Star Angel: Prophecy

by David G. McDaniel

  Zac was going to kill him.

  Zac’s jeans were still impossibly intact, but that was all. Like some kind of bare-knuckle brawler, shirtless and wearing Levis and punching the life out of his opponent.

  A glance behind showed her the Reaver was down and the ramp had lowered beneath it and bodies were hurrying off. From that extreme range Jess saw only figures, no details, but she recognized Bianca in the lead, others behind. Why her friend chose to exit and run across the snow to her she had no idea, but it didn’t matter.

  Kang would be dead soon enough.

  Zac was holding him to that one spot and Jess inched closer, on her feet, the closest spectator for this incredible beatdown, too close for such a deadly battle but Zac had Kang straddled and immobile and was pounding, Kang continuing to bleed, more red flecking the snow far and wide, spraying out with each titanic strike Zac hammered to his head and face.

  She wanted to laugh. It would’ve been a maniacal laugh, and as it rose in her throat she bit it back, so overjoyed she couldn’t stand it. Zac was going to save them all! After all this! Zac had won and Kang was through and Bianca had come and …

  Zac wasn’t punching. Kang wasn’t dead, not yet, not just yet, but …

  Zac had stopped punching.

  As she anticipated the next blow she realized, all at once, like her mind kept playing the action even after it stopped …

  Zac wasn’t moving.

  She staggered.

  NO!

  Kang was laid out. Maybe even unconscious. But he wasn’t dead. Not yet. Zac was straddling him, delivering the blows that would finish him …

  Frozen in mid-strike.

  No.

  Finish him!!

  Zac snapped out of it. As if waking from a dream with a gasp; but he didn’t continue punching. Instead he lurched to his feet; stepped back, trying to get control; she could see the strain, the effort, she could see it on his face, so close, so near to ending this, and he was locked up and lurching backward, unable to move through it this time, unable to gain control and stumbling back, one step, two, three, and she was rushing to him and grabbing him as he fell.

  Together they sank to the snow.

  “Zac!” she felt his solid weight collapsing into her. She settled to her knees and slid him to her lap. Zac! Head and shoulders in her arms, looking up at her. Oh Zac! Not now. Impulsively she stroked his hair, his face, willing him to rise. “Zac!” So heavy, so strong, such power in that body.

  Paralyzed.

  “Zac!” she ran her hands over his face, through his hair. He was looking up at her, alive, eyes so full of life, body like a great weight, no life in it at all.

  “I almost had him,” he gave a thin smile. His face was animated, expression one of resigned disappointment. He was locked up and all he could manage was to look …

  Disappointed.

  “Zac you have to move!” Vaguely, in her peripheral vision, she saw Kang sit.

  No!

  Zac still had that damning expression of defeat. If he could shake his head right then, or shrug, she felt like he would. “I’m all used up,” his voice was almost apologetic. Stop thinking like that! “My time is done.”

  “No! No Zac. Your time is not done. Do you hear me?” Tears were falling and she felt the desperation in her voice. “Do you hear me?” Rocking him in her lap, cradling his head with both hands, leaning closer and holding him to her armored breast, face close to his and pleading.

  This wasn’t happening.

  She pressed tighter; all the way in and kissed him. Again. Again and again, kissing him, kissing his forehead, his cheeks and his face and his nose and his lips and when she touched his lips he kissed her back, fervent, the only thing that could move, like he made it work but it was all he could do, and she kissed him more, crying softly “Oh Zac” face to his, “Zac”, acutely aware of the yellow threat rising nearby but not caring. Not caring about any of it. About Kel or Reavers or monsters or anything.

  Nothing else mattered.

  **

  Zac was down. Bianca couldn’t believe it. Mostly she couldn’t believe she was out there at all. On that cold, dreary field, vulnerable in ways she’d never felt. But her friend was there and Jess needed her. Bianca had crept close, too close—why, she had no idea—far ahead of the others who tried to caution her back, now Jess was on her knees with Zac in her lap, holding him, face leaning over his, and Bianca couldn’t tell if he was dead or just hurt. He wasn’t moving, that much was for sure, but whether or not he was alive …

  Could Zac even die?

  Kang was on his feet. Way too close and it was freaking her out. Big, creepy, skin-crawling freak-out. When she started running out here Zac had the monster on his back and looked to be killing him. Then the big guy got up, staggered back, Jess ran to grab him and Bianca pulled up short and now, to her horror, Kang had gotten up and got to his feet and now the yellow demon was standing there, face bloody, clothes shredded, one horn broken off, just a few yards from Jess and Zac, watching them, and Bianca had no idea what to do next. Jess was crying. Bianca could hear it on the wind.

  Maybe Zac was dead.

  The scene was—the thought came to her in that surreal moment—beautifully tragic. Two lovers in the snow, one dying, loomed over by a danger so great it was indescribable; a monster the likes of which had never been seen. Why Kang watched she didn’t know, but there was nothing Bianca and their friends could do now. Not with Jess so close. No way to run back to the ship and even consider using the Reaver or its guns or anything to drill the beast and maybe he knew that. Maybe that was why he paused.

  If Zac was dead Jess would never get away. Neither would she. If Zac was dead they were all going to die out there in the snow. She and Jess and Pete and Heath, Satori, Willet and Darvon ranged out in the field behind her, all equally foolish, all rushing out here chasing her, Bianca, her own impulse driven by God knew what, come to witness, first hand, the destruction of Kang.

  Only now Kang was up and it was about to be over.

  It was like the whole, freezing wasteland was locked in time. So poignant, that field of death, the cold breeze, small bodies peppered against the white, the dark mass of the Reaver book-ending one side, to the other the giant fortress and the huge, black mountains, slopes covered in white. Skirting it all a vast, deep, green forest that went on forever.

  And there, center stage.

  Jess.

  On her knees. Holding Zac in her lap. To the side Kang, horrible and watching, heartless, monster breath clouding before him, death an instant away.

  **

  Zac lay absolutely still. Not a twitch. Yet his face was alive, and there was absolutely no strain in it. The opposite, in fact, an incredible sense of calm come over him, like a peaceful serenity, looking as if he might break into a saintly smile at any moment, all-knowing. Tears ran hot down Jessica’s cold cheeks.

  “It’s weird,” were his next words, a gentle sort of introspection that flew in the face of his condition, “but now that it’s happening, I’m ready. I’m actually ready.”

  She almost asked, but she didn’t dare, and she didn’t want to hear his answer. Not the one she knew he would give.

  He said it anyway. “I’m ready to die.”

  She choked back a sob, “Zac, no,” raised her head and let one go, bawling into the unforgiving distance, then pressed her nose to his and told him quietly as her tears fell onto his face:

  “No Zac.”

  But he remained infuriatingly calm. She hated it. “My only fear,” he went on, ignoring her pleas, looking right into her eyes, “was leaving you.” Such a gentle expression, face so alive, so young—so impossible to match with that terrible moment, so impossible to look into that face and imagine the man behind it was …

  He was lying. She decided all at once and with conviction. It was a horrible joke and he was lying. Everything was lying to her right then. Zac, the universe, everything.

  “You’re lying,” she said i
t. “You’re not dying.”

  He looked deeper into her eyes, like his focus expanded and she felt the pierce of his stare, lost in it, just like at any other time, just like any other lovely moment when all was right and they were happy.

  She sobbed and held him closer. “Don’t go.”

  Bitterly she felt herself buying into it.

  Maybe it wasn’t a lie after all.

  “Zac.” NO! She pulled him closer; pressed her cheek to his, the warm feel of his skin against her tears, squeezing him with all her might.

  He whispered to her. “Don’t be afraid.”

  “Don’t die!” she pulled back, desperate to snap him out of whatever reverie of submission consumed him. “Zac!” Angry. “Don’t die! Don’t you dare go!”

  But he maintained that maddening, peaceful expression. Unaffected by the painful emotion she threw at him. “Don’t fear this,” he told her. “You’re too strong for that now.”

  She sniffed. “I’m not afraid.” Made herself be strong, if for nothing else than spite. “I’m not afraid, Zac. I’m mad. You’re not leaving me. Understand? Stay. Stay, Zac.”

  “I wish I could.”

  The tears came harder and she pulled him back to her armored chest and rocked him, holding him like a child. She put her chin on his head and held an arm around it, pulling him tight to her breast.

  His voice was quiet from within her embrace. “I’m not afraid because I know this is temporary. I’m only leaving you for a little while. We’ll be together again, Jess. We always are. There’s no reason to fear this.”

  “We’re together now,” she said. “Zac. We’re here. We’re here now. Don’t go.”

  “We’re never really apart,” and it seemed as if he’d lapsed into a sort of musing; an existential consideration of what it meant to be them, the soul mates that they were; together, apart … what did any of it really mean? he seemed to be thinking.

  Were they not always as one?

  She squeezed him tighter against her. “This isn’t the same, Zac.” The bitterness was all-consuming. “You know it’s not the same.”

  He was silent in her arms. She stared across the frozen waste, chin pressed desperately against his scalp.

  “Zac! I don’t want futures or pasts. I want now. I don’t care who we were or who we’ll be. We’re here, Zac. Now. We’re here now. Stay.”

  She pulled back and held his face in her hands, and his gaze came into sharp focus and he was looking right into her.

  And he was in awe.

  “Look how many times we’ve found each other!” It was driving her mad, this ridiculous enthusiasm, and she wanted to smack him. His eyes held her, as if he surrounded her: “Even just this lifetime! Through impossible odds, across impossible distances. Look how many times! Across a thousand years and across worlds. You think we won’t find each other again?” He almost laughed, and it only made her more furious. “We will. We will, Jess. I know it. You know it. Our time is not done. We are forever. There’s no reason to fear this.”

  His dismissal of it did nothing to stop her fear. She was so very afraid. “Hold on to me Zac.” Terrified; no idea what to do. “Hold on to me. Don’t let go.”

  Suddenly his body moved. Her heart lurched.

  He’s moving!

  She gripped him; but it was a small movement, not his whole body; just a hand, one arm, lifting toward her and she looked down, shooting through with hope as his hand sought her belly, found it and touched her gently. She snapped her eyes to his, inches from her own, and he was looking down at his hand on her stomach, then up to fix her gaze and he was, in that moment, filled with such serenity she almost bought it. Almost caved; almost bought into his reality and believed everything would be alright as he said, but it wouldn’t, and that fleeting hope dashed against the rocks of despair and a fresh round of tears were rolling from her eyes.

  Zac was dying.

  His hand fell away and he was frozen again, the movement of his arm no revival, as she feared, but his rapture held steady.

  “He’s going to be so amazing.” He drove the spike deeper: “Tell him about me. Tell him about his dad. One day, when we’re together again, you can tell me about him.” He gave an easy sigh, “I can’t wait to hear the stories,” and the light behind his crystal blue eyes flickered and she gasped.

  Incredibly his joy only seemed to swell, and he asked:

  “Have you thought of a name?”

  She couldn’t speak.

  Then those eyes, those wonderful, blue eyes, so alive, so always filled with energy, with passion, portals to adventure that could captivate her with nothing but a glance …

  Went blank.

  Her heart stopped.

  It was like the light behind them went completely out. Still open, still bright and staring at the gray sky, reflections of that pale glow in them, but the life that resided there …

  Gone.

  “Zac!” she squeezed him.

  But he was still with her.

  “Huh,” his voice held curiosity, and she pulled back, to search his face, his wonderful, serene face, eyes open and unseeing. “It’s like the song.” Alive, but soon …

  He quoted, quietly: “The stars, the moon, they have all been blown out.” Quieter: “You left me in the dark.” She sobbed, even as he marveled: “But this is different. You haven’t left me. It isn’t you that’s leaving.” He held that damning sense of wonder, eyes vacant, expression fully alive, and she hated what he was about to say even before he could speak the words: “I am.”

  “Don’t.” She was bawling. “Don’t, Zac. Don’t go.”

  He lay absolutely still in her arms.

  “Zac?” No answer. “Zac I can’t breathe.” She couldn’t. Not then. Not ever. Her whole chest had seized and Zac was dying. He was the only, the only one, the only one that could ever complete her and when he was gone there would be no one. The emptiness …

  When Zac was gone she would be so alone.

  But he wasn’t gone. Not yet.

  “You’re so powerful,” he said, face fully relaxed.

  This was truly the end.

  “I’m in awe of you,” his eyes were unseeing, expression set in that frustrating, permanent rapture. “Look who you are! Look who you’ve become,” he spoke quietly as she continued to sob. “You’re incredible, Jess, and you’re mine, and I’m yours, and nothing is going to change that. Not death. Not anything.”

  Heat. “Zac!” Rising in her breast and she was furious and she was gripping him to his senses. “You have to finish this! You have to finish Kang! You have to!” Maybe that would bring him back. There was no escaping his hatred of the monster.

  No escaping his love of her.

  “You have to kill Kang!” Zac knew Kang’s threat, knew it was still present. How could he leave her with the beast?! Maybe she could charge him with that; her own anger, her own desperation; make him rise to life and finish what he started. Make him remember the danger and how he was her guardian and how he had to live so he could protect her.

  “You’re my guardian!” she said. “Who will take care of me?! You have to take care of me, Zac. You have to finish Kang!”

  But his expression just grew more infuriating, eyes blank and that exasperating, easy smile on his face.

  Like she was such a silly girl.

  “Kang is finished,” his words were dismissive. Like Kang was the least of her worries. Again he nearly laughed, and, as before, it only made her more angry. The lack of concern in his voice made her so mad. That he could be this calm. This accepting.

  That he could be dying.

  Zac!

  But he invited her to sense what he did.

  “Don’t you feel it?”

  She didn’t. Or maybe she did. Whatever. This deathbed philosophizing was killing her. She just wanted to slap him back to life and get him up and back to the fight so he could finish off Kang and they could be on their way, so much left to do, and this was all going to pass, this litt
le incident, he would snap out of it, just like before and he would be Zac again …

  He was still smiling. Amused with himself. Amused with whatever it was that so captivated him. Her, in truth, and it was wrenching her heart to pieces.

  “You’re holding the moment, Jess. Don’t you feel it? You’re holding it and you have no idea.” She just looked at him, wishing his eyes could at least see, wishing they weren’t so blank and she could read anything in them but it really didn’t matter.

  She knew exactly what he meant.

  Then, with such unwavering confidence it very nearly, physically, shook her, he said simply:

  “Kang is through.”

  And, for that briefest of instants, she believed it.

  Then his eyes closed and he was in her head.

  he said. She stared at a body now, nothing more, and it drove her despair deep; deeper than she ever would’ve thought possible; a well of loss, alone on that bitter field as Zac’s voice continued in her mind, with her still but not for long. < I’m scared too,> he told her. His presence faded and she gasped. But he was yet there.

 

  he went on. Emphatic: Then, with such feeling, words said between lovers a trillion times through the ages, such simple words that, with meaning, real meaning, held a force beyond all words, beyond all other things, more power in them than in all the universe, and as he said them they ripped through her with an intensity that tore her soul to shreds:

  Tangible, like an embrace, more real than any embrace had ever been, and his declaration held her with a flash of indescribable marvel as he said:

  She latched on. Gripping, flooding him with her own, grabbing at whatever ethereal force remained, not understanding it, just like he said, but determined, right there, right then, to find a way, to know this thing all at once and bend it to her will, a force of resolve that would not be denied, holding fast to his spirit—to him, to whatever he might be—refusing to let go.