'River!' Marla called again. Shane joined her, held onto her arms as she called out once again.
He could see – and hear – the panic rising in her, and when she suggested they get Terry to stop the train he knew she was losing it, big-time.
As Marla inhaled, about to yell to the driver to hit the brakes, River's head appeared.
'We're okay!' River yelled as loud as she could. 'That was some scary shit, though, huh?'
Marla laughed; her relief palpable.
Shane smiled, as if River's safety had never been in question.
'I know,' Marla said. 'Just panicked, that's all.'
Shane pulled her away from the edge and gestured for her to take a seat beside him.
She did, and they sat silently, praying that nothing like that happened again.
*
'See, I told you there was nothing to worry about,' River told Saul. The kid looked apt to start screaming at any second, which was the last thing she needed. In such a cramped environment, a hysterical mute kid could cause quite a fuss.
They'd made it through, though. For a minute there, even she had felt a little unsure of how it was going to pan out.
There had been so many of them; a horde that size was capable of anything. Thank God Terry hadn't slowed, or even stopped.
Saul was slumped in the corner, his legs spread out in front of him. As River crouched next to him, she saw what he was doing.
He was using one finger to make letters on the steel floor of the car, trying to spell something out for her.
'Ess,' she said, watching rapt as he shifted his finger round in a serpentine shape. 'Cee.' She followed, hoping that it wasn't going to be a long message. Her legs were already beginning to numb beneath her from crouching in an unnatural position.
Saul – the boy who wanted desperately to be able to speak – continued to make large letters with his trembling finger, and when he was done River grabbed him by the shoulders so that he had no choice but to look deep into her eyes.
The word he had formed was SCARED.
'What did I tell you?' she said, wanting to shake him, make him realise that he was safe. 'I won't let anything happen to you.' She paused, thought for a second. 'Nothing bad will happen anymore. Those people, they're gone. Whatever they did to you, that's in the past, and it will never happen again.'
Saul allowed his solemn gaze to drop to the floor. River, in that moment, wanted to hug him so tightly that every bad memory, every single terrible thing that haunted him squeezed out.
She wanted to, but didn't.
When he finally looked up, a tear had escaped the corner of his eye, but he was smiling.
Finally, he gets it.
And then the smile was gone, and River realised that he was no longer looking at her.
He was looking across her shoulder.
She turned, saw the bloodied torso dragging itself through the side of the car, and gasped in terror.
The thing was barely recognisable. There was a head, but it was almost flat, as if a truck had gone over it. Eyes – if they could be called such things – squinted through the flapping flesh as it pulled itself forward with its one remaining arm. In lurker terms, it wasn't much of a threat, but she had to be quick in dealing with it.
Saul was losing his shit behind her, whimpering.
Just when I had him calm, River thought.
She stood, unsheathed the machete, and stepped over to where the pulped creature was sprawled.
A noise – a faint hissing that would have been a lot louder if not for the racket of the engine – emanated from the lurker's squashed face. The smell of putrefaction was tangible, and brought bile to River's throat, but she swallowed it back down.
Then she apologised. She told the creature sorry for what she was about to do.
The blade came down. River hoped she managed to catch the thing correctly; it was difficult to determine where its head ended and body began.
The hissing stopped the moment the steel sliced through the scabby flesh. A chunk of the creature hit the far side of the car.
Saul whimpered once again, pushed himself back against the car-wall. If he could, River thought, he would keep pushing until he was on the outside.
The severed portion slid slowly down the metal, leaving a bloody snail-trail behind it.
The stench was unbearable now, and River used the machete to force the torso over to the door. She pushed, and the thing dropped out, over the edge.
She stabbed the blade into the head on the other side of the car and tossed that out, too.
Then she sat next to Saul. She taught him how to play slaps, but he was either too slow or too polite to really try.
In the end, the gently swaying of the carriage lulled him to sleep, and she watched him dream.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
As the boat departed for
Ship
, with Gabriella's best friend on board, Emma stood next to her daughter. It had been tough on the girl, but she knew that it wasn't the last time she would see Lizzie. There would be plenty of opportunities to visit one another; both islands would need supplies, and a team of scavengers would return to the mainland every week or so to gather supplies. The team would also be providing a service back and forth between the islands every couple of days, so it really wasn't the end of her daughter's friendship with Lizzie. It was more of an inconvenience.
'How will we know that they get there safely?' Gabriella asked.
'The base is keeping tabs on them,' Emma said, squeezing Gabriella's shoulder, more for her own assurance than that of her daughter.
'We're next, aren't we?'
Emma smiled, or tried to. 'Yeah, looks that way,' she said. The thought of those bombs once again caused the hackles to rise on the nape of her neck. 'A few hours, so make sure you get everything together. This is
it
, soldier,' she said trying to lighten the mood. 'Ain't no coming back to this here country.'
Gabriella grimaced. 'You sound
silly
, Mom,' she said.
Emma feigned shock. 'I'll have you know that that's how all generals speak. Haven't you heard Pimlico.'
Gabriella nodded. 'Yeah, but he doesn't sound like that. He talks normally.'
'Normally! You can hardly understand a word that comes out of his mouth!'
''Cos he's always got a cigar wedged in it,' Gabriella said. 'You'd sound like that if you smoked cigars.'
'Well, that's not gonna happen, sweetie, because it's a disgusting habit and makes you smell funny.'
It was a nice exchange, something they hadn't had for a long time. The pressures of daily life had taken their toll, and Emma couldn't help feeling as though she and her daughter had drifted apart, somewhat.
Dredd, too.
Things would never be the same. Not for them, not for anybody. The only thing a person could do was evolve, make way for the new life they had.
'Go on,' Emma said, patting Gabriella on the head. 'Get started before it gets to raining again.'
'It's always raining,' Gabriella said, dejectedly. 'Hope we have some decent weather in the Summer, so me and Lizzie can play out like we used to.'
With that, she turned and started back to the tent.
Emma turned and glanced up at the sky. She wondered if the nukes would blot out the sun, the way they did in the movies. Dredd told her that these were different, that the yield was nowhere near the same range.
Then why did she keep picturing Hiroshima? Nagazaki? Those were nukes as she saw them; anything smaller should be called something else, something less terrifying, like mini-bombs, or baby-atoms.
'Emma!'
She turned to see Dredd rushing towards her through the campsite. In the first instant she panicked, but when she saw Dredd's calm expression she relaxed a little.
'I just sent Gabriella off to get ready,' she told him as he reached her and stopped.
'I know. I just passed her.'
He looked nervous now, as if there was something on the tip of his tongue that he couldn't bring himself to tell her.
'James,' she said. She never called him by his first name, not anymore, and the fact that she did so now seemed to startle him. Then she said, 'You're going back out there, aren't you?'
He hesitated, which answered the question for her.
Had she thought differently?
No.
'Look, Frank wants me to do one final sweep of the area before the jets leave. I figure it's the last time, so . . . '
'And what about us? What about if something goes wrong on this “last time”, and me and Gabriella have to board that fucking boat without you?'
'Nothing's gonna happen,' he said. 'Look, it's probably going to be a waste of time, and Al's coming with me so—'
'Oh, well that makes me feel better.' The sardonic tone was sharp enough to cut Dredd's face off, and he flinched as she spoke. 'A madman with a machine-gun flying side-saddle.'
She wasn't done yet; a thousand things ran through her mind, biting remarks that she could no longer control.
'And what if you find survivors? Huh? You pile them all into the back of the chopper and bring 'em back here? How many can you carry, Dredd? Ten, five?'
He shrugged. 'Maybe eight, maybe less.'
'So you're just going to go out there on the off-chance you might find a group of less than eight people? Is that what you're telling me? Putting your life on the line for that?'
Dredd hated that he had to justify his reasons for going back out, especially to Emma, who he thought would understand given her own fear of what was going to happen next.
'There might be more doctors out there,' he said, calmly. 'More people who we'll need once we get over to the island.' It was a thin excuse, but all he could think of. 'You won't even know I'm gone, Em. We leave in two hours, and that's not gonna change.'
She sighed. Once Dredd had something in his mind, there was no talking him out of it; a trait that she once found endearing, but not in this case.
'Just remember, once this is all over and we get to the island, no more errands for Pimlico. You're my husband, not his bitch.'
Dredd smiled. 'I'll train the pilots how to handle the Wave Hawk,' he said. 'I'll never have to leave the island again.'
What was meant as a comforting statement actually frightened him as it came out. Never. Leave. The. Island. Again.
Sounded so permanent.
'Fine,' she relented. 'But go say bye to Gabriella first. She'll wonder where you've got to.'
He leaned in to kiss her; her soft, delicious lips were almost enough to make him change his mind.
As he turned to leave, his wife grabbed his hand.
'Dredd!'
He swivelled, his eyes meeting hers. 'Yeah?'
She sighed, then said, 'We always know you're gone.'
With those words rattling around inside his head, he went in search of Gabriella.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The train was riding parallel to a main road now. Cars were haphazardly strewn across the lanes, but they would have been able to get by if their original plan had come to fruition, something that had worried Shane when they'd set out.
Lurkers were few and far between. One horde had staggered after the locomotive, but it didn't stand a chance, and if it had managed to get across in time, each and every one of them would have ended up flattened beneath the wheels, or spread across the windshield like molasses, the way the army squadron had.
'Any idea where we are?' Marla asked, more conversationally than to actually determine a location.
Shane glanced out to the passing stores. Here was a small RadioShack, dilapidated by either the weather or the looting that it must have endured; there was a small brick building with the words PEARL RIVER COUNTY TAX COLLECTOR along the side. Somebody had scrawled graffiti beneath it suggesting the proprietor go fuck himself. Then they past an even smaller brick building. This one had a sign hanging outside: THE POPLARVILLE DEMOCRAT. There was a newspaper box just out front, no doubt selling copies of the paper from the day the world went to shit.
'I guess we're in Poplarville,' Shane said, not knowing where the hell that was nor caring. It sounded like something out of a low-budget horror-movie.
The Poplarville Massacre
, perhaps. . .
'Doesn't look as poplar as it sounds,' Marla said. Shane rolled his eyes. 'Oh, come on! That was funny!'
'It really wasn't,' he said. 'Your jokes are
never
funny.'
Poplarville, it transpired, was a relatively small town and they had blasted through it within two minutes, leaving behind the quaint little buildings and stores that had been all but destroyed in the aftermath of the virus.
Shane was almost certain he could detect the scent of the ocean in the air, and as he inhaled he smiled.
'What?' Marla asked.
Shane held a hand up. 'I don't think we've got far to go,' he told her. 'Do you smell that?'
She sniffed, frowned, then said, 'Can't smell anything.'
But he could, and it was definitely sea-air. They were almost there, the edge of the world as far as they were concerned.
Shane stood in front of the open door, facing inwards. Marla admired his silhouette against the hazy morning light.
And then she screamed, but it was too late.
*
The truck came from nowhere, careering off the adjacent road, slamming into the side of their car at an impossible speed. Marla saw Shane's legs go from underneath him as the truck's front smashed into the steel car, and then he was gone, rolling across the truck's hood and out of sight.
Then it was her turn; the impact sent her flying backwards, knocking her from her feet. She hit the steel wall so hard that she bit straight through her lip, her teeth coming together between a fleshy pulp.