Alicia did not think so, anyway. Nate was pleased to see she kept detailed notes of any communication and times they occurred, and she would relay them to him as he was sat in the hide constructed on the hill overlooking Ascension. While Alicia thought she was just writing dreary notes and reciting boring communications, Nate was starting to build a better picture of their structure and key personnel. As he watched, Alicia’s additional audio allowed him to add some context to his observations.
For the moment though, all he wanted was sleep. Alicia nodded all bleary eyed as she rolled off the bed and dragged herself to her feet. It was a little after two in the morning, and Nate shoved the hot, black coffee into her hand as she rose.
Mumbling her thanks, she shuffled out of the bedroom into the next first floor room along the small landing, closing the door behind her. The room went dark as her flashlight disappeared.
There had been no signs of anyone near their little base of operations, which was a good couple of miles from the cultist settlement. Nate would make the journey from here on foot to his hide each day, about a mile and three quarters each way, where he would stay all day observing the settlement. Getting eyes on it overnight would be a boon but staying in the outdoor hide was just too much of a risk. For one, it was just too damn cold of a night. Secondly, the undead were silent predators and he could not take the risk of falling asleep and being pounced on. Their senses were inhuman, and he had no way of knowing if it was just sight and sound they used.
Considering what he had seen on first contact, and in the week since, he could not be sure of anything these days. The disagreement with Erin played on his mind for the whole time, and her wild theory of a dark celestial agency was difficult for him to digest. Admittedly, the dead rising to destroy the living should have changed the boundaries of what he should consider possible, but the thought of some dark force moving pieces in a game of its own twisted making was a little too far for him to accept at the moment.
The hurt on her expression when she thought he and Alicia had united against her was still raw though. They had always been a great team, as frustrating as she was at times. Leaving it as they did left a knot twisting his insides that he just could not seem to pick free.
Nate stripped off his tactical vest and boots, slipping into his thick sleeping bag on his bed in the twin room, before falling back on to the pillow with a grunt. The batteries on the radios were almost done and they’d have to return home tomorrow. A couple of days of comfort and warmth, a resupply, charging the radios and the spare batteries to full, and then it would likely be a return to this spot and start the observation again. He was unsatisfied with the intelligence gleaned so far, and there were still too many spaces that needed colouring in before he considered it acceptable.
With another heavy sigh, he closed his eyes.
The garden was in full bloom, a riot of colour bordering the lush rectangular lawn of vivid green. The rich intensity of the lilac, the gentle sweetness of the mock oranges, delicate tones of jasmine, and the strong headiness of the gardenias, were an explosion of fragrances that flooded Nate’s senses as he breathed them in.
The garden was still and quiet. No buzz of insects or bird calls disturbed the scene, which remained motionless without even a breeze to stir the blooms in their beds, as though he existed within an exquisite painting.
Sitting on the decking’s swinging lawn chair, he knew it was not real. It was only a dream, though a pleasant one, for it had been more than twenty years since he had sat in this spot. It had always been his favourite place in the world, and the only time in a life of frantic motion and violence that he was ever truly at peace. Sitting in his back garden in the summer, beer in hand as he watched her play…
Nate swallowed a hard, dry lump as his throat constricted, his eyes threatening tears as the dark phantoms of memory rose from their slumber to taunt him. Avoiding the shadows of those bleak thoughts, he turned his gaze around the bright garden, looking for Maggie, his ex-wife. His heart froze in his chest as he realised someone was sat beside him on the swinging chair.
Dark hair, dark eyes, and a face that would make Helen of Troy turn green with envy with her glowing skin, Nate’s ability to speak was taken from him as he stared. She was looking out over the yard, a serene smile touching her lips as she drank it in.
“This is a beautiful garden,” she said.
He struggled to find his voice as he stared in wonder.
“Freya?”
She turned, her smile so radiant and pure it almost burned him. The young woman appeared suffused with light, a paragon of such joy and purity, that the sight of her almost unmanned him. She spoke again and it resonated through him like the voice of an angel, melodious and uplifting, as though it was in tune with the harmony
