The World in Shadow (Eternal Warriors Book 2)

by Vox Day

  “It’s not worth it, kid. We don’t want to shoot you. No one wants you dead.”

  “But I do,” the boy told him, as he withdrew a small black pistol from his pocket.

  Jami’s vision blurred, and suddenly, she could see Kaym’s arrogant figure, standing with his arms folded just behind the boy. He smiled at her, an arrogant, twisted smile that made her want to hit him. A vortex of darkness emanated from his form, engulfing the boy in a black and pulsating fog. She looked around desperately for the Divine angels, but Paulus was the only one she could see.

  “Do something,” she savagely thought at him.

  “He has had those two in his grasp for far too long,” the angel replied in her mind, shaking his head sadly. “It is up to the boy… the choice is his alone.”

  As she looked back at the demonlord, he faded into nothingness, but not before cocking an irritating eyebrow at her.

  “Brian, no!” the girl she had been comforting pushed herself up, using Jami’s shoulder as a prop. “Don’t do it! Please don’t!”

  The chubby killer’s eyes widened, and he almost dropped the little weapon.

  “Tessa? But… I shot you! Twice! You can’t be alive!”

  The entire front of the girl’s white dress was dark, still wet with blood, and her face was smeared with the marks of Jami’s stained hands, but she stood fearlessly in front of her would-be killer and pleaded with him. Not for her life, but his.

  “Brien, I’m so, so sorry that I hurt you, that I treated you like I did. It was wrong, I know it. But it wasn’t you, it was me, it was my fault. The thing is, I know you, and a nice guy like you could never do something like this, not by yourself. You’re a good guy, inside, you really are! So it wasn’t you that shot me, it couldn’t be. It had to be something else, something wrong inside you. But don’t hurt yourself, please, just put the gun down and we can talk about it. They can find someone to help you!”

  Tears began to appear in the killer’s eyes as she spoke, and Jami, listening breathless, clenched her fists. You go, girl! She didn’t know anything about the girl, except for what was apparently her awful taste in guys, but she couldn’t help being impressed with her courage. Her willingness to overlook the fact that this was the guy who’d shot her in the first place was almost Christ-like. Maybe it was a good thing Paulus had urged Jami to save her after all, because without her intervention, she had no doubts that the fat kid was going straight to Hell.

  “Dude - ” the other killer started to say, but the cop immediately shut him up.

  “You, shut your damn mouth!”

  The sitting killer grumbled, but subsided. The standing boy, Brien, was now breathing hard, his chest was heaving and tears were starting to leak out from behind his closed eyes and run down his face. He had lowered his head, and he looked almost ready to collapse into someone’s arms. Thank God, Jami thought. There had already been too many deaths here tonight; one more wouldn’t serve any purpose.

  But then the killer’s eyes opened again, and beneath his tears Jami could see a broken spirit of self-loathing and despair. He raised the weapon to the side of his head in one smooth motion, cocking the hammer with a practiced thumb. His eyes were only for the girl, Tessa.

  “I’m sorry, Tess. I was really looking forward to tonight. This wasn’t how I wanted it to end.”

  Jami looked away. There was the sharp crack of a gunshot, followed a moment later by a muffled thump. Still keeping her eyes averted, she stood up and reached out for the girl beside her, thinking to comfort her again. But Tessa was numb with an overload of horror now, and she did little more than shake her head in disbelief as she stared at the floor. No, at the body of the boy on the floor.

  “God, I’m sorry too, Brien,” she said quietly. “I’m so sorry.”

  As she spoke, the big policeman dropped his weapon and rushed to the fallen boy’s side, feeling about the throat for a pulse. But there was nothing to be found, and when the cop stood up again, he pulled his helmet and mask from his face, and hurled them to the floor. His face was white with anger and frustration as he stalked over to the other killer and began putting handcuffs on him as he recited the rights.

  Jami glanced over at Paulus, and then at Christopher. The angel’s face was sad, but he smiled at her and nodded slightly as he, too, faded into invisibility. Her brother looked like he’d just been slapped in the face, and his brown eyes were wide and filled with helpless anger. Jami went to him, as the big cop and two other policemen escorted the surviving killer roughly from the ballroom, and she put her arms around him. She pressed her cheek against his shoulder, and felt him shaking his head.

  “Do you know, I used to want to be like Kaym?” he confessed. “But there’s nothing there, there’s just nothing there but evil! And I hate it, I just hate it now, so much!”

  “I know what you mean,” Jami pushed herself away from him. “He was there, you know, the whole time, the jerk. Just watching and smiling, enjoying it all. Enjoying the pain. And some day, you know what? God is going to wipe that smirk off his face once and for all, and we’re going to be there to see it.”

  And so is Eric,” Christopher smiled fleetingly. “I heard you talking to him, you know. You did good, sis, you did the right thing.”

  “Yeah, well, tell Holli that,” Jami said sadly, as the implications of her decision came back to her with a vengeance. “Let’s find Holli and go home, big brother. I’ve got a lot of crying to do.”

  Chapter 34

  Restoration

  But if all are alike both wrong and right, one who is in this condition will not be able either to speak or to say anything intelligible; for he says at the same time both “Yes” and “No.” And if he makes no judgment but “thinks” and “does not think”, indifferently, what difference will there be between him and a vegetable?

  —Aristotle, Metaphysics

  Six weeks later, summer had officially arrived, but Jami still wasn’t feeling any of that awesome wild-and-free, let’s-go-crazy summertime spirit that she normally felt about ten seconds after the final schoolbell buzzed an end to another school year. Maybe it was because that bell never actually rang; following the prom shootings, the school officials decided to just cancel classes for the rest of the year. More likely, though, it was the shadow of those fourteen deaths, fifteen, if you counted Brien Martin like she did, still hanging over the minds of everyone who had anything to do with Mounds Park.

  It was hard to feel young and immortal and invincible when so many familiar faces were now just pictures in a fading newspaper clipping. Jami wasn’t sure if losing the sense that nothing bad could ever happen to you was part of growing up, but if it was, then she was practically an adult now. Not only that, but she didn’t like it, not one little bit. She longed to remember what it felt like to really be a kid again, to be only vaguely aware that sometimes bad things happened, somewhere out there in the world, in a place that belonged to somebody else.

  Why was I in such a hurry to grow up, she thought wonderingly to herself. Why doesn’t anybody ever tell you that it sucks? It sucked in the biggest way! She half wished she could give up on the whole idea, and turn herself into Peter Pan or something.

  Summer soccer had finally started, which was cool because it kept her busy even though it reminded her of Eric now and then. Mister McDougal had finally managed to put together a decent Nike girls’ team this year, and even if they weren’t good enough to beat the Blackhawks ‘A’ team in state, Jami thought they had a reasonable shot at the North Suburban championship. She probably should have played with the KPAC travelling team instead, she thought regretfully for the umpteenth time, but she just didn’t seem to have the heart for it. KPAC had left for a week-long trip to California only four days after the funerals, which was just too soon for Jami to deal with it, so she had given up her spot on the team. But there was always next year, and if she had a good sophomore season, they’d want her back.

  They held the big funeral service on the footba
ll field, and more than three thousand people showed up for it. The camera crews from the TV news were there, along with students, parents, teachers, and a lot of people who just wanted to be there. Seeing Eric’s parents, and watching them as they tried, and failed, to hold it together, was about the saddest and most painful thing Jami had ever seen. The whole ceremony was too awful for words, and yet somehow there was something timeless and beautiful about it too. With the exception of Brien Martin, who’d been buried separately, of course, most of the murdered kids came from Christian families, and Jami felt both touched and inspired by their unshakable certainty that they would someday see their children again.

  “You will, you will,” she whispered softly to no one in particular. “You really will!”

  Things were good with Jason, although it seemed weird to start having a boyfriend in the middle of all this sadness. He was taking Eric’s death pretty hard, she was sure, but he tried not to let it affect their relationship too much. He came over every evening he didn’t have a game, and they’d spend hours in the backyard together, kicking her old ball back and forth until it started to get dark. Sometimes they talked, and sometimes they didn’t—it was enough to just spend time with him and know that he was there. He never left without kissing her goodnight, though, and her heart always started beating a little bit faster when he would glance up at the setting sun, flip the ball up into his hands, and smile at her.

  From time to time, she still found herself blaming herself for not doing something, anything, that might have averted the catastrophe, but mostly she had managed to accept whatever portion of responsibility was hers and tried to learn from that while letting the rest go. It was still hard to talk to Holli—not that they didn’t get along or anything, but everything seemed different. For the first time, Jami found them being nice to each other, which just felt totally wrong. It was weird. It was fake, superficial. It wasn’t real. They didn’t talk much now, and when they did, Holli always avoided her eyes. They never talked about anything important either, like feelings or relationships and stuff like that. And every time she tried to bring up Eric, or prom night, Holli turned away.

  It was hard, and in some ways it almost felt like a part of her was missing, but Jami figured it was just going to take a while before Holli could find it in herself to forgive her. Every now and then she was tempted to lose her temper—after all, it wasn’t her fault that she’d been the one stuck with making the call and Eric himself had said she’d done the right thing, not that Holli had ever given her the chance to tell her that—but she’d never given in to the temptation. Instead, she prayed for her twin, every night before going to bed, asking God to take away her sister’s pain, to heal her wounded heart, and to heal this rift between them.

  She sighed and looked out the window at the backyard. The sun was just starting to set, and the light spilling over the treetops was glowing with a rich, golden hue that always made her imagine God turning up the brightness on his TV. It never lasted long, but it was Jami’s favorite time of the day. It was a thick sort of light, dripping down from the green leaves in a way that made you think could almost feel it and taste it—and if you could, you just knew it would taste like butterscotch, or maybe maple syrup. It was beautiful, and she wished Jason wasn’t playing tonight.

  “Knock-knock,” someone said.

  “Hey,” Jami replied, pushing herself up to a sitting position on her bed. It was her sister, and she was leaning nonchalantly against Jami’s open door. “What’s up?”

  Holli looked down at her feet for a second, then up again. She seemed to be forcing herself to hold Jami’s gaze.

  “I just wanted to say I’m sorry, you know, for, like, everything. None of it was your fault, but I just wanted to blame you anyhow. It was, like, easier or something. I don’t know why, but I did, and I’m sorry I’ve been such a bitch to you.”

  She started to cry, but Jami couldn’t help laughing even as she leaped up from the bed and rushed to throw her arms around her sister. She squeezed her hard, and then laughed again. She couldn’t help it.

  “What’s so funny?” Holli asked, even as she started to cry a little.

  “Holli, you wouldn’t know how to be a bitch even if Angie gave you private lessons!” She hugged her sister again, and she started to cry too. “Oh, Holli, I am so, so, sorry. I know how much you loved him.”

  An hour later, both their faces were stained with tears, Holli’s hair was hopelessly messed up, and Jami’s nose was red, but she felt like a tremendous burden had been lifted from her heart. She told Holli of how Eric’s last thoughts were of her, and though Holli’s eyes were wet, her expression was one of remembered happiness, not sorrow. As the tear tracks dried tightly on their faces, Holli suddenly blinked and tapped her urgently on the knee.

  “Oh, I almost forgot, there was something else I wanted to talk to you about. Do me a favor?”

  Jami nodded. “Sure.”

  “Christopher and I were talking the other night. I mean, there was obviously a big spiritual thing going on with this whole thing, right? So, I think maybe the people who lived, lived for a reason, you know, so they could be given another chance.”

  “All right.” Jami thought she knew where this was going. “So you think we should try to find the people who were resurrected and talk to them about it?”

  “No,” Holli shook her head. “I want you to go with Christopher and talk to the guy who shot everybody. The one who didn’t kill himself.”

  Jami stared at her. She remembered the guy, tall, white, and skinny, sitting on the ground and flipping off the cops without the slightest sign of remorse.

  “Are you sure? I mean, I was there when he got arrested, and I don’t think it’s going to do any good, seriously. I don’t know if he’s crazy or what, but he’s totally a psychopath.”

  Holli shook her head firmly.

  “I don’t care. Everyone deserves the chance to say no. You’re probably right, but, if we don’t try, we’ll never know. So I really think it’s important, it’s, like, our job, you know.” She looked down. “It’s just I don’t think I can face him, though, not yet, which is why I’m asking you.”

  “Why can’t Christopher go by himself?”

  Holli didn’t respond, she just stared back at Jami with a skeptical look on her face. Jami laughed and gave in.

  “Okay, so he’s not always mister diplomacy. I’ll go. Even if it won’t do any good. When am I going.”

  Holli glanced at her alarm clock. A floor below them, the sound of a car starting could be heard from the driveway.

  “Like, now, I think. Christopher made the appointment.”

  Jami kissed her sister on the forehead and reached for her shoes.

  “Thanks for the warning, babe. I’ll let you know how it goes.”

  The jail wasn’t anywhere as grim as she’d been led to expect by the movies. For one thing, all the bars and gates and stuff weren’t grey metal, but instead had been painted yellow. Not a bright yellow, but a pale, gentle yellow. Even the concrete had been painted the same color, making her feel like she was in some kind of strange Teletubby world. The visiting room was just a plain old room, complete with worn industrial carpeting and old magazines, and if it wasn’t for the guards, you’d never have thought it was part of a jail. Jami felt almost disappointed.

  “What are you doing here?” the killer demanded. “You wanted to see me?”

  His face was scornful, and his eyes were full of contempt for both of them. He was better-looking than Jami had remembered, although he was even thinner than before and the acne on his cheeks stood out starkly against his pale skin. His black hair was longer, and he seemed to have a habit of pushing it impatiently out of his eyes.

  Jami looked at Christopher. Her brother smiled thinly at the boy, and shook his head.

  “I could give you a number of reasons. How do you like this one? 'Remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselv
es were suffering.'”

  The killer sneered.

  “That sounds like a Bible verse. Don’t tell me you take that shit seriously?”

  “Don’t you?” Christopher leaned forward, and his voice grew sarcastic. “No, of course not. You’re far too smart for all that, right? You know it’s all BS because science has proved it, right, and only an idiot could be dumb enough to believe something made up by an elite priesthood bent on controlling the unwashed masses a few thousand years ago. And you’re such a freaking superior mind that you don’t even need to look at the evidence yourself, right, because if some random scientist says so, it must be true, right?”

  Jami raised her eyebrows, but something in the killer’s face prevented her from trying to intervene. Christopher was being so obnoxious that it had to be deliberate, and the edge to his voice was so dismissive that Jami was sure it would infuriate the other boy. But somehow, it had the opposite effect. His contemptuous look abruptly disappeared and was replaced by a wary, guarded expression, although the sneer on his lips remained.

  “Oh, and you’re saying something different?” The killer grinned mockingly. “Do you actually think you can say anything I haven’t heard before?”

  Christopher smiled slowly, and Jami felt like she was witnessing an elaborate contest of some sort, a mental duel for which she didn’t know the rules. It was brutal, like watching two mountain goats bashing heads on the Discovery Channel.

  “I know I can,” her brother stated confidently.

  The killer jerked his chin at her, and his cold blue eyes scanned her indifferently. She tried not to let her disgust for him show, but all the same, his stare was almost as bad as being groped.

  “Yeah, well, we’ll see about that. What’s she doing here?”

  Jami forced herself to hold his gaze. He’s human, not a monster, she told herself firmly, even if he doesn’t act like it. Judge not, lest ye be judged…. It was impossible! He was such a total jerk! He seemed to hate everything and everyone, except himself.