Dead Cells
Author: Adam Millard; Chris Taggart
Date: 2011-09-01 07:00:00+00:00
Keywords: virus; Fantasy; prison; Zombies; Horror; undead hordes
Description: As a prisoner in one of the most brutal facilities imaginable, Shane Bridge thought that he'd seen it all. Surrounded by murderers, rapists, gangsters and paedophiles, Shane had managed to survive his three years in one piece. With parole just around the corner, and his wife and daughter at home awaiting his return, Shane has high-hopes for the future. When a new inmate is brought in, carrying with him a deadly virus, Shane soon realises that his plans, his release, and his very survival are in jeopardy. With the virus spreading, turning guards and inmates into flesh-eating zombies, it's up to
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

First Published in the UK 2011

This edition published 2011

Copyright © Adam Millard 2011

Cover Illustration © Chris Taggart 2011

The Moral right of the author has been asserted.

All characters and events in this publication are fictitious, and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

ISBN 978-1-4478-5035-9

ADAM MILLARd
DEAD CELLS

For all of those people that had faith in me; you know who you are.

And to Zoe, my wife, my everything, who keeps me firmly grounded for all the right reasons.

Thirty days. Thirty more shitty, wasted days, and he was out of there for good – he hoped; there was very little chance that he would make the same mistake ever again, although most prisoners had the same dreams whilst they were lying in jail, only to emerge into the real world and end up criminals once again.

Shane Bridge sighed. His mattress, dirty and in need of replacement – although he had never seen a replacement issued in his three years frequenting cell 101 – creaked beneath him. He wondered if Billy heard the creak.

Billy Toombs, the man lying on the upper-bunk of the bed in cell 101, had protected Shane throughout; Shane would have been nothing more than just another dead man in jail if it hadn't been for the giant sleeping above him now. Trained in some weird martial art that Shane had never heard of before, Billy was half American-Indian, half Irish. Fuck knows how that happened – and Shane didn't care in the slightest – but the man was a giant, and Shane had just been grateful that the ogre had not been a rapist or a murderer.

'You having a wank down there?' Billy asked, a little snigger following.

'You'd like that, wouldn't you?' Shane said, smiling to himself. 'If I were,' he continued, 'I know that you'd be peeking through that fucking mattress, checking if it was true what they say.'

'What do they say?' Billy asked, still sniggering.

'They say,' Shane smiled, 'that white men, pure Americans like me, have the biggest penises on earth, and that half-Tonto-half-Paddies, like yourself, have the smallest, and that even though you're great with a tomahawk, and even better with a pint of Guinness, you're absolutely shit when it comes to handling your primary weapon.'

Shane laughed, and so did Billy.

With a change of tone, one that indicated sincerity, Billy asked: 'Is it her? Holly?'

'Of course it is,' Shane replied. 'I haven't, you know, been with her for so long. I just can't believe that I'm finally going home.'

There came a silence, and it wasn't unwelcome; Shane actually enjoyed the lack of questions. Billy had a way of pushing his questioning a little too far, and Shane always had an answer for him.

'I wish I was you,' Billy said, a sigh accompanying his statement. 'Not because you're getting out in less than a month, but because you have people on the outside that love you more than possible.' A slight pause. 'I envy you, Shane Bridge. You're everything that I should have been.'

Shane, at that moment in time, felt a pang of guilt. Was he leaving his comrade? Was he a deserter? Billy had another ten years to serve, if his appeal actually came to fruition – and Shane had his doubts. In how many different ways was it possible to claim innocence when the axe was still bloody, in your grip, when the Sheriff turned up to investigate a “loud noise”?

There was no way – not a cat-in-Hell's-chance – that Billy Toombs had chopped up his wife's lover; there was more chance of ordering ice-water from Hell, and having it hand-delivered by Lucifer himself.

Incarceration, though, had been the most spiritual journey that Billy had ever been on; the man was a believer, through and through, and he had kept Shane sane for almost three years. Shane had been one of the lucky ones; others had been beaten to death in their own cells, raped for nothing more than a cigarette, tortured for information on who had put them inside, Life, for Shane Bridge, had been much better than most, and he was more than aware of his good fortune.

'You on the court tomorrow?' Shane asked, changing the subject surreptitiously. 'I think I need a little practice against someone as silly looking as you.'

Billy laughed. 'I'll be on the court. If it's a tussle you want, little Bridge, then you're gonna get it.'

Shane smiled, and fell into a deep sleep.

*

'Son, you don't have to talk to me, but I'm going to talk to you, and what you hear might not be polite, but I don't give a rat's ass what you think of my vernacular. You're a cunt, and you deserve to be here. You've disgraced this country, and this world, and you have warranted a place in this here jail, one of the toughest jails you could ever get yourself trapped in....' A breath, a sip of water, a bite on an apple. 'You're a very lucky fucker...I would have executed you on the spot, but there you go, yet another sign of your fortune. I'm not the judge, but in here, I am the jury, and I am the executioner, and you'll be a lucky motherfucker if you survive the next ten years with all of your limbs intact. You see, I have a, how shall we put it? A certain way of convincing other inmates that, well, certain people need despatching of, and you, my friend – I hate calling you that, you prick – fall under the category of notification. I bid you good day, Carlos, and wish you the best in my jail. You're going to need it.'

*

'They brought him in today,' Rooster smiled. 'I swear to God, that prick's on his way down here right now.'

Dennis Hart grinned. 'Well, he's in for a treat. I don't suppose that he knows we're here?'

Rooster grinned even wider. 'He has no fucking idea what's coming to him, boss. He's all over the place.'

'What, drunk?' Dennis asked, and then thought about it. It didn't matter; the grass was in, that was all that mattered. Carlos was a dead man now that he was within grasp.

'We'll have him by lunchtime tomorrow, the little prick,' Rooster said. 'We'll get rid of him.'

Rooster grinned.

This was finally it; nobody liked a grass, especially Dennis Hart. By lunchtime tomorrow, Carlos Silva would be a dead man.

*

It was after seven when Carlos Silva was led into his cell. He staggered, mumbled something inaudible, and was pushed onto the bottom bunk of the bed. After a fit of coughing, he tried to sit up, but couldn't.

'I'd stay down, if I were you,' Officer Michaelson grinned. 'I've heard that Clay goes easier on you the less of a fight you put up.'

With that, the cell-door was slammed shut. The sound of rattling bars disappeared down the block. A few voices called out, informing the noise-maker that “People are trying to fucking sleep, here.”

Carlos coughed; this time, though, there was blood. It came from his nose, his mouth, and he felt his pants become suddenly wet, as if he'd manage to piss himself, but he knew that it wasn't piss.

The bed above creaked. Carlos managed to open his eyes momentarily. Long enough to see two massive legs – tree-trunks – swing over the side of the top-bunk. It was dark in the cell, but it was the sweat in Carlos's eyes that made the shape almost impossible to focus upon.

The legs dropped down, revealing a tattooed back; perhaps some sort of gang sign, it was hard to tell. The figure – Carlos managed that much – grunted as his feet touched the floor. The man must have been almost seven foot, maybe more. He had a long, dark ponytail, and although Carlos was almost blind, he could just make it out as it swung back and forth between those hulking shoulder-blades.

'P – please,' Carlos said. 'I don't want any trouble.'

The man turned and crouched next to the bottom-bunk. His face, although blurry, could only be described as “damaged”. His grin revealed only three teeth, and even those were chipped. Carlos didn't need his eyes to smell the stale breath as it hit his face, making bile rise in his throat along with fresh blood.

'Be a good little boy,' Cyrus Clay grunted, 'and there won't be none.'

That was all Carlos could remember before the consciousness drained from him, like the last few drops of water escaping from a hosepipe. The final thought in his mind before passing out was: Please, kill me now. I'm ready for Hell.

*

There she was, as always, the most beautiful woman he had ever laid his eyes upon. This was the way the dream always started, and he liked this part of it. The calm before the storm, so to speak. She always strode into the room, that skimpy, silk nightgown – the one that he'd bought her from London – leaving hardly anything to the imagination. She was delightful. Her lips glistened from something that she used to apply just before bedtime; it made them sticky, but Shane didn't mind as it made her look so fucking fine.

'Megan in bed?' Shane whispered, not taking his eyes from his wife.

Holly nodded. 'She had a big day at school today,' she said as she brushed her hair in the full-length mirror at the foot of the bed. 'Something about an animal-man, and how she got to stroke three cute, little rabbits.'

Shane smiled. 'She'll be wanting one of her own now.'

'Well, she'll have to go without,' Holly said. 'We're on the brink as it is without further expenses.'

She was right; she always was. Shane didn't deal with the bills, or the taxes, or the groceries; he just provided the money the government gave him, which was next to nothing. He had never been too good with figures, and they had both agreed that Holly was in charge of the incomings and outgoings.

Although, Shane thought as he lay on the bed staring at her as she brushed her long, brown hair, it turns out that neither of us have been very good with the money.

'I'm working on getting a job,' Shane said, sighing. 'It's this fucking recession; there's nothing about at the moment.'

'I know,' Holly said, turning from the mirror. 'It's not your fault. It's just that,' a pause, 'I don't think we're going to be able to hold on to the house for much longer. Momma says we can always go stay with her for a while, until we get —–'

'No way,' Shane said, rising from the bed. 'It won't ever come to that.'

There was no way in Hell that Holly's mother, as nice as she was, would be the one to put things right this time. It wasn't solely Shane's stubbornness; his pride had always refused charity from anyone. If he was unable to do something by himself, then he went without.

Though, this time, it wouldn't be just him that went without. He had Megan to think about. Would he be so stubborn if it really came down to it? Would he be able to put his daughter to bed at night in the back of the car, still in her school uniform?

He doubted it.

'I promise, I'll sort something out in the next few days,' Shane said as he put his arms around Holly's silky shoulders. 'Just let me deal with it.'

Holly didn't have a choice. What could he possibly do, anyway? He'd been searching for a job for months. What were the chances that now, when the shit was really about to hit the fan, one would suddenly manifest?

'Okay,' she sighed. She nuzzled gently at his knuckles. 'But if it comes to it, we're going to my mother's.'

Shane sighed. 'Okay.' Yet he knew that he wouldn't allow that to happen.

Ever.

*

His heart raced so fast it was all he could do to not pass out. Sweat dripped from his forehead and nose in rivulets. The car radio drowned out the sound of his panicked breathing.

Was he really going to do this? Could he....?

He had been sat in the car for almost an hour, an empty bottle of water and a full ashtray served as a reminder for the time elapsed.

The sun was pouring through the windscreen, and although he had the windows down and the sunroof fully opened, the heat was unbearable.

He had contemplated a walk, maybe to take a closer look at the store, but decided against it. The only time he would leave the car would be to do the job.

He was parked a hundred feet or so away from the liquor store, and he was sure that nobody had really noticed him sitting there for so long. He had watched as couples, clearly under-aged, had wandered into the store and left with bottles of booze, no doubt for a college keg-party, or some seedy house do that would leave the parents with one hell of a repair bill. He had seen scores of middle-aged men, fresh from the day's loss at the bookies, enter and leave with whatever battery-acid was the fucking cheapest. He had smoked almost twenty cigarettes whilst building up the courage to do what he was about to do.

He reached up and pulled down the sun-visor. A photograph, six-by-eight, portrayed Holly and Megan on a see-saw, the kind of old rust-traps that you can no longer buy for health and safety purposes.

'It's for you,' he said.

He closed the visor, climbed out of the car, and headed for the liquor store.

*

Shane hadn't noticed the woman working the register press the button beneath the counter, but she must have; the cops were all over the place before he even had time to finish bagging the money.

'You bitch!' he cried at the woman, whose make-up had streamed down her face leaving her looking like something from a cheap horror film. 'You fucking bitch!'

The sirens and sounds of squelching tyres made it perfectly clear that most of the Department had been despatched. Shane couldn't see outside due to the stacked boxes and crates of beer that had been piled up in front of the windows. The only sunlight in the store emanated from the cooling fan on the far wall, sending an eerie shadow across the room as the fan spun.

He had to think fast.

'Where's the back door to this place?' he yelled at the hysterical teller.

The lady, Arleen – he had noticed her name-badge when he'd threatened to blow here head off – gasped as if there was no longer any air in the store. She couldn't speak, instead she just muttered incomprehensibly and pointed to the back of the room.

'THIS IS THE JACKSON POLICE DEPARTMENT,' came the voice that Shane had anticipated. 'COME OUT SLOWLY WITH YOUR HANDS UP.'

Like that's gonna happen, Shane thought. He turned and headed for the back of the store, in the direction of the shaking, bony finger of the terrified Arleen.

He could hear the crackling of police two-ways and the sound of a distant helicopter, but that couldn't be for him. Could it?

Wiping the sweat from his eyes, he lunged through the door that would hopefully lead to a back alley. Places like this always had a loading bay of some sort, a place where the crates get delivered and stored until they're needed.

This place, though, didn't. Shane stumbled straight through the door into possibly the worst toilet he had ever been in.

'Fucking BITCH, Arleen!' he yelled.

There were two cubicles, a solitary urinal, and a sink that Shane suspected hadn't been used in a long fucking time. Above the sink there was a window, frosted and rotten.

Without further thought, Shane climbed up onto the sink and grabbed hold of the lock. His heart sank when it wouldn't budge, either to the left or the right.

He reached for the back of his jeans and pulled out the gun. A gun that was no more real than the ones available to buy for children at the seaside. Nevertheless, it was heavy enough to smash the bathroom window through.

He thumped the glass with the butt of the pistol – BB pistol, for fuck's sake! - and the window exploded outwards. Making sure there were no sharp edges left to snag himself on, he climbed through and spilled out onto the street.

The sunlight hit him first.

The taser came soon after.

*

Shane came awake as the electricity began to surge violently through his body. A slick film of sweat coated him from head to toe. A dream that he had had almost every night – not just a dream, but a recollection of his mistake – could still cause him such panic and intense distress.

He sighed.

There would be no more sleep for him tonight.

*

Billy Toombs pushed his tray in the general direction of the slush they called breakfast. Working the spoon that morning was one of the newbies, and that bode well for the food; there was no way on earth a fish was going to spit in the food, or worse. He was shaking even as he piled the scrambled eggs onto the side of Billy's plate. Shane tapped Billy on the arm and they shared a silent smile that said: Fuck me! This kid ain't gonna last long!

The room was, as always, noisy as hell. Breakfast was the one meal that everyone turned up for.

As the nervous spoon-handler now slopped eggs onto Shane's plate, Shane glanced around the room. He could sense something.

Something wrong was about to happen.

The atmosphere had somehow changed. Not the volume, but the tension. Billy sensed it, too.

They moved along the line, receiving a solitary sausage, which was almost unrecognisable, and a rasher of bacon that looked like something picked off a child's knee a few days after a nasty fall.

Taking a seat, Billy looked to Shane. 'You feel it, too?'

'Yep,' he said, shovelling a forkful of sloppy egg into his mouth. 'I've got your back.'

'I've got yours,' Billy said, digging into his food.

They were halfway through breakfast when it happened, and it was one of the strangest things either of them had ever seen.

A man, also a newbie, staggered along the breakfast line, sweat pouring from his head and landing on his own plate. The man behind him, who Billy and Shane knew as Paulie Sorvino, watched silently as the man began to drool all over his own breakfast, swaying back and forth as if intoxicated.

'That's fucking disgusting!' Paulie said, taking a step away from the strange, drooling man. The room, as if someone was in control of a very large volume switch, faded to silence. All eyes fell on the breakfast line. A few of the men at the back of the room stood up, not wanting to miss what was almost certain to become a fight.

The man turned from the line, facing the rest of the room. He was clearly unwell. His eyes could barely focus, and sweat dripped from him in buckets.

He staggered forward one step...two steps, and then almost fell backwards, which prompted a raucous howl of laughter from most of the watching prisoners.

Shane didn't laugh. Something was seriously wrong with the man.

'Hey!' Paulie said, realising that he had the attention of the entire audience. 'Somebody get this fucking guy another beer!'

More laughter. Paulie was almost doubled over as the man continued to stagger through the room, bouncing from table to table. Some of the more violent prisoners began to push him about, laughing, encouraging the sick man to do something else funny.

Cyrus Clay stood up. 'It's alright for you fucking guys,' he said, laughing. 'I have to share a fucking cell with this fucking prick.'

The room erupted. Not laughing at Cyrus Clay's joke was a bad idea.

Carlos Silva bounced around the room for a few more seconds before coming to a stop. He looked confused; almost as if he had been sleepwalking all along and had woken up with no idea as to how he had got there.

His eyes were blank. In fact, his entire face was expressionless. He looked like a painting. Something by Goya, perhaps. It was then that he vomited.

The table in front of him got it the worst, but the ones to the left and right didn't remain clean. Carlos Silva was erupting. Prisoners were diving out of the way, falling from their chairs, their laughter silenced, just cries of revulsion as the man spewed forth a neverending torrent of guts.

*

The eruption of violence that followed was incredible. Carlos Silva was lucky to still be breathing when the officers managed to pull off the other inmates. Officer Tyler, one of the more experienced guards, had witnessed the entire thing from the side of the room, and had only decided to step in once the filthy Mexican had received what he deemed suitable retribution from the vomit-covered thugs.

'Alright, alright, everyone back the fuck up,' Tyler said with one hand on his taser; if the sick bastard decided to upchuck on Tyler's boots, then he better be prepared for a few hundred thousand volts.

The inmates separated. Rooster Hill, Marvin “Murderer” Manson, and Jimmy “Gentle Rapist” Kelly headed into the corner where Dennis Hart – the Pack leader – sat nonchalantly finishing his dinner. Out of the three of them, only Jimmy Kelly had vomit on him, but it was clear that some of it had managed to get into his mouth; he was still wiping it away from his lips and then scrubbing at his tongue as if he had just eaten something particularly rancid.

They watched from the side as Cyrus Clay got one final kick in before stepping away. 'See that sick shit, boss?' Cyrus said, pointing at the man rolling in agony on the canteen floor.

'Shut the fuck up, Clay!' Officer Tyler said. 'If I had to eat in here with y'all sick fuckers, I'd find it hard to keep my food down.'

The guard radioed for assistance, explaining that he didn't want to get any of it on his clean uniform. Michaelson said that he'd be over in a few minutes.

Meanwhile, Carlos Silva managed to push himself up onto his knees. A long string of blackened sludge hung from his mouth so that it was almost touching the floor. He was groaning and holding onto his stomach. Every few seconds he made a strange hissing sound, like a cat warning off a potential threat.

Tyler put his foot on the sick man's side and gave him a little push.

'Git up,' he said, still keeping his hand on the taser. When Carlos failed to respond – his dark drool was now forming a deathly puddle on the canteen floor – Tyler said: 'I will fucking taser you if you don't git up!'

Shane watched, along with Billy, as the guard kicked again. This time though, the sick man did something remarkable: He grabbed the guard's ankle and sunk his teeth in.

The expression that jumped onto Tyler's face would have been comical in other circumstances. As he screamed, he managed to pull out the taser gun and aimed it at Carlos Silva. The man on the floor, however, had no idea; he was way too busy trying to pull off the chunk of flesh that he had managed to clamp onto. And the funny thing was, despite what was happening, nobody moved a muscle. If anything, people stepped away, as if they wanted no part in the event. There were shouts and gasps, but nobody made to intervene.

As Tyler levelled the taser, trying to stay focused, he knew that there was no way he could fire. The contact between himself and the growling piece of shit on the floor would mean that both of them would receive the current, and having been shot once before – in training – he knew that he couldn't bring himself to fire.

Luckily, he didn't have to. The flesh on Tyler's leg pulled away, like a chicken wing on a Sunday roast. The guard stumbled backwards a few feet before crashing through a chair and thumping to the floor.

It was at this moment that Shane could see something was wrong. This was no sickness, no inane reaction to incarceration, there was something severely wrong with the new guy, something “bad”, even. The way he was growling, with thick, black slime dribbling down his chin and cascading from his face like a hellish waterfall; the way his eyes had changed into nothingness, like deep pits of anger and hatred with nothing inbetween. He was disturbed, and yet seemed to be grinning. The man had just added a few months to his sentence, maybe even years for the bite, but it didn't seem to register. It was as if he knew that it was all over.

He pushed himself up onto his haunches, like a rabid wolf might in anticipation of its prey. He snapped at the air, once, twice, and then he was airborne.

Officer Tyler opened his eyes just in time to see into the man's bottomless pits as they got closer and closer, his teeth still snapping at the air.

Tyler screamed.

The sound of a shotgun blast was the last thing he heard as the man landed on top of him.

*

The prison went on twenty-four hour lockdown shortly afterwards; an event like this, one that culminated in violence towards one of the guards, always resulted in complete internment, with no prospect of yard time and meals being delivered to cells with no cutlery. It was the guards' way of reminding inmates that violence against staff would not be tolerated. It also resulted in cells being turned over, private items being removed and incinerated, and the occasional beatdown. The prison took such acts of vehemence against their own very personally.

Tyler was taken to the infirmary, although Shane didn't think his wound would recover with a few stitches and a handful of Tylenol. That was a mighty chunk ripped off; a skin graft might be the only solution.

Billy Toombs sat in the corner of the cell. The book he held, and was flicking through at such an voracious pace that Shane couldn't take his eyes from him, was something by Kurt Vonnegut. Billy would laugh intermittently, and Shane would laugh too; it was a strange sight, watching a man the size and build of Billy Toombs laugh at literature. He looked more like the kind of man that would find a savage dogfight comical.

Shane watched, but he couldn't shake from his mind the events that had unfolded in the canteen that morning. How had that man, a man that had looked so sick and ill one moment, managed the strength to pounce from all fours like a wild animal the next?

The way that he had managed to tear the flesh away from Officer Tyler's bone, as if it were nothing more than window-putty, was something that required a lot of force.

Any man, Shane didn't care how crazy, would realise that the chances of succeeding in finishing off a guard were slim, and the probability of either escaping, or surviving the requital of the other guards, was so slim that it was practically anorexic.

Yet that man hadn't cared; his sole purpose was to cause as much damage as possible.

It was his eyes, Shane thought to himself. His eyes had been empty, dark, infernal.

Being in one of the toughest jails in the state, you came across evil on a daily basis; it was everywhere. If you turned your back in the shower, you made sure that your cell-mate – providing he wasn't your main rapist – was spotting you. Items would go missing; anything that could be carved, or shaved, into a weapon would mysteriously disappear, only to turn up a few days later covered in blood. Shane had lost three toothbrushes this way.

The volition of the damned was an unstoppable force.

Yet that man – Carlos, Michaelson had called him after blowing the top of skull off – had not been just evil, or the misplacement of what should have obviously been a secure hospital transfer. He had been Death itself.

'You think he wasn't right, don't you?' Billy said, without looking up from his uproarious volume. 'Hey, I've seen some things since I've been in here, man,' he continued, 'but I ain't never seen anything as crazy as that.'

He turned the page, as if his statement had been nothing more than a footnote.

Shane sighed. He'd seen his fair share of shit, too, and this was also at the top of his list of things I never want to see again, ever.

'I don't know what happened out there, Billy,' Shane said, wiping the sweat from his brow. It had become increasingly hot in the cell in the last two hours; another thing the prison tended to do when an inmate stepped out of line was turn the heating up to almost intolerable temperatures. 'I think he wasn't crazy. I think he was controlled.'

'Controlled?' Billy said, finally allowing his humorous novel to fall into his lap. 'By who?'

Shane shook his head. 'I don't think he was controlled by anyone,' he said. 'Satan himself?' he added.

This brought a massive laugh from Billy Toombs. 'So you think that the man was possessed?' he sneered. 'I'm the token fucking Red-Indian around here. Shouldn't I be the one who makes up inexplicable shit about forces and ghosts?'

'He wasn't a ghost,' Shane said. 'But do you honestly believe that he was human?'

There was a moment of silence whilst Billy pondered the farcical question offered to him. How could the man have been anything other than human? Monsters didn't exist, other than the kind that raped children, or burned down the houses of pregnant women in an effort to prevent them from having the “wrong coloured” baby.

'What are you talking about, Shane?' Billy asked. He placed the book on a table beside him. This meant that he was either genuinely intrigued, or severely pissed off.

Shane sighed. 'Don't you just think that what happened out there was gravely wrong? I mean, that guy was fucking ill one moment, and the next he had the force of a panther.'

'The guy was just pretending to be weak,' Billy said, sniggering. 'We've all thought about it, about trying to outsmart the guards. This guy had the balls to actually try it. He failed, and now he's missing the top of his head.' He picked his book up and returned to the page that was bookmarked. 'I wouldn't look too much into it if I were you.'

Shane smiled. 'You're right, Billy.' And yet he knew that he was right, that something bad was about to happen.

So near, he thought, and yet so far.

Freedom, he surmised, would have to wait.

*

Marla Emmet pulled up the tray of dangerous-looking implements. She was beautiful, yet not in the conventional sense. She had the eyes, the lips, the breasts, and yet it seemed that her confidence was her main appealing factor. She was the type of woman that needed no man; her own strength and sassiness were more than enough to get her through the working day. Her dark black hair trailed down her back, aiming towards the voluptuous thighs that nestled neatly in her prison-issued garb, and yet such shallow descriptions could never take away from her the fact that she was the only female graduate in the prison-system in the state of Phoenix, and that she could count cards better than any professional poker-player on the circuit. She could, in fact, complete a Su-Doku puzzle in less than a minute, and had even won awards for her paintings, which one critic said “reminded me of an early Renoir.”

'Is this gonna hurt, Doc?' Tyler said, whimpering like a child visiting the hairdressers for the very first time.

Marla glanced casually at the wound, then said: 'Probably. It was a deep bite, so I wouldn't be surprised if it stings a little.'

Tyler allowed his eyes to roll. 'Fucking typical. I get the chunk taken out of me, and he probably gets back to his cell with a meal and a goddamned certificate of virtue from the crims. I hate this shit.'

Marla laughed. 'Brace yourself,' she said as she dipped the cotton wool in the Iodine. 'This is gonna sting.'

She wanted it to sting, to be perfectly honest. Officer Tyler had been nothing but a lecherous pest to her since her arrival. She'd tried to present a case, but there just wasn't enough evidence, and he'd walked away a free man, knowing that his advances had been inappropriate. What was it about the prison-system that awarded the male staff complete immunity? Marla Emmett had no idea. So yes, she hoped that it stung like a motherfucker. The bastard deserved it.

He gasped as she applied the wool to the leg; he even drooled a little, like a child refusing to take his medicine. 'Fuck! That shit hurts,' he grimaced.

'Really?' Marla asked, uninterested in his pain. In fact, she had expected a little more response; she had laced the Iodine with salt in an attempt to induce more agony from the demoralising pervert. 'Shouldn't really. It's just Iodine.'

'Well it feels like pure acid to me,' he managed through gritted teeth. The ailed expression on his face made Marla want to laugh; he looked for a moment as if he was apt to pass out. She hoped that he would, but when he gasped again and blinked the pain away, she knew that it was unlikely.

She dabbed the wound and placed the bloodied wool on the aluminium tray. 'Looks like you're going to need a good few stitches in that,' she said. 'That man sure chewed you up pretty good.'

That delightful, wonderful man, she thought.

Looking toward the open wound on his leg, Tyler shook his head. 'He was like a fucking wild animal,' he said. 'An absolute maniac. I didn't even have time to taser the bastard. Shit, I couldn't even pull my leg out of his mouth.'

This made Marla smile. The though that Tyler, the sexual predator, had felt hopeless for even a second seemed to lift some of the darkness that she had felt during the tribunal.

'I'm gonna make that bastard's life a misery when I get fixed up,' Tyler snarled. 'He's fucked with the wrong guard.'

Marla hesitated for a second, and then said, 'Did they not tell you? They shot him in the head.'

Tyler blinked, unable to comprehend the new information. 'They what?'

'Apparently, Michaelson answered your call for backup, but by the time he got there things had already gotten out of hand.' She kept her eyes trained on the needle which she was expertly threading. 'Made a hell of a mess. The guy's down in the mortuary right now.'

Tyler thought about this for a moment, then smiled. 'Serves the sonofabitch right for messing with me,' he said. 'Good old Michaelson. Always knew that guy had the balls to kill someone.'

'Yeah,' Marla said, positioning herself more suitably for the surgery ahead. 'Anyway. Here we go. You may feel a little discomfort.'

She used very little anaesthetic.

He felt a lot of discomfort.

*

That night, the night when Officer Tyler had been stitched together so painfully, Carlos Silva lay on a trestle table, or at least, most of him did.

Doctor Jacob Strauss, a short portly man wearing wire-rimmed spectacles, stood over the body, a dictaphone in one hand and a ham sandwich in the other. Between bites he added new observations, sometimes with his mouth still stuffed with bread.

Strauss was good at his job; he had to be. Working at the prison had taught him many new things about cadavers, and although many of the bodies passing through his mortuary had certainly appeared to die from natural causes, more often than not there were other possible theories.

He stuffed the remainder of the sandwich into his already crammed mouth, and pulled on his double-thick autopsy gloves. Then he spoke into the dictaphone, announcing the time and date of the autopsy. It was, however, pretty clear what the cause of death had been; the man on the table had no cranium. Strauss chuckled to himself. 'Yeah, that'll do it every time.'

He began to slice through the breastbone, speaking as he did so. He wondered why he bothered though as most of the tapes were filed under N, as in Never to be listened to again.

As he crunched through the sternum, the stench hit him almost immediately. It was at this point that he realised he had forgotten his face-mask. He seldom wore one, anyway, but as the rancid fetor stung his nostrils and the back of his throat he wished he had on this occasion.

Regaining his composure, he continued to talk aloud, although it was laborious; in all of his years as a mortician, he had never smelt anything so vile, and it was all he could do not to upchuck all over the poor bastard on the table.

He reached for the shears and put them in place. A few crunches later and he had opened the chest cavity completely.

At first, he thought he was hallucinating, that what he was seeing was purely imagination, or the effects of too little sleep or not enough food. He blinked, glaring down at the mess.

Where the lungs should be there was just a black mass, so dark that it was almost impossible to determine where they started from the rest of the indescribable organs. The pericardial sac was blacker than the darkest night. Everything was covered in a liquefied goo. It looked like a sewer, not a person's insides.

'Holy shit!' Strauss panted. 'What is this?'

He picked up his camera and began to take photographs of the anomaly in front of him. When he'd been taking exterior photographs a few moments prior, he had never envisioned that what lay within would be so disturbing.

What is it? What the fuck is all of that black stuff?

He took a few more photos and placed the camera down on the table. Still speechless, he stepped closer, gazing again down into the horrible chasm of black sludge and unidentifiable viscera. The stench seemed to be worsening, too; the entire room now smelled like a trucker's sock. For a few seconds, Doctor Jacob Strauss thought that he would vomit, but he closed his eyes and eventually the nausea subsided.

Glaring down at the dead man's open chest cavity once again, he decided to examine further. He reached across and picked up his scalpel. Not knowing where exactly to cut – and not being able to see clearly – he opted to just aim for the heart and see what happened.

His own heart was racing.

He allowed the blade to slide across the black lump that had replaced the heart. In his ears, he could hear the terrible hush-thump of his own heart beating.

'Fuck it,' he said.

He pushed the blade into the darkened organ.

Immediately, a sickening geyser of dark slush erupted from the glob. Strauss had no time to close his mouth, which was instantaneously filled with the putrid liquid. He tumbled backwards, crashing into the table, sending tools and equipment clattering onto the mortuary floor. The noise was immense, deafening, but the doctor was spitting and choking, trying his damnedest to rid his mouth of the vile substance. It tasted like off milk. Its warmth made him want to vomit.

When the equipment had settled, and the room once again fell into silence, Strauss managed to pick himself up off the floor, pulling at his tongue with his gloved fingers, trying to get every ounce of stinking fluid out of his mouth. He thought, right there and then, that he would never get the taste of it out, that his tongue would forever smack of it.

After a few minutes he allowed himself to swallow. He ignored the dead cadaver, and made his way to the sink, where he drew some cold water and polished it off greedily.

'Nasty fucking shit,' he spat. His ass was sore from the fall, and his elbow had hit the aluminium table with such force that there was a small pool of blood soaking through his smock.

Composure regained, Doctor Jacob Strauss took a few more photographs of the body before beginning the tedious task of embalming.

The top of the head, though, would be impossible to stitch back on.

'Not like he's gonna get any viewers, anyway,' Strauss grinned, before going about his day without further calamity.

*

That night, after lights out, Jimmy “Gentle Rapist” Kelly sat on his bunk, gripping his stomach.

'What the fuck's the matter with you?' Dennis Hart asked, with all of the compassion of a Gestapo thug. 'You've been whining now for a fucking hour.'

Jimmy looked up. Sweat poured down his face, and his eyes were sunken, as if he'd taken a particularly bad hit of crack.

'I don't feel good, Den,' he said, breathlessly. 'Ever since that fucker puked on me, I've felt bad.'

Dennis Hart smiled. 'I don't blame you. If some spic blew chunks all over me, I wouldn't be feeling none too good either.'

Putting his newspaper down – he wasn't reading it, but looking at the fine pair of tits some model had dangling off her – he stood. 'At least it saved us doing the job, though. I've already got a twenty stretch; another ten for whacking some Dago and I'd be in here till my fucking balls were no good any more.'

He laughed. Jimmy Kelly didn't.

'Oh, fucking liven up, you pussy,' Dennis snarled. 'Anyone'd think you were dying. Let me tell you something, Jimbo: nobody ever died from being puked on.'

Jimmy straightened up, even though the pain was still almost all he could bare; it wasn't wise to ignore Dennis Hart. If he tells you to liven up, you'd better jump out of bed and dance the fucking Macarena for him. It was one of the downsides to sharing a cell with such a man. Most people thought it a privilege; Jimmy Kelly would disagree.

'See that fucking spic's head come off, Den?' Jimmy smiled through gritted teeth. 'I ain't never seen anything like that in my life.'

'I wish I had one of those cannons,' Dennis said. 'I'd show those guards how to fire it properly. Tyler, Michaelson and Jenson. Then I'd go up to that fucking fancy office and blow Charles Dean a new asshole.'

Charles Dean, the Governor, had treated Dennis Hart with all of the integrity he deserved. Years of shakedowns, and beatdowns; drug-planting and organised rape. Warden Dean reserved a distaste for Dennis Hart, more so than any other offender in the prison.

Hart regarded this as a compliment.

'You thinking of getting hold of one of those cannons any time soon?' Jimmy asked. Sweat dripped from the end of his nose and landed on the cell floor. Dennis Hart looked down and noticed that the drops of sweat had formed a small puddle.

'Never gonna get the chance,' Dennis said. 'Although, if I managed to somehow come across one, you know, by chance, then I'd fucking put it to its best use, and I ain't talking about blowing the top of those pricks' heads off. I'd go on the rampage of all rampages.'

'I'd be with you, boss,' Jimmy grimaced, clearly in a certain amount of discomfort. 'All the way.'

'I know you would, Jim,' Dennis said, once more glaring at the puddle of sweat forming on the floor. Perhaps he was ill; maybe that fucking spic had given him some sort of disease – which he knew was possible because they didn't wash and they were always fucking around with farm animals and shit. 'I wouldn't have anybody else by my side.'

That night, Dennis Hart slept with one eye open.

*

Governor Charles Dean poured himself another whiskey and downed it; the warmth as it hit his stomach was wonderful. So wonderful, in fact, that he poured himself another glass immediately.

He reached for the wooden box that had always lived on his desk, opened it, and removed a cigar, one of the finest cigars he had ever smoked. Lighting it, he lounged back in his chair, blowing out a satisfied plume of smoke.

The record-player was currently churning out Beethoven's Symphony number five in C-Minor, one of Governor Dean's favourites. His record-player was a vintage Dansette, not one of those new-fangled, all singing, all dancing CD things. The one thing Charles Dean hated more than criminals was pointless technology. What was the point in a device that could store hours of music, when you couldn't even see the music that you owned? He was more of an owner – he liked to feel the books, to see the record slips, to have a complete library, not just a fucking miniature device that could be completely wiped of its storage if you accidentally dropped it down the toilet.

As Beethoven spread throughout the office, and smoke rose in a blue miasma, Governor Dean realised that life could have been a fuckload worse. Sure, he'd has his troubles, and he had been divorced for almost ten years, but to be completely honest, as he sat reclined in his leather chair, sipping whiskey, he realised he had never been as happy – even when that bitch of a wife was still around.

It had been a bad day at the office

(or so the cliché went)

and one of the new fish had been blown away – perhaps overzealously, perhaps not – but he was relaxed now. The man, Carlos Silva, had been kinless, which made the whole situation a helluva lot easier to deal with. No immediate family meant no awkward phonecalls; Carlos Silva would disappear from the face of the earth, incinerated by the end of tomorrow, and that would be that.

Charles Dean smiled.

He almost fell backwards off his chair when the phone rang. He was caught mid-draw on his cigar, too, which meant that he had to cough it out of his system before answering. Once he had composed himself, he placed the cigar in an ashtray and picked up the receiver.

'Hello?' he said, still a little gruff. 'Governor Dean. This better be important.'

The man at the other end of the line cleared his throat, and when he spoke, his voice trembled. 'Governor, it's Doctor Strauss. I've, erm, I've sorted our body out, you know, got him all stitched back together and all that—'

'Oh, Doctor Strauss,' Dean said, smiling, 'that's very good news, although unfortunately you've wasted your stitching skills on that there particular body. Turns out there is no next of kin, no persons to come view the body in state.' He paused, took a drag on his cigar, exhaled the smoke, and continued. 'That poor boy ain't even gonna get a proper send off, I'm 'fraid. Straight in old Bessie for him.'

Old Bessie was Governor Dean's nickname for the crematory. Bessie was also the name of his estranged wife. He had named the crematory after her because they both sucked the life out of you, as painfully as possible, and left you the shell of your former self. He found it comical, although nobody else in the prison understood it.

'That's a shame,' Doctor Strauss said. 'Imagine dying, and nobody even knowing, let alone caring.'

'I'm sure that when it comes to it, Doctor, neither you or I shall have such worries.'

There was silence, apart from a slight rustle, which Charles Dean figured was a nod of assent coming from the doctor. 'I'm sure you're right,' Strauss said, finally. 'Do you want me to fire her up tonight, Governor, or can it wait until the morning?'

Charles Dean finished his whiskey and grimaced as the heat struck the back of his throat. 'No, you go on home, Doctor. I'm sure it will be there waiting for you when you return tomorrow.'

Strauss feigned laughter. Of course it fucking would! Bodies don't just get up and walk around. 'It will be the first job on my list, Governor.'

'Very well, Doctor,' Dean replied, and then hung the receiver back in its cradle.

He smoked cigars, listened to Beethoven's Symphonies one-to-nine, and finished the bottle. By the time he fell asleep in his chair, he hadn't a care in the world.

When he woke the following morning, it appeared that he had all of the troubles in the world hanging over him.

*

'What do you mean he's called in sick?' Governor Dean asked. 'He had a very important job to do today, and to be honest he sounded right as fucking rain when I spoke to him on the phone last night.'

'I don't know, Gov,' Officer Michaelson said, taking a step back from Charles Dean; it didn't pay to stand too close to him when his mood was so unbalanced. 'He couldn't even call in himself. I just spoke to his wife. She sounded really concerned about him.'

'She should be,' Dean snapped. 'The prick might not have a job to come back to.'

Michaelson knew that this wasn't an empty threat; he had seen Governor Dean fire at least five people in the last two years alone. One of them – a guard by the name of Carson – had been caught sneaking pornography in for some of the prisoners. It hadn't even been good pornography, either. It was the kind of shit that the models kept their knickers on, or just pretended to be in the throes of an orgasm, even though off camera they were more likely to be finishing the daily crossword. Carson, the poor asshole, had been summoned to the Governor's office after a tip-off from one of the more, how should we say, religious prisoners. Charles Dean had been waiting with the softcore magazines spread out on his desk, as if he'd been about to embark upon a masturbation-fest of his own. When asked to explain himself, Carson simply had no answer, and was escorted from the premises by guards Tyler and Jenson. Governor Dean had reminded the remaining officers that any contraband, soft-as-shit no pussy on display or otherwise, was not allowed within the prison walls, and that anyone who failed to comply with the simple rule would receive the same punishment as that “pervert” Carson.

Michaelson had guessed, though, that once the Governor had the office to himself again, he would be spanking his own monkey over the laid-out magazines and centrefolds.

'So what else is happening today?' Governor Dean asked.

'Other than visiting this afternoon,' Michaelson said shrugging his shoulders, 'not a great deal.'

Oh shit, visiting. It had completely slipped Charles Dean's mind. If there was one thing that Dean hated more than prisoners, more than pointless technology, and more than his ex-wife, it was fucking visiting day.

'Make sure that you keep a vigilant eye on that pack and their so-called visitors,' Dean grimaced. 'I don't want any more weapons exchanging hands.'

The pack he referred to was, of course, Dennis Hart's lot: Rooster Hill, Marvin Manson, and Jimmy Kelly. Governor Dean was suspicious – actually, pretty certain – that their visitors had been sneaking in all kinds of shit. Although there was no evidence of illegal substances or weaponry, quite a few of the stabbings occurring in Block D were definitely not perpetrated by a shoddy blade knocked up in woodwork classes. The size of some of the wounds suggested a professional weapon, and somebody was bringing those shivs in.

'I'll keep my eyes peeled,' Michaelson said, trying to reassure the Governor, even though he knew that he couldn't keep his eyes peeled on all four of the pack.

'You do that.'

As Michaelson made his way out of the office, Charles dean could only think about one thing.

The decaying, headless corpse waiting to be burned in the mortuary.

Only a few hours later, Governor dean would wish that Carlos Silva was the only dead thing in the prison.

*

Cyrus Clay sat in the infirmary, waiting for that fit piece of ass Emmett to emerge from the adjacent room. He looked around the room, and realised that he had never set foot in the infirmary before; he'd never been ill, nor shanked. But now, he was here, and he felt like shit warmed up.

His stomach was fizzing, almost as if he'd been slipped a suppository, and his head pounded so hard that he could see white spots dancing before his eyes.

He had never felt so sick in his life.

The door swung inwards, and Marla Emmet strode confidently into the room. She held in her hand a thick brown file folder, the kind that cost a buck-fifty for a hundred. Cyrus Clay wondered what could be in such a fat folder, since he'd never even visited the infirmary before.

Probably a pile of shit about how many tattoos he had, and pictures of old wounds sustained before his incarceration. Paperwork was such a waste of time.

Doctor Emmett opened the folder, and sat silently reading for a few minutes before speaking. As she read, Cyrus Clay glanced down at those pert breasts of hers, and wondered what it would feel like to stick his dick between them. And even though the pain was almost unbearable, his stomach seemed to jump inside him, he struggled to hide his forming erection.

'I said,' the Doctor snapped, 'how long have you been feeling like this?' Judging by her abrasiveness, it wasn't the first time that she had asked the question.

'Erm. Ever since yesterday, Doc,' Clay said, gripping his stomach as if to further convince the woman of his pain. 'Ever since that prick spewed in the canteen.'

Marla Emmet glared at Clay; it was clear that he was running a temperature. Sweat had formed a sheen on his forehead. His eyes were dark, too, almost as if he had been punched in them hard enough to leave a mark.

'Okay,' she said, 'I'm going to give you some pills, take some blood, the usual.'

Cyrus Clay wondered whether the usual involved putting his dick between those beautiful pert breasts. The funny thing was: he could, if he so desired. With a hand tightly pushed against her mouth, he could do what he wanted to her; he could fuck her seven ways from Sunday, and the guards wouldn't even know about it until he let go of her. He was a lifer, anyway; what could they do? Add another life sentence on? If he was going to die in jail, then he may as well get his dick wet while he was doing it.

She started to take the blood. Cyrus watched the top her head while she did it. He had an urge to just clamp down on her scalp and bite as hard as he could. For a moment, he thought that he might do it, and then she spoke, which distracted him just at the right moment.

'Are you having the pains right now?' she said.

He looked away, suddenly aware that he was going to bite her fucking head off; where had that come from?

'Constantly,' he replied. 'Feels like somebody's poisoned me. That dirty fucking dago must have been really fucked up.'

It was true. The pain that Cyrus was feeling was enough for him to sympathise with Carlos Silva. Last night, in the cell, Cyrus had raped the spic so hard that his dick had been covered with blood. Clay wasn't the kind of guy to feel remorse, but he understood now why his cellmate had simply accepted his fate.

He hadn't the strength to fight back.

'Must be some sort of virus going around,' Marla said. 'Let's just hope it doesn't spread through the whole system. I haven't got the time to test everyone.'

Cyrus Clay bit down on his tongue as the doctor drew his blood. 'Good job I got in here first,' he said. Again, he felt the inexplicable desire to lean across and tear a chunk off the doctor's face. Her ear, in particular, suddenly looked rather tempting.

When they finished, Marla called for the guards, who had been standing guard just outside, yet seemed to take forever to show up.

'Is he done?' Michaelson asked. 'You didn't hurt him too much, did you Doc?' He was grinning.

Marla smiled; Cyrus didn't. 'Officer, it's not in my best nature to cause unnecessary pain to your prisoners.' She said this, and then thought back to Tyler and the way he had squealed as she cleaned his wound. Not in my nature, she thought, but sometimes, it's in my best interests...

'That's a shame,' Michaelson sniggered. He pulled Cyrus to his feet and began to cuff him. Cyrus felt the pain again; his stomach seemed to wrench, deep down, as if he was going to be sick but there was nothing to bring up.

'Don't you dare be sick,' Michaleson said, noticing the strange way that his prisoner was bent over. 'And don't be getting no ideas, either. Just because you say you're ill doesn't guarantee you easy treatment. You've got shit to do, boy, and if she says that you're well enough to do it, then you're well enough to do it. In my book, the best thing for sick pricks like you is work. It'll help take your mind off the pain.'

It wouldn't. Cyrus didn't think that anything could take his mind off the pain. He tried to recall when he had ever felt so bad, and couldn't. This was terrible, almost to the point that he wished for death.

'I wouldn't say that he's well enough to do anything just yet,' Marla said. 'He's running a really high fever, which means that he isn't lying, and he seems to be in substantial pain.' She began to scrawl in her notes; the sound of the pen scratching the paper was the only sound for a few seconds. When she was done, she tore off a piece of paper and handed it to Officer Michaelson. 'Make sure you come and pick these pills up for him later on today. He needs to take one every four hours until the pain subsides.'

Michaelson wasn't happy. He practically snatched the script from her. 'Do you want me to wipe his ass for him as well?' he snarled. Marla suddenly felt uncomfortable. She sat down behind her desk and glared up at the officer, who was obviously perturbed.

'I think you should make sure that he gets those tablets every four hours,' she said. The officer seemed to nod along with every word that she said, but deep down he had no intentions of taking orders from a fucking doctor. 'I will need to see him again tomorrow, check his progress. If he informs me that you haven't been providing the pills, then I will make a formal complaint and hand-deliver it straight to Warden Dean. Do I make myself perfectly clear?'

Michaelson didn't know what hurt the most: the way she was speaking to him, or the fact that she had every right to make a complaint if the prick didn't get his medicine. As much as Charles Dean hated the prisoners, he didn't piss them off for no good reason.

'He'll get the fucking pills,' Michaelson grunted. 'Do you hear that, Nancy Boy? You'll get your pussy medicine to make your tummy-ache go away.' He was pushing Cyrus Clay towards the door as he spoke. 'The nice doctor here will tell on me if I don't give you what you need.'

He left the office, slamming the door so hard that the entire room appeared to tremble.

Marla leaned forward in her chair. She picked up the phial of blood and stared at it. 'Let's get you sent off,' she said.

Officer Michaelson could be heard cursing all the way down the corridor.

*

The prisoners were finally allotted some yard-time, which was good news for a few of the ones who had already started to go stir-crazy. Four walls did that to a person, especially when those four walls were all that you were going to see for the rest of your natural life.

It was overcast, and as Shane made his way out onto the basketball court, a few drops of rain had already hit him. Small flowers of water bloomed on the shoulders of his coveralls.

'Decided to let us out and we're gonna get fucking pissed on,' Shane said, accepting the basketball from Billy Toombs. 'Should have known there would be a catch.'

'Just be grateful we're out here at all,' Billy said. 'From what I heard, the guards took a vote. I don't care if it's hailing golfballs so long as I can stretch my legs.'

With visiting on the afternoon, Billy had nothing else to look forward to. He had had, as far as Shane could recall, no visitors since they had been celled up together. When Shane had questioned Billy about it, he'd simply said, 'I have my friends right here,' and pointed to the pile of books on the table in front of him. For a man to discard the people in his life – or in this case, accept that they had discarded him – and turn to literature was a tough thing to do. To Billy, though, words were all that he needed to get through the day. As long as he had a constant supply of reading material, he was happy; the days simply rolled into one another.

'Is Holly coming to see you today?' Billy asked. He tossed the ball across to Shane, who leapt up and guided it between the chain net. 'Nice shot.'

Shane scooped up the ball. 'She said she was,' he said. 'I hope she does, but I'm not sure I want her turning up here if there's some kind of nasty virus going around.'

Billy received the ball from Shane. 'I heard Cyrus is pretty bad with it,' he said. 'Whatever it is, I don't want it. People have been talking all kinds of crazy shit. You know how it is in here, the way stories get out of hand. The last I heard, Clay was pissing blood and praying to God. That fucker's the least religious person I've ever met, so if it's true, then he must be in all kinds of pain.'

'Who did you hear that from?' Shane asked. He stopped jumping around, his breathing was laborious.

'That new kid, the one working the spoon. I don't think he's the type to start rumours.'

'He's the type to believe any old shit he hears,' Shane said as he held out his hands. Billy bounced him the ball; he grabbed it and launched it in the direction of the net, and it almost fell in. After three bounces on the wire, it hit the backboard and bounced off to the side.

The rain was now hitting the ground and jumping back up.

'Fucking typical,' Shane grimaced.

The yard was emptying; the prisoners had stretched their legs and were heading back inside. Family and friends would be along shortly to bullshit about the outside world. Shane would be seeing his wife again, possibly for the final time before his release.

'Let's get back inside,' Billy said. 'You look like a drowned rat.'

*

Warden Dean was pissed off so badly that he wanted one of his officers to make a mistake just so he could fire their sorry ass.

He loaded the remains of Carlos Silva into Old Bessie, and searched the control panel for the button that took care of the fire. He was expecting to see a big red switch, or even a button with a picture of a flame on it – like a gas cooker – but there was nothing of the sort. Whoever had designed this piece of shit had not taken into consideration that somebody without a PhD in engineering would occasionally need to use it. Warden Dean was a smart man, at least he thought he was, so how could an Austrian, or German, or whatever the fuck Strauss was, operate the machine with such finesse? It was almost embarrassing.

'Sick my ass,' he muttered under his breath. 'He'll be sick when he gets back to work; I'll make pretty damned sure of that.'

There were laminated instructions nailed to the wall at the side of the incinerator, but they might as well have been written in hieroglyphics for all of the good that they were. There was something about pressure-checks, and then something else about temperature gauge. In the end, Charles Dean decided that it would be best to wait for the mortician to return. It was not a good idea to play with fire in his own prison; might end up nuking the place.

He decided to leave Carlos Silva's body in the incinerator, though, mainly because he couldn't be bothered to get it back out. What would it hurt? He wasn't going to stink the place out; not if the door was kept shut.

After making sure that everything was securely locked, the warden headed back upstairs.

'Fucking visiting,' he grumbled. 'I hate fucking visiting.'

*

They were led out into the room by Jenson and Tyler. The latter was limping still from his leg injury, and with every step that he took the pain was visible on his face. Shane almost felt sorry for the guard, but not quite.

There was a loud siren, which meant that the half hour visiting had begun. Shane hadn't even taken his seat.

'How's life treating you?' Holly asked. The gorgeous smile that stretched across her face lit up Shane's insides. It was a smile that said, Everything will be fine soon.

Shane pulled the seat out from the table and sat. 'You look beautiful,' he said. 'I wasn't sure if you would come, you know, the weather being so shit.'

'It would take more than just the weather to keep me away from you,' she said, gripping his hand across the table. In the corner of the room, Officer Tyler watched like a hawk, making sure that no contraband had exchanged hands, although he knew Shane Bridge and had never had an issue with him. The man was coming to the end of his term, so the chances of him trying to smuggle into the prison were slim, unless he was really stupid.

'How's Megan?' asked Shane. 'She still doing well at school?'

The last time Holly had visited, Megan had been named as class-prefect, which Shane thought was odd for a seven year-old, but everything was different now. They even had there own prom...at seven!

'She's doing great,' Holly nodded. 'She misses her daddy, but she knows that you'll be home soon.' She laughed. 'She gets really excited when she talks about it. Sometimes I have to tell her to calm down.'

Shane grinned. 'Really?'

'I swear,' Holly said. 'She's written songs about it, and everything.'

In that moment, Shane forgot that he was in prison; to hear that his daughter was already celebrating his release was amazing, and he couldn't wait to get home now, and hold her, the way he should have been holding her for the last three years. He had missed her growing into the girl she had, but he could at least be happy that she didn't detest him for it.

'How's your mother?' Shane asked.

'She's not too well at the moment,' Holly replied, the smile dropping from her face. 'The doctors think that she may have emphysema. I told her she should have quit smoking a long time ago, but would she have it? No, and now look.'

This was the first that Shane had heard of Holly's mother's problem, but it came as no surprise; the woman smoked thirty a day, and had done since she was twenty. It was only a matter of time before it caught up with her.

'She'll bounce back,' Shane said, although he doubted it.

'Shane, she's sixty and has to inhale steroids. What do you think she's going to do? Start yoga?'

He shouldn't have, but he laughed. The sight of Holly's mother bending into unnatural positions with a fag in one hand and a glass of wine in the other was too much.

'It's not funny,' Holly said, and then she started to laugh too. 'Shane, stop it. She might not last for much longer.'

'Then tell her that yoga is a bad idea,' Shane sniggered.

They laughed together for a while. Glossing over the problem seemed to have done the trick, and although Holly was worried sick about her mother, making a joke about it made the problem seem less important.

'You and Holly started to pack your things up yet?' said Shane.

Holly looked surprised. 'What do you mean?'

'At your Mom's?' he said. 'Have you got all of your stuff together for when I get out?'

She frowned. 'Shane, we have nowhere to go. You'll have to come stay with my parents for a while until you get back on your feet.'

The anger that Shane suddenly felt course through him was almost unbearable. The whole reason he was in prison was because of his stubborn refusal to accept any help from Holly's mother, and yet here he was, on the brink of freedom, and he would be forced to just set up home with the in-laws.

'We talked about this,' Shane said.

'You did,' Holly said. 'It's easy for you to talk about it, stuck in here, but we had nowhere else to go, and until we get set up, and you get a job, we'll have no choice but to stay with my mom and dad.'

Great, Shane thought. I could have avoided a three-stretch all along, and by now we'd be sorted, with a place of our own again.

Arguing was not what Shane wanted; there was nothing worse than falling out with Holly and then being shepherded back to his cell where he would have nothing to mull over except for all of the bad things that they said to each other. It was enough to drive a man insane. He smiled.

'You're right,' he said. 'I'll get a job as soon as I get out. Who knows, huh? Might even go for a job as one of these.' He nudged a finger in the general direction of Officer Tyler. He turned in his chair. 'How much do you make after tax?' he said to the guard.

'Not enough to look at your ugly face every day,' Tyler said, but there was something strange about the way he said it: breathless. Pained, even.

When Shane turned back to the table, Holly asked, 'What's wrong with him?'

'Some virus doing the rounds,' Shane said. 'Let's just hope that I don't get it before I get chance to have a proper munch on Megan.'

'I'll tell her you said that,' Holly smiled. 'That'll make her day.'

For the fifteen minutes that followed, they talked about how Holly had taken an art course at college, and was hoping to even showcase some of her work at the local gallery; they discussed Holly's father, who had built yet another shed in the back garden, taking the tally up to four in total. Shane wondered if he was planning on renting them out to immigrants to make a bit of extra cash. They talked about Holly's newly discovered interest in all things Justin Bieber, who Shane had never heard of before, but would be having a stern talk with Holly about when he was released. Talking about these things made Shane realise that he was about to embark upon a new chapter in life. He was going home, finally, and although certain things had changed, the two most important people in his life remained exactly the same.

As the siren sounded to announce the end of visiting time, Shane didn't feel the usual sinking feeling he usually did. He kissed Holly, not noticing Officer Jenson standing against the wall and admiring Shane's wife as if she was his own.

'I'll see you soon,' Holly said as she was ushered out of the door, a tide of less significant visitors following her through it. She blew him a final kiss before she was edged out of sight.

The prisoners left behind in the visiting room watched as Officer Tyler staggered, banged his head on the far wall, and hit the deck with a thud.

'Holy shit!' cried Officer Jenson. He reached for his two-way and called for help.

With the taste of Holly still on his lips, Shane watched as the guard writhed and spasmed, cheered on by the rest of the prisoners, who thought it was the best show they had ever seen.

Something, Shane thought, was definitely not right.

*

'I have a home to go to,' Marla said, although Warden Dean simply could not grasp the concept. 'I know there's something going around, but I'm not a witch; I can't just make it all stop.'

'Then why the fuck do I employ you?' Charles Dean snarled. 'You don't seem to have the slightest clue what is happening here. All I know is that one of my men was bitten yesterday, and now he's stretched out unconscious with some sort of superbug that, stop me if I'm wrong, you should be aware of.'

'I'm not in the CDC,' Marla retorted. 'When was the last time you noticed me wearing a biological suit? Huh? Never, because I don't deal with superbugs. I patch up your prisoners when they get stabbed; I make sure they get their Aspirin if they get a migraine. I never said I could prevent the plague.'

'That's what you think this is?' Charles asked with an expression that suggested he had already thought about it himself. 'Some sort of supervirus?'

Marla took a step back. The room, all of a sudden, didn't seem big enough for both of them. 'I'm not suggesting anything,' she said. 'All I know is that I have a life out of work, and I would like to live it. You know the protocol. Those infected should be taken to the hospital under guard. There is nothing more that I can do for them.'

'Protocol,' Charles grunted. 'What the fuck do you know about protocol. You just walk around here, prick-teasing and then complaining when somebody takes you up on the offer.'

Marla didn't know what happened, but before she could do anything about it, her hand was already connecting with the side of the warden's face. His head jolted backwards, and his eyes bulged with the shock that followed.

'How dare you!' she said. 'You know that your fucking guard was out of line.'

Charles didn't speak; he couldn't. He was still mortally offended that she had slapped him. He had gone a peculiar shade of red, too, which made him look as if he might explode at any given moment.

'If you don't put the call in to transfer Officer Tyler and Cyrus Clay, then I will.' She said it knowing that it would prompt a response from the man, who would never let her do such a thing.

'I'll make the call,' he said. 'But if I were you, I would start to look for another job, because I believe that you are of no further use to this facility.'

Marla smiled. 'First thing tomorrow,' she said, and turned to head for the door. She managed two steps before an alarm went off. It wasn't the fire-alarm, which she had heard on numerous occasions. This one, she didn't recognise.

She turned to find Charles Dean looking slightly anxious.

'Looks like you won't be going anywhere just yet,' he said.

*

'Can you see anything out there?' Billy Toombs asked. He was still clenching his book, aware that the chances of an actual riot were slim.

'I can see a few of the guards running around at the end of the row,' Shane said. 'Apart from that, everybody seems to be in their cells.'

He looked out at the cells across the landing. Prisoners were pressed against the bars trying to get a better look. A few of them were shouting obscenities towards the guards, who ran past with baffled expressions. The alarm seemed to go on forever, and after a while the shrill scream that filled the prison was enough to give everyone a migraine.

'Probably a suicide,' Billy said, picking up where he had left off with Vonnegut.

'Maybe,' Shane replied. 'But they try to keep suicides quiet, don't they? Why would they be raising the roof with that fucking racket if someone had hung themselves with their own bedlinen?'

No, something was happening, and Shane knew that it was something to do with the people falling sick.

*

'Is he dead?' Dennis Hart spluttered, grasping at the open wound on his neck to prevent the blood from squirting out so freely. 'Make sure he's fucking dead this time.'

The body of Jimmy Kelly lay outstretched just outside the cell. Jimmy had attacked Dennis, ripped a chunk out of his neck, and kept on coming until the guards arrived. Michaelson had been the first on the scene, and wasn't sure what was happening until he opened the cell door. It was then that Jimmy turned, growled, and leapt for the guard, his eyes filled with darkness, his throat filled with the blood of his cellmate. Luckily, for Michaelson, the baton had met the crazed man's face quite cleanly; a few teeth shot out and clattered against the cell wall. But even that had not been enough to deter Jimmy Kelly, who had clambered to his feet and started after the guard once again.

It had taken at least fifteen more hits from the baton to put him down, which was not right at all. One should have been enough, especially to the skull, which is where the guard had concentrated his attack.

It was then that the alarm had been sounded.

Dennis Hart struggled to his feet and began to approach Michaelson, who was breathless and confused and leaning against the cell wall for stability.

'Make sure he's dead,' Dennis managed, but white lights began to dance in front of his eyes, and he almost toppled over.

The guard straightened up and took a deep breath. He glanced over to where Jimmy Kelly lay, still and destroyed. 'He's fucking dead,' he said. 'Look at his head.'

Indeed, there was a hole big enough to put your foot through on the back of Jimmy's head; bits of brain and grey matter dangled out through the hole like some foreign cuisine.

Dennis shook his head. 'I can't believe he fucking bit me,' he said. 'Just came for me for no reason. I swear to god, if I find out that someone's got a contract out on me—'

'Shut up,' Michaelson roared. Dennis took a step back; the guard, although fatigued, was still clenching the baton in his hand and still wore the expression of somebody willing to use it. The noise of the alarm was making it impossible to think, and in that moment, Michaelson needed to get his head together long enough to figure out what had just happened.

In the cell, Dennis stumbled and fell onto the bottom bunk of his bed, cracking his face on the wooden frame as he went. He had lost a lot of blood; he knew that, and it was still spurting out of him like a geyser, spraying the bedclothes, covering the wall. The cell would take forever to clean, Dennis thought as he lay motionless on the bed, his legs hanging over the edge.

'If I find out they got a contract...' Dennis said, but unconsciousness came before he had a chance to finish.

Between the bars of the cell, Officer Michaelson waited for backup.

*

Charles Dean marched up the steps to the second floor, grunting to himself occasionally. If someone was trying to escape again, he was going to make an example of them. He couldn't understand why one of his prisoners would even attempt to break out, though. This was one of the most secure prisons in the world; the chances of succeeding were about as likely as breaking out of Alcatraz.

He reached the second floor and turned right, past the first row of cells. A few of the inmates backed away at the sight of the governor, not wishing to put themselves in the line of fire. Rooster Hill yelled, 'Go get 'em, Boss,' which made Charles quicken his pace.

He reached for his two-way and called for backup, which was apparently already on its way. By the time he reached the third floor there would already be a small army of guards waiting, some of them off duty, but that didn't make a blind bit of difference to Charles Dean. He wanted as many of them as he could get a hold of, and if that meant that they forfeit their smoking break, then it was a small price to pay for the continual success of the prison's reputation.

He was at the end of the second floor row when he heard the grunt. A low, animalistic growl that made the hairs on the nape of his neck stand straight up. He turned to make sure that nobody was behind him, and was about to ignore the noise entirely when it came once again.

This time he had to take a look. Someone was fucking with him; not a good idea.

He looked into the first cell, the one on the corner of the row. Two prisoners stared back at him. One of them shrugged, which meant that they had heard the growl above the noise of the alarm, too.

He moved across to the next cell, his hand creeping ever-so-slowly towards the gun on his belt. Again, confused prisoners stared back at him, only this time one of them pointed through the wall to the next cell.

Cyrus Clay, Charles thought. Should have known it was that piece of shit.

He stepped across, expecting to find Cyrus grinning back at him from his bunk, but he wasn't there. He was hunched up on the floor of the cell with his back to Charles. The floor glistened as a pool of darkness spread outwards from the huddled figure.

'Clay, on your feet,' Charles said, his hand now firmly holding the handle of his pistol. Under current circumstances, Charles Dean didn't think he would hesitate, not for one second, to use the gun. Cyrus Clay just growled again, which pissed the governor off. 'I said, get the fuck up!'

Cyrus Clay's head snapped around; his teeth were dripping with a thick, black substance which looked to Charles Dean like tar. He remained hunched over, but he now resembled an owl, with his head turned almost entirely around. His eyes were bleeding with the same black ooze that trickled out of his mouth; Charles looked into those eyes for a few seconds before looking away. The darkness was almost too much to take, and staring into the void for too long might drive a man crazy.

'What the fuck, Clay?' Charles managed. He hadn't noticed but he had instinctively drawn his pistol and had his finger on the trigger, ready.

Cyrus grunted, stood, and turned to face the governor. His arm, Charles noticed, was missing quite a lot of flesh, which would explain the mess around the prisoner's lips.

He had been eating his own arm.

Charles couldn't believe what he was seeing, but he had to, didn't he? His own eyes didn't lie. He was staring at a man who had, up until a few moments ago, been ripping into his own flesh. Had Cyrus finally gone over the edge? Was he really insane? Charles hoped not; he didn't relish the thought of all the paperwork that came with transferring a prisoner to a secure hospital.

'Don't move another—' Charles began, but it was too late. Clay was already running towards the bars, his arms stretched out, his teeth bared. He certainly looked like a mental patient.

When he hit the bars, his nose broke instantly. There was a squelch, and blood shot out of Clay's face; some of the black gunk that had filled his mouth hit the floor with the sound of treacle landing on a counter-top. His eyes suggested surprise as he bounced off the bars, but that didn't prevent him from giving it another try. He shot forward, clattered the bars again, all the time growling and moaning. His head split on the left side, which should have hurt – even a mental person – but if it did, then Clay didn't show it.

'Back up!' Charles called, but it made no difference. Clay kept on coming, and seemed to hit the bars with more force every time. In the end, the governor decided that he would deal with the disturbed prisoner later on.

He had to get up to the third floor.

'Don't leave us down here with him,' a prisoner called out as Charles Dean disappeared around the corner.

'Shut up,' the governor replied as he ran up the flight of stairs to the third floor.

*

'What, so you had to hit him so much that his brain came out?' Jenson asked Michaelson. 'That's pretty fucked up, man?'

And it was. In all of his years as a prison guard, Michaelson had never seen anything like it.

'He just kept on coming,' Michaelson said. 'I had no choice. You seen what he's done to Hart?'

Jenson glanced into the cell. He could see Dennis Hart's feet, which were twitching over the edge of the bed, but that was all. The blood that had sprayed all over the walls and floor confirmed it for Officer Jenson: he didn't want to see the wound on Hart's neck.

'What the fuck is going on up here?' Charles Dean asked as he huffed and puffed his way along the row. 'Will somebody turn that goddamned alarm off before I go fucking deaf?'

One of the other guards, a short fat man by the name of Reynolds, saluted the governor before running off down the stairs. Reynolds was keen, but a little too keen sometimes, and as he disappeared in search of the alarm controls, Charles Dean tried to remember the poor guys name, and couldn't.

'What happened to Kelly?' Charles asked. The body had been flipped over; Jimmy Kelly's one eye was hanging down the side of his face.

'I had to,' Michaelson said. 'He was trying to get to me, Sir. I think he wanted to bite me.'

'I don't care if he wanted to fuck you, Michaelson. You do not kill prisoners with excessive force.'

'Like I said, Gov, I had no choice. I hit him, and he kept in getting up and coming at me. He'd already ripped a chunk out of Hart.'

Charles Dean smiled; at least something good had come out of it. 'Where is he?'

'On his bunk,' Jenson said. 'But judging by the mess in there, I don't think he's going to make it, Gov.'

Charles glared into the cell, expecting to see Dennis Hart lying on his bed, dying a slow and painful death. When he saw the man running towards him, with no cage between them to prevent it, he said, 'Holy shit!'

As Hart hit the governor, they both went backwards, toppled over the railings, and fell three floors down.

*

Marla didn't know what to do. She would have been bored were it not for the unique collection of music to browse on the shelves in Charles Dean's office. There were jazz records, classical, blues. She even found a signed, first-edition copy of Michael Jackson's Thriller, which was out of place amongst the rest of the collection.

The office, she surmised, was a sign of the governor's unparalleled machismo. There were certificates announcing Charles Dean's adeptness down at the gun-club; there were trophies scattered haphazardly around the room with little men sitting atop them, playing golf. Marla located the drinks cabinet, which was cleverly concealed within a gilt-coated globe of the world. She poured herself a small whisky and sighed.

'Will somebody turn off that godforsaken alarm,' she said, sipping her drink and reading through some notes on the governor's desk which meant absolutely nothing to her.

In a silver frame on the desk, there was a photograph of Charles with two young girls; it was the typical daddy-daughter picture, with smiles all round and love glinting in everyone's eyes. She wondered if his girls were aware of their father's brutality, or whether they had even been on the receiving end of it whilst growing up.

It wouldn't surprise her.

A few more minutes passed; Marla refilled her glass knowing that she could finish the entire bottle and it would make no difference, although she did have to drive home, and the last thing she needed after the day she had had was to get pulled by the police. Tomorrow, she would be on the lookout for a new job, something different, hopefully something that she would be appreciated for. She could always try and get back into Russell's, which was the hospital that she had worked at before resuming her post at the prison. It wasn't a bad hospital to work at, and she had gotten along quite well with her colleagues. If they would take her back, then it might be something to consider.

The alarm continued to annoy her as she worked her way through the second glass of whisky.

*

'The fall would have killed them!' Jenson cried. 'It makes no sense!'

They peered over the railings at the two men on the ground floor. Dennis Hart was growling and ripping through Charles Dean's stomach; intestines were being pulled out, and Hart proceeded to bite at them, yanking them apart with his teeth.

'We need to get to somewhere safe,' Michaelson said. 'I've seen some crazy shit in my time, but this is something else.'

He knew what he meant when he said somewhere safe; the armoury, where all of the guns were at.

Dennis Hart continued to gnaw through the fresh cadaver before him. The alarm continued to sound in its shrill pitch. Everything continued to get gradually worse.

*

The cards went into the middle of the table. Rooster was not happy as he had lost three games on the trot. Marvin Manson, on the other hand, couldn't believe his luck. So far he had won twenty cigarettes – and none of those shitty menthol things that Rooster smoked – and twenty-three dollars in cash, which could get you quite a lot of stuff if you knew where to go for it. The constant alarm didn't seem to be putting him off his stride at all.

'Your deal,' Marvin said, pushing the cards across the table to his cellmate.

Rooster picked up the cards and began to shuffle. 'If I was a betting man,' he said while he began to handle the cards expertly. 'I'd say that Dennis is the reason why that alarm's still ringing.'

'You think?'

'Who else is up on third that might cause such a nuisance?'

Marvin nodded in agreement. 'But he wouldn't be trying to escape,' he said. 'He knows better than that.'

'He might be welcoming one of the fishes a little too roughly,' Rooster sniggered. 'You know what he gets like when he's pissed off.'

Rooster began to deal the cards, counting silently in his head as he did so.

'What are the stakes this game?' Marvin asked, feeling lucky.

'I'm all out of cash,' Rooster said, placing the rest of the deck in the middle of the table. 'How about if I win, I get a go on your mother when I get out of here, and if you win, you get to fuck my sister?'

Marvin laughed. 'Have you seen the state of my mother?' he said.

'Yeah, but you haven't seen the fucking state of my sister,' Rooster cackled. 'Even I wouldn't fuck her.'

'In that case, you're on,' Marvin laughed.

They played the hand; Rooster lost, and Marvin began to make plans to pay his friend's sister a visit upon release.

*

Reynolds ran to the end of the block, and when he got there he couldn't breathe. He reached into his pocket, pulled out an inhaler, and sucked it, pressing the button several times before giving it a shake and trying again. His asthma had never been a problem at work before; then again, he had never moved so sharply at work before, and he felt like he had no choice but to move as quickly as possible.

He pocketed the inhaler and entered the gate which led to the control panel. He could hear the prisoners starting to get increasingly frustrated by the din of the alarm, which was not a good thing, so the quicker he worked, the better.

He looked for something on the walls, but when you didn't know quite what you were looking for, then it was harder than it looked. There were a few levers and switches, all of which looked electrical, but most of them were labelled with coloured stickers: one said Main Lights, another said Yard. The next one didn't have a coloured sticker on, but a sign hung around the handle that said Do Not Touch. Officer Reynolds decided that it was the kind of instruction that the alarm would have written on it, so gave it a quick tug. When nothing happened, at least nothing that was instantly noticeable, he moved along the wall.

Eventually, he found the override box – it had Manual Alarm Override printed on it in big yellow letters - pulled open the little door on the front of it, and inserted the key. It was a key that all of the guards were issued with, but one that he had never used before. He turned the key, and immediately the alarm ceased its incessant racket. The prisoners were even louder for a few seconds, and then quietened down, happy that they could finally get some sleep.

'Yessss,' Officer Reynolds smiled. He would be commended for his quick work, and would be noticed by Charles Dean as one of the better guards under his command, which wasn't hard. All you had to do was take a good hard look at Michaelson, Jenson, Tyler, and a few of the others. You soon realised that they were corrupt. It was only a matter of time before the governor figured out that Reynolds was, in fact, the best of a bad bunch.

He closed the override box and headed back up to the third floor, where he hoped he would be the recipient of a pat on the back by his boss.

*

Shane was about to ask Billy Toombs what he found so funny about Kurt Vonnegut when the click came. It was a sound that he, and all of the other inmates, were very familiar with. But why now? Why had the gates been unlocked now, at night?

'Check it,' Billy said, pointing to the barred gate at the front of the cell. 'Must be some sort of mechanical failure.'

Shane stepped up to the gate and gave it a pull. When it slid across and slammed against the stopper on the other side of the cell he couldn't quite believe it.

'Shhhhh,' Billy urged. He could see that Shane was about to lose it, probably shout out to all and sundry that the cells were open. Billy reminded him just in time that such an action was probably not a good idea. The alarm had maybe drowned out the mechanical click for most of the prisoners, and the ones who had heard it might not cotton on what it actually was.

Then, the alarm stopped. The ringing continued, though, inside Shane's own ears; he wondered how long that would last for.

'Mechanical malfunction?' Shane asked. 'That's something that's never happened before.'

Billy nodded. 'Somebody's gonna get fired over it.'

Shane turned and glanced out. Across the railings, prisoners were screaming and shouting as they pulled across their cell doors. The second floor was exactly the same, and Shane didn't need to leave the sanctuary of cell 101 to know that the third floor were already aware of the malfunction, and were leaving their cells amidst cheers and bouts of excited violence.

'Somebody's going to hang for this,' Shane said.

*

Officer Reynolds stopped moving when he heard the faint crackling noise behind him. It sounded like somebody was walking across bubble-wrap. The darkness made it almost impossible to see where he was going, and he made a mental note to remind Charles Dean that there was a distinct lack of lighting over by the infirmary.

The crackling stopped, leaving only Reynolds's laborious breathing. Through the darkness, he could see the door to the infirmary was wide open. He watched as it swung half-shut, before opening again. As it hit the spring stopper on the floor, there was the sound that Reynolds had mistaken for bubble-wrap being popped, which put his mind at rest momentarily.

A slight breeze whipped through the corridor, hitting Reynolds, causing him to shiver. He made his way into the infirmary to locate the source of the breeze. There was one window, obviously barred, but it had been left slightly ajar, no doubt to cool whoever had been lying sick in the empty bed against the far wall. After closing the window, he decided to take a quick look around to make sure that nothing else was amiss. It would all go in his favour when reported to the governor, and the more things he found, the likelier it was that he would get the promotion that he so eagerly yearned for.

The sheets on the empty bed, he noticed, were sodden with blood. He would mention that to Charles Dean, as it was obviously against some sort of regulation that he was currently unaware of.

There was a drip standing next to the bed, which had apparently been unhooked from the patient with haste; a chunk of flesh encased the needle at the end of the line. That, Officer Reynolds thought, was obviously wrong, and as much as he liked Doctor Emmett – liked her so much, in fact, that he had a few secret pictures of her on his mobile phone – he would quite comfortably sacrifice her position in the prison to elevate his own.

'What the...?' Reynolds said to nobody, as he noticed the bloody footprints leading away from the bed. Whoever they had belonged to must have been dragging one leg, as one side of the trail was smeared.

Being heroic was certainly below his pay-grade, but he couldn't help it. He felt his own feet moving in the direction of the gory trail, which must lead to the injured party eventually. He followed them into an adjoining room; the sign on the door informed Reynolds that it was a room where medical supplies were kept.

The light provided by the prior room soon diminished, however, and Officer Reynolds found himself standing in near-darkness wishing that he hadn't been so stupidly inquisitive.

He could make out certain objects on the shelves; there was a pile of boxes which contained latex gloves, and he could see a row of empty urine-sample phials, but that was about it. There were no windows to provide light, and he couldn't find a switch anywhere on the wall.

But the footprints led into the room; he was standing on them, and he could feel the stickiness beneath his feet with every move he made.

Then he noticed movement across the room, followed by the sound of something falling from one of the surrounding shelves.

'Hello?' he said. Whoever was there had heard him, because they turned; he could see the slight glint of light in their eyes. 'Are you okay?'

It was the patient, the one that had been so unceremoniously detached from the drip in the adjoining room. He was obviously disoriented, and had somehow ended up in the medical supplies room. If the patient was still loaded up with drugs, which Reynolds guessed would be the reason why he wasn't crying out in agony from the wound in his arm where the drip had once been fed, then it would explain how he had accidentally confused the storage-room for perhaps somewhere he could find help.

'I don't think you're meant to be in here,' Reynolds said. He pulled his baton out of its loop on his belt and clenched it tightly. He was taking no chances; for all he knew, the shadowy figure was one of the more violent prisoners in the facility, and hiding amongst the supplies whilst the alarm created a diversion had been part of his plan all along.

There came an almighty roar from the patient, who had suddenly straightened up and, even in the dark, looked to be about six-foot tall.

Officer Reynolds didn't have time to scream as the patient lurched towards him, but the light from the adjoining room was enough to put a face to the growl.

It was Tyler, one of the other guards.

And now Tyler was tearing flesh away from Reynolds's ribcage.

Finally Reynolds screamed, and he continued to scream until darkness enveloped him.

*

They cowered in the cell, like two little boys hiding in the basement of their home as Daddy came a-looking for them for something naughty they had done. Only it wasn't Daddy that they were afraid of.

It was Cyrus Clay.

Terry Lewis and Jared Cole had shared a cell for almost seven years, and in that time they had discovered things about each other that not even their family knew about. It was one of the perils of living in such close quarters.

You had no secrets.

But Terry now knew that Jared could, if prompted, scream like a little girl, as he had when the cell door had suddenly unlocked itself. If Terry hadn't been there to cover his cellmate's wide-open mouth with his inhumanly large hand, there was no doubt Cyrus Clay would have heard the scream.

Terry pulled the mattress off the bottom bunk of the bed just in time; the sound of the cell door next to them as it slammed open was a sign that Cyrus had managed to free himself, and now he would come looking.

Terry yanked Jared into the corner of the cell, smashing his head on the aluminium toilet as he fell into it. He pulled the mattress against them, which acted as a makeshift hiding place that would probably fool nobody.

Yet it was better than nothing.

Cyrus Clay appeared in front of their cell, his mouth oozing with black drool and his eyes darker than the deepest pits of Hell. He turned, momentarily, towards the cell door which, although unlocked, remained pulled across. Terry watched through the tiniest gap between the overturned mattress and the wall; beside him, Jared was whimpering through Terry's fingers. A string of warm spit trickled across his knuckles.

Cyrus Clay sniffed the air around the cell, like some kind of wild animal. He grunted, and it was in that moment that Terry Lewis knew that what he was looking at was not human.

At Sunday School, a young Terry Lewis had excelled to the point where a career in the clergy seemed to be the only option. He had prayed with the enthusiasm required to meet such exacting standards, and his parents had already pushed him into a few courses that would see him head into the field as a Priest. He had, up until then, managed to stay out of trouble, and he had studied ferociously to placate his parents and meet the standards required by the church. He had learned all about the Devil, and Demons, and temptation, and betrayal, and had swallowed it all down heartily, yearning for more knowledge about the evil that men are capable of. A year later, Terry Lewis had been arrested for the murder of one of his teachers, a man by the name of Father Bennett. He had, in his own special way, become the evil that he had enjoyed reading about whilst preparing for priesthood. And yet the evil that he was staring at now, sniffing the air outside of the cell like a bear trying to figure out whether a log-cabin contained anything of notability, well that was something else entirely. If there was a Hell, and Terry was pretty sure that there was, then Cyrus Clay's wearer had been sent from it to devour everything in its path.

The creature turned to the cell and placed both hands on the bars.

Terry Lewis began to pray silently. If Cyrus stepped into the cell, he would see the two prisoners cowering behind the mattress. Jared couldn't see what his cellmate could, but he could feel Terry tense up which was almost as bad.

'Hey, Cyrus,' a voice said, and in that moment Terry knew that his prayers had been answered. The creature standing just outside the cell turned to where the voice came from. Terry couldn't see the man who had spoken, but he recognised the voice: Dale McCarthy.

Cyrus Clay roared, and Terry watched as he stepped out of sight. Dale could be heard still. 'What the fuck, dude? What's the matter with—'

Then came the screams.

Terry pulled his hand tighter against Jared's mouth.

'If we're really quiet,' he whispered. 'He might go away.'

Jared nodded. I hope so.

*

Turning the bed around was the easy part; making it fit the entire width of the cell, on the other hand, was impossible.

'So long as most of the gate's covered,' Billy said, 'we should be okay.'

They'd decided not to leave the confines of the cell if there was going to be a riot. The chances are they would end up with more jail-time added to their sentences – something that Shane was not willing to risk – or worse, they could end up being killed.

The best thing to do, both of them agreed, was to barricade themselves in. They had both been involved in riots over the years, and most of them had led up onto the roof where there would be a violent stand-off with the guards, leading to a list of menial demands which would never be met since it was not prison policy to negotiate with the inmates, not under any circumstances.

Billy picked up his table, which must have weighed a decent hundred pounds, and wedged it into the bottom bunk to prevent anyone from clambering across into the cell.

Not that they would, of course. Not with a giant half-Indian, half-Irishman waiting on the inside. By the time an intruder managed to break in, they would have a size 22 shoe in their face. If they got as far as the bunk, Shane would be able to crack them across the head with something, perhaps Vonnegut?

With the gate sufficiently blocked, they stepped back and admired their work.

'Guards see this,' Shane said, 'and they'll realise that we're not taking part in anything.'

Billy nodded. 'Let's just hope it doesn't last as long as the one last year,' he said. 'We'll starve to death.'

Shane laughed. 'We won't starve to death,' he said. 'I promise, if anyone's going to starve it'll be me first, and then you can just eat me.'

'I wouldn't eat you,' Billy said.

'No?'

'Uh-huh. I've smelt your insides on lots of occasions. Don't think it would be a good idea to go carving about and letting those gases escape.'

'Fuck you, Tonto!' Shane sniggered.

They sat on the edge of the bed and waited for things to calm down.

*

The armoury had not been breached by any of the crazed prisoners, which shouldn't have come as a surprise to either Jenson or Michaelson as a set of keys were required, not to mention fingerprint identification, which was scanned by a machine on the wall. Jenson held his hand up to the machine, but it took three attempts because of how badly he was trembling. When the light finally turned green – ACCESS GRANTED – they both barged through the door at the same time.

Inside, there were cages filled with guns. There were M-16s, standard military-issue rifles, there were a couple of Browning A-5 semi-automatic shotguns – Jenson immediately unlocked the cage which held these and grabbed one; he'd had plenty of training with it, and had decided that it was his favourite of all the guns he had fired.

Michaelson was loading two Walther P99 pistols; if he was going into battle with something that wouldn't die easily, then he was going to do it in style. He fastened holsters to either side of his belt and slotted the pistols into them.

'What the fuck are those things?' Jenson said, cocking his shotgun. 'I mean, that thing wasn't Dennis Hart out there.' He jabbed a conspiratorial finger towards the door. 'There was no way he could have survived that fall. No fucking way! That was forty feet, maybe even more!'

'Keep your voice down,' Michaelson said as he concentrated on filling extra cartridges. 'Whatever it was, it wasn't deaf.'

'Did you see what it did to Dean?' Jenson added, his face contorted with disgust. 'The way it tore at him like that?'

'I saw it,' Michaelson said. He clipped two extra cartridges to his belt and began to browse the cages for more weaponry. 'I saw it, and I'll never forget it for as long as I live, but for now, I want to make sure that I live for as long as possible.' He unhooked some smoke grenades and fastened them to his belt, which was now looking more like US Army webbing.

'I hear you, man,' Jenson said. 'Do you think somebody's called for backup?'

It was a good question. The alarm had been deactivated, though, which meant that any outside cavalry, had it been despatched, would be returning to base assuming that everything had been resolved. That was the way it worked. The alarm system was linked up to Jackson Police, and the army base over at Fort Neill. If the alarm had gone on for much longer, there would have been no doubt a helicopter would have been despatched; maybe even a couple of armed response units. Trust fucking Charles Dean to send that maggot to shut the alarm down.

Michaelson grimaced, then shook his head. 'We're on our own here, man,' he said. 'At least until we get to the radio.'

The radio was in Charles Dean's office, an old UHF number that could reach the Jackson Police and Fort Neill with the push of a button. Its usage had, over the years, been limited to two occasions, one of which had been a riot, the other a trio of escapees.

'We need to get up there and call for help,' Jenson said, brushing a hand through his hair, which was already greasy with sweat and worry.

'We will,' Michaelson said. 'If it's just the two of us, though, we need to watch each other's backs.'

'That's for fucking sure,' said Jenson. He swung his shotgun across his shoulder.

They grabbed up their ammo from the benches and left the armoury.

*

Dale McCarthy pushed himself up from the floor. For a moment, he looked confused, staring this way and that, trying to figure out what was happening and where he was. His right leg was missing a lot of flesh, and the back of his neck, if he could see it, was stripped of meat to the point where is spine was visible. Only three fingers remained on his left hand, and two on his right. Somebody had gone to town on him, that was for sure, and yet he felt no pain. He glared down at his leg, at the hole that seemed to take up most of his left thigh, and it meant nothing to him. The missing fingers were not a problem, either. What was a problem, however, was his hunger. It was the only feeling he had; a hunger so intense that he would do whatever it took to satiate it, if that was possible.

He sniffed the air, and he could smell them, hiding, somewhere nearby.

He drooled and groaned, not too loud, but loud enough for the concealed bodies to know that he was there, and he was hungry. He could see further down the row, a figure lurching away; a man also in search of something to put an end to the painful hunger.

Cyrus Clay stumbled through a gate and disappeared from sight, but Dale wasn't aware that it had been Cyrus, the man who had only a few moments before been feeding upon him. What he did know, though, was that he needed to follow the man on his search for food; the bodies that were hiding nearby were perhaps not there at all, but there would be others where the man was heading.

He took a step forward and let out a roar. His leg didn't hurt like it should have; everything for Dale McCarthy was fine, as long as he found something to eat.

He took another step, and then something smashed into the back of his head.

*

'Hit it again!' Jared cried.

Terry Lewis lifted the makeshift bat – something he had been hiding in his cell for almost a month, just in case – and slammed it down on Dale McCarthy's skull once again. There was a thud! Like the sound of meat hitting the counter at the local butchers. Dale was face down, but he was trying to turn himself over; his hands were grabbing out at anything they could get a hold of. Jared took a step back, not wanting to be caught by the flailing arms.

'Fucking thing!' Terry said. He lined himself up, then kicked the creature in the stomach. It lifted from the floor and came back down again with a sickening squelch. The black drool that had been dripping from the mouth of Cyrus Clay was now pouring from every hole in Dale McCarthy's face.

Slamming the bat down, and this time connecting with the side of the creature's face, Terry felt liberated, happy that he was finally using the bat he had forged to protect himself from scummy inmates. Instead, he was using it on a scummy demon, the kind which he was pretty sure he had studied at Bible Class.

'Watch its teeth!' Jared called out, and he was just in time. The thing had managed to get up to one knee and was about to snap at Terry's leg.

Terry stepped back and delivered a glancing blow to the face of what was formerly Dale McCarthy. The snapping teeth flew from its mouth, clattered against the rails of a cell a few doors down, and came to a stop like the roll of a dice on a casino craps table. Dark ooze spewed from the creature's mouth, and Jared almost felt sorry for it when it let out a moan, not of pain, but as an admission of defeat.

Terry Lewis began to pray. Not silently, like he had done whilst they had cowered in the cell, hiding from Cyrus Clay, but as loud as he could.

'Most glorious Prince of the heavenly armies, Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in our battle against principalities and powers.'

Dale's skull split open as the bat came down again; Terry Lewis took a deep breath before continuing.

'Against the rulers of this world of darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places.'

He slammed the bat down; there came the sound of bones cracking. The creature slumped to the floor, growling and grunting, still snapping with whatever teeth remained.

'Come to the assistance of men whom God has created to His likeness.'

'Fucking thing!' Jared snapped, spitting on it and giving it a cautious kick in its backside. Terry lifted a hand and told his cellmate to take a step back, which he did.

'And whom He has redeemed at a great price from the tyranny of the Devil.'

He pulled the bat high into the air and drove it down with such force that it hit the concrete beneath the creature's face. The bat stood up, sticking out of the back of Dale McCarthy's head like a candle on a birthday cake. Both of the prisoners took a step back now; Terry's hands were shaking.

'What was all that about?' Jared asked. 'I didn't know you were a religious nut.'

Terry wiped the sweat from his brow. 'I was,' he said. 'A long, long time ago.'

They watched as the creature continued to twitch for a few seconds, and then stopped moving completely.

*

'How many times?' Shane said to Billy, who was laughing. 'I've never dressed as a woman. That's just your fantasy.'

'My fantasy,' Billy said, 'is to get out of here one day, track you down, and teach you how to fight like a man.'

'You've never seen me fight,' Shane said.

'Exactly,' said Billy. 'Which leads me to believe that you fight like a girl.'

Their banter was immediately silenced as something crashed against the cell door. Shane jumped to his feet, ready to hit anything that tried to penetrate their fortress; Billy backed up against the wall and reached into his boot. A small knife, although big enough to kill someone if you stuck it in the right place, came out. Shane offered Billy a silent glare; he wondered where Billy had managed to procure the weapon, and why he needed it at all.

Something slammed the cell door again, but neither of them could see who, or what, it was. The wedged furniture had worked so well that their view of the outside was compromised.

'Get the fuck out of here!' Shane yelled, but he knew that whoever was hitting the gate was unlikely to listen. These were hardened criminals they were dealing with, not impertinent children. Telling them to back off was about as good as inviting them to try their luck at getting in.

There came one more slam, a scream, and then a gargle so close that Shane could practically smell the breath of whoever had made such a noise. Through a crack between the cabinet and a chair, Shane could see skin-colour, and a small rivulet of blood dripping across it. Then he was staring into the wide, bloodshot eye of a man as he slid down the cell door.

'It's getting bad out there,' Shane said, stepping away from the bed.

A pool of blood began to work its way into the cell. When Billy Toombs saw it, he said: 'No shit.'

The next hour was filled with screams, and Shane and Billy sat waiting, trying to figure out what was happening. They finally reached the conclusion: All Hell had broken loose.

*

Marla was starting to feel the effects of the whisky and decided that she had had enough, despite it being a free bar.

'Prick,' she mumbled, referring to Charles Dean and the ridiculous array of self-gratifying bullshit adorning his office walls. The thing was, it got boring after a while, and once Marla had read each of the certificates twice, she wanted to go home more than ever.

She wiped the glass clean on the sleeve of her blouse, and dropped it back into the fake globe where it smashed against one of the miniatures at the bottom. She smiled, said 'Ooops,' and decided that it was a good thing that she would be leaving pretty soon, as soon as she could find another job.

This really was taking the piss, now. She had been stuck in the governor's office for well over an hour. What did he expect? Did he want her to wait there until he was good and ready to return? Was it possible that he had forgotten her, and was probably having a good old catch-up with the guards whilst they all smoked fine cigars outside?

That, she guessed, was it.

She wouldn't wait any longer. He couldn't fire her for going home; she was already fired, albeit amicably.

'Fuck it!'

She opened the office door and stepped out onto the corridor.

*

The light flickered on and off with an infinitesimal blinking sound every time it did so. Damp laundry filled plastic baskets, waiting to be loaded into the machines which lined three out of the four walls. A few of the machines were still switched on; the red lights on the front of the consoles flashed. Whoever had used the room last had forgotten to shut down properly, which would under normal circumstances warrant a major bollocking from the guards, but in this instance it might be forgiven.

'Shhhh,' Terry said. Jared had accidentally tripped over a box of detergent, and was now standing in a pile of white powder staring gingerly towards his reprimanding cellmate.

'What if there's one of those things in here?' he asked, stepping out of the powder and leaving white footprints in his wake.

'There isn't.' Terry whispered.

'How can you be sure?'

Terry reached down and began to sort through a pile of folded clothes. 'Can you see anyone?'

Jared looked around; nobody. The room was big, though, and there were a few places to hide, but he got the impression that those things were not so much about the stealth, and that hiding would be the last thing on their agenda if they had the slightest opportunity for attack.

Terry Lewis began to peel off his prison overalls. Jared watched with increasing confusion.

'What are you doing?' Jared asked.

Terry was naked now, apart from his boxers. 'What the fuck does it look like?' he said. 'I'm changing out of those,' he pointed to the orange boiler-suit which he had just removed, 'and I'm putting these on.' in his hand he was clenching plain white clothes, a tee shirt and trousers. They were the official garb of the less violent prisoners, the ones from Block D, which was used to safeguard the pussies from the ones who might cause them damage. It wasn't fair, really, to throw in a tax-evader with a serial-killer; it might provide ammunition for the system-haters who were already trying to initiate deals and retrials from the outside.

'What about me?' Jared asked as he glanced down at his orange boiler-suit, mouth agape.

Terry shook his head. 'Find your own fucking size,' he said. 'What am I, your mother?'

Jared dropped to his knees and began to search through the pile; he was only small, and weighed less than one hundred and thirty pounds wringing wet, but luckily so was somebody over in Block D.

He quickly changed, shielding his inferior body from Terry Lewis, who was not interested in the slightest. Sharing a cell did not mean that you got to see each others balls, and Jared was not the kind of guy to let it all hang out, not like some of the other inmates.

'What the fuck are we going to do now?' Jared asked.

The truth of it was: Terry had no idea. Something bad was happening, something evil. He had read all about it, studied it, but never once thought he would be caught up in the middle of it.

'I don't know,' he finally said. 'But I'm not willing to die today. Are you?'

Jared shook his head. 'Fuck no!'

'I want you to keep that at the front of your mind,' Terry said. 'And we'll get out of this just fine.'

Deep down, he didn't believe it himself.

*

The main structure, everything up to and including Block D, had been built at a time when there was as much chance of breaking into prison as there was of busting out. In the late eighteenth century, a few people had succeeded in penetrating the security of similar sized prisons, scaling the twenty-foot walls and getting retribution against inmates that had done them wrong, which was why Jackson had been created with that in mind. Surrounding the prison were three walls, each of which stood at almost forty feet. Between wall one and two, an electric mat covered the ground all of the way around; if anyone were to fall between these two walls, the chances of them surviving were miniscule, and if they did, they would find themselves wishing for death to come just to be rid of the pain.

Between the second and third walls, eight men patrolled constantly. Out of the eight guards, four had German Shepherds.

With the dogs barking at each other, the eight guards were gathered in one area between the walls, discussing why it was that they had not been relieved of their posts. A few of the anxious men argued that they needed to get home to their wives, for they would be worried. One of the men continued to attempt to get through on the two-way but, as had been the case for over an hour, there was nothing but silence.

They decided to give it a few more minutes before sending a man in to investigate further.

*

It was no wonder the prisoners detested Charles Dean so unequivocally; he had built himself a very nice quarters on the side of the prison. Everything, it seemed, was antique, or would be by the end of the decade. As a prison governor he was certainly astute, but as a collector of fine arts which would eventually fetch him a fortune at auction, he was as shrewd as any dealer. Marla wondered whether any of the prisoners had, at some time or another, made plans to relieve the governor of a few of his items. Probably. The problem was, though, that when a prisoner was escorted through to Charles Dean's office, usually by at least two guards, past all of the good stuff hanging on the walls and resting temptingly inside alcoves, it would be near impossible to cause a distraction large enough to sneak anything away, which then made her wonder of any of the guards had had the same idea. She knew that Tyler was a corrupt fucker of a man, so it was likely, at some point, that he had been tempted by the goods on display, as he had been when he had assaulted Marla. She was sure that a man possessed of such weak will would find it almost impossible to ignore the antiquities and their obvious price-tags. In fact, it wouldn't surprise her to discover that Officer Tyler had already embezzled a few minor items just to test the governor's knowledge of the items he actually possessed. It was simple, really. Start off small, work up to something worth enough money to retire on. Charles Dean was not getting any younger, and his memory was probably not as good as it once had been. Fuck, you could probably swipe half of the things lining the quarters and he would be so caught up in prison business that he wouldn't notice until you were halfway across the country.

Marla felt the effects of the whisky as her head began to ache and buzz. She had to drive home yet, which was probably not such a good idea, but the sooner she got to bed and slept it off, the better.

Noticing the eerie silence for the first time, she called out: 'Hello?' It was, she knew, the worst thing to do; there was always the chance that somebody would reply, and being in a prison, where hundreds of violent men were incarcerated and the guards were not much better, a reply was not necessarily a good thing.

She ambled down the hallway, not knowing where she was going. This was the first time Charles Dean had taken her to his office since she accepted the position, and she couldn't remember which direction they had come from a few hours before, but why would she? She hadn't expected to be trying to find her own way out.

She came to a T as she reached the end of the hallway.

'Oh, great!' she said, looking to the east and then the west. 'Decisions, decisions.'

But, luckily for her, the decision was already made.

From the east came a man, dragging himself through the hallway, smearing blood against the cream wall. He was growling. His contorted face oozed with dark drool as he neared.

Marla screamed.

*

She began to backtrack, hoping that the office belonging to Charles Dean had a lock on the inside of the door. If it had, she hadn't noticed it earlier, but then she had been overwhelmed by the many egotistical certificates hanging on the walls; why would she have been checking to see if the office had sufficient security?

The man kept coming, sliding across the wall, leaving behind a trail of blood from a wounded shoulder. Never once, though, did he break into a run, or quicken his pace. He was either confident of catching up to Marla, or too wounded to run. Either way, Marla didn't care. She needed to call for help, and she needed to barricade herself in the governor's office. As she slid in through the door, she yelled up the hallway: 'Stay away! Stay the fuck away!' The man didn't falter, just kept on coming.

She swung the office door shut and looked down to the handle. There was nothing; not even a chain. Charles Dean certainly put a lot of faith in his guards, enough to warrant the lackadaisical approach to office-security. The absence of even a deadbolt, though, was bad news, and Marla realised this as soon as there was a thud against the door. Her shoulder jarred from the impact as the man slammed into it again. She bit her tongue, and blood began to dribble out in a fine rivulet. It hurt, but she didn't have time to acknowledge the pain as the man growled and pushed the door wide enough to slide a hand through.

Marla screamed. Her instincts were telling her to bite the hand, but she couldn't. Looking down at it, she could see that it was basically an open wound. Knuckles were exposed, and sinewy flesh hung loosely from the thumb.

A wrist followed the hand, and before she knew what was happening the hand was smothering her face, trying to push her away from the door so that it could gain proper entry.

Breathless, and out of options, Marla knew that she had to step away. By letting the man fall into the office, she would be back on a level playing field. She knew what she had to do, and she knew where to find a weapon.

She stepped away from the door, an exhalation, a whimper of fear. Had she made the right move?

The door crashed open; the man's momentum saw him fall to his knees and sprawl out on the fancy rug beneath him.

Marla had a few seconds, that was all, and she wasted none of them. She ran across to the governor's desk and plucked up the paperweight. She had spotted it earlier, whilst sitting at the desk sipping whisky. She abhorred it; the little boat at the centre of the glass served to signify that Charles Dean was a prick. When she had sat staring at it, she had never envisioned using it as a weapon, but now that was exactly what she was going to do.

She paced back to where the man was clambering to his feet.

'What the fuck?' she cried. She hit the man on the side of the face with the paperweight, but not as hard as she should have. The man barely flinched; his eyes seemed to grow darker, and he was up on one foot before Marla managed to hit him again, this time with enough force to put him back down.

'Fuck you!' she snapped. The man moaned, tried to crawl to his feet, but Marla wouldn't allow it. She hit him again. A chunk of the man's head came away from the force of the paperweight. Had she meant to hurt the maniac so fatally? Had she had a choice in the matter?

He rolled over onto his back and, as he stared up at her with black eyes and a sneer, she brought the paperweight down once more.

*

'How many of them are out there?' Billy Toombs asked.

Shane, who was staring through a gap in the barricade, said, 'Hard to tell. I can see three of them across the way.'

On the landing opposite, the three men were roaming up and down the row. Shane had watched the men leave their cells, watched them get attacked by other men, watched them die, and was now watching them as they wandered aimlessly around, bouncing off cells, crawling on all fours and eating the men who had lost the fight. The fear he felt when the realisation of what he was witnessing had been immense, more than he had ever felt before. The last time he had felt so helpless and unsure was sitting in the car outside the liquor shop, waiting for the moment to make his move.

'We need to get out of here,' Billy said. The knife he had been holding throughout was still clenched tightly in his hand, so tightly that his knuckles were white. 'It's only a matter of time before they find us. We're much safer out in the open.'

It was true. In the cell, they had nowhere to run. One, maybe two of them, they could handle, but any more than that and Shane knew that they would be in serious trouble.

'We go out there,' Shane said, 'then we'll need to go prepared. I saw what those things are capable of; they don't seem to feel pain the way we would.'

Billy shrugged and began to look around the cell for something, anything, that they could use to protect themselves.

He had his knife, that was enough for him, but Shane was unarmed. To venture out of the cell without at least something to keep those things at bay was practically suicide.

Shane moved away from the bed, which was still blocking the cell door, and helped to search.

'Where are the guards?' Billy asked.

'Even the guards wouldn't have been able to stop those things,' Shane replied. 'The guards would have battered them a few times with their batons, but those fucking things are relentless.'

'You saying they're all dead?' asked Billy. He opened the drawer to his bedside table and started to remove the books that had taken up residence there, stacking them neatly on the floor next to the bed.

'I'm saying, it stands a chance that once the guards realised they were fucked, they disappeared, the ones that were lucky did, anyway.'

Shane watched as Billy Toombs cleared the drawer of its contents and pulled the empty wood from its hole. There was an audible crunch as twisted metal snapped away from wood. Satisfied, Billy tossed the empty drawer aside and pulled at the aluminium runner, which was still attached to the main structure of the cabinet.

'You know,' Shane said as his cellmate became increasingly frustrated with the recalcitrant drawer runner, 'you really need to see somebody about that temper of yours.'

Billy smiled; his breathlessness prevented him from laughing out loud.

With one final twist, and a foreign word that Shane didn't think translated as anything nice, the aluminium runner came away.

'Nice,' Shane said. Billy handed it to him, and immediately it felt good in his hand. It was light, which was always good, and the end had twisted creating a sharp point. It was, given the circumstances, the best they were going to muster.

They moved the bed away from the gate, trying to keep the noise to an absolute minimum. Shane kept a close eye on the numbers outside the cell, and as far as he could see there were only four of them on the same level. The next level up, though, that one seemed to be swamped by them. Since there were only ten steps between levels, it paid to stay as silent as possible.

In another part of the prison, though, somebody screamed. It was faint, but both Shane and Billy heard it, and it sounded like a woman.

With the bed pushed aside, and their weapons in hand, Shane looked deep into Billy's eyes, and for the first time since they had met three years ago, the hulking half-Indian, half-Irishman looked frightened.

'Ready?' Shane asked.

Billy swallowed hard. 'As I'm ever gonna be.'

Shane slid the gate across.

*

At first, it didn't seem like the things noticed them. They managed to edge across the row quietly enough, and for a second, Shane believed that they would make it all the way to the end and could slip away down past ablutions, and who knew from there.

Then it saw them, one of the men on all fours across the landing. It peered through the metal railings, still on all fours, and let out a blood-curdling scream. The other three forgot what they were doing, and turned to see what all of the fuss was about.

'Oh, shit!' Shane said, and that was when they decided that stealth had gone out of the window, and now it was time to put some distance between those things and themselves.

'This way,' Billy said, leading the way. Shane glanced across his shoulder to find that two of the four things were now following them; the one on all fours was too busy ferreting away in the carcass of some poor fuck, and the other had tripped over a body whilst attempting to make chase.

'They're not so fast,' Shane said. 'we should be able to outrun them.'

Billy shook his head. 'I've seen shit like this in films,' he said, jumping over two bodies that were spread across the floor blocking their way. Shane did the same. 'You underestimate them, you die. Trust me.'

Shane did. Implicitly.

Sure enough, the two followers had gained some speed, and although they were on the opposite side of the opening, behind rails and a twenty foot drop, their sudden increase in speed served to make Shane keep his mouth shut in future.

'What kind of films have you been watching?' Shane asked as they neared the corner.

'You know, the ones where—' but that was as far as he got as a big, mean sonofabitch by the name of Xander Foreman slammed into him, sending them both to the metal flooring. Xander was snapping and biting at Billy Toombs, but Billy was having none of it. Even though he hadn't been expecting the sudden arrival of one of the creatures, he was now fully capable of taking it out.

'Billy!' Shane called. He didn't know what to do, but hitting it around the face with his aluminium stick seemed to be all he could think of.

'I'm okay,' Billy said, not looking okay at all as the thing tried to take a bite out of his cheek. 'Just keep an eye on those other two.'

Shane turned; the other two were still coming, and would reach them within a minute if they weren't careful.

'Be quick,' warned Shane. 'We don't have all day here.'

Billy managed to roll over; the big man – although both of them were huge and it was like watching Godzilla fight Mecha-Godzilla – was underneath now, those dark eyes staring up at Billy Toombs with vehement determination.

Billy shifted his weight so that his elbow was across the throat of Xander, who choked beneath the weight of it. Billy levelled the knife and slowly pushed it into the creature's eye. There was an audible pop as the eyeball burst; dark ooze squirted out and landed on the creature's cheek.

Shane quickly assessed the position of the approaching creatures. They were within spitting distance; a few seconds, maximum, was all that remained before engagement.

When Shane turned back, Billy was clambering to his feet, wiping the small blade on sleeve of his overalls.

The creature lay motionless. The tiny knife had been long enough to penetrate the socket and slice into the brain.

'Shall we go now?' Shane asked, stepping away from the two creatures, who were clawing at the air and snapping with blackened teeth.

'That would be nice,' Billy grimaced.

They turned and ran.

*

Being at the end of the row had its drawbacks. For one, Rooster and Marvin had no clue that they were the only ones still in their cell. They simply couldn't see that everyone else had realised the doors were open, and the noises from the past three hours had been linked with the riot, not associated with the murderous assault of the hellish creatures as they swept across the prison.

Yes, being on the end of the row certainly had its drawbacks.

'It's all gone a bit quiet, now,' Marvin said, shuffling the cards so badly that Rooster wondered whether the man was developing some sort of disease. 'Fifty bucks says Hart's in solitary.'

'Fifty?' Rooster said, shaking his head. 'How about a hundred?'

'You're on,' grinned Marvin. 'Easy money.'

Rooster was becoming bored of cards, but there seemed to be nothing else to do. Going to bed was not an option, not whilst there was a riot in progress. Going to sleep would be dangerous, especially if the guards were pissed off at the prisoners. See, that was the thing: if a riot was instigated, it wasn't just the minority who were punished, the ones who had plotted and started the uprising...it was everyone. To fall asleep now made you an easy target for the guards, who would no doubt be round very soon to cause some trouble of their own. You were likely to be woken with a steel toecap boot to the jaw, which was never a nice was to be roused.

'Wish we had a chessboard,' Rooster sighed. 'I could play chess for fucking hours.'

'That's a bit like draughts, isn't it?' Marvin asked.

This question made it pretty obvious to Rooster that having a chessboard would have been presently pointless, unless he somehow taught his cellmate the rules, which would have been like trying to teach a chimpanzee to sing opera.

'It's nothing like draughts,' he finally replied. 'You trying to tell me you don't know how to play chess?'

Marvin nodded. 'Some of us didn't have chessboards growing up,' he said. 'I had a penknife and a fishing-rod.'

Rooster tried to imagine Marvin “Murderer” Manson as a child, innocent, heading off to the river with a boxful of bait and excited expectations. It was, perhaps, such isolation that had led to Marvin becoming unhinged and killing three people in cold blood. Fishing was a dangerous sport if you couldn't cope with the tranquility and hours of tedious sitting. Marvin had developed his psychotic tendencies whilst eating a cucumber sandwich, listening to Enya from a crackly old radio sitting next to him on the bank.

'I used to play a lot,' Rooster said. 'Too much, in fact. My sister could never understand why the bishops could move diagonally, and the little horse, that's what she used to call 'em, did that silly move that they did. I couldn't tell her why, but I just told her to play properly and stop being such a little brat.' Rooster paused. The memory seemed to be more than he had expected, and the feeling that came with it he certainly hadn't anticipated. 'Dad took the board off of me after a while. Said that chess was for fucking pussies, and did I want to grow up to be a fag? My sister took to calling me a fag after that, and she and Dad would laugh about it.'

'That's pretty fucked up, dude,' Marvin said as he picked up dropped cards from the floor.

'I fucking hated them for that,' Rooster continued. 'I stopped playing chess because I believed him. Can you believe that? I thought that my dad was right.'

'Your dad sounds like an asshole to me,' Marvin laughed.

'He was,' Rooster said. 'Which is one of the reasons why I killed him. In hindsight,' he smiled, 'I wished I'd shoved a few fucking knights up his shitpipe for the forensics to figure out.' He burst out laughing.

'Probably a good thing we don't have a chessboard,' Marvin sniggered.

'You're right.'

Rooster stood and stretched. His back made a terrible cracking sound which Marvin grimace at. They had been playing cards for hours, that and listening to the riot play out. Now, though, everything had fallen ominously quiet.

Rooster took a few steps towards the cell door. 'What would you be doing now if you weren't here?'

'What, like if I hadn't been caught?' Marvin asked with a slightly confused expression. Rooster nodded. 'Fuck knows. Maybe I'd still be killing. Maybe I would have settled down, got it all out of my system and married some whore named Crystal.'

Rooster grinned. 'I like the sound of that,' he said. 'Me, I'd probably just drive around the country, taking everything in. I've always wanted to do that, you know? Just hire a car and keep on driving.'

Marvin smiled tentatively. 'Wouldn't you have to return the car?'

Rooster shrugged. 'What would it matter, unless I got picked up by the pigs?'

'That sounds awesome, dude,' Marvin said as he stood from the table and stretched. His back, however, did not crack.

'Funny how shit works out, isn't it?' Rooster whispered.

Marvin didn't think it was funny at all, but nodded anyway.

Rooster placed his hands on the bars of the cell, which rattled with instability. A sudden realisation hit Rooster Hill.

'You know when I asked what you would do if you weren't here?' he said.

Marvin nodded. 'Uh-huh.'

'Well how about we find out,' he said.

And with that, he threw the cell doors wide open.

*

Terry Lewis took a quick glance around the corner. There were seven of them, four on the floor and three standing. The four on the floor were picking at the bones of something unrecognisable, whilst the others meandered around the corridor, confused, hungry.

Terry made the signal of the cross against his chest.

'How many?' Jared asked. He was half-in, half-out of the laundry room.

'Seven,' Terry whispered. 'But we should be able to get by them without them noticing.'

The door which they needed to get to was a few feet away from the creatures. Terry knew that the ones feeding would be too busy to spot them as they passed, and if they were quick enough and waited until the others were facing the other way, they could make it without alerting any of them.

'I don't want to,' Jared said, fearful. His eyes were filled with tears. Terry realised that he didn't know his cellmate at all, not really.

'Do you want to stay here?' asked Terry. 'You want me to leave you to hide in there, on your own?'

Jared's eyes widened even more; his mouth fell open into a terrified O. 'What if they see us?' he managed. 'What if they see us, Terry, and we can't beat them?'

Terry knew the consequences of such a predicament, but his faith had returned somewhat. Not completely; it wasn't the same as when he'd first discovered religion all those years ago, but when you were young you believed in anything. It was, however, enough for Terry to believe that God didn't want him to die, not yet. He had once been a training servant to the Lord; that had to count for something.

'We don't have a choice,' Terry said. 'We need to get to the yard and pray that those things haven't had the same idea.'

'I trust you,' Jared said, closing his mouth. Terry knew, right then, that he was not just surviving for himself.

He had to take care of another soul, too.

'I'm going to take another look,' Terry said as he placed the flat of his hand against Jared's chest. 'I'll wait until the coast is clear, but when I go, you go. There'll be no time to piss about. We head for the door, second up on the right, and we don't stop running until we reach it. Do you understand?'

Jared nodded.

'Good.'

Terry stuck his head out again. One of the creatures that had been standing was now feeding with the others, which meant that there were only two now who could possibly get to the door before them. Those two, though, were heading down the corridor, bumping into each other and bouncing off the walls like fleshy pinballs.

'Now,' Terry whispered, and took off. Never once taking his eyes from the door, he listened to the creatures as they gnawed through bone and sucked at the flesh of the poor soul. It was enough to make vomit rise in his throat, but he quickly swallowed it down, never once faltering. He just hoped that Jared was following closely, for if he wasn't, then it would be too late for him to make it.

One of the ambling creatures had turned, and was now sliding along the corridor with teeth bared. It growled, but the five feeders didn't pay it any heed, even when it almost tripped over them and the cadaver upon which they fed.

Terry reached the door and turned to find Jared had been less than a step behind him all the way. As he turned they almost clashed heads.

'Get in!' Terry said, pulling the door open and forcing Jared through it. He followed, slamming the door shut as quickly as he could.

There was a single lock halfway down the frame, which Terry slid into place. It would be enough to keep the creatures out, for now; the sheet of glass which filled the upper half of the door would take some breaking, too, and those things were weak. It would take a lot of them to push through the glass, and they didn't seem to possess the brain-capacity to figure out a large brick or mop-handle would be enough to break it.

Terry wasn't taking any chances, though, and moved away from the glass. It was frosted, but that didn't mean the creatures wouldn't see them moving around on the other side.

'The yard,' Terry whispered, pointing across to the other side of the room, 'is through there, out onto the corridor, and a hundred feet down. If there aren't any of those fucking things out there, we shouldn't have any problems.'

Jared took a step in the direction of the door. A hand yanked him backwards. He was face-to-face with Terry Lewis, who was holding his index finger up to his lips.

'Shhhh,' he said, pointing to the frosted door which they had just come through.

There, standing on the other side of the door, was a creature, silhouetted through the glass. A hand came up and pressed against the door; blood dripped down from the fingers; the light from the corridor made it a brighter red than it actually was.

With its other hand, the creature was trying the door. The doorknob rattled, slowly at first, than more urgently. Jared, Terry could see, was fighting the scream that so naturally wanted to emerge.

The hand slapped, open-palmed, against the glass, but there was no fear of it shattering. The creature moaned, tried the knob once again, and slowly moved away from the door. Light spilled back into the room from the corridor as the silhouette departed.

They both exhaled, relieved that the creature had decided not to pursue them further or alert the others. Terry smiled smugly, which Jared didn't appreciate too much.

'Let's go,' Terry said, ushering his cellmate towards the door at the opposite side of the room. When they got there, Terry took a deep breath, Jared took a step back, and Terry grabbed the doorknob.

He turned it.

*

Nothing happened. The door was locked. Of course it would be, terry surmised. It would have been too simple to just waltz all the way across to the yard with no obstacles.

'Don't suppose you know how to pick locks?' Terry asked.

'I was one of the best,' Jared said. 'Just give me a lock-picking set and I can get us in.' There was more than a hint of sarcasm in his tone.

Terry turned and began to survey the room in which they found themselves.

Boxes, different sizes and multicoloured, were stacked against the walls. It was some kind of file-storage room, no doubt containing obsolete paperwork from years ago.

'Wait here,' Terry said. He made his way across the room, keeping a close eye on the glass of the door at the other end.

He grabbed a box down from one of the shelves and took the lid off. As he suspected, there were folders dating back to a time when even he wasn't an inmate. All of the folders had names written on them in permanent marker, but none of that interested him.

He opened one of the folders and saw what he was looking for almost immediately.

He never thought touching a paperclip would make him feel so impossibly happy. He slipped it off the end of the papers that it held and dropped the folder back into the box.

'What about one of these?' he whispered, holding the paperclip aloft as if it were the Holy Grail.

'That'll do,' Jared said.

With the paperclip in hand, Jared went to work on the lock. Terry didn't know why, but he had placed his trust in a man who was clearly terrified of what was happening. Even as he watched as his cellmate trembled with the tiny piece of steel, he knew that if it came down to it, he would have to leave Jared behind. If it meant survival, then sacrificing Jared was hardly something that required much thought. Jared was likely to get them both killed with his current nervousness, and that was not going to happen, not to Terry Lewis, who had rediscovered his faith and expected God to make the decisions from here on in.

There was a click within the doorknob. Jared retracted the clip and took a step back.

'Give it a try,' he said.

Terry stepped up, placed his hand around the doorknob, and gave it a gentle twist. When the door pulled silently out of its frame, Terry felt bad for how he had been treating his supposed friend.

'Well done,' Terry whispered. 'You did good.'

Jared smiled. 'Thanks.'

They stood for a moment, breathing deeply, aware that anything could be on the opposite side of the door. Terry could feel the anxiety generated by both of them; the air around them was practically thick enough to run a blade through. It was like waiting for the impending apocalypse; like seeing the mushroom cloud off in the distance, and knowing that you couldn't outrun it.

'Wait here,' Terry said. 'I'll go take a look.'

Jared didn't argue.

*

Marla turned the corner into another corridor, and realised that she hadn't a clue where she was. The entire prison seemed to be made up of the same generic, white corridors; the only way to determine where you were was to gauge the paint damage on the walls, which were peeling from years of neglect.

She noticed that the heat was suddenly palpable, as if somebody had turned the AC off. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead, and she wiped them away with the back of her hand.

For a moment, she felt like she was being watched, but that could have just been her mind playing tricks on her, which it was apt to do under the circumstances.

What was happening? Why was she attacked? What had happened to Charles Dean and his merry band of guards? None of it made any sense. She had known, though, that something was going on when the sickness began to take hold of the infected. She was a good doctor, at least she thought she was, and would have been able to diagnose a simple fever without much ado, but the sudden temperature increase – almost thirty degrees in less than a few hours – and the strange, almost docile, mannerisms of the infected, she couldn't explain that. It was beyond the realms of her comprehension.

She slowly made her way up the corridor, passing by doors that were either locked, or blocked by cleaning equipment. She was about to make a decision and try one of the doors when the man appeared from nowhere.

Marla didn't scream; she couldn't. Her heart seemed to jump up into her mouth and prevent anything from emerging.

'It's okay,' the man said. 'I'm not gonna hurt you.'

She was pretty sure that, at some point during her life, she had heard those exact words only to be fooled a few seconds later. She was taking no chances. In her hand, she was clutching the paperweight, and now she lifted it into the air and began to shake it threateningly.

'You stay back,' she said. 'I'll fucking kill you.'

She didn't know where her words came from, but they didn't betray what she thought she would do.

'There's no need to be killing anyone,' the man said. 'So just calm down.'

Marla scanned the man, who was wearing white coveralls which meant that he was non-violent, for a concealed weapon, but if he was carrying one, it was extremely well hidden.

'Who are you?' she gasped, swallowing hard.

'My name's Terry,' he said, offering a sweet smile. 'Terry Lewis.'

Marla lowered the paperweight, as if the knowing of his name made him less of a threat. She was about to speak, to ask questions that perhaps he knew the answer to, when another man appeared out of the door behind Terry.

He was running towards her, his face contorted with violence, his voice attempting something of a scream.

Marla recoiled, raised the paperweight once again, and waited for the man to reach her.

He didn't.

As the man was level with Terry Lewis, Terry threw out an arm, which hit the new man in the throat. He crumpled to the ground, where he began to roll around, clutching at himself where the fist had connected.

'Never mind him,' Terry said, as calm and collected as was possible. 'He tends to get a little nervous around women that ain't his momma.'

Marla relaxed a little.

'I don't suppose you know what the fuck is happening here?' she asked.

'Haven't a clue,' Terry shrugged. 'But we're staying alive as best we can.'

To Marla, that sounded like a good plan.

*

They encountered at least fifteen of the creatures as they ran across the landing; at one point, it looked as if they were cornered, but managed to weave and push the things away without getting snagged or scratched. It wasn't a good idea to hang around any longer than was necessary, and so they kept moving, trying to stay one step ahead of the thickening throng of wandering bodies. Shane developed a stitch in his right side; he hadn't been working out as often as he should have recently. What was the point? He was a free man in a few weeks, and he knew that once he was home with his wife and daughter, visiting the gym would be the farthest thing from his mind. Now, though, as the pain stabbed at his ribs, he wished he'd at least stuck to some sort of regime.

'How you doing?' Billy asked, noticing Shane's hand gripping at the pain in his side. 'You haven't been scratched, have you?'

Shane laughed, slowing his pace. 'Hell no,' he said. 'You know when I stopped going to the workout room a few weeks ago.'

Billy nodded.

'It was a bad idea,' Shane said. 'Feel like I'm going to keel over any second.'

Billy stopped running. There were no creatures about, not at the moment. 'You need to get some water down you,' he said. 'We should get to the canteen.'

The canteen was downstairs. Who knew how many of those things they would pass along the way? But it made sense; Shane was thirsty.

'Sounds good to me,' he said. 'You never know, the survivors could all have had the same idea. Go to where the food and water is.'

Billy hoped not. He wasn't really in the mood for socialising, especially with a bunch of people who were either infected, or deserved to be.

They continued, knowing that the likelihood of the canteen being open when they arrived was slim. Yet they had to go somewhere; standing around waiting for the creatures to find them was not an option.

Shane hadn't noticed before, but the prison was filled with the sounds of the undead, scratching around, moaning and growling. He thought that if he listened hard enough, he could hear them chewing away at captured inmates, but that might have just been a figment of his imagination.

Along the way, Billy started a conversation that seemed to lead nowhere: Was help on its way? Shane said that he didn't think so; Billy tended to agree. If news of what was happening had reached the outside, then the cavalry would have already arrived, wouldn't they? Billy said that the cavalry might have been notified, only to deem the prison and its inmates as collateral damage. The government was known for its lack of compassion when it came down to the greater good, and Shane wouldn't have put it past them to ignore any pleas from within the prison if it meant the issue being contained.

Where better to contain it?

A few floors above them, a scream echoed. It sounded like a man's, but it was difficult to tell. Billy and Shane shared a telling expression before descending the steps to the floor below. It was here that they found the man.

*

'Did you know him?' Shane asked, glancing down at the mutilated body lying vertically on the final few steps.

Billy shook his head. 'Uh-huh.'

'Me neither,' Shane said through gritted teeth. 'Whatever did this to him was fucking persistent, I'll give them that.'

The body was missing a leg, and an arm; most of the right-hand side of the torso had been gnawed through. Exposed ribs jutted out at uncompromising angles. The face, on one side, was stripped clean, to the skull, and both of the eyes had been removed, leaving only the darkness of the sockets in which they once sat.

'Sick fucking things,' Billy said, holding a hand up to his mouth, anticipating the vomit that never quite arrived. The dryness of his mouth, though, proved how close he actually was to throwing up.

Shane stepped over the extended leg of the prone body, and almost slipped in the blood that had pooled around the cadaver's ankle. Billy grabbed for him, and managed to keep him upright.

'You okay?' asked Billy.

'Nearly went arse over—'

The corpse suddenly snapped into life, grasping Shane's ankle. At first, Shane didn't know what had happened, and stared into Billy's eyes as if his colleague could explain further.

Billy pulled Shane away from the body. The hand slipped off Shane's foot and thudded down onto the third step of the stairs. What made everything a thousand times creepier, though, was those eyes – or the lack thereof. The corpse snapped its head around, trying to settle on something, anything, but with sight gone, and most of its other senses compromised, it was a pitiful sight to behold.

Shane wiped spit away from the corner of his mouth and said, 'Do you want to do the honours?'

Billy dropped his shoulders. 'Makes no difference to me,' he said. 'As far as I'm concerned, it's the humane thing to do.'

He stepped forward, keeping enough distance from the arm that was still flailing frantically around on the one side, and drove his massive boot down onto the face of the corpse. Beneath his boot, the remainder of the features spread out, the way a dog-shit would if you stepped on it. There was a crunch as Billy twisted his foot; the skull was cracking, bone driving deep into the brain. After a few involuntary twitches, the creature's motion came to a complete halt. Billy took his foot away, making the sign of the cross on his chest as he did so.

'That was unpleasant,' Shane said.

Billy smiled. 'Remind me to get a new pair of boots as soon as possible,' he said, wiping his foot along the floor as if he was trying to rid himself of a piece of recalcitrant sellotape.

'Dude, they don't make them in your size anymore, not unless you go to Bigfoots-R-Us.'

'Well, I'd rather shop there than Leprechauns4U,' Billy smiled. Shane laughed out loud. It was surprisingly easy to forget about the terror in which they suddenly found themselves. Laughing seemed to take the edge off an otherwise horrific scenario.

They reached the door to the canteen and immediately realised that their journey had been in vain. The door was wide open; Shane glanced down at the mess covering the tiled floor. There was food everywhere; uncooked meat stretched across the ground from the door to the back wall. It looked like the aftermath of a massacre, with only animal carcasses as casualties.

'After you,' Billy said, extending his hand with exaggerated enthusiasm. His faux etiquette failed to raise a smile for Shane this time. He stepped into the room with some trepidation. Billy held his knife to his chest, the way a hunter might stalk a deer, and followed.

The squelch underfoot was almost sickening. It was difficult to remember that the remains were merely those of animals, intended to be eaten by the inmates at a later date. It sounded, as it would, like human remains being trodden on.

Surprisingly, the smell in the canteen wasn't that bad. It was hardly pot-pourri, but the anticipated stench of abattoir never came either.

'Something was here,' Shane said, and then realised how obvious it was. He clarified with, 'Something inhuman.'

Billy nodded. 'One of those things,' he said. 'Must have mistook the meat for us. These things must be smarter than they look if that's the case. If they know the difference between human meat and bacon, then we need to be even more careful.'

Shane agreed. The creatures seemed to be stupid, the way they bumped into one another and stumbled from place to place, but if they were able to make assessments and decisions, then they obviously retained some of their more complex functions, something which made the hackles rise on the back of Shane's neck.

As they slipped further into the room, Billy noted the darkness which he hadn't been aware of before. The light was on in the corridor from which they came, but that limited light failed to reach more than halfway into the canteen. The barred windows on the far walls let in only a few rays of light from the East towers, but not enough to see by, and certainly not enough to explore by.

Shane walked across to one of the large windows and glanced out onto the yard.

'Anybody out there?' asked Billy, momentarily lowering his knife.

Shane shook his head. 'I don't see anyone,' he said. 'I'm assuming that the main perimeter would still be locked. There's no way anyone could get out onto the yard, unless it was one of the guards with the combination.'

The combination changed on a daily basis and was automatically chosen at random by the computer in Charles Dean's office. If it was after midnight now, which Shane was pretty sure of, then the chances were that the new combination had been implemented. There would be no way of knowing that combination; not even the guards would be aware of it yet, as it was shared only with the clocking-in guards at seven in the morning.

'Could somebody get to the governor's computer?' Billy asked, knowing exactly what Shane was thinking.

'It's possible,' Shane replied. 'But unlikely. If those things are everywhere, which I think they would be by now, and Dean's office is way across the prison, then the guards would need serious leverage to reach it.'

'Weapons?'

'Exactly.'

'The armoury is only on the other side of A Block,' Billy added. 'If they made it to the weapons, they could already be on their way out of the prison by now.'

Unfortunately, that was true, which made Shane's teeth stand on edge.

Apart from the yard, which was not the most desirable of escape routes, there were only two other entrances to the prison. At the basement level, where the guards parked their expensive cars, there was a door that led directly into the facility. Through that door, there were several gates, each of which required a four-digit code. Finally, there was one more door, which required fingerprint scans. It was thorough, if nothing else.

The other method of entry was a little more complicated, and involved all of the measures of the basement, plus a retina-scan, a two-guard security check, and an x-ray machine. That was situated on the first floor.

It was possible that surviving officers made it out through one of those exits, but that relied heavily on there being nothing standing between them and the gate.

That was very unlikely.

Shane left his post by the window and took a few steps into the room. Both men jumped as something clattered from the kitchen.

Billy instinctively raised the knife into the air; Shane lowered his aluminium stick and held a finger to his puckered lips. 'Shhhh,'

The kitchen, if it could be referred to as such, was situated through double doors on the west wall. There were no windows through which to see, mainly because the guards didn't think it was a good idea for the prisoners to know exactly what they were eating.

Billy held his fist up, and as he did Shane knew what he sought. Shane too raised his hand. A battle of scissors, paper, stone ensued, which Shane lost.

'Great!' Shane whispered. Billy made a gesture that told his cellmate to quit whining and get on with it.

Shane took a few steps towards the closed double doors that led to the kitchen, but paused when they suddenly swung outwards.

Standing between the frame, six and a half foot of pure evil: Cyrus Clay did not look happy.

His face was smeared with blood, and his stomach seemed to be hanging out through several lacerations. Intestines, blackened and dripping, dangled down to his lap, and swung side to side with every move he made.

Then it growled.

And then, it charged.

It was the fastest either of them had seen one of the creatures move, almost preternaturally quick. It was only when it was almost upon Shane that he realised it was holding a meat cleaver, which it swung maniacally. Shane threw his head back to avoid being slashed; he felt the wind as the blade whipped the air an inch in front of his face. Billy cried something, but Shane didn't hear it. All he heard was the whoosh as the cleaver split the atmosphere in two.

The next thing the creature had crashed into Shane. They both hit the ground, and Shane gasped for air which was no longer available.

The creature – formerly Cyrus Clay – tried to sink filthy teeth into Shane's neck, but Shane managed to wriggle upwards beneath the immense weight of his opponent. As he shifted, the teeth gnawed at nothingness.

Then, Cyrus's head snapped to the left, and then the right. A fist, Billy's fist, was punching away the increasingly frantic head as it bobbed down trying to take a bite out of the face of Shane beneath it. The black drool hung from its mouth like a dark string. As it settled on Shane's coveralls, it stretched and broke off.

'Stab it!' Shane called from beneath the creature, but Billy couldn't get close enough to inflict such damage. It was moving too quickly to get a clear cut. Besides, Billy was concerned that he would slit the creature and the subsequent blood would somehow infect Shane. If a single drop were to spray into his mouth, that might be enough to contaminate his cellmate.

It was a risk that he wasn't willing to take.

The creature tried to raise the cleaver, but Shane saw its intentions and grabbed onto its wrist, forcing it back down to the ground.

Its eyes glared down into Shane's face with something akin to contempt.

Shane realised that he was still gripping onto the aluminium runner, and managed to lift his right arm off the floor so that it was inbetween them.

Billy lashed a foot towards Cyrus, who retorted with a guttural cry of angst and frustration. The foot landed just to the side of the creature's neck, sending its head to one side with a crack.

Shane slowly pushed the drawer runner upwards until it was beneath the thing's drool-covered chin.

'Fuck you!' Shane said, and pushed as hard as he could; the aluminium strip made its way through the creature's jaw, up past the nose, and into the brain. There was a momentary look of confusion on its face, a split-second where the eyes bulged so far from the sockets that they were liable to drop out, and then the full weight of the creature came down on top of Shane as the life dripped out of it.

'Need a hand?' Billy asked. Shane looked up to find his friend smiling nervously.

'Get this fucking thing off of me,' Shane said. 'It weighs a tonne.'

Billy dragged the corpse off; as he did so, Shane made sure that he retracted his weapon from its skull. It came out covered in a thick black tar. It looked like a dipstick that had been used to check for oil.

Shane clambered to his feet, which seemed to have other ideas as they danced independently beneath him with pins and needles.

'Did you get any of that shit in your mouth?' asked Billy, who was checking himself over for possible tears and scratches.

'I don't think so,' Shane replied. Billy could tell by Shane's expression that, now that it had been brought to his attention, he was slightly concerned.

What if he did? What if, by some unfortunate twist of fate, a dot of the creature's blood or saliva fell into his mouth, rendering him one of the infected?

'You look fine to me,' Billy offered, reassuringly.

'I feel it,' Shane added.

'Then let's get the fuck out of this canteen before another one of them shows up.'

It was, Shane thought, the best idea Billy had ever had.

*

The shift patrolling the wall had decided that enough was enough, and all went marching along to find out what was going on, why they hadn't been relieved of their posts, and how much overtime they were going to get, if any.

They made it into the facility, where they came face-to-face with a horde of hungry creatures, inmates that they had berated and beaten in the past just for shits and giggles.

As they came under attack, the irony of the situation was palpable.

Out of the eight-man patrol, four returned from the dead. The other four, unfortunately for them, made excellent meals; perhaps the best meals the prisoners had had in a very long time.

*

The gate that led to the door that led to the yard was locked. Terry had expected it, but Jared seemed to find it impossible to digest. He was finally beginning to grate on Terry, and Marla wasn't too keen on having Jared around either, not the way he was behaving. It wasn't safe to carry such an incoherent, confused idiot, not with those things everywhere. Jared was apt to get them all killed, and Marla wasn't going to accept that.

'So what now?' Jared whined. His eyebrows seemed to have taken up permanent residence on the top of his head. 'What the fuck now, Terry?'

'I'm thinking,' Terry growled, and Marla found herself wondering how he had lasted so long in a cell with Jared without tearing his fucking head off.

Marla walked away, allowing Terry to think and Jared to whine. She listened to the noises coming from everywhere, or so it seemed. There were squeals, growls, scratches, moans. The whole prison suddenly felt alive.

In a way, it was deader than ever.

Whichever way she thought of it, she knew that things would never be the same again. Even if they were to survive the night, what was happening would be too impossible to explain. Supposing those things died of their own volition; if there was not enough food and they simply starved to death, what proof would they have of the inexplicable events? Nobody in their right mind would believe a word of it. Marla hardly believed it herself, and she had seen it with her own eyes.

She turned to find her two companions arguing, unsurprisingly.

'What?' she asked.

'Terry here wants us to make our way to the chapel,' Jared said. 'Used to be a man of faith, didn't you Terry?'

'So what's the problem?' Marla asked.

'The chapel,' Jared sighed, 'is on the other side of the jail. Just because Terry's had his faith reconfirmed, he thinks there's not a chance on earth that those things would be allowed under a roof of God.'

Marla didn't say anything, because there was nothing to say. She was the least religious person she knew, at least until she met Jared.

'I'm sorry,' she said to Terry. 'You want us to go traipsing halfway across the prison because you believe that God will take care of us?'

Terry nodded. 'He will.'

Marla shrugged her shoulders. 'Standing around here waiting for one of those things to find us is just as dangerous.' She turned to Jared, who couldn't believe what he was hearing. 'I say let God prove himself.'

'You're out of your fucking mind!' Jared cried, trying desperately to control the volume of his voice. 'It's suicide.'

'It's suicide standing here waiting,' Terry said. 'The chapel will be safe. You have my word.'

Terry's word, Jared thought, was about as useful as tits on fish. How could the chapel be safe? It was hardly maximum-security, and when they reached it, what were they expected to do? Wait it out? Hope that the cavalry arrive with guns ablazing and horns ablowing?

'Just let it be known that I don't like it,' Jared said.

'Duly noted,' Terry smiled. 'Now let's get a move on. If those things corner us down here, we won't stand a fucking chance.'

Marla nodded. 'Come on then.'

They were just about to move when they were cornered, and it was true what Terry had said.

They wouldn't have had a chance.

*

'Freeze!' Jenson cried, levelling the shotgun at Marla. When he realised who she was, he eased off momentarily. 'Doc, have you or any of your party been infected?'

Marla shook her head. 'No,' she said. Her arms remained in the air, which seemed to be a good idea when you were staring down the barrel of a shotgun.

'These two are convicts,' Michaelson said, holding out both pistols and looking something like the Lone Ranger. 'Hope you two haven't been getting used to all this freedom.'

Terry shook his head. 'Not in the slightest,' he smiled. 'In fact, I'm kinda missing my cell. The warm bed, the good food...'

'Shut the fuck up,' Jenson snapped. 'I'll shoot you where you stand.'

Jared made a squeaking noise, and he wasn't sure where it came from. 'We're not trying to escape,' he said, pleadingly. 'We 're just trying not to get killed is all.'

Michaelson holstered one of the pistols and took a step towards Marla, who in turn took a step back.

'We're not infected,' Jenson said. 'In fact, we've not seen any of those things for a while. Since we got the guns.' He finished his sentence with a tone of regret. The guns were there to be fired, and poor Officer Jenson had not had cause to do so, not yet.

'Where have you come from?' Marla asked.

'The armoury,' Jenson replied, holding the shotgun aloft as if he'd won it at a fair. 'We heard some noises on the way, though. Think they might be heading this way.'

'But you didn't see any of them?' Jared confirmed with more than a hint of worry.

'Not a one,' Michaelson said as he holstered the second pistol. He had, apparently, deemed the situation as non-threatening.

'In that case, what are we waiting for?' Jared said stepping forward.

Michaelson reached down and placed his right hand on the holstered pistol. Jared saw this and instantly stopped in his tracks. 'We're waiting,' he said, 'until we decide the best thing to do.'

Marla knew, in that moment, that bumping into the two guards might not be the best thing to have happened. Sure, they had weapons, useful guns that she presumed they were trained to use, but they were also on edge, liable to draw the creatures in.

'We were going to head to the chapel,' Terry said, breaking an awkward silence.

'What you were going to do is no longer of concern,' Michaelson sneered. 'From now on, you do what we say, when we say it.'

Marla rolled her eyes up into her head. This macho bullshit was the last thing they needed.

Jared was relieved; they had guards, men with guns. What could possibly go wrong?

The answer to that question would follow very soon.

*

The corridor was deserted, apart from the five survivors that was. The guards were at the front, trying to look like they knew what they were doing but making a real hash of it. The way in which they swept the area with their weapons simply proved that both of them had spent way too much time watching Die Hard movies, or playing arcade videogames whilst their wives did the weekly shop.

Marla, for one, didn't feel comfortable.

'So what's the plan?' Terry calmly enquired. His hands were pushed casually into the pockets of his white trousers, and he walked with a gait that suggested aloofness.

'We're going for the radio,' Michaelson whispered. 'If we can get through to somebody, anybody, then we might get out of this in one piece.'

Marla suddenly realised where it was they were heading. 'The radio's in the governor's office,' she said, intending it as a question, but she knew where it was; she'd seen it.

'That's right,' Jenson said. 'Direct link to the army base and Jackson PD. We make it to the radio, we figure out what's going on here, and then we get the fuck out.'

In theory, it sounded perfect, but things always sounded perfect on paper.

'I've just come from that way,' Marla said. 'Had a run-in with one of those things up there.'

'Did you kill it?' Jared said, suddenly intrigued and frightened in equal measures. 'Please tell me you killed it.'

'I killed it,' Marla said. 'I had no choice; it came after me like a savage beast.'

'That's what they do,' Michaelson sneered. 'They're no longer human, and they attack without a second thought.'

'I know,' Marla said. 'Like I said, I had a run-in with one.'

'Were there any more of them up there?' Jenson asked. Jared nodded along with the question, as eager to hear the answer as the guard.

'I got by a few of them,' Marla said. 'They were too busy eating to see me. I'm betting they're finished with their supper now, though.'

'She's right,' Terry Lewis said, taking one hand out of his trouser pocket. 'They'll be looking for seconds by now.'

'We're not going to the fucking chapel,' Michaelson growled. 'One, it's a stupid idea, and two, I don't like you; you're a fucking prisoner, no better than those things walking round in here like they own the fucking place.'

Terry shrugged nonchalantly. 'Do what you see fit,' he said. 'It's not like we've got a fucking choice in the matter.'

'That's correct,' Jenson stepped in, his shotgun dangling down by his leg. 'You might want to bear that in mind next time you fancy speaking.'

Terry grinned, but didn't speak. He knew that it was pointless.

They continued in silence for a while. Terry, sensing exactly the same thing as Marla, remained a few feet behind the guards, who were starting to enjoy holding the guns, or so it seemed. The power that came with the weapons gave them false confidence, and it was that false confidence that was going to get them all killed.

As they slipped through a gate and out to where the cells were, the atmosphere altered drastically. They had been safer with wall on either side of them, and now, well now they were out in the open, and the lack of communication between the group would be sorely missed.

Up on the second floor there were two of them, ambling around, groaning as their search for food continued. The guns of the guards in front were trained on the creatures, but firing was definitely not a good idea now whilst there were possibly another hundred – maybe even more – of those things that they couldn't see. To shoot would be suicide. The noise would draw them in like moths to a flame.

The only available option was to sneak, as silently as possible, along the row, and hope that they didn't run into any creatures.

'Up there,' Terry said under his breath. When Michaelson turned to see what the man was pointing towards, he wished he hadn't.

There were at least eight, maybe ten, of them, and they seemed to be feeding. Blood dripped down through the steel flooring like a rusty waterfall. The pool that had been created on their level was spreading outwards, the way a bath might overspill if a severely fat lady climbed into it.

As far as Marla could tell, though, there were none of them on the ground floor, which was all that mattered at that moment in time. The terrible sound of the blood dripping into the pool seemed louder than it should have been; it almost echoed.

Michaelson made a clenched fist and held it aloft, another reason why Marla knew he had watched way too many movies. It meant, in those films, to stay still; don't move; don't do anything. But as soon as he raised the fist, he took a few steps forward, and they all followed. There was no way that Jared would stay back, not with that amount of fear painted across his face. Michaelson turned to check that the rest of the group had followed, and turned back once he was satisfied.

The creatures were overhead now. The noises they made as they fed were horrible. They were sucking at flesh, stripping bones clear of any remaining meat, and generally making a right row about it. Marla sidestepped just in time; a chunk of flesh, small enough to fit through the grate of the floor above, landed by her side with a sickening thud. An inch to the left and it would have landed on her head, which didn't bear thinking about.

Michaelson used his pistol to point towards a gate before edging slowly towards it. They all followed without taken their eyes off the devouring horde above them.

The flooring had inch-wide holes in it; galvanised steel with twisted bars. It was the flooring of choice for prisons, oil-rigs, mezzanine floors. What it meant, though, was that the creatures above, should they look hard enough, would see the movement as they passed underneath.

Marla just hoped that they were too enrapt with what they were doing to notice.

Blood continued to drip down through the floor. A splodge landed on Jared's right shoulder, and it was all he could do not to start screaming. He slapped a hand to his mouth, as if he wouldn't be able to control himself otherwise.

Terry offered him a cursory glance: Don't fuck this up, or we'll all be dead! Jared must have understood him, because he nodded.

They all reached the gate and stood behind Michaelson, who began to silently rifle through the keys on his belt. When they had started moving towards the gate, everyone had automatically assumed that it would be open.

That had been a mistake.

Terry reached down and placed a hand upon Michaelson's. The guard made eye-contact with the inmate, a look that suggested he had better remove his hand or risk losing it.

The keys jangled nervously on the large ring. All eyes were now snapping back and forth between the guard and the horde above.

'Do you want to get to safety, or not?' Michaelson whispered.

Terry thought about this for a moment, and then let go of the guard's hand. For a few seconds, the guard simply stared into Terry Lewis's face. Marla was convinced that he was going to punch him, but he didn't.

Michaelson continued to search the ring for the key. He made a few sounds, the clinking of steel on steel, but nothing that would alert the gathering of feeding creatures on the floor above.

After finding the key, Michaelson pulled the chain across and slipped it into the lock. He turned it slowly to the right, and the deadbolt shifted with it. Despite the care the guard had taken to remain quiet, as the lock fell into place there was a metallic thud.

A groan from above told them that they had been rumbled.

Silence, it seemed, was no longer of utmost priority.

By the time Michaelson swung the gate open, three of the creatures were clambering down the stairs, practically falling over each other to get to them. One of them slipped, its elbow bounced off the steel bannister, and then it toppled over the side and landed with a grunt next to Jenson, who immediately levelled his shotgun at it. He was about to fire when Terry placed a hand on the barrel.

'What?' Jenson snapped.

'If you fucking fire there'll be hundreds of them down here,' Terry replied. 'We'll be absolutely fucked.'

The creature was, by now, dragging itself towards the group, who were stepping through the open gate and urging Jenson and Terry to do the same.

'We don't have time for this,' Marla said. 'Get both of your asses through here now.'

As the creature reached up with one hand, its mouth wide open and eyes rolled back into its head, Jenson took the gun away and marched through the gate. Terry kicked the creature once and made it through the gate just as the ones dragging themselves down the stairs turned the corner and came for them.

'Quick,' Jared cried. 'Lock it!'

'What the fuck does it look like I'm doing?' Michaelson yelled. He was trying, or so it looked from where the rest of the group were stood, to get the key back into the lock, and for some reason it just wasn't fitting.

'Running out of time,' Marla said, watching as three of the creatures, plus the one dragging itself along the floor, came towards the gate.

'I can fucking well see that!' Michaelson said, trying to control his nerves more than ever. 'I'm doing it as fast as I can!'

'Never mind fast,' Terry chided. 'Do it right.'

One of the creatures slammed against the gate, almost knocking the key out of Michaelson's trembling hand. The guard took a little step back and continued to make the key fit. Luckily for the group, the things didn't seem to know how to open the gate, and instead just threw themselves against the bars as if they could somehow push through the gaps.

Suddenly the key slipped into the lock and Michaelson twisted it.

The relief in the air was palpable; everyone exhaled, and Michaelson grinned to himself as if he had done something extremely heroic.

The contorted faces of the creatures were crushed up against the bars, a result of the subsequent throng arriving from behind. With eyes bulging out of sockets, and drool seeping from the corner of mouths, Marla was the first to speak.

'Shall we get a move on?' she said.

'That sounds like a good idea to me,' Terry said, wiping sweat from his forehead.

Everyone else seemed to agree.

*

'This is absolutely insane,' Billy said as they entered the chapel. 'I find it hard to believe that nobody else has survived.'

Shane nodded. 'I know, but it's sure as hell looking that way.'

Billy gave Shane a playful tap on the back.

'What?' asked Shane.

'You cursed,' Billy said. 'Have you forgotten where you are?'

Shane didn't know whether to laugh, or curse again. 'This place is pretty much obsolete, now, wouldn't you say?'

'On the contrary,' Billy smiled. 'If anything, we should say a few prayers. I mean, neither of us have been good, not in the spiritual sense.'

'Yeah, but we never did anything particularly bad,' Shane said, as much trying to convince himself as he was Billy. 'I know for a fact that neither of us need to repent.'

'I do,' Billy said. 'Or at least, I should, just in case there is a heaven.'

Shane watched as the hulking figure of Billy Toombs slipped into a confessional. There was no padre, of course, but Billy began to talk to himself. Shane couldn't quite make out the words, but he didn't need to.

He knew Billy didn't have it in him to do anything deserved of hell; this was just a precaution, something to make Billy feel better about his wasted life and the years he had spent procrastinating behind bars.

With Billy confessing his heart out, Shane began to search the chapel for anything of use. He wasn't expecting to find anything that could be used as a weapon, but perhaps a bit of rope...

There was one ambry on the right-hand side of the room, which contained an effigy of Christ, complete with stigmata and crown of thorns. The way in which the figure stared down at Shane made the hackles rise on the nape of his neck, and for a moment he was inexplicably breathless.

Not wishing to stare at the effigy for too long, he continued with the search.

There were three pews, which was plenty as far as the prison was concerned. They had a very tiny congregation; no more than three people a day, so there really was no point in installing anything larger than was necessary.

In front of each pew, strapped to the back of the chair in front, was a bible: King James.

Shane plucked one of the bibles from its netting and stuffed it into the pocket of his coveralls. He didn't know why he did it, but nothing made any sense at the moment. Whether he had subconsciously decided to turn to God at a later time, or not, it just seemed to be a good idea to be carrying a copy of the bible.

He headed on up towards the altar, taking the two steps carefully. Billy Toombs was still talking in his deep monotone; Shane thought it best to leave him for as long as he needed.

Upon the altar was an open copy of the bible, and Shane found himself instantly drawn to a particular segment.

Matthew 9:32-33: “As they went out, behold, they brought to him a dumb man possessed with a devil.”

'How fucking appropriate,' Shane muttered.

He turned and walked across to the apse, which was not really large enough to be called so, but Shane had no idea what else to call it.

It was here that Shane saw the body.

The padre had yanked down a curtain onto himself, perhaps to conceal himself from the eyes of God, perhaps to hide from the creatures.

Shane could see feet as they jutted out at the end of the royal-blue curtain, feet that were covered with blood, feet that were missing toes...

Shane made the sign of the cross on his forehead; again, he wasn't sure why he did it, it just seemed appropriate given the surroundings and current situation.

Shane was going to call out to Billy, to let him know that he had located the padre, but it didn't seem fair to interrupt the man when he was pouring his heart out to, well to nobody, really.

The things had been in the chapel, that was the main thing, and they were nowhere to be seen now, which put Shane on edge. He glanced around, expecting to find one of them ambling towards him with outstretched arms.

Thankfully, that wasn't the case.

'Anything?' Billy asked, which prompted Shane to swing around with his aluminium stick.

'Jesus fu—' Shane began, then remembered where he was. 'You frightened the life out of me.'

'Sorry,' Billy smiled. 'I think I got the answer machine.' He pointed towards the booth from which he had just emerged.

'Let's hope not,' Shane said. 'I found the bloke who used to run this place.' He pointed across to the curtain and the bloodied feet at the end of it.

Billy made the sign of the cross. 'Poor padre,' he said. 'Wonder whether he had time to exorcise a few of them.'

Shane shook his head. 'They're not possessed,' he said. 'They're simply us, sans logic and control. It's like they have some kind of rabies.'

That, Billy thought, was about the best and most comprehensive way to describe it. The way they came at you, with complete disregard, the darkness of their eyes, the frothy mouths, although there was nothing frothy about the black tar that dripped from every available orifice. It was like rabies.

'Did you find anything?' Billy said.

Shane thought about the bible in his coverall pocket, and shook his head. 'Nothing that could come in handy.'

'Still want to barricade yourself in,' asked Billy, but he already knew the answer.

'Not here,' Shane said. 'We need to get out of this place completely. I don't think we can get extra jailtime for trying to survive a viral outbreak.'

'Me neither.'

'Then let's try and get over the fucking wall.'

They didn't get very far.

The door to the chapel was filled with grunting creatures; they stumbled forward, scratching at the wooden décor either side of them.

'Put that on hold,' Billy said. He took out his knife and stepped into the battle.

*

'Behind you!' Shane yelled. 'Watch your fucking back!'

The creature lunged forward, and almost made it onto Billy, who was fending off the other two. Shane grabbed the thing's leg and yanked it back. There was a sickening snap as the creature's leg was torn from its socket, but the thing felt no pain at all. It was on its front, thrashing around the aisle like a drunken man being ejected from a nightclub by the burly bouncers. Shane managed to drag it towards the altar; it was only a few feet, but enough to keep it from scratching Billy, or worse, biting him.

Shane had time to look up; Billy had already slit the throat of one of them, but all that did was piss the creature off, who was trying to find its opponent without being able to see; its neck had been so severely slashed that its head was facing upwards, held on by an inch of flesh at the back of the neck. From where Shane was, all he could see was the creature's exposed throat and spine. Billy spun with the knife once again, this time finishing off what he had failed to do with the first cut.

The head slipped backwards, falling off the creatures shoulders. It landed in the aisle and rolled a few feet, where it came to rest against the leg of a pew.

Shane turned his attention back to the thing which he gripped in his hands. The legs were flailing and kicking, but Shane managed to dodge them. He realised, a second later, that he had dropped the aluminium runner. Realising that he was completely unarmed, he knew he had to improvise.

He dropped the thing's legs and lunged forward so that he was on top of its back. It growled and shuffled beneath him; it was like trying to wrestle an alligator, or so Shane assumed.

He could hear Billy taunting the other creature, begging it to come forward and try its luck, but he couldn't take his eyes off what he was doing.

As the creature continued to buck and moan beneath him, Shane reached a hand carefully around to the front, keeping a safe distance from its mouth, and tightened in on its neck. As he pulled the head upwards, there was a tiny snap, almost like a twig being trodden on in the middle of the woods. Shane pulled harder, tightening his arm around its throat. The creature gurgled, spilled out black ooze from its mouth.

With hope – he didn't know what he would do if it didn't work – he yanked the head backwards so hard that he was face-to-face with the thing, its eyes bulging, its life-blood seeping out of the corners of its mouth, The crack that came this time was like a firework, and Shane knew that he had severed the spinal-cord. As the thing seemingly realised what fate had befallen it, Shane eased up the pressure, allowing the body to slump forward.

Exhaling, Shane pushed himself to his feet. He glanced across to find Billy had beheaded the second creature in much the same fashion as he had the first. As he wiped the bloodied blade on the trouser-leg of his coveralls, he smiled.

'Most exercise I've had in a while,' he said.

Shane doubled over, fighting to suck air into his lungs, air that was apparently not there.

'Yeah,' he managed. 'That wasn't what I had in mind when I suggested the chapel.'

'The wall?' Billy said. 'Still fancy our chances?'

'More so than if we stay here,' Shane said, picking up his aluminium stick. 'Do you think we need to use the confessionals for what we've just done?'

Billy Toombs shook his head. 'Think God will just assume we're showing off,' he said, laughing a little. 'Might be easier to just save up for when we get out of here, do it all in one go.'

Shane nodded.

They left the chapel no better off, with consciences as heavy as they always had been.

*

He came to on the ground; he knew he was on the ground because he had a mouthful of gravel. The first thing he realised was that he was not alone; he could see feet as they walked by his head, feet belonging to people dressed in orange trousers. They were moaning, the people with the feet, moaning and growling as they walked around him, and he knew that he would like to do that too.

He pushed himself up slowly, and began to growl, but that didn't seem enough. He was hungry; very hungry. As he glanced around at the others he tried to figure out if they would taste good. After a minute or so, he knew that he wasn't meant to eat those ones. They were the same as him. They were also hungry.

He managed to get to his feet, swaying and almost toppling over on a few occasions, but once up, he felt like he would be okay. A few of the others – they were all dressed in orange, which was strange because he wasn't – looked at him, as if they were trying to decide if he would taste good. They subsequently ignored him, deciding that he was one of them, now, and had tasted good once, but not anymore.

One of them, a big one with a hairy face, stumbled into him, but he didn't mind; he simply moaned once more and shrugged his shoulder. Inside, he could feel himself regaining strength. Eventually, he would be back to normal, or as close to normal as was physically possible now that he had been infected.

He knew one thing, though. He needed to eat something, anything, but there was nothing around, and he knew that he couldn't eat any of the others because they were the same as him. He began to walk forward, which was almost impossible at first, but it got easier the more steps he took.

Starving.

A few of the others let out guttural warnings if he got too close, but he ignored them, because he knew that they wouldn't do anything. Maybe they were just talking to him? It didn't matter.

So hungry...

He almost fell forward, where he would have met a row of steel bars with his face, but he managed to regain his footing and steady himself.

Where was all the food?....

He knew that he was injured, but it didn't matter. He looked down to where his stomach should have been, but there was a massive hole with bits of viscera poking out. He probably wouldn't be able to digest properly, not anymore, but none of that mattered now.

What mattered was feeding....

He felt like he ought to know where he was, like he should recognise the people who he was with, but there was nothing. It was like he had just been born, born into a world where his sole purpose was to hunt and feed on...on whatever he could. How could he find food, though, if he was trapped, which was how he presently felt? There was nothing in the vicinity to eat, but his brain told him to keep looking, to keep walking until he found it, and then to attack as quickly as possible to satiate the hunger consuming him.

He walked in a perfect circle, almost falling over twice, and yet when he returned to the point where he had started a few minutes earlier, it felt brand new. He continued like this for almost an hour, sniffing the air, hoping to come across something that would feed him. As he walked, his hand accidentally brushed against a name-tag that had been pinned to his shirt, and sent it flying across the floor.

On it read the name: Warden Charles Dean.

But none of that mattered to him.

Not now.

All that mattered was feeding...

*

'I'm not sure this is a great idea,' Marla said as she surveyed the corridor. There were eight of them, and they all seemed to want to get into the governor's office. 'There's nothing in there for them. It's as if they still have some memories remaining, and now they want to get to the governor to teach him a thing or two about pain.'

'That doesn't sound feasible,' Terry spat. 'We don't know what the virus does to them, but we know one thing's for certain: It doesn't make them smarter, and I doubt whether it leaves them with agendas.'

Terry was right, although Marla had trouble admitting it. They wouldn't have remembered where the warden's office was, for a start, so they sure as hell wouldn't have headed towards it with ulterior motives. It just didn't sound right.

Marla edged backwards, concealing herself once again from the ambling throng. 'Whatever. The main thing is: We need to get into that office, right?'

Michaelson nodded. 'That radio is the only chance we have of surviving,' he said. 'If we can contact the PD, they'll send somebody to get us out of here, and then it's just a matter of sitting tight.'

Jared liked the sound of that and smiled, relieved that it would all be at an end soon enough.

'In that case,' Terry said, 'we need a plan. Or we could just go out there, guns blazing, blow them all to Hell?' It was a rhetorical question, meant to be playful, but everyone nodded along as if it was the best plan they had ever heard. Terry shook his head. 'Oh...so we're just gonna go and blow as many of them away as possible?'

'We need to get into that office,' Jenson said, using his shotgun to point. 'The best way to do it would be to keep those fucking things at arms length. If we shoot them where they stand, then there's no chance of any of us becoming infected, and we all make it out of here in one piece.'

Marla didn't want to, but she agreed. 'I know for a fact that I don't want to become one of those things,' she said. 'If we can make a few clean headshots, put them down straight away, then we're home free.'

Terry sighed. He had been contemplating returning to the fold, becoming spiritual again, but would he be able to after allowing such a massacre to take place?

'Do what needs to be done,' he mumbled. 'We need that radio, like you said.'

'You ready?' Michaelson asked Jenson, who cocked the shotgun.

'Let's do it.'

*

They swung around the corner without deciding who was going to shoot what, but it didn't matter. What mattered was that they all went down, and stayed down.

Jenson missed with his first shot, hitting one of the creatures in the shoulder. It recoiled slightly as the bullet tore through it, but that was about all. It came for the guards with clenched teeth, and it was the second shot from Jenson that managed to remove those teeth and spray them against the corridor wall.

Michaelson, with pistol in each hand, took out two with his first two shots; it wasn't a time to celebrate, though, as the ones remaining on their feet didn't look too pleased, and leapt forward with ghastly intentions.

Jenson moved forward, cocked and shot, and hit one of them – one he recognised as a paedophile from Block A, even though it was missing most of its jaw – directly in the eye. It stood for a few seconds, and then toppled backwards, hitting the door behind it. All manner of black innards trailed down the walls by now, leaving slimy tracks behind.

Two of the remaining things lunged forward, screaming and grunting. Michaelson managed to shoot the one on the left, and expected the other guard to take out the other, but when Jenson fired, all that came was a anti-climactic click.

The shotgun was jammed.

Jenson panicked; the line that he and Michaelson had been holding was no longer a priority, and he took a few steps back to try to fix the problem with his gun.

'Watch out!' Marla shouted as she appeared in the corridor.

Michaelson fired with both pistols and, luckily for him, shattered the approaching thing's face on both sides. It hit the floor with a dramatic thud and rolled onto its front where it remained, motionless.

There were two left, and one of them was running, or so it seemed. Its forward momentum, though, was what made it rush forward with preternatural speed.

'How fucking long?' Michaelson snapped, firing two rounds at the maniacal figure lunging towards him. Both shots missed the target, but one of them tore the ear of the thing clear off and sent it flying upwards where it stuck to the ceiling with vile effectiveness.

'Almost done!' replied Jenson, who was on one knee loading fresh shells into the chamber. 'One second.'

Michaelson didn't have time to fire off another shot; he was bundled over by the creature, who continued to snap and bite at his shins even when he was down. The guard whipped out a leg and caught the creature full on in the face. There was a satisfying crunch as its head snapped backwards, and Michaelson managed to level the pistol and fire.

The chin of the creature exploded; teeth flew from its mouth on a sea of blackness. The second bullet hit with such force the entire body lifted from the floor. Michaelson felt the weight shift from his legs, and felt instantly better.

Jenson heard a voice from way back in the corridor. 'There's only one left,' it said, which was hardly a consolation when you were out there facing it.

Officer Michaelson was still on the ground when the last creature reached him. It screamed, a guttural screech that shook the very walls in which they were encased, and then it dropped forward, mouth wide open, ready to bite.

Ready to feed.

There was a second when Michaelson simply accepted his fate. How was he going to stop it in time? There was no way he could fire off his pistols; the fucking thing was already on him.

Then came the blast. The creature flew a few feet into the air, both feet left the ground. When it came to a stop against the wall, sliding slowly downwards until it was sitting upright against the bloodsoaked skirting, Michaelson saw the huge, smoking hole in the creature's chest. Viscera hung loosely from the cavity, a dark mass of fleshy, singed meat fell out and landed in the creature's lap.

The thing looked down at it, as if pondering how things had gotten quite as bad as they had, and then came another blast. When Michaelson looked back – he hadn't been expecting the sudden follow-up from the other guard – the top half of the creature's head was missing, although that may have been it sliding down the door like one of those rubber spiders you used to be able to buy from the funfair.

'You didn't get bit, did you?' Jenson asked with trembling eagerness. When Michaelson climbed to his feet, he realised that Jenson was pointing the shotgun in his direction.

'No,' he said, holstering his pistols. 'Not a fucking scratch.'

Jenson exhaled deeply. 'Thank fuck for that,' he said. 'Thought you were a goner for sure.'

Appearing in the corridor, the rest of the group were almost as breathless as the guards.

'Are you okay?' Marla asked nobody in particular. 'That was insane.'

'I'm fine,' Michaelson replied. 'Wasn't expecting that one to come belting at me like that. Almost had me, too.'

Terry Lewis was leaning over one of the prone cadavers, mumbling incoherently to himself. When he straightened up, he said, 'Like to get to the radio now, please, if that's not too much to ask.'

Jared nodded in agreement.

The door to Charles Dean's office had a body in front of it. Jenson walked over and booted it on the side with the intentions of unblocking the door, but the creature dropped to one side, its head smashing against the ground with enough force to spill out yet more of its dark ooze. Jenson reached down, cursed, and pulled the creature away from the door by its legs.

'Fucking thing,' he snapped as he dropped the legs and straightened up, cracking his back intentionally.

Michaelson pushed the door to the governor's office open and walked through it, his pistol raised just in case.

The group followed.

*

'Holy shit!' Jared said, pointing to the creature lying in the middle of the office. 'Did you do that?'

Marla nodded. 'It attacked me,' she said. 'I didn't know that the whole fucking prison had turned into those things when I did it. In fact, it's a bit of a relief that I didn't kill an actual person.'

'That's all very nice,' Michaelson chided, 'but now's not the time for reminiscing. Can one of you block the door off?'

Terry was already moving; he grabbed a corner cabinet which housed trophies of some sort or other and dragged it in front of the closed door. It wasn't heavy, but it would buy them enough time to prepare should they come under attack.

'Is that the radio?' Jared asked, jabbing a finger towards the corner of the room. There was an old wooden box, or what looked like just a box. When Michaelson lifted the lid, it was clear to see the wires and controls that it housed.

'Not one for technology, is he?' Marla said. 'I thought that thing was another drinks cabinet.'

'He wasn't, no,' Jenson said, a pang of remorse appearing on his face. 'The way he saw it, why would you want to store a thousand books on one device when you could have a room filled with them?'

'They don't have anything like that, do they?' Jared asked, intrigued. 'A pocket library?'

Jenson grinned. 'You'd be surprised what they have now,' he said. 'Maybe one day you'll find out.'

'All of you keep it down,' Michaelson said. He twisted a knob until there was a distant crackle. It sounded, Marla thought, like popcorn being prepared.

They stood silently, not wanting to miss the moment when the signal was received. Michaelson seemed to know what he was doing with the contraption, which was good because none of the others would have had a clue.

'Jackson PD, this is Officer Michaelson at Jackson Penitentiary. Do you copy?'

Nothing.

'Jackson PD, I repeat, this is Jackson Penitentiary, in need of assistance, do you receive me? Over.'

The silence that responded was almost unbearable; Jared began to pace up and down the office, whining to himself. Jenson told him to shut up or face the shotgun up his ass. Jared managed to shut up, but only just.

The crackling became annoying after a while, but they stood listening to it, and to Officer Michaelson's pleas, for almost half an hour. In that time, Terry had located a comfy chair and was sat with his feet up on Governor Dean's antique desk.

'It's not working,' Terry said, reclining a little. The chair creaked beneath his weight. 'Nobody's listening.'

'Jackson PD, this is Jackson Penitentiary, do you copy?' Michaelson continued, undeterred. When the radio crackled its response, he turned to Terry Lewis and grimaced. 'Why the fuck would nobody answer?'

Terry shrugged. 'I have no idea,' he said. 'We're assuming that the radio's working, and that there's nobody out there to hear us. What do you think?'

Michaelson knew exactly what he was thinking, but was too frightened to say. Terry, too, was thinking the worst.

The prison wasn't the only place under attack. Those things were everywhere, attacking the entire city, maybe the whole country.

'That's not likely, is it?' Jenson asked as Terry finally relayed his fears. 'That one virus can infect an entire country so quickly? I mean, all of this only started yesterday; before that, everything was fucking fine. My wife...my children....'

Terry nodded. 'I know, it's hard to believe, but why else would we be getting nothing but static? Why is nobody at the station? Surely there would be somebody?'

Marla interrupted. She had been listening to the conversation from the side of the room, and finally decided to intervene. 'I agree with the guard,' she said. 'In prison, a virus would travel so quickly, it would be almost impossible to get away from, but on the outside things would be different. There are places to hide out there, places to go to. If there was a pandemic, then the government would be involved, not to mention the CDC. It wouldn't be able to spread; they'd quarantine it.'

'Maybe that's what they've done here,' Jared whined. 'Maybe we're the quarantined area?'

Terry and Jenson stared at each other; something like that would not be impossible, at least not where the government were concerned.

Michaelson walked across to the window. It was dark outside, apart from three searchlights which operated automatically, sweeping from one side of the yard to the other. 'There are aeroplanes in the sky,' he said. 'I can see the lights.'

'That doesn't mean anything,' Terry hissed. 'For all we know, those things have been up in the air for hours, safe. They might be flying blind up there, going in circles.'

Jenson nodded. 'If this thing is as big as you say it is,' he said, 'then it could have spread as far as LAX quite easily. Would you want to land knowing what was on the ground?'

'But what about the quarantine theory?' Marla interrupted. 'You were saying only a moment ago that we were the only infected area.'

'No,' Terry said. 'We're quarantined, that's a possibility, but that virus came in here from somewhere.'

'Carlos Silva,' Jenson said, as if the name should mean something. 'He was the first one to be sick, the one that bit Tyler's leg half off.'

'Then something must have infected Silva,' Terry said, stroking the stubble that was growing at rather a rapid rate on his chin. 'He brought it into the prison, but it was already out there, whatever it is.'

'Which means that the chances are that it spread like wildfire out there,' Michaelson said, staring meaningfully out at the sweeping lights and the surrounding darkness. 'Which basically means that we're fucked, either way.'

Jared began to panic. 'Oh, well that's just the best news I've heard all day,' he said. 'We might as well just lie down and fucking die right now, then!'

'Calm down,' Terry said, soothing his cellmate. 'We are speculating, that's all. For all we know, this whole thing is part of some government test. We don't know anything, so the main thing is that we continue to stay alive until we do.'

'I suppose that's a plan?' Marla said. 'But we can't just sit here and wait for those things to come crashing through the doors.'

It was true; it was only a matter of time before it happened. If ten of them, maybe even less, were to put enough pressure on the door, it wouldn't hold, not a chance.

'Are you suggesting we go back out there?' Michaelson said, obviously against such a ridiculous idea. In the corner of the room, Jared was frantically shaking his head.

'We wait,' Marla said. 'At least until morning. We will be safer when the sun's up.'

'I don't see how,' said Terry. 'Those things still have teeth, even in the daylight.'

'We wait,' Jenson said before Marla had a chance to respond. 'Until morning.'

*

They were in some sort of boiler-room area; there were pipes, steaming and hissing, in every direction they looked. Neither of them had even known it was there, but then why would they? They had never had such freedom in the jail, and if it weren't for the dire circumstances in which they had it now, it would have been almost enjoyable.

The area stank of stale water and metal, the way Shane expected it to smell. The ground beneath their feet was concrete, but water – roughly an inch deep – flooded the place, rusty water with shards of glass floating through it.

'How did we get into this?' Billy said, kicking away something that was trying to wrap itself around his shin. 'Still, at least you'll be getting out of here soon.'

That, Shane thought, was very unlikely now. He hadn't really had chance to think about it, but now that Billy mentioned it, all he could think of was Megan and Holly.

He hoped they were okay. Was it possible that they were out there, right at that moment, tucked up in bed, oblivious?

'I think things have changed here,' Shane finally said. 'My parole date doesn't mean shit now. I think the best we can do is get the fuck out, worry about the consequences later.'

Billy sighed. 'Everything will be okay, Shane. You do know that?'

Shane didn't know it, and neither did Billy Toombs. Billy's grandfather had been a very wise old man, one of the tribe leaders, a man that could see things that others weren't aware of. Shane hoped that some of that magic had been passed on through the generations. It would have been nice to know that Billy possessed such a gift; it would have taken some of the fear that Shane was currently feeling, fear for both himself and his family.

'All I know,' Shane said, 'is that something very wrong has happened here, something evil. The sooner we find out what and get to safety, the better.

Billy sidestepped a large pipe rising up from the ground, and—

'Look out!' Shane cried, but it was too late. The creature lunged forward and sunk its teeth into Billy's shoulder. Billy grunted, tried to shake the thing off, but it was attached so firmly that he couldn't.

'Fucking bastard!' Shane screamed, slamming the aluminium stick against the side of its head, but it was helpless. As it bit, it shook its head from side to side, the way a dog might shake a bone. Billy's face contorted with pain, and his feet finally gave way beneath him, sending them both to the flooded floor of the boiler-room.

'Fuck! Fuck!' Shane grabbed the creature by the shoulders and yanked it back. There was a tearing sound as a chunk of Billy's shoulder came away in the creature's mouth. Blood sprayed up from the open wound and fell into the water, turning it an even more revolting hue.

As Shane dragged the thing backwards, he recognised its face: Jimmy Kelly, one of the “Pack”, Dennis Hart's lot. Deserved everything that he got, as for as Shane was concerned, but Billy didn't. Billy hadn't done anything to deserve what he had got.

The creature growled, kicked its feet around in the rusty water, and tried to break free of Shane's hold. Billy came forward, pushed himself up onto his elbows, and released the knife from his trouser pocket. He gripped it so tightly that his knuckles turned instantly white.

'Hold it still!' Billy said through gritted teeth. 'Hold that fucker still!'

Shane did, he held it as still as he could, and he watched as Billy Toombs slammed the blade down into the top of its skull and twisted the hilt. There was a crunch; the creature made a strange sound – which wasn't quite a word, but might once have been before he had become infected – and then its eyes rolled upwards into its face.

Shane shoved it aside and spat on it.

'Are you okay?' he asked, but he already knew the answer to that. Billy had been bitten; he was already dead, his brain just didn't know it yet.

Billy Toombs glanced down at the wound, at the place where there had, not so long ago, been flesh. When he looked into Shane's face next, his eyes were full of concern, and acceptance.

'You're going to be okay,' Shane said. 'Maybe you don't get infected that way. Maybe there's something that we—'

'There's nothing,' Billy smiled. 'So stop trying to make excuses for me.' He gritted his teeth and pressed a bloody hand to the hole in his shoulder. 'Should have seen that sonofabitch coming. It wasn't even fucking hiding down here.' He laughed, but it was a nervous laugh, not comfortable at all.

'We don't know that there's nothing we can do,' Shane said, tearing the sleeve off his coveralls. 'I'm not accepting that shit, not yet.'

He wrapped the orange sleeve around the wound; Billy grunted intermittently. When he next spoke, it was words that Shane hadn't anticipated, and couldn't believe as he heard them.

'You have to kill me,' Billy said. 'I don't want to turn into one of those fucking things. The only way to make sure is—'

'No! Shane snapped. 'I'm not going to do it, and you'll just have to do what I say from now on.' He spoke with vigour and confidence, but even he didn't believe the words spilling out of his mouth. 'We're going to get you some help. You're not going to change into one of those...those creatures, you have my word.'

'But it fucking bit—'

'You have my word,' Shane said. He stood, pulled Billy to his feet, and smiled. 'I thought you had super senses. Why didn't you know that thing was down here?'

Billy shook his head. 'We're in some sort of basement,' he said. 'Obviously can't get a signal down here.'

They both laughed, but it was half-hearted, a way of ignoring what had just happened; a way of forgetting what was probably going to happen next.

Sooner, rather than later.

*

'What the fuck has happened here?' Rooster Hill said as he stepped into the infirmary. He reached into his coveralls, retrieved a half-smoked cigarette and lit it. 'Some riot.'

'Looks like it,' Marvin Manson said, surveying the room. 'But that doesn't explain why the cell doors were open, nor does it explain why we haven't seen a guard or another inmate since we came out.'

That, Rooster thought, was very strange. There should have been guards swarming the place, as was usually the case during a riot. Yet they had seen not one since leaving the cell.

'Maybe they're all outside,' he said. 'If the riot's moved onto the roof.' It wasn't meant to be a question, but it came out sounding like one.

'Maybe,' Marvin said, not convinced. 'Did you see all that blood in the corridor? Pretty savage, even for the guards in this fucking hellhole.'

Rooster had seen the blood; he didn't think he would ever scratch it from his mind, there was so much of it. It was on the walls, on the floor. There was even some on the ceiling, dripping down, fresh, probably still warm.

'One hell of a mess,' Rooster said, taking a step into the room and then stopping when he saw it.

A body, or what used to be a body, stretched out across the far side of the room. For a second, Rooster thought he might choke as something caught in his throat. It was only when he swallowed that he realised he'd been sick.

'What the fuck?' Marvin said as he neared the body, gingerly. 'Who is that?'

Rooster took slow, steady steps towards the corpse. 'I'd say it was a guard,' he said. 'And judging by all that fucking fat, I'd say it was Reynolds.'

Marvin could see the uniform, now. The blood that covered it had turned it a completely different colour, but there it was: a name badge, and Reynolds's belt was unmistakeable.

The body itself had been so badly mutilated that neither of the prisoners could look at one part for too long, and instead allowed their eyes to shoot from side to side in an attempt to see as little detail as possible.

Reynolds's right arm was missing, and his legs had been removed at the knees. One of the legs was a few feet away, stripped of flesh but still wearing a steel toe-capped boot, and the other was on the opposite side of the room, pointing towards the ceiling. The torso was almost empty of organs, some of which were pressed up against the skirting covered in dust and cobwebs. The ribcage was exposed and looked, to Rooster Hill, like some gothic organ you were apt to find in an old church. A few flies buzzed around the corpse, but not as many as there would be come morning.

'That's just wrong,' Rooster finally managed, biting down on his tongue to prevent the sickness from rising in his throat again. 'Who could do that?'

'I only know one man sick enough in this jail,' Marvin said as he wiped the sweat from his brow. 'Cyrus Clay.'

Rooster agreed; Cyrus Clay was a psychopath, likely to rape and kill his own mother if he had half a chance. 'If he's gone on the rampage,' Rooster said, 'then the guards better watch the fuck out.'

'They'd shoot him on sight,' Marvin said. 'All they need is a reason, and this is it.'

'Let's get out of here,' Rooster said. 'I don't want to be here when he comes back, and there's—'

Marvin snapped out a hand and covered Rooster's mouth. 'Shhhh.' With his other hand, he pointed across to a darkened corner which was shielded by a trestle table. Rooster listened, and heard the scratching, then the slobbering. How had they not heard it before?

Marvin took his hand away, and they stepped towards the door; if they could leave the room without getting involved, then that would just be dandy. Not taking their eyes from the darkened corner, they stepped carefully in reverse. Rooster was presently wondering what kind of mood Cyrus Clay would be in should he suddenly snap out of his mania and realise he wasn't alone in the infirmary.

Not a good one, Rooster thought.

There came a deep rumble, a guttural growl that made Marvin Manson reach up and hold onto his chest to check that he wasn't having a coronary.

Then it was up, and it wasn't Cyrus Clay. It was wearing a guard's uniform, cream and blue, but mainly crimson and black now. Its face dripped with something dark and thick, its eyes were transparent, even in the darkness that the corner provided. When it spotted them, it growled again and began to clamber awkwardly across the trestle table in an attempt to reach them.

'It's fucking Tyler,' Rooster cried, not believing what he was witnessing. 'Tyler's gone crazy!'

Marvin was trying to find something to hit the guard with. It was amazing how when you needed a weapon, everything seemed to be made out of rubber. 'Push the table!' he ordered.

Rooster looked across with a face full of confusion. 'What?'

'Quick, before he gets on top of it.'

Rooster turned to see the guard lift one leg up and slam it down onto the aluminium shelf. The blackness in those eyes was not natural; Rooster had never seen eyes so dark in his entire life.

'Quickly!'

Rooster stepped up to the table and pushed it as hard as he could. The wheels squeaked as the table shot backwards, so fast that it almost toppled over. When it slammed against the wall, sandwiching the guard, Rooster had to move his head to the side to prevent the flying ooze from hitting him in the face. The warm liquid which had spewed from the guard's mouth hit Rooster's cheek, and the first thing he thought was how warm it was.

'Hold him there!' Marvin said, who was now on his knees by the trestle table and appeared to be reaching underneath it. When he stood up, Rooster could see that he was clenching the guard's baton in his hand.

Marvin then proceeded in smashing the guard's head in until there was nothing left but a spinal cord and a few shards of skull. Rooster was sick, copiously, throughout the disgusting episode, but there was something intriguing about watching a guard's head cave in, and he found it almost impossible to divert his eyes.

The baton was dripping with grey matter and black slime; who would have thought that staring at the black stick covered with the guard's brain-matter would be the thing to tip Rooster over the edge? He began to retch so inexorably that the veins in his neck stuck out. His head began to throb from the constant retching, and he walked a few steps away from the trestle table to pull himself together.

'You okay?' Marvin asked, wiping the brain-matter off the baton using his trouser-leg. 'That was fun, yeah?'

'Fucking awesome!' Rooster gagged. 'Look forward to the next time.' Thinking there could actually be a next time was enough to start him off again, and it was almost five minutes later that he finally composed himself.

'What happened to him?' Rooster asked. 'Something was seriously fucked up with him.'

'No shit!' Marvin retorted. 'He was eating Reynolds, or at least had been. That's not normal behaviour, even for a guard.'

Then Rooster said something that was almost crazy given the circumstances. 'I'm hungry.'

'What?'

'I think I emptied my stomach,' Rooster sighed. 'I need to get something to eat.'

Marvin, despite what had just happened, began to laugh, but there was a funny taste in his mouth, which he wiped away with the edge of his hand. If he'd looked down, he would have noticed the blood that wasn't his smeared across his palm.

*

Outside, the darkness was intermittently broken by the sweeping searchlights. They were out there now, the things, wandering aimlessly towards the twenty-foot high fences. When they got there, they turned and walked back. If a searchlight neared, the creatures seemed to recognise it and follow, if only for a moment. As the light fell on them, it became clear that some of them shouldn't even be standing, such was the extent of their wounds; one of them, a prisoner by the name of Martin Jukes, was dragging himself along the floor with one bloodied knuckle. His legs had been torn from his body, fibrous flesh dragged along the floor from the waist down. His right arm had been severed somewhere around the shoulder; a stub of a bone was all that remained. As he pulled himself inexorably forward, the gravel of the yard digging into his face, embedding itself, Michaelson couldn't quite imagine what it would be like to suffer so much and yet still exist.

'Poor fuckers,' the guard muttered. Jenson was standing beside him, watching fervently.

'You wouldn't be saying that if one of them got you,' said Jenson. 'Would you?'

'I'd be blowing the top of its fucking head off,' Michaelson spat, using his left pistol to show how that might go. 'I hated them when they were just inmates, but I think I pity them a little bit, now.'

'How?'

'I don't know,' Michaelson said. 'It's just that, the way I see it, this is the most human a lot of them have ever been, and they're dead. There's something innocent about them now, something new. They're like fucking children, starting from scratch.' He laughed when he realised the irony of his words. 'I'm not making any sense at all, am I?'

'Not really,' Officer Jenson replied. 'The way I see it, they're more dangerous now that they can't be easily put down. Before, they were just murderers and rapists, but now they're demons. Almost impossible to kill, twice as likely to kill us.'

From behind, there came a cough. The guards turned from the window and were met by the beautiful eyes of Marla Emmett. She was holding two glasses, which were filled with a golden fluid that looked instantly welcoming. 'Thought you might like a drink,' she said. 'I know how thirsty sentry work can be.'

She handed them the glasses; Jenson stared down at his dubiously.

'I haven't put anything in it,' she sniggered. 'We need you and your guns, don't we?'

'That you do,' Michaelson smiled, drinking the whisky down and savouring the entailing burn. 'Jenson here doesn't really trust anybody, especially women who are being polite to him.'

'Fuck you,' Jenson said, barging the other guard playfully. To Marla, he said, 'I have no problem with women. Ignore this fool; his mom's probably at home right now, wondering why he hasn't rung to let her know why he's late.'

Marla laughed, and for the first time in a while it came naturally, a genuine laugh that sounded as good as it felt.

'There's plenty more in the governor's globe,' Marla said, 'but I reckon you want to stay sober?'

'Correct,' Michaelson said, jabbing a finger at her as if to say: Got it in one, Missy.

Jenson sipped from his glass, and then asked, 'What are they talking about?' He pointed surreptitiously across to where Terry and Jared were sat. 'More silly theories?'

Marla shook her head. 'Terry seems to think that there should be an antidote, or maybe a preventative should you get scratched or bit. Jared doesn't think so. He says that the government probably created the virus for modern warfare, you know, as some sort of biological weapon?'

'He's been reading too many comics, that one,' Jenson said, taking another sip of whisky. 'They haven't been trying to concoct a plan of escape, then?'

'Not that I'm aware of,' Marla said. 'But why would they want to escape from the men with the guns? You're probably their only means of survival, and I'll bet they just hate you for it.'

'Let's hope so,' Michaelson grinned. 'Wouldn't want to let down the fans.'

There was a moan from outside. The guards turned back to the window, creating enough space for the doctor in the middle.

The creatures were fighting over something in the centre of the yard; there were five of them, gathered around something indistinct.

'They're not having a game of cards,' Marla sighed. 'What's got them so worked up?'

The answer came almost as soon as the question was asked. The circle of creatures separated just enough to allow a glimpse of the object of interest, and Jenson slapped a hand to his head in disgust as soon as it became apparent.

'One of the dogs,' he said. 'They've got one of the fucking dogs down there.'

'There's nothing we can do for it,' Michaelson said, placing the flat of his hand on the other guard's shoulder. 'All we can hope is that it's over quickly.'

As they crowded the animal, there was a yelp. The German Shepherd growled a few times, and then fell completely silent, and then it was the turn of the creatures to growl.

'They make me wanna puke,' Marla said, averting her eyes. 'How can they do that to a fucking dog?'

'I don't think a few hairs bothers them,' Jenson said, trying to sound unmoved by what he was witnessing, and failing miserably. 'They're beasts, fucking monsters that will stop at nothing to sate their needs.'

'I hope they choke,' Marla sneered, and then realised that they were already dead and choking would probably have no adverse effects.

A few minutes passed before the things dispersed, leaving a bloody mess in the centre of the yard. There was very little remaining to suggest that a dog had once been there; all that was left was a few bones and a pelt of fur. It turns out that the creatures didn't like the hair as much as Jenson had reckoned.

'I need another drink,' Marla said. 'That warden of yours did have his uses, after all.' She walked across to where the globe sat, open, bottle necks jutting out invitingly.

Marla was about to reach down and pick up one of the bottles when the door banged. Her heart leapt into her mouth. Across the room, Terry and Jared jumped to their feet. Michaelson and Jenson snapped their guns in the direction of the door, distrusting the emergency blockade that held the door shut.

'Hello,' came a voice from the other side of the door. 'If there's anyone in there, we'd really appreciate some help.'

*

There was a moment where nobody spoke, an uncomfortable few seconds where fearful and confused expressions were exchanged. Michaelson signalled Jenson to move forward using one of his pistols, and the guard did, never allowing the shotgun to drop.

'Who are you?' Michaelson asked as he too moved towards the barricaded door.

'Inmates Toombs and Bridge,' came the reply.

Jenson turned to Michaelson and arched his eyebrows. They were, as far as the guards were concerned, non-violent prisoners; neither of them had really been a problem, even during past riots. Jenson shrugged his shoulders, Michaelson grimaced.

'Have either of you been scratched or bitten?' asked Michaelson.

There was a loud sigh from the other side of the door, followed by, 'No. Toombs is injured, but that was from an accident down in the boiler-room.' A pause, then, 'We're just trying to figure out what to do here, and those things are on their way. I can fucking hear them.'

Michaelson took a further step. From the corner of the room, Jared whined.

'You're not just going to let them in here?' said Jared, his eyes full of fear, his breath heavy and inconsistent.

'You think we should just leave them out there in the corridor?' Marla said. 'You heard what he said. Those things are coming. We leave them out there, then we'll have their deaths on our conscience. Is that what you want?'

Jared was about to say he didn't give a shit about his conscience when Terry interrupted. 'Of course not,' he said. 'Clear the doorway.'

The guards moved the barricade and took a step back. With weapons trained at head height, they waited with bated breath as Terry pulled open the door.

'Slowly,' said Terry, allowing entry to the two inmates. 'These guys have guns, and I'm pretty sure one of them at least knows how to use them.'

The guards exchanged a glance before turning their attention back to the newcomers.

'That looks pretty nasty,' Marla said, pointing to the makeshift bandage wrapped around Billy Toombs's shoulder. 'How recent?'

'Less than an hour,' Billy replied. 'Feels like shit, but I don't think it's infected.'

The barricade was replaced just in time. A horde of the creatures flung themselves into the wood, sending the cabinet forward an inch, but no further. The top of the doorframe splintered, sending two shards of wood down onto the office floor. Michaelson pushed the cabinet back into place and waited for a few seconds. The creatures must have realised that they couldn't get in. The pressure from their pushing subsided, and their groans trailed off as they headed away, off down the corridor, perhaps in search of an easier meal.

With safety restored, at least for the time being, the atmosphere relaxed a little. Marla peeled the sodden bandage from Billy's shoulder and began to clean the wound with expensive vodka.

'You should count yourself lucky,' she said. 'This is Dean's alcohol we're wasting, you'll be glad to know.'

Billy sniggered. 'That does make me feel better,' he said. A sheen of sweat coated his face, and he was looking a little more pallid than he had on his arrival. His eyes were sunken, surrounded with blackness, and his hair was dripping with sweat. 'How bad does it look?' The question, of course, was a test; he wanted to know if it actually looked like a bite. If the doctor couldn't identify it as such, then he was safe. If Marla discovered teeth-marks, however, beneath the blood and grime, then he was screwed, apt to take a bullet to the head from one of the guards, who seemed to be very keen on using their weapons on anything suspicious.

'It's nasty,' she said, 'but once I get it cleaned up properly, you should be fine.'

He knew that he wouldn't be fine, not at all. He had been infected, and he knew it. He could almost feel it coursing through his veins, a virus intent only in turning him into a walking predator. He knew that he must keep a close eye on his own behaviour, monitor himself until he could no longer control his urges, and when the time came, when all was lost, he would either take care of himself, or ask Shane once more. It was unfair, of course, to charge someone with such a dreadful task, but in his tribe back home it was forbidden to commit suicide. An eternity traipsing the afterlife in lament was all that awaited such people, and he had had enough lamentation for one lifetime.

'Are you okay, buddy?' Shane asked, pulling up a chair in front of his cellmate, who was obviously not okay and was almost as white, by now, as he was. 'The good doctor looking after you?'

Marla looked up and smiled. It was a nice smile, sincere. Shane noticed that the doctor had the same colour eyes as Holly, like emeralds surrounded by lightning. He couldn't look into those eyes for too long, though. It felt like he was cheating on his wife, who was still out there, somewhere. She had to be.

'In answer to your first question,' Billy said, gritting his teeth so hard that they crunched inside his mouth, 'I've never felt better. Wish I could feel like this all of the time.' He laughed nervously, but stopped the instant Marla poured neat vodka onto the wound. He hissed in pain, rolled his eyes up into his head, and waited for the agony to subside. It felt as if someone was drilling into his shoulder, but with one of those gigantic boring machines that are used on oil-rigs. When he could finally speak again, he said, 'Yes, the doctor is my new best friend,' he said. 'She's a much better friend than you, and she's prettier.'

'You don't mean that,' Shane laughed. 'Not after all of those long night we've shared on our bunks.'

Marla chuckled. 'You two should be on stage,' she said, sardonically. 'Now, can I get this wound clean, please, before I have to stitch up my own sides from laughing so much?'

Shane allowed a fist to drop onto Billy Toombs's thigh. 'You're gonna be fine, bro,' he said. 'Just like I promised.'

Billy shook his head. 'If you say so,' he grimaced, fighting another pang of agony. 'Just make sure that you're ready for those fucking creatures. They're sly bitches.'

Shane nodded. He knew exactly what Billy was saying, but with the doctor there couldn't.

Make sure you're ready if I turn.

Shane left the doctor to finish cleaning Billy's wound, and secretly hoped for a miracle.

*

The car was parked next to the kerb, as it always was. The engine was running, and so the car trembled, almost in anticipation, as it steadily ticked over. Shane looked across to the liquor store, and was half-tempted to ditch the whole idea and drive away.

The radio was blaring out some sort of melodious rock, but Shane couldn't place the song. It wasn't actually a song at all, but a mixture of several. Combined, the noise was unfathomable, and it was all Shane could do not to scream out loud.

Sweat dripped down his face; it puddled in his lap, and for a moment he thought he had pissed himself. He stared down, only for a moment, and realised that it wasn't just sweat any more.

It was blood.

Watery blood, diluted with the ever-increasing sweat, dripped from his head. His pores seemed to be producing it quicker than he could wipe it off, which he did frantically with the bottom of his shirt. It was useless, though. The shirt was drenched, and the car seemed to be filling up with crimson water quicker than it was physically possible. His feet splashed around as he fumbled to remove the seatbelt.

Had he been wearing one a moment ago?

He wasn't sure.

The radio began to splutter; the combined rock songs were now playing as if underwater, which they weren't. Not yet, anyway.

Shane tried to open the door, but the locks slammed down on him just as he did so.

He tried to curse, but nothing came out. Not even a whimper.

With the door locked, and the car filling up with bloody water, Shane panicked and began to smash at the window with his elbow.

The window had been open...it was always open.

But not now. He hit the window so many times that he lost count, but still it didn't shatter. He knew that it should have, that he was strong enough to break a simple car window with his elbow, and yet it just wouldn't.

Then, he saw them; a small army of the creatures walking towards the car. Some of them emerged from the liquor store, the very place that he had been about to rob to save his marriage and house. They struggled towards him, groaning, teeth bared, bloodsoaked.

As they surrounded the car, Shane realised that the water was now up to his neck. He could smell it – coppery and stale – as it lashed around with his struggles.

The things began to slam open palms down onto the car. They rocked it, and before Shane had time to think the car was pushing from side to side enough to change the directions of the waves within, which lapped up and filled his nostrils and mouth. He spat, trying to get rid of the putrid water, but more and more of it swept into his throat, and he began to choke.

As the darkness began to take him, he saw faces; the faces of his wife and daughter, the face of Billy Toombs, and the face of someone who looked remarkably like himself.

They were rocking the car. Holly and Megan were looking in through the flooded vehicle, grinning, black ooze dribbling from the corners of their mouths as Shane thrashed around to no avail.

When the darkness finally came, Shane closed his eyes and tried to erase the visions that he had just seen, but could not.

Shane...

*

'Shane, are you okay?' Billy asked, leaning close enough for Shane to smell the foul odour that only came through several days of poor hygiene.

Shane pushed himself up onto his elbows and glanced around the room. Over in one corner, the guards were talking amongst themselves and smoking cigarettes. Marla was sitting on the floor, pushed against the wall, with her knees drawn up. She was awake, but looked tired.

'You were having a nightmare,' Billy said. 'A bad one, by the looks of it.'

'No shit,' Shane mumbled. 'Whatever happened to puppy-dogs and ice-cream.'

Billy helped Shane to his feet. There wasn't a chance in hell of Shane returning to sleep, not now, not after that.

'Do you want to talk about it?' Billy asked.

'Never,' replied Shane.

They walked the length of the room to where the guards were sat. They broke their conversation off – something about Death, unsurprisingly – as Billy and Shane approached. Michaelson pulled another cigarette from a box and lit it.

'Any chance I can have one of those?' Shane asked.

The guard stared up at Shane silently for a second; Shane didn't know if he was considering parting with a cigarette, or whether he was gobsmacked that Shane had the audacity to ask for one.

Jenson didn't take his gaze off Michaelson, not wanting to miss the guard's decision. When Michaelson reached in and retrieved another cigarette from the box and handed it to Shane, Jenson shook his head in disbelief.

'You'll be gagging for that one when you run out,' Jenson smiled. 'I bet you.'

'Probably,' Michaelson said as he handed Shane a solitary match. 'Won't matter much, though, will it? Not if we're gonna end up hunted down by those fucking things.'

Shane struck the match and lit the cigarette, savouring the smoke as it reached his lungs. It had been a while since he last smoked, but it was like riding a bike; you always climbed back onto the saddle with confidence, and before you knew it you were riding without using the handlebars.

'Bad for you,' Billy said.

'If we get out of here,' Shane smiled, 'I promise I'll get some patches.'

'Cheaper to smoke,' Michaelson said, drawing deeply on his cigarette. 'I can't afford to quit.'

There was something disturbing, yet true, about what the guard said. As Shane sucked in more smoke, he knew that he would start smoking again should they get out alive. Holly wouldn't mind, would she? And Megan, well she was old enough to know that Daddy was a much nicer man when he was smoking. Cigarettes, he would explain, took the edge off certain situations. In a way, they were lifesavers; perhaps not his own, but other peoples'.

'Any action out there?' Shane asked, stepping gingerly towards the large window overlooking the yard.

Michaelson clambered to his feet and joined Shane. 'Just the usual,' he said. 'Lots of them, bumping into shit, eating stuff from fuck knows where.'

'Any chance we could get to the fences?' Shane said.

Michaelson shook his head. 'Not with all those down there,' he said, pointing to the creatures in the yard. 'Maybe one or two, then yes, but there must be fifty now, and there were more earlier. I have no idea where those ones have gone, and don't particularly want to find out.' He paused, then took a final drag on his cigarette and stubbed it out against the window. 'The best thing we can do is find out the new codes and get out through the doors.'

'What are the chances?' Shane asked. 'Where are the codes?'

Michaelson pointed across to the computer that sat atop Charles Dean's desk. 'But I have no idea how to work the damned thing,' he said, shamefully. 'Never been one for computers.'

'If we need those codes,' Shane said, 'then let me try. I was pretty good once.' He was. He had taken a course at the local college so that he could teach Megan and help her with homework.

'Then there's always the small matter of getting down to the basement level,' Michaelson said, not convinced. 'I don't like our odds too much.'

'I prefer our odds with the codes,' Shane smiled. 'Let me see what I can do.'

Michaelson stepped away from the window and rejoined Jenson, who began to ask questions that Michaelson shrugged off impatiently. Billy remained with the guards for the time being. Shane glared towards the computer, hoping that he could locate the codes and at least give them a fighting chance of escape.

'No substitute for a good book,' Terry Lewis said, startling Shane. Terry nodded towards the computer. 'I've never used one, personally, but from what I've heard people are using them now to read books on. Don't see the point, myself. Can't exactly take that thing to bed with you, can you?'

Shane laughed. 'I guess not,' he said. He liked Terry. He seemed to be genuine, and not at all dangerous. He would have liked to have known him before everything had gone to hell. Circumstances had drawn them together, though, and that, in itself, would have to be enough.

'God has a plan for us all,' Terry said, as if the conversation had already been predetermined. 'Are you a man of God, Shane?'

That, Shane thought, was a question he couldn't answer, at least not yet. He had the bible in his pocket, which he had picked up subconsciously whilst searching the chapel for weapons. Had he known then that he would meet Terry, a man of God? Was that even possible.

He reached into his coveralls and retrieved the book. When Terry saw it, his eyes lit up as if it were made of solid gold. He licked his lips, purely to moisten them, but in that moment he looked like Fagin as the thieving bastard orphans emptied their pockets for him.

'Do you mind?' Terry asked, holding out a trembling hand.

Shane handed him the bible and smiled. 'Not at all,' he said. 'Don't think I'll be getting into it anytime soon.'

Terry rubbed the leather cover as if it were satin, and then held it up to his nose so that he could smell the richness of the material. 'You can keep your computers,' he said. 'This is all I need.'

As he wandered back to the corner of the room, leafing gently through the first few pages, Shane felt an overwhelming sensation; he had not meant to pick the bible up for himself – as he had first thought – but for Terry Lewis, a man who clearly had faith and could put it to good use.

'What was all that about?' Billy asked, sidling up to Shane.

'Oh, nothing,' Shane replied. 'Just made the guy happy, that's all.'

Shane turned to the computer and sighed. He had work to do, and he needed to get started if they were to get the codes before daybreak.

He sat in the leather chair and booted up the system. Billy Toombs watched across his shoulder, and Shane noticed, for the first time, that Billy was struggling to breathe, and when he did it was terrible, as if something was dying inside of him.

*

The password, which Shane thought would have been the first obstacle, was surprisingly easy. When the screen appeared prompting an eight-figure configuration, Shane was initially stumped, daunted even. He pulled open the desk drawer and retrieved an address book – an old-fashioned thing that had been covered with what looked like wallpaper. Written upon it in calligraphy were the words: 2011. That was all.

'What are we looking for?' asked Billy, leaning too close for Shane's liking. The breath that hit him was rancid, and it was all that Shane could do not to vomit. How could he possibly inform his friend of the problem, though? What should he say? Can you take a few steps back, please, you're starting to fucking honk? He swallowed hard, hoping that Billy didn't notice his discomfort, and began to flip the pages of the book.

'Anything with eight letters,' Shane said. 'A name, or something unique.'

He worked through the book, which contained notes about the prison and a few choice cuts on what he would do when he retired, but it wasn't until the final page that he found what he was looking for.

SERENITY.

'What does that mean?' Billy asked. 'That sounds like a code to me.'

Shane shook his head. 'That's the name of his daughter,' he said, pointing to the framed photograph sitting on the desk. 'I think I've heard the guards talk about her before.'

Without a second's hesitation, he typed the name into the computer and pressed Enter. There was a whirring, and then the little blue doughnut on the screen kicked into life to signal that the computer was doing something. For a second, Shane didn't think that he was right; perhaps his daughter's name would have been too obvious, that he had instead opted for something more difficult. But then the doughnut stopped whirling and the desktop loaded up.

'Well done, Bill Gates,' Billy chuckled, and then coughed. He covered his mouth, but Shane could still smell the ghastly putrescence behind his clenched fist.

'Are you okay?'

'I'm fine, man,' Billy replied, fighting back another bout of coughs. 'Just think I need a drink. You know, calm the old nerves a little.'

'Knock yourself out,' Shane said, pointing across to the open drinks cabinet. 'I think it's a free bar tonight.'

Billy tapped Shane on the shoulder and headed off to numb the pain that had started to return. His shoulder was throbbing, but now the rest of him was tingling, as if he had pins and needles all over his body. It was a strange sensation, and one that he didn't want to share with the rest of the group. What if he was turning? What if he was dying and coming back as one of those things?

He knew, as he poured himself a large whisky, that he was, and there was nothing he could do about it. Shane knew, too; the way he kept turning his head away at the computer made Billy question his own scent, and as he breathed into the full glass, hoping for the scent of whisky, he was almost sick. The stench that hit his nostrils was Death. He downed the whisky in one, and refilled his glass, hoping that he didn't hurt any of the group when he did finally change.

If...

*

There were countless folders on the desktop, and some of them were certainly not options for the codes; family photos and videos were instantly dismissed, and Shane continued to trawl the C drive in the hope of locating the file.

There were employment records of all the guards, with pay-grades and background checks. There were several expenses folders, which had been altered drastically according to the system. No surprises there, Shane thought.

He opened up the programs-list, and found what he was looking for about halfway up. A program called GenaLock, which was apparently software designed to generate codes for a thousand and one purposes, but in this case, it generated the codes for the facility doors.

He loaded the program up and managed to navigate the functions as if he was a seasoned professional. It felt good that he was doing something, anything, to help. In the hands of the guards, the computer would have likely been wiped of its memory.

There was a calendar icon in the corner of the screen. Shane ran the mouse over the icon and clicked. He found today's date, clicked once more, and that was that.

7471.

'I've got the code, I think,' Shane said aloud, trying not to sound too sure, just in case he was completely mistaken.

'How sure are you?' Michaelson said as he pushed himself up to his feet. Jenson did the same.

'Pretty sure,' Shane said. 'It was dated today, and it was all I could find on here.'

Marla stepped into the conversation; her eyes were full of sleep and she yawned. 'What we got?'

'Genius here reckons he's got the codes for the basement doors,' Jenson said, far too condescending for Shane's liking. He'd like to see Jenson – fucking prick – operate the computer with as much savvy as he had.

'Is that all we need to get the fuck out of here?' Marla asked, perking up a little.

'No,' Michaelson said. 'You need us for the fingerprints and voice-scan.'

'In that case,' Marla smiled. 'We'd better make sure that you stay alive.'

'Glad to hear,' Jenson said. 'Probably fucked up your plans, though, hasn't it?' He directed that in Shane's direction, a look of genuine distaste in his expression.

'I have no idea what you mean,' Shane smiled, knowing that it would provoke the guard further. 'I love you like a brother, man.'

Billy spluttered a laugh, and then cut it off as soon as Michaelson shot him a warning glance.

'So, what are we waiting for?' Marla said. 'Let's get moving.'

'Hang on a minute, sweetheart,' Jenson said, with about as much chauvinism as possible. 'We can't just go out there, guns cocked, with our dicks in our hands and hope for the best. We need to set some rules. We need to make sure that we're all on the same page.'

Terry was already beginning to move the barricade. 'We're all on the same fucking page,' he said. 'We're getting the fuck out of here tonight, and I don't care if I have to spend the rest of my years behind bars, so long as those bars are as far as fucking possible away from those creatures.'

Jenson was about to reprimand Terry when Michaelson intervened.

'He's right. The only way we're going to make it out alive is if we trust one another. Usually, I wouldn't trust you guys,' he gestured to everyone in the room wearing coveralls, 'to make me a cup of tea and piss in it properly. But we don't have a choice.' Jenson once again tried to pipe up, but Michaelson cut him off. 'I know that whatever is happening out there has changed things, but we all just need to figure out what to do once we make it out. Is that the page that you were talking about?'

Jenson shook his head. 'I was talking about trusting a bunch of fucking prisoners with our safety,' he spat.

'If you think that you'll be better off on your own,' Terry said, sliding the remaining wood away from the door, 'then by all means, make a run for it.'

Officer Jenson opened his mouth, let silence escape, and then closed it again.

'Thought so. Now, you two have the guns, which means that we're placing a helluva lot of faith in your aim. If either of you feel that you can't handle the pressure, then please hand the gun to someone who can.'

'Fuck that!' Jenson cried, staring around the room. 'I can handle this gun just fine; better than anybody else here, so you just keep your ideas to yourself, old man.'

Terry nodded. 'Okay. Just make sure that you aim for the head. Anything else and it won't make a blind bit of difference. You can shoot them a hundred times in the dick and they'll just keep on coming.'

'What about him?' Marla asked. She pointed to Billy Toombs, who was using Charles Dean's desk to hold himself steady. Sweat poured from his head, and he looked as pallid as ever. 'Who's going to take care of him?'

'Me,' Shane said without a moment's hesitation. 'He'll be my responsibility from now on—'

'I'm nobody's respons—'

'You know what I mean, man,' Shane said. 'I'm going to make sure that you get out of here, just like the rest of us.'

Billy sighed, accepting his fate – although his fate, he knew, was a lot worse. It was simply a matter of time.

'Okay,' Michaelson said as he pulled his pistols from the holsters. 'If you both fall behind, though, then you both get left. It's that simple.'

Shane nodded. 'I'd expect nothing less from you.'

'Glad that's all clear,' Jenson said, edging closer to the door with his shotgun trained at head-height. 'Shall we?'

'We shall,' Terry Lewis said, and pulled the door open.

*

The lights in the corridor were flashing on and off, which was not the best for visibility. Luckily, though, there were no creatures to greet them as they shuffled nervously from the governor's office. On the ground, surrounded by all manner of nameless viscera, were three bodies, bodies that hadn't been there a few hours before.

The things were either dragging bodies around, or starting to eat their own. Perhaps the weaker creatures were becoming targets for the others; it wasn't beyond the realms of possibility, not with what had already happened in just a few hours.

Terry and Jared, along with Officer Jenson, remained on the left of the corridor; Shane, Billy and Marla stayed behind Michaelson, who seemed the more adept of the two guards.

'Slowly,' Michaelson whispered to his followers. There was a corner coming up, and it wasn't wise to all go throwing themselves into danger. Michaelson held a hand up, telling the others to stay put, and then took a peek.

His face relaxed a little as the corridor was empty, apart from a single body slumped against the wall. He signalled that it was clear and moved forward.

One thing was for sure; those things were close. Sounds of scratching and moaning came from an indistinct direction. Every now and then there would arrive a guttural growl, loud enough to cause some concern amongst the survivors, but they continued forward regardless, hoping that it was too far away to actually harm them.

The lights continued to flicker, the soft buzzing noise as the bulbs flicked off and on becoming annoying quite quickly. There was a stench in the hallway, a pungent redolence of dying flesh and faeces. It was a noisesome fetor, the kind that you could easily associate with an abattoir. It burnt the nostrils, lingered for what seemed like an eternity, and threatened to stay forever. As they pushed on through the corridor, Marla found herself wishing that her senses would simply disappear, all apart from sight, which would probably come in useful between now and the basement.

They reached a door. It was locked, but the fingerprint scanner on the wall at the side was still functioning. Michaelson holstered his right pistol and slid his thumb across the panel. There was a bleep, and then the red flashing light which had been dancing beneath the panel ceased, replaced with a constant green.

There was a metallic thunk between the door and its frame.

'Well, that went well,' Terry sardonically said from the side of the corridor.

Michaelson ignored him and pushed the door open. He muttered something beneath his breath as he stepped into the room – probably a profanity aimed at Terry for his sarcastic reproach.

'What is this place?' Marla asked, stepping past the guard. Hanging on the walls were posters of naked women, provocatively posing for some low-brow porn magazine. There was a fridge, which continued to buzz in the corner of the room. The lights were steadier than in the corridor, yet still occasionally flickered. On a table in the middle of the room was a card-game that had been abandoned; cards were scattered haphazardly, and there were a few on the floor surrounding the four chairs.

'Welcome to the guards' mess,' Jenson said, pulling open the fridge and cracking open a can of coke. As he glugged greedily from the can, the rest of the group stared on thirstily. Jared licked his lips and hoped there were plenty more where that came from.

'You perverts eat your dinner in here,' Marla said, stepping forward to investigate the filth adorning the walls. It was pretty full-on; you could practically see what the model had eaten for breakfast.

'We've got to come somewhere,' Jenson smiled.

'Plenty of coming goes on in here by the looks of it,' Terry smiled. He made the sign of the cross as he scanned the posters. 'Who does who? Do you pull Michaelson's, or is it the other way around?'

'Fuck you, Lewis,' Michaelson snapped. 'I swear to god you're starting to get on my fucking nerves.'

'Sorry,' Terry said. 'Wouldn't want to do that, would we now?'

'You guys knock it off,' Marla said. She walked towards the fridge. 'Anything in there for us to get involved with?'

Jenson sank to his knees and began to pull out food. 'Seems to be your lucky day,' he grinned. 'Reynolds must have skipped lunch; these are all his.'

He began to stack foil parcels on top of the fridge. In the end, there were eight in total, enough to feed a small family.

They ate. It felt, to the prisoners at least, like the best meal they had ever eaten. Who would have thought that a sausage-roll and a half-inch piece of cheese between two slices of bread could be so good? There was one can of coke left in the side compartment of the fridge, which Marla, Jared and Billy shared. Billy, though, dribbled most of it down his coveralls.

With the food finished, and a quick search of the room for anything that could be utilised as a weapon – there was a mop in the corner of the room which Shane snapped in half and handed to Terry and Jared – they stood in front of the door, once again ready to move.

Just as Marla was about to speak, she was dragged backwards by giant hands. She screamed, and Billy Toombs growled as he snapped for her throat.

*

It was a while before anybody knew what was happening. Shane realised first, and reached out to grab Marla as her momentum – and that of a six-foot odd half-Indian, half-Irishman – carried them towards the ground. When they hit, they hit hard. Marla's head met the concrete with brutal force; it snapped to one side, blood instantly oozing from the wound. Her hair turned red on the one side almost instantly. When Shane reached her, he could tell by her eyes – they were wide open, yet lifeless – that she was unconscious. She was at the mercy of Billy, who was thrashing his head from side to side in an effort to meet teeth with flesh. Luckily, the way in which Marla landed forced her torso across his, buying just enough time for Shane to reach her.

'Pull her off!' Shane yelled to the guards, who were standing by her feet with guns pointing towards the creature. 'Fuck the guns!'

Michaelson holstered his pistols and grabbed one of Marla's feet. He pulled, but only succeeded in turning her a little more; somewhere, Billy was holding onto his intended dinner.

Shane prised those giant hands apart, trying to create enough space to free Marla, but he held fast. In life, Billy had been strong, but this was something else. It was almost preternatural, and as Shane tugged and jostled for Marla's freedom, Billy's bones snapped and cracked as they fractured, but there was no chance he was going to forfeit his lunch.

'Pass me a gun!' Shane cried. It was inevitable, and as he dropped down onto Billy's throat with his knee wedged firmly between the chin and the collar-bone, he knew that he had no other options.

Michaelson dropped Marla's leg and reached for a pistol. As he pulled it out, he realised what he was about to do.

Hand a gun to an inmate?

Was he totally insane?

He walked around to the head-end and stared into Shane's eyes with profuse intensity. After a second – and Shane didn't know what the fuck was going on during that time – Michaelson passed the gun to Shane and stepped back.

Shane curled his finger around the trigger and placed the barrel on Billy Toombs's head.

'I'm sorry, friend,' Shane whispered.

Billy, or the thing that used to be Billy, thrashed wildly, trying to buck the man with the pistol off him so he could finish – or at least start – his meal. His eyes were dark, endless pits of insanity, and his mouth began to ooze with the black drool that came with the virus.

Shane closed his eyes.

Shane pulled the trigger.

*

There were hundreds of them; by now it was almost difficult to move without crashing into another. As Governor Dean slowly meandered through the corridor, he realised that if he didn't eat soon he would die. He was, of course, already dead, but he would cease to be completely. He could feel himself rotting on the inside – which eating would delay, if only for a while – and it was driving him further into despair.

Some of the other things were carrying food, body parts that they had plundered from elsewhere, and he wanted to grab for them, snatch away the food and devour it before they even knew what had happened. He had tried already, though, and been met with an angry response. In fact, he was lucky to still be walking alongside the horde, considering his attacks on some of them in sheer desperation. If only one of them dropped an arm, or a spinal cord, then he would have enough to survive, enough to see him through until the next meal, which would hopefully be much larger.

He could smell it was out there, waiting for him, and that kept him going.

He reached a T in the corridor. The others turned left, as if they knew something was at the end.

The thing that was once governor of the prison took a right.

If he found anything, or anyone, then he wasn't willing to share with the rest of them.

He ambled forward, alone. Part of his stomach slopped out onto the ground as he went, and he stared down at it, at least grateful that when the time came there would be plenty of room inside of him.

*

After what happened to Billy, Shane quickly fell into despondency. Marla tried to talk to him, but he shook his head, silently. He wasn't ready; that was all. He had shot his cellmate, a man with whom he had shared his life with for almost three years, and that was not something that he had ever anticipated, nor something that he could come to terms with lightly.

They waited for almost an hour in the guards' mess. Shane sat at the table, whispering incoherently to himself, while Terry and Jared covered Billy's body with the only thing available: the naked posters.

With the body covered, Terry said a prayer, reading it from the bible that Shane had gifted him. As the guards watched with tedious expressions, Marla stood in the corner of the room biting her fingernails. She had remained unconscious for only minutes, but by the time she awoke they were down a man. Her head throbbed; it had been bandaged with a tea-towel. She looked like something from Arabian Nights. After a few seconds, she took her finger out of her mouth and spat into the air.

What if she had had blood beneath her nails? She might have clawed at one of them during her struggles. She didn't think she had scratched Billy, but the one back in the governor's office?

She dismissed the idea as plain paranoia and sat at the table next to Shane.

As if he had waited for such a moment, he stood from the table and said, 'Let's move.'

'Are you sure—'

'Yes, I'm sure,' Shane said, cutting Marla off mid-sentence. 'We need to get the fuck out of here. Nothing's changed. At least we won't have anybody to hold us back.' They were harsh words, and he knew that he didn't mean them, but it seemed to please the others to know that they wouldn't be burdened on the way to the basement, and you couldn't buy morale like that...

'Open the door,' Terry said, pocketing the bible and holding his half a broom-handle aloft. 'We stick together, we'll make it out of here alive.'

Shane, with the knife he had taken from the pocket of Billy Toombs gripped tightly in his right hand, didn't think so, but there was only one way to find out.

He nodded to Michaelson.

*

Memories of a bad childhood were always a bad thing; nothing good would ever come of slipping back into a time where chaos reigned, a time when you were too young to do anything about it. Rooster Hill's childhood was much worse than most, and all of it came flooding back to him in what seemed like a personal attack from God himself. His head almost erupted with the agony – chess-set...little fag...the touching...”Don't tell your mother, it's our little secret.”...

It hit him so hard that it almost knocked him off his feet. It was all he could do to remain standing.

'What the fuck's the matter with you?' Marvin asked as Rooster pinched his nose between two fingers and clenched his eyes so tightly that a hundred wrinkles appeared across his face.

Breathe, breathe, breathe. 'Nothing,' Rooster grimaced, although the fact that he still pinched his nose, and the fact that he was leaning against the wall as if his legs were about to betray him suggested otherwise.

'You don't look so good, man,' Marvin said, thinking the worst. 'You haven't been fucking infected, have you?'

Rooster suddenly snapped open his eyes. 'What? Of course not. I've been more than careful about that.'

'Good,' Marvin muttered, hoping that his friend was telling him everything. 'You've gone a funny colour, that's all. Don't want you going all fucking crazy on me.'

'I'm okay,' Rooster lied. Where had it come from, and why was he suddenly remembering things that he had blanked out for almost thirty years? It made no sense. 'Just had a pain in my head, that's all.'

Marvin relaxed, the eerie darkness of the hall must have made his friend look worse than he actually was. Marvin was taking no chances, though. For all he knew, Rooster was hiding the fact that he had been bitten.

But Marvin didn't feel so hot himself. For the last fifteen minutes, his stomach had been turning over like a volcano about to erupt. It was hunger, that was all, or at least that was what he had convinced himself. He hadn't eaten for a while, and even though the prison meals were shit, they were enough to keep a man going until the next one. He told himself that it was because he usually slept through the night; because they had not slept, the hunger had crept up on him and he was ready for breakfast.

Yes, that's what it was.

Nothing more.

'You don't look so good, Marv,' Rooster said, noticing the sheen of sweat which was coating Marvin. He realised, almost too late, that his friend was infected. Marvin turned and lunged for him, his eyes bulging from their sockets, his mouth contorted into a terrifying O.

Rooster didn't have much time to dive out of the way – and there was nowhere, really, for him to dive – so he stood his ground, which seemed to be the only thing he could do.

Marvin thumped into him, his right fist catching the side of Rooster's face so hard that stars instantly began to dance in his vision.

He wasn't going to pass out, though. If that happened, it was all over.

They both slammed into a door. The wood splintered, but not enough for them to crash through to the other side. As Marvin snarled and drooled, trying his damnedest to take a chunk out of anything, Rooster held his friend's head as far away as he could, knowing full well that one bite, one tiny scratch of the teeth, might be enough to infect him.

Rooster, not able to control himself, uttered something intangible; it sounded like it should have been a word, but not quite.

Pushing the writhing figure away as best he could, Rooster knew that he needed a weapon to take down the thing. He had nothing, which concerned him greatly.

Marvin grunted, snapped forward once again – this time in search of the jugular – but missed. He was strong, stronger than Rooster had imagined him to be. Sure, they had wrestled and had the odd knockabout over the years; that was part and parcel of sharing the same cell. If you didn't knock the shit out of each other every now and then you would go stir-crazy.

But Marvin, dead Marvin, was exceptionally strong. Before Rooster had time to contemplate what to do next, he realised that he was already out of breath. For a moment, he wondered if he was about to die right there, perhaps suffer a massive coronary or pop a fucking vessel.

It felt like it.

He shoved Marvin against the wall, wedging his elbow right into his eye until there was an audible squelch. When he moved his arm, he could see that he had caused the thing some serious damage; the eye had exploded, and partially seeping from the socket like a half-cracked egg. The black goo dribbled down Marvin's cheek and fell off his face onto his coveralls, which were already starting to smell like they had been worn by a corpse for years.

Since he had no weapon – and nothing within reach, which would have been useful to say the least – Rooster improvised and began to throw Marvin's head against the wall, hoping that eventually – fucking soon, he hoped – Marvin would cease his incessant struggling and just die. With each impact there came a sickening squelch; it was like tossing a balloon full of jelly against a wall, and bounced back exactly the same. Marvin's eyes, which were no longer his (not really), rolled up into his face, but the lids didn't drop down to cover them, which was even more horrifying. Rooster had to watch as his cellmate was pummelled into pulp. When there was nothing left but grey-matter and teeth – several of which were trailing down his chin as if they were trying to escape – Rooster managed to stop, yet even then he didn't trust it.

The thing – Marvin, for God's sake it was still Marvin! - slid down the wall. A sound escaped from the hole that had once been its mouth, but it wasn't a breath, more a final exhalation.

Rooster stepped back and glared down at what he had done. Had he done all that? He couldn't remember, but he must have.

The entire episode had lasted less than two minutes. Rooster didn't know what was more frightening: the speed in which the virus attacked, or the fact that it could just wipe out a person's entire memory, start it from scratch, and then turn the person into a flesh-eating zombie. It just wasn't feasible, at least not in reality.

A few minutes ago, Rooster had been attacked by memories that he had suppressed a long time ago. Haunting visions of a past that had been locked away
chess-set faggot
returning at a time when he least needed them. He never needed them...fuck, he never wanted them again. During those impure reveries, he had questioned himself; if anyone was infected, it was him.

And yet, it hadn't been.

Somewhere along the line, Marvin had come into contact with the virus. Rooster guessed it was when they fought off Tyler in the infirmary, since that was the only time they really came up close and personal with the virus.

What if it was airborne?

Rooster shuddered at the thought. If it was airborne, then he was already dead.

Panicking, he began to check himself for cuts or scratches. One tiny mark would be enough, although that would have been academic if the virus was already airborne.

Satisfied that he hadn't been bitten or scratched in his exchange with Marvin, he pulled his coveralls up and buttoned the front. By the time he finished he was absolutely knackered, and slumped against the splintered door to the right of him. He closed his eyes, just for a second, and when the voices came he mistook them for a dream. He forced his eyes open, not wanting to fall back into the hellish nightmare that he had suffered only moments before.

And the voices, they kept on coming.

Rooster pulled himself to his feet, using the doorknob for support, and took a few steps backwards into the darkness that the shadows provided.

He waited.

The voices would be here soon.

*

This was Hell. It had to be. Pain, suffering, hunger, no remorse; it was Hell, no doubt about it, and it felt soooo gooood.

He climbed down the first step, steadying himself on the steel bannister. Some of the others had fallen over the side and landed head-first on the steel flooring below, There were bodies down there, at least three or four, and they weren't moving, which meant that they had slammed into the floor with enough force to keep them down. There was blood everywhere down there, black blood that seeped through the caged flooring and dripped down to the level below.

He moved down to the next step. His knee almost gave way beneath his weight, but he managed to grab onto the railing to prevent falling completely. He groaned, grunted, but not too loud; he didn't want the others to know where he was going, and he certainly wasn't going to share his food with them when he got there.

He had eight more steps to go, and he would traverse them as carefully as he could. He could almost taste the blood in the air by now, and it tasted sweet.

He couldn't wait.

*

'Shouldn't there be more of them?' Jared asked, though he was glad that there weren't.

'We're a couple of corridors away from the main facility now,' Jenson said, swinging his shotgun around with something akin to boredom. 'We might come across a few stragglers, but I reckon the rest of them will be chowing down on the bulk of the dead meat, which is roughly a hundred metres that way.' He stopped swinging the shotgun long enough to stab it towards the direction he spoke of.

'Good to know,' Marla sighed, although whether she was going to trust the guard's theory fully was an entirely different matter. He was, after all, dumb enough to be swinging a shotgun around as if it was nothing more dangerous than a rubber ball. Turning to Shane, she said, 'Are you okay?' She said it quietly, loud enough for only Shane and, perhaps, Terry Lewis to hear, but Terry was mostly harmless.

'I'm fine,' Shane mustered. He was still withdrawn, but not as badly as he had been. Killing your cellmate was hardly something that you could forget in a hurry. It wasn't as if Shane and Billy had had a bad relationship; they were friends, buddies, willing to die for one another.

In the end, though, the dying had not been an option, and neither had the killing.

'We're gonna get through this, Shane,' Marla said, and there was something about the way in which she said it – with honest-to-god determination – that made Shane believe her.

All he could think about was Holly and Megan, and whether they were okay. Perhaps the infection wasn't as widespread as first thought. Was it plausible that the virus might have only reached the outskirts of Jackson? Shane hoped that it wasn't too late to reach them, his wife and daughter. When he did, he knew that everything would be okay once again. Billy's death would haunt him for eternity, but with his family around he would be able to stifle the memory so that it became bearable.

Noticing that the rest of the group had slowed to a stop, Jenson placed both hands on the shotgun. 'I hope you're not making any fucking plans,' he said. 'I'll shoot you before you even have time to think about it.'

'Lower the gun,' Michaelson said; it wasn't a request. 'You're being a fucking idiot. Haven't you figured it out yet? Are you so fucking dumb that it hasn't sunk in? Everything has changed. These people aren't prisoners, not anymore, at least not until everything goes back to the way...to the way it was. Even then I think it'll be out of our hands. Fuck, we're not even guards any longer. You, me, them, we're all the same. We're just people, people trying to live through the night, and if we do, if we make it until morning, then I don't have a clue what we're going to find out there, but I promise you something: you, and me, we won't be fucking friends. You're too much of a cunt.'

Stunned silence prevailed, but Marla felt like applauding such a fine speech. Officer Jenson's face dropped about an inch; he looked like he'd been kicked in the bollocks constantly for an hour. His mouth eventually opened, but nothing fell out. In fact, he looked ashamed. When he hung his head, Michaelson didn't know whether to feel sorry for him, or give him another round.

'We need to move,' Shane said, pointing into the darkness. 'How far to the gates?'

'Not far,' Jenson sighed. He looked deflated; the shotgun hung loosely at his side.

It was a poor choice of timing to allow the dejection to hit.

Out of the shadows came the figure, screaming incoherently. By the time any of them realised what was happening, the man had relieved Officer Michaelson's holsters of their pistols.

'Watch out!' Terry cried, but it was too late; the figure was already moving through the darkness, a pistol in each hand.

Jenson hoisted the gun upwards and managed to get off a shot. The recoil sent him staggering backwards. From the darkness came a agonising cry.

The lunatic had been hit.

What happened in the next ten seconds was a blur to all of them. Shane, Marla and Jared threw themselves to the ground; Jared was whimpering profusely. Michaelson, being a few steps ahead of everyone else – and the closest to the maniac who now possessed both of his guns – didn't know what to do. He managed to fall to his knees, which was a lot harder than it sounded since every muscle in his body had seized up. Terry Lewis remained standing, for reasons only known to himself. Shane stared up at him from the ground, and could see that the man was praying silently; his eyes were closed, and his mouth moved quickly as the whispered words passed through it. Even in the darkness, Shane watched as a single tear rolled down Terry's cheek and landed on the collar of his coveralls.

And Jenson, who was a few feet in front of Terry Lewis, fired again. There was no pained reply this time, though.

The only response came in the form of bullets.

Lots of them.

Officer Jenson's body replied spasmodically as each bullet hit home. Blood sprayed out, showering the surrounding walls. The guard didn't – couldn't – cry out as he was riddled with gunfire, but from the floor Marla was screaming.

A shrill screech that seemed to go on forever, long after Jenson's lifeless corpse hit the corridor floor.

When the gunfire stopped, the ringing continued to echo through the hall. What should have been a shocked silence was, in fact, a high-pitched aftermath. Jared was still whining, Marla was screaming, Terry was silently praying, Michaelson was grumbling, and Shane was listening to the sound of his own heartbeat as it thumped incessantly inside his ears.

'Well, well, well?' the voice in the darkness said. 'What do we have here?'

*

Ahhhh, the gunfire was a message, a sign that he was on the right track. When it came, he had been contemplating altering his direction. There was a door, and he had been about to walk through it when the banging started.

The sign.

He continued onwards, knowing that whatever had made such a racket was close by. He could almost smell the blood, but maybe that was just a trick his new body was playing on him.

His stomach, what remained of it, seemed to lunge, as if it knew that the time was almost upon it. A tendril of intestine that had previously been hanging from his stomach slipped down and landed at his feet, but he didn't notice it, even when it wrapped around his foot and almost tripped him up.

He dragged it with him for almost five minutes before it freed itself and lay abandoned by the hallway skirting.

*

The unmistakeable stench of gunfire lingered on the air, its sole purpose to sting nostrils and make eyes water. Nobody spoke – nor could they – for the thirty seconds that followed the gunning down of the guard. Glances, fearful and confused, were exchanged, and the possessor of the pistols watched intently, trying to figure out if anyone was stupid enough to make a move.

'Well this is all nice and cosy,' Rooster said, taking a surreptitious step towards the shocked clique. As he moved, Marla flinched; Jared simply whimpered, as was his wont. 'What, did you think you could just run out on me? Leave me here to fucking die, like the rest of those things?'

Michaelson, being the only guard – and the only person with any semblance of authority – shook his head.

'Hill, that wasn't the plan at all.' The way in which he spoke was akin to that of a counsellor trying to convince a junkie not to toss himself off a seven story building. Almost patronising, but not intentionally.

Rooster turned to face the guard. 'You and your little buddies here were trying to escape, weren't you? Off to greener grass, leaving the rest of us here to rot.'

Terry Lewis, who had been standing stock-still and reciting excerpts from the bible in his head, held out a pacifying hand. 'We didn't know there were any more survivors,' he said, the tiniest hint of laughter at the end to embellish the claim. 'We were just trying to get away from those fucking things while we still had a chance. If we'd known you were here, and not infected – which I assume that you're not – then we would have come for you.'

'Bullshit!' Rooster Hill spat, and he actually did spit; a globule of phlegm landed on his chin. Nobody watching, though, was brave enough to tell him about it.

'He's telling the truth,' Shane said. 'We all met up trying to find a way out. It's not like we had a plan.'

'Well, if you did, and I'm pretty fucking certain that you did, then I'm about to toss a spanner in the works.'

Like we need any more spanners in the works, Shane thought.

'Let's not be stupid about this, son,' Michaelson said, and then snapped his mouth shut as Rooster lifted one of the pistols up and pushed it to the guard's temple.

'Stupid? I'm not being stupid. I'm the only one here sensible enough to see what's going on. Well, I'm not about to let you all go running off and leaving me here to die—'

'You can come with us,' Shane said. It was then that he realised that he was still cowering on the floor. He pushed himself up to his feet; at least he would be standing if Rooster was crazy enough to shoot him, which was a hell of a lot more admirable than crawling around like a worm looking for a place to shit.

'I could come with you?' Rooster said, clearly thinking it over. 'Yeah, I could, couldn't I. I could come with you, and then you and your merry band of fucking men could turn on me and feed me to those things as soon as the chance arrives.' He cocked the pistol, the one that was pushed against Officer Michaelson's head. The guard closed his eyes, anticipating the shot that would kill him. 'I don't think I want to come with you, not now. In fact, I think I'll be better off on my own. Well, not entirely on my own. I need somebody for company, don't I?'

His gaze dropped. Marla Emmett's expression changed so drastically that she seemed to mutate into a completely different person.

'Leave her alone,' Shane said, stepping forward, knowing that he was apt to get his kneecaps blown off if he moved too quickly. 'If you need to take anybody, take me.'

Rooster chuckled. 'Why the fuck would I want to take you when I could have her.' He licked his lips, the blob of phlegm gathered on his chin slid across to the other side of his mouth. 'Fine piece of ass, that one. I'll bet she could suck a fucking golf-ball through a length of hosepipe, couldn't you, honey?'

'Fuck you!' Marla grimaced. She thought, for a few seconds, that she was actually going to be sick; she managed to swallow it down.

'I'll bet you will, too,' Rooster smiled. 'Now, sweetie, I want you to get to your feet, and don't be trying nothing stupid, 'cos I will shoot you where you stand. I'll shoot you, and then I'll fuck you.'

Marla didn't know what that meant, but didn't want to question his intentions, not while he had a gun pointed towards her chest.

'Slowly,' Rooster said, licking his lips again. 'If you move too fast, I might slip with my little friend here.' He nodded to Michaelson, who still had his eyes shut tight.

Marla manoeuvred herself carefully, trying not to give the gunman an excuse to blow the top of the guard's head off.

'That's nice,' Rooster said. 'Nice and slowly, hmmm-mmmm, just like Momma used to do.'

When she was on her feet – feet which felt like they were liable to crash beneath her at any moment – Rooster told her to move towards him, then threatened to shoot the next man who moved.

'This isn't going to get you out of here,' Terry said. 'Son, believe me. There are other ways we could do this.'

'Do your ways get my dick wet?' Rooster asked. 'Didn't think so.'

'I'm not gonna get your dick wet, either,' Marla said, and she meant it.

'Oh, you will,' Rooster replied, shoving the pistol forward to emphasise his point. 'You will, and it will be sooo fucking good.'

Jared, throughout the exchange, had been backing away. The darkness of the corridor made it almost impossible to see, but Rooster did, and that was enough.

He removed the gun from Michaelson's temple and sliced the air in front of him with it. 'Don't!' he snapped. 'I promise you, it'll be the last thing you fucking do!'

Jared dropped to his knees and began to beg, crying uncontrollably. It was almost embarrassing, but Shane felt sorry for the poor guy, who clearly wasn't cut out for this sort of thing. It made him wonder what Jared had done in the first place to end up in prison.

'We're gonna go, now,' Rooster said. 'Make our way out of this hellhole together. If any of you try to follow, I will shoot you. And you, missy, had better behave, otherwise I won't be gentle with you when it comes to it, and then you'll wish that I'd shot you to begin with.'

He grabbed Marla by the hair and spun her around. She squeaked, and then stifled it. Shane thought about lunging for them, but there was no way he would make it in time. Rooster was definitely unhinged, and not lying about shooting people.

Rooster dragged her backwards, through the darkness of the corridor. Her feet shuffled with recalcitrance, but she had no choice; she had to do what the prick with the guns said.

'Bye-bye, boys,' Rooster laughed, and then he was gone, disappearing in the direction from which the group had just come.

Marla yelped as the sound of a pistol slamming against flesh reached the group.

'Well, I wasn't expecting that,' Terry Lewis said. 'We are going after her, aren't we?'

Shane shook his head. 'I am, but the rest of you should get out of here while you have the chance.'

Jared, from the floor, breathed a heavy sigh of relief and began to cry again.

'I'm coming with you,' Michaelson said, rubbing at the reddened area on his temple where the gun had been pressed. 'That fucker needs a slap.'

'Terry,' Shane said. 'I want you to take Jared and get out of here. You know the code, right?'

Terry nodded. 'Seven-four-seven-one,' he said. 'But that's no good. What about the fingerprint scanner?'

Shane scratched his head, and then said, 'I've already thought about that.' He glanced down at the bullet-riddled body of Jenson. 'I'll do the honours.'

He dropped to his knees, pulled out the blade – Billy's blade – and began to carve the fingers off the dead guard's hand.

*

'You're going the wrong way,' Marla sneered, wiping away the blood that had started to dribble from the corner of her mouth. 'They have the codes to get out of here.'

'Whatever,' Rooster said, pulling Marla's hair so ferociously that some of it snapped off in his hand. She yelped, but that was all. 'We're going to get out of here my way. That, of course, is after. First, me and you are going to get it on, and if you know what's good for you, you'll do what I say. If you want to live, and a pretty little thing like you should wanna live, then best behaviour, please. I promise you'll enjoy it. Probably not as much as me, but you will.'

The thought of the crazed lunatic penetrating her, forcing himself on her, made her sick to her stomach. Why was it that all men, the ones that she had met recently, anyway, just wanted to rape or molest her? Was she giving off some sort of signal, something that she was completely unaware of?

Fuck no!

She was in a prison, filled with incarcerated murderers and rapists; some of that must rub off on the guards, who had been almost as revolting as the inmates – Tyler certainly was, and Marla wasn't sure that Jenson had been the full ticket.

'Ahh, here we are,' Rooster said. They had reached a door, glass-panelled, and as Rooster turned the knob there came a click. The door swung inwards. 'Perfect. A place to call our own,' he sniggered. 'After you.'

Marla may not have been panicking on the outside, but her insides were turning over like a cement-mixer. She knew that she was going to vomit ten seconds before it actually happened, but it still came as quite a shock.

'That's no way to behave,' Rooster said, brushing the hair away from her face. 'Anyone would think that you didn't fancy me anymore.'

The rawness of her stomach, and the pain from the retching, served to make it almost impossible to prevent further projectile vomiting, but she somehow managed to control it; Rooster's hand, brushing gently across her cheek as if he were her mother trying to soothe her, made her angry, and it was all that she could do not to smash him in the fucking face and hope for the best.

'Better?' Rooster asked, taking a step into the room. He extended his hand and provided Marla with a curtsey. 'Shall we?'

This wasn't happening. This couldn't be real. She could believe all of the other stuff – the fact that there were people walking around out there, or what used to be people, trying to eat humans – but somehow, knowing that she was about to be raped by an inmate seemed almost too far-fetched to be true.

She stepped into the room, not having any other choice. 'Promise me one thing,' she said, wiping a tear away from her eye.

'Sure, sweetie,' Rooster said, licking his lips as if they had been coated with sugar. 'Anything for you.'

Anything for me, fuck you, you fucking gimp!

'Please don't hurt me.'

As soon as she said it, she realised how pathetic she sounded. She might as well have asked him to lie back while she did all of the work. Her mind began to run diagnostics, trying to figure out why she had said something so utterly demoralising, but couldn't reach a suitable conclusion.

'I won't hurt you,' Rooster said. He pulled her gently into the room by the wrist, a massive grin stretched from one ear to the other. 'Do you like chess?'

Marla had no idea what to say, but the longer the conversation went on, at least nothing bad was happening to her – well, nothing worse.

'I love chess,' she gasped, hoping that it would evolve into a full-blown conversation about the game, preferably with a rundown of the rules and a few anecdotal exchanges.

'Then you're gonna fucking love this,' Rooster said, and then he was on top of her, his hand fumbling between them, searching for the button of his coveralls. He was licking her face, trying to push his tongue into her mouth, but she clenched her lips tightly, promising herself that whatever happened, whatever he did to her body, he wouldn't be getting past her lips.

He grunted as he released himself from the trousers. She could feel him, savage and hard, as he pressed against her leg.

She wanted to bite it off. Chew it off, even, the way one of those creatures would.

He panted, his tongue slipping down to her neck. She felt like she was going to be sick again, but knew that if she did he would make her pay for it. As he tore at her clothes, yanking her skirt across and breaking all eight buttons of her blouse simultaneously, she tried to push her mind to somewhere else...somewhere safe. She couldn't. All she could think of was the conversation with Charles Dean, the one that practically terminated her contract with the prison.

How she wished that she had done that yesterday, or the day before. She would have been out of it, safe, untouched.

Rooster writhed around on top of her. She could hardly breathe as his full weight collapsed down, forcing any air she had amassed out of her lungs. Rooster must have mistook her forced exhalation as an aroused whimper.

'You like that, huh?' he said, licking her neck, trailing his slimy tongue up and down as if he were painting a fence with it. He grunted, pushed her legs further apart, and was about to enter her when he was pulled backwards.

Marla exhaled as the massive weight was removed from her. She couldn't see what was happening; for all she knew, Rooster was getting into a better position. Perhaps the guilt was too much for him, and he could no longer fuck her face to face.

Then, she heard the voice, and she instantly began to cry.

'Are you okay?' Shane asked; he was pulling her clothes back across so that she was no longer exposed. He was to the side of her, and she had never been so happy to see someone in all of her life.

She reached up and hooked her arms around his neck, pulling him downwards. She planted a massive kiss on his cheek before bursting into tears once again.

'It's okay,' Shane said, helping her to her feet. She stumbled a little, but he made sure that she was stable enough. 'Everything's going to be okay now.'

Marla shook her head. 'He was going to rape me,' she cried. 'Fucking sick bastard was going to rape me.'

'I know,' Shane said, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. 'Well, he ain't gonna be doing anything to hurt you now.' He pointed across the room, and Marla was pleased with what she saw.

Michaelson had his pistols back, for one. Two, they were both pressed against Rooster Hill, one to the head, one to the balls, which hung loosely from the coveralls. His erection had vanished, and his penis had shrivelled to about the size of a cigarette butt.

'Just say the word,' Michaelson said. 'I'll gladly pull the trigger. Both of 'em.'

It was Rooster's turn to whimper. 'I wasn't gonna hurt her, man!' he cried. 'It was just a game.'

Shane stepped towards him; Marla reached out and touched his arm. Whether she was trying to stop him, or simply urging him on, Shane didn't know.

'You're one sick sonofabitch,' Shane grunted. 'Everything's falling down around here, there are fucking monsters out there,' he jabbed a finger towards the door, 'and you thought you could just rape this lady?'

'I wasn't gonna—'

Suddenly, appearing between the doorframe, was Governor Dean, the hole in his stomach oozing blackened viscera, his eyes wildly snapping around the room, trying to figure out how he had befallen such a treat.

Shane grabbed Marla and pulled her aside, just as the governor lunged into the room, spewing dark bile from his throat. Rooster sensed he had an opportunity to redeem himself, and grabbed for one of the pistols in Michaelson's hand. The guard whipped the handle of the pistol across Rooster's face, and he fell to the ground, rolling into the wall with a dramatic thud.

Marla tried to persuade herself, once again, that what she was seeing was just a nightmare, something that she could blink away if she tried hard enough. She was grateful that Shane and the guard had managed to prevent her from being raped, but now this. It was a neverending reverie of inexplicable terror.

Across the room, Michaelson tried to fire. One of the pistols went off; the bullet hit the creature in the face, shattering its jawbone and spraying it across the wall. It wasn't enough, though, and it was when Michaelson attempted to fire the second pistol that he realised he was in trouble.

Nothing happened.

'Shoot it!' Marla screamed, trying to push herself as far into the corner as physics allowed.

Michaelson fumbled with the gun, trying to figure out why it hadn't fired, but he couldn't. It had jammed, and there was no time to play around with a gun that was about as useful as a chocolate teapot. He tossed it aside, took aim, and fired at the sluggish figure approaching. There was a moment when Michaelson anticipated the second gun failing, too, so when it went off, blowing the right ear off the side of the governor's face, he was almost surprised.

Shane grabbed Marla and pulled her towards the door. She, being terrified beyond belief, tried to resist, but she had to trust the man doing the pulling. He'd saved her life already, and would probably do the same before the end of the day. She gave in to his tugs, momentum carried them both towards the door. Once through it, Shane checked that there were no more where Charles Dean had just come from, and ordered Marla to stay put.

'Don't leave me,' she sobbed. It was okay to be scared now; even if she could, she didn't think she would be able to conceal it.

'I have to help Michaelson,' Shane said. 'We need him alive to get out of here.'

Marla hadn't thought of that. 'Just be careful,' she said, which was something that he had already considered. As Shane swung around and disappeared back into the room, Marla placed her head in her hands and began to cry uncontrollably.

Shane re-entered the room with Billy-s knife drawn, and it was a good job that he had the foresight to do so. The creature was in the middle of the room, snapping from side to side, trying to figure out which of them – Michaelson or Rooster – would put up the least resistance. It seemed to know that the guard could kill it with whatever it was he held in his hand, and so opted for Rooster, who was cowering behind a chair in the corner.

Shane didn't give two shits about Rooster; he was a rapist, a murderer. To help him now – which was what Shane's heart was telling him to do – was against his own moral fibre. Every man deserved a second chance, but the man cowering behind the chair, trying to keep Charles Dean at bay, had already had his, and chosen to fuck it up.

'Michaelson,' Shane said, trying to get the guard's attention without the peripherals of the creature – assuming it still had peripherals – catching him. Luckily, the guard nodded and began to move around the edge of the room, furtively. Rooster, who still had his cock and balls out, tried to clamber to his feet, and it was then that he realised what was going on.

'No!' he screamed. 'You can't!'

He picked up the chair and tossed it towards the encroaching warden. It clattered against Dean's head, splitting his eye wide open, but that only made it angrier. It ran the final few feet and pounced.

As Shane and Michaelson fell through the door, pulling it closed behind them, the blood-curdling screams of Rooster Hill followed them.

*

It was worth waiting for. It all came apart so easy, too, once it stopped moving and trying to wriggle away. He pulled the innards out, and ate those first, which was probably the best thing to do; there was very little movement after that. The noises, they came for a while, but maybe that was normal.

As he ripped at the flesh with his hands and teeth, he didn't notice that most of it was falling back out of his stomach and landing on his knees.

Neither did he care.

Because in that moment, Governor Charles dean was truly happy.

*

Shane scrambled to his feet and pulled both Marla and Michaelson to theirs.

'We need to move,' he said. The horrible sound of scratching and moaning came from only a few corridors away. 'There's more of them coming.'

'Oh God!' Marla cried. They started to run, but with the lights flickering overhead and the fear of crashing into a horde from another direction it was harder than it sounded.

'Fucking guns,' Michaelson panted; obviously being a prison guard didn't require much in the way of physical fitness. He threw the second pistol, the one that had fired, against the wall, where it smashed into about six pieces.

'What are you doing?' Marla yelped, slowing a little so that she could get the sentence out coherently.

'No bullets left,' the guard replied. 'Don't you think I would have used them if there had been?'

They raced onwards. Shane hoped that they hadn't taken a wrong turn, but his fears were quickly disposed of when he recognised a fire-extinguisher hanging on the wall.

'Almost there,' he said. 'Are you both okay?'

'Could be worse, I guess,' Marla said, pulling across her blouse to prevent exposing herself. The prick, Rooster, had torn her clothes up pretty good.

Luckily, thanks to the two men she was with, that was all that he had managed to tear up.

Nearby – so close that their insides trembled – there was a guttural grunt. It sounded like the gateway to Hell opening up beneath the prison, and it might as well have been. The noise didn't stop them; nothing would have in that moment. As they raced for the basement gate, Shane could only think of his family. Were they okay? Was the virus as widespread as feared? It occurred to him as they ran that he had had the computer on in the governor's office. Surely Charles Dean had had internet access. They had missed the perfect opportunity to check on the outside world, to see if the infection was attacking anywhere else.

How had they been so fucking stupid?

Shane didn't think to mention it to Marla or Michaelson, not now. What would be the point?

'That's it,' Michaelson said, breathlessly. 'That's the first gate.'

Shane didn't stop running until he was touching the codepad. It was then that his mind went blank.

'Fuck!' he snarled. 'Can anyone remember the fucking number?'

Marla cried, 'Are you fucking kidding me?'

'Does it look like it?' Shane said, allowing his fingers to stroke the keys, nervously. 'There were sevens, I know that.'

'Hurry it up,' Michaelson said. 'I can see....something...'

Shane glanced to the left, past Marla's head, and was instantly greeted by the sight of lurching shadows, ambling towards them. As the corridor lights continued to flutter, it became clear that there were at least twenty of them, maybe more. They started grunting, moving faster, as if they knew that they didn't have time to claim their lunch.

'Fuck!' Shane said, turning back to the codepad. He typed in a number, one that sounded right to him.

Seven-One-Seven-Four...

The light, which was flashing impatiently beneath the codepad, remained red.

'Fuck!' Shane reiterated. 'I'm sure it was something like that.'

'Well,' Michaelson said, not taking his eyes from the approaching creatures. 'Something like the code isn't going to be good enough to get us out of here.'

Marla couldn't speak. In fact, it was all that she could do not to scream.

'Seven-Four-Seven-One,' Shane said, and then keyed the code into the panel. His heart was almost in his mouth, and seemed to be palpitating in a very unhealthy manner.

Click...

The flashing red light transformed into a stable green one.

'Thank fuck!' Shane said, nudging the gate open with his thigh. It was heavier than it looked, and he had to put more weight behind it to shift it fully. 'Quick.'

Marla, who didn't need telling twice, was through the gate while it was only half-open. The guard, Michaelson, slipped through just after.

'Hurry up!' Marla screamed. 'They're coming!'

Shane thought of retorting with something sarcastic, but it was neither the time nor the place. He stepped through the gate, and all three of the forced it shut.

Just as it clunked back into place, the force of what felt like a hundred bodies slammed into it. The green light on the wall turned back into a flashing red. Marla and Shane stepped away from the gate, turning to the next panel, which required the fingerprint of an employee.

'Your turn,' Shane said to Michaelson, who was standing next to the first gate, his eyes staring down towards the floor, his face contorted – from what they could see of it – into something akin to disappointment.

'What is it?' Marla asked, almost inaudible over the maniacal cries of the slobbering horde slamming against the gate.

Michaelson didn't speak.

He didn't need to.

He held up his hand, and that was all that was needed. A scratch, four fingernails, stretched from his knuckles to his wrist. Blood had already begun to squeeze between the cuts.

'Shit!' Shane said, kicking the brick wall which housed the fingerprint scanner. 'Shit, shit, shit!'

Michaelson, as expected, looked terrified. 'I'm going to become one of them,' he said. 'One of those fucking beasts.'

'It's going to be alright,' Marla said, but didn't know how. How was anything going to be alright ever again?

Michaelson didn't say another word, and as far as either Shane or Marla knew, he never spoke again. He walked the distance between the first gate and the second, placed his hand on the pad, and waited for the scanner to work its magic.

When it did, the second gate slid open.

'We can't just leave you here,' Shane said, yet even he knew that they were out of options. 'It's not right. It's not fucking right.'

The guard turned and slumped against the wall. He held a hand up, the bloodied hand, and waved them on.

'We have to go,' Marla said. 'We can't do anything for him. He's infected.'

Shane shrugged Marla's hand away. He hadn't meant to be so rude, but what they were about to do was about as inhumane as it came.

'Fuck!' Shane snarled, and grabbed onto Marla's hand. They ran.

*

There came a cacophony of cries from inside the jail; it was almost as if the creatures knew that they were trapped, with nowhere to go, with nothing to devour. They were, in a sense, completely helpless.

Shane and Marla ran, hand in hand, through an underground car-park. Shane asked if Marla's car was parked anywhere in the vicinity, and she told him that it was, but her keys were in her jacket, which was still hanging up on the back of Governor Dean's door. Typical, Shane thought, as they rushed through the rows of cars towards the exit, which was illuminated at the far end of the lot by a large green sign with a white arrow upon it.

'Shane,' Marla said, grabbing his arm. 'I'm scared. What if they're out there? What if it's not safe?'

'Then we're gonna be in a whole heap of shit,' Shane said, with no sugar-coating whatsoever. Truth be told, he was trying to push that thought as far back into his brain as he could. If the virus was out there, then all hope was lost, and Holly and Megan would be lost along with it.

They reached the door which led to the outside, and stopped. Shane grabbed Marla by the shoulders and turned her so that they were facing completely. Her eyes were glistening with tears that had yet to appear, her bottom lip trembled with an amalgamation of fear and breathlessness.

'Whatever is out there,' Shane said, 'we'll be okay. I promise you.'

Marla allowed her gaze to fall to the floor; Shane placed a finger beneath her chin and lifted her head gently.

'We've come too far to die,' he said, stroking her cheek tenderly. 'And I swear to you that no matter what, I will take care of you as best as I can.'

Marla knew – it was his eyes that confirmed it – that he was telling the truth. He wasn't going to leave her as soon as they made good their escape; he wasn't going to abandon her to go in search of his own family, at least not straight away. Whatever happened, he would be by her side until she no longer needed him. His eyes revealed all of that to her in less than a second, and the warmth of the knowledge sent shivers coursing through her body.

'Thank you,' she said, her hand brushing against his as it continued to stroke at her chin. Her words didn't seem enough, but they were all that she had, for the time being anyway.

'Okay,' Shane said, turning back to face the door. 'Ready?'

She paused, took a deep breath, and then said, 'Ready.'

Shane pushed the handle of the door down and they stepped out into the foggy light of the dawn.

*

For a moment Shane couldn't believe what he saw. Something so unreal and terror-inducing that his brain could not acknowledge quickly enough.

The helicopter was the final nail in the coffin. It was parked right there on the street, sandwiched between rows of cars that had not moved for some time. The rotors of the helicopter weren't moving, but then why should they be? The pilot had no idea how long he would be waiting, and with the way things were, fuel conservation was of utmost priority. The side-door of the helicopter slid across to reveal Terry and Jared. Terry jumped down and urged the static couple towards the chopper. As he did, the pilot must have realised that the final survivors had appeared and time was of the essence.

There was a mechanical whirr before the rotors began to spin slowly around. Terry, for fear of losing the top of his head – which he had seen once in a movie – climbed back aboard the helicopter.

'I don't think that is good news,' Marla said. Shane was already running through several scenarios in his head, none of which were happy. The helicopter was there for a reason, and since it was a military helicopter – according to the USAF printed along the side of it – it was quite simple to determine that the country was perhaps up shit creek without a paddle.

'Come on!' Terry cried from the door to the chopper. 'They're coming.' He pointed away.

In the distance, a horde of them, lunatics, creatures, things, zombies, ambling down the street towards the helicopter, enticed by the sound of the whirring rotors, vying for blood and flesh. Marla saw them first and grabbed Shane forward. Shane was trying to invoke happy thoughts, which was almost impossible.

'MOVE!' the pilot yelled out of the front of the chopper. As he did, a second soldier leaned out and began to fire upon the nearing horde. A few of them toppled over as their skulls exploded, showering brain matter and bone fragments into the air. As bullets hit cars with deadened thuds, alarms began to sound and tail-lights began to flash.

This, Shane thought, is not the time to freeze up. 'Go,' he said. Marla didn't need telling twice. They ran for the helicopter, ignoring the sounds of zombies grunting and screaming as they were either gunned down or raced onwards. The helicopter rotors were at full-speed, now. In fact, it was hovering about a foot from the ground by the time they reached it and dived in. Terry grabbed a hold of Marla, who hadn't quite jumped high enough and subsequently left her legs dangling out for one of the creatures, had there been any near enough, to help themselves.

The pilot – a man that they would later call by the nickname Flyboy – took the chopper directly upwards, and it seemed it wasn't a moment too soon as the horde reached them and pounded, maniacally, on the underside of the helicopter. Shane and Marla lay face-down on the floor until a few seconds later, when Terry patted Shane on the shoulder.

'They wanted to leave without you,' Terry said, helping Shane to his feet. The helicopter banked suddenly, almost sending Shane back out through the open door. 'I made them stick around.'

Jared sat silently, strapped into the helicopter as if his life depended on it. His head was buried deep in his hands as he tried to come to terms with what had happened, and what was going to happen from hereon in.

'Thanks,' Shane said, smiling insignificantly. 'Where did they come from?'

Terry shrugged. 'They were just out on the street. Looking for survivors, I guess. We got shot at, but managed to convince them that we hadn't, you know?' He made a comical gesture, which was a pretty decent impression of one of the creatures. 'I guess He was looking out for us, after all.' Of course, He was the man upstairs.

'I guess so,' Shane said.

He moved towards the door and placed a hand on the edge to, if anything, prevent him from falling out. As he gazed down at the carnage beneath, he realised that the chances of his wife and daughter being alive were slim. He knew that he could ill-afford to break down, yet a tiny tear escaped the corner of his eye and fell out of the helicopter door. Where it would have landed, Shane didn't know, but there were hundreds – thousands – of them down there. Call them what you will; zombies, creatures, things, demons. It didn't matter. What did matter was that they were here, and there were so many of them that the chances of his own survival, and that of the other survivors, was just as slim as his wife's and daughter's.

The breaking dawn held little comfort, but as the sun rose in the sky, painting hues of orange and red across the landscape, it was obvious that the future, any future, was worth fighting for.

And by God, they would fight.

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