‘We take one of these each, run up the steps and let ourselves in. Sam, once we’re inside, don’t let the guys know you’ve got a gun — just in case.’
He nodded.
‘Everyone remember the code number?’ Sam asked.
‘Four-two-seven-four,’ Xian Mei replied without hesitation.
They looked out of the windows and in the mirrors, checking every direction to ensure none of the infected was close enough to surprise them. Then Purna said, ‘Go.’
Throwing open the doors, they jumped out of the van and ran up the steps. With one hand curled around the provisions tucked under their arms and the other clutching their weapons, they felt weighed down, encumbered. The naked man spun towards them immediately, like a radar dish picking up a signal, and broke into a shambling run. Sam turned halfway up the steps, but paused a moment, not wishing to waste his shot. He allowed the man to get within five metres of him before pulling the trigger. The bullet hit the man in the jaw, shearing half his face away and spinning him round in a clumsy pirouette. He rolled down the steps, but at the bottom he picked himself up and doggedly started climbing them again. Two more of the infected were now homing in on the steps behind him, but Xian Mei had reached the door and, after putting her box of food down on the floor, tapped in the four- number code.
To her horror the red light failed to change to green. Thinking she must have done it wrong, she tried again, forcing herself to concentrate, knowing that all their lives depended on it.
Once more the red light remained constant.
‘It’s not working!’ she shouted.
Purna put down her own box of food and stepped forward, face set. ‘Let me try.’
Although she was certain she had done it right, Xian Mei knew this was no time to argue. She stepped back and allowed Purna access to the keypad. A few feet away Sam pulled the trigger of his gun and out of the corner of her eye Xian Mei saw the naked man’s head become a crimson spray. As the zombie pitched backwards down the steps, Purna punched in the four-number code. It gave Xian Mei no satisfaction to see the light remain stubbornly red.
‘Shit,’ Purna muttered and stepped away from the door. She turned to assess the situation, raising the shotgun.
Two zombies were coming up the steps towards them, an old man and a teenage girl. The old man was shambling, dragging his left leg behind him; the girl was running, almost scampering, lips drawn back in a snarl, the metal braces on her teeth clogged with blackening meat. Further away, other zombies seemed to be receiving the signal that there was fresh meat to be had here, and were turning round, sniffing the air, homing in.
Clinically, Purna took the girl out, the shotgun blast hitting her right in the centre of her face, reducing her features to pulp.
A few steps below her, Sam glanced round. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Those bastards must have changed the entry code,’ Purna said.
‘How they do that?’
‘They’ve got Dani, remember?’
‘Shit!’
‘We’d better get back to the van and rethink this,’ Purna said.
‘What about the food?’ asked Xian Mei.
‘Leave it.’
They were halfway back down the steps when a chunk of stone exploded less than a metre away from Sam’s foot. He stared at it uncomprehendingly for a split-second and then something whacked into the pavement below, causing a mini-eruption of stone chips.
‘Get down!’ Purna yelled.
Sam ducked instinctively. ‘What the fuck?’
‘They’re firing at us,’ she said, dropping to a crouch, spinning round and pulling the trigger of the shotgun all in the same movement. As the shotgun blast hit the building and Purna hastily reloaded, Sam was aware of Xian Mei, bent almost double, leaping down the steps to his left.
‘Go,’ Purna said. ‘I’ll cover you.’
Knowing — as Xian Mei had done before him — that there was no debating the matter, he ran down the steps, catching up with Xian Mei at the bottom just as she straightened up and fired her flare pistol at a zombie that was still fifteen metres away, but approaching rapidly enough that it would have reached them before they had chance to open the van doors and scramble inside.
The front of the zombie’s shirt burst into flame and a sheet of fire rose up and engulfed its head. It began to stagger around, arms waving like a kid playing blind man’s bluff, as its face browned and sizzled like barbecue meat.
The other zombies were still far enough away for them not to be an immediate problem. Keeping an eye on the burning zombie, Sam pulled open the passenger door of the van and shouted, ‘Get in.’
Throwing her machete into the foot well, Xian Mei dived across the front seat and scrambled upright. Sam climbed in after her, then immediately turned, pointing his gun up at the police station. The oldest of the three guys was at one of the upstairs windows, albeit trying to keep out of sight, the barrel of his hunting rifle resting on the sill. Purna was crouched down, trying to use the steps as cover. Although the nearest of the infected was still twenty metres away from her, they were closing in from all sides.
‘Come on, Purna!’ Sam shouted, and fired a bullet towards the upper window of the police station to demonstrate that he was now in a position to cover
She needed no second bidding. Breaking cover, she ran across to the van, Sam scooting along the seat to give her room to dive in and slam the door shut behind her.
As she was doing it, the door of the police station opened and the tattooed guy ran out, keeping low, and quickly dragged the discarded boxes of food and the pack of water bottles inside. Seeing him, Purna wound down the driver’s window a few inches and stuck the barrel of the shotgun out, but before she could fire he was back inside the building and had closed the door behind him.
‘Bastards,’ she muttered.
‘What—’ Xian Mei began. But before she could complete her question the gloating voice of the scrawny man called out from an upstairs window.
‘Hey, thanks for the food, guys. We’re real sorry that we’re no longer in a position to offer you anything in return. Oh, you can have your boy back, though. We’ve finished with him.’ There was movement at the window and the dead or unconscious body of Dani was dropped out. He hit the ground head-first, his limbs splaying in all directions. The men in the building cackled and whooped as though this was the funniest thing they had ever seen.
‘Think we’ll keep the girl, though,’ the scrawny man said after a moment. ‘We need us a little
The window slammed shut — and their sight of the building was blotted out by a middle-aged man with thinning hair and a punctured eyeball, who lurched into view and snarled in at them through the driver’s side window. Without hesitation, Purna pulled the trigger of the shotgun and his head exploded in a gory confusion of blood, bone, flesh and brain. Yanking the gun back into the van, Purna wound up the window and turned on the engine. With zombies moving in rapidly, she drove away.
Chapter 11. GOING UNDERGROUND
‘I THINK I might know a way.’
Purna and Sam looked at Xian Mei. Once again they had parked in the car park at the back of the supermarket, having needed to find somewhere quiet where they could talk over what to do. In the back of his mind
