“I need to know what happens next,” Gary said.

“What do you mean?”

“Here, in our world, with all of this. The others said that there’s a war going on and that our world’s undead would be added to the forces of the necromancers. Is that right?”

Rain nodded.

“So that means they’ll just leave our world behind?”

“Yes.”

“And any survivors?”

“I don’t think there usually are any. It could happen. I guess. I suppose they’d be left to repopulate for maybe a hundred years. Then get harvested all over again.”

“By harvested, you mean the necromancers and undead return to kill them and add them to the army?”

Rain nodded.

“So even if we survive, all we’ll be doing is setting up a situation in a few generations’ time for the same thing to happen? That’s brutal.”

Rain shrugged. “It is the way it is. It’s been like that for hundreds of years.”

Gary and Rain were approaching the McPearson’s farm on foot, with James, Gemma and Martin following. The morning was crisp, the sky cloudless. The only sign that the world had ended was the silence. The road that led out of the valley was devoid of traffic. No trains ran along the viaduct.

Who knew the apocalypse would be so peaceful? Gary thought.

The previous night had passed slowly, with Gary guiding those on watch with him around his uncle’s land. The following morning, the survivors had awoken bleary eyed, beginning to realise that this might be their life now.

Jonathan, in a grim mood, had taken charge.

“The first thing we need to do is to work on our supplies,” he’d said. “There’s a farm nearby. I want some of us to head over there and check it out. We need to see first if it’s safe and second, what food sources are available. Gary, you, James, Gemma and Martin, that’s your job. Gary, you know the way, I presume?”

“It’s a twenty-minute walk,” Gary nodded, “Last time I was there, there was livestock and plenty of crops.”

“Good. We’re going to need that.”

“Shouldn’t we be seeing if there are any other people out there?” Fran had asked.

“That’s not the priority right now. Securing the area and supplies is. We already had to deal with five zombies last night, and there could be more on the way. You, Goremaster, I want you to keep your eye on the map. We need someone keeping an eye out at all times. If you need a break, you tell someone and they take over and you do not fuck about, is that clear?”

Goremaster nodded. “Yes, boss.”

Jonathan’s attitude after the events of the previous night had hardened. There was no room for questioning or dissent.

Gary took him to one side and explained his idea of creating kill-pits to lure any zombies into and then get the others to level up.

“Smart,” Jonathan nodded, “Though I don’t know if this lot are going to want to kill people, even if they are zombies.”

“Well, they’ll have to learn. Speaking of killing people, didn’t you say you were going to kill the guy responsible for all of this?”

Jonathan scowled, “I did. That’s my plan. But right now, having a secure base is the most important thing we can do. After that, it’s zombie killing and levelling up as fast as possible.”

“Right.”

“We’ll need tools to work on the defences, ditches and kill-pits.”

“There should be some in the basement,” Gary nodded, “When we were reconstructing the place, we stored them there.”

“The basement? I didn’t notice one.”

“Door in the small room next to the kitchen, where the washing machine is.”

“There’s no door there.”

Gary checked and saw Jonathan was right. He frowned.

“Weird. I must be misremembering. I haven’t been here for ten years. Maybe it was the McPearson’s place. I, uh, spent a bit of time there. I must be mixed up.”

He did a quick check of the garage and the shed, and found the tools he’d been expecting in the latter. Several shovels, pickaxes, general gardening tools.

“Here,” he said, dropping the tools in front of the others, “I guess you all better start digging.”

*

Rain had reappeared when Gary, James, Gemma and Martin were halfway to McPearson’s farm. The twenty-minute walk was an easy stroll, with Gary in front and James, Gemma and Martin trailing behind. The nice young couple had barely said anything, except to mention that she was a dentist and he was an optician. Martin had volunteered that he was an accountant, then retreated into silence.

You know, Gary thought, it would have been nice to get stuck with some folk that had practical skills for all of this. ‘An optician, a dentist and an accountant walk into a zombie apocalypse’ sounds like the start of a bad joke...

“Where have you been?” he’d asked Rain.

“I was scouting the area. It’s important to know your environment.”

Gary had nodded and started asking Rain questions, beginning with what happened next. During the long night of perimeter checks and showing the other survivors the territory, he’d compiled a list of further questions for Rain. There’d been no more zombies in the area, and the other survivors had remained muted during the night time walks.

Part of the problem Gary faced was that he only had one source of information. He couldn’t be sure how much he was told was fact, fiction, distorted perception or outright lies. Jonathan had been right when he’d asked, ‘what did they really know?’

The truth was, not much for sure.

“So all the undead are just going to leave in a week, or ten days at most?”

“The majority, yes. A handful might get left behind. Why that timeframe? A week to ten days?”

“It was something Juliet, the admin, mentioned. She wasn’t supposed to tell me, but it sounded like she felt bad. She let it slip, at any rate.”

“The admins are people too,” Rain commented, “Or so I heard.”

Not too sure about that, Gary thought, given the hell they unleashed on our world.

But this fact, assuming Gary could trust it, left him with a sliver of hope that he’d been lacking.

“So, if we can protect ourselves and fend off any attacks for the next ten days, we’ll be left in peace?”

“Yes, for a while. Although your planet will change as well. The flora and fauna may mutate, so it will be more dangerous than before.”

But there is still some hope of a respite, Gary thought.

The scale of what was occurring overwhelmed his brain, the tales of worlds destroyed to fuel the war. It had seemed like a hopeless, futile problem, a misery with no end, where all actions were futile. Now Rain was offering a glimmer of hope.

“Any undead left behind will focus on levelling up and consuming the living. If the world becomes too crowded, they’ll harvest it.”

I guess that’s one way to solve over-population, Gary thought.

“At least as far as I know,” Rain added, “I’m not an authority on this. Annabel knew a lot more than I do.”

Gary had more questions.

“Something else. Back at the church, Zafier brought back some zombies that had already been killed. Does that mean every killed zombie can just be brought back again and again?”

Rain furrowed her eyebrows. Despite her promise to give Gary any answers he required, it was proving a strain on her. Amongst other things, she was fighting against years of taught behaviour. Silence was her default.

“No, it doesn’t work like that. Undead that have been killed and then brought back come back at half their original strength, with exceptions. The ones your revenant brought into the church were barely level ones by that point.”

Okay, that was good. So there wasn’t a never-ending supply of the undead.

“By the way, about your revenant, I should warn you...” Rain began.

But Gary had already moved onto his next question.

“Is there any way to stop the undead from coming back altogether?”

“Decapitation works. Or cremation.”

“Cremation, huh?”

“They can’t return if there’s no body to return with.”

“Right. That’s me out of a job then.”

Rain cast a sideways glance at him. “Was that a joke?”

“Never mind. We’re here.”

Gary noted that, as gruesome as it might be, they should behead the McPearsons to be on the safe side.

“There aren’t any undead nearby,” Rain reported, after scouting around the barns and the main house. The McPearsons’ farm was a mixture of livestock and crops. Aside from the visible signs of struggle in the eleven-year-old’s bedroom and some blood on the floor and walls, there was nothing unusual about the place.

In total, there were a dozen cows, two dozen sheep, some chickens, a few pigs and several fields of potatoes at the farm.

“This is good,” Gary said. “This is really good. There’s food here. We should take this place over for ourselves.”

“Do any of you know how to farm?” Rain asked. Seeing the expressions on the others faces, she muttered something about the inferior teaching of convents on their world.

“Well, maybe we can figure it out,” Gary said with a smile. “I mean, things could be a lot worse for us, right?”

He tried to rally the spirits of James, Gemma and Martin, but they barely took any notice. They were still dealing with the shock and grief of the previous day.

Come on, Gary thought, if I can deal with the shit I’m putting up with, you can all get it together as well! Try having Vivaldi’s Spring playing through your head on repeat, a voice telling you to eat the living, being told you might be some kind of evil Messiah and possibly having a talking shovel! Fucksake!

But he didn’t berate the other three about his problems. It wouldn’t do any good, in his estimation.

“Right. I think the best thing to do is for at least one of us to stay here to keep the place secure.”

“I guess I’ll do it,” Martin said. An unexciting looking man in his early forties, with thinning hair, he hadn’t spoken more than a dozen words since the events of the church. Out of everyone that Gary had spoken to, the accountant was dealing with the new reality far worse than anyone else. He appeared to be sinking into a deep depression. Which was perhaps understandable, but not helpful.

“Do you have any weapons?”

“I’ve got this hammer,” Martin said. “I mean...it doesn’t matter though, does it? Everyone’s gone and we’re all going to get it at some point...”

James and Gemma cast their eyes to the floor in silent agreement with Martin’s sentiment.

Something snapped in Gary.

He raised his voice and a sudden torrent of words came out.

“Okay, look, I don’t want to hear that. At all. Everything has gone to hell, yes, and things are bad. But we need to focus on working together to get through the next bit. Rolling over and giving up won’t do anyone any good. Look, Martin - and James and Gemma - I know this is fucking horrible, all of it, but I need – we need – to know if we can count on you. Because right now we’re all in the shit and working together is the only damn way we’re getting through this. I’m sorry that you’re all struggling with this. Everyone is, including me. But like it or not, this is the way things are now. And we have to deal with that or we’re all dead. So I need you all to make a choice right fucking now. Pull yourselves together or, frankly, just leave. Because if you’re going to sit around feeling sorry for yourselves and not doing the things that need to be done, then you’re just putting everyone else at risk.”

He paused and crossed his arms.

“So make your choices. Right now.”

James, Gemma and Martin all looked at Gary in utter astonishment, his words having a bigger impact than he’d thought they would. Even Gary was taken aback. Giving leadership speeches was the last thing he thought he had a knack for. First standing up for himself in the church, now this. He was discovering qualities he wouldn’t have guessed at before all this happened.

Martin sighed and then gave a weak smile. “Yeah. Yeah, okay. I just...”

Gary shook his head.

“No. No ifs, no buts, no maybes. Pull yourself together, okay?”

Martin nodded, “Yeah, you’re right Gary. Sorry. You’re right. I’ll stay.”

“We’ll stay with Martin,” Gemma said, unprompted. “I don’t think any of us should be alone right now, should we? The more people that have the farm secure, the better. Plus, Martin’s only got that hammer and we’ve got these swords. No idea how to use them, but we have to work it out, right?”

James nodded in agreement with his wife and made a little hat-tipping gesture at Gary.

Well, okay, Gary thought. Okay.