The non-stop bone-jarring journey to Portsmouth took nearly three hours. The bus was pre-Big-Z, and looked it. There was more rust than paint on its bodywork, and the suspension was now more of a suggestion than a reality. The driver had rigged up a sound system with a double tape deck, and he regaled the passengers with a happy mix of Duran Duran, Abba and Wham! until they revolted. Otherwise, the trip was pretty uneventful. The driver stopped three times to clear some shamblers. “Pretty standard practice nowadays” he said, answering Charlie’s query. “They’ve slowed down quite a bit, and the old ones are pretty rotten. Not as many new ones are appearing either now. It’s a bit of a public service, making the roads a bit safer for the next user. Anyone not travelling alone will stop a couple of times to clear up.” He eyed her more carefully, taking in her military accessories. “You been out of the world a while? Looks like you’ve seen some combat at some point.” 

Charlie took a pew behind the driver as he steered through the rusted debris pulled to the sides of the roads. Old cars, lorries, buses, most nearly unidentifiable, picked clean of anything useful, and the rest left to rust into nothing. 

“I’ve been on ship for the last 10 years. Enjoying the fresh air and safe sleeping quarters. I thought there’d be more bones around. Most of the detritus looks inorganic.”

He nodded. “Yeah, they’ve finally been able to get clean-up crews on the main routes between cities – helps keep the routes clear of scavengers. How was it on the sea for all that time? I went the gated community route myself – I get seasick in the bath, so never fancied a cruise ship, even if the air is fresher. It was mostly good, we got the occasional incursion, but we had plenty of early warning systems. Although we had a murder once. Somebody let in a shambler – we only found the victim’s leg… back in ’92 I think it was. It took the community policeman a devil of a time to work out who’d done it. Almost the perfect crime, death by zombie. But anyways, probably not interesting to an outsider.” He trailed off, catching sight of Charlie’s face, her jaw had clenched, and she was tapping her holster. She looked down at his comment, and gave a slight start when she saw where her hand was resting. “Sorry,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “I remember dealing with a few body parts myself, back in the day.”

“Military?”

“Yep.” She replied curtly, hoping he’d recognise it as a signal to back off. Those were days she really didn’t want to replay.

The bus pulled into the Portsmouth terminal at 7pm; dusk was just starting to wash out the day, and play tricks on depth perception. She’d find a place to stay and suss out the lay of the land in the morning. It seemed as though she’d been out of touch for too long – the world had moved on without her. Things were starting to get back to normal – maybe the 2000s really were going to be a bright new world.

Charlie walked through the metal tunnel to the terminal building, catching glimpses of the odd shambler through the grilles. The bus driver was right – there wasn’t much left of the older ones; they were mostly bone and sinew, most of the skin gone or hanging in strips from the bones. Jawbones and eyes gone or hanging loose, they crawled or shuffled in random directions. They were so different from the screaming, raging, vicious, high-velocity creatures of 16 years ago.

A sudden movement caught her eye, as a single figure streaked across the tarmac, straight for the tunnel. A putrid, rotting corpse hit the metal barrier at full speed, a growling snarl emitting from its ruined maw of a mouth. Its lips were missing, as were most of its teeth, its tongue lolling, black, swollen, grotesque, seeping gangrenous fluid down onto its chin. Clouded, wizened eyes stared out from the skull, peering out through tufts of long, black hair that were plastered to its face. Despite the hair, it was still impossible to tell whether it had been a man or a woman. It smacked against the barrier, clawed fingers scrabbling against the bars, trying and failing to gain purchase through the gaps too thin for fingers to gain entry. Charlie fell backwards against the wall behind her, her heart stuttering, throat closing and black dots swimming in front of her eyes. Her heart stopped briefly, then started again, knocking against her ribcage. She took a deep breath, held it and slowly let it out, as though breathing through a straw, her combat training snapping into action automatically. As her eyes cleared and her fingers and toes slowly stopped tingling, she realised she was leaning against the fence, and that anything could be behind her. With a shudder, she stepped away, moving into the precise middle of the tunnel, as she watched the thing claw and shriek, trying to reach her. Strips of skin were tearing from the Shrieker’s fingers, dropping through the gaps onto the floor of the tunnel. Bile rose briefly, and  Charlie swallowed convulsively before heading to the terminal building, her muscles tensed and hard until long after the building door swung shut behind her. 

“Bit of a live one out there, love.” said a woman sweeping the floor of the waiting room. She was old; perhaps 70, bent over from age but strong looking, with arm muscles bunching as she moved the brush across the floor. “I’ll get on the blower to the clean-up crew. We get the occasional Shrieker coming through; they’re attracted to the passengers coming through. It’s time they did another sweep and got rid of the latest herd of Shamblers. They tend to accumulate here, as there’s quite a bit of activity. You the only newcomer today? That’s unusual that is. They must all be going onto Winchester for the Summer Festival. Fancy a cuppa love? You look a bit done in. I’ll put the kettle on and send out that call.” Without waiting for an answer, the old lady bustled through a door on the far side of the room. Charlie could faintly hear her still talking as she disappeared, saying something about ‘crazy new lifers’. Charlie had no idea what she meant, and was frankly not interested. She sank into a chair and waited for the promised cup of tea, which sounded like the best idea ever right at that moment.

Sipping the hot, sweet tea she finally felt her shoulders climbing down from around her ears to a more normal position. “Thanks for the tea. I guess I’m not used to dealing with them any more – I’ve spent the last 10 years on the water.”

“Oh, a good life if you can afford it,” the woman answered, looking at her shrewdly. “Although you look more like a worker bee than a lady of leisure, if you don’t mind me saying.”

Charlie snorted. “Definitely the latter. I’m a chef, which is a lot of early mornings and late nights, but I really love creating new dishes. Have you always been in Portsmouth, or did you come here after?”

The woman settled down in an adjacent chair, ready for a comfortable coze. “Nah, I was a Londoner born and bred, but the place was just unlivable after the Big Z. Rotting corpses everywhere, both the unmoving and the moving kind. The place smelt to high heaven, and you took your life into your hands just stepping outside your front door.”

Charlie nodded. “It was a battle ground. I was there for the first five years after the outbreak, trying to fight the tide. I think most people left for quieter places. Places easier to protect.”

“London’s still a city of the dead, last I heard. Left most of my family there. They all died in the first few weeks of the outbreak.” Her voice deepened, roughened, as emotion threatened to overflow. She stared into her mug for a moment, as if the meaning of life could be found at the bottom.

“It’s 42,” Charlie said, trying to lighten the mood.

“Huh? What’s that love?” The woman looked up, puzzled.

“The meaning of life. 42. looks like you were trying to find it in the bottom of your mug.” Charlie shrugged. “Sorry, my pathetic attempt at lightening the mood.”

“Ah, yes dear. Of course.” The woman clearly had no clue what the reference was. Embarrassed, Charlie rubbed the toe of her boot on the floor. And that’s why she kept quiet – she always said the wrong thing. Clearing her throat, she looked back up, and putting on a cheery voice, changed the subject. “Do you know of any accommodation near here?”

Charlie hurried off after gaining some recommendations from the woman, pretty sure she was going to be the topic of conversation at the lady’s dinner table tonight. “I met a right strange one today…” she could just imagine her saying to her dinner companions.

She walked along the streets of the now walled city, seeing the silhouettes of armed patrol men against the setting sun as they walked the walls, rifles slung over shoulders. There was a volley of shots from behind her: Charlie guessed that must be the clean-up crew arriving at the terminal. She was glad she hadn’t had to go down that career path. When she had joined the army aged 18, she had been training as an army chef before the outbreak meant all soldiers had to fight on the front line. She was never more grateful for this when she had heard about the chef’s position going on The Mystery of the Seas. A chance to get out and move on.

She remembered talking about this with Ben one night, halfway down a bottle of strawberry liqueur – the last bottle available on the ship. She remembered telling herself to savour it, in case it was the last bottle that could be found, but looking back, she could barely remember the taste, or what had made it so special to her. That night he’d told her about his time in Portsmouth, and how the new town council elected shortly after the outbreak had been controlled had made it a safe place to live. The first city of its size to eliminate the threat of death by Shrieker within its walls. 

It was a lot smaller than it had been before the Big Z, but according to the population sign at the terminal, it now held nearly 70,000 people. The streets were a testament to this, with people  strolling along chatting, or hurrying past on the way to somewhere better. There were shops open, selling a mixture of second-hand and new clothes – from the hawaiian shirts and blazers popular when the Big Z began, to more modern items,  including combat trousers, trainers and sports bras (all the better to run in). The people on the streets were the same – extravagantly coloured tops mixed with sensible bottoms, easy to run in. It seemed that even though people were moving on, the old fear was lurking underneath. At least the terrifying teased-to-the-heavens hair had gone – as hairspray stocks dwindled, so did the power hairstyles, and a more relaxed style had prevailed. Long locks flowed (both men and women), and laughter floated across the streets. 

Charlie shouldered her way through the crowds, following the roughly drawn map the terminal woman had given her. As she made her way away from the town centre, the streets grew narrower and darker, and the walls were visible behind the houses lining the left hand side of the street. Being so close to the barriers must be an uncomfortable way of life, Charlie thought as she peered at the house numbers. She found the one she was looking for, primarily because of the vacancy sign propped in the window. She rang the doorbell of the three-storey town house on the right hand side of the street. The front door looked freshly painted, there were net curtains hanging in the windows, and the lawn was trimmed to within an inch of its life.  An older lady opened the door. She had tightly curled grey hair, and wore a floral housecoat. Her face was unlined, although her hands as they held her cardigan closed at the neck, were liver-spotted, showing her age. 

She held out one hand. “Hello, you must be Charlie. Cheryl gave me a call to let me know you were coming. Come on in and I’ll show you the room.” Her voice was mellifluous and cultured, pitched low, as though she had received elocution lessons in her youth. Charlie shook the proffered hand and followed her hostess into the front room. The inside totally matched the impression created by the outside. There was not a speck of dust, and tram lines traced the old paisley carpet where the vacuum cleaner had been dragged back and forwards in neat, careful stripes. The walls were a deep green, and the ceiling and coving a lighter green, echoing the trends Charlie remembered when she was growing up. She had a sudden, nostalgic pang for her parents’ house, and wondered what they would have made of the word today if they’d lived. Emotion clogged her throat for a moment as she felt their loss once more.

Mrs Lillingham, as she had introduced herself, took Charlie up to the first floor to a small but very clean room at the back of the house. There were bars on the windows, juxtaposed with the frilly pink curtains and bedspread. The bathroom was down the hall, but Charlie was told she had it to herself tonight, as there weren’t any other guests at the moment – many people had headed to Winchester for the ‘celebrations’. Charlie could almost see the quotation marks around the last word, if Mrs Lillingham had not been too well bred to use them. This rang a small bell, and Charlie vaguely remembered Cheryl (as she now knew her) had also mentioned something. She felt a moment of disquiet, and hoped that the person she had come here to see wasn’t going to be out of town. That really would be bad timing. 

“What’s the celebration? Are there many people out of town?” 

Mrs Lillingham pursed her lips. She clearly disapproved of the ‘celebration’. “It’s mostly the young people that go. It’s a week of celebration. To mark the ‘return of civilisation’. Although how they think becoming completely uncivilised for a week does that, I can’t imagine. The shenanigans that go on there. It wouldn’t have happened in my day.”

“What, the 60s?” asked Charlie. “I thought they were full of risque activities. Not that I’ve seen many pictures; most of that was lost. But I’ve spoken to some that were there.” 

Mrs Lillingham stiffened. All pleasantries now at an end, she pointed out the towels laid out and the small kettle and tea leaves on the dressing table. “Breakfast is between 7 and 8am. Service stops at 8 sharp, no exceptions.” With that she swept out and down the stairs. Charlie felt chagrined, and a little like a naughty schoolgirl. It had been stupid of her – she still had to track down her first lead to Ben’s past. She’d just have to do a bit of apologising over breakfast tomorrow. 

Feeling wiped out, Charlie decided to make use of the bed. It was going to be very strange sleeping on solid ground again.