Free The Dead Walk The Earth II by Luke Duffy Page A

having confirmed it with her eyes.
    “Are you ready?”
    Christopher nodded and held the hammer close to his chest. He wielded it more for comfort than for defence or attack. He looked far from ready. He was completely terrified. His eyes shone wildly at her in the gloom and the beads of sweat running down his forehead sparkled in the low light.
    “It’s okay,” she said reassuringly. “We’re just going to have a look around. Stay close to me and keep an eye out behind us.”
    “I don’t like this, Tina,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Why do we have to go in there? Can’t we just stay upstairs where it’s safe?”
    “We need to go in there and see what’s left,” she replied as she reached for the door leading into the warehouse. “Unless you want to starve?”
    He shook his head again.
    Yeah, I thought not , she heard a voice grumble from deep inside her own mind.
    She opened the door and stepped out onto the raised platform. At first, Christopher failed to follow her and stayed within the relative safety of the corridor. She turned and glared back at him. He could not see her features but he could feel her eyes burning into him and since the previous day’s events he was unsure of who he feared the most, the infected or his sister. He stepped out into the warehouse beside her and instantly felt the change in the atmosphere between the two rooms.
    Although the light inside was barely enough for them to see beyond a few metres, he could sense the spacious room around him. The temperature was much cooler and the tiniest of sounds boomed in the expanse between the outer walls. Somewhere deep within the storage area liquid seeped out from a broken container or loose pipe. The faint echoes it made as the droplets fell into an ever-expanding puddle seemed magnified in the crushing silence and near blackness.
    Christopher was beginning to feel the icy tendrils of panic slowly creeping upwards along his legs and into his gut. His flesh was covered with goose bumps and the hairs of his neck and forearms stood out from his skin. His breathing was coming in short gasps and his heart was beating rapidly and thumping in his ears as he fought to keep control on his fear.
    Tina reached out and touched his forearm to get his attention. As her fingers made contact with his bare flesh, he flinched and almost let out a scream.
    “Chris, it’s okay,” she whispered soothingly. “Stay calm and stay close to me. We’re okay. We just need to make sure there’s no one here. It’ll soon be over.”
    She could not see his face but she was sure that his lips were trembling. She kept her hand on his forearm for a while longer to comfort him and she could feel him shaking in her grasp. She wondered how long it would be or how far they would need to travel from the safety of the doorway before he lost control of his bladder again or worse, his bowels.
    That reminds me, we need toilet paper , she thought fleetingly.
    She turned to her right and began to descend a set of concrete steps that brought her to the same level as the warehouse floor. Christopher did as he was told and remained close behind her. He was actually too close for her comfort but she did not bother to say anything. If it made him feel better then she would let him stay virtually on her shoulder. The fact that she had managed to get him to follow her at all was a victory in itself.
    Slowly but surely their eyes began to adjust to the lack of light. It was still extremely dark but they were now able to make out shapes and changes in depth and distances as they quietly made their way along the first row of incinerated and collapsed shelves.
    A minefield of burnt and destroyed stock lay strewn all over the cold floor of the supply room and they needed to be careful of where they placed their feet. They had heard nothing that indicated there were any infected within the warehouse but that did not mean that the place was free of danger.
    Tina had learned over the