As the Light Dies

by M. D. Woodham

  “C’mon!” she yelled hurrying Steve as icy sea water poured in over her through the open hatch as waves swept over them. The sea was rough and Steve was struggling for balance. Despite all his years at sea, he wasn’t used to being on a boat. Jen twisted and turned her boat hook grinding it into infected flesh and bone trying to unclasp their black fingers. It was working but too slowly! The infected were surprisingly strong and didn’t react to any pain from Jen’s actions.

  She worked fast forcing the pole with the‘S’shaped hook on its end up as hard as she could repeatedly twisting the hook, tearing already broken skin, working down to the bone, separating knuckles. One of the infected pulled itself up over the hatch and looked in at her with a knowing look on its face like it knew it had to stop her.

  Jen could feel that it knew!

  Her heart started to race at the realisation, then Steve bumped in to her pushing her out of the way as he lost his balance with the movement of the lifeboat as he joined her. She lost sight of the figure.

  “SHIT!Sorry!”he called and started thrusting his boathook up at the infected hands copying her, but he was missing them because of his poor balance. All he was doing was knocking tiny chips out of the lifeboats fiberglass. Jen stumbled back as he bumped in to her, she cursed him under her breath as she regained her balance. As she did the staring figure, a tall man, made an attempt to force himself in!

  Steve gasped stepping back for a second before he started jabbing at the man, forcing his way through the hatch. Steve jabbed at the man as fast as he could but he only managed to land the odd passing blow. The long lean man pushed himself through the hatch, pushing other infected out of the way as he dropped down towards them, forcing his shoulders through and reached in with one arm and started reaching out for Steve! The man’s arm thrashed through the air like a wild tentacle until the infected man grabbed a hold of the end of Steve’s boathook.

  Steve flinched back yelping out with a mixture of fear and revulsion as the infected man bit down on the‘S’shaped piece of steel. Steve pulled his boathook back, reluctantly at first, not wanting to hurt the man. Then the lifeboat pitched violently on a wave and he yanked the boathook out of the man’s mouth tearing both of his lips in two with the steel hook as he struggled for balance.

  The infected man swung as he dangled upside down like a bat as the lifeboat rode the savage seas. He reached out for the boathook and screamed his primal, alien sounding gurgle in anger as Steve pulled away and Steve realised that he’d held back when he shouldn’t have. He remembered Katie telling him that he had to be as savage as them,more soif he wanted to survive and he immediately took a jab at the man thrusting the boathook like it was a spear and he landed a solid blow and stabbed the infected man in his breast bone! He broke through the skin and ground into the bone, but it had no effect! The man didn’t react to the wound in the slightest he just carried on reaching out for Steve!

  “THIS ISN’T WORKING!” yelled Jen coming up beside Steve.

  “You keep at them,”she said,“I’ll be back in a sec!”

  Steve carried on jabbing and stabbing, but it was fast becoming a losing battle, others were trying to force their way in following his lead. There were thrashing arms waving in all directions, he could barely stand up. He knew that if it wasn’t for them being so unco-ordinated, and constantly fighting with each other to get in they’d already be inside.

  “Fucking Christ!” he said,“why aren’t they washing off with the waves?”

  Jen didn’t answer she was busy searching for something tearing through the survival packs. Another infected man started to squeeze in beside the first one.

  Steve was amazed, he didn’t think there was even room for two. It twisted and bucked all the way in passed its shoulders and stopped just short of the first figure. Steve ducked down just in time to miss its clasping hand.

  There were two to deal with now!

  The lifeboat rocked heavily and threw Steve on to his knees directly under the hatch.

  Fingers brushed through his hair. The gurgles roared above him, excited as they felt their fingertips touch him!

  Without looking he thrust upwards as hard as he could and the end of the boat hook pierced deep through the left eye socket of the first figure. Steve could feel that his hook was caught on something as he tugged and twisted, so he looked up. He was horrified when he realised what he’d done and vomit rose up his throat! His hook was caughtinsidethe man’s head!

  The infected man grabbed the pole and pulled at it. Steve pulled back emulating a morbid tug of war. But it was no good, the hook was caught fast behind the man’s eye socket. Steve pushed and pulled frantically trying to free the pole tearing the man’s eye socket to shreds, and he vomited unable to stop himself as black viscous fluid started running down the pole and over his hands as it oozed from the burst eye socket. Suddenly Jen took hold of the boat hook and violently whisked it around!

  Steve vomited again picturing the‘S’shaped hook inside the man’s head mulching everything in there!

  “STEVE!”yelled Jen.

  He didn’t respond!

  “STEVE!” she tried again screeching to be heard and he looked up to see her thrusting the handle towards him!

  “Try and get it free. We need to keep as many weapons as we can, he’s dead now but the other one isn’t and nor are the others!”

  Steve took a hold of the handle trying to keep his mouth clamped shut and he tried to retrieve the boat hook from the infected man’s head as he dangled there, while also trying to fend off the frantic reaching hand of the second figure!

  He used the dead man’s body like a shield against the second infected man as he tried to free the boathook and as he turned the dead body around in the hatch blocking the second man’s advances he managed to dislodge the second man slightly and he dropped down a few more inches, just far enough for him to free his second hand. Then he slid some more!

  Steve yelled out almost screaming, sure that he was about to fall in with them and Jen reappeared bolting along the aisle between the seats with her boathook extended out in front of her like a lance. Steve winced as she raced towards him. She screamed out at the last second gaining the attention of the dangling man. He turned around to look at her just at the right time and she thrust her boathook through his left eye socket with so much force that she rocked both of the bodies wedged in the hatch like carcasses in a meat locker. Jen tugged and pulled and spun and twisted the pole screaming as she did until the body fell limp. She yanked the hook back out of the man’s head and dropped it on to the floor. Then without stopping she started climbing the ladder towards the hatch. She was only using one hand to climb while she used her other one to pull out two silvery objects that were wedged under her waist belt.

  Steve saw her pulling at the two dull chrome rectangles.

  What the hell!he thought watching her. When she reached the top she hooked one of her legs through a rung in the ladder and used her leg to lock herself in place freeing up both of her hands, then she started whacking the discoloured clasping fingers that were curled around the edge. Steve realised she was using mess tins from a couple of the survival kits. She was using them like primitive steel boxing gloves, and it seemed to be working. She worked on two hands at a time, slapping hands, crunching knuckles and loosening their grip by sliding the mess tins around the rim of the hatch over and over, and every now and then she had to use brute force to push one or two of them back as they reached out for her. Steve was stunned by her ferocity. As she cleared the hatch she shouted down at him,“PUSH THIS ONE UP!”

  He looked up to see her holding on as best she could to the dangling figure that she’d killed before climbing up to the hatch.

  “What do you....”he started to ask when she yelled back,”JUST PUSH!”

  So he did. He reached up trying not to think about it and he pressed against the man’s shoulders and started pushing him back up. At first he didn’t think they were going to manage to push him ba
ck out, he thought they’d have to pull them both in first, before they’d be able to lift them out, one at a time when neither one or the other was still partly blocking the hatch. But then with Jen helping, the limp body moved several inches in one go. Jen repositioned her mess tinned hands quickly and shouted,“AGAIN!”

  Steve pushed again and instantly he managed to push up as far as his arms would stretch and Jen took it from there and shoved the infected body all the way out through the hatch just in time before the lifeboat bucked and leaned violently over to one side throwing Steve off his feet again leaving Jen holding the second dangling figure in place on her own, trying to stop it from falling in on top of Steve while she tried to hang on with her legs and fend off bloodthirsty infected hands as they reached in for her. She started losing her grip on the dead figure quickly!

  “STEVE!....STEVE!” she hollered.

  He saw what was happening as he scrambled back on to his feet and he rushed over and grabbed hold of the man just below his armpits as he began to slide.

  “HOLD HIM!” yelled Jen and she turned back just in time to dodge being bitten as one of the infected men leaned in towards her. She punched him square in the mouth bursting his lips and snapping teeth with her steel boxing gloves as she forced him back. He leaned in again and this time Jen punched out with both hands slamming his chest so hard that he bounced back from her and lost his grip, and he was swept away by the waves.

  Then she went back to forcing eager hands back, slapping them away and forcing them back between having to punch infected faces as they tried to lean in and bite her. She worked fast, she had to, she could tell that Steve was struggling to keep a hold of the infected body and dead or not she didn’t want it in the lifeboat with them for a second!“OK!” she yelled,“START PUSHING!”

  He did. He pushed as hard as he could and between them they had the body out and over the side in seconds. As the infected body slid up and out as Jen pushed, Steve grabbed the end of his boathook before it disappeared overboard and let gravity and the waves do the rest. It worked, the hook snapped free from the eye socket and Steve had his weapon back.

  He retched when he saw the end of his boat hook, but there was nothing left for him to bring up, and bile burned away at his throat. Jen dropped one of her mess tins and grabbed the end of Steve’s boat hook taking no notice of the black sludge that squelched through her fingers like mud and she started grinding it around the rim of the hatch as fast as she could forcing infected hands to let go. She cracked knuckles and snapped fingers, and when it didn’t work or had no effect on one of the bigger, thicker hands she punched at them with her metal boxing glove when they came in close enough then jabbed at their throats with the boathook and pushed them so far back that they had to let go, and the waves took them, sweeping them off into the icy depths.

  Jen worked fast and as soon as she had the hatch rim clear she reached out and snatched at the hatch and pulled it over, slammed it shut and spun the locking wheel faster than a spinning top.“Right,”she said dropping back down,“let’s get this thing started and head for home!”

  She climbed in to the compact wheelhouse and looked at the controls.

  After a moment she said,“Ok,”and she turned a key beside the steering wheel, then leaned over the control consul and turned a lever fixed to a copper pipe. There was a hiss as air rushed through it and then to Steve’s surprise the engine spluttered and coughed to life.

  “How did you do that?” he asked.“We lost all our electrics hours ago!”

  Jen looked at him and grinned.“These engines can be started using compressed air to turn them over, as well as the normal electronic start up. It’s called a black start. Handy back up huh.”

  Steve was shocked, he’d never heard of anything like it.

  “Think about it,”she said seeing the confusion on his face.“We’re using this lifeboat to escape from an oil and gas instillation, and if we’reusingthe lifeboat you can bet that something drastically wrong has happened! There’s a high risk of an oil or gas leak. The last thing we want to do is risk a spark trying to start up the lifeboat.”

  Steve nodded, it made perfect sense. Jen saw that he understood and went quiet, concentrating while she looked at the compass. Steve could feel that they were moving, being propelled away from the rig through the waves.

  “I’ll face us due west,”she said.“We can’t go wrong with that. We’ll make land at some point.”

  She tied a bungee around the wheel securing it in place, then joined Steve in looking out one of the small portholes. They looked up at the rig as they pulled away from it.

  The legs loomed large through the ash like some gigantic robotic crab on a far off alien world with black seas bearing down on them in their escape pod.

  The underside of the deck was nearly invisible; they could only just make out bits of its silhouette made up of straight lines and jutting edges. The ashy snow cleared here and there revealing figures falling in to the sea.

  “My God!” said Steve.“Do you think they’re jumping in after us?”

  “Probably,”said Jen,“they’re relentless, and nearly unstoppable! It’s bizarre isn’t it? What causes people to change colour and turn psycho and tear other people to shreds, and crack their heads open to get at their brains? I don’t think there’ll be any coming back from this, I really don’t. You and your friend were very brave to come and get me. I’ll never be able to thank you enoughever,but thank you anyway. And I’m very sorry about your friend, she seemed really nice.”

  Steve fell down on to one of the seats, and with his elbows on his knees he rubbed his eyes and said,“Yea, she was. Her name was Katie and she’d help anyone, and Imeananyone.”

  “I’m sure she would,”said Jen.

  “She gave Ken hell for not coming with us to help you, and God do I wish he had. Then maybe that wouldn’t have happened and she’d still be here.”Steve slammed his fists against the hull, then buried his head in his hands and wept.

  Jen placed a hand between his shoulder blades. She said,“I’ll leave you to it ok? If you need me just ask. I can’t go far.”

  Steve attempted a nod and she left him and went back to the little control area and wheelhouse where she had to readjust their course, the waves had knocked them of course already.

  She hoped that the twenty four hours worth of fuel or so at eight knots or so would be enough to get them back ashore, or at least close enough so that they could drift the rest of the way on the tide or even swim. She sat back behind the wheel strapped herself in to the seat and prepared for a long night....

  CHAPTER 24

  Dean took a step back to look at their handy work. He, Gavin and Keith had moved the leisure centre’s large and extremely heavy, long curved reception desk with all of the shelving units, two filing cabinets, and five chairs across and blocked off the entrance to the dry side of the building.“Looks good enough to me,”said Gavin.

  “Yep,”agreed Dean.

  “Are you sure it’s enough?” said Keith.

  “It’s all we can do for the time being,”said Dean rolling his eyes, and Gavin added,“This lot will hold them back for awhile, plus the doors buried under that lot are locked as well.”

  Then Dean said,“If they start trying to come through here, this lot will make so much noise that we’ll have plenty of warning to be able to get outa here. And maybe because they won’t be able to see us, they might not even try and get through.”

  “Oh I think they will,” said Gavin eyeing his brother.

  Keith sighed.“Oh great!” he said,“we’re sitting ducks.”

  Dean shot a look at Gavin frowning.

  Gavin raised his eyebrows innocently at first and then dropped them. He nodded understanding that his choice of comment wasn’t a good one.

  Dean saw he understood and said,“Right then, c’mon. Let’s tidy up and head back up to base.”

  He was eager to get Keith away from the barricade before he started to unravel again and star
t filling everyone with doubt. They gathered up their crude weapons that they’d taken from the maintenance area. Keith had two steel poles, Gavin had a chromed, industrial scale torque wrench and Dean had a red thirty inch long monkey wrench and he’d given Ann a two foot length of scaffolding pole that he found.

  They walked back up the ramp to the Relaxation Suite and as they did Keith looked back over his shoulder at the upended pile of reception they had left there. He wasn’t filled with confidence.“Whoa!” said Dean as he reached the top of the ramp and saw the Relaxation Suite.

  Ann had been just as busy up here as they had been with the reception. She’d arranged the white plastic loungers in a row along the balcony overlooking the leisure pools. Each one was layered with fresh towels from the store room and had its own set of cushions that she’d pulled from the staffroom and one or two of the offices. Each lounger shared a table with the next one along where she’d placed two plastic cups of water and some magazines to help pass the time.If that was possible!

  By the bottom of the end lounger, the one closest the ramp with the best view of the dismantled reception area, there was a crudely fashioned dog bed. Ann had built up a semi circular wall using swimming floats and then filled it in and covered the sides with towels.

  Sam saw this and trotted straight to it. He had a sniff at the towels and then at the floats, then he pawed at it with one front leg. Satisfied he looked back at Dean who was smiling. He nodded and said,“Go on boy.”

  Sam stepped in to it turned around twice following his tail and then settled down and looked back at everyone and yawned before he dropped his head down on to the small front ledge and relaxed.

  Dean chuckled and said,“Thanks Ann, this is great, and I think it’s safe to say that you’ve got Sam’s seal of approval.”