The Z Infection (2 page)
Claire Samson
08:20 hours, Friday 15
th
May, Wood Green,
London
I was a reporter for the London
Evening Standard at the time. I had been there for a year, since I had
finished college. It was a good job and I got on well with my boss and
colleagues, but I was hungry for success and I wanted to get myself noticed and
into the big time. When I heard about the bus crash it didn’t really register
with me at first. One of my contacts, a friend called Sue, who just happened
to live in a flat nearby, phoned me as I was on my way to work and told me
about it.
So what, I thought? This wasn’t
going to be my big breakthrough.
‘No,’ she insisted. ‘It’s
spectacular. Gone right into a shop. It’s lucky it wasn’t open at the time.
There could have been dozens of customers inside.’
‘Any casualties?’ I asked, my
interest picking up a little. ‘I’m just about to get onto the tube at Wood
Green. I could be there in half an hour or so.’
‘I can’t see properly,’ she said.
‘There’s a lot of smoke. Looks like it’s gone on fire. There were a lot of
people trying to help.’
It sounded like it might make a
decent news story after all. If I could just get there before anyone else. I
told her I would be there as soon as I could and hung up as the train
approached.
On board it was crowded as usual and
there was no chance of a seat anywhere so I had to contend myself with a face
full of smelly armpit as I squeezed myself on board. I quickly checked my
Twitter account.
Avoid Long Acre this morning folks
#buscrash
Bus on fire on Long Acre
#fireandexplosion
Chaos at Covent Garden. Scary shit
going on down there #keepclear
It looked like social media was
getting in on the act. I quickly switched to my Facebook page and saw that Sue
had just updated her status.
Don’t know what’s going on in Long
Acre folks, but stay clear. Looked like a bus crash at first, but there’s now
people fighting each other in the street. Stay away.
There were six likes attached to it
already and two comments from people thanking Sue. I settled into the ride as
the train set off and managed to send a quick text to my boss before the signal
on my phone suddenly disappeared. It was the last ever tube ride I ever took.
BBC News Broadcast
May 15
th
2015
08:30 hours
‘Reports are being received from
Central London, about a bus crash close to Covent Garden underground station.
The first indications are that the bus lost control and crashed through a shop
front at around 8AM. There are reports of walking wounded, but the exact nature
of the accident and details of casualties are still unknown. More on this
story as it develops…’
Mike Bradbury
08:35 hours, Friday 15
th
May, Heathrow
Airport
The flight from Heathrow was
delayed. Again. It was the second time it had been cancelled since I had arrived
at the airport, over an hour ago. I sat in the bar in the executive lounge and
ordered another coffee. No work today. By the time this flight took off it
would be nearly lunchtime and then, after arriving at Edinburgh, I would still
have to work my way into the centre of town. It would be pointless going to
the course.
I sent a text message to my wife,
telling her what was happening and then phoned through to the office. I was
greeted by the voice of the answer phone. I left a message for my boss and sat
down on one of the comfortable chairs which were scattered around the lounge.
There was no point in moving. He would get back to me eventually and let me
know if there was a space on tomorrow’s training course.
I’m not one of those who lives to
work anyway. Sod that. I like my free time too much. So I settled into my
chair, fumbling for my phone to check Facebook. I’m an addict, or at least I
was then.
There was all the usual stuff on
there. Robert Kirk, my friend of twenty years, had posted a picture of a pint
he was about to down. He was on holiday in Australia, lucky bastard. There
was a post about someone complaining about some new government initiative,
someone else had taken a photograph of their breakfast (why did they do that?)
and there was an entire album of baby photos, posted by someone I barely even
knew.
I switched the screen off to save as
much of the battery as I could and sank into the comfortable leather chair.
The lounge, one of the first class executive ones, was fairly quiet. I much
preferred it this way. No yelling kids, no cheap and nasty takeaway food and
no lobster-red package holiday tourists returning from their fortnight in
Marbella, where they had spent the first week ensconced in the various bars
watching Sky Sports and the second desperately trying to get a fast track sun
tan. No, this was the place to be. I took a long sip of my coffee.
It was just a few moments later when
something on the television caught my eye. It looked like an explosion. The
sound was muted, but as I watched I could see that it was central London.
Definitely London. There was a red double decker bus in the shot. It looked
like it had crashed into a shop. There were people wandering around, looking
dazed and bewildered as ambulances and police vehicles began arriving at the
scene.
‘That just happened,’ said a voice
behind me.
I turned to see a middle aged man in
a dark coloured suit. I glanced back at the television.
‘Just around from Covent Garden,’ he
said. ‘I’m not sure what caused it.’
‘Terrorists?’ I asked.
He shook his head. ‘I think it was
an accident.’
I turned my attention back to the
television. There seemed to be some sort of disturbance going on, with some of
the crash survivors. They were fighting with the police and some of the
onlookers. Then the footage abruptly stopped.
‘That’s all there is,’ said the man.
‘I watched it in one of the bars downstairs, before I came up here.’
The news anchor man came back on
screen. He seemed to be still reporting on the incident and occasionally would
speak to others who were either in the studio or somewhere with field
reporters. Several members of the public, who had presumably witnessed the
incident, were being interviewed. Some of them seemed to be traumatised by
what had happened and several were sporting nasty looking injuries. One guy
pulled down his shirt to reveal a gouge which had been taken out of his
shoulder. I sat up to get a better look. Was it a bite? It looked like a
bite mark.
Thomas Buckle
08:36 hours. Friday 15
th
May, Covent Garden
Underground Station, London
I had worked on the London underground
for thirty years. I started out working on one of the maintenance teams,
working in the tunnels at night when the trains weren’t running. My father got
me the job, when I had left school at sixteen with no qualifications. He had
also worked on the underground for years and he was keen to see me gainfully
employed, I suppose, not hanging around on the estate where I had grown up,
like some of my friends. I disliked him for it at first. I was quite happy
doing nothing and filling my days with my mates, but once I realised that the
money gave me more options I changed my mind. I had a better chance with the
girls, having a few quid to spend on them, and I could afford to go to the pub
for a few pints on a Saturday night.
I gradually moved from working the tracks to
working on the trains themselves and from there I managed to persuade someone
to give me a crack at being a driver. That was the job I loved the most. It
felt good, sitting in the cab, watching the people all crowded onto the
platforms. It wasn’t a huge space in the driver’s seat, but it was all mine.
I didn’t share it with anyone. And when the shift was finished I would get a
ride home, again in the cab so I didn’t have to mix with the passengers. And that
job saved my life.
I remember the day like it was yesterday. What
was it? Ten years ago? That long? I had started my shift early, working the Piccadilly
line. I was due to change trains at Hammersmith that day and take on the run
on the Hammersmith and City. Someone had called in sick, I was told, and we
had to change things about. I remember thinking it suited me. I would get
finished early and West Ham were playing that night, so I planned to go to the
game.
The morning rush hour was the time when
it was the busiest. Evenings came a close second but I think a lot of people
avoided that one by staying on for an extra hour or two, or by going for a
couple of drinks after work.
Anyway, I was coming in to Covent
Garden station at the time. The platform was already pretty crammed, more so
than usual, but I noticed more and more people crowding onto it, barging and
forcing their way through. I remember thinking that someone was going to end
up on the tracks if they didn’t all stop pushing and shoving. I stopped the train
and opened the doors. Almost at the same time I got a call on the radio to
tell me that there was some sort of problem at ground level. An accident of
some sort in one of the streets around Covent Garden.
People were fighting to get on board
the carriages, not waiting for others to get off. Even in rude London this was
unusual. There’s nothing that can be done in circumstances like that. You just
have to let folk get on with it and that’s exactly what I intended to do. I
waited.
Then I noticed something else. There
was a disturbance at the entrance to the platform. A woman screamed. Someone
shouted something I couldn’t make out and the crowd surged forward again. It
was impossible to get any more people on board but I couldn’t get the doors to
close.
Then a copper appeared at the window
to the cab. He was a youngster, probably not long out of training. The kind
that makes you feel old. He was pointing down the track and shouting at me to
move the train. I motioned to him that there were still passengers trying to
get on and off the train, but he was insistent. Then, suddenly, this figure
leapt onto his back. It was a woman. Middle aged. Respectable looking.
Dressed in a cream coloured skirt and jacket. She looked absolutely out of
control and was grabbing at him and trying to bite him. I couldn’t believe
what I was seeing. He flung her off and yelled at me to move.
I didn’t wait a second longer. I hit
the power and we set off, doors still ajar, people falling back onto the
platform. The fighting was intensifying as I entered the tunnel and the last
thing I remember seeing was that young police officer, baton raised above his
head, being swamped by half a dozen crazed commuters. What the fuck was going
on?
I didn’t stop at the next station,
Leicester Square, or at the next one, Piccadilly. Each time I drove through
the stations, past the crowds on the platforms, more people jumped from the
carriages and into the people waiting for their train. I didn’t stop again
until I arrived at Green Park and by then it was too late. There was something
dreadful happening inside the carriages. It caused those on the platform to
recoil in horror, desperately trying to escape from whatever horror was going
on inside the train. Passengers spilled onto the platform and into the crowds,
who couldn’t retreat for the others who were still coming down to join them,
unaware of what was unfolding.
Many times I have been asked, if what
happened that day was made worse by me failing to stop until I got to Green
Park. I suppose I certainly helped to spread it around the city a bit, but
when you saw how quickly it spread in other areas and other cities, all across
the globe, I think my part in the downfall of humanity was pretty small.
There was no way I was hanging around
any longer than I needed to. I grabbed my torch and my sandwiches and opened
the door of the cab. It was absolute bedlam on that platform. People getting
knocked to the ground, screams. Horrible screams that live in your nightmares
for ever. People being bitten and scratched, falling over one another to
escape the carnage. It was like scene from hell itself.
I slipped down onto the track and jogged
along the tunnel. The tracks are electrified but if you knew what you were
doing it was possible to get safely to the next station. When I arrived there,
a good fifteen minutes later, I could already hear others coming behind me.
I clambered up onto the platform at
Hyde Park Corner, to the astonishment of the commuters and tourists who were
gathered there and told them their train wasn’t coming and they would be wise
to get out of the station as quickly as possible. I pushed through them and
ran up the stairs and into the sunlight, gasping for air. Up there it looked
like business as usual, nothing untoward at all. It wouldn’t be long before
all that changed. Already, in the corridors of the underground I could hear fresh,
amplified screams. Whatever had followed me, was in the station.
Claire Samson