Red Eye | Season 1 | Episode 1

by Riley, Claire C

Then he turned and started to walk away from her.

  “What now?” Sam asked.

  Nolan turned back. “We get into the main airport, secure it, and wait for help.”

  Sam and I exchanged a cautious look. “She meant what now with her,” I clarified.

  Nolan shook his head—a small movement that held no answers. “No clue. Whatever this thing is, I don’t know how it’s passed on or if it’s curable. So let’s secure an area and wait for help.”

  I nodded and Sam and I started walking. “What if no help is coming?” I asked. “What if we’re the only ones?”

  “What if I turn into one of those things?” Sam interjected, making my steps stumble.

  I turned to look at her. “Don’t say that. You’re going to be okay.”

  I didn’t know if that was true, but it would definitely be what I would want to hear at a time like this.

  “But what if I’m not?” Sam asked, her voice thick with contained emotion. “What if I change? I don’t want to hurt anyone. I don’t want to be one of those things!”

  “You won’t!” I said, almost crying then, and goddamn her for making me get attached to her. I had only known her an hour and yet I felt like I’d known her for years. We were so different, yet I had shared more with this one woman than I had shared with any of my friends back home in England.

  “Look, lady—” Nolan started.

  “Sam,” I corrected, and he shot me a glare.

  “Look, Sam, if you turn into one of them, I’ll kill you myself. No hesitation,” Nolan added on. “But not a moment before. I’m not a damned murderer. So basically don’t die and I won’t have to kill you.”

  And with that he turned and carried on walking. We stared after him in silence before I slowly reached down and gripped Sam’s hand. Together we started walking again, towards a wide walkway. The place was eerily quiet as we made our way through to another security area of the airport. The smell of blood and death hung heavy in the air, but there was no sound of the grunting and growling that I had quickly come to recognize as danger.

  At the end of the hallway was a set of frosted glass doors. We were backtracking our way deeper inside the airport instead of going out, which seemed the better option. Surely if this were a terrorist attack or a CDC issue, someone would show up soon to help us. And we would be there, waiting for them.

  It seemed a hell of a better option than trying to get outside. Because from what we could see when we were outside on the runway, whatever was out there in LA was a shit-ton worse than what was in the airport.

  Before we reached the glass doors, Nolan stopped outside a small door marked security.

  I looked at him, my head cocked. “What’s going on? Do you think maybe there’s weapons or something in there?” I let go of Sam’s hand and stepped closer, pressing my ear to the wooden door. I couldn’t hear anything, and I took that to be a good sign.

  “Worth a shot,” Nolan said with a shrug. “We need some real protection—guns, knives, basically anything that’s going to do some serious damage, because if we get overrun again, it could be the end.”

  “I agree,” Sam said. “TSA doesn’t carry weapons though—we already talked about that. So I don’t understand…” Her voice trailed off. Her makeshift bandage was pink with blood, but it looked like Nolan had tied it tight enough to stop the worst of the flow. Though she looked pale and scared shitless, she also looked determined, and that made me feel stronger in myself. I nodded in agreement.

  “Confiscated shit already saved us once. If the TSA takes something bad, something like a gun, I’m sure they don’t leave it in a bin out in public. They’d bring it somewhere secure,” he said with a knowing tone.

  “Like here,” I said with a nod. I smiled, and it felt good.

  This was good.

  Really good.

  We had a plan. A semi-plan anyway.

  “Okay, so let’s do this,” I said.

  Nolan put his hand on the handle, and in one quick movement he pushed the door inwards. It swung quickly, bounced off the wall behind it, and started back, but Nolan caught it and stopped its momentum.

  The room was empty, though it hadn’t always been, given the amount of blood on the floor. We began to search the small room, pulling out items that had been confiscated from passengers, coming up with laptops, shampoos, bottles of water, celebratory fireworks and sparklers, and even some micro lighters. But sadly, no weapons.

  “This was a bust then,” Sam finally said after ten or so minutes of searching through other people’s crap.

  Nolan looked around, his expression frustrated. He dragged a plastic tub out from some shelving and threw the lid off it. “Perfume, shampoo—for God’s sake, this shit is useless to us. There should be weapons here!”

  “Well, there isn’t,” Sam said, looking from me to him.

  “But there should be!” Nolan shouted, looking really pissed off that they weren’t there.

  “Why are you so certain on this?” I asked, wariness creeping into my tone.

  Nolan turned to look at me, his expression menacing. “Because I was carrying.”

  Silence traveled between us until I couldn’t stand it anymore. I wanted to know why he had been carrying a weapon—what he thought he would need it for…there, of all places.

  But instead I said, “Maybe there’s a log somewhere, of all the items that have been taken. I mean, there has to be a record of stuff, right?” I walked over to the main desk and started rummaging amongst the paperwork, pulling out drawers and throwing papers aside until I found a small log book.

  I flipped to the latest page and saw that there were indeed weapons there. A surprisingly large cache of them, actually, which was great news if not slightly terrifying. But they were held in a more secure location somewhere upstairs, which made sense now that I thought about it. We’d need to find that place and get those weapons if we were going to see this thing out, but right then we needed to get somewhere that was more secure than that small room.

  I slipped the book into a small rucksack which had been taken from someone named M. Mathers, from what the notebook said. Looked like Mr. Mathers was planning on smoking himself to death with the amount of cigarettes and lighters he had packed in his rucksack. I wasn’t a smoker, so I emptied the cigarettes out but kept the lighters since they might come in useful at some point, and then I slipped the backpack over my shoulders.

  Nolan had found himself a metal baseball bat, which looked cool, and Sam had a metal crutch, which was better than nothing. I had lost my walking stick in the earlier fray, but there were plenty more of them there. I found that bizarre—taking old people’s walking sticks. Surely they must have had a reason for taking them? But no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t see an eighty-year-old grandma smuggling drugs or weapons through the country using their walking stick.

  I guessed you never really knew people though.

  Nolan was stood by the door waiting for me, and when he saw that I was ready to go he gave me a quick nod and we headed back out of the room and back towards the glass doors. The glass looked reinforced, but I wondered if when it had been designed, the designers had had zombie attacks in mind. I sincerely doubted it.

  “This is the central area of the airport. Once through here we need to start locking down doors, including this one, to keep ourselves safe.” He sounded so certain of himself and nothing like the man that had charged out of the toilets and almost crushed me to death earlier.

  “If there’s going to be survivors, they’re going to be in there, right?” I said.

  “Or those other things, whatever they are,” Sam replied, voice quavering slightly.

  “Yeah, those too.” I frowned, not wanting to head back into another battle with them again, yet it seemed inevitable.

  Nolan was looking down at his bloodied hands again. Though the blood was dry by that point, it was apparent that what he had done wasn’t sitting easy with him. I figured that for a good thing. At least
he wasn’t the murdering type. At least not without having a bad conscience about it.

  “All right, but let’s do this quietly though,” I said. “No charging in there, guns blazing or whatever.”

  “No chance of that,” Nolan grumbled.

  “Hilarious.” I side-eyed him.

  “I bet you can’t even fire a damn gun, for all the good you’re going to be if we find them.” Nolan scowled.

  “Hey! I might not have fired a gun before, but I’m from Manchester, England, and trust me, I can take anything this world throws at me.”

  Nolan looked away and I turned my attention back to Sam, who had thankfully regained some color to her cheeks.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Not too bad, all things considered,” she said. “I mean, I’ve been better.”

  “Haven’t we all,” Nolan replied. “Can you move it?” He nodded towards her arm.

  “I guess.”

  His frown deepened. “Can you hold that crutch okay and smash in some skulls if you need to?” he asked, his tone intense.

  I winced at his use of words, “Jesus, Nolan! Tone the skull-bashing down, will you.”

  “Tone it down!” he snapped, his voice raising. “What do you think we’re all doing here if not to cave their skulls in?”

  I hushed him, which only seemed to infuriate him more. I wasn’t about to get into an argument with him about it. Mainly because I knew he was right. Because even if I hated it, if it was a choice of them or us, it had to be us.

  “I’ll do my best,” Sam replied tetchily, placing her hand on my arm.

  “Your best might not be good enough though,” he said unapologetically.

  “Oh my god, what is wrong with you!” I glared. “It’s the end of the world and you think the best way to behave around the only two people you’ve met that haven’t tried to eat your face off is to be a total wanker to them!”

  “It’s okay,” Sam said.

  “It’s really not, Sam. You stay near me. I need you near me, because I trust you.” And I didn’t trust myself not to punch him right in the face.

  And I did, I realized. It may not have been the wisest decision to trust someone I had known little over an hour and was possibly infected with some unknown virus that turned you into a brain-hungry maniac, but I still did. Maybe because I had to trust someone and I had known Sam the longest, which wasn’t really saying much. Maybe it was because we’d rescued each other several times in such a short space of time already. Or maybe it was because I was a bloody good judge of character, and possible evil virus or not, Sam was a good person.

  “This whole girl power thing is beautiful and all, but can we get a move on?” Nolan grumbled, his expression impassive.

  We stood by the frosted glass doors and I took a couple of deep breaths before slowly pushing it open and looking inside.

  “I’ve got good news and bad news,” I said, my stomach sinking for the millionth time that night. If it sunk any further I might as well be 6 feet under. “Well, the good news is that there are other people in there, other survivors.”

  “That’s great—at least not everyone got ripped apart,” Nolan said dryly.

  “And the bad news?” Sam asked, giving Nolan the stink eye.

  “There are also more of those crazy monster people.”

  “Zombies,” Nolan interjected. “Let’s just call a dog a dog, huh? They’re zombies. Not monsters—at least not in the sense your thinking of—and they’re not cannibals. They’re zombies.”

  “I don’t like that word,” Sam said.

  Nolan turned and scowled. “I don’t like the word ‘moist,’ but you can bet your sweet ass that if I had my favorite chocolate fudge cake right here, I’d be complimenting the chef on his soft, moist sponge, because that’s what it would be. And that’s what this is, what they are.”

  Sam looked away from Nolan, her lips a thin, angry line, and I turned back to the door, peering in quietly again.

  There were twenty or so of them—probably more, since I couldn’t see very far into the room. They were all reaching up, mindlessly growling at the small group of people huddled on the top balcony.

  None of them had seen me yet, neither humans nor zombies, and I was glad of that, because if we were going to get the zombies out of there so we could use that place as our base, we needed to come up with a plan, and quick. Going somewhere else wasn’t an option.

  The terminal had shops and restaurants, which meant food and supplies. Sure, a lot of the things would be holiday essentials and there wasn’t going to be much call for bikinis and flip-flops, but there would be other things there that we would need to survive for a few days until this mess was sorted out and help came.

  So no, we were not leaving there and finding somewhere safer.

  It had to be there.

  It had to be that place.

  And it had to be now!

  Episode Two coming NOVEMBER 7th

  Stay tuned…

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  Claire C. Riley is a USA Today and international bestselling author.

  She’s a genre jumping book nerd who likes to write about psycho stalkers, alpha males and the strong women who love them, anti-heroes, and the end of the bloody world! A lover of all things dark and dirty, she likes to write books that f**k with your heart, and your head.

  She lives in the United Kingdom with her husband, three daughters and ridiculously naughty rescue beagle, Dogface.

  She also loves to drink cheap coffee… because she’s not a coffee snob like Elizabeth! (wink wink)

  Author of many books, including:

  Odium The Dead Saga Series

  Odium Origins Series

  Limerence (The Obsession Series)

  Out of the Dark

  Twisted Magic

  Beautiful Victim

  Blood Claim

  Wrath #3 in the Elite Seven Series

  Co–Authored Books with Madeline Sheehan:

  Thicker than Blood

  Beneath Blood & Bone

  & Shut Up & Kiss me

  Co-Authored Books with Eli Constant

  The Red Eye Series

  MC Romance

  Ride or Die a Devil’s Highwaymen MC series

  Devil’s Highwaymen Nomad Series

  CONTACT LINKS:

  Website: www.clairecriley.com

  Claire C. Riley FB page: https://www.facebook.com/ClaireCRileyAuthor/

  Amazon: http://amzn.to/1GDpF3I

  Reader Group: Riley’s Rebels: https://www.facebook.com/groups/ClaireCRileyFansGroup/

  Newsletter Sign-up: http://bit.ly/2xTY2bx

  IG: https://www.instagram.com/redheadapocalypse/

  @ClaireCRiley

  Eli Constant also writes as Eliza Grace.

  Eli adores all things quirky, eats ice cream with a fork, and likes warm Dr. Pepper (on a cool day). She once thought she'd marry Martin Short... until she discovered Alan Rickman. #Always (She might also have Martin Freeman and Simon Pegg on her 'I get a pass' list. And, please, don't get her started on Jeff Godblum... erhm, Goldblum. #lifefindsaway).

  The most important things to her are family, friends, books, and dresses with pockets. Typically in that order. Also really, really good coffee (winks at Claire).

  Available Books by Eli Constant:

  The Victoria Cage Necromancer Series,

  The Dead Trees Series (re-releasing soon),

  The Water is Sweeter,

  To Scream Within a Dream,

  and more…

  Available Books by Eliza Grace:

  The Shadow Forest Series,

  The Birthright,

  A Shade of Hades (Book 1 coming 2020)

  Available Co-authored Books:

  Scatter My Ashes,

  Darwin’s Fall (re-releasing soon),

  and more…

  *

  Stalk Eli Constant on social media:

  Website: www.authoreliconstant.com

  Newsletter: https://w
ww.authoreliconstant.com/newsletter-subscription

  Reader Group: Beastly Books & Badass Readers: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1996067960679574/

  Twitter: @Author_EliC

  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authorEliConstant/

  Books on Amazon: https://amzn.to/30Y0KJk

  Goodreads: http://bit.ly/2LWSiGj

  MORE FROM THE AUTHORS

  ODIUM I THE DEAD SAGA

  By

  USA Today Bestselling Author

  Claire C. Riley

  The infection came.

  Humanity fell.

  And the world everyone knew ended.

  But one woman’s unwavering determination to live, against all the odds, might just be the only thing to survive this bleak new existence.

  When the fate of a young girl hangs in the balance, Nina sacrifices herself and leaves the barricaded city she’s living in. Despite this act of selflessness, Nina isn’t the same woman she once was. She’s bitter, angry, and she wants nothing more than to disappear.

  But now she’s reluctantly become both protector and family to the girl she climbed the wall for.

  The duo set off across the bleak, post-apocalyptic landscape, toward a safe haven that might not exist. While journeying, they meet Mikey—a man on the run from his past and hiding from bigger demons than the ones that walk the earth.

  He introduces them to a life they couldn’t imagine. A life above the ground. However, this new world continues to bring more dangers, and darker shadows than they knew possible.

  And Nina quickly discovers that beyond the wall…

  The deaders aren’t the only thing to fear.

  That love and survival just might go hand in hand.

  And that fear will not be ignored, or Forgotten.

  One.

  Fear.

  Fear can make people do crazy things. Maybe that’s what makes me step forward and say something? Maybe. On the other hand, maybe it’s the injustice of it all. She doesn’t deserve this treatment. Their treatment. None of us do, but like I said before, fear can make people do crazy things.