by RR Haywood
‘You want my weapon and my horse?’
‘You’ve got a pistol on your belt. Charlie is higher so she can see further.’
‘I see…yes well that does make sense but may I ask to have it back later?’
‘Yep, you’ll get it back. Everyone ready? Move out.’
Back into it. A sense of heightened awareness but although we’re still exhausted at least the water we consumed has taken away that dire thirst. We stay close and tight with the survivors in the middle encircled by the rest of us and Charlie cantering ahead on the horse holding Neal’s M4 strapped over her shoulders.
With the fires still raging and the air full of chocking acrid fumes we go wide and have to venture over to the further reaches of the car park before we can get back onto the road that leads to the square. We see bodies flown far and wide from the explosion. Body parts. Torso’s smouldering and cooking. Legs, arms and things we cannot recognise. As we get back on that road we start to realise the flames are not just from the burning fuel station. Houses now alight and set on fire by scorching fragments and flaming corpses sent through windows and doors. The back walls of the houses closest to the fires have been blown out leaving huge gaping holes with flames licking out.
We move fast, staying in the dead centre and I notice that Jess doesn’t flinch from the pops, bangs and crackles of flames. When a dull thud sounds out inside a house from something bursting she doesn’t so much as blink but trots on with Charlie riding bareback scanning the route ahead with Meredith running at their side and that image gets imprinted in my memory.
Night time. A long street full of houses on fire. Bodies strewn everywhere and the ground littered with debris. Smoke billowing and a woman holding a rifle riding a horse down the middle of it all with Meredith right by them. A powerful image that gives representation to what we now are. I look back to see every face staring ahead and seeing the same thing and I hope those children always remember this night. Not for the horror of it, not for the fear but for what was done for them and that image right there will be cemented forever in their minds.
But all things have an end and that image, that powerful majestic mirage of human working with animals picking their way through the apocalyptic waste-land is brought back to the mortal world in which we live.
‘She’s so fucking fit,’ Cookey sighing dreamily that has the rest of us smiling as we scan and watch.
I look over to Marcy keeping pace at my side. She is a different person now. The whole of her has changed in my mind from a thing I detested but couldn’t stop thinking about to someone I half-liked and half-detested but still couldn’t stop thinking about to just being Marcy. And I still can’t stop thinking about her. Like she’s always there in my mind. She is so gorgeous and Paula was right, even in this shit hole and after the day we’ve had she still looks great. Wet hair swept back down her neck and her cheeks flushed from the heat that seems to radiate and reflect the light from the flames around us. More than that though, beneath the physical beauty there is a strength and love. She fought side by side with us. She bit into them. Took their blood and put her own life at risk again and again. She stepped up and worked with Paula to make sure we had water and worrying about the small things that can still make the difference between living and dying. Sexy as hell too and that top hugs her figure accentuating her curves perfectly.
I look ahead with a sigh and try to focus on the now but truth be told Meredith has got this. She runs from crawler to crawler with a quick now expert snap of the jaws to dispatch it and on she goes. Nose down and weaving a path. Charlie keeps her head up staring down the road and while watching them I notice the horse veer slightly to the right to step on the head of an infected moaning softly. The head bursts all soggy and broken and on the horse goes without showing any sign she did it on purpose.
‘Did you see that?’ Marcy asks.
‘Yeah,’ I say, ‘strange times.’
We reach the square without incident and view the scene of what has been the worst day so far. Thousands of corpses stretching thick and far with nucleuses showing where the individual battles took place. The way the thick line of them are lying over there shows the route the fire engine took. The broken mounds under the windows. The clusters round the door we finally came out from and the trail of them as they tracked and surged against us going for the northern exit road.
Low groans and hisses come from everywhere. So many broken mangled infected hosts that cling to life not feeling pain or discomfort but forever seeking to pass that virus and at the far end standing squat and solid is the blessed sight of the Saxon. How the hell that thing survives and keeps going is beyond me.
‘Mo, do you want to bring it up?’
‘Yep.’
‘Aim for the crawlers on the way back.’
‘Fuck yeah,’ he says sprinting down.
‘Nick, I forgot to say thanks for the petrol station. That was good work.’
‘No worries.’
‘Everyone remember we are being listened to,’ Paula calls out for the benefit of the surviving adults and children, ‘stay quiet and stay together.’
‘Such a teacher,’ Cookey mutters.
‘And later we will have a nice cup of tea courtesy of Cookey.’
‘Bollocks. Yes, Paula,’ he groans.
‘Nick, Roy. We’ll need a vehicle,’ she says.
‘I’ll get my bow first,’ Roy says threading through the bodies towards the open street door to the flats.
‘Everyone else look for our weapons,’ Paula says.
We move out pulling torches from our bags. The bags that were organised and sorted by Paula and we drink water that Marcy made sure we packed before we left the supermarket. The small things make the difference.
We sift through the rank fetid gore prising assault rifles from underneath the dead. We pull innards from the trigger guards and flick bone shards from the barrels. Slowly, one by one they get found and stacked up ready for cleaning as Mo drives a circuitous route back through the square popping skulls. Meredith ranges wide sniffing and biting while Charlie lets the horse meander her own route with those back feet treading on anything that might still be alive.
Antibacterial wipes are pulled from bags and we get to work cleaning the shit from the weapons. Working into the grooves and field stripping to get the worse of the gore away. Dry firing tests are done before fresh magazines are loaded in. Roy comes back with his bow in one hand as Clarence lifts the GPMG from next to the corpse of Captain Thompson. That too gets cleaned then fitted back on the Saxon with a fresh belt fed into it. We take magazines from the boxes in the Saxon and fill our bags while Nick, Roy and Mo head off into the darkened streets to find a vehicle.
While we do that, some of the adults head into the apartments and come back carrying bags of bedding for the children and clean clothes for them to change into. More wipes are used to scrub little hands and faces and in that place of carnage and death we gain order and structure.
It takes time. Everything always does but eventually we are back to having working rifles slung across our chests and hand weapons tucked away. Neal gets his M4, with the folding stock, back.
Reginald works with us. Sifting, cleaning and grimacing every time he touches anything sticky or gooey but he does it.
‘Boss, got a minibus, that do?’ Nick asks through the radio.
‘Perfect, can you get it started?’
‘Mo’s already got it started. He’s a fucking genius.’
‘Great. Bring it back.’
We finish off as the diesel engine of the minibus floats across the square. A battered old thing marked up with a taxi logo but it’ll do. Paula leads them all along the building line towards the road as I get back into the Saxon and feel an immense sense of relief at being surrounded by this seemingly indestructible thing. The engine starts and I pull away slowly following the others towards the waiting minibus.
We get the children loaded first then the adults squeeze in and like I
said, it ain’t perfect but it’ll get us the hell out of here.
Once loaded we drive a slow journey away from Stenbury stopping at the fire station when Reginald remembers that’s where they left Roy’s van. Nick, Roy and Mo in the front of the minibus and Charlie riding to the side. We go slow knowing that the horse must be exhausted but she doesn't show it. Everyone else crams into the Saxon and rests quietly for the mile back to the farmhouse.
Once there we pull up and tell the adults and children they can go inside to use the toilet or get cleaned up, drink water, look for food but stay close and our work continues.
The drone is brought back by Roy operating the controls with Cookey doing the camera. Nick and Mo head into the barn to look at the horsebox while Reginald sorts his desk out folding maps and stacking paperclips. Everyone does something and all under the ever watchful eyes of Paula.
Eventually Roy’s van is backed up to the barn and the horsebox fitted to the tow bar and I establish that it isn’t a horsebox at all but rather a horsetrailer. Same bloody thing if you ask me.
Netting gets filled with stuff for the horse to eat and she is guided inside seeming happy enough as the horsey stuff is packed away. Saddle and bits of rope and dangly things that look like they should be in a BDSM club. Horse people are weird.
With water in our bodies and spare fluids to use we start sweating again but that sweat adds to the stale sweat from the day and we stink. I mean we really hum. All of us. Stinky pits, filthy clothes, grimy greasy skin and hair that feels like oil has been poured through it.
The minibus is filled with sleepy children lying on adults and Nick asks for someone else to drive it so he can go on the GPMG in the Saxon and smoke. Clarence takes the minibus with Mo. Roy drives his van with Paula, Reginald and Neal and the rest pile back into the Saxon and our small convoy finally moves out to thread a route through the countryside.
Low voices chat in the back and Marcy dozes off in the front with me driving and her hand stretched over the gap resting on my leg. What a day. We go back through the villages. Flitcombe. Brookley, Hydehill and Foxwood. Through the thatched village where we stopped for a drink and it seems like days ago when we stopped here, not hours. We go back through the town we found Roy’s van and in the darkness it looks even more foreboding and in the distance there is an orange glow of a town burning to the ground. Stenbury will be pretty much erased from the surface of the planet but that’s a good thing. It needs burning to be cleansed and if I had my way I’d burn every fucking town we pass through to the ground. Fire is cleansing and doesn’t care. It destroys everything but more than that, what it leaves behind is used. Those ashes form layers of earth that in time will give life. Take away what was and replace with the future.
Aye, a weary tired and somewhat introspective group finally find the motorway that leads to the lanes that thread into the countryside that take us back to the golf hotel and although we were only here for one night it does seem like a home. A sense of coming back to familiarity and a kitchen stacked with food. Clean beds and running showers. We pull up outside and make ready for the final time of being alert and watchful.
‘Blowers, you check outside. Dave, you and Mo do the bedrooms. Everyone else search through.’
We drop down with rifles held ready. Reginald and Neal even come out of their van to stand outside and hold sentry while we head in and sweep through with torches shining ahead and low whispered commands.
‘Clear outside,’ Blowers whispers soft into his radio.
‘Bedrooms clear.’
‘Kitchen clear.’
‘Rear store rooms clear.’
‘Dining room clear.’
‘Thank fuck for that,’ I say louder as everyone files back to the front reception. ‘Charlie? Neal? What do we do with the horse overnight? Does she stay in that trailerbox thing?’
‘Horsebox, Mr Howie.’
‘Yeah whatever.’
‘Well personally I would let her graze,’ Charlie says looking politely to Neal. ‘I mean, the weather is warm and if anything happens she can run away.’
‘Won’t she walk off?’ Cookey asks.
‘She will stay close,’ Neal says.
‘So?’ I ask, ‘we let her graze then? We’ll have a watch on all night in reception so we can keep an eye on her.’
‘She will be fine, Mr Howie.’
‘Yeah sorry mate,’ I say forcing myself to stay polite, ‘is that a yes to letting her graze?’
‘Sorry, yes. Please do let her graze.’
‘Awesome, get the minibus up the side. We’ll put the Saxon and Roy’s van either side of the entrance but we’ll get the GPMG inside the reception. The survivors can take the bedrooms, all of us will stay in the dining room like last night. Everyone happy?’
‘Hungry,’ Nick calls out, ‘fucking starving actually.’
‘Can any of you cook?’ Paula calls out to the people clambering from the minibus.
‘Is there a kitchen here?’ A man asks, ‘I was a cook before…well…’
‘There is, we need everyone fed. Straight through the dining room. Blinky, show this man where the kitchen is. Lads, go and get cleaned up and changed. We’ll go after you. Charlie, do you need help with the horse?’
‘I’ll help,’ Neal says quickly jogging over to help with what used to be his horse before it was appropriated as Charlie called it. Appropriated for the war effort. I snort at the thought making myself laugh.
‘Something funny?’ Clarence asks stretching his arms out with a big groan.
‘Appropriated for the war effort,’ I say.
‘Like it,’ he booms, ‘we’ve appropriated the horse for the war effort.’
‘It was an organic transition of events that allowed the present situation to develop to its current system.’
‘Nice,’ he smiles at me big and toothy, ‘surprised you haven’t mentioned coffee yet.
‘Coffee! Fuck yes. Right, who is making the coffee?’
‘Nice one, Clarence,’ Marcy sighs.
While the kitchen gets busy we head inside and light candles that are carefully positioned so they won’t set anything on fire. The lads shower first and come back with freshly scrubbed skin and wet hair and wearing clean dry clothes that make the rest of us look like the smelly dirty shits we are.
Marcy, Paula, Blinky and Charlie go next and from the kitchen we start getting aromas of food drifting out. I have no idea what the time is, only that it’s late.
When the girls come back so Clarence, Dave, Roy, Reginald, Neal and I take our turn and I head into the separate bathrooms to strip off the filthy clothes that get dumped in a pile.
The shower is cold, sending shivers over my body and making me gasp and for a few minutes the water that runs off my body is black and filthy. I scrub and rub my skin and hair using copious amounts of shower gel and shampoo until finally I start to feel clean. After that I stand at the sink and brush my teeth twice and stare at my naked body in the mirror. Not an inch of me doesn’t have a bruise or a cut. Bite marks everywhere, some I recall and others I have no clue where they came from. The fat is gone from my frame now and what’s left is a man I hardly recognise. A hard face with dark brooding eyes and lean muscles that show under the skin and it almost hurts me to see myself this way so I look away and avoid glancing in the mirror again.
From my kit bag I pull my last clean load of clothes and get dressed. Socks that are dry. Underpants that feel fresh, clean and new. Trousers and a black wicking top and I walk back out and down the corridor to the main room and the air hangs heavy with the scents of soaps and food.
Everyone eating in the dining room. Sat at tables or on the floor. Spoons scraping in bowls. The smallest children being helped to eat and again I notice the way the kids gravitate towards Clarence who holds a little girl on his knee and feeds her with a spoon. Low voices murmuring and we’ve saved more than I realised. Not everyone of course. Never everyone. A pang of guilt hits me again which is just as quickly ch
ased away by a woman walking towards me holding out a bowl of food. She doesn't say anything but then neither do I. Something about them annoys me. It shouldn’t but I feel irritated. Not by the children but by the adults. Like somehow all of this was their fault and how they cower down and cry when bad things happen and take no effort to fix it.
Life is fucked up. I head over to a table with my lot and plonk down in the middle to start eating the food.
‘Shit this is nice,’ I say after the first mouthful, ‘can we appropriate that cook for the war effort too?’
‘We were just saying,’ Paula says from the other end of the table, ‘or rather Nick and Roy were just saying it wouldn’t be hard to make this place secure.’
‘Do what?’
‘Big fence, Boss,’ Nick says, ‘electrify it and we’ve got a secure area.’
‘Hmmm, maybe.’
‘You don’t sound convinced,’ Roy says.
‘We’ll see what tomorrow brings. We need to have a chat with Neal. Didn’t Reginald say you were a scientist?’
‘That’s correct,’ he says quickly, ‘and I really must discuss things with you…for a start I do not understand why so many of you are imm…’
‘Shush now,’ Clarence says without looking up from feeding the little girl, ‘talk about that later.’
‘Why not now?’ Neal asks, ‘we’re all here.’
‘Because I just said so,’ Clarence says softly as though talking to the child, ‘and these people here don’t know what we have…or if we can give it to them.’
‘But I have this list and…’
‘List? Give it Paula, she likes lists,’ Marcy says.
‘Nothing wrong with lists,’ Paula says holding her spoon out.
‘No I don’t think you understand. My list…’
‘Mate,’ Blowers says leaning forward to look past Paula, ‘long day yeah? Can we just eat and drink coffee?’
‘And then smoke,’ Nick says.
‘And smoke,’ Blowers adds.
‘And have a wank.’
‘And wan…oh fuck off, Cookey.’
‘Almost had you,’ Cookey says, covering his mouth as he laughs.