Winter Smith (Book 1): London's Burning

by Strange, J. S.

  “If we fired now, they would come charging, regardless of what was stopping them.”

  Winter looked up at the flat above. The curtains were drawn to reveal the woman Winter had waved at a few nights ago. She looked tired and ill.

  “What about the other end of the street?” She asked, her eyes lingering on the vacant woman in the window. “Why can’t we go that way, leave those zombies where they are?”

  The policewoman finally looked at her. A flash of recognition came over her young face, “That’s been blocked up, too. We just want to get these away. The only vehicles being allowed to leave are the evacuation vans. You should get yourself on one.”

  Winter eyed the bitten man again. He was shaking now, pale. Before she could tell the police officer, she began to talk again.

  “Have you thought about evacuating, Winter?”

  Winter didn’t ask how she knew her name. She shrugged. “Eventually. I just want to help the best I can.”

  “You’d help by getting out of here. Too many people are trying to stay, hoping this will blow over but it definitely will not. We’re losing numbers of ships that can come and go and the wait is too long at the docks. You’d be best to go now before the ships stop running at all. You don’t want to be one of the only survivors that gets left behind now, do you?”

  Winter just nodded. She had time, but how much of it she didn’t know.

  “Tell me, what’s with the flames in torches that some of these officers are holding?”

  “Flames prove effective against zombies. They’re destroyed easily. Bullets, too, although it does take more than one bullet.”

  “A shot through the head knocks them down,” Winter said.

  “Thanks for the tip.”

  “Is there anything I can do now?”

  The policewoman shook her head. “You don’t need to speak to anyone, do you? Go back inside, wait until morning then leave this street. It’s not safe anymore.”

  Winter nodded. “This is horrible.”

  “Indeed it is,” The woman nodded. “Stay safe.”

  “You too.”

  Winter turned to leave, but her eye was caught by the evacuation van. Pale survivors eyed her, scared and lost. A woman wept in one corner. As she approached, a man in a white cotton shirt and black trousers stepped out, a blue scarf around his neck.

  “Got any room?” Winter asked.

  The man consulted a note pad. He walked around to the side of the van and looked in the cage, where waiting evacuees sat.

  “About five more spaces available,” the man said.

  Winter heard a knock on the window above her. She turned around and saw Violet glaring at her, her look telling her that she would not be getting on an evacuation van.

  “I’ll be back,” Winter said. The man in the van just shrugged.

  Winter began walking towards the diner when the sound of glass smashing pierced the air. Winter looked up in time to see a man leaping out of the flat opposite the diner, the one Winter had been watching regularly. The one where the woman had been only moments before, but now was nowhere to be seen. The man landed on the police cars below, screeching, his mouth dripping blood. He turned his head to the policeman next to him and took a chunk out of his cheek, drawing blood. The policeman screamed out in pain as bullets were turned to the zombie on the car. Some of the police in riot gear turned their shields around, and Winter noticed the zombies on the other side saw an opportunity. Defences were weak.

  They ran past the green smoke as if it were nothing. They leapt at people and threw them to the floor. People scattered into their houses; some were lucky while others weren’t. Police officers began to fight as they lost control. The woman Winter had been talking to was now ordering other officers with instructions. Suddenly, the whole street was full of the flesh eaters.

  Winter bolted. She forgot about the table leg she held, only intent on getting back into the diner before it was too late. If any of the zombies broke in, Violet and Connor would be stuck.

  Winter was close to the diner when a zombie was in front of her. She swung the table leg around and caught the zombie through the chest. It screamed at her, and Winter let go of the weapon, throwing it away from her in the hopes it would give her enough time to get back into the diner.

  A police officer ordered her to leave as he shot at the zombie. Winter didn’t need telling twice. She turned and ran back to the diner; opening the door she had foolishly forgot to lock.

  She was halfway through locking it when weight on the other end began pulling it away from her. She had no idea if zombies were fighting to open the door, or if it was a survivor who needed safety. She didn’t have time to see. With all the strength she could muster, she pulled it back towards her. With relief she felt it lock. She breathed heavily as the zombies threw themselves against the window, snarling.

  Listening to the screams and commotion outside made her sick. She pushed the tables they had been using to block the door against it once more, before turning to make her way upstairs.

  “Winter!” Violet called from upstairs.

  “It’s me.” Winter called back, speeding up after she heard a particularly loud bang from the window behind her.

  She got to the stairway, shut the door and piled up the furniture once more. Heading up the stairs, she spotted Violet and Connor looking at her, both pale.

  “You idiot,” Connor muttered. “You could have been killed out there.”

  “We need to go,” Violet said.

  “How?” Connor asked. “How the hell are we going to get out of this?”

  “The roof.”

  Winter looked through the window of the living room, into the flat opposite. A bed had been pulled out, messy and now deserted. Winter thought she could see blood. A small table was piled with medication, a bowl of water and a used flannel. Her heart dropping, Winter saw the woman she had seen only moments before. She lay dead in the hallway. She had been trying to save the man, possibly her husband, unaware that his bite was fatal.

  Just then, they heard a smash downstairs. A cold sweat broke out on Winter’s skin.

  “Did you hear that?” She gasped.

  “Oh fuck.” Violet moaned. “They’re in, aren’t they?”

  They were. The sounds of bodies trying to break down the door leading upstairs reached them.

  “We need to get into one of those vans!” Connor shouted.

  Winter ran to the window. She saw the last evacuation van start up and drive away from the massacre of the street below.

  “Oh my god, we are goners!” Violet cried.

  The sounds from downstairs made Winter nervous. The pounding of body on splintering wood weren’t encouraging. The screams from outside, panic and fear, only made Winter feel worse.

  “The back window,” Winter said.

  She hurried towards Violet’s bedroom. She could hear Violet and Connor following.

  “Here, we jump out of here, and we run.” Winter decided.

  “We’re too high up,” Connor sighed. “We’ll break something.”

  “That’s better than being killed.” Winter opened the back window, a square just big enough to get through. Before they jumped, she checked that the coast was clear.

  All she saw was a narrow alleyway, full of bins from the businesses on this side of the street. There were no signs of the zombies that had been bursting to get through the kitchen, but Winter noticed the door lying on the floor. They had gotten in.

  “Looks like the zombies broke in on both sides of the building,” Winter said. She took in the height of the wall opposite, separating the back of local businesses to housing estates. She judged they’d be able to grip hold of it and walk across it to a safer place.

  “What are you thinking?” Violet whispered.

  Before Winter could answer, the crash of falling furniture echoed from down in the diner. The dull thuds of bodies being thrown against the door leading upstairs intensified.

  “We jump to that wa
ll, get on it, and escape this town,” Winter said.

  “You’re going first then,” Connor said.

  Winter nodded. It was her idea, and she’d rather she test out the theory than Violet or Connor. If it went wrong, she didn’t know what she’d do, but she’d hope Violet and Connor would escape.

  Taking tentative steps towards the window, Winter almost forgot that there were zombie’s downstairs seconds away from getting upstairs. She climbed up onto the window ledge and positioned herself for the jump.

  It was cramped. The window size was not big enough to allow her to stand. Her head brushed against stone, while her legs were cramped underneath her. She placed both her hands on either side of the window frame.

  Her body screamed out for her to stop as she jumped. She thought she screamed as she leapt through the air, the wall seemingly further away now. She had nothing to support her, and almost imagined falling to the ground below.

  Her hands hit stonewall and slipped. Her mind kick-started into action.

  She gripped the wall. She heaved herself up until she was able to sit on the wall and steady herself.

  She looked across at Violet and Connor, their pale faces looking back at her.

  She moved across the wall, listening to the gunshots and screams from the street on the other side of the diner.

  “Jump,” Winter whispered to Violet.

  Violet climbed through the window more gracefully than Winter had done, her gun strapped to her leg by her fishnet tights. Her plastic boots scraped dully against the stone as she jumped. Winter lifted her free hand and gripped Violet’s arm, pulling her onto the wall. Violet hit the wall with a thud, wincing as her knee contacted with stone. As she climbed up, she cursed Winter for her help.

  Connor was last to jump. Before he climbed the ledge, the sound of a door inside falling to the floor drifted up to them. Judging by the look of panic on Connor’s face, it was clear the zombies had finally gotten in.

  Connor leapt, having no time to debate whether or not this was a good idea. Despite Violet cursing Winter, she grabbed Connor’s arm and pulled him to the wall. Winter looked up at the window again to see zombies grappling to get out and attack.

  “Move.” Violet screamed from behind her.

  Winter crawled across the wall, working out where they could jump to escape. She could hear Violet and Connor breathing behind her, panicking that they were too slow.

  Winter turned around to see the zombies leaping from the window to wall, some missing the jump but others making it. With panic, Winter vaulted off the wall. She heard Violet scream and looked up to see Connor falling clumsily and Violet balancing on the wall and running above.

  Winter grabbed Connor, aware that jumping to the alley below had been stupid, as zombies were now pursing them.

  Winter heard Violet scream again, and she looked up in time to see what had happened.

  Violet had put her full body weight on part of the wall that had been loose. The slate had come out of place, tipping to the side. Violet stumbled, the narrow wall providing no footing, and toppled off the wall and out of sight, into the housing estate.

  “Oh shit.” Connor cried.

  Winter spotted the end of the wall. A gate was bolted into it, locked. She headed towards the gate, Connor overtaking.

  She watched as Connor vaulted over the gate, the sounds of the zombies behind them spurring him on.

  Kicking off from the ground, Winter leapt over the fence. She turned around in the air, felt panic at the idea of landing take over, and stumbled until she found her feet.

  Connor was ahead, running towards the place where Violet had fallen. Winter hurried to catch up with him, turning around to see the zombies struggling to get over the gate.

  They ran through planted bushes that were ten feet apart, the loose thorns cutting at bare skin. Winter stumbled on the ground and only just managed to find her balance. The wall to her left was towering tall above, dark and depressing. Winter hoped Violet had had her fall broken by one of the bushes, or at least found somewhere clear to land.

  Connor slowed down, his sight set on something Winter couldn’t see. As she ran towards him, she saw that the housing estate was dark and empty, surrounded by the wall on the left and black spiked fences everywhere else. Winter could see shadows moving and thought that the zombies had them surrounded.

  The houses, which were modern and had only recently been show homes, judging by company posters, were now all boarded up, and Winter couldn’t tell if anyone was inside.

  She spotted cars parked in the street, cast in dark shadows as streetlights had been cut out.

  “Winter.” Connor gasped as she approached.

  Winter was relieved to see that Violet was sat up, clutching the back of her head.

  “Violet, are you okay?” Winter gasped, slipping just a few feet away from her and landing on her knees.

  Violet nodded. “I hit my head on something. The ground, probably. Fucking loose fittings. That wall was a death trap.”

  “To be fair, I don’t think whoever built it expected that people would ever run across it.” Winter laughed.

  “Well they should have. I would sue if there was someone to take money from.”

  Just then, they heard a particularly loud screech. The sounds of gunshots from the town just over from them were distant, but not distant enough. Winter still felt in danger.

  Violet stood up, and Connor and Winter decided to do the same. Violet was gazing over at something behind Winter, her eyes squinted.

  “Are those the zombies?”

  Winter followed Violet’s gaze and saw she was looking at the metal fences.

  “They haven’t worked out how to get in yet.”

  “Do you think we can hide out here?” Connor asked. He was taking in the boarded up houses, no sign of life inside.

  Violet walked forwards, somehow managing to balance on uneven ground in those high heels of hers.

  “No,” she said. She let go of the back of her head. “We need to get out of this area. Let’s get in a building, travel by roof if we have to, just get somewhere off the ground, and we can head to my town.”

  “You really think that’s achievable after what we just saw?” Connor asked.

  Violet turned to him with the look of someone who would do anything to see her family again.

  “It better be.”

  They hurried through the housing estate, huddled together and not uttering a word. Violet held her gun, while Winter regretted leaving the table leg behind. Connor seemed panicked that he didn’t have anything to protect him.

  They found another gate at the end of the estate, leading down a pathway that was surrounded by overgrown hedges. Winter thought that maybe the council had given up, allowed the path to be swallowed up by nature. They walked in a line, as they couldn’t move otherwise, each of them holding on to each other, like they were being guided through a scare attraction.

  When they got to the end of the pathway, they found themselves on a deserted street, with no sign that a zombie apocalypse was imminent.

  Chapter Seven

  The walk from the deserted street to the town where Violet lived had been Winter’s most nerve-wracking experience of her life. At any sound of noise, Winter wasn’t alone in jumping or screaming out, expecting the street to be filled with flesh eating beasts and their luck to finally run out.

  It had taken most of the night to walk to Borehamwood, but when Violet said that her house was only five minutes away from a graffiti painted Spar, Winter had felt relieved.

  Connor was moaning that he hadn’t eaten enough to walk so far, the fear from the diner obviously wearing off the further away they got. Winter, who was tired, was beginning to find the whole thing tiresome, and she bit her tongue to stop herself shouting at him.

  Violet walked through the deserted streets with her gun in her hand so casually, Winter wondered if the area she lived in almost expected a gun to be in the hand of someone who’s age classed them
under adulthood. She noticed broken bikes lying on frayed grass in the front of people’s gardens, dirty teddy bears left on the ground, forgotten and lost. She spotted cracked windows and some boarded up, and she was sure it was not boarded up because of the arrival of The Dead Years. Winter supposed that anyone living here didn’t really comprehend the issues highlighted in the daily news.

  Violet walked down a street that was empty except for a row of flats. Winter and Connor trailed behind her, feeling like zombies themselves. The flats went up high; Winter thought there must have been seventy floors at least. The bottom floor was a reception area, the doors not protected by passes that only householders had, but instead by old fashioned locks. This is where Violet led them.

  She knocked on the thick wooden door casually, tucking away the gun she held in her fishnet tights. A woman at reception didn’t look surprised to see Violet arriving so late, and Winter felt a twang of sorrow for the girl standing before her.

  The door was opened, and the woman watched Winter and Connor with interest, chewing on gum.

  They passed each other in silence, the woman heading towards the reception desk again where a copy of Heat magazine lay, and Violet led Winter and Connor to a very small lift.

  Connor pressed the button and the lift sprang to life.

  Winter listened to the rustle of pages turning in a magazine behind her. Her feet stood on worn, beige carpet, aching and protesting, wanting to be freed from her Converse boots.

  The lift stopped, the sounds of whirring metal no more, and the doors slid open slowly with a groan. Violet walked in, her plastic boots echoing off the metal floor. The doors slid behind Connor who was last in and Violet hit the number three button. They went upwards, the lift trembling slightly, Winter thinking that this would break down at any moment.

  The lift stopped with a judder, Connor stumbling slightly. The doors slid open a little smoother than before, and they walked out into a dull hallway, four doors lining a small corridor, steps at one end leading back down to reception and up towards more rooms.

  Violet walked to the door nearest the steps leading downstairs. The floors were dusty and made of laminated wood. Violet turned the door handle and pushed the door open.