Daystar (57 page)

Helion snapped up an apple.
 
“This is the best apple in the world.”
 
He took a bite, and it was the best.

He pointed to himself.
 
“I am blue.”
 
His skin remained the same.
 
He frowned.
 
“I have eight legs.”
 
Helion still only had two.

He pointed at a bug.
 
“You have thirty wings!”
 
The bug broke out in wings and dropped to the ground unable to do anything.
 
Helion picked it up.
 
“I mean you are a regular thing.”
 
The bug returned to normal and flew away.

Helion chewed on his lower lip.
 
“Not me.
 
Only statements.”
 
He pointed his finger at the sun, and then lowered it.
 
He stared at his hands.
 
“What would Belial do?”

Helion knew instantly.
 
Belial would have gone on a destructive rampage, using the abilities to cause mayhem.
 
Helion stifled that impulse.
 
Dahlia had ordered him not to go to Heaven.
 
He would obey, not because he had to, he was sure he could get around that, but because Lucifer and Dahlia were right.

Helion gazed at his hands.
 
What he could do to others was dangerous and he had a good idea of what He would want with that ability.
 
Helion did not want to hurt anyone, on purpose or inadvertently, but Whitney was gone, taken from him.
 
He ground his teeth.
 
He repressed the feeling.
 
He was not a violent person.
 

Helion walked towards the lake.
 
“I cannot just do nothing.”
 
He frowned.
 
“What do I do?”
 
Helion looked in the water and spotted a fish.
 
“What do I do?”

The fish swam away.

Helion scratched his hair.
 
“Someone will come to give me advice now.”

Leviathan appeared over the water.
 
“What the fuck?”
 
She hit the water and splashed around.
 
She looked up.
 
“Oh hi, Helion!
 
I heard what happened to Whitney.
 
I’m sorry.”

Helion nodded.
 
“She will be fine.”

Leviathan eyed him.
 
“I also heard you can make things happen and un-happen so to speak.”

“Yes.”
 
Helion sighed.
 
“But I do not know what to do.”

“How can I help?”

“Tell me what I should do please.”

Leviathan shifted to a serpent and rolled in the water.
 
“Be ready and get Whitney when the opportunity makes itself apparent.
 
When others are there to help you.
 
Do not go in by yourself.”

Helion nodded.
 
“That is good advice, but I feel useless right now.
 
Horrid things could be happening to her and I can do nothing.”
 
He shook his head.
 
“No, I can do something, but it is smarter not to.
 
The right thing for everyone else is for me to do nothing.”

Leviathan coiled herself up in the shallow water.
 
“Helion, I think you’re being remarkably responsible by not charging off and putting everyone in jeopardy.
 
Dad would have done that if Mom had been taken again.”

“It does not feel responsible.
 
Doing nothing feels cowardly.”

“Are you going to go into battle when it comes?”

“Yes.”

“Then you are not a coward, you are prudent.
 
If I were you, I would put my mind on what to do to get Whitney back when the time arises.
 
Prepare yourself now and be ready, keep your mind busy.
 
Thinking over an issue is not doing nothing.”

Helion nodded.
 
“Thank you, Leviathan.”

She changed back to a young woman and grinned.
 
“You’re welcome!”

Helion smiled a little.
 
“Aren’t you nervous?”

Leviathan shook her head.
 
“Mom and Dad have got this covered.”

“How do you know?”

“I don’t know, Helion, but I have faith in them.”
 
Leviathan smiled and disappeared in a whirl of blue.

Helion stood on the shoreline and took a deep breath.
 
He sat down and stuck a finger in the mud.
 
“I have faith too.
 
Whitney
can
take care of herself until I get her.
 
I know she can.
 
I just don’t know if I can take care of myself.”

***

Whitney finished stitching Michael’s right side.
 
She moved him carefully to expose his left side.
 
Michael groaned.
 
She snatched her hands back.
 
“Sorry, sorry, sorry!”

Michael ground his teeth.
 
“It is not due to you, the pain in unavoidable.”

Whitney frowned.
 
“Yeah but still, I am sorry.”

“Do not apologize.”

Whitney began to work on his chest.
 
“You know I’ve noticed that you guys have issues accepting apologies.”

“To accept an apology is to admit that someone else can injure you.
 
To give one is to admit failure and fault.”
 
Michael blinked against the pain.

“So basically you’re saying that you’re too proud to do either.”

Michael glowered at her.
 
“Do not put it in those terms.”

“What terms?
 
The truth?
 
Are you too proud to admit that as well?”

“The truth, the absolute facts of things…that is important and must always be accepted.”

“So if it were truth that your God is a dick and in the wrong that would mean something to you?”

Michael glared at her.
 
“Why am I speaking to you?”

“It takes your mind off your pain.
 
Doesn’t have anything to do with you or me.”

Michael stared at the lights in the sky.
 
“
Hypothetically
, yes if He were in the wrong then that would matter.”
 
He groaned.
 
“This is idiotic.
 
He cannot be in the wrong.
 
He is right, what He does is correct.”

“Why?”

“He is our creator, we should do naught else but obey.”

“Why?”

“If we disobey what purpose do we have?”
 
He looked down at himself.
 
“I am ruined by my disobedience.
 
I damaged myself by going against Him.”

Whitney rolled her eyes.
 
“This is coming from the guy that just got lashed with a fire whip.
 
You sound like an abused housewife.”

“I deserved it.”

“Are you listening to yourself?
 
He
hit you
because you didn’t want to do something evil!
 
That’s okay?”

Michael set his jaw.
 
“Good and evil, they do not apply to His orders.”

“You’re really dumb.”
 
Whitney pulled out more of her hair.

Michael closed his eyes.
 
“Whipped, cast aside, and now insulted.
 
This is truly my end.”

Whitney laughed.
 
“God, you guys are
so
melodramatic around here.
 
Oh noes I am defeated!
”

WILL YOU SHUT UP?
 
YOUR INANE CHATTER IS DISTURBING ME AND STOP THOSE ROCKS!

Whitney turned her head slowly.
 
“Poor you, my heart goes out.”
 
She gazed at her rocks and four more appeared, different sizes, they added to the cacophony.
 
Whitney smiled.

Michael gazed at the rocks.
 
“That does nothing for your situation and yet you still do it.
 
Why?”

Whitney shrugged.
 
“I find it amusing.
 
Don’t you do anything for fun?”

Michael’s mouth twitched.
 
“No.”

“Ever?”

Michael remembered memories of laughter.
 
“No.”

“You’re lying.
 
I thought the truth meant something or were you lying then too?”

Michael bared his teeth.
 
“Fine, yes, I remember doing fun things once.”

“Why didn’t you just say so?”

“It was with
him
, the betrayer.”

“Lucifer?”

“Yes, he…he was my older brother.”

“
Was?
 
I don’t think you can undo that kind of relationship.”

“I have cast him aside.
 
I am ashamed to be his sibling.”

“Harsh.”

“He means nothing to me now.”
 
The veins on Michael’s forehead stood out.
 
“Nothing, he is nothing!”

Whitney looked him over.
 
“If he were nothing I doubt you’d go red in the face and hiss.”

“I am not hissing!”
 
His exhalation came out in a hiss.
 
Michael stared at his hands.
 
“I should not talk to you any longer.
 
Please leave me alone.”

“Fine.”
 
Whitney stretched and stood up.
 
“I needed a break anyways, gotta shake the limbs out.”
 
The rocks near Whitney stopped.

FINALLY.

They picked up into a beat.

NO.

Whitney kicked her leg over her head.
 
She twisted her waist.
 
She hummed and the rocks changed their tempo.
 
Bigger rocks appeared making louder, deeper percussion.
 
Whitney smiled.
 
“Bass!”
 
She made figure eights with her pelvis; the angels outside the area watched horrified and fascinated.

Whitney turned to Michael.
 
“You ever hear club music?”

“Club music?”

“You know the kind that makes you shake your ass like this.”
 
Whitney shook her butt at the throne.
 
She strutted towards the fire and formed high heels out of rock as she walked; she clothed herself in a stone bikini, polished mirror smooth.
 
Whitney pumped her hips to the beat.
 
Her chest and butt moved in ways that had the angels fixated.

DO NOT WATCH HER.

Whitney grinned.
 
“Aww, but I never get looked at in clubs!
 
I don’t really have much of a butt.”
 
She dropped and curled up slowly, she let a bikini strap slide to the side.
 
“It’s fun being the hottest girl around, even if that’s because I’m the only girl.
 
Sorry, I mean woman.”
 
Whitney glared at Ariel.
 
Ariel snapped her teeth at her.

Whitney slid to the right.
 
“Then you shake it to the left.
 
Drop and dip and roll your body.”
 
She sang along with the moves she was practicing.
 
“I can get on the floor and kind of do this one called the worm.
 
Do you want to see?”

Michael watched her.
 
“You do
this
for fun?”

“Well, with more people.
 
Dancing alone is kind of lame, but it seems to irritate Big G.”

“Big G?”

“God Almighty, ruler of Heaven and Earth, of all that is seen and unseen, Big G!”

Michael closed his eyes.
 
“What will make you stop this rock noise and your body gyrations?”

Whitney grinned.
 
“If you talk to me, I guess I’ll stop.”

Michael grimaced.
 
“Fine.”

The rocks disappeared.
 
Whitney sat by Michael’s side and picked up her needle.
 
She took his hand in hers and worked on getting his fingers back on.
 
“So, where were we?
 
Oh yes, brother trouble.”

“I do not seek to speak on this topic again.”

Whitney clucked her tongue.
 
“Now is that really healthy?”

“Healthy?”

“He’s your brother.”

“No more.”