Page 101 of Terror at the Gates

For some reason, the noise in the restaurant dipped, and my voice carried over the crowd. There was a beat of silence, and I felt like every eye in the room was on me.

I looked around. “Mind your own fucking business,” I snapped.

It was slow, but soon people shifted their attention away from me, though I couldn’t help feeling like some were still listening.

Abel leaned across the table.

“You know how some of us live so long? We know when to keep our thoughts to ourselves.”

“Maybe if more people weren’t afraid to speak up, Lisk wouldn’t feel like he could just kill us.”

“You have sweet dreams, firecracker, but in our world, when people get too mouthy, they die, and when a lot of them get too mouthy, they burn.”

“Are you telling me to let it go?”

“I’m just telling you, you can’t do anything if you’re cold in the ground. You think it’s bad now? It’s gonna get worse.”

I frowned, brows lowering. “Why do you say that?”

“Because I’ve seen this before,” he said. “Right before the fire that took out Southgate.” Abel downed the rest of his beer, letting out a wet sigh as he stood. “I’ll get your tab, firecracker,” he said, throwing a handful of dollars on the table. “Keep your head down and your eyes open, and watch the rich.”

“Watch the rich?”

“They’ll abandon the area,” he said. “Lisk isn’t gonna let them die. It takes money to start again.”

“Who’s rich in Nineveh?” I asked.

“Well, the Zareth family, for one,” he said. “But I never said they would only target us. There are plenty of sinners all over Eden.” He paused and knocked on the table. “I’ll tell Sam to get you back.”

I watched Abel wander away, pausing at the bar to clap friends on the back, laugh, and make jokes. It was like he hadn’t just been talking about a possible end to the world, though maybe he felt like he’d survived one and could again, or maybe he wasn’t afraid to die.

I couldn’t decide if I was afraid of death or the end of the world. I’d never really thought about it, not even whenI’d attended church regularly and Archbishop Lisk would preach about the promise of paradise. It was a gift for the righteous, for those who believed God sacrificed his only son for our sins, but that always seemed too simple.

Shouldn’t paradise be granted to people who were inherently good? That was assuming an afterlife even existed, except that if it didn’t, it would mean that Esther no longer existed, and I didn’t think I could handle that.

“Sam’s ready for you, honey,” said Shelley, dropping by the table to leave a glass of water and a handwritten receipt.

I stood, briefly overwhelmed by dizziness as the alcohol went straight to my head. I paused, steadying myself with a hand on the table. I downed the water. It was so cold, it almost tasted sweet, or maybe I was just dehydrated.

I headed down the dark hall. At the end, there was a door with a sign that read EMPLOYEES ONLY. I pushed it open and found myself in a familiar warehouse. It was full of shiny cars and looked more like an auto shop than a place to buy weapons.

A couple of men were trying to guide a tow truck into an open bay while another group gathered around the hood of a compact pickup truck. They had some kind of machine rolled under the front of the vehicle and were attaching chains to parts of the engine.

Sam stood behind a metal podium, looking through a stack of papers. He was tall and thin and sported a perfectly manicured goatee.

“Pretty car,” I said as I approached.

He looked at me and grinned. “Wanna take it for a spin?”

“I wish,” I said. “You know I can’t drive.”

“I got an ole beater and an empty field with your name on it whenever you’re ready to learn,” he said.

“Thanks, Sam,” I said, though I wasn’t sure I’d ever take him up on that offer. It wasn’t like I could afford a car anyway.

“What can I do for you?” he asked.

“I need a stun gun,” I said.