The House at the End of the Street

Chapter Thirteen: Welcome Back, Salvullaz

Gracie stood right next to Salvullaz, waiting for us to say something. We stood in shock, as we could have never thought that, Gracie of all people, would be the one to turn on us.
"Why?" Conner said, still stunned that she was on his side.
"To gain trust. To gain anything I could have wanted from you," Gracie said back.
"You Piece of crap! You gained all of our trust to just kill us? What the hell is wrong with you?!" I said, furious with Gracie.
"You think that I would let you win? It was becoming too easy for you. I sided with Salvullaz before this happened," Gracie replied.
"I just can't connect the dots. Why the hell would you turn on us?" Kaycie asked, walking to Gracie and shoved her.
Gracie retaliated and shoved her back. I ran up to Kaycie and pulled her back.
"I did it because I hate people. I wanted to destroy the universe before any of you were born!" Gracie said.
"Wait, what does that mean?" Conner asked.
"Fine. I'll explain. I am immortal. Salvullaz said that I could live forever if I helped him, which I accepted," Gracie finished.
"You so gained our trust to just break it?" I asked, my machete in my left hand.
I was so tempted to charge at her. She had given us her trust, then she just destroyed it. I was mad as I had ever been at that moment.
"Y'all are such idiots. Especially you, Zack, it is your fault Dade died, that the apocalypse happened, and especially because you killed the entirety of the world," Gracie replied.
"Shut... the hell up... you asshole," I said, slowly.
My eyes were fixed on Gracie, hoping she'd attack first so it wouldn't be entirely my fault that she died.
"Oh, we have a big mouth talker in the building," Gracie replied.
"Zack, let's back up and leave, we don't have time for this," Conner said, grabbing my shoulder.
All of a sudden, Salvullaz charged at us, grabbing me and throwing me into a small one-story house and into a window. I smashed into the window and glass shattered everywhere into my arm.
"Zack!" Kaycie screamed, running over to me.
Kaycie jumped through the now open window and helped me up. We jumped out of the window and sat down on the front lawn.
Salvullaz turned around, grabbed Gracie, and sunk into the ground. Jhett, Conner, Mae, and Jack ran over to the ground, but it was too late. They were both gone.
"That asshole, this is why no one's trusted here!" Jhett yelled, angry.
"She's gone. How will we win now?" Kaycie asked.
"We just need to fight back. We need to relocate. It's obvious that Biloxi was not a smart place to go. We need to find a way back to Ocean Springs and stop Salvullaz from destroying the rest of the world. Now, who's with me?" I finished.
"I am," Jhett replied.
"Make it two," Conner said after.
Eventually, everyone agreed with my plan to get back to Ocean Springs, but first, we needed to get to the casino as fast as possible. We started running towards the beach and would make our way west from the beach and hit the casino. We came out onto the beach and the cold sand.
"Guys... what's that noise?" Mae asked, turning around.
We turned around and saw what seemed to be a moose, but its legs were six feet and its body was not as big as a normal Moose's body was supposed to look like. It had huge, unnatural sized antlers that protruded from the sides of its head. It had sharp teeth, able to chomp through metal.
"Just what we needed," Jack said, sarcastically.
The Moose stood there, looking at us dead straight in the eyes, waiting for us to make a sudden movement to attack. We all stood still. The moose snorted, turned around, and walked away. We all had a sigh of relief.
We started walking to the casino in the sand. The sand was cold, the wind was cold too. I could feel the cold wind blow across my face and small grains of sand hit my face. Then, I noticed something in the distance. It was the casino... but it wasn't standing where it was supposed to be.
"What? Where's the casino?" Kaycie asked, running ahead of us.
"It's... gone," Conner said, losing her breath when she saw what was once a casino.
There was debris everywhere, with slot machines scattered all around the area. There were doors and rubble everywhere around the destroyed casino.
"It's all gone,"
"What the hell happened here?" Mae asked.
"It looks like something only a demon could do," Kaycie said back.
"Guys.... we need to leave. Now," I said, starting to run in the other direction.
"What about the other guys?" Mae asked.
"They are probably safe. They seemed to be able to escape Salvullaz's clutches before, so they should be able to escape him again," I replied, stopping dead in my tracks.
"I don't understand why Dade had to die. Dade was my best friend. Now, he's dead. Let's kick Salvullaz's ass," I said, resuming walking to the destroyed bridge.
"I agree. Who's ready to kick his ass?" Mae replied.
"Let's do it," Jhett said, walking behind Mae.
Eventually, everyone started following me to the once bridge. As soon as we made it(it was only a couple hundred feet), we could see that the entire bridge had sunken to the bottom of the water.
"Let's find an old boat and make it back over. We'll be safer in Oceans Springs than Biloxi," I said, sitting down in the grass right next to the water.
"Jhett and I will find supplies. Mae and Kaycie will try and find weapons. Conner and Zack will try and find a boat. Everyone knows what they're doing?" Jack said.
"Got it," Conner said.
"Okay," Jhett replied.
"Sounds good," Kaycie and Mae said.
"Then let's do this," Jack said, running off to the destroyed casino.
I stood up and Conner and I ran off to find a boat that would help us get across the Gulf. We first checked around the port area, trying to find a small motorboat.
"Anything?" I asked.
"Nothing," Conner replied.
We looked around for a little bit longer but came across nothing.
"We probably need to start heading back. Tell the others the bad news," Conner said, starting to walk back.
I started jumping on some rocks but hit something metal. It was a motorboat!
"Holy crap! It's a boat!" I said, stating the obvious.
"Nice!" Conner said, running over to it.
We uncovered a bunch of rocks, sticks, and leaves to uncover a small boat that could easily fit all six of us. Conner and I decided to sit down to relax for a few minutes.
"I remember what life was like before this. I had a dog, really good friends, and was actually really sad. I guess it's because I lost my parents when I was seven," I said, sitting down on the seat in front of the cabin.
"Yeah. Life was pretty good for me. I guess it's because everyone knew me and it was fun living with people knowing who I was," Conner replied.
"I played the stupid Euphonium in the band. The reigning champion of first chair, the best band for an audition. People kept saying how good I was, but I always felt that I sucked," I said back.
"Really? You remember that solo you had? It sounded awesome!" Conner said back, trying to lighten the sad mood.
"That's what they all told me," I replied.
"You really were good, though," Conner said.
"I guess so. I guess I just miss my parents. I've had no one love me since I was seven,"
"I had a friend who passed away right before I turned seven years old. She was my best friend,"
"Really? Why haven't you talked to us about it?"
"Because no one would care,"
At that moment, Jhett and Jack came running at us, Mae and Kaycie following close behind.
"It's here!" Jhett screamed, the huge Moose-like creature came running towards us.
"Oh no," I said, jumping off the boat and starting to push it to the water.
Jhett, Jack, Kaycie, and Mae ran next to me and started to push it in. Conner stood in front of us, shooting at the beast.
"Push!" I yelled, pushing with all my force to try and push it into the water.
Then, the boat started to move... and splash! It fell into the water and we all jumped on. Conner started running to the now in-water boat and jumped on. We started the motor and it started moving forwards, the beast stopping at the water.
"We did it!" Jhett yelled, all of us celebrating.
We all started giving high-fives and hugging each other until the motor stopped. We all froze in silence, hoping it would sputter back on, but it didn't.
"Oh great," Mae said, sitting down.
"C'mon. Damn it!" Jhett said, trying to fix the motor.
"What now?" Conner asked.
We looked at the brown water. It was cloudy and we couldn't see down a few feet, but we saw the shadow of something big.
"We aren't alone," I said.
Everyone froze and was dead silent. We looked around and saw the gator's spiked tail come out of the water.
"Oh no," Conner whispered.
"We are dead meat," I finished, still silent.