Bad Book Review 09 (The Guardian, Chapters 10 & 11) · 7:25pm Jul 23rd, 2019
Life goes on, and so do we. Just how we do it is no mystery.
Last chapter, Christina Urbain went into the murder church from chapter three to pray, when her guardian angel showed off, bitched about how much he hated the job, then insulted her and her whole family while threatening to do horrible things to her and her son. Father Stephen stepped in, then Gabriel fled when the cops showed up. Cameron points out how this attack means the killer is no longer going after the clergy (which again, do you see the problem with him pointing this out now?), and we end with Father Stephen asking the detectives if one of them could give Ms. Urbain a ride home.
As the chapter begins, we open with Christina opening the door. The place is a bit messy, with toys all over. It turns out that it was Cameron who gave her a ride home. Cameron notices picture of Joseph and asks. After Christina answers and mentions that she needs to pick him up from the babysitter, Cameron starts mumbling to himself, but dismisses it when she asks if he said something. After asking when her husband will be home (who died "four months ago."), it leads into a bit of a moment. He smiles, she blushes and looks away.
After asking if she'll be okay, he leaves.
After a scene break, Christina gets ready to go pick up her son from the sitter when she hears a noise. At first, there's nothing, but then she finds that one of the living room windows is open. When she goes to close it, Gabriel appears.
"I've come to finish what I've started."
Christina tries to escape, but the doorknob is burning hot. Running elsewhere, she grabs a golf club and tries to get him to go away, but he keeps moving toward her.
The door is knocked down as Cameron comes in and tackles Gabriel. Christina goes for the phone while the two of them fight. Gabriel proves to be stronger than Cameron.
Christina notices two other things: 1) that everything Gabriel grabs has burn marks on it, and 2) the walls and ceiling are starting to turn black and smolder, like the room is about to catch fire.
Gabriel managed to beat Cameron, but before he can finish him off or anything, the sound of police sirens fill the air, and Gabriel flees. Cameron tries to chase him, but collapses, and Christina rushes to him.
The chapter ends with that.
With how easily that was summarized and how I don't have anything specific to talk about, let's go ahead and move on to the next chapter.
Chapter eleven opens with Father Stephen at the alter, setting up and cleaning. I guess he has his back to the church because someone walks up the alter steps and comes up behind him, putting a hand on his shoulder.
We learn the mysterious figure is a parishioner by the name of Tammi. The Father asks what he can do for her, then asks if she's okay when he doesn't get an answer. Tammi "ran her fingers across the altar seductively," and talks about how different the church is when it's empty.
Father Stephen asks if there's something he can help her with.
Tammi looked back at him seductively. "Yes... as a matter of fact there is...."
She took the chalice with both hands and held it to her lips as if to drink from it, and ran her tongue along the rim.
He suggest they sit down and asks for the chalice, but she moves away, asks "Wouldn't you like to drink from...this...cup?" and moved to wrap her arms around him. Tammi sticks the tip of her tongue out and moves toward him, but he pulls her away and says how it's inappropriate. She keeps trying to get close, and he keeps moving away, the two of them circling the altar.
Tammi asks if he's ever seen a woman before, or done something with them. Father Stephen says she's not herself. She then giggles and picks something up from the altar (we aren't told what yet), performing oral sex on it. Father Stephen tells her to stop.
She must have put the object down because next thing she does is:
The young woman ran her hands up and down her body, caressing her breasts.
"These are the loaves.........."
She slides her hands to her crotch.
"....and these are the fishes....."
She then pushes everything off the altar, climbs on it towards him, and continues to caress herself.
By the way, no, there is no description of her body or how she is dressed. We are told earlier that she has red hair and green eyes, but have no idea what type of build she has or how provocatively she is dressed. There's no mention of her taking any of her clothes off, so she is most likely still dressed. However, there is a big difference in the eroticism of someone caressing their breasts through a jacket and sweater, and doing so in something like a halter top. Although... either way, wouldn't it be more sexual if she lifted up her top to actually expose her breasts? Or maybe pulled down the front of her lower garment to give a peek of her lower region? I know it hardly matters since this is meant to be more like an Urban Fantasy or Supernatural Thriller than anything, but still. She is trying to be seductive here. Why not go all out?
Getting back to the story:
Father Stephen tries to get Tammi off the altar. Tammi asks, "Don't you want me father?" then suddenly gets angry and screams about how nobody wants her. Father Stephen tries to calm her as she kicks and screams, and goes from trying to get her down from the altar to try and keeping her from falling off.
Tammi pulls out a knife and raises it above her. Father Stephen tries to stop her, gets pushed away, then tries again.
Slowly, as if in slow motion, the knife went down.
Slightly redundant there, but a minor thing.
It was as if a force was plunging the knife deep into Tammi's chest, and dragging Father Stephen's hands with it.
Father Stephen screamed. He watched helplessly as the knife plunged into Tammi.
"Nooooooo!!!!!"
Wouldn't it make more sense to have the scream at the point where it mentions he screaming?
The force releases it's hold, and the father cries over Tammi.
The chapter ends with:
In a dark corner of the church, Gabriel walked away from the scene, smiling to himself.
So, after failing to coax Christian Urbain into killing herself (although how he was trying to do that, I'm not entirely sure considering his methods), Gabriel found Tammi, and whatever he did to her made it so she would try to seduce Father Stephen. Then, when she failed, made her go into a tantrum and stab herself with a knife.
So, to date, according to what we've seen and been told, we have:
- A random neighbor who was hit by a truck
- Calvin having an aneurysm
- A priest who blew himself up
- A priest who died of shock
- A nun who set herself on fire
- Sal, who had the cops shoot him
- Lupe, who stabbed herself in the stomach
- Tammi, who also stabbed herself, but tried to seduce a priest first
.
Gabriel's methods seem rather erratic. I mean, the first priest, the nun, Sal, and Tammi all seemed to act on their own volition. Calvin and the neighbor were him starting out and made to look like accidents. That means that Lupe simply stabbing herself in the kitchen under his direct control is less than impressive. Then the priests, the nun, and Sal were all something of public spectacles that a lot of people noticed, with the first priest and the nun being shocking and probably horrifying to those who saw it.
Something about it all makes me think that Gabriel wants it to be a big spectacle. Like he wants people to notice what he's doing, but then there is Tammi and again Lupe. At least with Tammi, there's the fact that it has shocked and traumatized the priest. At best, he is going to bear the guilt of her death and his failure to help. At worst, he may lose his faith, turning his back on the church and God.
Lupe doesn't really have anything like that.
Compared to the others, especially the more active ones, her death just seems out of place.
Well, that's it for now.
Until next time.
Ink Hoof.
Ha, I was sorta right.. even though nothing happened with the sex. It seems really cheesy from a bystander position. I don't know if that's me reading too much into it, or how it was actually written, but outside of your commentary, I don't think I see myself reading it. To say nothing of my almost excessive consumption of fanfiction primarily, it just doesn't seem all that interesting!