“In this world, we survive.” Nate stood back up and checked on the fireplace. The gas was hooked up to the cylinder bottle outside so that they had fire. Two had run out so far, but they had simply swapped caravans.
*****
The cushions and single bed mattresses were on the floor in the main area of their next caravan. Ruby had placed them there. On top, she had thrown all the sheets she had found, plus some more from the previous caravans. Literally, a nest. She had laughed but continued anyway.
She hung thick curtains on all the windows except the front facing one. It was wide and stared openly onto the sea. She had stood at the bottom of the park and looked up to the highest caravan and pointed, and said “That one,” knowing that this was where she wanted to stay, at least for now.
As Nate broke into the van, she said “Thank you” and stepped inside. Standing by the window, she decided that this was where she wanted to have the baby. “Look at that view,” she said.
Nate nodded and turned to explore the rest of the caravan.
“See baby,” she said, holding her belly. “Beauty. There is beauty.” She smiled, then wondered if the glass were a mirror she would still be saying words like beauty, and the smile faded. She looked down at her hands and where there had once been fingernails. “Claw polish. Red claw polish, maybe,” she sighed.
She stroked the ends of her fingers across her wrist, pressing hard, causing red scratches to appear. She looked out to the sea; “Beautiful,” then back to her hands.
Again she looked out; down the cascading hillside and the reflecting tops of caravans, old car trails still visible here and there between the long grass; to the silver beach with its coarse sand and pebbles and breathing ocean; to the blue sky filling with clouds.
Tears filled her eyes, and though she gritted her teeth and tried to hold them back, she screamed.
Nate’s feet pounded to the front of the caravan. He saw Ruby screaming against the glass, hands pressed against it. “What’s wrong?”
She stopped screaming, but continued to cry.
Nate span her around and held her.
“It’s not my body,” she cried. “It’s not my mind.”
“I heard you,” he said. “You are beautiful. You are you. I am I. Baby is baby. Whatever comes, it is us.”
“But…” she couldn’t finish her thought. Instead she let Nate hold her.
After she had stopped crying, he turned her around again and pointed out the window. “It is beauty.”
*****
Woods lined the narrow road that lead to Clarach Bay, and it was here that Nate attempted to hunt, or at least search for the tamest of animals, or those bred for food who had perhaps wandered from the nearest farm. Here, he defecated and urinated, circling around the edges of the woods. He could smell the urine of other animals but had no idea what it might belong to.
As he travelled, he made sure to mark the way with his claws. He may need to get back to Ruby quickly – she was back at the ‘nest’ and he missed her when he was out here without her, but she increasingly needed rest.
Here, he couldn’t see the sea, though its salty brine still entered across his tongue and through his nostrils. He embraced the bark and pine and sniffed at the base of tree trunks to clear his head of the sea-scents. If Ruby was here, she would be looking to climb a tree to see the sea, or walking along the outer edges so that it was always in view. Nate didn’t really understand, but it seemed to please her.
He wanted to get her something she would like. Make her happy. She was in so much pain sometimes, he just wanted to make her smile.
Food? But what kind?
“Honey! Happy Birthday!” said his father, handing his mother some flowers and a box of chocolates.
Nate scowled; his parents’ faces were a fog.
Not food. She already had food.
As Nate neared his collection of bodies, the rank odour grew stronger. It no longer affected him like it had.
In a clearing within the woods, where there were no treetops blocking the sunlight, it shone down on a stack of dead bodies; a mixture of human, dog, sheep and cow. He hefted the latest one he had found crushed beneath a car off of his shoulder, and dumped it on the top. He stood back and looked at his work. Arms and legs, rags of clothing. A sheep’s head protruded from an edge in such a way that it could be matched with a human’s limbs. Nate yanked it free and threw it to the top of the pile.
These were all dead-dead. No moaning. No cowling. The chaos of Worcester, even of Aberystwyth, was a fading memory.
Around the grove where no bodies were stacked, spring daffodils had sprung. Nate picked as many as there were and bundled them together with a length of green bark and headed back.
*****
The daffodils were laid out in a circle on the floor, around the mound of sheets and pillows on the stacked mattresses. Their yellow heads were still vibrant, especially within the confines of the caravan with the windows darkened. Twilight entered through the front window, but inside was dark. They could smell the sweetness of the nectar held within the daffodil cups; it was heady and offered a numerous distraction to their scent; unwashed for days now, like the raggedy clothes they sometimes still wore, stained brown and red and green.
They spent their days eating and sleeping and listening to the unborn; Ruby’s mound extending daily beneath Nate’s carefully placed ear; first hearing a gurgle, a bubble, and then feeling the unborn adjust itself as it fed through the umbilical cord: sometimes a head would protrude, at times a knee, and they would watch, fascinated, the mountains move, displace, return. Ruby’s deeply tanned skin would sheen, and her belly-button would extend more and more daily.
Sometimes they would talk as Ruby lay, her breasts leaking milk, with Nate watching the horizon. Rarely was it of the past; always about now and the baby and their plans. How long would they stay here? Where would they go afterwards? Where could they go where they would feel safe, yet be able to feed and take care of both themselves and the newborn?
When Ruby did leave the caravan it was to defecate and urinate at selected locations around the park. Always somewhere new. She would return tired, and sometimes in pain. The pain wasn’t like her cuts or bruises; this was from within and usually originated just beneath her rib cage. She could not cut if off or ignore it, and sometimes lay in her nest for hours, staring at the sea through gritted teeth as the sweat poured from her brow.
If Nate was there, he would get her water for her to drink, and he would leave the door open so cool breezes could waft through the open space, the salty brininess like medication for her fevers. He left often, but always came back, with meat or sometimes sugar in the form of chocolate, or forgotten packets of crisps; sometimes more wildflowers he had spotted, which would cheer her up.
She liked smelling the flowers.
She liked the sea-smell too. All that.
But the flowers were the best.
*****
“Do you think…” started Ruby, her gall bladder suddenly feeling as though an elastic band was tightening a noose around it, causing her to take a deep breath and hold it.
“Okay?” asked Nate.
“Hurts.”
Nate squeezed her hand and held it until the furrows in her brow unfurled, and her eyes opened.
She smiled at him. “… any more like us?”
Nate lay back down and listened as rain pattered on the roof. “Must be.”
“Imagine if not.”
“If not, then we should find museum. Put us on display.” They laughed.
“Homo no-erectus.”
Nate looked down; “No,” he mocked.
The rain was like a hundred, a thousand, hoof-falls on the roof, all charging against each other in an everlasting war on a few metres-squared battlefield.
“Not just you. Not just me,” said Nate.
*****
The mid-morning sun was high above the caravan; if Ruby looked up out of the window she could just about s
ee it making an appearance as it fell west towards the sea; there were clouds but they were sparse, and today the sea was exceptionally blue. Other people would have liked it today, she thought, maybe come with their cars and buckets and spades and built castles out of the sand. Maybe it would be good to stay here, for the child. Children like beaches and sand and building castles. Children like the sea-side.
Only death in the towns and cities and no-one to clean it up.
It hadn’t rained for a few days and for once the ground wasn’t all mud and puddles; Nate could head out as he liked to now, without the clothes and shoes that made him feel enclosed. Restrained. He could come back to her clean. That was important now.
Outside the doorway lay all their dead flowers and leaves and bits of bark and wood that had somehow made their way indoors. She had overturned all the sheets and pillows and the mattresses and threw out those that were the most unclean. Nate was now searching for more to replace them.
She was looking at the glass of the window, wondering if it could be cleaner, should be cleaner, when she heard the sound of a gunshot.
*****
Nate felt the nearness of the bullet as it flew past his ear before he heard the whizz and the explosion. He dropped the rabbit he had been skinning and lunged towards a nearby tree. At its base, he hunkered down as low as he could and tried to keep the tree between himself and the source of the gunfire.
Where?
He sniffed and listened but a timpani of bells resonated in the higher enclaves of his hearing. Maybe there were voices, or maybe it was wind – he couldn’t tell. That wind blew from the sea – that was all he could smell. He growled.
Where?
He scampered across to another tree – one that looked thicker – and made himself small behind it. He knew his shoulders were wide though. It would be difficult to hide.
Where?
He looked up. The brown bark of the pine tree stretched to a waiting sun, blinding him temporarily. He shook his head and saw orbs of yellow-white light floating in his vision. Gripping the tree, he considered climbing. Safe? he thought. Only if they didn’t know. Blinking, he looked around the side of the tree and into the distant mix of brown and green; a dense undergrowth of tall ferns and sharp, pointed nettles, nestled between rising pine and shaded clearings where fungi grew unhindered, and saw a glint of light that wasn’t one of his floating orbs of sunlight.
There, he thought, as the rifle blasted and the bullet pierced through his eyeball.
*****
When the second shot rang out, Ruby halted her running. Her heart was pounding. She had fled from the caravan as she had been; nude, with her long, thick black hair curled around her body to her midriff. The sun had gleamed on her pronounced calves and hamstrings as she ran. Her hair – that which wasn’t pasted to her skin – had flailed behind her. Now, she knelt, and felt its warmth wrap around her body again.
There was silence. The shot had come from the woods beyond the caravan park and she stared at its verge now. Small leaves rustled in a cool, easterly wind.
Her stomach felt larger than ever, pressed against her knees. The baby was awake and moving around, having a fight of its own. As her heart pounded, she could feel her red-hot blood pumping throughout her body, and feel it enflaming the placenta, feeding it. Instead of feeling tired, she grew strength from it.
She stood and ran – half bent – to the edge of the woods, and entered. She touched Nate’s claw marks upon the bark of the nearest tree. When she breathed in, she could smell his essence – it was all around here; his musk.
Heading deeper, she crouch-walked, following the marks she saw on some trees, but following her nose more. She came to the pile of decomposing bodies and skirted around it to the left, continuing deeper. Nettles scraped against the toughened skin of her legs, leaving white scratch marks, and here and there the undergrowth was trampled flat by Nate’s many travails. Low-level branches sprung back into place behind her.
Where are you?
Whispering, she said “Nate… come to me,” hoping his hearing would pick it up.
In a small clearing, a little sunlight filtered down over what appeared to be a den. Nate’s scent was strong here, and in the centre of the clearing was a half-finished woven basket, the last green branch to be woven in still sticking out, waiting for the next weave. Ruby touched it, stroked her fingers across the smooth, slightly furred, bark. The other hand on her stomach, she smiled.
*****
The hunter stalked forwards through the trees, her boots crushing the wayward bushes and nettles and dock-leaves, her rifle aimed towards first one gap between the trunks, and then another. She had hit it – she knows she did. She saw the blood explode before the head ducked down again beneath the undergrowth.
The hunter swallowed – she could do with some water – but that could wait. It had been a few days since she had last killed a zombie and she wanted to make sure the area was clear before she rested. After that, she could check out the caravan park.
God knows, the hunter’s heart hadn’t raced like this for days. She grinned as she upped her pace.
The tree ahead – that was the one. She could see the blood stains on it now.
Leaves and twigs crunched under her boots.
Two dark feet with claws appeared first as she circled around, and then the muscle of the calves that were attached to those feet. When she had it in the sight of her rifle, she had thought it was naked; only covered all over with a thick layer of hair. And what of it? Some humans were hairy to the point of fur. She had been right – he was naked. He lay there now on his back with half a face and what can only be described as fur across his wide pectorals and down the flatness of his stomach to his penis. His leg-hair was not as matted, but was getting almost as thick.
“Geez, what do we have here? Ain’t seen one like you before.”
And then a shriek, so loud and so piercing it hurt the hunter’s ears and caused her to put her hands over them, cried out to her left. Her gun dangled on a strap from her shoulder.
Bending down and turning, the hunter took up her gun and winced as the shrieking penetrated her ear drums, and lifted the muzzle to the source. She fired and the shrieking stopped.
“Goddamn that was fucking loud!” the hunter screamed at it. “You fucking piece of shit!” She marched over to it, gun aimed forward and locked onto it.
But it was crying, whimpering, shaking, naked, bloodied. It was a she, and she lay sprawled on her back, struggling to rise as she pushed herself backwards against a tree, her bare feet digging into the clotted dirt with her claws, her long black hair wrapped like a sarong across her body, failing to hide the bulging breasts and expectant bump.
She was saying something and pointing at the hunter, her mouth moving, her bottom jaw shaking and her cheeks smeared with blood, dirt and tears. As she spoke she continued crying, continued shaking. She tried to push herself up some more, but her hand slipped out from under her and she fell backwards against the tree.
“I…” the hunter was aghast. “I… don’t understand you.” The hunter lowered the gun. She had already hit her target – blood poured from a chest wound. And it was too late now. She wanted to kneel down, get closer, but at the same time, she didn’t dare. At the same time, she wanted to turn and run from this horror.
“I… I’m sorry…” said the hunter.
The woman lifted an arm again, pointed. Her eyes slid across to the male and she closed her eyes and cried again. Then suddenly, her eyes, frantic, locked on the hunter and she began to speak.
“Is that… English? I’m sorry,” said the hunter again, “I don’t understand.”
And the woman wailed, angrily turning it into a screech as she hissed at the hunter, still pointing. She lowered her hand and slumped backwards, exhausted.
Eyes stared at the hunter as breaths became weaker. The rising and rising chest slowed its pace.
The hunter watched as the woman lifted a hand to her belly and
parted the strands of hair that clung to her. She moved the palm of the hand over the mound and made circling motions, while low, almost cooing sounds issued from her throat. She traced a finger up to her sternum and dug in a claw, then ran it down to her pubis, slicing. Her belly parted, but only slightly. Not enough. She traced her claws down again, splitting skin, fat, tissue, until all strength left her and she lay there, lifeless.
The hunter finally knelt down when the baby girl started to cry. She reached in and pulled it from the open womb.
The End
About the Author
Adam J Smith lives in the UK, publishing art books and writing novels, short stories and poetry. He’s an avid reader and his favourite storytellers include Jeffrey Eugenides, Stephen King, Isaac Asimov, plus many others - an eclectic mix! He loves old sci-fi and pulp novels, but equally horror and literary novels that are particularly well written – he enjoys being able to dissect a writer's narrative approach.
These loves apply to his own work: available now is The Risen, a horror/fantasy story, with elements of adventure, where the world has only just fallen apart and the survivors are trying to adjust to the new order, while going through some very real physical and mental changes themselves. In other work he explores the Montana frontier, following a group of families as they strive to eke an existence, and creates a whole new world in Neon Driver, a story set in 3100 following a man's descent into madness.
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Table of Contents
The Risen Page 20