The Screaming (Book 2): Refuge Page 6

  Zac turned north and started shuffling along the road, occasionally he hunched over to peer into cars, for signs of life, but for the most part he just blindly pressed on. He passed line after line of cars, trucks and buses, over each brow he paused to take in the vastness of the next meandering valley ahead, a carbon copy of the last with thousands of vehicles snaking for miles ahead.

  Tiredness was once again his biggest enemy and progress through the forest of cars, turned into a hunt for safe shelter to rest. Zac started trying car doors as he hobbled along the road, but found that, when fleeing for their lives from cannibalistic packs of people and nuclear fallout, people were very security conscious, habit was ingrained and tenacious refugees tended to lock their vehicles despite the hasty abandoning of them. Tired hysteria forced a chuckle from Zac at the notion, until he tried the door of a nice looking Mercedes and the alarm surged into life with its repetitive drone and flashing headlights. He sharply scurried on, checking over his shoulder as he went, in case the foolish error had alerted a nearby horde of infected.

  Before long he was braving more door handles as the alarm faded far behind. Until a door clicked open on an old family Volvo. He paused in surprise, before swiftly jumping on the back seat. An old tartan blanket that covered the tatty upholstery made for a sufficient cover as he laid himself down across the tan leather. With his head resting on a child seat, he fell asleep.

  A steady clattering of heavy rain drops on the aluminium roof briskly increased, until an angry torrential shower bombarded the car. Zac woke with a fright and sat straight up, checking every window for threats, until he realised the source of the sudden noise. He gripped the thin blanket tightly around his neck and slumped back into the squeaky dated leather of the seat. He stared at the seatback in front of him, where an elasticated leather pocket held a selection of children’s colouring books and empty sweet packets. He reached for the packets but found nothing but traces of sugar in the corner of a bag of fruit pastels. All devoured by a greedy toddler, even the green ones.

  He couldn’t remember when he last ate, it simply hadn’t been something that had entered his head, with all that had been going on. But now he’d stopped, his body felt weak and empty. He leaned forward, checking the glovebox, which was as barren as his stomach. Then he noticed a bag in the front passenger foot well. He grabbed the nylon strap and hoisted the bag up. He slumped back onto the rear seat with the bag landing on his lap. He groaned with the sudden burst of activity that his muscles were in no state to have attempted and cursed himself for his idiocy.

  He hurriedly tugged at the zip that ran across the top of the bright purple holdall and lifted the flap. It was a baby changing bag. Nappies, towels and cream were pulled from its interior and discarded on the seat to Zac’s left as he desperately perused the contents. Nothing of use in the main compartment. Disheartened he ripped at a Velcro flap that covered a side pocket, and revealed a small jar of baby food and a bottle of milk.

  “Chicken Casserole, hardly!” Zac uttered to himself as he read the label on the jar.

  He unscrewed the lid, which opened with a pop and wildly devoured the cold stew. He scooped chucks of chicken and vegetables with his dirt covered fingers until the jar was clean and was promptly discarded on the seat with the rest of the bags contents. He then took up the bottle of baby milk and started desperately sucking at the teat like a neglected piglet. It wasn’t until he was half way through the bottle that he realised it would be easier to unscrew the lid and drink the milk and it wasn’t until it had all gone that the possibility of it being breast milk as opposed to formula, crossed his mind. He discarded the bottle with a shrug of his shoulders, feeling strangely satisfied with his meal.

  Several hours passed and as an unfamiliar dusk drew across the countryside, the rain eased and the wind calmed. The car windows had misted up completely and Zac became increasingly nervous and paranoid at what might lurk on the other side of the thin glass. It was time to move on, he felt. He shuffled to the door, slowly pulled the handle and pushed the door open. He was instantly hit with the oddly warm air from outside. He had expected a cool breeze and was surprised by the temperate feel.

  He hobbled out of the car, cautiously looking around for signs of movement. The road was still and chillingly quiet. Zac had a sudden feeling of solitude. He had never felt so alone, even in London. He gripped the old blanket around his neck and slowly walked on.

  The rows of cars and other discarded vehicles, slowly started to thin out, the further North he travelled. He reached the scene of a crash where a bus had collided with a small car. Emergency vehicles flanked the scene, with stretchers, and equipment in abundance. The remains of victims lolled within the distorted car, cold, pale and blooded. It was instantly clear to Zac that they had been abandoned by those who had come to save them, as the infected converged.

  Several hundred yards further along, a large green road sign loomed over the roadside beneath a flickering yellow light. It contained two white arrows, one indicating up which read, “A1 NORTH” the second pointed left indicating to an off-road, which read, “RAF ALCONBURY.” Several paces further along and another sign marked the exit ramp. The off-road wheeled away to the left before swooping around and over the top of the carriageway, upon a humdrum concrete bridge that lacked design and embellishment.

  A large yellow banner draped from the bridge wall over the top of the road. It spanned a third of the bridge’s width and the message that had been hastily scrawled in large black writing read, “AID, SHELTER, REFUGE” Three simple words followed by a messy arrow which pointed off to the East. Zac scrutinised the horizon, over the fields and trees. He held little hope that any such place would still be around after all he’d seen, but a distant orange glow of lights, reflecting off the black misty sky offered some glimmer of promise.

  A recurrent interval of evacuation signs lined the narrow road up to the camp entrance. A small roundabout fronted the main gates of the former US Air Force base. Off to the left an old jet fighter on a display plinth greeted visitors, a relic from a more civilised time. Abandoned cars crammed every stone of the roads off to the left and right. Floodlights beyond the entrance gates spluttered and coughed with the wain of failing generators. The entrance gates themselves were dark and lifeless. Nine foot tall razor wire fences, spanned the perimeter and sand bagged machine gun posts flanked the barricades behind a sheltered search bay. His seeping blooded feet, slowly carried Zac towards the gates. He squinted into the shadows of the search bay, meticulously combing every recess for friend or foe, as he shuffled forward.

  A blinding dazzle of burning white light suddenly irradiated Zac in an overwhelmingly vulnerable bubble of luminosity. It was a spot light from a large scaffold tower, situated just beyond the gates that had gone unnoticed in the blackness by the exhausted refugee.

  “HALT, GET ON YOUR KNEES AND PLACE YOUR HANDS ON YOUR HEAD.” The precisely punctuated instruction boomed from the dark with a broad Texan twang.

  Zac raised a hand to cup his eyes from the blinding spotlight and peered in the general direction of the barking yell.

  “ON YOUR KNEES OR WE WILL FIRE.” Another voice, this time an English accent.

  Such instructions were lost on Zac, he understood the words, but fatigue had drained him of comprehension. However with almost perfect timing, his legs buckled and he blacked out.

  The cavernous echo of petrified whispers and whimpering cries slowly penetrated Zac’s semi-conscious mind. He opened his stinging eyes to a high ceiling of interlaced girders, a few dozen spotlights hung at equal intervals across the roof, each humming with a dull buzz. He quickly realised he was laid out on a firm cot bed, and covered in his old damp tartan blanket. A stainless steel pole stood to his left, hanging from a loop at its top was the remains of a clear bag of intravenous solution, which was connected by a long plastic tube and cannula in his right arm.

  Suddenly the light above Zac’s head was eclipsed by the silhouette of a male figure lu
rching over him.

  “Hello, welcome back.” The male said through a protective face mask and clear plastic googles.

  He leaned closer to Zac and removed something from a chest pocket on his white coat with his latex gloved hand. A stethoscope hung lazily around the man’s neck and Zac quickly realised he was a medical man. He tried to speak, but instantly found his throat tighten and scratch, managing only a dry, laboured cough. The man raised a torch and shone it in Zac’s left eye, moving it from left to right, before he repeated the procedure in his right eye.

  “Good. Now rest.” The man uttered, before quickly scurrying away.”

  All was silent as he woke again. He felt around for the comforts of his bed back home, before realising his surroundings did not have the familiar feel of cotton sheets and memory foam mattress. That moment of comfort, safety and illusion of home, was quickly exorcised and the veracity of his true predicament came into the forefront of his mind. He tried in vain to get back to that happy place, squeezing his eyes shut and denying the outside world entry into his thoughts, but it was too late.

  The sounds of the hangar resonated around the giant metallic dome, crying children being comforted by traumatised parents and people stretched out on gurneys and cot beds, writhing in pain, both physical and mental. Zac slowly raised himself onto the palms of his hands and took in his surroundings. Hundreds of cot beds, lined the huge interior. Families huddled together in dark corners, stunned by their individual journeys of torment and left as cowering shells. Off to his right a trellis table stood, adorned with an urn of hot coffee, a large bowl of chicken soup and boxes of Styrofoam cups.

  Masked doctors hurried from bed to bed, tending to people, as armed soldiers in black respirators stood guard on each doorway. Zac noticed the difference in uniforms and weapons of the guards, both American and British soldiers watched the crowds intently. As he surveyed his body, he discovered that the drip into his arm had been removed, though the cannula remained. His worn shoes had been removed and his feet, were strapped in tape and bandages while several of his cuts and gashes had been tended to and sutured.

  “How do you feel?” He recognised the voice of the doctor from earlier in the night.

  Zac looked up to see the masked, slight figure of the greying old man in a stained white coat. His shirt and tie, hung loosely from his neck like a child in a new school uniform and his hands rested in his clown sized coat pockets.

  “Better, thank you.” Zac replied.

  The old physician handed Zac a bottle of water, which was snatched and drained in moments with a gasp for air in conclusion.

  “Thirsty?” The doctor sniggered.

  “Sorry” Zac replied.

  The doctor reached into his chest pocket, Zac readied himself for another eye exam, but instead the doctor pulled out a big blue marker pen, took hold of Zac’s fingers and drew a big blue line on the back of his hand.

  “What’s that for?” Zac quizzed.

  “You’re NI, not immune! Oh and free of infection.” The doctor replied with an awkward thumbs up.

  “Oh… What about radiation?” Zac asked.

  “Radiation? Oh I wouldn’t worry about that. We’ll get you cleaned up.” The doctor said.

  “Time to go. We need your bed!” The doctor sniggered again before standing and shouting across to two waiting soldiers.

  “ONE FOR PROCESSING.” The old doctor bellowed, before turning to another bed.

  The soldiers stomped towards Zac, who slowly raised himself to his feet with a wince. He gasped through gritted teeth as his feet took his weight once again. He scanned the underside of the cot bed for his shoes, but they were nowhere to be seen. The two soldiers weaved their way through a maze of beds until they reached Zac, who flinched in the tartan blanket he had again secured around his shoulders. The American troops clomped to a halt at the foot of the cot bed. They were wearing camouflaged radiation suits, each donned with a blue arm band on their right arm. Their M4 rifles hung low on slings down by their sides and their respirators had fogged up from the heavy stomp across the hangar.

  “This way sir.” One of the soldiers said, as he checked the marking on Zac’s hand.

  They marched off, flanking Zac front and rear, through the field of beds and past the old doctor, who was leaning over the bed of a small boy. Zac looked at the crusty healer as he hobbled by and watched as he gave the young child an awkward thumbs up, before marking his hand with a red marker pen and signalling to a waiting detail of soldiers, wearing red arm bands.

  The soldiers lead Zac through a set of plastic curtains that had been hurriedly taped across a set of double doors, out of the hangar and down a dark corridor.

  “Where are you taking me?” Zac nervously asked.

  “It’s all good, sir.” One of the soldiers assured.

  Another set of double doors loomed ahead, again dressed in a wall of thick plastic curtains that barely allowed the lights beyond to penetrate. The lead soldier breached the plastic screen without breaking stride, allowing the heavy plastic to slap back in Zac’s face, causing him to recoil and reverse into the vast room. He turned to find himself inside another vast hangar, several times larger than the last. Tens of tents, screens and caged areas, filled the massive concrete floor space. A large line of storage containers lined one wall, fronted by military ambulances and soldiers patrolling the perimeter of the huge accumulation of temporary military structures.

  The two escorts lead Zac across a short open stretch of hangar floor until they reached the first structure. It wasn’t your normal family camping tent, but a large yellow cylindrical inflatable room, with heavy duty tarpaulin doors. A sign read, “DECON 4.”

  “This way sir!” The lead escort uttered, indicating into the big yellow dome.

  “Thanks.” Zac nodded, before stepping into the tent.

  The extent of the interior took Zac by surprise almost as much as what he quickly learned was the purpose of the tent. The large room was further separated into four areas. Within each area stood a person. The furthest two areas contained males and the closest two females, all four were completely naked. Each was being attended to by a figure wearing an orange plastic radiation suit, who firmly grasped stiff wooden brushes in both hands. A further figure walked between all four, spraying them with a powerful hose pipe.

  “Remove your clothes please sir.” The gruff female voice bellowed from his right.

  Zac looked up to see a chubby, middle-aged woman emerge from behind thick grey smoke, emanating from a blackened metal bin. She also wore an orange radiation suit and grasped a large wooden brush in her bloated rubber gloves. Glowing embers respired from within the burning cylinder to her left as she taped the brush handle on the bins rim with a rhythmical enthusiasm. Zac froze, confused by the request and the indignity of its delivery.

  “Come on, Chop! Chop!” She persisted.

  Zac achingly began to pull at his t-shirt, but his lethargy had clearly irritated the sturdy old lady, who had seemingly covered the space between Zac and the bin in moments and proceeded in wrenching the sodden coverings from his body. Soon Zac was down to his underwear and though he couldn’t see her mouth through the mask, he could tell from the raised rosy cheeks that the old girl was smiling.

  “Nice Pants.” She teased, looking at the tatty “Space Invader” shorts.

  Soon Zac was stood naked, cupping his chilly dignity in both hands as his clothes smouldered in the bin. He looked down at his anaemic malnourished body in utter shock. Through the veil of bruises, cuts and grazes, slouched a feeble shell that he found frighteningly unrecognisable. The old woman wasted no time. She took hold of a large white bottle that read, “DISINFECTANT,” unscrewed the cap and poured a generous amount of the cold gelatinous liquid over Zac’s head.

  “Arms up!” She barked.

  Cupping his dignity was now a redundant endeavour as the cold liquid seeped into every cranny. He slowly raised his arms and the acute impaling brush head began tearing across
his body. Every so often the pain of the brush raking his flesh was quelled by the surprising relief of a firm jet of cold water from the hose wielding narcissist at the centre of the room. The intense cold soon started to hurt more than the brush, until he could no longer feel the overzealous scrubbing.

  “NEXT!” The old scrubber unceremoniously yelled, as she stepped back from Zac and waved him forward.

  He was shepherded towards the rear of the tent like sheep through dip and emerged through a tent flap into another room. On the floor in front of him stood a large metal tray full of a fine white powder.

  “Into the tray please.” Came a voice from the far end.

  A young soldier in a radiation suit, hovered next to several large cardboard boxes in the far corner of the room. Zac looked at the tray of powder and stepped into it then looked up at the soldier expectantly.

  “Good, Right, now you need to coat yourself in it. Just like talcum powder.”

  Zac sniggered at the absurdity of the request, but continued applying the powder regardless.

  “Good, now step to me.” The soldier ordered.

  Zac stood as still as his shivering bag of bones would allow, while the soldier waved a small green device in front of his body like an airport metal detector.

  “It’s okay, I’m just checking for radiation!” The soldier said, sensing Zac’s unease.

  Then placing the detector on a chair, the soldier turned to the cardboard boxes and rifled through whilst muttering to himself.

  “Here, these should fit.” He said, handing Zac a grey tracksuit top and matching trousers.

  “Shoe size?”

  “Erm! 9.” Zac had to think.