This was supposed to be something wonderful. No, more than wonderful. Something perfect. He spent so long praying for this—a chance to get Benji back, to get his father back, to get his dignity back—and it was finally in his hands, glimmering like a star plucked from Heaven just for him. Sister Kipling’s own words: We need your help.

And he wasted it.

He has to make this right. He has no other choice. Reverend Mother Woodside made sure he knew, his father made sure he knew, every member of the death squads made sure he knew.

Make it right or die.

“O Lord,” he starts again, because he has to, he has to, “my heart is rotten with sin. It is in every cell, and there is no part of me that is good. Yet You still love me.” He has to keep saying it, or he’ll forget. It’s so easy to forget. “I have fallen short of Your infinite glory, but You are still here. I wash my soul in the blood of the Lamb and ask that You fill me with Your Spirit and guide me to where I need to be. Through Jesus Christ, I pray.”

When the prayers slow to a trickle, the last strings of bile on a sick man’s lips, finally, finally, Theo wipes his chin and faces Reformation Faith Evangelical Church.

Squad Absolution is falling apart at the seams. With two squads missing in as many days, they arrived last night on Mother Woodside’s orders, and now the soldiers pace like trapped animals. They snap at one another, snarling over imagined slights. A few hours ago, a knife was drawn over a stolen cigarette. Their white robes are speckled with gentle spots of color, rainbow light filtering through stained glass windows, and the beauty of it makes Theo’s breath catch for just a second—the Angels and their robes and the glory of God and everything—but one of the soldiers notices Theo is done praying and shoves him against the altar. The nest of Graces behind them keens, dozens of mouths wailing in unison.

“Don’t fucking look at me,” the soldier hisses. Brother Husock is twice Theo’s size and almost twice his age, a truck driver who found God just weeks before Judgment Day.

“I wasn’t,” Theo whimpers, but he stops because if God sees fit to punish him this way, then he should keep his mouth shut and take it. He was the one who let Benji leave the church. He’s the reason Heaven moves farther away every hour.

Forgive my unforgivable trespasses. Cleanse me from unrighteousness.

Benji was going to save them. Benji was going to make the world perfect again. Only then could the Angels come home to God’s arms. Without Benji, there’s nothing but a long, suffering existence in this world—and Hell in the next.