I Am Not Junco Omnibus: Books Four - Six (97 page)

“And Tier?”

“Was just like you, Junco. The perfect biological weapon. The SEAR knife exploded him, and his body has been prepped since he was five years old to dissipate a High Order being upon impact. That’s why all his gifts were illegal and unsanctioned. He was seven thousand years of planning. He was a weapon.”

“And I was the soldier.” I let out a long breath and we’re back inside the church, sitting down on the first bench in front of the iconic Fallen Archer. “Was it worth it?” I ask, looking up at my twine.

“I have no idea. But you can go home and find out.”

“What’s waiting for me? Ashur and Selia? The baby? My parents? Gid—” I almost choke on his name. “Is Gideon alive?”

“I dunno, Juncs. We are here and they are there. It’s not the same place.”

I look around the church as I think about what might be waiting for me. Nothing. I might have nothing. Not even my stupid, worthless mother might be alive. “I think I’ll stay.” Isten shifts in his seat. “I think I’ll stay a little longer, Isten. Is that OK?”

“Take your time. You’ve got all the time in the world to be ready.”

I do stay. For how long, I’m just not sure. But each morning when I wake up, I wonder if this is the day I leave. And each day when I lie down in my bed, I say, no. This is not the day.

I have no idea how long this goes on. I’m not sure time passes here. I’m not even sure it’s the same from moment to moment. Some days seem extremely long, some nights barely happen at all. But it begins to drag me down. How many poker games can you play before they’re not fun anymore? How many times can you wander the halls of the Fledge building, or the empty tavern where Ashur used to take me to eat while he watched sports? That Jax Justice picture is still on the dartboard. Every time I go there I throw darts right at the eye, just like I did way back when. I throw so many darts that the eye is just a gaping hole in the paper target.

But the next time I go back, it’s whole again.

This place is on reset.

It’s like… a loop. A time loop.

“Are you real?” I ask the guys as we eat breakfast one morning.

I ask this often. They don’t answer me today.

“I don’t think you’re real,” I say this time. Usually I just let them say yes, but since they’ve decided not to reassure me, I decide to be rebellious. “You’re not real. I’m not real either. This is fake.”

Mish looks up from his eggs. “It’s your dream world, Junco, not ours. I’m pretty sure we’d all rather be in a virtual of Sargassum Island Resort with half-naked girls running around on the sand. But hey, we’re good with waiting it out.”

It hits me then. They’re satisfied. Not happy, not sad, just… satisfied.

I laugh. And I can’t stop laughing. I laugh so hard the guys look at me funny, and when I keep it up, they have no choice but to join me, because that kind of laughter is contagious.

Isten punches me in the shoulder as we grab our stomachs and say, “Oh, shit, make it stop!” over and over again. “Why are you laughing, Junco?” he finally manages.

And then I cry. Because this is all there is for me. Sera promised me satisfaction and this is what that means. Not happy, not sad. Just existing. I have reached a state of satisfaction.

And it’s not even close to being worth it.

Not even close to making up for all the things I gave up to get to this crummy Destiny.

The only thing on my mind right now is how the fuck do I get out of this place?

I’d rather be breaking in half from sadness at losing Tier than the empty satisfaction I have from this empty world.

Chapter Forty-Five—JUNCO

Amelia Habitat – The Band

“Junco?”

I am lifted up from the goo. Again.

I am carried to the water to be washed off. Again.

I don’t even bother to open my eyes, even after the warm shower water breaks the seal that crusts over them. Why? I cough and sputter, vomit a little, even. I just let Lucan wash me and hold me up as the blasts of warm air replace the water.

My hand darts to my shoulder, but—yeah. No wings.

“You don’t need wings or those two fingers, Junco,” Lucan says in that soft
I care about you
voice. “You were perfect to begin with.”

I actually open my eyes for that bullshit. “Don’t, OK? Just don’t.”

“You’re naked. Put some clothes on and meet me in the other room. I have something to tell you.”

He walks out before I can complain, so I just go over to the cubbies and grab the only clothes in there. I pile them on the low couch and take a seat. This time I get jeans, which slip on and fit like they were made just for me, a white tank top, and a brown hoodie with orange lettering that says,
I’ll Work For Beer.
It’s like Braun was in charge of choosing my outfit.
I slide my feet into the field boots and don’t bother lacing them up.

I sigh as I scuff through the open door—so, so tired, even though I know my body has been doing nothing but floating in gel for God knows how long. Lucan looks normal again. Black suit, perfectly coiffed hair, blue eyes, no bat wings or fangs. He taps me on the shoulder and we’re out in space.

“Have a seat, Junco.”

I sit on the air. I still have no idea how he does this shit.

“You’re mine now.”

“That’s just rude—”

“No, you’re mine in that you no longer belong to Crage and Inanna. Your real parents. I took you. He wanted you back, but I said no. If you feel it’s necessary I will explain all the reasons why I think they are bad people—”

I put up a hand. “No, I’m good with that, thanks.” I feel a little self-conscious as the silence drags on, so I guess I better just get it over with. “Sorry for not following orders, Lucan.”

“You did everything right, Junco. There is nothing to forgive.”

I laugh. “I didn’t do anything right. I disobeyed Tier’s order. I told you not to count on me for anything.”

“You did follow orders, Junco. The order was to kill Tier, not me. Tier just felt you needed to make your own choice, so he gave Annun the wrong target on purpose and let you work out what was best. He’s honored that you decided to save him from an eternity of hell.”

It takes a few moments for all this to sink in but once it does… “Wait, he
is
honored? Like, he’s still alive?”

Lucan furrows his brow as I wait, looking up at him expectantly. “You really thought I’d kill him?”

I look away, a little disgusted. “Uh, yeah. You kinda had a one-track mind there, Lucan.
Save me, Junco. Kill the Angels, Junco. Do as I say, Junco. I’m so fucking important, Junco
.” My eyes track back to his smiling face. “This ringing any bells, Mr. I-Own-the-Universe?”

And then he bellows out his joy as roaring laughter.

“What’s so funny?”

“Would you like to know how I did it? Or no? You’re just gonna be a smartass and try to make me feel bad?”

“Whatever.” I wave my hand absently at him. “Get your gloat time in, go ahead. You’ve waited a long time for your party, I won’t spoil it. Tell me how clever you are.”

“The Halo was a shield. Your SEAR knife was the trigger to explode Tier—”

“See, how can he be exploded and alive at the same time?”

“Patience, Junco,” he chastises me. “Tier was made as a weapon. His genetics were changed with gifts and code, much like yours were, but not under duress. When your knife hit his body, he dissipated himself and all those around him. Save for me. I need direct contact with your SEAR knife to be dissipated. It was the one gift I got from the Higher beings who set this whole plan up using me as a pawn. To make it seem as though they were on my side.” He looks down at me with a sad face. “They were not on my side. It took me a very long time to piece together what happened to me on Earth when I lived as a man and what they were doing with me after the death of my Amelia. I was used in a struggle to claim power over that Bridge that we cannot cross, or else we’ll contaminate the other side.”

He wrinkles his nose at this. Like it disgusts him.

“So, they made you do things? That you didn’t want to do? And I was that girl? Who got her head chopped off?”

“They were collecting souls to take across the Bridge. Playing God, if you will. This system is filled with souls. It’s a special place, Earth is. Souls are everywhere. They recycle through life. And your soul was the one they put inside the woman, Amelia. And then my father used that soul to get me to agree to start a war that would last thousands of years. Aesin is my father, that insane Angel you saw out on the Red Rocks plaza. He has always been touched, but too many punishment cycles have left him… intolerable. He does nothing but kill. Some Higher Beings get this way, we all have the demon genetics inside us, some more than others. Aesin killed Amelia—the woman you were back then in those ancient times—collected that soul, and then used it, used you, Junco, to try to make a punishment for me. If I killed you, like I ordered Tier to do, then I was killing the one woman I loved. If you killed me, as you would’ve been ordered to do had Tier not removed you from Earth, then I would have been killed by the one woman I loved.”

“He must really hate you,” I say impulsively. Lucan says nothing to that and I feel a little guilty for bringing it up. It sucks to know that your father hates you. I thought mine hated me for a long time before I figured out the truth, and it really hurt.

“There were other punishments. Other demons they didn’t try to manipulate into being little girls who kill for corrupt governments. Those other Six Demons released a bunch of toxins on Earth to poison the biosphere. We’re cleaning it up. There was a stock of genetics found in a cave… well, let’s just say, my father, Aesin, thought of
almost
everything. He was going to destroy me, my avians and Archers, and the human population. Then use that seed stock up in the ice to repopulate things the way he wanted them. It was creation science engineering on the planetary level. We’ve halted the degradation of the planet, but it’s not all back together yet. Earth has been… decimated. The Six Demons unleashed so many disruptive genetic agents as they traveled down North America. Almost all the humans who are left have been contaminated and the DNA has been compromised. It will require many generations of molecular manipulation to set it right again.”

He stops to let the seriousness of this sink in. “There are only a few million humans on the entire planet. And even the avian have been cut to about ten percent of previous levels.”

“The best-case scenario?”

“This is it, Junco. The best-case scenario.”

“So anyway,” I interrupt because that’s just so depressing. That my entire planet was pretty much annihilated and all those avians died too. I can’t think about it. I can’t. I shouldn’t have to. I did my part, I’m done. I’m done with Earth and humans. I just can’t listen to it. I can’t let it become my problem, even if that’s selfish and disgusting. So I change the subject. “How did you outsmart them, Lucan? Take my mind off how fucked up things are.”

“Gravity,” he says simply. “Gravity is the anti-dissipater.” He laughs at his made-up word. “You see, you can only pull yourself back together if you’re floating in space—in a vacuum, right? All the laws of motion only apply in the strictest sense when they occur in a vacuum. High-school physics, Junco. That’s how the universe we live in works. And that’s how I defeated my father and Inanna. When you shot Tier, the SEAR dissipated him and in turn, he dissipated everyone around him—except me, of course—but Sera and HOUSE activated the Halo shield at the same moment of the dissipation, so all the particles fell back to Earth because of gravity.”

“Oh, I think I felt that. It was strange.” I look up at him. “I bounced.”

Lucan tries to tuck down a smile but he fails and this pleases me. It’s not a joke, but come on. It’s so, so fucked up, what can you do?

“And then HOUSE left Sera. She was very upset at being quarantined up in space when you came back to Earth, but Sera was insistent, to keep her safe for you. HOUSE and I collected all the scattered pieces. It took months to find you. But I pieced you back together first and put you in the Halo virtual with Isten. I told you I’d take care of you, Junco. And I did.”