After the Blast

by Ryan Casey

  The body he’d passed on his way in here.

  The knife wound in their neck.

  Could that be Holly’s work?

  Had she done this?

  Had she escaped?

  He started to walk back in the direction he’d come from. Because it couldn’t be coincidence. He knew his daughter. She was stubborn. She was a fighter.

  She’d done this.

  She’d got out.

  He passed by the bodies. Reached the bottom of the street. And he couldn’t help feeling hope as he pictured how this might’ve gone down. He couldn’t help feeling proud of his little girl, wherever she was out there.

  He smiled a little. Felt tears rolling down his cheeks. Because she was alive. She might not be here, but she was alive. She might not be with him, but she was out there somewhere.

  She might be in danger.

  But at least she still had a chance.

  He looked out beyond the street. Took a deep breath.

  It was time to go after Holly.

  It was time to find her, once and for all.

  He took a step.

  But then he heard the movement behind him.

  When he looked around, he saw five people standing there, all of them holding knives, all of them looking Mike’s way.

  “Hello,” the leader said. “Looking for something?”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Holly walked further into the darkness on her blistered feet, and she wondered when this nightmare was going to end.

  It was pitch black. The night felt like it had dragged on for an eternity. She had no idea how long she’d been walking, David behind her. Only she felt stupid. She felt naive. She’d believed in this person. She’d fallen for his lies, allowed herself to open up, and he’d exploited that and taken advantage of her.

  Her head ached with soreness. Every time she thought about it, she just felt her cheeks flushing red. David had ripped the hair from her scalp. Most of it had scabbed over, but every now and then she felt something warm trickling down her face, tasted the metallic tang on her lips, and she knew it was blood.

  Every now and then, she felt herself slowing down as the weight of her admittedly thinning body pressed down on her blistered feet. But when she did, she felt a push right against her back. Sometimes it was enough to just get her walking again. Other times, it was so heavy that it sent her face flat into the muddy earth.

  Whatever the case, Holly knew one thing for certain.

  This man, David, was evil.

  And she’d made a big mistake falling into his clutches.

  This time, when David pushed her, she felt to fall onto her front only to steady herself right at the last minute.

  She stood firm, heart racing, eyes tired, body shaking. She turned to look at him, his face nothing more than a silhouette in the darkness. “Why are you doing this?”

  He stood still. And even though she couldn’t make out his features, as the rain fell from above, she swore she saw a smile crack across his face. “Don’t you understand it yet, dear? You’re strong. A diamond in the rough. You’ll take some training, but I’ll get you to a point where you’re able to be strong. And then we’ll find others and make them like you and me, too. A strong new group ready to tackle the new world all on our own.”

  Holly shook her head. She was weak—and admittedly she was a little bit scared—but she wasn’t standing down to this guy. She was going to take the best opportunity that arose to get away from him as fast as she could. She knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but then nothing worth doing was easy.

  “I’m nothing like you,” she said.

  He puffed out his lips, let out a little chuckle. “Nothing like me? Holly, you massacred those people back at the church.”

  Holly’s mouth dried up instantly. She tried to move her lips, but they were frozen. “I—I—”

  “You can deny it as much as you like. You can resist your true nature as much as you like. But the more you fight, the more you’re just proving the violence that we both know is within you.”

  He stepped right up to her. Hovered over her.

  “So now, my dear, you are going to turn around, and you are going to w—”

  He didn’t finish.

  Holly kicked him in the balls as hard as she could.

  And then she ran.

  There was a problem, though. She couldn’t see, for one. But her run. It wasn’t as quick. Wasn’t as easy as she’d remembered. She must be weaker than she even realised.

  But she kept on going, kept on throwing herself through the trees. She thought she could hear footsteps behind her, but she wasn’t sure. Only that she had to keep pressing on. She had to get away from David. She couldn’t fall further into his trap…

  Mostly because of the fear.

  The fear that he was right.

  The fear that she was the monster he told her she was all along.

  She went to throw herself through the trees when she saw something.

  There was a light. A light up ahead. A glimmer shining in her direction.

  She found herself slowing down, found herself squinting at that light, not sure what to think, not sure whether it was real, not sure about anything.

  But there was one thing for sure.

  That light didn’t look like candlelight or firelight.

  It looked like the light of a torch.

  She went to move again when something slammed into her back.

  She tumbled down to the ground again. The wind was knocked from her body. Crippling pain split through her back, right into her stomach. David was sitting on her with all his weight.

  She tried to turn around, tried to fight free, but it was to no avail. He was bigger than her. He was heavier than her.

  And he had her pinned down like a pathetic animal.

  She managed to turn a little, managed to look up at David.

  And this time, she really did see his face.

  And the smile stretched across it.

  “That’s it,” he said. “That’s what I like to see from you. Fight.”

  Then he pulled back a fist and cracked it across Holly’s face.

  She tasted blood right away. Felt the jagged edge of a broken tooth against her lip. Dizziness, muffled hearing, and then she looked up and saw David again.

  He shook his head and sighed. “I am sorry. Your education isn’t going to be easy. I never promised otherwise.”

  He lifted his fist again.

  “But the sooner you learn, the better for all of us, hmm?”

  Holly closed her eyes.

  She held her breath.

  She waited for the blow.

  But nothing happened.

  She paused. Kept her eyes closed. Maybe he was just screwing with her. Maybe he was waiting for her to open her eyes before he hit her.

  So she waited a little longer.

  But the longer she waited… the more she realised something was different here.

  Something was wrong.

  She held her breath.

  Then she opened her eyes, just a little.

  She didn’t realise exactly what it was at first. But when she opened her eyes a little more, she saw it.

  There was another silhouette.

  Another silhouette standing over David.

  And they were holding something to his head.

  “Let her go,” the voice said. “Or I bash your filthy brains in.”

  It was then that Holly realised she recognised the voice.

  Someone she knew.

  “Alison?”

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Mike looked at the man standing opposite, and he knew right away that they knew something about Holly.

  He wasn’t sure what it was. He wasn’t sure whether it was the look on their faces, or just their overall demeanour, as they stood there in the dying light of day.

  But Mike knew whatever the case that these people were trouble. And he sensed deep down that trouble had something to do with H
olly.

  “What’re you doing here?” the leader asked. He was tall and slim with flaky skin and crisp blue eyes. He’d look like a creepy bastard in the old world, let alone in this world.

  Mike shrugged, holding his ground. “I didn’t know there was a rule against walking through a town.”

  “Well, you thought wrong,” the leader said. “You know how the new world is. No walking into a town without something to give, anyway.”

  Mike dropped his rucksack. “That’s funny. You see, I was hoping you’d have something to give me.”

  The man looked puzzled. He frowned, looked at a few of his companions. “We have something for you? I think you’re misunderstanding how this works.”

  “And I think you’re misunderstanding what I’m getting at. My daughter. I heard she was here. Goes by the name of Holly. Tall. Dark-haired. Slim. Imagine she didn’t give up whatever you tried to do to her without a fight.”

  The man’s face turned, then. First, a look of disgusted realisation. But then a smile. “Ah yeah. The name does ring a bell, actually. Feisty character, that’s for sure.”

  “You should wait ’til you meet her dad,” Mike said.

  The man laughed, then. His smile was wider than ever, now. “See I guess she does take after her dad. Only problem is, if you’re looking for her, it’s no use.”

  Mike braced himself. He could feel the news coming; the news he didn’t want to hear.

  But then something different happened.

  “She fought her way out of here, little git,” he said. “Killed one of our own in the process. Never got the chance to hunt her down and make her pay. Although believe me when I say we’ve got people out there right now making damned sure she does. And when she does… oh, it will be an event for the books.”

  The man pulled out a knife, then.

  And from the distance, a few more people appeared, joining this man’s merry band of freaks.

  “And I’ll be damned. Her dad’s here now. Her dad’s here to pay for his daughter’s misdemeanours. They do say a child is always grown in a father’s image, after all.”

  He nodded, and the group started to step forward.

  Mike held his ground and pulled out his own knife. He wanted to walk towards these people, to put them down individually. But at the same time, he knew he had to watch out; he had to be careful. Because they outnumbered him. They had more muscle than him alone.

  So he had no choice but to run.

  He sprinted to his left, down towards the alleyway. But right away the group was running after him. He could hear them closing in, nipping at his heels. He’d made a mistake standing his ground. He should’ve fled at the first sign of trouble.

  But then Holly. He’d learned the truth about Holly. Surely that had to be worth much more than anything… even if he did lose his life in the process.

  He looked over his shoulder, shat himself at the sight of how close they were. And there were lots more of them now, too. Fifteen, maybe more. He didn’t have time to get away. He didn’t even have time to think. Just time to keep on running, keep on going, keep on…

  He saw the end of the alleyway then, and he froze.

  He’d hit a dead end.

  There was no way out.

  He turned around.

  The group was blocking the alleyway. There were sixteen of them that he could count now. Too many to even try taking on.

  There was a window by his right side. It was partly open. But it was too much of a reach. Too much of a gamble. Too close to the enemy for comfort.

  “This is the end of the road for you, sir,” the man said, smile widening as the sun set behind him. “The end of the line, well and truly. Any last words?”

  Mike looked at the man. He looked at his knife. And then he looked at the window to his side.

  “No?” the man said. “Then we’d better get to it.”

  He started to walk towards Mike.

  “Wait,” Mike said.

  He lifted a hand. The hand without the knife. And when he did, the man stopped walking towards him. Like he was hearing Mike. Like he was, in a weird way, listening to him.

  “You’d better make it quick,” the man said.

  Mike searched his mind for all kinds of things he could say; all kinds of things he could use to bargain his way out of this situation.

  But in the end, something else happened.

  Honesty.

  “It doesn’t have to end this way,” he said.

  The man smiled. “I think I’ll be the judge of that, don’t you?”

  He started his move again, knife raised.

  “No,” Mike said. But this time, he did something radical. Something he didn’t expect.

  He dropped his knife, and he stepped forward.

  “You won’t be the judge of that. Not you alone. You have people behind you. And they can’t all be on board with this. They can’t all want what you want.”

  The man snorted. “You’d be surprised—”

  But Mike looked past the man now. He was looking at the man’s people, at the ones standing behind him.

  “You don’t have to let someone decide your future for you. You don’t have to wage war. You don’t have to fight. There’s—there’s a future out there. A future for all of us. Not the way it used to be. Because the way it used to be is what got us into this mess in the first place. But there’s a better future. A future where no matter what lies ahead—power or no power—we build alliances. We stick together. We grow. Because winter is ahead. And if we don’t prepare for winter… we aren’t going to survive it. It’s as simple as that.”

  There was a pause, then. A pause where Mike hoped he’d got through to these people; where he hoped they saw what he was offering.

  And he could see it. He could see the looks on some of their faces.

  They were considering it.

  They were actually hearing what he was saying.

  But then the leader stepped forward and looked right into Mike’s eyes, knife by his side.

  “That’s where you’re wrong about my people,” he said.

  He pulled back the knife.

  “This is the future we choose.”

  Then he slammed the knife into the side of Mike’s torso.

  Mike winced. He felt the hot pain split through his body. Felt it stretching through his stomach, burning, searing.

  He looked into the eyes of the smiling maniac as he held the knife inside him.

  And then he mustered up the courage to say the words he knew he had to say.

  “That’s where you’re wrong.”

  The man frowned.

  Mike reached for the window and slammed it against his head.

  He watched the man fall to the ground. And then he watched the wide-eyed look of fear on the faces of his people as they looked from him to Mike, weapons raised.

  But Mike raised a hand.

  “Remember what I said,” Mike said, as the pain stretched further through his body. “Remember… remember what I offered you. There’s a chance. A chance for things to change. A chance for things to be different.”

  They stood there. The leader of the group rolled over, blood dripping down his head and face. He looked up at Mike, manic expression in his eyes.

  “Kill him!” he shouted. “What the hell are you waiting for?”

  Mike looked at the man as he held on to the stab wound at his side.

  Then he looked at the man’s people, who looked back at him.

  “Kill him!” he shouted.

  The people moved in Mike’s direction.

  He closed his eyes.

  Took a deep breath.

  At least Holly was okay.

  At least Holly was…

  He heard something, then.

  A gasp. A gargle. A grunt.

  He opened his eyes.

  That’s when he saw it.

  That’s when he realised.

  That’s when he knew things had changed.

  A smil
e spread across his face.

  He took a deep breath.

  Then he fell to the ground.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  “Let her the hell go, right this second, or I’ll take your damned head off.”

  Alison stood with a large branch to the back of the man’s head. Of course, he didn’t know it was a branch. The darkness and the ominous nature of the rain were working in her favour in that respect. And she knew this facade wasn’t exactly going to last forever.

  But right now, time was on her side. And she had to make it count.

  It might be dark, but she could see what was happening here. She could see Holly lying on the ground, back to the earth. She could see this monstrous man over her. Only there was something different about Holly. Something that Alison didn’t instantly recognise about her.

  Then it dawned on her.

  Her hair.

  Her hair had gone.

  “And who do you think you are?” the man asked.

  Alison pushed the branch further into the back of his head. “Who I am doesn’t matter. What matters is what you’re doing to that girl. To my friend. And what’s going to happen to you if you don’t get off her right this second.

  The man turned around and looked at Alison. And she could see from the look in his eyes, which reflected against the moonlight, that there was something off about him. Something distinctly wrong about him.

  She didn’t know how Holly had got in with him. She didn’t know what circumstances had brought the pair of them together.

  She just knew that she had to deal with this man. Fast.

  “Not a very nice way to introduce yourself, is it?” he said. “I’m David. What’s—”

  “I don’t give a shit whether you like my introduction or not,” Alison said. “Get off her. Right this second. Or I’ll blow your brains out.”

  David didn’t look fazed. He just raised his eyebrows and tutted. “That’s a shame,” he said as he climbed off Holly.

  He looked right into Alison’s eyes. There was a pause between them, a moment of quiet.

  “I was hoping we’d get to know each other a lot better,” he said.

  “Alison!” Holly shouted.

  But it was already too late.

  David swung something at Alison; something sharp.