‘Thanksh.’ I set to work on my teeth – it’s tricky without a mirror – and grind away at those which have sprouted the most. The twins wait patiently, saying nothing as bits of enamel go flying across the yard. When I feel halfway normal, I lower the file, run my tongue around my teeth and say my name and old address out loud. I’m still not perfect, but a lot better than I was before.
‘How long was I in the Groove Tube?’ I ask.
‘Just over three weeks,’ Awnya says.
‘Twenty-four days,’ Cian elaborates.
‘Twenty-four Days Later,’ I say sombrely, deepening my voice to sound like a movie announcer. The twins stare at me blankly. ‘You know, like Twenty-eight Days Later?’ They haven’t a clue what I’m talking about. ‘Didn’t you watch zombie movies before all this happened?’
‘No,’ Awnya says. ‘They scared me.’
‘And we always watched movies together,’ Cian says. ‘So if one of us didn’t like a certain type of film, the other couldn’t watch it either.’
‘That’s why I never got to see any chick flicks,’ Awnya says, shooting her twin a dark look.
‘Life’s too short,’ Cian snorts. ‘Even if we live to be three thousand, it will still be too short as far as chick flicks are concerned.’
‘Well, I won’t let you watch any zombie movies either,’ Awnya pouts.
‘Like I want to watch any now,’ Cian laughs.
I study the twins. They’re about the same height. Both have blond hair and fair skin. They look similar and are dressed in matching, cream-coloured clothes. A chunk has been bitten out of Awnya’s left hand, just above her little finger. I see bone shining through the green, wispy moss. In the daylight they look even younger than they did in the lab, no more than twelve or thirteen.
‘Were you guys attacked at the same time?’ I ask.
‘Yeah,’ Cian says.
‘But I got bitten first,’ Awnya says. ‘He could have escaped but he came back for me. The idiot.’
‘I wouldn’t have bothered if I’d known you were going to tuck into me,’ Cian sniffs, rubbing his shoulder through the fabric of his jumper.
‘She turned on you?’ I smirk wickedly.
‘It wasn’t her fault,’ Cian says, quick to defend his sister. ‘She didn’t know what she was doing. None of us did when we were in that state. At least she didn’t rip my skull open, or that would have been the real end of me.’
‘Your nasty brain would have turned my stomach,’ Awnya says and the twins beam at each other.
‘Nice to see you don’t bear a grudge,’ I note.
Cian shrugs. ‘What’s done is done. Besides, this way we can carry on together. I wouldn’t have wanted to escape and live normally if it meant leaving Awnya behind. I’d rather be a zombie with her than a human on my own.’
‘Pass me the sick bag,’ I groan, but grin to let them know I’m only joking.
It starts to rain, so we step inside and the twins lead me to my bedroom.
‘How long have you guys been here?’ I ask.
‘Ages,’ Awnya yawns. ‘We revitalised quickly, less than a week after we were turned.’
‘We were among the first to recover their senses,’ Cian boasts. ‘Dr Oystein says we’re two of his most incredible Angels.’
I frown. ‘This place was open for business that soon after the attacks?’
‘No,’ Awnya says. ‘We wandered for a couple of weeks before we noticed the arrows.’
‘That was a scary time,’ Cian says softly and the pair link hands.
‘Dr Oystein was based in Hyde Park when we found him,’ Awnya continues. ‘He put up a tent in the middle of the park and that’s where his first Angels joined him and sheltered. He was already working on modifying this place, but it was another few weeks before we were able to move in.’
‘Did he have Groove Tubes in Hyde Park?’
‘He had one,’ Cian says, ‘but it was no good. There was a generator to power it, but the noise attracted reviveds. They kept attacking and knocking it out — they didn’t like the sound. He wasn’t able to mount a proper guard, so in the end he left it until we moved here.’
‘A couple of revitaliseds died because of that,’ Awnya says sadly. ‘They were so badly wounded, in so much pain, that they killed themselves.’
‘I’ve never seen Dr Oystein look so miserable,’ Cian croaks. ‘If he could cry, I think he’d still be weeping now.’
There’s a long silence, broken only by the sound of our footsteps.
‘How did you end up doing this?’ I ask. ‘Taking people round and getting stuff for them?’
‘We’re good at it,’ Awnya smiles. ‘Dr Oystein says we’re like jackdaws — we can find a pearl anywhere.’
‘Our mum was a shopaholic,’ Cian says. ‘She dragged us everywhere with her. We got to be pretty good at finding our way round stores and tracking down items that she was interested in. When Dr Oystein saw how quickly we could secure materials, he put us in charge of supplies. It didn’t matter that we’re two of the youngest Angels. He said we were the best people for the job.’
‘Of course he was probably concerned about us too,’ Awnya says. ‘Being so young, I think he was worried that we might not be as capable as the others, and he wanted to find something to keep us busy, so we didn’t feel out of place.’
‘No way,’ Cian barks. ‘I keep telling you that’s not the case. We train with the other guys and hold our own. Dr Oystein could send us on missions if he wanted. We just happen to be better than anyone else at doing this.’
Awnya catches my eye and we share a secret smile. Boys always want to think that they’re able to do anything. We usually let them enjoy their fantasies. They’re happier that way and do less whining.
‘What sort of missions do the others go on?’ I ask.
‘Dull stuff mostly,’ Cian huffs, and I decide to leave it there for the time being, as it’s obviously a sore point for him.
We come to a closed door and Cian pushes it open. We step into one of County Hall’s many huge rooms. There are six single beds arranged in a circle in the centre. The sheets and pillows on four of them have the crumpled look that shows they’ve been used recently. The other two have perfectly folded sheets and crease-free pillowcases.
There are three wardrobes, lots of shelving and two long dressing tables, one on either side of the room, with mirrors hanging on the walls above them, stools set underneath.
A girl is sitting on one of the stools, my age if not a bit older. She looks like an Arab, light brown skin, a plain blue robe and white headscarf. She’s working on a model of the Houses of Parliament, made out of matchsticks. It looks pretty damn cool.
‘Oh, hi, Ashtat,’ Awnya says. ‘We didn’t know you were here.’
The girl half waves at us without looking round.
‘This is Becky, but she prefers B,’ Awnya presses on.
‘Hush,’ Ashtat murmurs.
‘What’s your problem?’ I growl.
Ashtat scowls at me. ‘I do not like being interrupted when I’m working on my models. You cannot know that, never having met me before, but the twins do. They should not have admitted you until I was finished.’
‘Like Awnya said, we didn’t know you were here,’ Cian protests. ‘We thought you’d still be training with the others.’
‘I tired of training early today,’ Ashtat sniffs.
‘Well, I’m here, so you’ll have to live with it,’ I tell her, determined to make my mark from the start. If I let her treat me like a dog now, I’ll have to put up with that all the way down the line.
Ashtat raises an eyebrow but says nothing and returns to her model, carefully gluing another match-stick into place.
‘She’s OK when she’s not working on a model,’ Awnya whispers. ‘Let’s come back later.’
‘No,’ I say out loud. ‘I’m staying. If she doesn’t like that, tough. Which bed is mine?’
Awnya shows me to one of the spare beds. There?
??s a bedside cabinet next to it. A few files for my teeth rest on top of the cabinet, along with the watches I was wearing, one of which was smashed to pieces in Trafalgar Square.
‘Your hat’s over there,’ Cian says, pointing to a shelf. The shelf is blue, and so are the two shelves above it. ‘The blue shelves are yours. You can stick anything you want on them, clothes, books, CDs, whatever. Half of that wardrobe –’ he points to my left, ‘– is yours too. You’re sharing with a guy called Jakob. He doesn’t have much, so you should have plenty of room.’
‘What about a bedroom of my own?’ I ask.
Cian and Awnya shake their heads at the same time, the exact same way.
‘Dr Oystein says it’s important for us to share,’ Cian says.
‘It’s the same for every Angel,’ Awnya says. ‘Nobody gets their own room.’
I frown. ‘That’s weird, isn’t it?’
‘It’s meant to bring us closer together,’ Awnya says.
‘Plus it stops people arguing about who gets the rooms with the best views and most space,’ Cian says.
‘All right,’ I sniff. ‘I don’t suppose I’ll be using it much anyway. It’s not like we need to sleep, is it?’
‘No,’ Cian says hesitantly. ‘But Dr Oystein prefers it if we keep regular hours. We act as we did when we were alive. Most of us get up about seven every morning, do our chores, train, hang out, eat, whatever. Then we come to bed at midnight and lie in the dark for seven hours, resting.’
‘It’s good to have a routine,’ Awnya says. ‘It’s comforting. You don’t have to use your bed – nobody’s going to force you – but if you want to fit in with the rest of us . . .’
‘Sounds worse than prison,’ I grumble, but I’m complaining just for the sake of it. Sinking on to the bed, I pick at my robe. ‘What about clothes?’
‘We thought you might want to choose your own,’ Awnya says. ‘We can get gear for you if you have specific requests. Otherwise we’ll take you out later and show you round some of our favourite shops.’
‘That sounds good,’ I smile. ‘I like to pick my own stuff.’
‘We figured as much,’ Awnya says smugly. ‘We’ll come and collect you in an hour or so.’
‘What will I do until then?’ I ask.
The twins shrug in unison.
‘Get the feel of the place,’ Cian says.
‘Relax,’ Awnya suggests.
‘Keep quiet,’ Ashtat lobs in.
I give her the finger, even though she can’t see me, and slip on the watch that works, an ultra-expensive model that I picked up in the course of my travels. As the twins leave, I start to ask them for the correct time, in case the watch is wrong, but they’re gone before I can.
I sigh and stare around the room, at the bed, the furniture, the silent girl and her matchstick model. Then, because I’ve nothing better to do, and because I’m a wicked sod, I start filing my teeth again, as loudly as I can, treating myself to a mischievous grin every time Ashtat twitches and shoots me a dirty look.
TEN
The twins take me over the river and into the Covent Garden area. True to their word, they know all the best shops, not just those with the coolest gear, but those with the least zombies. The living dead don’t bother us much once they realise we’re like them, but it’s still easier to browse in places where they aren’t packed in like sardines.
I choose several pairs of black jeans, a variety of dark T-shirts, a few jumpers and a couple of jackets. New sunglasses too, and a baseball cap with a skull design that I spot in a window, for those days when I don’t feel like the Australian hat which has served me well so far.
When it comes to shoes, the twins have a neat little device which screws into the material, making holes for the bones sticking out of my toes to jut through. They measure my feet and bore the holes with all the care of professional cobblers.
‘I like it,’ I grunt, admiring my new trainers.
‘Dr Oystein invented that years ago,’ Cian tells me, pocketing the gadget. ‘He’s like one of those crazy inventors you read about in comics.’
‘Only not actually crazy,’ Awnya adds.
‘I don’t know about –’ I start to say, but a rapping sound on the shop window stops me.
We all instantly drop to our knees. There’s another rap, a loud, clattering sound, but I can’t see anyone.
‘Do you think it’s a revived?’ I whisper.
‘I don’t know,’ Cian says.
‘I hope so,’ Awnya croaks.
There’s a long silence. I look around for another way out. Then there are two more raps on the glass. I spot a hand, low down and to the left, close to the open door. Another two raps. Then a series of short raps.
I roll my eyes and stand. ‘Very funny,’ I shout.
‘Careful, B,’ Awnya moans. ‘We don’t know who it is.’
‘But we know they have lousy taste in movies,’ I snort. ‘I recognise those raps. They’re the theme tune from Jaws.’
‘And what’s wrong with that?’ a girl challenges me, stepping into view outside. ‘Jaws is a classic.’
‘The hell it is,’ I reply. ‘A boring old film with lousy special effects, and hardly anyone gets killed.’
‘You don’t know what you’re talking about,’ the girl says, stepping into the shop. Four teenage boys appear and follow her in. The girl smiles at the twins. ‘Hey, guys, sorry if we frightened you.’
‘We weren’t frightened,’ Cian says with a dismissive shake of his head, as if the very idea is offensive to him. ‘We were excited. Thought we were going to see some action at last.’
‘This is Ingrid,’ Awnya introduces the girl. ‘She’s one of us.’
‘I figured as much.’ I cast an eye over the tall, blonde, athletic-looking girl. She’s dressed in leathers, a bit like those the zom heads used to wear when they were tormenting reviveds.
‘You must be B,’ Ingrid says.
‘Word travels fast,’ I smile.
‘Not that fast,’ Ingrid says. ‘You were in a Groove Tube for almost a month.’
My smile vanishes.
‘What are you doing over here?’ Cian asks. ‘Are you on a mission?’
‘Yeah,’ Ingrid says.
‘What sort of a mission?’ I ask.
‘The usual,’ she shrugs. ‘Looking for survivors. Searching for brains. Keeping an eye out for Mr Dowling or any other intruders.’
‘We do this a lot,’ one of the boys says. ‘Not the most interesting of jobs, but it gets us out of County Hall.’
‘Sounds like fun,’ I lie, eager to see what they get up to. ‘Can I come with you?’
‘Absolutely not,’ Ingrid says. ‘You haven’t been cleared for action by Master Zhang.’
‘Aw, go on, Ingrid,’ Cian pleads. ‘If it’s a normal mission, where’s the harm? We can tag along too. We won’t tell.’
‘I don’t know,’ Ingrid says. ‘This is serious business. If anything happened to you . . .’
‘It won’t,’ Awnya says, as keen as her brother to get involved.
Ingrid checks with the rest of her pack. ‘What do you guys think?’
They shrug. ‘Doesn’t matter to us,’ one of them says.
‘Three mugs to throw to Mr Dowling and his mutants if they turn up,’ another guy smiles. ‘Might buy us enough time to slip away.’
‘Bite me,’ I snap, and they all laugh.
‘OK,’ Ingrid decides. ‘You can keep us company for a while. The experience will be good for you. But don’t get in our way, do what we tell you and run like hell if we get into trouble.’
‘How will we know?’ Awnya asks nervously.
‘Oh, trouble’s easy to spot,’ Ingrid says with an icy smile. ‘It’ll be when people start dying.’
ELEVEN
The Angels check the apartments above the shops, searching for survivors who might be holed up, or the corpses of people who died recently, whose brains might still be edible. They don’t talk much, operating
in silence most of the time, sweeping the rooms swiftly and efficiently.
One of the guys opens all of the doors. He has a set of skeleton keys and can deal with just about any lock that he encounters.
‘That’s Ivor Bolton,’ Awnya whispers.
‘Was he a thief when he was alive?’ I ask.
‘No. Master Zhang taught him.’
‘Who’s that?’
‘Our mentor,’ Awnya says. ‘He trains every Angel. You’ll meet him soon.’
‘Do you all learn how to open locks?’ I ask
‘Only those who show a natural talent for it,’ Cian says.
I stare at Ivor enviously. I hope I show that sort of promise. I’d love to be able to crack open locks and gain entrance to anywhere I wanted.
We explore more rooms, Ingrid and her team taking it slowly, carefully, searching for hiding places in wardrobes and under beds, tapping the walls for secret panels.
‘Do you ever find people?’ I ask as we exit a building and move on.
‘Living people?’ Ingrid shrugs. ‘Rarely, around here. Most of the survivors in this area moved on or died ages ago. We dig up the occasional fresh corpse, but mainly we’re checking that the buildings are clear, that potential enemies aren’t setting up base close to County Hall.’
‘What do you do if you find someone alive?’ I ask.
She shrugs again. ‘It depends on whether they want to come with us or not. Many don’t trust us and leg it. If they stop and listen, we tell them about County Hall and offer to take them to it, and from there to somewhere safe.’
‘That’s one of the main things the Angels do,’ Awnya chips in. ‘We lead survivors out of London to secure camps in the countryside.’
‘It’s not as easy as it sounds,’ Cian says.
‘I bet not,’ I grunt, thinking of all the difficulties I faced simply getting from the East End to here. ‘Have you been on any of those missions yet?’ I ask Ingrid.
‘No,’ she sighs. ‘It’s all been local scouting missions for us so far.’
‘Long may they continue,’ one of the boys mutters.
Cian scowls. ‘You don’t want to tackle the harder challenges?’