He pushed the wooden hatchway. It didn’t budge.
Readjusting his position, Ali braced himself and pushed again. Still the hatch didn’t move.
He dropped his arms a few inches and then slammed the palms of his hands into the wood. In its neglected frame, the hatch squeaked and lifted up by the tiniest of margins. Ali battered the hatch again and again in quick succession. The cover separated further from the frame with each heavy pound. Then with a groan it was free. He pushed it clear and slid it out of the way.
There was another groan but this time it came from bellow. Ali slowly turned and looked down. Two landings below the lone zombie was looking up at him. The expression on its vacant face could have been mistaken for disbelief. Its head craned up on its stiff neck and its mouth opened. A foul, flat-keyed wail bellowed from its dead lungs.
The droning horde on the first floor, which up until now had been intently concentrating on the door Ali had disappeared behind, turned their heads up in unison. Their dull monotonous chant raised a pitch with excitement.
“Ah, bollocks,” Ali said.
He tossed the rucksack and the hook into the loft space. He placed a foot on the stairwell’s railing and stretched upwards. The chair beneath slipped and clattered to the floor. With his right foot precariously on the handrail, Ali pushed himself up.
The slapping footfalls of the undead horde on the stairs mingled with the alarming chorus and Ali’s own strenuous grunts. He wriggled up and wedged his elbows into the hatch frame. He spread his forearms out, feeling for something solid to gain a grip of. Finding the flat surface of wooden beams, he heaved himself up. He writhed and twisted trying to haul himself up, but he wasn’t a fit man. The years of confinement in their warehouse sanctuary and starvation diet had robbed him of his strength.
The encroaching zombie saw Ali’s head and shoulders disappear through the access hatch. But like a worm on a hook his torso and legs wriggled and squirmed.
The sweat dripped off Ali’s brow and he panted with the exertion. He just didn’t have the muscle to lever himself up and with every moment of struggle the strength drained from him.
Then his foot caught something.
The panic coursed through him. It could be only one thing. A hand grasped at Ali’s ankle. Instinctively he lashed out, kicking in all directions. The hands grabbed his foot and drew it in for the inevitable bite.
Ali stomped his foot down, trying to kick the creature away. Miraculously his stamp found the zombie’s shoulder. With his shove he knocked the zombie back and at the same time propelled himself those vital few inches further up. His blood saturated with fresh adrenaline, it was enough for him to scramble through the opening.
Ali paused for a moment to snatch a breath before turning and looking back through the hatch. The cadaver was directly underneath, its arms stretching up in a futile attempt to catch its prey.
Ali showed the zombie his middle finger.
“Fuck you, you fucking dead fuck!” he screamed at the corpse. It wasn’t the most eloquent of taunts, but the rant felt cathartic.
Ali sat back for a minute to catch his breath. His shoulder ached; undoubtedly he’d strained muscles in the adrenaline-charged tussle. The stairwell below was becoming quite crowded. More and more zombies had found their way up the stairs and were stretching their arms up for him in what looked like some kind of supplicant salute.
“You are not eating me today, so go fuck off.”
Ali made a shooing motion with his hand. It had no effect.
Then Ali’s eyes were drawn to someone familiar. In the gathering crowd below stood Ray. He had lost his signature glasses and his skin was painted in his own fresh blood.
The corpse of his friend shuffled his way up the stairs, head cocked arms outstretched. It was a painful sight to see a friend consumed by the infection, to see them mindlessly searching for anyone to contaminate.
Ali picked up the hatch and put it back in place, blocking out the sight below.
The roof space went black. He sat for a moment letting his eyes adjust to the lack of light and listened to the muffled moans. Under the insidious call of the dead there was a soft cooing coming from somewhere in the loft. With a flutter of wings, a plump bird hopped out of the eaves, bobbing its head like it was dancing to a powerful beat.
Ali recalled people’s distain towards pigeons. ‘Rats with wings’ he’d heard on numerous occasions. Sure they were opportunists, but so was he now.
His mind wandered back to a forlorn-looking bird that had been brought into the animal shelter where he’d worked. The underweight bird had hobbled, unable to stand, its right claw tangled in a mess of fishing line. He’d gently snipped the line free, but the claw had been too badly injured to be saved. It was a stark equation for an animal charity. Treat the wound and then release the bird knowing its chances of survival were low, or put it down and spend the money on a creature with a better chance. The cash-strapped centre had made the economical choice.
As his eyes became accustomed to the dark, the small chinks of light breaking in through the gap between the roof and the building fabric were just enough to work by. He could open the hatch and let light in from the hallway below, but he preferred the psychological comfort of the closed hatch.
A barrier between him and his dead friend.
Crouching down in this tomb of rock, wool, and plaster sheeting, Ali got to work. He prized the insulating boards down from the eaves and then started smashing through to the tiles. It wasn’t long before the first beam of daylight streamed through the punctured roof.
Spurred on by the daylight, Ali hacked at the roof with renewed strength. Within minutes there was a hole big enough for him to climb through. He stuck his head out of the fissure like a bizarre parody of a prairie dog. He looked around and got his bearings.
The pitch of the roof was quite steep and he didn’t fancy his chances if he had to scramble up it. Across the street the fire had finally leapt to the adjacent buildings and pillars of smoke billowed skyward. Ali was thankful the wind was blowing the clouds away from him. But that same wind was foreboding. A sharp gust or misplaced foot and Ali feared he would slip from the roof and fall into the mob of zombies filling the street.
No, he would not simply sit astride the roof waiting for his rescue, he decided.
Ali picked up the metal rod again and started remodelling.
Within a few hours Ali had dislodged a good portion of the roof, producing a rubble-hewn veranda. He pitched the tent he’d retrieved from the zombie backpacker and set up the camp stove. He brewed himself another coffee, and half in the sleeping back sat back sipping the beverage, waiting for his rescue.
Chapter Nineteen
Trigger
“Hold your fire!” Cahz cried. “Hold fire!” he called again, this time forcing Ryan’s arm down. “Cease fire!”
The railway line fell silent.
Ryan’s daughter was screaming, shocked by the crescendo of gunfire.
“Calm down,” Cahz said. “We don’t have much ammo left.”
“I shat myself,” Ryan protested, his gun still aimed at the undergrowth.
“It was just a fucking rabbit.”
“Yeah.” Ryan waved the gun in the general direction. “Well, when it came crashing through that bush, I didn’t know that, did I?”
“You shouldn’t have shot at it, let alone blast away like Yosemite Sam!” Cahz barked. “How many shots did you waste?”
“You didn’t even hit the fucking thing,” Cannon chipped in.
