Outbreak: The Zombie Apocalypse (UK Edition)

by Craig Jones

  Nick, Jenny and I had sat for hours, gleaning as much information as possible while Danny took the role of child’s entertainer. He was good at it, too, but then Robbie, Sally and Jayne liked most of the same things he did. He only started paying attention when a special announcement was put out across all channels at the same time.

  We kept the curtains to the lounge closed. The room was off to the left of the house and therefore the closest to the front gate, so we didn’t want the children wandering up to the window when they were down here to be greeted by that thing in front of our house. There were three big, deep, comfortable sofas, none matching, centred on a massive television. Along the left hand wall were bookshelves with a wide array of titles from technical manuals to sporting biographies. Halfway along was the now-disused open fireplace, blocked up because squirrels and birds would get trapped and die in there, filling the house with a putrid stench. The room had two doors, one leading to the stairs, and the other, to the back of the room, leading into the kitchen.

  Although there was also a dining room and Dad’s study downstairs with all his historical memorabilia, as well as a loo, this was the room that had always been occupied the most, had always been the centre of the house and full of vibrant life. With the windows covered and the lights off, however, it was a dark and eerie place, the glare from the television screen casting strange moving shadows upon the walls and floor. In every dark movement, especially on the uneven surface of the bookcases, I saw that hand rise up and shake the bar of the gate.

  A change on the television screen brought my attention back into the room. I recognised the newscaster; she was the one who always popped up in the middle of dangerous conflict zones.

  ‘Thanks to ongoing investigations, we are now able to bring you up-to-date information on the situation engulfing Britain,’ she announced. ‘Do not approach any individual that you suspect has been infected. They will be highly contagious and direct contact must be avoided. The incubation period varies according to the individual, but when symptoms occur, they are severe, and as of this moment, there is no cure. First, those infected will become faint and may black out. This is followed by what most of us have already witnessed: extreme violence. If a member of your party, whether family or friend, becomes infected, you need to isolate them immediately and restrain them if possible.

  ‘There appears to be no other way to stop the infected except to inflict damage to the brain. Help will be with you all soon, but you must remain calm, stay inside, and ensure that the infected cannot gain access to you. We will keep you updated when we can, but for now, keep safe.’

  As if on cue, the creature at the gate let out a roar. We all jumped.

  The screen went black and Danny sprinted out of the room. Jenny made to follow him, but I raised a hand to stop her. I knew him too well; if he was truly upset, he’d want to be left alone. His footsteps thundered up the stairs, but within seconds he was back down again. He had a manic look on his face and an armful of DVD cases and books.

  ‘Zombies!’ he shouted, and dropped his bounty onto the floor.

  Dawn of the Dead, 28 Days Later, novels by Max Brooks and David Wellington; Danny took one of the disks out of its case and fed it into the player.

  ‘I’m telling you, the dead have risen, guys. It’s just like in the movies, look.’

  He had fast-forwarded to a scene where dead bodies sat up from their ambulance gurneys and attacked the medical staff wheeling them out of a block of flats. The police opened fire, but they kept advancing until one of the cops pulled off a headshot and the reanimated corpse, with a spurt of crimson blood, went down for good. Danny paused the movie just as a second corpse was hit in the shoulder and spun away from the camera.

  ‘See’, he said. ‘Head shots, blank looks, a desire to eat human flesh.’

  I was glad the kids had stayed upstairs.

  ‘For crying out loud Danny, we don’t know they eat flesh.’

  ‘Yes we do,’ said Jenny. ‘We saw it happening. We saw our neighbours get bitten. They just…’ she trailed off, and Nick rushed to her, wrapped his arms around her.

  ‘I don’t care what they are,’ he said, his gaze drifting towards the stairs, clearly thinking of his children. ‘I’m just glad we’re in here.’

  * * *

  Within the hour, Nick’s external calm broke. I don’t blame him. I would have punched Danny, too. Nick and I had been in the lounge, trawling through the channels to find the latest updates. Apparently the royal family had been in the process of evacuation to a safe venue when the Queen collapsed. Some reports said she’d suffered a heart attack and had actually died, while others claimed that it was just a sign of stress and that she was going to be okay. Turned out it was the former.

  Jenny called from the top of the stairs, asking if the children were with us. We were both on our feet in a second and in the hallway by the time she was halfway down from the upper floor. We could hear laughter, which for the shortest time made us all smile and breathe again, until we realised the sound had come from outside. I flung open the front door and took in everything in a split second.

  There were now ten of the infected at the gate. They stood there, groaning, but hardly moving, just rocking from one foot onto the next. Rob, Sally, and Jayne stood about one and a half metres from the Range Rover, while my genius brother perched on the bonnet with the heavy, decorative sword from our father’s study wall in his hands, stabbing at the faces of those the other side of the gate.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ I shouted as he lined up an eyeball and drove the tip of the sword into the brain of a dark-haired woman. He glanced at me as, with a flourish, he whipped the sword back and she fell, black slime spewing from her eye socket as the groans of those around her intensified. Jenny ran and ushered the kids inside as Danny jumped down off the car.

  ‘I told you, man, they’re zombies! I must have nailed six of them and they don’t even back off, they—’

  Nick punched him. It was a wild haymaker, and with the run-up he had taken, it made one heck of a noise as it connected. I swear even the infected stopped moaning for a moment afterwards. The sword clattered to the ground. The creatures returned to their hellish chant.

  Nick swivelled on his heels to march back in. ‘He’s an idiot, a fool, and if he puts my kids in danger again…’

  ‘Yeah, he’s an idiot,’ I agreed curtly, catching him by the shirt sleeve. ‘But he’s my brother, he’s just a kid, and if you ever hit him again, you know what side of the gate you’ll find yourself on.’

  Of course, Nick was right and Danny should never have taken the kids outside, no matter what he had planned, but Nick was a guest on our land and had to know who was in charge here. He nodded.

  * * *

  Danny looked up from the floor, his lip bleeding but that moronic grin of his still there.

  ‘Sorry, bro.’

  ‘You should be, you Muppet, but you need to apologise to them, too.’

  ‘I will.’ He sighed. ‘Where are they coming from, and how did they know where to find us?’ he asked, turning back towards the gate, wiping the blood from his face.

  ‘I don’t…’

  I’ve replayed this moment a million times over in my head. Danny turns, they see the blood, and they surge at the gate. As one. No fear of the sword, no care for the ones in front getting squashed against the bars. Just pure, instinctive bloodlust. The roar from them made me feel sick to the pit of my stomach. Some were screeching, snapping their teeth like rabid animals. Others let their heads roll from side to side, eyes wide and staring. Even though I knew the gate would hold, I dragged Danny up from his place on the floor and shoved him towards the door.

  ‘See! See! I told you.’ He smirked, pulling the front door open and stepping backwards over the threshold. ‘Fricking zombies.’

  I glanced back at the gate just before I slammed the door, and I had to admit it: the little idiot was right.

  5

  I ran my hands
down my face and shook my head, beads of water flicking across the mirror above the basin in front of me. It had been a long day. Jenny had offered to cook and none of us had felt the urge to argue with her. I leant forward and took a long look at myself. I needed a shave; the sporadic stubble across my cheeks, chin and neck didn’t suit me. I needed to sleep; I may not have had dark patches under my eyes but my lids felt heavy and my shoulders were tense. I pushed my hair back with my left hand and held on to the basin with my right, staring at myself.

  Was it my imagination or were there more lines around my eyes, deeper crevices along my forehead? After what I had seen, after what had gone on just that afternoon, after how the situation had become more and more ominous, how could I not have more worry lines? There was plenty in this world to be worrying about, and everything seemed worse since night had fallen.

  * * *

  Nick and I had been watching the zombies from my bedroom window at the front of the house, trying to discern a pattern to their behaviour, when we realised that we could hear a car engine. We looked at each other. Was this rescue? Was this the Army? We held our position and waited as the whine of the car got closer and closer. It was coming from Usk. As it approached, Danny’s bedroom door opened and he poked his head out.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Not sure,’ I replied, opening the window and leaning out a little, trying to get a better view of the road. ‘Just keep the kids in there, okay?’

  ‘Yeah, of course,’ he said, agreeable for once, and giving a little nod to Nick before he closed the door behind him.

  The car was suddenly at our gate and was almost past it before the driver applied the brakes. It slid out of sight and we could only make out the blue roof of the car until the rear passenger door opened and a dark haired woman leapt out.

  ‘You have to help us!’ she screamed at the same time Nick gasped, ‘I know her!’

  I thought she was shouting up to us. I thought she was in control. But she wasn’t. I realised in an instant that they’d seen a group of people, assumed there was safety in numbers, and now she was out of the car and running into the mass of zombies.

  ‘No,’ yelled a voice. ‘Get back in the car!’

  It was my voice. I could only see the top of her head, saw her turn and look up at the window, saw her continue to move towards the gate, and saw one of the creatures reach out an arm and wrap its gory fingers around her wrist. The zombies’ wailing increased and they all shuffled towards her, and then I think I saw her fall, and then there was nothing more of her to see.

  More of the undead ploughed forward, and they tripped over each other in their race to get to her, muffling out her dying cries. The passenger of the car got out. He was a big bald guy, tall with broad, thick shoulders and he advanced to help his friend, but before he even reached the back of the car he had stopped, realising that not only was he unable to help her, but that there was no one to help him.

  ‘Get back in the car!’ shouted Nick, and as the man looked up over the wall to our vantage point, the driver pressed down on the accelerator and began to move away.

  ‘NO!’ the man shouted, and Nick let his forehead drop onto the windowsill; he’d seen enough already to know how this was going to end.

  As the car struggled to gain traction and snaked along the road, the screeching tyres drowning out the drone of the dead, the bald man must have believed he still had a chance to get inside and he threw himself towards the still-open door. He missed. I watched as the car disappeared away from the house, the passenger door flapping on its hinges as it sped away. I could not watch as the infected beings at my gate turned their attention from the woman and began to pace towards the downed man, their incessant moaning increasing in both pitch and volume.

  I could not watch, but I had to do something.

  ‘I’m on my way!’ I shouted, shoving my head as far out of the window as I could. The man was pushing himself to his feet and I could see that he had grazed the top of his forehead in his effort to get back into the car. Blood dripped. That explained the added animation of the corpses. Without waiting for Nick, and praying that Danny would for once show some common sense, I sprinted down the stairs. I nearly lost my balance on the last few steps and slammed into the front door, the solid wood bouncing me back. I opened the door and ran outside, my feet leaving waves of gravel in my wake.

  ‘Keep away from them!’ I bellowed. ‘I’m coming.’

  I could hear the bald man’s breathing even above the zombies’ hungry cries. There was another noise permeating the air; an occasional slap or thud. I had no idea what it could be. I jumped onto the bonnet of the Range Rover and then up onto the roof, keeping my feet back from the gate itself. I leant forward and could see the man swinging wild punches, trying to keep the zombies away from him. The torn jeans and huge gash in his left knee explained why he had not run away; he simply couldn’t.

  ‘Over here,’ I called, my voice, to me, like some from outside my body.

  The man clearly had some sort of boxing training and he was managing to pick off the creatures with jabs or hooks as they got close to him. It was also obvious that the monsters were slowly closing in on him, and it would not be too long before he was surrounded. He caught my eye and almost grinned as he punched a zombie directly on the jaw, sending it sprawling to the pavement with a hoarse croak.

  ‘I can help you over!’ I shouted, reaching my right arm over the gate, taking a firm grip of the metal with my other hand.

  He nodded, blood streaming down over his eyes from his head injury, and began to edge his way towards me, his hurt leg slowing him down but his arms continuing to create space in front of him. He stretched his hand towards me and our fingers brushed. One or two more steps and I could at least try to haul him over. Then one of the dead fell forward, pushed by one of its friends, and it was able to snare his trailing leg. He glanced down, and the tenuous contact we had made was broken as he lost his balance and fell. He didn’t even have the chance to scream.

  I turned my eyes away as a dead man I recognised fell onto him and ripped his nose from his face, blood spurting out and hitting the side of the Range Rover with such force that it sounded like rainfall. I jumped down off the roof and stumbled on the gravel. I looked up at Nick and it seemed like he had not moved; his forehead remained flat on the windowsill.

  I splashed more water on my face, trying to wash away the memories, but they lay deeper than the water could reach. I dried myself and walked through to my bedroom. I shook my head as I heard music emitting from Danny’s room across the landing. Only he could take this situation and make it another excuse to chill out. Did he have no concept of what was going on outside, or was it simply that his life had left him with no idea of how to handle the outside world? I could only imagine how his brain was working, casting himself in the movie of what was going on around us, obviously with himself as the ultra-cool action hero.

  As I crossed to his room, I cringed inside to see that he had his door wide open; I feared the worst and that he would be watching one of the movies he had earlier displayed downstairs. I hoped the kids weren’t in with him. Nick could do with a few hours without Danny winding him up.

  Seeing Danny was on his own, I stepped inside and closed the door. He flicked the remote and the screen froze on his huge, wall-mounted flat screen television, silencing the sound of the music video playing. Over the years, my brother had managed to remove every ounce of individuality the original architects had tried to bring to each room in the house. The walls around the T.V. were plastered in movie and gaming posters, a king-size bed centred in the room and shelves along the right hand wall, filled with movies, books, a multi-functional sound system, games consoles, and CD cases. He had a wardrobe on the left of his bed, together with a small chest of drawers, but his clothes were generally kept all over the bed and floor.

  The door to his en suite bathroom stood partially open, towels strewn all across the tiles. Under the window, which was positioned
opposite the door, sat his computer on a simplistic desk. Every light on each piece of electrical equipment glowed green. Mum would have gone mental.

  And in the middle of it all, sprawled across his bed, lip swollen and still a little bloody, was Danny. Unbelievably, that moronic grin remained firmly in place. I couldn’t help but smile back at him.

  ‘Glad to see you’re not overly concerned about the fate of humanity,’ I said as I crossed the room and perched on his desk.

  ‘Look, we’re fine in here. You know it. I know it. Even Punchy downstairs knows it.’

  ‘Hey, you’ve pushed it about as far as I can defend with Nick, so just leave it now. It’s bad enough knowing what’s outside the wall without having to worry about World War Three inside, too.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah. Look, all I was doing was a little research. If he can’t understand that what I found out could save our lives, then…’

  I’d turned away from him, tuning out his naïve logic, and looked out of the window across the river to Usk town proper. The street lights still glowed, of course, but the houses were dark. Something caught my eye, further to the left. I leant in against the glass, trying to catch sight of it again, shutting out Danny’s theoretical drivel.

  ‘What…what…what the..? Dan, just shut up for once and look at this. Get over here.’

  Danny flipped the remote control onto the bed and came over to the window.

  ‘What are you going on about? There’s nothing… What the..?’

  I guess he’d seen it. It was a building, had used to be the Cardiff Arms pub—the tallest building on the main street, just over the bridge into Usk, and someone was in the top room, turning the light on and off.