She pulls herself to peer through the windows, nose brushing against the fabric of the door, and rubs at the condensation, making a small hole in the mist. She squints. The courtyard is empty. Perhaps they’ve gone.
She reaches for the key fob and presses ‘unlock’. The click ricochets against her eardrums. Jaws clench as the indicators flash, the orange lights gleaming on the wet cobbles. Damn! Damn! Damn! What if they’ve seen it? She slides back below the window, tense, muscles aching.
Shuffling. A cackle. A clatter and knocking. The courtyard fills again with noise. They’ve heard! Hell! Heart pounding, she clears a tiny circle in the misted window—she has to see, face what’s coming.
Figures run across the courtyard. A female passes, two males follow, one with a body slung across its shoulder. Javeen realises with a sickening lurch that it is Marion Shelby, Conrad’s wife. More figures spill out of the doorway. None look her way. She watches and waits. The creatures appear in small groups, some with the harvest of their hunt slung across their shoulders, and disappear through the gates until eventually a few stragglers thin out to nothing. She waits, counts the seconds. After ten minutes without sight of a creature, she reaches for the door and pulls the handle. It opens with a dull click. Freezing air blasts her cheeks. She pushes at the door with arms that have lost their strength.
Movement in the doorway.
She freezes, holds her breath, trapping it in her lungs, desperate to stay hidden. A figure appears at the doorway. It staggers against the frame then stumbles out into the courtyard. Andy!
As he sinks to his knees, she pushes the door open and slides out onto the wet cobbles. In the distance, from the forest, a howl breaks through the patter of rain.
On all fours, she crawls to Freddie as he kneels on the cobbles, rain wetting his hair, water dripping from the tips of his nose and eyelashes. His shirt is torn, the ripped fabric soaked with blood.
“It bit me.” His voice is rasping as he turns to Javeen. “Help me, Jav. Help me.”
He jerks then, head thrown back as a spasm rips at his body. “Please!” He forces the words through clenched teeth.
His face is contorted by pain, ugly in the harsh shadows of the outside lights as she crawls to him. He sags as another agonising spasm subsides.
“Jav. Help me! The vials. Get the vials. Put me down!”
“In the car! They’re in the car.”
He grunts again as pain wracks his body then pushes up from his knees and staggers to the car.
“In the glove compartment.”
He throws the door open and leans in. “Got it.”
He clutches a box and staggers away from the car as another wave of pain hits him. He jerks, back bending in a backwards arc, and the box lands on the floor. Glass clinks as the small bottles roll to the cobbles. In the next second, he crashes to the ground, knocking against the car’s bumper, crumbling next to Javeen. His skin glows pale in the light, highlighting the track and criss-cross of blue veins across his cheeks. Another spasm controls him and his head thrashes against the cobbles.
“Stop! Oh, God. Stop!”
Blood trickles over the stones as, with a grunt, and through gritted teeth, Javeen pulls herself to a sitting position and grasps Andy’s jacket. His weight is enormous, but she manages to manoeuvre his head onto her lap, stroking his forehead as his body spasms. Eyes roll back in his head. Blood has seeped into the whites.
“Please … please …” He jerks again and growls, his jaw widening.
Startled at the lengthening incisors, Javeen grabs for a vial. She reaches for a syringe, pulls off the protective plastic lid and points the needle towards the vial’s rubber top. How much should she give him? It was meant for dogs. It had killed the beagle at the Institute, but would it kill him? A punch to her belly at the thought. Kill him! Kill Andy? She quivers. She has never killed a man. Sure, during her training, she’d been taught to shoot, and to fight, but it was all defensive stuff. No part of her being had ever considered actually killing a man. Andy Bucks and groans, his eyes locked to the syringe. How can she kill a man that she loves?
“Do it!”
She sobs, her heart breaking as their eyes meet. His are almost entirely black, the white replaced with blood, the pupils huge. A shudder and she pricks the rubber stopper with the needle then draws the fluid into the syringe. Her hands tremble as she points it towards his throat. In the distance a howl. Her memories flash back to the beginning. How had this all happened? How had the entire village been destroyed in the space of a few days? She was entirely alone. What chance had she of survival? Every avenue of escape has been closed. The woods are infested, her theory about them being nocturnal wrong. So far, all efforts at escape had ended in disaster. She is the last survivor. But for how long? How long before she is torn to shreds, disembowelled, her innards feasted on? Her belly clenches and bile rises in her throat. How long? A week? A day? Through this night? One more hour? She shudders as Andy groans and writhes against her. She holds his head close to her belly, holding him still as another fit takes hold. The tips of his incisors now rest on his lower lip, blood seeps from broken skin as his face contorts.
She throws the syringe to the cobbles and waits for Andy’s bite.
Epilogue
TEN YEARS LATER
Kielder Forest,
17th November, 4:40pm
An hour has passed since Jake left the path, forty-five minutes since he tried to find his way back, and thirty since he noticed the snapping branches and rustling leaves. He wipes away the sweat trickling at his temple. Shining the torchlight, he searches through the darkening woods for a way out. Each tree looks the same as the last. He fingers the map in his pocket, squeezing the paper between index and thumb. What the hell had he been thinking of coming here? It was Marston’s fault. He should have just ignored the man.
Another branch snaps, but this time it’s closer. Startled, Jake pushes away from the tree and lurches forward. His boot clips a raised root snaking across the forest floor and he stumbles, drops his torch, and catches his outstretched palm against rough bark. It gouges the soft flesh and Jakes sucks in his pain through gritted teeth. “Goddamn it!”
Another branch snaps behind him as he reaches for the light.
The hairs on his neck prickle, and he freezes mid-bend. Heart hammering, he grabs for the torch. He has to see it. Whatever it is, he has to see. He swings the light in an arc and checks the dark spaces. The light barely makes a dent in the thickening gloom. He can see nothing but branches, low shrubs and the roots that rise from the soil like thick and ugly worms. Scratching comes from a patch of low undergrowth about three feet to his left. He trains the light there. Leaves shake, and something scurries, then darts from the undergrowth—probably a rat. Jake sags with relief. Idiot! Just calm the hell down. He takes another quick breath to ease the tightness of his chest and leans up against the tree, his back pressed against the bark, and shivers. There was something dead about these woods.
When the light was better, when he still had his bearings straight, he could see between the trees to the decaying forest. There, rotting stumps, and the massive up-turned roots of wind-blown trees, were grown over with bright green moss. The moss undulated, smoothing the harsh lines of the broken trees, and they sat like gargoyles leering from the gloom as a low and rolling mist spread across the forest floor. You couldn’t make the place creepier if you tried. Jake curses Dr Peter Marston and his damned secret for the tenth time since he’d lost his way in the forest. No, it was before that. He’d cursed him when the sat nav had quit working and he’d had to follow the map. He’d cursed him yet again when the track had become impassable and then again when he’d had to climb over the rusting wire fence that marked the forest boundary. The fence, which ran in either direction, and as far as the eye could see, was hung with a large red sign painted with white lettering: ‘DANGER. FIRING RANGE. NO UNAUTHORISED ENTRY. DANGER OF DEATH’. He’d ignored the warning, determined to prove that the old
man was sane, and that his damned boss was up to no good. If Dr Marston’s ravings were true, the sign was just another ruse to put people off from entering and, from the dilapidated state of the fencing, it looked as though it had worked.
Once over the fence, Jake had pulled out the map he’d found in Marston’s belongings. His sudden appearance on the ward, drugged up to the eyeballs under Dr Spellman’s care, complete with black-suited bodyguards – they couldn’t scream government any louder – and the almost coma-level sedation Jake was expected to monitor, had aroused his suspicions and he’d held back some of Marston’s medication. Once he was lucid, the man had begun to talk. Not that he made much sense, but it was obvious he wasn’t as ill as Dr Spellman was insisting. Intrigued, Jake had listened to his ramblings and become convinced that the man was sane, perhaps a little odd, but nevertheless being forcibly silenced.
Jake had convinced him to share his secrets with the promise of lessening the tranquiliser dosage and Marston had obliged. It turned out that the wily old goat had hidden the evidence up his chimney. The contents of the soot-covered package, Marston’s research notes, were mainly indecipherable to Jake, pretty much a foreign language, but among them was a map to the facility, and enough information to confirm that this particular conspiracy theory - that Marston’s incarceration in the asylum was a government cover up - had merit. Jake fingers the camera in his pocket. When he had enough evidence, he would hand it over to the board and it would be sayonara Hilary Spellman. The old cow had it coming, and Jake would take great delight in watching her marched off the premises never to be seen again. She deserved it. She was as psychopathic as the worst patients under his care and seemed to take an especial delight in humiliating him. Jake stops for a moment. What if the board are in on it too? He’d go to the police or leak it online. Whatever—he’d make sure Spellman’s efforts at taking directorship were ruined either way.
He takes another breath, tries to ignore the scurrying of unseen forest creatures and peers closely at Marston’s map. It was pointless. He had no idea where he was. No idea if he was travelling north, south, east, or west. He stuffs the map back into his pocket and considers turning back. He grips the torch and clenches his jaws. The old man didn’t deserve what they were doing to him and Hillary bloody Spellman didn’t deserve the directorship she was so desperately clawing for. No, sir. He’ll keep on until he finds the evidence he needs. Sure, it was creepy as hell in the woods, but monsters weren’t real and he’s damned sure - please let it be so - that he’s the only other person in the woods; the place was deserted, there had been no sign of walkers, or campers, and no traffic for the last fifty miles of his journey. He just has to hold his nerve—that’s all. Get a grip, tubby! A memory surfaces and he checks for daylight above the canopy and rechecks the map; it’s winter, so the sun will set southwest. The light, as far as he can tell, is brightest at his back and the institute is to the east. He stuffs the map back in his pocket and heads in that direction.
As the light fades the trees grow blacker and the night colder. Jake zips his jacket to beneath his chin, making the collar snug around his fat neck, and pulls up the hood. It gives protection against the branches and their sharp needles. The grey forest light fades to black and, far from the light pollution of cities and towns, the night is dark and the sky sprayed with a million glittering and intensely white stars.
Tarmac scuffs beneath Jake’s boots and he steps out onto a road.
“Yes!” He pumps his hand in the air with triumph.
White mist billows around his face as sweat trickles down the centre of his back to the crease of his arse. He checks up and down the road. If he takes the left then the road should lead him to the Institute. If he goes right – he swings the torch – if he goes right it should … the road is headed off by a thick bank of trees. He frowns and checks the map again. According to Marston’s map, this road leads from the forest and back to the B456. He swings the torch to the left; the road stretches out, but a glimmer of white reflects in the distance. He stuffs his free hand into his pocket and strides towards it.
As he walks closer, he can make out the shape of a rectangle. White paint reflects yellow in the torchlight and seems to hang in the air but, as he approaches, he can make out writing. Another sign. This one reads, ‘BIOLOGICAL HAZARD. CONTAMINATED LAND. ENTRY PROHIBITED.’
The sign is pitted with age and the fence it is screwed onto, rusting. Below it another sign has been added in case the first wasn’t enough to put you off. ‘DANGER OF DEATH. ELECTRIFIED FENCE.’ He snorts. Another ruse, but whoever put it up meant business. Unlike the fence at the forest’s perimeter this one is made of solid metal panels and reaches to more than twenty feet high. Where the road intersects, a gate sits flanked by sentry boxes; two white boxes with peeling paint, patterned green with algae and lichen. Moss sits in humps on their corrugated rooves. A barrier of red and white stripes sits across the road, barring entry. Beyond the gate, the road winds on into the woods but there is no sign of the institute. A padlock hangs on a tight chain keeping the gates together. Jake shrugs off his rucksack and pulls out the bolt cutter. It cuts through the old chain and the padlock drops to the tarmac with a clank. Reaching through the bars, he lifts the bolt that keeps the gate closed and steps through to the other side. The gate clanks shut behind him.
On this side, a tranche of dark earth at least thirty feet wide, and littered with the stumps of felled trees, sits between the fence and the forest. Nothing has grown in their place. Where the rotten trunks and fallen branches had been blanketed in moss on the other side of the fence, here they remain black and petrified. The tranche of earth is a desolate expanse; no ferns, no undergrowth, no lichen, no fungi. Between the wall and the edge of the forest, the land is completely barren.
A tree ahead shudders, its branches creak. Jake swings his torch to look. A pair of eyes reflect from deep inside its canopy. The air fills with a screech and flapping of wings. Startled, Jake stumbles, regains his footing, swears at the bird, and marches along the road then breaks into a run. His knees creak with the effort; if the cold didn’t kill him tonight, the stress would. Bloody Marston! He’ll find the institute, take his photographs, get his evidence, then get the hell out of here. He pulls at the straps of his rucksack for reassurance and trains the light on the road as he jogs along. The road with its crumbling tarmac sprouting with grass, disappears back into the trees.
“Shit!”
A branch creaks to his right. He grits his teeth and ignores it - stupid birds, stupid rats! - and steps into the forest. On the other side will be the Institute and maybe - please! - there will be people working late at the office.
Something scrats in the undergrowth behind him. Louder this time—something bigger than a rat. Calm it, Jake! Could be a badger, or a fox. He swallows, his throat suddenly dry. From somewhere deep in the forest another tree creaks, another branch falls, and the wind blows through the canopy.
He swings the torch and trains it in the direction of the noise. A pair of eyes shine from the trees—level with his own. He tries to swallow but his mouth is too dry. He grips the torch as the eyes continue to stare. They’re too large for a rat, and foxes don’t perch in trees. His heart beats hard in his chest. The eyes disappear. Rotten wood cracks in the undergrowth.
Training the torch back into the forest, he pushes his way through, picking up speed. Jake can no longer hear the creaking trees. All he can hear is his own breath and the throb of his pulse pounding in his head. Behind him a branch snaps. He swivels. The eyes have returned. Whatever it is, is following him. He twists back and runs. Behind him footsteps pound. As he pushes his way past another branch, a dark figure runs through the trees to his left. His breath comes hard as he crashes to the right. He runs blindly through the woods, batting at low branches, pushing through leaves. His boot catches against a root and he’s slipping. The soil gives way to a steep bank. He falls and tumbles down the embankment, fingernails filling with soil as he claws the eart
h. Roots catch at his legs. He grabs for trunks and branches to stop his fall. Leaves crunch and cling to his jacket, and soil pushes against his lips as his cheek scrapes the ground. He stops with a thud, winded, the torch still in his hand.
Sour, fetid breath blows warm on his cheek.
He swings the torch to see.
Staring into his face, with fangs that glisten in the light, is something that is no longer human. It snarls, and Jake’s scream dies in his throat as the creature pounces.
In the distance the air fills with a yapping, snickering chatter, and the metal clank of the gates crashing open.
The End
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