Demise of the Living (16 page)

Still, it was nothing compared
to her friend’s injuries. Karen had come off lightly. Her shoulder
was chewed up pretty badly. Ordinarily she could see herself
milking it for a couple of weeks of school, but she had no such
luxury now. Her mother and father were gone and now she only had
Shan.

Even then she could have lost
her, too.

“
It’s just round the
corner and we’ll be there. Hang on, Shan.”

Karen mounted the
pavement to cut past a knot of abandoned cars. As she did she felt
Shan’s grip around her waist slacken.

“
Stay with me, Shan.
We’re almost there,” Karen said, engaging her friend to keep her
conscious. “Look up ahead, What can you see?”

They drove past a bright yellow
digger surrounded by mesh fencing to protect it from vandals. It
sat on the outside of a playing field. Behind the grey fencing the
flat grass swept up to a long blocky building.

“
It’s the fucking
school,” Shan groaned.

“Bet you didn’t think we’d be
coming here during the school holidays,” Karen said.

Shan simply grunted.

Karen pulled up in front of the
school gates. They were locked. Skirting along the side of the road
she tried the pupil entrance further along, but it too was
barred.

A handful of zombies had
taken an interest in the buzzing of the bike and were plodding
their way towards them.

“The dog bolt at the back of
Science,” Shan mumbled.

Karen tugged the accelerator
and sped off, following the line of the school fence. She quickly
took the bike round a thick clump of bushes and round to a strip of
wasteland between the school and adjoining housing.

There was an old wooden fence,
greasy and knotted with splintered edges. Karen pulled the bike up
to the fence and stopped it.

“That’s as far as we can take
this,” she said.

Painfully, Shan eased
herself off the bike and waited for her companion to park it. The
adrenaline from last night had drained from her and she shook like
there was ice inside her veins. Blood still trickled from the mess
of torn flesh at the side of her face.

Karen saw her holding
back and took the lead. One of the slats in the fence was missing
and the two adjoining ones had been snapped at the middle. The hole
was just big enough for the girls to tiptoe inside, then duck
through the gap. A narrow path flanked by gangly grasses and only
the breadth of a single foot width meandered its way down the
corridor of waste ground. As they passed, their legs brushed the
stalks back, leaving a faint line of pollen below the knee. To the
left the stiff branches of bushes squeezed their way past the slats
of the metal fence. On the right was the creosote-stained wood that
formed the boundary to the back gardens beyond. A few metres into
the corridor the path took a sharp left-hand turn. Ducking low, the
girls squeezed themselves through the tunnel of snapped branches
and through a twisted and bent hole in the fencing to emerge at the
back of the school’s science block. The ground here was littered
with discarded drinks cans, wrappers, and spent cigarette
butts.

“How do we get in?” Karen
asked.

“Break a window,” Shan
answered.

“
We can’t...” Karen
stopped herself. After everything that had happened since
yesterday, breaking a window was a small matter. “I suppose. Which
one though?”

Shan pointed down the
side of the school block. “That’ll do.”

They walked down a slight
incline to join a paving slab path that ringed most of the school
building.

“How do we break it?” Karen
asked.

“
I don’t know,” Shan
snapped. “Find a brick or something.”

“Okay,” Karen said softly.

Shan slumped against the wall
and made a controlled slide down it, ending up in a sitting
position with her knees up by her chest.

“
You be okay?” Karen
asked.

Shan waved her off.

Karen started skirting the path
and the edge of the playing field. It wasn’t long before she found
a snapped corner of a paving stone she managed to work loose. She
trotted back, holding the lump of concrete like a shot-putt.

Shan was still slumped up
against the wall when Karen returned.

“Watch out,” Karen said.

She pulled her arm back and
threw the lump of concrete at one of the classroom windows. The
projectile went straight through the glass with a tremendous crash.
The window was left with a hole twice the size of the object that
had hurtled through it, but Karen was disappointed. She had
envisioned that the whole window would just simply evaporate,
leaving a clear window frame to climb in through. Instead there
were razor edge splinters creeping out from the break.

Karen slipped off her
shoe, and using the heel as a hammer she gingerly tapped at the
remaining glass to free it. With each successful tap she would jump
back out of the way of the crashing shards. Once the window was
cleared,she swept the inside and outside ledges clean with the sole
of her shoe. Confident she had removed anything that could cut her,
she slipped her shoe back on and clambered into the classroom. She
landed with a crunch as the broken glass shifted under her
weight.

Karen looked back out of the
window.

“
You coming?” she
asked.

“
What?” Shan snapped.
“No, I’m not coming. Go round and open the door for fuck’s
sake.”

“Oh,” Karen said sheepishly,
realizing her stupidity.

She trotted out of the
classroom and into the hallway. It was a shock how alien it felt.
With the power off, only the light filtering through the empty
classrooms illuminated the corridor. The air was still and cold,
but the silence was the eeriest thing. No period bells ringing, no
sound of shoes squeaking on the polished floors, no voices.

There was a soft crunch of
glass from underfoot. Karen scuffed the sole of her foot down the
rough breezeblock wall, knocking free a mote of glass imbedded in
the plastic.

She moved on to the fire door
at the bottom of the middle stairwell. She pushed the bar down and
pushed the door open.

She called out, “Shan.”

Shan moaned, and without
raising her head she stretched out her arms at the sound of Karen’s
voice.

Karen scurried over and took
Shan’s hands.

“You’re freezing,” Karen said
as she pulled Shan upright.

Shan gave a displeased moan and
threw her arms around Karen.

“Come on, let’s get you to the
nurse’s office.”

“Thanks,” Shan muttered.

The pair shuffled down the
abandoned hallways to the administration block.

Although the nurse’s office was
locked, it didn’t take much to break the flimsy internal door open.
Karen laid Shan on the bed and rifled through the medical cabinet
until she found all the equipment she thought she’d need.

“Any painkillers in there?”
Shan asked, looking at the various first aid supplies.

“Nah, I don’t think they’re
allowed to give you any. You’ve got to bring your own and have a
note.”

“This is fucking killing me,”
Shan protested.

“
I’ll clean the wound out
and get a dressing on it, then I’ll look for some
painkillers.”

“Miss Gilmore has had a
migraine forever. She’s always popping something,” Shan
offered.

Karen turned round, a wad of
white tissue in one hand, a pair of tweezers in the other.

“I’ll check her desk after I
look after you,” she said.

“What’re you doing with
those?”

“
I need to clean the
wound out. Otherwise it’ll go bad.”

Shan sunk back into the sick
bay bed.

“Do it fast,” she said.

***

Mo walked into the canteen and
saw only two of the tables occupied. There was a cluster sitting at
the table in front of the TV: Thomas, Colin, Magda, and Alex.
Further back, Liz sat with her daughter Melissa.

“There’s no banging on the fire
door,” Mo said, taking a seat between Colin and Thomas.

“
I took a look out the
window. They’re still in the car park, just wandering around
aimlessly,” Colin answered. “Reckon if we don’t attract their
attention they won’t bother us.”

“What are we doing about
breakfast?” Mo asked.

Thomas snorted out a plume of
smoke from his cigarette.

“
Not much of a
breakfast,” he grumbled, holding out the lit cigarette as if he
were examining it.

“I run off coffee most
mornings, anyway,” Colin said, taking a swig from his plastic
cup.

“Anything new on TV?” Mo
asked.

“Fifty-seven channels and
nothing on,” Thomas said.

“Just the looped announcement
that people should stay in their homes, to avoid contact with
others, and co-operate with local law enforcement and military
forces,” Colin said.

“
It’s just a recorded
message; you don’t even see an announcer on screen. All it is
is
that
.” Thomas pointed at the screen.

Mo looked at the static image.
It was a crude graphic spelling out exactly what Colin had
said.

“Suppose I’ll get some
breakfast then,” Mo said, standing back up.

He walked over to the vending
machine and punched the buttons for a coffee.

He carefully picked up the hot
beverage and rejoined the group.

Thomas caught Mo’s eye and
nodded over at the girl and her mother. The girl was eating an oat
and nut bar and sipping from a can of cola.

Thomas whispered, “Tell me
again why they’re getting a breakfast bar?”

“
Are you serious?” Colin
asked.
“You telling me you can’t skip
breakfast?”

“No, that’s not what I’m
saying.”

“Well, what do you mean?”

“How long are we going to be
here?”

“I don’t know.”

“
There’s my point.”
Thomas said, prodding the table with his finger. “It’ll be easier
to skip eating today than it will tomorrow or the next day. We
should be conserving our resources.”

Colin shook his head.
“She’s an eleven year-old girl and Liz hasn’t even opened
hers.”

“Who gave them the food
anyway?” Thomas asked.

“
I did,” Colin
answered.

“
So you’re in charge
already?” Thomas asked loudly. “You’re the one who decides who eats
and when?”

Before Colin could defend
himself, the canteen door opened and Sharon walked in. She had done
the best she could to tidy herself up with fresh make-up and combed
hair, but the difference from yesterday’s pristine visage was
unmistakable.

“What are you doing smoking in
here?” Sharon demanded.

“Having breakfast,” Thomas said
in an overly loud voice.

“
You’re not allowed to
smoke on the premises.”

“I think you’ll find a trip to
the Smoking Shelter contravenes health and safety legislation at
the moment,” Thomas said, taking a drag on his cigarette.

“This is intolerable,” Sharon
snapped.

“Take it up with HR,” Thomas
replied.

Sharon’s face flushed scarlet.
She looked to Mo and then back at Thomas before turning and
stomping out of the canteen.

“Excuse me,” Colin said.

He stood up from the table and
left the canteen. As soon as the door had shut behind him he jogged
up the stairs after Sharon.

“Sharon.”

Sharon paused on the
first landing with her back to Colin. He had the sense that she was
composing herself before acknowledging him.

Colin skipped up the last few
steps to draw level with her.

“
Yes, Colin, how can I
help you?” she said in a very controlled tone.

“I don’t know your staff, but
Thomas strikes me as trouble,” Colin said.

“
I have to admit this
situation is revealing people’s true colours,” Sharon agreed. “What
are you proposing we do?”

“
Do?” Colin said. “I
don’t know. I don’t think we can do anything just now. But if
things get worse there will be less of a restraint on
him.”

“Is this an area of expertise
you have?”

“
Um, I guess so,” Colin
replied. “I’m a high school teacher.”

“A teacher?” Sharon said,
disappointment in her voice.

“A teacher and I see this kind
of power play in the classroom all the time—the bullies gathering
allies, intimidating people, using violence to get their way. If we
don't keep him in check he’ll start pushing us around.”

“So what are you
proposing?”

“We need to keep a united
front,” Colin said. “The moment he spots a weakness he’ll exploit
it.”

“Very well,” Sharon agreed.

Colin nodded. “We need to
put some structure in place, give everyone something to work for.
Otherwise we’ll just fracture and start pulling against each
other.”

“
Okay,” Sharon said. “We
start after breakfast. Try to work out a consensus as what we
should be doing, prioritising our situation, look at what possible
outcomes we have.”

“Good. Shall I go tell everyone
to meet at, say, nine o’clock?” Colin asked.

“Yes, that will give me time to
write an agenda. Nine o’clock in room A-1,” Sharon replied.

***

Although there were three empty
floors to the building, Sharon had dictated they all meet up in one
of the many conference rooms. The room could easily host a dozen or
so people comfortably, but the atmosphere was anything but
comfortable.