by Wendy Reakes
They traipsed over fields and then went the rest of the way on foot. It was nearly four o’clock. The light was dimming and soon it would be dark. Thank God for the pending darkness, Bill thought. Being outside like they were, in the day, having nothing to cover their presence from the birds, was like shouting upwards and proclaiming that they were there to be taken. So far, they’d gotten lucky, and Bill was sure when the light faded, they’d be less visible. One small mercy.
At Exeter, Armoured Army trucks were clearing the roads by pushing abandoned cars over to the sides. Some were collecting the dead. Bill likened it to a scene from the apocalypse, where martial law prevailed. How many dead? he wondered. How many lost souls? Entire families wiped out.
Bill Hock had many things on his mind, but the most pressing was how his own family were coping. Not just his family, but Harry and Melanie too. Harry had been a godsend. Only thirty-six hours ago, Bill had looked upon him as a city man, soft, selfish, pampered, but he’d been wrong. Harry Fear had saved them more times than he could count, and Bill appreciated that more than words could say. As Bill worried about his own family, Harry had worried about his. He had a wife, Ellen, and three children, the twins, Matt and Gemma, and the youngest Molly. He spoke about them with such pride, but in his eyes, there was something else lurking; fear, guilt, all the things, as a father, Bill also felt.
Melanie, bless her, had taken the whole thing quite badly, but none of them had suffered such a terrible personal attack. She was wounded physically but it was the mental scars that had taken her from a vibrant, independent woman, to the demeanour of a broken little girl. Now, she was lost in herself, not daring to face up to the pressures of the abnormal events going on around her. Bill wondered if she’d ever be the same again. Perhaps when it was all over, she could recuperate somewhere. Get her mind back to where it was.
Dolly was doing well. Making out she was, anyhow. That was Dolly all over. She put everyone else first when faced with a crisis. She was strong, so capable, she knew her own mind, but there was nothing more important to her than her family. With everything that had gone on, he’d forgotten the promise he’d made to her when they’d got wed. That he would hug her regularly, just to let her know he still loved her. He’d make it up to her when they get to her sisters in Portishead, west of Bristol. They’d have a rest, relax a while, call it a holiday. He hoped her sister was all right. She was a strong girl too.
His mother, Gladys was struggling to keep up. Normally, she was a good ambler, walking miles each day, but that particular journey was telling on her. It wasn’t a jaunt around the lanes picking blackberries, it was serious, and she knew it. Earlier, he’d offered her a piggy-back, but that was the worst thing he could have suggested. Now, she wasn’t talking to him.
His children. His brave Lucy and Toby were keeping their chins up. He was a proud dad. They hadn’t complained at all. Well, not much. Even when they had to put down Arthur Reed’s dog, they had accepted it as necessary to put him out of his suffering. Those birds had damaged him good; taken one eye, and they had pecked away at his neck, leaving his ripped veins pumping blood over the deck. While Bill had soothed his children, Harry had taken the old lady’s gun and put a bullet in its head and killed it outright. Bill wondered if such action had been necessary. He would have bled out and gone peacefully anyhow.
They’d left Lucy and the dog inside the house with a blanket covering them.
Gladys, forever practical, while mourning the loss of her new-found friend had taken some food for their journey, a sliced loaf, a pack of butter, cheddar cheese and a jar of strawberry jam. All their other belongings had been left in the truck, covered over with the hardtop and stored in the barn next to a motorbike. Bill had suggested they took the bike, just so Gladys could ride it slowly and stay off her feet. That had been a bad suggestion too.
As they saw a sign for the station, Bill turned to watch them all walking behind him. Soon, they would be on a train going north and away from the dastardly, murderous birds.
Harry watched Bill up ahead. The guy was a tower of strength to them all. How many times would Harry and Melanie have died without Bill’s help? And he liked the guy a lot. He was one of those people you could always trust and rely on, no matter what.
They were at Exeter now, approaching St. David's station. He hoped they would be able to secure places on a train. It was crucial they got off the streets, and they all needed to rest, especially Melanie. He couldn't believe how she had completed the trip. A walk like that in the state she was in... And what about her foot, where the birds had plucked off her nail? She was surely in a lot of pain. They hadn't checked her wounds for a while, but Harry had a bag with fresh bandages. When they got on a train, he could look her over then. They'd already given her antibiotics from the chemist they'd looted, just as a cautionary measure to ward off any potential infection. They'd also given her strong painkillers. He just hoped they were doing the job. She hadn't said a word since the scare she'd had yesterday. Harry wondered if she was blaming him for taking her to Cornwall. If she wasn't, then she should be. He still blamed himself. She'd be home now with her parents, if he hadn't have insisted on a weekend away.
At the station, the entrances were barred to everyone except government personnel. Some people were arguing with army officials. It wasn’t just their group that wanted to get a fast train out of there. Then he thought, where was everyone else? Surely there should be hundreds… thousands of people trying to flee the south. Maybe they were all dead. Or they’d barricaded themselves in their homes. Earlier, Harry deduced that a safe place to live would be in a caravan. With their Perspex windows, the birds would be hard pressed to enter. Of course, how long could one stay shut away in a box while killer birds hovered over their home?
He imagined all the caravans on the coast around Cornwall, hundreds, thousands…and what of all the boats out there on the sea? How were they faring? And Cruise liners! How were they avoiding the birds? Maybe they weren’t attacking so far out at sea. Maybe, being on a cruise was a double blessing…Or were they now deserted floating hotels with bodies lying randomly around its decks, like ghost ships? Harry’s imagination was doing somersaults. Or was everyone thinking the same thing?
He heard a lot of shouting up ahead.
He saw a group of officials in uniform. They were army, carrying weapons, talking, nodding, deciding…
One hollered above the noise. “We’re letting ninety-five individuals through. Get in line and walk forward in an orderly fashion.”
Bill and Harry bustled the others into a single line. Harry went in the lead as Bill took up the rear. They were going to get through. Surely, there couldn’t be ninety-five people ahead of them. More like fifty.
The queue moved forward as a soldier head-counted with a clicking counting mechanism. On the wall were handwritten notices. Next train. Exeter to Manchester, stopping at Taunton and Bristol, Temple Meads.
The journey to Bristol would take ninety minutes normally, but who knew what they’d face along the way.
As the light faded, the station’s lights automatically switched on. One of the soldiers called for them to be turned off, except for the ones controlling the trains.
The lights went off.
Visibility was still good. Another thirty minutes and it would be dark.
They were getting closer to the entrance. Harry had lost count of the people ahead of them. He couldn’t remember another time he’d prayed so hard for a favorable outcome.
Melanie was leaning into him. She was exhausted. “Just a while longer, darling,” he whispered in her ear. He kissed her head as the line kept moving.
The soldier held up his hand to stop the flow. Harry’s heart missed a beat.
“Only twenty-five more and that’s it,” he called.
Harry turned and looked at Bill. They both began a frantic head count of the people up ahead. Desperation showed on both their faces. What if they only allowed half of their group in? Or just o
ne? Who would they send? Who would go without the others?
He couldn’t stand the suspense any longer.
He lost count again. Only twenty-five more, the soldier had said. They weren't going to get on.
Then: “Fifteen,” the soldier said, as he ushered along one more person. Thank god, Harry thought as he and Melanie became sixteen and seventeen. Behind them, the children were eighteen and nineteen. Gladys, twenty, Dolly, twenty-one, and Bill, twenty-two. Harry gasped as their whole group came through the gates.
Behind them, the children belonging to a family of four began to cry.
Chapter 47
As they ran outside to the garden, the group took the path leading away from the house to the back wall, where earlier Tom had rescued Ellen and Mark from certain death. They all fell against the cold stone wall as they regained their breath and their nerves. As they hid in the shadows, they looked back at the house and saw hundreds of birds of all variety, rushing like a spreading plague through the hole at the top, once an elegant glass dome. They entered in droves, searching for the blood that had tempted them all day.
For as long as she lives, Ellen would never forget that image of pure horror unleashed.
As a series of sobs burst from her mouth, contemplating their close shave with death, the group charged-off under the cover of darkness, slipping out of the garden to the open streets. Where they were once again exposed and vulnerable. At that point Ellen had to wonder if they would ever make it out alive?
Tom had been right. Only one side of the road was illuminated by streetlamps, functioning on an emergency supply of electricity. Mark buttoned up the professor’s coat to cover up his white shirt, but his collar still showed. He ducked into someone’s doorway and stripped off his shirt, putting the coat back over his bare torso.
Tom and Martin crouched behind Ellen, allowing her to lead the way. Their panting breaths were visible in the night air. Martin wore glasses, so he removed them and put them into his pocket. “Light could bounce upon the glass and give us away,” he said.
Ellen was relieved he was thinking strategically. She couldn’t have coped if he had started his whole, ‘magnificent birds’ campaign.
Running in short bursts, they got closer to the top of the hill. They saw a few people along the way. Groups of people, not families, but strangers, staying together for the sake of survival. They were all stronger in numbers. As they passed each group along the road, no one spoke. What could they say? They just looked in each other’s eyes as if to say, what the hell happened to our lives?
At the top, the group rested in darkness on the other side of a hedge bordering someone’s garden. The house behind them was eerily dark. It was hard to tell if the houses were inhabited, or if they were just empty now and the people, dead.
Ellen whispered "I know a shortcut from here. It will take us behind all the houses, but I doubt if it will be lit. That will help us, but it could also hinder us. The path is concrete, but it's not well cared for, so you will have to watch your step. I still think we should keep our heads down and do short bursts. That way we'll all stay together, and we can assess our position as we go."
They all nodded.
“From here, we’ll have to cross the road and dodge a streetlamp. Beyond that, we should be okay.”
They all nodded again.
“I’ll give the signal. Go as fast as you can to the other side.”
Ellen peered out from behind the hedge. Visibility was poor, but reaching their goal wasn’t impossible. The moon had lit the sky, but they were on the wrong side of the hill to see it. That was a blessing. They had some light, but not so much that they would be clearly visible to the birds.
She looked upwards, searching the trees, looking for birds hidden among the branches. The trees were bare of leaves, making it impossible for the birds to conceal themselves.
When she was satisfied the way forward was clear, she gestured for the group to emerge from behind the hedge and run across the road. Ellen followed, and they all gathered inside the lane that would take them further up the gorge, to home.
As they waited silently, Matt and the others hung around the sitting room. No one wanted to go into the kitchen, not with Sim and his dad lying on the floor.
Molly was in the sitting room, quietly drawing with colored pencils at the table down the far side of the room near the front entrance. Earlier she had cried for her mother to come home. Matt had soothed her, saying he would protect her, but she hadn’t believed him. ‘I want mum,’ she’d said, despite his reassurances.
Gemma and the two girls were lying on their stomachs in a circle on the floor, facing each other around a single candle. They were touching each other’s faces, rubbing a finger under another’s eyes, touching the lips of another, arranging one another’s hair over their ears. Matt thought their actions were bizarre, but he put it down to them being girls and that was what girls did when faced with a crisis: they did each other’s hair.
Matt sat in a chair next to the windows with a torch in his hand as if it were a weapon, like a silver sword. The curtains were closed, with just a small gap in the middle, allowing him to keep a look out. The most important thing was to guard everyone from the birds. He had let Sim and Franco die but he wasn’t about to let another. Not on his watch.
To pass the time he imagined himself as a brother Stark, defending ‘the wall’, being warmed by a fire in a steel basket, wearing a coat with a big fur collar, holding a weapon that would wield damage to any white walkers from the other side.
Winter’s coming, he thought just before the front door burst open and people rushed inside.
He stood up and gasped. “Mum!”
Ellen charged in as Molly raced to get to her first. Gemma sprang up from her place on the floor and careered into her as she cried tears of relief.
Matt was fixed to the spot.
He couldn’t move.
He simply couldn’t get emotional in front of Coco.
Chapter 48
Ellen went into the kitchen with the sole intention of seeing the two bodies. She crouched on the floor next to them and raised the sheet. She let it go again when she confirmed that it was indeed Simon and his father.
Simon and Matt had grown up together. Ellen had known him since he was a little boy. And his dad! She’d known him for years too. She couldn’t believe that they were both dead after suffering such a cruel fate. And Franco. She didn’t know him as well as Matt’s other friends, but to think he died while in her home…and in such a shocking way…she could hardly contemplate any of it.
Her brave children and the other kids! What on earth had gone through their minds when all of it had happened? Her little Molly? What the hell! Was she now scarred for life? But at least she had a life. They all could have been killed. Oh, God, she should have been there. She should have stayed with the children.
She heard a noise behind her. It was Mark. He was wearing a Bristol City football shirt. “Matt lent it to me,” he said.
She smiled, glad that her son had seen his way to giving a stranger a helping hand. She wouldn’t mention that Matt didn’t support Bristol anymore.
“Is the professor all right?” Ellen asked.
They were both whispering. Not to wake the dead.
“Yes. He’s a strong old boy.”
“If not a little annoying,” she chuckled.
“I know, right.” He was about to turn away.
“Mark! I want to thank you. I’m not sure I would have got here if it wasn’t for you.”
“I didn’t do anything. Locked you in the cellar remember?”
“Yes, and I’m grateful for that. I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to make good decisions.”
“Well, you’re a strong one. Like the Professor out there.”
Then Ellen crumbled. She was spent. She’d had enough. “I’m not strong. Look at me. I’m not strong.”
He stepped forward and put his arms around her. She hugged him back, willingly
, eager to feel a man’s body protecting hers.
She looked up as he looked at her parted lips, not knowing if he should kiss her.
Ellen reached up to kiss him, wrapping her arms around his neck. When they joined in the most delicious, passionate way, it felt natural, like they were supposed to be together.
Chapter 49
They took two sets of four seats. The children sat with Dolly across the aisle, while Bill watched over them from the other side, seated next to Gladys. He watched Dolly stare out of the window, devastated for the families that hadn’t managed to get on the train.
Others filled the carriages, as everyone waited patiently, all thinking their own thoughts. Directly opposite Bill, Harry held Melanie in his arms as she leaned on him, staring downward, her eyes lost and vacant. Bill watched people come and go along the platform outside the window. He wondered how long they could wait before they got attacked by birds. His nerves were on edge, but he contained them, despite being worn out from lack of sleep.
A soldier in Khaki battle dress and a beret worn on the side of his head, paraded up and down the aisle assessing the luggage. One family had two suitcases lying on a table in the center of their seats. He grabbed one and carried it down the aisle. Then he threw it off the train and onto the platform.
“Hey,” the man said. “You can’t do that.”
The soldier came back and faced him. “I can do what I like,” he said. “You were told the rules before you boarded. Only one piece of luggage per family.”
“Per person, they said,” the man argued.
“Well, I’ve just changed the rules. So, sit the fuck down.”
The man conceded. What choice did he have?
After listening to the altercation, Bill was more than a little alarmed when he heard Dolly address the soldier. “I think we can squeeze a lot more on, if we shuffle up,” she said, seeming positive he would appreciate her proposal.
