by Frank Tayell
“Yeah, the bet’s off,” Damien said.
There had been a running competition to see who could collect the most, best supplies. They hadn’t defined what ‘best’ was, nor had they decided on a prize. Where others would return with a few tins and an occasional jar, Locke would bring back a bag filled with rations, and her pockets full of loaded magazines. The subterfuge had been difficult to keep up, and Locke had finally decided to abandon it after Phoebe had sneaked out and followed her halfway to the warehouse.
“So how did you get all this stuff?” Gavin asked.
“My employer was a prepper,” Locke said. “She thought the apocalypse was actually going to happen.”
“So she built this?” the younger Isabella asked. “If you told me that a year ago, I’d have said you were crazy. Actually…” She picked up an oiled submachine gun. “Actually, I’d have said that it made an awful lot of sense, and that you were both very wise people, and then, as soon as I could, I’d have run out of here screaming for the police.”
“How much is there?” Gavin asked.
“Enough for about five years,” Locke said. “Give or take.”
“Any formula?” Isabella asked.
“Sorry,” Locke said. “This wasn’t a place for people to rebuild or repopulate, it was a place to hide, to survive, to wait. Keeping a child alive wasn’t…” She frowned, and decided against the truth. “I suppose we didn’t think any children would end up here.”
“I suppose your boss didn’t really think the world was going to end,” Gavin said. “I mean, who would? But Bella seems to like that vitamin powder stuff.”
“It’s not as good as formula,” Isabella said. “But we won’t find any more of that. We’ll make do, we’ll have to, and that means our time frame hasn’t changed.”
Locke nodded. That was another reason for telling them about the warehouse, and the reason she hadn’t told them until now. Isabella couldn’t breastfeed. The looted pharmacy that Locke had seen on her first day in Birmingham was evidence of their search for formula. With the addition of her silenced submachine gun and its seemingly endless supply of bullets, they had searched the rest of the city, but found most pharmacies looted or their remaining stocks contaminated by mould and decay.
“There’s powdered potato, and powdered milk,” Locke said, “and she seemed to like the re-hydrated vegetable soup that we pureed.”
“I’m not sure it liked her,” Isabella said. “No, but this is good. It takes the pressure off.”
“It does, doesn’t it,” Gavin said, visibly relaxing.
“Is there any ice cream?” Damien asked.
“No, I’m sorry,” Locke said. “It’s only canned, freeze-dried, and dehydrated foods.”
“What about chocolate?” Phoebe asked.
“There, I think you might be in luck,” Locke said. “There are some chocolate chip energy bars somewhere.”
“Cool,” Damien said. “Hazel will like that.
“She doesn’t like anything,” Phoebe said.
“At the end of the aisle,” Locke said, handing the children a lantern. “It’s a green box. Don’t touch any blue, white, or red boxes. Okay?”
“A green box. Got it,” Damien said. The two children hurried off in search of chocolate.
“So why are you really telling us now?” Isabella asked. “There’s something else, isn’t there?”
“It’s the generator you found,” Locke said. “I know you want to turn it on, but we can’t waste the diesel. The petrol is a different matter, but I’d rather not use it yet, either. There is enough food here for about five years. Spoilage is a risk, and I’d say the margin of error is two years either way, but my bigger concern are the buildings. There are too many ruins on the verge of collapse. The canal has been breached in too many places. The roads that aren’t flooded now soon will be. We need to think of the future, and it won’t be in Birmingham.”
“Do you have a place in mind?” Gavin asked. “Not Ireland?”
“And not Anglesey,” Isabella said. “Not after what you told us about them.”
“No, not Anglesey, and that’s another reason to leave,” Locke said. “We’re too close to them here. In Ireland, we had a farm. It was built by my employer, and was another refuge in case the world came to an end, though they ran it as a working farm. That’s where I was. We had wind turbines and solar panels, and high walls. They weren’t high enough. The farm was overrun, but it wasn’t the only redoubt. There are others. The nearest is in Portugal, but there’s a larger one in America.”
“They might as well be on the moon,” Gavin said.
“That’s why we need the diesel,” Locke said. “We can’t waste it to keep the lights on. We’ll need it for the boat.”
“You know where there’s a boat?” Isabella asked.
“No,” Locke said, “but we’ll find one. We’ll find a boat, but not by looking around here. We need to go to the coast. These supplies give us time, but time creates a new problem. You saw what happened to the zombie two days ago?”
“You mean the one that was injured,” Gavin said.
“I think it was dying,” Locke said. “When the zombies die, the people on Anglesey, assuming there are any people left, will come back to Britain. The threat of the undead was the only thing holding that island together. When Anglesey collapses, people will come here. When they do, we need to be gone. So, yes, these supplies give us time, but not as much as it might first appear.”
“You want to go to Portugal?” Isabella asked.
“Possibly,” Locke said. “We’d find more supplies there, and we might find people that we can trust. Reliable people. My people.”
“Assuming they didn’t die like all your people in Ireland,” Gavin said.
“Which is why, ideally, we’d go to America,” Locke said. “But our final destination will depend on what kind of boat we find, and as I say, we wont find one around here.”
“So what is your plan?” Isabella asked, more firmly.
“We should go to the coast and look for a boat,” Locke said. “A fishing trawler, perhaps. We’ll take enough food for six months. If the craft can make an Atlantic crossing, then that’s what we’ll do, and we’ll leave before the winter storms. If the boat can’t make that distance, we’ll head to Portugal. It would be a better place to spend the colder months than Britain.”
“That’s all well and good,” Gavin said, “but precisely how do we get everyone, and all our gear, to the coast.”
“By using the Grand Union Canal,” Locke said. “We could use a barge, make three or four trips. It would be noisy, yes, and it would be slow, but it would be safer than a road, and less likely to be blocked by the undead or stalled traffic.”
“If we can find a barge,” Isabella said.
“I already did,” Locke said. “Ten miles south of the city. We can take the canal down to London. Perhaps we’ll find other barges that we can bring back here. Ultimately, we’ll reach the Thames. We’ll go through London and into the estuary. There, we’ll find a ship.”
“You hope,” Gavin said.
“If we don’t, we can search up and down the coast. The alternative is staying here and hoping no one comes from Anglesey. At best, we’d survive for four years, maybe five, possibly six, but I doubt it will be that long. The food will run out, and by then, any abandoned ship will have been dashed against the shore, the hull turned to rust, the rigging to rot. There are risks in leaving, but the only certainty in staying is that of death.”
There was a scampering of feet as the children returned, fists and mouths full of silver-foil wrapped energy bars.
“Found them,” Phoebe mumbled through a full mouth.
“What do you think?” Locke asked.
Gavin looked to Isabella.
“Think about what?” Damien asked.
“I think,” Isabella said slowly. “I think that we should go back to the library and find some maps that show where the canal joins the Ri
ver Thames.”
Part 4
Five Days
Eamonn Finnegan
London and Beyond
September & October
Chapter 13 - Departure
The Tower of London, 26th September, Day 198
The streets of London rang to the sound of ancient metal biting into undead flesh. Eamonn Finnegan dragged his axe free from the zombie’s skull. He spun around, raising the weapon above his head. Fine droplets of dark brown gore sprayed from the blade, splattering the rotten clothing of his next foe. Its trousers were torn, its feet so caked in mud and grime that Eamonn couldn’t tell if it still wore shoes, but somehow a pair of glasses were still perched on its necrotic head. He slammed the axe down onto its temple. Skin split, bone broke, and its glasses flew off. Eamonn wrenched the axe free as he looked for the next threat, but the fight was over. The zombies were all dead.
Behind him, Jay had climbed onto the roof of one of the coaches. They contained the fruit and vegetables they’d brought back from Kent. There had been too many undead in the streets near the Tower of London to drive the coaches up to the walls. Instead, they’d abandoned the vehicles a few hundred metres away. There hadn’t been any pressure to collect the food immediately, but everything had changed in the time it took to pull a trigger.
Jay had organised the expedition to collect the food. Organised wasn’t the right word, the teenager had said he was going and asked who’d come with him. Almost everyone had.
Jay waved the all-clear. Eamonn waved back, then spared one last second, trying to find Greta among the crowd hastily rushing to the buses. He couldn’t see her, but if he spent any more time looking, he might never leave. Someone had to, and he couldn’t allow anyone else to risk their life for him. Not now, not ever again. He turned his back on his newfound family, and vanished into the narrow streets of London.
His pack was light. He had water, weapons, and little else. He needed little else. It was about three hundred miles from London to Anglesey. Three hundred miles of farmland and cities, hills and rivers, zombies and ruins, but he had the maps Chester had created before he was shot. The annotation was a little odd, and it didn’t contain a specific route so much as the best areas to travel through. With that as his guide, he would make it to Anglesey, but not on foot. His first task was to get out of central London, find a bicycle, and then find a railway line he could follow away from the city. It was still early, and he hoped he could make at least seventy miles before dark. He’d be beyond Birmingham tomorrow, and into Wales the day after. In four days, he’d be on Anglesey. Five if he was unlucky. If he could he find a bike. If he didn’t find the roads and railways filled with too many undead. If he could just get out of the maze that was London.
Cartwright, Royal Mint, Leman. He mentally noted each street, looking for one that was familiar. There was a sign for Aldgate East Tube, but he wanted to go west towards Liverpool Street Station. He spied an alley that was too narrow for a car. When he reached it, he found the undead clustered inside. They were standing rather than crouched in that sedentary squat they adopted when no prey was nearby, and they saw him. Arms clawed and thrashed as the creatures staggered out of the alley. For one brief moment, Eamonn thought of his family in the Tower, but fighting these zombies wouldn’t save them. Their only salvation lay on Anglesey. He ran.
The towering offices cast deep shadows across the canyon-streets filled with leaves and litter, then steel and rubble next to a fire-ravaged hotel. The building beyond looked remarkably intact. He paused for the briefest of seconds, peering at the grimy windows, trying to discern what had lain inside. A fist slammed against the dust-smeared pane, then another, and a third, a fourth. A score of decaying hands and faces beat against the glass. Eamonn ran, and had made it ten yards before he heard the window break. He didn’t turn around, but took one street, then the next, no longer sure where he was going except that it was away from the Tower.
He found a narrow alley, ran through, and found the street outside free of the undead. At the next junction was an upright map-board that displayed the location of nearby landmarks. He was already four hundred metres northeast of Liverpool Street, and close to Brick Lane. That was a familiar name, a place he’d heard of and promised to visit some day. Like so many others, that day had never come and now it was beyond too late.
He’d been running for half an hour, and his legs were beginning to twinge. He reached for the water bottle at his belt. There was a dull thump as a fist hit the glass window of a coffee shop on the other side of the street. The doors had been hastily barricaded with upturned tables and benches, but a figure had managed to squeeze between them and the glass. From the oozing stump on its left hand, the flap of skin hanging loose from its jaw, the rotting clothing barely concealing dried flesh, it was undead. Not long ago, it had been a survivor, just not one that Eamonn recognised. He left the creature there and the water un-drunk, and continued, though at a slower pace.
There wasn’t time to fight, nor was their time to stop, not now, not today. Get out of London. Get to the Midlands. Get to Wales. Get help. Get back to the Tower, and then they could all leave. They could begin a new life. Him, Greta, and the children in a house in Wales. A large house, sure. A mansion. A castle. A farm. In three days, he’d be on the island. Four days at the outside. Five if he was unlucky.
He’d left a note for Greta. It hadn’t said enough, but there wasn’t enough paper in the world to say all that he’d wanted. Words were easy, actions were hard, but they were what mattered, and by his actions she would know how deeply he loved her. Hana, their vet turned doctor, was dead. Chester was unconscious. Realistically, he was dying. By now, he might well be dead. Both had been shot by Graham, the man who’d stolen their food and, in doing so, stamped a death sentence onto their community. It wasn’t just a community, not really, though Eamonn hadn’t realised it until it was almost too late. They were a family, and one that had doubled in size with the discovery of the group in Kent. Other than the man, Styles, the newcomers were all children, mostly from a remote boarding school. The children had brought their numbers close to a hundred, and they’d changed everything.
While Chester had gone back to the Tower for help, Eamonn and Greta had stayed in Kent. They’d helped the children bag the food from their small farm. Eamonn knew exactly how little there was, and how long it would last: not long enough. There was no more food in London or Kent. The children couldn’t travel far or fast. Someone had to go for help, and if it couldn’t be Chester, it had to be him.
His foot crunched on glass. There were ominous shadows beyond the gaping hole where the window should be. He returned to the middle of the road and picked up his pace. He reached a junction with a sign pointing to a dozen places. Hoxton Railway Station was at the bottom of that list. Again, he recognised the name, but couldn’t place it in relation to the Tower, or to London’s outskirts. There wasn’t time to take out the maps because, outside a sushi bar, were two ragged zombies. As he raised the axe, a third stepped out of the restaurant. Then a fourth. There wasn’t time. Eamonn turned and ran. It wasn’t cowardice. Not this time.
The road curved, and he knew he was going the wrong way. There was another map-board at the next crossroads, but a zombie stood next to it. Eamonn had the axe held across his chest. It wasn’t a firefighter’s tool, but an ancient weapon, a steel war-axe from the Tower’s collection. The weapon had been painstakingly restored with a new grip, new shaft, and, judging by how sharp it was, a new blade, but the sign in the museum had said it was a thousand years old, and that had given him comfort.
He swung the axe, cutting deep into the zombie’s face. The blade sliced neatly through flesh and bone, and slammed into the map-board behind. The zombie fell, but the axe needed a tug before it was free. The cut and dent marred the map, but he could see where he was, Columbia Road.
“Second left. First right, keep on.” Always keep on, and in four days he’d be in Anglesey. Five days at the most.
/> “It never ends,” he muttered, taking the smallest sip from his water bottle. He’d been on the move for over two hours, was still in London, and was close to lost. He was heading away from the river, but no roads ran straight. When he found one that should lead him to a railway line, he’d also found the undead. He was out of central London, and somewhere near Highbury, though he wasn’t sure if he was north of it, or south, or due east.
He’d thought he’d known London. In the last five years, he’d spent as much time in the city as he had in Frankfurt or Dublin, but knowing the names of bars and Tube stations wasn’t the same as knowing the city.
“Find a bike, find a railway station,” he murmured, eying the bridge behind the fire engine. It was definitely a rail bridge, but there was no station on this road. If he could find a way up to the bridge, he could follow the tracks. That would be quicker than navigating through the maze of alleys and roads.
The fire engine had been driven into the front of an office block, demolishing the ground floor. From the way the building sagged, resting on the roof of the cab, the vehicle had knocked down a supporting joist.
“Give it a year, and that building will collapse,” Eamonn murmured, and he got a reply. It came from ahead, from behind the rear of the truck. He raised the axe and stepped closer to the fire engine, turning around so his back was against the vehicle. The sigh came again, this time accompanied by the rustle of cloth in what was almost an echo. It was an echo, and it came from above.
A zombie fell from the roof of the vehicle. Its arms caught in Eamonn’s pack, tearing one strap completely free of his arm. He danced and spun, letting the pack fall as he swung the axe. The blade bit into flesh, neatly severing the zombie’s arm. Then came the sound of the other creature, staggering around the side of the fire engine. It wasn’t alone. There were three of them. Eamonn backed off a pace, then darted forward, hacking the axe low, aiming for its legs. That was a trick every survivor knew, aim for the legs, knock them to the ground, give yourself time to deal with the others. It worked. The lead zombie fell, but though it gave Eamonn time to plan his next move, it also gave time for more zombies to appear from around the side of the fire engine. Three, then four, then five. He backed off another pace. He needed the pack. The maps were inside. The zombie that had pulled it from his shoulder was standing up, and the others were getting closer.