by Noah Porter
“Mariella!” he screams. “I would never leave you! I love you, Mariella!”
Then the men who forced him into it shut the door, and the last thing I see is the haunted look in his eyes, the look of prey that’s been cornered.
The scene changes, and Matthew’s running around a track. He’s sweating bullets, but keeps going because of the man behind him with a gun set to stun.
Then Matthew morphs into Ben, who gives me an easy smile when he sees me, and then Ben turns into Maria.
“Take care,” calls Maria. “Defend our cause in the coming war.”
Maria disappears, revealing Mariella.
“Go get them, Sarah,” she says. “Get those traitors and make them regret what they did to me. They did it on purpose, you know. They did it on purpose.”
Mariella morphs into Lily and Lily into Aria and Aria into Penelope Whitman, the creator of the DEK program.
“Sarah,” she says. “Don’t give up hope. The traitors that made the zombies on purpose for the war.. they won’t win.”
I wake up, breathing heavily. This dream, too, couldn’t be true.
There couldn’t have been traitors who knew that they’d make zombies, right? I sigh, pushing my thoughts to the back of my mind and getting changed.
It’s a quiet send-off. We pick up the bags filled with food, weapons, and other supplies the village gifted us with. Arcya says goodbye to Elder Manoiv and he’s struggling to hold it together.
Before long, we’re setting off and the sun’s starting to fully rise in the village. Cilla, the tiger, follows us, and if a tiger can look sad and determined, she looks sad and determined.
As we walk out into the forest, I can’t stop thinking about what Ociri said about Murlyn falling. Was it a deranged man’s insanity or a half-insane man’s prediction of the future? Only time will tell, and just for now, I’ll have to keep my guard up.
Just like when we fell from Tieryl, we don’t know where we’re heading.
We’ll just take it as we go, fighting zombies, attempting to save lives, and trying to survive and help other survivors.
-A few days later-
It’s nighttime, and I fall asleep, only to be plagued by another nightmare.
Matthew is standing in a gigantic swarm of men and boys wearing the same uniform as him. They’re marching out of the gate on the edge of..
My stomach gives a jolt.
Tieryl City.
All of them are walking out, and all of them have the same scars Ben, Lily, Aria and I do.
“What is our goal?” booms a microphone out at the soldiers.
“Looking for the renegade superhumans! Convince them to our side of things or eliminate them!” shout the soldiers as one.
A chill goes down my back as I realize it was all but one soldier that responded. Matthew stands there, looking sort of stunned.
“I must remember my life before,” he repeats to himself in a monotone. “They kidnapped me and forced me to leave Mariella.”
He keeps repeating the words to himself, even as the other soldiers scream their response to the microphone over and over again.
Then a man who is tall, brawny, and looks to be a high rank interrupts Matthew, asking, “What is our goal?”
For one heart-stopping moment, I think that Matthew is going to respond with his monotone.
Instead, he says with fake excitement, “Looking for the renegade superhumans! Convince them to our side of things or eliminate them!”
The man nods with satisfaction and lets Matthew continue walking.
Matthew goes back to saying his monotone to himself.
I wake up, stunned.
“What’s wrong?” asks Ben, looking at me with concern.
“Nothing,” I reply, acutely aware that Arcya’s staring at me and knows exactly what’s bothering me.
Arcya challenges, “Really?”
“Yes, nothing,” I say.
Arcya doesn’t press the point any more, and after eating our breakfast, our group sets off.
We finally reach the outskirts of the jungle, enjoying the sunlight that we are now able to see in full, but what lies before us is a wasteland.
All of us, Arcya included, stare in shock.
The buildings are all gone, if there were any, and only ashes remain. There are long stretches of dirt with no grass covering them, except for in patchy spots where the grass is scorched-looking and miserably scraggly.
What’s the greatest shock is that, in the middle of this wreck, there’s an enormous, but somehow unscathed, white building. It’s modern-looking and shiny, gleaming to almost perfection and looking like an oasis in this dead land.
We start towards the building, and I covertly take out my knife to defend myself. The others do the same. Suddenly, there are lasers targeted right at our heads, and a voice blares over a microphone telling us not to move.
We’re scooped up by a helicopter, and just before I can get a clear look inside, everything goes black.
THIRD ACT
Prologue
So much has changed in just this past year. There have been betrayals, deaths, new life in the midst of sorrow, and the world is not as it once was. I guess I’m getting ahead of myself.
You probably already know my name because of what I did. I’m Sarah Sindile. Part superhuman, part incredibly clumsy teenage girl.
That’s not what I’m famous for, though. That’s just the icing on top of the cake. Along with a couple of friends, I saved the world from a power more destructive than the apocalypse and the natural disasters that scarred this world.
Curious enough yet?
Ah, well, I suppose I can’t keep being elusive (as to the answers you really want to know, at least) forever.
Be prepared to laugh, cry, and be shocked at what it’s been like for me during this year.
Welcome to my nightmare of a life.
Chapter 1
Just like that, everything went black. When I came to, I had an awful headache and forced myself to remember what had happened.
I’d finally reached the edge of the jungle before seeing a giant helicopter and being knocked unconscious by people in said helicopter. And now, I’m sitting in an extremely comfortable chair, without bonds tying me down (what a lovely change of pace to last time I’d been kidnapped or knocked unconscious intentionally!) and with an unlocked door to the room, as I quickly discovered.
When I walk out of the room I was in, I walk straight into a conference room. Ben, Lily, Aria, Arcya, and Cilla (who is sleeping on the floor) are all sitting around the table, with pleasant smiles on their faces.
“Ah, yes, great to have you join us,” says a woman with thick, curly black hair. (I can only see the back of her head, not her entire body). “I was just discussing an important issue with your friends.”
She turns around and I gasp. Penelope Whitman, the lady we could have sworn was dead months ago, was right in front of me.
“There’s a lot to explain in only a little time,” she says.
“Oh, really now?” I say in a sarcastic tone of voice. “I had absolutely no idea. Just please, get started.”
She ignores my sarcasm, instead choosing to power up this small black box, which immediately opened up a giant screen.
“DEK341. The concept was created about ten years before we successfully did it on humans- you.”
The screen switched to show detailed writing about experiments.
“As you can see, we started with it as a liquid, but it quickly morphed into multiple injections, and then a single injection. The natural disasters set us back a few years, but we redeveloped the serum. I took a bottle of that home and two needles, just for safekeeping. Then our facilities were broken into. Our cameras were shut down, so we saw nothing. When we came back the next morning, everything was destroyed except for the items we kept at people’s houses and our giant pot of serum. I took another bottle of the serum home, labeling it with the date. We breathed a sigh of relief, not th
inking to double check that the serum hadn’t been changed. My husband, Brad, was willingly the first person we tested it on. For a week, he appeared to be a perfect success. We injected thousands of brave adults with the serum the day after.”
I take a deep breath, trying to steel myself for what I knew she would say.
“Then they started having strange symptoms. When I visited my husband, he didn’t know me.”
She looks away, and the raw emotion in her voice makes me hurt for her.
“You know what happened. I hugged my husband one night without knowing I was saying goodbye, and the next morning, he was gone. The news headlines were all over it, but no one knew about our program. When we went to investigate the serum and find out what had happened to it, we were shocked when we discovered everything gone except for a small jar of serum and two needles I’d brought home with me. A video played, telling us not to worry. The zombies would be restored to be normal humans when they had done their job and eliminated ‘weaker humans’ under the guise of a war. The survivors would be given normal serum and turned superhumans. I vaguely recognized the voice of the man; I think he was an underling that worked here. To this day, I believe that the traitor is still alive.”
The smiles had disappeared from everyone’s faces during this talk. When Penelope turned back to face us, the tears were gone.
“I grabbed my jar of serum and created more of it in the secrecy of a more hidden base after staging my death. I injected it in myself. I didn’t turn zombie, but I had a raging fever. When I came to, a full superhuman, all the serum was still with me. With the plans to DEK341, Tieryl City’s going to make an army of superhumans. They don’t care about the zombies any more. The zombies have served their purpose, eliminating what they believe to be the weaker humans.”
I look at the others, and they all look stunned. (Except for Aria, who looks like she’s hoping that someone would jump out from behind a bush and scream, “April Fools!”).
“As some of the last non-brainwashed superhumans, it is our responsibility to fight this,” says Penelope in a matter-of-fact tone of voice.
“Oh, of course, why didn’t I see it before! Let’s, just the 6 of us… including Cilla... fight thousands of superhumans and zombies, on top of being wanted by the superhumans to join their side, and defend all the humans at the same time? Sounds like a perfectly reasonable thing to ask four teenagers, albeit superhuman teenagers, to do, with the help of a tiger!” exclaims Arcya.
I hide a smile. It does sound ridiculous when Arcya puts it that way.
“Well, the personnel on board are superhumans… plus my spies.” says Penelope, and I can tell Arcya is still panicking.
“The other choices are either joining those superhumans or being murdered and fading into oblivion, so, ya know,” I respond, still trying not to smile at the look on her face. To my surprise, she looks at me for a split second before bursting out laughing.
“I guess you’re right,” she admits.
Penelope says crisply, “Excellent. So, now that you’ve had your panic attack over and done with, there are only 4 more of you that have to get it over with. That’ll happen soon enough, but for now, let’s make a plan.”
And so we did. We debated and drew and mused until finally, we’d come up with something that would hopefully work exactly as we planned it.
You’re probably wondering what the plan is, and I’m very pleased to tell you that you’ll just have to wait and see. After all, I don’t particularly want to hand instructions on exactly how I’m going to save the world to any old person.
They might just be another traitor who ruins our plan. So, I guess you’ll have to read it step by step.. and even if you ARE a traitor, our plan will either be executed (or will have failed, in which case you’re either dead, a zombie, or a brainwashed superhuman anyways) by the time you figure all of our plan out.
The first order of business? We’re going to head to Sunrise City. If Old John is still alive, we’ll turn him superhuman with the serum Penelope made. If not, we might have to ransack his old lighthouse for weapons.
From there, we’d need better weapons, but I suppose I’m getting ahead of myself.
Whatever kind of building I’m in starts to move, and my seat lurches.
“By the way, this is a giant helicopter-type thing very similar to Tieryl City,” says Penelope. “It was constructed to be that hidden base I made the serum in. The flying capability was recent. The helicopter that you were captured in is our only other vehicle.”
I nod, numb with exhaustion and feeling overwhelmed at the thought of what we’re facing up against and what we have to do. The dump of information about how the zombies were made was sickening, and I can’t stop myself from being stunned about what people would do to reach their ends.
Penelope notices our yawns and immediately taps the projector twice. The screen shuts down and the conference table sinks into the ground, while our chairs morph into beds.
“Sleep now. I’ll wake you up when we get there,” she says.
I’m too tired to argue, so I lie back with a sigh of relief, quickly claimed by sleep.
Chapter 2
I wake up when somebody gently shakes me, and when I open my eyes, I’m surprised to see Ben (not Penelope).
“I told her you would be less likely to yell at somebody if I was the one to gently shake you awake,” he says and I begin to laugh. “What? It’s true!”
“I guess so,” I admit.
“We’re here, anyways,” says Ben.
I get up, yawning. It’s almost morning, judging by the light coming through the windows.
A fresh pair of clothes is on a table next to me (neither of which items were there before), so I shoo Ben out of my room (which now has walls) and quickly pull on the clean clothes. I tap a button on the wall that must’ve just appeared. My bed changes back to a chair, while the walls simply go down and out of sight.
I follow Ben, Lily, Aria, and Arcya (who actually looks tired for once!) out of the room and along some twisting hallways until we come to a giant door. Penelope is standing nearby, tapping on a keypad until a giant green light flashes and the door starts to open. Dismally gray sunlight greets us all as we step out of the ‘helicopter’ (which we’ll call ‘helicopter’ for lack of better word).
Penelope hands us each a gun and a knife. “Keep your heads up, be alert, and stay together! Sarah, you can lead us to the lighthouse. Ben and Arcya, watch for any attackers. Lily and Aria, scout slightly ahead. As for me, I’ll be doing whatever I can to protect you all.”
I nod, starting to walk in the direction of where I think the lighthouse is.
Worried he won’t be alive? says Arcya in my thoughts.
He was a strong old man, but we don’t know where the brainwashed superhumans are now or have been already, I reply.
Well, the lighthouse is still standing, she says cheerfully (and yes, you can tell it’s cheerfully).
“All right,” I say. “On your guard, everyone. The zombies are the ones that make a mess when they attack; the superhumans could’ve been here and not left a trace.”
Penelope looks at me, surprised at my authoritative tone of voice.
“Sorry,” I say apologetically. “Ben and I were kind of the leaders, though we all made the important decisions together.”
She smiles. “It’s fine. If I had been with them and then you had joined the group, I’m sure I’d have had the same problem.”
Silence falls as I pick up my knife and open the door to the lighthouse.
It’s a mess.
Scratch that, it’s a disaster zone. Maps with knife slashes in them are everywhere, food cans dumped on the floor, papers scattered across the desk (completely unlike when we were here and John was, too), but there is no corpse and no blood.
We all look at each other grimly, walking up each set of stairs to double check there’s no dead body. Nothing. The upper levels with crops growing are burnt to a crisp, but Old John’
s not there.
“In hiding or captured?” I ask quietly.
“They wouldn’t slice the maps if they got their quarry.. it’s more likely that was out of anger at not finding him, though they didn’t know who they were looking for,” says Ben.
I nod before I think of an idea, blurting out, “Could he have made a tunnel? We should check.”
The others agree and we walk back outside as a group, looking closely at the ground to see any irregularities.
Arcya finds one, and sends out a mind message to me. I think I found one. She must’ve sent it out to everyone because all of us go towards her, crouching to look at the spot.
