Dying Light (32 page)

I suck in a ragged breath.
But I can’t get the images of the coffin out of my head, of the
dirt falling into my eyes and nose, while I lay there trapped
several feet under the ground.
Caldwell
did that to me—buried me alive. I jumped. This is different. It’s
different.

I take another breath with Ally’s
hands on my back, rubbing it encouragingly.

“
Good,” she says. “Another
big breath.”

I take another.

She points up. “See. That’s the sky.
We just have to get out of this hole. We’re not closed in at
all.”

We start climbing. At first, the
shield surrounding us rubs away the busted up pavement and we can’t
get anywhere. I have to drop the shield so we can use our hands,
knees, and feet to get ourselves out.

My palms are smooth and covered by a
film of white chalk, by the time I pull myself out of the crater
and reach down to pull Ally out after me.

An irritating cold sweat collects
under my clothes. My hands and face are still freezing but my body
is hot.

I glance around. My eyes fall on Tate
Tower. It looks mostly unharmed, the building whole and windows
unbroken, even if the glass is coated with ash.

“
Come on,” I tell her.
“Let’s go see if Sasquatch survived.”

She doesn’t complain about my nickname
for Nikki. She doesn’t even look annoyed.

“
She’s probably okay,” I
tell her. “She’s…sturdy.”

It’s not a great compliment. I guess I
can’t really pretend to care about people that I don’t care about.
But I do care about Ally and I hate that she’s so
worried.

Gabriel appears beside me in all his
winged glory. His suit looks like he just pulled it off the dry
cleaner’s rack, but I’m not fooled.

“
What’s wrong?” I ask
him.

“
Be careful.” He starts to
flicker as if he can’t hold onto his form.

I jog to catch up to Ally, who is
stepping through the busted entrance and into the half buried
foyer.

“
Don’t get too far away
from me,” I tell her. “Something’s up.”

“
What do you
mean?”

“
Gabriel is all glitchy
like when a partis is around. It could be Caldwell or someone as
charming as Jason. Just stay close to me, okay?”

“
Okay.” She searches the
rubble. “Nikki?”

No answer.

Louder. “Nick?”

Her voice echoes in all that
space.

“
Hey, Sasquatch, can you
hear me?”

Still no answer. Nothing
moves.

Ally’s face screws up with concern. “I
never asked where the new location was. I don’t see any bodies
though. We should check the bunker downstairs and then we’ll go. I
can just run down alone?”

A little red flag goes off
in my mind. I can’t quite recall why, but something about this idea
strikes me as
bad
. “No, we should stay together.”

Relief washes over her face. Have I
really been such an ass that she expects me to take off and leave
her at every chance. My chest hurts.

“
I’m sorry,” I say, as she
pushes open the door to the stairwell.

“
For what?” She holds it
open for me.

“
That I went with
Caldwell. It was dumb and unproductive.”

“
He had Winston.” She
pushes her hair behind her ears. “I just wish you would’ve talked
to me first.”

My chest constricts again. “I’m sorry.
I won’t take off again without you knowing about it.”

She snorts. “Don’t make promises you
can’t keep.”

“
Really,” I insist.
“People are always going to go after you to get to me. Getting far
away from you doesn’t work. Instead of chasing me, they grab you
and make me come back.”

“
Warfare for the lazy,”
Ally says, descending the steps. Emergency lights flood the
stairwell, but after a certain point, it’s only darkness. “Go for
the easy target.”

“
You’re not weak.” I sound
pissy even to me. “You’re smarter than me. And
prettier.”

She spares me a smile. “All right,
Casanova. Do you have your phone?”

“
Yes, why?”

“
I think I dropped mine in
the helicopter or on the way down. And I need a
flashlight.”

I punch the correct application on my
phone and a light shines from the camera’s flash. “I’ve only got a
little battery. Sorry.”

Ally points it down into the void.
There is a door, but it’s blocked by debris. My phone dies. Ally
frowns at it before handing it over.

“
If they’re in there, we
aren’t going to be able to get them out,” I say. “Aren’t there
firefighters for that kind of thing?”

“
If they are inside, they
should be safe, assuming no one was hurt in the initial blast and
they were able to get down to the bunker okay. If not, maybe
they’re safe in their new building. The lack of bodies is a good
sign, right?”

“
Right.” I agree though
I’m not sure we’d see a handful of bodies under all this
debris.

I let her frown at the abyss for a
moment longer before we trudge back up the stairwell. I’m about to
ask her about Gideon, but I hear Ally’s sharp intake of breath. I
turn. “What?”

Caldwell has her from behind. His hand
on the back of her neck.

The world stops.
Caldwell’s hands, on a neck. I can’t think. All I can see is his
hands wrapping around Brinkley’s neck and
snap
.

“
Don’t
.” My body ignites in blue flame. “Don’t you fucking
dare
.”

His hold on her throat relaxes and I
can’t let go of the fact that one of his hands can almost entirely
encircle her delicate throat. I try to run through my options. I
can’t actually explode now. Maybe if I can hold a shield around
Ally at the same time I firebomb, but Caldwell already has ahold of
her, so won’t that protect him too?

“
What do you want?” I hear
the trembling fury in my own voice.

“
We aren’t finished and
it’s time we settle matters,” he says. “Come to the cathedral on
State Street, and we’ll finish what we started.”

My body ices at the mention of the
cathedral. The last time I was there, I had to listen to Liza being
murdered and I barely escaped with my life.

“
No,” Ally says.
“Jesse,
no
.”

“
Don’t take her. I’ll come
with you now.”

Ally talks over me. “Don’t be
stupid.”

“—
I will if you leave her
here.”

Caldwell releases her and the second
he does, I erect a shield around her, leaving myself unprotected.
Ally jerks forward, trying to strike him but he disappears, only to
reappear on the landing above.

“
No, Jess, you promised.
You said you’d never leave me alone again.”

It’s hard to look at the tears in her
eyes. I’m an asshole, I know it. And an idiot. Have I really
learned nothing? I was just here with Winston.

“
I know. I’m sorry. But I
don’t want you in that cathedral.”

I don’t want you there
when I die.

I feel Caldwell grab on to me, and
Ally’s eyes double, more desperate.

“
I love you.” I don’t know
if she heard it, because Caldwell chooses that moment to pull me
through the nothing.

Jesse

C
aldwell pushes me away from him and I stumble into a large
room. Columns run from the marble floor up to the cathedral
ceiling. A huge mural of Mary hangs overhead, one hand over her
heart, her other palm out as if in blessing. I remember the last
time I was in this room—surrounded by the sound of Liza screaming
like her skin was being sliced from her bones.

Caldwell grabs my arm, wrenching me
around to face him.

“
Hey,” I say. I try
to
pull
my arm
away, but he doesn’t let go. Instead, he spins me toward the center
of the room: Cindy, Georgia, Jeremiah, a black man, an Asian woman,
and Rachel, holding Winston, stand in a circle.

I lock eyes with Rachel. “What the
hell are you doing here?”

“
Oh you know, one minute
I’m in a helicopter trying to comfort a pug that just watched its
mother jump, and the next,
that
asshole is kidnapping me.” She nods at
Caldwell.

I try to picture it—Rachel holding
Winston, soothing him, and Caldwell popping in and out with both of
them in tow.

Caldwell claps his hands together. “It
was quite challenging getting you all here today. First I had to
find you, discover who you were. Then I had to set a stage worthy
of such an event. I had to blow up a whole city just to give us a
little privacy.”

Caldwell laughs, and Rachel and I
exchange worried glances.

Cindy scoots over to my side. “What’s
going on here?”

Her Texas drawl is even thicker than
usual, and it doesn’t take a genius to know she’s terrified out of
her mind. There’s too much color in her cheeks and her eyes are too
wide.

“
No idea.” I tell her and
take Winston from Rachel.

Caldwell can’t seem to wipe that grin
off his face. “With all the commotion, no one will notice if we get
a little out of hand.”

I search the faces in the circle. I
know Cindy and Rachel have powers like me. And I’ve seen Georgia
suck all the life out of a room. But I don’t know what Jeremiah,
the black man, or Asian woman can do.

I point an accusing finger at
Jeremiah. “You said you weren’t partis.”

“
Ah, you’re right.”
Caldwell says. He crosses behind Jeremiah, speaking over his
shoulder “Mr. Tate is our prophet. Every tale needs a teller, and
he is ours. Not
my
choice, mind you. But we make do with what we are
given.”

Caldwell’s giddiness is horrifying.
He’s practically prancing around the room. I’d rather he be trying
to rip my head off.

“
Like Matthew or Mark,”
Cindy says. Obviously, she isn’t having as much trouble staying
focused on the conversation as I am. “How’s that
possible?”

Jeremiah doesn’t say
anything.

“
Don’t
be modest,” Caldwell says.

“I have visions,” Jeremiah
says, as if he knows prolonging this will only make it worse. “I’ve
seen each of you as you were chosen. I’ve seen what you’re meant to
become and what will happen to the world.”

“Yes, now that we’re all
acquainted, let’s not waste time.”

My shield goes up.
Everyone but Rachel takes a step back. Georgia’s black death
ribbons reach up from behind her and strike Cindy, her eyes rolling
up into her head as she collapses. Dead.

Blue flames erupt around
Georgia and she starts screaming as if she’s been lowered into
boiling water.

Rachel and I exchange a
glance.

And run.

Ally

I
walk four blocks in each direction, trying to get a sense of
where State Street is in relation to the destroyed Tate Tower, but
I can’t. I don’t think it’s in this part of the city.

Firefighters and police flood the
streets. I’m approached by three separate personnel.

“
Ma’am, are you all
right?”

“
I’m fine,” I say to the
person hidden behind the mirrored visor. “Help someone
else.”

They never need to be told twice. They
rush on to the next person without stopping. Cops break up groups
of looters who are trying to carry TVs bigger than themselves out
of busted store front windows.

“
Al?”

It takes me a moment to process the
sound of my name.

“
Al!”

I turn toward the sound of the voice
and see Nikki in black tactical gear, gun slung over one shoulder.
She is an imposing figure in the desolate landscape. Her high
ponytail and taut face are severe.

She runs across the street and
squeezes me hard, crushing me against the scratchy vest she wears.
She kisses me just as hard, cupping my face in her hands and
exhales a breath like she’s been holding it for hours. “Thank god,
you’re all right.”

“
I’m glad you’re okay
too.” I place my hands over hers. “I saw the tower. Did everyone
get out?”

Her face pinches. “Caldwell took
Jeremiah. We don’t know where. We’re checking each of Caldwell’s
properties one by one. We’ve been at it for a while.”

“
He took Jesse to the
State Street Cathedral. Maybe Jeremiah is there as
well.”

Nikki reaches up and presses the
snail-shaped device tucked into her ear. “Target 7: State Street
Cathedral. Move in five.” She gives me a once-over. “You’re
coming?”