Unrelenting Tide: A Post-Apocalyptic/Dystopian Adventure (Children of the Elements Book 4)

by Alexa Dare

  “Brody’s got his big-brain thinking going on again.” Junior groaned.

  Beneath them, like a tenant house near the railroad tracks, the ground rumbled.

  Awakened children screamed and scurried into a tighter packed pile to hold one another and hide their heads under blankets.

  “Sorry. Just got a sudden reach into the ground.” Junior planted his feet wide

  The tunnel floor settled.

  “Can you home in on where the girls are?” Abe squinted. “If we use the tunnels, and your earth quaking works, we could get through to them.”

  “Hey, watch out.” Junior smacked at the shaggy hair around his ears. “You scorched me.”

  Burnt hair stink rose in scattered tufts of smoke.

  Abe snapped his eyelids closed. “Sorry.”

  “It’s not a power if you can’t control it,” said Junior, jabbing a jutted jaw-backed glare at his older friend.

  “Fine. Right.” Abe kept his eyes closed as if he counted to rein in his firepower. “Junior you pick out the right kind of rocks, and I’ll heat them. The heated stones will keep the dampness off, and maybe we can cook. That is, if we find anything to eat.”

  As if their newfound powers were no big deal, Tonya parked her fists on too-thin hips. “We’ll find stuff all right.”

  “We’re hungry,” one of the kids whined.

  Meatballs. Like the limestone, bits were the size of garlicky, tomato sauce-covered—

  “Let’s move. Junior will tell you which rocks to pile and where.” Abe, aiming his gaze at the rock wall, peered out of one eye. “Hurry, because I can feel the need to burn slipping away even as it builds.”

  “Let’s go deeper into the tunnel. Grab some light.” Like six shooters, Junior held two bottles. “If we hurry, I’ll see if the ground can help me find Hannah and Darcy Lynn. Even Brody's Uncle and Miss Irene.” Though he sounded super confident, the ten-year-old’s brows dipped in bunched worry, like sideways question marks over his eyes.

  The gauntness of his and Abe’s cheeks…

  Brody tongued the sunken hollow of his own.

  Had any wildlife survived?

  Uncle Merv hunted wild turkey, deer, and hogs. With onion tossed in a pot, all of them cooked up real tender.

  His stomach grumbled with a squeaky squelch.

  While some of the children headed off to collect rocks, the girl who’d been handed the wiggling puppy, asked, “You’re the ones in the pictures. How do your powers work? You get brain smart, right?”

  “Sure.” Brody didn’t let up his scribbling. “When my thinking’s good, I understand and remember things.” He wrote down designs he intended to make, to keep them safe and for weapons. The plans for possible hunting traps quickly formed in his mind.

  A smaller towheaded little girl sidled over and asked, “The Abe boy does fire with a look, right?”

  “Yep, and Junior connects with the ground with touch. The two others that are not with us right now, one gets all emotional and can control water, while the other plays with the wind with her fingers.”

  “My uncle and his friends made you start the weather going wrong, didn’t he?”

  A dullness like a coating of sand spread in his mouth. Yearning for a gallon of fresh water, he rasped out, “Your uncle?”

  “Uncle Roderick made us run errands.”

  Brody’s scalp constricted so tightly that he shook his head as if hundreds of thousands of bugs crawled in his hair. “Your uncle and I, are, um, old friends.”

  “Mister, I hope you’re lying, because he and Yates and the others aren’t the kind of folks you want around.” The girl went back to playing with the puppy.

  A frantic Brody wrote and made lists while the hyped-up brainwave surge lasted.

  On one section of the wall he jotted down fiery rain, EMF charged rain, then the onset of headaches. Return of abilities came next. There had to be a pattern.

  If they could nail down the timing and the actual flux.

  He wrote until his arm ached, then he propped his right arm up with his left and kept writing.

  The cavern warmed.

  Grateful, Brody shot the gang a smile.

  The little ones were once again bedded down, while a large mound of rocks glowed orange from Abe heating the stones.

  Even among the smoky, unclean odors, the warm fumes wafting off the rocks, like a wood fire of pine and cedar, lent comfort along with the warmth.

  A glance over his shoulder told him Abe, Junior, and Tonya had gone on their run.

  The area round his heart banded tight.

  If the kids were harmed, or worse, it would be on him.

  The hurt in his head had eased, but he must keep writing before his smarts waned. His writing covered a twelve-foot wide and six-foot high section of rock wall. The whitish scribbles tilted and ran into other lines of lists.

  While he used the limestone against the damp rock wall, a fragrance like a natural rainstorm rose. The ozone wafted from the wet limestone, due to the reaction of calcium—

  His rapid ideas overran his scribbles.

  He couldn’t keep up. He recorded lists, drew design plans, and made notes until his fingers ached and the piece of rock pinched between his thumb and index finger crumbled to dust.

  Headache gone, with no idea how much time past, he stepped back.

  As the hyped-up reasoning and thoughts slowed to a trickle and seeped entirely from his mind, he stood before the wall, hands drooped low at his sides.

  Hope washed away was worse than having no hope at all.

  The writing on the wall...

  What did it all mean?

  The baby cooed from the middle of the kiddie pile, while the puppy snored curled up in the little girl’s arms. Hands on the puppy’s fur, toddlers sucked thumbs and chortled in their sleep.

  Brody hung his head and longed for the solitude to drown in his own tears.

  Chapter 13

  In Friday’s morning hours, once again in the small principal’s office and sitting at the wooden desk, Nora wiped blood from her chin and tossed aside the bone and gristle of a leg of lamb. Splat and squelch, the gnawed remains slid down the pastel blue wall. Eating granted her more energy, while at the same time boosting her need to feed.

  The dampness hanging in the elementary school building, under ordinary circumstances might chill and call for a sweater, yet today, her concern was for her level of decomp, odd how her nostrils dulled to personal rot, although the dropping temp might help.

  Nora eyed Roderick standing before the closed door. His last visit brought food, yet this trip, hmm, no treat in sight.

  A classic lift of her brow might share so much, yet Nora feared the stretching of her flesh might bring about further damage to her decaying body. The flesh around her lips seemed rather thin and fragile. Despite her attempt to keep her face stilled, a smile teased her outer lip corners. “Seconds?”

  “That’s the last.” Roderick stood before the principal’s massive desk and aimed the tilt of his forehead at her meal’s remnants.

  “For breakfast?” She edged the tip of her tongue along the inner side of her bottom lip. Surely, the tiny dip near the right corner of her mouth wasn’t a split.

  “For now.” He grunted a snort. “Here on out, if we don’t get to forage soon. Any idea what’s going on with the weather?”

  “If you’re finished feeding, uh, with enjoying your meal, there’s a matter we need to attend.” Roderick scooped bones tossed to the floor into a greenish black trash bag.

  Bits of bone, with tags of raw meat clinging between her teeth, should bother her. Yet Nora ignored the reek of the remains of her meal and her own dead body odor, while her nose keyed on Roderick.

  Ah. Sweet. Fresh.

  With a nod, Roderick passed her a stack of napkins from atop the file cabinet.

  Dabbing her chin, Nora lifted her highly keen nose. “Roderick, how many of your troops are posted in the building?”

  “There’s e
ight of us. Including me, makes nine.”

  Sniiiffff, sniff. “Why, then, do I detect ten living humans?”

  “There should be twelve of us.” Roderick toted the garbage bag toward the door. Handing out the remains, he ordered, “Bring in our guests. Have someone toss the bag into the gym and perform a visual headcount of all of our troops.”

  “Sir. Yes, sir.” A female voice replied, then barked orders to others farther down the hallway.

  Sad to watch the remnants of her last meal go, Nora eagerly waited.

  The female militia member, a high cheek-boned, shorthaired blonde clutched a semi-automatic rifle, and herded three bound prisoners before her.

  Two men and another woman.

  Lunch?

  No. To possibly feed on a human…

  Yet, the former flavor of the exquisite lamb faded far too quickly. Hunger already gnawing at her stomach, Nora could never, would never, cross that line. Yet she patted the corner of her mouth with a napkin.

  All three of her guests, hands bound behind their backs peered at her over white gags made up of medical gauze. The men, one bronzed with sun-kissed tousled hair and the other lighter skin with brunette hair, glared at her. The doe-eyed woman with long brown hair trembled in fear.

  “Vessels,” Roderick said. “Three unwilling and one willing.”

  “Roderick, please. Not this again.” Nora shoved the bloody paper towel into the top desk drawer, careful to shut the slightly warped drawer without leaving a finger behind.

  “We need strength and vitality. Your body is no longer of use to you. The lightning hit damaged mine.” Roderick cut a sideways glance, with his good eye, at the militia woman. “LeeAnne has offered to fill the role of your vessel. If you will have her, she is willing to be my mate.”

  LeeAnne nodded, prodding the three with her long-barreled gun to go to their knees on the gore-smeared floor before the desk.

  A brave woman in a zombie-infested world.

  While the willing woman possessed light golden hair and a fair skin, the bound woman had chestnut brown hair. High cheeks jutted above the gag, while emerald pupils set in overlarge eyes widened with fear.

  Exquisite. If only—

  “One of the two men will serve as my vessel. Yates and Doc and I would be honored if you would make that choice for us. We wish for our presence to please you.” Roderick leered as if the Yates part of him whispered, from the inside, in his ear.

  The current Nora’s cheeks might have blushed as they had when she was alive. At least, no more welts would appear on her chest.

  The olive-skinned prisoner would not darken much should she blush, while the blonde… What was she thinking? Perhaps not only Nora’s body, but her mind was going. Roderick’s delusion was becoming her own.

  “I can assist you in making the transfer. It’s what I was enhanced to be capable of.”

  Nora and the children had lost their powers, yet, was it possible that due to his specific ability, Roderick might be able to use his?

  A knock sounded at the door. Roderick whispered with one of his men.

  Nora was unable to resist the urge to shop.

  What strapping specimens they were. One of the male prisoners was blond and bronzed, with muscles bulging beneath his shirt. The other was lighter skin, not quite as muscled, yet he had raven hair, and the palest blue eyes Nora had ever had the pleasure of gazing into, except for the faint blue of Yates' and her son’s eyes, of course.

  What if...

  Perhaps, even in death, hope never dies.

  Nora wanted to believe. “Show me.”

  Yates' light eyes looked back at her from Roderick’s damaged face. “That’s my Nora Belle.”

  “First, I want to see the rest of the brunette’s face.”

  Yates, in Roderick’s form and clothing, sauntered over to the bound woman He removed her gag and stepped away.

  Yates caressed the trembling woman’s cheek with a brush of his knuckles. Her full lips were swollen from the gag, appearing kiss plumped, and the square of her lower jaw gave her character and strength.

  “Please don’t do this. Please let me go.” Tears, so tender and real, cascaded down the woman’s face. He tapped her lips with his finger.

  The woman whimpered and quieted.

  A pity Nora was incapable of pity. If only she could bottle the lady’s sharp whiffs of fear…

  Yates—Roderick—strode to LeeAnne and slid his jaw along her cheek. The caress was too at ease for this to have been the first shared touch between the two of them. The blonde closed her eyes and would have melted against Roderick had it not been for the gun across her chest.

  Green, vinegary, and snarling jealous, Nora growled.

  “Either lovely vessel would please me,” Yates said, “if it would mean having you back, Nora Belle.”

  “My men are going missing, and I’m not sure how long we’ll be able to hold them in the gym if they put their dead noggins together and come up with a breakout plan. We must get on with this, or we’ll have a full-out mutiny on our hands, in our group and with those of your kind.”

  “How exactly do we do this?”

  “You’ve made your choice for the vessel for Yates, Doc, and myself?”

  The bronzed hunk or the swarthy rogue?

  Such aspects no longer interested her, yet if she were whole and living and human again, who might appeal to her? “The rogue.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “The dark-haired one.”

  “I can see we three as your handsome rogue. Yates will be pleased.” Roderick unlocked and banged on the door. He yanked open the door. “Hold him aside, just in case.”

  Guards entered, keeping their gazes lowered away and from Nora, and dragged the blond Adonis away.

  The door closed as the chosen man swung his head and tried to push the gag from his mouth with his tongue.

  “I think he means to plead his case, but there’s no plea in the world that would keep me from living on, in a healthy, unmarred body.” Roderick stood in front of the man. He grabbed the chosen vessel’s hair and yanked his head up and back. “Not a word.”

  Nora’s attention swam within the ache inside her head. A metal zest overtook the savory memory of her just-eaten meal.

  “Instead of taking in his essence, we shall transfer into his.” Roderick yanked the gauze out of man’s mouth and let the cloth drop around his neck. In a booming voice, Roderick said, “We, with the vessel, shall become one.”

  The harshness of Roderick’s full exhale overtook the room. A wisp of whitish smoke—perhaps more of an essence—spewed from Roderick’s mouth.

  In the trace of sparking electrons, like a few moments before a natural storm, the chosen man tried to angle his face away, yet on his frightened gasp and inhale, the mist entered his nose and mouth.

  “My sacrifice I make for thee.” Roderick slumped. He lifted a wobbly head, with its ruined eye, and exhaled a loud, in-need-of-teeth-brushing breath.

  The vessel shook his head, and his red cheeks puffed.

  A fist from Roderick in the solar plexus sent a rush from the man’s lungs, then on his inward gasp, stringy vapor gushed out of Roderick’s gaping mouth and into the victim.

  Roderick’s body folded, and he fell.

  The rogue man caught him and eased the body to the ground.

  Bizarre. Fascinating. Real?

  The fresh corpse of Roderick lay on the floor.

  Hunger cramped, and a moan leapt from Nora’s throat.

  “Nora,” said the prisoner, with a dimpled grin.

  “Roderick?” asked Nora.

  “No reason to cause confusion this go around. We are Brockton Yates. Doc, Roderick, this vessel, and I have semi-merged, leaving me in charge.” The supposed new Yates smiled.

  The blond woman, taking far too caressingly long, freed the supposed new-and-improved Roderick’s wrists.

  With a one-sided smile, he dipped his chin and offered Nora his hand. The pale gaze belonged to Yate
s. He talked like Yates. “Your turn, Nora, dearest. The vessel of your choice awaits.”

  Chapter 14

  “Stop.” Hannah tipped her head. “The tapping again.”

  Amid metal scrubs and creaks of Peyton prying the hammer’s claw part around the door edges, from inside the safe room, bangs hit the metal slab.

  Wrapped in the sudden quiet, only Darcy Lynn, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Peyton’s, and her ragged breaths chugged. In the lower floor of the Rocky Top Observatory and in the dimming light of the light stick, carpet mildew reeked.

  Tap. Tap. Tap.

  “Do they say they have fizzy soda dopes?” Isaiah, his brown eyes wide, asked in a not-so-quiet whisper.

  “I like root beer.” Jeremiah held his wrench at the ready to fend off any Z around.

  “Orange or grape. Yummy,” added Darcy Lynn. “Is it breakfast time yet?”

  “Shut up, all of you. I’m getting in.” A snarling Peyton pried at the door seams with the screeching claw of a carpenter’s hammer.

  The metal hadn’t even dented, let alone opened.

  “You didn’t ask who else is there.” Darcy Lynn gripped the red tool handle with both hands.

  “Does it matter?” On her knees, Peyton gouged the metal doorframe in quick jabs.

  At Peyton’s scalding tone, Hannah’s temper boiled. She rushed forward and knocked the hammer from Peyton’s grip.

  “You little—”

  In spite of a dull pain throbbing in Hannah’s head, she leaned over the teen. “You’re a smarty pants with a mean mouth.”

  “Bossy too.” Darcy Lynn wagged her chin up and down.

  From overhead, five-gallons of water poured onto Peyton’s head.

  “What the—” Peyton shook her head and blew water through thick strands of hair hanging in her face.

  Hannah scooped the claw hammer from the floor. “Get out of my way, or there’s more where that came from.”

  Peyton parted her stringy, wet hair and peered out.

  “Move. We might only have a short time.” Hannah elbowed the older girl out of the way.

  “If you get them out, the Vincent guy is mine.” Peyton glanced upward as if gauging whether another water dump might fall.