The Tale of Belial and St. Michael.


Belial admired the lush Garden behind the head of St. Michael, the Archangel. Trees peacefully sighed in relief from the wind. Many creatures stirred and ate and enjoyed the endless landscape of forest, stream and field.


"I ask you again," Belial said to the head, "to be reasonable. Isn't your God a forgiving and loving God, full of mercy and compassion? Please let me but enter the Garden for a few minutes. I will leave no footprint, no broken branch or disturbed animal in sleep."


"Only one man may enter the Garden," Michael answered.


"But I am so much more than a man!" Belial protested. "It was you who granted me power to rule when you spat me out. Am I not the Christ is all but name?"


"You were born a man and a man you remain," Michael replied.


"I should shatter your gigantic head," Belial said. "I could, you know. I was His favorite before the Son, and I am more powerful on this earth than even you!"


"So powerful that you sit here day and night requesting to enter the Garden," Michael bellowed laughter. "Go home, Belial. There is a place for you yet. Destroy your creation and go home. Perhaps you will be forgiven. But you will never enter this Garden."


"You're a fool, Michael," Belial said. "Come out of that rock and join me. Together we could enter the Garden unhindered and let that dullard Gabriel guard it for us. We could leave in peace, not servitude."


"I remember the last time you made this offer," Michael said. "The results were less than ideal for you. I choose to serve."


"Fine," Belial said, "Then I refuse to destroy my creation. I will sit here and wait for this Holy Man to enter and I will go in with Him."


Michael laughed quietly.



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Father

Harmless lay in a blood outline of his body. Barely conscious, he knew many things that he never understood. The Law and the Prophets. All of the incarnations of the one true Light. The new species of humans. The underworld dwellers that had lived hidden for centuries. The giant black stone computer hidden in Thibet. The world of terrible secrets awaiting him as he died.

He would suffer. His mistakes ruined him completely.

The last minutes he remembered before lying there in his own blood. He, a wicked man, lost a long battle with a man infinitely wicked. The Fink changed once in the mouth of the Head of St. Michael. He became a force primeval, an Angel. The Angel. The Lightbringer. The Morningstar. God's own lieutenant who rebelled granted Fink the greatest gift the Devil can offer. Fink became the Devil Incarnate. Fink beat Harmless into realms of pain beyond things imaginable by normal men.

Be design, St. Michael intervened after seven years and spat them both out. Fink ran with a madness he could not explain. Harmless lay in blood. At that moment a young man approached the Head of St. Michael and asked, "Can this be my Father?"

"Extend your hand," St. Michael commanded, "And raise him by the strong grip, the Paw of the Lion." The Son of Harmless, the Son of Man, did as commanded. His father was healed. Then Michael issued a warning, "You, Son of Man, may enter the Garden. It is your right. But remember that whatever you carry in, comes with you."

Neither man saw a Garden.



Harmless



I took my father's name both to honor him and to remind me of his fate. We stood side by side and lived by the rules for a long time before he died, but he'd killed too many and never forgave himself. Why ask God for forgiveness if you won't even give it to yourself. He's in Hell now.



The Harmless Man, post Meggido, when asked about his father, the previous Harmless Man.



Guise



Retirement is a good life. Guise still had the old relics hanging about his shop. He had the admiration of all the new building jumpers. They knew. They knew he did it when there was no help. He did it with guts, not powers or mutations. The knew he could talk endlessly, but every story had a nugget of wisdom to use. Plus, no one made a suit or did a cut job like Guise.



So, one day when Mercy answered the door and saw her son standing with the look on his face, the look his father always got, she called Guise. Her and Guise had tried to make a go of it after her boy had healed, but she could never let go of the father of her son. Guise talked to mercy the way one talks to a Doctor while in treatment for a long term, terminal illness. Hopeful, but always aware there was no chance of a cure.



The first time Guise had the young man in his shop, he was amazed. Young Harmless was shorter than his dad, but stronger, more beautiful. For a man, he was gorgeous. Guise recognized the source of that beauty. Despite his loathing for the father, he instantly loved the boy.



Young Harmless admired Buzz Baldwin's old suit. Guise modified it. Blue and yellow, no insignia. He made a special mask of double interlocking verticle diamonds and spiked the boy's shock of blond hair up. Harmless looked stunning. The wonderous part, the boy wanted no modifications. "You'll see," he said, when Guise tried to talk him into some padding or kevlar.



After the fitting, Guise begged him to stay and sit with him on the back porch and talk. Harmless admitted that's why he really came by. Guise, for the first time in years, felt genuine joy. Maybe good Dr. Mercy had found a cure after all.

Issue Two: Introduction | Issues Two: Part 2