A bullet pinged off the hood of a nearby car and put an end to their run. Whoever fired wouldn’t miss a second time.
“Don’t shoot.” Doyle’s voice was steady and calm and he had his hands above his head.
In the car, Scott, Mustafa and me, have ducked down.
I inch up enough to see what's happening and peer out the window. Five people emerge from the other side of the bus. Two men, a woman and two teenage girls. The girls were chained together convict style. Their shoulders were hunched and their clothes were torn. Behind them, there was a woman, but unlike them she was standing tall and proud. She was in her 50’s and was dressed like an aging biker chick in knee-high boots, trousers and a leather jacket.
The tall man with the gun held the weapon the way people with experience do, which worried me. In Scotland, most people don’t hunt and most people have never held a gun far less fired one.
His companion had brown hair and a podgy heart-shaped face. He was holding a gun, the way an amateur would. Both men were wearing fleeces that said SECURITY on the back.
Doyle and Kenny have their hands up as the men stride towards them.
Doyle’s talking but I can’t make out the words.
The sight of the armed men paralyses me. I can’t move and Scott has to pull me back down to the floor where Mustafa's already crouching. I told them what I’d seen.
Doyle’s left the keys in the ignition and one thought springs to mind.
“We need to drive…get out of here…”
As the words tripped out of mouth, I despised myself for saying them. Only a coward would suggest leaving Doyle and Kenny behind. But these men are armed and by the look of these girls, they were prisoners, not their companions. Staying here could be signing Scott and Mustafa’s death warrant, and leaving me to a fate worse than death – one where I’d be raped and abused.
Whatever we were going to do, we had to make a move. Dither and it’d be taken out of our hands.
23 WHAT WILL BE, WILL BE
Scott and Mustafa eye each other.
“I think you know what to do?” said Scott.
“Aye,” says Mustafa, who’d shifted over to the driver’s seat.
He fired up the engine, put his foot down, and fuck yi he cannoned straight into the two men with guns.
The pair were propelled over the bonnet, landing with a pleasing thud onto the half-gritted road. Limbs at unnatural angles, their bodies twitched in the snow. One of the man’s eyes were open wide, and staring up at the heavens. As if, he’s going there.
I’d been so focused on the armed men, I’d lost track of Doyle and Kenny and my heart did a wee leap when I realised they were okay. They must have dived out the way because they’re twenty yards away from the dying men.
Scott pats my shaking arm but it doesn’t stop the drum roll of my heart. I thought we were done for. Screwed. As dead as anyone can be - at least before the dead got restless and got up and bloody walked.
Scott had a grin as wide as a crocodile’s as he turned to me. "Now you see why I never get in a car with this nutjob, Emma.”
He doesn’t care that Mustafa has just killed two people; people who weren’t dead bastards and you know what, I didn’t care either. Deep down in my gut I know what happened had to happen.
We got out the car and that’s when I see Doyle’s bending over one of the girls. As I approach, I see a trickle of blood running down her lips and a gaping bloody hole in her chest where the bullet must have hit her after it pinged off the bus. Her eyes stare sightlessly up at the sky.
Doyle lifted her limp arm to feel for a pulse and that’s when I notice the vicious vine of cuts and scratches running down her arm as though someone took a knife and dragged the tip down the skin several times.
There’s a girl beside her, curled up into a ball, not making a sound, but there’s no sign of the woman.
My eyes met Kenny’s, but we don’t say anything. What is there to say? Humanity has managed to outdo the dead bastards for bringing misery. And, we thought the infected were the only ones we needed to worry about.
Doyle eyes the chains that tie the girls together. “I’ll go and get the metal cutters from the car.”
“What’s your name?” I ask the girl gently.
The girl uncurls herself and stares warily at us. She can't be much older than 15. She had dyed blonde hair with a dash of pink highlights, delicate features and a nose ring. Despite the freezing cold, she's dressed in a crop top and low hung jeans that show off a studded belly button ring under an open hooded top.
She eyes me with fear and suspicion, but then the dam bursts and she weeps great bug hacking big sobs that made her whole body shake. All I can do is put my arms around her and keep telling her it’s okay, that she’s safe now. Nobody will hurt her ever again.
The more reassuring things I say the less I believed them. How can I protect her when I’m having a hard enough time protecting myself?
When she stops crying she finally tells me her name is Laura and I tell her mine.
When Scott steps forward to introduce himself, she flinches, so he backs off. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” And I know he didn’t. Scott knows how to deal with damaged people. He works with them at school.
All this time Kenny and Mustafa have kept their distance. Zombies they can handle, but a traumatised young girl was a step too far.
Taking off my coat, I drape it around her shoulders. Touching her is like touching a block of ice, but she’s not shivering. It must be the shock.
“I’m sorry about your friend. What was her name?”
She gazes at me, dead eyes filled with misery. “Callie, her name’s Callie. She’s my sister.”
Doyle arrived with the wire cutters, cursing away about having been able to find them much sooner if some bastard hadn’t been messing around in his car. Without a word, he hands them to me and I cut Laura free of the chain binding her to her sister.
Kenny appears at Doyle’s shoulder. He’s brought the girl some water.
I open it for her noting the cuts and fag burns on her wrists. She gulps it down, wiping her dribbling mouth on the sleeve of her hooded top. “Sorry, I don’t usually act like a slob.”
“It’s okay.” I let her finish her drink in silence, before I ask the killer question. "Laura, what happened to you and Callie? Who were those two men?” I cock a finger at the two bodies. “And, that woman. Who was she?”
When Laura spoke, she told us how she and Callie fled a nightclub full of “crazies” only to fall into the clutches of two psychopathic rapists and their mother.
When she’s finished recounting her tale, she asked who those crazies were and I told her. There was no point in sugar-coating it, so I tell her everything. She might be a kid in the eyes of the law, but in a lawless world, she needed to know the full truth.
When she'd recounted her story, she'd showed little emotion, almost as though the story wasn’t hers, but as the full reality of what I was telling her hit home, her eyes swam in tears.
“So, my mum’s probably dead too? And my gran and my friends?”
What could I tell her? That she was probably right? That everybody she loves is probably dead, or would be better off if they were? Because there’s worse things than being truly dead. There’s waking up and wanting to eat the first person you see and everybody else after that.
She eyed me with a weariness no girl her age should have. “What happens now?”
“You come with us,” I said. “They’re good guys. None of them will hurt you. Not like...”
I have to stop myself from saying any more. This girl’s been through so much already.
Kenny gave me a hand and we helped her up – she wasn’t as afraid of him as she was of the others - maybe it was because of his big puppy face.
She feels so light in our arms I'm worried she’ll float away. She must weight less than six stone. How could anyone hurt her? She was so delicate – just like Fiona.
We were trying to get her into the car when she pulled away from us. I don’t know how she got hold of the gun. It happened so fast there wasn’t time to react. She shoved it in her mouth and pulled the trigger.
For her at least, the pain was over.
24 WE’RE NO AT LASER QUEST NOW
We buried Laura and Callie in the same grave side by side. It was the last thing we could do for them. We left the two thugs to the dead bastards; that’s if they’d eat human flesh cloying with the stench of moral decay.
Once the job was done, Mustafa told me that all he seemed to do these days was bury bodies. He looked so sad and pathetic that I almost hugged him. Without his quick thinking, we could all be dead or like those two poor girls, I could be trapped in hell at the hands of those two psychos and their freak of a mother. When Mustafa strode off with the spade gripped in his hand and in the direction of the bus I’d no idea what he was doing until I realised that he was lifting something up with the end of his spade. It’s only when he tossed it my way that I realised what was at the end of it: a sock with part of a child’s foot in it. Bile rose in my throat.
“Hey, Emma, guess they missed a bit,” he shouted.
Sick bastard.
I wanted to batter some sense into him for his crass insensitivity with my bat, but Doyle got there first.
“What the hell are you doing, pal?” The pal bit didn’t sound too friendly.
Mustafa advanced towards him, but Doyle didn’t move. They were within head-butting distance now.
When Mustafa spoke, he threw out the words like daggers. “Don’t know what the fuck you’re looking at, you cunt. You wanted to blow the fuck out of innocent people. See that wean’s leg, that’s nothing compared to the number of body parts there would have been if you’d got your way. At least those fuckers are killing to eat. What were you doing it for? Some sick, twisted political agenda?” His face was twisted with rage. “You’re a disgrace to Islam.”
He had a point. Doyle didn’t have the right to take the moral high ground. He'd lost that right when he decided to blow innocent folk to smithereens. A plan he would have carried out if he hadn’t been turned back at the airport. He’d even admitted that himself.
Doyle’s face flushed, but he didn’t respond as he brushed past Mustafa and marched back towards the car. Part of me was terrified he’ll jump in and drive off, abandoning us in the middle of nowhere, forcing us to make the long trek to safety, so I sprint after him, my heart pounding away like its set to drum roll.
I was relieved when the doors were still open and we all got back in the car.
We travelled in silence until we reached the narrow coastal road coming into Largs at Skelmorlie to find the road was blocked by a jackknifed lorry.
“Fuck. What do we do now?” Mustafa’s words are out before the rest of us have a chance to talk.
There was a glint in Scott’s eye. “Hold on a minute, Muzz, I’ll phone my personal chopper pilot, shall I?”
I don’t fancy getting out and walking either. But winding up Mustafa is way too much fun.
“Or we could hop aboard our hovercraft.” I chirped.
“Or flap our wings and fly,” said Scott.
“Or summon up the Tardis,” added Kenny.
Mustafa threw us all stinking looks. “Ha, bloody ha.”
Doyle’s not in the mood for any carry on. “We need to get our backpacks and haul some ass.” He says it like he’s a sergeant major and we’re his bad lads army.
“Shit, that’s what I thought you’d say,” said Mustafa.
Resisting the urge to point out that he shouldn’t have wasted time asking the damn question then, we got out of the car and saddled up, securing our backpacks. Mine weighed a ton, but I’d never hear the end of it from Mustafa if I mentioned that, so I walked along as though it was as light as a feather. Two minutes later, I had to give up because, one, I’m knackered and, two, he hasn’t even looked in my direction as we make the relentless trudge towards Largs through the snow.
Every crunch had us thinking the undead were on our tail, jaws clenched ready to tear into our flesh. It didn’t help that one side of the road is full of houses. There was no cover on the other side because it was all rugged shoreline or a dead man’s drop into the sea.
Death smashed against the rocks or by zombie; none of us wanted to have to choose.
As we plodded along the wind gusts tore at our clothes as though they were made out of paper – for all the good they did, we might as well have been wearing hospital gowns with our backsides showing. The freezing cold gnawed at our bones. But there wasn’t a murmur of complaint. We didn’t have the luxury of wasting our ears on listening to each other bitching, not when we need to listen for any incoming. We were all using military jargon now, because if this isn’t a war we’re fighting what is it? We’re no at Laser Quest now.
Finally, we reached the signpost welcoming us to Largs. There was something hanging on the pole.
When we get closer I realised it wasn't a burst football as I'd first thought. It was a human head. The skin at the top had been peeled off and there was a gaping hole on the top of the skull where the brain should be. It may have been a trick of light but the bulging eyes stared at us hungrily.
The grey tongue hung out and I reckoned if it wasn’t well below minus degrees there would have been drool coming from it.
Scrawled across the forehead in what I guessed wasn’t red felt tip, were the words KEEP OUT.
Scott summed up what we were all thinking when he said, “What the hell is in Largs?”
25 THE BATTLE OF LARGS
As we walked through yet another deserted street, Scott asked the question that had been hanging in the air. “Where have all the people gone?”
“Dunno.” There’s an uncharacteristic desperation in Kenny’s voice. “There’s got to be survivors somewhere.” He made it sound like a rule has been broken; that this was not the way it was meant to be in Kenny’s world.
“Aye, of course there is, man,” Mustafa said with forced cheer.
He plastered a smile on his face, and I prayed Kenny didn’t see through Mustafa’s lie. Our resident expert in all things undead needed to keep believing we could survive this hell. His eternal optimism drove us all on. Not to mention his brilliant ideas like the one back at the shopping centre.
“Aye,” I said, wanting to gee Kenny up. “We can’t be the only ones.”
We reached the most populated part of Largs. It was a ghost town. Even in the grips of winter that wasn’t right. It may have been a typical Scottish seaside resort, a bit rundown and in need of a decent coat of paint, but the few times I’d been here en route to visiting Scott’s parents, it’d been a bustling wee place full of old people on mobility scooters and day trippers. The beach wasn’t much to write home about; just a few hulks of rock and hardly any sand, but people still talked about this place with fondness. It had a bowling alley and amusement arcade along the seafront, so there were always unaccompanied kids skulking about, and the seagulls were known for their bolshiness. They’d pluck a sandwich right out of your hand whilst it was still in the wrapper.
Cars usually zipped up and down the wee roads, driven by drivers who were known for their mad driving, but today apart from a few cars that had been ditched in the middle of the road or left parked, there was no traffic.
Scott once told me the invading Norwegians were sent packing by the locals in 1263. They were probably shocked to see what little they were fighting over. At least that was my opinion. Scott loved this place and talked fondly of visiting Nardini’s for an ice cream every Saturday with his parents.
Our footsteps were on stereo as we crunched on snow and glass shards from smashed store windows. Apart from that, it was deathly silent. Even the birds were quiet.
Scott had the axe over his shoulder (his new one courtesy of the shopping centre) and was gagging to use it. I knew how he felt; it was easier attacking than waiting to be attacked.
Kenny
had made himself something he called the ultimate zombie killing weapon. It was a big stick with the club end large enough to brain anything and a sharp point to ram through some dead bastard’s eye. He'd covered all bases.
Doyle’s strutted about, being a soldier on patrol with his weapons belt stuffed full of what I’d since realised were grenades - he threw one to save us the first time we met. He had an iron bar gripped in one hand and his gun in the other. He also had the bomb vest in his backpack: his insurance against being eaten.
Mustafa’s sword still had blood on it. He refused to clean it because he said he didn’t want to wash out the good luck.
As for me, my new baseball bat and I were fast becoming bosom buddies. Without it, I’d have felt as though I'd lost a limb.
With a small coastal town made up predominantly of senior citizens, the infected must have made an easy meal of the town. The snow was saturated in spots with frozen blood. We came across body parts: some frozen under the ice, others sticking out from under the snow and a metallic smell hung in the air, so pungent I could taste it.
We passed an old woman in a mobility scooter. Half her head was gone, and her body was slumped over the vehicle. Her chest was just a shell of rib bones devoid of their innards. A carton of milk lay frozen in front of one of her wheels.
Further down we saw a dog’s lead tied to a lamp post outside a shop. No dog in sight.
Mustafa sounded shocked. “Fuck, do they eat dogs now?”
Kenny shrugged and pointed down at the lead. “Naw, look, it’s been chewed. The dog must have escaped.”
Mustafa relaxed. In this new hellish world, eating dogs would have been a step too far for him.
We passed the Scottish Pride Bank that had been haphazardly boarded up as if it was done in a hurry. The boards used were the flimsy kind used to temporarily board up a broken window until it could be replaced.
Daubed in blood on one of the boards that was nailed over the window was one word: QUARANTINE.
The Restless Dead: A Zombie Novel Page 14