Heaven Sent

Epilogue

                                          Cassandra

It's a rare day in Heaven when a child is born.

Only once before has a god been granted a child. Aoife, The God of Creation. With no reproductive organs himself, the baby was a miracle delivered by Jehovah personally. And in that case, Aoife raised the child, now grown, named Eawa, as a symbol of his divine power.

No child has ever been borne from a mother naturally. That changes today.

A restless crowd gathers around the four-poster bed, anxious to catch sight of the unprecedented childbirth. All I was told when I became pregnant was that this would be an unprecedented event, and that not even Jehovah could know what would await when the day came. The universe would be in control then. While Aoife experienced no pain in the arrival of his daughter, and since injury isn't common in Heaven, I hoped, somehow, delivering a baby would be easier than I heard it was on earth.

It is not.

"No crowding! Back up!" I distantly hear Erika bark. Followed instantaneously are threats made passionately in the French language. Damien and Paris, preventing anyone near but Elijah and Jehovah. The God of the Light stands off to the side, as enthralled as the rest of them. While my screams drown out most of Elijah's commendations, I'm able to catch a few in between the torture.

You're going to be fine. It'll be alright. You are almost there.

His eyes resolutely glance from the flickering glow beneath my skin, brightening and dimming like a lantern, to Jehovah. It's been hours, maybe days. I don't even know anymore. All I can recollect is the changing of the frontlines, as angels filtered in and out. My parents, and his, sit in the corner of the magnificent room, awaiting the cry that's destined to come.

My body isn't weakening. My mind is... as I slip further and further into my past.

My legs are open wide, a sheet placed over my nakedness to conceal a curved belly. I've seen this position before, in very different circumstances. Those harrowing images disturb my endurance, flattening me to the bed like a truck. The confinement. The deliriousness. The fear. A doctor at the base of the sheet, intending to rid my body of something precious.

It takes the steady voice of my husband, and constant observation of my surroundings to keep the terror at bay. Because there are no ropes tying me down to the bed. There are no narcotics altering my system. And the doctor at the base of the sheet is the only person I trust to deliver this baby, the person I begged to do it.

"Guardami," Elijah demands. "Cassandra, look at me."

I crane my neck towards the end of the bed, setting drained eyes upon my physician. My mother, now at my side, pats at my head with a soaked cloth, pushing my damp, frizzy mane from my eyes. The child I carry is of the divine, and conducts all of its unwavering strength.

"I need you to push, my love. We're almost there," Elijah says.

I nod, glancing to Jehovah nervously, then back to Elijah, digging my knuckles into the wet bedding, bracing myself for more. Multiple witnesses shrink back at the return of my screams. I think I hear their whisperings between gasps.

"You can do this," my mother coos. My eyes bore into Elijah, and his arms that have disappeared under the sheet. His features are hard with concentration, a man who has seen these circumstances many times before, but his transparent eyes can't help revealing the stakes that set this event from the rest.

This is his child. His wife. His hopes and dreams.

And not even Heaven is a safe haven in this.