Afterworld: Into the Arms of Darkness Ch.3
Title: Afterworld: Into the Arms of Darkness
By: Pink Rabbit Productions
Chapter: 3
Date: 1 September, 2010
Disclaimer: Hmmm, characters, not mine, situation, mine, though with the proviso that certain scenarios owe a major debt of gratitude to George Romero. Sex? Likely. Genders involved? Likely all female (at least anything on camera). Also there are likely to be very bad things in this story. I'm not one for prodigious amounts of gore, but this is horror and there is likely to be ickiness and things that might disturb some folks. Seriously. If it's gonna bother you, move along.
Summary: When the dead rise, civilization falls.
Author's Notes: Awhile back, just for fun, I did a faux movie poster that set Otalia in a horror setting and used some elements from an idea I've had running around for ages (what can I say---it was the Halloween season). Sooo, at some point, it seemed like fun to take a gander at writing them in that universe. I've quite deliberately tried to break away from my usual style and make it a bit faster moving, with frequent chapter breaks, deliberate cliffhangers, shorter scenes and more directed pov. We'll see if I can keep to one pov per chapter (well, they are short chapters...lol).
Previous Chapters: | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 |
In mathematics you don't understand things. You just get used to them.
Johann von Neumann (1903 - 1957)
Afterworld:
Into the Arms of Darkness
Chapter 3
When no shots were fired and nothing happened for a beat or two, Olivia tried to risk a quick look over her shoulder only to incur another of the skull-cracking blows to the back of the head.
"I said, don't move." Definitely a woman's voice this time-hard, sharp-edged, laced with anger, but low, using rage instead of volume to carry a sense of intimidation. It didn't pay to make too much noise, even when issuing threats. It drew attention and that was always a bad thing.
Olivia jerked her head straight forward again, muscles locking for a beat. But she was running on instinct, with reflexes geared toward moving fast to have any hope of survival and staying still wasn't an option once she spotted her dropped Eagle. She tensed, intending to make a play, but something thumped the back of her skull, then continued to press firmly. Sharp edged, circular, large bore.
Shotgun.
"Don't. Even. Think. It," her assailant ground out. "Unless you want the last thing you see to be your grey matter splattering all over the grass."
Olivia froze.
Fear and caution were the watch words in Afterworld, but at the same time, there were still good people, and more than once Olivia had helped and been helped by people who'd initially seemed like enemies. So she tried. "Look, I just stopped for water and I-"
"Shut up and put your hands on your head." Another sharp thump to the back of the skull punctuated the command, though the actual words were pitched too low to carry beyond their immediate environs.
Realizing she wasn't going to talk her way out of things as long as she was viewed as a threat, Olivia slowly did as told, overlapping her hands on top of her head in spite of the instinctive resistance to making herself so vulnerable.
A quick knock and a sharp order. "Link your fingers together."
Lacing them that way would slow her down. Maybe only a beat, but that could be the difference between life and death. She swallowed hard, muscles threatening to lock in refusal.
"Do. It."
Teeth gritted, fury rapidly taking the place of fear, Olivia slowly linked her fingers together. "I'm not-" she tried again, but found herself cut off almost instantly.
"Quiet," her assailant bit out. "Now where are your friends?"
Which left Olivia with a serious debate. Admit she had no backup and maybe seem less threatening in hopes of being released, or try to bluff and bully and hope her attacker would decide she wasn't worth a fight. Either way was a risk. "Friends?" she questioned, playing for time and hoping to get a better sense of the situation.
Not her best plan she realized as the shotgun barrel cracked into her skull with enough force to set firecrackers off behind her eyes and draw a pained groan.
"Don't play stupid with me-"
"Who's playing?" Olivia hissed before she could think better of it.
She got another solid thumping as a reward for her snarkiness. "Shut up," the woman behind her bit out, then fell silent, creating the sense she was debating her next course of action. "Lie down," she ordered at last.
Green eyes slid shut. "Please," Olivia whispered, instinctively certain the moment she followed that command, she was dead. "Just let me-"
"Do it."
Her muscles locked. She couldn't do it, couldn't lie there and wait for the shot. She shook her head slowly. "No." She half expected a shotgun blast in reply.
"If you don't, you're dead."
"And if I do, I'm dead," Olivia countered, an angry smirk twisting her mouth when her assailant didn't even bother to deny it. Then suddenly a strong hand tangled in her collar from behind, twisting it into a solid knot and dragging the front against her throat with enough force to set her gagging.
"You think I won't?" the woman behind her snarled, hate lacing every sharply punctuated word.
"I don't know," Olivia gagged raggedly through the pressure against her windpipe. "Murder easy for you?"
"Murder?" came the snarled response. "I'm not the murderer here."
Suddenly Olivia was shoved hard. She sprawled forward, grass and dirt digging into her palms with painful force. She didn't have time to care. The shotgun barrel clipped the back of her head and she heard a soft click.
No time to think. Pushing off on one hand, she twisted, swinging her other arm wide. She had a brief impression of a woman, young, dark-haired and pretty, as she slammed her forearm into the shotgun barrel, using strength and body weight to throw it to the side so she was nowhere in its line of fire.
She'd bought a second or two, but not her life.
Her attacker managed to hold off on firing, preserving her ammunition for a real shot. Which meant the price was likely to run a whole lot higher.
Now it was time to pay the piper. Rolling, Olivia kicked, slamming a booted foot into a hard shin with enough force to unbalance her attacker.
Another second or two on credit.
Her injured knee screamed at the jarring pressure, but Olivia ignored the pain and kicked again, smiling grimly as she heard a soft, bitterly uttered curse.
Good. That hurt. Not to mention bought another second.
Olivia used the tiny slice of time to get her feet under her and launch into the slender figure, grabbing for the barrel of the shotgun with one hand and the stock with the other. Bodies crashed into each other, then into wood siding, drawing low grunts of pain and frustration.
It wasn't the first battle for survival Olivia had been in since the old world ended and the new began, but it was one of the few for which she was woefully unprepared. Her primary weapon lost and unable to draw a backup quickly enough, her body nearly at the edge of collapse, she was in no condition for a fight.
An elbow cracked into the side of her head, reopening the wound at her scalp and sending a fresh flow of blood over her face. Vertigo made the world spin violently and she couldn't hold her ground when the woman slammed the shotgun into her chest to knock her back a pace.
Even dazed and half blind, she knew what was coming next and instinctively fought to avoid the violent death stalking her with mad intent. Olivia felt the gun barrel swing around. In the narrow space, her attacker couldn't aim straight, so she'd have to tip the weapon up and press the end under the curve of Olivia's jaw to get a successful shot in.
Hard angle to manage, but once there, one shot would take her head off.
Only she wasn't ready to die.
She didn't even try for an organized grab this time, just got her arm under smooth steel and jerked it up, forcing the barrel high and sideways, twisting her head to the side and out of the way as she lunged forward, forcing the end of the weapon up over her shoulder.
The shotgun barrel was still braced against her forearm and shoulder when the blast roared through the sinking dusk, so close to the side of her head that it wasn't a wonder she didn't blow an eardrum. As it was, she was almost completely deaf, her skull throbbing. No new injuries though. The barrel had skidded past the line of her body before it discharged, sending shot harmlessly into the night.
Both combatants froze, suddenly staring at one another as the inflicted silence of numbed eardrums echoed inside their heads. Olivia found herself gazing into dark eyes that reflected tiny pinpoints of the sun's dying light, startled by the sick look of horror and something that looked suspiciously like regret. She was still trying to parse the meaning she had no time to consider-the dead would be drawn by the sound, and it wouldn't take long, a few minutes at most-when a tiny sliver of sound fought its way past the ringing in her ears.
"MOMMY!!"
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TBC