Dead Winter: A gripping crime thriller full of suspense (19 page)

"Oh right, you're immune. I forgot about that. Lucky for some." Shaun said, tightening his grip on the rifle in his arms.

We walked for a couple more hours, having found a little road that cut through the forest. According to the map, this road led up to the scrapyard, which wasn't that far ahead now.

"I think I can see it." Shaun mumbled, pointing ahead to a fenced-off enclosure. It looked like a rather large scrapyard, and I could almost make out a stack of scrap cars as we drew closer to the facility.

The road forked a little bit to reach the entrance of the scrapyard. Approaching the pair of fence-gates that sealed the area off from the public, we stopped to take a little breather.

"I'm praying there's a bus in there. God knows we need the space." John said, sighing lightly as we all caught our breath. We'd been walking for hours again.

"I don't think our luck is that good, John." Shaun remarked, examining the gates, which didn't appear to be locked.

"Still, it'd be great!" John sang, wiping the blood from his kukri on a stray piece of clothing that lay on the dusty ground.

"Alright, let's get this thing open." Shaun said as he walked up to one of the gates and began to push it open, revealing the mountains of scrap cars beyond. My eyes were instead drawn to a charred heap of what appeared to be bodies, I grimaced and tried to look for a vehicle.

There was a small building to our right, partially obscured by a few cars and transit vans that were clearly part of the to-hire business this facility ran. John split off from the rest of the group to walk around the building, stopping dead in his tracks to raise his hand into the air.

"Holy shit! There's actually a bus!" he called, waving us over. And sure enough, there was a minibus parked around the side of the building. It was navy blue in colour and looked relatively new. I was almost certain that the keys would be inside the building.

"Damn! Seems our luck is turning, people!" Shaun bellowed, laughing to himself. They were overjoyed, but I had a sneaking suspicion about something. There was a familiar feeling in the air.

I glanced around the expanse of trashed cars and little stacks of wheels, tires, windscreens and other miscellaneous objects, trying to find the source of this daunting feeling.

"What's wrong, Ethan?" Claire asked, nudging me in the side to get my attention, clearly concerned about me.

"I've got a weird feeling about th-" I began to say, finding myself rudely cut off in mid-sentence.

"Hands where I can see them! Come slowly!" a rough voice called, forcing us to tear our eyes away from the bus. And then I noticed him, a rather old looking man stood on the roof of the building with a rifle in hand. Shaun pointed his assault rifle at the man and the tension ramped up to an almost palpable level.

Nothing was ever simple these days. The same thing repeated over and over again.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Day Fifteen (4th January – 3:05PM)

Reach for the sky.

Fighting a ludicrously strong urge to draw my gun, I let my itching trigger finger fall to my side as I began to examine the situation unfolding before me.

Arms in the air, I scanned my eyes over the rough-looking man on the rooftop. He was wearing soldier attire, just like Shaun; however, the clothing looked old and had a different camouflage pattern. A forest green compared to Shaun's desert camouflage. He held his weapon, a sniper rifle of sorts with surprisingly good form. From the way he held himself, his short haircut and how he handled his rifle, I figured that he must be ex-military.

"Put the gun down! We don't want to cause any trouble!" Shaun roared at the man, his own rifle still trained intently on him.

"Then what do you want!? My supplies? My gun?" the camo-clad man called back, shifting his aim to each of us in turn as he examined us through the scope.

"No! Let's all put the weapons down and we'll talk about this!" John exclaimed, being the first to lay his weapon down on the ground in front of him.

There was a whole minute of tense silence, filled with nervous glances and nothing but the whistle of the wind, which whipped my hair around slightly. The minute passed by exceptionally slowly, until the man finally lowered his rifle; and with that motion, so did Shaun.

Shaun was the cautious type, quick to point his gun, but hesitant to shoot until he was certain that he needed to. It was all about survival for him, and ensuring the safety of those close to him. These traits were apparent in him right now.

"Since you haven't killed me already, I assume you're the guys with a plan, right?" the man shouted from up high. Shaun nodded silently, staring upwards at him.

"Then, I guess you better come inside..." the man growled, clearly agitated by our mere presence. He looked as though he hadn't seen a real person in days, or at least not any decent ones, if that's what we were.

We waited outside in the relatively warm light of the sun, which was on its way down from way up high in the sky and would soon be setting, bringing forth the night. The door that lead into the building clicked as it unlocked, the man visible through the frosted glass as it slid open to reveal a rather cluttered lobby. The man had taken a chair behind the desk at the back of the room, his rifle propped up against the wall beside him.

"Before we talk business, let's cut to introductions. I'm Vincent, if you care. And since you haven't shot me dead, it's a pleasure to meet you." the man known as Vincent said, his tone rife with bitter sarcasm.

"Shaun. This is John, Ethan, Claire, Nick, Annie and Steve. The pleasure is all mine." Shaun said, pointing to each of us in turn as he did the introductions for us.

I leant back against the wall and let out a deep sigh of relief, idly watching Vincent light a cigarette, which he began to puff casually upon, reminding me somewhat of Dave. I shuddered at the thought and immediately cast it out of my mind. Now wasn't the time to be having a trip down memory lane.

"I suppose you want to hear our request?" Shaun asked, his assault rifle hanging under his arm in its usual location, when it wasn't in the hands of its owner.

"No, I want to hear your plan first." Vincent stated, taking another drag from his cigarette, which had a minty sort of scent that forced my mind back before all of this had begun; the smell of menthol reminded me of my brother.

"They're sort of hand-in-hand, really." Shaun said, making small hand motions as he spoke. The man in front of him continued to puff on his cigarette, a little haze of smoking blurring his features.

"Go on.." Vincent muttered, watching in apparent interest as Shaun pulled the map out from his bag, strode over to the desk and flattened it out across the metal surface, pinning it down with a couple of books.

"Basically, there's an evacuation going on in two days, a boat out of the country, god knows where it's going, but it'll take us out of here if we can make it to the port in Hull." Shaun continued, pointing out our current location on the map before dragging it across the roads and motorway that lead to the port. I noticed the expression on Vincent's face change drastically as Shaun concluded, his interest clearly piqued.

"A boat out of this infernal mess? Interesting.." Vincent mumbled to himself, putting out his cigarette and tossing it to the side. I suppose it didn't really matter where he put it any more, nobody would care.

"But here's the catch. To get there, we need a vehicle." Shaun admitted, voicing his concern for the well being of our group if we were forced to walk the whole way, never mind the fact that we might not even make it by foot.

"And that's why you were eyeing up my bus?" Vincent enquired, leaning forwards in his chair to gaze at the map, his hands pressed together.

"Yes, we'd like to use it." Shaun stated. From where I was stood, it looked as though Shaun were staring the man directly in the eyes, his gaze unwavering.

"And what's in it for me?" Vincent asked, after a few seconds of quiet contemplation.

"You mean besides getting the hell out of this train-wreck?" John piped up, clearly taken aback by Vincent's comment.

"I guess that's enough. Hull's riddled with those things though, I barely managed to get here alive." Vincent admitted, pressing his hands to his face and letting out a quiet sigh. We were fazed though, it was practically what we had been expecting to begin with. We'd have been more surprised if the city was completely deserted when we got there.

"You're welcome to join us, of course, I do believe that's what John was implying." Shaun put in, crossing his arms against his chest as he looked around the lobby.

"I thought that was a given. We can't go now, though. Too late for that, you'll have to stay the night." Vincent added, addressing the rest of us. He was right, I suppose; it was too dangerous to move around at night with absolutely no visibility.

"Can we stay in here?" Claire asked, emerging from behind John with a curious expression on her face.

"Don't see why not, I have been." Vincent chuckled, glancing at the girl for a moment before directing his attention back to Shaun. For a moment, I thought I saw his eyes make contact with mine, and I felt the ever-so-familiar sensation of being scanned.

Was there something on my face?

That night, I found myself unable to drift off to sleep. Tossing and turning in my uncomfortable sleeping bag, I instead sat up and looked around the lobby. In the darkness, I could make out the silhouettes of the members of our group, but not Vincent. I glanced at the display of my watch, the hands illuminated the moonlight.

4:05AM

Climbing to my feet, I took a few quiet steps before I felt a overwhelmingly powerful surge of dizziness. I swayed from side to side for a few seconds until my sense of balance and direction returned.

Shrugging it off as just one of 'those things that happen'. I made my way towards the staircase at the end of a corridor that went through the office, the latter of which lead to the rooftop. Carefully climbing over the sleeping bodies of my friends, I pushed the door open as quietly as I could and began my ascent onto the rooftop.

The sounds of birds chirping met me as I climbed the last few steps, slowly swinging the door open. The door didn't make a sound as I pushed it aside, walking up the last couple of stairs onto the roof.

Vincent was alone on the rooftop, humming to himself on top of a small crate. He appeared to be gazing up at the sky; this reminded me of the other people I had seen doing this, and I took a second to admire the beauty of the star-strewn sky.

"It's not bad, right?" he suddenly said to me, I averted my gaze from the stars in time to notice Vincent staring intently at me.

"It's a clear night." I said, walking over to him.

"Look over there. Look at that." Vincent sighed, pointing up to a patch of sky where a few blinking lights could be seen. Trying to make them out, I noticed that they were red and blue. Were those planes?

"Huh.." I muttered, still staring at the supposed planes.

"Just makes you think, life everywhere else is going just fine. It's like everyone's forgotten about us, just going on with their lives." Vincent said, his tone struck with sadness.

"It's only a matter of time before they quarantine the country. I mean what else are you going to do with a diseased, little island?" he continued, offering me a cigarette as he light one up himself. Hesitating for a moment, I took the cylindrical object from him and pulled out my own lighter. Taking in the harsh smoke, I coughed a little bit, which made Vincent chuckle to himself as he turned around on his 'seat' to look at me.

"Ethan, right?" he concluded with a question, letting out a deep, smoke-filled breath that hung in the air like a cloud.

"Yeah. That's me." I said, nodding slowly as I took in another load of smoke.

"You've got the dead-eye stare, like you're looking right through me. Expressionless.." Vincent noted, pointing at my face as he puffed once more.

Did I really not have an expression any more?

"Funny, I always thought I was making the right face." I chimed, gazing down at the floor, some birds chirping to each other from beyond the trees, the sound carrying over through the clearing.

"You've seen some shit then, I take it?" Vincent asked curiously, again scanning me over with his eyes.

"More than my fair share, but who hasn't?" I stated, sitting down on the cold, hard ground of the rooftop, regretting my decision as some little stones dug themselves into my behind. I couldn't be bothered the move, so I brushed them aside.

"I remember that look, back in my days as a soldier. People had that stare, and nine times out of ten, that person cracked up." Vincent said, clearly taking a trip back into his own memories.

"I'll keep that in mind." I scoffed.

"You ever killed anyone, Ethan?" he asked suddenly, his gaze unwavering as he looked me in the eyes.

"Only when I've had to." I admitted, not even ashamed of the acts I'd had to do to survive in this world.

"Good. I saw a guy kill someone for a tin of beans a few days back. This infection thing, it's changing how we act, bit by bit." Vincent said rather seriously, examining his rifle in the dim moonlight.

"I'm not that sort of person." I stated, feeling my eyebrows furrow in irritation. I know he didn't mean anything by it, but I felt as though I were being persecuted.

"Again, good. Lord knows I've done my fair share of pointless killing back in the day, and it haunts me to this day." Vincent revealed, letting out a quiet sigh which floated through the air in spirals.

"Must suck to be forced to do it all over again." I spoke, tossing my cigarette aside onto the stone-covered ground.

"Not as much as you'd think. It's all for survival now, so it has a point after all." he responded, rubbing his chin in contemplation. We sat there in relative silence for a few minutes, I'd begun staring up at the sky again, looking for aircraft.

"I guess you're right." I said, noticing another plane in the sky. I tracked it with my finger, observing the vapour trail that was barely visible against the dark sky.

There was a bitter chill in the air, complimented by the sickly breeze that made the trees sway and rustle around us. It was an eerie atmosphere that made me shiver uncontrollably.

"We should probably get some sleep, got a long day ahead of us." Vincent called out, stretching his arms out wide as he let out a loud yawn, picking up his rifle and heading towards the stairs.

As he passed me, I followed suit and thought about how appealing my sleeping bag sounded now compared to staying out here.