by Stevens, GJ
Instead, I watched as with a satisfied smile she scooped up the bag at my feet and took slow steps back. I watched as my chance to get the answers walked out of reach.
“What are they doing at the hospital?” I blurted out.
“Collecting samples,” she replied, still taking steps.
“Samples of what?” I said, the words barely voiced.
“Children who've been exposed to the organism,” she said, the bag raising through my vision.
That word. The one Toni had used.
“Why children?” I asked, even though I didn’t want to know the answer.
She didn’t reply; instead, took a step back.
“Why children?” I repeated, looking up and raising my voice.
“Because they’re the future. Right? And they make the best ho…” The stranger’s words were blocked out by sound of a vehicle horn at our backs and Alex’s shout.
“Get down.”
I turned to my right as movement triggered in my peripheral vision and I saw a ragged figure heading towards us, a sharp breeze sending its stench our way for the first time.
Without thought I leapt forward to shove the stranger to the road just as the air lit with a gunshot at our backs.
95
She stepped to the side and I stumbled to my knees, her eyes lit with a fire, pivoting between the decaying body settling at our side and me on the ground.
“Don’t go to her,” she said. “It’s what she’s wanted all along.” She turned and ran, her feet padding to the ground as I climbed to my feet but not chasing after.
I watched, pushing down the questions in my head; I knew where I had to get answers from now.
As I watched her race away down the road, I knew I’d done my job, fulfilled my role. I’d explored my passion to expose wrong and those in authority abusing their positions, but it hurt no less to know such a big part of my life had been false. To know what I’d given, tried to give, had been thrown away.
I questioned if there had been signs of Toni’s disfunction. We’d both come close to crossing the line and after that I’d put a stop to it, but before then had my blind feelings put her behaviour down to quirks of personality? I wondered if Hitler’s companions had done the same?
I tried to stop my breath flinching at the comparison.
I turned and my gaze fell on Alex at the sound of her trainers on the rungs of the ladder. A smile lifted my lips as I saw her stood on top of the van with her hand shielding her eyes from the bright morning as she peered along the blocked road.
“Can we make it?” I said, calling toward the roof as I walked back, knowing one way or another I was getting through the mess.
She didn't reply and I imagined the thoughts spread across her features. I imagined her scratching her head as I walked along the side of the van, my gaze elsewhere other than the movement in the coach frenzying as I drew nearer.
“Jess,” I heard Alex call as I approached the coach, only giving the rattle of the door the barest notice and ignoring the slight parting of the clear plastic as the short bodies clambered to be the first to break through; the first to pierce my flesh. The first to fill themselves with me.
I paid more attention to the paint scraped down its side, the buckled panels and black scuffs running the white length until blocked by the back of the truck. I listened, tried to sense beyond the canvas and figure out what lay behind the musty green cover. What made the truck rock with a gentle movement, but didn’t cause the canvas to bulge with hands reaching out?
I heard Alex’s steps down the ladder, her feet landing on the road. I lifted my hand behind me, palm out to stop her from getting any closer. When I could no longer hear her steps along the road, I unpicked the string ties with my good fingers, not stopping to take a deep breath as I lifted the musty material.
It was dark inside, but nothing came from where I couldn’t see. No fingers jumped out, clawing for the softness of my eyes.
To Alex’s soft calls for me to stop, I undid enough ties so I could fit through and I climbed with the awkwardness of using only one hand, but I’d made it into the back still alive. Unbitten.
Welcoming the musty air, I blinked, testing my vision with each opening. Four rows of seats lined the sides and centre, growing clearer in my vision with each flutter of my lids. They were empty, but the space between was not. Instead, boxes stacked high lined the gaps between where soldiers should have sat.
I climbed to the nearest long rectangular box; plastic perhaps, but I couldn’t be sure with my thoughts elsewhere and beads of sweat rolling down my forehead as the morning sun trapped under the canvas.
I headed forward, sliding on my knees with my gaze fixed on the edge of light toward the front.
Air pulled sharp between my teeth, forcing myself steady with both hands as my knee found the space between the next row. I wouldn’t let it slow me as I bridged the gap and my hand soon grabbed the flap of canvas I hoped covered the window to the cab.
Reaching out with my good hand, I told myself I’d seen the worst. I tried to prepare for the horror I guessed moved beyond the thin fabric, beyond the glass on the other side. I told myself the worst I could see was traffic lined up, blocking the road, ending our path and sending us for hours around another way. Blood and guts were nothing new. No injury could top what had already burnt into my dreams.
I took a deep breath before lifting the fabric, but when a pale pink light flashed my eyes shut, I’d seen enough to regret not bringing the gun.
96
Flinching away, I lost my footing, but it wasn’t the desperate sight through the glass that sent me back, but the clawed hand shooting out to block my view, the hand appearing from somewhere in the cab.
Instinct forced my eyes wide, sending both hands to grasp for something to steady myself on. Stars shot across my view as pain leapt up my right arm when my puffed grip took hold of a cold metal upright.
I couldn’t concentrate on the pain; instead, I watched the clawed hand circle as it felt for flesh, but only wafted the stench of death.
Blinking, I tried to clear the spots of light from my swimming view whilst attempting to steady myself, despite having already fallen to the floor between two plastic crates.
With my back crunching into the cubes of glass and despite my vision still stained with the horror I’d seen through the blood-smeared windscreen, I scrabbled to turn and raised myself up high, leaning back to avoid the arm which was still the only part of the creature that had come through.
I backed up, turned, forcing my trainers to kick out at the stiff canvas, breath ran away, darkness descending as a creature fell through the canvas partition.
I screamed. I couldn’t see its advance, but the sound of its crawl was as clear as if I could, as were the scratching fingers as it scrabbled over the canvas seat and the trickle of the glass to the floor as it followed my journey.
Lashing out at the canvas I screamed again, desperate to find where I’d entered and could get back to safety, but everywhere I hit stayed stiff against my effort. The creature was getting so close, the stench of death I would never get used to filling my lungs, bile rising as I coughed between gasps of air.
Amid my panic I saw the faces of my parents. I saw colleagues in their buildings around the world; the buildings they thought would keep them safe with the twenty-four-hour security guards and thick concrete walls.
How wrong they were.
The army couldn’t protect us from these creatures. Most of them were the enlisted.
I’d yet to see a battle where we had won. Where the mental jar of the creature’s appearance didn’t cause us to pause. Didn’t stop us from striking out. Didn’t prevent wasting those first precious moments.
They were easy to defend against. If only you knew you had to protect yourself. If only you didn’t stand there transfixed, eyes wide, trying to figure out if the creature from so many horror movies was real and how it could exist.
Their main advantage wa
s forcing us to kill our friends and family if we wanted to survive. If only people knew they were already long dead.
Choking down a deep breath, I balled my fist, knowing it would be of little use, but at least I would go down trying.
Light came from the front of the truck. A second creature falling through and lifting the flap, but I barely took notice as I saw the first soldier with half his face covered in blood nearly on me.
Throwing myself back against the canvas in a vain hope it would give way, to my surprise it did and I could feel myself tumbling out in the cold air as I hit the road, my left foot taking the brunt of the force.
Alex was by my side, helping me up sooner than I’d expected, sitting me with my back to the hard metal of the truck.
“Can you stand?” she said, the concern in her voice secondary only to her urgency.
I nodded, letting her help me up as I tested pressure on my left foot. I could walk, but only at a slow pace. I followed Alex’s gaze to the coach and the heads butting against the glass as we passed, their touch leaving bloody shadows.
So many times I flinched against the pressure, expecting the glass to spray out, forcing us to run for our lives again. Instead, the creatures moved along the inside of the bus not fighting each other, but bumped together like they took no notice of their surroundings other than the feast outside.
Arriving at the coach’s flimsy doors, Alex tightened her grip as she hurried me past. What was she afraid I would do?
“Can we get through?” she said, jumping into the driver’s seat of the van after letting me down softly on the other.
I stared on through the windscreen. For a few moments I’d forgotten what I’d seen as I peered through the truck’s blood-dripping glass. The vision came back in that instant as clear as if still in the moment.
“Yes. We just need to push it out of the way,” I said nodding, my absent gaze fixed somewhere unimportant, but snapped back into focus when the doors of the coach cracked apart.
The plastic pushed out under the pressure and the creatures who’d lived such short lives fell to the ground, faces hitting the road, but not flinching, their stares never leaving us.
One by one they struggled to rise back to their feet, despite their similar-aged companions falling to their backs as they stepped off the coach to tenderise the flesh of the new step.
After Alex checked she'd locked the doors and the windows were closed, the engine roared to life and we rolled forward. I watched her expression harden, her lids tightened together and mouth bunching as each of the black-veined faces disappeared below the view, one by one, until our bumper nudged against the back of the truck.
She looked at me and I turned her way, trying to ignore the faces past her which were barely tall enough to reach the window, their hands leaving bloody marks down the glass.
I nodded, as she revved the engine hard before slowly letting out the clutch.
We didn’t move despite the smoke soon billowing from the engine, the smell of burning plastic clawing inside our noses.
I coughed, Alex copying my action despite her best effort, but we knew to open the windows would have greater consequences.
I could see she was about to let up when we moved forward. Slow at first, but progress had started. We were pushing against the weight of the truck.
I closed my eyes, trying to ignore what would happen on the other side as we rolled, not wanting to see its great mass rise and fall as we pushed on, relentless.
Opening my eyes, I saw Alex steering us close to the coach to despatch the creatures following, heads crushing as the pressure grew too much.
I closed my eyes for a second time to the sound of cracking bone, the faces gone from the window, nausea drawing up from my throat.
On hearing Alex’s intake of breath, I knew the time had come to open my eyes and see the other side, but even as we edged forward I struggled to bring myself to face the view again, despite knowing from her quickening breath Alex had taken in the full horror.
97
I heard her exclamation as the roar of the engine slowed. I opened my eyes and tried to force myself to continue drawing in air. With the truck still at our bumper we knew the road was somewhere underneath, the black tarmac through both side windows hidden beneath the blanket of bodies, none with a head intact.
Resting my pained hand on top of Alex’s, together we pushed the stick back into gear. I held on as she forced the truck clear, watching the line of water down her face glint in the low sun.
Moving my hand to her shoulder, I gripped tight, my gaze fixed on her face while she turned the wheel to steer clear of the truck. I forced my eyes to stay open as we winced with each rise and fall, each spin of the wheels as they lost traction for a moment.
We stopped when the ride smoothed out, lingering for a long while, not saying a word. She knew without asking I wouldn’t let us drive away. She knew I wouldn’t leave these people alone without making a record, without putting their horrific deaths to some good.
As Alex filmed out of the open back doors, I forced myself to look at every body and stare at their erased identities. I lingered on flesh turned to pulp from the finger-sized bullets, the empty brass casings littering where the van rested.
With the final shot panning along the side of the road, the camera tracing the river of blood long-dried in the sun, we pulled the doors up as the first of the young creatures peered around from where we’d left them. We drove away as they stumbled to get a footing on the carpet of the dead.
Neither of us talked as the van wound its way around the thin country roads. Neither of us spoke as we travelled, barely making a detour in the hour. We skirted around roadblocks, through fields on either side. We weren’t the first; instead, following paths smashed through stone walls but from the other way. We were the only ones who seemed to want to go in this direction.
The going was slow, but we weren’t in a hurry. Staring across the horizon kept the bodies of the dead repeating over, punctuated only by glances to the Sat Nav and the dot on the white road, the number in the corner ever decreasing.
As the number fell below five miles, we saw the metal fence cutting across our view, stretching out across the road to curve inward as far as we could see either side.
For a moment I thought we might have headed in the wrong direction, but could see no other signs that somehow we’d ended back at where we’d started.
“Left or right?” Alex said, her voice devoid of energy.
Somehow I raised a smile. I’d half expected her to turn the van around.
“You choose. It won’t be long now.”
With barely a pause, she manhandled the wheel to climb up the shallow grass bank to the left.
“What happens when you’ve got what you need?” she said, her eyes fixed forward like mine to follow the sweeping metal, tracing the deep ruts compressing the stony mud.
I didn’t hold back my reply for any reason other than I didn’t know. I hadn’t considered a next step. I still didn’t want to think of what would happen next.
I hadn’t thought I would survive last night without another dose of Toni’s medicine. I didn’t know if I would survive the next. Now wasn’t the time to think any deeper.
I’d spotted the end of the fence, a panel leaning against the side of an olive drab flat-bed truck.
I nodded towards the army vehicle and twisted in my seat to face Alex. She stared forward.
I expected the body to rise from its lean against the fence.
Alex didn’t slow. She’d expected it too, but neither of us expected the call from the soldier’s mouth, the hasty reach for the rifle. Neither of us expected another to appear around the side, fingers pulling up his trousers’ fly in a hurry as he searched for a weapon and found it close at hand.
Alex slowed only at the soldier’s demand, her breath remaining calm as I raised my hands to the air.
Alex did the same, but neither of us expected the shot which rocked the van, slammi
ng hard, sending shattered dark plastic shards high in to the air as it hit the engine’s grill.
98
They were on us before we had time to flinch. The doors pulled wide and they dragged us to the ground to the shouts I could barely make out for their volume. The soldiers seemed to call for an answer, expecting us to say something.
I couldn’t understand the question, their energy masking the words. I kept quiet whilst trying to protect my hand.
The soldier on me pushed me to the side, rolling me around so I could see the barrel of the rifle in my face. His voice blared, spit raining down as he shouted with his view fixed to my left eye then my right.
“Clear,” came a strong call from the other side of the van, but I could hear the question in his tone.
“Clear,” the guy said, still leaning over me, but the furrowed forehead told me he wasn’t sure. His heavy brows covered most of his bright blue eyes.
Then I got it. Although we’d been in the van and we’d slowed when asked, they couldn’t be sure we were still human.
Had they yet to experience the life-changing encounter and was it disappointment I read in his face?
“I’m okay,” I said with a timid voice, trembling as I guarded my hand.
His brow evened out, his expression falling as he stood upright to draw the long gun around the horizon.
“Clear,” he called again, and I heard Alex’s voice, her hand reaching down to help me from the ground.
“I’d keep your voice down,” Alex said in a light tone, her brow low as she turned to look me up and down. As she did, her mouth formed silent words.
I nodded, confirming I was fine.
“What do you know?” said the soldier, rounding on us, double taking as Alex moved to block his path, raising her head high like a strutting stag.
I smiled within, holding back a flutter of laughter rising from my chest as she drew herself up to protect me.
