Ravage: An Apocalyptic Horror Novel(59)

Crack!

Charlotte looked like a rabbit caught in the headlights. She looked around at the room’s door and started hyperventilating. There was a jagged hole at the top of the door where a probing arm hung through, groping and clawing at the air with its bloody fingernails and trying to get inside. There was only moments left before the door would give way completely.

“Just go,” Annaliese urged her. “Before it’s too late.”

Charlotte climbed up onto the ledge tentatively. Annaliese placed a hand on the girl’s back to steady her.

Then, without pause, Charlotte jumped. It seemed that, once the girl had made up her mind, she wanted to get it over and done with. Annaliese watched her hit the mattress and rebound off into the grass. She stood up quickly and made it clear she was alright.

Crack!

My turn, Annaliese thought as she placed one of her wellington boots onto the ledge. Her hamstrings were painfully tight from her desperate sprint through the hallway and it was a real struggle to push herself up onto the ledge. Every time she tried to climb up, her legs went numb and she fell back down. It took a couple of attempts before she was finally able to get up onto the ledge. Then she found herself looking down at the mattress below, suddenly feeling that the drop was more like twenty feet than twelve. She knew it was just her imagination – a built-in safety device that every person had to keep them from taking risky falls – but the thought of jumping was still terrifying. The hardest part of the jump would be fighting her instincts and stepping out into nothing but thin air.

Crack!

The room’s door continued to splinter and come away as the infected threw themselves at it.

Right, Annaliese told herself. Let’s do this.

I’ll count to three.

One…

Two…

Thr-

She stopped herself just as her body was about to take flight. She quickly realised that she had forgotten something.

Mike’s wallet.

She didn’t know why, but she couldn’t leave without even having looked for it. She hopped back down off the window ledge and glance frantically around the room. The wallet was in clear sight; right on the bedside table where Mike had said it would be.

I can grab it. There’s time.

She eyed the brown leather wallet and then the room’s battered door. The hole at the top was now the size of a person’s head and several of the infected peered through at her with their swollen eyes.

I can make it. I can get the wallet.

She made up her mind. She dodged back around the bedframe and headed over to the bedside cabinet. She placed her hand around the wallet and was surprised by how heavy it was. She just about managed to force it into her pocket when—

There was an almighty crash! The cracking of wood and the sound of a door being busted wide open.

Annaliese hurried back to the end of the bedframe, but was cut off by a large man with a torn cheek and a flap of skin hanging loose.

She let out a scream, and so did the man, screeching at the top of his lungs.

She leapt onto the exposed box springs of the bedframe and used it as a springboard to hop towards the window. More infected people flooded into the room and headed right for her, all of them screeching like banshees.

With a fresh surge of adrenaline, she was able to leap up onto the window frame with a single attempt. She stared down at Clark and Charlotte below. Both of them stared back at her anxiously.

Annaliese prepared to jump.

Before she had chance to step forward and plummet to the mattress, something hit her from behind, grabbing her around the waist and shoving her off-balance. She fell forward, grabbing out but finding nothing but air. Then, suddenly, she was falling. She fell fast and she fell awkwardly, as the weight on her back bore down on top of her. She hit the mattress hard and felt something snap. The fabric covered springs were less forgiving than she had anticipated.

The next thing she knew, besides the stars floating through her vision, was someone clawing at her back. Company had followed her through the window.

And now it was trying to kill her.





Chapter Sixteen

Annaliese struggled on her stomach as her attacker clung to her back. A flash of white hot pain stabbed through her right hand but she had no time to investigate the cause. If the infected man, who had followed her out of the window, managed to bite her then she was doomed. Just like Bradley had been.

Clark and Charlotte were nearby and quickly offered their assistance. Clark managed to wrap an arm around the infected man’s throat and prevented him from taking a bite out of Annaliese. Charlotte grabbed her arms and began pulling her away. The pain in her hand exploded once again, but she focused only on getting away from the infected man. She kicked out with her legs and sent her attacker sprawling backwards. Clark, still clutching the man around the throat, twisted and threw him to the ground. Together the three of them backed away from the mattress.

“What do we do?” said Clark in a voice so thick with fear that it sounded like he might run screaming at any moment.

Before Annaliese could answer him, another body landed on the mattress and bounced off onto the grass.

And then another.

The infected guests continued falling from the bedroom’s open window, hitting the ground below. As soon as they jumped, another infected person would take their place, forming a line like a bunch of ungodly lemmings.

There were now four infected people on the ground and they were getting to their feet quickly. One of them limped on a broken ankle caused by the awkward fall, while another had a slashed face, lower lip hanging like rancid sausage meat.