“There are also two portable flame-throwers in a locked container clamped to the rear of the vehicle. Not enough room for them in here, besides they’d stink the place out. Your air systems wouldn’t be able to cope. But they may come in handy when you reach London. I hear the fungus can grow pretty thick in places.” He looked at his watch. “I suggest you get moving at first light, which is less than four hours away.
“Sergeant Slocock, I’ll have one of my engineers give you a run-through on all the equipment so you can familiarize yourself with it.”
“No need, sir,” said Slocock quickly, anxious to hit the sack with his bottle. “I’ll pick it up along the way.”
Buxton gave him an expressionless look. He said quietly, “I think it would be a good idea to have the run-through, Sergeant. The automatic gun controls are especially tricky.”
The Major’s tone of voice told Slocock it would be a waste of time arguing. Besides, he didn’t have the strength. “Yessir.”
Buxton turned to Wilson. “As for you, Doctor, you might as well get some shut-eye.”
“All right, but first I want to check in on Kimberley.”
“Yeah, you do that, Doctor,” said Slocock with a barely concealed sneer. “And while you’re at it take her temperature for me too.”
“That’s enough, Sergeant,” said Buxton curtly. “Stay here. I’ll send Sergeant Boardman along. He helped customize this beast so he can tell you everything you need to know. And I’d appreciate it if you didn’t touch another drop of what’s in your kitbag. Understand?”
When the Major and Wilson had gone Slocock slumped onto the bunk and pulled the bottle out of his bag. He took a long drink and frowned as he thought about Wilson. He’d been clucking around Kimberley like a bloody mother hen ever since they’d left Bangor. And she, the bitch, seemed to be lapping it up. Well, he’d put a stop to that somehow . . .
“I hope you won’t have any trouble with him,” said Major Buxton as they left the shed.
Wilson glanced at the young, serious-faced officer. “With Slocock? Should I?”
“I’ve been talking to his commanding officer in Belfast. The Sergeant’s a good soldier in many ways but he has a record for being a trouble-maker. And there were certain incidents involving him that were under investigation . . .”
“Incidents?”
“Shootings. On three occasions he has shot and killed men, while on patrol, who he claimed were carrying firearms. A gun was found on only one of them. Apparently the other two men had no connection with the IRA. And as all three incidents happened in a relatively short space of time it suggests that the Sergeant has become, how shall we put it . . . ?”
“Trigger happy?”
“I’m afraid so. Not the sort of chap I’d personally have picked for a job like this.”
“But I understand he volunteered.”
“Yes. Which is rather worrying, don’t you think?”
Wilson found Kimberley running a checklist on her medical supplies and equipment which she’d laid out on her bunk in the empty barrack room. She was looking a little better but was still shockingly white and her army-issue t-shirt was soaked with sweat despite the coolness of the night.
“Almost time for us to have our shots,” she said. “Where’s the Sergeant?”
“Still outside, playing with his battle-wagon.” He then told her what Buxton had said about Slocock. She didn’t seem alarmed.
“Someone who shoots first and asks questions later is the sort of man this situation calls for. The Major’s living in the past. What does he think his men are doing out there at this very minute?”
She was referring to the gunfire that had been going on in the distance ever since they’d arrived. The camp was close to the barrier. The troops strung out along it were continually shooting at refugees who were trying to escape from the ever-growing infected area. Even so Wilson was a little chilled by the callousness of her words. It revealed an aspect of her that he hadn’t suspected existed.
“But the Major has a point in wondering why Slocock volunteered for this job. I mean, what man in his right mind would?”
She gave him a weary smile. “You did.”
“No. I had no choice. I was drafted. But Slocock . . .” A thought struck him. “And you. You volunteered. You know our chances of surviving until they find the means of eradicating the plague are pretty slim, so why are you throwing your life away?”
She shrugged. “I want to see the fungus stopped and destroyed. It’s as simple as that.”
Is it? he wondered.
They got underway at 5.45 a.m. They were escorted to the barrier by Major Buxton in a Saracen armored car. The barrier consisted of great rolls of barbed wire that stretched off into the distance in both directions. Behind the wire, small groups of soldiers were positioned at regular intervals, backed up by the occasional armored vehicle. There was a gap in the wire where it crossed the road. Two tanks sat in the middle of the road, plugging the gap. They began to trundle to the side as the Stalwart approached.
The Saracen also pulled up on the side of the road.
The opening between the two tanks yawned like the mouth of some monster. Abandon hope all ye who enter here, Wilson thought grimly.
“Well, cheerio chaps,” came Buxton’s unnaturally jovial voice over the radio. “This is as far as I go. But I’ll be with you in spirit all the way.”
“You have no idea what that means to me, sir,” said Slocock into the mike.
Buxton ignored the sarcasm. “Don’t forget to report in on this frequency at half-hourly intervals or in the event of emergencies. Goodbye and good luck.”
“Well, here goes nothing,” said Slocock. He took a swallow from the bottle sitting between his legs and then gunned the engine. The Stalwart lurched forward and sped through the gap.
12
“It’s a beautiful day,” said Wilson, peering up at the cloudless blue sky.
“Keep your eyes on the bloody road,” growled Slocock.
They’d been traveling for over half an hour now and even though Slocock intended doing most, if not all, of the driving he thought it would be wise if Wilson knew the basics of handling the Stalwart. He’d even instructed Wilson on how to operate the guns, despite his insistence that he could never bring himself to use them.
They were heading down the A449 towards Worcester in order to avoid the chaos that was apparently surrounding Birmingham and Coventry. North of Worcester they would try and get onto the M5, if it was clear, and proceed toward Gloucester, then across on the A40 and M40 to London, making a wide detour around Oxford as well.
Everything looked deceptively normal, apart from the lack of traffic on the road. So far their worst moments had come during the first few miles on the other side of the barricade. They had seen the first of the bodies almost immediately. They were everywhere; lying across the road; hanging half out of their bullet-riddled cars; huddled together in groups beside the road.
At first Slocock tried to avoid running over them. But it was impossible, so he stopped trying. Wilson shuddered every time he felt the tires go over something.
The bodies nearest the wire were all badly charred.
“Flamethrowers,” said Slocock. “To kill the fungus. A fucking lot of good it does.”
But so far Wilson hadn’t seen a sign of the fungus on any of the bodies they’d passed.
A half-mile past the barrier, they entered the “dead zone,” as Slocock called it. It was a total wasteland in which nothing lived. Parts of it were blackened and burned; other parts were covered in a strange white powder. At one point they saw a plane flying low across the ground to their east, leaving a trail of yellow dust behind it. Later they saw, in the distance, a jet dropping napalm.
They passed several burned-out vehicles, their occupants charred husks with rictus grins, their teeth showing white against their blackened flesh.
On these occasions Wilson was glad Kimberley wasn’t sitt
ing up front with them. The motion of the truck made her feel even sicker and she’d gone to lie on one of the bunks even before they’d reached the barrier.
Both men felt uneasy as they drove through the “dead zone.” They knew that the Air Force had been informed of their crossing, but this was no guarantee that some pilot might not decide to attack them, either for the sheer hell of it or because he hadn’t received the message about them.
Slocock pushed his foot down. But speed was dangerous on the battered road surface, and there were several sections where the road disappeared completely—obliterated by massive bomb craters. Slocock was obliged to slow down and drive off the road around them.
Finally they saw green ahead of them and knew they were almost out of the man-made wilderness.
On the other side of the zone they passed a large group of disconsolate-looking people sitting beside a number of parked cars. They’d obviously decided not to risk trying to cross the zone, or perhaps had heard from fleeing survivors what was waiting for them even if they got through.
Most of them just stared apathetically at the speeding Stalwart; a few looked puzzled at the fact it was traveling in the wrong direction, and a few raised their fists angrily at this symbol of the now-hated military. None of them, Wilson saw, displayed any external sign of fungal infection.
When the road ahead seemed clear and undamaged, Slocock suggested, or rather ordered, that Wilson take a turn behind the wheel.
Wilson drove for about 10 minutes and was almost beginning to enjoy himself, absurd as that seemed in the circumstances.
“Okay, that’s enough,” said Slocock suddenly. “Pull up and I’ll take over. We’re getting near Kidderminster.”
As Wilson crawled over Slocock, he decided to check on Kimberley. He was tempted to go through the heavy hatch that separated the driver’s cabin from the rear compartment, but undoing the seals was a difficult business so he flipped the intercom switch instead. “Hi, Kimberley! How are you doing?”
There was a long pause before she answered, rather irritably, “I was asleep.”
“Oh.” He glanced at Slocock and saw the expected sneer. “Sorry. Are you feeling any better?”
“No. Where are we?”
He told her they were approaching Kidderminster. She said she was going back to sleep and not to wake her unless something important happened. He switched off the intercom with a sigh.
They rode on in silence for a while. Then Wilson pointed at the bottle of whiskey resting upright against Slocock’s crotch like a glass phallus. “Mind if I have a drink?”
“Piss off,” said Slocock.
Wilson wondered if he was joking.
“Does that mean no?”
“Look mate, I’ve only got another four bottles left.”
“That’s plenty.”
“Not the way I drink. And who knows how long it’s going to be before I get my hands on any more. So I’m sure as hell not wasting any of it on you.”
“You don’t like me very much, do you?”
Slocock laughed. “You intellectuals are real sharp. Yeah, you’re right. I don’t like you. My job is to make sure you stay alive long enough to do your job. After that, well, we’ll see.”
Wilson realized, with a mild shock, that Slocock was making some kind of threat. And yet he was surprised to note that it didn’t particularly disturb him. There were too many other things to worry about.
“Well, as Flannery would say in a situation like this, ‘Up yours, boyo.’ ”
Slocock grunted. “Who the fuck’s Flannery?”
“An old friend of mine.”
“Sounds like a real wit. But whoever he is he’s too far away to do you any good.”
“You’re wrong there. He’s closer than you think,” said Wilson and smiled.
They made a wide detour around Kidderminster just to be safe even though the town appeared deserted. Slocock sent the Stalwart off the road, through a fence and across the fields.
Wilson winced when the vehicle crushed the fence under its tires. “Aren’t you afraid we might get a flat? I noticed we’re not carrying a spare.”
“They’re puncture-proof. The tubes are honey-combed with lots of separate cells inflated with nitrogen.”
They got back on the A449 without any difficulty and were heading south toward Worcester when they encountered a group of nine people coming along the road. Five men, two women, and two young children. Wilson expected Slocock to speed by them as he had the other group, but to his surprise the Stalwart began to slow down.
“Why are you stopping?”
“Take a closer look at them.”
As the truck came to a halt about 20 yards from the group Wilson saw what Slocock was talking about.
They were victims of the fungus.
Compared with Dr. Bruce Carter on the video they seemed scarcely affected, but it was there nonetheless. They all appeared to be subject to a particularly dark blue five o’clock shadow. The women and children too. And the same blue coloring was on their hands as well.
Wilson felt his flesh crawl.
The group had come to a halt and were staring silently at the vehicle. They projected a sense of hopeless despair.
“Can’t we do anything at all for them?” Wilson asked Slocock.
“Yeah, we could shoot the poor bastards.”
Wilson didn’t take him seriously until he reached up and pulled down one of the folding gun-control units from the ceiling of the cabin.
“No!” cried Wilson, grabbing his arm. “Don’t! Let them live!”
“Why? They’re finished anyway. If they get through the dead zone they’ll die on Buxton’s barrier. Be doing them a favor to put them out of their misery right now.”
“And I say let them be!” cried Wilson, his voice rising to a shout.
Slocock shrugged and said, “Okay, don’t get excited.” He started the truck moving again. “Your trouble, mate, is that you’re too squeamish. But you won’t be for long.”
As Slocock drove past the group Wilson got a closer look at the blue mold covering their faces and hands. He avoided looking at their eyes.
They stood motionless as the truck went by. Not much more than two weeks ago, Wilson realized, these had been normal, healthy people. But now, thanks to one mistake made in a laboratory in distant London, their world had been turned upside down and destroyed almost overnight. And he too was doomed . . .
Later, as they got nearer to Worcester, Wilson began to notice streaks of color that were alien to a British summer landscape. Bright orange, purple, blue and red . . . they were not the color of flowers; the orange was brighter than marigolds and seemed to glow unhealthily, and the purple suggested something that was rotting rather than living. Worse were the large patches of gray. On one occasion they passed an entire field of grayness. Whatever the crop was—either wheat or barley—it was covered with a thick coating of gray fuzz.
“Well, we’re in the land of the magic mushroom for sure now,” said Slocock and took another drink from his bottle.
The sight made Wilson aware that the fungus attacked other living things apart from people. Crops and livestock right across England were being destroyed, which meant there would be a tremendous food shortage in the months ahead. Those who survived the fungus would most probably die of starvation.
Ahead of them, where Worcester lay, they saw columns of smoke rising into the sky. “Looks as if someone’s torched the place,” said Slocock. Then, a short distance further along, he brought the truck to a halt and snatched up a pair of powerful binoculars.
“What is it?” asked Wilson. He could see some moving dots in the distance but couldn’t make them out.
“Army convoy. Four trucks. Two tanks in the lead. New ‘Challenger’ tanks. Must be planning to try and break through the barrier. And they have a good chance of succeeding with those babies. They carry Chobham armor.”
“Are you going to make contact with them? They might be able to
give us information about conditions between here and London.”
“They’re just as likely to blow us to small pieces. I’m going to give them as wide a berth as possible.” Again he drove the Stalwart off the road and into a field. “This is going to slow us up but I don’t want to take chances at this stage of the game.”
As the vehicle bounced over the rough ground the intercom buzzed. Wilson pressed the switch and heard Kimberley ask worriedly what was happening.
“Nothing. Just a little detour. Go back to bed,” he answered.
“I just fell out of bed. It’s like being in a barrel going over Niagara Falls back here. I’m coming through.”
“Shit,” muttered Slocock.
Wilson helped her open the small, circular hatch and then assisted her through it. She came feet first and he supported her legs until she was all the way through. She landed on the seat between them with a thump. “Thanks,” she said. She smelled of sweat but it was a smell Wilson didn’t mind. And he saw she was looking much better. Still pale, but more like her old self.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea for all three of us to be up front at once,” growled Slocock. “If the cabin gets holed or we break a window, we all get exposed.”
“And if that happened what good would it do having me sealed off in that tin can?” said Kimberley. “I’d be helpless.”
“But still pure and untouched, Doctor,” said Slocock, giving her a suggestive grin. “And there’d be a lot you could do. Like climb into one of the suits and bring the other two to us. They wouldn’t do us any good, of course, but at least we could keep our contamination away from you.”
Wilson tapped the thick glass of the narrow windshield with his knuckle and said worriedly, “I thought you said this was special armored glass, bullet-proof and all that.”
“It is. Doesn’t mean it’ll stop everything though.”
Kimberley was peering round at the passing scenery. “Where the hell are we?”
“According to the map this is Fernhill Heath. I’m cutting across it toward the M5,” said Slocock.
“We saw an army convoy coming toward us,” explained Wilson. “And the sergeant thought it would be a good idea to avoid them.”
The Fungus Page 12