Noah
Newton Abbot, King Street
The Paint Center
10:39 AM GMT
Noah was knelt by the end of the breakroom building looking across the car park toward the paint center. There were only four cars in the car park, and all of them had been broken into – but not set alight. Rubbish littered the ground, with a shopping trolley thrown in for good measure.
The wind picked up, blowing mushy newspaper across the ground. There were faded red and yellow footprints among the rubbish.
Someone has obviously been in the paint center.
Noah could hear the rain starting to patter against the faceplate. His breathing was heavy and fast. Seeing the video for the second time gave him a surge of adrenaline.
He could hear a voice. He ducked back against the wall. It was coming from the street. Noah ran crouched over to the nearest car. He knelt behind an old style, red Renault Clio that had all its tyres slashed and windows smashed.
The voice became two, and rose slightly, as if in anger.
Noah peeked over the side of the car, looking through the back broken windows.
“I told you the world would end in two-thousand and twelve.” The voice belonged to an old woman, pushing a shopping trolley full of clothes and tied-up bags.
“It’s two-thousand and thirteen; ya fool, how could it end in two-thousand and twelve if we’re still ‘ere?” stated an old man in a long black trench coat and brown cap, with fingerless gloves, and a tatty brown canvass rucksack on his back. He used a long length of rusty pipe as a walking stick. He did not turn his head to address the woman, rather; he hobbled along looking straight ahead. They both looked like they were in their late eighties.
“It started then. It was a slow process. It’s still happening.” The old woman, who was dressed in an old style-cleaning smock, with her grey hair up in a bun, said. “Margaret, who’s a dab hand on the internet thingy, said... oh what’s that word she used? Connected! That’s it, everything’s connected.”
“Poppycock!” He stopped walking, rested the pipe against his shoulder, and removed his thick, plastic rimmed glasses, to wipe off the rain.
“Margaret doesn’t know squat; she doesn’t even know how to use a calculator. The daft old bugger doesn’t even know what day of the week it is half of the time.” He replaced his glasses and started walking again. His feet shifted through debris that covered the middle of the road.
Noah had to smile to himself. Even with the end of the world just on the horizon, some people would never change.
“I am ninety-six years old, and I was born during the first world war, and also survived the second. There’s no way a bloody virus is going to kill me off.” He shrugged his shoulders, as if to say that is that.
They disappeared behind the wall of the paint shop, heading up the road, still arguing.
Noah strained his hearing. Apart from the old couple, there was nothing, just the wind, and the rain echoing a staccato sound on the car roof.
Noah gripped the rifle and headed across to the paint center, ducking and diving around the four cars. The sound of his breathing inside the mask was deafening.
The paint center was a two-story building. The front was the shop, and the back was the warehouse.
Noah headed down a thin back lane that led to the paint centers docking area. The front of the building look untouched, but the back was ransacked. A truck, parked up against the large back loading dock had its rolling back shutter open, with the contents scattered around the loading bay. Paint tins lay spilling their contents. The ground looked like a vast contemporary piece of art. Footprints of all sizes were scattered around in the paint, leading off in all directions.
The bay doors were wide open.
Paint tins were stacked on pallets four high. A row of cardboard boxes did not fare well from the rain; they had collapsed, spilling their contents of paintbrushes and tape over the loading bay, onto the back yard.
Noah climbed up a metal ladder the seven feet to the concrete loading bay platform. He stood listening. There was just the sound of the wind whistling around the warehouse and some loose cling film flapping on one of the pallets.
Noah headed in. There was row upon row of metal and wood shelving. He started checking them all. There were all sizes of tins, in every shade imaginable. Brushes, rollers, sponges, scrapers, trays, tape, and aerosol cans.
He inched his way along the wide aisles. Some were too high to reach. He craned his neck to check above. There was just too much stuff; he would have to check out on the shop floor.
A large double door, with plastic strips hanging down, led to the shop. Carts were abandoned with stock piled up. Vandals had ransacked the place. Shelving was tipped over, with dented and opened tins littering the floor. The place was huge. He had never been in it before, so he did not know the layout. He simply walked up each aisle, as if out on a shopping trip.
Bingo!
Noah found the car spray section, with all the aerosol cans. On a hook were a couple facemasks, cheap paper ones with elastic string.
No good.
Around the end of the aisle was the expensive equipment. A full-face filtration system with an attached electric pump breathing apparatus. Too bulky. Next to it was an insect looking, blue facemask that covered the lower half of the face. He grabbed the last one on the hook. There may have been more on the floor, mixed in with all the items that had been ripped from the hooks and knocked off the shelves.
Goggles. Goggles. Where are the goggles?
They were opposite. There was more of a choice, so he grabbed six pairs of various shapes and sizes, so Red could pick whichever was comfiest.
Sorted. Time to get back to Red.
Noah headed for the back of the store, towards the warehouse, planning to exit where he had entered, when he noticed the steps.
I wonder what’s on the second floor? There might be a staff breakroom with food? he reasoned. Best to check while I am here, save having to go out looking for more food when ours runs out.
He caught himself thinking ours. He pushed it to the back of his mind. Now’s not the time for trying to work everything out. There is a time and a place for everything.
Noah left the mask and goggles on the bottom step, inside a small box he found on the floor. He jogged up the stairs two at a time.
The warehouse was two floors high, but above the shop was a large selection of offices and the breakroom. Noah went through the fridges. There was nothing edible, and the kitchen was smashed up for good measure.
Noah found himself in the office of the store manager. Photos of his family were all over the wall. They looked happy and content.
A loud pulsating, chop-chopping sound made him move toward the window, as a helicopter flew over head. It had been the first one he had seen in weeks. When the outbreak had first started, they seemed to be forever flying overhead. This one though was streaming a trail of black smoke, and wobbling, as if the pilot was struggling with the controls. He watched as it tried to hover in the distance, and then sink below the roofline, way too fast, twisting around in circles as it descended.
That would be near Courtney Park, he thought.
The sound of the helicopter receded, leaving an eerie silence. That is when he heard the wheezy breathing, coming from the next office.
14
Doctor Lazaro
Military Merlin Transport Helicopter
Courtney Park, Newton Abbot, Devon
10:46 AM GMT
Melanie’s head was spinning. Or is it the helicopter that is spinning? She thought. She had to concentrate on not throwing up. She jostled hard against the webbing, as her body pitched from side to side. Then the sheer g-force the spinning helicopter was creating pinned her back against the grey padding. She could not move even if she wanted to.
A loud pinging alarm squawked around the confines of the hold.
A container broke free from the webbing in the center, flying through the air, catching a soldier in the
face, crushing his skull. Pulp and brain matter sprayed over Melanie’s face. Others shouted in defiance at death. Some sat praying, with their eyes clenched tight.
The helicopter was going down, and fast. Just at the last moment, the pilot pulled off some last minute maneuver. Whatever he did; it stopped the hunk of metal hitting with full force. The crashing jolt reverberated throughout the hull, twisting the frame, shattering glass and crumpling metal. The machine slid along the ground, churning up grass and mud, until some piece of the outer structure caught on something and flipped the helicopter over, making it roll a few times, making everything inside weightless, before coming to a grating halt.
Melanie was still conscious. Her body had not completely recovered from the drugs the nurse had pumped into her earlier, so she had been relaxed, making her body limper than normal, which saved her from serious contusions.
Others did not fare so well. The two soldiers, who were injured, and had been on stretchers, had been tossed about like rag dolls when the harnesses snapped. Melanie had seen them both shoot up into the air, smacking against the roof, when they first hit the ground.
The spotty soldier, who first noticed she was awake, and had raised the alarm, was missing his head; it was smeared along the grey padding behind him, and splattered over Melanie’s face. It had all happened so quickly, his heart was still pumping blood out of his neck in a stream that sprayed across the ceiling.
Her arms were still held by the webbing harness, so she could not wipe the blood and gore from her eyes and out of her mouth.
Some part of the crumpled helicopter settled and moved slightly, making a loud grating sound.
The shock was wearing off. Groaning, and whimpering started to echo around inside the metal hull.
A couple of soldiers had unharnessed themselves and was checking on their companions. One was holding his hand over a chest wound, staunching the flow of blood from a piece of metal that was protruding from the mans chest.
Melanie could twist her head to one side, to see out the shattered side window. The crashed helicopter was resting up against some kind of bandstand, in the middle of a large park. She could hear water running from somewhere. However, what was most unsettling was the horde of ten or so creatures, that used to be humans, running along the ground, heading straight for the crashed helicopter and the warm bodies inside.
15
Red
Newton Abbot, King Street
The Mortgage Company’s Breakroom
10:47 AM GMT
“He’s gonna be fine,” Red muttered to herself. “He’s only been gone about ten minutes. It’s a big paint center; he will be back any minute.” Red stood facing the door Noah had left by, with the arrow notched and ready.
Why am I so nervous? She thought. I’ve been alone for weeks. She shook her head, spilling red hair everywhere.
A creaking sound echoed behind her, coming from the door that led off into the main building.
Fuck! She spun around; the arrow was now pointed at the door leading into the mortgage company. He wouldn’t have come back through the main building, would he? Her hands were sweating.
Just the building settling, nothing more. Get a grip.
Then, there was another sound from behind the closed door. It sounded like something being dragged along the carpet.
Red used her forearm to wipe the sweat from her forehead, and then re-aimed the arrow at the center of the door. Her hands were trembling slightly, making the arrow wobble.
Suddenly, the muted sounds became a loud thud, as something hit the door from the other side.
Red jumped back a step, catching the back of her legs on the couch. She regained her balance and stood back up straight.
Shit, what if I missed a room and someone had been in there all this time? Impossible, I checked the place from top to bottom. The only other answer is someone has entered through a window or the front door.
Another thud that slammed the wooden door, shaking it on its hinges.
Fight or flight. Red had a choice, stand firm and wait for whatever it was to come crashing through the door, or run out the way Noah left, leaving behind all their worldly possessions, and try to find Noah.
However, before Red had chance to make a conscious decision, the door flew open, ripping it from the doorframe.
16
Noah
Newton Abbot, King Street
The Paint Center
10:48 AM GMT
Noah spun around; the breathing in the next room was loud and wheezy. He chastised himself for not noticing it when he first entered the room.
Images from the video filled his mind. He started to sweat. Noah raised the .22 air rifle.
What good would a small pellet do to one of those creatures? He thought. It was easy to scare a mindless chav, but senseless, animalistic beasts that look like they belong in a zombie movie, was a different matter.
Noah unclipped the hunting knife and held it in the hand that was balancing the rifle’s barrel.
If the pellet doesn’t work, I can use the rifle as a club, or swing out with the knife.
He inched his way along the wall. The doorway was the only way out, unless he wanted to jump a story to the concrete below.
There was a clatter of paint tins on the floor below.
Shit, how many of them are there? Maybe it is the yobs from earlier, and they have found me? He reasoned.
Then he heard the guttural sounds of something moving up the stairs, as if whatever it was could sense his presence, or smell him.
Another bang from downstairs, shortly followed by another. Whatever it was, there were a few of them.
Shit! I gotta run for it. Head along the hallway, check for another exit. I can’t be cornered in this room.
It was need, not bravery that made him run out into the hallway. As he spun around the corner, he looked over his shoulder. Coming up the stairs was a naked male and female, both covered in dried blood and gore. The instant they noticed him they sprung into action, giving chase.
Noah swung the rifle over his shoulder; it would be no good on them. He ran with all his strength down the hallway. Images of the young man in the video flashed before his eyes.
An exit! Perfect.
Off, in the distance, Noah could hear automatic gunfire, peppering in short bursts. However, he did not have time to think about whether it was coming from those in the downed helicopter.
Noah slammed into the exit door at full pelt, swinging the door open. It led to a set of metal steps leading down into a thin back alley, to one side of the paint center. Noah stood looking down.
Fuck! No way!
Behind him, the two naked creatures charged, screaming a guttural, throaty roar, while ripping at the walls as they ran along. Below him, down in the alley there were mounds of bodies, all bloated and vibrating, ready to explode.
PART TWO
Ruin
17
Doctor Lazaro
Crashed Military Merlin Transport Helicopter
Courtney Park, Newton Abbot, Devon
Friday January 5th 2013
10:48 AM GMT
Melanie could see the creatures as they ran across the grass towards them. All were naked and covered in blood and filth. Some were young teenagers, who ran ahead of a few older ones. Their guttural cries pierced the air, making the hair on the nape of her neck stand on end. The sound of the helicopter crashing drew their attention.
Automatic gunfire sounded like metallic burps. One of the soldiers must have been surveying the area and noticed the advancing mass.
“Make a defensive wall,” the soldier in command shouted over the screaming heading their way.
The crash, mixed along with the lingering drugs the nurse had given her, made Melanie weak and nauseated. If it were not for the crash webbing, she would have tumbled forward to lie stretched out on the metal decking.
The soldiers who survived the crash, and were conscious, were scrambling to get outside. Too
many remained unmoving. There were probably only ten left capable of defending themselves.
Melanie was physically as well as emotionally drained. The last three weeks had been a nightmare, what with the world going to hell and all, but the morning she had been having was straight out of a horror movie.
“Rogers, to your left!” the officer shouted.
Gunfire vibrated the metallic walls of the helicopter’s fuselage. The guttural sounds of what were once humans echoed around them. The crash, as well as the gunfire, was drawing more of them in. Melanie could not see how many because the small window gave a limited view across the park.
“I’m out!” a voice shouted over the sound of the gunfire.
“Me too!” shouted another.
“Coco, break the supplies open.”
A soldier bounded in and pulled a knife from his belt, and proceeded to cut the webbing off some dark-green containers that were strapped to the metal decking. He tossed the lid back. It was full of ammo.
Melanie hung limply forward, held by the webbing. The soldier seemed to notice her for the first time.
“Hang in there Doc. We just have a little tidying up to do, and we will get you sorted.” He gave her a smile. Sweat glistened on his young, stubble covered black face.
Melanie did not know if he was trying to lighten the situation by making a joke, or if he was the kind of individual who sees the best in every situation – the perpetual happy guy.
Coco grabbed an armful of ammo, gave her a wink, swung around, and headed out.
Cheers went up as the ammo was passed around.
“Oh shit!” another shouted. “Where are they all coming from?”
18
Red
Newton Abbot, King Street
The Mortgage Company’s Breakroom
10:50 AM GMT
The Sixth Extinction & The First Three Weeks & The Squads First Three Weeks Omnibus [Books 1-10] Page 7