"But I'm a doctor, I should've seen the signs----"

Sarah put a finger to her lips. "It made you a better one. Think about all the good you've done. Now," she said seriously, "we've really got to go, there are things to do."

It was Beth's turn to be puzzled. "What things?"

"You'll see."

"Wait." Beth pulled her back again. "I need to tell you one last thing."

Sarah sighed. "Kay."

"I love you."

Sarah beamed. "I love you too, sis. Now let's go." She pulled on Beth's hand and led her out of the lab.

~

These weren't the only occurrences.

All around the country, all over the globe, people were seeing the dead. Not ghosts, but living, breathing human beings----of a kind. Mrs. Shaw, the school helper, woke up from yet another troubled sleep only to see the figure of young Oliver at the foot of her bed, burn marks from the rope still around his neck. Terrified, and thinking she'd brought the images from her nightmare into the real world, she tried to wake her husband. But he just kept on snoring beside her.

Oliver held out his hand for her to take it, and she felt compelled to do so...

Across town Thomas Valentine was shocked to see that his best friend from college, Martin Raines, who had drowned during the Tsunami disaster in Sri Lanka, was playing computer games on the X-Box in his living room. Meanwhile WPC Trisha Adams' discovered that her Granddad, who'd passed away from a stroke when she was only a little girl, had come to visit offering her a bag of those sticky toffees he always used to bring.

And as PC Frank Wilson was sitting down to eat breakfast, he found that his Uncle Ted and Auntie Rita, the couple who had taken him in as a child and brought him up as their own, were suddenly in the room with him. Ted was making himself a cup of coffee and Auntie Rita was asking him if there was any toast left. He was scared and happy at the same time, but he wasn't really surprised. After all, the dead man in the cell had told him he would see them again soon.

~

In the cold, damp cellar he waited.

It wasn't comfortable: he was hungry and he couldn't feel his hands now, but he had to wait it out. What he'd done had been right, of that he had no doubt. But the authorities wouldn't see it that way. They'd probably been to search for him already, though he doubted whether they'd find this hiding place----used to protect the faithful during the blitz when the bombing had been fierce. Why, they'd even held services down here.

Smiling, he patted the instrument he'd used to rid the earth of that monstrous creation. His father's trusty old service revolver, given to his mother after the great man's death. It had been used back then in the name of good, fighting the forces of evil, and he'd put it to use in much the same way.

Father Lilley struck a match and lit the altar candle he'd brought down with him. He wished to consult the good book once again. But in the half-light he saw something stirring there. A shadow at the back of the cellar.

"Who's there?" he asked, snatching up the revolver.

The shadow drifted closer and, in spite of himself, Lilley let off another bullet.

"Put that thing down, right now," said the voice, stern but with genuine feeling. "Put it down before you hurt anyone else."

Lilley recognized the voice, but it couldn't be who he thought it was. "Father?"

The Captain, still in uniform, walked over towards him shaking his head. "Gerald, what did you think you were doing?"

"This isn't real," gibbered Lilley. "It's a trick, the Devil's work."

"He has been at work, yes, but not here. Not today. It was not me who told you to shoot that man." His father, the moustache he sported twitching, reached forward and took the gun from him.

"Our father who art in Heaven----" began Lilley.

"Not anymore," said his own father, seriously.

"Begone demon. I smite thee from the Earth!"

The army man picked up the bible and leafed through it. "You're so fond of quoting these passages, Gerald. Here's one for you: 'And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life, and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged, every man according to his works.'"

Lilley's face froze. "The Book of Revelation."

His father nodded. "The immortal body is real, Gerald. And yet that same body can pass through an object, or pick up the object." He looked down at his old gun. "They also have none of the defects they had in life."

Lilley was shaking. His father grabbed him by the hand and started to drag him up the stairs to the hidden door beneath the altar itself. "No!" screamed Lilley. "It can't be."

The soldier dragged Lilley out into the church and forced him to look through the window. There, in the graveyard, were the dead. Each one standing next to the grave they had risen from, the soil on top untouched (in fact the only hole there was at Matthew Daley's plot). Their clothes ranged from the quite recent, to centuries old. All were looking at him, all were pointing.

"Now do you understand, Gerald? Around the world, those who have died in conflicts like mine----those who are stilldying----they are coming back, too."

Lilley grabbed the gun off his father and placed it against his head. Before the Captain could do anything, the trigger had been pulled and the last bullet punched a hole in Lilley's skull. To the priest's own amazement, though, he didn't fall down. He dropped the weapon and touched the wound in the side of his head, looking at the disgusting mess on his fingers.

His father went to the font and dipped a cup into the water, bowing his head at the stained glass image of Christ above him. The he returned to his son and washed away the blood on his scalp. The hole was gone.

"'And immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales: and he received sight forthwith, and arose, and was baptized.' That's Acts Nine, Eighteen, Gerald," said the man.

Lilley started to cry. "I'm so sorry. I didn't know."

The Captain held him for a moment, then pulled away. "It's time to go, boy."

He placed a hand on his son's back and led him out of the church. Lilley turned and looked up at his much younger father. "Will I be spared for my foolish actions?" he asked.

The Captain didn't reply. He just carried on walking, the dead from the graveyard following them both on their way up the road.

Epilogue

Irene Daley woke from the deepest sleep she'd had in years. She could remember the priest being here, them praying and discussing Matthew. And then she must have fallen asleep, except she had the vaguest recollection of trying to wake up and not being able to. She looked at the clock by the side of her; it was just gone nine. But the date must have been wrong on it, because according to that she'd been in bed the past few days.

There was a knocking at the door downstairs. It was probably Father Lilley back again to tell her what was happening. She got up, feeling none of the usual aches and pains that came with age. No cracks of the knees, no arthritis, which was always wicked first thing in the morning. In fact she felt better than she ever had in her life.