One Night In A Supermarket

No Pulse

Ok just a bit of a refresher...

* Cameron was stabbed and is in the manager's office.

* James is on the back dock, alive still.

* Vincent is also on the back dock, deceased.

* Nathan's been stabbed, and he's hiding in the fresh produce coolroom with Lily, who has been hiding in there all night and is determined to keep them both alive.

* Ella was stabbed in the offices

* Brian was stabbed in the store, but hasn't been declared alive or dead yet.

* Sarah's on the run in the store, no clarification as to where she's gone yet.

* Lisa escaped the store, and passed out as she entered a coffeehouse.

* Sarah and Lily are the only two who haven't been stabbed...

Chapter Ten... No Pulse

Sarah's POV

I had been running for a long time, about ten minutes before I climbed up onto the top of the refrigerated cases and cowered against the wall. He'd have to climb to get to me, and I could run away before he got up here.

As far as I knew, everyone else had taken that knife to their gut. Which sucked... big time. I wanted to help them all but wanted to stay alive just as much. It was hard to balance both of these out, but my thoughts became scattered as I saw the killer move below me. He hadn't looked my way just yet, thank god.

He walked over towards the front of the store. I watched him carefully, but noticed that the door was open slightly.

Someone had gotten out of here...

My instincts told me to run out the door. But the psycho forced the door shut again before he started walking around the store.

The back door swung open, and Brian stumbled out of it. I thought he was still on the shop floor.

I watched as the murderer spotted Brian and ran over to him. Brian's screams filled the shop as he was stabbed again, and he fell limply to the ground. The man had been stabbed himself, I remembered, and he bent over in pain. I could only pray that he would feint from blood loss, then I would find everyone, call the police and some ambulances, and get the hell out of here.

After Brian had been stabbed again, the murdering man checked Brian's pulse. My heart ached as reality set in.

Brian was dead.

Tears rolled uncontrollably down my face. Brian had been stabbed to protect me. He'd died to protect me.

I watched in horror as the psycho kicked Brian, as if he was a rock or something. Just casually. That hurt even more than knowing that the man that could have possibly been the love of my life was most definitely dead.

I curled up further against the wall and cried.

Cameron's POV

I had been stabbed and unconscious for a small period of time. But I seemed to be lucky. The wound had even stopped bleeding, oddly. I couldn't stand up, so I crawled across the floor of the manager's office and out the door. In the hallway...

Ella.

"Ella?" I whispered, still in a lot of pain.

I checked for a pulse, but couldn't find one. Vincent had died... James was close to death, too. And now Ella.

How many of us would have to die before this man was caught?

I crawled into the office next to the manager's one. It had a small room off of it that was like a computer... uh... well, it was like the main base for all of the checkouts and all that. I opened the door, and crawled in there. I shut the door behind me.

The door locked from the inside, and you couldn't access it through the roof. Pretty impressive... they should have put the safe in here, but that room was even more secure, the cash office.

I curled up into a ball of pain.

Either I'd just saved myself, or prevented myself from being stabbed more and I was to die in here. But either way, I was safe from the murderer.

Nathan's POV

Lily sat in the corner, shivering.

The cold of the coolroom was starting to get to both of us. When the power had been out, the coolrooms were all shut off. But the power had come back on, and the coolrooms were refrigerating again.

"Lil, take my sweater," I insisted again.

"No, Nath!" she said stubbornly again, teeth chattering. "I never thought this room was that cold before. I'm having second thoughts now."

"Well, I could keep you warm a different way, but you might be opposed," I chuckled.

"Oh, you men and you're bloody hormones," she giggled.

"Gee, you read that pretty easily," I smiled.

"Well, pretty sure we'd still be cold even if we were having sex, Nath," she laughed.

"Probably," I grinned. "But we'd be warm while we were doing it. Just when we stopped we'd get cold again."

"Exactly."

"Well, here," I smiled, crawling over to Lily and wrapping my arms around her. "We can cuddle. For someone that's been stabbed, I'm feeling reasonably strong."

"That's good," she grinned as she wrapped her arms around me, too.

"Hopefully we'll be out of here soon."

"I hope so. It's getting quite boring in here now."

"And freezing cold. Wonder if the police have been phoned yet?"

"Hope so. That psycho bastard needs to be caught. Queer..."

"Lily, no matter what happens, I'll make sure I do whatever it takes to keep you alive. I'm gonna die first, there's no doubt about it."

"I know," she smiled weakly, kissing my cheek. "But if you die... I'll make sure I die."

Our lips met again. It was hard to be positive when your life was hanging in the balance, and you could feel yourself getting weaker every minute.