Under Zenith

  Hayden was silent for a moment, his dark brooding eyes studying me before he actually let out a small, short lived laugh that died almost the moment it escaped his lips.

  “Okay, fine. I’m sorry I said I wished you were dead. Now do you have any other pointless questions for me or can we get on with things?”

  “Can I ask you questions while we walk?” I proposed, still not ready to just blindly follow this person I didn’t know. I wasn’t a complete idiot.

  “I’d rather you didn’t,” he replied, glancing at me over his shoulder as he, once again, began his trek. “But somehow I get the feeling there’ll be no shutting you up no matter what I say.”

  “It’s a good thing that you’re realizing this early on,” I said, almost smiling.

  He didn’t say anything in reply, but shook his head in front of me, leading the way through the woods without a word.

  “So I may or may not be dead,” I began, thinking out loud and trying to sort through things to figure out what in the world was really going on. “But no matter what, I have to get to this ‘Destination’,” I continued. “So if I’m dead the Destination is probably Heaven…or something like that, and I’m currently in Limbo.”

  “You’re not a child are you? Isn’t Limbo only for children?” he asked, raising a thick dark eyebrow at me and lifting the corner of his mouth.

  It made sense that the only time he’d sort of smile would be when he was mocking my intelligence. This man wasn’t very hard to figure out.

  “I may not be an expert on the Catholic faith, but I think you don’t quite fit the requirements for Limbo. Purgatory maybe, but not Limbo.”

  “I’m not Catholic either, but given my current predicament, maybe I should have been,” I said, looking around at the endless expanse of fog and thinking maybe Purgatory wasn’t such a bad concept if this was all it was.

  Of course being stuck with a rude, British, pseudo-bad-boy was kind of like eternal damnation.

  “Okay, so there’s the Purgatory explanation,” I began again, not bothering to wait for Hayden to make a snarky comment. “There’s the possibility that I’m in a coma and my Destination is waking up from that. And then there’s the very real possibility that I’m dreaming and my Destination is just waking up in my bed and wondering how I was ever creative enough to imagine a scenario like this.”

  “I’m so glad we talked through all of that,” Hayden said sarcastically. “And what explanation do you think is the most realistic possibility, because I’d really like to avoid starting off every conversation with, ‘If I’m dead, or in a coma, or sleeping then why is this happening?’,” he said, mimicking my high pitched voice and Southern accent disturbingly well.

  I thought his question through for a moment.

  This was all too realistic to be a dream. There was always the possibility that the paramedics had stabilized me enough to get me to the hospital where I was currently lying in bed in a coma, but given their assessment of my condition when they’d found me, that seemed like a very optimistic outlook. I wasn’t sure there was any way to come back from the amounts of blood I’d seen in my truck.

  And that only left me with one other option.

  “Hayden?” I asked, my voice small despite my efforts to look tough in front of this stranger.

  “What?” he asked, annoyed as usual that I dared to speak to him.

  “I think I’m dead.”

  Chapter 4

  We walked for a long time through the woods, mostly in silence since Hayden had some sort of aversion to speaking and I didn’t really feel like trying to suck up to someone so rude. Instead, I attempted to come to terms with my death. Honestly, I wasn’t really as sad for myself as I should have been. I was more worried about my parents.

  Like I’d said before, I could be logical about death.

  I’d driven recklessly in the rain and I’d died. It was my own fault and I couldn’t really get all bent out of shape over the fact that I was now facing the consequences of my own stupid actions. But it wasn’t fair that my parents now had to pay for a funeral that they couldn’t afford.

  Of course I was sad that they would undoubtedly be upset about my passing, but my logical mind could only go right to our financial situation. My parents were good people. They were hardworking and frugal. I always tried to encourage them to splurge a little on a vacation just for the two of them, but they just weren’t the ‘spending’ type.

  Now they’d have to spend any potential vacation money on their dead daughter.

  Not to mention the smashed truck, the cost of the ambulance, and whatever other charges went with burying a family member. I wished I could visit them in some ghostly form to tell them to just skip the whole funeral thing and just toss my body into the river or something. I didn’t need a fancy coffin and loads of flowers that they couldn’t afford.

  “I hope I’m dead,” I said quietly.

  “What is it now?” Hayden asked, still sounding as put out about my existence as ever.

  “I really hope I’m dead, not just in the hospital or something,” I repeated.

  “I thought you’d already decided you were dead. Why are we going back on that theory now?”

  “I’m not going back on it,” I said defensively. “I’m just saying, if I was in a hospital my parents would be racking up quite a bill over me. It would be so much better if I’d just died and all they’d have to worry about is a funeral.”

  “You’re a little morbid,” was all he said.

  “I’m just being realistic. Judging by what I saw in my truck, I’m not going to live through the accident. If I died right on site it would be better for my parents financially. If I lived long enough to be in the hospital for a few days, then died, my parents would have to worry about the hospital bill and the funeral, and that’s just not fair to them.”

  “Maybe you lived through the accident,” he stated, not really in a tone that suggested he was giving me hope. It was more like he was trying to kill time with mundane conversation.

  “Ugh, that would be even worse.”

  “How so?” he asked.

  “If I lived, my injuries will probably require physical therapy or some sort of medication or…I don’t know…something expensive,” I said, ticking the possibilities off on my fingers.

  “All you think about is money. It’s a little disturbing.”

  “When you’re poor, you have to think about money all the time,” I told him honestly, wondering if he’d ever been poor enough to worry about money. “What did you do? I mean…before you died. Or have you always been a Guide?”

  “We really don’t need to do this,” he answered gruffly.

  “Do what?”

  “The whole ‘let’s get to know each other because we’re stuck together’ thing. I’d prefer if we kept this professional.”

  I gave him a skeptical look, raising one eyebrow and smirking.

  “What?” he asked, now taking his turn to sound annoyed at my vague expression.

  “How do you keep some sort of weird Twilight Zone relationship professional?” I asked.

  Whatever was going on here was far from business suits and contracts. It was something straight out of a sci-fi movie.

  “By not asking me stupid questions and keeping your mouth shut.”

  “You’re rude and unpleasant and I really don’t like you,” I told him bluntly.

  Maybe it was rude of me to say that to him, but he was definitely asking for it. And really, I probably shouldn’t have tried to be nice to him at all. He hadn’t really earned my friendship in the least.

  “You’re the one who got yourself killed. I’m just doing my job,” he stated. “Guess you shouldn’t have been such a reckless driver huh?” he asked sarcastically.

  “If you must know, I was trying to avoid a dog in the road,” I answered primly.

  Hayden didn’t say anything. Instead he pressed his lips tightly together and smiled, trying to hold in laughter I was assuming.

/>   “What?” I asked in an annoyed tone.

  “I could have pegged you for some sort of animal lover,” he laughed. “You died because you tried not to hit a dog?”

  “That’s not funny,” I insisted, angry that he was reducing my death to something so insignificant.

  “Oh, you’re going to love this first task then.”

  “You keep saying there’s a task, but all we’ve done is walked for hours,” I complained. Not that I really had anything to complain about. Somehow, I wasn’t tired at all, which I found very odd.

  We’d been walking for a good three hours and yet, I felt like it had only been a few minutes. My feet didn’t hurt, I wasn’t out of breath, and I couldn’t even feel myself getting a sunburn through the fog.

  “First task: Agility,” he said cryptically, stopping his trek near a river.

  We were still surrounded by the beautiful North Carolina greenery, though the humidity was surprisingly gone. Something I was very happy about.

  See? Purgatory wasn’t that bad.

  “Agility?” I repeated. “Do you want me to cross the river using the rocks or something?” I asked, still puzzled by the situation.

  “You need to get to a cabin about a mile from where we are right now,” he said, pointing to some unseen place past the river. “It’ll be due west.”

  “That’s it?” I asked.

  There was no way the task could really be that easy. It just didn’t make sense. What did walking a mile in the woods have to do with agility? I’d already walked several miles with Hayden.

  “You’ll have some company,” he stated simply, leaning against a tree and picking at his fingernails disinterestedly.

  “I hope you don’t mean you,” I said pointedly.

  He looked up at me calmly and simply smiled. Unfortunately, his smile creeped me out much more than his cryptic brooding ever could.

  I would have asked what he’d meant by his comment, but before I could decipher it, I heard a growl far off in the distance.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “Motivation to keep you going quickly. You know? Agility?”

  “Is it like some sort of animal?” I asked, suddenly feeling my worry leave me. This really would be easy. “Piece of cake,” I told him. “It’ll be just like hunting with my daddy.”

  Hayden gave me an appraising look, maybe trying to figure out if I was bluffing or not. I wasn’t quite sure why he cared if I really thought the task was easy. It wasn’t like he could do anything about it.

  “Well we can’t have this being too easy now can we?” he asked. “I guess animals aren’t a great motivator for you.”

  “Sorry,” I said smugly, already picking my way across the rocks, managing to get half way across the river without ever getting wet.

  I turned back to look at Hayden, wanting to gloat a bit more about how I’d been taught to fashion a bow and arrows from cast off wood lying on the forest floor, when a wolf walked out of the shadows of the forest, right beside him. I felt my heart start a bit at the sight of the animal, but I didn’t run. I knew there were so many ways I could take care of it if I needed to, using only the tools I had around me.

  One of the rocks in the river could be the end of that wolf and he’d never even know what had happened. I was far from hopeless.

  “The cabin is your safe house,” Hayden said easily, leaning down and placing a finger between the wolf’s eyes gently.

  The animal instantly collapsed onto the dirt covered forest floor without a sound. It didn’t appear to be in any pain; instead it looked as if the creature had simply stopped living.

  “What did you do to it?” I asked, in horror.

  Like I said, I was logical about death. I’d been around hunting my entire life. But I’d never seen a human being kill an animal with one touch. There’d been no force involved at all. It was almost as if Hayden had simply sucked the life out of the creature with his finger.

  “If you can get to the cabin and lock the door, you will have completed the first task,” he went on, not bothering to answer my question.

  “Why’d you kill the wolf?” I asked, still balanced precariously on a rock in the middle of the river. “I thought that was my job.”

  “Your job is to run,” he told me simply. “And the wolf didn’t scare you enough to do that.”

  “So you killed it?” I asked, not feeling like his logic really made much sense. “Now I have even less motivation to run.”

  “I don’t think you do.”

  The wolf’s lifeless body began to twitch at Hayden’s feet. It moved and contorted in an unnatural way, causing me to shiver. I could see the grey fur quickly becoming brown, then black, and then melting off of the corpse all together until all that was left was an off looking pile of skin and bones.

  “What are you doing?” I asked Hayden slowly, letting my eyes lock on his and wondering if he really was there to help me.

  Something told me that only some sort of darkness could do what he was currently doing.

  He gave me a quick wink as the pile of skin began to pull itself up from the ground, revealing something resembling a decaying human form and instantly making me want to vomit.

  “I’m motivating you.”

  Chapter 5

  “What’s that supposed to be? A zombie or something?” I asked with a nervous laugh.

  Animals didn’t scare me. Being alone in the woods didn’t scare me. Even Hayden with his faux bad boy thing didn’t scare me. But something about the twitchy movement of the corpse staring at me with its empty eye sockets stirred a primal fear deep within me.

  “Sure, we can call it a zombie. I’m sure it wouldn’t mind eating your brain,” he said with a laugh, apparently finding the whole situation very amusing.

  “You watch too many sci-fi movies,” I told him, still not running.

  Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t that tough. The zombie-like thing definitely scared me. But it also intrigued me. It was fascinating to see something up close that looked like a special effect in a movie.

  “It won’t really kill me, will it?”

  “You’re already dead,” Hayden pointed out.

  “True,” I agreed.

  “But that doesn’t mean it can’t hurt you…a lot.”

  My eyes widened at this statement, and suddenly I had to wonder what kind of place this was. What was the point of having a zombie chase me through the woods to a cabin? It made absolutely no sense unless you were on the set of a reality TV show.

  “Are you going to help me or just stand there and laugh while this thing eats my brain?” I asked him incredulously, wondering if the corpse would make a move to chase me.

  Luckily, every zombie movie I’d ever seen suggested that the creature would be a slow moaning mess.

  Still, I didn’t really have a way to defend myself against it.

  I wasn’t a naturally queasy girl, but I didn’t think I could bring myself to kill something that looked like a human. It just didn’t feel right.

  “I can’t help you, Isla. You have to do this yourself,” he said with a shrug, not really sounding like he felt all that bad about this fact. “And I suggest you run.”

  “Zombies. The great motivator,” I joked, keeping my eyes trained on the corpse. “It’s just standing there. Why isn’t it moving?”

  “I think it’s trying to be a good sport and give you a head start maybe,” he said, looking over at the corpse who, in turn, turned its head with a loud crack to face Hayden.

  He shrugged at the thing.

  “I say you just get to it, mate,” he said.

  At first I thought he was talking to me. Then, as the corpse turned to look at me with the black holes where its eyes should have been, I realized he was giving the zombie motivation.

  Some Guide.

  “I hate you,” I said to him as I instantly turned on my heel to finish crossing the river.

  One of my boots slipped on a moss covered rock, twisting my ankle and
sending me sprawling into the icy cold water. My knees and palms painfully made contact with the rock lined river bottom, and the water forced its way down my throat, rushing over my head for a moment until I pushed myself up.

  I turned around to say something my mama wouldn’t have approved of to Hayden, when my vision was suddenly blocked by the corpse. I screamed in panic, not expecting it to be so close to me already, and I threw up my arms to defend myself.

  Apparently I wasn’t as agile as I’d expected because the creature grabbed me by the shoulders and forced me back into the water, hitting my head agonizingly on the rocky bottom and causing stars to spring to life in front of my eyes.

  I thrashed against its weight, sputtering for air in the water that was quickly robbing my body of heat. I could feel the bony fingers closing around my throat when I kicked out with my boot, hitting the (for lack of a better word) “zombie” in the place where its stomach should have been.

  It released me momentarily, and I took the opportunity to scramble to my hands and knees, crawling out of the water desperately.

  “Hayden!” I screamed, looking back over my shoulder to see an empty space where my Guide had once stood.

  The creature didn’t waste any time getting back to the task at hand, and soon it was crawling out of the water after me at an alarming pace. Really, the sight of a running corpse was all the motivation I needed to get to my feet and run at a full on sprint in the direction of the cabin with water sloshing in my boots.

  So much for slow, moaning movie zombies.

  The involuntary dip I’d taken into the river was enough to turn me around, but luckily the sun was setting through the fog and Hayden had so kindly pointed out to me that the cabin was to the west. Still, as I ran toward the setting sun, I didn’t know that I’d be able to outrun the creature for a full mile. I was a slow runner and it was quickly gaining on me.

  Of course, the cowboy boots in thick mud probably didn’t help my situation much.

  “Hayden!” I yelled again, hoping this time he’d offer me something more than a few sarcastic comments.