‘You can’t remember?’
Rising from her crouching position by Si, Jial quietly fluttered over towards Chrissy. Settling down beside the naked, trembling girl, Jial didn’t speak at first. Instead, Jial lovingly embraced her, fully enveloping her in the warm, soothing cocoon of her wings.
Chrissy buried her face against Jial’s heaving chest and wept.
‘I…I can’t remember anything! I just woke up and saw – saw all this, all this horror! Who are these poor people? What happened to the beasts, the monsters who were chasing us?’
‘Those “poor people” were the chiasmus. Or, at least, they were until you killed them.’
‘Me? I killed all these beasts – but they’re not beasts, are they? They’re just teenage kids! What is going on? All this makes less and less sense to me!’
‘What’s going on, Chrissy, is you saved us: saved me!’ Si rose unsteadily to his feet, his voice choked and quavering.
Chrissy was relieved to see that Si no longer appeared as shocked, no longer as scared of her, as he had only a moment ago. Rather, he seemed relieved, more understanding and forgiving, more concerned and pitying.
‘As Jial says, they were beasts when you were fighting them. They changed as soon as you’d killed them. You know – like some kind of werewolf, or something.’
Chrissy felt Jial let out an almost imperceptible sigh of relief, as if relishing being spared having to tell the truth about what had just happened to her.
‘Fighting them? How did I fight those monsters?’ a bewildered Chrissy demanded.
‘Like I said; they’re some sort of werewolf. And you…you must’ve been bitten or something because–’
‘Bitten?’
Chrissy anxiously checked her blood soaked skin, looking for any gash, any bite marks.
‘You kind of transformed into one of them – only briefly, Chrissy, only briefly. Somehow you changed back too!’
Seeing the dawning horror on Chrissy’s face, Si hurriedly tried to reassure her. But it was no use. Chrissy was panic-stricken.
‘I’m a beast? I’ve been bitten, and now I’m one of these monsters?’
‘You changed back, that’s the main thing, Chrissy!’ Jial hugged Chrissy even tighter. ‘It’s even possible to remain permanently human, if you can keep a tight check on your anger, your worst emotions.’
‘And if I can’t? I transform, don’t I? And maybe next time, its Si I end up killing!’
Si blanched. Even so, he tried to remain calm, reaching up for a car blanket he’d spotted hanging from an open door of one the wrecked cars.
‘But you didn’t kill me,’ he pointed out. ‘It was as if you almost recognised who I was, and spared me. Despite how murderous you were towards the other beasts.’
With a sharp pull, and the sound of tearing, he dislodged the blanket from wherever it had snagged on the inside of the car.
‘It was such a brief change, it was almost like you had some sort of control over it,’ Jial agreed. ‘You fought the beasts, rather than joining them; which I would normally have expected, once you’d transformed.’
‘Then…then I’m not a danger to Si?’
‘You protected me,’ Si said, stepping closer towards Chrissy and, as Jial stepped aside and unfurled her enveloping wings, covering her with the blanket. ‘If you hadn’t changed – hadn’t been able to control that change too – I’d be dead. We’d be dead.’
‘And I’m here to help you control your emotions, to calm you, remember, Chrissy?’ Jial tried to smile, but her effort faded. ‘I’m to blame over what happened, not you. It’s my role to keep you calm, and I failed. Sorry. I’ll be more careful in future.’
Si grinned.
‘Jial, don’t you be so hard on yourself too! How were you supposed to help keep her calm when we were about to be torn apart by a gang of massive monsters?’
Chrissy reached for and gripped Si’s hand tightly.
‘But that means I might transform again! I can’t go with you Si! It’s too dangerous for you!’
Wrapping the blanket tighter around her, Si gave her a loving, reassuring embrace. He kissed her tenderly on her neck.
‘It’s too dangerous for me without you!’ His breath was warm on her skin. ‘Besides, if the worst comes to the worst, you bite me, and we can be beasts together, right?’
Jial laughed sourly.
‘Don’t be so romantic, Si. Eventually, you’d just be animals, beasts of the worst kind. You won’t remember any form of relationship between you, let alone love.’
Turning towards Si, Chrissy looked him directly in the eye, gripped his hand even harder.
‘Si, I don’t want to be a beast. I’d rather die.’
*
Chapter 40
‘We’re getting out of here. It’s not safe.’
Leaving the gas station behind them, Si swung the jeep out onto the wrong side of the road, the side where under normal circumstances you’d expect to be met by angrily blaring, oncoming traffic.
He peered out of his side of the jeep. He was looking for the dirt tracks that would highlight where they’d pulled onto the road earlier, when arriving from out of the desert.
There weren’t any signs pointing towards Hermon. There wasn’t even any indication that anything lay out there other than a forbidding, murderous desert.
With a deft spin of the steering wheel, Si swerved off the road and headed out into the desert along their earlier tyre marks.
‘Oh, and Hermon is safe?’ Chrissy observed sarcastically.
On their way back to the jeep through the shop, Chrissy had grabbed a set of loosely fitting clothes – t-shirt, baggy trousers, scuffed and holed plimsolls – from what was probably a counter-assistant’s locker. She’d also rubbed herself as clean as she could with a few, quickly grabbed packs of moist baby wipes. She was surprised to find that she wasn’t gashed or wounded in any way that she could see, leaving her wondering if part of her transformation entailed rapid healing.
‘Uh uh, Hermon’s not safe either,’ Si replied. ‘But this is the only way I know to somewhere out in the desert we know’s relatively safe. Somewhere where we can rest awhile and plan what we’re going to do next.’
‘We have to go back; to Hermon, I mean.’ Jial was seated in the rear of the jeep once more, her wings spread out across the backs of the seats.
‘Hmn, now that wasn’t the sort of plan I’d envisaged coming up with,’ Si said.
‘I suppose that depends if your plan involves helping your parents. Remember those people who raised you, cared for you, loved you?’
Chrissy swung around in her seat to glare accusingly at Jial.
‘You told us they’d be safe! That they’d be protected by the police and military.’
Jial hung her head ashamedly.
‘I thought they would be safe. But something’s gone wrong. Should all else fail, if an attack by the chiasmus becomes too powerful to hold back, there’s a failsafe device in the mayor’s home that will fry the brain of any beast in range. But no one’s tripped it. Like it’s been forgotten, or they can’t get to it.’
‘But the angels, the Angelic Guard that we saw; they can protect everyone against the beasts, surely?’
Jial shook her head as morosely as if she were a spoilt teenager.
‘We’re…we’re losing Chrissy. Yes, even the angels are losing. What do you think has been happening to us? Why we’ve been disappearing?’
‘You mean Zorbielle? Petrial?’ asked Si.
Jial nodded miserably.
‘And all the others; more now than you can imagine, Si. There are so few of us left.’
‘But how? How can angels die?’ Chrissy was dumbfounded.
‘The chiasmus; they can attack us almost as effortlessly as they can attack you.’
But…how’s that possible. They’re here, here on earth! Not up in heaven, or wherever it is angels live.’
‘Yet we can talk to you, even interact a
little with you, yes?’ Jial said. ‘And the chiasmus are a far older branch of humanity than you are; a more elemental offshoot. They can intrude within our zone, where they’re every bit as powerful as they are on earth.’
Everyone was quiet for a moment while Chrissy and Si took all this new information in. While they considered its many implications.
‘So, what do we do?’ Chrissy said eventually. ‘To protect our parents, I mean; how can we possibly help?’
‘You trip the failsafe device.’ Jial replied bluntly.
‘Wait, wait, wait!’ Si was so furious he almost slewed the jeep to a sudden halt. ‘Didn’t you say this device fries the mind of any beast in range? And won’t that include Chrissy?’
‘Yes; it might,’ Jial agreed with tears in her eyes.
*
Chapter 41
‘We can’t do it!’
‘We must! It’s the only way to save our parents!
Si took a hand off the wheel to reach out for and tightly grasp Chrissy’s hand.
‘I can’t watch you die, Chrissy!’ Si continued to insist. ‘Especially if I’m the one responsible: if I’m the one who’s tripped this damn switch!’
‘I’ll trip it then. As I’ve already said, Si, I can’t live my life as a beast!’
‘But what’s to say you can’t beat this? You’re not a beast! It was only a brief change, while you were incredibly angry and frightened. You might never change again.’
Their hands gripped all the tighter.
‘Si, we know that’s highly unlikely! Besides that might be what saves me, right? If I’m still human when we flick the switch, it isn’t going to harm me!’
Chrissy glanced back towards Jial for confirmation that she might be right. But Jial avoided her stare, ashamedly hiding her face behind a curtain of long hair.
‘No, no!’ In his frustration, Si vehemently banged the steering wheel. ‘I’ll trip the switch! I’ll leave you somewhere safe on the outskirts of town, out of range of this doomsday machine!’
‘You couldn’t do it, Si,’ Jial mumbled from the back seat. ‘Not on your own.’
Si fleetingly glared back at her.
‘You said we should drive through to the mayor’s house, stopping for nothing and nobody.’
They had Google-Mapped for the quickest, easiest route to the mayor’s house once they entered town via the road to Bonniville. Once inside the house, they would have to search for the failsafe switch, as Jial wasn’t sure where it would be hidden.
‘And if the chiasmus decide to stop you?’ Jial obviously hated having to continually point out the obvious flaws in Si’s reasoning.
‘The angels, damn you Jial! Isn’t that what you’re for? To protect us?’
‘We can hardly protect ourselves anymore. But yes, we’ll do what we can, I promise you that.’
Chrissy took one of Si’s hands in hers again.
‘Si, we both know what she means, why she says you need me.’
Tears appeared in Si’s eyes. He grasped Chrissy’s hand all the tighter.
‘I can’t let you do that for me again, Chrissy! You don’t want to be a beast, you’ve already said that!’
‘I said I can’t live as a beast. But I can die as one: if it means saving you.’
*
As they drew closer to the mobile home park, Chrissy cradled her gun in her lap.
She hoped that this would suffice: that this would be enough to protect them from any beasts that had remained in the park. That way, perhaps, she herself wouldn’t change into a monster.
Jial had explained the role of the trailer parks in helping Hermon remain an oasis deliberately cut off from the rest of world, where it was hopefully protected from the surge of chiasma plaguing and gradually overcoming every other town and city on the globe.
Vehicle disablers ensured no one, not even rebellious parents like Si’s, could travel beyond the parks. There had never ever been trips or holidays to Bonniville, Homehaven and the other towns supposedly surrounding Hermon, let alone to Europe. The break took place here, with a mix of drugs and hypnosis instilling the false memories necessary to maintain the idea that Hermon was part of the wider world. Old movies, books and news items all added to the sense that Hermon was safe and idyllic, ensuring that the children at least had no fear of what was really happening in the outside world.
The sun was high and, out in the desert, blistering. A while back now, they had raised the jeep’s canvas covering to give them some degree of shade. They had also briefly stopped for a rest, to eat a few more bites of the rations, to go to the toilet. Chrissy had even wondered if Jial was hungry, the way she had momentarily eyed the food being shared out. Of course, that was crazy; angels were never hungry.
Jial had vanished for about half an hour but, as she had promised just before she vanished, she had returned, appearing in the rear of the jeep with a satisfied smile.
Even though the sun was now startling bright, the street lamps standing between the mobile homes were still on. Many of the homes were crumpled wildly out of shape, as if smashed by a ferocious storm. Chrissy tensed, listening out for the howls of any beasts that had hung behind in the park, clutching tighter on her gun, hoping it would be enough.
There were no howls. No beasts emerging from the wreckage, giving chase.
Alongside her, Chrissy saw Si steadily breathe out a sigh of relief.
‘They’ve abandoned the park: headed back into town.’
‘Which means you’ve got more of them to face when we get there,’ Jial pointed out.
‘Did you notice?’ Chrissy asked anxiously. ‘There weren’t any bodies. What did they do with the bodies?’
Si shrugged.
‘It probably doesn’t mean anything.’ He didn’t sound convinced. ‘They’d left them at the wrecked convoy we found, remember?’
‘They hadn’t finished with the convoy. They had other prey to seek out.’
Chrissy tried her best to hide that she was quivering with fear.
Is this what she was now? A vicious cannibal?
She felt physically sick, and mentally sickened, disgusted with herself, what she had become.
She looked back towards Jial. Jial seemed strangely distracted, edgily glancing off to her side as if watching some invisible, soundless events. Her face was creasing up in horror.
‘Jial?’
‘Huh?’
Jial turned to face her, but appeared anxious, perhaps even irritated that she had been interrupted.
‘Do you really think it’s possible for me to control…to control who I’ve become?’
‘I…I think it is possible, yes.’
Jial’s eyes continued to uneasily flicker to one side. For a brief moment, she even flinched, as if some invisible object had been thrown at her and she was trying to avoid it striking her.
‘It was such a brief change,’ Jial continued. ‘And while changed, you managed to remember who Si was, and that he was important to you.’
‘But…will I ever forget that?’
Chrissy fleeting looked Si’s way, at once thinking it would be impossible to forget how important he was to her. Yet she also recalled how her actions as a beast were a complete blank in her life. She hadn’t really been in control of the beast she’d briefly transformed into, surely? And what if the transformation lasted longer? Would she completely forget who she really was, who Si was? Would she attack him then?
As if reading her thoughts, Jial spoke up again.
‘The way you avoided striking out at Si earlier was something I’ve never seen or heard of before. It’s like your love for him restrained you – that’s all I can put it down to, to be honest. But also to be honest; no, sorry, Chrissy, I can’t reassure you that you’ll always remain aware of the connection between you.’
She spoke remarkably quickly, everything coming out in a rush. It was the way someone speaks when they need to tell you everything they can before having to urgently leave.
&
nbsp; Suddenly, Jial threw her arms up in a protective gesture around her face.
‘Oh no no!’ she shrieked. ‘Please help me someone!’
And then she vanished.
*
Chapter 42
‘She’s gone! Jial’s gone!’
‘What?’
Seeing how frantic Chrissy had become, kneeling up dangerously in her seat to pass her hands through the empty air behind her, Si slewed the jeep to a halt as carefully as he could. He turned, looking back into the empty seat.
‘She’s vanished before. She’ll be back.’
‘No, no, this time it’s different,’ Chrissy wailed, the tears streaming down her face as if they would never end. ‘She didn’t say she had to go, or that she’d back, like she has before. It was like she was being attacked – like when the other angels vanished!’
She glowered at the empty air around her, in the hope her intense, probing eyes could spot the invisible foe that had managed to spirit Jial away.
Si took her trembling hand.
‘She’s an angel, Chrissy. She can take care of herself.’
‘Can she, Si? I don’t think she can. What did she say? That they were under attack too, just like us!’
‘Then – then that’s all the more reason to carry on, Chrissy. To flick this switch, or whatever it is.’
Chrissy slumped miserably into her seat.
‘She…she was like my sister, Si. My little sister!’
Si leant across from his seat, hugged her tightly, kissed her tear soaked cheeks.
‘We can turn back. There’s nothing that says we have to go ahead with this, risking your life.’
‘No, Si; you were right before,’ Chrissy said resolutely, wiping away her tears, sitting comfortably once more in her seat. ‘I’ve already lost my little sister. I’m not going to lose my parents too!’
*
They rushed through the town as quickly as they dared. Wherever they could, they kept to the widest, straightest roads. They headed down the middle, which was as far away from the buildings as possible. They kept turns to a minimum.
Everywhere seemed deserted. Cars were abandoned at the side of the road, or were strewn across the carriageway as shattered wrecks. Apart from the hollow echoes of their own roaring engine, it was all eerily quiet.