Dark World

by George Ivanoff

  The sound of shifting rubble, followed by a growling, made them both turn.

  Is someone alive?

  The office door was splintered and broken, the bottom section missing, the top hanging from the frame by one hinge. Beyond it, they could see more rubble and devastation.

  Another growl. Closer this time.

  There was something out there.

  It was getting closer.

  ‘Probably just a stray dog,’ said Rowan hopefully.

  ‘It doesn’t sound like a dog,’ said Newt, a little swell of hope rising up within her.

  ‘I hope it’s a dog,’ said Rowan. ‘I mean … what else could it be?’

  A pair of legs appeared in the lower half of the doorway, the torso and head obscured by the remaining piece of door. The legs were wearing ragged grey pants that were torn and grimy. The feet were bare and dirty.

  Is that dried blood? wondered Newt. Is he hurt?

  ‘See,’ she said, ‘it’s not a dog. It’s a man.’

  The man growled again … the sound shifting and changing to more of an anguished moan.

  ‘Hello!’ called Newt, her voice shaky.

  ‘Shhhh!’ said Rowan.

  ‘We need help,’ said Newt. ‘We need to know what’s happened.’

  There was another moan as the top section of the door swung open, the hinge giving way. It crashed to the floor, revealing …

  Principal Hardnose.

  Except he was different.

  Any hope Newt had felt at an adult’s arrival dried up.

  Both the kids instantly recoiled and started backing away. He was wrong and utterly horrifying.

  His jacket and shirt were as tattered and grimy as his pants. And that is dried blood, thought Newt.

  The principal’s hair was a mat of filthy clumps. His face was distorted. One side looked as if his skin had melted, like a candle left burning too long. His thin lips were curled back from blackened teeth. His tongue lolled out in an almost comical way. He was drooling.

  Mr Hardnose moaned again and stretched out his arms towards them, his hands like claws.

  ‘O … M … G …’ said Newt, backing away further, barely able to keep her legs steady. ‘He … he’s … he’s a …’

  But she couldn’t form the word. Her mind refused to acknowledge that such a thing could exist. Because it couldn’t. It was unscientific.

  ‘He’s a zombie!’ finished Rowan.

  With a guttural growl, Mr Hardnose lurched towards them.

  ‘Run!’ yelled Rowan, leaping over the collapsed wall.

  Newt stumbled, unable to take her eyes from the zombie principal. Her foot caught on some debris and she tripped.

  This is not possible, she thought.

  Mr Hardnose shambled forward, eager to get to Newt. Gnarled, disfigured fingers reached towards her.

  This is not possible. This is not possible. This is not possible.

  SMACK!

  The zombie staggered backwards as a brick hit him on the side of his head. Trying to regain his footing he slipped in the little puddle of Rowan’s puke and crashed to the floor.

  Newt scrambled to her feet and glanced over her shoulder to see Rowan in the quadrangle outside the office, another brick in his hand. ‘Come on,’ he urged.

  Newt didn’t need any more persuasion. She clambered through the remains of the wall.

  Gazing around, she could hardly believe that this was her school. Everything was destroyed. And it wasn’t just the buildings and equipment. All the trees and plants were dead. Withered patches of brown grass dotted the grounds, along with dried and splintered tree trunks.

  What happened here? she wondered.

  A moaning wail brought her attention back to the office. The principal leaned against the collapsed wall, blood trickling from where the brick had hit him.

  He lifted his face skyward and wailed again. It was long and sad and filled with misery.

  ‘Why is he doing that?’ hissed Newt.

  ‘Maybe he’s hungry for human flesh,’ suggested Rowan.

  ‘Not funny.’

  The principal stopped and turned, his wail answered by another.

  ‘There’s more of them?’ Newt’s voice was dry with fear.

  Newt and Rowan watched in horror as another zombie came shambling through the wreckage. This one also looked familiar.

  ‘It’s the principal’s secretary,’ said Newt.

  Edna Farunkle shuffled towards them, dragging her left foot along the ground. It was twisted at an odd angle. Her tattered dress billowed in the breeze. Her greying hair was missing from one side of her head, matted on the other. As she approached, she reached out to them.

  Rowan squealed.

  Mrs Farunkle’s hands were claw-like and deformed, the fingers crooked and twisted.

  ‘I think I’m going to be sick,’ said Newt, swallowing hard.

  ‘Been there, done that,’ said Rowan. ‘Come on. I think we need to get out of here.’

  He threw the second brick at Mrs Farunkle, but missed, and they dashed through the ruins towards the school entrance.

  ‘At least they’re not very fast,’ said Newt, catching her breath at the collapsed gate.

  Rowan stopped beside her. The two of them gazed across the road, past the devastated houses and into the distance.

  It was the city. Their school was at the edge of an inner-city suburb, the CBD only a twenty-minute walk away. And there it was. Some of the buildings were still standing … but not many.

  ‘Looks like it’s not just our school,’ said Rowan.

  A feeling of dread worked its way through Newt and she shuddered. ‘What if it’s the whole world?’ she whispered.

  They stood in silence, staring at the city. The wind whistled through the debris and blew a stray strand of Newt’s hair into her eyes. She brushed it aside.

  It was eerily quiet.

  No birdsong.

  No traffic sounds.

  No distant bark of dogs or laughter of kids.

  And it smelled wrong. Decaying. Like food left out in the sun on a really hot day.

  ‘Thanks,’ Newt said softly.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘For back there. You know, the brick.’ She smacked her hand on the side of her head.

  ‘Oh. No worries. You looked like you needed some saving.’

  ‘Excuse me?’ Newt’s temper flared. ‘I’m not some damsel in distress from one of your dumb fantasy books.’

  ‘Okay! So … so next time, I should just leave you, huh?’

  A growl snapped them out of their argument.

  The principal and his secretary were back, stumbling through the school towards them, arms outstretched. And behind them were more shambling figures, some in school uniform.

  ‘Come on,’ said Rowan.

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘The city, I guess.’

  Leaving the school and its zombies behind, they started jogging. Newt looked back over her shoulder.

  ‘They’re not following. They’ve stopped at the gate.’

  Rowan glanced back and slowed down to a walk. They continued on through streets of devastated inner-suburban flats and terraced houses. Skeletons dotted the side of the road, some covered in rags that might have once been clothing. It was creepy.

  Newt noted that, despite all the destruction, most of the electricity poles were still standing, their wires hanging between them.

  She shivered as she walked. Not because she was cold – it was actually a pleasantly warm day – but because she was having difficulty coping with everything that had happened.

  Rowan suddenly stuck a hand into the pocket of his school pants and pulled out a battered mobile phone.

  ‘No reception,’ he complained and put it away. ‘Do you think this is our future or something?’

  ‘You think we time travelled?’ said Newt.

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘What about portal fantasy?’

  ‘I don’t know what this is,’ said
Rowan, voice a little panicky. He quickened his pace, raised his arms up and stretched, then put his hands on his head. ‘I read lots of fantasy and sci-fi … but, it’s not meant to be real. And this is real. Too real! And I don’t know what to think.’

  It struck Newt that he was having just as hard a time coping with everything as she was. She had stupidly assumed that just because he was into fantasy, this would be easier for him. Apparently, it wasn’t.

  ‘Well …’ Newt lengthened her stride to catch up with Rowan, walking alongside him. ‘I read lots of science mags and websites. There’s debate about whether time travel is really possible or not. But the whole multiverse theory seems to have a lot of supporters.’

  ‘Multiverse?’

  ‘Some scientists reckon that there are lots of other worlds – an infinite number of them – all existing side-by-side. Maybe we slipped from our world into another.’ Talking like this and formulating a theory, helped Newt to calm down. She liked theorising.

  ‘Portal fantasy or sci-fi time travel,’ said Rowan. ‘I don’t really care, so long as there’s a happy ending.’

  ‘Real life doesn’t always come with a happily ever after,’ said Newt. ‘That’s just dumb.’

  ‘What is it with you and your … Why are you so …’ It seemed he couldn’t think clearly, let alone form the correct words. He clenched and unclenched his hands, took a deep breath and stopped walking. ‘There is nothing wrong with wanting a happy ending. We don’t always get them. But why can’t we hope? Huh?’ His eyes were scared. ‘Right now I’m hoping for a happy ending that involves us finding a way home.’

  Newt felt guilty for making fun of Rowan. Now it was her turn to be tongue-tied. ‘Um … well … I guess …’

  ‘We’re being watched!’ Rowan suddenly announced in a harsh whisper.

  ‘What? Where?’ Newt looked about frantically, their latest argument forgotten.

  Rowan stopped and pointed up to a grey, box-like block of flats. The edges were crumbling, there was a massive hole in one wall and the roof had caved in, but it was still standing. Someone was staring at them from a third-storey window. And from the next level, two windows to the right, someone else.

  Rowan pointed in the opposite direction to a partially intact terrace house. The door was ajar and someone stood in the shadows.

  ‘Do you think they’re all …’ Newt still couldn’t bring herself to say the word.

  ‘Zombies!’ Rowan said it for her, again. ‘I don’t know. But do you really want to stick around and find out?’

  They quickened their pace and continued without speaking.

  More eyes watched from the shadows.

  Rounding a massive pile of rubble that had been a set of high-rise apartments, they entered the outskirts of the crumbling city.

  Parts of it looked hundreds of years old – the buildings collapsing with age; the streets and pavements cracked and broken; cars rusted and half disintegrated. But the deterioration wasn’t consistent. Some buildings were intact. Others were only partly aged and damaged.

  They stopped and stared.

  So weird! thought Newt.

  Newt had a need to enter the devastation. It felt as if the answers they sought were somewhere among the rubble. She was also scared.

  ‘Should we go in?’ she asked, at the same time as Rowan said, ‘We should go in.’

  The breeze blew that loose strand of hair back into Newt’s eyes. She took out her hair band, swept her hair back neatly and secured it … extra tight. She couldn’t control what was happening to them, but at least she could control her hair.

  They smiled weakly at each other and started forward.

  As they moved through the shattered city, they saw haunted faces staring out from broken buildings and from behind piles of rubble. Occasionally, one of the creatures would shamble towards them, only to stop and stare as they moved away.

  ‘They’re like the ones at school,’ observed Newt. ‘They don’t seem to go very far.’

  ‘Staying in familiar territory?’ suggested Rowan.

  They continued on in silence until …

  Newt spotted something unexpected.

  ‘Hey!’ She pointed ahead. ‘City Park.’

  The park was a wasteland of dead trees, withered bushes and scorched earth. At least it was free of building debris.

  At the opposite end of the park was a tall, thin building – a tower of gleaming steel with smashed panes of glass. It loomed over the surrounding destruction, tapering up to what looked like a glass antenna, remarkably intact.

  Newt inhaled sharply as she felt a tug towards the building, like her insides were being drawn towards it. Weird!

  ‘I don’t remember that building,’ said Rowan.

  ‘I know the park,’ said Newt. ‘There should be a greenhouse full of plants at the end of it, not a weird skyscraper.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I guess this means we are in another world,’ said Newt.

  ‘Or in a future where they’ve replaced the greenhouse.’

  Newt huffed in reply. ‘I wonder what the building is,’ she mused, as they walked towards it.

  ‘There’s only one way to find out,’ said Rowan with a grin. ‘Onward ho!’

  Rowan’s sudden cheeriness bugged Newt. He seemed happy to explore. That bugged her too, because she was fighting the internal need that was luring her to the building. She directed her frustrations onto him.

  ‘You’re enjoying all this, aren’t you?’ accused Newt, angry with herself just as much as with him. ‘What’s the matter with you?’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘This isn’t fun. This isn’t some sort of fantasy story full of adventure, where everything will turn out okay. This is weird … and dangerous … and scary. I mean, we were chased by … by … ZOMBIES!’ She finally articulated the word, yelling it out. She tried to stop herself from shaking.

  ‘Um … sorry.’ Rowan shrugged. ‘I’m scared too. Not that you’d care.’ He paused and looked away. ‘This is the only way I know how to deal with it.’

  ‘Oh.’ Newt felt ashamed for judging him. This is silly, she thought. I want to go in there just as much as he does. But she didn’t say it.

  ‘I still reckon we need to go inside if we’re going to get to the bottom of this,’ he said.

  ‘I guess,’ said Newt, not wanting to show her own eagerness – not wanting to admit to any similarity with him. After all, she didn’t like him … did she?

  They walked to the building without speaking. The perimeter was littered with shards of glass from the panes that had shattered and fallen from the tower. Their shoes crunched over it as they approached the double doors. One of the doors still had its pane of glass, the other had only a few jagged remains.

  Newt and Rowan peered in. A reception desk sat in a large open space. The walls, floor and ceiling were all in shades of beige. There was a door behind the desk. To the right was a corridor, to the left a wall with an elevator that had been smashed out from the inside. It looked like something very large had burst through it.

  They warily climbed through the broken door, careful not to catch their clothes on the broken glass, then walked cautiously up to the desk. There was no one behind it.

  Newt still felt an odd tugging within her, but she wasn’t sure where it was leading now that she was in the building.

  They started to explore.

  The corridor led to lots of empty beige offices. They walked past smashed doors and collapsed walls, peering into ruined rooms full of scrap that used to be furniture.

  The big office at the end was in better shape. The door was gone, the carpet mouldy and rotted, but the desk still stood. Behind it, a high-backed chair faced a shattered window, the safety glass still partly hanging together.

  ‘Now where?’ asked Newt.

  ‘Door behind reception?’ suggested Rowan.

  SQUEEEEEEEEAK!

  Slowly, the chair swivelled around. The woman seated there wore the remains of
a business suit, her hair was still perfectly quaffed in bouffant blonde waves and … she had no face. Her teeth clattered and her eyes jiggled about in skeletal sockets as she stood.

  She stumbled forward out of the chair and crashed into the desk as she reached – with perfectly manicured red nails – for the kids.

  Newt wasn’t sure who screamed the loudest: her or Rowan! But they continued screaming all the way back to the main area.

  Rowan made straight for the door behind reception, and Newt followed without thinking.

  They stepped into a darkened stairwell.

  ‘Only goes down,’ noted Rowan.

  Newt peered into the gloom, feeling uneasy. What if there were more zombies?

  ‘I’m not sure we should go down there,’ said Newt.

  Before they could argue, a snuffling moan turned their attention to the reception desk. There was a zombie lying underneath it. He looked at them with bloodshot eyes and began to crawl out.

  Rowan slammed the door, plunging them into darkness. ‘No choice now.’

  A wan light pushed through the gloom. Rowan was holding his mobile phone. The torch app only illuminated a few steps ahead.

  Down, down, down they went.

  There were no doors or landings, just stairs.

  They seemed to go on forever.

  Rowan stopped abruptly and Newt bumped into him.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  He didn’t answer. She looked over his shoulder at where he was shining the light. In the gloom below them was a skeleton wearing a tattered lab coat. Newt stifled a scream. Despite having seen similar sights out on the streets, in a confined space, in the dark, it somehow seemed so much worse.

  They didn’t talk about it.

  They didn’t say anything.

  Carefully skirting around the skeleton, they continued down.

  Ten steps later they came across another lab-coated figure sprawled across the stairs. They edged around it.

  The zombie reached out and caught Newt’s ankle. Her scream echoed through the stairwell.

  Rowan kicked out at it, tripped and dropped his phone.

  The light went out.

  The zombie moaned.

  Newt pulled her leg free and fell, tumbling down the last few steps to the bottom. She scrambled to her feet, bumped into someone and screamed some more.