The Z Infection (6 page)

       The situation at Buckingham Palace was under
control, as far as we could make out.  A small number of civilians had managed
to get through one of the side gates, but many more had continued to flee west. 
What the garrison at the palace was faced with now, was a horde of belligerents
who had surrounded the grounds.  The figure quoted, was put at an astonishing twenty
thousand.  Of course we thought that was an exaggeration.  There was surely no
way that so many people could have become infected so quickly.

       The PM had taken the decision to fully mobilise
the armed forces, taking his cue from the US President in a telephone
conversation.  The navy was to make every seaworthy ship available immediately,
while the army was to prepare to deploy in London to combat the outbreaks of
violence.  The Air Force was ordered to be ready to destroy the bridges over
the Thames and jets were on standby at RAF Brize Norton.  This was how serious
the outbreak was now being taken.  It was a difficult decision for the PM.  He
knew whatever he did would be unpopular.

       One of the scariest moments was when he took a
telephone call from the Met Commissioner.  He was at New Scotland Yard and was
surrounded by a baying mob, desperately seeking safety from the rampage of the
infected.  They had barricaded the doors but the crowd was growing by the
minute.  He was asked by the PM if he could still function and police the
city.  The answer wasn’t good.  He estimated that the force was down to about
half its strength, either through deaths, injuries or officers simply
abandoning their posts and going missing.  It was becoming impossible to keep track
of what officers he had available.

He signed off the conversation by
saying that he was trapped in the building, with a few hundred staff.  He
didn’t know how long it would be before the mob broke through, or the infected
made it to that part of the city.

       There was a deathly silence in the room after
that conversation.  The Prime Minister was quiet for a long time.  General
Breck, who had stayed with us when we fled from Downing Street, suggested that
the PM and the cabinet be evacuated by helicopter, to a safer place somewhere
to the north of London.  Then he would direct the ground forces against this
enemy which had so far seemed to be unstoppable.

       The PM disagreed.  He wanted to stay and be
seen to be leading the country from the front in this time of crisis.  He was
so insistent that Breck backed down and agreed that this would be the course of
action he should follow.  When the PM went to his office to read through
another pile of depressing reports, I took Breck to one side and told him to
make sure three helicopters were on standby for evacuation.  I wanted them to
be able to be at our location with half an hour.  Someone had to be thinking
straight in those desperate hours.

Kim Taylor

17:00 hours, Friday 15
^th
May, Buckingham
Palace, London

       When Ellie and I got through the side gate and
into the grounds of Buckingham Palace it felt like we had been saved.  There
were about fifty of us altogether.  I don’t know why we were selected.  Chosen
by God was one ranting woman’s explanation.  I’m not sure about that.  I wasn’t
sure about God any more.  Why would he have done something like that to us?

       Ellie was in better shape, now that we were
able to sit down.  One of the soldiers had a look at her ankle.  It wasn’t as
bad as we had feared.  A couple of days rest would see it back to normal.  The
only thing was, I wasn’t sure if we would get another two days, or even another
two hours.  By the time we had come back out of the sick bay there was a
distinct change in the mood outside the gates. 

       Panic had really set in.  Some tried to climb
over and were beaten back by the soldiers who had formed a perimeter inside the
fences.  One man, a young officer who seemed to be in charge, took a megaphone
and addressed the crowd, telling them that they would not be allowed access to
the grounds of the palace under any circumstances.  Any attempts to gain access
would be met with deadly force.

       It didn’t stop them.  Whatever was behind them,
pressing in on the desperate crowds, was far more frightening than the threat
of a bullet.  People began to climb once again, as shouts from behind them
turned to screams.  The officer drew his pistol and pointed it at the first
man.  He ordered him to get off the railings.  The man took no heed and the
officer fired once, hitting the man in the shoulder and knocking him back onto
the ground.  People screamed and ducked for cover, fearing more shots.  And
behind them the carnage continued unabated.

       I couldn’t stand to watch it any longer and
walked back towards the rear of the palace.  This, I discovered, was where the
queen’s apartments were located.  There was a line of soldiers preventing
anyone from going any further, so we sat down on a patch of grass and had a
long drink of water from a bottle which had been given to us in the sick bay.

       There was nothing else we could do.  Going
outside again was no longer an option.  We seemed to be safe for the time
being, behind the high fences and walls, and from the increasing noise outside
it was clear that things were not going well.

Callum MacPherson

17:10 hours, Friday 15
^th
May, Buckingham
Palace, London

       After that first man was shot by the Lieutenant
it soon dawned on the crowd that we meant business.  They began to scatter,
dispersing to either side of the front gates.  If only they had gone sooner,
many might have lived.  As it was, the ones who had been turned by the virus
and who were pressing them from behind, were joined by a huge horde from Green
Park and another that came marching down from the direction of Victoria Station,
like some ghoulish army from hell.

       We shouted to people to run but there was
nowhere to go.  Another army of those freaks came from St James’s Park, cutting
off their last chance of escape.  And that was that.  I looked to the
Lieutenant for direction.  He was still young and was absolutely frozen with
fear.  That he now found himself in charge of the garrison was a cruel twist of
fate. 

       ‘Sir,’ I shouted.  ‘We have to let those people
come over the gates.  They’ll be slaughtered out there.’

       He didn’t move or speak.  He just kept staring
at the gates and the man he had shot, who had managed to get to his feet
through pure adrenalin and was frantically looking for an escape route.

       I couldn’t wait any longer.

       ‘Get over the fences,’ I shouted to those
nearest.  ‘Get over.  You’re trapped.’

       One or two began to climb as the ghouls closed
in on those on the extremities of the crowd.  I ordered ten of the men to each
side and told them to give as much covering fire as they could manage.  They
did their best but it was impossible.  Every time they shot one it just got
straight back up again.  This increased the panic.  Nobody knew what we were
dealing with.  It seemed like it was an indestructible army, bent on death and
destruction.

       A lucky few managed to get over the fences and
scrambled to the building, but the vast majority were eaten alive as the blood
crazed mob moved in on them, clawing and tearing at them as they pulled them
apart and devoured them.  The injured man was one of the last.  I won’t forget
his face.  He had his hands through the railings, begging for us to open the
gate as they fell on him and pulled him into the throng.  His screams only
lasted for a few seconds, then the only thing I could hear was the sobbing of
the few we had saved and the grinding and chewing of the dead as they feasted
on their prey.

       I turned and walked back to the guard room.  I
felt the bile rising in my throat and, after twenty years as a soldier, twenty
years of seeing some of the worst things humanity had to offer, I suddenly
threw up.

Thomas Buckle

18:00 hours, Friday 15
^th
May, Barking, East
London

       We made it as far as Tower Hamlets, before the
driver got cold feet and said he wanted to go home to his family.  The radio
was full of news, telling people to stay indoors.  I paid him for the trip and
jumped out.  The streets were busy enough, but there was a feeling in the air
that all was not right.

I had to walk the rest of the way
home.  I couldn’t face the underground.  I doubted I would ever be able to go down
there again.  The memories of those people on the platforms, who were lined up
for a train and became food for the dead, have stayed with me to this day.

When I finally made it home, late
that afternoon, I had seen some pretty gruesome things.  When I got inside the
house and switched on the news the BBC were saying that the army was to be
deployed on the streets and that the RAF had already flown several
reconnaissance missions over the capital.  I had seen a couple of jets, which
was unusual, but the strangest thing was the lack of civilian airliners in the
sky.  They had been almost non-existent all day.

       The house was empty.  That didn’t surprise me. 
My wife would have been at work.  She was a nurse at St Bartholomew’s Hospital
and I knew that she would be busy.  According to the news there were thousands
of casualties.

I checked my phone.  I had ten missed
calls on my mobile, all from my wife, but every time I tried her phone I
couldn’t get through.  The system was creaking under the weight of usage. 

       A lot of the neighbours were packing cases and
loading their cars with anything and everything they could.  Kids were being
bundled in next to dogs and cats, valuables of all sorts and spare fuel cans. 
People were moving out for the long haul, not heeding the government’s advice.

       I decided to wait around until my wife got
back.  There was no way I would be able to get back into town.  The footage on
the evening news told me that huge parts of the city were now no-go areas, so I
mooched around for an hour or so, wondering what we were going to do.

       I decided, eventually, to get prepared for
leaving.  If everyone else thought they would be safer elsewhere, then we
should go too.  The car was almost fully fuelled, which was a good start and I began
to load it with as much necessities as I could find. I started with the food
cupboards.  I emptied them of all the tins, pasta, rice and dried food and
bottles I could find.  They would last the longest.  There was no point taking
frozen food or things that would go off.

       Once I had sorted out that and put it into
boxes, I searched around for anything I could use as a weapon.  Knives were the
obvious things.  We had a good selection and I took them all.  I also found an
old air rifle and some pellets.  It wouldn’t be powerful enough to stop a man,
but if things got really bad it might come in handy for killing the odd rabbit
or bird.  Also in the garage, I found a tool my wife used for weeding.  It was
long handled and had a sharp pointed end.  I imagined it might come in handy so
I threw that in as well.

       When I was finished I went back into the house
and turned on the TV again.  There was a military man on the screen, telling
everyone that the army was in the process of deploying three thousand troops to
the city.  He asked that people stay off the streets and assured us that
control would be regained shortly.

       The channel then flipped over to cover a story
from New York.  An outbreak of similar disturbances there and in other cities. 
Washington DC, Los Angeles, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Tokyo, Cairo.  The list was
growing.  Places around the world were beginning to experience what Londoners
had been suffering all day.  And things would only get worse.

Kareef Hadad

18:30 hours, Friday 15
^th
May, Central London

       The thing I was most desperate to do, was to find
my wife and son.  Sophie and I had walked for about three miles, trying to put
as much distance as we could between us and the chaos we had left behind at
Covent Garden, but in the forefront of my mind was them.  I had to get home to
make sure they were safe and then somehow get them to safety.  I thought, in
the long term, about returning to my family in the Middle East, but I knew that
was a long way from happening at the moment.

       At various points during the day we were forced
to run or hide.  Several times we had to double back on ourselves, due to large
numbers of infected people, which frustrated me.

       Sophie wanted to try to find her boyfriend
too.  She had no idea where he was, only that he was supposed to have met her
just before the whole thing with the bus happened.  He could have been anywhere
now.  He might have escaped with some of the other crowds, or maybe he was
hiding somewhere.  Of course the other possibility was that he was dead already,
along with a lot of others.

       We made our way to a small restaurant, just
around the corner from Russell Square.  It was owned by my friend, Saeed.  We
were both tired and hungry and we needed somewhere safe to rest for a while.  It
was the closest place I could think of. 

It was empty when we arrived and he
was sitting in the main seating area, watching television on a wall behind a
small bar.  He looked at Sophie with some suspicion but he poured us two
coffees anyway and we sat down to watch the unfolding drama.  I asked if I
could borrow his car, but he told me he had already loaned it to his
brother-in-law.