"Susan Bousso?"

"Here. Or--actually, she's not. I'm Beth Hartley. I'm taking Susan's place."

Electa flinched. Beth was here? She couldn't help glancing down the line; she was only four bodies away.

Vex didn't 100% know who Beth was, just maybe that she was that girl that Electa had interacted with before, so didn't have much a reaction.

He moved on down the line. A few minutes later, he said, "All right. This is it." Even out of the corner of her eye, Electa could see that he was sickly pale. He went and opened the door. "Let's go."

Vexin just kept his eyes dead forward.

He led them down the short passageway. Jonah stopped the first person just in front; the long line of them stretched down the corridor, identical in their silvery-blue robes. "It's time," he said, glancing at his watch. "The--the angels be with you, everyone."

Vex felt like puking at the phrase, 'The angels be with you'. But he just swallowed.

He swung open one of the doors, and the people started filing into the cathedral. Electa could sense the massive hush from the audience, feel their deep sense of expectation and yearning. Her eyes met Jonah's as she walked through the door. He was staring anxiously at them. Fear. He hoped that this worked; there was nothing left for him anymore.

Vexin was shaking a tiny bit, barely noticeable. He was hoping he could do it, but he was terrified no matter what. Even if it did, or didn't, ... it wouldn't end well for him either way.

At least Electa was there, though.

They passed through dim shadows at the side and entered a brightly lit stage area, where it was suddenly so dazzling that they couldn't see the audience, just a deep, waiting blackness to their right. Their footsteps sounded around them, amplified by the microphones like a heartbeat. Details, all of them so clear: an angel-winged pulpit up ahead with a white-haired preacher behind it; a dark-haired man and a voluptuous woman with auburn hair just beside him--the two angels, Raziel and Lailah. A giant TV screen was just sliding up into the ceiling, revealing towering stained-glass windows of angels, with the sunset shining through. And in front of everything stretched a space half the width of a football field, with massive floral arrangements to either side.

The gate.

True.

Vex stared a little at the floral arrangements, stomach churning as his mind kept going over what he would have to do.