400 Horsepower of the Apocalypse
Chapter 22
I stood up and checked the little window set into the top of the door. There was a lot more gray concrete outside, but when I squinted off to either side, I could just make out black-clad shoulders and the stocks of large-caliber guns. Diane may have left us alone, but she didn’t leave our prison unguarded. I turned to find Leo leaning against one of the cell walls, watching me.
“I hate this shit,” he growled. “But we need to consider what Diane’s offering.”
I blinked. “What? You were about to punch her!”
“I don’t want these people to kill you,” Leo said. “But me… Maybe Death isn’t actually evil, maybe it’s just amoral or chaotic or whatever. But it’s in my head and I do not like how it thinks.”
And that was coming from a big biker gang road captain and career criminal. My eyes stung, but I forced down a breath to speak. Were we really considering suicide? Leo and I had literally been fighting off death since pretty much day one. But here we were.
“So we… let Diane’s doctors kill us?” I asked.
“No,” Leo answered.
“You’re giving me some mixed messages here,” I said with a shaky laugh.
Leo shut his bloodshot eyes for a moment and rubbed them, then looked at me again and offered up a fragile smile.
“That suit had a whole speech about how vital it is that this battle is fought four against four,” Leo said. “Eight of them. Two of us don’t need to die to fuck up that number. Just one.”
I couldn’t breathe. I grabbed Leo’s arm, feeling his muscles bunched beneath the leather of his well-worn jacket.
“Leo…” I gasped.
“We let SPOT kill me.”
I agree to this plan, Uriel said.
Shut up! I thought. You don’t get a vote!
“No,” I said aloud. “Not a chance! Besides, what good would it do? Uriel and the angels follow the rules — even when they shouldn’t — but the horsemen don’t give a shit. Death and Pestilence have already tried to kill me before the big fight! Without Death, that’s still three horsemen against four archangels. How much of the world will survive that?”
“More than if Death fights, too,” Leo answered.
“Fine,” I said. “But by that token, more than if Uriel leads the angels into battle.”
Leo’s dark eyes narrowed. “No. I’m not letting you die, Jaz. I can’t.”
“Why the hell not?” I asked.
I released Leo’s arm and threw my hands into the air. My head was weirdly light and my stomach twisted in painful knots. None of this felt real. I began pacing back and forth across our little concrete prison. Leo watched me with a pained look on his face.
“You’re a good person, Jaz,” he said at last. “You just wanted to see the world. You shouldn’t have to die in some anonymous gray room.”
“Neither should you!” I cried.
Leo intercepted my pacing. I moved to get around the biker, but he matched me step for step and remained right there in front of me.
“Look, I know what I am,” Leo said. “I know the life I chose. You think I ever expected to die of old age? A bullet or lethal injection was pretty much always how this was going to end for me. And at least this way, I’ll be dying for something.”
I tried to push Leo back, but I may as well have been trying to shove a brick wall. I settled for kicking one of the chairs across the room.
“Hey, I’m every inch as dangerous as you are!” I said. “Uriel might be more of an uptight bitch, but they’re perfectly willing to destroy the entire universe just to bloody Death’s nose!”
That is not entirely– Uriel thought.
“Shut up!” I shouted at the angel in my head, then spun and pointed to Leo. “No. Either we both die here in this stupid base or neither of us do!”
Leo shook his head. “I already let my whole gang die, Jaz.”
“You can’t blame yourself for what Pestilence did!”
“Maybe,” Leo answered quietly. Now it was his turn to put a hand on my shoulder. It was heavy and I felt the warmth of his touch through my shirt. “But I can’t lose you too, Jaz.”
“Then… then we need some other option,” I said. “Anything! What about Carlos? We’ve been driving like hell to get to San Diego for a reason, right?”
Leo nodded. “My uncle said that he knew what was going on and that he knows what to do about it.”
“What if it’s the same solution as Diane’s?” I asked. “Killing us to kill the things inside us?”
I didn’t know how to answer my own question. I was lost, trapped, and totally fucked. Things have gotten pretty damned awful when being back home in Crayhill suddenly didn’t sound so bad.
“I have no idea,” Leo answered. “But Carlos saved me before. Maybe he can do it again.”
At least he was talking about living, even if the hope in Leo’s voice was paper-thin.
“Look, I hope so… but Diane and SPOT seem to know a lot about what’s happening to us, and she didn’t offer up any other solutions,” I said, hating myself for the words. “Carlos might not have anything better. He may want to kill us, too.”
Leo considered, but then he nodded. “If I’m going to die, I’d rather my uncle do it than SPOT.”
“Then I guess we should tell Diane,” I said. “But I don’t think she’ll be very happy about it.”
I went to the door. It was locked, but when I knocked, one of our guards appeared at the window.
“We need to talk to Diane,” I told him in a loud voice. “We’ve decided.”
The armored man spoke briefly into a radio on his shoulder. I couldn’t hear what he said, but only a minute later, Diane came hurrying down the hallway with her row of soldiers following like a line of deadly, heavily-armed ducklings. I stepped back as the lock on the door thunked and Diane came inside. The other Spotters remained out in the hall.
“Mister Valdis, your motorcycle has arrived at Blue Mountain,” Diane said. “Intact and unmarked.”
“Thanks,” Leo answered.
Diane took a deep breath. “Now, Shen says that you’ve made your decision.”
“Yeah, we have,” I told her. “Sorry, but the answer is no. You made a really good point and we’ll die if we have to… But we’re not ready yet. There’s still one more option for us in San Diego. We need to try.”
Diane’s brows shot up, but she sighed and glanced back at the armed and armored Spotters.
“I can’t tell you how truly sorry I am to hear that,” Diane said. “And even more sorry to say your answer is not one we can accept.”
“Wait, what?” I gasped, heart sinking.
“We can’t afford to release you, Jasmine. The other six are still out there, and the cost of letting you reunite with them is too high. Sacrifices must be made. I’m sorry.”
“So you’re just going to execute us?” I asked.
Diane’s nod looked honestly pained, but I didn’t really care. The southwestern SPOT director might not sleep well for the next few years, but at least she would be alive to do it. I should have guessed, though… Diane and her people had already tried to kill us before. Of course she wouldn’t just let us walk away.
But Leo stepped between me and Diane, shaking his head.
“Alright. You don’t need to kill Jaz,” he said. “You only have to mess up the numbers for the final apocalyptic battle, right? So you can have me.”
“Damn it, Leo!” I shouted. “No! We talked about this. I’m not letting them kill you!”
“Trust me,” Leo said. He held out his hand to Diane. “Do we have a deal? You get me, and Jaz can leave?”
The SPOT director looked at Leo’s extended hand, sighed and pushed her glasses up her nose.
“That’s noble of you, Mister Valdis,” Diane told him. “And I wish I could accept your sacrifice in lieu of Miss O’Neil… But I’m afraid that the combined power of the archangels is just as destructive as that of the horsemen. We require both of you.”
“Well, I tried,” Leo said. “Sorry.”
But he didn’t lower his hand. Diane regarded it again, then reluctantly took it. Leo smiled grimly as he closed his fingers around hers. The big biker yanked Diane’s hand, spinning her and pulling her arm up behind her back. Diane yelped and shot up onto the tips of her toes.
Before I could blink, Leo had pulled his gun, flicked off the safety, and jammed the muzzle against Diane’s temple. The door burst open and all eight of the SPOT soldiers ran into the room with assault weapons leveled at us.
“Release Director Owens!” one of them shouted.
Leo nodded and kept his gun on Diane.
“I will,” he said. “Once Jaz and I are safely out of here.”
