Chapter 3
The morning arrived, it was slightly over cast and lightly drizzling. I laid out and lit the fire pit and then put on the kettle while I made up a bigger than normal batch of damper bread ready for breakfast. Sarah came down from the roof tent with towel and wash kit and saw what I was doing and lit up. ‘I won’t be long then I’ll come back and help.’ I nodded my thanks. ‘Is Sue still asleep?’ She asked.
‘After weeks sleeping in the back seat of a car and now in a tent with a comfy matt and sleeping bag, she’s probably sleeping like a log.’
‘Don’t blame her then.’ She said as she headed for the showers.
I carried on with my breakfast preparations and before long there was movement and noise from Sue’s tent. ‘Fuck!’ Then general mumbling then ‘Fuck!’ Again as the zip to her tent burst open and she emerged with limbs flailing, part kneeling then standing up dressed in a white lace bra, white lace knickers and slim fit jeans that were halfway up her legs. ‘Mother fucker!’ she exclaimed again. ‘How in the fuck do you get dressed in something that bastard small?’
I was chuckling. ‘You don’t! it’s for sleeping not swinging cats around in!’
As she bent down to pull her jeans the rest of the way up, her pert arse protruded and wriggled in my direction. As she started to do her fly buttons up, she part turned towards me. ‘Oi mister, I am not your eye candy!’
I laughed again. ‘I’ve seen a damn sight worse before the apocalypse, never mind now. Glad I gave you such a small tent.’
She turned smiling her cheeky smile. ‘One for the wank bank later on then eh?’
‘Well if you see my hammock swinging and hear it creaking later on tonight that might answer your question!’
She faked a look of shock. ‘How rude! I’m almost blushing.’ Her smile disappeared momentarily as she pulled a purple sweat shirt of Sarah’s on to cover her white lace bra. The smile was still there as her head popped through the head hole and she threw back the hood, but the subject was now changed. ‘What’s for brekkie then?’
For me it was an uncomfortable husband bulge in my jeans I needed to hide and ever so many dirty, dirty thoughts. ‘Damper bread and jam.’ Before she could ask what that was Sarah appeared behind us.
‘It’s like cake, you’ll love it!’ Spoke Sarah.
Sue physically jumped and her head hit the tarp. ‘Bloody hell girl! Are you some kind of Ninja sneaking up on people like that? I never heard you creeping up!’
Sarah laughed, it was great to see her having fun and laughing since we got to the camp. The last week or so had done her the world of good being with people her own age. ‘After brekkie you can borrow my wash kit if you like? I can also do some washing for you if you like.’ As she looked at the sweat top Sue was wearing.
Sue looked at her and then me sheepishly as she realised it wasn’t my hoodie. ‘I’m sorry Sarah, I thought it was Brian’s.’
I laughed this time. ‘Trying to get into my clothes are you? So that’s why you have tracked me down, you just want me for my body! I’m truly shocked!’
Sarah went red. ‘Oh my god you two, get a room!’ And she went off to get the breakfast things ready.
I said to Sue. ‘We have got a memorial service at eleven for two guys we lost on a shopping trip and the people we lost the other night, then we will get together with Kev and camouflage and plan the finer details of how we go from here. That sound okay?’
‘One step at a time, I want to try this damper bread first!’
After breakfast we all went for our shit, shave, shower and shampoo routines. The men’s showers were back to being pine fresh and blood splatter free, though there was a broken tile on the floor where my crossbow bolt had gone right through the one zombie and hit the tile below. Sarah had told Sue that you only needed just a bit of the travel wash and not the whole bottle. Sarah and I shared a knowing nod at that information and Sue, seeing there was some kind of in joke there just looked at it sceptically and off she went to the showers.
The memorial service was out the back of the school in a bit of the meadow. It was a fairly simple affair compared to how they used to be in the previous world, no one was dressed in black mourning dress here today though, mainly because I doubt anyone thought about packing such suits and dresses when they were running for their lives from their house’s weeks ago. People had made an effort though by wearing their smartest clothing, having shaved and had their hair in at least some kind of style. Despite the rowdy meetings we had at the sports hall previously, everyone today was respectful, solemn and let those that were speaking do so unhindered by heckling. Each and every person we lost that day was spoken about, even if it was a few quick sentences, and that person had no family left at the school, everyone was remembered.
The grave was one long trench, dug by a mini digger due to the amount of bodies, but rather than be a mass grave as such that you used to see on the news or in history books, where each person was laid to rest they had a wooden head marker carved with their name and date of birth (if known) and date of death above them and each had a wreath of wild flowers from the meadow and edges of the fence. The light drizzle that was giving everyone assembled a beaded sparkle on their hair and clothes stopped towards the end of the speeches, but the sky didn’t really much brighten up. There was no twenty-one-gun salute as I’m not sure that was the right thing to do in this situation, plus we aren’t American and ammunition was quite depleted after the other night, but they did have a bugle call from one of the old teachers along with two minutes of silence. It was all very civilised and even quite moving if I do say so.
Sarah was there helping hand out plastic glasses of wine for the toast to all the fallen, most people got two glasses, it seems Sarah was quite generous with wine that wasn’t hers! I’d have to watch her when she was older and having teenage parties with my booze.
I Saw Croc in the crowd of mourners and he came over to myself and Sue on crutches, his one trouser leg was pinned up tight against the stump. He had a lot more colour about him, was clean shaven and looked like a different person altogether. He held out his hand and I took it; I had no problem with him. ‘Hey Brian, how are you doing after the other night?’ It was his way to break the ice and must have taken a bit of courage for him to do so. ‘They should have you, Kev and the other guys getting medals or some kind of recognition after that night, you all saved us.’
Sue was giving me an admiring look hearing this, and I was doing my best not to blush.
‘Mourning the dead instead of praising the living gives us more focus not to become one of their numbers I think, but I’m good thanks mate now I’ve had some quality sleep, how’s the stump coming along?’ Sue was listening intently; I had told her about the incident, but this was information from the horse’s mouth.
‘Well, the doctor asked if it had been done by a Napoleonic butcher stroke surgeon.’ He smiled and winked. ‘But without what you two did for me, I would be one of the undead by now, so I have nothing but thanks. I’m a bit off my tits on painkillers and antibiotics if I am honest at the moment so no wine for me, we haven’t much choice on what types of either we can use, not like we can pop out to the pharmacy like back in the day but it’s all good. Also one of the guys in the workshops is going to make me a leg that he thinks will allow me to walk without crutches.’ He smiled, and really did seem upbeat about his future.
‘Awesome, as I said the other morning when we dropped you off at the medical room, we would see how the new style NHS does and it seems to be doing pretty well!’ We shook hands again and both made our excuses to move on. Sue and I spoke to a few more people I kind of knew and I just introduced Sue as an old friend who had recently found me. I heard the doctor and Christopher talking about much needed medical supplies, confirming what Croc had just told us, and Christopher saying that he would ask Kev if a raid on a pharmacy could be handled. I liked the way he said he would ask. Although Christopher was pretty much in charge, he wasn’t one for
making people do things, especially if he himself couldn’t do them. He liked to defer to their experience and listen to them. I chuckled inwardly; he might now listen to what the security guys had been saying for weeks about checking people for bites at the gates etc from now on now though. Hind sight could be a bitch at times.
As people started to thin out after paying their respects to the graves, we also took our leave and headed back to camp and awaited Kev and Camouflage. We were on our second cup of tea as first camouflage and then Kev turned up, Sue got a brew on for them both and we all sat down. Sue with her rather full note pad. We all agreed on the message that we were to send, pretty much as what Camouflage had suggested yesterday. We would also say to them that we can meet at the golf course and give a copy of our video, notes and a vial of blood that they could take back, in return for ammunition and encrypted communications equipment. The encrypted communications were for getting back in contact once they had seen or tried out the blood for themselves. For security reasons Sue wouldn’t be coming with us to the meet. She and her secret were to be kept as so until they got back to us.
Camouflage, although the meet and location etc was his idea, was of the sceptical view that someone would still try and fuck us over, so he suggested an outline of a plan that would involve him going up to the woods the night before and secure the area with a few tricks he was keeping close to his chest, for the moment at least, but assured us that it was the way to go. It was a risky plan but it was much better to be safe than sorry, we were a community protected by very few and very basic weapons and whoever turned up was going to make sure they had superiority over us in numbers and weaponry, so we needed the element of Speed Surprise and Aggression.
Kev said that the best time to contact Bristol was after lunch, it seemed to always be the busiest on the airwaves around then so it would reduce the risk of the transmission being picked up and understood by those that we didn’t want understanding. He also said that he and three others plus me would drive up there for the meet an hour or so before via the town but when the meet is finished that we should all come back at least three different ways after picking up Camouflage in case we were to be followed back to the school.
So that was it. We were going to sit around and drink tea and scratch our balls until lunch and then contact Bristol. Camouflage made his excuses and said he was off to see a few people in the workshops to help with his idea for not being screwed over (whatever that was going to be and why he needed a work shop to do it I was stumped, but couldn’t wait to see it.), so it looked like it was a goer!
After a lunch in the canteen of tinned hot dogs and fried onions in homemade (canteen made at least) rolls and at least three toilet visits to dispose of all the sweet tea drunk, we went to the tower with the radio and waited whilst Kev cleared the room of non-need to know people. He transmitted the request to speak to a doctor, got fobbed off a few times but carried on asking until he eventually got one on the line. Once his veiled message had been understood and sunk in, they couldn’t do enough for us. They were going to send a helicopter out to our meet point for ten am tomorrow, with an encrypted radio for us but said they couldn’t afford the ammunition without confirmation that this was all real. All of this was in veiled speech and it took both sides a while to work out correctly what each was saying but we got there in the end. Seems none of us on both sides of the radio conversation would have ever gotten jobs at Bletchley park during the second world war that was for sure!
Once that was all done it was time to go back to the camp and get my kit sorted out for tomorrow. Sat in the 90s front seat I loaded all my pistols and pump action with what cartridges I had left from the other night. Loaded the vest up with more gas cannisters and made sure everything inside was secure and tied down so it didn’t fly around everywhere when off road. Kev had promised me something to sort the buggered bonnet out, but he was busy, so I just tied it down securely. The radiator needed a proper repair though, I used a gas soldering iron borrowed from the work shop and soldered the tiny hole closed in my radiator and filled the system back up again. I put some rad weld in the radiator too as a belt and braces measure, going off road would run the engine hotter than a trip up the A38, so I wanted to be sure.
When I had finished myself, Sarah and Sue went for dinner at the canteen and had huge plates of piping hot pasta and pesto, this canteen lark was great, meaning I only had to cook breakfast if needed and saving more food for ourselves for if we should ever move on. We met people we knew and again introduced Sue as a friend that randomly found us here, ate our food and went back to camp. No drinks again at Kev’s tonight, there hadn’t been since the incident the other night. We sat around the fire having some of our own drinks and sneaky marshmallows from my stash, Sarah loved that.
Camouflage popped by, he was all cammed up as per his nickname I gave him in his combat gear and face make-up and was all packed ready for a night in the woods avoiding being eaten. One of the guys was going to drop him up there an hour before night fall so he could do his scouting out and get his ‘Anti getting fucked over measures’ as he called it, sorted should it go sideways tomorrow. He said for us not to look for him as it could mess everything up when the helicopter landed, we should just pretend he wasn’t there, and if he wasn’t needed he would stay out of sight and then meet one of the guys at a predetermined pick up area on the way back. I wished him the best of luck and even offered him my cross bow for if he had to silently kill any zombies, but he politely declined. We wished him the best of luck and off he went to the packed Police 90 and headed out through the gates.
Not long after Sarah made her excuses and headed off up to bed, and we continued to drink Malibu and pineapple juice, very exotic, and the best way to use the pineapple juice I had got from Christopher as part of my payment bag for doing the shopping run, though I was lacking in the straw and paper umbrella department to class them as cocktails. We spoke about nothing really, just chatted drunken bollocks like we would have done at a bar before this all happened and Sues chair got closer, then my chair got closer and more drinks flowed. It wasn’t exactly Netflix and Chill but more firepit and chill, with the licking flames being our TV for the night. Before long she whispered in my ear. ‘Fancy staying at my place tonight? Not much room for us to swing a cat around but I’m sure we will manage and to be honest, it’s not a cat that I want to swing around.’ She chimed with a massive grin.
I certainly didn’t need asking twice! The tent was only four yards from where we were sat but by the time we had got there, opened the outer zip and piled in we were both pretty much naked and already onto the third base as our American friends often say in such situations.
Chapter 4
The next morning we were both up, dressed, huge brekkie under way to replenish our spent energies from the night’s activities and very, very happy. We had picked up and tidied our discarded clothing from where it was strewn last night, and the one-man tent was now back to its normal shape and configuration after having two people in it doing a lot of moving around in all directions. Sarah was aware that I needed the 90 again today so would soon be down for food. Some boiled, sliced and then fried potatoes along with spam, beans for the ladies, I hated the things, mushrooms foraged from the back meadow (not by me but by someone that knew their mushrooms. You can eat any mushroom once but only some will leave you alive to eat anymore) and some scrambled egg from the ration packs.
Sarah came silently under the tarp and poured herself a cup of tea smiling at us both but didn’t say anything. ‘Are you okay? I asked.’ Wondering what the smile was all about.
‘Shame, shame, I know your name.’ She partially sang.
Sue and I both swung around. ‘Eh?’ I asked trying to sound innocent.
‘You don’t have to deny it?’ She smirked. ‘That roof tent I’m in is only canvas and I could hear you last night, not only that but when I had to have an emergency wee last night, when I got out there were clothes scattered everywhere.’
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Sue was blushing like mad and I could feel my cheeks flush too. We had been rumbled by a fourteen-year-old girl! ‘Looks like we are busted then.’ I admitted.
‘I’m not bothered, I’m actually pleased for you both but keep the noise down next time please?’ She said sounding like a parent I no longer had.
That was us told. ‘Okay Mum.’ I replied. Sue was still just blushing not knowing what to say and wishing the earth would just open up and swallow us..
‘What’s for breakfast then?’ Sarah asked with a superior look on her face from getting one over on us.
‘Sit down and I’ll serve it in a minute young lady.’ As I started serving it up. Sarah looked at Sue and gave her a thumbs up thinking I hadn’t seen. Sue looked surprised momentarily but smiled and gave her a thumbs up back.
The rest of breakfast went without any more mentioning of last night luckily, Sue and I still smiled or winked at each other, but nothing was spoken.
Sarah did ask if she could borrow the Air Rifle I kept in the 90 later in the day as there was quite a few rabbits around in the back meadow and Christopher was worried they would ruin the recently planted veg etc. I told her that it wouldn’t be a problem and that I’d give her a run down on how to use it later after I had popped out on a scout about the town with Kev. It did make me think that either the rabbits were here before the school had the culverts built around it or their burrow was very deep and came under the culvert. Anyway, we had more important things to think about currently.
After clearing up all of the brekkie kit, I partially broke camp again, following my usual routine with the sticks and folding of the Tarp so I could park back up close again later on. I wondered on how Camouflage had faired last night on his own up the woods and hoped he was okay and in place for later on. I bid farewell to Sarah and Sue, sneaking a passionate kiss that Sarah probably saw anyway, and drove off to the gates to meet the others for the helicopter rendezvous.
The Reanimated Dead (Book 2): The Answer Page 3