The Lightkeepers

16

6.

Torment

They ’ d never gotten this close before.

I bounded up the stairs, my breathing ragged and shallow.

Not again, not again, please not again , my mind begged somewhere in my subconscious.

The thought went unnoticed amongst the flurry of bricks and my own franticness. Someone shoved

me from behind.

“ Keep going! I ’ m right behind you! ” My mother called up to me. Again, her hand pushed

at my back, urging me forward.

It ’ s not supposed to be like this . I took the stairs two at a time, my feet slamming briefly

on each step before pushing off and landing on the next. Not real, not real, not real .

It didn ’ t seem to matter what I thought in the outer edges of my mind. The zombies clawed

against the door at the base of the stairs. Dad and Henry were setting up the rest of our defense

mechanisms as Mom and I rapidly flew up the spiraling staircase to join Ellie on the catwalk. My

hands barely wrapped around my shooting earmuffs before I stumbled up the ladder and grabbed

a gun I hadn ’ t realized we had before clamoring out onto the catwalk.

Bang! Bang! Ellie sent two rounds into the horde crowding around the door at the base of

the lighthouse. A sharp ringing in my ears reminded me to put my muffs on. Sunlight blinded me

as I flipped the safety switch off and brought the rifle to my shoulder. I took a shuddering breath.

I ’ d forgotten my sunglasses. There was no time for that now.

It ’ s only a nightmare, I told myself.

My mother loosed an arrow, striking a zombie toward the edge of the pack, on the east

side.

“ I ’ ll pick off the outer west! ” I shouted over the moaning and rifle rounds. That incessant

moaning — that moaning flooded my covered ears and haunted me even now.

Just like target practice, Rae. Pumpkin on a post , I reminded myself. My index finger

found the trigger as I lined up a zombie ’ s head with the post. In, out, squeeze .

I repeated this process several times, breathing in and breathing out, and then pulling the

trigger. My father joined Ellie in her quest to eliminate the ones at the front of the pack, the ones

who were beginning to surge into the lighthouse. The door surely laid in fragments.

“ I got this. Go help your brother, ” Dad ordered me. I nodded in acknowledgement, taking

one last shot before I joined Henry on the inner staircase. He only had a pistol and was down to