enormous creature pulled away and ran across the room.
“Get out! Now!” she said menacingly.
“What are you doing here?” Izzy said. “Sleeping with the
enemy?”
“He is not myenemy. You are. Now get out.”
“So it’s been youthen,” Sprout said. “You’re the only one who
knew enough about us to devastate us. You helped Bidden destroy us,
to destroy Undergrounds.”
“You are mistaken,” she said, now taking a sheet and wrapping it
around herself. “I didn’t help him,” she admitted, “He’s helping me.”
“What are you…” Sprout started, but Leona boomed over her
frail voice.
“Get out! Now! Start running!”
“Where’s my father?” Colin said weakly from the floor.
“Ha! Your father!” she shouted.
“You gave Undergrounds to the anarchists,” Sprout said.
“Is he here?” Colin wondered weakly.
“I gave Undergrounds back to nature,” she said. “Away from you.
Aliens.”
“Then you’re going to give it back to us,” Sprout said, now
leveling the pistol directly at her head.
“Security is coming,” Leona said, “They’ll be here in minutes.”
“It only takes a second to pull a trigger.”
“You couldn’t.”
“I’ve done it before.”
“What happened to my family?” Colin said, sobbing.
Leona grimaced and strode across the room to a big oaken desk.
“Your family!” she barked at him, still laughing.
“Don’t try anything funny,” Sprout said.
“I didn’t think angels shot guns.”
“I never said I was one. That was your idea.”
Leona took out a document, signed it and put it in a plain manila
envelope. She threw it at Izzy.
“That’s the original deed,” she said, “Now get the fuck out of
here.” She pointed to the doorway.
Heck pulled Colin to his feet and the four of them ran out the
bedroom with urn and envelope and fled down the stairs and out the
front door. They were too stunned to exult, too confused to think.
When they finally had driven a safe distance away down
Mulholland Drive in the rented car, they parked at the edge of a cliff
ABYSSINIA
306
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