Surviving The Evacuation, Book 0.5: Zombies vs The Living Dead

Home > Science > Surviving The Evacuation, Book 0.5: Zombies vs The Living Dead > Page 4
Surviving The Evacuation, Book 0.5: Zombies vs The Living Dead Page 4

by Frank Tayell

11th March

  George had woken after a restless night. He couldn’t see what course of action he should take. He couldn’t leave the others, nor could they all stay there in the home, not without more food. After breakfast, and after he had deputised Mr Grayson and Miss Conner to do the washing up, he examined the storeroom.

  There were now only three and a half cases of milk left. The biscuits and cake he’d found in the staff break room had lasted less than a day. He looked at the rows of packets and cans, trying to estimate how long it would be before they too were gone. Perhaps two weeks, he thought, perhaps less. He decided to go down to the village. He knew that there wouldn’t be much there, not if the Vicar and the Singhs had been relying on his hand-outs, but he had to at least look.

  He took his coat, went down the drive and out to the footpath that led through the woods and down to the village. After half an hour he came round a bend, and caught a glimpse of the river and the houses nestled alongside it. He slowed his pace, with each step nearer his view of the village improved, and his sense of unease grew.

  Hesitantly, feeling like he was being watched though he could neither see nor hear anyone, he walked off the path and into the trees. He found a secluded spot a little further down the hill where he could watch the village, hidden from view.

  When he’d looked down at the village from the home, he’d been able to make out little more than the rooftops and the patchwork colours delineating flowerbeds from lawns. Now that he was only a few hundred metres from the Vicarage, he saw that the windows of the shop, the pub, and the tearoom had been broken. Shattered glass now littered the streets in front of them.

  It was a little over a week since Mr Singh had said that they were planning on leaving. George tried to remember how many other people he’d seen on that visit. There had been the armed police patrolling in camouflage gear, but none of them lived in the village, he was sure of that. Had he seen anyone else? He didn’t think so. The village was deserted, that was clear, and going by which windows had been broken he doubted he would find any food there.

  “So we’re on our own. Can’t stay, can’t go,” he mused. “Or can we?” There were cars in the village, at least a dozen that he could count. None would contain much petrol, but pooled together there would be some. “Enough for one car, at least.”

  What did he need then? The keys, obviously. Mrs O’Leary had joked about him breaking into a house to look for them, but why not? He’d also need some tubing to siphon the fuel out of the other cars. His eyes were drawn to a small red run-about that belonged to Daphne, the cook from the pub.

  In the summers her disabled sister would visit. A childhood accident had left her in a wheelchair and George remembered being amazed at how the chair and a full load of shopping could fit in the boot of such a small car. He could get that car, drive it back up to the home, get Mrs O'Leary in and just drive away. Except he knew she wouldn’t leave the others behind. Now that he came to it, he wasn’t sure he could either. Which meant he needed drivers. He did a rough calculation in his head. At a pinch they could manage with just three cars, four would be better, but they could manage with just three. He was sure that at least two of the other residents would remember how to drive. And then they would go… go where? He thought for a moment. Cornwall was the obvious choice, that was where the letter said they were eventually going to be sent. His mind made up he turned and headed back up the hill.

  “What’s he up to?” George asked himself when he got to the top of the footpath and saw that the front door to McGuffrey’s cottage was wide open. Expecting to see the manager, and preparing himself for at least some kind of confrontation with the man, George walked up the drive to the main doors of the home. There, he was stopped in his tracks by a reddish brown stain, splashed across the off-white paintwork.

  Gingerly, he pushed open the door and stepped inside. The signs of a struggle were unmistakable. The never-read magazines, usually arrayed neatly on the coffee table, were strewn across the floor. A solitary lilac slipper lay on the floor next to a fire extinguisher that had been pulled down and used, judging by the thin film of foam covering part of the reception desk.

  Automatically he bent over to pick up the empty coat stand lying across his path. Then he stopped himself and listened. The home wasn’t silent. There was a strange sound, something he couldn’t quite place, something he wasn’t sure he’d ever heard before. It was coming, he thought, from the dining hall. Slowly, he headed down the corridor, his heart racing faster the closer he got. With each step the noise got louder, until he was only a few feet from the pea-green double doors with their porthole windows. Uncertainly he took a last final step, cautiously twisting his neck so he could peer through the glass window into the dining hall.

  The sight froze him to the quick. A trail of blood led from the kitchen to two bodies lying face down near the windows. In the centre of the room lay Mr Pappadopolis, his legs still twitching as McGuffrey, kneeling above him, chewed on the old man’s shoulder.

  George backed away from the doors. He’d never liked Mr Pappadopolis. There was something about the way that the man with the comic-opera accent was accepted where he wasn't that had created an enmity between them. But no one deserved that fate. The uncertainty that had been gnawing at him since the outbreak evaporated. He knew what had to be done and knew it was he that had to do it.

  He returned to his room, closed the door, and wished, not for the first time, that residents were allowed locks. He bent down and pulled out his box.

  “Destroy the brain, they said,” he muttered, trying to recall all that the news bulletins had said. “Didn't say how or what with, though, did they?”

  He pulled out the chain that hung around his neck. On it hung Dora’s engagement ring and the key to the box. He unlocked it and, with a grunt of effort, turned it onto its side. The meagre contents spilled out onto the floor. He laid the box down and carefully removed the false bottom. Inside was a bundle almost as long as the box. He took it out and carefully unwrapped the Assegai.

  His father had brought it back from the Second World War. He’d taken it from the effects of a blundering Captain who’d died during a night offensive that had killed the rest of the squad. It had been in the Captain’s family for generations, ever since it had been brought back as a macabre souvenir of a massacre in South Africa, and had been taken to this new desert war as an outsized and ultimately ineffective lucky charm.

  After the war, George’s father, a citizen of Empire and a decorated war hero, had immigrated to Britain. He’d brought the Assegai with him, wrapped in canvas and strapped to the outside of the old kit bag that contained the rest of his worldly possessions. It was hardly hidden, but during the immigration process he received such a thorough examination it would have been discovered regardless. “Family heirloom is it? A spear for a spear-chucker?” the senior immigration officer had said, laughing. “Let ‘im keep it.”

  Dora had thought he’d thrown it out and he would have done had it not been the only thing he had of his fathers. Instead George had replaced the broken shaft, fitted the false bottom to the box, and hidden it there, almost forgetting he had it when he’d moved into the home.

  He hefted the spear tentatively, gauging its balance. It was almost like a sword with an elongated handle. He had held it before, but never like this.

  He pushed the door open and stepped out into the hallway. His resolve stiffening with each cautious step, he made his way back along the corridor towards the dining hall. Outside the double doors, he paused just long enough to raise his hand briefly to the ring hanging around his neck. Then he shouldered the doors open, levelling the spear in front, as he stepped into the room.

  McGuffrey wasn’t there. Nervously, his eyes alert for any sign of movement, he moved towards Mr Pappadopolis’ body. It lay in a pool of drying blood in the centre of the room. He could tell the man was dead.

  There were plenty of small wounds across the body, any of which would have been enough
to cause the old man to have a heart attack. Two fingers were missing from his left hand, his face was covered in dozens of deep bloody scratches, and a semi-circular bite mark stood out against the pale flesh visible beneath a ragged tear in his trousers. There was no question as to what had killed him, though. His left arm was unnaturally twisted, white bone exposed where a chunk had been ripped from his shoulder. George forced himself to look at the face, to fix the agonised rictus of confused terror into his memory. After a few seconds, tasting bile in the back of his throat, he had to turn away, back towards the door. Where he saw Mr Parker.

  Mr Parker was a bitter man, angry at the world and everyone in it. He’d celebrated his eightieth birthday in November, a dreary affair with a handful of equally sour faced relatives who’d made no secret of their frustration that the old man was still alive. Neither George nor Mrs O’Leary had been invited. To them Parker, and his vocal dislike of everyone and everything, summed up all that was wrong with the lives they had become trapped in. Now, that face was smeared with blood, that expression of universal disgust turned to a snarling grimace.

  “Parker. It’s me, George,” he said, trying desperately to remember the man's first name, and unsure that he’d ever known it. The creature took a falling half step forward, its hand snaking out and clawing at empty air as George took a step back.

  “Please!” George cried in desperation as he stared into grey flecked eyes that were absent of all humanity. He took another step backward and his heel touched something soft. The body of Mr Pappadopolis. It wasn’t Mr Parker, George told himself, not any more. He took a two handed grip on his spear, twisting it so that he was holding it like a sword with the blade facing forward.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, as he raised his arms up until his elbows were level with his ears. “I’m sorry,” he said again as he hacked the spear down on its head, cutting through bone and skin, only stopping when the blade was level with the creature’s eyebrows.

  The body slowly collapsed to the floor taking the spear with it. George bent down and pulled. The blade moved, but only by a few inches. Grimacing he put one foot onto the dead man’s face, then tugged and stepped down at the same time. The spear came free with a sucking crunch of bone. There was no spray of blood, just a thin trickle of brownish ooze. He wiped the blade on the dead man’s coat and looked around.

  “Where there’s one…” he said, speaking only to fill the deathly silence. “McGuffrey. Got to find him. What would Mrs O’Leary…” He’d forgotten about Mrs O’Leary. He almost ran out of the door, not checking the corridor as he turned right, stumbling as he headed past the Sun Room, cursing his legs, cursing his lungs, and above all cursing his age.

  He turned the corner and saw two of them. Mrs Kennedy and Mr Carter were both pawing at Mrs O’Leary’s door. A door that, like his, had no lock. As soon as one of those hands accidentally found the handle and knocked it downward, the door would swing open and…

  “NO!” he shouted. “No,” he repeated quietly as they slowly turned toward him. He levelled the spear at eye height, gripping one hand around the butt, ready to push, but also ready to pull it back. “Come on, then. Come on, you greedy eyed, condescending, too-good-for-the-likes-of-us, patronising, self-centred.” He aimed the spear between Mr Carter’s eyes as he got closer. “Sanctimonious, pompous, self-important, stuck up, arrogant.” He thrust out, pushing with one hand. “Bastard!” The spear went in right between the zombie’s eyes. This time he kept a firm grip on the spear as it went in, wrenching it out as the body crumpled to the floor.

  “I hate you people. All of you!” George screamed as Mrs Kennedy approached. “Had to be the lords and ladies in a little pond. Couldn’t be gracious. Couldn’t be kind. Couldn’t think of what others might feel. What others might want. You’re all the same. All worthless. That’s why you’re here. Not wanted. Not welcome. No use to anyone, not even yourselves.” He swung the spear up and overhead. “Well I’m different. Me and Mary, we’re different. We’re better than you!” he screamed, as he brought the spear down with all the anger he’d kept pent up over the six years since his wife’s diagnosis. “We’re better than this!” The undead woman collapsed. George breathed out.

  “You’ve been wanting to get that off your chest for some time, I think, Mr Tull.” Mrs O’Leary’s voice came faintly from her room.

  “Aye. Well, you know,” he mumbled after a moment.

  “I suppose I do. What’s going…” she began. “No, I think I can guess. Are you alright?”

  “I’m fine. Not a scratch,” he added, knowing what she was really asking. “That’s three of ‘em down, but there’s at least one more. McGuffrey.”

  “I see. Well… you best do what you have to do,” she said. “I’ll be fine here until you get back. Go on, now.”

  “Right,” he hesitated a moment, but couldn’t see any alternative. “I will come back for you.”

  “You see that you do.”

  George looked along the corridor, first one way, then the other, unsure which direction to go. What he knew about the undead, at least about these real undead, not the fictional kind he’d become familiar with from the television, was very little. They attacked. They bit, but they didn’t eat, not really. They died if you destroyed the brain, and if they got you then you died, then you turned into…

  “Mr Pappadopolis. Damn.” He realised he should have finished him and the other two dead residents he’d seen then and there, before they turned. Once more he headed back to the dining hall.

  From the windows he could see the body of Mr Parker near the door and another one still lying by the window. Of Mr Pappadopolis and the other body that had been by the window, there was no sign. He pushed the door open a few inches and looked through the gap. He could see no one. He paused to listen, but could hear nothing either, though these days that didn’t mean as much as it once did. He pushed the door open, his eyes darting left and right as he moved inside.

  Mr Pappadopolis was halfway through the door to the kitchen. He must have been in there, George realised, but why? He shook his head, there would be time for questions later.

  He glanced around, making sure that the floor was clear, checked over his shoulder, but there was no sign of the other resident. Mr Pappadopolis took another step forward, and George could see past him, and saw the other undead creature behind. Mrs Ackroyd had been in the kitchen as well.

  Between him and the two zombies lay the long serving counter. As he watched, they tried to walk through the counter, thumping into it at waist height almost as if they couldn’t see that it was there. With each thump and rebound they were being edged slowly along the counter towards the small gap between it and the wall. That would funnel them, George realised. It would force them to come at him one at a time. He raised the spear to waist height, breathed out, and waited.

  As the zombie that had been Mr Pappadopolis reached the edge of the counter and lurched forward into the open space of the dining hall, George saw that there was no blood except that which was drying on the man’s clothes and face. That same reddish brown ooze he’d seen in Parker’s skull dripped from the stubs of his missing fingers onto the once pristine floor.

  Drip, drip, drip. George was mesmerised by it, unable to comprehend or understand how such a creature could possibly exist. Drip, drip, drip. Closer and closer. And now it was too close.

  George started suddenly, bringing the spear up, swinging it at the creature one-handed. Too low. The tip of the spear grazed along the zombie’s throat, scoring a deep line across its neck. It didn’t notice, it didn’t flinch, it just took another step forward. George swung again, this time aiming at the legs, a long scything blow that knocked it down to the floor.

  George changed his grip so he was now holding the spear point downwards and then plunged it into Mr Pappadopolis’ skull. The body twitched once and then was still.

  He tugged at the Assegai, but the tip was embedded in the floor. He glanced up. The undead Mrs Ackroyd was out pas
t the serving counter and only a few steps away. George looked around for a weapon in vain. The home had strict policies on dangerous objects, going so far as to refuse to serve steak on the grounds that it would require too sharp a knife.

  He backed away until his legs banged against something solid. He glanced down. It was a chair. He was at the other side of the room, against the good table with the views of the garden where Mrs Ackroyd had played her interminable game of cards with the other three residents.

  He picked up the chair and flung it at the creature. It hit her in the waist, but lacked the force needed to do much more than make it stumble. He looked around for something else to throw, and his eye caught sight of the table’s centrepiece – a glass vase containing silk flowers. He grabbed it, turned and saw that it was almost on him. He swung.

  It collided with the zombies face, knocking it off balance but not off its feet. He swung again, this time in a windmilling overhand blow that brought the vase down on its head. Both vase and skull shattered. The zombie fell to the floor, unmoving.

  George looked down at his hand. There was a cut running the length of his palm where the glass had bitten into his skin. Had he been infected? He wasn’t sure. He took out his handkerchief and wrapped it around his hand. He could do nothing more, except hope. Then he retrieved his spear and went into the kitchen.

  There was another body in there. He gently pushed at it until he could see the face. It was Mrs Jones. She must have been hiding in there when he’d killed Mr Parker, he realised. It was only a matter of minutes ago, but now that truly was a lifetime. He sighed then brought down the spear onto her head.

  He went back into the dining hall, stepped over the corpses and walked over to the last body. It was Miss Conner, he realised, her body now framed by a beam of early afternoon sunlight. He thrust the spear into her skull, then he turned and left the dining hall for the last time.

  “You alright in there Mrs O’Leary?” he called through the door.

  “I’m fine Mr Tull. Don’t you worry about me. How about yourself?”

  “Well.” He took a deep breath. “There were thirteen of us in the home this morning. There’s you and me, that’s two. I’ve killed two outside here, and another three in the dining hall. Two more who were murdered. I took care of them, just to be certain, you understand. So that’s four residents left. And McGuffrey.”

  “And yourself?” she asked again.

  He looked down at his palm. “I’m fine. Tired, but not too tired. Someone must have gone up to the cottage. Opened the door somehow. McGuffrey must have been infected days ago, gone home and… been trapped, I suppose. Whoever opened the door rushed back here, but they were nowhere near as fast as McGuffrey. That’s how he got in.”

  “I see.” There was a pause as they both tried to think of something to say.

  “I’m going to continue my rounds, now,” George finally said. “You stay safe.”

  “You too.”

  George kept the spear at his side as he stalked the corridors of the home. The adrenaline had begun to leave his system and with it, his strength. The question gnawing at the back of his mind was whether any of the residents had made it outside and whether they had been infected before they left. Though his mind tried to stay focused on the job in front of him, it kept straying to thoughts of that red car in the village, of getting himself and Mrs O’Leary out and away.

  He found Mrs Lyndon next. She was stuck in the staff break room, unable to turn the handle to open the door. From the sounds she was making he was sure she had turned inside the room. He stood by the door, trying to work out if there was more than one creature inside. He couldn’t be certain but he thought she was on her own.

  Holding the spear in his left hand he gripped the handle with his injured right, turned the knob and pushed. The zombie heard the movement, sensed the presence of prey and pushed back. George managed to get his foot in the door, stopping it from closing completely. Then with an almighty heave, he pushed the door open, knocking the undead resident back into the room and down to the ground. He stepped forward, kicking at its arms as it tried to lever itself up. Then, in a move he was becoming experienced at, drove the spear through her eye.

  “Some of them might have run,” he said to himself, as he wiped the spear on her coat. “Where haven’t I checked? McGuffrey’s office.” Slowly now, he crept up the corridor to the door at the end. He couldn’t hear anything except the sound of his own laboured breathing. He threw the door open. The office was empty.

  “Three and McGuffrey,” he said to himself. “They’ve got to have run.” But could McGuffrey have left the home? These creatures, these zombies, they seemed unable to even open a door. Didn't that mean that if they were inside then they wouldn’t be able to get out? Or, if McGuffrey had followed one into the home, then couldn’t he just as easily have followed someone out of it? George hoped so. “Where’s left?” he muttered. “The bedrooms.” He hadn’t checked the residents’ rooms.

  He went back to the main area of the building and, one by one, checked each bedroom. He found only one more resident. Mr Grayson. He was dead, but not murdered by the undead. He’d taken a razor blade and sliced thick gashes along the inside of his wrists.

  George checked the last three rooms along that corridor but they were empty. “Then the others have run,” he said, and this time he said it with certainty. “You were the last,” he said to himself, pulling the door to Mr Grayson’s room closed as he passed it. “Just me and Mrs O’Leary left. And we’ll be leaving as soon as I’ve got my breath back.”

  How though? He wasn’t leaving her alone up here whilst he went down to the village to get the car. What if he couldn’t get back up? A chair! That was the answer. He’d get her into a wheelchair. It was downhill to the village. Perhaps he could find two chairs. He’d look, just as soon as he’d rested.

  His heart was beating harder, his mouth was dry and he could feel a headache forming behind his eyes. He took a moment to lean up against the wall. All he could hear was the pounding of blood in his ears. He felt nauseous. It was shock, he was reasonably sure of that. He just needed to get back to Mrs O’Leary’s room, then he could rest. Just a few hours rest and then they could leave.

  At first he didn’t notice the pain. Something was tugging at his arm. He pulled it back and saw the blood. And as he turned a dagger of burning ice shot up his arm and into his skull. He twisted, tried to jump back, but he was slow and McGuffrey was fast. Its mouth snapped towards George’s face.

  He pushed at the zombie, but it was like pushing at a brick wall, there was no give. He swung a punch at the former manager’s face. It was a weak blow, but even if he’d had his full strength it wouldn’t have been enough to knock the zombie down. It just turned its head slightly, snarled again and lunged. George snarled back. Their faces barely inches apart, George pushed, and managed to get the spear between him and the zombie.

  With one hand pushing at McGuffrey, keeping its snapping teeth away from his face, he gripped the spear more tightly with the other. Underhand, he brought the spear up with all the force he could muster. The tip of the blade entered the creature’s head just behind its jaw, tearing through skin and flesh to pierce through its tongue, and George could see the tip of the spear through the creature’s open mouth.

  He gritted his teeth and pulled the Assegai out, then plunged it upwards once more. It went in at a slightly different angle, tearing through the hole he'd just made and up into the roof of McGuffrey’s mouth. He jerked the spear out and stabbed up again. The jawbone cracked and skin ripped as the spear went through the mouth and up a further four inches into its skull. The creature’s hand spasmed as George twisted the spear free. He thrust it upward one last time. Grunting with the effort he dug it in further, twisting the blade until the creature stopped moving.

  He let go of the spear and the body sagged to the ground. George breathed out slowly, bent, and retrieved the Assegai. As he straightened he looked down at his hand. Th
e skin was torn where his knuckles had met McGuffrey’s teeth. He pulled up his sleeve and looked at his forearm. There was a trickle of blood running down from a semi-circular bite mark to the bandage on his palm. None of the wounds were deep, nor were they severe, but he knew they didn’t have to be. According to report after report he’d watched on the television, even the merest scratch was enough for infection. Sometimes it took minutes, sometimes it took hours, but according to everything he’d seen once you were infected it was only a matter of time.

  “I got bit, Mary,” he said as he closed the door to her room behind him.

  “Oh, George!” And his heart broke at the sound of his name coming from her lips for the first time.

  “I’ve got to go. Got to get out of here. Away from you. I don’t know how long I’ve got…” he began, not looking at her.

  “Oh, George!” she said again, tears welling up as the enormity of the situation sank in.

  “But look. I can’t leave you here. Not like this. Someone might come, they might,” he tried to imbue the words with all the confidence he didn’t feel. “But in that bed, you’re not going to stand a chance. I’ve brought you a chair. It was Mrs Lyndon’s,” he added. They’d always envied that chair, an expensive model with an electric motor bought by her son. Mrs Lyndon hadn’t needed one, she, at least in their opinion, had only used it so as to constantly remind the rest of the inmates of how successful her bank manager son was.

  “I got these pills from the pharmacy. There’s enough if you wanted—”

  “Now, George, that would be a mortal sin. And I think that there’s been enough of those recently, don’t you?”

  “And this is the food. All I had. It’s enough for a few days. Well. That’s it,” he said placing the bag on the foot of the bed. “Come on. Shift yourself up. Sit forward, and we’ll swing your legs out first,” George said brusquely, wanting it to be done, and done quickly.

  “No, wait a moment,” she said.

  “Oh, come on, Mary, there’s no time!” he cried plaintively.

  “I know, but I’m not going to die in this.” She lifted the hem of the frayed nightgown. “My dress, my good one. And my hat.”

  He hesitated. He’d no idea how much time he had, but the look in her eye, that same look that had terrified thousands of school children over the years brooked no argument.

  He went to the small closet and took out the solitary ancient dress-bag that smelt faintly of mothballs. It was the one she wore to funerals, the one she wore when she had visitors and the same one she’d worn at their own personal Christmas, eating the cake he’d brought and sharing out the chocolates her grandson had left.

  “Now, you’ll have to help me, George,” she said. “But you’ll keep your eyes closed.”

  “Of course Mary,” he said, smiling. He helped her get dressed and then helped her out of the bed and into the wheelchair.

  “Alright now, George,” she said, firmly.

  “Alright, Mary,” he replied. They looked at one another for a moment. There was so much that they wanted to say, but now there was no time for it.

  ”Goodbye George,” she said softly.

  “Goodbye, Mary.” He hesitated a moment. More than anything else he wanted to kiss her, but knew that he might infect her if he did. He turned and walked to the door.

  “You know, George, I will see you again,” she said.

  “I hope not, Mary. Goodbye. Good Luck.” And he walked through the door, and back into the corridor.

  He picked up the Assegai from where he’d left it leaning against the wall and headed towards the exit. He wasn’t certain that the last two remaining residents had fled, but there wasn’t time to check properly. He had no more time. He had no idea where he should go, just that he should go far enough away so that after it happened he wouldn’t go back to the home.

  He found his feet taking him up the road towards the cliffs. There was a bench there, overlooking the spit where a U-boat had become stuck during the war. It was a good place, where he’d passed the days when he wasn’t working in the electrical shop. He’d take food, a flask, and a book, and he’d sat for hours, regardless of the weather, doing nothing but looking, reading and thinking, but mostly remembering.

  There were a couple of fields between him and the bench, owned by a farmer who didn’t want anyone using them as a short cut. Especially not George, as had been vocally pointed out to him during a particularly unpleasant conference with McGuffrey last August bank holiday. He’d have to walk down towards the village, then, and take the gate to the footpath half-way up the hill, and…

  He laughed. What did any of that matter now? He twisted his Assegai between the strands of barbed wire and tugged it free. Then, humming as he went, he pushed his way through the hedge and walked across the dark damp earth, ready for a crop that would never now be planted.

  By the time he had reached the bench it was two hours since he’d been bitten. His time was running out. He sat down, carefully placed the Assegai by his side and looked out to sea. It was calm. Inland he could already see plumes of smoke from where fires had taken hold. He thought he heard a scream in the distance, but he couldn’t be sure. All he could see was the tranquil blue of the ocean. He concentrated on the sound of waves crashing against rocks. George smiled, and closed his eyes.

  The end.

  The story continues in Book 1: London & Book 3: Family.

 

  I hope you’ve enjoyed this book. If you’ve a few minutes to spare, I’d be grateful if you’d consider leaving a review.

  To join the mailing list, just click here:

  https://eepurl.com/brl1A1

  You won’t be bombarded with messages, but I will let you know about new titles and special offers. For more information, or to get in touch, visit:

  https://blog.franktayell.com

  https://twitter.com/FrankTayell

  www.facebook.com/TheEvacuation

  Other titles:

  Work. Rest. Repeat.

  A Post-Apocalyptic Detective Novel

  Surviving The Evacuation

  Book 0.5: Zombies vs The Living Dead

  Book 1: London

  Book 2: Wasteland

  Book 3: Family

  Book 4: Unsafe Haven

  Book 5: Reunion

  Book 6: Harvest

  Book 7: Home

  Undead Britain

  (In the charity anthology, ‘At Hell’s Gates 1’)

  History’s End

  (In the charity anthology, ‘At Hell’s Gates 2’)

 


‹ Prev