AN: Hello and welcome to Chapter 3 of Become Wrath! I'm really excited because I had SO much fun writing this chapter. I can't wait for you to read it and let me know what you think. Please remember to leave a review and let me know your favorite part. I'll be back soon with the final chapter, but for now, ENJOY!


Chapter 3 - The Atonement

No more fucking around!

That's what John had said after the Junior Deputy's last escape.

Several days had passed since then and the Deputy, apparently having a single drop of obedience in her body, had followed John's directive. She had become Wrath. It felt like every hour he was receiving word of a new atrocity committed by her hands. Some group of Project fighters found dead or some shipment of Bliss destroyed on the river. Those of Project were whispering to each other in places they thought John could not hear them. They said she could turn animals against them. They said she shrugged off bullets as if they were bug bites. They were sure that this Deputy was the last Rider of the Apocalypse. That she was the Enemy Itself.

Hearing those words, John finally understood what Joseph had meant. His brother had been right when he looked into her soul. If only a force like the Deputy could be turned toward the work of Eden, they would have completed their preparations for the Collapse in mere days instead of this drawn-out campaign they'd been subjected to.

That was why the Deputy needed to reach Atonement. That was why John needed to bring her to heel. When the members of their Project saw their greatest enemy turned to the side of righteousness, they would believe. They would rejoice. They would know that they walked in company with God.

So John decided that now was the time. He would handle this challenge himself.

Taking all of the forces he could spare, John swept into Fall's End, the most populated town in the area and the center of the Holland Valley. His men had overwhelmed the defenders and taken them captive, reconquering the town that the Deputy had stolen from them long ago. With the Deputy's allies in hand, John had taken to the airwaves, ordering her to come alone to the church if she wished to see them alive again.

Unfortunately for her, she had complied.

A reverent silence hung over the church of Fall's End. All eyes were focused on John and the work he was doing. The pews were filled with his Chosen and even more soldiers of their Project were stationed outside. There would be no escape for the Deputy this time.

John was halfway through the Deputy's tattoo when she began to stir from unconsciousness. The Project members on each side of her tensed, pressing their boots down on her shoulders and keeping their rifles trained on her face. Sweat beaded on John's brow and dripped down his nose, but that couldn't diminish the smile on his face. This was the moment. His victory. The Project's victory. Joseph's victory. The most vicious of all their adversaries would confess her sins. She would reach atonement right here. After that, the Project could continue. They would all be saved as soon as she realized the kind of punishment she deserved.

Lifting the tattoo needle for a moment to mop away the blood with a cloth, he saw the Deputy's eyes flutter open. She stared uncomprehendingly up at the ceiling and tried to lift a hand to the bleeding wound at her temple, but the men on either side stopped her movement.

A moment of panic flared in John's gut. What if she resisted too much? What if they were forced to kill her, now when they were so close to their goal? He would fail Joseph. He would fail everyone. They… they'd leave him.

No. Stay focused on your work. She will Atone. She. Will. Atone.

Clarity suddenly returned to the Deputy's eyes and icy cold rage seemed to roll off of her as she glared at him. He just gave a light smile and tattooed the line crossing the 'T'.

"I doubt… you're certified for this," she grunted, gritting her teeth against the procedure. John chuckled. If this was how she reacted to the marking of the flesh, he couldn't wait to hear the screams of her Atonement.

"Rest assured, Deputy," John said with a smile, "these are highly practiced hands." With that, he began work on the last letter. "Sin must be exposed so that it may be absolved. If we hide our sins from God, we hide our very selves. Now, hold still." He could hear the Deputy's fingernails gouging into the floor of the church as he finally completed the 'H'. Mopping away the last of the blood, he stood and spread his arms to the congregation of his Chosen. They all looked upon the humbled Deputy and at the black letters tattooed below her throat.

WRATH.

"Behold!" he said. "Her true self is revealed at last. May all the world know her sin. And before day's end, we shall purge it from her very soul. Amen!"

"AMEN!" the Chosen roared.

"Let's begin!" John yelled. He gestured to the two men and they lifted the Deputy up before dragging her toward the alter where her comrades awaited her.

Father Jerome stood with a slight hunch to his back. He cradled his Scripture to his stomach as if it would offer comfort to his tainted spirit. His bandaged chest bled from his own Atonement, courtesy of the strip of flesh stapled to the wall proclaiming 'PRIDE'. Clearly, Jerome's Atonement would need to go on longer than others, but at the very least he was cowed enough to assist with this holy ceremony.

On either side of the priest stood Nick Rye and Mary May Fairgrave, their chests marked by 'GREED' and 'SLOTH' respectively. They all glared at John, allowing the sight of their festering sin and hate to come to the surface. They were stayed, however, by the score of Project members holding them at gunpoint from multiple angles. It was awful that such lengths were necessary, but there were some in this world who would fight like animals against the nurturing hand when it was offered to them. These precautions would not be needed for much longer, John was certain.

Discovering their sins had been quite simple. Rye was ruled by greed, thinking only of himself and his kin and willing to kill scores of Project members to protect that wife of his, but only to satisfy his own selfish desire to possess. John remembered how he had selfishly tried to hoard the best plane in Hope County for himself, only because it belonged to something as pathetic as a family line. Mary May's sin was similar, but focused entirely on that filthy den of drink and sin down the street, the Spread Eagle. If only she weren't so set in her ways, weren't so afraid of sacrificing a place that only served to tie her down like an anchor, then she could make a wonderful leader in Joseph's Eden. Perhaps she still could be after she cast off such self-indulgent stagnation. By the time John was done with her, she would burn down that loathsome tavern herself at his command.

But the Deputy… Ah, now that was someone who would require work. Her Atonement would be long and painful, but Eden would gain a powerful follower when she finally understood how deeply she deserved this punishment.

And she would understand.

She would say 'yes'.

John smiled and gave Pastor Jerome a slap on the shoulder. The man squirmed under his palm.

"I figured that having some familiar faces would help you feel more comfortable," John said good-naturedly to the Deputy. "Atonement, after all, can be a very scary process to those who fight against it. And, so you know what to do, we'll have Mr. Rye here go first." As a Project member urged Rye before the priest, John slapped the Scripture from his hands and then gave the man his own Book of Joseph. "Let's make sure we use the proper book here, Pastor," he said before taking the priest by the shoulder.

At last, it was time for the Atonement to begin.

"Repeat after me, Pastor. Our devoted…"

Pastor Jerome's lip curled and he remained silent. The gun trained on him jabbed him sharply in the shoulder.

"Come on, Jerome. You can do it," John said encouragingly, clapping his hand against Jerome's wound and making the man gasp in pain. "We are gathered here to bear witness…"

Still, Jerome stood silent.

John sighed, drew the gun in his waistband, and shot Mary May in the arm. The woman screamed in pain, collapsing to the ground, as the other three sinners roared in anger. All of them made to leap to her defense, but their minders kept hold of their limbs and their weapons.

"If we could please continue with this most holy of sacraments?" John said. Two Project members dragged Mary May roughly to her feet, the woman still whimpering in pain, while a third kept his gun barrel pressed to the back of her head. John nodded to them before turning his attention back to Jerome. "Let's try this again… Our devoted, we are gathered here to bear witness…"

John felt the pastor tremble under his grip, but he finally acquiesced. "Our devoted," Jerome snarled through his teeth, "we are gathered here to bear witness…"

"To those willing to atone for their sins…"

"To those willing to atone for their sins."

"Will you, Nick Rye, place your hand upon The Word of Joseph?"

"Will you, Nick Rye, place y-"

"Fuck that, man," Rye spat. "I ain't ever giving in to that fucking psycho!"

"Ah, there it is," said John, pushing the priest aside to stand before Rye. These heretics thought they were resisting, but they only succeeded in making it clear that John was only doing what was right. "The greed that drives you to only think for yourself. To spurn all of those who reach out a hand to help you because of your own stubbornness. So very like your father."

Rye snorted and spat a wad of phlegm at John, splattering his cheek. The other Project members seized Rye's limbs and jammed gun barrels against him. All the while, John ground his teeth, feeling the indignity from the splatter of filth on his cheek. After wiping it away with a handkerchief, he affixed a wide smile to his face and leaned close to Rye's ear.

"If you will not atone for your sins," John said softly, "then I just suppose I'll have to take your pretty wife in for a confession of her own. And…" He stopped to take a breath through his nose. "Perhaps I will check for myself if your unborn child is a son or daughter, shall I?"

Rye froze and John allowed himself a tinge of satisfaction as he pulled away, savoring the wide-eyed look of fear in the pilot's eyes.

"The choice is yours, Mr. Rye," John said with a shrug.

Rye swallowed audibly before opening his mouth.

"Yes…" he said in a soft, trembling voice. "Yes, I-I will Atone."

"And that is all I asked of you," John said happily, drawing the knife from his pocket as the Project members pulled Rye down to the ground.

John was quite practiced at this by now. Where the first few Atonements he performed had been messy and unnecessarily painful, now he could do this duty in seconds. Rye's resolve proved to be as weak as his faith and he began to wail, but fortunately for him, John didn't take long. Soon, Rye's chest was being bandaged as John stapled a new scrap of sin to the wall of the church.

"You bastard!" roared Mary May, seeming to forget her own injury for a moment. It was as if her very gaze wanted to tear his throat out.

"Calm yourself, Miss Fairgrave," John chided. "Your turn will come soon. Speaking of which…"

John seized Pastor Jerome and dragged him before the Deputy. He was just about to open his mouth to begin the sacrament when he noticed the Deputy's eyes. She wasn't looking at him, but off to the side. He thought perhaps that she was staring at her comrade's Atonement, but her gaze was too high for that. She was just staring out the window, which showed nothing but trees and clouds gently moving in the breeze. He couldn't help but feel angry and insulted. She didn't even consider him worthy of her attention, despite the power he held over her life and the lives of these other sinners?

"Place your hand on the Book, Deputy!" John snapped, not even bothering with the proper sacrament. She looked back at him and only stared silently with her icy eyes. An enraged breath hissed through John's teeth before he drew his gun again and leveled it at Mary May's head, silencing her cries and protests. "Now!" he ordered.

The Deputy's eyes flickered, but she slowly raised her hand and obediently settled it upon the Book of Joseph.

"Name your sins, Deputy," John said, shoving the gun back into his waistband. The Deputy paused before the corner of her mouth curled upward slightly.

"Well, where to begin?" she said. "I torched eight men with a flamethrower. I ran over four people with a semi-truck. I fed three others to a mountain lion." She gave a wicked smile. "And that was just this morning. Recounting all the ways I've butchered you fucking Peggies would probably take all d-"

John swung his hand out, striking her across the face. Her head snapped to the side, but she remained standing and kept her hand firmly on the Book.

"You are a plague upon this valley!" John roared. "Upon this very world! It's people like you that show me why the Collapse is nigh! You care for nothing beyond you next self-indulgent sin! You think only to gorge yourself on blood! To sate your own madness!"

"I suppose so," she said flippantly. "But I guess that's something that you and I have in common, don't we John?"

An icy shudder traveled up John's spine. His hand, acting on its own will curled around the grip of his pistol and lifted it from his waistband. Thoughts of Atonement flew from his mind. All he could think was how much this woman needed to die.

Before he could thumb back the hammer of his gun, a flash of light crossed the Deputy's face, the side that faced the window. She smiled, lifted her hand from the Book of Joseph, and covered her ears.

"Brace yourself, Jerome," she said conversationally.

John blinked. Why the hell would-

BOOM!

With an ear-shattering explosion, the door and front wall of the church exploded into splinters. John fell backward from the force of the explosion, his ears ringing. He lay there, blind and deaf, as his body screamed in pain. It took a few moments for his eyes to clear, but what he saw was chaos. Several of his Chosen had their mouths open in inaudible screams, vicious lengths of shattered wood jutting out from their backs. Others were struggling to reclaim their weapons. One Project member was lifting his machine gun before something that John thought was a firefly landed on his head. The green mote of light disappeared into a burst of blood as the man fell, the back half of his skull missing.

Slowly, the sounds of the church began to return to him, sounding as if they were a hundred miles away but growing steadily closer. He could hear the sounds of automatic gunfire coming from outside, the screams of dying men, and…

Laughter.

Her laughter.

"God DAMN, Hurk!" she yelled toward the hole in the church. She was on her knees, barely moved from where she had stood before, and craning her neck around to speak toward the fighting. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you did that on purpose!"

John felt icy horror seize his heart. She had planned this. He thought he had her cornered, but she had been toying with him all along. Off to the sides, Jerome had knocked aside the Chosen guarding Mary May while Nick Rye buried a combat knife into the neck of the man who had been pinning him to the ground. John struggled to rise to his knees as the Deputy crawled across the floorboards. She was heading for… Jerome's bible? Any questions he might have had at such behavior were immediately silenced when she flipped open the cover of the tome to reveal not meaningless words, but a large revolver hidden inside.

"Gun!" he heard one of his Chosen yell. Several Project members lunged at the Deputy or tried to bring their weapons to bear, but they were too slow. She fired from her hip, almost like she were in some western film, and fanned the hammer with her off-hand. The revolver barked in rapid succession, ending the lives of those brave Project members who tried to stand up to her.

When the Deputy had turned to gun down a man to the side of her, the one trying to fight Pastor Jerome, John surged to his feet and charged. Even putting his feet in front of each other was a challenge, but he managed to cross the distance between them and tackle the Deputy to the ground. He crouched over her, one hand grappling for the gun while his other hand tried to wrap around her throat. She bared her teeth in a blood-crazed smile as she fought against him, fighting against his hold to turn her gun on him.

She has to die. She needs to die. I'm sorry, Joseph. I can't let her destroy-

His world exploded once again as the Deputy's gun went off, just to the side of his head. The flash from the muzzle blinded John, the heat burning his face. And the noise seemed to echo inside his own skull, continuing on into eternity. He threw himself away from her, plastering a hand against the side of his head. When he lifted his hand away, it was red and sticky with blood.

His ear.

His ear was gone.

"John! We have to go!" one of his Chosen yelled from a hundred miles away. Hands grabbed him and lifted him to his feet before urging him in a mad dash for the destroyed front of the church. John could barely stand up straight, finding his body trying to lean to the side all on its own and send him falling to the floorboards again, but the men around him kept him up as they stepped into the light.

From the moment of the explosion, a part of John's mind had thought he was in hell.

When he finally saw the chaos outside, he knew he was.

The Project members were in disarray. Scores of them were dead or dying while the rest crouched behind any cover they could find. There was a firing line of Hope County sinners taking cover in the trees, automatic weapons blazing. He couldn't focus enough to make out how many they were. It could have been as few as five or as many as a hundred. A flash of the American flag caught his eye as a fat man emerged from cover and launched a rocket from the weapon braced on his shoulder. The explosive streaked through the air before it impacted the side of a Project truck, causing the vehicle and its machine gunner to be consumed in a blinding fireball. John heard the loud crack of rifle fire as a second machine gunner was knocked from his perch, leaving a nearby Project member to try and take his place. And weaving in between their vehicles — was that a fucking bear?!

Where once his soldiers of the Project had been confident. Righteous in their faith and the task they were doing. Now their eyes showed only fear in the face of this unspeakable ambush against their holy mission.

"We have to get out!" one of John's Chosen yelled, pointing to a truck that was still relatively undamaged. That was the last thing he did before an arrow slammed into his chest, passing between his ribs and throwing him to the ground. The rest of the Chosen opened up with their weapons, spraying across the tree line in an effort to suppress the heretics. Their enemies took cover against the Chosen's desperation and they hurried across the front lawn of the church. John almost lost his footing tripping over the leg of a fallen Project member, but he managed to balance himself against his guard, thankful for the protective barrier they formed between him and the forces arrayed against their cause.

They reached the truck and John threw himself into the back seat as two others jumped into the front. The last Chosen tried to climb after John into the back seat, but he screamed as the fucking bear suddenly sank its jaws into his shoulder and pulled him away.

"DRIVE!" John roared. The engine turned over a moment later and the driver stomped on the gas. The tires screeched against the asphalt for a single, heart-stopping moment before they sped away. John lifted himself from the seat and looked back at the receding church as plumes of smoke soared into the air. There was much less gunfire now, which likely meant that their forces had been truly overwhelmed.

"The bunker," said the Chosen in the passenger seat. "We need to get to the bunker!"

What? The bunker? To hide underground and admit defeat? To never pass through the gates of Eden that Joseph-

That train of thought was forcibly derailed as he saw the receding form of the Deputy stride out of the church, already lifting an assault rifle to her shoulder as she sighted in on their vehicle. Though the distance between them grew with every heartbeat, John could swear that she stood right before him, those frozen eyes promising nothing but torment. He let out a strangled cry as he dropped to the floor of the backseat and covered his head.

He could only barely hear the sound of the far-off gunfire over the roar of the engine and his missing ear, but he had no trouble hearing the sounds of dozens of bullets hitting their truck and smashing through windows one by one. He also heard the dull splat as one of those bullets passed through the head of the Chosen in the passenger seat, killing him instantly and spraying his brain matter across the dashboard and windshield. The driver cried out and swerved across the road, but managed to regain control and straighten their path once they were out of the Deputy's range.

That won't stop her. Nothing can stop her. She'll chase us. She'll kill us. She'll kill everyone.

"John! Are you okay?!" called the driver, trying to glance back to check on John's condition.

"…the bunker," John said after a long pause, slowly pulling himself up. With every movement, he tensed in expectation of discovering a wound the Deputy had given them in her last barrage, but he remained mostly whole to his surprise. "We must go to the bunker."

The driver nodded and opened his mouth to say something before his radio squawked and he turned his attention to whoever was on the other end. John couldn't hear the conversation that was carried out, but he could clearly see how his driver's face went ashen.

"What's happening?!" he snapped. He was probably speaking too loud, but he was far past caring about that.

"The… the sinners are attacking our patrols and checkpoints," the driver said slowly. "Simultaneous attacks. They're… they're cutting us off. We can't get to the bunker without crossing them."

John swallowed through his dry throat and felt his heart travel down as well. He had been so sure of victory, but now…

"Then get me to my airstrip," John said. "I'll fly to the bunker."

The driver nodded and pulled a sharp turn onto another road to take them to the southwest corner of the valley. John was left to look back through their destroyed back window, where the columns of smoke were still clearly visible.

"It will be fine," he muttered to himself. "We will survive. Joseph will understand. Of course he'll understand."

All he could do now was pray he made it to safety before she came for him.