“What’s going on?” said Singh.
“I don’t know,” said Allen.
One more thud, and then silence.
Allen motioned to Lewis, and they both quickly stood back from the door, grabbing their weapons and holding them up.
The door opened. A man in battered and worn army fatigues stood next to a woman, her hair shorn close to her skull. She had a sword, and he had a baseball bat. He also had sergeant’s stripes on his shoulder.
“This way,” said the man. “We don’t have long.”
Allen stared at the men.
“Come on, now!” shouted the stranger.
“Lynsey,” said Allen, holding out his hand.
She shook her head and held out the medicine bag.
“No,” said Allen. “We’ll get you out of here, back to camp, the least we can do.”
“She bit?” said the man.
Allen ignored him. “Come on, Lynsey.”
“Tell Mark I’m sorry we didn’t have more time,” said Lynsey. “Good luck.”
“We have to go,” said the man.
“What’re you going to do?” said Allen to Lynsey, ignoring the man.
“I’ll figure something out,” said Lynsey.
“Now!” said the man, “or you can try and get out of here yourselves.”
“Go,” said Lynsey, tears in her eyes.
Allen hugged her, as did Lewis and Singh.
They followed the man into the corridor, closing the door behind them. Dead zeds littered the floor. As the man led them down the corridor, Allen heard the smashing of glass from the room they had just left. They were on the fifteenth floor of the hospital. It was a long way down.
“You’ve moved the barricades?” said the man as they ran through the dark corridors.
“You put them there?”
“We had everything sealed off,” said the woman. “We had them contained.”
“We didn’t know,” said Allen.
“I can see that,” she said.
Moans echoed from the darkness. The shuffling of feet. Plastic and metal items falling to the floor.
The man and woman moved quickly, not hesitating at any turn. They went through doors, around corridors, through wards, up and down small staircases. Allen was soon lost.
Eventually, they stopped in a thin corridor, no light. The man lit up a torch and shone it on a small doorway. He opened the door, light burst from it into the corridor, and he hustled them in.
The room was large, with other doors leading off to the right and left. A thin, dark-skinned man sat in the middle of the floor by an oil burner. Natural light came in from both of the doorways. A desk had been pushed up against the wall, and three sleeping bags lay on the floor. Three backpacks. A pile of books, Allen glanced at a few titles: SAS Survival Guide; Prepper’s world; Gardening for Sustainability; A World Without a Doctor. A glass half full of water. Each sleeping bag had its demarcated area.
“Hello,” said the man in the room, standing up. “I’m Abdul,” he held out his hand.
“Allen.” They shook.
“You found them then?” said Abdul looking to the man and woman who had rescued them.
“We did,” said the woman. “On the fifteenth floor, about to be zed food.”
“They moved the barriers,” said the soldier, moving through to the next room. He came back with a plastic container full of water and some glasses. “I’m Crowe,” he said. He poured drinks for everyone. “Sergeant Crowe.” He saluted at Allen. “I’m guessing by your age that you take rank,” he said, half smiling.
Allen returned the half smile. “You’d be right. This is Corporal Lewis and Private Singh. And this is Sarah.”
“You military make me laugh,” said Sarah. “The end of the world and you guys still acting like all this rank and file business matters.”
“It does,” said Crowe. “It’s the reason we’re still alive.”
“Come through,” said Sarah, motioning for them into the room on the right. Daylight burst in through large windows. “We think this was some boardroom. Not bad, for the NHS. We’re on the twentieth floor. This is where we live mainly. That room we came in through, that’s the bedroom. The other room is where we cook.”
“It’s nice to separate out,” said Abdul. “Makes it feel like we are in a penthouse flat. Something like this would have cost thousands before the Fall,” he let out a small laugh.
“How long have you been here?” said Allen walking to the window, and looking out across the town.
“Long enough,” said Crowe. “We spent a good few months after the Fall in one of the Safe Zones, a stadium. The idea was that we, army, I mean, would keep everyone safe. That didn’t last long. Food, heat, people going feral, the zeds. Lucky we got out alive. As you can see, not many of us did. We scrambled around in the countryside for a while. Lost one of us in the woods. You know what it’s like. Surprise attack. How those fuckers surprise anyone is beyond me, but they do. We found here about ten weeks ago. It’s not much to look at, but its safe, once we got the barricades up, and its warm.”
Sarah was looking at Crowe with a smile on her face.
“What?” said Crowe.
“That’s the most I’ve heard you say in months.”
Crowe motioned towards Allen. “A superior asked for a sitrep. Don’t get excited.”
“Looks like a good set up. You've done well,” said Allen.
“Pardon?” said Sarah. “It wasn’t all soldier boy here. We all had a hand in getting things working. And if I remember correctly, it’s your soldier size nines that have just ripped our barriers apart. Who the hell knows what’s going on in the floors below.”
“I’m sure the Sergeant meant all of us,” said Abdul, smiling, his slim frame hiding a once larger man, thought Allen, seeing the loose skin under Abdul’s chin, the wobbling wings under his arms. Hard to place an age. Somewhere in his late thirties, early forties guessed Allen. A picture was on the wall behind Abdul’s sleeping bag. His smiling moon face, a woman, and four children. It still hurt to see the remains of people’s lives, nothing now but little pictures, pieces of clothing, the various talismans of a life; toddler’s scribblings, teenager’s certificates of achievement. Allen’s hand unconsciously moved to his jacket pocket, where he carried the picture of his young boy.
“Sir?” said Lewis.
Allen looked up, focused back on his surroundings.
“And what about your set up?” said Abdul. Even when not smiling, it looked like he was. His cheeks framed continuously with a smile.
“Well, there are plenty of us,” said Allen. “Nearly fifty now. Three soldiers - us three you see here. The rest civilians. We rescued most of them from a safe zone the day the zed’s hit.”
“Which zone?” said Crowe.
“Lima Delta.”
“You were near the London Barrier then?”
“Near it? We were working it.”
“Was it as bad as they said?” Crowe sat down, his attention now on Allen.
“I don’t know what they have been saying. But it was bad. Worse day of my career.” He looked at Lewis and Singh. He wondered how much he should say in front of them. For a year now, they had eaten, slept, fought, and killed together. They must know by now he wasn’t infallible, that he had weaknesses and fears, like them all.
Or maybe not.
“We did a lot of shooting that day. Zeds, civilians. Didn’t do the slightest piece of good. Our CO, a second lieutenant, named Dalby, lost control. He had no idea what he was doing. Straight out of Sandhurst. He lost it, went rogue. I didn’t like that.”
Silence in the room. Shuffling as someone shifted position.
“That sounds ominous,” said Crowe.
“No, I didn’t kill him. We just, went our own way.”
Crowe smiled. “You’re deserters?”
Allen allowed himself a small laugh. “You could say that. I’d say Dalby was the deserter. None of it matters now, of course. None
of it.”
Another few moments of gentle silence, not uncomfortable. Silence was never uncomfortable between people who had made the same desperate decisions.
“Dalby wanted us to continue firing into the crowd, but we couldn’t. Not all of us. We ended up on the run, ended up finding Zone Lima Delta. We got a lot of people clear before the Air Force took care of things.”
“I heard that,” said Crowe. “That the safe zones near London were obliterated. Bombed from the sky. A real clusterfuck.”
“They must’ve been shitting themselves in Whitehall,” said Allen. “The world was falling apart, and for once they couldn’t do a thing about it. No amount of Daily Mail headlines, BBC discussions, C.O.B.R.A. meetings, or knee-jerk legislation would fix a damn thing. The world was fucked, and the only thing they could do was try to blow it up.”
“How many people did you get out?” said Sarah.
“Oh, about twenty. We wandered for a long time. We’ve lost some, we’ve gained some. We have a base now, though, near here.”
“Sir,” said Singh, his tone cautious.
Allen raised a hand and smiled at Singh. “I know, I know, son. How can we trust these people?” He looked at each of Abdul, Sarah, and Crowe in turn. “How do we know they aren’t insane, ready to rip us apart and then destroy our base and take everything we have. The answer is we don’t.” He turned to Singh. “I just have to trust someone, for a change, or I’m going to go mad. And given these people saved us, even though we fucked their barricades,” he smiled at Sarah, “I say we start with them. How does that sound?” said Allen.
“Sounds good, sir,” said Singh.
“We have a base,” said Allen. “It’s in the woods, about four miles from here. We have a nice set up on top of a hill. We’ve been good there for a few months now.”
“Secured?” said Crowe.
“As much as can be. We have 24-hour lookouts, crude warning systems. It’s warm, dry.” Allen paused. “We could always do with more good people. What do you think?”
“We decide these things together,” said Sarah. Her hair, although short, showed tight curls where it had grown out slightly. Allen imagined her a formidable sight before the Fall, long red curling hair, her stern features and piercing eyes.
“Well, it’s too late for us to head back now,” said Allen. “We won’t get back before dark. How about we stay the night, and you let us know in the morning if you’re coming with us?”
“We’ll do that,” said Crowe, glancing at Sarah and Abdul, an almost imperceptible nod of agreement passing between the three. “First, I guess you’d like something to eat?”
Sarah couldn’t get to sleep. It was one in the morning. After a pleasant meal of various tinned foods and rainwater with the three new guests, they had all retired just after dark. Allen and his men were sleeping in the ‘kitchen.’ They had their sleeping bags of course. The military, always fucking prepared.
Allen had taken a photograph out of his top pocket and put it beside him while settling for the night. She had glanced and seen the image of a young boy playing in the sea. Must have been about ten. Allen had looked at it for a few seconds, before placing it under his pillow.
Everyone had a photograph, whether real or in their head. Something they returned to every day, a part of the old world and life that wouldn’t let go, that would trace forward into eternity, always pulling one back to the past. To the way things used to be, and how wonderful they were although never appreciated; now gone forever, maybe. Always hold on; always have hope; it will get better; you will find your children; you will find your peace; the zeds will disappear and the world will return.
Stop it, she said to her herself. Too late, tears already forming around the corner of her eyes. In her past life, she had been the financial director of a fortune 100 company. Power suits and big hair and sassy talking; no emotions, pragmatism only, please.
A real hard bitch.
Supposedly. Her connection to the past, her little daughter, three-year-old Clarissa, tugged at her emotional shroud and pulled it apart thread by thread. Her little girl, gone.
Or was she?
Stop it!
Sarah sat up, taking the photo of Clarissa off the wall next to her sleeping bag.
Abdul snored gently.
She walked to the lounge room, where the full windows looked out across the dark town. A clear night glittered with stars, inky black pierced with the millions of sparklers that her daughter loved to throw all over her dresses.
Shapes of buildings in the dark like black lego. The bushy silhouettes of the woods. The rolling dark carpets of the farm fields, all stretching to the distance, to the sea.
She looked at the photo in her hands. Her little girl, smiling, her face wide open in laughter. Sarah had been stuck on a channel tunnel train as the virus raged in London. Sarah hoped that somehow her husband had got out of the city, that somehow her daughter and husband were alive in the woods and fields and terminally ill towns and cities of the country. Somewhere, thinking of her, dreaming of the day they would be together again.
Sarah allowed herself to cry. Allowed the heavy tears to flow down her cheeks, her body to rock in the stillness of the night.
Arms around her shoulder. It was Crowe.
“Come on, this does you no good,” he said, helping her back to her sleeping bag.
“Let’s go, from this place,” said Sarah, wiping tears from her face. The taste of salt on her lips.
“It’s time?” said Crowe.
“Yes,” said Sarah. “We’ll go tomorrow, with Allen and his people.”
Chapter 4
Harriet, in the caravan they had found, with her two men: stoic Arthur - her stone harbor, her breakwater against every horror of the new world, and Little Adam - ten years old, the lost boy she had saved on the day of the Fall. Her little scout, her heart, her reason.
“How far is it?” said Harriet.
Adam looked up from the map. His brow furrowed. “I think it's another few days yet. But we should be there soon.”
It had taken the best part of a year to get here, to Cornwall, to be within reach of Tulloch Bay holiday park. It was Adam’s quest, not her’s or Arthur’s. They had no quest. Arthur had lost his wife and children in the crazed mess that was London. Harriet had no-one to lose. Twenty-five years old, no significant other, no children. Just a burgeoning career in recruitment and a long list of drunken nights in London’s neon maze.
She was glad she had been alone when the end came.
Arthur picked up Adam and embraced him in a huge bear hug. Adam laughed fast and loud. “A few days?” said Arthur, his African accent curling around his vowels with mock anger. “A few days?! You said we would be there in no time! We’ll see about that!”
Arthur was too tall for the caravan, and he had to duck. An old tinker’s caravan in a scrapyard. It smelt terrible, but the gates in the scrapyard were secure, and they had a few good days there, resting, restocking. Getting ready for the final push to Tulloch Bay. It had been a long time coming.
Adam ran out of laughter, exhausted as Arthur placed him down next to the small table by the back of the caravan. What would Adam do if he didn’t find what he was looking for in Tulloch Bay? He was so convinced; his hope had driven both her and Arthur on through the darkest of nights and the most terrifying of years. She knew she wouldn’t be able to stand seeing his little heartbreak.
She loved him.
Adam sat down on the seat, his ruffled blonde hair like a nest.
“We need to cut that,” said Harriet.
“You too,” said Adam.
She raised a hand to her own hair. Adam was right.
“Come on then, Arthur, get out the scissors, time for a trim.”
Arthur went to one of the rucksacks and took out a metal tin box. He opened it and took out the scissors. He placed the metal tin box back in the bag. Nothing to be left out of place, nothing to be gathered. Always ready to move, immediately.
Spirits were high. The end of a journey. They’d almost made it.
“Can I go on your shoulders?” said Adam.
“‘Course you can,” said Arthur, hoisting the young man up to his shoulders. “What can you see up there?”
“Hmmm, the tracks are bending ahead,” said Adam.
“Which way after that Adam?”
“I think, we leave the tracks here, and then walk through the forest. That will take us to the top of the hill, if we follow that down again we will reach the road. That takes us to the holiday park.”
“What would we do without you?” said Harriet.
The old train tracks they followed were rusted red with age, overgrown with weeds and grass. Bushes and trees encroached from the sidings. Bloated flies buzzed lazily in the midday heat. What month was it, May, June, maybe? Harriet wondered what she’d been doing this time last year. Sitting in her office. Bored. If you took things in isolation, today was actually better than her past life; here she was walking along a beautiful abandoned railway path in the sun, with a close friend, and young Adam.
They left the track and passed into the shadow of the trees. Low hanging branches, fresh and full green leaves. Soft footfall on weeds and unpacked soil beneath their feet. No one passed here but rabbits and badgers now.
“I built a treehouse here once with my Dad,” said Adam. “There is a clearing somewhere, a huge rock by it. There’s an old oak tree that’s flat in the middle.”
“A tree house? My word,” said Arthur. “That sounds amazing. Will it still be there?”
“No. We went the year after and it was gone. Dad said it would’ve been the council.”
“Ah, the council, of course,” laughed Arthur. “Well, I tell you what, when we get to the holiday park, we can come back up here one day, and build another one!”
“That’s ok Arthur, I can build one with Dad. You can come too, of course.”
Harriet felt a stab of pain in her heart. Adam’s Dad wouldn’t be there. How could he?
The Fall Series (Book 3): The Fence Walker Page 5