by Ryan Casey
Riley shook his head as Ted continued to throw up beside him. “I’m sorry. But we need to get to Claudia. She… she’s in trouble. We need to get to her and then we need to leave.”
Riley pushed past a sickly Ted and hopped down the stairs. The group behind him was in a complete state of shock.
When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he stared into the canteen. Claudia was in the kitchen in hysterics. Pedro and Chef were trying to calm her down as she threw herself onto the floor. Pedro covered her mouth. Held his finger to his mouth. He was silencing her. Doing all he could to silence her.
“Typical, isn’t it?”
The voice caught Riley by surprise. He turned around and he saw Ivan standing by the door of the freezer room. Ivan’s face was pale. He looked just as sickened as everyone else. The door to the freezer room was wide-open. The cold air seeped out and clouded Ivan in a conspicuous mist.
“You work so hard for something. So hard to keep something secret. And then one little accident like this happens.” He shook his head and approached Riley. “One little accident. We didn’t have to keep the girl in there. We could have done as we’d said. Burned her. Cremated her. But we were thinking about the future. I was thinking about the future. I didn’t want anything to go to waste. And I guess I just… I made the wrong call. But I tried.”
Riley tensed his grip and shook his head. Anna appeared beside him from the staircase and stared ahead at Ivan as he stumbled in their direction.
“I tried. You know that, don’t you?”
“You sick fuck,” Riley said. “You… You are sick. Truly sick.”
“And yet you didn’t tell ‘your’ people when you had the opportunity. You had the chance to walk out of this corridor and into that canteen there and tell everybody a couple of hours ago. And yet you didn’t. Why is that? No, wait. I’ll answer that. It’s because you know all of this made sense. Horrible sense.”
Riley shook his head. Barney and Chloë joined Riley outside the canteen door. Ted was still lurching somewhere on the floor above them.
Ivan got closer and closer to them. More cold air clouded out of the freezer room door.
“You’re holding on to something that’s dying, Ivan,” Riley said. He held his hands up and pointed at the medal-laden walls. “You’re holding on to a dream. We all have been. We’re all guilty of that. But we have to leave these walls at some stage. You know that.”
“No,” Ivan said. He shook his head. “You see, that’s where you’re wrong. There’s—there’s enough in there to last us the winter.”
“And what about when the winter ends?” Riley shouted.
Ivan’s gaze moved around the rest of the group. Looked at Barney. Looked at Anna. Then fixed on Chloë for a few seconds. “We… Then we decide. Who’s strongest. And who’s… who’s willing to help us sustain our society.”
Anna’s jaw had dropped so much that it looked like it was scraping the floor. “You… You’re fucking insane. You’re a fucking lunatic.”
Ivan shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. But aren’t we all in this new world? Don’t we all have to embrace a bit of lunacy to survive? Especially when you’re leading. Like me. You have to make the tough decisions. Everybody knows that.”
Riley backed up into the others behind him. Claudia was still in the canteen with Pedro and Chef, struggling to break free and shout out. “We’re going to walk. We’re going to leave this place and you aren’t going to try and stop us.”
Ivan laughed. He frowned and shook his head. His laughter was so sincere that it was chilling. “Why do you think we brought you here in the first place, hmm? I mean, it wasn’t ideal having to… to do what we did to the troops. To the weaker ones. But we never intended that, not at first. Did you really think we’d just move on out of those walls to—to save people? To save you?”
Anna’s jaw shook. Her cheeks had turned so red that they were bordering on purple. “You… You didn’t want anything with us.”
Ivan rolled his eyes. “Anna. Dear, dear Anna. Of course we wanted something with you. We wanted something with you from the moment we had a scout cycle outside that lovely restaurant you were shacked up in. We wanted something very important from you. Your… your contributions.” His wide eyes scanned her bare skin on her neck. Her perfectly slender legs.
Thoughts spiraled around Riley’s head. He remembered Aaron’s words at Stan’s dairy farm. “The dead squirrels around the farm first thing this morning.”
“You… The dairy farm. And the horde that—that attacked the Chinese. You were responsible for that?”
Ivan tilted his head from side to side. “‘Responsible’ would be flattering. But we had somebody run a very successful job. Just a pity that tensions flared later that evening, huh? Maybe some of our soldiers didn’t have to die. But there weren’t enough of you to last us the winter. Not after all your little heroic missions.”
Riley was speechless. The Labrador outside the Chinese restaurant when they’d first arrived. The way the horde of creatures had stumbled out of nowhere and attacked their countryside Chinese restaurant home. The lives that had been lost. All of it, linked. Linked by a psychopath who just wanted an endless supply of food for his troops. And then killed the bulk of his troops anyway.
“But you proved me wrong, to your credit,” Ivan said. He stopped at the wall and leaned against it. “Proved to me that you were good people. We had a nice couple of weeks, didn’t we?”
Riley shook his head. He wanted to beat Ivan to a pulp. Torture him for the things he’d done. For the loss of life he’d caused. “We’re supposed to be human. We’re supposed to be different to them.”
“And we still can be. Well, at least, the soldiers of mine who aren’t awake can be. How many is that? I make it eight. Nine. Enough.”
“They won’t trust a word that comes out of your mouth,” Barney said. His lips quivered. Tears streamed down his cheeks from his bloodshot eyes. “You killed ‘em. Killed our own. Won’t trust a word.”
Ivan’s cheek twitched. “Oh really?” He reached into his pocket. “We’ll see about that.”
He lifted a pistol and he fired at Barney’s stomach.
Barney tumbled onto his knees. He stared at the bloody mark on his shirt with confusion, then looked back over at Ivan. Ivan rushed over to him and cradled his head.
“Ssh, now,” Ivan said. He lowered Barney to the floor. “Hush. It’ll be over soon. It’ll be over.”
Barney winced and smacked his head against the floor as he gripped the slowly bleeding hole in his stomach. Ivan looked up at the group. Chloë hid behind Anna. Ted continued to heave at the stairs. Everybody was in shock.
“I suggest you walk into that canteen right now and start making your excuses fast,” Ivan said.
Footsteps sounded above. The remaining soldiers inevitably awakened by the gunshot.
Ivan held the gun against Barney’s head. Barney’s eyeballs rolled upwards as he coughed up thick blood and tensed his body with the extreme pain. “The rest of my men aren’t going to be happy when they see what you’ve done to poor old Barney.”
He pulled the trigger. Riley flinched. Ivan closed Barney’s eyes and sighed. Then, he checked the gun and pulled the trigger another couple of times. Empty. He stuffed the gun into Riley’s top pocket and squared up to him. “Better run.”
Riley, Anna, and Chloë rushed into the canteen area. Pedro and Chef swung around, surprise on their faces.
“We know,” Riley said as he approached them. “No bullshit. We know.”
Pedro let go of Claudia and threw her back to the floor. “Fuck. Fuck.”
Chloë rushed over to her mother and into her arms.
“Oh, my darling. I’m glad you’re okay. I’m glad you’re okay.” She looked over her daughter’s shoulder. Her eyes were black underneath. “They… My Elizabeth. They’ve… I saw her. I—”
“I know,” Riley said. He glared at Pedro and Chef. Chef’s white apron was splattered with blood. “We all know.”
Footsteps clanged down the stairway. Voices shouted out.
“Pedro,” Riley said. He stepped up to Pedro and stared him directly in his eyes. “I know there’s… somewhere deep down, there’s a good man in there. The man I sat atop the wall with. The man I confided in. I know he’s in you, somewhere.”
Pedro’s eyes teared up as the voices and commotion grew louder in the corridor. He wiped his cheek then opened his mouth. “I—”
The door clattered open. Ivan and four soldiers walked in. They had anger spread across their faces. Gripped onto guns that Riley hadn’t even known about.
And at the foot of the door, Riley could just about make out Barney’s body, as thick blood trickled out of his skull and stained between the cracks of the tiles.
“What’s… what’s happened?” Chef asked.
Ivan raised a finger. Pointed it directly at Riley. “This man. And her. That bitch. They killed him. They killed Barney.”
Pedro took a step back. He shook his head. “Barney? But… Oh shit. Oh, shit, shit, shit.”
“It didn’t happen like that,” Riley pleaded. “Seriously.”
“Then how the fuck did it happen?” Pedro asked. He pushed his forehead up to Riley’s.
“You know how it happened,” Riley said. “You know damn well what’s going on here—”
A gunshot rattled through the room. Gaz had his pistol raised up towards the spotlights on the ceiling. “I think we should deal with them right now. Make ‘um pay for what they did.”
Riley backed up. Anna followed. “Please,” Riley said. “You have to see what’s going on—”
“Shut up.” Riley felt something smack across his face. Tasted metal in his mouth, as Pedro knocked him to the ground. His head stung with the sharp pain of the butt of the gun. He looked up at Ivan, who was approaching, slowly.
“I don’t think you’re wrong,” Ivan said. He had another gun in his hand. A handgun almost identical to the one he’d killed Barney with. He aimed it at Riley. The other soldiers looked on, guns raised. They were screwed. There was no escape. This was it.
He lowered the gun and pressed it again Riley’s forehead as Pedro covered Riley’s mouth. He tried to struggle from side to side, but it was in vain. “I think we should make this one suffer. I think we should make him pay for what he’s done. Gaz — give me the knife.”
Gaz lowered his gun nervously. “But… But Ivan—”
“Give me the fucking knife.”
Gaz hesitated then reached into his pocket. He pulled out a large knife with serrated edges. Tossed it over to Ivan, who weighed it up in his hands.
“Please, don’t—” Anna begged, before going silent as another of the soldiers wrapped a hand around her mouth and held her down, gun to her head. Claudia mumbled. Chloë mumbled. All of them were silenced, and they’d soon be silenced in a completely different way. A final way.
Ivan approached Riley, knife in hand. “Now lift his shirt.”
Riley screamed out against the material that Pedro had stuffed into his mouth and tried to shake from side to side. Pedro pulled Riley’s shirt up and exposed his skinny chest. There was no getting away. Struggling would only make things worse. There was no getting away from Ivan’s approach. From the anger in his eyes.
Ivan crouched down in front of Riley and tapped the sharp metal blade against Riley’s bony chest. Riley could feel his heart plummeting against his ribcage. He could see it, too. See it as the knife approached. And he’d see it as the knife stuck into him, blood spilling from the hole between his ribs.
“Treat this as a lesson,” Ivan said. His bottom lip shook as he twirled the knife between his fingers. “A lesson to mind your own business. A lesson to… to trust those who trust you. Yeah. To believe in people. To know when it’s your turn to just let things progress behind the scenes. Huh? You listening to me?” He slapped the side of the knife against Riley’s right cheekbone. “You need to learn where your leadership ends and where mine starts.” He pressed the blunt edge of the blade against Riley’s pale, exposed skin. It tickled him with the coldness. “But I guess none of that will matter anymore. Right.”
He flipped the blade over and sliced Riley’s chest.
Riley wasn’t sure what to make of the sensation at first. The first thing he noticed was just how much blood must have been in that one small area of his chest, as Ivan worked the knife further and further across his skin, scratching against the muscle and bone. It didn’t look like it was happening to him. It looked like he was just a spectator to somebody else’s misfortune.
But then the pain started to kick in as his brain overcame the initial shock.
He screamed at the top of his lungs into the material that Pedro was holding across his mouth. He clenched his eyelids. The whole room seemed to blur into the background, like it was just him and the pain. The hot, sharp, searing pain, spreading right through his body.
“Ivan, don’t you think that’s—”
“Shut up,” Ivan said. He pulled the bloody blade away and wiped it against his uniform. Then, he brought it back towards Riley’s chest. “We’re just getting started.”
Riley’s heart raced as tears of blood slipped down his chest. His body shook like a malfunctioning machine as he struggled and struggled to break free. He couldn’t take another bout of that pain. He just couldn’t do it.
He focused on the shuffling feet in the room. The sounds of muffled cries and soldiers muttering to one another. The distant humming of the generator down the corridor. Ivan’s breaths, short and throaty, as he prepared to stick the knife back into Riley’s chest.
He’d be home soon. The job he’d started when he’d driven that car into that wall at the speed he had. The closing of his eyes as the impending death got closer and closer. He knew that feeling. It was familiar to him. He’d experienced death already, or the closest thing to it.
Only this time, there was no coming back.
As he held his breath, he noticed one of the sounds give way.
The hum of the generator.
He opened his eyes. The room had been bathed in darkness. Complete, total darkness. Voices became audible. Anna’s voice. Claudia’s voice. The soldiers, whispering and chattering to one another in confusion.
“What the fuck’s going on?”
“Where’d the lights go?”
In the distance, Riley heard another noise. It was a noise he hadn’t heard all that often since they’d got inside the barracks, but he remembered it from that first day they’d got here. The screeching against the ground.
“Oh fuck. Fuck.” It was Ivan. He moved away. His silhouette stepped up against the window and peered out. “That fat fucker. That fat fucking bastard.”
“What is it, Ivan?” Pedro asked. “What’s going on?”
But Ivan didn’t need to respond, because Riley understood what was happening already. He knew what the sound was. He remembered it so vividly. The generator hum had disappeared. The lights had gone out. And the gates were opening.
Riley laughed. He shouldn’t have laughed, but it felt completely right. Tears of joy streamed down his face. Relief at surviving death twice. He disregarded the searing pain in his chest as the tears dripped against his exposed flesh.
“What the fuck is—”
“Ted’s switched off the generator,” Riley said. He laughed again as the whispers started to pick up around the room. “He’s switched off the generator and tripped the gates and—and now you’re fucked.”
A loud thump echoed through the courtyard as the gates finished opening.
And the groans started to approach.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“Fuck,” Ivan shouted. The commotion was at full force in the canteen area. The conflicts and preoccupations of moments ago slipped away into the background. It had gone from humans against humans to humans against the threat outside the walls. The threat staggering in through the front gates. No matter what issues the group had with one another — no matter w
hat pain Ivan had caused that seared through Riley’s chest — they had to deal with the most immediate threat. Fast.
A lamp came to life to Riley’s left. It made him realise just how affected his vision was. The pain was getting to his head. It still hurt in his chest, sure. But it was the nausea that hit him most. The dizziness. The feeling of just wanting to lie down and sleep for days. Weeks. Forever.
Chef shined the blue-tinted fluorescent lamp around the room. The soldiers had backed off from Riley’s group, but Anna was still on her knees, wide-eyed. Claudia and Chloë held one another’s hand.
“The fat shit has done this. He’s fucking done this.” Ivan stepped from side to side scratching his head.
“That’s not what we worry about right now,” Pedro said. He pointed out of the window. In the moonlight, the creatures were walking in through the gates and heading in the direction of the wing they were in. They must have heard the gunshots. The commotion. They heard a lot, that much was certain.
Ivan stepped up to Pedro and grabbed the scuff of his neck. His hands were soaked with Riley’s blood. “You don’t tell me what to worry about. Don’t you fucking dare tell me what to worry about. I’ll worry about what I want.”
“I’m just saying,” Pedro said. The other four soldiers looked at one another, uncertain. “We have a threat heading right through our gates. It’s hard to tell how many there are. But we need to deal with them. Or at least decide what we’re going to do before we—”
Ivan pushed Pedro back. He turned to the rest of the group, his face lit up by Chef’s lamplight. “Then deal with them.”
The remaining soldiers shuffled their feet. Gaz took a fearful glance out of the window. “But they… It’s dark. And those things, they—”
“If you want to save this place, you’ll deal with them.” He stormed over to the door of the canteen.
“And where are you going?” Anna shouted.
Ivan turned to face her and his nostrils twitched with disgust. He looked as if he had forgotten she and the rest of the group were in the room, even though Riley’s blood still dripped from his knife. “I’ve got business to attend to. Now get the fuck out of here and see to those invaders if you want to survive.” He stormed through the double door and disappeared down the corridor.
