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  The BIG Horror Pack 2

  RAVAGE

  SAVAGE

  ANIMAL KINGDOM

  THE PICTURE FRAME

  2389

  THE PEELING OMNIBUS

  SLASHER

  BOOK 1 OF 7

  RAVAGE

  By Iain Rob Wright

  NEWS REPORT: SEPTEMBER 29th 2012

  Terrorist attack suspected of killing up to 1500 people as commercial cruise liner, SPIRIT OF KIRKPATRICK, sinks due to massive explosion.

  Joint relief efforts are underway today in the Mediterranean Sea by France, Italy, UK, and Egypt, as they to attempt to salvage the ill-fated cruise liner, Spirit of Kirkpatrick. No survivors have yet been identified and it is thought that an explosion inside the engine compartment is what caused the 33,000 tonne vessel to sink beneath the waves.

  No terrorist groups have yet come forward to claim responsibility for an attack, but owners of the doomed cruise liner, Black Remedy Corporation, have claimed that, with the stringent safety measures present on all of their public passenger ships, there is no other possible cause for the disaster aside from an act of terrorism.

  The company has previously been targeted by eco-terrorists and religious groups because of its reputation for operating unethically in the 3rd world, and for allegations of corruption and sabotage. While the vast, multi-national corporation has made great efforts in the last decade to conduct its affairs to a better moral standard, it is thought that there may still be groups and individuals who wish to target it.

  NATO Secretary, General Able Rasmussen, condemned the suspected suicide attack as ‘despicable.’

  Part One: Life

  Chapter One

  “The town is dead,” Paul said, re-entering the phone shop with a bored shuffling of his feet.

  Nick sighed as his gaze fell upon the shopping centre’s vacant seating and deserted walkways. The Boots megastore directly opposite – usually teeming with customers – was devoid of a single shopper today. Its staff pottered around the shelves aimlessly.

  Likewise, the small mobile phone shop that Nick managed was deserted. It’d been two hours since the last customer left. Each minute felt like hours.

  He yawned, then said, “I wonder why it’s so quiet. Are England playing football or something?”

  Paul shrugged and shook his bald head. “I’m Sikh. I only know when there’s cricket on.”

  Nick chuckled but still felt frustrated. With no customers, how could they possibly expect to meet the day’s sales targets? He needed to earn his bonus this month to cover the deposit he’d already paid on a new car. “All the other shops are just as quiet? You checked?”

  Paul fingered the edge of his turban and nodded. “I spoke to Chris at Game Traders and he said they haven’t had a customer since eleven. They’ve been playing Call of Duty in the back.”

  Nick rubbed at the dull stubble on his chin and stifled another yawn. Slow days weren’t uncommon, especially with the recession still in full swing, but this was one of the worst footfalls he could remember.

  Paul browsed the Internet while Nick stood around with his hands in his pockets. “Check if something’s going on today that we don’t know about,” he told his colleague. “Find me an excuse to give the area manager later. An outbreak of plague would be ideal.”

  “No problem, governor.” Paul typed away with his gold-ringed fingers.

  Just then, Chelsea, another of Nick’s salespeople exited the back and came back onto the shop floor. She looked at the empty shop floor and then gave Nick a look. “Maybe I should have taken a longer break.”

  “I know, I know. If it stays like this much longer, I’ll probably send you home. No point the three of us being here.”

  No point even one of them being there, at this rate.

  Nick was about to go for a break himself when, finally, a customer entered the store. “Hallelujah,” he said under his breath.

  “He’s mine,” said Chelsea.

  “Go get him,” Nick said. “We need to get a contract out of him or I’m screwed on the conference call later.”

  “No sweat!” Chelsea flicked her long blonde hair over her shoulder and tottered forward on her heels. She gave the customer her best smile, but the man didn’t seem to even notice her.

  “Hello, there,” Chelsea said.

  Instead of responding, the man slumped against the central display where the live demo-phones were lined up on a desk.

  “Are you okay, sir?” Chelsea asked the man, somewhat tersely. “What kind of phone are you using at the moment?”

  The man remained hunched over as if he hadn’t heard her. He let out a low moan.

  “I said, are you okay there, mate? Can I help you?” Chelsea had become irritable.

  Nick eased the girl aside and took over. “Buddy, I’m afraid you can’t sleep it off here.”

  The man still did not respond.

  Nick reached out to the man, getting impatient. “You’ll have to go someplace else.”

  The man shot upright like an uncoiling spring. He turned to Nick with swollen, bloodshot eyes. A thin strand of saliva hung pendulously from his lower lip.

  Nick stumbled backwards. “Wow! What’s wrong with you?”

  The man swayed on his feet and groaned unintelligibly. He seemed to concentrate for a moment and managed to spit his words out slowly. “I…I’m not…feeling…well.” His voice was thick, like he was speaking with a swollen tongue.

  Paul gave Nick a queasy glance before looking back at the man. “You look rough, mate. Hope it’s not catching.”

  “I…I don’t think I can make it…home. W-will you call my wife for me…please?”

  Nick stared for a moment, speechless. The stink coming off the man was foul, even worse than the sickly sight of him. Nick managed to find his voice, though, and do the right thing. “Yes, yes, of course,” he said. “Chelsea, will you grab my mobile, please?”

  Chelsea hurried over to the sales desk, then handed over Nick’s phone gingerly, keeping her distance from the sickly man.

  Nick held the phone up in front of him and looked at the man. “What’s the number for your wife?”

  The man’s eyes rolled to the back of his head and it seemed like he was going to pass out. Eventually, he managed to reply. “It’s…it’s – one moment. It’s 07…0798…07985…”

  It took sixty seconds before the man managed to give out the full phone number. When Nick dialled it, a woman picked up immediately and asked who was calling.

  “This is Nick Adams. I’m calling from Touch Pad, one of the phone shops in town. I have your husband here with me. I’m afraid he’s not feeling well. He needs someone to come and collect him.”

  Nick clutched the phone to his ear while the woman informed him that she could be at the store in twenty minutes. The thought of having to babysit the sick man wasn’t something he relished, but what worried him more was that the man’s wife also sounded sick.

  “Okay,” Nick uttered into the phone. “See you soon.” He slid the phone into his pocket and smiled at his sickly guest. “Your wife is on her way. She won’t be long. Perhaps you should take a seat while you wait.”

  “I’ll make the poor sod a cuppa,” Paul said, already wandering towards the back. “Looks like he could use one.”

  Nick led the sick man over to the carpeted sales area. As the man sat, Nick was forced to turn away as the man’s humid body odour made his eyes water.

  “Should I do a
nything?” Chelsea asked, turning her head away and looking nauseous.

  Nick waved a hand. “Just go, Chelsea. Paul and I will be okay.”

  Her shoulders loosened with relief. “You sure, boss?”

  “Yeah, I’ll see you when you’re next in.”

  Chelsea hurried to get her things while Paul returned with three mugs of piping hot tea. He passed one to their sickly guest. “Here ya go, fella. Drink up.”

  “Thank you,” the man replied weakly. He seemed a little better since sitting down, but still looked decidedly unwell as he sipped from the promotional coffee mug that Samsung had sent them. “I’m sorry to put you all out like this,” he said. “I just felt like I was going to pass out. I just…I just headed into the nearest shop for help. My name is George, by the way. Thank you for taking care of me.”

  “So you’re not interested in getting yourself a shiny new phone then?” Paul chuckled.

  The man didn’t laugh.

  “So, any idea what you’ve come down with, George?” Nick pried, wondering if he should be covering his mouth.

  George shook his head, spattering the desk with gobs of spittle. “I-I don’t know. I’ve been feeling under the weather since yesterday morning – a lot of the lads on the lorries have been feeling low. I work at a distribution warehouse. I started feeling really bad this afternoon. I think I must have the flu or something.”

  Nick smiled reassuringly. “Probably just flu. Might be worth getting yourself down to see the doctor.”

  “Soon as my wife picks me up, I’ll be heading right there, don’t you worry.”

  “Your wife sounded pretty poorly, too,” Nick mentioned.

  George nodded slowly. “She has whatever I have, but she only started feeling ill this morning. Must have caught it from me. I feel terribly guilty if she feels half as bad as I do.”

  Nick sipped his tea and tried to ignore the smell of wet fart that was continuously drifting from the other side of the table. “I hope you get well soon, George. Then you can come back and buy a phone from Paul.”

  Paul chuckled.

  George slumped over the desk, his head hitting the laminated wood with a thud!

  Paul and Nick exchanged worried glances.

  Fifteen minutes later, when George’s wife arrived, he was still face down on the sales desk, snoring loudly. His wife tottered into the shop looking almost as bad as her husband did. Her bloodshot eyes bulged the same way.

  “Hi!” Nick greeted her, but kept his distance.

  “I’m here to take George home,” she said, then sneezed three times in quick succession.

  “He’s here.” Nick pointed to the desk. “I think he’s napping.”

  George’s wife staggered forward, her steps uncoordinated and clumsy. Her husband managed to lift his head as she approached, almost as if he sensed her. Perhaps it was a skill all men adopted after enough years of matrimony.

  Paul placed one of his thick hands on George’s shoulder and shook him tenderly. “The missus will get you to the doctors now, fella. You’ll be right as rain.”

  Like a thrashing animal, George snapped his teeth. Paul yelled out, pulling his hand free and clutching it against his chest. He cursed in his native Punjabi. “Haram Jada!”

  George looked frightened, as if he had no idea what he’d just done. “I…I’m so sorry. I…”

  “George!” cried his wife. “What the bloody hell are you playing at?”

  George looked tiny and afraid. “I’m so sorry,” he gushed at Paul. “I don’t know what came over me.”

  “No problem, fella,” said Paul, bewildered. “I’ll just put it down to the fever.”

  Nick frowned at George’s wife. “Maybe you should get your husband to a doctor.”

  She nodded, looking as anxious as she did embarrassed as she hurriedly ushered her husband away.

  Once they were gone, Nick and Paul looked at one another in confusion. “The fuck just happened?” Paul said. “The guy bit me like he was a vampire or something.”

  “Is your hand okay?”

  Paul was still clutching it to his chest. “Hurts like a mother. Gandoo broke the skin. I probably got rabies or something.”

  “Then you best stay away from me. I don’t want to start frothing at the mouth and biting people. That guy was a mess.”

  “You’re telling me. He said his workmates were ill, too. Maybe something is going around.”

  Nick shook his head and rubbed his temples. He felt a huge headache coming on, vibrating like rails before an approaching passenger train. “Screw it,” he said. “I’ve had enough of this. Let’s just cash up and get out of here. I’ll do the conference call at home and pretend I’m still here. If I get found out I’ll just say that someone tried to eat you.”

  Paul nodded, rubbing at his hand and wincing. “Sounds good to me, governor. I’m sure things will be better tomorrow.”

  Nick huffed. “They couldn’t be any worse.”

  Chapter Two

  The roads were quiet on the journey home. He had left early enough to avoid rush hour and the only vehicle he encountered was a rushing ambulance, its sirens blaring.

  By ten-to-five he was walking into his house.

  It was nice to be home an hour early. He began to think about what he could do with the extra time. Perhaps he would take Deana and James out for a nice meal. It’d been a while since they’d treated themselves and it’d be a nice way to put the day behind him. Maybe he’d forget that tomorrow he’d have to endure it all over again.

  Deana was standing barefoot in the hallway when he walked through the front door, obviously surprised to see him. “What are you doing back?” Her dark Moroccan eyes were suspicious beneath her choppy black fringe. “Everything okay?”

  Nick hooked his woollen coat onto one of the porch hangers and sighed. “We had three customers all day and then some weirdo came in and attacked Paul – he’s okay. In the end I decided it wasn’t even worth the trouble of being open.”

  “Won’t you get in trouble?”

  “I’ll take the conference call in the bedroom. I’m sure no one will even know. You fancy going out for dinner tonight, oh dear wife of mine?”

  Surprisingly Deana didn’t seem enthused. “I don’t know, honey,” she said. “James is feeling a bit under the weather. I don’t know if it’s wise taking him out, and I don’t want to get a babysitter.”

  Nick raised an eyebrow. “What is it with people getting sick today? I swear something must be going around. What’s wrong with him?”

  “He’s just a little bunged-up with a headache. Probably just needs an early night. He’s in the living room watching Family Guy.”

  Nick sighed. “I told you not to let him watch that show, Deana. It’s not like The Simpsons.”

  “It’s alright. He doesn’t understand the adult jokes. Go check on him. He’ll be glad to see you.”

  “Okay.” He gave her a peck on the cheek and headed for the living room. His mop-haired son lay curled on the beige corner sofa, squinting and blinking as if something was irritating his eyes.

  “You okay, little dude? Mommy says you’re not feeling very well.”

  “I have a headache,” he said pitifully.

  Nick sat on the end of the sofa and pulled his son’s bare feet onto his lap. They were cold and sweaty. “I’ll get Mommy to cook you something nice and then you can get an early night. You’ll feel all better tomorrow.”

  “Do I have to go to school?”

  Nick laughed and tickled his son’s foot, but James didn’t react, which was strange because he was usually very sensitive to tickle-torture. “We’ll see how you’re feeling tonight, buddy, and then decide. So, what’s happening in Family Guy?”

  “Brian and Stewie are trapped inside a bank and Brian just ate Stewie’s nappy.”

  Nick screwed his face up in disgust. “Lovely. Well, you can carry on watching until dinner, but then it’s going off, okay?”

  He was about to get back up again, b
ut paused when he spotted the thick Beano plaster on his son’s finger.

  “Hey, buddy, what happened to your finger?”

  “Jordan bit me at school. I didn’t even call him a name or nothing. He got in lots of trouble with Mrs Tanner, though, so it’s okay. Mommy had to kiss it better for me and put a Dennis the Menace on it.”

  Nick didn’t like the coincidence. Paul had been bitten, too. But what did it mean? Surely an unruly child biting his son was nothing to worry about and in no way related to the man who bit Paul. Still, it was weird. “Jordan bit you? Were you feeling ill before that, or afterwards?”

  James shook his head. “I didn’t feel poorly until Mommy picked me up. I started to feel sick in the car and got a headache.”

  Nick patted his son on the leg and gave him a reassuring smile. “Okay,” he said. “You just rest here and I’ll call you when dinner’s ready. Anything in particular you’d like?”

  “Fish fingers.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Fish fingers.”

  “Fish fingers it is then.”

  Nick got up from the sofa and headed into the hallway. Deana was in the kitchen, already starting dinner.

  “His lord requires fish fingers,” he said as he approached from behind and squeezed her hips.

  “Right-o,” she said, already rummaging around the fridge freezer. She set Cod sticks down on the breakfast table next to a basket of laundry and brushed off a layer of frost. “Did he ask for anything else?”

  “Just fish fingers with a side of fish fingers. I suppose you could force him to accept some chips and beans with them.”

  “That wouldn’t be because you want chips and beans, would it? You’ve got fillet steak in the fridge, you numpty.”

  “I know I have.” He perched back against the table. “But I’m too tired to eat it tonight. I’ll just have whatever James is having.”

  Deana moved closer to him, tiptoeing up on the tiles, and gave him a kiss. “You’re not coming down with something as well, are you, babe? Because I can’t be doing with nursing you both back to health. I’m in no mood for man-flu.”