Free The Retreat (The After Trilogy Book 1) by Kelly St. Clare

in an effort to dislodge some of the dirt. The result wasn’t too shabby. The river bubbled enticingly as she draped the spandex garment over a wiry shrub.
    Romy had a strong desire to jump into the river herself. Removing her underwear, she scrubbed both pieces and used them as a sponge to wash the rest of her body.
    Rinsing her underwear once more, she put the wet undergarments back on, leaving the orange garment to dry over the shrub.
    Her hair. The strands, usually silken, were limp with sweat and dust. Romy couldn’t swim and it looked too deep to touch the bottom. But she could still dip her head in. Wait until Deimos heard what she’d done! Romy chuckled thinking of his reaction.
    The spot she’d selected was deep and still. The river itself seemed to have quietened alongside the dying light. She leaned forwards on her hands and knees, staring down into the water. If she was braver, she’d jump in—then Deimos would really lose it.
    Romy hummed to herself as she brought her head closer to the water.
    Her nose breeched the frigid surface.
    Water exploded in every direction, the river erupting into a furious white torrent.
    Romy toppled back in a mass of flying limbs, too shocked to cry out.
    Before she had time to process what had happened, a monster scaled the riverbank.
    A long-muzzled and scaly monster. Romy screamed, scrambling back until she hit the trunk of a tree, pain shooting through her ankle.
    Calm down and think, Rosemary.
    The water animal had a long, thick body atop short, thin arms and legs. It was designed for water . . . surely she could outrun it.
    Romy slowly stood in careful increments, trying to hush her gasping breath. Climbing the tree was her best option.
    But her assumption about the animal’s speed was wrong.
    In a thrash of movement, the sharp-toothed creature burst forwards, lashing across the ground—jaws wide, and slitted, red eyes trained directly on her. Romy grappled behind her for any hold on the tree.
    She covered her face with an arm, mouth opened to scream.
    Crack!
    The sound echoed through the bush.
    The monster skidded half a metre to her feet and collapsed.
    Romy shook from head to toe, limping out of its path as quickly as she could. Staring back, she wondered why it fell. Was it dead?
    The beast was going to eat her, until that cracking sound happened. Did its tiny limbs break underneath it?
    The monster remained still.
    Summoning her courage, Romy crept to the side of the immobile river creature and inspected it. Blood flowed from its head in a steady trickle. Her stomach rolled at the sight and her eyes widened in shock. It was dead. There was a hole in its flat head.
    There was no sound in space that the human ear could hear. Aside from the staccato sound of lasers and debris missiles leaving the battler, Romy had never heard the echo of a fired gun.
    But someone had shot the river animal. With a gun. An Earth gun.
    A soft snap from behind caught her attention. In her fascination with the scene she’d forgotten one thing: A gun didn’t fire itself.
    She remained bent close to the monster, but all her senses were trained on the foreign noise.
    There was something else she’d missed, though:
    The creature wasn’t dead.
    The animal rolled grotesquely, bursting upwards. Romy flung herself out of its trajectory. She was too close. The monster turned its head and she watched in horror as ten-centimetre teeth descended.
    A man burst from the bush and threw his weight on top of the thrashing animal. Her first feeling was relief that the Orbitos had found her.
    The man was trying to pin the writhing beast to the ground.
    And that’s when she noticed he wasn’t wearing an Orbito uniform.
    Earth human.
    Romy left everything, half hopping, quarter sprinting, and the rest limping, in a random direction. The first half of the population died. The second half murdered each other. The tall man wasn’t encumbered like she was with her half-healed ankle. She only had until he