The Alpha Plague (8 page)

The closer they got to the tower, the denser the crowd. People loved a drama, although no one wanted to go and help her. When Rhys saw an unoccupied bench he called, “Jake” and jumped onto it. Jake followed his lead. The city usually fined people who stood on the benches. They probably didn’t give a fuck about that right now.

For a moment, everything else vanished as Rhys stared at the girl. She swayed with heavy breaths and watched the crowd. The sheer amount of people didn’t seem to faze her at all. She held her ground as if she could take them all on.
 

When she exploded to life, Rhys damn near fell from his perch…

As the girl charged forward, a woman in the crowd screamed. The girl roared in response; deep and guttural, it seemed an impossible sound for such a small frame.
 

Only a third of the size of the screaming woman, the girl hit her so hard she knocked her over. Even from a distance, Rhys heard the deep bark as the wind left the woman. The child tackled like she was on a rugby pitch.
 

The pair hit the concrete ground with a loud
thwack.
They disappeared from Rhys’ sight because of the dense crowd. He traced their scuffle by the crowd’s reaction. A bigger and bigger space opened up as the people formed a ring around the pair. More people screamed as the panic of what was initially only a few spread to those around them.

“What the fuck’s happening?” Jake said.

A gap opened in the crowd, and Rhys saw the girl had bitten into the woman’s neck and remained clamped onto it. Several people, fully-grown men and women, surrounded the girl. They tugged on her legs but they couldn’t pry her free. “I think we should go, Jake.”

A loud foghorn silenced Jake’s reply. It boomed through the city and echoed off the hard surfaces. It rang so loud it blurred Rhys’ vision and hurt his ears.

The building on Rhys’ left went first. Brushed steel shutters snapped across every window in quick succession. It turned the pillar of shiny brilliance into what looked like an industrial phallus. Surrounded by a protective shell, it seemed that not only had the windows been covered, but every entrance and exit. Nothing could get in or out.

All of the other buildings followed suit. The collective snapping and sliding of barriers called out through the city like some kind of mechanical army as it suited up for battle. Within seconds, the noise had stopped. It seemed like every building had gone into lockdown—every building
except
The Alpha Tower.
 

Rhys turned full circle as he took in his surroundings. “They’ve shut down Building Seventy-Two, Jake.”

“My car keys are in there.”

“Mine too,” Rhys said.
 

“What’s happening, Rhys? Have you ever seen this before?”

Rhys shook his head. “Never.”

Another loud
snap
and a cylindrical steel pillar shot up from the middle of the road closest to Jake and Rhys. About half a metre tall and thirty centimetres in diameter, it blocked the way for any vehicles that would try to escape. Like the buildings before it, the sound repeated throughout the city. It sounded like popping corn as all of the pillars came up at slightly different times.

“Whatever’s happening,” Rhys said, “I guarantee you it’s got something to do with—”

Screams by The Alpha Tower cut Rhys off. When he looked over, anxiety twisted through his bowels. The woman who had been attacked by the girl had gotten her feet. Like the girl, her eyes bled. She bit at the air like a dog trying to catch flies. Blood oozed from the deep wound in the side of her neck. The crowd screamed again when she snarled. She ran at the person closest to her. Driven by the same rage as the small child, she crashed into her victim, and they both fell to the concrete.
 

The little girl stood up too. Within seconds, she’d taken out a man like she had the woman before him. No one tried to help a second time.

The muscles in Rhys’ legs tightened. If he was to get out, it needed to be now.
 

When he stepped down from the bench, Jake looked at him. “Where are you going, man?”

Rhys shook his head as he backed away. “I dunno. Away from here though.”

Chapter Eight

The sound of panic chased Rhys as he jogged away from the tower. A deep growl rode beneath the shrill cries and screams. Something guttural and tormented, it sounded like the little girl, but multiplied. Rhys quickened his pace.

Most people hadn’t twigged yet and stood dumbstruck as they stared in the direction of The Alpha Tower. As he weaved in and out of them, one girl called to Rhys, “What’s happening down there?”
 

Rhys ignored her as similar questions came at him from the other onlookers.

“Why are you running?”

“Why are the shutters down?”

He couldn’t stop to answer them. Even if he could, they wouldn’t believe him. If they hadn’t seen it with their own eyes, surely they wouldn’t go for the idea that a little girl had just bitten the throat out of an older woman. He couldn’t convince them to run.

The deep growls and yowls increased and provided a low bass line to accompany the shrill chaos. Rhys gritted his teeth and picked his pace up another step.
 

Before long, Rhys ran at a flat-out sprint. It didn’t matter that people stared at him. Let them. The questions came at him from all angles, and all centred on the same theme—
What the fuck’s happening?
 

The farther Rhys got from The Alpha Tower, the more sedate the crowd. A lot of people stared at him still, but the questions died down.
 

A man, with his phone raised to record the chaos, stepped out in front of Rhys. With only a second to react, Rhys clipped his shoulder. The impact ran a sharp pain through him, but Rhys didn’t slow down. He heard a
crack
as the man’s phone hit the ground, followed by the man releasing a barrage of abuse at him.

***

When Rhys reached the edge of the square, he stopped. His lungs burned and his heavy breaths rocked his tired frame. The crowd outside The Alpha Tower had gone from panicked onlookers, to a writhing mass of insanity. Whatever happened back there, it spread fast and would catch up with him if he didn’t keep moving.
 

Rhys looked but couldn’t see Jake. The poor kid probably didn’t make it out. They would have been better had they remained on the wall by the fountain.

Rhys looked back at the water fountain and his bowels sank to his knees. “Fuck!” He knew that on the wall, exactly where he’d left them, sat the bark and the photo of Flynn. If Jake hadn’t have been so damn keen to get involved, he would have never left them there. “Fuck!”

An older woman stared at Rhys and said, “Are you okay? What’s going on back there?”

Did he look okay? Instead of responding to her, Rhys rubbed his face with both hands and shouted into them, “Fuck!”

When Rhys felt someone grip his shoulder, he pulled his hands away. The older lady raised her eyebrows at him. “Please, tell me what’s happening. Why were you running?”

With a quick shake of his head, Rhys pulled a deep breath into his tight lungs. He stared into the lady’s wide eyes and said, “I’ve seen hell, and it’s coming this way.”

The woman’s gasp chased after Rhys as he ran full tilt back toward the insanity in the square.

Chapter Nine

A quick side step and Rhys dodged the guy whose phone he’d knocked to the floor only minutes previously. He, and those around him, stared in the direction of The Alpha Tower. They still hadn’t got the message to get the fuck out.

Every instinct Rhys had told him to turn around and run the other way—every instinct other than the one in his heart. He couldn’t leave that picture behind.
 

Random sprays of blood shot into the air; screams, growls, hisses, and roars filled the square. Whatever was happening, it was brutal, and it had spread fast.

A group of people ran straight at Rhys. The crowd finally seemed to have woken up. With his sights fixed on the water fountain, he dodged and sidestepped through them. Half of them looked over their shoulders as the chaos chased them. Some of them screamed. Some cried.

Another loud explosion like the one that had started it all ran through the ground. It threw Rhys slightly off balance and he crashed into another person as they fled. He remained on course for the fountain and looked for the source of the explosion. He saw nothing.
 

A girl in her teens ran straight at Rhys. She looked over her shoulder and Rhys had no choice but to raise his forearm. When she turned around, his elbow smashed into her nose. A wet crack, a shriek, and she crashed to the ground. He’d hit her so hard, the pain made his entire arm weak.
 

With the fountain less than twenty metres away, the circle of carnage that radiated from The Alpha Tower grew.
 

Yet another explosion tested his tired legs, and Rhys wobbled again. He narrowly avoided another collision. The explosions drew louder screams from those around him. Snippets of people’s fear entered Rhys’ world.
 

“What is it?”

“…like bombs.”

Rhys fought for breath as another explosion went off.

“Terrorists?”

“The East?”
 

Another explosion.

Then another.
 

It could be terrorists. The East dropping bombs on them. Everyone saw it coming. Rhys scanned the sky, but it was as clear and blue as a child’s painting. Its purity stood in stark contrast to the furore below. There were no missiles up there.

Another explosion.
 

A woman from The Alpha Tower—blood-red eyes, features twisted with hate—collided into an old man directly in front of Rhys. They both went down, and the bloodied woman dove into the old man’s neck with her mouth open wide. Without a break in stride, Rhys jumped over the downed pair. The man on the floor screamed. Within seconds, he became just another cry of many.

Two more explosions came so close together they almost sounded like one.
 

“That was two,” someone in the crowd called out.

Ten metres until he was at the fountain.

Another explosion.
 

“That’s seven in total,” someone else said.

“Seven?” The conversation seemed to catch as if everyone in the square were having it.
 

“It’s the bridges. We need to get out of here before we get trapped in the city.”

The few who remained static burst into action and added to the swell of escapees.

Rhys clattered into person after person as he fought against the mass exodus.
 

When he arrived at the water fountain, his body battered from his run against the mob, Rhys lifted the bark and photo of Flynn. For the briefest second, he stared into his son’s dark eyes. For the briefest second, everything around him stopped. He slipped both items into his pocket.

Then he looked up and breathed a relieved sigh. “Jake?”

Except it wasn’t Jake. Not anymore.

Chapter Ten

Rhys recoiled from the personification of hate and let out a high-pitched yell as he closed his eyes and raised his arms up in front of him.
 

The expected impact never came.
 

When he opened his eyes, he saw a woman shoulder barge Jake. It sent him sideways over the low wall that surrounded the water fountain. A popping crack sounded out as Jake’s top half went towards the water, but his feet remained in the same place. Jake seemed oblivious to his clearly broken shins. Instead, his twisted features remained fixed on Rhys. His desire to attack seemingly overrode what must have been pain beyond measure. Either he didn’t feel the pain, or his lust for the kill burned brighter than anything else. Something inside told him it was the latter and a chill gripped Rhys.
 

The blonde woman passed Rhys at a flat-out sprint, so he called after her, “Hey, wait up.”

She didn’t.
 

For a second, he froze and stared at Jake in the fountain. The boy’s legs pointed at impossible angles to his body, and he thrashed and writhed as if he were drowning. A loud roar grabbed Rhys’ attention. He saw another one of the crazed people nearby. “Sorry, Jake,” he said, spun around, and sprinted off after the woman who’d just saved him. In the insanity that surrounded them, she seemed to be the only person with purpose.

The combination of too much noise and too little air in his lungs made it a struggle to get his words heard, but Rhys tried anyway as he called after the woman again, “Wait up.”

She still didn’t react.

The crowd continued to flee from the square. At least he didn’t have to run against them anymore. Although, with so many bodies, he lost sight of the athletic woman who’d saved him.

The roars of the people from the tower spread. The woman then came back into view as she tore a zigzagged path through the pandemonium, and Rhys tried to keep up.
 

Rhys gave everything he had, but the woman continued to pull away from him. The crowd thickened and she disappeared from view again.
 

This far back, no one seemed to know which direction to run. Two people in front of Rhys fell to violent attacks.
 

A strong grip stung Rhys as it locked onto his shoulder. He shook it off, stumbled, and turned to see the bloody eyes of one of the crazed people. They tripped and fell before they could grab him again.
 

The sound of his own ragged breaths echoed through his head, and Rhys dug deep as he pushed on. The heat of the day suffocated him, and sweat cascaded into his eyes. It didn’t help to run in slacks and a shirt; they raised his body temperature by what felt like a thousand degrees. Thank god he had his trainers on. The woman came back into view through the crowd. She had about a ten–metre lead on him.
 

An impact stung Rhys’ left side and an older lady spun away from him like a top. Her arms and hair flailed out from the collision. She fell and someone jumped on top of her. Before Rhys had passed her, she screamed as the person that had pinned her down bit into her face.