After the removals and having sewn and dressed the wounds, the bloodied trackers were placed in a small pile in the centre of the table. Each of the men were thinking the same thoughts as they stared down at the small units. There should have been eight in total. Nick, Brian, and Marty were dead, their trackers still inside their bodies.
“They’ll not relay any bio-readouts, but hopefully, as long as ops are still seeing the transponder signals, they’ll just treat it as a glitch, for a while at least,” Bobby stated as he added his own device to the pile.
“Pretty fancy pieces of kit. Not much to them really, is there? Hi-Tech stuff,” Kyle commented as he picked up one of the trackers and began studying it between his fingers. “Eventually, someone will want to know why none of your hearts are beating and will probably come to check you all out in case you’ve turned.”
“We’ll be long gone by then,” Danny replied, rubbing the bandage on his arm. “We’ll be off the radar and beyond their reach.”
Kyle nodded and tossed the tracker back onto the table with the others. It was getting late and the sun had already sunk beneath the horizon, leaving just the last tendrils of daylight behind. Everything was prepared, checked, and then double checked. It was time for the group to snatch what sleep they could. It could be days before they next had the opportunity to rest.
12
It was dark when Melanie awoke. The moon was shining from somewhere beyond the jagged hole in the roof, but she could not see it. Its light glinted from the shards of broken steel and glass that lay scattered throughout the room causing them to twinkle like thousands of stars around her.
She was cold. Her body was shaking, and she could see her breath misting in front of her face. Her fingertips were numb to the touch, and the shivers that ran continuously along her spine would not allow her to drift back off to sleep, even if she had wanted to.
The room around her was dark and quiet. Nothing stirred, and the eerie silence was unnerving to her cold and foggy mind. She knew where she was, and there was no confusion on that part. What she struggled with, for a few short moments, was how she had arrived there. She then remembered the crash. The distant sound of beating hands against the doors at the front of the building reminded her that she was trapped inside and that hundreds, maybe thousands of rotting, infected bodies were clambering at the outer walls.
The crumpled and useless aircraft framework around her retold the story of how desperate their situation was and the fact that they had no communications with their home base. The radio was out of action, and she doubted that their transponder was still functioning. The stairs to the roof—she had been unable to find them. Her memory was jogged when she remembered finding what she believed to be the smashed remains of bannisters and railings strewn over the floor of the room and mixed with the shattered furniture and masonry.
A feeling of hopelessness suddenly engulfed her. It coursed through her body, being carried along on the shivers that rippled through her muscles, and across her chilled skin. Dark and despairing thoughts began to filter into her mind. She was beginning to think that they would never be able to get out of there, and no one would find them. They were thoughts that would drive her to surrender to their situation if she allowed them to fester. They would consume her. She would lose all hope. She could not give up. Not yet.
Checking herself mentally, she sat up and rubbed her hands together, blowing her hot breath into her cupped palms. In the darkness, it was almost impossible to see any detail of her surroundings, but she could feel Mike close beside her.
She reached down and gently placed her hand upon his, checking that he was okay but not wanting to disturb him. He was cold, too, like a slab of meat that had just been removed from a refrigerator. Her first instinct was to pull away, but when she felt his fingers move against her touch, she felt reassured that he was okay. She looked down upon his faint dark shape. He did not make a sound and remained completely still. She wondered how much longer he could survive without proper medical care. She had no idea how bad the internal bleeding was and was worried that it would eventually be too late by the time somebody found them.
Hold on in there, Mike,
she thought to herself, willing him to survive.
A pang of guilt began to rise from within Melanie. She had been the pilot. It was her fault that they were in the situation that they found themselves. It should have been her lying there, not her friend. He had advised, even warned her against attempting the landing on the rooftop. She should have heeded his caution. As usual, her overconfidence and self-assurance in her skill had gotten the better of her. Why had she come out of the crash unscathed? Why was Mike the one who had to be suffering and slowly dying? She stared down at his faint silhouette and felt a warm tear trickle down over the cold skin of her cheek. She needed to find them a way out. She at least owed that much to her co-pilot.
“I’m going for a look around,” she whispered softly to him.
She doubted that he could hear her, but speaking to him gave her a degree of inner comfort. She gripped the edges of the blanket and pulled it upwards, tucking the rough material beneath his chin in an attempt to keep him warm. There was very little else she could do for him. His internal injuries were far beyond the treatment of her knowledge and skill.
“I’ll be back soon.”
She had slept for long enough and felt an overwhelming urge to be proactive. Sitting around, placing her faith in the ability and willingness of others to get them out was not going to help either of them. They had been there for over twenty-four hours, and there was still no sign of a rescue party. Grabbing her flashlight and pistol, she shuffled across to the wrecked and open doorway leading out of the rear passenger compartment. The pockets of her flight suit were filled with flares, just in case. If she heard any aircraft outside, she would fire them through the hole in the roof. She knew in her own mind that it was doubtful that she would hear anyone coming to their rescue, but the thought enabled her to continue functioning.
Her boots crunched against the debris beneath her feet. She stood still for a moment, listening into the darkness, and expecting something to have taken notice of the tiny high pitched sounds that the crushed glass and crumbling brickwork had made as her weight pressed down upon them. Nothing appeared out of the gloom. She fumbled with her light and switched it on, illuminating a large round patch of the floor in front of her. In the bright glow, nothing revealed itself to her, but on the peripherals where there was nothing but blackness, her imagination pictured a thousand of the infected, lurking just beyond her sight and watching her with lusting, ravenous eyes.
She quickly turned in a three-hundred and sixty degree arc, panning the light over every surface around her, wanting to be sure that her imagination was not going to get the better of her. She held the beam for brief moments, scrutinising the dark recesses that seemed to be filling the entire room. Every piece of broken furniture or deformed pile of concrete and steel presented itself as the twisted body of one of those grotesque ghouls. She was terrified at the thought of just one of them having found its way inside. Her heart was pounding heavily, and her breath was coming in short, sharp gasps. She was at risk of losing control and flinging herself back into the ruined aircraft, throwing her head beneath the blanket, and curling into a ball while all manner of perceived horrors closed in.
“Get a fucking grip,” she hissed angrily.
She stepped away from the fuselage and into the centre of the room. It seemed to have grown colder there, and her instincts screamed at her to move back towards the helicopter. She fought against them and her fear of the unknown. She needed to check that they were still safe, and she could not do that if she was curled up next to Mike and hiding beneath a blanket. She smiled nervously to herself in the darkness. For an instant, she was taken back to her childhood when she would use pillows and duvets as protection against imagined terrors. She and her brothers and sisters would sit up into the late night telling scary stories and fighting for control of their feather filled shields. She shook her head, expelling the childish feelings from her mind. The danger was real and she could not, no matter how much she would like to, go back to her childhood innocence.
She stepped further into the gloom and looked up at the hole above her. She could not see the moon, but its glow was there, brightening the edges of the clouds that drifted by over the rooftops. She paused and listened, hoping to hear the sound of beating rotor blades from the helicopters that she longed to be currently scouring the city, searching for her and her co-pilot. She could hear nothing except the steady thump of the dead at the main door to the restaurant. Their pounding hands never gave up the beat. The dull and distant thuds would continue until they managed to break their way in. They would never tire and never grow bored.
Somewhere in the distance, many streets away, a long and agonising moan drifted out above the city as one of the wandering corpses howled against the night. It was a deep and hollow wail, haunting and poignant. It sounded as though the soul of the creature was being tortured. For a second, she almost felt pity for the unfortunate man, but it did not last long. Regardless of what he had once been, the thing he now was would not hesitate to tear her apart, no matter how sympathetic she felt towards it.
She shivered again and felt the cold rising up through her legs. She needed to move or she would become frozen to the spot with cold and fright. She had no choice but to continue her clearance and search for an alternate way out.
Stealthily, she made her way around the ground floor of the building, creeping through the shadows, and occasionally, stumbling into objects that she could not see. Each time, she barely managed to stifle the scream that jammed in her throat and sat waiting for its opportunity to erupt from her mouth. Her jangled nerves were beginning to get the better of her. Her mind was constantly seeing threats that were not there. Her light flitted erratically around the room as her eyes and ears detected movement from every corner. Again, she paused. She sunk into the shadow of a corner and felt the wall behind her, acting as a psychological barrier against anything sneaking up on her from the rear. She breathed deeply, keeping her flashlight shining to her front, proving to herself that there was nothing else inside the room with her. After a minute or two, she was able to continue, but she had no idea for how much longer she would be able to keep her fear under control.
Many of the partition walls had been destroyed or heavily damaged during the crash, so there was no need to expose herself through doorways and into the unknown. It was a simple matter of peering over the remains of the brickwork and shining her light into the next room. Nothing revealed itself to her. With each minute that passed, her immediate fears were being proven to be nothing more than her imagination.
The glowing beam moved over the floors and walls of the adjoining rooms, and she was careful not to allow the light to touch the windows around the outer walls. Anything in the street beyond would see the illumination and be attracted towards the delicate glass of the windows. There was no doubt in her mind that the street outside was packed with the infected. She could see their ghostly shadows lurching around from beyond the frosted glass. From experience, Melanie knew that the dead did not have the intelligence to attack the windows, viewing them as an alternate way in. However, a light or her silhouette reflecting from the panes would soon convince them that the windows were indeed to be used as an entrance. From what she could hear, there were enough of the dead at the exits. She did not need to signal to any others that there were living people inside the building.
Her sweep completed and safe in the knowledge that all the doors and windows remained intact, she headed back for the helicopter. She moved across the room rapidly, eager to reach the relative safety of the wreckage and feel Mike close by. She would sit and wait for morning, fighting against the cold, and keeping a watchful eye on her co-pilot. She was certain that by the time the sun was up, they would hear a helicopter coming to their rescue. She took comfort in the fact that Samantha was her friend and was in a position to be able to influence the senior staff back on the Isle of Wight.
She wouldn’t leave me here
, she reassured herself.
On reaching the aircraft, Melanie placed her pistol back into its holster and clasped her flashlight between her teeth. She needed both hands to be free in order to begin the climb back into the twisted fuselage. Her upper body was through the door when Mike’s foot moved across the floor, emitting a light scraping noise that was deafening in the otherwise silence. She looked up in surprise, the light clutched between her teeth shining over Mike’s lower body. He was sitting up now, his features cast in darkness and facing in her direction.
“Ah, you’re awake,” she said, relieved that she would not be alone. She pulled herself in further and hauled herself up so that her legs were inside.
Mike was silent. His body did not move but remained facing her. As Melanie’s feet were firmly on the floor of the cockpit she reached up and pulled the torch from her mouth. She held it in her hand and angled it upward, illuminating his face.
She gasped.
His clouded, flat orbs stared back at her, but there was no indication of recognition in Mike’s gaze as the light reflected dully from his sunken eyes. His skin was ashen and drawn, and his lips had withered and turned a faint purple from the lack of blood. He did not move but continued to look at the light shining into his face, mesmerised and confused. Finally, his lips parted slightly and a long drawn out huff rasped out from between his teeth. His hand, the soft skin of the fingertips shrivelled and the nailbeds quickly turning a deep blue, reached up towards the dazzling brightness that Melanie held in her hand.
She froze for a moment, unable to form a clear thought in her petrified mind. As the body of Mike began to move, his grasping fingers reaching out for her, her subconscious took over, and she recoiled. Before she realised what had happened, her body was flying through the air, back out through the door, and towards the floor of the restaurant. The light swirled in her hand and bounced from floor to ceiling, from cockpit to Mike. In the split second that the torchlight shone across him, she saw that he was now flinging himself out after her, his mouth agape and his arms outstretched.
She hit the floor hard and felt a searing pain in her side as she landed against something sharp that drove itself deep into her soft flesh. She let out a yelp and rolled to the left, feeling the foreign object tear through her skin, its jagged edge scraping against her ribs and causing a torrent of agony to rip through her body and along her nervous system. A blinding flash streaked across her vision, and she howled, unable to control herself against the torturous pain that assaulted her.