‘So how long do you think this will last Eric?’
I frowned and looked at the fuel tanks. ‘Well you know better than me about the fuel usage and…’
‘I don’t mean the supplies,’ Alan cut me short. ‘I meant how long you think we will be here before we get saved. If we do get saved that is?’
‘I don’t know man,’ I said staring into my empty cup. ‘I just hope it happens long before those tanks run out though.’
‘I hear that’ Alan said. ‘Do you still think your girlfriend is alive?’
I looked him in the eye and shrugged. ‘The longer it goes the less I believe it to be honest. The only thing that keeps me going is the thought that I’m still here.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean Lauren had a head start on the game you know? She got to that centre, and by all accounts it looked pretty secure. Then I found a note that she left me saying they were being moved to an even better one – a more secure one I’m hoping. But she didn’t know exactly where they were being taken. But I’d like to believe that she is alive and well somewhere. I need to believe it.’
‘So why are you having doubts then?’
I sighed and rubbed the back of my neck. ‘If she is still alive then what sort of world is this to be bringing a baby in to? If the stories that I’ve heard are true, then it’s not only just Ireland that’s dead. It’s worldwide. How do we come back from that? And what chance has a child got growing up in it?’
‘Well the kid has got good genes. His folks are survivors. That’s a good head start.’ Alan shot me a wink and then he smiled. ‘Don’t lose your belief Eric. It’s like you said yourself, once you have belief you will stay strong.’
‘You’re right,’ I muttered. ‘Is that what keeps you going too?’
‘Yeah that’s part of it,’ Alan nodded. ‘Plus the routine of this place keeps my mind off it too, as humdrum as it can be. And as crazy as it sounds, I just keep comparing what’s happening out there to nothing more than a terminal illness.’
‘What do you mean?’
Alan reclined in his chair and folded his arms under his chest. After a long time he spoke. ‘My mother got blood cancer when I was teenager. She kept it from me for as long as she could, and then quite soon after I found out, she was gone.’ Alan pursed his lips together and let out a faint whistle before speaking again.
‘Her demise was just so rapid. She faded away and changed into this totally different thing… person, until right at the end she didn’t even know who I was. I would go and sit by her bedside every day and each time she looked at me it was as if she was seeing me for the first time. She couldn’t even keep a sip of water down, and she had no memory of her old life. That’s what I think has happened to those people out there Eric. I still call them people because I still think of them that way. They just got something that they didn’t ask for, and it’s changed them in to whatever they actually are. All they know now is the need to rip us apart.’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘your guess is as good as mine on that one.’
‘I don’t think anybody out there at this moment in time knows exactly what they are Eric. We may never find out either. I keep wondering if they know what they have become. Part of me doubts it, but then there’s another piece of me that thinks differently when I see they can still show signs of basic motor functions.’
‘I bet Monty knows more than the rest of us combined.’
Alan grinned and shrugged his shoulders at my remark. ‘Well, if he does he doesn’t speak much about it. Well not when he’s sober anyway.’
‘Oh really?’
‘Yeah,’ Alan went on. ‘There’s been a couple of occasions over a few late night drinks where what we just talked about has come up, and Monty had made some strange comments and then gotten very uncomfortable. Some of the other guys found it weird.’
‘And you didn’t?’
‘Not really. I just think that Monty’s pissed off because he thought himself as something of a big deal. But in the end, he got left behind to die with the rest of us peasants.’
‘So has Monty really got some sort of a contingency plan for us if we’re not saved before the supplies run out?’
Alan sized me up. I could see he was giving my question some serious thought. He leaned towards me, and then shot a glance at the walkie talkies we had left on the work bench before we had sat down to our coffees.
He looked back at me and licked his lips. ‘If I show you something you got to keep it a secret ok Eric?’
‘Of course I will. I’d rather keep this whole conversation between us secret Alan. Especially what I told you about the note Lauren left me. I don’t want anybody else knowing.
‘Ok it’s a deal Eric. I’ll show you, but we got to be quick. Grab the radios from the bench and follow me.’
Five minutes later we were standing in front of a steel door that was hidden behind a towering stack of wooden pallets. There was just enough space for myself and Alan to stand sideways between the wood and the door.
‘This is actually a double door Eric. When this one opens there’s an identical one right behind it. Behind the second one is an underground tunnel that leads to a small garage, and a jeep with a full tank of gas and emergency supplies.’ Alan wrapped his knuckles lightly on the door. ‘I’ve got the key for this door. Bruce has the second one. And Monty… Monty has the keys to the garage.’
‘You don’t sound all too pleased with that arrangement.’
Alan’s shoulders sagged and he rested his hand on the door. ‘I trust Bruce one hundred per cent. It’s just that sometimes I think Monty never wants to leave this place. I don’t know if it’s because he’s scared of not making it on the outside or whether he wants to be king of this castle for the rest of his days.’
‘Well now that you mention it I do find there to be something off about him. I thought it was just me when I first got here but I felt I was being unfair. I didn’t really know him and he – you guys – saved our lives, so I tried to drop it. But something keeps niggling at me Alan. A lot more now that you’ve just shown me this door.’
‘What do you mean?’
I gestured at Alan to step out from behind the pallets. When we got back into the light and open space I looked all around at me and double checked my radio before speaking.
‘This whole set up. Well not just this but something else I saw a while back at the medical centre too. It just strikes me as being too well pre –’
Our radios buzzed with Bruce’s voice asking us for our status update, and then informing us that dinner would be getting served shortly. I bit my lip and turned off my own radio as Alan signalled back on his one. When Alan signed off we began to head back upstairs.
He didn’t bring our interrupted conversation up again, and I didn’t know whether that was purposely done, or if it had genuinely slipped his mind. We made the rest of our ascent up the building in silence. The more steps we climbed the more determined I became for answers.
Chapter 34
The rest of the day passed in what had become the normal routine of interaction over dinner and supper, alcohol, Monty’s life stories, and pearls of wisdom, and Janet doing her best to avoid me. But I didn’t care. I used my new job title to hide out down in the belly of the building with a paperback after I ate. I was doubly glad to be on patrol down below, while Janet was on the same duty up topside.
When my shift was over and Alan relieved me, I headed back up to the library to wind down before lights out. I had gotten my own room two doors down the hallway from Janet. The room was identical to the one we had shared but I still felt more comfortable in the library. I went to the window and looked out into the black night but I couldn’t see much. The moon had vanished completely, while the ever present rain tip tapped on the window. I sat down in my now usual chair wondering if the dead still cared enough to take shelter.
The dead. Ever since my conversation with Alan about his mother, I had begun to reconsider
what to call them. I agreed with him in his thinking about them changing into something else yet despite that how their motor functions still remained. How that was even still possible with the amount of decay their bodies showed, and the obvious brain damage they had suffered was beyond me.
Perhaps there was somebody out there with a better brain than I possessed that was working on an answer? Or maybe the man a few floors above me already had one? I began to think of my plans for Monty, but I was asleep too soon.
I was awakened by a hard shaking grip on my shoulder. When my eyes adjusted I saw Janet standing over me. Her white face was streaked with tears and her other hand which was holding a gun by her side trembled.
‘Eric you need to come quickly, there’s been an accident. Something… terrible has happened.’
Moments later we were downstairs in the main entrance hallway. My stomach sank when I saw the trail of blood running along the floor. It began at the front door and ran right up to Bruce’s body. Sarah and Ellen were on their knees working from a first aid kit, and tending to an apple sized wound on his neck. The more Bruce groaned and spat blood, the more both women sobbed. Monty stood over them with his fingertips over his mouth. He was trembling just as much as Janet and the two nurses at his feet.
‘What happened?’ I asked Janet looking at Bruce’s writhing body. Tendrils of smoke were rising from the skin on his face, and the whites of his eyes were beginning to discolour.
‘He’s been bitten,’ Janet replied through heaving breaths.
‘We don’t know that yet!’ Sarah barked back at her.
Monty put his hands on his head and mumbled something incoherent. Janet moved in closer to me and squeezed my arm.
‘We should do something Eric.’
‘Don’t you come near him!’ Sarah choked out her retort. ‘Monty, help us with Bruce. I need to get him up to my room. I can treat him better up there.’
Monty took a step towards Sarah and froze. ‘Sarah, he’s been, attacked, we can’t… the infection is already inside him. The contamination risk is too high to be taking him upstairs.’
‘Don’t give me your bullshit now Monty.’ Sarah roared back. ‘I’ve dressed his wound and it’s holding for now. But I need to get heavier gauze and a tighter strapping on him. He needs antibiotics too.’
‘Sarah, I really don’t think that this will help him...’
‘You’re wasting time Monty! He could have been bitten by a rat for all we know. And we’re not sure if they even carry the virus or not. Now stop fucking around and help me get him upstairs!’
I could see that Sarah’s words had shocked Monty into action, but I knew what he was thinking. It was the same thing that I was thinking, and most likely Janet and Ellen too. Bruce was fucked. And wrapping him up like a mummy and shoving pills into him wasn’t going to help one bit. But I still felt for Sarah, and I knew exactly where she was coming from. I wasn’t willing to give up on Lauren until I knew for certain. I moved forward to help, but Sarah halted my advance with her hand.
‘No Eric,’ she sounded more composed. ‘I need you and Janet to go and find Alan and Marty. They were supposed to be with Bruce when this happened. Go and get them, and bring them upstairs. They’ve got some explaining to do.’
I looked at Monty and he nodded at me. His face was as white as his hair. He took a deep breath and bent down beside Sarah. Once again I went to help but this time it was Ellen who halted me.
‘Please Eric,’ she begged. ‘Find the guys and get back to us. We need to regroup and stay together. We need to get on top of this situation as fast as we can.’
I obeyed Ellen’s words and left with Janet. She holstered her gun and wiped the tears from her eyes.
‘Better take it back out,’ I said keeping my eyes forward.
‘Why, where are we going?’
‘Alan’s workshop.’
‘Do you think they’re in trouble too?’
‘I don’t know Janet. I’ve just learned to always expect the worst these days.’
‘I guess you’re right. Listen Eric, we need to talk.’
‘Yeah we do. But it can wait. We’ve got a big problem to deal with right now.’
Behind us Bruce groaned deep in his throat. Janet looked at me and shuddered. We rounded the corner at the end of the hallway and before we began our decent to the workshop I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.
Janet took my arm. ‘Are you ok?’
I opened my eyes and shook my head at her. We walked with caution. I didn’t know which was worse, the situation we were leaving behind, or the one that we were walking in to.
Chapter 35
When I first saw Alan I thought he was one of the dead. He was standing motionless in the middle of the workshop covered in blood and vomit, and staring at something we couldn’t see from our viewpoint.
Janet and I crept up to him slowly. We both walked side by side while Janet aimed her pistol at Alan’s head. I could see her finger hovering over the trigger from the corner of my eye. But as we got closer to Alan I knew that he was still himself. It was his crying that gave him away. I followed his line of sight to see what he was sobbing at.
Marty’s body lay in a pool of blood in the centre of the workshop. What was once his head was splattered across the floor. Alan looked at us nonchalantly, and then back at Marty. I turned to Janet and raised my eyebrows. She shrugged back at me and then nodded at the gun Alan was holding by his side.
‘What happened Alan?’ I asked even though it was pretty obvious that he had shot Marty and then puked all over himself. But I wanted to know why exactly. It was impossible to tell if Marty had turned from the way his head had exploded. If he had turned it had been pretty fast compared to how Bruce was changing.
But Alan didn’t answer my question.
‘Alan, what happened here?’ I asked again taking a step closer to him.
Alan mumbled something inaudible, and then began to whine. He couldn’t take his eyes from Marty’s dead form.
‘Alan listen to me ok? Bruce has had an accident upstairs. He’s badly hurt but he’s still alive.’
Alan’s eyes widened and he spun around to face me.
‘That’s right,’ I went on. ‘Sarah and Ellen sent us down here to get the two of you. They want us all back upstairs pitching in and making sure Bruce is ok. But first thing is first, we need to get ourselves together down here Alan. You know what I mean?’
Alan bobbed his head. I knew my words about Bruce being ok would garner a reaction. I just had to keep him calm, and find out why he had killed Marty. And I needed to get the gun from him too.
I took another step closer towards him and spoke with my palms held up in front of me. ‘We don’t have much time here Al, so you’ve got to tell us what happened with you and Marty over there. We need to get our story straight. Then, we need to get you cleaned up and back upstairs with the rest of us.’
Alan looked at me and then back to Marty. After a long time he spoke. ‘I was down here reading when Marty radioed me. He sounded panicked, he was screaming into the radio, and talking way too fast. He told me to get up to the main corridor right away. He kept saying code red over and over. But I already knew what it was Eric.’ Alan broke off and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand that the gun was in.
‘Jesus Alan be careful with that gun’ Janet scolded him as she came and stood closer to me.
‘It’s not loaded. I emptied them all into Marty. I had to you see? It wasn’t my fault.’
‘What happened with Bruce?’ I asked.
‘He got bitten Eric! Did you not see that for yourself ?’
‘Yeah I did see it. But how did he get bitten? You said you already knew what had happened to him before you saw him. How did you know? Did the dead break in here?’
‘Sarah is pregnant Eric. Bruce told me a couple of weeks ago. It was obviously unplanned. He said the two of them were shocked. Stunned. They had been nothing but careful, yet they had still gotten caught.
It was Bruce who was taking it the worst out of the two of them though.’
Alan paused and rolled his eyes over myself and Janet. He looked at Marty’s body and then back to us.
‘That’s when he started to go outside. I warned him not to. I pleaded with him. But Bruce wouldn’t listen.’
‘He went outside? Why?’ I asked. I looked at Janet. ‘Did you know about this?’
‘No Eric I didn’t. I swear.’
‘He snapped Eric.’ Alan said in a far off voice. ‘Bruce started creeping out at night to shoot as many zombies as he could. He thought that the more he killed, the better things would be when the baby was born. He said it would give us a better chance at survival. I didn’t really understand his logic, and as I said, I begged him not to go out, but he was a trained killer in a very bad mood, so I wasn’t arguing with him.’
‘So that’s why he liked doing the early morning shifts?’ Janet asked.
‘That’s right. When that radio call came in I knew it could only be one thing. I was expecting it. But I didn’t even make it to where Bruce was. I got halfway up the stairs before I bumped into Marty. He had blood all over his face and he was hysterical.’
Alan looked at Marty again and bit his bottom lip. He took some deep breaths before speaking again. ‘Marty said he came upon Bruce in the hallway. He said he was leaning against the front door holding his neck. So Marty radioed to me straight away. He knew exactly what had happened too. Then he said Bruce was on top of him before he could do anything. But he wasn’t trying to attack him he was trying to ask him for help. But instead of talking he vomited right into Marty’s face. So Marty pushed him to the floor, and came running down here to me.’
‘Holy shit,’ I said mumbling.
‘When Marty got down here he tried to clean himself up. He told me that Bruce was bleeding out and that he was fucked. Then a couple of minutes later Marty started puking everywhere himself. His voice changed, it became really deep, and then his body started to spasm.’
The Dust: The Zombie Apocalypse in Ireland Page 13