The line went dead.
Vicky had returned to the control booth to look across the river into the city. As she stood in the smell of stale sweat and flatulence, she watched the large collection of diseased that still remained on the other side. Their numbers had diminished a little. Some of the stupid fuckers seemed to have finally worked out how to identify a lost cause, not many of them, but some.
After she’d glanced around again, Vicky looked at the car. Flynn remained in the back as he had done since they’d been there. The only time he’d gotten out was when he needed to take a leak. They may need to mobilise in an instant so he needed to remain inside the vehicle to avoid any delay.
When the walkie-talkie came to life in her hands, Vicky snapped it up. She spoke into it as she continued to look across the river. “Hello?”
“Hi, how are things?”
Vicky stepped out of the hot booth and hid behind the raised drawbridge. They couldn’t cross the river, but best not provoke them anyway. She kept her voice low. “We’re all good. You?”
“I’m hanging on. I’ve met a person who also wants to rescue somebody, so we’ve teamed up. We’re keeping each other alive, although there’s something I don’t trust about him.”
“Oh?”
“He knew your name.”
Vicky frowned. “My name?”
“Yeah. I’m sure I didn’t tell it to him, but he knew it all the same.”
The thought of Brendan sent a shot of adrenaline through Vicky. “Wh- what’s his name?”
“Oscar.”
Some of the tension left her body.
“At least that’s what he told me it is. The fella’s handy in a fight though. He’s saved my arse on more than one occasion already. I’d be dead by now if it wasn’t for him.”
It may not have been Brendan, but he must be connected to him in some way. How else would he know Vicky’s name?
“Vicky?”
A shake of her head and she snapped out of her daze. “Yeah, sorry. I’m worried about you, Rhys.”
“Don’t be, I’m fine. Can I talk to Flynn?”
Vicky crossed the space between her and the car and handed Flynn the walkie-talkie.
The boy pressed the button on the side in. “Hi, Dad.”
“Are you okay, mate?”
After he’d nodded several times, Flynn clutched the walkie-talkie with both hands and said, “I’m fine. When are you coming back? Have you found Mummy?”
“I won’t be long now. I’ve spoken to Mummy and she’s going to be coming out of the city with me. Just hang on there, yeah?”
“Okay.”
“I love you, mate.”
“I love you too, Dad.”
Vicky took the walkie-talkie back. Oscar had to have something to do with Brendan. “Just be careful, yeah?” she said. If she had said more, it would have looked like she had something to hide. “I’ll see you before nine.”
After she’d slipped the walkie-talkie into her back pocket, Vicky lost focus as she stared into space.
“They’ll be okay, won’t they?”
“Huh?”
A watery glaze covered Flynn’s eyes as he stared up at her. “Mummy and Daddy. They’ll be okay?”
A forced smile and Vicky stroked Flynn’s face. “Of course they will. You don’t need to worry. Your daddy’s a superhero.”
The thwip thwip of a helicopter blade sounded out and Vicky poked her head out of the car’s window to look up into the sky behind her.
A large helicopter, military by the look of it, came from the direction of Summit City. It flew so low Vicky felt the vibration from the loud propeller in her chest.
When it got overhead, she saw the large cage beneath it and her toes curled. It had five or six diseased inside. The angry faces of the monsters stared down as they scanned for prey. One of them watched Vicky with its bloody eyes and snapped at the air as if it could taste her.
“What’s that?” Flynn asked.
Vicky continued to look up as it pulled away. “A helicopter, sweetie.”
“Are they here to save us?”
The helicopter headed in the direction of London.
“I don’t think so. I think they have other things in mind.”
When she looked into her mirror at Flynn behind her, she watched him sink back into his seat. “Maybe they’ll come back and pull Mummy and Daddy out of Summit City like they have with those people.”
Vicky didn’t reply. Instead, she watched the helicopter get smaller as it headed toward London and the cage swung beneath it.
Evening had settled in and the temperature had dropped by a few degrees. With the crisper air, Vicky had managed to shake the lethargy from her muscles and she could finally sit in the car without sweating. However, her tacky skin still itched from the day’s perspiration and she’d have killed for a shower. When she looked in her rear-view mirror at Flynn, who sat up on the back seat, she smiled and the boy smiled back. He gave her the grin of a child reciprocating a gesture. The deep frown that had been etched on his face for the past few hours remained. A boy that young shouldn’t have to deal with this. After a long sigh, Vicky said, “So what do you want to be when you grow up?”
“A fireman.”
She laughed. “Wow, you really know what you want to be, huh? I admire that, a man who knows who he is and where he’s going.”
The boy’s worried frown shifted to one of confusion.
Vicky drew another deep breath, but before she could speak the walkie-talkie cut in. “Vicky, it’s Rhys, come in.”
“Rhys?”
“Why would someone from The East know your name? What have you done?”
Ice ran through her veins and her stomach tensed. His question cut straight to the pain of what Brendan had done to her. “I … I don’t know, Rhys. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“If you don’t know what I’m talking about why do you sound so fucking nervous?”
The temperature in the car rose and Vicky didn’t reply. When she looked in the rear-view mirror again, she saw fear in Flynn’s wide eyes.
“Brendan told me to say hi.”
A surge of adrenaline ran a violent shake through her limbs and Vicky dropped the handset into the footwell.
Rhys’ voice called up at her. “Vicky? What the fuck’s going on? What aren’t you telling me?”
After she’d reached down and picked the walkie-talkie up again, she pressed the button on the side. She couldn’t lie to him. “I’m sorry, Rhys. I’m truly sorry. If I’d have known it would have come to this, I wouldn’t have done anything, I promise. I’m so, so sorry.”
“What have you done? Where’s my boy?”
Vicky looked at Flynn in the mirror.
“Vicky?”
The boy chewed on his lip and she shook her head. He didn’t need to fear her. Everything would be okay. Vicky turned the walkie-talkie off.
In the silence, Flynn stared at her.
“Everything’s going to be okay. Trust me.”
But the boy didn’t reply. Instead, he looked at the back door to his right as if to work out a route of escape. When he looked back at her, he continued to frown.
Despite the conversation Vicky had had with Rhys, Flynn had remained in the car with her. Another glance at the clock in the car’s dashboard and she sighed. “We don’t have much longer now.”
“Much longer until what?” Flynn said.
“Until your mummy and daddy arrive.” Maybe she shouldn’t get the kid’s hopes up, but hope seemed like it would be in very short supply soon so she may as well use it while she still could.
Nighttime had started to tighten its grip on the day as the sun set and the air cooled further. Vicky looked at the little boy who had now moved to the passenger seat next to her. She’d reassured him that he could trust her and told him to come up front. He seemed reluctant at first, but he did as she asked. “In about half an hour your mummy and daddy should be coming across the river.�
�� If they didn’t, the heat of the incineration would turn them into sludge on the city’s streets. She chose to keep that detail to herself.
Before she could say anything else to the boy, a loud bang shook through the car. Vicky’s heart stopped when she looked in the rear-view mirror and saw Brendan. Wild-eyed and red-faced, he had his hands pressed down against the vehicle’s boot and screamed before he ran around to the driver’s side door.
“Get out of the car now,” she said to Flynn.
The boy complied, popped the passenger door open, and fell out onto the road. Before Brendan could open her door, Vicky tore the keys from the ignition and climbed across the car after Flynn. Brendan reached in and grabbed her ankle.
His tight grip stung, but she twisted and shook to try to get free. In the struggle, she bashed the horn. A loud tooooot called out into the quiet evening. When she saw the shock on Brendan’s face at the sound, she snapped her leg free and pulled far enough away from the lunatic to avoid his axe as he swung it at her. The bloody weapon hit the handbrake with a loud clang and chipped a chunk of plastic away from it.
“You ain’t getting away, you bitch. Your boyfriend fucked me over and now you’re going to pay the fucking price for it. You and his horrible little kid.”
Fear pulled Vicky’s chest tight and she couldn’t catch her breath as she scrambled away from Brendan.
Another walkie-talkie rested on the dashboard in front of the passenger seat. When Vicky had tested it earlier, it spoke to the radio inside the vehicle. She grabbed it, and just as Brendan lurched for her again, she fell out of the open passenger door and hit the ground so hard the jolt ran a shock through her left shoulder.
As she got to her feet, she heard the enraged scream of the diseased and froze. They must have heard the horn. Then she saw them. Three diseased, all women, ran at the car from Brendan’s side. With the man half in the vehicle, they looked set to end him.
But Brendan pulled himself in and pulled his door closed just before the first one reached him.
Vicky slammed the passenger door shut and leaned against it. Thank God Flynn had closed the window on that side when he’d gotten cold earlier. She’d been tempted to tell him to man up when he did it because the car had been too hot as it was, but it now prevented Brendan from getting through to them.
The whack of Brendan’s axe hit the other side of the glass. It cracked it, but it didn’t break through. The confined space restricted his swing, but the window would only take one more whack at the most. Vicky looked into Flynn’s wide eyes. “We’re going to run in three seconds, okay?”
The boy trembled but he nodded.
Another crack of the axe against the window and Vicky heard the splinter of more glass. One more swing and the axe would be in her back for sure. She nodded at Flynn. “Three … two … one!”
The car shook just before Vicky pulled away from it. As she ran, she turned around to see the first of the diseased had climbed in through the driver’s side window to get to Brendan. A flurry of activity, and she lost sight of the big man to the flailing limbs inside the car. The next diseased followed the first inside. Fuck knows why they left her and Flynn alone. Impossible to tell which arm belonged to whom, she looked forward again and followed Flynn. They ran in the direction of the dead police officers. The direction of Flynn’s school … The direction of London … Fuck knows what they would find there.
Chapter 21
The sound of the diseased remained well behind Rhys and Larissa. They couldn’t outrun them forever, but maybe they could get to Biggin Hill Airport before the things caught up with them … maybe.
The street, wide and uninhabited, seemed like it could be clear for miles. Although with no more than about twenty metres visibility, Rhys couldn’t let the false sense of security relax him. Anything could spring from the dark. “I know I’ve said it before, but I’d rather have them behind us than in front,” Rhys said.
Larissa looked around. “I’d rather they weren’t anywhere.”
With his poles raised, Rhys walked by Larissa’s side. Permanently alert, he stared into the grainy darkness. The dense woods ran a border on their left and the glow of the city flanked their right.
Whenever either one of them spoke their voices carried in the quiet night air. If anything waited for them up ahead, they’d hear them all right.
“Rhys?”
“Yeah?”
“What exactly was the helicopter doing? You said they’ve dropped the virus in London, but you didn’t explain any more than that.”
Rhys kept his eyes ahead as they walked. “When I was in the city, I saw a helicopter trapping the diseased in a cage and then lifting them out. They baited them with a live human, locked the cage on them, and carried them away. Oscar … Brendan, or whatever the fuck his name is, told me that The East were airlifting the diseased out and dropping them in the major UK cities. They’ve even dropped some in mainland Europe. Vicky saw the helicopter too.”
“So we’re fucked?”
Rhys didn’t have an answer for that. After a few seconds, he finally said, “It’s best to not think of it like that. Let’s just take one step at a time. We need to meet up with Flynn and Vicky and make sure they’re okay. Once we’ve achieved that, we can think about what to do next. The possibilities of what could happen are too overwhelming to comprehend, but I don’t think the virus has spread from the diseased that spilled out of Summit City. I think the disease is coming down from London where The East dropped it, which means—”
“It’s behind us,” Larissa finished for him, a taut impatience in her tone.
After he’d sighed, Rhys lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “I know that’s what I keep saying, but that’s what I hope.”
Superman’s glow-in-the-dark arms stared up at Rhys from Flynn’s watch. “We have forty-five minutes to get to the airport. We can meet Vicky there and then plan our next step.”
“We? I hope you’re not including Vicky in that we.”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because she can’t be trusted?”
“And Oscar’s opinion can? I’m reserving judgment on Vicky until I’ve spoken to her.”
“Well, I hope your openness doesn’t lead to the death of our son.”
“I think Vicky’s doing a good job with him so far.” The words stuck in his throat and he had to force them out. “Flynn won’t die. He won’t. And Vicky will bring him back to us safe and sound. I think …” Rhys froze. He stared into the dark and listened to the sound of feet approaching from the direction they were heading in.
He then lifted the broken stool legs and squinted to try to see better, but their surroundings were too dark. Although the sound got louder, he saw nothing.
Rhys’ raised stool legs trembled in his grip while Larissa stood alert next to him. As the sound drew closer, he swallowed a dry gulp.
The footsteps came at them quicker, a drum roll of a beat. Much faster than they could run, they’d have to stand a fight.
So dark, Rhys dared not blink, his eyes ached from straining them to see something, anything. Still, he saw nothing and the clumsy beat of a diseased’s run continued to close in on them.
Suddenly a shadow shot from the darkness and sprinted past them.
So fast Rhys barely had the time to see it.
Once he’d regained his composure, he laughed as the thing disappeared into the darkness. “A dog? Jesus, I thought we were done for then.” A second later, he sighed. “Doesn’t the poor thing realise it’s heading toward a ravenous mob?”
“I think you’re asking the wrong question, Rhys.”
“Oh?”
“I think you should be asking, What the fuck is it running from?”
The hairs lifted on the back of Rhys’ neck and his jaw fell loose. What the fuck was it running from?
Chapter 22
About three hours ago
Once they’d run over the brow of the hill, Vicky looked at the huge highway in front of them
. Seven lanes wide on each side of the road, it bottlenecked down into a dual carriageway for the traffic that needed to cross the bridge into the city. Just the thought of rush hour made Vicky tense with a Pavlovian response to something that she’d probably never experience again.
Vicky paused and hunched down as she let her heart rate settle. She pulled on Flynn’s arm and he squatted down next to her.
“Imagine we’re playing Call of Duty: Zombies and we’re the snipers,” Vicky said. She pretended to talk into a walkie-talkie. “Okay, soldier?”
The wide and glassy eyes of the little boy regarded Vicky before he gulped and nodded at her. “Okay.”
Vicky pointed two fingers at her eyes and then pointed them to the brow of the hill back in the direction they’d just come from.
Flynn followed her lead and looked to where she’d pointed.
After she’d patted his back, Vicky pulled the boy’s slight frame in close to hers. “Over the other side of that hill are the Nazi zombies. We need to creep close enough to the brow to see over, but we need to make sure the Nazi zombies don’t see us, okay?”
A half-smile lifted Flynn’s pale face.
“You ready, soldier?”
After he’d nodded at her, Flynn threw up a clumsy left-handed salute and said, “Yes, sir.”
Vicky lay down on her front against the road surface. The hard asphalt retained the day’s warmth. As she commando crawled, the car key in her pocket dug into her right thigh with a sharp sting every time she put pressure on that side. The younger and sprightlier of the two, Flynn kept pace with her with no problem.
When they got close, Vicky stopped and looked at Flynn again. She pushed her finger across her lips and whispered, “You ready for this, solider?”
Wide eyes and tight lips stared back at her, and Flynn nodded.
With a rapid pulse and wobbly limbs, Vicky crawled farther up the hill. When she got close to the top, she lifted her head and peered over. Her heart sank.
The door to the police car hung open and Brendan had gotten to his feet. The diseased in the car writhed and moaned, locked in their perpetual torment, and all still very alive.
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