Into the Dark: A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Thriller

by Ryan Casey

  Mike decided not to pursue this line of enquiry anymore. Sonia was unhinged. He’d keep an eye on her. And he’d make damn sure she didn’t slip any poison into her daughter’s mind when they were reunited.

  He thought he remembered something, now. Something that Gina had said. Her family. How they suffocated her. How they loved her but loved her into believing she couldn’t stand on her own two feet; couldn’t be confident in herself.

  Mike was going to keep an eye on Gina and her mother’s relationship when they got back together.

  Because one thing was for sure.

  As much as this woman might be Gina’s mother—and as beautiful as it was that they were on the verge of reunion—Gina was one of his people now. She was a part of his family.

  And she wasn’t going to let anything come between that.

  He wasn’t going to let anyone chip away at Gina’s confidence.

  “We’ve just got to keep on moving,” Mike said. “Just a little further. If we don’t we’ll end up…”

  He stopped.

  Because he heard something.

  Rustling. Rustling up ahead.

  And movement.

  He went still. Totally still. Lifted his knife. Because something was coming. Something was running towards them.

  “The Screamers,” Sonia said, her voice growing shaky, quivery. She smacked the side of her head repeatedly. “I knew they were here. I knew they were coming. I knew they were watching.”

  “Just keep yourself together,” Mike said.

  He focused. Focused despite the chaos Sonia was causing behind him. Focused despite the footsteps racing towards him.

  He focused, lifted his knife, and prepared himself.

  The figure appeared in front of him.

  He went to swing his knife.

  But then he stopped.

  He stopped because it wasn’t a person, for one.

  It wasn’t a dangerous animal, for another.

  It was a dog.

  A Siberian Husky.

  Jumping up at him. Licking his face.

  Mike frowned, a combination of emotions. “Hey, girl,” he said. “It’s okay, Arya. It’s okay.”

  Sonia looked on, bewildered. “You know this wolf?”

  “Wolf?” Mike said. “How bloody long have you been out here?”

  Sonia didn’t seem amused.

  But as Mike stroked Arya, as he patted her, as he made a fuss of her, the curiosity grew in his mind.

  The uncertainty grew in his mind.

  Because there was something wrong here.

  Something very wrong.

  “What’re you doing all the way out here, girl?” he asked. Because he knew where she’d been. He knew exactly where she should be right now.

  Back at the cabin.

  With the others.

  He patted Arya. Stood up. Because he knew he needed to get back to the cabin now. He knew it, more than ever. He might be lost. He might be struggling. But he’d just have to suck it up and find it because it was all he had right now.

  “Come on,” he said. “We need to keep moving.”

  He went to walk on.

  That’s when he noticed something.

  Two things, actually.

  First, Arya’s fur. There was blood on it.

  Like someone had tried to grab her with a bloody hand.

  And then in the distance.

  Right ahead.

  Mike heard something that made his blood curdle.

  A scream.

  Chapter Thirty

  Alison must’ve searched the cabin another two, three times entirely before she finally gave up. Before she finally accepted the truth. As hard as the truth was to face.

  Arya was gone.

  Gina was gone.

  Kelsie was gone.

  And Calvin was gone.

  She ran back downstairs when she heard footsteps by the cabin door. She hoped that this would all just be some kind of mistake. That Calvin had broken free, only Gina had caught him, stopped him getting too far.

  But then Arya…

  Kelsie…

  When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she saw Ian at the door.

  “Anything?” she asked.

  Ian shook his head. “Checked all over outside. Checked the woods around us. Nothing at all. Not a sign of them.”

  There was a look to his face, though. A look that told Alison right away that he was hiding something.

  “But?”

  He lifted his hand. There was something in it. Something Alison didn’t recognise at first. Something she couldn’t make out.

  And then when Ian placed it in her hands, she realised exactly what it was.

  It was one of the ties. The ties that had been around Calvin’s wrists. Around his ankles.

  These ties had been cut.

  Calvin was free.

  “He’s got them,” Alison said.

  It was the first thing that came to mind. She didn’t know what was happening. Not for certain. Only that Kelsie, Arya, Gina… they were in danger. Shit. She was an idiot. She should’ve known better than to leave Calvin behind. She should’ve known that this was some kind of frigging trap.

  She pushed past Ian, made her break towards the door. “We need to go out there.”

  Ian stopped her. Put a hand on her shoulder.

  She looked at him. Frowned. “Why are you stopping me?”

  “Because we’ve been out there, Alison. We’ve been out there for hours. We need to face it. They’ve… they’ve gone. And us racing into things isn’t exactly going to help us. It isn’t going to help anyone.”

  Alison felt her blood boiling. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “So, what? We’re just going to give up? We’re just going to sit back and wait while Calvin could be murdering Kelsie out there? Just like he murdered Sofia?”

  Ian didn’t look fazed by what Alison said. Even if she knew it was a bit low to sink to the depths of calling up Ian’s wife just to get a reaction out of him. “I’m just saying,” he said. “We don’t know what happened. Not exactly.”

  “We don’t need to know what happened. We were together. All of us were together. Now, suddenly, we’re all apart. Mike’s gone. Kelsie, Gina, Calvin, Arya, they’re all gone. We don’t know what happened. But we know they’re not safe. You heard the screams too. You saw those people. You saw what they were doing.”

  Ian nodded. It was the first time they’d addressed the men in the woods they’d seen. They’d been pretty distracted ever since. “It looked like they were trying to lure people.”

  “So they could be the ones who have Mike. They—they could be out there just waiting. Waiting for Kelsie and Gina to stumble upon them. If they’re even still alive at all.”

  “We can’t think that way,” Ian said. “We don’t know for sure.”

  “How can you be so calm?” Alison said. “When he’s out there? When he’s got away?”

  Ian swallowed a lump in his throat. “Because I’ve… because I’ve learned to realise that getting revenge on Calvin won’t bring me any peace. I looked him in the eye. I looked him in the eye, and I saw how sorry he was. I was close to killing him. Close to ending it all. But… but I saw something. And maybe I’m wrong to believe him. Maybe I’m an idiot to fall for it. But I looked in his eyes, and I saw a man who really wanted to change. Who really wanted to try again. Despite everything he’s done. Despite everything he’s stood for.”

  Alison heard Ian’s words. She heard them, and she couldn’t believe them. She couldn’t accept them. “He wanted to rape people, Ian,” she said. “He endorsed mass assault to further his own twisted agenda. He wanted to turn women into baby farms. That’s the kind of man you want to forgive? That’s the kind of man you want to give a second chance?”

  “I don’t forgive him,” Ian said. “And I don’t think he deserves a second chance. I’m just saying… maybe his intentions today aren’t as nefarious as we think. At least, not anymore.”

&nb
sp; Alison pondered Ian’s words. She wondered if he could be right. If he could be on to something. Maybe Calvin hadn’t done what he’d done with bad intentions. Maybe he was protecting the others.

  Maybe she was completely crazy for even considering it.

  “The fact stands,” Alison said. “We can’t just stick around here. We need to do something. We need to try.”

  Ian nodded. “You’re right. But we need a plan. A proper—”

  She heard something, then. Something from the lounge. Something that stopped Ian in his tracks.

  First, a crack.

  A smash.

  A window caving in behind the weight of something heavy.

  She looked at Ian. Hoped she was hearing things at first. Hoped she was imagining things.

  And then she heard the footsteps.

  Heard them hitting the cabin floor.

  She listened to them walking through the lounge, and as she stared at Ian, fear in his eyes, she could only say one word.

  “Hide.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Gina heard the footsteps getting closer and closer towards her, and she tightened her grip around Kelsie’s hand.

  The night was intense and suffocating. She couldn’t make out a thing around her in the darkness, not anymore. Just the trees. Just a few leaves close to her.

  She could hear the footsteps edging closer and closer towards her, but she didn’t know who they belonged to, where they came from.

  She swallowed a lump in her throat, keeping tight hold of Kelsie’s hand. Calvin had gone. Arya had gone, too. They were alone here, together.

  And sure. Calvin can’t have got far. Arya… well, more likely she’d got a little further.

  But it really didn’t matter how close or how far away they were.

  Gina felt totally alone.

  She thought about that scream as the footsteps edged closer. Thought about how much like Ian it had sounded.

  Or had it?

  Had it really sounded like him? Or had it just been a part of her imagination?

  She started to wonder. Started to suspect.

  Could this have been a setup?

  Could Calvin had led her along, all this time?

  She went to take a step back when she heard footsteps behind her, too.

  She went still. Deadly still. Creaked her neck slowly, so she could see over her shoulder.

  She couldn’t see anything there in the darkness. Which, in a sense, was a relief. It meant they weren’t close. At least not immediately close.

  But the fact she couldn’t see a thing… that wasn’t exactly helpful, either.

  Because there could be somebody there.

  Standing in the darkness.

  Waiting.

  “We need to get out of here,” Gina whispered.

  Kelsie kept tight hold of her hand. “But—”

  “No buts,” Gina said. “No arguments. We can’t stick around here. It’s dangerous. It’s—”

  She didn’t get to finish.

  Because the footsteps up ahead.

  They weren’t just walking in her direction. Not anymore.

  They were running in her direction.

  She turned around. No time to think. No time for anything but pure reaction.

  She ran off into the woods, off into the trees.

  She kept hold of Kelsie’s hand as she ran. She had no idea where she was going. She was losing sense of which direction she’d even been running in the first place. The extraction point. The one Calvin had promised to lead her to. The one he’d told her he’d direct her towards as soon as they got out of the woods.

  But now he was gone, and Gina was alone with Kelsie.

  She raced through the trees. Every now and then, she banged into one, slamming against her shoulder and knocking her for six. She thought she could hear footsteps getting closer and closer to her from behind. Or maybe that was just in her mind. Maybe that was just a figment of her imagination.

  She didn’t know. She couldn’t be certain.

  She just had to get away.

  Fast.

  She kept on going through the trees. And as she ran further she became certain of something. Something that filled her with a devastating sense of dread. There was someone behind her. Close behind her.

  And all she could think about was that scream.

  That blood-curdling scream from the woods.

  And who it might belong to.

  But at the same time… she couldn’t afford to wallow. She couldn’t afford to get caught up in these dark thoughts of what if.

  She just had to get away.

  Get Kelsie away.

  Get—

  She felt it, and before she even understood what was happening, she was on the ground.

  Her head spun. Her face ached like mad. She could taste blood. A tooth was loose in her mouth.

  And as she lay there, ears ringing, she realised what had happened. Exactly what had happened.

  She’d run into a tree.

  Right into a tree.

  She cleared her throat. Tried to regain her composure, even if she did feel a little dazed. It reminded her of a time when she’d been playing netball as a kid and ended up with concussion. Mum always warned her not to play netball. That she’d only get herself hurt. So, after that, she’d gone home, fallen into her mum’s arms, and she’d never played netball again.

  Even if deep down she wanted to.

  Deep down, she wanted nothing more.

  She went to pull herself up, head smacked, feeling like she’d had the reset button hit on her, when she realised something.

  Something stark.

  She looked around. Heart pounding. Chest tight.

  She looked everywhere.

  But her fears were well placed.

  Her fears were well placed all along.

  She wasn’t holding Kelsie’s hand anymore.

  Kelsie was nowhere in sight.

  She looked around. Totally still. Totally fixed to the ground. She didn’t want to risk shouting out. She didn’t want to risk getting the attention of the people out there chasing her.

  But at the same time, she needed to know where Kelsie was.

  She needed to find her.

  She couldn’t just let her go.

  She went to stand when she heard something.

  Shuffling.

  Shuffling, right ahead of her.

  Movement towards her.

  She went still. And then she fumbled around. Fumbled for the hammer she’d been holding in hand; the one she’d been holding knowing she’d use it on Calvin if she had to.

  But that was gone, too.

  She’d dropped that, too.

  So she clutched for something else. A rock. A stone. A piece of wood—just anything she could use to whack the person coming her way. Something to give her a little more time. Something to give her a chance.

  She felt nothing but dirt beneath her fingers.

  She backed up. Backed right up to the tree. Tensed her fists as blood trickled down her chin.

  She’d have to fight.

  And she would. She’d stand her ground, and she’d fight. She’d fight as dirty as she possibly could.

  Anything to keep these people away, whoever they were.

  Anything to deter them.

  She saw him, then.

  A man.

  Beefy. Far bigger than her.

  He was looking right down at her.

  She swallowed a lump in her throat. Curled up. Tightened her fists even more.

  She’d stand her ground.

  She’d fight.

  She’d keep on going.

  She’d do whatever she could.

  She thought for a moment that maybe through some miracle, he hadn’t actually seen her. That he was just going off sound. And she could use that. She could use it in her favour.

  But then her hopes, slim as they were, were quashed.

  They were crushed.

  Because at that moment,
the man threw himself towards her.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Mike heard the scream, and his body went numb.

  He knew Arya was by his side, head tilting, whining. He knew Sonia was somewhere beside him. He knew she was saying something, too. Muttering things. Fearful words.

  But he didn’t hear them. Not really.

  Because he was more focused on the source of that scream.

  It was coming from up ahead. Coming from right through the trees.

  Mike’s first instinct was to run from it. His first instinct was to get away. Because it was that scream. The same scream he’d heard already. The scream that started a panic in Sonia.

  But at the same time… he wanted to know where it came from.

  He wanted to know what it meant.

  “We have to get away,” Sonia said. “The—the Screamers. They show no mercy.”

  “We’re not going anywhere,” Mike said.

  Sonia shuffled in front of him. She was shaking. Shaking her head, twitching, scratching. “I—I’m not going anywhere near them. They’re dangerous. They’re—”

  “We’re going to see who these people are. We’re going to find out who we’re dealing with. And when we know—when we know for certain—we’re going to go back to the cabin. Back to your daughter. And then we’re going to decide from there what we’re going to do next.”

  “I’ve—I’ve seen these people already. I’ve seen what they do. What they’re—what they’re capable of. We get away. Get away from them. We run. We’ve got to. We’ve—”

  “Ssh,” Mike said.

  “I just—I just—”

  “Be quiet!”

  Sonia did go quiet, then. Because she’d obviously heard it. Heard it just like Mike had.

  The footsteps.

  Heading right through the trees, right towards them.

  Mike lifted his knife. He held it right in his hand. He wasn’t going to hesitate. He wasn’t going to hold back. He wasn’t going to resist.

  He knew there was a risk. He knew this could go wrong. He knew he could be stabbing literally anyone.

  But then the person emerged from the trees, and Mike saw them.

  It was a man. A man he didn’t recognise. Short hair. Scarred face.

  He looked at Mike like he was less than human, somehow. Like this world had turned him into something else.