Through
sheer force of will, Mary Saint rose to her feet. She was not sure exactly what Celia had done
to her but she was not going to let Celia win.
Mary had faith in a higher power, one that would get her through this
and allow her to help her only child.
She could feel the humanity begin to return to her as the feeling of
decay gradually left her body. Reaching
up to feel her face she could still feel the effects of the curse, her face was
no longer that of a human woman, but of some kind of monster. However she felt much better than she had
mere moments ago. Mary walked out of the
house, determined to return to her own home and find a way to save her son.
Upon returning
home, the first thing Mary noticed was her son lying down in the dog crate
outside. After being placed there by his
father, it appeared to Mary that all of the humanity had left him, that he had
fully turned to zombie. The odor of
death and decay increased the closer she got to the cage as well as a sense, a
feeling in her that her son was a zombie.
While she could obviously see that with her own eyes, the extra sense
was not there earlier, before her encounter with Celia. Could this be a side effect of the curse not
actually working on her? Was she able to
now sense the living dead? The
implications of this, that she would be haunted by zombies for the rest of her
days, staggered her a little, but she regained her composure, reminded herself
that her faith had gotten her this far, and proceeded into her home, in search
of her husband.
Obadiah
Saint was seated at the kitchen table, a blank expression hung like a mask over
his face. His loaded hunting rifle was lying
across the table. He was not sure
whether he wanted to use it on any approaching zombies, his son outside, or on
himself. Obadiah licked his lips, the
smell of decay created a taste in his mouth that he was unable to get rid of,
at least not without drastic measures.
Obadiah placed his left hand on his gun, the heirloom from his
grandfather felt cool and reassuring under his callused fingers. The last few hours proved to him that nothing
in this life was set in stone. That no
matter how good of a person that he or Mary was, or even Levi, bad things would
find him and his family. He tried, he
really did. He prayed every day to a God
that he thought was a kind a merciful God.
Where was that God now? That God
let Abraham’s only son live, why would he take away Obadiah’s?
Obadiah
picked up the rifle, turning it so that the barrel was pointed squarely at his
head. He kicked off his slipper. Obadiah stared down the barrel of that gun
for what seemed like an eternity, the solid black hole mocking him with his own
futility. He couldn’t keep his family safe;
he couldn’t even kill himself properly.
A tear ran down Obadiah’s cheek as he lowered his forehead and placed it
over the barrel of the gun. If he did it
correctly the bullet would pierce his skull and sink right into his brain,
killing him and taking away the pain that he felt. Obadiah lifted his foot to place it upon the
trigger, ready to finally end what had been the single worst day of his life.
“Obadiah,
wait!”
The hand
jerked the gun away before the trigger could be pulled and safely deposited it
back on the table. “Obadiah, it’s
me!” The voice sounded familiar, but the
face was different, it was not the face of Mary, but that of a horrible monster,
a creature not unlike what his son had turned into. “Obadiah, she tried to do it to me too, Celia
tried to change me too. But I survived;
I am still me, Obadiah. Do you know what
this means? There is hope for our son,
there is hope for Levi!”
Obadiah put
his head down on the table and wept.
There was hope! His God had
forsaken him but he still had hope. This
nightmare was not going to claim him just yet.
Come to the Throop Haunted Trail, starting tonight to see if the nightmare will claim you.
No comments:
Post a Comment