Andrea Höst - And All the Stars

Most of the world – or at least this portion of Sydney – had died curled up on the couch, watching television. These were much easier to deal with than the handful who, like Madeleine, had ended up in their showers, finding some comfort from the pelting water. They were usually at least partially naked, the marbling of flesh and the beginnings of bloat difficult not to look at when reaching to shut off the water. The splashing left Madeleine feeling contaminated.

In one apartment the windows and door were so effectively sealed with tape and plastic that Madeleine swore she could hear the room inhale when they broke through. She had to wonder whether it was the stain or suffocation which had killed the small family inside. In a different apartment there were nearly a dozen people, with empty bottles – champagne, beer – everywhere, and a partially-eaten sheet cake where someone had roughly scrubbed off Birthday , and spelled out Apocalypse with shining silver cachous.

Death had not come all at once. Most Blues had died quickly, but many of the Greens had obviously lingered over the past three days, so the sick-sweet aroma of rot was not always present, though there were often other smells. Bowels relaxed in death. A couple of times pungent incense made their eyes sting. In one bedroom scented candles still burned, set all around three little beds and three tiny occupants tucked up with toys, and favourite books. Noi and Madeleine blew out the candles, and found the mother in a bathtub of blood.

Out in the hall, Noi marked off the apartment, then slumped to the ground, and Madeleine joined her, shuddering.

"How long ago do you think she did that?" she asked the shorter girl. "An hour? Two? If we’d started at the other end of the building we could have saved her."

"Or just delayed her."

Madeleine hunched her shoulders, then pulled off her sandals and massaged her arches. Velvet against velvet. Over two hours, and so much more left.

"I thought we’d find more people. How can they have had one in five come through at that boarding school, while in forty apartments we were too late for the sole survivor?"

"One in five healthy teenagers with Science Boy playing head nurse," Noi pointed out. "We’re trying to Nightingale the wrong demographic."

"Do you want to go on?"

With a sigh, Noi nodded. "Yeah. I’d obsess about it if we stopped now. About things like that family, except with one of the kids still alive instead. But eat something – don’t let the hunger catch up."

They snacked on some of the nuts and dried fruit they’d brought along to offer to survivors, and Madeleine browsed BlueGreen while Noi sent some texts. There was an entire section devoted to Rushcutters Bay Grammar, one of a half-dozen major studies cobbled together by whoever happened to have access to a large number of infected people.

"Looks like we’re not being very original," Noi said, and held up her phone to show a Twitter feed for #checkyourneighbors.

Madeleine could wish for fewer neighbours, but nodded and stood up. "My cousin’s apartment’s the last on this row. We can put me down as a survivor."

"One less door to thump on, anyway."

There was a merciful run of empty apartments, and they moved on to the next level up.

" Who is it? "

The words had a horror movie quality, the barely audible sound sending Madeleine flinching backward, the keys she’d been lifting to the lock jangling.

"Hello!" Noi called out, with only a suggestion of a gulp. "We’re checking for sur – for anyone who needs help. We have some food and bottled water, or we can bring milk if you want it."

" I don’t need anything. "

It was a woman, her voice hoarse, frantic. Madeleine and Noi exchanged worried glances.

"We can leave some things out here for you, if you’d like," Madeleine offered. "You don’t have to open the door while we’re here."

"Go away ."

"All right. Sorry for – uh, we’ll be in apartment 222 later, if you, um…" Madeleine trailed off as a thump made the door shake, as if the woman had hit it. "We’re going now."

Noi hurriedly pushed the trolley down the walkway to the next door, then clutched Madeleine’s arm.

"I don’t know whether to laugh or scream," she whispered. "What the hell?"

"Maybe she somehow managed to avoid the stain. Of course she wouldn’t want to open the door."

"She could have just said that." But Noi shrugged off her annoyance. "I guess we can at least chalk up another survivor."

"We still don’t know everything that the dust does to people. She could be something new, changed in other ways."

"Don’t say that after you told her your apartment number. Let’s get on – I’m wanting some distance."

Madeleine rapped at the new door, far less casually, and called for longer than had become habit, before making a quick, nervous sortie and heading for the next apartment.

" Wait. "

The strained voice was worse for being louder, sharper, and it was impossible not to jump, Noi even letting out a tiny, cut-off shriek as they spun in unison to see the previous door had opened, though there was no sign of a person.

" Take him away. "

The faintest suggestion of movement followed, then nothing.

"I am freaking the shit out right now," Noi said, under her voice. "Are you freaking the shit out?"

"I’m…really looking for an excuse not to go in there," Madeleine said.

They approached the door like nervous horses, ready to shy at a moment’s notice. Madeleine moved to peer around the corner, changed her mind and backed to the limit of the walkway, against the railing, so she wouldn’t be in reach of anything which might be just inside the door.

"Can’t see anyone," Noi murmured, craning for a look down an airy, white hall. She hefted the bolt cutters, adding: "It’s going to turn out to be some scared little old lady and I’m going to look like the bad guy waving these around, and yet…"

"Let’s get this over with."

Madeleine picked up a bottle of water, on the theory that it might make a distracting projectile, and followed Noi in. One of the smaller apartments, very neat and tidy, with the windows wide open, sheer curtains rippling. No-one in sight. Two doors shut, one open. Competing scents: pine, and rot.

"Oh."

Noi lowered the bolt cutter, gazing into a room dominated by a king-sized bed. A pale cream spread had been drawn over the occupant. Two steps and a twitch of the cloth and they had found an obvious candidate for him .

"I almost wish she’d come at us yelling Brainnnsss! . Then I could justify running away."

Madeleine nodded, staring at a thick-set man in his sixties, whose cheery strawberry-striped pyjama pants cut into a swelling stomach, the skin unpleasantly mottled. Probably one of those who had died the very first night.

"Could we even lift him?" she asked. "Where would we take him to ?"

"One of the other apartments?" Noi was frowning, but no longer held the bolt cutters at ready as she worked through the problem. "I think it’s doable. We’ll need something to shift him with, but I’ve got an idea for that. Come on."

Calling out that they were going to get something to help, Noi led the way down to the wharf’s echoing central hall.

"You head back to the restaurant and grab a couple of pairs of gloves. They should be in the box in the storage room to the left in the kitchen. Meet back at the elevator."

That was easily accomplished, and Madeleine found Noi had beaten her, and was lazily spinning a wheeled platform topped with a gilt metal framework.

"Luggage thing from the hotel," she explained. "All we have to do is get him off the bed."