She felt her way along like before, avoiding the shuffling dead she encountered. She reached the end of this corridor, realising that the next would be the main throughway to A Block, back where she had started.
She pushed through another set of doors, immediately hearing the swell of shuffling and grunting noises ahead. It seemed the dead travelled in packs, like a herd of sheep. They were gathered along the end of the corridor, circling the security door Abe had most likely left through. It was the door Ellis needed too, in order to get back into A Block.
She made her approach carefully. Curled against a nearby wall and listened intently.
Ellis noticed a leg hanging out across the exit, wedging the security door ajar: it belonged to one of the dead. The gap created was just enough for her snakelike body to slide through.
She stayed low. Crawling more than walking. Slowly and quietly, Ellis edged her arms and torso through the exit, climbing over the felled body.
She went to pull her legs through, but the body suddenly stirred, grabbing her ankle. Ellis kicked out hard, freeing her leg and pounding the dead thing’s head, sending it back into the other corridor.
She fell back against the door.
The pack of dead were drawn to the commotion. She could feel the weight of their charge upon her back, spurred on by the promise of her flesh. The gap was too narrow for them, but if Ellis moved, their combined might would push through the heavy security door, filling the corridor in seconds.
She heard a gunshot. It came from somewhere in the complex.
“Damn it,” Ellis swore, finding her torch and flicking it to ON.
She’d made it back to A Block, along with more of the dead than Ellis could imagine. They had followed Abe through the complex and were now scrambling against each other, fighting to get through the double doors at the far end of the corridor where the security guard had left.
As Ellis’ light spilled upon them, they turned around.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Ellis moved her torch away, desperately seeking out an alternative exit. She found office doors all along the corridor on each side.
She stood up, pulling away from the door at her back, allowing the dead from the previous corridor to bulldoze their way into this one.
Those from the other end of the corridor moved towards her.
She was trapped, sandwiched between two herds of the dead.
Frantically, Ellis tried each of the office doors, starting with the closest and working her way up.
The first was locked tight. Likewise with the second.
The third was open, and she went to enter, just as one of the dead reached for her, making contact, wrapping its clammy hands around her arm.
Ellis dragged the cursed thing into the room with her, threw it to the ground.
She slammed the door closed, then pushed a nearby trolley against it.
The body she’d dragged into the room was crawling back onto its feet.
Ellis searched the room with her torch, finding a letter opener on a nearby desk. She reached for it, and as the cadaver attacked, Ellis stabbed its throat. She held the blade fast, wedging it further into the rancid flesh. The body shook vigorously and then fell.
Ellis dimmed her torch.
Darkness. Always darkness. It was her friend. Movement from the corner.
Ellis snapped her torch on again, searched the room.
She found a body stumbling towards her. She raised the blade again, still bloodied from her last attack, but the body raised its hand in defence, and then spoke to her.
She recognised the voice. It was Dave Lightfoot.
She caught him as he stumbled, helping him into a nearby chair. His hands covered a stomach wound. “Jesus, who did this to you?”
“A-Abe...” he mouthed, blood spilling from his lips as he spoke.
He tried to talk some more, but Ellis shushed him, setting the torch and blade on the table, grabbing some bandaging from a nearby first aid cabinet and trying to stall the bleeding. But it was no good. The bullet was lodged inside. He was sinking fast.
“H-he’s hunting us,” Dave said. “He’s killed everyone else.”
Ellis was reminded of the storeroom in the canteen. The bodies stacked up inside. Abe told her they’d been infected, that they’d attacked him and he’d taken care of them...
Ellis raised a hand to her mouth, stalled a sob. Was that what had really happened?
Another gunshot. Abe was close.
Ellis spotted a door adjoined to the next room. She remembered where she was. This was where the clerical staff worked. She could move through some of the rooms here without going back into the corridor.
She grabbed her torch from the table. Pocketed the envelope opener.
“Come on,” she said to Dave, pulling him to his feet.
***
They moved through the clerical rooms, finding the door into Corridor A3. They left A Block, entering C Block. With the cats no doubt still trying to claw their way into the canteen, they were able to pass through C with little trouble, into D Block. There they found the doors leading to the fire exit stairwell.
They’d been ripped open.
Abe.
With Dave’s energy depleting fast, his burden upon Ellis became heavier. But she managed to help him up the winding staircase, torch switched on and outstretched as they went.
They reached the double doors leading out of the complex. A sign warned staff to only open DOOR 2 when DOOR 1 was closed and all safety measures had been followed. This was important when entering and leaving a potentially contaminated lab. But both doors had been blasted wide open, the last person through not caring much about health and safety.
Ellis slid through the gap. Once in, she helped Dave.
They reached the foyer of the outer building. Ellis shone her torch along the foyer’s generous reception. She could see shutters drawn across the windows. They were still locked in.
She swore under her breath, relaxing Dave into a waiting room chair by the reception desk. She was wracking her brain, trying to work out just how the hell to get out of the complex when she heard a loud crack.
Dave’s head slapped against the wall, a short gasp leaving his mouth. His body tumbled forward onto the floor. A bloody smear was left on the wall, a separate pool of blood seeping across the tiles where his body now lay.
“No!” Ellis screamed.
She knew it was Abe.
“Where are you?!” she screamed. “Show yourself, you coward!”
Silence.
The darkness was paling. Daylight spilled through the tiny gaps in the shutter blinds.
“What are they paying you?” Ellis shouted. “It must be money. Because I don’t think you’re a bad man, Abe. I can’t believe that...”
Abe stepped out of the shadows.
He looked ashamed, unable to keep his eyes on her. “Where’s Farrow?” he said.
“Dead.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“He’s in B Block. Take a look if you want, but he’ll be dead by the time you get there. He’s infected.” She looked at Abe, noticed a gaping wound on his arm, sallow skin across his face. “You’re infected too,” she said.
He laughed, and for a second he became the old Abe; the affable Abe who would sit in the canteen and do his crossword; whose eyes would light up when Canteen Carol brought him his chips, or ‘fries’ as he’d call them, making Carol laugh every time. But this wasn’t old Abe, and Carol was no doubt stacked with the others in the canteen store, a bullet in her brain.
“I have an ex-wife,” he said. “Always going on about the shitty money I send her for the kids. How they’ll never make it into college, end up deadbeat losers like their old man.” He smiled, perhaps aware that Ellis had no time for his sob stories. “When the Jenkins thing happened, I shut the lab down, just as they’d instructed. I needed to contain the infection, take out everyone exposed, especially those working on Project QT. Farrow got away, b
ut I knew he’d come out of hiding if I had you, Ellie.”
“It was you who opened the door to Johnson’s office,” Ellis said. “You set me up.”
Abe nodded. He showed her his security card. “It’s not like yours, Ellie. It works. I used it to override the shutdown, open the doors I needed.”
“The people in E Block,” Ellis said. “You killed them in cold blood.”
“I had to,” Abe said. “They’d been exposed to the virus.”
“We were all exposed!” Ellis protested.
Abe sighed. “You’re right. They were never going to come for me,” he said. “Even if I killed every damn person in that lab, even if I killed all those things...” He shook his head, looked at his gun. “They knew I was desperate. Desperate enough to do something like this. Desperate enough to believe their lies.” He smiled. “I’m just the dopey security guard, after all...”
He looked to Ellis, aimed the gun at her.
Ellis closed her eyes, braced herself for the inevitable. Nothing happened.
When she opened her eyes, she saw that Abe had lowered the gun.
He waved a hand.
“It doesn’t matter anymore,” he said. “None of it matters.”
A breeze blew in, ticking the hair on the back of her neck. Ellis noticed one of the shutters partially open. There was a crowbar nearby. Abe had been working to create a gap. She could get through. Escape.
“Abe, please...” she said. “Let me go.”
He looked at her, stepped forward, came right up to her face.
She reached a hand into her pocket. The envelope opener was still there. She curled her fingers around its handle.
Abe’s face was strained, riddled with guilt. “I’m sorry, Ellis,” he said. “I really am...”
“Please,” Ellis begged. “You’re scaring me...”
He touched her cheek with his hand. Smiled poignantly then raised the gun, this time forcing it into his own mouth.
Ellis backed away, shut her eyes.
The gunshot rang out, almost deafening her.
Abe’s body fall to the ground.
“Fuck!” she screamed and it was probably the first time Ellis ever used the word. “FUUUCCCKK!”
His blood was all over her. She could taste it, still warm on her lips. She wiped it from her face, spat on the floor.
Ellis needed to get out of here. She couldn’t spend another second in this godforsaken building.
She struggled through the gap in the shutters, clambering out into the open air.
The light blinded her, but she didn’t care. She ran out into the grounds, eyes closed, the sun bathing her, the wind caressing her hair, the fresh air filling her lungs... But something wasn’t right.
Ellis stopped running, opened her eyes.
She looked into the face of a man wearing the same yellow suit and breathing apparatus that Abe wore. Others in similar garb stood behind him.
Ellis backed away.
They moved closer.
One of the men grabbed her, and in the struggle, she noticed the USB stick Blake had given her fall from the pocket of her scrubs. She watched as the device was trampled into the ground.
“No!” Ellis cried.
She reached into another pocket, finding the envelope opener. Jammed it into the neck of her attacker. It pierced the plastic of his suit, found his flesh. He stumbled backwards, one hand clamped upon the wound.
A broad shouldered man stepped forward. Ellis swung the blade again but he dodged it, brought the butt of his rifle down heavily across her face.
Ellis went down hard.
The broad shouldered man moved in closer, brought the rifle down again. Then again. He pounded Ellis’ face until it was nothing but bloody mush. Grunting with each strike until he was sure there was no life remaining within her brutalised corpse.
He stepped back. Looked at his rifle, studying the blood and gore dripping from its end with disgust.
He turned to another man.
“Clean that shit up,” he said, pointing to Ellis.
The broad shouldered man moved towards the laboratory entrance, flanked by more suits.
“The virus is out, gentlemen,” he said. “So we move to Plan B.” He pointed to the building. Let’s get to work.”
PART TWO:
THE VIRUS SPREADS
CHAPTER ONE
Belfast, County Antrim, 20th May
“Mam, I got in.”
The other end of the line was quiet. Ciaran looked at his mobile phone, in case he’d been cut off, but the screen was still bright.
“Mam? Did you hear me? I got in.”
“I heard you”, a voice said.
“Well then... what do you think? Isn’t it great?”
Ciaran was still holding the papers from the open day in his hand. One sheet was signed and dated, and he’d put it into a clear plastic envelope to keep it good. He’d waited for this day since he was a child and didn’t want anything to spoil it. He knew it wasn’t every mother’s dream to have her son enlist, especially in West Belfast, but couldn’t she at least be proud of him?
“You’ll be sent home in a box. Just like all the others.” Her words hit him like a hammer.
“Mam, I’ve joined the TA! Territorial Army, not the regular Army. They won’t send me anywhere.”
He heard her tut. He knew that noise well; his mother made it when a lump got stuck in her throat. Before the tears came.
“Mam, don’t you start—”
“You never listen to me!” she wailed, “Always think you know best.”
“Mam...”
“DON’T YOU MAM ME!” Within seconds, she’d gone from longsuffering and weepy to something that reminded him of a boiling kettle. Ciaran often wondered how someone so small and delicate could make this many sounds, all so different. But that was the wonder of his mam.
“Mam, listen...” he said, “I’ll not be home for dinner. I’m going to grab a pint to celebrate.”
“Who with?”
“Jamsey. Maybe John.”
“John who? You’ve never mentioned a John!”
Jesus. He was eighteen years old. When did this ever stop? “John Ford.”
“Ford? I’ve—”
Ciaran held the phone away, shaking it in the air as if to kill it. He took a deep breath, returned it to his ear. “Look, Mam. Gotta go.” He flicked the phone off before she had a chance to say anything else, pocketing it in his joggers.
He clenched both hands. She’d really pissed him off this time.
He stood near a lamppost. It was early evening and still bright, but the stupid thing was already lit up.
Ciaran slammed his fist into the rough metal. The pain was barely registering. He slammed again. A bloody mark showed up on the bleached grey hide of the lamppost. He went to swing again then stopped himself, turning his hand and looking at it. His skin was raw. It looked like mincemeat.
He turned to see if anyone else was around.
An old man pulled his dog across the road, the dog straining against its lead to glare at Ciaran. He’d scared them. He hadn’t meant to, but Ciaran had scared them nonetheless.
He took a deep breath. There was no way he could get on like that in the army. He needed to cool himself down.
A drink would help.
He looked at his watch. Only seven o’clock. He’d get a taxi into town and grab a drink somewhere.
Half an hour later and Ciaran was sitting in the Garrick bar with a pint.
The TV in the corner broadcast some football match that he feigned interest in—United against someone. There was a good crowd in to watch the football, most of the seats filled.
Ciaran sat by the door, a constant to-and-fro as people poured in and out. Neither Jamsey nor John sat with him. He didn’t expect to see them. John he’d made up, just as his mam guessed. Jamsey he hadn’t seen for a couple of years, since a major falling out over something he couldn’t remember (they had both been drinking). It was just
going to be Ciaran tonight, and that was fine. He wasn’t afraid of his own company.
His hand was sore from punching the lamppost. He took another swig from his half-empty pint glass to try to numb the pain.
His mind wandered, finding the rugged desert terrain of Afghanistan. Ciaran was dressed in pale, desert khakis. He carried a rifle, probably an SA80. The rattle of gunfire was all around him. The enemy was everywhere, and his unit was hemmed in. He lay flat in the sand, looking down the scope of his weapon. There was an enemy combatant in his sights—a sniper on a mound to his left. He squeezed the trigger, and the barrel of the rifle shook briefly before—
“Not watching the football?”
Ciaran looked up, pulled from his daydream. A girl stood by his table. She was a little older than him, probably early twenties. She held a glass in one hand, sucking her drink with a straw. She was on her own.
“Not big into football,” he said.
“I thought every fella liked football.”
She smiled, and he caught a glimpse of her teeth. Thick metal braces ran across the top row like train tracks. She saw him looking and closed her mouth. Ciaran looked away, embarrassed.
There was silence for a moment, both of them drawn to the football on the screen. The ball came flying towards the United goalmouth, only to be knocked wide by the keeper’s fist. A low moan ran throughout the bar, followed by excited voices.
“I’m just waiting on a few mates,” Ciaran said over the noise.
“Oh. Alright...” she said, looking disappointed. She stood glued to the spot, one thumb hanging on the belt loop of her jeans. She looked around, as if wondering what to do with herself.
“You can sit for a bit,” Ciaran offered.
“You sure?”
“Yeah, why not.”
She sat down in the seat opposite him. In the light coming through the window, she looked a little older than he initially thought. Maybe twenty-five. She wasn’t unattractive, even with the braces. She looked over, and he knew she wanted him to buy her a drink.
“I’m... er... kinda not working right now,” he said.
She smiled. “Kinda not working?” she said. “What does kinda not working mean?”
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