Bad Book Review 10 (The Guardian, Chapter 12) · 8:20pm Jul 24th, 2019
Just keep readin'. Just keep readin'.
Last time, our killer angel, Gabriel, went after Christina in her home, only to be stopped by Cameron. He then used his powers on a woman named Tammi, who tried to seduce Father Stephen, then killed herself in front of him when that failed.
Chapter Twelve opens with the sun setting over an amusement park, then the amusement park shutting down for the night. I don't know how late amusement parks stay open, but I do know they don't close immediately after sundown. After everyone leaves for the night, Gabriel shows up. As he wanders the park and doesn't burn anything, the book describes him as looking "forlorn and lonely. Almost vulnerable."
Except the park is not completely closed as he "watched people leaving and the lights going out."
We'll mark that up to "could be phrased better." That the park is supposed to be shutting down in sections for some reason instead of all at once, and Gabriel is supposed to be in one of the parts the shuts down sooner.
Gabriel stops in front of a funhouse mirror, looks at himself, and then has a flashback.
Or as Miss Price puts it:
Gabriel began to have a sudden flashback. A bright white light enveloped him.
We are brought to a destroyed medieval church, where a group of boys (the one age mentioned is six) are collected, a bishop praying for them and blessing them. After the blessing, they are led out, holding wooden swords. They boys are then led out onto a battlefield where an army of adult men are approaching them. As they are standing, another priest blesses them, calling them the "Child army of Christ!" and telling them to, "Advance ye holy army of innocents and vanquish all of God's enemies!"
After some fanfare, the army charges and the boys run in, but the single boy we're following is a bit slower, or doesn't run.
He hears a scream and sees bodies start to fall.
The story then alternates back and forth between Gabriel and the flashback.
in the present, Gabriel continues to see the memories and is in pain over it.
In the past, he, as an unnamed six year old boy, is scared. Beside him, an eleven year old boy prays to God to help them, to save them all as he supposedly promised.
After another brief flash of present Gabriel in pain, we have another moment in the past:
The 6-year old suddenly looked up, wide-eyed as a shadow hovers over him, and a sword comes down.....
The vision ceases and Gabriel starts smashing things around him in anger. During a lull, he notices small, shadowy figures and hears the sounds of children giggling. It comes from everywhere, and annoys him, so he starts throwing things at it.
The sounds stopped. Everything was quiet. Gabriel stood alone in the dark, breathing heavily.
That's the end of our chapter, and the original of our villain. Some time during the medieval ages, he was recruited by the church to be a child soldier of God, and sent into battle against full grown and probably trained adults. Then he got killed (although, I'm willing to guess that "slaughtered" would not be wrong), and whatever powers decided to make him a guardian angel, giving him the very job he likely feels no one had bothered to do for him.
Kind of makes sense why he might be a little bitter.
Until next time.
Ink Hoof.
And now we have our backstory of our villain. Wouldn't it be some kind of twist if this story was genius and flipped things on us. Actually making him the good guy or something. Though I doubt it, this was just a random, bullshit theory I pulled out of my ass based on absolutely no conviction or evidence!