Children of the Apocalypse: Mega Boxed Set

by Baileigh Higgins

“Lucy, I love you. Never forget that. I love you.”

  “I love you too, Mommy.”

  “Now be quiet, sweetheart. Please, or he’ll hear you. Don’t let him hear you.”

  “O…o…okay, Mommy.” Lucy pressed a fist against her lips, muffling the sobs that wracked her body.

  “Don’t…don’t let him find you.” The words came out softly, a gurgle twisting the vowels as blood gushed up Eleanor’s throat to pour onto the floor. Lucy watched as the creeping pool of sticky black fluid crept across the ground.

  Eleanor’s struggles ceased as the strength left her body, the only movement coming from Jared as he pushed and pulled at her broken body. Her last words left her lips on a wisp of air, a single exhale. “Live, Lucy. Live.”

  The sounds of frantic struggle and pain died away, replaced by the wet sounds of chewing and slurping. Lucy closed her eyes against the reality that faced her. Her mother was dead, and the monster was eating her. The same monster that mustn’t find her.

  She turned away from the grate and pressed her hands to her ears. She closed her eyes and willed the room apart. Willed the sounds of death and the smell of blood away.

  I’m not here. I’m at home. I’m watching cartoons. Mommy is baking me a birthday cake. Chocolate and strawberries. I’m turning six this year. Next year, I’ll go to big school.

  Daddy is happy. He’s laughing and look, he’s kissing Mommy. She’s happy too. She’s smiling. We’re happy. We’re all happy, and nothing is wrong. Nothing. Happy, happy, happy, happy.

  The scene faded away, replaced by her current reality. Her mind shied from it, unable to cope. A single refrain played through her head, a single thread she clung to with fierce tenacity. Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy…

  Dee’s Destiny - Chapter 1

  Dee’s boots crunched over a patch of gravel on the tar, the sound loud in the silence that surrounded them. Night had fallen with the last rays of sunlight winking out on the horizon, but visibility was excellent. The road snaked ahead, lit by the bright full moon that shone down and cast their environment in sharp relief.

  A breeze stirred the leaves on the branches, and the air was damp, dense with moisture. She’d noticed the half-dried puddles of water in the hollows made by tree roots and ditches and surmised it had pelted down in the last day or so. It will likely rain again tonight.

  Ryan walked next to her without saying a word, his hoodie bouncing on his back with each step and his worn takkies making barely a sound. In each hand, he carried a weapon. The long screwdriver she’d found not far from his unconscious body, and the hatchet he’d wrenched from the skull of a dead zombie.

  She’d watched as he retrieved the ax without hesitation. It proved to her he was tough enough to survive and strong enough to kill when he had to. She had no time for sissies. Not during the zombie apocalypse, a thing she’d never have thought possible in a million years, but there it was. The end of the world.

  Dee cast a sidelong glance at Ryan, marveling at his innocent looks. He was younger than her, that much was obvious. Maybe sixteen to her nineteen. Goofy-looking too. Not exactly a stone-cold killer. Still, he was tough, and he had a cute way of blushing whenever she smiled at him. Not used to girls, I bet.

  “So Ryan. I guess all this is right up your alley?” she said, gesturing around them.

  “Huh?” He stared at her in confusion.

  “You’re a gamer, right? I recognize the look,” she said, her lips quirking into a teasing grin. I wonder how long it will take him to blush this time?

  “The look?” he asked.

  “You know. Pale skin, slender build, that sort of thing. You’re not much into sport, are you?”

  He shrugged. “Not really.”

  “You’ve got the hands of a gamer too. Long fingers, strong, well-defined. You must have played tons of zombie games. A real expert, I bet.”

  A flush crept up Ryan’s neck, suffusing his cheeks with hot blood.

  Bingo!

  “Um, th…thanks. I guess,” he stuttered.

  “Don’t mention it,” she replied with a satisfied smile. Not used to girls at all!

  Her teasing banter was interrupted by the sound of groaning, and she shucked her gun, a Glock 17 she’d taken off a dead police officer’s corpse. The magazine was nearly full at thirteen rounds, and she had a spare tucked into her pocket. Once again, she thanked her gun-enthusiast dad for teaching her how to shoot from a young age. Even at University, she’d visited the shooting range every weekend to hone her skills. Besides, it was a fun pastime. “Heads up.”

  “I see them,” Ryan replied in a low voice as he readied the hatchet. “It’s the same lot that stormed our car and followed me. Luckily, they’re the slower type. We took out the runners earlier.”

  Dee aimed at the nearest zombie, its shambling hulk turning their way as it heard their conversation. She stilled her body before squeezing the trigger. The gun bucked, and a spray of brain matter exploded from the back of the infected’s skull. “Gotcha.”

  The rest of the undead sprang to life and ran toward them, galvanized by the noise. Their groans changed to eager snarls, and their broken bodies moved with surprising speed.

  Dee snapped off another shot but missed, the weaving targets defeating her aim. After a second miss, she changed tactics and blew out the front runner’s knee instead. It tumbled to the ground and tripped up the two following behind it. One was just a child, a little boy, but she didn’t allow pity to slow her reactions. With swift precision, she stepped closer and took them out as they lay writhing in a knot of limbs. One, two, three.

  More were closing in, and she stepped back to give herself breathing room. There must be a dozen of the rotters. “You’re up, Ryan!”

  To her immense relief, he didn’t hesitate. The hatchet buried itself in the forehead of the nearest zombie, a young woman in jeans and a t-shirt. Her head whipped back, and she sank to the ground in a crumbling heap. Ryan pulled the small ax free and swung it sideways at another infected. It lodged in its neck with a grating noise, and the zombie’s head flopped around on the half-severed muscle. It performed a comic dance before it too keeled over.

  Ryan tossed the screwdriver to his right hand, prepared to take on the next zombie. “Come on, you buggers!”

  Dee’s estimation of the quiet boy shot up another notch. With careful aim, she blasted two more of the closest infected as they reached for him. That left only three more standing and a crawler.

  Ryan stabbed one through the mouth. The point penetrated through the roof of the mouth and emerged at the back. The zombie collapsed but took the screwdriver with it, leaving him unarmed.

  “Oh, crap,” Ryan cried, fumbling at his leather toolbelt for a hammer. He wasn’t fast enough, though, and had to grab the next zombie by the neck to keep it off him, instead. His fingers sank into its rotten flesh as it snapped at his face, eager for a taste.

  Dee tried to line it up in her sights, but their struggles left her afraid she’d hit Ryan instead.

  “Just hold him off,” she ordered as she ran forward to help.

  A man with half his face missing reached for her with a bloody grin. She ducked to the side and snapped off a quick shot that punched through his remaining eye and blew out his brains. She leaped over the body and aimed a chopping blow at the zombie fighting with Ryan. It stumbled, and Ryan managed to pull free from its grip.

  “Thanks,” he gasped.

  She rolled beneath the grasping fingers of another zombie and collided with its legs. As it tumbled over her, she pushed the nozzle of the Glock to the back of its head and pulled the trigger. “Don’t mention it!”

  Ryan pulled the claw hammer from his belt and slammed it down on the zombie’s forehead with a yell. Blood gushed down its face as it tipped over backward, its grasping fingers still twitching in death. Without waiting, Ryan ran to the crawler and popped open its skull like a rotten egg. It stilled with a final moan, and silence fell over the open road.

 
Dee jumped to her feet and looked around, but the area was clear. They’d gotten them all. Not willing to celebrate quite yet, she exchanged the almost empty magazine of her gun for the full one in her pocket before giving herself a quick once over for bites. Nothing. She was clean.

  With her lungs heaving for air, she looked at Ryan while wiping her face and gun clean with her shirt. He took a moment to retrieve his other weapons and check all the corpses to make sure they were truly dead. He grinned at her with a blood-spattered face. “All good?”

  “Yup, I’m in the clear. You?” she asked.

  “Me too. We were lucky.”

  “Lucky, yes, but you sure can handle yourself,” she said, nearly crowing with glee when he broke out in blushes again. So predictable.

  “Ready to go?” he asked. “I’d like to get to the car and check that my sister and the others made it out okay.”

  “Sure, let’s go. We shouldn’t hang around here anyway. More infected will come,” she said. “I’ve noticed they’re drawn to noise.”

  “Noise and movement. I just hope they can’t smell us too,” he replied.

  “That would suck,” she agreed. “At least, they’re stupid.”

  They set off at a brisk pace, each keeping an eye out for more zombies. The trees and brush that lined the road were dark and ominous. It gave the impression of hidden horrors, and she hoped it didn’t hide a horde of zombies too. She’d seen enough of them to last a lifetime.

  “We’re getting close,” Ryan murmured in a low tone of voice.

  “Be careful; there might be more around,” Dee warned as they hurried forward. She spotted the wreck almost instantly with its nose crunched up into the trunk of a tree. The driver and back doors were open and the interior empty. “Seems like they got out.”

  Ryan blew out a relieved sigh. “Thank goodness.”

  “Let’s hurry. We might still catch up to them,” she added.

  They jogged along the road until they reached the turnoff to Riverbend. It was lucky Dee was there, or Ryan might have missed it. The sign was faded and half covered in foliage and mud.

  “In here,” she said.

  “How far is it to your house?” Ryan asked.

  “Not far. A few kilometers. If we run, we can make it in half an hour or so.”

  “I hope Jonathan made it, but with the kids slowing him down…” Ryan trailed off, and Dee imagined he was envisioning the worst.

  “I’m sure they did. They had a good head start, and you drew off all the zombies, didn’t you?”

  He nodded.

  “My parents will look after them too, don’t worry. They’d never turn them away if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “Of course,” he replied, but an unsaid thought was left hanging between them. What if Dee’s parents hadn’t made it? What if they were zombies too? Jonathan and the kids might be walking straight into a trap.

  Dee wasn’t willing to entertain that kind of thinking for long, though, and she set a punishing pace. The road was rough and pitted, a mixture of loose sand, packed earth, and gravel, pockmarked by tussocks of grass. They slowed to a crawl as they picked their way over the terrain, neither willing to risk a broken ankle.

  They kept both eyes on the encroaching growth on either side, looking for danger. Dee was sure it would be deserted. Few people stayed out here, but then again, the infected that had attacked Ryan and his friends seemed to appear from nowhere. Maybe they were townspeople drawn away by fleeing survivors. Or maybe they were fleeing survivors, and one of them was bitten. That’d be enough to turn the whole lot of them.

  After what felt like forever, they reached the gate, finding it locked with no sign of Jonathan, Kerry, or Lucy. She eyed the fence, relieved to see it was as sturdy as she remembered. It should hold any infected off.

  “I hope they made it,” Ryan said.

  “I’m sure they did,” Dee replied with a confidence she didn’t quite feel. Maybe they had, and maybe they hadn’t. Time would tell.

  She scaled the gate and jogged across the open grass toward the house, noting no lights were shining in the windows. Either Jonathan was careful, or they’d never reached the house.

  Dee could make out the outline of the garage and saw the doors were shut. Underneath the carport, she spotted her mother’s car, a silver Audi, and her father’s old truck. He’d always refused to let go of the rusting hulk, preferring it to the newer versions on the market. Joy flooded her veins. They had to be here, safe and sound.

  As she turned the corner, a strange sight brought her to an abrupt halt. A group of people was gathered around a fire under the thatched patio. The flames flickered inside the built-in barbeque, casting an orange glow on the faces of the kids and teens surrounding it.

  Ryan stopped next to her and sucked in a breath. He broke into a broad smile and called, “Jonathan, Kerry!”

  A tall, gangly youth and a young girl turned at the sound of his voice. The girl sprinted across the gap, her hair bouncing on her shoulders. She threw herself into Ryan’s arms with a happy squeal. “Ryan!”

  “Hey, sis. See? I told you I’d be back.”

  “I was so worried,” she said. “I thought I’d never see you again.”

  He patted her head and turned to Dee. “Dee, this is my sister, Kerry.”

  Dee smiled at the young girl. “Nice to meet you.”

  Kerry returned her greeting with a shy nod, her hands still fisted in Ryan’s shirt. Behind her, the tall boy Dee guessed to be Jonathan, approached with a cocky grin.

  “I see you made it, Ry. Never doubted you for a second.”

  Ryan nodded. “Thanks for looking after Kerry and Lucy.”

  Dee craned her neck and spotted a tiny girl with dark hair hovering in the background. She was sucking on her thumb over a pair of huge eyes, and the look on her face made Dee’s heart ache with sadness. She looks so lost.

  “Lucy?”

  The little girl nodded but stayed silent.

  “I’m Dee. Nice to meet you.”

  Lucy ducked her head, black ringlets falling across her eyes. Kerry let go of Ryan and gathered the girl into her embrace. “She doesn’t talk much.”

  “That’s okay,” Dee replied with a soft smile. “As long as she knows I’m a friend.”

  “She knows,” Kerry said. “She sees a lot more than she lets on.”

  Behind them, three more figures walked over, a little more hesitant than Jonathan and Kerry had been. Ryan noticed them as well and asked, “Who are they?”

  Jonathan gestured at a girl who couldn’t be much younger than Dee, and two children. “This is Cat, and the two kids are Theresa and Juan.”

  Dee mumbled a greeting, but her real interest lay beyond Cat and her charges. In vain, she searched for any signs of her parents. Her eyes scanned the darkness, seeking out their familiar faces.

  Finally, she couldn’t take it anymore and blurted out, “Where’s my mom and dad? Are they in the house?”

  Cat’s eyes widened, and her expression became haunted. “This is your home?”

  “Yes, I live here.”

  “I thought you looked familiar. I saw your picture inside,” Cat replied, jerking her head toward the home. “I’m sorry, but your family didn’t make it.”

  The words hit Dee in the chest like shots fired from a gun. She gasped. “That’s not possible.”

  “I…I’m sorry,” Cat said, her pained expression highlighting how inadequate the words were.

  “I don’t believe you. Show me.”

  Cat nodded. “Come with me.”

  With her mind in a whirl, Dee followed the girl toward a far corner of the yard. Beneath an ancient willow tree, the same one she’d climbed as a child, two mounds of freshly dug earth was clear in the moonlight.

  She stared at the graves in silence, her brain unwilling to process what she saw. Her father, so strong and vital in life, dead? Her mother, the most capable woman in the world, gone? No, it couldn’t be.

  Tears bur
ned her eyelids, but she refused to let them fall. Her voice was thick with suppressed grief when she said, “Tell me what happened.”

  In slow, halting terms, Cat laid out what she knew, wincing when she came to the part where she had to kill Dee’s mother. The rest was supposition, but it was obvious enough what had happened to the older couple. Dee’s father got bitten somehow and came home without knowing he was a danger to anyone. There he turned and attacked her mother. Her mother fought back, but got infected as well.

  The story fit. It made sense. Still, Dee couldn’t imagine it, let alone believe it. “They’re gone.”

  “I’m sorry,” Cat whispered as she left.

  Dee didn’t even hear her and stared at the ground for a long time before she was ready to acknowledge the truth. “I’m sorry, Mom. Dad. I should’ve gotten here sooner. It’s my fault, and I’ll never forgive myself for it.”

  Dee dropped to her knees and pressed a kiss to each palm before placing her hands flat on the graves. She let the rich soil stain her skin as hot tears coursed down her cheeks. “I love you both. Forever and ever. Goodbye.”

  Dee’s Destiny - Chapter 2

  After a few more minutes spent in a silent farewell to her parents, Dee jumped to her feet and joined the group around the fire. Though she wasn’t in the mood to chat, she knew she’d have to establish her dominance early on. Now that her folks were dead, the property belonged to her after all.

  They watched her approach with somber expressions, their uncertainty obvious in their shifting postures and shuffling feet. She heaved an inward sigh and pushed all thoughts of her mother and father aside.

  “Right, as you all know by now, I’m Casey, but you can call me Dee for short. This place belonged to my parents. Now that they’re gone, I guess it belongs to me.” She paused and looked around the circle of faces. “Does anyone object to that?”

  Everyone shook their heads except Lucy and Juan who stared at her with wide eyes, and Jonathan who drawled a lazy, “No, ma’am.”

  She scowled at him. “Don’t call me that.”

  He grinned, unfazed by her bad humor. “Yes, ma’am.”