The undead.
He swallowed a lump in his throat as he made his final paces towards that emergency exit. He looked down at Kesha. She was wailing, pretty d.a.m.ned loud. Part of Mattius wanted to rea.s.sure her and tell her that everything was going to be okay.
But another part of him wanted to put his hand over her mouth and quieten her once and for all.
What did that make him?
Did it make him the monster Riley claimed he was all along?
He reached the fire escape and pushed the handle.
The door didn"t budge.
A nauseating sensation pounded through his body. He tried the door again, but still it wouldn"t budge. Someone had locked it. He didn"t know why, but they had.
And because they"d locked it, Mattius was trapped.
He heard groans behind him. He didn"t want to look back, but much like when you see a "No Entry" sign, the first thing you have to do right away is wander on in.
He looked over his shoulder.
When he saw the crowd-and it was a crowd, make no mistake about that-of infected heading his way, Mattius didn"t know how to feel. He could try to hold them off, but he wouldn"t be able to keep all of them away. There were way too many of them for that.
Kesha"s cries grew louder.
"Be quiet, now," Mattius said, trying to sound as rea.s.suring as possible.
It was hard to be rea.s.suring when the undead were literally filling the corridor to the brim. In fact, it was so full that some of the undead were being pushed up against the walls, the anti-life squeezed out of them, crushed under the weight of the collective crowd.
Kesha"s cries got even louder.
Mattius took a step back and pressed against that fire escape once again. But still, it wasn"t moving.
Undead ahead of him.
A locked door behind him.
A fire roaring above him.
Kesha in his arms.
He couldn"t stay here. He had to think. Fast.
He looked to his right and saw a partly ajar door to a hotel room.
Then he looked back at the zombies. They were just ten metres or so away now, the smell of rot filling Mattius" nostrils.
"Please let this work out," Mattius whispered under his breath. He knew going into that room would be a gamble. There was a good chance he"d fail to find a way out. The window could be locked, or he might not fit through it, or the zombies might get to him before he even had the chance to escape.
But still he had to try.
"Please work out."
The zombies were just five metres away.
Mattius held his breath.
He stepped away from the door and he ran into the room, Kesha bundled in his arms.
He felt the sharp fingertips of the infected scratch at him, trying to tear the coat off his back as he ran into that room. He slammed the door shut, pressed himself against it, then realised he didn"t have much time to sit around. He had to get to the window and he had to get out of here.
But he wasn"t alone.
"Mattius? Is that you?"
Mervin was sitting at the opposite side of the room. He was an old man, with bushy eyebrows and a wispy beard. He was going senile. But he was no harm to anyone. In fact, most of Mattius" group liked having Mervin around. He might be going bats.h.i.t crazy, but he was good for a game of chess against.
"Mervin," Mattius said, trying to keep the composure to his voice. "We have to-"
"Come on in, fella," Mervin said, standing from the edge of his twin bed and smiling. "Got some decent whisky "ere for you to try."
Mattius heard the bang against the door then, and it forced him to his feet. He hurried over to the window as the door banged some more, as the wood warped and started to split under the weight.
"Someone else here to join us?" Mervin asked.
"No," Mattius shouted as he unclipped the window from its latches. "There"s..."
Then he had a thought. A horrible thought. One he wasn"t proud of.
"Actually, yeah," Mattius said. "It"s a few of the lads. I told them to get down here for some of that whisky of yours. The expensive stuff."
Mattius saw the smile creep up Mervin"s face and he couldn"t help feeling so, so guilty for what he was doing. "Then I"d better go let "um in then, hadn"t I?"
He whistled as he wandered towards that door, not even noticing the changing shape of the woods, the roaring groan of the creatures.
Mattius wanted to tell Mervin to turn around. He wanted to tell him to come with him. But in the end, all he could say was: "I"m sorry."
Mervin turned around and frowned, his hand on the door handle. "Sorry for wh-"
The door split apart.
Mattius saw the first zombie wrap its teeth around Mervin"s neck and tear a chunk of his flesh out.
He saw blood splatter up Mervin"s face, covering his gla.s.ses.
But before those gla.s.ses were covered, it was the look in Mervin"s eyes that stayed with him more than anything.
That look of betrayal.
As the zombies filled the room, distracted by Mervin"s fresh body, Mattius climbed out of the window, Kesha in his arms.
He dropped out onto the ground and ran down the alleyway beside the hotel. He had to find a safe place. He had to find a route that was suitable for...
When he got to the end of the alleyway, he saw his hopes weren"t going to be realised anytime soon.
His camp was filled with the undead.
The area in front of the cells. The food court. Even the vehicle garage.
Everywhere, filled to the brim.
He looked back up at his hotel, smoke pouring out of the window, and he felt a tear roll down his cheek.
This wasn"t his home anymore.
It couldn"t be his home anymore.
"Come on," he said, tucking Kesha further under his arm, not wanting her to get harmed in any way. "I"m going to keep you safe. I promise."
Then he stepped out into one of the rare clear parts of his camp, and he walked towards the fences.
Chapter Three.
Ricky and the woman-who still hadn"t revealed her name-made their way away from Ricky"s old camp to a place where the woman insisted was going to be safe. For now at least.
The afternoon sun was low, and already a night-time chill was setting in. The sun shimmered through the trees and reminded Ricky of those winter days he used to spend with his dog, Stevie. Especially the days he had off work. He"d drive up to Carnforth and walk Stevie all the way up and down Warton Crag. Looking back, Ricky realised those days were some of the best of his life, yet at the time they"d just seemed so everyday. So routine.
How the end of the world could change your perspective on everything.
He looked at the woman beside him. She had her hood back up again. He"d seen her eye, though. Something had happened to it, no doubt about that. She"d lost it in battle, and judging by the state of the wound, it"d happened since the outbreak.
She was lucky to still be alive; that was for sure.
"What"re you looking at?"
Ricky looked away. He didn"t know that the woman knew he was looking at her. And just hearing her talk was disorienting. She"d been so silent up till this point. "Just wondering if you"re ever going to introduce yourself."
"I don"t see much point to introductions. Not anymore."
"Not even a name?"
"What"s the point? I"m the only person around you right now. Not like you"re going to get me mixed up with anyone else, Ricky."
Ricky saw her glance at him around the side of her hood. She shot a smile at him like she enjoyed knowing his name without him knowing hers. As if it put her at an advantage, somehow.
"What happened back there. With the woman you were burying..."
"She was my mother."
"Well, I"m sorry for that," she said. "Really, I am. But it"s a tough world. And in tough worlds, people do crazy things sometimes. It doesn"t make them bad people. Sometimes, they"re just... I dunno. Lost."
Ricky thought about Mattius and the way he"d changed. And as much as he told himself Mattius was a good person, that he"d just got lost along the way, he couldn"t simply give him the benefit of the doubt. Not anymore. "Maybe so. But we are the decisions we make. If we aren"t defined by those, then what are we defined by?"
She glanced at Ricky again, like she was weighing him up; scanning him for his own losses, his own traumas. "It"s not always as simple as that."
After a few more minutes of total, serene silence, Ricky decided to be the one to break it this time. "So how about you?"
"How about me?"
"Out here on your own. It can"t always have been that way."
"Why? Because I"m a woman?"
"I didn"t mean it like that."
"You men never do."
"I"m just interested, that"s all. I want to know your story. I want to know I"m not talking with, like, a psychopathic serial killer, for example. I"ve pretty much had it up to my neck with those types."
The woman chuckled a little. "You and me both."
She didn"t answer Ricky"s question. Not right away.
"I"ve been on my own a long time," she said then. "At the start, there were others. Then something went down, as it always does in this world, and I lost them. Since then, there"s been people. The odd person here or there, just like you."
"I don"t see anyone else with us now. Doesn"t exactly fill me with optimism about my own situation."
"That"s where you"re making your mistakes, then," she said. "Showing optimism in any situation. Because nothing"s forever. Not in this world."
"It must be hard having a world-view like that."
"And it must be hard having such faith in the order of things only to have that faith torn apart repeatedly."
Ricky didn"t answer that. He figured this woman, whoever she was, had a point.
"What about your eye?" Ricky asked.
"My eye? Or my eye-hole?"
"You know what I mean."