“Fair enough.”
“Tinned beef stew and marrowfat peas?”
“Yum.”
The sisters did not talk much during dinner. Wren was contemplating the work ahead, but Robyn felt frustrated by “a day of inaction,” as she saw it. They shared the bed they had the first night they’d stopped at the house; it was not long before both of them were asleep.
✽ ✽ ✽
Robyn was awake the following morning, long before her eyes opened. She staved off reality for as long as she could, but eventually, she acknowledged she had to face the day. It took a moment for her to focus. “Wren?” There was no sign of her little sister, and now as she came to her senses a bit more, she noticed an unfamiliar droning sound. “Wren?” she called again, climbing out of bed.
Robyn slipped into her clothes and headed down the hall. The sound was coming from outside and as she walked through the kitchen, she looked at the wall clock. It read six-fifteen. “What the hell?”
Robyn opened the door. The sky was a little overcast and there was a nip in the air that hadn’t been present across the previous few days. She noticed Wren’s javelin was not leaning up by the side of the door where it had been left. She picked up her own bow and a quiver of arrows before stepping outside. As she opened the door, the noise amplified, and she followed it through the yard, eventually tracking it down behind the barn.
Her mouth dropped open as she saw the mechanical digger with an already considerable ditch dug in front of it. Wren was sat in the operator’s seat, controlling various levers. She had an instruction manual on her knee, and did not see her sister at first. When she did catch sight of her outline, the first thing she did was reach for her javelin, fearful that the noise of the digger had been in earshot of something monstrous. Robyn saw relief sweep over her sister’s face, as recognition dawned. Wren reached for something and the engine stopped. She climbed out of the cab, carefully placing the instruction manual on the seat, before heading across to Robyn with a huge smile on her face.
“Oh my god!” Robyn said.
“Cool, huh?”
“Ohhh my god!” Robyn threw her arms around Wren. “Is there anything you can’t do?”
“Don’t know yet. Haven’t tried everything.”
“Wren, this is amazing.” She looked at not just the ditch, but the earth that had been extracted. It was piled in a berm around the hole, effectively making it deeper still.
“I thought it was worth giving it a try. It would take us an age to dig it manually.”
“How? How did you figure it out?”
“It’s not that difficult with the instructions. You just have to remember what each lever’s for. There are no pedals or accelerator or anything like that. There are just two direction levers, forward and back, and then you’ve got levers to control the arm and the bucket, and then—”
“Okay nerd girl, I didn’t want a driving lesson,” Robyn said with a smile. “This is amazing, Wren. You’ve done amazing.”
“I should have it finished pretty soon. The only thing I’m worried about is if any of those things are around. It’s not the quietest of machines.”
“Okay. Let me go pee and make a coffee. We’ll come back out, and I’ll stand guard with the javelin while you dig. How does that sound?”
“That sounds good,” Wren said, beaming.
The girls headed back into the house, had breakfast, got ready, and were outside again within half an hour. Wren passed the javelin to Robyn, who kept a keen eye on the surrounding landscape as the engine began to rumble once more. Wren put her hands on the different controls as a quick reminder of what each one did before she started moving the arm and bucket again. It seemed like no time at all before she reversed the digger away from the ditch and turned off the engine.
She jumped down and Robyn went across to join her. “You know the best part about this,” Wren said.
“What?”
“I get to use a highlighter on section one of our list and put a big tick by it,” she said, smiling.
Robyn laughed. “I think you’ve earned that, don’t you?”
They headed back into the house. “Okay. That was a doddle compared to what comes next.”
“Why?”
“We’re going to have to head down to the polytunnel site for some concrete.”
“There wasn’t that much left down there; that’s why Thomas wanted us to go to the builders’ merchant.”
“Yeah, maybe there wasn’t enough for a polytunnel, but we don’t need anything like that amount,” Wren said.
Ten minutes later they were loading bags of concrete into the wheelbarrow. “Bloody hell. These things weigh a ton,” Robyn said, lowering one end.
Wren angled her head to read the writing on the bag. “Erm, twenty kilos to be exact.”
“Ha, ha,” Robyn replied.
The early morning cloud cover had disappeared and the sun was starting to heat up the air. The two sisters loaded the final bag onto the barrow and stood up, straightening their backs.
“Going to be a nice…”
“What is it?” Robyn asked as her sister trailed off.
“Oh no.”
“What?” she asked, following the direction of Wren’s eyes as she looked off into the distance.
“Oh no,” repeated Robyn.
There was no way of telling how far away it was, but by the sheer volume of haze, there was no mistaking the size of the fire that was burning. Multiple plumes of black smoke drifted towards the clouds. “I think...I think that might be Sterling,” Wren said, sadly.
The two sisters just stared for a moment in horrified awe as they watched the city they had visited so many times going up in smoke. “That’s horrible,” Robyn said.
“Not only that. It’s bad for us too.”
“What do you mean?”
“That size blaze is bound to attract everything for miles around. We could be getting a lot of traffic coming this way.”
“I didn’t even think of that.”
“Come on, let’s get back.” Wren huffed as she picked up the handles of the wheelbarrow and started pushing it along. It was slow going, and it was only when they were back on the road that they realised the tyre was not inflated as well as it should have been, making things even worse. They headed along the country lane, eagle eyed and jittery, conscious of the smoke signals that were rising in the West, conscious of the fact that there could be an army travelling towards them. The soft squeak of the wheel as it turned was the only sound that filled the morning air. The two sisters could not even hear their own shallow breaths as the potential of yet another threat plunged them into a heightened state of paranoia.
Wren brought the barrow to abrupt halt, and carefully lowered it. It was a couple of paces before Robyn realised her sister had stopped. “What is it?”
“Listen,” Wren said.
For a second, Robyn didn’t hear anything, but then, very faint at first, it sounded like a distant rumbling. Wren knelt down on the ground and put her ear to the tarmac. “Run!” she said, snatching her javelin from Robyn. The two sisters began to sprint, forgetting about the loaded wheelbarrow for the time being.
“What is it?” Robyn asked, already panting.
“It sounds like a hundred feet.” Wren replied, trying to control her breathing. “We should go to the house by the loch. At least that’s got a gate. They won’t head in that direction unless they actually see something. There’s nothing to physically stop them walking straight into the farmyard.”
Both sisters were out of breath as they ran past the entrance to the farmyard, and now, as well as the rhythmic pounding of feet, they could both hear the gruesome growling serenade in accompaniment. They finally reached the turn for the track and ran up the incline to the gate. They did not waste time opening the latch, but instead saved a valuable couple of seconds climbing over. Bursting through the entrance and with their weapons still in hand, they ran to the side window that overlooked the road.
Despite the thick lace curtains, they could see beyond the gate and down to the tarmac of the road. As their heavy breathing threatened to steam up the windows, the two sisters pulled back a little, just as the first creatures sprinted past.
The lead group consisted of about twenty, then there was a gap before another band of ferocious beasts sped by. A few more passed in single file then another large throng appeared.
“Oh god!” Robyn said.
“This is far more than I saw in Tolsta. It was inaccessible by car, but you could still get through on foot. Who knows how many are going to pass this way?”
Robyn stepped to the side, away from the window, placed her back against the wall and slid down. “It’s not going to stop is it?”
“Course it’ll stop. There are a lot of them but—”
“I don’t mean that. I mean that feeling. That feeling of being permanently terrified.”
Wren stepped away from the window too, and sat down in front of her sister. “This is how things are now, but the feeling will go away.”
The sound of feet continued outside, and Robyn put her head back against the wall and closed her eyes. “How? How can it?”
“Because we’ll grow accustomed to it. The more time that goes by, the better we’ll get at dealing with everything. We’ll get better at fighting, we’ll make our home safer; trust me. It will all come a little bit at a time.”
“How can you stay so positive?”
“What else is there?”
“Reality.”
“This is reality.”
“Yeah, and look. We’re crouched down underneath a window, scared to death at being spotted by a pack of zombies. What is there to be positive about?”
“There’s no talking to you when you’re like this. I believe I can make things better for both of us. You believe whatever you want to.” Wren stood up, leaving her javelin leaning against the wall, and went to the kitchen. She reached into one of the cupboards to bring out a packet of biscuits, and that’s when she saw them coming out of the woods. There were two at first, but then more joined them. They were heading in the same direction as the other creatures, running parallel to the road, but somehow, somewhere, they had veered off the tarmac and gone through the woods. Wren stayed perfectly still. For the time being they were just making a quick detour around the house, they were not looking inside. She did not want a movement, a reflection, anything at all to stop their progress.
Wren was completely transfixed, and remained like a statue with the packet of biscuits in her hand. She did not see or hear her sister come into the room, until the chair squeaked across the floor and her sister flopped down. Wren spun around, her eyes wide and panic stricken.
“What?” Robyn asked, before noticing the first of the figures. Everything happened in an instant. The creatures, running strides through the garden, came to an abrupt halt. There had been a sound. Something unfamiliar to them. It had come from inside the house. Suddenly the kitchen got dark as at least a dozen figures crowded the window. Breaking glass acted like the sound of a starting pistol to Wren as she ran down the hall to collect their weapons. She heard Robyn’s chair clatter to the floor then the sound of the heavy table being upended and dragged across the tiles. There was more breaking glass as the remaining two windows in the kitchen shattered.
As Wren returned to the kitchen entrance with the weapons, Robyn had dragged the now vertical table to the doorway. The four legs protruded into the hall, but the solid wooden top was too wide and provided a chest-high barrier.
The sounds of the creatures filled the room as even more appeared at the windows. The stretching bodies and grabbing hands began to shrink the room as the outside horrors reached in. “Get more quivers from my room,” Robyn said, taking her bow from Wren, and placing the string into the nock of an arrow. She brought the bow up and stared through the sight window, lining up head after head, deciding which one looked like it was going to invade the sanctity of their home first. Then it happened. Three creatures at once began to clamber and wriggle over the three sills and into the kitchen. “Hurry up Wren!” Robyn shouted, before taking a breath and releasing the string, just as her sister rejoined her. Despite the commotion, despite the growls and the battering, despite the thousand things that were going on in that one broken shard of time, the two sisters just watched it unfold as if in slow motion. The arrow flew through the air. The creature’s eyes were glued to the girls, its pupils shot black beams of hatred towards its prey. It struggled forward over the kitchen work surface. It bared its teeth in a savage snarl…then, in an instant everything changed. The silver arrowhead smashed through the beast’s skull and burrowed into its brain. The creature’s eyes snapped shut and the monstrous figure flopped down onto the work surface. Half its body was still trapped outside, causing an obstruction for other beasts eager to gain access.
“You did it! You did it!” Wren said excitedly. Robyn looked at her sister in a state of shock, then snapped out of it and grabbed another arrow. She angled the bow around to one of the two side windows while Wren opened the case to her crossbow.
In her life, Robyn had never taken naturally to anything, and as excited as part of her was that she had actually killed one of these things with an arrow she had fired, she realised she had to keep a calm head. She lined her shot up once more and fired. The arrow entered the beast’s mouth and split through its right cheek. Robyn grabbed another arrow straight away and stared down through the sight window. She held her breath as she released the string and this time, the head of the arrow disappeared into the creature’s left temple. Like the first beast, it collapsed, half its body in the room, half out.
There was a thud over the sound of the jostling and growling, and the third creature that had been trying to climb through landed heavily on the floor. For a moment, it was protected from view by kitchen chairs, but it sprang to its feet, and began to sprint the short distance across to the doorway. Robyn loaded another arrow. She did not have time to aim, though, and she stumbled back as the flying monster smashed its body against the kitchen table.
Robyn let out a stifled scream as the beast’s arms reached out towards her. Its chest pressed harder and harder against the table top, making the wood groan. She fumbled to bring the bow up, but before she could, Wren thrust her javelin up through the beast’s open mouth and through the back of its head. She withdrew it immediately and the creature collapsed to the floor. More and more creatures were clambering over the sills now and the room got darker still as even more appeared behind them. Robyn continued taking aim, concentrating her efforts on the ones that looked most likely to climb through first. Another shot, and another down, while one more beast scrambled over the draining board and disappeared out of view for a second until it sprang back to its feet. It ran towards them, but this time it was Wren who took aim and fired. The bolt skimmed the side of the beast’s face, taking the top half of its left ear off completely. The spongy morsel cartwheeled through the air, while the bolt continued, landing in the shoulder of one of the other creatures still trying to climb in. She placed the crossbow down and picked up the javelin again, skewering the creature through the eye the second it came into range.
Robyn released another arrow; it disappeared through one of the beast’s ears, making it fall back, slip over the sill and out of view. Yet more appeared behind the throng of creatures at the window.
“Shit!” Wren shouted, they’re everywhere!” She picked up the crossbow, pulled the cocking lever on the handle and placed another bolt in, while Robyn fired a headshot at one more advancing beast. Wren held the crossbow pistol in both hands and lined up one of the creatures in her sight. She squeezed the trigger and the glinting missile crushed the cartilage of the potential home invader’s nose, creating a black hole where there had once been flesh. The beast fell back only to be replaced by one of its comrades.
“I got one! I got one!” Wren cried.
“Great! Just another fifty to go,” Robyn said. “Concen
trate, Wren.”
Two more creatures flopped over the sills into the room. Robyn fired, but missed—the arrow ricocheted off the wall and onto the floor. Wren’s bolt missed too, and in a heartbeat, four ghoulish grabbing hands were reaching over the top of the table barricade and into the hallway. Grey fingers grasped handfuls of air, while the creatures’ fierce black pupils devoured the girls’ flesh. The two beasts pressed harder against the wood of the table, making it moan once again with the weight.
“This is going to give way if too many of them make it in,” shouted Wren over the noise of the growls, as she plunged her javelin up through one monster’s chin.
Robyn parried the second creature’s arms with the bow, and stabbed it through the eye with one of her arrows. The beast fell back, and she immediately placed the string in the nock of the same arrow, aimed and fired, as two more creatures broke through the gap in the kitchen windows. One of them flew back; its head made the plasterboard shudder as it banged against it before its lifeless body dropped to the ground. The second creature leapt at the barricade, but a bolt stopped it in its tracks. It dropped in mid-step, skidding across the tiles to its final resting place.
Arrow after arrow, bolt after bolt, the sisters gradually thinned out the horde of zombies. Wren stole a quick look down the hallway. The procession of beasts was still in full flow along the lane, but a small handful had veered off to see what all the fuss was about. Their bodies pressed against the large farm gate. Their arms reached out, but they knew not why.
“Shit!” cried Robyn, and Wren’s attention was quickly drawn back to the kitchen. Four beasts had dragged themselves through the windows at the same time, while four more were desperately trying to do the same.
“Shit!” echoed Wren, firing one shot with the crossbow and watching one of the creatures drop to the ground before picking up the javelin again, ready for the remaining beasts’ assault on the barricade. Three arrived at once and their foul smelling frames hit the table hard. This time the wood did more than groan. There was an earsplitting crack as the pine split.
The End of Everything Box Set, Vol. 1 [Books 1-3] Page 28
