F Wilson - Midnight Mass

Joe, it seemed, wasn't the only one watching the church.

He bent into a crouch and moved a few yards closer. He caught the flash of a Vichy earring.

Not surprising that the undead would want to keep an eye on the church. They had to be furious and more than a little unsettled by these defiant "cattle."

With a start Joe realized that they might be watching for him.

Of course. Franco had expected him to rise from the dead in the rectory and start feeding on the parishioners. He must know by now that that hadn't happened. He'd want to know why. Never in a thousand years would he guess the truth.

Franco had to be baffled. His beautiful plan had gone awry. More than awry, it had gone bust. He had to be furious.

Joe cradled the thought, letting it warm him, feeling the best he'd felt all night.

He found a place between a couple of waist-high shrubs where he could watch the watcher without being seen. He settled onto the ground. Despite his lightweight shirt and shorts, the damp earth and cool breeze didn't chill him. He felt perfectly comfortable. Extremes of temperature didn't seem to bother him.

What else wouldn't bother him? He had much to learn about, this new existence, this altered body he'd be wearing into the future.

The future . . . what did that mean anymore? How long could he exist? Would he go on indefinitely like the true undead? And beyond that hazy future, what of his salvation? What of his soul? Did he still have one?

The possibility jolted him. What if his soul had departed after Devlin had torn him up? Was he an empty vessel now, marked and doomed to wander the earth like Cain, offensive to the sight of God and man?

Joe shifted his gaze to the dark blotch of the graveyard to the left of the church. He could almost pick out Zev's grave among the shadows.

Zev, he thought. Where are you, old friend?

How he wished he were here tonight, sitting beside him. He longed for the comfort of his wit, the honed edge of his Talmudic intellect. He wouldn't have answers, but he'd know the questions to ask, and together they might come to understand this, or at least find a path toward understanding.

Here, on his own, would he ever understand what he'd become? Was there anyone else like him on earth? He doubted it. He was sui generis.

The quote, Alone and afraid in a world he never made, trailed through his head. Whoever wrote that hadn't been thinking of Joe Cahill, but could have been.

Joe watched the watcher through the night. When the sky started to lighten, the Vichy slunk away from the tree and started walking south. Pistol in hand, the man kept to the center of the street, looking wary. Dear Carole, all on her own, had filled their rotten hearts with terror.

Joe paralleled his path, traveling through the backyards of the deserted houses lining the street, catching only occasional glimpses of him between the buildings, but that was enough.

Although Joe's was a much more difficult route, hopping fences and ducking through hedges, he felt no sense of exertion. He wasn't even breathing hard.

He stopped as he realized with a start that he wasn't breathing at all. He had to take in air in order to talk, but otherwise he didn't need to breathe. No blood, no respiration—what was powering his body? He didn't know, might never know.

He'd lost ground on the Vichy and hurried to catch up. The task of tailing him became dicier as he entered the business district. Too open, with no cover. Joe had to settle for huddling in a doorway and watching him. After what Lacey had told him about her abduction, he had a good idea of where the man was headed.

Sure enough, the Vichy stopped before the Post Office where he met with another pair of his kind.

And then, out of the shadows, a group of undead, seven males and a female, appeared as a group. Joe couldn't make out their faces from this distance. He couldn't hear their words, either, but he saw a lot of shaking heads and tense, unhappy postures.

He was more sure now than ever that they'd been searching for him.

With the arrival of another trio of Vichy, the first three left. The second three took up guard positions as all eight undead trudged up the Post Office steps. Joe noticed that six of the males clustered around the female while a lone male brought up the rear. Something familiar about that solitary figure, but Joe couldn't place it.

No time to think about it either. He broke into a run. Dawn was coming and he had to race the sun to the beach.

- 10 -

CAROLE . . .

Soon.

Carole sat on the bungalow's tiny rear deck and watched the sun's lazy fall toward the horizon. A beautiful end to the day. She might have enjoyed it but for the adrenaline buzzing through her.

A good day ... as good as could be expected. In these times, a good day was when nothing unusually ugly occurred.

Joseph had made it home just after sunrise. Before dropping into a deathlike sleep in the rear bedroom, he'd spoken into the cassette recorder Carole and Lacey had looted from the Radio Shack.

Was it really looting? she wondered. Did taking something from a store that was never going to reopen make you a looter? It seemed like a silly thing to worry about, but she did.

When Carole had asked Lacey what she thought, she'd replied, "Who gives a shit?"

Maybe Carole needed to adopt more of that attitude.

Carole had returned to the church this morning and, when no one was watching, left the recorder on the front steps. It seemed to take forever, but eventually someone found it and played it for the congregation.

Cheers and tears—that was the only way Carole could describe the reaction. At least initially. It took a while for the anger to set in, but when it came it was fierce. The undead and their collaborators had tried to turn their Father Joe. A craven, cowardly, backstabbing act. The anger bound the parishioners even more closely. They'd stay on and fight harder. To the death if need be.

Carole tried to draw strength from the memory of their boisterous resolve. For soon she would have to do what she and Lacey had discussed. Part of her hummed with anticipation while an equal part recoiled.

Joseph had awakened a short while ago. He and Lacey were inside, talking. The indistinguishable murmur of their voices drifted through the open glass door, mixing with the thrum of the waves and the calls of the gulls.

Her heart kicked up its tempo as their voices faded. That meant that they were heading for the front bedroom.

Soon ...too soon . . .

"Okay."

Carole jumped and turned at the sound of Lacey's voice.

"Now?"

How inane. Of course now. That was why Lacey was here.

Carole rose unsteadily. Did she have the nerve for this?

Lacey pressed the steak knife into her hand. "He's waiting."

Carole nodded, took the knife, and headed for the bedroom. When she reached the alcove she hesitated. She wiped a sweaty palm on the pants of her sweatsuit, then forced herself forward.

I can do this, she thought. I must do this.

Joe was sitting on the bed, head down, hands clasped between his knees, looking like a man on death row. He didn't look up as she entered.

"Okay," he said, his voice hoarse. "Let's get this over—" He must have sensed something. His head snapped up. "Carole? Sorry. I was expecting Lacey."

Her tongue felt like flannel. "It won't be Lacey today."

Before he could understand, before he could protest, Carole clenched her teeth and jabbed the point of the knife into the center of her palm. She suppressed a gasp of pain as the blade pierced her skin.