All His Angels Are Starving

The underbelly of New York City was filthy. Maybe that was why Nancy preferred praying in the subway. She'd tried the church, the library, and even near the crater where her children's school once stood, but underground was the only place she felt safe enough to pray. It was the only place she felt God might hear her. Or maybe it wasn't God she was reaching for; she didn't know anymore.

The subways felt amniotic with its retched odor, the bustle of busy people, and the screech of metal every time a train roared in and out of the station. It was difficult to breathe too deeply, and the stench of piss or trash or rot clung to everything. Nancy clutched her purse, her jaws clenched, her eyes on the dirty tiled wall. A homeless man lay beside her on the bench, covered in a filthy brown blanket. Beneath him were piles of dirty clothes and shoes of all sizes and colors. She'd sat down and counted the curious stains on his brown blanket - twenty-four. Some she identified as dried food stains, and a good wash or two might get those out. Some of it was dried blood or smeared dirt. Other stains were things she'd rather not wonder about.

People kept shooting her concerned or curious looks as they walked by. She couldn't blame them. After all, who would purposefully sit beside a vagabond whose stench surrounded the bench like a toxic cloud? Nancy would; she deserved it. She inhaled sharply through her nose, disgust crackling her lungs. Her stomach tried to compress and contract, to force her to expel this rancid odor. Throw up, said a voice in her head. Throw up, urged her body. Just get up and move somewhere else.

But where? Every inch of the station was filthy, and it wasn't like this was the homeless man's fault. Maybe he had debilitating medical issues. Maybe he'd been dealt a bad hand in life. Maybe he got cheated. Or maybe he was evil and he deserved this. Isn't that what her parents had raised her to believe? What she'd tried to instill in her daughter? That the sinful were punished?

And all Nancy had ever done was sin.

She buried her fingernails into her palm and squeezed her eyes shut as tears trailed down her cheeks. I lost my children. They're gone. They're gone. God took them from me. I'm a bad mother. I'm a terrible person. It should've been me! God, please. Take me. Take me! Bring them back. Please!

"Lady," grumbled the homeless man, lifting his blanket to squint at her with sleepy eyes. Her sniffles must've woken him up. He had terrible bags beneath his eyes, bags that matched Nancy's. A scraggly beard crawled over his chin and his cheeks; he was bald. "Lady, what's wrong? You're really good-looking. Do you have any food?"

Nancy reached into her purse, heart pounding. Her fingers closed around her pepper spray, but the man wasn't trying anything. He wasn’t being weird. He smiled almost apologetically, or maybe he was just grateful someone would sit next to him.

She returned a strained smile and pulled out a wad of cash. The man's face lit up and he flashed a toothy grin as he reached for it. But his hand came too close to her navy blue skirt, and Nancy stood abruptly before placing the handfuls of fives and tens on her seat and briskly walking away. She kept her eyes on the tiles beneath her sandals as the man praised her from behind.

She didn't glance back, and instead waited by the yellow line at the edge of the platform. The yellow line meant danger, anyone standing on it risked getting hit by an oncoming train, risked falling into the tracks. A rat skittered across them, and she stared at its long pink tail as it vanished into a drainage pipe. A short while later, the station rumbled. A train screeched out of the dark tunnel and rushed in front of her, and a violent gush of wind lifted her hair and ruffled her skirt; windows and flashes of all the people inside went by, and Nancy grimaced. She must look like a mess.

With a shaking hand, she tried to smooth down her hair. How long had it been since she'd washed it? She hadn't washed her face in a while too. No makeup. No moisturizer. Not even lip balm. She forced herself to smile as the train slowed to a stop and she caught sight of her distorted reflection in the doorway window. Three days. It'd been three days since that earthquake, since God took her children away, since she'd last eaten. Her stomach had no space for food; it was too filled with worry and disgust.

Once the doors slid open, she flowed inside with everyone else and grabbed a pole. A moment later, the announcer came on, "Stand clear of the closing doors." The doors shut, the train groaned back to life and pulled out of the station. Through one of the windows, she could see the homeless man counting the money she'd given him. He looked like he was about to cry with joy. She was glad she could make someone happy.

She studied the ads splayed across the train's sides. There was something for breast surgeries, something for trade schools, something for designer watches. There was a sign saying, if you see something, say something in bold white letters. New Yorker's keep New Yorker's safe.

Her lips twisted. She was aware of people moving away from her, not making eye contact with her. They got up from their seats to find another place to stand. They leaned against the door. They didn't want to be near her. Nancy sniffed her armpit; she reeked. Maybe she'd sat too long on that bench. Or maybe it had been too long since she'd washed. She didn't care; she got to sit down. A bench had cleared out in front of her.

Nancy sank into the seat and rested her head back as the train bumped and jostled. She looked at the other passengers as they side-eyed her.

They seemed nervous. On edge. The city was haunted; nobody knew what to do about the buildings that had vanished. So many people were gone, and almost everyone knew someone who'd disappeared. The news had run the list every single hour. The first night and for most of the second day, Nancy sat on the living room floor, reciting as many names as she could, hoping, praying, even as Henry tried to pull her away, to kiss her and give her food, she kept hoping Jenny's and Oliver's names wouldn't appear.

Please, please, please, please.

Just before she'd left the apartment this morning, after telling Henry she didn't want any breakfast, that she didn't want anything but her children, she'd punched the television. The screen had cracked, and she'd stormed out, and now she sat on a train staring at the red patches of skin. Her knuckles were already bruising; she could barely open and close her fingers, but she forced herself to anyway. Just to feel the pain radiating into her wrist and climbing the veins right into her brain. Oh, it felt good. It felt really good, and she deserved so much worse.

Why was she on the train? She'd gotten out of the apartment; she had to. She couldn't stand going up and down the stairs anymore, hoping to hear Jenny's voice, her biting sarcasm, or Oliver popping his head out of his room to ask what was for dinner. Her husband Henry had become a shell as well. He wasn't eating much, but he kept cooking. Kept making breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and setting the table for four. Except now he kept his handgun on the counter. "Just in case," he'd say.

"In case of what?" Nancy would ask.

He'd look at her with those sharp brooding eyes that had won her heart over and say, "I don't know."

His ex-wife would call sometimes, Oliver's biological mother. She'd screech on the phone about her precious boy, about how Henry was a failure, about how she would kill Henry for failing. She was a horrid woman; Nancy had always wondered about her. Jessica Spencer. She'd kept Henry's last name, but it was all a strange mess, something Nancy was afraid to untangle.

Henry had been adopted from Korea. He'd grown up in the Midwest, and he’d tell Nancy about how he constantly felt like an outsider, constantly bullied for being different. He'd joined the navy to see the world and find his purpose, and Nancy hated all the things he’d suffered through, all the racism and toxicity, and she'd tried her best to make his son Oliver, who was her son now too, feel welcome and loved. His shock of red hair was from his mother, but his face and soft skin came from his dad. And his kindness, his sweetness, that was all Oliver's. So, she didn't care what features came from where; she just loved him as her own. But I couldn't love Jenny like that.

I tried my best!

I should've done more; I could've.

More tears slipped down Nancy's cheeks, and she licked them off her face. The train rattled through tunnels. Small lights flashed by the windows. At the next stop, more people piled in, took one look at the sobbing mess she'd become, and scrambled away from her. She didn't care; the world was broken, falling apart. How was everyone else so normal? How could everyone pretend things were okay? Everything was crumbling, and all it had taken was a few buildings going missing.

She could've laughed. The news that day when she'd come home, her feet bleeding, her heart broken, the newscasters were going on about the stock market crashing.

Who gave a flying fuck about the economy? The world was ending!

She'd collapsed in Henry's arms and all they could do was follow along as people and news outlets and social media twisted this in every way possible, as they tried to make sense of it: The reckoning. The end of times. Sinkholes. Rapture. Sin. It had to be aliens. It's because of the gays. It's because of the immigrants. It's because of the monsters in power. Everyone found someone to blame, even Henry who blamed God, but Nancy blamed herself.

That first day, it felt like the world stood still. People held their breath, waiting for the sky to burst open. But by the second day, the trains and busses were running again. Coffee shops reopened. The business district filled with men in suits. Everyone was expected to go back to work; it was like a bizarre nightmare that made no sense. How could anyone go about their day?

Riots broke out in the evenings. Marches and violent protests, but what were they for? What did they expect would happen? A curfew was instilled. Everyone was to be home before 9 pm. Anyone caught outside without permission would be arrested. But Nancy didn't care about any of that.

"Oh, that's right," she said out loud. She laughed and touched her injured hand to her forehead. "I'm going to their school."

Several people glanced at her. One asked if she was alright. Nancy smiled and shook her head. She was on the N train. A few stops more and she'd arrive at Jenny's and Oliver's high school, to the crater in the ground that had filled with muddy rainwater. She'd have to walk back later. She'd given all her money away and she hated using her credit cards at the kiosks. Maybe she'd call Henry. Or maybe he'd come looking for her again.

She tried to relax. She straightened her blouse and smoothed her skirt. She wasn't sure why she was trying to make herself look nice for a hole in the ground but she ran her fingers through her hair and dabbed her eyes with her sleeve, and just as she was about to fish for deodorant in her purse, the train bounced violently, throwing Nancy forward onto the floor.

Everyone who'd been standing got slammed against the windows and the doors and each other. Several bumped their heads on the seats and collapsed. A roaring scream of people and metal whirled around her; the lights flickered; the ground shook so violently, rumbling and shaking, everything bounced as though the train was trying to spit them all out. But Nancy recognized these tremors, recognized this chaotic rumbling of the world; it was the same earthquake that had taken her children away.

It was the same. Much stronger, and much more impactful, but it had to be the same. She wasn't sure how she knew, but she felt it in her bones as someone's boot struck her ribs and her knee banged against a pole. The train screeched to a halt, sparks flying and flashing by the windows, and then the earth stopped shaking.

After a long, quiet minute, one of the lights flickered, but most of the train was stuck in near darkness. Someone turned their phone's flashlight on, and light glistened across the mess inside. Everyone was a pile of limbs. Many were bleeding, and people kept asking one another if they were alright, helping the elderly stand and get to a seat, trying to assist the unconscious.

Static blared over the intercom, and the conductor's voice crackled through. Nancy could barely understand him. It was a mess of white noise, but she caught a few words. “Remain calm - don't move between - inspection - wheels and rails - emergency services.”

Nancy felt herself all over. She'd hit one of the seats with the side of her face, and her cheekbone was sore to the touch. She was sure one of her ribs was broken, and she winced when she tried to extend her leg. But she grabbed the nearest pole and forced herself upright and groped around for her purse. A man was lying on top of it; he was out cold but still breathing. Shaking, Nancy yanked her purse free and then pulled out her phone.

Would she even have a signal this far underground? She typed in her PIN, and yes! She had a few bars; they must be close to the next station. She could access the internet. Her heart pounding with adrenaline, the threat of several prayers on her tongue, Nancy flicked to the news as someone tried to wake the man beside her. She ignored them both as she scrolled through reports of the earthquake, and there, on the front page, was the headline she was looking for. A video tried to autoplay, but her signal was too weak. and it couldn’t load.

Fresh tears streamed down her face. A cry of happiness and hope broke free of her throat. She’d been right. Breaking News: The missing buildings have returned!

Something wet and hot ran down the side of her head. She scratched it absentmindedly and her fingers came away with blood. It glistened in the tunnel lights. She was dizzy. Someone knelt in front of her, a face full of concern, mouthing something. Nancy just shook her head. It took her a few moments to understand; they were asking if she was okay.

"I have to call my children," she said in a choked voice. The person gave her a strained smile and moved on to check on someone else. Nancy shut her eyes. She couldn't stop shaking.

The school was two more stops away. And the train seemed to be upright. Maybe they could get moving again. Or maybe she could run to the next station and get back to the surface. Slowly, she became aware of the other passengers helping one another up, crying, calling loved ones, calling for help. As she searched for Jenny's name, her screen lit up with a call from Henry, and her heart lurched. For a moment, she thought it was Oliver's face in the icon.

"Hello?" It was Henry's voice, but the line dropped and she couldn't hear what he'd said next.

The train announcer came back on as well, his voice crackling overhead. "Emergency services are en route to escort everyone out. Please remain where you are. Nobody should move between... between...." There was a burst of static. "Dear... god..."

Nancy blinked at the ceiling. Then she glanced at the other passengers who were staring up in confusion at the intercom as well. Another light flickered, and they heard more static. There was a shout and then a strange hissing sound, almost like a snake or a radiator, but it triggered every danger-sensing cell in her body.

It was followed by a thud. The intercom cut off abruptly, and the train fell silent. Nobody spoke a word or made a sound. Her phone crackled.

"Nancy? Nancy are you there?"

"I'll get off at the next stop," she whispered into the phone. She was trembling, but she told herself that was just cause she'd hit her head. "Emergency services are on the way."

"They're not picking up, Nancy," he said, breathing heavy. "The traffic's so bad. I'm running, and-" The line cut again, and when it came back, Nancy couldn't understand what he was saying.

Before she could whisper frantically, a strange sensation, like a headache, moved through her head, from behind her left eye to just inside her ear, and a shudder went down her spine. Someone cried out. Words appeared in her head:

Rapture has commenced.

The Final Challenge is in effect.

The faithful shall be rewarded. May His light guide your way.

Humans remaining: 7,885,246,104

Her phone fell from her hand. Her breath caught in her throat.

Rapture... humans remaining? The final challenge? She could hear something faint, something echoing down the tunnels. Was it sirens? The wind? Was it the emergency services coming to help them?

She reached for her phone but her injured hand found her purse instead. She grabbed her pepper spray and remembered what Henry told her about his handgun. Just in case.

Then the door on the far side of the train car slammed open. Nancy flinched. People rushed into their car, scrambling over one another, the flashlights from their phones bouncing all over the place. Countless shadows flicked across the train, and as they rushed toward her, as she caught the glimpses of sheer terror on their faces, Nancy realized what she’d been hearing. It wasn't sirens or the wind. It was screaming. It was people screaming.