Ravage: An Apocalyptic Horror Novel (7 page)

Dave put his foot down in reply and the bus lurched on
its axels.  While Nick couldn’t be sure, he had a feeling that the guy’s
unflappable manner was actually masking a great deal of fear; fear that was
currently manifesting as a heavy right foot.

“Hey, buddy.  Slow down a little.”

“It’s fine, we’re clear.”

“I know,” Nick said, “but we don’t know what’s around
the next bend.”

“Hey, this is
my
bus.  I picked
you
up, remember?”

“I just don’t want us to have an accident.”

“We won’t.  I know how to drive.”

Something collided with the front of the bus.  Dave
slammed on the brakes.  The bus fishtailed, its tyres slipping.  The
left side of the vehicle rose up off the road, making Nick feel weightless and
tossing him to the other side of the aisle.  Eve screamed and then landed
right on top of him.  For a few terrifying seconds, the swaying interior
of the bus was silent as the passengers held their breath and waited. 
Nick was sure that the vehicle was about to tip over onto its side and end up
in the ditch.

But it didn’t happen.

Thank God.

The bus came to a stop with a pained screech of its
tyres.  Nick climbed to his feet and headed back to the front of the
aisle.  Dave was staring ahead in a trance.  He had gone deathly
pale.

“Are you okay?” Nick asked.

Dave continued to stare forwards.  “I-I’m
fine.  W-what did we hit?”

“I don’t think it matters,” said Nick, pointing. 
“Look!”

In front of them was a group of maybe ten or twelve infected
people.  They glared at the bus and let out a single, collective
screech. 

As a single entity, they rushed forward.

The first body to collide with the bus was that of a
child.  The small girl had blood-soaked pigtails tied with two
bright-orange bows.  She leapt onto the windscreen and clawed at the
glass.  The rest of the mob hit the bus a heartbeat-of-a-second later from
every direction.  From inside, it sounded like a hailstorm was underway,
but the view from the windows betrayed the true horror of the situation. 
Blood-shot eyes peered in at them from all sides.  Swollen and smashed
faces smeared themselves against the glass.  Nick felt like a zoo exhibit,
except in this case it was the spectators who were dangerous and not the animals
in the cage.

The bus’s interior went dark as all sunlight was blotted
out from the windows by the writhing bodies.  The weak strip lighting
above the aisle flickered as the vehicle rocked to-and-fro.  Nick looked
back to see the terrified faces of the other passengers and knew right away
that none of them had any ideas what to do. 

He turned to Dave.  “Can we still move?”  When
there was no answer, he shook the driver by the shoulder.  “I said can we
move?”

Dave snapped out of his daze and then blinked his eyes
rapidly.  “I-I don’t know.”  He reached shakily for the ignition
key.  “Let me try.”

The engine grumbled back to life at the first try.
 Nick sighed relief.  Dave worked the clutch, kicked the accelerator,
and the bus lurched forward.

“We’re moving,” said Dave, “but I can’t see a damn
thing.”

Nick patted his shoulder with encouragement.  “Just
keep her moving.  Maybe they’ll lose their grip.”

The little girl was still clinging to the
windscreen.  She stared in at them with unblinking eyes.  Bloody
tears leaked down her cheeks and Nick watched in horror as she began beating
her forehead against the glass like some sort of mental patient in a padded
room. 

Again and again and again.

Thud! Thud! Thud! 

The little girl’s face broke apart, flesh splitting open
with every head butt against the glass.  After a while she barely even
resembled a child any longer.  She was just a gore-soaked skull with
pigtails.

The bus sped up.

But the little girl held on. 

Crack!

The windscreen began to give way.

“Shit!” said Dave.  “What do we do?”

Nick shook his head.  “I don’t know.  Just
keep moving.  If we stop now, we’ll never get going again.”

The little girl continued smashing her skull against the
glass and the cracks in the glass began to spread outwards in thick
cobwebs.  At the sides of the bus, more infected people began bashing at
the other windows as they, too, clung on tightly.  It was only a matter of
time before they all smashed their way inside.

“Step on it,” Nick said.

“But I can’t see where I’m going.”

The little girl struck her skull against the glass again
and the windscreen finally gave way.  It fell out in a single cracked
sheet and landed in the aisle.  The girl came tumbling in after it, but as
the bus picked up speed the other bodies on the side of the bus slipped free.
 Some fell beneath the wheels, becoming morbid speed bumps.  Nick
lost his balance as the floor lurched beneath him. 

The little girl thrashed on the floor at the front of
the bus.  She was attempting to claw her way up onto her feet. 

“What do I do?” Dave cried.

“Just keep driving,” Nick said.  “And step on it.”

The bus sped up, Dave now able to see through the
missing windscreen. 

Nick braced himself as the little girl rose to her feet
and faced him.  As soon as she was up she launched an immediate attack,
barrelling into him with so much force that it felt like her bones were made of
bricks.  Staggering backwards, Nick’s ankle clipped the bolted-down leg of
one of the passenger benches.  He went stumbling into the aisle and landed
beside the teenager in the padded yellow coat.  The lad was startled but
quickly reached down to help Nick back to his feet.  As he did so the
young girl pounced, sinking her sharp little teeth into his hand.  He
cried out in agony and pushed her away. 

The little girl fell backwards but immediately came at
them again.  Nick tried desperately to get back to his feet, but she
bundled into him, knocking him sideways onto one of the benches.  The
teenaged boy got involved again and grabbed the girl around her waist before
she could leap on top of Nick.  He began wrestling with her from behind,
even as blood dripped from his wounded hand.

“What should I do?” he cried out in the high-pitched
tone of panic.  He was struggling to restrain the little girl, despite her
diminutive size.  “She’s gonna take another chunk out of me in a minute.”

Nick looked around for inspiration and quickly found
it.  “Pauline!” he shouted.  The woman was already staring in his
direction, a terrified expression contorting her face.  He clicked his
fingers at her. “Pauline, throw me your scarf.”

For a split second she looked at him as if she didn’t
understand, but then she reached down and picked up the colourful piece of
material from the bench beside her and balled it up.  She threw it in Nick’s
direction. 

It fell a foot short and landed on the grubby floor.

Nick huffed and quickly reached to pick it up. 
Once the scarf was in his hand he turned to the teenaged boy, who was still
struggling to restrain the thrashing girl in his arms. 

“Hold her as still as you can,” Nick said as he unfurled
the scarf and pulled it out wide.

The teenager nodded, but the beads of sweat on his
forehead made it clear he was beginning to tire.  “Whatever you’re doing,
mate, you better do it quick.”

Nick thrust the scarf over the girl’s mangled face and
quickly began wrapping it around her head, trying to cover her bleeding eyes
and ruined mouth.  After wrapping it as tightly as he could, he then tied
a double knot at the back with the frayed ends of the scarf.

The little girl stopped thrashing. 

The teenager stared at Nick with astonishment. 
“She’s stopped fighting me.”

Nick shrugged.  It was bizarre, but it was as if
the little girl had shut down.  Her attack mode had been switched
off.  His intention had only been to disorientate her, but it seemed the
result was even better. 

Nick waved a hand in front of the girl’s face, trying to
tempt a reaction.  There was none.  After thinking for a few moments,
he came up with a suggestion.  “Try letting her go.”

The teenager balked.  “What?  No way.”

“It’s okay.  I’m ready to grab her again if she
tries anything.  Go on, just let go of her, slowly.”

The teenager didn’t seem happy about it, but he obliged
anyway.  He slowly pulled his arms away from the little girl. 

She stood there motionless.  Everyone on the bus
seemed to let out a collective sigh of relief.  Nick took the moment to
examine the child.  Her hands hung limply at her sides, fingernails caked
in blood.  One of those fingers pointed outward at an unnatural angle that
suggested a break or dislocation.  She was also missing a shoe; dirt and
stones were imbedded in her bare foot. 

Looking at the girl, one thing in particular was clear
to Nick.  She needed help they could not provide her.

“How we looking, Dave?” he shouted over to the front of
the bus.”

“I got us back onto the main road, but there are
pile-ups everywhere.  It’s like the whole country started trying to get
somewhere in a hurry but forgot how to drive.  I can’t say how long until
we get into difficulty again.”

“Is it safe to stop for a second?”

“Safer than it was earlier.”

Nick looked at the little girl with sadness. “Okay,” he
said.  “Stop the bus.  We’re dropping off a passenger.”

The bus began slowing down.  Nick took a hold of
the little girl’s arm and began pulling her towards the front of the bus.

“What are you going to do?” Pauline asked him as he
passed.

“Taking her outside.”

“We can’t leave her.  She’s just a little girl.”

Pauline was right of course, but Nick had the feeling it
would be a bad idea to let the little girl stay with them.  “It’s not
safe,” he said.  “She’s…
infected,
for want of a better word. 
We can’t risk having her near us.”

“We can’t just leave her outside on her own,
blindfolded.  She’ll get hit by a car.  She’s just a little girl.”

“A little girl that almost took my bastard thumb off,”
said the teenager from the rear of the bus.

Pauline could see she was fighting a losing battle, but
pleaded anyway.  “Still…”

“I’ll take off her blindfold,” Nick conceded.

The teenager shook his head.  “What?  No
way.  She’ll come right at you again.”

“I’ll do it outside.  I’ll do it quick.”

“Your funeral, mate.”

Nick took the girl to the front of the bus and then
guided her down the steps to the road.  She was completely docile,
completely willing to go wherever he guided her.

“I’m sorry to do this,” Nick whispered to the
girl.  “Whatever is happening to you, I hope it isn’t permanent.”

He manoeuvred her into the treeline, hoping she would
wonder off into the countryside rather than onto the motorway.  He faced
her away from him, towards the trees, and then glanced back at the bus. 
The door was hanging wide open for him to run back on board.  Hopefully he
could do so before the little girl launched another attack.

He took a deep breath and began to shove the blindfold
up and over the girl’s head.  A vein in the side of her head seemed to
pulse like a drumbeat as the scarf began to fall away. 

A bead of sweat rolled down the small of Nick’s
back. 

Once he’d yanked the blindfold completely clear, he spun
on his heel and legged it back to the bus.  He performed a running leap up
the steps and skidded in the aisle.  He told Dave to “step on it.”

Dave didn’t argue.

The doors closed and Nick watched the young girl turn
around and scream at them.  But by that time they were already well on
their way.

The bus picked up speed and the cold autumn air swept in
through the broken windscreen.  It gave Nick a chill.  He leant up
against Dave’s driver compartment and watched the road go by, eventually losing
count of the numerous wrecked cars and fallen bodies that seemed to pop up
around every bend.

“We need a new plan,” he said to Dave.  “Driving
around like this is just going to get us killed.”

“No argument here.  We’re running out of petrol,
too.  So what should we do?”

Nick thought for a second before giving his
answer.  The plan was simple.  “Stop at the first safe place that
will take us.”

One hour passed.  The view
from the bus’s windows only got worse.  On the outskirts of Cannock, they
witnessed an overturned petrol tanker and a dozen charred bodies.  It was
unclear what had happened but it seemed that the tanker’s operator decided to
try and run right through a police barricade, disregarding a group of people
gathered there.  The explosion probably killed them all instantly. 
Then, only minutes later, the bus entered a village called Alrewas only to find
every resident there dead.  Their limbs and guts lined the concrete paths
like Christmas decorations.  A group of infected people milled around the
middle of the village’s roads, eating the remains of the dead.  Eve had
almost vomited and had been crying ever since.  After everything they had
all witnessed, the bus passengers were slowly realising that they weren’t just
having a bad day.  The situation wasn’t going to be dealt with by the Ten
O’ Clock News.  Things had fallen apart.  Totally and
irreversibly.  The country – maybe even the world – was under siege.

But all I really care about is that my son is dead.

Does that make me a terrible person? 

The bus’s current heading was north on the A38, just
past Derby.  Nick still held onto a slither of hope that they might chance
upon a local army regiment or police force, but the current plan was simply to
keep their eyes peeled for any sign of authority at all.  What form that
would take, none of them knew.  None of them cared.

The current road was one of the few that still flowed
with traffic.  The various remaining drivers were now mostly careful and
things were moving along in an orderly fashion.  The only problem was that
most people didn’t seem to know where they were going.  Many cars were
parked off on the verge, their petrol tanks dry after miles of aimless
driving.  Some people wandered the side of the road in small groups,
trying to hitch a lift.  Dave stopped for a couple of people whenever he
could, but had no choice but to ignore most of them.  Those he did pick up
were eternally grateful.  Those he ignored screamed obscenities.

In addition to the passengers they had started with, the
bus now held Cassie, a twenty-something nail technician from Tamworth; Carl, a
factory worker they had picked up on the outskirts of blood-soaked Alrewas; and
five minutes ago they had picked up Kathryn, a supermarket manager from
Birmingham – she had been on her way to a company meeting in Matlock when a
frenzied driver had sideswiped her car at a set of traffic lights.  She
had kept mostly to herself, but had been kind enough to share her bottle of
water with the teenaged boy in the yellow coat when he started to feel
unwell.  His hand had not yet stopped bleeding.

It turned out that the teenager’s name was Jake.  He
was a Creative Writing student from Wolverhampton University.  His hand
was a mess from where the girl had bitten him; tough to even look at, in
fact.  It had blistered up and was leaking a kind of mustardy pus along
with all the blood.  He was currently lying on the bus’s back seat,
applying a bandage that Dave had given him from the vehicle’s first aid kit.

The guy in the overalls with the calloused hands and
dreadlocks was named Mark.  He was a Jamaican-born mechanic currently
living in Smethwick.  The reason he had remained so quiet throughout
previous events was that he had a broken leg.  Nick hadn’t noticed it when
he’d first gotten on the bus, but the man’s left leg was set in a grubby white
cast with a West Brom FC sticker on it and a crude drawing of a throstle. 
The man had told Nick he’d wanted to intervene during the incident involving
the little girl, but had expected only to make things worse with his cumbersome
leg.  He seemed genuinely upset about it.  Nick wasn’t holding a
grudge.

The two old ladies were Ethel and Margaret.  They
had become sullen and voiceless in the last hour or so; a stark contrast to
their earlier natterings.  It seemed they had only been able to take so
much before losing their ability to persevere.

“We’re running on fumes,” Dave said from the front of
the bus.  “Every time we pass a petrol station, it’s totally blocked up
with car wrecks or swimming with sick people.  We’re going to have to pick
somewhere to turn-in or we’re going to come to a stop in the middle of the
road.”

“Okay,” Nick said.  “Let’s get off this road as
soon as we can.  Maybe park off in the woods somewhere?”

“Will do.”

Dave took the next slip road and headed west into a
residential area full of Victorian semis and dusty shops.  Nick eyed-up
every road sign as they passed.  After a few minutes, he pointed. 
“There,” he said.  “Head for that.”

Dave glanced at him.  “Head for what?”

“The Ripley Heights Country Park.  I bet we can
hole up there.  I just saw a sign for it, saying to head left.”

Dave flicked on the turn indicator despite the total
lack of traffic behind him.  The bus entered onto a steep incline with
woodland on either side.  Nick was immediately pleased by the lack of
buildings.  If they found a rural enough area, they may just be able to
sit tight somewhere until they could figure out what to do next.

Or until help arrives.

While the bus continued to climb, Nick decided to take a
seat and attempt a conversation with Eve again.  For some reason he felt
an attachment to her – perhaps because their relationship stretched back to
before their presence on the bus.  Perhaps because she was there because
of him.

I feel responsible for her.  Fuck knows why.

“Hey,” she said to him as he took a seat beside
her.  “Any idea where we’re going?”

“We’re heading for a country park,” he said. 
“We’re hoping it will be deserted enough that we can stop for a while and catch
our breath.  We’re running low on petrol, so it’s not like we have a
choice either way.”

Eve stared out of the window thoughtfully.  “I
wonder if my family are okay.”

Nick thought about Deana and James.  They certainly
were
not
okay, but there could still be hope for other people.  He
knew he should care about that, regardless of how hard it was to think beyond
his own losses.  “I guess it will be a while before any of us find out how
bad things really are,” he said.  “I think Jake has a mobile phone if you
want to try and call your parents.”

“Already tried,” she said.  “My call wouldn’t go
through.  That Kathryn has a phone, too, and it wouldn’t connect
either.  No calls are getting through to anyone.”

“Well, just assume that they’re okay, then. 
Anything else and you’ll drive yourself crazy.”

Eve looked him in the eye.  “I’m scared, Nick.”

He went to put his arm around her, the same way he would
whenever Deana was anxious, but he stopped himself, remembering that he barely
knew the girl.  “I’m scared, too,” he said, keeping his hands in his
lap.  “I’m scared that even if we get through this, things will never be
the same for any of us.  We’ve all lost too much.”

“Do you think terrorists did this?”

Nick hadn’t thought much about it, but he considered it
a possibility.  It could also be a dozen other things.  “I don’t
think it’s worth thinking about why this has happened, for now.  Leave
that to the experts. All we need to focus on right now is sticking together and
getting through the rest of the day in one piece.”

“You think we’ll manage to?”

He nodded.  “Yeah, I think we’re through the worst
of it.  This day can’t get any worse.”

At least I hope so,
Nick thought to himself as he
looked out the window at the passing trees.  “Just try not to worry,” he
said.

***

The bus came
to a stop in a grassy picnic area that was surrounded by woods on all
sides.  No other vehicles were parked there.

“Well done,” Nick told Dave.  “This place looks pretty
deserted.”

Dave switched off the engine and leant back in his
chair.  He rubbed at his eyeballs with two meaty fists and then blinked
them a few times.  “I’m just glad to take a break from driving.  I
would have gone cross-eyed after much longer.”

“I’ll bet,” said Nick.  “We all owe you for keeping
us safe.  I think we can stretch our legs for a little while now and take
a breather.  Then perhaps we can check out the surrounding area.”

“Sounds good to me.”  

Dave pressed a button on the dashboard and the bus’s
pneumatic doors opened.  Everyone got to their feet and started piling
out.  There were multiple sighs of relief as they each stretched their
muscles and took deep breaths of the crisp country air.  The temperature
was a little low for comfort, so Nick fastened his coat around himself before
joining them outside.  He winced as the garment brushed his various
injuries. 

“You okay?” Eve asked him.  “Your face still looks
pretty bad.”

“Just a little sore.”  He prodding at the slick
wound on his cheek.  “But I’ll live.”

Mark limped off the bus behind Nick, his cast sinking
into the mud as he landed awkwardly.  “Hey,” he said.  “Do we have
any water or snack food?  I’m starting to feel lightheaded, man.”

“Me too,” added one of the old ladies.

“We’ll just have to make do for now,” said Dave, taking
on an air of authority that he probably felt was rightfully his as driver of
the bus.  “We can look to see if there are any shops around here later,
once we’ve all had a rest.”

“Bad idea,” said Pauline.  “We’re safer to just stay
put.”

Mark hopped on his one good leg over to the side of the
bus and leant up against a wheel arch.  “We’ll need to eat something
eventually, lady.  So how long do we plan on staying here?”

“I don’t know,” said Dave.

“Well, don’t you think we should have a plan?” asked
Pauline.

Dave huffed.  “If you have one, then I’m all
ears.  Until then, just keep quiet.”

“Look,” said Nick.  “For now, let’s just enjoy
doing nothing.  We don’t know enough to make any sort of plan, which is
why we just need to take things one moment at a time.  Let’s just be glad
that we’re off the road.”

Everyone seemed to grumble in agreement, before breaking
off into their own little patches of space.  The supermarket manager,
Kathryn, went and sat on a nearby picnic table and began shaping her long red
fingernails with a file from her handbag.  The two elderly women sat on
another bench just a few feet away.  Eve stood around aimlessly next to
Dave, who had decided to check the oil level of the bus.  Nick thought it
was pointless seeing as they were out of petrol anyway.  Jake stayed on
the bus, still feeling unwell.  Carl chatted to Cassie nearby, and Mark
remained leaning against the bus, taking the weight off his cast.

Nick chose to approach Cassie and Carl.  He hadn’t
spoken to them much yet and thought it was wise to know everybody he was
with.  “You folks okay?” he asked them both.

Carl laughed.  “As well as can be expected. 
Can’t say I’m a big fan of sticking here indefinitely, though.  We’ve all
got families to get home to.”

 “I know,” Nick agreed, but deep down he knew that
it was no longer true for him.  “Ideally we’ll be able to find some help
soon, but for now we just need to be safe.  We all saw what’s happening to
people.”

“It’s like they’ve all gone crazy,” Cassie said
meekly.  She seemed like a shy girl.

Nick nodded.  “I think it’s a virus or
something.  My son was feeling ill last night and then this
morning…”  He didn’t need or want to finish the sentence.  Everyone
had been through their own personal torments and that meant that they
understood each other’s losses without having to hear them explained.  It
was almost like being part of a club.

“I don’t know if it’s something that can be cured,” Nick
said.  “Right now, our best bet is to just stick together.”

“Safety in numbers, huh?” said Carl.

“I’m glad you people found me,” Cassie said.  “I
don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t.  I watched my best friend
get ripped to shreds by her own father – gutted like an animal.  Then she
got up and came after me.”

Nick scratched his chin.  “She got up and came
after you?”

Cassie nodded.  “Like five minutes after her dad
attacked her.  We managed to hole up in the bathroom, but Michelle was
hurt bad.  I mean real bad.  Her neck and stomach were gushing and
the floor tiles were covered in blood.  Then she just stopped breathing
and I knew she was dead.  But two minutes later she was back on her feet
again, coming after me just like her dad did.  Only she was different than
him, she was-”

“Slower,” said Nick, remembering how Mr Curtis had first
been fast and agile until his throat got cut on the fish tanks, and then
afterwards had moved very slow and drunkenly.

“People don’t come back from the dead,” Carl scoffed,
wiping his hands on his jeans.  “It’s crazy.”

Nick shrugged.  “I think crazy got invited to the
party today.  Whatever virus is turning people insane is doing something
else to them when they get badly injured.  It still makes them want to
kill us, but they get clumsy and slow.”

“Like walking corpses?” Carl scoffed, still unwilling to
grasp such a concept.

“Maybe it’s something in their blood,” Cassie
suggested.  “Maybe when they get injured and lose enough blood, the virus
leaks out and makes them weaker.”  She shook her head and sighed. 
“Or maybe they really are just dead and this is the end of the world.”

“You’ve been watching too many horror films,” Carl
said.  “We should just stay calm and wait for this whole thing to blow
over.  I guarantee this time next week we will all be back at home,
watching the news about whatever this is.  And it won’t be that the dead
are coming back to life to eat the living.”

“I hope you’re right,” said Nick, moving away.  “I
really do.”