I wanted to be ready for whatever awaited us at the marina.
fourteen
When the city of Swansea appeared off the bow, I squinted against the falling rain at the buildings and streets visible from the sea. Mike had taken us out into deeper waters as a precaution and the rain made it harder to see anything clearly, but the city looked deathly quiet.
Something wasn’t right. The city shouldn’t be like this. I had expected to see zombies lumbering around the streets. The city should be full of the hungry groans of the undead.
This unearthly silence chilled me to the bone.
Mike shouted down from the bridge. “You see that, man? It’s too good to be true.”
Those were my thoughts, exactly. I remembered the zombies at the farmhouse and how they had waited silently on the porch until we came out of the house. I didn’t think they had the reasoning power to set such a trap but now, as I looked at the ghostly city in the rain, I wondered if we were heading straight into an ambush.
The rain bothered me. I went through the door into the living room.
The girls were in the kitchen, sorting through the cupboards and making a list of what food we had and what we needed. Because this boat was used for long trips, the cupboard contained long life products, mainly in cans, so it was perfect for our needs.
I wiped rainwater from my face and peered through the window at the tall buildings and empty coastline. I still had the axe gripped in my right hand.
“What’s up, Alex?” Lucy asked from the counter where she and Elena had piled up packets of rice and cans of beans.
“It’s just so quiet. Where are all the people who lived here? Where are all the zombies?”
“He’s complaining because there aren’t zombies?” Elena asked, rolling her eyes. “You really are weird, Alex.”
Weird or not, I still couldn’t shake my feeling of unease.
A speaker set into the wall crackled and Mike’s voice came out of it. “Hey, can you guys hear me? I can see the marina.”
I went out and up the ladder to the bridge.
Mike was bringing us in closer to the shore. Ahead, the twin jetties of the marina jutted out into the sea. There were boats everywhere. Most were moored in the slips but some floated freely on the tide. “I don’t get it, man,” Mike said. “Why didn’t everybody just take the boats when they knew about the zombies?”
“The virus spread fast. By the time people knew what was happening, the army was probably rounding them up for the Survivors Camps.”
There were no people on the jetties, no sign of life. No sign of the undead.
Mike brought us around so we faced the docks. There were two fuel pumps, one at either side of the marina. We sailed towards the closest one and I jumped off The Big Easy onto the jetty, mooring rope in hand. Before I tied the boat to one of the steel cleats, I listened to the marina. All I could hear was rain bouncing off the boats and splashing into the water. I tied a fast and loose knot in case we had to leave here quickly.
Mike jumped up onto the dock and inspected the pump. “Looks like someone left it switched on. So at least some people got away on boats.”
I looked towards the marine supply shop on shore. It looked quiet enough. “How long will it take to fill the tank?” I asked Mike.
“About ten minutes.”
Climbing back onto The Big Easy, I grabbed the gun from where Lucy had left it on the dining table and headed back outside.
“Where you going?” Lucy asked.
“There’s a store here. I’m going to check it out.”
“Want me to come with?”
“No, it looks deserted.”
Elena looked up from the piles of food they had arranged across every available kitchen surface. “We need sugar if they have any.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
I grabbed the binoculars, climbed back out onto the dock and looked towards the marine supply store through the magnifying lenses. A glass door gave me a view into the shop. A second door on the far side of the building led to the street beyond. That didn’t make me happy. There were two ways into the shop, which meant zombies could come in off the street. I couldn’t see that street from where I stood so I decided to check everything out and lock the street door, if it wasn’t already locked, before I salvaged supplies from the store.
With the gun in one hand and the axe in the other, I walked along the wooden dock.
A large poster inside the shop window had a picture of a man and woman drinking champagne on the back of a luxury yacht with the slogan ‘Sail To Your Destiny’. The world that poster belonged to no longer existed.
I glanced into each moored boat as I passed, looking for movement inside. Nothing. The boats sat silently waiting for owners who would never return. For most of these craft, this was the end of the line. Unless other survivors found them, they would float here until they rotted into the sea.
I reached the shop door and looked through the glass. It was dark inside but I could make out racks of clothing, fishing gear, a bookshelf crammed with books, and shelves of food. No movement. No sounds from within.
I slid the axe into the leg pocket of my cargo pants and put my hand on the cold, wet metal door handle. Holding my breath, I gently pulled the door open. Nothing jumped out at me. No yellow eyes appeared in the shadows. I sniffed the air inside. No rank decaying meat smell assaulted my nostrils.
I slipped inside.
Stood by the half open door.
Listened.
The gun felt slippery in my hand.
No sound except the rain outside and the whirr of the pump at the end of the dock as Mike refuelled our boat.
I took two steps into the shop, my wet boots squeaking on the floor.
The clothing racks cast deep shadows over some areas of the room. I wished I could see if anything was hiding in those shadows.
The door and windows looking out onto the street showed me a deserted road lined with more shops. There was nobody out there. I crossed the room quickly, arcing the gun in front of me in case anything jumped out at me. The door to the street was unlocked and without a key I had no way of changing that situation. I went to the counter where a display of GPS units in a glass case stared at me with blank screens. Hopping over the counter, I looked for a light switch. When I found it on the wall behind the cash register, I debated whether I should use it.
First of all, I didn’t even know if there was electricity still running to the shop. Secondly, switching on the lights would give away my position to anyone out there in the street. Just because I couldn’t see anybody didn’t mean there wasn’t someone out there somewhere. That thought chilled me.
Leaving the switch alone, I went back into the main part of the store and found a bunch of small metal shopping carts lined up near the door. Wheeling one over to the clothing racks, I filled it with T-shirts, sweaters, hoodies and cargo pants. I grabbed waterproof jackets from a rack near the wall and put them into the cart as well. When I had raided most of the men’s and women’s clothing section, leaving behind only the children’s clothing, I positioned the full cart near the door to the docks.
Taking a second cart, I loaded it with wetsuits, diving masks and snorkels. If we were going to spend a long time at sea, these things would be useful. I read a zombie novel once in which the main character used a wetsuit as protection against bites and scratches. No reason why it wouldn’t work. I added swimming trunks and bathing suits to the cart and picked up some pairs of sunglasses.
Pushing the cart to the back of the shop, I found a food shelf and loaded up with pots of dehydrated noodles and three bags of the sugar Elena had requested. I found coils of strong thick marine rope and looped one over my shoulder. I slung a large pair of binoculars around my neck. They looked more powerful than Mike’s.