The Chasing Series Box Set [Books 1-3]

by Hamrick, R M

  “A low-grade fever? Dude, you got time. What if we took a little detour after I meet Corette?”

  “Detour? We’d already be there.”

  “I’m just thinking, you could go up and see your little girl. I’ll watch out for you, make sure you get where you need to be. Keep everyone safe. I am after all, a tagger.”

  “You’d do that for me? Don’t you need to get back and… save the world?” Gordon looked at him in earnest.

  “I’m saving my part,” he assured Gordon. “Plus, if I can buy some time, maybe I can convince you not to sign yourself over to the corporation.”

  “I’m not sitting around.”

  “I know, I know,” Dwyn assured him.

  But those weren’t the only two options.

  Dwyn raised his arm and ran his fingers along the silver links of the fence. He could almost make out the melody. A small song in the woods. Dwyn thought of Corette’s sweeping lines and wondered if she still danced.

  * * *

  Dwyn showed Gordon a spot by the creek outside the Choros fences. When Audra had business in Choros, she was often here instead. He smiled as he remembered Audra running off with his clothes when he was bathing there one day. She and Vesna had really taken him under their wings. They introduced him to this new world and showed him that it wasn’t that bad. Only the people who lived in it and made it bad were the ones that soured it. And Vesna explained that could be fixed. They could eventually overthrow Greenly and Lysent. And he, in turn, had convinced Audra. But did it all start here with Corette? Was she the first one in his life to take a stand against Lysent’s principles, so that he could do the same?

  Even though he hadn’t made a name for himself as a tagger, rebel, or anything in between, he still felt nervous standing at the gate. Tall, bulky guards stood in front of the massive timber block gate. They had upgraded since he was last here.

  The two men, almost identical in size and color, said nothing to him. One waved his hand, a signal to someone hidden. And mechanical noises accompanied the opening of the gate. Dwyn cautiously stepped inside, but no one stopped him. It seemed Choros had become so confident that they were open to public business.

  Dwyn took a deep breath, fighting against his shoulders arching into his ears. He wasn’t sure if it was being so close to Lysent headquarters or the possibility of seeing Corette that was making his entire body tense. He stiff-marched up the main drag, which had been dressed in cobblestone. It seemed that being close to headquarters had its perks.

  No one paid the man any attention as he entered the gated plaza, rounded the fountain, and walked up the tall white building’s steps. The tall windows glistened and when Dwyn entered the marbled lobby, he thought the combination magnified the light. No matter the weather outside, it was just brighter in the Lysent building.

  A mahogany desk sat center, like a sentinel protecting the administrative keep. A woman with round cheeks and dark hair that fell in coils sat behind it, her fingers deftly separating paper from file. Her brown eyes matching her desk looked over their papers to see him standing there.

  “Dwyn!” she said, taking no time to recall his name. “How is she?”

  He knew whom she spoke of. While she remembered Dwyn’s name, it was Audra who held a special place in Rosie’s heart.

  “She’s doing well. We’re all doing well. Thanks to you,” he said with a somber smile.

  Rosie had saved Belinda from being slaughtered with a simple paperwork error. And she’d saved the entire laboratory by warning them about an incoming attack.

  Rosie gave a soft smile as if these things were basic duties in her line of work. Then the smile turned mischievous and her eyes sparkled.

  “Are you two…?” she asked.

  “No ma’am.”

  Rosie shook her head. Her soft curls echoed the movement. “It’s not good for a person to grow up alone out there like she did.”

  “She had her sister,” reminded Dwyn. Audra could make connections. Belinda was proof.

  “She had a burden,” Rosie corrected unapologetically. She straightened a thick stack of papers, and then immediately placed a larger, more disordered stack of papers on top. “So what can I help you with, tagger Dwyn?”

  “I was hoping you could connect me with someone.”

  “Isn’t that the job of a tagger?” she asked, amused.

  Dwyn smiled. If he was still tagging, the fact he hadn’t seen Rosie in the last year did not bode well.

  “Corette Ku—” her maiden name of Kuzma trying to roll off his tongue. “Corette Godin. She awakened me. I’d like to say thank you.”

  Rosie squinted thoughtfully. “I do think it’s time.” Dwyn wasn’t sure what that meant, but at least Rosie seemed willing to help. Rosie straightened in her chair as if returning to her administrative duty. “I will arrange a meeting for you, at the creek, outside the fences, tomorrow morning.”

  “Thank you, Rosie.”

  “No problem, dear. Don’t give up on Audra, all right? She’s been through more than most.”

  Dwyn nodded, already anxious to see his Corette.

  * * *

  Audra ran. More, she sprinted until she was out of sight of the motel and even the highway. Sooner than she was ready, her lungs began to burn and her legs slowed without her permission. Sweat stuck inside her shirt, pulling her skin. The space between her nose and lips moistened.

  Her tags would die, just like those in the semi-trailer, the open roof billowing with smoke, ash, and flame. She pumped her arms ever harder to get the last of her sprint until her feet stumbled. Her face careened into the pine needles, scraping the high of her cheeks and neck.

  She lay there for just a moment. The silence. The constant silence. Just her heavy panting into the dirt, the heaviness of her pack, and nothing moving within earshot.

  All dead.

  She snapped off her bag and rolled over. Dark branches scratched through the overcast. Dead leaves. Dying earth.

  When her breath settled in her stomach and slowed, she pulled herself up against a small poplar. Pulling out the list once more, she tried to ignore the names of those already lost. At least others would be searching for bodies gone. Instead, she racked her brain to remember all the tags she had left in secure locations, locations where they’d have been able to survive.

  Audra used the poplar tree to pull herself up. She needed to hurry. Time would kill anything Audra couldn’t reach.

  Hours of running led her to back roads that slipped through overgrown fields. Green tractors, sweeping arches of irrigation systems, hay balers and their decaying rolls scattered along the farm land. These places supported the food supply for thousands when thousands was just a drop in the bucket.

  It wasn’t good tagging grounds though. It seemed those who fed people didn’t get much in return. Most families from this area couldn’t afford to awaken their loved ones. By the time the awakening process was set up, farmers had already shared all their knowledge and skill to help others survive. They had nothing left to trade.

  A fallen sign for Hunt Drive signaled to Audra to turn from the asphalt road to a gravel road. She peeled the sign from its tangled nest and chucked it into the field. The ground was evidently disturbed, but at least undeniable confirmation of the spot had been removed.

  Audra traversed the lengths of a couple of fields before she reached the head gate on Hunt Drive. A metal sign hung a good ten feet over her head. Hunt Farm. No way she’d be chucking that sign. She walked underneath the graying archway.

  The large two-story house had probably looked imposing before, but now that the exterior was falling apart, it seemed even more intimidating. Its sunken wrap-around porch, jagged like teeth. Shutters falling off hinges as sagging facial features. Audra tiptoed on the floor joists of the porch. An open front door allowed anything to come and go, animals and spirits alike, but also offered rain water and vermin to any occupants within.

  Kaci and Sofi Hunt were high school-aged daughters of
the Hunt Farm apparently abandoned when they turned. Audra wasn’t sure what would push the Hunt parents to leave such an advantageous spot, but then, she had also never lost offspring to a gruesome disease. A storm must have passed through to leave the exterior in such disaster. The interior was otherwise intact.

  Audra stepped into the foyer and waited. She hadn’t made much noise, but for hosts that hardly ever had visitors, it would be enough. Moisture from the elements had crept into the space. Where tile protected the floor, shoes lined against the wall rotted underneath damp fallen jackets. The hooks on the wall remained stalwart, but the walls were stained and pitted.

  Audra was surprised no one had come to greet her. She looked up the stairs, following the wrought iron rail up to the second floor and its balcony hall. Past the stairs were several doorways. A large kitchen with an island bar, breakfast nook, and butcher table. A dining room with the furniture perfectly aligned — never used before or after. Audra entered the open living area with a double fireplace, dried-up throw pillows, and intact couches. And sleeping bags. And camping supplies.

  Audra finally heard someone approach, but it wasn’t decaying twins coming with a pitcher of lemonade and neighborhood gossip. It was boots on the porch joists and the rattle of a door unsticking from the tile on the floor.

  Shit.

  Audra stepped softly but quickly into the back end of the kitchen, out of view of the foyer. Opening a door, she found the laundry room as well as Sofi and Kaci. Their buttery blond hair crept down to their waists, blending with their pearly skin with a jaundice tinge. They had the same sharp noses and even tilts of the head as they turned to look at Audra. Audra left the door open a crack. She might need a diversion.

  She heard cackling laughter bouncing in the foyer as she slipped into the walk-in pantry. The door creaked open but closed with a dry click. She hoped the twins hadn’t caught sight of her entering her hiding place.

  “What was that?” Audra heard a thump of two bodies and the laughter ended.

  Audra was left in the dark. She hadn’t even seen the entire interior of the pantry before she closed herself inside. Afraid to shift her feet, she pulled out her dagger and bent her knees, ready to strike if someone opened the door.

  They were silent and she was silent. Then Audra heard the rasp of labored breathing as the women migrated across the kitchen.

  “Oh hell, the twins figured out doors,” a deep voice announced. Heavy boots met the women’s barefoot steps and ushered them back into the laundry room. A scraping sound as something was braced against the laundry door. The back wall of the pantry backed into the living room and Audra could hear two other people – which matched the number of blanket piles Audra had seen.

  “That’ll keep ‘em,” the voice gruffed in the kitchen.

  It would keep more than just them. Audra’s eyes adjusted to the light coming through the bottom of the door and saw the pantry floor clear. She allowed herself to shift her feet.

  She’d be here awhile.

  “Wanna try to fish?” asked a voice in the living room. “It’s been warmer these last couple of nights.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” came a voice which shifted with the owner’s movement through the house.

  “I don’t know why anyone’d leave this place,” laughed someone else, matching the grating laugh that had first traveled through the front door.

  “Well we’re gonna have to, to take these girls to Lysent. I’m thinking we stop by Osprey Point on our way there. Maybe we can grab someone else.”

  The three rummaged around and bantered for a bit before she heard them pass through the kitchen for the back door. Audra recalled a pond out back. Laughter was right. This would have been a wonderful place to bring Belinda. A modern home where she could pretend the world was normal minus the Internet and cable television.

  Audra gave the men time to settle in their fishing spots. She didn’t want someone retrieving something they’d forgotten while she was out of her hiding spot. With the house continuing its silence, Audra opened the pantry door. It gave with a low-volume, but high-pitched complaint.

  Audra paused again to assess for sounds that were not her own before she slipped out into the kitchen. Tall windows and a windowed patio door looked out to the pond a hundred feet away from the house. Audra decided they’d have trouble discerning motion inside with the glare and refraction.

  As Audra tried the doorknob of the laundry room to verify it hadn’t been locked, the chair placed against the door slid then clattered to the floor. Audra didn’t see any reaction from the men outside. Inside, the girls faced each other and rocked from foot to foot in sync with each other. Audra had never seen such behavior. Had they inadvertently hypnotized each other? Audra didn’t have time to think about it. She wrapped her silk cloth around the wrist of each, attached a lead, and walked them out of the kitchen and into the foyer.

  After navigating the broken porch and crossing underneath the Hunt Farm sign, Audra helped them pick into a run. With good form (for zombies) and coordination to stay upright, the girls could have been track stars. They left laughter and fishing in their dust... although Audra did laugh herself as she thought about the men trying to understand how the girls had mastered the barricaded door and escaped.

  CHAPTER TEN

  CONNECTIONS

  He waited. He didn’t know if she would come. He hoped she would come, even if it was just to tell him to leave her alone. Then he’d know. But he wouldn’t know if she didn’t come. If she didn’t come then maybe she was too scared, or was stopped, or didn’t trust. God, he wasn’t making any sense.

  Dwyn watched the water flow over the river stones. The bright blue sky reflected in the water, making it appear clearer than it was. After long runs, he and Audra would soak their feet in the cool water, rubbing their blisters and hot spots on the smooth river rocks, massaging sore muscles. It was one of the rewards of running — the pure relaxation that could follow. He wished he could reach that place now, but instead his stomach twisted in knots and his heart danced around, even though he commanded that it slow. He was here to ask for her help in upending a corporation, not for her hand in marriage.

  He remembered when that had happened too. He had taken her to a fancy dinner. She loved to dress up and eat a three-course meal with white tablecloths and where the server placed the napkin in your lap. Dwyn always found the places rather impersonal, but he liked to watch her there. She could be so sophisticated with her sly smile. Dwyn didn’t even remember dessert. They had two options, and he didn’t remember which one he had. He was too nervous. He paid for dinner. He must have, else they wouldn’t have let them leave, right? And now they were walking down the sidewalk. He gave her his jacket. She said she didn’t want it. It was quite warm.

  Oh, so it was.

  “Can we walk through the park before we leave? I really like this park.”

  “It’s a little dark,” she remarked.

  Was it?

  “That’s OK – let’s just go to the fountain. It’s lit up. I want to make a wish.” He smiled broadly.

  She smiled back. “OK.”

  She didn’t complain that he was making her walk in her nice heels. Later they’d realized the leather on the back of one was ruined after getting stuck in a crack between two concrete insets. And when they got to the fountain, it was beautiful. The prism of colors from the lights flashed and made the fountain look much prettier than it actually was. They had spent many an hour here, making wishes, and spending time with each other.

  He kissed the penny and tossed it in, but instead of making a wish to the fountain, he knelt down in front of Corette and held out a velvet box with a ring.

  “Will you?” he asked.

  “I will,” she said.

  And his wish came true.

  Or, no it actually didn’t. He had forgotten that for a second. His wish had not come true. Months later instead of leafing through their wedding planning book, they were running for their lives. It was a d
ifferent hand in hand. It was a nightmare.

  “Is it you?” someone asked of his back.

  He was sure he was doing something, but he wouldn’t remember what later. He turned and saw her. She looked just as beautiful as when they had first met, although she had matured much more. Dwyn was behind a few years for all his slowed metabolism. She hadn’t had that experience, instead she had experienced much more. Subtle wrinkles accentuated her dark eyes. Her thin nose leading down to lips and perfect teeth were just as he remembered, but her dark brown hair was sprinkled with fine gray. She had worried, struggled, and fought to survive. And she had. She had even carried Dwyn through to this new place and world. She was the reason he was there. And he was so thankful.

  “It is. I… I… thank you,” was all he could muster as the tears flowed.

  “What?” she approached him cautiously.

  “Thank you for curing me. I have all of this because of you.”

  “It’s not much. I’m sorry I couldn’t give you more,” she said with a concerned smile.

  “It’s so much. I have a chance out here.”

  “May I give you a hug?” she asked.

  Corette walked toward Dwyn. Her steps were so graceful. Long legs creating perfect lines.

  Wrapping his arms around her, he found himself wrapped in that familiar lavender scent.

  He couldn’t help himself. It burst from him before he knew it. “Do you love me?”

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “I know that. Boy, do I know that. But, I just need to know what happened between us.”

  “Nothing happened between us. It happened to us. You got bit. I had to survive on my own. I found someone else.”

  The last sentence stung Dwyn.

  “Do you love him?” he asked.

  “I couldn’t find it in myself to kill you after you turned. But I mourned you as if you were dead. Eventually I met Hiram. And yes, I do love him.”

  Dwyn let go and nodded his understanding. He was thankful for what he had, but it turned out, that was all he had.