'I just hope we don't get any unpleasant surprises.' the man thought as they made their way towards the building, whose facade was already covered in moss, weeds and rust.
They passed through the rusty, half-open door and stepped inside.
The warehouse was dark inside, but holes in the roof were large enough to let in enough light, allowing them to see the small number of corpses that littered the floor.
They made their way cautiously through the macabre facility, still intrigued by the voice that now resounded clearly.
It was a cry.
And a cry for help at that.
It came from a young woman - possibly in her early twenties - who lay bent over what appeared to be another body.
"I beg you, please someone help me." she cried.
The man motioned to his son not to take another step forward, but to go and hide silently behind one of the metal barrels nearby.
He advanced towards the young woman, firmly holding a stone he had picked up.
He didn't know if he was in any danger from this person, so it was better to be safe than sorry, especially considering the bodies lying on the ground.
He continued to silently make his way towards the woman, making sure not to make more noise than what was already heard with all the commotion outside.
In fact, if he and his son were able to move around in the warehouse without having yet been noticed by the lady, it was thanks, or perhaps because, of the sirens blaring outside still relaying their evacuation messages, and also from the various screams, ambulance noises — as well as the crashing sounds that surely came from buildings collapsing or the explosions resounding in the far distance.
The man wanted to make another step, but his improvised crutch missed a beat and he slipped.
He landed face first on the ground and tried to get up, but the pain in his severed leg threw him so hard that he felt dizzy.
What's more, the loss of blood had made him so weak that, at that moment, he couldn't find the strength to get up again.
The young woman turned abruptly and, with one hand trembling with fear, pointed a knife at her potential attacker, holding an iron bar in the other.
Her hair was a mess, her make-up ruined by tears and snot cascading from her left nostril, and the pale indigo dress she was wearing was almost in tatters, exposing knees and thighs full of wounds and small scratches.
At chest level, most of her garment was torn, and part of her bra could be seen hanging pathetically over her shoulder. However, she had managed to stabilise the top of her dress, so that her bust was not completely exposed.
Her arms, still trembling, were also covered in scratches and blood - not necessarily her own - which perfectly depicted the horrors she had seen and been through.
She pushed herself backwards, hitting the body on her back. As it touched her, she turned her head towards the corpse and sobbed, then returned it to the man still lying down.
"W-Who are you? What do you want?" she asked in a broken voice.
The man on the ground looked at her, and then cautiously turned his head towards where his son was hiding.
'Please stay hidden, Luka!' He thought, nearly praying for a catastrophe to happen, so as to distract the lady in front of him.
As long as his kid was safe, he didn't care much about what could happen to others.
It might have been a selfish line of thoughts, but this night, he didn't have the luxury of playing the good samaritan. Especially not in this current situation where, if things went wrong, he could join the ranks of the dead men strewn across the warehouse floor.
He shifted his gaze back to the women, menacing him with her knife, and answered with as much honesty as he could give.
"W-We're survivors, we were heading for the nearby shelter and we heard you, so we thought it would be a good idea to come take a rest, if there were other refugees here."
"H-How many of you are there?"
"It's just me and my son."
"You're lying!"
"No! I swear"
She stared at the man on the ground, who was trying to get up without much success.
"S-Stay where you are! If you make a single move, you'll end up like them" she said, pointing at one of the other corpses with the tip of the iron bar.
The man changed his mind and decided to do as ordered.
He exhaled, with difficulty as a coughing fit wracked him for a few seconds, then he pulled himself together and tried to calm the situation.
"What are you doing in this abandoned warehouse? You should be heading for the sh-"
"WE WERE GOING!" interrupted the young woman.
"Dhelan and I were on our way there, but a piece of rubble suddenly fell and blocked our way. So we decided to hide here until things calmed down."
She clutched her head, letting her sadness flow freely.
"Everything was going well, but these people came in a gang just after us. And that's when they-"
She didn't finish her sentence.
The man more or less understood what had happened.
He turned his head, glancing at the bodies of those who appeared to be attackers, then returned it to the young lady, still terrified and on her guard.
He then tried to get to his foot, leaning with all the strength he had left in his already meagre reserves, alerting the young woman who braced herself even more.
The knife pointed at him grew more menacing, but the man decided to ignore it.
"I TOLD YOU NOT TO MOVE!" she cried.
He held up a hand, indicating that everything was fine, and sat down with difficulty.
"We don't wanna hurt you. Besides, in my condition it wouldn't even be possible." He replied, pointing to his badly amputated foot and the wound in his belly.
"I-I don't believe you. You're just waiting for an occasion to do your awful deed... Just like these people!" she said, almost yelling, and tears flowing out her eyes sockets.
He glanced in the direction of the corpses, and then his son's hiding place and replied.
"We were heading for the shelter too. Would you like to come with us?"
The young woman froze.
Her whole body was clearly screaming at her to leave this cursed place, yet she hesitated.
"N-No! I must stay with Delhan!" she finally spat out after a few seconds' thought.
She pressed herself against the corpse behind her back, almost as if she wanted to be one with it.
"I understand-"
"NO! You don't understand! How can you ?!"
The man was startled by this sudden interruption which allowed the lady to continue.
"You don't understand a thing! We were supposed to get married in two months! Why does this have to happen! What have we done wrong?!"
She completely gave in to her sadness, even lowering her weapon.
Faced with this vision of torment and weakness, the man couldn't help but think of his wife who had died in the tunnel.
Tears welled up in his eyes too, but he tried to keep a cool head.
"Yes, I do. I understand you perfectly!
"I'M TELLING YOU-"
"MY WIFE DIED IN FRONT OF ME! SO YES, I UNDERSTAND!" he burst out.
He immediately stopped.
A noise was heard from the direction of the barrels.
His son emerged from his hiding place, tears streaming down his cheeks.
Realising his mistake, the man tried to get up to join his son, but collapsed miserably.
"Luka, it's not-"
"Mum... Mum's dead." Repeated the boy, clearly trying hard not to cry, as he slowly walked towards the two adults, shaking from sadness.
"I'm sorry, Lu. I'm really sorry." Said the father, who'd also surrendered to sadness, unable to hold back his grief any longer.
"You lied! You're just a liar!" replicated the young boy.
The man tried to get up and move towards his son but he fell again, pathetically.
"I-I'm sorry! But I ha—"
"DON'T TALK TO ME!..."
The child sat down and clutched his head in between his legs.
"Don't talk to me... Liar..."
He cried.
The man felt so helpless that he found himself wishing he were the one dying, instead of his wife.
He crawled with great effort to reach his son, ignoring the scratches and small cuts caused by the ground and debris, and hugged him tightly.
They both cried.
The scene lasted a few minutes, until they calmed down, followed by an awkward silence.
The young lady, who now understood that they too had suffered, got up, wiped her tears, and walked over to the man on the ground, then helped him to get up.
"I'm sorry." She said, fighting back more tears.
The boy raised his head and got up, then positioned himself on his father's weak side, so as to provide support.
The father, who saw his son's gesture, could not contain his emotion. But he pulled himself together.
"Once again, I understand you. Just like you, I lost someone dear to me in this disaster.
"Um... sorry for yelling all that awful stuff at you." she apologised.
"It's all right. It's all so horrible that we don't know how to react. The important thing is that we understand each other. "
She sat back down beside the body of her fiancé.
"This is a real nightmare. The barrier failed to stop the monster and now everything is-" tried to say the man.
He didn't finish his sentence, deciding to change the subject.
"But are you alright? Did those men hurt you?" he said, casting a vague glance at the stiffs in the background.
The young woman shuddered, then hugging herself, she replied.
"When they came in, things were fine at first because we were all in a panic given the situation outside.
Delhan and I were in our corner and they were in theirs. But suddenly they started coming towards us."
She paused for a moment to take a breath, then continued.
"Then one of them pulled out this knife, and they started threatening us, saying that if they had to die, they might as well give it one last go."
She felt a shiver run down her spine as the memories came back.
"Another said that, dying that way just after escaping prison was in no way what he would want and that it didn't matter if they had to force their way on me!" She added
She lowered her head, clutching herself even tighter.
"They hit Delhan when he tried to defend me, then they attacked me, but he managed to save me. And I used this bar and the knife to get them."
Tears sprang to her cheeks.
The man, sympathetic, separated himself from his child, approached Delhan's body and bowed as far as he could without falling.
Then he straightened up.
"He would have made a wonderful husband." He said, facing the young woman.
He cleared his throat.
"We have to get out of here. I need treatment and so do you, and most of all we don't know what kind of disasters may still happen, if we stay here."
The girl seemed to hesitate, which the man noticed.
"Of course, once it's all over, we'll come and collect his body, along with that of my wife. They deserve to rest in peace in the best possible conditions. But for the time being, that's all we can do," he added.
The young woman pondered a little longer, then resigned herself.
"Agreed. I'll follow you."
"Good! Since we're making the journey together, we should introduce ourselves. I'll start. My name is Rickard, and this is my son, Luka." Said the man, patting his boy on the back.
"A-Ah. I'm Lavitha."
Rickard smiled.
He pulled the backpack over his chest and checked what supplies and tools they had.
After making his assessment, he exhaled, visibly dissatisfied and anxious.
'Looks like we're going to have to improvise.' he sighed.
"Lavitha, get that guy's jacket. You need to cover up. And Lu, bring me the metal rod I use as a walking stick."
They both did so, although the girl winced as she approached the corpse of her attacker, the experience still fresh in her mind.
Having collected what they could, they got out and set off for the refuge.
***
After covering a few kilometres, they were exhausted and so chose to take a break in a convenience store whose entrance had been destroyed, perhaps by the attack or by looters.
It was a godsend: they could eat, drink bottled water and clean themselves up in the toilets.
Rickard headed for the pharmacy and, with Lavitha's help, was able to renew his tourniquet and bandages. They also found a map of the town and some supplement pills in Internal Kilith.
The man took the pills, and sighed with relief when he felt the energy circulating through his body, speeding up his healing and giving him back some of his strength.
Lavitha also took the opportunity to wash up, bandage herself and change clothes.
The shouting continued in the distance and the siren sounded closer.
After resting for around fifteen minutes, they decided to continue their journey.
But no sooner had they done so than the ground shook, at first faintly, then more and more strongly and repeatedly.
They scrambled out, realising the approaching danger, but couldn't get very far, paralysed by a shrill scream.
Part of the store's roof suddenly separated from the rest of the building.
Their eyes met those of the creature, whose size was around six or seven metres at first sight.
Proof of this was that the domed roof of the mini-market reached only as far as what might have been the creature's abdomen.
Speaking of the creature, it was more a kind of misshapen, or rather shapeless, nine-legged lizard, made up of a mass of blackish matter that was both gaseous and slimy, which leaked from what could have been called its scaleless skin — Or at least none that could be observed — of which only one part of the abdomen shone with an orange glow.
Four mandibles protruded out of a rounded head — itself connected to the body by a short yet wide neck that blended into what could be shoulders — and were twitching and clacking while simultaneously letting hang a long, blackish tongue covered in a dark viscous mucus.
Its four eyes were looking in several places at the same time - a pair of them, however, staring at the fugitives.
The roof collapsed with a deafening crash and the presence of the creature instilled a primal terror in the psyche of the little group, leaving them unable to move or risk ending up as a meal for the monster.
The beast climbed onto the building that almost collapsed under its weight, producing cracks and holes here and there, then leapt off and landed dozens of metres away from the runaways.
The long appendage protruded from its mouth, dripping a huge, slimy stream of black mucus and its mandibles tore the air in a cacophonic sounding.
The sight of this apparatus made the young lady shudder, and she tried to turn back, ignoring all the warning signs her instincts were sending her.
No sooner had she moved than the tongue unfurled and whistled like an arrow through the air, heading straight for them.
A liquid then gushed out and sprayed Lavitha's half-turned face.