“We are.” Olga checked up and down the wide road and led them out of there.
“How do you know your way already?” William said, following Olga down another tight alley. “Everywhere looks the same.”
“I don’t trust Gracie, so I paid attention to where she led us. You can never be too careful, can you?”
“Apparently not.”
At the end of every alley, Olga had done the same thing, this one no different. She paused, poked her head into the road, looked one way and then the other, and led them out. Although, unlike every other occasion, this time the city opened up, a large mall in front of them. A vast and ugly building. It took up more space than it had any right to. Made predominantly from rusting steel, it had once been painted white, but most of the paint had since peeled off.
They closed in on the derelict metal monstrosity, crossing the open plain of asphalt that surrounded it on every side. Like every other road in the area, nature had begun its reclamation of the land. Cracks dominated the black surface. Shoots of green packed each one, grassy tendrils of enquiry before they swamped the city for good. What would this place look like in fifty years’ time? How long had it taken to get to this state?
“Gracie told us a bit more about this place after we’d lost the drone. She called this the car park,” Olga said, all three of them jogging side by side. “Apparently, people drove large metal vehicles, came here on their days off, and spent their time walking around the shops, buying shit they didn’t need. It seems like a waste of a life to me.”
Matilda shook her head. “I don’t get it either. And this is where you last saw—”
“Over there,” Olga said. She pointed at a wide sprawl of dead diseased. “Jeez, I didn’t realise there were that many. Hawk and the others went one way, Gracie, Dianna, and myself went the other. They must have drawn them out into the open to make them easier to fight.”
Many of the corpses had glistening holes, puncture wounds from Hawk’s and Artan’s knives. Many more had smashed-in skulls and distorted faces. They’d been bludgeoned by something hard and angular. “What was Hawk playing at?” William said. “There must be a hundred of them.”
Olga shrugged. “I’m not sure even Hawk could answer that question. Although, to be fair to him, from where we stood, there was no telling how many there were. Also, by the look of things, it probably won’t help our cause to get him to wind his neck in when we do reunite with them.”
“What do you mean?” William said.
“Well, if this is anything to go by, it looks like the three of them got away. Hawk went to war and won. That might make it much harder to convince him his actions were reckless. And I doubt he’s aware of the impact on Max.” Olga looked away from the pile of bodies, her eyes losing focus.
“Look!” Matilda pointed at the ground. The twisted and savaged corpses lay in a lake of their own blood. Crimson footsteps led away from it, the early morning light revealing a shining trail.
“Well, at least we know which way they went,” William said. He rested a hand on Olga’s back. “We can help Max when we find him. Hopefully, we’ll be able to rest up in Gracie’s community. Come on, let’s go.”
Olga gulped and nodded. She took the lead again. They followed the shining footsteps towards the large mall.
“Please tell me they didn’t go back in there,” William said.
The steps had grown fainter the farther away they were from the bloody mess of diseased. “It doesn’t look like they did,” Matilda said. Almost invisible, she pointed at the faintly glistening remnants of their path out of there. It caught the light like a slug trail. “I think they went around.”
The first building in the next street stood as an enormous cube with a roof. Each side stretched at least one hundred feet long. A functional building, aesthetics be damned. “It reminds me of the barns in Edin,” William said. “A place built for storage. Dad took me—” A lump swelled in his throat, robbing him of his words.
“It has a fire escape,” Olga said. “We should get on top of it and see if we can see the boys.”
William coughed to clear the lump in his throat. His eyes itched with the start of tears.
Matilda said, “Just lead the way and we’ll follow.”
The wall of the building made from bare red brick, it had small windows in it that looked like they were there for ventilation. When they finally reached a window they could peer into, Olga poked her head inside.
She snapped back so quickly, William jumped, teetering on the edge of his balance, his heels hanging over the last stair he’d climbed. Olga’s face had turned several shades paler. “What is it?” William said.
Olga stepped aside so William could look in. He approached on tiptoes and held his breath as he peered into the warehouse. A chill snaked through him. As he pulled away, he mouthed one word at Olga. Fuck!
Chapter 24
The inside of the building had been as William had expected. A vast open space without walls. It had been designed for storage. Although, he hadn’t expected to find the entire first floor covered with sleeping bodies. At least, they all appeared to be asleep. Many of them snored and grunted while they dozed, some of them entangled on the floor, lying across one another like post-coital lovers. The place reeked of rot, dirt, and flatulence. The collective funk of a warehouse filled with scavengers.
Olga hissed, “There must be four hundred of them in there.” She backed away.
“And that’s on the first floor,” William said.
Olga pointed down. “You think there’s more below?”
“Who
