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  RUIN: (August: Book One)

  By

  G.G. Garcia

  First Edition

  Copyright 2019

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  The author uses UK English

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  RUIN

  Prologue

  The nervous private walked briskly with scissor strides and headed for the large tent. He didn’t want to disturb his commander, but this was a matter of great importance. He stopped walking once he reached the tent and paused before entering.

  He entered and his heart almost stopped when he saw the grisly sight of the man that he hardly exchanged words with, eating breakfast.

  The private cleared his throat, but the commander continued to eat his breakfast and never acknowledged the young private, forcing the nervous man to speak up. “We’ve found something, commander.”

  Commander Gray looked up from where he was sitting and glared at the private, making the young man shiver with fright. He was dressed in a multi-terrain uniform, like everybody else that was stationed in the area, with his helmet sitting next to him on the wooden bench. The commander was sitting down at the large table, all on his own, and was holding his spoon that was half full with milk and hovering over the bowl of bran flakes that had hardly been touched.

  It seemed to have taken an age for the commander to speak, and once he did, it was with a snarl. “This better be fuckin’ important, private. I’ve only sat down for a minute, and already I’m getting pestered.”

  “It is important, sir.”

  “Oh, it better be.” The commander dropped his spoon into his bowl and stood up.

  “I was told to get you straightaway when—”

  “Isn’t this something that Sergeant Dawkins can handle?”

  The private nodded and said with a quaver in his voice, “I’m sorry, sir. He told me to get you. I didn’t want to question his order.”

  “Fine.”

  The senior officer walked around the table and stormed out of the tent, with the private following, trying to keep up. They were both out in the fresh air and were walking onto the grass with their heavy boots. A barrier of sandbags and barbed wire could be seen as far as the eye could see and forty armed men were stretched along the barrier, all armed with Diemaco C7 assault rifles.

  The commander was twenty yards from the barrier, and approached the sergeant, who was standing with a Glock 17 in his hand. Beside him was a woman. She was on her knees, crying, and looked dishevelled. Her clothes were dirty, and by her side were her two children. She had a son and a daughter, both under the age of ten. The boy looked a couple of years older than his sister. They also looked like they hadn’t been washed in weeks and were malnourished.

  The commanding officer was an intimidating man, even without his rank and weapons. He was broad shouldered, had a hard face and a head full of grey hair.

  The sergeant announced, “Three intruders, sir.”

  He glared at the sergeant and snapped, “How the fuck did they get by the barrier?”

  “We found them two hundred yards over there, sir.” The sergeant pointed to his right, which was just a mass of fields. The sergeant could see that the commander was perplexed and tried to explain, “She dug her way under.”

  “She...” the commander wasn’t sure if he had heard right or not, “…dug her way under?”

  “Must have taken her ages, sir.”

  The commander ran his fingers through his grey hair and then ran them over his face. He admired her determination. That had to be applauded, as well as her bravery. Not many made it over the barrier, but the ones that did were punished, and he had never heard of anyone going under to get away from the West Midlands area. This was a first for the man.

  “Please, sir,” the woman begged. Her hair was dirty and she had tears in her eyes, ready to fall. “We’re starving. I have family in Carlisle. We won’t be any trouble. We can start walking again, go north, once we’ve had something to eat and drink.”

  The commander shook his head and produced a smirk for her boldness. “You know the rules, darling. Anyone caught from the West Midlands on this side of the barrier has to be taken care of.”

  “There is no infection any more!” she cried. “There hasn’t been for days. It was something that happened overnight.”

  “I don’t make up the rules. I take my orders from the government.”

  “It’s hell out there, chaos. If it’s not the infected, there’re people killing others to survive.”

  “I’m sorry,” the commander moaned. “I have orders.”

  “Thousands of people have probably died because no one came to help!” she screamed at the commander, but kept on her knees.

  “And thousands more would have died if we allowed this thing to spread.”

  She pointed to her children and added, “Look at them! How can you turn us away?”

  The man in charge took in an intake of breath and folded his arms as he thought. He was a man of oath and would never bend the rules for anybody. There was too much at risk. There were too many lives at risk, north and south of the country.

  “What shall I do with them, commander?” the young private spoke, fighting back the tears. He already knew the answer.

  “What do you think?” The commander pulled out his Glock from his holster and fired a single shot into the woman’s head.

  She collapsed to the side, as part of her head fell away, and her two children began to scream hysterically, and both infants held one another and shivered with fright.

  The commander fired two more shots and then there was silence. He looked at the sergeant and the private and shook his head, his face telling them both that he was displeased with them. He placed his Glock back into his holster and started to walk back to the camp. “If you gentlemen need a shit, give me a shout. I’ll come and wipe your arses for the pair of you.”

  “Commander!” The sergeant yelled. “What do we do with the bodies?”

  The man in charge stopped walking and scrunched his eyes, as if he had been asked a ridiculous question.

  He turned around and said, “You’ve both done this before, haven’t you?”

  They both nodded.

  “Well, then. Burn the cunts,” the commander snapped, and added before entering the tent, “You disturb my breakfast again, and I’ll shoot you both myself.”

  FIVE DAYS EARLIER

  Chapter One

  The boisterous wind slapped the bedroom window, but the noise coming from outside did not put off the amorous couple that were seconds away from finishing making love. Once they were done, the two of them fell on their backs and gazed up at the bedroom ceiling in the dusky room, and continued to pant, eventually getting their breaths back.

  She remained on her back as her lover, Henry Brown, got to his feet and stood by the side of the bed. He walked over to the window and looked out. He had never heard wind like it. Henry looked up and could see that the moon was small and narrow, like a grin in the night sky. He went over to his lover, kissed her on the lips, and managed a smile. The sky possessed some dark clouds, and there were stars that looked like they had been scattered and looked like sequins on a black dress. He predicted that there was going to be heavy rain later on.

  He told the woman that he was going to the bathroom to clean himself up. She never responded as he walked away. By the time he returned, she was almost fully dressed and only had her shirt to put on.

  “Going already?” he asked her. “My flatmate won’t be back for a few more hours.”

  “Not yet.” She began to button
up her shirt. “I’m going outside for a smoke. I know you hate the smell, and it is your flat.”

  “That’s very considerate,” he said sarcastically with a smile.

  “I’m gonna ring my mum while I’m out,” she said.

  “She still ill?”

  “She’s getting better.” She put on her shoes and her lover also began to get dressed.

  “Have you told her about me yet?”

  “No, not yet.” She shook her head. “I’ve only been separated from my husband for a month. I don’t want her to think I’m some kind of tart.”

  “Who cares what she thinks?”

  “I separate mutually with my husband of fifteen years and then three weeks later I’m sleeping with someone else. Trust me, I may be in my early forties, but my old fashioned mother wouldn’t understand. I’m living with her for a couple of months, so I don’t wanna upset her. I need to respect her old fashioned ways. If she found out I met you on some dating website, she’d go nuts.”

  “What did you tell her when you left to come here?”

  “I told her that I was going for a drive to clear my head. It’s been nearly an hour now. Any longer and she’ll know something’s going on. And I couldn’t tell her I was going out with friends.”

  “Why not?”

  The woman laughed, “Because I don’t have any.”

  They both went downstairs and Henry Brown went into the living room, sat in the armchair, and began to play with his phone as his female lover went outside for a smoke. She shut the door behind her, and he told her to give the door a knock when she was ready to come back in.

  He looked at the time on his phone and could see it was almost half an hour past midnight. I wonder if she’s up. A bit late to be calling your mother, especially an old one.

  He could hear talking outside and took a peek out, and could see the middle aged woman, who was more than ten years his senior, talking on her phone on the garden path, just yards away from her car that was parked at the side of the road.

  Ridiculous. He shook his head with a grin. A woman in her forties explaining to her mother after midnight where she is.

  He placed his phone on the arm of the chair, leaned back, and closed his eyes, waiting for his lover to return, waiting for the knock.

  Tiredness was creeping up on him.

  *

  He woke up with a gasp, almost shooting out of his armchair. Confused, he scanned his living room and looked over at the lamp, which was the only light in the room.

  “Kelly?”

  He ran his fingers over his face, suffocated with confusion, and went over to the window and looked out, but couldn’t see his lover. She was nowhere to be seen.

  He picked up his phone and could see that he had been asleep for seventeen minutes. He looked out of the window again. Kelly was nowhere to be seen, and yet her car was still parked at the side of the road.

  “What’s going on?”

  He went to the front door and stepped outside. He could feel the wind tugging at his clothes, like an impatient child wanting attention, and also felt the spitting rain on his face. It wouldn’t be long before the clouds had emptied their contents on the village of Colton, showering the place and cleansing it in time for a fresh day.

  He walked to the end of the garden path and looked out onto his street. Sirens could be heard in the distance and his eyes narrowed when he thought he heard a scream.

  “Kelly!” He called out once again. “Kelly!”

  He looked down his street and could see a figure running up the road in the distance. He could tell that the runner was female, but wasn’t entirely sure that it was Kelly. He looked down and could see that he only had socks on his feet and still hadn’t put his shoes on.

  He could now see that the running individual was Kelly and the scene baffled him. Why was she running? Why was she at the bottom of the street in the first place, and so far away from her car? It didn’t make sense.

  She was only yards from him now and her speed wasn’t decreasing.

  “Um ... Kelly, are you okay?”

  Her running continued.

  “Kelly! What’s going on?”

  She was yards from him and the speed of her never declined.

  “Kelly?”

  She pounced on her lover, knocking him over, and he was dazed as soon as the back of his head hit the tarmac.

  She was on top of him, snarling. Her eyes were bloodshot, and her lover reached out to touch her face, but she snapped at him, missing his fingers by millimetres.

  She leaned down and buried her head into the side of his neck, trying to take a bite, but Henry grabbed her around the throat and knew if he let go, she’d kill him. He had no idea what was happening, but he began to choke her, and the woman he had met on a dating website was beginning to weaken.

  A minute later, she collapsed to the side and an exhausted and baffled Henry tried to scramble to his feet.

  He looked down on the woman and checked her carotid artery. Her heart had stopped. She was dead. He had killed her.

  Chapter Two

  Sunday 2nd August

  The vehicle had entered the small village of Milford and they were all now just a few miles from their hometown. It was nearly 4am on this August morning. Although visibility wasn’t a problem, it was still dusky and the army of black-bellied clouds were suffocating the early sun.

  Rain was due.

  The black Corsa took the snaky lanes of the countryside and the driver was told by his nervous front passenger to slow down. Many people had perished on these roads over the years, and it wasn’t to do with collisions with oncoming vehicles, it was down to erratic driving. Many a vehicle had unnecessarily collided with a tree and had ended a young life or lives over the years. The passenger in the front, Tony Willetts, didn’t want to be another statistic; he just wanted to get home in one piece. He had already experienced the funeral of a friend, and didn’t want to be another dead young man.

  Tony’s friend that died from years back was thirteen years old, and was being driven home by his mum from his football practice. She decided to overtake a slow moving vehicle. Another car came around the bend the opposite way, forcing the mother off the road and the vehicle smashed into a tree. Both were killed instantly.

  Tony snapped out of his macabre daydreaming of yesteryear and could hear that the driver, his friend Paul Newbold, and the three passengers in the back were conversing with one another.

  The chatter amongst the five people in the car was raucous, and although it was late—or early?—they were talking about the party they had just left in Stafford. It was early Sunday morning, and as usual the three males had been to the Fatty Arbuckle’s nightclub in Stafford. Hours later, they had met up with some people and were invited to a party after the nightclub had closed.

  Party? Well, basically all it entailed were a bunch of young people sitting about, drinking, smoking cigarettes and weed, snorting coke, and listening to really loud dance music. After a visit by an officer of the law, because neighbours had complained about the noise, the party was abandoned. It was supposed to be a get together that lasted through to the late morning, but the police presence had ruined what fun they were having.

  The driver of the vehicle, twenty-four-year-old Paul Newbold, had left the party of around twenty people, taking his friends, Tony Willetts and Craig Shepherd, with him. It was one of those get-togethers that was dour from the start, but nobody wanted to be the first person to leave. The neighbours and the police had done Paul a favour. As he was the designated driver, he was sober and glad to be finally leaving. He was desperate for his bed, and reflected on another pointless night.

  The Fatty Arbuckle’s nightclub opened at 9pm. It was Paul’s turn to drive, as they took it in turns each week. Unlike his two pals, Paul drank water for most of the time, and even tried a Red Bull to snap him out off his tiredness at around 1am. He never even had so much as a joint when they went back to the house they were invited to, and helped hims
elf to a black coffee in the kitchen of the house.

  Paul Newbold, Tony Willetts and Craig Shepherd were all from the small town of Rugeley, situated eight miles from Stafford, and once they were about to leave the house where the party had taken place, two girls from the abandoned party asked if they could get a ride. The girls were from Brereton, a smaller town next to Rugeley, and had never said a word to the three males all night. And now they wanted a lift.

  Paul had the room in his black Corsa, so he decided to allow the girls to tag along. They introduced themselves and went into the back of the car.

  The brunette introduced herself as Demi and was a gorgeous voluptuous thing. Her friend was called Emma, and she was also stunning, way out of the boys’ league, and all three males were surprised that the girls were going home alone.

  They got themselves comfortable in the vehicle. The two girls were in the back, Craig Shepherd was in the back with them, and Tony Willetts was sitting next to Paul Newbold in the front passenger seat.

  The car continued to go along the winding lanes, and now the road straightened up and they were on Stafford Road.

  The front passenger, Tony Willetts, ran his fingers through his short blonde hair and looked around the shadowy area with his blue eyes. He could see nothing but trees to the right side of him, and farmland to his left.

  The chatter amongst the five people had died down and there had been a couple of minutes of silence as all passengers began playing with their phones. Tony placed his phone into his pocket and folded his arms, staring out of his window.

  “This is creepy as hell, man,” he groaned, scratching at his left cheek.

  “Wit ya talkin’ about?” Paul asked, and then released a strident yawn. He sniffed and realised his breath stunk and was desperate to brush his teeth once he returned home. Then, after that, he was going to sleep for the rest of the Sunday.