Eternal March

Several people scream, a child dies, and others watch in horror. One more soul has crossed over onto the dark plane that is Helana's lair. One more lost soul for the army of an immortal. I watch in both morbid fascination and repulsion. I've seen this happen a thousand times, across the eons of my existence. I am Belan, I serve my master Sheba. She is one of several other immortals that are collecting souls for an army that will march at the end times. My role is as a shepard. I guide souls towards service of my master. You could say that I am a recruiter of sorts.

I walk away from the house were I was to collect my next soul. Unfortunately, Densen was there first. He had working on this boy for a while, corrupting him to commit the acts he is now guilty of. I was hoping to stop the final act that would have sealed the child's fate. I guess I was too late. It's not to say I'm always so, but I'm only one being. I can't expect to be every where. To those who think I'm some kind of angel and my master is a benevolent force, they are mistaken. I have the blood of thousands on my hands and I have my own sins to answer to one of these days. I have been known to be the source of genocide on a horrific scale in the process of full filling my role.

As I walk away, the police are arriving on the scene. The don't even notice Densen as he walks away from the home smiling. They are too busy running into the front door as he walks out the back. We look at each other briefly as he disappears into the bushes behind the house. I start walking away myself. I have no interest in dealing with police tonight.

The cafe around the street is still open as I walk in and sit down at a table. As I look at the menu, a black woman walks in and sits down in the seat across from me. She has a college sweater on and looks to be about 23.

" What happened?" she says as she motions for the menu.
" He got there before me." I say as I hand over the menu.

"That's twice now. We need some fresh blood that's willing to get their hands dirty." she says calmly as she looks over the choices.

" They have their hooks in them by the time we act. Unfortunately, that means they know when to harvest them. This tactic failed before. Granted we need people who know their methods but I think we are going about this the wrong way."

" What do you suggest?"

" We need to find one that is like minded but we can get to first. We know what they prefer but we don't who they will pick. The last person who could provide us that information was killed when she crossed us."

"Their side is more tempting to those types." she says as she looks up.

As I was going to respond a waitress came over.

"Can I help you?" She says as she looks at us. If she only knew the college kid and the old man she was serving was talking about, she might have decided to not even bother us.

" I'll have a raspberry muffin and a green tea." Sheba says as she hands over the menu.

" Just a coffee for me, please." I say as I look her over.

"You sure you don't want a piece of humble pie? It's fresh." She says with a smirk as she takes the menu.

"What?" "Oh." It took me a moment but I recognized the handy work of Cal. Her movements were too precise and smooth to be human.

"What do you want?" Sheba said as she looked at the automation.

"Just a tip for the service." the waitress said as she turned and walked away.

"I don't care how many times I've seen his dolls, they still creep me out." I said as I watched it walk away.

"They have a way of doing that...", Sheba says as she watches the doll. She always envied Cal for his skill in bringing lumps of clay to life. It was once said that Cal could reanimate the dead but gave it up after they started thinking for themselves.

A few minutes later the waitress came back with the orders. I couldn't help but wonder how complete she really was.

"You like what you see?" Apparently I was looking at something other than the coffee cup she was presenting to me. Unfortunately it's been a few decades since I last knew a woman in the biblical sense.

"Not really.... you forgot the cream...." I took the cup and tried to look at something else.

She leaned over and whispered in my ear, "I can get that for you if you want...."

"thanks....but I'm fine." Sheba tried to not look amused as the waitress swished away. It's moments like that that remind me what it was like before I was immortal. I knew the warmth of a kiss and a soft bed quite well in those days. Now I sleep on the floor as if I knew of no other way to live.

Sheba munched on her muffin like a cat that caught a fresh mouse. I drinked my coffee in silence brooding over my embarrassment. I was later thankful for that moment of forgetting what happened earlier that night.

When we finished, we got down to business. Although all out war was many life times away, it didn't mean that skirmishes didn't break out from time to time. In this cold war, things do reach a boiling point.

" Theo's scouts tried to raid our warehouse again. This is the third time this week he tried to steal our supplies." Sheba's amused face was now replaced with a cold burning mask. Her calm face was highlighted by her fiery eyes.

"How many did he loose in the attempt?"

"All of them." She said with contempt. Sheba never believed in taking prisoners.

"There will be more. He has yet to recover after we killed most of his crop before they could be harvested. The plague was quite effective at that."

"'Several generations of selective breeding' my ass. " Sheba said with a smile. It was her idea to use rats as the carriers for the disease that later became to be known as the Black Plague.

"If he keeps using that Eurotrash there won't be anything left in the end." She motioned over the waitress.


to be continued.....