* * * * *
Beth sat in her bedroom, trying to gather the strength to get up and do something. She could hear other people in the house and knew that she ought to go and join them. But she also knew there would be questions which she didn’t have an answer for.
It was two days since the explosion and time was rapidly running out for her to make a choice. As yet, no one other than herself, Russell and Darrel knew that they were keeping Will prisoner. He still hadn’t confessed to anything, but his lack of denial was proof enough.
A sound outside her room prompted her to get up. It was still cold enough that she went to bed fully dressed. Although the fire had been lit in the evening, no one had much interest in sitting around it. She guessed they’d all had their fill of flames.
Downstairs there were half a dozen people gathered in her living room. She stopped at the bottom of the stairs and tried to decide whether it was better to try and sneak out to avoid them, or face it head on. She’d had enough of running so she straightened out her clothes and walked into the room.
They descended on her at once.
David was the first to reach her, mainly because he had been so much closer to begin with. Beth looked around but she couldn’t see Rachel there.
“Can we talk?” he said, rubbing the back of his neck, he looked almost embarrassed.
Beth nodded and turned away, he followed her into the kitchen and shut the door behind them.
She switched on the hob and stuck the camping kettle on top.
“Coffee?” she said.
David was still standing by the door, his hands working anxiously in front of him. He didn’t reply.
“David?” she said.
He looked at her as if it was the first time she’d spoken.
“Coffee?”
“Oh, yes, please.”
Beth turned away and wondered why he was so nervous. They had never been particularly close, but they’d known each other since Harmony. She didn’t think she’d ever given him a reason to be scared of her.
“Take a seat,” she said, putting the coffee down on the table.
He sat, but he didn’t look any more comfortable.
Beth sipped her coffee, too hot to drink, and gave him the chance to say what he wanted. When he didn’t say anything, didn’t even reach for his cup, she asked him what he had come to see her about.
“It’s Rachel,” he said.
Beth nodded.
“She doesn’t know I’m here.”
“She won’t hear about it from me.”
He smiled at last.
“What can I do to help?”
He sighed and Beth could see that it was difficult for him. She expected him to say that Rachel was overworked and stressed out, both of which were undoubtedly true. She would say she understood and that as soon as she could, she would find someone to share the burden. But that wasn’t what he said.
“She’s pregnant.”
“What!” Beth said. Her coffee cup rattled on the table and almost spilled. She recovered quickly.
David nodded. “We didn’t plan it.”
But that didn’t change the fact that it had happened. Beth wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do, or how she should feel about it. On the surface it was great news. There was going to be a baby in the near future and that was something worth celebrating. On the other hand, their situation was so fragile that the thought of a helpless baby joining them was terrifying. She couldn’t imagine how Rachel must be feeling.
“How far along is she?” Beth said.
David shook his head and shrugged. “Maybe a couple of months, we’re not really sure.”
Of course they weren’t. Who, other than a trained midwife, could be sure of that now?
“Is she getting on okay? Is there anything she needs? Vitamins or anything like that?”
“Maybe, I don’t know. She’s under a lot of stress.”
“David, I’m not really sure what I can do--”
He held up his hands and waved at her to stop. “I know, I know. She’s the only one of us with medical training. We need her to do that. But maybe she could train someone else?”
Beth nodded. It was a good idea, and probably one that would have occurred to her, sooner or later. In fact, she had just the person in mind. “We’ll get some books on midwifery as well,” she said. “Whoever she trains will probably be delivering the baby.”
David smiled and appeared to relax a little, this must have been worrying him for ages. “Thank you,” he said.
“It’s what I’m here for,” Beth said, returning his smile.
He got up without having touched his coffee. “I should get back; see how she is.”
“Of course.”
David made it as far as the door before he turned back. “Beth?”
“Yeah?”
“There was one other thing.”
“What’s that?”
“The Townies, what are we going to do about them?”
“Send Rachel my regards,” she said.
He nodded, understanding that she didn’t want to talk about the Townies, at least not with him.
“I’ll see you at the funeral,” he said and then he was gone.
David wasn’t the last person to ask her about the Townies but she gave them all the same answer, brushing them off and changing the subject, telling them that she wasn’t prepared to discuss it until Kathy was in the ground.
* * * * *
The clouds hung low in the sky and reminded everyone of the smoke that had clogged the street. For the first time in what felt like months, there was warmth in the air and the wind was gentle. It wouldn’t last, but today of all days, it was a welcome respite.
There was a field in the middle of the town. To get to it from the road they had to pass a children’s playground which was still buried beneath the snow. It looked as if someone had laid a thick sheet of icing across the whole thing. It depressed Beth to see it and made her think about Rachel: what sort of world were they leaving for the next generation? Not a very good one.
Russell led the group across the open field. Behind him two men carried Kathy’s wrapped body between them. Beth had loved Kathy as much as anyone, but for less time, she felt as if she had less of a right to grieve, and buried herself at the back of the group.
Everyone was there except Darrel and a few of the bikers. He was guarding the prisoner and they were patrolling the borders. At any given time, there was always at least three people away from the street, because Beth was paranoid and convinced that, sooner or later, more zombies would show up. She had been tempted to relax the rule for the funeral, but Russell had talked her out of it.
The spot that had been chosen was beneath a cluster of trees at the far edge of the field. The hole had been dug that morning.
Beth reached for Dawn’s hand and squeezed it. “Are you okay?” she said.
Dawn nodded. “Fine. You?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “There’s something I want totally to you about after. Okay?”
Dawn nodded again but couldn’t answer before the service began.
They each took a turn standing beside the open grave, either for a moment of silence, or to share memories of Kathy with the whole group. Sometimes they laughed, more often they cried. When they had each taken their turn the grave was filled in and they sang.
When it was over nobody seemed willing to move. The sun was getting lower, however, and there had been a noticeable drop in temperature.
“There’s food and drink back at mine,” Russell said.
He led the way and soon they were back in the warm, sharing happy memories of their time with Kathy and, for once, no one asked Beth what she was going to do about the Townies.
* * * * *
The following morning Beth was woken by someone knocking on her front door, which was unusual, as it wasn’t even locked.
She reluctantly got out of bed and went downstairs to see who was there.
Outside the front doo
r there were a dozen people and none of them looked pleased. Beth was tempted to close the door again and leave them out there. She didn’t know what to say.
“We’re here about the Townies,” Ellen said. She was standing at the front of the group. Her left eye was still swollen and bruised.
Beth nodded. She wasn’t sure what to make of them. Ellen was not the person she had expected to become a rival.
“You don’t have to do anything,” Ellen said.
“What do you mean?” Beth said. Although somewhat relieved to hear that, she couldn’t help but feel suspicious.
“We’ll take care of it, we just need to arm ourselves.”
“What do you mean ‘take care of it’?” she said, although she thought she could probably guess.
“They killed Kathy, they forced us out of our homes. We know where they are and we need to show them they can’t mess with us. Or do you want to spend the whole winter scared that the next time it’ll be you, or Dawn that gets killed?”
Beth bristled at the sound of her sister’s name. “And you think that going in there and shooting people is going to stop that, do you?”
“We do,” Ellen said.
“You don’t think that’s going to make them retaliate at all?”
Ellen said nothing.
“You don’t think that they’ll retaliate and then we’ll retaliate and then they’ll retaliate again and again and it’ll just keep going on and on in a never-ending cycle of retaliation until there’s nobody left?”
Ellen stood there looking at her, not saying anything.
Beth matched her silence and wished that she’d put on her jacket before answering the door. At the bottom of the steps, the people who Ellen had come with, were standing and looking up at them. Beth tried to pretend that they weren’t there.
“Are you going to give us the keys or not?” Ellen said.
“Of course I’m not going to give you the keys,” Beth said.
“Fine,” Ellen said, she nodded once and turned away, back down the stairs and onto the street. She didn’t stop to talk to anyone and when she started marching away they followed her.
“Where are you going?” Beth shouted after her.
“To help ourselves,” Ellen said without turning back to look at her.
Beth swore under her breath and ducked back into the house for long enough to grab her coat, she pulled it over herself as she walked out the door and down the steps to try and stop them.
The weapons were stored in a spare room, in the house that Russell and his family had chosen. As the defacto leader of the military wing of the group, that had seemed to make sense. Beth didn’t think that he would let Ellen take what she wanted, but she didn’t want him to be swayed by her rhetoric. When she reached the house Ellen was already banging on the door.
The door opened mid-bang and Russell was standing there. He looked like a giant at the top of the steps and, judging by his expression, he was not impressed about having been disturbed. Beth pushed her way through the group and up the stairs to stand beside him, hoping that he would stand with her.
“What’s this about?” he said.
“We’ve come for weapons,” Ellen said.
“Oh you have, have you?”
“They want to attack the Townies,” Beth said.
“I see.”
“I told them we’d find another way.”
“And you’ve come anyway?” Russell said, turning back to Ellen.
“They attacked us in our homes, we could’ve all been killed,” Ellen said, repeating the same basic argument she’d been making to Beth.
Russell nodded. “True enough.”
“They deserve to pay for what they did,” Ellen said.
“And that’s exactly the same argument they’ll make to retaliate against us,” Beth said.
“Not if we don’t give them the option,” Ellen said.
“What do you mean by that?” Beth said.
Ellen shrugged, as if what she meant was perfectly clear and, Beth thought, it probably was: one big attack that they wouldn’t recover from. If any of the Townies survived it, they wouldn’t be able to think about returning fire.
“You’d kill a whole group of people for revenge?” Beth said, dumbstruck.
“If it’s the only way to protect my people, yeah,” Ellen said.
Beth didn’t know what to say.
“Go home Ellen,” Russell said.
“You’re taking her side?” Ellen said.
He ignored her and turned back inside. “Beth, we need to talk.”
Beth followed him into the house, closing the door behind her. She wondered if Ellen would still be there when she left.
* * * * *
Matilda brought them coffee while they sat around a long table in the dining room. There were notebooks and other papers scattered around which Russell tidied away. He looked like he’d been busy, but she couldn’t tell what he’d been doing.
“People are angry,” he said.
Beth nodded.
“It’s not just Ellen that feels like that. I hear people talking. Some of them talk to me.”
“What do you tell them?” she said.
“That you’re in charge, that you make the decision.”
“But you think I’m wrong?”
“I didn’t say that, did I?” He picked up his cup and sipped the coffee. Beth watched him and tried to work out what he was saying, because, so far, it wasn’t exactly clear. He’d said he wanted to talk and, presumably, not just about the gossip and rumours that she already knew were going around the group.
“What do you think we should do?” she said.
Russell lowered his cup and put it down on a coaster. He moved slowly and, it seemed, with a great deal of barely restrained power. “The boy,” he said at last.
“Will?”
Russell nodded. “He planted the bomb and maybe he acted alone. If we give people an execution they’ll feel like justice has been served.”
The thought of killing Will made Beth almost physically sick. She imagined a noose hung up in the middle of the street and everyone gathered around to watch him swing. Although she could see the logic in it, a life for a life, she recoiled from the idea.
“That’s not an option,” she said.
“We’ve got to do something with him,” Russell said. “We can’t keep him prisoner forever. He’s using up food and he has to be guarded.”
“We could send him back,” Beth said, thinking just a step ahead of what she was saying. “A peace offering. Maybe we could stop all of this, once and for all. If he acted alone then maybe, they’ll punish him.”
“And if he didn’t?”
“I don’t want anyone else to die,” she said.
Russell looked at her for a long moment and she looked back at him.
“You won’t let anyone take the weapons, will you?” Beth said.
“Not unless you tell me to,” Russell said.
Beth wished that she could believe him, but she didn’t know what to think, the last person who she had expected to come to her had been Ellen (well, maybe not quite the last) so the whole world seemed a little untrustworthy at that moment. Russell seemed to sense how she was feeling.
“You’re in charge Beth,” he said. “I won’t do anything until you tell me to.”
“I’m not going to order his execution,” she said.
“Then he won’t be executed,” Russell said.
They turned together at the sound of the front door bursting open. A moment later Darrel and three other black clad bikers were storming into the dining room.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Russell said.
Darrel came towards him, his eyes wide and angry. “Zombies are coming,” he said.
Beth felt the air go out of her but Russell just nodded as if this was completely standard news. She wondered if zombies had come before, but had been taken care of before she found out about them.
“How many and ho
w long?” Russell said.
“A thousand, maybe, but they’ll be here soon. Some of them are quick.”
Russell turned to Beth. “Thoughts?”
She wasn’t prepared for it, but she knew what to do. Somewhere in the back of her mind she had been thinking about it since they’d taken refuge from the Townies. “Arm everyone who knows how to shoot,” she said. “Get everyone else to the church. We’ll make our stand there.”
“Very good,” Russell said with a nod and a satisfied smile. “You heard her Darrel.”
Darrel nodded to his father and offered Beth a smile which she didn’t know how to take. Then he was gone and Beth was left there with Russell.
“What about our prisoner?” he said.
She thought about it for a moment but the decision was obvious. “He comes as well.” She stood up and cut off any argument he might have been preparing. “No one gets left behind.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Beth closed the church door behind her and turned towards Russell. He handed her a semi-automatic and a box of ammo. The night was quiet and there was no wind, but the air was cold enough without it. It was also dark and she couldn’t see anyone other than Russell outside with her, although she knew there were at least a dozen.
“How far away are they?” Beth said.
“Not far,” Russell said.
In the direction he was facing there was a sudden flash of light, a communication from one of the bilkers. He turned away and Beth could tell that something was wrong.
“What is it?” she said.
“They’ve changed direction.”
She frowned but he wasn’t looking at her. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, they were coming towards us, but now they’re not.”
Beth didn’t feel as relieved as she thought she probably should have done. “That’s good though, isn’t it?”
“Maybe,” Russell said. “That depends. Now they’re moving towards the town hall.”
Beth turned to look in the direction of the town hall. She didn’t know whether the Townies had lookouts, whether they were even aware what was heading their way. She could send someone to let them know and maybe save their lives in the process. But then she thought about the explosion and about Kathy. She thought about Will and the eternal problem of what they were going to do with him.
Zombie Apocalypse (Book 3): Absolute Zero Page 14
