Then he smelt it.
“What the hell has died around here?” he said out loud. It smelt like the possum carcasses he sometimes found – dingo leftovers – but it was much stronger, completely foul. The buzzing of the flies filled the air and sounded like electricity.
Then Pat heard moaning, off in the trees.
He frowned, swatted a few more flies, before hopping back up into his truck. He sat still for a few moments, feeling lost. The bush had a thousand ways to kill a man. Almost every thing with legs, and many things without, were either poisonous, venomous, or at the very least, onerous. Tiger snakes, Red Back spiders, crocs, and dingos; living in the outback was like living life on the HARD setting. Pat was used to it all, though, and very rarely felt the unease he was feeling right now. Without knowing why, he switched on the Toyota’s headlights.
What he saw knocked his socks off.
“Strewth.” So surprised was Pat, that when he leaned forward to get a better look through the windscreen, he accidently put his elbows on the horn.
Blaaaargh!
Immediately the group of Abbos up ahead turned and faced Pat’s truck. Each of the six men was bloodied and limping. One of them even had most of one arm missing. Pat knew that some Australian’s saw the Abbos as lazy booze hounds, hanging around the bars and selling their wares wherever the could, but Pat knew a different breed: those who still lived beneath the sky and slept upon the ground. Those men were brave, hard, and wise. But plodding around with an arm missing took a toughness that surprised even Pat.
Slowly, he stepped out from his truck. He kept his eyes on the approaching tribesmen, noting that they were wearing red and white face paint and had bones through their noses. The red skirts around their waists were dusty and torn. Pat’s assumption was that they had been conducting one of their ceremonies nearby. But what the hell happened to them?
The six tribesmen ambled towards Pat. Each of them moaned and reached out their hands. Pat just stood there, watching them, wandering if it was danger approaching him or fellow human beings in need. They need help.
The door to the watering hole flung open and Ralphie, the barman, appeared. Tarfinger Marge was stood right behind him.
Pat waved a hand at them. “Over ‘ere.”
Ralphie and Marge trotted over to Pat and joined him. The three of them stood and watched the group of tribesmen for a while with curious interest.
“They look as rotten as a chop,” Ralphie eventually said.
“Looks like they had some bad tucker,” said Marge.
As the six tribesmen stumbled closer, Pat saw that one of them had a chunk missing from his throat. The windpipe was severed and hanging loosely.
“They’re dead,” Pat muttered. “Blow me down, but they’re dead as doornails.”
Ralphie nodded thoughtfully. “Well…they looked a bit narked, I’ll give you that.”
Pat shook his head. “No, look. They’re dead.”
The three of them stood in silence while the six tribesman continued to close the distance between them. They were out of the treeline now, stumbling between rocks and cactus and nearing on the watering hole’s front yard.
“We should probably nick off, then,” said Ralphie.
“And go where?” asked Pat. “The beer is here.”
The tribesman with a missing arm moaned loudly, like a lost lover stumbling though the fog. He reached forward with his remaining hand and licked at the air with his tongue.
Ralphie folded his arms and smirked. “I think that one’s perving at you, Margey. I’ve got a bottle of plonk you can share in the back, if it’ll do yer.”
“Don’t poke mullock at me, you wally. We’re up shit creek here.”
Pat nodded. “So what do you want to do? Do we leg it like a bunch of panic merchants, or do we stay and fight like the Aussie battlers we are.”
“I just started a new bottle,” said Marge. “I ain’t leaving it.”
“My bar my rules,” said Ralphie. “These party-crashers are barred.”
“Should we at least warn them, first?” asked Pat, but then he started laughing. “You think they’ll listen?”
“As much chance as pushing shit up a hill,” said Marge. She stubbed her cigarette out on her tongue and threw the butt to the ground. Then she reached into her hammock-like bra and pulled out a long machete.
“Shit, Margery,” Ralphie chuckled.
Pat pulled out his own machete from the sheath on his hip. Ralphie didn’t have a knife, so Pat handed him the spare he kept on his other hip.
“You fellas ready?” Marge asked.
“Ready as a possum at a bear party,” said Ralphie.
“Let’s do this,” said Pat.
“I’ve got the one-armed perve,” said Marge. She raced forward like a pomme chasing a tea wagon, machete slashing through the air and a screech coming from her lungs like a campsite kettle. She took the one-armed tribesman’s head clean off. Her blade was almost as sharp as Pat’s.
Almost. Pat leapt forward and then sidestepped, the exact same way he would approach a snapping croc. The nearest dead abbo reached for him and missed. As the bloody man stumbled forward, Pat slashed at the back of his knees, cutting the tendons and sending him to the floor, facedown in the dirt. He placed a foot on the squirming tribesman’s back and sighed. “See you on the other side of the great divide,” he said. “Safe travels, chief.” He swung the machete like a cricket bat and sliced open the man’s neck, separating the head.
Nearby, Ralphie launched into a flying kick, which hit home but also sent him flopping onto his back. Pat shook his head and grunted. “This ain’t no bloody kung-fu movie. Get up off your arse and stop playing the bludger.”
Marge shouted out as one of the tribesmen grabbed her from behind. Pat was about to race to her rescue, but then the old woman smashed her head backwards and broke the tribesman’s face. Then she twisted and flung the man over her shoulder and onto his back. She finished it off by thrusting her machete down into his face. “No fucking worries,” she said, slightly out of breath.
The next danger to present itself was the tribesman with the severed windpipe. He fell on top of Ralphie, who was still grounded from his botched Bruce Lee attempt. The barman fought and struggled to hold the man off, but was losing the battle. Pat leapt over a knee-high boulder and came down beside the two of them. He span around and slashed his blade across the side of the dead man’s skull. It struck the target dead, but buried itself in bone. Pat pulled at it for a few moments but had to give up. “That was my best bleedin’ knife,” he muttered before crouching down and picking up the knee-high boulder. It weighed heaps, but he managed to heave it over his head.
One of the two surviving tribesmen came at Pat quickly, almost falling forward rather than walking. Pat brought down the heavy rock and obliterated the man’s head like a mango on the motorway.
Marge sliced the legs off the last dead man and then stamped on his face until he stopped moving. Once it was all done, the three of them stood there, looking at one another and panting. The gravel had become a battleground and blood was everywhere.
“You never killed a bleedin’ one,” Marge said to Ralphie. “You useless drongo.”
“I was just getting warmed up,” he argued, before staring at the ground and looking ashamed.
“Don’t worry about it,” said Pat, clapping him on the back. “Just get the beers on the go and we’ll say no more about it.”
“Should we call the wallopers?” Marge asked.
“No phone,” said Ralphie.
Marge shrugged. “I’m sure someone will come by eventually. No point sweating it.”
Pat looked down at the six dismembered tribesmen and felt bad. Their people had traditions when it came to the dead. It felt wrong to leave them all hacked up. It didn’t stop him from going back inside the bar and finishing his beer, though.
When four other tribesmen turned up an hour later, Pat felt a little better. Ralphie got the new men a
ll a beer and they holed up in the bar together.
“The dead are rising,” said one of the men who said his name was Berri. He spoke the best English and was the one who explained how half of his tribe had gone to the city to sell wares, but only a handful had come back; and they had been sick and injured. Before they died the sick men spoke of chaos and murder in the city. Adelaide was on fire and awash with blood and terror. It all sounded very dramatic. Several hours later the injured tribesmen had risen up as zombies and attacked the rest of the camp. Berri and his companions were all that was left. They had tracked the six dead tribesmen to the watering hole and were glad to have found them at rest. Pat and the others had performed a service by killing them permanently.
“So,” Pat said. “It looks like it’s the end of the world, then.” Berri nodded earnestly. His eyes were wide and full of anxiety. Pat let out a hearty laugh. “Don’t look so worried, old cobber. We’ll be just fine. This is Australia. Everything tries to kill you in Australia. What else is new?”
To that they all laughed and shared a drink. The men and women of the bush were as prepared for the apocalypse as anyone could be. They were already seasoned survivors and a bunch of zombies wasn’t enough to get their knickers in a bunch.
Pat sipped his beer and had one last thought, though. I wonder how my boy, Sally, is getting on?
THE LONELY BEARD
The beard is lonely. The beard is hungry. The beard is afraid. Once the beard had a name. It might have been Daniel, or Dave, maybe Stephen.
He was just the beard now, though. Ever since he’d used his last razor, his bushy black beard had grown from the saplings of stubble to the fuzzy behemoth that it was now. It had become his identity more than his name ever had. He knew that if he were to ever meet other survivors it was the beard they would see first. The beard kept him warm and reminded him that he was alive. The dead did not grow beards.
The beard’s gold Omega watch, a gift from his grandmother, had the day of the month on it, along with the time, but nothing else. All the beard knew was that it was the 3rd. Of which month or even which year he did not know. All he knew was that the beard was long and getting longer. Every inch it grew was another month he had avoided the dead. The beard had been alive inside the old fish shop for a very long time. The fish had spoiled and stunk so bad that it had made his eyes water and his nose run at first, but eventually he had gotten used to it. The smell had eventually become part of the beard. The only thing that had kept him alive so long was the dried and salted fish inside the shop: smoked haddock, pickled cockles, and other foul tasting sea creatures that had fortunately not poisoned him up until now. He was running low, though, and soon the beard would have to leave.
He had been preparing to do so, summoning up the courage over the span of days, when he saw the other people. They were far away in the distance, but he had spotted them from the second-story flat above the shop in which he lived above the fish shop. There were a dozen men over by the church, trying to get a Range Rover started. The beard wanted to shout out to them, but the beard knew that they would not hear him. The dead would, though, and then the beard would be done for and would grow no more.
But the beard had to leave soon. The beard was starving. The beard was lonely. The beard was afraid.
The beard made his escape. He slid out of the fish shop’s back door and ran from the building. The group of survivors were half a mile away and from the street he could no longer see them. He knew where the church was, though. He had grown up in the village and had visited the church himself on occasion, although it was only to appease a girlfriend whose name he no longer remembered. Janet, her name had been Janet. The beard remembered.
The beard passed into an alleyway that he knew would take him between the old post office and the Salty Cod takeaway towards where the churchyard was located. If he kept up his pace, he would be there in minutes, but it was the quickest he’d moved in months. The beard was short when last he had sprinted. Doing so now turned his lungs to choking syrup and he was forced to slow down to a jog and then a lolloping gait. It wasn’t long before the beard needed to stop completely and take a breath.
The sounds of voices came from nearby. The other men were close. The church was just up ahead. The beard was glad. The beard was excited.
The beard was about to use his last reserves of strength, to sprint towards the first men he had seen in a very long time, but somebody jumped out and stopped him. The person was rude and nasty. The other person bit the beard right on his arm and made him yell.
The beard recoiled backwards, clutched the burning gash on his arm and found blood there. The beard growled, angry and afraid. Bites were bad. The beard knew, but could not remember why. But the beard knew bites were bad. Very very bad.
The person who had bitten him was a woman with a wide smile. The beard punched her in her face and threw her to the ground. The beard felt alive as he stamped on her head until she was not alive. Then the beard felt bad. The woman had once been like him. He had his beard and she had her smile. Now her smile was gone and the beard was bleeding.
The voices from the church had stopped. The beard sprinted as fast as he could. They could not leave without him. They were his only hope. The beard was starving. The beard was lonely. The beard was bitten.
But when he reached the church, the only thing he found was the sight of a distant minivan, disappearing into the distance and leaving the beard still alone. And bitten. The beard was bitten.
The beard began to cry. The beard began to laugh. Then the beard turned around and set off in the other direction. He could never hope to keep up with the men in the van, but perhaps he could find where they came from. Perhaps there were more people nearby. Maybe he had missed them all this time. He wondered if they were at the pier. It was at the other end of the village, but the more the beard thought about it, the more it seemed like a great place for people to live. The beard had been alone and afraid for too long, but he was outside again now; it would do no good to go back into hiding. The beard was starving.
The beard would head towards the pier. Maybe he would find people there. People to help him and look after him. It would be perfect. He wouldn’t be alone anymore. They might even be the beard’s friend and feed him until he was full. The more and more the beard thought about it, the faster he ran. In his excitement, he couldn’t help but let out a screech. What he wanted now, more than ever, was to find people and eat.
The beard was hungry.
THE HEART DOES GO ON
It had been nineteen days since the Kirkland had sunk. Edward knew because that was how many days’ rations he had left with and he had just run out. He was floating up the Irish Sea with no food and no petrol, too afraid to take his chances on land. I’m almost there, though. I know I am.
Edward had enjoyed the safety of the fleet and once thought that he would never leave it, but when a war had started with the pier on the south coast, he realised that the fleet didn’t offer any real safety, just the illusion of it.
After the great warship sank, the several dozen vessels of the fleet quickly scattered. Many chose to form up again, further out to sea, and retain their safety in numbers. Edward chose to go it alone. He knew that the schism would get ugly. The consolidated fleet with a single leader had become a shattered outcropping of floating fiefdoms. Life would never again be pleasant on the sea. So he had set off alone. Old and alone.
At first Edward had no destination in mind. He chose to sail north because the British Isles were familiar to him. If he’d journeyed south to the continent he would have been lost. So he had left the English Channel and entered the Irish Sea, shivering against the Polar Maritime winds.
Once he watched the last remnants of the fleet fade away, the isolation had set in. Edward had always thought himself to be a fairly self-reliant person. He had kept few friends in his previous life and had been single for several years. He hadn’t always been so private, but a broken teenage heart had left him e
motionally drained and unable to devote to building new relationships. Still, he’d been happy enough, sitting behind his desk, designing advert after advert for various companies and magazines. He liked his job, his pay, and his home. He felt little need to fill it with superficial relationships so that he could feel better about himself.
But he quickly realised how much he needed other people once he was alone on the sea. Whilst Ireland sat off to his left and Wales to his right, neither landmass contained life of any kind. Edward knew that beyond the coastlines there would be an abundance of wildlife and, of course, hordes of the dead, but from out at sea, the world seemed uninhabited, as if he were the only person left in the world. The loneliness seemed to crush down on Edward, making him want to scream and shout. Occasionally he did.
It was at his most desperate, about seven days in, when Edward suddenly knew where he was heading. The destination popped into his mind like a zit bursting. He would head to the place he loved the most, yet had visited only once. He would sail for the Isle of Man.
The Isle of Man was where he had met Elsie. Edward had stayed at her cosy bed and breakfast when he visited the isle to meet a client interested in sponsoring the Manx Grand Prix who needed to put forward a marketing brief first. They had opted for someone younger and more ‘tech savvy’ in the end, but Edward had decided to make a holiday of it and stay a few weeks. One of the upsides of his job was that he could work anywhere with a phone line and Internet connection. There was no hurry to get back to his apartment in Croydon.
Elsie had owned the bed and breakfast since her thirties. Her mother and father raised her in the business and left it to her when they died. Elsie kept the place presentable all on her own and Edward immediately loved it when he saw the open log fires and worn-down carpets. It felt like a real home, something he’d never had. Love never came easily to Edward and his work had consumed him as a younger man. He had grown old as a man alone and always wondered what it would be like to sit in front of the fire with newspapers and slippers. Elsie showed him.
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