“It’s good stuff.”
“Oh well. I’ll get you a glass.”
“Sit,” Arlys ordered. “I’ll get it. Pound of sugar,” she added as she got up, went inside.
“Pound of sugar?”
Lana tapped her baby mound. “Have a cookie.”
“Wouldn’t mind that, either.” He took one, bit in. Shut his eyes. “Oh man, that’s really good. You could make a living.”
“Those were the days.”
Arlys came out with the glass, poured him one. Will leaned back against the fence post. He glanced back as three deer trotted down Main Street.
“It’s a good thing Fred thought of putting that invisible fence around the gardens,” he commented. “We don’t have to go more than half a mile to bag a deer.”
“Also good we approved the town ordinance against deploying a firearm within town limits,” Arlys added. “Or we’d end up with more windows being shot out by accident.”
“You got that. We’re thinking of invading Rachel’s place tonight for some DVD roulette. Are you in?”
Arlys raised her brows. “Who are ‘we’?”
“Dad and me—and Chuck if we can pull him out of the basement—a few others. They’ve got that big screen and the player. Entry fee’s a snack or beverage.”
“I could be in,” Arlys said, smiling at him. He really was nice to look at, she thought as Lana got up and walked to the other side of the steps. “What about you, Lana? An evening of DVD roulette sound appealing?”
“Something’s coming. It all changes. Something’s coming. It always was. Something’s coming. It ends. It begins.”
Will stepped toward her, then rushed to her as she swayed.
“Hey, hey, hey.” He shoved his glass at Arlys and steadied Lana.
“I’m all right. Just got dizzy.”
“I’ll get Rachel. I’ll find Max.”
“No, no, I just got dizzy. I’m fine.”
“I’m getting Rachel,” Arlys insisted, and bolted across the street.
“Here.” Will carried her to the chair, set her down. “What’s this?”
“Ah, sun tea.”
“Okay, that’s probably good. Drink a little. You really went pale. What’s coming?”
“I don’t know.” She laid a hand on the baby. “It was just this feeling of inevitability. And sorrow. I practice, but not as much as I should. I don’t know how to control or interpret as much as I should.”
Rachel, in a T-shirt and cargo shorts, crossed the street at a fast clip. “What’s all this?”
“I just had a moment,” Lana said as Rachel took her pulse. “It came and went. I feel fine.”
“Your pulse is rapid.”
“It scared me. It was one of the feelings I get. They just cover me. I don’t know how to explain. They pour out of me and saturate me. It’s not physical. Not in the usual way.”
“I’ll find Max.”
“Oh, don’t.” As he stepped back, Lana pleaded with Will. “Don’t worry him. I’m fine.”
“He’d kick my ass—and I’d have to help him do it—if I didn’t go get him.”
“All right, all right. I can’t be responsible for you and Max both kicking your ass. Rachel, really, you just examined me and the baby this morning. I know what it was—it’s not medical, and it passed.”
She took Rachel’s hand, then Arlys’s. “Something’s coming, and soon. That’s all I know for certain.”
“‘It all changes,’” Arlys repeated. “‘It ends. It begins.’”
“Did I say that? It’s a little like being outside myself. Or inside. I’m not a seer.” She looked down at her belly. “But she might be. I can’t see what she sees. I just feel it.”
She heard the sound of running feet, but saw Chuck not Max rushing along the sidewalk.
“I got something!” He waved the paper he held, jogging onto the porch. “Contact. Sort of.”
“Internet contact?” Arlys snatched the paper out of his hand before he’d caught his breath.
ATTENTION ALL GOD-FEARING HUMANS
If you are reading this, you are one of the chosen. No doubt you have lost those dear to you and have felt, may still know, despair. No doubt you have witnessed firsthand the abominations that have desecrated the world Our Lord created. You may believe the End Times are upon us.
But take heart!
You are not alone!
Have Faith!
Have Courage!
We who survived this demonic plague wrought by Satan’s Children face A Great Test! Only we can defend our world, our lives, our very souls. Arm yourselves and join The Holy Crusade. Will you stand by while our women are raped, our children mutilated, while the very survival of humanity is threatened by the ungodly, by The Uncanny? The future of the Human Race is in our hands. To save it we must soak them in the blood of the demon.
Gather together, Chosen Warriors! Hunt, Kill, Destroy the EVIL that threatens us. “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live,” so sayeth The Lord. This is the time of retribution! This is the time of The Slaughter! This is the time of
The Purity Warriors!
I am with you. I am of you. I am filled with the light of righteous vengeance.
Reverend and Commander Jeremiah White
“Bad copy,” Arlys managed. “Overwrought and fucking terrifying.”
“Purity Warriors.” Lana gripped the porch rail. “Flynn said he finally got Starr to talk a little more. The gang who killed her mother called themselves Purity Warriors, and had tattoos. Crossed swords with a P and a W under the X.”
“I know. Just like I know this Jeremiah.” Arlys handed the paper back to Chuck. “He was already stirring up calls for bloodshed back in January, in the early weeks of the Doom.”
“He’s got a rudimentary site up,” Chuck told them. “I stumbled on it while I hunted for communications. There’s more. He’s uploaded some photos—they’re pretty graphic. And he’s got one up of the tattoo you’re talking about. He calls it the Mark of the Chosen. Bat shit, man. Sick and bat shit. He claims he’s working on putting up a message board. I hacked in, and he’s got more than two hundred hits. Less than fifty individuals, so people go back, check the site again.”
“Fifty’s not many,” Arlys murmured. “But…”
“It says we’re not the only ones with power and Internet,” Chuck finished.
“We wouldn’t be the only ones appalled by the sick and the bat shit,” Arlys commented. “But…”
“Some will revel in it.” Eyes grim, Rachel nodded. “Including a handful in New Hope. Could you tell when he is, or was, posting? Where the site’s based?”
“I think he’s mobile—adds more scary because I don’t know how he could be. Still, now that I found it, I can monitor it. Everything else I’ve found, so far, is pre-Doom. It’s stuff that’s been up since before it all fell down. But if there’s one—the bat shit—there’s going to be more.”
He broke off as Max pulled up to the curb in a truck. Max got out one side, Will the other.
“I’m fine,” Lana said quickly.
“Will said you fainted.”
She aimed a frustrated look at Will. “I got a little dizzy.”
He cupped her face, studied it. “You had a vision?”
“No, not … It’s hard to explain. I think the baby did, and it somehow filtered through me.”
“You’re connected physically,” Rachel pointed out. “Your health, the baby’s. I don’t know anything about this other side of things, really, but it seems to me that connection could go there.”
“It’s not the first time,” Max concurred. “Could it harm her?”
“I’d say driving’s out.”
Appalled, Lana stared. She’d learned to love driving. “Come on!”
“I’m going to side with the doctor,” Arlys said. “You went off, Lana. You were somewhere else. I’d give a pass on driving, operating heavy equipment,” she added, trying to lighten the blow.