Redemption of the Dead (36 page)

“I don’t understand.”

“You got the crystals and brought them
to me. Now it’s Tracy’s turn. She has to because if the other you
shows and sees you, then this mission won’t be properly carried
out.”

“I don’t get
it,” Tracy said. “Why doesn’t she just stop herself from entering
the bank thus stopping everything . . . else.” She furrowed her
brow. “Does that mean that all this is suddenly going to disappear,
or we’ll disappear, or—help me! Here, I don’t want this.” She gave
the pocket watch back.

“How about
just trust me?” he said calmly, and returned the watch to
her.

“No,” she
said and tried giving it back, but Nathaniel withdrew his hand.
“Seriously, take it.”

“Please trust him,” Billie said. “I
know you’re confused, I know this is confusing, but he knows what
he’s doing. He wouldn’t have brought us here otherwise.”

Tracy looked
at the watch. “Fine. Just . . . whatever.” She headed toward the
bank’s doors.

* * * *

35

The Past

T
racy reached
for
the door handle and her
hand passed through the metal. Thinking she was losing it, she
tried again and the same thing happened.

“What is this, a hologram?” she
said.

Someone else was coming up the steps
behind her, a middle-aged man with dark gray hair.

“Can you
open the—” she started, but he walked right through her, opened the
door and went in. “What just happened?” She faced the door and
tried touching it again. Like before, her hand went through the
handle. Giving up, she said, “I’m not going to even ask anymore.”
Slowly, she stepped toward the door’s glass and, bracing to smack
her head into it, she instead passed smoothly through the glass and
was in the bank’s landing. “Whoa,” she breathed and proceeded to
the main entrance. She passed through it and was before the ATMs on
the other side.

There were
people all around. A security camera covered the front entrance.
When she glanced up at its corresponding monitor, there was no one
where she stood. She tried talking to the next person to pass her
and was completely ignored. She went to touch them on the shoulder
and her hand passed through them.

“This is
cool in its own way, but you need to stay focused.”

Outside,
lightning flickered and a black helicopter emerged in the middle of
the parking lot, not affecting any of the cars around it. A few
moments later, an older man with long hair and beard followed by
Billie and Joe came out.

“Joe . . .” she said. She stepped
forward to run to him, but stopped herself despite her heart
desperately telling her otherwise.

Outside
through the window, the trio spoke before Billie fell forward and
sank into the sidewalk. Joe pulled her up and she started freaking
out.

Thank goodness that didn’t happen to me,
Tracy thought.

Soon Billie
came in first and hid. Joe and August entered shortly after and
started looking for her.

Joe was so
handsome and put together, the long coat, the bald head with only a
bit of stubble. He had a hard edge to him, the same he had when she
first met him and saved his life. She wanted to go up to him, to
wrap her arms around him and caution him of what was to come, but
remembering the horrors of the demonic undead invasion, any wrong
move on her part could destroy what she, Billie and Nathaniel came
here to do. She could only hope and pray that what she was to do
here would save his life in the end.

Tracy kept
to herself near the brochures, pretending to be just another
customer in case they saw her. She watched as Joe and August went
around, looking for Billie. Joe called out her name. It was so good
to hear his voice again.

An old man
in a white fedora and overcoat was outside the bank, about to come
in.

That’s him!
she
thought and ran through the bank, through the doors, straight in
front of him.

He didn’t say anything, but she knew
he saw her because he was looking directly into her
eyes.

“Nathaniel?” she said.

He simply
nodded.

“I have something for you.” She pulled
out the pocket watch and gave it to him.

He took it without reaction, tipped
his hat, and walked on past into the bank.

“What?” she said. “No thank
you?”

Billie came
around the side of the bank, alone. She gave Tracy a wave. “Done
already?”

Tracy did a
quick replay of the pass-off in her mind’s eye. “Yeah. Too easy.
Just gave it to the old guy and—Where’s Nathaniel?”

“Said he’d
be right back, wanted to check on something.” Billie’s eyes went
wide in apparent realization. “You don’t think—”

“I guess we understand now, don’t
we.”

“I guess, but if he has the watch and
it’s intact, what is the one inside the safety deposit
box?”

“Safety deposit box?”

“Yeah,
that’s where the original pocket watch was, the one that he went
into the private booth to reset and I interfered, thus him missing
the reset time.”

Tracy waved her hands. “Wait, wait,
wait. What’s that watch for?”

“You know,
it’s a long story, but in the end . . . I was told that by him
resetting it, that that was his assignment. He comes in and resets
it every week and by doing so forbids the Doomsday Clock from
rolling over and unleashing Armageddon.”

“You mean
the
Armageddon?”

“That’s the one.”

A series of
dark shadows rose over them and when Tracy looked up, she saw a
host of demons on the bank’s roof, looking right at
them.

* * * *

The forces
of darkness upon the roof leered at them before swarming down and
surrounding the girls. They had them trapped, each of the creatures
hissing and snapping as they taunted.

Tracy already had her gun drawn. Billie wished she had one
of her own, not that it would do anything, but at least she’d
have
something.

If it’s my time to die, then I’d rather do it myself than
them.
“Tracy, shoot me,”
Billie said, suddenly feeling like a coward.

“What?”

“It’s either us or them who decides
how we die. Do you want to leave that choice in their
hands?”

“Leave them in mine.” A bright golden
robe with enormous wings landed in front of them, sending the
demons back a step. The angel drew his long sword and got to work
cutting heads, wings and bodies. Each time one of the creatures
came in, he countered their attack lightning quick and removed
either a limb from their body or ended them entirely.

When the blur of golden motion was
over, Billie saw who had rescued them.

Michael.

“My friend has other matters to attend
to,” he said.

Suddenly,
scores of demons rose from the ground, weapons drawn. Michael
immediately got at the ready. Surrounded by a multitude of them,
Billie didn’t know if they’d make it.

From the sky, an army of angels
descended and instantly the battle began.

Running for
their lives, Billie and Tracy headed back into the bank and she
jerked Tracy out of the way when she saw her other self pass
through the wall into the booth where Nathaniel was about to reset
the watch.

Not long
after, her counterpart emerged with Nathaniel forcing her along,
the ground shaking. The angel passed her off to August. A moment
later, the two started running. At the same time the ground split
open and demons began to funnel out like bees escaping a packed
hive.

“We’re too late,” Billie said. The
same thing that happened before was happening again. It wasn’t
supposed to be like this. Nathaniel was supposed to have it all in
hand. Where was he? She bolted toward the privacy booth and was
quickly mauled by a demon that swooped in low and fast.

She scrambled, trying to get away from
its grip. Tracy fired round after round into the creature, the
bullets not making a difference. Tracy hurled the gun at it in
frustration.

The foul
demon’s claws pierced Billie’s legs; she screamed, and in an
instant the evil creature swallowed up her body
underneath.

Hissing, it whispered its victory,
then ran its claws through her neck.

* * * *

Landing on
the demon’s back, Tracy beat on it. “Get off her!”

Billie’s
limp form lay beneath the creature, most of her head detached from
her body. The demon fluttered its leathery wings and sent her
flying off its back into the air, and into Nathaniel, who had now
changed into his angelic form and was fighting off the
demons.

He pulled
her to her feet, but her shaking legs gave out and she
collapsed.

“Billie . . .” she said, looking into
the angel’s eyes.

With a look
of sadness which quickly turned to red-hot fury, Nathaniel fought
through the packs of demons, Michael coming to join him, the large
angel cutting at the swarm of demons flying through the hole in the
bank floor, through the walls and into the world.

The Rain.
“Joe,” Tracy
said quietly.

“Gone already,” Nathaniel said,
running a demon through with a sword to its face.

“And me?”

“Help me.”
He swiftly came beside her and stuffed something into her hand then
dove right back into the fray. She opened her fingers and had the
pocket watch.

“Hold it as close to the opening as
possible,” he said.

The demons
started to rise in a tornado, their flapping wings creating a
whirlwind she was having a hard time fighting through.

“Open the watch and wind it back!”
Nathaniel shouted as the demonic assault grew larger.

“Wind it back? How far?”

“Look at it!”

She read the
clock’s face. It had hands like any other watch, but it wasn’t
measured in minutes. It was measured in months, weeks, days. It
seemed one full wind back would count for one year, but an odd
three-hundred-and-sixty-day-year. “All the way?”

“All the—” A
demon pounced on him and took him down. On his back, Nathaniel ran
the creature through and chopped the head off another that quickly
got closer.

Tracy wound
back the hands. The watch face glowed white. She assumed that once
she suppressed the winder, something would—she was brought down
from behind, the watch falling on the floor and sliding
away.

She rolled over.

The devil stood above her.

“Tracy . .
.” he hissed, his black eyes filled with malice. He drew his liquid
black sword and pointed it at her throat. “I lost Joe to my
Adversary. I’m not going to lose you.” With a snarl, he lashed out.
The blade was deflected just inches from her face by a silver
flash.

Nathaniel kicked the devil back then
locked swords. “Get the watch!”

Tracy scrambled to her feet and
scampered toward where the watch had slid under a chair.

A series of whooshes rose on the air
then a searing pain pierced her lower back straight through to her
gut. She looked down and saw almost half of the devil’s blade
protruding from her abdomen. Falling on her knees, the blade
causing her muscles to start locking, she strove forward inch by
painful inch along the floor toward the watch.

It was in
view. Hot pain ignited in her feet as a pair of sharp teeth dug
into her legs. One of the demons had her.

“Help . . .” she wheezed and was
alarmed when she had difficulty breathing in.

Her
fingertips touched the watch as the demon crawled up her body. She
pulled the watch into her hand and instantly the demon’s weight
lifted. Had she suppressed the winder? She checked and it still was
out, the watch face glowing. Hot pain fired up in her back and
mid-section again as the sword was yanked from her body. Her blood
gushed out and she could barely move. The devil stood over her and
just as he reached for the pocket watch, both Nathaniel and Michael
flew in from the side and pulled him away. Both the devil and the
angels disappeared through the wall beside her.

Hands
shaking, she pulled herself along the floor, blood filling her
mouth. She coughed then gagged, and darkness started to invade her
vision. Near the hole, the demonic swarm poured out, but seemed to
be thinner in numbers.

Tracy
reached as far forward as she could and pressed the
winder.

* * * *

Epilogue

Alterations

Six Months Later . .
.

Tracy walked down Main, Nathaniel guised as a young man
beside her. She wore a black T-shirt, black jeans, the color
something she refused to give up after what happened at the bank
six months ago. As the two walked through the crowd of people, even
now
she still saw the city she
once knew, the one ravaged and broken, with the undead at every
corner. The pain, the suffering, the blood. The brown and gray
sky.