Shaun Harbinger - Rain

And further down the page.

’No sign of Harper. It looks like I will be facing this situation alone.’

Then at the bottom of that page I found the entry referring to the U.N. rescue mission.

‘Radio picked up a military broadcast. American ships coming to rescue survivors. Everyone moving north to be picked up. I can’t be left here alone. I need a boat. I dare not travel by land. The tide is out at the moment but thankfully there is no sign of those things on the beach. I pray for the sea to come back in and protect me again.’

My heart sank. He hadn’t written down the location of the rescue. He said north, which probably meant Scotland, but that didn’t help. We were heading that way anyway. Without a specific location, we would be drifting around aimlessly off the Scottish coast. I flicked back through the pages but the other entries were all in the standard report format before the apocalypse.

Lucy came over from the kitchen carrying two bottles of beer. “Anything?”

“Nothing. He wrote that the rescue will be in the North but that’s all.”

She took a swig of beer. “Do you think if we had let him on board he would have taken us to the rescue site?”

“From what I read in here he was just scared and lonely. There was someone called Harper in the lighthouse with him. Harper took their boat up the coast to find out what was happening and never returned. I think Eric was being honest when he said he wanted to make a deal with us. He just spooked at the last minute and tried to use his shotgun to make sure he ended up on the boat. He knew the tide was going out and the zombies were on their way.”

“What happened in there, Alex?”

I shrugged. “Mike lost it when Elena got shot. I think we approached the situation the wrong way. We went in with force. If we had dealt with Eric the way he wanted, we’d probably be on the way to being rescued now. And we’d all be alive.”

She nodded and took another drink of beer to stop herself from crying. “Do you think Mike is going to snap out of it?”

“I don’t know. We’ll have to see how he is when he wakes up.”

With tears in her eyes, she stared at the night beyond the window. “This is never going to end, is it? Things aren’t going to get any better. I put the radio on when you left for the lighthouse and the Reach Out came on. All those people looking for loved ones they’ll never find. They won’t ever know how they died or even if they are dead. Their relatives could be out there wandering around as zombies, spreading the disease. And none of it is going to get better. They’re just going to bomb the country. It’s like they want to wipe the slate clean but they’re wiping away all those lives and memories.” She started to cry, her face in her hands.

I put an arm around her and she leaned into my chest. She was right. The world would never be the same again. There was no going back from this. Whether the virus was man-made or nature’s attack on our species, the human race would never recover.

We went to bed and lay in the darkness, fully-clothed, holding each other against the pain and sense of loss.

We both cried for what was gone.

I cried for my parents, for Joe, and for Elena. I even shed a tear for Eric. He hadn’t been trying to steal The Big Easy, he was just as frightened as we were. He was simply trying to survive.

We fell asleep in each other’s arms, two lost souls surrounded by a vast sea of darkness.

It wasn’t until the early hours of the morning, as sunlight started to seep in through the windows, that we were both startled awake.

Something big had bumped into The Big Easy.

I went up to the aft deck, rubbing sleep from my eyes. Mike was still dead to the world in the easy chair. The room smelled of curry and beer as I walked through to the deck. Dark clouds were forming farther out to sea. The sea was calm at the moment, rolling gently beneath The Big Easy and lifting her into a slow rocking motion. I leaned over the side and looked towards the bow.

A second yacht floated on the water in front of us.

I walked through the dining room to the bow, picking up my baseball bat as I went.

The first thing I thought of was pirates.

These were lawless times. The military exerted some control on the mainland but the sea was a no-man’s land. We knew there must be pirates out here somewhere. Had they finally found us?

I stepped onto the sun deck, bat clutched in my hands.

Lucy joined me, holding the Colt gingerly. “Is there anyone on board?”

“It doesn’t look like it.”

The yacht was smaller than The Big Easy. Her name, written across her hull in green script, was The Hornet. She had collided with our bow and floated away about twenty feet. Her engines were dead and everything was silent but a creepy atmosphere hung over her.

“What do you think?” I asked Lucy.

“Looks like she’s been floating out here with no crew.”

“So how did she get out here?”

“Maybe she came loose from her moorings at the marina and just floated away.”

It was possible.

But unlikely.

It was more likely that The Hornet had been piloted out here and something had happened to the crew.

They were either dead or turned into monsters. And they might still be on board.

“We could just let her float away,” I suggested. After our experience at the lighthouse, I didn’t see any reason to risk our lives just to explore a ghost ship. The possible rewards were far outweighed by the deadly risk.

Lucy nodded. “I think that’s the best idea.”

I was glad Mike was still asleep inside. I was sure he would insist on going on board The Hornet. I had zero desire to explore that eerie ship.

“Back to bed?” Lucy suggested.

I took a glance at The Hornet. She was floating away slowly on the gentle waves. She wasn’t going to bump into us again. “Bed sounds good.”

We turned to the door and I held it open to let Lucy inside.

Then we heard it.

A bang.

From the Hornet.

We both froze and looked over at the boat.

Another bang came from inside. It sounded like someone slapping their hand against a wooden door.

“We don’t have to investigate that,” I said.

She bit her lip. God, she was so cute. “What if someone’s trapped below deck?”

“The only thing trapped below deck on there is probably a zombie. We should let it go.”

I thought she was going to agree with me. I looked forward to getting back to bed. It was still way too early to get up, never mind explore a zombie-infested boat.

Lucy didn’t agree. She said, “What if it’s a person on there? What if they need our help?”

I sighed. The bed suddenly seemed an unfathomable distance away. “What are you suggesting?”

“We could check it out. We don’t have to go on board. We could row up to The Hornet and look through the portholes. If it’s a zombie, we let it drift away.”

It sounded safe enough. I hoped that whatever was on board The Hornet could be seen from the portholes. At least we’d know what we were dealing with.

“Only one of us should go,” I said. “In case Mike wakes up. I don’t want him to wake up and be alone.”

“I’ll go,” she said.

I didn’t see any reason to argue with that. It wasn’t like I had to step up to the plate and volunteer for Lucy’s protection. Looking through the portholes of a boat wasn’t exactly dangerous. Besides, she was capable of looking after herself. I just hoped she saw a zombie through the window. Then we could forget about The Hornet and let her drift away.

We went through to the aft deck, passing a sleeping Mike. Lucy climbed down into the rowboat and I handed her the baseball bat. “Take this.”