Kilgore was tired. He’d had enough. He wanted it to stop now. He wanted to fall asleep and not wake up again.
He had been hallucinating since early morning, and now there seemed to have been a sudden and dramatic increase in the strength and ferocity of the freakish sights which surrounded him. About half an hour ago he thought he’d been visited by his dead mother and father and one of his teachers from school. In his confused mind the three of them had stood over him and critically discussed his general lack of progress in life. An hour before that and the room he was lying in had appeared to lose all structure and form. The ceiling above him had drooped and dripped down until it had almost touched the floor and the windows on the wall opposite had seemed to close up until they’d disappeared and the room had become dark as night.
The windows were clear again now.
Another hallucination.
He could see Kelly Harcourt in the distance.
Kilgore watched as she came closer. He could tell that it was her because she was wearing the same kind of protective suit that he still wore. He could see her long blonde hair being blown around in the wind. She didn’t have her facemask on. Christ, she could breathe! For one irrational moment he forgot everything that had happened in the days leading up to today. And if she could breathe, he thought, then maybe he could too? Groaning with effort he slowly sat up and lifted his hand to his mask. Then he stopped and remembered.
Harcourt continued to come closer. She walked slowly and awkwardly with her head listing over to one side and her arms and legs appearing clumsy, unresponsive and stiff.
She must have been hurt. She was dragging her right foot along the ground behind her, not even able to lift it up. And then the sun illuminated her face. A cold and lifeless mask with sunken cheeks and dark, hollowed eyes. Her mouth moved constantly as she approached, seeming to form silent words and moans. Despite his lack of strength and energy, Kilgore forced himself to stand up and walk towards her. His legs as heavy and uncoordinated as his dead colleague’s, he hobbled painfully across the room and leant against the window exhausted. Seconds later Harcourt’s body clattered against the other side of the glass and for a split second he stood face to face with her before the sudden noise and vibration sent him reeling backwards.
Swaying unsteadily for a moment, he watched as the corpse turned and began to walk away.
Each step forward took huge amounts of effort, but Kilgore found himself instinctively trying to follow Harcourt’s shell-like cadaver. He wasn’t sure why; was it fear, inquisitiveness or nervousness which drove him to do it? Was it that he wanted to properly see what he might still become? He waited in the doorway for a moment to catch his breath before pushing forward again and leaving the building where he’d presumed he’d die. Just ahead of him the body continued to stagger away listlessly, silhouetted against the bright and low late afternoon sun. The sky above Kilgore, so clear and blue for much of the long day now ending, was beginning to darken and was tinged with hints of deep reds and purples and trailing wisps of clouds.
Away from the horizon the moon and the first few bright stars could be seen. He followed Harcourt along the runway, past the front of the observation tower and then out towards the perimeter fence.
Kilgore stopped. He couldn’t keep up. He’d not gone far but the effort of moving had already become too much to sustain. He put his hands on his knees and sucked in a long, slow mouthful of purified air. Another hallucination was beginning now. More powerful than any of the others he’d had, this one seemed to surround him and swallow him. It began with a noise. Starting quietly and initially seeming to be without direction, it quickly built to a deafening and strangely controlled roar, accompanied by a fierce and angry wind. Exhausted, his lifted his heavy, clouded head and saw the helicopter above him beginning a rapid descent. Wrong footed by the sudden distraction, his weak legs buckled and folded underneath him and he fell onto his backside. Shooting pains ran the entire length of his emaciated body and he winced with sudden agony. Just over ten metres from the perimeter fence he sat in the long grass and watched as the powerful machine hovered in the air above the heads of thousands of seething bodies. Then another sound from out of nowhere and a sudden, sweeping movement as the plane swooped over him before touching down and bouncing along the runway, finally coming to an undignified, lurching halt at the far end of the strip.
Kilgore watched from his collapsed position at the edge of the airfield as people began to emerge from the observation tower. He didn’t recognise any of them anymore. They were just dark, shadowy figures now. From where he was they appeared little different to the thousands of corpses surrounding the airfield and as cold and featureless as what remained of Harcourt.
Too tired to stay sitting up, the soldier lay on his back and stared up into the darkening sky above him. The relentless noise of the helicopter changed direction and faded away.
Once he was sure that the plane had safely touched down, Lawrence began to bring the helicopter in to land.
He looked down into the relentless, seething mass of diseased cadavers below as he hovered above the perimeter fence. Bloody hell, he thought, the bodies seemed more incensed and animated than he’d ever seen them before.
Many ripped and tore at each other. Others were pushing against the fence being crushed, no doubt, by the weight of hundreds more corpses behind them. Many more still were standing their ground as best they could, looking up at him defiantly with cold, unblinking eyes which were filled with anger bordering on hatred. Forcing himself to look away and concentrate again, he flew towards the observation tower and the other buildings.
Cooper was waiting for him by the time he’d landed and had climbed out of the helicopter. With the rotor blades still circulating slowly above him, the pilot ducked down and walked over to the other man. Together they jogged down towards the plane. Keele was sitting in the cockpit trying to recover from the flight. He’d managed to turn the plane round to face back down the runway but he hadn’t yet moved. Landing was proving to be the hardest part of flying today.
‘Everything go all right?’ Cooper asked as they stood and waited for Keele to move. Lawrence nodded. The airfield was suddenly silent now that the plane and helicopter were back and their engines had been switched off.
‘Went like clockwork,’ he replied.
‘And you’re both still okay for fuel?’
‘Just about.’
‘You’ve got enough to make another flight?’
‘Plenty. I should have enough for a good few crossings yet, and I think Keele’s got similar.’
‘So we’ll try and get another load over there first thing tomorrow morning, okay?’
Lawrence sighed.
‘Bloody hell, mate,’ he protested, ‘give me a chance to get my breath back first, won’t you. It’s been a long day.’