Part 769: Heaven’s First Battle

January 29th, 2021. Heaven, inside the Archangel’s Assembly Chambers.

None of the angels, Titans, or Lazarites outside knew it, but a momentous and historic meeting was taking place during the hours of preparation before dawn, the same day as the demons were planning a bloody invasion and assault into Heaven’s borders.

The four living Archangels had accosted Catherine, intending to imprison her for betraying Heaven, only for a human woman to somehow suddenly appear in their midst, calling herself a Lowborn, but also a representative of the Trueborns, authorized to speak on their behalf.

Her name was Jessica Harper, and while she was actually a ‘mere’ split soul belonging to Jason Hiro, nobody in the chambers knew the truth of the matter except for Catherine, who only suspected the truth.

Catherine shakily stood up and stood behind the Archangels, staring intently as they strode over and sat at the table across from Jessica Harper. Seeing the cups of tea that had magically appeared, as well as the table itself, the Archangels were examining her with great interest.

"The Great Builder." Raphael repeated, as he took a sip from the cup. The tea could potentially be poisoned, even to the extent of affecting his physique, but he wasn’t too worried. The fact Jessica had declared that Catherine had saved her life almost certainly meant she was not hostile to the Archangels’ interests and would not stoop to such a level as poisoning them. "If thou art so ‘great’, then why hath thy title yet to reach my ears?"

"I didn’t pick my title." Jessica said. "It was chosen for me by those who saw my powers in action."

Raphael nodded. "Thou stateth that the Daughter of Heaven saved thy life. Under what circumstances did this happen?"

Behind the Archangels, Catherine felt a cold, icy sensation wash over her skin. She knew she’d never met ‘Jessica’ in her life. Anything Jessica would say was surely a lie. How could she hope to fool the wisest Archangel alive?

"I was at Catherine’s Monastery." Jessica said. "I was sent there by the Trueborn, Cat Mask, to prepare for the demon attack we knew was coming, but the attack came too swiftly and caught me by surprise. Right when the demons were about to kill me, the Daughter of Heaven swooped down and killed my assailant. She was attacked by Emperor Lucifer, and I managed to pull us both out of there."

"Thou possesseth the ability to flee from Lucifer, yet thou were helpless against lesser demons?" Raphael asked, his sharp eyes poking holes in Jessica’s story.

"That’s right." Jessica said, not even flinching under Raphael’s questioning. "Well, ‘helpless’ is a strong word. Given enough time to prepare, I can adapt to most situations. But a sneak attack is a sneak attack, and my abilities were not much help when the Battle Brothers arrived to capture me. Even Cat Mask had no idea they were coming, or if he did, he didn’t tell me."

Camael leaned forward, opting to speak before Raphael could. "This individual, Cat Mask, verily we hath heard his name of late, but we know not who he is. Coulds’t thou describe him?"

"He used to keep his abilities a secret, but I guess he decided to experiment recently, try something new." Jessica said, the slightest hint of annoyance in her voice. "Maybe it’s a form of psychological warfare designed to mess with the minds of the demons. Anyway, you’ll hear about him sooner or later, so I don’t mind telling you now."

She paused for a moment.

"Cat Mask is a temporal manipulator. He possesses the ability to rewind and alter time as he pleases, and in doing so, he has rewound time millions, billions, maybe even trillions of times. Nobody knows how many years he’s spent reliving the next 70 or so years on Earth, perhaps not even him. Apparently, he made a big change in the current ‘causal loop’ we’re experiencing now, which has caused the rapid emergence of Lowborn Heroes, and he also imbued his own son with the power of a Trueborn Hero."

"What?" Raphael gasped. "A second Trueborn? Dost thou speaketh the truth?"

"Since the demons have already learned of his abilities, it won’t hurt if I tell you… but I don’t know all the details." Jessica said with a sigh. "He’s known as the Archseer, and his power is called Dream Eating. He can devour the dreams of other entities to learn of their plans and to empower himself. He took the knowledge of an unknown demon and became a master of hand-to-hand combat at only age eighteen, for instance. He has been combining his power with his father’s, and in this way, the two of them have quickly built a huge intelligence network."

Raphael slowly nodded. He digested Jessica’s words with great caution, thinking about the implications and pondering how they would affect his own plans.

"Despite being a man who knows the future, Cat Mask did not foresee thy attack at the Monastery?" Camael questioned. "This point is far too suspicious. Are we to believe he was so careless with a valuable asset?"

"Nay." Raphael said quietly. "Tis beyond reason. It seems ‘Cat Mask’ has designs on Heaven, for he arranged the meeting between the ‘Great Builder’ and the Daughter of Heaven."

"I may be part of the Trueborn’s inner circle, but there are plenty of things they don’t tell me." Jessica said. "I also believe the Trueborns planned for me to be there, but they did not tell me the demons would attack early, so I truly thought I was going to die. When Catherine saved my life, I was grateful to her, and I asked her how my powers could help. Thus, after some effort, I came to the conclusion that empowering her with a superior Mind Realm would be the best way to repay her."

Raphael glanced back at Catherine. He didn’t say anything, but she could see that there was a question in his eyes. As if confirming something to himself just by seeing the look on her face, he returned his gaze back to Jessica and nodded to himself. Neither woman knew what the old fox was thinking.

"Well. Thou art here, and it seems thou intendeth to protect Catherine. I appreciate those who value friendship." Raphael said solemnly. "Thou hath told me a bit about the two Trueborn, but what about thyself? What sort of woman art thou? What powers dost thou commandeth?"

"My powers…" Jessica said, her tone slightly hesitant, "…are quite formidable. I am not the only Lowborn of this generation with abilities beyond those of our predecessors, but admittedly, mine could be considered a tier above the rest. For example…"

She motioned with her hands, causing a thin metal rectangle to appear on the table between herself and the Archangels. Immediately, all their eyes locked onto the strange object.

"This is…?" Uzziel asked.

Jessica didn’t immediately answer. Instead, she reached over and poked her thumbs into the side of the rectangle, then lifted what turned out to be a ‘lid’ of some sort.

The lid flipped up to reveal… something. None of the Archangels knew what they were even looking at. There was a glossy flat spot recessed inside the flipped-up lid, and a bunch of letters, numbers, and symbols arrayed inside the bottom part.

"This is a laptop computer." Jessica explained. "Do any of you recognize it?"

The Archangels slowly shook their heads. Even Raphael, who had definitely seen computers at a few points in the last 50 years, wasn’t up to date on them. For him, 50 years was like the blink of an eye. He simply couldn’t keep up with human technological advancements, and he also didn’t interact much with the newest Lazarites who would know.

"Computers can do all sorts of things." Jessica said, before directing her eyes in Camael’s direction. "They’re similar to your sentient artifacts, like Excalibur. Internal circuitry, not dissimilar to the internal magical matrices used to create your most powerful artifacts."

"Thou art familiar… with my work?" Camael asked in confusion.

"I’ve had a chance to look at Jepthath’s staff, as well as Arthur’s sword. I’m not too familiar with their internals, but I know they’re complex enough to be fairly similar to human technology. At least in the broadest of strokes… naturally the minutiae will differ."

Camael was enlightened. "Art we to understand thy abilities are similar to mine, in thy own human way?"

"Yes. That’s basically correct. My internal mana storage is quite limited, but I was able to increase it by building bigger and bigger mana batteries inside a secret location, which I have connected to my soul remotely, and some other stuff that you and I might be able to talk about if we have time later. But that time is not now, as the demons will attack soon and I cannot stay here long."

Raphael looked back and forth from his sister to the Lowborn Hero. He could tell that Camael’s interest had been piqued, as her blacksmithing identity meant more to her than any other part of her personality. Camael was practically a slave to her creative thirst, and she would shut herself off from the world for decades at a time while working on a new artifact, often using her seer powers to portend the future and make weapons suited for future Heroes, Titans, and Angels alike.

Raphael frowned, ever so slightly. It was important that Camael remain in Heaven, never getting too excited by whatever nonsense the humans and other lesser species were working on. A few notable blacksmiths had appeared across human history, but none of them had ever forged artifacts at Camael’s level, so to her they were little more than juniors with middling potential. Since they all died of old age in a hundred years or less, she barely had time to notice them before their flames flickered out like candles in the wind.

But Jessica appeared quite young. If she was already forging artifacts capable of catching Camael’s eye, she might have several good decades to draw the Archangel’s eyes away from Heaven. This was not something Raphael wished to see.

"Fascinating indeed." Raphael said, taking care to switch topics and not linger too long on Jessica’s previous words. "But we have not yet discussed the fact that thou hath granted a formidable boon to Catherine while surreptitiously asking her to hide thy handiwork. What art thy intentions, young one? Why doth thou sneaketh behind our backs in such a snake-like manner?"

"I didn’t anticipate you’d be able to see through Catherine’s Mind Realm so quickly." Jessica said, not bothering to deny his accusation. "I’m not out here trying to advertise my capabilities, you know. They will become known sooner rather than later, but the longer I can keep them under wraps, and the fewer who know of my abilities, the stronger a foundation I can build."

Gabriel tilted his head. "Foundation? What is thy meaning?"

"I am the Great Builder. I build things." Jessica said simply. "I haven’t even begun to build at my highest possible level. I might soon craft weapons capable of rendering the demons helpless. I could elevate humanity to a tremendously mightier level in the coming years, allowing us to stand as a bulwark against the greater Threats inside and outside the galaxy."

Raphael’s eyes flashed. "What Threats dost thou speak of? What dost thou know of Threats outside the galaxy?"

Jessica crossed her arms and directed a pointed glare at Raphael. "You know exactly what I’m talking about."

Raphael and Jessica’s eyes met. Sparks seemingly flew between them as she easily matched his glare with one of her own. Raphael’s heart skipped a beat. He could tell the young woman was not bluffing. But how did she know? When did humanity acquire knowledge of the Threats outside their own small world?

Surprisingly, it wasn’t Raphael who spoke next, but Camael. "Thou speaketh of the Akashic Barrier?"

"That’s right." Jessica said, slyly smiling as she jerked her eyes over to the old woman. "We have at least 100,000 more years before the Akashic Barrier falls. That’s plenty of time for humanity to create contingency plans. The angels too, if you’re interested. Maybe the Titans, the Demons, and the other species as well. All this infighting on one little world is only making our future situation worse."

By this point, Raphael’s heart had jumped five or six times. His skin turned cold as he listened to the woman before him speaking. How in the god-damn did she know about the Akashic Barrier? Raphael had always been careful to keep knowledge of it limited to the highest ranking Titans, and the Archangels. He knew for a fact such information had not leaked to the demons yet, and the humans had barely even managed to step foot off-planet, only exploring their local moon and other worlds with probes and such.

How did the humans know? When did they learn of such matters?!

Jessica smiled sweetly at Raphael, but her eyes were filled with mockery. It made Raphael realize, or at least think of the possibility, that there was a mole in Heaven. Had one of the Lazarites chanced upon this information and passed it to the humans?

That line of thinking made him consider that Catherine had betrayed Heaven, but just as quickly as the possibility arrived, he cast it aside. Catherine was a formidable Lazarite, but matters relating to the Cosmic Scale were above her station. Neither Raphael nor the other Archangels would discuss the Akashic Barrier with her. She was not entitled to such information.

But if Catherine had not betrayed Heaven, then how had the humans learned of this information?!

It truly confounded him. The simple and plain-looking woman before him suddenly seemed wrapped in mystery, larger than life. Was she truly only a Lowborn?

At this moment, Raphael had a revelation.

"The Trueborn…" Raphael muttered. "Thou stated before that Cat Mask was… a time traveler?"

"Oh yes, he’s seen many different versions of future events play out." Jessica said. "I’m sure you’re wondering how we know about the matters of Akasha? I don’t actually know how he came by the information, but perhaps you and him became best friends in another life, and you let the matter slip? It’s hard to say."

Raphael paled. Was it possible? Was he the one who had casually tossed such sensitive information to this lowly, primitive species? It wasn’t as if there were Akashic Laws against doing such a thing, but knowledge was power, and simply blabbering about these things was giving up future leverage for free! It was a deeply unwise move!

What Raphael did not know was that at that very moment, Jessica, AKA Jason, was dealing with a headache of his own. He didn’t really want to be informing Raphael that his father was a time traveler. In fact, Jason didn’t want anyone to know, especially not the angels and demons!

But his goddamned dad had gone and yapped about his powers to Ose, of all demons. Ose! The most manipulative, evil piece of shit Jason could imagine! Now that she knew, the other Emperors knew, and before long word would get around to the angels, including Raphael.

Thus, Jason was forced to reveal knowledge of his father’s powers to one of the people he least wanted to know. It was beyond undesirable, but by giving up this information willingly, Jason would benefit in a few key ways.

Firstly, he would appear more honest and frank to Raphael. He could reveal the information on his own terms and force Raphael onto the back-foot.

Secondly, Jason could control the narrative and twist the information to his advantage.

Thirdly, Jessica would become mysterious, and behind her, Cat Mask and the Archseer would become shrouded in a fog of deception.

Cat Mask, especially, would become an enigma, making the angels and demons second and third-guess their every moves. They would constantly wonder if they were bumbling into a trap Cat Mask had laid for them, or doing something he already knew was coming and had handily prepared for.

What none of them would know was… Cat Mask didn’t give a shit about any of this!

Right now, Cat Mask wasn’t helping his son at all. He wasn’t feeding Jason knowledge of future events, and even if he wanted to, Jason’s time traveling had drastically changed the timeline, so all of Cat Masks’s previous knowledge had become outdated and unreliable.

…But the angels and demons didn’t need to know that part. Once Raphael learned of Ose’s battle against Cat Mask, he would know that the humans were telling the truth about Cat Mask’s power, and he would be forced into a passive role, uncertain of what actions to take moving forward.

In essence, Jason allowed his lazy father to take on the role of a mysterious powerhouse, drawing everyone’s attention to him.

The crazy thing was, it sure was hell wasn’t Cat Mask who had told Jason about the Akashic Barrier. In matters of the Cosmos, Cat Mask was totally ignorant. He’d never heard of the True Cosmic Realm, he didn’t know about the Akashic Barrier, and he didn’t even know about the Archdemon! It seemed that even with Cat Mask’s billions of years of life, he hadn’t thought about anything besides saving Earth, or at least humanity as a whole. Matters of the cosmos had always been outside his purview, and beyond what even his time-rewinding powers would allow him to affect, so he had never given them much thought.

Thus, it was not Cat Mask, but instead Jason who came from the future and knew of Cosmic matters. He had been the one to educate his father, but now he was using his father as a prop to draw attention away from himself.

It was sneaky, it was effective, and it worked. If Raphael did think of Jason, he would simply assume Jason had used his Dream Eating powers to learn of the Cosmic Realm and other such things. But, more likely, Raphael would focus his attention on the time traveler leading humanity.

And so, after Jessica answered, Raphael was left lost and confused, unsure of what to do. By now, he had mentally forgiven Catherine and no longer thought about her so-called betrayal even a little bit. If she did betray Heaven, that much was only natural. It was likely that the damnable time traveler had investigated her in a forgotten future timeline and used his knowledge to bamboozle her! Clearly, that must be the case, for he’d even swindled Raphael out of knowledge Raphael didn’t remember telling him about!

If the Archangel of Wisdom could be fooled by such a slick-talking time traveler, what hope did poor little Catherine have? She was not at fault.

"I… I see." Raphael said, his heart heavy. "Verily, this ancient one hath lived a life in vain. The new Trueborn duo make for quite the formidable pair."

"We’re not your enemies." Jessica said. "Humanity, I mean. You angels live here in Heaven, hiding away from the real world, living a lie forged from ancient pain that secretly burns your soul every day. But it doesn’t have to be like this. You hide your existence from humanity and puppeteer its leaders from the shadows, but why? Symbiosis is possible, certainly preferable to the lonely lives you lead now."

She glanced toward the door leading outside, the movements of her eyes intentional and calculated. "By the numbers, Heaven is, what, 90% Lazarites, 9% Titans, and less than 1% Pureblooded Angels? The Lazarites have turned Heaven into a laughable imitation of their former human world. If you survive this war, I believe it might be possible to deepen the friendship between humanity and angelkind. With my abilities, especially, we might be able to solve some major problems holding both sides’ development back."

"Such as?" Uzziel asked, speaking up for the first time in a while.

"Well, the mana problem, for one. I imagine with billions of Lazarites, managing all their mana must be difficult. There’s only eight billion humans on Earth, and the meager Faith Energy they generate is made lesser by the fact a large number of them are atheists, and even the believers themselves aren’t too devout, only praying occasionally. These problems are solvable by me."

The underside of Raphael’s eye twitched. "For a substantial price, no doubt. This ancient one doth not believe such favors shalt come cheaply or freely."

"It won’t matter right now." Jessica said, neither confirming nor denying his words. "You have to beat back the demons and survive before you even start thinking of thriving. Cat Mask does not want to see Heaven fall. Are we authorized to enter and assist you in the coming battle?"

Raphael hesitated.

His mind revolved at lightning speed as a great many concerns piled upon his lap all at once.

Two possibilities immediately emerged in his mind. First, there was the matter of whether or not Jessica was being truthful, especially about one particular point.

Was Cat Mask a time traveler, as she stated?

The answer to that question had a heavy bearing on what he should say next.

It seemed likely that Cat Mask was a time traveler, but Raphael would not be able to determine if he was or wasn’t unless Cat Mask came and demonstrated his powers right before the old man’s eyes.

If Cat Mask was not a time traveler, then this meant Jessica was deceiving him. Why? Perhaps to place people inside Heaven and strike at Raphael when his guard was down? Perhaps to assassinate other key figures within Heaven?

If Cat Mask was a time traveler though, then this presented its own issues. Had Cat Mask spoken to Raphael in a previous timeline? Had he engineered Jessica’s responses to Raphael’s questions to achieve exactly the result he wanted? If he had, then would Raphael rejecting Jessica’s offer become a major problem for the Archangel of Wisdom down the line? Maybe rejecting her would allow Cat Mask to say to the human leaders ‘Well, I tried!’ and this would drive a wedge between Heaven and Earth.

But then again, maybe saying yes to her offer was what Cat Mask wanted? Maybe all of this was designed just to nudge Raphael in the direction the mysterious Trueborn wanted?

Raphael tried not to let his anxiety show, but he was sweating on the inside. This was all so sudden, it had sprang on him out of nowhere, and he had never seen Cat Mask in person. All he had to go off was the man’s silly-sounding Heroic moniker, and that was truly nothing at all.

Was it possible Cat Mask had engineered everything, including Catherine’s slip-up in Raphael’s quarters, for this moment? Was ‘this moment’ even all that important? Maybe this was just a setup for an even more dangerous future gambit, and whatever Raphael chose now was rather unimportant and it was what came later that would truly test Heaven’s foundation.

These thoughts, and many others, came to Raphael in a flash, a single second of thinking time. His face twisted slightly at Jessica’s words, but he succeeded in not fully baring his emotions before her.

Raphael had no way of knowing, but Jessica was just as worried as he was! Jason puppeteered Jessica, having no idea about what Raphael’s answer would be. Jason had his guesses, and he was mixing in lies with truth at a ratio of 20% lies and 80% truth, but he did fear Raphael would see through his gambit. Luckily for him, the information he’d given Raphael was so overwhelming with potential consequences, along with the looming threat of the demon invasion, that Raphael simply didn’t have the time or mental capacity to carefully evaluate everything Jessica had told him.

If Raphael had the time and energy, he’d surely have spotted several more issues with her words and attempted to poke holes in her story. But with Jessica constantly reminding him of the impending doom at his doorstep, Raphael begrudgingly had to come to a decision, and quickly.

"Thou art… authorized." Raphael said slowly. He quickly firmed his tone as he made the decision. "Heaven is in need of allies at this crucial time. Naturally, we shan’t forget those who reach out to us with good intentions. We art not an ungrateful people."

It didn’t escape Jason’s notice that Raphael had deliberately mentioned ‘good intentions’ as a caveat in case Jason’s intentions turned out to not be entirely pure or in Heaven’s best interests… but the Wordsmith had no desire to call the old man out on this minor point. Raphael was clearly grasping at straws.

"Good, good. I’m glad to hear that." Jessica said. "Since you’ve agreed, we’ll move fast to limit the damage the demons can inflict. I’ve already begun building specialized counter-weapons for some of the most dangerous demons. I haven’t had time to build all of them, but if we can take out the highest-threat targets, we’ll be able to avert the coming crisis with minimal casualties."

Raphael nodded solemnly. He felt as if he had exchanged blows in the first moments of the coming war, and he had come up short. His opponent, this unexpected young Lowborn, had outmaneuvered him.

It wasn’t a death-blow by any means, but Jessica had seized the initiative and momentarily left Raphael at a loss for what to do. He would have to move quickly to regather his momentum in the coming period, or else she would continue pushing deeper and deeper into his territory.

"Catherine, come sit beside me." Jessica said, gesturing to the seat on her right. "You will be quite important during the battles to come."

Raphael flinched, but he said nothing. Once again, Jessica had struck another blow, taking advantage of his attack on Catherine to alienate her a little further from Heaven’s interests. The worst part was that if Raphael had apologized sooner, if he had spoken before Jessica, he might have been the one to get in Catherine’s good graces and reduce the damage of his actions from earlier.

But now, as Catherine walked over and sat beside Jessica, Raphael realized that she did not seem hesitant in the least. It appeared she and Jessica had quite a close relationship… and Raphael had inadvertently pushed her away.

Should he apologize now, with all the others looking? Would it come off as performative and perfunctory? Or should he wait until later, to make the apology seem more genuine?

"My apologies for what the words I spake earlier." Raphael quickly said, humbly bowing his head. "Verily, I hath wronged you, young one. I should have known thou were an upright woman of good moral standing. Thou woulds’t never think of betraying Heaven."

Jessica’s eye twitched. Raphael had indeed apologized, but he also sneakily tried to guilt-trip Catherine a little, ‘reminding’ her of where her allegiances should lie.

"Yes, you should have known that much." Jessica quickly retorted, speaking before Catherine could say a word. "But speaking of Catherine not betraying Heaven, was it not Heaven’s leader who betrayed her first? I suppose 600 years of affection doesn’t mean much to an ancient creature of the primordial times. Our human lives are so fleeting and forgettable, after all."

"It’s fine." Catherine said, quickly raising her palm. "Thank you for the apology, Raphael. I am also sorry that I deceived you before. I made a promise to… Jessica… and I didn’t want to break it."

"Thou hath always been good at keeping thy word. Thou dost cherish thy vows deeply." Raphael said, raising his head to smile warmly at her. He ignored Jessica’s previous barb. Now was not the time to exchange insults, for it would make him seem the lesser man at the table.

Jessica resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Once again, Raphael couldn’t help but bring up ‘vows’ to try and guilt-trip Catherine. But it was fine, as Jessica had already called him out once. Catherine was not so stupid as to be unable to see through the hidden meaning in his words, especially after having it pointed out once before.

"Time is running out." Jessica said, waving her hand to turn the laptop computer she’d made into dust, before reforming it into a map of the outer Sinai countryside. "Let us discuss strategy, and how humanity’s military can best assist Heaven in this coming war."

"This ancient one would be deeply appreciative." Raphael said, smiling at Jessica as well.

None present but Raphael himself knew what schemes were cooking inside his twisted old mind…