We huddled in the bell tower like low-rent Hunchbacks of Notre-Dame. We’d scampered up the creaky wooden ladders, losing ourselves in the network of walkways and scaffolding that threaded around the old apse. From here we could keep an eye on the city below.
Patrols of Harvesters tore through the streets and alleys. We’d closed and barred the weighty oak doors of the church beneath us. The stone façade was impenetrable. More important, the Drones and Hatchlings centered their search a few blocks away from the department store, figuring we’d had time to get in a bit more distance from where they’d last seen us.
The setting sun sent an orange glow across the tower, reflecting off the giant bronze bell overhead and casting us in a twilight hue. We leaned against the brick walls. It had been hours since our escape and it still felt like we were catching our breath.
I rubbed the aching tendons around my shoulder. It didn’t help. My cheek stung from where the Hatchling had sliced it with his nail. Alex tended to the cracked swelling on her forearm. Rocky and JoJo were off to the side, tucked into the corner of the belfry. Rocky had curled up like a puppy and fallen asleep. JoJo was sitting cross-legged, hopping Bunny up and down in her lap. The Head of Bunny had never looked worse. Tattered, dotted with acid burns from Hatchling spatter, a missing half-marble eye. But JoJo loved her just the same.
Patrick sat with his elbows resting on his knees, his black Stetson slanted. He looked well rested and calm. I had no idea how that was possible, but that was Patrick for you.
On the stone floor between me, Patrick, and Alex sat the single syringe. Miraculously, it had remained unbroken in my cargo pocket.
One viral vector.
And—in me and my brother—two dispersal bombs.
The math sucked.
The three of us did our best not to look at the syringe, but it was screaming for our attention there between us. It felt like some macabre game of spin the bottle. Which—if you really thought about it—was kinda appropriate.
Alex looked away, and I followed her gaze. To the west across Stark Peak, the City Hall spire rose, the highest point in the skyline. It used to represent such hope for me. I remember marveling at it on our third-grade field trip. They’d even let us onto the roof for an up-close look. We’d stood at the base, leaned back on our heels, and stared at it thrusting into the sky. It was the first time I’d ever encountered vertigo from looking up. But especially for us kids from a farm-and-ranch town, it seemed to hold all the promise of what mankind had to offer.
And now, there on that spire, we would make our last stand for mankind.
How had Zach put it? A high altitude in the middle of a dense population.
Yup, City Hall spire seemed just about right.
If we could get there.
If the scientists’ viral vector worked with whatever dispersal mechanism had been implanted in my and Patrick’s DNA.
If the engineered, weaponized pathogen worked against the Harvesters.
I pushed my doubts away. We had one play to make, and we would have to make it. There’s no point second-guessing your final option.
“We’re down to our last day,” I said.
Alex stayed still, but her eyes shifted over to me. “Before I die. Or before one of you does.”
“What does that mean?” JoJo asked.
“New Year’s baby,” Alex said. “I was born just after dawn. Tomorrow’s December thirty-first. The last day where I still get to be me.”
“I know that,” JoJo said. “But Patrick and Chance are gonna save you, right?”
I said, “That’s right, Junebug.”
“So what does she mean that one of you might die?”
No one answered.
“The streets are too busy to make a move,” Patrick said to me. “We gotta wait for it to die down a little.”
JoJo said, “Why can’t you just do whatever you’re doing here?”
“We need to get as high up as possible,” Patrick said. “For wind currents and all that.”
“What are you gonna do?” JoJo asked, fear taking over her voice.
Patrick met my eyes. “We’re not sure yet.”
“Yeah,” I said. “We are.” I leaned forward, took the syringe, and put it back in my pocket.
“No,” Patrick said. “No way.”
“You guys can be together,” I said. “It’s always been you two.”
A tear rolled down Alex’s cheek. “No,” she said. “It’s always been us three.”
“We don’t have that choice,” I said. “Not anymore. One of us has to, or everything’s over.”
JoJo was crying now. “I’m scared,” she said. “Why won’t you tell me what’s happening?”
Patrick’s gaze didn’t waver from me. “I won’t let you,” he said.
I looked at him. “Big brother, you don’t have a choice.”
Patrick got up and walked out of the belfry.
JoJo started to sob.
I looked at Alex and nodded for her to leave me and JoJo alone.
Alex got up, picked up Rocky, and carried him out.
I opened my arms, and JoJo crawled into my lap.
I did my best to explain to her what was going to happen tomorrow. My best wasn’t very good. She beat at my chest with her little fists and then collapsed into me and cried so long I thought she’d never stop. The sun went down, and I rocked her in the darkness until at last she quieted. Her breaths were still jerky.
“Will you come down from here with me?” I asked.
“What for?”
“To finish our story.”
“No,” she said. “No, I won’t.”
She got up and ran from the belfry.
I sat for a while, tasting the night air.
Tomorrow at this time, I’d be dead.
I gave myself a couple extra minutes to study the moon. How beautiful it was, blood-orange and ripe.
A harvest moon.
* * *
I found Patrick and Alex down in the vast chamber of the church, talking quietly. As I approached, Alex held out her hand.
I took it. Then Patrick took her hand and mine, the three of us standing in a circle, dwarfed by the huge golden altarpiece. Before us was a simple wooden table covered with a white linen cloth. It was so peaceful here.
I glanced over to where Rocky and JoJo were conked out in the pews. Sleeping peacefully.
I said, “You guys have to take care of them.”
Alex nodded. “We can’t as well as you. But we’ll do our best.” She wiped her cheeks, not letting go of my hand. I felt wetness on my knuckles.
“When we go tomorrow, we’ll set them up here in the bell tower,” I said. “They’ll have a good view of the city, so they’ll know when it’s safe to come down.”
“Chance,” Patrick said. “We got it.”
We stood at the altar, the three of us. No one knew what to say.
Alex finally broke the silence. “Since my mom left, it’s just been us. You guys got me through. You’re the best family I ever could have asked for. All that matters…” She swallowed, hard. “All that matters is us.” She looked up. “Big Rain? Little Rain? I love you guys. I know you know it. But I wanted to say it.” She stared over at the massive altarpiece. “I wanted to say it here.”
I was too choked up to reply. I couldn’t see Patrick clearly beneath his hat, but—as crazy as this sounds—I think he might’ve been choked up, too.
Alex let go of our hands. Then she hugged me. I figured that was my cue to leave them there alone. I wandered off to one of the pews in the back and fell asleep beneath the celestial vaulted ceiling.
* * *
I woke up with her body pressed against mine. Before I could say anything, she kissed me.
Kissed me deep.
She pulled back, and my spinning mind took a moment to fasten onto reality.
Stark Peak.
End of days.
In a church.
My last night.
Alex.
I sat up. We faced each other on the pew there in the rear of the church. I looked around for my brother, but he was nowhere to be seen.
Alex took my chin. Turned my face back to hers.
And then I kissed her. I couldn’t help it. Her mouth, her lips, her eyes—I wanted to lose myself in her. For a time I did.
We pulled apart, breathing hard, our foreheads touching. Her eyes glinted in the darkness.
“You’re both in my heart,” she said. “But you…”
“What?” I said.
“You are my heart, Chance. I can’t imagine living without you.”
My own heart was doing things inside my chest it had never done before.
I said, “I’m glad I won’t have to live without you.”
We kissed again, hard, her arms wrapped around my neck, mine around her waist.
And then we parted.
I felt like I was being ripped in half. From her eyes I could tell she felt the same.
She walked off quietly toward the nave, her footsteps pattering softly on the old stone tiles.
I took a deep breath and turned back toward the altar.
Patrick was standing there in the aisle, no more than ten feet away. Staring right at me.
Before I could say anything, he walked away.
* * *
I lay there staring at the ceiling, guilt and fear crushing in on me. I had the sensation of being trapped in a rowboat in the immense, roiling ocean. So tiny. Everything else so huge. Doom tapping its foot, biding its time.
A hand shook my boot. I sat up.
JoJo stood at the end of the pew.
“You okay, Junebug?”
“I’m bigger than I thought I was.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Me, too.”
She gazed at me with her giant eyes. Bit her lip. Held it between her teeth until it stilled. “I’m ready to finish our story now,” she said.
I got up and took her hand. As always, I was struck by how small it felt in mine.
I grabbed my backpack, and together we climbed up into the scaffolding. I pulled out my notebook and my last two pens. We sat together, side by side, our legs dangling off the suspended planks.
There couldn’t have been a prettier place. It was like we were floating in the dome with its beautiful murals. All the great stories laid out in paint and stained glass. Adam and Eve in the garden. Cain sneaking up on Abel. Christ’s eyes turned to heaven, the crown of thorns trickling blood down his temples.
I wrote entry after entry, JoJo and I talking quietly, catching up on everything that had happened since we’d been apart.
When we’d written our way through to our arrival at the church, JoJo leaned into my side. “Where should we end it?” she asked. “With us sitting here on the scaffolding?”
“No.”
I handed her the pen. She took it. Her eyes glittered with tears.
“You’ll take over,” I said. “Write down everything that happens. You’re the keeper of the human record now.”
She blinked and tears fell. “But I want you instead.”
I rested a hand on her dirty hair. “You’ll keep me alive this way.”