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Alex reached across and squeezed her hand. “No. I guess not. ”
For amazingly, at least one other person in the world had figured out the truth about the angels. They’d first heard the “Voice of Freedom” a few months ago, when Sam had shouted the four of them into the comms room.
“I was doing a routine check – and listen!” he’d said, cranking up the volume.
“Don’t trust them. The Edens are a trap – if you go into one, you’ll never come out. The angels are poisonous to us, toxic as rat poison. Do you know anyone who’s seen an angel? Is that person well? Or are they sick and feeble and tired…”
They’d stood gaping in wonder. The husky voice coming out of the speakers was androgynous – and utterly welcome.
“This has been the Voice of Freedom,” the broadcast finally concluded. “I’ll be on again soon. Just listen, and you’ll find me. ”
Alex knew the broadcasts couldn’t reach more than a handful of people – those lucky enough to have both generators and shortwave radios – but, Jesus, every little bit helped. If nothing else, it was comforting to know that the AKs weren’t completely alone.
An army truck appeared: one of the transport vehicles that cruised near the Edens, picking up refugees. Alex put on a bored expression. As with the other vehicles they’d passed, the driver acknowledged them with a lift of his fingers off the wheel, obviously assuming he and Willow were Eden staff. The truck disappeared and Willow let out a breath.
Alex knew how she felt. Just being on this route made him uneasy; it was the same road he’d sped along a year ago, desperate to reach Willow before her attempt to stop the Second Wave could kill her.
As if to underline the point, they passed a fading poster of Willow tacked to a tree. Her pixieish face was smiling, her long hair Photoshopped short. The headline screamed: WILLOW FIELDS, WANTED FOR CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY!
Neither mentioned it – though they both knew the poster offered a generous reward if Willow was taken alive. Alex’s jaw tightened. Yeah, he could just imagine what delights Raziel would have in store for his daughter if he ever got his hands on her. At least her shoulder-length brown hair looked nothing like the poster now.
An hour later they’d passed through the heart of the Rockies and begun the long descent towards Denver. Conversation had stopped – whatever waited was now only a dozen miles away.
All at once Willow shivered. “Alex, it feels really close. Can we go faster?”
Her voice was a taut wire. Alex slammed his foot down on the gas; their tyres shrieked as they whipped sharply around turns. Willow clutched the dash with one hand.
She was actually trembling now; risking a glance at her, Alex saw she’d gone completely white. “Oh god, stop, stop!”
“What?”
“Stop the car!”
Alex screeched over to the shoulder. They were at a lookout point, with pine trees in the foreground and Denver half hidden in the distance, the walled city stretching up to meet the late afternoon sky. Willow scrambled out of the cab; Alex threw on the emergency brake and followed.
She stood staring down at the city, her face twisted in frustration. “I can’t see! These stupid pine trees—”
Alex glanced back at the truck. “Come on,” he said, climbing onto the hood. Seconds later they were both perched on the roof, Willow’s body tense beside his. Alex had a moment of wondering how he’d explain this if their soldier friends saw them, and then all other thought was wiped from his mind. With a cry, Willow leaped to her feet; the truck rocked slightly.
“Oh god, this is it – this is it—”
A chill came over Alex. He rose, gazing down at the city. Lifting his consciousness to view it on the ethereal level made no difference at first, it was still the same – and then the sky over Denver tore open in a vertical slash.
Alex stared. Dimly, he was aware of the massive white-domed roof of the Church of Angels cathedral just below the sight. In the sky, the slit seemed to writhe with life; through it were pink-stained clouds.
And angels.
Even from so far away, Alex could see that there were thousands, millions – hovering in a shining vortex that faced the gate between worlds like a sideways tornado, twisting and spiralling far off into the distance, spiky with wings. He gaped, lost for words.
“No,” whispered Willow. He put his arm around her; she clung to him. “Something terrible – any second now—”
She broke off with a cry as the angels surged forward, starkly white against the sunset of their own world. As they poured through the gate, a sound came like the cracking of a giant whip; there was an explosion of light, searing the world into a faded reflection of itself. Alex wrapped his other arm around Willow, shielding her as a wave of energy roared past; he buried his head in her hair to hide his eyes from the burning light.
Slowly, the world returned to stillness. The only sound was the rustle of the wind through the pines.
Alex dared a look. The sky over Denver was a solid mass of angels, their ethereal bodies reeling; some were making hasty landings, gliding down into the city. Whatever had happened, they obviously hadn’t expected it either. In the angels’ world it was now twilight, with a single star shining. Then the gash between worlds shrank as the sky seemed to knit itself together. The star winked from view, leaving blue sky and clouds.
Alex exhaled. “Hey,” he whispered, rubbing Willow’s arm. “Whatever it was, it’s over now. ”
She had her fingers pressed tightly against her forehead; after a pause, she swallowed. “I can still sense Seb – I don’t think we were affected. We’ve always been separate from them, so I guess…” She trailed off.
“Affected? What are you talking about?”
She looked up then, her eyes wide and tearful. “You – you don’t know what that burst of energy meant, do you? You don’t know what he’s done. ”
Alex stared down at her with dread. He knew he didn’t have to answer; his incomprehension had to be written all over him.
Gazing out at the angels, Willow shivered. Her tone was flat, defeated. “Alex…the angels aren’t linked any more. ”
SOMEHOW THEY WERE DRIVING AGAIN – still heading towards Denver so that they wouldn’t pass the cruising army truck again too soon. It was as much thought as Alex was capable of right then.
“Not linked,” he murmured at last. He gripped the wheel with clammy fingers. “Are you sure?”
Willow sat statue-still. “Yes,” she said quietly. “I felt it when the energy rushed past. It’s something Raziel’s done on purpose, to protect them. He used the energy of the gate opening to…to sever their connection, somehow. I think some of them died when he did it. I could hear them screaming. ”
She crossed her arms tightly. “Anyway, they’re safe now,” she went on, her voice wooden. “We can still kill any one of them, but to destroy them all, we’d have to—”
“Kill them one by one,” Alex finished. He saw a dirt road and took it; once out of sight, he brought them to a lurching halt. The world was battering at his skull. He clutched at his temples, squeezing his eyes shut. “Oh, shit. Shit, shit—”
He felt Willow slip her arm around his waist and press close. “Alex…” she whispered.
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