The door opened noisily and I cringed at the noise along with the sound of my echoing boot heels on the wood floor. Only a few of the thirty odd people gathered looked up from the silence of their prayers to see who had come in the door though.
Nathan quickly made his way down the aisle and stepped in to sit down by a sweet looking girl, who greeted Nathan with a smile. They made a cute couple.
Looking from the innocent infatuation of the young couple with each other I made a prayer on the spot that whatever happened in the coming struggle that these two would be together in the end and survive whatever happened.
I caught the Pastor, whose name was Lonigan, motioning to me from the front of the church. Inwardly I cringed. Longingly I looked at the last row of pews in the church before making my way to the front hat in hand.
Pastor Lonigan stepped in close to whisper, “I’m not trying to embarrass you, but as a man of leadership in the community you need to be up here.”
I looked at him in wonderment. A position of leadership in the community? Yeah right, only he wasn’t joking.
Awkwardly I sat down on the first pew of the church and the Pastor sat down beside me and in a whisper asked, “What did you find?”
I stared at the hardwood floor for a moment. How to answer the man?
“Do you know what the indians refer to as a white hair?”
The Pastor’s face tightened and he nodded.
“Well then could you explain it to me, because I don’t know what I’m dealing with?”
The Pastor nodded in understanding and I went on, “I keep getting visited by the personage of an old indian, which I think…… I know, is an angel. I don’t know why all this is happening or how I got dragged into it, but I am!”
The Pastor looked from his folded hands to me and asked softly, “Do you regret being involved by God in this war?”
What kind of a question was that?
The more I thought about it though the less I could come up to argue against my new spiritual awakening. Finally I just shook my head no and went back to staring at the floor.
“Let’s pray Taran.”
“You still haven’t answered my questions.”
Sighing he said, “I know as much as you do, which is next to nothing in terms of these white hairs, but in prayer perhaps God will reveal more to us. They are evil that much I know. I also know that our best hope for victory lies in our faith. Pray Taran.”
“I’m not much good at this praying stuff.”
“That’s fine. The Lord loves a humble attitude.”
The Pastor seemed to close off from me then and I was left alone on the bench for the most part. I stared at my hands as the whispered prayers of those gathered in the room helped create a complex atmosphere of mood that was hard to explain.
I began going over in my mind everything that had happened of late, only I made note to thank God for my deliverances, my second chance, and the courage to take it. I started to find myself praying for almost everything, even things unconnected with the situation at hand.
I began to feel sleepy, but then it all evened out somehow. I wasn’t in the church anymore, but yet somehow I was. It didn’t make any sense as nothing of the church was around me and yet I knew what I knew.
I walked forward into what I knew had to be a dream of some kind. Whether past, present, or future I did not know. “What’s going on God?” I inquired.
“Look and see.”
I looked again and there was nothing. Literally nothing!
The land before me, the Earth, literally everything was gone.
“God?” I quivered out in great fear.
“Watch what I did with nothing.”
I saw it all transpire as a fast-moving blur of realization after realization. The heavens and earth were made and sights strange to me and yet similar in some ways passed by with blinding speed. It was as if I was a spectator over countless eons of time and change that had transpired upon the planet that had been created from nothing.
Then the pictures that I was looking at became marred by war, death, and violence beyond any comparison I could offer. I shivered within the framework of my mind at the terribleness of the once glorious creation now being destroyed before me.
“I can’t bear to see any more!”
“Watch!”
I did and I watched the world as it had once been destroyed beyond seemingly any repair. My view shifted until I stood as if in the air above the planet from a great distance away.
Earth, if that was what it was and yet I knew it to be, was before me. The planet was cold and lifeless. All the light was gone from it and the surface was barren ice for as far as could be seen. It was a forbidding landscape of hopelessness.
I looked and looked but could not place what I saw within the framework of what I knew of Biblical history. A warm wave coursed by me and pierced through the darkness surrounding the planet and seemed to hover over the surface of the ice.
Ice began to crack up and where extreme cold had been before warmth began to rise as steam that seemed to wipe away the ash of the world’s former destruction. I then watched six literal days of creation play out before me and then as if in a blink of time I saw the passage of several thousand years pass by as if but a few seconds had gone by.
In the brief time after the planet’s rebirth I saw the same elements that had destroyed it over eons of time still present within the new creation as if hovering on the edges of a herd of bison waiting for the herd to sicken before moving in for the kill. In that brief moment it was as clear to me that they intended to do no less than what they had done before.
As if to back up that thought I heard, “As it is written, ‘The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.’”
The creatures I saw, no matter their origins, were now morphed forever into the form of being destroyers of worlds.
My view expanded past the Earth and I saw the devastation of both ages past and those quite recent almost everywhere within the greater created cosmos. The sight of it all sickened me. Destruction was being carried out on a daily basis almost everywhere!
“There is an end, but yet for now time remains. My Spirit is yet upon the waters and I have not withdrawn My Divine favor from mankind, whom I created in Mine own image. My order to My creation of man remains. Be fruitful and have dominion.”
I was suddenly back in the world I knew looking out over the desert towards dark. Before my eyes the wind blew up a maelstrom of sand into the air which then abruptly took flame and burned as if oil caught on fire. The swirl of flame seemed to call to me, but in hesitation against the heat of its brilliance I drew back and suddenly I was falling.
*****
With a start I reared up. Gasping for air I looked about the darkened church in fright.
“Easy! Easy! It’s all right!”
I looked to the Pastor kneeling beside me on the floor to then stare about the darkened church.
“I don’t understand! How long was I out?”
“About eight hours. What did you see Taran?” The Pastor asked, with keen interest.
I clutched at my head with both hands. What had I not seen?
Looking to him I said, “Some of what I saw I understood, so much of what I saw at first I have no comprehension of.”
“What did you see?” The Pastor asked patiently.
“At first a period of time that seemed without end. The Earth and its surface was all different. Creation as you and I know it was different. It took time, but eventually it all became destroyed. The planet was left cold and dark. It seemed to be covered in ice. Much how you read in Genesis I then saw the days of creation unfold over six literal days. From there I could comprehend what was going on, but the time before? Is such an expanse of time even possible? I thought we were the only thing God created.”
The Pastor shook his head and leaned over to snare a Bible off of a pew. Turning it he showed me the binding and said, “The Bible wasn’t first written in English. This is but a translation off the original scrolls written in ancient Hebrew and there are quite a few flaws with the translation. Most notably in the first few verses of the Bible. For years I believed that the creation of the Earth occurred in the six days of creation, but looking further I discovered a translation error. Here I’ll read it to you in the English first and then I’ll read how the verses should’ve been properly translated. “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”
Pastor Lonigan looked up to me and said, “The most notable translation issue is with the word, ‘was’. It should have been translated as the word, “became” from the ancient Hebrew and perhaps a better way of expressing the meaning of the Hebrew then saying, ‘without form and void’ would be to say, ‘ruin and uninhabitable’. Instead of “moving” in verse two the correct translation from Hebrew is ‘vibrate’. Here’s what the first two verses should read as, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth became a ruin, and uninhabitable; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God vibrated upon the face of the waters.” Tell me Taran did you see the ice covering the planet broken up?”
“Yes I did!”
“Well that explains that part of the mystery to me now. I always wondered what ‘vibrating’ could have to do with the Spirit of God. Now I see. It seems hard to fathom, but it’s rather simply laid out that there was an indeterminate period of time between the first two verses of Genesis and then verse three where God actively starts the re-creation of His earlier creation, by making a great light, and a separation of light from darkness, which at the completion of He said was the end of Day 1. It seems rather clear that the creation of the heavens and earth in verses one and two are separate from verse three and yet many do not see that distinction, but choose to loop the first two verses in with verse three and claim that it all transpired on Day 1, in spite of the fact that God specifically outlines exactly what transpired on Day 1. I think it interestingly collaborative that God’s first action of recreation in verses 3-5 was to create a great light and thus the creation of heat by which a frozen planet could begin to be thawed out by. Well what do you think Taran?
I stared at him astonished at the possibilities, “So you think the great expanse of time I saw could’ve happened?”
“Yes, I believe so. Indeed I believe you have been gifted with a great insight, but tell me how what you saw is of help to us now?”
“I saw them, the white hairs and many others. I saw what they were before and how they came to be. They are old and their hatred for us is real. They have no hope and they hate us for the redemption we have in God’s Son. They would’ve killed us long ago, but the Spirit of God has been holding them back. They are far more advanced than us.”
“Then how do we fight them?”
I looked him in the eye, “I didn’t say they were stronger than us.”
Just then I heard a peel of laughter drift into the church off the evening breeze. I glanced from the open windows of the church to the Pastor and mentally sized him up.
I felt different somehow now and going on the faith inspired in me by all I had seen I said, “Last night this church, indeed your whole congregation of believers was spiritually attacked. Are you ready to defend the faith and claim victory?”
“I am!” The older man said thumping his Bible to his knee.
Smiling I got to my feet and extending a hand to the Pastor I said, “Well come on preacher man I know where a monster of old exists in the flesh.”
He looked at me oddly, but took my hand. Pulling him up I headed for the door with him close behind.
Twilight was passing by and the evening of the day, when life seemed to settle down was upon us, but tonight I felt alive with the challenge of what I felt to be my new commission in life. Whether I died or lived I didn’t much care, because for the first time in years I had the joy of feeling completely alive.
My God had brought me this new life and to Him I would dedicate what remained of it.
Edgar and his lady love of the night before were together just outside the café. I tipped my hat to both, but didn’t stop.
Angus was putting his ‘Closed’ sign in place and I stopped to tap him on the shoulder and say, “Come along Brother Angus. I have need of you.”
Angus blinked, but didn’t hesitate to drop in alongside of the Pastor and follow along behind as I continued on down the boardwalk.
Thaddeus stepped into my path with his usual overbearing manner. There was a queer anxiety to be seen in his beady eyes as he said, “I heard you got religion Marshal.”
“Get out of my way!” I said testily.
“Now Marshal don’t be going and doing something you might be regretting later. I for one don’t think it’s a good thing to be mixing too much religion with a position of governance and all. Now maybe we should just simmer down and……”
Angus cut in hotly, “What are you blathering about man?”
“He’s just doing as he’s been trained Angus. Thaddeus, the towns under new management and if you can’t change then I think it’s time for you to be moving on.” I said point blankly into his face.
Belligerently Thaddeus drew himself up to say, “Who do you think you are to threaten me? I hired you and I can fire you!”
“Well since I’m fired there’s nothing to be said about me doing this!” I said, as I slugged him in the gut.
He pitched over gasping and I straightened him back up with a roundhouse right that had his eyes doing strange things. He started to fall, but grasping ahold of his collar I drug him along behind me as I made my way towards the dance hall saloon.
Reaching the double doors I busted through them with a quite sizable party of townspeople in tow. The eyes of everyone in the place were on us.
With gasps of exclamation saloon girls cleared out of the way and shot glasses of whiskey toppled off their trays to crack onto the floor loudly. Men forgot their poker chips and drawn hands of cards as they tumbled out of their chairs and to their feet in sudden fear of incarceration for past misdeeds.
In general a state of alarm gripped the saloon and everyone in it except for the woman in red, who stared at me with cold disdain.
Coolly measured words flowed smoothly off her lips, “Look what the tomcat drug in. My my Marshal come to raid us already? I already offered you more than any man in your pathetic position could ever hope to achieve for himself.”
She could talk a good case all she wanted, but I was through with formalities. Shoving Thaddeus onto a nearby poker table I took my hand and wiped it across his broken nose and then smoothly I spun to drag my bloodied hand down the side of the saloon mistress’s face.
“Take that Princess of words and be damned!”
She’d drawn back from my touch, but not quickly enough. Wisely I stepped back, as I watched her torment begin. The dying indian in the desert had been right.
The blood on her cheek was a red stain of crimson against the white of her skin, but her skin was changing. The struggle in her eyes was disgusting to behold as with increasing euphoria she tried to gaze at the blood on her face out of eyes that were suddenly very much not human.
A forked tongue sprang out to swab at the blood on her now scaly cheek and with gasps of horror everyone in the place drew back in fright. Everyone that is except for me and the two men that I’d asked to come along. Both stood behind me with hands on my back as they fell into deep prayer.
With the blood gone the creature of green scales, cat eyes, and a forked tongue slid out of the booth. The size of the creature increased and the red dress fell off from her in shreds.
The look in its eyes was insane hatred that was centuries in the making for the likes of me and my kind. Feeling the directed anger of the skin walker at me I responded out of the anger that I felt, “I’ve seen much. Enough to know that your kind and the kind that killed that poor boy and his people are at enmity with each other. At least most of the time. Then there are those times that you unite around a common cause. A sincere man of faith along with a faithful following of believers in the one true God constitutes such a threat, because their access to power is far greater than your own. You run the town, but the Pastor was too much for you so you brought in outside help. The white hairs performed the sacrifice, but you were the one who ate the boy’s heart and drank his blood. Unfortunately for you your enemy of old brought in outside help too. I’m not letting you leave this place alive!”
“You pathetic man! I will feast on your impudence!” The reptilian creature roared out at me.
I drew my gun, but its long tail whipped out and wrapped around my wrist and tugged me forward toward the recently elongated jaw full of teeth. Hiking my knee up I pulled the boot knife free and jammed it through the thick scales of the tail gripping my arm and the reptilian screamed.
The hold of the tail released and whipped away with my knife still embedded. As the reptilian grasped at the knife still lodged in its tail I spun close and punched straight into her throat.
Her reptilian eyes pulsed with fear and I ripped the small bladed knife in my fist to the side and severed her throat wide open. The creature fell forward gagging, as I stepped to the side.
Stooping down I picked up my gun from where it had fallen and coolly emptied all six shots into the back of the reptilian’s head and the body that had already begun to regenerate new tissue to repair what I had severed. The six shots were too much though and it slumped out to lay immobile upon the floor.
Leaning back against the corner of a table I thumbed new shells into my gun idly as the room watched on in paralyzed shock. My voice carried well throughout the room as I said, “I know how strange this must all seem to you. Truly I do, but the fact remains that now faced with the reality of what you now know what are you going to do? As I see it you have three options. You can leave this town as fast as possible and take up a life elsewhere and pretend this never happened, but you would only be deluding yourself though because the darkness you see before you exists everywhere and one can never run from the darkness of one’s own soul. The second option would be to stay here and pretend that nothing is different. That false utopia will soon be impossible to play along with, because all hell is about to break loose. That ladies and gentlemen leaves us with option three. Option three sees you all heading over to the church to plead for the redemption of your immortal souls. Whether you leave or stay in town after that I don’t care. Take my words to heart friends and get right with your Maker or………” I kicked the green pile of scales before me and continued, “or you could be spending eternity with the likes of these monsters.”
People flocked for the double doors like a parched herd of cattle stampeding for water.
Angus and Pastor Lonigan both wore huge grins, as they turned to shepherd the bunch on over to the church, which had likely never been filled to such capacity before. Before I knew it I was alone within the bar that had been the setting for many a man’s fall from grace.
Going to the bar I picked up a bottle of whiskey. I stared at it for a moment in contemplation.
Never again! Turning I smashed it into the bar. The amber liquid spilled out everywhere and I walked for the double doors as I left the stains of the past behind.
I had a strong temptation to set fire to the place, but it would accomplish nothing other than to likely catch the whole town on fire. The choice to not frequent such places and the delights they offered came from within rather from the physical absence of such places.
Where there’s a will there’s often a way of accomplishing it. The same is true whether people are rebelling or doing that which is right.
I walked out the double doors and saw that most everybody was at the church. It had to be standing room only in there. Behold the power of prayer. Nodding I walked down the boardwalk my boot heels echoing with the noise of my passage.
The war wasn’t over by far, but a victory had been attained. Now that victory would need to be pushed beyond the borders of the town.
How to achieve that I wasn’t sure, but I prayed that it would even be so. In pride I walked down the street of my town.