He needed to get to Kelly.
He needed to get to their home.
He needed to make sure they were okay.
Because he didn’t understand what was happening. He didn’t understand what this was.
But he knew one thing for sure.
These helicopters were the cause of these deaths.
They were the source of so much death.
And if they reached the industrial estate, they would be the cause of even more death, even more suffering.
He ran through the trees. Stepped out onto the hill. The industrial estate in sight. People standing at the gates, standing in front of it.
“Get away!” Noah shouted. “Get back!”
They looked up at him. Some of them holding rifles. Some pointing in his direction.
“Get inside! Get away! Now! Get…”
He went to shout again when his heart skipped a beat.
He saw her.
Standing there.
Right at the fence.
Looking right at him.
Her one eye staring up, wide.
“Kelly,” he said.
Up above, the eight helicopters moved closer towards the industrial estate. That film, that mist, it filled the air now. Made a fogginess between them.
Noah ran down the hill towards that. Determined to reach them. Determined to warn them. “Get back! Kelly, get back! Get inside! Get everyone inside!”
He kept on running down the hill as the helicopters got closer.
Kept on running down the hill as they kept on pumping that mist out.
Kept on running and running as the mist filled the air and blocked his vision, as the helicopters got closer to the industrial estate, out of sight behind that mist now.
He kept on running, until he heard it.
First, a strange silence.
Like the air had been sucked out of the atmosphere.
A silence, then a series of screams.
He stood there in the mist and listened to the gasps.
Listened to the cries.
Listened to the agonised howls of terror.
Of agony.
The gunshots.
The shouts.
The desperate pleas for help.
“Kelly,” he said.
He ran through the mist towards the industrial estate. He just wanted to know. He just wanted to see.
The more he ran, the louder those cries grew.
The more he ran, the more pained they got.
And then he stepped beyond the mist, and he saw it.
The helicopters passing over.
The industrial estate, standing right in the distance.
The bodies.
People.
People reaching out. Clutching their throats. So many people. Crying blood. Gargling vomit.
“Kelly?” Noah said, stepping closer towards the place. Bruno close by his side.
When he stepped towards the fence, he noticed something.
Kelly wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
He moved a little quicker.
“Kel—”
“Noah?”
He looked around.
Kelly stood there.
Covered in blood.
But alive.
Covered in blood, but alive.
“What’s… what’s happening?” she asked.
He walked over to her. Wrapped his arm around her. The smell and sounds of death and chaos lighting up the air. Screams all around them. Men, women, children. People running through the streets—the ones who were still alive, still surviving, desperately trying to get their kids into their homes, even though it was already too late.
“What’s happening, Noah?” Kelly asked. Tears smearing her blood-soaked cheeks. “What is this?”
Noah looked around at the fallen bodies. He looked at the dead kids. The crying children clutching their parents’ chest.
He looked up at the hills, over towards the mass of fallen Society and Reds.
And then he looked off into the distance, over towards those helicopters, disappearing ahead.
“It’s the end,” he said.
“The end? Of what?”
He swallowed a lump in his throat and felt a tightness deep in his chest. “Of everything.”
Chapter Forty-Eight
Doctor Watkinson sat in the offshore lab and stared at the screen ahead of him.
He watched the people fall. Watched them clutch their throats. Watched the children scream. The women drag their bloodied bodies across the floor.
He watched it all, and he felt two things.
Guilt.
And pride.
He glanced at the other screens in the labs.
Saw more helicopters across the country.
More scenes like this.
Phase Two. The beginning.
The end.
He removed his glasses.
Wiped a tear from his eye.
And then he reached into his desk, lifted a pistol, and put it into his mouth.
His work here was done.
He closed his eyes, thought of sunshine and laughter, and then he pulled the trigger.
END OF BOOK 8
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The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author. Any reference to real locations is only for atmospheric effect, and in no way truly represents those locations.
Copyright © 2020 by Ryan Casey
Cover design by MibLart
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Published by Higher Bank Books
