The End of Everything | Book 8 | The End of Everything

by Artinian, Christopher

  “I was an artist.”

  “That’s handy. Must have taught you all sorts of skills to survive during the apocalypse,” he said with a broad smile on his face.

  “No, I taught myself.”

  “You do know being a smart mouth isn’t actually a skill, don’t you?”

  Mila smiled. “We shall see, but it is not one you will ever have to worry about … or being a smart anything for that matter.”

  Rod laughed. “I like you, Mila. You’re funny. My sister, Izzy, will like you too.”

  “I look forward to meeting her.”

  An ear-splitting noise erupted from somewhere in the depths of the industrial estate. “Holy shit, what the hell is that?” Rod cried.

  The sound reverberated around the buildings, down the streets and in a thousand different directions, announcing their presence to all who were in earshot, living or dead. Mila and Rod looked back towards the soldiers on the motorbikes. It was obvious the sound was no surprise to them, and as Mila listened more carefully now she understood what it was. “They are sawing metal.”

  “What?”

  “They are sawing metal.”

  “What? Why?” Rod asked.

  Mila stared down the street. Each individual building and its car park was surrounded by eight-foot-high galvanised stainless-steel security fencing. “I’m guessing this will help them build their fortress quicker.”

  “Oh crap. This is bad. This is really bad.”

  “Maybe we will be lucky. Maybe the infected will all have been drawn to the heart of the city. Maybe they won’t hear these sounds.”

  “That’s an awful lot of maybes for such a smart girl.”

  The seconds passed into minutes, and gradually the tensions eased. Line One was in the perfect position to see any potential source of danger.

  “I think maybe we are in luck,” Mila said, breaking the nervous silence, as despite the noise, there was no sign of any infected.

  A few more seconds passed. “I think maybe you’re right.”

  Quiet conversations started to ripple once more, but then another noise began to drift on the air. At first, it was a low grumbling, and Mila couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Are they dragging something big and heavy back there? She turned to look into the heart of the industrial estate to see if there was any clue as to what was going on, but as she did, it dawned on her that the sound was coming from somewhere else. They were positioned at the mouth of the road, and there was just enough leeway with the chain to look left and right down the T-junction of the main carriageway. Mila strained against her manacle and leaned forward. There were more industrial estates, a car showroom, a filling station and then office buildings as far as she could see until the road disappeared around a bend. She turned right, it was a similar landscape in that direction, and she was about to look left again when she caught sight of movement. At first, it was just a small handful of figures, nothing that could create the low-pitched quake that was seemingly beginning to make the air vibrate around them. But then a handful of figures turned into twenty, fifty, a hundred, several hundred. More and more and more appeared until all Mila could see was a moving rotting mass heading straight towards them.

  “Scheisse!”

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  Robyn put her foot down on the accelerator. “God, I hate this bridge.”

  “It’s just a bridge, Bobbi. It’s just like any other piece of road.”

  “Yeah. I just don’t like it that’s all. There used to be burnt-out cars and stuff all over here and then they just vanished one day.”

  “Yeah, I saw the burnt-out cars too, but there was nothing weird about them vanishing. Someone obviously just moved them.”

  “Uh-huh, and that doesn’t seem the slightest bit strange to you? That we’re in the middle of the frikkin’ apocalypse and a massive roadblock like that just disappears?”

  “What are you getting at? Please don’t tell me you think it’s haunted or something.”

  “No … that hadn’t even occurred to me ... until now,” Robyn replied, putting her foot further down on the accelerator.

  “Oh God. Look, somebody shifted the vehicles, that’s all. Yes, it’s a little strange, but what isn’t strange about life now? I’m sure at some stage we’re going to find out who it was because people with that amount of resources aren’t likely to stay hidden for long.”

  “Way to reassure me, Sis, I feel much better now.”

  The tyres of the van shrieked as they sped across the roundabout. They carried on to the next without slowing down and then Robyn took the left turn, leaving all memory of the bridge and Inverness behind them. Both sisters looked in the wing mirrors at the same time, both felt the same relief. As the road gradually narrowed to a lane and verges gave way to hedgerows and finally woodland, they relaxed a little further, and Robyn eased off on the accelerator.

  “Y’know, you’re actually a pretty good driver.”

  “Err … you were with me when I totalled that car earlier on today, weren’t you?”

  “Yeah, but I mean you couldn’t really help that, could you? That deer didn’t give you an option. We all walked out of that crash, that was the most important thing, wasn’t it, boy?” Wren said, turning around in her seat to look at Wolf, who was still comfortably curled up in his quilt.

  “Well, Mila always let me drive when we came up to Inverness, so I had a lot of practice. I don’t know what most of the signs mean or anything, I didn’t have to do the theory part of the test, but I think she taught me okay.”

  “I’d say better than okay.”

  Robyn looked across at her sister and smiled. “Y’know, even when you weren’t around, I could hear you in my head. I’d like have conversations with you and stuff. Sounds stupid, doesn’t it?”

  “No. I heard you. I saw you too. It doesn’t sound stupid at all, Bobbi. It was you who kept me alive.”

  “Same here,” Robyn replied and then burst out laughing.

  “What’s so funny?” Wren asked, a little hurt.

  “This.”

  “What?”

  “I mean look at us.”

  “I still don’t understand.”

  “Remember back when all this first happened? God, I thought we were going to kill each other long before the zombies got the chance. We just couldn’t agree on anything. And now we’re like sisters of the year or something.”

  “We weren’t that bad. We—”

  “You weren’t. I was a total bitch. I can’t believe you put up with me and kept trying. I swear, if the roles were reversed, I’d have left you.”

  “No, you wouldn’t.”

  “Well, maybe not, but no way would I have been as caring as you were. No matter what, you just kept on with it. You got all the food together, the supplies, you started training. You saw everything that we needed to be doing, and you just got on with it. I wouldn’t be here now if it wasn’t for you, and that’s not something I’m just saying for saying its sake. I mean it.”

  “Same goes here. You kept me going too.”

  “But it was different, and you know it was. You had this whole thing mapped out in your head, what we needed to do and I … all I could think about was what would happen when the battery ran down on my phone.”

  “Yeah well, we had different priorities back then, but that was a long time ago. You’re a changed person now. There’s no point thinking about it anymore. It’s done, we’re together again; that’s all that matters.”

  “Yep. You’re right. I just wish—” Robyn hit the brake, causing the van to skid a little.

  “What is it?” Wren asked urgently.

  “I saw someone.”

  “What?”

  “There was someone behind a tree back there,” she replied, ramming the van into reverse. She brought it to a stop again, and for a moment both girls stared at the tree line; then, suddenly, a figure in black, aiming a shotgun straight towards Robyn, stepped out into the open. Another emerged from the opposite sid
e of the road, then a third and fourth.

  “Oh crap!”

  chapter 9

  “Hey! Hey! We need to get out of here—now!” Mila shouted, looking back towards the guards on the motorbikes. Other panicked shouts and cries began to circulate around the zefs, but the armed men remained unmoved. They were at least fifty metres back and could not see what she could see.

  “She’s right. Hey!” cried Rod, waving his arms in the air.

  Mila took her wooden spear and began to swing it like a bat, smashing it against the side of the metal lamppost they were attached to. There was just enough give in the chain for her to reach it and it chimed like a church bell with each impact.

  The guards looked at each other, and one started the engine of his bike, carefully manoeuvring onto the pavement, making sure he stayed out of striking distance. As he got to the front, he saw what Mila and the others were seeing and flicked his visor up. He retrieved a handheld radio from his belt and hit the talk button. “ABORT! ABORT NOW! GET THE TRUCKS HERE. WE’VE GOT TROUBLE.” The massive rampaging horde was around half a mile away, but that still did not leave them with a lot of time. He turned towards the zefs. “Throw your weapons down, now. If you want to stay alive, none of you will give me any trouble.”

  No one hesitated, and within seconds of the last spear hitting the ground, the first of the trucks appeared from around the corner, quickly followed by the second and third.

  The guards got to work loading the zefs. Each second that passed by, the massive horde drew nearer. “Jesus. I’ve never seen so many,” Rod said as he and Mila stood there. There was nothing else for them to do, and as some of the women and men further down the line began to sob and feverishly recite the Lord’s Prayer, they just watched.

  The infected moved like a massive flock of birds, blocking the view of everything behind them as more and more emerged onto the road. “Hurry! Please!” a woman cried.

  Mila looked back. One of the older men in line behind them had collapsed, and others were having to carry him, slowing everyone down. She looked towards her spear still lying on the ground. “Don’t even think about it,” Rod said to her.

  “We’re going to run out of time.”

  “Yeah, and are you going to fight off thousands of infected by yourself?”

  “I’d rather die with a spear in my hands than with nothing.”

  “Well, you pick that thing up and I can pretty much guarantee your wish will come true.”

  No sooner had he spoken the words than one of the motorbikes pulled up in front of them. The driver looked fearfully down the street then brought his rifle up and aimed it towards Mila and Rod as a second guard dismounted from another bike and ran to the opposite lamppost unfastening the lock where the chain was tethered before running across to the final one.

  “Hurry it up, Harper; these things will be on us in no time.”

  “Thanks for the update, no way would I have figured it out for myself,” he replied, skidding onto his knees and fumbling to get the key into the padlock. “Shit! It’s jammed.”

  “What do you mean it’s jammed?”

  “What do you think I mean? It’s bloody jammed. I don’t know how to say it any more clearly, you dumb bastard.” Harper glanced in the direction of the horde. No more than two minutes had passed since they had originally been spotted, but they were getting dangerously close now. The rumble of their pounding feet was making the ground shake.

  “We’re just going to have to go. We’re going to have to leave them.”

  “Hey, dummkopf, screw that. You get us out of these chains—now!” Mila demanded with more anger than fear.

  Harper tried to give the key one final turn and then he tugged it, attempting to release it from the lock. When he could do neither, he stood up and backed away. “You’re by yourselves, I’m not dying for anybody,” he said, running back to his bike and starting it up. Smoke came from his tyres as he sped away.

  Rod and Mila looked at one another in disbelief then looked towards the massive horde as the first two trucks started moving.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  “What do we do?” Wren asked as they watched one of the men speak into a radio handset.

  “We don’t really have many options, Sis. They’d turn us into Swiss cheese before we got ten feet.”

  The man returned the radio to his belt then walked up to the driver side door and opened it. Wolf began to growl, and Wren hurriedly calmed him.

  “Who are you?” It wasn’t a man at all but a woman with close-cropped hair who now pointed her shotgun towards Robyn, who in turn put her hands up.

  “Jehovah’s Witnesses. Can I interest you in a copy of The Watchtower?”

  Wren’s mouth dropped open in disbelief, and she felt sick to the pit of her stomach. She knew her sister had changed in her time away, but deliberately provoking someone aiming a shotgun in their direction was insane. She tensed, expecting to hear the click of a trigger any second.

  A broad grin appeared on the woman’s face. “Funny. I’ll ask you again.”

  “I’m sorry about my sister,” Wren answered, leaning forward. “We’re just trying to find someone … a friend.”

  The woman glared at Wren. “How old are you?”

  Wren puffed her chest out and raised her head. “Sixteen. Why?”

  “And you?” the woman asked, turning back to Robyn.

  “Old enough to drink, smoke and—”

  “She’s eighteen,” Wren interrupted.

  “—vote.” Robyn finished.

  “Get out of the van,” the woman said, backing up but keeping her gun trained on them.

  Robyn paused for a moment weighing up her options then finally unbuckled her seat belt and climbed down. Wren undid hers and slid across to the driver side before climbing out too. She closed the door of the van behind her and Wolf jumped into the front seat, staring intently at the woman.

  “He’s very protective,” Wren said as the woman glared at the dog.

  “So, this friend you’re looking for. Tell me about them. You,” she said, pointing her shotgun towards Wren.

  “Err … well … her name is—”

  “Look. Take that thing off my sister and point it at me,” Robyn said. “It’s my friend we’re looking for. This is my sister, and she came along to help me.”

  “Okay, talk,” the woman said.

  “I just have. That’s what I was doing when my lips were moving. See? I just did it again. And again.”

  “I’m sure at some point in your life some bloke who wanted to get in your pants told you that you were funny, but trust me, I don’t find this funny. You’re starting to piss me off. Now, you’d better answer my questions or this is going to end badly for you.”

  Robyn let out a long sigh. “A few days ago … a few days ago…” She gulped hard and realised she couldn’t continue.

  Wren had a feeling about this woman, about these people. She had been face-to-face with evil, but whatever these people were, they weren’t that. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Look, have you ever had someone in your life who has saved you, who has literally brought you back from the brink? Have you ever had someone who you have depended on completely, whose life and yours have been so entwined that sometimes you don’t know where you end and they begin? Well, that’s my sister’s friend. She was incredibly brave and put everyone else ahead of her own safety. I didn’t meet her, but she saved my sister, and she saved the lives of twelve kids by doing what she did. And now we’re looking for her.”

  The woman stared at Wren and lowered her shotgun ever so slightly. “And why are you here? Why are you looking around here?”

  Wren was about to answer when Robyn took over. “Because where we’d been living burnt to the ground. We were looking for somewhere safe just to catch a breath. We parked on the outskirts of a village called Andrew’s Bay, and my friend went in on foot. She made me promise that if she hadn’t returned in an hour I’d get the kids to safety. Well, the kids are safe, and
now I’m back to find her.”

  The woman peered into Robyn’s eyes. She could see the sincerity as tears began to well. All the false bravado was gone now. “Lower your weapons,” she commanded the others, and the rest of them did as the woman asked. “My name’s Izzy. You need to come with me.”

  “I’d prefer to—”

  “Listen to me. I’ll explain everything to you on the way, but if you even think about heading towards Andrew’s Bay, you’re going to wind up in all sorts of hurt.” She turned to look at the others. “I’ll be back in a while. You know what to do if you see them.”

  “See them? See who?” Wren asked.

  “Like I said, I’ll explain on the way. Now come on, we don’t have much time.”

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  “Jesus Christ!” cried the other guard as he watched Harper disappear down the road. He climbed off his bike and ran across to the padlock, casting a frightened glance over his shoulder towards the advancing horde as he went. He crouched down, desperately trying to fiddle with the key before jumping back to his feet and raising his weapon. He fired twice at the sturdy padlock; the second shot made it disintegrate. The driver of the third lorry was looking nervously towards him. “Get in the truck, quick,” the biker ordered.

  The chain was already pulling in the direction of the final vehicle as the padlock came free, so no one needed any coercing. One by one, they ran up the ramps into the back of the lorry, and when they were all on board, the ramps were dragged into the vehicle, and the doors were slammed shut. Chilling screams sliced through the air as the two guards who had closed the doors were seized by the first of the creatures. Nobody needed to see it to know exactly what was going on.

  Then screams filled the interior of the cargo compartment as body after body began to batter against the side of the truck. The entire vehicle began to sway and tip. For a few seconds, Mila and Rod just looked at each other, placing their hands against the inside wall for balance.

  “It’s going to go over,” screamed one woman.

  “Everybody, over to the right-hand side,” shouted Rod.