“Postman? You there? Over.”

  A click came from her radio, indicating he was, but he wasn’t able to speak.

  She saw a few of the attackers appear on the yacht. Each moving to a different downed guard. Crouching, doing something beyond her view. To her astonishment one of the attackers, pulled one of the unconscious guards to his feet and started dragging him down the ramp to the dock. The same happened from the top deck, where it was the young man she had seen arguing, being taken off the boat. But what happened next was even stranger.

  The pop of bullets echoed out, as the other attackers, shot, methodically all the guards that were still left onboard. They were being executed.

  Those in the black body armor then got back in the van, with their human cargo and left, driving back the way they had come.

  Ramses’ voice came from her radio. “That was an interesting. Over.”

  “What the hell was that. At first I thought it was good old fashioned gang on gang conflict,” she replied. “But it was specific. They wanted the people they took away. And I’ve never seen body armor that good, because a few of them, definitely were hit. Over.”

  On the dock, Ramses emerged from the shadows walking to where the van was parked and looked down at the splatter of blood on the concrete then held his radio to his mouth. “It wasn’t their body armor that saved them. They were vamps.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Todd awoke and immediately winced from his swollen eye. It hadn’t closed but his vision on that side was through a hazy slit. Cash was resting by his side and Evelyn and her kid hadn’t moved one inch from when he saw them hours earlier. Nor had Cash’s barking made them stir. He had to admit it was a bit odd. He leaned forward slightly to better see if their chests were rising and falling and they were, although the closer he got to them, the more his skin crawled. A reaction he couldn’t quite explain. He blinked a few times while stretching. He had no idea how long he had been out, but he felt a little less drained than before, despite his aching eye. He stood up, quietly opened the door and walked into the corridor closing the door behind. He looked to his right. The large room with the parking area at the far end was empty of people, although the vehicles were still there. Including the large SUV which was missing from earlier. He still hadn’t got a complete handle on the layout of the place. The corridor he was in, had four doors. The small room he just left. The one at the far end which he knew ran to the lab area, the one opposite where he was standing which ran to the sewers and the storage area, and then another door. An exit he had not been through yet. He walked up to it, and listened. Faint sounds came from beyond. It sounded like music being played.

  For now though, he needed some answers, so he turned and walked to where he knew the scientist was working and pushed open the door.

  He looked at the gurney to the right and was glad to only see disheveled blankets on it.

  “Hey, partner,” said Cole, sitting on a bench at one of the long counter tops. “Shit. You look worse than I do and I was attacked by a lion.”

  Todd forced a smile. “So now we got to deal with vampires and apex predators.”

  Cole nodded towards the door. “They still sleeping?”

  Todd nodded, then looked at Morgan who was bent over slightly looking into a microscope. “What’s the plan for them? We got, what—” he looked at the clock on the wall. “— three hours before sundown?”

  “The plan is you roll up your sleeve so I can do to you what I have just been doing to the firefighter, here…”

  “Right…”

  Cole laughed, holding up his arm and the small plaster over the inside of it.

  “You want to take samples of my blood?” said Todd to Morgan.

  For the first time since he entered the room, she stood up, moving away from the eyepieces. “We learned something very important when you, August and the others visited the factory. That—”

  He remembered the conversation in the bunker. “Immune blood, helps those infected. Keeps them human or something?”

  She held up a vial of blood. “That’s what he said and from my studies, he would seem to be correct. I would of course, tried this as a remedy eventually anyway, but good to know so I can save time. All I have to do is administer it to them and hopefully, tonight will be a little less traumatic for Evelyn and her daughter.”

  Todd felt a weight fall from his shoulders and he sat on the nearby stool. “That’s… good. They deserve to get through this.”

  Morgan walked to a refrigeration unit, opening it and pulling out an ice pack. “Here, put this on the eye, it will help.”

  He gladly did. “Where does the other door lead to, out there?”

  “I assume you’re talking about the door to the living quarters? There are three more levels below us, full of rooms. We could house a thousand people down there. Not that August would ever do that, but you know… we could.” She picked up two syringes. “Right. I’m going to go do my doctor thing then get a few hours rest. It’s been a long day.”

  She walked to the door, stopping before leaving then turned back around. “There are ropes in the green box in their room.” She held up the syringes. “Probably a good idea to tie them up, in case these don’t work.”

  Todd nodded and she left, leaving the two men in silence.

  “You planning on staying with them?” said Cole.

  For a moment Todd thought he meant Evelyn and Zoe, but then realized he meant the gang. “They seem the safest bet in all this craziness.”

  Cole nodded. “Yeah… When I found a way out of the collapsed bank building. I was ready to find a car and just head for the hills. Literally. But then I thought. What if everywhere is like this? And I’m just going to be one guy by himself against thousands of those things I saw take the lion down. What if every town is the same?”

  It was an idea Todd hadn’t entertained. That the world, truly had ended. He hadn’t had a chance to imagine the devastation beyond the city boundaries and surrounding counties. They were all now living in a different reality and he knew he needed to get with the plan, sooner rather than later.

  The frozen pack was beginning to soothe the throbbing from his eye. “There has to be somewhere else that got through this. We just need to hang around here until we learn of it.”

  Cole stood up. “That’s a great idea, if we can prove ourselves useful, and they let us stay… Anyway, I was told to use one of the empty rooms downstairs. I’m going to get some shuteye.”

  Cole left and Todd made his way back to where he was before in the corridor. As he pushed open the door to the small room, it was obvious why August had chosen this confined space to stash the mother and her child that could rip everyone’s throats out, if left unattended. It was away from everyone else. Two vamps couldn’t do much damage in there.

  He walked inside, closing the door and claimed the white pieces of ropes from where Morgan had told him they would be, then beginning with Evelyn, tied her ankles then wrists securely. He moved on to Zoe and sat back on the floor, pulling his handgun out and letting it and his hand rest in his lap. If they ripped through the ropes and began to try to do the same to him, he had enough bullets left to put them back to sleep, permanently.

  *****

  Shouts and booms drifted within Todd’s mind. He was lost within a dreamscape of smoke and flame. Explosions shuddered the ground beneath his feet, bathing him in heat that singed his skin. He was running, but had no idea to where. Just that he had to do something. Had to get to a place where it would be safe. For them. For the ones he was—

  He was shaken awake by a tough grip on his shoulder. Through blurry eyes he looked into Daryl’s bearded face.

  “We’re being attacked! Get your shit together and—”

  The crack of bullets came from somewhere distant… For a fraction of a moment he struggled to disentangle his dream from what was real. The sound repeated and he flicked his head towards the open door.

  Tunnels.

  Uneasily he stood, his knees complaining of the effort. “Yeah, I’m coming.” He suddenly remembered the two others in the room, that hadn’t even flinched during the ruckus. He looked at the younger man. “What time is it?”

  More muffled shouts came somewhere beyond the door. Daryl moved to it, peering slowly outside. “What the hell’s that got to do with anything?”

  “Is it dark? Has the sun gone down?”

  “I don’t know! Maybe! You coming or not?”

  Cash barked near his feet and he looked at the two still sleeping and the ropes binding them. The knots were tight. They will hold. He nodded to the man, checked the magazine in his gun and moved into the corridor closing the door behind.

  The gunfire was coming from the old sewers, from where Cole had reentered hours before. They moved towards the entrance, as another opened and a bleary-eyed Callum stumbled out of it, holding his own handgun.

  “What the actual fuck is happening,” said the younger of the three.

  “Can’t you tell?” said Daryl.

  Callum scrunch his face in confusion, then followed the other two through the door. Shouts guided them and they quickly made their way to the stairs which ran down to the first set of old tunnels, which August had shown him earlier. At the bottom a few of the gang were on the ground, blood oozing from various wounds. Morgan’s clothes were smeared with other’s blood. She looked up as Todd approached.

  “Who’s attacking?” he said.

  “We don’t know! But they’re fast and hard to put—”

  Shouts and more gunfire pulled their attention to the tunnel, and the sparks of light which ignited in the dark and the bodies that were emerging from the gloom.

  Cole ran to them, bending over, out of breath, dropping his AK-47 against the Victorian brick. He shook his head. “I don’t know if we can hold them back… They got body armor or something.”

  Ramses hurried down the stairs, an M2 light machine gun on a strap across his shoulder, its fully loaded magazine hanging out the side. “It’s not armor!” he said, running past them all and into the darkness.

  Todd picked up the rifle, checking the magazine. “You mind if I borrow this?” Cole waved his hand and Todd with Daryl ran after August’s bodyguard.

  Callum stood awkwardly. “I’ll make sure no one comes down the stairs…”

  A single light illuminated hallways ahead of Todd. He could spot at least five gang members, laying on the dusty floor, people he hardly knew. Another three were firing at anything that moved further along, where the light from the weak bulb dared not to go. He kneeled next to a young woman, tapping her on her shoulder. Her moment of shock quickly gave way to relief on seeing someone else to take up the fight. Blood dripped from her hand as she leaned in closer. “There’s at least three of them down there.” Her bloodshot eyes was filled with confusion. “We filled them with bullets! They kept on coming! They gone back into the tunnels, but they’re still there. I know it!”

  Todd’s instincts told him what was keeping to the darkness in the alcoves and open spaces just ten or so feet away. It was the same feeling he had when nearing the mother and daughter. He could remember going to the zoo once and standing just a foot away from a tiger, only a thin clear barrier between him and five hundred pounds of killing machine. You know when you’re near a creature that can tear you apart. You know when death is just a wrong turn away.

  He looked across the tunnel to Ramses, also kneeled, his M2 now on a small tripod. Ramses held up a flashbang grenade in complete silence. The others saw the intention and closed their eyes while doing their best to cover their ears.

  The almighty explosion of sound and light happened before most were prepared to shield its effects but Todd had been trained. He had also thrown more than a few himself during his tours and was already pushing into the darkness while the ringing continued in his ears. He spotted the first sign of movement to his right. A humanoid was swiping at the air. He couldn’t make out if it was male or female in the low light, but the lower half of its face was blood red and he could just about see the reason. One of the August’s people was laying at its feet, parts of them anyway, the rest were detached and ragged. He raised the barrel and fired, two shoots to the chest knocking the thing back. The deafening cracks of his gunshots almost masked the rush of feet from ahead, further along the tunnel. He staggered back, the impression of a mass of movement being enough impetus to make him retreat but before he could move back into the main corridor, a stream of neon blue projectiles filled the narrow area, as if the tunnel had suddenly been flooded with a swarm of florescent insects, all with only one intent. To stop what was coming.

  Todd jolted away from the kill zone, only just avoiding the torrent of projectiles from the M2 removing his hand from his arm. He kept on retreating, right into a grasping claw which sliced across his back. He felt the razor sharp nail pierce the skin back there, and not knowing how deep the injury was, swung around firing as he turned, catching the creature square in its torso. This time the impact was lasting and the thing recoiled with a screech that sounded human in its pain. Todd raised his weapon higher and fired again. Parts of its skull flew off into the darkness and it dropped lifeless to the ground. It was only then that he realized that the thunder from the light machine gun had stopped.

  He moved back towards the tunnel. “I’m coming out!” Tentatively he peered around the corner, first to his left where he saw five people standing with a bright light behind them. He then turned the opposite way, to the corridor filled with bodies. Some whole, most not. Blood dripped from the old moss covered architecture and the air was filled with dust and the smell of sulfur.

  August walked forward from the group, standing next to him. “More will be coming.”

  Todd looked up at the masonry. “We could collapse the tunnel…”

  “And then we would only have one way to leave. For now, we will fight to keep this tunnel open.”

  A figure pushed through the small crowd that had gathered, from its height, Todd could tell it was Noah. He walked forward, shaking his head. “We lost Jones, Heather, Mike and Stratford! The bum is right. We should blow the tunnel!”

  August did his best to hide his sigh, but Todd caught it regardless. The older man turned, ignoring the younger man’s comments. He looked at Ramses. “Change the shift every two hours. Make sure that gun is fully loaded at all times.”

  Ramses nodded while August walked past.

  Todd looked at Noah who shook his head and moved back into the crowd. It wasn’t long before Todd was making his way back up the stairs, and into the top floor corridor. He paused before entering the small room on hearing a child’s laughter.

  Slowly he pushed open the door.

  “Hi?” said Evelyn, her greeting quickly followed by a smile.

  “Mr. Todd!” said Zoe. She got up, ran forward and threw her arms around him, knocking him into the door frame.

  “Ah, hi there kiddo.” He looked back at her mother, not knowing how to react to them seemingly acting normal, but there was one problem.

  Evelyn noticed his reticence. She waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, the black eye thing. Don’t worry about that. We’re not going to bite you or anything.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Evelyn watched August’s chief drug maker move from gurney to counter top and then to the floor, to try to keep alive those that had come in contact with… people like herself? She knew those that now ruled the city at night were not like her. They were blood hungry… things. She wasn’t sure what to call them, but the term that everyone else had been using, ‘vamps’ did not sit right with her. This wasn’t a movie or a nineteenth century novel. This was her life. This was everyone’s life, which had been turned upside down by some side effect of a virus which swept the earth and then the bombs which fell after. That was reality. Things that were outside of that, she had no time for.

  Morgan tried frantically to tighten a tourniquet around the upper arm of a young man, but the blood spurted regardless.

  A warmth crept up Evelyn’s spine and with it came the sensation that she was falling. She looked at her legs and feet to confirm she was still firmly on the bench, then back to the last remaining embers of the man’s consciousness flickering into eternity, and began to do something instinctual but on recognizing the act, reviled and stopped her tongue from sliding across her lip.

  He just died, Evelyn.

  She wasn’t sure how she knew that, but Morgan shook her head and stood, wiping the blood on her sleeve. The younger woman also glanced at Evelyn, who wasn’t sure how to react. She knew the right reaction was revulsion, horror at what had just happened to the man that wasn’t much older than Karl, but instead she felt nothing for his passing. Not a shred of sympathy. Perhaps the events of the past twenty-four hours had numbed her.

  She feigned a sad exterior and luckily Morgan turned away, quickly moving onto the next victim of what attacked them in the tunnels. She thought again about her two children who were in the room next door and began to feel whole again. The darkness within her, retreating with every happy, glad thought of her lanky teen and plucky daughter. At least Zoe was better than earlier.

  When they first awoke, her daughter quickly became distraught at being bound but the ropes were broke almost instantly. But worse for the child was seeing her mother’s black eyes then realizing she had the same. It took a few minutes for Evelyn to calm her. Finally, Evelyn managed to talk to her, to tell her that they were both still themselves, despite the funny business with how their eyes looked. In fact, they both felt great. The burden of exhaustion they had felt in the morning had passed and Evelyn was buzzing with energy.

  She watched Morgan have more success with another patient. A twenty something woman whose wounds had stopped bleeding and the sounds inside the room had reduced to a murmuring of groans and gasps of despair at what had just befallen the river gang. Earlier, she had quickly picked up the sound of incessant gunfire, almost as if it was coming from the corridor outside. And the metallic smell which drifted through the gap under the door. The odor which brought with it invasive thoughts that she had to push to the back of her mind.