Mutation (Twenty-Five Percent Book 1)
Page 32
It was Janie.
For a moment, Alex couldn’t breathe.
She saw him and grinned and, suddenly overcome with emotion, Alex ran across the street and threw his arms around her. He held her for a several long seconds before loosening his grip and stepping back, slightly embarrassed.
Janie’s eyes were wide. “What was that for?”
He shrugged and looked at the ground. “Nothing. I’m just happy to see you’re alright, that’s all.”
“Of course I’m alright,” she said, smiling. “You know me, I’m tough.”
He laughed. “Yes, you are. How did it go? Did you find your son?”
“I did. He’s here. I’ll introduce you later.”
“And how’s Kenny?”
A smile began to creep onto her face. She cleared her throat and it slunk away again. “He’s fine. I haven’t seen him that much.”
Yeah, right. “I’m really glad you’re all okay. Um, did you happen to see a woman following you while you were out there? Reddish brown hair, young, pretty? Possibly covered in blood?”
Janie raised her eyebrows. “No, why?”
He shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. Just forget I mentioned it. Do you mind if I meet your son tomorrow? I’m exhausted. I think I’m just going to go home and relax.”
“Sure. Is Micah okay?”
“He’s fine now. He went home.”
She cocked her head to one side. “You’ll have to tell me what happened.”
He smiled. “It’s a long story, but I will. Be prepared to hear astounding tales of bravery and heroism. And Micah did some stuff too.”
. . .
Alex woke at 7:18am the following morning.
Damn you, Micah Clarke.
He rolled over and promptly went back to sleep. When he woke again, it was after ten.
Much better.
He wondered how long it would be before he had a night’s sleep uninterrupted by dreams of hanging from a building by one hand, clutching onto the fingers of a beautiful, terrified, screaming woman being pulled from his grasp by vicious, ravenous monsters. It was funny how the mind worked.
He spent the day with his friends, helping to fortify the growing compound and catching up on everything that had happened around his home. Even though he worked hard, it was relaxing. In the evening, he, Janie and Kenny had dinner with Leon and Patrice while Emma and Katie spent a couple of hours with the family Alex and Micah had rescued from the car wreck. Apparently, Emma and Luke had struck up a friendship, and Katie, Aaron and Miriam were now inseparable.
Alex regaled his friends with the story of the eater hordes, the trapped office workers, the secret lab, and his standoff with Kerry. Leon and Janie looked sceptical when he told them about how he had crowd-surfed the eater horde, until he rolled up his sleeves to reveal all his bandages. He also offered to show them the actual bite wounds, at which point Kenny turned an interesting shade of green and politely requested he didn’t.
After he got home from the little dinner party, he checked the news. The situation was deteriorating fast. As there wasn’t anything he could do about it, he chose the head in sand option and turned the TV off again.
He didn’t like to think how long it would be before they lost power and water and their carefully constructed, fragile civilisation disappeared down the drain.
Later that night, the mobile phone signal vanished. The landline was still up, but he knew it would only be a matter of time before they lost that too. He called his family again. Then he called the lab and spoke to Hannah for an hour. Admittedly, she did most of the talking, but he didn’t mind.
The last thing he did before going to bed was eat all the ice-cream he had in the freezer. If the power went off while he was asleep, he didn’t want that added to his list of regrets.
32
Alex woke to the sound of banging on his front door. He glanced at the glowing figures on the clock next to his bed and grimaced.
7:42am
“Damn it.”
Hauling himself from beneath his warm duvet, he pulled on a t-shirt. As he left the room, he flipped the light switch. The bulb flickered into life. Relieved, but feeling slightly nauseous from all the ice-cream he’d eaten unnecessarily, he turned it off again and plodded to the front door.
“Why is letting me sleep until a civilised hour such anathema to you?” he said when he pulled the door open.
Micah pushed past him and dropped onto the sofa, giving the cushion a loving caress before looking up at Alex.
“So, what’s next?”
Alex frowned. “Next?”
“Yeah. The country’s being overrun by soldier termite eaters. We have to do something.”
“And what do you propose we do?” he said, rubbing at the sleep in his eyes. “Hannah and the other brainy ones are working on the sciencey stuff. What contribution do we have to make? Especially before the sun’s even up.”
“The sun is up.”
“It shouldn’t be.”
“I’m still working on the details. Go and get dressed. I’ll wait here.” Micah flipped his shoes off with his toes and stretched out along the sofa, closing his eyes and smiling as he shimmied into a more comfortable position.
Alex heaved a sigh. “Fine,” he said, turning to walk into his bedroom, “but when I get back, there’d better be bacon.”
“Phone’s ringing,” Micah called.
“Can’t you get it?” Alex called back.
“Not really, no.”
Alex sighed, wrapped the towel around him, and walked into the living room. Micah was exactly where he’d left him twenty minutes before, eyes closed, flat out on the sofa.
“Where’s my bacon?” Alex said, picking up the phone.
Micah waved a dismissive hand without opening his eyes.
“Hello?” Alex said into the receiver.
“Alex.”
A smile spread across his face. “Hello, Hannah.”
“Alex, they’re here.”
His smile vanished at her panicked tone. “Who’s there?”
Micah opened his eyes and looked up at him.
“They killed Jim,” she whispered, the hint of a sob in her voice. “I’m hiding, but I don’t know how long...”
Alex heard a crash, and Hannah gasped.
Then silence.
“Hannah?” he said, his heart pounding. “Hannah!”
To be continued...
FROM THE AUTHOR
Thank you for reading book one of the Twenty-Five Percent series and I hope you’ve enjoyed the ride so far. If you have a moment, please consider leaving a review HERE, even if it’s only one line. It’s so nice to know there’s someone out there reading my book when I’m slaving over a hot laptop bringing the next one into existence!
A quick word about Sarcester – as you’ve no doubt realised, it doesn’t exist, other than in my head where it is very real. Rather than search in vain for a city that fulfilled all the criteria I needed for the story, I decided to create my own, influenced by places I know and using a few names from areas I’ve lived. And it’s pronounced “Sarster”. Although as it is just made up, if you want to pronounce it “Serflackenweiner”, go for it.
For the inspiration behind the eater spiral in Tesco, search online for “ant death circle”. Yep, creepy.
Alex and Micah will be back!
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And finally finally, check out the anthology ALL THINGS ZOMBIE: THE GATHERING HORDE for the story of how Alex saved Rodney Cutter’s life, plus thirty-two more zombie tales b
y a really talented bunch of authors.
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And finally finally finally... just kidding.