New Justyce (Book 1 / Episode 1)
Book 1: Justyce Begins
Episode 1: Angels and Meteors
Logan Kastala’s eyes widened in fear. He saw the car speeding right toward him, but he knew he didn’t have time to get out of the way. Logan lifted his arms to try and shield his face, and then everything went black. Someone or something lifted Logan off the ground, and then it felt like he was rolling. Logan stopped moving but could not see a thing. He was still in total darkness. Logan moved his arms and felt a soft barrier like a blanket of feathers. He tried to push his way out, but Logan felt another person in the darkness with him.
“Hey! What’s going on? Who’s there? What happened?” Logan asked.
What Logan thought was a blanket pulled away from him and parted, letting in the light. Logan blinked and saw his friend, Obadiah. “Obie? You’re always helping me out of tough spots lately. It’s good we met! Thanks for the save!” Logan laughed, but he cut his laugh short when he got a better look at his friend. “Obie?” Logan said, backing up slowly. “You have wings! Am I dead, Obie? Are you an angel?” Tears welled up in Logan’s eyes.
Obadiah reached out and grasped Logan’s arms. “Don’t be scared, Logan. You’re not dead. Yes, I have wings. But I’m still the same guy you’ve become friends with over the last few weeks.” He tried to give Logan a reassuring smile.
“What are you, though? Are you an angel? A mutant? Something else?” Logan didn’t pull away from Obadiah, but he was still nervous.
“I am what you call an angel. We call ourselves Seraphim. We are not religious spirits from a place called Heaven. We are a race of beings from an alternate plane of existence. Our doorway into your world opens in the space between Earth and Mars. Many years ago, a human saw one of us coming to Earth. They saw him “descend from the Heavens,” and the myth of angels sprang up from that sighting.” Obie guided Logan into the park while they talked. They finally settled at a picnic table off by themselves.
“Why me? Why would you befriend and help me? And I can’t see your wings anymore. Where do they go?” Logan peered around behind him, looking for Obadiah’s wings.
“The wings are always there. I can control when people see them and when they can’t. As far as helping you and making you my friend? I genuinely like you. I sense great and special things in your future, Logan. You will do amazing things. I’m sure of it.” Obie said.
Logan blushed. “I’m nothing special.”
“Oh, but you are. I know it.” Obadiah’s smiling face turned suddenly serious. “I will get in big trouble for revealing myself to you. You probably won’t ever see me again. My father sits on the Council of Judgement, though I doubt if even he can get me out of this mess. If I never see you again, I want you to have something.” Obie’s wings reappeared for just a moment. He plucked one bright silvery feather, and then the wings vanished again. He handed the feather to Logan. “Keep this close, and you will always feel my presence when I am on Earth, and I’ll be able to sense if you are in danger.”
Logan’s head was reeling. He was still trying to absorb everything that was happening. First, a car nearly ran him over. Then an angel saved his life, an angel who happened to be his friend. Now, that friend gave him a magic feather plucked from his wing. Could things get any weirder? Logan reached over and took the feather. “Thanks, Obie. Everything that is happening is overwhelming, but I mean it when I say thanks. I’m just trying to wrap my head around all this.”
Obadiah reached across the table and took ahold of Logan’s hands. “Logan, everything will be ok. I promise. Even if I can’t come back, I sense remarkable things for you. You’re special, Logan. I knew it from the first time we met.” Obie leaned across the table, staring intently into Logan’s eyes.
Logan blushed. “I am not special in any way. I barely know what I’m doing from one day to the next. How am I supposed to have an important destiny? You must have me confused with someone else.” Logan huffed out a laugh.
“I could never confuse you for anyone else,” Obadiah smirked. “I can’t exactly see your future, Logan. I can only sense that you have an important destiny. You will overcome many difficult challenges very soon. You will not be alone. Others will gather around you, but you will be a central figure as the events unfold.”
“Well, that’s frightening. Are you sure you won’t be around to help and guide me through whatever happens?”
“If I can be here, I will be. I fear that if my actions today are known to my people, they will call me home to face judgment.” Obie frowned, his eyes downcast.
Logan reached over and lifted Obie’s face. “Your actions today were heroic. You saved my life. You didn’t do anything wrong. They have to see that.”
“We are forbidden from interacting with humans in any way. They won’t care that my intentions were good.”
“Let me talk to them. I’ll make them understand.” Logan reached across the table and took Obadiah’s hands in his own.
“That would only make things worse. I hope I am wrong, but I may never see you again after today. Please know that it wasn’t my choice to abandon you.”
“I pray that you are wrong! I’ve grown to care a lot about you in the short time that I’ve known you, Obie. So, if I might never see you again, I better do this now.” He closed the remaining distance between them and kissed Obadiah.
A bright flash of light caused both boys to pull back from the kiss quickly. Logan grinned and said, “Wow. That kiss made the sun brighter.” But then his smile faded. Three angels were standing around them. Two wore bright, shining armor, and each one grabbed one of Obadiah’s arms and pulled him to his feet. The third angel wore a suit and tie and was obviously in charge. Logan could see their wings. The two armored angels had silver wings like Obadiah’s, but the other one had golden wings.
The angel in the suit spoke first. “Obadiah, son of Samael, I hereby place you under arrest by order of the Council of Judgement. I order you to go with me to the Council Chambers for your trial.”
Logan sprang up from his seat. “No! He didn’t do anything wrong! He saved my life! How can that be a crime?”
Abathar glared at Logan. “Your words have no bearing on the business of the Seraphim. Obadiah knows our laws, and he chose to break not one but three of them. Forget you ever saw us, human. Especially forget you ever saw him.” Abathar pointed at Obadiah.
“I’ll never forget him. We’ll find a way to be together again. You can’t stop us.” Logan scowled, then looked at Obie, and his smile returned. “I’ll wait for you, Obie. No matter how long it takes.”
Abathar scoffed. “Let us be gone.” He motioned toward the other two Seraphim.
Obadiah reached out toward Logan but looked at Abathar. “Wait! I….”
He started to say more, but Logan never heard what Obadiah would say. All four angels disappeared in a flash of light. Logan waited around for a while but gave up and went home. He hoped that Obie was telling the truth about the feather. He clutched it tight and prayed that someday it would lead him to Obie.
The two Seraphim Law Keepers half dragged, half carried Obadiah through the Council chambers before pushing him down into the Judgement Seat. The Law Keepers fastened the restraints and left the room. Obie’s face contorted in rage as he turned to look at the third Seraphim. “You could have let me say goodbye to him, at least. Two more minutes would not have mattered to you, Abathar.”
“If you want mercy, speak to Zadkiel. I seek only to see you judged for your crimes against our society. Crimes which you added to just before our arrival.” A look of disappointment and disgust crossed Abathar’s face. “With these new crimes, even your father won’t be able to help you, Obadiah. You held such promise.”
Obadiah sat straight up in his chair and stared directly into Abathar’s golden yellow eyes. “I did what my heart commanded of me. If the Council judges that to be a crime, then so be it! I would do everything the same all over again!”
The doors at the end of the Great Hall opened, and six more Seraphim entered, all with golden-hued wings. Abathar joined the other Council members. Three sat on each side of the table. The last, the High Judge, stood opposite the Judgement Seat. The High Judge, Azrael, spoke to the accused. “Obadiah, your father pleaded with the Council to show you mercy. We were inclined to accede to his wishes until news of your added crimes reached us. Your crimes have tied our hands, and our decision is final.”
Obie glared at each member of the Council. His father wouldn’t even meet his gaze. He clenched his teeth and looked directly at Azrael. “I did nothing wrong. Not one thing I did hurt anyone here or on Earth. I saved Logan’s life and fell in love with him. He has an important future. I’m sure of it. Earth benefits from what I did. I committed no crimes!”
Azrael shook his head. “You know that interfering in a human’s life is not allowed. You also know that engaging in sex with a human is a crime. And just for your crime of same-sex activity, the punishment is banishment. All three of these crimes individually are serious offenses. You committed all three. We cannot ignore that.”
Obie blushed in embarrassment and anger. “I did not have sex with Logan! And besides, none of those things should be crimes. Love is not a crime. Humans are a lot like us. If we interact with them more, we can help them. They can even help us in some ways! Your views are ancient and bigoted.”
“My views are the views of our people. My views are the law. You kissed that human boy. If we allowed it to continue, you would have gone further. Obadiah, you know why we passed these laws. The last time a Seraphim became involved with a human, he impregnated her. The humans called it a miracle birth. Hell, they still have wars over it over two thousand years later! The Council cannot excuse your actions, no matter how much we’d like to.” Azrael walked over to where Obadiah sat. “Obadiah, son of Samael, you are forever banished from our kingdom. If you return, your sentence will be death.” Azrael pushed a button, signaling the Law Keepers to return. Azrael and the other six members of the Judgement Council left the room. Samael never once glanced back at his son.
Obadiah’s screams echoed throughout the Great Hall as the Law Keepers removed his wings and dragged him to the Plains of Judgement. Obie saw his father in the crowd, “Father! They took my wings! Father! Help me!” Samael merely turned his back and walked away.
The Law Keepers opened a rift to the blackness of space above the Earth. They forced Obadiah to stand, then pushed him through the breach.
As Obadiah fell through space, his Seraphim power leaked out of the wounds on his back, mixed with his blood. The power attracted space dust and rocks that gathered around the young Seraphim like a meteor shower. Obie entered the Earth’s atmosphere as part of the most massive meteorological event ever recorded. There were so many rocks surrounding Obadiah that no telescope caught sight of his body at the storm’s center. The meteors, glowing with a bluish light, streaked through the warm August night sky on a collision course with a small town on the east coast of the United States. Newville, Virginia would never be the same. The entire world was about to change forever.
Erik Reilly glanced away from his computer and looked out the window. A flash of light in the sky caught his attention. As he continued to stare, Erik saw what, at first, looked like a shooting star. He was puzzled. Erik knew he shouldn’t be able to see any star, shooting or not, through driving rain. Then there was another bright flash of blue light. Specks of blue fell like rain in the meteor’s wake. Erik watched in awe as, just as the shooting star or whatever it was broke through the clouds, it exploded into several pieces. One reasonably large chunk fell towards the docks, while the biggest one and many little ones continued over Erik’s house and towards Newville Park.
Carl Chambers pounded his enormous fist on the table. “Full house? How do you have another hand like that, Myers?” Carl threw his cards into the air.
Rick Myers shrugged his shoulders. “Lucky night, I guess.”
“No one is that lucky,” Carl grumbled.
“I don’t know why we all even play. The two of you argue every single week.” Lisa Jenson complained.
“We’re here for more than poker. That’s why. You know that, Lisa. Now that Rick has all our money, we may as well get down to our real business. We need to tighten control of our territory. I’m sick of these piddly street thugs thinking they can come to my docks and rob people. If anyone is getting robbed, it’ll be by us!”
Carl was just getting warmed up with a speech about his plans for their next moves to take over more of the town. “First, we put a stranglehold on the docks. Every business must pay! Then, we take over the city, working out street by street, block by block.” Carl nearly yelled.
“Yeah! Let’s do this! First Newville, then the world!” Rick cheered.
Carl smirked as he looked around the table at his friends. He had them all convinced of his plans. Carl was ambitious and wasn’t satisfied just running Newville Heights and the docks. Carl wanted it all. Then, as fate would have it, a massive meteor smashed through the union hall roof ending the meeting abruptly with a loud, literal bang that would change their lives forever.
Logan Kastala woke up screaming. He had the worst nightmare he could ever remember having. Logan felt as if he had been falling for hours, and his back felt like it was on fire! The pain subsided now that Logan was awake, but he still felt it. That’s weird, Logan thought. He could never remember a physical reaction to a dream quite like he was feeling now. Logan was about to fall back to sleep when he noticed the glowing blue light. Logan leaned over towards his nightstand to see what it was. The feather that Obadiah gave him was glowing! Logan picked up the feather and felt Obie’s presence nearby. Obadiah was somewhere on Earth for sure. Logan desperately hoped that Obie had not gotten into too much trouble with the other angels or Seraphim. Logan clutched the feather close and drifted back to sleep. Tomorrow he would begin his search for Obadiah. Logan never looked out the window, or he would have seen blue streaks falling out of the sky right over his house.
Erik went outside to get a better view. He ran to the top of a hill right behind his house. Drenched in seconds, Erik brushed the water out of his eyes and watched as tiny meteors fell and hit the ground. Suddenly, a tree not twenty yards behind Erik exploded in flames. In his excitement, watching the small meteors hit, he lost track of the big one, but he thought it was still heading toward the park.
“Wow!” Erik thought. The rain put the fires out quickly. Erik ran over to the remains of the tree. A small, glowing blue rock sat right in the center of the blackened and burned tree. Erik waited for the rain to cool the stone, then he reached in to pick it up. He thought better of it at the last minute, and he continued to stare at the rock.
The meteorite was about the size of a marble. Erik finally threw caution to the wind and picked it up. He almost dropped it as soon as he picked it up. It looked harmless. The stone wasn’t hot anymore, but it started to pulse in his hand. Erik could feel waves of energy coursing through his body with each pulse. He wasn’t sure what was happening to him, but Erik immediately felt different, more vital. He liked the feeling. Erik put the rock in the front pocket of his jeans and ran back into his house.
The meteor at the center of the storm hit the baseball field behind the high school with enough force to leave an impact crater and rattle the windows of nearby houses. A shockwave was sent deep into the earth, awakening an ancient supernatural force. The shadow peeled itself away from the wall. It could sense the power of the being directly above, but more importantly, it could smell a world full of delicious evil. Evil that the shadow was eager to devour.
The shadow swirled upward, sliding through the cracks and crevices in the earth. It had been over a thousand years since the shadow was free to roam the land. The scent of evil was nearly intoxicating. The shadow needed to bond with a host, but it could sense that the being that had awoken it would not be suitable. The shadow had waited for a long time. It could wait a little longer.
Everyone in the union hall jumped to their feet and backed away from the glowing blue rock. Part of the ceiling collapsed, and the wall caught fire. Carl felt waves of power emanating from the stone, and he leaped into action. He grabbed a fire extinguisher and yelled to his friends. “Don’t just stand there! Grab the rest of the extinguishers or buckets of water. We have to put this fire out and cool down this rock. I feel that it’s important!”
“Carl is right!” Yelled Rick. “Cool that rock down and put out the fires as soon as possible. And do not call the fire department! We have to handle this ourselves.”
Anyone with an extinguisher sprayed water or chemicals on the already glowing and pulsing meteor rock. The chemicals began to bubble and boil then the entire rock exploded. Steam and dust enveloped the twelve people in the room from head to toe. They all started coughing as they breathed in the mist. Carl dropped to his knees and then collapsed onto the floor. He looked through blurry eyes and saw all his friends on the floor around him.
The boy groaned as he tried to lift his face out of the mud. He felt disoriented by the overwhelming number of sensations he was feeling. The most immediate was the almost unbearable pain in his back. It felt as if someone was ripping his muscles right off the bone. He could not remember ever feeling such pain before. As that thought crossed his mind, it occurred to him that he could not remember anything at all. The boy had no idea where he was, how he got there, or even who he was.
The boy, with significant effort, sat up and tried to clear his head. The pain in his back made it nearly impossible to concentrate. He opened his eyes and wiped the mud, rain, and hair out of his eyes. The cold, driving rain that pelted his face and body helped ease the burning pain in his back just a little and helped him clear his thoughts. He was cold and wet. His clothes were torn, dirty, and smelled of smoke. The smell of smoke was also thick in the air. The entire field was empty, burnt, and, in places, still smoldered. The rain helped to put out some of the small fires.
He got up and stumbled off in the direction of the one light that he saw. He hoped to find help, or someone might know who he was or how he got here. All he knew right now was that he needed to leave this field and get out of the rain.
Bryson Indiana woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of sirens. He stumbled out of bed and out onto his patio. The first fire trucks Bryson saw were racing toward the school. The fires were past the school when he looked closer, maybe at the baseball field or a nearby house. Just as Bryson turned to go back into his house, he noticed the other fires. There were small fires in what appeared to be a nearly straight line from the school in the south to the Newville Docks in the north. Bryson’s curiosity was piqued, but it would have to wait until morning. Right now, all he wanted was more sleep.
Carl rolled over and pushed himself up to a kneeling position. He felt weird. Strong. But weird. It was challenging to understand all the feelings that coursed through his body. Intense pain nearly caused him to blackout again. He looked down and saw tan hairs sprouting out on his arms and hands. His hands were growing and changing, nails turning into claws. He tried to look around for his friends, but the blue mist still hung over the entire room. He called out for help, but his voice sounded like a growl. He heard other growls answering his own, and just before he blacked out again, he perceived the distinctive clip-clop of hooves on the wooden floor.
The boy stumbled away from the crater, and toward the light he saw in the distance. Words and images kept flashing through his foggy mind. Tree. Road. House. Logan! He immediately knew that Logan was important, but he did not know why. The boy crossed the street and walked through an empty parking lot. The boy walked to a dimly lit building at the far end of the lot. The doors would not open, but the boy saw a reflection of himself in the glass.
“Obadiah? Is that who I am?” He touched the face of the reflection, then drew his hand back and felt his face. “Logan would know if that’s my name. I must find Logan.”
Obadiah turned and once more headed in the direction of the only light in the distance. The glow belonged to a house. Obadiah walked past a metal box with writing that said, “C. Justyce.” He continued past the mailbox and stood in front of the blue wooden door. Obadiah raised his hand and knocked.
A woman opened the door, and her eyes went wide with shock. “Who are you? What do you want?”
Obadiah started to speak but became dizzy and fell to the ground. Obadiah looked up at the woman with pleading eyes just before he passed out. “Help me. I need to find Logan.”
Coming Soon - Episode 2: The Zodiac Club