Ignoring the body, he could also see in the distance four of those freaks; he floored the pedal, trying to swerve around them. He tried not to look at their faces, but their macabre appearance was hard to miss.
A minute later, he was at the gym.
Chapter Twenty One
All four ran upstairs, and Pickle took a quick peep out of the front bedroom window. He saw two cars pull up on the main road and could see four men get out, two of them carrying shotguns.
Vince was behind Pickle and asked, "Can we take them?"
"No chance. Not even worth the risk if there was just two o' them."
Vince walked away and went into the main bedroom. He saw young Harry and Shaz go into the front bedroom and walk into the built-in cupboard. They could just about get the door open, and Vince helped to shut it once they were both inside.
They heard the front door open, and once Vince returned he grabbed Pickle and dragged him into the bathroom.
Pickle thought it was possibly the worst hiding place in the world, until Vince pointed to a small cupboard under the sink. Pickle opened the cupboard to see, although it had a low ceiling, it was spacious in width.
With no time to lose both men climbed in. Vince slowly shut the door behind him and held onto the inside latch to keep it closed. Their breathing was slow and heavy in the dark, claustrophobic place, and Pickle was beginning to perspire already.
The ground floor was all of a sudden filled with voices and footsteps, and the occasional laughter. It was clear that these men had known each other for a while and was comfortable in each other's company.
"Okay, mate," Pickle and Vince both heard a voice speak out at the bottom of the stairs. "I'll give you a hand once I've had a piss outside."
They then both heard footsteps of another entity gallop up, and both Pickle and Vince reached for their machetes, both were drawn and ready. They heard the individual skulking about, then yelled down, "We should have enough room for the rest of the water! Just means we're gonna have to sleep on the ground floor!"
"I don't know why we can't just stay in the hangar," a man was heard speaking from the ground floor.
"Gavin said it's too cold in there," said the man on the first floor. "Too cold and not enough comfort, we're his words. Besides, winter will be here by the time we know it."
A silence emerged, and Pickle, and Vince knew right away that something was up.
They heard the man creep downstairs, which was followed by whispers. Vince then nudged Pickle and said, "They know something's up."
Pickle whispered back, "Yer don't know tha' for sure."
"I'm telling you—"
Pickle ordered, "Just stay still. Don't move."
A minute later they heard the men creeping up the stairs. The bathroom door was kicked open, making Vince jump, and the sound of footsteps was heard followed by another man bellowing in another room, "In here!"
Fuck. Pickle puffed out his cheeks. They've got them.
Pickle grabbed a hold of Vince's arm and was struggling to get out. Both men then began tussling with one another.
"No, no, no," Vince grabbed Pickle. "Don't," said Vince. "They'll kill you."
"We can't leave them to fend for themselves."
Pickle tried to protest further but Vince shushed him. "Let's hear what they have to say."
After a few muffled voices and a scuffle coming from one of the bedrooms, both men in the bathroom cupboard could hear someone ask, "Who else are you with?"
"No one," they could hear young Harry say straight away.
Pickle and Vince then heard Harry moan as if he had been punched, and was then asked the same question again.
This time Shaz stepped in. "He's telling the truth," she said. "We used to live in a house in Lichfield. Now we're looking for something else. Somewhere safer."
"What do you reckon?" one of the men asked another colleague.
Pickle and Vince held their breath, waiting....hoping that the men would release them.
After an anxious few minutes of waiting, someone spoke. "I don't like this. I don't trust them. Let's take them back to the hangar, and we'll let Gavin make a decision."
Pickle assumed that the Gavin fellow was the leader of this rabble, and he nearly gasped when he heard another voice say, "Just kill them. Gavin ain't gonna know."
"No chance," the other male spoke up. "We're gonna do what I just said. Take them back to the hangar and wait. It's going to be dark soon."
Vince and Pickle could now hear another set of footsteps making their way upstairs. A new voice said, "We've just spotted a pick-up truck in a lay-by, a few hundred yards down the road."
"Is it yours?" the main speaker asked. Both Pickle and Vince assumed correctly that they were questioning Shaz and Harry.
"No," said Shaz. "Check me for the keys if you want."
"She's clean." the same voice spoke.
Vince had the keys in his pocket. He didn't understand why Shaz said that it wasn't her truck, considering that she was pretending that she and Harry had arrived on their own. Maybe it was nerves.
"Take them to the hangar, try and move the truck and take that over as well. I don't trust these two."
Young Harry began to protest with a weak tone and it sounded to Vince and Jack, from inside of the bathroom cupboard, that he received another blow for a reason they didn't know.
"Right," the same voice spoke up. "Gavin will be here in the morning, so until then they can sleep in the hangar, under guard of course."
Vince turned to Pickle and whispered sharply, "Them taking the truck leaves us in the shit. We could have got to the truck and came back with more muscle."
"Not now," Pickle responded.
They both could hear the people leaving the house, heading for the hangar, they assumed. A few minutes had passed, and they were now certain that the house was vacant again.
Asked Vince, "So what do we do now?"
Pickle finally gave Vince an answer. Pickle opened the bathroom door and began to climb out, Vince followed. "I'll tell yer what we do now." Pickle stood up and brushed himself down. "We go to that hangar and get back our people."
Chapter Twenty Two
"Would have been better with a crowbar," Paul reprimanded himself as he sat in his car.
The street he was in was peaceful; he took a look at the metal fence that didn't look too hard to climb, and he stepped out of the car with his empty sports bag.
The gym was away from the neighbourhood, and Paul approached the area and tossed his knife and hammer through the railings of the metal fence, threw his bag over, and climbed it with ease.
Once Paul landed on the grass, within the grounds, he picked his 'weapons' up and walked towards the main door. It wasn't the biggest gym in the world, but it used to be Paul's regular place when he could be bothered to go.
Paul tried the door. It never budged, which pleased him. It appeared that nobody had tried to break into the gym. He had no idea why this was the case, and even thought that the people who worked there, who probably had keys, would have at least went there for some kind of safe refuge.
Maybe they were dead.
Or...
He brought out his hammer, and with no hesitation at all, he smashed the glass. He removed any shards sticking out before climbing in, then began to scowl through the dark area and knew exactly where he needed to go.
There were two vending machines in the reception area, full of protein drinks, protein bars, crisps, chocolate, and other sports drinks. He realised that with no power the products weren't cool anymore, but he was certain that they were still drinkable and edible.
He smashed both machines open and stuffed his face with crisps, a protein bar, and a Lucozade drink. He then began filling his bag and left it against a wall. The gym was at the side, ten yards away, and there was a cupboard where they kept the water inside the gym. That was his destination.
He began walking down the dark corridor, towards the entrance of the gym, and sud
denly stopped in his tracks. His ears pricked up; standing silently, he heard a noise. It then became hushed, and he began walking again, only this time with less-confident steps. He then heard the same sound. It was a shuffling noise, and it seemed to be coming from the right of him where an opened door was present.
Paul knew it was the manager's office, and before he had a chance to walk over and shut the door, one of the creatures stumbled out, making Paul gasp in fright. He took a step backwards, hypnotised by its hideous features. He had kept himself away from these things since the outbreak, and the closest he had been to one of them was when little Jody approached him from her kitchen when he was in the neighbour's back garden. But there had been a pane of glass between them. Now, he was in his first dangerous predicament, and he was frightened as hell.
The thing looked like it was wearing the attire that staff members wore, but it was so dark that he couldn't be wholly sure until it progressed nearer. Paul slowly pulled out the hammer from his belt, as his eyes never left this once-male instructor—he guessed—who was now covered in dried-in blood. He had no idea whose blood it was, but it was over his jaw and down his shirt as if he had been feeding.
It stumbled forwards, and Paul could feel his heart punching the inside of his chest while his whole body shuddered in fright. He then felt a cold presence on his neck, quickly turned around and released a scream.
There was two of them!
He was so engrossed in the male that he didn't hear the dead female instructor approaching him from the side. Paul fell over, dropping his hammer, and quickly scrambled back to his feet. The two beings followed him around the dusky reception area, and Paul seemed hesitant on putting them down.
He couldn't believe it! He was so annoyed with himself.
He pulled out the knife, and went behind the reception's desk to create a barrier between him and the two freaks that were desperate to rip him apart with their rotten teeth. The male leaned over, moaned a little, and tried to reach out for Paul, desperate for his flesh. Paul stabbed at the face of the male, making little progress, and then suddenly leaned back, took a breath in and shoved the knife into its right eye socket. Paul jumped back, shocked at what he had just done, and watched as the ghoul's head lowered. Thick, dark blood poured out onto the blade and handle of the knife, and it fell to the floor with a strident clump.
Unbothered by her colleague's demise, the female instructor reached out for Paul, but he was too far behind the reception area to be grabbed. He jumped over the barrier on the other side and picked the hammer up off of the floor. The creature shambled after him and he brought the hammer back, ready to strike.
Despite the dusky area, Paul could see that the female was bloated, blue in her facial features, and was missing an eye for some reason. With his eyes narrowed, Paul swung the hammer at the once-female. It struck at the front of her forehead, forcing her to stumble back a few yards.
It came forwards again, and this time Paul turned the hammer around and made another two-handed strike, claw first. The hammer embedded itself into the top of the cranium, and the thing immediately dropped to its knees and landed hard, face down, with a disgusting splat. Dark blood oozed out of the wound, pooling around the floor, and it suddenly hit Paul how disgusting these things smelt, forgetting for a moment that they were already dead.
He managed to keep the food in his stomach down, and reached for the implanted hammer. Once he took a hold of it, he closed his eyes and pulled it out, trying to ignore the disgusting noise. He looked at the knife that was in the eye socket of the other corpse, but decided to leave it in its new home. It was covered in blood, and he didn't want to touch the diseased tool. He thought about having to go back to Kyle, and worried he could be carrying back all kinds of infections with him.
With the dripping hammer that he held with his right hand, he gaped at the two bodies and had nothing but sympathy for them. They had turned into the freaks he had seen on the TV, but before the virus occurred they were people in their twenties, making a living with their whole life ahead of them, or so they thought.
He had no idea how they had turned. He thought that maybe one was bit, and while being comforted by the other it reanimated and bit its colleague. He wasn't really sure. Why didn't they call the emergency services? Maybe they did, but were, as expected, constantly engaged. And where were the customers? Did they all leave? Were there some inside? He never noticed if the small car park was full or not.
Paul bent down and wiped the hammer on the clothes of victim number one, the knife still sticking out of its eye, and then made his way down to the gym, but with more caution this time.
Once he peered through the glass doors of the gym, his heart galloped even faster than before. "For God's sake."
There was a solitary ghoul slumbering around the small gym area. Paul had seen enough violence for one day, but walked inside nevertheless. He needed the water.
The ghoul spun round; its neck had been torn open by a set of jaws, and his right cheek was mostly missing, revealing an awful yellow set of teeth at the side. Paul recognised the gym goer; he was dressed in blue shorts and had an orange Nike sports top. He didn't know him by name, he was just a guy that he used to say hello to when he was a regular himself.
He was in a far worse state than the two instructors, and stumbled in Paul's direction. It held its arms up and Paul twisted to the side and swooped its legs, easily putting it to the floor. He then picked up a barbell that had 80kgs of weight on it, where someone must have been dead-lifting, and just about managed to dump the bar on top of the creature, stopping it from moving off of its back.
It gnawed, writhed and snarled in dissatisfaction at its predicament, but Paul was confident it was going nowhere. He opened the door to the cupboard, that was situated inbetween the Lat-Pull and the Leg Press machine, and smiled to see four gallons of water in their plastic canisters. He thought they'd be more, but was happy nonetheless.
Now it was time to move them from the gym to his car, as well as the bag stuffed full of vending accessories that was still sitting against the wall in the reception area. The moving of the water was going to take a bit of time, but he had no room to complain. He was still alive. He still had air in his lungs, and he still had Kyle.
Once he had put all the stolen supplies in his car, after making three trips, he fired the engine and did a U-turn in the barren street. The car went forwards and Paul was in such a dream, he had no recollection of the short journey back to his house.
Chapter Twenty Three
Karen Bradley sat on the step of the caravan with the main door ajar. She said good evening to an elderly gentleman, and she noticed as he walked by that he was hunched over, frail-looking, and would be lucky if he would see his next summer. Karen soon stopped looking when he ceased to walk. The senior citizen tried to straighten his back the best he could, and began shuffling towards Karen.
Karen rolled her eyes, convinced that the individual had found out that she was a nurse, and quickly prepared herself for a barrage of questions that would probably test her patience. She just wanted some peace and quiet, and she was beginning to worry about Pickle and Shaz—not so much the other two.
"You're new here, aren't you?" was the old man's first query.
Karen gazed at the man. It was hard to tell if he was a handsome man in his younger days as there was now so much wear and tear on his face. He was covered in wrinkles and had four or five moles scattered over his face, and he hadn't shaved in days, leaving white whiskers over most of his features.
"I've been here a few days," Karen answered, at last.
"Oh, you're lucky." He turned around and looked over his shoulder as if he was apprehensive of being overheard by someone. "Vince very rarely lets people in." He held out his hand. "The name's Waite. John Waite."
"Karen." She shook his hand. "So, what's your story?" Karen asked. "Were you a resident here before it all happened?"
"Been here nearly twenty years." The old man smiled
and began coughing heavily. He pulled out a handkerchief and spat into it, then screwed it up and put it back into his pocket. "Sorry about that. But I suppose you're used to that kind of stuff. I hear you're a nurse."
"Used to be," Karen said with sharpness.
"My wife died five years ago," the old man began. "I'm kind of glad that she did now. It would have broken her heart to see all of this stuff happening. Don't get me wrong, we've seen little violence because Vince and the crew made sure of that. In the first days we had a few incidents with the dead and people taking their own lives..." He paused and began to shed a few tears. Once he managed to compose himself he continued. "I never heard from my daughter in weeks. Don't even know if she's alive."
"Is she your only one?"
He smiled sadly. "She gave me two beautiful grandchildren, though. Carla and little Jack. God, I hope they're okay."
"I'm sure they are," said Karen, convinced that most children never made it in the first week. "What was it like in here, you know, when it first kicked off?" Karen wondered, unsure whether Vince had already told her this story.
"It happened all very quickly." The old man fell silent in thought, then added, "There was a knock on my door. Apparently most people got this knock, and we were told to stay where we were. Within hours Vince had the road blocked with trucks from the HGV drivers that live on the camp. Then a day later, because phones were still working, Vince called folk that he knew, most were farmers, telling them about his plan and that the camp would be a better set-up than any farm. Some came, others didn't and weren't convinced."
"Is that how it happened?" Karen twisted her face, thinking that she may have heard a different story.
The old man bit his bottom lip in thought and added, "Well, that's what happened according to my friend, Geoff."
Karen smiled. It didn't matter what really happened; they were here now, and although she had to begrudgingly admit it: Vince had done a good job. He'd been brutal, greedy and selfish, but the people had benefited from his actions, and it didn't do his hero status and his ego any harm either.
Snatchers: Volume Two (The Zombie Apocalypse Series Box Set--Books 4-6) Page 35
