Rating: T for language, demonic images, violence. Rating may change to M.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Pity. No money made, no damage intended. Don't sue.
A/N: Notes at the bottom of the chapter. Story begins six months after the movie.
And when the seven thunders spoke, I was about to write; but I heard a voice from heaven say, "Seal up what the seven thunders have said and do not write it down." – Revelation 10:4
Seven Thunders
Chapter One
Constantine slouched in front of his table, one hand lying limp on his knee, one resting next to the pack of cigarettes. He reached out one slow finger, flicking it over the rough surface. The pack skidded to the edge but didn't fall. Licking his lips, he took a deep breath. The air filling his clean lungs tasted like smog and dust. He wanted a cigarette badly. The fingers of the hand on the table jittered and tapped. The gum was supposed to keep his nerves from reacting to the lack of nicotine, but it wasn't the same. He missed the comforting warmth of smoke in his chest, the honest smell of burning tobacco—nothing like sulfur—and the solid weight of his gold lighter. He missed always having something to do with his hands. He missed the effortless contempt that holding a lighted cigarette projected to the world. He wanted a fucking cigarette. Abruptly, he threw himself out of his chair and grabbed his coat, heading for the door.
Striding along the street with his hands in his pockets and his head down, he ran straight into a kid. The boy snarled something in Spanish and shoved him aside, sprinting down the sidewalk. Constantine turned listlessly and watched as he disappeared around a corner. The sound of pounding feet came again, and he swiveled to watch a uniformed police officer and an older man running toward him.
"Did you see a kid run past here?" shouted the officer without stopping. He didn't bother to answer, just jerked a thumb in the right direction. The officer ran on, but the older man, obviously the boy's father, stumbled to a halt and tried to catch his breath, leaning his hands on his knees.
"He's a good boy. A good boy," the man panted in heavily accented English, sounding bewildered and broken. Still gasping, he went on, "No lo comprendo, lo ha poseído el Diablo," and rubbed at his eyes as though trying to wipe away a nightmare. Constantine watched him and reached into his coat pocket for a piece of gum.
A fat woman in stretch pants stepped out of one of the peeling doors in the projects and came toward them down the sidewalk. He lifted his head alertly as she came nearer, seeing the red sheen of a half breed playing across her eyes. She approached the boy's father slowly and ignored Constantine. But she knew who he was. He could tell. "Oye, Agustín," she said, and glanced up through her heavy mascara at Constantine, who stared back impassively. She put her arm around Agustín, pulling him back to the apartments as she went on, "no te culpes, él que venda las drogas es hijo del infierno…" They walked out of earshot, Agustín leaning on the half breed for comfort. She looked over her shoulder at Constantine and shot him a mocking grin, her face warping and stretching to show twisted black teeth.
Spitting his gum out on the sidewalk, Constantine started after them, walking fast. After a few steps, she noticed him following and sped up. She tugged on Agustín's arm, trying to hurry him, but he resisted. Pulling his arm away from her he looked behind them, his eyes sliding uncaringly past Constantine. He called, "Juanito?" and stared at the half breed in confusion as she snarled something at him and grabbed his arm again.
Constantine was only a few steps away when the half breed panicked. Spitting insults in Hellspeak, she left Agustín standing in the middle of the street and took to her heels, fat legs pumping as fast as they would go. Shocked, Agustín watched Constantine run after her. She ducked between one building and another and was gone. Constantine looked at the row of bland apartment doors on either side of the alley and cursed before retracing his steps until he was face to face with Agustín.
"Mister? What the hell?"
"Her name," Constantine snapped.
"What? Look, she know you, or what?"
"Her name."
"Pacha. Hey, leave her alone, she's my neighbor, good woman. She's helping me with my kid," Agustín said and rubbed at his face again.
"I bet. What'd he do?" Constantine slid a hand in his pocket for a cigarette and came up with a pack of gum. "Fuck."
"They say he shot a man, killed him. They say he's pushing." Agustín shook his head, denying that his world could have fallen apart like this. "He's fifteen. Jesucristo."
Typical lazy half breed bitch, Constantine thought viciously. Start whispering in the ear of some kid who hasn't got half a chance to start with. Easy blood. There were shouts, and a siren howled briefly as a cop car pulled into the curb. Looks like Juanito's going down. Agustín hurried forward as two cops in uniform got out of the car, a third sitting in back with a skinny kid in handcuffs. Another unit pulled in behind them, and suddenly there were officers everywhere.
Constantine strolled off, popping a piece of gum in his mouth. Influencing some kid hellward wasn't against the balance, but he was willing to bet he could find a reason to deport Pacha if he looked hard enough. Maybe he'd just deport her for the hell of it. Midnite was the one who bought into that balance bullshit, not him. Maybe he'd just find Pacha and beat the crap out of her.
Whatever. It beat sitting around wishing for a cigarette.
MISSING TEEN. Sarah Peters, 14, has been missing from her home in Irvine since 4/29/06. If you have seen her, please call...
Angela Dodson gulped her coffee and dropped the paper on the kitchen table. Grabbing her hair back into a ponytail, she kicked at the papers and cushions on the floor next to the sofa, looking for her purse. Scooping it up, she tried to slide the strap over her shoulder at the same time she pulled her jacket on. After a confused moment or two, she managed it. A quick check in the mirror to make sure she didn't have hair sticking out in a weird direction or coffee drips on her blouse, and then a more serious check that was part of her routine every time she left the apartment: badge, gun, amulet.
Locking the door behind her, she remembered the last article she'd read. Sarah Peters. Missing. A non-story buried on page nine with a photograph in case someone with too much time on their hands happened to spot her. Angie didn't know how many teenagers went missing in LA in a year and didn't want to know. Usually they ran away. Sometimes they were taken. Either way they were heading straight down, and she'd had too many homicide cases that came to her months after a sad little notice and photograph: Missing teen.
So why even notice Sarah Peters? Angela didn't know, but the article haunted her, shining in her memory as though it had been outlined in light. Once, she'd have ignored the feeling, or passed it off as stress and overwork. All detectives had to deal with the stress of knowing too much about the human condition. But now, Angela was unhappily certain that the feeling meant something. Now, she knew too much about things that went far beyond merely human. Now, she couldn't deny it or shut it out – Sarah Peters' disappearance was on her mind, and sooner or later she would know why.
Damn him, she thought as she climbed into her car, then immediately scolded herself. It's not his fault. He tried to warn you, Angie. You were the one who wanted to have your Sight back. Congratulations. You're stuck with it now. Slamming the car door with unnecessary roughness, she started the engine.
The morning passed slowly. She'd arrived at the precinct and bravely confronted a cop's worst job – endless paperwork. Reports to file, forms to fill out, memos to answer. In the middle of a routine call the thought whispered across her mind. Sarah Peters. She found herself doodling the name in the margins of reports, tapping out its rhythm with her pen.
"Looks like we got a full moon this week." Superintendent Weiss slammed a thick file down on her desk and hitched his hip over the corner.
"No, we don't," Angela replied without looking up from her computer. "Last quarter."
Weiss rolled his eyes. "I don't believe you know that off the top of your head. I just meant things are getting wacky out there. Guy robbed a Mickey D's in a clown suit, bunch of end-of-the-world nuts lying in the middle of the road stopping traffic because Jesus told them to, that kind of crap. Big spike in domestics, shootings, assaults. It's been that kind of week, and it's only Tuesday." Weiss laced his fingers together and cracked his knuckles. "Oh, and you're getting a new partner."
Angela grunted. It wasn't unexpected, after Weiss' promotion, but she wasn't looking forward to learning to work with someone new. Hopefully her new partner would know enough to stay out of her way until he learned his way around. "So, who?"
"Kaczynski. Guy from Narcotics, you know him?"
Her eyebrows went up. Mike Kaczynski had been successful heavyweight boxer before retiring and joining the force. A huge man with dark chocolate skin, battered face, and slow deep voice, his physical presence was intimidating. And after a good look at his eyes – sharp and hard in his worn face – people tended not to underestimate the brain that went along with the brawn. Kaczynski wasn't someone you messed with.
"Yeah. Isn't he senior to me, though? I thought I'd be training a new detective?" Angela kept her voice even, but she was afraid she knew what was coming.
"Angie..." Weiss hesitated, then shrugged. "Well, shit. You know you're not doing so hot as far as the chief is concerned." She gave him a look. "Yeah, OK, so I've been wondering too. Shoot me. It's just, since your sister passed away..." he trailed off, and then swung his hands up into his lap and adopted a buddy-buddy tone. "You've been dealing with a lot, we all know that. Kaczynski will give you some support, help you get back on track."
"Damn it, Weiss..."
"No, don't even start, OK?" Weiss stood up, no longer looking all that friendly. "Last week? Pulling in a suspect, no probable cause, no – Angie, you arrested Gresham for being about to rob a Circle K. You've had three cases fall through over the past six months due to insufficient evidence. The department's got its hands full trying to back you up. You're a good cop. Stop chasing shadows and get back to doing your job. Kaczynski is coming in as the senior partner."
She looked down, jaw tight. It was a slap in the face, if not an actual demotion, but the worst part was that she knew it was deserved. However she'd denied and repressed her psychic abilities, it was her flair for knowing where a suspect was, her instinctive management of violent situations, that had made her reputation. Now that her abilities were no longer repressed, instead of hints and hunches she found herself bombarded with information she didn't know how to handle, and it was ruining her career.
She'd followed Gresham because she knew he was on his way to rob that Circle K, knew it would go bad. She'd seen blood everywhere, seen the young woman who'd stopped for a candy bar falling to the ground, her eyes already glazing over, seen the pimply kid behind the counter with the back of his head missing. It hadn't happened. It hadn't happened because she'd handcuffed Gresham and hauled his butt down to the station.
He was suing her for wrongful arrest. She couldn't look at him without seeing that vision of blood, illogically blaming him as much as if he'd actually done it. The way things were working out she wasn't supposed to be looking at him anyway – the chief had made it painfully clear that she was to go nowhere near him ever again. If she was very, very lucky, Gresham's case would be thrown out, given the firearm he'd been carrying. The department lawyers were pushing the 'suspicious demeanor' line for all they were worth. But truth was, it had been a wrongful arrest. She couldn't charge people with crimes they intended to commit. But she couldn't have let him go, either. It was a nightmare. Damn Constantine, anyway, she thought, automatically following it with her ritual response. It's not his fault. He tried to warn you.
Weiss sighed and tapped one hand against the edge of her desk, then gave her a half-hearted wave before turning and walked back to his office. Angela turned back to her computer screen and stared at it for a full five minutes before giving up and lowering her head into her hands. Her amulet swung forward, its weight shifting against her neck. It protected her, she knew that. The few times she'd taken it off she'd seen half breeds loitering at corners, working in her bank, in the car waiting next to her at the stoplight. So damn many of them. And each time she'd looked she'd seen them catch her eye and follow her with their eerie red gazes. She saw them, and they saw her. She'd never dreamed that there were so damn many of them. With a shiver, she wondered how many were around her right now, how many of the seemingly normal people in this busy room were hiding the flames of hell behind their eyes. Raising her head, she looked around at the chattering, swearing, working crowd and saw them, in her mind's eye, with faces warping into evil shapes, rotting and burning – she grabbed the amulet and closed her eyes. Don't get paranoid. You don't want to know. Or do you? Isn't it worse to know that they could be creeping around, whispering...touching...and you've blinded yourself? Just as she thought this, a hand landed on her shoulder. She jumped and whirled with a kind of strangled yell.
"Sorry. I didn't mean to startle you." Kaczynski's deep voice was placid and he drew his hand back deliberately, looking at her with open curiosity.
Great first impression, Angie. She straightened and grimaced at him. "Sorry. I was a million miles away, I guess. I'm Angie Dodson...I think we've met a couple of times."
Kaczynski nodded. "Sure. I've seen you around." He smiled at her, making the skin around his brown eyes crinkle and showing off a chipped tooth. "What do you say we go get some lunch, get acquainted."
She smiled back. "Sounds like the best idea I've heard all day." Pulling her purse over her shoulder and checking her holster, she stood up. Standing next to him, she realized that she barely reached his armpit. He stood aside, politely gesturing for her to lead the way. She grinned to herself, picturing John Constantine as her new partner. He'd have found a way to piss her off already, no doubt about it. He didn't know the meaning of the word polite. But he'd make a good partner – solid, someone who'd back you up all the way to hell and back. Literally. She'd have to wait and see if Kaczynski had more going for him than size and manners.
"I hear you've given up smoking."
Constantine tilted his head back to see the speaker, standing a few feet behind his armchair. Raphael gave him a small, formal nod and walked around to occupy the armchair facing him across the rug, shifting around to get his huge grey wings comfortably settled. Constantine sighed and slumped further down in his seat. "Cosmic gossip. Don't you have anything better to do?"
Raphael missed the irony. "Actually, I came here tonight hoping to talk to you about what happened with Gabriel," he said. He tucked his longish, straight brown hair behind his ears and leaned forward. His delicately feminine features were earnest, as always, his china-blue eyes serious.
"Yeah, well, I came here for some peace and quiet." The Theological Society was mostly deserted this afternoon. Father Linehan was supposed to meet him to discuss the theft of a box of relics, but just his luck, Raphael had cornered him first.
"I don't believe you fully understand the situation. It is much more disturbing than you think."
"Right, because I think dealing with Lu is such a hoot, particularly when he's ready to drag me off. Gabriel going insane just added to the fun and games."
Raphael shook his head, smiling seraphically. "Sarcasm is a feeble excuse for humor, John."
Groaning, Constantine fished out a piece of gum. Raphael went on, folding his hands carefully on his knee and kicking at the skirt of his ecclesiastical robes with one slipper-covered toe. "I am, of course, disturbed at Gabriel's fall. I had always hoped he would work out that unfortunate tendency to jealousy. I had faith that he could overcome temptation." Shaking his head sadly he said, "It appears that I was wrong."
"That must've been a surprise," Constantine muttered.
"However, there is a larger significance in Gabriel's misfortune and Mammon's mischief."
"Mischief? Misfortune? You're kidding me." Frowning, Constantine glared at the archangel. "Hell on Earth, murder – "
"Forgive me." Raphael's wings twitched, although his face remained blandly peaceful. "I know you lost friends, and I am sorry for your grief. But you are surely aware that they've gone on to a better place? And although you find yourself more alone, no doubt your new faith is a comfort."
Even when Raphael was right he was a pain in the ass. Constantine knew that the 'better place' was real, although the archangel made it sound like a Hallmark card. Since he was reasonably certain that Hennessey and Beeman hadn't gone to Hell, he was willing to admit that they were happier away from war-torn Earth and a certain asshole named John Constantine. But he didn't need it pointed out.
As for his new-found faith...dammit. He'd had a moment of clarity as he was bleeding to death, ready to give his soul itself – for what? So that the balance would remain in place a little longer? So that good would triumph over evil? The balance didn't seem any less hypocritical to him now and he didn't have any more of a clue why God should be able to gamble away human souls. He didn't have any new answers. Looking into the face of Gabriel's insanity, he hadn't needed them. He'd been entirely willing to burn forever in order to do what was right. He'd had faith...faith that good was more than an incomprehensible God with an ant farm. He believed in a loving God, and it went against everything he knew. Comforting wasn't what he'd call it. Had God planned to put him through all that pain and suffering, all that death, just so he'd be the perfect person in the perfect place to stop Mammon and Gabriel? Couldn't he have pulled off a good old-fashioned miracle instead? All Constantine had when the old questions and the old bitterness choked him was the...comfort...of his faith, and the memory of Angela's face. Raphael was watching him sympathetically. Damn.
Clearing his throat gently, Raphael said, "In the six months since Gabriel's fall, demonic activity on Earth has risen dramatically."
"I thought I was just imagining it."
"No. It seems that Gabriel has unwittingly set in motion the beginning of the end."
Constantine sat up straight. "Run that by me again?"
Raphael pressed his lips together primly and repeated, "The beginning of the end. The forces of hell have sensed the advent of the apocalypse and it has made them quite active. They have their prophecies too, you know, just as we do."
"'Quite active.' Only you, Raphael, you know that? Yeah, I've seen more half breeds around – your side and theirs – over the last couple of months than in the last couple of years."
"Of course, some of that is your growing fame. There are many who are anxious to see the human who outmaneuvered Lucifer. I understand that my brother is not happy with what people are saying. You did make a bit of a fool of him, you know." Raphael sniffed and adjusted the folds of his robe. "But most are here because when Gabriel fell, the First Seal was opened."
There was a long silence. Constantine finally vented with a low whistle. "The news lately has been scary. The takeover of most of the Middle East, the fall of the China to the Indian Empire, the rise of El Arquero in South America – nation after nation occupied. But I didn't realize...so it's not going to stop."
"No. The great Conqueror has set forth, and all the world will fall. Don't worry about it too much."
"Don't worry – "
"No one knows the timetable," Raphael cut him off, impatiently. "It may take generations before the entire world is united under one rule and the Second Seal is broken. Or it could be broken tomorrow. There isn't anything you can do about it, regardless. It's part of the natural course of things. It's foretold in the Bible in Hell just as it is in ours."
Constantine rolled his eyes. "What are you doing reading banned books?" He was surprised to see a flicker of embarrassment cross the angel's pretty face. "No, really?"
"I, well, yes." Raphael twisted a piece of hair between his fingers and refused to look directly at John. "It seems to me that – that the balance isn't entirely balanced anymore. I know it's supposed to be, but – I think something is going wrong. I think that Hell is up to something bad."
"No!"
"You don't need to be so difficult, you know. I'm trying to help." Raphael's white skin was tinged with pink.
Constantine stared for a moment and then gave him a hard smile. "No, you're not. You've come for help. You want someone to tell you it's all right. You're the one looking for comfort. Come on, Rafe, where's your faith?"
Raphael stood up, wings arching with indignation. "Suit yourself, John," he said coldly. "You have never been a what anyone would call a nice person, have you? If you don't want help I certainly don't mean to force myself on you. Do say hello to Angela, next time you see her." With that, his wings swept down and he shot upward toward the arched cathedral ceiling, fading from view as he filtered through the plaster and stone.
"That was a low blow, you feathered freak," Constantine said softly.
A/N: Hiya. I saw Constantine for the first time a couple of days ago, and couldn't resist writing about what happens next. The story includes a large helping of quasi-religion mixed in with total fantasy. As far as theology goes, if it works within the context of the story I'm going to go with it, although if I make any huge mistakes with regard to Catholic beliefs please let me know!