The Rebellion of The Angels, page 14
To the extent that the occupants of the place advanced towards the precarious underground trains made of at least three wooden carriages each, the walls extended until they covered the different platforms where the aforementioned transports rested.
Those men who were once neutral angels approached the two closest platforms, to verify that the three—carriage trains that rested on the tracks were in perfect condition.
Little by little Love, Compassion, Rahab, Light, Peace and Youth were coming closer, without being able to hide the sadness for the recent loss of Experience, much deeper in Youth, that loved her so much, and behind all of them, that young woman who led the small group of men.
—We can go now —One of the men who were neutral angels said, unable to hide some concern not only for the moment they lived, but for what could happen in the future.
—Get in the transport —The young leader ordered, and the men who were once neutral angels quickly get in the transport that rested on the nearest platform.
—You will go in this one —She continued, talking to Youth´s group and pointing at the transport of the adjacent platform—. As you can see, all the trains have a crank on the back of the last carriage, which starts them up and changes their speeds. The routes are for all the same, so we will be travelling along and only in some parts we will be separated by the rocky walls of the caverns. We will go down in the seventh station. There is our home. In any case, the underground road concludes there, although the routes continue as large caves in which you have to move on foot. Now let's not waste any more time —The young women said, and she went to transport, while Light and Rahab got in theirs, occupying the first carriage, followed by Love and Compassion, who did the same with the following one; and shortly before Peace and Youth got in the last carriage, Youth interrupted the young woman´s way:
—Will you tell us who you are? Are not you interested in knowing who we are?
The young woman, who escorted them, turned around and answered:
—As I told your friends, when we get to our house we will all introduce ourselves —And turning around again, she continued walking towards her transport, but not satisfied with the answer, Youth interrupted her again and burst into tears:
—¡You do not even want to know who they killed ...! —The young woman stopped suddenly—. Look… —Youth said, taking her guardian angel out of one of the pockets of her jacket; the young woman turned around to see.
—I am Youth... you remind me... —The young woman already knew that, because Experience had called her by her name shortly before the battle that ended her life started.
—And this is my guardian angel. When it twinkles transparent like now, it indicates the presence of natural humans like she is, called Rahab —Youth said, before everyone's attention. When it does it in light—blue as it is doing now, it indicates the presence of good angels, such as Light, Love, Compassion, Peace and I —She mentioned her group—. When it does it in white like now, it indicates the presence of neutrals like you —The young leader opened her eyes even more—. And if it twinkles in red that would indicate the presence of demons. Now, I can understand that the demons do not care about the life of others, but you... I thought we were sisters. You no longer feel or think like us, like what we were and you were, like angels... What strange change did you experience when you arrived on Earth, becoming men and women? How big is the selfishness and ambition in your hearts? Because evidently and although our guardian angels indicate that you were once neutral angels, your hearts no longer respond as such —Peace approached Youth and hugged her, taking her to the carriage, while the other young woman did the same to hers, but not satisfied with what she had said, Youth looked back saying—. I am sure Hope will regret the death of Experience —The young woman stopped instantly without being able to hide her anguish—. She was the one who died on the third floor of the library —Youth concluded, sitting in the last carriage, the third of that kind of precarious train, as well as Peace, while the young woman did the same, but in the transport with those who, like her, were once neutral angels, unable to prevent their eyes from getting wet. Shortly after, the same young woman activated the crank located in the back of her carriage, as Peace did from the other; and both kind of precarious underground trains with three wagons each, was started up leaving behind that kind of underground station of departure…
Then, Rahab, who was sitting next to Light in the first carriage, took advantage of the first dark part of the trip to get the pain off her chest, and in turn, to know a little more about her closest travelling companion.
—I do not have friends, you know. I live or lived with my father, and between my classes and housework I have never had much time to make friends. I miss the presence of Experience. In a few days I became very fond of her.
—We all miss her —Light said.
—I thought you hated Youth... However, it was very brave what you did for her in the library..
—¡Hate…! —That feeling is only known by demons and I suppose...
—What? —Rahab asked impatiently.
—That also human hearts can experience the feeling of hate.
—And what about the neutrals?
—They are all a mystery.
—Do you think they will help us?
—You have to have faith and think so. Hope is the one who leads them. She was a great sister of ours, but as Youth said, apparently they, the neutrals, have changed a lot. That is why I insist that it is all a mystery whether they will help us or not. Although this young woman that who knows who she is, let me see that they will apparently help us, although it is true that they could be setting us a trap too...
—They would do that?
—It is a possibility, but even so we must take risks and trust someone. Things do not happen by chance. Surely there is a cause and an effect by which we find the neutrals and we escape.
—But we lost Experience...
—Yes it is correct. But even in the middle of a deep sadness and even Youth, we all know that the loss of Experience also means a message. I particularly understand it as a message of union between us. We still have a long way to build, and we will build it as long as we advance through it... because on the horizon there are no roads, but they will be made after your footsteps...
Rahab remained thoughtful for a moment, observing the monotonous underground route of rocky walls, until then she said:
—You are as wise as Experience...
—Light smiled and answered:
—I am not. I am not as smart as she was... Along with Hope, she was our older sister. But everyone, including Hope herself, only had eyes to admire Experience.
—It was for her memory that you risked your life for Youth in the library?
—No. I helped Youth because she is also my sister, and because in my own way, I love her as such, and have no doubt that she would have done the same for me.
Rahab smiled when she heard that secret confession from Light, but then somewhat bitter thought appeared in her mind...
—I do not know why I feel we are trapped in a dead end and that the demons will find us and they will —Light apparently intuited what Rahab would say and that is why she interrupted her, without letting her complete her sentence.
—Because maybe they never told you, and if they told you, you forgot, that from the darkness, the light arises... —At the same time that she illuminated her with her clear eyes leaving her thoughtful, without words, and remembering Experience, who once told her the same thing.
At that moment, Rage, the leader of the demons who were still inspecting the reception of the library while many others did the same in the room looking for their distant enemies, who were travelling the underground routes, was interrupted by the demon she threatened to cut his head and hanged it as a decoration for one of the many pieces of furniture...
—Rage, we found a secret passage at the end of the wing next to the farthest wall from the exit doors. We recognized their smells. They escaped through there —He said, showing the capacity of his developed sense of smell.
Rage immediately abandoned an old map that she put on the table saying:
—You, go for the others, the rest follow me —She divided the group that was next to her in the reception.
Moving quickly among the corridors surrounded by furniture, even in that area where they seemed to embrace each other complicating the access that was reduced in short passages, they reached that circular place where there could not be more than two at the same time, and after moving that worn manhole cover they went into the secret passage, which led them to the cavern that seems an underground station, through a long staircase.
Shortly after, the demons, led by the group that Rage sent to search, arrived and they were moving through different areas of the room trying to find the enemies, or something similar to what they had already found, a secret path that took them directly to the whereabouts of their enemies; and little by little also the demons that appeared recently went into that passage.
As they went down the stairs, they reached the well—known underground station. There, Rage, after observing that with the exception of two, all the other platforms were occupied by those precarious underground trains, she ordered:
—Get in the transports with greater number of carriages.
Eight transports made of more than ten carriages each, left their platforms in search of the group of Youth and company.
But not only had this last group of demons inhabited the community of underground caverns at that time, since by the Eastern region hundreds of miles away, the demons that kidnapped Abed, father of Rahab, were also crossing the caverns, after they entered by a road that extended from the mountain range near the East coast.
They did it with some caution, to such an extent that practically they all carried lit torches as lanterns, since in those latitudes there were no concrete indications of the labour, of those men and women who were once neutral angels, who placed torches on the walls of the underground station for their lighting.
Then, that group of demons, with Abed as hostage and guide of the operation since he was apparently the one who had to lead them to the lair in which the neutrals were supposedly hiding protecting the Holy Grail, crossed a wide and wet cave with high walls, whose appearance was that of a vault, which was cold and lonely in all its interior and dimension.
Hours later, the dawn saw to the night off, and in that town whose library had practically not rested during the early morning due to the disturbance caused by the persecutions and the many fights, little by little the movement of people grew; although in the early hours of the day it was the group soldiers of King Lagash who had the pleasure of being greeted by the birds that with their songs, summed up how beautiful the day was.
While nature's decorum failed to connect with the reality of men, even of those who were once God's followers, as it was the case of Eyes of Heaven, who according to the description of his long hair, seemed to be just out of bed, at least taking into account that at that moment he left the room that he and his group occupied during the night, those who were apparently still sleeping.
—Good morning, old friend, have you been able to rest? —The general asked who received him as soon as he arrived in town the night before.
—Yes, thank you —Eyes of Heaven answered.
—The king has already woken up, but I am afraid that you will have to wait a while longer to talk to him, until I can announce you.
—Then I will take advantage of my time and go to visit the library. There is someone I want to see... —He said anxiously, at a time when a soldier on horseback arrived at the place, and talking to his superior, overwhelmed, he said:
—Sir, you must come with me.
—What is going on?
—We found blood on the floor next to the entrance to the library. It comes from inside. Something happened last night there, the doors have not opened yet.
Without answering, the general immediately turned around, telling a group of soldiers who were near him:
—You, follow me —Then he took his horse as well as his men did, and at full gallop they went to the library, while Eyes of Heaven found Temperance and Offer, who were leaving the room where they spent the night.
—What happened? —Temperance asked, while Eyes of Heaven untied the reins of his horse from the poles by the sides of a drinking trough.
—Apparently there are casualties in the library —Eyes of Heaven answered, already on his horse, while Temperance and Offer untied them, while the last one exclaimed:
—¡How weird! —They went behind Eyes of Heaven, who, in turn, was following the general, accompanied by several soldiers.
When they arrived at the library´s doors the general ordered that they must find some strong element to knock those doors down.
Then, his soldiers looked for a thick trunk of some strong fallen tree, with which they would try to open the strong wooden doors of the library. In turn, after quickly inspecting what was already said about the blood on the floor next to the entrance, the general ordered:
—Knock the door down! —At the moment that Eyes of Heaven arrived with Temperance and Offer. They saw how a group of soldiers, holding with their hands that thick trunk, moved it forward and backward again and again, until they ran to the door and hit it against it...; but these doors resisted, to the point that the men had to repeat the manoeuvre several times, until at last they knocked the door down; meanwhile, a new group of soldiers approached the place, all of them keeping guard, and they entered the library. There, in the first instance, they found the four soldiers that were killed the previous night by the demons. It was their blood what, sliding under the door, made that puddle on the floor next to it.
—Divide in groups of five and inspect every single room. Who has done this must still be inside! —The general exclaimed, and when they entered the main room, divided as their superior ordered, they all approached the different rooms on the ground floor, while others went to the upper floors, even those that entered the library shortly afterwards, joining to the search.
The general went to the third floor with some soldiers and accompanied also by Eyes of Heaven, Temperance and Offer, entering the rooms of the south wing, which they walked clockwise, and finding no trace, they went to the rooms of the east wing, following the initial direction. They walked like this through the tight corridors surrounded by furniture, always keeping guard. Perhaps because of their old condition of angels, in this case followers of God, although they could never return to the Celestial Kingdom, for having descended to Earth in pursuit of the demons without the consent of their Almighty Father, Eyes of Heaven and his companions recognized a strange smell, although their sense of smell was not as developed as their auditory sense, or as the sense of smell of the demons who did use it.
—¡How strange the air smells! —Temperance exclaimed.
—The air has been polluted —Eyes of Heaven said.
Shortly after moving through the corners of the different corridors, that smell was concentrated in the air in a way that seemed to chase those walkers. Then the general understood:
—The nauseating smell comes from the reception, come on! —And without lowering their guard, they all went through the small passages made by the furniture, until they arrived at the reception.
—But what happened here? —The general asked himself, after observing without understanding, the commotion that caused that battle between angels with the skin of women and men, among them the neutrals, and the demons; since there were papers, maps and books lying on the floor, chairs everywhere, and the table used as a shield, in which there were arrows stuck, as there were also in the furniture.
—Dead demons! —Eyes of Heaven exclaimed surprised, at the same time that he pointed to his companions.
—There is a dead girl... —A soldier said immediately, and his superior approached, followed by Eyes of Heaven, who could never even imagine that that body was Experience. On the contrary, everyone thought that it was some young woman who after visiting the library in a normal way, had been involved in a battle that did not belong to her, but that ended with her life.
The general made sure that the body did not breathe, and when he corroborated it, he said:
—I must inform the king. You keep looking! —And while he was taking the road back, his men were lost in the corridors; after checking once again the fallen bodies, Eyes of Heaven, Temperance and Offer also left the reception area, going through a different corridor than the one the soldiers took.
Once all the souls that breathed left that polluted reception, a strange phenomenon happened... The guardian angel of Experience, who remained alive and hidden in one of the pockets of the girl's jacket, left her, taking with it her soul, after flying over the lifeless body of its mistress; that guardian angel transformed, like an effect of magic, into an angelic aureole that covered the soul of the lifeless Experience, and soon after, it flew and disappeared in the air, as if protecting itself from whoever could see it, moving the dust above the furniture that built corridors.
Meanwhile, Eyes of Heaven, Temperance and Offer were in that area of the rooms, where the corridors were embraced even more in brief passages that quickly exchanged their routes, and soon after, they arrived, perhaps attracted by the smell of demons, to that circular space where the worn manhole cover was.
—I think we found the answer to so much loneliness —Eyes of Heaven thought, and he bent down to move the lid.
