The Left Series (Book 5): Left On The Run (17 page)

Batfish and Wingate both made a fuss of Spot and spoke to him a bit. I guessed we’d all neglected the poor little guy recently.

“He’s already been fed,” I said. “Corned beef this morning. He hasn’t eaten so well for a while.”

“I know, Brett,” Batfish said. “And he’s made a little more room for some more.” She wafted her hand in front of her nose. “Can’t you smell that? He’s done his business in the corner right here.”

I shook my head, oblivious to the smell of doggy-do. “Sorry, I didn’t notice.”

Batfish took a napkin from the countertop and scooped up Spot’s waste product.

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, Brett,” she sighed. “I'll go dispose of this down the potty.”

Batfish held the soiled napkin out in front of her and walked quickly out of the café. Wingate waited until she left the room then approached my table. She sat down opposite me and put her hand on top of my own. She looked me straight in the eyes and I knew she had something serious to say.

“You sure you’re okay?” she asked.

I shrugged. “As okay as I’ll ever be,” I sighed. “It’s me who has to live with it if I ‘aint.”

Wingate broke her gaze. “It’s about Cordoba.”

“I had a feeling it might be.”

“We have to dispose of her body somehow. You know we can’t just leave her in that emergency room, right?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“I hate to say this but…Chandra says the incinerator is still in working order, operating on that lone generator. I think it’s the best way, Brett and the sooner the better. We wouldn’t want her to start…well, you know.”

“Decaying?” I tried to mentally push away the image attempting to enter my mind. “Yeah, of course. You’re absolutely right. We have to dispose of the body. After all, it’s not her no more, is it?”

Wingate shook her head and sniffed. “I’m going to miss her a lot. She was a good friend. She really did like you, you know.”

I nodded, feeling the lump rise in my throat once again. “I know she did.” My voice cracked. “But it’s so hard to keep a relationship going amongst all this.” I waved my hand, gesturing around the room. “We’d cooled off a little lately but I was hoping we could pick it up again when we got settled someplace.”

Wingate met my gaze with sorrow in her eyes. “I’m sure you would have done, Brett. We have to move forward now. You know how these things roll?”

“Yup, up and at ‘em,” I said, smiling falsely, with tears threatening to spill from my eyes. “We have a little time to rest up for a while, so let’s make the most of it, I guess.”

Wingate nodded. “If you ever want to talk to somebody, come and grab me and we’ll talk in private someplace, okay?”

I gulped the lump of sadness away and nodded.

“You don’t have to come down to the incinerator if you don’t want to. Smith, Batfish and I can handle it.”

“I’d rather not,” I said. I knew the images of Cordoba burning up would haunt my dreams forever if I did.

Batfish returned and Wingate stood. She patted my shoulder before returning to the countertop to grab some breakfast.

It must have been sometime during mid-morning when Chandra Yadav approached me as I milled around outside the café smoking a cigarette.

“Do you play chess, Brett?” he asked. His face broke into a cheery smile.

I shook my head. “Nope, never played before in my life,” I replied.

“Come, let’s go to the TV lounge and I will give you your first lesson,” he said. “I need an adversary to play against and I’m sure you will become a very skilful player.”

I followed Yadav to the lounge. I knew the whole thing was a ruse just to get me out of the way. Smith, Batfish and Wingate would be taking Cordoba’s body to the incinerator and wanted the doctor to keep me occupied while they performed the necessary deed.

Chess wasn’t really a game I’d ever been interested in. The stupid board game looked totally boring and not really my bag but with time on my hands, I decided I’d give it a go. Chandra and I ended up playing the game for the next few hours. I picked up the rules real quick and found it wasn’t so boring after all. Of course, he beat me easily several times but I felt I was improving with every game. Spot sat beside me, watching the proceedings.

Smith, Batfish and Wingate entered the TV lounge with sheepish looks on their faces and I knew they’d done what they had to. Cordoba was no more. She’d returned to dust. I sighed and tried to think about my next chess move.  

“You doing good, Brett?” Batfish asked, pointing to the chess board.

I flapped my hand. “Ah, I suck at the moment but I’m getting better.”

“He’s going to be a very good player,” Chandra chipped in, obviously attempting to make me feel better. “A very deep thinker with an eye for anticipating my next move.”

“That don’t sound like the Wilde Man I know and love,” Smith teased, before slapping me on the back.

“Ah, thanks a bunch, Smith,” I hit back. “The guy blows smoke up my ass and you’re already blowing him off.”

We laughed between us, albeit a little falsely. Even so, it felt good and I hadn’t been capable of any sort of humor in a long while. Maybe it was the start of a new beginning.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Our few days stay in The Royal Glasgow Infirmary Hospital turned out slightly longer than planned. I’m not sure exactly what happened but I guess Smith, Batfish, Wingate and I all felt kind of settled for the first time in a long while. We had hot and cold running water, flushing toilets, plenty of food, shelter and comfortable beds.

My earlier malicious misgivings about Chandra Yadav totally changed over the course of the following days since we first entered the hospital. He was a lovely, charming, kind, intelligent man with a great sense of humor and I enjoyed his company. We whiled away hours hunched over the chess board and I actually managed to beat him a couple of times. He recounted stories about his poor upbringing in India and how hard he’d worked to become a qualified doctor. I told him about our own perilous travels across America and the flight over Atlantic. He listened intently when I told him about my hallucinations and horrific nightmares. I thought I’d found a new friend as well as a fellow survivor.   

Chandra and I also found a kid’s indoor cricket set when we were mooching around the basement while collecting more food tins. He tried to explain the rules of the game to us all and we played a few games of indoor cricket in the large floor space beyond the ward. None of us really knew what we were supposed to be doing but Chandra was very competitive and easily won the match. Nobody seemed to care, we had some fun playing. Fun was an experience I had long forgotten.   

We soon ran out of cigarettes and I knew Smith was itching to get to the Range Rover
to retrieve our supplies. He collared me one morning in the café while I was half way through a fruit dessert.

“How do you feel about taking a quick trip to the outside world, kid?” he asked.

“What for?”

“Ah, well, I figure we really could use some spare clothes and we could definitely do with that spare ammo.”

“And the extra cigarettes?”

Smith ducked his head in a laugh. “Okay, kid, you got me. I really could do with a smoke and I’ve also got a couple of bottles of the good stuff tucked away in one of those packs. But I really am sick of wearing these same combat fatigues day in day out. I’ve washed them but they don’t dry properly. I’m even getting a rash around my ass. So, what do you say?”

I really didn’t need to venture outdoors in the zombie infested hospital grounds but I knew Smith would go out there with or without me regardless.

“Have you told Wingate or Batfish about this little expedition?” I asked.

“No way, man,” Smith gasped. “She’d bust my balls and tell me to quit smoking and the lack of cigarettes would do me good and blah, blah, blah. You know how she is.”

I assumed he was talking singular about Wingate.

“And Batfish is talking about quitting cigarettes anyhow. Yadav has got her some of that nasty nicotine gum or whatever the hell it is. So, it’s you and me again, buddy.” 

“All right,” I sighed. “When do we go?”

“Atta boy, kid.” Smith slapped my shoulder. “The sooner the better.”

“Hold up a moment.” I held up my hand, not trying to sound too enthusiastic. “How the hell are we going to get out to the car? I don’t want to get trapped in that damn corridor again, like the last time.”

“No, I have it all figured out,” Smith said. “We use the door from the basement next to the incinerator. There’s a staircase down there with a door leading to the outside. We go out that way and double back to the Range Rover. We’ll be back inside before anybody notices we’re gone.”

I took in a deep breath and blew it out. This sounded like another one of Smith’s crazy assed plans. “We haven’t got much in the way of ammunition. You got any mags for that M-16?”

Smith shook his head. “Half a mag at best. This will have to be a strictly covert op. Handguns as a last resort. We’ll have to use silent weapons as much as we can.”

I started to weigh up whether the expedition was really worthwhile. “Okay, so you’ve got your big assed machete and what the hell am I going to use?”

Smith looked blank. His cravings were getting the better of him. “Didn’t the Doc say he used to inject the zombies with some kind of death dose?”

I sighed in frustration. “Smith, I’m not going outside with my ass hanging out, armed with nothing more than a stupid little needle. I need a decent kind of weapon.”

“All right, all right, I hear you,” Smith groaned, holding up his hand to silence my griping. He rubbed his chin in thought. “Where did you find that bat and sponge ball for that silly assed game we played?”

“I am not taking a kid’s cricket bat out there against a whole bunch of undead. Forget that one, Smith.”

Smith shook his head. “No, I didn’t mean that,” he hissed. “Was there any more sports gear down there where you found it?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. I didn’t look too closely at all the other stuff down there.”

“Well, let’s take a look. Come on.” Smith grabbed my arm and led me to the basement staircase. “You wait right here while I get my machete.”

Out of habit, I reached for my pack of cigarettes while I waited for Smith. Realizing I didn’t have any only made me want to smoke more.

“Damn it, Smith,” I whispered to nobody. “I wasn’t even thinking about the lack of cigarettes before you mentioned them.”

Smith returned carrying mine and his cold weather jackets between his arms. He tossed me my coat and I noticed he held the machete and two M-9’s under his own jacket.

“I see you’ve been into my room then?” I snapped.

Smith took a look behind him to check nobody had followed and was watching from a distance, as we loaded the firearms.

“Yeah, look they’re all playing some silly assed board game at the moment so let’s sneak out while the going is good.”

“What about my weapon?” I asked.

“Okay, let’s take a look down in the store room but we’ll have to hurry.”

I felt as though we were a pair of kids playing hooky from High School.

Smith hadn’t been to the store room and I hadn’t ventured down into the incinerator compartment so I led the way through the corridor and through a set of double doors leading to the basement. I fished through my jacket and retrieved my flashlight, hoping it still worked. I clicked it on and thankfully the bright light lit up the staircase. I hurried down the vinyl covered steps with Smith following close behind.

The store room was long and rectangular shaped, filled with rows of shelving racks with various sized food tins lined in neat sections. The racks stretched back into the shadows, as far as the flashlight beam shone. An assortment of other equipment was piled to the left of the entranceway. Dusty old books, kid’s toys and various sports gear stood in separate stacks against the wall. I searched through the junk and found something I thought would amuse Smith.

“What about this?” I said, pointing to a kid’s plastic orange water pistol at him. “
Stick ‘em up, punk.
”

Smith sniggered. “If you want to take that out there, then go right ahead but I ‘aint coming to save your silly ass if you do.”

I tossed the toy gun back in the pile and rummaged through the sporting equipment and found exactly what I was looking for but didn’t exactly know what the object was. I held the long, wooden stick like thing up for Smith to see. It looked like a cross between a hockey stick and a paddle.

“What the hell is this?” I gasped, like I’d found some ancient treasure.

“Hey, way to go,” Smith said. “That’s a Hurley, as used in the game of Hurling.”

“Get the fuck out of here, Smith,” I scoffed. “There’s no such game, man. The only hurling game is when you drink too much hooch with your pals.” I mocked vomiting over Smith’s boots.

“You never heard of Hurling, seriously? You being a
Mick
and all? Shame on your ass, Wilde Man,” Smith scorned. “It’s an Irish game but it’s played all over the world, kid. Or used to be played all over the world, anyhow. They played it in America, sure enough. The Irish kids in Brooklyn taught me how to play in McCarren Park, back in the day.”