Shock

by K. R. Griffiths

  Above him, John heard Jeff’s scream of pain and fury become something altogether more unsettling, something twisted, almost inhuman in its unbridled terror.

  The well was covered by a large wooden slab. John grasped it and heaved; every muscle in his body working in perfect, panicked harmony, sending the thing crashing to the floor with a solid thud.

  And there it was, salvation dropping down into the earth. A ladder, dropping some twenty feet to an opening in the wall of the shaft. A passage. The way out. John felt giddy with relief. He leapt onto the ladder and slid, feeling the thing tremble as Ash’s weight hit it above him.

  And then he was off the cold metal and in the dark passage, as blind as the poor bastards now filling the bunker above them, but still moving forward.

  Behind him, John heard the familiar metallic snick, and suddenly the soft light emanating from Ash’s lighter pushed back the blackness. The lighter had not been the reason John had picked Ash, of course, but it proved a handy bonus.

  The two men stopped for a moment, listening. Nothing had entered the well shaft behind them. If they remained silent, there was every chance the creatures would stumble around up there forever without ever discovering their escape route.

  John examined his new surroundings: a narrow passage cut into the rock. The first few feet were clearly manmade, smooth and straight. Beyond that, the dim light revealed a more natural-looking path, a narrow space between sharp, jagged walls.

  John motioned to Ash to pass him the lighter, put a finger to his lips, and waved at the pilot to follow.

  They moved slowly, for what felt like an eternity, until at last John realised he could feel a cool breeze on his sweat-drenched face. Moments later, he heard the rumbling roar of the ocean, and then he could see it: the exit, a faint light cast by the moon revealing an opening. A way out.

  When they emerged into the moonlight, the two men found themselves on a tiny pebble beach, barely more than 15 feet in width, almost entirely concealed from the ocean by towering rocks to either side, and home to something that took John by surprise.

  “Son of a bitch,” he breathed.

  A boat. Victor’s contingency. John felt like laughing out loud. They had travelled all this way to catch the lunatic and his paranoid mania and obsessive planning might just have ended up saving their lives.

  The boat was moored to a steel rod driven deep into the beach. John clambered aboard, pulling the wet rope with him. It had an engine, the use of which he dismissed instantly as too noisy. They weren’t going to make for the open sea, just for the next spot at which they could make land. The boat was a bonus, but the helicopter remained the real prize.

  After a moment’s search, John found what he was looking for under one of the low seats that ran port and starboard: oars.

  Further investigation revealed something else: a flare gun. John tucked it into his waistband, comforted to be once again in possession of something with a trigger.

  “Grab an oar, Ash,” he said. “We’ll go out around that rock.” He pointed to the rock to the right of the beach. “First chance we get, we’ll get back on land, get back to the chopper and get the fuck out of here.”

  Ash nodded.

  I’m the leader now, John thought. Shit.

  The boat was heavy, and they made slow progress with the oars, straining to manoeuvre it through the narrow entrance to the beach, muttering low curses of frustration. The tide was working against them, quickly draining the strength from John’s arms.

  He caught Ash looking at the controls to the engine and burned a glare into the pilot’s eyes until Ash turned away, his face flushed.

  It took them a long time, maybe as much as an hour, to finally get the boat out onto the open water and clear of the beach. The going got a little easier then; with less chance that they would strike sharp rocks the two men were able to put in smooth, powerful strokes to drag the boat, inch by inch, through the rolling water.

  The cliffs were steep for a long way, but John could see their destination in the distance, a drop in the rocky walls to a level that would allow them to leap from the boat back onto land. They would be losing the boat, trusting to chance that there would be no welcome party waiting for them, but it seemed like the only spot available. John pointed at it, returning Ash’s nod of understanding.

  It took them another thirty minutes, long enough that when they made the jump back to land, John’s arms were aching so much he was unsure he still had the strength to haul himself back up over the rocks. When finally he dragged himself back onto flat land, he crashed onto his back, panting as quietly as he could, eyes scanning the woods around him for signs of movement.

  It took him a moment to see it, the shuffling shape in the woods, maybe fifty yards distant. As he focused on it, he saw that it was not alone. There were other shapes out there in the dark, stiff-moving and aimless, blundering blindly through the forest. He counted five. There would be more.

  Shit.

  Ash hauled himself up over the edge of the rocks, eyes widening in surprise as John clamped his palm over the pilot’s mouth. John’s eyes narrowed and he nodded his head toward the figures in the distance.

  John pressed his mouth to Ash’s left ear, breathing the words softly.

  “You know the way to the chopper from here?”

  Ash nodded; his face pale. He pointed to the east.

  “We go slow, and silent.”

  Ash nodded again.

  It would have been a risky plan anyway: they had probably a couple of miles to travel and rough terrain to cross in the darkness. Still, John had hoped it would prove slightly more successful. As it was, the two men had barely crept forward a few yards when the tide drove the boat into the rocks behind them with a sharp bang.

  John didn’t bother to turn toward the figures in the distance to check whether they had heard; the creatures seemed to have preternatural hearing. The ‘plan’ such as it was, unravelled like worn fabric.

  “Run!”

  John put his head down and sprinted. He was quicker than Ash, but he was gratified to see the pilot keeping pace with him, bounding over shrubs and branches, his speed a product of unhinged terror.

  Behind them, John could hear the now-familiar crashing and shrieking of pursuit. He didn’t look back. There was nothing to be done about the chasing pack: the true danger lay in the possibility of them running headlong into another group. He saw nothing, kept charging forward until his lungs felt ready to burst.

  He was pulling ahead of Ash now, and he risked slowing a little to look back. The pilot, to his credit, wasn’t far behind. Of more concern to John were the shapes he could make out further back: more of them now, crashing through the trees, some falling, and bouncing back to their feet almost instantly to give chase.

  He remembered the weapons he had lost in that first chase. The sword. Ridiculous as he had felt the weapon to be, he would have given anything to feel that cold steel in his hands now.

  Ash had closed the gap; John focused on the way ahead, leaping over a rock that threatened to put an end to things, and then suddenly the trees thinned and he burst into the clearing, unaware of the hysterical laugh that burst from his lips.

  The chopper sat where they had left it, untouched.

  Behind him, Ash screamed in triumph, the sight of his beloved helicopter apparently pouring extra fuel into his engine. The pilot took off like a sprinter, and John could almost swear he heard the man cackle as he closed the gap.

  John reached the chopper fractions ahead of Ash and leapt inside; his eyes immediately landing on the objects that made his heart feel like dancing.

  Secured to a rack on the far wall of the chopper he saw something that might just give them a chance: M27 assault rifles.

  John snatched one up, slamming in a full clip.

  “Get this thing going!” He roared as Ash clambered into the cockpit, and leapt back out onto the grass.

  There were too many to count now, a seemingly endless stream of
them gushing from the woods into the clearing, the nearest of them only thirty yards or so away, closing fast.

  As the helicopter’s engine hummed into life, blades gradually turning in the night air, picking up the pace, John levelled the weapon, arms shaking at the recoil as he poured bullets into the damn things, his wordless yell of triumph barely audible above the chattering gunfire.

  Still they came, clambering over their fallen comrades, slowly gaining ground. John slammed in another clip, and then suddenly there was another roaring next to him, Ash, gun in hand, spitting lead across the clearing as the chopper’s blades approached full speed above their heads.

  “What the hell are you doing?” John yelled as he squeezed the trigger. “Get this thing off the ground!”

  “Helping!” Ash roared back.

  John cursed. The things were getting closer, pooling around the chopper like liquid. They were surrounded now, dozens of the Infected coming at them from all directions. Fighting was hopeless, guns were hopeless. Escape was their only chance. He leapt back into the helicopter, still firing, and grabbed Ash’s collar, hauling the pilot aboard even as the grasping fingers clawed at him.

  Ash was yelling, firing wildly right up until the moment that John slid the door shut, wincing at the impact as the things outside crashed into the metal. John plucked the gun from the pilot’s grasp and threw him bodily into the cockpit.

  “Go!” He screamed.

  It took only seconds, the longest period in John’s life, and then the ground began to fall away from them. He could feel the weight of the infected, the ones clinging onto the chopper, felt the machine wobble as they fell away, and then they were clear, soaring forward and up, just clearing the trees.

  John collapsed to the floor, laughing hysterically, almost sobbing in relief.

  He was still laughing when he felt the sudden change of course, when he heard the strange, strangled grunt from the pilot’s seat.

  When he leant over into the cockpit, John saw Ash sitting dumbly, his hands away from the controls, staring in horror at the deep, ragged wound on his forearm.

  He looked up at John and for a moment John saw pleading and despair in Ash’s eyes. Only for a moment. Then the whites began to fill with a livid crimson stain, as if the blood vessels within were bursting all at once.

  As Ash leapt from the pilot’s seat toward him, roaring, John didn’t have time to consider where he was, or that outside the windows, the ground was rushing toward him at sickening speed.

  He snatched the flare gun from his waistband, stuck the barrel into Ash’s gaping mouth, and set the world on fire.

  Epilogue

  The man awoke in a field of twisted wreckage and mangled bodies. There was blood everywhere, some of it his own, seeping from a large gash in his shoulder.

  The wreckage was difficult to identify: a plane? A helicopter?

  Less difficult to identify were the dead: at a rough estimate he placed around twenty bodies in a radius around the burning wreckage. His jersey was smouldering, and he cried out in pain as he felt the fire licking at the flesh of his lower back, yanking the jersey off and tossing it.

  Bare-chested, he felt the cold breeze hit him. It was a bitter wind, but it felt delicious on his scorched body.

  He stumbled clear of the debris, catching his feet on blood-soaked corpses.

  What the hell had happened, he had no idea. More disconcertingly he had no idea where he was. Come to think of it, he had no idea who he was.

  Gasping for breath, coughing, feeling the air sting his smoke-scarred lungs, the man stumbled from body to body, searching for any sign of life, and found none. Tears of despair welled in his eyes.

  Scanning the horizon, he saw no landmarks, just trees and fields under a dark, glowering sky.

  Stumbling, the man made his way across the dark field, dimly aware that something was making its way through the trees toward the crash site, and with an unshakeable certainty that he had to get away.

  He fell into the trees, turning in time to see several people, drenched in blood, emerge into the clearing from the other direction. Screaming, the figures made directly for the crash site, some running straight into the burning wreckage as though they couldn’t even see it.

  The man gasped and was sure, even at this distance, that he saw one of the silhouettes in the flames whip its head in his direction.

  Holding his breath, careful to make no sound, the man picked his way through the trees and into the freezing night, walking for countless minutes. He saw no sign of civilization.

  Finally, the man heard something: the distant roar of the sea, and almost cried out in relief. There was something about the sound, something that reassured him. Some primitive instinct maybe, an echo of a time when humanity depended on the landscape that surrounded it, when proximity to natural resources mattered.

  The man slumped onto the floor, leaning against the cool bark of a tree, wincing as the rough surface met the burns on his lower back, and let his eyes close.

  He might have slept, the man couldn’t be sure. But when he next opened his eyes, he knew that he was not alone. There were voices in the woods. Close.

  The man leaned to his left, craning his neck around the tree trunk, peering into the gloom.

  In the darkness, maybe thirty feet away, the man saw figures treading carefully through the trees, mumbling in a low whisper that obviously carried a little further than they realised.

  The man frowned. There were three of them. A young woman, followed by the biggest guy the man could imagine: a towering giant almost as wide as he was tall. On his back, the giant carried another man, whose legs dangled and swung behind the enormous man’s stride, as though they were injured.

  The man searched for anything that he might use as a weapon, but found nothing but useless twigs. Beyond the trees, he saw the figures settle down, the giant man collecting wood and starting a small fire. The man looked longingly at the tiny flickering flames, but felt a deep certainty that he was in some mortal danger. There was nothing to do but watch.

  And wait.

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  Psychosis

  Wildfire Chronicles Vol. 3

  Michael Evans, crippled survivor of the massacre at St. Davids, has only one goal left: to find his young daughter. And that means journeying north and discovering that during the five days he spent comatose in an underground bunker the world has changed dramatically.

  And worse, it's still changing.

  Struggling to come to terms with a world steeped in shocking violence and ever-present danger, Michael must adapt quickly to a new reality: the virus has already infected the population. But it isn't stopping there...

  Available now!

  Mutation

  Wildfire Chronicles Vol. 4

  The only thing the survivors of the catastrophe in South Wales wanted was a safe place to ride out the apocalypse. The castle looked perfect: high walls and natural defenses that even the infection could not breach.

  The problem was that someone had beaten them to it. Someone with who would stop at nothing to maintain control.

  Someone with a dark secret that could change everything...

  Available now!

  A word from the author

  I wrote Shock primarily as thanks to all those people that bought, and read, Panic. In all honesty, I never believed anyone other than friends and family would end up reading my work. Hoped, sure, but believed? No chance. That strangers have shown an interest - even paying hard earned money to do so - is as humbling as it is mystifying to me.

  Panic was always designed to be the start of something bigger. When I wrote it, I wanted it to be short and fast, I wanted a book that reflected the nature of the events occurring within. I also wanted it to be focused on the lives of ordinary people as the world around them became extraordinary. As such, a part of the story that I wanted to tell necessarily fell b
y the wayside.

  I’d always wanted to delve a little deeper into Project Wildfire, and the circumstances that surrounded Victor’s involvement, but doing so within Panic felt like it would slow the story down, and drag focus away from Michael Evans and Rachel and Jason Roberts. Panic was their story.

  I’d already started work on the sequel, Psychosis, when Panic, for reasons I still can’t fully explain, started to gain popularity. I knew the character of John Francis would be important to the second novel. I also knew that telling his backstory would again slow up the story.

  His was a story that I had resigned myself to not telling in full, but only hinting at during the course of Psychosis. It was as I searched for a means by which to express my thanks to those that purchased Panic that I came up with the idea for this novella. To me, it almost seems like one of those ‘bonus features’ you get on DVDs.

  One day, when Wildfire Chronicles is complete, I may find myself re-editing the whole thing, and there may be a place to weave these chapters into the story as a whole. Until then, John’s story will remain the bridge between the events of Panic and Psychosis.

  If you’re still reading this, then you have my thanks. If you’ve already read Panic then maybe, like me, you’re just at the start of this, and I’m glad that we are in it together.

  K.R. Griffiths

  30 June 2013