ZombiePalooza - Anthology

#TeamEcrivain Pt. VII - @AngusEcrivain's "Meanwhile, at the Abbey"

//Meanwhile, at the Abbey

by // AngusEcrivain

Part One: An Eye on the Horizon

He threw the looped rope around the low branch and used it to pull the rowing boat tight to the island's edge.

It was not a large island by any means, situated as it was some twenty feet into a lake, one of three on the grounds created by the damming of the River Leen generations prior, when Lord Byron owned the estate.

Anthony chuckled at the thought as he trod carefully across the ground, wanting to disturb the area as little as possible.

He could, of course, quite clearly remember a time before the undead walked the Earth and every day had become a fight and struggle to survive, but the way of life he and his fellow survivors were now forced to maintain was becoming more and more natural with every passing day.

"Morning, guys and girls," he said cheerfully as he slid the bolt back, thus allowing the first quartet - a cock and three hens - to descend into their pen. "Everyone slept well, I hope."

He repeated the process with three other groups of birds, all of varying Pekin breeds, and then opened the duck pen which was already the source of much noise and excitement.

Between them the birds served as a handy source of protein and very occasional meal. It was for their eggs though, that the birds were really prized amongst the community. As one might expect, such things were considered quite the delicacy, given the state of the world.

"All right then," he said, his tone just as light and cheery. "Who're we gonna' let out with the ducks today?"

Anthony always liked to make a game of it, despite the fact he invariably worked the four groups of chickens on the same rotation, and he smiled as he slid the door back upon the coop containing the day's group.

The handsome blue-silver cockerel, the youngest of all the males, eagerly made his way from the confines of the coop and his girls followed with varying degrees of urgency, clucking gently and pecking at the ground as they did so.

Anthony turned and made his way towards the island's largest tree, an ancient Birch that by rights was far too large for the small plot of land that rose from the lakebed. It offered a good amount of shade though and was a handy place to store the birds' feed box, a metal chest wedged at a height far enough from the ground to prevent the guys and girls of the island from helping themselves and thus, being overfed.

He reached inside and took hold of the plastic beaker, a faded green colour, as it was, and scooped it full of feed. He then proceeded to scatter it around the island before filling it a second time, only on this occasion it was intended for those birds still cooped up.

The birds occupied, Anthony returned to the boat and retrieved the cool box situated towards the bow. It was not going to keep anything cold, of course, not without the aid of a freezer block or two and those were in pretty short supply. The egg boxes it contained though were perfect, as one might expect, for keeping the morning's haul safe and unbroken during the short transit from the island to the fort, the central hub of the Newstead Abbey community.

The community itself was not the first who had made use of the site since the outbreak, however when Anthony and his companions arrived some sixteen months prior, only the dead were in residence.

Just off the main drive beside what was formerly a car-park used by members of the general public; day-trippers, families who brought their children to enjoy a little piece of history, was situated a reasonably large block of houses. Ten or twelve of them, terraced, built around a central courtyard.