Thirty people stood on the beach. There were more shapes than that moving down there, but only thirty of them were living people. The people ran upslope, towards the town of Seaside, dodging the dead, swinging makeshift weapons at them before plowing onward, away from the beach.
The rowboat dropped off its latest load of passengers, and they too took to their heels, flying across the sand, though from this distance, it looked like nothing more than a crawl.
In the distance, the horizon changed. It darkened somehow, and Rhodri turned to look. It was the ocean rising up. He placed his hands on the railing, and his jaw fell. He realized he was looking at a giant tsunami, still very far out, but it was coming.
There was nothing to do now but watch. The rowboat wouldn't get back to the ship in time. Maybe that was a good thing. He watched that gray swell in the distance roll on underneath the cloudy sky. It came fast. He tried to calculate how fast it was moving, how tall it was, but the numbers were too big in his mind.
A roar shook the day as billions of gallons of water hurtled towards the beach. He was safe where he was, but that gave him no comfort, as everyone below would be dead soon. The base of the lighthouse stood some 80 feet above the ocean, so he should be alright.
He watched as the crew of the Gypsy Drifter scrambled about on deck, tightening hatches and then disappearing. The ship drifted slowly, counterclockwise, lining itself up with the wave that came at them. But the tsunami hurtled across the ocean at such a speed that the Gypsy Drifter was still slightly canted when the wave hit. It was picked up like a child's toy boat in a bathtub. It rode the wave forward, shipping containers slipping from its deck.
With his binoculars, he lensed the bridge of the ship, and he saw Captain Schwenk standing there, screaming like a child on a rollercoaster. But this was no amusement park ride. The ship tumbled over, and the Captain was gone, but still, the wave came, with a roar like a million lions.
It washed over the beach, the dead and the living disappearing in one fell swoop, and then it rushed through the closest buildings of the town, crashing over them, and just when you thought it couldn't get worse, the water rushed through the streets foaming until it became a sea of white. He watched cars pushed like Legos. The buildings on the edge of town were turned to scrap and forced through the streets.
His own lighthouse shook from the impact of the ocean on the spur of the hill below him. But he was in too much awe to worry about the lighthouse crumbling beneath him. He watched the power of the wave as it swept away hundred-year-old buildings in a second. The ground beneath him shook, and he realized it wasn't the ground that was shaking. This was not an aftershock. It was the building below him. He heard the first tumble of brick from the lighthouse as it clanged its way down the spiral staircase. It was followed by another, and then another. The lighthouse was unraveling beneath him.
He watched the Gypsy Drifter as it came to rest half a mile into the city, sandwiched between two buildings and perched like Noah's Ark on Mount Ararat.
Rhodri marveled at the power of nature, at the forces that man could never hope to fight against. Gravity was another of those forces, and as the Seaside Lighthouse let out one more terrible groan, it took hold of the weakened lighthouse and drove it to the ground, Rhodri with it.
A Word From Jacy
Thank you for reading This Rotten World: Winter of Blood. If you've made it this far, I'm guessing you enjoyed the ride. Please leave a review! As an indie author, the only marketing I receive is from fellow readers like you!
If you enjoyed This Rotten World: Winter of Blood, you might enjoy my other apocalyptic novel, The Drop. It's a sprawling tale told through a combination of news articles, journal entries, and other weird media. It's the tale of a world felled by the music of a boyband. Other than my This Rotten World series, it's probably my most popular novel, and it's my own personal favorite. It is available to buy and also free as part of your Kindle Unlimited subscription.
I am currently working on the final chapter of This Rotten World, This Rotten World: Choking on the Ashes. It should be ready to go by the beginning of 2021.
Click the links below to check out The Drop!
THE DROP
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Also By Jacy Morris
In the This Rotten World Series
This Rotten World
A sickness runs rampant through the world. In Portland, Oregon it is no different. As the night takes hold, eight men and women bear witness to the horror of a zombie outbreak. This Rotten World is the zombie novel that horror fans have been waiting for. Where other zombie works skip over the best part of a zombie outbreak, This Rotten World revels in it the downfall of humanity, dragging you through the
