Plagued (6 page)

When Mark had chosen the route to take back in the
basement, he’d assumed he would be able to lead them through the woods by
memory (having spent a lot of time in them as a child) but — as he was becoming
increasingly aware — that had been a long time ago and the world had seemed a
different place through the eyes of a child.

They followed a faint line of lowest grass that
looked like overgrown trail, hoping that they were going the right direction.
The map they had brought in their backpacks told them nothing since they didn’t
know where north or south was in the middle of the woods. Disturbingly, no
wildlife stirred in the woods now, the faint tweeting of the birds had died
down an hour before. On the upside though, there was no more screaming.

Sarah’s ankle began to feel better and she could
walk with only a slight pain in her foot. The sunlight was disappearing quickly
as the forest grew denser. Sarah didn’t think she had ever seen it so dark in
the afternoon. Was it afternoon? Had they really been walking that long? She
couldn’t be sure, though they weren’t moving very quickly. She chastised
herself for falling asleep in the bungalow. It lost them precious time.

The wind blew gently through the trees, blowing
the branches and leaves. They danced in the breeze making shadows everywhere —
to Sarah, they looked like arms reaching out for her to drag her into the
bushes.
Get a hold of yourself!

A black shape ran through the trees in front of
them, so quickly they barely registered it. Sarah hoped it was a figment of her
imagination until Mark whispered for her to stop walking. He pointed ahead at a
long shape in the distance. Panic flowed through her body, prickling her skin.

They dropped to the ground. It was too dark to
tell what it was but it wasn’t small enough to be a rabbit or fox. Mark hoped
in vain that it was a deer, though he had never seen a deer in Witches Woods in
his whole life. It was too close to the city.

The shape shrank in size as it moved, so much so
that it disappeared entirely. Sarah let out a sigh of relief and they began to
relax a little, neither of them realising it had gone in the same direction as
they were.

Getting back on their feet — Mark unwilling to let
Sarah walk unaided — they walked sheepishly forward, concentrating on the
sounds of the forest. Every now and again Sarah felt Mark’s gaze at the side of
her face and every time he did, she blushed, so she had been avoiding his gaze
ever since.

She felt like an awkward young girl again, which
was an unwelcome feeling. It reminded her of a horror movie; the ones in which
the heroes are close to being murdered yet still find the time to fall in love
with each other, which to Sarah was ridiculous. She hoped he hadn’t noticed her
scarlet face. Her stomach started to rumble loudly and she rubbed it. She had
been hungry ever since they got into the woods.
About to be ripped apart by
crazy people and I’m giggling like a school girl and thinking of my belly!

Mark looked around them and smiled, relief filling
his face. He had thought they were lost, something he didn’t want to tell
Sarah, but he was starting to recognize his surroundings. He had played here as
a child! There were rocks in the distance, very distinct ones — one was large
with a flat top and it was one of his favourite climbing spots. There were two
smaller, completely round ones on top of it. He and his friends had taken turns
jumping off it onto a pile of leaves many times in his youth. His heart leapt
in his chest as he remembered what was so special about them.

“I know this place!” he whispered to Sarah,
dragging her towards them hastily.

“Where are we going?”

“I’m going to show you something pretty awesome,
if it’s still here!”

 Sarah looked around her anxiously until the rocks
were right in front of them. Mark stopped running and they leaned forward,
catching their breath.

The biggest rock with the flat top was nearly
Sarah’s height and it stood near an old oak tree with an enormous trunk that
looked at least five foot in width. There were remnants of writing all over the
rock that had been engraved into it over the years. Mark pointed to one, ‘Mark
Si n Chaz were here’, and he followed the carved words with his finger and
smiled.

“Is this what you wanted to show me?” Sarah
whispered, reading the other etchings.

“No, not this,” he said and pointed directly above
them into the trees. He had a smug smile.

Sarah was astonished at the sight — way above
them, high up in the branches of the oak tree was a large tree house. It was extremely
well built, not a gap in sight and wooden planks were nailed into the trunk as a
makeshift ladder. The branches were thick and opened out like a man with
outstretched arms, intertwining with the tree next to it. The base of the tree
held the tree house in place and large, rusty nails held them together. “Wow,” she
said, mouth open.

“Looks a little different than I remember it,”
Mark said, circling the tree. “Someone must have added to it recently.”

Something let out a scream ahead and they dropped
down behind the rocks. Then another scream...and another, until the air filled
with screeching. These were not painful screams — as the young woman being
dragged across the street had done — but screams of pure rage. They differed in
pitch but they had one thing in common — they were all
very
angry.

Mark jumped to his feet and signalled up the tree,
without protest Sarah climbed clumsily up the wooden steps and Mark pushed her
bum up gently. She scrambled up quickly, willing the wooden planks to stay
where they were and not break beneath her feet. She grabbed the tree branches
and lifted herself through the small, square hole in the base of the tree
house. Then it was Mark’s turn, he climbed up effortlessly and his head
appeared in the hole. His shoulders were broad and Sarah didn’t think he make
it through. After a struggle, he did and they sat in the tree house panting for
breath, hidden from below.

The tree house was large on the inside — more than
enough room for both of them to sit down comfortably. A felt roof had been
stapled on top of the wooden planks, making it mostly rain proof and the wood
had held well with age, despite its mossy cover. A picture of the Biker Mice from
Mars hung limply on the wall, all the colours faded to a weak yellow. A few
empty cans of Cola lay in the corner with an empty Mayfair cigarette packet.
Someone had really enjoyed this place.

Mark and Sarah sat rigid, listening to the screams
get closer and closer, accompanied by footsteps stomping through the
undergrowth.

“Farbah!” a woman shouted in the distance and a
man screamed something back in response.

They screamed at each other for a minute or so,
rambling to each other in what sounded like nonsense and then they ran off
again, laughing and screaming. The noises quietened down until there was no
sound at all.

Sarah let out her breath and her shoulders
relaxed. “Phew. That was close.”

“Yeah, thank God for kids, aye?” Mark said with a laugh.

Sarah eyed the cigarette packet with an accusing
look on her face. “How old did you say you were when you played here?” she
said, eyebrow raised.

“They’re not mine, I swear!” he said, crossing his
heart with his hands. “I didn’t start that until I was fourteen.”

They both laughed breathlessly. Sarah held her
stomach and it growled in response.

“You’re hungry,” Mark said, taking some of the
dried crackers out of his backpack. “This might be the last chance we get to
eat.”

Sarah smiled. “You know, if anyone had told me
last year that I would be sitting in a tree house in the middle of the woods,
with a man who I barely know, eating dried crackers, I would have told them
they were crazy.” She took a swig of water from her bottle.

“Yeah, if you’d told me that I was going to end up
dragging a half-conscious woman through Winding when she was infected with what
looks like the plague, I would have said the same thing,” he grinned.

“Dragging?!”

“Well, all I’m gonna say is that you’re certainly
not six stone in weight, my dear.”

Sarah elbowed him in the ribs and he grabbed her
arm, laughing. His hand slid down to her hand and held it there, stopping her
from hitting him again. Their laughs fell silent as they stared at each other,
still hand-in-hand. Sarah blushed and Mark let go of her, turning away from her
to hide his scarlet cheeks.

They both crunched quietly at their crackers,
watching the woods around them and using the valuable time to rest their weary
legs. They caught sight of infected running madly through the undergrowth from
time-to-time but —as they were high in the treetops and the infected showed no
sign of knowing they were there — they weren’t too worried.   

“How are we going to get by them?” Sarah finally
whispered, breaking the long silence.

Mark shrugged, as though he’d been wondering the
same. “Well, it looks like it’s getting darker out there. Hopefully their
eyesight is as bad in the night as ours. We’ll have to wait here until the sun
goes down and—” he sighed, “sneak by them.”

Sarah looked at him with an anxious face. “How far
until we’re out? We’ve been walking for hours; we’ve got to be nearing the edge.”

As a child Mark had wandered here often with his
friends, spending hours looking for new forts and places to play. Even after
all that time, he had never explored the edge of the forest, it was too far for
them to walk and his father had always warned him about the sudden, steep drops
around the eastern edges that overlooked the farms. He’d never been a
particularly brave child.

He got out the map and laid it on his lap,
studying it intently. It wasn’t much help as they had no idea which direction they
were facing. They had started walking north from Winding and they were supposed
to go straight east to get to the farmland which led to Solitude, but — in the
panicked state they were in — they’d lost all sense of direction.

“It can’t be that far surely,” he said, trying to
sound confident.

“Liar,” she said and nudged him. He gave her a
weak smile. 

“I’m sorry. I promise to a more engaging liar in
the future,” he said, putting the food and water back in his pack. “We’d better
go before they cotton on. If they can climb, we’re pretty much fucked.”

They climbed back down the tree trunk, alert to
any sound coming from around them. The tension between them was high and they
both tried to ignore the feeling that they were walking into a hornet’s nest. They
stepped on the ground with a thump — one after the other — and listened to the
distant bellows coming from all directions.

The light was really dimming as the sun lowered
from its spot high in the sky and the shadows had completely changed, making the
forest look alien and unfamiliar. They studied the ground, looking for a
parting in the grass that their footsteps should have made but they seemed to
be everywhere. Lines ran through the grass in all directions, creating a large
web around them that Mark swore weren’t there earlier. His stomach tensed.

Something flesh-coloured whizzed by somewhere in
front of them, disappearing into the trees. Mark pulled Sarah down into the
grass. Another figure — this one was female and had long, knotted blonde hair —
ran past and yelled something, a moment later the first figure reappeared and
began mumbling to the second one. Sarah and Mark instinctively ducked their
heads further, both breathing heavily, the fear of being seen almost tangible.

The figures were all naked — the blonde-haired
woman, a fat bald man, and a man with black hair were the only ones they could
see, but they could hear the delirious ramblings of others. They scuffled with
each other, growling and snarling at each other with bared teeth.

“Cooee!” the blonde shouted to the fat man,
wiggling her naked breasts at him.

The fat man, seemingly unimpressed by her body, raised
his arm high over his shoulder and hit the woman in the face with a curled fist.
It connected with a hefty blow that knocked the woman onto the floor with a
‘thud’. The woman howled in pain and she looked at him with her bottom lip
extended. The fat man threw his head back and laughed heartily, causing the
large folds of skin on his stomach to wobble uncontrollably.

The woman scowled and turned away from him,
sticking her nose into the air petulantly. She caught sight of the dark-haired
man in the corner of her eye — who had been watching the show and clapping
along merrily — and she ran for him with impressive speed. By the time the poor
man realised what was happening, she had already sank her teeth into his head
and pulled off what seemed to be his ear, shaking it like a dog with a toy.
Blood dribbled down her chin as she chewed on it, jumping up and down
triumphantly.

The dark haired man screamed in agony and ran away
to the left of them, followed closely by the blonde, who was now laughing
happily with a bright-red face.

“Now, we’ve got to go!” Mark said, seeing his
opportunity. He grabbed Sarah’s arm and pulled her to her feet.