Book Two Chapter Twenty: Humanity, Insanity

After finding out that Saja and Irene destroyed the Blade of Faith and the Essence of Life, Nick and his friends scrambled to come up with a plan to save the world.

Chapter Twenty Humanity, Insanity:

"Nick. We need another way to defeat Saja." Kalen said.

"No kidding." I said.

"But we need to survive this apocalypse first." Tim said.

"We need weapons." Said Eric, his voice had a little hope in it.

"We should look around in the cars and buildings." suggested Lisa.

"They look abandoned." Kaleen said.

“Let’s just try it.” Eric said.

We split up, going to the surrounding vehicles, leaving Irene’s corpse behind. I looked in the back of a pickup truck and found a small cardboard box. The lettering was somewhat eroded from the box but I made out: 7X64 MM. I emptied the box. These bullets looked the same as the ones my rifle used! Hope filled me. I loaded in another bullet, because I only had four chambered. There were twenty in the box, so I had a total of twenty four. I stuck the spares in my pocket.

I looked in the cab, the door was open and I found a coil of yellow rope that looked in okay condition. I grabbed it, lying next to it was a hunting knife with a clean steel blade and a slightly worn handle. I took that as well.

"Find anything, Nick?" Asked Lisa quietly.

"Yes, some rope, more bullets and a knife." I whispered back. I looked over and saw that Eric had found something silver looking: a handgun.

"Where did you get the handgun?" I whispered to Eric.

"In the glove compartment of this car." He whispered.

He tossed it to me. I ejected the magazine. It had a seven round magazine. It looked like the M1911 from my video games, but I wasn't sure. I tossed it back to him.

We regrouped down the road a little when we were done looting cars. Eric inspected the handgun, he looked afraid.

"Let's hope I won't need to use this any time soon." He said.

When he said that, the image of me shooting Irene played through in my mind. Was it the right thing to do? Sorrow followed my conflicting feelings. I had killed someone. Evil or not, I wondered if it was the right thing to do. Irene was dead because of me. I had never seen her directly hurt anyone. It was all Saja. Could it be that Irene was innocent, and Saja was the one calling all the shots? Was I just being difficult? Did Irene really deserve to die? If I really needed to kill someone again, could I do it? I felt a tear coming to my eye.

“Nick, are you okay?” Kaleen asked.

I nodded, subtly wiping away the tear.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” I said.

Kaleen looked at me skeptically, but turned away.

"We need to get moving, out of this town. Those Kerulen could be on our tails any minute now." Anara said.

"Nick, I thought about it, and I want to come with you, to fight Saja." Said Lisa.

"Me too." Said Eric.

"Eh, why not? We’ve already lost everything. What’s the worst that could happen?" Tim said grimly.

 

Several Hundred Feet From Kaleen’s Apartment, Earth. Saja’s Point Of View.

 

Saja stood watching, horrified. Nick had shot Irene. He actually did it. She watched as the Kerulen ran away. They didn’t know that they were immune to gunfire.

"Spineless creatures." She said to herself.

She looked at Nick, and watched him bandage Irene with his own shirt sleeve, the loud noise from his rifle shot echoed for a few more seconds. Nick picked Irene up and ran off. Saja saw that the Kerulen were running back, this time by the hundreds.

"This should be good." She said deviously to herself.

She stuck to the shadows like the creature of the night she was. She was mildly thirsty. She had not thought of the shortage of humans on the earth when she created this apocalypse. Even after Nick had mentioned it to her, it was too late. It was still too late. The Essence of Life and the Blade of Faith are destroyed. She could not revert this. Soon the human race would die off. It may take years, months, decades, but it would eventually happen. When it did, the Kerulen, vampires, and even herself would go insanely thirsty. Vampires can’t die from lack of blood, but they will feel the burning thirst every second of the day until they get blood. The thirst gets worse every day. A very, very cruel fate.

Saja saw the Kerulen chase Nick into the alleyway.

"Surely Nick and his friends are finished now?" She asked herself.

When she saw that they had piled the trash containers to block the exit, she was furious, she wanted Nick to die. She thought of going in there and slaughtering every last one of Nick's friends, making him watch, then killing him, but she could not lose her advantage of surprise, lest she made a mistake. She would strike when the time is right.

She noticed how Nick and his friends had pulled down the ladder of the fire escape climb up, and watched their struggle to bring the ladder back up. She then heard a girl's voice.

"Who's there?" Asked the voice.

"Who is it Anara?" Asked a second voice.

She recognized the second girl's voice, it was Kaleen. The friends were re united now, how quaint. She saw the friends go out onto the street, loot the cars and buildings, then leave. They went out into the distance, Saja followed.

She saw Nick look to the sky. She thought of the eternal night that she cursed the world with. Ectoclis and Artemis looked much the same as Earth right now. The worlds were forever thrown into darkness, Kerulen overran in force. In a few words, it was total desolation. She figured she couldn't give the humans an advantage, because if there was one thing she learned, it was that giving your enemies hope, even a spark, would turn into a wildfire. As Saja stalked Nick and the others along the road, she laughed to herself, giddy with the excitement of the hunt. She pictured herself slaughtering Nick now, just like she had done with his other friends, and her former self.

Saja noticed that Nick and one of his friends both had firearms. Saja knew how firearms worked, she had witnessed them in action many times here on Earth; on herself, right before she killed the people who shot at her. Saja planned a way to kill Nick, she could use magic to make his death all the more painful, but she hated using magic, it unnaturally drained her of her own strength, like a vampire bite. She did not use magic often, but she knew the basics. Summoning fire, healing, and a few other basic magic abilities. Saja had taught what she knew to Luna. What had happened to Luna, she had no idea. She did not see her body after the Hemlon explosion, so there was no guarantee that Luna was dead. Still, no one could have survived that. Well, except for her, her other self and Nick. Saja figured that since she was watching and stalking Nick, she may as well practice her magic.

Saja directed her mind's eye at Nick. She closed her eyes, and thought of confusion, yes, the physical emotion of confusion, she then created a channel from her mind's eye to Nick and... Nick fell. He tripped over his own feet.

"Nick, are you all right?" Asked Kaleen.

"Yeah, I just got a little... confused." Nick replied.

It had worked! Saja felt the drowsy after effects of using magic, along with the unnatural weakness, it wasn't as bad as the last time she had used magic. She then put her hands together, bowed her head, and she began to float slightly off the ground, she used her mind's eye to direct her. She flew a little too close to Nick's back, and crossed the road behind him.

"Did you hear that? Someone is here, whatever it is, it smells familiar." Kaleen said wearily.

Saja was ready to strike, she had landed in some bushes and could still see the humans and vampire standing on the road. Saja considered killing them now, but she saw a familiar group of looters, the leader's name was Theodore Dickonson, if her memory served, she knew that they had the appropriate weapons to kill her, and they would most likely help Nick if she attacked him. The predator must lie in wait for its prey.

Author's Note

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