Solstice: A Novel of the Zombie Apocalypse (15 page)

“I’ve worked with gas before.”

“Why not just connect us to the main?”

“That might be more difficult. Besides, I’d rather have one store going
ka-blam
, than the entire grid,” George said, grinning wickedly.

“That makes me feel so much better.” Stu stifled a yawn. “So now what?”

“Cross your fingers that this thing works.” George pointed the remote toward the generator. “Now, let there be light!”

Chapter 20

Gothenburg, Sweden

In her peripheral vision, Melanie noticed sudden movement. She clambered up to the driver’s seat, giving Leila a not-so-accidental elbow across the head in the process.

“I know you had to see that,” Melanie said.

Alternately watching the writhing shadows and checking for any signs of Tomas, she nervously felt her coat pocket for the pistol, then remembered Tomas had taken it. She gripped the steering wheel to steel her hands from tapping.

“I didn’t see anything. Just a dark sky and a burning city,” Leila answered.

In the very back, Bo whimpered, which reaction had become something of an alarm over the past week. The dog seemed to be able to sense the presence of Ragers. She didn’t know if the ability could be attributed to the strange, slightly-off way Ragers had of moving, possibly some sort of sound they made that animals could detect or the funky death-stench they carried with them.

“See? Bo can tell when they’re around.”

“He’s a stupid animal. He needs a piss,” Leila sniped. “Here’s a notion. Why don’t you get out and walk him around the block?”

“Bitch,” Melanie whispered, glancing back at Christopher. He was awake and staring out the window.

When she turned back to the front, she spotted a squared-shouldered silhouette against the bar of light spilling from the ticket-takers booth. Tomas sprinted toward them with Melanie just able to make out the wide smile on his face.

The shadows moved again, and appeared to be spreading, oozing across the snow toward Tomas. Melanie laid her hand on the horn and shoved the Rover into drive, tires spinning uselessly for a terrible moment before finally gaining purchase. Tomas glanced over his shoulder and then took off, sprinting to meet the SUV. A dozen flailing scarecrow-shaped figures fell in behind him howling, screaming, and kicking up sprays of snow and ice into the gray night. Bo began barking madly and scraping the back windscreen with his claws.

Tomas slipped, probably on a patch of ice, and went to one knee, then he sprang back to his feet. That small hesitation was enough to allow the horde of infected to gain on him.

Christopher began to wail for his daddy, sending sharp little kicks to the back of Melanie’s seat. “Calm down, baby. We’ll get him,” she said.

Leila waved a hand. “Leave him.”

As the car came close to him, Tomas jumped to the side, and Melanie floored the gas. The Rover crashed into the gang of Ragers, sending some pin-wheeling through the air. Others fell beneath the Rover, their bodies snapping like dead branches under the tires. The SUV jostled as if rolling over a series of speed bumps.

Tomas circled around as Melanie slammed on the brakes. He yanked open the backseat door and dove in across Christopher’s lap. He reached back, slammed the door, and then pressed the lock.

Melanie watched until he caught his breath. “You okay?”

Tomas dropped his head back and grinned. “I’m okay.” He looked at Christopher. “Aren’t we, Christopher?”

“We’re okay,” Christopher agreed, then kissed Tomas’s cheek.

Tomas straightened and leaned over the front seat. “I think we have a ride to the continent. Pull up over there to that slip. Our new friend, Mr. Weller, will be out to open it in a moment.”

Just ahead, an obese male Rager wearing only pajama bottoms and a bad comb-over struggled to climb back to his feet. His arm, severed just below the shoulder, lay on the ground between his bare feet. Melanie turned the Rover in his direction, whitewashing him in headlights. The crazed man laughed and patted his formidable belly. Then, he snatched up his unattached extremity and waved it over his head like a club. In the meantime, the stump spewed blood like a broken garden sprinkler.

“Look at this!” he shouted. “How am I supposed to catch you now?”

A flashlight appeared, plunging in and out of the night. “Weller’s ready for us,” Tomas said. “Now, take that bastard out.”

Melanie floored the gas and rammed the flabby cannibal, sending the body sailing over the hood of the Rover. She skidded to a stop at the edge of the boarding area. Gore obscured the windshield, making it nearly impossible to see, so Melanie switched on the wipers.

Leila heaved open the passenger door, leaned out, and vomited.

***

“There’s the possibility the open waters might be the end of us,” Milo said a bit too cheerfully. “Then, of course, what’s the alternative? I’d take drowning over being eaten any day. Wouldn’t you, Tomas?”

The ferry was designated for metro transportation, built for harbor cruises, not open sea. Tomas didn’t particularly like the idea of either death, but he agreed that he would prefer drowning to being lunch for some Rager.

Milo insisted he had enough diesel fuel to get them across the narrow scrape of the North Sea. They’d need to refuel in Frederikshavn, Denmark, and Tomas wondered how tricky that might be. The boat was bound to drawn attention, especially if it was lit up like a Christmas tree.

Much of the food on the ferry was frozen, but Tomas relished preparing a meal of packaged burgers and fries, washed down by a bucketful of Coca-Cola and followed by a few squares of precious chocolate. He, Christopher, Melanie, and Milo ate like royalty while Leila vanished into the adjacent bar area to sample as many of the wines she could before passing out.

“Why do you not just live on board?” Melanie asked between bites of her burger.

Milo shrugged a bit shyly. “Don’t know, really. First, I’d have to anchor somewhere far from land. Otherwise, I’m sure those sickos would do whatever they could to get at me.”

“But still,” Melanie said. “Food, electricity, hot water—it’s paradise, almost.”

“But if I had done that, I would have never been around to meet you, would I?” Milo replied with a wink.

“I suppose not.”

Tomas drew a ketchup moustache on Christopher, who puckered his small, red lips and then giggled uproariously. It seemed like days since he’d last heard that beautiful sound.

“I haven’t left because I have a younger sister and niece in Tjörn,” Milo volunteered. He uncorked a surprisingly earthy bottle of Carménère. “I keep hoping they might come looking for me.”

“You didn’t go looking for them?” Melanie asked.

Tomas wished she hadn’t gone into that, but the wine had made her tongue a bit loose. Another time, he would have thought it endearing.

Milo dropped his eyes to his lap. “No. I didn’t. What if I didn’t find them? And what if I did? Some things are best left unknown.”

Tomas reached across the table and squeezed the older man’s arm. “I understand.”

“I’m not sure you do, Tomas, because it makes little sense. If I know what happened to them, all hope is gone. If I don’t know, there is always the possibility.” Milo refilled their glasses. “We all need hope.”

“Then, here’s to hope,” Tomas said, raising his glass. The alcohol spread like warm honey throughout his body, making his limbs feel wonderfully leaden. The excitement of finding Sanctuary made him feel like a boy on Christmas morning.

After dinner and two bottles of wine, Tomas left Christopher sleeping in the small cabin he had selected, one as far from Leila’s as possible. She no longer cared for Tomas, but the child was her life’s light, as he was Tomas’s. She would try and take the boy before she turned in, if she wasn’t too wasted. Tomas would lock the cabin. She had grown irrational and worse, suicidal. He couldn’t trust her with his child.

Electricity felt foreign to him after days of going without it. He decided to sleep with the lights on and crank the heat in his cabin up to ninety degrees. The cabins were for day-travelers and crew. The décor was 1970s tacky-nautical, and the furnishings smelled of cedar and must. The bedding was adequate at best, but sleeping in light and warmth was a luxury. He might search the boat for a radio, as well. Perhaps another broadcast from
Zombie Radio X
would give a better indication of Sanctuary’s location.

From the deck, he could see Gothenburg blazing with fires like angry red eyes against the blanket of black. Watching the city of his childhood burn away to ash gave him a sickening feeling. The ferry’s engine coughed from time to time, then hummed like a tone-deaf old man the rest of the time.

Milo had moved to the bridge, muttering about navigation, or more exact, the lack of it. They were moving in the right direction, but it was difficult to discern if another vessel might lie stalled in their path.

Melanie joined Tomas after a few moments. “Hi.” The wind blew her hair, revealing the face of not a girl, but a woman. She was almost a stranger to him, yet so familiar. Her cheeks glowed, even in the sparse light. She pulled a half-full bottle of wine from inside her coat and held it up like a trophy. “Shall we go ahead and get completely smashed? This might be the last time we can relax without a monster tearing at our jugulars, you know.” She took a long, undignified swig and passed the bottle to him.

“Why not?” he asked, looking at her pointedly. “You really took to wine at university, huh?”

“Not so much. I didn’t really start drinking until the world ended.” She tapped her fingers against the side of the bottle, four and then the thumb with her right hand, four and then the thumb with her left. Tap, tap, tap, tap… Tap.

He tried to ignore it. He had taught her to do it as a trick for the breathing, but unfortunately, the tapping had morphed into a nervous habit. “I see. That’s not exactly a great attitude.”

“Sorry,” she said, feigning petulance. “I’ve never had to deal with the apocalypse before. I don’t know the protocol.”

“Neither do I. But what I cannot have is another version of Leila.”

She laughed. “Don’t worry, Tomas. I’m hardly like she is. I’m
really
nuts.”

“Don’t say that, Melanie. You’re not nuts.” He held out his hand. “Come over here.” Melanie pressed to his side, and he put his arm around her shoulders. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“For what?” She took another drink of wine, then thrust the bottle at him. “Leila’s losing it, Tomas. She wants us to give up. She wants us all to die. She would do it herself, but she’s too afraid.”

That comment made him uncomfortable. Would Leila do something stupid? He’d read about women who’d lost it and killed their own kids. The lack of sunshine could cause depression, and Leila had never been a happy person. Was she hurt that her lover—her precious accountant—hadn’t come for her? Perhaps he’d perished or become infected. She hadn’t mentioned him, but Tomas could tell she was lost.

“Look,” Melanie said breathlessly. She gestured with the wine bottle toward the sky. Northern lights churned blue, green, and yellow, like a livid bruise. “It’s incredible.”

“That it is,” Tomas agreed, enjoying her wonderment. He took the wine and drank another sip. The fires on the shores seemed very small, like the orange pinpoints of a cigarette from a long distance. Without the bottle to occupy at least one hand, Melanie began to tap again. She counted under her breath, four right, four left, then again.

Finally, Tomas placed his hand over hers, then lifted her hand to examine it. “How’s that finger?” It looked swollen and stuck straight out. “Can you bend it?”

“Actually, I forgot about it.”

“What about the asthma? Do you have enough medicine?”

Melanie pulled her hand away. “I have a little left. I’d stopped relying on it so much and things were going well, until I realized people eating other people sorta freaked me out.”

“Join the club,” Tomas said, laughing softly. “Join the club.

December 30

Chapter 21

London, England

Sleep held Stu in its grasp, but even in his deepest slumber, he wondered what might have happened to his precious Maddy. He dreamed of her running from those monsters, those “Ragers,” how they clawed at her pale flesh, making stripes of crimson on her thin arms and narrow back. When she cried out, she cursed him for not being there with her.

He flailed his arms, kicking away his sleeping bag, and was vaguely aware of someone placing the cover back over him. He shook his head to clear the hateful nightmare, but immediately dove back into his bleak dream world. When he saw Maddy again, her eyes were white, and her pink Carolina Panthers T-shirt was stained with blood. He no longer recognized her as his baby. When she reached to embrace him, he fled, weeping.

Finally, he awoke, sweating through his shirt and trousers. His hair lay against his skull like a damp cloth. Christ, he couldn’t remember the last time he had been warm. Bleary-eyed, he looked around the tent. Everything seemed so damned bright. Maybe everything—the darkness, the Ragers, Nathan's and Brett’s deaths—had been some kind of crazy dream.

He threw back the flap and stuck his head out of the tent.

No. Hell, no. Everything was just as he had left it when he had fallen asleep, except the market had heat and a little more light. At least that was something, he supposed. If only he could make a few phone calls…

Just a few yards down the aisle, Davis kicked a soccer ball with Tana and George. Tana shuffled to the side, graceful as a cat, made a clean tap, and passed the ball again. Then, she turned to face Stu. He saw her in full light, and again her beauty struck him. Her dark skin glowed naturally, and her hair curled against her neck. She smiled, but it was impossible not to see the despair in her face. Stu knew he carried that same look… almost. He still had some hope inside him. His child might very well be all right. He had to believe that, anyway. Otherwise, he would have nothing else to keep him going. He was beginning to feel Tana might be another reason to go on, but he wondered if she wanted to be saddled with that burden.