All You Can Eat

By Ed O'Loughlin

“They have no remorse or loyalty. They’re insatiable. They don’t hear what you scream as they’re eating you alive...”

...And then there's the flesh-eating zombies.

A gruesome vision of an Ireland where society has collapsed and pitiless monsters feed on the weak and defenseless.

From the Man Booker Prize-nominated author Ed O'Loughlin

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ed O'Loughlin
• Release date: May 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301238910

Ed O'Loughlin

Ed O'Loughlin was born in Canada and grew up in Ireland. From 1994 to 2008 he was a newspaper correspondent in Africa and the Middle East. Not Untrue and Not Unkind, his first novel, was long-listed for the 2009 Man Booker Prize. A second novel, Toploader, was critically acclaimed in 2011 for its darkly humorous take on the war against terror. He now lives in Dublin with his wife and two children.

Book preview

Chapter one

Diarmuid Nolan sat on the patio of his penthouse flat in Monkstown, smoking a cigarette, gazing out across the sleeping Bay.

It was a fine, clear night, a rare event in yet another dismal autumn, the sky pale with the light that comes before sunrise. A band of crimson cloud on the south east horizon, out beyond the Muglins, gave notice of imminent dawn. The still bay lay breathless between its bracketing headlands, a peaceful mirror to the opaline sky, with only the twin exclamations of Poolbeg’s high smokestacks, lights flashing red over the harbour mouth, to hint that such things as urgency, exigency, clamour, could ever intrude on the calm, cool reflections of gentle new day. Around the sweep of the shore, from Dalkey to Howth, the city lights kept vigil on the dreams of sleeping citizens.

None of this mattered a solitary damn to Diarmuid Nolan. He was staring at the aeroplanes.

Like most things that happened in the sky, aircraft had never much interested Nolan before. Now, he couldn’t take his eyes off them. The stars having already vanished, the high-flying jets blazed like comets, flaring in the rays of the still-sunken sun. Streaming out behind them, white contrails streaked the sky.

The ones high above must be intercontinental flights, Nolan decided, passing over Ireland to or from America, or perhaps even further afield. That one out there - the light blazing low over the sea, beyond the black snout of Howth - that was an arrival, on final approach to Dublin airport. There were other lights stacked in the sky behind it, increasingly faint, a daisy-chain of aircraft inbound for Ireland. They stretched back across the Irish Sea.

Nolan shuddered, not just from the cold. His pinstripe suit, which he had put on the morning before, was wet from the dew. Beads of dew silvered his fine dark head of curly hair, still thick despite his advanced middle age. People thought he dyed it, but he didn’t. It was thanks to that hair, to the big round head set well back on his shoulders, his open face, its look of stupid, decent wonder, that Nolan had been elected seven times to Dáil Éireann, usually topping the poll in his rustic constituency.

A phone started to ring on a table in front of him. He picked it up, looked at it, then threw it down again, as if scalded. After a while it stopped ringing.

Nolan’s huge, crimson face drooped until his chin met his chest. His eyelids fluttered, then closed. Forgotten between his fingers, the cigarette burned ever closer to his knuckles. Then a sliding door screeched open, jarring him awake again. Nolan’s student daughter appeared on the patio, wrapped in her frilly pink dressing gown. She was plump, currently blonde, quivering with fury.

Are you smoking again? You wait till I tell Mammy!

Nolan stabbed his cigarette into a mug of cold tea. Ah now Sorcha, love!

She stamped her foot. She really did. "You are so lucky Mammy’s not here tonight. Pat McDonnell is ringing on the door bell, at five in the bloody morning! Mammy’d kill the both of you if she was here. It’s not even election-time!"

Relief stampeded onto Nolan’s face. Pat’s here? Than God for that. Any chance of a fresh cup of tea?

She vanished, swearing. The answer, it seemed, was no.

Nolan’s political adviser emerged in her place in the doorway, glancing back after her. In his late thirties, Pat McDonnell was fifteen years younger than Nolan but dressed in the same old-school pinstripe. A head taller than his boss, he assumed a slight hunch when in Nolan’s company, not because he was scared of him, but because he secretly liked to be kind.

Advancing across the patio, McDonnell held a folder in front of him, half shield, half offering.

Nolan lit another cigarette, squinting. What have you got there?

McDonnell placed the folder on the table. Its buff.cardboard had gone fuzzy at the corners. Pasted on the front was a typewritten label, once white, now yellow. An Roinn Cosanta, it said. Then - reverting to English for business - Department of Defence: Top Secret.

Nolan squinted at it suspiciously. What’s that?

A plan. McDonnell glanced unnecessarily about them, then lowered his voice. We spent the whole night looking for one that might cover us. We’d almost given up when we finally found this one. It was in the back of an old cabinet in the basement at Infirmary Road. ‘Operation Wild Geese ’, they called it.

Nolan took a puzzled drag on his cigarette. Operation Wild Geese? For dealing with the bird ‘flu, is it? Like when we were back in the Department of Agriculture?

McDonnell shook his head quickly. No, minister. This plan is much older than that. It was updated in the Cold War, but the guts of it are older still. It goes all the way back to 1940.

McDonnell could not quite hide his excitement. In all his years at Nolan’s service it had never occurred to him that their political arc might ever touch, however tangentially, the line of global history. It had not occurred to Nolan either, though for different reasons. His lips moved silently as he processed the information.

1940? You mean like the Second World War? Why were we making plans for the Second World War? I thought we were neutral in that one.

We were, minister. But you have to make plans for everything. Or at least, they did back then. What if the Germans had invaded us, neutral or not? Or the Russians? Plus, we’re not neutral any more. Not in this one.

Nolan slumped. No. We’re not... Minister of Defence, for the love of Jesus... Why does it have to be me? It’s not even two months since they kicked us out of Agriculture...

McDonnell said nothing. The phone started to ring again. They both looked at it.

It’s the Taoiseach’s office, said Nolan sadly. They’ve been calling me since midnight, wanting to know what I have for them. After a while I stopped answering... This wild goose plan of yours will have to do, I suppose. But change the name first, so it looks like a plan we came up with ourselves.

Right you are, minister. McDonnell stood, gathered the folder, then straightened, staring up at the sky. Look! he said.

High overhead, in a sky turning from white to blue, a contrail bent back on itself. It looked like a shepherd’s crook.

Both men had to shield their eyes from the rays now spearing the horizon. As they watched, another plane began to curve back towards its point of origin, then another, then another. Beyond Howth, the daisy chain of landing lights was breaking apart, each plane turning off on its own separate heading.

The Atlanta Protocol, McDonnell said grimly. All civilians flights are being grounded or recalled. This is really happening.

The Atlanta Protocol?

Don’t worry, Minister. First, we have to get your family to safety - I’ve already sent a driver down to the constituency, to brink your wife back to Dublin. Meanwhile, the two of us have to get to the Taoiseach’s office. They’ll be running this whole thing from there.

Chapter two

The car was a 1992 Nissan Bluebird, almost white apart from the rust. It was sitting on a back lane in north Dublin city, strewn with rubbish, tramp shit, burnt wire, what have you. The car looked as if it too had been dumped there, except that two young men were sitting in it.

Michael Walsh leaned across the gear-stick to look his companion in the face. He tapped his index finger against the patch on his baseball cap that said Manchester United. Remember, Trigger: one in the head. That’s Dáithí’s golden rule. If you don’t put one in the head, the job isn’t done. He sank back in his seat, nodding wisely.

Trigger was behind the wheel. He was of medium height, scrawny, with short red hair, blue jeans, a hoodie. He looked blankly back at Micko, whilst scratching his nuts. It was early morning. Cats were prowling through the litter.

I don’t want to do it anymore, said Trigger. His words came flat, affectless, the way a child reads aloud when it isn’t used to reading. It was how he usually sounded when he talked.

Micko smiled at him. When Micko smiled, which he often did, he looked like one of those dogs that show you their teeth when they want to seem friendly, because they’re half-smart enough to have noticed that that’s what people do. Nice try, doggie, but that’s not how it works for you.

Course you do, Trigger, leered Micko. Anyway, you can’t back out now. Let’s get this thing done, then we’ll go talk to Dáithí.

Trigger took a plastic shopping bag from the back seat. He got out of the car. The bag swung heavily as he crossed the street toward a terrace of discoloured council flats, two-storey, recent builds, each with its own door at street level.

It was almost light now, but the street was deserted.

Trigger looked about then rang a doorbell. A light came on in the hallway, beyond the frosted glass lozenge set in the door. Trigger eased his hand inside the bag.

Who is it? It was a young woman’s voice, angry, suspicious.

Trigger recognized the voice. He felt his breath catch. It’s me. I got the stuff you asked for.

Powder?

The other stuff. It was all I could get.

Oh, for God’s sakes... A dead-bolt clicked. The door swung open a few inches, checked by a chain. Give us a look at it. A hand snaked out through the gap.

Trigger stepped back from the door, pulled his hand out of the shopping bag. He swung its contents up at the woman’s face. She screamed.

You stupid thick, Trigger! That’s the wrong stuff! I told you: Amy only likes that other baby milk! This stuff here gives her the wind!

Trigger released the empty shopping bag. It fluttered down to join its kindred in the street.

It’s not my fault, Maeve, he protested. They had the stuff you wanted down at the petrol station, but the carton was too big to fit through the little service hatch. The fella inside wouldn’t open the door to pass it out to me. He said robbers had tricked him that way before.

The baby milk disappeared into the hallway. Well, that’s your own fault, then, for looking like a hard man. As if. Jesus Christ.

Maeve tried to close the door. Trigger got a foot in it.

Can’t I come in for a minute, Maeve? To say hi to the baby?

She slammed the door on his foot again. No. It’s five o’clock on a Sunday morning.

Trigger’s face began to flush. That didn’t stop you ringing me to send me off looking for baby-milk.

She tugged at the door again. Well, Amy’s your bloody baby! Besides, the fact that you had to come around here first to get the money off me kind of takes the good out of the gesture, wouldn’t you say, Trigger?

Maeve was wearing her short cotton nightie, the one with the cartoon cats on it. Her tumbled brown hair reminded Trigger of their one or two good times. He tried smiling at her.

I got some work, Maeve. I’m off there now. Micko’s taking me.

Micko? The chain slid out of its slot, the door opened fully. Is he here?

She spotted Micko in the car, beckoned him. Micko laid his runners heel to toe as he padded across the street, doing his new gangster walk.

Looking good, Maeve, he said, smirking.

Trigger saw Maeve smile back at his friend. Fancy a quick cup of tea? she said to Micko.

I’d love one, Micko told her, but I can’t. He remembered Trigger. We can’t. We’re off on a job now. Loading vans at the airport. Off the books, cash in hand.

Maeve laid her head to one side. Her hair brushed a bare shoulder as she gazed at Micko fondly. Trigger’s so lucky to have a pal like you. He’d be nowhere without you.

Is that Micko? There was another young woman inside the flat. I thought you said it would only be Trigger.

Maeve’s younger sister appeared beside her in the hallway. Melanie was wearing a tight green dress that skimped on the material. It was a look that usually worked for her, but now her makeup was