“Take a load off,” she stated, pointing to the chair closest to him.
Noah dropped down with a sigh. He popped the lid and took a long drink, downing half the can. He rattled off a loud belch.
“Sorry!”
“Don’t worry about it, does the same to me.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes. Both seemingly unsure what else to say and they were both conscious of just how close they were sitting.
“So where are you headed?” she asked, breaking the silence.
“Headed?”
“I take it this wasn’t your destination,” she said, her hands waving around the room.
“I didn’t really give it much thought, to be honest. I had to leave my flat on Union Street because some idiots set light to a building next door. And after I managed to get out, just in the nick of time, the pricks were outside, and I ran right into them. Then when I got away from them, I headed to the first place that looked safe, where they couldn’t double back to find me.” It was Noah’s turn to shrug his shoulders.
“Do you think we could hold out here until the cavalry arrives?” She asked, obviously referring to the army, believing they would swoop in to save the day.
He realized she had said ‘we’. He ignored that for the minute.
“I don’t think the cavalry are ever coming,” Noah said. “There’s a video I think you need to see!”
10
Doctor Lazaro
Exeter University
The Gym, Bio-pod Area
9:34 AM GMT
All Melanie could concentrate on was the figure crawling towards her.
The naked old woman’s bloodshot eyes were fixated on her. Hunger radiated off the deformed woman, who had resorted to quadrupedal movement to drag her deformed stomach across the gym’s floor.
The alarm raged, bouncing off the walls. Gunshots echoed around the pods as the army tried to take down the other occupants of the third pod.
A scientist in a blood covered hazmat suit ran past. The two twins followed closely behind.
A firm hand grabbed the doctor on the arm.
“Are you okay? We need to get out of here,” the voice shouted, as Melanie was manhandled to her feet. The voice was muffled by the hazmat’s mask.
She could now see who was dragging her backwards. A soldier had her with one hand, while the other held the SA80 rifle, which was spraying bullets into the pod.
The old woman was hit repeatedly in the face, obliterating the back of her head.
“The general,” Melanie shouted.
“He’s gone ma’am. There’s nothing we can do for him now.”
The soldier dragged her backwards as she limped along on her aching leg. He was heading towards the hatch she had entered through.
The hatch was already occupied with ten soldiers in military hazmat suits. As soon as the mist was sucked away, the door opened and the men poured out, firing as they came.
“Has the doctor’s suit been compromised?” one soldier asked.
“No sir,” he stated. “I saw her go down. She was hit pretty badly in the leg by a container, but the suit is intact.”
“Get her in the hatch. But not you soldier; your suit has been compromised. Once the area has been cleared, you will be evaluated.”
“Yes sir.”
Melanie was pulled into the hatch, as another doctor ran to join her. The soldier slammed a hand on the button to start the cycling sequence.
“Thank you,” Melanie muttered in her mask, as the white mist washed down over her.
The gunfire was muffled inside the thick hatch, and the alarm seemed dulled.
Just as suddenly, the sounds intensified when the other side of the hatch opened. Strong hands lifted Melanie onto a waiting stretcher. The SCBA breathing apparatus was pulled off, and an oxygen mask shoved on.
She found herself inside a polythene tunnel, being checked over by nurses in hazmat suits.
“No rips, she’s clean,” a voice announced, as they stripped the hazmat suit off her and tossed it into a container with a yellow biohazard sticker on it.
“Get her out of here!”
With nauseating speed, the stretcher was hustled out into the vast openness of the gym, and pushed over to one side, near other uninfected casualties.
Everything happened in mere minutes. Melanie’s head was ringing from the alarm and flashing lights, and the image of the general lying dead next to her.
The gunfire died away. The alarm switched off, but the red lights still kept flashing.
Melanie was staring at the high ceiling, trying to get her thoughts and emotions in order. Her leg was also throbbing with a dull ache.
I wonder how long I can lie here before someone makes me move?
She had not slept properly in days, and she could quite easily shut her eyes and sleep for the rest of the day; blocking everything out, and pretending she was at her parent’s house, in bed, with her cat Pepper nestled up beside her.
My parents! Shit! They are out there, with those things everywhere. Melanie went to rise, to demand her parents be brought into the university, so they could be protected.
The media needs to know. The public needs to know what they will be facing.
Melanie went to sit up, to swing her legs down, and to find whoever was in command now the general was dead. She felt something touch her right hand. It was the folder she had shown to the general. It reminded her that there was a helicopter on its way to collect her, and take her to the base on Dartmoor. However, as she went to move a nurse jabbed an injection into her leg.
“That’s for the pain, and it may make you a little drowsy.”
Melanie was about to insist that she did not need any medicine, she just needed to see who was in command. As far as she knew only the general knew about her findings, and he was now dead. However, due to the painkiller and her exhaustion, she started to slip into unconsciousness.
However, just before her head dipped to the side, the alarm started to pulsate again, with someone shouting over the university’s speaker system, “We are under attack! They have breached the barriers!”
11
Noah and Red
Newton Abbot, King Street
The Mortgage Company’s Breakroom
10:06 AM GMT
Red had the laptop on her lap. The video Noah had downloaded onto the hard drive had just finished. Red sat with her hands clenched over her mouth; as if she was afraid she would scream and notify everyone in the area where they were.
“I know, right,” Noah said.
Red’s eyes snapped away from the screen to look at Noah. Tears streaked her freckle-covered cheeks. She removed her hand and sucked in a big sob.
“Fuck!” was all she muttered. “That was real, right?” she questioned.
“I think so. The fear in his eyes looked real.”
“Shit!” she said, as she wiped the tears away with the back of her hand, and gave an unladylike sniff. She slowly shut the laptop, hiding the last frame of the camera, almost as if in respect to the death she had just witnessed. She placed it next to her on the couch, then sprang up, and started pacing back and forth.
“Jesus!” She muttered while running her hands through her long red hair.
“That’s why I believe no one is coming. They are busy trying to sort out, or fight, or doing whatever it is governments do, in situations like this.” He slowly shook his head. “They are most probably hiding,” he added quietly. “I know if I had the resources I would.”
“But things like that don’t happen in the real world. How, how is that possible?” Red looked at Noah with a tear-streaked face, her tangled hair cascading around her shoulders – shoulders that were hunched as if a great weight was resting on them.
Noah felt terrible that he had shown her the clip, but she needed to know what the world was turning into, the dangers that were now stalking the streets.
“I believe it all started in Madagascar, with those nine or so logge
rs. When they were airlifted out of the jungle, they brought something with them. Something that is now spreading from human to human.” It was Noah’s turn to stand up. He picked up the laptop and took it over to the pool table. He turned back to Red.
“I’m not sure if it’s airborne or you need physical contact. That is why I am using the gasmask.” He had walked back over to the backpack, and picked up the mask.
“I had grabbed it by chance in the army-navy store; I didn’t realize how valuable it would become.”
“But I don’t have one!” Red almost screamed. “What’s going to happen to me?” She had dropped back onto the couch. The anger had instantly given way to depression. “I don’t want to end up like that,” she whispered while pointing at the laptop.
Noah stood for a moment, thinking.
“The paint center,” he stated. “It will have filtration masks for spray painting. That would be as good, if not better than my old army castoff. And there would be goggles in their too, to protect the eyes.” As he said it, he was pulling the mask back over his head.
“What are you doing?” Red stood back up.
“Going to get you some protection,” he stated. “It’s only across the parking lot. I will only be twenty minutes or so.” Noah went to retrieve his knife from down next to his sleeping bag, and slid it into the sheaf on his right thigh. Then he pulled his boots back on.
Jesus, what am I doing? I have only known her for half an hour and already I am willing to risk going back outside for her.
He looked across. She stood with her arms crossed, still physically upset from the video. A tear ran down her cheek. She was slightly shaking too.
There is something about her. I remember her from somewhere, and I don’t think it was from school. And is it a coincidence that the only thing I remember from my strange reoccurring dreams is the sense of the colour red?
“You would do that for me?” She wiped another tear away. “Why?”
He couldn’t think of a good answer.
Her red hair. The flames consuming my flat.
“It’s the right thing to do.” He could think of nothing else to say. Anything else would sound cheesy and dramatic. The sort of line a guy would say while trying to get in a girls pants.
“You always were nice at school,” she stated while looking at her feet.
He felt bad that he had no recollection of her from school. With a head of hair like that, you think she would have stood out. But it was over five years ago, he reasoned.
Noah picked up the rifle, double-checked a pellet was pumped and ready, and then swung it over his shoulder.
“Push the chair back under the instant I’m gone. Don’t answer unless you hear my voice,” he said, which sounded muffled because of the gasmask. He felt something else needed saying, but he did not know what. The whole situation was confusing.
“Be safe,” Red said.
Noah simply nodded, removed the chair and slipped out the door, and closed it without a click. His shadow passed the small windows.
Red stood alone, with her arms wrapped tight around herself. Half an hour ago she had been by herself, and had no problem with it – preferred it even. Everyone close to her either left her, or hurt her. She had decided to strike out alone and survive on her own.
The pandemic had been the perfect opportunity to get away from the situation she was in, the ideal distraction for her to run. It was either leave, or kill. She had once had a younger sister. She had not done the right thing back then, and her sister paid the ultimate price for it. More tears flowed, but this time they were not caused by the video clip but from old memories.
Red picked up the compound bow and notched an arrow. She stood facing the door. She had never felt so alone in her life. She decided she no longer liked the feeling.
12
Doctor Lazaro
Military Merlin Transport Helicopter
Over the A380, Near Haldon Forest, Devon
10:27 AM GMT
The first sensation Melanie had was of vibrations running through her body. Her foggy mind associated it with being stuffed inside a tumble dryer. There was also muffled chatter, sounding like it was coming from a radio. However, the dominant sound was a kind of dull chop-chopping whirr.
She felt like she was propped up against something. Her mind was slow and muddled.
The drugs the nurse gave me. Her mind was slowly sorting itself out.
Flashes of gunfire and being wheeled along, sprung to mind. Blurred faces in military uniforms and naked, frenzied bodies running and attacking. It was all a haze of screaming and blood and bullets.
Melanie slowly opened her eyes. She was strapped to a seat with a red webbing harness. The cabin had two long continuous rows of seating against each sidewall. Grey squared padding covered the walls, with a metal-decked floor that was chock-full of gear in dark-green containers interlocked together, and strapped down by green webbing. Around her were about ten or so soldiers in combat gear, covered in blood and gore, with another two on stretchers connected to intravenous drips. To the right was a hydraulic door that opened up the complete end. To the left was a hatch to the cockpit. Melanie’s foggy mind realized she was on a helicopter.
“She’s awake, Captain,” a spotty soldier stated while leaning over her. He stunk of spent gunpowder and the acidic tang of blood.
Another, older soldier leant across from the right. “Thought we were going to lose you there for a minute. You were out cold when we found you.”
With the chopping of the rotors and the vibrating of the cabin, his words sounded metallic and distant. He had to shout to be heard.
“We have orders to pick you up and drop you off at the research base on Dartmoor. We got there just in the nick of time; a large mod of naked...” He tried to think of a correct description, as his face screwed up from the recollection.
“Zombies!” Melanie mumbled.
“It’s the only word that can describe them.” He could not have heard her softly muttered word, but must have read her lips. He wiped at a cut on his forehead. “They were attacking the compound. There were maybe a hundred of them. It looked like an organized attack, if that is possible.” He closed his eyes and looked like he gave a sigh, which was lost to the vibrating hum and chopping of the blades.
“I hope the information you have is worth it? We lost twenty good men back there, and the base has been overrun.”
Melanie noticed the folder in a large industrial plastic, see-through Ziploc bag on her lap.
“It has the cure,” she muttered, but her voice was lost to the background noise, and this time, he did not read her lips.
“First we have to drop some supplies off at the Britannia Royal Naval Collage in Dartmouth, and then we will take you to the research laboratory inside Dartmoor Prison.”
A loud pinging sound started to echo through the cabin.
“Now what?” the captain said to no one in particular.
“I will check it out sir,” the soldier who had first leant over her said. He unharnessed and headed through the cockpit hatch. Within seconds, he was back with a look of fear in his eyes.
“Brace yourselves everyone,” he screamed, “we are going down!”
13
Noah
Newton Abbot, King Street
The Paint Center
10:39 AM GMT
Noah was knelt by the end of the breakroom building looking across the car park toward the paint center. There were only four cars in the car park, and all of them had been broken into – but not set alight. Rubbish littered the ground, with a shopping trolley thrown in for good measure.
The wind picked up, blowing mushy newspaper across the ground. There were faded red and yellow footprints among the rubbish.
Someone has obviously been in the paint center.
Noah could hear the rain starting to patter against the faceplate. His breathing was heavy and fast. Seeing the video for the second time gave him a surge of adrenaline.
> He could hear a voice. He ducked back against the wall. It was coming from the street. Noah ran crouched over to the nearest car. He knelt behind an old style, red Renault Clio that had all its tyres slashed and windows smashed.
The voice became two, and rose slightly, as if in anger.
Noah peeked over the side of the car, looking through the back broken windows.
“I told you the world would end in two-thousand and twelve.” The voice belonged to an old woman, pushing a shopping trolley full of clothes and tied-up bags.
“It’s two-thousand and thirteen; ya fool, how could it end in two-thousand and twelve if we’re still ‘ere?” stated an old man in a long black trench coat and brown cap, with fingerless gloves, and a tatty brown canvass rucksack on his back. He used a long length of rusty pipe as a walking stick. He did not turn his head to address the woman, rather; he hobbled along looking straight ahead. They both looked like they were in their late eighties.
“It started then. It was a slow process. It’s still happening.” The old woman, who was dressed in an old style-cleaning smock, with her grey hair up in a bun, said. “Margaret, who’s a dab hand on the internet thingy, said... oh what’s that word she used? Connected! That’s it, everything’s connected.”
“Poppycock!” He stopped walking, rested the pipe against his shoulder, and removed his thick, plastic rimmed glasses, to wipe off the rain.
“Margaret doesn’t know squat; she doesn’t even know how to use a calculator. The daft old bugger doesn’t even know what day of the week it is half of the time.” He replaced his glasses and started walking again. His feet shifted through debris that covered the middle of the road.
Noah had to smile to himself. Even with the end of the world just on the horizon, some people would never change.
“I am ninety-six years old, and I was born during the first world war, and also survived the second. There’s no way a bloody virus is going to kill me off.” He shrugged his shoulders, as if to say that is that.
The Sixth Extinction 1: An Apocalyptic Tale of Survival. (Part One: Outbreak.) Page 6
