Undead at Heart (17 page)

 She hauled the
rucksack from the floor and onto her back and made her way downstairs. She knew
she had to carry on with the task ahead of her, but her dread weighed her down.
In the kitchen they were dividing the things that had been found upstairs more
evenly, and interspersing food with more practical objects. Nicola suspected
that they had packed more things than they would need, but didn’t want to take
any chances.

She stood in the
doorway and watched them, the weight of the rucksack threatening to bring her
to her knees, but she was unwilling to let it drop. Following the checking of
the house, and the zombie attack, the others who had waited in the courtyard
were now clustered around the back door. Nicola watched as they chatted and
swapped objects back and forth, sorting what they would each need and who was
capable of carrying what. Tony had also set himself apart from it all. He had
taken a chair and placed it against the far wall. He was examining the gun. So
far he had worked out how to open it, and was now examining cartridges which he
had taken from the box. As she watched, he started to slide them into the gun:
one, then two. He closed the gun with a click, and she saw a look of
satisfaction pass over his face.

He looked up and saw her
and his face went blank.

She stepped into the
room and finally swung the pack from her back and let it thump to the ground.
She took a deep breath, then, “Okay, then. How are we getting on?”

Andy looked up from
where he was sliding bottles of water into one of the packs. “Not bad, we
should have enough stuff to keep everyone comfortable and fed for a few days if
needs be.” He glanced around then back to Nicola, “We should be good to go in a
few minutes. We just need to sort that one out.” He pointed to the pack Nicola
had brought down, and Dave stepped over to take it from her. He glanced up into
her face, but she couldn’t read his expression. She looked away.

“Okay, good.” She
turned and called out through the doorway, “Sam, if you want to come in, I’ll
show you where the bedroom is. We can get you some shoes.”

Sam was conscious that
everyone was now waiting for her. She and Nicola went upstairs quickly and she
was able to find trainers which fit her when she added two pairs of trainer-socks
on each foot, and also to exchange her ’little black number’ for a pair of
drawstring ¾ length ‘shorts’ and a t-shirt which wasn’t too baggy.

Nicola had left her to
change, but all in all it had taken less than 5 minutes. She walked back into
the kitchen, looking more practical but a lot less glamorous, she felt. She had
even tied her hair up with a band she had found on the dressing table. She
didn’t know if it was the new look, or just something what had been simmering,
but as soon as she walked in, Tony stood from his chair at the side of the
room, walked over to her with the shotgun held at his side, slid his left hand
round the back of her neck to cup her head, and kissed her.

It was a soft and
sensuous kiss, which grew a little harder and more passionate as it continued.
Sam was aware that all movement in the room had ceased and imagined all eyes
watching them, but she didn’t care. She didn’t know if it was the pressure of
the situation, or just hormones which didn’t know when to shut up, but she had
wanted Tony to kiss her almost as soon as she had first placed her hand on his
shoulder back in the woods. She melted into the kiss, and felt her body mould
to his, but he didn’t change. He stood, straight as a plank, holding her head
to his, and kissed her until she finally had to break away, to breathe. She
looked into his eyes, still surprised at the suddenness and publicness of what
he had done. She didn’t know what she expected to see in his eyes – some
softness, some affection, perhaps – but they were flat and fathomless, like a
poisoned reservoir. She almost pulled away, but his fingers massaged the back
of her neck a little, and she saw his face soften into a smile.

“Sorry,” he said, the
smile seeming to fit itself over his features, rather than being part of them.
“I just needed to do that.”

She tried to think of
a response, but before she could he had turned back to the others, who looked
away and tried to pretend they hadn’t been watching.

“We ready?” he asked
them.

A last couple of
things were swapped between bags and then they all agreed that, yes, they were
ready.

Nicola seemed, after
dawdling far more than Sam would have expected
,
to
have found her urgency again. She grabbed a bag and swung it onto her back, and
marched out of the kitchen, causing the group outside to have to back out of
her way. The rest of them followed.

Once back into the
open, everyone split into their two groups without having to be told. Dave, Dan
and Nicola were carrying the packs for their group. Andy, Alan and Ryan had the
other three. A couple of small bags had been hung from the back of Heidi’s
pushchair, too.

There seemed little to
say,
now they had finally reached this point. Dan and
Daz wished the others from the pub good luck, and the sentiment was repeated across
the groups. And then they picked up their weapons and walked.

At the gate there was
another round of farewells, and then James was leading his group off to the
right, towards the village, and Dave was leading the others to the left, back
the way he and Nicola had come the night before; back to Alyssa.

Nicola was angry. She
knew she had no reason to be, and that her mind should have been focussed on
her daughter, but it was anger which drove her now. She just wanted to find her
daughter and get her away from all this to somewhere safe; somewhere where they
could wait out whatever it was that was happening.
Somewhere
away from Tony.

She had no reason to
have been shocked and angered by the way he kissed Sam, but she was, and she
hated herself for it. When he stood up and did what he did, she knew
immediately what had happened. He had seen her and Dave, and it had made him…
what?
Jealous?
Something
like
that. And he had then kissed the girl in retaliation. That was what she was
angry about. She wasn’t jealous for herself. She was just sad for the girl, who
had obviously taken a shine to him, for some unknown reason. He had used her to
try and get back at Nicola and the girl was going to be heartbroken when he
cast her aside. She knew his type; she knew that would be his pattern.

Okay, so stressful
times brought people together who would normally never look at each other, and
maybe some of that was what was going on between Tony and Sam. But it was no
excuse for treating her like that.

As they walked away
from the farm, Dave set the pace, but Nicola soon moved up to join him. Dan and
Daz followed behind, with Tony and Sam bringing up the rear. Nicola glanced
back and felt a fresh jolt of anger as she saw they were holding hands. Sam was
smiling, but Tony’s face was set.

A minute later and she
could no longer worry about such things. They reached a place where a whole
length of hedge had been torn down.  

Dave stopped. The
others caught up with him as he spoke, “This is the place where I came out last
night, or as near as dammit. We could go back by the road and round, but I
think this is quicker and I’m fairly sure I remember the way. It’s not
particularly hard, but it is cross-country. That okay with everyone?”

They all agreed and
again, he led the way. They stepped through the hedge and stopped. Like the
sheep by the barn, the cows in this field had been ripped apart. Splashes of
gore and bovine body parts littered the fields. Nicola ignored them, stepped
around Dave, and carried on going. She didn’t look back to see if the others
were following.

They did, and Dave was
soon walking at her side again, guiding her to a gate which led to a field with
similarly butchered sheep in it.

They crossed two more
slaughterfields before they reached one containing crops. At the edge of this
one, the ground started to rise and, as they climbed, Nicola could see a roof
appear on the horizon.

She turned her head
towards Dave, not breaking stride. “Is that it?”

“Yes,” he replied and then
watched as she doubled her pace, taking the hill as if it wasn’t there.

The others started to
drop behind, but all other thoughts had left Nicola’s head. She no longer cared
what Tony did with his life. She didn’t care if Sam got hurt – she was a grown
up and had to make her own mistakes. She didn’t care what Dave might assume
about her and their shared kiss. She didn’t even care that he had abandoned her
daughter here overnight. All she cared about was getting into that shed and
rescuing what would be a very frightened, very hungry and very bewildered
little girl.

Despite the weight of
the pack on her back she sprinted up and over the brow of the hill. She rounded
the side of the shed and stopped.

The door was not just
ajar, it was completely gone. In the efforts to remove it, whatever had wanted
to get in had torn the boards of the door into so much kindling. The pieces lay
scattered across the grass in front of the shed, and she could see spatters of
blood on them.

She was still standing
there when the others arrived. They were out of breath, but that was not why
no-one said anything. They all just stood ranged around her and looked at the
same scene of devastation which had halted her.

Finally Dave stepped
forward. He looked into her face as he passed her, making sure it was okay for
him to do what he was doing, but she didn’t say anything to stop him. She
wasn’t sure she could say anything at all.

He stepped into the
shed and then straight out again. She waited for him to tell her about the mess
of limbs and intestines and blood which was all that was left of her daughter.
He took a breath to speak and she all but cringed before the blow that she was
sure was coming.

He shook his head.
“Nothing.
She’s gone.”

Somehow, she found her
voice.
“No… body?”

He shook his head
again, and walked over to her. He took her hands in his and she was reminded of
their moment in the bedroom. He looked into her eyes.”
Nothing.
No blood, no body, nothing. Maybe, wherever she is, she’s okay.”

His voice was
soothing, but she knew exactly what it was he wasn’t saying.

She nodded at him,
acknowledging, but not agreeing. “That’s true. Or maybe she was screaming and
they heard her. They broke down the door and – hell, maybe she ran for it – but
more likely they dragged her out, they tore out her throat, and next time it
goes dark my own daughter will come looking to eat her mother’s brains.”

She never raised her
voice, but she saw him flinch at her words anyway. She felt bad for a moment.
He was taking all this as his fault, but he hadn’t caused any of it to happen.
He had just been trying to do his best. He might have messed up, but he hadn’t
intended it. It occurred to her to say this, to try and relieve his guilt, to
put aside her own feelings to make him feel better. But she didn’t. She didn’t
have the chance.

She was just working
out how to phrase what she wanted to say when the sky went dark. She looked
around, expecting to see one of the giant metal spiders which she had been told
about, but had yet to see. The transition from sunlight to shade was so sudden
that she thought it must have been cast by something. Instead, as she looked
up, she saw thick dark clouds- as thick as smoke, but too high up and moving
too fast – covering the sky.

“Look!” Daz, who had
ended up at the back of the group when they clustered at the front of the shed
was pointing beyond it, back the way they had come.

The empty shed and its
raft of possible meanings was forgotten in the moment. Nicola moved round the
shed to look where he was pointing.

She looked out, over
the fields and woods which they could see from their vantage, and could see the
line of the A34 cutting through the landscape. In breaks in the trees she could
see the snake of stalled cars, and had to force herself to remember that it
hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since she had been there.

Beyond that she could
see the blasted and blackened landscape that had once been trees and grass and
crops. Smoke rose from fires dotted around, some large enough to be buildings,
some more likely vehicles.

Finally, right at the
edge of what she could see, and getting less clear by the moment, she could see
a dark dish, the size of a cruise liner, sitting amongst the charcoaled
countryside. Rising from this, in a tree-trunk of light which must have been
many yards wide was a beam of green light. It lit the charred land below it
with a sickly hue that made her stomach lurch.

Where it reached into
the sky, fresh clouds were boiling, thick and black, and from there they spread
out at a frightening speed. She turned and looked, just in time to see the last
of the blue vanish over the other horizon as the clouds finally covered
everything in sight.