Shadowhunter in the Apocalypse

They sat two stools back from the cafeteria window, eyes on the street like predators watching irrigation channels. Coffee steamed between them; cars flowed in obedient bands beneath the lamps, people moving in that soft, obedient rhythm of a city that prayed the same way it breathed. Reed liked to watch traffic when he was nervous. It was boring, and boring meant predictable — and predictability was a weapon.

"How's the turnout?" he asked, not looking at Jasmine.

She didn't look up from the tablet, thumbs already in her groove. "Packed. They cleared extra seating this morning. Prophetess Miriam's got the front half singing like it's a revival and the back half Instagramming the sermon. This place is basically a river of bodies right now."

Reed smirked. "Perfect. The more people, the more human error."

"Also perfect," Jasmine said flat, "because a crowded venue makes for sloppy security. Saints always assume sanctity equals safety. They forget bodies get tired, clocks slip, people go to piss. Human openings trounce rune math."

He liked that line. Human openings. That was their whole toolbox.

They'd set the pieces yesterday — the photo, the phone, the quiet voice on the line. Miriam had agreed to the only thing that could actually shift the system: she would text the moment she stepped into the Holy Room. Protocol made the runes do the rest; the magic unspooled to make space, old power bleeding out so the new offering could be drawn. Normally that purge happened and the saintess offered the faith into the angels and the system stitched itself right back. Tonight, Miriam was to hold off on the offering. Delay the offer; let the purge finish; the runes would be naked and hungry for one thin, surgical hour.

Jasmine flicked another tab open, her face lit by numbers and glyph-heat maps. "I'm watching internal telemetry too," she said. "If she enters, you'll see the rune saturation drop across the grid. It's subtle, but it's there. Think tide pulling out before the swell."

Reed rolled his shoulders like a man loosening armor. "That's our tide. We step when the water's gone."

They watched the feed: a live stream of the church's exterior, the volunteers guiding the devout into the courtyard. A banner flapped in the wind: PROPHETESS MIRIAM — MONTHLY BLESSING. The stage was awash in white and candles; the halo-stitched choir was a cloth of human motion. Reed's fingers brushed the stone of the ring at his thumb, feeling the faint pulse Raven had promised — a promise and maybe a trap.

"Three minutes," Jasmine murmured. Her eyes narrowed at the scrolling timecode. "She's standing now. Camera shows her making the semicircle walk—there, toward the side door. That's the holy access."

The world outside narrowed to the clock and the tiny green dot on Jasmine's map. Reed tasted metal on his tongue, his nerves stretching into a wire.

"Text goes out on entry," he said. "She said she'd do it."

"Entry now," Jasmine said, calm as ice, and her fingers tapped the screen.

The phone on the table buzzed like a waiting thing that finally had a reason to speak. One little message — a single word that felt like an exhale.

inside.

Jasmine's eyes flicked to the telemetry; the glyph-map breathed out a hairline of black where it had been full. Numbers slipped down in clean, surgical decimals.

"There," she said. "Runes bleeding. Window's on the clock. Forty-seven minutes total—houserules say senior apostles will compensate in an hour, but they need to assemble. On that hour they'll be weaker. We've got the seam."

Reed let his smile be small and sharp. It wasn't prideful so much as relieved. "Forty-seven minutes," he repeated, tasting the time like a promise. "We move when the last candle gutters."

Jasmine snapped the tablet shut and slid it into her bag. Her hand hovered near the door as if she might get jumpy if she didn't move.

"Check your kit," she said. "No ring unless we absolutely need it. Shadowstep in, slow and clean. Cameras are looped for exactly twelve minutes on the north axis — then they reroute to the worship stream."

Reed stood up, the coffee cup leaving a dark circle on the wood. He should have felt guilty for the kid and the mother and the thousand tiny sins stacked in his pocket, but guilt was for men who had time to be sentimental. He tightened the strap on his pack, shadow-bow snugged against his back, fingers twitching toward the familiar weight.

"Let's go make some noise while the angels are out on break," he said.

They left the cafeteria together, the city humming around them, the clock sliding toward a hollow that Reed could already taste.

The cafeteria door swung behind them with a tired groan. Night clung to the street like oil, and the traffic streamed past in messy ribbons of headlights. They didn't walk fast; they didn't need to. Their pace matched the rhythm of the city, blending into its noise.

Jasmine's phone glowed in her palm, the one-word text still pinned on the screen: inside.

"You feel that?" she asked, not looking up.

Reed exhaled through his nose. The air around him tasted thinner, drier. Even the shadows on the walls looked hollow, like something had been pulled out of them.

"Yeah," he muttered. "Runes bleeding. City feels different when the angels are unplugged. Like a socket sparking."

They cut across a side street, shoes crunching over gravel. The church wasn't far—its steeple crowned the skyline, a spear of stone lit up by floodlights. From here they could hear faint echoes of the choir still chanting, thousands of human throats spilling faith like gasoline onto fire.

Jasmine checked her watch. "Forty-six minutes left. We don't get do-overs if the Apostles wake up early. Miriam's stalling will only hold for so long before they suspect."

"Then we don't stall either," Reed said. His jaw flexed. "In, cut the artery, out before anyone knows what happened."

"Cut the artery," Jasmine repeated with a thin smile. "That's one way to call it."

They passed a parked delivery truck, and Reed slowed enough to let a family cross ahead. A mother, father, two kids—all dressed in white, carrying candles. They were late to the sermon, laughing softly as if the night itself had blessed them. Reed watched them go, his throat tight for just a second.

"You know this isn't just politics anymore," Jasmine said quietly, reading the look on his face. "This ritual—it props up every angelic rune in Israel. Apostles pull strength from that lattice. If it cracks, the whole network gets shaky."

"That's the point." His voice was low, but hard. "Make them bleed. Show them they're not untouchable."

Jasmine's gaze flicked at him sideways, measuring. "Just making sure you remember the collateral."

"I remember everything," he said. And he did. The boy in the photo. Miriam's tears. The war brewing under the skin of the city. His own shadow humming at the edges of his control. He remembered it all, carried it all like a pack of knives on his back.

They reached a narrow alley that funneled toward the outer perimeter of the church. Security lights buzzed overhead, illuminating metal barricades and volunteers in reflective vests. Beyond that: the holy ground.

Jasmine pulled a folded paper from her jacket pocket and pressed it into his hand. "North axis," she reminded him. "Looped cameras for twelve minutes. Door should be clear. After that, they'll see us."

Reed unfolded the paper. It wasn't just a map—it was a spiderweb of routes, timings, guard shifts, rune strengths. Jasmine's work, neat as an engineer's notes but ruthless in intention. He admired it, just for a moment.

"You do good work," he said.

"I do necessary work," she corrected. "Compliments don't count until we're alive on the other side."

Reed smirked, folding the paper back. "Cold as ever."

"Focused as ever," she shot back.

They stopped just shy of the barricades. Reed leaned against the brick wall, eyes half-closed, letting his shadow bleed outward. The asphalt beneath them rippled darker, thickening like spilled ink. He felt the way it crawled up the wall, touching the metal railing ahead, brushing against the boots of the nearest guard.

A shiver ran through him. His body always recognized the hunger of the shadows before his mind did.

"Don't overextend," Jasmine warned, her voice sharp. "You shadow-step now, you'll look like a ghost with a seizure. Save it for the door."

Reed opened his eyes, black rings swirling faintly around his pupils before fading. "You sound like Hale," he said, smirking.

"I sound like someone who doesn't want to die tonight," she replied flat.

From the church courtyard, the choir swelled louder—voices peaking as Miriam's sermon reached its orchestrated pause. The crowd roared with it, a sea of devotion spilling faith into the air. The very ground seemed to hum with power.

Reed checked his watch. "Forty-three minutes."

"Forty-three," Jasmine echoed. She tucked her hair under her hood, her face a blank mask now. The switch had flipped; the Jasmine who teased and bantered was gone, replaced by the strategist.

Reed rolled his shoulders, shadow-suit adjusting like a second skin. The veil of calm he wore was thinner now, stretched over something sharp and restless.

"Once we're in," Jasmine said, eyes locked on his, "we stick to the plan. No improvising unless absolutely necessary. You keep the saintess' text as our anchor—if anything changes, we pull. Clear?"

Reed's grin was thin, dangerous. "Crystal."

They stood there for a beat longer, the traffic behind them fading into background noise, the holy tower above them bleeding light.

Then Reed's shadow peeled off the ground like smoke, stretching toward the north axis.

Time to cut the artery.