Unfed (24 page)

“No!”

“Hey!” Smitty stands up and moves toward Russ. “She doesn’t want to.”

“Yeah. Too bad.” Russ fumbles behind him, and a second before he does it, I guess what he’s going to do. He pulls out a gun. I recognize it. The one I thought I’d lost in the sea. “And guess what, Smitty? You’re coming, too. Outside, now.” He waves the gun at Smitty and Alice. “Both of you.”

“What. The. Hell.” Alice freezes to the spot.

“Do not move, anyone!” Russ shouts. “Don’t even think about it.”

“Gosh,” Pete says, “the classic double cross.” He frowns at him. “You bit me, didn’t you? In the lighthouse, during the scuffle with the zom. You wanted them to think I was infected. And then when that didn’t work, you pushed me down the steps onto Bobby’s gun.”

Russ chuckles. “Couldn’t resist, Petey-Poos. Thought you had me figured out. Turns out I was the paranoid one.” He looks at Mum. “Sorry, Anna. Bad Xanthro pays way better than you do, even with your hot daughter thrown in. Alice comes with me. Thanks for just confirming what we thought. Truth is, those tests back at the hospital weren’t quite as reliable as you might think. We knew one of them might be a carrier, but not which one. So thanks for saving me the trouble of taking them both. Now I’ve got a space for Smitty. Bonus. The bosses won’t believe their luck.” He gives us his best boy-next-door smile, the one with the dimple.

And then the sirens start.

“Please tell me that’s the fire alarm,” says Smitty.

Russ guffaws and shakes his head. “No, mate, Pete was right. He generally is; you should trust what he says.” He winks at me. “I put a little incendiary device on the door of the containment room. Any minute now those thirty or so crazies are going to be heading upstairs to say hello.”

“Russ, no!” Mum’s face crumples.

“Good god!” Martha gasps.

“Sorry, ladies. Time to boogie.” With that, he shoves Alice outside. Smitty faces up to him, but Russ sticks the gun in his face and Smitty backs down. They step outside, and Russ slams the glass door shut.

Mum dashes to the intercom on the wall and presses a button.

Russ smiles at her through the door. Alice’s face is twisted, she’s screaming full out.

Mum shouts into a phone while I race to the glass. Russ looks at me blankly; he holds the gun up to Alice’s head. I freeze.

“Where does he think he’s going?” Pete says.

“A powerboat. One on each side of the ship,” Martha says. “He’ll get them in there, lower it down.”

We watch them move past the windows, bent double against the driving wind and rain. We’re helpless.

“Someone’ll see them, won’t they?” I say to Mum.

“Won’t work,” she says. “They think Russ is on our side.”

“Yeah. The whole having-a-gun-set-to-two-kids’-heads might change their minds, nope?” I mutter.

Something pings off the sides of my brain, not unlike a bullet, an idea, a memory …

“Only six.” I have it. “There were only six bullets.”

Before anyone can question me, I fling the door open, and then I’m skidding on the slick deck, chasing them as they stagger toward the boat suspended off the side. I know I let off six shots. One on the poor goat. Four at the soldiers. One misfire when I fell in the sea. And I know there were only six bullets. So Russ is carrying an empty gun.

Unless there was already one in the chamber
.

The new idea nags at me, but I won’t let it. I loaded that gun. I should know. But truthfully, it’s all foggy. And there’s always the frightening possibility that Russ had his own cache of ammo — but then again, why would he, I think as I skid around a funnel, because if he had ammo, wouldn’t he have his own gun? I’m betting my life — and Smitty’s and Alice’s — that Russ is currently toting a big fat nothing.

They’ve reached the railing where one of the powerboats is lashed to some kind of pulley system. Russ smacks a button, and the boat begins to lower into the water. The ship pitches as we are hit by big waves, and I cling to the icy-cold railing, pulling myself toward them before I can change my mind. Russ waves the gun at Alice, forcing her down a ladder off the side of the ship to the boat below. I’m only a few yards away when he swings round and points the gun at me.

“You’re out of bullets!” I shout at him. Behind me I sense the others running up toward us.

He laughs and shakes his head. “Don’t you think I would have checked that, Bobby? I’d be pretty amateur if I left something like that to chance.”

“Maybe you did check,” I shout back, edging closer toward them. “But you’re counting on the fact that I wouldn’t remember how many I’d fired. And guess what? I do remember.”

He points the gun at Smitty’s temple. “Want to risk it, Bobby? Risk losing the only remaining source of the cure? Want to risk your
boyfriend
?”

I wish people would stop calling him that
.

“Russ, how can you do this?” Alice screams at him, clinging to the ladder. “You looked after us. You came after me when those kids drove me away.”

“I went after the Jeep, you stupid cow.” Russ’s lip curls. “The Jeep was my best chance to get out of town.
Anna
is so paranoid, she didn’t even tell me where she was waiting for us, so I had to follow the pathetic clues along with the rest of you.”

My mother gives a hollow laugh. “Turns out I was right to be paranoid.”

“Yes, well.” Russ looks around, and I follow his gaze. In the distance I spot three black dots moving through the sky. The helicopter went away and came back with friends. Russ smiles. “Lovely as this chatting is, we’ve got another little school trip to go on, people.” He flicks the gun at Alice on the ladder, and she jumps down to the boat with a yell. “You next,” he says to Smitty.

And then I see the shape behind him. Out of a doorway comes a figure, arms outstretched, mouth torn back in hunger, teeth gnashing.

My eyes widen; I take a step back.

Russ laughs. “Nice one, Bobby. But I’m not falling for the oldest trick in the book.”

It’s Smitty who does it. He looks behind him and gives a convincing yell, dodging out of the way as the monster lurches toward Russ. Russ is only human; he turns his head.

A moment’s distraction is all it takes. I barrel into him, knocking him against the rails, the gun flying out of his hand. He’s shocked, but he’s way stronger than me, and it only takes him a second to recover. But that’s all that’s needed for the zom to pile in after me. He goes in low, lifting Russ up, ready to plant a kiss in Russ’s stomach. A lucky wave lifts the boat, and somehow the two things happen just right to make Russ and zombie clear the rail, headfirst. A hand shoots up. One body falls and splashes, the other dangles. Russ has grabbed a lifeline from the gray, frigid water below. He hangs there, looking up at me.

“Bobby …” He gulps. “Please help me …”

Fingers grab at my heart. I can’t let him fall. I hold out a hand.

But at that moment the ship rises again, and his grip fails. He falls, looking up at me all the while, irritation and surprise on his face. There’s barely a splash, it’s like the sea just eats him whole.

“Where did he go?” Alice yells from the boat below.

I don’t know. I keep waiting for him to come up, like when you see a bird dive for fish. You always watch the same spot, and then they totally surprise you by coming up in a completely different place. So I scan the undulating waves, feeling sick to my stomach. But he doesn’t surface.

Another body appears in the doorway, and then another.

It’s enough to make up my mind.

“Into the boat!” I shout at Pete. I grab Smitty and start down the ladder to Alice.

“What are you doing?” Mum calls to me.

“Zombies. Helicopters.” I yell back, still climbing down. “That’s our cue to leave. It’s kept us alive so far.”

“No!” Pete is still at the rail. “We should stay, they can help us here.
Good
Xanthro, good Xanthro, Bobby.”

“Come back!” Mum cries.

Martha has arrived with some armed men. They shoot at the infected while Pete and Mum cower against the deck railing.

I press a button, and the boat falls the final few feet into the water below with a huge splash.

“Drive this thing!” I shout at Smitty. “You managed a Jeep and a train, this should be a breeze!”

“We’re leaving Pete?” he shouts back. “Your mum?”

“They made their choice!” I shout. Besides, my mother will follow us, I’m sure of it. Because she’s left me to fend on my own too many times to not follow me now. But let her follow, and let “Good” Xanthro clean up shop before we board the
Titanic
again. I’ll give them a run for their money.

Smitty has us going, and going fast. I steady myself on the side of the boat, carefully moving up to where Alice sits at the bow in silence. What a life change. She’s just gone from Most Popular in the Class to, well, Most Popular in the World. She and Smitty are the Osiris Homecoming Queen and King. I wonder if they’ll make them have lots of little immuno-babies together. The idea makes me want to hurl.

“Come sit back here with us,” I tell her. She nods, we make it to Smitty, and we sit in a row, all three of us.

“It’s not over, is it?” He looks out to sea. “It’s never going to be.”

“We head to England,” I say confidently. “They have to take us in, we’re only kids.”

“Or we could go to Norway,” Smitty says. “They only have trolls there. Trolls would be a doddle after this.” He looks at me, a rare flicker of fear on his face. “But for me. And Alice. It’s never going to be over, is it?”

The fog has lifted, but the light is fading. Off toward the land I see the dark shapes moving through the air. They look like crows searching for carrion. Is it my imagination, or is there a little black speck bobbing in the sea over there? Could it be Russ? Have they come to pick him up?

“I’d like to go home,” Alice says. “While there still is one.”

I throw an arm around her and give her a hug. “We’re not home yet,” I tell her. “But we’ll get there. I promise you.”

She growls at me. “Get off me, you freak.” But she puts her head on my shoulder, and slips an arm around my waist.

The helicopters get louder, and there’s a roar of the ship’s engines going into full power.

“They’re chasing us,” Smitty says. “Your mum won’t leave us.”

I twist around to see.

What chance do we have of outrunning Xanthro? We’ve done it up to now, though the odds seem stacked against us in our tiny little boat. But they have other things to contend with; helicopters have reached the ship, and one is attempting to land.

A huge explosion rips through the air and the water beneath us; instinctively we all hit the floor of the boat, Smitty losing the rudder, bringing us round in a slow circle to face the ship.

“Jesus,” Smitty chokes. “They must have hit a mine.”

He stops the boat just as a huge wave hits us. Lucky we were facing it; the small craft rides it without capsizing, bobbing over the aftershocks. Some distance away, the ship is on fire, black smoke filling the air. One of the helicopters is on its side on the top deck, propeller still trying to turn and flying off in different directions.

“Mum,” I mutter.

“There!” Alice points. A small powerboat is coming toward us, two people aboard. One controlling the rudder, the other standing at the bow, his Mohawk flopping over against the wind.

“They’re OK.” I breathe again. Smitty throws his arms around me and kisses me.

“Oh, gross.” Alice makes a retching noise. “Get a cabin.”

He breaks off, and we look back at the approaching boat. My mum looks so pissed with me. I’m definitely grounded now.

“Shall we wait for them?” Smitty says.

“We should get going,” I reply. “Fast as you like. Just watch out for mines.”

Let Mum chase me for a while. I feel like it will be good for both of us.

We can’t stop yet. That’s the rule around here now. I should know. Keep moving, and you live to struggle through another day. Sit still, and you’re Undead.