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.7Danny crashed past me as I headed up the stairs, desperate for some sleep and hoping that an afternoon nap would re-energise my body in a way that restless nights were currently failing to do.‘Do you know where the binoculars are?’ he asked over his shoulder, his shoes slapping on the steps as he descended.‘What?’He stopped by the front door.‘The binoculars? There’s activity outside and I want to get a closer look.’‘What activity? Over in town?’ He shook his head.‘Then what?’ ‘Let me find the binoculars and I’ll show you.Any idea?’ ‘Range Rover.Glove box,’ I replied, and he was out of the front door and across the gravel drive before I had chance to tell him to be careful.It was only when I heard the crunch of his return journey that I realised I had been holding my breath.He closed the front door behind himself and once again made his way past me on the stairs.‘Come on, bro,’ he said.‘If you snooze, you lose.’With Usk so close across the river, it was really easy to forget just how isolated we were out here, but apart from Des next door, there were no houses for a couple of miles.By the time I reached Danny’s room he had already opened his window and was focusing the binoculars off to the right and away from the town.I edged in next to him.I could see the farmhouse and the attached stables he was looking at, probably about five miles from our house.It was one of those places that I saw every day and paid no attention to.It was painted white and stood out from the trees and fields that surrounded it.If I thought we were isolated, then the farmhouse was a million miles from civilisation.Only one single lane track, about a mile in length, linked the farm to the main road.‘Check out the courtyard.’He passed me the binoculars and, after a few moments, I found the track and followed it up towards the front of the farm.It opened up into a paved driveway, which itself broadened into a courtyard between the house and the stables.I adjusted first the zoom and then the focus dials.I removed the binoculars from my eyes.I placed them back again.I removed them.I looked at my brother.For once, he was calm.I looked again out over the fields, across the river, to the farmhouse.I placed the binoculars back in front of my face and leant forward, resting my elbows on the windowsill.The courtyard was full of zombies.Men, women, children.They walked and they bumped and they turned and their mouths were open, and I could all but hear that sound they made.Some were torn.It was the only way to describe them.Limbs were absent, clothes were ripped, faces were unrecognisable.I began to try to count them, but Danny preempted me.‘There are at least fifty.Seriously, bro, I recognise loads of them from Usk.I guess this is where they went after they left the town.’I scanned the front of the house, no longer able to watch the undead and their bizarre dance.None of the windows were broken.The front door looked rock solid.The sun was reflecting off the glass and it was impossible to see inside, but if the theory was right, then the farmhouse had people inside and the zombies had been drawn to the scent of their flesh.I placed the binoculars down on the desk and rubbed at my eyes.The magnification was beneficial but the slightest movement made the view jump around like a badly edited movie.I felt like I had a little motion sickness.‘So many of them,’ I sighed.‘I know, but…’ Danny paused.‘If they’re out there, then it means they might not be in town.’8‘We need to keep the gates secure, so there’s no way that we can take the Range Rover.’‘We won’t need to take it; we’re going to get them on the bikes.More manoeuvrable, faster off the mark.We’ll be in and out before the zombies even turn around.’I felt like I was the only voice of reason in the house; despite knowing that we had to offer some sort of help to the five people stuck in town, there was no way I was going to let anything we did jeopardise the haven we had here.Apparently I was the only one with that opinion.Danny had totally bought into the idea.He had trawled the news stations and, in his head at least, had developed a very thorough dossier on the strengths and weaknesses of the creatures outside our wall.He’d found clips of the zombies walking, always slowly, just as Nick and Jenny had claimed [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]