The Purple Haze (22 page)

Martin looked back to see the horde only a hundred yards or so behind. He looked around the gate and saw the lock was a dead bolt which needed a key to unlock. He moved Mike and Yvonne back and fired all his remaining bullets into it. He kicked the gate and, to his relief, felt it open behind the force of his kick. The three of them urged forward and onto the gang plank. There were many boats moored here, and it seemed several of them had to double park and had been blocked in by other boats. The group continued forward. Yvonne looked back over her shoulder to see the horde still following, but with the gang plank only wide enough for three people, both flanks of the creatures poured into the water. In spite of this many were still following them along the gang plank. She could see the number was far too many to be able to stand and fight against.

“
Which boat?” Martin shouted, now sounding tired now under the strain of carrying Mike.

“
Does it matter?” Mike replied sounding just as equally tired after having to effectively hop the entire way to the harbour.

They came to the end of the gang plank, and on the left of them was a sloop. It was tied to the gang plank and had no other boats blocking it. As fast as they could, they got aboard. Yvonne went first, then turned back to help Mike. She was expecting Martin to follow but he ran towards the front of the boat.

“
What are you doing?” Yvonne shouted.

“
We need to cast off these ropes,” Martin answered. He got the bow line off the gang plank and quickly headed back to the stern. As he went towards it he saw the creatures were getting very close. He had to make a decision in his mind. He knew if he got the line off he wouldn't have time to make it aboard, but it was better that Yvonne and Mike escaped than none of them, which he felt would let down all of the people they lost on their journey here. Someone had to survive to make it worth it. He reached the line and untied it, and just as the line came loose, he felt the hands on him. He readied himself for the end, but instead heard gunfire. He looked up and saw Mike and Yvonne, standing shoulder to shoulder, picking off the creatures as they came close. Martin looked over his shoulder and saw the creatures falling, and those that followed were stumbling over their dead comrades and falling into the water.

“
Get aboard!” Mike shouted.

Martin pushed the boat and jumped aboard, a couple of creatures reaching for him, but not making any contact they fell into the water beneath. Slowly the boat drifted towards the open sea. The three survivors stood there, watching the creatures in the moonlight. They were still trying determinedly to get to them, but hopelessly they fell into the water below. Martin breathed a huge sigh of relief and turned to thank his friends, then walked into the cabin of the boat. The cabin looked quite accommodating, with enough room for them all to sleep and sit. He looked back at Mike and Yvonne, who stood watching the harbour as the boat moved away. Martin found the pilot controls for the boat and saw the ignition switch. He removed the coverings, found the necessary wires and, using his expertise, got the engine running. He flicked a switch and the lights on the bow of the boat came on, and he could see out in front of him the steady rising and falling of the sea water. He carefully steered and followed a line of buoys, and before long the boat was out at sea. He found some charts and studied them, looking at which direction to point the vessel in to get to their destination, and as he did, he couldn’t help but wonder what they would find on the Isle of Mann. He knew that if things weren't any different there, they wouldn't have the ammunition or food to survive. For now he didn't care. He called Yvonne and she came into the cock pit. “I need you to do something for me,” he said to her.

“
What do you need?” she asked.

“
I want you to hold this wheel and keep the boat steady.” As he went to walk away, Yvonne stopped him.

“
Things are going to be okay, aren't they?” she asked.

Martin looked at her. In his own mind it was a question he didn't want an answer to. They had been through hell and for now he wanted to relax. He couldn't say what he felt to her though. To vanquish the gleam of hope on her face would have been cruel. “With you, everything will be fine.” Yvonne smiled at him and took the wheel. She held it level and looked ahead at the white foam of the waves caught in the lights of the boat.

Martin moved back to the stern of the boat to where Mike stood leant against a pole. Together they watched as the shores of England, silhouetted against the night sky, shrank into the distance. From what they could make out it all looked so calm and peaceful, the only signs of chaos coming from the flames of whatever accident had happened on the day the purple fog hit, still burning bright in the night sky. “What do you reckon?” Mike said.

“
About what?” replied Martin.

“
Our chances out here.”

Martin took in a deep breath. He couldn't bring himself to answer the question. “Let's not bother about that just yet,” he said, and the two of them stood in silence, and watched, until the land was swallowed by the darkness of the night.

A Note from the author

The story you have just read is the result of good times spent with friends whilst growing up. As a group of friends, the six of us always used to enjoy watching movies, playing video games and talking about random, useless rubbish, which would always end up turning into a discussion of our favourite supernatural creature, the zombie.

The obsession began when a certain popular video game series launched in the mid-nineties, and from there the passion for zombies grew. The passion became obsession when a very popular zombie movie based in a shopping mall made its way into my household, and research on the net gave us our own great ideas (or at least they seemed it at the time) for zombie movies. Using my dad’s Hi8 camcorder we filmed a five minute zombie movie in my house. I don’t think my parents know this, so I’m pretty sure they’ll be finding this out right about now! With no home editing technology available to us, the whole film was one shot, was acted terribly and was, ultimately, pretty awful.

This didn’t dampen our spirits or opinions of the zombie, and it wasn’t long after, aged just thirteen at the time, I embarked on a personal project to write an epic zombie movie script. The paper for it came from my school exercise books, and in pencil I wrote a movie script which, if filmed, would have been roughly seventy minutes long (at least by my own adolescent reckoning). In typical teenage fashion, bad language and over the top monsters and action, which all seemed so cool at the time, were in plentiful supply. The movie never took off, of course, due to the ambitious content, which was based around a bank robbery that goes wrong, only to be made worse further by a mysterious mist that transformed people into zombies.

Fifteen years on, and what you have just read is that story, updated and reworked with all the over the top action and bad language, stuff that seemed cool as a teenager, removed. To keep it in the same spirit if that movie idea most of the character’s names have remained the same, which means that six of the characters in this book make up the six of us teenagers who grew up together with a love of the zombie. I won’t tell you which are the names of those people here, but if you happen to be one of those people and you are reading this yourself, please know that the memories of talking about zombie survival and making stupid zombie movies haven’t gone away, and probably never will.

If you are one of those people, and the character named after you died in the story, the manner in which they died, or where they died in the story, is not a reflection on my opinion of you as a person. The fact your name is in the story will always remind me of those teenage years, free from responsibility and full of nothing but spare time, and it makes me smile to remember such times.

Wherever you are now, and whatever you are doing, thank you.

Gary Richardson, 2012