“Do you think she’ll be okay?”
“Does it matter? According to her, we’re all dead anyway.”
The crimson robes drew nearer, their shouting clearer. Three words, over and over again.
“What are they saying?” Zorn asked.
“It sounds like they’re saying ‘We love you’.”
“We love you?”
“I don’t think it’s meant to make you feel good.”
The cry came up again. “We love you! We love you!”
Zorn blanched.
“It works.”
The enemy formed on the highway, first as a line on the horizon spanning all three lanes, men and women in crimson robes. More filled in behind them, hundreds more, and even more flowed in from the woods on either side, all of them chanting the words over and over, “We love you! We love you!”
Isa hugged her middle and started to rock back and forth. The children on the roof wept.
