The Rising - Chapter 117: 'Wake Up Daddy!'

‘Daddy! Wake up, Daddy!’

Jonnie woke up to find his daughter Poppy shaking his body as hard as she could with her tiny hands. He immediately sat up and grabbed her, hugging her, holding her tightly.

‘I’m here now, sweetheart. Everything’s going to be okay.’

Where the hell are we?

Jonnie looked around him. They were in a metal container. The doors were ajar, allowing faint artificial light from outside to spill inside. Everywhere he looked, he saw bodies lying on the metal floor.

The plane.

His last memory was injecting himself and his daughter with a mysterious yellow liquid. A yellow liquid given to him by that man on the plane.

Tom.

At least he knew he was right to trust the stranger. Both he and his daughter were alive. Jonnie didn’t feel any different. He rolled up his sleeves and checked his arms. Sure enough, there was a bruise on his left arm.

Shit. What the hell did they inject me with?

He didn’t want to hang around and find out what all the other bodies were infected with, especially if he and Poppy were temporarily immune. Jonnie got to his feet and took his daughter in his arms.

‘Come on, sweetheart, we’re getting out of here.’

He opened the door and jumped down from the edge of the container. They were in an almost-empty car park. Jonnie looked at his watch.

Just after five. Jesus, we’ve been out all night.

The thought of the plane crash hit him again. It must be all over the news. Poppy’s mother must be going mad with worry.

Jonnie headed for the door, hoping their surroundings would soon become familiar to him. He also knew that he somehow had to find Tom again. He had to know what happened on the plane. Why did those people do this to him?

Holding Poppy in one arm, he jogged up the stairs behind the door. As he reached the top, he spotted a single door at the end of the corridor ahead of him but the sight before him was the last thing he had expected as he opened it.

They found themselves standing at the back of a bustling department store. Jonnie instantly knew he was in the mall but he had no idea why. He blended into the crowd who were more bothered about searching for bargains in the early hours than a man and his daughter sneaking past them and out into the mall.

Jonnie’s feeling of complete helplessness turned to hope when he saw a face he recognised across the mall. Deep inside he knew that his presence couldn’t be a good thing. It was too much of a coincidence, but he didn’t want to think about that for now. All he cared about was getting help from someone who might know what they were doing there.

‘Tom!’ he shouted as he ran across the marble floor.

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