“They shall be bound and set aside to be consumed by Them.” Michael’s right hand flashed under his shirt, the button there already open, his fist closing around the butt of the Predator. “Uh-uh, guys.” Michael stabbed the .44 forward, aiming it toward the opposite end of the table, his right thumb jacking back the hammer. “You’re plain out of luck. I’m finding Madison and my guns and I’m gettin’ the hell out of here.”
“See how he defiles the Conference Room!” It was the one who had proclaimed Michael as guilty.
“See how I defile your face when I blow your fuckin’ brains out,” Michael whispered, his voice low. “My advice—open that diary, read it. Maybe you were meant to read it, and if you weren’t, then maybe you should anyway.” Michael started toward the door, backing up, glancing once behind him—the doors were still closed. He assumed the three guys with the cattle prods would be outside—but the gun would even the odds substantially. “Where do you keep the girl?”
The old one smiled, but said nothing.
Michael nodded. “OK, I’ll find her—then we’ll be out of your hair, you’ll pardon the expression.” he added, the light reflecting from the top of the man’s head.
Behind him, he felt the doors. He reached for the handle…
“Not gold,” he rasped, the electricity surging through him, the Customized Ruger falling from his right fist, not discharging, his body shaking, trembling, pain. “No!” He sagged forward, the blackness coming, but his hand unable to release the door handle.
Chapter Thirty-Four
The door opened, and she shrank back into the corner, three of the ones from the Families, two of them with gloves on, dragging Michael. His body shook, his eyelids fluttered as they rested his body on the floor, walking from the room without looking at her, the third one closing the door. She Jeft her corner, on her knees, moving to be beside Michael, her right hand gently touching at him—she felt the mild shock his body still carried, her hand drawing back, cradled in the palm of her left hand on the faded gray skirt of her uniform.
“Michael—Michael, answer me. Michael— please—Michael!”
His eyelids fluttered again, but did not open.
His right hand—it twitched. The flesh on the inside of his fingers—it was black and burned.
She could not touch him until the electrical current left his body—she had seen what the electrical current could do before.
On her knees, still, she rocked her behind back against her heels, her body swaying, her hands still in her lap, her calves cold-feeling against the bare floor. It was a holding room. She knew where she would go. She had been placed in a holding room once before—when the Families ha4 selected her as one who goes. To Them.
She felt tears in her eyes, felt them dribble down her cheeks.
Her archangel.
Michael.
He was human after all.
And in her heart, the thing Michael had talked about as love—she felt it stronger for him now as she knelt at his side.
“Michael…”
Chapter Thirty-Five
The wind of the slip stream was cold against his face, but every few moments he would feel the warmth of Natalia’s breath against the back of his neck, her body close against his as they rode searching for Michael’s trail lost in the rocks an hour earlier. They had split up, Paul running a search pattern to the south, Rourke and Natalia searching to the north. AH they had uncovered was another campfire of the cannibals and more—but vastly less this time than before—of their ghastly leavings: human bones.
“John.”
He turned his face right, to speak over his right shoulder. “What is it?”
“I think I saw movement in the rocks—above us and to the left.” He nodded. “I saw it a little while ago. I think we’ve got company. Our cannibal friends.”
“What about Paul?”
“He’ll be all right—so’ll we. It’s Michael I’m worried about.” He glanced up into the rocks—a furtive blur of motion, then nothing. He slowed the Harley, stopping it at the close of a wide arc, cutting the engine. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going up there—gonna catch a cannibal. Get him to talk.”
“John!”
“They won’t come down here after us. I’ll go up after them.” He felt her hands leave his waist where they had rested as they had driven. She dismounted the Harley, Rourke dismounting as well. He unzipped his coat, pulling off his gloves, folding them after straightening them, putting them in his bomber jacket’s left outside patch pocket. He took a cigar from the inside pocket of his jacket, the end already cut away as was his habit, putting the cigar in the left corner of his mouth, clamping it tight between his teeth. “You back me up from down here—and listen for any gunfire fr6m Paul. He should be on the other side of the rocks. If it sounds like he’s getting into trouble, you double back and I’ll cut across the top.”
“You don’t know how many of them there could be, John.” “They don’t have guns,” he told h^r, his voice low. “At least I don’t think they do. But I do. Anyway, maybe we can just talk,” and he smiled.
“Don’t—I mean—just because it is Michael— don’t—“
“I won’t,” Rourke whispered, leaning toward her, kissing her cheek lightly. He pushed the CAR-15 farther back on its sling so it was across his back, then started toward the rocks.
Chapter Thirty-Six
He would find his son—there was no question of it, he knew. He kept moving, across the bare rock face, moving upward slowly, his rifle swaying away from his back, then swaying against it. He had seen no more movement above. Rourke looked back once, below him, Natalia, her hands on her hips, standing beside the jet-black Harley, black like the black of the jumpsuit she wore—her battle gear—black like the boots she wore. Black like the color of her hair—but her hair was only almost black for there was no true black in nature he knew. Rourke kept moving.
Sarah. Natalia. But now the task was to find Michael. He had laughed at Annie when she had awakened them early from the Sleep, laughed at her premonition, her dream. But the cannibals— he had not anticipated this. How any men could have survived on the surface was incomprehensible to him. There were mysteries in this new earth. If the Eden Project returned, there would soon be machining capabilities. Perhaps an aircraft could be built. As it was, the Harley’s engine would power a light biplane more than adequately. He kept moving, reaching up with his right hand, then bringing his left leg up, then his left hand, then his right leg, repeating the sequence as he climbed higher, the edge of the higher rocks more clearly discernible now. He kept moving.
His left hand reached out, and with his left leg he thrust himself up against the meager purchase below the height of the rocks, half falling forward onto the rock surface.
Rourke pushed himself up and rolled away from the edge, flat on his back for a moment, resting from the exertion in the thin air, setting himself as bait to the cannibals, for them to attack.
No one came.
After several minutes, he rolled onto his abdomen, then pushed himself up, standing to his full height. He walked back toward the edge, waving down at Natalia. She waved back. Michael would be more used to the thinner air. In time, he too would become used to it.
He turned away from the edge, staring across the flat expanse of the height of the rocks. He reached into his Levi’s pocket, finding his lighter. He smoked less and less—in the thin air, intentionally damaging his lung capacity was insane. But he lit his cigar now, rolling the Zippo’s striking wheel under his thumb, plunging the tip of the cigar into the wind-dancing blue-yellow flame, flicking the cowling shut with an audible click. It was the stillness. No sudden engine noise betraying a Soviet patrol or a Brigand biker gang, no gunshots from off in the distance, no one. Nothing. The Earth was a dead place.
And he supposed the cannibals were its newfound scavengers. He moved ahead, dragging easily on the cigar, his breathing still rapid from the exertion of the climb, his rifle across his back again rather than at his side as he had placed it before making the final assault on the top. He wanted to look like easy prey.
Rourke kept walking.
Could these people talk? Could they understand?
Where had they come from?
If these cannibals lived, however few in number, others lived too, he knew.
He kept walking. “Hey—I want to talk,” he called.
No answer. “Do you speak English?”
No answer. “Habla EspanoB”
No answer. “Parlez-vous FrancaisV he laughed. He could ask the same question in German, in Russian, perhaps another language or two if he racked his brain for the right combination of words.