Surviving The Evacuation (Book 2): Wasteland (20 page)

“Music,” Annette said. “Like you did in the village.”

“No mp3 players. No speakers,” I said. “I mean we don't do we? You guys didn't bring any with that stuff you brought here?”

“The cars,” Annette replied. “Car's have speakers. Cars have music.”

“That's true,” Chris said.

“We'd need to dismantle the speakers, rewire them, run them up to the walls, away from the gate,” I replied.

“You know how to rewire car speakers?” Barrett asked

“I reckon I know enough to take the wires out and splice them together,” I said.

I didn't. However, with Stewart's initially reluctant help, we managed it. It took all day, with most of that time spent making sure we weren't pulling out anything important. I can't say we bonded, not exactly. That's too much of a Hollywood montage kind of word. By the end of it, though, we were talking about football and cricket and movies and the usual stuff people talk about when they're trying to avoid talking about anything serious.

Whilst we were doing that, Chris and Daphne made the platforms. Most of the sturdier beams had already gone to reinforce the walls, but there was enough left over to reinforce a couple of doors. They seem strong enough.

Kim made the spears. Rough and ready, for the most part, knives stuck on poles with a weight added near the blade so we'll get gravity to assist with the force of the thrust. We pushed the cars up to the walls and checked that the speakers work. All in all, it was a productive day's work. It was only natural, therefore, that conversation this evening turned to where we would be escaping to.

“London should be our fall back. I've seen the cities. I know what they're like,” Stewart said, adding in a grudging but conciliatory tone “You do too, Bill.”

“If it's still there,” Liz said. “We don't know. We can't know. It's too much of a risk.”

All afternoon she had made no secret that she still wanted me to go out and face the undead on my own, preferably dying after killing the last zombie trapping us here. It wasn't that she'd said it openly, at least not to my face, but all afternoon she kept finding opportunities to ask what we'd do if the plans didn't work.

“North, then. Across the M4,” Chris said. “Then Wales, maybe?”

“But where in Wales?” Daphne said. “We're less than an hour's drive from the farm, a lot less, and we didn't even know that anyone was here.”

“And the flag house,” Annette said, continuing angrily when it was clear that the others weren't following. “The house I saw from the top of the school, the one with the flags. There's people there too.”

“But we don't know where that is, dear,” Barrett said, in syrupy tones that made her sound less like a concerned adult and more like a pantomime wicked witch.

“I know, my point,” Annette replied, sounding more like Kim with each passing hour, “is that there's other people. Other survivors. Dozens. Hundreds. Probably more, and they're going to be everywhere, just holding on. We could find them.”

“Not easily,” Chris said, before Barrett could say anything. “And where would we start? We have to look after ourselves. We need somewhere concrete to go to after this. Somewhere we know we'll be safe.”

“Scotland. One of the islands.” Daphne said “Far enough away from anywhere anyone would want to nuke.”

“Why not New Zealand?” Kim muttered. Unfortunately she said it loudly enough the others heard. “Because,” she went on, carefully, “it's the same difference. No ferries, no planes, so how would you get there?”

“The Thames,” Stewart said. “If we had a boat, sail along through London and out the other side. Then we can follow up the coast, towards Scotland. That's got to be easiest.”

“You know how to sail?” Kim asked

“Don't need to,” Stewart said smugly. “We've got petrol here, haven’t we? We get ourselves a motor boat and chug our way along the coast.”

“What about the zombies in the water?” Annette asked

“The Thames is pretty deep, even this side of London,” Stewart said. “We'll be going at speed, right over their heads.”

“And if we let the tide pull us out, the fuel will go further. Much further than on land,” Daphne added. I didn't think she was correct. The friction of the water would surely be greater than that of tyres on a road. How long would the fuel last? Not as far as it would driving a car, I'm sure of that.

“What if you run out of fuel and end up adrift at sea?” I asked.

“Is that any worse than being stuck here?” Barrett snapped back.

Personally I thought it was, but I didn't want to argue. I was starting to get a feel of the direction this conference was taking.

“Alright,” I said, leaving that point. “Where do you find a boat? I went up and down the Thames looking for one. They'd all gone, even the houseboats were gone.”

“Ah,” Daphne said, “Stewart knows a place.”

So they'd been talking, planning it. Kim and I exchanged a glance.

“Well?” Kim asked.

“I knew this guy. He did boat hires in the summer. On the Thames, near Oxford. Day trips mostly, up and down the river. Usually, the punters'd get stuck somewhere, not be able to turn the boat, and have to call up for a lift back. That's how he made his profit...”

“But you don't actually know,” Kim interrupted, “that there are any boats there now?”

“I can't be certain, of course, but he was out of the country in February. Off sailing around Australia, so he won't have taken any of them. As for someone else, well, he had two boat houses. One was for the hire boats. The other was for repairs. The hire boats probably are gone, but in his repair yard he kept his own boat. A nice one, always drained the engine of fuel, but otherwise it was ready to go.”

“We'd have gone there weeks ago,” Chris said. “But without the petrol and the...”

“Sounds perfect, doesn't it,” Daphne cut in, loudly.

“Perfect? It's mad.” I hadn't meant to say the words, they just came out.

“Oh really? And what's your great idea,” Barrett asked

“There's the bridges around central London, I doubt you'll get a boat through those ruins, but let's say you do, then what? You'll just drift down the river and out to sea with no chance of rescue. You'll die of dehydration drifting around the North Sea.”

“That is,” Barrett said softly, “A possibility. But we don't think it's a great one. We stick close to the shore, when we're down to our last few gallons of fuel we'll find a spot to get out.”
“That's easy to say,” I shouted, “but you know, you must know, it won't be like that. It can't be, not any more.”

“Right.” Barrett said, her voice still deathly soft, “so what's the alternative.”

“You're hoping that the engine works, hoping there's enough fuel, hoping there's enough water and food, hoping the boat doesn't sink, that somewhere along the coast there'll be somewhere safe. What if all the enclaves were nuked? What if this is it, this here. This small corner of England, what if it turns out this is all that's left of the entire world,” I stopped. My voice had become nearly hysterical at the end as I expressed my secret fear, one that up until now I hadn't dared think, let alone express.

“So suggest an alternative,” Barrett said, loudly this time, “or shut up.”

“She does have a point,” Kim said. “Of a sort. What is the alternative?”

To me there was really only one choice “Lenham Hill. If it's abandoned there'll be supplies. If it's occupied, well, we'll see. But we need answers. We need to...”

“That's it, is it? Either join you on your mad quest no one else cares about, or go to an almost certain watery grave? What a choice!”

“Well, what do you want?” I asked, shocked at her sudden venom.

“What I want you can't give,” she replied. “I want to know that there'll be a tomorrow.”

What do you say to that? If I don't go there now, then I never will. We'll find a cottage in Wales or we'll end up on some boat trying to get out and away from this Island and we'll never come back. Am I carrier? How else can I find out? I should feel guilty that this now seems more important than making sure Lenham Hill is no threat to any future generations, but I don't.

Day 116, Brazely Abbey, Hampshire.

07:45, 6
th
July.

To get to the boat house we'll have to cross the M4. I've drawn up a route from here to the motorway, on the roads I remember being the most passable. After that, from there to the river, we're travelling through unknown territory. I thought of adding a little “here be dragons” notation to the road atlas, but didn't think anyone but Annette would find it funny. Possibly she wouldn't either.

I slept little last night. The night before battle. I suppose I should have been standing watch over my armour but since I don't wear any, I sat and watched the stars instead. It's odd, those little bits of history that you learn, but never really understand because you have no frame of reference. Knights and armour and castles and battles. It was all just words and movies. It was never real, not until I learnt the smell and touch and taste and fear that goes with it all. Is this a new Dark Age? Will there, one day, be some myth told about our flight from this Abbey? No, this isn't the time for that type of introspection.

The gantries are ready. Chris and I are to go up onto them. Though no one said it, not out loud at least, they clearly wanted Kim to be the other person to go up, but I just don't trust the others. I swung the argument by saying we would need her to use the rifle to kill any zombies that still lingered on the track. Their quick acquiescence suggests, well, I’m not sure, not exactly. They're all acting oddly. Then again, we're all nervous.

It's going to be a tough few hours, but it's almost over. The truck and the car have been loaded. Fuel, water, and the rest of the space goes to the food. I'd liked to have packed differently, but that would have been too obvious a sign we're heading off on our own, once we reach the river. And it is “we”. I spoke briefly to Kim this morning.

“Annette and I have talked,” she said.

“Yes?”

“The boat's a bad idea. So is Lenham Hill. But it's the least worst option.”

“You don't have to come with me.”

“Annette was right,” she said, tilting her head to one side. “You really don't get it. We're not going with you. You're coming with us. Lenham Hill, then keep going north. Out of the radiation zone, wherever that is.”

And that was that, and since everything is in place so, if 'twere done...

16:40, 6
th
July.

My part of the operation went exactly as we'd hoped. More or less. The rest of it, well, we're still at the Abbey.

As soon as we lowered the platforms over the edge of the wall, the undead began pushing and shoving, their hands reaching up to claw at empty air as They tried to reach across the four feet or so between the gantry and their heads.

Half way down the rope, I paused to watch as a zombie lost its footing and fell. Somehow, it had managed to get this far still wearing a green baseball cap. When it stumbled and slipped, the hat flew off, disappearing into the crowd as the prone zombie was crushed underfoot by that great grasping mass of the undead. I saw the same thing happen again as I reached the platform, and again as I was testing my footing. I didn't think we would need to do any more than just stand and wait.

Then the music started. The track was one of those generic almost-hits that I sort of vaguely recognised from adverts and movies, but I couldn't tell you who it was by. I wasn't really listening to it. I was watching the woods.

They were pouring out, through the trees. Dozens, hundreds of Them. I turned to look to the right. They were coming along the side of the Abbey too, away from the track, away from the road beyond. It was clear enough, standing there, that the plan was going to work. The danger now was that it might work too well.

The spears were ready, tied to one of the ropes holding the platform in place. I gripped one and took a step towards the edge. The platform shifted, tilting at a perilous angle. I grabbed at a rope with my left hand, and shifted my right leg backwards, trying to stop the whole thing swaying.

That's when I wished we'd practised this inside the Abbey's walls. Standing as I was, one foot forward, one back, left knee bent, right held rigid by the leg brace, I couldn't see anything but the wood beneath my feet. If I couldn't see the undead, how was I to aim at Them?

“Tell me if I hit one,” I called out, and, holding the spear as close to vertical as I could over the edge of the platform, I hurled it downward.

“Miss,” Kim shouted back.

I grabbed at the rope and started to pull the spear back up. The undead batted at it, as it went by. I tried again.

“Hit,” Annette called.

“Shoulder,” Kim said, “I don't think this is going to work.”

That was clear enough. I tugged at the rope, pulling the spear out of desiccated flesh. It didn't require much effort. The spear hadn't gone in deeply.

Clearly I needed to be able to see what I was doing. I tried standing on the edge, peering down and, by moving carefully, I managed to get a view of the undead beneath me without the platform tipping over. One hand on the support rope, the other gripping a spear, I picked out one of the undead, taller than the others, slightly fresher looking, its clothes less ragged.