by Russ Watts
* * * *
With a scraping sound and a clang, the metal gates opened, scratching their way across the road. The exit to the tunnel appeared and they were confronted by an eerie cold blackness. A cool breeze drifted over them and Parker shivered.
“Oh, thank God,” said Christina as the gates opened.
“I knew it,” said Jessica smiling at Parker. She handed him the torch.
“Let’s go. Whoever’s got the torches, one at the front and one at the back. Reggie, stay in the middle with those candles. I doubt there’s anyone down here, but there could be rats, so keep quiet and listen. Don’t take any chances, okay?” Tom literally crossed his fingers, hoping they would be all right.
Brad went to the front of the group holding the torch and shining it into the black tunnel. Tom stood behind him followed by Christina and Caterina. Reggie held the flickering candles out and Jackson took one. Jessica stood between him and Parker, who was at the rear of the party.
“Hey, guys, I hate to say so already, but I hear something,” Parker said.
They listened and sure enough, there were more footsteps. The noise grew louder and was heading in their direction.
“It’s coming from that passage again,” said Reggie, looking back at the doorway to the building.
“Oh no, it’s another one of those things,” said Caterina quietly. She clutched Christina’s hand and she squeezed it back.
“Well, fuck this, man, let’s go, let’s not wait around,” said Brad impatiently. He started marching off ahead, following the white lines in the middle of the road as the gates clanked back against the wall.
“Wait, please wait!”
A figure appeared in the doorway in the distance. From where Jill had come, a glimmer of weak light showed the outline of a large overweight man. He called out to them and ran into the underground darkness.
“Jesus Christ, he’s alive! Who is it?” said Jackson.
“Hold on a sec, Brad,” said Benzo. He jogged over to the man and returned a minute later with the strange figure. He was puffing, out of breath already, despite having only run across the car park. He wore a uniform that stretched tightly across his stomach and Tom saw the security name badge on the chest pocket.
“I’m Ranjit,” said the wheezing man.
Tom shook his hand. “Thanks for opening the door.”
Jessica stood beside Parker, her arms folded. “Why didn’t you help before?” she said. Ranjit looked at her and then around at the group.
“We have to hurry, they’re coming. Here.” He unzipped his briefcase and handed out the torches.
Benzo, Tom, and Jackson, gratefully took them and Ranjit flicked one on. He walked toward Brad at the front of the group. Brad viewed the newcomer with suspicion. Ranjit was looking at him. If this guy was security, and he had seen them waving at the cameras, then what else had he seen?
“Seriously, we have to hurry, they won’t be far behind,” said Ranjit.
“Who is this guy?” said Brad. “People are tired and stressed and we don’t need more bullshit. Poor Caterina’s probably sick from a lack of decent fresh air. This dude turns up and we start listening to him without question? A complete stranger?” Brad shone his torch into Ranjit’s face. “How did you get down here?”
“Look, I’ve been stuck in the control room since this whole bloody thing began. I’ve been stuck here just like you. I just had to fight my way out of there and kill my friend in the process. Although he was already dead, so figure that one out,” said Ranjit. He turned away from Brad’s interrogating spotlight, facing the group who were huddled together. They looked scared.
“Look, I opened the gate to let you out, but that means I had to override the security lockdown.” Ranjit was nervously looking back at the passage he had come through. It was empty; for now.
“So when you opened this door, you opened all the doors? Shit.” Tom looked at Parker.
“The foyer’s open.” Parker held onto Jessica’s hand. She didn’t have a coat and it was cold down in the car park. He wanted to tell her everything would be fine, but he knew it would be a lie.
“Let’s move, as quickly and quietly as we can,” said Tom and he started leading them further into the tunnel.
As they walked on in silence, it seemed to get darker. Their torches reached only so far and they were constantly spooked by their own shadows. After a couple of minutes had passed, Benzo stopped.
“Hey, stop, I hear something.” He put his hand in the air and everybody stopped instantly.
“Buddy, I don’t hear anything. There’s no one here,” said Brad.
“Shush! It’s not footsteps. It’s...it’s like a rustling sound or something. Listen.” He shone his torch at the ground, looking for the source.
“I hear it,” said Jackson. There was a faint rustling sound to their left. “Over there,” he said, pointing his torch down to the ground. “Rats.”
Six torches aimed at once to where Jackson was pointing and they saw them. There were hundreds of rats scurrying along the side of the road, away from the building.
Caterina screamed. “They’re going to get us!”
“No,” said Brad. “If they were, we’d be dead already. These ones aren’t infected. They’re not running toward us, they’re running away from us.”
“I don’t think it’s us they’re running away from,” said Christina. “Listen.”
“God, it’s cold in here,” said Reggie quietly. His fingers felt numb and he wished he were at home in bed with his wife.
Over the sound of the rats was something else, a deep thundering noise, a sort of low pitched rumble that was increasing by the second.
“Oh fuck,” said Ranjit, “they’re here. The dead. They’re here!” Ranjit did something for the second time today he had only done once before in the last five years; he ran.
“He’s right, move!” Tom started jogging, then running. They ran beside the rats in the darkness, feeling the black walls close around them. They rounded a bend and saw light. A small shaft of round light that opened up as they ran, building to a large circle of light. It was the tunnel exit. Tom turned as he ran and saw thousands of zombies tearing after them.
“Run!”
* * * *
Tom and Benzo ducked under the barrier, still holding their torches, and raced outside into the sunlight. The rats scattered in all directions looking for shelter. The road from the tunnel led upward to the street, and the conference centre loomed up ahead of them.
“Where now?” said Brad behind them.
“Don’t know,” said Benzo. “Just keep moving. We have to find someplace to hide.” He looked back down the tunnel and saw Jackson and Reggie running past the barrier. Christina and Caterina followed them with Parker and Jessica swiftly behind. Ranjit was struggling to keep up.
“I’m not waiting for that fat fuck, he’ll get us all killed,” said Brad.
As Ranjit dodged around the barrier in obvious pain, clutching his briefcase to his chest, the first of the zombies appeared out of the tunnel behind him. They ran with their arms outstretched as if they thought they could catch their prey by willing it into their hands. With no depth perception or awareness of their body, they looked absurd as they ran, these deadly killing machines.
“Come on, Ranjit, you’ve got to run faster,” shouted Tom.
They ran on and reached the top of the ramp. Tom surveyed the street and for a moment, forgot all about the dead chasing him. The street looked like a war zone. There was a taxi abandoned in the middle of the road, its doors open and the road around it stained with blood. Next to the conference centre was the pub, and next to that, a house that had caught fire. Its roof collapsed and it was just a black hollow shell now. The fire raged uninterrupted until finally, it burnt itself out.
Next to the destroyed house was a row of more houses and shops. A truck had driven into the front of a shop and been left where it had stopped. The shop windows were smashed and on the pavement in fro
nt of the shop lay bodies. Women and men scattered across the path and the road. Tom could not count nor identify all the limbs and body parts.
He looked down the road and at one end, there was a military blockade of some sort; he saw army trucks and vans, but there was no sign of life. There were no soldiers or police to help them. From the houses, doors began to open. A few doors down from the pub, a couple in pyjamas wandered out into the front yard. They were covered in hideous boils and bruises, welts and sores; the woman had vomit down her front and the man still had a knife sticking out of his chest.
On the road to his left, a small group of people were staggering in their direction. There was a pile of bodies in the road, and from behind it emerged a young boy. He had one arm and lurched toward Tom, quickly followed by more children, all dead. Tom saw the gated entrance to a school yard, the metal railings swinging loosely on their hinges.
From a side street, Tom heard a clattering and suddenly a horse appeared. Red foam was dribbling from its mouth and its mane was long and dirty. It was hauling itself along the road by its front two legs. Its back legs were broken and the horse was slowly dragging its bloated carcass across the hot tarmac toward them. A policeman was still mounted on it, his feet tangled in the stirrups, being pulled along. Tom saw that the man’s legs were twisted and his body had been lopped off, or eaten away, from the waist up. Tom felt his body shaking and heaved, his guts spilling out what little food he had eaten last night.
“Holy shit,” said Brad next to him, putting a hand on Tom’s back.
“We have to keep going, look.” Benzo pointed down into the tunnel as the rest of the group caught up with them. The zombies from the city plaza were running up the ramp, pouring out of the tunnel like a pack of animals.
“To the centre, let’s go,” said Christina.
“I don’t want to go back inside,” said Jessica looking around the streets in wonder. “We could end up trapped again.”
“You want to stay out here?” said Brad. “Be my guest.”
“We have to hide,” said Parker. “We can’t keep running like this.”
Ranjit was on his knees, gasping for breath.
“We can’t stay here. I’m going with her,” said Reggie running after Christina. She was across the street with Caterina and almost to the entrance already.
Benzo pulled Ranjit up. “Come on, mate.”
They all ran across to catch up with the others to find Christina pounding on the doors.
“It’s empty. You can see inside, but the doors are locked.” They peered into the dim entrance hall. There were tall posters advertising a financial investment show with the Fiscal Industries logo prominently displayed. The lights were off and the internal doors were shut. Clearly, nobody was around.
Brad swung the metal desk leg he had been carrying with him at the glass door and a small crack spread across it.
“No, stop!” said Tom. “If we break in, they’ll just follow us in. We need to find a better way; something more discreet where they can’t follow us. Let’s check round the side, there must be a back door, a fire escape or something?”
They ran around the side of the building, and were briefly out of sight of the road. Christina pointed out the fire escape. A set of rusty metal steps led up to a door about twenty feet from the ground.
“There!” She ran and they climbed the steps quickly. At the top, she yanked on the door but it wouldn’t budge. Brad looked at Tom expectantly.
“Do it,” Tom said.
Brad swung the metal leg at the small window in the door and it broke immediately. Brad pushed the glass away and reached his arm inside. He managed to push down on the exit handle and the door opened.
“Okay, everyone, let’s get in quick before they see us,” said Tom.
Brad went into the room, and one by one, they climbed the steps into the conference centre. Ranjit, at the back of the group, closed the door behind him. As he did so, the first of the dead chasing them spilled into the yard below. He could see them looking around, wondering where the living had gone. Ranjit quietly shut the door before the zombies could see them and follow.
* * * *
“So where now?” They had entered a meeting room and there was a small horseshoe shaped table. They sank into the chairs, tired and drained.
“We should find another room,” said Tom. “I don’t think they saw where we went, but they’ll hear us, see us, or bloody smell us through that broken window. We should find somewhere else.”
“True,” said Brad. “We’re not safe yet. Do you want to lead the way, Christina?”
She looked at Brad holding the desk leg and bit her tongue. “I haven’t been up here, only in the large hall downstairs. I can’t imagine it’s too hard to find our way around though.”
She got up and pushed her chair back. Caterina got up and took Christina’s hand.
“Just tread quietly and be careful, please,” said Jackson. “We don’t know for certain this place is safe yet.”
Brad rolled his eyes and the weary group traipsed out of the room with Ranjit last again.
Leaving the small meeting room, they went into a sparse hallway. There was a plastic plant and a water cooler at the end, but otherwise, it was as nondescript as every other corridor back at the building they had just left. Christina pushed open doors as they progressed down the corridor, every time finding empty rooms just like the one they had left.
“I think we’re above the Nelson room,” she said standing at the top of a small staircase.
“Whoopee fucking do,” said Brad. “And?”
Christina sighed. “It’s a smaller version of the large hall. It’s completely internal so there are no windows. It’s big enough for us to get some rest and some space,” she said taking the stairs carefully, listening out for any hint of trouble.
At the bottom of the stairs, they were confronted with a set of double doors with the words, ‘Nelson Room,’ above them. Christina pushed the doors open and stepped inside. She smiled and let out a small ‘yes’ under her breath.
The room was set up for a conference. There were no windows and only one more set of doors on the far side. In the middle of the room were tables and chairs, while at the end of the room, was a projector and screen. By the wall, another long table had been set out for lunch and was full of piles of food: pastries, sandwiches, wraps, and fruit, all covered in cellophane.
Tom closed the door and rubbed his eyes. He watched as the group dispersed once more, Ranjit plonking himself straight down on a chair, while the others took as much food as they could carry.
“Some of this is still fresh,” said Benzo peeling a banana.
“Some of it isn’t,” said Jackson, holding up a mouldy salmon sandwich. “Careful what you eat, guys.”
As the weary group sat, ate, and drank, Tom pulled a table in front of one of the doorways. Jessica grabbed one end to help him.
“Good idea,” she said.
“I just think we should be extra careful,” he said positioning the table directly under the door handles. “How are you doing, Jess?”
“All right, I suppose.”
Jessica rummaged through the food and pulled out a bag of crisps. She offered them to Tom.
“Thanks,” Tom said taking a handful. He sat down on a chair and Jessica sat down beside him. “So this Ranjit bloke, you know him very well?”
They looked over at Ranjit. He was the furthest away from them, apparently happy to keep himself distant. His face was red and he was still puffing, exhausted from the run. Tom thought he looked like he was about to have a heart attack.
“Not very well,” said Jessica. “I’ve met him a couple of times, but I’ve just heard rumours really.” Her voice lowered and she leant forward. As she looked at him, Tom had to force himself to concentrate on what she was saying. She was attractive, but there was clearly something between her and Parker which he didn’t want to get involved in.
“He likes to pretend he’s this
big shot security officer, family man, whatever. He monitors the cameras. Well, monitored. I heard he got cameras put in the toilets, the changing rooms, everywhere; all under the guise of protecting us. We all knew why really. He’s a creep. He sits in his office on his fat backside all day and thinks he’s better than the rest of us.”
“Well, he seems harmless, but I suppose you never know, right?” Tom took another handful of crisps. “If he hadn’t opened the underground gate, we wouldn’t have gotten out of there, you know.”
“Be careful, Tom. I don’t trust him.” Jessica put her hand on his knee and he resisted the urge to take hold of her. Tom nodded.
“Don’t worry, careful is my middle name now. It used to be danger, but, you know...”
Jessica gave a small giggle. “I’m going to talk to Christina, see how Cat’s doing.”
As she walked away, Tom sat back. There were hushed conversations going on around the room; Brad, Benzo, and Reggie were deep in discussion about something. Jackson was lying on the floor, stretching his back out and rubbing his feet. Parker was on his own and Tom went over to see him.
“How you doin’?” asked Parker.
“I don’t know,” said Tom. “I really don’t.”
“You know we can’t stay here long. Those things out there will know we’re here. Somehow, they’ll find us. They’ll find a way in and then...”
“What do you think we should do? Where should we go? Part of me just wants to go home and crawl into bed. Part of me doesn’t give a shit if I don’t see the sun come up tomorrow.” Tom rolled his head on his shoulders. “I know I should eat, but I can’t. I can’t relax.”
He opened a can of lemonade and sipped. Parker thought about how to answer.
“If anyone wants to go home, let them. As long as they know they’ll be on their own out there, then there’s no point stopping them.” Parker let the apple he was trying to eat fall to his lap. He had only had two small bites.
“I think it’s safe to assume the whole city is fucked by now though. If you ask me, we should try to get out. Get out of the city completely. The city airport’s not far from here, you know. If we can get there, maybe we’ll find some help; could be a way out. I don’t know what else to suggest really.”