T
he longer Hayden
and the group walked, the further away the wall seemed to get.
Morning stretched on to early afternoon. The sun hid behind the clouds now, giving a welcome coolness to the air. They walked down a long road, an old dual carriageway of sorts. Either side of them, grassy embankments. They had no way of knowing what waited for them either side. What watched them.
Hayden wasn’t sure he wanted to know.
He just had to get to the wall. Get to the wall.
They all did.
The road was suspicious by its absence of cars. Its absence of life, or death. It was like an unused film set. Or a closed stretch of a road.
It’d been cleared. Which added fuel to the fire that where they were going was populated. Where they were going welcomed people like him. His group.
Or maybe that was just wishful thinking.
“Don’t you find it weird that there’s no signs?” Anthony asked.
Miriam frowned. “What d’you mean by signs?”
“Well, first thing I’d do if I were trying to welcome people aboard Boat Anthony is put a few signs up. Freedom This Way! That sorta thing.”
“Maybe they’re worried about the kind of people they’ll attract, Miriam said.
“Or,” Renee cut in, “perhaps they are averse to attracting anyone at all.”
Hayden wasn’t sure where he stood on the wall. Just that he had to get to it. He had to see what was behind it for himself. There were some things that bothered him. Many things. The truck driving through the town a few miles back. A similar truck to the one that took him to Salvation. To that prison.
He was starting to wonder if the same people were driving those trucks that lived behind the wall.
He just didn’t know why.
Yet.
“Least none of us have turned yet,” Anthony said, grin on his face. “But if you start sniffing anytime soon, do us all a favour and keep your distance, yeah?
“Same applies for you,” Renee said. Then a pause. “Do you really think the virus is airborne now?”
Hayden saw Renee turn to him. Saw everyone turn to him. He wasn’t sure why. But he’d been the one to come up with the theory in the first place, so perhaps it was something to do with that. “We can’t be sure. But signs suggest—”
“The injections,” Renee said. “The ones they gave us back at Salvation. Perhaps they had something to do with it?”
Hayden thought back to Little Tim. He hadn’t been injected. He’d wondered about the injections himself at first, especially after the state of Bob’s arm. But he was okay. The rest of the group here were okay. And Little Tim turned bite-free long before jabs were being doled out. “I’m not sure. I don’t think so. But…”
He stopped when he saw the movement at the top of the embankment on the left.
“Ah, shit,” Miriam said. “And we were doing so well.”
Six zombies stumbled down the side of the grass. Hayden could smell their rot, see flies buzzing around them from here. So they were old ones. Ones that’d been out here a while; infected some time ago.
“Sam, you go over to Anthony and Renee. We’ll deal with these.”
Sam ran over to Anthony and Renee, who turned away from the oncoming zombies. The numbers were increasing. The groans were becoming a chorus, a chant.
Hayden stepped up beside Miriam. He held the sharp metal pipe. Miriam held a gun in one hand, a cricket bat in the other.
“Ready?” Hayden asked.
Miriam nodded. “Ready.”
They ran towards the first of the zombies like it was just procedure. Like it was just routine. Hayden swung the pipe at the skull of an old man, his skin so grey and wrinkled he looked like he’d been sat in a bath for weeks.
Hayden watched his skin split away as he pounded the metal into his head. He lowered it. Pressed it up against his already-bitten neck.
Pushed the spike right through it.
He had a flashback to the supermarket. The zombies that wouldn’t die no matter how much he messed up their necks. And as he pushed the sharp edge of the pole into this old man’s neck, Hayden saw the increasing mass of zombies and knew they wouldn’t stand a chance if they didn’t fall. They’d have to run.
Then the man’s body went limp and he tumbled to the ground.
His head dangling on loosely by rotting flesh.
Hayden wiped his forehead. Breathed a sigh of relief. One down… a good few to go.
But they were falling.
They were falling, so they were manageable.
They were falling, so—
He felt a hand grab his left ankle as he lunged forward.
Turned around.
The old man was clinging onto him.
Teeth snapping.
Staring up at Hayden, his head barely hanging on.
“Shit,” Hayden muttered. He turned. Saw the growing mass of zombies coming towards them. Surrounding Miriam. Surrounding Renee, Anthony. Sam.
“They’re—they’re not dying!” Miriam shouted. She fired three bullets into the neck of a lanky ginger guy launching itself at her.
It fell to the road beside her.
Went still for a moment.
Then its teeth started snapping and it pushed itself up again.
Hayden looked around. Looked at the zombies pouring over the embankment. Too many to deal with if they did fall, but definitely too fucking many to deal with when they didn’t fall.
“What do we do?” Anthony shouted.
Hayden swallowed a lump in his throat.
Gripped onto the metal pipe.
“We run,” he shouted.
Nobody needed any encouragement.
They all ran as fast as they could down the road, towards the wall. Zombies kept on appearing at the top of the embankment as if from nowhere. He saw a man with half his face ripped off, maggots chewing away. He saw fresher bodies. The body of a Hispanic looking woman, two young boys beside her. Where were they coming from? Why the fuck hadn’t he seen them earlier?
“Over the next embankment,” Anthony called.
Miriam shook her head, panting as she ran. “But we don’t know what’s—”
“We have to try!”
They kept on running. Hayden heard the echoing groans behind them. The droning cries. His feet were sore, blistered. His mouth was dry. They couldn’t fail now. Not now they were so close to the wall. Not now they were so close to getting behind it. To finding out what was hiding within.
But then he heard someone cry out.
Looked over his shoulder.
Anthony was crouched on the road. His ankle was twisted at an impossible right angle.
He looked down, pale-faced with horror.
Behind him, the mass of undead poured down the road.
“We… we can’t go back,” Miriam said. “We need to keep moving.”
Hayden thought about Miriam’s words.
Then he thought again about everyone he’d lost.
Everyone he’d let down.
“Hayden, we can’t—”
“I’m not letting anyone else die,” he said.
And then he ran away from Miriam and Sam, back towards Anthony.
When he got there, he crouched beside Anthony.
Renee was tearful, hysterical, constantly looking up at the approaching zombies. “He—he just toppled over. Just keeled over.”
“You go,” Anthony said, shaking his head, wincing with pain.
Hayden put a hand on Anthony’s shoulder. Shook his head. Did everything he could to keep the zombies out of his view, out of his mind. “We’re not leaving you behind.”
“You have to. Or they’ll get us all. They’ll—”
“So be it,” Hayden said.
Anthony looked him right in his eyes. And for the first time, Hayden got the sense that these people really respected him.
That they believed he was being sincere.
That he wanted to help them.
Lead them.
He wrapped his arm around Anthony’s back. Started to lift him up, Renee doing her best to grab his other side.
“Just try not to walk on that ankle, mate,” Hayden said.
“Easier said than—agh!”
Anthony squealed with pain as his foot made contact with the road.
“Come on,” Hayden said. “One step at a time. One step at a time.”
He could hear the zombies behind getting closer.
Noisier.
Smell them closing in.
In the distance, he saw Miriam and Sam waiting. He saw the road ahead. The road to the fence. To the wall. To freedom.
The final steps.
They kept on moving, the zombies so close to nipping at their heels, just metres behind.
But they could do this.
They could make it.
They could…
Then, Hayden saw the truck.
Speeding up the road.
Speeding towards Miriam and Sam.
Towards them.
“Is that…”
Anthony didn’t finish his question.
His words blurred away in Hayden’s mind.
The truck was exactly the same as the one he’d been bundled into and taken to Salvation.
The same as the one the people had driven, taken him away to that prison.
Speeding from the fences.
Speeding towards his group.
H
ayden froze
as the truck sped towards his group, as the zombies closed in behind him.
He heard Renee shouting something at him. Heard Anthony calling out. And up ahead, he saw Miriam standing by Sam’s side. Waving. Waving at Hayden to join her. For the group to join her.
But all he could focus on was that truck.
Even though the zombies were inching closer, all he could think about was that truck.
Coming from the wall.
The same people, as he’d suspected all along.
Coming here to take them away from this place after travelling so, so far.
He looked over his shoulder. Looked back at the rotting mass of zombies edging ever closer.
And then he eased Anthony to his feet once more.
“You’re gonna have to run,” he said.
Before Anthony could protest, Hayden started running.
He felt Anthony grip onto his right shoulder. Felt him dragging him down. On Anthony’s other side, Renee held on, trying to keep her husband upright. Anthony screamed as his twisted—probably broken—ankle hit the road. He screamed so loud that Hayden’s ear started ringing. He grew certain that he was going deaf in that ear sometime soon.
But he had to press on.
He had to keep on moving.
Keep on fighting.
Miriam had already missed out once before. She’d already made this journey and had it cut short. Not again. Not again.
She didn’t deserve that.
Hayden ran towards the truck. Saw it pulling up. He watched as a man in a black outfit climbed out. He waved at Miriam, at Sam. Then at Hayden, Anthony, Renee.
Miriam just stood still.
Stood still and stared as the man tried to bargain with her.
Hayden couldn’t hear him through the growling mass of the monsters.
He didn’t have to.
He knew what the guy’s game was.
He knew exactly what was happening here.
He watched as Miriam shook her head. But he could see the man had a gun. If she didn’t at least try and blend in, he’d shoot her. He’d shoot all of them. He had no doubts about that. Not now.
Not after he’d seen the guards butcher the prisoners back at Salvation.
Killing wasn’t the ideal option. But if it were necessary, it’d happen.
As Hayden ran, clinging on to Anthony, he started to wonder why the people behind the wall would do this. Why they’d send out trucks to take people away. To deter them from crossing. To lock them away far, far away. But then he realised. All of a sudden, he realised. The world had always been this way. Whenever people needed help—weaker people—the strong always turned them away. It happened in the Middle East. It happened all over the world. People fleeing conflicts. The world pretending to give a shit.
But not enough of a shit to let those people into their homes, to share their food, their shelter.
Well that was changing.
Right now, that was changing.
“Quick!” Hayden heard one of the men shout. “Get on board or they’ll have you. They’ll have you any fucking second.”
Hayden stopped beside Miriam. Beside Sam. Two men were outside the truck now. Both staring at the group. Both holding guns.
“We just want to go to the wall,” Miriam said.
“We’ll take you some place safe.”
“Like Salvation?” Miriam shouted. “Like—like one of your other prisons?”
The main guard’s beady eyes narrowed. “You’re one of the Salvation escapees?”
“I’m a fucking human being. And I’ll tell you right now I’d rather die out here than step in that truck with you. I’d rather take my fucking chances out here than inside that truck. Not again. Not after all we’ve gone through to get here.”
The men looked at one another, engine of the truck still rumbling.
Then they looked back at Miriam. Hayden. The rest of the group.
“Very well,” the guard on the right said.
He lifted his gun.
Hayden heard the gunshot. But he didn’t process what was happening. Not completely.
All he knew was he felt blood splash onto his face.
Then he heard more gunfire. Gunfire from Miriam as she took out her pistol, fired back.
He ran towards the guard still perched in the driver’s seat. Threw himself inside.
The guard pointed the gun at him. Glasses steamed up. Fear on his face.
“Don’t make me shoot you,” the guard said. “P-please. Don’t make me shoot you.”
Hayden looked through the grill at the back of the driver’s cabin.
He didn’t have to see in the darkness to know that tons more people were packed in there.
He turned back to the driver.
Slammed the gun from his hand with the metal pipe.
Then he stabbed him in the throat.
Hayden pushed the driver away. Sent him tumbling down to the road below. The keys. The keys were still in the engine. They could use this vehicle. To get to the wall. To get to the other side.
He leaned out the window. “Quick!”
The guards were dead. Lying on the road.
But the zombies were here.
Miriam fought off a greying old woman. Renee pulled her husband along, Sam by their side.
“Shit,” Hayden muttered. Wasn’t a driver. Never passed his fucking test. But the new world had taught him a thing or two about practical experience.
He started to accelerate. Stalled the vehicle. Started it up again, driving towards the mass of zombies.
He swung the truck around. Crunched a few bones in the process.
Pulled up right by Miriam, Renee, Anthony, Sam.
“Quick!” Hayden called.
He watched the group run towards the truck. Grabbed Sam’s hand, lifted him up. Helped Miriam up. Took Anthony’s hand, lifted him, and then Renee’s.
When they were all inside the truck, Hayden slammed the door. Split a zombie’s flailing hand in two in the process. And as he sat there, rain peppering down from a storm cloud above, the sound of zombies muffled outside, he couldn’t help but feel proud. Because they’d done it. They’d fought off the guards. They’d taken this truck.
“We can press on towards…”
His elation subsided when he saw Anthony clutching his stomach.
His bleeding stomach.
His gunshot stomach.