SIXTEEN
Deep down, in the dark and the quiet, Oscar and his friend Leet were talking. Leet had confessed how he had borrowed and moulded Oscar's memories without his permission, and how those memories had subsequently escaped, replicating and mutating like a virus, turning bad.
'Oscar,' Leet said to him – and to Oscar he seemed to speak in thought bubbles, like in a comic book – 'only you can save the world. It's up to you to put it right.'
Oscar nodded slowly, his face grim and determined. 'Leave it to me, Leet,' he said authoritatively. And then he rather spoiled it by asking, 'What do I do?'
So Leet told him, and now Oscar was rushing up towards the light, rushing and rushing, faster and faster. The light was getting bigger. First, it was the size of a pinprick; then an eye; then a football; and then suddenly it was the size of an entire planet.
Oscar burst back into the world with a sound like a thunderclap. He opened his eyes and there on the floor, just a few inches from his outstretched hand, was the gun, exactly where Leet had told him it would be. He curled his hand around it, and it felt good, it felt right. And then, with one bound, he was on his feet and looking around him, taking in everything in an instant with his super-sight.
Everything Leet had told him was true. His memories were out of his head, and out of control. He raised his hands and shouted, 'Stop!'
And the memories did stop. They stopped and they looked at him, as if waiting to be told what to do next. And the four people – the four real people – looked at him as well: the smart man with the chair; the chubby man with the metal stand; the handsome man in the long coat; the black-haired girl on the floor, who immediately scrambled to her feet and shouldered her way out of the memories which were crowding around her.
'Sorry,' Oscar said to them, and then he turned and pointed the gun at the tall window opposite the door. He pulled the trigger, and the window, blind and curtains and all, exploded outwards into the night.
A voice roared, 'Stop!' and, incredibly, the zombies obeyed. The ferocious child pushed itself away from Gwen and stood beside her, almost to attention. The zombies which had been reaching down to tear her apart straightened up. Eerily, they all turned their heads towards the source of the sound. Exhausted, bedraggled and covered in bloody handprints, Gwen turned her head too.
She saw Oscar Phillips standing in the middle of the room, amid the chaos, with a gun – her gun – in his hand. His eyes were shining and his face was serene. When his gaze passed briefly over her she shivered, and then she scrambled to her feet.
'Sorry,' Oscar said, and then he turned and pointed the gun at the window. He pulled the trigger and the glass shattered, the impact causing the blind and the curtains to go flailing out into the darkness in the wake of the falling glass.
Gwen's attention was still focused on the jagged remains of the window when Oscar started to run towards it. He ran fast, with no trace of post-coma lethargy or muscle wastage, zombies stepping aside to allow him passage. Realising what he was doing, Gwen yelled, 'No!' and leaped forward to stop him. But Jack leaped at the same moment, grabbing her arm and hauling her back. She could only watch in horror as Oscar dived head first out of the window, his thin, pyjama-clad body sailing into the night.
For a moment, like the Darling children from Peter Pan, he looked as though he might fly. And then his body twisted and he plummeted towards the earth.
Angrily, Gwen tore herself free of Jack, ran to the window and looked down. Oscar's twisted, broken body lay in a spreading pool of blood on the concrete far below. She heard gasps of shock and surprise behind her, and turned round.
Only Jack, Ianto and Rhys stood there on the blood-smeared floor, amid the broken glass and overturned furniture. All that was left of the zombies were a few spirals of glittering light, which rose into the air and disappeared.
Rhys dropped the metal IV stand, which clattered to the floor. Ianto put down the chair he was holding and sank shakily into it.
'They just. . . melted away,' said Rhys. 'Into, like. . . twinkly little balls of light.'
'Stardust,' muttered Ianto.
Jack reached into the pocket of his greatcoat and withdrew a creased and crumpled handbill, which he held out for them all to see.
'I think the All-Night Zombie Horror Show is officially over,' he said.