The Z Infection (38 page)

When I thought I had removed all the
possible infection I poured water over the wound to clean it, then I ripped the
sleeve from Dave’s shirt and used it as a rudimentary bandage, tying it tightly
around his arm.

It only took seconds but I knew I had
no more time to waste.  I hoisted the unconscious man onto my shoulder and
staggered towards the loch.  The boat, with a man and a woman from the island,
was just offshore.  They were waving and calling to me as I stumbled forwards.

Suddenly a figure, another woman,
lurched at me from behind another bush.  I dodged the attack but I couldn’t
defend myself while carrying Dave.  Then, as the woman steadied herself for
another attack, Pancho unexpectedly appeared from behind her.  He leapt onto
her back and knocked her to the ground, snarling at her as he landed nearby and
turning to face her.

I took my chance and raced for the
shore.  In my peripheral vision I could see other figures.  They were all along
the shoreline, dozens of them, all converging on me.

‘Pancho,’ I yelled as I teetered into
the cold water of the loch and started wading for the boat.  ‘Pancho.’

I could hear a real commotion going
on in the bushes, then a yelp.  I reached the boat, which was in waist deep
water and we managed to get Dave on board.  Then I turned to go back.

‘Where are you going?’ asked the
woman.

‘The dog,’ I said.  ‘He’s still in
there.’

‘Leave him,’ said the man.  ‘You’ll
never survive in there.’

I looked at the shoreline.  He was
right.  There were dozens of the infected there now, bellowing at us as we
remained out of their reach on the water.  I pulled myself onto the boat and
stared back at them.  It was almost enough to break my heart.  The one thing I
had come to love throughout all the tragedy, the most loyal friend I could have
ever imagined and he was gone.

I slumped onto the deck, silently
cursing Dave and his stupid ideas.

But as we turned to head for the
island I heard the man speak.

‘Look.’

I looked up and back towards shore. 
There, weaving his way through the dead as they reached for him with rotten
hands, was Pancho.  We shouted at him, encouraging him as he headed for the
water.  They grabbed for him but he was too fast, too agile and too smart.  As
he reached the last of group he leapt onto the back of a man and launched
himself into the air.  I could have sworn he was showing off and he landed in
the water with a huge splash.

He paddled out to us and we hauled
him onto the boat by the scruff of his neck.  I was so pleased to see him and
he licked at my face and squeaked as I petted him and ruffled his soaking fur. 

We rowed back to the island sanctuary
at a steady pace and unloaded Dave with some care when we arrived at the jetty,
surrounded by a small crowd.

‘What happened to him?’ asked a man.

‘He’s been bitten,’ I said.

The crowd moved back, almost as one
and some of the women ushered the children away.

‘It’s okay,’ I said.  ‘I cut around
the bite just after it happened.  I think I might have stopped the infection.’

‘We can’t take the risk,’ said one.

‘He’ll have to be put down,’ said
another.

There was a discussion amongst the
group as they deliberated on what to do with Dave.  Finally a voice spoke above
all the others.  It was Laura.

‘We should wait to see what happens,’
she said.  ‘If he was bitten fifteen minutes ago he should have turned by now. 
I’ve seen it happen in seconds.’

‘Sometimes it takes much longer.  We
can’t take that chance,’ said a man.  ‘What if he turns and infects others.  We
could be wiped out.’

‘Tom and I will guard him round the
clock,’ she said.  ‘We’ll put him in quarantine until we are absolutely sure he
won’t turn.’

There was more discussion, before an
agreement was reached.  We were to row out onto the water and stay there for
the rest of the afternoon with Dave.  Once the others returned from their
scavenging trip they would decide what to do with him.

The two of us rowed out, to about
twenty metres, leaving Pancho on the island.  He had done his bit for the day
and if Dave was to turn I didn’t want him to be put in any more danger. 

So we waited, out there, whiling away
the time until we suddenly heard a boat engine.  I looked up and saw two small
launches.  It was Anna and Mike and the others.  We would have our answer soon
enough.

Kareef Hadad

08:30 hours, Monday 25
^th
May, Windsor
Castle HQ, Windsor

We had been at the castle for over a
week and things were pretty much the same outside.  The dead still laid siege
to us and we cowered inside, afraid to go out and challenge their authority. 
They were the true rulers of the country now.  We were the pathetic remnants of
a nation which had once had the temerity to call itself Great.

Sophie and I had been given some
training in the use of the army rifles.  We were expected to do our bit in
there.  We trained alongside regular soldiers, civilians and the royal
household staff.  We took our turns on guard duty, manning the walls and
keeping observations on the enemy below.

In return we liked to think we were
safe there.  We had a roof over our heads and three meals a day.  They were
small meals, granted, but at least we were eating.  Outside, in the real world,
people were dying like flies.

Every night we watched news
bulletins.  It was the same all over the country.  It was the same all over the
world.  The Americans had finally given up on their idea of bombing their own
cities.  They had nuked a small city near the Canadian border, as a test.  But
the Canadian government protested and in any case the dead had simply walked
through the destruction and carried on as before, those that hadn’t been
incinerated.

Now the Americans were falling back
to the Mexican border and the west.  Everything they tried seemed to fail. 

In the rest of Europe it was much the
same.  Hundreds of millions had been infected within a short space of time. 
They, in turn, had attacked and either infected or killed tens of millions more. 
Nobody had any answers.  People fought back, of course, but the numbers were in
favour of the dead and their advantage increased with every passing day.

My own thoughts continued to be with
my wife and family.  Where they had gone I had no idea.  Trying to get answers
was difficult.  Every time I asked a question I was put off with the same old
‘the situation is very confusing’ routine. 

Then, one morning I had had enough. 
I waited until I knew that the Prime Minister was in his office and knocked on
the door.  He was in a meeting with General Breck and some other important
figures, but I was insistent that he listened to me.  He had no choice.  In one
of his addresses to the survivors in the castle, he had said that his door was
always open.

‘I have to find my wife and
children,’ I said.  ‘They are out there, somewhere and I know they are alive. 
I can sense it.’

‘I’m afraid there can be no way of
telling that,’ said the PM.

‘Please tell me where they would have
gone,’ I pleaded.  ‘There must have been a plan.’

‘The plan was for the setting up of
safe zones and camps,’ said the General.  ‘But we never got that far.  It all
happened too quickly and the zones were overrun.  We had no idea it would
spread so fast.’ 

I sat down on a chair.  Someone
brought me a glass of water and I took a long drink.

‘I cannot stay here any longer,’ I
announced.  ‘I have to find them and bring them to safety.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said the PM.  ‘That is
out of the question.  There is no way you can get out of this castle, other
than by helicopter and I will not authorise its use for such a venture.’

‘I’m not asking for much,’ I said. 
‘A weapon and some ammunition.  Maybe some food for a couple of days.’

The General shook his head.  ‘We
can’t afford to give you a rifle.  We need every weapon we have and all the
ammunition too.  You can see how heavily outnumbered we are.’

‘So that’s it?’ I asked.  ‘We leave
millions to the mercy of the dead, do we?  Leave them without any hope of
salvation?’

‘The army is doing everything in its
power to save people,’ said the General.

‘They’re not doing a great job about
it,’ I retorted.

It was true.  In seven major
engagements so far, the army had been defeated in every one of them.  It was on
its knees.

The RAF had fared little better.  Its
main base at Brize Norton had been overrun two nights ago.  Many of the pilots
had been killed on the ground and an attempt to retake the base had already
failed.  It had left us with very little air support.

Of the three military arms, it was
the navy who had performed the best.  They had saved sixty thousand people from
the beaches at Bournemouth and had transported them to the Channel Islands. 
Several outbreaks on those islands had been controlled and now the navy was
conducting further evacuations around the coast, from Aberdeen to Swansea.

I resigned myself to the fact that
they weren’t going to give in to my request and left them to their meetings. 
Why would they endorse it?  It was crazy.  My wife could have been anywhere. 
The likelihood was that she was dead.

I went back to my room and lay on my
bunk.  I was still there when Sophie came in.  She sat on the edge of the bed
and I told her about what I had done.

‘Are you surprised?’ she asked. 
‘They allowed us in here.  They didn’t have to accept us, an extra two mouths
to feed.  They could have turned us away like they have done with so many
others.’

We had been the lucky ones.  That was
true.  Many others had sent requests to be allowed in and all had been turned
down.  Only one had been approved, as far as I knew and that was someone who
was a professor of some sort, who Dr Bryson knew personally and vouched for.

‘I can’t stay,’ I said.  ‘I can’t
stay here all safe and secure, while my wife and son are facing danger
outside.  I have to find a way out of here and go and find them.

She didn’t say anything, but I knew
what she was thinking.  Poor old Kareef, he’s losing his mind.  But I wasn’t. 
I was determined.  I had never been more determined in all my life.

Dr Richard Bryson

09:00 hours, Monday 25
^th
May, Windsor
Castle HQ, Windsor

The facilities we had to work with at
Windsor were basic.  We had a small lab with a computer, some chemicals and a
few instruments.  We also had a room which we were able to transform into an
area to carry out post-mortems and a secure area for any patients we may have.

I was banned, at first, from taking
any of the infected into the castle, but I soon realised that this was totally
impractical.  If I was going to solve the mystery of this disease I would need
subjects.

Every morning I had a progress
meeting with Anthony.  Often the Prince of Wales would sit in on it, along with
General Breck and some members of the government.  Today, it was just the two
of us and a secretary who took notes.

‘How are things going?’ Anthony
asked.

‘Slowly,’ I said.  ‘The brain I
removed from Subject 1 (that was our new name for Esmerelda) has been studied
and experimented on with everything we have at our disposal.  There was nothing
in there.  Whatever it had been, that had taken her life and turned her into a
walking corpse, it’s no longer there.’

‘Nothing?’ he asked.

‘Not a trace,’ I said.  ‘It’s almost
like it had never been there.  Apart from the gunshot wound which killed her,
the brain seems normal.’

He rubbed his chin.  He looked
tired.  He had been surviving on about three hours sleep each night and a nap
in the afternoon to recharge the batteries.  At all other times you would find
him working.  Either reading reports, making television announcements or
attending meetings.  He took an active interest in what the armed forces were
doing, although he stopped short of giving direct orders and let the top brass
get on with their jobs.  He seemed to be everywhere.  Nobody could have done
more.

‘So what do you plan to do now?’ he
asked.

I knew what I wanted to do.  He knew
too.  We had discussed it more than once and each time it had been denied.

‘I need live subjects,’ I said.  ‘I
can’t do any more without them.’

‘The military are against it,’ he
replied.

There it was, I thought.  He was
wavering.  The military were against it, but perhaps he wasn’t.

‘I can keep them safe,’ I said.  ‘We
now have the facilities to make sure they cannot escape.’

‘But you’ve already examined one,’ he
said.

‘That was over a week ago,’ I
countered.  ‘And it was a half hour examination while I was on a boat and we
were fleeing for our lives.  This will be different.  More controlled.’

He thought for a moment longer.

‘I will have to run it past Breck and
His Royal Highness,’ he said.  ‘I can’t guarantee anything.’

‘Please explain to them that this is
absolutely necessary,’ I said.  ‘I wouldn’t ask if there was any other way.’

I stood up and we shook hands before
I left. 

I walked out of his office and
decided to get some air.  Up on one of the walls I looked down onto the town of
Windsor.  It was now a sea of dead.  There were hundreds of thousands of them. 
Could it be that they knew that this was where we were leading the fight
against them from?  Or was it just that they had run out of people to kill and
we were all that was left?

Anna Hasker

09:30 hours, Monday 25
^th
May, Loch Leven,
Kinross-shire

We had made good use of the time we
had bought for ourselves.  Mike had organised working parties and had designed
decent looking shelters among the old foundations within the castle walls.  He
had also managed to rig up a temporary roof for the tower, which kept the rain
off our heads if nothing else.

We were all now living within the
castle walls.  It felt secure.  Every day we would send out a scavenging party,
to try to find the things we needed.  Every day they came back with more than
we asked for.

Two of them were better at it than
most.  They were the two younger men who had acted as bait on our first foray
into the town.  They had devised routes in and out, which they swore were
almost completely free of the infected and they used them to maximum effect. 
We now had tools for building, more weapons, luxuries like toilet paper and
toothpaste (which I had originally overlooked) and batteries for the radio.

On top of all that, they had also
made a night-time visit to where the weapons had been dropped, when Tom and
Dave had been forced to flee.  What an event that had turned out to be.  Dave
bitten on the arm.  It had looked like he was finished, but Tom had saved the
day by cutting away the infected area of skin.  It had been quick thinking and
there had been no guarantees, but it had worked.  After twenty-four hours in
quarantine on the boat, we had decided that he was safe to have back on the
island.  I saw it as a massive breakthrough.

 I was munching an apple for
breakfast when I caught up with Mike as he was making a morning tour of the
buildings.

‘How long before you are finished?’ I
asked.

‘Everyone will have a proper place to
sleep by the end of this week,’ he replied.

‘They look impressive,’ I remarked.

He didn’t seem pleased.

‘They’ll do,’ he said.  ‘But what I
really want is bricks and mortar.’

I was surprised.

‘Could you build proper houses?’ I
asked.

‘We could have a go,’ he replied. 
‘It’s not too difficult to build some basic walls and we could use timber for
the roofs.  They wouldn’t be perfect but they would be better than this and
would last longer.  These will have to be redone every year I think.’

‘I’m sure one of our scavengers said
there was a builders merchants nearby,’ I said.  ‘There would be plenty there
for us, but how do we transport it across here?’

‘It would be a big operation,’ he
said.  ‘We would all need to lend a hand.  We could take it across on the boats
but we would need to be careful not to overload them.’

I was impressed.  Stone built houses
would be a huge improvement to our standard of living.

‘There are other matters we need to
address too, but we can look into it,’ I said.

I didn’t want him getting too carried
away.  Houses would be great, but we had to think about food and I wanted to
get the farm up and running.

I wandered out of the castle and down
to the loch side.  We had no idea if there were any other survivors out there. 
We knew that the government were operating from Windsor and there were some
reports of scattered survivors in other places, but making contact with them
was going to be difficult.

What I didn’t know, and I would have
been shocked if I had been told, was that covetous eyes were already watching
our thriving community and were preparing to take what we had worked so hard to
build from us.

Xiaofan Li

10:00 hours, Monday 25
^th
May, Central
London

On one of my many forays into the
streets, I had found a shop which sold two way radios.  They were cheap little
efforts and I didn’t imagine that they would have an enormous range, but I took
them anyway.  You never knew when something like that might come in handy and
they would be useful for Claire and me to speak to one another when I was away
from the flat.  Mobile phones had conked out on us three days before and we had
to assume that they wouldn’t be returning.