Part 25 (1/2)

He looked up, his jaw quivering, and he faced up to what he had to do.

He wasn't going to die here. He couldn't die here. So he only had one choice.

He had to get away from here and leave his mother's body behind for the zombies to... do whatever they had to.

He had to run.

He had to- He saw movement, then. The nearest zombie to him.

Its skull split in two.

Then the one beside it fell as well.

There was someone here.

There was someone helping him.

”Catch!” she shouted.

It took him a few seconds to register, but he realised the woman had thrown something to him. A knife. Small, but big enough to take out a few of the dead.

He stabbed a zombie in its temple, its wayward eyes flickering all over the place.

Then he got another, right over the head. And before he knew it, they were down. All of the zombies were down.

He stood there, a circle of zombies around his mum's grave, and he looked over at the woman.

She was wearing brown shoes, blue jeans, and a hooded waterproof jacket in blue. Ricky couldn't see her face.

”Who are you?” he asked.

She pulled back her hood, and he saw that she was missing an eye.

”It doesn't matter who I am. What matters is we get away from here and get to safety, fast. There's something coming. Something big. And it's heading in our direction.”

Chapter Nine.

”Come on, Riley. I know it hurts. I know this isn't easy. But we have to move. Right now.”

Riley eased off the edge of the table that he'd been strapped against until Melissa's arrival. When he moved, he realised his back was stiff, and his neck was aching like mad. There were sores on his skin, too. Sores that'd rubbed into him after however long he'd been tied up down here.

But nothing was worse than the stumps where the two fingers had been severed from his left hand.

Kane's last laugh.

”We have to get to Amy,” Melissa said. ”And the others. Your fingers. You think you'll be okay?”

”Kesha-”

”We'll get to Kesha. But Amy's locked down here, too. She's a few doors down. They probably heard my gunshot, though, so we don't have much time. Did you hear what I just asked about your fingers?”

Riley nodded. He still felt sick and dizzy from the pain, but he had to pull it together. He had to rescue Amy, Siobhan, and Carly. They'd come this far with him. They'd helped him. He couldn't just leave them behind to die.

He staggered towards the door and puked up right beside Kane. He felt better for it, in truth. Sure, it reeked, and sure, the taste was so bad it made him want to throw up again, but it was good to get it out of his body.

He felt like he was getting rid of all the badness that had been in his system, purging himself of the encounter, the showdown with Kane.

He looked at Kane's body, then. Every now and then, his finger twitched, and it made Riley's stomach turn with fear.

But then he remembered he couldn't show fear. If he felt fearful, then that meant Kane had won.

He leaned beside him and put a hand on his b.l.o.o.d.y face.

”I told you I'd have the last laugh,” he said, staring into those piercing eyes. ”I told you I'd win.”

He closed Kane's eyes and he stood up.

Then, with Melissa by his side, the pair of them left the room, and left Kane on the floor, as alone in death as he had been in life.

They stopped when they reached the door. Riley could hear footsteps walking in their direction. Melissa still had a pistol, but he wasn't sure how much ammo she had left. He was holding a knife now, though, that she'd given him.

They waited as the footsteps pa.s.sed. They slowed down, right by their door.

”Swear it came from down here,” a man's gruff voice said.

”Nah. It was further down. We're not to go in there anyway. That's where Kane's dealing with Riley.”

”Kane?”

”That nutter. The one Mattius likes.”

”Oh. s.h.i.+t. Yeah, he gives me the creeps.”

Melissa turned the handle of the door slowly. Riley figured she didn't want to risk these people reaching the rooms where Amy, Siobhan, and Carly were being kept.

She stepped around the door slowly but surely. She lifted her gun, pointed it at the back of one of the two men.

Riley touched her arm, lowered it, and then nodded.

He crept towards the men. Kept his movement as swift and as fluid as he possibly could.

He picked up his pace as he got closer.