by Frank Tayell
“I don’t know if you’ll find it here,” he said. To the west was a grey stone building with a peeling-paint second-storey extension. To the east, an ancient stone wall held back a thicket of wind-battered trees. Ahead, the road widened into a branching set of junctions around a grass triangle hosting an empty flagpole.
“Where are the road signs?” Siobhan asked. “Do you see that varnished wooden building to the northeast? It looks like a community centre.”
“Those curtains look more like someone’s home,” he said. “Want to break in?”
“Not yet. We need a map. We’ll look for the Hotel Tórshavn. Assuming it hasn’t been torn down, it should be around here somewhere.”
“The trees have taken more of a battering than the houses,” Sholto said, stepping over a branch a storm had ripped from a rooftop-high pine. “And no one’s cleared the branch from the road. Still, that’s a good sign.”
“That no one’s tidied away the fallen branches?”
“No, that trees can grow here. That grass doesn’t look healthy, but the trees are still alive.”
“You know where this reminds me of?” Siobhan said.
“Nowhere I’ve ever been,” Sholto said, glancing up at the windows. All were dark, but all were intact. “Are you thinking of Ireland?”
“Initially, yes. I was thinking of Connemara, but the more I see, the more I’m reminded of northern Germany.”
“You were working a case there?”
“Missing person, that’s how most of the liaison work began. They rarely ended with the happy discovery of a living soul. So many young people took advantage of freedom of movement, travelling wide-eyed, innocent, and far too trusting to a foreign land. Yes, that’s where this reminds me of. Northern Germany, on a Sunday evening. A small town, shut but not shuttered. Apparently deserted. All that’s missing are the press vans. That’s why everyone was hiding inside, you see?”
“It was a murder case?”
“A serial killer. They found the body while my flight was in the air. Dismembered. The limbs were displayed around the corpse in the basement of an abandoned house. The victim was a nurse. Twenty-one years old. She was working in a care home on the edge of town. When word spread, everyone, all the locals, locked themselves inside. No one went out, not even to speak to their neighbours. It was quickly linked to seven other, similar, murders over the previous decade, each in a different country in the union. I shared what I knew, but it was little enough, and I was back on a plane a day later. French police took the lead, since they’d been tracking the killer the longest. But that’s what it reminds me of. Except for the press vans.”
“Did they catch the killer?”
“Yes, but they didn’t have the evidence to prove it. Not in court. Fortunately, if that’s the right word, there was a pursuit in which the murderer ran over a pedestrian. Killed him. So he was in prison for manslaughter while further evidence was sought. His name was Dernier.”
“Dernier?” Sholto stopped, and turned to face her. “That’s one of the names Chester mentioned. One of the cartel thugs who attacked that town in France.”
“Which is probably why northern Germany is on my mind,” she said. “You know what his alibi was? They found similar victims in Australia while he was in custody.”
“So he was just a copycat?”
“Or the Australian cases were the work of such a fiend. But the man’s dead, so he faced justice in the end. In the very end.”
Silence settled between them, matching the near silence of the town. Branches creaked. Water dripped from blocked pipes down to stoppered gutters. No birds cawed. There was no rustle of cloth against necrotic skin, but that wasn’t as reassuring as it should have been.
“There, ahead, do you see the glass?” Siobhan asked. It glistened in the rain, on the pavement outside a boarded-up window.
“A shop, I suppose,” Sholto said. He tried the door. “Locked. That’s more like it. Shall we?”
“A spot of retail therapy? Why not?”
He drew the hatchet from his belt. An elongated triangle of steel with a curving handle he’d re-wrapped in easily discarded cloth. One blow, and the lock was broken. “Not that well secured.” He took out his torch, and shining it before him, stepped inside. “No one’s looted this place. We’ve got sports equipment. Mostly clothing. Active-wear. Track-pants and tops on this rack.”
“And shoes still in the storeroom,” Siobhan said from the doorway behind the register. “About a hundred pairs, a mix of trainers and hiking boots. Six larger boxes, too. They’ve been opened, but the contents were left behind. Clothing, all lightweight and colourful. At a guess, I would say that was part of their spring and summer range, delivered in February, ready to be displayed in March or April. They boarded the window, but didn’t take the clothing. Did they not need it? Or was it simply unsuitable for the weather at the time? It must have been suitable in the months since, so that gives us an idea of when this island was abandoned. Closer to the outbreak than the summer.”
“And it gives us an idea of the post-outbreak numbers on the island,” Sholto said. “At its peak, it was probably less than the original population. Probably a lot less. Otherwise, every scrap of clean cloth would have been worn.”
“And every hotel bed slept in,” Siobhan said. “That’s what’s missing outside: bones. If a great number of people were here, we’d expect to see the remains. We should check a few churches, but, for now…” She looked behind the counter. “No maps, so for now, let’s go find another hotel.”
“Churches?” Sholto asked as they pulled the door closed behind them.
“You must have seen that in your travels, how people sometimes went to church to commit suicide.”
“It could be there is no grim story to be told on these islands,” Sholto said. “Perhaps this place, unique out of all those visited by survivors we’re in contact with, is empty and safe.”
Siobhan didn’t deign to answer.
The houses had given way to a shopping district. That was obvious from the ground-to-ceiling windows. From the chairs and tables stacked behind some of the broad panes, cafes and restaurants dominated, but the doors were all unlocked. After checking the third, and finding nothing left inside to loot, they continued on.
“Unlocked means empty,” Siobhan said as they took another turning. “They were systematic. That’s another clue as to their numbers, and confirmation that they were locals, not more recent arrivals like ourselves. I think we’re lost.”
“We can’t be lost if we don’t know where we’re going,” he said.
“No, but we don’t want anyone else to come look for us. We should go back, concentrate our search for a map on the private homes near the hotel. Paper leaflets by a cash register are an obvious thing to grab to start a fire, but they can’t have burned every book in the town.”
“No, hang on,” Sholto said. “Ahead, beyond that odd statue in the middle of the road? Do you see what I see?”
“Cars,” Siobhan said.
There were three. High-arched, four-doored, splattered with mud, dripping with rain, parked in a line outside a granite-and-glass building.
“That’s something,” Siobhan said. “So what do we have here? Shops? Offices? Apartments?”
“Municipal buildings?” Sholto said. Then he heard it. A bang. A scrape. Behind the first car, in the gap between it and the vehicle beyond, a figure unfolded, knocking into the exhaust, the bonnet, the boot, as the zombie rose from its sedentary crouch.
Sholto raised his rifle as the zombie lurched forwards, splaying itself across the car’s boot. Claw-like fingers screeched across the metalwork, as it dragged itself across the car and into the road. Two arms, two legs, one head, it was almost human. Almost. Hair sloughed from its scalp. Peeling skin slackly flapped from its face. Its jaw hung loose while the remains of its swollen tongue lolled from its open mouth. Sholto fired. The zombie sprawled to the ground.
“Left is clear, front clear,�
� he said.
“Right and rear, clear,” Siobhan said, as they moved closer together, back-to-back, rifles sweeping in a hundred-and-eighty-degree arc.
“Underneath the cars,” Sholto said. “I’ll check, you cover?” He began to kneel, then winced. “You check, I’ll cover.”
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Just stiff.”
She bent, looking under one car then the next, while he kept watch.
“Nothing,” she said. “I think it was alone.”
Finally, they crossed to the corpse.
“Its clothing isn’t worn,” Sholto said. “It’s muddy, but those aren’t rags beneath.”
“Can you tell what colour the blood is?” Siobhan asked. “Is that black, or is it red-brown?”
“Couldn’t say. You’re thinking of what Chester and Bill were told by that professor in France?”
“Only out of curiosity,” she said, crossing to the first of the cars. “Door’s unlocked,” she said, opening it. “There’s… a bag in the back. A knife, a felling axe. A shovel. Some water bottles. A lot of junk. Keys are in the ignition.” She turned the key. They both jumped when the engine roared to life. “I wasn’t expecting that,” she said. She peered at the dash. “Half a tank.” She let the engine run for a moment longer, then switched it off. “The battery isn’t flat. Try the other cars.”
The keys were in the ignition, and each started first time. “No more than three months,” Sholto said. “That’s how long they’ve been here, and probably a lot less than that.”
“Right,” Siobhan said, crossing back to the body. “No holster. Nothing unusual in his clothing.” She drew her knife, and began peeling away the sodden garments. “Too much skin is gone to tell how he was infected, but he didn’t infect himself.”
“No,” Sholto said. “There’s at least one more zombie out here, and that’s important news to take back to the others. At the same time, why did three cars come here?”
“There’s no antennas on the roofs,” Siobhan said. “No barricades in the street. Can you see any bullet casings?”
“None.”
“They stopped for something,” she said. “Maybe it’s whatever is in that grey building. What does that sign say? Býarbókasvaniđ.”
“Never seen an accent on a y before,” Sholto said. “And is that a d at the end, or an o? Want to take a look?”
“Cautiously,” Siobhan said. She glanced behind. “The hotel is down there, then the first left, straight on, then right near that flagpole, yes?”
“I think so.”
“Then let’s take a look inside.”
Chapter 10 - Reference & Research
Tórshavn, The Faroe Islands
“Well, what was inside?” Private Torres asked.
“Were there any more zombies?” Reg asked.
“No zombies,” Sholto said, reaching into his pack. He pulled out a handful of paperbacks and placed them on the tables they’d pulled together between the sofas in the hotel’s lounge. “It’s a library.”
“A legal thriller,” Reg said, picking up the topmost book. “Ah, this is more like it. A Short History of the Faroe Islands.” He flipped through the pages as Gloria and Torres began sorting the other books.
“This is an… eclectic selection,” Gloria said politely.
“The English language section was nearly untouched,” Siobhan said. “About three hundred books. Quite a lot of classics, and a few more of the learn-to-read-the-language types. Some popular histories, but mostly about World War Two or the Royals. We grabbed what we thought would be most useful.”
“And a thriller,” Gloria said.
Sholto picked up the book. “I started reading it on my way across the Atlantic, but lost it over the side before I finished. I want to know how it ends.”
“The main part of the library, the books in Faroese and Danish, had a lot more books missing,” Siobhan said. “Most of the non-fiction books were gone. The more practical ones, anyway. Engineering, mathematics, histories. There isn’t a single book on farming or gardening. Rather, the shelves where they should be are empty. I have no idea how to read Danish, let alone Faroese, but the Dewey Decimal System was our friend, at least in identifying the categories that were of most interest to the locals. There were some gaps in the English section, and it was the same with Norwegian, Swedish, and Russian. Does that tell us the nationality of the readers, or does it tell us what languages they could read? I can’t say.”
“What about the cars?” Toussaint asked. “Did the passengers go to the library?”
“Impossible to tell,” Siobhan said. “There was a ton of mud on the carpet. A lot of people went there, but we could tell that from the gaps on the shelves. Inside, there was a cafe, but it was as empty as the others we looked in. To summarise, we found three cars, all with over half a tank of fuel. Diesel, in all three cases. The batteries are live, so they haven’t been there long. We saw one zombie, but that man didn’t infect himself. There could be more, unless the survivors killed the others who were infected. But in which case, where are the bodies? In short, we’ve got some books and a lot more questions.”
“And a sportswear store with some clothing still inside,” Sholto added. “What about you? What did you learn?”
“There’s a bus terminal down at the harbour,” Toussaint said. “That section of the harbour is for ferries, both vehicle and passenger, for larger ships, and judging by the small crane, for freight. There’s some useful equipment there, but nothing for fishing. Those craft must have docked on the other side of the bay. What Torres did find was fuel.”
“What kind?” Sholto asked.
“Two tanks, one of diesel, one of marine-oil,” Toussaint said. “Presumably for the ferries and freighters.”
“How much was there?” Siobhan asked.
“We don’t know,” Toussaint said. “The gauges require electricity. There’s a generator, but it’s empty. To fill it, we need diesel.”
“And you found that, in the cars,” Torres said. “We can drive one down to the harbour, syphon some out of the tank, get the generator working, then pump up as much as we need. We could have light and heat if we move down there.”
“We could,” Siobhan said. “And we should find out how much fuel is there. But is that where the cars came from? Rather, is that where the fuel in their tanks came from? And in which case, if there is fuel in the harbour, why didn’t the ships take it when they left? Rather, why didn’t they stay until there was only enough fuel left to take them away? Ah, there are too many questions.”
“Do the answers matter?” Toussaint asked. “We’ve seen only one zombie between us. The buildings are mostly intact. It’d be great if the lights worked, or there was food on the shelves, but I’d say our glass is three-quarters full.”
“We came to the wrong island,” Reg said, holding up the book.
“I’m sorry?” Siobhan asked.
“We want the hydroelectric plant, yes?” Reg said. “Well, there’s more than one. Bill implied that, didn’t he? That the island was moving towards one hundred percent renewables? Well, we came to the wrong island.” He laid the book down on the table. “This photograph shows the monitoring station for the Botnur hydroelectric dam. It says it’s an unmanned facility, monitored from the control room at the dam near Eiđi.”
“Where’s Eiđi?” Toussaint asked.
Reg turned to the front of the book and unfolded the cover to show a map of the islands. “We are here, in Tórshavn, on the southern tip of the island of Streymoy. Eiđi is here, on the northern tip of the island of Eysturoy, the island to the immediate east, and I think the second largest of the islands. There is a bridge connecting it with this one.”
“How far away is that bridge?” Siobhan asked. “What’s the scale of that map? Right, so the bridge is forty kilometres north, but that’s in a straight line, and no roads will run direct on such a hilly island. And Eiđi is another fifteen kilometres north of there.”
>
“And here,” Toussaint said. “This island to the west, that symbol means what I think, right? The airport is on that island. What’s it called? Vágar. Is that a bridge, linking that island with this one?”
“So the airport is on one island, the main harbour on another, the electrical grid runs from a third,” Siobhan said.
“As I said, we came to the wrong island,” Reg said.
“We have three cars,” Siobhan said. “So, tomorrow, we can split into three teams. One to go to the harbour, to refill that generator and see how much fuel remains. They can do some fishing and search some of the houses. We won’t find food in the shops, but we might find it in the homes. The second team will go to the airport. Search some of the remote houses on the way there, but it would be useful to know if the runway is intact, clear, or can be easily repaired. Check if there’s any aviation fuel left, and confirm the bridge is intact. Third team goes north, to the hydroelectric plant. If that island is like this one, if the hydroelectric plant is undamaged, maybe we can turn it back on. And if we can, we should relocate there, and that’s where the Amundsen should come on its return. Anyone object? Thaddeus?”
“Hmm?” He lowered the paperback where he was trying to find the place he’d reached all those months before. “No, sounds good. But keep reading, Reg, see what else you can find out. We better call the admiral, and check in. I’d say we’ve good news to report.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Siobhan said.
“It’s not bad news,” Sholto said. “So why worry them with our questions? Call her, let’s get a fire going, and then we can talk through what we saw today, see if we can’t figure out a few more answers.”
Day 263, 1st December
Chapter 11 - The Dead Farm
The Island of Streymoy, The Faroe Islands
The next morning, the road outside the library was as empty as when he and Siobhan had left it the afternoon before. The zombie still lay where it had fallen, and the cars still rusted where they’d been abandoned.