The Unimaginable World by Amber Riel (ereader with dictionary txt) 📕

Thorn pulled out his cross bow and aimed it at the zombie and shot it in the head.         

“Oscar!” Anna’s crying grew louder when she watched the body drop to the ground.         

Thorn walked over to the dead zombie and yanked the arrow out of its head.  He turned toward us and dropped his head at the sight of the woman.         

Ziles let Anna free and the woman ran over to Thorn, yelling and screaming her head off.  “You killed Oscar!  You killed my husband!  Why would you do such a horrible and cruel thing?!”         

Thorn closed his eyes for a moment.  He locked eyes with Anna and sighed.  “I’m sorry but that wasn’t your husband anymore,” he answered.

On the road was nothing but silence.  We drove past nothing but trees and dead animals.  I sat in between Ziles and Thorn during the drive.  Anna drove in silence while Vivid sat in the passenger side, playing with her fingers almost like she was playing a piano.         

All I could think about was that Anna’s whole world had changed within twenty-four hours and it was my entire fault.  Why did I let that stupid zombie get away?  A mortal is dead because of me, I thought.  Innocent lives are at steak because of me.  I leaned back in the seat and closed my eyes.  I knew better than to let that happen.  I fought the zombies and killed all but that one… that stupid one which escaped into the mortals’ world.  I just continued to blame myself for what I had let happen.         

“How far is the city or town from here?” I heard Ziles’s voice ask.         

“About a few more hours,” Anna replied.  “Do you think most of the town is gone now?  I mean like how my husband was?”         

“Most likely,” Vivid replied.         

I opened my eyes and looked at the others.         

Anna nodded.  “I just can’t believe he’s gone now.”  She began crying and Vivid had to take the wheel a few times to keep from crashing into things.         

“Eyes on the road,” Vivid told Anna.         

“Sorry,” Anna replied, sighing and took a deep breath.

“You know if you want one of us to drive we can.”         

Anna shook her head.  “I’m fine.”         

“Okay.”         

I looked out of the wind shield and noticed a blockade of cars.  “Damn,” I muttered.         

“Park the car,” Thorn told Anna.         

Anna did as he had said and placed the car into park.

“Vivid, stay in here with Anna.  Ziles, Quill, and I will see if we can find a way through and make sure that there are no more zombies around.”         

“I love a man in charge but I want to go with you,” Vivid told Thorn in her flirty mischievous voice.         

“Just stay here with Anna,” Thorn told her, ignoring her tone again.         

“Why can’t Quill stay?”         

I narrowed my eyes and eyed the demon.         

“Because I need Quill to help me fight if needed,” he answered.         

I sighed in relief when he spoke.  Shot down again, I thought, good.  I climbed out of the car after Ziles and closed the door.  I had Bones stay in the car with Vivid and Anna.         

I pulled out a gun just in case there were more than one zombie around and I followed behind Thorn and Ziles.  I examined the area.  Everything had been clear as far as the zombies went but there was no telling what was on the other side of the blockade.  I looked around, watching and waiting for something to pop up.

I held onto my gun, watching for anything or anyone.  I listened to Ziles chat about some nonsense thing about time and clocks which to me wasn’t something that I was too concerned with at the moment and could care less.  He had his moments when he would just talk about things that nobody really cared to listen to.         

Thorn stopped dead in his tracks and urged Ziles and I to do the same.  “Listen,” he whispered.         

At first I didn’t hear anything but then the sound of something falling and smacking the ground caught my attention.  We watched a tin can rolled out in front of us.  I held up my gun in the direction which the can had come from.  We waited for a few moments when a zombie appeared in between the cars.         

“Quill, save your ammo for more.  I got this,” Thorn told me while he held up his cross bow and aimed at the zombie.         

I nodded.         

“I want at him,” Ziles mumbled with hunger in his voice.

“Let me kill him and then you can have your fun eating him,” Thorn told the starving werewolf.         

“That works,” Ziles replied.         

We watched as Thorn shot the arrow into the Zombie’s forehead.  The zombie fell to the ground.  He walked over and pulled the arrow out and placed it back with the others.  “All yours, Ziles,” he told the werewolf.         

Ziles smiled, happily, and made his way over to the zombie.  He examined the body then torn of the right arm as if he were getting ready to feast on a chicken.  He held the arm up to his mouth and without hesitation he took a bite.         

I looked away, grossed out by the sight.  I knew it was normal for the wolves to eat anything dead but it still wasn’t something that I wanted to witness.         

“Heads up!” Thorn called.         

I looked up and a zombie stood right in front of me.  “Here we go.”  Before I had a chance to aim my gun the thing had its hands on my arms pulling me closer to its mouth.  Without hesitation the thing bit into my shoulder which I couldn’t help but laugh.  “Hey, stupid, I’m not mortal and you can’t kill me.”  I managed to hold my gun up under the zombie’s jaw and pulled the trigger.         

The zombie’s grip loosened and the dead body dropped to the ground.         

“I hate when they get that damn close to me,” I told the other two.         

Thorn laughed.         

Ziles finished off the first zombie then jumped to the one I had just killed.         

“Are you foul from the last one?” I asked.         

Ziles shook his head.  “I’m a wolf.  I’m never fully satisfied with any meal I eat.”         

Thorn took a moment and looked around.  “I don’t see any more as of right now.”         

“Let’s hope that most of them are gone and that we can get out of this mess,” I replied.         

Thorn nodded.         

Once Ziles finished up his meal, we began walking around again, checking for more zombies when a man ran out in front of us.  He had fresh blood dripping from his shoulder.  “Please help me,” he told us.         

“What happened to that shoulder?” Thorn asked.         

“I was…” he stopped, afraid to finish his sentence.         

“Were you bitten?”         

The man dropped down to the ground and began crying.  “Yes but please don’t kill me.  I can beat this thing,” he tried to convince himself as much as he tried to convince us.         

I walked over to the man and kneeled down beside him.  I locked eyes with the man and the fear was evident.  He didn’t want to die but he had too.  We had to stop him from changing.  “I’m sorry,” I told him with tears in my eyes.  “If we don’t then you will change and harm others,” I told him.         

He continued to stare at me.  “You were bitten too… I watched from a distance when that thing attacked you.”

I closed my eyes and gestured to my shoulder which had healed within seconds after the bite.  “I’m immortal… I can’t die.”  I looked over at Thorn and Ziles.  “He’s immortal,” I told the guy, nodding my head toward Thorn.  “He’s a werewolf,” I explained, nodding toward Ziles.  I locked eyes with the man again.  Tears filled my immortal eyes.  “This is my fault.  I was supposed to keep them from entering in this world but I had failed.  I’m sorry this had to happen to you.”         

The man stared with confusion, shock, and more fear than ever.  “That’s all impossible,” he told me.         

I shook my head while I held up my gun and placed it to the man’s forehead.         

“Please don’t kill me,” he begged.         

“This is the only way.  I don’t want to see the change.  I can’t witness that, knowing that it was my fault.”

“Please don’t kill me,” he repeated.         

“I’m sorry.”  I didn’t want to see the man suffer and I didn’t want to watch him change into one of those monsters so I pulled the trigger.  “I’m sorry,” I repeated as the man’s body dropped to the ground.  I stood up and turned my attention toward Ziles and Thorn.  “What else was I supposed to do?” I asked.  “I didn’t want to see him change.”         

Thorn walked over to me and wrapped me up in a hug.  “I know.  I know.”         

Ziles walked over to the body and bent down.  He laid a hand on the guy’s body.  “I can’t eat a body from a living soul.  It’s inhumane.  If he had changed it would have been different but I can’t just eat what was a human right before it was killed.”  He locked sad eyes with me.  “I’m not trying to sound mean or rude or anything.  I’m just saying that maybe we should give this guy a proper burial.  I mean it’s the least we could.”

Thorn and I both nodded in agreement.  “Ziles, pick up the body and carry it too the car.  We’ll bury him before we leave,” Thorn replied.  “Quill and I will continue checking the area.”         

Ziles nodded.  He picked up what use to be a mortal and carried the body back toward the car.

The funeral was hard to do, seeing that the man was a stranger to all of us but we managed to at least say something about him.  I stood by the bed which was dug for him while everyone else