She investigated more seriously. Of course there was a wheel and lots of buttons and levers. Maybe she could drive it? She punched a few buttons and some of them lit up. She punched more and noise barked out of the radio, but only a white crackly hiss. The ocean of people pressed harder at that, so she punched until the sound stopped.
Probably she couldn't drive. Her legs were too short and she could hardly see over the wheel.
She checked her pockets for ideas. Crayons, no. The Alice figure, no. Her Daddy's phone? The police!
She swiped it awake and the screen icons popped up. This time she found the phone symbol, at the bottom in a green square, and she pressed it, bringing up lots of numbers and letters which she couldn't read. She tapped the first number and it began to ring.
After five rings a woman spoke.
Anna babbled over her. "Help me please, my Daddy ate the Hatter and now I'm lost and I can't find him, I'm stuck in a car on a road somewhere and there's people all around me looking in and-"
There was a long beep, then silence.
"Hello?" Anna said.
No answer came.
She pushed another number and tried again, but this one didn't even ring. Soon a female voice told her repeatedly, "This number is out of service, please hang up and dial again."
She tried again. This time after ten full rings she got a man, but again he didn't listen to her and a beep cut her off. She tried every number, but none of them had real people at the other end.
There had to be something in the phone to help her. She investigated it thoroughly, clicking more buttons, which lead to writing, to pictures, to little videos.
"Why isn't there a button for the police?" she asked.
At last she came to the button for the Hatter's chip: a white bone on a red background. She didn't much want to push it. The Hatter was dead, and she didn't want to see pictures of his bloody smear in her Daddy's room again. It seemed unlikely it had any connection to the police.
Still she pushed it, to be thorough.
It took a long moment to wake up the map. It didn't look like the last time her Daddy showed it to her- this time there were no lines and shapes that were roads and buildings. It was just a gray fog with a blue dot at the bottom and a flashing yellow dot at the top. That would be the Hatter, dead in her Daddy's room.
She was about to swipe away when the yellow dot moved. She frowned. Was that right?
It moved again.
"Hatter!" she shouted.
She turned and pressed her face to one of the side windows, peeking through a tiny gap between the bodies and hoping the Hatter would come bounding up.
"Come on boy!"
Her shouting brought more bodies to the window, blocking her view, but the Hatter didn't come. She looked at the phone again. Now she noticed the yellow Hatter was actually moving away from the blue dot.
She frowned. The Hatter should come to her. But then the Hatter was dead, because her Daddy had eaten him. What was…
The pieces clicked into place, and she understood. Her Daddy had eaten the Hatter, every last bit, which meant he had eaten the Hatter's chip too. So the Hatter's chip was in her Daddy, and this yellow flashing dot was actually her Daddy.
Hope sparked in her chest.
She studied the blue dot at the bottom of the phone screen. It had a little arrow sticking up off it to the side. She turned the phone and the arrow revolved. Her Daddy had already shown her this trick. She pointed until it aimed right at the Hatter's flashing dot, which was through the steering wheel and out into the ocean.
Now she just had to reach him.
An idea came to her.
She tapped on the side window glass with the phone. It felt like signaling for fish in an aquarium. A twitchy young man dropped his gray face to her level.
"Hey you," she said to him. His eyes tracked the phone and his pale lips snuffled on the glass. "You like my voice, is that right? You like it when I make noise?"
She tapped the phone along the glass in a line, and his eyes followed. Others outside moved too. Perhaps her idea would work. She climbed through the gap into the back seat and tapped the side window back there, and her hooked fish kept following, along with the others. They all shuffled round the taxi like a game of musical chairs.
She laughed. She leaned over and tapped on the back window, and they circled faster to meet her. A chink of light slipped in through the front windshield as they cleared. More followed from the front to the back, peeling like a banana skin.
Soon the front window was clear again. Ahead the narrow island of clear black tarmac was clear again, with the flow of bodies continuing either side. She watched the front doors, waiting for the people there to shuffle clear too. She would open the door and run, get lost in the flow and find her Daddy. He'd protect her. She tapped the glass crazily.
Then the taxi moved.
Her side thumped against the back seat as it lurched forward, dropping her firmly on her bottom. The taxi kept moving, inching forward. She stared at the front controls in disbelief, like Alice watching her body grow or shrink.
"What are you doing?" she asked the car at large.
The taxi didn't answer, but kept going, rolling slowly into the tarmac island. It nudged past the front edge of one of the other cars, which crunched gently and shifted to the side, and passed on. It was headed right for the point where the two flows of bodies joined together.
"Stop," she ordered the car, but it didn't listen.
She took urgent action, clambering into the front seat with the wheel. It was high and she could barely see over it, so she squatted on her heels, wrapped her long bony fingers round the gray wheel, and pulled it to the right.
It turned. She yelped at how easily the whole taxi changed direction. She pulled it left and steered back into the island. She laughed again. It was so easy! But now the island was running out, the flow of bodies was right ahead and the taxi was picking up speed.
She looked frantically for some way to brake the car. She punched buttons and the radio came on again noisily, which just made the taxi go faster. She pulled the wheel left and the taxi bounced into the flow. Bodies thumped and bumped off the side like the ocean in her dream, then the windows filled up with more staring people, and seconds later the taxi stopped completely.
Anna sat back and let out a deep breath. She looked at the car's dials and its radio.
"What was that for?" she asked the vent-things that looked a bit like eyes.
The vents didn't say anything.
"Where were you trying to take me?"
Still nothing.
She hit the radio button and it stopped hissing. She looked around and thought hard. She looked to the back of the taxi and thought hard.
Were they…
She climbed into the back. She tapped on the glass. The people gathered again, trying to get close. They pressed themselves to the back glass so hard she could feel the vibrating rasp of their breath. And they pushed.
The taxi moved. It was just as startling the second time.
"Yes!" Anna cried.
The taxi bumped further into the flow until it was enfolded on all sides and everyone was helping to push. The pace cranked up quickly and the needles on the dials began to dance. People ahead bounced off the front noisily, then circled to the back to help push, where she was still tapping with a manic grin on her face.
The taxi went faster. Whoosh they went through the flow. The steering wheel jogged a little left and right as they bounced forward, but it didn't change direction much.
"Keep going!" she urged the ones at the back.
They carried her on like the ocean in her dream. Ahead they parted in a series of lapping waves. It was unbelievable. With one hand she brought up the gray fog on the Hatter's map and watched as her blue dot rapidly closed on the yellow dot. She stopped tapping but the people kept pushing. She climbed into the front seat and took hold of the steering wheel again.
Thump thump thump the taxi
went off gray bodies, and each impact drilled up her slender arms and into her chest, making her head bobble. She had to hold on with both hands and put the phone on her lap, steering through the flow. The blue dot sucked in toward the flashing yellow dot like a swooping birdwoman, so close that she began to worry that she would smack into him and bounce him off the front too.
She yanked right on the wheel, plowing sideways hard. The thumping became thunder and the taxi lurched as it ran over fallen bodies. It did slow though. She pulled the wheel to the left and the angle was even steeper now, barreling through the ocean so hard that in a few seconds she shot out of the flow completely.
The taxi banged hard up over a curb and shot freely over the light concrete forecourt of a strange open space with a high white roof. Ahead stood a stand of machines with handles and tubes spilling out, at which other cars were resting.
She jerked the taxi back to the right, rocking her sideways and pulling away from the people pushing at the back. The taxi freewheeled further then crashed into the rear of a dark yellow plastic box.
Crunch said the box. Anna bounced off the wheel and back into the seat. The car had stopped.
Despite feeling dizzy, she grabbed the phone, yanked the door open and lurched out before the ocean could seal her in again. They were running over so she ran too, climbing over a low red wall and along a sidewalk with the phone raised up before her eyes.
He was so close. She looked up; the ocean were parading down a wide road lined with shiny glass buildings. The sky was deep blue and the road was studded with cars. She jogged down the side of the ocean like it was a moving train, peering through the windows for the one face she knew.
The yellow flashing dot was just ahead. She put on a burst of speed and dived back into the mass. Here there were men in yellow construction suits that kicked her, a woman in tight red leather who elbowed her, and then a broad black back with a sharp yellow lightning bolt drawn on it.
"Daddy!"
Anna leapt ahead of the figure, took hold of his cold hand, and looked up into his face. It was her Daddy, with his bloody beard still on his chin like a mask. She began to cry.
He kneed her in the chest and she staggered backward through the mass.
"Why did you leave me?" she coughed. "Why, Daddy?"
He didn't say anything. He didn't even look at her. He kept on walking.
Anna stumbled along by her father's side, clutching to his hand and surrounded by the ocean. She didn't have the energy to run away from the ones chasing her anymore, but being with her Daddy made her brave.
"Leave me alone!" she shouted at them.
They approached more slowly. Perhaps they were afraid of her father. They came close but slowly now, and not crushing her. That was something, but hardly enough. Her Daddy just kept on walking, and it was all she could do to keep up. All her cries of, "Daddy!" were ignored. She tried several times to pull him to a stop, but he was too strong and she was too small, and she was dragged along behind.
So they walked.
They walked along the road until it twisted to the side, then they got off and walked through fields. The grass was damp underfoot and her too-tight shoes got soaking wet. They walked through a bush, mostly trampled already, then through a field of tall golden grain. They walked across a low stream which made her feet even wetter, then they climbed up a low hill and walked over another road where her wet shoes went slosh slosh slosh.
At the middle of the road there was a railing which she had to climb over. Her Daddy got stuck for a little while, trying to walk straight through it, so she used the time to rest. Most of the others got stuck too, so that was kind of funny. After a while she got up and managed to guide him over, lifting his legs for him. Some of the others saw and followed their example, while others just got shoved over helpfully by those coming up behind.
Anna didn't know whether to scold them for being rough, or thank them for being helpful.
For a while they walked along the new road, mostly at the head of the group. Anna saw the world outside of the pack of shambling bodies for the first time since the riotous taxi ride. Cars of all types sat at crazy angles across the road's lanes, like dropped crackers on the bedspread. Some had broken through the railing, others seemed to have crashed into each other and were still steaming, while some had gone skidding down the little hills to the side.
"What happened here?" she asked her Daddy breathlessly.
He walked on.
"You have to talk to me. This isn't fair!"
He pulled her on. Some of the faster members of the ocean folded back around them soon, closing off her view. Soon the road swerved and they walked off it again, down another low hill and into a dark forest.
"Stop!" she shouted, but he didn't stop. There was no use arguing. He pulled her into the dark brambly undergrowth and she stumbled through behind, while thorny bits of scrub tore at her jeans. She clutched to his leg and let him do most of the walking for her. Still her feet were wet and hurt and she could barely think.
None of this was right. None of it should be happening, but there was nothing she could do. It was just like the hurt. Not even her Daddy understood; it just had to be faced.
"Let's stop Daddy," she gasped for the fiftieth time. "I'm tired."
He walked on.
"I can't go much further. Just for a little while."
They walked on. She pulled out the phone; it said 3:53. She could read numbers enough to tell the time.
"I'm serious Daddy. I'm really serious."
He was too.
The forest got darker as they got deeper. Was it night already? She wasn't sure. Her room had always been dark all day. She began to think about the night. Of course it scared her. Scarier though was the creeping hunger in her belly, and the feeling that at any minute her arms and legs would give out.
She wouldn't be able to catch up to him again if she was left behind. She was only little, but she knew cars couldn't be pushed through the forest. They needed roads. If she let go of his hand now, that was it, but she couldn't hold on much longer.
That thought was scariest of all: being left alone like Alice in the woods. She didn't know if she could be as brave as Alice, in the night in such a horrible and spooky place.
There had to be another way.
"Think of it this way," she said aloud, trying to make herself braver. Her voice sounded breathy and weak. "A little girl is following with a group of snails." The idea for snails came right out of her impossible things head. "But they never stop. How can she keep up?"
It was like one of her Daddy's impossible challenges. She imagined the girl and her snails drawn on a piece of paper. The answer was simple; build a saddle and ride the snails.
"And if she's tired?" she asked herself aloud. "If she needs to sleep?"
A very nice saddle, that was obvious. She thought about it. A saddle on a snail was easy. But on her Daddy?
She looked up at him. His back was upright. He could easily carry her if he just extended his arms, but she knew now he wouldn't do that. Something was wrong with him, like a sickness, and she had to steer him to a hospital. First though she had to ride.
She imagined sketching the saddle. It looked familiar, and she racked her brain while stumbling over slippery roots. There had been a sick woman earlier, carrying her sick baby with no hands in a sling.
Anna looked around. There were no slings here, but there were plenty of jackets, and maybe they could be the same?
It wasn't easy.
"I'm coming back," she said to her Daddy, then let go of his hand and stumbled over to a lady in a black suit. Stripping off her jacket required a few feeble leaps, falling more than jumping off little ledges to get the sleeve off her shoulder, but once one sleeve was clear the other came easily.
She balled it up so it wouldn't drag in the stinking moldy leaves. Her Daddy hadn't gone far, and she stumbled and slipped back to him.
"Here," she said. She tried jumping onto him and looping i
t round his head, but she could hardly jump and she couldn't hold on at all. She reversed the process in her head, and tried tying the jacket at the arms first, then lassoing it over his head.
It hung loose round his neck like a cape.
"Hold on," she said, and tried to climb up. It was much harder than she'd expected. First she took hold of one side of the loop, but it just spun round him, so she tried again with both sides. It held firm, but there was no way her feeble arms could lift her up.
She tried climbing up his legs. Twice she missed and fell into the swampy muck as her hands slipped off the loop. The third time she managed to kick off his knee and get her butt up high enough to slip into the saddle/sling.
It slipped right out. She hit a patch of bushes hard and rolled.
Tears brimmed to her eyes. She dashed them away and got up and tried again. It was this or nothing, and it had to work. Two hands on the loop, a kick in his knee, and she vaulted higher than ever before. It was just long enough to spread the jacket beneath her, like a hammock, so when she fell it grabbed her.
"Ha!"
She laughed as it caught her and cradled her in close to his chest. It wasn't comfortable and it didn't feel very secure, but she was riding him like a horse. Her aching feet breathed relief. Her Daddy bowed a little as he took her weight, then he straightened again. It put her closer to his face, and the horrible clumps of dried Hatter in his beard, but that hardly mattered.
They stumbled on together.
Anna shuffled side to side, trying to make herself comfortable. When they came close to a burly man wearing a brown sweater, it was easy enough to lean over, reel him in like a fish, and peel his sweater like a banana skin.
"Excuse me," she murmured as she looped the arms beneath her and tied them round her Daddy's head. It spread her weight and made the ride more comfortable.
She did it once more with another man and his grey duffle coat. The arms were thick and hard to tie, but when it was done she was much warmer, tucked tightly like the snug covers back home.
She rested her head against her father's cold and raspy chest. She was so tired. Her eyes closed, and carried along by the waves of snails she fell asleep.
Zombie Ocean (Book 2): The Lost Page 3