chapter 2
Darrton
I walked back up to the place where the child had left me. My mind was racing and my side was scorching as I climbed the ladder. Lying down on the bed, I tried to calm my anxieties. There was nothing making sense in my brain. The child was so incompetent, but I had to use her, the best I could. I needed help. I held my side and closed my eyes, trying to make my head stop spinning. My thoughts traveled back to the moment where I awoke to this awful place.
My senses were returning slowly. All I could make out was the blue of the sky and a humming sound in the distance. It had to have been a few hours before I was able to comprehend what was going on around me. My head was throbbing and when I tried to sit up, a sharp pain thundered through my body. Looking down at my side I noticed there was a fresh wound oozing blood. When I fell, I’d landed on my side. I hadn’t been able to catch myself in time to land properly. The rocks, a few feet away in the garden, had broken into my skin, leaving a nasty looking gash in my side. A dark shade of hatred flashed through my mind. Trying to sit up, I fell back toward the ground, panting. This cannot be happening. Where am I?
I knew the answer to that. I was on Earth. I also knew why. I had been damned to Earth for my sins. It was my brothers and my punishment for trying to start The Apocalypse before Father told us to. We wanted to start our jobs. We wanted to make Father proud. Reaching back to feel my wings, I sighed. They were still there. My surroundings were...strange. It had been so long since I had been on Earth, everything had changed. I hadn’t been on earth since 1898. When I had lain dying, I thought this was the end of everything, until Father gave me the title of a Horseman when I got to Heaven.
It had to have been midday, and all I could see was the building in front of me. It looked like a home, but I couldn’t be sure.
There was a sudden noise at the back of the building and I looked up. A woman was coming toward the door. I guess it is a home. Pulling myself, I crawled with every ounce of power in me toward the side of the building where a shrub was growing. I made it to the bush just as I heard the door handle turn. Panting and lying down, I felt my blood drizzle onto the ground below. I wish my brothers were here. They weren’t my real brothers, but our bond had strengthened over time. We were each other’s brothers now. We were all each other had, the only family we had left. I hoped they weren’t injured like I was. My three brothers would be in contact with me soon. We have a mission. I tried to sit up but my body refused. I lay back on the grass and closed my eyes.
When I came to, I wanted nothing more than to beat my head against the ground. There was an obnoxious sound coming from the house next to me. That music had words so ill-bred, it had to have been another language I had never heard. But regrettably it was the English language. The lyrics meant nothing, and I could hear the footsteps across from me, hopping around to the ignorance. There wasn’t a language on this damned planet that I couldn’t comprehend.
I moved, or tired to, but a significant pain struck me again. I cringed, holding my side in a tight grip. I would recover. I knew I would. Only in time.
My injury was from my fall. My fall from Heaven to Earth. I was damned by God. I was a Horseman. It’s time now. We’ve waited long enough, Father.
The home beside me had been quiet until later in the afternoon, I guessed there were children by the loud voices and irritating music. Damned children.
People drove by, so oblivious to their surroundings. Take the people in the house beside me. I had been on Earth for a mere eight hours and not one of the fools had noticed a prowler. Even though the large shrub hid me, they should never close their eyes without checking. The Earth was full of dangerous predators. Not just humans existed, and there were far more terrifying things to fear than a murderer.
Girding up my loins under the almost unbearable pain, I moved. The solid earth was no comfort below me. Silently I held my tongue as I stood up.
My eyes searched the unusual ground below. There was hardly anything green around us, beside the pathetic excuse of a bush. The ground was filled with rigid rocks and some concrete.
I tried not to be distracted by these alien things. I had to move. I pulled myself up on the side of the house with my hands, but stopped moving when I caught a glimpse of something unfamiliar behind me. I reached back, searching for my pure white wings that used to surround me and protect me. They weren’t there. Well, they were, but they were no longer an unpolluted white. They were a raw, dark, and hatred-filled black.
“Damn!” I yelled, stretching my arms and then falling to the concrete, cringing at the pain from the gash in my lower side.
Tears. Crying was something I had not done since the time of my former life on Earth. Years had passed since I had died and been chosen as one of the Horsemen. However, Heaven doesn’t keep track of time like the Earth. A lifetime can seem as only a day to the Father. The time seemed to drag on for my brothers and myself.
I brought myself back up to my bare feet. Continuing around the wooden house, I heard the sounds of the mortals breathing inside. They didn’t even realize I was entering their home. Their pathetic lock was nothing. All I had to do was turn the doorknob until it broke. Even with the gash in my side, leaking my blood, it took little effort to accomplish.
The house was full of objects of different shapes and sizes. Everything seemed so outlandish. Examining my surroundings, I could smell something not human. It was animal like. I saw something to my left move closer to me. The little creature was not much bigger than a rat, but its sounds were fierce and canine like. Its fur was fluffy and brown, and its barking continued.
“Silence!” I commanded.
With that one word the animal tucked its tail and ran. Coward.
I continued looking, stepping across the floor and toward the large white sitting place. It looked like a large seat. Oh how times have changed. Books, something I could relate to. I picked up a book labeled American History. Then a smaller book with a lot of blank pages. I read the lines. My favorite part of school would be lunch. It’s definitely not this class. Whoever wrote this was apparently not that bright. The lameness of the words made my stomach heave. The world had come down to pure ignorance and it was infectious.
“Baby, baby, baby, oh.”
I dropped the book, and my head jerked toward the stupid melody from the floor above me. It was around midnight and everyone except whoever was playing that ignorant music was asleep. I knew no one else could hear it. My hearing was better than any mortals. I took the steps two at a time and rounded the corner, seeing a door slightly cracked, with a bright light shining through. I hadn’t seen such a bright light since I had walked into one many years before. And this light was indoors, of all places!
The music became louder. I carefully glanced around the corner of the door, folding my blackened wings tight against my back. The light seemed to be formed in a hard tube, hanging from the ceiling. There in the center of the room a mortal stood a young mortal. Her shirt was incredibly long and hung loosely to her knees. She hopped around with a hairbrush before her mouth and sang along to the obnoxious music. “Thought you’d always be mine,” she sang over and over again. I quickly snuck back, away from the intolerable human that I could only want to kill. If only I could rid the world of this ignorant mortal. But calling attention to myself would only cause infinite problems.
The light that caught my eye from the end of the hallway was not as bright and the sound was lower. I entered the room and froze. This human girl was older and in a tight-fitting shirt and pants. They enfolded her every curve. Her hair was matted to her face and she twitched. Taking my gaze from her I looked at the flickering box. Walking toward it, lowering my head, I listened. It was speaking, softly, and the pictures were moving so quickly, as if there was a life in a box. A picture box? How bizarre. I heard a slight moan and the girl moved, but I was gone before I knew if she had awakened or not. Leaving the mortals’ loathsome and unfamiliarly bizarre house behind me, I felt my side. It was still bleeding. I couldn’t comprehend why it wasn’t healing any faster.
The night air was crisp and cool against my bare back. My wings spread out wide and I tried to not notice the pain in my side. I heard a twig snap and glanced to the right.
A figure emerged from the bush where I had just been. The hood of his coat was over his face so I could not tell who it was.
He eyed the second story and then the door. I watched from the shadows as he picked the lock. If he were smart he would have checked the back door, I had already broken it. The door clicked.
I didn’t know this family, and I had no reason to care what happened to them, although it was my job to kill those who did not serve Christ. My brothers and I had made a pact—we would start The Apocalypse, no matter what it took. We were Famine, Death, War, and Conquest. What were the Four Horsemen to do rather than take out the ones not of the Lord’s honor?
It wouldn’t hurt to go ahead and kill one child that didn’t seem to be missed. His mother didn’t even care enough to check on him during the night.
He opened the door and I caught him by the shirt. “What the f*ck!” he shouted and took a swing at me. Stupid mortal.
“What business do you have here?” I asked.
“Okay, Miss Fairy, why don’t you go get done in the ass...ahhh!” he screamed as I gripped his arm. “I was here to see Lizzie. She is my friend.”
I laughed without humor. “Yes, I see. She waits up for you and everything.” I leaned closer to his ear. “I think you want to die tonight.”
Tears began to swell over his horrid face. “Please, don’t—”
Snap. Easier than I thought.
I stripped the boy of any belongings on his body. He had a leather bound wallet with a few dollar bills and some odd objects that said, Trojan. After dragging the body until I found a junk yard a mile or so up the road, I went back to the mortals’ house, eyed the bush, and walked toward it, pulling my wings into my bare back, until they were completely gone. I curled into the patch of dirt and tried to push the hard days to come out of my mind. The thought of being back on Earth both excited me and sickened me. The people around me were fools, but to think we would finally get to go through with The Apocalypse, which we had been chosen for, sent excitement through my entire body.
There was so much to do but I was entirely too weak to do it. I lay on my back against the rocky earth and closed my eyes, silently twisting the ring around my ring finger. That’s when my ring burned into my skin. It was happening. One of the other Horsemen was trying to contact me. I closed my eyes and focused. My mind went blank and words appeared in it. It was Warren speaking to me. The time is coming, Brother. I will not tolerate you not being here. You only have a scarce amount of weeks to get your priorities together. Get better. The time is coming. Satan will not wait much longer. We have to have Death of the Horsemen to perform.
The words stopped. It was more like getting the wind knocked out of me than words appearing in my mind. I gasped for breath. Our rings were the only way for us to keep track of one another. It was painful to contact each other mentally, but a necessity. The time was getting closer—my brothers could not complete the ritual without me. I had to go. I had to find them. Pushing myself up, I tried to move but my side ached too much. I fell back to the ground, breathing hard. Time was running out. They would come for me if I didn’t get better soon. I wanted to be better by the time my brother’s found each other. They would be mad if I delayed any longer. My brothers are waiting for me.
I opened my eyes and gritted my teeth. There wasn’t much time at all. I had to hurry and get well. My brothers are waiting for me. I closed my eyes and tried to will myself to sleep. I needed rest for the upcoming days.