The Infected (16 page)

I reckon, to get the 760km to Bloem, with the roads in a pretty bad state with abandoned cars, possibly multiple car pile-ups, I’ll need three or four days max. And before I’d even think of leaving I’d want at least a full days’ worth of rain to make sure that the infected in my immediate vicinity are out of action. Four days of rain? That’s not too much to ask for is it?

Take care

Sam W

7:34pm, July 25

Hi. Still as bored as a squirrel with no nuts. If that makes any sense. Thank God for the solar power that lets me charge my iPod through my computer, as I don’t know what I would do without my music.

Over the last few weeks I have moved away from the folky, downcast, basically very depressing stuff for this situation (Fleet Foxes, Turin Brakes, Jose Gonzalez, Ray LaMontagne) in favour of the more punky, hard rocking stuff (Hundred Reasons, Hell is for Heroes, A, Biffy Clyro, 3 Colours Red) which puts a smile on my face – there’s nothing like a chugging, palm muted electric guitar to lift the spirits! I must admit though that I have given up playing my guitar (along with the refinishing project I was busy with when the shit hit the fan). There’s just no point, is there?

Oh, and no rain yet. Haha! But there is good news – I saw my first onion in my veggie garden today! It feels like such an accomplishment, and even though it’s probably only the size of a R2 coin at the moment, I am still tempted to take it out and eat it! Things are looking good on the lettuce front too – there is lots growing which doesn’t look too edible yet but I am sure it will be. I can’t wait to eat something fresh – I am sick of eating things that come in packets or boxes.

Well, until they grow I’ll just have to be patient. Thankfully the water services haven’t stopped like the electricity has (I have a feeling that I am just using what’s left in the reservoir or wherever it is kept). Hopefully I don’t drain it – or other people like me who are out there don’t drain it either – but I still fill up my bath and basins every day just in case.

Take care

Sam W

3:19pm, July 27

Oh my word, oh my fuck. I just received a mail from my Lil. Thank you God, thank you Allah, thank you Buddha – thank you any and every mighty being out there for answering my prayers. Will update you tomorrow, but for now all you need to know is that she is fine and surviving. Just.

Sam

6:29am, July 28

I couldn’t sleep last night, probably unsurprisingly considering the news that I had just got, and when I did eventually drift off, sometime after 3:15am, I had dreams about Lil. Lots of dreams about Lil. But okay, I was lying on my couch yesterday and had just finished listening to an album by Symposium, a 90s punk rock band from the UK, when I glanced up at my computer and saw that next to the dwindling battery indicator there was a mail icon in the bottom right hand corner. I was tired and was tempted to just turn the computer off and deal with it in the morning – the only mails I am getting nowadays anyway are automated newsletters (blank, by the way) – but I decided to have a look just in case.

It was from a Lourens Stadler. And I don’t know a Lourens Stadler, but apparently he knew me because the subject line was “Hi Sam.” So I opened it and this is what I saw:

From:
Lourens Stadler
Sent:
27 July 2009 2:43 PM
To:
Sam Ward
Subject:
Hi Sam

My dear Sammie! It’s me, Lily. I am well and I hope you are too – I know that you are alive and that makes me happier than you could ever know (I have been reading your blog). I miss you so much my peanut.

I am okay, scared, but okay. I am with some guests who were at the lodge when this whole ‘episode’ started. We are making our way to Bloemfontein because we had also heard, like you, through some peoples family that we met, that a ‘safe house’ for survivors has been set up there. It has been a rough ride so far for the six of us, and I’ll tell you everything, but we are now in a small town just outside of Bethlehem, so we are over half way there.

Just after I came back here at the beginning of May, maybe a week or two into my stint, a bus load of tourists arrived from Sweden – they were all oldies, probably in their 50s and 60s, but as soon as I saw them I knew something was wrong – they were all pale with bloodshot eyes and seemed very irritable (well more than normal for Europeans). I wasn’t driving them as I had a South African group – Lourens, whose email address I am using to mail you, his wife Sandra, their two kids, Luke and Paige and his brother, Corne. We were just leaving a sighting of lions finishing off a buffalo carcass when Harold, one of the rangers with the Swede’s came over the radio (you remember Harold? He’s the one whose wife had cancer? Well, as there were so many in the group, he and the new ranger, Andrew, were taking them in convey). Well Harold sounded different – the only other time I could recall him talking in that voice was when he discovered the first white lion cubs on our property. But that time it was excitement – this time it was fear I could hear in his voice.

“Come in. Come in!” he said. “They are attacking Andrew.” At first I thought it must have been the wild dogs that they had been on their way to find, but I couldn’t see that happening without the dogs being seriously provoked – they are notoriously shy animals – and there is no way that Harold would have allowed anything like that to happen. I got on the radio immediately, but what I heard made me wish that I hadn’t… it wasn’t the wild dogs or any other animals that were attacking Andrew, it was his guests. Briefly Andrew’s radio clicked on – it must have been accidentally turned on during the struggle – and I heard Andrew whimpering through the muffled noises and grunts (it did sound like animals, but Harold assured me that it wasn’t) and then I heard gun shots – Harold had decided to take the matter into his own hands.

First there were two warning shots, and then louder shots aimed towards the radio signal I was picking up from Andrew. Then the radio went off. Harold wouldn’t answer my calls either. I was in such a state that I hardly even remembered that I had guests with me until I heard the little girl sobbing. I turned around to see their anxious faces and apologised, I don’t know what for, but I did. And then I headed for the airstrip – Harold and Andrew’s last location.

Sammie, I have never driven that fast, in a game reserve or on the open road, and if it hadn’t been for the screams of the little girl probably warning animals of our approach I am sure I would have hit more than just the one impala. By this time Lourens had joined me in the front of the landie – I could tell by his eyes that he was afraid but that he was willing to do whatever needed to be done. We didn’t speak, I just drove like my life depended on it. Maybe it did.

By the time I got to the air strip, Harold had stopped answering my calls on the radio. The last I heard from him was a muffled, “Get out of here Lily. Just get the fuck out.” Well at least that is what it sounded like at the speed I was going. What I saw when we turned the corner and emerged from the mopane thicket into the open at the edge of the airstrip was just like a scene from one of those horror movies you used to enjoy watching – people eating people… blood… people dead… people dying. Sammie, it was horrible. Andrew was nowhere to be seen, and Harold… Harold was everywhere…

The
things
that had attacked everybody – they weren’t people, they could not have been – eventually noticed us when Lourens’ wife couldn’t take what she could see in front of her any longer and started shouting, “Stop it! What are you doing? Stop!” Lourens and Corne tried to shush her (as they had been doing with the kids) but the ten or 11
things
had already been alerted to our presence and were coming for us – slowly, but still heading our way nonetheless. I grabbed my rifle and shot at the one nearest to us, a Swede with a beer belly and a bad mullet. But I missed by a mile… I have been charged by elephants Sammie, almost walked into a pride of lions and been in touching distance of a hyena, and never a flutter or a shake, but then I was shaking like a leaf in a gale. I steadied myself, took two deep breaths and pulled the trigger again, this time the bullet hitting him dead on in the heart. Dead probably being the wrong word, as apart from a stumble, the
thing
kept on heading our way.

I panicked and shot twice again in quick succession, one bullet sent up a tuft of grass a metre or so behind him while the other took out a tennis ball sized chunk of arm. He didn’t flinch. It was then that Lourens spoke for the first time since he climbed into the front with me. “Take your time. Relax. Then shoot. Aim for the head this time,” he said in probably the most calming and soothing voice I have ever heard. So I did that. I closed my eyes, and do you know what I saw Sammie? I saw you. Your smiling face staring back at me! I opened my eyes, saw the guy gaining on us – he was probably under ten metres away now, and I fired. I have had to shoot an impala before – I am sure I told you about it – and that time I was amazed at the amount of blood, but with him… it was like a shower. And I know that’s so gross and I am sorry, but I have to tell you everything, even if it’s just to get it off my chest.

So he was no longer a problem, but the other ones were and I only had four bullets left. With Lourens’ help I took out the three closest to us – I wanted to keep one bullet for a ‘just in case’ scenario – and then we decided to go – the land rover was still idling so I put it into first and headed for the camp. I looked once in the rear view mirror and saw the remaining
things
slowly following the car…

By the time we got back to camp (I spotted Ngala, my favourite leopard in a tree on the way back, and usually I would have stopped to see her no matter what, but not that day), it was getting dark but it was deserted. Remember from when you were here that weekend that dusk is when the whole place comes alive? The boma fire gets started, the chefs sing, the bar staff get ready for the night – but that night it was dead. Again, maybe a bad choice of word.

Lourens, Corne and I decided (Lourens’ wife and kids were all in a state so it was left to us) that we would pack some essentials and head for the safety – we thought – of the nearest town, Hoedspruit. I grabbed two more rifles from the ranger room and a couple boxes of ammo while Lourens filled up on some food from the kitchen. Corne kept tabs on the rest of the family and kept lookout with my original rifle. As they had just arrived that afternoon they were luckily able to just grab their unpacked suitcases while I, on the other hand, quickly grabbed what I could and threw it into a bag. Luckily the bus that had brought in the Swedish tourists was still there, so we took that rather than Corne’s smaller Nissan Livina or my clapped out little Golf.

We were all in the bus and just about to leave – I was behind the wheel, because even though Lourens insisted that he drive, I insisted that I drove because I knew the roads… he eventually gave in and handed me the keys which we had found above the wheel on the driver’s side – when we heard a mumbling, grumbling sound in the bushes just beyond the reception. At first I thought it might have been a hippo, but there are no water holes big enough to cater for a hippo anywhere near the camp. And then we saw them – five
things
coming through the bush towards us. The bar staff.

I struggled to start the bus – the engine just wouldn’t take – and they were close now, almost close enough to smell. I prayed. Lourens prayed. Corne prayed. And it suddenly started. I pulled out from under the thatch entrance as quickly as I could, Lourens’ son Luke sliding off his chair and screaming as his head connected with the metal arm of the seat across from him. Usually I would have worried, but right then I didn’t care. I floored it. And I hit Petros. He was always so nice and friendly to me, I really liked him, but the way he was then I was glad to see him motionless as I roared down the sand road, leaving the rest of the bar staff reaching for us in the dust.

Sammie, it was petrifying. I was just glad to have some people with me, and such a nice family at that. On the hour long drive into Hoedspruit (there was nothing interesting happening – as you know, we are out in the middle of nowhere), Sandra began to calm down (Paige and Luke – a bit bruised but okay – fell asleep, probably out of sheer emotional and mental exhaustion) and we talked about family, our lives, what they did, what I did, and I told them about you and about us – it made the drive go by a bit quicker.

But sorry Sammie, I’ve got to go now but I’ll finish telling you everything as soon as I can. But for now all you need to know is that I am safe and sound and although we have had some seriously close shaves with the things out there, please know that I will be okay. I love you more than you will ever know and I can’t wait to see you again. Thinking about you has kept me going most of the time… Okay, I am crying and can’t type. Love you baby. See you soon.