Sarah's Nightmare: A Supernatural Uprising Novel: Book 3

By Jayelle Cochran

A mysterious past...

When Sarah was a toddler, her parents found her in a Gutter alley with severe burns and speaking an unknown language. With no money for doctors and no way to know where she was from, they sought help from Vincent Vinachelli. The Highborn agreed, and even had papers drawn up so she could legally be theirs to raise, but only if Sarah joined the Supernatural Underground Movement when she turned seventeen.

On the run with nowhere to turn...

Not wanting to be a terrorist or criminal, Sarah runs from the movement at the first chance she gets. Injured and suffering from frostbite and hypothermia, she is found by Charlie and her aunt, Mae. They take Sarah home and together Mae and Charlie help the frightened young woman to heal from the damage SUM had caused her mind. Little do they know that other escaped operatives are looking for Sarah as hard as the movement itself.

Without adequate training and the movement hard on her trail, will this powerful young woman be able to survive, or is the war between her kind and the government something she can't escape?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jayelle Cochran
• Release date: Sep 1, 2016
• ISBN: 9781370678532

Jayelle Cochran

Jayelle Cochran is an independent author and artist living in San Diego. As a military wife and mother of two special needs children, finding time to write and publish her novels can prove to be a challenge at times. According to Jayelle, there are two things a writer needs if they wish to make it into a career: Perseverance and Dedication, and she has both in full supply.Jayelle's writing primarily consists of Urban Fantasy, though she has plans for a post-apocalyptic scifi series for the future. Currently, she is focusing on the Supernatural Uprising series of novels. After the 4th novel for the Supernatural Uprising has been written, then the second series will begin and the two will be written in tandem.Although she has been writing for over a decade, it wasn't until Sadie's War that Jayelle became serious about turning her love of writing into a career. The novel had began as a way for Jayelle to cope with her addiction to role playing games. Taking a few characters from a freeform campaign, and designing a few new ones, she began to write her daydreams about these characters. It wasn't long before a story began to unfold and a new love for writing was ignited.

Book preview

Dedications

There are many people who have helped me in one way or another on this writing journey. But, the people mentioned below have been there for me through thick and thin and have inspired me, each in their own unique ways.

Frankie, my husband who continues to be my biggest supporter.

Orion and Kieriana, my children who both are extremely creative and inspire me every day.

Nicole Haeussinger, my best friend who is always willing to listen to me carry on about the plots to my stories.

Joe Trammell, who beta reads every one of my books. Hie enthusiasm fuels me in more ways than he knows.

Claudie Taake, my editor whose advice has always been sound and whose experience has helped guide me to being the author I am today.

Chapter 1

Dammit, Kevin! Get Eyes back on the line or we’re dead once that storm clears!

Yeah, I’m trying, Nate. It’s not like I’m a Techie for crying out loud!

Something banged against the wall. Hard. Sarah froze and resisted the urge to open her eyes to see what was going on. The men’s shouting had woken her up and at first she wasn’t sure where she was. It was a struggle not to move. Fear crept it’s way up her belly and her heart skipped a beat as memories of the past few days invaded her mind: The start of a civil war, the government agency who came for her in the middle of the night, the operatives who saved her life, the accident that left them stranded on a mountain, the trek through knee deep snow...all of it left her feeling disoriented.

It was a battle to keep her wits about her. Nate and Kevin were both Supernaturals, like Sarah. But they were also criminals who worked for a terrorist organization called the Supernatural Underground Movement. A few days prior, SUM had started a civil war with the government stating that they intended to end the unjust persecution and sadistic experiments forced upon those born with power. The government was corrupt, but Supernaturals who turned their power into weapons weren’t any better. Sarah wanted nothing to do with them. It wasn’t as though she had a choice. Refusal meant being killed as a traitor to the movement, while compliance meant possibly dying in the war. Either way her life was bound to be short.

When the Paranormal and Supernatural Investigation Agency came for her, she used her power over Time to get away. PSI had attacked the safe house she had been holed up in and she’d seen that as her only way to free herself of SUM. If it hadn’t been for Tara, she would’ve been free, too. But the Paranormal woman was immune to Sarah’s power and so she’d had no choice but to allow herself to be ‘rescued’.

Now she lay on what felt like a couch while the sound of wind battered the walls and windows. Was the blizzard still raging outside? Listening for anything that could tell her if it was safe to let the others know that she was awake, all she heard was occasional swearing from one of the two men. Tara didn’t appear to be in the room. That was a small blessing. Although she seemed trustworthy, the Psychic was too dangerous to be around Sarah’s in her current state. Who knew what Tara would see.

Trying isn’t good enough, Kev. Both of the girls are out of time, and soon we will be, too! For all we know, PSI won’t wait until the storm is over to attack!

Both girls? Did that mean Tara was in trouble? The Paranormal’s power had exhausted her, that much had been obvious. Was she in danger of a burnout coma, too? Sarah pushed the concern out of her mind and into the pit of her stomach. Although she liked the woman, if Tara was unconscious, that could work in Sarah’s favor. Feeling sorry for her was something Sarah couldn’t allow...yet.

Yelling at me won’t get the job done, Nate. Either the blizzard is too thick or PSI is jamming us. There’s nothing I can do! It’s up to Eyes now.

From somewhere nearby Sarah heard glass shatter and her breath caught in her throat. As the sound of her quickening pulse filled her ears, Kevin said, Watch it Nate! Calm down, man. I don’t need you going poltergeist on me.

Now Sarah was terrified. Nate was a Telekinetic and she had once heard that when one lost their temper, objects could potentially fly about uncontrollably. At such times they were considered ‘poltergeists’ and a serious threat to anyone around them. If Sarah didn’t do something soon, then she could potentially find herself in more trouble than she could handle.

With Tara out of the room, now would probably be the best opportunity to escape the operatives and take her chances on the run. Waiting was too dangerous, and for more reasons than the threat of the Telekinetic losing control. If they managed to escape PSI – and that was a HUGE ‘if’ – then that meant going to the compound SUM’s operatives referred to as ‘home’. Already she was aware that most didn’t survive the training program held there, which was why she was being trained at the safe house, away from the danger. Salvina Vinachelli, the leader of the terrorist network, felt that Sarah’s rare power over time was too valuable to risk her death. Even so, that didn’t guarantee her safety in an underground compound that housed an illegal Supernatural militia.

If Tara had been awake, Sarah wouldn’t have had a shot. The Paranormal was immune to Sarah’s power and was most likely skilled enough to take Sarah down before she could get far. It was now or never, and the odds weren’t fully stacked in her favor. There was only one way she could see to escape, and that meant using her power so she could disappear before either of the Supernatural men knew what had happened. Once they received help from the mysterious Eyes in the Skies, a master hacker who worked for SUM, she wouldn’t stand a chance.

There was one problem with her plan. Using a power took a lot of energy and Sarah didn’t have much to spare. If she wasn’t careful, she could find herself passing out before she managed to make much progress. The likely result would be a burnout coma, which would then cause her body to rapidly starve to death. If they realized that she had passed out while trying to escape, she would be punished, and she didn’t want to find out how far their torture would go.

Already it had been a few days since her last meal, and she had used far too much of her power escaping PSI with the SUM operatives. All she could do now was leave and hope to outlive the madness that had taken over society. Somehow that didn’t seem likely, but she was out of options.

Tara had mentioned that the only way out of SUM was to die and Kevin had told her how dangerous it was to be classified as a traitor. Sarah knew all about the experiments PSI performed on those they captured. As a Supernatural born to the Gutter, she had no right to a trial. PSI could do whatever they wanted to her, and there would be no way to stop them after they temporarily neutralized her power. No matter where she went, either of the organizations would hurt her badly if she was recaptured.

No, the best way would be to run and maybe fake her own death. Yes, she knew all too well what would happen to her if either side found her if she made a mistake. But it was worth it if she could find a way to avoid playing any part in the uprising. All she needed was to lay low until the war was over. Better to risk dying on the run than be forced to do God knows what. Sarah hoped that by then, both sides would’ve destroyed each other. Then she truly would be free and clear.

First, she needed food. To stave off a burnout coma, one needed to eat. By the feel of the couch beneath her, she assumed that they had made it to the ranger station as planned. Hopefully that meant there would be food she could eat before her power overwhelmed her body. With no food in her belly for a few days, it was unlikely that she would last much longer anyhow.

Most Supernaturals didn’t have to worry so hard about burnout, but Sarah’s power was stronger than most and rare to boot. Ms. Vinachelli had told her that she was a Time Weaver, though Sarah doubted that the young woman fully understood that her power was much more than that. Since the last Time Weaver lived centuries ago, the validity of the ability had been debated among scholars. According to what little Sarah had been told, her power defied known quantum physics. It also caused her eyes to glow an eerie silver, which was unusual enough that nobody had ever heard about it.

Sarah took in a deep breath and held it as she focused her mind on her power. Gradually, what she always thought of as the Threads of Time filled her awareness. Maneuvering the threads allowed her to control the speed at which time flowed. Each one vibrated at it’s own frequency and they were interconnected with other threads, weaving themselves across the planet and the cosmos beyond. If she weren’t so afraid of what could happen to her body from controlling their vibrations, the strands’ silver glow might have been beautiful to behold.

Slowly letting out the breath she held, Sarah pulled on those threads until the vibrations eased, careful not to stop them completely. Such an action would cause time to stand absolutely still, which would use up more energy than she could spare even after she ate. It was better to simply slow time enough so she could leave before anyone knew that she had moved.

Yawning from the effort, Sarah opened her eyes and glanced over at the men. They stood at the far end of the room, near a radio behind an old desk. Nate, an Italian whose impressive build was overshadowed only by his power, had his hands on his face as though he had been rubbing his dark brown eyes. Kevin, an African man who was nearly as large as Nate, had his back to Sarah. Tara, a strikingly beautiful woman whose ancestral line was unclear, was nowhere to be seen.

Sarah sat up and yanked out the IV that had been stuck in her arm. Whatever medicine it contained had probably saved her life, as had the people she was about to betray. But she couldn’t wait much longer. Ignoring the sting in her arm as the needle scraped her skin, she tossed the tube aside and watched as it lazily fell. This was how she measured the speed that time now moved, which was a good pace. Slow enough that she could barely be seen as she moved about, but fast enough that she shouldn’t become too exhausted before she could leave. If she passed out this time, there wouldn’t be anyone to help.

As she stood, she glanced around the room and gasped when she noticed a large blood pool on the floor by an overturned chair. More blood was on the wall; the red droplets had run down a topographical map of the mountain. Holding her hand to her mouth, Sarah turned away from the horrific scene. What could possibly have happened here? Now more than ever she was convinced that leaving was the best idea she’d ever had.

Sarah blinked back the tears that threatened to fall. Having never felt comfortable crying, she wasn’t about to start now. These people were monsters and she needed to figure out how to get away from them as quickly as possible. Even though she doubted they would hurt her – all this time they had been trying to help her – there was no way she wanted to see what else they were willing to do. If these were the sort of people that SUM had on their roster, then she needed to make sure she never became an operative. Sarah needed to run for as long as she could.

First, she needed food. Whatever had been in the IV wasn’t enough to keep her from falling into a deadly coma. Glancing about the room, she saw a kitchenette in the opposite corner from the men. The counter was full of dirty dishes and half eaten food. The operatives must have already had their fill, which meant that they were more powerful now. When she considered the amount of training the others had been given, Sarah knew that she was at a huge disadvantage.

Pangs of hunger caused her to clutch her belly and rush to the food. In order to keep the food down, she needed to ignore the blood and whatever had happened to the rangers who crewed the station. Throwing up now would make her weaker and closer to passing out. Although Sarah never thought of herself as strong, she needed to be so in the one-two.

Rummaging through the food, she ate whatever she could stuff into her mouth. Dismayed at having to eat the meat, she recalled how she once wanted to be a vegan. Unfortunately for her convictions, only those with little or no power could afford not to eat meat. For someone with a lot of power, high amounts of animal proteins were required. So she dutifully ate the roast beef along with potatoes and mixed vegetables. Survival was more important than her feelings about eating anything with a face. Perhaps one day...

After stuffing her belly until it started to cramp, Sarah turned from the counter to look for something to serve as a food carrier. There was no way of knowing how long it would take for her to reach the next city. Last thing she wanted was a repeat of the past few days, struggling to stay awake with no food to fuel her body and power.

A trail of smeared blood ran along the floor from the main room and under a door. It was tempting to check the other room first, but Tara could be in there. If she was awake, Sarah wouldn’t be able to escape. No, first she needed to see what was in the room the blood trail led to, regardless of how the notion made her feel.

Taking a deep breath to calm herself, Sarah opened the door with a shaky hand. Gasping, she saw two bodies, a man and a woman dressed in ranger uniforms, thrown carelessly off to the side. The body of a third person, a man, was on a small bed with his throat slit. Blood covered the floor by the bed and around the bodies. Closing her eyes, she gagged and tried with all her will not to vomit. It didn’t work and she threw up all of the food she had just eaten.

When she was done she wiped her mouth and held onto the wall to steady herself. The effort it took to keep time moving slowly was beginning to take it’s toll and she wasn’t sure how much more her mind and body could take. Ignoring the pain in her gut and the bodies in the room, Sarah looked around and saw that she was in an infirmary. A blue backpack with a white cross hung on the wall and she emptied its contents onto the floor. It was large enough to hold quite a bit of food. For once something was going right.

Turning her gaze so she looked at the wall and not the bodies, Sarah ran from the room and glanced out the window above the couch she had slept upon. The snow was thick. With a little light shining from the window, she could barely see two snowmobiles and a snowplow off to the side of what she assumed was a parking lot in the spring. That was her ticket out of there.

Last night Sarah had asked Kevin and Nate about traitors. To SUM, any Supernatural who refused to join the movement, or who joined PSI instead, was classified as a traitor. According to Tara and the men, such people were either killed or tortured and rarely given a second chance. It was terrifying that after tonight she would be considered one. Tara had told her that the only way out would be to fake her own death. The idea made Sarah’s skin crawl.

How could she fake her own death and also keep the others from following her? If she found a way to destroy the other vehicles, that would give her a real chance to escape. But faking her own death meant she needed a body to replace hers. Groaning inwardly, she remembered that one of the dead rangers looked to be a woman. Could she really do such a thing; use the body of the dead ranger woman to trick the others into thinking she had died?

Glancing down at the IV tube, she saw that it was finally settling onto the couch. Neither man had moved, which meant that for them a second or two had passed. Sarah had slowed time almost too much and she was already exhausted. If she were to leave, then she needed to do it now.

Taking the bag to the kitchen, she filled it with leftovers and a bag of bread, eating as she went. Her stomach had calmed down some, and she needed the extra energy before she passed out. When she was done, she put her coat back on and put the backpack onto her shoulders. To disable the other vehicles, she needed matches or a lighter. A quick glance through the drawers and cabinets of the kitchen produced exactly what she needed.

Now it was time for the disgusting part. Hesitating, she walked into the other room and saw that one of the bodies was indeed a woman. Sarah couldn’t tell what she had looked like, since her head had been bashed in and her face was unrecognizable. Sickening as it was, that could work in her favor. Once more she gagged, though this time she was able to keep her food down. Did what she planned to do make her a monster just like the operatives? Shaking her head, she hoped that deep down she was still a good person.

Steadying herself, she grabbed onto the woman’s legs to avoid covering herself with blood, and pulled with all her might. The ranger’s dead weight was almost too heavy. It took more effort than she would’ve thought to pull the woman into the other room and out the door, ducking to miss a stapler that had been thrown by the Telekinetic. Once outside, she found that the woman’s body sunk into the knee deep snow and she had to pull even harder to get her over to the vehicles. The effort was draining. When she finally made it, she needed to eat more of the meat before lifting the dead body onto one of the snowmobiles.

Again, Sarah had to hold down her food as her stomach lurched. It was difficult to believe what she was doing to the poor dead woman. The ranger most likely hadn’t deserved a violent death. Now her body was about to be used in a way she also didn’t deserve. Did that make Sarah a bad person? Doubt swarmed her mind and she pushed it away. Later she could berate herself for what she was doing. Now...now she needed to survive.

Running through the snow, she quickly dashed inside, ducked under the floating stapler, and grabbed a knife from the kitchen and the book of matches she had found in a drawer by the stove. To disable the vehicles, she was going to have to blow them up. It was the only way she knew to keep the others from following her once they realized she was gone. So she ran outside to cut strips of fabric from the ranger’s clothing. On her way out, she saw helmets hanging in the mudroom with two sets of keys next to it, and grabbed both sets and a helmet before she dashed outside.

After cutting the ranger’s uniform, she stuffed the fabric into the gas tanks of the snow plow and one of the snowmobiles, leaving the other one for herself to ride. Then, with the match, she lit the fabric. One thing to be thankful for was that her power also stopped the wind from moving, so she didn’t have to worry about the matches burning out before she lit the fabric. It also kept the fire from spreading to the gas tanks and blowing herself up.

Sarah got onto the snowmobile she had left for herself, adjusted the body of the ranger so she wouldn’t fall off, and put on the helmet. One of the keys fit the snowmobile and she threw the spare onto the ground. After this, no one would need it anymore. It was strange that the keys had been so easily accessible, until she realized that the rangers probably weren’t concerned about thieves, especially in winter. Must be nice not to worry about such things.

Sarah turned on the engine and felt her heart race. At the safe house where she had been kept for the past month, she had learned how to drive a pickup truck. But there hadn’t been a need to learn how to drive anything else yet. It took her a moment to figure out how to get the thing to move, and she was terrified that she was going to hit a tree and end her getaway before it began.

In the area that was a parking lot when not covered in snow, the vehicle swerved several times before Sarah was able to straighten it out and head for what she hoped was a road leading down the mountain. As she sped past the treeline, she let go of her hold on the Threads of Time and the world around her began to move once more.

A minute later and her body vibrated as two loud explosions were heard from behind. The sound caused her to swerve and she almost lost control of the snowmobile, narrowly missing a tree. Swallowing hard, Sarah kept her focus on the road and refused to look behind her. The sound was beautiful and terrifying as it signaled both her freedom and her betrayal.

Now the plan was to race down the mountain and force the snowmobile to crash into a tree when she was near a city. The body of the ranger should be all that would be needed to convince SUM that she had died trying to run away. Chances were good that the police would wind up with the wreckage and body, and no one at SUM would be able to investigate. Then again, Sarah had no idea what SUM was capable of, and there was a small possibility that they had the means to figure it all out. Even so, she had to do something to get off their radar. This was a start.

Freedom. It felt like forever since she knew what that was like. Somehow she never expected freedom to taste so terrifying. For the next three hours she rode down the mountain before reaching the foothills at the bottom. The road turned up and then down again several times before her fear began to subside. There was no one behind her, but that wasn’t going to last for long. More than once she questioned whether or not she had done the right thing by leaving the way she had. After all, the people who started the war were Supernaturals who had been trained to use their power in combat. Did she really think she could run from such an organization?

No, not for long and not without help. But, she also couldn’t stay and become a part of them either. To do so would destroy what little of her soul she had left. Chris, the one who had been assigned to train her, had said that one day she would be expected to do more than the hacking work they had given her. Her power could quite possibly make her one of the movement’s most successful black agents – an assassin. Hacking computers was one thing since she loved technology. But to become an assassin was simply more than she could bear. No matter how short-lived her freedom might be, no matter how much she might have to endure as a result, it would be better than becoming a monster.

Sarah had to do a lot in her life to survive, but she had never killed a person and would do anything to avoid becoming a murderer. If she were to die, then let it be while holding onto her convictions.

Chapter 2

After three hours of driving, Sarah felt frozen solid. The helmet kept her face warm, and her coat insulated most of her body. But her legs had nothing but jeans on them and her muscles cried out in pain from the cold. Where her gloves met her sleeves was another matter. The skin was raw from the blistering wind on the exposed areas and she wasn’t sure how much more she could take. Fearful of what the cold might do to her body, and feeling quite hungry, she stopped the snowmobile and slid off.

As she rubbed her thighs to get the blood circulating, she glanced at the ranger’s body. The corpse had frozen in place and Sarah was silently grateful. It would’ve been difficult to keep it from sliding off while staying on the road. Twice she had almost lost the road in the dark, the meager light from the snowmobile was hardly enough. One of those times she nearly slammed into a deep snow drift when she tried to correct her direction.

Shrugging the backpack off of her tired shoulders, Sarah wondered how far the main road was. It couldn’t possibly be much further, though without ever being on a mountain before she couldn’t be sure. To properly hide from SUM, she needed to find a city that housed a Gutter district. It was the only place where she knew how to blend in. The poor Gutter Trash and the wealthy Highborns didn’t mix well, and she had resisted learning how to speak and behave like one of the elite.

Digging through the backpack, Sarah noticed that most of the food was now frozen. A few bites that she had stuffed in her pockets had been able to get enough of her body heat to be thawed. More was needed and she felt her desperation rise. In the dark, she cried and wondered how she was going to survive on the lam. It wasn’t as though her parents had prepared her for this.

Sarah stomped her feet in an effort to warm them. Unfortunately, all that brought her was more pain so she stopped. As she blew on her hands, she wondered if she would make it to the town on the snowmobile or if she was going to die first. Silently, she wept as she ate what little she had that wasn’t frozen, and fought the depression that had begun to wash over her. Falling into despair now would kill her as quickly as the cold and Sarah had a strong desire to survive.

After a moment, she saw what looked like headlights through the trees. Someone drove up the narrow road fast. The storm hadn’t yet ended and she didn’t expect to see anyone until she was at the highway and closer to whatever city was nearby. Knowing that PSI had been chasing the terrorists, she was willing to bet that it was they who she saw.

Sarah felt her body break out into a sweat and ran for the side of the road as she struggled to close her backpack. She dropped the bag three times before she made it to the giant trees and hid behind one. PSI would see her snowmobile, and that couldn’t be avoided. That didn’t mean she was willing to become a target herself.

Glancing from behind a tree, she saw a huge truck come to a stop perhaps 100 yards away. Cringing with fear, she slunk further into the forest and looked around for a good place to hide. In the dark, men shouted to one another and she dashed in the direction where she thought the main road would be, careful not to be seen. No matter what, she would run for as long as her sore feet would take her. Staying would