Just a Little Death (Children of the Apocalypse Book 1) (21 page)

I wondered what they saw when they looked at us that made them so frightened. “What does Death look like to humans?”

“The reaper, skeleton under a dark hood. That’s what you look like too.” Pete said. “I look like a death ridden corpse, black skin that falls off and sunken-in eyes. War looks like he’s gone through battle, wound-covered and blood-splattered. Kaleb looks like he’s starved to death. Ruthie though… Ruthie looks amazing. White draped robes, flowing curly black hair down to her waist and of course her white wings.”

I looked around at all of them. “Why don’t I see that?”

“Because you aren’t human. You never were. You get to see the subtler signs. Ruthie’s wings, the red in Lucile’s eyes, the skulls in your dads. We’re not even sure why you can’t see much else yet, but I think it’s a developed skill.”

“The divine being in you sees the divine being in others. It’s how we know what we all are. Those humans are in between worlds because their soul needs to be claimed, they see us for what we are, not what we want.” Aeron motioned to the couple as they disappeared around the corner.

We continued to shuffle along the sidewalk as thunder crashed overhead. The flashing neon lights of the pizza parlor bounced off the brick of the building. Squeaking sounded as Kaleb pulled open the black door and let us all in. The smell of dough and sauce filled my nostrils when we walked in and the door shut behind us with a little snap.

Ruthie’s and Kaleb’s shoulders touched mine in the small lobby. I moved backwards and found myself against the door, but if I had moved forward I would have been at Pete’s and Aeron’s back. I pressed my hand against the cold metal of the door and it helped ground me from the fear of being closed in.

I took a deep breath and tried to focus when the waiter came up. His eyes didn’t hold the same reflection that the people outside did. Which I suppose was good because it meant he wasn’t supposed to be dead, like half the other people we had encountered.

I couldn’t tell if he was smiling behind his medical mask or not. “Just the five of you tonight?”

Aeron nodded. “If you have a table away from other people that would be great.”

“We’re slow tonight, that won’t be a problem.” He turned and grabbed a couple of menus and led us towards the dining room. “You’ll have to excuse us, we’re short staffed tonight. Many of my employees are out sick.”

The plague, I was sure. He led us to a large booth that could easily sit four on each side. I took an edge seat and looked at the menu. Forty dollars for a pizza. I put the menu down and took a deep breath. Prices would go down as soon as the famine was over.

“Two pizzas?” Aeron asked. “It’s almost eighty, but we’ve got it covered between the five of us. Not to mention we’ll have left overs for breakfast.”

There was no sense in wasting food when a pizza cost forty dollars. “Sounds like a plan to me. I want pepperoni.”

“We’ll make it simple and just do two of those.”

Everyone nodded in agreement and piled the menus in the middle of the table. It took the waiter a few minutes to get back to us with glasses of water.

“The water has been cleared by the CDC to be plague free. I hope that you enjoy it. I’m sorry but because of the rise in prices, we have no soda to offer, but do have tea if you’re interested.”

We all shook our heads. “We would like two pepperoni pizzas though.” I said and handed him the menus.

He didn’t bother writing the order down, but did take the menus before turning away from the table.

“We made good time today, hopefully we’ll make good time tomorrow and we don’t get any grief crossing the borders.” Pete tapped on the table. “How are you feeling, Sammy?”

“I’m sore, but I feel like the wounds are healing up. My mind is clearing up a bit too.” I shrugged. “I don’t know what else to say. It’s not like I can explain what’s going on in my head to anyone.”

Pete nodded. “That’s good that it’s clearing up. If you’re up to it, maybe we can spar tomorrow night, just to make sure you’re still up to snuff?”

I smiled at that idea. “That sounds great.” That’d give me a chance to channel my anger into something useful. I took my medical mask off and took a sip of my water. “I think it’s ridiculous we have to wear masks everywhere.”

“We stick out more if we don’t and a lot of cities have made it mandatory, with fees if we don’t. I don’t want to see the size of those fees.” Aeron took his off and laid it on the table.

I rolled my eyes. “They haven’t figured out it’s not helping yet? From what I’ve seen since we’ve gotten here, most of this city should be dead already. The only reason they aren’t is because I screwed up and Death is gone.”

“Death is gone?” A waitress had stepped up to the table. Her blonde ringlet hair hung right at her chin level and her carefully made-up eyes started to tear up. “What on Earth happened to him?”

I rubbed my eyes. “Who are you?”

“I’m Mandy and I’m—”

“An angel.” Everyone at the table said.

“How did you know my father?”

“You’re little Death, demons have been looking for you.” She pulled her mask down and gave a small smile. “I’m the angel your father loved. He disappeared a few centuries ago because he didn’t want to commit to a relationship that could result in a child. Looks like he changed his mind.”

I wasn’t going to explain to her how I’d come out of a one-night stand. “The demons got what they wanted from me. They should be leaving me alone now.”

“They were looking for all the Children of the Apocalypse. Said they screwed something up.” She shrugged. “You said that Death is gone. Which means the apocalypse is truly happening now.”

“No.” Pete looked at her. “It doesn’t truly happen until we can no longer carry on with our normal life. That means no modern conveniences and the world shutting down because of what is happening, that kind of thing. This…we’re just on the path to the apocalypse.”

I leaned back in my chair. “He’s not dead, just sealed away. Like the others.”

“You kids are in trouble then.” She shook her head. “I just wanted to let you know I’m taking over your pizza order. You were freaking the waiter out, he said something about you looking creepy.”

“Thanks.” I was starting to wonder why there were angels in pizza places across the states. We needed to find a different food to eat if it was going to be a common occurrence, especially ones that knew my dad. I put my forehead against the table and closed my eyes at the feeling of the cold wood against my head.

Ruthie put a hand on my back and rubbed gently. “You going to be okay?”

“Once the guilt passes, I think so.” I muttered.

I lifted my head back up when the waitress returned with the pizzas. She set them down on the table and looked at me. “You, Lust was very interested in finding you. Said you had some unfinished business.”

“Yeah, we spent some time in hell together. Lucile wouldn’t let him have his way.” I didn’t meet her gaze; I focused on pulling the pizza onto my plate.

“Honey, have you ever fought Lust?”

I shook my head. “No. I’ve fought a few of the other Sins though.” And that was another time we had managed to screw up. “I don’t see how this is any of your concern.”

“Sammy, be nice.” Ruthie looked over my head. “She just got back from hell, she’s a bit testy.”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw the waitress turn and march off. “I’m sorry. I just don’t see why it matters to her. You don’t see her out there fighting off demons and trying to find the seals.”

“Because it’s not her job, but the outcome of the fight is her problem. If Lucile gets what she wants and destroys the world, then we’ll have to retreat into heaven and you’ll all be on your own. No guardian angels to whisper into ears, no archangels to undo the seals. No one would be willing to brave coming down here.”

“And there’s no one else that would be able to undo the seals?”

“Another horseman, but we’re out of options for that.” Aeron took a bite of his pizza.

I peeled the pepperoni from the greasy cheese and pulled upwards. The cheese dripped off the round piece of processed meat. “So unless we stop this before it escalates too much, we’re screwed.”

“Pretty much.” Aeron took a big sip of his water. “I can’t imagine it’ll be too much longer before cities start shutting down.”

I stuck the pepperoni in my mouth and wiped my fingers on a napkin. “So maybe we should double our time. There are five of us. We can drive straight through, take turns sleeping. Cut some time off the trip.”

“I don’t think that’s wise.” Ruthie put her pizza down. “The lower demons tend to attack more at night, and with the world in chaos, I’m betting they are expecting us to be rash about some of these choices.”

I picked off another pepperoni. “So we play it safe and hope we’re not too late.”

“It’s going to take me time to talk to the higher-ups anyways.” Ruthie stated. “This isn’t going to work if one of you is killed because we are too tired to function.”

She had a point. I let the grease drip off the pepperoni before eating it.

“This pizza sucks.” Pete held his up and the cheese slid off.

“Especially for the money.” Kaleb sighed. “I’m betting college students are the first to die of starvation.”

“No one can die.” I muttered and pushed my plate away. “Next time we go to a burger joint.”

“You haven’t been very hungry since you got back. That could be part of your problem.” Ruthie took another bite. “I don’t think this is that bad.”

Food just didn’t appeal to me, but what I wanted was a thing of tea. I snorted. I didn’t even know where to find more of Dad’s tea. For all I knew, he grew it somehow in his world of dead plants. I took a sip of my water, but it didn’t satisfy the need. I recalled the host had mentioned they had tea, but no one was anywhere to be seen in the dining area.

I took a bite of the pizza and managed to swallow the greasy food. If I could convince my stomach it was hungry, maybe I could get it to jump-start again and make it want to be hungry. We finished eating and boxed up the leftovers for the next morning’s breakfast.

I paused at the door on our way out and read the sign there. “’In a famine make sure not to waste food.’”

“There are signs like that all over now.” Pete said and handed me my mask. “You left this on the table.”

I put it on, hooking the elastic behind my ears. “Let’s just get back to the hotel and get some sleep. The sooner we’re rested the sooner we can get out of here.”

The walk back to the hotel lacked any people wandering the streets. Our footsteps were the only sound in the city of walking dead. Not quite zombies, but not really alive either. The woman at the hotel and the employees at the restaurant were still living and weren’t waiting for their souls to be reaped.

The reception desk was empty when we walked in. The boys headed towards the elevator while Ruthie and I went to our room. I opened the door and noticed the pictures above the bed were no longer crooked. My gaze slid to Ruthie who summoned her staff. I called my scythe and moved around the room.

My heart pounded as I moved so I could see around the wall that divided the bathroom. No one there either. Ruthie tapped open the bathroom door with her staff and signaled it was empty. The tension in my shoulders lessened.

“Housekeeping maybe?” I glanced around to see if anything else had been moved.

Everything else stood exactly where it was when we had left the room. I let my scythe disappear and sat on the bed. “Maybe you’re right, maybe I am just a little bit overly paranoid.”

“No, I thought the same thing when I noticed that the pictures weren’t crooked. It’s the right time to be paranoid, but you have to react accordingly. You didn’t freak out and start attacking random things. That means you reacted properly.”

I pulled my facemask off. “The only time I think clearly is when I’m channeling all my emotions into thoughts of fighting. I don’t know how to explain it. Like, back in my father’s house, when I summoned my scythe with all intentions of destroying something, the fog from my head cleared.”

“It’s because you have control in that area of your life. It might have been your choices that led you to hell, but you can’t control your healing. You couldn’t control your father’s choice. You can’t control the emotions going through you. Fighting, that’s something you can control.”

“You should have seen her face when Lucile locked her father away.” Lust’s voice came from the balcony.

I spun around, my scythe in my hand. “What do you want?”

“Didn’t you hear?” He stepped in and held his hands out. “I’m here to take you back to hell and lock you away. Since Death is gone, I can’t kill you. A nice little angel at the pizza place told me all about you tonight.”

I snarled. “Lucile said she’d let me go if my Father went into the seal willingly.”

“And she did. We never said we wouldn’t take you back.” He rushed forward. Two swords appeared in his hands as he tried to bring them across my body diagonally.

I brought my scythe across my body, the metal clanged as he hit the handle and I kicked him in the chest.

He stumbled back a few steps and chuckled. “I can feel all that anger inside of you. All that grief and pain. I’ll tell you what. Come see Sloth and I tomorrow at your next check in.” His eyes went to Ruthie. “Alone, or I’ll make sure the Trickster takes Ruthie’s wings as well.”