Z: UK (A Zombie Novel)

by David Whaley

  “Sir, are you alright? It’s dangerous walking the streets alone, especially at night,” said John through the front passenger window.

  “Actually, it is dangerous no matter what time of day it is,” said the man continuing to walk off.

  The driver of the Focus reversed on the dual carriageway, no danger likely to present itself in terms of traffic.

  “Sir, do you need a lift somewhere?”

  “No thanks. That’s quite alright.” He continued walking and they reversed again.

  “Are you sure? Where’re you headed?”

  “Lakeford police station.” It was required that the Focus reversed for a third time.

  “We have just come from there. Anything we can help with?”

  The mere mention that they had just come from his desired location was enough to get his attention and he remained still.

  John took this time to look the man up and down.

  He estimated him to be around five foot ten inches in height, slim and approximately twenty eight years of age with wavy blonde hair shaping his head. He wore a suit minus the tie but complete with suit jacket.

  “You can’t help. But Natalie can.”

  “Yeah, we were with Natalie. Some crazy things going on let me tell you.”

  “I am fully aware of what is going on. I have some… friends coming to meet me. If I were you I’d continue on my way and stop getting involved in other peoples business.”

  “Sir! There’s no need to be rude. We were concerned and that’s it. We have a camp of survivors in Hertfordshire. Do you want to come along? Natalie is busy trying to sort out this mess.”

  “This mess can’t be ‘sorted out.’ Don’t waste my time. Don’t you know the police have no authority around here anymore? Look, I have a knife. You would normally arrest me for carrying an offensive weapon in a public place. So what are you going to do?”

  John held back the urge to agree with his statement about police and to punch him straight to the eye, but the oath he took, or perhaps habit of never doing it previously, prevented him.

  “Sir, just be careful out there. Natalie is busy and she will be the saviour of us all if she is successful. Just don’t go wielding that weapon around at her. Save it for the undead.”

  “Whatever.”

  The man walked off along the hard shoulder of the dual carriageway that would have been against traffic, if there were any.

  There were many guesses as to where he had come from but only half a mile until he would reach his destination.

  “What a weird guy,” PC Richards said to his driver. “We better tell Natalie.”

  John fumbled on his radio ensuring he was still on the Lakeford police channel. He was.

  “Natalie receiving?”

  No answer.

  “Met Base one receiving?”

  No answer.

  “Leon mentioned they were going to try and get some sleep after we left,” said the driver.

  “I hope that they are sleeping. We’ll call them tomorrow to see if anything happened. For now, we need to get back to Stortford.”

  “Roger that.”

  Ten seconds later and they were on the M11 driving at well over the speed limit and making good progress. Considering people had abandoned their cars all over the United Kingdom, they didn’t abandon them on the motorway as it was completely clear except the select few that were parked on the hard shoulder. John assumed these vehicles had broken down.

  They passed the junction with the M25 just in time to see a large explosion on coming from it followed by the sound of a roar high above that was loud enough to shake their Focus.

  Ahead, they saw two jets soar past that circled around to head in their direction.

  “They’re fighter jets,” said the driver, a quick glance in his rear view mirror to ensure the following Focus had also seen it. They had.

  The second Focus pulled aside the leading one matching its speed and indicated to the driver with one hand to speed up which was agreed with a thumbs up.

  “Floor it,” said PC Richards. “They’re coming around for another go.”

  Both vehicles were now frantically shaking as they surpassed the specification top speed of their vehicles, the jets headed straight toward them at a low altitude.

  Multiple something’s, barely visible, started falling from both of the fighter planes as they passed a second time. Then, realisation set in as to what this object was likely to be. Bombs!

  They couldn’t go any faster; they could only ensure that they didn’t lose speed.

  The items falling overhead did so at an alarming rate, John remembering that its speed will continue to increase the further it falls. Then they hit.

  They missed both of the county police vehicles but hit the tarmac sparking a loud bang and an eruption of fire, followed immediately by a shockwave.

  John knew the shockwave was to be expected and that it was caused by a change of pressure in the air, a propagating disturbance.

  “Hold on!” he shouted.

  Everyone had their seatbelts on which made his request a moot point as holding on to the dashboard, for people in the front, or the seats, for people in the back, did very little for what happened next.

  The shockwave hit with an astounding level of force, forcing the rear axle of both cars into the air. It was the speed they were travelling that saved them from the severity of what could have been. Nonetheless, it wasn’t enough to stop them spinning out of control just before the rear wheels returned to the ground.

  Both drivers stamped on the brake pedal which only seemed to accelerate their spins. Eventually, as the tyres regained traction, the brakes also began to work and forced them both into an abrupt stop.

  Each officer was moaning at the force that had been applied to their necks caused by the sudden spin and them stopping, but one person in particular was the loudest.

  It was Pete. His broken right arm had hit the door inducing a sense of pain that no man should ever have to go through, only women being brave enough to withstand that level of torture. Pete was helped back to a regular sitting position in his seat by the officer sitting beside him.

  “Is everyone okay?” John asked with a hand nursing his own neck and head that had bounced of the window.

  Everyone in his vehicle grunted to signal that they were fine and another thumbs up from the second Focus that had come to a stop not too far from them indicated that they too had sustained no serious injuries.

  Debris rained down upon them in a flaming heap of traces of tarmac, metal from the dropped bombs and then a fine layer of dust that was floating around everywhere but lit up especially around their headlamps.

  John turned around and looked through the rear windscreen, wincing as he turned his neck, to ensure the jets weren’t coming back. They weren’t.

  “Those fuckers have blown up the main roads but luckily the M11 behind us,” said John. “We need to continue. Get us back to Bishops Stortford.”

  The drivers continued on their way to head for their police station where the survivors rescued thus far were being housed.

  Chapter 26

  Natalie awoke with a start, partly owing to the explosions that were very real sounding in London and her nightmare. Unfortunately, her nightmare was not of the norm, of make believe; it was based on reality.

  Between the blasts of the explosions she could hear the soft pitter patter of rain drops gently knocking on the window panes, a subtle and calming contrast otherwise. That is, until she looked.

  Staring out over the balcony, she saw mounds of flames rising upwards and the barely visible plume of smoke that followed each in the dark early morning sky. The rain changed from being calming to an element that invoked a sense of terror, its imagery only adding to the apocalyptic feel of what had come to be.

  There was a faint sound of what she recognised as jet engines in the distance. Natalie accurately assumed that they were the cause of the disturbance and remembered what Leon had said w
hen they blew out the bridges. Maybe they are trying to contain and quarantine sectors of the UK, she thought.

  Looking around the briefing room, Heather and Leon stirred but remained asleep but Devlin, still asleep, wasn’t affected in any way by the noise levels. She was herself surprised that she awoke, but then again she always was a light sleeper.

  She walked quietly through the door and into the canteen only opening it slightly as not to let too much light through and wake the others.

  There was a staff kitchen here, the same kitchen in which she had cooked food, and decided to pour herself a glass of water from a bottle Devlin and Leon had collected from the petrol station, water from the tap was used to wet her face.

  After taking a sip from the glass, she set it on a side counter and leaned against the sink with both hands, water still dripping from her face, when she heard a loud bang coming from the corridor that led onto the main landing of the second floor.

  Natalie retrieved her Glock from the briefing room whilst still being careful that she didn’t disturb the others. She walked silently but quickly across the canteen floor and reached the door in which the sound had come.

  Firearm up, she pulled the door open and pointed it in both directions along the hallway. There was nothing and no one there. Having made her way to the main landing she found that still nothing and no one was present.

  Another bang, but this time from one of the floors below that echoed throughout the stairwell as she started to descend. She soon ruled out the first floor as she neared the door due to another bang sounding from further downstairs. Definitely the ground floor, she thought.

  Natalie walked along the ground floor corridor after having a quick glance in the PCs writing room and found nothing obviously out of place.

  In the foyer she stood still and held her breath to listen intently to further sounds only for her heart to interrupt as she noticed something on the floor.

  On the floor were four sets of footprints that she failed to notice previously proving people had recently walked through here and along the corridor in which she had just used to get to this part of the building. She knew these would have been living people as the footprints were spaced perfectly, not what would be expected from a shuffling zombie.

  She followed these steps which led to the writing room but they had dried out by the time she got there. Someone is definitely in this building. The sounds, the footprints.

  She knew she needed help and, as noisy as could be, she ran up the two flights, struggling to breathe at the top, and burst into the briefing room frightening her previously slumbered associates.

  “Jesus, Natalie. What’s wrong?” said a very tired Devlin.

  “You all need to come with me,” she said.

  The quartet headed downstairs to the foyer where she pointed out the footprints that had now been disguised with a wipe leaving only wet streak marks and not the tread of the footwear.

  “There were four sets of footprints here, clear as day before. Someone’s in here. I had a quick look around but couldn’t find anyone. These footprints lead to the writing room.”

  “Okay, is anything out of place?” asked Leon.

  “No, nothing as far as I can see.”

  “Is it possible the Hertfordshire officers have come back?”

  “I wouldn’t have thought so. They would have told us. Besides they can’t get in without a swipe card.”

  “Okay, so there were, or are, people here. They must have been here for a reason. Why?”

  “I have no idea.”

  Leon and Natalie silently agreed to check the writing room and they all made there way, and as Natalie had discovered before, nothing looked out of the ordinary. Except in Heathers opinion.

  “Oh no. This is bad. This is very bad,” she said.

  “What?” the others asked in unison.

  Heather didn’t respond, but instead ran to the fridge that she had moved during their previous outing from the station office to her makeshift one.

  The fridge was old but still in good working order. As is often the case, a fridge does not work when the door isn’t properly closed. In this case, the fridge door was open fully, the padlock and hinge damaged by someone intent on gaining entry.

  Heather pulled out the shelves and other chemicals she was storing within it as she continued to search for something.

  “What’re you looking for?” asked Devlin.

  She didn’t reply.

  Heather was focused; digging out the fridge like a dog does a bone, perhaps a bit more careful when it comes to handling chemicals in comparison.

  “Where is it? Please be here,” she said not in response to any verbal communication nor to anybody in particular.

  “Heather, what?” said Natalie lifting Heather from her crouched position to a standing one. “Tell us what’s going on.”

  Heather pulled her arm away from Natalie. “There was a cooler box, small in size, that I was storing in there. We need to find it.” She returned to her search but stood up again in response to what Devlin had to say.

  “What, have you lost your lunch or something?” he said.

  “For your information, contained within that cooler box was my sorry attempt at a cure. Yes, I failed in my creation but it can be used to enhance the virus if it falls into the relevant hands. So, no Devlin, I haven’t lost my lunch and when this apocalypse gets even further down shit creek when the ‘super’ virus comes about, I hope they use it on you first.”

  Devlin had nothing to say to this but knew he had done wrong once again by not thinking before he spoke. The story of his life.

  “Why was it in the fridge?” asked Leon.

  “Because I had to maintain the cold chain – protect it from exposure to heat. Basically, it works better chilled.” Heather was calming down as her attention had been averted to focus on Leon and Natalie.

  Devlin headed for a chair in a corner of the room and sat down remaining quiet, deep in regret.

  Suddenly, whilst all staring at the fridge, they heard a moaning sound coming from behind them. It was a deep moan. The sound that comes from deep within a person’s throat. A sound that could only mean one thing.

  “We’ve been breached,” shouted Leon prior to turning around and aiming his pistol high at average head height of a human. A quick glance over his shoulder and he downed the zombie with a single bullet.

  Devlin rose to his feet knowing that he was still part of the survival plan regardless of what people thought of him. If they were going to survive then they needed to work as a team, he thought.

  They all ran from the writing room and into the foyer where, through the hole in the glass doors created the previous night, they saw a number of flesh eaters shuffling by outside, one having just walked through the opening, Leon shot it dead alerting the others. Each zombie ran.

  “Stand side by side,” Leon said. “They have to come through in a maximum of threes to get through the door. I’ll shoot them at a distance and when they reach the door, kill ‘em.”

  The formation was set and put in place. Leon in the middle, Natalie to his left and Devlin to his right.

  “Ready?”

  Devlin and Natalie nodded, each holding their firearm in front of them and aimed at the doorway.

  They could see ten of the undead ahead with more approaching from the right hand side behind the building. They were fighting blind but had no choice but to fight.

  Leon hit his targets with every shot, of the first ten he took down six. There was a slight miscalculation, however. Four fitted through the doorway, not only three.

  The four that entered were quickly taken down, Natalie firing two rounds and downing two whilst Devlin fired three taking the remaining two out.

  “There’s more on their way,” said Leon.

  Leon took down a further two as they appeared from behind the building into view of the doorway.

  “How many of them are there?” asked Natalie.

  “God only k
nows, but we ain’t losing this place or we’ll be dead for sure,” Leon replied.

  Natalie took down a further six and Devlin another three.

  They were forced to step backwards as more approached the door with staggering pace. That being said, hope was on the horizon as there didn’t appear to be anymore in the yard as they had all gathered by the doorway trying to climb over and run through each other.

  This was used to their advantage. A skull of a zombie is fairly soft, softer than its original human self, and as such bullet entry and exit was easy.

  Natalie, having joked about this very thing with PC Richards, noticed this advantage first and planted one bullet through the leaders forehead which exited out of the back the fourth zombie along. Two birds’ with one stone, she thought. Four zombies’ with one bullet.

  Devlin quickly picked up on this strategy but due to the angles of his shots, with each bullet he only killed a single target, on occasion taking two bullets to kill one. Leon was a more adept shot and mimicked Natalie as he too took out multiple enemies. Devlin was able to achieve one feat being the one that killed the last remaining zombie.

  “Okay, this is ridiculous. Who let them in?” said Leon.

  They walked out into the rear yard feeling the last few droplets of rain hit their face before stopping altogether. The vehicle gate was the first place to be checked and it was closed shut. The perimeter wall hadn’t been breached either which was Leon’s main concern when they had been fighting James.

  The sun began to show its orange glow as it started rising slowly in the distance. A sense of peace fell upon the four watching on, frozen in soft tranquillity at the normality that radiated from the smouldering ball of fire.

  “C’mon. We’d better check the station office doors,” said Leon.

  These too were closed and locked without using a swipe card that left them scratching their heads as to how their intruders gained access.

  Heather broke away from the pack to have a final rummage in the fridge only to return empty handed with a content look of worry marring her face.