Surviving The Evacuation (Book 6): Harvest (27 page)

“Out of my way,” he yelled, barrelling back down the stairs, past the confused group.

“What? What is it?” Nilda called after him. He ignored her.

She caught up with him as he was pulling the barrier away from the gatehouse door.

“What is it, Chester?”

“The boat,” he said, but didn’t say any more. He had the door open, and ran outside, across to the railed gate and looked down at the river lapping at the worn steps. He climbed up onto the wall and looked east and west. There was no sign of the boat.

“Was it dragged away by the storm?” Nilda asked.

Chester bent, pulled on the rope still attached to the black-painted ring. He held up an end.

“It’s been cut.”

“It was Graham!” McInery stormed, incandescent with rage. “It had to be.” She stood, paced a step, sat down. Stood again.

“Yes, I think you’re right,” Chester said. He’d seen McInery in a fury before, but always a quiet one, as if the energy was being reserved for the act of vengeance itself and so was not to be wasted on mere words. This was something else.

“He’s betrayed us,” McInery fumed.

“Yes, yes,” Hana said. “We all know that, but—”

“Worse,” McInery interrupted. “He’s condemned us.”

“It’s not as bad as that, is it?” Hana asked.

“Well, he’s got the lifeboat,” Chester said. “And that had the rifle, the ammo, the last of the fuel, and a bit of food.” He probably had the revolver too. Chester had assumed the pistol and the four loose rounds had fallen out of his jacket during his journey back from the mansion, but only because there had been no other logical explanation. Now, he wasn’t so sure.

“He has a rifle, and we don’t even have slings or arrows,” McInery snapped. “He could be waiting in any building. Sitting on any rooftop, ready to shoot the first person who leaves.”

“N’ah, he won’t hang around here,” Chester said. “He needed the boat so he could transport all that food he stole. Why else would he have risked lingering nearby? He’d have turned the engine on as soon as he dared. About an hour after that, he’d have realised there was something wrong with the fuel tank.”

“There was?” Hana asked.

“It leaked,” Nilda said. “We didn’t say because we all had enough to worry about. But Chester’s right, he’ll be out of fuel and at the whims of the tide. If he’s lucky, he’ll end up on a beach downriver. If he’s not, he’ll be adrift at sea.”

“Well, good, I suppose,” Hana said. “But where does that leave us?”

“It doesn’t change anything. Not really,” Chester said. “It’ll take a little longer to get to Wales, that’s all. You said there was a bike shop near to Embankment Tube?”

Tuck nodded.

“Well, that’s as good a place to start my journey from as any other,” Chester said.

“We’ll go, too,” McInery said. “Find some more rifles and collect the ammunition from that hotel.”

“Do we really need it?” Hana asked.

“Chester can’t row a life raft all the way to Westminster on his own,” McInery said. “And if Graham is coming back, then it’s better that we’re armed.”

“She has a point,” Chester said, and saw Nilda’s look of puzzlement. “About rowing to Westminster. Better to send one large group and make just one trip. It’s like you were saying, Nilda, about how we need to accept that things have to be done differently. Those bicycles could be useful, but forget the hotel, Mac, there’s nothing there we need.”

They weren’t short of volunteers. Whatever fear and suspicion had gripped them since the revelation of the theft had been replaced with justified anger. The factor determining how many could go was space. They had to leave room on the rafts for any bicycles and other supplies they brought back. Chester had already volunteered Tuck, and he wasn’t surprised to see Nilda step forward at the same time as Jay.

“I—” Nilda began.

“Bring your drone, Jay,” Chester interrupted. “We can use it to lure the zombies away from the embankment.

“Right.” And the boy ran off before his mother could formulate an objection.

McInery insisted on going, and Chester didn’t bother arguing. Nor did he try and stop Stewart. Out of all of them, he seemed most affected by the theft. Whether that was due to his fear of starvation or from that personal enmity that existed between him and Graham, Chester didn’t know. He saw Stewart as a man who’d been twisted so far he was going to break, so better that happened outside where they could make use of it. Finnegan and Greta brought their numbers to eight. Kevin and Aisha made ten.

“No, that’s too many,” Chester said, looking down at the raft bobbing gently on the river. “There’s going to be space for eight on the way back, no more, not if you want to bring back a few bikes.”

“And I’m sorry,” Hana said. “But I won’t allow Aisha to come.”

“Won’t allow it?” Aisha said, her face flushing with anger.

“No. I won’t,” Hana stated. “You might think me old-fashioned, but it’s too much of a risk for someone who’s pregnant. I’m sorry.”

There was a tense moment when Chester thought Aisha would explode, but it was defused by the murmur from those in the group – mostly the men, Chester included – who’d not realised.

“Congratulations,” Chester said. “But there’s space for one more in the raft. Kevin?”

“No. I’ll go,” Hana said. “I may not be much good in a fight, but if I can lift a sick pig, I can carry a full pack. We’re not going that far from the river. How dangerous can it be?”

Chester looked over at Nilda to see if she’d insist Hana stay behind. Nilda just gave a shrug.

“Then get in the boat,” he said, not happy at all that the vet was coming with them.

It took a long, fraught hour to get to Westminster. Chester would have preferred it if he’d been able to row, but no one would allow it. They said he’d need his strength for the journey ahead. He sat in the middle of the raft as the others slowly paddled their way up the newly swollen river. The storms they’d witnessed must have been the tail end of a far larger deluge, and they had no trouble passing over the rubble around the collapsed bridges. The difficulty was caused by the soup of partially dissolved cardboard, shredded cloth, plastic, rubber, and items Chester couldn’t guess at, mixing with the white-foamed scum bubbling on the surface.

“You should keep an eye on this,” Chester said, addressing everyone. “It might be better to drink rainwater for the next few weeks.”

“That’d save on…” Nilda began, paused, stroked. “Filtering.” Stroke. “It’d still have to be…” Stroke. “Boiled.”

“But give it another couple of storms and the river should be cleaning than before,” Chester added.

“The…” Stroke. “Sea…” Stroke. “Won’t…” Stroke. “Be.”

“Let me take over,” Chester offered.

“No.” Stroke.

Chester didn’t stop asking if he could take a turn at the oars. No one would let him, and he felt like giving them a lecture in the futility of stubbornness, but decided against it. He’d only get one on hypocrisy in return. Nevertheless, by the time they reached the stone steps leading up to Cleopatra’s Needle a short distance from Embankment Tube and Whitehall beyond, they all looked exhausted.

Everyone snatched a moment of wary-eyed rest as Jay set up the drone. With Chester directing, Jay flew it up and towards the old heart of the dead city.

“That’s the hotel,” McInery said. “It’s five minute’s walk. No more.”

“But too far for such a small prize,” Chester said. “Turn it left a bit, Jay. There. That’s the edge of Horse Guards. Now, fly it along the edge of the park for a couple of minutes, then point it towards the Eye and bring it back. Everyone else, let’s go.”

“No, hang on,” Jay said. “If you wait twenty minutes, I’ll come with you.”

“Sorry lad, there’s no more time to waste,” Chester replied.

Nilda mouthed a quiet ‘thank you’ as the eight of them climbed onto the bank

There was a solitary zombie on the embankment. Its right foot dragged behind, giving it a twisting limp as it staggered towards them. Its right arm rose in a half-hearted swipe whilst its left hung loose at its side. As Nilda walked briskly towards it, the fingers on its right hand clawed out towards her. She drew her sword, batted the arm away, and stabbed out, spearing the blade through its gaping mouth. A twist of the blade, and it collapsed. She began to kneel.

“There’s no time for that,” Chester said, knowing she was going to look for the creature’s name. He grabbed her elbow and hustled her towards the Tube and the tunnel behind with its cafes and the bicycle shop. Chester went inside, grabbed the first bike he saw, and took it out into the light.

“Someone start pumping the tyres,” he said. Tuck was standing guard, looking back towards the river, Hana and McInery were watching the Westminster side of the tunnel. Nilda grabbed the pump as Chester went back to get another.

“Take it back to the boat,” he said, thrusting the bicycle into Stewart’s arms. He gave Finnegan the second, Greta the third. On the fourth trip he turned his attention to the repair kits, water bottles, and lights on a display behind the counter. He stuffed them into a pair of mouldering pillion bags and went back outside.

“Where’s McInery?” he asked. Nilda looked up. Finnegan looked around. Stewart just looked vacant.

“She went that way,” Hana said, pointing towards the hotel. Chester almost smiled with relief.

“Do we leave her?” Nilda asked, looking first to Chester, and then to Tuck.

“We can’t,” Hana said. “We have to wait.”

“There’s no time to wait,” Chester said. “The zombies will come back. There’s the food in the coaches, and I’m wasting daylight standing here.”

“You go, Chester, we’ll be fine,” Hana said. She had the sword in her hands, gripping it firmly, her eyes, however, were not on the road she should have been watching. It was clear of the undead, but Chester could hear rustling and snapping coming from not too far away.

“No, I want my last sight of you lot to be on that raft, heading downriver. I don’t need any extra worries on this trip.”

“We can’t leave her,” Stewart said. “Can’t leave anyone. Got to stick together. Work together. Keep everyone alive.”

“He’s right,” Greta said.

“Fine. Come on,” Chester said, not bothering to keep the irritation from his voice, and moved quickly towards the tunnel’s far side and the roads beyond.

The streets of Westminster were in a far worse state than they’d appeared on the pictures taken by the drone. The wind had blown the contents of upper storey rooms out of broken windows to join the leaves and litter on the street. Rain had pooled in the rubble and around blocked storm drains, rehydrating dust and dirt and other dry detritus into noisome decay.

“At least the drone got rid of the undead,” Chester murmured as he clambered up a pile of masonry. They’d passed a couple of dead creatures, but none of the still-animate kind since the one by the river. As he jumped down the other side of the heap of rubble, he realised he’d spoken too soon. Ahead, turning right down a side road, he saw McInery, her axe swinging as she smashed into the head of a zombie invisible from his vantage point. But there were plenty more behind her. These were the broken, crippled creatures missing legs or feet, crawling a slithering path through the muddy debris. They’d tried to follow the drone, and now they were following McInery. Chester started to run, smashing the mace’s spiked head down on the skull of a zombie missing both legs above the knee. He glanced over his shoulder. The others were close behind but each staying a cleaving weapon’s length apart.

Sometimes dodging a grasping hand as he ran through that carpet of the immobile undead, other times swinging the mace with a brutal finality, he reached the turning McInery had taken. She’d stopped, partially hidden in an alley on the left-hand side fifty metres ahead. He couldn’t believe she was waiting, but then she waved them over. He ran to her.

“Mac, what the hell are you—” he began.

“The hotel is the next block over,” she interrupted. “One trip, yes? One trip to gather all we need. And we need weapons and ammunition. We can run in, grab the ammunition, get out through the lobby and grab a few more of those rifles. Five minutes, that’s all it’ll take.”

“Five minutes? It’s worth the risk,” Hana said with uncharacteristic decisiveness.

All Chester wanted was to know that Nilda was back on that boat. But if McInery went to the hotel, Hana seemed likely to follow. Greta and Finnegan would follow her. He could hardly leave them all, and he wasn’t sure Nilda would either.

“Mac, you keep an eye on Hana. Stewart, you too.”

And once again, he led the way.

A zombie stumbled out of a pub’s broken doorway. Chester swung the mace. It fell. Another yard and Tuck overtook him, skipping a step, and bringing the axe around and up, hitting a zombie in the chin with such force that it split the creature’s head right open. The axe kept going, and the soldier spun with it, twisting her grip to bring the blade down on a zombie half-crawling along the rubble-strewn road.

Chester saw the hotel and a closed door almost immediately in front of them. For a glorious few seconds he thought they were free and clear. It was only when Tuck ran ahead, angling to the left, that he realised something was wrong. There was an alley almost too narrow to be called that, and down it in a jostling single file came the living dead. Tuck waved a hand towards the hotel as she raised her weapon and ran towards this new and imminent threat.