Salvation | Book 1 | Salvation

by McNeil, Nick

  A Son from the crowd approached Gideon and placed a revolver into his open hand.

  “Elijah, Aaron, my children, please, pray with me.”

  Aaron and Elijah kneeled next to Gideon and folded their hands.

  The old man leapt to his feet. “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.” He pushed the barrel of the revolver against the back of Elijah’s head and fired a round into his cranium. The prophet face-planted into the soil.

  Aaron didn’t flinch and proceeded to pray to himself.

  “As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be—” Gideon pressed his revolver against Aaron’s head and pulled the trigger “—a world without end.”

  Levi waited with his sister for as long as he could. “You know I love you, right?”

  “You’re literally the only person I don’t hate, Levi.” Amelia rubbed her eyes and let her hair fall over her face. “We’ve been best friends since birth. I don’t know who I’m supposed to boss around without you. Or protect, even though you really don’t need my protection.” She wiped her hair from her face, but it immediately fell back. “I don’t want to protect annoying-ass Dinesh and our fake mom.”

  “Then come with me.” Levi nodded along with his own thoughts. “We can come back to kill our fake mom and to save Dinesh and Jay. We just need to save Clementine first.”

  “You want me to go with you?” Amelia smiled and tied her hair back.

  “Amelia, you’re my second half.” He nudged his sister while still sitting on the floor. “We have that weird twin thing.”

  “What do we say?” Amelia picked Levi’s Beretta up off the floor and wedged it into the back of her waistband. “What if he just says no?”

  “Amelia, put on some sweats and shoes and let’s get out of here.” A sparkle shined in Levi’s eyes. “Just let me do the talking.”

  Gideon reached his arm out and dangled his revolver; a Son promptly swooped up the handgun and used a cloth to clean the blood off Gideon’s hand and face. “The Lord has shown Abraham more mercy than I, as He once again only tested Abraham’s loyalty, allowing him to keep his one and only son.” Gideon addressed his people. “But this is okay, for I have not served God in the same way Abraham has.” Gideon bowed his head and prayed, the Sons of Salvation dropping their heads, mimicking him. “Angel of God, my guardian dear, to whom God’s love commits me here, ever this day, be at my side, to light and guard, rule and guide.” The old man’s eyes rolled back as his body convulsed. He fell to the floor and seized, drool spilling out of his mouth. He gasped. “Our mission is clear and the path clearer. Guided by the son of Abraham, we will discover our next true mission.” Gideon’s skin tingled and his stomach fluttered. “Love.”

  Levi took small steps out of the house, carrying Clementine’s limp body in both of his arms. Amelia trailed just behind him, with her arm bandaged up and a rifle tossed over her shoulder.

  “Before the Lord reveals himself on the eight day, we all must not only be baptized in his name, but married under his word.” Gideon waved his arm to urge his followers to take Clementine from Levi. “The Lord already knows who it is we shall marry, for His plan for each of us is already decided. And He has chosen his newest prophet, Isaac, to lead us there.” Gideon placed his hand on Levi’s shoulder and held his arm in the air. Gideon leaned in and whispered in Levi’s ear, “We did not agree on your sister joining us.”

  “The Lord has spoken with me, Gideon. And this is His will.” Levi lifted his chin.

  Gideon hissed under his breath, “What do you know about the word of God?”

  Levi stepped forward and cried out to the Sons of Salvation, “Whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father, who is in heaven.” Levi turned his head and glared at Gideon. “I have been sent by the Lord because salvation is found in no one else but us, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.” Levi looked the old prophet in the eyes while keeping his head pointed forward; he spoke only loud enough for Gideon to hear. “You’re in my world now, bitch.”

  Amelia bumped Gideon’s shoulder as she walked past him. “So, big brother, what the hell is your plan?”

  “First, I need to get my hands on a copy of the Bible. These dozen passages I remember from school aren’t gonna cut it.” Levi grinned. He seemed to always manage his way out of a tricky situation, not just since the world ended. But for the first time in his life, Levi Jones felt in control. “When we were children and wrote all those stories about the end of the world, is this how you ever imagined it?”

  “You becoming a leader of a cult in four days?” Amelia blew a bubble with her gum nearly the size of her face before it popped and caught on her nose. “Oh, yeah, called that one from a mile away.”

  “Watch this.” Levi winked at Amelia. The new prophet fell to his knees. “Let us fix our eyes on Gideon, the author and perfecter of our covenant,” he shouted.

  Gideon started to cough and shuffle his feet.

  “Who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, carrying its weight for what has already been a lifetime. He sat down at the right hand of the throne of God and led you all to me.” Levi made the sign of the cross. “The prophet Gideon is wrong. I am not the son of Abraham. Gideon’s mistake comes not from naivety, but ignorance. He is correct, I do share blood with Abraham, but I come from a time four hundred years after Abraham.” Levi placed his hands over his heart and gazed into the sky. “I have come here to ask of this world to let God’s people go. I have come to free you from slavery. I will guide you with the pillars of clouds by day and God’s fire in the sky by night.” Levi sprang to his feet and exhaled. “I have returned to you as the prophet Moses, and I will lead you to the promised land.”

  The Sons of Salvation dropped their firearms, collapsed to their knees, and praised their prophet.

  Gideon gasped for air, clutching at his throat. He was sweating profusely enough for it to show through his robes. “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.”

  “Gideon.” Levi was taken aback. “Not I, but you are the one who told everyone here that I am a prophet. Do you deceive your own people?”

  Gideon opened his mouth to speak but could not muster the words; his body shook.

  “Either you lie now or you lied then.”

  This time the Sons of Salvation couldn’t help but break out in conversation. The panic brought ease to Levi. The young prophet placed his hand on Gideon’s forehead and hollered at the top of his lungs, “No one who practices deceit will dwell in my house. No one who speaks falsely will stand in my presence.” Levi kicked the inside of Gideon’s knee, forcing him to the ground. Amelia tossed her brother his Beretta 92FS, and Levi shoved the barrel into Gideon’s mouth. “Ezekiel 25:17. The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and goodwill, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children.”

  Levi pushed the gun down his throat, gagging the old man and chipping his front four teeth. Tears poured down Gideon’s face, and snot ran down his nose and into his mouth, also covering Levi’s pistol with mucus. “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”

  Moses pulled back his pistol, allowing Gideon to fall forward. The old man went into the fetal position and wept like a child. Levi approached his people. “Today we are reminded that all men carry sin, even prophets. But the Lord is not above forgiveness.” Levi bent down and placed his hand on the old man’s back. “Nor is he above punishment.” Without request, a handful of men detained Gideon, and he faded into the crowd as though he were swallowed whole.

  Amelia stood next to
her brother. “Was that one verse really from the Bible?”

  “Oh heavens, no.” Levi hunched forward laughing. “That’s a quote from Pulp Fiction.” Moses adjusted his glasses and fastened the top button of his collared shirt. He straightened his back, puffed out his chest, and lifted his chin. He walked up to the Sons of Salvation, and they parted for him and his sister like the Red Sea.

  “What a shame. It made God sound pretty badass,” Amelia said with a too-sweet tone and a bemused smile. “Nice call on not killing the old man, by the way. With his two prophets dead, Sarah being utterly useless now, and me probably killing Dad”—Amelia shrugged—“who knows if anyone else has the location of these Daughter women.”

  “Oh, man, I was honestly just trying to make a power move.” Levi felt a wave of relief over a problem he never knew he had. “I didn’t even think about that when I let him live.”

  “I have to ask again, what the hell is your plan, Levi?” Amelia wrapped her arms around her gurgling stomach. “Food should for sure be a part of the plan.”

  “To be honest, for now, I am just going to make it up as I go. I don’t even know if I am walking in the right direction right now. I’m just assuming they have a vehicle of some sort off the nearest main road.” Levi rolled up his sleeves. “I know we have to get Clementine to the Disciple’s Daughters. If we don’t go there first, these people won’t believe I’m a real prophet. I’m banking on this women’s cult to have the same amenities as the Sons do. Which, from the sounds of it, would be medical facilities.”

  Amelia kicked a pine cone down the untraveled path. “What makes you so certain that Gideon will actually tell you where the Disciples are?”

  “Honestly, I think Gideon still believes he can rise back to power and take this covenant back. So I think he’s going to try to show his value and continued loyalty for a while.” Levi took his collar off and threw it on the ground, wondering why he’d kept it on this whole time in the first place. “I suppose the next thing we will need to do is track down a coder. Obviously, not many people can achieve what our father was able to. Otherwise, the Sons would have had coders stockpiled within the organization or as prisoners. They went through a lot of effort to find us, so I am guessing they already have something huge planned.”

  “So you want to follow through with all of this? Go along with this batshit-crazy plan?” Amelia let her hair down, just to readjust it and put it back up. “What about Cheltenham? He’s pretty damn weird. He can probably hack the nuclear launch codes and shit.”

  “I was trying to avoid him based on our last encounter.” Levi used his hands to show himself weighing his options. “We will probably have to lean toward the side of keeping coders prisoner.” Levi rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck. “I want to see where their plan goes, and then I am going to make it my plan.” Levi spoke with gusto. His senses felt sharp, and his imagination ran as though he could write his own story. “Between the Sons and Daughters, I could have an army of over one hundred thousand soldiers at my disposal. I can make this new life whatever I want it to be.”

  “I feel like you’re underestimating the amount of resistance we are going to face. It isn’t the Sons and Daughters that I worry about the most,” Amelia countered. “It is the government, the military, other country’s governments.”

  “I am going to let future Levi worry about that.” Levi cut his sister off. “Right now, if anyone intervenes, we could play the ultimate victim card. Put literally everything on Abraham. I will worry about the army once I’m in control of my own.”

  Amelia bobbed her head side to side as she tossed around a few thoughts. “I suppose if we act swiftly enough, by the time anyone figures out what we are up to, it’ll be too late.” She reached into her back pocket and pulled out her cell phone and untangled the headphones she had wrapped around it. “Whatever it even is that you’re… we’re up to.”

  “I feel like Abraham planned further than this. Someone who could and would plot all of this—” Levi’s eyebrows rose as he peered at his sister’s phone; he couldn’t help but naturally miss the sounds and rhythm of music “—didn’t stop planning at this point in the story. He has always planned several steps ahead, and I can’t imagine us shooting him as being part of the plan. So let’s see what he was going to do now, and we will change course when we see fit.”

  “Whatever you say, Levi Jones.” Amelia handed her brother one of her earbuds. “My solar charger broke, and I have 3% left on my phone. One last song?”

  “Uh, it’s Moses now, and I’m leading our people to the promised land.” Levi snickered and took a sidestep to walk closer to his sister. He placed one of the earbuds in his ear. “Don’t worry, by the way, I stole a solar charger from Cheltenham when I was back at his place. I don’t want to deal with music-less Amelia, to be honest.”

  “Hmm.” Levi’s sister rolled her eyes and scrolled through her phone playlist indecisively, starting the first few seconds of a handful of songs. “You know what, we will let the shuffle option decide.”

  Amelia tapped “shuffle” on her phone, and the twins marched toward their new world to the tune of “East Bound and Down” by Jerry Reed.

  The End

  Book Two of Salvation Series

  SALVATION: RISE OF THE SISTERHOOD

  About the Author

  Nick McNeil is the author of Salvation, the first novel of a post apocalyptic series. Nick began writing while he was in college and self published his first novel before graduating. Mr. McNeil currently resides in Washington State with his pets and girlfriend. He spends most of his time enjoying the outdoors, cooking, and playing golf.

  You can reach him online via social media.