by Frank Tayell
“You do know that the reason we stopped playing around with those batteries is that they had a tendency to catch fire,” Chester said.
“George said, but there’s risk with anything. This is a risk we can manage.”
“And you know that you’ll need tens of thousands of batteries?” Chester asked. “Maybe a hundred thousand. That was the number Jay and Kevin were talking about, though I think they were getting carried away with their dream. That being said, a laptop’s battery was designed to power a laptop, not a home.”
“There are plenty of laptops in Belfast,” Bill said.
“Hmm.”
“You’re not convinced?” Bill said.
“I’ll say to you the same thing I said to Jay. I’ll believe it when I’ve got the plate of food you’ve grown in front of me. Until then, I’m going to say the answer is old-fashioned soil, and old-fashioned sunlight.”
“Which is fine when the undead stop,” Bill said. “The presence of that horde changes my estimate of when that might be. Is that Scott Higson?”
The Australian pilot sauntered down the road.
“G’day,” Higson said, falling into step next to them. “Nice to see you up on your feet again, Chester. How are your mates?”
“Alive, thanks. And thank you for pulling me off that Birmingham rooftop. I’m not sure I said it yesterday.”
“No worries, mate, what goes around, comes around, especially around here.”
“I thought you were going to take the helicopter up over Birmingham,” Bill said.
“Been and done,” Higson said. “I left before dawn. It’s not like I need to bother with a flight plan.”
“And you saw the horde?” Chester asked. “Was it heading south?”
“I’d say it’s stationary in Birmingham,” Higson said. “What we have is a case of the observer changing the experiment. They weren’t standing still, but stamping the city to the ground. That produced a lot of noise, but some of them heard the sound of our rotors, particularly near the edge of the crowd. We hovered overhead for a bit, and then came back, due west. I think a few followed. Hard to say whether they continued in this direction after we disappeared over the horizon.”
“But they’re not heading to London?” Chester asked.
“Not this morning, no,” Higson said.
“Well, that’s something,” Chester said.
“Can you take the helicopter up again?” Bill asked.
“Sure. As long as the weather holds,” Higson said.
“Then see if you can lure them west,” Bill said. “The Snowdonia Mountain Range might stop them, perhaps they might become trapped in the valleys, but even if they end up in Menai Bridge, that’s better than London.”
“I’m ahead of you there, mate,” Higson said. “I was going to do just that, but I want to warn Heather Jones, make sure she hasn’t got any people over on the mainland. First, though, I wanted to pitch an idea to you, Bill. It’s a plan for my plane. I mean, when we leave here, what are we going to do with her?”
“Fly it to Belfast,” Bill said. He turned to Chester. “Nilda looked for a landing site in London, but they couldn’t find anywhere viable. That was before we knew about the horde.”
“And what are your plans for her after Belfast?” Higson asked. “I’ve crunched the numbers. If I strip her down to the bolts, I can save about seventeen percent on fuel.”
“What’s your plan?” Bill asked.
“Canada,” Higson said. “I can be over Newfoundland in four hours, winds allowing.”
“And land where?” Bill asked. “We don’t know of any airport, nor do we have any reason to think that Canada is going to be in a better shape than Britain.”
“That’s what the satellites are for,” Higson said. “Look, I’ll fly her to Canada. The admiral can bring one of the ships over, with barrels of fuel strapped to the deck. I’ll refuel, fly her over Newfoundland, keep an eye out for survivors, maybe drop a few leaflets, telling people to head to the coast.”
“And then what?” Bill asked. “I mean, that’s more or less the long-term plan we discussed for the plane. What’s the part I won’t like?”
“That, after I’ve flown over Newfoundland a few times,” Higson said, “I’ll fill the tanks, then fill the cabin with those barrels of fuel. And then I’ll set off for Baja California.”
“What’s there?” Chester asked.
“No idea,” Higson said. “But from there, I can refuel, and I should be able to reach Hawaii. I land, refuel again, and head for home.”
“You mean Australia?” Bill asked.
“Of course,” Higson said.
“Seriously? Where are you going to land in Hawaii?” Bill asked.
“That depends on what the satellites show,” Higson said. “I spoke to your brother. We can set them up to circle the Earth. Right now, they’re just taking pictures of the tops of clouds, and I can’t see that changing any time in the next few weeks. You can feel the pressure, you can feel the weather settling.”
“How far is it from Mexico to Australia?” Bill asked.
“About six thousand miles,” Higson said.
“And the plane has a range of about four thousand?” Bill asked.
“Hence the stopover in Hawaii,” Higson said.
“What about the zombies?” Chester asked. “You might be able to find somewhere to land, but you can’t refuel and fight them off on your own.”
“It’s a matter of weight,” Higson said. “Each person takes up the space of a fuel barrel, and costs me fuel in moving them. Once I’m in the air, anyone but a pilot is useless. On the ground, anyone but a mechanic is the same.”
“Except for holding off the packs of the living dead summoned by the sound of the engines,” Chester said.
“Well, I could ask around,” Higson said, “see if anyone wants a ride to the Pacific. Look, this is my one shot to get home, and I know what I’ll find when I get there. The chance my family’s alive is slim, but there might be a few survivors. I’ve got to tell them that we’re alive, right.”
“Yes, yes, you do,” Bill said. From the way that Higson missed a step, he hadn’t expected agreement. “Yes,” Bill continued, “every life is precious. No lives can be wasted, but that goes as much for Australia as every other part of the planet. You might get there, but once there, there would be no way to collect you and anyone you find.”
“Even so—” Higson began.
“Even so,” Bill interrupted, “the knowledge that we, here, are alive might be all they need to hear. It might be enough to give them hope in the darkest of times, in the hardest of years. Five years from now, or ten, or a hundred, it would give a reason for their descendants, and ours, to risk venturing out beyond our narrow horizons.”
“So you’re agreed to the plan?” Higson asked.
“Not as it stands,” Bill said. “It’s more logical for you to go east. Refuel only once in Africa, or perhaps in India. And it’s more logical that you set out from there with enough fuel to return with passengers aboard, or at least with some way to communicate what you find back to us. We’ll need to find a landing site. A dangerous mission with little chance of return is one thing, a suicide mission is a non-starter. No, you should go, but we need to plan this more carefully. It’ll be the last flight for maybe a century. Let’s not have it end in a crash.”
“So how long until I give it a try, do you think?” Higson asked.
“Let’s get to Belfast first,” Bill said. “And it’ll need to get the council’s approval. For now, why don’t you pass the word that you’re going to propose the expedition to the council? You’ll get public opinion on your side, and that should guarantee you get the go-ahead. I’ll speak to Sholto, and send word to the admiral. We’ll start getting things in place.”
“Right. So, under a month, you think?”
“Less than that, I’d say,” Bill said. “It depends how long it takes to finish the exodus from Anglesey.”
“Ri
ght. Right. So what do you want me to do with the plane in the meantime?”
“Like I said, fly it back to Belfast,” Bill said.
“To the airport?” Higson asked.
“I know, I know,” Bill said. “It’s not ideal. It’s a step backward, a waste of effort in many ways, but we can’t afford to lose the plane.”
“It’s impossible, is what it is,” Higson said. “To get the VC-10 into the air, we had to cut off part a 747’s wing. We had a few feet of clearance, but we were only travelling at twenty miles an hour. Landing, we’ll be coming in fast and steep. There’s no way even I can thread that needle, not if the plane’s going to fly again.”
“You can’t land there?” Bill asked.
“Not at the airport, no,” Higson said. “That’s why I asked George to check out the grassland near London. Britain’s roads are all useless, what with those fences they put up during the evacuation. That’s why I thought I’d pitch my idea about a trip home. We’ll lose the plane if we leave it here.”
Bill looked up and down the street, as if seeking inspiration. “We can’t send a boat anywhere right now,” he said. “It would have to be The New World, or the Amundsen, and we need both for the exodus. We can’t send a plane without a boat… Well, I suppose we could, but only if we knew there was somewhere to land. We can’t redeploy the satellites, though. I know there’s cloud overhead now, but we need to keep eyes on Elysium and Belfast, and if that horde turns south, it’ll be the only way we’ll know how much time London has.”
“You don’t need a proper runway?” Chester asked.
“Firm grass will do,” Higson said. “As long as someone can do a visual inspection to confirm that it’s not waterlogged, or concealing ditches or worse.”
“A road would be okay?” Chester asked.
“It would be better,” Higson said. “But in Britain, there’s all those fences they put up to keep the evacuees hemmed in.”
“But not in Ireland,” Bill said. “Not in Belfast. They didn’t put up any fences on that section of motorway near the harbour.”
“But there are streetlights? Abandoned cars?” Higson asked.
“I’m not sure about lights, but I imagine so,” Bill said. “There were a few vans. But there are also two thousand people now in Belfast with not much to do. We’ll move the cars, and clear the road. How much do you need?”
“Ideally, three miles. Half for take-off, half for landing. More is better, but I can manage with a bit less.”
“Three miles? We’ll get it done,” Bill said. “Belfast, and then Australia.”
“Thanks,” Higson said. “I’ll… I’ll go get the chopper ready for another flight.”
He gave Chester a nod, and headed off.
“He wasn’t expecting that,” Chester said. “To be honest, neither was I.”
“What do you think of it?” Bill asked.
“A flight to Oz? It’s a gamble,” Chester said. “I can see how the satellites could be used to find a potential landing site in Africa, and how a ship could be sent to confirm that the plane could land, but how long would that take? Weeks? A month? But I can see how it could be done. That second leg to Australia itself, that’s the really dangerous part. It’ll be a rough landing in a plane whose cabin is filled with barrels of aviation fuel. Even then, even if he gets to Australia, how’s he going to find people, how long will he look? I’d say it’s possible he’ll reach there, but it’s unlikely we’ll hear from him again. Why not send the ship the whole way?”
“Because I don’t think we have a ship that could make it there and back,” Bill said. “And I know we can’t expect to find any ship-oil anywhere other than Svalbard. No, we’ve got a plane, we’ve got aviation fuel, and we’ve got a pilot who’ll take the plane there without permission if we don’t give it.”
“And if he doesn’t come back?”
“Then we’ve lost a pilot,” Bill said. “But we have others. Mostly among the admiral’s crew who were Marine Aviation Corps. They’re not as experienced as Higson, but they can fly.”
“Then what’s the best-case scenario?” Chester said. “The plane makes it back to Africa, and the ship returns to Ireland. They come back with a few dozen more survivors, some interesting stories, and perhaps news of some other small groups. Either way, come March, maybe April, the ship will have returned, but not much will have changed.”
“It’ll be a distraction for the next couple of months. The bikes are over there,” Bill said, gesturing to a partially enclosed car park outside a primary school. “Yes, it’ll be a distraction, and we could do with a few of those to take people’s minds off the grim conditions they’ll be living in once they leave Anglesey.”
“Still, I’d put fifty pounds on Higson flying east rather than to Belfast,” Chester said.
“He wouldn’t be the first to disappear,” Bill said. “Each day, a few more boats are gone.” He took a bike from a rack.
“How many people have left?” Chester asked.
“Hard to say,” Bill said. “Somewhere between three and eight hundred. A few have turned up in Belfast, and perhaps more will turn up in the next few weeks. We think some went to the Isle of Man. They’d only stayed on Anglesey because it was safer than the mainland. For most it was just a place to out-wait the undead. After the election turned into a disaster, after they learned the island has to be abandoned, they decided they stood a better chance on their own. I think they’re wrong, but the people who’ve left aren’t my problem. Nor is Scott Higson, beyond that his stealing the plane would be bad for morale. My concern is the people in Belfast.”
“You said there are two thousand?” Chester asked, mounting his bike and following Bill down the road.
“Two thousand, counting the children, and some who are sick. Dying, really. There’s nothing we can do but make them comfortable. That’s why they’ve gone to Belfast rather than Elysium. They, and the children, are in the John Cabot, a container ship just outside the harbour. The rest are in the harbour itself, in the old warehouses and offices. We’ll send the rest of the sick, and injured like Eamonn, to Elysium. That’s only a few dozen, and it sounds counter-intuitive, but it’s a matter of electricity for the equipment, and right now Elysium is the only place with a renewable supply.”
“And everyone else?” Chester asked. “When do they leave?”
“Heather Jones will take her people over in one large flotilla. That’s just over three thousand people. They’ll leave within the week. They’ve got the better sailing craft, a mixture of fishing boats and luxury yachts. They’ve done what they can to repair and prepare. Even so, it’s unlikely all the ships will survive the crossing, but those that do will become our fishing fleet in the months to come.”
“Leaving five thousand people here?” Chester asked.
“Just over four thousand, now,” Bill said. “We’ll ferry them over on The New World when it arrives, that should be next week. That way, Belfast gets a few hundred new souls every few days. That’ll be easier to manage than everyone arriving at once. We’ll be out of here by the 10th December. Maybe a little after, but long before our January deadline.”
“And London?”
“Heather’s got your boats and crew,” Bill said.
“And Eamonn is going to Kenmare Bay?”
“Along with Isabella Garcia, her family, and the children from Birmingham,” Bill said.
“So we could go there?” Chester asked. “I mean, all of us from London?”
“Sure,” Bill said. “One place is just as safe as the other.”
By which Chester assumed he meant that neither was safe, but was there anywhere that was?
Chapter 11 - The Prisoner
Wylfa, Anglesey
The nuclear power station was situated among the windswept cliffs on the northern edge of the island. It was an ideal site, Chester thought, for wind turbines. It was an ideal site for a prison, too, at least in appearance if not location. The access road was littered with
bulldozers, the field outside dotted with unmarked graves, most belonging to the undead who’d died in the long-ago battle to clear Anglesey. The other graves, those with markers, belonged to the survivors who’d perished in the conflict.
Chester hadn’t visited the power plant during his previous trips to the island. There had been little point before electricity was restored. After, there had been no opportunity before he’d left with Nilda and in search of Jay. He pushed down a pang of lonely longing. He’d see her soon.
The guard post by the entrance was empty. Considering what he’d learned about Bishop, Chester wondered if that was wise. Then again, who would sabotage the power plant, particularly when everyone knew it was already falling apart?
They dismounted, propping their bikes against the open gate. They’d only made it three feet inside before they heard a soft whine. The disconcertingly artificial sound grew in volume as a golf-buggy spun around the side of a building, and came to a halt in front of them. Chief Watts was behind the wheel, alone in the cart.
“Chief, all well?” Bill asked.
“All the same,” Watts said. “Are you here for me?”
“No, we want to have a word with Locke,” Bill said.
“Ah. Are you taking her away?” the chief asked.
“Not unless she wants to leave,” Bill said.
Watts nodded and drove off.
“He hasn’t changed,” Chester said.
Locke was being held in the offices of the nuclear constabulary. Not in the cells, but in a small apartment for staff temporarily living on site. Situated on the upper floor of a two-storey grey-clad building, the stairs led directly into a rec-room that reminded Chester more of an airport’s departure lounge than a sitting room. That was partly due to the cheap armchairs, and partly to the complete lack of natural light. Where the windows should have been were cheap paintings depicting birds on boulder-strewn beaches. Against the wall opposite the stairs was a kitchen counter with a sink, kettle, fridges, and cupboards. The wall next to that was covered in densely typed health and safety notices either side of a corridor leading to a row of closed doors. Before the corridor was a desk with a bank of CCTV monitors, all of which were blank.