Disintegration

now beginning to burn.
    The crowd finally thinned sufficiently for Webb to risk getting up and running again. He could see the van and the bike waiting behind the gutted remains of a burned-out coach, parked at such an angle that the dead were prevented from getting too close. He pushed through the final few awkward figures, then slipped between the side of the coach and the front of the van. Hollis lobbed another two bombs directly over his head and watched them detonate deep in the heart of the maggot-ridden mob.
    “Let’s get out of here.” Jas, on the bike, sighed wearily as he climbed back onto the saddle of his machine. Webb moved toward him. “Piss off,” he spat. “You’re not getting on here like that. Look at the state of you. You’re covered in all kinds of shit.”
    Webb looked down at his blood- and pus-soaked leathers. Gore dripped onto the ground around him. With his face screwed up in a grimace he bent down and picked a piece of scalp—complete with a clump of lank brown hair—out of a crease in his trousers at the top of his boot. He tossed it away in disgust.
    “You’re not coming in here either,” Hollis snapped, looking him up and down. “Hold onto the back of the van.”
    Too tired to argue, Webb picked up his trusty baseball bat from where he’d dropped it at the roadside, then climbed wearily up onto the footplate at the back of the van. Jas pulled up alongside him and shouted over the roar of the bike.
    “And when we get back you make sure you wash yourself down before you take one step inside. I don’t want to be stepping through your shit all night, okay?”
    Webb didn’t respond. He wasn’t interested in anything Jas or any of the others had to say. He tightened his grip on the van roof bars as they began to move away, then looked back over his shoulder, watching the smoke rise up from the burning crowds. One of the dead, its clothes and hair aflame, broke free and staggered after the van like the last firework on bonfire night, eventually dropping to the ground when its remaining muscles had burned away to nothing.
    Is that the best you can do? Webb thought. Is that all you’ve got left?

 
     
    2
     
    Cold, tired and angry, Webb stormed up to the third floor and headed straight for the communal flat where most of the small group spent much of their time. He barged into the living room, almost tripping over Anita, who was asleep on the floor.
    “You left me!” he yelled when he found her. “You bloody well left me!”
    Sitting on a threadbare sofa in the corner of the room, Lorna barely lifted her eyes from her magazine. Anita groaned at him to shut up.
    “Yeah,” Lorna mumbled, her voice devoid of any sincerity, “really sorry about that, Webb.”
    “You stupid bitch,” he continued, her apparent lack of concern only increasing his anger, “I could have been killed.”
    “Now there’s a thought.”
    “Didn’t you even notice I wasn’t there? Didn’t you realize the seat next to you was empty?”
    Lorna sighed and finally lowered her magazine.
    “Sorry Webb,” she said, her voice now overly sincere. “Truth was I did notice that you hadn’t made it back. Problem was I was trying to drive a van filled with cans of petrol through a crowd of dead bodies. I could either turn back to get you and risk being blown to kingdom come, or just keep going. We both managed to get home in one piece, didn’t we? I’d say I made the right decision.”
    “Bitch. You wouldn’t be so cocky if it was you that had been left behind. If I’d been in the van—”
    “Two things to say to that,” she interrupted, pointing her finger at him. “One, I wouldn’t have gone mooching around for fags when I’d been given a job to do. And two, you can’t drive.”
    “You always have to bring that up, don’t you? You’ve got a problem because I—”
    “No, you’ve got the problem. I couldn’t care less if you could drive two cars at the same time. I just think you need to start—”
    “Will you two shut up arguing?” Caron demanded as she entered the room carrying a pile of recently looted clothing. “You’re like a couple of kids. For crying out loud, look out of the window will you? The whole world’s dead and all you want to do is fight with each other.”
    “We don’t have to look out the window, Caron.” Lorna sighed. “We’ve just been outside, remember?”
    “And we’re all very grateful,” Caron replied calmly, refusing to allow herself to be