American workers are the most productive in the world. You know those little tags that read, ‘Made in China,’ or ‘Made in Mexico?’ American workers make those!

The sanctuary was quiet as Mike sat talking to God and studying the broken man affixed to the large cross hanging on the wall above the alter. And though it was quiet, he never heard him enter and take the seat right behind him.

“I have been sent to answer your prayers,” came the voice.

It was so sudden, that Mike jumped and spun around. He watched as a glowing figure slowly manifest before him.

The fear must have been easy to see in his eyes, as this figure said, “Do not fear for I am an Angel.”

The homeless man froze as wings spread from the shining body, casting a shadow over Mike’s unshaven face.

“Why do you wish to die?” the Angel asked.

Ashamed, Mike answered, “My life has no purpose and I’m simply a waste of humanity, space and breathe.”

“Would it not be better if you were to ask for purpose in your life?”

“Perhaps, but I can’t seem to get an answer.”

“Then allow me to give you that answer…if you’re willing?”

“Yes.”

Without another word, the Angel gently wrapped his wings around Mike, pulling him so tightly against it’s body that Mike couldn’t breath. Then he saw the flash of the blade, but too late, as it penetrated his rib cage.

There was no pain as the Angel released him and allowed the mortally wounded man to slip to the cool stone tile. Mike opened his eyes to look at the murderous Angel, knowing he’d been tricked.

In its place stood the dark red features of a dragon, bony outspread wings, covered in a thin, scaly and oily membrane and short, thick horns affixed to its forehead. Mike gasped for words, but nothing came.

“You wanted purpose,” it laughed, “and now – you have it.”

Mike felt for the blade, still hilted in his chest, and slowly drew it from his failing lung.

“That’s the blade Abraham was supposed to use on his son, Issac. When that failed, I stole it from him.”

Again the beast laughed, only longer and more guttural, bellowing “And now it is yours – use it wisely my little fool – go forth and slaughter!”

Before Mike could get to his feet, the thing that stood over him, vanished, leaving behind only the foul stench of burnt sulfur and brimstone. With renewed strength and desire, Mike crawled to his knees, then staggered to his feet.

He stood there, holding the blade. Mike quickly looked at his blood soaked shirt and checked the wound beneath it; it was already healed jus’ as he supposed it would be.

His strength having fully returned, Mike walked over to the large fount and dropped the blade into the holy water. He stood there, watching as the blade bubbled and fizzed, before reaching into the water to retrieve it.

As he grabbed, Mike felt an over-sized clawed hand grab him by his left shoulder and yank him back, spinning him about.

“What have you done, my little fool?” roared the beast.

The beast picked Mike off the floor by his head. And though surprised at the sudden onset of violence, he plunged the still wet blade into the beast’s midsection.

The beast stepped back in surprise, howling long and low before vaporizing into a dark and putrid smelling mist then into nothingness. On the floor, lay Abraham’s blade.

Mike picked it up, withdrew a piece of leather from his back pocket, and gently wrapped the blade in it. Then he removed his blood stained shirt and shook his wings free of their confinement before gliding towards the heavens.

Archangel Michael had won another round with evil and finally, after several millennia had even recovered Abraham’s missing blade. The boss would be happy.

Congress has passed a bill making it illegal to kill Buffalo simply for their wings or Wolves for the bain.

Nancy Pelosi says she wants to see President Trump in prison — but he’s pretty busy, so I doubt he’ll have time.

He loved how his girlfriend woke him up, whispering sweet nothings in his ear, then climbing on his manliness for amazing morning sex. However, he hasn’t enjoyed her companionship so much since her funeral.

Half of their love, after all, is dead.

Speech, it had been how the old man had made his living at one time. Mostly alone now he did not talk much, and when he did words tumbled slowly outward with long and painfully drawn pauses where no comma or period should be – empty spaces filled by silence.

Isolation comes with a staggering price.

The Marine Corps sniper lay still, trigger-finger slightly touching the thing inside the guard. His spotter lay next to him, field glasses pressed against his cheek bones, before whispering, “On my signal — send him to Hell.”

The Grim Reaper stood off to the side, unseen, but grinning widely.

The Higgins Boat slapped hard on the choppy swells as it motored forward across the open seas and towards the beach code-named ‘Omaha.’ He felt seasick within moments and soon the large breakfast the Navy had fed him was washing back and forth on the bottom of the boat with the vomit of others experiencing the same.

Half-an-hour later came the call from the Coxswain, “Standby to disembark!”

Men who had been talking seconds before, fell quiet, some crossed themselves and mumbled prayers. Others, like 19-year-old Johnny Geiger, slid the bolts back on their Garand and charged the weapon.

Then THUMP! The craft came to an abrupt halt and the forward facing ramp dropped into the surf. Out of it spilled men into a thick cross fire from the Nazi’s MG-42’s.

Those that didn’t fall dead at the first raking of the machine gun fire, found themselves in the freezing ocean, over their chests. Johnny grabbed the dead and floating body of a man and used it as cover and an aid to wade to shore.

Coughing up water and breathing heavy, he watched as men dropped in the sand, torn to pieces by gunfire and explosions. Johnny huddled against a large steel hedgehog, placed in the sand to keep Allied forces from advancing tanks and other mechanized units onto the beach head.

Suddenly, a blast, only a few feet away, lifted the terrified young man off the ground and slammed him back into the surf. The shock-wave left him in a state of confusion and it took him a few seconds to not only clear his head but to actually understand what he was seeing.

---

“Oh, mon dieu, Louis!” a frightened woman screamed in French.

Louis raced to the waters edge to pick up his son, who had disappeared momentarily underwater only to reappear in the arms of a young man dressed in full battle gear, only to have the soldier disappear into the waves the following second, leaving his son safe.

“As-tu vu ça?” she cried as her husband handed their little boy to her.

“Oui, mais je ne peux pas l’expliquer,” he answered, shaking his head in disbelief.

---

The beach was filled with tourists; gone were the dead and dying, soldiers, the gun-fire and explosions and the sky was blue with sunshine beaming down where once he’d seen cloudy overcast gloom. Johnny had no time to think about the sudden change as he saw a small child floating in the surf.

Instinctively, Johnny reached over and yanked the child next to his body. He curled over it in such a way as to protect the little boy from the murderous gunfire that tore up the beach as he watched a man wearing nothing more than swimming shorts race towards he and the child.

And as Johnny began to scramble to his feet, another shell tore into the sand and close by, sending both he and the little boy tumbling violently through the air. When Johnny recovered, the boy was gone.

Panicked, he searched for the child, then knowing there was nothing more he could do, scrambled across the open beach, rejoining his unit as they prepared to assault one of pillboxes embedded on the cliff-side. Johnny looked back, chalking it up to the stress of battle.

All things considered and life being as it is…

I managed to burn myself on the barrel of a sprinkler head as I worked to repair it.

“Forever together,” he glared as he squeezed the trigger.

The bullet ripped through my face but failed to kill or render me immediately unconscious. So I heard the gun discharge a second time and his body drop hard to the linoleum beside me.

When I woke, I had the nastiest headache and foul taste in my mouth. Looking around, I wondered how emergency crews had missed me as my would-be murderer was no longer in the room.

Dizzy and disoriented, I stumbled to the hospital. There I found him, in a bed, head wrapped in clean gauze, tubes and wires hanging off of him.

Quietly, I sat in the chair next to him, waiting for him to awaken. As he stirred, I ran my graying, swollen and cold hand along his forearm.

He looked at me, eye as wide as any I’d ever seen, as I whispered through my broken jaw and jagged teeth, “Forever together.”