Heir of Anubis: Survive the God's Deadly Game

Chapter 2. Living Skeletons

Raline's weak, feverish breathing more unsteady. Devon noticed it immediately.

'I pushed her too hard... Damn it.'

He stopped abruptly and steered his sister to a curb, settling her onto one of the damaged benches on the sidewalk. She slumped down with pale face, desperately trying to catch her breath.

"You okay?" Devon asked, kneeling anxiously before her. His sister couldn't answer, focused only on regulating the panicked intake of air.

Devon kept glancing over his shoulder toward the city square anxiously. Raline knew he was doing it, and hating the weakness in her body. She could still her the human screams echoing, which meant the slaughter was moving fast, barreling right toward them.

"Just go by yourself, Devon. I'm only slowing you down," she managed to rasp out, softly and weakly.

Devon snapped his face to hers, a snarl twisting his lips as he prepared to argue, to curse her foolish thought. But he saw her eyes, they were glazed with tears and fears. The anger dissolved instantly.

He stood, a soft hiss escaping his mouth. "Never."

His eyes immediately scanned their surroundings, searching for a solution. They fixed on a motorcycle lying on its side, knocked over by the quake. The key was still hanging from the ignition.

Devon sprinted to it, hauled the motor upright, and checked the steering and the tires. It seemed okay. He twisted the key.

The engine roared to life with a satisfying burst. He checked the gas gauge, confirming it was nearly full. A grin crossed his face. Perfect.

He spun the bike around and pulled up sharply beside Raline.

"Get on, quick," he snapped.

Raline, visibly relieved by the action, climbed onto the seat behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist without a wasted word.

Devon sped the bike away, quickly maneuvering through the scattered rubble. But as they neared the supposed city limits, the view ahead was radically different.

"Devon. I'm pretty sure our city did not have mountains nearby, especially not ones that are pitch black like that," Raline muttered, her voice muffled against his shoulder.

He hit the brakes. Two kilometres ahead of them stood a jagged line of obsidian coloured mountains. He weighed his options, head back toward the unknown mountain range or turn back into the hell of the city. And he settled on first.

"We'll check it out," he said, speeding up again. Raline didn't respond, she just held him tighter.

Devon's bad feeling was confirmed the moment they got closer. The nearly black mountains were a hostile landscape. Not a single scrap of vegetation grew in those forbidding slopes.

'They shouldn't be here,' he thought. They had replaced the highway and the houses.

Devon stopped the bike dead on the dividing line, right where the asphalt of Newark city road ended. He stared, completely bewildered, and Raline mirrored his expression.

"How can the city border be... just sliced like that?" Raline whispered, her voice laced with disbelief.

He had no answer. He could not explain the sight before him with anything resembling logic. Newark City looked like a slice of colorful cake that had been fused crudely, with a slice of purple black cake.

"I... I don't know, sis."

His mind quickly pivoted. This disaster could wait. Raline's safety was the only thing that mattered now. He quickly scanned their immediate area, desperately looking for any kind of refuge that could protect them from the skeletons.

The mountains were his absolute last resort. He didn't know them. The last thing he needed was to trade walking bones for some other mountain dwelling threat, especially with Raline sick.

Finally, he saw it. A multi story shopping complex. He recognized the spot, and knew there was a mini mart on the third floor.

'We'll have food and water for a while...' That hope immediately became his plan.

Devon rode the bike to the complex and parked it quickly in a covered, discreet spot. He led Raline through the emergency stairwell toward the third floor. The place was silent, abandoned. Everyone must have fled during the initial earthquake.

Once they reached the third floor landing, he made Raline stop. "Wait right here, okay?"

"Where are you going now?" she asked, still visibly still seemed frightened.

"I have to block the entryways so those boneheads can't climb up. Just wait a bit."

Raline nodded reluctantly. Devon then raced down to the ground floor, sealing all access points leading upstairs with whatever he could find. Filing cabinets, chairs, and heavy chunks of building debris.

He repeated the same action on the second and third floor stairs. But remembering the impossible agility of those things, they way they had vaulted up on cars, he worried about the large glass windows.

With Raline's help, he ripped wooden supports and metal beams from the mini Mary's shattered display shelves. He found a hammer and a box of nails in the hardware aisle.

They worked quickly, securing the boards across the third floor windows, driving nail after nail into the concrete wall.

Raline stood by one of the newly barricaded windows, using a pair of binoculars she had grabbed from a display to scan the street. Suddenly, she gasped, making a choked sound.

Devon was on his feet instantly. He saw her face, now even paler, and took the binoculars from her trembling hand.

Through a narrow gap between the wood planks, he adjusted the focus. A troop of skeletons, twenty or so, were marching toward their location. His heart hammered in his chest.

The horror was amplified by one of the figures, seating on a skeleton horse, its body partially concealed by a dark, tattered cloak. 'They have cavalry?'

"They are real...all skeletons," Raline whispered with one hand clutching her chest in sheer terror. "They're coming right at us..."

'Shit,' Devon thought, realizing what her sister said was true. 'Please, please don't let them know we're in here...'

The bone troops paraded down the street. A few skeletons moved out as scouts, searching methodically for any remaining humans. They checked every building, every car, and ruthlessly plunged their short swords into any quake victims caught in the rubble.

When they reached the shopping complex, they found the ground floor entry sealed. They didn't even attempt to breach it.

Devon and Raline heard no sounds of communication between them. No clicking bones, no strange hisses. But the scout skeletons simply returned to the side of the mounted figures, which stood at the edge of the dark mountains.

Then, without further ceremony, the skeleton troop marched away from the building, re-entering the ruined city.

'We're safe...' Devon let out a shaky breath.