The Sunset Prophecy (Love & Armageddon #1)
Page 1
Love & Armageddon #1
www.thesunsetprophecy.com
Acclaim for the novels of P.J. Day:
“P.J. Day breathes fresh air in a genre oversaturated with the same plotlines and characters. This page turner is something special.”
—H.T. Night, author of Vampire Love Story and The Fourth Sunrise
“A fun departure from the usual vampire tale, with King’s Blood author P.J. Day has introduced a whole new kind of vampire.”
—sookiestackhousebooks.com
“The Sunset Prophecy is The Davinci Code, meets Percy Jackson, meets Beautiful Disaster, all with a much bolder twist.”
—J.R. Rain, author of Moon Dance and The Witch & the Gentleman
Atmospheric and extremely memorable, this is the story of Jack, a vampire who is finally starting to feel that he can tell his story.
—John Warner, indiebookspot.com
E-book Edition, License Notes
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written consent of the both the copyright owner and/or author.
The Sunset Prophecy is a satire by P.J. Day, and is not intended maliciously. P.J. Day has invented all names and situations in its stories, except in cases when public figures are being satirized. Any other use of real names is accidental and coincidental, or used as a fictional depiction or personality parody (permitted under Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell, 485 U.S. 46, 108 S.Ct 876, 99 L.Ed.2d 41 (1988)).
DEDICATION
To my beautiful wife and mother of our gorgeous girls, I thank you for your unbreakable spirit, patience, understanding and incredible fortitude.
Books by P.J. Day
King’s Blood: Best Selling Serial Novel
Episode One: Vampire Revealed available on Kindle
Episode Two: Vampire Unleashed available on Kindle
Episode Three: Vampire Lust available on Kindle
Episode Four: Vampire Descent available on Kindle
Episode Five: Vampire Terminus (coming soon)
The Complete Serial Novel available in two versions:
Boxed or Uninterrupted
Other Works in progress
Zombie Party & Other Stories w/ J.R. Rain (coming soon)
Daughters of Eve w/ J.R. Rain (coming soon)
Mercy's Magic (A Witch Series #1) w/ Elizabeth Basque (coming soon)
Thank you for purchasing a book written by P.J. Day
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1 The Parable of Rebellion
Chapter 2 The Maledicted Transformation
Chapter 3 At the Crossroads of Fate
Chapter 4 A Night on the Mount
Chapter 5 Saint Drake
Chapter 6 Lumber of Shame
Chapter 7 Eye on the Prize
Chapter 8 Pins and Emails
Chapter 9 Rumors and Half-truths
Chapter 10 Fateful Relay
Chapter 11 Failure’s Pride
Chapter 12 Claret Clarice
Chapter 13 The 4th or 5th Commandment
Chapter 14 A Trivial Pursuit
Chapter 15 Know Your Place
Chapter 16 Blessed are the Autodidacts
Chapter 17 Good Night and Good Luck
Chapter 18 Fish and Loaves
Chapter 19 Loose Lips Sink Sponsorships
Chapter 20 Viral Jabs
Chapter 21 Bailout
Chapter 22 Codex Unleashed
Chapter 23 Intersection
Chapter 24 Protests and Passageways
Chapter 25 Don’t Look Back
Chapter 26 Blessed Sacrament
Chapter 27 Buttons
Chapter 28 Crossroads of the World
Chapter 29 Gratitude
Chapter 30 The Fight
Chapter 31 Revelation
Chapter 32 The Pit
Chapter 33 Reborn
Chapter 34 Thicker than Blood
Chapter 35 Doubt
Chapter 36 The Shrine
Chapter 37 Deprogramming
Chapter 38 Honor thy Fire
Chapter 39 Sermon on the Green
Chapter 40 San Gabriel
Chapter 41 Original Sin
License Notes
Dedication
Other Books by P.J. Day
About the Author
Acknowledgment
Special Thanks
That song was about your mind. You have to change your mind before you change the way you live and the way you move...The thing that’s going to change people will be something that no one will ever be able to capture on film. It will just be something you see and all of a sudden you realize, ‘I’m on the wrong page.’ —Gil Scott Heron
1
The Parable of Rebellion
“I’m afraid,” said Isaac.
The boy winced as he sat up in his hospital bed. With IV tubing latticing his tanned forearms, nine-year-old Isaac looked too athletic and healthy to be bedridden. The profusion of medical equipment flickering at his bedside contrasted with a wall of pictures and handmade cards from classmates and Little League teammates—the Pasadena Reds missed their shortstop.
“Talk to me,” said the young man wearing a black hoodie, jeans and distinctive green Puma Roma Slims. This was his third visit with Isaac. He sat in a visitor’s chair upholstered in an ugly 80s pastel Santa Fe print. The hospital and its staff were state of the art, but the non-medical furniture…not so much.
Isaac looked comfortable around the man. There was nothing menacing about his face beneath the pulled-up hood. The boy relaxed into the safety and growing familiarity of the young man’s eyes. They were a soothing caramel color.
“I’m afraid of things going dark, of hurting,” Isaac confessed. “My leg hurts, but I’m afraid of it hurting even more.”
The man glanced down at the boy’s leg—through the sheets, through his skin and muscles, down to the cellular level—he could see a small black blob of cells feeding off the boy’s bone marrow. He perceived the pangs of dull pain throbbing in the boy’s leg; the cancer had spread to Isaac’s femur.
“What’d the doctor say?” the man asked.
“He’s not smiling like when I first got here. He smiles, but not the same kind of smiles. They’re fake.”
The man eyed the rolling entertainment kiosk that held the television and the video game console. It sat unused in the corner of the hospital room. “Haven’t been playing as much...huh?”
“No,” the boy said. “Not really into it.”
“How about we fire up a game? You and me. I’ll let you have the rocket launcher this time.”
“No, thanks. It’s all right.”
“I’m surprised. You’re always itching to play.”
“I’m just worried about my mom and dad and Natalie.”
The man got up from his seat and sat at the end of the bed. He flashed the occasional glance toward the door. The nurse wasn’t scheduled to come in yet, but he didn’t want to get caught in Isaac’s room past visiting hours. That would just complicate everything.
“What worries you the most?” asked the man.
“That they will be sad if or when…you know…,” the boy said, his eyes tilting downward, shaking his head. “…I can’t say that word, I’m scared.�
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“You don’t have to say it,” interrupted the man. “That’s noble of you—you’re the only kid in this entire hospital who’s expressed that thought. I want you to know that.”
“Really? My family is the most important thing. The only thing.”
“But you don’t think you’re going to beat this?”
“After the doctor told my parents that he had to stop chemo, he took my Mom and Dad outside the door to talk. I saw them through the window. It wasn’t just Mom who cried. Dad cried. That’s how I knew.”
“Things changed since then?” asked the man.
“Yeah. It’s different. They bought me more stuff. Now I have every first-person shooter on that game system. I got Disneyland passes. I only want to talk to them more...about everything, but they just buy me stuff. They give it to me and leave kinda soon. They don’t stay and talk.”
“Grownups cope differently. You’re handling the situation better than most kids in this hospital. You’re a tough kid.”
“Thanks,” said Isaac. “They ask me how I am, but every time I tell Mom it hurts, she cries and leaves. Now, when she asks, I just say, ‘Fine.’”
The man nodded. “If you beat this, besides Disneyland, what would be the first thing you’d do?”
“You...you think I’m going to get better?”
“Where do you think you’ll go if you don’t?”
“I don’t know...Heaven?”
“Which would you want more? To be with your family, or go to Heaven?”
“My family, of course. I make them laugh, they make me laugh. I’m not perfect. I get in trouble sometimes, but Mom...Dad, they always make me feel safe,” said Isaac.
“So, why not Heaven?” the man asked.
Pensively, the boy lowered his eyes. When he raised them, he said, “Everybody seems to want to go there, but I don’t know what it’s like. They don’t either, you know?”
“From what I hear, it’s pretty swell there, but hard to get into, kinda like professional baseball.” The young man stood up from the end of the bed. He walked toward the door and glanced out the small window. He looked left and right, and then walked back toward Isaac. He leaned next to the boy’s bedside, and patted the back of his head. “Don’t change. Don’t ever change, you got me?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your loyalty for those who truly love you is a gift. Spread that around.”
“Okay.”
“You hold grudges?”
“No. People have their bad days about stuff. Next day, everything’s okay again.”
“Good.”
The man put his thin hand on the boy’s forehead, as if he were checking his temperature and closed his eyes. Isaac felt a little hot. A pleasant fizzle—as if a warm electric eel slithered around his vertebrae—traveled throughout his body. A strange electricity surged through him, all the way to his fingertips and toes. “What are you doing to me?” he asked.
The man took his hand away from Isaac’s forehead, stood straight and said, “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For convincing me.”
“Of what?” Isaac laughed.
“To do the right thing.”
“Okay...you’re welcome, I guess.”
The young man stretched out his arm and offered a horizontal fist. Isaac hesitated at first. It looked like a salute, but eventually gave it a light fist bump.
“Harder,” the man said.
Isaac cocked his arm back and smacked the man’s fist.
“There you go...you look better.”
“Yeah?” Isaac said. “I do feel a bit better.”
“Tomorrow, when they discharge you, have your father call the insurance company. Have him ask for Rick Baird. Don’t forget that name now. It’s similar to the lead character’s name from X-Wars—you know, Harold Baird.”
“Okay,” said the boy.
“Tell your father to tell Baird to shred the denial letter.”
“Rick Baird. Denial letter…shred it. Got it.”
The man walked to the door and again looked out the window. He quickly glanced back at Isaac. “Make sure your dad tells him he’s on notice, too, okay?”
Isaac nodded.
The man opened the door, stuck out his head and looked both ways.
“You never told me your name,” said Isaac.
The man turned around with a sly grin. “Batman.”
“Batman? Really?”
“No, but I like Batman.”
“Okay,” the boy chuckled.
He smiled at Isaac and slipped through the door into the hallway.
The young man in the black hoodie and the Pumas was gone.
So was the pain in young Isaac’s leg.
2
The Maledicted Transformation
Lying in bed with his eyes closed, Adam Cagle gripped his white cotton sheets and waited for a reply, a twitch, or the warmth of a finely contoured blonde. Unfortunately for him, the sudden onset of stomach acid that raced up his esophagus was the only thing that greeted him that morning, the same morning where, unbeknownst to him, his life as the most successful and handsome fashion editor in the U.S. of A. was about to be cast into chaos.
It appeared that Adam had been quite neglectful of his role in the grand, multi-dimensional scheme of things. Seduced by flesh and purses, lipstick and heels, drugs and spin, he was about to be reminded of his intended function within the universe, and one that he had not fulfilled.
He lifted his heavy head from one of his pillows and groaned loudly. The inside of his skull felt as if it were filled with a fistful of marbles, marbles that collectively bashed against the walls of his cranium whenever he’d tilt his head.
You stupid lush. Last flippin’ time you mix wine and fruity spirits.
His eyes opened slowly. His bedroom was blurry, as if he were looking at it through a pair of Vaseline-smeared bifocals. He raised his heavy arms and examined his hands—through the fogged lenses of his eyes, his fingers appeared thick and meaty.
A loss of control resonated in his voice as he said out loud, “Heather? Heather, are you there?”
No one responded.
Clumsily, he scooted out of his bed and staggered through his bedroom, catching himself on one of the solid oak bedposts. He paused and scanned his room. Shadows filtered against the wall as light splashed in from the skylight in the hallway. Adam narrowed his eyes, attempting to decipher the Lascaux-like forms that played with his head.
With renewed resolve, he took another step toward the bathroom and stumbled again, this time landing against a nightstand where he kept his trusty bottle of potassium chloride, which he used to mask his $5,000-a-month coke habit. He squirted a couple of drops in each eye and blinked. The solution didn’t help clear his mirage-like shimmering vision.
“Heather, where are you?” he whined while stepping into the bathroom. “My eyes are stinging; I kinda need your help here.”
Heather sat on a small stool by the sink, staring at the floor in deep thought; her naked back faced him as she brushed her long, Fructis-sponsored locks. Upon seeing the blurred siren-like form, Adam walked up right behind her and placed his hand on her shoulder to gather his balance.
Eventually, his glazed eyeballs adjusted. He looked down, and to his astonishment, he noticed a swollen pink hand blotched with diabetic rashes, which contrasted with her young, bronzed and smooth skin. Adam snapped his head toward the large mirror and the tiny bottle of eye drops fell from his hand.
The man he knew was gone.
Heather peered at Adam in the mirror and screamed. She sprang from her stool and raced toward one of the robes that hung by the bathroom door. “Adam?” she asked, bewildered and shocked, quickly covering her naked body. “Oh my God, what happened to you? Was it the lobster?”
Adam shook his head as he stared at a pock-marked, slightly hunchbacked, 450-pound version of himself in the mirror. He smoothed over his third chin with his hand, then the belly t
hat overlapped his crotch and finally, the love handles that meshed with his rotund backside.
“Adam, do you want me to call 911?”
He didn’t reply, but he instinctively knew what he had done to deserve his sudden bout of cursed bloat.
Adam stormed out of the bathroom and clambered through the multiple high arches that separated each of his rooms. He made his way to the living room where he stopped in front of the fireplace. With controlled haste, he grabbed the scented logs from the gold-plated cradle and tossed them into the hearth.
Heather came running into the living room. “Adam, sweetie, what the hell are you doing building a fire? You need to see a doctor immediately.”
Adam snapped his head toward Heather. “Get out!”
“What?”
“Heather, just leave.”
“But...”
“Now!” he screamed.
Heather grabbed the dress and heels she’d willingly shed last night in the living room. Her last pleasant memory of Adam was that of a fit man who owned a six-pack, toned arms, barrel chest, eyes colored like the bluest sea and wavy hair like a wind-spun field of wheat.
“Adam, you need help,” she shrieked, her eyes watering.
Adam glared menacingly. “Out!” he bellowed.
All Heather saw was a stranger who dismissed her concern with callous, brutish indifference. An injured beast had implored for her sudden exit so he could marinate in his own pain.
Sobbing, she exited the penthouse, slamming the door behind her.
Adam didn’t flinch at Heather’s reaction. Instead, he grabbed a match from the top of the fireplace, lit it and calmly tossed it onto the logs. He sat in his chair, bowed his head and waited for the fire to take hold. “Jrue, I submit, for you are my one true lord and father. I succumb to your overreaching power and guidance,” he breathed through his clenched teeth.