Vampire Apocalypse: A World Torn Asunder (Book 1) (18 page)

Pritchard had a witty response
all ready but shrugged as he realised that no-one would hear him
anyway and instead he crossed the room and helped Jenny and Bill
Anderson to their feet. They both blinked profusely and rubbed at
their eyes, trying to get rid of the spots swirling in front of
them. “Don’t worry it’ll pass,” he shouted to them but gave up when
they looked at him in confusion. Great, he thought, now I’ve got to
talk to myself until the effects of the blast wear off.

Over by the wall he heard Scott
help Hackett to his feet and only then noticed the other
white-coated technician. He crossed quickly to the man and shouted
into his face.

“What’s your name?”

“R...Roberts,” the man stammered
in reply though whether he had heard him and read his lips he
wasn’t sure.

Either way he couldn’t resist
another quip. “Well, Roberts, it’s your lucky day. You’ve just
joined the resistance.”

Harris felt the air rush past
him while he fell. Henshaw was still slumped over his shoulder from
the tackle, still dazed from taking the brunt of the impact through
the window, and Harris tried to turn in mid-air to avoid his friend
taking the full impact. Amazingly he had time to think of Butch
Cassidy and the Sundance Kid making their famous leap over the
waterfall before the impact came and darkness enveloped him.

John Kelly jumped when the
explosion came. He looked up in time to see two men crash through
the third floor window and fall toward him. They seemed to twist in
the air, and then they hit the ground with a sickening thud.

Neither moved.

“Oh, Jesus,” Kelly muttered as
he ran to the two figures. His hands quickly found the artery in
Handsaw’s neck and he sighed when he found a faint pulse. “This
one’s still alive,” he shouted to Ashley as the man approached.
“See if you can make him comfortable, but for God’s sake don’t move
him.”

Kelly had already moved on to
the other figure. His hands searched for a pulse. “Oh no,” he
whispered when his fingers detected nothing. He clasped his fingers
together and pumped Harris” chest, counted, then pressed again. He
stopped to blow into Harris” mouth and then checked again for a
pulse.

Nothing.

“Come on, Harris,” he urged
while he continued CPR. Push, count, blow and then a second time,
push, count, blow. Sweat ran freely from his brow and he became
more desperate. He straddled Harris and used all his weight to pump
against his chest. “Come on, you bastard. You can’t die on us
now.”

Harris suddenly jerked and made
a loud rattling noise as he sucked air into his starved lungs.

“Thank God,” Kelly sighed.
“Don’t try to move yet. We have to see what damage you’ve done.”
Kelly gently patted along Harris” body and watched for any
reaction. Harris” left arm was bent behind him at an unnatural
angle and Kelly lifted him gently to free the limb. Harris gritted
his teeth as pain swept over him and he nearly passed out
again.

“Okay,” Kelly soothed, “it looks
like you got off lightly. Your left arm is fucked, but the rest of
you seems to be okay. Can you try sitting up?”

“I didn’t know that “fucked” was
an official medical diagnosis.” Harris winced when he tried to sit
up.

“It is when you’re dealing with
crazy bastards who jump out of windows,” Kelly replied. “How do you
feel?”

“Dizzy,” Harris replied.

“Okay, stay there and it’ll
pass.” Kelly turned to Ashley. “How is Henshaw?” he asked.

“He’s awake, but he says he
can’t lift his legs.”

“Henshaw,” Kelly bent over the
prone figure, “I’m going to lift you to a sitting position, so hold
on.” Henshaw screamed when Kelly lifted his shoulders.

“Pain is a good sign,” Kelly
encouraged, “it means you’re not paralysed.”

Harris looked over to his friend
and the two men grinned at each other.

“Anything that doesn’t kill ya
only makes you stronger,” Henshaw managed between gritted teeth. “I
really hate to bring this up, but how the hell are we going to get
back to the meeting point in this state?”

Kelly scratched his head and
looked around, and then a broad grin appeared on his face. “Wait
there, I have an idea.”

With that he sprinted across the
street and disappeared behind the house. Harris lifted his left arm
across his body and laid it in his lap to look at his watch.

Five minutes late already, he
thought, we’ll never make it at this rate.

Chapter 18

The burst of fire impacted
against the table that Reiss hid behind and sprayed debris into his
eyes. He recoiled back behind the cover and looked around him to
gauge how many of his men were still alive. Rodgers lay over by the
stairs with his arm cradled in his lap. Tyson and Williams lay
crumpled against the far wall; the angle of their necks left no
doubt as to their condition. Fischer, Price and Wentworth all
scrambled for whatever cover they could find. The others all lay
still and Reiss couldn’t tell whether they were alive or dead.

He briefly considered using a
grenade, but in these close confines the blast could cause as much
injury to his own men as to the thralls. He rolled to his right,
pointed his machine gun in the thralls” general direction and
pulled the trigger. The thralls answered his fire and drove him
back behind his cover.

Damn! He thought. This isn’t
getting us anywhere.

Suddenly a door opened at the
top of the stairs and three thralls appeared. They opened fire and
Price and Wentworth screamed as bullets ripped through them.
Fischer made a break for the window to try to avoid the deadly
crossfire but, unfortunately, got caught by both sides and bullets
thumped into his body. The thralls neared the end of the stairs and
Reiss knew that they’d see Rodgers any second. He shouted a warning
and let loose a sustained blast. He ignored the bullets that
ricocheted around him and smiled in satisfaction when he saw two of
the thralls fall and tumble down the remaining steps.

The thralls behind Reiss used
the distraction to their advantage and advanced on his position
before he could bring his weapon around. Bullets flew all around
him, destroying the furniture in front of him. The volume of fire
became too much. “All right, all right, I surrender!” he shouted
over the racket and threw his weapon down.

The remaining thrall from
upstairs reached the ground floor and kicked Rodgers viciously. He
even spat on the wounded man as an added insult. The lead thrall
grabbed Reiss and threw him roughly to the ground. When he thought
about it later he realised that act probably saved his life.

The back door suddenly flew open
and he caught a brief glimpse of Jenkins before bullets again
decimated the small foyer. The noise was thunderous as bullets
strafed around the room. Bodies jerked violently in a grotesque
dance and then fell to the ground. Reiss remained on the ground
with his hands over his head until Jenkins approached him and
signalled the all-clear.

Reiss got to his feet and looked
around him at the new carnage.

My God, how many have to die
before this nightmare ends, he thought. He went to help
Rodgers.

“We’ve got two more alive here,”
Jenkins said as he examined some of the unmoving team members.
“That makes twelve still alive, but only six mobile for now.”

He saw some of the men picking
themselves up around the room and staggering over to help their
team-mates.

Twelve still alive still means
eight dead, Reiss thought. Eight good men dead in, he looked at his
watch, only twenty minutes. “Okay, people,” he said, “those who can
walk, follow me. Rodgers, get the wounded to the trucks. We’ve
still got to get those supplies out and we’ve just run out of
time.”

Warkowski led his family through
the streets as quickly as his broken ribs would allow. The morning
light had burned away all the shadows so they kept to the side
streets as much as possible. He hoped they didn’t meet a patrol.
The girls could only walk at a slow pace and his own appearance
would be impossible to hide. He cursed the serum for the umpteenth
time that night.

He was already ten minutes
late.

If all had gone to plan, his
colleagues would have loaded up and left at this stage, but he had
to believe that his sacrifices over the last hour counted for
something, and he continued on, hoping that, somehow, they could
still get home. In the distance he heard a strange scraping sound,
metal on concrete, and he frowned. It wasn’t any engine he had ever
heard and, intrigued, he led the girls in the direction of the
noise.

The noise grew louder. He
motioned for the girls to stay put while he continued on to
investigate. Just ahead of him, about a hundred and fifty yards
down the street, he saw three men struggling to pull a car hood.
The metal scrapped along the concrete in short spurts and their
exertion was obvious even at this distance. A third man walked
along beside them, helping at intervals, but was himself injured
and of little real help.

“That’s Harris!” Warkowski
muttered. The feeling of elation was quickly squashed by the
realisation that he was here without permission. He could ignore
the struggling party and go around. Even at his slow pace he would
be at the meeting point before Harris, but he knew he could not do
that. The men needed his help and, despite leaving his position
earlier, Warkowski did not consider himself a quitter or a
deserter. He rushed back to his family and led them out of hiding
to hail the group ahead.

“Harris!” he shouted.

The three men stopped and looked
to the source of the shout.

“Who is that?” Ashley asked. He
squinted, trying to focus on the approaching figures.

“Isn’t that Warkowski?” Kelly
replied. “But who’s that with him?”

Harris waited for the three
figures to approach and looked at the two girls before he locked
Warkowski in a withering gaze. “You couldn’t wait.”

Warkowski couldn’t hold the gaze
and dropped his eyes to his feet as he shifted uncomfortably. “I’m
sorry, Peter. I really am, but I couldn’t bear to think of them in
this hellhole alone. To be so close and do nothing . . .”

His voice trailed off and Harris
watched Warkowski put his arm protectively around his family. He
was a bear of a man, his arms as thick as tree trunks, but Harris
could see the tenderness with which he treated them.

“You better hope nobody dies
because you left your post.” Harris stared at Warkowski, his eyes
hard as steel, and then his face softened. “How are they?”

“Petrified. That damned serum.
Goddamn it, Harris, what kind of monster traps people in their own
bodies like that? She’s only nine years old,” he replied. Tears of
frustration welled up in Warkowski's eyes, and thin rivulets crept
down his blood-encrusted face.

“You look as bad as I feel,”
Harris said softly. “Come on, put her on our carriage and let’s get
out of here. We’re already way too late.”

Warkowski scooped up his
daughter in his arms as if she weighed nothing and laid her gently
on the hood with Henshaw. He then moved around front and took up
position. The sound of metal scraping on concrete began again and
its echo reverberated through the empty streets.

Jenkins led the way down the
stairs to the basement. The rest of his team followed, favouring
different injuries.

What a sorry group we make,
Reiss thought while he watched his team stumble and limp its way to
the supplies. I hope we don’t meet any more thralls.

The group spread out once they
reached the bottom and approached the racks of food and supplies
that filled the majority of the basement area.

“My God, I’ve never seen so much
food in one place. We’ve hit the jackpot, guys.” Jenkins grinned
like a cat in a creamery.

“Okay, people, let’s get to
work,” Reiss ordered. “Oh, Jenkins, when you drop off the first
load at the trucks send the drivers back here to help. The wounded
can mind the vehicles. We need every able bodied man to shift this
lot.”

They went to work.

They’d been moving the supplies
for ten minutes when they heard the distant rumble.

“Did you hear that?” Jenkins
asked.

“Yea, it never ends, does it?”
Reiss replied and grabbed his machinegun. “You guys continue with
this and I’ll check it out.”

He disappeared up the stairs,
exited out to the street and ran towards the approaching noise.
When he reached the end of the street he skidded to a halt. The
noise was suddenly deafening this close and Reiss risked a quick
glance around the corner, then blanched and collapsed back against
the wall in shock.

“Jesus, a tank.”

Harris lay in a gully and
watched while the tank thundered down the narrow street. There
wasn’t much room for it to manoeuvre so it crushed any cars and
debris in its path. Its progress was slow, thankfully, but it was
advancing steadily and would soon be in range of the others.

“Warkowski, get Henshaw and the
girls out to the trucks and warn the others. Kelly, Ashley, follow
me.” The men hurried to their assigned tasks and Harris” heart
hammered in his chest while he watched the approaching behemoth. It
can’t get much worse, he thought wryly.

It was at that point that he
heard the thumping of the helicopter.

Warkowski stumbled over the
debris made by their initial assault and saw the trucks beyond.
Sweat poured from his body and his ribs ached from the exertion of
carrying Henshaw and Jill, but still he smiled when he saw the men
loading the supplies.

“We’ll have you safely tucked up
in bed soon,” he whispered to his daughter and kissed her lightly
on the forehead.

He made his way down to the
vehicles and laid his charges in the furthest truck. The other two
were completely full with supplies. He hugged his family with
intensity and then turned to one of the men.