Free The Grave: A Zombie Novel by Russ Watts

thrown against the roof of the cabin. He crashed down onto the floor, unconscious. Tricia screamed and Claire began sobbing.
    “Will!” shouted Suzy. It seemed as if she was pointing right at him. Her face was filled with horror and he turned round to see what she was pointing at. Through his window, he could see flames coming from the propeller. The fire was being sucked into the wing and over it, flowing down smoothly before flickering out into the blue sky. The plane was now at such an angle that Will could only see sky. He could tell they were heading down, and fast. The turbulence was increasing again and it felt as if the plane was being torn apart. It was as if every bolt and joint in the plane were slowly being unscrewed. If the pilots didn’t shut down the propeller, it would burn out and Will knew the fuel was stored in the wing.
    “Mark, help me,” demanded Will, getting out of his seat. He began to clamber over Suzy.
    “Will, what are you doing? Sit down!” said Suzy. Her tears had caused her mascara to run down her face, and he wanted to grab her and hold her. Rasmus needed help though. If they left him like that, he could be thrown around the cabin and suffer worse injuries than he no doubt already had.
    Mark ran his hands over his short blond hair and unclasped his belt. Instinctively, he flung his camera around his neck, letting the strap hang over his thin shoulders. No matter what, he never left it behind. Mark advanced cautiously up the aisle, holding onto both seats as he did so. The plane was descending at such an angle that it was difficult to walk. As he passed Claire, he put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “Don’t worry, Claire, it’ll be fine.”
    She looked at him briefly as he carried on up the plane beyond Tricia and Suzy to where Will was trying to pick up Rasmus. Claire touched her mobile phone in her pocket and wondered if she could call her mother now. You could get reception most places so why not up in a plane? Then she remembered how the signals could interfere with the plane’s controls and decided against it. The situation was already bad and she didn’t want to risk making it any worse.
    Will and Mark managed to scoop Rasmus up and put him back in his seat. He had a nasty looking cut on his head and the blood had trickled through his white hair. The bright red blood made his beard look like he had dribbled ketchup down it. With Rasmus strapped back into his seat, Will cautiously approached the cockpit door. The plane was still lurching down and to the left. There was no sign of it being pulled up. Will glanced out the windows on the left side of the plane and could almost feel his heart skip a beat. Through the window, he could see only land. The ocean, the coastline, the sky were all gone. He could see nothing but brown dirt mountains, which were much too close for comfort and only getting closer. There was no way that they were thirty thousand feet up in the air now. Will estimated they were barely half that and clearly still going down. The plane was screaming under the pressure of the rapid descent and it would be a miracle if it didn’t break up. Will turned to the cockpit door and pounded on it with his fists.
    “Hey, what’s going on? You ok ay in there?” he shouted.
    Mark joined him, shouting through the door to the pilots. “Open up. What’s going on?”
    The two men braced themselves against the cabin walls as the plane began to right itself. They stopped shouting and waited for a response. For a moment, there was no reply. All they could hear was the metal on the plane as it tried to sustain the pressure it was being placed under. The small craft was not designed to suffer such stress for prolonged periods and they were all worried. Will looked out the right hand windows. The fire had gone, but so had the propeller. He didn’t know if it had been sheared off by the descent or the fire, but either way, it was not good.
    “What the fuck is happening? For