‘Everything okay? asked Katie, but the only reply came as a barely noticeable nod. As Sarah slowly lowered herself to the floor Chris wandered over to the coffee pot and filled another mug. He tentatively offered it to her but the girl shook her head and instead looked away at the wall.

  ‘Here. Give it to me’ said Ben, his hand outstretched. ‘I’ll see if Reg wants it.’ As he took the mug from Chris he noticed a small pair of white headphones dangling from around the youngster’s neck. ‘Hey, what’s that you’ve got there?’

  ‘It’s an MP3 player’ mumbled Chris. ‘I found it in a box in the bedroom. Reg thought his niece might have left it behind when she stayed over...’

  ‘Oh. Anything good on it?’

  ‘Yeah. Some blues and stuff...’

  Ben looked surprised. ‘You like blues?’

  Chris nodded. ‘Mmm-hmm. Hate all that chart shit.’

  Ben smiled at discovering a like-minded individual and turned toward the open door with a mug of coffee in each hand. Moving past Katie, he leaned in and whispered: ‘I’ll just see how he is...’

  Tony Skinner heard the comment, huffed and shook his head.

  As soon as he was alone in the hallway Ben Reilly’s shoulders sagged. His heart began to sink and he immediately knew why. They had been fooling themselves these last few days, hiding away in a cocoon of imagined safety. Sure, the outer fences had been made secure and the driveway blocked off, plus the rooms had been cleared of debris and cleaned from top to bottom. Their clothes had been washed and dried too, something which Ben greatly appreciated after donning his now clean pair of jeans and navy-blue shirt. Food and drink had been brought up from the basement and the rations had been counted and logged. Chris had even started to keep a diary, detailing everything they had experienced since day one. Their resourcefulness had been tested and they had responded - as a team - with textbook efficiency.

  There was, however, one subject of uncertainty that stood out above all the others.

  Reg.

  The old man’s failing health was a reminder of just how precarious everything still was. Ben had hoped for a dramatic recovery but in his heart of hearts he’d already begun to fear the worst. He also knew that a hard decision would have to be made soon; that he couldn’t possibly allow Katie to be left alone with the pensioner anymore. Chillingly, the memory of Maureen’s rapid decline and violent end was still as fresh and visceral as ever. If - or when Reg’s end came - would he, Ben Reilly, be able to step up and act in the best interest of the others?

  He paused, finding himself outside a door. He saved Katie’s life, he thought. You should be ashamed of yourself. With a deep breath he knocked twice before turning the door handle and then stepped nervously inside.

  ~ 6 ~

  The room was gloomy, the curtains still closed, and it took more than a few seconds for Ben’s eyes to adjust. His nose wrinkled at the acrid stench of decay.

  ‘Reg?’

  ‘Hello, bonnie lad...’

  Lying ahead on the bed, sitting up with pillows propped behind his head, was the pensioner, a thin blanket covering him from the waist down. His Geordie accent was weak, breathless, and came as a whisper like the rustle of dry leaves in the breeze. Ben approached, noticing even in the half-light that the old man’s face, shirt and bedclothes were soaked with sweat. His injured arm was by his side, grotesquely swollen and covered in stained bandages.

  ‘Sorry’ said Ben, shaken by the sight. ‘I’ve got a coffee for you but I didn’t know if you were up to it. To be honest, I don’t know what I was thinking really...’

  Reg motioned for him to come closer and extended his good arm to take one of the mugs. ‘I’ll have it. It’s a bit late for me to worry about having too much caffeine now...’

  Ben cringed at the gallows humour and reached for a small chair from the corner of the room, moving it closer to the bed. He sat down, exhaling slowly and deeply. ‘I owe you an apology’ he said eventually.

  Reg looked confused. ‘Eh?’

  ‘I should have made time to speak to you more over the last few days. I’m sorry...’

  Reg put the coffee down on the bedside cabinet, almost spilling it, and closed his eyes for a moment. ‘I don’t blame you, lad. I know why you haven’t. It’s because I’m showing you what might happen to all of us. That’s it, isn’t it?’

  Ben hung his head, hating the assumption but also realising that there was every chance it was right. ‘Listen, Reg-‘

  ‘I can feel it, you know’ the old man interrupted, looking over at his swollen arm. ‘I can feel it moving inside, spreading everywhere now. The infection, I mean. Like pins and needles but worse...’

  Ben nervously chewed the inside of his cheek. ‘Is there anything I can do for you?’

  ‘Aye. Couple of things. First off, you can keep that woman of yours safe. That’s an angel you’ve got there.’

  Ben nodded. ‘Yeah, I know.’

  The room fell silent as Reg used the cuff of his sleeve to wipe sticky moss-green mucus from the corner of his mouth. Then he winced and sat up straighter, taking a deep breath. Ben stiffened, preparing himself for the next request, already guessing what it would be.

  ‘And if, for whatever reason, it comes down to you’ said Reg, ‘don’t hesitate. Promise me lad, don’t hesitate. Just do it...’

  Ben nodded again. ‘I promise’ he muttered, unable to prevent a slight quiver in his voice. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Aye’ Reg mumbled with a strange, embarrassed smile. ‘I need a bucket.’

  ‘A bucket?’

  ‘Aye. Somewhere to...you know. And a roll of paper too.’

  ‘Oh. Can’t you manage-‘

  ‘I’m not going anywhere’ said Reg, pulling aside the blanket and pointing to his foot. A length of flex wire was coiled tightly around his ankle, treble knotted with the other end tied equally securely to the bedpost.

  Ben’s eyes widened. ‘Who-‘

  ‘I did it’ said Reg. ‘I’m a stupid old sod, though. Did it before I remembered that I’d need somewhere to do m’business...’

  ‘Jesus, Reg! You don’t need to tie-‘

  ‘Listen - I’m not putting you in danger. Any of you. This way, if you need to end it you can do it at a safe distance. Use the pitchfork, it’ll be easiest...’

  Ben bit his lip, terribly sad that Reg had considered every aspect of his demise and sick with even the thought of having to use the pitchfork on his friend. ‘Look,’ he said quietly, ‘we don’t know that this is going to happen to you, do we? Like Katie said, everyone’s different. Give it a couple of days. You might be back on your feet...’

  The pensioner sank back into the pillows and glared at Ben with a look of resolution. ‘Look lad, I didn’t want to say, but I’ve been pissing blood since this morning.’

  Ben put a hand to his brow. ‘Oh, bloody hell, Reg.’

  ‘So now we both know it for sure; I’m rotting away from the inside out. The only reason I haven’t done myself in yet is that when I turn, I don’t know, you might learn something from it; how it happens or why it happens. Don’t you worry, lad. I’ll be trying my damndest not to turn, you can be sure of that. I’ll be fighting it all the way...’

  Ben slumped in his chair, weighed down by a crushing sadness. ‘I know you will, Reg...’

  The old man reached for his coffee again, taking a tiny sip. Then he looked toward the small window. ‘Looks like a nice morning’ he said, noticing a sliver of sunlight through a gap in the curtains.

  Ben stared blankly ahead, shell-shocked. The comment was completely out of place but then again it was the English way: to discuss the weather at every opportunity, no matter how inappropriate. Closing his eyes for a moment he quickly regained his thoughts. ‘Do you want me to open the curtains?’

  ‘Aye’ Reg said softly. ‘Maybe just a little...’

  Ben nodded and swigged the last of his drink before standing up. He stretched, still feeling the ache in his sore elbow as he drew aside the curtains about half an inch. Bright golden sunshine scythed through the gap, making him blink. ‘Is that okay?’ he asked, turning to see that the beam of light had illuminated the bottom part of the bed.

  ‘That’s fine.’

  As Reg put his coffee down and reclined back into his pillows Ben looked out through the window. The view outside over the side fence showed him a cloudless sky painted with the gold of a new dawn. His eyes began to water, partly because of the sun’s brightness, partly because it was so beautiful, but mostly because Reg’s predicament was so very tragic. Now there was no choice. It had to be done. He would have to tell the others.

  ‘One last thing’ muttered the weak voice from behind him. ‘I’d appreciate it if you can bury me next to my Maureen when I’m done...’

  Ben nodded wearily but continued to face the window. Leaning forward, he rested his head on the glass pane, feeling the magnified warmth of the sun on his face. And then he felt something else.

  The glass was vibrating.

  Eyes gaping wide, he pulled sharply away from the window. There was a sound now too; a rhythmic sound that he had heard before, a whup-whup-whup sound that had intensified enough to rattle the window in its frame. Frantically wiping away the blurriness, he scanned the skyline as the old man sat up on the bed behind him.

  ‘What is it?’ croaked Reg.

  ‘I don’t kno-‘ Ben started to say, but then a trio of dots appeared in the middle of the sky. Now both the steadily amplifying sound and rapidly approaching shapes were no longer a mystery. It was three helicopters, heading straight in their direction.

  ‘Quick!’ yelled Reg. ‘Don’t worry about me. Get outside now!’

  ‘But-‘

  ‘I’ll be fine! Go, man! Go!’

  Ben’s heart was pumping as he threw himself out the door and along the hallway, almost colliding with Katie outside the entrance to the living room. He grabbed her, pulling her close as the house began to shake around them. Somewhere amid the chaos Pepper barked twice and then there was shouting.

  ‘I think they’re ours!’ boomed Harry Skinner, barrelling into the hall and shaking his head as dust fell from the ceiling onto his shaggy mane. Behind him Sarah screamed and Chris tried to haul her up from a crouching position while also trying to grab hold of the distressed dog.

  ‘Quick!’ Ben shouted to them as he dragged Katie toward the front door and wrenched it open. ‘Follow me!’

  ‘What about Reg?’ yelled Chris, looking back over his shoulder.

  ‘He’s okay! Now, move!‘

  Suddenly, the Reillys were outside with the others right behind them. The whup-whup-whup was almost deafening now and the front yard was a swirling squall of debris which blew dust and grit up into their faces. They shaded their stinging eyes to look up and three huge black shapes flashed overhead, blotting out the sunlight for a flicker of a second.

  Sarah dropped to her knees as Tony Skinner fell back against the wall of the bungalow, shotgun in hand. Ben hauled Katie to the centre of the yard and together they began to wave frantically. Harry stood amid the maelstrom like a colossal statue while Chris grabbed Pepper’s straining collar and stared skyward. The youngster gasped, suddenly realising that the helicopters were neither descending nor changing direction. Instead they had already moved further away, growing more distant with every passing second.

  ‘Come back!’ screamed Sarah as pieces of detritus floated back down around her. ‘Come back!’

  The others, all of them speechless, remained focused on the skyline as the teenage girl fell sobbing to the ground in front of them. Ben watched until the trio of dots grew smaller and smaller in the distance and gritted his teeth as they disappeared from view altogether. Katie felt the grip of her husband’s hand tighten significantly on hers while behind them Pepper turned twice in a circle and sat down. Whimpering strangely, the dog almost seemed to be reflecting their mood.

  ‘Were they ours?’ Chris suddenly asked, directing the question at no one in particular. ‘Did anyone see if they were ours?’

  ‘Who knows’ growled Harry. ‘Doesn’t matter now anyway...’

  ‘Yeah. Fuck ‘em’ added Tony, spitting on the ground and slinging the shotgun strap over his shoulder. A wild fire raged in his eyes as he spun away and headed back to the bungalow. With a grunt and a scratch of his overgrown beard, his father followed.

  A little disoriented, Ben shook his head and looked around anxiously. In their haste to be rescued they had been careless and made far too much noise. From the elevated driveway he scanned his eyes along the lane which ran past the front gate. Thankfully it was clear.

  ‘Hey Chris’ he muttered, pointing with his chin toward Sarah. ‘Can you help me with her?’

  Chris nodded and Katie stepped aside as both men stooped to haul the girl to her feet. There was no resistance in her trembling body, as if this latest ordeal had completely drained her of energy. Taking one arm each they carefully helped her back toward the bungalow while Pepper trotted along at the rear.

  Nipping ahead of them, Katie pushed the front door open and stepped inside. Ben and Chris followed, turning sideways to enter with Sarah dangling limply between them. All of a sudden the girl’s lolling head lifted up and she yanked herself free, her tearstained face twisting in anger.

  ‘Sarah...’ pleaded Chris as the girl pushed clumsily past Katie and stumbled along the hall. Without replying she disappeared into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her.

  Ben sighed and scratched the nape of his neck. ‘Leave her, Chris...’

  Standing in the hallway the others allowed themselves a moment’s silence. Chris knelt to scratch behind Pepper’s ear while Ben looked down at them both, his brow suddenly furrowing.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Katie, noticing her husband’s expression.

  ‘Hang on’ he replied, looking up with a sparkle in his eyes. ‘Help me get everyone into the living room. Reg too. Get everyone. I’ve just thought of something.’

  Three miles away the thing that used to be a young woman called Jane Morgan stumbled awkwardly through a leafy thicket. Her body was severely decomposed, almost skeletal, and for that there was an explanation. Unlike the majority of her decaying brethren she had died four days before the bombings.

  Her end had come via a combination of factors; one too many vodka shots, an unplanned walk alone by the side of the river, a drunken misstep at just the wrong moment. Lost within the flowing water and far too inebriated to react, she was drowned in minutes.

  Once she was gone, it took just over a day for Jane Morgan’s mysterious disappearance to hit the public domain. A local news channel ran reports which offered various theories yet failed to suggest the actual sequence of events. This was due in part to an (incorrect) eyewitness statement where an old woman was ‘certain’ that she had seen Jane board a night bus for the next town accompanied by a dark haired man. While Jane’s tearful mother made herself available for interviews media suspicion began to focus elsewhere, particularly on the potential gripes of an ex-boyfriend.

  During this time the young woman’s corpse had continued to bump along the river bed, the current carrying it half a mile downstream where the cold temperature of the depths delayed its rise to the surface. By now the various creatures of the river had taken advantage of the unexpected bounty. Fish had nibbled at the bloated fingers and toes; aquatic insects had laid eggs within the wrinkled folds of swollen skin...

  Eventually, on the morning of day four, with the gases of putrefaction having done their work, Jane Morgan’s body finally drifted upward and bobbed to the surface of a lake twenty feet away from the bank. Dead but not yet reanimated, she could not know that explosions were echoing across the sky, the closest of which rippled the water with thunderous shockwaves.

  Hidden among a cluster of bulrushes the young woman was just another body lost among the tens of thousands to follow. As the explosions died away she remained there, face down in the cloudy water.

  Then, after a short time, it began to rain. And the rain was red.

  Life, or a decayed semblance of it, slowly returned. Slimy, mildewed fingers twitched. Bulging, milky-white eyes opened. The thing pulled itself upright to stand waist deep among the silty shallows. Oblivious to all else, it was driven by one thing alone.

  Hunger.

  The thing’s jaws clacked as it tried to take a step forward, finding that its feet were stuck. Arms thrashing the water, it gave a haunted groan as scores of river flies began to buzz around its twitching head. Minutes became hours, during which the insects multiplied into hundreds of biting, stinging, egg-laying scavengers. Then, with a sucking sound and a bubbling glug of water the thing’s swollen feet finally pulled free.

  Staggering clumsily toward the muddy bank, the creature eventually clawed its way back onto land. Others were there already, others like it; dozens of shuffling, groaning, bloodstained monsters moving in no obvious direction. ‘Jane’ simply became one of them, ambling slowly this way and that in search of living flesh.

  For days the growing horde wandered through narrow village streets, across ploughed fields and over car-strewn motorways. Occasionally the moans and groans would intensify as a victim was taken; someone trapped or wounded, unable to escape. Once overcome the prey would be torn apart and consumed in minutes. Then the herd would move on again.

  At this point the thing that used to be Jane Morgan found itself at the very head of that selfsame herd.

  But something had changed.

  Now there was uniformity to their movement.

  Minutes before an airborne sound had turned them around to face in one direction, a whup-whup-whup sound that they had continued to follow even after it had faded away.

  That sound had registered within their festering brains and now like sheep they flocked together, their numbers continuing to swell with stragglers from every quarter. Shuffling, lurching, stumbling, they moved their rotten selves through woodland and across muddy fields. Now a seething mass of decaying flesh in various stages of decomposition, they numbered three hundred and seventeen.

 

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