“That’s something, I guess.” But it wasn’t. You could see it in his face. “I should’ve gone, too. Maybe I could’ve—”
I grabbed his hand and turned the note back over, then pointed at one word—Bitsy.
“Yeah.” Owen didn’t sound too convinced. He looked back at me. “You’re going to get them back for this, aren’t you? Will was—” His voice cracked again and two huge tears rolled down his cheeks. “She was so good. They put out a light with her. Dodge, too. You know what I mean, don’t you? The world needed people like them. The payback for that ought to fit the crime.”
I nodded. It’s going to.
Godkiller
We pulled the liquid metal and rock outward from the center of the planet, cracking the crust in places that had never seen a lava flow. Ash and poisonous gases filled the air, choking the life from human and NP bodies alike.
“You have to stop.” The voice was quiet, but it cut through us, to the center of our being.
We turned to find Him there. (God with us, now literally.)
“It’s always been literal,” He said.
“You think that makes it better?” we yelled.
The Earth trembled at the sound of our fury, but He didn’t flinch.
“You were always with us?” we raged. “You were there when they stuck that coat hanger into me and ripped out my insides? You were there every time Leif raped me, then said he’d tell everyone in school I was a slut if I broke up with him? When Mom was deciding she would rather be dead than our mom? When Dad was screwing a girl young enough to be our big sister? When vampires used us, when boys and angels treated us like cum rags, when we used to cut ourselves and pray to die, and when we laid awake all night crying and praying for you to make everything okay, you were there? YOU WERE THERE?”
Moons and planets shook in their orbits. Asteroid belts and planetary rings ripped apart, firing meteorites and debris out into the solar system.
We reached out our hands to take Him apart, but He grabbed our wrists. Then He said a name that we had never heard before.
It was mine, it was me. I…we… It was us as one. It was my name.
“Yes, I was there,” He said. “Go ahead. Ask.”
We thrashed in His grasp, but He didn’t let go.
“Why didn’t you do anything?” we demanded. “Why didn’t you stop it?”
“Desty already knows the answer to that,” He said. “You both know the answer, even if you can’t get it through to your emotions yet. Do you think you’re the only one who gets free will?”
We screamed. It was the sound of continents cracking apart, of nuclear bombs detonating. Any mortal within hearing distance would have dropped dead at the sound.
“That was my feeling as well,” He said.
Our fury raised in pitch until the air caught fire with it. The holocaust exploded off of us in a flare of fire that scorched the moon and turned smaller meteorites to ash. The sun shuddered and flickered. For a moment, it looked as if it would burn out. Then He spoke a word and it returned to full strength.
“What now, —?” He said my name again in the language I couldn’t speak. “Will you fight me? Try to destroy me?”
“You watched! Everything they did to us and you just stood back and watched! You let this happen to us! You made us this by doing nothing!”
He shook His head. “What I created was something beautiful. A destroyer of evil, a protector of innocent, a replenisher of life. You’ve allowed your original purpose to become corrupted.”
“Life?” we spat. “I am the Godkiller. I am the Destroyer. I am Death and the end of all worlds!”
“But you could have been life.” His expression was so sincere and sad that it silenced us. “Your blood can revive the undead. Your voice comforts the brokenhearted. Your touch exposes the true nature of evil and your presence cleanses it from the Earth with holy fire. You could have healed the dead in spirit and body, comforted the broken, led the lost back home, and purged evil from the world.” He squeezed our wrists, but not hard enough to hurt. “You could have been so much greater than this.”
“This was done to us!”
“Do you think that’s an excuse? When Harper Ives asks me why her baby sister died, what should I tell her? That you were angry about being mistreated? Is that supposed to make her feel better?”
(Scout’s dead? I didn’t mean for—)
“Tough Whitney’s entire family is dead. Should I tell him not to miss them because the fallen angels who murdered them were angry and wanted revenge?”
“We’re different!”
“How?”
Our mouth opened, but no words would come.
After several seconds, He shook his head and let out a soft sigh. “You were beautifully and fearfully made, —. Kathan and his kind did everything they could to pervert your purpose, but you still could have chosen to overcome that. Instead…”
We raised our chin. “Instead we chose to hold you accountable for everything you should have done, for every impossible standard you hold your creations to, for every punishment you lay on us that outweighs our crimes. We chose to exact justice on behalf of a world that could never touch you.”
“You chose to exact what you were told was justice by a proven liar,” He said. “Academic speculation has always been one of your greatest gifts. The moment you saw me, you were already wondering whether I was appearing like this because it was the only way the mortal mind could comprehend me. The answer is yes. Of course I
