God's Dogs Book 2
Chapter 10

There has to be evil so that good can prove its purity above it.

The Buddha

In one of the shamanic systems Coyote candidates learned in their second year of training, there is a mile-high dark and evil wall. It’s located in the spirit or archetypal realm.

During a protracted guided meditation, the candidates are led to this wall. The instructors, then, demand that they choose: good or evil. If the choice is evil, they are absorbed through the wall to inhabit the environs beyond. The ones that opt for the light, though, are subjected to the temptations of evil. They must refuse its seductive beauty, its alluring promise of power, its enticing offers of excitement and sexual fulfillment.

Few choose the dark, but it happens. For the majority, though, confronted with this clear choice acquaints them with the attributes and qualities of evil. They will never again mistake it for anything else. Primarily, they recognize that evil is as real as a hand grenade.

It beckons, ‘Give over your will, and all your desires will be satisfied.’ And if you do, your light goes out, and your life becomes a king of the mountain game: enslave and use those below you; fear and try to dethrone those above you – an endless and impossible quest to satisfy what the light could have provided with the only sacrifice of self-will run riot.

The enemy troops assaulted the team through the blasted out doors of the control room. It was a bad tactical situation for them, and they fell in a growing heap of bodies. During a halt in the action, a voice called out.

“Yo! You’re trapped in there. Do you want to talk about your surrender?”

Quinn retracted his helmet and answered, “No. We’re good.”

“You realize you’re in a Faraday cage. You can’t call for help.”

While that was technically true, River had drilled into the wall and installed a comm booster outside the cage. They were in contact with Sgt. Blessing and Rand.

Quinn replied, “We can call a cease-fire and consider what you have to offer.”

“Is it okay to take care of my downed men?”

“Sure.”

Quinn activated his helmet and it rose from its sleeve at his collar to encompass his head. He watched as unarmed men removed the bodies clogging the entryway.

“I’m coming in,” the enemy commander said.

As he stood in the doorway, Pax said, “He’s not the one.”

River agreed, “Yeah. He’s just a minion.”

Quinn turned on his suit speaker. “Don’t bother. You’re not high enough on the food chain. We’ll talk to your boss, or we can just keep killing your men.”

A moment later, River sent, “Feel it?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Pax answered. “You’re getting really good at reading subtle energy.”

“It isn’t that subtle,” River chuckled. “I know what you mean, but, damn Pax, it’s oily and oozes power.”

“I’ve got it now,” Pax said. “Down the hall to the left.”

Moss and Quinn chimed in with their acknowledgments. Then Quinn smiled as he registered it. “There you are.”

Then, to his team, he sent, “Are we ready?”

River answered, “I can do this.”

Quinn said, “You can handle the power we will channel into you. You have the greater capacity for that than any of us.”

“I can do this,” she repeated and took a deep breath.

Quinn said, “We will link with you.”

There are places one can meet in the spirit world – extensions of one’s personal area or private domain. The danger for doing so was similar to giving someone the keys to your home. The team, though, had developed a level of trust where they breathed their way to their personal spaces in the realm of spirit and linked them up with River’s.

Each of their personal or sacred spaces was different. They understood it was a gift from the Creator, a safe space from which they could start their adventures in spirit. River’s space was near a lake with widely spaced trees shading an open area. Pax’s was on a bluff overlooking a meadow. Moss’ was on a mountaintop with a bird’s eye view of a vast, mountainous landscape. Quinn’s was like the farm he spent his six-month break – orchards, fields of grain, and a simple hut on flat ground above it.

Each of them extended a tunnel to River’s location and stepped through to the lake shore where she stood. Then they laid hands on her and infused her with all the power they could channel. The power came from the ground, Nature energy; it came from the sun, Spirit energy; and it came from all around, Void energy. Then it flowed through them in a targeted rush.

River felt the surge and let it rest within her as a reservoir she could tap on demand. The she directed her attention to the hallway and spirit-walked to face the leader. In her spirit-body River resembled a coarse-robed nun and carried a staff. The enemy looked like a ten-foot tall, glowing red devil straight from hell.

River challenged him, “Free these people or die.”

The devil laughed. “I’ve trained to acquire the same powers you possess, Coyote. The difference is I can draw on the life-force of my minions. I am more powerful than you.”

What he said was true. Power was neutral. Behind the black wall, in the compound of evil, men and women trained in all the spiritual practices: yoga, shamanism, meditation, and so on. What they couldn’t do was work together in cooperation and compassion. Only people of the light could do that.

River spoke, “While all that may be true, I know that one candle breaks the darkness.” Then she released the energy coursing through her into the staff, pointed it at the devil and blasted him with a brilliant white beam of light.

The devil easily folded the light into the darkness that surrounded him – at least, at first. The steady stream, though, began to overwhelm the ability of the darkness to snuff it out. As the struggle turned against him, the devil backed up.

Sensing the devil was about to run, River flew at him, leading with her staff. She plunged the staff into the devil’s body, arched over and twisted to take the devil’s back. Arms wrapped around the devil’s neck, River continued to let the light flow through her, radiating out through her arms wrapped around the devil’s neck and her legs wrapped around the devil’s torso.

The devil fought back. He pulled the staff out of his body and threw it aside. Then he began twisting his body, flailing his elbows into River, and struggling mightily to dislodge the glowing radiance that was River.

In their shared space, Moss, Pax, and Quinn fought to stay calm so that the channel their spirit-bodies had become would not constrict with tension or anxiety. They breathed deep and slow and focused on moving as much light as they could to River. Out in the hall, they could hear the bellows of the devil, feel the impacts of the conflict that bled through to the physical realm, and maintained their link to River.

It ended with a resounding ‘pop,’ and all the evil in the building disappeared in a flash as brilliant as a nova. River rose from the floor in the hall and stood there confused. Then she heard Quinn call her back to their shared space. She shifted there and reconnected to her flesh-and-blood body. Then she breathed deeply, trying to regain her center. It was a struggle. The fight was draining in a spiritual way that was new to her.

The others released their connection to River, returned to their sacred area, and reconnected to their flesh-and-body bodies as well.

Finally River said with some conviction, “I’m okay. What’s happening in the hall?”

“Nothing yet,” Moss answered.

“They’re in shock,” Pax clarified. “And confusion. It’s time to call in the militia.”

“Okay,” Quinn muttered, as he held out a steadying hand to River who was still staggering from the battle in spirit.

Pax knew it would take a few minutes, so he called Blessing on the tac-net. “It’s done. You can move in and secure the place. Some of them will be in shock. Use stunners on them.”

“On our way,” Blessing told him.

The team eased into the hall and began ordering the troops to disarm and sit against the walls. They reached the body of the leader. He looked like his life had been sucked out of him. His face was hollow and drawn, and his body was shriveled up in a fetal position.

“Not a pretty sight,” Moss offered.

“Evil does take its toll,” Pax said.

“And these minions?” River wondered. “What about them?”

“We’ll need healers to balance their qi,” Moss said. “The guy knew how to use them as batteries for enhancing his power.”

“Is that possible?” River queried.

“It’s a technique similar to possessing someone,” Moss replied. “Lots of controlled breathing with a certain focus. We learned about it in advanced medic class.”

Blessing and a squad of militia showed up and began forming the enemy troops into some semblance of order to evacuate them. She strode over, slinging her rifle to her back.

“Is this their boss?” she asked looking at the leader.

“What’s left of him,” Moss quipped.

Rand’s team trailed behind the militia platoon that supported Quinn. They served as a rear guard and over-watch for the aftermath of the battle. He didn’t think the enemy could regroup quickly enough to pose a threat, but the explosive forces rippling through the spirit realm could cause unpredictable responses.

He stood atop a warehouse, and his sniper, C-Sharp, was set up nearby. The other two were across the street atop their own warehouse.

“That was some crazy shit,” C-Sharp spoke.

“Spirit battles usually are,” Rand agreed.

“I haven’t been around one before,” was her reply.

“Stay grounded in the light, and you’re okay.”

C-Sharp glanced at him and snickered. “I remember my training, Rand. I just wasn’t expecting the earthquakes the whole thing caused.”

Rand cracked a rare smile. “It’s not something you get used to.”

C-Sharp refocused on the street. “Looks like they’re ready to transport the bad guys.”

“Saul?” Rand commed.

“All clear,” was the response.

Trucks arrived and the remaining DNP troops were loaded. Quinn’s team exited the building last, boarded one of the trucks, and the convoy headed back to base.

Rand’s team moved in, then, and in stealth mode they searched the office building for intel. After a few hours, they returned to base as well.

The next day, River spent time with an acupuncturist, while Moss helped out with the captured troops in the hospital. Pax and Quinn joined the interrogation team.

Rand and Quinn met up in the afternoon at the cafeteria. The large room was mostly empty, and they sat with coffee near a bank of windows.

Rand began, “Helmut Steiner was his name, a colonel in their organization. With him gone, the DNP has lost its black soul.”

“There are no more like him, is there?” Quinn prompted.

“We don’t think so,” Rand replied and leaned back. “I take it that was the first one your team dealt with.”

“It was. River’s capacity to channel all that energy overpowered him.”

“She is a strong one. The dark lords make a special effort to take out the strong ones.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Quinn said, “but she seems perfectly capable of dealing with it on her own.”

“I’ve dealt with two in my twenty-five years of this,” Rand said. “They are pretty rare. My theory is that bad guys are lazy by nature, and it takes a lot of develop the psychic skills these super bad guys have.”

“Lazy?” Quinn smiled.

“Yeah,” Rand snorted. “It’s easier to steal than work; it’s easier to destroy than build; and so on.”

“So these super bad guys are rare.”

“It seems so, but we’re a ways from fully understanding how evil works. Sort of like sociopaths, they learn how to fit into society and can be productive members. And you’ve run into people you know are evil, but they fit into society pretty well. The ones like Helmut seem to be driven, though, and they claw their way to the top.”

“I’ve told people that the evil archetypes they know about – Lucifer, Satan, and those entities – are actually agents for the Divine. I know that’s true, but are there other archetypes that are just agents for evil?”

Rand thought for a moment, sipping his coffee, and replied, “An archetype is built from what people believe in, or need to have as a touchstone, or is demanded from their mythology. That need becomes an intention, and the dark energy coalesces around it, and you get your culturally appropriate archetype of evil.”

“That makes sense,” Quinn mused. “And it makes what we learned about it in training a bit clearer. We embody both the light and the dark, good and evil, but nothing else in the Universe does. Everything else is light or dark, yin or yang; whereas we somehow are the stitching combining the two, and as such we keep the Universe whole.”

Rand snorted again. “Seemed a bit grandiose when I first heard that, but we see it on a daily basis in our work. People drift from good to evil and back again. We fight to keep the playing field level – no force or fraud – with the understanding that people will opt for the light when the playing field is level. It’s been my experience that expectation is mostly true.”

Quinn leaned back in his chair. “On that note, I wonder about the Galactic Congress. Their structure is sponsorship.”

“I heard it called ‘patronage,’ but it’s the same thing. I’m skeptical as well. That structure is a set-up for corruption – at least, for humans.”

“Even so,” Quinn went on, “our two trips there turned out well. In both cases, we were able to stop a war. They weren’t too happy about how we did it.”

Rand chuckled. “Yeah. I read about it. I also read that our super A.I., Solomon, is lobbying for humans to occupy a separate status when we join the Congress.”

“I think we have allies for that exemption,” Quinn said, thinking about the elf-like humanoids.

Rand sighed and stood. “I guess you’re done here, but we could use the help for a while longer. We’ve got good intel from the records Helmut kept. He was a typical control freak and kept meticulous records, and the prisoners are like rats on a sinking ship. We should have this wrapped up in a couple of months.”

Quinn stood as well, and they deposited their cups in the tub near the kitchen as they left.