Adrift 2: Sundown

by K. R. Griffiths

The group had ruled out using the fire stairs for fear that once they entered what was in effect a maintenance stairwell, they might not be able to get back into the central part of the building itself, but it was the only place they could hide. If they didn’t use it, the man searching for them would simply herd them all the way back up the Shard, right back to the apartment.

  In the distance, at the far end of the corridor, Herb saw movement, and ducked back into cover.

  “We can’t just kill the guy,” Conny whispered.

  Herb grimaced.

  “Not sure we have any choice.”

  “We could take the fire exit.”

  “And if we get stuck in there? We’d be putting ourselves in a place with only one way in and one way out.”

  “Like right here,” Conny said pointedly. “We can’t kill him.”

  “It’s not ‘him’ anymore,” Herb said. “Whoever that guy was, he’s gone now. Just an empty shell. If there’s any part of him still in there, he’d probably thank us for putting him out of his misery. We’d be doing him a favour.”

  Conny pursed her lips.

  “Some favour.”

  Mancini hustled forward.

  “What’s the problem?”

  In the distance, Herb heard a strange, soft clunk, and risked a peek around the corner.

  The vampire’s puppet had made it halfway along the corridor, and was checking the fire door.

  Shit.

  In around a minute, the group would be forced to retreat back up to the next level. And then the next.

  Trapped.

  Waiting to be discovered; waiting to die.

  Even if we do kill him, we’ll just bring his master down on our heads. No way of knowing how far away the vampire is. Could only be a level or two.

  “We need a distraction,” Herb whispered, focusing on Mancini. “We can hide on the fire escape, but he’s checking the doors on each level. We need to find a way to get him to move right past without checking. Something to draw him away.”

  “Something like a cellphone ringing?” Mancini said, slipping a small black phone from his pocket and holding it up.

  Herb frowned. He knew exactly what Mancini was suggesting—that he could run up a level or two and set the alarm on his phone. Maybe, if it trilled at just the right moment, it would persuade the approaching man to hurry past the next fire door without checking it.

  Another desperate plan, he thought. He didn’t dare risk another look around the corner. He nodded at Mancini.

  “Go,” he said, “quickly. The further up the building you get, the more time we’ll have to run. Once you drop the phone, take the fire exit back down to us. We’ll keep the door open for you.”

  “Run?” Mancini repeated, his eyes wide with doubt.

  “Yeah, run. I’ve tried fooling these things before, and they are far from gullible. If it takes the bait, we won’t be safe for long. I’m betting it will know straightaway that we have slipped past it. We’ll have to make a run for the hotel. It’s only a couple of floors down from here. We’ll be able to lose them in there. I hope.”

  “Running will be noisy.”

  Herb nodded.

  “Yeah. But it’s all we have. Go.”

  Mancini turned without a word, and jogged lightly up the stairs, his footsteps inaudible. He might have time, Herb thought, to carry the phone up a couple of levels at most. It would have to be enough. Once he dropped the phone, he could enter the fire escape and make his way back down to meet them.

  Herb waved at the others to follow, and made his way back up the stairs, following Mancini slowly, and quietly.

  On the next level, when he reached the fire door, Herb pressed on the bar and eased it open quietly. They would all fit into the fire escape, of course, but there would be nowhere to hide once they were in there. If the puppet opened the door, the game would be up.

  He waved the others inside, and waited.

  He figured Mancini had around thirty seconds. He closed the door, stopping just before the lock engaged, and left a crack through which to peer. Outside, the hallway was still empty, but only for a few moments. He saw movement in the darkness by the stairs, shuffling toward him slowly.

  His heart began to pound loud enough that he felt sure it would give them away, and he winced when he heard a fire door opening above. It sounded like Mancini had made it up a couple of storeys.

  The man outside approached the fire door, and a cold sweat broke out on Herb’s brow. If Mancini’s alarm didn’t go off…

  The figure in the hallway was barely five yards away. Herb was desperate to keep the door open a crack to see, but he didn’t dare. He closed it until he felt the lock trying to engage, and stared at it furiously, waiting for the man outside to push it open.

  He didn’t have to wait long.

  Pressure on the door.

  Starting to push.

  This is it, Herb thought, and felt energy begin to fizz through him. The plan had failed. Running blindly was going to be the only option.

  The door opened a crack.

  And somewhere above, a loud, cheerful tune rang out, splitting the silence.

  The pressure on the door lifted abruptly, and Herb heard footsteps departing in a hurry.

  He felt Conny at his back.

  “Shouldn’t we make a move?” she whispered.

  Herb grimaced, and shook his head.

  “Wait,” he said.

  After a moment, he heard it. Clicking on the main stairs. Coming up fast. When it reached the hallway, the carpet muffled its approach a little, but the vampire was moving quickly, oblivious to the noise it was making. It thundered past the fire door, and Herb waited until he heard it clicking up the next stairway to the floor above.

  “Move,” Herb whispered. “Quietly. When it comes—and it will—just run.”

  He pushed the fire door open, and burst out into the dark hallway, breaking into a near-silent trot.

  He had made it as far as the steps leading down to the next level when he heard the screech a couple of floors above, and knew that the ruse had been discovered. The monsters weren’t stupid—far from it—and he was certain that the creature would immediately realise that it needed to descend.

  Before the screech had receded into silence, Herb growled run in a seething whisper, and began to sprint.

  And somewhere above, the vampire followed.

  39

  The Infinity Pool represented the top floor of the eighteen-storey Shangri-La hotel. The pool itself was small, set alongside a fully equipped gym and fitness centre. At any other time, the sight of the pool, nestling alongside a huge window which offered an extraordinary view of the city below, might have taken Dan’s breath away.

  If he had any left.

  The others were pulling away from him, and with each stride, he felt pain shooting across his abdomen as he tore more stitches out of his wounds. Another screech somewhere behind and above him told him that running was an option with a severely limited shelf-life. He was just too weak to keep going, and the vampire sounded like it was closing fast.

  There was nothing else for it. He felt weak and sick; unsure even whether he could repeat the trick that he had pulled on the hospital roof, but knowing he had no option other than to try.

  He came to a stop alongside the pool and turned around, waiting for the monster to appear.

  “Dan!”

  Herb’s whispered call barely made an impression on Dan’s mind. He was already looking inwards, searching for the river, wondering if this was to be the last time he ever saw it.

  Some part of him hoped that was true.

  He took in a deep breath, focusing on the entrance to the pool, and flinched in surprise when the doors burst open and a man charged through.

  The man from the hallway, he thought bleakly. He focused his eyes on the approaching man—a middle-aged guy in a business suit with a loosened tie and an untucked shirt who looked like he had probably slept through the evacuation of the building
. Most likely, the man had awoken to find a nightmare looming over him, and had known terror for an instant before his mind was plucked away.

  Dan focused on the man’s eyes.

  Nothing.

  His mind is already taken.

  Dan stumbled backwards, making it only a few steps before the businessman tackled him heavily around the waist and slammed him down onto the tiled floor surrounding the pool. For a moment, his vision blurred as the pain in his abdomen became a howling agony. Breath exploded from his lungs, and before he could suck in more oxygen, the businessman drove a solid fist into his jaw.

  Dan’s head ricocheted off the floor, and for a moment the world went dark.

  Can fight vampires.

  Can’t fight people.

  Still a pathetic, feeble weakling.

  He lifted a hand, trying vainly to block the next blow, and suddenly the weight of the businessman pinning him to the floor was lifted.

  Dan’s head rolled weakly to the side, and he saw Herb hauling the businessman off him and swinging a savage flurry of punches. The man in the suit collapsed backwards, falling into the pool with a loud splash.

  And Herb dropped to his knees.

  His mouth opening in a silent scream.

  The vampire had arrived at last.

  It stalked into the room almost warily, as though unsure of exactly what it might face.

  A good job Herb doesn’t still have the gun, Dan thought dimly, or we’d all be dead already.

  Sickly despair washed over him as he watched Herb pivot at the waist and drive his forehead into the tiled floor with a loud smack. The big man lifted himself up, his forehead dark with blood, and drove himself down again.

  And, finally, the river crashed through Dan’s mind, the rushing torrent of rage and fear and disgust, and suddenly his injuries were forgotten; the pain wracking his body a distant, faded memory.

  He rose to his feet, still aware. Still conscious.

  Not blacking out this time.

  “It’s me you want,” he screamed, unnerved by how unlike his voice the words sounded.

  The vampire whipped around to face him, and the terrible red eyes fell upon Dan. Herb dropped to the floor, lying still, like some kid’s toy which had its batteries removed abruptly.

  The vampire’s attempt to take his mind was weak; water breaking against a vast dam. He batted it aside and took a step toward the monster, drilling his gaze into it, ripping whatever it called a soul to shreds.

  And suddenly, he was the vampire.

  Staring back at himself, and the group of people cowering behind him.

  Dan’s face broke into a wicked grin.

  “I think,” he said, watching himself speak through the monster’s eyes, “that I’m getting the hang of this.”

  *

  Herb’s head felt like it was about to explode. The pain was one thing, but the presence of the vampire in his mind, like the residue of some terrible toxin, was something else entirely. It had only been in his mind for a couple of seconds, but felt like the inside of his skull was bruised and bleeding.

  Groaning, he twisted his neck, levering his eyes open through the thick blood which stuck the lids together like glue, and saw the vampire take off at a sprint, charging past Dan, heading for the window which ran alongside the pool.

  “Dan! No!” Herb tried to yell. The words emerged as a weak croak.

  Dan turned to face him, his expression curious, and the vampire skidded to a halt. It remained still, like a freeze frame, a few yards from the window which Dan had been about to make it jump through.

  Herb struggled to his feet, shaking his head in a vain attempt to stop the world spinning.

  “How long can you control it?” he gasped.

  Dan looked dubious.

  “I don’t know. Not long. Why?”

  “The others,” Herb grunted. “They’ll be coming.” He focused his gaze on the vampire once more. “We can use this one.”

  *

  The window on the east side of the fifty-second floor of the Shard exploded, and the monster hurtled out.

  But not to its death.

  It clung to the exterior of the building like a spider, racing up past the residential levels. At the sixty-fourth floor, it passed the public viewing gallery, and kept going. The top fifteen levels of the building were dedicated to utilities: a heat rejection system and power plants. It raced past them, making for the spire at the very top of London’s tallest structure.

  When it reached it, clinging to the narrow glass spike a thousand feet above the city, it bellowed out a screech.

  Calling its kin.

  40

  “Will they fall for it?”

  Dan tried to focus on Herb, but it was getting more difficult with each passing second. He felt his grip on the vampire’s mind weakening; his grip on reality beginning to break as he struggled to occupy two minds at once.

  He was staring at Herb, and seeing a dark city spread out far below him simultaneously; screeching in a language he couldn’t understand and trying to form words in one that he did.

  He felt a warm wetness running down his cheek, and knew that he was crying blood again.

  “I…think so,” he mumbled. “I think they’re heading up to the top. But I can’t hold it much longer. When I lose it, the game’s up, Herb. They’ll all know exactly where we are.”

  He felt the same warm wetness spring from his ear, and in his mind, the tumbling river became a cascading waterfall, threatening to tear his mind to pieces.

  “I…”

  He grunted, bending at the waist as an avalanche of pain crashed over him.

  “I’ll hold it as long as I can…think I’ll pass out—”

  He began to wobble on his feet.

  “Get away from the windows,” Dan slurred, “they’re coming up the outside of the buil—”

  He collapsed, and felt strong arms catch him.

  “Gotcha,” Herb grunted, and turned to face the others. “You heard him. Get down, get away from the windows. When they pass, we start running, everybody got it?”

  None of the others spoke, but they scattered at Herb’s words, moving away from the Infinity Pool’s huge window and ducking down behind exercise machines and a small drinks bar.

  Herb dragged Dan to a huge cross-trainer, ducking down behind the machine, praying that he was out of sight.

  Moments later, he saw the first of them, thundering up the exterior of the building. It was followed by another. Another. Herb counted eight in total. Judging by the speed they were moving at, it wouldn’t take them long to reach the top of the Shard.

  When he was sure that there were no more coming, Herb lurched to his feet, throwing Dan over his shoulder once more.

  “Go,” he roared at the others. “Run!”

  He broke into a sprint, barely slowed at all by Dan’s weight, making for the stairs. Taking them three at a time; almost falling down them. Almost immediately, Burnley hurtled past him, the American woman running like a seasoned sprinter. A few seconds later, Conny’s son also overtook him, his speed born of youth and terror.

  Herb glanced over his shoulder.

  The others were following: Conny and Remy close behind, the dog clearly matching its pace to that of its master. Behind them, struggling to keep up, he saw Mancini, and Jeremy even further back.

  Dan moaned; a low, sickly sound.

  “Hold on, Dan,” Herb yelled, “just hold it for as long as you can.”

  Dan coughed a mouthful of blood across Herb’s bandaged arm, painting it red.

  *

  At the top of the building, the first of the vampires arrived, shrieking in confusion at the one which had called it. There was no sign of the humans; no sign of the Hermetic.

  The others arrived, circling warily, staring at their kin with naked suspicion.

  And the creature at the top of the spire hurled itself at the nearest of them, driving it clean off the side of the building, its momentum carrying them both o
ut into the night. The two vampires plummeted toward their deaths and, half a building below, Dan Bellamy’s mind, too, fell a thousand feet, and landed in darkness.

  *

  Herb felt Dan’s body go limp as he passed a sign which read 29th floor.

  “They’re coming,” he roared. He could no longer see Mancini’s partner or Logan in front of him; he figured at the speed they were travelling they might even be two or three levels below already. Conny and Remy had also passed Herb a couple of floors back. He hoped the policewoman, at least, could still hear him. “Find a vehicle,” he yelled, “get the engine running!”

  28th floor.

  Herb felt dismay rising with each stride, and when he heard a muffled screech, he knew.

  Not gonna make it.

  There was a good chance that the two women and the teenager would reach the ground floor, he thought, and maybe if he hadn’t been carrying Dan, he might have had a shot himself, but though the guy was light, carrying him down near-pitch black stairwells was slowing Herb down too much. As for Mancini and Jeremy, well, the two older men were both a little larger than Herb, both a little heavier and a lot slower. Neither of them would reach the ground floor.

  Leave them.

  Let them slow the vampires down for you.

  Herb gritted his teeth, and even as the thought raced across his mind, he knew that he didn’t have it in him, no matter that Mancini had been prepared to kill him barely half an hour earlier, or that Jeremy had lied to him and called in the Americans in the first place.

  Soft, his father had called him, more than once. Too concerned with the wellbeing of others; too willing to let feelings stand in the way of his sacred duty.

  His run began to slow even before he was aware that he had made the only decision he could make. For the men, outrunning the vampires on the stairs looked all-but impossible, but he could buy Conny some time to escape.

  He stopped, listening intently, and heard footsteps approaching fast. Mancini.

  The big American almost barrelled right into him in the dark.

  “Why have you stopped?” Mancini gasped.