Surviving The Evacuation (Book 9): Ireland

by Tayell, Frank

  “I’m not saying that we should let her live,” Colm said. “But right now, we’re not in a position to make that decision. We can’t kill her without knowing where she is. Where would you go? Where would you look? How long would you search?”

  “You’re saying we’re not going to do anything?” Dean asked.

  “No,” Kim said. “He’s saying, we’re saying, that we have to do something, but it’ll be dark in an hour. If we leave now, and row to the shore, we’ll arrive at dusk. We’ll have to wait until dawn before we can act. We might as well spend the night here, and that will give us time to work out precisely where we’re going and what we’re going to do.”

  “Okay, but what’s that?” Dean asked. He looked at Colm, at Kim, and then at me. None us had an answer.

  “I think that she’s asleep more than she’s unconscious,” Siobhan said. “It’s a fine distinction, but an important one.”

  Colm, Kim, and I had left Dean and Lena on guard, and gone inside to discuss the problem with Siobhan.

  “Is it safe leaving Dean out there on his own,” I asked. “He won’t try to go ashore?”

  “He might, but Lena will stop him,” Colm said. “He’s right, though. We do need to do something.”

  “What are the options?” Siobhan asked. “We’ve got enough fuel to make ten miles. That won’t get us very far.”

  “To the Ards Peninsula,” Colm said. “And no further. There’re the towns of Bangor and Newtownards, and a score of villages. There’d be plenty of houses to search for food, but I don’t think we’d find much. The only way out of the peninsula, at least by land, brings you to the eastern edge of Belfast. When people fled the city, I’m sure plenty would have gone that way. No, we won’t find much.”

  “Did you find anything at the harbour?” I asked.

  “No, nor at the George Best Airport,” Colm said. “They’d been picked clean, except the parts that were ruins. A fire had ripped through a couple of the hangars. The structure’s sound, but it’s skeletons inside. People and vehicles. People came here, hoping there would be a way out, and then they stayed because they had nowhere else to go. There was no fuel except what we’ve got in the launch, and that won’t get us far.”

  “It won’t get us far enough,” Siobhan said. “We might find a house with food, but what do we do if we don’t? What do we do when it’s gone? Kallie won’t be able to walk for weeks, and it’ll be longer before she’ll be able to walk any great distance. The children won’t be able to get much further, and of course, on the peninsula, there’s nowhere to walk but Belfast.”

  “It would get us out of immediate danger,” I said. “We could… we could… I don’t know. We could look for bikes. Make a trailer for Kallie, if we couldn’t find one. We could cycle…” I trailed off. “Where?”

  “Remember what the roads were like,” Kim said. “Remember south of the Shannon? We could spend days looking for bikes, only to be forced to ditch them after a few hours. Except we couldn’t ditch them, because Kallie can’t walk.”

  “And where would we go?” Siobhan asked. “Colm started in Belfast, I started near Cork. Mark was in Dublin and he ended up in Malin Head. I won’t say that we went everywhere. We didn’t see every corner of the island, but until this morning I thought this ship was the safest we’d been in months.”

  “There’s the Aran Islands,” Colm said. “There’s that ship in the Shannon Estuary. That mansion, Elysium, if we could clear it of the undead. We just won’t ever get there. Not now. Not on foot with Kallie and the children. So we’re back to the question. If we can’t leave, what can we do? Stay here, hope that the people from Anglesey return to Belfast?”

  “I’m afraid we can’t,” Siobhan said. “There’s only two days of food left.”

  “That little?” I asked.

  “We didn’t find much on our way here,” Siobhan said.

  “I should have kept better track,” I said. “No food? Talk about rock and a hard place.”

  “It’s not as bad as that,” Kim said. “We need food and fuel. That’s more or less the same problem as we had before Kempton shot Kallie. Where do we find fuel? Well, our best option is the international airport. We need to find bikes, cycle there, bring it back. The fuel was stored in tankers, wasn’t it? And the plan was to drive those to the runway, load the plane, then drive off. As long as they didn’t burn what they didn’t use, there should be a tanker with a charged battery and fuel in its tank on the runway itself. We could get to the airport and back in two days. Three at the outside.”

  “But it’s aviation fuel,” I said. “And so we’re going to need some time to experiment before we pour it into the launch’s tank.”

  “And we’d have a tanker’s engine in which to test it,” Kim said.

  “Assuming we can drive it back,” Colm said. “I don’t know what the city is like, but you saw the harbour, we’re not going to get close. We’d have to drive it somewhere up the coast.”

  “Well, how about somewhere on the Ards Peninsula?” Kim said. “Ten miles is ten miles, and it might be far enough to keep everyone else safe.”

  “The real problem is still food,” Siobhan said. “If there’s any delay, if there’s no fuel in the tanker, or no tanker at the airport, or there’s too many zombies on the runway, or no route back, or anything else, the children will starve. It’s better to do something than nothing, but it’s such a long shot.”

  “Fine,” Kim said. “Then what we need, what we really need, is enough food for a couple of weeks. Well, we know where we’ll find it: the zoo.”

  “But Kempton’s there,” Colm said.

  “She’s not,” Kim said. “Not all the time. When we went there, there was no sign of any barricades or cooking fires, no discarded clothing or other rubbish. There was a bandage in the bin, but nothing else. The zoo isn’t her lair, so it’s reasonable to assume that she’ll leave there tonight. She’ll go home, wherever that is. So if we get to the zoo before her, we can get the food, and those antibiotics, and we can get it back here before she turns up.”

  “Or we lie in wait,” Colm said. “We wait for her, and kill her. Not for vengeance,” he added, “but because she might come looking for us.”

  “I’m not sure,” Siobhan said.

  “If we see her, we’ll have to kill her,” Kim said. “We can’t try to arrest her.”

  “I know,” Siobhan said. “And that wasn’t what I meant, I don’t know if it’s worth the time. If we leave the ship before dawn, we could be at the zoo before the sun’s fully risen. Colm and I could be halfway to the airport by noon. If we wait for her and she doesn’t come back, it’s half a day wasted. If she followed us back here, and attacks while we’re away. Well…” She shrugged. It wasn’t a happy gesture. Silence settled as we mulled the options over.

  “Any ideas where her lair might be?” I asked.

  “Me?” Colm asked.

  “Did she have an office here? You said she funded your gym.”

  “She was the principal donor to the interfaith charity that funded the gym,” Colm said. “About ninety percent of our funding came from her, but it went directly to the bishop. To be precise, it went to his assistant. I suppose he’d have an address or contact, but that’d be an accountants or law firm.”

  “And it would be stored digitally,” Siobhan said.

  “You can’t think of anywhere?” I asked.

  “Not really,” Colm said. “She funded a soup kitchen on the Donegal Road. A few of my regulars came from there, and I sent of my lads there from time to time. They didn’t have a computer; too great a chance it might be stolen. The manager had an old-fashioned address book. I doubt that the contact details would lead us to Kempton’s private home. It might lead us to somewhere that leads us to somewhere.”

  “And we don’t have time for that,” Siobhan said.

  “It’d be pointless anyway,” Kim said. “We’re not looking for her home. We’re looking for somewhere like the house in Pallasken
ry. A place built to survive the apocalypse, not a place for a billionaire to live when she was in the city.”

  “So we’re back to the zoo,” Siobhan said. “And then the airport. Who’s going?”

  “All four of us to the zoo,” I said. “Four packs full of food would keep us going for two weeks.”

  “And then Colm, Siobhan, and I will go to the airport,” Kim said. “Sorry, Bill, but speed will be of the essence, on bike or foot—”

  “I know,” I said. “And one of us needs to stay here.”

  “And if we don’t get back—” Siobhan began.

  “Let me worry about that,” I said.

  “Dean wasn’t happy,” I said to Kim as we walked the deck at sunset, our eyes on the shore. The young man had been triply furious: first that we weren’t doing anything until dawn, second that he wasn’t coming with us to the zoo, and third that he wasn’t going to the airport, either.

  “It’s Lena I’d watch out for,” Kim said. “She’s a driven woman, and I don’t know who’s behind the wheel. They think they want vengeance, but what they want is for none of this to have happened. Not just Kallie being shot, but the outbreak, and the months since. You can see the stress building up behind their eyes. It’s ready to burst through. I think Lena will be the first to erupt, so watch her.”

  “Is there another way?” I asked. “Is there something we’re missing?”

  “Not really,” Kim said. “This isn’t like when we went after Barrett. We knew where she was. If we knew where Kempton was, then I’d say we could find her and kill her, or at least try to contain her. We don’t know. I’ve twenty rounds left for my rifle. Eight for the SA80, and two magazines for the MP5. What about your pistol?”

  I had to eject the magazine and count them. “Eleven.”

  “Not enough for an ambush,” she said. “You remember how Pallaskenry, The New World, and Elysium all had caches of weapons and ammo? That’s what Kempton must have here in Belfast. We’d need a small army to go up against her. No, I can’t think of another way to do this, but what we’re planning could so easily go wrong. The more I think about it, the fewer the chances I can see for it to go right.”

  “Best not think about it, then,” I said.

  “I’m trying, but I really thought we’d found a moment of safety here,” she said. “But nowhere is safe, is it? And it never will be.”

  Chapter 21 - Belfast

  12th October, Day 214

  It can all change in a moment, but sometimes that moment lasts all day.

  The luminous dial showed it was just after three a.m. when I hauled myself over the side of the ship. It was my second watch in as many days, and had come from one of the shipping containers. The strap was almost too small. The smiling cartoon character looked more like a raven than a mouse in that dim glow. I hoped it wasn’t an omen, but I saw them everywhere after a sleepless night.

  I slipped into my seat and stowed the crowbar by my feet. It had replaced the cutlass, but the familiarity of the weapon wasn’t as reassuring as on other days. Despite my poor aim, I’d have preferred the submachine gun that Siobhan carried.

  The crowbar and watches had been found during our search for bicycles among the contents of the containers. We’d not found any bikes. Neither Colm nor Kim could recall having seen any among the ruins in the harbour. That meant our journey back to the zoo would be on foot, and that meant we might not get there before Kempton. Of course, there was a chance of that regardless of how we travelled, but not finding bicycles was another omen portending failure for a desperate gamble that was our only hope for survival.

  The oars splashed softly as we rowed away from the dark ship towards an equally dark shore. I found my eyes drawn to the outline of the rifle by Kim’s side. If Kempton was at the zoo, we’d have only one choice. One chance to give Kim the one shot that she’d need. It was a chance that surely would see at least one of us dead. The outline of the rifle grew stronger as dawn approached. Detail emerged on the shore as we rowed towards it.

  “Hazelbank Park,” Colm whispered as we dragged the boat above the high-tide mark. “We’re just where we should be.”

  I decided to take that as the good sign I’d been wishing for. “Show us the way,” I said.

  During a long night of circular discussion, we’d decided that Kempton’s lair was somewhere south of Belfast. It had been Dean who’d pointed out that if Kempton lived near the zoo, she’d have looted it at the beginning of the outbreak. That tallied with my own theory that Kempton had seen the zombies we’d killed during the battle near the piano teacher’s house. Perhaps she’d even heard the shots I’d fired. Because of that, and because we thought she’d be watching the south, we were going to approach the zoo from the north. We’d enter via the car park and entrance furthest from the route we’d been on when Kallie had been shot. We’d fill our bags, head back to the ship, and then Kim, Colm, and Siobhan would go to the airport. That was it. That was our plan. Go to the zoo, enter from the north, hope Kempton wasn’t there. It’s hardly worthy of being called a plan, but we’d spent all night trying to come up with something better. As we walked, I went over it again, searching for an alternative. From the look on the others’ faces, they were doing the same.

  We looked in a few gardens and three closed garages for bicycles, but found none. We did find the undead, and there seemed to be more of them than on our previous journeys. We fought them when we could, hacking with crowbar and axe, machete and knife, but twice there were too many, and we had to detour north. Because of that, it was close to nine o’clock before we arrived outside the zoo.

  We stopped in the shelter of the trees that ringed the near-empty car park.

  “Looks clear,” I said, after a minute scanning the abandoned cars, two vans, and the low buildings on the other side of the gate.

  “Seems empty,” Colm agreed. Siobhan said nothing, and Kim didn’t answer immediately. She had her sniper’s rifle raised, and peered through the scope, first at the triangular-roofed ticket office, then at something near the gate in front of it. “There’s a zombie. Dead. Wasn’t there on our first visit.”

  “You sure?” Siobhan asked.

  “Positive,” Kim said.

  “Could have been killed yesterday,” I said, surveying the cars, the gate and fence, the buildings, and then the trees beyond that. It did seem empty. At the same time, I could imagine Kempton waiting for us to step out of cover. “I suppose someone needs to draw her fire,” I said.

  “I’ll do it,” Colm said.

  “We’ll both do it,” I said. “One to the left, the other to the right. What’s it they say: two shots are better than one, at least when you’re trying to work out where a sniper is.”

  “Then three’s better than two,” Siobhan said.

  “No,” Kim said. “Bill, go left. Colm go right. Siobhan, you get ready to open fire, empty a magazine at the building. Aim high, but don’t fire until I say.” She lay on the ground, adjusted the scope, then glanced up. “Bill, I… Good luck. You too, Colm.”

  “I’ll see you at the gate,” I said, and limped away from the treeline. Colm easily kept pace, angling to the right of the car park. Where I kept a straight line, he weaved and dodged. I don’t know if that would help him avoid a bullet. Perhaps that was the point. He was trying to draw Kempton’s attention. I focused on the distance remaining, mentally breaking the journey into a trip from one vehicle to the next. A red four-door, a white hatchback, the first of two white panel vans, a black car-share, the second van, a green hybrid, the gate. Colm reached it first, and stopped, looking vaguely confused. I slowed my skipping run to a walk, and came to a halt next to him.

  “Did you see anything?” I asked, a little more loudly than I’d intended. A bird took wing from the one-storey building just beyond the gate. It had black and white plumage, but was too large to be a magpie.

  “Nothing,” he said. “That bird confirms it, right?”

  “I guess so.” The corpse lay five feet f
rom us, splayed across the asphalt, black gore glistened around its head. “That’s fresh.”

  “So is that,” Colm said. A padlocked chain ran through the gate.

  “That wasn’t there two days ago,” I said.

  “She’s inside, then,” Colm said.

  “I guess so.”

  He looked at me, and I at him. We looked down the car park towards where Siobhan and Kim still lay hidden from view.

  “If we go inside,” I said. “And if she shoots us, afterwards, she’ll come and check the chain is intact.”

  “And if we kill her…” Colm said, but didn’t finish.

  Though I couldn’t see them, I motioned for Kim and Siobhan to stay where they were. Colm cupped his hands, and hoisted me up. I straddled the gate, and reached down a hand to help him. My head itched as I pictured Kempton taking aim.

  “She’s a bad shot,” I murmured, but you don’t need to be a good shot when you have an automatic weapon. We dropped down and inside. I looked back across the car park. I still couldn’t see Kim. I drew the pistol and followed Colm into the zoo.

  The buildings by the entrance were as empty as when we’d first seen them. Dirt and dust, leaves and mud lay undisturbed. Above us, another bird took wing. A moment later it was joined by a trio of blue-feathered birds from somewhere deeper inside.

  “That wasn’t us,” Colm whispered, raising his axe. I triple-checked the safety on my pistol was off.

  “Onward,” I murmured.

  The undergrowth seemed thicker than before. The trees seemed taller, the rustling of leaves louder. I started at each shifting branch, brandished the gun at every wavering leaf, and somehow resisted the urge to pull the trigger at each and every shadow. Colm took the lead, stalking diagonally across the path, left to right, right to left, getting further ahead, and faster with each step. He walked unharmed through the zoo. So did I, until we came to the building with the office and lab.

  There were two zombies by the door, pawing at the glass. They turned as we approached. Colm charged, cleaving the axe down in a massive blow that split one creature’s skull from forehead to throat. He wrenched the blade free, but was too close to the next. With his left hand, he punched the creature in the face. It staggered back. He swung his right, still gripping the axe shaft, into its head. There was a crack that I hoped with the zombie’s jaw. A left, a right, and its head slammed into the glass window. It broke. He grabbed the creature by the hair, and slammed it down on the jagged shards. It sagged, and went still.