“I’m sorry! I—” he began, but the figure squirmed, rolled. “You’re okay?” he asked.
It was a man, in brown trousers, a quilted vest over a checked shirt from which the left sleeve had been cut away so that a bandage could be applied. A bandage stained brown with blood. The man rolled to his side, and Pete saw the sightless eyes in the undead face. Its mouth snapped. Its legs thrashed. Its arms beat and churned at the floor as it kicked and rolled its way to its knees.
Pete raised the gun, but its hand curled around his ankle, tugging as he pulled the trigger. The bullet went wide, tearing off the zombie’s ear, but it didn’t stop pulling. Pete kicked, and lost his footing, falling to the ground. Prone, he lashed out with his foot while pulling the trigger. The bullets whispered from the suppressed barrel, thudding into the zombie’s shoulders, but that didn’t stop it, and no one outside would have heard the silenced shots.
He kicked with his free foot, then brought his knee back, and stamped sideways, into its head. There wasn’t enough force to kill the zombie, but there was enough to free his leg. He scrabbled away, and to his feet, turning to see that the zombie was doing the same. He raised the gun again, aimed, and pulled the trigger, but the magazine was empty. He swung the empty gun at the zombie, but it swung back, and harder. Its arm hit his wrist like concrete. The gun flew. He needed a weapon. Something heavy. The closest object was a coffee pot. He grabbed it and swung, smashing the bulbous glass jug against the side of its head. The pot shattered. Red-brown pus oozed from the zombie’s torn skin, seeping from the glass shard now embedded in its right eye, but the creature came on.
Pete backed away, and into the corridor. He grabbed a fire extinguisher, hefting it up, then slammed it forward, breaking the zombie’s nose, sending the embedded shards of glass deeper into its eye. Still it came on. He pulled his arm back, and slammed the fire extinguisher back again, and again, screaming with terrified anger until, on his third blow, he heard bone crack. His fourth smashed skin and skull, spraying gore and bone across the narrow corridor. The zombie collapsed.
Pete swore. He wanted to cry, to yell, to run, but there wasn’t time. He dropped the extinguisher, jogged outside, to the closed main gates, grabbed the hammer that had been left to rust in the open, then went back to the corridor, stepped over the dead zombie, and into the break room. He took the electric lantern first, turning it on, then searched the room until he found the pistol. Only then did he check his pockets, but he truly had no more ammunition.
“Yeah, it’s easy with guns,” he said. Hammer in one hand, lantern in the other, he turned to the stairs. The light stretched up to a narrow landing, but he couldn’t see anything beyond that. He supposed he should go up. But there could be more zombies.
More.
The word echoed around his head. Corrie and Liu thought the runway was safe, that the padlocked gate had kept danger outside. Lantern still on and still in hand, he jumped over the corpse, and outside. Slipping on the ice, he kept running, back to the plane, only slowing when he saw Bobby standing in the open doorway.
“You okay?” Pete called out
“Are you?” Bobby asked.
Pete looked down. “Fine,” he said. But there was no point lying to the boy. “There was a zombie,” he added.
“Did you hear the gunfire?” Bobby asked.
“Gunfire? That was me, I think,” Pete said. Except it couldn’t have been him. “Where?”
“Dunno. Over there,” Bobby said. Pete changed course, but had only managed ten metres from the plane before he saw Liu and Corrie walking slowly back towards him, rifle and pistol held casually in their hands, though with a frequent glance over their shoulders.
“We’ve good news and bad,” Liu said as Pete washed his face and hands with bleach. She glanced up at Bobby, still standing in the plane’s doorway. “The good news is that there’s fuel in the storage tanks. Bobby, can you get the map from the cockpit? Not the one of Vancouver, the other one that shows most of the Pacific coast.” She waited until he’d gone before continuing in a lower voice. “I thought it was going to be like Broken Hill. That there’d be soldiers and barricades, electricity and… and normality. I didn’t think it would be like this. If I’d known. If I’d realised—”
“Here you go, Mum,” Bobby said. He dropped the map down.
“Thank you,” Liu said, forcing calm back into her voice. “Let’s see. Nanaimo is here. This speck,” she said. “We really need a more detailed map.”
“The airport isn’t even marked,” Pete said.
“It wasn’t one of the alternates,” Liu said. “Not even one of those I asked Corrie to look at when we were back at the house. Vancouver is about fifty kilometres to the east, but most of that distance is the Strait of Georgia.”
“What’s that, Mum?” Bobby asked.
“Water. Basically the sea,” Liu said. “We were meant to land the other side of it.”
“We could fly, couldn’t we?” Pete asked.
“There’s enough fuel,” Liu said. “We’d have to fly around to scout somewhere to land. Assuming there is somewhere to land. What worries me is that people will see the jet. They’ll follow it to the airport hoping it represents an escape and then take it, leaving us stranded here. I suppose we could check the hangars, see if there’s a smaller plane. That might be safer.” She glanced up at the plane. “But is it really safe for Bobby?”
“We can lock the plane,” Corrie said. “We have the code. No one can steal the jet. They could destroy it, but why would they want to? I think we should take a look at the town. Assuming there is a town and not just an airfield.” She peered at the map. “It really is a speck, but it does look close to the water. Maybe there’s a boat. That might be less noticeable than a plane.”
“And then there’s Bobby,” Liu said.
“What do you mean?” Bobby asked.
“He should come with us,” Corrie said. She looked over at Pete. “He can stay on the boat with Pete, while you and I go find your daughter.”
“What about Indiana?” Liu asked.
“Travelling two thousand kilometres to chase down a girl who sorta-kinda-maybe likes me?” Pete said. “Yeah, no. It took coming this far to realise how dumb an idea that is. Corrie’s right, we have to go with you. Bobby can’t be left on his own, which means someone has to stay with him. He can’t go with you into Vancouver, and I don’t like the idea of staying with the plane without any ammunition. Scratch that, even with ammo, I’m not sure I’d like the idea. It’s not people I’m worried about, but more zombies. No, a boat would be safer, and it’d give you two a place to sleep at night if it takes more than one day to find Clemmie.”
“Can zombies swim?” Bobby asked.
“No,” Corrie said, though too quickly. “We’re agreed, then. Liu and I will go check those hangars for a prop plane. Pete, you and Bobby can find some bags, fill them with any food that’s aboard. And clothing, and anything else you think we’ll need. That will save us looking elsewhere. We’ll lock the plane, go into town, find ourselves a boat, and take it from there.”
“No!” Bobby called out. “Hang on! Look. I can see someone coming. On that road over there.”
“Are you sure it’s a living person?” Liu called out as Pete turned to look the direction that Bobby was pointing, but all he could see was trees.
“Pretty sure, Mum, because they’re in a car.”
The car had stopped out of sight. That the four people approaching the padlocked gate were alive was obvious from the rifles in their hands. A young woman in a near luminous yellow jacket casually held a hunting rifle. An older man with a fur-flap hat and thick suede coat carried an identical rifle far more cautiously. A man about Pete’s age, and a woman older than Liu, both carried military-grade rifles. Those two were dressed in uniform, but not that of soldiers. The four of them slowed as they reached the pile of dead zombies between the gate and the bus.
Pete wondered what he should say that could possibly diffuse the growing tens
ion.
“G’day!” Liu called.
That caused all four of the newcomers to stop. Even from a distance of thirty metres, Pete saw the puzzled expression on all but the older woman’s face. It was she who spoke.
“Where are you from?” she asked.
“Australia,” Liu called.
“You didn’t fly all the way here?” the young woman asked.
“We did, all the way,” Liu said.
“No. Way,” the young woman said with genuine excitement. “That is so, so cool.”
“Are you the soldiers?” Liu asked. “We were told there would be soldiers waiting, but I think we’ve come to the wrong airfield.”
“I’m Sergeant MacDonald, RCMP,” the older woman said. “We’re none of us soldiers. Why did you come all the way from Australia?”
“That’s a long story,” Liu said. “Me, personally, I came to pick up my daughter. She’s studying in Vancouver. But our plane is part of a mission to find runways across the Pacific so supplies and troops can be brought in.”
“Troops from Australia?” MacDonald asked.
“And Guam, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea,” Liu said. “Other places as well, I think. The runway was attacked while we were waiting for the soldiers who were meant to be leading this expedition. I was worried we’d lose the plane, so I took off, and decided we might as well land here as somewhere closer to home.”
“And the boy? How old are you?” MacDonald asked.
“Ten and a quarter,” Bobby said.
“My son.” Liu shrugged. “We were expecting to have soldiers waiting for us. I thought Canada would be like Australia. If I’d known, I’d have done differently, but we’re here now.”
“How about we continue this when we’re all on the same side of the locked fence, eh?” MacDonald said.
It took nearly half an hour to explain, more or less truthfully, who they were and how they’d come to fly halfway around the world.
“And you two were meant to lead some U.S. Marines to Indiana?” MacDonald asked. “What’s in Indiana?”
“Nothing really,” Pete said, extemporising on his increasingly cold and weary feet. “Nothing specific anyway, but that’s where I’m from. The goal was to find out what was happening inland, in Canada and the U.S. Indiana’s a good spot to turn around. I guess, since it’s halfway across the country, they’ve got other teams moving in from the Atlantic to search the East Coast. I don’t really know. We got tagged for the mission because we were at the airfield.”
“Everyone’s having to do what they can to help, eh?” MacDonald said. “It’s the same here. We could look for these soldiers who you were meant to meet, but I don’t think we’d find them. Most of the military went east days ago. We can help you secure this runway, if that’s important?”
“I think it is,” Liu said, glancing at Corrie.
“And supplies will come in? Medical supplies?” MacDonald asked.
“I hope so,” Liu said. “I can’t promise any more than that.”
“It’s more hope than we’ve had since this began,” MacDonald said. “And you want to look for your daughter? She was in the city?”
“I don’t think she’d be at home, but I’ve a few ideas where she might have gone,” Liu said.
“Vancouver is a real mess,” MacDonald said. “We’ve had rioting and looting, and people fleeing into the countryside, taking the chaos with them. The living dead are in the city, now. I don’t know if you’ll find your daughter, and the search won’t be easy.”
“I’ve got to try,” Liu said.
“I understand,” MacDonald said. “I have a deal for you. You two want to go to Indiana. Andrea can take you. She has a boat plane.”
“I do,” the young woman grinned. “Where’s Indiana?”
“You can fly them to Lake Michigan,” MacDonald said. “And they can go overland from there to wherever they need to go.”
“Oh, that’ll be fun,” Andrea said. “You want to come with, Jerome?” she added, turning to the young police officer.
“He’s still on duty,” MacDonald said sternly. “He’ll go where I send him. Can this plane really fly all the way to Australia from here?”
“Yes,” Liu said.
“And down there, you have hospitals? Doctors?”
“Of course.”
“We don’t,” MacDonald said. “Not to speak of, not anymore. We rescued some children out of the paediatric intensive care unit before the hospital burned down. Three are still alive, but they won’t be for much longer if we can’t get them proper treatment. If you can take them back to Australia, I’ll find your daughter. She’ll be here, waiting for you, when you come back north.”
Liu looked over at Bobby, then at the plane. “Of course.”
“There you go, Martin. Help from above,” MacDonald said. The older man closed his eyes and whispered a silent prayer.
Pete pushed the cart into the corner of the hangar, once again enjoying the familiarity of a mundane task. The storage boxes were being removed from the plane, since they were both extra weight and space needed by the sick passengers on the return leg. He strolled back to the hangar’s entrance, and met Corrie wheeling a similar cart.
“This is the last one,” she said. “Two more trucks have arrived. Pick-ups, with another eight people aboard. MacDonald has six standing sentry, the other two are going back to the town to get more people.”
“How many are there nearby?”
“I’m not sure,” Corrie said. “A hundred, maybe. Perhaps more. They’ve been running boats to rescue them from Vancouver, but sending them on elsewhere. Not sure where. I was eavesdropping rather than asking because I didn’t want people asking me questions in return, not until we’re on our way to Michigan. What I did hear is that they’re talking about moving everyone from the town to the airfield, so I guess there can’t be too many more than a hundred.”
“Are you and I still going to fly out of here?” Pete asked.
“At dawn, but we’ll be leaving this airfield within the hour. We should take as much of that dried food as we can carry, save us having to loot on the way.”
“Loot?”
“Yeah. It’s really bad out there,” she said. “It sounds like the military were all sent east because they thought the danger would come closer to New York. They fortified the border, but there were too many refugees to quarantine them and too long a border to defend. Too many planes as well. That’s how the infection reached Vancouver. That’s how they lost control of the city.”
“Who is in control of it now, then?”
“No one,” she said. “People have either left, or they’re hiding. I don’t rate the chances of anyone finding Clemmie, so I think this has turned out for the best. Liu can keep her son safe while taking comfort in the notion someone else is searching for her daughter.”
“What about the soldiers we were meant to meet?” Pete asked.
“There are none,” Corrie said. “There are soldiers, but they’re basically refugees like everyone else. I’m not certain, but I don’t think Canberra was in contact with anyone here.”
“They lied?”
“Maybe Anna Dodson just said yes to everything Liu said just to stop her doing something stupid like flying the plane halfway around the world. Maybe she was always meant to be stuck on a plane with Mick Dodson and flown to Canberra. Or maybe it was Anna who was lied to by someone in military intelligence. Or maybe there is some group of soldiers in contact with someone, but they’re not in contact with MacDonald. Who knows?”
“I guess it’s not important,” Pete said.
“Nope.”
“Do you think Liu will fly back here?”
“I think the jet will, and it would make sense that she’s at least the co-pilot. And what else are they going to do with the aviation fuel? I suppose it depends what’s going on in Australia. Really going on. But I’ve given Liu a message to pass on, a reason they should send the plane back for us.”
&nb
sp; “You have?”
“Phones,” she said. “Or the cameras on them, anyway. We’ll strap them on like bodycams and record everything over the next few days. Those Marines, assuming they were real, they were to mount an expedition to learn what was happening in the interior. We’ll give them video footage, which has to be worth something.”
“There’s plenty of that online,” Pete said.
“There was,” she said. “But this will be verified and accurate, and we’ll be able to mark down on a map precisely where the images relate to. Yeah, maybe it won’t be much use, but after Broken Hill, it’s the only thing I can think of that will make them let the three of us carve out a happy life down some mine or hacking dirt in a field.”
“I don’t think they’ll punish Liu,” Pete said.
“I was counting Olivia,” Corrie said.
“Oh. Yeah. The more I think about it, the more I realise how dumb an idea this is.”
“It’s not dumb. It’s just stupidly romantic.”
“There’s a difference?” he asked.
“Not really. We’re getting flown to Lake Michigan, so that’s safe enough. Then drive from there to Indiana. I guess that’ll be dangerous. We should make sure to get some ammunition to add to the food. But as for looking for her, there aren’t many places we can search. I don’t know if we’ll find her, but within a day, one way or another, we’ll be heading back to that plane. Whether it’s the three of us, or just two, we’ll have the camera footage. And whatever use that might be to Canberra, it’ll prove that we had no nefarious purpose, just a young bloke following his damn-fool heart. It’ll be a good yarn to tell.”
“If we live that long,” Pete said. “You actually seem cheerful.”
“I guess I am,” she said. “Cheerful isn’t the right word. I’d say I was content. I spent so much of the last few years hiding and running, worrying about Kempton and the cartel, and about politicians plotting their nuclear war. It’s over now. None of that matters. The outbreak has changed everything, and for me, I guess it means my life can begin again. I’m looking forward to it. Tomorrow, when we’re stuck in the middle of an undead America, I’ll feel a whole load different. Today, though, I’m genuinely grateful for everything I have. Especially you. Thanks for coming to find me.”
Surviving the Evacuation (Book 16): Outback Outbreak Page 28