The engine shuddered to a standstill and silence flooded back. The rear canvas flaps of the truck peeled back and people started to drop to the ground, stretching their backs and looking in wonder at their new surroundings.
“More people answering the siren call of the changing universe,” Kinderman said. “And just in time too.”
Shepherd looked down at the countdown again just as the numbers tumbled to zero and immediately started to build again with a minus sign in front. At the same moment two things happened: the ambient light levels jumped slightly as all the stars became a little brighter; and a deep, almost animal cry split the night as Liv gave one long, final push. Then there was the tiny mewl of a newborn.
111
The first thing Gabriel heard when he climbed stiffly from the back of the truck after the long journey was the cry of a woman.
He was naturally conditioned to respond to signs of distress and cries of pain but there was something in the sound that he recognized. His senses snapped to attention and he reacted quickly, moving along the side of the truck, heading to the source. The sound had come from a screened-off area by the water’s edge, with light coming from behind the screens.
He pushed past a staked sheet of canvas and squinted against the sudden brightness of the stand lights.
Liv was lying on a makeshift bed in the center of a group of people. She looked tired and drawn but was still the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. She seemed to glow in the lights. A young girl was at her feet holding a newborn baby that squirmed and cried. She wrapped it in a towel and handed it to Liv.
A baby — Liv’s baby.
Shepherd saw the man get down from the truck — and head straight for the canvas screens. Hevva was in there, he couldn’t see what was happening, he was too far away. The man disappeared behind the screens and Shepherd broke into a run, his feet slipping in the soft earth of the shore.
Over by the truck someone else started to move with the same sense of purpose the first man had displayed. He was wearing a bulky jacket, like a soldier’s tunic, and there was something about it and the stiff way he walked that set alarms ringing in Shepherd’s head. The man reached the screens and turned briefly before disappearing behind them, the light from the truck’s headlights catching his face. Shepherd stared, shocked.
It was the Hubble control technician from Goddard. It was Merriweather.
112
Liv saw Gabriel appear at the edge of the light and walk toward her. She thought it must be some kind of hallucination brought on by hormones or pheromones or endorphins or any combination of the three.
She felt the weight of the baby as it was placed on her chest and she looked down at it — this tiny, perfect being. She had never really believed in love at first sight but in that first moment she saw her baby she loved it more than she had ever loved anything else in her life. She would die for it right now if she had to.
She looked back up, expecting the vision of Gabriel to have gone but he was still there, solid and real. He too had tears in his eyes and he was looking down at her and the baby.
Liv smiled and wept all at once, holding the baby’s velvety head close to her mouth. “It’s your daddy,” she whispered. “He came back.”
Then she saw movement, directly behind Gabriel.
Merriweather stepped into the blaze of light and beheld the bizarre nativity: the woman on the bed, holding the false prophet in her arms — the undoer of everything, the Antichrist.
He stepped forward, unbuttoning his tunic and letting it fall to the floor, no longer Merriweather, now revealed as his true self — the Novus Sancti. He opened his arms to form the cross with his body, revealing the ritualized cuts in his flesh, and the packs of explosives strapped to his chest. In one hand he held a gun, in the other, a wire connected to the explosives.
Now he could complete his transformation and become the instrument of mankind’s delivery, the first martyr of the reborn Church, ending this Satanic rebellion before it had even begun.
Gabriel saw the fear in Liv’s eyes and turned to see what had put it there.
He saw the bomb, the outstretched arms, the ritual cuts of a Sanctus.
His instinct was to just hurl himself forward and knock him away from Liv and the baby. But the Sanctus was too far back. Gabriel would be shot before he covered the distance. But he was also too far away from Liv and the baby and he could see by the look in his eyes that they were his target. He would move closer, to try and close the gap between himself and everyone else to make sure the bomb blast was effective. That was when Gabriel would do it.
Then someone stepped into view, and the Sanctus reacted, spinning around to point the gun at the newcomer. The gunshot was like thunder. The man fell back, thrown by the impact of the bullet. Gabriel threw himself at the Sanctus, hitting him hard and sending them both to the floor. He pinned his gun hand down beneath the weight of his body and grabbed for the hand holding the wire, digging his thumb hard into the wrist tendons, seeking the pressure point that would weaken the man’s grip. In a detached part of his mind he remembered his grandfather doing something similar to save him and his mother from a grenade. He had smothered the blast with his body, giving his life in exchange for theirs, and now he must do the same.
The Sanctus roared in pain as the thumb dug deeper. He tried to twist away and brought his arm down hard on the top of Gabriel’s head. Once, twice, the elbow driving the full force of the blow into his skull.
Gabriel held on, weathering the blows as best he could, unable to raise an arm to protect himself. He had to keep hold of the Sanctus, if he let go then they were all lost. The blows continued to rain down and the jarring movement of them caused Gabriel’s hand to slip. The Sanctus pulled his wrist free and the button fell from his numbed hand.
Gabriel kicked hard with his legs, digging into the earth and pushing them both a few inches farther from the bed and the precious people on it.
He reached for the hand again but the Sanctus had twisted it away far enough to keep it out of reach. The hand found the button and Gabriel kicked again to try and jar it free or gain a few more precious inches.
But it was not enough.
He saw the hand close around the button and he shut his eyes, bracing himself, hoping the ground and his own body would absorb enough of the blast to protect Liv and his child.
Shepherd came through the canvas screens on the opposite side from where the others had entered. The rider who had greeted them was lying on the floor, a gunshot wound bleeding in his chest. Hevva was by the bed, her eyes fixed on the violent struggle taking place on the floor. He stepped forward. Saw the hate burning in Merriweather’s face, saw the bomb, the newborn baby, the mattress out of place, even the light on the stand burning like the sun had burned from the poster — all of it so familiar from Hogan’s Alley and the other dark basement.
He raised the small gun he had taken from the woman and aimed it at Merriweather’s head, trying to put all that had happened before from his mind.
The bullets are real—he told himself—and so is the bomb.
And Hevva is standing right by it.
His finger tightened on the trigger but Merriweather jerked away, swinging his other hand around. Shepherd saw the gun in it, saw it angle down toward the man he was struggling with. He took a step forward, not caring about getting shot, only about narrowing the gap and improving the accuracy of this tiny gun he had never fired.