See my previous post for a communication to any who would join me in writing.  Meanwhile, a wee bit of this bullshit…

Blasfemia withdrew one knife from the pontiff’s chest, but left the other in his heart, a hand still on the grip.  The spasms of dying muscle sent a jolt of dark pleasure through her hand, the scarlet ribbons coursing down his chest thrilled her eyes.  His head rolled dramatically, with an air of finality stealing the gaze from her handiwork.  “No no no,” she said, “Stay with me, papi.  You need to feel this.”  She dropped the loose knife and slapped his cheek with her free hand, little smacks.  “Come onnn.  Know why this is happening.  Don’t forget her!”  The pontiff died abruptly, and his dead weight dragged itself free of Blasfemia’s blade, collapsing on the floor.  “Josefina!,” she yelled, and stabbed him again – perpendicular to the fatal wound, marking his corpse with an X.  She crouched over his body like an ardent lover.

The witnesses – the band of assassins – all bore different burdens within their hearts.  Zochino had spent his entire young adulthood in study of political philosophy and its history, and became as obsessed as the dreamers of old with the idea that a more perfect system must someday be born.  Cristina had come to see all the sanctimony of her pious homeworld as bars in a cage, had grown to see all priests and police as icons of her oppression – just so many targets.  Jorge was a scholar of the spirit world, who saw how The Church’s angels press-ganged innocent entities into their host, twisting embodiments of nature into foot soldiers of celestial fascism.  He felt their pain and sought their liberation.

Xihuani had only wanted the people of her world to live their own culture free from the foreign influence of The Church, but it all seemed so remote, as she stood drenched in cold sweat on an alien world.  They all beheld a savage murder, the culmination of a hatred divorced from all sense and ideal.  Xihuani, at least, could not feel her ideals anymore, not in the slightest.  They would return to her later in some quiet moment, if she survived the consequences of their terrorism.

None of the assassins had been truly prepared to see Blasfemia’s passion consummated like this, and it broke the energy of their movement.  Zochino had already been feeling the absurdity of their quest as they stole into the Tiemplo Santo Pietri.  Who wanted to kill the pontiff?  Who wanted The Church gone?  Just a few isolated radicals.  The main run of the people truly loved and trusted the institution.  Without popular support, any revolution was doomed to fail.  They were bringing the wrath of several worlds down upon themselves for no lasting benefit, just for a single moment to satiate their bloodlust, to feel like they could do something important.

He was the first to speak, an attempt to dispel the haze of war, to restore sense to his comrades.  “Blasfemia!  Put those things away!  We need to get the fuck out of here.”  Nominally the leader, he might have ordered Christina to restrain her, but Blasfemia’s knives were the claws of a bear enraged.  They would kill anyone in the hot moment.

Blasfemia paid no heed, rocking on the knives, barely resisting the drive the keep savaging the corpse.  Christina rapped the ground with the butt of her rifle, just out of reach, and whistled sharply.  “Crazy bitch.  Move it!”

A strange murmuring sound rose in the world around them.  Had it begun when the first knife entered the old priest’s heart, and only then grown loud enough to overcome the blood pounding in their ears?

“what is that,” Xihuani muttered, terror stealing her breath.

“The angels.  They’re crying,” said Jorge.

“Bullshit,” said Christina.  “They’re animals, like a bunch of flying fish.  They didn’t notice shit.”  She still readied her weapon.

Jorge shook his head.  “He was bound to the celestial hierarchy.  You know the Church wasn’t lying about that, right?  We took a linchpin out of a bridge.”

Zochino readied his rifle.  He hoped he would not have to kill them.  They had passed hundreds of them in the cathedral halls, clustered in slumber at the rafters, or lolling around the floors in mindless play.  They were alien things, but they did rather convincingly resemble winged human infants.  “Ximura,” he used Blasfemia’s birth name, “come with us.”  He hustled to the door, deftly skipping through the bodies of papal guards, and paused at the threshold.

Blasfemia cocked her head at the words.  Who was Ximura?  Two people ever used that name, two voices in her memory.  One whose memory made her spit.  One whose name had just been in her mouth, spoken in hatred.  Why would she ever say Josie’s name like that?  Sweat beaded around her dark eyes, and she finally freed herself from the corpse’s embrace, staggering.  “Josie?”

She looked at the blood-soaked knives in her hands, and they responded to her will, the blades shifting shapes, twirling to shake off the red, and dulling to soft curves.  They were never meant to be weapons – just adjustable farming tools.  She hadn’t engaged in agriculture for a hectic little eon.

Seeing the blades go dull, Xihuani picked up the courage to get close.  She even put a hand on the brute’s shoulder.  “Ximura, Josie isn’t here.  You just killed the pope.  We all need to hide, just hide away forever.  Right now, honey.”

Blasfemia flicked away sweat with long curling eyelashes, and her coal-black eyes burned again.  “Hey.  Hey I did what we wanted to do.  Where are you going?”  She called over Xihuani’s shoulder to Zochino, not shy about shouting.

Zochino grimaced in frustration.  “We need to go!”

“Where’s Josefina?,” she asked.

Xihuani said, “You know this.  She went to her abuela at the north pole.  Why are you asking?  Please… Snap out of it.”

Blasfemia sheathed her tools and went to Zochino.  “We’re going home, to Corazon.  How?”

“We’ll be lucky to get out of this building alive.  Are you ready to try?”

“We can do whatever we want, man.”

He shook off his annoyance, but was glad the squad was ready to move again.  “Maybe the mewling putti will distract the guards.  Pull up that habit.  We’ll cross the plaza to the stabling, steal a ride to the astropuerto–”

“It’s no good,” Jorge said.  “The Church’s astronaves are part of the Hierarchy too.  They won’t fly for us.”

Christina scoffed.  “They’re less than animals.  They don’t know shit.  We could ride them up God’s asshole and blow the Universe to Hell.”

“Could that be true?,” Xihuani asked, obviously ignoring Christina’s take.

Zochino’s sweat felt like ice water.  “Did you know that was possible before we came here, comrade?”

“I didn’t imagine.  I knew it would have an effect.  Maybe I hoped they’d all just lose their wings.”

Christina grabbed him by the scruff of his collar.  “We kinda need wings to fly the fuck out of here, Jorge.”

Zochino waved a hand to hush them, and in that moment the squalling of unnatural babies sounded like an industrial farm full of goats.  “Animals fly around with fleas all the time.  Christina’s right enough.  Everybody on me.”

Blasfemia felt the coagulating blood glue the sleeves to her arms, and rubbed them idly, disgusted, annoyed.  But she followed the squad, not knowing what else to do with herself in the moment.  They’d go home, she’d go north, and she’d find out where Josefina had gone to hide.  It was the only thing that made sense, with her rage finally spent.

They were a little flock of priests and nuns again, walking briskly in the temple halls, heads bowed, rifle-shaped parcels under their sleeves.  But one nun’s habit lay askew at her shoulders, curly hair hung heavy, sweat making serpents of it – a frame for a bestial face.  They marched past clots of putti, the winged babes thrashing on the tiles with eyes squeezed shut and mouths agape in tantrum.

A golden door opened at the end of the hall ahead, and priests rushed out, to make sense of the chaos.  On seeing their fellows of the cloth, they waved for their company.  Zochino let Jorge out in front – his seminary studies gave him the vocabulary to talk with these clerics.  He met their approach with palms down, eyes trying to meet theirs – draw attention away from the squad’s numerous suspicious details.

“Brothers, what has come to pass?”

The most senior of their number pushed up his glasses.  He was also taller than anyone present, with an eagle’s nose.  “This happened when Pope Sincerus VI died.  Be still.”

His head jerked back, charred brain sputtering into the air, and as his friends came to grasp the situation, they were already being gunned down with laser bolts.  It was Christina who had pulled the first trigger.

Zochino glanced down a hall in alarm.  “That way.  We gotta kill ’em all fast!  Go!”  They could leave no witnesses, if they wanted to reach the astropuerto in peace.  A general alarm would be the end of that.  The vision was taking shape in the young man’s mind.  Chase down one group of witnesses to slaughter them, behind them two groups, behind them a hundred, behind them the world bearing witness.  They had only gotten as far as they had because nobody in a thousand years imagined anyone would be foolish enough to strike at the pontiff.  The scheme had been foolish, and it was unraveling.

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