The Tasmania Trilogy (Book 1): Breakdown

by Owen Baillie

  He slipped off the earmuffs and welcomed the feeling. He laid them on the seat and glanced down at the body in the corner, wondering who the man might have been. Jim didn’t recognize him from the local area. He might have walked from Tarleton, with its rolling, bushy hills or even Spreyton, with its blend of residential and country-style houses. From what Jim had seen, either was entirely possible. He supposed it didn’t matter now; although, the man had been somebody to someone.

  “Where’s your family, mister?”

  It was the first time he’d spoken since the day before and the sound made him uneasy. The noises from outside grew louder, as if they had heard him speak. Or was that his mind making it up?

  He turned back to the shelving and scanned the stacks of items wedged in between the uprights. There were all sorts of things: an old baby car seat, cupboard doors, boxes of files from Alesia’s cleaning business she had a few years back, an old toddler bed with the mattress wrapped in black plastic so it wouldn’t get damaged. Jim narrowed his gaze and saw a long box stuffed behind the bed. A thought popped into his head. He recalled putting that box there some time ago, in it an item that might be of use.

  Jim took the ladder off the storage hooks, laid it against the shelving, and climbed to the top level, where the box waited patiently. He slid it carefully out of its place, dust puffing up from the wooden shelf, and then climbed backwards down the steps, pressing it against his chest. On the floor, he began sifting through the contents and found what he was looking for beneath a set of flippers. He’d purchased the spear gun from K-mart a few years back and had only used it once, to shoot flounder. It wasn’t the most expensive in the range, but it would work for this purpose. He placed the gun and spear on the floor, then climbed up and slid the box back into place.

  As he climbed back down, Jim noticed the small barbecue bottle in the corner. It was full of Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG), having just been purchased from the service station as a spare for his barbecue. A crazy idea popped into his head. What if he could get the bottle to explode and kill off some of the infected?

  He stood there for a long moment, and then suddenly he was moving, pacing the garage as he turned the plan over in his mind, the first sentiment of hope since his failed escape attempt. As soon as he opened the door, the infected would try to get inside. If he wasn’t able to distract them, they would overcome the doorway and he’d never get the car out. But what if he left the other body there to distract them, and he could shoot one or two down with the spear gun, then roll the gas bottle out with the end alight? Would it explode? He’d witness two bottle explosions at caravan parks over the years. Both had been the result of faulty valves. Jim thought if he created a slow leak, he might be able to reconstruct the same scenario. It would take a few of them with it, too, clearing a path for him to escape.

  It was fraught with danger. More risk than Jim ever liked dealing with. And it was probably a ridiculous idea that couldn’t possibly work, but he had nothing else. If he failed, he’d never know; he’d be dead. Otherwise, at the rate he was going, he’d never get out. What did he have to lose? How was it any better being alive in the garage until his food and water ran out? Who could he help from here? Nobody. Not even himself.

  Jim went through the preparations. He took the dead body by the feet and dragged it to the door, where he laid it parallel, leaving a streak of blood over the concrete. The idea was that when the door lifted, they’d see the body and go for it.

  From the racking, he took a piece of board with nothing on it and laid it against the uprights. He stood as far back as the space would allow, slotted the spear into the front of the gun, then pulled back the rubber band until it clicked into place. He took aim, the tip of the gun quivering as he lined up the board.

  The spear made a pfftt noise as it exited the gun, and crashed into the board with a deafening thud, causing the board to jump. Jim felt more confident.

  From the wooden drawer on the bench, he took a lighter and lifted the heavy LPG bottle to the middle of the roller door. Using a plastic drum of mower fuel, Jim doused the end of the gas bottle cord. Light the cord, it burns down and then lights the gas.

  “Come on, Jimmy. You can do this.” He had to hold his nerve. When the infected people started to climb under the door, he would have to roll the bottle out far enough away from the garage. He began to laugh—not because of any humor, but due to the absurdity of what he was doing. It was total madness. He placed the spear gun on the trunk with a spear ready to go, just in case he had to shoot one of them.

  He opened the driver’s door and stood there, considering what he was about to do. Come on, you can do this. He really had no other choice. He climbed in and started the car without hesitation this time, then clambered out of the seat and ran to the gas bottle near the door. He crouched, turned the gas on a fraction—just enough to create the slowest of leaks—then lit the bottom of the hose. A flame appeared, dancing along the bottom of the cord.

  The moment Jim pulled the door up, several infected began scrambling to get inside. He waited until it was a foot high, then picked his line and rolled the bottle out between gaps in the infecteds’ legs. It skidded over the concrete and landed perfectly about ten feet from the garage door. Now he had to get the door back down.

  One of the infected poked its head underneath and started crawling in. Its skin was a pale, scaly white, with red blotches and the odd dark lesions, its mouth full of blood. Jim kicked it in the face, but it didn’t flinch and stared back at him with a dull expression. He reached up and pulled on the garage door, but the man kept wriggling inside and Jim couldn’t get the door down. In moments, he would have the same problem all over again.

  The spear gun.

  He leapt to the car and grabbed for the weapon. It skidded off and clattered onto the concrete floor. Bending, Jim snatched it up, then spun and took aim. He pressed the trigger and the spear shot out of the gun, but it crashed into the door with a deafening bang and fell aside.

  Exhaust fumes filled the garage, causing Jim to cough. The infected man crawled further inside as Jim scrambled to where the spear lay. He fitted it in the end of the gun then stepped up to the infected man. Jim pulled the rubber band back and pressed the trigger. At point-blank range, the spear pierced the man’s skull. His body fell forward and slumped to the ground.

  Two more infected trying to crawl inside had pushed the door higher. Jim dropped the spear gun and raced for it, kicking them both in the face. One withdrew, but the other screeched and fell forward. Jim pulled the door down, knocking the man to the concrete, but it would go no further than his neck.

  The bottle exploded.

  The sound was thunderous. The force knocked him backwards against the racking. He landed on his side and struck his head on one of the uprights. For a moment, he thought he might have blacked out. He shook his head to clear it and, through the gap beneath the garage door, saw a number of monsters writhing on the ground, their clothes and hair alight. The smell was horrific.

  Ears ringing, Jim scrambled to his feet and stumbled to the door. He got his hands under the corrugated ridges and lifted. Bright light pushed in and stuck blades into his eyes as the door rolled to its highest position. Coughing, Jim ran for the car and leapt into the driver’s seat.

  He stuck the gearstick into reverse, took the handbrake off, and pressed the accelerator down. He rolled over the thing he’d shot with a loud thump; the car bounced and Jim crunched his head on the roof. He spun the wheel and veered off to the right, where he thought there were less of them, but the car crunched into another infected, the impact vibrating through the chassis. A wall of infected filled the driveway, blocking his path to the street. He was too close to stop now. Jim gripped the steering wheel tight and slammed the pedal down. The car flew backwards, striking them with a clunk and scattering bodies in every direction. It leapt off the curb and onto the road with an almighty crunch, Jim’s neck jerking forward. He unconsciously slammed on the brakes and the ca
r came to a halt in the middle of the street. Breathing hard, he stuck the car into drive and accelerated away, not caring if he ever saw his battered home again.

  31

  Kumiko’s parents were standing on the school’s football field. Her mother wasn’t sick; she no longer had the sniffles and red eyes. She seemed to have recovered her energy, and she was smiling, as though everything was going to be all right. Her father followed behind as they approached Kumiko. Despite her mother’s reassuring smile, Kumiko sensed something else wrong. She hugged her mother then her father, and she felt tears come. But her mother shook her head and told her not to cry. It was of course, a dream.

  “You’re dead, aren’t you?” Kumiko asked. Her mother nodded. “Dad?” Yes.

  “Don’t be afraid, Kumi.” Her mother held her hand. “You won’t get sick.” She wanted to ask how mother knew that, but grief washed the words away.

  Her father broke in. “We’re so proud of you, sweetheart. So proud. So many have died—will still die, but you will survive.”

  She had so much to ask them, so much to tell. She wanted to say it all, but it wouldn’t come out. She wanted to tell them how sorry she was, that it was all her fault. She hadn’t made them proud. And that she loved them, despite not saying it enough. She didn’t want the moment to end. She knew, when she woke, she would never see them again.

  Dan shook her awake. “What?” she snapped.

  “Hey, sorry.” He put his hands up in the air. “But we’ve got a problem. Several, in fact.”

  She rolled over and closed her eyes again, wishing she could return to the dream, to get one last moment with them. They were dead. Kumiko was certain of that. And she couldn’t go back to the dream. That was it. Forever. She sat up and swung her legs around the couch, blinking away the sleep. “What is it?”

  “Actually, we have three problems.” Dan started pacing, running a hand through his thick hair. “Firstly, Jim is still not back. Second, did you hear the big bang last night?” She shook her head. “A bloody big petrol tanker turned over just past the entrance to the school.” He looked at her, waiting for some kind of reaction. “Second, the infected have almost broken down the fence. They’re going to get inside the school soon.”

  Kumiko took the hair tie off her wrist and tied her hair into a ponytail. She had to focus. In the now. Otherwise, they’d be in more trouble than they could handle. “What are they doing?”

  “They’re pressed against the fence. It wasn’t made to have a hundred people pushing against it. Eventually it will give.”

  “There’s a hundred of them now?”

  “Close to it. Take a look.”

  “What time is it?”

  “A little after six.” No wonder she felt so tired. Kumiko loved sleep and generally needed at least eight hours a night to stay sane. The last two nights she had gotten far less than that. “Let’s go.”

  On the way to the doors leading out into the courtyard, Kumiko asked Dan if he thought Jim was dead.

  “Probably,” was his glum response. “He’s been gone over twelve hours. Didn’t he say his house had been attacked before?”

  “I hope he’s okay.”

  “We really need someone like Jim. He knows this school, and he’s well organized. If we’re going make this a place to survive, having him will make it easier.”

  Kumiko changed the machete to her other hand and opened the door. “Still, if he doesn’t come back, we need to be able to survive without him.”

  “You’re right.”

  They stepped out into bright sunshine, but there was a mass of purplish thunderclouds in the distance. They crossed the brickwork and reached the narrow way between the library and the upper school buildings. Dan led them up the timber steps, which were beginning to feel familiar, bending as he approached the top to remain concealed.

  “Holy shit,” he whispered. “There’s even more of them now.”

  The numbers had swelled well beyond those they had seen the previous two nights. Instead of scatterings across the road, and in the gardens, there was a wall of the infected, three, five, even ten deep, pressing at the fence, as though they all knew what awaited them inside. Hands reached out, fingers clawed at the chain link spaces. She couldn’t hear much above their slobbery calls.

  “Oh my God,” Kumiko said.

  Dan’s face was wide with wonder. “Just like the books and movies. This virus has been around for over a week now so the ones that have died are starting to come back.”

  “How many people live in this town?”

  “Nearly three thousand.”

  “That’s a lot of hungry souls.”

  Dan removed a small pair of binoculars from his jacket pocket and peered into the smaller end.

  “Where’d you find them?”

  “Lost property. There are all sorts of useful things there.” Dan scanned the mob, moving left and right, pausing at certain spots amongst the sea of moving bodies. “If they get in here, we’re in deep shit.”

  They stood watching for a time, as the infected curled their fingers around the fence, the ones at the front pressing their faces against the wire. Those at the back tried to slide in between, but their bodies were pressed up hard against the barrier. As Kumiko and Dan turned to leave, there was a snapping sound, like the ping of tight wires breaking.

  “What was that?” Kumiko spun back around. It had to have been loud to be heard above the sound of the infected. One of them fell. Others pushed back to make space, dove on the fallen, and began to eat.

  “They’re all gathering near the gate. If they keep—”

  A metallic snapping noise sounded. The fence near the gate buckled inwards. The infected fell with it, their hands searching as they tried to stop themselves from falling forward. There was a pop and a whistling and the entire barrier collapsed.

  “Shit,” Dan said. “They’re in.”

  The first one stumbled over the fence into the school grounds. A second and third clambered across the falling wire, pushing it the final few feet to the ground. Soon there were five, then six, and eight, eleven, fifteen. A handful were still picking at the bones of the first infected.

  “We have to get inside now,” Dan said, returning the binoculars to his jacket. He turned, and Kumiko followed, but she twisted around to watch them, a feeling of dread tightening around her stomach. The protection inside the school was finished.

  32

  Morning light poked its way in through the gaps in the blinds of the convenience store. Juliet was tired of their imprisonment, tired of waiting for the infected to leave. They had kept their heads down all night to avoid being seen by the infected wandering around outside. They’d assembled makeshift sleeping arrangements, using padding from dog and cat beds stacked in the corner and some old cushions the store owner had kept in the back. They’d eaten their share of candy bars and potato chips, drunk bottles of cold soft drinks from the refrigerators. It was almost an hour since they’d seen any infected. She supposed they should have taken their chance already, but the threat lingered like the rain in dark clouds. It was stuffy, the heat of previous days remaining, and if the day grew hotter, as she suspected, it would only get worse. She was ready to try anything to get them out.

  Juliet had fed Jessica and Bill pain relief tablets from the clear plastic-wrapped boxes on the store shelves. The redness around Jessica’s eyes and nose had softened and her cough had reduced to an infrequent bark. Bill’s ankle was a problem though. It had swollen almost immediately and turned a darker shade around the bone. Juliet made him elevate it and applied an ointment several times to help bring out the bruising. It was tender, but Bill thought he might be able to walk on it sooner rather than later.

  As she packed supplies into a couple of children’s backpacks Jessica found for sale in the store, Juliet thought of Deirdre and Tara for the first time since the day before. It made her feel sick that she would never see them again. She’d never see their smiling faces, hear their laughter, or
console each other in times of need. There’d be no more coffees before an early morning shift or walking out at the end of a double, arm in arm, smiling and chatting about what they were going to do with their time off. It was almost impossible to accept. Those two women had been more like family than Juliet’s own. There was a whole lot of things that would never be the same again.

  “So, what’s the plan?” Meg asked as Juliet crouched near them with the two loaded packs. “I think we’ve waited long enough.”

  “I’ll go out and fill up.”

  “You sure?” Jessica asked.

  “I can’t wait any longer. I have to try.”

  “It might look like it’s clear out there, but I’m not so sure.”

  Bill shifted, grimacing. He smoothed his long grey beard and said, “Jessica’s, right. It’s quiet now, but they won’t be far. That’s a guarantee.”

  “I’ll be quiet. I’ll crawl out to the pump if I have to.”

  “Those things make such a racket,” Meg said, her nose twisted with distaste.

  “I’ll pump the fuel—assuming it works—then drive the car to the door, toss the bags in, and you all get in too.”

  Bill chuckled. “Sounds easy when you say it like that.”

  “What if the pump doesn’t work?” Meg asked.

  “Then it doesn’t work. Will you let me back in?”

  “It’ll work,” Bill said. “The world hasn’t been in the shit long enough for someone to drain all the fuel in the bowsers, and the doors and the fridges are still working. But if the one you’re parked next to is empty, the hose should reach from the next one. Even jump in your car and take the handbrake off. Gravity should get you there.”

  “Got it.”

  Bill tried to stand. “What are you doing?” Jessica asked.

  “Hand me that pole, will you please, Jessica?” She did and Bill used it to get to his feet. They were all staring at him. He turned to Juliet. “You didn’t think I was going to let you go out there alone, did you?”