The same eerie message, read by the same female in the same monotone voice, was playing on three different channels. As the warning repeated, Kingsley realised that James was displaying most, if not all, of the symptoms listed.
It didn’t seem like this day could get any worse.
Then – having feasted on most of the dead – the zombies outside moved in search of more food.
Kingsley looked up as the interior of the SUV darkened to see several of them shrouding the car like a mob of rioters. They banged on the doors, the windscreen, the roof, their opaque eyes fixed on the four inside.
6.
Kingsley, Eric and Sammy were silent as they stared into the glassy, lifeless eyes of the zombies.
They were silent long enough for James to start shifting in his seat, his breaths getting heavier. He was rousing.
Kingsley rubbed James’ shoulder as he stirred, imagining the horror he would feel when he regained consciousness and saw what was outside the car. He needed to put James at ease.
“What... what did you say?” James slurred as his eyes fluttered open, visibly confused. They all leaned toward the passenger seat.
“It’s okay, James,” Sammy said, her voice croaking. “You just passed out. We were camping, remember? Then we left because there was an accident on the road near the woods, and... and we were trying to get to Braintree but the A120 was blocked. Do you remember that?”
James coughed, then looked around at each of them. “Ugh... My arm is burning. Seriously, it feels like it’s on fire.”
“Just take it easy,” Kingsley said. “We’ve got this under control.”
“What's under contr—” James seemed to focus then on the zombies outside for the first time since he’d woken. He just stared at them – snapping their jaws and licking the windows, drooling blood-laced saliva down the glass – and blinked several times, as if he thought he was hallucinating.
“Oh shit,” James said. He looked down at the bite mark on his lower arm. “I remember... what happened.” He turned back to the others. “What are we going to do? Are we trapped?”
“I’m working on it,” Kingsley said. “We should be safe in here for now. It doesn’t look like they’re getting in anytime soon, at least.”
Eric had sat in contemplative silence for a while now, watching the zombies outside with a glazed expression. Just then, he spoke in a calm, level tone. “I know what to do.”
Everyone faced Eric, waiting for him to tell them his plan. Eric always had been the best at improvisation, always the most focused in the toughest of situations. And now hope shined in the eyes of the rest of the group.
Eric nodded at the bags in the front of the car that they had retrieved from the campsite on their way to the vehicles. “First we need weapons. We can use James’ ukulele.”
Everyone went quiet again. If they weren’t in such a serious predicament, Kingsley might have laughed at that point.
Sammy frowned, shook her head. “Eric, what are we supposed to do with—”
“A ukulele is hard enough to do some damage. We can use it to defend ourselves against those zombies outside, along with whatever else we can find in here that’ll hurt. If we draw the zombies towards this side of the car” – Eric tapped on his window – “then we can open up a gap on that side, and we can jump out.”
“Wait,” James said. “I can’t fight. I’m too weak right now, and my arm…”
“You don’t have to fight, James. You either, Sammy, if you don’t want to. But we’re going out there – it’s the only way. And I need someone to have my back.”
“I’ll do it,” said Sammy.
“I’m with you too,” Kingsley added.
“Good.” Eric reached forward and grabbed the headrest of the passenger seat in front of him, pressed the two buttons on the sockets that the plugs of the headrest slotted into. Nobody questioned him as he released the headrest and knocked on the window with the metal plugs a few times.
Eric nodded to himself, then began to explain. “The plugs on these are designed to be hard enough to break the windows on a car. It’s a safety measure. So, if you’re trapped in your car and you need to get out but the doors won’t open, you can detach the headrests and smash the windows with them.”
“Right.” Kingsley followed Eric’s train of thought. “If they’re strong enough to break the windows, they can be used as a weapon.”
“Exactly,” Eric said.
It was probably the talk of weapons that caused Sammy to remember; all of a sudden, she straightened up in her seat and, with a wavering look of courage on her face, reminded them that she had brought her Swiss pocket knife from the camping gear with her. She pulled it out of her pocket and flicked the blade up. It was sharp enough to inflict some serious harm.
“Good. Now we just need a distraction.” Eric rapped his knuckles against the window, observing how the zombies reacted to his hand. They followed it with their glassy grey eyes as he moved it up and down, side to side, in front of their unchanging faces. Some of them tried to bite Eric’s fist through the glass of the window or grab it with their own hands.
Their desperate hunger for Eric’s flesh prompted Kingsley to think about trying to give them food. He had an unopened pack of bacon in his bag that he’d been saving for a breakfast at the campsite. Maybe that could be their distraction. It might not work. Kingsley hadn’t seen the zombies eat anything but the flesh of other people yet, but they were clearly hungry.
Maybe the virus – whatever it was making people act like this – did something strange to their appetites. Maybe the zombies were just starving, to the point where a primal response had been triggered in their brain, causing them to violently seek out anything to eat
