TORMENT (45 page)

For a moment.

Then it was gone.

She opened her eyes.

She stood inside the light. White haze surrounded her.
A mirage.
Nothing more.

Despair dropped her to her knees.

The combined howl of Austin and Masters put her on her stomach.

54

Mia felt her stomach lurch. She was starving, desperate to leave this world. The combined roars of Austin and Masters shook her insides. She
convulsed,
her body out of control. She lay below the sphere of light, but no longer desired it. Its allure had vanished with the realization that it wasn’t really there.

Was it all a delusion?
she
wondered.
The grassy hill.
The wolf.
The ocean.
Elizabeth. It all felt so real. She wanted to go back more than anything she’d desired before.

The question was
,
how could she get there?

It became the background soundtrack in her mind on which she could never fully focus.
I had years,
she thought,
why didn’t I think about this before the world went to hell?

She tried to focus on the question of God, Hell, forgiveness and eternity, but the world around her drew her attention away.

“Get up!” Garbarino shouted at her. He grabbed her arm and pulled, but she just slid across the rough crater floor leaving a trail of blood behind her. Garbarino looked at her and his facial expression changed to that of a family member waiting by the bedside of a terminally ill family member. The look said
,
you’re not long for this world
.

He lowered her to the ground. “Don’t take long.”

He stepped away and she wanted to follow, but found herself rooted in place. She couldn’t move. She could only watch.

At the top of the crater, Austin and Masters jumped over the edge. They landed amid the crowd of people buried waist deep in the hardened ground. Those beneath the giants were crushed. The rest paid them no attention, their focus on the globe of light absolute.

Don’t take long
. Garbarino’s words echoed in her thoughts. Her time had come at last. She would escape.

You’re not ready
, her inner voice said.

But
a new voice, this one more confident, replied,
I’ve been there
. I saw Liz.
I’m going back. I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.

She had no doubt about it. She was a good person. She’d done bad things, but nothing like Collins. If God was real, he would see that. If God was merciful, he would understand. He had already shown her paradise. It was a gift.
An incentive.
She felt peace.
And life.

Peace and life.

Masters and Austin charged down the hill. They tore bodies from the ground, ripping them in half and tossing them away. Others they simply stepped on, crushing them into the ground. A river of blood preceded them down the crater’s bowl. When they roared, the people around them leaned away, a shockwave moving through the masses, like a crowd doing the wave at a baseball game.

Garbarino stood between her and the two approaching juggernauts. He held his gun in his hand. She knew it held only one round. It wouldn’t even slow them. He turned back toward her.

“Are you ready?”

She started to say yes, but some part of her wasn’t so sure. Was she forgetting something? The chaos around her kept her thoughts from solidifying.

Bodies flew.

Desperation filled the crater.

Monsters roared.

Her body quaked.
 

Ask, she thought.

Ask what?

“Are you ready?” Garbarino screamed it this time.

Austin and Masters were nearly through the crowd. She had ten seconds.
Maybe less.

Ask what? Ask what!

“Please,” she said. “Let me see Matt again.”

“You’re out of time!” Garbarino said.

“I’m ready!” she shouted.

Garbarino spun around and faced her. His face was full of fear, but his eyes burned with determination. She saw his hand come up, weapon steady.

One bullet left.

He’d been saving it, she realized.

For her.

Better to die by the bullet than torn apart by Austin and Masters. He was going to kill her—a final act of mercy.

She had just begun to mouth the words, “Thank you,” when he pulled the trigger.

At the same moment the gun fired and kicked in his hand, Garbarino was struck from behind. The gun tilted down slightly as the bullet left the barrel. He looked up and saw Mia kneeling, her face twisted in pain. The bullet had struck her chest instead of her head. It was a kill shot for sure.
Punctured lung.
Close to the heart. She’d be dead within the minute.

But the anguish she felt at that moment was for Garbarino.

He looked down. A large hand had pierced his back and come out of his stomach. As it pulled back out, he could feel the thick arm scraping against his spine. Once back inside his body, he felt the fingers flex. A mixture of pressure and pain registered in his mind before he felt the hand pull back out. He felt his insides unravel in him, pulled out through his back. Numbness claimed his body. His thoughts drifted away. And he was gone.

Mia shook with sadness as
Garbarino’s
body fell to the ground, dead.

But she couldn’t cry. Not really. Her left lung was filling with blood. Each breath was shorter than the last. She’d drown in the stuff soon.
If Masters and Austin let her live that long.
But she was determined to last the minute, to make sure Garbarino had escaped. She pushed away from the monsters as they walked slowly toward her. They sensed the end coming and were in no rush.

She stopped moving when they reached her. They stood on either side, looking down at her.

Her mental count to sixty ended.

Garbarino was not coming back.

He’d escaped.

“Peace,” Masters said.

Austin raised his fists. She thought she saw him give a faint head shake, as though disappointed. “Life,” he said.

“Please,” Mia said. “Let me see him again. Let Matt be there when I open my eyes. Please.”

Four massive fists slammed into her body. In that split second of impact she felt her bones break, her organs burst and her life escape. Then everything went black.

55

Black became white.

Her body had returned, hale and healthy again. The broken bones, the wound in her leg, the fatigue and exhaustion were all gone. Warmth tickled her face. She smiled.
Alive again.

As her thoughts returned, she could feel her body moving.
Running.
It felt wonderful.

There was dirt beneath her feet.
Bare feet.

She smelled earth all around, and something else.
Onions.

The white began to fade.

A breeze caressed her skin.

She saw colors.
Dashes of orange.

Her eyesight returned in full. She blinked and elation filled her to the core. Matt lay beneath her, smiling, staring up into her eyes.

“Matt,” she said, dripping with affection.

“No, no, no,” he replied.

“Matt, it’s me,” she said. “It’s Mia.”

He screamed and she realized what she had taken for a smile was actually gritted teeth. His face was covered in grime and dried blood.

“No,” she said, looking down. Matt’s stomach was open. His guts were in her hands.

He screamed again and she realized her hands were yanking at his insides, eviscerating the fiancé she’d betrayed.

“I’m sorry,” she screamed turning her head to the sky. “Make it stop! God, make it stop!”

But she didn’t stop until Matt’s body stopped moving and his own screams of pain faded. Then she was up and moving. She spotted several other killers and headed for them. She didn’t want to be with them. She didn’t want to hear their voices mixed with hers, but her
body, and its actions, were
not hers to control anymore.

“I wasn’t ready,” she screamed, her voice going hoarse. “I wasn’t ready!”

A shuffling sound turned her around.

Matt was there, alive again, pulling his organs back together. He saw her attention and shouted, “No!”

But she was already running toward him, arms outstretched, fingers locked like claws. “I’m sorry!” she screamed. “I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t ready!”

###

The following pages include samples from Jeremy Robinson’s BENEATH and David McAfee’s 33 A.D. Both are fantastic reads.

—SAMPLE—

BENEATH by JEREMY ROBINSON

Available for $2.99 on Kindle at:
http://www.amazon.com/BENEATH-A-Novel-ebook/dp/B0036TH6T0

DESCRIPTION:

Three thousand years after a chunk of iron the size of Khufu’s pyramid collides with Europa, Jupiter’s sixth moon, an asteroid borne of the collision crashes into Earth’s Arctic ice shelf carrying extraterrestrial microbial life. The first man to come into contact with the microbes hears voices—and then dies.
After determining the meteorite originated from Europa, the Global Exploratory Corporation sends oceanographer and biologist, Kathy Connelly, and her crew to the moon aboard the Surveyor, an experimental spacecraft. They are charged with the task of melting through miles of ice to the hidden ocean beneath, where the search for alien microorganisms begins. But a startling discovery awaits them on the surface of Europa. 
Life. 
Vast fields of red, plant-like organisms fill the cracks crisscrossing the moon’s surface, surviving on nutrients welling up from the waters below. Intoxicated by thoughts of what might lie beneath, Connelly and her crew activate the Thermal Exploratory System and melt through the ice—toward a world that does not want to be found, toward a force that will do anything to make sure they never leave. 
They search for life. They find death.

EXCERPT:

CHAPTER 21 -- PRESSURE

A series of questions sprang to
Choi's
mind all at once. How had Peterson come down to the surface? He wasn't a trained pilot. What happened to Harris? Why weren't the com systems working? What was wrong with Peterson's eyes? That was just the beginning. But she dared not speak, not a single word. Something was wrong with Peterson.