Designated (Book 2): Designated Quarantined by Ricky Cooper Page B

human. He thrashed violently as the distorted, pustule-covered face of his fellow human snapped down at him. Clumps of flesh and offal hung from its teeth; the squirming tendrils slithered over Kevin's skin and his gorge rose, bursting from his mouth in a fountain of bile and stomach acid. The Infected woman recoiled as the caustic mix of his lunch and bodily fluids scorched her already battered airways.
 
    Her face twisted as she clawed at her throat, the stale flaking dregs of the hospital's re-heated shepherd's pie encrusting her lips. Thin red lines trailed down her constricting neck, the misted bile and stomach acid scouring the inside of her oesophagus, sealing the walls of her throat together like paste over paper. His mind boiled in his skull as he ran through the entirety of his self-defence training. Curling his fists, he let his thumbs jut outwards as he drove them forwards, smashing them into its eyes. Her ocular balls burst as he pushed forwards with as much strength as he could manage. He felt the lenses crumple as his thumbs carved their way forwards; the aqueous humours oozed over his thumbs as he continued to push.
 
    A sharp jet of warm clear gel shot over his hand as he clasped the sides of her head and threw his weight sideways. Her screams echoed down the hall as his thumbs dug deeper inside her skull. He jerked his head from side to side as her hand clawed at his shoulders and chest. Her pain-drenched flails doubled as he forced his thumbs past the soft, porous sheath of bone in the back of her eye sockets.
 
    His nails grated against the sides of her eye sockets as he pushed, shards of bone snatching and pulling at his already torn nails as he rolled his body over; with an almost primal growl, Kevin drove her head into the floor. The dull crack of her skull echoed like a popping eggshell as he crushed it against the melamine-covered concrete.
     
    Kevin flopped back, his heels digging painfully into his backside as he tried to pull his legs from under him. His hands sank down, the grit and broken glass from the wall displays scraping at his skin. He snatched them up, fear coursing through him as he looked at his hands covered in the bloody remnants of the dead Infected's eyes. He tentatively reached forwards, peeling the smeared remains of the Infected woman's eye lens from the end of his thumb, the thin membrane sheet slid from his finger like a piece of plastic, cold and slippery to the touch. Reaching into the remains of his coat, he pulled out a bottle of disinfectant gel and squeezed; the cold, viscous fluid dribbled into his palm as he emptied the entire bottle. The cooling tingle settled into his hands as he smeared it over them, desperate to get the layers of filth off his body.
     
    His eyes strayed from their task, his panicked, fear-laden stare travelling over the prostrate form mere feet away; the soft twitching of its feet sent a rhythmic squeak down the hall. Bile danced in Kevin's throat as he gazed at what he had done; the leaking mire of cranial fluid and pulped brain matter slowly inched its way towards him. It was as though the fluid was calling out, screaming at him for an explanation as to why he had, for the second time that day, desecrated his Hippocratic oath and taken another life.
 
    Janet slowly eased the door open; the soft hush of the draught excluder seemed to tear at her ears as it invaded the soft silence that now fell over their sanctuary. She let her eyes drift, her mind soaking in all that lay before her. Turning, she ushered the children into a corner, desperate to keep them from seeing the tableau that awaited the unwary.
     
     
    Pulling the door closed behind her, she reached out, setting her hand on Kevin's shoulder. His hands were still pawing and turning as he smeared the gum-like paste of blood, tissue, and disinfectant gel across his rapidly reddening skin.
     
    'Kevin?' Her feather-light, encroaching whisper drew his eyes to hers. The shock-filled orbs