Dying Day Page 6

  He smiles. “My reputation precedes me.”

  “Your arrogance precedes you,” Gabriel says.

  I turn and gape at him, surprised by the harsh tone. “Tell us how you really feel, Gabe!”

  Michael smooths a hand over the lapel of his suit as if he’s surprised to find himself wearing it. It’s the same beautiful suit that Gabriel has on… Really, what is it with angels and Versace?

  Michael starts to circle me with slow, deliberate steps, his fingers still trailing along its surface.

  It reminds me so much of Caldwell. The way he walks—walked—hands in his pockets, one foot in front of the other—very devil may care.

  The angels swarming all around us fall away suddenly. Their darting forms no longer darken the sand.

  In a blink, they appear behind Michael, neatly lined up. But they aren’t wearing Versace—or whatever the angel equivalent is. They’re armored in light. A shimmery gold glow covers their chests and limbs. Maybe it’s not armor at all. Maybe it’s pure power.

  The talons are gone from their bare feet and hands, and they look so normal that I wonder if Gabriel has a crazy talon form. I hope to never find out.

  We stand in the sand, facing each other, battle ready. Well, they look very battle ready. I really have no idea what I’m doing. How do you even fight angels? I’ve got the shield and the firebombs and all that, but I suspect they have tricks for that sort of thing. And if they don’t, what pathetic angels they are!

  Michael continues to run those long, tapered fingers over the surface of my shield, causing violet ripples to flow around me.

  “You did an excellent job of hiding her, Gabriel, I will give you that,” Michael says. He fixes his brutal, blue eyes on the angel standing at my left shoulder. “Until she reclaimed her power, I didn’t realize who she was. And Azrael has kept me from finding the other.”

  Azrael. Maisie’s angel. I’m about to open my mouth and shout obscenities at him. If he thinks he’s going after my sister. I’ll tear him apart where he stands.

  Gabriel’s hand shoots out and seizes mine. He squeezes so hard I yelp.

  “Geez,” I whisper.

  Make no mention of Maisie. Do not even speak her name. You’ll put her in grave danger.

  Because she’s the only partis still alive? I ask.

  Yes. And other reasons.

  “I didn’t even know what she was when Caldwell put her right in front of me. Of course, he was too emotional, but they often are about their offspring. An unfortunate biological imperative, I’m sure. But that was distracting enough to hide the truth of who she is.”

  “She, she, she,” I say with a snort. “My name is Jesse, you know.”

  His smile widens. “Is it?”

  No names, Gabriel reminds me.

  “Well, you know, Madonna was taken.”

  He smirks. “Congratulations on reaching ascension,” he says, flicking his blue eyes to me. “It is very noble that you are willing to sacrifice your own heart for the sake of your kind. You must have your reasons. Perhaps you’ve grown tired of her?”

  Michael smiles, revealing his brilliant, wolfish teeth. Man, I can see why he and Caldwell got along. This guy doesn’t look congratulatory at all. He looks like he wouldn’t mind putting his fingers through my eye sockets.

  Meanwhile, my stomach feels like there is a fist curled around it. Sacrifice my heart? No one mentioned anything about sacrificing my heart to ascend…did I miss the freaking memo?

  That better be a metaphor he’s using, Gabe. Like me being a cold-blooded killer sort of thing.

  Michael clucks his tongue. “You haven’t told her everything, Gabriel. No wonder she was so willing to slaughter her own family.”

  You must guard yourself, Gabriel says. But he’s whispering through my mind instead of speaking aloud. Some attacks can pass even the most steadfast of shields.

  “No doubt you’re warning her not to believe a word I say,” Michael says with a boyish pout. “But tell me, Gabriel. What lie have I told her?”

  Gabriel says nothing.

  “Tell me one lie I’ve spoken.”

  Still nothing.

  Michael meets my eyes and they flash, feral, like fox eyes in the high beams of a car’s headlights. “Maybe I’m not the one you should worry about, Jesse. I’m not the one who tricked you into sacrificing the woman you love.”

  My mouth opens, but Gabriel’s hand is stone-hard on mine. A stream of swear words pours out of my mouth. Finally, when I’m sure I won’t kill Gabriel, I blink back tears and yank my hand free. “I’m glad to know that my angel isn’t the only cryptic one in the universe. It must be an angel thing.”

  Michael laughs.

  “What’s so damn funny?”

  “My angel. I suppose it’s true enough. He is yours, whatever form you take.”

  I default to the only weapon I’ve always had. My sarcasm. No matter how bad things get, it never leaves me. “Do we need to have the talk? A little how-to-communicate-with-humans 101? I’ve had to give Gabriel the talk about eight times now, but he’s getting better.”

  Michael doesn’t take my bait. He only gives me an amused grin. But there’s no real humor in it. Again, I get this sense that this shield is the only reason he hasn’t torn my eyes from my head yet.

  “Your faith in her amazes me, Gabriel,” Michael says. “Even after all the horrors, you still serve her.”

  Hey, what horrors is he speaking about? Killing people? “It’s not like you left me a choice, buddy.”

  “I dare not believe I know better,” Gabriel says.

  Michael’s grin widens. “Because your loyalty makes you a fool. That was always your problem. If only I could persuade you to be loyal to me.”

  Michael gives Gabriel a devilish wink. Then he disappears, leaving only the vast beach stretching out before us. And his whole army disappears with him.

  We are on the tundra again—the convergence point as Gabe likes to call it—hunkered inside my shimmering purple field, and I’m more confused than I’ve ever been. I’ve always been confused by almost everything that has to do with the partis and angels and weird powers and stuff, but I thought I had an idea of what was going on. The gist: The angels are fighting over the fate of the world. Some of the angels want to keep it safe, others want to destroy it. And it’s the choice of the planet’s apex that tips the scale.

  But none of that makes sense now. Michael suggested so much more…

  I tuck my chin in the stolen coat and try to process what the hell just happened. But let’s be honest here, thinking has never been my strong suit.

  “So…” I say to the vast shelf of ice and snow before turning my gaze on Gabriel.

  The tension has left his shoulders, but his face is stony as ever.

  “You and Michael?”

  Gabriel only blinks at me.

  “I mean, that wink…”

  No laugh. No smile. No mischievous grin. I guess my humor doesn’t work on angels. Alternative? Stuck together in crappy sadness.

  Best to just face this head on then. That’s what Ally would do—but she’s always been braver than me.

  Ally.

  My chest clenches.

  If she were here, she would tell me to pick just one part of the problem, just one question. And from there, hack my way in.

  You haven’t told her everything, Gabriel. No wonder she was so willing to ascend.

  “So tell me the truth,” I ask, my skin turning as cold as the barren landscape around us. “What is going to happen to Ally?”

  Chapter 5

  Ally

  The flight to Oklahoma is quicker than I thought it would be. Snow is falling in loose, non-committal flakes as we touch down in a wide-open runway. After the settling bump of landing, my door slides open and I’m greeted by a man wearing giant earmuffs. He offers me a hand and helps pull me from my seat out into the frigid air made colder by the merciless helicopter blades.

  I pull my red coat tighter and loo
k around, trying to get a sense of where I am and the time.

  A strip of concrete extends to what can only be described as a sloping slab of concrete. It slants as a boat ramp might, disappearing beneath the horizon of my vision.

  “That’s the base,” Nikki says, catching my gaze. “You enter there, and it takes you a mile underground.” She turns and points in the opposite direction. The concrete roadway extends toward a gate, ending in a concrete barrier and presumably connecting to a road on the other side. “And there’s a whole lot of nothing over there. Lawton is about forty miles east. Nothing but small towns from here to there.”

  I look at the base again, and a sense of foreboding washes over me.

  Nik laughs. “Yeah, it’s not much to look at, but it’s safe. It’s true it’s a little clinical, but there are certain parts that are downright homey. Hopefully, we won’t be here long.”

  Perhaps she is right, but all I can think about is that movie where a zombie infection originates from such an underground facility. And the idea of going so deep underground doesn’t make me feel safe. It makes me feel trapped.

  “Do you really think we’ll be safe down there?” I ask. I fall into step beside her as Gloria’s bed is pushed ahead. Maisie carries Winston on my left side. I take just a moment to reach out and squeeze her arm. It’s a silent question that she seems to understand. You okay? She nods as if I’ve spoken.

  “If Jesse goes nuclear, I don’t think even five hundred miles underground would do any good. I think Jeremiah is hoping for some kind of minor catastrophe. A place to hide until the worst passes. Of course, you’re right. There are limitations.”

  “Jesse won’t hurt us,” Maisie says. She glares at us, her eyes bright and sunken. The skin under her eyes is so dark. Too dark for a sixteen-year-old.

  Nikki’s jaw tightens. “I hope not, kiddo.”

  “Don’t call me kiddo.”

  Maisie marches ahead of us, her blond hair blowing in the wind. She’s scrambling to keep pace with Gloria and the attendants who are pushing her bed down the ramp into the base.

  “Sorry,” Nikki murmurs. Maisie’s already charged too far ahead. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

  “I know,” I say, and squeeze her arm again. “But her parents are dead and her sister is…”

  How do I finish that? Missing? On a rampage? Endangered?

  “Right,” Nik says, the lines around her mouth deepening. “I keep forgetting that those monsters were her parents.”

  “Monsters or not, I’m sure anyone would be confused if their parents were killed by their sister.”

  Nikki only nods. “She’s going to need a lot of therapy.”

  I snort. “We’re all going to need a lot of therapy.”

  Nikki turns and offers me a fist. I only frown at it.

  “May we all live long enough to get the therapy we need,” she says. It’s a devilish smile that lights up her face. If I’m being honest with myself, she’s cute.

  I brush my knuckles against hers. “May we be so lucky.”

  We laugh, short, choked sounds. We sound like two people on the verge of losing it.

  “Of course, I’m pretty sure that isn’t how fist bumps work,” I say. “So you’ve probably disqualified our luck by misuse alone.”

  Nikki only smiles bigger.

  I add two more items to my to-do list, though. Two things I need to do when both Nikki and Jeremiah are out of earshot: contact Gideon, and talk to Lane. And maybe also pass a warning to Maisie, if the opportunity arises.

  I’ll have to keep my eyes open for the chance.

  I cast a look over my shoulder and see Lane and Jeremiah in deep discussion. Lane’s head is cocked so he can better hear whatever the man in the sweater vest and wool coat is saying.

  He looks up and meets my eyes. I cut mine to the right—to nowhere in particular—with a slight incline to my head. I hope the message is clear. It’s easier for two people to find a closet to talk in if both are aware they’re looking for said closet.

  His expression remains guarded and unmoving. I can’t tell if this is a refusal to talk to me, or if this is his way of being discreet while Jeremiah continues to pour instructions into his ear. He used to care about Jesse once upon a time. I find myself praying that hasn’t changed. The very fact that Jeremiah chose him out of everyone gives me hope.

  When I turn back, I bump into Nikki, who has stopped walking. I yelp in surprise and she mumbles her apology. Then I see why she’s stopped.

  We are in an enormous holding area that reminds me of the DMV after hours for some bizarre reason. Empty and dark windows sit to the left, and it is easy to imagine a queue lining up there. But to the right are double doors.

  A scrub-clad medical team has appeared and surrounded Gloria and Maisie. Maisie is being ushered into a wheelchair and a nurse is trying to remove Winston from her lap. Maisie isn’t having it.

  “Nik,” I say, and fortunately that’s all I have to say to initiate the chain of command.

  “Jer—” Nikki says.

  Jeremiah pauses in his instructions to Lane and looks up just long enough to assess the situation.

  “The dog stays,” he calls.

  The nurse’s cheeks blush and her jaw sets. She is clearly unhappy to make this accommodation, but she stops trying to take Winston from Maisie’s arms, which is good for Winston. If Maisie had squeezed him any tighter, she might have popped his little eyes from his head.

  “Where are they taking them exactly?” I ask. I know they need more medical care but I don’t want to lose track of them in this enormous place.

  “Gloria needs more surgery,” Nikki says, flipping her ponytail over one shoulder. The orange streaks stand out against the black sweater she’s wearing. “They did as many reconstructive surgeries on her bones as they could before moving her, but there are a few follow-ups that need to be addressed. She had countless pins added. She’ll be lucky if she can ever walk again.”

  My heart aches. Oh, Gloria. Even if she wakes from the coma, a long, hard road to recovery lays before her.

  “And her kidneys aren’t doing so well either. They’re failing. It’s unclear if she’ll need an actual transplant or perhaps just several rounds of dialysis until they can function on their own. Of course, this says nothing of the crushed muscles and damaged veins.”

  I place a hand over my heart.

  “She should count herself lucky that it wasn’t her head, and most of her vital organs seem all right. She’s incredibly lucky.”

  “Crushed and possibly never able to walk again,” I remind her. “Let’s not go too far.”

  She concedes the point with a nod of her head.

  “What about Maisie?”

  “They’re just monitoring her. I am sure you’ve had enough experience with Jesse upon resurrection to know that her body will heal, but she can use some TLC until it does.”

  I do remember. It seems like only yesterday that Jesse was almost decapitated by Eve and died of blood loss and spinal cord damage. For days, I fretted over her while her body worked its magic. Then she was up and moving, albeit stiffly and begrudgingly. She never felt well for the few days after. That could explain Maisie’s haggard appearance—or the buckets of sadness that we’ve heaped on her.

  “Let me give you a brief tour,” she says. “And you too, if you’re interested.”

  “Yeah, thanks.” Lane sidles up to her right side as soon as Jeremiah disappears through an adjacent door, the blue phone light in his ear lit up to signify a call. Lane sees me watching. “He says his wife is on her way.”

  “Yeah, we’re moving everyone here that we can,” Nikki says, pushing open the door which just swung shut behind Maisie’s chair. “This base has the capacity to house over sixty thousand.”

  “Sixty thousand!” I balk. This place must be even bigger than I imagined. That creeping sense of descending into a pit where I’ll never see the light of day overwhelms me again.

  “We can sustain t
hat population for about six months on the rations that have been stocked here over the years. But if a global event were to happen, we would have to establish a long-term solution.”

  “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Lane says gravely.

  I must agree with him.

  Maisie, Gloria, and the team hook a right through a set of doors that say do not enter.

  “This is the medical wing,” Nikki says, gesturing at the swinging doors. “It sits here in the center, so it is accessible by all eight units, each with a different entrance.”

  It’s not hard to imagine. The tiled floor and white walls have a very hospital look to them.

  We keep moving on.

  “The base is divided into eight units,” Nikki says. She leads us down the hall away from the medical ward to an elevator and mashes the down button. “Think of them as octagonal shafts under the earth. We are in unit three, which has sixteen levels like every other octagon. Each unit is meant to accommodate eight thousand occupants. Levels one through eight are the living quarters. Levels nine through eleven are cafeterias. Levels twelve through fourteen are work stations. At full capacity, people will be assigned work to help maintain and supply their unit. Level fifteen is for recreation and level sixteen is the only joined level.”

  “Joined with what?” Lane asks as I continue to count the tiles under my feet and cast glances over my shoulder as if memorizing my way out.

  “The other units,” Nikki says. “It’s a gathering place if we need to assemble for any reason. Important announcements. Rallies.”

  To hold each other, pray, and say goodbye to the world as we know it, I think.

  Nikki mashes the button for the third floor.

  I’m holding my breath as we descend. Get ahold of yourself, I groan. What is wrong with me? I act like I’m going to prison.

  We step off the elevator onto level 3. It opens on an enormous common area. Lounging furniture of all kinds is scattered around the perimeter of the walkway. The way the walk and walls curve, I get the sense that I’m moving through an enormous hive, this octagonal shape like countless interlocking honeycombs.

  We move past the lounges, past the rec area with ping-pong tables and fake plants. Past the dormitory-style bathrooms with their small mosaic tile and fluorescent lights, and then stop in front of a door marked 3.