Michel de Bordeaux was born on the 29th of December in the year 1977 Anno Domini, in Toulouse, in a Catholic family. His father was an old soldier in the normal French army, and it was only by accident that Michel became a paladin. He was a good friend of Henri de Villiers, who secretly came from a long line of paladins and himself continued it. When the Apocalypse had not yet started, but the first signs of trouble appeared and the paladins were called up, Henri - who, like most paladins in the Catholic countries, was ordered to seek out new recruits - persuaded the bored Michel to join their ranks. At first, Michel didn't take all this seriously - though a Catholic in theory, in practice he was an (undeclared, to avoid offending his parents and friends) agnostic. Still, out of curiosity he went along. They travelled to the basement of some old house... and there, Michel for the first time experienced that dogging, primal fear of the supernatural. He saw miracles there, he saw light appear out of nowhere, he saw a cripple's burnt wounds (apparently, he ran into one of the demon scouting parties) heal... he saw an angel, who, after healing the cripple, gave them a briefing and then had them teleported away to Israel.
There, as soon as the angel disappeared, Michel went openly hysteric, demanding that he be brought back to France. Most of the paladins in the vast barrack he wounded up in ignored him, the others laughed. Only later, Henri explained to him that there was no going back. "But what about my parents?!" - asked Michel. "Oh, they're probably doomed." - explained Henri reassuringly. Michel just starred at him, and then Henri pointed him to his digital wristwatch. It showed the date: 06-05-30.
"But what does that mean..." - started Michel, and then was once more paralyzed by fear, for angels begun arriving. And amongst them, a huge, powerful one, an archangel. Michael. Supreme Commander of the Heavenly Ground Force in the Meggido Theatre.
Days passed by like years, but gradually, though Michel still did not understand much of what was going on, he did become a paladin. He learned to fight with a sword, he remembered all prayers and learned to bless, to assist in healing and in exorcisms. And gradually, he even learned to not fear angels - humans can get used to just about everything over time. He still was very easily intimidated by Archangel Michael's very presence, though.
Just as he got used to the side that he was going to fight on, and even to the fact that his parents were already slain (they had no TV here, but the angels did tell them what was happening, did explain that the demons were running loose, and wherever there weren't enough angels to counteract them they came out victorious, like in France), a new shock came, for Michel finally figured out the meaning of Henri's gesture. That was because one night as they were coming back from particularily long training, Henri showed him the time on his wristwatch of which he never got rid. Before anything else, Michel noticed the date. 06/06/06. Armaggedon was about to begin.
Michel didn't sleep at all that night. Even when his body actually begun craving for sleep despite all, he subdued it because he was afraid to see nightmares. Instead, he begun inadvertly scaring himself while conscious, by thinking of what awaited him, of the final clash between good and evil...
Not at all the final, as it later turned out. Only the first direct clash in millenias. Well, maybe not the first... The best analogy to the Battle of Armaggedon would be the First Battle of the Marne in WWI. Yes, it certainly was only a beggining. And what a beginning it was.
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In the beginning, there was the small town of Megiddo, and near it was a hilly terrain overlooking the Plain of Esdraelon. And Archangel Michael did climb upon the nearest hill, which was called Har Megiddo. And he did look through a looking glass at the approaching demonic hordes, vast in numbers and hideous in sight. And he did lick his lips. And he did declare: "This is a good position. Let us make our stance here." And he did add after a moment of hesitation: "Start deploying the artillery."
And verily the position was good, and as sanctified shells fell on the ground of the valley, the casualties of the approaching demon-wave were high indeed.
But the demons gave up not; rallied they around a rider on a white horse, by the name of Effef, whom enemies and followers alike called the Antichrist. And he did send out flying demons to bombard enemy artillery and pinpoint its position for him, so that his own artillery may commence with the counter-battery fire. And he did order a flank attack that seized the city of Umm el Fahm, threatening the angelic communications and supply route. And while Archangel Michael tried to deal with this threat to his army's rear, Effef did lead a mighty charge that took the town of Megiddo and from there commenced an assault upon the Har.
And then the real meatgrinder did verily begin...
Michel de Bordeaux was not the only one who did not sleep, far from it. There was scarcely any need for the angels to wake anybody up; almost all the paladins jumped up as one upon the first alarm, dressed, armed and went for a quick briefing, which was cut down to "We are going to fight now" in the end due to an emergency - the angelic officer corps, though well-drilled, didn't conduct a single military operation half the size of this one for millenias now, and thus the angelic activity during the Battle at Har Megiddo was quite chaotic and frenzied. Then several portals opened, and Michel de Bordeaux like the rest of his comrades withotu a single thought ran into the portal... and appeared on a hill. Around him were fellow paladins, a great force of them. Around them were angels, and the further they were from Michel, the higher they were in rank. And finally, towering above them all was Archangel Michael.
Michel felt fear. But it did not yet come. He didn't fear the Archangel as much as he feared what he saw seconds later. A horde of demons. All sorts of them. Hideous, disgusting beings they were. Michel didn't feel anything but fear; it paralyzed him utterly, he couldn't even breath; neither could he think, but even then he FEELED that he would soon collapse...
He was saved by Archangel Michael. All of the paladins were saved in a way. Michael ordered with a thunder-like voice: "FORMATION!!!" And his army did form - automatically, by reflex, not by mind. Angels took their places as commanding officers, but there didn't seem to be much use for them yet, as Michael continued giving out orders - this time, more specific ones.
Michel stared at the approaching demons dumbly, trying not to think lest he be strangled by fear again. He expelled all the thoughts from his head as he awaited the clash. He observed coldly, passionlessly, thoughtlessly as demons charged, as explosions of light tore gaps in their ranks, as new demons came up to take their place... And he waited, waited for orders. At one point, he heard the flight of wings above him. He did not look away, nor did he do so when behind his back, agonied yells and the sound of an explosion came, only shook alittle due to the explosion's impact. Away from him, his namesake the Archangel gave out orders, sent out squadrons of angels to kick the demons out of the sky... Above him fighting commenced, but it had nothing to do with him yet.
And ahead, demons marched and marched to their death. From behind his back, lightning flied as angels fired beams of holy light to kill the most lucky and persistant demons. And they came coming; if anything, there seemed to be more of them now, as, after all, the artillery fire died down.
These demons were horrible. The most horrible thing about them was their variety. Some had tentacles, others - wings, third ones - horns, some had everything. Some were small, others large, some flied, some crawled, but most of them walked, ran, charged, and did so ever faster... especially as a human being rode up to them. It was a handsome, strangely-pale man on a while horse; dressed in black armour, he did stand out even amongst the darker-skinned of demons, for he indeed was a human, or seemed very much like one, and still did have pale, visible skin. He was ordering something. He was making them go faster, Michel realized... and immediately, froze, though he did not move before neither. The dam was blown; thoughts streamed rapidly. It was the Antichrist ahead of him. And around him, hideous demons, at whom Michel now stared wide-eyed, as if he did not observe them for an hour now.
He froze just in time, for Archangel Michael gave out a new order. "CHAAARGE!!!"
"MICHAEL!!!" - the angels let out their battlecries, and charged forth. The paladins charged after them, clearly overcome by fear, but none as much as Michel de Bordeaux.
They drew swords, and cut in all directions, giving no heed nor thought, for had they done so many of them would have fainted. They didn't look at their disgusting, horrifying opponents; they only looked at their own swords, and at the weapons and limbs of their enemies, again taking great care to not study them, but only to remember their location and track their movements to parry the enemy attacks; to beat the enemy swords out of their limbs; to severe these limbs from enemy bodies. And just to cut, cut, cut, hoping to kill or injure an enemy and instinctively praying... not for the safety of their cormades or themselves, but for the death of the demons.
The angels and paladins charged, cutting their way through the demonic horde, which begun stumbling, retreating... breaking and routing.
Then through the deafening sound of battle, a single sound came, the groan of a dying demon... slain by the Antichrist, as everybody thought without any ground behind this theory other than the simple fact that indeed it was the truth.
Demons stopped running and begun attacking again, and more, and more of them came, from all directions. They also killed like maniacs, attacking with everything they could use to attack, as did the angels and the paladins - there was no time for niceties now. A very short demon tried to attack Michel; later, after the battle, he had suddenly realized that it was only the upper half of a demon, but back then he merely trampled it with his feet, and went on. He was bleeding ofcourse, but that was as fine... He continued to slash, and cut, and parry, and strike, and main, and kill, kill, kill... And he quite sincerely suspected that he was shouting "MICHAEL!!!" during this time, as did all the other paladins who survived the battle.
Then suddenly, his sword disappeared somewhere and he himself flew backwards, hitting the ground. Not feeling any pain, he tried to stand up, and fell over again. Before his eyes was a tiny, disgusting, snickering imp. And as Michel tried to throw it off from himself, as he tried to strangle it... he suddenly went limp.
When Michel was a small child, he was very, very afraid of bees. It was the same, as he had noticed over time, with paranormal things, especially those that he didn't get used to yet. He did not get used to the imp and never would have to, as eventually, he somehow managed to kill it, and crawled away, still shuddering and trembling. Around him, the angelic army was slowly, but surely dying, unable to throw off the imp of a huge demonic army that the Antichrist had hurled at it. It still struggled, but the pockets of resistance were being surrounded and crushed, and though the demonic casualties were heavy, the Antichrist just kept hurling more and more troops into the fray, both in the valley and on to the hill, while Archangel Michael, himself with a few higher angels choosing to lead the final stance, bellowed "FALL BACK!!! TO THE PORTALS!!!"
Michel crawled away, not looking back, but trying to escape, escape from this slaughter, escape from Death...
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Back then, he avoided Death's scythe, and although wounded he managed to limp back to a portal. But a few days ago, he once more met Death - the Death of Henri de Villiers, and of Ali Mubayyid, the man who killed Henri. That Death claimed their lives, but did not go away after that. And just like in the beginning of his training, and then during that patrol, and, ofcourse, during the Battle at Har Megiddo, fear grasped Michel, the strongest fear that he had ever experienced. Death approached. But it did not come for him. It came for his fear, and for the fear of the entire Ibrahim/Abraham Paladin Division, now renamed quite simply and precisely into Azrael's Division, for the Death now took charge personally; Faid Chamoun now became something like a vice-commander.
There was no more fear. And now, when Michel de Bordeaux looked back on his life, on these all-powerful moments of pure, unbrindled fear... he didn't laugh. He simply didn't understand it, didn't want to understand it and didn't have to neither. Why was he afraid back then, when he first saw an angel? That angel was on their side, he healed people... so that they could fight the demons. Why did Michael frighten him? He was not as good as Azrael, but he still was a commander, he still was on their side. He led them to battle with the demons. And why did he, Michel de Bordeaux, fear the demons, why was he afraid of that imp that attacked him? It could evoke disgust, hatred... but not fear. Not anymore.
And why was he scared by the battle, which - now that fear was removed - now seemed to be the happiest, greatest moment in his life? What was frightening in the pump of adrenaline, the clash of enchanted weaponry, the rain of lead, a demon's sword at one's neck and one's sword within the demon's bowels? Nothing. And Michel de Bordeaux, who lost his fear, gained in exchange a different sin - lust, lust for war, lust for a close, bloody melee, lust for battle. And nothing gave him greater comfort than the knowledge that the war was only beginning, that Azrael himself was going to lead them to battle after battle, that already, the enemy forces drew near, already, the first skirmishes took place...
Already, orders were given for Azrael's Division to assemble and prepare for a forced march, on full battle readiness.