Emilia

Tuesday, May 10th, 2022 (49 days after the Shutdown)

Death could be written a thousand different ways and each would hurt as badly as the last. Unless of course, it was your father who was the one doing the killing.

They all stood in silence, waiting for what was on the other side of the doors to come barging through but they were spared the wait. With a grunt, they heard the monster stomp off, dragging the headless guard behind him.

A collective sigh was released around the room.

"Did he recognize us? He's not trying to kill us," Katherine mused, sitting down and immediately jolting to her feet. Grimacing as she wiped her pants, her face went through a myriad of emotions when she realized what she'd sat on.

Picking up a half-eaten apple, her eyes hardened. "No fucking way… They kicked us off the ship because there wasn’t enough 'to go around'. Charles Daniels… died… for their greed, those lowlife pieces of shit!"

"Katherine, that’s not our priority right now. Don’t mistake my silence as acceptance. Believe me, I understand your anger but this is our chance," his deep voice blanketing Katherine’s temper as he continued explaining the rest of his plans. "Remember that raft we were building?"

"The one you asked us to stop? Yeah, what about it?" Katherine replied, scraping off the rotting parts of the apple. "Wait… No. That's your grand plan? Jump ship and go to the island across the beach? We don’t know how far that is and we don’t know what’s out there.”

“Ah, but we could,” he replied, putting above them. “The maps in the bridge should still have the latest information about where we are. Get that and then we escape.”

“What about my father?” Emilia whispered but the words cut through the silence.

“Emilia…”

“I know what he’s become. I’m not stupid. But can’t we help him?”

“Darling, we don’t know how,” Katherine replied, throwing the apple away. A miasma of flies flew out of the garbage bin. “I hate seeing Juan the way he is right now too, but we can’t fix him.”

Biting her lip, Emilia muttered under her breath. “Right.”

It took more guesswork and walking into walls but in the back of the cafeteria they found the spiral stairwell that went directly to the bridge. Making their way up to the top they were immediately bathed in sunlight. Its soft, golden glow was so distant from the world of bloodshed and butchery they’d run away from that the three of them stood there for a second in awe, their objective momentarily forgotten.

“Okay… how about we uhh… get started?”

***

The maps Mr. Daniels had gone to great lengths to take care of were strewn across the floor with boot prints marring their details. As the others sorted through the daily logs he made, Emilia found the map they needed crumpled at the bottom of the trash can. Did someone get pissed at the map? she wondered, flattening it out.

"Oh, you found it."

Jefferson brought over a log book and the three of them started putting the pieces together. After several failed attempts at matching the date to the map notes, he smiled.

"What?" Katherine asked, putting her logbook back. "That smile tells me it's good news. Please let that be true."

"It is. Oh, it very much is," he grinned, pointing to the west coast of North America. "That, ladies, is where we are and across the bay where we saw that patch of land is… Oregon, America."

"Which means " — the smile lines deepened as he rolled up the map and tucked it in his shirt — "We don't have to worry about getting stranded on another island. A couple of miles and we're homebound free. And to you, oh uneducated child, I can finally teach the joy of baseball!"

"Free… you—"

A large hand clamped over her mouth before she could finish the rest of her question.

Katherine was fiercely staring at the door, her eyes conveying a sense of danger as she pointed to the door and then held up a finger to her lips.

"People," she mouthed, moving toward the door to the catwalk.

Straining her ears to make sense of Katherine’s worry, the blossom of hope that sprouted in her chest withered as she heard footsteps coming up the stairs. The monster her father had become didn’t make footsteps leaving only one other explanation.

Marcus and his mutineers were back on the ship.

Eyes widening, Jefferson hurried over to the door and locked it.

"They'll see the blood and realize something is wrong," he hissed, propping a chair against the bridge's main door. “We’re leaving. Now!”

No, we still have a chance. The only lantern on the ship is on the lower floors. If they came up here without visiting any of the other floors…

That's what she convinced herself of but she knew those thoughts were nothing more than a paper shield to hide herself from the truth. Sooner or later Marcus and the others would arrive at the bridge and wonder why it was locked. Papa…

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Grabbing the last of the maps, they ran out the back as the entrance doors shook.

"What the fuck?! Which idiot locked the doors?" a crass voice mumbled. Shaking it again, Jean Bain yelled out behind him. "Horace, do you have the keys with you?... Horace?"

After a few moments of silence, they heard him shuffle away, his mutterings growing quieter as he finally disappeared.

Herded forward by Jefferson, the lone catwalk that remained after weeks of salvaging the ship for materials ran down the center of the Santa Marino. Looking over the edge of the rails, stacks of cargo containers covered the deck like a quilt. Even after a month, over three-quarters of the crates hadn’t been opened so there was still a chance one held food but they wouldn’t be sticking around to find out. They’d already lost 2 of their number to this forsaken island.

“Katherine! Slow down!” Jefferson cried as the red-haired woman rushed forward, but the wind ripped the words from his mouth.

Reaching the end of the catwalk near the bow of the ship, the urgency in her face transformed into terror as she dropped to her knees.

A chilling premonition made the air thicken around Emilia, her body instinctively tensing, knowing there was something dreadful lurking behind her. Moving on its own, each degree of movement made her muffled heartbeat grow louder until the sound of her heart in her ears blanketed all other noise.

The crack of a gunshot ripped her from her trance, a sharp and jarring sound that echoed in the wind. Instinctively her hands frantically searched her body yet the bullet didn’t find its mark on her. A shaky exhale escaped her lips.

As she raised her head, her relief was short-lived when she saw the bullet had found another target.

Lurching towards her, Jefferson’s gaze momentarily lost focus and his hand went to the hole in his throat. He tried to say something to her, his eyes conveying a tempest of confusion and fear but all that came out of his mouth was blood. No… NOOOO! His composure, forever stalwart and confident, crumpled like a tin can as pain rippled across his brow causing him to falter.

“One shot to bring down the beast, eh? Color me surprised,” a sickening voice ridiculed them. “I’ve never seen a bigger bunch of idiots. Were you betting on me not realizing something was wrong when there were no guards to greet us? Was that your gamble?”

Jean Bain’s low chuckle cut deeper than any knife as she helplessly watched Jefferson struggle to stay on his feet.

“I’ll make it painless for him if you tell what happened when we were gone.”

His words were lost on Jefferson. Eyes bulging out of their sockets, he stretched out his body, shielding Emilia from Jean’s gun. Interlocking his fingers around the railings to anchor himself, his wound wept red tears, tendrils of lifeblood spreading across his shirt to depict a morbid mosaic. But he weakly smiled at her as if to say, ‘It's alright’.

“Jeff… please don’t, not you too… I-I won’t forgive you if you die—”

“You’re comforting him?” Jean Bain guffawed. Firing another shot into Jefferson’s back, the African-American man coughed up fresh blood, his muscles working in his jaw as he fought back the pain. “You don’t get to do that until you give me what I want. Or we can wait until Marcus is back and watch your crook bleed out together.”

The world closed in on her. What do I do, what do I do, what do I do, she kept repeating in her head as another pillar of her life crumbled in front of her.

“We w-were too lax. Emilia,” the man in front of her croaked, the blood clogging his throat. “R-Run. Hurry!”

Stumbling back at the ferocity of his face, she ran towards Katherine blinking back tears.

“Hey!” she heard Jean Bain bark. Gunshots erupted but as she looked over her shoulder, she saw Jefferson draw a single-edged blade; one she’d remembered seeing the first day they arrived on the island.

How does he have tha—

“Emilia, don’t look back!” Katherine hollered as the wind started to pick up.

She made it to the end of the catwalk when something cut the air past her. Casting a quick look behind her, Jefferson was thrown over the edge, wordlessly falling until the back of his head erupted in blood upon impact with the deck 3 stories below. Jeff… Biting her lip so she could feel pain anywhere other than her heart, she turned to Katherine who was holding her leg.

“It's a flesh wound,” she said through her clenched jaw. “I’ll be fine.”

Heading south along the coast to where the cottage awaited them, this was the third time Emilia had taken this path. The first time was for exploration, the second was for sustenance, and now for their survival.

Jean Bain continued firing bullets into the forest, each one missing its mark but he was gaining on them.

“Emilia…” Katherine whispered as she struggled to keep up with Emilia’s pace. Her injured leg was trembling under her weight. “I can’t…”

Refusing to let her continue that thought, Emilia took on her weight and lent her a shoulder. Silently fumbling through the forest, the gnarled roots and withered branches stretched out to scratch them. Signs of weeks' worth of famine started to show themselves the deeper they went, wearing down their bodies bit by bit. The whistling of the wind stirred up the fallen leaves giving them cover but pushing forward in silence didn’t last long. They couldn’t control their exhausted bodies as broken branches and twigs spread across the forest floor announced their location.

“Stop. Emilia stop.”

Emilia ignored Katherine’s voice, her eyes stinging with sweat.

“Emilia.”

A firm hand pushed her away. Katherine plodded over to the embrace of a nearby tree’s shade and sat down. Her weariness was etched deeply into her features, painting a haunting picture as she gazed into the distance, resigned and still.

“We can make it. The road is right there!” Emilia pleaded, kneeling in front of her yet Katherine only shook her head.

“He’s right behind us, darling. We can’t outrun him when he’s hellbent on killing us off and I… I’m of no help to you,” she replied, her voice thick with emotion.

“... not you too… Why do you all want to leave me?” she cried, grabbing Katherine’s trembling shoulders.

“I never wanted to leave you, ever. But… it seems that’s what the world wants.”

“Screw the world! Just want you to stay with me!”

Smiling at her spout of anger, Katherine grew silent.

“We should’ve left when we had the chance. All 5 of us.”

With a bloodied hand, she reached for her neck and yanked off her necklace. Holding it out to her, Emilia took it, watching it pool into her hands.

“Do you remember it? You got it for me for Mother’s Day years ago even though I wasn’t your real mother. And when I tried to correct you, you threw a fit and cried until I finally wore it. Thank you… for showing me the joy of being a mother,” she whispered.

Unspoken words hung in the air as the glistening trails on her face reminded her of their shared memories and laughter.

“Now go. Jefferson was right. If we die, our souls will be chased to Hell. Go… and don’t look back,” Katherine whispered.