The bus’s interior went dark as all sunlight was blotted out from the windows by the writhing bodies. The weak strip lighting above the aisle flickered as the vehicle rocked to-and-fro. Nick looked back to see the terrified faces of the other passengers and knew right away that none of them had any ideas what to do.
He turned to Dave. “Can we still move?” When there was no answer, he shook the driver by the shoulder. “I said can we move?”
Dave snapped out of his daze and then blinked his eyes rapidly. “I-I don’t know.” He reached shakily for the ignition key. “Let me try.”
The engine grumbled back to life at the first try. Nick sighed relief. Dave worked the clutch, kicked the accelerator, and the bus lurched forward.
“We’re moving,” said Dave, “but I can’t see a damn thing.”
Nick patted his shoulder with encouragement. “Just keep her moving. Maybe they’ll lose their grip.”
The little girl was still clinging to the windscreen. She stared in at them with unblinking eyes. Bloody tears leaked down her cheeks and Nick watched in horror as she began beating her forehead against the glass like some sort of mental patient in a padded room.
Again and again and again.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
The little girl’s face broke apart, flesh splitting open with every head butt against the glass. After a while she barely even resembled a child any longer. She was just a gore-soaked skull with pigtails.
The bus sped up.
But the little girl held on.
Crack!
The windscreen began to give way.
“Shit!” said Dave. “What do we do?”
Nick shook his head. “I don’t know. Just keep moving. If we stop now, we’ll never get going again.”
The little girl continued smashing her skull against the glass and the cracks in the glass began to spread outwards in thick cobwebs. At the sides of the bus, more infected people began bashing at the other windows as they, too, clung on tightly. It was only a matter of time before they all smashed their way inside.
“Step on it,” Nick said.
“But I can’t see where I’m going.”
The little girl struck her skull against the glass again and the windscreen finally gave way. It fell out in a single cracked sheet and landed in the aisle. The girl came tumbling in after it, but as the bus picked up speed the other bodies on the side of the bus slipped free. Some fell beneath the wheels, becoming morbid speed bumps. Nick lost his balance as the floor lurched beneath him.
The little girl thrashed on the floor at the front of the bus. She was attempting to claw her way up onto her feet.
“What do I do?” Dave cried.
“Just keep driving,” Nick said. “And step on it.”
The bus sped up, Dave now able to see through the missing windscreen.
Nick braced himself as the little girl rose to her feet and faced him. As soon as she was up she launched an immediate attack, barrelling into him with so much force that it felt like her bones were made of bricks. Staggering backwards, Nick’s ankle clipped the bolted-down leg of one of the passenger benches. He went stumbling into the aisle and landed beside the teenager in the padded yellow coat. The lad was startled but quickly reached down to help Nick back to his feet. As he did so the young girl pounced, sinking her sharp little teeth into his hand. He cried out in agony and pushed her away.
The little girl fell backwards but immediately came at them again. Nick tried desperately to get back to his feet, but she bundled into him, knocking him sideways onto one of the benches. The teenaged boy got involved again and grabbed the girl around her waist before she could leap on top of Nick. He began wrestling with her from behind, even as blood dripped from his wounded hand.
“What should I do?” he cried out in the high-pitched tone of panic. He was struggling to restrain the little girl, despite her diminutive size. “She’s gonna take another chunk out of me in a minute.”
Nick looked around for inspiration and quickly found it. “Pauline!” he shouted. The woman was already staring in his direction, a terrified expression contorting her face. He clicked his fingers at her. “Pauline, throw me your scarf.”
For a split second she looked at him as if she didn’t understand, but then she reached down and picked up the colourful piece of material from the bench beside her and balled it up. She threw it in Nick’s direction.
It fell a foot short and landed on the grubby floor.
Nick huffed and quickly reached to pick it up. Once the scarf was in his hand he turned to the teenaged boy, who was still struggling to restrain the thrashing girl in his arms.
“Hold her as still as you can,” Nick said as he unfurled the scarf and pulled it out wide.
The teenager nodded, but the beads of sweat on his forehead made it clear he was beginning to tire. “Whatever you’re doing, mate, you better do it quick.”
Nick thrust the scarf over the girl’s mangled face and quickly began wrapping it around her head, trying to cover her bleeding eyes and ruined mouth. After wrapping it as tightly as he could, he then tied a double knot at the back with the frayed ends of the scarf.
The little girl stopped thrashing.
The teenager stared at Nick with astonishment. “She’s stopped fighting me.”
Nick shrugged. It was bizarre, but it was as if the little girl had shut down. Her attack mode had been switched off. His intention had only been to disorientate her, but it seemed the result was even better.
Nick waved a hand in front of the girl’s face, trying to tempt a reaction. There was none. After thinking for a few moments, he came up with a suggestion. “Try letting her go.”
The teenager balked. “What? No way.”
“It’s okay. I’m ready to grab her again if she tries anything. Go on, just let go of her, slowly.”
The teenager didn’t seem happy about it, but he obliged anyway. He slowly pulled his arms away from the little girl.
She stood there motionless. Everyone on the bus seemed to let out a collective sigh of relief. Nick took the moment to examine the child. Her hands hung limply at her sides, fingernails caked in blood. One of those fingers pointed outward at an unnatural angle that suggested a break or dislocation. She was also missing a shoe; dirt and stones were imbedded in her bare foot.
Looking at the girl, one thing in particular was clear to Nick. She needed help they could not provide her.
“How we looking, Dave?” he shouted over to the front of the bus.”
“I got us back onto the main road, but there are pile-ups everywhere. It’s like the whole country started trying to get somewhere in a hurry but forgot how to drive. I can’t say how long until we get into difficulty again.”
“Is it safe to stop for a second?”
“Safer than it was earlier.”
Nick looked at the little girl with sadness. “Okay,” he said. “Stop the bus. We’re dropping off a passenger.”
The bus began slowing down. Nick took a hold of the little girl’s arm and began pulling her towards the front of the bus.
“What are you going to do?” Pauline asked him as he passed.
“Taking her outside.”
“We can’t leave her. She’s just a little girl.”
Pauline was right of course, but Nick had the feeling it would be a bad idea to let the little girl stay with them. “It’s not safe,” he said. “She’s…infected, for want of a better word. We can’t risk having her near us.”
“We can’t just leave her outside on her own, blindfolded. She’ll get hit by a car. She’s just a little girl.”
“A little girl that almost took my bastard thumb off,” said the teenager from the rear of the bus.
Pauline could see she was fighting a losing battle, but pleaded anyway. “Still…”
“I’ll take off her blindfold,” Nick conceded.
The teenager shook his head. “What? No way. She’ll come right at you again.”
“I’ll
do it outside. I’ll do it quick.”
“Your funeral, mate.”
Nick took the girl to the front of the bus and then guided her down the steps to the road. She was completely docile, completely willing to go wherever he guided her.
“I’m sorry to do this,” Nick whispered to the girl. “Whatever is happening to you, I hope it isn’t permanent.”
He manoeuvred her into the treeline, hoping she would wonder off into the countryside rather than onto the motorway. He faced her away from him, towards the trees, and then glanced back at the bus. The door was hanging wide open for him to run back on board. Hopefully he could do so before the little girl launched another attack.
He took a deep breath and began to shove the blindfold up and over the girl’s head. A vein in the side of her head seemed to pulse like a drumbeat as the scarf began to fall away.
A bead of sweat rolled down the small of Nick’s back.
Once he’d yanked the blindfold completely clear, he spun on his heel and legged it back to the bus. He performed a running leap up the steps and skidded in the aisle. He told Dave to “step on it.”
Dave didn’t argue.
The doors closed and Nick watched the young girl turn around and scream at them. But by that time they were already well on their way.
The bus picked up speed and the cold autumn air swept in through the broken windscreen. It gave Nick a chill. He leant up against Dave’s driver compartment and watched the road go by, eventually losing count of the numerous wrecked cars and fallen bodies that seemed to pop up around every bend.
“We need a new plan,” he said to Dave. “Driving around like this is just going to get us killed.”
“No argument here. We’re running out of petrol, too. So what should we do?”
Nick thought for a second before giving his answer. The plan was simple. “Stop at the first safe place that will take us.”
chapter six
One hour passed. The view from the bus’s windows only got worse. On the outskirts of Cannock, they witnessed an overturned petrol tanker and a dozen charred bodies. It was unclear what had happened but it seemed that the tanker’s operator decided to try and run right through a police barricade, disregarding a group of people gathered there. The explosion probably killed them all instantly. Then, only minutes later, the bus entered a village called Alrewas only to find every resident there dead. Their limbs and guts lined the concrete paths like Christmas decorations. A group of infected people milled around the middle of the village’s roads, eating the remains of the dead. Eve had almost vomited and had been crying ever since. After everything they had all witnessed, the bus passengers were slowly realising that they weren’t just having a bad day. The situation wasn’t going to be dealt with by the Ten O’ Clock News. Things had fallen apart. Totally and irreversibly. The country – maybe even the world – was under siege.
But all I really care about is that my son is dead.
Does that make me a terrible person?
The bus’s current heading was north on the A38, just past Derby. Nick still held onto a slither of hope that they might chance upon a local army regiment or police force, but the current plan was simply to keep their eyes peeled for any sign of authority at all. What form that would take, none of them knew. None of them cared.
The current road was one of the few that still flowed with traffic. The various remaining drivers were now mostly careful and things were moving along in an orderly fashion. The only problem was that most people didn’t seem to know where they were going. Many cars were parked off on the verge, their petrol tanks dry after miles of aimless driving. Some people wandered the side of the road in small groups, trying to hitch a lift. Dave stopped for a couple of people whenever he could, but had no choice but to ignore most of them. Those he did pick up were eternally grateful. Those he ignored screamed obscenities.
In addition to the passengers they had started with, the bus now held Cassie, a twenty-something nail technician from Tamworth; Carl, a factory worker they had picked up on the outskirts of blood-soaked Alrewas; and five minutes ago they had picked up Kathryn, a supermarket manager from Birmingham – she had been on her way to a company meeting in Matlock when a frenzied driver had sideswiped her car at a set of traffic lights. She had kept mostly to herself, but had been kind enough to share her bottle of water with the teenaged boy in the yellow coat when he started to feel unwell. His hand had not yet stopped bleeding.
It turned out that the teenager’s name was Jake. He was a Creative Writing student from Wolverhampton University. His hand was a mess from where the girl had bitten him; tough to even look at, in fact. It had blistered up and was leaking a kind of mustardy pus along with all the blood. He was currently lying on the bus’s back seat, applying a bandage that Dave had given him from the vehicle’s first aid kit.
The guy in the overalls with the calloused hands and dreadlocks was named Mark. He was a Jamaican-born mechanic currently living in Smethwick. The reason he had remained so quiet throughout previous events was that he had a broken leg. Nick hadn’t noticed it when he’d first gotten on the bus, but the man’s left leg was set in a grubby white cast with a West Brom FC sticker on it and a crude drawing of a throstle. The man had told Nick he’d wanted to intervene during the incident involving the little girl, but had expected only to make things worse with his cumbersome leg. He seemed genuinely upset about it. Nick wasn’t holding a grudge.
The two old ladies were Ethel and Margaret. They had become sullen and voiceless in the last hour or so; a stark contrast to their earlier natterings. It seemed they had only been able to take so much before losing their ability to persevere.
“We’re running on fumes,” Dave said from the front of the bus. “Every time we pass a petrol station, it’s totally blocked up with car wrecks or swimming with sick people. We’re going to have to pick somewhere to turn-in or we’re going to come to a stop in the middle of the road.”
“Okay,” Nick said. “Let’s get off this road as soon as we can. Maybe park off in the woods somewhere?”
“Will do.”
Dave took the next slip road and headed west into a residential area full of Victorian semis and dusty shops. Nick eyed-up every road sign as they passed. After a few minutes, he pointed. “There,” he said. “Head for that.”
Dave glanced at him. “Head for what?”
“The Ripley Heights Country Park. I bet we can hole up there. I just saw a sign for it, saying to head left.”
Dave flicked on the turn indicator despite the total lack of traffic behind him. The bus entered onto a steep incline with woodland on either side. Nick was immediately pleased by the lack of buildings. If they found a rural enough area, they may just be able to sit tight somewhere until they could figure out what to do next.
Or until help arrives.
While the bus continued to climb, Nick decided to take a seat and attempt a conversation with Eve again. For some reason he felt an attachment to her – perhaps because their relationship stretched back to before their presence on the bus. Perhaps because she was there because of him.
I feel responsible for her. Fuck knows why.
“Hey,” she said to him as he took a seat beside her. “Any idea where we’re going?”
“We’re heading for a country park,” he said. “We’re hoping it will be deserted enough that we can stop for a while and catch our breath. We’re running low on petrol, so it’s not like we have a choice either way.”
Eve stared out of the window thoughtfully. “I wonder if my family are okay.”
Nick thought about Deana and James. They certainly were not okay, but there could still be hope for other people. He knew he should care about that, regardless of how hard it was to think beyond his own losses. “I guess it will be a while before any of us find out how bad things really are,” he said. “I think Jake has a mobile phone if you want to try and call your parents.”
“Already tried,” she said. “My call wouldn
’t go through. That Kathryn has a phone, too, and it wouldn’t connect either. No calls are getting through to anyone.”
“Well, just assume that they’re okay, then. Anything else and you’ll drive yourself crazy.”
Eve looked him in the eye. “I’m scared, Nick.”
He went to put his arm around her, the same way he would whenever Deana was anxious, but he stopped himself, remembering that he barely knew the girl. “I’m scared, too,” he said, keeping his hands in his lap. “I’m scared that even if we get through this, things will never be the same for any of us. We’ve all lost too much.”
“Do you think terrorists did this?”
Nick hadn’t thought much about it, but he considered it a possibility. It could also be a dozen other things. “I don’t think it’s worth thinking about why this has happened, for now. Leave that to the experts. All we need to focus on right now is sticking together and getting through the rest of the day in one piece.”
“You think we’ll manage to?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I think we’re through the worst of it. This day can’t get any worse.”
At least I hope so, Nick thought to himself as he looked out the window at the passing trees. “Just try not to worry,” he said.
***
The bus came to a stop in a grassy picnic area that was surrounded by woods on all sides. No other vehicles were parked there.
“Well done,” Nick told Dave. “This place looks pretty deserted.”
Dave switched off the engine and leant back in his chair. He rubbed at his eyeballs with two meaty fists and then blinked them a few times. “I’m just glad to take a break from driving. I would have gone cross-eyed after much longer.”
“I’ll bet,” said Nick. “We all owe you for keeping us safe. I think we can stretch our legs for a little while now and take a breather. Then perhaps we can check out the surrounding area.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Dave pressed a button on the dashboard and the bus’s pneumatic doors opened. Everyone got to their feet and started piling out. There were multiple sighs of relief as they each stretched their muscles and took deep breaths of the crisp country air. The temperature was a little low for comfort, so Nick fastened his coat around himself before joining them outside. He winced as the garment brushed his various injuries.
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