Am I ready for this

My heart would be pounding like a jackhammer, right? Is that the right way to put it? Especially if I had a working heart.

It’s been three days since we started our trip to the perilous Black Hills in South Dakota. My writing is the scratches left over from normal, “chicken scratch,” as my good friend Emma once said to me. I miss her. She and her girlfriend India are staying behind and I’m so sad they are not here.

Ax is leading the way as he knows the path ahead. I am feeling so painfully exhausted. My bones literally feel like they are turning to mushy dust and muddy like Mississippi water.

When we sit to rest for a while, Stan strikes up a conversation about gems and their health benefits for zombies with Ax.

“Black Hills Gold, very good for keeping zombie from deteriorating. Lasts long for bones from breaking,” Ax signs to my husband in very short and haphazard bursts of shaky hand communication. How can the giant even see? His eyes look cloudy and dark.

“What does it look like?” Stan signs back in an animated manner. I look at Serena cradling her girlfriend Clara with an empty, exhausted glance. It makes the pounding I feel I am hallucinating seem even faster and louder. I can tell Stan wants so badly to find gems not just for Asher, our best friend who is currently in a zombie-coma, but he wants to get some for me. I feel it. It’s all there in his gorgeous brown eyes.

“My brother says it’s three colors,” Ax almost violently pushes three huge fingers in my husband’s face and I feel a strong tingle in my throat.

Stan immediately throws a passionate stare at me and signs, “I love that laugh, darling.”

I cover my face and peep from my fingers. He makes me feel like a young zombie again. New and freshly dead and full of passion.

Ax keeps talking, listing off gems we may be able to mine:

“Fairburn Agate, Holley Blue Agate, Tepee Canyon Agate and… Rose Quartz. That last one, heal up really good. That one will shine up dead like a new penny.”

I move in closer to Ax.

“You are never this talkative Ax!” I sign and he growls.

“It was what my life was before I was a bodyguard for the rich zombies.”

“Will Rose Quartz really wake him up?” Hudson suddenly rose to life and spoke out loud. Out of our entire group of humans and zombies, though he was a human, he seemed the most undead of all. Until now.

Ax growls a yes.

“Then let’s hurry!” Hudson says in a panicked tone.

“We are doing 2-3 hours everyday for travel, sugar,” Serena perked up. “No wonder we’re behind. It’s a fourteen hour walk-job from Missouri.” She eyes Ax. “From what Ax tells me anyway.”

Clara sighs in a whiny growl. “We get tired faster than you humans!”

Serena winks at her.

“Let me guess, that’s why she loves you, cause you are fast ahead of the game…” Hudson sneaks in and Serena throws her wolfish and wild red curls to laugh raucously.

“Ya little fire cracker, I can tell why Ash likes you, boy!” Serena cat-calls in a loud whistle.

Hudson laughs and we all look at him with surprise. That’s the first time he’s laughed in weeks.

“We still got about five hours left to go,” Stan says. “I’m assuming we can get this trip done by tomorrow if we make a few more hours today and start early tomorrow.”

“How the hell do we know we’re going the right way?” Serena asks.

I stand up, “Ax has old maps! I see him checking them every so often.”

“Old maps I got from my old mining boss,” Ax affirms. “We’d sell the rarest gems to the entire community of elites. Whenever delegates from all over world meet to discuss what they wanted to do for the country, they’d also go crazy over the newly mined gems we’d get from our last mining project.”

“I wonder how other so-called countries work out humans and if they are all living in bunkers,” Hudson asks, scratching his head.

“It’s all… in a sense of similar design, as they say,” Ax signs in an almost shamed way.

“All humans live underground or in a caves?” I ask.

“Mountains. Woods. Caves. Underground. Anywhere away from zombie communities,” Ax explains.

“Am I ready for this?!” I hear a loud and familiar voice, it makes me jump up and my body warbles around like a crazy person, my limbs shaking uncontrollably.

“EMMA!” I scream out loud, and run away from the group.

She’s out of breath and I slam into her, hugging her tight. India is next to her, looking at us with a perplexed smile.

“Holy shit, you’re here! I thought we’d get so lost and I was freaking out! Indy was trying to figure out where y’all were. Ugh!” Emma yells out in a relieved scream. “Can shit actually be holy? Like where did that expression even come from? Like, ‘holy shit,’ was just a random question of shit someone imagined as a possibly holy creation! Hah!” Emma rambles. India interlocks arms with Emma and pulls her close.

“I’m so happy you’re not lost!” I look at India as I sign, and we give each other a knowing look of funny irony as it’s silently obvious how forward Emma is socially compared to her.

“What made you change your minds?” I sign to India as we walk to our friends.

“Emma. She made me feel ready. Ready to fight for everything and everyone. For Hudson. Ash.”

As everyone circles around Emma and India, I get a feeling of utter desperation and despair.

This trip to Black Hills isn’t a guarantee of success and what if I fail Hudson and Asher? What if I fail my god-daughter Shadow? What if I can’t recruit enough help of zombies and Bloodletter’s to help our compaign?

Am I truly ready for this?

My heart would be pounding like a jackhammer, right? Is that the right way to put it? Especially if I had a working heart.

It tha-thumps loudly in my poisoned mind as we contemplate our future in this hellish void of space.

——

Author note: this is a chapter from my upcoming sequel to my novel I am Bexley: The Bloodletter’s Scourge, the horror/fantasy/romance that is currently published as a chapter to chapter read on Resurgence Novels. It is titled I am Bexley. Please check out the full story on the free app and the short side story about India and Emma called Flipping The Veil, (it’s from a free collection of short stories called Chasing Fate) also on the app!

I hope this leaves you feeling full. Or at least hungry for more …. 🧟‍♀️