diversions to plough down two meandering cadavers which pointlessly stumbled after them.
Breathlessly, and without saying another word, the men motored back to the warehouse.
Inside the building Emma had managed to find the two remaining soldiers who had disappeared in fear of their lives. They were hiding together in a large storeroom.
‘Just leave us alone,’ one of the soldiers spat as they heard Emma approaching. His voice was high-pitched and strained, full of desperation and fear. ‘That bloke’s a fucking psychopath. He’s always been the same. He’ll fucking kill us.’
The frightened trooper cowered away in the shadows.
Metres away from him Kelly Harcourt pressed herself back against a storage rack hoping she would melt into the shadows, her heart thumping in her chest.
‘He’s no psychopath,’ Emma said as she took a few cautious steps further into the room, trying to pinpoint the exact location of the two frightened figures. ‘He’s a survivor, that’s all.’ She peered into the room, sure that she had just seen a flicker of movement. ‘You’d probably have done the same if you were in his position.’
She didn’t find it easy defending Cooper’s virtually indefensible actions, no matter how relieved she was that he had acted so quickly. She’d also forgotten that, many weeks ago now, these two troopers had served alongside him. Perhaps there was much about his character they knew that she didn’t.
‘He’ll do it again,’ the male soldier whimpered. ‘All he’s got to do is open our suits and we’ve fucking had it.
That’s all that any of you have to do.’
‘But no-one’s going to do that to you, are they?’ Emma sighed. ‘Why the hell would we?’
‘You’ll do it if you have to,’ Harcourt shouted, the sudden volume and direction of her voice giving her location away. ‘You’d kill us just as quickly as you get rid of those bloody things outside.’
‘Personally I couldn’t, but maybe you’re right, maybe some people could. The point is we shouldn’t have to. The only reason that Cooper did what he did was to safeguard the group. He’s just looking out for himself and for the rest of us, that’s all. As long as you don’t do anything to put us at risk, you’ll be okay and…’
She stopped talking. Just ahead and to her right Kelly Harcourt slumped against the racking and slid down to the ground. Emma could see one of her feet sticking out into an aisle. She slowly walked towards her and crouched down at the side of the terrified soldier. Her facemask was clouded and blurred with condensation. She lifted her head and looked up at Emma.
‘I don’t know what to do,’ Harcourt admitted, struggling to keep her composure. The anger and fear in her voice had suddenly given way to desperation and pain. ‘I can’t handle this.’
‘It’s all right,’ Emma soothed, putting a gentle hand on her shoulder. ‘We’re all struggling to handle this, we just drag ourselves along from day to day.’ She paused, not sure if Harcourt was listening or whether it was even worth continuing. ‘Listen, I don’t believe in bullshit so I’ll be straight with you, you two have got the worst deal of all here. You’re stuck between a rock and a hard place. You’re trapped in those bloody suits and it must be hell, but you don’t have much of a choice, do you? You can try and get back to your base, you can stay here or you can come with us. Like I said, as long as you don’t put anyone at risk then…’
‘Then what?’ she demanded. ‘Then your friend won’t kill us.’
Emma sighed with frustration. She stood up and began to walk back towards the door, keen to get back to the others.
‘Look, we’re too busy trying to keep ourselves alive here. No-one’s interested in killing you.’
Without waiting for a response she turned and walked away.
Strangely calm and uncharacteristically oblivious to the potential threat of the growing crowd of restless bodies on the other side of the chain-link fence, the survivors readied themselves to leave. Their brief and unexpected respite at the warehouse had given them precious time to regroup and reorganise themselves and the arrival of Lawrence and Chase in the early hours had given some direction to their frantic and previously directionless escape from the bunker.
Now without the motorhome many of the group had been crammed into the back of the personnel carrier, which had proved to be slightly less cramped and more comfortable than the back of the prison truck. Cooper took the wheel of the military vehicle with Peter Guest at his side while Steve Armitage took up his now familiar seat at the controls of the second truck. Armitage had begun to fiercely guard his position. Apart from the fact that very few other people could have driven the truck, the responsibility, power and control which he attached to the role made him feel worthwhile and alive. Strange, he thought, that what had previously always felt like such an ordinary and menial task should now give him such purpose.
Fewer survivors travelled in the back of the prison truck than on earlier journeys. The spare space was taken up by the supplies and equipment which the group had stripped from the warehouse. Just a handful of people travelled in the final vehicle in the convoy - the bright red and uncomfortably conspicuous post van. Donna sat in the driver’s seat with Jack Baxter on the passenger side and Clare sat between them. Behind them were the two remaining soldiers, surrounded by yet more supplies.
Donna watched them in her mirror. Harcourt seemed genuinely afraid and didn’t appear to be a threat. Her male colleague, however, was far more unpredictable and less trustworthy. His name (she had recently discovered) was Kilgore. A short, wiry-framed and nervous man, he was too jittery and agitated for her liking.
Fifteen minutes earlier Lawrence and Chase had left in the helicopter, taking with them two of the younger survivors. The remaining group of people had crowded round and watched in awe as the powerful machine had lifted up into the clear blue early morning sky. Having spent weeks underground and cowering away in the silent shadows, to witness the aircraft rise with such majesty, strength and sheer bloody noise and arrogance had been a humbling and strangely emotional experience. As the helicopter disappeared into the distance the sounds made by the rabid bodies smashing themselves furiously against the metal fence had suddenly seemed louder than ever. The closeness and anger of corpses reminded the survivors of the relentless danger which faced each one of them.
Before leaving Cooper and Guest had gathered the other drivers around them to talk about the proposed route in detail one last time. It was crucial that they all knew the route and the potential problems they might face along the way. Using road atlases he had found in the warehouse, Guest had highlighted the directions they needed to take and had quickly handwritten a set of rough notes to be carried in each vehicle. He was desperately keen to share with the others the information which Richard Lawrence had earlier shared with him.
‘You see,’ he explained, talking with unprecedented energy and interest, ‘they’ve obviously not had to spend much time on the ground and so this was the most direct route they were able to come up with. Now I’ve not personally spent a lot of time in this part of the country so I’m not completely sure where we’re…’
‘Do me a favour,’ Armitage sighed, ‘just shut up and let me have my bloody map, will you?’
Undeterred, Guest continued.
‘Lawrence told me that they’ve not seen any particularly large gatherings of bodies between here and Bigginford.’
‘What’s large supposed to mean?’ asked Cooper.
‘Twenty-five of them? Two thousand? Half a million?’
‘Don’t know,’ he quickly admitted, keen to continue with his explanation. ‘Anyway it looks like we’ll be able to stick to the motorways for a good part of the journey.
They’re probably not going to be clear, but from what they’ve seen from the air they think we should be able to work our way through.’
‘What about cities?’ Jack Baxter anxiously wondered.
‘We’re going to stay away from the cities as best we can, aren’t we?’
‘We’d like to,’ Cooper answered quickly, deliberately denying Guest the opportunity to respond, ‘but we’ve got to try and balance out safety and risk. To get to Bigginford we’re going to have to get pretty close to the centre of Rowley.’
‘What does pretty close mean?’ Armitage demanded.
‘Like I said, it’s going to be about balancing safety with risk. If we bypass Rowley then you’re right, we’ll probably avoid a whole load of potential trouble spots. The problem is, we’ll also end up adding a hell of a lot of distance and time onto the length of the journey. Obviously we’ll be in a better position to make a final decision when we’re nearer to getting there, but personally my opinion is that we’ll be better off following this route. I’d rather take a chance and take the quicker option than risk running out of fuel because we’ve driven further than we
