‘Chris!’ Sarah shouted abruptly, pointing with one hand while reaching for her former boyfriend with the other.

  Some of the other car doors were beginning to open.

  The youngsters froze as Ben wheeled, looking for the quickest possible escape route.

  ‘I-It’s alright’ said Chris, stopping him in his tracks. ‘Look. They’re okay, like us...’

  Ben looked down the lines of traffic, picking out random figures as they stepped nervously onto the road. There were couples, some with frightened young children, and there were individuals too - poor shell-shocked people struck dumb by what they had seen. Then there were others that stuck out more for differing reasons; an older couple still in their dressing gowns, two teenage girls and a stocky man with tattoos. There was even a couple who Ben imagined could easily have been he and Katie ten years ago...

  Ben glanced at every person as they appeared; desperately moving from one face to another in search of his wife or the old man called Reg. When he saw neither he began to walk further along the packed highway, looking beyond them to the roundabout crammed with abandoned vehicles.

  And at that moment his heart sank...

  There, partially covered by ash and red rain mush, was a small green hatchback. The car was empty, the front and rear doors on one side left wide open, and on the ground beside it was a smeared patch of bloody rags and the gnawed remains of a ribcage.

  Ben felt himself swaying, his head spinning. The strength went out of his legs and they buckled, dropping him to his knees. Try as he might, he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the gruesome remains.

  It’s not her, he told himself. It can’t be her.

  ‘Ben…’

  The female voice came from behind him, but it wasn’t Katie. It was Sarah, standing next to Chris alongside a chubby woman with a small boy. ‘Uh, this is Joe’ said Chris, nudging the boy forward. ‘He thinks he might have seen something…’

  Ben rose to stand and wiped the sweat and grime from his eyes. His legs wobbled again as he approached the boy, crouching down on his haunches to meet the youngster’s eye level.

  ‘Hello Joe’ he croaked, trying to keep his emotions in check. ‘My name’s Ben. Can you tell me what you saw?’

  The boy looked a little frightened and glanced firstly at his mother before pointing away toward the roadside barrier. ‘The lady ran over there with an old man’ he said. ‘Then they disappeared...’

  Ben gulped and slowly stood up. ‘Thank you’ he mumbled, almost incoherently, and then turned to walk unsteadily across the road. He reached the barrier and steeled himself before looking down over the edge to the bottom of the grassy slope.

  His wife was nowhere to be seen.

  Then something else caught his eye, a glint of metal in the sprigs of grass near the top of the incline. He hooked a leg over the barrier and reached down, picking up a small silver chain bracelet.

  It was Katie’s.

  Ben doubled up as if he had been punched full in the stomach. He held onto the barrier and stared into the shadows at the base of the hill, noting the dense woodland beyond it.

  ‘Katie!’ he yelled.

  No reply came.

  Weak with despair he turned back toward the group of people behind him, noticing that the little boy called Joe was staring up at Chris and whispering to him.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Ben, trudging over to them. The boy saw him approach and immediately stopped what he was saying to the teenager. Frantically, Ben searched both their faces. ‘What is it? Come on, Chris. Tell me.’

  Chris scratched the back of his neck. ‘Uh, he says they were being chased…’

  ‘Chased...?’

  Joe looked up, his chin trembling. ‘By some of the monsters…’ he whimpered, before taking a step back in fear of Ben’s horrified expression.

  Ben turned away, his breath catching in his throat. Staring away into the distance, he started to shudder at the thought of Katie being hunted down by hordes of cannibalistic dead.

  ‘I’m sorry, Ben’ said Chris, moving closer with Sarah at his side. The little boy returned to the arms of his mother and they slowly shuffled away, joining another group of grieving people.

  Ben gulped and looked to the left along the various packed carriageways. In the far distance, between the lines of stationary vehicles, were countless ‘survivors’ with others visible further away. They were standing around, shocked by everything that had happened and unsure of what to do next. Some had collapsed in tears, their partners trying to hold them upright.

  Ben took a deep breath, fighting against a rising tide of despair. His eyes welled as he sensed the teenagers close at his shoulder.

  ‘You two should find one of these groups to go with’ he mumbled, slipping Katie’s bracelet into his pocket. ‘Try and find somewhere safe.’ Then he took a step toward the barrier before a hand grabbed his sleeve, stopping him in his tracks.

  ‘What are you doing, Ben..?’ asked Chris.

  ‘She’s still alive. I know she is. I’ve got to try and find her…’

  ‘Okay, then’ said the youngster, glancing sideways at Sarah. ‘But we’re coming with you.’

  The teenage girl gulped and looked over her shoulder at the other groups of people. Fear and uncertainty masked every one of their faces. They were broken; none of them able to guarantee her safety. Turning back to face Ben, she gave an uncertain nod.

  ~ 10 ~

  Katie Reilly struggled through the twisted mass of trees, pushing aside thorny branches that clawed at her hair and scratched her face. Her breath came in shivering gasps and her eyes were heavy with tears. Behind her, perhaps a hundred yards away, the wood continued to echo with the cracking sounds of shambling footfalls on dry twigs.

  At the same time, somewhere away in the woods to her right a scream rang out; a woman’s scream so drenched in panic and pain that it reverberated in Katie’s ears until it was dramatically cut short just seconds later. A spike of fear, like a lightning bolt, jolted through her body, forcing her to stumble away in the opposite direction.

  Tired, lost and absolutely terrified, her mind flashed back to events on the road…

  She had been leaning forward from the back seat of the car when she heard the first drops of rain on the roof, watching the old man as he turned the key in the ignition again and again.

  ‘Bloody pile of...!’

  Reg thumped the steering wheel in frustration as the engine gave a whine and died, the windscreen wipers stopping mid-sweep. He turned the key twice more, this time getting only a lifeless click matched by the vehicles all around them. Then the dashboard lights faded away completely.

  ‘What’s going on?’ yelled Katie, panicking.

  ‘I don’t know. It’s dead. The engine’s completely d-.’

  ‘Oh..my...God!’ Katie interjected. ‘What the hell is this..?’

  She was looking back and forth from windscreen to side windows, watching as they became awash with teeming crimson. In fear for Ben she lunged toward the door, but the pensioner grabbed her other hand and pulled her back before she had even touched the handle. ‘Don’t do it!’ he yelled.

  Katie tore free from him just as a noise hit her ears. Above the sound of rain on the roof she could hear something else.

  Screaming.

  Growing more intense by the second, the cries were immediately followed by buffeting bumps on both sides of the car. Bewildered, Katie leaned forward and peered through a gap in the red-spattered windscreen. She saw dozens of people, scores of them, running through the queuing traffic as if the hordes of hell were on their tail. Their flailing hands and elbows clattered against the windows and doors as they sped past. And then she saw him. Hurtling toward her, at the tail-end of one group, was Ben.

  Gasping, she yelled his name but was already too late. He hurtled past on her left hand side, not seeing or hearing her, and in the split second it took her to turn and look through the rear window he was lost from view. Just at that moment a larger mass of swarming bodies collided with the front of the car, the impact throwing her back in her seat.

  These people, men, women and children, were vacant-eyed and open-mouthed, snarling and hissing as they fought their way around the vehicle. They shambled past like overwound clockwork toys, for the moment focused on their running prey, seemingly oblivious to the terrified occupants within.

  Overcome with horror, Katie curled her body into the foetal position, throwing her hands around her head to block out the awful sounds. Shaking uncontrollably, she closed her eyes and cried into the seat.

  -crash!-

  An explosion of glass rained over her head and she looked up to see a long-haired man reaching in through the broken window. His lacerated hands scrabbled inside, finding the handle as she shimmied to the other end of the seat.

  ‘Let me in!’ the man yelled, wrenching the door open wide and throwing himself inside. Almost immediately he screamed again, this time in pain as unseen fingers dug into the flesh of his calf. For a split second his face was centimetres away from Katie’s and then he was being dragged back. In desperation his flailing hands reached out, catching first her arm and then her blonde hair, yanking it painfully as he pulled her out along with him. She screamed, trying to prise his fingers away as they both tumbled from the car and onto the road. Mercifully, at this point, he let go.

  Her scalp burning, Katie rolled over just as long-hair yelled and turned to grapple with his groaning attacker, a gangly individual with sunken eyes and black teeth. The two bodies wrestled on the wet road, long-hair’s wiry hands squeezing into the other’s neck, desperately trying to keep the snapping jaws away. Dizzy, disoriented and with a cacophony of sounds all around her, Katie suddenly felt other hands grab her from behind.

  ‘Come on!’ shouted Reg, hauling her to her feet with a surprising show of strength. ‘Come with me!’

  ‘But….where’s Ben…!’ Katie exclaimed.

  ‘He’s okay!’ the old man yelled again. ‘Follow me, he went down there!’

  Fighting through the wooziness, Katie saw that the old man was pointing at the barrier by the side of the road. With a look of determination he grabbed her firmly by the wrist and began pulling her toward it, weaving them past groups of snarling people that had wrestled other victims to the ground. Piercing screams were all around them as they reached the barrier and stepped over. Together they began to descend the grass verge.

  ‘I don’t see him!’ Katie whimpered, looking down the empty slope. ‘Where is he? Ben!’

  ‘Just keep going..!’ barked Reg. His grip on her wrist was tighter than ever, painfully so.

  ‘No!’

  Panicking, Katie pulled hard and yanked herself free, snapping the clasp of her bracelet in the same movement. Oblivious to its loss and despite the carnage taking place nearby, the recent memory of Gaz Selby’s assault again loomed large.

  ‘Come with me!’ yelled Reg, grabbing her other hand and leaning closer until she could see the urgency etched into his face. ‘Come with me now!’

  ‘No! Get away from m-’

  Katie started to pull away again, but the combination of wet grass and the sharp angle of the slope threw her off balance. She slipped, and in his effort to keep hold of her, so did the old man. Down the verge they tumbled, rolling over and over until they reached the bottom, finally coming to a halt in the centre of a muddy ditch with dense woodland behind it. Katie clambered to her feet first, covered in leaves and mud and bits of grass.

  ‘You lied to me..!’ she yelled, her voice crackling with a combination of anger and grief. The old man rose much more slowly, glasses askew and with a grimace on his face. He put a shaking hand to a fresh cut on his forehead and glared back at her. Then, at that exact moment, a scream rang out from atop the slope.

  It was long-hair’s scream, a screech so ear-splittingly high that Katie knew that the man was being torn apart. She looked back up the hill, just in time to see scores of swaying silhouettes gathering against the hazy sky.

  ‘My...God..!’

  Katie did not wait for the first dark shape to take a step forward. Instead she wheeled away from Reg and threw herself into the woods, pushing through thick, clinging foliage. Seconds later the mass of creatures began to descend from the top of the slope, tumbling down the hill like ninepins.

  That was ten minutes ago; ten terrifying minutes of scrambling through bushes and darting between trees. But for all her haste Katie Reilly was still being followed - the sounds of rustling branches and cracking twigs told her that much. The only positive was that she seemed to be putting some distance between them.

  ‘Please…’

  Katie’s heart jumped and she stopped in her tracks, leaning against the nearest wide trunk. Had she imagined it – was that a woman’s voice...? Holding her breath, she strained through the rhythmic rush of blood in her ears to listen more intently.

  ‘Please...please help me...’

  The voice, weak and trembling, was drifting through the forest from around twenty feet away. Desperately trying to hold her fear at bay, Katie moved around the side of the tree and dared to look. Crawling slowly along the forest floor toward her was a dark-haired woman, her ragged body drenched in blood, a shard of white bone jutting through her dirty jeans just below the knee.

  Katie clasped a hand over her gasping mouth and took a backward step as the woman saw her and stretched out a pleading arm.

  ‘Please help...me...’

  As the woman spoke a deep wound yawned open on the side of her pale face. Her outstretched forearm had been mutilated; the flesh ripped away on one side to leave a flap of skin hanging like a torn sleeve. Her other arm was an even more horrifying sight; great chunks of flesh eaten away right up to her hand where only two fingers now remained. Her belly was exposed too, revealing a gaping wound from which a glistening loop of pink intestine dangled free.

  Katie almost retched.

  ‘Please...’ the mangled figure pleaded again, weaker but even more desperate, and finally Katie reacted. She dropped to her knees, taking the woman’s hand in her own, instantly aware of how cold and clammy it was.

  At that moment their eyes locked.

  Katie was about to speak but stopped herself before a word had formed. She knew that there was nothing she could do or say. This woman was going to die...

  ‘Thank...y-‘

  The whimpering voice trailed off, the woman’s grip growing limp as a strange look of serenity flooded over her face. Slowly, she slumped sideways onto the forest floor, her blank gaze fixed on the blonde-haired stranger that had held her hand in her final moments.

  And then she moved no more.

  Katie was numb at first but then an aching grief took over. For countless seconds she remained kneeling next to the dead woman, staring into the cold, pale face. Katie wondered what her name had been, if she had been a wife, or a sister, or a mother. And then she wondered if somewhere a loved one was looking for this woman, destined never to find her and never to know her fate...

  Lost in a haze of hopelessness Katie did not hear the staggering figure approaching from behind until it was right upon her. Only then, at the very last moment, as a twig cracked and a man’s hand fell on her shoulder did she jump up with a scream on her lips.

  ‘Shhh!’

  A grubby palm instantly clamped over her mouth, muffling her cry. She tried to pull away, fighting her attacker for a few seconds before realisation struck her like a bolt of lightning.

  It was Reg.

  ‘Shhh! Be quiet!’ he hissed, leaning close to her ear. ‘Listen, pet. I’m not going to hurt you, but you have to be quiet. Okay?’

  ‘Mmmfff!’ Katie struggled again but the pensioner’s grip remained secure. He gritted his teeth and held her tightly, smothering her writhing limbs until slowly, over the course of half a minute, her resistance began to weaken.

  ‘I told you’ Reg repeated breathlessly, ‘I won’t hurt you. Now, for God’s sake, are you going to be quiet..?’ Gradually Katie grew calmer and she gave a weary nod. The old man slowly released his grip and took a step back, his palms raised in peace. ‘I won’t hurt you, pet’ he mumbled again as she turned to face him. She looked into his eyes and a different emotion began to flood through her, one she had not expected.

  Shame.

  In her panic she had abandoned Reg and now he looked ready to drop. His face was grey and covered in mud and sweat. The lenses of his glasses were partially misted with perspiration and blood dripped from a nasty cut on his forehead.

  ‘Oh my God’ she whispered. ‘Are you okay..?’

  The pensioner put a hand to his head and looked at the blood on his fingers. ‘I hit it when we fell’ he said softly. Then his attention drifted to the prone body of the dead woman, her glazed eyes still staring blankly into space. A moment later sounds of movement began to filter through the forest around them. ‘We have to go’ he muttered. ‘It’s not safe here.’

  Katie nodded, biting her lip. ‘Look. About before, I’m so sorry. But Ben-‘

  ‘It’s my fault’ said the old man, cutting her short. ‘I lied to you, and I’m sorry. I knew that we had to get off the road or we were done for. But if we got away from there, maybe he did too...’

  With that Reg stooped to pick up a thick broken branch and turned to move as quietly as he could through the trees. Katie took one last look at the woman’s body behind her and slowly followed him, thoughts somersaulting through her mind.

  Ben was alive. He had to be.

  He was alive, and they would find each other again.

  He was alive, and now she had to stay alive too.

  She was through being a victim.

  ~ 11 ~

  For the next twelve minutes Reg and Katie worked their way through the forest as silently as they were able. Their eyes darted constantly left and right, responding to every rustling leaf and every distant scream or groan. They were being followed, of that there was no doubt. Somewhere in the woods behind them were God knows how many of those deranged people.

 

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