“Mum, Dad – are you alright?”
Pulling back the curtains, I saw Ruth standing there. I went to the front door and let her in.
“We’re OK, but Linda was in a panic,” I said, looking into the air. “Would you like a cup of tea?”
Ruth greeted Brian and John and followed me into the kitchen.
“Yes, that would be nice,” Ruth eventually replied. While I was making the tea, she asked Linda the reason for our early wakeup call.
“We couldn’t find any toilet paper anywhere,” Linda said.
“God, that must have been a bit of a disaster,” replied Ruth.
I tried to work out whether Ruth was being sarcastic or really meant it. I put her tea in front of her and went back into the living room, rather confused.
We discussed our planned trip to ASDA and possibly B&Q. The question was: who was going to come? Eventually we joined the ladies in the kitchen.
“So, do any of you ladies want to come on our ASDA trip?” I asked.
Mary was the first to speak.
“Yes, Josephine and I will come this time. We’re getting a bit fed up waiting for you to come back, and at least we will get all the stuff we need.”
“I’ll be coming too,” Linda replied. “Elizabeth and Jack can look after the little ones for a couple of hours.”
“I’m coming,” Ruth replied. “Tom can look after our two little ones as well, and he’s hopeless at shopping, anyway.”
“Well, that’s settled, then. We’d better check on Miles and the others, Dad,” said John.
“This could be interesting,” Brian remarked.
“OK, guys and girls, we’d better get going – it’s now eight-forty-five,” I said.
“Josephine and I will start to get ready, if you and John check to see what Miles is going to do,” suggested Mary.
Ruth, Linda and Brian left the house, and John and I walked across the road to Miles’s house. Maria must have noticed the activity in the close as she was standing by her front door before we had made it halfway across the road.
“Hi Maria,” I called out. “Just wanted to know who is coming on our trip to ASDA, and we thought it might be a good idea to pick up some gear from B&Q on our way back. One other thing – can we get Lucy anything?”
“Ah, yes. I’ll pay Lucy a visit and make out a shopping list for her. That means I’ll be coming with Miles this time – we can leave Jeffrey in charge.”
“OK, I’ll speak to Mat, Sara, Bill and Rose. See you at ten.”
“See you later. Miles has taken root in the loo,” Maria informed us unnecessarily, making an excuse for her husband’s no-show.
Next John and I went to see Mat and Sara, who both decided to come. We continued to number 29, now occupied by Bill and Rose. John tapped on the door and after a minute or two Rose appeared.
“Hello James, John – what can I do for you?” she enquired.
“Hi Rose. Two things, really – one, how are you and Bill settling in, and two, do you want to come on our trip to ASDA and possibly B&Q?” I asked.
“Yes, we are slowly finding our way around, thanks. Yes, we will both come as we’re still missing a few basics, and candles, torches and a few batteries wouldn’t go amiss. Plus something to cook on, as this house has no gas supply.”
“Hi James, John. Is everything alright?” said Bill, as he appeared behind Rose.
“We’re fine. Trying to organise our road trip – Rose tells me you will both be coming,” I replied.
“Yes, we are short of a few things, including food,” said Bill.
“See you all later, then,” I said.
“Will do.”
John and I started to walk back to our house, just in time to see Maria enter Lucy’s place, presumably to obtain a shopping list. Mary and Josephine were still upstairs getting ready for the trip as we entered. We started checking the firearms ready for our imminent trip, and were both apprehensive but excited at the same time and pleased to be on the move again.
Josephine and Mary joined us at about 9.30, both apparently pleased that they were finally going out. I hoped they were prepared for some of the horrific scenes we could come across.
“Who wants a drink before we go, then?” asked Josephine.
We all put our hands up, and Josephine retired to the kitchen to get the drinks underway. Mary followed her out, and John and I could hear them chatting as we waited for our drinks to arrive. Five minutes later, the ladies returned to the living room with the drinks.
“So, what do we need besides food, toiletries and cleaning stuff?” asked John.
“Aspirin, plasters and some sort of antiseptic, maybe bandages and probably other medical stuff that I haven’t thought of yet,” replied Mary.
“An electricity generator would also be useful, and there may be one in B&Q,” John added.
“Plus some nice candles, torches and more batteries,” Josephine remembered.
“‘Nice’ candles – I like it,” John commented.
“We’re going to need bottled water sooner or later. Maybe some extra tools while we are at B&Q, too,” I said.
“Time to go,” said John.
It was now 9.50 am. We collected our guns and ammo, Mary picked up the Micra’s keys and we made our way outside. Miles and Maria were waiting for us in the middle of the close, and we were soon joined by Mat and Sara.
“James, shall I take Alf’s van instead of the taxi?” asked Miles.
“Good idea. We can get a lot more gear in the van. John wants to see if he can acquire a generator from B&Q, so the van would be a useful asset,” I replied.
“Have you got Lucy’s shopping list, Maria?” asked Mary.
“Yes, we compiled it together,” replied Maria.
“Perhaps Josephine and I can help you,” Mary continued.
Ruth then arrived on the scene.
“Hello, is everybody ready to go?” she asked.
“No, we’re still waiting for Bill, Rose and your sister and Brian,” I replied.
“I’ll go see where they are,” said John as he started to walk towards Linda’s residence.
Bill and Rose appeared in their doorway and started making their way towards us. Just before John reached Linda’s house the front door opened and Brian appeared.
“We’re on our way, John – just waiting for Linda, who’s sorting out the kids,” he said.
“OK, Brian, we’re all ready to go,” replied John.
John walked back to our group as Brian went back into the house, soon returning with Linda.
“Right then, we’re all here. Let’s get the show on the road,” said Miles.
Mary moved the Micra from the barricade while Miles moved the van and the rest of us went to our own vehicles.
“Ruth, you can come with us,” said Mary.
John led the convoy off in the truck, with Miles in the van directly behind us, then Brian, Mat and finally Bill bringing up the rear. Lucy, Elizabeth and Jeffrey waved at us from their front doors as we negotiated the barricade. As we passed the green, John and I looked at the smouldering remains of our funeral pyre. There were still a number of partially burnt bodies at the fire’s edge, nearly all covered with feeding vermin, and two dogs were trying, without much success, to chase the vermin away from their newly acquired food supply.
We were finally on our way. I was surprised by the sense of freedom as we turned right onto the main road. Making good progress, we were soon taking the slip road to the B&Q roundabout. Our journey so far had been uneventful and nothing much had changed from our last trip to Brian and Linda’s house.
“John, be careful at the roundabout – the last time there were hundreds of infected here,” I said.
“Yes, I do remember, Dad,” John replied.
He began to slow down. Fortunatel
y, the roundabout appeared to be clear. John continued straight on, passing the B&Q store on our left. Looking into the car park as we passed, there were a number of bodies, most of them covered with members of the crow family, and there must have been at least 20 dogs of various sizes tearing at the corpses. Four of them were having an altercation over the remains of a very large woman, which lay in the centre of the car park exit lane.
“My God, I’m starting to feel sick,” said Josephine.
“Best not to look,” soothed Mary.
“James, I don’t think it will be a good to visit B&Q after all,” Mary continued.
“Sooner or later we are going to need some tools, and we may end up growing our own food,” I said. I was thinking that the situation at ASDA could be just as bad, if not worse, but decided to keep that piece of speculation to myself for the moment. We continued on our way, negotiating three more roundabouts before finally turning right at the fourth, which took us into the ASDA car park.
“Dad, I don’t know if you noticed, but the number of bodies lying in the road has slowly increased as we’ve got nearer to ADSA,” observed John.
John was correct, but I had not taken much notice. Mary and Josephine were just staring at the back of the front seats, trying to avoid looking out of the side windows as we passed the ever-increasing carnage.
“I’m not going to park in the car park, I’m going to drive through the pedestrian area and park by the entrance,” said John.
“Good idea, son” I replied.
John slowly negotiated a path through the bodies, and after a few bumps caused by driving over several arms and legs John mounted the kerb and headed towards ASDA. We didn’t get very far before we had to stop, as even here there were some bodies on top of each other.
“We’re going to have to move some of these corpses for us to get through,” said John.
I turned to Mary, Josephine and Ruth.
“You’d better wait here while John and I clear the corpses – unless you want to help, of course.”
Mary, Josephine and Ruth declined, in unison.
John and I got out of the truck with guns in hand, indicating to the occupants of the following vehicles that we needed some help. Miles, Brian, Mat and Bill exited their vehicles and joined us in front of the truck.
“What’s up, then?” asked Miles.
“The idea is to park opposite the ASDA entrance, but we need to move a few bodies first,” I replied.
“This could be messy,” observed Brian.
The problem was a lamp post in the middle of the walkway with a number of bodies either side, completely blocking the path.
“If we move these eight to ten bodies to the left of that lamp post, we should be able to get past,” said John.
As we started to drag the bodies to the right of the lamp post, I noticed that several of them had been shot, and lying amongst them were a number of empty 12-bore cartridge cases. We also noticed that two of them did not have the bright red eyes of the others. Managing with great difficulty to move one well-built man, I picked on a slim young woman next, hoping I would be able to recover my breath. Her eyes appeared to be white; I say “appeared” because she had been shot in the shoulder and in the centre of the chest with a shotgun, and had obviously been dead for several days as her face had been half-eaten away by various vermin. I took her by the wrist and started to drag her to one side, but stumbled backwards as her arm detached itself from her body, which left me sitting on the ground. I looked in horror as the head of a rat popped out of her chest wound. Noticing me, it jumped out and ran across both my legs and disappeared into the growing pile of bodies to the right of the lamp post. I was still holding the arm in the air when Miles spoke.
“You seem to be having a problem with that one, James. Well, look what I’ve found,” he said, as he retrieved a double-barrelled shotgun from beneath the young lady’s body. He opened up the gun. “It’s still loaded.”
I had now recovered my composure, although I was still holding the woman’s arm. I threw it onto the growing heap and, getting to my feet, grabbed her other arm and dragged her to the right of the lamp post.
Miles and the others had now cleared a path for the vehicles, so I went over to Miles to look at his newly acquired shotgun. It looked quite an expensive piece of kit, spoilt only by a number of shotgun pellets embedded in the stock.
“I’ll give this to Bill,” said Miles.
“Let’s see if this lady has any cartridges on her,” I said.
Miles and I rummaged around in the young woman’s pockets, eventually extracting 20 good cartridges.
“Time to get going, folks,” I said, trying to sound fully recovered from my recent experience.
Miles gave Bill a quick demonstration of the shotgun and then handed him the gun and cartridges. We then went back to our vehicles. John waved his arm out of the truck window, indicating he was ready to continue. He negotiated a sharp bend as we approached the shop entrance. We passed the trolley park on our left and then racks of wilting bedding plants, which had probably not had any water for a week. John pulled up just past the main entrance, which gave Miles enough space to put the van directly outside.
Turning to the ladies, I said, “You ready for this?” They all nodded apprehensively.
“Let’s go, then,” said John.
The five of us joined Miles and Maria, who were waiting for us at the entrance. Bill and Rose had joined Brian and Linda, with Mat and Sara close behind, all of them walking towards the first two.
We all arrived at the entrance together. Miles was the first to speak.
“So, what’s the plan, then?”
“May I suggest that Dad and I go together,” said John. “Perhaps we, you and Brian could form a group to search inside the store before the ladies go in, while Bill, Mat, Ruth and Linda hold the fort outside.”
“I agree with that,” said Mary, “but why Bill, Mat, Ruth and Linda, and not me?”
“Because they have the guns, Mum,” John answered.
“Oh, I see now,” said Mary.
“OK, time to lock and load,” I said. “Does everybody have plenty of ammo and fully loaded magazines?”
In response, there were a few “yes” and the nodding of heads. John and I went through the open outer doors, then passed through the partially open inner doors. Directly ahead was the main store, to our right the customer toilets and to our left the tobacco counter and the electrical section containing TVs, computer games and accessories, plus iPods, iPads and a whole host of other electronic accessories.
John and I moved cautiously forward into the main store, with Miles and Brian close behind. The fruit and veg section was straight in front of us, with a weighing machine in the middle of the aisle, placed in front of a two-foot-wide pillar. Miles and Brian followed us until we reached the centre aisle, which ran a short distance to the right to handbags and clothing, and much further to our left, to the far end of the store through the main shopping area.
“John and I will go to the bottom aisle and turn right,” I said to Miles. “If you turn right here, we can then turn round at the bottom and walk back until we reach the other end of the store, which will allow us to check on each other’s progress as we pass by the intersecting aisle. What do you think?”
“Sounds good to me,” replied Miles.
John waved at Miles and Brian as we reached the bottom of the store, and we continued cautiously the short distance to the end, checking at each intersecting aisle on Miles’s and Brian’s progress. They reached the end at the same time as us. Miles indicated to us he was turning round and we continued to retrace our steps, quickly at first and then more slowly. As we passed our starting point, we started to cover new ground. The first half of our check to the bottom proved uneventful. We were now 40 yards from the end, and John tapped me on the shoulder as we reached the next in
tersecting aisle.
“Wait for Miles – I can hear something,” he whispered.
I stopped in my tracks and listened intently. Miles and Brian had now reached the same aisle, about 25 yards from us, and John waved at them to stop. Miles mouthed the words, “What’s up?” and John pulled on his ear indicating to Miles that he should listen.
Then I heard a rustling noise and what sounded like someone chewing with their mouth open, and finally a grunt. The sounds seem to be coming from the far end of the store. Miles signalled us to move forward, and John put a finger to his lips, warning him to stay quiet. John then turned and looked at me, swallowing hard. We started to move forward very slowly, with guns at the ready, and Miles and Brian did the same. There were two more aisles to check before we reached the end of the store. We cautiously looked around the corner of the first, where nothing moved except Miles’s head appearing at the other end, and then Brian’s. Moving slowly in the opposite direction towards the front of the store, we reached the second aisle and the munching sounds and the rustle of clothing were getting louder. John began to look into the second aisle and as he did so he caught a one-litre bottle of water on the cuff of his shirt. The bottle started to topple off the shelf, but – thank God! – John’s quick reactions enabled him to catch it in his left hand before it hit the ground. I started to breathe again, not having noticed that I had stopped in the first place. John placed the bottle very gently on the floor, and then with his Ruger in front of him slowly moved his head into position so he could see into the next aisle.
He let out a sigh of relief and shook his head to indicate that nothing was there. Changing my position, I could see the full length of the aisle to the top of the store, and again nothing moved until Miles’s and Brian’s heads appeared halfway along. John signalled me that it was now my turn to go first. I approached the corner of the final aisle, where the sound of munching and rustling of clothing were much more prominent. We had now reached the wines and spirits section and, being very careful not to disturb the stack of beer cans at the end of the aisle, with the semi-auto shotgun at the ready, I slowly moved my head around the corner, trying to peer through the beer display. Eventually a foot and then a leg came into view, and it appeared someone was kneeling on the ground.
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