by Perrin Briar
“No. I don’t think he even saw us. He hasn’t even come out of the alley yet.”
Chris turned to look at the quiet street they’d entered.
“Someone here must have a car,” he said.
Chris walked up a driveway to a small bungalow with adjoining garage. He stopped at the door and listened. He heard shuffling footsteps inside. Something bumped into the wall and fell to the floor. He crept back down the driveway and onto the next house. Chris noted the sporadic oil stains on the concrete, and his heart raced with possibility.
He moved to the garage doors and gripped the handle. He tried to lift it, but they wouldn’t budge. He moved to the house and peered in through the French doors. He could make out cheap laminate and a ratty sofa. There was no movement. He pressed on the handle and was surprised to find it unlocked.
“Stay close,” he said to Maisie as he stepped inside.
He peered around at each room as he moved further into the house. He moved through into the small but well-appointed kitchen that backed onto the garage. He tried the door. It too was unlocked.
The garage was dark, the air heavy with the smell of oil. Chris reached for a handle jutting out of the knife rack on the kitchen table. He moved into the darkness with the knife held out in front of him, slashing at the darkness with broad strokes. His hand pressed against the wall, looking for a light switch. His hand came to a solid piece of plastic on the wall. He hit the switch. The light didn’t come on. He flicked it on and off, but nothing happened. He walked forward, hands feeling at the darkness.
“What are you worried about?” Maisie said from the doorway. “They won’t bite you.”
“No, but they might bite you.”
“The blonde scientist in the research centre, she didn’t bite me.”
“She might have, had she had enough time. We don’t know how they’ll react when they see you. They’ll have never met someone who has been cured before. People too.”
“But people wouldn’t hurt me. Would they?”
“Why not? They would have at the zompit. And God knows what the soldiers would have done if they knew you were infected. It’s best if they don’t know. They’re prone to be even more unpredictable than zombies.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re the first person to be cured. They will raise you up as their symbol of hope. Some people might try to exploit you, use you for their own purposes. Don’t let them know.”
Chris’s hands came to a large sheet of metal at the front of the garage. It was cold with curved grooves. He knelt down and felt for the handle. It was the kind where you grip it with the palm of the hand and twist it around. The lock unlatched and he drew the garage door up. Moonlight spilled into the space, illuminating a long worktable and tools carefully arranged on the wall.
“No car…” Chris said. “What kind of person locks their empty garage before running away, but leaves their patio door unlocked? Unbelievable.”
Diamonds of light glinted off small round canisters and metal tools. Chris’s eyes alighted on half a dozen bikes leaning against a wall. He pulled them from their restraining hooks and chose the two in best shape. One was a full adult-sized model, grey, with a Batman-themed bell. The other bike was small, a child’s bike, with a yellow basket on the front.
“That’s cute!” Maisie said. “But what’s this?”
She gestured to a grey box attached to the underside.
“That’s a motor. These are electric bikes. When we cycle it charges up, and when we are tired we can take a rest while it drives for us.”
Chris checked the tyres on both bikes. They were a little flat. He pumped them up with a foot pump. He grabbed a small backpack from off the table and shoved items into it: a puncture repair kit, the foot pump, two pairs of sunglasses and baseball caps. He moved to the deep refrigerator in the corner of the room. It sat in a water-shaped stain, having defrosted with lack of power weeks ago. He sorted amongst the foodstuffs and packed the unfrozen vegetables and ice cream.
“Get on your bike,” Chris said.
Maisie did. The bike was the right size for her. Chris picked a child’s helmet off a table. He pressed his hand to Maisie’s frizzy hair.
“Hey,” he said. “Your hair looks thicker already.”
“You think so?” Maisie said, touching it. “I do feel better, stronger, like I’m full of life.”
“Must be the cure. That’s lucky, because if your mother saw how thin your hair was before…”
He grimaced, like it was beyond imagining. He fixed the helmet onto Maisie’s head, drawing the chin straps tight. Maisie looked down.
“Mum’ll never notice because she’s always going to be one of those things,” she said.
Chris lifted up Maisie’s chin with his finger.
“No, she’s not,” he said. “We’re going to get you to the Tomorrow. They’ll manufacture the cure and give it to all the zombies and everything can go back to the way it was.”
“Do you really believe that?”
Chris kissed Maisie on the forehead.
“Yes, I do,” he said.
After a moment, Maisie smiled. It took up her whole face.
“Okay, then.”
They peeled down the driveway, out of the cul-de-sac, and then down the country road. It was long and narrow and hedged on both sides by large ash trees.
“We’re going to cycle all the way there?” Maisie said.
“Unless we come across a car on the way,” Chris said.
Maisie looked ahead at the winding open road before them, with no sign of a car in sight. She let out an exaggerated sigh.
“I’m tired already,” she said.
“You can sleep when you’re dead.”
“Thanks for being so understanding.”
Z-MINUS: 6 HOURS 32 MINUTES
Phillips kneeled down beside the muddy footprints. One was large, the other smaller, but they were clearly both heading in the same direction. The man appeared to be of average height, though he rolled when he walked, like a boxer. His strides were wide and confident, deliberate, like he had a mission. Phillips was fairly confident the small footprints belonged to a girl due to the flower patterns on the soles of her boots.
“Do you think we should be out here by ourselves?” Vasquez said, peering around at their surroundings.
“Would you prefer to wait for the army to come join us? To trample all over their tracks? Wait until it’s too late?”
“Just seems a silly risk, that’s all.”
“Far riskier not to, I fear.”
“You know, I’ve been looking at these images Dr Kahn drew on the cabinets and I think maybe they really are hieroglyphics. This one looks like an eye. What does that mean? Something to do with Ra, right?”
“Put it away. It’s gibberish from a destroyed mind.”
The army’s boats were lined up along the riverside, like soldiers ready for war. Each had a number painted on it in white paint. A single cleat sat unused, and it was here that the footsteps ended, disappearing into the lapping river’s edge.
“A boat’s missing,” he said.
“A small one, by the look of it,” Vasquez said.
“Big enough to carry two people, I’d wager.”
“Wait, what’s that?”
Vasquez pointed to a series of indented squares in the mud, pressed together like the strands of a rope.
“They’re motorbike tracks,” Phillips said. “They were made after these footprints.”
“Maybe they were soldiers doing a routine perimeter check?”
“Maybe.”
On the opposite river bank Phillips could make out small shapes standing, groaning, and stretching for him, no doubt able to make out a moving object, but uncertain what he was. Phillips looked down the River Thames, toward the long blind corner.
“Let’s get up in the air,” he said.
Z-MINUS: 6 HOURS 28 MINUTES
The road unfurled like a blossoming black orch
id, the moonlight shining off the tarmac, lighting the way. The woods on either side were thick and dense, dark and scary. Chris forced his legs around in circles like he was lifting sacks of meat. He had a heavy sweat on his brow that had nothing to do with cycling.
He coughed with his whole body, bringing up lumps of red. He tasted blood. He poked at them with his tongue. They felt rubbery and thick. If he didn’t know better he could have said they were pieces of lung. He spat it out, onto the grassy verge, revulsion surging through him. And then he licked his lips and let his blood run over his teeth and gums, let it coat his tongue. The taste made his heart race, his pupils dilate and a deep groan of longing grumbled at the back of his throat.
Just a few months ago Chris had thought he’d been infected and the virus was ravaging his body, but it had turned out he was just suffering the effects of coming off alcohol cold turkey. But there was no mistaking the symptoms of the real virus. He felt a weariness deep in his bones, like a poisoned cloak over his skin, pervading and vicious. He swore he could actually feel the disease tearing through him, leaving a sense of hopelessness in its wake.
Chris looked at his hands resting on the handlebars. They were skeletal, the skin pulled tight over his bones, the knuckles like whorls in a lump of wood.
“What happened in that cleaning cupboard in the research centre?” Maisie said, her voice startling Chris. “I remember walking down the corridors, looking for the cure, but it’s all a blur, really. I remember being in a small room smelling of Dettol and zombies pushing on the door… How did we get out?”
“Why does it matter? We did.”
“But we were trapped.”
“And we managed to get out.”
“How?”
“the zombies must have gotten distracted or something.”
They cycled along in silence.
“You were bitten, weren’t you?” Maisie said. “I can see it in your eyes. I was bitten too. I know what it looks like. When did it happen? You were okay until the cleaning cupboard. But there weren’t any zombies in there… Oh.”
Her frown relaxed with comprehension.
“It was me, wasn’t it?” she said. “I bit you, didn’t I?”
“I made you bite me, so we could escape and get you to the cure.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you were infected before?”
“You didn’t need to know. It would only worry you.”
“Don’t you think I should know?”
Chris put his hands on Maisie’s shoulders.
“What happens to me doesn’t matter,” he said, “so long as you’re safe.”
“It matters to me. What would I do without you?”
“That’s why I want to get you to the Tomorrow. They will have the best defence. They can protect you. Even if they fail to get the cure out of you, you will be safe with them.”
“The people in the St Barts’ research centre had lots of protection too but they weren’t safe.”
“But they were safer than most people. And look where they were – in the middle of London! The Tomorrow is in the middle of an ocean. You will be safe.”
For a moment neither of them said anything.
“You might get lucky and be immune,” Maisie said with a hopeful smile.
“Wouldn’t that be nice? A bit of luck for a change.”
The foliage up ahead shook and a woman dressed in torn rags stepped out. She waved at them.
“Hey,” the woman said. “Wait. Wait a minute, please.”
Chris’s legs ached, burning for a reprieve. The road began its upward incline. He flicked a switch and the bike’s electric motor came on. It pulled him up the hill, emitting a soft whirring sound. Maisie followed suit, flicking her own switch.
“Wait! Please!” the woman said, chasing after them.
“Shouldn’t we stop?” Maisie said.
“When we’re making good time and we have everything to lose?” Chris said. “Yeah, sure.”
“We should stop for her.”
“No, we shouldn’t.”
“She looks like she needs our help.”
“She looks like she needs our bikes and food and everything else we’ve got. We can’t stop.”
Chris flicked the motor off as he crested the top of the hill. He turned to look back triumphantly at Maisie, but found she wasn’t behind him, but cycling in the opposite direction toward the woman.
“Maisie!” Chris said. “Maisie!”
She didn’t respond. Chris turned his bike around and descended the hill at speed, pedalling fast. The wind press against him and blew the sweat from his face. Maisie pulled her bike to a stop beside the woman. By the Chris skidded to a halt, his wheels kicking up dust, he found them in deep discourse. Chris puffed and panted, catching his breath, beads of sweat making dirt trails down his face. Maisie had barely broken a sweat. Chris got off his bike, his limbs and joints stiff.
“Hey,” Chris said. “What’s going on?”
“She’s got some food she wants to give us,” Maisie said. “And she says there are some wild animals in the woods.”
“It’s a wood, of course there are wild animals.”
“No, like rhinos and hippos and things.”
“Sure there is.” Chris turned to the woman. “Thanks, but we’ve got to get going. Maisie, get on your bike.”
“But I want to see the animals.”
Chris looked the woman over. She was pretty in a homely kind of way, her dirty blonde hair tied back with a long string of tree sap. There was a glimmer of playfulness in her eyes.
“It’s just a little food,” the woman said, her voice soft and welcoming.
Chris glanced at Maisie, who had her hands clasped together in hopeful prayer.
“All right,” Chris said. “Five minutes. That’s all.”
The woman clapped her hands excitedly.
“Guests! I have guests!” she said.
She ran to the edge of the forest and pulled the foliage aside like a curtain. Chris took Maisie’s hand and led her toward the opening. Moonlight streamed in through holes in the thick canopy. Chris looked back at their bikes parked beside the road with longing. Their footsteps crunched and snapped over a thick green carpet, feet snagging on unseen protrusions.
“Daddy, look!” Maisie said, pointing to a pair of giraffes plucking at the upper boughs of a tree. “They’re beautiful! Where did they come from?”
“Probably escaped from a zoo,” Chris said.
Then the hair on Chris’s back stood up on end. He peered around at the foliage.
“Don’t worry,” the woman said, chuckling. “I’ve been here a while and I’ve never seen any big cats or wolves.”
Chris kept his eyes on the low-hanging boughs all the same.
“It’s just a little further,” the woman said.
She led them through the dark wood without hesitation, never needing to stop or consider. Finally, she said, “Wait here.”
The woman dashed away. There were a few pleasant clicking noises like tap shoes on a parquet floor, and then flickers of light, but the sparks were quickly smothered by the darkness. Then one caught and a small fire took root.
Chris started at the sight of dozens of thick poles that had been buried into the ground and pointed outwards at the forest, like a thick wall of pikes in army formation. There was congealed blood on a good number of them.
“Why do you live here?” Chris said to the woman. “Why not out in a deserted house somewhere?”
“Because that’s where everyone is hiding. Here, I have nature’s bounty. I can pluck my meals from the very trees and eat to my heart’s content.”
The woman picked up two broad leaves and piled an assortment of berries and plants onto them. She handed one each to Chris and Maisie. Chris eyed the food, and then locked eyes with Maisie and shook his head.
“What’s your name?” Chris said.
“Tiffany.”
She led them to a series of short wooden stumps around the
fire.
“You can sit here,” she said.
“I’m Chris Smith. This is Maisie.”
“Any news from the outside world?” Tiffany said.
“The same old. The zombies have taken over and there’s no getting away from them.”
“Any rumours of a cure?”
“There are always rumours.”
“Tell me. I like to hear about them.”
Chris shrugged.
“Scientists are working in a research facility in London,” he said. “That’s about all I know.”
Tiffany nodded.
“They’ll come up with one, I’m sure,” she said. “We went to the moon. I’m sure we can solve this.”
“The smartest minds in the world went to the moon, with an unlimited budget.”
Chris looked at the clearing closer.
“You have three sleeping bags,” he said.
“Yes,” Tiffany said. “One for me, two for weary travellers.”
“That’s convenient.”
Chris looked at the sharpened posts jutting out of the ground.
“A lot of work for just one person,” he said.
She shrugged.
“I’ve had a lot of time to do it,” she said.
“You have some experience of surviving out in the wild?”
“My father was in the army. He taught me everything he knows.”
“Lucky for you.”
“I think so. Eat up. There’s plenty more if you’re still hungry.”
Chris smiled, but didn’t eat any of the food.
“My father was a great man,” Tiffany said, putting her hand on Chris’s knee. “We’ve all lost somebody. Sometimes it’s a comfort just to remember them.”
She let her hand move up his thigh.
“I need a big strong man to take care of me,” she said, not taking her eyes off Chris. “I get awful lonely here sometimes.”
Chris got to his feet.
“Thanks for the meal, but we really need to keep moving,” he said.
“But you haven’t touched your food!”
“We’re not hungry.”
“Your little one looks tired.”
Maisie couldn’t have looked less tired, her eyes gleaming with energy.