“I don’t feel right, I…” His words trailed off as he saw the blood pouring from Annaliese’s neck. He reached out a hand, but then stopped himself.
Her blood could be infected. Don’t touch it!
Annaliese stepped away from his grasp and frowned. She followed his gaze and looked down at her shoulder. She saw the blood there and her mouth dropped open.
“Oh, no,” she said. “No, no, no.”
Nick stepped forward and put his hands on both her shoulders. Suddenly his headache was gone, replaced by trepidation and fear. He caught Annaliese’s gaze and looked her dead in the eye. “Are you bit?” he asked her. But she didn’t seem to hear the question and stared into space. “I said, are you bitten?
“I…I don’t know.”
Nick shook his head. “Damn it!”
Annaliese began unclasping the buttons of her shirt and tugged the material away from her neck and shoulder. Nick leant forward to examine her wound.
Damn it, damn it, damn it.
There was a lot of blood. It was bright red and already clotting. It wasn’t from a deep wound, but that wouldn’t matter if it was from a bite. Nick followed the bleeding to its source, until it became clear what they were dealing with.
I can’t believe it.
He stepped away from her and let out a sigh.
Annaliese eyes went impossibly wide. “What?” she pleaded. “Am I bitten?”
Nick shook his head and stepped closer to her. He reached a hand around her neck and plucked something from a gash he had discovered on the back of her shoulder.
Annaliese flinched. “Shit! What was that?”
Nick held the sharp twig out in front of her and watched the relief take over her. He couldn’t help but laugh with relief. “It was sticking right out of you. It was in pretty deep, but there’s no bite.”
Annaliese put a hand to her forehead and rubbed. “Thank God! I must have landed on it when the infected woman took me down to the ground. Jeez, that was close.”
“What were they doing up here anyway?” he asked her, hoping she would have an answer.
“They must have followed you up in the cable car,” she said. “Climbed up the hill after you.”
Nick looked around anxiously, eyeing the treeline that surrounded the park and led down the hill. “You think there are more?”
Annaliese shrugged. “I bet there are more in the trees, but if we get out of sight they should all head back down towards the village with the others. These two must have been nearby when the explosions happened. They probably already had us in their sights.”
Nick looked down at the scattered items they had been carrying back to the restaurant. Then he looked back up at Annaliese. “I think that once we get all this stuff back, our only priority for now should be getting this place secure. The infected may be heading away for now, but I’m sure more will come by eventually.”
Annaliese nodded her head, staring at the ground as she thought about things. “We need to make this place a fortress.”
“Either that,” said Nick. “Or we need to start watching our backs every second.”
Chapter Thirty
Almost three weeks had passed since the decision was made to dig in five-hundred feet above the ground. Nick was grateful for stumbling upon the survivors at Ripley Heights. He knew he would be dead if he hadn’t.
Several more infected people had found their way into the park grounds over the days that followed. They quickly lost Greg to one of them. He had been checking out the woods when an infected man dressed in a Royal Mail uniform jumped out at him and took him to the ground. He was dead before anybody could get to him.
The group had mourned Greg’s loss and had shared a common regret that nobody knew him well. It just made everyone feel even luckier to still be alive.