George finished, and wandered back over to the lockers. Jumping down, Jack grabbed his hand. “We’re going to go find your mum, okay. But we have to be super silent. We don’t want to wake the monsters, do we?”
George pulled his hand away and twisted his fingers nervously, intertwining them in a wringing motion. “Nope,” he murmured.
“Good. If they find us, you run, okay? You run in here and hide.”
He continued to stare at George, waiting to see if he understood. His eyes were wide, pupils dilated. The sight broke his heart. The poor kid, having to live through this. He should be out playing. Running around. Gaming. Kid stuff.
Jack shook his head, angry at those responsible for ruining George’s innocence. He embraced the anger. It gave him new energy.
He moved to the door into the room. Placing his ear against it, he listened for any sounds. He could smell that faint rotten fruit smell. It amazed him how it smothered even the stench of death. He cracked open the door and looked into the corridor. Seeing it was clear, he took George’s hand and placed it around the waist belt of his pack.
“You hang on to this. Don’t let go. Unless I tell you to run,” Jack whispered.
“Okay,” George said.
Not wanting to head back the way they’d originally come, Jack headed in the opposite direction. Several other doors lined the corridor and a large green door stood at the end. More people were glued to the walls here, their faces oddly calm and serene as if in some sort of coma. He tried not to linger on their faces too long.
“Don’t look at them, George. Look down,” Jack said as he searched the people for blonde hair.
He felt George’s grip tighten on the belt.
Tears pricked his eyes, a long-buried pain bubbling to the forefront of his mind. Jack had thought he had buried that particular memory deep, away, forgotten. He had avoided having his own children, limited his time with other people’s kids. All to avoid the pain.
Jack loved his little brother, even though there was a ten-year gap. He was so full of life and curiosity. Jack read to him every night, played games, built forts.
As his brother grew, he introduced him to films, comics and the wonders of creativity and imagination.
Before the fateful trip to the snow.
Jack took his brother sledding. With each run, he squealed louder and louder.
“Higher, Jik Jik, higher!” he pleaded.
Caught up in his brother’s delight, Jack relented. Took him to the very top of the steep hill.
Down they flew, getting faster and faster, the cold wind stinging their faces.
A fallen tree branch poking from the snow caught Jack’s trailing foot, throwing him off.
The sled turned sharply. His brother slammed into the trees lining the hill.
Racing up, he found his loving little brother crumpled to one side, blood streaming down over his face, his little head crushed.
Jack cradled him and screamed until he was hoarse. That was how the paramedics found him.
They took his little brother away.
He never saw him again. The funeral directors advised Jack’s mum to have a closed coffin.
Once an outgoing sixteen-year-old, Jack retreated within himself. Shutting away the world, he found solace and comfort in his books, his comics, his movies.
His mum sent him to see a psychiatrist. He went, begrudgingly. How could a stranger know his pain? Know his shame? Know his failing? His little brother was dead because of his error of judgement. His little brother was ashes in the wind because Jack’d been trying to impress his brother with his bravery.
But time heals all to a point, eventually. The psychiatrist helped Jack realise that it wasn’t his fault. He hadn’t put the branch there. To think more on the times he’d shared with his brother, the love, the laughter, the joy they’d brought to each other.
So Jack buried the guilt and the pain deep, deep down. Never forgetting the memory of his little brother, he learnt to live with it.
His brother’s name had been George too. I’ll save this one…
Wiping away the tears, Jack stopped at the first door and listened. Not hearing a sound, he tried the handle. Locked. Cursing silently, he quickly moved on to the next one. After several locked doors, he found an unlocked one. Opening it, Jack saw it was a maintenance room. A workbench lined one wall, with a peg board above filled with tools.
He couldn’t hold back the exclamation that escaped his lips. Finally, a little luck. Grabbing some screwdrivers and a hammer, he jammed them into his belt.
If those things attack, at least I can go down fighting, give the kid a chance to run.
“What’s this, Mister Jack?”
Jack looked down at George. He had crawled under the bench. He was holding out a rusty old machete, its wooden handle so cracked and pitted that someone had wrapped red electrical tape around it.
“That is a very dangerous weapon,” Jack said, gently taking the machete out of the child’s hands.
“But I want something to fight the monsters,” George moaned.
Jack crouched down. “Okay, George, but let’s find you something more suitable.”
Jack searched the work area and found a tool belt. He placed it around George’s waist, adjusting the strap as small as it could go. He populated it with chisels, screwdrivers and a small ball peen hammer.
“If they come, you stab and hit them as hard as you can, all right?” Jack demonstrated the motions.
George beamed up at him and nodded.
He knew the tools wouldn’t do much good against those creatures; they were so damn fast, so ferocious. For that matter, he didn’t know how long either of them would last. But a little hope and something to live for goes a long way.
“C’mon, kid. I don’t know about you, but I want to get out of here.”
“Mummy?”
“Yeah, we’ll keep looking. Remember, super silent. If they come, run back to the red door and hide, okay?”
George pulled out his little hammer. “But I am Thor.”
In spite of all the horror, the fear scratching at him, Jack smiled at George. The kid’s resilience was incredible. He just wanted to find his mum.
“Okay Thor. Let’s go,” Jack said, still smiling.
As they approached the green door at the end of the corridor, the stench of rotting fruit became overpowering. Jack’s hand was shaking as he reached out and opened the door. Peering through the gap, he saw a sight that even the best horror writers’ minds would struggle to imagine. Not wanting George to see, he spun the kid around, stood in front of him, and blocked the child’s view.
Beyond the door, steel stairs descended into a cavernous area. Piles of bones, some with bits of tissue and sinews still attached, lay stacked in corners. Bits of people were strewn about, some half eaten. He could see torsos, arms, legs. Bones sticking out. One of the monsters was lying on top of a pile of intestines, covered in blood and plasma. Lining the walls of the room, severed heads in varying states of decay were on spikes made of bones.
In the deepest shadows of the room, Jack could see sleeping creatures. Some smaller creatures were nestled against some of the larger ones for warmth.
Jack paused, shocked. Were they breeding? Already?
He could see a particularly large stack of bones in the centre of the room. A throne of bones, reminiscent of one Jack had once seen in a catacomb in Europe.
The large mass moved. It was a massive creature, and plated bones protruded from its shoulders, forming spikes. A severed child’s head had been placed atop each spike, much like some sort of grisly trophies. Fighting the bile rising up his throat, Jack turned away, his mind reeling. He had seen this creature before. When they were captured. It hadn’t had the heads back then. The creature led, gave out orders.
Jack stumbled back, pushing George farther into the corridor. His eyes wandered lower. At the big creature’s feet, blonde hair flowed over a woman’s half-eaten body.
No! S
arah…!
Jack remembered, in a moment of clarity when he was drifting in and out of consciousness while trapped on the wall, that he had seen Sarah being taken. Taken for slaughter. All her past, present, and possible futures, snuffed out in an instant. In the end, she had become these monsters’ sustenance.
George started screaming. Jack spun round. The boy was standing in the doorway, looking directly at his mother’s remains.
As one, the creatures’ heads swivelled around to face the door. Terrifying screeches echoed around the cavernous room. With stunning speed and agility, they leapt from the floor.
Jack pulled George away and slammed the door. Jamming one of his hammers through the handle, he hoped it would stop them for a moment, enough time to get away.
Grabbing the still-screaming George by his hand, he sprinted up the corridor, back towards the room they had sheltered in.
— 23 —
Behind Jack and George, wood and concrete splintered with a crash. Half-turning, Jack saw the monsters piling into the corridor, screeching and howling, saliva dripping from their sucker mouths. Muscles rippled beneath semi-translucent skin. They spotted Jack and George and howled as they bounded towards them.
George reached the red door first and was pulling it open when the next door down opened. The man with the red trucker’s cap appeared, a stunned look on his face as he took in the unfolding chaos. Jack barrelled into him, taking him to the ground. The man bucked beneath him, shifting his weight in an attempt to throw Jack off. His hands flailed, desperate to get a hold on Jack.
Jack saw an opening and, without hesitation, rammed a screwdriver up under the man’s chin, burying it deep into his brain. The man’s eyes went wide with disbelief as Jack watched the life blink out.
Groping bastard!
A creature howled and leapt off the wall at Jack, claws extended. Jack twisted and threw himself through the door. But too slow. The creature raked its claws down his leg, tearing into his flesh. Screaming in pain, Jack stabbed down with the screwdriver, plunging it through the weird translucent skin and into its flesh. Gritting his teeth, Jack kicked out with his free leg, smashing the beast’s head. The monster howled in anger, and clawed and scratched at Jack’s torso. George, leaning over Jack, started whacking the monster on the head with his little hammer. The monster momentarily let Jack go to deal with this new annoyance, giving Jack the chance to kick out again. Freeing himself, Jack grabbed George, slammed the door closed and locked it.
Immediately, the creatures started throwing themselves at the door.
Throom, throom, throom. The sound of them hitting the door reverberated around the small room.
Ignoring the agony lancing up his body, Jack pulled himself to his feet. He knew the flimsy door and lock wouldn’t hold the monsters out for long. Hobbling over to the metal lockers next to the door, he tried to tip them over.
“George, help me push!” he yelled.
George scrambled away from the noise of the beasts and stared at Jack.
“Push. Buddy. Please,” Jack pleaded, straining with the weight of the locker.
George pushed against the metal side, and with their joint effort it crashed across the doorway.
“And this one too.”
A second locker joined the first.
Exhausted from the fight and the effort of moving the lockers, Jack stood gasping. Blood continued to pour from his wounds and he was beginning to feel lightheaded. He knew he needed to stop the bleeding, at least temporarily. Sitting down with his back against the far wall, Jack taped up his wounds with the last of his duct tape. He could see they were deep.
God knows what bacteria and germs those things have on their claws. Will I become one of them?
The creatures continued to slam against the door. Jack could hear tearing sounds. They were beginning to tear the plasterboard walls surrounding the door.
Frantic, Jack looked around for an escape route. The small window was out; Jack had already tried it the day before. Welded shut, for some reason. The glass was reinforced with wire mesh.
They were trapped in a room with horrifying creatures attacking them, and with no way out. The same as in Aliens… Aliens! Suddenly, Jack had the answer. The ceiling! He looked at it. It was a false hanging ceiling made with cheap plaster tiles that could be individually moved.
Thanking his movie obsessions, and his knowledge of building materials, Jack grabbed George under his arms and hoisted him on top of the lockers. Jumping up, he pushed a tile up and to one side and poked his head through. Jack could see right across the rooms, and dividing the rooms were solid concrete walls with enough space to walk on.
Throom. Throom. Throom.
“C’mon, George.” He grabbed the child and lifted him through into the ceiling cavity. “See that concrete bit? Run along to the end. Go! Now!”
Screeching, and then a huge rip, sounded from below as the monsters tore through the wall and into the room. Jack’s heart leapt into his throat. With one final look below, he replaced the tile and turned to follow George, blood dripping off his boot and onto the ceiling tiles.
A monster smashed through the ceiling behind. If they hadn’t been so dangerous, he’d have laughed as it got all tangled in the metal struts and wires. A red mist descended over Jack’s vision. Pulling the rusty, red-handled machete from his belt, he lashed out at the nightmare’s head, slicing into its neck and on, down through muscle and tissue. Black, gunky blood gushed over his hands. The machete stuck fast, lodged on the spinal column.
He pushed against the monster’s chest, yanking the blade out.
Another one smashed its way through the ceiling.
Oh, you want some too!
He swung out with the machete, taking a big hunk of its face off.
“Jack! Jack!” George screamed.
More creatures started slamming through the ceiling.
“Run! I’m coming,” Jack said. Taking a last swipe at the nearest creature, Jack half ran, half hobbled after George.
There! He could see sunlight streaming through a maintenance tunnel. He lifted George up and pushed him into it.
This red-haired kid, his chance at redemption.
Jack pushed himself through the tunnel, pain beginning to take its toll. Gritting his teeth, he fought through it. He wanted to find Dee so bad, to hold her again. Feel her soul. To sit on their couch and watch their favourite movies and talk into the night.
He and Dee could talk about anything. It was one of the things he loved about her.
Jack glanced at George. Now he had someone else who needed him.
Dee would love him.
With the warmth of the sun on his battered body, Jack inhaled his first clean air in days, revelling in the scents; the river, the slight smell of decaying plants, even the lime from the surrounding concrete. He looked down at the boiling, bubbling river so far below. The spillways were open. They were standing in an opening halfway up the dam. On both sides, high cliffs led downriver. The rest of the concrete dam wall soared above them.
Screeching from above echoed around the sides of dam. The monsters howled, eager for their prey. The leader stared down at them, his huge muscles rippling under his bark-like skin. Severed heads on spikes, jiggled as he pointed at Jack and George, and howled.
Monsters ran down the dam from all sides, racing towards Jack and George. A dark avalanche of unstoppable sharp-toothed suckers and claws that made Jack’s blood run cold.
Glancing quickly to his left, Jack grabbed George in a bear hug. “Take a deep breath buddy.”
Filling his lungs, he leapt off the ledge and into the roaring water of the spillway.
Sorry kid. Better to drown than be torn apart.
I’m sorry, so sorry I’ve failed another George…
— 24 —
Dee couldn’t believe how refreshed the shower made her feel. To wash all the stench, grime and dirt away after so many days. It was heavenly. She stood under the glorious hot water, for a time
forgetting the repugnant Variants outside, the horrors of the last few days. Forgetting the sight of Faye being torn apart, of Rachel disappearing under a mass of Variants, her hand outstretched, her gasping, pleading for Dee to save her. She even forgot about Missing Teeth and his attempt to rape her.
The water washed away her fear and relaxed her tired mind.
Reluctantly she reached up, turned off the water and stepped out. Drying herself, she paused. Looking into the small mirror, she gazed at her gaunt reflection. Dee let out a bark of laughter at the sight of her collar bone poking out and she traced the curvature of her neck with her hand, surprised. She was happy to lose some extra pounds, but shocked at how quickly it had happened. With one last look at her lack of curves, she turned away from the mirror.
Dee pulled on her borrowed clothes, grateful to have something clean against her skin. She headed back into the main section and checked on Boss. The swelling on his head seemed to be going down but the bruise was darkening. His breathing was shallow but steady.
Hearing Ben talking in the war room, Dee walked over.
“Yeah, that’s correct, Falcon 1. I picked up two today. Over.”
Hissing and static carried over the airwaves through the speakers. “Anything happening on the Variant front? Over.”
“Heard some on my travels and the usual sniffing around my place. I had to take out two of them collaborators though. Over.”
“All right, Dusty Hollow. Report in tomorrow. Over.”
“SNAFU, Falcon 1. Wilco, Out.”
Ben reached up. Switching off the radio, he turned to Dee. “Hey, howa you feeling?”
“Great. Thanks so much. You don’t know how much I’ve been wanting a shower.”
Dee was staring at the monitors and the camera feeds they showed. She could see several Variants moving across the feeds.
“You’re not worried?” Dee said, pointing to the screens.
“Not really. I’m more worried about the ones I can’t see. These ones are just looking for a way in, probing, looking for a weak spot. I don’t get much sleep, though.”
The Rule of Three (Extinction New Zealand Book 1) Page 13