Redemption of the Dead (2 page)

The
passenger window was blown out; glass mixed with the dust and
gravel littered the cab. Stretching past her, he reached up and
grabbed the edge of the passenger window’s frame and pulled his
body up. With a quick bend forward, he was able to shift his weight
and climb out of the cab like climbing out of a pool. Now on top of
the cab, knees against the truck bed, he tried to open the door.
The handle moved, but the door only budged a half-inch and no more,
and it wasn’t gravity keeping it down. The entire door mangled, the
metal and plastic crumpled, part of the cab side was ripped and
bent over the door, acting like a mini latch. He tried to bend it
upright so as to free the door, but he wasn’t strong
enough.

Wiping the sweat from his forehead and
coughing out some more dust, Joe straightened his body, got as
close to the open window as possible without losing his balance,
then brought his knees back up under him. He reached in slowly so
he wouldn’t tip, and once again put his hands and forearms around
Tracy’s waist.

“Have to get her head free,” he said, straining.
She’ll suffocate, otherwise.
“Come on, Tracy.” He pulled against
her, this time able to have the leverage to pull her away from
under the glove box before dragging her up.

Joe got her
upper body free. Her arms and head hung limp. He quickly debated
checking for a heartbeat, but thought better of it and decided the
best course of action was to just get her free from the
truck.

“I won’t let you die. Not you,
too.”

April had died at his own hand, but
she had already become one of the undead creatures before that.
Despite the wall he’d put around his heart since that day, he found
his kinship with Tracy had penetrated it enough for him to care
about her.

He quickly
adjusted himself so he sat on the truck door, his legs now dangling
inside the cab. He reached low and readjusted his grip on Tracy
before pulling up with everything he had. Her body turned in his
arms, her legs dropping beneath her. He held her tight and with a
heave, pulled her up hard enough so he could momentarily let go and
get his hands and arms under her even more securely. He did the
same thing again, and was able to jerk her body up so her upper
half was now across one thigh, her legs hanging between
his.

Gravity no longer an issue, he put his
fingers to her neck and listened for breathing.

She wasn’t,
and with the hollow moans of the giant undead floating on the air
from downtown distracting him, he wasn’t sure if he felt a pulse
either.

“Tracy!” he
said and shook her. He forced her mouth open, pinched her nose, and
pressed his lips against hers. He breathed out, hopefully getting
enough air in her lungs to jumpstart her breathing. He listened.
Nothing. He yanked on her harder and got her out of the truck even
more. He pressed his palms hard against her chest and pressed down
three times. He breathed into her again and pumped her chest once
more.

Joe kept up
the CPR, whatever it took, however long.

Please, God, no. Don’t take her. Not Tracy. I need . .
.
“. . . I need
her.”

He breathed
into her mouth again, pumped his hands against her chest, waited a
moment, then resumed trying to resuscitate her. Screaming, he
cursed at the sky and got back to work, the heavy dust lingering on
the air not helping him any.

Once more and . . . Tracy
wheezed.

“Yes, yes!
Breathe! Breathe!” He leaned in to give her air again and about
halfway through his breath, she coughed wet dust up into his face
and started to gag. “Yes, yes! Cough. Get it out.”

Invigorated, adrenaline pumping, he
hoisted her into a sitting position and tapped her firmly on the
back several times. Tracy kept gagging and coughing as she let out
wads of wet dust.

Somehow in
the middle of all this, Joe clearly heard the word, “Ow.” He
stopped slapping her on the back.

“You’re . . . hurting . . .” She
coughed and yacked out some more moist dirt. “You’re hurting . . .
me.”

He stopped
and wanted to hit her on the back again to ensure she got
everything, but stopped himself.

Tracy coughed some more before finally
getting in a deep, long breath. She exhaled then panted hard and
fast.

“You’re
alive,” Joe said. “You’re alive.” He couldn’t believe it and the
emotions flooding through him caught him off guard and sent his
thoughts into a whirlwind. Barely able to concentrate, but so happy
she was okay, he reached around her and hugged her tight. “You’re
alive, Tracy. Thank God.”

“Joe . . .” was all she said before
coughing again.

* * * *

Body shaking, every muscle weak from
strain, Tracy held onto Joe as tight as she could as he
piggy-backed her away from the truck and further from the city, the
aim trying to clear the cloud.

She had
nearly died. There had been many close calls since the dead began
to rise, even since meeting Joe, but she had felt herself go to
that place of darkness where any thought and idea of herself and
her body was gone. All she remembered was a strange sense of
awareness that she was on the edge of being transformed into
something new. Whether something good or bad, she didn’t know. Just
some kind of transformation. Yet there was also an extreme
heaviness, one not physical, but almost spiritual.

That was all she could
recall.

She closed her eyes and rested her
head against the back of Joe’s shoulder.

“You okay back there?” he
asked.

“Mm hm,” she said.

“Hey, Tracy, you okay back
there?”

“I said yes,” she said
louder.

“Didn’t hear you.”

The dust
eventually began to clear. They were in the suburbs, a fairly
modern neighborhood that looked to have been built in the eighties,
one they passed when driving back to the city.

Finding
shelter under a large pine, Joe eased her down. When she landed on
her feet, she wobbled and fell against him. Joe grabbed her and
slowly lowered her to the ground.

“Is it . . . is it okay here?” she
asked.

“I think
so,” he said. “While trying to get away from that dust cloud” —he
coughed— “I saw the shadows of a few of them, but made sure to keep
away. Didn’t see any in this neighborhood, though.”

“Do you have your gun?” she
asked.

Joe’s eyes
went wide as he patted himself over. His expression sank. “I gave
it to you.” He started to get up as if he was going to take off
back to the truck, but stopped himself mid-stand and squatted down
again. “Do you?”

Tracy
couldn’t feel the solid security of a weapon resting anywhere
against her. “No, I’m sorry.” She saw the disappointment in his
gaze.

She took a deep breath and coughed
some more. It would probably be a few days before she expelled all
that had built up in her lungs during the accident.

“How are you
feeling?” he asked.

She was sore all over, especially her
gut and chest. She didn’t think anything was broken, just strained.
“I’ll live.”

“Wonder what
caused that dust storm?”

“I don’t know.”

He was running through a mental
checklist, she knew, because she was, too. “It’s sheltered enough
under here, but nowhere near safe. Why don’t you rest here for a
bit then we’ll get up and take it from there?”

She nodded, her head pounding. A rest
sounded amazing.

* * * *

To greet the devil.

Nathaniel’s words were all that
lingered in Billie’s mind ever since he said them.

She was in
the woods, the angel having lifted her and Hank, a man with a few
screws loose, into the air and set them upon a thick tree branch
four or five stories from the forest floor. A lake separated them
from the other side where hordes of the undead had gathered, some
from within the forest itself, others having traversed the bottom
of the lake before climbing up onto the shore.

The lake stained with gray rain looked
like liquid clay. Already the stench of the dead had wafted across
the lake, causing Billie to ensure she only breathed through her
mouth. Nathaniel stood between her and Hank.

“This going to happen like you said?”
Hank asked the angel.

“Yes, it will.” Nathaniel’s voice
seemed strangely calm.

“How’s
what
going to happen?” Billie asked. “You
said these things are going to greet the . . . the devil.” Though
she had never been a church-going girl, she, like almost everyone
else, had heard of this master of evil. She just never believed he
was real, and even now wasn’t sure what to think of what was about
to supposedly happen.

“He will come when he is ready and
will claim dominion over those gathered to greet him. From there .
. .”

“He’s gonna
take over the whole planet,” Hank said. “He’s a bad boy. Very bad.
I don’t know why he’s so bad but he is.”

“Iniquity
was found in him long ago,” Nathaniel said, “and he caused a great
war in Heaven. Him and a third of his brethren were cast
out.”

“To Hell?” Billie asked.

“To the Earth.”

“What? Is this what this is, that
casting out?”

“In a manner of speaking, but the
downfall of Lucifer happened before the world began.”

It
made zero sense. How could the devil be sent to the Earth before
the Earth even was?
This is
the exact reason why I avoid religion,
Billie thought, turning her attention back on the
shore across the way. The undead stood in ranks even despite their
usual disorientation.

“The Earth
existed before the one you know,” the angel said.

“You’re still not making sense.” She bit her tongue,
forgetting for a minute
who
she was talking
to. “Sorry. I mean—”

“Do not be
afraid, Billie. You can talk to me, you can be honest. I won’t harm
you.” The gleam of his golden robe dimmed then morphed into a gray
turtleneck and jeans. Nathaniel’s brilliant visage dimmed as well
and he took on the features of a young man no more than thirty with
dark brown hair and stubble across his cheeks.

His gleaming blue eyes drew Billie in, and she thought
better of herself when her first inkling was to be attracted to
him.
He’s an angel for crying
out loud!
She cast her eyes
downward.

“If I may,”
Hank said, his voice suddenly taking on an attempted British accent
that was both terrible and stupid. Billie cut him a break though.
The poor guy, she gathered, couldn’t help it. “He already explained
it to me, my lady. The gentleman had stated that after Lucifer’s
rebellion there was a war that took place in both Heaven and Earth,
one so devastating and destructive it caused this planet to
essentially be a destroyed battleground. Once all was settled, the
realms were split and the supernatural became that which was
unseen, while the natural was renewed, and man was created and so
forth.”

“You say well, Hank,” Nathaniel said,
“and so it was long ago. Now, the enemy has come before his time to
bring about his final confrontation with On High in a way outside
the ordained events.”

“And if he does?” Billie
asked.

“All will
come to an end and, by proxy, God will seem overpowered in having
what is written altered. This has been Lucifer’s aim since the
beginning: to usurp the throne. We mustn’t let that
happen.”

The ground
shook beneath them. Billie lost her footing on the wide tree branch
and would have nearly fallen off if Nathaniel hadn’t grabbed her
and kept her and Hank’s feet firmly planted.

Trees snapped and fell over, rocks
crumbled off the edge of the lake and tumbled to the water below.
The undead across the way rocked on their feet and collapsed. The
lake before them began to boil, its putrid steam a foul-smelling
mix of rotten fish and sulfur.

“It’s time,” Nathaniel
said.

* * * *

2

The Arrival

T
he lake
bubbled
, the gray of its
waters growing darker with each passing moment. The bubbles on its
surface grew larger until some were as a big as a basketball. The
heat coming off the water reminded Billie of the intensity of a
sauna.

With a roar
of waves, the water shot upward in a wide and high spout, its apex
towering over her and the others by what had to be around ten
stories. She and Hank stepped back while Nathaniel remained
still.

Atop the
enormous tower of water burst forth a blast of white light, its
presence crackling against the air like electricity. As the water
slowly began to descend, so did the mysterious light with it until
its brilliance sat upon the water, its violent bubbles of its boil
beginning to subside. Amidst the light, the form of a man appeared,
average height, average weight. Soon, the light began to dim,
leaving the man standing on the water.