Tankbread 02 Immortal

by Paul Mannering

  Else held his gaze for a several long breaths and then the gun angled upwards, the hammer clicking to a safe position. “Get everyone on board.” She climbed into the front seat of the SUV and fed her son.

  The convoy drove south on the Lynd Highway in silence, Eric scowling into the growing light of dawn. Else studied the countryside. The thicker bush of the north was thinning now to dry scrubland. The offspring of surviving stock could be seen moving in flocks and herds, always away from the road and the noise of the vehicles. They had to stop once when a mob of kangaroos exploded out of the bush and thundered across the road in front of them. Rifle shots rang out from the larger truck, and two of the animals skidded across the road, twitched, and lay still.

  Else remained in the SUV while Michael and Sam supervised the butchering of the ’roos. The boys were skilled with knives, another lesson learned on the farm from their father. The skins and the meat were loaded onto the truck and in less than an hour the convoy was rolling again. Soon they drove through the ruins of another small town where dogs ran barking after the vehicles, but they saw no sign of the living or the dead in the roadside properties.

  More abandoned towns flashed past, some with barricades and warning shots, one of which shattered the windscreen on the smaller truck and killed a young woman of the fishermen called Sal. They kept driving, Else refusing to let anyone stop and engage in a gunfight with an enemy of unknown strength.

  They stopped at each roadside petrol station and checked the storage tanks for diesel fuel. They all came up dry.

  After a week on the road, the heavy truck sputtered to a halt. The other two vehicles pulled over and they measured out the remaining fuel in all three.

  “How far?” Rache asked.

  “We’ve come, eighteen hundred kilometers, nearly eleven hundred miles.” Else said, poring over the paper map. “Eric, how much fuel do we have left?”

  “Maybe two hundred miles.”

  “Not close enough,” Else said. “It’s more like three fifty, three sixty to get to our destination.”

  “Well let’s not fuck about then.” Eric leaned out the window. “Mount up, we’ve got miles to go!” he yelled to the other two vehicles.

  The survivors stretching their legs scrambled back up onto the open decks of the two trucks. They rolled on, moving so much slower than Else would have liked, but the highways were breaking down and in places the road had been washed out.

  “What state are we in?” Rache asked, peering over from the backseat at the map in Else’s lap.

  “New South Wales,” Else replied.

  “Where’s Mildura?”

  “Here,” Else’s finger stroked a point on the map.

  “It’s so close.” Rache sounded disappointed. “We should be able to see it from here.

  “Heads up,” Eric said.

  Else folded the map, looking out through the dusty windscreen. In the distance a lone figure stood on the edge of the road next to a bus laying on its side, a faded white cloth waving over his head.

  The SUV stopped, the trucks parking angled left and right behind the four-wheel drive. Armed survivors jumped down from the trucks and scattered to the edge of the road. They had picked up the tactics quickly and with minimal training.

  The man walked towards them, hands raised high, the white cloth stretched between them, fluttering in the light breeze. As he came closer they could see his gaunt frame and long hair. His clothes were faded by the elements and he wore a long coat.

  Rache slipped out of the SUV and called out, “Are you alone?”

  “What?” the man called back.

  “Are. You. Alone?!”

  “Yes!” the man yelled back, his eyes flicking to the wrecked bus on the side of the road.

  Else narrowed her eyes. “He’s lying,” she said to Rache through the open window.

  “Uh-huh,” Rache replied. “Walk forward, and keep your hands up!” she shouted. The man started walking towards the SUV.

  “Thank you for stopping,” he called as he got closer. “I haven’t seen any live people for weeks.”

  “Where were you headed?” Rache asked.

  “Melbourne. I heard there’s a sanctuary there. A Japanese supply ship came in. They have medical supplies and a cure for the dead.”

  A murmur ran through the group. Hope, as always, was open to suggestions.

  “Bullshit,” Else said.

  “How do you know this is true?” Rache asked.

  The man lowered his hands as he turned to look southward, his face wracked with confusion. “I . . . I was told, by a woman who said she had been told by someone who had seen the ship.”

  “When was that?” Else asked Rache.

  “When was that?” Rache called across the distance between them and the man.

  “I . . . I dunno. A month? Three months ago?”

  “Tell the people behind the bus to come out,” Else said.

  “The people behind the bus have to come out,” Rache called.

  The man hesitated. “There’s no one—”

  “They come out or you die!” Rache shouted.

  “They’re just kids,” the man said.

  Else opened the door of the SUV. Her baby lay asleep in the back, between Cassie and Lowanna. Standing behind the door, Else drew her revolver.

  “Everyone, out in the open now!” she aimed her pistol at the gaunt man.

  “Okay! Okay! Jesus, chill the fuck out . . .” The man turned back to the bus and whistled. They came in ones and twos, filthy, wide eyed, and dressed in scavenged clothes with little understanding of size or fashion. Seven children, and none of them could have been more than ten years old.

  “Where did they come from?” Else called.

  “There was a settlement, over on the coast. They were in danger of being overrun. They asked me to take the kids and head to Melbourne.”

  “What happened to the bus?” Rache called.

  “I fell asleep at the wheel and crashed.” The gaunt man looked embarrassed at the admission.

  “Are you messing with these kids?” Rache demanded.

  “What? No! Jesus, I’m just trying to help.”

  “We cut the cock and balls off the last guy who messed with a young girl,” Rache warned.

  “Good for you,” he replied.

  “What is your name?” Else asked.

  “Godfrey, Alan Godfrey,” the gaunt man replied.

  “I’m Else, this is Rache, the others can introduce themselves. Bring whatever supplies you have and find those kids some space on the trucks.”

  “Thanks!” Alan herded the children towards the trucks. Rache and two survivors went and pillaged the bus, returning with food, water, and a bag filled with paper.

  “Do you know what this is?” Rache asked Else.

  “I think it’s money,” Else said.

  “Yeah, that’s cash. Old world money. I wonder why they were carrying it?” Eric said.

  “Maybe they thought it was still worth something,” Else said.

  “Maybe.” Eric started the SUV and the convoy continued south.

  The last of the fuel ran out on the edge of a town that by Else’s calculations was around 200 kilometers from their goal. At 120 miles, Mildura was a lot closer than they had expected.

  “So now what? We load everyone up with what they can carry and start walking?” Eric didn’t look convinced. The sun was setting through a thin veil of cloud, giving the dry grassland all around them a sepia tone.

  “We leave most of them here,” Else replied. “We take a few people and explore that town ahead.”

  Turning from Eric, Else shouted out the window, “Rache, we need no more than five people. They should be armed and sensible.”

  While Rache gathered her patrol, Else fed and then washed the baby with a damp cloth. “Cassie, can you look after him while I am gone?”

  Cassie nodded. Lowanna was grizzling and kicking on the backseat. She took the baby boy and laid him down next to the girl
.

  “You want me to come with?” Eric asked, unclipping his seat belt.

  “No, you stay here. Keep an eye on things while we are gone,” Else said.

  “Sure. You know what to look out for, right?”

  Else nodded and slid out of the SUV. The air was dry; the clouds to the west held no promise of rain.

  Rache caught up with her on the road, five men with rifles, shotguns, and blades on her heels.

  “We’re going to look for fuel, right?” one of the men asked.

  “We’re looking for all kinds of things,” Else replied.

  At the first town they came to, the outlying houses were ransacked. The ones that were boarded up had been torn open, gutted like a carcass and the scraps left to rot in the sun.

  Deeper in town they moved more carefully. While there were no signs of life, evols drifted among the abandoned cars and looted shops.

  The group spread out. Moving in pairs they opened shops and houses, searching the interiors for tinned food, medicine, and Eric’s shopping list of household chemicals and fertilizers.

  As Else walked down the center of the main street, the evols slowly turned and focused on her. Moving closer they roused themselves, attracted by the beating of her heart and the whisper of her breathing. Else drew her blades, flexing her arms and waiting for the dead to come within range. Then in an explosion of movement, she cut them down, the sharpened steel of the scythe blades severing grey limbs and destroying necrotic brains.

  More came shuffling onwards, slashing at her, the rags of their clothing hanging like their dried strips of torn skin. Else ran a man through with one blade, spilling his guts and tripping him as he walked. With the second blade she took his head, a wide swing shearing through his neck.

  She killed them with a dancer’s grace, spinning and turning to an unheard symphony. The hands reaching for her had no sense of rhythm. She danced with the dead anyway, taking the lead and ending the existence of five in quick succession.

  When the mob had been cut down, Else walked into a store. The place had once sold clothes, and what rats and moths hadn’t devoured lay under a thick cover of dust. Plastic wrapping cracked with age as Else sorted through the different items. The photographs of babies on the packets, some close to her son’s age, fascinated her. Unpacking one of the packets she examined baby clothes, tiny outfits for a newborn. Gathering a selection, she carried them across to where racks of women’s clothing hung. Else felt the texture of the dresses. She liked dresses; they were cooler in hot weather, and the swish of the fabric was nice against her skin. She could run and fight in a dress too. After making her selection from the brightly colored clothes that weren’t filled with moth holes, Else went to look behind the counter for something to carry it all in.

  A dead woman on her hands and knees looked up at Else as she came around the counter. Blood dripped from the woman’s mouth; the severed head of a rat rolled in her mouth as she chewed on it.

  Else dropped the clothes on the bench and with a smooth motion she pulled her pistol and fired once into the woman’s forehead. She had once been a larger figure, dressed in the kinds of loose dresses that Else liked. Now she was just a swollen sack, leaking rotting meat.

  Else found woven bags under the counter. She stuffed the clothes in them and stepped out into the dark street.

  Rache came jogging towards her. “What the fuck happened?”

  “Evol,” Else replied. “It’s okay. I took care of it.”

  “What did you find?” Rache regarded the bulging bags with interest.

  “Clothes, for baby.”

  “When are you gonna give that kid a name?” Rache teased.

  Else shrugged. “Names are important. I need to give him the right one.”

  “Lot of babies on the ship, they never got names,” Rache said.

  “Everyone will have a name now,” Else said.

  They continued their sweep of the town, the other salvagers joining them, all laden with a variety of salvage looted from shops and houses. Else went through their loads, tossing things aside. “CDs? Coins? Keys? Find any food? Fuel?”

  The salvagers shook their heads. “Everything’s been swept clean.”

  “There’s a sign up there, that’s one of those fuel places.” Rache pointed down the road. “Let’s check it out.”

  Else nodded. The moon was bright enough to see on the street, but the darkness of the shop fronts and houses made her uneasy. They walked down the centerline of the main street. Somewhere in the darkness a dog howled. It was answered by others.

  “Dogs,” Rache said with a shudder.

  “If you come across a dog, attack,” Else replied. “Charge at them, make noise, show your teeth. Be a bigger predator than they are.”

  “What if we come across a pack?” an engineer wearing a CD as a necklace asked.

  “Shoot the biggest one and run like hell.”

  They arrived at the gas station, fanning out and checking through the windows for trapped evols. Else waited till everyone reported back that it was clear.

  Opening the door Else slipped inside, her eyes wide in the dim light. She inhaled through her nose, sorting through the myriad scents and confirming there were no dead here.

  She found what Eric had shown her on previous searches of gas stations, a metal rod under the counter and an articulated stick with marks on it. Taking the two items outside, she used the rod to open the metal disc that covered the diesel fuel storage tank, then she unfolded the marker stick and lowered it into the tank. It came up wet to the hundred-liter mark.

  “There’s fuel in this tank!” Else called across the forecourt.

  The others came running. “Where is the pump?” Rache asked. The salvagers looked blank. “Go on, find it,” she ordered. They trotted off, returning a few minutes later with a hand-cranked pump. A long pipe hung from the base of the cylindrical pumping unit. The output pipe was a heavy plastic tube.

  “You,” Rache pointed at one of the salvagers. “Run back to the trucks, get everyone to bring fuel tanks.” The man sprang into action, vanishing into the darkness as if a swarm of rats were on his heels.

  “We should keep exploring,” Else said. “There could be other useful stuff around here.”

  Leaving the pump they walked on to the far edge of the town.

  “Listen,” Else said, raising a hand to stop the procession. They strained in the dark, ears tuned to the slightest change in the background noise.

  “What is that?” Rache asked, her eyes wide at the strange sound.

  “A piano. And people singing to the music,” Else said.

  “It’s beautiful,” Rache sighed.

  “It’s coming from that way,” Else said, turning from the main street and walking deeper into the town.

  They tracked the music to a small wooden church. A fence had been built outside; six-foot-high posts and layers of chicken wire were topped by rolls of barbed wire and surrounded with sandbags. Heavy orange road barriers were arranged at angles, putting the church inside a diamond shape, the purpose of the configuration lost on Else.

  She froze and gestured the people behind her to move into cover as evols came wandering into view around the perimeter fence. They were attracted by the noise from inside the building and as they shuffled along, the smooth plastic lines of the barriers gently turned them away from the fence.

  Else watched, fascinated at the way the evols were being guided. They didn’t bunch up against the fence; instead they were being channeled, funneled into a corridor of barricades until they reached the end of the barriers, somewhere out there in the darkness.

  “There’s got to be a way in,” Rache whispered in Else’s ear.

  “A gate, between those two bigger posts,” Else replied, her eyes fixed on the evols moving away down the barrier. “Okay, let’s go.” Else led them over the plastic barriers and into the evol run. Then, after clambering over the other side, they approached the gate. It was securely latched but not padloc
ked.

  Else scanned over the gate, looking for wires, explosives, or other alarms and booby traps. Satisfied it was safe, she unlocked the gate. “Look where you are stepping,” she warned, ushering the others through and closing the gate behind them.

  On the inside of the fence the yard had been arranged with tables, chairs, and folded sun umbrellas. An unlit neon sign traced out the word OPEN.

  Else tried the front door. The handle turned and it opened easily. “Hello?” she called into the church.

  The piano stopped immediately. A few moments later the sound of singing cut off. Footsteps, too light for a man, Else realized, came walking towards the door. Light flared and they all blinked in the sudden pool of white, cast by halogen bulbs on stands. A set of double doors swung open and a figure with long white hair stepped into view. “Why hello!” she beamed at the group.

  “Hi,” Else grinned back.

  The woman was thin and elderly. Her skin appeared as soft and wrinkled as a crushed tissue. “Well come on in, I’ve been waiting for you.” The smiling woman stepped aside, holding the inner doors open. “Oh and be a dear and shut the door behind you,” she called. “It lets the moths in you understand,” she confided in Else.

  Beyond the curtain a café decor had been set up in the church. Tables, chairs, and white linen with glassware and place settings awaited them on each table. A piano waited for the player to return. Only the pews were missing.

  “Take a seat,” the woman gestured to the room. She went to a table at the end and poured jugs of colored liquid into carafes; she set these on a tray and returned to the table where the salvagers stood in confusion.

  “I’m Else, this is Rache and . . .”

  “Uhh, Anchor,” one of the scavengers said, looking surprised to be singled out.

  “Pisty,” said the first engineer.

  “Johno,” added the second.

  “I’m Will.”

  “Crab,” the last of the scavenger team said.

  The old woman clasped her hands together. “What fine boys you have, Miss Else.”

  “They’re not mine,” Else said.

  “I have drinks for everyone, on the house of course.” She laid out the carafes and turned away, hesitating as if she had forgotten what to do next.