Surviving The Virus (Book 1): Outbreak Read online

  Outbreak

  Surviving the Virus, Book 1

  Ryan Casey

  ryancaseybooks.com

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  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

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  Chapter One

  Harvey Watson didn’t want to admit it, but he was lost.

  It was light. Always light in the Arctic Circle at this time of year. The days just blended into one. Nothing differentiated one day from the next except a brief dulling of the skies, so quick you could easily miss it. It was disorienting. Especially with the thick layers of bright white snow on the mountain tops. Especially when you were out here, away from society, out of the range of signal. Cold, even though it was the middle of June. It did something to your senses. Your perspective. Really made you realise your ultimate insignificance in the grand scheme of life.

  “Do you actually know where we’re going or—or should I be getting worried?”

  Harvey heard Fred’s voice, and he smiled. He always acted like he was so tough. Like he was the most masculine of the group. Nothing fazed him, or at least that’s what he liked people to believe.

  But Harvey heard that quivering in his voice right now. The shakiness to his words. That slight stutter.

  And he couldn’t help smiling.

  Harvey turned around. He saw the open plains all around him, barely a tree in sight. In the twenty-four-hour darkness of winter, they’d be covered in snow. He saw little specks of life, where other groups took guided tours. Every now and then, the slight hum of an engine from a bunch of quad bikers.

  But mostly, it was peaceful. It was desolate. It was serene.

  And it was the perfect place for a week away with the lads.

  Fred stood there, rifle over his shoulder. He was a big lad, bearded, well built. The kind of guy you wouldn’t want to mess with. Looked like he never missed a session at the gym. Like he weighed out his meals to make sure he got absolutely optimal levels of protein and carbs. That kind of guy.

  But right now, he was shaky. Kept on looking over his shoulder, checking every inch of this landscape for some invisible threat.

  “Something bothering you, Fred?”

  Fred looked back at him. Frowned. “No. Why?”

  “You just seem a bit shaky, that’s all.”

  Fred shook his head. Took in a sharp breath, puffed out his chest. “Rubbish, mate. Only one shitting their pants here is Kev.”

  Kev looked over at Fred, rolled his eyes. “Piss off.”

  Kev was short, ginger, and not well built. Practically the opposite to Fred. The three of them were so different, really. Fred was all about appearance and got a lot of his self-value from women’s approval of him. Kev had been in a relationship with a girl since he was fourteen, so if they split up, he wouldn’t have the foggiest idea how to float in the dating game.

  And Harvey... well. Harvey was happy to forge his own path. He liked to think he got value from himself. He didn’t rely on the opinions of others to make him happy.

  They were different, the three of them. All in their early thirties. All had very different lives of their own.

  But they were lifelong friends.

  And like most lifelong friends in their thirties, they’d drifted over the years. They lived on opposite sides of the country. Harvey rented a flat in Salford, handy for his work at the BBC. Fred preferred the bustle of London, even though his jobs seemed to be changing all the time—from personal trainer to barber to “motivational influencer,” whatever that was.

  And Kev, well. Kev preferred the countryside. Quiet little road in North Wales. Two dogs, two kids, and a loving wife. Not to mention a comfortable job at the council.

  And that’s what this trip to Svalbard was about.

  Bonding.

  Recapturing their youth.

  Forcing themselves into the uncomfortable, rediscovering their sense of adventure.

  “I’m just saying,” Fred said, walking along the cold, desolate ground. “If we don’t know where we are, wouldn’t we be better heading back to the cabin?”

  “Why?” Harvey said. “Worried the polar bears might eat you?”

  “I’m just thinking we should—we should get back before dark. Maybe.”

  Kev snorted. And Harvey found himself laughing, too.

  “What?” Fred said blushing. “What the hell’s so damned funny?”

  “If you’re waiting for it to go dark,” Harvey said, “you might be waiting a long time in the land of eternal sun. I think it goes dark in October. So we’ve got a hell of a long time yet.”

  Fred went a shade redder. Shot Harvey a look of pure hate. “There’s nothing wrong with worrying out here. It’s—it’s a dangerous place. And I’d rather live. Unlike you two idiots.”

  Harvey just shot a smile back at Kev, then turned around, looked up ahead. “That point over there. Just at the foot of the mountain. There’s some old Nordic sculpture over there. Some old structure of a god looking down at the world. Looks absolutely stunning. One of the remotest in the world. We get there. We eat. And then we head back. And don’t worry. If those nasty polar bears come for you, you’ve always got a rifle.”

  He punched Fred on the arm, who swatted it away like an annoying fly. “If I die on this trip, I’ll make damned sure I come back as the ugliest, smelliest damned ghost and haunt the shit out of you.”

  “So you’re assuming I’m gonna survive?”

  Fred just shook his head. “Can we get this done with already? I’m getting bored standing here and staring at your ugly little face.”

  Harvey turned around and started walking. Truth was, he didn’t know that sculpture was exactly up ahead. He was kind of guessing. Tourists weren’t recommended to go wandering on their own. He knew he was a bit daft. But then he’d read loads of blogs and seen loads of YouTube videos of people going it alone, and they’d been fine. The threat of polar bears was overstated. This place was safer than it sounded.

  He had to keep telling himself that.

  Even if the thought that the opposite was true was rather exhilara
ting to him.

  That was the thing about Harvey’s life. He was kind of at a crossroads. He was in his thirties, single, spent most evenings and weekends at home watching whatever was on Netflix. And as much as he was content, as much as he was comfortable... it still just didn’t feel enough sometimes. Like there was something greater out there. Something bigger than this out there.

  And that’s what brought him here. That desire. That quest to reawaken something inside. That urge to discover some deeper meaning. It was unavoidable. It was irresistible.

  But there were problems, too. And those problems were that he never found what he was looking for when he came on trips like this. Just a temporary illusion that things were the way they used to be. That his old, teenage life was back, even if just for the briefest of moments.

  He smiled. He figured maybe that’s what the point was after all. Maybe those fleeting moments of contentment were what life was all about.

  Maybe he already had everything he was looking for.

  He took a step and felt something crunch under his foot.

  He looked down, and he saw something unusual.

  There wasn’t much snow around at this time of year. But the ground before him looked like it was melting, too. Most of the ground here was still rock solid. But this. It looked like dirt. Like mud.

  Like something had melted.

  “Something bothering you, goon?” Fred asked.

  But Harvey just kept on staring down at this patch of ground. A sense that something wasn’t right. Like something had been here.

  Every instinct in his body told him to turn around. To head the other way. To get back.

  But then he took a step and kept on walking. “Come on. We’d better keep moving.”

  The further they walked, the more Harvey noticed this anomaly on the ground. A layer of soil looked like it’d melted. That’s the only way he could explain it. And he wasn’t sure why he found it weird. It was summer, after all. The sun beat down from above.

  But something about it just sparked uncertainty inside him. It made him feel weird.

  “What the hell is that?” Fred asked.

  Harvey turned around. He half-expected to see Fred gawping into the distance at something.

  But instead, he looked straight at the ground.

  “What?” Harvey asked.

  Fred pointed out a finger. “That.”

  Harvey didn’t see it. Not at first.

  But then his eyes rested on it, and every muscle in his body went numb.

  There was a bone in front of him.

  It was long. About a foot long. It looked like an arm.

  “What the ...”

  And as Fred and Kev backed away, Harvey saw exactly what they were so worried about.

  It wasn’t just one bone.

  It was a whole host of bones.

  They were surrounded by bones. And skulls, too. They looked human but bigger. Far bigger than any human heads Harvey had ever seen. Not just a small bunch of them, either. A hundred, at least. A hundred skeletons, all lined up. A grave.

  “Shit, Kev,” Fred said. “Looks like we’ve found your ancestors. Look at the size of that head!”

  “Fuck off, Fred,” Kev said.

  “What d’you reckon, Indiana Jones?” Fred said to Harvey. “This not a sign to you we need to get the hell away from here right now, or...”

  Harvey just stood there.

  He stared at these bones.

  This mass of bodies lined up, one after the other, partly buried in this melting ground.

  A smell to the air. Dampness. A stench he couldn’t explain as the sun beat down. As the wind stopped. As everything fell silent.

  “You’re right,” he said. “We—we should get away from here.”

  “Too damned right,” Fred said. “Last one back to the cabin misses out on a bacon butty!”

  Fred stomped away from this bone-filled ground. Kev followed closely behind, although a little more reluctantly.

  And Harvey just stood there in the middle of it.

  Staring at it.

  Heart racing.

  And he couldn’t shift the smile on his face.

  Because whatever this was, it was a discovery.

  His discovery.

  Exactly what he’d come here for.

  “Harvey?” Kev asked.

  Harvey looked up at him. Nodded. “I’ll be right behind you.”

  Kev nodded back, a little reluctantly. Then he turned around. Started walking away.

  And then he stopped.

  “What do you think killed them?” Kev asked.

  Harvey looked around at these bodies. He looked at them lined up, one after the other, a dread growing inside. “Polar bears, probably. Go on. I’ll catch up. Don’t leave Fred on his own with a gun. Probably find a way to accidentally shoot himself.

  Kev smiled. And then he turned away, started walking.

  And as Harvey stood there in the solitude of Svalbard, he looked down at these remains, and he got the sense that polar bears hadn’t done this. They weren’t responsible for this.

  He got the sense these remains were old.

  Very old.

  He reached down. Yanked a piece of broken skull from the cold, wet remains.

  And then he stuffed it in his pocket and started walking.

  The sun drifted behind the clouds, and Harvey couldn’t ignore that stench creeping into his lungs, as a hundred dead bodies stared back at him, the ground melting around them...

  Chapter Two

  Noah raced across the street and prayed to God he hadn’t missed his bus.

  It was morning. Way too early for his liking. Which, well, meant any time in the morning. He was a night owl. Couldn’t help it. Just preferred the solitude of night to the busyness and the bustle of the day. Getting up before 9 a.m. was an assault on his senses. It didn’t make him lazy per se; he just preferred staying up late and getting up late. Same amount of hours awake and asleep as everyone else, when you really think about it.

  But when you had a shift that started at eight, night owl tendencies were no excuse for a lack of punctuality.

  The June sun beat down from above. He felt clammy. Sweat trickled down his arms. He’d sprayed a load of Lynx all over his body before he’d rushed out of his flat because, by the time he’d woken up, it was too late to take a shower. But that didn’t seem to be doing much for the smells coming from his body right now anyway. His stomach gnawed with hunger. He needed to eat something substantial if he got up first thing, merely just to function normally. His throat was dry, gasping for water.

  But he couldn’t exactly mope. This was his own frigging fault. He swore he’d set an alarm for half six. Or at least he’d intended to, but he’d got sidetracked watching music reviews on YouTube and then drifted in and out of consciousness and then …

  Well. Here he was. Half seven. Racing down the side of the main road, six-hour shift at the coffee shop starting at eight.

  And this wasn’t the first time, either.

  He raced down the side of the road, dodging bins lined along the pavement, sitting ready for collection. Cars were stacked up behind one another, the busy work rush into town hitting its peak. Every now and then, a car honked at him as he ran by, clearly sensing his discomfort, his desperation.

  And it was desperation.

  He’d had a job at Collin’s Cofee for six months now. And no. That’s not a typo. Collin’s Cofee is actually spelled like that. So if that gives you any kind of idea what kind of a guy runs the place, you should have a pretty good idea just how screwed Noah was right now.

  The bloke who ran the place wasn’t even called Collin.

  Nobody asked what that was all about. He’d fired staff for less.

  But anyway. Noah was twenty-six. He’d followed the typical path of any intelligent young lad: school, college, university. He dreamed of going into clinical psychology after his degree.

  Only life had other plans. At twenty-one, he left t
he University of Cumbria with a 2.2 in psychology and a batch of anxiety that wasn’t there before. It crippled him for three years. Left him housebound. Screwed his life up, especially being burdened with one of the very psychological issues he was supposed to have all the answers to. It’s like he had all the tools in his locker, but he just couldn’t find the key.

  It was only when he hit twenty-four that he figured he’d better get his arse in gear.

  He got therapy. Went on medication. Tackled his problems head-on. He got a decent job writing for a local newspaper. Not what he’d imagined, but it was something he was alright at, so he seized it with both hands. He even fell in love with a girl called Jasmine. For a while, life was actually good.

  And then the double blow. First, the newspaper went bust. The paper couldn’t afford to hire staff writers anymore and had to rely on freelancers, all of which were mostly students who they could get away with paying a pittance.

  And then after trying and struggling for a couple of years, living with Jasmine and doing what he could to contribute, she dumped him. Ended the relationship. Told him his life wasn’t going anywhere, and that he needed to grow up and mature. Her parents were delighted, naturally. Always thought he was beneath their daughter, who had her sights set on big things.

  It could’ve knocked him. Could’ve broken him. For a time, it did.

  But he didn’t let it keep him down.