ZRAC: Prologue

“You killed me, Zhee! How could you do that to your little sister?!”

Little Sarah looked up at me with big brown eyes, begging, pleading at me for an answer. I turned away, holding back the tears that only she could bring out.

“I couldn’t… I... I had to, Sarah. You had turned! Living a half life isn’t living one at all! You-- you would have killed me!" I yelled. Tears threatened to fall as I turned around to face her, recalling the toddler I left asleep in the forest one day, who woke up undead.

"I didn't have the medicine to cure you. Please, please, please, Sarah. Forgive me," I whispered.

Sarah’s eyes glowed a murderous red. Her feet floated off of the ground and her hair whipped around her face.

“You killed me! How could I forgive that?”

I shrunk back, terrified of the demon child who was once my sister. Her body smoldered with fury. Her face began to flicker between toddler and skull. Smoke curled from her fingers and trickled to the floor. I was nearly knocked down by the waves of hate rippling from her.

"Because I'm your sister, maybe?" I whispered.

Her anger melted. She threw herself at me desperately for one last hug. I felt an extremely sharp pain in my chest area. I didn’t need to look down to know that it was a katana, like the one I used to kill her. I screamed in pain and struck out violently. Sarah ducked, looking horrified. I scratched franticly at my chest, but I couldn't find the weapon. My hands became stained with dark blood I knew was mine. Sarah cradled my head and whispered a lullaby I had always sung her. I croaked along with her in a dying harmony as my vision started flickering out. Her tears salted my lips.

“I’m sorry, Sarah.”

Then everything went black.

~~~~~

I shot up in my cot. It was all a dream, I reminded myself, looking anxiously around my bedroom. The old storage space was completely empty, all bare concrete and oil spots. One metal dresser and a bed decorated the dirty little room. I had no belongings when I came to Z.A.C. and I didn't plan on gathering any more. Anything that could be used to track us in this reality. I sighed, putting my head in my hands.

That’s when Bellatrix came running in, yelling her head off. 30 seconds of peace and quiet, that’s all I got. Typical. 

“Zhia! It’s an attack!" my friend yelped, "Where were you? Didn’t you hear the alarm?”

Startled, I stared at her. I must have slept through the whole thing. “What do you mean, attack?”

She stomped her foot and huffed in annoyance.

"I mean that we're under attack!” she said sarcastically.

She gave me a look and promptly raced out of the room.

I tugged my battle suit on as quickly as I could, and rushed out of the storage room after her, armed to the teeth and ready to bust some zombie heads.

~~~~~

The battlefield looked like a scene from a war movie. There were corpses and blood everywhere, gunshots echoing, and small fires scattered across the field. I looked on grimly for a second, and then charged in, armed with my dual katanas, a few daggers, a few throwing knives, and a couple grenades.

I ran over to a few teens of low rank who were totally surrounded and sliced up a couple of the zombies. I blew up the oncoming wave with a grenade to buy them some time as they gathered their wounded. I helped a little kid, maybe 10 years old, off of the field so he could get his arm treated at the hospital area. Then I continued running to help my friends, Bellatrix, Selene, Xavier, and Mici.

“How’s it going?” I yelled over the loud explosions going off everywhere.

“Not good!” Mici yelled back, gesturing around us. I looked around, noticing anxiously that the bodies strewn everywhere were mostly ours. I winced, and fought even harder than before.

Bellatrix dodged a zombie, and Mici busted its head open as it went past. Selene punched one in the gut while I pounded on its back. We worked as a team, fighting just like we had been trained to. For hours, it seemed, we knocked the creatures down, but new ones kept popping up from the field. We were nearly at the front of the invasion, and were getting the brunt of the undead. I glanced towards the building, hoping to spot reinforcements, and that’s when I noticed something really bad.

“Bella!” I shouted, knowing that the nickname would get her attention.

“Don’t call me--" She suddenly stopped short. "Dear god…” 

She had noticed where I was pointing. There was a titanic fire tickling the defensive walls right beside our Walmart. 

“We have to stop it! If we don’t, our base will just... just... go poof!” I made a little explosion gesture with my hands. “We'll all die.”

“I realize that, Zhia! SELENE! Look!” Bellatrix yelled.

Selene turned and stared in shock. She then screamed, “Well, what are you waiting for? Come on!”

I muttered, “Always the big strong leader…” 

“Will you be able to hold them?” I asked Mici and Xavier.

Mici nodded briefly. I smiled at him and then ran furiously to catch up to my friends for what could be the last mission we ever had. I shuddered at the thought.

The blaze was giant, to say the least. Flames seems to lick the sky above us. The blaze must have been about twenty-five feet high. The enormous bonfire raged across the plain with the ferocity of a starving tiger. If we didn't stop it soon, it was going to completely destroy our home.

“Together?” Selene asked.

Bellatrix and I nodded. I raised my hand up so it was perpendicular to my body, and watched as my friends did the same. Together, we concentrated on our powers, and their respective uses. 

I focused on blowing the flame down, back onto itself next to my friends, while they tried something they had just learned: absorbing the fire. Their hands were thrust directly into the embers in front of them, making me grimace in sympathy. The lack of flames made a protective pocket, giving us a tiny area where the heat didn't hurt us. It was still horribly hot and dangerous, and if we stepped out of it we would literally be blasted to cinders, but still, it let us get up close and personal with the fire, which we needed to put it out. I subconsciously kept cool air flowing into it, to keep us from dying of heat exhaustion, but it was incredibly intense. Even sitting within a few feet of a backyard 2-foot campfire feels disturbingly like you're getting a little singed around the edges. This was like that feeling times a million. And after about five minutes of intense concentration, Selene broke.

“I can’t go anymore, I-- I can't!”

She fell to the ground, panting. I knew that if she said that she was ‘spent’, then she really was. Selene would keep going until every ounce of energy was gone. Her eyes were glassy, and the hair on her arms was singed off. Small flames ran through her hair. She couldn't do much more now than stop her skin being burned off. I glanced over at her in concern. I shouldn’t have. I lost control for one second, and all hell broke loose.

The wind knocked me off balance and I tripped, knocking Bellatrix over, making her lose concentration. Half-focused and exhausted like she was, she couldn't control her powers. Her hands stopped absorbing fire, and the pocket of protection we had crumpled. The flames came down upon us, and I heard one last echoing “NO!” before everything faded into intense heat. Red, orange, and yellow took control of my sight, and darkness clouded my eyes. The fire was so intense. I probably screamed, but the fire scalded my skin and hair, and I could hear nothing except its intrusive roaring. I clawed furiously at my roasting head, but nothing happened. I could only smell my hair smoldering. My brain went into shock as I burned. It made me feel flashes of cold and calm before blasting me back into the blazing heat. All these feelings happened in a matter of seconds. Then, suddenly--

I felt nothing.