Welcome to the world of Edison City, where the never-ending battle against the forces of evil includes everything from the Owl Bandit taking over the subway line downtown to the Antichrist trying to rewrite history aboard the HMS Titanic. Anything and everything is a possibility here, including flying sharks. Especially the sharks.
If you’re new here, catch up with the Edison City Index:
Previously in the current serial, Life, Death, and H.O.P.E., we bid tragic farewell to longtime character Peter Hawkins, Special Agent of the D.E.R.P., after he was disintegrated by a blast from H.O.P.E. As a distraught Wyatt flees the scene, we move to somewhere else entirely to take stock of events…
There is a place in the vastness of all Creation, an alcove of sorts, tucked away in a corner where Space and Time don’t quite join up at exact angles, and if one stands there one can look down and see…Everything. Rumor is it makes for quite a view, although only the angels and a few others have been privileged to see it.
Constance stood there now, trying not to be impatient, which should have been easy as she was an angel. But Winifred usually met her here at a certain time, as much as Time meant anything in a location technically beyond its boundaries, and she was late. “And yes,” Constance said, “I know, lateness doesn’t mean anything when you’re beyond Time, I got it, can we just take that for granted and move on? Honestly.”
“Honestly what?” Winifred said, and Constance tried not to jump. “Apologies,” the Death Angel added somberly. “Something came up at the last minute. The duty, you know.”
“Yeah, about that,” Constance said. “Was your guy someone named Peter Hawkins?”
Winifred’s eyes narrowed. “No, although the initial alert I received said it should have been, which was odd, because-”
“These things don’t make mistakes, yeah, I know,” Constance replied, waving at her halo, which made a golden chime of appreciation. “Here’s the thing. Weird things have been happening in Edison City, you know? Captain Midnight’s off the board. Mal-Meddie and Candystriper were supposed to go legit a while back but they’re just now getting around to it, and only because a cherubim smited Professor Cthulhu for ‘em after someone threw a car through the window and I don’t even know who threw the car in the first place!”
“Smote,” Winifred, ever the mentor, said gently. ‘
“Sure, smote, yeah,” Constance said. “So, Midnight’s out, we got an unexplained flying car, what else? Oh, yeah. The Scarlet Shapeshifter got herself captured and I thought well hey now we can get redemption going on her maybe but no she escaped again and that’s not supposed to be possible unless she had outside help, but no one knows who, I mean, no one down there, anyway. Then you got this robot running around thinking it’s a person and now it’s disintegrated a guy and now his soul’s gone missing! I figure that’s a problem, yeah?”
“It is,” Winifred agreed. “I should probably consult with-”
“No need,” Constance interrupted, which normally she wouldn’t have done but she felt the urgency of the situation. “I went back to Records. Rechecked everything. Took a while, which doesn’t mean anything up here, oh sheesh now I’m doing it, but anyway. I found this.”
She tapped her halo. Golden rays of light sketched out an image in the dim light of the alcove.
Winifred was, for the first time in a really, really long while, actually surprised. “That isn’t possible.”
“Yeah, you’d think,” Constance said. “But there he is. My very own loathsome squid ex-boyfriend, Ben. Aka, the Antichrist. Should be locked in the deepest regions of Hell, but nooo, he’s out on the streets of Edison City. Stupid-” She muttered something in a low voice which Winifred decided not to hear.
“So you think your, er, Ben-”
“He’s not my Ben!” the angel snapped back hotly.
“Right,” Winifred said as tactfully as she could. “You think Ben is responsible for all the developments you mentioned?”
“He’s gotta be,” Constance said, staring out at the reach of Creation as if she suspected it of hiding Ben’s location from her. “So I want to find him, and smite his- can I say butt?”
Winifred sighed. “It’s not strictly angelic, but yes, you can say butt, I suppose.”
“Fine,” Constance snarled, drawing her sword. “I wanna smite his butt.”
She waved it about her head, and a crack of thunder echoed throughout Creation. A long, long distance away, Ben paused on the sidewalk and glanced up at the bright blue sky. He tried to smile jauntily, and didn’t quite manage it. “Okay,” he said to himself. “They’re on to you. That’s cool. You can still do this, pal, okay? Okay. Let’s go. Game on!”
Heartened, if only a little, Ben the once and would-be again Antichrist scurried off into the swirl and bustle of the city.