Doomware

by Nathan Kuzack

  A few minutes later Tarot stepped onto the balcony and slid the door closed behind him. He was carrying a large folded map.

  “He’s gone off,” Tarot said. “Can I show you something?”

  David blinked rapidly to wake himself up. “Sure.”

  Tarot unfolded the map and placed it on the table. The section of map on show was of England’s south-western peninsular.

  “I’ve been thinking about this for a while,” Tarot said, pointing to an island off the Devon coast. “Lundy Island. It’s perfect.”

  David stared at the speck of land. He thought he’d heard of it before, but he couldn’t be sure. “You mean for living on?” he asked.

  Tarot nodded. “It’s three and a half miles long and half a mile wide; not too big, not too small. There are plenty of houses there, so there’s water and power. Shawn says it had a permanent population of about fifty. It wasn’t high season when the virus hit so I’d guess you could add on the same again in tourists – at the most. If we had enough ammunition to take out that many people we’d have ourselves a bona fide zombie-free existence.”

  The Promised Land, David thought. Was it really possible? He could see the logic of it, but it seemed too easy. A nervous excitement started filling his stomach nevertheless.

  “We’d have to make regular trips to the mainland for food and supplies,” Tarot went on, “but as long as we had a boat that was reliable enough we could do it. What do you think?”

  David touched the tips of his fingers together and pressed them against his lips, thinking hard. Gradually, the nervous excitement in his belly became more nerves than excitement. It wouldn’t be that easy in reality, would it? They had to find a seaworthy vessel and sail it to the island. He assumed the island was visible from the coast so navigation wouldn’t be too much of a problem, but he hoped Tarot had a good level of sailing experience since his own was non-existent. Then there was the not inconsiderable task of ridding the island of zombies, which of course was easier said than done. The good thing about it was that it would be a one-shot deal. Whenever they eliminated a zombie here on the mainland there was always another one to replace it, but on a small island it would be a different matter. There would only be a limited number to terminate and then no more, but what if there were more there than they’d anticipated? Plus their reliance on one vessel bothered him. If something happened to it they could end up marooned on the island with a dwindling supply of food. There was no way of knowing if any boats were already moored in situ, no way of telling if they would have another way of returning to the mainland if something happened to their original vessel.

  Even so, the more he thought about it the more the risks would be offset by the reward of living zombie-free lives. No matter how easy it was to kid yourself the calamity had never happened at times, they were still prisoners here. They had to be on their guard constantly. Weapons were an absolute necessity. The boy couldn’t roam free. The scores of dead bodies posed a risk of disease, to himself and Tarot at any rate. The prospect of it daunted him, but they had to give the island a shot.

  Tarot was watching him patiently.

  “I think we ought to start looking for a boat,” he said.

  CHAPTER 41

  D + 519

  “A ship! I can see a ship!”

  David didn’t look up from the tinned carrots he was slicing. “Yeah? Where?”

  “On the horizon,” the boy said.

  “What kind of ship?”

  “A big one.”

  “It must be adrift.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t think it’s moving.”

  David put the knife down, quickly washed his hands and went over to the balcony where the boy was. The weather was good, but visibility wasn’t. A kind of heat haze was hovering over the horizon, which he scanned closely.

  “I can’t see anything,” David said.

  “It’s a long way away,” Shawn said, his blue eyes fixed on one spot.

  “How far?”

  “About eleven point five miles.”

  “I need my glasses.”

  David looked around the apartment for his spectacles. He had a feeling he’d left them in the Land Rover, which Tarot had taken on a scouting trip to the nearest harbour town, looking for a boat they could use. He stared at the horizon again. His vision was myopic in comparison to the boy’s computer-enhanced eyesight; he didn’t doubt there was something out there.

  “Can you see what type it is?” he asked the boy.

  “The outline doesn’t match anything. It says the closest thing is an old freighter. It doesn’t have any sails.”

  “Are there any markings on it?”

  “I think so, but I can’t read them. It’s too far.”

  David stood with his hands on his hips, not knowing what to make of it. Since arriving they’d seen nothing but debris out on open water, and none of it had come close to resembling a ship.

  “Has it moved yet?” he asked the boy.

  “Nope.”

  “Better keep an eye on it, little man,” David said, returning to the kitchen. “Maybe Tarot will see it too.”

  * * *

  The ship stayed in the same position for a couple of hours before vanishing as suddenly as it had appeared. This was according to the boy; David hadn’t laid eyes on the phantom vessel once.

  Tarot returned half an hour later. He’d found supplies of food and fuel, but no usable boat. He hadn’t seen the ship on the horizon.

  They thought the mysterious ship’s movements were odd, and they could only speculate that drifting ships did strange things.

  CHAPTER 42

  D + 520

  At low tide the following day they trekked up to the Lookout. The boy said he wanted to have a picnic there, but David suspected the real reason was so he could search the ocean from a higher vantage point, looking for the ship. They climbed onto the Lookout’s roof and spread blankets out before unpacking a picnic from a holdall. It was another sunny day, interrupted every now and then by scudding clouds, whose shadows were visible for miles as they crept across land and water. It was humid, but occasionally a cooling breeze swept over the hillside. David sprayed sunblock on himself and Tarot; the boy didn’t need it: his skin produced a natural sunscreen when exposed to dangerous levels of ultraviolet radiation, not to mention the fact that his brainware monitored and controlled the effects of such radiation on a cellular level. They ate sandwiches and crisps and chocolate bars, washed down with apple juice. Insects buzzed around them. David noticed the boy scanning the horizon. The curvature of the earth was clearly visible, and there was a similar kind of haze as the day before.

  “Do you think we could build a fire up here?” the boy said.

  “What for?” David asked.

  “Like in the Lord of the Flies – as a signal.”

  “Well, I suppose we could.”

  “It might have been a rescue ship.”

  “It might have been pirates,” Tarot said with mock fearfulness in his voice.

  “Don’t be silly,” the boy laughed. “There aren’t any pirates any more.”

  “That’s as may be,” David said, “but a signal fire could still attract unwanted attention, couldn’t it?”

  “I guess,” the boy conceded, sounding unconcerned either way.

  Moments later Tarot got to his feet in a way that told David something was amiss. He looked up at him, shielding his eyes from the sun. Tarot was looking fixedly in the direction of the town, his eyes hidden behind his sunglasses.

  “What is it?” David asked him.

  “I saw movement.”

  “Zombies?”

  “No, a vehicle.”

  David fumbled in the holdall for his glasses. Before he could put them on Tarot fell to his stomach, saying in a harsh whisper, “Get down! Get down!”

  “What is it?” David asked with greater urgency as he put an arm around the boy, encouraging him to lie f
lat.

  “Offliners.”

  The way Tarot said it – without inflection – sent a shiver up David’s spine. Lying flat, he slipped his glasses on and zoomed in on the town. Identifying the vehicle Tarot was talking about wasn’t difficult: a huge black behemoth of a truck, which hadn’t been there before, was inching its way through the streets. He thought it strange they couldn’t hear it, but he assumed they were too far away. He couldn’t see anyone except the truck’s driver, who was just two sets of knuckles clutching a steering wheel. Now he understood why Tarot had told them to get down: from the truck’s location the Lookout stood out on the skyline; their silhouettes atop it would have been clearly visible.

  “Are you sure?” he asked Tarot.

  “Pretty sure.”

  Then he saw someone moving on foot alongside the truck. It was a bearded man wearing dark clothes and sunglasses and toting a sub-machine gun. The man certainly looked the way he imagined offliners to look. Offliners, those lawless people who were acybernetic by choice, whose criminal activities had been diabolical enough to warrant deactivation of their own brainware. They were murderers. Rapists. Thieves. Terrorists. There was no telling what they were capable of. Neither was there any way of telling for sure that they were offliners, but Tarot’s opinion, based upon centuries of experience, was good enough for David. Apart from anything else, it was better to err on the side of caution.

  As David watched he caught glimpses of more people on foot. He tried counting them, but they kept disappearing behind buildings or vehicles or fences. They were all male, all armed. The truck crawled to a halt. He wondered if the truck’s engine was switched off. The thought that they’d rolled into the area silently sent another shiver up his spine. Then he realised that they’d probably just coasted down the hill into town to conserve fuel. Alarmingly, the truck had come to a stop only a short distance from Shanti Court. If they realised the Land Rover was drivable they were bound to take it, along with anything else they wanted. Their cache of weapons. Their personal possessions. Their food. And if they found all that they would know there were survivors in the vicinity. There was a good chance they would hunt them down like animals.

  “What have they stopped for?” Tarot said through clenched teeth. He was clearly thinking along the same lines as David.

  “And we thought there were no pirates any more,” David said under his breath.

  There was a crackle of gunfire, making David’s stomach tense up. He couldn’t see who had opened fire, nor what they were shooting at. He looked at the boy, who evidently comprehended the seriousness of the situation and was keeping quiet. There was fear in his eyes. David rubbed his back, noting his rapid heartbeat, and said soothingly, “It’ll be all right. Don’t be scared.”

  “They wouldn’t hurt Tom, would they?” the boy asked.

  “I don’t think so,” David said. “They’re not interested in cats. They probably won’t even see him.”

  The minutes dragged by. It was difficult to ascertain what was going on, other than the fact that the truck wasn’t moving. David rested his chin on the back of his hand. He felt quite certain the gang of offliners was in Shanti Court. They were probably ransacking the apartment right now. The filthy bastards. The feeling of violation a burglary gave you washed over him, even though he didn’t know for sure that it was happening. He supposed they ought to be grateful they hadn’t been in the apartment; if they had, they probably would have been in an all-out firefight by now. They only had the boy to thank for being up here, he thought.

  “They’re moving,” Tarot said.

  David looked. Tarot was right: the truck was crawling along again. He saw a couple of men jump into the back before it disappeared from view, hidden by an apartment complex. Then an engine roared into life like a mechanical monster and the truck reappeared amid a pall of exhaust fumes. At the end of the road it turned uphill, gears grinding. Before long it was concealed behind the bulk of the hillside they were on, but it was still audible as it laboured its way up and out of the town.

  David allowed himself to relax a little. They were leaving.

  “Do you think they found the apartment?” David said.

  Tarot wouldn’t take his eyes off the town. “I don’t know.”

  “Do you think they saw us?”

  The same response: “I don’t know.”

  The sound of the truck faded away until it was swallowed up completely by birdsong and the drone of the sea.

  After a moment, David said, “What do you think?”

  “It could be a trap,” Tarot said. “I’ll go down on my own and recon the area.”

  “Oh no, no way,” David said. “We stick together.”

  “They might have set an ambush.”

  David was adamant. “Then we’d have a better chance facing it together. We’re not splitting up now.”

  “Okay, but when we get back I think we ought to keep watch, stay off the balconies and observe light discipline – at least for tonight.”

  “Agreed,” David said.

  * * *

  They made their way back to the apartment with Tarot out in the lead like a special forces point man, determining the most tactically sound route and approaching every corner as if an enemy horde might be stationed just beyond it. David held the boy’s hand and kept up quiet conversation with him as they walked, as much to calm his own nerves as the child’s. The heat was oppressive once they were off the hill, and he was uncomfortably aware of sweat running down his body.

  When they reached Shanti Court there was no sign the offliners had been there. The main entrance was as they had left it: locked up tight. The Land Rover was still in the car park, untouched. It appeared they hadn’t been discovered after all. Even so, David didn’t breathe a sigh of relief until they were inside Apartment 28 and they could see that everything was untouched.

  Shawn scooped up and hugged the cat, who mewed loudly, unimpressed by the disturbance to its usual afternoon nap. “You’re a good guard cat, Tom,” he told the feline squirming irritably in his arms. “You scared them all away.”

  * * *

  That evening the humidity was broken by a summer storm. Dark clouds rolled in from the ocean, whose white-tipped waves grew steadily taller, and there were flashes of forked lightning on the horizon accompanied by the attendant thunder. This only served to heighten David’s nervousness. The appearance of both the unidentified ship and the gang of offliners in so short a space of time had unnerved him, and the storm felt like an omen that something dreadful was about to happen.

  By the time darkness started to close in the boy was already in bed. They made sure all the curtains and blinds were firmly closed and kept the overhead lights off, allowing only lamps on dim settings to glow here and there. Tarot hovered around the apartment, regularly alternating which window he chose to peer from with his glasses, as he’d been doing ever since they had gotten back from the Lookout. The height of the apartment made it ideal – second only to the Lookout itself – for keeping watch, negating the need to go outside. Earlier, Tarot had checked the local area and had found nothing except a couple of freshly slain zombies and a few windows that looked as if they had been smashed recently.

  Before long it started raining. David was sipping on a glass of red wine as he parted the living room curtains a couple of inches at eye level and peered out. On the horizon nature was putting on a truly spectacular lightning show. David watched, enthralled and disquieted. He didn’t look at Tarot when he entered the room, but asked him if he thought there was any connection between the ship and the offliners.

  “It’s possible, but I can’t see it myself,” Tarot replied. “Offliners aren’t known for being seafaring, are they? Um, David, what’s this?”

  Reluctantly, David tore his eyes from the storm. Tarot was holding in his hand an object he recognised as being Shawn’s sketch pad. With a quizzical look on his face, David took the pad. On the page showing were ordinary examples of the boy’s scribbles, bu
t amongst them, encircled by a wavy line, was a number he recognised straight away: 937, the number the boy had seen the first day of the virus.

  “Look at the next page,” Tarot said.

  David stroked a finger across the pad’s screen and the next page appeared. The doodles were gone, replaced by a much bigger 937 surrounded by smaller versions of the same. He flicked to the next page. Here the number was repeated in a chain that almost filled the entire page.

  David smiled at the pad like a proud parent. “I’ve never seen him do this before.”

  “Why’s he doing it at all?”

  “It’s the number he saw.”

  “Where?”

  “On the Cybernet, on TV … everywhere, he said.”

  “When?”

  It was only now that David registered the intensity in Tarot, the tension evident in his voice and his body language. Curious, he studied him as he said with a shrug, “The day of the virus.”

  Tarot’s jaw dropped. His eyes glazed over and the colour drained from his face. For a second, David thought he might be about to collapse.

  “Oh my God!” Tarot murmured under his breath.

  “What is it?” David asked, his curiosity giving way to concern. “What’s wrong?”

  “Why the hell didn’t you tell me this before?”

  David caught the mixture of incredulity and anger in Tarot’s voice. “It’s just a number! Telling you never even occurred to me.”