“My lads will do their best, sir.”
“That’s all I ask, Commander. As your namesake once said, all England expects is for every man to do his duty.” Rigby looked up at the picture on his office wall of the man he was quoting. “Get my ships to sea, Commander.”
10.51AM, 16th September 2015, Oxford University, Oxford
Professor McCann, head of Art History at Oxford University, sat at his open window, enjoying the morning breeze, his lit pipe a blessed distraction from the tedious assignments he would soon have to get around to marking. It had been a mistake to go into teaching – he realised that now. He just couldn’t stand the mediocre minds that sat in his classes every day. Occasionally, there was one with promise, who showed a spark of true brilliance, but every year, it seemed he saw less and less of that. When he was a student, there was passion and rebellion, but he saw none of that now. All he saw was meek acceptance and an allergy in the young to discuss anything controversial. Gurdjieff was right; the masses were nothing but pointless machines.
He wasn’t supposed to smoke indoors, but he was damned if he was going to abuse his arthritic hips with a walk outside. So damn the rules, and damn those who made the rules. And double damn those infuriating mindless drones who enforced them without even understanding why. They were everything that was wrong with humanity. He blew the smoke out the open window and wished for a mind that could challenge him instead of asking a question that bloody Google could answer. There was a knock at the door, and McCann coughed in surprise. He quickly knocked the remaining tobacco out of his pipe on the external window ledge and hid the pipe from view, his minor rebellion something he wanted to keep to himself today. Although part of him said he should just carry on smoking in open defiance – everyone knew he smoked in his office. The dean had even sent one of his bloody minions around to ask him, so very nicely, not to do so. McCann, not one to be told off by a lackey, had told the young man that if the dean wanted him to stop smoking, then the dean knew where his office was. Of course, the dean had never raised the matter. Probably because that very lunch time, an extremely annoyed McCann had wandered out onto the grass, and it being on the ground floor, had mysteriously found himself outside the window of the dean’s office. Tapping on the window with the lighter his wife had bought him for their fifth wedding anniversary, holding a mischievous glint in his eye, McCann had proceeded to light his pipe and blow smoke through the open window.
“Come in,” McCann said. The door opened, and his secretary popped her head in.
“Urgent phone call for you, Professor.” She nodded to the landline phone that presently had the receiver out of its cradle.
“Am I never to get any peace?” McCann said half-jokingly. “Am I to be constantly hounded by jackals and ghouls?”
“I wouldn’t know about that, Professor. All I know is the caller said it’s urgent. I’ll go and make you a nice cup of tea.” With that, she left and closed the door. McCann sighed and picked up the phone receiver, pushing a button for an external line.
“Hello, Professor McCann here.”
“Professor, please hold,” the voice said.
“What? Now hold on…” But he was interrupted by an automated voice. Was this one of those bloody telemarketing calls? Urgent my arse, and he almost slammed the receiver down.
“Please hold for a message from the prime minister regarding operation codename Noah.” There was a click and then a few seconds of silence and then the voice continued. “Please repeat your name for voice verification.” McCann sat confused for several seconds and then his blood ran cold. Noah? No, it can’t be; that could never happen. But still, he spoke his full name. There was another click, but this time, the prime minister’s voice came on the line. Obviously recorded, but still earth shattering, the professor sat and listened. When the recorded message ended, McCann put the phone back in its cradle and reached into his top drawer. He pulled out the half empty bottle of scotch and poured a decent measure into the empty glass that sat on his desk. Fuck the tea.
He still remembered the day the government official had come to see him at his home, uninvited and accompanied by two men who could have come straight out of a spy novel. The official had been courteous, but had refused to discuss why he was here on the doorstep. Sat in the professor’s lounge, the wife looking on, uncomfortable with the intrusion, the official had extracted a thick folder from his briefcase, as well as a clipboard. Only one of the other men had come into the house with them, the other staying outside, the front door now closed.
“What I have to discuss with you is highly confidential and is in the national interest.”
“The national interest? What is this? I’m a bloody history professor, not a spy,” McCann had stated bluntly, just a hint of fear starting to crawl into his mind.
“No, sir, you are mistaken. You are the best this country has in your field. Most of your peers say so, and that is the reason why I am here.” The official withdrew two sheets of paper and attached them to the clipboard. He passed it over to the professor.
“What the hell is this?”
“That document, when signed, states that you agree to abide by the Official Secrets Act. It states that if you discuss anything of what I’m about to tell you, you will have all your assets seized and will be arrested. Let me assure you, there will be no trial, and you will live out your days in a hole in a country most people haven’t even heard of.” The official pointed to the clipboard. “There are two copies there; your wife will need to sign one too.” McCann looked at his wife who was almost in tears, and he thrust the clipboard back at the official.
“I’m not signing anything. Get the hell out of my damned house.” The official looked at McCann for several seconds, ignoring the clipboard.
“Whilst I am not allowed to discuss the details, I am allowed to tell you the following. It is the government’s determination that, in the event of a national catastrophe, the best and the brightest should be saved where possible. You are one of those individuals, and you are being given the opportunity to live should the worst case scenario occur.”
“You mean like nuclear war?” McCann said, shocked.
“That is one such scenario. I can’t tell you any more until that document is signed. Signing the document also allows for your children to be added to the list of those to be saved. By not signing, should the worst-case scenario occur, you are likely condemning your children to die.” The official reached into his inner pocket and extracted a Mont Blanc, which he passed forward. “Do you need a pen?”
McCann had signed and then put the incident away in the part of his mind where he kept memories of idle curiosities. And now the call had come. Across the country, hundreds of people on hundreds of phones were receiving the same message. Gather your essentials. Gather your designated immediate family – spouse and under eighteen-year-old children only – and proceed to the designated extraction point. Your communications are now being monitored. Failure to comply will result in a loss of your Noah privilege. Any attempt to contact anyone outside your designated group will result in a loss of your Noah privilege. Failure to be at the extraction point at the designated time will negate your Noah privilege. Arrival of the extraction point with anyone other than your designated immediate family members will negate your Noah privilege. Your Noah privilege? Life.
10.55AM, 16th September 2015, Marylebone Road, London
They had tried to reach the Albany Street police station just north of Great Portland Street, but abandoned that plan when they had seen it besieged by dozens of, as Stan called them, “those insane fuckers”. Although they were at a distance, it looked like the police station had been overrun, and with the numbers of infected visible, the three of them were in no position to attempt any kind of a rescue. So they headed to Paddington, staying hidden where they could.
Humanity was all around them now, as well as the infected. Through the bedlam, they moved almost unseen, dispatching the occasional threat when it presented itself. They move
d with purpose, the infected spread out and often isolated. Still in the distance, there was that noise, like an enraged crowd baying for blood, baying for vengeance. With all the traffic clogging the roads, it was almost impossible to see anything up or down the street, but as Holden noted on several occasions, the noise was getting closer, as if it was following them.
They reached Baker Street, smoke filling the road as flames billowed out of the windows of several of the buildings. The bodies of two dead officers lay under the protection of the bus shelter, gunshot wounds having shattered their brains. Stan had knelt down to inspect them, but the frantic voice of Holden telling him not to touch them had caused him to back off.
“They were shot for a reason,” Holden had said. She didn’t know exactly what was going on, but she had seen enough for her medical training to deduce what they needed to be avoiding. At the next junction, three frantic people ran across the road they travelled from north to south. Moments later, four obvious infected followed them, one glancing a look over at where Holden and her protectors stood. It was as if the infected looked right at her, and it held her gaze for a second, perhaps two, but then it continued its original pursuit. Neither officer moved to help the chased. This was no longer about protecting the public. This was now about survival, and they moved on past the junction.
They had received no further contact on their police radios. It was as if the whole system was collapsing around them, which was exactly what was happening. Stan stopped them in their tracks.
“Do you hear that?” he asked.
“What?” Brian asked as he turned on the spot once.
“I hear it, like a strong wind,” Holden said. “It’s the same noise that’s been following us since we left the Euston.”
“We need to get off the street,” Brian added. “I’ve been wondering what that noise was and I remember now. It’s the sound of people. We’re slam bang in the middle of two huge crowds.” They moved back to the junction they had just passed and stood briefly surveying the scene.
“There,” Holden said pointing to the door of a fast food restaurant. The door was ajar, and they moved together, but Stan stopped them from entering. He opened the door, raising his weapon. He tried to ignore the blood trail that marked where someone had been dragged out into the street. He tried to ignore the dead body in the corner, and the single blood-stained child’s shoe that sat almost artistically on one of the serving counters.
“Armed police, anybody in here?” he shouted through the open door. There was no response. “Show yourselves now or risk getting shot.” Still nothing. “What do you think?” he said to Brian.
“Best we’ve got,” came the reply, and the three moved inside, Holden closing the door behind her. “Look for the controls for the security shutters,” Brian ordered as Holden flipped the lock on the very vulnerable glass paned door.
10.57AM, 16th September 2015, Wholesale Warehouse, Sheffield, UK
It was the strangest phone call he had ever received in his time as manager of the warehouse. The call was from what was effectively his boss, telling him he needed to close the store down, get all the customers out and send non-essential staff home. Tell everyone it’s a gas leak, tell them the Martians have landed, tell them anything. His anxiety raced when he was then told he had to seal it up tight, and he found himself reaching for his anti-anxiety meds. Within minutes of the call, two police patrol cars had arrived, and the security feeds playing on the screens in the main office showed four police officers entering the building. Two of them were armed. He had never seen an armed police officer in Sheffield before. He reached for the store intercom.
“Good morning, shoppers, this is the management speaking. Unfortunately, I have some bad news for you folks. The store is having to close early today as we have ourselves a bit of a gas leak. Now don’t worry, we aren’t all going to blow up, but safety has to come first with these sorts of things. Those currently at the checkouts, please finish your transactions and head for the nearest exit. As this is an emergency situation, we must ask that those not already involved in a transaction leave the store immediately. You will not be allowed to purchase anything, and police are here to ensure your safety to help you exit the building in an orderly fashion. There is no need to run; this is merely a precaution.”
Announcements like that were being made across the country. Someone in government phoned someone else in government who arranged for the telephone tree to contact the national headquarters of all the main food distribution chains. They, in turn, sent the message down their networks. And the message? Close all the stores and lock them up tight because panic was coming. One by one, the larger supermarkets and wholesale stores were emptied of people and put under guard. As the day progressed, things didn’t all go to plan. In some parts of the country, where the panic had already started, some stores were already being stripped clean. Some saw fighting and assaults as madness descended and the thin veil of civility began to tear. Once the chaos started, there just weren’t enough law enforcement officers to deal with it. Any police that arrived did so too late to stop what had become basic fear induced looting, and in many cases, they just turned their cars around and drove away. In many of those stores, the staff themselves, realising what was happening, joined in the fray.
When the people began to realise what was descending on their country, they went into one of three modes. The first was denial; they didn’t believe things were as bad as they were hearing. This was actually the majority of the people. They walked outside, saw cars on the roads, saw their TV was working and the lights were still on. They stayed at work, even when their friends and family started calling them, even when social media started to explode with the insanity.
The second was flight. Those individuals packed a bag and went to where they thought it was safe, but most of them didn’t get anywhere, because their actions clogged the country’s arteries. Most of them became trapped in a state of limbo, their cars barely moving, their nerves slowly disintegrating as they listened to the radio and the tales of the apocalypse it brought.
The third was chaos. Deciding to hunker down, they did what unprepared people always did – they panicked. Corner shops and grocers saw the same old pattern. First, it was five or ten people who arrived and loaded up baskets with canned goods, candles and bottled water. Then it was dozens, stripping the shelves bare. At first, the managers and owners looked on in wonder as their produce was sold at ever-increasing rates. Then hundreds descended, bringing chaos and theft and violence. Violence that spread onto the streets in the form of looting and flames, and in some areas, even rape. And sometimes murder. As the infection began to destroy the country’s brain, its own people began to desecrate the rest of the now rotting carcass.
Rarely, however, there was an individual who was prepared. Gavin Hemsworth was such an individual. He watched the news with a growing sense of both excitement and dread, not knowing that the man who created the devastating virus was sat watching exactly the same TV channel just over a mile away. Excitement because it proved he had been right all along. And dread because he was presently alone. He had obviously not been expecting a zombie apocalypse, but he had been expecting the inevitable breakdown in civilisation. And here it was. Having no children, it made sense to him to plan for when the electricity stopped and for when the taps ran dry. His partner, James, agreed, and if anything, was even more convinced the end was coming. Several years of listening to Alex Jones and a library filled with David Icke books had convinced the pair that the New World Order was rapidly approaching, and that the only solution was to hunker down off the grid as best they could.
As a couple, they were well off through their internet businesses, but not anywhere close to being rich, so they couldn’t buy a plot of land on an island somewhere to weather the eventual storm. However, they did the next best thing and moved as far away from humanity as was possible on the UK mainland, buying an old, run-down farm in the middle of Devon. They had moved here ten year
s ago, and had slowly made the farm self-sufficient. It had its own well, and a means of generating electricity through a combination of solar panels and wind turbines with an array of storage batteries. They had chickens, pigs and cattle, and a significant greenhouse that was growing a substantial crop. The farm, a thumb shape of sixty-three acres, even had its own natural defences, most of the property borders being bounded by a wide, rushing river. The only road that accessed the property could be easily blocked and easily hidden. With high hedges and thick layers of spiky plants, the rest of the farm’s boundary was virtually inaccessible. Barbed wire and panel fencing had plugged any gaps. For anyone who managed to breach the defences, the five goats were the only alarm the pair needed, and the three German shepherds and the safe full of shotguns would make them regret the day they chose this plot of land to invade.
There were three accommodation buildings on the farm, and it was one of these, derelict on purchase, that Gavin had decided to upgrade for the apocalypse. With the help of his partner and his two brothers, who admittedly both thought the whole thing ridiculous and yet were more than happy to help their younger brother fulfil his dream, the farm was upgraded. The derelict was transformed into a fortress, basically rebuilt from the basement up. Six shipping containers had been purchased and precariously navigated through the winding country roads, only to be buried around the new building in an L-shape. Joined together, connected to the basement and covered in six foot of earth, the shipping containers formed a bunker that could easily house the couple and all their provisions. This was their ark, where they and their families could survive whilst the world around them went to hell in a hand basket. They could sit back, protected and hidden from the world, and drink red wine and eat home grown beef whilst the rest of civilisation burned.
The only problem was that James was not here. It was the classic scenario they had been warned about when they had joined the survivalist internet forums. Building a bunker and a hideout were all well and good, but what if you weren’t there when the shit hit the fan? What if you were miles away or, worse still, trapped in another country? What if you were in the very city that was the epicentre of the problem, which is exactly where James was? Then there was the added complication that James wasn’t answering his phone. And that’s because James, intent on catching an early train back to Devon, had found himself in Waterloo Station just as the infection hit in earnest. As Gavin rang his lover again, hundreds of miles away a phone rang, ignored. It was ignored because the pocket of the person it was in no longer understood what a phone was. And even if he did remember what the phone was for, he wouldn’t have answered. He was too busy, knelt down in the dirt of the street, his entire focus spent eating a dead child’s liver.
Cobra Z Page 22
