Agent on the Run (The Agents for Good) (18 page)

He’d poured out his life for others in the pursuit to please his Savior and he’d been given more than was ordinary to receive in return because of it. To those with faith in God it is given to know that what joy was felt over one man’s life in the surrounding assembly paled in comparison to the joy already being expressed in heaven over the life of one righteous man, who’d fought hell and his own weaknesses to keep the faith entrusted to him and run the race well that had been set out before him before time had ever even begun.

Through it all Maria stood at the forefront of the gathering in attendance with those closest to Chantry, his agents for good. The assembly broke up after the two-hour event in which many expressed how they had known the man and had been touched by his life. Many lingered around talking and reminiscing for several more hours, but as the evening shadows grew darker they too left, until all that remained were Maria and Tyre at the gravesite.

Tyre had already sent his family back to the hotel earlier and he would have been there with them now, if he hadn’t felt so burdened to help Maria cope with Chantry’s passing. She’d spoken to no one, but she’d quietly stood there as still as a statue for hours on end.

When everyone else had finally gone she’d left her spot by the headstone to go over and kneel beside the fresh dirt of the grave strewn with flowers. It was autumn and the chill of the evening was upon the land.

“Maria?” Tyre asked.

She looked up at him and he said, “Maria it’s time to go.”

She shook her head no and went back to gazing at the grave before her.

He wanted to say more, but he felt a nudge in his soul not to so he kept his words inside. He slipped off his coat and settled it down onto her shoulders and then he spread his vest across her lap.

“Thank you Tyre.” Maria said softly.

Tyre nodded and left the graveyard, inwardly very unhappy to let his actions to help her stop at just loaning her his coat, but that was all the compelling nudge from within seemed to want him to accomplish. So he bit his lip and walked away.

Maria looked up and watched Tyre go. She was so grateful for Tyre’s coat and vest. They helped, but she was already chilled.

Shivering she clutched Tyre’s coat tight about her, but it wasn’t enough. It was going to be a long night.

Tyre lay awake in bed staring at the ceiling. Anna stirred and lifted her head up from her husband’s chest, “Can’t you sleep honey?” She asked sleepily.

He shook his head no.

Anna sat up some, “You’re worried about Maria?”

He nodded.

“You don’t think she’s still out there do you?”

He nodded.

Anna glanced out the dark window and shivered involuntarily at the cold dark look of it. Tyre glanced at the clock; it was a little past 3 AM.

“I can’t take it any longer!” Tyre said slipping out of the bed and quickly throwing some clothes on.

Before he left the room he turned to Anna and said, “I’ll be back.”

Anna nodded, as she proudly watched the love of her life from the bed. Her husband was a good man.

Tyre went to the door and started to open it, but it wouldn’t move. He checked to see if the locks were off, they were, but the door still wouldn’t move. Not so much as to even budge.

Anna came up behind Tyre her voice full of concern, “Is it stuck? Should I call the front desk?”

Tyre’s forehead rested against the door in defeat, “No, it will open in the morning, when it’s time. Go back to bed. I’ll be there in a moment.”

The door did unlock at 6 AM just as the sun was coming up. Tyre, who’d been sitting in a chair in front of it was through the door and down the hall within moments of it unlocking.

Maria wasn’t sure it was real at first, but the warmth didn’t lie. The styrofoam cup of coffee in her hands was real. It tasted real and it helped restore her sluggish senses somewhat.

“Maria why are you doing this?”

Maria glanced to the side, as she put the gift of the warm coffee and Tyre together.

“Chantry told me to.” She managed to stutter out.

She was so cold!

“Chantry told you to wait by his grave! Why would he do that?” Tyre exclaimed.

“I don’t know, but don’t you dare try to stop me!”

“No that point has already been made clear to me. Do you need anything?” Tyre asked with evident concern.

She needed a lot of things like more warmth, but she let it go unsaid and shook her head no.

“Thank you Tyre you’ve been a real friend, but you should go be with your family now.”

“Are you sure there’s nothing I can do?”

Maria shook her head and reluctantly Tyre left.

Thankfully the sun was coming up. Maybe it would warm her like it had so very long ago, when she had been alone in the desert after having just lost everything.

Bitter tears welled up in her eyes, as she was forced to remember her past once more and still the overlying thought that came through it all was that all this suffering and her reason for still being alive was her father’s fault. Why had God had to listen to him? Why?

She could have been peacefully dead if it weren’t for her father’s dying wish!

Chapter Seventeen

Purposeful Journey

Tyre stopped at the edge of the cemetery and looked back at the still figure hunched over the fresh gravesite. In desperation Tyre glanced up at the sky and asked, “God isn’t there something more than giving her coffee that I can do?”

On a sudden inspiration he pulled his phone out of his pocket and accessed his contacts to stare at the number he’d never called. He pushed call and held the phone to his ear to wait as it rang.

“How can I help you Tyre?”

“I don’t need help Elon, but there’s a problem that does and it concerns Maria.”

There was a telling pause on the line, “What’s going on?”

“She won’t leave Chantry’s gravesite. She was out there all night and this morning she was half frozen. I’d move her by force, but something in my spirit says it’s not my place to so can you please help? I don’t know how well you know Maria, but if Chantry told her to stay then she will until she’s dead!”

There was an even longer pause on the line, “I’ll come and deal with it, but it will take me a while to get there.”

Tyre felt a wave of relief course through him and oddly he felt released from his part in the situation. He turned away and headed back to have breakfast with his family trusting that everything would go well with his friend Maria.

The day actually got warm and it helped return warmth to Maria’s stiff body, but that was all it did. She was so thirsty and her nose had begun to run what precious fluid she did have away. Doing something like this was hard enough without getting sick!

Oh well, guess it went with the territory of odd last requests, she acknowledged to herself.

Towards afternoon distant rumbling began near the horizon. An hour later the skies opened up and rain poured down. Cold rain.

Maria was drenched to the skin and shivering before even darkness had come. Her teeth rattled so hard that her jaw hurt, as she hunched over herself her soaked hair falling free to drag in the mud of the grave.

She’d been pressed to the breaking point and she fell over the edge and started to laugh hysterically, as the cold rain beat down on her driving all sense of reality from her. A twisted form of elation rose within her, as she self realized that she’d be dead in only a few more short hours of this kind of exposure to the elements.

This had been Chantry’s last gift to her!

She’d been too much of a coward to do it herself, but Chantry had done it for her. It would all be over soon. She faltered from consciousness and pitched over into the mud of the grave that all the flowers had been washed off of.

The rain poured down and the storm thundered heavily. Lightning flashed brightly lighting up the cemetery of engraved stones to reveal the silhouette of a man that came to stand on the opposite side of Chantry’s grave from Maria.

More lightning strikes illuminated the scene, as the man in black went around the muddy grave and knelt down beside Maria to feel for a pulse.

It was barely there, Elon acknowledged to himself bitterly. He could leave her here and she would be gone by the time the sun came up, along with the problem that she represented to him. He thought about it for a moment.

He knew she welcomed the release of death. Her body wasn’t even trying to fight to survive. She’d given up. It was time to go.

Elon stood up, only to hear her hack on muddy water that was pouring off the gravesite into her open mouth. Elon fought the urge to turn her face away from the water. It would be best for all parties to just walk away.

He turned and started off, when she hacked on the muddy water again. He stopped.

He just couldn’t walk away despite all the trouble he knew she would bring him. He turned back and pulled Maria’s face out of the mud.

Half sitting her up he scooped her sodden weight up into his arms and started out of the cemetery swiftly, as the steady pouring rain began to wash the mud from off Maria’s face and hair. Up ahead after ten minutes of brisk walking through the dark soggy landscape was the white glow of lights. He headed for them.

It was a secluded open air metro rail station. The only shelter to be had were the glass enclosed booths outfitted with benches illuminated by a security halogen light overhead. It was all Elon needed. The deserted privacy of the place would be suitable for what needed to be done.

It was a relief to get out of the rain. He sat Maria down on the bench and stripped off her soaking wet coats. He picked her back up and sat down, as the rain hammered down on the glass roof overhead.

He pulled her gun out of her waistband and set it off to the side. Goodness knows there were easier ways to kill oneself than the method she’d chosen.

He steeled himself to the task ahead and undid the lower buttons of her shirt. Her skin was cold and he checked for a pulse again, it was barely there. He pulled a knife out, but then hesitated. The smooth’s unblemished skin of her abdomen wouldn’t be the same because what he was about to do would leave a scar. What did it matter anyway?

He started to make the cut, but stopped. Such things always matter to women. He cradled her over onto her side facing him and pushed her pants down slightly at the hip to make the cut in a spot where the scar would not be so noticeable.

He made two cuts close together and then he quickly made two cuts in his palm, which he lined up over the cuts on her hip.

The wounds fused together, as he began to concentrate. He shivered helplessly, as her icy blood began to pour into him through one cut, as his blood entered her through the other. He was warming her and being her immune system all at the same time.

It was an exhausting ordeal to recycle her blood through the first time and his hand shook with his desire to rip it off and let her perish, but his hand stayed put.

He was without a doubt making the biggest mistake of his life. God help him!

The hours passed and she warmed up in his arms, as the rain stopped and an unseasonably warm breeze began to blow. She slept peacefully curled up against him all sickness gone from her. In some ways she’d been an easy fix.

He’d only had to jumpstart the process and her body had intuitively caught on and helped along. He hadn’t had someone react so quickly or instinctually in a very long time. Most of the time he had to do all the work, but not with her and as a result he wasn’t nearly as tired now as he usually was from such a process.

Elon pulled his hand away from the wounds, only to see that they’d already closed. She’d always have a mottled like bruising from the process from where extra blood vessel growth had been spurred to creation, but it would likely not be noticed down on her hip and with her darker olive skin complexion.

Their skin tones were almost a match for each other.

Helping to heal her had only deepened the mystery of who she was to Elon and why her life was being Divinely prolonged as his own was. He pulled her pants up and buttoned the bottom of her shirt. She stirred slightly against him, but went back into contented rest. He should wake her and leave, but she needed this rest so he sat holding her to him, as she breathed deeply and dreamlessly asleep in his arms.

As if on cue with the dawn’s first rays of light the other benches filled with a smattering of people waiting for the metro train. Only the people weren’t what they seemed. One man stood with a newspaper folded under his arm, another with a book held out in front of him, several more who were dressed for business, one who looked like he was a painter by trade, another who wore a chef’s hat, and two that looked like waiters. None of them were minding their own business though.

They were all intently watching him making no effort to conceal the fact of their guileless curiosity, as to what was going on. They were all Watchers, otherwise known as angels of heaven and Elon fully knew it. He knew he had embarked on a perilous and misbegotten journey by choosing to save Maria!

Under the weight of their stares Elon went over and over in his mind in regards to the problem that lay in his arms sleeping contentedly pressed up against him. He sat there wishing that the Watchers would all just go somewhere else, because his own sense of guilt inside was enough to punish himself by. Had he made a mistake by saving Maria?

The watcher with the newspaper broke rank and walked over. He glanced from Maria and then up to Elon. There was no condemnation in his gaze, which reflected only curiosity as he asked, “Why Elon? Why after so long a time?”

Elon stared at the angel in shock. The angel didn’t know? That meant something must be hidden from them in regards to his actions!

Why would that be?

Elon stammered for a moment and then spoke the truth, “It wasn’t right to just let her die, because it would’ve been convenient for me.”

The angel nodded and Elon looked away at the horizon trying to solve his own riddle. Looking back he asked, “It was right to save her, but it was also a mistake too. How can that be?”