Vicky rolled over onto her back in time to see Larissa drop the ladder onto the container with a clang. She then watched the woman fall to her knees and release a demented and broken wail. The hundreds of diseased that surrounded them joined in with her cries, their clear frustration at missing yet another meal.
Chapter 14
Flynn may have sounded like a young man when he spoke, but when he screamed, he returned to the little boy Vicky had watched grow up over the past decade. The tone of his high-pitched cry, amplified by the metal container he lived in, woke Vicky from her restless sleep with a start. Had he been on his own, then she would have slept in with the boy, but he had his mother by his side, and though Vicky hurt over the loss of Rhys too, they needed to share their grief without her.
With the lethargy of sleep still deep in her muscles, Vicky sat up in her container as Flynn continued to cry. He sounded like an enraged primate, his screams coming in bellowed and furious waves. After she’d slipped her shoes on, she reached up for the ladder in her container and pulled herself to her feet. Still clumsy with tiredness, and with her eyes stinging, she dragged herself toward the daylight above.
The stench of shit and rot hit Vicky as soon as she poked her head out of the container. The diseased joined in with Flynn’s cries, their agitation setting the air alight; their prey stood just metres away but they had no way of reaching it.
Atop the containers, Vicky looked over to where they usually dropped the ladder into the field behind the airport. It had been lowered. But if Flynn remained in his container …
Instead of going to the boy, Vicky ran for the ladder. Her footsteps boomed against the three containers she crossed to get to it. At the precise moment she peered down into the field, a pack of diseased came around the corner as if they’d gotten wind of a chance to get to them. Vicky gripped the cold aluminium ladder and yanked it up. A second later, the container shook beneath her feet from where the pack crashed into it.
Without taking her eyes off the mob below, Vicky dropped the ladder on top of the container with a loud clang.
Although they’d bridged the gaps over the containers with ladders, Vicky ignored them as she hopped from one to the other in the direction of Flynn’s cries.
Still early enough for there to be low-lying fog on the airfield, the containers had a slight coating of dew, but not enough to encourage Vicky to slow down. She jumped another gap and looked at the diseased below as she crossed it. No matter how long she lived with them, the sight of the beasts still ran ice through her veins, especially on days like today when they seemed to be rising out of the fog.
In one fluid movement, Vicky jumped onto Flynn’s ladder and climbed down into his container.
When she got to the bottom, she found the boy. His features were twisted with grief as tears ran down his face. He paced his small container, frantic in his disturbed state.
Vicky looked around the sleeping quarters, the walls a garish mix of lime green and turquoise, and shrugged. “Where’s your mum?”
But Flynn didn’t reply. He didn’t seem to have it in him. Instead, he walked over and handed Vicky a scrap of paper. Larissa had written on it in pencil, and Vicky had to read it twice to be sure she’d taken the message in.
The air left her lungs when she looked back up at Flynn and whispered. “She’s gone?”
Flynn pointed at the paper. “To find some supplies.”
Vicky read the note for a third time.
Dear Flynn,
It’s not fair that we expect Vicky to wait with us, so I’m going to go out and hunt for food. I’ll be back soon, so please don’t worry about me or follow me. I’ll be fine. We’ve survived this long; we’ll continue to survive.
I love you, little boy.
Love
Momma Bear xxx.
“Fuck,” Vicky said. Without another word, she jumped on the ladder out of the container and shot up it. She crossed back to where she’d lifted the ladder up that led down into the field.
Flynn appeared at her side a few seconds later, and he too stared down at the angry faces below. The diseased all looked up at them, their mouths working as if they could taste the pair. Some of them had fur and blood around their mouths from where they’d clearly eaten something non-human.
A sharp grip dug into Vicky’s bicep, and when she turned to look at Flynn, she saw his wide and bloodshot eyes stare out toward another pack of diseased who’d just come into view.
Maybe Vicky saw it before Flynn did, but maybe not. Regardless, the boy spoke it first as he looked at the diseased woman at the front of the pack. Fresh blood ran from the hole that had been bitten into her cheek, and her eyes bled waterfalls down her face. In her grip she had a bag with tins and bottled water in; the supplies she’d gone to fetch.
Flynn’s legs gave way beneath him, and he hit the container with a loud boom. As he curled up in a ball, he rasped just one word… “Mum.”
Chapter 15
Day and night blended into one another; especially inside a shipping container, regardless of how brightly it had been painted. Vicky comforted Flynn as he grieved for the loss of both parents. She’d remained at his beck and call, and only rested when he did. Mostly, he cried until he collapsed with exhaustion, only to wake a few hours later to sob all over again.
About a week had passed since Flynn had last seen his mum in the field behind the airport. Fortunately, Vicky had had the foresight to ration their supplies since then. They’d stretched their food so thin that hunger now gnawed away at Vicky’s concave stomach as if her starvation could eat her alive.
But she wasn’t starving. She knew that. Just hungry. Fucking hungry! At some point, they would have to make a decision that involved getting more food. To do that, they would have to move on.
With Flynn asleep in his bed, Vicky left him in the container. She held her breath as she climbed his ladder. It did nothing to quiet the aluminium rungs that creaked beneath her weight.
Once up top, Vicky squinted against the daylight and crept across the containers to the end by the field where Larissa still waited for them. Unlike all of the other diseased, Larissa didn’t leave. She just stood there. Vicky had watched her grow skinnier with each passing day; she looked ill—even for an infected.
Not that Vicky could see her irises, but she saw sadness on her face as she looked up. Almost like an addict that stared at the needle she both hated and craved. It seemed like she had some awareness of who Vicky was, but would still bite her in a heartbeat.
Maybe Larissa would fall down dead at the container if she waited for longer than her body could last without sustenance. Not that the diseased died easily; the virus seemed to give them a longevity that only required them to eat and drink occasionally.
A sudden distressed scream from Flynn snapped both Vicky and Larissa from the stare that locked them onto one another. Vicky burst to life and ran over the containers. “Don’t worry, Flynn,” she called out, the corrugated surface rolling and turning her ankles as she moved. “I’ve not gone anywhere. I’m coming.”
As Vicky ran, the usual stirrings of discontent rose from the diseased below.
After she’d descended into the container, she found Flynn sat up in bed and crying. She hugged him close to her. The pair rocked together as Flynn sobbed into her shoulder. Flynn hadn’t done much else for the past week. As she’d done since Larissa had gone, Vicky sat with him until he had no more tears to cry.
The look on Larissa’s face had stayed with Vicky all night. Flynn had fallen asleep in her arms again, and she continued to hold him. Aches ran through her body as she gripped Flynn and leaned up against the cold wall of the metal container.
The vibration of the diseased as they crashed against the container shook through Vicky’s back and served as a constant reminder that had been there for over a decade. As Vicky looked at the turquoise and lime-green walls, she saw a spot in the corner where an angry cross had been scratched into the paintwork. Unsure as to what it r
epresented—other than a frantic obsession in the repeated marks—she looked down at Flynn’s hand and saw the paint beneath his nails. He must have done it when she’d gone up top. They’d spent too much time in these cursed containers. They had to get out. There had to be something better than this.
When the early morning sun lifted to the point of lighting up the inside of the container, Flynn stirred in Vicky’s arms. She loosened her hug to allow the boy to sit up straight. As he looked at her, he blinked several times. A confused frown crushed his face.
Vicky silently counted down from ten in her head. When she got to zero, Flynn hadn’t cried yet. For the first time since his mum had gone, he hadn’t cried after waking.
After a few minutes of silence, Flynn still held it together, so Vicky took the opportunity. “We need to move on soon, mate.”
Nervous of his response, Vicky winced as she watched him. But he said nothing.
“We need to find somewhere other than this to live. We can’t stay here anymore. I know this place reminds you of your mum and dad, and I’m sad to leave that behind too, but it won’t work here with just two of us. It’s going to be risky, so we may as well try to find Home. What do you think?”
Although he didn’t speak, Flynn bit down on his bottom lip and nodded at Vicky. He saw the sense in it too.
A few seconds later, the light caught the tears in Flynn’s eyes and his mouth bent out of shape. “I miss Mum and Dad, Vicky. I miss them so much.”
“I know, mate,” Vicky said as she held him close to her. She cleared the lump in her throat and blinked against the itch of tears forming in her eyes. “I know.”
Chapter 16
Sweat lifted along Vicky’s brow as she stood over Flynn’s container and peered in. A hot day to move on, but now that they’d decided to go, they needed to follow through with it.
Vicky watched Flynn slowly move around down below, his small rucksack bulging with all the things he wanted to take. The first two things he’d gone for when they decided to leave were Rhys’s hat that he always wore, and Larissa’s bracelet. She’d taken it off before she went on her supply run for some reason. Maybe she knew she’d never come back. After Vicky cleared the lump in her throat, she called down to Flynn, a warble in her voice. “Come on, mate, we need to go.”
But Flynn ignored her; he clearly needed a little longer. And she got it, she really did; the container had been all the boy had known for the past decade. The hardest part would be to walk away from it. In an unstable world, those seventeen shitty shipping containers had given him some kind of consistency.
Although she wanted to call down to him again, Vicky walked over to the edge of the container that led to the field behind the airport. To look at Larissa got no easier with repetition. The woman she’d known so well had gone; Vicky barely recognised the thing that stared back at her now. In one slow movement, Larissa opened her jaw to reveal a blackness inside her pit of a mouth, and she released a long hiss. The sadness that Vicky thought she’d seen in Larissa’s eyes had well and truly left her now. The thing wandering below didn’t even hold the memory of Larissa. Another diseased, it now stood free of personality. Just another member of the hive mind.
A chill snaked through Vicky’s body, so she turned away from Larissa and walked back over to Flynn.
“Come on,” she said as she crossed back over the couple of containers. But before she could peer down into his again, Flynn poked his head above the surface.
Vicky stopped and watched him climb out. He pulled his shoulders back as if to adjust his rucksack and stared at Vicky before he said, “You need to be more patient.”
As she looked out over the fields behind the airport, the town of Biggin Hill beyond it, Vicky shrugged. “I want to make the most of the daylight. I dunno about you, but I want to arrive at Home as soon as possible.”
“See, that’s what this is all about, isn’t it?”
Before Vicky could reply, Flynn continued. “It’s all about you getting your way. And now you don’t have to go to Home on your own, it’s worked out nicely. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?”
Flynn’s words drove a spear into Vicky’s heart and her vision blurred. The accusation with which he stared at her cut straight to her core. Not many people in this life had that power over her, but he had her heart.
Flynn remained still and continued to stare at her. Vicky could have ignored his accusation—and she nearly did—but it would come up again at some point. Better now than when they were in the thick of it. After a deep breath, she blinked repeatedly and said, “Yes, Flynn, I wanted to go to Home, and I would have loved for you all to come with me.” Her voice broke because of the lump in her throat. “But not like this.”
She shook her head. “Not like this at all.”
The moment passed, and Flynn didn’t say anything else about it. Instead, he turned his back on Vicky and ground his jaw. After a few minutes, Vicky grabbed his arm.
Flynn spun around and stared at her.
“Just wait there, okay?” she said.
With a scowl so hard it hooded his eyes, Flynn glared at Vicky.
“Please?”
Although Flynn didn’t reply, he remained still.
Vicky jumped the gaps between a couple of containers and arrived at the place where they banged the heavy weight down.
A dent sat in the steel from years of being bashed. Like a church bell calling to the congregation, it rang out every time Vicky and Rhys had left the containers, and every time they came back again. Haunting, but it provided some kind of reassurance to Vicky when she heard it. It told her that no matter how many of the fuckers chased her, she wasn’t on her own. A tight team, the four of them could cope with anything—at least, that’s what she thought.
Weak with grief, Vicky lifted the weight and let it fall against the top of the container with a resounding boom. Vicky then lifted and dropped it again. It hit a slightly different spot and returned a different tone, higher in pitch than the one before it.
As she found her flow, Vicky watched the diseased below walk toward the container. After every knock, more of them appeared as though it were a never-ending stream of horror and rot.
By the time Larissa had joined the other diseased on the airport runway, Vicky’s arms ached and sweat ran into her stinging eyes. It had taken about ten minutes for the woman to find her way around.
So hot, Vicky nearly removed her sweatshirt. But she needed it with her, and to wear it would be the easiest way to carry it. She needed to be ready to leave in a heartbeat.
Larissa nudged and shuffled her way through the crowd until she got to directly below Vicky. The blood in her eyes had dried, yet she—like all of them—stared up as if she could still see. And to judge them by the way they moved with intent, they could still see. Maybe the blood put a red lens across their vision, an enraged tint to everything they saw.
Confident Larissa would remain where she stood, Vicky continued to beat against the container and looked over at Flynn. “Lower the ladder now, mate. Get ready and I’ll come and join you.”
With her attention on the boy, Vicky beat her booming call. She watched him lower the ladder to the ground and remain on top of the container. Despite his size, the scared little boy looked over the edge like he always had. He’d have to grow up fast to survive, and she’d probably have to drag him every step of the way.
If only Rhys and Larissa had forced him to grow up sooner as she’d suggested.
With her shoulders burning from the effort, Vicky stopped banging the weight against the container and stood up with it still in her hands. She stared down at the diseased and watched as they screamed and hissed at her.
As she lifted the weight above her head, she focused on Larissa. Were the roles reversed, Vicky wouldn’t want to exist as one of them. No fucking way.
Vicky screamed as she threw the heavy weight down. On its way to the ground, the weight smashed into Larissa’s face. The metal lump sank into her nose
with a crack, and it knocked Larissa back.
The diseased parted and looked down at one of their own, dead on the ground. As one, they returned their attention to Vicky and screamed louder than before.
Vicky bit down on her bottom lip and flipped them the bird before she spun on her heel and jogged across the containers that separated her from Flynn.
Without missing a beat, Vicky arrived on Flynn’s container, grabbed the top of the ladder, and climbed down it. When she reached the ground, she looked back up to see Flynn hesitate. “Come on, mate, we need to get the fuck out of here.”
The groans and moans of the diseased called around the container at her. They hadn’t worked out where she’d gone yet, but it wouldn’t be long.
Just before she could shout at the boy again, he started his descent.
As he climbed down, Vicky checked around them. The coast seemed clear so far.
When the boy reached the ground, Vicky grabbed both of his hands in hers. “Okay, this is it now. I need you to follow me and run like the wind, all right?”
Flynn nodded.
When Vicky took off, Flynn followed behind. For the first time since they’d been at the containers, they left the ladder down. The diseased didn’t seem able to climb, but let them try now. Hopefully a few of them would fall into the containers, and it would give the world a couple less to deal with.
The sun’s heat hit the back of Vicky’s head as she ran, and the sound of Flynn’s footsteps chased behind her. Thankfully, Flynn’s were the only footsteps she heard.
… for now.
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