by Scott, Zack
Three bodies. All broken, lying next to one another.
Alec’s hand landed on Nicole’s back, their faces inches apart. His fingers managed to graze her cheek before dropping limply to the ground.
I saved none of them. With this realization, Jeff fell on all fours. Gagging and choking, he turned away.
Scot rubbed his own neck as he grabbed Jeff’s shoulder. “They—?”
“Yes.”
Eyes breaking away, Scot’s hands shook in front of his face. “No, fuck, shit.”
Drool fell off Jeff’s lips as he tightened his eyes from his friends’ corpses. “Scot.” He fought to keep his quivering lips still. “What have we done?”
His eyes straining, Scot lowered and grabbed Jeff. “Come on,” he said confidently. “We’ve all died at least once now.”
Jeff wrapped an arm around his smaller friend. Even if Alec lives, Nicole is surely dead. Her death will be worse than anything Alec could ever suffer. Glancing back at the end of the roof as Scot helped him walk, Jeff fought to maintain his strength. I wanted to save all of us. Can I still? I need to. I will.
“Things could be worse,” said Scot.
“How?”
Scot’s eyes were a watery blue. “We could still be in that well.”
They went to the entrance of the complex, while the death of night flushed with life upon the arrival of morning.
ALEC
His arm snapped into place as he lifted his crumpled body off the sidewalk. With trembling limbs, he wrapped around his frail, shattered Nicole. His grip tightened and he whispered constant apologies. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” His eyes shut. A sharp pain welled up in him. The world crushed against his chest. Without love, without her, I have nothing.
Alec had felt her skin for the shortest of seconds before his love fell from Kale’s hand, and as he hung off that dreadful roof, staring in shock, loss, and defeat, he knew he’d never be a hero. He’d never accomplish great things. Killing Kale had been his goal when he threw the both of them off of the roof, even hoping to end his own life, perhaps getting a chance to see Nicole again.
But he didn’t die. I cannot.
Moans of the undead surrounded him and Nicole. The hordes’ remainders closed in. They wanted her flesh. He wouldn’t allow it. After carefully lowering her head, he let light blast throughout his body, and, jolting from one corpse to another, he ripped each head off with one clean swipe. Anger, vengeance, and hate pulsated with each flash through his veins. By the eighth dropped corpse, Jeff and Scot reached the street. If they helped, Alec didn’t notice, nor did he give two shits. Zombies number nine and ten fell in the same manner as the others. The last three he left for his friends to handle, then he returned to Nicole.
Curled up against her, cheeks touching, he kissed her blood-drenched head. “I want to be with you.”
Scot yelled for Jeff to watch out. Seconds later, he said, “Holy crap, did you kill it with a scalpel throw?”
A few last moans and the night became silent.
Alec rose, keeping Nicole dear to his chest.
“Alec!” Jeff rushed to them, heaving for air. Scot followed. They glanced at Kale’s body. The yellow fire hydrant had scrambled his entire face. His arms and legs hung limp. Chunks of his flesh were scattered across the street.
Jeff touched the massacred head.
Turning his back to them, blood falling down his throat to his stomach, Alec started walking, unsure to where.
“Where are you going?” Scot’s voice.
“To bury my fiancée.”
“I’ll help.”
“Fine,” mumbled Alec.
“Jeff, come on,” Scot said to him.
Jeff mourns Kale. But Kale died back in high school. We all did.
By the time they reached the beach, the day had grown bright. But it did nothing for Alec. The world had descended to a dark, spiraling hell with Nicole’s fall into death. They dug a hole close to sand. Down the beach, waves crashed, and a salty smell snuck into his nostrils.
It was all shit.
After he finished digging, Alec lowered down into Nicole’s grave, lying with her one last time. I’m grateful for everything you gave me. He swiped hair off her face and touched her chin. I’ll see you again. His lips pressed against her and he wanted to keep them there forever. Bury him. Leave him there to rot with love.
But she would’ve wanted him to continue on, as cliché as it sounded. Fuck moving on. I want to die with her.
Yet he found himself climbing out of the grave, assisted by Jeff and Scot. He wanted to bury her alone and forced them to step aside. Each clump of falling dirt killed his heart. The light he once felt vanished with every passing second.
A Guardian of Life? Never. Whatever that so-called Curer of Death had said was a lie. Death took his brother. Death took Nicole. The only thing left for him was suffering.
And vengeance.
“Do you think Kale is really dead?” Scot asked Jeff, standing behind Alec as he buried Nicole.
“You saw him.”
“Yeah, well, I was shot in the head and came back.”
“I don’t know, Scot. We can go and check.”
If Kale lives, I will kill him a thousand more times.
Scot continued, “If he is alive, hopefully that fire hydrant knocked some sense into him.”
“Alec, I really want to help.” Jeff moved closer.
“Get away from me,” he snarled back.
“Let him do his thing.” Scot pulled at Jeff. “Here, Addison gave me this paper on the roof. Check it out.”
“What’s this?”
“A name.”
“Brody Vitaly, who is that?”
“I have no idea, man, but Addison said that guy has all our answers. What we are, what we can do. I think you’ll appreciate him more than me.”
Jeff fell silent as Alec continued to bury his fiancée.
Sweat covered Alec’s body, a drop falling from his upper lip. The last two piles of dirt fell on his soul. He flattened the grave and dropped his necklace, a golden cross, on top of it. His eyes shut. How can I move on? How can I keep going?
Jeff and Scot’s voices drowned to a bottomless pit behind him as he lowered to the grave. Face pressed against dirt, he held back tears fighting to escape. He remembered those tears he’d fought back just days earlier. Cries because he was denied a position at the Green Hills Fire Department.
Those were meaningless cries, he knew. Those cries were nothing like this.
Nicole. His mind whispered her name as he kissed the grave. Grains stayed on his mouth as he raised his head.
Turning to the others, he asked, “Brody Vitaly?”
Jeff raised the paper slip. “Apparently he has all the answers we want.”
Alec looked away, weighing options and biting his lip. Waves crashed to shore in a splash of white foam. “I have no questions.”
Scot clapped his hands. “Well, I somehow need to find my way to this Numark. I miss my Kels—” His face reddened before finishing her name. “Sorry, Alec.”
He said nothing.
“I know how to get there.” Jeff walked up the sand.
“Oh, right.” Scot, standing closest to Nicole’s grave, stared at it for seconds in silence. He mourns nothing.
“We’re not far from Numark.” Jeff went for Alec, forcing them to meet eyes. “You’ll come with us?”
“Sure.” If this Brody knows everything, which seems highly unlikely, maybe he knows a cure. A chance to bring Nicole back...
“All right,” said Scot. “Lead the way, Homer.”
They followed Jeff, the sun beating at their backs. To Alec, Numark was only a word, for he began to believe it wasn’t even real.
An unreachable hope.
The well, his brother’s bar, the yacht, the clinic, the cliff, the roof, the hydrant — all flashed through his mind as they traveled along the beach.
Perhaps they were invincible. Perhaps they were meant to s
ave mankind, but these things plummeted to no importance. No meaning. Nicole had died. Faith had died. A cure was another impossible dream, so he disregarded the idea of saving her.
She is gone forever, never believe otherwise.
However, if there were a creature that had possessed Kale, turning him, causing Nicole’s death, Alec would find it and punish it. Following Jeff and Scot would help him achieve this goal.
The only thing they’re good for now.
After Nicole received full vengeance, he would be done with them, because they were not his friends, they were not his allies, they were not his brothers. Their dead lives meant nothing to him.
They were no better than Kale.
to be continued