by Ryan Casey
How had they all been bitten if they were out in the countryside?
“We need a plan. We—we need a—”
“All we need right now is to get to a pharmacy before you bleed out or get some infection. We take things step by step. Okay?”
Ted looked as if he was about to protest, but then he winced again and slackened his shoelace even more.
“At least you’ve finally got a good excuse to get rid of those fucking disgusting smelling shoes.”
CHAPTER TWO
They drove down the main country road for quite some time. The countryside seemed relatively clear, still yet to have been hit with the same level of force as the inner-city. Ted clutched his foot. He cried out with the pain now and then. Blood continued to ooze out of the bottom of the shoe and onto the floor. He had to get him some help. A pharmacy. A bandage and some alcohol to ease the infection.
“You holding on over there? We’re almost there. It should be up here on the left.”
“I can’t wait anymore,” Ted said. He bit his lip and started to pull his shoe away, shouting out as it slipped from his foot.
“Just keep it still, for God’s sake. Keep it still.”
Ted’s white sports sock was completely covered in blood. At the bottom of his foot, near his toes, a piece of glass poked out. The piece that had snapped away when he’d tried to pull away from the shard of the patio.
Ted went completely pale when he saw the glass sticking out of the bottom of his sock. “I’ve… I’ve got to get it. It’s dangerous. I… I can’t walk. I’m fucked, mate. Fucked.”
“Just calm down, okay?” Riley looked back on the road. Despite all the twisted things he’d seen in the last couple of hours; all the mangled corpses. All the raw flesh. Despite all of that, it was the sight of a shard of glass sticking out of his best friend’s foot that made him feel the most queasy. He kept his eyes on the road as his face started to heat up. Just a wound. Just a bit of blood.
“I’m going to have to get it out,” Ted said. “I just… I just don’t want to… I don’t want to.”
Riley saw the pharmacy approaching on the left. Two cars were parked outside. It looked quiet enough.
But the old people from the residency. The man who looked like he’d been on chemotherapy. He didn’t look like he’d been savaged by these things. Maybe Ted was right. Maybe it was airborne. Maybe they were all carrying it. Or did that only happen on the TV shows?
“I’ll never walk again. Never—never walk properly again. What good am I in this world? I’ll just be slowing you down. I’ll just be—”
“Shut up,” Riley said, as he turned into the driveway of the pharmacy. It looked dark inside. The window shutters were down. A ‘closed’ sign dangled from the front of the glass door.
Riley opened up the dashboard. A few CDs, unlabelled, with marker pen scrawled on them. Empty tobacco packets.
And a red spanner.
Riley grabbed the spanner and turned it in his hand. Heavy head. Heavy enough to swing at one of those creatures and knock them down if he needed to.
“I can’t even help now. What am I supposed to do? What am I… Hey!”
Riley opened the car door and climbed out. “I’m going to take a look inside. Grab what I can. Then I’m going to get back to this car and we’re going to…” His gaze diverted to the glass wedged into Ted’s food. “We’re going to deal with the, um. The problem.” He pressed the door shut quietly before Ted had a chance to protest.
He scanned the area quickly. No abandoned cars on the road. Crows flying overhead in the distance, cawing. Ruling from above. He peeked in through the window of the car nearest to him in the car park — a dark red Mercedes. Nobody was inside. The doors were closed. Abandoned, and never returned to.
As he started to walk towards the pharmacy, spanner in hand, he saw a movement in the upstairs window of the Chinese takeaway restaurant next door. A curtain twitched. Somebody peeked out at him, then moved out of sight. He kept on watching the window, waiting for the curtain to move again, as he walked towards the entrance of the pharmacy. Made sense. If he was shacked up in some place, running low on supplies, he’d hardly be announcing his presence to some stranger with a spanner either. He turned back to the pharmacy door and approached, slowly.
Riley pushed the door open. There was nobody at the till. The floors smelled of disinfectant. The place didn’t look like it had even opened up at all today. He crept through the central aisle, squinting in the relative darkness that was caused by the shutter blinds. This place wouldn’t be such a bad hideout. Secure windows. The door could easily be blocked by a shelf or two. Scraps of food — yesterday’s sandwiches, cartons of juice. They could get by in here for the time being. He’d have to go get Ted. Bring him in here instead of taking the medical gear to the car.
But they still needed food. And the supermarkets would be running low on supply, if they hadn’t already run out. They needed to get there first. Get enough food and water to live on for now. Then, they could think about shacking up in here. Physiological needs first, safety needs second. Maslow’s Hierarchy. Some crap or another that he’d read at journalism school. Great load of good that was for music journalism. Now, however; now it seemed more appropriate.
He peeked down the aisles. It seemed clear, but he had to be sure. The cosmetics aisle was stacked with lipstick and women’s hair products. They’d probably still shift, even in the middle of all this chaos. He moved on to the next aisle. He needed some bandages and some disinfectant of some sort. Did pharmacies sell pure alcohol? Was there even such a thing, or was that a thing of the movies too?
He reached the third aisle and noticed the bandages. Gotcha. He walked down and grabbed a pack. Underneath the bandages, a bottle of Dettol. He picked it up. Ideal for cleaning minor wounds and areas of infection. The glass sticking out of the bottom of Ted’s foot. Was that a minor wound?
He slipped it in his pocket anyway. Couldn’t afford to be selective in the apocalypse.
As he walked back to the door, Dettol in his pocket and bandages in hand, he saw a movement outside between the pharmacy and the Punto. He slowed down to a creep. Clenched the spanner tightly in his free hand. Ted would be okay as long as he’d stayed inside the car. As long as he hadn’t done anything stupid.
He got closer to the door. All he could hear was the sound of his own heartbeat, thudding in his skull. That was a good sign. At least there were no groans. No screams.
Something dropped to the floor behind him. He swung around. It sounded light. Plastic. A small bottle of sun cream lay on the floor at the back of the pharmacy where he had come from. It definitely hadn’t been there before.
Must’ve knocked it off. Unsteadied it. No big deal.
He turned back to the door of the pharmacy and pulled it open. There was nobody around the car. Nobody in the road or either side of the pharmacy. The movement must just have been his eyes playing tricks on him. Easy enough considering everything that had happened today. Even if these creatures were contained, it wouldn’t surprise him if the world ended up throwing itself off a cliff through madness, not sickness.
He picked up his pace as he approached the car. He’d have to tell Ted about the pharmacy. They could easily use the place as some sort of refuge as soon as they had some food. As soon as he’d sorted Ted’s foot out. Sure — Riley was no doctor, but he could handle this. He could try.
As he crouched down to open the car door, he froze. Something was missing. Something from the passenger seat.
Ted.
Riley opened the door. Looked around the car. Checked the back seats.
“Ted?”
He checked the other side of the car but there was no trace of him. No sign that he’d tried to get away.
Except for the drops of blood leading from the passenger door.
Riley’s body tensed. The drops of blood led around the back of the car. He followed them, his spanner raised above his head. A creature had tried to get Ted. He
’d freaked. Hid somewhere. That’s all it was. He kept low and moved round the back of the car.
The trail of blood continued. Spiralled half way down the parking area and led right to the middle of the two cars, a Previa and the red Mercedes, parked closely to one another. Riley took a deep breath and walked in the direction of the trail. He’d hid. That’s all it was. He’d hid.
The crows cawed overhead as he approached the two cars. Asserting their dominance. A light breeze blew a discarded can along the pavement, aluminium scraping the concrete. He’d have to look between the cars. Take a look, and act fast if he had to.
No. Ted would be okay. He had to be okay.
He placed a hand on the boot of the red Mercedes and prepared himself. The blood pools were larger here. Collected.
Three. Two. One…
He swung around the side of the cars.
But Ted wasn’t there.
The spanner dropped slowly to Riley’s side as he stared at what was in front of him.
A golden retriever was lying on its side. Its eyes were closed. The bone in its back leg was exposed, flesh torn from it.
Riley shook his head. Poor thing. But that didn’t explain where Ted was.
He heard something behind him. A footstep. Or just the wind. He swung around. Nobody in sight. His fingers tingled. His body tensed. “T—Ted? Is that you?”
As he turned back round to look at the dog, he felt something smack against his chin. He flew back onto the floor.
His vision blurred. His head thumped. But he could see two silhouettes above him. Two dark silhouettes. Voices. Muttering.
He felt himself being elevated from the ground, flying away, and then silence…
CHAPTER THREE
His head pounded. He was in bed at his flat. Had he been out last night? He wasn’t sure. But his head — splitting headache. Sickliness in his stomach. How many had he drank? Five? Six?
He could hear noises in the background. Voices, one minute sharp and the next muffled. He tried to open his eyes, but they stung. He winced. There was a dampness on the back of his head.
And then he remembered. The groans. The dead on their feet. Raw flesh. Grandma.
And Ted. Ted had gone.
He forced his eyes open. A shadeless lightbulb shone brightly in the centre of the room, stinging his eyes.
“Stan — hey, he’s awake.”
Voices. Movement in the distance, blurred, and just out of view. Footsteps approached him as he lay on his side, pushed back against a wall. The large figure crouched down and grabbed Riley’s cheeks with his tree-trunk fingers.
“Were you bitten?”
Riley stuttered as the man looked into his eyes. He had wispy grey hair and protruding ears. A full beard sprouted around his mouth.
“Hey,” the man said. He pushed Riley back against the wall. A shot of pain ran right the way through Riley’s body. The place where his head had been hit, digging into the solid wall. “Were you bitten?”
“No,” Riley said, cringing with the pain. “Nobody was… We weren’t bitten. My friend. Where is he?”
The man held Riley’s head against the wall a few seconds longer before letting it drop to the floor. “Weak bastard.”
“Go easy on him, Stan.” Another voice. The woman’s voice from earlier. She was crouched over something at the other side of the room. She had long, dark hair and gorgeous auburn eyes. Riley arched himself upright, his head spinning with colours and dizziness. He—llo gorgeous…
“What’s… Who are you people? Where am I? And my friend?”
The man called Stan tutted and pointed his finger over at the woman.
Riley followed his finger with his gaze. His vision was returning now, adjusting to the light in the room, which wasn’t so bright after all.
His stomach tingled with relief when he saw what it was the pretty woman was crouching over.
Ted was leaning back against a pillow. He had a large smile on his face as the woman’s hand rested near his crotch. His foot was propped up at the end of the bed, wrapped in a bandage. “Hello, mate,” he called. “Sleep well?”
Riley smiled. A speck of jealousy ran through his body when he saw the woman massaging his ankle. But mostly, he felt relief. Relief that his best friend hadn’t been taken. Bitten.
“Allow me to introduce you to the lovely Anna,” Ted said. He grinned at woman, who rolled her eyes and smiled back at him. She had a slim face with freckles peppered across like spots on Mini Eggs. The tall, thin features of an actress.
“Hi,” Riley said. He sat even further upright even though his head was searing. “I’m Riley. Pleasure to meet you.”
“Okay, okay.” Stan folded his arms and grimaced. “This isn’t a fucking speed-dating society. You two almost caused us a load of trouble wandering into the pharmacy.”
Riley looked around the room. Blinds covered the windows, although it looked dark beyond them. An orange glow emitted from a small lamp over by the mattress that Ted lay on. There was a door at the other end of the room.
“Where… When…”
“You were out cold for an hour or two,” Stan said. “Whimpered like a baby when you got hit.”
“I’m guessing that was you.”
“Actually, that was me.” Anna raised to her feet and brushed her hands together. She held one of them out to Riley. The same one that had been massaging Ted’s feet. “Pleasure to meet you too, Riley.”
Riley shook her hand. He had to remember to wash that later. Poor woman, messing around with Ted’s feet. Lifting his slippers out of the middle of the flat was a tough enough task in itself. “And you did that because?”
“Can’t take any chances.” Anna smacked Stan on the shoulder. “What’s grating on you, Granddad?”
“I wish you’d stop calling me that,” Stan said. He kept his eyes on Riley. Held his jaw together tightly and bit at his fingernails. “I’m just not comfortable with this arrangement. We’ve got enough people weighing us down as it is, what with Trevor, and Claudia and her kids. We’re bustling at the seams.”
“The arrangement was that we helped them out. The guy’s stepped right the way through a shard of glass. We owe it to him to let him rest with us, even just for the time being.”
Stan tutted and mumbled. “It always starts with the ‘time being’.”
“Is this the pharmacy?”
Anna tilted her head to Riley. “Close, genius, but not quite. We’re in the Chinese restaurant next door. The upper floor just so happens to run right the way across. Not sure I’m so comfortable about the Chinese being able to sneak into the pharmacy. Makes you wonder what they’re putting in our takeaway after all.”
“Or what the pharmacists are really putting in our laxatives,” Ted said.
Anna smirked at Ted’s joke before walking back to Stan. He mumbled something. Whatever it was, it didn’t sound like a compliment. She whispered in his ear and patted him on the shoulder.
Riley stepped up and examined the room again. “This place you have here. It’s good. Safe. It’s not ideally close to the supermarket though, but it’s one of the safer places I’ve seen.”
“Before you ask — no,” Anna said. “You can’t stay. Just for tonight.”
Riley thought about replying. He looked at Stan, who peered back at him. He was old, but he certainly looked like he had some steel in him. Capable of packing a punch or two. “I… We’ve nowhere else. The only place is in the middle of town. I don’t know if you’ve seen it out there, but—”
“Yes. We have. I had to run on foot from those things. Got caught up in the traffic making its way over the Ribble Bridge. Wasn’t so lucky as to have a car. Insurance and petrol costs never really appealed to me. Guess I can freeload now, huh?”
Riley nodded. Without the pharmacy, where did they go? They should have stayed at the flat. Ted was right all along. All the good places would have been taken. Fortified. “You say there’s other people. How did you meet?”
“Un
fortunately,” Stan spat. “Anna and my wife, Jill, they are okay. But the others. Weighing us all down. Especially the kids. Absolute drain on our resources. No wonder we’re running low.”
Riley’s ears pricked. Running low. “The ASDA. It’s about five miles from here. We can help you gather some food and water. We can—”
“And how do we know we can trust you? We’ve got children here. A single mother who can’t stop bawling her eyes out every time she sees a speck of blood. A guy who seems to want to sleep his way through this whole thing. And — and no offence here, Stan — an ageing couple. How do we know you aren’t just going to try and… well. Shoot us.” She pulled the gun out of her pocket and held it out like it was toxic waste.
Riley and Ted’s eyes met. The gun. She must’ve found it in the car. “Listen. The gun — we found that by accident. We’re not—”
“By accident? People count themselves fortunate when they find pound coins lying around in the road by accident. But a gun in the middle of a zombie apocalypse? What sort of accident?”
Ted slowly lowered his head back down onto the mattress, attempting to bail himself out of the debate. Great one, Ted. Great one. Could he tell her about Jordanna? About leaving her behind? No. He couldn’t risk it. They’d almost certainly throw them both out to fend for themselves then. And with no weapon and no place to go, how would they survive?
“I’m… I stole it. I was caught in town too. And one of the police officers. They were carrying guns because of the… of the ‘things’. And he… One of them was on the floor. Bitten. So I took it.” He stared Anna straight in the eyes. Hold eye contact. Make her trust you. In the corner of his line of vision, he could see Ted peeking out of one eye. Stan muttered and cursed inaudible words beside them, and shook his head.
Anna twirled the gun around in her hands. “And what’s stopping you from just ‘taking’ something from us?”
Riley cleared his throat. He could feel warmth working its way up his back and into his neck. “We won’t. What you’ve got here — it’s good. We… We want to prove ourselves. In any way we can.”
