Dead Tropics

by Sue Edge

  If we could just get to the empty highway, we would have a chance, but to do so, we would have to run a gauntlet of undead bodies. Even as I hesitated, the gaps between the cars rapidly filling with undead bodies moving towards us.

  “On top of the cars!” Lucas blurted. “We might be able to make it if we run across the tops of the cars.”

  I looked at the bumper to bumper line of cars stretching before us and then at the dead bodies lining the sides. Without another word, I scrambled on the bonnet of the nearest sedan and leapt onto the boot of the next car. The thumps behind me told me that my friends had followed suit. Over the roof and down onto the bonnet and a leap onto the next vehicle. My heart leapt. This might just work!

  As I climbed onto a truck bed, dozens of corpses mobbed the vehicle and reached for me. Carefully, I kept to the middle of the truck bed, avoiding the forest of grasping hands on both sides. I clutched my parang tightly in my hand as I scaled the roof and surveyed the obstacle course before me. Eight zombies were grouped around the lower bonnet, hands pawing at the air as their dull eyes stared at me.

  With a deep breath, I launched myself through the air, landed on the bonnet and immediately pushed off again. Hands grasped at my clothes but fell away as I scrambled over the roof of the next vehicle. Ahead, more and more zombies lined the vehicles like some kind of perverse ticker parade.

  If I stopped to think about it, I would quail, so I just ran. Over and over, I clambered over roofs and dodged hands. As I carefully moved from a Volkswagen to a four-wheel drive, a hand succeeded in hooking itself in my pants. I reacted immediately. Holding on with one hand, I viciously lashed out with my parang and buried it in the arm of a young girl of about eleven years old, almost severing it. Yanking my leg away, I was free to continue my climb over the roof of the four-wheel drive, trying to control my trembling limbs.

  I drew a quivering breath as I saw the roadblock ahead and, beyond it, the open highway. A quick look back showed Emma and Lucas just one car behind. I waited for them to join me as I looked for a vehicle that could negotiate the small gap in the road not blocked by the pile-up.

  “Um.” Lucas said hesitantly. “I have a suggestion.”

  As we turned to look at him, he pointed at a motorbike lying on its side, blood splattered on the ground beside it. Emma and I glanced at each other and then back at him.

  “Can three of us even fit on it?!” Emma asked dubiously.

  He shrugged. “If they can fit a whole family on them in Asia, I think we can squeeze three skinny folks on this one.” Glancing around at the growing group of zombies, I knew that we were out of time - and options.

  Without waiting for a response, Lucas leapt off the vehicle, dashed over to the Honda motorcycle, and righted it. I knew he had a trail bike at home but it seemed to me that this was a whole different kettle of fish.

  However, Lucas seemed to think differently and immediately kick started the bike into life. With an ostentatious squealing of wheels, he roared to the front of the car and revved the engine. It was the signal for us to climb on behind him. Scrambling down, Emma squeezed onto the seat behind him and I jumped precariously onto the rear section over the exhaust, clutching Emma’s waist tightly.

  With a surge of power, the bike roared forward. Instinctively, I leaned over to counter the tilt as we flew past the roadblock and onto the blissfully empty highway, leaving the mayhem behind us.

  The Refuge

  1

  After the chaos of the city, the peacefulness of the highway on the other side of the roadblock was stunning. We travelled unimpeded to the turnoff to my sister’s. I reached over and tapped Lucas on the shoulder to remind him to turn.

  On the right was the local shopping centre and a little further on were a couple of schools. People continued to file in and out of the shops, armed with shopping trolleys and toddlers in tow, apparently unaware of the dangers in the streets.

  I resisted the urge to stop and warn them, knowing what a hopeless task that would be. I focused, instead, on thoughts of my family. For the first time all day, I allowed myself to imagine holding them in my arm, covering them in kisses and reassuring myself that they were well.

  We left the populated suburbs behind and started passing large acreages dotted with horses. Then we passed into the rainforest estate. Thick, dense foliage covered the road on both sides as we travelled over the rickety old bridge that crossed a fast flowing creek. Just past it, was the welcome sight of the road my sister lived on. The motorbike’s engine groaned in protest as it struggled to get us up the small hill the road curved over. Topping the hill, I anxiously scanned the street for any sign of trouble but it looked as serene as ever.

  As Lucas parked the motorbike at the bottom of my sister’s steep driveway, I jumped off and ran up the driveway as if my feet were on fire. My heart felt like it would burst with the need to see my kids. As I reached the stairs, I heard the sliding doors open and the stampede of little feet.

  At the top of the stairs, the cherubic faces of my babies peered down at me.

  “Mummy!” Sarah smiled happily. Alex cautiously placed a plump foot on the top step as he started down towards me. I laughed and bolted up the stairs. Sweeping them up in my arms, I spun around, causing them to laugh and squeal. Oh, they smelt so good! I nuzzled my face in their neck. Then, in the doorway, I saw the most beautiful sight in the whole world - my daughter Michele, healthy and smiling.

  I grinned, trying to think of something to say that wouldn’t embarrass her when all I wanted to do was burst into tears and cover her in kisses. “Hey, honey.”

  “Hey, mum.” Did I spy a hint of shine in her eyes? “What took you so long?”

  I shrugged, blinking rapidly while I readjusted the kids on my hips. “Got delayed at the school.”

  Kaye pushed past Michele and hugged me tightly, babies and all.

  “I’ve been so worried.” She stepped back and slapped my arm. “Couldn’t you ring at least?”

  “Hey, I tried several times! I think the lines were swamped or something.”

  She gestured dismissively. “It doesn’t matter now. Come inside - all of you.” She smiled welcomingly at Emma and Lucas as they topped the stairs.

  Inside, Roy was standing guardedly beside the sofa, freshly showered. He shifted a bit nervously as I moved towards him, holding his hands up defensively. “Hey, you told me to keep the kids safe. Those zombies were six deep around us by the time I left - if I hadn’t left when I did, we mightn’t have been able to get away at all! I circled the block a few times, looking for you… “

  Putting the babies down, I touched his arm. “Roy. You did the right thing. Thank you.”

  If they hadn’t left when they did, they might have ended up in that traffic jam…I shuddered to think what might have happened then.

  “Yeah, well.” He blustered. “Tell your daughter that, will you? I’ve haven’t had a moment of peace ever since!”

  I grinned and looked around. Michele was standing next to Lucas, playing self-consciously with her hair, while the babies played underfoot.

  “Where’s Jessie?” I asked anxiously as I realised who was missing. Kaye touched my arm reassuringly. “She’s sleeping. Come and see for yourself.”

  I followed her into my nieces’ bedroom and saw the frail looking child curled up in the bed, looking peaceful and angelic.

  “Is she okay?” I whispered. I suddenly realised that I didn’t even know why she was in hospital in the first place.

  Kaye nodded, understanding what I was asking. “Turns out she’s an asthmatic. She had a bad attack last night. Needed to be observed overnight but she is fine now. Just a bit tired. I gave her a bath and some food and then suggested she have a nap.”

  Food. I suddenly realised I was starving! Kaye recognised the look on my face and laughed. “Come on, I’ll make you guys some sandwiches and you can fill me in on everything. I’m still trying to process the stuff Roy and Michele told me!”

  As my si
ster talked, I felt the tension start to drain from my body. My sister, my kids, my friends - we were here and, for now, we were safe. I knew it wouldn’t last but for now, a few moments of peace felt like a slice of heaven.

  ****

  After a long drink of cold water, we sat around the long wooden table and brought each other up to date. I told an edited version of our adventures, although I’m sure they filled in the more unpleasant gaps for themselves.

  “What about here?” I asked. “Any activity, dead or alive?”

  Kaye wrinkled her forehead. “No, it has been as quiet as ever. I haven’t seen or heard anything unusual - unless you count the sight of an ambulance coming up my driveway.”

  As I opened my mouth to ask, Roy pointed downwards. “Parked it behind the four wheel drive. That’s why you didn’t see it. “

  “What about the radio or the tv?” I asked. “Any information?”

  Kaye snorted. “This morning, there was all that talk about the encephalitis outbreak and then the minister came on at lunch to say that they were considering implementing a quarantine. Nothing since!”

  “Maybe we should check again.” Emma suggested.

  Kaye gracefully stood up and picked up the tv remote. She frowned as only static came on. She flicked to another channel and then another. There was static on all the channels. Kaye moved to the radio and tried to find a station. Static. She turned to us with a raised brow. “I’m going to take a stab and say that this is not a good sign.”

  I sighed. “We need to talk about what we should do next. Do we sit tight, make this place secure and wait for our armed forces to bail us out? Or do we get out of town?”

  “What about Mike and Ken?” Emma asked anxiously.

  “I hope that they are okay, Emma, but if they are not here soon, we are going to have to assume that they are not coming. In the meantime, we need to make plans.”

  Kaye looked across at me, subdued, and my gut clenched at the fear in her eyes. I knew what she was thinking because the thought was in my mind, too. What about our brother and her husband? Were they safe? Can we leave town without them? Would they want us to? I pushed the thoughts away. Joe would want me to keep our children safe, as would Andy. That had to be our first priority.

  For the next half an hour, we discussed our options. Going north was out of the question as there was only rainforest and the ocean. And, as I pointed out, Cape Tribulation seemed to be the origin of this plague so heading in that direction was not a good idea.

  Going south was not a good option as we would have to travel through parts of the infected city. That only left the hills. About twenty minutes up the road was the exit to the Tablelands, the mountainous farming region of far north Queensland. As far as we knew, that road was still clear, but for how long? We needed to make a decision soon.

  Once we’d determined our viable options, we argued about the pros and cons of each for several minutes. I felt torn. All I wanted to do was huddle under a blanket and sleep, and in these peaceful surroundings, it was easy to believe that we were safe. I desperately wanted to believe that I could just relax and leave it to the government to fight the walking corpses.

  However, the cynical side of me said I should pack up and head out of this hellhole while I had the chance, because the only thing I could count on was myself and my small group of family and friends. An image of Joe and Andy standing on the pier, laughing, flitted across my eyes. No, I thought fiercely as panic rose, I have to trust that they are safe, I have to.

  “We have to go.” I said. “We don’t know how long this situation could go on for. We don’t know how long we can hold out here for. It makes more sense to take the kids up to our friend, Claudette’s, farm until this mess has been cleared up.”

  I would find a way to get through to the boys, I promised myself. The boat usually arrived back around 6am and Joe’s mobile phone came back into reception range about an hour or so before then. I could warn him and Andy off.

  “What about Mike and Ken?” Emma repeated her earlier question. “Are we going to wait for them?”

  I shook my head. “We shouldn’t wait any longer. You saw how quickly things deteriorated in the city. We don’t know how long the road will remain open. We’ll leave them a note so they know where to find us.” If they make it here, I added silently. Emma nodded slowly, chewing her lip unhappily.

  Roy spoke up. “What if this problem has spread to the Tablelands?” The thought hadn’t even occurred to me. Surely, it couldn’t have spread that far in one day!

  Pushing myself away from the table, I looked around the group. “Maybe it has. If we need to, at least we can take the inland route down to Townsville; hell, we can go all the way down to the bottom of Australia if we want! Here, we have no options except to stick it out.”

  There were nods of agreement around the table. With that decided, we split up to pack food, clothes and whatever weapons we could find. I found an axe and long handed shovel in the shed; Kaye produced some butcher knives and Roy located some star pickets.

  Twenty minutes later, we pinned a note to the verandah post for Mike and Ken, piled uncomfortably into the four-wheel drive and headed for the Tablelands exit. In the backseat, Kaye’s toddlers wriggled on Emma and Roy’s laps, while Michele and Lucas juggled my two in the rear beside a sleepy-eyed Jessie. I rode shotgun as Kaye drove. Glancing in the rearview mirror, I grinned as I caught Michele and Lucas casting sidelong glances at each other. Even in these circumstances, teenage hormones don’t rest, it would seem.

  2

  The streets were now eerily empty. No cars moved along the road, no children played in front of their homes, no schoolchildren played in the grounds. Everywhere, people huddled silently in their homes.

  As we turned onto the highway, the situation changed dramatically. We watched, open-mouthed, as tanks, jeeps, and trucks full of grim faced soldiers passed us, heading for the city. They must have travelled through the Tablelands, which suggested that the south side of Cairns was inaccessible…

  “Yeehah!” Roy exclaimed. “Now those zombies are going to get their arses handed to them!”

  I felt a moment of excitement. “I hope so, Roy.” The thought that this might all be over by tomorrow or Sunday was heady.

  Driving along the highway flanked by canfields, a lone zombie stood beside the road, staring blankly ahead. Blood marred the whole left side of his body. A shiver went through Kaye’s body.

  “I knew you were telling the truth but to see it for myself…” She whispered. I nodded silently.

  For the next several minutes, vehicles continued to pass us, heading into town. As we took the turnoff to the Tablelands, we fell in behind another civilian vehicle coming from the beaches, presumably with the same idea of leaving town via the mountain route.

  “What the hell…?” Roy murmured. Before us, armed soldiers stood across the Tablelands road, backed by a tank blocking any passage. We slowed to a stop as a soldier with a loudspeaker moved forward.

  “There is a quarantine order in place. Please turn around and return to your homes.”

  As the driver ahead of us pushed open his door and emerged, the soldier backed away rapidly. The other soldiers brought their weapons up sharply. “Sir, return to your vehicle immediately.”

  As the driver, a solid dark-haired man in his mid thirties, continued to move forward, I started to get a bad feeling about this. The soldiers looked jittery and nervous and I could see this situation going bad quickly.

  “We have orders to shoot, sir. Return to your vehicle now.”

  The driver paused. “You can’t force us to stay here!” He yelled, gesticulating wildly. “It’s not safe!”

  The soldier lowered his loudspeaker. I heard his voice clearly as he tried to calm the driver down. “I understand, sir. However, you need to take your family home and make your house as secure as possible. Lay low and it will be over in a few days.”

  “Yeah, when my family and I have been killed by those l
unatics!” The driver screamed, face red with frustration. He started to move forward again. “I want to talk to whoever is in charge of this goddamned operation!”

  The soldier with the loudspeaker stumbled backwards as the other soldiers charged forward. “Move back, move back now!” They all yelled in agitation, guns raised to firing position.

  “Oh my God.” Kaye whispered, horrified. “Can’t he see they mean business?! They are going to shoot him!”

  The man hesitated, desperation etched in his body. He ran his hands through his hair in frustration. As he did so, his shirt fell away from his forearm, revealing a bandage. Instantly, the tension amongst the soldiers escalated. Their voices mingled incoherently as they shouted orders, guns aimed straight at him.

  We watched, aghast, as the driver continued forward determinedly. A shot rang out and the man jerked. He touched his chest in surprise and then took another stumbling step forward. We watched in horror as a barrage of bullets pierced his body, causing him to jerk around in a grotesque caricature of a dance. As the noise faded away, his body collapsed to the road.

  Agonised screams erupted from his car. The passenger door flung open and his wife ran out. I closed my eyes, unwilling to watch this disaster play out. The loudspeaker blasted a warning for the wife to stop. Hearing no more gunshots, I ventured a peek. The wife was on her knees a few feet from her husband’s body, sobbing her heart out.

  “He just wanted to get our baby to the hospital.” She cried in grief and anger. “He didn’t deserve to die, you bastards. You’re supposed to protect us, not kill us!” She stretched out to touch her husband’s foot.

  “Your daughter’s sick, ma’am?” The soldier’s suddenly alert voice should have warned her but she was too distraught to notice. “Was she bitten?”

  She sobbed. “She’s unconscious. She needs treatment!”

  Without a word, the soldiers circled around her towards the car, weapons high again. “Have you been bitten, ma’am?”