Part One is here

 

Krystal – Thursday: Plague Day

She hammered the button. The doors began to slide closed again. Then the arm came through and with it, the rest of his body. She couldn’t help calling it a he. Behind her, Ed’s voice was soft as he breathed a name.

‘Rob.’

‘What?’

‘He’s Rob. He’s having troubles with his wife.’

‘Yeah, not any more.’

She lashed out, her heavy boot catching ‘Rob’ in the kneecap. It shattered and he dropped onto one knee. From the broken one came the smell of rotting meat and she covered her mouth and took a step backwards. He tried to rise but managed only a sort of stumbling fall further into the lift. She sidestepped and he tumbled past her. She heard Ed shout but was far too busy slamming her finger into the button.

The doors began to slide closed and she span around, hand going for her back pocket. The zombie called Rob lay atop Ed and was wriggling like it meant to do something disgusting to him. But the growl was in no way flirtatious and in every way terrifying and Ed screamed. He had one hand beneath Rob’s chin and pushed the zombie’s head up so its teeth clicked shut on air again and again.

Krystal stared, frozen for a second. She didn’t think she could bear to touch it. But in the end, she did. She wrapped her arms around its throat and hauled it up and off Ed. The moment it was clear she let go. For a brief time it stood, wobbling back and forth, its lazy eyes tracking between the two of them. They stared back, panting and sweating. The doors pinged behind them and began to reopen and Krystal reached for the button.

At the same moment, Rob made his decision and dived at Ed. Krystal threw herself at it and crashed into its waist. Its knee collapsed and she drove it to the floor. Now she found herself astride the zombie, one of its arms trapped between her legs. Caught between freaking out and feeling somewhat in control, she yanked the knife from her pocket.

She glanced at Ed as she fiddled with the blade and saw his eyes widen as he looked past her. She resisted the urge to turn and put all her attention on getting the blade free of the knife. The zombie struggled but its knee hampered it and it kicked feebly. How strong was it? She couldn’t weigh more than eight stone.

The blade popped out and she drove it straight down into Rob’s ear. It caught against something and half closed, cutting into her finger. ‘Shit, dammit.’ The zombie’s struggles grew suddenly more intense and she grabbed hold, barely keeping the knife. She rode it, hands dug into its shoulders to stay on as it wriggled like a fish on a ship’s deck.

It slowed a little and she reopened the knife. She lined up this time, which was a little like she imagined catching fish with a spear would be. She slammed the knife down again. It went in cleanly this time, straight through his ear and into his brain. Rob who was having troubles with his wife stiffened and froze and she let out a long breath. And noticed the silence.

Ed was still staring, wide-eyed and shaking. This time she turned and looked the other way. The lift doors were open and there they were, staring in. She scrambled off Rob and fetched up beside Ed against the back of the lift. Then she remembered her knife. Not that it mattered now, they were dead.

She grabbed Ed’s hand and squeezed it. ‘It’s been nice, you know, just for a little while.’

He opened his mouth to reply then the first zombie moved. It lurched into the lift, bent down and sunk its teeth into Rob’s dead face. Krystal shrieked. She couldn’t help it. Steaming blood gushed out onto the lift floor and the tiny space filled with the smell of a dog carcass left out in the sun. She’d seen a few in her time, hidden away in one of the alleyways of Soho.

She clapped her hand over her mouth and watched in horror as the zombie lifted its head, a flap of Rob’s skin hanging from its mouth. The other zombies were pushing to get to the body and one grabbed its foot and began to pull. Zombie number one, the face eater, turned and snarled at the puller and they glared at one another, teeth bared.

‘Ed, we need to get the body out of the lift.’

‘How the hell do we do that?’

They were speaking through gritted teeth as though to open their mouths fully would somehow expose them to the zombies. Krystal slipped further down the wall, put her boot against Rob’s shoulder and pushed. The body slid the tiniest distance, but it encouraged the puller to try again and this time he succeeded in getting the lower leg out of the lift.

‘Yes, that’s it.’

She pushed herself away from the wall until her foot touched it again. Another nudge and the puller got the legs completely out. Zombie number one, who up to this point had been happy to be dragged along with it, face buried up to its nose in face flesh, rose up and growled at her, then took a swipe.

She moved, but not fast enough and the claws caught her across the leg. She howled as her trousers were ripped open and curled nails opened three long tears in her leg. She yanked it back and wrapped her jeans around the wounds, staring at the zombie. It hesitated, as though deciding what the best smelling meal was. Then the puller yanked again and zombie number one turned away, growling at the body thief.

It turned serious this time, her attacked lunging over the body to clout his comrade in the face. His claws opened up more wounds and some of the others fell on puller, dragging him away from the lift. He was still living and she saw teeth dig into his shoulder and more into his neck and the sound he made reminded her of the baby pigeons she watched, high-pitched squawking that went on and on before abruptly cutting off.

Someone else had taken the place of the puller and Rob was almost out of the lift. She watched and shook her head as Ed scrambled up and shoved the body the rest of the way. Zombie number one was engrossed in opening Rob’s stomach with its teeth and barely reacted.

Then Ed stepped back and hit the down button and finally the doors closed all the way. He dropped onto his butt and let out a long breath. He raised his hand. ‘What just happened?’

She patted him on the shoulder. ‘They’ve all become zombies.’

‘Zombies?’

‘Yeah. Weird huh?’

‘Why us? Why are we still alive?’

‘I have no idea. Not sure I will be much longer though, not with this.’

She edged her torn jeans away from the cuts and inspected them. They were shallower than she’d thought and the bleeding was minimal. Ed knelt over them and prodded with one outstretched finger. Then he shook his head. ‘Nah, you’ll be alright with them. It’s only bites that infect.’

‘How the hell d’you know?’

‘I’ve read everything there is to know about zombies. Vampires too, but they don’t exist.’

‘Not unless you’re some hot, skinny American school girl.’

Ed grinned. ‘Nah, they’re the most non-existent ones there are. You have to get bitten by a zombie if you wanna be infected.’

‘So just like vampires then?’

‘Sort of. Only vampires drink blood and zombies either want to eat brains or all of you.’

‘Don’t think those ones were all that bothered.’

He shook his head, frowning.

‘What?’

‘Why us? Why aren’t we zombies?’

‘Why’s it so important?’

He shook his head again, blinking as he looked at her. ‘It might not be, but normally if you’re left alive, there’s a reason. I suppose we might have a natural immunity to whatever was in the fog, but what’s the chances of you and I having it and none of the others?’

The doors pinged and slid open and they both froze, staring at the widening gap. The lobby looked like it was night time. She realised it was the fog surrounding the building and keeping most of the sunlight out. There were no zombies in sight and she let out the breath she’d been holding.

‘Look, any chance we could solve the mystery of our survival after we find somewhere safe?’

‘That’s fine by me, but where’s going to be safe?’

Krystal shrugged and got to her feet. ‘Somewhere they can’t get in I guess. A house or a flat or something?’

They made it across the lobby and to the door. The fog was thick outside, so they couldn’t see further than ten feet in any direction. It was high as well, going far above their heads. When they stepped out into it, their world would shrink. And the zombies could come from anywhere.

Ed grabbed her arm. ‘I don’t want to go out there.’

‘You think? What else are we gonna do?’

He stared at her, those dark eyes mirroring what she felt but was determined not to show.

‘C’mon, it’ll be fine. We move fast as we can and head back toward the city.’

‘Why the city?’

‘We know places there. There’ll be places we can get in and be safe. I don’t know what’s around here. And hey, who’s to say the zombies can see any better in the fog than we can? Maybe it’ll help us.’

Ed looked about as convinced as she felt when a politician appeared on a newspaper saying he was going to stamp out homelessness. It didn’t happen very often and when it did she couldn’t help hearing ‘stamp out homeless people,’ which seemed a bit pointless, because she couldn’t have been more stamped out of the world already.

She gripped Ed’s hand, took a deep breath and pulled the door open. The fog billowed around them, carrying with it the scent of mould, like a building left too long with damp and she coughed. Taking a far shallower breath this time, she dragged him with her into the fog.