The Left Series (Book 3): Left On The Brink Read online

  “That’s better,” Johnson muttered. “At least I can damn well breathe now.”

  We moved into the center of the lobby, unsure which way to go.

  “Christ! It’s like looking for a needle in a junk stack,” Smith sighed. “This place is so damn big.”

  “That’s a haystack,” I corrected him.

  Smith ignored me and read the overhead signs. “Trouble is, the service exits and walkways won’t be signposted for the public to see. Where do we begin to look?”

  Johnson looked frustrated and tried to contact Milner on the radio again. We heard static for a brief moment but no coherent speech.

  “Look, what’s that?” Cordoba said.

  We turned and saw she pointed toward the escalators. A hunched figure sat moving around on the motionless metallic staircase. We hadn’t seen whoever it was before as the escalator sides had hidden them from view. The area where the figure sat was covered in blood.

  Whatever or whoever it was sat on the escalator, definitely wouldn’t be welcoming us to Canada with a cheery smile and a bottle of Screech Rum.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  We approached the escalator with increasing trepidation. The lone figure who sat on the staircase was caked in blood and nonchalantly chewing on something resembling the remains of a human internal organ. The blood encrusted creature didn’t seem to notice us or care as we slowly approached. Long, greasy black hair, entangled with blood flopped over the figure’s face as it hungrily devoured the sinewy meat, making chomping and little growling noises.

  “What the fuck is it eating?” Johnson quietly whined. An expression of disgust and revulsion engulfed his face.

  “I don’t know and I don’t want to know,” Cordoba said, raising her M-16 to her shoulder.

  The figure glanced up and saw us, hissing a warning to stay away. The face beneath the mask of blood was narrow and gaunt, with sunken eyes and the open mouth revealed a row of chipped and twisted teeth.

  “Don’t fire!” Smith yelled, but it was too late.

  Cordoba opened up with a burst of fire from the M-16. The rounds pierced the zombie’s head, blowing off half of the emaciated face into mushy pulp. The gunfire echoed around the lobby as the brass shell casings clattered to the floor.

  “Well done, Einstein,” Smith barked. “Now the whole fucking airport is going to know we’re in here.”

  Cordoba flashed him a reproachful glance. “What were you going to do, march right on by that thing?”

  Smith pointed to the empty, escalator next to the one spattered with blood. “We could have gone straight by without making a damn sound.”

  “When you two have quit quarrelling, we better think of an exit strategy,” Johnson yelled.

  I looked at Johnson and followed his gaze to the top of the escalator. Dozens of undead tottered around the staircase summit trying to navigate the descent.

  “Oh, shit!” I spat. “There’s a whole bunch of them.” Fear rose from the pit of my stomach.

  There were plenty of routes to take but any one of them could lead to a dead end. The zombies at the front of the line were jostled and pushed from behind. They toppled and tumbled down the motionless escalator steps, rolling ass over face towards us. The others surged forward and a wave of undead ghouls plummeted down the staircase.

  “There’s too many of them,” Johnson yelled. “Let’s pull back.” He opened up with a burst of gunfire, the rounds rattling and ricocheting over the chrome plates between the escalators.

  Smith and I ducked out of the way; worried the ricochets were heading our way. Johnson and Cordoba scooted off down a walkway to our left. The zombies who had fallen down the escalator now rose to their feet, cutting off our route to follow Johnson and Cordoba. We could have tried to battle our way through but more of the undead poured down the escalator. To stop and stand and try and fight was certain suicide.

  Another walkway stood to our left, opposite to the one where Johnson and Cordoba had gone. I tugged on Smith’s arm and pointed the M-16 towards the walkway.

  “Let’s go this way and try and double back,” I suggested.

  Smith nodded then twisted his head around. I followed his gaze and saw more zombies emerging from the upper level, down another staircase at the far end of the lobby, above where we had entered from the fire escape. Our retreat was cut off, even if we wanted to get back to the C-17 outside.

  We ran for the walkway, glancing behind us every few seconds.

  “Did you see the sign where this leads?” Smith asked.

  I shook my head. “No, I didn’t have time. I hope we’re not running into a dead end.”

  Smith and I moved quickly through the enclosed walkway with only skylight windows overhead, shedding limited daylight onto our path. Our boots clattered across the linoleum flooring and I had a horrible feeling we were heading in the wrong direction. We had a limited supply of ammunition and no planned escape route. At the very least, we needed to find a high place where the undead couldn’t reach us.

  The walkway opened out into a smaller lobby area, paved with white marble tiles and tall, green potted plants dotted around the floor space. Some sort of high class restaurant stood in front of us. The bistro’s door was closed and white blinds had been pulled down over the windows from the inside. We could hear the moaning sounds of the pursuing undead echoing around the walkway behind us.

  Another set of escalators stood to our left, one descended and one led to the upper level. We skidded to a halt in the lobby.

  “Up or down?” I gasped, gazing at the immobile escalators.

  Smith thought for a moment. “Let’s go up. It’ll take them longer to climb that staircase than to go down the other way.”

  I nodded and we leapt up the escalator, two steps at a time. The cold weather clothing was causing me to sweat beneath the layers. The staircase led to another expansive floor space and I felt as though we were running through a never ending maze. An overhead sign written in both English and French, told us we were now on the departures level. Signposts pointed to various numbered boarding gates, which were irrelevant to our plight. Blank screened monitors hung above our heads and more shuttered, duty free stores stood on each side. I felt the rising sensation of panic rear from within me. We carried on, walking apprehensively through the departure lounges. I nervously glanced along the rows of empty chairs to our right.

  “Where the hell are we headed, Smith?” I groaned.

  Smith shook his head. “No idea, kid. Maybe we should just double back and get the hell out of this terminal. I’ve no clue where to go or where the guys we’re looking for are or likely to be. That’s even if they’re still alive. Did you see the blood on the escalator?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, of course. It was a real fucking mess.”

  “I mean it was fresh,” Smith sighed. “Unless there’s still live people running around in here, those guts must have been the remains of one of Milner’s crew.”

  “Do you think they’re all dead?”

  “Who knows? This operation is turning into one almighty fuck up,” Smith spat.

  I had to agree. Reaching Scotland suddenly seemed like an impossible pipe dream.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  We saw the C-17 aircraft standing motionless outside the terminal building as we walked by some large windows. Snowflakes still blustered through the foggy air outside and visibility was still poor. A layer of snow formed on the top of the aircraft body and along the wings. I was worried the C-17 wouldn’t be able to take off again, even if we did manage to refuel.

  The departure lounge still seemed eerily quiet but I noticed a zombie with no legs below the knee, crawling towards us from beneath a row of chairs. I nudged Smith and pointed at the creeping ghoul.

  “Don’t fire at it,” he hissed.

  “I wasn’t going to,” I protested. “I was just alerting you to a potential danger.”

  “Geez…you’re beginning to sound like those military guys,” Smith muttered.


  “You were a military guy.”

  “Long time ago, kid,” he sighed. “That life feels like a million years ago.”

  I knew what he meant. I felt like a different person since the undead virus had started. The memories, hopes and dreams I had back then, now seemed to belong to somebody else.

  We heard a crackle of static over the radio again and then a faint but distinctive voice.

  “Will anybody tell me what the hell is going on down there?” Chief Cole’s voice sounded tinny and far away.

  Smith depressed the button on the handset. “We’ve encountered a shit load of undead, Chief and had to split from Johnson and Cordoba.”

  “Smith?...Smith, is that you?”

  “Yeah, it’s me, Chief. I can hear you but you’re not very clear.” We stopped walking and Smith held his headset firmly to his ear.

  I turned and noticed the legless zombie was still in pursuit, crawling along the walkway behind us. The crawler was the body of an elderly male with long white hair and clad in the remains of a brown checked sports jacket, gray shirt and red tie. I raised the M-16 and took aim, desperate to dispatch the creeping ghoul.

  “Have you found any of the Marines or the aircrew who went in first?” Cole’s voice came through the headset, only slightly audible above the static.

  “We haven’t found anybody yet,” Smith replied. “We’re still searching right now.”

  Cole said something more but we couldn’t determine the words.

  “You’re breaking up again, Chief. Please repeat your last.” Smith stood facing the windows, holding his earpiece but the radio went dead.

  The crawler drew closer, to around ten feet and my unease rose considerably.

  “Smith?” I pointed to the legless zombie.

  Smith ignored me. “Shit! The fucking radio’s died,” he seethed. “It must either be the bad weather interfering with the frequency or these radios are crap.”

  “That thing is getting closer,” I whined.

  Smith turned and studied the approaching ghoul. “That fucking thing hasn’t got any legs, Wilde,” he snorted. “What are you so scared of?”

  He shoved the butt of his M-16 at me and gestured with his chin for me to take hold of the rifle. I gripped the stock and took the weapon from him. Smith marched over to the row of empty chairs, which consisted of padded blue seats and backrests attached to a chrome metal frame. I knew he was pissed off by the way he huffed when he paced forward in quick, jerky movements. Smith grabbed one of the chairs and strolled towards the crawling ghoul. He stopped and stood over the legless zombie. The crawler opened its mouth and gave a rasping howl, clawing the air in front of Smith.

  “Fuck you!” Smith barked. He raised the chair above his head then brought it down in one quick, fluid movement. The chrome frame smashed hard onto the crawler’s head, creating a tubular shaped indent in the side of its skull. Smith raised the chair and battered the legless ghoul around the head a second time. The force of the blow caused both the chair and the zombie’s skull to buckle. The head crumpled and shattered like a large egg, sending a spray of brown, decayed blood and brain matter across the floor.

  Smith ducked out the way of the spurts of gore and tossed the blood spattered, twisted chair frame aside. Both the seat and backrest detached themselves from the chrome frame as the chair clattered across the floor.

  “You happy now?” Smith said to me, as he marched back to where I stood and took his rifle back.

  “Err…yeah, relatively,” I muttered.

  “Come on, Wilde,” Smith ushered me to keep moving through the departure lounge. “Let’s go find these jerks and get this fucking plane refueled so we can get the fuck out of this place.”

  I struggled to keep pace with Smith as he strode across the floor space. When Smith was pissed off, it was hard to stop him and he sometimes took on irrational odds. Maybe it was the lack of communications, the bad weather, lack of sleep, or the length of time we’d spent in the airport terminal that had irritated him so much. You never knew with Smith. He always was and always would be a loose cannon.

  We walked passed a shuttered liquor store and both stared through the slats at the display in the interior.

  “I could sure use a drink right now,” Smith muttered.

  I had to agree with him. We’d gotten used to shots of liquor to help numb our senses over the last six months. Maybe we’d become a little too reliant on alcohol to anesthetize ourselves.

  We approached a pair of escalators, descending to the lower level. Smith crept to the one on the left and I went right. We peered down the staircases and I saw the remains of the zombie Cordoba had shot, lying in a bloody heap on the steps. I looked further down and saw a few zombies shuffling around the floor space below. One lay motionless at the bottom of the escalator and I wondered if the ghoul had been crushed when the surge down the staircase occurred.

  I crouched and shimmied over to Smith, who hunkered down at the top of the adjacent escalator. We ducked behind the chrome panel at the side of the staircase.

  “I can see a few of them moving around down there but I don’t know how many are still in the lobby,” I whispered.

  Smith nodded. “I think we’re wasting our time searching for Milner and the aircrew,” he said quietly. “They could be anywhere in this damn building and without comms, it’s impossible to pinpoint their location. We could be running around in here for a week and still not find them. I think we should just look for the pump generators ourselves and see if we can get any of them started.”

  “What about Cordoba and Johnson?” I asked.

  “Ah, fuck them,” he hissed. “They were quick enough to leave us all alone. They’ll soon get themselves back to the C-17 if we can get those pumps going.”

  “Okay,” I huffed. I was slightly disappointed I hadn’t managed to gain Cordoba’s acquaintance but we had to complete the mission and get out of this place.

  “We need to find some kind of maintenance office and get a blueprint or a detailed map of the workings of the terminal,” Smith said.

  “Where the hell do we find that?”

  “My best guess is back down on the ground floor. There’s only the lobby and departure lounges on these two upper levels.”

  “You’re probably right,” I agreed. “But we’ve got to find a way down there for a start.”

  Smith sighed. “I know. We can’t take any service elevators as there’s no damn power. We’ll have to fight our way down the levels.”

  Smith’s words reminded me of a video game I used to play when I had to fight my way through different levels, controlling an on-screen character. Those were happy times in an easy environment, when fighting for your life was only a term of phrase.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  We knew we had no choice but to go down the escalators and back into the lobby. The crowd of undead pursuers behind us would eventually overcome the obstacle of the staircase and follow our path through the departure lounge. We could run in circles around the terminal forever without achieving anything, or at least until the undead caught up with us. Smith and I had to either escape the building or try and get the refueling mission back on track.

  Smith led the way down the escalator on the left side. We kept in a crouching position and shuffled forward on our haunches between the stainless steel, outer cladding, staying out of any immediate sight from the ground or above. Smith stopped when we reached the bottom of the escalator. The lobby was still relatively populated with around thirty undead, scuffling backwards and forwards across the floor. They knew their prey was around someplace but obviously couldn’t figure out in which direction to go.

  The body at the bottom of the steps still lay unmoving and had a twisted grimace frozen on its face. The dead zombie was male and had a large indent in the top of his skull from where he’d crashed head first down the escalator. His eyes remained open and unsettled me as Smith and I crouched near his corpse.

  “That dead guy is gi
ving me the shits,” I hissed.

  “Ignore him, he’s the least of our worries,” Smith grunted. “I’m trying to figure out which route to take. That staircase we came up when we entered the terminal is out; it’s only a fire escape. The left walkway only takes us the same route we’ve just been. We’ll try going right where Johnson and Cordoba went.” He signaled with his hand as though he was explaining directions to a lost driver. “We move fast and don’t fire your weapon unless absolutely necessary.”

  “Got it,” I said.

  “Ready?”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

  “Right, let’s go,” Smith hissed.

  We gripped our rifles, slowly raised ourselves from our haunches then sprinted from cover towards the walkway to our right. Our fast movement allowed us to dodge the outstretched arms of the zombies closest by. Those undead in the distance at the far end of the lobby turned but we were gone by the time they could follow. Smith and I headed into the walkway, running into yet another dim corridor.

  Another burst of static sounded through the headset but no words followed. We rounded a corner and slowed to a brisk walking pace.

  “Somebody is trying to get through on the radio,” I said, breathing heavily.

  “We may as well give up with these fucking things. They’re useless,” Smith snorted.

  The headset was starting to irritate my ears and I felt like ripping the damn thing off my head. In fact, I was becoming sick of the damn airport, period. I just wanted to get back in the air and away from the undead hordes.

  The walkway led us to two sets of concrete staircases facing the walls to the left and right. They both led to the upper and lower levels. I knew we wanted to go down but wondered which route we were going to take.

  “Which way do we go now?” I sighed.

  Smith moved to each staircase, gripped the chrome balustrade and peered down into the levels below.