fliers, first!" Carlos shouted.
"Wait," Damali said, looking at Carlos. "Shields up, white light it, they'll have bullets raining back down on our own team."
Carlos shook his head hard. "Damn ... that's fundamental." He looked at Damali. "Maybe I did hit my head harder than I thought."
"No," the amber-winged hybrid said. "It's her! You can't have a dark coven witch behind your lines like a sleeper cell!"
The entity from Nod jumped up so quickly and grabbed Lorelei that the word "No!" rang out on the team in a Doppler effect. Carlos couldn't hit them with a knock-down pulse
without injuring the pregnant angel hybrid that Damali had just healed and saved. She moved too quickly. Lorelei's skinny, petite frame was no match for the more muscular, winged creature. The hybrid rebel went over the wall in a suicide plummet clutching a screaming Lorelei. Everyone, including phantom warriors, rushed to the wall to watch in horror as the angel hybrid tumbled in a struggling spiral. Demon Roman legion fliers took flight and surrounded the spiraling pair, snatching them out of the sky. But to the team's surprise, they gently set the amber-winged hybrid down, and settled Lorelei beside her -
holding her.
"Something's seriously wrong," Damali said quietly as they all stared over the wall.
"Maybe they think they've got a Nod hostage and can negotiate," Carlos said, pacing like a trapped panther as he con tinued to stare over the wall. "They know we won't allow an angel to be eaten. Everybody be cool, hold your fire, until they set terms." A swarm of Harpies flew over the ground and surrounded the hybrid and frightened witch as demon legionnaires stepped back to form a menacing, threatening ring around the Harpies.
"Oh, they are definitely reinforcing troops around them so we can't do a snatch," Damali said, raking her locks. "Shit! Why would that crazy, zealot hybrid break ranks on a suicide mission like that? We might not be able to get to her." Lilith's sulfuric plume made veins of rage stand up in Carlos's temple. He spat and then glanced at Damali. "What did I tell you? Let the games begin."
"In Dananu like old times," Damali said through her teeth.
"What do you want, Lilith!" Carlos hollered over the wall in Dananu. "A body for a body?
State your terms!"
"I don't want anything," Lilith cooed in a loud echo. "I've already got what I want ... a body for a body, and then some." She stroked the angel hybrid's hair and then tongue-kissed her. Clerics closed their eyes and cringed.
"Desecration ... complete sacrilege - get thee away from thy angelic host, demon!" Father Patrick shouted over the wall with his eyes squeezed shut.
"No, no, no," Lilith clucked with her tongue, leaning the hybrid back. "This is of her own free will, isn't it, my dear?"
"Away from an angel, you unholy beast! May the wrath of Heaven scorch your vile body and exterminate your rav enous spirit from existence!" Father Patrick yelled, thor oughly undone by the cruelty he was witnessing.
"Of all people, Father," Lilith said with a snide chuckle. "I know you aren't the one calling for Heaven's help or cast ing stones. Chastising me, are you?" She narrowed a withering gaze on the elderly priest. "Why, not too long ago, I believe, you lost your faith." She glanced around at the laughing demons at her flank. "Isn't that right? Didn't he renounce the church?" Her gaze widened as she studied him and clucked her tongue. "Such a dangerous position to be in as a priest out here with all of us ... my ... my ... my. Well, you all do keep it interesting, that I will give you." With a lightning quick motion, she sent a black charge toward the elderly man, but was surprised when a white-light bolt from the sky deflected it.
"I never lost faith in the Almighty, Lilith!" Father Patrick raged. "I lost faith in men - men, not God! And as we know, in the last days, the devil will even take up residence in the
churches. My love of the Almighty never wavered! So I call on every prayer, every righteous cleric that ever died to pro tect this team! We will have your head! I still believe, and will to my gasping last breath!"
"Guess the thunder and lightning from above served as your answer, bitch," Juanita shouted over the wall, training a machine gun on Lilith. "You ain't fronting on no priest up in here!"
Mike fingered the bazooka trigger. "D,