Coldbrook

There might be wolves and bears, coyotes and cougars, moose and caribou, and perhaps animals that he had never seen or even dreamed of. And perhaps he would see some of them if he walked far and long enough.

Something down through the trees caught his eye, a shadow that he recognised, visible against a wall of deep blue flowers. Jonah approached at his own pace. The time had to come soon, he knew. And he had a sudden, panicked thought that for every second he stalled, another world fell to the fury infection.

‘I can’t know that,’ he said. Birds quietened around him, and something rustled through the undergrowth. How ironic it would be to die here, taken down by a wildcat or bitten by a snake, stung by a spider or mauled by a mountain bear. Ironic and tragic, because no one would ever know, in this universe or any other.

He rolled the soft trigger between his fingers, still in his pocket. It remained warm to the touch.

‘Accept,’ the Inquisitor told him. His voice came from beside Jonah, even though the shape he could see was at least two hundred feet away, visible past tree trunks and through the light camouflage of bushes and heavy ferns.

‘Fuck you,’ Jonah said mildly.

He saw the first evidence of what had become of this place. Perhaps it had been a fury, perhaps not, but the corpse, tied to a tree, was now little more than mouldy bones and scraps of leathery skin. No evidence of clothing, though the rope was wound and knotted with skill. He moved closer and saw that a spider had made its home in the cadaver’s skull. The arachnid was as large as an apple, and its web was an architectural wonder: some single strands were eight feet long and stretched in all directions. He had no wish to touch one; he didn’t know how fast the spider might move. But he had seen all he needed to. There was a small metal plate in the skeleton’s skull, and glinting on one wrist where both had been tied behind the tree was a watch.

Another dead Earth, and perhaps centuries had passed. He would never know when that watch had stopped.

Jonah moved on. This world had been darkened for him, and yet the beauty of the scenery seemed to bloom brighter. The flowers were wonderful, their scent subtle on the air; birds flitted from branch to branch, or plucked insects from the air, or gracefully rode thermals higher up; the tree canopy shifted and swayed, alive and kissed by the wind. And he would never be able to tell anyone about this.

I’ve seen more than any human ever has, he thought, travelled further, and to die right now would just feel like only one more step. But he still found comfort in the idea that had always kept him rooted — there were billions of stars in the galaxy, billions of galaxies, and perhaps infinite universes. He meant so little, and knew next to nothing.

The figure stood beside a fallen tree, flies buzzing around but never quite settling. The Inquisitor seemed to favour his left leg, his right shoulder was a hard scab of blood against his robe, and now that he was this close Jonah was sure he could see the end of a snapped-off crossbow bolt pinning the clothing there. The man swayed slightly, and steam rose from his strange mask and from vents in his bulbous goggles. There was so much that Jonah could ask, but he didn’t want to know.

‘I accept,’ he said, and the Inquisitor let out what might have been a sigh.

14

‘We are so fucking fucked!’

‘Hey, not in front of the kids,’ Chaney said.

‘The kids! The fuckin’ kids?’

‘Dude. Please.’ Chaney grabbed the biker’s arm and squeezed. Vic laughed out loud.

More gunfire, more falling bodies, more swearing, the smell of fear from where some of the kids — or maybe the adults — had pissed themselves, more screaming, more thudding of zombie bodies striking the bus and scrabbling for purchase, and five minutes ago when Vic had asked about ammunition Chaney had glanced at him without replying, his look answer enough.

‘Five more minutes,’ Vic said from where he was hunkered beneath the shot-up steering column.

‘Yeah, maybe,’ Chaney said.

Glass smashed, someone grunted. And then screamed.

‘Stay back, stay back!’ a biker shouted, and Vic did not look up. He was splicing three wires together, bypassing the ignition, and he had enough to concentrate on without-

‘Shoot her!’ the biker shouted.

‘But she’s Mrs Joslin, she’s our-’

Gunshot, splash, a body hit the bus’s floor, and the children’s screaming changed. It turned crazed.

‘Hurry up, dude,’ Chaney said, crawling over to kneel beside Vic.

‘I’m hurrying.’

‘I mean it.’

‘I’m hurrying! Every time you tell me to hurry I have to answer you, and that slows me down because I need to concentrate here, and-’

Chaney tapped his leg and stood, his gun blasting again.

The biker’s initial assessment of the state of the bus had seemed obviously correct but on closer inspection Vic thought he could fix it. Everyone was pleased to hear that. Scores of zombies now surrounded the bus, and more appeared from around the town every minute. Many more — perhaps hundreds — had gone in the opposite direction, following the others towards Coldbrook. How they chose which way to go, or whether they could perform any thought process that could be described as choosing, was something that troubled Vic. But he’d dwell on it later. Right now he was using Chaney’s bowie knife and a nail-grooming kit as impromptu tools, and the guts of the steering column were hanging above him. The shear bolt and retaining clips had been blasted apart, and these he could repair temporarily. The bigger problem was that the steering lock had been deformed and the starter was smashed. As he finished splicing the wires he touched them to another bare wire. They sparked, and the engine coughed.

‘Done?’ Chaney shouted.

‘Two minutes.’

‘Make it one.’

‘I’ll make it two!’

‘Make it one and a fucking half!’

‘Not in front of the kids, dude,’ Vic said, concentrating on the steering lock, wondering whether he could risk wedging Chaney’s blade in there to try and jimmy it straight, worried that it would snap off and lock the steering completely. As it was now, they’d have about seventy per cent of the steering capability, and to turn right would take a much longer, wider sweep.

But fuck it.

‘Done,’ he said. Chaney grabbed Vic’s belt and pulled him out, hauling him upright in one move and dropping him into the bloodied driver’s seat.

‘You got the duty,’ he said.

‘Fine.’ Vic had only glanced around briefly and what he’d seen was not good. Zombies crowded at the unbroken windows, smashing at them with fists and heads, falling away with bullets in their brains.

‘Out of ammo,’ one of the bikers said.

‘Then piss on them!’ Chaney shouted.

Kids screaming, the two adults remaining with them doing their best to calm them, and the most terrifying thing wasn’t the noise of gunshots or the screaming but the soft calling of the zombies. Weren’t they supposed to growl, or groan, or moan? And weren’t they supposed to eat their victims? But there were no supposed tos here. This was reality.

Vic once more touched wires to each other and this time twisted them together. The engine grumbled into life. It didn’t sound too happy about it. ‘Come on, come on, be a good girl,’ Vic said. He slid the gearstick into reverse and pressed down on the gas. The bus rocked and then moved, and in the mirror he saw several standing kids jolted to the floor. The gunfire lessened, and then the bus started bumping over fallen bodies.

‘Gross,’ Chaney said.