400 Horsepower of the Apocalypse
Chapter 10
We drove through the night. The Packmaster’s back end bucked and forced me to hold on tightly to Leo until my arms ached. What the hell was wrong with the bike? Bad suspension or bent swingarm? The motorcycle had been thrown across a parking lot, after all.
Or was the machine just… haunted?
Not haunted, Uriel corrected. This vehicle is Death’s steed.
Oh, right. I wasn’t alone in my own head anymore. No more daydreams about hunky bikers, apparently.
Hunky bikers? Uriel asked.
Stop that!
Arrow had been up in the north of Texas, in the narrow part that people called the Panhandle, and by one o’clock in the morning, we were leaving Texas behind and following Highway 44 across New Mexico. The late night was warm and clear, and we drove beneath the brilliant silver points of a million stars. There were a few long-haul truckers on the highway, occasionally washing out the star-glow with their bright headlights. But then they passed us or we passed them, and we were alone with the heavens again.
Waxing poetic usually meant it was way past my bedtime, and tonight was no exception. I was scared out of my mind by what had happened in Arrow and if I thought about it for too long, I started hyperventilating all over again. But it was also exhausting. I yawned and my head sagged forward until it came to rest against Leo’s shoulder. He didn’t object, so I left it there.
It’s pretty much impossible to sleep on the back of a motorcycle, though, even if it’s not a possessed Packmaster trying to shake you off. I held onto Leo as the sky began to lighten from black to violet, and then a blue so deep that it looked like something pulled up from the bottom of the ocean.
My stomach growled nearly as loud as the engine. I tapped Leo on the shoulder and pointed a thumb at my mouth in the standard biker shorthand for if we don’t stop for food soon, I’m going to start chewing on the tires. Leo gestured to the next green aluminum sign — Novak, 23 miles — and I nodded.
By the time we made it to Novak, my stomach was snarling and I almost wished Leo wasn’t throttling back on the demonic speed so much. But we took the indicated exit and followed a road that rose through rocky hills and scattered patches of scrubby green pine trees. As the sun finished rising up over the horizon, we rolled past stores and restaurants all in midwest-styled stucco.
It was still early in the morning, but a restaurant with the name Country Kitchen Café printed on a folksy wooden sign was open, so Leo parked along the street out front and I jumped off the Packmaster. I was starving and that run had beat my ass to a pulp. The motorcycle growled metallically as Leo switched it off and I discreetly flipped the damned thing off. You would think a demonic hell-bike could manage a smoother ride. But maybe I was being unfair… It had taken a serious beating last night.
We stashed our helmets back in the saddlebags — which Leo then buckled tightly shut — and went inside. A tall woman in a pink skirt and frilly apron looked up from the coffee pot and told us to take a seat wherever we liked.
Leo pointed to a spot by the door, close to the exit in case we had to run, but we weren’t the only people up this early and who needed to eat. There were a few men and women sitting along the counter, and a couple of trucker-looking guys, each at their own table. So I headed toward a booth in the very back of the restaurant where we could talk about bonkers shit without any of the other patrons overhearing.
Leo nodded and followed me through the café. I rubbed my aching tailbone for a moment, then dropped down onto the upholstered bench. Leo sat across from me and folded his arms on the tabletop.
“How’re you doing?” he asked.
“I’ve got a voice talking batshit inside my head,” I said. “And an archangel turned my Bonneville into scrap. I… I worked for years on that bike!”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. Yeah, the loss hurt — a lot — but I wasn’t the one who had found all my friends dead on the road from some kind of… demonic disease. I swallowed against a hard lump in my throat.
“It sucks, but I’m okay…ish,” I told Leo. “How about you?”
The big biker looked down at the table and sighed. “Shitty, but we don’t have much time for that, do we?”
“I guess not.”
“Jaz, that angel inside of you…” Leo said, dropping his voice. “Have they told you anything useful? Anything we can do?”
“Not really,” I answered. “Mostly they’re telling me to give up control of my body and run away from you.”
This is what your world and entire universe were created to do, Uriel told me. And you should run. Death slumbers in this mortal and when it meets its brothers, it will awaken.
“Now they’re lecturing me,” I said.
The tall woman in the frilly white apron shuffled over to the table, stifling a yawn behind her order pad and then offering up a guilty little smile.
“Sorry,” she said. “Early morning for all of us. Hope you slept well.”
“Not yet,” Leo answered with a tired grin.
I wasn’t sure if he was talking about riding through the night or the apocalyptic dreams we were both apparently having. I frowned down at my menu, then up at the server and her name tag — Beth.
“Hey Beth, can I ask you a pretty strange question?” I asked.
“It’s early, so I can’t promise much of an answer,” she said. “But go ahead.”
“Have you been having any weird dreams? Like end-of-the-world kind of stuff?” I asked. “Four angels fighting against four horsemen?”
Beth blinked, then raised an eyebrow and shook her head. “I’ve had a few nightmares about my girl running out on me, but nothing like that. Sounds like you’ve been having some pretty long nights.”
“You have no idea,” I said.
“Well, maybe I can improve your morning,” Beth said. “How about some breakfast?”
“Coffee,” Leo answered, then glanced at me. I nodded. “Two coffees, please.”
“And waffles, with lots of whipped cream,” I added. “Strawberries, too, if you’ve got them.”
After what we had been through, I figured that I deserved it. Our server dutifully wrote down my order, then turned back to Leo with a smile.
“Any food for you, hon?” she asked.
“Some scrambled eggs and sourdough toast,” Leo said.
“Sure thing. I’ll have that right out for you two.”
Beth yawned again, but she didn’t bother covering it up this time, and headed off again in the direction of the kitchen. Leo waited until she was out of earshot, then gave me a curious look.
“What was all that?” he asked. “Why were you asking about her dreams?”
“Until about thirty seconds ago, everyone I’ve talked to about these… visions… seems to know more about them than I do.” I picked up my napkin and twisted it into a knot of cloth between my hands. “Your uncle knew all about the dreams, and you’re having them, too…”
“So you’re wondering if maybe everyone was dreaming about the angels and horsemen,” Leo said. “Good idea. But it sounds like the answer is no.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “But I just remembered something else that Carlos said. How weird a coincidence is it that we met?”
“My bike was giving me a lot of shit. I needed a mechanic,” Leo said, but he sounded a little uncertain.
“How long had the Packmaster been acting up?” I asked.
“Before I left Chicago. It started during the job.”
“But you suddenly decided to get it looked at when you and the Knights were driving past Crayhill?”
Leo frowned. “Yes…”
We four warriors of light and order are drawn together, Uriel said. I barely resisted the urge to rub my temple as the angel’s voice echoed in my skull. As are the horsemen. That is how Gabriel found us, and how Pestilence seeks Death. But the light and the dark are pulled toward one another, as well. We are called to battle. It was… unfortunate that Death got so close before I had control of your form, vessel.
Leo watched me with one eyebrow raised. “Uriel was talking to you just then, weren’t they?”
Apparently, it showed on my face, and so did the flush I felt warming my cheeks.
“Uh… yeah,” I stammered. “Uriel says the angels are all kind of pulled together like magnets, and so are the horsemen. That’s how they find each other and get stronger. But the two different sides are also drawn together.”
“And that’s what happened to us?”
I nodded. “According to Uriel. Who is pretty cranky that you got to me before Gabriel did.”
“How did my uncle know about it?” Leo asked.
“I have no idea.”
Rules were set forth for the final battle, Uriel told me. It is to be fought by four warriors of light against four warriors of darkness. But the horsemen are forces of disorder and when Death is strong enough, it will not hesitate to kill us.
I stared across the restaurant booth at Leo. Was there really some kind of evil monster lurking inside of him? Leo certainly looked intimidating with his tattoos, the beginnings of a beard shadowing his cheeks, and all his biker leathers. And I remembered the chains rising up out of the crater in the Arrow Lodge parking lot like impossible metal snakes. I shivered.
Our server returned with two cups of hot coffee, along with a tiny pitcher of cream and a ceramic dish of sugar packets. Leo thanked her as I got to work pouring cream into my coffee, then mixed in five sugars.
Hey, don’t judge me. I had a rough couple of days.
Leo stirred his coffee — though he hadn’t added anything to it — and licked the spoon. I couldn’t blame him for wanting every last drop of coffee, but it was kind of distracting. It was amazing how even when my head was bursting with terror and weirdness, I could still notice how hot Leo was. Which was very.
You must leave him, Uriel told me.
Would you stop that? I asked.
Stop what?
Stop listening to all of my thoughts!
We are one, Uriel said. But you may stop having thoughts, if you wish. I will take control of this vessel.
And then do what? I asked. Kill Leo? Or Death or whatever?
That is not what was agreed upon. When both sides have united, four and four, we shall do battle. Our enemies have little regard for order and law, but we do. Yes, I will kill Death — but only when the time is right.
Leo stared out the nearest window with an intent expression as he drank his coffee in long gulps. Was he watching for cops? Angels? Or maybe the other horsemen…?
Was any of this even really happening?
“Any helpful input from your angel?” Leo asked me, finally turning away from the window.
“No, not really. Just a lot of ranting about the final battle,” I reported. “Destroying the horsemen, victory over darkness. Stuff like that.”
“Damn it.” Leo sighed and raked his fingers through his hair.
“I’m not sure that we can believe what Uriel tells us,” I said. My voice sounded too shrill. “Or if they’re even real at all. What are the symptoms of schizophrenia?”
“I don’t think you’re crazy, Jaz,” Leo assured me.
Both my heart and stomach clenched. It was nice to know at least one of us believed me… But what if Leo was wrong? What if I was losing my mind?
What if we both were?
I took a drink of coffee. Even with all the cream I had added, it was still hot enough to burn my tongue, but after a long night on the back of a bike that really seemed to hate me, it felt good just to drink something warm and sweet.
Beth appeared again a few minutes later with our breakfast plates balanced on one arm and carrying a coffee pot. She set the food down in front of us and refilled our coffee. Leo looked over Beth’s shoulder at a boxy old television bolted up into a corner of the country diner. On the screen, a man with an impressive blond mustache was reporting from… I don’t know, a war zone?
I blinked. Wait, no…
That was the remains of the Arrow Lodge. It looked different in the daylight and some of the wreckage had been removed, but there was still black smoke rising from the crater where Gabriel had smashed Leo into the asphalt.
“Holy shit,” I said.
Beth finished setting out our food and glanced at the news. “Oh, yeah. There was a big gas leak over in Texas last night. Blew a motel to pieces and everything. A couple of people died. It’s a government cover-up, if you ask me.”
“Huh?” I asked. “What makes you say that?”
“There was some kind of biohazard thing out on Highway 44 yesterday,” Beth said, dropping her voice down into a conspiratorial whisper. “Not far from that explosion. I’m guessing some new biological weapon escaped from a government lab and that ‘gas leak’ was the military cleaning it up afterward.”
Leo stared at Beth with a stricken expression on his face, and I looked down into my coffee. Nope, that wasn’t going to do the trick today.
“Hey, can I get a bloody mary?” I asked.
Beth nodded and left again. She detoured to check on her other tables, but I really hoped that she would hurry with that bloody mary. I wasn’t driving anymore and I needed a drink.
Leo was still watching the local news over my shoulder and he looked ill. The biker hadn’t touched his eggs or toast. I craned my neck to watch the television, too. The mustached reporter gestured animatedly around the ruins of Arrow Lodge. There was no sound, but I wondered if he shared Beth’s government cover-up theory. Only when the segment ended and went to commercial did Leo finally look at me again.
“We have to get you a phone charger and some power,” he said. “We need to call Carlos.”
“Do you really think he knows anything about this stuff?” I asked.
It is highly unlikely, Uriel said. What would a mortal possibly know about our battle?
Hey, he knew about the dreams, I pointed out. That’s more than anyone else.
Uriel didn’t answer that. Leo watched me, probably waiting for whatever weird face I made when I was talking to myself to pass. I blushed and dug into my waffles.
“Sorry,” I said around a mouthful of strawberries.
“Don’t worry about it. Do you want to call your parents?”
I shook my head. “No way.”
“You don’t get along?” Leo asked. He didn’t sound alarmed or surprised by that idea. “You were arguing last night.”
“What? No, I love my parents,” I said. “But they think I’m off making a bunch of money on the best job of my life.”
Leo blinked, then smiled at me a little. “Is that what you told them?”
“Pretty much. But what the hell could I say now?” I asked. “That archangels and the four horsemen of the apocalypse are itching to have it out and I’m somehow caught in the middle? Even if Mom and Dad believed me about any of it, I don’t want to worry them. It’s not like they could help.”
Leo nodded, conceding the point, and then finally picked up a slice of his toast. He kept his eyes on the television, but luckily, there didn’t seem to be a story about the ‘biohazard thing’ off Highway 44. I doubted that seeing his dead friends all over the news would do much for Leo’s appetite.
“What about you?” I asked after I demolished my first waffle. “Is there anyone that you need to call? Other than your uncle, I mean. You two seem close.”
“I spent every summer with Carlos when I was a kid,” Leo said. “He came out to Chicago as soon as school was over and I would ride on the back of his bike all the way to San Diego. He’s the one who taught me to drive a motorcycle.”
Which was certainly an important skill in Leo’s life, but it wasn’t quite the same thing as knowing how to deal with angelic and demonic possession. Leo’s faith in Uncle Carlos’ ability to help seemed pretty strong, though.
“Anybody else to call?” I asked. “Parents, maybe? A boyfriend or girlfriend?”
Leo picked up his fork and stabbed it into his yellow heap of scrambled eggs. He shook his head. “Nope. But my dad’s still out there. Somewhere.”
“Ran off?” I asked.
“You could say that. He was gone when I got out of prison, which was the smartest move he ever made.”
“So… you two weren’t close or anything,” I guessed.
“My dad’s an asshole,” Leo said. “Liked to hit my mom whenever he had a bad day — which was a lot — and punch me when she wasn’t home.”
I winced. I mean, domestic abuse isn’t as uncommon as we would all like it to be, but I could see the pain of it right there in Leo’s brown eyes. And I worried… Kids who grow up getting hurt often end up hurting someone else.
“Uh… mind if I ask what you went to prison for?” I asked. “Since we’re in this batshit together and all.”
Leo took a bite of eggs and chewed slowly, but after he had wiped his mouth with a white cloth napkin, the biker was grinning again.
“I finally got big enough to hit my dad back,” Leo said. “Put him in intensive care for a week. And me in prison for a year. But it was worth it.”
Yay! I mean, that sucks, too.
But if Leo said the time was worth it, then I didn’t feel too bad for cheering that his asshole dad got a little taste of what he dished out.
I wasn’t feeling quite brave enough to tell Leo that, though, which left us sitting in awkward silence while we both ate. Beth returned with the bloody mary I had ordered and I chugged the spiked tomato juice, then crunched the celery to get the very last drops of vodka. If I was going to be riding on Leo’s demon-bike and listening to Uriel whisper doom into my ear all day, then I needed all the help I could get.
When we were finished eating, Leo dropped a pair of twenty-dollar bills on the table, pulled on his leather jacket and we both hurried outside. The sun had finished rising and illuminated the town of Novak in bright golden light.
“I should take a look at the Packmaster,” I said reluctantly. “If we have any engine problems now, we’re stranded. That thing is our only ride.”
“I don’t want to be stuck here when Gabriel catches up,” Leo agreed. “Need a hand?”
“Nope. This is my job, remember?”
Leo nodded. “Okay. There’s a convenience store just down the street. I’ll go find a phone charger.”
I watched him stride away along the road. A few fluffy white clouds raced across the sky in a warm wind that tousled Leo’s wavy mahogany hair. I groaned and clapped my hands over my cloud of thick, dark curls.
“And buy me a bandana!” I shouted. “Or we’re both going to be eating my hair all day!”
Leo flashed me a thumbs-up over his shoulder and I turned to face my nemesis. Let’s see how smug the Packmaster was after being knocked around the parking lot of an exploding motel.
I knelt down next to the bike to inspect how bashed up the exhaust pipes and muffler had gotten, though I wasn’t exactly sure what the hell I could do about it without my tools. The loss hit me all over again and I had to squeeze my eyes shut against tears. Some of the tools were older than I was, inherited from my parents back in their factory days. My kit had hundreds of dollars of my own tools in it, and I had worked hard for every one of them.
But now my toolbox was another heap of slag back in Texas and unless I wanted to end up the same way, I had to keep Leo’s bike running. Considering what it had been through last night, it was kind of a miracle the Packmaster was still working and hadn’t dumped us unceremoniously onto the pavement.
I opened my eyes again and squinted at Leo’s motorcycle, but it was… perfect. The exhaust pipes were straight and the chrome shined in the sunlight. The paint job wasn’t even scuffed. My stomach churned and threatened to cover the blacktop in strawberries and tomato juice.
What were the possibilities here? Either I had hallucinated a little old church lady turning into a ten-foot-tall angel, or else Leo’s bike had fixed itself afterward.
Such material damage is easily healed by our power, Uriel said. And that of the horsemen.
I remembered the news and swallowed against the tightness in my throat. Unless my hallucination had somehow ended up on television, I had to accept that it was real. All of this was actually happening. I took a deep breath and smelled bacon frying inside Novak Country Kitchen Café.
This motorcycle is Leo’s… steed, right? I asked the angel living in my head. That’s why it doesn’t like me.
Death’s steed, Uriel corrected. It is a part of Death. It answers only to the horseman and will grow stronger as Death does.
So… what it really hates is you, I thought. I doubt it cares about some silly little human. But it doesn’t want an angel riding on its back.
Yes, Uriel said. You must leave now, vessel. Before Death returns.
Leo, I corrected this time. And where else can I go? The cops? A psychologist?
To Gabriel. To Michael and Raphael. Find them, and I will lead them into final battle against the horsemen…
I squeezed my eyes closed, tighter and tighter until I could hear only the oceanic rush of my blood. Damn, Uriel really sang a one-note song.
Shut up! I thought as hard as I could. I’m not running off to join your angelic circus! I’m not leaving Leo. He has the bike and the uncle with answers. I need that or I swear I’m going to lose it.
Lose what? Uriel asked.
It was like having a child in my head. One of those possessed kids from a horror movie who can fling shit around with their minds and murders people for poorly explained reasons.
Despite having access to everything I thought about — like shirtless Leo — Uriel was terribly literal. In fact, whenever they weren’t lecturing me about apocalyptic battles and things that wanted to kill me, the archangel was pretty clueless.
I am new to this world, yes, Uriel said. I could practically hear the ruffled feathers. But also ancient beyond your limited ability to understand. We existed before this universe of matter and energy. We created it.
The angel didn’t just speak the words — though they echoed like great bells inside my skull — I could see the emptiness before the universe, the impossibly bright spark of the Big Bang exploding out through the void, filling it with fire and substance.
And this is exactly why I’m going to lose control, I said.
Good. Then I will take control of this body.
I was sorely tempted to run screaming back into the restaurant for about a dozen drinks. A chill like an arctic ice flow ran through me and I felt the vast, powerful presence of the angel tensing itself within me, but then the Packmaster’s motor revved. I jumped back and spun to find Leo jogging across the parking lot toward me. In one hand, he carried a branded plastic bag bulging with snacks and hopefully a phone charger. How long had I been sitting there, staring at the motorcycle and arguing with Uriel?
The Packmaster growled louder as Leo approached us. He cocked his head as I stood up again.
“Did you start it?” he asked.
“Nope,” I said. “Just started itself.”
Leo paused, then ran his free hand over the smooth curve of the gas tank. His motorcycle downshifted and the engine purred contentedly. Leo’s dark-eyed gaze wandered over the Packmaster and a muscle twitched at the angle of his jaw.
“Fuck,” he said. “How bad is the damage? It was shaking a lot last night.”
“I think that’s because your bike didn’t like the passenger.” I pointed to myself. “But there’s no damage at all. Not anymore. It… healed.”
“Fuck,” Leo said again. He took a deep breath. “Alright. Can we ride it? Is it safe?”
“As safe as it was last night, I suppose,” I answered slowly. “It seems ready to go.”
Ready to seek out the other horsemen, Uriel said.
“Uh, Uriel thinks it’s in a hurry to find the other ones… like you,” I told Leo. “Just like Pestilence was trying to find you when it came across your friends.”
Leo looked up from his motorcycle with something burning in his eyes. Not literal fire, thank goodness, but seething rage. I was pretty sure I knew exactly what Leo’s dad saw right before his son punched him.
“Too bad,” Leo said. “We’re going to San Diego.”
The Packmaster’s rumbling engine hitched ominously under his hand. Leo patted the motorcycle once before standing back and running his fingers through his hair. The biker took a deep breath.
“Carlos will know what to do,” he said.
The words were quiet, like Leo was talking to himself. Hey, not that I was one to judge. Uriel said a lot weirder shit and at least Leo was using his own voice.
For now, Uriel reminded me. By the time you hear Death’s true voice, it will be too late.
Can you ease up on the doom and gloom? I asked.
Doom is coming.
I hated to admit that Uriel had a point, but Gabriel and Pestilence were both out there looking for us. We really needed to get moving.
“Did you buy a phone charger?” I asked as gently as I could.
Leo blinked a few times and then looked down at me. He nodded and opened up the grocery bag to show me the charging cable enclosed in its plastic blister pack.
“As soon as we stop somewhere with power outlets, we’re good to go,” Leo said. “I also got you these.”
He reached into the bag and withdrew a package of folded bandanas. I snatched them so fast that Leo laughed.
“Hey, your hair is always perfect,” I told him. “Mine rebels when I keep it under a helmet all day.”
I selected a red bandana, then folded it diagonally and tied it into place over my hair. I rolled up the other two and stuck them in my pocket. Leo stuffed his purchases into the Packmaster’s saddlebags and pulled on a new pair of leather riding gloves. He caught his reflection in the bike’s mirror and squinted at his wavy brown hair.
“Yeah, perfect,” I said.
Leo gave me a smile that looked a little bit embarrassed and handed me the extra helmet. He straddled the Packmaster and patted the back of the seat.
“Climb on,” he told me.
The Packmaster revved again and I hesitated. That motorcycle really didn’t like me. Leo choked down the throttle and the engine smoothed out.
Death’s mortal vessel will not remain in control forever, Uriel said. Leave now.
I climbed onto the pillion and the motorcycle bucked hard under me. Even Leo felt it and he glanced over his shoulder.
“Hold on tight,” he said.
I wrapped my arms around Leo. He kicked up the stand and we drove back out toward Highway 44.
