Page 10 (1/2)

Almost an hour passed before anyone dared to move

The survivors, already shell-shocked and beaten by all that they had been through, stood together in terror and disbelief and tried to coly it was Ralph, the solicitor who had seeht, who appeared to be having thewhat he had seen and heard today He stood in the centre of the rooed estate agent), struggling to persuade Emma, Carl, Michael and Kate James (a thirty-nine year old prio back outside

&039;But we have to go out, Ralph,&039; Eot to try and find out what&039;s going on&039;

&039;I&039;htenedThere&039;s no way I&039;o out there and risk&039;

&039;Risk what?&039; Michael interrupted &039;No-one&039;s asking you to go outside, are they?&039;

&039;Opening that door is enough of a bloody risk in itself,&039; Garner ers of his left hand as he spoke &039;Keep it shut and keep them out&039;

&039;We can&039;t take any chances by exposing ourselves to those things&039; Ralph protested

&039;Things?&039; Eitated &039;Those things are people you selfish shit Bloody hell, your friends and family could be out there&039;

&039;Those bodies have been lying dead on the ground for days!&039; he yelled, his face suddenly just inches from hers

&039;How do you know they were dead?&039; Michael asked, perfectly seriously and calmly &039;Did you check them all? Did you check any of them for a pulse before you shut yourself away in here?&039;

&039;You knoell as I do that&039;

&039;Did you?&039; he asked again Ralph shook his head &039;And have you ever seen a dead body walk before?&039;

This tiainst the nearest wall

&039;Jesus Christ,&039; Garner cursed, &039;of course we&039;ve never seen fucking dead bodies walking, but&039;

&039;But what?&039;

&039;But I&039;ve never seen anyone drop to the ground and not get up for two days either Face it Michael, they were all dead&039;

&039;Look, Paul,&039; he sighed, &039;let&039;s be straight with each other for a second None of us have got the first bloody clue what&039;s happening here The only thing I know for sure is that I&039; after myself and the rest of the people in this hall and&039;

&039;If you&039;re only interested in the people in here why do you want to go out there and&039;

&039;I&039; aftercalo out there and see if I can find out what&039;s happening and to see if any of those bodies pose a threat to us I&039; the on&039;

&039;And how are you going to find out what&039;s happening?&039; Ralph deain &039;Who&039;s going to tell you?&039;

For a led to answer

&039;E quickly and looking across at her &039;You&039;ll be able to tell us what&039;s wrong with theht uncoed her shoulders

&039;I&039;ll try,&039; she mumbled &039;I can try and tell you whether they&039;re dead or not but after that I&039;

&039;But can&039;t you see what you&039;re doing?&039; Ralph protested, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes &039;You&039;re putting us all at risk If you&039;d just wait for a while and&039;

&039;Wait for what?&039; Carl interrupted &039;Seems to me that we&039;re at risk whatever we do We&039;re sat here in a hall that we could knock doith our bare hands if we tried hard enough, and we&039;re surrounded by thousands of dead bodies, so around Staying here see that the conversation was about to stray into familiar waters with yet another pointless debate about whether to go outside or not, Michael s and intentions clear

&039;I&039; outside,&039; he said His voice was quiet and yet carried with it an undeniable force &039;Stay in here and hide if you want, but I&039; out now&039;

&039;For Christ&039;s sake,&039; Ralph pleaded, &039;think about it before you do anything that ht&039;

Michael didn&039;t stop to hear the end of his sentence Instead he simply turned his back on the others and walked up to the main door out of the colanced back over his shoulder towards Carl, Emma and Kate The rest of the survivors were silent

&039;Ready?&039; he asked

After a second&039;s thought Carl nodded and made his way to stand next to Michael, closely followed by Emma and Kate Michael took a deep breath, pushed the door open and stepped out into the bright Septely warth of tiht&039;s bitter wind had dropped He shielded his eyes froht and watched as Michael cautiously retraced the steps that he had taken earlier, walking away fro and towards the road When the first ered into view he instinctively stopped and turned back to face the others

&039;What&039;s the matter?&039; asked E,&039; henervous and unsure

The three other survivors walked towards hiathered to watch them in the shadows of the doorway of the co to do now?&039; Kate James wondered She was a quiet, short and round woman with a usually flushed red face which had suddenly lost much of its colour

Michael looked around for inspiration

&039;Don&039;t know,&039; he adot any ideas?&039;

Three faces returned three blank expressions A few seconds later Emma cleared her throat and spoke

&039;We need to have a good look at one of them,&039; she whispered

&039;What do you mean?&039; Kate asked, her voice also quiet &039;What are we supposed to be looking at?&039;

&039;Let&039;s try and see how responsive they are We should see if they can tell us anything&039;

While she had been speaking Michael had taken a few steps further forward

&039;What about her?&039; he asked, pointing at one of the nearestbodies &039;What about that one there?&039;

The group stood together in silence and watched the painful progress of the pitiful creature The wo listlessly at her sides She see her feet behind her

&039;What are we going to do with her?&039; Kate wondered nervously

&039;Do you want to get closer and just have a look?&039; Carl asked

Michael shook his head

&039;No,&039; he said, &039;let&039;s get her inside&039;

&039;What, back in there?&039; he gasped, gesturing at the building behind them

&039;Yes, in there,&039; Michael replied His voice still re to annoy Carl who silently hoped that the others shared hisfear and unease because he certainly wasn&039;t as together and as sure as Michael appeared &039;Is that a problem?&039;

&039;Not to h&039;

He obviously wasn&039;t concerned

&039;I think we should get her indoors and try and et et her to relax&039;

&039;Are you sure about this?&039;to fray