Unfortunately for us, the noise of Granny's brutal demise attracted the attention of a nearby group of Dead that, had they not been brought by the sounds of slaughter and the smell of blood and death, might have wandered past us in the grey snow and gloom. Instead, they swarmed towards us, several tripping their fellows up in their eagerness to reach fresh flesh.
Apocalypse Girl, having left her guns at the truck, picked up Granny's frypan, waiting, ready to splatter the first Dead head that came near. She didn't have to wait long at all. Sonny, grief-stricken, threw himself at the horde, cricket bat raised, whacking away like nobodies business with a wail. Sister blasted away with her assault rifle, set to single fire, each round destroying a Dead skull. My katana almost sang as I drew it, slicing through the air musically as I cut deep into Dead brains, severing limbs that threatened to grasp and claw at Apocalypse Girl while she crushed skulls. We stood back to back, each one working to keep the other alive as we had so many times before. Sister swore as she ran out of ammo, reloading as quick as she was able while dancing out of the way of bitey teeth. Sonny had disappeared, though his wail remained, as did the rhythmic smacking of his cricket bat.
Eventually, all lay dead. Sonny knelt by an impressive number of dead Dead, about as many as Apocalypse Girl and I had taken out together. I wondered where The Kid had gotten to, having not seen him during the assault of the Dead. At that moment, he came from the direction of the truck, saying that there had been another group coming from that direction. The fresh black glorp covering his claws bore testament to his ability to take care of them. I suggested that we move on. Everybody agreed immediately. Sonny only stopped for a moment to bash Granny's brains in as she began to move in Death.
noon
Sonny was distraught by the morning's events, as Granny had been his only remaining family, so he asked to continue travelling with us. Sister told him that it would be hard going, that we had gone through a lot of shit to get to where we were, that we likely had a lot more shit to deal with before we found somewhere safe that we could stay. I got the impression that The Kid didn't really want him coming along, but our mutated friend was, at least verbally, as welcoming of our new companion as were Apocalypse Girl and I.
Apocalypse Girl still held Granny's iron frypan, covered in Dead brains as it was. “I don't think we'll be cooking with this any more,” She began, “But it makes one hell of a good weapon against the Dead.” I took it from her, to test the weight. It was fucking
heavy
, Granny must have been a lot stronger than she looked. I offered it to Sonny, but he simply shook his head, saying that Apocalypse Girl used it better than he ever could. He had his cricket bat, after all.
evening
We came to a stop when the gloom became total darkness. Apocalypse Girl turned the engine off, then we made out way to the back of the truck, jumping in and pulling out some pre-cooked Meat-beast that we ate cold. We were beginning to run low on food once again, though we still had plenty of water.
The Kid took his position on the roof of the truck, keeping an eye, or at least some kind of sense, out for any stray Dead while the rest of us prepared for sleep. Sonny asked me how I had coped with everyone I cared about dying around me. I thought about that one for a while. I told him that basically, all I could allow myself to care about was Apocalypse Girl. I have other friends, sure, but if she died that would likely be the end of me, too. He nodded and asked how long we had known each other.
Apocalypse Girl, overhearing the conversation, said; “We've known each other since the apocalypse started. He's right, though. You can't let yourself care too much about anyone, really. Sometimes you don't have a choice, though, do you?” She looked into my eyes. No, sometimes you really don't have a choice. “Anyway, stick close to the four of us, you should be alright. You can take care of yourself with that bat of yours, true enough, but going it solo against the Dead the way you did earlier today is fucking suicide. You could have been bitten a hundred times doing that shit!” Realising that she was raising her voice, she lowered it and apologised. “Still, you need to look after yourself. No more suicidal berserker charging into the Dead, okay?”
Smiling shyly, Sonny said “Yes, Mum!”
May 20thYear 1 A.Z.
morning
We followed the road, stopping for nothing, not that there was anything nearby. Sonny kept quiet, staring at his blood-and-brain soaked cricket bat since he woke up this morning. Apocalypse Girl told me last night that he had reminded her of her little brother in many respects. One thing that she had been grateful for, in fact, was that her brother had not had to deal with the apocalypse, having died when a stolen ice-cream van ran him over on his way home from school one summer afternoon, about seven years ago. The driver, hardly more than a kid himself, felt so bad about the whole situation that he committed suicide in his jail cell less than a week later.
We passed a sign which informed us that Coober Pedy was no more than two hundred kilometres away, meaning we had made better time than I had expected, finding a service station, abandoned to the Cold and Dead, several of which staggered about aimlessly. The Kid drew them away easily enough, Apocalypse Girl pulling the truck up to one of the bowsers. We figured that we should take full advantage of the situation, filling up our dwindling, yet still more than adequate fuel reserves.
This was one of those tiny blink-and-miss-it towns, by the look of things, so Sister took Sonny for a bit of an explore while I filled the truck and Apocalypse Girl took watch from the roof of the truck. The Kid, meanwhile, was off making sure the Dead didn't turn around and realise that there was food back here. After nearly half a year of this I was beginning to get used to the idea of being food for the Dead.
noon
Truck full, spare cans full, Apocalypse Girl and I decided to check out the interior of the service station. The shelves had been thoroughly ransacked already, no doubt weeks or months ago, though Apocalypse Girl was able to use her unique … abilities to acquire some fresh bread and a few bottles of water. Thankfully, though we knew it was safe to do so, we had not had to resort to melting the grey snow in order to survive.
The service station attendant sat at his post, stiff and dead. A rather large hole gaped from the back of his head, an even larger revolver lay on the floor at his feet. I picked it up. Five rounds left. Fiddling with the drawers and cash register I found a box of about a hundred bullets for it, only six rounds missing. Replacing the one used shell, I stuck the gun in the back of my jeans, putting the rest of the ammo in my pack, then we returned to the truck.
As we prepared to leave, once Sonny and Sister returned, The Kid soon after, we heard an unearthly, inhuman, shrieking wail that echoed all around us. Rather than stick around to discover whatever kind of horrible mutant made that noise, we hurriedly moved on.
evening
The Kid left us this evening, saying that it was time for him to go, so off he loped into the Cold and darkness, all alone. He was off to find Archer's Daughter, he told us. We all wished him luck, then we ate. Sonny was more than a little confused as to where the bread had come from, so Apocalypse Girl tried to explain it to him. By the expression on his face he was even more confused after the explanation.
“
What happened to him?” Sonny wanted to know, once The Kid had gone well and truly out of earshot. I told him all that had occurred back at the commune, the tiny scratch of a Dead one's teeth on his leg, the Deaths of his friends and Kindly Lady. Apocalypse Girl took the story further, telling of how he had infected almost an entire army of convicts that were descending upon the commune after having broke out of a nearby jail. Apocalypse Girl and I chose first watch, wrapping ourselves up as warmly as possible to ward against the Cold. There was nothing around, not within visual range at least. Not that visual range was particularly far these days. We had a couple of torches with which we were able to light up the surrounding area somewhat, though, honestly, they didn't do much.
To kill some time, Apocalypse Girl whipped out the radio, checking in with Soldier at The School. There was no real news, just more of the same. The Empire was consolidating their position in Melbourne, actually making things safe for the Living. Soldier was quite impressed by their effectiveness, in fact. There existed an uneasy truce between The School and The Empire, both sides leaving each other more or less alone apart from the occasional meeting between The Principal and an Imperial Ambassador. At least The Empire were better neighbours than The Followers had been.
May 21stYear 1 A.Z.
morning
Thanks to The Kid's ill-timed departure, the first we knew we were in trouble was when Sonny awoke us with a scream. Fortunately it was little more than a squeak that the Dead outside failed to notice, thanks to the incredible job that Viking and Valkyrie had done insulating the truck from the Cold. There were easily a hundred of them out there, shambling along in their sluggish fashion. They seemed uninterested in us, however, preferring to stagger off down the road, creating furrows in the snow.
Deciding that we shouldn't take any chances, Apocalypse Girl got behind the wheel. Gunning the engine to life, she attracted their attention. Telling Sonny to be careful not to get bitten, Sister slid out the window, climbing up onto the roof of our vehicle. I handed her assault rifle to her on request, which she promptly used to gun down a good dozen or so of the stench-ridden throng before Sonny and I jumped out, cricket bat and katana in hand. The noise of the engine and gunfire from the front of the truck caught and held fast the attention of most of the Dead, though a couple came at us, sensing a meal was near. Sonny flattened a couple of heads with his bat, I sliced a couple apart and we proceeded to clear the exterior of the truck in short order. As we heaved the dead corpses of the Dead off the road Sonny asked me why we didn't just burn them, like everybody else was doing. I was about to answer him when the downpour began. Rushing back into the dry warmth and safety of the truck, we were still drenched by the time we made it inside.
noon
The deluge was as intense as we had seen them before, creating a layer of dark grey sludge at the base of the windows. With little to do to pass the time, Sister fished around in her pack for a little while, eventually, triumphantly, displaying a deck of playing cards. After a few hands of poker, gambling with our spare
ammunition, Apocalypse Girl and I grew bored and retreated into the cabin.
“
What is with this fucking rain, anyway?” She asked of nobody in particular. I shrugged, not having an answer. “At least this one doesn't have any coloured lightning. That kind of freaks me out a little bit. Especially having seen where it comes from.” I couldn't agree more. She began cleaning her guns, I followed suit. Sister poked her head in, saying that Sonny had reiterated his question. “I've always wondered myself, actually. Why don't we burn them? Everyone else seems to.” Apocalypse Girl and I looked at one another, a slight smile on her face, probably on mine as well.
She answered for me. “The natural way is for dead things to just rot, combining with the earth, right?” Sister nodded. Sonny stuck his head through, next to hers. “Right, so anything that's burned up goes up into the atmosphere. It's been our theory for a while now that burned Dead are the main cause of this...this
fucking
Cold. Sure, all the nukes that those dickheads in power let off in the early days wouldn't have helped matters, but let's face it, Beijing and Tokyo were completely overrun with the Dead by then. They were
all
burnt up by the nukes, you see?”
“
So, we've fucked ourselves and our planet properly, this time?” Sonny wanted to know. Sister slapped him on the back of the head. “What? We did it to ourselves, didn't we?” That was one way of looking at it, I told him. I didn't know anything about what started the Dead Plague, I continued, but I was pretty sure the bombing of major population centres wouldn't have done much good anyway. Incinerating maybe a billion Dead in a couple of days? That was bound to have some kind of effect.
evening
The rain continued as the already dark world outside grew to total blackness. The Colonel got in touch via radio, telling us about a huge horde of Dead that she and her men had taken out before the rains came again. She asked if there was any news from out friend Fluffy, whose very existence I was reasonably certain she doubted. Mind you, had I not met it myself I would have probably called 'bullshit' on anybody trying to tell me they'd met an alien.
There was not, and we told her so. She had lost a few more men to Drop-Bears, she said. Apocalypse Girl related the story of what had happened to Granny. “
Three
hits? She was able to get three fucking hits on that damn thing? Fuck me, I could use a hundred of her. Hell, give me five, that'd do. One of my men got a single shot off, once, after it had ripped his stomach open. Mostly they're lucky if they even have time to scream.”
Before signing off, The Smart Couple came on the radio. They had managed, they told us, to vaccinate most of The Colonel's force against the Dead Plague by now, telling us to relay their thanks, and apologies, once more to The Kid. I assured them I would pass on their message. As Apocalypse Girl put the radio away, I noticed something. Silence. The rain had finally stopped.
May 22ndYear 1 A.Z.
morning
The rains had washed away the snow, though the Cold remained. I was not certain, but I thought I spied a tiny glimmer of blue amongst the dark grey of the clouds above us. As it was, I was sure the day seemed slightly brighter than the usual gloom. The four of us at least were able to stretch our legs and go for a proper walk to warm ourselves up. I had grown weary of the crunch of snow underfoot. Realistically I knew that it was likely only a temporary thaw, but it was a pleasant change.