Tankbread

by Paul Mannering

  I went scouting, finding a good supply of canned food, a shotgun and some cartridges that didn’t crumble in my fingers. I even found sodas and beer in one of the houses I visited. Else and Donna stayed with the truck, Donna teaching Else by answering her endless flow of increasingly complex questions.

  Coming back, I found an old evol making his way towards the Humvee. A slow shuffler, so thin his spine and ribs jutted out against the leathery skin of his back. The pants he wore flapped like sails and his hair had come out in clumps. The last few wisps of it were white long before he died and his beard was long and ragged. He shambled along, hunched over and attracted by the lilting sound of Else’s laughter. He must have been deaf before he died, because he didn’t hear me coming up behind him. I used the solid walnut stock of my new shotgun to smash his knee in, dropping him with a grunt that almost sounded surprised.

  The zombie groaned and rolled on to his back in the sunburnt grass, clutching at his shattered leg. I hesitated, the gun raised and ready to smash the foul creature’s brains out. The evol had pink gums and no teeth. His lips peeled back in a grimace of agony. This man was alive.

  ‘Whaddya do that for?’ He moaned. ‘Shonnofabish.’

  ‘Shit, sorry man, I thought you were dead.’

  ‘I am dead you shtupid bashtard, you’ve fushing killed me,’ he slurred his words with no teeth. His moans got louder and I heard Else’s distant laughter go still.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ I raised the gun and smashed it into his throat, crushing the fine ringbones of his trachea. He started gurgling, eyes bulging as he drowned in his own blood. A few well-placed blows broke his skull open and ensured he wouldn’t have enough brain left intact to get up again and bother us during the night.

  Else met me near the Humvee. ‘What was that noise?’ she asked.

  ‘Just an evol, I took care of it. Hey, I found some fruit juice, and some soda. You’ll like this.’ We feasted pretty well that night, and I tried to ignore the sound of wild dogs snarling and tearing at the old man’s body that lay less than a hundred yards away.

  CHAPTER 31

  In the morning all that remained of the dead man were few chewed bones and a smear of blood on the grass. Dingoes and dogs were mostly extinct in Sydney, the living ate them all. Out here though they hunted the wild sheep and scavenged. A man would have to be sick, injured or dead to go down to them and I wondered how the old man survived as long as he did.

  We left town at dawn. It was still cool enough to be pleasant driving and I wanted to get as much distance between Wirrabara and myself as possible. Else read her road-atlas and called out names of towns as we drove along. She took delight in seeing the names on the yellow page and then seeing the actual place a few minutes later. The road had always been dotted with small towns, the rural communities that are the foundation of any great nation. Since the great panic, these communities had shattered or died out. We drove through ghost towns, as dead and bordered up as Wirrabara and Crystal Brook. We drove for four days, averaging a little over 100 k’s a day and passing through empty shells of towns like Laura, Mount Bryan, Morgan, Taylorville, Renmark and Yamba.

  The dead were less common than the animals. Kangaroos thundered in herds across the road and Else yelled things from the gunners hatch like, ‘Macropus Giganteus!’ and ‘Macropus Rufus!’ at them, casting her words like a wrathful spell.

  Kangaroos, wallabies, koalas and wombats, none of them cared that humankind was dying out. They were here before us, and would be long after. Thinking like that is enough to drive you to drink, and we were running low on everything. Else’s navigation skills had proved accurate. According to her map we were within twenty kilometres of one of the last places I wanted to return to, Mildura and the nearby convent of St Peter’s Grace.

  Our journey took us straight east along the Stuart Highway again. That long line of road, twisting and turning like a trapped snake across South Australia, and then lying flat and straight from the state border into Victoria before tangling up in Mildura again.

  Else guided me through side roads, skirting the town and bringing us up on the outer fence of the convent. Their efforts in rebuilding after our departure showed in the new gates with firmly grounded posts set in concrete and the double mesh and barbed wire topped fencing. Homemade road spikes waited to catch the unwary on the other side of the gate. It seemed that the lost and injured were no longer welcome at St Peters Grace.

  I stood on the roof of the Humvee, scanning the area with the binoculars. The fields were looking fresh and green, benefiting from the water brought up by the irrigation pump I had fixed. I waited while Else and Donna walked along the fence line. Sooner or later one of the nuns had to come out and investigate, either to offer aid, or to tell us to piss off.

  It took until dusk for someone to come down the road, a woman on horseback, arrows in a quiver on her back, a home-made zombie scythe glinting over her shoulder. She did not wear the carefully mended habit of the sisters, she wore men’s trousers, boots, a denim shirt and a stockman’s hat.

  She reigned her horse in far enough away to be heard but out of melee range. ‘There is nothing for you here!’ she called, ignoring the horse as it stamped and snorted, twisting under her.

  ‘I’m here to see Sister Mary. Tell her the courier and Else have come back. Tell her we got to Woomera, and we have news.’

  ‘You come on foot, leave your weapons in your vehicle!’ She lifted the bow from her saddle hook and notched an arrow to the string, not aiming at me, but at the two women jogging back along the fence line towards us.

  ‘That’s Else, Sister Mary should remember her. She’s your goddamned miracle.’

  ‘Step away from your vehicle, hands behind your head, turn around,’ the nun didn’t care to be argued with, so I did as she asked. Slowly spinning so she could see I wasn’t carrying anything deadly behind my back. Disarming her bow, and holding the reins she unlocked the gate. ‘Come through, slowly and in single file.’

  We did that, and she locked the gate again before swinging back up into the saddle. ‘Start walking,’ she said, backing the horse up to watch over us as we marched.

  ‘Can I put my hands down now?’ I said.

  ‘Just move,’ she replied. We walked up the long driveway to the walls of St Peter’s. Here, maybe a month ago at most we had fought for our very lives against an onslaught of the undead. Coming back, I had expected this place to be dead, every last holy virgin torn asunder or infected and reborn as a cannibalistic, animated corpse. The heavy doors in the white-washed walls swung open as we approached. Four girls, two with bows, and two with rifles covered us as we entered. None of them were dressed like nuns either.

  ‘Did Sister Mary make it back here okay?’ I felt a sudden twinge that she might have never returned, and I would be held responsible for her disappearance.

  ‘We have chosen to separate ourselves from our Godly work for now,’ Sister Mary said, stepping out of the main building. Standing on those steps looking down at us she looked every inch the military veteran she claimed to be, rather than a middle-aged nun. ‘The Lord spared our lives, but taught us a valuable lesson. Faith must be accompanied by action. I will not allow my girls to come to harm ever again.’

  ‘I’m glad to see you’re alive, Sister. We’ve come from Woomera. This is Donna. She’s a geek,’ I added.

  ‘Come in and explain yourself,’ Sister Mary vanished inside and we went up the steps and into the cool interior of the convent.

  They gave us food and water. Grace was still said with a fervent solemnity over the meal and Else ate daintily using her correct utensils. After dinner she went to reacquaint herself with her friends among the young nuns.

  The Mother Superior ordered Donna and I to her office for a chat. I gave Sister Mary the highlights of our trip west and explaining honestly the situation we found in Woomera. To explain our return journey I only said that we had an important message for the geeks at the Opera House on a possible cure
for the evol epidemic.

  She listened and asked Donna questions, which the doctor answered truthfully. The shudder in Donna’s voice as she described our escape from the Woomera compound and the horrors she had witnessed since then did not move Sister Mary.

  ‘I told you that the Lord had a purpose for you,’ she said eventually. I half-shrugged, my feeling had always been that if there ever was a God he’d long since buggered off to some other project.

  ‘I guess,’ I said.

  ‘You will not stay here,’ Sister Mary announced.

  ‘Well no,’ I said. ‘We have to get back to Sydney.’

  She carried on as if I had not spoken. ‘After I returned we were contacted by a small community who saw the chopper flying over. Two young men volunteered to follow my path and with God’s guiding love, they found us. It falls upon us to restore the world to His grace. To do so we must fill the earth again with his chosen.’

  ‘Uh..huh’ I said.

  ‘One of the young men died of injuries sustained during their journey here. The other has returned to his people. He will gather them and they will make a pilgrimage to this holy site. From here we shall re-populate the earth.’

  ‘Okay…’ I’d seen this kind of plan before.

  ‘How many of them are there?’ Donna asked.

  ‘By the account of Thomas the last woman who lived among them died six months ago during child birth. Leaving twelve men of marriageable age.’

  ‘Marriageable age?’ I said only to be ignored by both women.

  ‘They are genetically diverse?’ Donna leaned forward, her gaze intensely interested.

  ‘They come from three separate families,’ Sister Mary’s nostrils flared slightly, unsure whether to be offended at this line of questioning.

  ‘To ensure the survival of a species you need a minimum of four adults, the entire world once reduce to a population of less than five thousand humans, and before all this happened we numbered in the billions,’ Donna said.

  ‘There shall be no debauchery in God’s new world,’ Sister Mary declared.

  ‘Of course not,’ Donna said immediately, ‘But there is so much work to be done, so much genetic cross-matching, selective trait breeding – or marrying the right man with the right woman to ensure viable and uh, truly Christian offspring.’

  ‘What do you know of such things?’ Sister Mary didn’t glare so I spoke up.

  ‘I told you she’s a geek. Donna does this sort of thing.’

  ‘I can help you build the community. I can help make your divine vision a reality,’ Donna reached out and gently laid her hand over Sister Mary’s. ‘I am here for a reason, Sister,’ she said.

  Sister Mary announced that she would pray on the matter. Duly dismissed we went outside.

  ‘You didn’t tell me you were religious.’

  Donna snorted and gave me a withering look. ‘Of course I’m not. That woman is completely deluded. However she does present a unique opportunity. I can launch my own eugenics program that will last thousands of years. An entire new race of people will be born from this genetic stock. I can shape the genetic future of humankind from right here. You have no idea what an amazing project this is going to be.’

  ‘You sure Sister Mary is the one with the delusions?’ I quickly grinned. Donna didn’t react like I’d hoped.

  ‘I’m not pregnant,’ she said.

  CHAPTER 32

  Since Sister Mary’s return the convent had been transformed into something more akin to a military base. The girls still prayed and worked the farm, but they also went out in armed groups. Returning with animals, tools, building materials, food and books. The chapel had become a library, books stacked on the floor and against the walls. I found Else here, surrounded by volumes and reading three at once.

  ‘You should get some sleep,’ I said.

  ‘Not tired,’ she replied without looking up.

  ‘Whatcha reading?’ I scanned the titles of a stack that included medical texts, autobiographies and car-workshop manuals.

  ‘Everything,’ she said.

  I left her to it. After the long days of driving and sleeping in the Humvee, I needed sleep. I slept hard until the bell calling the faithful to morning devotions woke me up again.

  Else and Donna joined me for breakfast and Sister Mary scolded Else for reading at the table while we ate porridge drowned in fresh milk.

  ‘We have no wish to keep you any longer than necessary,’ Sister Mary announced over a strong cup of bush tea.

  ‘I understand, Sister. Else and I will be out of your hair by the end of the day.’

  ‘I was speaking to you specifically, the young lady is welcome to stay with us.’

  I put my spoon down, and looked the nun in the eye. ‘We’ve had this discussion before. You know she goes with me.’

  ‘She goes with you into a world of sin, and the wrath of God. That is no place for one so innocent.’

  I held back on filling Sister Mary in on some of the things Else had seen and done during our time together. She’d order us both burned at the stake if I told her the whole truth.

  ‘An early start will see you well on the road,’ Sister Mary said, her final word on the matter.

  ‘Yeah about that, Sister, I have a proposition for you…’

  After breakfast they gave me permission to bring the Humvee in and Else learned the fine art of bartering. We traded the vehicle and everything in it for a helicopter ride.

  Farewells are something I’ve never been good at and saying good-bye to Donna proved harder than I thought. I found her in the chapel library writing up lists of things she needed to ensure the creation of a new master race.

  ‘We’re heading out,’ I said from the doorway.

  She glanced up, ‘You’re not coming back,’ there was no question in her voice.

  ‘No, I guess not. At least not for a while.’ I didn’t walk out then. It would have been easier to just tip my hat and stride out into the sunset. Instead, I stood there in the doorway and took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry we didn’t work out, with the baby thing I mean,’ I said.

  She stopped writing her notes and tucking her pencil in her shirt pocket she stood up. ‘Yes, the hormone patch hasn’t changed colour, see,’ she lifted her shirt, twisting to show the round patch near her armpit to me. The patch glowed the same dull green.

  ‘We could try again?’

  Donna snorted, ‘I’m now menstruating you idiot. Safer this way I guess. Back at the lab I could tell you the sex, screen for any genetic disorders,’ she gave me an appraising look. ‘But here…’ she looked around the white stone chapel. ‘Here I’d be lucky to survive childbirth if there were any complications.’

  ‘Sister Mary and the nuns, they’d look after you.’

  ‘Sure, they would pray for my health and the health of my baby, how reassuring. Besides I’m going to be busy with my eugenics program. If a suitable sperm-donor turns up in the screening process I may try again.’

  It was my turn to shrug. ‘I have to get going. I hope it works out okay. If I can, I’ll come back and help.’

  Donna had gone back to her note taking. I waited a moment longer while she ignored me and then I left.

  Else carried her sword, I carried an M16 with two spare clips. The weapons, a backpack full of books and the clothes on our backs were all we took away from St Peter’s Grace convent.

  Sister Mary lead us to the helicopter beyond the line of gum trees. ‘You okay with this?’ I asked Else.

  ‘Sure,’ she said. ‘This is going to be fun.’

  ‘Well okay, if you’re sure,’ I said.

  ‘Stop treating me like a child,’ Else scolded. ‘Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Soren Kierkegaard. Nineteenth century Danish Philosopher, eighteen-thirteen to eighteen-fifty five,’ Sister Mary said from ahead of us without breaking her stride.

  ‘He thought a lot about God and life a
nd wrote it all down,’ Else explained.

  ‘Kierkegaard wrote extensively on Christian theology. He was a devout man and an instrument of God’s will,’ Sister Mary with a hint of admonishment in her voice.

  We reached the helicopter and got settled in. Sister Mary did her pre-flight checks, the engine whined and the rotors began to spin. Else took a deep breath and as the turbine above us began to wind up, she reached out and silently took my hand, squeezing it hard and closing her eyes.

  The dropped-gut feeling of take off soon passed and we turned towards the east, flying at two-thousand feet. Below us I could see lines of roads, small gatherings of buildings and small gatherings of the undead moving around them. Rooftops marked with faded signs of SOS! and HELP! passed underneath us. Sister Mary’s community of men were just one more group of survivors who still held out hope for salvation.

  The sound of our helicopter flying overhead drew the few remaining living souls out of their holes. Tiny figures ran about waving sheets, burning torches and flashing sunlight off mirrors. Sister Mary ignored them all and we flew on to land before dark at a small airfield outside Goulbourn.

  CHAPTER 33

  Goulborn - once home to over 20,000 people - survived well into the apocalypse. Host to the New South Wales police college, the city found itself with a ready supply of cops-in-training who assisted the town fathers in keeping the infected quarantined and the uninfected under control. I’d been here twice since it all went shit, but found the martial law they used to justify punishing the few remaining civilians more dangerous than reassuring.

  The sun set over the horizon as we climbed out of the chopper and stretched our legs. A fire had burned through the dry grass of the plain recently, leaving the ground charred and shedding flakes of burnt grass like black dandruff. We were only a few kilometres from town and other than the birds coming into roost in the empty hanger we saw nothing moving.