Vigil Read Online Free Page A
Book: Vigil Read Online Free
Author: Craig Saunders, C. R. Saunders
brain, pushed by the sinking blade. For a second I thought I saw a bright corona of light and it didn’t hurt my eyes, but that was all I saw. Then thoughts and sights and smell, the things that made me what I was, stopped.
To my knowledge, that was the first time I had died.
*
Chapter Six
Paris
Year 0026
Post Apocalypse
Tom Fallon crouched in the shell of a burned out building looking out over the city. Smoke no longer curled above the sky line. The city was a necropolis, abandoned by the living these past years. Even in the early days, when it had been ground zero for the plague that cured mankind of all disease and sickness but one, the living had fled to the countryside to escape the cured.
Tom wasn’t watching for people. He watched for vampires.
That was what they had called them in the first few years. There had been hope, then. The televisions had still worked. But the trappings of man soon failed. The radio had been the last to fall, but even radios needed power.
The infection spread to the city, then the world. People were slow to learn. At first it was merely horrific. You could tell them apart. They were shambling and stupid. Their hunger made them idiots with only the most basic of functions – eat and breathe. It was the hunger that drove them on.
The police were called to the first few outbreaks. They would arrive in their armoured vans, guns at the ready. The shooting would start and the cured would fall. But they rose again. The cured came on, unstoppable as the tide. The flesh they tore from the police gave them strength and drove them on. The infection could not be contained.
Tom could see the results all around. Here, on the eastern most edge of Paris, the scars were still visible.
Then the army had come, and Paris had become a battleground.
If the cured had stayed stupid, mankind would have had a chance. But for the cured it was evolution on the edge. They learned fast. The older ones, weeks old, became cunning. While the newly cured ran straight into gunfire to be torn down and torched with the army’s flamethrowers, the older ones bided their time. They watched.
By the time someone made the call to burn the city down, it was too late.
Paris was a graveyard. Blasted rubble stood in place of headstones.
It was an eerie, foreboding sight.
Tom stared into space, his duty forgotten for a moment. Marie waved frantically to him from her hiding place across the street, but all he saw was fire. He could hear the screams.
The screaming haunted his dreams still, twenty-six years after the fall of man.
A small stone hit Tom in the head and brought him back to the present with a curse.
He saw Marie gesturing wildly at him.
Wanker.
Marie was French, Tom was English, but some sign language was universal.
He signalled back, letting her know he was OK, with his middle finger. She smiled.
Daydreaming out in the wastes. A fine way to get yourself killed.
He looked at Marie, questioning. She shook her head. She had seen nothing, either.
Tom steeled himself. He knew what he had to do.
He’d hoped it wouldn’t come to it, but it was his idea. He wouldn’t expect anyone else to do it.
He stood up as straight as he was able and drew a knife from the sheath at his hip. He gritted his teeth and slashed deep into his hand. The blood flowed freely. He held his hand out and let the wind take the scent.
There was little danger from the shamblers. They had died in the firestorm.
It was the elders they hunted.
Their hunger was more controlled. They would smell his blood, but he didn’t think they would rush in. Tom was planning on their cunning. No one was better at this than Tom. He was ideally suited for the job. He was old. A vampire would be able to hear his old heart beating out its broken rhythm from within his chest. The stab suits his team wore muffled their heartbeats. Tom wore only a ragged shirt and jeans. His gait would be uneven, because of a
To my knowledge, that was the first time I had died.
*
Chapter Six
Paris
Year 0026
Post Apocalypse
Tom Fallon crouched in the shell of a burned out building looking out over the city. Smoke no longer curled above the sky line. The city was a necropolis, abandoned by the living these past years. Even in the early days, when it had been ground zero for the plague that cured mankind of all disease and sickness but one, the living had fled to the countryside to escape the cured.
Tom wasn’t watching for people. He watched for vampires.
That was what they had called them in the first few years. There had been hope, then. The televisions had still worked. But the trappings of man soon failed. The radio had been the last to fall, but even radios needed power.
The infection spread to the city, then the world. People were slow to learn. At first it was merely horrific. You could tell them apart. They were shambling and stupid. Their hunger made them idiots with only the most basic of functions – eat and breathe. It was the hunger that drove them on.
The police were called to the first few outbreaks. They would arrive in their armoured vans, guns at the ready. The shooting would start and the cured would fall. But they rose again. The cured came on, unstoppable as the tide. The flesh they tore from the police gave them strength and drove them on. The infection could not be contained.
Tom could see the results all around. Here, on the eastern most edge of Paris, the scars were still visible.
Then the army had come, and Paris had become a battleground.
If the cured had stayed stupid, mankind would have had a chance. But for the cured it was evolution on the edge. They learned fast. The older ones, weeks old, became cunning. While the newly cured ran straight into gunfire to be torn down and torched with the army’s flamethrowers, the older ones bided their time. They watched.
By the time someone made the call to burn the city down, it was too late.
Paris was a graveyard. Blasted rubble stood in place of headstones.
It was an eerie, foreboding sight.
Tom stared into space, his duty forgotten for a moment. Marie waved frantically to him from her hiding place across the street, but all he saw was fire. He could hear the screams.
The screaming haunted his dreams still, twenty-six years after the fall of man.
A small stone hit Tom in the head and brought him back to the present with a curse.
He saw Marie gesturing wildly at him.
Wanker.
Marie was French, Tom was English, but some sign language was universal.
He signalled back, letting her know he was OK, with his middle finger. She smiled.
Daydreaming out in the wastes. A fine way to get yourself killed.
He looked at Marie, questioning. She shook her head. She had seen nothing, either.
Tom steeled himself. He knew what he had to do.
He’d hoped it wouldn’t come to it, but it was his idea. He wouldn’t expect anyone else to do it.
He stood up as straight as he was able and drew a knife from the sheath at his hip. He gritted his teeth and slashed deep into his hand. The blood flowed freely. He held his hand out and let the wind take the scent.
There was little danger from the shamblers. They had died in the firestorm.
It was the elders they hunted.
Their hunger was more controlled. They would smell his blood, but he didn’t think they would rush in. Tom was planning on their cunning. No one was better at this than Tom. He was ideally suited for the job. He was old. A vampire would be able to hear his old heart beating out its broken rhythm from within his chest. The stab suits his team wore muffled their heartbeats. Tom wore only a ragged shirt and jeans. His gait would be uneven, because of a
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