by Ryan Casey
He wasn’t going to fail to take up that opportunity the next time it came around. That was for certain.
The draw of revenge was too strong.
“You say you know Riley.”
Kane smiled. There was blood between his teeth, presumably from where Mattius’ people had given him a beating. “I can’t speak.”
Mattius looked up at Marion and Simon. He nodded. “You sure about that?”
Marion and Simon pulled their fists back and came in to beat Kane some more.
“Beating me isn’t going to do a thing of good for any of us,” Kane said, raising his voice. “But maybe healing me will.”
Mattius lifted his hand, then. He stopped Marion and Simon from beating the prisoner, right in their tracks. “And what’s that supposed to mean?”
Kane’s eyes twinkled. “You know exactly what I’m referring to. Who I’m referring to. The girl.”
The mention of “the girl”—Kesha—was enough to make Mattius’ stomach turn. It felt like Kesha was his source of power. Like someone else just knowing about her weakened his stance, somewhat. And Mattius didn’t like that. “What do you know about the girl?”
Kane twitched, clearly leaning against a sore spot on his back. He grimaced, and then adjusted his sitting. He seemed far too at ease with all this. “I know a few things about her. Namely, that she’s powerful. Very powerful. And that she could save my life, if the rumours are true. Although I have to admit, I’m somewhat sceptical.”
He paused for a few seconds. Like there was still something else on his chest.
“What else do you know?” Mattius asked.
A long smile stretched across this man’s face. And at that moment, Mattius swore he saw evil. Pure evil. “I know what she means to Riley. I know that Riley is tearing himself up with guilt that he lost her to you. And I know how much it would devastate him—ruin him—if something were to happen to her after so much effort to get Kesha back.”
Just hearing the man say her name was enough to make Mattius nod, signalling another round of beating for his captive. He let him take it. Let him take punch after bruising punch, more cuts and bruises covering his face.
After a good thirty seconds of beating, he clicked his fingers and Marion and Simon halted their assault.
“Give us a minute,” Mattius said.
“You sure?” Simon asked.
Mattius nodded. “Absolutely sure.”
They left up the steps, leaving Mattius alone down here with the captive. His face was swelling up. His paleness was only broken up by the dark red blood dripping down his cheeks. He didn’t look like he could take much more.
Mattius crouched right opposite him. He lifted his swollen chin so they were looking right at one another.
“What do you want from me?” Mattius asked. “What are you suggesting?”
Kane smiled—somehow, in spite of everything he’d been through. “I’m just suggesting you follow your intuition.”
“Enough of the bullshit. Or I’ll bring Marion and Simon back in here.”
“And what? You’ll get them to beat me some more? Don’t lie to me, ‘Mattius.’ I know you aren’t as comfortable leading a violent reign as you’d like everyone around you to think.”
Mattius felt his chest tightening. He didn’t like that this man seemed to be able to see right through him. “You’re wrong.”
Kane tilted his head and smiled. “Oh. Is that so?” He didn’t sound convinced.
They were silent a little longer. The candlelight grew weaker as it flickered beside them.
And as the thoughts played on Mattius’ mind—as that lust for revenge against Riley for what he’d done to Mattius’ people built up all over again—he felt like he was the weaker man here. Like he wasn’t in charge of this conversation. Not anymore.
“What do you suggest?” Mattius asked.
Kane’s smile reached its peak. “I’m suggesting you think about the small picture rather than the big picture.”
“Isn’t that counterproductive?”
“You saw the mass of undead outside your walls earlier. You saw them, didn’t you? If there is a cure, then that’s all fine and dandy for people who’ve been bitten once or twice. But what about everyone else? What about all the rot? There’s no saving those people. No chance at all. Deep down, I think you know it, too.”
“Know what?”
“That holding on to the hope that Kesha’s going to save the damned world is nothing more than a fantasy.”
Mattius’ eyes started to twitch. He didn’t like where this conversation was going. “And what’s the ‘smaller picture’?”
Kane leaned forward a little. Blood dripped down his chin, dangling down in a phlegmy string. “I’m suggesting you think about Riley. About what he did to you. And how to hurt him most.”
Mattius swallowed a lump in his throat.
“I’m suggesting you let him get close to victory when he attacks this place, which he will, very soon if my predictions are correct. I’m suggesting you make him think he’s going to succeed. And then I’m suggesting you take the last thing he cares about on this planet away from him, with me by your side.”
Mattius took a moment. He took a moment to really absorb what this prisoner had just suggested to him.
Then he punched him in the face and knocked him out.
He stood up, holding on to his sore knuckles. He climbed the steps, torch in hand, and then walked into the darkness.
He walked right up to his floor, to his room, and then walked inside.
He looked down at Kesha’s cot. He looked at her staring up at him with adoration, with love, with trust.
He looked down at her and he remembered what the prisoner had said.
I’m suggesting you take the last thing he cares about on this planet away from him, with me by your side.
Mattius lifted Kesha out of her cot. He patted her back, held her warm body close.
Then he walked over to his window and looked out over the wall, into the trees, into the darkness.
I’m suggesting you take the last thing he cares about on this planet away from him, with me by your side.
He thought about all the death and destruction in this world. He thought about the fantasy he had of curing people. But the fact that he was even acknowledging it was a fantasy now was enough to scare him.
“I won’t hurt you,” Mattius whispered, as if guilty of the mere thought of harming Kesha. “I won’t ever hurt you. I pr…”
He thought of Riley and how much more pain he could put that man through.
He didn’t finish his sentence.
Because as he stood there in the darkness, Mattius didn’t like making promises he wasn’t sure he was going to keep.
KANE LAY back against the wall in the cellar cell.
He’d seen the look in Mattius’ eyes.
He’d planted the seeds in Mattius’ mind. Now he just had to watch the fireworks explode.
And it started with Riley falling right into their trap.
He felt a smile stretch across his face.
MELISSA, Amy and Riley stared into the crackling fire.
“Where do we go from here?” Amy asked.
Riley looked at Melissa. Melissa looked back at him. And then the pair of them looked at Amy.
“There’s a place we could go,” Riley said.
And with that momentary, still partly revenge driven decision, the cogs that Kane had created started turning.
Fast.
EPISODE FORTY-FIVE
THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS
(THIRD EPISODE OF SEASON EIGHT)
PROLOGUE
She tasted the blood on her lips, and she knew she’d had a close call.
Another close call.
The day was drawing to a close, and she couldn’t help feeling a little relieved about that. Even though the nights were dangerous, she’d be glad to put her head down on the spongy earth somewhere and get some rest. Sure, a shelter would
be better. But when you were surviving alone in a post-apocalyptic landscape, shelter wasn’t always an option. It depended what the elements decided. You didn’t have much control over what you might or might not come across, not anymore.
A cool breeze blew through the air, carrying with it drizzly specks of light rain. She was relieved for that, too. She was soaked in blood. It’d been that way since she’d come across the enormous crowd of undead a few miles back. In a way, the drizzle freshened her up, acting as a micro-shower, and one that she was totally grateful for.
She walked down the long, narrow country lane. She tried to keep her focus on the tall hedges to her left, and to the occasional buildings on her right, which gave her hope of finding shelter tonight after all. In the fields beside her, she saw carcases everywhere. The skeletons of dead sheep and cows, which crows still picked at in hope they’d find something other than bone.
It was beautifully silent on this road. She’d been walking down it a long time now, and she knew it would be wise to find a place to rest somewhere around here.
She felt the sores on her feet getting worse. Another reason to stop. She’d been wearing the same shoes since… since… well, she didn’t like to think about that day very much. Thinking about it just brought back too many reminders of the life she’d lived, and how everything changed on that winter’s day.
Thinking about it made her stomach turn. Because it just made her speculate what might’ve happened to the people she’d cared about back at that place.
Back at that home.
She took a deep breath of the cool air, which was mostly fresh—a remarkable feat in a world where rot was so common. She felt warmth spreading up her body as she visualised a calming light filling up every single muscle inside her.
The more she thought about that light, the more at ease she felt. The calmer she felt.
And then she heard a groan on her right.
She stopped. There was a big house beside her, with a massive black gate guarding its entrance. Behind it, the torn up remains of a dog, which remarkably didn’t look like it’d been dead too long.
By its side, there were three creatures. All of them were looking at her, now, pressing their faces up to the gate, snapping their teeth against the metal.
She pulled out her axe as she walked towards that gate. She got close to the first one, then rammed the axe into its skull, some of the cold blood falling back onto her arm.
She moved on to the next one, then. A woman. Couldn’t have been older than university years. Another tragic loss of this brutal world.
She pressed the axe in between her eyes and listened to her skull crack, then watched her fall against the bars.
When she moved on to the next one, she saw something different.
She couldn’t explain what it was. This person was a man, once. Muscular. Dark, curly hair. Blue eyes. He was well dressed, even though his clothes were torn.
But it was his eyes that got to her, mostly.
That tearful look in his eyes, like he was fighting.
Fighting back against what he was doing.
He wasn’t snapping his teeth, either. And that’s when she wondered. As she looked into the eyes of the undead and he looked back at her, she wondered whether there could be a light inside some of these monsters. Whether there could be some semblance of how things used to be.
She was so focused on the undead’s eyes that she didn’t hear the footsteps behind her.
She felt the hands wrap around the tops of her arms. She tried to swing around and slash the creature, but her movement was restricted. And as much as she tried to push back against the creature behind her, she was being pressed closer and closer towards the one remaining zombie behind the gate.
She looked into its eyes and saw an eagerness not to attack. A determination not to do any harm. Because it didn’t want to. That wasn’t what it wanted to do. It was clear in its eyes and yet she couldn’t explain it. Even trying to explain it would make her sound insane.
She pressed her feet up against the gate. She pushed back against the undead holding on to her.
Then she kicked back, with all the force she had.
She felt the undead behind her losing its grip. She felt it slipping.
But the one behind the gate had a hold on her shoe now.
It brought its teeth down towards her shoe. She couldn’t see it properly. Her vision was blackened on one side.
So she just let it hold on.
She let it bite the sides of her shoe.
And then with all the energy she had, she pushed back even harder.
She felt the undead’s teeth ripping from its mouth, wedged into the sides of her shoe.
The undead holding onto her fell, and she landed on top of it with force.
Enough force to make some of its rotted body splat.
She broke free of its grip. Pulled back her axe.
Then she slammed that axe right through its head.
The silence returned. The peace returned. No sensations other than her heart pounding, racing.
She heard a pitiful groan then. Almost sounded like a whimper.
When she turned to the gate, she saw the final undead still standing behind it.
She walked over to it, slowly. Its jaw had decayed so much that the force she’d pulled away with had ripped it clean off. Again though, it looked like there were tears in its eyes. Like there was a human underneath.
It punched and pressed its face up against the gaps in the gate. There didn’t seem to be any efforts to stop itself anymore; any attempts to resist.
She walked over to it and stopped just inches away.
She’d seen some weird things since the world fell. Things she thought were beyond possibility.
So what if there was a fragment of humanity left in these things?
What if there were some cogs ticking behind those pitiful eyes.
“I’m sorry you ended up this way,” she said. “However it happened… I’m sorry. I really am.”
The undead man didn’t break eye contact with her.
She turned away, took a deep breath, and felt that calming visualisation running through her body once more.
Then she pulled back the axe and cracked it through his skull.
BEN HUGHES FELT the axe crack through the centre of his skull and finally—finally—he felt peace.
If he could thank this woman, he would.
Instead, he dropped down to his knees and, his consciousness finally faded.
CHAPTER ONE
“Are you ready?”
“Ready.”
Riley rushed through the trees towards Mattius’ camp. Behind him, Amy followed, Melissa not much further behind her. There were others here, too. Carly, Annabelle, Natasha, Siobhan, and Rosa. Nobody had stayed behind at camp. They were all heading out of their comfort zone and through the looking glass, now.
The sun hadn’t long ago risen. They figured they’d use the first opportunity they could to attack Mattius’ camp. Well, not so much attack. The plan was to intercept their way inside the place. Three of the group members would distract Mattius’ people while Riley, Amy, and Melissa made their way inside Mattius’ base. The remaining group members would hold back and pick off as many of his people as possible.
They might be outnumbered. But they had the advantage of covert action on their side.
They rushed through even more of those trees, getting closer to Mattius’ camp. Riley could feel the adrenaline and the fear building in his system. Part of him dreaded coming across another obstacle in the form of a ton of creatures. After all, that large group was still out here, somewhere. Who was to say it wasn’t just going to come back at any time, stronger and bigger—if that was even possible?
Who was to say that something wasn’t going to get in their way, just like it always seemed to?
Riley’s thoughts stopped when he saw the hotel block where he’d seen Mattius holding Kesha.
He looked at it, righ
t in through the window. He expected to see Mattius there again, standing in exactly the same place he’d stood last time, Kesha in his arms. He could imagine them there. Picture them, in his mind’s eye.
But he could picture a lot in his mind’s eye these days.
Jordanna.
Anna.
Chloë.
He felt a hand on his arm and he flinched.
Amy was by his side.
“We should talk,” she said.
Riley shook his head. “It’s been a week since the siege. We’ve talked enough as it is.”
“I mean we should really talk. About the things we’ve been avoiding talking about. The two things.”
Riley wasn’t sure he wanted Amy to continue, but he couldn’t exactly stop her. “Which are?”
“If you don’t make it. If none of us make it. Then what happens?”
Riley swallowed a lump in his throat. He didn’t want to consider that as an option. “We cross that bridge when we come to it.”
“We cross it now,” Amy said, bow over her back. “We’re going into somewhere better armed than us. We’re taking a massive, massive risk.”
“We’ve discussed the plan. We take a few out. We take their weapons. Then we take their home.”
“I hate to say it but I can’t help but think you’re under-thinking things.”
“I’m done with thinking,” Riley said. “We’ve got a plan and now we’ve got to carry the plan out. Trust me.”
Amy didn’t look so trusting. But she nodded regardless.
Riley went to move when Amy hit him with another bombshell.
“What if Kesha doesn’t make it?”
That was a thought Riley couldn’t allow to grow too strong. A possibility he couldn’t even begin to entertain. He didn’t look at Amy when she suggested it. He couldn’t. “She will make it.”
“But if she doesn’t—”
“She will make it.”
Riley didn’t have to say anything else. He didn’t have to say a thing to anyone. He could tell from the tension now cutting through the air that they’d heard him, loud and clear.
“Now we move,” he said.
He started his descent down the hill, towards the flat ground before Mattius’ camp, still using the trees for cover.