Surviving the Fall: How England Died

by Stephen Cross

  Harriet looked up and gasped, stepping backwards to the door in shock, unable to catch a breath, her heart banging against her ribcage.

  “Let him go!” shouted June.

  Jake, the kettle cord around one of his wrists, stood by the sink, his arm tight round Adam’s neck.

  “You stupid bitches!” Spittle spat out of his mouth as he spoke, hanging down in thin white strands towards Adam’s head. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!”

  “Mummy,” Adam started to cry, his face red, his eyes wide open in fear.

  Harriet couldn’t move, she had pushed herself up tight against the kitchen door, frozen in fear.

  June started to walk towards Jake, “Come on now, Jake, let’s not be silly. He’s only a boy.”

  Jake shook his head. “Oh no, I’m not falling for that again. You aren’t nice, you’re horrible, and you cheated me! You stupid fucking cow, I’m in charge. Get it? I’m in CHARGE.”

  He moved backwards, tightening his grip on Adam’s throat, causing him to scream in pain.

  “I’ll break his neck!”

  June suddenly jumped forward, pulling the knife out of her back pocket. She plunged it into Jake’s shoulder.

  Jake yelled out in pain and let go of Adam, who ran towards Harriet and wrapped his arms around her. Adam turned his head round, watching his mum fight with Jake.

  Jake grabbed June around the head and pulled her towards his knife drawer. June writhed under his grip, trying to pull herself and her knife free.

  “Do something!” shouted Adam, looking up at Harriet.

  Harriet only looked at him, her body unable to move. She heard herself let out a small whimper.

  Jake grabbed the knife drawer and pulled it open. A muffled cry escaped from June as Jake squeezed his arm harder around her head. He pulled out a knife from the drawer with his free hand, and plunged it into June’s back.

  She screamed, a loud blood curdling scream, echoed by her son who watched his mummy slump under Jake’s grip.

  Jake looked at Harriet, spit dripping from his mouth, his eyes wide open and crazed, and he laughed.

  It was his last mistake.

  His attention wandered for a second, enough for his grip on June to weaken. She pulled out the knife from Jake’s shoulder. He cried in pain, his head snapping round in fury, but it was too late. June dug the knife into his side, once, twice, three times.

  Jake’s cry’s turned into murmured gurgles, as blood pumped out of his mouth. His eyes glazed over, and the two of them slid to the floor.

  Harriet screamed and held her head in her hands.

  Adam ran to his mum and hugged her. “Mummy, mummy, don’t die!”

  A wave of nausea rushed over Harriet. She felt light, her vision went dark, and she passed out.

  Chapter 3

  Harriet opened her eyes. Her head was sore. Black holes swam in and out of her vision, but she saw Adam clearly enough.

  The young boy was sitting beside his mum, holding her hand, his body jumping with small sobs. His face was forlorn, staring dead ahead with empty eyes, red through crying.

  A pool of blood covered the kitchen floor, Jake’s body lying next to June’s, a knife stuck in his side. His eyes were wide open, staring into space.

  Harriet took a few moments to calm herself, to stop herself from vomiting. The kitchen door was right next to her.

  “I have to get out of here,” she said and scrambled to the door, pulling at the handle.

  Adam started to cry behind her. She paused and turned to him.

  “You can’t go,” said Adam between sobs.

  “I can’t stay here!” she said, almost shouting. Adam stared at her, his eyes and cheeks red with tears. “We can’t stay here,” she corrected herself.

  Adam shook his head. “What about my mum?”

  Harriet felt panic rise in her stomach. She had never seen a dead body before, never mind two. Never mind two murders.

  “We need the police,” she fumbled in her pocket for her mobile phone and pulled it out. Her hands shook violently. There was no signal. “Shit!” she shouted and threw her phone across the kitchen.

  “What about my mum?” shouted Adam.

  “I don’t know,” Harriet put her head in her hands.

  “We can’t leave her. We need to bury her.”

  Harriet thought about being outside, digging a hole, those things walking the streets.

  She moved closer to Adam and took his free hand. “Adam, I’m really sorry what happened to your mum. She was a lovely woman, and what she did was very brave, but we have to go.”

  “Where?”

  “I don’t know. Somewhere else. We can’t stay here, in this house.” She wondered if the smell of the dead bodies would attract the things.

  “We can’t leave my mum. I’m not leaving her like this.”

  Adam held a defiant look in his face, he stared straight at Harriet and pulled his hand out of hers.

  Harriet took a deep breath. “Ok, wait here. I’ll go and find a spade.”

  The day was hot, and Harriet was soon covered in sweat. No one had ever told her how hard digging was. She had been at it for an hour, and the hole was still only a shallow foot deep. Would that be enough to bury June?

  The garden had a high fence, and a good gate. There had been no sign of any zombies.

  Adam had spent his time between being in the kitchen with his mum’s body, and out in the garden watching Harriet. It made her feel uncomfortable, the small boy staring at her.

  He brought her drinks of water and pieces of toast and fruit.

  It was early evening before the hole was finished.

  Harriet lay out the sheet on the floor of the kitchen. It immediately turned red as it soaked up the blood. Harriet tried not to gag.

  She rolled June’s body onto the sheet, puffing and letting out small moans as she struggled with the weight. Something else she had learned today - dead bodies were really heavy. She would need Adam’s help to get the body into the back garden.

  “Ok Adam, if you can push, and I’ll pull. That’s right,” said Harriet as they moved the body into the back garden. Tears flowed freely down Adam’s cheeks.

  The grave was shallow, only a few feet, but Harriet didn’t have the energy to dig any more. They rolled the body into the grave and it fell in with a dull thump. The sheet feel away around June’s face and her eyes stared up from her grave.

  Adam’s legs gave way and he fell to the floor, crying. “Mummy,” he said under his breath, over and over.

  Harriet filled in the grave, now crying herself.

  The next day it rained.

  Harriet and Adam had both slept in the spare room. She was grateful for the physical exertion of digging the grave - she didn’t think she would have been able to sleep otherwise.

  They sat in the lounge, Harriet’s stomach turning at the smell coming from the kitchen. She would be glad to leave, even if it meant going outside where the zombies were.

  “Ok, Adam, we have to try and find some help. I think we should go into town and see if we can find a police station.”

  Adam shook his head. “We have to find my Dad.”

  Harriet sighed, “Look Adam, I think that finding the police will be easier. Don’t you?”

  He shook his head, refusing to look at Harriet.

  “Adam, I think we have to do what I say now. I have to look after you until we find someone.”

  Adam turned round to face her, his face screwed up in anger. “You can’t even look after yourself. You let my mum die, you didn’t do anything! I want to find my dad!”

  Harriet stared at the boy, his words having the same effect as if he had hit her in the stomach. “I’m sorry Adam. I didn’t know what to do.” She felt tears trickling down her cheeks.

  Adam turned away from her, folding his arms. “I know where my dad’s base is. We have to go there.”

  Harriet nodded. “Ok. Ok Adam, we can do that, if that’s what you want to do, then we can do that.
” She wiped away her tears. “Where is his base?”

  “We have to get to the M25, then we can follow the M4. I’ll know the junction.”

  Harriet thought to herself, the M25 was the motorway she had escaped from a few nights ago. She didn’t want to go back there. “Adam, I’m not sure if we can-”

  “You can’t help me! The police can’t help! We have to find my dad. Only the army can help against the zombies.”

  Harriet sat back against the couch, feeling defeated, feeling empty. She was out of fight. Besides, maybe he was right. “Ok, Adam. Let’s go to your dad’s base.”

  “I was going anyway. You’re not in charge of me.” He left the room, pausing to say, “I’m going to find some survival gear.”

  Harriet sat in the lounge for twenty minutes or so, unable to move. She couldn’t describe how she felt, beyond simply scared to be alive.

  The sounds of Adam moving about upstairs broke the silence, and she listened as if hypnotised.

  He appeared at the lounge door with a small backpack on. He had a hunting knife tucked into his belt. “Coming?”

  Harriet nodded and stood up.

  “That’s your bag,” said Adam pointing to a larger backpack on the floor.

  Harriet picked it up and followed Adam. They stepped out of the house, and Harriet looked nervously up and down the empty street. No zombies.

  The rain fell hard, the skies dark with clouds. Harriet pulled up the hood of her waterproof, and they walked towards the fields, back towards the motorway.

  After ten minutes of trudging through the thick mud of the saturated fields, they heard gunfire. Adam visibly brightened.

  “It’s the army - maybe my dad is there, come on!”

  He walked ahead of Harriet as she struggled in the muck and driving rain.

  Entering another field, a motorway bridge became visible. Although difficult to see in the dull light, it was apparent a number of green trucks lined the motorway exit.

  A large crowd of people congregated in this lower portion of the field, near the motorway exit.

  Adam charged toward the motorway, the gunfire becoming louder the closer they got.

  “Wait, Adam, wait!” Harriet quickened her pace to catch up with Adam.

  Another sound mixed with the gunshots - shouts and high pitched screams.

  Adam heard them too and stopped running. He turned and allowed Harriet to catch up with him.

  “Who’s screaming?” he said.

  “I don’t know, stay with me. Ok?” She held out her hand. Adam looked at it for a moment, then took it. “I imagine your dad wouldn’t rush into something, would he?”

  Adam shook his head. “No, he’d want to do a recon.”

  “Ok, well, let’s walk slowly and do a, erm, recon.”

  Adam seemed satisfied and they kept a gentle pace as they neared the bridge.

  They started to mix with the edge of the crowd. People ran in all directions. No one seemed to know where they were going. The field and the embankment leading down to the motorway teemed with a confusion of bodies - thick with shouting and screams.

  A middle aged woman stood near Harriet, tears streaming down her eyes. “Millie, Millie! Where are you?” shouted the woman.

  A man in a mud covered suit ran past pulling a young boy by the hand, an even younger girl on his shoulders. The girl held onto a teddy bear.

  No one paid any attention to Harriet or Adam.

  Gunshots, screams, shouting, engines. All these sounds melded in an ominous cacophony, sending a chill up Harriet’s spine.

  A young woman, running past Harriet, tripped and fell. Harriet rushed forward and helped her up.

  The woman, her face pale, her eyes open wide, stared at Harriet, then at Adam. She grabbed Harriet by the shoulders. “Get out of here, get him out of here, they’re shooting at everything!”

  “What, who’s shooting? The Army?”

  The woman let go of Harriet and continued running, “They’re shooting anyone, they shot my husband.” She disappeared into the crowd of people.

  Adam tugged on Harriet’s arm. “What does she mean?”

  “I don’t know Adam, she’s probably confused.”

  “We need to find the army.”

  Harriet looked around her. The field was churned to mud. Gunshots, loud and close continued to crack on the air. Hundreds of people running in all directions.

  “No one knows what to do…” she said.

  There was a high scream and a yell from close by. Harriet turned to the sound and saw a young man falling, an old woman seemingly attached to his neck. The two landed on the floor and the woman lifted her head, peeling a large flap of skin from the man’s neck in her teeth. Blood spurted high into the air and the man let out a brief yell before his head slumped forward.

  Adam screamed and Harriet pulled him in close. No one helped the man.

  “Come on, we have to go.” They changed direction and headed back the way they had came, away from the motorway.

  Adam didn’t offer any resistance, but ran quickly after her, holding tight onto her hand. He let out small cries of panic as they ran.

  Harriet pulled left and right, avoiding the randomness of the crowd. Adrenalin kept her moving.

  She spotted a rising path that led from the edge of the field.

  “Up this way, Adam.”

  Another scream. A woman fell with two zombies pulling at her stomach. They fought over the woman’s entrails as they unwrapped from her gut. Harriet covered Adam’s eyes and yanked him forward, hard. “Come on Adam, don’t look.”

  They reached the path, which was busy with other people trying to escape the field. It inclined steeply and Harriet pushed her legs hard up the path. She gasped as a view of the motorway below opened up.

  A maze of hundreds of cars blocked the road on both sides. Fire’s burnt freely and hoards of people moved in-between the charred and empty vehicles. A military fence ran across the motorway and up the embankment, against which multitudes of bodies pushed and swelled. Soldiers were crouched on the other side, firing into the people.

  “What are they doing?” shouted Adam.

  “Shooting at the zombies, come on,” she pulled on Adam’s arm again, a little too hard, but she needed to get him away.

  They reached the top of the incline and kept running, the ground thick with mud, making movement hard. Harriet pushed against her fatigue, against the pain in her legs, and took one step after the other, fear driving her on.

  To their left was a wood, thick with undergrowth, dark and foreboding.

  Gunshots rang out from further up the path. Harriet stopped and stared into the distance. Adam tugged on her hand, “Let’s go.”

  Fifty yards or so ahead a number of figures crouched on the path, emitting brief bursts of light, cracks of sound. They were soldiers, firing at the people on the path. Screams echoed with each shot.

  “This way!” she pulled Adam to the left and they ran into the woods. They were not the only ones - many people were taking the same escape route, a panicked run of prey.

  Shot’s followed them, and Harriet gasped as a woman and a man to her right fell as they ran, eruptions of red around each.

  She ran. She held tight onto Adam’s hand and he ran with her. The sound of her breath and the sound of Adam’s cries drowned out the sounds of screaming and gunfire.

  People around her fell.

  Branches and bark exploded as shots went wide.

  They ran deeper into the wood, jumping over branches, tramping through thorns. Harriet felt a pain in her ankle, but she kept going.

  Soon the sound of gunfire became distant. The crowd around her thinned. She had no idea how much time had passed.

  “Keep running, Adam.”

  “I can’t!”

  “Keep running soldier.”

  They ran deeper into the woods, and after a time there was no sound but their running and the rain falling through the trees above. Passing a ditch, Harriet led Adam int
o it.

  “We can rest here, just for a few minutes.”

  They crouched deep in the undergrowth. Harriet pulled Adam close and he hugged her, burying his head into her shoulder.

  Chapter 4

  It was dark when Harriet woke. She didn’t remember falling asleep, and couldn’t imagine how she had. The down after the adrenaline high, she guessed.

  She glanced at her watch, it was ten at night. Insects chirped in unison and the odd owl whoot broke what was otherwise a deathly silence after the noise and panic from the earlier afternoon.

  Her first thought was Adam - he was no longer in her arms.

  “Adam”, she whispered in the darkness. There was a mumble of response from beside her. She felt around and found Adam, sleeping a few feet away from her.

  She shook him gently and he stirred awake. His eyes stared at her from the darkness.

  “Are you ok?”

  Adam didn’t answer but turned away from her.

  “Adam?” She put her hand on his shoulder. He shrugged her off quickly and with force.

  “Get off.”

  Harriet pulled her hand back and held it in mid air, not sure what to do with it.

  “What is it Adam?”

  “My mum’s dead because of you,” he hissed back at her.

  Guilt rushed over her. He was right, wasn’t he?

  “You did nothing,” said Adam. “You just stood there. You’re useless. And then you took us to the bad soldiers with the virus instead of the good ones.”

  “Adam, I don’t think the soldiers had the virus, I think…” she caught herself and stopped speaking.

  “My mum would have known what to do,” said Adam. “But she can’t now because she’s dead.”

  Adam began to cry again, his body shaking in sobs, getting louder.

  Harriet slowly moved towards Adam. “I’m sorry, Adam, I really am. I know, I’m not very good at things like this.” She put her arm on Adam’s shoulder again, gently. He tried to shake her away again, but it was without commitment.

  “I would do anything to change what had happened, but I can’t.” She put her arm around the young boy. “But what I can promise is that I’ll do everything I can from now, to keep you safe, and to find your Dad.”