Disintegration

38

Webb, Sean, Amir, and Harte were drunk. Their successful excursion into Bromwell, coupled with the news that the helicopter had been heard flying nearby yet again today, left them feeling temporarily invincible. They, it seemed, were fully in control. Hollis and Jas watched them from the other side of the Steelbrooke Suite. Their noise was beginning to make Hollis nervous. The rest of the group had gone to bed, but he wasn’t going anywhere until these stupid, selfish fuckers had settled down. He didn’t want to think about what they might do if they were left unsupervised and, although the hotel grounds and surrounding area were relatively corpse-free, he wasn’t prepared to take any chances. Webb and Sean seemed more volatile than usual tonight, buoyed by the events of the day. Sean in particular had been unexpectedly aggressive when, less than an hour ago, Hollis had suggested to him that maybe he’d had enough to drink. Rather than antagonize them, Hollis had instead decided that the best approach was to give them what they wanted. Like leaving a fire to burn itself out, he planned on making sure they had enough booze to help them lose consciousness. It was the only way he could guarantee keeping them quiet.

He heard footsteps in the corridor outside. He picked up his torch and went out to investigate. It was Martin. He looked tired and preoccupied.

“Come to complain about the noise again?” Hollis asked.

Martin shook his head. “Would it do any good?”

“Probably not. What’s up?”

“Just been down by the pool.”

“And…? Got a problem with your pet?”

“Don’t take the piss.” He sighed. “She’s acting strangely.”

“Stranger than usual?”

“It’s the noise this lot are making,” he explained, nodding toward the Steelbrooke Suite and cringing as Webb threw another beer bottle onto a pile of empties. “She’s not used to it and it’s freaking her out. We’ve survived here for as long as we have by keeping quiet and staying out of sight. What you’re doing now is going to undo all of that.”

“Don’t be overdramatic. They’re just letting off steam, they’re not doing any harm. Listen, I’ll talk to them in the morning and—”

“You don’t understand,” Martin snapped, his voice angrier but the volume still restrained.

“What don’t I understand?” Hollis snapped back. “As far as I can see you’ve spent all your time locked in here with your head down. You haven’t actually seen what’s happening to the rest of the world. I have, and I know that we’ll be safe here.”

“Come with me,” Martin interrupted. He turned and walked away, leaving Hollis with little option but to follow. He knew exactly where Martin was taking him, back to the body he kept trapped in the office so he could prove his point. But what point was he trying to make? Sure enough, they turned down the corridor which led to the swimming pool.

“Look, Martin,” Hollis protested, “I promise you I’ll speak to them tomorrow. I won’t let this happen again. I’ll make them see that—”

He immediately stopped speaking when they reached the window through which they usually watched the corpse. He shone his torch into the room and jumped back when the creature slammed against the glass. Its dead eyes followed his every move and its numb, unresponsive fingers clawed pointlessly at the window, leaving a crisscross hatching of blood-tinged, greasy smears. It slid along as he approached, keeping as close to him as it could.

“Why’s she doing that?” he asked, suddenly concerned. “She’s never done that before, has she? She’s always tried to get out of the way, not followed like that.”

“You see what I mean? She’s scared,” Martin hissed, turning back and walking away, almost as if he didn’t want the corpse to hear. He disappeared down the west-wing corridor. Hollis followed, breaking into a jog to try and catch up. Martin stopped when he reached the foot of the staircase which led to the rooms on the first and second floors.

“Thing is, Greg,” he whispered, “I know you’ve managed to stay alive by doing things your way, and that’s worked for you. Christ, the very fact that we’re both standing here now is proof that we’ve all succeeded.”

“What are you trying to say?”

Martin thought carefully for a moment, choosing his words and finally beginning to calm down.

“What I’m saying,” he began, “is that our methods of survival have to be adapted to our surroundings. Where you were before, it suited you to make a bloody huge noise and to fight and destroy them.”

“And what about here?”

“Here things are different,” he immediately replied.

“How?”

“We’re relying on the fact that they don’t know where we are.”

Rather than explain further Martin began to climb the stairs and beckoned Hollis to follow. He sprinted up each flight until he’d reached the top floor. Halfway down the corridor was room West 37—his room. He opened the door and went inside. Hollis walked with him into his remarkably clean, comfortable, and well-ordered living space. Martin stood at the window which overlooked the car park and the countryside below. Hollis moved closer. He couldn’t see anything but the usual never-ending blackness.

“What exactly am I supposed to be looking at?” he asked.

“Down there,” Martin replied, opening the window slightly and pointing. The air outside was cold. Hollis shivered as a blustery gust hit his face.

“What?” he asked again.

“Look down there on the other side of the road. What can you see?”

Hollis stared, his eyes slowly becoming used to the outside gloom. He could see the thick, protective hedgerow which enclosed the hotel grounds and the gap where the narrow road ran around its perimeter. Beyond that was the hedge on the other side of the road which bordered the golf course and surrounding fields. There was some movement in the field immediately opposite. Corpses. He couldn’t see how many.

“There are a few bodies. Nothing out of the ordinary. Why?”

“Because that is out of the ordinary.”

Hollis leaned forward again. He could see the tops of as many as fifteen, maybe twenty bobbing heads moving in the field on the other side of the road. He couldn’t see what the problem was. A noise from downstairs—a sudden torrent of drunken, shouted abuse from Harte—distracted him. It affected the bodies too. As soon as they heard it they shuffled closer to the hedge.

“But there are still only a handful of them,” Hollis protested. “They’ll probably be gone in the morning.” He was tired and cold and was beginning to get annoyed with Martin.

“You’re not listening to me.” Martin sighed. He shut the window and sat down on the corner of his bed.

“I am listening, I just don’t see what the problem is.”

“Christ, Greg, I thought you’d understand.”

“Sorry…” he mumbled, shrugging his shoulders, not actually sure what he was apologizing for.

“You might be used to having that many bodies around. You might be used to having hundreds more, thousands even. We’re not.”

“But we can sort them out. They’re not a concern, believe me.”

“Thing is,” Martin continued, “we did have that many here to start with, but we dealt with them. We distracted them and we fooled them. We tricked them into moving away with the music and we lit a couple of fires on the golf course, then we locked ourselves down and kept quiet and out of sight. From what I’ve heard, you did the opposite. You just carried on like nothing had happened.”

“Well, not quite, but—”

“You did! As far as I can tell from what you’ve said, you kept going out to get your food and your fuel and your booze and whatever else you wanted.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“I’m not criticizing what you’ve done.”

“You sound like you are.”

“Well, I’m not. I’m just saying that in your situation back where you were based, that approach worked. You can’t do that here. You can’t keep going outside and you can’t keep making the kind of noise that those bloody drunks downstairs have been making all evening.”

Hollis was struggling to understand.

“I still don’t know why you’re getting so upset—”

“I’m not upset,” Martin protested. “I’m concerned.”

“What about? Come on, spell it out for me. What is it that’s bothering you tonight? We knew we were going to attract a few of them.”

“I understood that, but I’ve been watching the bodies out there for a couple of hours now, Greg. Their behavior is changing. We’ve had them this close before, but they’ve always disappeared by now. Those things out there tonight aren’t going anywhere. The music’s still playing and there’s still a big enough crowd to keep them on the golf course, but it doesn’t seem to be working like it usually does. Christ, man, they’re moving in the opposite direction!”

Hollis looked out again, carefully considering the frightened man’s words.

“What about the helicopter?” he asked. “It flew over again today, didn’t it?”

“Yes. What about it?”

“We need to do something to make them see us.”

“Is this relevant?”

“I think so. How are we going to attract their attention without attracting the bodies too?”

“I don’t know. I was thinking about marking a message on the lawns or something like that.”

“Might work. Some kind of beacon would be better, though. They won’t see your message unless they fly right over us and happen to be looking down.”

“I know…”

“The point I’m trying to make is that we’re going to have to risk making our presence known at some point. And we can deal with the dead, Martin. We’ve done it before. Bloody hell, Webb alone has torched hundreds of them.”

“He might well have, but there are thousands more waiting out there.”

“Waiting?”

“Yes, waiting. Waiting to find out where we are. Driving around in bloody trucks and buses, lighting beacons and making a bloody noise like you lot have done today is just going to bring them straight back to us. You’re going to start a chain reaction. Once a few of them know where we are, the whole bloody lot will follow.”