The Rise of the Fallen (The Angelic Wars Book 2) (39 page)

Chris let him go and stepped back,
laughing and crying at the same time. He turned and grabbed Tyler in
a hug as well.

His friend returned the embrace and
watched Chris curiously as he moved back.

“Gees, Chris. You're acting like
you haven't seen us in a year. What happened?”

Tyler looked baffled by Chris' reaction
and even more so as he noticed Judge Hawkes and the others as they
gingerly approached the beds.

“Judge? Hi there. What are you
doing here?”

“Welcome back, Tyler. Welcome
back, Jacob.” The judge was smiling widely and Chris heard the
relief in his voice.

“Okay, guys, what's going on?”
Jacob asked, bewildered. “Welcome back from where? We haven't
gone anywhere.” He hesitated. “Have we?”

“I'm not sure, Jake,” Tyler
said as he began to check out his surroundings. “Where are we,
in a hospital? And who are these guys?” He nodded at the other
Angelics as he gave Chef a wink. The big man returned it broadly.

“What is the last thing either of
you remember?” the judge asked intently as he stood next to
Chris between the beds.

“The last thing?” Tyler
fell silent and Jacob frowned in thought. Then his face lightened.

“I know. We were patrolling
around the Nest. There was an alarm, wasn't there, Ty?” Tyler
nodded. “Right. And we rushed to the front gate and we
saw...something.” He shook his head in puzzlement. “Now
what was it?”

Natalie had moved to the bedside table
next to Tyler and filled two glasses with water from the pitcher
there. She handed one to each of them.

“Thanks Natalie. Hey, how are you
doing anyway?” Tyler asked as he took a sip.

“I'm good, Ty. Better now seeing
the two of you back, awake and alert.”

“Oh, I get it,” Tyler said
with a wise look at the other bed. “We must have gotten hurt,
Jake. Chris here must have called in Sariel to heal us. Right Chris?”

“Uh, not exactly,” Chris
answered, unsure of just what to say. He looked at Judge Hawkes
appealingly and the man took over.

“Gentlemen, this is going to be a
little hard to accept, perhaps. But the Nest is gone. It was
destroyed in the attack that you vaguely remember.”

Jacob gasped, wide-eyed, while Tyler
stared at the man in disbelief.

“Gone? But, what about the
others? The staff and everyone?”

“Except for me, and the group
that was traveling with Judge Hawkes, everyone else was killed,
Tyler,” Chef answered heavily.

“No. That's not possible!”
Jacob looked around frantically. “Our friends, the Nest, it's
just...gone?”

“Yes, gone,” the judge
answered. “The Nest will be rebuilt, that I promise you. But
the people and the other Angelics, they can never be replaced. That
is part of our sorrow.” He smiled gently at the two teens. “But
it is part of our joy that you are back with us again. And so we will
celebrate that victory, at least.”

Tyler was watching the judge
suspiciously.

“I've heard two of you tell us
that we're back. Back from where? How long were we unconscious
anyway? And where are we?”

“This is Valiant, Tyler,”
the judge answered. Tyler looked around in surprise. Jacob did the
same. “You two have probably heard of it.”

“You mean you flew us here,
unconscious, and we've been out ever since?”

There was a long, uncomfortable
silence. Tyler was frowning, waiting for someone to speak, but Chris
was watching Jacob.

His friend had that blank look on his
face, the look that said that he was communing with his angelic
spirit. Chris braced for his reaction.

“Oh my God,” Jacob said
slowly as he turned to look at Tyler. “We haven't been
unconscious, Ty. According to Janariel, we were dead.”

Tyler began to laugh, a sound that was
cut off as he realized his friend was serious.

“Dead? We were dead?” He
looked to Judge Hawkes for an answer.

“Yes, it is true. You were both
captured and then killed after the attack. Your bodies were kept by
the Fallen, for what purpose we do not know. But you were returned to
us, in an effort to demoralize us, we believe, and Sariel resurrected
you.”

“Is this true, Chris?”
Jacob asked, visibly dazed by what he was hearing.

“It's true, Jake. We've found two
pieces of Sariel's sword now, and that was enough for him to channel
the power to call you back from...wherever you were.”

“Astriel confirms it,”
Tyler said. He still sounded like he didn't want to believe what he'd
been told. “But I don't remember anything. Anything at all. Not
Heaven, not a bright light. Nothing. You, Jake?”

“Nope. One minute we were
charging into battle, I still can't remember against what. And the
next, tada, here we are.”

Tyler lifted the covers of his bed and
looked down at his body. He seemed relieved.

“Well, I don't look like some
kind of zombie apocalypse survivor, so that's good.”

Everyone laughed at that comment,
including Chris, who thought that the two boys were taking the news a
lot better than he would have in their place.

Still, he thought, it worked. They were
back. As the others crowded around the beds and Natalie began to
introduce the resident Angelics to the two friends, Chris caught the
judge's eye and nodded toward the other end of the room near the
door. The judge raised an eyebrow but followed him away from the
suddenly boisterous group.

“Yes Christopher? What is it?”
the man asked.

Chris lowered his voice. “Sir,
when will we know if we managed to get this one by the Fallen? I
mean, is there any way to know or do we just have to wait?”

“Good question.” The judge
patted the inside pocket of his jacket, where he kept his phone.

“I'm waiting to hear from Ghost.
Hopefully he got away cleanly. If so, I'll ask him to do some
reconnaissance in London when he returns, see if there are any signs
that the agents of the Fallen are up to something. Until then, we
simply have to wait and hope it went well.” He shrugged
ruefully. “There is really nothing else we can do, except keep
Valiant locked up tight for a few days until we have some news.”

The judge clasped Chris on the shoulder
and gave him a gentle shake.

“Let me take this opportunity to
thank you for a job well done, my boy. I know it was something you
did reluctantly.” At Chris' surprised look, the judge smiled.
“Yes, I can read you that much. But you did it anyway, and it
worked. Let's celebrate that for now and worry about the future down
the road, in say an hour or two.”

Chris laughed at this last comment and
nodded in agreement.

Judge Hawkes went back to stand between
the two beds and chat with Jacob and Tyler, while Chris watched from
a distance for a minute.

Maybe we actually won one for a change,
he thought with a certain hopefulness.

That was well done, Sariel. The
judge thinks so and so do I.

Thank you, Chris. But it was the
power of my Father, not me, that brought back our friends. He has
need of them and we do as well. Let us hope that the Fallen remain
ignorant of my presence. At least for now.

Yeah, let's hope so.

Chris felt
Sariel fade from his mind and he walked back to be with his friends;
happy for a change that something had gone right.

* * *

Two days
passed with no news, either positive or negative, on what the Fallen
were up to. Chris had been walking on pins and needles, waiting for
some sign that they had been found out, but there was nothing. He
gradually relaxed and spent his time either visiting with Jake and Ty
in the Infirmary, or outside with the other Angelics.

On the
second day, the three teens that had been rescued from Luxembourg
were released from the medical ward and joined Chris and the others
outside. They looked relieved to be walking in the sunlight again.

There were
two guys, Sebastien and Chase, a name that Alysa immediately fell in
love with, and a girl named Simone. She seemed to be the spokesperson
for the threesome and thanked everyone more than once for their
rescue.

Anabelle
finally had to interrupt and explain that none of the Angelics had
anything to do with getting them out of the safe-house.

“
Oh,
I know that,” Simone said. She was quite tall and lean, with
dark hair and eyes. Her smile was lovely. She had a slight Parisian
accent. “But we must thank someone, and you are here, after
all.”

Anabelle
laughed at that and accepted her thanks gracefully.

“
I'll
pass on your gratitude to his lordship, if you don't see him first,”
she said. “But all of us are thrilled to have you here.”

“
We
are equally pleased to be with you,” Sebastien said slowly.

He had a
thick accent that Chris couldn't quite place; Belgian maybe? He spoke
in a measured and careful way. His short, messy hair was almost bone
white and he wasn't much taller or older than Chris.

“
You
bet we are. Why, we could have been splattered by those evil bastards
or starved in that damned vault.”

That was
Chase who was, surprisingly, American. He was from New Jersey
apparently and had been recruited a year before. He'd been brought to
Luxembourg recently, waiting to be assigned to another safe-house.
But the attack had occurred before he could be transferred.

Alysa looked
at him with a dreamy, wide-eyed expression.

“
I
love your accent, Chase,” she said with an adoring smile. He
returned it absently, apparently unaware of her rather obvious
interest.

It probably
didn't hurt, Chris thought a bit cynically, that Chase looked like a
football player. He was muscular and tall and wore his brown hair
flipped up at the front. But his open smile and cheerful nature made
Chris warm up to him anyway.

All nine of
them sat on benches or lay on the grass in the center of the garden,
a spot that Chris had come to think of as 'their place'.

The sun was
shining, the smell of the flowers was thick and strong and there was
enough of a breeze to keep the mid-day heat at bay. All in all, a
perfect day, he thought with contentment.

An hour
later, it became even better. Jacob and Tyler showed up, to general
applause. Both boys looked embarrassed at the reception. Embarrassed
but gratified.

Anabelle
introduced them to the three survivors from Luxembourg and it wasn't
long before the atmosphere turned party-like, with everyone talking
and laughing like they were old friends.

Chris
enjoyed being surrounded by other teens like himself, but he didn't
add much to the conversations. Finally he stood up and moved off to
lean on a tree and watch the others. Natalie noticed and joined him a
few minutes later.

“
Something
wrong?” she asked quietly. He shook his head as he watched the
group.

“
Nope,
just the opposite. But I'm still not used to being in the middle of a
crowd, even one this small.” He waved at the chattering teens.

“
Yeah,
I hear you,” Natalie replied with a small sigh. “They're
all so...energetic, aren't they? Makes me feel ten years older.”

Chris looked
at her and she returned the look and shrugged.

“
You
know how it's been for us, you and me. The things we've seen and
done. These guys, well the ones from Luxembourg saw some traumatic
stuff, I'm sure. But really, they're innocents still. Look at them.
They could be any group of high-school students, inexperienced and
carefree. I worry about them, Chris. I really do.”

“
Cripes,
Nat. I thought I was the gloomy one of the bunch. What's with all the
negativity?”

“
I'm
not negative,” she replied shortly. “I'm a realist. Right
now it's all friends and laughter for them. Rainbows and unicorns.
But things are going to get dark soon and frankly, I don't know how
they're going to respond.”

Chris
watched the group, trying to think of a way to reassure her.

Alysa kept
moving slightly to sit closer to Chase on one of the benches, and he
kept sliding away from her, apparently without thinking. Chris nudged
Natalie and nodded toward them. She giggled as Chase stood up
abruptly and moved to sit on the grass next to Sebastien. Alysa
watched him go, pouting.

“
Nat,
it doesn't really matter how they respond,” Chris told her.
“It's their angels that will be doing any of the fighting that
needs to be done, if it comes to that. And
they
will be just fine.”

She gave a
little noncommittal twitch of her head and continued watching the
boisterous group.

“
I
suppose you're right,” she answered after a few minutes. “I'm
just being a bit pessimistic today, I guess.”

She turned
and looked at him. “Speaking of which, is your feeling of
impending doom still hanging around?”

Chris looked
at her, annoyed.

“
It's
not a feeling of doom. It's just, I don't know, like an itch I can't
scratch. Except that it's in my head. And yeah, I still feel it. Less
when I'm with all of you guys, but it's still there. Something is
inching closer, Nat. Something sneaky and dark. But on a day like
today,” he looked up through the leaves above him to the
glorious blue sky, “I hardly feel it at all.”

“
Good.
Let's hope it's just gas.”

Chris
laughed at Natalie's comment and they went to join the others.

Ghost got in touch with
Judge Hawkes the next day. Chris was called to the judge's office by
himself and the man filled him in.

“
Christopher, I
think we got away with this one,” the judge said when Chris had
entered the office and sat down.