by Sarra Cannon
There was no time to stand there and consider it. A new horde of rotters was headed their way, and Crash had no doubt the bird-like creatures would be back soon. Probably when they least expected it.
He made a mental note to keep his eye on the sky as he gathered lightning in his hands.
He was going to try something different this time, building on a technique he’d practiced at the beach house a few times. With David getting closer by the minute, Crash’s power surged to new levels.
If he was possibly going to die today, he might as well have some fun before that happened.
As a test, he moved his hands back and forth in front of his body, nodding as he perfected the timing. With this type of motion, he could create a surge of electricity that worked like daggers, slicing through the air.
Now, to try shooting them.
He widened his stance and repeated the motion, this time sending the slicing motion forward, like he was throwing a dagger or a ninja star through the air.
The first few he sent sliced the shoulder off a rotter on the front lines. Not bad, but he needed to work on his aim.
“Whoa, what was that?” Parrish asked. She’d already reached the front row of rotters and sliced through them with a flash of blue light that separated a dozen heads from bodies.
He couldn’t let her show him up like that.
Crash licked his lips and took a deep breath. “Just something new I’m trying,” he said.
He set his sights on a group off to the far left, away from the rest of his group.
He breathed power into his hands, amplifying the energy sparking at his fingertips.
With rapid motions, he threw lightning daggers at the group, aiming for the head and not letting up until he’d unleashed a barrage of at least fifty. The magical daggers made a cracking sound like miniature lightning as they left his hands, and Crash whooped as they hit their marks, knocking one rotter after the other down to the ground.
Hell, this was more fun than a machine gun any day of the week.
He’d played video games his whole life and never dreamed he’d be some kind of superhero in reality, so despite the extreme danger and the threat of death at every turn, there was a part deep inside that was enjoying this.
“Don’t get too cocky there, lightning-boy,” Karmen said, knocking him down a peg. “We’ve got incoming.”
He’d forgotten to look up until she said that, but now there wasn’t a second to waste.
The bird-like women were back, claws stretched toward him. They were too close for him to send daggers at them, but just as the long, razor-like claws reached him, he had a sudden flash of memory.
It was like some ancient, buried part of him awakened at a moment of heightened focus and fear, and instinct took over.
He pushed both palms forward, creating a shield of pure light that crackled with a familiar web of electric energy.
The bird-woman shrieked and pulled back, her wings flapping frantically as her claws sparked. Still acting on instinct, Crash reared back and sent his lightning-disc toward the creature’s underbelly. The disc sliced through the woman’s wings, severing them from her body.
Crash pulled the hunting knife from his belt, gripping the hilt with both hands as he brought the thick, jagged blade down through the top of the woman’s head.
Her eyes widened and then went dark.
He was about to let out another whoop of celebration until he looked up to see that the second bird-woman was headed straight for Karmen.
Forty-Three
Karmen
Karmen locked eyes with the bird-like creature swooping toward her. She wanted inside that thing’s mind, but it was locked down tight.
“Karmen, move. I’ve got this,” Crash shouted, lifting some kind of lightning disc into the air.
“Leave it,” she said. “I can do it. Help the others.”
He hesitated, but she knew what she was doing.
“Go,” she said.
Crash ran off to join Parrish and Noah on the front lines of the horde, and Karmen’s confidence wavered just a touch.
I’m insane.
But getting inside this thing’s mind was a challenge for her now, and she wanted to figure it out.
Her Beast roared and ran toward her, which was a surprise. She hadn’t given it any instructions to keep her safe, but it seemed to have a natural instinct to want to protect her. Good to know.
She told him to stand down and focused all of her energy on the winged-woman above.
Searching the woman’s mind was like searching for a keyhole. If she could just find it, she could unlock the woman’s brain and command her the same way she’d taken hold of the Beast at her side.
But where was it?
Dammit, this thing was getting too close. She needed to crack this, but she was rapidly running out of time.
“Karmen, watch out.”
“Leave me alone,” she shouted, anger bubbling up inside of her. Not that she was really angry at Crash for wanting to help, but she was angry and frustrated at her lack of skill with this woman.
She knew she could do it, and the whole group needed for her to be able to turn these super zombies over to their side, but she was failing.
As she embraced her anger, though, orange flames broke out across her arm and hands. She forced her emotions into that flame, and it flared.
Okay, new plan. If she couldn’t turn this thing’s mind, she’d light it up and see if she could get it to turn around. She needed to buy herself more time.
Raising her hand in front of her, she blew out, sending a stream of flames out in front of her like a flame-thrower. The flame widened as she poured her anger and determination into it, and the bird-woman flapped her wings harder, flying backward away from the flames.
“Yes,” Karmen shouted, laughing as the woman flew higher and then circled back around.
This time, Karmen kept contact with her flames as she focused on the woman’s mind, searching again for the keyhole.
“Cutting it close there, Barbie,” Crash said.
“I told you never to call me that again,” she said, letting her annoyance at the nickname fuel her rage.
She locked eyes with the flying woman, forcing herself into the thing’s mind. She didn’t need a keyhole. She needed a crowbar.
But the moment she connected with the woman’s thoughts, it wasn’t the Dark One she heard in her head.
It was Lily.
Forty-Four
The Witch
The fifth was on the move again. The witch tracked his energy signature to about six blocks away when he’d suddenly stopped. She’d sensed a larger output from him for a few minutes, but then he’d started moving faster than ever.
He can sense the others fighting.
This wouldn’t do.
She’d put all of this time and work into getting him to Central Park and into her trap, where he wouldn’t be able to leap across rooftops anymore.
She couldn’t have him heading back toward the others. That was the opposite direction of where she needed him to go right now, and if she wanted to keep her plan on track, she was going to have to think fast.
Luckily, she’d put a few barriers up between the fifth and his friends, just in case.
One of those barriers was hiding on a rooftop near where the fifth was jumping right about now.
The witch wasn’t sure if she should make her way over there or stay put, but before she could make up her mind, something very strange happened.
A voice entered her head.
A familiar voice.
I know you’re here. I’ve taken some of your toys away from you, and they’re going to lead me right to you.
The witch stopped in her tracks, shaken by the invasion into her own thoughts.
She’d done the same thing to other people plenty of times, even watching their dreams or listening to their thoughts, but she’d never had anyone besides the Dark One do it to her.
It w
as an unsettling feeling, hearing the voice of someone you couldn’t see in your head like that. Knowing from their tone just how badly they wanted revenge.
What surprised her most, though, was how much it stung to hear Karmen’s voice dripping with such disdain. It wasn’t like she’d been the easiest person to get to know in the first place, and she had a tendency to sound snarky or rude, but the witch had liked Karmen.
Maybe her most of all.
They were very similar in their powers, which was something that usually bonded witches in her world. Witches of the same elemental side who shared core abilities were often like sisters back home, and the witch had longed to have someone close to her to discuss spells with and share secrets.
Of course, back there, the witch had barely even known what she was capable of herself. She knew she possessed some fire abilities, but she’d had no idea she could track. She’d used it instinctually when she tracked Tobias through the forest that fateful night, but that was the first time she could ever remember following someone and just knowing where they were headed. Sensing their power.
The coercion abilities were fun, though. The ability to see into people’s minds and twist them to her will.
Karmen enjoyed it, too, and the witch had no doubt that they could have been good friends under different circumstances.
But now, they were on different sides, and she would destroy Karmen if she had to.
I know you can hear me, whether you want to respond or not. I will find you, Karmen said.
The witch smiled and shook her head. Maybe a slight change of plans was in order.
Not if I find you first.
Forty-Five
Parrish
Parrish’s mouth dropped open in shock as the bird-like creature who’d attacked her earlier swooped across the crowd of rotters, slashing them with her sharp talons.
For a split second, she’d thought that thing was coming for her when it flew over her shoulder, but now it was clear what had happened.
“Good job, Karmen,” she said. “I take back every mean thing I ever said about you.”
“Wow, that’s years’ worth of stuff, I bet,” Karmen said.
“Eh, only if you count everything I wrote in my diary about you,” Parrish said with a laugh as she continued working her way through what was left of the horde.
“Oh, I bet I know who you wrote about the most. Dear diary, I have the biggest crush on the hot guy who lives across the street,” Karmen said.
Parrish’s face warmed, and she glanced over at Noah.
He was holding back a smile, and when he winked at her, she could hardly believe this was real life.
After all these years of dreaming, she was finally hanging out with him on a daily basis, and instead of lying in the grass holding his hand and talking about the future, they were fighting their way through a horde of zombies in downtown Manhattan, both covered in blood and guts.
She winced as she studied his face. That did not look good at all.
“Hey, Noah, how are you feeling?” she asked, sliding her blade through the neck of a woman in jogging gear. She’d still been wearing a pair of fancy headphones with an iPhone strapped to her arm.
“I’m feeling a little woozy, to be honest,” he said, bringing his bat down on another rotter’s skull.
Something deep down turned in her stomach.
Was it possible he could get infected from taking on one of their injuries? He’d discovered a while back that his skin was hardened against zombie attacks or any kind of cuts and stuff, but when he shielded them, he got at least some of their injuries.
So the question was whether or not those bird-women had any of the virus in their talons.
Parrish’s mouth went dry just thinking about it, and as she stared at the sea of rotters still heading toward them, she wasn’t sure she had the patience to deal with all of them.
She needed to check on Noah a little more closely. See if he was showing any signs of infection.
And if he is, what do I think I’m going to do about it?
She didn’t have an answer to that, but she needed to know.
They needed to make faster work of these zombies, and she was about to tell her friends that when Karmen’s voice interrupted her thoughts.
“Um, guys? I might have done something really stupid,” she said.
“Oh, well, I guess there’s a millionth time for everything,” Parrish said.
“Haha, very funny.”
“What did you do?” Noah asked.
“I reached out to Lily and kind of threatened her, so I think she’s coming for us,” Karmen said. “So, we might want to make quick work of this horde and figure out a plan for facing her.”
“You did what?” Parrish asked. “How?”
Karmen explained it as though she’d simply tuned into the frequency of Lily’s mind and reached out to her.
Parrish rolled her eyes. Great. That was just what they needed right now.
But hey, if that meant Lily was looking for them instead of Zoe, she was okay with that. They were bound to have to face her at some point, anyway.
Parrish still wasn’t sure why Lily had decided to help them back at the hospital, or what she would do when they met up again, but she guessed they were about to find out.
“Okay, let’s do this,” she said. “Give it all you’ve got, and then we’ll slide into one of these buildings and take a break to make a plan.”
The four of them lined up side-by-side in front of the oncoming horde while Beast and BirdWoman watched their back, cleaning up any rotters who dared attack from behind.
Parrish smiled. Time to show off what they could really do.
So far today, she’d been mostly going back and forth between her fire and ice abilities, practicing the switch between. For the most part, changing from one to the other was a pretty clumsy process for her. It was like trying to do math with someone shouting random numbers in her ear.
Focus was the main issue, but once she got into the rhythm of the new ability, she was getting better at controlling it.
Like now, for example. She sheathed her katana and allowed a cold chill to crawl through her. It took a moment for her to embrace the ice side of her energy, but when she connected to it, her hands glowed with a bright blue light.
She blew air across her lips and smiled as the air came out like a cold fog that crackled in the heat.
Reaching forward, she pressed her icy hand on the forehead of a rotter who lunged toward her, its mouth open. Frost travelled quickly down its decaying body, freezing its jaw in place.
She pushed her power just a little and the rotter’s entire body froze to the spot.
But she wanted to see just how far she could take this, and how easily she could switch from ice to flame when she needed to.
She inhaled, drawing as much breath as she could hold. When she exhaled, she turned her head from side to side, sending a cloud of white snow and ice in an arch in front of her body.
Whoa.
She’d frozen at least fifteen zombies in place.
Noah caught on to what she was doing with the ice and contributed his own power to hers. At first, they combined efforts to freeze another row about twenty deep on Noah’s side.
Unlike before, when she and Karmen and Crash had all touched skin to amplify their power, Parrish and Noah were able to boost each other’s spells just by focusing together as one.
She wasn’t sure if it was due to the fact that they’d become so close in so many ways over the past couple of months, or if it had something to do with the fact that they were using the ice element side of their power, but either way, she could feel his energy infusing with hers.
With every second, her power grew stronger alongside him. She reached deeper, pushed harder, and together, they sent a wave out over the horde, encasing them all in a harsh blue coating of pure ice.
“Whoa,” Crash whispered, stepping back as every rotter in the area ceased to move.
/> But their awe and excitement was short-lived as a blast of heat rolled back toward them in a widening rush of pure flame.
The frozen horde disintegrated into ash, and in her fear, Parrish reached for the second half of her power. For the first time since she’d gotten to New York, she managed to access both sides of her abilities, tapping into the combined power she’d only just discovered back at the beach house by accident.
Back then, she’d wondered if it was some kind of fluke. Something she’d done but could never replicate or understand.
Now, though, she was sure it was a skill she had the innate ability to use, which meant that some part of her, deep down and still buried within a series of trapped memories, still knew how to use it.
She gave herself over to that subconscious part of her own mind, and everything slowed to a crawl. Time was suddenly hers to control, and in that moment, a memory took hold.
Parrish, standing in a field of flames, her face bloodied and burned on one side. A woman with dark hair stood on the other side of a raging fire, a purple glow surrounding her form.
In her mind, she saw herself clap her hands together, a purple orb forming between her hands as she brought them apart. With a thrust of forward motion, she sent the purple orb toward the woman in the flames just as another blast of fire came toward her.
The fire moved in slow motion, and this ancient version of Parrish threw up a wall of ice to shield herself.
She snapped back to the present and repeated the motion, creating a wall of ice that protected her and her friends from the flames.
She continued to pour her energy into the ice wall until the fire on the other side subsided. The ice quickly melted onto the asphalt, combining with the ashes of the dead.
Parrish’s heart raced as her combined power slipped away from her and time sped back up to normal.
She’d managed to use it this time, but she wasn’t strong enough yet to hold onto it for very long.
And from the looks of the fresh horde approaching them from all sides, she was going to need it.
