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

by Alexa Dare

  “The bug is burning the metal can.” Vincent leaned away.

  Overheated metal then scorched corn lifted in little white puffs of smoke.

  “Something isn’t right.” Hannah tipped on her toes and peered into the shadows.

  “Firefly.” One of the boys reached cupped hands upward.

  The second boy hopped up and down.

  A blinking lightning bug spiraled downward.

  “No,” Merv bellowed. “Don’t touch it.”

  Isaiah jerked back and fell onto his backside. Both boys screwed up their faces and bawled.

  Merv chugged the remaining water in the jug. He handed the glass container to Irene. As delicate as if she collected insects every day, she captured the blinking bug and capped the jar.

  The insect blinked yellow, and a liquid moistened the curve of the glass and steamed.

  “Something liquid. Like acid.” Merv unscrewed and tipped the top a tiny bit to the side and sniffed.

  Tart rotten apple fumes turned his head aside.

  Hannah shivered and pinched shut her nose.

  Tears from the smell seeping from the outer corners of his eyes, Merv tugged his beard. “These are no everyday bugs, but mutations caused by Brody’s storm.”

  Vincent eyed the ceiling. “There are more of them.”

  “We want out,” Merv said, “and this little fellow is your answer.”

  More bangs vibrated against the metal door, then a muffled yelling ensued.

  “I can get the door open, but no telling what lies on the other side. Hate to have to fight a child.” Merv handed Hannah the jar and dragged himself along the floor. “Look for gloves, the sort with long-sleeves . “ You two are catching lightning bugs.”

  Hannah met Vincent’s saucered gaze.

  Three more loud clangs resounded against the door.

  “First, acid-filled insects,” a dazed Vincent said. “Secondly, this Peyton person is out to get me, as you say.”

  “You haven’t met Peyton yet. She should be at the top of your list.”

  One side of Vincent’s mouth shot up.

  Hannah matched his smirk and enjoyed their making fun of a situation that was anything but funny.

  The sticks’ glow faded as the use of the chemicals ran out and more lightning bugs flashed in the deepening shadows.

  So not funny.

  Chapter 17

  While Nora waited for the dimness outside the crank-out windows to lighten from the black of night to the charcoal of day, Nora sat in the school principal’s gore-smeared office, three healthy, living hearts pumped.

  Musky red glops, shiny in kerosene lantern light, slimed the walls where she’d tossed lamb bones and gristle. If she had a bone, she might gnaw a few more bits of meat or suck out the marrow. The man, who’d taken care of her after she turned, lay dead on the black and white squares of the floor.

  Trying not to think about her next meal being anytime soon, she listened for, but failed to hear, the beat of her own heart.

  Yet, the dark-haired man’s—Nora could think of him as Yates for now she supposed—pulse maintained a steady thrum, while the blonde’s pulse skittered, with excitement no doubt.

  A wonder the brunette prisoner’s ribs contained the harsh pounding within her chest.

  Roderick’s body lay, forgotten, except the zombie part of her brain homed in on Nora’s need to feed.

  “Make your choice, Nora, and I will gladly assist with the transfer.” Yates, his cornflower blue eyes sparkling, said.

  “Kill me.” Trails of tears marred the dark-haired woman’s cheeks. “Please.”

  “You’d rather die than have the honor of serving as a vessel? Rather than have a chance to live forever?” Yates strode to stand beside Nora.

  “I don’t want to be one of the dead walking the earth. Like her.” The woman wept. “Or to have one take me over.” Her fear lent an enticing sharpness to her meaty freshness.

  Not meat.

  Human. Living.

  Vessel?

  Could the hurt in her head cause her to imagine things? Brains decomposed. She was dead after all. She hungered to eat, yet, she had seen—hadn’t she?—vapor leaving Roderick and entering the dark-haired man.

  After the supposed transfer, the man insisted she call him Yates.

  A rogue, in looks in essence and spirit, the new and much improved Yates steered her to stand between the two women. The warmth seeping from the man’s fingers into the dead flesh of her hand certainly felt real, as did the absence of his touch when he released her to drag Roderick’s body aside.

  She tested the air with her nostrils. Only three meaty-fresh living beings remained inside the room. Roderick was truly dead, and she was well past dying.

  Yates rolled Roderick’s corpse against the wall.

  The body thudded and didn’t move.

  “Time holds still for no one,” said Yates. “Make your choice, Nora Belle.”

  Nora lifted her hand.

  The blonde elbowed the bound woman out of the way and lunged at Nora. “Pick me. I’m worthy.” The persistent woman threw herself into Nora’s arms.

  Nora gripped LeeAnne’s upper arm to push her away.

  Dead was one thing. Dead and damaged due to an obsessive woman’s stupidity another.

  Upon Nora’s touch, the woman’s eyeballs shot upward and rolled behind her eyelids, so that the irises jittered out of sight and the whites gazed outward. Was the foolish woman in rapture of some sort?

  “Ah. Uhn.” Color drained from her smooth features. Her full lips gaped in a twisted grimace.

  “No, no, no. Too many times before.” Nora’s kill-by-touch ability had returned in a rapid surge. “Not again. Not now.”

  “Let her go,” yelled Yates.

  Nora eased the grip of her claw-like fingers.

  The blonde tossed back her head, arched her back, and went limp.

  Lowering the once-lovely woman’s corpse, Nora sucked in sharp drool, yet dribbles spilled from her mouth corners. The memory of the chewy lamb flesh wrenched the hinges of her jaws. Hunger gnawed from the inside of her stomach like a beast chewing to get out.

  With deep regret, she placed the dead woman’s body near where Roderick had once lain.

  The brunette prisoner swayed to her feet. Shock distorted her face into a sweat-glistened mask. She backed away until her bound hands and back smacked the wall.

  As if either would keep her from suffering the touch of death.

  For the first time since Nora’s death, Nora enjoyed a surge of elation, so close to an infusion of life. She’d touched the blonde, and her heart had stopped in an instant. Nora could halfway imagine a flush warming her own cheeks.

  Pounding shook the door.

  “Roderick,” a man called out. “The zombies are loose.”

  The new-and-improved Yates shoved the sniveling woman, then the other man across the room.

  The terrified female prisoner mewled and swatted at him as if he were a swarm of tiny gnats. The man dragged his feet as if in a death march.

  “Take them.” Yates pushed the woman into the hallway.

  “Roderick?” asked the guard from beneath his baseball cap bill.

  “We are one.” Yates lowered his forehead in quick nod.

  “Code word?” The guard pointed the barrel of a shotgun at Yates’ Rev 3’s face.

  “Good job, soldier.” Yates chuckled. “Lazarus.”

  “You chose well. You look great, sir.”

  “No more flaming rain?”

  “No sir. The opposite. Slush just like before a big snow.” The guard gripped the female prisoner’s upper arm. “Zombies got out when we tossed in the bones. They blocked the door from closing with old animal remains. Used bones as weapons. Might have been human parts. Heck, I don’t know.”

  Yates glanced back, meeting Nora’s gaze with his newly minted one.

  “I can’t risk touching you at the moment. I promise that I’ll be back for you. You have my word.�
� Yates slipped out, taking his living masculine musk with him.

  The door snicked closed behind him.

  “Your word doesn’t mean squat, Yates. You and I both know that.” Nora shuffled to the door. She turned the knob. Her fingers connected with wood. The nail of her little finger pried away and went flying. “Broke another nail. Darn.”

  “They might not kill her,” the man said from the hall. “Then again, they might tear her limb from limb. You truly want to leave her?”

  A thump slammed the wooden slab.

  “Do.” Whump. “Not.” Wham. “Question.” Thump. “Us.” Something thudded to the floor. A red puddle, reeking of a coppery stink, spread under the bottom of the door.

  Along with the insight that Yates killed the guard, Nora allowed herself a blink. “You’re a fool Brockton Yates or Doc Halverson or Roderick or roguish stranger or whoever you are. My brain is literally rotting in my skull, and I have more sense than you.”

  “I’ll come for you. Soon.” Yates’ voice dropped low as if to caress her through the wood. “We’ll figure out how to align you with your vessel.”

  “Is such a transfer possible, Yates?” Perhaps Yates wasn’t the only fool. “Truly?”

  “Yes, Nora Belle. We will find a way.” Dragging sounds could be heard scraping against the floor, and the heady blood pool stopped spreading inward.

  Footsteps faded down the hallway.

  Nora placed her hand on the door’s surface. Alone. Trapped. Left behind by a man who’d abandoned her and his unborn son so many years ago.

  Nora held no illusion, putrid brain or not.

  There was no hope for the dead.

  ***

  Bangs and sounds of scratches on wood yanked her from her sorrow. Zombies bumped against and attacked the door to get into the office.

  Nora’s skull no longer felt as if it split in two, nor did she perceive the beating of hearts of those inside the school.

  From their body odor and meaty aroma, she knew the few living headed for the building exits. The reek of the not living filled the outer hallways as they fed on the body of the murdered guard and clawed at the door.

  “We know you’re in there,” one called out.

  Nora shuffled behind the desk. Streaks of gore marred the floor from the drag of her foot on her injured leg.

  “There’s more than enough to go around, Nora,” the muffled voice growled through the door.

  Enough?

  Oh, the bodies of Roderick and the blonde.

  The door wouldn’t hold the zombies any more than locking them in the gym. However, they were reasoning creatures, like herself, and where there was reasoning therein lay the option for possible persuasion.

  “Help me.” The former scientist sat in the office chair and raised her voice an octave or two. “Please.”

  The banging and frantic scraping eased to a shifting of movement in the hall.

  “They’ve locked me in. Please let me out.”

  Nora, when alive and now dead, enjoyed drawing others in. But from the way she’d used her son in the past, she was a horrible monster even before she became a zombie.

  “What kind of mother was I?” she muttered on a stale, rotten breath.

  No mother at all.

  Still, she’d hopefully raised her son to be strong and to survive. He was out there, more than likely alone.

  Unless the flames from the sky—

  “No, Vincent and the others survived.” She wouldn’t allow herself to consider otherwise.

  Wood cracked.

  The frame broke apart, and the door swung open with a wham against the inner wall.

  A zombie woman with one eyeball wobbling from tendrils upon her upper cheek shuffled into the office. Her stiffened arm gestured at the bodies.

  “For you.” Nora risked a flesh-splitting grin. “Take them.”

  For the time being, she couldn’t bring herself to feed on other humans. At least, not yet. Even though she’d just had her first zombie-meal of raw lamb minutes before, urgent hunger clenched her insides. The need to chew sinewy flesh ached in and agitated her lower jaw.

  With snarls and growls, the zombies tore into the corpses.

  “Show some respect.” The one-eyed zombie woman said. “Out in the hallway.”

  “Aren’t you the local librarian?” Nora studied the elderly woman’s gray, slackened face. “I remember you, from years ago.”

  “Was. When the library existed and before…”

  “You died.” Nora dipped her chin in a mild nod.

  “They want to tear you apart because they blame you.” The graying, frizzy-headed librarian tapped the earpiece of her black plastic glasses frames with an unbending and crooked goo-smeared index finger.

  “Yet you are keeping them in check.”

  “We need your knowledge. We have living ones we care about, and we want to save them from such suffering.”

  “How?”

  “By making sure they don’t turn out like us. We’ll feed on the lowlifes, murderers, and thieves. We want our loved ones to have a decent world to live in.”

  Would the flavor differ so much from lamb?

  “I want my son to grow up in a world better than one feeding on—” Nora stared at the decaying zombie librarian and wished for a spring-fresh room spray. “If we bring Yates and his men back in, we can use them to gather more food.”

  From outside, the sound of a machine, not a car but louder and hulking, drew near. Through crack-ridden windowpanes, Nora peered out. What looked like lanterns swung before the hulk.

  The former armory tank, once used by Yates’ former cohort Merv and the children, pulled up in front of the school.

  So, the two missing men had been tasked for a job. Had Roderick known and chosen to mislead her? Or did the Yates’ part of him keep the quest from Roderick? Too much and too out there for her not-quite-sharp brain to grasp.

  Yet, she intended to outwit the best of them. Nora said, “We need to corral the living.”

  “For food?”

  “At first, as workers. If they are able to get out, they can scrounge for our meals. Just think… There must be housed venison, beef, and jailed convicts just waiting for us.”

  The former librarian’s glasses sat at a forty-five-degree tilt on the bridge of a nose that sagged into her face.

  Did Nora herself look that horrid? Stink that much like road kill?

  The woman held on to the doorframe as if her skeleton might not hold her upright. “Capture those alive and bring them to the gym. In the meantime, clear the place of all bones that might be used to block the door or as weapons.”

  “We need all of them alive.” Nora said.

  “Alive. No taste testing.” the older lady relayed what Nora wanted. She returned to the window. “The glass is either breaking from the cold or—”

  Clinks showered against the pane.

  Hail?

  From under the outer door awning, a man, the Adonis she’d hallway coveted as Yates’ vessel, rushed out of the building toward the tank. Shards of ice hit him, knocked him down. He writhed on the ground and screamed.

  Icy spikes, the length and width of foot-long icicles, yet flattened like thin knife blades, fell.

  In seconds, the ice sliced the man to bloody ribbons and cut off his scream. Within moments, a bloody pulp, mixed with shredded denim and canvas material, lumped near a military tank—possibly the same tank once used by Merv—tracks.

  Just outside, close to the front exit, shots banged, and the guards yelled.

  Poor fellows.

  Nowhere to go, with zombies hot on their tails.

  The wobble of her left back molar stilled Nora’s grin. Not long after the firestorm, Nora briefly regained her powers. While it might take a few modest attempts, Nora must time her transfer into a new vessel.

  As she sought another chance at life and with her son, she would send out her zombie army and bring her children home.

  The real fun was just about
to begin.

  Chapter 18

  Hate. Hate. Hated. Spiders.

  About as much as he hated snakes. Giant black widows? Even more so. Brody tugged an inhale through his teeth like canned air into computer guts.

  In the damp and earthy cavern, super strong webs draped one whole side of the wide tunnel area. Within the webbing, fist-sized black widows, with creepy, orange eyes, clung. The hourglasses on their underbellies glowed in silent warning.

  A quiver crawled from his tailbone to the top of his head as if too many hinged legs crept up his spine. A persimmon-tinged ball of fear slid down his throat leaving his mouth as dry as bone dust.

  Beneath the sticky webs, the baby swaddled in a pink blanket and two soot-dirtied toddlers slept on a pallet of scratchy blue wool blankets heavy from the earlier barn fire smoke.

  The webs vibrated from the leg movement of the glow-in-the-dark, oversized arachnids with inch-long fangs.

  Junior, Abe, Tonya and one of the other kids, mouths agape, stood nearby in a silence, as if they’d forgotten to inhale.

  In a stillness as hushed as a pre-zombie mausoleum, his breath out-ramped the rush of his pulse. “I kept seeing movement out of the corner of my eye, but when I checked, I didn’t see anything. I let myself be outplayed by flipping spiders.”

  “We have to save the little ones.” Tonya retrieved Brody’s shovel from its lean against the wall. With a quick jab, she poked a web strand with the scoop of the blade.

  “Wait.” Brody lunged for the long handle.

  The nearest spider skittered across the web. A few feet from the edge of the white mass, the black widow lifted its front legs. The fangs opened, and the thing hissed.

  Brody took the shovel from her.

  “Ooh. Creepy. Ugly.” Tonya grimaced and backed away.

  “Quiet, you’ll hurt its feelings,” said Abe.

  “This isn’t funny.” Tonya propped one fist on her hip and wagged her pointy finger at the thirteen-year-old. “Think about the babies.”

  Beneath the swaths of webs, two toddlers, one a little girl, and the other a boy, and the girl baby stirred as if each sensed, even in sleep, something amiss.

  Amiss?

  Heck fire, they were in trouble with a capital T.