World After

Still, even the civilian angels were a force to be reckoned with as they grabbed Resistance trucks, tossed soldiers, and crushed the frantic crowds.

Now, some of the angels lying on the asphalt look seriously injured. Some of them are so badly off that they can’t fly on their own. The warriors yank them by their arms as if a

None of them are dead as far as I can see.

Obi’s expression shows that he’s begi

When the warriors dig down to ground level, the one in charge signals, and more than half the remaining angels take their injured and fly off. The remaining angels look resentful as they dig. I suspect warriors don’t like to do menial labor.

Although I can’t see into the pit they’re digging, I can hear screeches. I recognize the noise from the thing that attacked and paralyzed me in the aerie basement. There are still a few scorpion fetuses alive down there.

The warrior in charge pulls out his sword and jumps in.

A scorpion screeches. From the sound of it, it’s being skewered.

IT’S NOT long before the streets are quiet. There weren’t many surviving scorpions to begin with but now, I’m willing to bet there are none.

Masculine bodies burst out of the pit and disappear into the cloud cover. One of them carries a limp angel, the only one I’ve seen who looks dead.

Somewhere, far away, thunder rumbles. The wind whistles through the corridor of buildings.

We wait until it seems safe to get up and take a closer look. I’d be shocked if there’s even a skin sample of the angels that we could bring back.

We approach the rubble, staying hidden as much as possible even though the coast seems clear.

We’re a stone’s throw away from the smoking wreckage when a boulder of concrete clanks down the side of the rubble pile. I freeze, eyes and ears alert.

Another piece falls and rolls into a tiny landslide.

Something is coming up from the rubble basement. We all take cover behind cars, watching carefully.

More rock-sized debris falls and it’s some time before hands reach up to the top of the rubble. A head emerges. At first, I think it’s some kind of demon that tu

It’s an old woman.

But I’ve never seen anything like her. She’s shriveled, frail, and bony. Most striking of all, her skin is so dry it looks like beef jerky.

Dee-Dum and I look at each other, both wondering what she’s doing in there. She climbs up onto the peak and begins a shaky trek along the debris pile, moving as if she has arthritis.

She wears a tattered lab coat that’s five sizes too big for her. It’s so stained with dirt and rust-colored blotches that it’s hard to believe it was ever white. She holds it closed as she gingerly steps across the rubble, looking as if she’s holding herself together.

The wind blows her hair in her face and she tosses her head to get it out of the way. There’s something odd about both her full hair and that gesture. It takes me a minute to figure out what it is.

When was the last time I saw an old woman toss her head to get her hair away from her face? And her hair is dark all the way to her scalp even though the latest post-apocalyptic fashion for older women is at least an inch of gray roots.

She freezes like a frightened animal and looks up at us as we emerge from behind the cars. Even with her dried-up face, there’s something familiar about her that’s nagging me.

Then a memory tickles my mind.

An image of two little kids hanging onto the fence, watching their mom walk toward the aerie. Their mom turning around to blow a goodbye kiss.

She ended up as di

She’s alive.

Only, she looks like she has aged fifty years. Her once beautiful eyes have sunk into her face. Her cheeks are so lean I can almost see the skeleton beneath them. Her hands are talons covered in thin skin.

She scrambles away in abject terror as she sees us getting up from our hiding places. She’s almost on all fours as she runs off, and my heart breaks to remember her health and beauty before the monsters got to her. She can’t get very far in her condition, and she hides, trembling, behind a post-office box.

She’s a tiny slip of a thing, but she’s a survivor and I have to respect that. She deserves to get away from the place where she was buried alive, and she’ll need energy for that. I dig through my pockets and feel the Snickers bar. I root around to see if there’s something less valuable but find nothing.

I take a few steps toward the poor thing as she cringes in her hiding place.

My sister has more experience with this kind of thing than I do. But I guess I’ve learned a thing or two from watching Paige befriend all those abandoned cats and damaged kids. I put the candy bar on the road where the lady can see it, then take a few steps back to give her some safe space.

There’s a moment when the woman watches me like a beaten animal. Then she snatches the candy bar faster than I would have given her credit for. She tears off the wrapper in a split second and stuffs the candy in her mouth. Her strained face relaxes as she tastes the nutty, sweet flavor from the World Before.

“My kids, my husband,” she says in a hoarse voice. “Where did everybody go?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “But a lot of people ended up at the Resistance camp. They might be there.”

“What Resistance camp?”

“It’s the Resistance who attacked the angels. People are gathering to join them.”

She blinks at me. “I remember you. You died.”

“Neither of us died,” I say.

“I did,” she says. “And I went to hell.” She wraps her thin arms around herself again.

I don’t know what to say. What difference does it make if she actually died or not? She certainly lived through hell and she looks it.

Sanjay walks up to us like he’s approaching a stray cat. “What’s your name?”

She glances at me for reassurance. I nod.

“Clara.”

“I’m Sanjay. What happened to you?”

She looks at her jerkied hand. “I got sucked dry by a monster.”

“What monster?” Sanjay asks.

“The scorpion angels I told you about,” I say.

“The hell doctor said I could go free if I led him to my little girls,” she says with her parched voice. “But I wouldn’t give them up. He said the monster would liquefy my insides and drink them. Said the mature ones wouldn’t go all the way and kill if they could help it, but the developing ones would.”

Clara starts shaking. “He said it would be the most excruciating thing I could imagine.” She shuts her eyes as if trying to keep tears back. “Thank God I didn’t believe him.” Her voice sounds choked. “Thank God I didn’t know any better.” She starts crying in dry heaves as if all the fluid actually was sucked out of her.

“You didn’t give up your children and you’re alive,” I say. “That’s all that matters.”

She puts her trembling hand on my arm, then turns to Sanjay. “The monster was killing me. And out of nowhere, she came and rescued me.”