Suddenly, his curiosity turns to terror as I feel my body yanked backward and up, through the branches of the trees and into the darkened stormy sky.
The force that has a hold of me snatches me down now, pulling me back down through the trees. The crash of thick branches snapping against my back and ribs make me want to cry out in agony, but I’m held captive within myself, unable to express my pain. I’m not sure if the cracking sounds around me are the branches or my body breaking as the pain spreads over my body. All too quickly, the sky disappears from above and I hit the ground hard, an audible, “Ugh,” forced from my mouth, the only sound from me that is truly mine.
Both disturbing and surprisingly, I haven’t lost consciousness. Well, I don’t think I have. I hear my labored breathing, the sound from the beating of my heart, and below that, a trickling sound that I’ve heard before, recently, in a vision.
Am I in a vision?
Instinctually, I open my eyes, hoping I’m still in the now. With my vision crossing and blurring, I blink countlessly, trying to see.
I feel a cold tickling liquid current moving over and around my left hand. Water; it’s the stream from my vision.
Abruptly, a foreign and disturbing voice startles me, stirring my nerves and charging my adrenaline as it says, “You are not in a vision.”
Trying to get up, but still feeling disoriented from the fall, I roll over, placing my hand onto the softened ground at the edge of the stream. My hand sinks into the mud slightly, and then settles on the hardened ground beneath. With the support of my hands, I rise on my left knee first without a problem, but when I put pressure on my right one, I feel searing pain shoot up my thigh and into the pit of my stomach. Overcome by the agony, I wail as I push through it and rise on my feet shakily. I look down at my right knee and see the evidence of my suffering; my pant leg has been ripped open from kneecap to upper thigh revealing raw flesh mixed with too much blood. I’m not sure if it is the spasming throb of the wound as I stand on my injured leg, or the sight of it that almost claims my consciousness. Whichever it is, I breathe through it shakily; in and out, in and out.
You can do this, Jes. C’mon, move! I hobble and drag, hobble and drag my right leg, drudging through the stream and pushing myself lamely through the sloped wood.
Remember the vision, dammit!
I close my eyes and see the shaman pulling me along with him. As quick as the glimpse of the vision has come, it is gone, leaving me blinking and wondering how I just did that. How did I enter and exit the vision on command?
Now on sloped wood, I start climbing as I attempt to command seeing more of the vision.
Onawah being pulled along by the shaman up a hill. Once again, the flash of my divination is gone, leaving me adrift and unhinged, but not so much as to not understand that my vision is trying to guide me right here and now.
I whisper, “This is the stream and the slope she climbed.”
I look up at the slope and see the heavy brush barring any exit from the small open patch. I turn around and look down the slope back at the stream, then whisper, “No, they crossed further back.”
With my mind trying to work out where I’m based off of my vision, I notice the pain subsiding enough that I give it a go and step on my right foot fully now. I start to head back down the slope toward the stream, when I hear a rustling in the thicket ahead of me. It is quickly absorbed into a roll of thunder and unexpected flash of lightning, but I freeze in my steps, not taking any chances. The sky quickly darkens shrouding the brush and trees ahead into darkness again and the rumble of thunder fades. The rustling in the wood has faded with it.
Until Nate shouts my name, “Jesca!”
Charged by his voice, I step down on my foot outright, forgetting the pain, and attempt to run toward his voice. “Nate!”
CHAPTER 36: WEAKNESS
Xander
Tessa’s entire body is trembling in my arms as I hold her close and move away from the panicked and yelling guardians and Rephaim. Shiva is snarling at the guardians, freaked out and confused by their attack on Elisabeth. I push past Nick and Ezra into the open path and instantly I see Jesca standing by herself, frozen in place. What is she doing?
“Jesca?”
There is no attempt to answer or move toward me. She remains cemented to the ground. The slightest quiver in her lips and her eyes widening with fear are the same symptoms I saw by the bus. It’s a trap! Just as I step toward her, Jesca’s body is wrenched backward and snapped up off the ground and into the trees.
Before her body disappears into the trees, Ezra dashes past me and yells, “No! Jesca!”
Shiva is barking hysterically, running into the bush in the direction Jesca’s body was yanked.
Tessa is crying and yelling so hard for Shiva, she can barely catch her breath.
“It was a trap!” I yell.
Ezra kicks at the earth with an angry grunt and paces back and forth, his hands covering his face.
I feel a hand rest on my arm and look back to see Ms. Olivia open her hands to take Tessa from me. I quickly give her over and stride back to the widening huddle around Sebastian and Elisabeth. I don’t expect what I come upon; Sebastian holding a very still and colorless Elisabeth cradled in his arms. Sebastian is stroking her silvery hair away from her face, rocking her. His words are simple, “Her heart has stopped. It took the weakest of us to get to her.”
It had used Elisabeth, killed her to distract us from Jesca.
I think about the times this hybrid Dweller has attacked, who it has attacked. It had targeted Nate, then me, Elisabeth, and Jesca. Wait, where is Nate? I spin around, scanning for him, and then I remember Nick calling out for him before Jes was taken. Did he know that it was a trap before the rest of us? Why would he run into the woods? Unless, he was involved in the trap. Did the hybrid Dweller kill Elisabeth then leap into Nate? The thoughts sink in and I know in my gut that I’m right. It has Nate again.
Hurriedly, I search for Nick. He is on the edge of the path with Elicia by his side. I stalk over to him and take hold of his shirt, pulling him to me. “You saw him last! Which way did Nate go?”
Taken aback by my agitation, Nick leans back from me and says, “We were walking, then all of a sudden he ran off.” He nods toward the woods to the right. “Right there. He went in there.”
Realizing I’m still clinging to Nick’s shirt, I let go and step back from him. Ezra comes to my side as I try to make sense of the direction of Nate’s and Jesca’s disappearance. It doesn’t make sense. Where he went is in the opposite direction of where Jesca was pulled.
Ezra’s urgency is visible as he grabs hold of my arm. “We need to go after her, Xander! It is using Nate!”
Daniel tries to bring reason to the situation, “What if this is another trap?”
Ezra lets go of my arm and argues flippantly with Daniel, “This hybrid Dweller used Elisabeth to distract us. Nate could be a part of this or not. Either way, the trap has already been set and it has the one person that can end all of this.”
Shiva comes charging back from the woods, drawing all of our attention. She is crouched down, looking through the cluster of us at something beyond us. The animalistic gnarling rumbles snap me to attention. What I see gives me an adrenaline spike so strong, I feel pinpricks running along my arms and scalp from the rush of fear. Three beasts the size of bears are stalking toward us, stealthily. Lightning flashes above us, spotlighting the blackened eyes and unnatural fibrous muscle mass these mutated creatures possess.
Nick hisses a chain of curses behind Ezra and me as we both pull our guns. Drawn to our weapons now, the beasts raise their bulbous heads and display their enlarged razor-sharp teeth. The one in the middle releases a carnal roar, initiating their charge.
Ezra’s command to fire on them is swallowed by our emptying our ammunition on them. As the bullets strike, it only see
ms to agitate them as the bearlike Dwellers rear up, and then charge us full force.
Seth and Cale are the first to rush them, daggers drawn. Ira cuts around through the woods to attack from behind. Seth releases a rebel yell just as he plows into one of the beasts, sending it airborne then landing flat on its back. He doesn’t give it a chance to rise, taking his dagger and slitting the creature’s throat from ear to ear. As the inky Dweller begins to withdraw through the vessel’s widened mouth, Seth takes hold of it instantly and rips it apart with his hands, turning the evil being to ash. Ira has killed another and I catch sight of him just as he rips another Dweller to shreds.
Ezra and I pull back, guns held steady as we huddle close to the other guardians, back to back. I’m searching the woods anxiously for more of these freakish creatures awaiting their attack, when Tessa screams from behind me. Another one of these mutated bearlike creatures is coming up from behind us on the other side of the path.
Daniel bellows in fear, “Another to the left!”
Low and behold, another beast reveals itself, parting the thicket with its enormous body, ready to pound on us.
Siobhan hisses, “They will just keep coming. We need to get out of here!”
Jake adds, “We need to use our abilities to get to the mounds, Sebastian.”
I growl, “What about Jesca and Nate?”
Ezra demands, “We will go after them!”
Shiva is snarling at the slow-stalking Dweller mutation.
Obviously angry with himself, Daniel snaps, “Damn, we are going to have to separate!”
Ms. Olivia argues, “We can’t! That is what it wants!”
Ezra bellows back at her, “It wants us dead! We have to! It will be harder for it to get us all at once!”
Ezra fires his gun at the creature in the thicket. It looks like it is recoiling, but then surprises me and leaps at us. Lathan’s roar precedes him as he throws his body into the beast, sending it into the one behind us. Both beasts roll, but recover instantly and are ready to draw blood as they charge us again. We fire at the two remaining beasts as a blaze of fire shoots from Jake’s open hands, covering them in flames. The screeching and gnarling shrills coming from the fire-laden bodies are so loud, I have to cover my ears.
I look around frantically, trying to see if there are any other beasts stalking toward us. The remains of the bodies are all I see until Lathan announces, “Another one!”
I turn to see it coming from the woods on the right. Another flash of lightning brightens a cluster of tree trunks with the large frame of this beast approaching low to the ground.
Daniel speaks quickly, “He’s right! Sebastian, Luke, Siobhan and Jake, take Olivia and Tessa! Nick, Elicia, Corinna and Sam, you come with me! Use your ability to astral project!”
Ezra’s anger boils over. “You can’t! It’s too dangerous!”
Daniel yells back, “We have to if we have any shot of making it to the mounds!”
He was right; two miles between here and there, they needed to get there quick.
Daniel continues, “It will draw the Dwellers in different directions! They can’t attack all of us at once! It is our only shot! Cale and Seth will guard us along the way!”
Daniel looks at Cale and Seth. They both nod and ready themselves to run. Suddenly, half of our cluster disappears into the atmosphere, leaving Ezra, Ira and Lathan to the approaching beast now tearing through the brush to get to us.
Lathan commands Ezra and me, “Run!”
Without thinking, I run in the direction I saw Jesca disappear. Ezra is next to me in a flash keeping stride. I hear Shiva ahead of us. She stayed behind.
I tell Ezra, “She is tracking her.”
I see Ira’s blurred frame, steady and keeping pace with his enormous strides to my right. The feeling of Lathan’s presence follows to my left.
In a flash, I catch sight of Shiva’s silver coat shining under the electric discharge from above, just as Jesca’s voice carries through the wood.
She says his name, “Nate.”
My panic spikes and I pick up my pace, racing to get to her before anything bad happens.
CHAPTER 37: INTENTIONS
Jesca
“Jesca!”
Nate’s second call to me is urgent, but coming from behind me. I turn to change directions and I trod back through the stream, feeling a little steadier on my injured leg when my feet are pulled out from under me. My chest and chin hit the ground hard and the gripping force that has yanked me off my feet drags me along the musty loam and into the frigid shallow water of the stream.
The compressive grip around my ankles softens and releases. I take my chances in rolling over and drawing my gun on the thing that has attacked me.
When I see his bloodied face against his dark skin, and the dull gray tone of his once brown eyes, it takes me mere seconds to register who my attacker is. “Briggs.”
The hybrid Dweller has him. The scenario of our truck colliding with the torn-up asphalt, causing us to crash, and Briggs being drawn from the wreckage by this hybrid Dweller before we emerged, or Ira and the other Rephaim could find him, zips through my mind as I scoot myself out of the stream with one hand, aiming my gun at him with the other.
The hissing voice comes again from inside of my head, “Noooo, not Briggs.”
This hybrid Dweller uses Briggs to start moving on me. I fire two shots at his chest before the click, click, click of an empty clip replaces the sound of gunfire. I drop the gun, turn, and try to scramble through the muddy soil. My speed isn’t enough.
Briggs’ hands grip my shoulders and flip me on my back. Crouched over me, Briggs brings his face to mine, narrowing his clouded eyes and opening his mouth.
I place my hands on his shoulders, attempting to push him away. I use all of my strength, but it is not enough against Briggs and the hybrid Dweller within him.
That is when I see Nate charging full speed at us out of the corner of my eye. Not slowing the closer he gets, he bears down and charges Briggs, throwing him off me and into the water. Nate leaves me and rushes Briggs.
Ignoring the pain, I rise to my feet and yell at him to stop, “Don’t Nate!”
Before Nate gets to him, Briggs leaps high above him into the trees, dodging his attack. The rustling above moves around us from tree to tree in a circle as Nate comes back to my side.
Surprised, I hear Xander yell my name just as he, Ira, Ezra and Lathan spring from the heavy woods with Shiva keeping pace behind them. Xander’s eyes are charged with anger as he glares at Nate.
I yell to them, “No, it’s Briggs! It has Briggs!”
No sooner I say his name, Briggs drops from the treetop onto Ira’s back, then rolls to the ground. Ira is on his body instantly, with one hand holding him down and other wielding his dagger up high. Ezra, Nate, Xander and Lathan huddle around me guardedly looking on as Ira delays his strike.
Lathan growls “Kill him, Ira!”
Ira peers at us nervously as he says evenly, “It doesn’t have him!”
I feel the woods around me closing in, knowing that the hybrid is loose again among us.
Ira lowers his dagger and releases Briggs’ body back to the ground. Lathan backs into us, guardedly looking among the trees above.
Ira rises and, just as he stalks toward us, a shooting pain and current of nausea has me bent in half. Ezra, Nate and Xander take hold of my hands and arm to keep me from toppling over.
As I catch my breath and stand as upright as I can without the paining coming again, Nate and Xander release my hands, but Ezra’s tight hold on my hand remains. I feel the slightest tremor radiating from his palm and I fear the worst. I look at him and see that his warm brown eyes have gone cold and milky.
It has him! The hybrid Dweller has Ezra!
I try to make him fight. “No, Dad. Fight it! I know you a
re in there!”
Nate and Xander try to pry Ezra’s hand from mine.
Xander yelling, “Ezra! Let her go! Ira, help!”
No, not Ira! He will kill him! My vision blurs from the tears welling up in my eyes as I hold my free hand out to Ira and cry, “No! He can fight it! He’s strong!”
Suddenly, I hear the screeching sound of the birdlike Dweller creatures again. I look up to see them circling low, ready to strike.
Ira places his hands on top of Ezra’s and mine to try to separate us.
I wail, “Please don’t leave me! Fight it, Ezra!”
My saddened wail shifts to a yawp of blustering anger as I narrow my eyes on my father. “Damn it, Ezra! Fight back!”
The guttural growls and snarls of the Dweller creatures are distinct and frightening. I angle my eyes in the direction of the sound and see three of them approaching us. Behind them, a mass of human-occupied Dwellers spotlighted by the flashes of lightning are writhing and tearing through the woods straight toward us.
Having seen them, Lathan bellows over the roll of thunder, “Ira, they are coming!”
I take hold of Ezra’s other hand and continue my howling assault. Ira, Lathan, Nate and Xander are trying to pry us apart. I grind my teeth as I try to stay tethered to him. “I won’t let you go! It can’t have you too!”
My eyes dart to the creatures crouching low to the ground making their approach. Then dart to the sky, the Dweller hawks stalking us, getting closer to attack. I look at the human Dwellers charging the woods; men, women, and children. Fear, pain, sorrow, agony, hate, love, every emotion within me is rolling, stirring, building.
I look back at Ezra and pull him into my arms, clapping my arms around him. Nate, Xander, Ira and Lathan take hold of me and try to pry me from my father, but I lock onto him with no intention of letting go.
I whisper into his ear, “I won’t let it have you, Dad. I love you.”
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