Fever (Flu) (28 page)

She looked to the young man beside her for support. His name was Lark, and while he looked like a mean son-of-a-bitch, he was acting quite the opposite right now. The little girl, Brina, was hanging off his neck, having left Geri in order to pull herself up onto the tattooed man’s knee.

“Please, you have to trust me...” the pilot said.

The gun was still there, but his voice softened. He pulled at the strap on his helmet, removing it, dropping it to the ground. He ran a shaking hand across his brow, wiping it free of sweat, and then rubbed his eyes.

Geri took a chance.

She jumped down from the helicopter.

“Look, you’re not going to shoot me...” she said and reached for the man’s gun.

But the pilot grabbed her hand, turning it against her back, and pushed her to the ground.

It was then that Lark flipped.

In his head, he was no longer in this helicopter, parked somewhere North of Craigavon centre. Instead, Lark found himself in southern Afghanistan, a small village within Helmand Province. He wasn’t looking at Geri and the pilot anymore. Rather, Lark watched a British soldier smack a young Afghan girl across the face, then pin her to the ground, three others looking on, waiting their turn.

Lark was one of them.

“Take your fucking hands off her!” he yelled now, leaping down from the helicopter and grabbing the pilot.

Lark pulled the older man away from Geri, throwing him to the ground.

He hit the man repeatedly.

He was still hitting the pilot when he felt Geri pulling at his shirt.

“Leave it!” she was shouting.

Lark jumped up, moved away.

He noticed his shirt was spattered in fresh blood. “Fuck,” he muttered to himself.

Geri stooped over the pilot’s body, brushing her long red hair to one side as she searched the man’s face for any sign of life. She prodded him with a finger, stepped back.

“You’ve killed him!” she said, turning again to Lark. “He was touching you. No one fucking touches you!”

“Jesus, would you
listen
to yourself?!” Geri screamed.

“What’s wrong with you?”

The little girl was still in the helicopter, a panicked look across her face. Geri reached for her, lifted her down.

“Can you fly this thing?” she said to Lark, nodding towards the helicopter. “Because what we need right now is someone who can fly this thing. Not some mad man tearing into people like a fucking animal!”

That stung him. Lark felt a wall of rage rise up from his insides. He wanted to scream in Geri’s face, to grab her—

To hit her? Pin her down?

He made for the nearby house. Anything to get away. “Hey, where are you going?” she called after him. “Leave me alone! Stay away from me!”

Lark reached the building. It was a small two-storey farmhouse. He pushed the door, entered.

Inside, the place was a mess. Spent cans of beer littered the floor. An overbearing smell of urine greeted him, mixing with other smells such as tobacco and sweat. A single bloody handprint stained a nearby wall.

But Lark didn’t care: the place could be jam-packed with those dead fucks, and he
still
wouldn’t care.

He fell onto the sofa.

“FUCK!” he shouted, wringing his hands.

A familiar scent filled his nostrils, mixing with the other smells.

Marijuana.

Lark’s eyes widened. He rubbed his mouth, looked to a nearby ashtray where some spent roaches lay.

Christ, he needed a hit.
Something stronger than weed, of course, but you had to start somewhere...

He reached for the longest of the roaches, pulled the lighter from his jeans pocket and sparked it up. He sucked the smoke in hungrily.

Lark hadn’t scored in quite a while, and it was beginning to show. He was shivering all over. His bones were sore, his head wired. Geri was right: he was getting on like some kind of lunatic.

Lark took another drag. Bloody thing was spent already. He flicked it to the floor, leaned back in the sofa. He heard the door open.

Geri came in, the child behind her. They sat down beside him.

Geri’s face creased as the room’s smells filled her nostrils.

“Dope?” she asked.

Lark didn’t answer, his eyes staring dead ahead. Look,” she said. “What happened to you?”

He looked at her quizzically. “What do you mean?”

“To make you
like this
. Something must have happened...”

The tattooed man looked away. He noticed a calendar hanging on the wall. June, it said. There was the picture of a beach; the sand reminded Lark, once again, of his time in Afghanistan. He was taken back to that village in Helmand, where the sky seemed so blue it felt like you could drown in it.

He had been only nineteen at the time. Sent to a foreign land where he couldn’t speak the language. Where nothing was familiar. Where everyone looked dangerous and different and fucking scary, staring at Lark with hate and fear in their dark eyes.

But he hadn’t touched that Afghan girl.

He’d watched as the others raped her one by one, on the dusty floor of her single-roomed home. They’d laughed at him when he wouldn’t take her, called him a faggot. And he’d walked out with them and left her there, bleeding on the floor.

But he hadn’t touched her. Surely that meant something!

Geri gestured to the child beside him now. “We have to look after her,” she said to him. “She’s important, somehow. I can feel it...”

The little girl looked up at him with her big doe eyes.

Lark laughed humourlessly. He was no family guy.

Sure, he had kids: two that he knew of. One in the States with her mum. The other he’d fathered with one of the most twisted bitches he’d ever had the misfortune to shag. She was in rehab, last time Lark heard. The kid was living with her grandmother in Carrick. A restraining order forbade Lark from seeing either of them.

“Do you hear me?” Geri pressed.

She moved a little closer. Touched him. Not in a big way, just her hand on his shoulder. But it surprised Lark. Ran through his skin like electricity.

“Look, I’m okay,” he said to Geri.

He wanted to get up, move away. He suddenly felt very aware of himself.

Still she looked at him; still her hand remained on his shoulder.

“Seriously,” he said. “I’m okay. It’s just this—”

“What?” she said and her face was so close he could smell her. An unwashed smell, but still somehow fragrant.

“I don’t want nobody touching you” Lark said, this time quietly. “Not him, not those dead things. Nobody.” His eyes blinked nervously as he talked.

He rubbed one hand across his brow, wiped it on his jeans.

“I know,” Geri said, and when Lark looked up, he could see her eyes were moist.

The little girl broke in, hugging Lark’s arm, but the tattooed man pushed her away.

“Lark!” Geri chastised.

“
What?
I don’t even know her name!”

The little girl looked hurt, rejected. “Brina,” she said, patting her own chest.

Lark and Geri exchanged looks.

“Brina,” Geri said smiling. “What a pretty name.” She ran a hand through the little girl’s hair. “Can you understand us, sweetie?”

Brina looked confused for a moment but then nodded. Geri smiled. “Well, Brina, we’re going to look after you now. You don’t need to worry about a thing.” Something outside disturbed them. A booming noise. Lark got up, walked to the nearby window.

The helicopter was in flames, the pilot coming towards them, carrying the gun.

“Jesus Christ!” Lark exclaimed.

“What is it?” Geri said.

“The fucking pilot...”

“What!?” Geri went to the window, looked out. “Holy... Did
he
do that?” she said, looking at the burning helicopter. “Why would he
do
that?”

“Fucking nutter, that’s why,” Lark mumbled.

The tattooed man quickly scanned the room, finding an old walking stick on the living room floor. He retrieved it, went to the doorway and hid, waiting for the pilot to make his entrance.

Gunfire. Someone was shooting.

Lark swore again, venturing a peek outside the door. He found the pilot now facing the burning helicopter, his gun hand primed.

A flock of dead emerged from the nearby trees. Some were heading for the flames that smothered the helicopter, their hands raised as if in worship. Others were heading for the pilot.

Lark swung his head to the right, following the tree line. More dead appeared, closing in on the farmhouse.

Lark shot a glance towards Geri and Brina.

“Stay here!” he ordered.

He stepped outside, closing the door behind him.

He veered towards the dead nearest to the house, raising the walking stick in his hands and swinging at the head of an older man wearing brown slacks tied with a rope. The handle of the stick connected with the dead man’s jaw, shattering his mouth, spitting bone and teeth onto the muddy grass.

The dead man struggled to remain standing, but Lark struck again, this time bringing the stick crashing down on his skull, splitting it wide open. He hit the ground, but Lark attacked once more, the next blow sealing the deal.

Lark stepped back to avoid the lunges of a second dead man, this time tripping his attacker up before, once again, bringing the head of the stick down hard on the thing’s rotten old head, piercing it like a ripe tomato.

Another one, this time a woman, came at him from his other side, managing to grab Lark’s arm, but the tattooed man shook it off, twisting his body around in order to connect a left hook to the dead thing’s jaw, flooring it with one blow. Then he was pounding again with the stick.

But there were too many of them.

Another one grabbed Lark, the tattooed man’s stick falling from his grasp. Lark tried to pull away, but more of the fuckers were in his face, the nauseating smell of their rotten flesh overbearing.

“Ye bastards!” Lark screeched, closing his eyes, trying to shake them off.

And then there was shooting, Lark almost deafened as gunfire surrounded him. The bodies fell heavily around him, Lark managing to pull away as the shots continued. When he opened his eyes, Lark saw the pilot standing in front of him, gun in hand.

Lark could hear more of the dead pouring out from the woods behind him, their flu-ridden chorus loud and obnoxious in the still country air.

The pilot aimed the gun in Lark’s direction. He squeezed the trigger.

Lark closed his eyes.

A click.

When Lark looked up, he found the pilot working at his gun, dropping an empty magazine, searching in his jacket for a fresh clip. He loaded the clip, chambered a round, and then turned the gun back on Lark. His teeth were gritted, his face still bloodied from Lark punching him earlier.

“Move, you idiot!” he said.

Lark moved, and the pilot offloaded several rounds into the crowd of dead behind him. Several of their number fell, but still more came, seeping out of the woods like a marooned army.

“Come on!” the pilot said, grabbing Lark and frog-marching him at gunpoint towards the nearby building.

“Oh, this is great. Just GREAT!” Geri slumped dejectedly into the sofa. “Trapped in
another
fucking house.”

The pilot ignored her, circling the downstairs rooms, latching the windows and doors.

He looked to Lark, said, “Check upstairs.”

“Fuck off,” the tattooed man replied. He was doubled over, his face pale, breathing heavily. Blood soaked his face and top. He looked like he was going to be sick.

The pilot waved the gun at Lark. “I’m warning you, punk, this is not the time or place...”

Lark exchanged a dirty look with Geri. Laughed then shuffled upstairs, still out of breath.

“Look, who are you?” Geri said to the pilot.

Still the older man ignored her.

Geri could see swelling around his nose and lips where Lark had punched him. He was still bleeding. He wiped a hand across his face, the bloody smear spreading like snail tracks across his sleeve.

“The woods,” he muttered to himself as he looked out a nearby window. “Stupid to land here...”

He looked to Brina, frowned.

Brina frowned back, imitating him.

She didn’t understand the words too well, but it was clear what was happening. They were trapped in the house. The dead surrounded them, creeping up against the windows, staring in with their stupid, vacant eyes.

They reminded Brina of Tony Farrell, one of the boys at her school. Like her, Tony wasn’t local. He’d told Brina he lived in a caravan and travelled around. She hadn’t understood him, but he’d drawn her a picture to explain. He was her best friend, but sometimes Tony looked a bit like those dead things. Like someone had switched him off inside.

“We can’t let them hem us in. We have to get out of here,” the pilot said.

“Says the man who torched the helicopter,” Geri retorted.

“Upstairs bedroom window,” Lark said, coming back down the stairs. “Drops down onto a garage. Leads out onto an open field. We could get a head start on them.”

“Show me,” the pilot said.

The two men disappeared up the stairs, leaving Brina and Geri alone.

From outside, the dead peered in at them, hands clawing uselessly at the windows, voices pained and hoarse like wounded animals.

Geri hooked her finger. “Double glazing, you pricks!” she yelled.

Brina felt trapped.

She thought of the flat back in Finaghy, where she’d been quarantined during the outbreak. Brina had been very sick, a merciless fever burning through her tiny body. Her mother was screaming, trying to escape, but the men in the yellow suits sealed them in.

And then she’d woken—bed sheets glued to her skin, the screams of her mother sharper, not unlike the noises made by the dead gathering outside the farmhouse now.

Mother had locked herself in the bathroom, but Brina wouldn’t let her out...

A gunshot. Sounds of struggle.

“Stay here!” Geri shouted.

But Brina didn’t want to stay. She couldn’t face being alone again with those things.