The Ruins

Chapter 10

"What? Are you serious?" Rin blurted out. Mal didn't say it but the sign on the wall said 'Level 5', so she saw the girl's point. Mal doesn't mind, had always jumped on roof to roof; this was putting a lot of faith in a collection of metal planks, pipes, cables and connectors that had been hanging out in the elements without maintenance for twenty years and was hanging fifty feet up in the air.

"Aaahhh... this is crazy," Johan's voice had gone up an octave. Lalon navigated the jiggling platform, its metal surface slick from the driving rain and the wind trying to throw him over the side. He turned and looked at all of them, who were still in the stairwell landing, looking out of the shattered plate glass window after him with horrified expressions. "'S'okay," he lied through his teeth. "Just remember not to look down!"

Rin nervously clambered the platform's safety rail and gently lowered herself down onto the platform's floor. "Okay... Don't look down... Don't look down..." She began to edge along the platform.

Mal in no problem vaulting onto the platform.

She probably let herself drop to the floor a bit too heavily because the platform rocked crazily from side to side, its support cables twanging and whining with the sudden stress. Rin shot Mal a look of utter terrified accusation that the tern wasn't about to forget any time soon (although, if her clumsy move had killed them both, who could blame her?).

Johan and Vix gently eased Rin up onto some kind of platform that was part of the corner of building. She continued to mutter her mantra: "Don't look down... Don't look down..."

Vix touched Rin's shoulder reassuringly. "You're okay; we've got our way through."

Mal never thought she'd appreciate so much the interior of a Infected-infested ruin that was waiting to fall over into a bomb crater.

-:-:-:-:-

Killeen suggested this, making their to an Infected area. Max is a bit concerned, he does try to prove the RK's, especially Mal he's capable however, it feels wrong. The way further down was blocked; really blocked. They looked down from a second level set of windows, mostly broken now, at an open space, its side and roof blown away during the carpet bombing, with about a half-dozen Infected wandering about, raving to themselves.

Killeen looked down through the windows and scowled at the barrier of Infected killers. "Killeen..." He paused, toning his voice lower. "Maybe we shouldn't do this."

He groaned, wailing his arms around as like a child, "I thought you want this."

"But this is suicide. We don't know what's out there."

"But one? Pleasepleapleaseplease?" He pouted, giving him goggly eyes. Max sighed, frowning. "Fine."

To the left was a small office space whose floor had collapsed into a corridor running just behind the area infested with Infected's. They dropped down as lightly as they could, very aware of the sensitivity of Infected denizens to sound. He noted a dead drinking fountain and, at its base a disconnected metal water pipe. He scooped up the treasure, twice as good as a club as any bit of wood could be and gave to Killeen.

They walked into the interior corridor. There were too doors leading deeper into the building; an office space of some kind. On the other side were the gaping frames of long-vanished plate-glass windows looking into the devastated office space beyond.

Finding a cabinet to hide behind, Max crouched down. What he needed now was patience, another lesson. The strange thing about the Infected was that they tended to stay in more-or-less the same area where they Turned. They'd wander short and repetitive 'patrol routes' but didn't wander far from that unless they found something to attack from movement or sound, and never stop wandering. All they had to do is crouch behind the small end table and plot the routes they were taking. So long as he didn't make a noise or move in front of one of them, they were effectively invisible.