Free Surviving The Evacuation (Book 5): Reunion by Frank Tayell

what the chickens could eat and what we didn’t want to, yeah that was alright. But each trip outside, we saw more undead, and maybe it was the illusory safety of the station that makes it seem so idyllic now. Or perhaps it was being surrounded by the innocent. And they were that, in every sense of the word. As for me, when they slept, I went out and mapped the tunnels. I found a route to Westminster. That was easy enough. Those tunnels haven’t changed since before I was born, let alone since I was a kid. There was a bit of a thrill stumbling across one of my old tags, faded, flaking, but still there. And it wasn’t hard finding a bridge over an open section of track where the undead might be tempted to fall down onto the railway line. No, the trouble was finding a way out at the other end. I needed a platform that sloped down to the tracks, and a station whose steps weren’t too steep for a zombie to climb, and which was inside their barricade. That was the hard part. And it was whilst I was skulking about down there that I heard the gunfire. An occasional shot during the daytime or volley at night had become the background symphony to our little corner of England, but this was something different. This was a war, and it was right overhead. By the time I got out of the tunnels it was nearly over. By the time I made it up to the roof of a tall enough building, I was just in time to see the end. Parliament was in flames. So was part of Whitehall. There was a helicopter hovering over the river, firing down into the buildings. And there were people in them firing back. It was… It was unlike any movie. It wasn’t even like the news footage you saw on TV. It felt so much less real. I must have been half a mile away. No, it had to be further than that. I’d have to check a map, but I was close enough that when the missile hit I was thrown off my feet and nearly off the roof.”
    “It wasn’t a nuclear missile?”
    “N’ah, obviously not, though that idea didn’t cross my mind until a lot later. I don’t even know if it was a missile. I’m assuming it was, and that it came from that submarine Quigley had. Of course, if it was, it doesn’t really explain why the helicopter was firing at the people inside. Perhaps it was launched by some foreign government. I don’t know, because that blast knocked me off my feet, and the landing knocked me out. When I came to, the helicopter was gone. So were most of the buildings, and the only gunfire was so sporadic that I first thought it was just rounds cooking off in the fire.”
    “First thought. You mean it wasn’t?”
    “No. Not everyone died. There were a few people left. I learned that a couple of days later. I went back to see if there was anything I could salvage, but they just shot at me. I tried again, but on the third trip I’m pretty sure they’d left. I can’t be certain, and they might have been killed by the undead that ended up flooding that part of the city, but… I’m getting ahead of myself. The sun was rising by the time I felt able to stand. I couldn’t use the streets, they were full of zombies. I had to use the tunnels, and I must have had a concussion because it was midmorning before I got back to Farringdon. There was a mob of the undead outside the station entrance. It was the animals, you see. They kept squawking and squealing, and the only way of shutting them up was the anaesthetic, and there was only enough of that to keep them quiet for a few hours. There were far too many zombies to fight, and I was having enough difficulty trying to stand. The power had gone out, of course, and if it wasn’t for the undead I’m certain the whole lot of them would have fled.”
    “What about the tunnels?”
    “I was getting to that. After I’d slept for a bit, and was feeling as good as I was going to, I went to have a look. The undead had got inside. They must have fallen off bridges or broken into crossings, just like I’d been planning. My view,