Plagued

by Barnett, Nicola

  Sarah let out a deep sigh and buried her head in Mark’s chest.

  The group of infected ran for Stuart, screaming playfully, like children on the playground. He gave up on the door and tried to slip past them, screaming for help as he ran, but they were too fast. The biker—who was a large-set man—leaped through the air with a wide smile on his face and landed right on the boy’s back, knocking him to the ground with a ‘thud’. He lay on top of Stuart, laughing at his horrified squeals and petting the boy’s hair like he was a pet dog. The other infected joined the biker and leapt on their victim.

  Upstairs, most of the people turned away from the window, sickened by the sight below. They wretched and cried as Stuart’s agonizing screams filled the air. Mark stood fast, hoping irrationally that the boy might somehow crawl out from under them as they bit and clawed at his flesh—but he didn’t.

  As the fog grew denser, the only thing visible was the bright, red blood that covered his attackers’ bodies. The boy’s desperate screams turned to gurgles and eventually he fell silent. The four infected climbed off him and then dragged his body laboriously into the fog.

  “He was just a boy,” one of the older women whimpered.

  “We’re all dead, aren’t we?” a man shouted. “He was right!”

  As the villagers began to panic, Sarah thought she heard a crackling. She stopped in her tracks and listened intently. There was another crackle, followed by some low mutterings. “Shhh!” she shouted to the crowd, they didn’t hear her.

  Mark noticed Sarah’s expression. “What?”

  Sarah hushed him and pointed her hand to her ear as she listened out for the sound again. Another low crackle followed by a low grainy voice. It sounded muffled and distant.

  Mark’s facial expression told her that he heard it too.

  “What is that?” she asked him.

  Mark ignored her and turned to face the crowd. “Shut up for a second!” he bellowed at the top of his lungs.

  A few of them stopped and turned around curiously, when they heard the crackling too, they hushed the ones around them.

  “Where is it coming from?” Jamie asked, frowning.

  Sarah listened to the sound again and ran to the door. “The bathroom.”

  “Sarah, that’s where—” Mark didn’t have time to finish his sentence before she left the room. He followed her.

  Sarah ran into the men’s bathroom, just outside the main door and saw a body covered in a blue blanket. She stopped in her tracks, feeling nauseous. The crackling came again.

  Mark stood in the doorway, followed by Jamie and Annie, who were all watching curiously.

  “It’s coming from him,” Sarah said and ran to his body. She pulled the sheet off him from the bottom upwards, so she didn’t have to look at his face. His leather jacket was matted with blood. Bile rose in Sarah’s throat and she spat it onto the ground, heaving.

  “Sarah,” Mark said, looking disgusted.

  She ignored him and peeled the sheet up to his throat. A muffled voice came from his chest, startling her. She reached into his leather coat without thinking and searched for a pocket. His body was stone cold. She felt around the right side of his chest and her hand hit something hard—there was something square and hard underneath the soft material of the jacket’s inner lining. She found a large pocket and shoved her hand in, grasping the rough plastic object and pulling it from his pocket. She stared at it and smiled.

  “A CB radio,” Mark laughed, shaking his head, “how long was he carrying that around?”

  “Bastard,” Sarah said, as the small screen lit up blue and the room filled with crackling.

  A voice bellowed from the machine. “This is Officer Alex Craig. My men and I are searching for survivors in the area. We have supplies and weapons. If you can hear this and you need our assistance, please respond.” The voice went quieter, as if turning away from the radio. “There’s no one out there, sir. We’ve been doing this for hours now. No one is listening.”

  “Oh my God,” Sarah said, looking at the radio with disbelief.

  “Give it here!” Mark said, and Sarah shoved it into his hands. He pressed a button on the side and pulled the radio to his mouth. “Wait! This is Mark England, we’re in Winding and we’re trapped inside the sports hall. We are in desperate need of food and water. Please respond!” He lifted his finger from the switch and the sound of crackling returned.

  Seconds went by with nothing but silence and the doorway was now filled with hopeful survivors, watching and listening with their hands to their mouths.

  “Come on, you bastard,” Mark muttered at the white noise.

  “They’ve gone,” someone said in the background.

  The radio burst into life again, this time with a different voice. “How do you use this?” A croaky voice said very quietly in the radio. “Just speak? Okay. Bloody contraption.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Mark said, as the voice mumbled on.

  “If you can hear me, son, I’m okay. I’m alive and we’re coming to get you. Now how do you turn this thing off?” The voice in the radio said before being disconnected.

  “Who was that?” Jamie asked, as Sarah and Mark stared at each other with tear-filled eyes.

  “That was my father,” Mark said, and laughed in disbelief.

  The End