Wild Strawberry: The Motorcycle Diaries (6 page)

             
“What the fuck?  Eh?” said Terry.  “Let’s do it.”

             
Terry threw open the window and started to shout, “Yoo hoo, you dead fuckers, dinner time!  Come and get it while it’s hot!”

             
The creatures below looked up, and gathered underneath the window, scratching at the windows and walls.

             
Jeffrey looked over Terry’s shoulders, trying to see if any zombies were not taking the bait.

             
“I think they’ve bought it.”

             
They ran for the back door, flinging it open and running for the truck.  They made it to the hedge without a problem, but as they pushed through the narrow gap they imagined that every branch was a dead hand reaching out to grab them, each twig scraping against their skin was fingernails scratching at their flesh.

             
They got up and into the cab, everything seeming almost too easy.

             
As soon as they started the engine the banging began on the truck.  When they turned on the lights they saw dozens of creatures running down the road towards them from both directions.

             
Jeffrey had to reverse a few feet before he could move forward.  The truck let out a warning beep, and lights flashed at the back to warn people behind that it was coming, but the noise echoed through the countryside: a piercing signal that there were still people alive in the area.

             
The creatures running down the road crashed into the front of the reversing lorry, their hammering fists only reaching the bottom of the window, leaving greasy prints.

             
Jeffrey slammed the truck into gear and sped off down the road, crunching bodies under his wheels and sending body parts flying in all directions.

             
“OK, so now the shit has really hit the fan,” Jeffrey groaned staring wildly out of the window, “where do we head for?”

             
They had packed some emergency supplies in the cab of the truck: clothes, water, tins of food and a can opener, but only enough for a day or two.  The truck had enough petrol for a hundred steady miles at most.

             
“Bexleyheath!” Insisted Terry,  “It’s that way.”  He pointed to the North East, towards the edge of London.

             
“I was thinking more of the countryside.  We were doing quite well until…” Jeffrey stopped in the middle of his sentence; he was remembering the arrival of the creature that had once been Troy.

             
“Fuck that!”  Terry shouted, “I want big, secure walls, and a garden in the middle.  A prison!  My son’s prison.”

             
“Nice idea, but if those things can’t get inside how the hell are we meant to?”

             
“No problem.  We just park the truck alongside the wall, climb up through the sun roof and jump over…”

             
“Will it be tall enough?”

             
“Dunno, but I’m pretty sure.”

             
“Pretty sure?  And what if the prison is already overrun by those things?”

             
“Well then, we park for a minute outside, look over the wall, see what we shall see.  If it’s a dead place then we just get back in the truck and carry on with your plan to a find a place in the country.”

             
“You do know it’s taking us into the city: it’s going to be crawling with those things.”

             
“It’s only the edge of the city, five minutes from the countryside.”

             
“OK,” sighed Jeffrey, “do you know the way?”

             
“Sure, it’s signposted as soon as you come off the M25.”

             
“Yeah, but do you know the way using the back roads?  The motorways are blocked, and the closer we get to London the more small roads will be blocked too.”

             
“I know the direction,” said Terry doubtfully, “but not an exact route.”

             
“There’s a map in the glove box; get it out and lead on.”

             
Terry rummaged around and found the map.  It was an old dog-eared, spiral-bound book with several pages loose.

             
“It’s five years out of date,” Terry complained.

             
“Luckily we won’t be much affected by new one-way systems,” returned Jeffrey, wryly.

             
Every five minutes a figure would come running out into the road in front of the truck.  The lights made them look brilliant white, almost comical: like ghostly clowns, their make-up a stark smudge of dark red around their open mouths.

             
Then they truck would hit them and they would either go down under the wheels, or burst against the front of the cab, splattering guts and gore over the windscreen; the wiper would smear the stain before wiping it away.

             
One creature looked like it had once been an old woman, its white hair crazed and tangled.  It smashed into the front of the truck, a splatter of blood smearing the window.  Then the woman stuck there, the body glued to the radiator grille by torn flesh and the truck’s momentum.

             
It beat its hands feebly against the windscreen, snapping its teeth at the faces on the other side of the glass.

             
“Oh shit!  I really could do without the hitch-hiker,” spat Jeffrey, “fuck off  grandma!”

             
The truck lumbered on, maintaining a reasonable pace, slowing only when the road was blocked, to push rather than smash the obstructions out of the way.

             
As they approached their crossing under the blocked M25 motorway all the roads became busier and zombies increased in number.

             
Jeffrey stepped on the accelerator, bodies crumpled, and cars were shoved aside.  When they drove under the motorway they started to hear pounding on the roof of the truck.  As Jeffrey looked in the rear-view mirror he saw monsters spilling over the edge of the flyover chasing the survivors in the truck.  The noises on the roof continued and Jeffrey realised that zombies were still up there.

             
He looked up through the sunroof and saw two faces staring back at him.

             
“Up there!” Jeffrey shouted, pointing to the roof as he slammed on the brakes.

             
As the truck jolted, Joe, who hadn’t fastened his seatbelt, and who had been sitting in silence up to this point, smacked against the inside of the windscreen.  The glass cracked in a cobweb pattern, and Joe lost consciousness.

             
At the same moment the sunroof shattered.  One of the zombies was able to get half inside the cab before the other shot forward by the truck’s change in speed.

             
Everyone in the cab was showered with broken glass.  Jeffrey screamed to Terry, “Get this fucking thing out!” He was gripping the steering wheel and pumping the accelerator once more as, outside the truck, crowds of the dead were emerging from every direction.

             
Terry struggled against his seatbelt, while the zombie, a middle-aged man in a grey suit, was flailing about in his lap.  Terry tried to push its head away, but in the confusion and tangle of limbs, the zombie was able to turn itself around and lunge for Jeffrey.

             
Jeffrey screamed as the creature managed to sink its teeth into his neck.

             
Terry unhooked his seatbelt and pushed at the creature with all the adrenaline-fuelled strength that he could muster, til it smashed out through the windscreen.

             
His triumph was short-lived as he realised that Jeffrey was steering the truck up the kerb, and was clutching his throat, blood flowing freely.  He was losing control.

             
Terry unclipped Jeffrey’s seatbelt, and pulled him out of the driver’s seat.  For a moment there was no one driving and the truck left the road altogether, slowing down as it started scraping along the side of a high, brick wall.

             
Terry quickly took over driving, and headed back to the middle of the road.  Creatures were coming from the shadows, and Terry heard more falling on the truck from above.

             
They were near the prison now.  If he could get there without further catastrophes it should take five minutes. 

Terry squeezed Jeffrey’s arm  “You’ll be alright mate, just hang in there, we’ll get you help; not far now.”

              Terry continued his litany of reassuring words, although he knew that Jeffrey was beyond aid.  Even if they could bind his wound the disease would get him sooner or later.  Probably sooner.

             
He
had
to get to the prison,

             
“They have a medical unit,” Terry soothed, glancing nervously at Jeffrey, “all the medicines we need.  They usually have a doctor on site, and there’s always a nurse.”

             
The truck rammed into a charging group of zombies, and with no windscreen, blood splattered the faces of Terry and Jeffrey.

             
Most of the creatures went downwards, under the wheels, but one body did not.  As the truck hit the fragile body of a child it split apart.  The zombie was covered in bite marks, and also large, slashing wounds where some survivor had tried to fight it off with a knife.  Now the body had split in two and from the ribs down the guts and flesh fell to the ground and were flattened by the wheels.  The top half of the child was thrown upwards and landed on the dashboard of the cab.  Its arms were still working and it pulled its mangled remains towards Terry.

             
Its small form managed to get tangled in the steering wheel when Terry had to take a sharp left turn to avoid a road totally blocked by a burnt-out double-decker bus.

             
He tried to reach in to grab the monstrous child and throw it out of the window, but its small hands found his large one and latched on.  It pulled itself through the steering wheel and sunk its teeth into Terry’s forearm.  He screamed and smashed his arm against the roof, window and steering wheel in a desperate attempt to free himself from its grasp.

             
The creature managed to bite him twice more before he managed to pulp its head against the roof of the cab.

             
“Fuck you!  You little fucking shit.”

             
Terry glanced down at his arm.  Blood was pumping vigorously from a gouge near his wrist.

             
“Fuck this!”

             
He slammed his foot on the accelerator and lurched forwards.  The city was totally overrun, zombies emerging from every building.

             
He smashed his way through any obstacle.  As he saw a sign for the prison ahead, he crashed into a car that exploded on impact, causing a flare of heat to hurt his eyes and singe his hair.

             
The truck drove on even though it had lost some tires, something flammable had stuck to the passenger side of the cab and flames curled around the edge of the shattered windscreen.

             
He was nearly there.

             
His head started to feel woozy.  There was a warm, damp feeling in his trousers; he wondered for a moment if he had wet himself, but no, it was blood running down his arm from his bitten wrist.

             
White dots started to pop in front of his eyes.

             
“Hold it together, Terry,” he told himself, “nearly there now.”

             
He was finding it harder to put his thoughts together.

             
His heart leapt when he saw lights on inside the prison, but he couldn’t remember why that was such good news any more.

             
His vision was getting blurry, and the white spots were so distracting he could barely see anything else.

             
“Must get to the prison.”

             
The crowds of the dead outside the prison must have numbered thousands, attracted by the light, noise and movement of the wind-turbine.  They now turned towards Terry and his truck.

              Barely able to keep his eyes open, Terry sunk the accelerator to the floor…

Chapter Twenty-three

Crash