by Rich Hawkins
Joel smiled, showing dirty teeth. “Today.”
*
Word of their impending rescue spread around the camp. The ships were stationed just off the coast, waiting to take the survivors to safety. Requisitioned buses were coming to transport them to Sidmouth, which had finally been cleared of most of its infected population.
For the first time in a while people spoke with a renewed sense of hope and purpose. Couples even rutted in their tents in celebration.
An old man and his elderly wife wept and embraced. Some started to sing songs in celebration. People began to talk about salvation.
Ralph thought they were fools.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR
The refugees massed at the front of the camp, kept behind the gates while the soldiers manned the perimeter. Varied odours of neglect and dirty bodies filled the air. The ground was sticky, clinging onto those standing upon it. Some people were caked in mud. Children sniffled and watched the adults with expectant eyes. They were so close to being rescued from this diseased isle. No one wanted to be left behind. Apprehension and anxiety flitted through the crowd like the creeping arms of a silent mist.
Some people stood in silence. A few outspoken men, determined and a little too proud, advocated walking the few miles to Sidmouth, but they were overruled by the soldiers.
People complained and fretted, small arguments breaking out, but everyone fell silent when a coach crested the hill and started down the road towards the camp.
Moments later the people were cheering.
*
Frank was jostled by the musty bodies around him. He kept hold of Florence.
Each of the five coaches could hold approximately fifty to sixty people. Not enough to carry all of the refugees. The rest of the crowd realised this just as he did, and began to surge. Bodies pressed Frank on all sides. Joel was hugging Anya, keeping her close to him. Florence whimpered and then she was drowned out by the collective roar of the refugees. A man demanded to know what was happening. A woman asked if more coaches were coming. The pulse of the crowd quickened, people slipping in the mud. Some were knocked down, battered by errant legs and feet. Someone screamed.
A gunshot halted the crowd and silenced the human mass.
A sergeant raised his hands. “Please stay calm! There is no need to panic.”
“Where’re the rest of the coaches?” asked a fat man near the front.
The sergeant hesitated then looked to the officer in charge of the camp, Captain Shaw, who was watching the coaches as they descended the hill. Shaw turned to the crowd. He was a tall and morose man, black haired and dark-skinned.
“Everyone will be evacuated, I promise you. I have been told by my superiors that there are more transports arriving soon. There’s no need to worry. Salvation is here.”
He wasn’t lying. Frank could tell. But Shaw’s superiors might have lied to him, for all he knew.
The coaches, driven by haggard soldiers with pale faces, halted outside the front gates. The sides of the coaches were streaked and smeared with blood, grime and mud. Their doors hissed as they opened.
Frank held Florence’s hand and offered her a crooked smile.
*
The first coach had been filled, packed tight, the refugees weighing down the suspension as it left the camp.
Frank and the others were near the front of the crowd. He was confident they’d be on the next coach when it was ready to receive them. He breathed in, breathed out, tried to keep his heart steady. Florence was jittery beside him.
“Are we going to France or an island?” she asked, large eyes peering up at him.
“We’ll find out when we get on the ships.”
“Okay.”
Frank looked at Ralph and nodded. Ralph returned the gesture. Joel and Anya were struggling to stay on their feet as the crowd swayed and flowed.
“Keep together,” Frank said. “No matter what.” He wished Catherine was here to hold his hand. His insides were cold, and he missed her enough to offer his own heart for her return, but he pushed away his grief to deal with it later.
The second coach slowly filled with refugees. The soldiers checked the lines of people to keep them in order. Belongings were left behind. All they could take was what they were wearing.
Frank and the others missed the cut off point for the second coach.
“At least we’ll get a decent seat on the next one,” Ralph said sourly.
“Hopefully,” said Frank.
“What’s that sound?” asked Florence.
Frank lowered his head to look at her. “What sound?”
But then he heard it, and so did everybody else. It was the sound of several thousand footfalls trembling in the ground, and seconds later the northern horizon was filled with an enormous swarm of infected. Abominations, travesties and twitching wretches. Enough of them to wipe the refugees from the earth.
The soldiers opened fire upon the swarm, dropping dozens of infected; but they still came forward, surging down the hill. The refugees at the front of the crowd panicked and bolted for the coaches. People were trampled and crushed as the vehicles were swamped by the rush of desperate, terrified survivors.
The infected tore through the line of soldiers, overwhelming them, and moments later were upon the refugees.
The slaughter began.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE
No one spoke on the coach.
Frank stared out the window. The blood on his face was not his own and still wet. Florence perched on his lap. Ralph sat next to them, his head bowed. Joel and Anya were seated across the aisle, huddled together. A few people were crying. Several soldiers slumped in their seats, some of them without their rifles, which they had dropped during their dash to the coach. A woman at the front wailed and sobbed, mourning her husband.
There were many empty seats.
Only two of the remaining four coaches had escaped. The other two had been left behind, overrun by the infected. Hundreds of refugees abandoned to die or be assimilated into the swarm.
Frank was still shaking. He had managed to board one of the coaches, carrying Florence in his arms, with Ralph and Joel and Anya right behind him. They were among the last on the coach before it pulled away from the camp with shrieking infected hanging from it trying to get at the people inside. More infected had been crushed by the coach’s large wheels, snapping and cracking like wet twigs.
Frank had looked back at the camp as they drove away. The image of what he’d seen was branded into his mind. Blood had covered the ground, such was the carnage dealt by the infected.
Now, they were approaching Sidmouth. Deserted houses appeared alongside the road. Piles of bodies stacked in a field. He put his hand in his jacket pocket and felt for Catherine’s wedding band, relieved it was still there. He looked at his own ring, loose on his finger because of the weight he had lost.
The coach entered Sidmouth.
*
Through the town and towards the beach, past gutted buildings and wreathes of smoke. Frank saw a little girl’s bicycle lying by the pavement, its front wheel buckled. Cars had been pushed to the sides of the road to allow the coaches through. Gulls swooped over the roofs.
The army had cleaned out this town.
The two coaches reached the shorefront. Coaches and buses from other camps and rescue centres had already arrived. Beyond the seawall, the beach was covered with refugees, crammed together and waiting to be rescued. It reminded Frank of holidays in Spain where the beaches were packed with sunbathers and tourists. There were thousands of people here, stretched along the beach for a mile. A desperate, exhausted mass of humanity. The thrum and drone of chatter and complaints. Some people were injured, with many on crutches or being carried on stretchers. Medics tended to those needing help. The remaining soldiers patrolled the beach.
And beyond the beach was the sea, tempestuous and uncaring. Waves fell against the shore. Some people even stood in the shallows, the water up to their knees at low tid
e, so desperate were they to escape to the four Royal Navy ships anchored as close to the shore as they could come without beaching themselves. Landing craft ferried people straight from the beach to the ships, but the turn-around was slow and torturous. It would take hours – maybe a full day – to evacuate the refugees.
Frank and the others were herded from the coach to the edge of the beach.
“I’d like to be out of here before nightfall,” said Joel. “Anyone fancy swimming to the ships?”
“You’d drown in that water,” Frank said. “And there’s no guarantee the ships would let you on if you made it out there. They could even shoot you.”
“Can the infected swim?”
“I hope not.”
“We’ll be okay,” Anya said.
Ralph looked out to sea. “Now we just have to wait. Fucking great.”
*
They had been waiting for over three hours without food, water, or shelter from the elements. The landing craft went back and forth delivering people to the safety of the waiting ships, but the beach was still packed with bodies. Soldiers deterred desperate refugees from diving into the water.
The smell of dead fish, brine and seaweed filled the air, carried upon the wind, sweeping at the huddled masses. The waves pawed at the shore, frothing and churning. A few small fires had been started, scattered along the beach like small beacons. People gathered around them, warming their hands and faces. But most of the refugees were left in the cold.
Frank and the others sat in a small circle. Granules of sand danced in the cold sea breeze, invading their eyes and mouths, sticking to clothes and skin.
“You think we’ll ever come back?” asked Anya.
“Not sure I want to,” said Joel. “The country is dead.”
Ralph scooped a handful of sand and stones and let it fall between his fingers. “If the whole world’s been hit by the plague, then it doesn’t matter where we go.”
Joel shook his head. “There must be somewhere safe…”
“There is, somewhere,” said Frank, mindful of Florence next to him. “The Navy will find somewhere safe.”
Ralph looked at the others and there was something dead behind his eyes. It unsettled Frank. “This is the end of the world, isn’t it? What will happen to us once we get to safety? Will we be running and hiding every day for the rest of our lives?”
No one answered. Ralph was right. But what else could they do? Give up? Frank couldn’t do that while Florence was still alive.
“These are the last days,” Ralph continued. “And this is the last plague. I’m glad I’m not religious, because I’d be shitting myself right now.”
“What do you mean?” Joel asked him.
“Think about it. If you’re a believer in God, how does that fit in to all of this? How could God let this happen?”
“I don’t think it’s that simple.”
“Surely it is that simple? All of these people around us, these refugees who were just ordinary people not even a fortnight ago. They had lives and jobs. Families. Birthday parties. Roast dinners on Sundays. Bank accounts and mortgages. Loans and bills. That Monday morning feeling at work. Remember the mundaneness of the old world, and remember it well, because it’s gone forever, my friends. All gone. And God hasn’t lifted a finger to help us.”
Joel opened his mouth to reply when Anya touched him on the arm, and he turned to her and accepted her head on his shoulder.
Ralph started picking his teeth.
Frank noticed the soldiers glancing nervously at the road leading into the town.
“I’m hungry,” said Florence.
“So am I,” Frank told her. “We’ll have something to eat when we get on the ship.”
She clutched her belly. “Okay.”
He smiled at her, the corners of his mouth aching.
A terrible shriek rose from within the town and rippled through the crowded beach.
Ralph took his finger out of his mouth.
“Oh shit,” said Joel.
The infected streamed out of the streets. The swarm from the camp had arrived. Victims of the plague and those recently welcomed to the swarm.
The soldiers opened fire.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX
The crowd turned towards the sea. Frank grabbed hold of Florence. Bodies rushed around them. Joel and Anya gripped each other, desperate not to be separated. Ralph was moving with the tide of people, towards the water. Ashes and cinders flitted through the air as fires were trampled and extinguished.
Many people were already in the water, attempting to swim to the ships.
Frank glanced back. The infected were being shredded by suppressing fire. Grenades detonated with sharp concussions, throwing bodies into the air and slicing the swarm with hot shrapnel. Bodies fell and lay twitching; others were ripped apart by automatic fire. Death-screams and gurgles rose from torn throats.
The infected still rushed forward, pouring through the streets, and there were not enough soldiers to hold them back.
The refugees stampeded towards the shore, but the landing craft hadn’t returned yet. Frank was terrified they wouldn’t return at all. People were screaming, shouting, wailing, crying. The soldiers who’d been loading the landing craft failed to hold the civilians back from the water. Parents carried their children to the edge of the shore. Men and women fell down in the shallows. Some were crushed in the stampede while others drowned in less than a foot of water. There was red in the surf. One of the soldiers fired his rifle into the air, but to no effect as the refugees engulfed him. Several people who’d been knocked down on the beach were now crawling towards the sea. Some were lying prone, dead or unconscious.
Frank stumbled, knocked from all sides by flailing arms and elbows. A hand struck him in the face and he reeled away, stunned, but managed to keep hold of Florence. They were in the middle of the crowd. Frank couldn’t see the water past the scrum of bodies. A woman was screaming next to his face, deafening him temporarily.
Behind him the infected were coming forward under withering fire. Machine guns opened up, ripping into their ranks.
“The boats are coming back!” someone in front of him shouted. The crowd broiled in utter confusion and chaos. The light dimmed. Frank couldn’t move; he and Florence were hemmed in tight. She was crying. He kissed the top of her head said that everything would be okay.
More gunfire from the water’s edge. Were the soldiers firing upon the refugees? Frank glanced at Joel, Anya and Ralph. He dug his feet into the sand and pushed forwards, struggling through the bodies, determined to get to the water. His vision swayed when an elbow clocked him in his right eye.
He stumbled forwards into the shallows, the cold water up to his ankles. His breath caught in his chest. He could hear the landing craft approaching and people begging for help. The soldiers were shouting.
The gunfire behind him lessened. And then there was screaming at the back of the crowd. The infected were amongst them, ripping and tearing. People collided with one another, fell down, were crushed. Bones snapped. Bodies left helpless on the sand.
Bullets shot through the air. A man’s head became red mist and splinters of bone. Another man was caught in the shoulder, and he collapsed and was trampled.
Frank kept hold of Florence. He clung to her so tight that she whimpered. He looked back as people were dragged down and swarmed by the rampaging infected. Their screams didn’t last long.
He saw a woman, her arms like scythes, bony spines erupting from her back as she removed a man’s throat with her teeth. And there were others, their gaping mouths delivering the most awful of sounds. Hungry mouths. Wet grimaces that could have been smiles. Sharp-toothed things with shivery breath, their eyes loose and grey within their sockets. Engorged growths consuming faces, and limbs melding together. Naked, lurid bodies.
There was an infected man with eyes and mouths on his naked back, searching for something they could batten upon and suckle and drain.
There was a bl
oated wheezing figure, neither man nor woman, but something in-between. Its sightless eyes were vestigial, mere distractions from the rest of its slippery, greased form.
People were falling.
Frank was pushed one way then the other. He tripped and fell, managed to land on his back. Things blurred around him. Florence was screaming. The infected were eating dead bodies. More infected were coming, chattering and shrilling. He couldn’t see Joel or Anya or Ralph.
Florence helped him up. He stood, picked her up again.
An infected man barrelled towards them, mouth lined with teeth growing over his lips. Frank dodged him at the last moment, and the man jumped upon a screaming woman and ripped away most of her face.
Breathing hard, Frank looked around. There were injured on the ground, their hands clutched to bleeding wounds and bite marks. A man juddered in the throes of a seizure, his skin paling and his flesh shifting on his bones. He flipped onto all fours, snapping his mouth at the air, and leapt away into the crowd.
Frank dipped his head, held Florence tightly, and shoulder-barged through the crowd. He glimpsed wet mouths and squirming tongues flicking outwards. Horridly malformed faces shrieking and covered in blood. There was a severed arm on the ground, wearing a wristwatch. People were dragged back up the beach, clawing at the sand. A red haired man was ravaged by two infected. They pulled at him and he came apart easily like tender meat. An old woman, bleeding from her stomach, crawled on her hands and knees, reaching out to Frank, until a girl with fleshy tendrils emerging from her torso pulled the old woman towards her. Frank watched as the girl’s tendrils developed clawed tips and pulled apart the old woman’s mouth until her face tore like ripping fabric. Then some kind of dangling stinger emerged from the girl’s torso and slid between the old woman’s legs. The stinger began to thrust, moving slickly and deep. The girl’s body sagged and she let out a soft moan, both tortured and pleasurable. The old woman bucked and writhed, her hands flailing vainly at her assailant until the life drained out of her.