The Sunset Prophecy (Love & Armageddon #1) (21 page)

“
What is a Kronotos?”

“
An actor who agrees to protect the vessel to ensure the harvest, and is rewarded with divine success. One who is mediocre, average, but has the will and fateful certitude to guard the Sacrament in case people like you poke around long enough to discover the tomb.”

“
So, the Blessed Sacrament is in Shia Labeouf’s home?”

Murat nodded.

“Tell me. Where in his house?”

Murat
’s thin and bald head perked up. The small holes on the side of his head pulsated like the quivered gape of a miniature mouth. “Above ground, where else?” he said.

A piercing shriek resonated through the bedrock. Loud scratching and clawing mangled at the door as if someone was scrawling furiously at a chalkboard.

Cindy picked up Murat from the floor and shook him violently. “How do I get out of here? Is there an exit?”

Murat
’s eyes perked up, his jutting brow bones looked as if they were about to pierce through his translucent and tender skin. “Maybe,” he grinned.

The shining beacon above the Blessed Sacrament attracted two of the guardians. They pummeled the door in spastic rhythm. Cindy heard the thumping of rocks as they hit the door and ground.

“They’re digging in,” Murat said. “They will tear me to shreds and punish me for my failure and then they will play with your innards, as you scream for mercy.”

Cindy opened the Apocryphon and riffled frantically, searching for a picture or a word that might signal an escape.

“Once the Seraph can see you or the space in front of it, it will teleport. They don’t even need to breach. Accept your fate, pray for your forgiveness,” Murat breathed, as he hunched over the floor.

One of the
Seraphs managed to take a chunk out of the bedrock, creating a foot-long space between the room and the outside. Its shriek briefly paralyzed Cindy.

“
Kufikiri hekima moja kufikiri...Kufikiri hekima moja kufikiri
,” she chanted loudly, repeatedly, as she continued her hurried thumbing through the pages.

Inside the book, h
er eyes came upon a crude depiction of the Sacrament’s tomb. Next to the tomb, she recognized the same iron grips she used to descend into the initial chasm. She scanned the alien words, hoping to come upon a familiar consonant, vowel, or pattern that she could deduce. She quickly found a somewhat familiar Latin-derived phrase. The Seraph penetrated a hole in the rock with its claw. Cindy saw the black and shiny talon breach the bedrock as if it were foam. Murat bowed his head in surrender.

“
Precor nam ascensus
,” she said.

The nape of her neck tingled as if hit with a slight gust of air. She turned around and a collection of iron grips appeared against the wall. She gazed
upward and a concrete manhole, like the one at the floor of the church, appeared as well. She quickly climbed the grips, and the Seraph’s large, spiraled eye peered through the hole it created. Cindy scaled the grips with cat-like reflexes, aided by an unprecedented rush of adrenaline as the creature teleported into the room. Cindy paused and gawked at the creature. She couldn’t comprehend the physical makeup of such a beast—her heart beat furiously and with a flutter that raced up her windpipe and gullet, and finally lodging at the back of her throat like a pulsating tumor blocking her airway. The Seraph circled Murat, its claws tapping the hard ground like a drunken tap dancer. Murat laid close to the ground, his head lowered in submission. The Seraph pounced on the feeble and once-strong sprite and tore into its flesh as it were rice paper. Murat didn’t scream or yelp and absorbed the brutal attack in silence.

Cindy gazed
down in terror and fumbled the rondure out from her backpack while tightly snuggling the Apocrypha and the backpack is was in between her arm and rib. Her wallet and cellphone fell to the ground with her scurried extraction. She placed the dowel into the hole and pushed through. A salient and stinging burst of sunlight blinded Cindy as the cover opened. She immediately pulled the rondure from its hole and threw it up through the opening.

The Seraph shrieked and struck its claws at Cindy
’s ankle. The tip of its claw grazed Cindy’s soft skin, partially slicing her Achilles tendon. She cried out in pain and kicked at the beast with her other foot as she hung on the grips with both arms. The Seraph hesitated as she connected with its face, giving Cindy precious seconds to climb up the remaining grips. She pulled herself up out of the hole and slammed the cover. The Seraph managed to place its talon between the metal covering, as it struggled for a grip. Cindy bounced on one leg and body slammed herself down onto the cover, stunning the Seraph as it shrilled in annoyance, giving Cindy enough time to lock the cover with the dowel. She sat in an empty office, with an empty desk, and sunlight peering through a large, decorative window. She scooted backward, finally resting against the wall. She stared down at her ankle, the back of her foot gnarled and gashed.

She scanned the deserted office and found a dirty rag
discarded on the empty desk next to a half-bottle of Windex. She snatched it off the desk and tied it around her ankle. Her mouth pulled back in excruciating pain. She then reclined her head against the wall and closed her eyes.

“
Repel the thoughts, Cindy,” she breathed softly before nodding off; it was her body’s flight response to the horror and her injury.

27

Buttons

T
he city was calm, with not a siren or a spotlight hovering in the distance.

A
large window in Logan’s hotel room opened up to the sprawl west of downtown. The television played in the background. Talking heads in a panic. Beautiful, ear-pierced blonde girls with vitriol spewing from their glistening lips. Prognostications of the unknown, of the suddenly powerless and threatened, blared through the news-channel groupings of every cable and satellite box across the country and the world.

Logan
’s eyes focused on South Central. The neighborhoods tucked underneath the 110 North overpass, forgotten by gentrification, and infamous by culture, remained subdued. As the world burned in offices and high-rises across the land, there was no sign of smoke or fire in places where revolution usually sparked. Instead, the revolution was being broadcasted and waged through the flickers of LED’s and LCD’s displayed on the blue serenity of amoled screens and revealed by the oily swipes and scrolls on Gorilla and Sapphire Glass.

A knock on the door drew his attention away from
what lay beyond the large window. “Who’s there?” he asked.

“
Buttons...” said Keelen.

Buttons
had been Keelen’s nickname when they’d dated that one summer. She wore blouses, that for some inexplicable reason, had buttons on their shoulders or pockets, which Logan loved to tease her about.

“
Come in,” said Logan, as he opened the hotel room door.

Keelen lunged at Logan and gave him a hug, not just any hug. It was a tighter embrace than the ones Marines receive
d at the end of their deployments, or at least the ones that came home to a semblance of loyalty. She almost squeezed the breath out of him.

“
Whoa, it’s only been like 24 hours,” he said, lifting his hands in the air.

“
I thought something happened to you,” she said, her cheek planted against his chest. “Everything that’s going on is giving me anxiety. I’m glad you’re safe.”

“
You like the Buttons reference?”

Keelen pulled back from her hug and raised her eyebrow with playful castigation.

Logan smirked. “I’m sorry, but those buttons served absolutely no purpose. It’s not that you didn’t look good in them, but you know...”

Keelen pressed her finger on Logan
’s lips. “Stop it.”

“
Okay...okay...no more Buttons, I promise.”

“
I don’t think you called me here to talk about my past wardrobe decisions.”

Logan smiled. It
’s not that he didn’t think Keelen dressed well, he just thought pointing out silly details like the number of buttons on a blouse was not only a good way to break the ice, but it showed his attention to detail, which Keelen appreciated. Also, something about the buttons sparked familiarity and a warm feeling of nostalgia in Logan.

Keelen looked at Logan with tired eyes.
“I need to sit down. My legs feel like they’ve been used as punching bags.”

Logan pulled out a chair from the small table across from the bed and offered it to Keelen. As she sat, she sighed at the news program on the television. The media pounded her senses. It also made her question Logan
’s role in the chaos. “What did you do?”

Logan reached out for Keelen
’s hand and said, “Just trust me.”

She retracted her hand away from his grip.
“I don’t want to end up in prison. How do I know you’re not doing something illegal?”

“
I guarantee you there’s nothing shady going on.”

“
What about the video?” Keelen asked, changing the subject abruptly. “How did you not appear in the video? What kind of shit are you pulling?”

“
Can an explanation wait?” he pleaded.

“
No, I think I deserve an answer now.”

“
Deserve, huh? Why do you think you deserve an answer?”

Keelen sat back in her chair in slight agitation.
“Seriously?”

“
Answer my question...”

“
Are you really going to make answer that question?”

Logan sat still.
His face unmoved.

“
Because...because...I don’t want to be complicit in what you’re doing,” Keelen stammered. “Because as your friend, I deserve an explanation.”

Logan relaxed his abrasiveness.
“Listen, in my gut and in my heart, I know you’re special...unique, even. But what’s with the self-entitlement? You deserve an explanation?”

Keelen crossed her arms and curled her mouth to the side in submission.
“Fine, you’re right, I don’t deserve an explanation. But as a friend. As someone you trust, can you let me in on what you’ve been up to?”

“
Have you eaten?”

“
What?” she asked, surprised.

“
Are you hungry?”

“
Yeah, I guess?”

“
There’s a great deli around the corner. You want to go?”

“
Fine, as long as you’re buying and you tell me what’s going on...”

“
Let’s go,” he said, as he stood up from the white Tomorrowland-inspired chair-shaped seat, a common theme for the furnishings that were placed around the rooms and lobbies in the downtown, trendy hotel. He grabbed his wallet, and left the hotel room, Keelen in tow.

As they exited the hotel lobby, Logan leaped off the front stairs of the trendy hotel that sat on Sixth and Flower.

“Why are you so happy?” she asked, carefully descending the steps, as her tall, thin heels added an attractive inch or two to her height.

Wide-eyed, Logan pumped his fists in front of his chest.
“Because the dawn of humanity has just begun.”

“
How long are you going to keep me in the dark?”

Logan ignored her questions, once again.
“Their pastrami is to die for.”

Keelen grunted.
“Seriously, what the hell is going on? Are you going to tell me or what?”

Logan stopped mid-walk in front of a bank branch, where
a row of ATM machines flickered with an identical error code. He faced Keelen, looking dapper in his designer T-shirt and black sports jacket. “Yes,” he nodded, scanning both sides of the sidewalk. “Little by little, though, or as much as you can handle.”

“
If I can handle constant rejection in this town, I can handle anything,” she said, following him, as Logan picked up his pace. “I seriously need to know.”

They both rounded the corner on 4th Street and entered the New York Style Deli. The waitress rolled her eyes as she observed them stroll to the back of the restaurant. She preferred that they sit closer to the front, as the diner was about to close for the night. Realizing a decent tip was more important than
convenience; she relented and took their order anyway.

Logan waited for the waitress to leave before asking another question.
Biding his time, he tapped his fingernails on the table, as Keelen decided on the flavor of her iced tea. He glanced over his shoulder, waiting for the waitress to walk out of earshot, before popping the question.

“
Why did we stop dating?”

Keelen now looked annoyed.
“You’re never going to tell me, are you?”

“
Was it my bathroom habits?”

She sighed.
“No, you were pretty clean, actually.”

“
Was I too thin? In relation to Matt, of course.”

Keelen chuckled, as she relaxed a little from her ongoing anxiety.
“No, I think your build is quite nice.”

“
Good,” Logan smiled, relieved. “I do remember your exact words, though. You said you needed time alone. I thought, sure, it’s probably only gonna last a couple of days at most, and then just like that, next thing I knew, we were broken up.”

“
I’m sorry,” Keelen said, letting out a deep breath. “Sometimes, I’d rather lose someone than deal with the potential anxiety of a relationship. Does that make sense to you?”

“
You’d think if you liked someone a lot, the potential for something long-term would supersede your own personal demons and you’d try to make it work.”

“
But what if you care for someone so much that you wouldn’t want to put them through hell of your own making?”

Logan paused as the waitress served their drinks.

“Have you guys decided?” asked the waitress.

“
Two pastrami on rye...” Logan answered.

As Logan ordered, Keelen checked her phone with worry.

“Everything all right?” Logan asked.

“
I’m worried for Cindy.”

“
Is she all right?”

“
I don’t know. I’m kinda freaked out. Last I heard from her, she was doing research at the church during that crazy protest today. I haven’t heard from her since.”

Logan took a sip from his straw.
“I’m sure she’s fine. The protests have been peaceful. She’ll call.”

“
I hope so.”

Logan
’s brow lifted precociously before his next question. “So, what’d you see in Matt?”

Keelen rested the side of her chin on the palm of her upright hand.
“How many more questions before you answer mine?”

“
Just one more.”

Keelen rolled her large blue eyes in reflection.
“Fine, let’s see. He’s confident. It also helps that he’s extremely handsome. He’s also spontaneous. Funny. Loose...”

“
You love him?”

Keelen paused for a moment. She took a sip of her cola.
“Of course.”

Logan looked on skeptically.
“Yeah?”

She nodded with vigor.
“Um...yeah.”

“
Just checking...”

Keelen nodded toward the window.
“Okay, now that you’re caught up on me, what’s going on out there?”

“
Things are balancing themselves out.”

Keelen sat back in the booth and peered sharply into Logan
’s eyes. “Kinda vague...how’d you do this. How are you pulling this off?”

“
I can’t tell you, yet.”

“
How come?”

“
I need to prepare you.”

“
For what?”

“
How strong do you think you are?”

“
You mean physically or mentally?”

“
Both.”

“
Um...I...huh? Well, physically, I used to run cross-country—wait you knew that,” Keelen said with a laugh.

“
You do have nice legs, and you did tell me you ran cross-country track,” Logan grinned.

“
I could run 10 miles right now, if wanted to,” she bragged. “Now, mentally? Well, I’ve been in L.A. for 2 years now. All alone, by myself. Trying to make it. I’ve survived so far. Mentally, I’d say I’m Herculean.”

“
Confident. Good,” Logan asserted.

“
I’d say so.”

Logan
’s demeanor turned serious. His glare interrupted the rhythm of their banter. “I’ve been meaning to tell you something, something that’s been gnawing at me since we’ve begun seeing each other regularly again.”

The waitress came by and served the pastrami sandwiches
.

Logan paused.

Keelen drew an awkward smile and squirmed slightly. “You know, I really like Matt...”

“
...you’ve inspired me,” Logan interrupted.

“
In what way?” Keelen asked, clearing her throat.

“
I love you.”

Keelen subconsciously tugged on the lobe of her ear in discomfort, and looked away from Logan, darting her eyes around the deli. She then leaned toward Logan and whispered
, “I love you as a friend. We had our shot. You decided to concentrate on your work. I couldn’t handle the loneliness, the flakiness. I didn’t want to hound you.”

Logan grabbed Keelen
’s hand. She didn’t fight him off this time.

“
I appreciate that. You let me be. You let me be myself. Because you gave me space, you now, unknowingly, have your hand in everything you see around you.”

Keelen narrowed her large eyes.
“What do you mean?”

“
I love you a lot. Yes, romantically. And I would pursue you if I still had the opportunity. But I know I don’t have a chance, because Matt’s there, and he seems to care for you. So, mentally, I’ve moved on. I wouldn’t try anything that would put you in an uncomfortable position. But what I’m trying to say is...you inspired me to pursue something larger than me.”