Chapter Eight
The following morning, we met the others who were tied up in the holding area; there were seventeen of them in all, and they stopped by in ones and twos to check up on what was happening on the television. Word had clearly got round that we were happy to trade food for news, so when they came, they didn’t arrive empty handed and we soon had enough food to last us for several days.
All day the news was improving; it seemed the tide was finally turning, and England and Wales might yet be saved. The military was now running every game in town, including all the television channels. No matter which one we switched to, they all showed the same pictures: some were live; others pre-recorded; all suggested things were being brought under control, and our spirits started to rise.
Only Claire remained sceptical. ‘Look, we can’t trust what they’re saying. They want us to believe they’ve got it all sorted out; they haven’t: they can’t have.’ She paced back and forth in the cockpit. ‘There’s no way they can get a grip on this, not this quickly. Look at what’s happening elsewhere; if the Americans can’t get things under control after Miami, we sure as hell can’t after Glasgow. They’re just saying what they need to say to keep people off the streets.’
‘Oh come on, Claire. Surely you can’t really be that paranoid, can you?’ Tom was sitting with his back against the cabin watching her. ‘Can’t you give them the benefit of the doubt, even for a moment or two?’
‘You don’t know these people; I do. It’s what they do. It’s their job.’ Claire stopped. ‘I’ve seen it before.’
Daz was leaning on the wheel and this caught his attention. ‘Where’ve you seen anythin’ like this before?’
Claire gazed into the distance. ‘Sierra Leone. Sudan. Rwanda. The Congo. The military always thinks it’s doing what’s best, even when it’s doing the worst.’
I felt the need to interrupt. ‘But this is nothing like any of that. This isn’t a civil war; it’s a disease.’
‘It’s not the cause that’s important; it’s the way those with power react when their way of life is threatened.’ Claire was staring straight at me. ‘You can’t understand it until you’ve seen it.’
I could tell from her eyes she was keeping something back. I wondered if it was because Sophie was listening, but before I got a chance to ask, there was a shout from our left; the large black ribs were approaching, towing an empty wooden rowing boat. In one of the ribs, there were two men dressed not in uniforms, but in civilian clothes. They both looked young — early twenties at the most — and sat huddled together, surrounded by the heavily armed marines.
As they came closer, I could see that one of them had a black eye and was holding his arm delicately. He wasn’t the only one who was hurt; one of the marines was sporting a series of ragged scratches across his cheek. Once they were close enough, the naval officer we’d spoken to the previous day hailed us. ‘Hey, can you take these guys for us? It’s against orders to take anyone back to the frigate and they’ll end up dead if we leave them floating around in that.’ He pointed to the rowing boat.
‘I don’t know.’ I eyed the two men suspiciously. ‘Are they okay?’
‘Yes. There was just a bit of, er ... resistance, shall we say, when we tried to pick them up.’ He glared at the man with the scratched face who, in turn, was doing his best not to catch anyone’s eye. ‘They really shouldn’t be out here, but it’s not like we can take them back to shore. The land’s not safe anymore; at least, not around here.’
‘I’ve got plenty of room. They can stay on my boat.’ I looked up to see who was speaking. I’d talked to the man earlier in the day, but I couldn’t remember his name. He was on his own on a thirty-foot yacht tied up at the other end of the line of boats, but when the ribs had arrived, he’d been sitting on Bob’s boat, chatting to us as Bob cooked them some food down below.
The rib with the civilians on board came alongside and the marines helped the two men out and onto our deck. I watched as they moved unsteadily onto the next boat and then followed the man as he led them across to his yacht.
‘They look like they’ve never even been on a boat before.’ I turned back to the rib. ‘What the hell were they thinking?’
The officer leant on our guard rail. ‘I guess they were just trying to survive, and when you’re desperate you’ll try anything.’
He let go of the guard rail and rubbed his face with his hands, clearly exhausted. ’How’s your man doing? The one with the infection.’
‘Ask him yourself. He’s sitting right there.’ I pointed towards Tom.
Tom smiled. ‘I’m happy to say, the antibiotics have pretty much got it under control.’
‘Good. Here, catch,’ He tossed a small package to me. ‘A few extra, just in case. I … eh-em … liberated them from the ship’s doctor.’
‘Thanks.’ I opened the bag and peeked inside: it contained several bottles full of capsules. ‘But won’t you get into trouble for this?’
He chuckled. ‘Seems unlikely; I‘m the first officer.’
I looked at him curiously: it seemed odd that someone so far up the chain of command would be running around in a rib, herding up strays trying to flee by sea.
‘I know what you’re thinking. It’s just that there have been a few incidents.’ He scowled at the highest-ranking marine, who adjusted his stance and stared back defiantly. The other marines suddenly took an intense interest in their boots in a bid to avoid making eye contact with either man. ‘And the Captain thought there’d be a better chance of it not happening again if someone more senior went out on patrol with them.’ He took off his cap and ruffled his hair. ‘I was happy to volunteer; it’s nice to get off the ship now and then, and it’s not like we’ll be getting shore leave any time soon.’ He replaced his cap and adjusted it. ‘Anyway, we’ll leave those two,’ he nodded to where the two men were now sitting on the boat at the far end of our little flotilla, ‘in your capable hands.’
As the rib started to leave, there was a shout behind me. ‘Wait! I want to speak to you before you go.’ I turned to see Bob scrambling up his companionway. ‘Hey wait! When’re you goin’ to let us go? I need to find ma family. Hey! Come back!’
Ignoring him, they left. As the boat disappeared off into the distance, Bob crumpled on to a seat in his cockpit, ‘Shit! I don’t think they’re ever gonna let us get out of here.’
‘I don’t know about you guys, but I don’t plan on staying here for much longer.’ I’d finally found out that the name of the man who’d taken the two newcomers onto his boat was Pete, and he was addressing a group of us who’d gathered in the cockpit of Bob’s boat; we were doing our best to make a dent in what seemed like an endless supply of beer which he had on board.
Bob opened another bottle and threw the cap into the water. ‘What’re you goin’ to do?’
‘One night, when there’s no moon up, and it’s nice and dark, I’ll pull up my anchor and see if I can slip past the blockade.’ He sipped the beer he was holding.
Bob pointed his beer bottle at Pete, slopping some of its contents onto the deck. ‘You won’t stand a chance! I got here before you guys; I saw what it was like before they put that officer on the ribs … when it was just the marines. There was another boat here, an’ it tried to sneak past the blockade on the first night.’ He took a slug of beer. ‘But they were spotted an’ when they caught up with them, they didn’t even try to turn them back; they just opened fire. They were pretty much right beside them an’ they used the big machine guns, the ones mounted on the ribs themselves. The boat was riddled in seconds an’ started sinkin’.’
I thought about how much damage the bullets from the Erskine Bridge had done to our bow, from 500 yards away. Up close, they’d have ripped holes the size of dinner plates in the fibreglass hull of a yacht: they wouldn’t have stood a chance.
Bob carried on. ‘There were eight of them on board. Some of them made it out of the cabin, but before they could launch their life raft, they
were machine-gunned, too. All of them.’ Bob’s voice started to waver. ‘Even the kids.’
The cockpit went quiet as everyone digested this new information. Daz was the first to break the silence. ‘How’d they know they were tryin’ to sneak past? You know, if it was dark an’ all?’
Bob took another slug from his bottle. ‘Radar: I’m guessin’ that’s how they’re keeping an eye on us, and how they found us in the first place. I mean, it’s the only way one ship could monitor the whole channel. The moment we move, they’ll know about it.’ He looked towards Pete, ‘Even if it’s pitch-black.’
I played with my empty beer bottle. ‘Maybe we need to start talking to them; make them see us as something more than collateral damage. If they start seeing us as people and not just prisoners, or whatever we are to them, they might start listening to us, giving us some information. Maybe they’ll even let us go.’
‘That’s not going to happen.’ Claire took a mouthful of beer. ‘Not if they are as trigger-happy as Bob says they are.’
Tom picked up a bottle, and Claire glared at him. He shrugged back at her. ‘One beer can’t hurt.’ He reached for the bottle opener. ‘That first officer seems pretty decent. He’s already given us antibiotics and he seemed happy enough to talk to us earlier. From what Bob said, he’s the one keeping the marines in line. Maybe he’s someone we can work with.’ There was a slight hiss as he opened his beer and took a swig.
‘Maybe.’ Bob scratched the side of his head thoughtfully with the top of his beer bottle. ‘The only trouble is, they won’t answer when we call them on the radio, an’ they only come close enough for us to speak to them when they’re bringin’ new people here. The rest of the time they just watch us from a distance.’ He drained his beer and tossed the empty bottle over his head; there was a splash as it landed in the water. ‘Wouldn’t hurt to give it a go, though, would it?’
***
‘Daz. Lines!’
I’d been woken in the middle of the night by the sound of screaming. Rushing up on deck, I saw a commotion on Pete’s boat. I grabbed the spotlight and shone it into the darkness, revealing a horrific scene: Pete was grappling with one of the young men the marines had left with us that afternoon, trying his best to fight him off as the man clawed and tore at his face; blood pouring from the jagged wounds. Pete backed away, trying desperately to escape, but he tripped over a winch, landing heavily between the cockpit and the guard rail. The man fell on him, ripping through his clothes and into his belly, sending long coils of his intestines spilling across the deck and over the side. They hung there, jerking back and forth, smearing blood across the white side of Pete’s boat, as the man buried his head into his abdomen, Pete’s mouth slowly opened and shut as bloody bubbles emerged from it. Somehow, despite his wounds, he was still alive.
The deck lights of the neighbouring boat came on, flooding the area with light and the young man’s head snapped up. As the blood dripped from his face, I could see he had the unmistakeable stare of an infected. He leapt to his feet and lunged at a woman just emerging from the cabin of the next boat. Before she knew it, the infected man was on her, but he didn’t attack her for long: people were appearing on the decks of all the boats, distracting him. Back on Pete’s boat, the other young man sprang into view and leapt over onto the neighbouring boat where the woman was pulling herself back to her feet; yet he ignored her. The reason for this became clear when her young daughter appeared and was instantly set upon. The girl screamed as her mother pinned her to floor and bit into her neck, sending blood spraying across the cockpit. By this time Daz and Claire were on deck, while Sophie and Tom were coming up from below.
I shouted at Daz again. ‘Lines! Now!’
‘What d’you mean?’ Daz sounded confused.
I yelled at him. ‘Get those lines off. Now!’
‘Why?’ Daz’s eyes darted around frantically until they settled on Bob, who was wildly swinging a winch handle at the first infected as it climbed over his guard rail. ‘Shit! What d’we do?’
‘Untie the lines holding us to the other boats!’ I screamed, then changed my mind. ‘No. Forget it! We don’t have time.’ I grabbed the small hatchet I kept strapped to the helm in case I ever had to cut any ropes in a hurry, and leapt forward, slicing through each line in turn. Almost immediately, the currents started to move us away from the other boats, and it was just enough to keep us out of reach of the infected. We watched helplessly as those left alive struggled with the infected, but it was clear they weren’t going to win.
Daz shivered with fear. ‘What now?’
‘I don’t know, but we can’t stay here.’ My eyes drifted across to where the other boats were still tied together, their deck lights shining down, illuminating the scene below: the fighting had stopped and the infected were feeding on those they’d killed; the ones who hadn’t died had turned and were feasting alongside them. I could see Bob tearing the flesh from the throat of a teenage boy, leaving a gaping wound. Blood oozed slowly from it, adding to the congealing pools that were already seeping across his deck and soaking deep into the wood.
‘Yeah.’ Tom shuddered as two of the infected snarled and growled at each other as they fought over the body of a little girl. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
‘What are we going to do about the navy?’ For the first time since I’d met her, Claire sounded really scared. ‘If we move, they’ll think we’re trying to get away.’
‘We’ll just have to explain what happened and hope they understand, but we can’t stay here. At the moment, the tide’s keeping us away from the other boats, but when it turns, it’s going to push us back up against them.’ I glanced at my watch, ‘and that’s going to happen in about ten minutes.’
‘But how’re we goin’ to let them know?’ There was concern in Daz’s voice.
‘I don’t know.’ If Bob had been right, they wouldn’t respond to a radio call. I wondered how else we might be able to alert them, yet every alternative I could come up with required it to be daytime so they could see us. I glanced nervously at the other boats. The infected could sense our presence and some were already pacing along the nearest guard rail, searching the darkness, as they tried to work out where we were. ‘But we can’t stay here; we need to move away.’
‘Are you sure that’s goin’ to be okay?’ Daz shifted back and forth nervously. ‘You know, with them navy guys?’
Before I could answer, there was the sound of a distant explosion and a fireball leapt into the night’s sky somewhere to our south.
‘What the hell’s that?’ Tom had sprung to his feet and was standing on his tip toes, trying to get a closer look.
‘I don’t know, but ...’ I stopped when a thought occurred to me. The only thing I’d seen in that direction was the frigate, but surely it couldn’t be that, could it? I turned round to find everyone was looking at me, waiting for me to finish what I was saying. I wasn’t ready to tell them what I thought: there was no point until I knew whether I was right or not. ‘I think we need to go and check that out.’
‘What if they catch us?’ Sophie was white as a sheet, and clearly terrified, not only by what had just happened, but also by what might happen next.
My eyes returned to the flames leaping high into the distant sky. ‘I don’t think they will.’
The sun was creeping over the eastern horizon as we neared the source of the explosion. It revealed the frigate, flames leaping high into the air from its bow. At the other end, we could see huddled groups of figures battling each other. The fighting was intense and brutal, and I had little doubt that we were seeing the last of the sailors trying to fight off the advancing infected who had once been their colleagues.
Daz stood beside me, his eyes wide with shock. ‘What d’you think happened to it?’
Before I could reply, there was a shout.
‘Ben!’ Tom was staring not at the frigate, but at a point a short distance ahead of our boat. ‘There’s something in the water.’
; ‘Where?’ I scanned the sea, searching for what he’d seen.
Tom craned his neck, trying to get another glimpse of what he’d seen. ‘It seems to have gone.’
‘No, I see it, too!’ Daz was leaning over the right hand guard rail. ‘It looks like there’s someone in the water.’
‘I can’t see them.’ I weaved my head from side to side. ‘Where exactly?’
‘There!’ Daz was pointing frantically at the water just ahead of the boat and finally I saw him: a man, his head being kept above the water by the life jacket he was wearing. Yet, something didn’t quite seem right.
Claire cried out. ‘Quick, we’ve got to get him on board!’
Daz ran forward to where the man was just coming alongside the boat, with Tom following after. As they were reaching through the guard rails, hanging as far over the side as they could to try to grab the back of his life jacket, two things happened almost instantaneously: first, I realised the man had a deep bite mark on the side of his face; second, he began to thrash frantically just as Daz got a hand on to his shoulder.
For Those In Peril (Book 2): The Outbreak Page 13