A Hundred Words for Hate (16 page)

What I wouldn’t give for a Hot Pocket about now.

Through bleary eyes he saw the angel. His back was to him, and he appeared to be working, standing in front of a slab of black rock that seemed to have grown up out of the floor. And there was somebody else . . . someone who looked to be in even worse shape than Francis lying atop the slab. The Hellion was curled in a tight ball of nastiness at the angel’s feet.

“Hey,” Francis squeaked, his throat tight and dry.

“You’re awake,” the angel commented, continuing to work.

The Hell beast lifted its obscene head and hissed.

“Let me just finish here and I’ll be right with you,” said the angel.

Then he dropped something wet and red. It plopped to the floor of the cave with a spatter, and the Hellion reacted immediately, snatching it up into its awful mouth, chewing eagerly.

“Glad you won’t be needing that anymore,” the angel said with a chuckle to the being laid out before him.

Then he turned to face Francis. The front of the angel’s robes, already filthy with the dirt and soot of Hell, were now spattered with blood. He held his glowing blade in a relaxed hand, and Francis again recalled the agony as it had entered his head.

Though the muscles in his neck were screaming, the former Guardian angel could not—would not—lower his head. He could see the other figure lying upon the slab now. It had once been an angel. Francis guessed he was likely one of the few who had managed to escape the tortures of Tartarus, reverting to barbarism on the plains of Hell. Now his stomach had been opened, the skin peeled back.

Something that could have been a mountain crumbling roared somewhere outside the cave, and the angel tilted his shaggy head slightly, listening to the sound.

“The changes are coming closer,” he said. “I wonder what it will be like when
he’s
finished?”

“What the fuck are you doing?” Francis demanded. A while ago he had expected to be dead, but now? He had a front-row seat on the crazy bus and it didn’t show any sign of slowing down soon.

“It’s all about change, really,” the angel said. The glowing scalpel disappeared somewhere inside his robes. “Take this poor beast, for example.” He gestured toward the angel on the slab.

“You wouldn’t believe the changes his body has undergone, living the way he did . . . changes that I never foresaw, and I was partially responsible for his design.”

Responsible for his design? Who is this madman?
The thought coursed through Francis’s fevered brain as he fought to keep his head up.

“His internal workings have evolved to survive the rigors of Hell,” the angel continued.

Francis had no idea what this lunatic was talking about, but as long as it kept him from using the light-saber scalpel to open him up, he could keep right on talking.

“To survive what is coming, we must all evolve. I learned that quite a long time ago, but I’ve only recently come to truly understand it.”

The angel approached Francis, and he squirmed on the slab, but to no avail. He wasn’t going anywhere.

“But I knew that things were finally about to come around when I found you out there. It was a surprise, but not really.”

The angel reached out with a bloody hand to stroke Francis’s bald head.

“I knew you would be coming; I just didn’t know when.”

The scalpel was in the angel’s hand again, and all Francis could do was stare in horror at the figure looming above him.

“I was always proud of the Guardian’s design,” he said.

“Who the fuck are you?” Francis growled.

“You don’t remember me . . . yet,” the angel said with a smile that would have given Charles Manson the creeps. “But you will.”

He leaned toward Francis, one blood-encrusted hand holding the former Guardian angel’s head steady as the scalpel once more slipped effortlessly into his skull.

Like a hot knife cutting through butter.

CHAPTER NINE

R
emy helped Jon bury Nathan as the sun started to set over the Arizona desert.

They were silent as they shoveled dirt over the poor man’s battered corpse with tools they had found after foraging through the wreckage of the biodome.

“Tell me about him,” Remy said, desperate to ease the uncomfortable silence.

“Nothing much to tell, really,” Jon said. He had begun to place large rocks atop the fresh earth in an attempt to keep the desert predators away. “He was a good man . . . a kind man, and I loved him.”

Jon looked at Remy with a sad smile as the tears began to flow down his dirty cheeks.

“There, I said it.” He looked skyward. “I said it, and the heavens didn’t open up, and fire didn’t rain down from the sky.”

“Did you think it would?” Remy asked him.

Jon shrugged. “Relationships like ours were frowned upon in the Sons,” he said. “So we kidded ourselves by ignoring our true feelings . . . lying to everyone around us, as well as ourselves.”

The man looked back to the fresh grave, then bent down to retrieve more rocks.

“How pathetic is it that only after he is dead can I say it out loud.” Jon shook his head in disgust. “You should have left me to die under the rubble.”

“He knew that you loved him,” Remy said.

Jon laughed bitterly. “Yeah, I’m sure he did.”

“I can sense these things better than most, but one would have to be in a coma to not see and feel the connection you two had.”

Jon knelt beside the grave. He stayed like that for a little while.

“Thank you for that,” he said finally.

“It’s the truth.”

“Well, thank you anyway.”

“You’re welcome,” Remy said.

Jon stared at the grave again. “It’s kind of funny,” he said. “I can still feel him around me.”

“Not such a bad thing, is it?”

“No, not at all. It’s really kind of nice.”

“We should probably think about going,” Remy suggested.

“Yeah,” Jon said.

“From what I remember of the map, we’re going to Louisiana, right?” Remy asked.

“Louisiana it is,” Jon agreed. “But we’ll have to be careful. It has to be done just right, or it could be disastrous.” He seemed to almost physically shake off his emotions, and was suddenly very professional. “The first thing we need to do is find some batteries for my hearing aid, and then get ourselves cleaned up. I doubt the Daughters of Eve would talk to us if we look as though we’ve just fought a war.”

“Do you think they will talk to us?” Remy was curious, given the feud between the two groups.

“Sure,” Jon said. “Right before they find out who we are, and try to kill us.”

Fernita Green reached into her bucket of filthy water and removed a rag.

“Here,” she said to Mulvehill, handing him the dripping cloth. “Start scrubbing. Anyplace you see this writing.”

For some reason he took it, soapy water dripping from his hand to patter on the threadbare carpet.

“Listen, Fernita,” Mulvehill started. “Why don’t we talk about this . . . ?”

“There’s no time to talk,” the old woman snapped as she frantically rubbed at a blackened smudge on the wall. “I have to get it all off.”

Mulvehill wasn’t familiar with the scrawl, but it looked old, and he got an odd, itchy feeling at the backs of his eyes when he looked at it for too long.

“All the things I forgot,” Fernita said as she scrubbed. “The more I wipe away, the more I remember. . . . It was horrible . . . just horrible.”

The old woman was sobbing as she dunked her brush into the bucket beside her and brought it out again to scrub at the wall.

Cautiously Mulvehill knelt beside her, feeling the spilled water from the bucket soak into the knees of his slacks as he gently put his arm around her. “It’s all right,” he tried to console her. “Everything is going to work itself out. Why don’t we take a break, talk a little, and see what—”

“They were burnin’,” the old woman said, staring at him with eyes red from crying. “All those folks inside, they all got burned up because of me.”

Mulvehill felt horrible. Fernita Green was in genuine pain; he could practically see it eating away at her.

“He was trying to kill me,” she said between sobs, and then with a desperate moan she attacked the wall again, rubbing with all her might to make the markings disappear.

“Who, Fernita?” Mulvehill asked. “Who was trying to kill you?”

The old woman slumped forward, sliding down the wall until her face and hands were touching the ground. She was exhausted, barely able to hold herself up anymore.

“The angel,” she said into the floor, and he thought for sure that he must have misheard her words.

“Who?” he asked again, squeezing her tighter.

“The angel,” she said again, raising her head. “The angel wanted to kill me.”

“Shit,” Mulvehill said, fingers of icy dread tickling the length of his spine. “This just keeps getting better and better.”

Jon and Remy were at a motel on the outskirts of the Sonoran Desert, cleaning up before beginning their search for the Daughters of Eve.

The van from the biodome had been singed a bit in the explosion, but it had proven to still be road-worthy. They’d made a quick stop at the closest megastore, picking up some fresh clothes, a map, and Jon’s hearing-aid batteries.

Remy had just run himself through the shower, and he came out of the bathroom to find Jon sitting on the corner of one of the beds, staring at the room’s green carpet with laser-beam intensity.

“You all right?” Remy asked, drying his dark hair with a towel.

It took a moment or so, and he was about to ask the question again when Jon pulled his eyes away from the rug.

“I’m good,” he said, but Remy wasn’t sure he believed him. The man was pale, sick-looking, and he hoped that it was just the reality of their situation catching up with him.

“Are you done in there?” Jon asked, rousing himself.

“It’s all yours.” Remy stepped aside as Jon grabbed a plastic bag containing his purchases and disappeared into the bathroom, closing the door behind him; seconds later the water in the shower was running.

Remy had bought a new pair of jeans and a powder blue dress shirt. He tore the price tags off and dressed, glancing toward the bathroom, wishing he were alone on this leg of the journey. Something told him that things were only going to get worse, and Jon had already been through enough.

From another bag on the floor, Remy took out the maps he’d bought and unfolded them on the bed, planning the quickest route to Louisiana and hoping the van would last long enough to get them there.

Steam swirled around the bathroom as Jon held on to the edges of the sink, staring at his fogging reflection in the mirror.

But it wasn’t himself he was looking at; it wasn’t a person at all. Jon was seeing a place . . . a place not seen by man or woman for a very long time.

Eden was coming.

He was both in awe of and terrified by the immensity of the place, the wildness of its smell. It was closer now than it had ever been, and soon it would be here.

If only Nathan could have lived to see it.

But it was his sacrifice that had allowed Jon to connect to the special place in a way that his people never had before.

It was as if he were actually there, walking amid the lush, tropical green, feeling the moisture of the humidity upon his naked skin.

The pain was sudden, like stepping on shards of glass with bare feet.

Jon recoiled, his entire body shivering with the intensity of the agony. His gaze fell on the ground at his feet and he realized that where he was standing was inexplicably dead. The Garden around him was lush and thriving, but this area now appeared leached of life.

And then he heard the sounds. They were coming from the dead zone, somewhere very close.

Something was stirring.

Something beneath the earth.

And as it stirred, Jon felt himself growing sicker . . . weaker . . . as if his very life force were being sucked away.

Remy had just finished leaving Linda Somerset a message, explaining that he’d be gone longer than he thought, but would make it up to her when he got back.

First Mulvehill’s bottle of twenty-five-year-old Scotch and steak dinner, now Linda, and he was sure Marlowe would have something to say when he returned.

Jon emerged from the bathroom, interrupting Remy’s thoughts. He was completely naked, and looked even paler, if that was possible.

“We have to find the key right away,” he said, swaying on his bare feet.

“I agree,” Remy said carefully. “I’ve already gone over the maps and I think—”

“No.” Jon shook his head. “We have to get there fast. . . .”

“Yes, I know, and I’m pretty sure I’ve mapped out the fastest route—”

“Faster,” Jon interrupted, panting, as if he’d overexerted himself in the shower. “It has to be faster. We have to be there now.”

Remy rushed to the man’s side as he began to fall, grabbing hold of his arm to steady him. “What’s happened, Jon?”

“Something’s happening in the Garden,” he said, gasping. “Since Nathan did his thing I’m more connected. . . . I had a vision. . . . Something’s killing it.”