Jasmine
I opened my eyes in fright and I looked around. Taking in my surroundings. Remembering that Lilith had paralyzed us and made us pass out. Shawn and Nas were already up while Aaliyah and Omarion were starting to stir. We were all wearing white full-body jumpsuits complete with boots.
“How long have you two been up?” I asked.rubbing my head.
“Not long, two minutes,” Shawn said.
“Yeah, about the same. Shawn was already on his feet when I came too.” Nas went over to help Omarion up and Shawn helped Aaliyah. I looked at the entrance and noticed that another man was in there with us. The man from the alley. He was staring at us with hate. He was an older man about 60 years old. You couldn’t tell it by his hair, which was still long, brown, and rich. He stood up as soon as Aaliyah was on her feet.
“I can’t believe she put me in here with you,” he said.
I was a little tired of this man and he was pushing my patience. When we helped him last night he was belligerent. Telling Omarion and me that he didn’t want our help, not from our kind. Racism in 2019 still exists. Now that I knew he was an angel I thought it was because we were humans. Regardless his bigotry bothered me. If he was, in fact, an angel, shouldn’t he be more benevolent?
“Will you stop yelling at us!” I said louder than my usual tone. He stopped to look at me and then at the guys. “
“So, she must be the one in charge, huh? Figures.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Aaliyah retorted, which was unlike her. She wasn’t confrontational. I guess the stress must be getting to her. She was tough but looked to others to take care of her. I didn’t understand it myself, but she was loyal and she was one of the few that came with me here. She didn’t know how strong she was. Before I leave, I will help her learn that she is stronger than she gave herself credit for. All I wanted was to make sure she and the rest of my friends were ready for the next phase.
“It means a woman place, isn’t here, but I forget you humans are more equal these days.”
“Why did we help him again?” Aaliyah looked at me.
“Help me? Some help, we are now trapped with her.” The angel said. “With Lilith. Now we’re all dead.”
I was still having a hard time believing we fought demons and that Lilith and this guy were angels. The only thing that was bothering me, was that if they were angels, why was he beaten by the demons. Why can’t he fight back against Lillith and where was his help. God and the other angels should know he was here. Unless this was some kind of test. I wanted to ask him these questions, but I doubt he would answer them. For now, I have to assume that he is like us. I didn’t believe we were Nephilims, I believed that God gave us what we needed when we needed it.
“You sound like you know her,” Shawn said his voice was soft and gazing at the angel. He wore the same clothes as us and seemed to feel uncomfortable.
“I do. You see, she is a fallen angel. One who has evaded capture for some time.”
“How is that possible, why wouldn’t other angels be able to find her or you?” Omarion ask.
He looked at us with an inquisitive stare, shook his head, and spoke with an almost sad tone. “You don’t know? You have no idea what you are, do you?”
“Lilith said we were Nephilim,” I said.
“Artificial Nephilims, but that doesn’t make sense either. My family has pictures of me actually being born.” Nas said.
“Only the Lord can see everything. Not angels. We go where he tells us. Like humans, we have the freedom to make decisions. We have more drastic consequences. It’s one of the reasons why most angels fall, because of their jealousy of humans. The Lord forgive humans multiple times, but the moment angels go against him. We get kicked out.”
“So, this Lilith isn’t the one from Jewish manuscripts?” I didn’t know that Nas knew about that. I guess the surprise showed on my face because he laughed. “Yeah, I pay attention in my intro to religion class.”
“Yes, she is. She is,” he paused. “Confused. When she was cast out she thought that she was Adam’s first love and that Eve had replaced her. A few angels had to guard both Adam and Eve, at least until their expulsion from the Garden of Eden.” He went on to explain how angels and fallen angels are no different from mortals. Except that God created them from energy and humans earth. Those humans could use miracles and gave us examples of Moses.
“How do we know we can believe you?” Aaliyah asked. “I mean I know everything is happening, but how do we know for sure?”
“You do, that’s why you are freaking out. Now that you know we exist, you know heaven exists, and now you are afraid. Don’t worry, as I said before, you humans have more favor with him.”
I couldn’t take his bigotry anymore and besides, we needed to prepare for Lilith’s return. We had to escape, I knew this was a test and that we can get through it with faith. I had to trust my faith in God and they would have to trust me.
“I’m surprised that you are still an angel,” I said. “We can hear the hate in your words.”
“Hate? No. Still an angel? No, again. I’m a fallen angel, but I still fight for God because I’m hoping he will forgive angels like humans. Like I told you last night, I was looking for a woman who went missing. I promised the family I would return her and when I thought I found her the demons attacked me.”
“So, why should we trust you?”
“Because even with fallen angels, there is a spectrum of good and evil. We were cast out for sin, but not every fallen angel is evil. Most of these misguided angels are still trying to get back into Heaven. Others want to destroy Heaven and Hell. Lillith is one of the evil ones. Even when I was still an angel, she would trap other angels and killed them. Rumors were that she was experimenting. She remains at large trying to build an army to face off against God.”
“So, she’s a female Satan?” Nas retorted. “Great, the cute ones always are the crazy ones.”
“What does she want from us though? She said it herself. We aren’t angels.” I asked.
“Nephilims were chaotic. That’s one of the reasons for the great flood. God didn’t want the angels and men together. In those times they were a group of angels, a Host, that thought to disobey God. They called themselves, “The sons of God.”
“From Genesis Chapter 6,” Omarion said. “The sons of God went saw the women of men.”
“And they produced the heroes of those ages. Nephilims.” I finished.
“Not word for word, but yes. The Sons of God went and had sex, even married these mortal women. Their offspring, Nephilims were strong, but also wicked.”
“Which lead to Noah’s ark,” I said.
“To get rid of wickedness,” Omarion said.
“The flood.” The angel said. “That’s when God kicked out the Sons of Man. That’s when he kicked out Lillith. For when she couldn’t have Adam, she went after his generations. She continued to sleep with human men until the flood. Until her own children, killed in the flood, being half-human. God banished Lillith and in her exile, she theorized that God was afraid of Nephilims. That the Nephilims may hold the key to defeating God. Others believed that as well. Since then, angels hunt down Nephilims and demons. We didn’t ask why. That would be expulsion.”
“So, these fallen angels believe that theory even more. So, she considers us artificial because somehow we have these angel-like abilities.” The man looked at me and nodded. He then looked at the doors.
“Intelligence reports come in of her kidnapping Nephilim for herself. She even has taken angels and humans. We assume she is making her own Nephilim army. For her not to notice you as Nephilim, means you were not born as Nephilim. Somehow, you did acquire them, but you are all human. I couldn’t tell until you were using your abilities. In fact, it almost seems as if an angel is possessing you. If that were the case, your personalities would have changed though. You are, indeed, rare. I’m sorry you are all in this, I’m sorry you tried to save me and became collateral damage.”
Collateral damage. Those two words hit me. That’s what we were. He was their intended target and I made my friends come along. I led them to this. No one rejected my actions, not in front of me anyway. They followed me because of respect. Now, I’m sure my decisions did upset some of them. Aaliyah and Nas are in that category. Shawn is mad about not protecting us, he had his own code of conduct that way. Omarion is most likely scared. In the end, I hope they know we did the right thing. We saved an angel after all, from demons. I don’t regret that decision. We will figure out how to escape, we need a plan. I need a plan. Yes, we were collateral damage, but we weren’t finished.
“We have to escape.”
“Jasmine, we agree, but we still don’t know what we will face outside those doors,” Shawn responded.
“More prisoners.” The man said. “Guards too, fallen angels, humans, Nephilim. I’ve seen them on my way here.”
“Why did she put you in here with us? Because we save you?”
“No to teach you how to use powers.” He looked at Omarion. “She said you figured out how to do it. Is that true?”
“I did. I had to hold on to a memory.”
“I see. Halos don’t work on memory. It’s all muscle memory and faith. I will train you because if we are to escape, we’re going to need you to know your powers. All of your powers.” He looked at me.
