The Hunted

  ‘But now I really was different. I looked like a monster. You can’t deny it. I am a monster. I frighten people. And you know, when people are all squashed up together and things are going badly, they look for other people to blame. I mean, we had grown-ups for an enemy, but there was never enough food in the house. There wasn’t enough room for everyone. So people got forced out.

  ‘Rav was doing his best. He was a good leader as it goes, but it was hard for him to keep everyone happy. They were always trying to find more food. And when they went out looking they were often attacked by grown-ups. Graffiti started appearing. The kids were spraying the walls. A sort of logo of a mouth, with big lips, bared teeth and a tongue sticking out. The words “Too many mouths” next to it. Too many mouths to feed. In the end they had a meeting. Rav tried to fight for me. He was cool. But he was voted down, and he wanted to stay in charge.’

  ‘So did they throw you out?’ asked Ella.

  ‘Not just me. All of us. All our little gang. Me and Andy and Susannah and weird sweary Henry. They booted us all out. Told us we were on our own.’

  ‘Were you cross with them?’

  ‘I just felt too bad to get angry,’ said Malik. ‘I thought that if it wasn’t for me they probably wouldn’t have kicked the others out. Felt it was all my fault.’

  ‘What did you do? What happened to the others?’

  ‘First thing we had to do was find a source of food. I talked to the others. We were sitting out under a tree in the park, hadn’t gone that far from the camp. They told me they knew about a supermarket full of food that nobody could get into. Sounded like a magic supermarket to me, but they claimed it was real. All locked up and the windows impossible to break. So I said we’d go there. Work out a way. It was something to do. The supermarket was just outside town with a big car park and a petrol station. It had been built in the same red brick as the older buildings in Rowhurst, to try and make it blend in, but it was huge and out of scale and still looked like what it was – a big shed full of food – like it didn’t really belong there.

  ‘There were some cars in the car park and a long line of abandoned shopping trolleys. When we reached the supermarket entrance, we found three dead bodies lying there. A middle-aged woman and two younger men. They’d been half eaten. Whether by animals or by other humans it was hard to tell. One of the guys was missing both his arms. We all tried not to look at them, tried not to think about them. Pretend they weren’t there.

  ‘The shop doors were bolted firmly shut. We pressed our faces against the glass. It wasn’t exactly full. That would have been too good to be true, but there did still appear to be some stuff on the shelves. How were we going to get at it, though?

  ‘I asked if anyone knew how to hot-wire a car. Not something they taught at Rowhurst. Well, that set Andy off. He was one of those guys who knew everything about everything.

  ‘He was all, like – “It’s very difficult with modern cars. Almost impossible with any model built after 2004. They have too many security systems. With earlier makes it’s easier, but you’d need tools, wire-cutters and electrical tape and a screwdriver. I’ve never actually done it, but I’ve seen videos on YouTube. It’s quite complicated.”’

  Malik said all this in a squeaky, nasal voice and Ella giggled.

  ‘Yeah, Andy knew a lot of stuff,’ Malik went on. ‘Couldn’t do a lot, stuck in his chair, but knew a lot.

  ‘So I’m like – “What about those dead bodies? They might have driven here; they might have car keys on them.”

  ‘“Go on then,” said Andy, and he was almost sort of grinning. “Why don’t you take a look?”

  ‘I told him no way and he said it wasn’t like I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here, I didn’t have to eat them or anything. “Just got to think of them like a dead fox or something, a dead bird.”

  ‘Anyway, I couldn’t do it,’ said Malik. ‘The way my hands were I didn’t want to risk infection. In the end Henry did it. I remember him going over to the armless man, mumbling and swearing. He leant over him, covering his mouth and nose with one hand. He got hold of the zip of his jacket between his finger and thumb and peeled it back. The jacket was stiff with dried blood. A cloud of flies flew up from underneath it and Henry fell back on his arse, swearing and spitting.

  ‘The others laughed. Henry really went for it then. Searching all the man’s pockets, but he couldn’t find anything. Susannah suggested he try the woman’s handbag. She still had it clutched in one hand, though the flesh had mostly been eaten, or had rotted away. I remember her hand was bony, the sinews showing like strings. Henry picked up the handbag and yanked it, trying to wrench it from the woman’s grasp, and there was a snap as her hand broke off and came away with it. He flapped about, trying to shake it loose, and it flew away and hit the window. Then he opened the bag and tipped out its contents. There were all the things you’d expect to find in a handbag – a purse, house keys, make-up, a brush, mobile phone, tissues and ta-dah! – a car key.

  ‘He found a rag and cleaned it. Then paraded round the car park, aiming it like some kind of ray gun at the cars and pressing the unlock button until at last a Ford Focus flashed its indicators and there was a clunk as the locks popped open.

  ‘Everyone cheered and we crowded round the car. And then we saw what was inside.’

  21

  ‘What was inside the car?’ asked Ella.

  ‘There were the bodies of two small children on the back seat. Holding each other in their arms. Long dead, they were covered in a fuzz of green and orange mould and had sort of melted into the seats.

  ‘Henry dropped the key and walked away, squatted down, holding his knees to his chest. Nobody wanted to get in the car, so I stepped up. This was supposed to be my expedition after all. I was supposed to be the one getting into the supermarket. I picked up the key and opened the door. The stink that came out was so foul that Susannah bent over and threw up all over the place. I quickly climbed into the driver’s seat and just told myself to keep moving. I buckled up my seat belt and jammed the key into the ignition. One twist and the engine started. First time.

  ‘I’d had driving lessons from an uncle in Iran when we went over there on a family holiday the summer before. It had been cool. We’d rolled round the countryside and I knew enough to get the thing going and keep it in a straight line. It wasn’t as if I was going to be driving the Focus very far, after all. It was a short, quick ride into a large plate-glass window. Finding the bodies in the car had distracted me from the fact that this was a very dangerous stunt.

  ‘Yeah, well, I tried not to think about all that and kept moving.

  ‘“Mirror, signal, manoeuvre,” that was the drill.

  ‘I looked in the rear-view mirror and got a glimpse of the two corpses in the back. They were blackened, their lips shrunk back, showing their teeth, as if the two of them were grinning at a private joke.

  ‘I looked away pretty quickly. I really didn’t need to check my mirror or make any signals, did I? I was about to break all the rules. So I set off across the car park towards the front of the shop. It felt unreal, like I was a dad on some kind of warped family outing, with his two kids in the back.

  ‘A family of crash-test dummies.

  ‘As soon as I had a clear run at the window, I accelerated. Not too fast – I didn’t want to kill myself – just fast enough to break the glass. It felt insane. I was about to ram a car at full speed into Tesco. I had no idea what might happen. If it had been a film the car would’ve probably exploded …

  ‘At the last moment I put on a final burst of speed, screamed like a kid on a roller-coaster and slammed the car into the window. It all went down so quickly I didn’t really have any idea what happened next. I thought I might be dead, to tell you the truth. I couldn’t see anything, hear anything or feel anything. I think I probably blacked out for a moment.

  ‘All I had was a memory of the impact, rather than the actual feeling of it. The memory of a big bang followed by the sou
nd of glass falling. The memory of something big and white punching me in the face. The memory of being kicked back into my seat and my head bouncing off the headrest. The memory of the two bodies in the back being thrown forward through the windscreen and splattering messily across the bonnet.

  ‘It was like a computer rebooting. First my vision came back into focus. There was smoke and steam and shiny bits of windscreen everywhere. Then my hearing. Hissing, dripping, tinkling, a high-pitched whine inside my head. My nerves started to send pain signals to my brain. I had the beginnings of a monster headache. My face was sore, scratched, throbbing with each heartbeat, as if someone was hammering at it.

  ‘I was slumped over the air bag, the car crumpled up against the tills inside the shop. There were bits of rotten flesh and wriggling maggots in a funnel shape over the bonnet, as if the car had thrown up something evil through its broken windscreen.

  ‘Then I heard voices … “Are you all right? That looked amazing.”

  ‘“The whole window went, like, just boom …”

  ‘“It was like a film or something.”

  ‘They helped me out of the car and I, like, limped over to the supermarket shelves. A lot of them were empty, the shops had run out of food real quick when the panic set in, but miraculously there were still a few things left to eat, a few cans and packets – beans and sardines and cake mix. And in a back storeroom we found some water and some bags of rice and pasta. Plus a load of sweets and chocolate. Enough to last us about maybe two or three weeks. And then what? What could the four of us do? We barricaded ourselves in the back room there and talked.

  ‘Henry had nowhere to go. No family. He went on and on about someone called Mary, in between the swearing and the spitting, which he also sometimes did. I worked out that Mary must’ve been his, like, teacher, or nurse, or carer, or something. He kept asking where she was and when he’d see her again. At first I explained every time what had happened, how she was probably dead, and he’d understand and nod his head, and not long after he’d ask the same questions over again … “Where’s Mary? Where’s Mary? Will she bring my tea?” So after a while I stopped explaining and just said she’d be coming soon, and that seemed to keep him happy.

  ‘Andy said his family were all dead. He hadn’t had any brothers or sisters. Only parents and they went quick. Susannah said she had one sister, who was back at Brockridge House with Rav and the rest. I couldn’t believe it. That her sister would let her go like that and not say anything. But Susannah just sort of shrugged, said her sister hated her.

  ‘I told them about my family. Three sisters, all younger than me. I had no idea what had happened to them. I said I wanted to go look for them. See if maybe they were safe back home somewhere. I mean, I didn’t expect much, it was a way long shot, but it was something to do, somewhere to go. What was the alternative? To stay there and wait till we either starved to death or were attacked by a group of grown-ups wanting to finish what they’d started. I told the others they could either come with me or stay there, it was up to them.

  ‘Susannah just shrugged again; nothing seemed to be a big deal to her. It was like she had something missing. Andy said he wanted to come, but we’d have to help him with his wheelchair. He’d had an electric one before, but when his batteries had run down there was no way of recharging them. So now he had a fold-up one that we had to push for him. It was a bit rickety.

  ‘And Henry? Well, Henry just did what he was told.’

  ‘Where was your home?’ asked Ella. ‘Was it nearby?’

  ‘No. Rowhurst was a boarding school. I had to do a load of exams to get in. It was my dad’s idea. He couldn’t really afford it, to tell you the truth, but he always said he wanted the best for me. He wanted me to be a doctor or a scientist. “Something proper,” he always said. My dad worked at Heathrow, at the airport. Mum was an office cleaner. But Dad had been buying cheap properties to rent out around Slough, and I think he had some family money. I hated it at first, being away from my family, but I guess I got used to it. I grew up in Slough. It’s not far from here, as it goes.’

  ‘I remember Slough,’ said Ella. ‘We came past it when we drove out of London. I remember saying that it sounded like a horrible place.’

  ‘Yeah. Imagine growing up in a place called Slough.’ Malik laughed sourly in the dark. ‘It’s not totally horrible, though. I mean, it’s not exactly great, it’s just … Slough. Bad name, I know. It’s about sixty miles from Rowhurst to here. Andy said the average human walking speed was three miles an hour. So we figured it would take us about twenty hours, give or take a bit. If we pushed ourselves we could do maybe ten miles a day. Get to Slough in a week.

  ‘What did we know? This was early days. We had no idea what was out there. How dangerous it might be. It was just a school maths problem. They never asked that in the exams, did they? Like, “If John walks at three miles an hour from London to Brighton, and he’s attacked by rabid grown-ups four times, and they bite his right leg off, how long will it take him to bleed to death?”’

  Malik laughed again.

  ‘We were just four dumb kids with a lot of stupid hope.

  ‘It was Andy who suggested we look for some more car keys. I mean, it had gone so well before, hadn’t it? I’d only been knocked out for a few seconds. So me and Henry searched the supermarket. Andy and Susannah stayed behind to guard the storeroom. Though what use they’d have been if anyone got in and attacked I don’t know. Susannah would just shrug, I guess.

  ‘We found an upstairs bit and we found the manager’s office, and we found the manager, hanging from the ceiling, with his belt round his neck, and his trousers round his ankles. He hadn’t thought about that. How he’d look if he took his belt off. I must admit I laughed. But Henry didn’t really have a sense of humour. He was determined, though, I’ll give him that. As I looked round the office, he went through the guy’s pockets. I found his keys in his desk. House keys, work keys, car key. For a Volvo. We looked out the window that overlooked a staff car park behind the supermarket. Henry knew a bit about cars and he recognized the Volvo.

  ‘Ten minutes later we were packing our supplies into the boot. It didn’t have a whole lot of petrol in it. The info panel said twenty-seven miles. We knew we probably wouldn’t be able to find any more petrol anywhere. It had run out quickly when the disease hit. The tankers had stopped delivering. Everyone ran dry, got stranded. But twenty-seven miles was better than nothing. It would get us halfway there. It felt like a good sign. We were learning how to get by. We felt like we’d sort of achieved something.

  ‘It was a good thing we had the car because five minutes down the road we ran into a big gang of grown-ups, blocking the street. We braked hard and they came after us, but we managed to turn round and go a different way, and that felt like a good sign too.

  ‘Do you remember what it was like in those early days? Crazy. There were fires everywhere. Kids and adults roaming the streets, all fighting each other. We’d been lucky not to come across any of it since we’d left Brockridge House, but now we were seeing it everywhere, the full-on madness of it. I just kept on driving, trying not to think too far ahead. I had my plan to get to Slough and that was it. Didn’t want to think about anything else.

  ‘It was hard work. At first I kept stalling the car, but I slowly got better at it and we made our way out of town. We figured we’d be better off on the M25. It was a good wide road, with not too many buildings near it. We found our way there and set off. There were crashed and burnt-out cars all over the place: people had driven until their petrol ran out, or they’d got too sick to carry on. As if you could escape the sickness by driving. I mean, there was nowhere to go, was there?

  ‘There were dead bodies as well. In the road. In the cars. Lots of cars piled up. There wouldn’t have been any police around, or fire brigade. People just went nuts. There were cars all twisted together. We even passed a convoy of army trucks, stalled in the road. No sign of the soldiers. We stopped to look for weapo
ns – nothing there, worse luck. Would have been good to get hold of some rifles, hand grenades and stuff, like in the movies.

  ‘So it was back in the car and more driving. Felt good to be moving. Even if I was a bit of a slow driver. These were scary times, but, in a way, maybe they were the most optimistic. Because we were moving, it felt like we were winning. I thought, because I was driving, that it was down to me. I was saving people. We were just like the other drivers, though. We thought we could get away. We thought we were going somewhere. Instead we were just going round in a big circle, which is what the M25 is, isn’t it? A big roundabout going all the way round London.

  ‘We were chatting away. Excited. Except Henry who talked to himself, swear words mostly. We really thought we might live forever. Well, we didn’t, did we?

  ‘Susannah was the first to go. We’d made it as far as some services, nearly ten miles further than the gauge had said we’d go. But we’d been running on empty for a long way. We just made it and I parked up near the pumps.

  ‘There was no power so I knew we couldn’t actually use the pumps, but I wondered if there was maybe some way we could get some petrol out. Gave up after a few minutes. It was hopeless. So the next thing was to look for another car. There was a sort of hotel place there, an inn it was called, with brightly painted walls. There were some cars parked outside it. We searched the cars for keys, but didn’t find any. So we went in, me and Henry, the fearless key hunters.