by Frank Tayell
“I wrote code,” she said.
“I guessed that. What kind?”
“An air traffic control system,” she said. “That was one of them. Kempton got the contract to produce a new global tracking system. You know she has her own satellites?”
“Not until you told me.”
“I designed an air traffic control system, but she wanted a way to alter it after the fact. Not to make it so planes could disappear, but so they appeared to have come from somewhere else.”
“Why would anyone want to—” he began. “Oh. When we flew in, it was direct from Hawaii, but the pilot, or whoever he was, he said to say we came in via Cairns.”
“Sorry. You can blame me for that. When I realised that’s what I’d done… I mean, I knew what I’d done, obviously, but not why I’d been asked to create it, if that makes sense? I’d given Kempton a way to make an international flight appear to be an internal one, at least to a casual observer. I knew Kempton was up to something, because that’s why Tom Clemens got me the job with her. But that’s when I started to understand everything else she’d asked me to do. It’s when I started digging. Most days I wished I hadn’t.”
“How long have you been out here?”
“Four years. But as far as the official records go, I emigrated ten years ago, became a citizen five years ago.”
“Don’t people ask why you’re here, though?”
“I just tell them about our childhood,” she said. “That’s the reason I give. They don’t ask questions after that.”
“Ah.”
Matilda finished drinking, straightened, turned towards them, then bounded away.
“But what do you do out here?”
“Fix the fence. It keeps the dingoes to the north, away from the farms in the south. Five thousand six hundred and fourteen kilometres of machine-made steel and hand-planted wood. It’s beautiful.”
“A fence is beautiful?”
“All that research into silicon and software, all the money to fund wars, and the longest structure in the world is a fence to help farmers. There’s beauty in the elegant simplicity of it. Beauty and hope.”
“You look after all of that on your own?”
“No. Though I wish I did. Do you see the mast? There’s that and forty-four others to keep an eye on. I use it for the radio, but the university set it up for some climate monitoring experiments. Then there are the archaeologists. There’s a site about ten miles south of here that’s about fifty thousand years old. Doctor Dodson brings up the rock-polishers. Makes sure they stay respectful of his ancestors. That’s how we met. I met Anna, too. She came up to see the site herself. Nice woman. Driven. Trustworthy. Honest.”
“There’s no way I’ll see Olivia again, is there?”
“Probably not.”
“It’ll be detention in Australia. In some federal cell.”
“Probably. But it’ll be more like witness protection. You haven’t done anything wrong. Were you and Olivia dating?”
“No. We were going to have drinks just before Kempton arrived in her car. I dunno. Maybe I was mistaken. Maybe there was nothing there.”
“From the way she was looking at you in that photo at New Year’s, I’d say there was. Personally, I like to hold onto the good memories. Some days, they’re all I have.”
“There weren’t many of them,” he said. “Not growing up.”
“Do you remember that time, you were ten, we went to the amusement park? You ate all that cotton candy.”
“I remember feeling sick.”
“It was a nice day,” she said. “Maybe nicer for me.” She sighed. “There’s something else I should do. One last thing. Stay and wait for the sunset. You won’t see one like it anywhere in the world.”
Chapter 5 - Outbreak
The Outback
Pete’s gaze wandered from stunted trees to scrubby grass to the lengthening shadows cast by cacti that almost looked like prickly pears, but surely couldn’t be, not here in Australia. Perhaps, if the vista had been less unfamiliar, the weather more what he thought of as normal, he’d be better able to make sense of what his sister had said. Corrupt politicians and murderous gangsters plotting a nuclear war? Surely that wasn’t how the world really was. Surely not. The landscape offered neither confirmation or denial, and certainly no comfort, and so, as the sun eased towards the horizon, he retreated inside.
Seeking an echo of familiarity, he turned on the television. The set was as battered and ancient as the chairs, and so was the American sitcom currently airing. It was too great a reminder of all he had, apparently, lost, so he flipped through the channels until he found the opening credits for a late night show. Expecting a news satire, he frowned when the opening monologue produced no studio laughter. Understanding dawned as he realised it was a programme on art and history. He was about to turn back to the sitcom when he caught the name of the host’s first guest, Anna Dodson.
A woman in a cream-white suit walked onto the stage. The polite applause faded as the host finished his introduction, and picked up a book.
“Your new book is called Pioneers in Democracy, The First Hundred Years,” the host said. “But it only begins with the start of the First World War. The title itself implies that there will be another hundred years and that what went before can be discounted.”
“Not discounted,” Anna Dodson said. “But empires are not democracies. How can they be when they’re based on the notion that some people’s voices, their opinions, their votes, their lives, are of lesser value than others? At some point, we have to say the past is history. It shouldn’t be forgotten, but in fixing our eyes too far back, in focusing on millennia of cultural rise and fall, we have little time for the present, and none at all for the future. We risk being lulled into the fallacy that our species’ progress has been a straight path advancing through enlightenment and equality to the here and now, that democracy is both inevitable and permanent. It is not.”
“Give me an example,” the host said.
“How about the by-election in Wentworth?” she said. That got a chuckle from the audience.
Pete sat down, listening curiously. The names of places and politicians meant nothing to him, but he was more interested in the shape and tone of her words. Soon, Anna Dodson would hold his life in her hands.
After a few minutes, the host abruptly raised his hand.
“I’m sorry, I’ve got to stop you there. We’re getting—”
Before the host could finish, the screen switched to a news desk. Behind it sat a dishevelled anchor, still adjusting her microphone, a sheet of tissue paper stuck beneath her collar. She snatched the paper away as she turned to the camera. There was a moment of silence as she scanned the words on the teleprompter. She licked her lips, nodded, and began.
“Reports are just coming in of a viral outbreak in Manhattan, New York,” she said, her voice trembling. She coughed, clearing her throat. “It’s currently 07:31 there, local time. Eyewitness accounts and video footage being uploaded to social media appear to show…” She paused, took a deep breath, and continued. “Appear to show infected people attacking one another. No official confirmation has been received, nor an official diagnosis. So far it has been confined to…”
But Pete had stopped listening. It was the start of some movie, that had to be it. He reached for the remote, thumped the buttons, and when nothing happened, got up and found the button on the set. When he saw a sitcom playing on the next channel, he relaxed. It was a movie, that was all. A weird one, sure, for it to begin with an interview with a real politician. They must do things differently in Australia.
He flipped to the next channel, and saw what appeared to be shaky phone-footage of a man staggering along the sidewalk. Skinny, with clothes to fit, his jacket and shirt were almost shredded and entirely covered in blood. More blood covered his face, utterly obscuring his features. A few yards in front, the door to a coffee bar flew open. A woman in a green pantsuit, headscarf, and heels ran out, her
eyes fixed on what was still inside. Her foot slipped and her left high-heel spun from her foot. She slipped, falling to hands and knees. The blood-covered man reached out to help, but seemed to trip and fall on top of her.
But he hadn’t fallen. He’d lunged, mouth open. His teeth tore into the woman’s flesh as his hands grabbed and clawed. The footage abruptly cut out and the image switched back to a studio and an ashen-faced anchor.
“Pete? Watch this,” Corrie said, and Pete jumped. He’d not heard her approach. She placed the laptop in front of him.
“Is it New York?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“I think I’ve just seen it,” he said. “It’s fake, right? A hoax? It’s not real?”
“What do you think?”
“It is real?” he asked.
She pressed play.
Two police cars had stopped askew across a junction. Four officers stood with sidearms drawn, their weapons braced on the roofs of their vehicles. Behind them hovered half a dozen civilians armed with bats and brooms. One civilian, a woman wearing chef’s whites, held a cleaver. Only when the police began firing did Pete realise there was no sound.
The angle of the camera was off by forty degrees, and initially didn’t show the officers’ targets. The screen moved, blurred, then refocused on two-dozen blood-soaked figures staggering along the street. In suits and skirts, jeans and workout-gear, there was no uniformity in their clothing, or ages, only in the blood coating their snarling faces.
A police officer began wildly gesticulating. Perhaps it was an instruction to stop. Perhaps it was something far more primeval. The cops opened fire. The lurching figures staggered as bullets impacted against their chests, their arms, but they kept moving. Then one fell.
“Head shot,” Corrie whispered. “It has to be a head shot.”
Another fell, but the remaining monsters marched closer, with ever more slouching into frame until, abruptly, the screen went blank.
“What happened?” Pete asked.
“The guy with the camera decided to stop recording and run,” Corrie said.
“What’s going on, Corrie?” Pete asked, not really expecting an answer, but simply voicing his confusion. “It looks… It looks like…”
“Zombies,” she said. “That’s what people are calling it.”
“It’s not, is it? What is it really?”
“Guess,” she said.
“How could I guess? How could I know? Wait, you mean— That thing, that vaccine they were demonstrating in New York, is that what it is?”
“It isn’t the vaccine, but it’s connected,” she said. “It has to be. The coincidence is too great for them to be unrelated. But at the same time, who would deliberately release this on the world? The cartel? The politicians? Kempton?”
Pete leaned back in the chair, and his eyes fell on the muted TV. It showed a different street, a different group of people, but it was the same story. Someone coated in blood attacked someone else, killed them, and then moved on. And then he saw the victim drag themselves to their feet and, dripping blood from the stump of their hand, lurch along the street in pursuit of the still living.
“Zombies,” he muttered. “They’re zombies.”
“Call them that if it helps,” she said. “I don’t think it does.”
“What does this mean?” he said. “Should we stay? Go? What do we do? We should do something.”
“Like what? I’m going back online to see what I can find out.”
“Maybe they’ll get control of things in a few more hours,” Pete said. “That’s New York, right? If anywhere can deal with this, it’s there.”
“Maybe,” Corrie said. She picked up the laptop and retreated back to the table by the window.
Pete turned back to the TV, shocked, confused, refusing to accept that the impossible had happened, and a nightmare walked the streets of New York.
Chapter 6 - The Phony Apocalypse
The Outback
20th February
After an hour, Pete switched off the TV, lay down on the sofa, and closed his eyes, but the violent scenes of walking death stayed with him. He sat up, turned the TV back on, but walked over to the window, watching the darkness outside. There were stars, and he wished he’d learned their names. His eye was caught by the radio mast’s red and white blinking lights. He wished he’d learned how radio worked. Or TV. Or anything and everything. It truly felt as if he’d never now get the chance. He returned to the chair, the television, and to the same scenes repeated over and over again.
As the Australian night headed towards morning, and the American day moved towards night, the footage was edited, trimmed, and sanitised. The anchors were replaced with calmer voices, but that didn’t change the reality of what they were reporting. Nor did the new and more professionally shot footage offer any hope that, with time, the authorities in New York were getting the nightmare under control. It became clear that no one knew precisely where and when the outbreak had occurred. Even he knew that was the first step to containing the horror.
He fetched himself a glass of water, then poured one for Corrie, and took it over to where she was still sitting by the window, hunched over her laptop.
“How bad is it?” he asked.
“It could be worse,” she said.
“They’re stopping it?”
“No. I mean that it’s getting worse, but it could get worse still. The police and military are acting against one another. One group will set up a barricade, and another will be told to abandon theirs. I think they’re receiving contradictory orders.” She leaned back and rubbed her eyes. “Sometimes people are infected and… and turn immediately. Sometimes they don’t. Does that mean they’re not infected? That some people are immune? Or is that wishful thinking? It’s too early to tell.”
“Have you seen any just die?” Pete asked. “On the TV, they’ve shown clips of people with arms missing, with open, oozing wounds that should mean instant death.”
“No, so far only those shot in the head haven’t risen back up. It spreads through saliva, I think. Through bites. Maybe through touch. I don’t know. It’s too soon to know anything. There’s no real information in what the government is saying. In anything any government is saying. How could there be? It doesn’t appear to be airborne. It might be, for all we know, but I don’t think so. But that’s one way this could get worse. Another is a collapse of the electricity infrastructure. The internet still works. The data-centres still have power. People are still uploading footage to social media. Comments, too, but I’m ignoring those. There’s too much rumour. Too much speculation. It’s hard to tell how far the outbreak has spread.”
“You mean it’s beyond Manhattan?”
“It’s beyond New York State,” she said. “They’re talking about destroying the bridges and tunnels, cutting Manhattan off, but they’ve left it too late.”
“What about South Bend?” he asked.
“I don’t think it’s reached Indiana yet,” she said. “But it will. Because people don’t turn symptomatic immediately, they get in their cars and drive. A few hours ago, they were still getting on trains. I think the airports are closed, but if there’s a plane on a runway, and a pilot wanting to flee, how would they stop them? And other than watching, there isn’t anything we can do. Life goes on, even now, which means we’ve got chores to do. Can you take some water out to Matilda? We had a little rain at the beginning of the month, but then this front moved in, and summer returned with a vengeance. If we don’t give her water, she might not find it. I’ll see if I can find you some more clothes. We’ll have some breakfast, take it from there.”
He filled a jug with water and took it outside, and into a world that was already heating up as the sun dragged itself up into a cloudless sky. Sweat blossomed on his neck, threatening to turn to a waterfall as it trickled down to the small of his back. He was in an oasis. Literally and figuratively. Though, considering hell had been unleashed a few thousand miles away, it was bet
ter to think of the calm as a mirage.
Matilda waited near her trough. As Pete took a slow step towards her, the kangaroo backed away, giving him a suspicious look.
“Just bringing you water,” he said, cautiously filling the trough. When he was done, he stepped back. She hadn’t moved, but had seemed to relax a little. Her head was cricked to one side, her hands loosely resting on each other in front of her chest. He backed off, but only when he was ten yards away did she bound toward the trough. In that moment, the anthropomorphic features once more became those of an animal.
“Okay, you’re a weird creature,” he said. She cricked her head towards him. “Weird but cool,” he added quickly. “Different, I mean. This is not how my morning usually goes. Usually I wake, make coffee, go for a shower, drink the coffee, get in the car, and go to work. Olivia brings breakfast to work, you see. Has done for the last six months. Huh. Never really thought about that before. She always brings me breakfast. Lunch, too, sometimes. Says I eat too much cereal, but that’s not why, is it?”
Matilda returned her attention to her water trough.
“Olivia would sure like a photo of this,” Pete said, and retreated another few steps, looking down to see where he was putting his feet. A black spider with a red stripe splashed across its back was sidling up his boot. Remembering the poster inside, he danced and shook, kicking the spider free. The sudden movement startled Matilda, too, and she jumped back a few paces, glared at him, then bounded away, across the red ochre plain. Pete quickly retreated back inside.
“Everything okay?” Corrie asked.
“I saw a spider,” he said. “I think it was this one,” he pointed at the poster. “A mouse spider.”
“No way,” she said. “Not out here.”
“It had red markings on its back,” he said.
“How big was it?”
“About an inch.”
“Then it was probably a redback.”
“Oh. Okay.” Then he saw that redbacks were on the poster, too. “The spiders don’t bother you?” he asked. “They used to. Growing up, you were terrified of them.”