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by Everheart, AJ

  “It’s just you…there’s no one else to let you down, to hurt you. To lie.”

  “Yeah, it’s just me. Now. But that wasn’t always the case,” I say the words carefully, trying to remove the emotion, the anger, the hurt that they should be laced with. I’d lost everyone. My mother. My brother. Even my dead-beat dad was probably dead. My worst nightmare about returning to London was being faced with the demons I’d left behind there. My past wasn’t a clean one, it was like a black smudge compared to the lily white of Mia’s, and I wasn’t ready for it yet.

  She covers her mouth as if trying to catch the words she’d just said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t think.”

  I give her a small smile. “It’s okay, let’s go back and get some sleep.”

  We walk in comfortable silence back to the room, and as soon as I close the door behind us, Mia throws herself at me.

  “I’m not ready to sleep. My mind is awake, running rampant, and I need a distraction,” she murmurs as she pulls my T-shirt up over my head and tosses it aside.

  “Is that all I am, a distraction?” I ask teasingly.

  She peppers my jaw with kisses. “A very delicious one.”

  I chuckle as her mouth finds mine. Mia gives with everything she is, she doesn’t get self-conscious or question what she’s doing like some of my exes did. She just feels. She just loves me and lets that guide her. Her hands slide up my back, and her delicate fingers trace invisible patterns into my skin as they move higher. I grin before deepening the kiss, my hand snaking up to cup her cheek. I could drown in Mia easily. I would willingly get lost in her and never have to face this shitty world again. Her fingers move quickly to the buttons on my trousers, and I stop her, distracting her by taking off her jumper and letting it fall to the floor.

  She shimmies out of her leggings, desperate to be pressed against me, skin to skin. I push my own trousers down, leaving me in my boxers while she had removed everything. I grin again, this girl is so eager. Human touch is something we all crave when everything else has fallen apart. I pick her up, wrapping her long, lean legs around my waist, and together, we fall back onto the bed, her on top of me. She straddles me, her bottom lip poking out.

  “Is this the bit where you make us stop?” she says with a pout.

  I always had to stop us from getting carried away. Things were too risky, and I wouldn’t do that to her.

  “Do you want to stop?” I ask, knowing the answer.

  “No, you know I don’t,” she purrs with a coy smile.

  “Then it’s a good thing I saw Donovan earlier, isn’t it?”

  A small crease appears between her brows as confusion clouds her face. With her still straddling me, I move us both higher up the bed and rummage around in the cabinet. Her eyes light up when she sees the box of condoms in my hand, as though I was presenting her with diamonds.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Mia

  I wake wrapped up in Alex, our legs intertwined, his arm tight around my waist, his hand threaded through mine, gently resting on my stomach. With everything wrong in the world, he’s the only thing that feels right. My fingers gently trace his tattoos, I know his body as well as I know my own by now. He rarely speaks about his life before, but then again, neither do I. It was too painful to think about our lives before, the things we had, the people we lost, what we took for granted. I know he wasn’t a saint, I’d known it the second I’d laid eyes on him, but that didn’t matter now. He managed to chase away my demons, if only for a few hours. He was my home now. We’d become bound by what we’d been through, tied together by the red string of fate and the need to not be alone.

  Slowly, I untangle myself from him and leave him sleeping in our bed. He looks peaceful like this, younger. In the cold light of day, I know we’re on the verge of something, I’m not sure what, and while I’m scared, I also want to help. Last night’s events were horrifying, watching that soldier sacrificing himself was burned onto my brain. The test runs that had all failed before. Humanity had truly been ripped apart at the seams, and in order to fix it, we were doing monstrous things. Necessary things.

  I find my father down in the lab, he’s exactly where I knew he would be—after all, he had a mission to prepare for, and he was a soldier down to his core.

  “Mia,” he says my name softly. “I thought you’d want to sleep in today? Last night was…hard.”

  The schoolgirl in me struggles not to giggle, if only he knew. I think back to Alex, his hands on my skin, his mouth on mine, but then my mind wanders to the soldier, and the laugh dies in my throat. I came here with a decision made in my mind, now I just had to make sure there was nothing in my way.

  “I’m coming to London,” I say firmly as I cross my arms, preparing for the argument I knew was coming.

  “No. You are not,” he says simply, not even looking up. He’s dismissing me like I’m still a child.

  I slam my hand down on his desk, and he looks up, surprised. “I am not a little girl anymore, and I refuse to stay behind and babysit.”

  My father opens his mouth to protest, but I shoot him a look. “Alex has shown me everything your men have taught him in training. I am good with a bow, and thanks to you, my survival skills aren’t half-bad either.”

  He sighs, and puts his pen down. “Mia, this isn’t a camping trip or some jolly little jaunt.”

  I raise my hand to silence him, I don’t need a lecture from him right now. Does he not understand how I got here?

  “Dad, you need to stop mollycoddling me. The past year, I have had to grow up a hell of a lot. I’ve done things, had things done to me that I could never have imagined in my worst nightmares. I can’t revert back to the child you still want me to be. I’m different, and this isn’t me asking you for permission—this is me telling you. I am coming to London.”

  The soldiers who had been rushing around packing for the journey, preparing the vaccine, have all slowed down as they try to listen in, inconspicuously, and fail.

  My father looks broken, and while I’m not ready to forgive his actions yet, I do love him. His regret, the horror at what my life has become, is etched so deeply on his face that they mirror the cracks in my own heart. This virus has broken us, but we have a chance to rebuild, and I won’t let him keep me from doing my part in that.

  Finally, he nods and hands me a thin black folder. Inside are the blueprints for the water plant we’re targeting in London, alongside several others. The Thames Water Plant produced the most water, serving almost seventy percent of London, or at least it did before the outbreak. The intelligence my father has confirms that it is back up and running, so that’s where we’re going to hit. There is also a map of London, with a route marked out in red pen. The plan in such a densely populated area is to lay low and use the underground where possible. The base had limited vehicles, and we were going to take one with enough fuel to get us into Uxbridge, a large town on the edge of the London Underground. The plan then was to carefully make our way through the tunnel systems towards Canary Warf. Then we’d have to go topside and make our way to the water-pumping station. It was risky, incredibly so. The fact my father has this folder, with all this information, tells me that he’s been preparing for this since before everything went tits up.

  I clutch it to my chest, my face solemn. I know the risks we’re all taking. Rosehill and Litchfield existed somewhere between England and Wales and was made up of small villages and farmlands. London was, well, London. The population was well over seven million, but how many survived? How many were now rotting bags of bones, waiting to eat us? Except now, they weren’t even rotting anymore—they were adapting, evolving, and that was fucking terrifying.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Alex

  I head for food like usual, Donovan and Lee by my side as we find a table and sit. There’s a different atmosphere in the air today. The soldiers are grinning, joking with one another, and while the civilians haven’t got a clue, the mood is infectious. Everything almost f
eels normal for a change.

  “You coming to London?” Donovan asks, and I nod as I devour my soup. He raises a brow. “Mia?”

  I shoot him a look that says he should know better. “Wild horses couldn’t keep her away.”

  Donovan snorts; he knows exactly how stubborn she is. There’s an odd little half-smile on his face, and I know he’s excited to set out for London. He wants to get this vaccine out there, he wants to fight back.

  “Alex, I was thinking of sitting this one out. I think I may be more use here…” Lee says quietly as if he was afraid I’d be mad or something

  I slap a hand on his back. “Do what you need to, Lee. No one is going to force you to come.”

  I feel a little disappointed that he wasn’t going to be joining us, but Lee was enjoying it here, he was learning new skills, things we never could have taught him in Basecamp, and there was a certain blonde civilian girl who’d caught his eye. It may not last, but for a minute, he was happy.

  The soldiers who’d been sent to Basecamp were due back today, and I was anxiously waiting for news. There had been about twenty-five of us back at the farmhouse; I wonder how many survived since we’d left. The radio silence hadn’t been a good sign. I feel a pang of guilt, we should have gone back, gone to look for them, but this is the zombie apocalypse, and we were no good to anyone if we died too. I had to be logical and ignore my feelings on this.

  Mia joins us, putting a black folder down on the table beside me. She grabs my cup of coffee and takes a swig. She’s got her serious face on, the one that scares me a little. It’s the face she was wearing when we first found her and she’d shot Ethan in the leg. My little archer.

  “What’s that?” Lee asks as she helps herself to some of my bread.

  “The mission details for London. It’s going to be intense,” she says as she shows me the map.

  I groan. “We’re going in at Uxbridge?”

  I hated Uxbridge, my mother used to love the shopping centres there. She’d drag us around for hours with the promise of Pizza Hut if we behaved. When I was a little older, I’d started seeing a girl from there, and she was as nutty as they came. Demi once recorded herself setting fire to my hoodie because I went on a night out with the lads. I wonder if she made it?

  “Yeah,” Mia replies with a shrug.

  Donovan gives a low whistle. “Fuck, do you know how many people there are—were—in Uxbridge?”

  I keep staring at the map, trying to figure out a better way. None of them are ideal, but a quicker route is going to be better. I mean, it’s London, there are bodies everywhere, and that won’t change no matter which way we go in.

  “I think Heathrow will be better. Take the Piccadilly line, switch to District, then Jubilee.” I trace my finger along the line, and show Donovan and Mia what I mean. “It’ll be about six hours on foot.”

  Donovan counters, “Uxbridge would only be seven…”

  “Yeah, but the airport entrance is going to be easier to get to,” Lee chimes in as he tears a chunk out of his bread roll.

  Mia frowns, looking at the map. “You think an airport terminal entrance is going to be easier than Uxbridge?”

  “Easier than a massive city centre? Yeah. Zombies follow noises and smells, which means that they’re drawn to the city centres, and Uxbridge is going to be swarming. Hopefully, Heathrow will have died down as the food died out,” I explain.

  Mia groans softly beside me and nestles into my side. “The food died out…you make it sound like you’re talking about pigs or cows, but it’s not.”

  I wrap my arm around her and squeeze. “I know.”

  Donovan places his mug down on the table with a clink. “You’d better go and talk to Hazeldine, tell him your thoughts then.”

  I nod before standing. Hazeldine’s plan was riskier; he was likely to lose more men and his daughter that way. I wouldn’t let him play with her life again.

  I head towards the bunker, but as I do, I see the Basecamp soldiers returning. They don’t look happy, their faces grim. As they come in through the gates, I march towards them. I can’t see anyone I recognise: not a good sign.

  “What did you find?” I demand.

  A man at the front of the group shrugs off his bag, he looks exhausted. “Nothing.”

  I cross my arms, “Nothing at all?”

  “Well, you know. The usual.” He shrugs, and I can feel my temper flare.

  “What the fuck does that mean?” I spit as I step towards him. I grab his shirt in my fist and pull him to me. The rest of them step towards me but do nothing.

  The guy in my grip doesn’t even flinch, that’s how tired he is. He lets out a long drawn sigh before rubbing his face. “It means we found blood fucking everywhere, some random body parts, and a few fucking Z’s. That’s it. No survivors. Not one.”

  I let go of him and step away. “Not one?”

  I feel like I’m just repeating myself, hoping that the answers will change, but I know in my gut that this is my fault. I left them. I came here. I shake my head as I keep walking to Hazeldine’s office, no, the plan was always to come here. I followed protocol. But that doesn’t stop the rock that has settled in the pit of my stomach.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Mia

  The next three days are a blur as the vaccine is put in these weird metal cylinders. In all honesty, it looks like a slightly thicker version of the cardboard in the middle of the kitchen roll. They even have a line etched in around, where the cylinder can be twisted open. There are five in total, one is coming with us to London, one is heading to Wales, two to Scotland, and one is being sent to some labs in Leeds, where hopefully, with Dr. Landry, they can produce more. The problem with this plan? No one knows what to expect. Communications have gone quiet, and we don’t know if the army bases have been overrun, or if the water stations are just zombie hang-outs. We don’t know. We’re risking everything on a glimmer of hope, a last check in from London over two months ago, but it’s all we have.

  We have four armoured patrol vehicles, three Foxhounds, and a Husky. My father tells us that these were primarily designed and built in the UK for operations in Afghanistan. The soldiers who will be heading up to Scotland will take the Husky, Dr. Landry will be following in a Foxhound, with more soldiers in a Land Rover. They’ll need to stick together until they get to Leeds. This offers them and the vaccine the most protection, it’s not much but every little thing counts. The second Foxhound will be going to Wales, and we’ll have the third and also be escorted by a Land Rover since we need the man power. Once these vehicles leave the base, that will be it. There isn’t enough fuel in any of them to get back, and the ones headed for Scotland are taking petrol cans with them just to make the trip up there. If we survive, getting back here is a whole other mission.

  We aren’t allowed to take a lot with us, just a backpack with basic supplies and weapons. I chuckle as Alex hands me some small throwing knives and my bow. He raises an eyebrow in question as he straps a large knife to his back and clips his gun in around his waist.

  “You know it’s a one way mission when you pack more weapons than food or underwear.” I point out, jokingly.

  Donovan gives me a smile as Alex nods in agreement. We were supposed to be leaving tomorrow, but my father wants to get going now. Everything is ready, and he doesn’t see the sense in delaying. He’s agreed with Alex that Heathrow may be the easiest way into the Underground for us as we can cut through the airport fences and drive on the tarmac, dropping us right outside the terminals instead of us having to fight our way in through the main gates.

  The drive would normally take three hours along the motorway, but we have no idea what the roads are like or what we’ll encounter. Either way, my father wants to get us there before tomorrow night. That, with six hours walk through the tunnels, should get us topside the day after if not sooner, hopefully in the early morning, which works out better for us, at least this way we won’t be fumbling around London in the dark. I mean, oth
er than the bits where we’re trapped in underground tunnels…

  I climb into the back of a Foxhound with my father and Alex, Donovan rides in the Land Rover behind. He doesn’t like not being able to see where he’s going, or so he says, as he clambers in. I know I’m only in the armoured patrol vehicle because I’m the Colonel’s daughter, and Alex, well he’s like my shadow. I don’t go anywhere without him.

  I look across at him, he hasn’t been sleeping the last couple of nights, and I know it’s because of Basecamp. No survivors, that was the official conclusion. Karen yet again blamed me for this, but she blamed Alex even more. When was she going to realise, he wasn’t Superman? His presence wouldn’t have stopped Dai from dying, he couldn’t have gone back to the Basecamp and rescued everyone—he was just one man. That daft cow needed to rein in her expectations and stop expecting my boyfriend to save her.

  The Foxhound growls to life, and we leave Litchfield behind us and head towards the motorway. I haven’t actually been on a main road or a motorway since way before the outbreak. I mean, it would have been when my father dropped me off at the beginning of the school year in September…now, it was over a year and a half later, and it looked nothing like I remembered.

  There were cars everywhere, just stopped in the lanes, some with doors open, others would have looked perfectly normal if not for the mould growing on the window seals and the slight signs of rust. Weeds had begun breaking through the concrete in places. The central reservations had overgrown; you could barely see the metal barriers through the long grass. The Foxhound wove carefully between the vehicles; we can’t have been going more than ten miles per hour, which we pushed to twenty if we hit a clear stretch.

  As we passed, I felt a chill in my bones. Were these people escaping? Trying to make it somewhere safer? Didn’t they realise there was nowhere safe? A small Polo we pass has the doors and the boot open, clearly the owners had tried to grab their bags and make it on foot. Judging by the suitcase not five feet away from the car, popped open with its contents on display, they didn’t get far. Another has its windows splattered with blood and gore, not unusual these days, but what makes my stomach turn is the baby seat in the back. No one got out of this unscathed.