Dead Days: Season 3 (Books 13-18)

by Casey, Ryan

  And now he was staring death in the face, it terrified him.

  “You should end it for me. End it for me…‌end it for me here,” Riley said.

  Alan’s mouth opened. His eyes widened. He scratched the back of his neck. “Riley, I couldn’t‌—‌”

  “It’s what I want,” Riley said. His eyes were blurred and his breathing was difficult. Every slight twitch of his leg sent a whole new bout of agony through him. “It’s…‌There’s nothing else for me. I can’t keep you safe anymore.”

  Alan looked like he was going to protest again, but this time he didn’t. He looked resigned. Shoulders were slumped. He looked resigned to the inevitability of the truth‌—‌he was screwed on his own, but he was safer on his own.

  Now he just had to grant Riley’s wishes. Because there was no chance for Riley. No way he was coming back as one of those things.

  “I can…‌I can wait until I absolutely have to,” Alan said, his voice a quiet and meek shadow of its usual cocksure self.

  “What’s the point?” Riley said. He raised his voice as he did, hurting his legs even more with the minor muscle shift. “I…‌I’d rather not go through the pain. I’d rather not go through…‌go through the turn.”

  Alan looked at Riley. Looked at him, completely silent, and Riley looked back at him. Riley’s heart pounded. Adrenaline was making every part of his body shake. He didn’t even feel himself anymore, more like he was watching a film or looking through a lens into someone else’s life. That helped a little bit. Helped with the distancing. Helped with the detachment he needed for what was about to happen.

  “Or if you can’t…‌If you can’t, give me the gun and let me.”

  Another blank stare from Alan. Another shade of white engulfing his face.

  “We can…‌we can try to go further. There’s still a chance. There’s still‌—‌”

  “Not for me,” Riley said. “Not anymore.”

  Alan hesitated for a few moments. Some red returned to his cheeks.

  Then he sighed, reached into the blue rucksack, and lifted out a small black pistol.

  He looked at it in his hands like it was a tarantula getting ready to bite him. Riley thought back to when he was three. Back to when he was at nursery, and the Bug Man had come around with his big box of bugs. He let the kids hold everything except the tarantula, which Riley innocently asked whether “people could hold.”

  To which the Bug Man plonked the tarantula in the middle of his hands against his wishes.

  Alan walked towards him with the gun. Lifted it with his shaky hands, wrapped his finger around the trigger, looked away.

  Riley remembered the intense fear he’d felt. Remembered wanting to throw that tarantula to the other side of the room, remembered wanting to scream out.

  But he didn’t. Instead, he just held the tarantula in his hand. Held it, and as time went on, every second died and a new second was born, and it got easier and easier.

  Alan sniffed up. His lips quivered. “I don’t…‌I don’t want to‌—‌to do this. I don’t want to kill.”

  “I’m dead already,” Riley said, completely constrained by fear. “You know it as well as I do.”

  He took in a sharp shaky breath. Alan glanced at Riley, then back away again, pointing the gun at his head. “I’m…‌I’m really damned sorry about all this,” Alan said. “I…‌If I hadn’t made you come down here with me…‌”

  Riley thought about saying something to comfort Alan, to reassure him, but he knew nothing he could say would solve his guilt.

  He took a final look around the metal, damp-smelling bunker. Took a look at the metal walls, the hard tiled floor, and Alan, the last human he’d ever see.

  And then he closed his eyes. Inhaled the dizzying smells of disinfectant, somewhat smoother now he knew it’d be the last scent he smelled.

  He thought about that tarantula. Thought about the fear he felt. Thought about the fear drifting away with every dying second.

  “Do it,” Riley muttered. It was only then that he realised he could taste salt on his lips‌—‌the salt of his tears.

  He heard Alan sniff again. Heard him mutter a few inaudible words.

  And then he heard the footsteps. The soft footsteps tapping towards him.

  The cold barrel of the gun tapped against his head. Like the sting general anaesthetic gave you when it was about to take you under its clutches. The knowing that, although you’re about to wake up, you’ll never wake up the same person again.

  Except this time, he wouldn’t wake up at all.

  “Bye,” Riley said. He wiped away his tears. He didn’t want to die a sobbing mess.

  “Bye Riley,” Alan said, his voice hoarse and slack.

  Riley held that tarantula in his mind.

  Held it, with Anna at his side. With Ted grinning away with his silly fat face. With Claudia, Chloë, all the others he’d loved and lost. With Gran. With his mum and his dad. With his kid. His kid he’d never met.

  He smiled when he thought about them, and they smiled back at him.

  And then he heard the bang before he felt anything.

  EPISODE SIXTEEN

  (FOURTH EPISODE OF SEASON THREE)

  Prologue

  Riley could still feel his hands.

  He could still taste blood in his mouth. He could still feel the jagged edges of his teeth scraping against his bitten down tongue. He could still smell the disinfectant, strong in the bunker. Could still see the blackness, peppered with colours that came from squeezing his eyes too hard.

  He could still feel the cold barrel of Alan’s gun against his head.

  But he’d heard a bang. Heard an almighty thwack that could only have come from the sound of a gun.

  He opened his eyes. Opened his salty, stinging eyes and took a peek back at the bunker, a peek that he never thought he was going to get again.

  Alan was holding the gun to his head, but he was looking over his shoulder. Looking at the grey metal door and frowning at it, like there was something he didn’t understand.

  He looked back at Riley. Looked back at him with his pale face, eyes widening as he realised Riley had his eyes open again.

  “Did you…‌” Alan started.

  And then the bang came again.

  Riley let out an uncontrollable sob. Let out a gasp of air, planted his head against the floor. For the bang wasn’t from the gun. No‌—‌it was from outside. From right outside the bunker door.

  He couldn’t even contemplate the ramifications. He didn’t know what someone or something being outside meant for him or for Alan. All he knew was that he was here. He was alive.

  Barely alive.

  Alan lowered the gun. Lowered it and hobbled over the tiled floor of the bunker. He stopped by the door. Slowly brought his right ear to it, frowned and squinted as he listened.

  Riley’s head was spinning. The pain in his legs was intense and sharp, but not as bad as it had been. Probably the shock. He remembered a similar thing happening when he had a rock thrown at his head as a kid. Killed like mad at first, then just drifted away…‌only to return a hell of a lot stronger a day later.

  At least now Riley wouldn’t be alive to witness another day.

  “I think there’s‌—‌there’s someone outside,” Alan said. He looked at Riley. For all that had happened, he seemed more shocked now than ever before. His stubble and bloodied blue shirt made him look like a mad scientist or an escaped convict, not a world saver.

  Riley didn’t know what to say to Alan. His mind was fuzzy. Hazy, like he was living a weird dream. “What do you mean there’s‌—‌”

  The bang again. Right outside the door. Such a bang that it made Alan flinch away.

  And this time, Riley heard something else beyond the bang. Heard something he hadn’t heard for hours, or was it days?

  Voices. Multiple voices.

  “There’s someone outside,” Alan said, looking back at Riley again, shock all over his face.

&
nbsp; Riley shook as the bang sounded again‌—‌as Alan started shuffling and twitching around‌—‌as the voices got louder and more pronounced.

  He shook as he realised how close he’d been to being a bloodied pulp on the ground.

  Shook as he realised that he should be dead right now.

  Shook at the fact that he wanted to live. He really wanted to live.

  But he had no choice. Not looking at the state of his legs.

  He was alive. He was actually alive.

  But only for now.

  He took in a deep, difficult breath.

  He was going to make “for now” as lengthy a time as he could.

  Chapter One: Chloë

  It was so dark that Chloë couldn’t see the faces of the monsters properly, but she knew they were monsters because of the dead smell they brought into the already smelly room.

  Chloë backed up against the wall of the dark room as the monsters wandered inside. The other scared people, who were tied up, started to shake at their handcuffs, scream as the monsters noticed them. Chloë wanted to scream too but she was too scared to scream, too scared to even move. All she could do was stay still. Stay still and pretend Mum’s necklace was still in her hand. She didn’t know where it was or who had it but she wanted it so bad.

  One of the monsters crouched down opposite an old man with thin white hair. He struggled, wriggled his way away from its dirty, bloody hands and its sharp teeth, but it just got closer and closer, brought its mouth to his tummy and took a massive bite out of it. Chloë heard the blood squirt out of the man’s tummy. She heard it drip down onto the floor, watched it stain the man’s white T-shirt as his eyes rolled into the back of his head and his screaming stopped.

  And then she watched as another monster clamped its teeth into the dark hair of a girl a little older than her, brought the teeth further and further into her skull as she struggled and struggled, the life dripping out of her with the blood.

  She wanted to hold Jordanna’s hand. She pushed herself closer to her so that she was resting on her warm black cardigan, which smelled a bit like off-milk but she didn’t mind. She just wanted someone to be there for her when they came for her. Someone to be friends with in the very last minute when the teeth bit into her and took her away. She was worried for a moment, as she listened to the monsters chewing, more blood and guts squelching and people screaming behind their gags. Mum and Elizabeth hadn’t been bitten by a monster, so maybe she’d go somewhere different than them. A different heaven. She hoped not. She really wanted to be with them. She really wanted them more than she’d ever wanted them in her life.

  She clenched her eyes shut. Sobbed onto Jordanna’s cardigan.

  “I’ll be there soon, Mum,” she said. “I’ll be there soon‌—‌”

  “My daughter! My Beatrice! For heaven’s sakes, get her out of there!”

  At first, Chloë didn’t know what the voice outside was talking about. But then she remembered. Beatrice. That was the name that the weird lady Ursula had given her.

  Get her out of there.

  Was she helping her? Why was she helping her?

  She looked up and over at the door. There were about six monsters in the room now. She felt damp on her bum because blood from the chained up people had leaked onto her. But they hadn’t got her yet. They hadn’t got her. And maybe Ursula was going to help her. Maybe the weird lady that made her call her “Mum” was going to help.

  Chloë looked at the door, listened as footsteps scraped against the stones in the darkness outside.

  And that’s when a monster looked right back at her, started walking and stumbling towards her.

  She held her breath. Every muscle in her body tensed. She backed against the wall. Backed against the hard wall so much it hurt her back and the back of her head.

  “Please,” Chloë said, her voice shaky.

  The monster kept on walking. Its smell was getting closer. It even had flies buzzing around a red bite wound on the side of its bitten-down leg.

  “Please.”

  But it wasn’t stopping. Course it wasn’t stopping. The monsters never stopped. That’s why they were so dangerous.

  She waited for the feel of the teeth in her head or neck or tummy.

  And then she felt cold fluid splash all over her face.

  She heard a bang, too. One bang, then another then another.

  “Away from my daughter!”

  Chloë teased her eyes open. Looked over at the door where the banging was coming from.

  Ursula was standing at the door. She had her brown hair down so she looked less like a weird old lady, and she was wearing a long white nighty. She had nothing on her feet, but she was holding a big gun like the shotguns Dad used to shoot when he played Call of Duty, and she was blasting at the monsters.

  Monster bits splattered all over the room. Pieces of smelly, salty skin and flesh hit Chloë in the face as showers of cold blood kept splashing over her. She listened to the bangs. Watched and listened as Ursula fired at monster after monster.

  Fired and fired until all of the monsters were on the floor, all of their heads were blasted in, and all of them were down.

  She lowered her gun. Tears were rolling down her cheeks, Chloë could just about see that.

  “Oh my Beatrice,” Ursula said. She wandered barefoot into the room, her feet splashing through the blood that was not just coming from the dead monsters, but from the loads of people tied up in the room who had been bitten.

  “I’m so sorry, my angel,” Ursula said. She wrapped her arms around Chloë’s neck, so tight that she couldn’t breathe for a few seconds. She smelled of perfume now, but not nice perfume that Mum used to wear. Perfume that made Chloë cough, tickled the back of her throat. “I thought my darling would be safe in here. I really thought she would.”

  Chloë looked at Ursula. Looked into her weird, spaced-out eyes. Listened to the sounds of whimpering, of agony, surrounding her in the room. Agony that Ursula seemed oblivious to.

  “Come on,” Ursula said. She reached around Chloë’s back and struggled with the cuffs. “Let’s get you inside. Let’s get you inside and bathed. Mummy’s angel.”

  She unclipped Chloë’s cuffs. She didn’t seem to even notice Chloë’s gag was down. Chloë looked at Jordanna. Looked at Jordanna for her to tell her what to do, but Jordanna didn’t say a word. She just sat there, totally still. Sat there with a piece of brain or meat on her face that she couldn’t wipe away, so it just slid down her cheek.

  Ursula lifted Chloë to her feet. Chloë had a clear view of the outside now. The road from the woods up the hill that she’d come down. She could run away. Run away, but she was so hungry, so weak. So sickly after the eye that Ursula had made her eat earlier.

  She felt a nudge in her back. A sharp nudge that tapped against her spine.

  She looked around and saw that the nudge was from Ursula’s shotgun.

  Ursula smiled like Mum did when she was proud of Chloë or Elizabeth. “It’s okay, my sweet. I’m just making sure you don’t go running away. Wouldn’t want you to go running away into the dangers outside now, would we?”

  Chloë turned back to the door. Felt her heart beating so fast that she could see it through her top.

  “What about…‌what about the people in here?” Chloë asked. Her throat was sore, her voice weak.

  Ursula frowned as she walked Chloë out of the miserable, smelly room. The room where so many people were bitten, in pain.

  “People? Darling, these heathens aren’t people anymore.”

  Now she was outside, in the cold, Chloë took a look back into the room. Looked at all the blood on the floor. Looked at all the people holding their bites, and the pile of blasted-apart monsters on the floor.

  “What about my frien…‌What about the‌—‌the ones who weren’t bit?”

  Ursula reached for the rusty handle of the metal door. She pulled it with her elbow, her gun still pointed at Chloë.

  “Their turn has
n’t come yet,” Ursula said, closing the squeaky door. “But for most of them, it will come soon.”

  Chloë stared into the darkness, stared into Jordanna’s brown eyes.

  She knew what Ursula meant. She didn’t always know what adults meant, but Ursula meant that the bitten ones who were chained up would wake up. They’d find a way to eat, to bite the others, when they were monsters.

  They’d find a way to get to Jordanna.

  She stared at Jordanna for a few more seconds.

  And then the door slammed shut and she was gone.

  Chapter Two: Pedro

  Before he heard the bang, Pedro actually got some damned good sleep.

  His dreams were blurry. Blurry and fuzzy. Couldn’t feel his hands properly in his dream, and he was down some alleyway or another trying to run away from something. But then he realised he was carrying Josh. Carrying Josh, whose bite had got worse and worse. And he realised he was actually running to something.

  When he looked over his shoulder, he saw the mushroom-haired kid from Afghan. Saw him, half his head blasted open from Pedro’s gun.

  But he wasn’t chasing Pedro. He wasn’t chasing him anymore. Just watching, as Pedro got further and further down this alleyway, further and further into the light.

  And then a bang.

  The bang was so loud it woke Pedro up. He looked around, blinked in the darkness of the back of this green Mercedes van, wondered what the hell was going on for a few seconds. His teeth chattered with the cold, and he could hear the snoring of Barry not so far away.

  He sat up and realised he was sweating. Could taste it on his lips. He rubbed a rough hand over his sweaty head. He had no idea how long he’d been sleeping. Could be light outside now for all he knew. But he still felt pretty groggy, in need of a good shower. Hell‌—‌he always felt in need of a good shower these days.

  Shit. The bang must’ve been in his sleep. Just a dream, something like that.

  He lowered his head back down onto the hard floor of the van when he heard the bang again.