The Z Infection Read online

  The

  ‘Z’

  Infection

  By

  Russell Burgess

  Text copyright © 2014 Russell Burgess

  All Rights Reserved

  For my children, who think they are bad ass enough to survive the zombie apocalypse

  Table of Contents

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Prologue

  Aim for the head. Nothing else will stop them.

  If there was one thing I always told people, in those days, it was that. I lost count of the times I said it. But it was the truth and it saved my life on many occasions. Some believed that fire did the job too. It did, but it took much longer. By the time the fire had consumed what passed for a Zombie’s brain, the chances were he had run you down and taken a bite. So always aim for the head.

  Others swore that decapitation worked just as well. It did kill them, but again it wasn’t a given. The head could carry on for several hours, sometimes days, depending on the individual. I saw so many people caught out by that one. A seemingly harmless head, which suddenly became an ankle biter. It didn’t take much, just a scratch and you were finished. So I repeat myself. Always aim for the head. Nothing else will stop them.

  It’s taken years for me to get to this point. Years to be able to speak about what happened to me during that time. The others here with me, who have also chosen to speak today, are the same. The broken bones, the scars, bruises and abrasions, all the physical things, are healed. The mental scars have taken much longer.

  The memories of the horror that engulfed the world in those terrible times are beginning to fade. For new generations they are stories. Some don’t believe it happened. But it did. No matter how outlandish it seems, never mind the arguments about the physics, it happened. Plain and simple.

  It still scares me to think how close we came. How close the human race was to being extinguished. Every now and again we suffer another outbreak. They are smaller now, more manageable. We have found the best ways to deal with them, and we do so with a ruthless efficiency.

  We continue to theorise as to the origins of it. A mutated virus, alien attack, an ancient curse or the wrath of God himself. All have been suggested. It has never been properly studied. Partly because we never had time – people were too busy trying to survive – and partly because a lot of the clever people, the ones who might have worked it out, were killed in the early days.

  My own theory? I think it was something primeval, buried deep in the Earth. Mother Nature is a clever bastard. She was never going to let the human race destroy her beautiful planet, something she had worked hard to create and perfect. The human race was out of control, careering along a path to self-destruction. The brakes were off and we were hurtling down the hill. So I think she had an ace up her sleeve and she played it before she lost the hand.

  It happened in the blink of an eye. Everyone thought that something like that would take weeks, months or even years to establish itself, spread and take control. But it happened in a matter of hours. One minute the world was going along, as it always had, the next we were plunged into a chaos that it looked like we would never emerge from. If anyone had told me, that I would have gone to work that morning and straight into an apocalyptic nightmare, I would have laughed in their faces. But, as the months and years wore on, it became routine. Living like a hunted animal, hiding, scavenging and fighting. Every day was the same. It never let up. I stopped crying for my lost family and friends after the first week. I stopped puking after a month. I never grieved for anyone after a year had passed. That was how it was. I met so many survivors who told me the same thing. It was the way we coped. The way we survived.

  And what did we call it? Well, it was given many names. In China and other parts of the Far East it was called the European Plague, because they misguidedly thought it originated here. In Russia they called it, somewhat grandly and out of context, the Second Great Patriotic War. In most of Europe it was known as the Zombie Plague. A lot of teenagers and geeks called it the Zombie Apocalypse and in parts of Africa it was called the Walking Death.

  And in the United Kingdom, the day when it all kicked off came to be known as The ‘Z’ Infection.

  Chapter One

  Sophie Westerly

  08:02 hours. Friday 15th May, Covent Garden, London

  I was twenty-two years old that day. I’ll always remember it because it was my actual birthday. Of course everyone else remembers the date too. I’m not unique. But it always held a significance for me, in a way that would be difficult for others to understand. It was my birthday. It should have been a nice day.

  I was in Covent Garden when it happened. I used to love it there, with all the nice shops, the old market building and cafes. It was where I often met friends, because it was centrally situated to where most of us lived. We would sometimes meet during the day, for coffee, or at night for a few drinks and a laugh.

  That day was going to be nice. The weather forecast told me that before I had left my flat, just half an hour before. It was already busy. The streets were packed with the usual mix of early bird shoppers, commuters and tourists, ready for what the city had to offer.

  I was having a coffee and a naughty slice of carrot cake for breakfast, sitting outside my favourite coffee shop and watching the world pass by. The Italian owner’s son, Antonio, fancied me and was hovering around as I sipped at my cappuccino. Why wouldn’t he? I was young and slim and had a great figure. All the hours spent in the gym had been paying off. I knew that if I told him it was my birthday that he would give me my breakfast for free. And he did. I liked Antonio. He always did his best to chat me up, but he was too young and always so obvious about what he wanted.

  I was waiting for my boyfriend, Ricky, to meet me in any case. We had decided to go to the zoo for the day. It was something we did from time to time - take a day off work and just do stuff together. He was really into that sort of thing. Today, being my birthday, it was the ideal excuse.

  I had been there for about twenty minutes I suppose, when suddenly there was this enormous crash, followed by grinding metal, screams and then an enormous explosion. I nearly dropped my cup with the shock of it. I stood up and tried to locate where the sound had come from. Antonio came out from the café and we looked to the northwest, where a huge pillar of smoke was already rising into the sky, maybe about two blocks from where I was sitting.

  Almost immediately, people around me began to gravitate towards it, intrigued by what had happened. I sat back down and took and another sip from my coffee, hoping that Ricky would get here soon and telling myself there would be nothing I could do anyway.

  I checked my phone for about the tenth time. Nothing from him. That man. He was a total technophobe. He didn’t own a car or a computer, or a tablet or a smart phone. He wouldn’t have bothered with a phone at all if I hadn’t insisted on getting him a cheap one, just so I could keep in contact with him. But try getting him to use it.

  I sent him a text message.

  Where r u? Something happening here. Text or call me.

  The first sirens began wailing just a few moments later. A param
edic car weaved its way among the milling crowds and the stationary cars. It was followed, a minute or so later, by a police car, then another and another. A fire engine was the next to go past and it was followed by ever increasing crowds of people, all morbidly eager to see what was going on. If they had known then, what was happening at the scene, they would have run the other way. Every single one of them.

  Kareef Hadad

  08:04 hours, Friday 15th May, Long Acre, Covent Garden, London

  I had moved to London from Jordan just three years before, to make a new life for myself and my family. I’m only half Jordanian. My mother was born in the country, but my father was English and we spent a lot of time in the UK when I was young.

  I owned a small shop on Long Acre and was in the process of buying into my friend’s restaurant. Life was very good. I worked hard to provide for my wife and my young son, but that’s what you do for family, isn’t it? You work to support them. I was still only thirty and my dream was to be retired by the time I was fifty.

  The incident I saw was horrific. I was about a hundred metres away, opening up my shop for the morning, when I heard this incredible crashing sound. I poked my head out into the street and could see smoke billowing from the shops further up. A bus was half in and half out of the building and as I watched there was a mighty explosion. I don’t know what caused it. Maybe some of the fuel leaked out or maybe there was something in the shop which was flammable. Whatever it was, it caught so quickly. The shock wave travelled up the street, shattering windows and knocking people to the ground, including me. Then everything seemed to go quiet for a long time. I was still clutching the keys for the front door to the shop as I slowly got to my feet. A police officer, hatless and with incredible calmness, was making his way down the street towards the bus, using his radio to call for assistance and checking people as he went.

  Then I heard sirens. A paramedic arrived first, followed by a couple of police cars. The smoke was thick but I could already feel heat. That must have been the flames taking hold of the building. I’m ashamed to say that my first thought was for my business. What if the flames carried on up the street and engulfed my place?

  A few people began to approach the bus. The policeman tried to stop them from getting too close but they insisted on going to help the injured. People covered their heads in blankets as they tried to get near it. A few minutes later the first fire engine approached from the other side of the street, followed by a second and then a third. I’m not fanatically religious, I do believe in God but I also have an understanding that he doesn’t fix everything for you, but I certainly prayed to Allah to protect my business that morning. Next to me I was aware of a girl standing filming the whole thing on her mobile phone. It all seemed so bizarre.

  Then I saw the first one. He was a middle aged man, dressed in a suit. He staggered from the wreckage of the shop frontage and towards the first rescuer. A thick swirl of black smoke suddenly enveloped the two. When it subsided a few moments later I thought I could see the guy in the suit kneeling. It was difficult to see what was going on, but the rescuer seemed to be on the ground, thrashing about. Had he been hit by falling debris? It was the most likely thing, I thought.

  Another appeared from the smoke, a young woman this time, with a rucksack on her back. She looked badly injured but she was walking with a slow and stilted purpose, as if she was desperate to be far away from the flames. She was followed by another, older woman, and she in turn was followed by several more figures.

  ‘Someone help those people,’ a voice shouted.

  More people started to run towards them, waving their arms and calling the survivors to them. The smoke still made it hard to see and, as the would-be rescuers disappeared into it, I could have sworn I heard a scream, followed by another. Then, as the fire crews began to douse the flames with their hoses I could see some of the walking wounded stagger towards them.

  I strained to see what was going on through the smoke and suddenly one of the hoses was dropped as one of the figures grabbed at the fireman. The two wrestled with one another in a frantic struggle as they fell to the ground together. The poor soul, I thought, must have been so traumatised by the accident that he didn’t know what he was doing.

  Suddenly, one of the rescuers who had run into the smoke just moments earlier, came staggering back towards me. She was about thirty years old and was slim, casually dressed in jeans and a tee shirt. The tee shirt had ‘Stop the War on Gaza’s Children’ and the picture of a crying child on it. I will remember her face for all time.

  She had a gash down one cheek and blood was pouring from the wound. Her breath was rasping and her eyes were filled with fear and pain.

  ‘He bit me,’ she said, through the obvious agony. ‘He bit me.’

  She staggered away, into the gathering crowd, presumably looking for someone to help her. I didn’t know what to do. The spectators were increasing by the second as more and more people assembled to see what had happened.

  Then, suddenly, one of the police officers came running through the smoke. She was hatless, like the others I had seen, and she had her baton in her hand, extended.

  ‘Everyone back,’ she yelled. ‘Clear the area.’

  I looked at her. She was terrified. I wondered if there was going to be another explosion.

  ‘My shop,’ I said. ‘Will it be okay?’

  She had cuts and bruises, like she had been fighting, but she was still doing her job, on her radio, requesting armed units. Did I hear right? Armed units? Then she stared right into me.

  ‘Run,’ she said.

  I couldn’t comprehend what was happening, but her next words filled me with absolute terror.

  ‘Run for your life.’

  Clive Westlake

  08:08 hours, Friday 15th May, Central London

  I saw the first ambulance while I was cycling in to work that day. It was just after eight in the morning and it passed me, with its lights and sirens clearing a path for it through the morning rush hour. I didn’t think anything of it. Just another day in the city. Another day where I was going to have to fix the problems of the people in society, who couldn’t fix them for themselves. I put the thoughts to the back of my head. If there was one thing I had learned, in twenty years of policing, it was never to deal with an incident in your head before you arrived at the scene.

  By the time I had made it to the station, another two ambulances, together with several police cars and fire engines had passed me. Whatever was happening, it was serious.

  Sophie Westerly

  08:15 hours, Friday 15th May, Covent Garden, London

  I was becoming increasingly nervous as more and more police cars, ambulances and fire engines raced down the roads towards the accident. The memories of the London Bombings of 2005 came flooding back. I could hear murmurs among people, discussing the possibility of another terrorist outrage.

  I still hadn’t heard anything from Ricky and he hadn’t picked up the last four calls I had made to him. Shop workers, café owners and their customers were all out in the street, trying to make some sense of what was going on. It reminded me a bit of the footage I had seen of 9/11, when most of the population of lower Manhattan had stopped to look up at the twin towers, as they burned and finally fell. It was eerily similar.

  Then something else happened. Instead of running towards the scene, many people were running in the opposite direction. A few to begin with, then more, then dozens, scores, maybe even hundreds. They were pushing and shoving, desperately fighting past one another, like a herd of animals being stalked by a hungry pride of lions. Only it turned out to be far worse.

  Amongst the crowds I could see the occasional staggering person. I thought they might have been injured in the accident or knocked down and dazed as the crowd surged along the street. But, as I watched, I could see that they were lashing out at some of those who were fleeing, grabbing at them. I saw one man grab hold of a youthful looking boy – he was maybe about seventeen or eightee
n – and then bite him on the shoulder. I stood up.

  The boy wriggled free and, as he staggered off with the rest of the throng, the man grabbed a woman by the ankles, tripping her up. She fell hard onto the ground and he crawled after her, biting her on the leg even as she stood up to run. Another man tried to stop him and launched a savage kick to the guy’s head. It should have knocked him senseless, but it seemed to have little effect and he rolled back onto his knees and grabbed at the assailant, who promptly ran off.

  Antonio was suddenly at my side.

  ‘I think this looks very bad,’ he said in his stilted English.

  He disappeared inside the shop. How I wished, many times, that I could hear his voice again. But I never have.

  People were screaming and yelling at others to run. They were clambering over cars, which had been brought to a standstill, without any thought for the curses and threats it brought from those within. Some were knocked over in the rush to escape and were dived on by those who were pursuing them. Many sought refuge in some of the shops and pubs, hundreds ran down into the Covent Garden Underground station. I saw some of the staggering people follow them down the stairs. I could hear blood curdling screams that made the hairs on my arms stand up. I saw some horrifying sights that day, things that have stayed with me ever since.

  Then, all of a sudden, this man was right next to me, taking me by the arm, urging me to go with him, telling me to run for my life. It was the first time I had met Kareef. We have rarely been apart since. I never saw Ricky again. He never called or sent a text. It was no surprise. After what happened on that first day, I guessed he might be dead. After what I saw on the second, I was convinced of it.

  Claire Samson

  08:20 hours, Friday 15th May, Wood Green, London

  I was a reporter for the London Evening Standard at the time. I had been there for a year, since I had finished college. It was a good job and I got on well with my boss and colleagues, but I was hungry for success and I wanted to get myself noticed and into the big time. When I heard about the bus crash it didn’t really register with me at first. One of my contacts, a friend called Sue, who just happened to live in a flat nearby, phoned me as I was on my way to work and told me about it.