chapter 20
Noah pulled a bottle, two glasses and his Colt Python from the bottom drawer of his desk. He had managed to escape the fate that so many others had suffered so far, but he knew he did not have long left. He poured healthy measures into each glass and then pushed one of the drinks over to Viktor.
Viktor was looking very pale. He had met up with Noah as the mass exodus from the dining room had taken place. He had saved Noah from one of the infected and for his troubles been bitten on the arm, no, more than bitten, a chunk had been taken out of him. He had lost a considerable amount of blood, and even though a tourniquet had been applied, the prognosis was not good. He grabbed the glass of whisky and glugged it like it was water. Noah leaned over and immediately refilled it then grabbed his own glass and took two big gulps. “I’m sorry as hell this happened to you, Viktor.”
Viktor took another drink. “Death comes for us all in the end.”
“I just hoped it would be later … much later for both of us. I can’t believe Angel would do something like this. I mean running out on me is one thing. Killing me is one thing. Doing this to all these people, well, that’s just … it’s just evil.”
Viktor took another drink and placed the glass back down on the desk. “Sir, I always liked you.”
“Why thank you, Viktor, I always liked you too.”
“But your wife was a total fucking bitch.”
Noah’s eyes widened with shock as he looked towards his bodyguard; then finally a smile turned the corner of his mouth up before he guffawed with laughter. “Well, I suppose you got that dead right.”
“But, sir,” Viktor continued, “This wasn’t her.” He gestured around as distant screams could be heard from the hallways. “This was someone who wanted to make sure that there was no chance anybody could come after them. This was a tactical move, a clever move, a winning move. Rendering the ship immobile, sabotaging the lifeboats, making sure there was no way anybody could escape. That was check. While ever there were engineers or ship hands on board, there was always the slimmest possibility that some would find a means of escape. But this is checkmate. This was the move of a grandmaster. This was Troy.”
“Well, my dear wife, may she rot in Hell, chose him over me.”
“Yes, but I know Troy. I know what he did as a mercenary in Mali and Rwanda. I know some of the men he has with him. A very small circle would have known about this, and your wife would not be among them. For whatever she is, she would not be able to reconcile herself to this.”
The room fell silent for a moment, and both men took a drink. Noah looked towards Viktor whose face had turned greyer. “Sweet Jesus, we should get you laid down on the couch.” He started getting up from his chair to help his wounded bodyguard when Viktor put his hand up.
“No. I need … I need a favour, sir.” He looked towards the revolver on the desk.
Noah took an even longer drink. He rubbed his other hand over his face as another scream, nearer this time, echoed down the hallway. He picked up the gun and felt the weight of it in his hand. “The only thing this baby has ever fired at is paper targets.”
“Not today,” Viktor said. His voice was just a whisper now, and as Noah looked at him, he could see the bodyguard’s head start to droop.
“No, not today.” Without hesitation, Noah raised the weapon and fired. The bullet disappeared into Viktor’s forehead and burst through the back of his skull, decorating the wall behind with a bloody abstract. The loud crack made Noah’s ears ring, but he was still able to hear yet another scream. It wouldn’t be long before they were right outside his door. He looked over the desk to the grey figure on the floor. If he didn’t do it now, if he didn’t take his own life, it could be too late. He could be damned to spend eternity on this ship as one of these … things. He poured one final glass of whisky and drank it down straight. Figures ran by his window. They didn’t see him, but it would not be long until one did. He placed the muzzle of the revolver against his forehead and tears filled his eyes. “Please, God, forgive me for what I’ve done and what I’m about to do.”
Noah closed his eyes, and warm streams ran down his cheeks. He smiled; he could not remember the last time he had cried genuine tears. He had done it a thousand times on stage using peppermint oil to start the waterworks. Seeing a preacher cry was always a crowd-pleaser, always made the donation hotlines go into meltdown. This was real though. These were real tears, and, despite everything, they felt good. Noah let out one last breath and squeezed the trigger; then Noah didn’t feel anything, ever again.
✽ ✽ ✽
The spade hit something solid. “I think this is it,” Wren said, tapping the metal blade against the lid of the wooden box again.
“Okay,” Mike said, jumping down. “You’ve done enough, get yourself a drink, I’ll finish this off. He reached across and took the spade from Wren who struggled to pull her eyes away from his brown, glistening bare chest and shoulders.
Oh, God. “Okay,” she said, colouring up and hoisting herself out of the hole.
Mike cleared the rest of the earth from the top of the coffin, or what passed for a coffin. It was not decorative or even varnished. It was the type of wooden box he had seen in Western movies after a gunfight. It served a purpose, no more, no less. The smell from within was already seeping out of the cracks, but it was a smell Mike was familiar with and used to now. He reached across to his rucksack and retrieved a straight-edge screwdriver then got to work levering the lid. When there was a big enough gap, he shoved the blade of the spade in, twisted and pulled. Some of the wood splintered, but the lid opened, revealing the rotting body that had once been John. The stink hit Mike like a freight train, but he stood his ground. Wren was standing by the graveside watching, and it was a split second later that the full impact of the odour reached her. She immediately ran off to the side and threw up.
Mike grabbed a pair of gloves from his rucksack, put them on and pulled out a knife. “You okay?” he asked, looking over towards Wren.
“Oh yeah, I’m fine. Having a ball.”
“Okay, dumb question.”
“Do you think?” she said, standing up and returning to the side of the hole.
Mike bent down and pulled open John’s shirt. He inserted the knife into the grey skin a few centimetres below the boy’s – the creature’s – ribcage and began to carve a cantaloupe-sized hole. When he was done, he peeled back the disc of flesh, revealing the gory contents within. Wren’s eyes widened and she ran off to the side once again to be sick.
“For someone who was out there so long by yourself, you’ve got a poor gag reflex.”
“Yeah, well, funnily enough, I never cut one of these things open. It’s not something that ever occurred to me.”
Mike straightened up for a moment. “We need something to mix this in.”
“What?” Wren asked, wiping her mouth and looking towards him.
“We need something to mix this in.”
“Mix it? What are you talking about?”
Mike’s head tilted a little. “Wren, what do you think we’re doing here?”
She looked towards Wolf, who was sitting patiently at the foot of the grave, then back at Mike. “Well, we’re … we… I suppose—”
“Listen. We need this as some kind of solution. This thing’s been dead a few days. The flesh is stiff, solid. We need something like a mortar and pestle to mash it up so we can make it usable.”
Wren vomited again. She remained bent over for a few seconds then straightened up once more. “That’s the grossest thing I’ve ever heard.”
“Hey look, it’s not my first choice either. The first time I did this, I used a blender; the second time the infected were still fresh enough to—”
Wren bent over and wretched again, but there was nothing left to come out. “I’m begging you, please stop talking. Do whatever you need to do, but, please, no more commentary.”
Mike climbed back out of the grave and placed a comforting hand o
n Wren’s back. “Are you okay?”
“I swear if you ask me that again I’m going to set Wolf on you.”
“Wolf likes me.”
“Yeah, for a German Shepherd, he’s not that smart.”
Wolf whined, and their attention was immediately drawn to him. They both looked at the dog who in turn was staring out to sea. They followed his gaze. Both of them had been so preoccupied with the digging of the hole and the contents within that they had not noticed the entire fleet of ships and boats that had made its way into the bay. “Oh shit!” Mike blurted.
The pair of them watched as the smaller boats sailed into the harbour, while the tall ships dropped anchor further out. Even from this distance, they could see the busy crews. “Oh my God, Mike, there must be hundreds of them.”
“The more the merrier.”
“You really are mad, aren’t you?”
Mike smiled. “If I had a penny for every time somebody said that to me.”
“This isn’t a time to be flippant,” Wren snapped.
The grin disappeared from Mike’s face, and he took a step towards her. “Wren, right this minute, it’s you and me against all of them.”
“Err … yeah, that’s what I’m saying.”
“If our plan works, we are going to be the last thing they’ll be worrying about because the place will be swimming with RAMs.”
“Okay, I get that, but they aren’t the only ones who’ll need to worry about RAMs, Mike. We don’t have immunity to them.”
“What, really? Damn, we’d better come up with another plan then.”
“Look, smart arse, I’m just saying, even if our plan works, the chance of us getting out of here in one piece is like fifty million to one.”
“Do you have a better idea?”
“No.”
Mike leaned against one of the taller gravestones. “This is why I wanted to do this alone. You say fifty million to one, but it’s one more shot than we have at the moment. Look, it’s not too late. You and Wolf could still make it out of here. You know the woods and the shortcuts well enough, and at your speed you could catch up with the others.”
“I’m staying.”
“So we’re doing this then?”
She glared at Mike. “We’re doing this.”
✽ ✽ ✽
Talikha and the others had resumed their trek when the crowd from town led by Kirsty had caught up. Now they marched along the coast road like a slow caravan of war prisoners. They had not seen the minibus again since it had left them and headed north, but they were under no illusions as to who was in charge. Everyone had seen the fleet appear in the bay.
“What are we going to do when we reach North Ridge?” Kirsty asked.
Talikha looked across to Sammy and Jake, who, for the time being, were walking with another group of children. “Mike told me to head to Torridon, wait for them there and then…”
“And then what?”
“And then we move on.”
“What if they don’t show up?”
Talikha did not answer, she just carried on walking. If they did not show up, it meant that Raj, Mike and the others were dead and if that was the case, then nothing else mattered anyway.
She did not need to speak the words, Kirsty understood perfectly without them. Picking up on the worsening atmosphere, David changed the subject. “Mac’s place is coming up over the next brow. We should be able to stop there and get some water at least. If I know Mac, he’s going to take some convincing to leave, that property has been in his family for generations.”
Nobody responded; they carried on walking. They reached the brow of the hill, and as they began their descent, a fresh gloom shrouded them. “Oh no,” Richard said and then turned towards Talikha. “Keep everybody moving; we’ll get water from somewhere else.”
Even from the road, they could see the door had been forced off its hinges. Richard and David jogged ahead and ran through the gate. As they entered the kitchen to the compact fisherman’s cottage, they immediately noticed that the double-barrelled shotgun that usually hung proudly over the fireplace was missing and the kitchen drawers and cupboards were all open. The pair of them looked at one another and then trepidatiously walked towards the short hallway that led to the bedrooms.
Richard came to an immediate halt. “What is it?” David asked. Then he saw it too. There was a stain on the carpet—not just a stain, a spray like a fine mist of blood had been pumped through an atomiser. They edged towards the patch of red, and as they reached the open doorway from where it protruded, they stopped again. It was a full minute before either of them could tear their eyes away. The four hundred plus people they had been marching with began filing past the entrance to the driveway, blissfully unaware of what had gone on inside.
“Poor Mac,” Richard eventually blurted.
“Do you think he suffered?”
“He had his throat cut like some halal goat. Of course he suffered.”
“What should we do?”
“There’s not really anything we can do, is there?”
“We could put him to bed.”
“What?”
“We could lay him to rest in his own bed. I think he’d like that.”
“David, he’s dead for Christ’s sake. He doesn’t care anymore,” Richard snapped and immediately regretted it as he saw an even greater sadness chisel its way onto his friend’s face. “Oh, good grief! Get his legs, I’ll take his shoulders.”
The two of them lifted the old man’s still warm body and placed it onto the bed. Then Richard opened the wardrobe, found a blanket and covered Mac’s corpse from toe to chin. “Thank you,” said David.
“For a man of logic, you defy reason sometimes.”
“What sort of people would do something like this?”
“The sort of people we don’t want to be anywhere near.” The two of them stood in silence for a moment longer, just looking towards the bed.
“I wish Ruth was here.”
“David…”
“What?”
“You do realise that we’re probably never going to see Ruth again.”
David had a tendency to be overly sentimental sometimes, but he wasn’t an idiot. He knew what was going on. “Why are we bothering? Why are we bothering with any of this?” he said, gesturing out towards the road.
“Because there are families, children, friends out there who are counting on us. Because the people in that hall, Shaw, Hughes, Ruth, Lucy, Emma, Jenny, Jules, George, Raj, their deaths can’t be in vain. They’ll know better than anybody that they’re not getting out of this alive, but if we can help lead our people to safety; if we can at least try to save them, then it won’t have been in vain.”
David looked back towards the bed and let out a comical honking sound. Richard immediately turned towards him, baffled as to what he was doing, but as he looked towards his friend, icy despair embraced him. David was crying, he let out the humorous sound again, but there was nothing funny about it. It was his desperate attempt to suck in air while combatting streaming tears and problem sinuses. Richard walked across and placed a comforting arm on his shoulder. “I’m not ready to lose Ruth, Richard. I can’t. I don’t want to carry on without her.”
“We have to carry on. For her, we have to carry on.”
chapter 21
In the tiny shed, Mike had found a pickle jar that was crammed with everything from galvanised fencing staples to padlock keys. He emptied it out and wiped it clean with an old cloth. Placing it on the corner workbench, he poured in some of their last remaining water and the handful of zombie sushi he had chiselled out of John’s stomach. The tissue floated down to the bottom, not even causing the clear water to discolour slightly.
“This isn’t going to work,” Wren said.
“Trust me, it’ll work.” Mike grabbed his knife and straight-edged screwdriver. He pinned the flesh to the bottom of the jar using the screwdriver then slowly carved. Gradually, the water started to turn pink then red.
When he had sliced as much as he could, he placed the glass container on the floor, reached for the sweeping brush leaning against the wall, turned it upside down and placed the dome-shaped end inside, squashing and melding the tissue, blending it with the water until it was a gloopy red mess.
“That is the grossest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”
Mike picked the jar up and screwed the lid on. “I wish I could say the same.”
“You’ve seen something worse? What could be worse than that?”
Mike thought back to the siege in Candleton, when he sliced chunks of fat from John’s mother who had also had the misfortune of becoming infected. He remembered Emma and Jenny putting the flesh into a blender and hitting the button. “Trust me, you don’t want to know.”
“I’ll take your word for it. So, what’s the plan?”
“Huh?”
“The plan with this,” she said, pointing to the jar.
“Well, that’s going to be the tricky bit.”
“Oh good, there’s a tricky bit. ’Cause with the hundreds of armed soldiers heading into shore, the fact that my grandad, your girlfriend and sister as well as a load of our friends are being held captive and the rest of our friends are being frogmarched out of town into God only knows what kind of hell, everything was looking so boringly straightforward. So come on, Einstein, enlighten me, what’s the tricky bit?”
Mike smiled. “You know sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.”
Wren turned to the German Shepherd. “Wolf, get ready to rip his balls off on my command.”
Mike ignored the comment and carried on. “When we did this in Candleton, we had hollow-point bullets. We put the mixture inside and sealed it with wax. When we went up against Fry, we had tennis balls with nails through them that were covered in entrails and all sorts of shite. As of this minute, the only thing I can think of is me dipping my blades in this stuff and stabbing the fuckers. The really tough part will be stabbing them but not killing them. They need time to turn.”
“Okay, I see your problem… You’re an idiot.”
Safe Haven (Book 6): Is This The End of Everything? Page 17
