Part 3 (1/2)
”And licked the walls clean for good measure,” Chester added.
”But its right there. Surely its worth looking,” Jay said.
”Sugar might make life sweeter, but you cant live on it,” Nilda said. ”We have to keep focused. The Geiger counter first, and then the farms in Kent. How do we get into the airport?”
”Its a single runway, built out onto water that forms a sort of marina,” Chester said. ”Not like the ones near the Tower, there were too many security concerns to let boats come and go as they liked. Access to the marina was through a lock that well get to in about five minutes, and Im pretty sure that it was open when we pa.s.sed it on our way down from Hull.”
It was. Chester had to turn the engine on to pilot the small boat through the narrow channel that led to the airport. When he switched it off, there was a brief moment of quiet, suddenly interrupted by a banging clatter from above as the undead clawed at the high-sided metal barriers of the road bridge under which they pa.s.sed. Nilda scanned the quay to either side, but there were no other zombies in sight. Nevertheless, as they puttered away from the lock and bridge, and the sound slowly faded, she thought it an inauspicious start to their quest.
”And thats the airport,” Chester whispered though the comment was unnecessary. They could all see the planes, dozens parked, others crashed with wings jutting straight up, almost like plaintive hands reaching to the sky, but their collective attention was on a tail wing sticking out of the water at the runways end.
”Thats a 747,” Tuck signed.
”It was a short runway,” Chester said. ”Theyd fly to Europe and not much further. I suppose that plane was out of fuel and had nowhere else to go. The terminals over there.” He pointed down the long stretch of water at the cl.u.s.ter of large warehouse-like buildings at the far western end of the cluttered runway.
”How close can you get the boat?” Nilda asked.
”You want to risk turning the engines on?”
”Look at how many planes there are. Fifty? A hundred? If they all came in carrying the undead, and if those zombies are still there, Id rather know before we climb up.”
Chester turned the engine on and steered a course parallel to the runway. When he pulled the boat up against a steep set of stairs next to a series of pontoons floating lazily in the water, no undead had appeared.
”You know what a Geiger counter looks like?” Jay asked Chester as Tuck tied the boat to one of the pontoons.
”Yep,” Chester said.
”Good,” Jay said. ”Then Tuck and Ill sort out the rafts. You go and find one.”
”I think one of us should stay on the boat,” Nilda said with unsubtle subtext.
”Theres no room for pa.s.sengers now, Mum.”
”You wouldnt be a pa.s.senger,” she said. ”Youd be making sure we had a safe way out.”
”Nowheres safe, not until we make it that way,” Jay replied. ”And two teams are quicker than one, and quicker is safer.”
”Then you should come with me,” Nilda insisted.
”Chester, do you know sign language?” Jay asked.
”You know that I dont,” he said.
”Then its settled. Tuck and I are a team. Weve done this before. Well be fine.”
Nilda was again reminded how much her son had changed, but as much as she hated it, she knew he was right.
”Fine. Chester and I will go and find the Geiger counter. You get the rafts. Well be back here in... I dont know. An hour?”
”Right. And youll signal if you get into trouble?” Jay asked.
”If we get into trouble,” Chester said, patting his pocket, ”youll hear the shots.”
Wanting to skip forward to the point where she and her son were once more on the relative safety of the boat, Nilda climbed up onto the runway. She was stunned by what she saw. For five hundred metres to the east, the runway jutted out into the water. A hundred metres to the west, the site widened and spread, with windowed warehouse-like buildings ringing the landing strip in a U-shape of unequal height and depth. Going by the position of the train station on the maps shed poured over back at the fortress, the pa.s.senger side of the airport was in the southeastern corner. On every available patch of tarmac between her and those buildings were planes. They were a mix of single engine, twin props, and jets, and all were parked wingtip to window. She recognised a few of the paint schemes as those of commercial carriers, a few more as being obviously privately owned, but most were burned and broken beyond recognition.
There was a narrow path down the centre of the runway. At first, Nilda thought that it had been deliberately left clear, but as she took another step forward, she realised that it was the result of the 747s failed landing. Though there was still enough clearance for one of the small-winged planes to set down, the runway was so littered with charred debris that any attempt would end in a crash.
Her foot kicked against something. It skidded across the tarmac with a jangling tinkle of metal. Looking down, she saw a twisted seat buckle still attached to a few inches of singed belt. The sound brought her back to where, and when, she was. She looked and listened, but there was no sign of the undead, nor could she hear their ominous shuffling wheeze.
”Stay safe,” she said, turning to Jay. ”And stay close to the boat.” She nodded to Chester, and the two of them set off at a jog towards the terminal.
Rafts ”Which plane should we start with?” Jay asked.
Tuck looked around, taking in the wreckage. ”Not all planes had rafts,” she signed.
”Okay,” Jay said. ”So, which ones did?”
Tuck shrugged and pointed at a twin-engine jet with a set of steps pushed up to the open door. ”That one. The stairs will save us the climb.” Their presence also meant that the pa.s.sengers had exited the aircraft. Tuck didnt want to enter one of those planes and find it full of the dead, or worse, the undead. Not now, not today. She was tired, and in a way she hadnt felt in months, not since she and Jay had first arrived at Kirkman House. Then it had been the shock of finding a group of survivors and discovering that civilisation had been reduced to a handful of people using ramshackle rooftop walkways to scavenge from the remains of a dead city. There had been a euphoric moment when they were rescued from the British Museum, compounded by seeing it was Nilda who had rescued them. That had turned to near ecstatic joy with the discovery that there were ten thousand people alive and thriving around a nuclear power plant in Wales. That had been the high point from which shed come cras.h.i.+ng down when shed realised that the fifty of them in the Tower of London were probably the second largest community left on the planet. Anglesey and London, the last bastions of humanity, and each week their numbers shrank, the struggle for survival grew harder, and the only end to it that she could see was death.
She glanced at Jay, forced a smile, and planted a weary foot on the planes steps. She froze. Something was wrong. Slowly, she turned around. It wasnt just exhaustion, not this time. Shed had this feeling before, though in a very different city, facing a very different threat. It was the sense that despite everything appearing deserted, they were surrounded.
Again she looked at Jay. He saw her expression and knew without being told that danger was close. He twisted his head left and right, listening, then tilted it to one side, squinting in a way that reminded her of a cat looking at a mouse that wouldnt run away.
”Not zombies,” he signed.
She was about to berate him for being imprecise when, out of the corner of her eye, she caught a flash of movement through one of the cabin windows. Most of the shades had been pulled down, but three near the dirt-encrusted wing were half open. There. She saw it again. Something green, but moving too fast to identify any more detail than that. She grabbed Jays arm and pulled him behind her. He stumbled down the steps as she raised her axe.
Before she could signal to him to back away, a small bird with bright green plumage shot out of the open door. Then there was another. And a third, and then, all at once, a great ma.s.s of flapping wings as a green wave exploded out of the plane and up into the sky.
She ducked, the movement involuntary and unnecessary. The birds came nowhere near them. A smile crept slowly across her scarred face. The tension that had been plaguing her dissipated as the flock, perhaps a hundred-strong, flew up to circle the aircraft above them.
”Are they parrots?” Jay asked.
Tuck had no idea. ”Probably,” she signed.
”Did they come on the plane?” he asked.
She shook her head. ”I dont know, and it doesnt matter. But theres a lesson here.” She pointed at the white and black stained wing. ”We were so busy looking for the undead we didnt see what was immediately in front of us. Guano.”
”And so busy looking at it now, that we dont realise whats not in there,” Jay said. ”No zombies, and now there are no birds. Come on.”
He pushed past her and ducked into the cabin. She followed. As soon as she stepped inside, her nose tried to shut down as it was a.s.saulted by a foul stench. She gritted her teeth and turned on her flashlight. It, like most of the torches the group used, was a wind-up LED model, originally part of a window display at an electrical shop near Farringdon. It wasnt bright, but it added texture to a cabin otherwise only illuminated through the open door and a few half-closed window shades. There was a tug at her arm.
”Wheres the raft?” Jay signed.
Even in the gloom his expression was clear, the reason for it obvious. She grinned.
”Dont like the smell?” she signed.
”Its pretty...” he began, but couldnt find the word.