Yesterday's Gone: Season Three (THE POST-APOCALYPTIC SERIAL THRILLER)

Boricio cackled, “ain’t nothing better in this wide blue world than blowing a load of cock snot and having a pair of lady lips to catch it. And it don’t matter if those lips are camping up north or down south. Believe you me Rip Van Freakshow, you bring Mary and her little lamb back, and you’ll be too droopy dicked to take the skin boat to tuna town. And seriously, fuck that shit with a crowbar, kid. Save one lucky fucker, my money’s still on Godzilla, and consider yourself Santa Claus.”
    “I don’t know what to do,” Luca turned from Boricio sighing, his stomach twisted from all the gross words that he didn’t quite understand.
    He finally said, “I have to do what feels right.”
    Boricio looked at Luca, eyebrow arched, shaking his head in resignation. “I don’t think I like where this is going,” he said
    “No, you won’t,” Luca said, marching past Boricio, then down into the basement where they’d been held — the basement where Mary and Paola died. He was going to do what he couldn’t before, save them both — whether Boricio liked it or not.
    “Damn it, kid!” Boricio said, though he didn’t put up a fight.
    Luca stepped inside the darkness, past the corpses littering the ground, until he found Mary and Paola’s bodies, lying just as they’d left them.
    They looked so pale. So dead.
    No way are they coming back.
    Luca wondered how much damage he could repair. Could he heal a gunshot to the head? What if a big chunk of the girl’s brain had been damaged?
    What if I bring her back and she can’t think right anymore?
    Maybe I should find someone without brain damage?
    Stop stalling — you don’t have much time.
    The evil is coming.
    Luca wasn’t sure if the voices in his head were made from truth or fear, or if it even mattered.
    He dropped to his knees and laid his hands on Paola’s face, feeling the familiar warmth flow like a current, spreading through his body and into Paola’s.
    Luca glanced at Boricio, who was shaking his head as he watched. Luca closed his eyes, avoiding distraction.
    Please, wake up, Paola.
    Please.
    Luca wasn’t sure what to expect — whether he’d take a trip inside the girl’s head as he had before, or if she’d simply wake up as though she’d been sleeping.
    Neither was happening. After a full minute, Paola was still nothing but dead.
    “Come on!” Luca cried, opening his eyes, and looking at Paola. He shook her shoulders. “Please, wake up, Paola! Please!”
    Luca squeezed his eyes shut tighter, both hearing and feeling Boricio pace by his side, probably ready to tell him to stop trying, with more words that would make Luca sick.
    No, I have to do this. I have to bring her back.
    Luca thought again of how Paola had died, until he could feel the anger coursing through him. Anger at Brother Rei. Anger at his inability to save Paola or Mary. Or Rebecca, Desmond, Linc, or any of the others he could have saved. Anger at whatever the hell took his family from him last October.
    The warm current flashed brighter, then flowed faster inside him, like someone lit a fuse. It burned hotter than it had before; the heat was suddenly everywhere inside him, flowing from his body and into Paola. Luca could feel her skin warming at his touch. He opened his eyes as Paola’s eyes opened too.
    Her eyes met his, and her mouth parted, but her ragged voice couldn’t crack into words. Paola could only cough instead.
    “Shh,” Luca said, tears of joy streaming from his eyes. “You’re alive.” He smiled. “You’re going to be okay.”

    * * * *

CHAPTER 5 — Edward Keenan Part 1

    March 28
    Somewhere in Georgia
    FIVE MONTHS AFTER THE EVENT…

    Three days had passed since their capture.
    Ed and Brent were shackled beside one another, handcuffed to giant metal shelving in the grocery store’s stockroom as four Black Mountain Guardsmen took turns, along with the kid, Billy, keeping watch. The power was out, but enough daylight was spilling through the skylights to see by.
    Lisa, the woman from the parking lot who had lured them inside the store, was standing guard. Ed wished he’d followed his instincts and simply shot her and the kid when he first saw them. But that would have freaked Brent out, big time, just as it had with Teagan when he took out those men in the gas station.
    One more reason I should’ve fucking gone alone.
    Ed glared at Lisa, lounging in a reclining leather office chair — the kind where executives sat, not the hourly workers