Locked Down | Chapter 1
We Shouldn’t Have Come Back!
Click here for Locked Down | Prologue
“We shouldn’t have come back! What the hell was on your mind?”
“I didn’t ask you to come along, now did I?”
“Oh man we are so–”
“SHH! Keep your damn voice down!”
Daniel couldn’t count on the clothes hanging in the wardrobe to muffle her voice. From his cramped space, he pushed the wardrobe door slowly. Once the gap was big enough, he put his head through and peeked around. Their bedroom was empty and the light from the morning sun flooded in through the windows, lighting up the inside. But he was still scared of coming out. Those things were still around, and he knew they weren’t going to just wander off anywhere. There wasn’t a damn soul anywhere in the vicinity for them to chase after, except for the two of them.
Still surveying the room, he whispered to his partner. “Sara, we’re going to move out now.”
She didn’t seem very happy with that plan. “Are you crazy? If a leech finds us… Oh God… We haven’t even found it yet!”
“I’m going to go find it. You lock yourself in the bedroom till I signal you to come out.”
With that, they both cautiously stepped out into the room. They removed their boots and left their socks on. Daniel tip-toed to the bedroom door, and gently closed it shut. He hoped the click of the latch wasn’t loud enough to alert the invaders.
“OK remember,” he whispered. “Only on my signal, I’ll knock. Until then, sit tight.”
Sara nodded in comprehension. Daniel went up to the door and placed his ear on it. He couldn’t seem to hear anything on the other side. With his heart in his mouth, he turned the knob and pulled the door open in slow-motion. The corridor was empty. He stepped out of the room and clicked the door shut behind him. He heard another click as Sara locked the door from the inside.
The corridor led to a wooden stairway to his right. At the bottom of it lay the main door out of the house. They still couldn’t leave; they hadn’t gotten what they had come for yet. Daniel heard something grunt downstairs, and that was enough incentive to stay upstairs for the time being. To his left, the corridor led to his office. He turned away from the stairs and proceeded down the corridor. He had to get into his office, then the situation would become a tad less fatal. His sock-covered feet made no noise on the smooth tiles as he made his way up to the office door. It was partially open and the sunlight from the corridor lit only a corner of the dark office. The light fell upon his desk. What he needed was right in its drawer. With a little haste stemming from the excitement of seeing his desk, he swung the door a little faster than he had intended to. The hinges creaked, and from inside the room, a grunt came in reply. Daniel froze instantly, his sight locked on the desk. He couldn’t afford to move and make another sound. The open door allowed more sunlight to light up the room, and Daniel turned to the source of the grunt.
Shit.
The leech was hideous. It was a human… Or at least, it had been. It was standing by a bookshelf opposite to the door, next to a window covered by thick curtains. Its skin was a light tinge of grey. Blotches of green and brown could be seen over it, where the flesh was rotting. Its bald head looked like only a skull, with its cheeks sunken in and its eyeballs almost popping out. Its eyes were clouded, almost opaquely ivory. Its ears were flared out and one of the pinnae was torn slightly. It had only a pair of trousers on; its stomach was almost non-existent and Daniel could see its ribcage. Its throat was bloated to the size of a handball. From its mouth, a long, black, worm-like thing was protruding out. It was wriggling and writhing above its tongue, sometimes hitting its face and knocking its head around. It had turned in the direction of the creak, and was now facing the door, exactly where Daniel was.
He stood stark still. He knew it couldn’t see or smell, but its sense of hearing was heightened. As long as he didn’t make a sound… He looked around his room to find anything he could use. The floor was carpeted; it would muffle his movements. On a bulletin board above his desk were photos of him at work, pinned with tacks. He was dressed in uniform in all the pictures, and his big police badge pinned to his chest wasn’t missing in any of them. Then an idea popped up in his head.
My badge.
Hanging on a clothes stand a few feet away was his uniform, and on it, his badge. It was the only heavy, throwable object in his immediate vicinity, something he could reach with minimum movement. He turned back to the creature to find it walking to the noise it had heard. He had to act quickly. He made for the badge, lifting his feet off the ground and placing them as fast as he could, noiselessly. The leech was picking pace, and so did he. He reached his uniform and tried to pluck the badge off quickly. That was a mistake. In his impatience, some of the cloth snagged on the pin and pulled the stand along with it. In an attempt to catch it before it fell, he ended up pushing it against the wall, where it hit with a low thud. It was enough to catch the leech’s attention.
The new sound was louder and closer. The leech turned towards the new disturbance and started walking towards Daniel, blocking the doorway. He knelt down, cowering against the clothes stand, scared for his life. It was when it was right on top of him that he saw a sliver of space towards the doorway. He threw the badge outside the room. It crashed in the corridor with a clear, loud ring. The creature stopped in its tracks, its feet inches from Daniel. The worm-like thing from its mouth was still swishing around, spraying the creature’s spit onto him. He held his breath, hoping it would’ve gotten distracted enough. His prayers were answered as it bolted out the door, crashing into the doorframe on its way out. It spun in the air and crashed onto the floor. Rearing its head up, it screeched wildly, frustrated that it couldn’t find the cause of all the noise it had heard. With it distracted, Daniel could head for the desk with a little more leniency. He opened the drawer and let out a silent sigh of relief. He reached in and picked up his pistol and its silencer. He was done screwing the silencer on halfway when he heard something — some-things — rushing up the wooden stairs. His eyes went wide. The other leeches downstairs…
He ran for the door as he screwed the silencer on completely, not caring if he was too loud. He reached the door and was about to shut it when a leech popped right in front of him. The worm-like thing in its mouth almost licked Daniel’s face. He slammed the door shut, but instead of hearing banging wood, he heard a crunch. The leech’s hand was caught between the frame and the door, and that was enough to let it know that something was right in front of it. The door was pushed back with tremendous force, and the leech that did it screeched so loud that Daniel had to cover his ears. He heard the other leeches in the corridor run up to the doorway. With his heart racing, he shot the leech in the neck and kicked it into its approaching friends. The second he shut and locked the door, it shook as the leeches outside rammed into it. Darkness consumed the room.
“Sara!” Daniel shouted from inside the room. “Sara! Can you hear me?”
No response. Another ram from outside shook the door, though this time he could see splinters by the hinges. He didn’t have much time at all.
His heart was still racing at a hundred kilometres an hour. There was no time to succumb to panic. Sara was locked safely in the bedroom and the leeches had no idea where she was. Fact was, he wasn’t very safe, and once he could sort that out, he could move for Sara. He eyed the room and found a little light coming through the draped window. He went up to it with no further thought. He slid the curtains aside and the window open. He was temporarily blinded by the sunlight when another strong ram on the door flung a few splinters onto the floor. He looked outside the window. A tree branch from a nearby elm poked towards him, almost beckoning him to jump onto it. He hesitated, not wanting to test his athleticism lest he fell to his doom. That’s when the door came flying off its hinges and the leeches flooded in. If he stayed any longer, they’d find him, eventually. Without a choice, he tucked his gun away into his pants’ waistband, dove through the window and caught the branch. Hanging from a height of one storey in his front garden, he looked at all the abandoned houses around him. An infestation of leeches roamed almost every corner of the neighbourhood. They seemed to have come to the locality when he and Sara had entered the house. Their damned luck.
He made his way to the trunk of the tree and scaled it down to the ground. His socks hit the earth and soaked up some of its moisture. A shiver ran up his body from his feet. The winter air was chilly, but kind of refreshing. He had no time to dilly-dally, he had to find a way to get to Sara. But before he could take another step, a noise right by his ear made him freeze; the sound of a gun being cocked. A voice whispered into his ear.
“You alright there, bud?”
Click here for Locked Down | Chapter 2
