For Those In Peril (Book 2): The Outbreak (23 page)

Daz
frowned. ‘No’ too late for what?’

‘For
learning about the stars.’ I pointed upwards. ‘See those ones up there? The ones
that would look like a saucepan if you joined them together?’

I
watched as Daz’s eyes flicked around for a few second before they locked onto
the right set of stars. ‘Yeah.’

‘That’s the Big Dipper; it’s part of a constellation called
Ursa Major
,
the Great Bear. Now, if you imagine a line connecting the two stars at the end
and continuing across the sky, that takes you to another star; that one there,
out on its own. That’s
Polaris
; the Pole Star. It’s directly over the
North Pole and it’s the only star in the sky which doesn’t seem to move. That
means you can use it to navigate and work out where you are.’

‘Just
from that one star?’ Daz shook his head gently. ‘That’s fuckin’ mental!’ He
stared at the sky for a few seconds before he carried on. ‘How d’you know all
that?’

The
back of my neck was starting to hurt and I rubbed it gently. ‘If you spend
enough time out here, it’s just something you pick up.’

‘What
else d’you know?’ There was an eagerness in Daz’s voice.

‘See
that really bright star there?’

‘Yeah.’

‘That’s
Sirius
, the Dog Star. It’s the brightest star in the sky, but its
light takes eight and a half years to reach us, and that’s with the light
travelling at almost seven million miles an hour.’

Daz
let out a long, low whistle. He cast his eyes back and forth across the sky and
then they fixed on something. ‘What about that one?’ Daz pointed to a faint
object which looked a little out of focus. ‘That one’s no’ very bright. It must
be a lot further away. How long does its light take to get here?’

‘That’s not a star. It’s another galaxy: the Andromeda galaxy. There’s something
like 300 billion stars in it and it’s two and a half million light years away;
the light we’re seeing now left there about a million years before anything we’d
even vaguely recognise as human walked the Earth.’

‘Mental!’ Daz paused for a moment. ‘Mind you, with this disease thing, it
mightn’t be very long before it’s like that again.’

It was
a depressing thought; that humans had evolved, spread to every corner of the
planet, created great civilisations, fought great wars, and then wiped
themselves out: all in less time that it took for light to travel between two
neighbouring galaxies. In the history of the universe, we were a mere blip; a
momentary flash worthy of little more than a footnote.

Chapter Ten

‘Mum,
I can’t get the TV to work.’

I’d
stayed in the cockpit all night, unable to fall into any sort of restful sleep.
The worry of what we should do next gnawed away at me, keeping me awake. I’d
dozed now and then, but only briefly and Sophie’s shout woke me from one of
these naps. I checked the sails and went below, presuming the batteries had
finally run out of power, but I was wrong. In the saloon, Sophie was pointing
the remote at the television as she stabbed repeatedly at its buttons: it was
on, but there was no picture … not on any of the channels she selected.

I went
out and checked the alignment of the antenna, and then the wire which took the
signal down into the cabin; they both seemed fine. Back inside, I took the
remote from Sophie and made sure the right input was selected.

‘What’s up?’ Claire came into the saloon, her hand covering her mouth as she
yawned. From the bags under her eyes, it was clear she’d slept as badly as I
had.

Sophie
flopped onto one of the seats. ‘The TV’s broken.’

I
unplugged the wire for the antenna, blew on it and plugged it back in. ‘The
television’s fine; it’s just that it doesn’t seem to be picking anything up.’

‘How?’
Daz had come into the main cabin as well. Shortly after, Tom appeared,
stretching and then grunting in pain. Instinctively, his hand went to his
bandaged side.

‘I’m
not sure.’ Then a thought struck me. I went over to the FM radio and turned it
on, but I couldn’t find any of my usual stations. ‘Hmmm ...’

‘What’s going on?’ By this time Tom had sat down opposite Sophie and was
watching me intently.

I
reached up and turned the television off. ‘It looks like nothing’s broadcasting
anymore.’

‘Nothing at all?’ Claire sounded incredulous.

I
looked at her. ‘Not on the television, or on the radio.’

‘You
sure?’ Tom got up and started fiddling with the settings on the radio. ‘Not even
an emergency broadcast of some kind?’

‘What
does it mean?’ Sophie’s gaze shifted from Claire to me, and then to Tom.

‘I
don’t know.’ I turned to Claire, ‘D’you and Tom want to come up on deck with me
for a minute?’

‘Hey,
you’re going to talk about it. That’s not fair!’ Sophie leapt to her feet. ‘Me
and Daz have a right to know what’s going on. We’re not little kids!’

The
more time I spent with Sophie, the more I was beginning to realise I’d
underestimated her. I’d thought, given her sheltered upbringing, that she
wouldn’t be able to cope with all that was happening, but she was holding up
much better than I’d expected, and she seemed willing to meet our situation
head-on. I glanced at Claire. ‘Your decision.’

‘I
suppose she’s right.’ Claire sat down beside Sophie. ‘After all, we’re all in
this together.’

‘So?
What does it mean?’ Sophie looked at us all again.

I took
a deep breath. ‘We can’t know for certain, but I think it means London’s been
overrun. I think it means there’s no one left in charge.’

Daz’s
brow furrowed. ‘What does that mean for us?’

Claire
stared straight ahead. ‘It means we’re really on our own now. Britain isn’t
coming back from this. Not any time soon; possibly not ever.’

There
was silence as Claire’s words sank in.

After
a few minutes, Tom spoke. ‘So what’s your plan?’

I felt
every eye in the room fall on me. They were looking to me to make a decision and
yet I couldn’t. Then I remembered Tom’s words from the night before and I felt a
wave of relief wash over me. Suddenly my brain was no longer paralysed with fear
and I knew what to do. ‘I can lay out the options, but I think we should make
any decisions as a group.’

Daz
sat down at the table. ‘So what’re the options?’

‘There
are really only two: we can try to find an island which is uninhabited and set
ourselves up there; or we can see if we can find other survivors and join up
with them.’

‘How
likely is it that we can find an uninhabited island?’ Claire was clearly leaning
towards that option.

‘Very.
A lot of islands around here don’t have anyone living on them anymore,
especially the smaller ones.’

‘But
where’re we goin’ to get food from?’ Daz was thinking with his stomach.

‘There’s plenty around, if you know where to look. It just might not be what
you’re used to.’

‘What
d’you mean?’ Daz glanced at me curiously.

‘Well
…’ It took me a couple of seconds to come up with a good example. ‘We’re a lot
more likely to be able to find puffins than chickens.’

Daz
looked startled. ‘What the fuck’s a puffin?’

‘I
think that’s getting away from the point.’ Tom leant forward, placing his elbows
on the table and clasping his hands together. ‘If we find other survivors, do
you think they’ll be happy to have us turn up?’

‘I’m
really not too sure.’ I’d already given this some thought, but I had yet to come
to any firm conclusions. ‘Some might; some might not. Either way, I think our
chances will be better in the long run if there’s more than just the five of
us.’

‘Why?’
Sophie was staring at me, eyes narrowed.

I
wondered how to explain this, and settled for just being honest. ‘Because if
something goes wrong, there’d be more people to help out. Think about it: if
something happened to me, if I got ill or got infected, would the rest of you be
able to handle the boat on your own?’

Daz
puffed out his chest. ‘I could do it.’

His
growing self-confidence made me smile. ‘Daz, you’ve done well so far, but you’ve
still got a lot to learn. Wait till we run into a decent bit of wind, then
you’ll see what I mean.’

‘Can
we trust other people?’ I could understand Claire’s concern. ‘I mean, we won’t
know them or what they’re really like.’

I
turned to her. ‘Until a few days ago, you’d never met Daz or Tom, or me, but you
trust us, don’t you?’

Claire
looked flustered. ‘That’s different.’ She was obviously worried she’d offended
us. ‘Anyway, I had no choice; it was the only way we were going to get out
alive.’

I
slowly scratched the side of my face, where the lengthening stubble was really
starting to itch. ‘I think it’s going to be the same with other survivors, but
we won’t know that until we’ve met them.’

‘How
d’you even know there are other survivors?’ Sophie stared at me solemnly. ‘What
if it’s just us? What if we’re the only ones left who aren’t infected?’

That
was something I hadn’t even considered. I’d presumed that if we’d made it this
far, there had to be others who’d made it, too. Suddenly, I realised I needed to
know if there were others out there, or whether we were really the only ones
who’d survived.

‘Okay,
here’s a compromise. Why don’t we see if we can find any other survivors. If we
do, and if they’ll let us, we can spend some time with them and then decide if
we want to join up with them or not.’ I glanced at Claire. ‘That way we can at
least see what they’re like before we make any decisions. How does that sound?’

There
was a general murmur of agreement.

Tom
sat back in his seat. ‘So where do we start looking?

I
retrieved the chart I’d spent so much time staring at the night before and laid
it out on the table. ‘If there are any other survivors, it’s most likely they’ll
be on one of the islands out here: the sea should have acted as a barrier to the
infected getting to them. We can start here,’ I pointed to a medium-sized island
which lay about twenty miles to our north, ‘and then work our way up from
there.’

Daz
peered at the chart. ‘How’re we goin’ to know if there are people there, and if
they’re infected or no’?’

This
was something else I hadn’t really thought about. ‘I don’t know, but if we find
people, I’m sure it’ll be obvious, one way or another.’

As the
day wore on, the wind shifted to the north and started to pick up. To make any
sort of headway, we had to tack back and forth, slowing our progress to a
snail’s pace. As the wind strengthened, I handed out life jackets and safety
harnesses, and insisted they were to be worn at all times when on deck. The
strong winds meant it was more difficult for the others to both hear and follow
my instructions, and it didn’t help that as the seas increased, so did the
movement of the boat. Tom succumbed to sea sickness early in the afternoon and
went down below, quickly followed by Sophie, who’d started to look a little
green.

By
nightfall, we were still some five miles from our destination and the winds had
built to a force ten. The waves, which had started the day as rough chop, had
built into a sizeable rolling swell, lifting the boat high into the air as we
passed over them and then dropping it into troughs so deep we could see nothing
but water all around us. The mizzen had been reefed once, the main twice and the
jib was little more than a pocket handkerchief. The rain which had started at
lunchtime was moving almost horizontally as it rattled off the sails. Waves
broke over the bow every few minutes and washed along the decks. It was rougher
weather than I might have expected for the time of year, but it was by no means
unusual.

Daz
seemed to be enjoying the challenge of sailing in the harsh conditions. He’d
quickly picked up the knack of steering through the swell and tweaking the sails
to keep us as stable as possible. He still couldn’t handle tacking, but that was
hardly surprising, given that he’d only been at sea for such a short period of
time. Claire sat in the cockpit with her legs pulled up to her chest, the hood
of the waterproof jacket she’d taken from one of the lockers pulled tight around
her head, and a pallid tinge to her face. Having thrown up continuously for
about an hour, Tom was now lying on his back, with his eyes closed, on the floor
of the saloon, at a point which he insisted moved the least. Sophie had bundled
herself up in a sleeping bag and was wedged in the corner of one of the seats,
looking dejected. She hadn’t actually thrown up, but it seemed like it was only
a matter of time.

Despite the darkness and the weather, I pushed on, knowing the others would feel
better once we finally got into the lee of the island and by midnight I could
feel the seas start to calm beneath us. Tom reappeared in the cockpit soon
after, looking drained, but apparently feeling better. Daz took the helm and I
went below to search the charts for a bay which would provide us with shelter
from the wind and where we could anchor up for the rest of the night. Almost
immediately, my eyes fell on Port Ellen. It wasn’t an anchorage I’d used a lot,
but I’d been there a few times: the seabed was firm, meaning there would be
little risk of the anchor dragging, and since it was almost encircled by land
with a south-facing entrance, it would provide the much needed shelter from the
strong northerly wind. Being the largest community on the island, it would also
be the best place to start our search for other survivors.