In The End Box Set , Stevens, GJ [motivational novels .txt] 📗

against the windscreen, he stretched his neck to get a better look. He, too, had seen the body in the headlights move as the beam bathed our view.

I looked left, expecting to see Andrew's hand pulling the handle, but he was still staring forward with his mouth open.

It was Chloe's form which lunged into the light before I felt the chill of air coming from her open door and heard the chorus of voices calling her back. She wouldn't be turned as I joined in with the frantic calls, her nursing instinct hard-wired.

Drawing a deep breath, I followed her into the night. The darkness brought fog to my breath.

Glancing, I watched Chloe kneel at the body's side. With her head bent down, she listened to the gentle moan of death.

I forced myself to breathe through my mouth, the powerful stench of blood and ripe, overflowing toilets sticking in my throat. I couldn't look at the scene for very long as I drew closer, instead surveying the wider view, despite knowing I should avoid it for the sake of my dreams.

This was by far the worst we’d come across; the highest body count. Double figures ticked off, despite my desperation to avoid the detail. This roadblock was also unique because on this side of the concrete blocks were cars. Some hadn’t got away. Bullet holes strafed their sides, shell casings glinting in the powerful light.

I was grateful to arrive at Chloe's side, despite the growing stench giving me an excuse to look away. With a stolen glance I saw the desperate view I couldn't turn from and watched the last moments of a woman Chloe's age; mid-twenties, hair once blonde, streaked with scarlet. Half her face was blown off, her lips missing from one side of her mouth. The one intact eye remained closed. Still, she was moving, cradled in Chloe's arms.

Chloe made no attempt to halt her death. Even I could tell there was nothing to be done, other than to give the ultimate gift of not letting her be alone when the final moment came.

The moment came too soon. Came as Andrew arrived at our side. Came as both of us rested our hands on Chloe's shoulders.

Her head turned down, her comforting words silenced as the body went limp and her chest flattened. Chloe remained sat, Andrew and I sharing a solemn pause until we sank our heads.

It was Chloe's shoulders rising, her back arching which caused us to look up, to watch the woman in her arms seem to draw a long, deep breath. Chloe's head turned up with a wide smile, full eyes pouring with compassion and giving joy her prayers were answered.

Startled, I watched as the woman's remaining eye opened. The white was red, the lens milky and my legs forced me back as she lunged headlong at Chloe's hand lain on her blood-soaked chest.

Teeth found bone according to the sound and Chloe's arms shook as if electrified as she struggled to pull free.

I'm ashamed to say my instinct forced me to leap back. Isolating Chloe, I stared wide-eyed, helpless to the view of my friend's hand clamped in the mouth of an abhorrence grinding into her flesh.

8

The sight caused my brain to crash. The woman had been dead only moments before. Fear took control over my body, but the sound and sight of Chloe’s pain pulled me back as a second instinct countered my first. Anger overtook the fear.

Without conscious thought, my feet stepped forward into the stench, closing to the gurgle of liquid breath. Blood sprayed from the abomination's mouth.

Chloe's shock had gone, replaced with a searing scream. I watched as the woman’s mouth ground on Chloe’s hand like an animal.

With a lunge, my right foot connected to the head and my hands grabbed at Chloe's arm, but the grip held firm. A second kick did the same and Andrew was around the other side, his feet in on the action.

After longer than I feared, the skull gave way under the onslaught and the bloody mouth released.

With one arm under each shoulder, we dragged Chloe whimpering back to the car and the howl of stunned reaction to what they'd witnessed in the headlights.

The girls were frantic, tears streaming, but still they took control of Chloe, cradling her hand with such care. With the courtesy light on, I shouted for calm between the heavy breaths I could barely control.

The car filled with a tirade of questions demanding what the hell was going on, screaming out as they tried to make sense of our brutality. The words rolled into white noise which sent my vision swimming to the sight of my foot smashing at the woman’s face rolling in a loop in my head, doubt at what I had seen already creeping in.

The disbelief turned to fear that despite the state we’d left her in, she might come crawling along the ground to take a second bite.

I shouted again for them to hold back and for Andrew to get in the fucking car. With the doors barely sealed, I revved the engine, stomping the accelerator to screams of panic and coos of sympathy for the patient who lay across them on the back seat.

The car swerved left and right, my complete concentration fixed hard on the drive. Vehicles abandoned to the roadside flashed by in the headlights, the lines of bullets and smashed glass not overlooked.

I left the engine to roar. Left the pitch-black scenery to fly by the window to the cacophony of words until Andrew shouted, his voice clear of the melee and with a strange calm.

With his hand on my shoulder I let the engine dip from the red line. Let the engine decay to idle. Let the wheels coast. The inside calmed with the diminishing speed and Andrew pointed.

My gaze followed his finger