by Josh Hilden
As they approached the flooded harbor area and the chaos of small sail craft and row boats that choked it, they were confronted by a horrid sight. There were literally hundreds of the once human creatures attacking the boats, their crews, and the refugees attempting to find safety.
She heard the Captain undue a clasp and then he touched her shoulder. She turned, and saw that he was handing her a long bladed knife that had been secured to his thigh.
“Don’t let them get you.” He said.
At first his words confused her but then she understood. The knife would be of little use against the monsters that looked like men. But a quick motion across her own throat would deny them the taste of her still flowing blood. She took the knife and nodded to him.
They began moving toward the boats, while trying not to catch the attention of any of the monsters. They’d traversed two thirds of the distance, when an obscenely fat creature she thought she recognized from Temple Services started lumber toward them. He was quickly followed by a dozen more who’d noticed fresh meat was in their midst.
The Dead swarmed around them, and the pair found their path blocked by a wall of her former kinsmen. She looked at the Captain and saw the dejection in his face. Even a warrior of his skill could not stop more than two dozen of the Risen Dead. Fear grabbed hold of her heart, and the swell of panic rose from her bowels. They stood close together, blades drawn, and watched the stumbling approach.
“No, no,” Tana said to herself as the Dead approached, and the smell of rot saturated her nostrils. “This cannot be happening, we have to stop them.” She said loud enough to be heard.
“It is happening, Lady.” The Sentry Captain said.
She gripped the hilt of the blade, and fury flashed through her as she looked at the boats and realized just how close they were to salvation. The water around her began to grow warm. Then the air glowed as if someone had lit a powerful lantern.
“My Lady, where is that light coming from?” The Captain asked.
Tana did not answer. She was suddenly outside herself and looking down on the scene from above. She could see the chaos sweeping across the island. She could see the fires, the floods, and the Army of the Risen Dead massing all around them. She looked toward the Temple on the Silver Mountain, and saw the colossal, shadowy figure of a winged demon standing astride the mountain top. The light emanating from the dome flashed through and around it’s incorporeal from.
Below her, she saw light building up around her physical body like a second skin. The captain shielded his eyes as the light glowed nearly as bright as the sun. The creatures slowed, and then tried to turn and run. But it was too late, white fire lanced out from her body and burned them all to ash where they stood in the water. The light and fire seemed to have no effect on anything else. She was weak all of a sudden, and her mind fell back into her body, which partially collapsed into the arms of the Captain.
“Are you alright?” He asked.
“Yes, just tired. I don’t understand what just happened.” She was so confused and exhausted.
“Neither do I, my Lady, but we have to run.” He took her hand and began leading her toward the still besieged boats at the sunken docks.
Tana and the Captain ran through the now breast deep water. For a moment Tana thought that she was going to make it, when she felt a hand seize her ankle below the water. She was immediately pulled off her feet. Then she was sliding into the thick wet murk of the rising waters. The hands grabbing her were small, and she thought that she caught a glimpse of a bloated child’s face. Tana tried to scream, and succeeded only in expelling all of the air from her lungs. She saw the face of the hideous child loom over her.
Then she passed out.
She awoke coughing and expelling water from her body in a gagging torrent. The rain was falling as cold and as steady as ever. The night had gone quiet.
“Are you well?” A familiar voice asked her.
She looked and saw the Captain kneeling next her, she felt a gentle rocking, and realized that they were on a boat. “What happened?” She asked, “I thought I was dead.”
He chuckled softly and then said, “You almost were, there was a blinding flash of light from the temple, and then it was utterly black. All of the demons dropped where they were standing and rose no more. I am not certain, but I believe the Speaker and the Initiates stopped the evil one.” He sat down weakly and looked at her. “No one will return to the top of Silver Mountain. If they are still alive they will have to find their own way to safety.” He looked to see if this angered Tana.
“I understand.” She said, but she was barely holding back tears as she said it.
He looked relieved and then continued, “I pulled you from the water and tossed you into the nearest boat.” He gestured to the craft they rested in, “You were not breathing, so I used the compression and breathe technique to revive you. Thank the Gods it worked.”
“Thank you, I don’t even know your name,” She said.
“It’s Talmus,” he said with a boyish grin that took years off of his face and revealed him to be very handsome.
She smiled shyly at him, then lifted her head and looked back at the island that had been their home. The last shred of At-Lan was slowly being engulfed by the sea. Tears streamed down her face, but she made no sound as they mixed with the rain.
“I have heard the first people to evacuate have established a base West of us on the Isthmus between the continents.” He said to her, when she didn’t respond he continued. “They say that the natives have been friendly.”
She didn’t reply. In the East, the sun was beginning to peek over the horizon. She thought that they would be safe for now, first the Speakers on Great At-Lan, and then the single Speaker on Silver Island, had worked a powerful magic to restrain Ast-Murath. She was the last of the Speaker Caste Bloodlines, and she was unsure of what her next course of action would be. She knew her Uncle and the other Initiates of the Temple had bought the human race some breathing room, but she did not know how much breathing room. It could be a year, 10 years, 100, 1,000, 10,000, or even a 100,000, but she knew that the Ancient Enemy would try again.
Tana leaned back onto the deck of the small boat and fell into a deep sleep. This sleep, like almost all sleep she would be granted till the end of her days, was punctuated by the face of the child under the water. When she looked toward the sky, she was sure that for an instant she saw the three strangers from the mountain again, sitting in the bow of the boat.
6
The Docks
12:10am EST
Wave after wave of the Dead continued to crash into the wall of steel the defenders had erected on the docks. Like Legionnaires from a long dead empire, they held the barbarians at bay with only the strength of their muscles, the sharpness of their blades, and the courage of their beliefs. Behind them, the rest of the people awaiting extraction from the docks were trying to cut the connection between the land and the long solid pier.
They were having very little luck in the effort.
The last of the ammunition ran out in the first five minutes of this final stand. The people of White Harbor were forced to rely entirely on melee weapons to keep the Dead at bay. Below the docks and the pier, the water of the bay was choked with the Dead forced over the sides and into the drink.
“We can’t keep this up!” Rich yelled at Jennifer as he hacked down another of the Dead clad in what was the defacto uniform of the White Harbor Militia. He wondered if he’d met the man before he died and rose to try and kill his former comrades.
“Ken says the Choppers are on the way.” She called back. Then stuck one of the Dead in the gut with her pike and flung him into the icy water.
“Well, they had better fucking hurry!” Rich yelled and then grabbed one of the defenders and jerked them back before a crawling corpse could sink its broken and blackened teeth into her leg.
The Dead continued to push them back one inch at a time. The space the defenders had to maneuver in
was not infinite, and it would not be long before their only option would be to take their chances in the dead infested water themselves.
Jennifer glanced back at the end of the docks, where the wounded not bitten were being protected. She wondered if Benny was OK. Then the growls of the Dead regained her attention, and she redoubled her efforts to sweep the space in front of her clean.
7
The Pump House
12:15am EST
David Hall stumbled through the dark interior of the fuel pumping house. He was having a very hard time maintaining his concentration, all he really wanted to do was lay down and take a nap. But he knew that if he did lie down, he would never get back up while he still had a pulse.
He and Thorn Hilstrand had considered there may come a time when they would have to use the tanks positioned near the water as an offensive weapon. From the central reservoir below the pump house, pipes ran to the older White Harbor power plant on the other end of town that now served as the emergency generator. The system was still kept full of diesel fuel in case of problems with the hydroelectric plant. Two weeks ago they’d manually opened all of the safety valves and rigged the pumps with Symtex. The main detonator was inside the pump house itself. It was that switch the quickly dying man was seeking. When the switch was flipped, the entire town of White Harbor would be consumed, along with anyone inside, by the conflagration. It was their option of last resort if they were overrun.
He’d thought Herb insane at the time.
“Have to light the fire.” He mumbled as he staggered toward the steps leading to the control room.
He kept Amy’s face in the forefront of his mind as he took the steps one at a time with a painful stagger. He’d finally unburdened his soul to her and received her forgiveness. Now he needed to make sure their enemies would never be able to threaten any of the people he loved again.
Especially Amy.
The door at the top of the steps was unlocked. When David turned the knob the well-oiled hinges opened with no squeak. The people who’d maintained the fuel depot had done their jobs well. David would have smiled if enough of the logical side of his mind had been left. The door swung shut behind him, and he staggered toward the desk. The detonator with its shiny red button that rested upon it.
David reached the table and stared at it. The grooves in the ancient wooden table which began its life more than 50 years ago as the table in some fisherman’s breakfast nook hypnotized him. There were dozens of ancient cigarette burns and uncountable scratches and gouges preserved under layers of furniture oil. David knew he had a job to do, but for the life of him he was unable to remember what that job was. All he cared about was the beauty of the ancient block of maple.
“Amy,” he whispered, and it was enough to jar him from the trance
his fever induced in him. David Hall knew he only had minutes and possibly seconds to complete his final duty on this Earth.
He reached his shaking, pale hand out and grasped the detonator, lifting it from the table. Then his thoughts changed, and he began to look around the room seeing it in a far different way. David Hall was gone, and the creature now existing in his body wanted only one thing.
To feed.
The Dead man in the sheriff’s uniform stumbled to the door and pushed on it, but it would not move. If he’d had the intelligence of a monkey, he might he realized he needed to pull on the door to open it and not push. But the creature only knew the glass in the door showed him there were more lights outside of the room, and its primitive intelligence equated light with food.
The David thing banged its fist against the door. The detonator it had forgotten fell to the floor. It bounced and the casing cracked, but the wires within were not jarred loose, and the batteries remained secured in their housing. David stepped over the remote a dozen times as he pounded on the door, until he finally stepped on it and the button was pushed.
The fuel pumping house was the first building consumed in the ensuing explosion. David Hall never felt a thing.
8
Somewhere Else
Some Time Else
The boats bore the refugees from Silver Island away to safety across the Americas. Amongst those survivors was the woman who would pass her lineage on to two little girls born in the twentieth century.
Kyle, Lisa, and Rudolph Clarke were transported to the top of the mountain. The scene was very different.
Kyle wasn’t sure how he knew, but he was convinced the scene they were watching was the top of the very same mountain in the present time. The temple which had been so grand and awe inspiring as the waters rose and the lightening crackled was now a vine covered ruin, with large sections of the walls and dome cracked and fallen. All around the ruins, dozens of the Dead walked aimlessly.
“Why are we here?” Kyle asked Lisa. He looked over at her, and saw the glow she’d been emanating was dimming.
“I don’t understand,” she said. The confusion in her voice was evident. “We should have gone back to the farm house.”
“Do you really think you were in charge of that little jaunt? I needed you to open the door to the other world. Once that was done, I was free to take us bodily wherever I chose.” Rudy said and then he laughed. “Now you will meet my God, and you, my dear, will finish the task that your pathetic sister failed in.”
Kyle and Lisa doubled over in pain as their physical bodies were drawn from the basement of the Jacobson farm, and merged with their essences on the island. The pain was excruciating and Kyle was only vaguely aware of the vomit rising and spilling down the front of his shirt, while his nerves burned with fire. Lisa screamed and wondered if this was what it felt like to be born. As the pain subsided and Kyle was again aware of his surroundings, he saw Rudy standing in front of them as solid as they were.
Before Kyle or Lisa could attack the mad man, bands of black energy erupted from Rudy’s hands and bound Lisa from head to toe. Kyle leapt toward Rudy, and was rewarded with a stiff kick to the chest that sent him flying. He passed straight through the tree line, and crashed to the ground inside of the jungle at the top of the mountain. His consciousness swam and he struggled to stay awake, every time his eyes closed, he knew the Dead would find and eat him if he lost consciousness. The pain, absent while they had been out of body, returned and his arms and shoulders were burning with agony.
In the distance, he heard Rudy retrieve Lisa from the ground and carry her toward the temple ruins. Kyle got up and began to head in the same direction. The dead all around the temple did not perceive him. He stuck to the tree line and entered the temple behind Rudy and Lisa.
The inside of the temple was dark, but Kyle had no problem seeing through the blackness. He was not sure how long the after effects of being in the other plane would linger here. He needed to capitalize on it for as long as possible. With each step, he felt the limitations of his physical body returning.
9
Lisa
Lisa struggled to escape her restraints, but her arms and legs were bound to her body. She was unable to move a single digit. The black ribbon constricted tighter with every twitch of her muscles.
“Don’t struggle too much. If they get much tighter you will not be able to breathe.” He chuckled. He seemed like he was having entirely too much fun for Lisa’s comfort.
“Fuck you.” She gasped and he laughed at her. Then he actually began to whistle a jaunty little tune as he carried her to the center of the structure. She wondered what had happened to Kyle, and hoped that he was still alive.
“It’s too bad about your friend. My master will be hungry when he emerges from the waters. But perhaps he provided some nourishment for the walkers outside.” He laughed again, and Lisa wished she had a free hand so she could punch him in his grinning face.
Rudy was moving very quickly down the shadowy hall. When they entered the vast central chamber, she recognized the room where her sister had met her final end. The recognition was a potent catalyst, and she lost the battle to keep t
he unshed pooling tears from falling. The hot salty fluid ran down her cheeks and splattered to the rotted stone floors below her.