The Fire Unseen Read online

  Contents

  The Fire Unseen

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  THIRTY-NINE

  FORTY

  FORTY-ONE

  FORTY-TWO

  FORTY-THREE

  FORTY-FOUR

  EPILOGUE

  Ari will return

  Also in the Unseen Series

  About the Author

  Dedication

  Copyright

  THE FIRE UNSEEN

  Book One of the Unseen

  by Andrew C. Jaxson

  ONE

  The accident was the first time I saw someone die.

  The blast knocked me from my feet, and flames licked at my arms. My skull cracked as it hit the glass. Searing heat. Blood clouding my eyes. A child screaming.

  A young boy lay next to me with his face half-burned. He reached for me, pleading, and then he was gone.

  My vision blurred, and I blacked out.

  The world was gone. Everyone I knew, everyone I loved. I stood on a desert plain under a dark sky. The stars were red, and aside from them, there was no light. The sand stretched as far as I could see. It was dead flat; I could run for weeks and never reach the horizon. This was not my world.

  The wind picked up, and it smelled of death. I had been here forever. I would be here forever.

  Nearby, a figure perched on four limbs. It was human, or it used to be. Wrinkled grey skin rippled as it moved. It had no interest in me.

  A face emerged in the sky above, a colossal, obsidian face that blacked out the stars. Its eyes were dark, lightless, hungry. I was drawn to them; they called for me like magnets. The desert shifted under my feet, rolling like an earthquake, and a field grew around me, but not one made of grass. I stooped to get a closer look. The field was black, and slimy. It moved against the wind, of its own accord. It was alive. I touched it, and my hand came away red with blood.

  The figure nearby noticed my presence and crawled towards me with backward joints. The face in the sky opened its mouth, ready to swallow the world.

  I was conscious again. Voices swam through the blood in my ears. The boy lay next to me, and he wasn’t moving. I raised my arm to try and feel out my surroundings.

  “The Unseen are getting stronger,” said a voice.

  “Here, of all places,” another replied.

  How long was I knocked out? Sirens screamed in the distance. A fire, maybe? The nearest station was almost twenty minutes away. I must have been lying here for at least that long.

  “Did you see the reverb on the girl?”

  “I did. Weird resonance. Can’t see her now though, and those sirens are getting closer.”

  My mind was on fire.

  The world went blank.

  Red and blue lights, subdued only by the blood still clouding my eyes.

  “Got another one. No way—she’s alive! Help me move this!”

  “Looks like she was sheltered by the barricade. Miracles do happen.”

  Faces, asking my name. A muffled engine through ambulance walls. Needles in my arm. Still, somewhere, a child screaming.

  Nothing. Nothing for a long, long time.

  “You’re lucky.”

  My brain swam to the surface. Disinfectant stank through the fog of concussion.

  “If you hadn’t been shielded by that barricade … well, let’s just say you wouldn’t be in recovery.” A blinding light. I recoiled, slapping the torch away. “Sorry. Should have warned you. I’m still pretty new at this.”

  My eyes adjusted to the light. He was in his early twenties; his brown-eyed baby face was out of place atop a doctor’s coat.

  He must have seen my own face drop. “Sorry again. I shouldn’t have said that. But you might as well know, I’m just an intern. All the senior staff are attending to the more serious cases. We’ve never had an accident on this scale before. Not out here.” That meant I wasn’t a serious case. Or at least not as serious as others. He kept talking. “Can I try again? I need to check your vitals.”

  I nodded, not yet sure if I wanted to attempt a verbal response. The intern checked that I could feel all my limbs and performed a few other tests I didn’t understand. He tried to get me talking, probably to make sure my concussion wasn’t too serious. “Can you tell me your name?”

  I swallowed. “Ari. Ari Carpenter.” My full name’s Maria. But I never really liked it much. My parents were huge fans of The Sound of Music or something. I think it makes me sound like I’m eighty instead of sixteen.

  “Nice to meet you, Ari. I’m Nathan. Do you remember what happened?”

  I croaked, trying to respond. My name seemed to be all my throat could muster.

  Passing me a glass of water, he said, “Just small sips for now. Do you remember where you were?”

  “Founders Road. The café.”

  “Which café?”

  “The only one we have,” I shot back. It was a dumb question to ask. A country town like Ettney doesn’t normally have more than a church, post office, and a pub. We were lucky to have the café. Still, I was probably in the regional hospital in Cawley, now, so how was he to know? I apologised.

  “That’s fine. You must have a nasty headache. I’d be cranky, too. Do you remember what happened?”

  Things were still a little hazy, but a few key memories came floating to the surface. There was a teacher’s strike, so we had the whole morning off school. I was hanging out at home with Josh and Caitlyn, and they sent me up to Founders Road to grab lunch before we headed into class. They probably had no idea where I was now or what had happened.

  I’d been waiting outside the café. Technically, it wasn’t a café. More of a takeaway—fish and chips, milk, bread, that sort of thing. But the owner had decided “Bill’s Café” sounded fancier than “Bill’s Takeaway,” so a café it was. Everyone said it in a sort of ironic way, one of those small-town in-jokes no one else got. I’d been waiting for my order, holding the little ticket they give you with your number on it—which seemed pointless since there were never more than three people waiting for their orders at one time. Part of the fancy café image, perhaps. Anyway, my number was 34. No idea why I remember that. Some things just stick in your memory. But as I stood there, it got so cold, just for a moment, and then—

  “There was an explosion.”

  Nathan nodded. “An oil tanker hit a power line just up the street from you. The police think there must have been a short in the tanker’s insulation, because as soon as the live wires touched it, the whole thing went up. Never seen anything this bad out here before. Not like this. No reason for the tanker to swerve like it did, either, from what I’ve heard. Freak accident.”

  I suddenly remembered being thrown through the glass shopfront and raised my hand to my face. Only a few scratches, but the back of my head had started to throb. “Why doesn’t it hurt more?�
�

  “Well, for starters, like I said, you got lucky. The ambo’s said you were protected by the metal café barricade. It must have been blown in after you. It shielded you from most of the blast. Plus, I’ve pumped you full of painkillers. They’ll wear off in a couple of hours, then you’ll probably feel it a bit more.” He checked the drip running into my arm. “We can always give you a second dose if you need it. Keep me updated. The good news is you shouldn’t need to stay in here too long. You were concussed, but we’ve done some tests, and everything looks okay up there.”

  “So my brain’s not going to explode or anything?”

  He smiled. “Not that I can tell. There’s a first time for everything, though.” He saw the panic on my face. “Sorry, I’m kidding. You’ll be fine. Anyway, you seem to be making a fast recovery. I’d like to keep you under observation for a few days to be safe, but if nothing changes, you’ll be free to go home. Just keep an eye on those stitches on the back of your head. Don’t want them coming loose. I’ll be back later with an attending to check up on you. Can you give me contact details for your family? There was no phone or ID on you. I think they’ll be very relieved to find out you’re okay.”

  Great. I would have to get a new phone and bank card. They were probably melted under a bunch of metal. I gave him my mum’s number, and then I was alone.

  The boy’s face floated back into my mind. His eyes. His desperate eyes. How could I care about something stupid like my phone after what I’d seen? After what had happened to him?

  My mind was wandering down a dark path, and I tried to distract myself by moving. As I propped myself up in bed a little, the coloured stars that filled the edges of my vision warned that sitting up any farther would be a mistake, so I had to try and twist around a bit to see the whole room. I was surprisingly flexible, considering. That was a good sign.

  I took in my surroundings. The room was that ugly shade of mud-yellow that was big in the eighties. Mustard, but with a little pink thrown in. It was comforting, in a weird way, as my room was the same colour when I was young. Beeping came from elsewhere in the room, but the curtain was drawn so I couldn’t see any of the other patients. They made no noise, so they were likely still unconscious.

  Outside the windows was a busy street. Well, busy by my standards. At the end of it was a squat brown building bearing the town name. Cawley was more than an hour from home, at least driving the speed limit. Driving like my mum, it would take half that. Australia’s a big place, especially inland, and the space between towns can be enormous. Still, that’s nothing a lead-foot can’t solve.

  Mum was probably at her single mothers’ support group in the city, toting my sister along. It had likely been a few hours since they’d left, but it was a long drive back. My parents split a while ago, so she was going to this club thing to make friends and talk about how bad their ex-husbands were. Not that Mum and Dad were even divorced yet. It was, to quote their lawyer, a “trial separation,” which sounds a bit like a weird medical procedure: “We’re going to attempt a trial separation of this man’s pancreas.” Besides, they’d been on a trial separation for three years, which practically made it permanent anyway. Hopefully they wouldn’t worry about me when Nathan called.

  At some point, I drifted back to sleep. Dreams mixed with morphine and memories to create a disturbing, blurry cocktail.

  Standing on the street, my father leaped in front of the truck, his face covered in blood and ash. The truck exploded, and the flames twisted into the fiery hair of my mother, wrapping around my chest, burning my heart. The boy became my sister, eyes bleached white with fear before she shattered like the shopfront glass. A figure stood nearby, watching. He had no face.

  I woke in a cold sweat.

  “Rough day?”

  I jumped and looked towards the voice. The stabbing pain in my neck meant I’d turned my head too fast. A man sat in the visitors’ chair. He was older, a fatherly type. Flecks of grey dotted sparse hair, and his eyebrows raked toward the ceiling, giving the impression he was permanently deep in thought. His mouth smirked upwards at the sides, the smile reflected in the corners of his eyes. I tried to match his detached tone. “Yeah. I never got my burger from the café. I’m really freaking hungry.”

  He laughed at my pathetic attempt at humour, probably more out of sympathy than genuine amusement. I appreciated the sentiment. At least he was trying. “You’re lucky,” he said and smiled again.

  “People keep saying that.”

  “With twenty-three dead and nineteen injured, you could be a lot worse off.”

  The numbers took a moment to sink in. In a town of ten thousand or so, accidents on that scale just didn’t happen. I probably knew some of them. What if they were my friends? My family?

  My smiley new roommate noticed the look on my face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  The pity in his voice annoyed me. I don’t like to be patronised. “Who are you, anyway?”

  “For now, just a friend.”

  What was this, the start of a bad stalker film? I frowned. Smiley guy was starting to creep me out, and I was feeling more and more trapped in here. He met my eyes, and I tried to look defiant.

  His voice darkened as he leaned forward. “We saw you, just before you went through the glass.” His breath was musty.

  “Who’s ‘we’? Who let you in here?” My throat dried out, undermining the tough voice I was trying to put on.

  The man sighed and sat back in his chair, folding his arms across his torso. “My apologies again. Sometimes I’m too enigmatic for my own good. Suffice to say, your world is going to change soon. There is a calling on your life, my dear, and it will soon become clear to you.”

  I snickered. This guy was nuts, or a super-religious weirdo, or both, but I was too tired to interrupt as he moved in close to me, his eyes glinting.

  “Underneath the surface, in the shadows, in the unseen moments, in the spaces between now and not yet, between past and future, there is destiny.”

  The awkward length of his pause meant he was expecting some sort of response.

  I’d tried to stay nice, but my grinning visitor was beginning to bug me. “I’ve had a long day, and I’m not interested in whatever crazy religious thing you’re trying to convert me to. I’m in a hospital bed, my head is aching, and I – I just saw someone die.” I took a breath to compose myself. “So get to your point or please just go away.”

  “All right. I’ll move straight to the point. But you won’t understand.”

  I rolled my eyes. My head was starting to throb even harder. I tried to turn over, toward the window. Hopefully, he would take the hint.

  He didn’t. “Just before the blast hit, we saw you. You have a kind of resonance.”

  Resonance. That’s what the voices had said, back in the café. The strangers I heard in the dark. The memory triggered a shiver down my back. I turned and looked back at the man. “They said that. After the accident. They said something was getting stronger. They said it was the Unseen.”

  He swore under his breath, surprised by the word. Standing, he composed himself. “You’re different, Ari. You have a calling. You’re one of us.”

  How did he know my name? I looked around, straining to see the chart above my bed. But the doctor hadn’t written it there yet.

  Before I had time to ask, he opened the door to leave. Flashing me one last grin, he glanced over his shoulder. “It’s coming, Ari. When it does, you’ll know. And you’ll find us.”

  A memory played at the edges of my mind, a dream of a dark sky and a field of blood, and something worse, an unspeakable face …

  Something else had happened in the accident.

  TWO

  It was easier to forget down here. Forget the accident. Forget those who died. The boy was visiting from out of town with his family, his name was Adam, I knew that much. When things settled I’d try and find his family, to tell them … something. Anything really. I wasn’t even sure what I wou
ld say, but it felt important that I meet them.

  The truck driver was the father of Indira, a girl from my school. I didn’t know her well, but I heard she was a wreck afterwards. A family of four were killed too. They were driving on the other side of the road and got hit by the blast from the explosion.

  My lungs burned, and I had to resurface. I took a breath in the cool air and then sank back down. The porcelain bathtub in my bedroom’s en suite had become a sort of sanctuary since I’d returned home.

  I tried to think about something else, but it was pointless. The stories drowned my brain like the water around me now.

  Mrs. Annalund, the primary-school teacher speared through by metal debris …

  George, who retired to our town from the city to pursue painting, crushed by the truck as it spiralled onto the sidewalk …

  Aside from Adam, the hardest to think about was Shaylee. She was in the year above me at school. In a sort of sick irony, she’d once told me she wanted to be an emergency room doctor when she grew up. She died on the operating table.

  So much death, but somehow, in some weird twist of fate, I was still here. That didn’t seem fair. A forum post I read said survivors’ guilt was common. But knowing what it was didn’t make it any less real or make the others any less dead.

  My lungs burned again. The water was cold now. I’d been in here a while, and I didn’t feel much better. Time to get out.

  It’d been about forty-eight hours since I was discharged. Before that were three blurry days of tests, pain, and medication. It was strange being forced to stay in one place for so long. I should have had more time to think about my weird smiley visitor, but amongst the haze of painkillers, exhaustion, and Mum fussing over my injuries, there wasn’t much time to think about anything except how badly I wanted sleep. I was more struck by how unusually caring Mum had been. Dad couldn’t get out of work in the city, but Mum, for once, had actually made an effort.

  Since returning home, I’d had nothing but time. School was cancelled for the week, as most of the town was affected by the accident, either directly or through someone they knew. The blessing and curse of small communities is that everyone knows everyone. I was going crazy at home, though. I almost preferred the hospital, because in there, I’d had no time to think.