Unraptured

By Sherry D. Ramsey

Kellianne hasn't fallen prey to the Rapture virus--yet. But it's taken hold of her stepmother, threatening Kellianne and the other survivors in her neighborhood. Now her uncle is missing too, and Kellianne feels like she's the last person others should be asking for help. But in this a post-apocalyptic future, no-one survives long on their own, so Kellianne must keep everyone safe while coming to terms with her stepmother's last request--a quick end.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sherry D. Ramsey
• Release date: Apr 7, 2019
• ISBN: 9781999575632

Sherry D. Ramsey

Sherry D. Ramsey is a speculative fiction writer, editor, publisher, creativity addict and self-confessed internet geek. When she's not writing, she makes jewelry, gardens, hones her creative procrastination skills on social media, and consumes far more coffee and chocolate than is likely good for her.Her debut novel, One's Aspect to the Sun, was published by Tyche Books in late 2013 and was awarded the Book Publishers of Alberta "Book of the Year" Award for Speculative Fiction. The sequel, Dark Beneath the Moon, is due out from Tyche in 2015. Her other books include To Unimagined Shores—Collected Stories. With her partners at Third Person Press (http://www.thirdpersonpress.com), she has co-edited five anthologies of regional short fiction to date. Her short fiction and poetry have appeared in numerous publications and anthologies in North America and beyond. Every November she disappears into the strange realm of National Novel Writing Month and emerges gasping at the end, clutching something resembling a novel.A member of the Writer’s Federation of Nova Scotia Writer’s Council, Sherry is also a past Vice-President and Secretary-Treasurer of SF Canada, Canada's national association for Speculative Fiction Professionals.You can visit Sherry online www.sherrydramsey.com, find her on Facebook, and follow her on Twitter @sdramsey.

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Unraptured

by

Sherry D. Ramsey

Copyright © Sherry D. Ramsey 2019

Cover Design by Sherry D. Ramsey ©2019

Cover image by by Nathan Wright on Unsplash

Cover font: Boycott by Flat-it

Free Brushes by Brusheezy.com

All rights reserved. The author retains all copyright in the content of this book.

No part of this book may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior written permission from the author.

This book contains a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, entities or settings is unintentional, coincidental, or entirely attributable to the whimsy of the multiverse and fluctuations in the space-time continuum.

Ramsey, Sherry D., 1963-, author

Unraptured / Sherry D. Ramsey

Email: [e-mail]

Web: www.sherrydramsey.com

Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canada

Unraptured

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-9995756-3-2

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The rapture wasn't all it was cracked up to be, at least for the unraptured. The dwindling supplies. The feral victims. The collapse of civilization as they'd known it.

Kellianne's current challenge was more personal—she couldn't bring herself to kill her stepmother. Kellianne hunkered in the rooftop garden of their two-storey house, listening to the sounds filtering up from the open kitchen window two stories below. Ellen—now one of the soulless, aimless horde blanketing the world like restless insects—bumbled around, colliding with furniture and knocking things off the counters. Ellen had met Kellianne with a vacant stare and slack face when she'd come down for breakfast earlier this morning, not recognizing her stepdaughter.

Raptured.

Incubation of the rapture virus was only about eight hours, so when Kellianne saw Ellen’s blank face, she’d sprinted back upstairs, grabbed her always-ready evac pack, and scrambled up the narrow stairwell to the rooftop garden, heart pumping in muted terror. She felt no effects of the virus herself, so she probably hadn’t been exposed—or exposed, but immune. Only a blood test could tell, which sucked. She’d had opportunities to visit an immunity testing post, but she'd delayed. It was one of those things. If she were immune, she could stop worrying about ever catching the virus. But if she wasn't...if she wasn't, the worry would never end.

They'd discussed this possibility. Everyone with any sense did.

If I get raptured, Kelli, just find someone to put a bullet in me, Ellen had instructed her three months ago, with the virus spreading like wildfire. Ellen's voice had been flat and lethargic ever since Kellianne's father had gone to work one day and not returned. Mr. Carson, if he's still around, or your Uncle Jeff. They'll help you out. She swiped aimlessly at a spot on the countertop with a hand-knit dishcloth she'd made a few months before the virus had hit. Its bright, variegated colors had faded to a barely-discernable pattern of greys now. It didn't look