’s possessed contingent entered the room. “Sir, we have reports of an unauthorized take-off at an airfield north of here. We believe Sullivan may be on board.”

  Azazel picked up on the muted gasp from Savelli. “Well, well… It seems you may be correct, Raxis. Find out who owns it and where they are going. Congratulations, Cardinal, it seems your god does answer prayer, just not yours. Kill him quickly.”

  The swirling ebony miasma rose up to engulf Savelli and inject his mind with Lovecraftian horrors. The man’s scream rose to a high pitch, taking on an almost inhuman quality before choking and fading into nothing, as his heart gave out. The cloud lingered for a moment, as if savoring its deed, and roiled back toward Azazel. It caressed his outstretched hand and dissipated back into the spaces between the quantum foam.

  The old man’s body stared blankly up at the ceiling, his mouth agape and lips already beginning to turn lose their pinkish tinge, as his body cooled in the chilly tunnels. Azazel ran a finger down his victim’s cheek, admiring the after-effects of his minion’s work. “Poor Savelli… were you so racked with guilt by your part in this that you committed suicide before the authorities could find you, or did you simply run away and disappear?” He spoke over his shoulder to his subordinate, “Do want you want with the body. If you want to leave him whole, make sure he turns up s
omewhere public.”

  * * *

  Jude held his head back as he lay on the couch of the Gulfstream and willed the cold compress to numb the welt on his forehead faster. He had been incoherent for an hour or so, but now he had full control of his faculties, and the dizziness from his concussion was slowly fading. He was grateful the jet was equipped with a closet containing some of Leo’s own wardrobe to replace his soiled ones. “Any word on what’s going on out there?” he asked Eva weakly, as he accepted the glass of water she gave him.

  She sighed and sat down on the chair next to him and stared at the muted television. “It seems they got to our dear Lorenzo. The media is reporting that he ran from the madness at the Vatican and threw himself in front of a train to escape capture. Leo is certain Azazel played a role, though.”

  “What does that mean for you two?” Jude asked with concern.

  “I means we can’t go back to Italy any time soon. Our assets are sure to be frozen by now,” she answered. “Airports in Italy received orders last night to ground all flights until further notice, so our take off probably raised a few alarms. At least we were lucky and escaped into neutral airspace before the military could intercept us.”

  “Won’t they be able to track us?”

  “They can try, but it will be like searching for a needle in a haystack. We’re part-time traffickers, remember? This aircraft has a special coat of paint that not only absorbs radar signals, but the color makes us almost impossible to track overhead by satellite while we are over open water. No one should know where we are, until after we have landed.”