Having attended to our ablutions, I felt the need to rest again and to block out the intermittent roar of the ongoing slaughter outside. I was just too stuffed from what had been happening over the last week and more – and, anyway, we had nowhere else to go just at the minute. More than that, if I were to continue on, I couldn’t afford to think about the horror of recent and ongoing events – it was simply too overwhelming and sleep was the place to retreat from all that. David lapsed into a torpor with which I was now becoming familiar. Was it sleep? Was it another form of death? I awoke again in the afternoon, I think. The shooting was now very sporadic and the cries of the zombies were no longer audible. Still, we’d need to be here for at least a few days before it was safe to venture out – or so I guessed – and I would need to keep myself occupied. What to do next? Then I hit upon it: there was a pack of playing cards that Charles and Paul had left behind in their rush to exit. Today, I would try to teach David how to play poker. It was a game he’d once been good at – and had enjoyed. So, why not? Why not indeed? But first, I would catch up on world events. Yes, miraculously, I had managed to hold onto the transistor radio whilst effecting our escape from the battle. True, it was now a little battered – and smelled a lot of gasoline soot – but it still worked. (I hoped that the batteries had been relatively new because I had no replacements at hand.) “This is the BBC World Service,” the announcer intoned. (I was warming to that voice.) News that I wasn’t interested in came first but the ‘Battle of Melbourne Port” was the third item of the broadcast. The item confirmed a couple of things. The first was that the herding of the zombies into the uni campus – and their subsequent destruction there – had been entirely planned and was claimed to have been largely successful in its aim. (There was no mention of the soldiers who had been taken by the zombies during the battle.)
Agan tronkys gwrys, my a omglywo bos edhomm dhymm a bowes arta – rag lettya dhiworthiv usans treweythus dhiworth an ladhva esa ow pesya yn-mes. Spenys en vy drefenn an hwarvosow re hwarsa dres moy es seythun – hag, yn neb kas, nyns esa le vyth arall may hyllyn mos y’n tor’ na. Ha, gans henna, mar mynnen mos yn-rag, ny dalvien prederi a-dro dhe’n euth a hwarvosow a-gynsow – oversettyes gansa en vy ha kosk o an le may yllyn kildenna dhiworta. Davydh a goedhas yn anwrythresekter, lemmyn aswonnys yn ta dhymm. O hemma kosk yn hwir? O hemma eghenn a vernans arall? Dohajydh, dell grysav, my a dhifunas arta. An tennans o lemmyn pur dreweythus ha ny yllys na fella klywes skrijansow an zombis. Byttele, res o dhyn triga omma nebes dydhyow kyns bos salow mos yn-mes – po dell grysyn – hag ytho yth esa edhomm a dhidhana ow honan. Pyth yw an nessa tra dhe wul? Ena, y teuth dhymm: yth esa kartennow-wari re via gesys gans Powl ha Charlys hag i resys dhe-ves dhiworth an gleudhgell. Hedhyw, my a vynna dyski Davydh dell wariir poeker. Kyns, y fia Davydh pur skentel ynno – ha da re via ganso ena. Ytho, prag na? Prag na yn hwir? Byttegyns, y’n kynsa le, yth esa edhomm dhymm kavoes nowodhow a hwarvosow an bys. Ya, dre verkyl, my re sewensa dhe dhalghenna an radyo- transystor ha ni dienkys an vatel. Gwir yw, nebes fustys o lemmyn – hag yth esa dhodho fler hudhygel-betrol – mes yth esa hwath owth oberi. (Govenek o dhymm bos poran nowydh an pilyow drefenn nag esa dhymm nammpyth yn le anedha.) “Hemm yw Servis SDP an Bys” a leveris an derivador. (My a omglywo lemmyn neb konfort drefenn son y lev.) Yth esa nowodhow nag o poesek dhymm a dheuth y’n kynsa le. Byttegyns, yth o “Batel Porth Melbourne” an tressa tra kampoellys y’n darlesans. An kynsa poynt gwrys gensi a gonfirmyas diw dra. An kynsa tra o bugelyans an zombis. I re via bugelyes yn kampus an bennskol – ha distruys ena – dre dowl kler. An towl ma re sewensa, dre vras, herwydh fentynyow an nowodhow. (Byttegyns, ny veu kampoellys an soudoryon re via kemmerys gans an zombis dres an vatel.)langbot langbot