Demise of the Living (35 page)

The beam of a torch danced its
way across the tiled floor of the lobby. There was the odd
diamond-like sparkle as the light caught a shard of glass.

Thomas grabbed for the man’s
feet, but his hand was quickly kicked away. Balling his staved
fingers into a fist, he scrambled back up. As he got to his feet,
the dark figure was opening the door to the stairwell. Lunging
forward, Thomas got to the doors just a fraction of a second after
they closed. There was the clunk of a lock sliding into place.

“Open up!” Thomas shouted,
battering his fists against the doors.

Through the slim safety glass
he could see the torchlight skipping up the stairs.

Thomas cried, “Bastard!”

From behind, he heard the
crunching of glass. He whipped round. From the reflected light of
the car’s one working headlamp, he could see a wall of corpses
pushing through the shattered windows.

“Mo?” Thomas said more
cautiously.

The moaning changed pace to a
rasping groan.

“
Bollocks
,” he
whispered.

Thomas vaulted over the
reception desk, making for the corridor to the plant room and the
lobby. As he landed he skidded on broken glass. His leg went away
from under him and something in his knee popped out of place.
Hitting the solid tile floor, he let out a wail of pain.

A hand grabbed at his
ankle.

Thomas lashed out, striking
hard at the attacker.

“Thom—” the voice was cut short
as Thomas’ heel struck something solid.

“Shit!” Thomas cursed,
realising what he’d just done.

“Mo. Come on, buddy.”

The zombies were almost on top
of him and Mo wasn’t moving.

Pulling himself up, he felt his
leg quiver with pain.

A mass of undead were streaming
into the lobby, their arms outstretched, their mouths gaping
open.

Thomas called, “Mo?!”

There was nothing but the hum
of the car’s engine and the zombies’ sorrowful lament.

Taking sharp breaths, his hands
braced against the walls, he hopped down the corridor towards the
fire exit sign above the loading bay door.

The guttural moans following
him down the corridor pushed him forward.

Then there was a scream. A
high-pitched, hysterical scream.

Thomas didn’t stop. He didn’t
look back. He knew he couldn’t.

He jumped down the stairs to
the door and threw his whole body weight at it. The door flew open
and he tumbled out into the car park.

The noise of the screaming
echoed up the corridor, cutting through the constant drone of
moans, the screeching rising and falling like waves against
rock.

Thomas scrambled for the door
and slammed it shut.

***

Colin was only a few steps
behind Billy when he came to a sudden halt. Grabbing hold of the
handrail, he was barely able to stop himself from running into
him.

A torch flickered across their
faces.

“Who the fuck are you?” an
unfamiliar voice asked.

“Where’s Mo and Thomas?” Billy
demanded sternly.

“Fucked if I know,” the man
answered.

“Stephen!” Sharon cried from up
the landing.

“Sharon,” Stephen replied in a
flat tone.

A muffled scream emanated from
down the stairwell.

“Mo,” Billy said, pushing past
the new arrival.

“I wouldn’t go down there,”
Stephen warned.

Billy thundered down to the
ground floor doors. They had been locked.

“
Wouldn’t open them,”
Stephen said, shining his torch at Billy.

Billy flipped the key in the
lock and swung the door open. He hadn’t even stepped through it
when a zombie made a lunge for him.

Billy blurted, “Christ!”

He threw himself backwards just
as the first zombie reached the doorway.

“Help me shut it!” Billy
called.

Colin charged down the stairs
and grabbing hold of the handle with Billy, they heaved at it. The
door crashed into the jamb and Billy turned the key. The door
shuddered as the creatures on the other side started pounding at
it.

“Mo! Thomas!” Billy
shouted.

The moaning and hammering
gathered pace from the other side of the door.

Again Billy shouted, “Mo!
Thomas! Are you there?!”

“I told you not to open that
door,” Stephen said smugly.

“And we told you you weren’t
getting in,” Billy said, marching up the stairs.

“
What, wrong shoes?”
Stephen said sarcastically. “It’s not a night club.”

Billy marched up the stairs, a
look of anger on his face.

“
Oh, so you
are
a
bouncer,” Stephen quipped.

“Too fucking right,” Billy said
as he sent an uppercut smashing into Stephen’s jaw.

The force knocked Stephen from
his feet and he landed unconscious, slithering down the stairs to
stop at Billy’s feet.

“Why did you do that?!” Sharon
demanded.

“
Why?!
Why?!
Because he’s just killed two of our people and torn a hole
in the side of our refuge, that’s why!”

“Not to forget he’s infected,”
Colin added.

“He might not be—he said it was
nothing,” Sharon replied.

Colin picked up the torch from
where it had clattered to a halt. He bent down over the unconscious
Stephen and unwrapped the bandage covering the lower part of his
arm.

He held the arm up by the hand
and pointed the torch at the wound.

“
There. What do you
think?”

Billy and Sharon looked at the
oval chunk of mangled flesh. It wasn’t a deep wound, but its edges
were dark and uneven. The skin around it was pale and the blood
vessels underneath pronounced and thick.

Holding the arm on either side
of the injury, Billy lent in and sniffed at the laceration. At the
smell he scrunched his face up and pulled back.

“Smells rank,” Billy said, his
face contorted by the malevolent odour.

“What are you going to do with
him?” Sharon asked.

“Chuck him back out on the
street,” Billy suggested.

“No, you can't do that!”

“Why the hell not? Mo and
Thomas are dead because of him,” Billy said.

“No, I don’t think we could
live with ourselves if we did that,” Colin said.

“I could,” Billy assured
him.

“We might have to,” came a
voice from the landing.

Liz stood just outside the
office doors, her daughter Melissa pressed tight to her side.

“If Billy’s right, he’s
responsible for the deaths of two people and he’s bringing this
infection in among us,” Liz said.

“
Oh, come on!” Sharon
scolded. “Your dead kid is up on the fourth, tied to a radiator,
and you talk about bringing the infection in here?”

“He doesn’t deserve to live,”
Liz argued.

“You’re just mad at him because
he didn’t get you to a hospital,” Sharon spat.

“And you’re just protecting him
because he was your boy-toy in the office!” Liz shot back.

“Ladies, ladies, calm down,”
Billy said, loud enough to interrupt them.

“Whatever we’re going to do,
can I suggest we drag him up to the fourth floor and tie him up
just in case he turns on us, one way or another?” Colin said.

Neither Sharon nor Liz
objected.

Billy and Colin took an
arm each and started dragging Stephen’s unconscious body up the
stairs.

“Would one of you be so kind as
to get the doors for us?” Billy asked in a falsely sweet tone.

“I will,” Sharon volunteered
and she trotted ahead of them.

***

When they walked back through
the doors to the office campsite, Liz said, “I got Melissa and
Karen to go to sleep, so please keep your voices down.”

They all nodded.

“Where are Mo and Thomas?” Liz
asked.

“They were downstairs when
Stephen crashed through the lobby,” Billy answered.

“What happened to them?”

“They’re dead,” Colin said. “We
heard screaming and we couldn’t get to them.”

There was the sound of a tent
unzipping and they all turned to look. Karen stepped out, wearing
an oversized t-shirt as a nightdress.

“I thought you were asleep.”
Liz said.

“I’m not a two year-old, Liz. I
just went into the tent to get away from your fussing,” Karen
replied. “So what’s the score with this guy Steve?”

“He’s one of my employees,”
Sharon answered.

“He punched me and threw my
kids out of his car before abandoning us,” Liz added.

“
Okay, okay. There’s bad
blood; we get it,” Colin said. “But what are we going to do with
him?”

“Is he bitten for sure?” Liz
asked.

“I’d say so. The wound is
chewed up and it stinks,” Billy replied.

“So how long before he turns
into one of them?” Karen asked.

“
Who knows,” Colin said.
“With your security guard...”

“Gary,” Sharon offered.

“Yeah, with Gary, he turned in
about six, seven hours.”

“Grant took a little longer,”
Liz volunteered.

“All well and good, but when
did Stephen get bitten?” Billy asked.

No one could answer.

“Well, since we can’t tell, I
think we should keep an eye on him,” Colin said.

“
Yeah, good idea. He
might even be able to give us some useful information when he comes
round,” Billy suggested.

“
Like
what
?” Liz
snapped.

“Like where’s safe,” Billy
said.

“
He already said
nowhere
is
safe,” Sharon said. “That's why he came back,”

“Sure, he might not know where
a safe place is, but he hasn’t been everywhere and he can sure as
hell tell us where not to go,” Billy added.

“Makes sense,” Colin agreed.
“We’ll all take turns watching over him. Karen, would you take
first watch?”

“Oh, why me?” Karen
protested.

“Because you’ve not just
dragged him up three flights of steps, that’s why,” Colin said.

“Oh, come on,” Karen
sulked.

“
You’ve been asked to do
fuck-all around here. Now go up there and sit with him!” Sharon
snapped.

“I have not done fuck-all. I
put up a tent and sorted out food,” Karen whined.

“
If you want to be
treated like a grown-up, then stop acting like a little girl,”
Sharon said. “We’ve all had to do jobs around here. It’s about time
you started pulling your own weight.”

“Not you or your buddy,” Karen
said, pointing ferociously at Sharon. “You just stood around
ticking boxes on a sheet of paper and bossing everyone around.”

“John,” Sharon uttered
softly.

“John’s been...” Colin
stopped.

“
Where the fuck
is
John?”
Billy said.

They all looked around and then
at each other.

“Is he still in the toilet?”
Colin asked.

“Shit. Mo did say he looked
infected,” Billy said.

“No, Mo didn’t say he looked
infected; he just worried he might be,” Colin corrected.

“We’d better go find him,”
Sharon added.

“Grab a gun,” Billy said,
rushing over to the crate with the rifles.

“Thanks,” Colin said, placing a
firm grip on the handle as he took the weapon from Billy’s
grip.

Billy shouldered his weapon and
turned to the girls.

“One of you up for holding the
lantern?” he asked.

“I’ll do it,” Liz said.

The trio made their way up to
the gents’ toilets where John had last been seen.

Billy took his hand off his
rifle stock and held up three fingers to Colin, then pointed at the
door. Colin nodded. Billy started his countdown.

Colin found himself bouncing in
time with the count, building up courage and momentum.

Billy flipped down his last
finger and Colin flung the door open.

With the butt of the
rifle firmly against his shoulder, Billy was into the toilets in an
instant. Colin hurried in behind him, with his weapon also at the
ready.

Billy stopped and lowered his
rifle. Colin sidestepped him to see why.

One of the stall doors was open
and John was laying half in and half out.

“
Fat fucker’s fallen
asleep,” Billy said, laughing. He stepped up to John, the rifle by
his side, and kicked the sole of John’s foot. “Wake up, sleeping
beauty.”

John’s leg reverberated with
the impact, but other than that he didn’t move.

“
Come on, John. You’re
not that sick on a bellyful of leftovers,” Billy said.

“
Billy?” Colin said,
placing his gun down on a sink with a clatter.

He took the lantern off
Liz and walked over to the man on the floor. There was watery sick
down his front and around his mouth. The unflushed bowl was
streaked with yellow bile.

Colin went to kneel down beside
John, but the cubicle was too cramped.

“Billy, pull him out a bit,
would you?”

Billy bent down. Grabbing
an ankle, he hastily slid him out.

“Thanks,” Colin said as he bent
in closer.

John’s eyes were lightly closed
as if he were dozing. Colin placed two fingers behind his jaw,
trying to feel for the cardiac pulse. The clammy skin was still
warm to the touch. He shifted position, but failed to find a
heartbeat. He lent over him, placing his ear over his mouth so
close they almost touched. The smell of warm sick filled his
nostrils as he listened for a breath.

There was nothing.

Colin stood up and gazed down
at the body.

“He’s dead,” he said.