by Wilde, J. M.
“Forget him,” I said, too upset to care about Dave or his camera. I sunk to the floor of the boat, and Wyatt came and sat next to me, holding me in his arms as I wept. Jo joined me, taking hold of my hand. I looked up to see Ben stretched out on a seat, his leg being looked at by a nurse. No-one said a word as the boat sped towards the M2, the only hospital carrier left in our fleet.
Chapter Nineteen
The nurse in the biohazard suit tapped on the door, holding a tray of food, just as she had done the day before, and the day before that. Already used to the routine, I moved to the back of the room and waited as she opened the door, slid the tray inside, and closed the door again. The moment I heard the handle click and the keys slide out of the lock, I grabbed the tray and carried it over to the window, tearing the bread apart and shoving it in my mouth hungrily. With the M1 at the bottom of the ocean, taking much of the hospital supplies with it, food rationing had tightened, limiting meals to only once per day until another ship came with provisions.
I had been quarantined in the small but comfortable room on the M2 hospital carrier for near seventy-two hours. Every twelve hours, a doctor would stand at the observation window and scrawl notes on his clipboard, watching for any signs of the virus. I felt like an animal in a zoo, and I knew I was not infected—I still remembered what it felt like to have the virus coursing through my veins—but I understood why I needed to be there. After the outbreak on the M1, I didn’t blame the authorities for taking extra precautions to ensure nothing like that ever happened again. But with my time under their watchful eyes almost at an end, I intended to tell them it would never have happened in the first place had they chosen not to keep zombies on the ship. Because of their great underestimation of what the infected were capable of, Joel and many others lost their lives—and an entire ship was taken down. I had to make it clear that although the virus is minuscule in size, its consequences were not. Surely, the wasteland that was Australia was proof enough of that, and yet they still thought they knew better. Zombies were not something to be toyed with, and I hoped they had learned that lesson.
I finished my bread and moved on to the bowl of brown rice, turning to face the window and watch the Adelaide rescue unfold. The ship was too far out on the coastline to see much, but I could make out the crowd of survivors as they ran to the barges. They looked like tiny ants swarming on a scrap of food, running in every direction to avoid danger. I couldn’t hear the gun fire, but I could see the blast flashes, erupting every few seconds to take down the infected as they hunted their prey. Even without the sound of their screams, I could see the commotion, sense the danger, and feel their terror. I wished I could be there to help them, but a part of me also felt grateful to be stuck in that glass box with only the passing of time to set me free. With Adelaide being our last evacuation, after that day I would no longer be anywhere near that dangerous land. After that day, we could all begin the journey to our new home, to our new lives.
A clanging noise diverted my attention to the door, and I saw the nurse sliding a tray of food into Wyatt’s room across the hall. I stood up and went to the window, smiling and waving at him as he stood behind his glass.
“How are you?” he mouthed. We couldn’t hear each other, but we could see each other, and that was all we needed.
“Fine,” I mouthed back. “You?”
“Fine.” He picked up his tray and moved over to the bed to eat, and I went back to the window to do the same. I wondered how Jo and Ben were coping, and hoped they were okay. We were separated into rooms immediately after exiting the rescue boat three days earlier, and I hadn’t heard or seen them since. I knew they were quarantined on that floor too, but I didn’t know where. Seeing Wyatt in the room opposite, knowing he was there, going through exactly what I was going through, gave me comfort. I loved him more and more each day, and I felt immensely grateful that we had made it out of Australia alive. I had lost so much, I would be heartbroken if I had lost him too.
The jingling of keys at my door snapped me out of my thoughts. I glanced over expecting to see the nurse waiting to collect my tray, but I was surprised to see I had a visitor.
“Eric,” I said as he entered the room and closed the door behind him. He wasn’t wearing a biohazard suit, and I wondered if that meant I had been cleared to leave.
“Eva,” he nodded before gesturing to an armchair in the corner of the room. “May I?”
“Go ahead,” I said.
“How are you feeling?” he asked as he pulled the chair closer to the window where I was sitting and sat down.
“Uninfected, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Oh, I know you’re not infected,” he said, waving his hand dismissively. “I mean, how are you feeling after everything you’ve been through?”
“Oh,” I said, not expecting him to care. After all, he had plenty more things to worry about than my mental or emotional wellbeing. “I’m alright. As good as anyone can be in this mess.”
He nodded as though he completely understood what I meant, which I knew he couldn’t, but I appreciated his attempt to empathize with me. “You and your friends have been cleared to leave. A boat is waiting downstairs to take you back to your ship. But I would like to speak to you for a moment, if that’s okay.”
I shrugged. “Sure.”
“I wanted to thank you, Eva.”
“Thank me?” I asked. “For what?”
His eyes widened in surprise, as though it was obvious. “For your bravery, of course.” He leaned forward in his chair and looked me in the eyes to emphasize what he was about to say. “Eva, without your courage and determination in the threat of danger, Dr Desai’s research would have never made it into the hands of our researchers. Then for you to go back down to the secured floor on the M1 to retrieve it once again, even though you knew you might not make it out ... Well, that shows tremendous valour. Without that research, all our efforts to deconstruct the virus and develop a treatment would have been lost. It would have set our researchers back weeks, maybe longer, and that is time we just do not have when it comes to preventing the virus from spreading to an international level. And it was not just the research you saved, but Dr Thomas, the lead scientist on the case. He told me about all you did to ensure his safety and help him get his and Dr Desai’s work off the M1 intact. I commend you for your service to the world.”
“Anyone would have done it,” I said.
“I’m not sure you understand the impact you have had, Eva. You have potentially saved the world. Twice.”
I sat on the windowsill, at a complete loss for words. He glanced out the window behind me, standing up to see the rescue operation. We stared out into the chaos for a few minutes, watching it together in silence.
“I recommended you for the Cross of Valour,” he said, his eyes still on the city. “I just received word that my recommendation has been approved, and the Queen herself will be awarding it to you once you have settled into your new life in London.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, shaking my head, sure I had misheard him. “What did you say?”
“The Cross of Valour,” he repeated. “ It’s Australia’s highest bravery award for civilians. You will be the first woman to ever receive such an honor, and with the Australian government and all systems disbanded until further notice, you may very well be the last person to ever receive it.”
I stared up at him, my mouth hanging open in amazement. A part of me felt incredibly humbled to have been considered for such an honour, but I couldn’t help but think of all the people who deserved to be acknowledged much more than I did.
He shot me a knowing glance. “I have also requested that your friends Jo, Wyatt and Ben receive bravery awards for their service and courage. Dr Thomas too. Dr Priya Desai and Captain Joel Reeves will be receiving posthumous honors for their invaluable contributions.”
Before I could find the words to thank him, he turned and left the room, leaving the door open to signal my freedom to leave qu
arantine. I turned back to take one last look at the evacuation, tears welling in my eyes. My first thought was that I hoped my parents would be proud of me.
“Eva,” Wyatt said, and I turned to see him standing in my doorway, his hand out waiting for me. I loved how he could convey so much love and care simply by saying my name. “You ready?”
I nodded, wiping a stray tear off my cheek before sliding off the windowsill and walking over to him, taking his hand. As we walked down the ward to Ben and Jo, who were waiting for us at the stairs, I knew the terror was finally over for us.
Chapter Twenty
44 days later ...
The rhythmic sound of heavy footsteps echoed through the ship as hundreds of us made the climb to the highest deck. Even with all those people, it was silent, not a word was uttered. We had been waiting eagerly for this moment to arrive, and we all knew it was too precious to stain it with chatter. Emotions had been running high for days, but the nervous tension and impatience had faded away, replaced with fresh hope and overwhelming gratitude. The last month had been quiet and uneventful, giving everyone on board a lot of time to grieve and try to come to terms with everything we had lost.
Each of us found different ways to cope: Jo had found an empty notebook and started a journaling process, letting it all out on the page; Wyatt and Ben had spent their time volunteering on the medical floor—Wyatt had found a new passion for helping the sick and injured and Ben had been kind enough to take him under his wing; and I had spent most of my time in the library, reading whatever I could find. When I wasn’t reading, I was volunteering at the orphanage or sitting in the counsellor’s office, trying to sort through the demons I had brought with me from my homeland. Every day, Jo, Wyatt, Ben and I made time to sit on the deck and play with Hunter, who always made us smile—no matter how hard our day had been. Life had not been easy, but it was heaven compared to the hell we had escaped.
We walked shoulder to shoulder as we shuffled through the double doors out onto the deck. Many people stood on the tips of their toes to peer over the crowd and catch a glimpse of what awaited us on the horizon.
My bones burned. I could feel every harrowing step I had taken since the moment my worst nightmare had become my reality all those weeks before. My heart ached with the remnants of each time I had stood on the verge of death, each fear-riddled second, each tear soaked loss. Already, my newfound and hard-earned freedom had birthed fresh horrors: grief, despair, guilt, and trauma. These were monsters I could not outrun, hide from or battle with an axe. As relieved and thankful as I was to finally be safe from danger, I knew the struggle was not over for any of us on that ship. Much work remained to be done, both in our inner and outer worlds. My physical wounds had almost entirely healed, but my emotional and psychological wounds were so deep I had barely scratched the surface in the near-daily sessions with my floor counsellor.
Survival was both the prize and punishment for escaping the wasteland. A prize, because I had a chance to start over. I had a future. I had hope. I had time to heal, to move forward, to build a new life with Wyatt. But it was punishment because I would carry the detritus of war, disease and terror with me into that future. My hope would always be shadowed by guilt. I had seen, done and experienced terrible, agonizing, despicable things just to make it through another day. I had killed. I had lied. I had left good people behind. I had been rendered helpless as the shrill screams of the dying begged me to do something, anything. I would have to live with those memories forever. I would have to live with the eternally unanswered questions that often shook me awake at night: Did I do enough? Could I have done more?
Those ghosts would haunt me for the rest of my days. I knew that. It was still too early to tell where my life would go from there, but I was determined to stay hopeful. I owed it to all the people we had lost to make the most of the rest of my life.
I stood out on the deck with my fellow Australians, taking in the most beautiful sight I had seen in a very long time. Grateful tears rolled down my cheeks as others wept around me. After spending more than a month at sea, there it was in front of us: the United Kingdom. As we sailed towards the mouth of the River Thames, preparing to dock, I could feel the weight of all that I had been through begin to lift off my shoulders. Our nightmare was finally coming to an end. A lot of hard work and trials lay ahead of us, but I knew I could handle it after everything I had overcome. Whatever lay ahead of me would be nothing compared to what I was leaving behind.
A BBC news helicopter approached, a camera perched at its door so it could film the triumphant moment we planted our feet on new soil. We had already been warned that the media would be all over us, offering exorbitant amounts of money for exclusive interviews and printing headlines that praised us as the heroes of our ruined nation. Eric had informed me that the award ceremony with the Queen would be a globally televised event, which would catapult my friends and I into a very public life. That was the last thing I wanted, but it seemed none of us had a choice. From that day forward, we would be known to the world as heroes. But we didn’t see ourselves as heroes, just people who were tired of fighting for our lives every day. Refugees fleeing from a diseased country. Tormented souls who had watched people die senseless, ghastly deaths. I did not want to be known for that, but it proved too late to stop it. The flames of fame had already been lit, and I had to burn in it. But if that was the price I had to pay for being alive, for being safe, I would light the fire myself.
I looked over at Lea, who was standing only a few feet away, her arm draped around Skye. They held each other close, quietly crying like the rest of us, eager to step off of the ship and into our new lives. Ash was nearby, her hands firmly on the rail as she stood tall, taking in the view.
I reached out and held Jo’s hand, and held the other out for Wyatt, and Jo followed by taking Ben’s hand, linking us all together. We had proven that when we stood together, nothing was impossible. We had faced death more times than I could count and seen things no-one should ever see, but we had made it out alive. During our travels from Melbourne to Cairns and then on to Sydney, we had waged war against the undead, and sometimes each other, but at that moment we stood side by side. At that moment, we were invincible. Neither the terrors of the past nor the trials of the future could touch us as we sailed into our very own promised land. The four of us would be eternally bonded, forever connected as so much more than survivors—as allies, saviours and friends.
“We made it,” I said through the tears. “We survived.”
BONUS: INTERVIEW WITH EVA
The following is a character interview with Eva, featuring questions asked by fans. I hope you enjoy this glimpse into Eva's life after the outbreak!
Eva, do you think you would ever speak to the public about your journey? Or at least about the ones who died as heroes trying to save you? Like Joel?
Yes, I’ve been talking to the media a lot since arriving in the UK. In every interview, I make it clear that my friends and I wouldn’t be here today without the help of incredible people who didn’t make it.
Everyone in the whole world knows who Joel is, but not entirely for the right reason. A photograph that was taken of me reaching out to Joel when he was being killed on the ship has gone viral and was plastered on the front pages of newspapers and magazines all over the world. But, Joel has also been honored for his courage, receiving multiple medals that have since been given to his family.
How would you have coped if your parents were still alive? Would you try to rescue them?
My experience in the outbreak would have been very different had my parents still been alive. I would have gone to save them instead of going to Cairns. If they had met the same fate as Ben’s parents, I don’t know if I would have wanted to go on. I imagine my friends would have to drag me through the apocalypse if that had have happened.
If you had time to prepare, what would you have done to protect you and others?
I would have fled the country somehow. I would hav
e taken a boat and sailed far, far away.
If Priya is still alive and sends you some kind of message to save her, what would you do?
I’ve wondered this myself. I think I would go back. I’ve felt a lot of guilt about leaving her behind, and I feel like I would owe it to her to go back for her. But, I wouldn’t go alone. I would take an army with me.
Do you have hope for your country ever recovering?
I always have hope. But from what I’ve been told, Australia will be off-limits for at least five to ten years, while the zombies die off. Unfortunately, with the many valuable resources of Australia cut-off, such as oil, the rest of the world faces new challenges.
Are you heartbroken to see your home like this, in a zombie wasteland?
I’m absolutely shattered. I didn’t know how lucky I was to live in such a beautiful country until it was taken away from me.
How have you kept your sanity?
I’m not sure I have kept my sanity. Since arriving in London, it’s become painfully clear to me that I have some intense anxiety issues, and post-traumatic stress. Mentally and emotionally, I’m barely coping. But I have a good support network around me and I’m getting help. I think the hardest part is that everyone in the world knows me as the girl who survived. The girl from that confronting photograph of Joel, trying to save him and failing. Some see me as the girl who left Joel behind, who left him to die. Sometimes, that’s how I see myself, too. It’s hard.
Would you kill the terrorist organization that did this?
No. After everything I’ve seen, it’s clear to me that more violence is not the answer. And I’m so glad to see the rest of the world feels the same way. This horrible outbreak has at least shocked people into the realization that fighting each other is pointless.
After seeing so many zombies eat human meat, do you want to be a vegan?