Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
Shuffling from my flat, scratching my fluffy hair, I entered the mess flat.
Coffee. Must have coffee. I definitely saw some in the food supplies.
Miko sat alone at the table, brooding over a book, as put together as he’d been yesterday. Not a sleepy mess like me.
“Good morning,” I greeted him.
He lifted his dark eyes to me. “Morning. Did you sleep well?”
“Really good.” I let out a yawn. “My spine is thankful for a soft mattress.”
His lips twitched. “I’m glad to hear it. Would you like some breakfast? A coffee?”
“Music to my ears, Miko.”
He closed his book, getting up. “Have a seat.”
“I can—”
“Sit.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
He left the flat, returning moments later with two jars of instant coffee and a packet of long-life croissants.
“We have decaf or regular,” he said. “If you don’t like croissants, there is some cereal. Feel free to have a look at the stores. This is just a suggestion.”
“This will be great, thank you. Regular coffee.”
“Long-life milk? Sugar?”
“Just the milk, please.”
He got to work on my drink, boiling up some water on the camping stove.
The croissants were filled with jam and imitation cream, individually wrapped in foil packets.
“Wow, the use by date is two years from now,” I said.
He didn’t respond.
The croissant had a slightly chemical taste, but it was delicious. Much better than the cardboard energy bars.
I checked my watch. Just gone seven.
Butterflies stirred in my belly thinking about my upcoming supply run with the alpha. I fished Wendy from my pocket. Keeping her on silent, I cleared her poop, bathed her, fed her, played with her until her happy meter flashed full, love hearts in her eyes.
“What’s that?” Miko asked, putting a mug of coffee down before me.
“Thank you. This is Wendy.” I explained her to him.
He returned to his seat opposite me. “Interesting.”
“She is.”
His eyelashes were really dark, enviably thick.
“Are you okay to come on a run with me today? You don’t have to if you need some time to adjust.”
“No. I’m fine.”
A nod.
“But why me?”
He looked down at his book. “No reason.”
Meaning there was a reason. “Oh.”
“To show you the ropes.”
What about Trev? “Okay.”
“Eat up, drink up.” He opened his book, saying nothing more.
In gold writing, on the cover of the black book, read: Signs and Omens: A Guide.
Interesting reading.
When James and Cate entered the mess flat, he picked up the book and left after a curt good morning and an, “I’ll see you downstairs,” to me.
“I have a holder for your axe I forgot to give you yesterday,” Cate told me. “I’ll give it to you before you set off.”
“Thank you.”
“Ooo, processed croissants,” James said, “my favorite.”
After breakfast, I dressed in my clothes, strapped my new axe to my back, and headed downstairs to meet Miko.
He was waiting beside the gate next to the elevators in his stab-vest outfit, looking impossibly clean, moody and incredibly hot.
My skin gave a little tingle at the sight of him.
I smiled.
He didn’t.
Who would smile with the pink smoke of Dawn rolling across the ground floor, licking at our ankles?
“Follow me.” He opened the gates.
“Sir?” James appeared behind us.
Miko simply gave him a look to freeze lava, and the beta left without a word.
Strange.
“Everything okay?” I asked.
“Yeah.”
We stepped out into the autumnal sunshine, the air crisp, the blue sky almost clear of clouds. Dawn smothered the ground, pouring over the river wall into the water, searching for humans.
“Another nice day,” I said brightly, trying to make conversation.
He walked silently, two steps ahead of me.
I sped up to flank him. “So, where are we going?”
Miko turned onto the Thames path, following it east. We passed the boat bobbing in the water.
“That’s such a sturdy mooring.” I knew nothing about boats, but I knew the river was tidal, and therefore the vessel impressively secure.
“Has to be.”
“Have you ever used it?”
“Once, for a test. It’s there for an emergency.”
“Right. So, where are we going?”
He stopped. “There’s something I want to show you.”
“What is it?”
“But can we have a bit of silence until we get there?”
“Okay.”
I obeyed, falling two steps behind again.
Show me something? Just us? He didn’t want to simply show me the ropes. He might try hiding things behind his hard exterior, giving nothing away. But I read between the lines. This was something more, something weird.
Still, I didn’t want to bother him. So I followed him in silence, reaching Deptford Creek, as he pointed out, before seeing our first zombies of the day.
Miko shot out an arm, holding me back. He pressed a finger to his lips, even though we weren’t making a sound.
The bridge crossing the creek was packed with vehicles and rotting dead bodies both in stasis and properly dead. Around twenty zombies at my count.
Apartment blocks dominated the area, lining the creek on either side. Many scorched by fire, one of them half-collapsed and strangled by a complex tangle of vines.
“Easy, quiet steps,” Miko ordered. “Mirror me. Keep behind me.”
I obeyed, keeping cool and low. I faced the dead every single day. This was no different. Swallow the fear, be a shadow, keep going. Avoid confrontation as much as possible.
We made it past the slowies, getting back on track.
“Good job,” he whispered to me five minutes after the bridge.
My turn to not answer him.
Eventually, we followed the Thames path again, reaching a square with a dilapidated carousel and an old ship resting on a glass structure. It looked like a pirate ship, a relic from a distant time. In surprisingly decent condition, though covered in bird poo.
I remembered reading about the ship in a tourist guide before coming here. “Is that the Cutty Sark?”
“Yes.”
Was it called a clipper? Definitely not a pirate ship.
“Is this what you wanted to show me?” I asked.
“No. It’s in there.”
Miko pointed to a structure a few feet away, close to the river. The lower half of it a circular brick, the top a filthy glass dome caked in bird droppings. As if to illustrate a point, a gull landed on top of the dome, dropping some poop before flying off.
The structure’s doors were heavily barricaded, giving off extremely foreboding energy.
I swallowed, taking a backward step away from it, bumping into Miko.
“Easy,” he said.
“What’s in there?”
Miko approached the door. “This is the Greenwich foot tunnel. It links this side of the river to the Isle of Dogs.”
“Underwater?”
“A useful connection back in the day.”
“It’s not anymore?” I asked stupidly.
“Now it’s a prison.” He touched the heavy wooden boards. There were warnings painted all over the front.
“For zombies?”
He nodded, looking at me.
I backed off some more. “We’re not going inside, are we?”
Excuse me while I vomit.
“Of course not.”
My shoulders sagged in relief. “Thank the stars.”
“We’re going on the roof.”