by Wood, Rick
Ron was the name of the character.
The one he read to Laney.
He huffed. This was ridiculous. It was a fictional character, yet it pulled at his conscience enough to make him limp across the room and collect his gun.
He opened the window, took aim and fired.
The infected fell and Ron pushed it off, gaping at the hole in its head.
They looked up at him with tears of gratitude.
“Thank you!” the woman shouted. “Thank you so much!”
But it wasn’t over.
Gus heard the rumble. The gunshot had attracted more of them. A horde was now approaching, and the tremble in the ground suggested there were a lot of them, and they were very close.
“Run!” Gus shouted.
Wanting to remain unnoticed by the horde, he shut the window and closed the curtains, returning to his bed.
The groans and heavy steps of the speeding horde passed outside.
He thought nothing more of the family.
He’d done his bit.
And he doubted they’d made it any further.
AFTER
Chapter Eighteen
The compound was both similar and different to what the facility had been. The facility was a number of buildings, whereas the compound was just one – yet it still took up the same vast amount of space. It was far from inconspicuous; in fact, it looked as official and domineering as a government building could, and the fence surrounding the perimeter did nothing to disguise its prominence.
Gus spotted the snipers atop the building first. They were going to be tricky to bypass. The snipers would, however, be looking for the infected rather than people – perhaps they could use that to their advantage.
They paused beside a set of trees, remaining low and out of sight.
“How should we do this?” Gus asked. Even though it was a general question aimed at the group, he looked at Desert, wanting to include her.
He couldn’t help his glance still being wary, however – if they were to find Donny, he did not know what she was going to do.
“How many snipers do you think there are?” Desert said.
Gus tried to count, but there was no way to really know. They were in the distance, and they could only see the few that were visible on this side of the building.
“We can’t be sure,” he said.
“Maybe if we create a distraction, and the rest of us–”
“Guys,” Whizzo interrupted, unravelling a few pieces of paper and looking over them.
“What?” Gus said
“I’m pretty sure there’s an underground entrance.” Whizzo eventually found the diagram he needed. “Yeah, on the north side.”
Gus raised his arm to create a shadow from the sun, which he used to deduce that the north side was to their right.
“Let’s find out,” he said and, remaining crouched, stepped as lightly as his boots would allow him through the wooded area.
They found one of the infected staring gormlessly at a tree. Gus raised a hand to pause the others, withdrew his hunting knife, ran up behind it and slid the knife into the base of its skull.
They continued around and, sure enough, they found it. A door beneath a sloping roof leading into the ground. Two guards stood outside.
Desert went to aim her gun, but Gus gave a stern headshake.
“You don’t want to kill them?” she snapped.
“I don’t want to attract a horde,” Gus replied in a shouting whisper.
She nodded and withdrew her knife.
Instinctively, Gus knew to take the person on the right, which meant he had to get to the other side of them unnoticed. He remained as low as he could, practically on his belly, and shuffled past the bushes and around the trees until he was out of sight, yet close enough to introduce an element of surprise.
He searched out Desert and saw her hiding in a similar position to the left of the guards. Gus lifted three fingers on his hand, counted down to two, then to one, then with a nod of their heads they rushed out.
The guards went to aim their guns but weren’t afforded the time to shoot. Gus grabbed the end of his man’s gun, tilted it so the trigger could not be fired, and swung his knife into the man’s neck. The man gurgled blood, but Gus couldn’t be sure this was enough, and he couldn’t risk this guy firing his gun and attracting unwanted attention – so he slid out the knife and jabbed the man in the gut a few times.
Once he was able to take the man’s gun from him, Gus let the guard drop to the floor, where he spluttered the last moments of his life. He turned to his left and found Desert’s guy doing the same.
They threw the guns into a nearby bush – they already had guns and didn’t want to carry anything else. A quick search of the bodies revealed a set of keys, and Gus used them to unlock the door.
The corridor was painted solely in darkness. Desert and Gus took out their guns and entered, followed by Sadie and Whizzo. Their steps echoed, and they moved slowly and cautiously.
Whizzo took two flashlights from his bag and handed them to Desert and Gus, who fixed them to their guns.
“What would I do without you, kid?” Gus whispered.
The light didn’t do much to illuminate their way, but it at least gave them reassurance that nothing was coming toward them.
The corridor began to rise, and they found themselves walking upwards. They reached a set of steps that led to a light, and it was at this moment that Gus and Desert exchanged a glance and killed their lights.
Keeping their guns aimed, they ascended toward the light, which appeared through the window of a door. As they approached, the view through the window began to gain clarity.
Yet they didn’t quite conceive the view.
It didn’t seem real.
Gus shook his head, trying to break the hallucination.
But it wasn’t a hallucination.
What they could see was real, and it changed everything.
Chapter Nineteen
Gus had presumed that he would find some more research.
A few test subjects, maybe.
At worse, a handful similar to Donny but not quite as strong yet.
Not this.
Never this.
“What the fuck is this?” Desert asked, the only one of them able to talk.
Whizzo tried to speak, feeling that he was the one who should give the answer – but all that fell from his mouth were stuttering syllables.
Even Sadie withdrew a little. Gus felt her hand grip around his arm as her body recoiled back.
They were masses of them. And they weren’t just higher functioning specimens waiting around – they were training. Working hard to increase their abilities even further.
There was still something about them that was off… Still something zombie-like… With enough human about them to think, but enough inhuman to obey the handlers.
Just imagine what kinds of things those handlers could ask them to do…
Gus shook his head. Tried to snap himself out of it. His eyes were mistaken. They had to be. This was not what he expected.
But it was what was there.
“Whizzo,” he grunted, once he was able to find his voice again. “Is this what you were expecting?”
“Er… No… And yes, I guess… But mainly, no.”
“What do you mean?”
“I knew there were designs to create something like this, I skimmed over them, but I – I never thought…” He sighed, rubbing his hands over his face. “I think we should go back. Let me look at the rest of the research and I can try to figure out what these things are.”
“Go back?” Desert said. “We can’t just… This is…”
Gus put a hand on her shoulder. A move he didn’t think was wise but suddenly felt bold enough to do.
“I know,” he said. “We can’t allow this, can’t leave it, we have to do something – but I don’t think now is the time. Look at them, look at us.”
Desert nodded. She seemed
to agree.
Yet, Gus didn’t turn to go.
What could these things be capable of?
And why would anyone want to create them?
What was Eugene Squire planning?
All of these questions and more were hanging in the air, unanswered.
Is this what the infection was actually meant for?
Then he looked to Sadie.
He recalled the experimentation and torture she endured when they were contained within the facility.
And he realised.
I led her right to them…
Without Sadie, this couldn’t have happened. Sadie’s genes had a partial resistance to the infection that they had been able to utilise.
It was her blood that began this creation.
It was Donny who was the test subject.
And Gus had brought Sadie to their facility, led her right into their hands.
He loved Sadie, but he decided that, for the sake of the world’s future – he would have been better off leaving her where they found her.
Sadie looked questioningly at him. He realised he was staring at her.
He rested his palm on the side of her cheek and she bowed her head into it.
No. He couldn’t blame him or her for what bad men had done.
Either way, it was time to go.
“Come on,” Gus instructed.
He gave a final glance at the mass of superior infected.
Was Donny among them?
He scanned every body and every face, but there was no sign.
He wanted to jump down and search every one of them more thoroughly, but he had to heed his own advice – now was not the time.
He led them back to the corridor that led them back underground. Within seconds they had re-entered the darkness.
He didn’t bother with the flashlight.
It was straight tunnel to the other side, and he’d hear any infected approaching.
Though, to be honest, the regular infected were now the least of his worries.
He checked behind himself and he could hear the tapping of the others’ feet. There was no conversation, no talking, no verbal engagement – just wary steps.
Everyone seemed to be stepping a lot lighter than they had on the way there.
But there was some heavier tapping. Some footsteps he didn’t recognise.
Which one of them was that?
But the heavier tapping was not coming from behind him.
“Stop,” Gus whispered, halting, the others doing the same
He listened.
There it was.
Heavy steps. A few of them.
Lights came on through the corridor. So bright, Gus had to turn his head away and shield his eyes.
Once he had readjusted, he looked up and there they were.
Eugene Squire with that same smug look on his privileged, arrogant face.
General Boris Hayes on one side.
Donny on the other.
Though Donny was not standing tall and proud like the others.
He was on a lead. In rags. Crouched on the floor. Cowering and snarling. Eugene Squire’s bitch.
Chapter Twenty
“Donny…” Gus muttered in a voice so weak he didn’t recognise it as his own.
“I know,” said Eugene, that same smackable grin plastered cleanly across his pale face. “I know, I know. I take it you saw them?”
Gus looked over his shoulder at the others.
They said nothing.
“Let him go,” Gus demanded.
“Oh, are you sure you really want me to do that? He’s quite feisty when he’s off his lead! Doesn’t play well with others.”
Gus felt his nails digging into his palm.
Whizzo had backed away, Desert had taken out her gun, and Sadie was bursting to get at Eugene – and it took all the strength in Gus’s arm to stop her.
“I,” Gus began, taking a step toward Eugene, “am going to kill you.”
“Are you?” Eugene replied, sticking his bottom lip out.
“It may not be today. It may not be tomorrow. But I swear it.”
“Yes, yes, rather. Anyway. Enough of empty threats. Let’s play.”
Eugene clicked a button on Donny’s collar and Donny pounced without any hesitation. He jumped on Gus, retracted his arm and threw a heavy fist full-on into Gus’s face.
A crack echoed, and Gus was pretty sure it was his nose.
He braced himself for another, but it didn’t come.
That was because Donny had seen the gun Desert was aiming at him.
“Don’t shoot!” Gus said, but it made no difference. Desert hadn’t a chance to put any pressure on the trigger before Donny had leapt forward and stolen the gun from her hands.
Donny hit the butt of it into Desert’s face and she stumbled back.
He hit her again and she fell to the floor.
He hit her again.
And again.
And again.
He was like beast uncaged. A wild animal let loose of its restraints, intent on carnage. The human element of Donny had gone, and he was a savage predator.
Eugene’s laughter combined with the sound of pummelling.
Gus dove at Donny, but Donny leapt out of the way and Gus ended up on top of Desert. She was groggy, and some of her blood made it onto Gus’s arm.
Donny thrust forward at Whizzo, speedily on all fours. Whizzo ran, then remembered what he was running toward if he carried on down the corridor.
He paused, poised between coming and going, and closed his eyes as if making peace with his demise.
Gus, getting more incensed by the constant laughter – hoh, hoh, hoh – did his best to ignore it and ran at Donny. He managed to tackle Donny before a third strike could be landed into Whizzo’s face.
Donny turned back on Gus.
“Sadie!” Gus cried. “Help!”
Sadie looked the most distraught of all of them. She was crying, wanting to help Gus but not wanting to harm Donny – caught between two choices she didn’t want to choose.
In the end, she curled into a ball and buried her head in her arms.
There was nothing Gus could do but accept the inevitable beating.
Donny’s fists rained down on him from cheek to cheek. Both of his arms were going; as soon as one was in the air, the other landed.
Then he uncurled his fists and used his hands instead. His dirty nails scratched at Gus, pulling skin off his face and ripping his cheeks to raggedy streaks of red.
“Donny!” Gus cried out, fighting the agony, fighting the pain.
There was no stopping him. Donny was relentless.
“Donny, stop!”
Donny lifted his hand into the air.
Readied the nails.
Looked down at Gus’s throat.
This is it.
The end.
The full stop.
The final curtain.
“What’re you going to do, Donny? Kill me?”
Donny’s eyes glowered red and Eugene could be seen over his shoulder, hands clasped together with excitement.
“What, you going to kill me like you did Janine Stanton?”
Donny’s face flickered with raw emotion.
His hand didn’t descend to Gus.
It remained poised.
Hovering.
Stuck in mid-air.
Gus saw the real Donny behind those eyes.
And he took his chance.
He pushed Donny off, grabbed the gun from Desert’s side and pointed it at Hayes, who pointed a gun back.
“Back off,” Gus demanded.
Hayes did not back off, but he did not fire.
“Get up,” Gus urged Desert. She pushed herself to her feet, staring at the blood landing in small puddles beneath her.
“Come on,” he said, and he walked past Hayes, their guns still aimed at one another’s heads.
Whizzo walked past with his arm around Desert, who limped and clutched her eye.
“We’ll come back for him,” Gus told her. “Come on.”
Reluctantly, she moved, and followed the others.
To Gus’s surprised, Hayes lowered his weapon.
Instead, Hayes took out a small gadget, with a button.
He pressed the button.
An alarm pierced Gus’s head and his forehead throbbed, feeling as if his brain was going to expand and burst against his skull.
A mass of footsteps came running.
Entering the corridor.
Coming closer.
Gus didn’t have to ask what that was.
“Run,” he said.
“What?” Whizzo asked, his face changing as he realised what was coming.
Desert looked weakly up at Gus.
“Run!” he shouted.
And he ran.
Sadie at his side.
Whizzo and Desert following. Desert struggling, then looking back at the oncoming faces and forcing herself to move.
Adrenaline powered them to the end of the corridor and they emerged into the forest, where they kept running.
It took seconds for the army to appear behind them.
Chapter Twenty-One
In a way, Gus came to accept that all of them were probably not going to make it.
Then he scolded himself for accepting it.
He ran ahead with Sadie at his side. A glance over his shoulder told him that Desert still had enough about her that she could run with Whizzo encouraging her.
But, behind Desert and Whizzo, there they were.
Catching up, and catching up quickly.
“To the lake!”
The sight of them in the light and in attack mode was something to behold. Gus didn’t have time to stop and look, but he had enough of a glance to see what terrifying creatures had been created. They were like the infected, but with skin more ripped than pale and dead. They were still unaware, relying on instinct, yes – but there was enough about them to obey instructions. The stench of death they carried was stronger, their steps heavier, and their faces just as aggressively eager to feed on their prey.
Gus reached the nearby lake and paused for the others.