Purification

security and shelter. A quiet, simple life with his basic needs satisfied. A roof over his head and Emma by his side was all that it boiled down to.

35
    Just after six o’clock the following morning, Gary Keele stood between two of the smaller buildings on the airfield, out of sight of the numerous survivors who were now moving between the observation tower, the office building and the helicopter and plane. This time he wasn’t hiding from them, he just didn’t want the others to see him. He was literally sick with nerves. He’d already thrown up twice and the sudden cramps in his gut seemed to indicate that he was about to vomit for a third time. He hadn’t eaten anything since late yesterday evening and his stomach was empty, but the thought of flying the plane instantly made the bile rise in his throat again.
    His legs shaking, Keele crouched down and spat into the overgrown grass and weeds at his feet, trying to clear the sour, stinging taste of vomit from his mouth. This was stupid, he thought to himself. He had literally hundreds of flying hours under his belt, so why was he so worked up about making this flight now? If anything, flying to the island should have been easier than most of his previous flights - apart from the helicopter piloted by Lawrence the skies were otherwise empty. Was it the responsibility of carrying so many passengers and having them relying completely on him that was causing his nerves? That could well have been the reason. In his job as a tug plane pilot at a gliding centre he’d previously almost always flown alone and had no-one’s safety to worry about but his own. Or was it because he’d been in the air when the disease had first struck that he now found the thought of flying so hard? On the first morning he’d been tugging the fourth out of five gliders into the air when they’d started falling out of the sky around him.
    Get a fucking grip, he thought to himself, forcing himself to stand upright again. Suddenly determined he took a deep breath and marched to the edge of the building but then stopped the moment the plane came back into view. He pushed himself flat against the nearest wall, a cold, nervous sweat prickling his brow once again. He had to do this. He had to make himself do this. He knew he didn’t have any choice. Never mind the rest of them, if he didn’t get in that bloody plane and fly it then he was stuck at the airfield too.
    ‘Finally, here he is,’ Richard Lawrence grinned as Keele walked purposefully past him and towards the plane. ‘You feeling all right, Tuggie?’
    Keele didn’t hear him, concentrating instead on trying to rise above his fear and focussing on the task ahead.
    Lawrence looked over at Cooper and shrugged his shoulders.
    ‘Don’t knock it,’ Cooper whispered, ‘at least he’s here.
    As long as he gets that bloody plane up in the air I don’t care what state he’s in.’
    The two men stood and watched as Keele climbed into the cockpit of the plane and began to nervously run through his series of pre-take-off checks. In the back of the aircraft twelve equally nervous survivors sat strapped in their seats, surrounded (as they had been for more than half an hour now) by all the bags and boxes of useful supplies the group had been able to safely cram inside. Five more people, Donna and Clare included, emerged from the office building. With her arm wrapped around the shoulder of Dean McFarlane, the youngest survivor at only eight years of age, Clare made her way over to the plane.
    ‘You make sure you don’t do anything stupid when you get there,’ Jack Baxter shouted to her from where he stood next to Cooper at the edge of the runway.
    ‘I won’t, don’t worry,’ she smiled as she buckled up her safety belt. She glanced across at him nervously. ‘I’ll send you a postcard. Let you know what the place is like!’
    ‘Don’t bother,’ Baxter grinned, taking a couple of steps forward so that he could be sure she was safely strapped in.
    ‘We’re all planning on being over there with you in a few days time. I’ll be with you before the postcard gets here!’
    Keele emerged from the cockpit of the plane. He climbed out onto the runway again and looked up and down the length of the aircraft and then up into the sky, obviously psyching himself up for the flight. Richard Lawrence turned and spoke to Donna who was stood nearby, watching anxiously.
    ‘Looks like we’re ready,’ he said, taking hold of her arm and