[Anh Ngữ] Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days) - Susan Ee (English)

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 40:​

Spoiler

WE NEED to get out before the hotel comes crashing down. But I can’t just let these people get sucked dry by the scorpion angels. Dragging the ladder to each tank and slowly pulling out each paralyzed person could take hours.
I pull my sword out of the lab angel. I run over to the fetal columns in frustration, holding the sword like a bat.
I swing the blade into one of the scorpion tanks. It’s mostly to let out my frustration and I don’t expect it to do anything other than bounce off.
Before I can even register the impact, the thick tank shatters. Fluid and glass explode onto the concrete floor.
I could get used to this sword.
The scorpion fetus unlatches from its victim. It screeches as it falls. Then it flops and writhes on the glass shards, bleeding all over them. The emaciated woman crumples to the bottom of the broken tank. Her glassy eyes stare into the air.
I have no idea if she’s alive, or if she’ll be in better shape once the venom wears off. This is the best I can do for her. The best I can do for any of them. All I can hope is that somehow, some of them will recover enough to get away from here before things become too explosive, because I can’t drag them up the stairs.
I run over to the other tanks that are holding victims and smash them, one after another. Shards of water and glass spray all over the basement lab. The air fills with the screeching of thrashing scorpion fetuses.
Most of the monsters in the surrounding tanks wake and twitch. A few react violently and slam against their glass prisons. They are the ones that are more fully formed, staring at me through the veined membranes of their eyelids with the understanding that I am preying upon them.
While I’m doing this, a tiny part of me considers running without Paige. She’s not really my sister anymore, is she? She’s certainly not helpless any longer.
"Ryn-Ryn?" Paige is crying.
She calls to me as if unsure whether I would take care of her. My heart constricts like an iron hand is squeezing it as punishment for thinking of betraying her.
"Yeah, sweetie," I say in my most reassuring voice. "We have to get out of here. Okay?"
The building shakes again and one of the stitched-up corpses topples. The little boy’s mouth opens when his head hits the floor, revealing metal teeth.
Paige looked that dead before she started moving. Is there any chance this kid could be alive too?
A weird thought pops into my head. Didn’t Raffe say that sometimes, names have power?
Did Paige wake up because I called her? I scan the bodies leaning against the wall, noting their shiny teeth and long nails, their discolored eyes. If they’re alive, would I wake them if I could?
I turn away and smash my blade into another tank. I can’t help but be glad I don’t know the kids’ names.
"Paige?" My mother walks over to us as though in a dream. She crunches over broken glass and weaves to avoid the thrashing monsters as if she sees this kind of thing regularly. Maybe she does. Maybe in her world, this is normal. She sees them and avoids them, but she’s not surprised by them. Her eyes are clear, her expression cautious.
"Baby?" She runs over to Paige and hugs her with no hesitation despite the blood and gore covering her.
My mother cries in big, anguished sobs. For the first time, I realize that she’s been at least as worried and upset over Paige as I have. That it was no accident that she ended up here, the same dangerous place that I trekked to find Paige. That even though her love often manifests itself in ways that a mentally healthy person couldn’t understand-might even declare abusive-that doesn’t diminish the fact that she does care.
I swallow the tears that threaten to drown me as I watch my mother fuss over Paige.
Mom takes a good look at Paige. The blood. The stitches. The bruises. She doesn’t remark on any of them but does make shocked and cooing noises as she strokes Paige’s hair and skin.
Then she looks at me. In her eyes is a hard accusation. She blames me for what’s happened to Paige. I want to tell her I didn’t do this to her. How could she think that?
But I don’t say anything. I can’t. I can only look back at my mother with guilt and remorse. I look at her the way she looked at me when Dad and I found Paige broken and crippled all those years ago. I may not have held the knife to Paige, but this terrible thing happened on my watch.
For the first time, I wonder if my mother really was responsible for Paige’s broken back.
"We have to get out of here," says Mom with her arm protectively around Paige. Her voice is clear and full of purpose.
I look up at her in surprise. Before I can stop myself, hope blooms inside me. She sounds full of authority and confidence. She sounds like a mother ready and determined to lead her daughters to safety.
She sounds sane.
Then she says, "They’re after us."
Hope shrivels and dies inside me, leaving a hard lump where my heart should be. I don’t need to ask who "they" are. According to my mother, "they" have been after us for as long as I can remember. Her protective statement is not a step toward taking responsibility for her girls.
I nod, taking the weight of my family responsibilities back on my shoulders.

 

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 41:​

Spoiler

MOM IS guiding Paige toward the exit when a loud crash from behind the double doors stops them in their tracks. It comes from the room the angels came out of. I pause midswing, wondering whether to check it out.
I can’t think of a good reason to waste time looking through those doors, but something bothers me. It snags on my brain like a needle picking a weave, trying to unravel it to see something beneath. So much has been happening I haven’t had time to follow up on a thought—something that might be important, something…
The blood.
The angels had blood all over their gloved hands and their white smocks.
And Laylah. She was supposed to be in surgery with Raffe.
Another crash comes through the doors. Metal on metal like a cart tipping over and crashing into another.
I’m running before I know it.
As I near the double doors, a body crashes through it. I only have a second to recognize Raffe hurtling through the air.
A giant of an angel slams through the doors after him.
Something about the way he moves seems familiar. His face might have been handsome once, but now his vicious expression dominates.
He has beautiful snowy wings spread out behind him. The bases of his wings are covered in dried blood where fresh stitches hold them onto his back. Oddly, though there is blood on his back, it’s his stomach that’s bandaged.
There’s something familiar about those wings.
One of them has a notch on it where scissors have sliced through the feathers. A notch exactly like the one I cut on Raffe’s wings.
My brain tries to reject the obvious conclusion.
The giant angel stands between my family and the door we came through. My mom stands frozen in terror as she stares at him. Her cattle prod shakes in her hand as she holds it out toward the giant. It looks almost more like an offering than a defense.
A low bang rumbles through the ceiling, closely followed by another, then another. Each bang gets louder. This must be what the angels were hearing. Now there’s no doubt in my mind that the attacks have started.
I frantically wave at my mother to go through the doors the delivery guy used. She finally gets it and scampers off through the doors with Paige.
I’m terrified the giant will stop them, but he doesn’t pay them any attention. He reserves all his attention for Raffe.
Raffe lies on the floor, his face and muscles contorted with pain. His back arches to try to keep from touching the concrete floor. Below him, spread out like a dark cape on the floor, is a pair of giant bat wings.
It looks like a film of leather stretched out over a skeletal structure that’s more like a deadly weapon than a frame for wings. The wing edges are razor-sharp with a series of ever-growing hooks, the smallest of which resemble barbed fishhooks. The largest hooks are at the wing tips. They remind me of sharp scythes.
Raffe’s back drips with fresh blood as he turns around painfully and pushes himself up off the floor. His new wings droop over him as he moves, as if they are not yet under his control. He shoves one behind him the way I might shove my hair out of my face. His arm comes back bloodied with fresh slices on his forearm and a gash where one of the hooks catches his flesh.
“Careful with that, archangel,” says the giant as he stalks toward Raffe. The word “archangel” is steeped with venom.
I recognize his voice. It is the voice of the Night Angel who cut off Raffe’s wings the night we met. He walks past me without looking as though I am a piece of furniture.
“What games are you playing, Beliel? Why not just kill me on the operating table? Why bother to sew these things onto me?” Raffe weaves a little on his feet. They must have just finished the operation, moments before the doctor angels left.
By the look of the dried blood on the giant’s back, it doesn’t take a genius to tell they worked on him first. He’s had more time to recover than Raffe, although I’m willing to he’s nowhere near full strength yet.
I lift my sword, trying to be as discreet as I can.
“Killing you would have been my choice,” says Beliel. “But all those petty angel politics. You remember what that’s like.”
“Been a long time.” Raffe sways on his feet.
“And it’ll be longer still, now that you have those wings.” Beliel grins, but his expression still manages to be cruel. “Women and children will run screaming from you now. And so will angels.”
He turns toward the exit, stroking his new feathers. “Run along now while I show off my new acquisition. No one below has feathers. I’ll be the envy of Hell.”
Putting his head down like a bull, Raffe charges Beliel.
With all that blood loss, I’m surprised Raffe can walk, much less run. He weaves a little as her rushes Beliel, who catches him under one massive arm and shoves him into a cart.
Raffe goes crashing down along with the cart. Vivid red slices appear on his cheek, neck, and arms as his uncontrolled wings flop around during his fall.
I run over to Raffe and hand him his sword.
A look of uncertainty crosses Beliel face, and his motions suddenly become cautious.
As soon as I let go of the hilt in Raffe’s hand, the sword’s tip hits the floor like a ton of lead.
Raffe holds the sword like it takes every ounce of strength for him to keep the hilt from hitting the floor as well. It’s been as light as air in my hands.
Raffe looks like someone just broke his heart.
He looks at his sword in bewilderment and betrayal. He tries to lift it again but can’t. Disbelief and hurt mix in his expression. This is the most emotional I’ve seen him, and seeing him like this makes me want to hurt something.
Beliel is the first of us to recover from the shock of seeing Raffe struggle to lift his blade. “Your own blade rejects you. It senses my wings. You’re no longer just Raphael.”
He chuckles, a dark sound that’s made all the more disturbing by the undercurrent of genuine mirth. “How sad. A leader bereft of followers. An angel with severed wings. A warrior without a sword.” Beliel circles Raffe like a shark as he taunts him. “You have nothing left.”
“He has me,” I say. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Raffe wince.
Beliel looks at me, really seeing me for the first time. “You’ve acquired a pet, archangel. When did this happen?” There’s puzzlement in his voice, as if it’s normal for Beliel to know of Raffe’s companions.
“I’m not anyone’s pet.”
“I met her tonight at the aerie,” says Raffe. “She’s been following me around. She means nothing.”
Beliel snorts. “Funny, I didn’t ask if she meant anything to you.” He looks me up and down, taking in every detail. “Scrawny. But serviceable.” He saunters toward me.
Raffe hands the sword hilt back to me. “Run.”
I hesitate, wondering how much of a beating Raffe can take in his state.
“Run!” Raffe positions himself between me and Beliel.
I run. I hide behind a fetal column to watch.
“Making friends, are we?” asks Beliel. “And with a Daughter of Man. How deliciously ironic. When will the surprises end?” He actually sounds delighted. “Pretty soon, you’ll end up being a full-fledged member of my clan. I always knew you would. You’d make an excellent archdemon.” His smile dries up. “Too bad I don’t care to have you as my boss.”
He grabs Raffe in a bear hug but quickly lets go. His arms and chest bleed from fresh cuts. Raffe is apparently not the only one who is unused to his new wings.
This time he grabs Raffe by the neck, lifting him off the floor. Raffe’s face turns red, veins popping on his temples as Beliel crushes his throat.
A loud boom shakes the building above us. Concrete debris crashes through the door to the garage. Several of the remaining glass columns crack, causing the monstrous occupants to gyrate in agitation.
I run toward Beliel.
The sword feels solid and well-balanced in my hands. I swing back the sword and get yet another shock.
The sword adjusts itself.
I could swear it tweaks its angle to raise my elbows higher. It’s ready for battle and thirsty for blood. I blink in surprise, almost missing my timing. But I don’t, because though my feet are frozen in shock, my arm moves in a smooth arc, led by the sword.
I’m not wielding the sword. It is wielding me.
I swing the sword at the same time Raffe whips his deadly wings at Beliel. My sword slices through the meat of his back, wedging in his spine.
Raffe’s wings shred the demon’s cheeks and lay open his forearms. He screams, letting go of Raffe’s throat.
Raffe crumples to the floor, gasping for breath.
Beliel staggers away from us. Maybe if he hadn’t just been through surgery, he would have been strong enough to withstand us both. Or maybe not. The bandages around his middle must be from the sword wound Raffe gave him a few days ago during their last fight. Beliel’s wounds won’t be healing anytime soon if Raffe is right about angel swords.
My blade swings back again, clearly wanting me to attack him again. Beliel stares at me with bewildered eyes, no less surprised than the angels who saw me kill their coworker. An angel sword isn’t supposed to be in the hands of a human girl. It just isn’t done.
Raffe springs up and charges Beliel.
I watch in awe as Raffe pummels Beliel with blows so fast they’re almost a blur. The force of the emotion behind those blows is immense. For the first time, he doesn’t bother to hide his frustration and anger, or his longing for the wings he has lost.
As Beliel staggers from the blows, Raffe grabs his old wing and pulls. Stitches begin popping out of Beliel’s back, fresh blood staining the once-snowy wings. Raffe seems determined to get his wings back even if he has to rip them out of Beliel’s flesh, stitch by stitch.
I grip Raffe’s sword. I guess it’s my sword now. If the sword rejects him as long as he has his new wings, then I’m the only one who can use it.
I move toward Raffe and Beliel, ready to slice the wings off.
Something grabs my ankle and pulls from behind. Something slimy with an iron grip.
My feet slip on the wet floor and I slam down onto the concrete. The sword skitters out of my hand. My lungs spasm so hard at the impact that I think I’ll black out.
I manage to turn my head to see what has a hold of me.
I wish I hadn’t.

 

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 42:​

Spoiler

BEHIND ME, a well-muscled scorpion fetus opens its jaws to scream at me, revealing rows of piranha teeth.

Its undeveloped skin shows its veins and the shadows of muscles. It lies on its belly as if it crawled all the way from its shattered tank to get to me.

Its deadly stinger shoots up and over its back, aiming for my face.

An image of Paige and my mother running through the night flashes through my head. Alone. Terrified. Wondering if I’ve abandoned them.

“No!” The scream is torn from me as I twist unnaturally to avoid the onrushing barb. The tip narrowly misses my face.

Before I can even take a breath, the tip whips up and jabs down again. This time, I don’t even have time to brace myself as it darts down toward me.

“No!” Raffe roars.

My body jerks as the stinger punctures my neck.

It feels like an impossibly long needle digging its way through my flesh.

Then the real pain starts.

A burning agony spreads across the side of my neck. It feels like I’m being shredded from the inside out. My breath comes in harsh gasps and my skin breaks out in a sweat.

A tormented scream bursts from my throat and my legs pump in frantic kicks.

None of that stops the scorpion fetus from coming for me. Its mouth opens as it nears, poised to give me its deadly kiss.

Our eyes meet as it pulls me to it. I can tell that it thinks sucking me dry will give it enough energy to survive outside its artificial womb. Its desperation shows in its grip, in the way it opens and shuts its mouth like a fish trying to breathe, in the way it squeezes its veined eyelids shut as if the harsh light is too much for its underdeveloped eyes.

Its venom spreads a swath of torment across my face and down my chest. I try to shove the scorpion angel away, but all I can do is feebly nudge at it.

My muscles are beginning to freeze.

The stinger suddenly rips out of my neck. It feels barbed, like it’s pulling my neck inside out.

Another scream rips through me but I can’t release it. My mouth only opens a crack. The muscles in my face just twitch instead of contorting in agony. My scream sounds like a weak gurgle.

I can’t move my face.

Raffe whips the tail in his hands and drags the abomination off me. He is roaring, and I realize he has been screaming all this time.

He grabs the scorpion fetus, swings it like a bat, and hurls it into the scorpion tanks.

Three columns shatter as it crashes through them, one after another. The room fills with the dying screeches of aborted monsters.

Raffe crashes to his knees beside me. He looks stunned. And oddly shaken. He stares at me as if he can’t believe what he sees. As if he refuses to believe what he sees.

Do I look that bad?

Am I dying?

I try to touch my neck to see how much blood is flowing, but I can’t get my arm to move all the way up there. I watch it come up a third of the way, trembling with effort, then fall limp. He looks stricken when he sees my feeble attempt to move.

I try to tell him that the stinger venom paralyses and slows down breathing, but what comes out of my mouth is a mumbling that even I can’t understand. My tongue feels enormous and my lips too swollen to move. None of the other victims looked swollen, so I assume I don’t either, but it feels that way. Like my tongue has suddenly become large and clumsy, too heavy to move.

“Shh,” he says gently. “I’m here.”

He pulls me into his arms and I try to concentrate on feeling his warmth. Inside, I feel like I’m trembling with the pain but outside, I’m utterly still as the paralysis spreads down my back and legs. It takes all my willpower to keep my head from drooping on his arm.

The look on his face scares me as much as the paralysis. For the first time, his face is completely unshuttered. As if it just doesn’t matter anymore what I see.

Shock and grief line his face. I try to wrap my head around the fact that he is grieving. For me.

“You don’t even like me, remember?” That’s what I try to say. What actually comes out of my mouth is closer to a baby’s first attempt at babbling.

“Shh.” He runs his fingertips along my cheek, caressing my face. “Hush. I’m right here.” He looks at me with deep anguish in his eyes. Like there’s so much he wants to tell me but feels it’s too late now.

I want to stroke his face and tell him that it will be okay. That everything will be all right.

And I wish so badly that it would be.

 

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 43:​

Spoiler

“SHH,” SAYS Raffe, rocking me in his arms.

The light around Raffe’s head falls into shadow.

Behind him, Beliel’s dark form rises into my field of view.
One of his new wings is mostly torn off and dangling by a few stitches. His face is contorted in rage as he lifts what looks like a refrigerator over Raffe’s head the way Cain must have hefted a boulder over Abel’s head.

I try to cry out. I try to warn Raffe with my expression.

But only a whispery exhale comes out.

“Beliel!”

Beliel swings to see who yells at him. Raffe also swivels to take in the scene, still holding me protectively in his arms.

Standing in the doorway is the Politician. I recognize him even without the terrified trophy women following in his wake.

“Put that down, now!” The Politician’s friendly face is marred by a frown as he stares down the giant angel.

Beliel breathes heavily with the refrigerator hefted above him. It’s not clear whether he’ll comply.

“You had your chance to kill him out on the streets,” says the Politician as he marches into the room. “But you got distracted by a pair of pretty wings, didn’t you? And now that he’s been seen and rumors are running wild that he’s back, now you want to kill him? What is wrong with you?”

Beliel hurls the refrigerator across the room. He looks like he’d like to throw it at the Politician. It lands with a crash out of sight.

“He attacked me!” Beliel stabs his finger at Raffe like a crazed infant on steroids.

“I don’t care if he poured acid down your pants. I told you not to touch him. If he dies now, his men will turn him into a martyr. Do you have any idea how hard it is to campaign against an angelic martyr? They’d forever be making up stories of how he would have opposed this policy or that.”

“What do I care about your angel politics?”

“You care because I tell you to care.” The Politician straightens his cuffs. “Oh, why do I bother? You’ll never amount to more than just a mid-demon. You just don’t have the faculty to comprehend political strategy.”

“Oh, I comprehend it, Uriel.” Beliel curls his lip like a growling dog. “You’ve turned him into a pariah. Everything he ever believed in, everything he ever said will be the ravings of a demon-winged fallen angel. I get it more than you’ll ever understand. I’ve lived through it, remember? I just don’t care that it gives you an advantage.”

Uriel faces off with Beliel even though he has to look up to glare at him. “Just do as I say. You got your wings as payment for your services. Now get out.”

The building shakes as something explodes above.

The last ounce of will drains out of me, and I just can’t keep my head up any longer. I wilt in Raffe’s arms. My head dangles, my eyes are open but unfocused, my breathing imperceptible.

Just like a dead body.

“NO!” Raffe grips me as if he can bind my soul to my body.

An upside-down view of the doorway shows up in my field of vision. Smoke wafts through it.

Although the pain obscures Raffe’s warmth, I feel the pressure of his hug, the rocking of our bodies back and forth as he repeats the word, “No.”

His embrace comforts me and the fear ebbs a little.

“What is that he’s mourning over?” asks Uriel.

“His Daughter of Man,” says Beliel. “One of your Franken-pets killed her.”

“No.” Uriel sounds delightfully scandalized. “Could it be? A human? After all his warnings to stay away from them? After all his crusading against their evil hybrid spawn?”

Uriel circles Raffe like a shark. “Look at you, Raffe. The great archangel, on his knees with a pair of demon wings puddled around him. And holding a broken Daughter of Man in his arms?” He chuckles. “Oh, God does love me after all. What happened, Raffe? Did life on Earth get too lonely for you? Century after century, with no companions but for the Nephilim you so nobly hunted?”

Raffe ignores him and continues to stroke my hair and rock back and forth gently as if putting a child to sleep.

“How long did you resist?” asks Uriel. “Did you push her away? Did you tell her she meant no more to you than any other animal? Oh, Raffe, did she die thinking you didn’t care about her? How tragic. That must just tear you to pieces.”

Raffe looks up with murder in his eyes. “Don’t. Talk. About. Her.”

Uriel takes an involuntary step back.

The building rocks again. Dust falls over the dying scorpions. Raffe lets me go, putting me gently on the concrete.

“We’re done here,” says Uriel to Beliel. “You can kill him after he’s known as the Fallen Angel Raphael.” His shoulders are stiff with authority, but his feet beat a hasty exit. Beliel follows him with his torn wing dragging in the dust. It’s a heartbreaking sight to see Raffe’s snowy feathers treated that way.

Raffe takes a moment to tuck my hair out of the way so it won’t tug against my head, as if that matters.

Then he takes off running after them. He roars out his rage as he tears through the doors and up the stairs like a cyclone.

Two sets of footsteps pound up the stairs ahead of Raffe’s.

A door bangs shut at the top of the stairs.

Blows echo off the door and walls. Something crashes, then clangs down the stairs. Raffe yells his fury and it sounds like he’s punching through the walls. He’s raging like a mad dog at the end of his tether. What’s he tethered to? Why isn’t he going after them?

He stomps down the stairs and stands at the doorway breathing heavily. He takes one look at me lying on the cement floor and hurls himself at a scorpion tank.

He practically howls with fury. Glass shatters. Water erupts.

Things flop on the floor and screech as the scorpion monsters are separated from their victims. I can’t tell which explosions and screams are from upstairs and which are from Raffe’s rampage as he demolishes the lab.

Finally, after there’s nothing left to smash, he stands surrounded by rubble, chest heaving, looking around for more things to break.

He kicks broken glass and lab supplies aside and stares down at something. He bends to grab it. Instead of picking it up, he drags it over to me.

It’s his sword. He maneuvers me so he can slide it into the scabbard that’s still on my back. I expect the weight of the blade to pull against me, but it’s barely perceptible as it slides into the scabbard.

Then he picks me up in his arms. The pain has plateaued, but I’m completely paralyzed. My head and arms dangle limply like a fresh corpse’s.

He shoves his way out through the door to the stairs and we head up toward the explosions.

 

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 44:​

Spoiler

AT FIRST Raffe staggers, always on the verge of collapsing. I can’t tell if his stumbling is from recovering from surgery or from the adrenaline crash after his rampage.

The cuts on his neck and ear have already stopped bleeding. He’s practically healing before my eyes. He should be getting stronger with every step, but his breathing is labored and uneven.

At one point, he leans against the side of the stairs and pulls me up into an embrace. “Why didn’t you run like I told you?” he whispers against my hair. “I knew from the start that your loyalty would get you killed. I just never thought it would be your loyalty to me that would do it.”

Another explosion rocks the stairs and we move on.

He steps over the contorted railing that lies on the stairs. It’s been torn out of the wall. The walls on both sides are punched and shredded with ragged holes.

We finally reach the top. Raffe leans into the door and we push out onto the ground floor.

It’s a war zone.

Everyone who isn’t shooting seems to be dodging bullets.

Angels are ripping off their dress coats at one end of the foyer, getting a running start to the front door and leaping into the air as soon as they get outside. But one out of every three comes down again in a bloody heap of feathers, as bullets find their marks. It’s a little like shooting angels in a barrel since there’s only the one big exit on this side.

Chunks of marble and light fixtures come tumbling down as something explodes.

Dust and debris shower us as the building is riddled with gunshots.

People scatter in every direction. Many of the women run in high heels, slipping and stumbling over broken glass. I swear some of the people who ran one way a minute ago are now running the other way. They have to step over people and angels who are lying limp on the ground.

Raffe is much more noticeable now with his new wings spread out to keep them from shredding us. Even in their panic, everyone stares at us as they run by.

More than a few angels stop and stare, particularly the warrior types. I see the light of recognition and shock in some of their faces. Whatever campaign Uriel is running against Raffe, it’s getting a major boost in the polls. Raffe and I are like a demonic campaign poster on legs. I worry about what will happen to him, how he’ll be treated if and when we get out of this madness.

I try to look for my family but it’s hard to see anything in this chaos when I still can’t move my eyes.

A number of angels decide to take their chances at being trapped indoors and run away from the front doors. They’re probably headed to the elevator area where they can fly up and out from a higher part of the building. It gives me some satisfaction to see the party literally disintegrating, to see these aliens stripping off their highbrow costumes and running for their lives.

What’s left of the front doors blows apart in a blast of shrapnel.

Everything sounds muffled after that. The floor is covered in shattered glass, and several of the people running in robes and bare feet are having a hard time of it.

I want to run to the doors and shout that we’re human. Tell them to stop shooting so we can get out of there, just like hostages on TV. But even if I could, there’s not a cell in my body that thinks the resistance fighters are going to pause their attack just so we can go free. The days of bending over backward to preserve life for its own sake have been over for weeks. Human life is now the cheapest commodity around, with one exception. Angels lie side by side with humans, like rag dolls strewn about the scene.

We move into the bowels of the building. Everyone gives us a wide berth.

At the elevator lobby, there is a carpet of discarded formal jackets and ripped dress shirts. They must be able to fly better without being bound by clothes, even if those clothes were custom-made for them.


Above us, the air is filled with angels. The majestic spirals of angelic grace are gone, and it’s a free-for-all of flapping wings.

Our shattered reflections flow along a wall of broken mirrors, making the scene seem even more chaotic. Raffe, with his demon wings and dead girl in his arms, dominates the lobby as he glides through the pandemonium.

I catch my reflection in the mirror. Although my throat feels torn out, I can hardly see the red mark where the stinger pierced me. I’d assumed there would be bloody strips of flesh from where the stinger erupted, but instead, it looks no worse than a bad bug bite.

Despite the chaos, I start to see a pattern. The angels are generally running in one direction, while the majority of humans head another way. We follow the stream of humans. Like a zipper, the crowd opens up before us.

We push through a swinging door into an enormous kitchen full of stainless steel and industrial appliances. Dark smoke swirls through the air. The walls near the stoves rage with flames.

Smoke stings my throat and makes my eyes water. It’s a special kind of torture not to be able to cough and blink. But I take it as a sign that the pain from the stinger must be receding if there’s room for me to feel other sensations like smoke irritation.

At the far end of the kitchen, a stream of people shove through a delivery door. Several people move back against the wall, letting us through.

Raffe stays silent. I can’t see his expression but the humans look at him as though they are seeing the devil himself.

Another blast rips through the building and the walls shift. People scream behind us in the kitchen. Someone is shouting, “Get out! Get out! The gas is going to blow!”

We burst through the door into the cool night air.

The screams and explosions are even louder outside as we walk into the combat zone. All my senses fill with the rat-tat-tat of gunfire. The acrid smells of overheated machinery and gun smoke fill my lungs.

Ahead of us, there is a convoy of trucks surrounded by a small crowd of civilians and soldiers. Beyond them, I catch a glimpse of the apocalypse.

Now that the angels have taken to the air, the battle has taken a turn. Soldiers still lob grenades from inside retreating trucks, but the building is already on fire and the grenades only seem to add noise to the mayhem.

They also shoot machine guns at the flying enemies, but in doing so they risk being targeted by them as well. A gang of angels lifts two of the trucks into the air and drops them on top of other trucks that are trying to speed away.

Humans scatter down every alley, both on foot and by car. Angels swoop down seemingly at random and tear apart soldiers and civilians alike.

Raffe does not change his steady pace as he walks away from the building and toward the group of people crowding around the trucks.

What is he doing? The last thing we need is some berserker citizen-soldier strafing us with his machine gun just because he sees something that makes him nervous.

The soldiers seem to have been cramming civilians into the backs of large military trucks. Resistance soldiers in camouflage uniforms kneel in the truck beds with their guns pointed up. They’re shooting in the air at circling angels. One of the soldiers has stopped yelling commands and is looking at us. Another truck’s headlights sweep over him, giving me a glimpse of his face. It’s Obi, the resistance leader.

The shooting and yelling stop the way conversation might stop at a party when you walk in with a police officer. They all freeze and stare at us. Their faces reflect the fire’s glow as the kitchen behind us pours flames out the door and windows.

“What the hell is that?” asks one of the soldiers. There is deep fear in his voice. Another soldier crosses himself, completely unaware of the irony of such a gesture from a soldier fighting angels.

A third man lifts his gun and points it at us.

The soldiers in the truck beds, apparently spooked and on hair triggers, swing their machine guns toward us.

“Hold your fire,” says Obi. Another truck’s headlights sweep across him and I can see his curiosity fighting his adrenaline. For now, curiosity keeps us alive, but it will only hold the bullets back for so long.

Raffe keeps moving toward them. I want to yell at him to stop, that he’s going to get us killed, but of course, I can’t. He thinks I’m dead already, and as for his safety, it’s as if he doesn’t care anymore.

A woman screams in absolute hysterics. Something about it makes me think of my mother.

Then I see the woman who is screaming. Of course, she is my mother. Her face glows red in the firelight, showing me the full force of her horror. She screams and screams and looks as if she’ll never stop.

I can just imagine what we must look like through her eyes. Raffe’s wings are spread out around him like a demonic bat out of Hell. I’m sure the firelight emphasizes the sharp scythes at their edges. Behind him, the building burns with malevolent flames against the smoke-blackened sky, shrouding his face in flickering shadows. I have no doubt that he looms dark and menacing in classic demon form.

My mother doesn’t know that he’s probably holding the wings that way to avoid slicing us. To her, he must look like the Thing That Hunts Her. And her worst nightmare has come true tonight. Here is the devil, walking out of flames, carrying her dead daughter in its arms.

She must have recognized me by my clothes for her to start screaming so soon. Or maybe she’s imagined this scene so many times that she just has no doubt that it must be me in this demon’s arms. Her horror is so genuine and so deep that I cringe inside to hear it.

A soldier twitches with his gun aimed at us. I don’t know how long they’ll restrain themselves. I realize that if they shoot, I won’t even be able to shut my eyes.

Raffe kneels down and places me on the asphalt. He lifts my hair to one side and lets it run through his fingers as it slowly cascades over my shoulder.

His head is haloed in firelight above me, his face in shadow. He runs his fingers across my lips in a slow, gentle touch.

Then he pulls away stiffly as if every muscle is fighting him.

I want to beg him not to leave. Tell him that I’m still here. But I lie frozen. All I can do is watch as he gets up.

And disappears from my view.

Then, there’s nothing but the empty sky reflecting the firelight.

 

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 45:​

Spoiler

SOMEWHERE IN the city, a dog howls. The hollow sound should have been lost in the clamor of the battle, drowned in my fear and pain. Instead, my mind draws it out until it eclipses everything else.

As I lie paralyzed on the cold pavement, all I can think is that it’s the loneliest sound I’ve ever heard.
My mother rushes toward me, still screaming. She throws herself on me, sobbing hysterically. She thinks I am dead, but she is still afraid. Afraid for my soul. After all, she just saw a demon deliver my dead body.
Around us, people burst into frightened conversation.
“What the hell was that?”
“Is she dead?”
“Did he kill her?”
“You should have shot it!”
“I didn’t know if she was dead.”
“Did we just see the devil?”
“What the hell was he doing?”
He was delivering my body to my people.
He could have been shot. He could have been attacked by other angels. If I was actually dead, he should have left me in the basement to be buried in rubble. He should have chased after Beliel and taken his wings back. He should have thwarted Uriel and avoided being seen by the other angels.
Instead, he delivered me to my family.
“IT’S HER. Penryn.” Dee-Dum comes into my line of sight. He’s smudged with soot, looking exhausted and sad.
Obi comes into view. He looks down at me solemnly for a moment.
“Let’s go,” Obi says wearily. “Move it!” he yells to the group. “Let’s get these people out of here!”
People shuffle past me onto the trucks. They all stare down at me as they walk by.
My mother grips me tighter and continues sobbing. “Please, help me get her on the truck,” she wails.
Obi stops and gives her a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry about your daughter, ma’am. But I’m afraid there isn’t room for…I’m afraid you’ll have to leave her.” He turns and calls to his soldiers, “Someone help this lady onto a truck.”
A soldier comes and pries her away from me.
“No!” She screams and wails and twists in the soldier’s arms.
Just when it looks like the soldier is about to give up and let her go, I feel myself being lifted. Someone is carrying me. My head lolls back and I get a glimpse of who holds me.
It’s little Paige.
From my angle, I can see the crude stitches along her jawline leading up to her ear. Mom’s cheery yellow sweater lies askew along the stitches on her throat and shoulder. I’ve carried her like this a thousand times. I never thought we would switch places one day. She walks at a normal pace rather staggering the way she should with my weight.
The crowd goes quiet. Everyone stares at us.
She places me onto a truck bed without anyone’s help. The soldier standing in the bed grips his rifle in the ready position and backs away from us. The people who are already on the truck back up into each other like animals herding together.
I hear Paige grunting as she climbs into the truck. No one helps her. She bends over to pick me up again.
She smiles a little when she looks at me, but it turns into a wince once it gets big enough to shift her stitches. I catch a glimpse of raw meat fibers caught in her even rows of razor teeth.
I wish I could close my eyes.
My baby sister places me along a bench on the side of the truck bed. People shift out of our way. My mother comes into view and sits by my head. She props my head on her lap. She is still crying but no longer hysterical. Paige sits by my feet.
Obi must be nearby because everyone on the truck looks past the truck bed as if waiting for a verdict. Will they let me stay?
“Let’s get out of here,” says Obi. “We’ve already wasted too much time. Get these people on the trucks! Let’s go before she blows!”
She? The aerie?
The truck fills with people, but somehow, they manage to leave some space around us so we’re not crowded.
Gunshots pop among the shouting. Everybody hangs on, preparing for a rough ride. The truck lurches forward, weaving through dead cars as it speeds away from the aerie.
My head bounces on my mother’s thigh as we run over something. A body? The machine-gun popping of bullets shooting into the air never stops. I can only hope that the wild spray of bullets misses Raffe, wherever he is.
Not long after we leave, a large truck crashes into the building in the false dawn of the firelight.
The first floor of the aerie explodes outward in a ball of fire.
Glass and concrete spray in every direction. Through the fire, smoke, and debris, people and angels run and fly from the aerie like scattered insects.
The majestic building teeters as though in shock.
Fire flickers out from the lower windows. My heart constricts, wondering if Raffe stayed out of the aerie. I didn’t see where he went after he left me. I can only hope he is safe.
Then, the aerie slowly collapses on itself.
It comes down in a heap, with a puff of dust billowing out in slow motion. The accompanying rumbling sounds like an endless earthquake. Everyone stares in awe.
Hordes of angels circle the air, viewing the carnage.
When the dust mushrooms toward them, they back off, spreading out, looking sparse and dispersed. When the crown façade of the aerie topples onto the broken heap, there is an awed silence.
Then, in twos and threes, the angels scatter into the smoky sky.
Everyone around us cheers. Some are crying. Others are hollering. People jump up and down, clapping. Strangers who would have pointed guns at each other on the street are now hugging.
We have struck back.
We have declared war on any being that dares to think they can wipe us out without a fight. No matter how celestial, no matter how powerful they are, this is our home and we will fight to keep it.
The victory is far from perfect. I know that many of the angels have escaped with only minor injuries. Maybe a few have been killed, but the rest will heal quickly.
But to look at the people celebrating, you’d think the war has been won. I understand now what Obi meant when he said this attack was not about winning over the angels. It was about winning over the humans.
Until now, no one, certainly not me, believed there was even a chance at fighting back. We thought the war was over. Obi and his resistance fighters have now shown us that it’s just beginning.
I never thought about it before, but I’m proud to be human. We’re ever so flawed. We’re frail, confused, violent, and we struggle with so many issues. But all in all, I’m proud to be a Daughter of Man.

 

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 46:​

Spoiler

THE SKY glows with a blend of bloody red and soot black. The bruised light gives a surreal radiance to the charred city. The soldiers have stopped shooting, although they continue to scan the skies as if expecting to see an army of demons bearing down on us. Somewhere in the distance, the sound of machine-gun fire echoes down the streets.

We continue to weave through dead cars. The people in our truck talk excitedly in hushed voices. They’re so pumped up, they each sound ready to take on an entire legion of angels all by themselves.

They still stay as much on their side of the truck as possible. It’s a good thing they’re so excited and happy; otherwise, I’m afraid they might just burn us all at the stake. In between the chatter, they keep glancing our way. It’s hard to say whether it’s my mother in her speaking-in-tongues prayer trance, my sister with her disturbing stitches and vacant stare, or the dead body that is me that keeps them glancing our way.

The pain is fading. It’s starting to feel more like I was hit with an economy car running a stop sign as opposed to an eighteen-wheeler on the freeway. My eyes are beginning to come a little under my control again. I suspect some of my other muscles are thawing too, but my eyes are the easiest to move, if you call shifting a fraction of an inch moving. But it’s enough to tell me that the effects of the venom are wearing off and that I will probably be okay.

The streets have turned desolate and empty of people. We are out of the aerie district and in the demolished zone. Miles of burnt-out car husks and wrecked buildings flow by. The wind whips my hair around my face as we drive through the charred and broken skeleton of our world.

We occasionally stop, blending in with the other dead cars. At one point, Obi shushes us, and we hold our breath, hoping nothing finds us. I assume angels have been spotted above and we are camouflaging ourselves.

Just when I think it’s all over, someone in the back shouts, “Look out!”

He points above him. Everyone looks up.

Against the wounded sky, a lone angel circles above us.

No, not an angel.

Light glints off curved metal on one of the edges of his wings. They are not shaped like a bird’s wings. It’s a giant bat-wing shape.


My heart speeds up with my need to shout out to him. Could it be?

He circles overhead, each pass spiraling him down closer. The spirals are wide and slow, almost reluctant.

To me, it’s a nonthreatening look at our truck. But to the others, especially in their adrenaline-fueled states, it’s an enemy attack.

They heft up their rifles and point them up at the sky.

I want to shout for them to stop. I want to tell them they’re not all out to get us. I want to slam into them and mess up their aim. But all I can do is watch as they point and shoot into the air.

The lazy circles turn into evasive maneuvers. He is close enough for me to see that he has dark hair, and now that he’s doing more than gliding, the way he moves seems awkward. As though he’s just learning to fly with his wings.

It’s Raffe. He’s alive.

And he’s flying!

I want to jump up and down, waving and yelling up to him. I want to cheer him on. My heart soars with him even as it is gripped with fear that he’ll fall out of the sky.

The soldiers are not expert enough with their rifles to hit a moving target from that distance. Raffe flies away without injury.

My face muscles twitch a tiny bit in response to my inner joy.

 

[Đông Tịch]

Angelfall (Penryn & the End of Days)

Author: Susan Ee
Genre: Mystery Thriller

Chap 47 (end):​

Spoiler

IT TAKES another hour before I thaw out completely. All the while, my mother clenches her hands and prays desperately over my body in the low guttural sounds that are her speaking-in-tongues utterances. They are her unique perversions of words that are undoubtedly disturbing to hear, but she chants them in a cadence that’s somehow lulling at the same time. Leave it to Mom to be simultaneously frightening and soothing, as only an insane mother can be.

I know I’m getting my body back, but I just lie there until I can sit up. I start to occasionally blink and breathe normally long before I move, but no one notices. Between my sister’s stitched and automaton-like presence at my feet, and my mother’s nonstop prayers over my head, I suppose my still body is the least interesting thing to look at.

The day is dawning.

I never realized what a triumph it is to simply be alive. My sister is with us. Raffe is flying. Everything else is secondary.

And for now, that is enough.