by Rick Wood
She looked back at him. Her eyes flickered yellow. Her breathing calmed, but the brutal look of a predator stayed. She looked vulnerable yet dangerous. Like a playful lion ready to pounce as soon as it was uncaged.
She didn’t move.
She looked down the barrel of the gun, then back at Gus.
He waited.
He didn’t know why he waited, but he did.
God-damn it, just shoot, get it over with.
The longer he waited, the more dead he was going to be.
If he didn’t kill her now, she would pounce on him. Without a shot to the head, that bullet would be wasted.
He gently squeezed the trigger, just enough to feel the bullet move in place, but not enough to end her life.
She looked back at him.
Her yellow pupils faded back to green.
The heavy panting of a dangerous fiend relaxed into that of a susceptible young girl.
Somehow, her features relaxed, and their animalistic qualities faded to something just about resembling human.
He didn’t shoot.
He urged himself to, but he didn’t.
It just didn’t feel right.
He lowered his gun.
He didn’t know why, but he lowered his gun.
She didn’t change.
She had the blood of zombies dripping from her mouth. Just a speck of undead blood splashed into someone’s mouth would be enough – Gus had seen it turn a mild-mannered human into a delirious, ravenous creature within the blink of an eye.
He had seen it happen on…
No.
Can’t think about that now.
He had been saved. He didn’t know why, but he had been saved.
But she hadn’t turned.
She had taken the blood of a zombie – tons of it – and she was still standing.
How?
I wonder…
He considered.
She talked in ape-like grunts. She overpowered those zombies. She was able to do things that no other human could.
She could survive zombie blood dripping from her lips.
Could it possible for someone to be immune?
But Sadie wasn’t immune.
Her eyes had changed to the yellow of a zombie. She was faster than a human could be. Stronger, also.
She must be infected.
But again, that didn’t make sense.
She was not just stronger and quicker than a human – she was stronger and quicker than the zombies. How could she be infected when her abilities outmatched them?
Could she be something else?
It doesn’t make any sense…
“What?” Donny asked, interrupting Gus’s thoughts. “What is it?”
Gus didn’t answer.
Sadie edged toward him, looking up at him, like a pet proving to its owner that it had done a good job.
She rubbed her head against his leg. It left a blood patch, and Gus didn’t mind – but he was not used to affection, however disordered its form was.
“Get your shit together,” Gus told them. “We leave as soon as it’s light.”
He stuck his gun in the back of his belt and strode toward the windows, still shaking his head in disbelief at what he may have just discovered.
14
As it turned out, a cottage full of permanently dead zombies was the perfect deterrent for any further zombies. A miraculously magnificent disguise in a way, really – disguise yourself as the one thing they don’t seem to eat.
After the initial shock of Sadie’s abilities had set in, Gus had decided they needed to make contingency plans for the night. Dark had descended and, however much he hated delaying his mission, he knew there was no way they could travel safely. He needed to gather himself, rethink their strategy, figure out a possible transport – all whilst protecting themselves from the dangers that dark brought. With the speed they can sprint at, a zombie could approach you from shadows and be on you before you realised you smelt something funny.
The decision, and a genius one Gus considered it to be, was to use the zombie bodies as a fort within the cottage. To pile them upon each other against the walls, covering the smashed windows and the door that had been broken to pieces. It took them an hour, but they did it. Sadie used her peculiarly impressive strength – muscle power far beyond Gus’s – to help him pile them.
Donny, with his one arm still hanging loosely in a bandage, attempted to help by straightening them once they had been lifted into position. He pushed and prodded, careful not to touch any of their rotting skin, until he considered them balanced enough to not fall.
In truth, Donny’s presence had been useless, and more of a burden than anything else. But if it made him feel like there was a point to his meaningless existence, then Gus let him satisfy himself.
The whole time, in the back of his mind, was the face of a little girl trapped in the heart of the capital city.
God knows if she was even still alive.
Once finished, they all moved silently into a position for the night. Donny leant against a broken armchair, his head drooping as he fell almost immediately into a doze.
It was strange, really. Gus knew that Eugene would want contact and updates on the progress of his daughter. But why consider Donny to be the best person to do this?
Maybe Donny was the only person who would agree.
This was a suicide mission, after all. Gus intended to save that child, but he did not intend to return himself.
Once the mission was over.
Once he had taken that small hand in his, dragged her out of the genocidal pit of London, and given her to Donny and Sadie to return to her father, he was done.
He would find a bottle of scotch. Use the antidepressants held secretively within his inside jacket pocket. Maybe some tranquilisers, if they passed a vet or a pharmacy. He would place everything he had on his tongue, close his eyes, and lift his drink to the world. Toast the new United Kingdom of damnation. Cheerio to hell.
He would join his family. Hug them as they ran into his open arms.
Or it would all end. And, if he had to be truly honest with himself, that’s the version of death that he expected.
Either way, it was the perfect solution.
The perfect goodbye.
Sadie took her place on the floor to sleep. Whilst he and Donny had searched out an area without blood stains, she had not been bothered. She padded around like a cat finding the right position, then flopped onto her side in a bit patch of blood and curled up into a ball.
She closed her eyes and began twitching within seconds.
That left Gus alone with his thoughts.
The whole time, he could not take his eyes off her.
What she was, was completely unprecedented.
If he was correct in his assumption, that is.
But if he was…
The solution. The end of the apocalypse. Salvation.
For everyone else, anyway.
The way out.
He could be wrong. She could be something else. Something far more dangerous.
Though he doubted it.
The way she had dealt with the attacking horde. The speed, the skill, the strength. It had been remarkable. It wasn’t within the capability of a young woman.
She must be eighteen, nineteen years old. Twenty at most.
She was thin. Scrawny. Her skin clung to her bones.
There was no muscle on her.
She was pale. Sharp teeth. And whilst she was fighting, her eyes had turned from green to yellow.
She looks like one of them.
Yet she had moved with speed and fought with muscle that had outdone them.
No matter how many times he reminded himself of that, it still made no sense.
He decided not to allow himself to become complacent. He didn’t allow himself to lose his cautious nature.
He kept his eyes open all night, fixed on her body, watching her intently as she slept soundly on the rough f
loor.
Just in case.
Minus One Day Two Hours
15
“So please,” Donny insisted with an irrefutable air of scepticism, “tell me what exactly it is I am supposed to do.”
Gus exhaled.
Monkeys were easier to train.
“You go down this hill,” Gus spoke as slowly and patronisingly as he could manage, “and you go to the boot of the car we were driving, and you put as many guns as you can into this bag, kindly donated by Sadie.”
Gus gave a nod to Sadie standing beside him, holding a grubby, torn sack that was once a designer sports bag, and now smelt like it was what she had been using to defecate in.
She grinned and nodded eagerly. As if she understood. Honestly, Gus reckoned she was probably just pleased to be part of it.
“Okay, yes, well,” Donny stuttered, “that part I get. You know, the whole, get the guns, put them in the bag part, I get that, yes.”
He raised his one good hand with an open palm, in a gesture that indicated to wait for his mind to form his incoherent thoughts into clear, dictated words.
“The thing is,” he continued, “I just do not like the whole part where the motorway is completely swarming with infected!”
With a frantic edge to the rising tone of his sentence, he turned and waved his arm at the view below them.
Standing atop of the hill that overlooked the motorway, he indicated past the frighteningly steep drop toward where the upturned Ferrari was. Its wheels had fallen off somewhere in the process, the glass on its mirrors had been smashed in, and smoke still sauntered from the engine into the cool morning air.
And, oh yeah, it was surrounded by a horde of flesh-eating zombies.
“That’s where this comes in,” Gus declared, lifting his sniper rifle.
“Yeah, I still don’t quite get where you got that.”
Gus exhaled an impatient sigh. It was like talking to a petulant child.
No, a petulant child would understand better. At least their petulance would be based on sound reason, rather than dumb misunderstandings.
“I left it at a tree,” Gus growled impatiently. “Donny, we ain’t got long to do this. Not being funny, but there is a soddin’ girl in London whose time is running out pretty damn fast.”
“Well, I am not being funny, but why don’t you be the one who runs down and gets the weapons!”
“Can you shoot a zombie with a sniper rifle from this distance?”
Donny looked over his shoulder at the motorway, at least five hundred yards away. Then looked back at Gus.
“Why can’t she do it?” Donny asked, pointing at Sadie.
“Because she doesn’t understand me well enough to know what I’m talking about.”
Gus smiled sarcastically at Sadie. She beamed back like a proud kitten.
“Do we really need these weapons?”
“For fuck’s sake, I am a dead shot with the sniper, just do it.”
“Thing is though, Gus – do you even care if I don’t survive?”
Gus thought about it.
Did he?
Honestly?
“Do it, or I shoot you with the sniper rifle.”
Gus put the rifle together and placed it on his mount, assembling it with the expertise one only gets with sufficient combat experience. He peered through the visor, aiming at one of the zombies wandering aimlessly around the burnt-out wreckages of the road, just wanting something to chase after, wanting something to hunt.
He pulled the trigger, tagging the undead lurker in the head with pin point precision.
He twisted his head to Donny.
“Satisfied?”
Donny stared at the zombies milling around their fallen comrade, twisting their heads back and forth in a clueless attempt to locate the source of the quick shot through the air.
Donny hesitated again.
Gus has had enough.
He pushed out his one good leg, knocking into Donny’s calf, sending him tumbling down the steep drop. Donny ended up spinning down the slope, knocking against tufts of grass and unfortunately placed rocks.
When he got to the ground, he raised his head groggily, readjusting his vision. As he stared above him, he saw a zombie looming over him, thick goops of saliva dripping from its chin as it prepared itself for a satisfying meal.
Donny screamed. He closed his eyes tight, readying himself for impact.
He waited.
And waited.
When he finally opened his eyes, he saw the zombie’s corpse lying beside him, an exploded head lavishly decorating the road.
He looked up at the top of the hill where Gus was perched.
The guy was a dick head, but he was a good shot.
Donny pushed himself to his feet, staring at the multiple undead attackers now running toward him from all angles.
He took a deep breath in and ran.
16
Gus took out another bullet, placed it in position, and loaded it.
He pulled the trigger, sending the bullet into the head of another pathetic piece of walking butcher meat.
He lifted his hand out and Sadie placed another bullet in his palm, which he loaded in rapid speed, firing another shot that landed perfectly in the skull of a zombie charging at the wuss edging forward.
“Run, you cocksucker, run,” Gus snarled. As quick and accurate as he was, if Donny didn’t run to the car, the speed at which the zombies could run would mean they’d descend on him at a speed even he couldn’t match.
Gus held out his hand and Sadie withdrew another bullet from the box, placing it in his palm with a large grin. She seemed genuinely elated to be contributing to the mission at hand.
She reminded him so much of his daughter.
When he’d be training in the garden, or playing football with his nephew, or painting.
He had always loved to paint.
She would stand there for hours beside him, holding out his palette. Every time he needed to dip his brush in she would lift it out, allow him to dip the brush, then withdraw it again
He would say, “Thank you, darling.”
Then she would glow. She would be so happy to be contributing, to be helping.
He’d never asked her. Never would have even suggested it. He wished she’d be off playing with dolls – but dolls weren’t her kind of thing. She was too much of a ‘boss’ for that. She would run rings around the lads at on the school football team, tell them what to do, beat up the bullies, show them who was in charge.
But when it came to a Saturday afternoon in, she took no greater pleasure than watching him paint for hours, helping in any way she could. Staring at him with her adoring eyes, marvelling as the picture took place.
It was his favourite thing to do.
It was his favourite memory.
And looking at Sadie next to him, handing him his bullet, it was just like–
Fuck.
He’d slowed down.
He’d stopped firing so fast.
The zombies.
They were gathering around Donny. They were coming in too fast. They were…
You imbecile.
Those were faded memories.
More than faded.
Stained. Blood-soaked. Ripped up, torn, and thrown into the wind. Left to rot. Left to turn to ash. Left to do whatever the hell they wanted to.
Just so long as he didn’t think of them.
He increased his speed. He loaded even quicker, shooting at an accelerated pace.
But Donny needed to run. If Donny didn’t run it would be absolutely pointless.
“Fuck’s sake, man,” Gus muttered to himself. “Run.”
As if somehow hearing his urging across the wind, Donny threw his legs forward and, looking like a headless chicken, he ran.
He flinched and jumped as zombies went down either side of him.
But Gus just kept on dispatching the bastards.
More and more were approaching. Whether it was the sound
of Donny’s feet, his shrieking, or just the smell of a sweaty night on dirty clothes, they were alerted to his presence.
No matter.
Gus could handle them.
Shoot, reload. Shoot, reload. Shoot, reload.
Sadie kept handing him the bullets, he kept exploding their heads to messy, bloody gunk, just before their snapping teeth managed to sink into the flesh of the helpless, useless running turd below.
Donny made it to the car.
Gus didn’t jump for joy. He knew he had a way to go yet.
Shoot, reload. Shoot, reload. Shoot, reload.
Focus.
Don’t think about her.
Don’t think about my dead daughter.
Don’t picture her face.
Her teary face.
Her sweet, sweet face.
Shoot, reload. Shoot, reload. Shoot, reload.
Donny plunged his hands into the boot, shovelling the weapons into the bag. It looked as if he was doing all he could to ignore the snarls around him. He had a complete three-hundred-and-sixty-degree circle of oncoming attackers, but he was focussing on his job.
He trusted Gus.
Gus found the concept laughable.
Someone trusting him.
Him.
The man who let his own family…
Shoot, reload. Shoot, reload. Shoot–
Gus held out his hand. He waited. He did not feel the indent of the bullet in his palm.
“Come on, Sadie!” he instructed, watching through his scope as Donny began to panic.
The bullet was not placed in his hand.
He turned his expectant eyes to Sadie, who looked back at him red-faced.
“What have you done?”
Sadie buried her face in her arms, refusing to look up, inconsolable.
Gus looked for the box of cartridges.
It was open. On its side.
Empty.
Bullets danced down the slope in every direction.
All of them, gone.
Dropped.
Gus bowed his head.
Shit.
17
Keep your head down.
That’s what Donny kept telling himself.
Keep his head down.
