by Aline Riva
“What the fuck happened up there?” asked Ryan as his face paled.
“Megan is dead and so is Sylvia. There's no time to explain, not here, not now – we need to be out there -” he said, indicating to the icy landscape through the wide frosty window, “because it's safer than being in here. Once we're out of here, I''ll explain everything.”
“Samantha's missing,” said Tara as he turned to to open the door.
“She's what?”
“I thought she was in bed but it was Sylvia...looking like that... throat torn out...then she just jumped up and lunged at me.”
Holly was crying, Lauren was shaking and the two girls were clinging together as they looked on, huddled up to the others.
“I want my cousin!” said Sofia.
“Maybe we should go back and look for her,” suggested Alex.
Then another, audible crash came from behind the door of the locked wash room.
“No time!” David said urgently, and he threw open the door as the cold rushed in sharply, “Everyone outside, now!”
Then he held open the door as the group made their way swiftly out into the cold, Tara was last, then as the creature locked upstairs crashed against the door again, he left the hostel, closing the door behind him as he hoped these creatures couldn't remember how to do the basic tasks such as opening a heavy doors. Then he turned to the others and began to lead the way quickly, down the slope towards the other buildings.
“We'll be okay,” he said his breath formed an icy cloud in the sharp air, “We just need to find some help...Everyone stay together...just follow me, its going to be fine.”
Tara shot him a glance. He shot her one back, knowing it was not fine and never would be again – they had just encountered their first of the creatures that now crawled over half the planet – maybe nowhere was safe, maybe there would never be any kind of safe place, not ever again...
The ice cave was smooth and clear and tinged with electric blue, a trick of the light and a refection of the cold as the daylight shone in from the narrow entrance guarded by the long icicles that hung from the roof of the cave and extended all the way inside. The walls were pure ice, made of odd shaped chunks of frozen water, the floor was frozen solid and coated by the snow blown in from the entrance. It was like an ice palace to Justin as he stood there in his balaclava and looked about the blue tinted space where icicles hung long and solid ending in razor sharp points. The passageways that led off into gloom occasionally punctuated by sun rays escaping in from gaps above were narrow and glowing blue and made by nature itself.
This was a place where no living thing could dwell, and it was good. That was his thought as Justin made his way over to the back of the cave, he looked down at Samantha, her hairless body packed in ice that made her white-blue tinted skin look like the surface of the arctic as she lay there in the blue haze.
“New Samantha?” he enquired, kneeling on the floor of the cave and sticking a gloveless hand into a heap a heap of guts and gore that still steamed in the extreme cold, the scarlet hue of the blood looking stark against the ice and snow.
“New Samantha...” he said again, almost singing the words in his raspy tone as he pulled out a sliver of fresh human meat and drew it up between his thumb and forefinger, then trailed it across her bloodless mouth, painting her lips scarlet.
She was still dressed in the clothing she had slept in back at the hostel, she wore only a t shirt and a pair of leggings, having no need of protection from the cold now she was no longer human....but she was not quite mutant, either, not like he was.. her flesh still looked human. It had taken on the tint of the New existence, but had not dried and cracked. Her nails were not turning black, nor had she revived...
“Wake...” he said softly, his dry voice echoing about the cave as an eerie whisper.
He slid the bloody flesh over her lips again.
“Taste, you must feed!”
She did not move.
Justin's head tilted to the side and then straightened again as he fixed her with an intent gaze... She had to come back! This was the way of the New, he was New Justin, she had to be New Samantha!
“WAKE!” he yelled, but Samantha's body lie still, packed in ice and reflecting the blue of the cave, dead and staying dead...
He turned away from her, scooped up some bloody human guts and stuffed it into his mouth and began to chew. It revived him, cleared his mind and as he ate and the blood stained his balaclava, he smiled, thinking on how easy it had been to kill the others back at the settlement: Soon they would become New. They would rise and make others New. It was the way of New, this was the birth of the New World. The dead would inherit the earth. It made perfect sense...
As the group made their way towards a brightly painted domed building, David breathed a relieved sigh to see in the far distance there were others, workers, clad in bright orange thick padded jackets, wrapped up against the cold – a sure sign they were human.
“Hey!” he called, giving them a wave.
“Thank god!” exclaimed Tara as the group of three in the distance saw them, then began to head in their direction.
Then Ryan turned to David, demanding answers.
“What's going on?” he said, “All I heard was screaming and someone said Megan was hurt -”
“Megan's dead,” he replied, seeing shock in the eyes of his companions, shock and fear as they stood there looking at him in disbelief.
“This is going to sound crazy,” he continued, “I don't' know how to explain this but it's all over the news...on what stations are currently up and running. There was a world wide pandemic of some kind of virus spread from bad batches of the M0-RBD-1 vaccine...those affected became sick and they killed others...who came back and -”
“Came back?” As Ryan stood there bundled up in his thick, dark padded clothing he stared at David like he had gone insane as he wondered if this was some kind of crazy nightmare.
“Yes, came back...” David said quietly, shaking his head at the recollection of Sylvia with her throat torn out, clearly dead yet up and running at him like a maniac...
Ryan stepped forward, squaring up to him.
“That's bollocks! The dead can't come back to life, that's zombies, that's not real!”
“YES IT FUCKING IS, I SAW IT!” David yelled in his face, and as he saw fury and a deep terror set in his gaze, Ryan's anger faded as he stepped back, staring side eyed at his tutor.
“What... what the fuck?” he whispered.
“Yeah, what the fuck indeed!” David exclaimed, still caught between organisational mode and the fighting mode that had seen him cut off a dead woman's head as she ran at him like some kind of creature from hell.
The others exchanged frightened glances.
“I want to go home...”whimpered Lauren, “We all need to go home...”
“Yes, we need to find help and jump on a plane, get out of here!” added Alex.
“It's world wide,” David reminded him, casting a glance around the group, “World wide. Everywhere. Us being stuck in the Arctic has probably done us a favour – less people, less of those things!”
“But we can't stay here,” Tara reminded him as she huddled into her snow coat, her layers of clothing , for now, protected her from the cold, just like the others, but they were all shivering now, purely out of fear...
“So what do we do?” David demanded, “Go to the pole? Live there? We won't survive, we can't survive - we're trapped on the most uninhabitable place on earth!”
Then he paused, his dark eyes darting left and right as he took in the quiet settlement, then looked to the hillside, where the three figures in bright orange padded coats were coming closer.
“We'll get help... there must be others like us...looking for a flight out of here.”
Then he made his way over to the nearby domed building, the others waiting outside as he gave the metal door a push.
“It was ajar...” Tara whispered.
Then she gave a ga
sp at the sight of the dead worker on the floor, jacket torn, blood spattered over the concrete floor of the storage area. There was blood up the walls, blood over the crates of supplies...
“Too much blood for one person..” he murmured, then he shot her a look that she read correctly – they needed to get moving, fast.
He stepped out and she helped him to pull the door shut, then he turned to the others.
“Someone's dead in there... I don't' know how many of those things are out here but we need to wait for those guys heading our way and then try and find a way to another landing point – there's no planes here and the radio said ports and airports are closed. We need to find a plane.”
Holly looked to the three men who had cleared the hillside and were running towards them, she smiled as she saw them nearing and gave a wave.
“I bet they can help!”
Then her smile faded as her face took on a look of horror that was matched by the others as they all realised the same thing:
The three men were running, still running, such a long distance in such harsh conditions, the reason for their stamina was now horribly obvious – their throats were torn, their jackets were spattered with dried blood....
David's dark eyes widened at the sight of the reanimated dead heading their way, running, a crazed look in their blood shot, sunken eyes....
“I want you all to head for the entrance, there's an orange four wheel drive open truck...” he said, his sights still set on the sight of the dead, running towards them,. Looming closer by the second, “Let's go!” he said sharply, looking to the rest of the frightened group, pulling up some of his old military command into his voice, “Those things are fast, we can't waste time – RUN!”
Then as they turned to flee he led the way, as they ran for their lives towards the truck, as now much closer, the dead ran on in pursuit.
His voice was like dry, cracked autumn leaves crunching under foot. She knew that voice, it was speaking to her again, breaking through a strange silence where she felt no pain or cold or anything at all, Samantha just felt... different.
“New Samantha,” he said, “Wake up! This is the new world!”
She opened her eyes, seeing a haze of blue, then gave a gasp, something that confused the man knelt at her side as he tilted his head and looked at her strangely, as if he didn't understand why a cloud of air had just formed icy from her lips...
“Why is it different with you?” he asked, “Why, New Samantha?”
She blinked, looked up and her vision cleared:
Ice. It was all around her, gleaming blue ice in a cave, icicles hanging down like the teeth of some great beast as if she had been caught in its jaws... And above her, looking down, clad in black, his face covered by a balaclava...It was Justin.
She licked her lips, gave a sigh as the taste of something wonderful seemed to revive her senses in a brand new way, then he reached for her with gloved hands, pulling her up into a sitting position as he looked at her intently through the eye holes of his mask.
“You like the blood...yes, we all like the blood. The New ones, we love the taste. The world has changed. We changed with it!”
She looked to the scarlet guts piled on the floor, longing for a taste in a way that suddenly seemed so natural and right...
But it was blood and flesh and it looked human.
“What...” her voice had changed, become hoarse like his, but softer, “What is this?” she whispered.
“The vaccine. A way to choose the New ones. The rest will perish,” he replied, “We are New.”
Samantha's head felt dizzy as she looked to the blood and flesh and gore then back at Justin again as something at the back of her mind snapped into place, like the virus that had changed her was singing a lullaby that only she could hear but she could partly block it out...Clearly, Justin could not...
“I am New?”
She looked down at her hands, inspecting them slowly, taking in the arctic hue of her flesh – she felt no cold, no pain...just hunger, something she did not want to give in to. Justin pulled a small hand mirror and held it up in front of her. She gave a gasp at the sight of her hairless head, her flesh deathly white-blue, blackened shadows beneath her bloodshot eyes...
“No!” she gasped, shoving the mirror away as she pressed her back against the ice wall and looked at him fearfully.
“I am not New!” she yelled, her voice echoing about the cave, “No, Justin, no! Let me go!”
He shifted closer to her, kneeling beside her, ignoring the way she cringed at his closeness as he spoke again.
“You ARE New!” he insisted.
Samantha felt it, that sensation of being caught halfway between what he was...and what she used to be.
“Whatever happened to you, it didn't happen like that to to me!” she cried, as he leant closer and she gave a frightened gasp.
“We are the same. We will be the same!” he insisted.
She glared at him with unexpected strength and defiance bursting into her vision.
“I will never be like you!” she said in disgust.
He raised his hand and slipped off his balaclava.
“You will be like me soon,” he promised.
Her eyes widened in horror at the sight of his hairless head, his flesh dry and cracked in shades of white and blue and grey, corpse-like, as he set sunken, hollow eyes on her and smiled with cracked lips.
“I will never let you go, you will understand eventually - you will become like me soon,” he promised, “You will be New.”
Samantha screamed, finding strength in her lungs she didn't know she had left, and her screams echoed around the cave, carrying outside, into an empty arctic wilderness where no one heard cries that were lost on the icy wind.
Chapter 7: Low Fuel
As they reached the truck and jumped into the back in a chaotic frenzy, scrambling for a place as the dead ran closer at an alarming speed, Tara was first in the cab as David joined her, slamming the driver's door and grabbing keys left in the ignition. As he turned them the engine stuttered.
“Shit!” he exclaimed, turning and turning again as in the back, the panicked survivors were yelling as Ryan thumped a gloved hand on the back window of the cab.
“They're on top of us!” he yelled.
David looked back, saw the dead rapidly gaining, heard screams from the back of the truck as the first to reach the vehicle reached up, grabbed Sofia by the hair and as her screams punctured the air and her throat was bared, the creature's mouth yawned open, the skin on dead lips splitting as teeth grazed her living flesh, making blood rise shining scarlet, steaming in the freezing air.
David turned the key again and the engine fired into life.
“Just go!” Tara yelled, turned back to the view of the creature, as the others clung to Sofia, wrestling her free from its grip as David slammed down the accelerator and the truck shot away, kicking up gravel from the gritted path as they sped away from the settlement and head off through the blank terrain, as the others clung on and Sofia held her scarf to her injured neck, her face was pale and her eyes wide as Ryan put a protective arm around her shoulder. David pushed the speed up, looking back to see the dead in pursuit, but now growing smaller like specks in the distance, their bright coats the only thing visible against the enfolding whiteness that was all around. He kept his eyes fixed to the road, where the surface had been treated, as he wondered where it would lead to – it seemed to promise civilisation at the other end, but there were many stations out here in the Arctic, and if they had all been affected, help was not arriving in the form of other humans....
“What's the plan?”
As Tara turned her head and glanced at him, he heard fear in her voice but kept his sights on the road where everything seemed to lead into whiteness as all around walls of ice and snow built up at odd angles about the landscape, and the road ahead went on long and straight for miles, with no end in sight.
“There are stations all around the perime
ter,” he said as he kept going full throttle, “We have to assume everyone is either dead or dying or becoming those things... it's world wide. Our only way out is a plane. Somewhere out here, there must be a plane ready for take off. More than twenty stations, and no planes? I don't think so, Tara...there has to be one, and we're going to find it, board it and I'm flying us out of here and back to Chile.”
Then he glanced at her. Tara's eyes were wide, she looked so afraid and confused as she took in what he had said.
“But you don't know if you can fly it -”
“I was an RAF pilot, Tara. I can fly anything!”
Determination shone in his dark eyes.
“I will get us home, okay?” he said sharply, “Have you got that, Tara? I will get us home!”
She nodded, thankful that in that moment she saw strength in the eyes of the ex military man who had, like every other human on the planet, never encountered reanimated corpses before, yet now he was pulling up all he knew of his experience of past combat to handle this situation...
“What if we get home and nothing is left?” she said in a hushed voice.
David glanced back, looking through the back window at the students, clinging on and huddled together as he didn't give an answer to her question, because now was not the time to voice his worst fears.
“Sofia's been wounded... I have no idea how this thing spreads. I know the dead make the dead come back but she's alive and has a tiny scratch...could be nothing but we should keep an eye on her.”
He was now looking at the straight road ahead, here the bleak landscape broke up into shades of white and freezing blue while up ahead on the left, azure water was broken up by floating ice as penguins dived off an icy bank. The sky was blue and white streaked and the sight under other circumstances would have been breathtaking, but now it spelled all manner of horrors he didn't focus on thanks to his military training. To think about how trapped they were, how they could be the only humans left, how the rest of the occupants of the Arctic wasteland could have turned into those thing, or how maybe back home, everyone had become undead, was enough to drive the strongest of minds to insanity. But that road was long and mostly straight and had to end somewhere. David focussed only on that road as he heard Tara ask if Sofia might be infected, giving no answer as he watched the road, thinking only that it had to end somewhere, and any place had to be better than the hell they had just left behind...