“We will expedite our glorious fathers! The return of Uriel, the divine sentinel, the reborn Lesbians to stand guard upon hir gate!”

A woman screams, chokes, crashes against furniture. A shrieking of crickets. Burgess Meredith, young and saturnine, bellows from offstage, cackles, laughs, slaps palms together.

“Rise! Rise!” Blare of trumpets. “You have been chosen of the lord God! Now you must destroy yourself, be one with us, be one with our kingdom!”

Another voice from below the floor: “Take it! Let this night lead you to us! Make you well again!”

A chiming of bells echoes off the distant cliffs of the city. A cacophony of seagulls, crashing of waves, the orchestra loses its goddamn mind, strings warring on brass, percussion shaking the walls of Jericho.

“Resist! Desist!”

In her hand a triangular knife. The old man’s blood wet upon her dress. The music and voices swell beyond bearing and—