The train continued to brake and slow. When it got to a walking pace, we would make a leap for it – hopefully before we reached the platform and the awkward questions that might await us there.
I slid back the door of the baggage car just enough to allow us through. The train got to with a mere 50 m of the platform before I judged it safe to jump. I was already clasping David’s slimy paw. We jumped together and landed hard, half on the bluestone ballast and half on the packed clay beside it.
I was winded and in pain. I lay there for a few precious seconds, wondering if I had broken anything. David, meantime, was up and about – no sense, no feeling, I suppose.
Though I was still in pain in several parts of my body, I could not afford to linger as I saw the train come to a halt in the station.
The door of the baggage car was still open. Discovery was at hand. I crawled to my feet and again took David’s hand.
In the half-light of dawn, we would be seen but we needed to move swiftly. We were down the street and entering the gates of the Botanical gardens when we heard the first whistles being blown – presumably by the MP’s who’d been on the train. (The train was absolutely full of military personnel – just our luck.)
We broke into a sprint after we passed the gates. The gardens were deserted. I dragged David along behind me as we plunged into the chilly waters of the lake. As I did so, I remembered that zombies are reputed to be hydrophobic and/or non-swimmers.
“No time to worry about that,” I thought.
(If you are interested in such matters, he had indeed lost the ability to swim – he had been a very able swimmer in life - but was by no means hydrophobic. In any event, the lake was shallow enough to wade through as we made our way to the island in the middle.)
After disturbing a bunch of nesting ducks, we lay face down among the rushes and waited, listening all the while to police whistles in the near distance.
o0o
Indeed we waited much longer than I had hoped. We could hear squads of police and/or soldiers systematically combing the nearby parkland for some hours. My hopes of non-detection started to rise, against all reason.
Around midday, the sun was beating down on our backs and the ducks, at least, had accepted our presence on their little island. My heart-rate must have dropped sufficiently for me, inadvertently, to start dozing. I didn’t hear the ‘gentle plash’ of the oars of an approaching row-boat.
When first I became aware of its presence, and the presence of its crew, I found myself covered with a heavy net (of the camouflage type favoured by the military) and a number of rifles were trained squarely upon me.
“No false moves, Pete,” I said to myself.
I had let David down – he was similarly encumbered by a heavy net and, though he immediately started roaring his protest at the troops, there was nothing he could do to free himself. Rifles were also trained upon him. I was sure that summary execution was shortly to follow.
“Sorry, Mate,” I thought. “We did our best. It just wasn’t good enough.”
A corporal called his commanding officer over: “This one ain’t a zombie, sir,” he said, pointing in my direction. “Perhaps he’s a collaborator.”
A Captain approached. He wore a caduceus badge. He was a military doctor.
“A collaborator?!” he scoffed. “What an absurd concept.”
He looked first at me and then at David. He did the same thing three or four times.
“They’re related. Brothers, I’d say. Maybe even twins. It’s a bit hard to tell what the zombie looked like a few days ago – what with that awful grey skin and the bloody mess that they all seem to wear.”
He addressed himself to me: “You there! I could have you shot as a spy, you know. I assume that you’re not really a sergeant in Her Majesty’s army. The penalty for impersonating army personnel during time of war is summary execution, you know.”
Yes, I had heard of this, now that I thought of it – but was this really a war? In any event, it seemed that David and I would be going together. That, at least, was of some comfort.
I remained silent. I had nothing to say.
Then a strange thing happened. The Captain’s manner abruptly changed. He examined me and David more closely. David kept roaring his protest, of course, and tried vainly to escape his bonds.
Then the Captain came and sat himself beside me, took off his hat and assumed an avuncular (but definitely creepy) tone with me:
“Would you rather be shot, here and now, as a spy or would you prefer to live on – and possibly ensure the existence of your zombie relative for a while yet?”
This was an entirely unexpected turn of events. Was he merely toying with me – like a cat with a mouse or was he serious? I decided that, maybe, he was serious. He was, after all, both a senior military officer and a medical man. It was worth answering his question – I had nothing to lose.
“I would prefer life, sir” I answered simply.
“Well, then, my friend. Answer me this question: are you and the thing over there identical twins by birth?”
I nodded uncertainly and a broad smile broke across his face.
What had I done?
CHAPTER 18
WHY THE CAPTAIN WANTED A ZOMBIE
Good news: neither David nor I received an immediate bullet to the brain.
Bad news: both of us were blind-folded, bundled into the back of a military paddy wagon and found ourselves bumping along a rural highway for a very, very long time. (Or did it just seem that way?)
The paddy wagon was roughly sprung to the point where I felt every pothole, every bump and every undulation on this roadway – and there were many.
My hands and feet were bound securely and so it was difficult to remain sitting upright. I couldn’t be sure what David was doing – other than roaring and moaning at irregular intervals.
“Shut up, Dave!” I screamed – to no obvious effect.
And the back of the paddy wagon smelt distinctly of urine and vomit – both sharp and sour. My guess was that its usual occupants were soldiers who had had a big night on the town and needed some ‘assistance’ getting back to their base.
When you close your eyes, travel time becomes distorted. I know this from empirical research. What sort of research you ask? Good question: try closing your eyes on the way home from work – whether travelling by train, tram or bus – and only open them when you think you have arrived at your train stop.
Go on, try it. I guarantee you’ll always open your eyes long before you get anywhere near your accustomed stop (unless, of course, you fall asleep).
On this particular occasion, of course, I was blindfolded and had no idea of how long the trip was supposed to take. So, of course, the overall effect was that the trip seemed many hours longer than it actually was.
Does that make sense? No matter, it’s just another digression.
In any event, the paddy wagon eventually came to a juddering halt – but not before I was physically spent from the effort of remaining upright whilst bound hand and foot.
The doors swung open and the ‘red carpet’ took the form of being dragged roughly from the rear and onto the tarmac of the roadway. (Oh, goody, just what I needed: some more deep bruising to my upper body!) David was treated likewise but I don’t think he was bruised – he sort of ‘tears’ if you apply enough force to his skin but you can patch the tears, if you know how.
Apparently, the Captain who captured (and spared) us wanted to present his still-bound, still-blindfolded prizes to his commander. As best I can recall the exchange, it went like this:
Commander: What have we got here, Captain?
Captain: a zombie and his non-zombie brother, sir.
Commander: they both seem still to be moving, Captain. Have you put a bullet in the zombie’s brain yet?
Captain: No, sir.
Commander: Dammit, man, why on Earth not? Best thing for a zombie is a bullet in the brain. Can’t risk having one bite any of the officers, can we?
&
nbsp; Captain: Of course not, sir. But we could do with one or two for training purposes, Commander. After all, we have a thousand yank soldiers due to come through here in the next few days. And, none of them have ever even seen a zombie, sir. We don’t want them mistaking any of the living locals for the enemy, do we, sir?
(There was a pause, apparently while the commander absorbed this logic.)
Commander: Very well. But what about the other chap, the one who isn’t a zombie. Has he been bitten?
Captain: Not that I can see, sir. The two brothers appear to be identical twins. Maybe one is simply immune. (And there have been some cases of that already observed.) If so, that could make for very interesting research. Why would one brother succumb and not his identical twin. Maybe we could use the blood of the living brother to make a vaccine.
(“My friggin’ blood for a vaccine!?” I thought.)
Commander: That’s all very well, Captain, but we can’t hold the man against his will, can we? I mean, Geneva Convention, Human Rights and all that.
Captain: When I caught these two, the living brother was not only masquerading as a non-commissioned officer of Her Majesty’s Armed forces but was actively protecting his zombie brother from capture.
Commander: Well, yes. I suppose we could detain him for a while on those bases but they are hardly hanging offences, are they?
Captain: But commander, the zombie brother had just eaten Major Smythe. That’s certainly a ‘hanging offence’.
Commander: (incredulous) Old Smitty? Decorated Veteran of Korea, Malaya and ‘Nam?
Captain: The very man, sir.
I could then hear poorly stifled guffaws followed closely by unrestrained howls of laughter from both men – which went on for a considerable time. “Old Smitty” had obviously been very well liked!
In any event, the Captain had overcome his Commander’s initial reluctance to accommodate a zombie and his brother – and so we became medical specimens to be exhibited and experimented on.
CHAPTER 19
THE FIRST LECTURE
‘For the Yanks are coming, the Yanks are coming,…’
That old patriotic anthem from World War Two rolled about in my head as I sat in a cell beside my brother. I even started to sing it but David glared at me – he never did like to hear me singing. (Nobody does!)
So, just as I had heard, there were foreign troops on the way to reinforce the local effort. What this meant, of course, was that the ‘war’ against the zombie was by no means over. And, if you thought about it, that was no surprise. As I had calculated at the time of the battle at Melbourne University, a primary area of 400,000 square kilometers had been taken over by the zombies – and outbreaks were occurring all the time beyond that zone.
So, despite the fact that thousands of zombies had been machine-gunned and napalmed at the university, there were hundreds of thousands of them still roaming the countryside – and those, in their turn, were still actively ‘conscripting’ yet more to the cause (whatever that might be).
So, David and I were to be used to show these fresh-faced doughboys what a zombie looks like. I was to be the ‘before’ and he was to be the ‘after’ – like in one of those advertisements for body-building equipment. Was I ‘Skinny John’? Would I have sand kicked in my face?
Probably not.
I guessed we had been taken to Puckapunyal, the largest army base in Victoria at the time. (And still.) It was in Central Victoria, two or three hours by army truck from Castlemaine. So, the interminable journey in the paddy wagon fitted with that geography (once corrected for time distortion due to blindfolding.)
If my guess on our location was correct – and this would be a logical place to train foreign soldiers in Australian conditions but away from the primary zone of infection – that was good news. Once again, my cadet training would come in handy. I had bivouacked several times in the vast tracts of bush-land that surrounded the base and, I believed, still had a rough idea how to get from base to inaccessible bush (if ever the opportunity presented itself.)
Indeed, I had done several map-and-compass day navigation exercises in the area. Did I still have a mental picture of the topographic maps I had used some years before? Well, no, that would be stretching it a little. But I did remember the names of one or two of the areas I’d been put in – as well as the sort of topology to expect in those areas and how to make my way round.
David and I had been placed in the same cell. Obviously, they had realized he posed no threat to me. I’m not sure if army cells are any worse than civilian cells – I’ve never been in a civilian one (except at Port Arthur). This one, however, consisted of bare concrete and two thin mattresses for bedding. There was a bucket in the corner for ablutions and a solid steel door. I wasn’t warming to the facilities just yet.
As I lay there in that cell, mining my memory banks for potentially useful scraps of half-remembered information, a guard’s voice shouted something unintelligible and the door was opened. The guard shouted ‘Get back against the wall’ – or something similar- and a woman appeared on the scene. She was wearing a white lab coat over her neatly pressed military fatigues. She was an officer – a lieutenant, perhaps. I felt the urge to salute her – but the need for that particular charade had now passed and I resisted the urge.
This woman was an impressive sight. Tall, commanding and (apparently) severe. Her hair was cut reasonably short and pulled tightly away from her face. She was very striking – but not really pretty, as such.
I took David’s hand – just in case he had thought of snacking on her.
“You are both required for the Captain’s first lecture. You will be transferred into a portable cage – and restrained as may be required.”
Behind her stood three very large soldiers – with fuckin’ cattle prods!
“Okay, lady,” I thought. “I’ll come quietly.”
I wasn’t so sure about David.
o0o
David didn’t ‘come quietly’ – but he did come. The cattle prod is a remarkably effective tool of persuasion, even on a zombie.
Once again, we were blindfolded. Why I cannot say. Perhaps they didn’t want us getting familiar with the layout of the place. Perhaps they wanted to calm David down – though the cattle prod had done a terrific job of revving him up.
It’s amazing what 10,000 volts will do to even dead flesh.
Soon enough, David and I found ourselves on stage in a large meeting hall. A lecture had apparently already commenced and we could hear the Captain’s voice droning on and on. He obviously enjoyed the sound of his own voice but I could not be so sure of the audience.
Our blindfolds were removed and the curtain rose on us to reveal all.
David roared as if on cue and the hundreds of fresh-faced Yankee soldiers gasped as one. Pure theatre!
I looked towards the Captain, standing at the microphone. He was in seventh heaven.
I didn’t begrudge him his petty pleasure (not that one, anyway). After all, I was still alive and he still held the power of life and death over me and David.
The audience resumed breathing. The lecture continued.
Damn this man was boring!
Over and over again he repeated the same broad observations of the appearance of zombies: grey skin colour, dull eyes, unkempt appearance, enlarged lips.
Really basic stuff that any member of the audience could observe for himself within a matter of seconds. Did this man not have any insights of his own to offer?
Evidently not.
Still, this was hardly surprising. How long had he actually spent observing zombies and how many had he observed? Answers: not very long and probably only one.
So, what made him think he was qualified to give a lecture to the troops on zombies?
Well, he was a doctor and a captain – and he had a very good opinion of himself as a result.
But serious cases of over-inflated pride need urgently to be pricked, don’t they? (And I knew just the person to do
it.) I bided my time.
Eventually, the lecture came to an end – even David had long since ceased roaring and lapsed into a torpor.
“I will take any questions from the floor,” stated the captain.
A few perfunctory and obvious questions were posed and answered – more or less correctly. Then:
“Captain, can zombies talk?”
“No,” asserted the Captain. “Zombies do not possess the power of speech. They have never been known to utter a single word. In fact, …”
This was my chance for some pay-back.
“I beg to differ,” I interrupted. “I have met several talking zombies. Most of them spoke in single words – but a few could form complete sentences of a non-complex kind.”
Brother Mine, Zombie. Page 12