Escaping Heaven (33 page)

Being called into the Captain’s office was very exciting for the men and women, because it was extremely rare for an entire choir to be called in there. Usually if there was a loose soul running around Heaven, one or two Taggers from a unit would be brought in and set on the trail, because that was all that was needed. And they knew it was not a drill, because those were done in the barracks with all Taggers present. Typically, it meant there was some kind of wargame going on, and one choir was being pit against another choir, to see which barracks had the most capable members, but there was always the slightest, most remote chance that it was to see real action on Earth, in combat with demons. None of the members of this barracks had ever had the privilege, and so each of them was yearning that that’s what it was going to be.

The Captain’s office was cramped to begin with, but with the seven members of the choir, and Carlos still standing quietly in the corner, it was downright claustrophobic. The Captain never unfolded his wings even the slightest in the tiny room. The Israeli, a woman named Yael, spoke up first. “Why have you called us into your office, Captain?”

             
“Yeah,” the ex-Delta Force man named Max interjected. “Which sector are we playing against today?”

             
“No games today, troops,” the Captain said, as he leaned his hands against his desk. “Young Carlos here has been telling me we have a runner which we’re going to need to apprehend.”

             
Max waved his hand dismissively. “You don’t need a full choir for some random guy, top. So someone goes running from the lines somewhere. Get one or two people and they’ll have him tracked down in a couple of hours.”

             
Captain Diogenes chuckled a bit, shaking his head at them. “He didn’t escape from the lines, Max. He actually broke out of the quarters.” Suddenly, none of the Taggers were laughing, and all of them were paying attention to every word the Captain said. “That’s right boys and girls, we have ourselves an escapee who successfully got out of the therapy quarters and is loose somewhere in Heaven. Three friendlies are in pursuit, but they have not reported back, and it’s been one week since the man’s escape.”

             
“A week?” Yael said. “Why are we just now hearing of this? He could be anywhere by now.”

             
“As I said, we have three friendlies who thought they could track the man down on their own. Seems some of our young Mister Carlos’s crew wanted to try and keep their fat from the fryer, so they struck out on their own to prove that they could do our jobs better than we can.” The soldiers laughed, and the Captain offered a soft smile as he waved a hand at them to quiet them down. “Now now, let’s not be too hard on the angels. Their ward had a few days headstart on them, as he locked them in the quarters. As Yael said, our target could be anywhere by now, but first, let me tell you all something I know about this man. No matter what his file said, no matter what his mother would say about him or nice things they said at his funeral, this man is a much smarter opponent than the kind of runner we’re used to dealing with.”

             
“How you figure, top?” Max asked, crossing his arms over his chest as he leaned back against the wall. “A runner’s a runner.”

             
The Captain shook a finger at him. “This man is something different. He may not even
be
what we normally call a runner.” The soldiers looked at him curiously, trying to figure out the point he was obliquely trying to make. “Runners, on the whole, are stupid. They’re running, and therefore stand out. Our guy isn’t standing out, and so no one noticed him. We have no idea where he got to or how he got there, but he did so without attracting attention to himself. He’s not running anywhere. He’s gone native, blending in, disappearing among the crowd. He got out of quarters, which no one, I repeat
no one
, has ever done before, in the history of Heaven. He got past at least two or three checkpoints without anyone so much as batting an eyelash in his direction. He’s up and vanished like a fart in the wind. This guy is our proverbial nightmare. He’s smart, and that makes him someone we respect. Follow?”

             
The soldiers around the room all nodded.

             
“Good,” Diogenes said. “Now, just because we’re respecting him doesn’t mean we aren’t going to take him down. People get into places where they’re not supposed to be all the time, and it’s our job to get them back to where they belong. Polydorous, I want you and Max to get us a compass, and Nhlanhla will head down to lockup to get us our target’s personal effects. The man’s name is Jacob Altford, and as of this moment, he is Heaven’s Public Enemy Number One, which means we are going to hunt, subdue and return Mister Altford to the loving care of Heaven, which he has so ignorantly denied in his foolishness. Your choir also needs to be ready to move, in case you have to go topside.”

Carlos peered at him, his eyes wide, from his corner, and his voice was a squeak among the lions. “Do… do you think that’s really possible? All the way from the quarters down to Earth?”

             
“We’re not going to put anything past him at this point. It’s rare for a runner to get out of Heaven, but it does happen with enough regularity that I wouldn’t put it past our Mister Altford here. Yael, I want you to get to records and read through Mister Altford’s case file. Also, see if you can track down the Cherub who brought him up to Heaven. Maybe he can tell us something about Mister Altford’s last few weeks on Earth that will be of some relevance to our hunt. And get a copy of the portrait the scanner took of him when he turned his things into lockup when you’re down there, Nhlalha. It’ll help us to have an exact picture of what this guy looks like. The rest of you, I want you to do a preliminary sweep of the checkpoints between Mister Altford’s former quarters and the nearest thoroughfares. Talk to the guards at the checkpoints and anyone who happens to be clerking a desk near a door our target could’ve moved in or out through.” The Taggers were whispering quietly to one another until Captain Diogenes clapped his hands with a start. “Let’s go, people! You going to waste all day lollygagging around?”

             
The Taggers filed out of the single exit to the room quickly, leaving Carlos alone with Captain Diogenes.

             
“Don’t worry, Carlos. We’ll get him.”

             
“I hope you’re right, sir. Because sooner or later, word of this is going to get up to the Seraphim, and I certainly don’t want to be the one taking the blame for it.”

             
Diogenes walked around his desk and patted Carlos on the shoulder, escorting the man to the door of his office. “The Taggers are just like the Mounties, Carlos. We always get our man. I’ll let you know when it’s done.” He politely pushed Carlos out of his office, closing the door behind him.

             
Carlos sighed, looking back at the door as it was almost closed in his face, turning to walk away. “Either it’ll be done, or you will, I guess…”

*
             
*
             
*
             
*
             
*

             
J
ames looked back at Randall and Shelly as the three of them walked along one of Heaven’s endless corridors of doorways. “It’s been a while since I’ve done this, so you’ll have to forgive me if I don’t get the exact right exit door. I can’t say that Omaha was ever a hotbed for runners to go when I was doing this,” he said before turning back to look at the doors, as if he was trying to find some mental landmark to give them an idea of where they were.

             
To Randall, all the doors looked exactly the same, and he wasn’t even sure how anyone could tell them apart. “Hey, you’re definitely the expert here when it comes to these kinds of things. I would’ve probably just ended up picking a random door and then had to make my way across however much endless space before I even found… whatever state it is Omaha’s in.” He laughed a bit as Shelly looked at him, curiously. “What? I’m from the Bronx, hon. Anything west of Chicago’s all one big blur to me.”

             
Shelly forced a smile, but Randall could see she was slightly uncomfortable. “Yeah, I think this is going to be a little bit harder for me than it is for you, Randall. How long ago did you die?”

             
Randall shrugged slightly. “I dunno. Fifteen, maybe twenty years ago now, why?”

             
“Not that much changes on the planet in twenty years, and James here was chasing runners down, both here and on Earth for a while, so he’s seen some of the changes. Me… well, I haven’t been back to Earth since I died, and that was a few thousand years ago, at least. The world’s not going to look anything like I remember it. I’m not going to have any idea what anything is,” she admitted nervously. “I don’t want to be dead weight down there.”

             
Randall tried to offer her a warm smile, patting her shoulder. “We’ll be around to help you make sense of it all. It’ll be a lot to take in at first, but you’ve always been a quick study. I’m sure you’ll figure it out all quickly enough.”

             
Shelly turned and hugged Randall again, holding him for a moment before James cleared his throat, and she released him so the two could turn again to face him.

             
“I think this is the door,” James said, “but I certainly wouldn’t want to stake my life on it.”

             
Randall looked at him and waved a hand in the air. “Nothing much left for us to lose,” he said before he placed his hand on the doorknob, turning it and pushing the doorway in, the doorframe filling with white light. “So let’s go.”

             
One by one, the three angels stepped into the doorway of light and left Heaven.

             
As he emerged on the other side, Randall looked around him curiously, taking a few steps forward so he wouldn’t have the other two bumping into him when they came through. He was, however, absolutely perplexed, and his head swiveled and craned to let his eyes scan around them. “Okay, so this doesn’t seem right,” he said to himself. James stepped through next and Randall turned to look at him. “Are you sure you were even in the right vicinity, James?”

             
James looked at Randall with a slight frown on his face. “Sure? No. I thought I was going to end up pretty close, why, what seems…” he trailed off as he started to look around them.

Shelly stepped in after them and nearly bumped into the back of James, the door closing shut behind her, then disappearing. She looked around and smiled. “Oh, so the world really hasn’t changed that much at all. That’s a relief,” she said.

The three of them found themselves in the middle a jungle-like area. It was dark, and the sounds of primal wildlife were all around them. It was a little disconcerting to James, and Randall was one step away from panicking.

James paused a moment, then started walking a little bit before looking back at the other two. “Wait here a minute.” Then he took off at a quick run into the trees, vanishing into the night.

Randall knew, deep down, that he was intangible and that nothing in here could harm him, but he was a city boy who’d never much liked the wilderness, and being in the middle of a rainforest jungle wasn’t exactly soothing his nerves. Shelly could see that Randall was jumpy, and she put her arm around his shoulder. “Don’t worry, you silly man, nothing here can hurt you,” she told him.

From the darkness, there was a slight rustling, and Randall let out a soft sigh of relief. “Oh thank god. James, what did you fiiiIIIYAAAH!” he shouted as a large howler monkey came barreling at him, running straight through him as Randall stood there, arms out in shock. The monkey passed through him without so much as a scratch to either the angel or the primate, carrying on his run and disappearing again into the jungle.

Shelly couldn’t help it. She began to giggle. And the giggle bubbled over into a laugh. And the laugh boiled up into uncontrollable fits of cackling amusement.

“
Oh, VERY funny, Shelly!” Randall said, stomping his foot as he closed his eyes and shook his head quickly, trying to snap himself back into focus. “How the Hell am I supposed to be prepared for a charging monkey?”

“
Randall,” James’ voice said, right behind him.

“
AHHH!” Randall shouted, as he jumped again. (If he still had functioning bowels, he probably would have soiled himself
twice
by now.) “Don’t
do
that James!”

James looked at him with a slight smile. “What’s the matter, got a monkey on your back?”

“
Oh, ha fucking ha. Everyone have a good laugh at me? We done? Good. Now what did you find?”

“
Seems I wasn’t that far off in the first place. Come on,” he said as he started to walk towards the jungle. “It’s not far.”

“
Not far?!” Randall said in shock. “Look, I don’t know much about Omaha, but I’m pretty sure that there aren’t any rain forests in North America!”