Chapter Three
After the downfall of men and Lucifer, a revolt broke loose in heaven. God was busy with Gabriel and a couple of other angels helping Eve and Adam settle into their new lives. Some of the angels thought it was their chance to take over Heaven.
Before he was thrown into the lava pit, Lucifer had already designed a plan to do that. He let some of the angels make swords out of titanium, forged in the heat of Betelgeuse, one of the brightest stars in the constellation of Orion, believed to have special powers. Its name meant: The House of the Central One. So Lucifer told them it had the power to kill angels. Maybe even the power to kill God Herself.
Guebel had become the new leader of the angels. Guebel Inda Inkadib (mountain of lies) was his full name, but he shortened it to Guebel. He used to be Lucifer's right hand, a fanatic and a smooth talker that convinced a lot of the angels to come to Lucifer's side. Where Lucifer used his charm and wit, Guebel used the power of the repeated message, until some of the angels heard the message so often that they started to believe it. He spread the ranting about God being a tyrant, having her favourites, restricting the angels in their freedom, choosing inferior creatures over them. What also helped was that Guebel was a gifted speaker who used his opponent's weaker sides and emphasized them. It had proven useful. One in every three angels was on their side. And with the swords, Guebel thought they would be invincible.
The raid on the angels happened in the evening when they were gathered to play some games or tell some stories. It took them totally by surprise. Before they could gather their wits, more than half of them were slaughtered. Then they tried to run, but only a few of them managed to escape. The small group that survived gathered after half an hour. They decided to go to the few angels, led by Michael, who were guarding the skies.
Michael was actually in charge of Heaven when God was gone. But there had never been real problems so he was taking his share of duty to guard the skies. After Lucifer had been thrown down in the pit, occasionally strange looking creatures appeared at the border. But they were very weak forms that could easily be defeated, so they did not bother Michael much. When the survivors arrived and told him what had happened, he was in shock. He was convinced they were immortal, and now he heard that angels were lying dead on the fields of heaven. Frozen, he stood there till dusk arrived.
The astonishment was huge when the angels that were supposed to be dead came to them when the sun let its first light shine upon them. All the survivors started to talk at once, asking them all kind of questions. Michael gave a roar to silence them. Then he pointed at one of the reborn angels. "Daniel, tell us what happened, we heard you were dead, and now you are standing here alive and well." "We don't know. We died and everything went dark, then there was a strange light that took us up, and next thing we know, we woke up on the field where we died, our bodies intact."
"Where were Guebel and his hench-angels?" "I don't know, but I did send some of us to go looking for them." "Good thinking. Let's wait for what they can tell us before we make any plans."
When the scouts came back they told Michael and Daniel that the traitors were in a field close by, celebrating their victory with mead, lying drunk all over each other.
Michael and Daniel started to develop a plan together. When they had made up their minds about what to do, they gathered all the other angels and asked them if they were willing to die for the chance to take over heaven again. All the angels confirmed their willingness. The ones that had already died once were excused. From the others Michael selected 50 angels that would serve as bait for the revolting angels.
At dusk Guebel led his followers to what he thought would be an easy victory. They saw the fifty angels standing in a valley. With a big roar, he led the traitors to kill the defenseless angels. Great was his surprise when suddenly from all sides angels appeared, throwing big rocks at them. One of themhit him, he dropped his sword, panicked and fled. Several of the traitors had fallen, the others that saw their leader fleeing the valley got confused. Because they didn't get any orders, they had no idea what to do. So they panicked too and ran after their leader. Others were still trying to recover from the heavy blows of the rocks when the loyal angels threw themselves at them. They took over their swords, and now the fallen traitors were slaughtered themselves.
A few fields further they gathered again. Guebel who had found new encouragement turned to them and started cursing them. "Cowards, how could you leave your comrades behind to the mercy of our enemies?' When one of the angels pointed out that he had fled first himself, Guebel took his sword and cut his head off. Then he turned to the other angels. "Is there anyone else who wishes to say something about it?" All the other angels kept silent.
"As your leader, I have to make sure I am safe at all times. You wouldn't know what to do if you lost me. So, from now on I won't lead you into battle anymore. I will stay behind to give you directions. Some of you will be appointed to lead the rest into battle." There was some murmuring among the traitors, but when Guebel raised his sword, they became silent again. Guebel pointed at two angels. Romael and Kaitel.
"You two will be the leaders of the attack. Do you have any ideas about how to do it?" Romael stepped forward. "We can circle them and attack them from three sides. Then try to close them in." "Great idea, so I will appoint he angels that will be on your sides, and then you can lead them."
In the meantime the loyalists were celebrating their victory. A loud roar was heard by the approaching traitors. When they attacked the loyalists they were unprepared, but not defenceless anymore. They had gathered the swords from the fallen angels and put them to good use. They were not such easy prey anymore. It was a fierce and brutal battle. But the next day the angels that had died or were wounded faced another day in health so they could fight the next one. This went on and on for weeks. Each group kept changing their tactics that led to the positions shifting.
God, on the other hand, was busy with setting up a new life for Eve and Adam at full speed. Eve's pregnancy was rapidly taking its toll on her. The fact that she was carrying twins was contributing to it. God wanted her to be settled before she wasn't able to do anything anymore. First Eve and Adam learnt to build a shelter.
Gabriel protested that they had to do it themselves, but God told her that they had to become the teachers of their children, and if they didn't know how to do it, they wouldn't be able to pass the knowledge to their offspring. Gabriel swallowed her protest because she saw the logic behind it.
Poor Adam. Not only was his world turned upside down, he still had to deal with a very pregnant Eve whose hormones were playing havoc with her mind. In the day time he had to learn how to kill animals, skin them and prepare the skin to use as clothes or to build a tent, using the animal's bones for the structure. The first part was the hardest. He had never killed an animal before. Now God had told him that if he and Eve wanted to survive, he had to learn how to use all sources available. And meat was a big source of energy, more than fruit, vegetables and nuts, their food till then, now they had to do hard labour that would not suffice. And almost everything of the animal could be used.
God taught Adam which arteries to open, so the animal would rapidly bleed to death and not suffer too much. The first time Adam opened the veins of a goat he got covered in blood. Adam puked. It was disgusting. Gabriel taught Adam how to prepare the meat, heating it first so no germs would survive and threaten the mother's or unborn children's health. When Eve first tasted the meat she couldn't control herself. Hungrily she swallowed the meat, hardly chewing it. It tasted good. The fact that she also had to provide food for the new lives inside her made sure she had a good appetite. Adam soon found out that eating meat led to him having to look a lot less for fruit and vegetables, which gave him more time to build a shelter.
At night Gabriel was worried about God. When God fell asleep beside her, Her body started to glow and She tossed and turned as if She was having a nightmare, or in great pain. When she asked God the next morning if something was wrong, God said She had nightmares about the angels battling among each other. And Her whole body ached. It was most likely that She was weak in this form, and soon She had to return to heaven to change into Her original form. She would not be able to do it on Earth, because Earth wouldn't be able to withstand the force She would be.
During the night Gabriel would hold God in her arms, worried sick because everyday God appeared to become weaker. On the other hand it felt good to hold God's body, to feel the pressure of God's head resting on her chest. The angel felt very protective of Her. So she held Her, and caressed Her hair till Her body came to rest again. This continued for a few weeks till God thought Eve and Adam had learned enough to be able to sustain themselves. A few angels were appointed to stay behind and keep a watchful eye on them. Then God told Gabriel they would return to heaven.
Normally Gabriel would have protested loudly because she cared so much about the humans and was still worried they wouldn't be able to cope, but now she gave in immediately. God's condition was worsening and Gabriel didn't want to come up with excuses to stall their return to heaven any longer.
When they arrived in heaven they were stunned by what they saw. Angels were battling each other, some lay dead on the ground, others were dying, the blood dripping out of their wounds. God was furious. When She saw Michael standing in the middle of the field slaughtering an angel, She flew right at him. Michael withdrew his sword from the body of the dead angel when he was blown off his feet. A furious Deity stood over him, demanding an explanation. Quickly Michael gave God a summary of what had happened. Then God looked up to search for Her prey.
When She found him She raised Her arms. Rays of light sprang from them, catching Her target in it. He squirmed, he screamed because God charged him up. And when She finally released him, the little weasel was whimpering at Her feet, begging for mercy. When he tried to get up God put Her feet on his neck.
"Stay down! That is where you belong, crawling in the dirt. So you thought you could stand up against Me? Defeating Me using those ridiculous swords?" Then God grabbed one of the swords and stabbed Herself. Everybody fell down, feeling a terrible pain coursing through them. "So you thought you could kill Me? Don't you realise that I am everything. So if you kill Me, you put an end to everything."
Then she grabbed Guebel by his hair and pulled him up. "Tell me, was it Lucifer who put you up to this? Guebel nodded. He was trembling from fear. "You thought it would be better to serve him? Are you so naive that you think he can defeat Me? You fool. But if you are so keen on serving him I think you better should join him."
Having said that, God opened the pit into which She had thrown Lucifer. She dropped Guebel in it. She then turned to the traitors. They were easily recognised because they wore Lucifer's colours - brown with gold.
"Tell me who your leaders are and I will be kind to you." The traitors were true to their nature and pointed at Romael and Kaitel, talking all at the same time to tell God what atrocities the two had committed.
"So you two led the attack against my loyal angels. Why?" "We had our orders!" Romael said. God shook Her head. "I gave you free will. So every terrible deed you do is of your own making. You can't hide behind someone else. The choice to act will always be yours. You will always stay accountable for your own actions. Anything else to say in your defense?" "I was given orders!" Kaitel said. "The first orders you got came from Me. You decided they could be ignored. You should have done it with these two. Now you can go and serve the master of your own choice." Kaitel disappeared in the same pit as Guebel. Romael stepped in front of God. "I have no excuse!" And then he jumped into the pit himself.
God turned to the angels that had betrayed Her. "I gave you everything - your existence, your souls. All you wanted. Everything that was available was free for you to use. All but two exceptions - The Black Hole and The Garden of Eden. I don't know what it exactly was that made you decide to follow Lucifer. But look what you were willing to do for it." God waved Her arm over the battlefield.
"You were willing to kill your fellow angels. And to what purpose? Every morning they would be here again. It was a battle that couldn't be won by either side." God stepped closer to them, anger burning in Her eyes. "You made weapons to kill other angels." Some of the traitors bowed their heads in shame. "For that I will punish you. You are immortal - your bodies as well as your souls. I have made that everlasting. But your bodies I will take from you. You will be given new ones. Mortal ones." The angels looked at her in shock. Then Gabriel whispered something in God's ear. She nodded.
"I have decided to make you human. You will lose the powers that your bodies contain now. Your new bodies are mortal, and if they die your soul will leave the body and go through purification. Every wrong you have done, every pain you have caused, you will feel yourself. After your soul has been purified it will be born again. If your soul has learned from the purification it will try not to do harm in its new life."
Then God took clay from the same place as Gabriel had got it from to create life on earth. She shaped it into human forms. She took the souls from the traitors' bodies and put it into the newly built forms. They started to move. "You will now start populating earth. It will be yours to exploit. If you treat it right it will be good to you. If you treat it wrong, then one day it will turn against you. You will give birth to new life. Every new soul that will be born will be bound by the same rules that you are. If your soul has learned enough and is pure again, it will become an angel. So you all will have the chance to become an angel again. Now leave and try to deserve your wings." The humans then left, scared of what was lying in front of them.
God took care of the disposal of the angels' bodies. She threw them into the core of Betelgeuse. She turned to her loyal angels. "There they will burn up! Although it may take centuries before the last remains of them are burned up. For your loyalty and dedication to me I will give you the power to heal. Some will be healers of the soul, some will be healers of the body. You will become guides of the good souls that are too weak to completely heal themselves. You won't be able to protect them from wrong by others, but you will be able to restore some of the damage that is done. You won't be able to heal completely, but you will be able to speed up the process, as long as the ability and will to heal are there." Gabriel looked at God in awe. Then she kissed Her on the cheek. "What a great gift! Thank you for that."
All the angels got a big grin on their faces, and a sparkle appeared in their eyes.
The thought of having received the power to give, to be able to reduce suffering, had brought tears to the eyes of some.
God turned to Gabriel. "Please give me your arm. I need your support to get out of here." Gabriel offered God her arm and led her away from the angels.
"Gabriel, I will have to leave you for some time." God said with sorrow colouring Her voice. "I have to take my original form for a couple of hours. In this form I am too weak. All the events have demanded too much from this body.' "The nightmares, the pain you felt during the night was all because of this, right?" "Indeed, during my sleep the dead bodies of the angels took their energy from Me to restore. As I told you, you all come from an essential part of Me. The bodies that are thrown into Betelgeuse are burning, but not diminishing. I will take My original form and retrieve them. I don't want the others to know this. I can't run the risk that this knowledge will be used by one of them someday." "Then what about the bodies of Lucifer and the others that were thrown into that pit? And what about the humans? What will happen to their souls when they die?"
God took Gabriel's head in Her hands and kissed her softly on her lips. Gabriel was stunned. Her lips were tingling from the sensation of that kiss. When God withdrew Her head, a stunned Gabriel was looking at Her.
"I am sorry Gabriel, but I had to stop you from asking a hundred questions at once and I had not the energy left to do it with words. Will you accept that I will answer your questions after I have restored myself and come back to you like this?"
Gabriel nodded. "Then leave now because you can't see Me in My original form."
A stunned and trembling Gabriel walked away with a hundred and one more questions running through her head.
"My God, what was that?"
Continued...