A loud sound that he at first erroneously thought to be the wind rose from across the lake to his left. He allowed a wan smile to cross his lips. He’d seen the best winds Mother Nature could offer in the middle of the desert and in the hurricane gales on the high seas. This was something else entirely.
“Showtime,” he whispered, rolling onto his haunches.
A shriek answered him from his right.
When he turned, he saw nothing at first until the tall bird hopped through the deep snow to stand beside him, cocking its head at him quizzically.
“I don’t suppose those wings of yours are strong enough to fly us both out of here?”
It opened its golden beak and screeched at him.
“I’ll take that as a no.”
The ground shook so hard beneath him that the fissure he had carved into the ice made a loud crack that sounded like the earth had split down the middle.
He finally understood.
“Better get out of here,” Norman said. “I can’t imagine you’re the world’s best swimmer.”
It shrieked again and hopped up onto his thighs. His eyes locked onto the birds and that milky white faded away to show him a glimpse of several shadows emerging from a cave onto a beach littered with black corpses. The sun shone down on them through the dissipating clouds and he could see the joy on their faces, but most of all, in that spotlight cast from heaven, the look in their eyes was unmistakable. Maybe he had never seen it before and most certainly never would again, but he recognized it nonetheless.
Hope.
With a cry, the bird leapt into the air, sharp talons tearing through his pants and ripping his flesh, but it didn’t matter. Those long white wings clapped in front of his face before blending back into the snow.
“Thank you,” he whispered, though even he didn’t hear it over the rumble coming toward him like an earthquake racing from its epicenter. The ground rose and fell, but he managed to fight through it until he stood and faced the east.
He tasted tears in the corners of his mouth and raised his chin. Black shadows raced past him at the edge of sight, all but invisible in the blizzard. The hissing rose to a level that positively hurt his inner ear, drowning out the sound of the crack he had created as it widened to the point that he could see the black water a foot ahead. Jagged fissures raced away from the main crack, expanding under the snow like lightning bolts. A section of ice broke away to the left, followed by more and more. The ground beneath his feet tipped upward, forcing him to grab hold of the highest edge as an army of monsters appeared, darkening the entire horizon.
They fell through the ice as it disintegrated beneath their awesome weight, and into the painfully cold lake. He was blessed with watching those that dropped beneath the surface become rigid with shock, sinking out of sight into the darkness. Many clung to chunks of ice as he did, their claws so sharp they gouged trenches into the surface before either sliding to their deaths or freezing from the feet up and dropping away. Their dewlaps trilled and they hissed through their dying breaths.
Many of them managed to perch atop the bobbing sections, leaping from one to the next, followed by those who had been far enough back to watch the others fall in before them. The underwater equines, the same seahorse-looking steeds that had brought them there, threw their bodies against the ice from below, toppling creatures down into the water, sticking their heads out long enough to grab hold of ankles and feet, dragging more and more to their demise. A trail of fire rushed toward him, the horse and rider consumed by flames. He saw a blur of skeletal legs moving so fast they never even touched the ground, turning the water to steam.
Legs sopping wet and numb, he struggled to his feet and faced what he knew to be his end. Taking a deep breath, he clenched his fists at his sides, and stared down the rider. In those fiery eyes, all but hidden behind a mask the color of blood, he could see the fires of hell, but he wasn’t afraid.
And even in death they couldn’t take that away from him.
“We will surviv—!” he shouted, only to be cut short by the hand that reached down from atop the horse. Fingers like knives lanced through the soft tissue beneath his chin, curling underneath to scrape bone. War’s palm slammed into his face so hard that his nose flattened.
The almighty War held onto his chin as Thunder stampeded past, ripping Norman’s head backwards with such force that his spine easily snapped. They rode on with War carrying Norman’s head like a football helmet, leaving his decapitated body to sink slowly down into the Great Salt Lake.
Chapter 8
I
Mormon Tears
JILL STOOD ON THE FAR SIDE OF THE SAND WALL AS SHE HAD SO MANY times before in her dreams. It felt as though the world had frozen all around her, leaving her standing in the middle of a vortex. She couldn’t breathe or think. All she could do was survey the beach around her. A glance back over her shoulder confirmed what she already knew. The others were back there, hunkered down behind the barricade, only their breath rising above before being swept sideways by the wind. To either side, smoke drifted from the smokestacks in the open sections of water where the kelp grew at such an accelerated rate that the leaves now broke the surface of the water. Twin pillars of fire rose from the vents over the pits full of coal on the beach. Turning her attention ahead again, as she knew she would, she waited for the final act of her vision to unfold.
Her body cried out for her to whirl and sprint back into the cavern, to find a nice dark corner and curl up into a ball, but she was rooted to the ground. A passenger in her vessel of flesh. She was like a marionette, forced to stand her ground until the moment she was released, but then what? Her visions had only shown her so much. Beyond that, she was as blind as the rest of them. Or was that simply the end? Had they lined up along this frozen stretch of sand merely to be annihilated?
She shook her head. That couldn’t be it. They had been guided here by powers beyond their understanding and whatever it was—be it God or fate or some cosmic hand—hadn’t summoned them all through such arduous trials simply to be put down like dogs in the middle of nowhere beneath a nuclear winter of their own creation.
Her heartbeat accelerated when the first two silhouettes materialized from the snow. One leaned on the other, both struggling through the deep snow, falling forward before fighting back to their feet. They staggered toward where the burning blockade cast her shadow out onto the snow. She tried to run out to help them, tried to turn and run away, but she couldn’t move.
Another human shape appeared behind them and she screamed.
The first shot threw up a cloud of snow beside Adam before the report echoed from the face of the mountain. She watched in horror as Adam glanced over his shoulder, then looked back in her direction with eyes wide in terror. He grabbed hold of Ray—Dear God! His eyes! They’d carved out Ray’s eyes!—and tried to pick him up, but both men just fell into the accumulation with a pattern of steel whizzing over their heads to tear up the snow nearly to her feet.
Jill jumped away, still screaming, but the shot had freed her body from its stupor. She took her first stride toward them and saw more silhouettes knifing through the snow behind the man with the gun, who stumbled after Adam and Ray, holding the shotgun to his right shoulder.
“Hurry!” Jill shouted, running toward them.
Someone ran past her to the right and she caught only a flash of blond hair. Lindsay reached them a step ahead of Jill, who ducked under Ray’s opposite arm to help ease Adam’s burden.
“Oh, God, Ray. I’m so sorry. So sorry. I knew…I knew this was going to happen,” she blubbered.
“Shhh,” he whispered into her ear, giving her shoulder a reassuring squeeze.
Lindsay grabbed Adam by the hand and started to pull him forward. She looked past him and recognized Richard’s blood-drenched face leering at her down the barrel of a gun. There was no longer anything human about him. Whatever monster looked out from behind his eyes was even more frightening than the creatures sprinting
out of the storm past him.
The left corner of Richard’s mouth raised in a mockery of a smile.
Lindsay didn’t even have time to cry out. Pellets pounded her chest, tossing her backwards like a feather on the breeze. A spatter of blood washed over the snow before she slammed backwards into it, still clinging to Adam’s hand and jerking him down on top of her. His left shoulder landed first, driving his weight firmly into the sloppy remainder of her thoracic cavity, breaking away already fractured ribs and pulping an indecipherable mess of internal organs. His face landed in the snow beside hers. He recoiled, coughing out a glob of slush, and stared into her glassy blue eyes. Her face was freckled with blood, streams pouring from the corners of her mouth.
“No,” he whispered, trying to push himself back up, prying his fingers from her death grip. Enraged, he looked back at Richard as more steel flew past, the warm wind of its passage on his cheek. A splash of wetness slapped his other cheek and he knew the pellets had robbed Lindsay of the last remaining identifiable part of her.
He hadn’t heard the shot. How in God’s name had he not—?
The Swarm rose up behind Richard, whose maniacal eyes had him dead to rights down the sightline of the weapon. Adam spun and propelled himself toward the shore. Jill was having a hard time keeping Ray on his feet, but they had gained a good five yards on him. The others were climbing over the barrier, sliding down and running out to help them.
“Go back!” Adam shouted, waving his arms.
There was no way they would hear him over the loud hissing.
They all froze in place and looked out across the lake.
“Go back!”
But they weren’t looking at him.
They were looking past him.
II
RICHARD FELT HIS HEAT DRAINING DOWN HIS LEFT LEG, BUT THE REST OF HIS body was growing colder by the second. The frozen lake teetered to either side as the lightheadedness worsened, now spreading through his chest and into his arms in numbing waves, his movements far too slow and deliberate. Only one thought permeated the fog settling over his brain as he leveled the barrel of the shotgun at the two figures in front of him.
Kill.
He squeezed the trigger and the butt kicked him in the shoulder, his shot firing wide and to the left in the snow beside the two figures.
So much for the element of surprise.
He urged his legs faster, kicking up snow all around him. It sizzled on the smoldering steel as he lined up the second shot, shucking the smoking shell into his wake. The person on the left glanced back and Richard recognized him with a grin. It was their leader. Cut off the head and the body would thrash around and bleed to death. Aligning the back of Adam’s head with the small sight, he stopped to steady the gun, pulling the trigger and bracing himself for the recoil. His targets stumbled and fell, his shot skimming over Adam’s head to tear up the snow all the way to the shore, where someone else stood, screaming as the steel shot raced toward her feet. She jumped away, but instead of running back up the beach, she dashed out onto the lake toward him.
That would only make it easier for him.
The rest of them climbed over the wall from where they’d been hiding and slid down the sand into plain sight. What were they, stupid? It was like fish jumping into a fisherman’s boat. Might as well pass around the gun and let them all do themselves for him. Nah, where was in fun in that? He wanted the pleasure of doing it himself, of feeling the kick against his shoulder and smelling the gunpowder as their lifeblood exploded out the far side. He wanted to see the look of recognition in their eyes when they realized their lives were over and it was he who had killed them. He wanted their last thoughts to be of regret for trying to trick him, for defying him. But most of all he wanted to see their pain, the excruciating agony of hot steel searing through them, shredding bone and organs alike, leaving only the exposed nerves to send their message of suffering to the brain.
Another person sprinted toward his targets, reaching Adam’s side and trying to hasten his progress. She looked at him and his blood boiled. It was that same blubbering woman whose feet had cost them hours of travel time and whose incessant whining had driven him up the wall. He’d give her something to really gripe about this time.
He swung the shotgun slightly to the left and fired, a blossom of red bloomed in the middle of her chest before she was launched back into the snow, pulling Adam down with her. There had been only a transient expression of fear on her face, the rest happening so quickly that he couldn’t revel in her pain. He fired again, but missed Adam, the pattern of steel pounding Lindsay’s face into oblivion.
Roaring his displeasure to the heavens, he shucked the spent cartridge and tried to load another, but it closed on an empty chamber. He jammed his bloody left hand into his jacket and tore off the lid of the box of shells, grabbing a handful and pulling them out. Half a dozen flew from his grasp and dropped into the snow and out of sight, but he retained enough to shove them up into the shotgun. By the time he chambered the first load, his quarry was already to the shoreline. The others stood facing him, wide-eyed like so many deer on a highway.
This was going to be too simple. The least they could do was try to run and create a little sport. What the hell were they doing, anyway? Did they want to be shot?
He ran at them, resting the shotgun against his shoulder and trying to steady the barrel on Adam’s back.
Why were they just staring at him? It was as if…
Richard stopped and turned around. He never even got a shot off. Three reptilian humanoids slammed into him as more raced past on either side. Claws tore through his clothing and lacerated his flesh. There was a flash of color like the setting sun from beneath their chins before he saw nothing but teeth. They hooked beneath his skin and ripped away strips, revealing the juicy muscles beneath. His nose was torn away and choked back down an eager gullet. Several of them fought over what appeared to be his hand, which explained why he couldn’t seem to get a grasp on the shotgun. Teeth lanced into the meat of his shoulder, jerking from side to side until muscles were torn from tendons, baring his electric nerve endings.
He screamed as he experienced a pain beyond anything he had dreamed possible. There was crippling agony in places he didn’t even know were capable of sensation. His rage kept him conscious, acutely aware of every inch of his body, every nerve bundle singing in sheer torture. He couldn’t allow himself to be cheated. He had to deliver his vengeance upon those who had defied and openly mocked his power. Pain was only a state of mind, while passion was all consuming.
Raising his gushing stump, he punched one of the creatures in the face and tried to rise, but fell right back down. He rolled to his side and managed to get to his knees, straightening his legs until he stood. One arm, the bones in the shoulder exposed, dangled limply at his side, the other wedged into his shirt to staunch the arterial rush, he swayed back and forth, the blood loss toying with his equilibrium.
“Where’s my shotgun?” he railed, blood draining past his lips and running off his chin.
The Swarm encircled him. They kept their distance as though sizing him up, picking the best cuts of meat.
“Is that…?” he sputtered, his eyes rolling upward, but he forced them back down. “Is that all you’ve got?”
A blinding light appeared in front of him, his attackers shrinking away from it. After a moment, he rationalized it as fire, the flames revealing a horse larger than any he had ever seen, its skin and flesh stripped away. Astride it was what had once been a man, though he radiated a level of power unlike anyone Richard had ever encountered. The man wore blood-red armor and sat in the middle of the flames as though immune to them. In his left hand was a severed head.
The man reached toward him with a heavily muscled arm and extended his index finger to point right at him.
The creatures descended upon Richard from all sides, though instead of shredding him, they grabbed him and pinned him down, slathering bulbous purple tongues over his ex
posed flesh, hissing and flapping the scales under their chins. One grabbed him around each ankle and they sprinted back out across the lake. His head dragged though the snow, his arms trailing behind.
“No!” he screamed as the beach fell farther and farther behind.
He couldn’t allow them to keep him from completing his mission. He still needed to kill them. It couldn’t end like this.
“Nooooooo…!” he screamed, his words fading as unconsciousness finally claimed him.
III
EVELYN SWEPT JAKE UP IN HER ARMS, BRINGING HIM TO HER CHEST. He clung so tightly that she could barely breathe, his legs squeezing her hips. His cries pierced her ears, his tears momentarily warming her neck as he buried his face against it. The last thing she saw before she turned and climbed over the barricade was black bodies rushing inland toward the shore. There was no way they would be able to hold them off. They would crash down upon them and exterminate them mercilessly. They had never stood a chance. All along, despite their best preparations, they had been doomed to extinction.
She slid down the slope, catching her heels on the board bracing the spears and sending them both tumbling into the snow. Battling to her feet, she looked up and saw movement on the cliff above the cave. Large white falcons lined the stone. There were easily a hundred of them, motionless like gargoyles standing sentry over the beach. Where had they all come from? She tried not to imagine them like vultures picking knots of cartilage from their bleached bones where they fell. But animals always knew. They could sense these things.
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