Authors: Daniel J. Williams
“We need to go,” Chelsea repeated. “Now, before they get any closer.” She stood all the way up and the boat started rocking again.
“Careful!” Kelly held on to the side of the canoe as Chelsea climbed out and Buster immediately jumped after, rocking the boat further. As Maya stood to exit they heard the first shouts.
“Abominations!”
“Get them!”
“Kill them!”
The Plaguers behind Marty and Stephen started sprinting towards the canoe. Joline yelled to her flock, “Kill them!”
Maya and Kelly both panicked, trying to get out at the same time. The canoe rocked wildly as Maya jumped for land and the canoe tipped backwards. Kelly flew back, causing the canoe to flip over and she splashed hard into the murky water. She surfaced a few seconds later, gagging and fighting to grab onto the side of the boat. The Plaguers gained quickly.
Seeing the mob sprint towards them, Chelsea yelled out to Kelly. “Stay close to the side and make your way under the bridge. The wall grows higher the closer you get. Swim underwater as far as you can. We’ll come back!”
“Don’t leave me!” Kelly screamed.
“We have to!” Chelsea yelled as she started to run. The mob screamed crazily as they drew closer. “We’ll lead them away! You need to swim!” Chelsea yelled as she sprinted away.
Kelly plunged under water and swam deep and fast towards the bridge. She couldn’t see anything the water was so foul. Terrified to surface, she felt her way forward, finally smacking her hand against the side of the wall. Her lungs felt ready to burst. She surfaced the water ten feet short of the bridge.
Gasping for air, she looked up. Four feet above her the mob ran wildly past. She couldn’t believe their numbers. “Kill, kill, kill!” they chanted in rage as they went. Kelly took another deep breath and dropped back under the water. Feeling her way along the wall she suddenly felt something slimy. She pushed off it and surfaced again. This time she was under the bridge.
Despite her need for oxygen she suddenly couldn’t breathe. She started to hyperventilate as she tread water inches away from the decayed and bloated face of a young girl. The girls eyes, milky, wide-open, and oozing, stared in death directly at her. Flies buzzed incessantly around her and the other bodies trapped by a large tree branch jammed against the bridge support.
“Oh my God,” Kelly gasped as she swallowed water and fought to keep from going under. With no choice but to grab for the corpse, her hand frantically reached for it, and as her fingers grabbed a hold of the girls gooey face, the flesh slid right off in her grip.
Kelly slipped back under the water. She surfaced a few seconds later in complete panic. She splashed desperately, reaching for anything to hold onto, yet unable to bring herself to touch the bodies again. She struggled past two more bloated corpses before reaching the support under the bridge that kept them all trapped.
Holding on to the beam, she choked as she fought to catch her breath. She couldn’t look at the bodies. She needed to get out of there. Now.
Chelsea and Maya ran hard with Herman clutched to Chelsea’s back and Buster struggling to keep up. Silent and focused, the girls jumped over and around demolished remnants of Riverwalk restaurants and shops. Maya looked back and almost tripped over a patch of overgrown weeds. “They’re catching up!” she yelled as she turned back around. “What do we do?”
“Head for the hotel!” Chelsea pointed to the burnt-out husk of rising concrete and broken glass up ahead.
“We’ll be trapped!” Maya yelled out in fear.
“They won’t catch us! They’ll trip the mines!”
Buster did his best to keep up. He had trouble with distances and stumbled over obstacles. He panted as he ran, a low growl emanating from his throat.
The alarm suddenly sounded from inside the Alamo as the guards spotted the intruders. The camp was going into lockdown.
“Run!” Maya yelled as she glanced behind her again.
“Kill the witches!” the crowd roared. "Kill them!"
They were closing the gap and growing wild with longing.
Chelsea came to the burnt-out doorway of the hotel and shot through it with Maya directly behind. Buster barely cleared the opening, scraping his side against the door frame as he slightly misjudged the distance.
Diving around obstacles, Chelsea made her way to the back of the lobby, avoiding all mines and praying that Buster wouldn’t falter off course.
A huge boom suddenly sounded behind them, and both Chelsea and Maya stumbled and fell from the detonation. Dirt and dust filled the bottom floor of the hotel, instantly covering them. The building shifted, making loud creaks as pieces of plasterboard and concrete dropped from the ceiling, shattering around them. They covered their heads and rolled into a ball.
Inside the Alamo, Mace shouted orders as he ran to asses the situation. “Lock everything down! Get snipers in place!” Scaling the ladder to the chapel roof, he bound across it, planting himself behind the wall at the edge.
A huge dust cloud spread out from the hotel, and Mace spotted people moving around inside it. He lifted his sniper rifle and quickly scanned the dusty haze. They didn’t look like an army. It was a mixture of men, women and children of all ages. They seemed dumbfounded as they stood in the dust cloud.
Mace flinched as another explosion erupted in front of the hotel. Concrete chunks and body parts jettisoned from the source and another dust cloud shot up. The mob started quickly retreating.
Joline, who stood close to the entrance, screamed at the top of her lungs. “The curse is expanding! Run
!”
The crowd screamed in fright as they ran away from the source of the explosions.
From behind the crowd, on horse-top, Stephen and Marty were dismayed. “They were witches sent to trap us,” Stephen remarked in surprise. “We need to retreat!”
“But we have to finish this!” Marty watched the dust cloud in despair. “If we don’t we’re all dead!”
They both fought to keep their horses under control. “The curse is affecting them!” yelled Stephen. “We need to go now!”
Realizing there was no other choice, Marty agreed. “Retreat!” he yelled over the crowd as he pulled the left rein of the horse. “The curse is too strong! We need to retreat!”
Bowie and Crockett met Mace on the roof. They ran up to the wall, hunching down to avoid being a target. “Woody sent us,” Crockett said breathlessly. “What do you want us to do?”
Peering over the wall at the fleeing crowd, Mace wasn’t completely sure. “Keep everyone alert,” he said calmly as he continued to watch the crowd. “I’m not sure what we’re facing.” He turned to Bowie. “Don’t do anything without my okay.”
They all heard the ladder creak and turned as Roger quickly made his way towards them. “I’ve been watching them with this,” he said, handing Mace a small telescope as he squatted down. “It’s Plaguers. I can tell by their faces.”
“Shit,” remarked Mace.
Chelsea squirmed under the light debris and coughed out dust. “Are you okay?” she asked Maya as she carefully stood up and brushed herself off.
“I think so,” Maya answered as she climbed to her feet. Slightly disoriented by the explosion, Maya looked around in confusion.“What happened?”
“They stepped on a mine.” Chelsea studied the damage through the dusty haze. The blast sealed them inside the building. The lobby remained dark except for a few holes in the concrete where thin rays of light beamed through. “We’re lucky that blast didn’t set off a chain reaction,” Chelsea said, fighting to control feelings of claustrophobia. After being locked in the basement in Kansas, it was one of her greatest fears.
Buster stirred next to her and she bent down and nuzzled his neck. “I love you, boy,” she said, feeling better immediately. The last time she was locked in a dark place with Buster, he had a bullet lodged in his head. Buster moved his head up and licked her dirty face. Hearing something tiny stir behind Buster, Chelsea suddenly remembered Herman. “Herman, are you okay?” she asked worriedly.
The lizard scampered across the floor and climbed up on a big chunk of concrete.
“What are we going to do?” Maya asked as she scanned the darkened room. “Nobody even knows were gone.”
“We’ll have to climb to the roof and shoot off a flare,” Chelsea responded nervously, wanting to get out of there. They kept several flare-guns on the roof as a warning system.
“What do you think happened to Kelly?” Maya’s heart dropped as she pictured Kelly in the water pleading with them to stay.
“I don’t know,” Chelsea answered quietly. She couldn’t help but feel guilty. “C’mon,” she said, knowing she couldn’t dwell on it. “Let’s go before they get in.”
Back at the Riverwalk, Joline stormed up to Marty, who sat on his horse surveying the area. “You led us into a trap!”
Peering down upon her, Marty's face looked warped, like he was high on drugs. “We were all fooled,” he answered rabidly, as crazy thoughts spun through his head. “We found the Source, but forgot about the witches! We need to crucify every last one!”
Peering up at him, Joline was in agreement. “I've destroyed witches in the past. We need to burn them as well.”
“We must be vigilant!” Marty said louder, looking at the crowd of faces that now listened intently to his words. “We find ourselves at the Source. Expect more witches, more demons, more bloodshed to come." The crowd cheered at the thought of bloodshed. They longed to spill blood yet again.
“We will not be fooled!” yelled Joline as she turned and addressed the mob. “We will mutilate every witch and evildoer that gets in our way!”
The crowd cheered more loudly and frothed at the mouth. They were delirious with blood lust.
Underneath the bridge, shivering in the foul water, Kelly listened to the crazy gibberish and cursed under her breath. “Fucking whack-jobs,” she whispered.
Slowly swimming sidestroke to the other side of the bridge, she felt utterly disgusted at being stuck in the same water as the molting corpses. The stench and flies were enough to drive her crazy.
Staring at the bodies in disgust, she pushed through the water, pausing as she noticed a holster strapped across one of the bodies stuck in the back. Treading water, she focused on the holster. The way the bodies were piled, a small hole was all that gave access. She could barely make out the butt of a handgun through the swarming flies. It was only at this angle the gun could be seen.
“Holy shit,” she said quietly to herself. The gun was dry. Her heart beat faster as she realized she might have a weapon. She needed to get her hands on it. If it held bullets, she’d use it to get the hell out of there.
Kelly almost threw up at the thought of touching the corpses. Keeping her eyes completely focused on the firearm, she swam slowly forward. Her stomach roiled the closer she got. “Fuck,” she whispered as she grabbed one of the bodies and squeezed her hand through the opening.
Flies scattered at the intrusion and she closed her eyes as they buzzed around her face.
Feeling metal, she slid the gun out of the holster and pulled it slowly through the hole. A fly landed on her lip. She tried to blow it off through closed lips. It moved up and started to climb up her left nostril. Freaking out, she tried to blow air out her nose and started to sink. Flailing her arms, the gun dipped below the water’s surface and she yelled, “Help,” without thinking. She surfaced and scrambled back to the bodies where she clung desperately, trying to get her wits back.
From the top of the bridge the first Plaguer yelled, “Witch! There's one in the water!”
Realizing what she’d done, she struggled to check the gun for bullets. It was a six shooter, with four in the barrel. She snapped the barrel shut as more shouting echoed under the bridge. “The witch must be destroyed!” “It's in the water!”
Kelly jumped as a shotgun blasted a round into the water ten feet away. Thinking quickly, she yanked at the body she rested against, dislodging it from the branch and the rest of the corpses. She pushed it in the direction of the shotgun blast. Her heart pounded as she screamed, “You can’t destroy us! We are many!”
She held her breath as the body floated out from under the bridge. Gunshots punched into the corpse.
“Kill the she-devil!” voices screamed in unison.
More bullets ripped into the bloated body as Kelly pulled at the next cadaver. Its arm ripped out of its socket when she pulled on it and she vomited as she pushed it after the other.
“We are Coven!” she screamed again, choking down throw-up. “You’ll all die!”
At the sight of a second corpse one of the Plaguers by the bridge started backing away. “There are more!”
The body of the young girl floated out next, face up, and Kelly yelled, “We are rising!”
The one that backed away turned and ran. “The witches are rising!” he yelled as he went.
The statement filtered through the crowd and the idea stuck as it went. “They’re rising!” “The witches are rising!” The crowd turned and ran as paranoia quickly spread.
“We need to retreat farther!” Marty yelled as the fear sank in.
Kelly held tight to the gun just under the bridge. She couldn’t take another second of being stuck there. Flies buzzed her and she felt slimy body fluids clinging all around her. She pushed off the side with her feet and raised the gun as she checked out in the open. The Plaguers all disappeared.
“Whack jobs,” she murmured, as she sidestroked her way towards camp.
Chelsea threw open the door to the roof of the hotel, huffing and puffing from the effort. She ran straight to the box with the flare-guns. Grabbing one, she checked to make sure it was loaded.
Maya came up behind her, out of breath. “I hate stairs!” she yelled. “One more friggin’ floor and I was gonna puke!”
Looking down over the Alamo, Chelsea spotted tiny dots of movement as the compound secured itself. She looked briefly at Maya, who just nodded and said, “Do it. We’re in trouble either way.”
Chelsea shook her head for a second, knowing she was screwed, then aimed the flare-gun overhead and fired.