The Forsaken - The Apocalypse Trilogy: Book Two (64 page)

“We needed Gabriel. He was a proud fool who
was glad to see me go and he could have caused trouble if he got
wind of the
continuing
rebellion.”

“So, Michael involved him, and others in a
second
rebellion.” Felon flexed his arms. Some strength was
left in them. One of his hands went to his throat. It was torn and
numb. The deck shifted underfoot. “Gabriel had no idea you were
involved.”

“No.” Lucifer smiled like a cat. “As Angel of
Death, his powers could be quite useful.”

“But
you
never truly conspired with
any of them. All pawns. Even Michael…” Felon looked up at the
buildings. The yacht was inching forward. The street was white with
corpses.

“Of course.” As Lucifer chuckled his feathers
rattled. “You don’t think I would be fool enough to challenge God
in open combat and expect to win? He created the universe!” A look
of disdain twisted his features—tightened into a churlish pout.
“And I was his favorite and they hated me for it. Those fools
gladly turned against me when I was no longer in his favor. It was
a pleasure to bring them down.”

Felon sighed. “And Michael’s death?”

“I always wanted to kill him.” The Devil
smiled. “It was just convenient that Gabriel took things into his
own hands.”

“Now?” Felon spat—his hatred was boiling to
the surface again.

“Now, we await the end of the world.” He
smiled, looked thoughtful. “Not by my hand, no. My tin soldiers are
quite efficient once they’re wound up.” Lucifer looked along the
length of the boat. “Ah, that’s better!”

Felon realized that the boat had been moving
imperceptibly—whether by the Swimmers’ actions or by the Devil’s.
It was inching its way along the flesh-choked Street of Walls.
Fallen had dominion over the earth, perhaps the water too.

“I want to see this.” Lucifer gestured to
him. “Come along.” He walked the length of the deck toward the bow.
Felon staggered after and joined him at the forward rail. Water
splashed. Hissing came up from dead mouths.

“Humanity’s final night. At least the
humanity you know.” Lucifer snarled self-satisfied. “The world of
human slaves is about to be born.” He chuckled. “Even now, missiles
have launched. They’ll destroy the City. The Prime is an all or
nothing kind of guy and he hoped to reach his shelter in time.”
Lucifer sighed. “He had the foresight to target the centers of the
competing primes the world over. They have already detected his
launches, and have fired their retaliatory strikes. It is the
end.”

Felon felt nothing. The yacht inched its way
out of the jumble of collapsed and broken-down buildings. The
Swimmers crowded around it. Their weight heaved it toward the open.
The City of Light slowly came into view. Its lights formed a cloud
of pale orange haze around the buildings. In the sky beyond it,
burning white and red comets conflicted. Explosions echoed and
thunder rocked the water as supersonic aircraft made attack runs.
In the center of the City, lights burned over the surface of
Archangel Tower.

“I’ll step out when the show starts.” Lucifer
chuckled.

“Why?” Felon’s hands gripped the rail.

“You don’t care.” Lucifer’s self-satisfied
state would not let him resist. He laughed. “The Scroll of the Lamb
must not be opened.”

“Revelations.” Lucifer smiled as Felon said
it.

“Exactly.
Angelic
or not, my brothers
understood that Judgment Day would summon the Judge!
He
would take their Principalities from them and make them common. So
imagine
my
predicament. How will I be judged?” Lucifer’s
wings quivered. “I didn’t want to find out.”

“In the City?” Felon gestured across the
water.

“Yes, the Scroll will be destroyed with my
brethren.” Lucifer laughed with finality watching the City. “They
do not expect the attack. Suicidal thoughts do not occur to
immortals.”

“Humanity has it coming,” Felon said and
staggered toward Lucifer leaving a bloody trail.

A heavy bullet pierced the assassin’s hand
continuing an upward trajectory through Lucifer’s back. Felon
couldn’t drop in time. Two more rounds punched him in the shoulder.
As he fell to the deck bullets hit Lucifer as he turned.

A machine gun howled. The Fallen’s wings were
ripped to tatters. Bestial, snarling—his head suddenly like a
wolf’s; Lucifer roared at the gunfire. But the bullets chopped him
up. Felon’s cheek was pressed against the deck. Blood poured over
his shoulder and pooled under his chin. He’d landed with his head
facing away from the gunman. Lucifer screamed like the damned. He
raised his wings to fly but one pinion was cut from him in a
concentrated blast. A final cry and Lucifer dropped on the
deck.

Felon lay very still as heavy boots
approached. From a half-open eye he saw the barrel of an
autoshotgun hover near his face, he grabbed it with his good hand
pushed it away, rolled and kicked upward—both feet in its owner’s
belly.

Felon was surprised to see Wurn fall over the
ship’s rail. The Swimmers tore him to bloody gobbets.

The assassin staggered to his feet. His chest
and back were slick with blood. He coughed, blood spilled out.
Felon kicked Lucifer over. The Devil’s lips moved—vapors of
Ardor
steamed off his features. His body drooped, the skin
and muscle sagging on the bone but did not evaporate. He was dying,
and he had nowhere to go.

Felon dragged him to the sloped front wall of
the yacht’s cabin. They left a sticky trail of scarlet. The
assassin slumped against the glass, slid to the deck with his arms
tight around Lucifer’s chest. They watched.

92 – The Last Lesson

Whistles moved to the mangled back wall of
the bus like she was sleepwalking. The gun was out in front of her,
it was empty but she kept clicking the trigger at the open space. A
low moan started in her that brought more tears from Dawn, and the
other forever kids echoed her sadness.

Finally, Mr. Jay pulled himself to his feet
and moved to her. He reached out and grabbed the empty gun.

“Reload it,” he said, flipping the revolver
open. “And keep fighting.”

“That was Max,” Whistles started and then a
girlish squeak came out of her, and a low groan. She turned her
face to Mr. Jay. “We never told anybody but he’s my little
brother.” And she buried her face in Mr. Jay’s chest.

“Remember him as a boy and a hero—
and
a little brother,” Mr. Jay whispered, and held her tight, swaying.
The bus had developed a rocking unsteady pace. “He bought us time.”
He turned to the many sorrowful gazes around and said: “Let’s not
waste what he gave us.”

Suddenly a roar thundered overhead and a
tremendous light sent bending shadows coursing through the bus. The
brilliance shrieked toward the front of the convoy. Then, a blast
and horrific crumpling noise! The bus slammed into the vehicles
ahead—tires screamed on asphalt, glass shattered. The kids pitched
forward as the bus shuddered to a halt.

Dawn had bit her tongue and came up spitting
blood. Other kids were cursing or crying, holding wounded
limbs.

“A jetfighter!” one girl screamed.

“Almost hit us,” yelled a boy.

Mr. Jay hurried to the front of the bus.
Marcus was nursing a bloody nose, but he opened the doors for the
magician. Dawn ran forward and slipped through before they closed
behind him.

Outside on the ground, she couldn’t believe
her eyes. The lead bus was on fire. Many forever kids and drivers
were out helping—pulling people from the burning vehicle. Beyond
it, she saw that whatever had hurtled in from the sky had hit the
ramp to the elevated highway and exploded, collapsing most of the
structure. There were flames everywhere, and destruction was spread
out in all direction.

The driver, Dahlia, ran back to Mr. Jay. He
raised an eyebrow.

Dahlia shook her head and almost wept.
“Driver and six kids. Lost.”

“Get the survivors on the other buses,” Mr.
Jay said nodding. “Keep moving.” He looked up at the ruined
highway. “We’ll go overland.”

Mr. Jay cursed and then jumped when Dawn
grabbed his hand. Anger flashed in his eyes when he saw her.

“Get on the bus!” he growled, before turning
to Dahlia. “The elevated highway follows the old one. It’ll be
grown over but it’s there. Tell the others.”

He knelt by Dawn. “Stick with the other
kids!” He shook his head when he saw her lower lip slip out.
“Crying won’t always help, and I might not always be around.”

They hurried back onto their bus and waited
while kids from the damaged vehicle loaded. The convoy got underway
again in minutes, slowly at first as the lead trucks picked their
way through brush and overgrown pavement. They finally started
making speed as the land flattened out.

Dawn watched the battle to the west and was
amazed. It seemed to be rolling closer to them—or spreading out
like a grass fire. Even Mr. Jay noticed it and wondered. Apocalypse
was growing.

Jets roared overhead and were gone. Then the
buses themselves fell strangely silent. And everybody felt a weird
quiet. An unnatural calm descended. Everything slowed down. Dawn
felt the tension turn sour in her stomach.

“Oh God, NO!” Mr. Jay screamed, and held his
walking stick high. “Shut your eyes!” And his walking stick burned
white.

There was a flash. Dawn had put her hands up
to cover her eyes, and she clearly saw her finger bones. She
thought she heard someone scream, and realized it was her. There
was another flash of light more powerful than the first—and
another. Silence and dry heat pressed in on her. She wanted to
scream. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears.

Mr. Jay was shouting. His voice sounded
broken as he chanted old words. And then Dawn realized she couldn’t
tell if her eyes were open or not because she could only see
white.

And then the sound hit the bus. A horrific
roar clamored in, splintered the air with heat. Shook them all off
their seats, bellowing it buffeted them on the floor. It heaved the
vehicle skyward and almost pitched it over. For a second, Dawn
thought it was a Hellhound. But there was too much heat and too
much light. And the bus bounced, and all the kids were thrown up to
the ceiling. Dawn pressed her hands over her ears as the thunder
cracked and roared.

Then it was still bright, and the bus stopped
having that sideways sliding feeling, and there was no more
roaring. Distantly, like she’d gone partly deaf, Dawn could hear
the rumble of the engine and grunt of gears shifting—vibrations
came up through the floor.

She opened her eyes and saw Mr. Jay across
from her. He still held the walking stick over his head, but it was
bent. It drooped down to either side of his fist like a piece of
licorice. His lips still mumbled unfamiliar words and his eyes were
half-closed. Then they opened, and he looked at her. Sorrow mixed
with joy on his face as he reached out and pulled her into his
embrace.

“Oh Dawn! I’m so sorry,” he cried, but pulled
away from her smiling. Then his eyes saw something past her
shoulder and his expression changed to horror.

Dawn turned to look. The City was burning.
All its many levels had dropped or folded down. The steel and
concrete was mangled—cinders and flames billowed off the mammoth
pile toward a massive mushroom cloud that ripped a hole through the
thick overcast. The land around the city was burning, trees, grass
and all. And in the flames on the ground Dawn saw shapes of things
on fire. Things like trucks and buildings, and things like people
and bigger things—writhing in the inferno.

She felt Mr. Jay’s arms go rigid as four
flaming shapes steamed out of the holocaust. Just fire and coals at
first, they soon resolved, took the shapes of men on horseback.

Mr. Jay turned her in his embrace. She didn’t
like his look. Behind him she saw the other forever children had
gathered, were hanging over the seats watching as the buses drove
as fast and as far as possible.

“Don’t go!” Dawn screamed, feeling suddenly
that she was about to lose him.

“I’m sorry Dawn.” He hugged her and then got
to his knees—hands stroking her hair.

Then they all heard the pounding horse’s
hooves. Galloping fast, the clink and jangle of harness, the
constant throaty breath of a horse running full out. Dawn saw the
other forever kids’ eyes go round with fear.

“He forgets himself,” Mr. Jay said and Dawn
looked back. Against the orange fires of the dead city, there rode
a pale man on a pale horse. Both were like skeletons in shape, what
flesh they had was stringy muscle stretched over yellow bones. And
the face of the rider was pale without skin, and his eye sockets
were empty, and his exposed teeth gnashed with unspeakable
hunger.

The rider carried a twisted weapon with
handles on it, and a long blade. He slashed outward as he got
closer. The blade clanged against the bus’s mangled body.

“I love you Dawn,” Mr. Jay kissed both her
cheeks and then her forehead. “I will always love you.”

“Don’t go, Mr. Jay,” Dawn pleaded, her chest
tight.

“You’ll be fine with friends,” the magician
brushed tears from her cheeks with his thumbs. “You have it in
you.” Mr. Jay set a palm against Dawn’s chest, smiling. Then he
turned his face, placed his hands on the other kids, and caressing
them softly he said, “You all have it in you.” He smiled at Dawn
then and did a crazy roll of his eyes before shaking his head. “You
can never tell when the cup will come to you. But you’ll know when
it’s time to drink.”

He watched the skeletal monster riding
closer. It swung its weapon and the blade slashed the fender. The
whole bus shook. Mr. Jay leapt out. He grabbed the rider’s arms and
swung a leg over the beast’s neck. The horseman’s eyes burned like
coals. The magician slammed his forehead into the monster’s face
and they struggled. Mr. Jay’s eyes blazed with white fire. The
charging beast screamed and veered away into the burning plains.
They were soon lost against the flaming landscape. Dawn and the
children wept for the magician.