He had intended to call though. Stuart had held the phone with his thumb over the dial button for almost ten minutes, nervousness preventing him moving the digit bare millimetres. The shot from outside his apartment had made him jump, and any resolve for reconciliation had dissipated in that moment.
Stuart had been horrified by what he saw out of the window. Three armed police were crouching behind a parked police car, the blue lights blazing hypnotically. He was confused by what was going on, only for there to be the sound of another shot. Stuart instantly saw the motion, a man behind a tree shooting at the police who were choosing, at this time, not to return fire.
What the fuck was this, 1920’s Chicago?
It was after eleven in the evening, way past the military imposed Curfew that had been placed across the city of Manchester. Somebody had clearly been caught out after hours and had chosen the path of death by cop. Because really, this was the only way it could end. Already back up units would likely be on their way. If the lone idiot with the gun didn’t give up, and soon, he would be going home in a box.
One of the police officers lifted his head up above the car’s bonnet, only for another shot to come his way. The officer didn’t duck back down, the distance was clearly too much for the silly twat shooting at him to have any real chance of effective aim. There were too many guns on the streets of Manchester these days, but fortunately, nobody knew how to use the bloody things. It wasn’t like some countries where you could nip down the shooting range and pop off a few shots as practice.
A second officer appeared from where he was hidden and aimed his machine gun, leaning his elbows on the boot of the police car. Stuart opened the window and only three floors up, he could just about hear what was going on. The rest of the city was quiet, hundreds of thousands of people having retreated to their homes.
“Armed police, drop the gun now or it’s over. I won’t ask again.”
“Screw you pig,” the man said, fear evident in the words. If there was bravado there it was brought on by pure desperation. He barely looked like he was an adult. Just a frightened youth full of piss and vinegar most likely. The boy came out from behind the tree and let off two more shots. Then there was a third, and the kid wasn’t shooting anymore because the organ pumping the blood around his body suddenly had a catastrophic hole through it. When the gun fell from his hands, two of the officers made a tactical advance towards him, the third obviously radioing everything in. Stuart closed the window, he didn’t want to see anything else. But he did, he saw the worst of it. The officer who shot the man got up close enough to accurately put a second bullet through the now dead man’s head. Was that what it had now come to?
Stuart naturally couldn’t sleep with all that was going on. He was still haunted by the mistake he had likely made. Jessica had phoned him and told him to go to her brother’s place because it was safe, secure and out of the way from all this madness. Only Stuart hadn’t listened because he’d had important shit to do. Well, it wasn’t important now, and Stuart was likely trapped in a city where people were openly killing each other.
He reckoned he could still be accepted there if he went, but how did he get out of the city? Public transport had been suspended, and all the main roads in and out of the city would be blocked off. The military didn’t want people moving around because that risked spreading the infection. So they had simply shut everything down, the TV saying that only essential personnel were allowed to travel. There was no way Stuart’s job classed him as essential personnel. He was a lawyer, not an engineer or a paramedic. Maybe his dear departed mother was right after all, maybe he should have become a doctor. They could get rid of all the lawyers, and the lights would still stay on and the water would carry on flowing from the taps.
Stuart realised he was going to have to wait it out. He’d managed to get some canned food on the way home and had enough in the house to last him about two weeks. Surely everything would be back to normal by then. There was no way he would allow himself to envisage anything but a happy outcome here. I mean, okay, the TV now seemed to be telling the truth about what was occurring, but it wasn’t like there were legions of zombies crashing through the streets outside. Stuart was more than confident that the police and the military would get things back under control. And if what he had witnessed outside was widespread, there was likely going to be a bob or two to make out of the impending lawsuits. There were undoubtedly massive infringements of people’s human rights going on throughout the city and the country. So there was definitely an opportunity for himself and his firm once all the insanity ended. Some would consider it strange that he was still thinking about money when zombies were walking the Earth, but it was just who he was. It would end though, right? This couldn’t go on for much longer, humanity always won out.
The sneeze took him by surprise, the droplets forming into an infectious cloud that spread out through the apartment. With no other lungs to breathe them in, they slowly drifted down onto the furniture around him. Invisible death with nobody to infest.
21.08.19
Hounslow, UK
Night was fully on them now. The civic centre’s surroundings were illuminated by piercing spotlights, but virtually every building around their position was internally dark, the inhabitants likely long since dead. The relentless undead moved around the perimeter, and Whittaker thought he understood why now. It occurred to him that the undead had some sort of animal cunning and that their present actions were merely to taunt the soldiers. He had no idea if he was correct in his assumption. After all, he was just a Corporal. He’d barely managed to leave school with four GCSE’s, so he didn’t consider himself to be particularly smart.
Smart people rarely did.
Ammunition stocks had been dangerously depleted throughout the day, and whilst the last supply run from their barracks had arrived successfully, the one before that had never turned up. The last they heard of it was a garbled radio communication that the convoy was being attacked. There had been nothing heard since, twenty men most likely lost to the horde rampaging through the streets of Hounslow. That was all assuming it had been the undead that had been the attackers.
The Major was now relying on helicopters to keep the supplies flowing, determining that the roads were becoming impassable to anything except a fully armoured column. At the moment, only the occasional sniper shot could be heard across the night’s sky, the Major now ordering the heavier stuff to hold fire until an assault actually came. Unbeknownst to the bulk of the men, Major Pickering was already deciding that he had to get his men out of this shit-fest. He just had to try and figure out how. The Major silently cursed the senior officer who sent him and his men on this fool’s errand.
“Do you think this is the end, Corp?” Tod asked. He sat with a satisfied air about him, the rifle resting across his lap. Whittaker wouldn’t be surprised if Tod suddenly started stroking it. He’d heard a rumour from some of the other lads that his section’s sharpshooter sometimes talked to the rifle. If he did, he certainly wouldn’t be the first soldier to do so.
“The end of what?” Whittaker was surprised by the question if he was honest. Tod may have been a bit of a nutcase, but he always had an optimistic slant to his personality.
“The end of everything. I mean, fucking zombies right.”
“It’s not looking good, I’ll give you that.”
“At least we get to go out doing what we love.” Tod sucked on the cigarette he held between his lips, savouring the hit of the nicotine. Nobody as of yet had told them to don NBC protective gear.
So far by his count, Tod had killed seventeen zombies today. Whittaker figured he might have embellished that figure somewhat, and if this continued, he also reckoned it wasn’t long before Tod started to keep some sort of visual tally. If the stock of his gun had been made of wood, that probably would have already happened.
“Sometimes I think you enjoy the job a little too much.” Whittaker said it playfully, but he meant what he said.
>
“I won’t lie,” Tod said, “I do like killing these things. When I was told I could put on a uniform and kill for Queen and Country, I jumped at the chance.”
“Well looks like you are going to get plenty of practice tonight.” Whittaker had met a few men like Tod during his stint in the army. He wasn’t shocked by them, it was only natural for such characters to find their way into the armed forces. What surprised him more was that people like Tod seemed to be a bit of a rarity. The majority of the men and women he met could go through their whole careers without firing a single shot against an enemy.
Until today that was. Today changed everything. Every man here would be doing their part.
Whittaker was distracted by the sound of a helicopter in the distance. He wondered if it was the same one that had saved him and his men earlier in the day. He’d tried to find out who the pilot was with a view to one day maybe thanking him, but nobody seemed to know the information. There was the distant sound of something laying down machine gun fire, and he wondered how long those flying angels of death would be up there.
Down the line, five men distant, someone had a coughing fit.
Behind him, the Sergeant from earlier walked past with the Lieutenant in tow. The officer had a computer tablet, which he was obviously monitoring the video feed from a drone that had been sent up earlier.
“They are massing on the other side of those buildings,” the Lieutenant could be heard to say. “We have a Yank airstrike incoming any minute. Should take out the majority of them.” The RAF didn’t have the ordnance needed for this sort of attack. As a NATO ally and with jets stationed in the UK, the Americans had agreed to do limited strikes on selected targets before they bugged out of the country entirely.
“Let’s hope those flyboys know friend from foe,” the Sergeant replied. Whittaker had yet to catch his name, but he felt reassured by the Sergeant’s presence. Sensing something, Whittaker joined the two men in looking up at the skies, even though the night was overcast, the moon fully hidden from sight. They weren’t looking, but listening. He heard it, the distant roar of fighter jets, what every soldier wanted to hear when their position was in danger of being overrun. Their technology might just be the edge they needed to beat this thing.
Who am I trying to kid? thought Whittaker. The scratchiness of his throat was really starting to irritate him.
They came in low and quickly, their engines a fanfare to their arrival. Some of the men around him cheered. As the cacophony rose, Whittaker just managed to hear the Lieutenant shout “My God, they are scattering,” and then the planes seemed to be overhead, the aviation lights briefly the only visible indication of their existence. A second later a line of fire erupted above the buildings bordering one side of the recreational ground, the flames billowing into the night’s sky. It didn’t take long for the smell of the burning to reach Whittaker and it seemed to stick to the back of his nose, the chemical fire bringing with it the stench of burnt flesh, exacerbating the soreness there.
The Corporal found himself coughing for the first time that day. He didn’t know the Americans even still used such incendiary ordnance.
On the opposite side to the military stronghold, another line of fire engulfed a whole street. The visible buildings began to burn, a wave of warmth washing over the defenders. Whittaker had read about the firestorms in German and Japanese cities of World War Two and knew there was no threat of that here. This was precision bombing, almost surgical, creating a barrier whilst hopefully destroying as much of the undead as possible. A secondary explosion went off some ways in the distance.
With the politicians out of the way, the military seemed to have no hesitation in sacrificing the British public for the greater good. Any civilians that had survived the undead were scorched to death now. Whittaker just hoped fire could kill these things. They were horrific enough, the last thing he wanted was to face burnt zombies running across the battlefield.
Two more strikes hit streets further out, the plan obviously to create a buffer zone of burning death. How long would that hold the zombie armies off, Whittaker wondered? How many would it kill?
“Corporal,” the Sergeant shouted at him, Whittaker jumping to his feet.
“Yes Sarge?” Whittaker stood at attention, the Lieutenant completely ignoring him.
“You told the Major you thought the undead used strategy, is that correct?”
“Yes Sergeant. They tried to outflank us.” That was when the Lieutenant looked at him. The officer seemed nervous, but then he was young and inexperienced. This was likely his first time in battle, so it was wise that he was listening to the veteran Sergeant.
“Where is the rest of your Section, Corporal?” the Lieutenant asked him.
“Not sure sir.”
“Go and find them mate,” the Sergeant said softly. “Better to be together with lads you know when the attack comes.” Whittaker nodded. Giving the officer a salute, he went off in search of his men, leaving Tod to savour his next kill.
21.08.19
Manchester, UK
The clothes fit him surprisingly well. Brian had always felt that his body was difficult to shop for due to his height and relative bulk, but this was military gear. It was designed to fit men of his size. The black fatigues gave him a menacing appearance, which was only hardened by the black gloves and the respirator he wore. He absently scratched at the small plaster that covered the needle mark in the crook of his arm. Florence had taken blood from both he and Susan, and whilst Susan had squealed when the needle penetrated her, Brian hadn’t felt a thing.
Everyone had to have the blood tests so they could be checked for the virus. Brian didn’t ask how Clay could get those blood tests done. Somebody at some hospital somewhere was obviously being paid a lot of money to provide that service. Brian knew that the time when money would be seen as irrelevant hadn’t arrived yet. People would likely cling to the hope of it for a few more days yet, and it gave Clay the edge he needed.
He sat and listened to Clay, the three other men present with him of similar rank in the organisation to Brian. They were all dressed as he was, and they all kept at least two arms distance away from each other. Clay wasn’t taking any chances here.
“Is there anyone here who doesn’t want to stay?” Clay asked. The gang boss had just spent the last twenty minutes outlining the information he had been given by his contacts inside MI6 and the British military. Selling guns across the world was a lot easier when you had the unofficial blessing of the powers that be.
Some of those present had sat mouths agape under their masks as Clay told them about the zombie outbreak at Wythenshawe Hospital. Nobody asked how Clay had acquired this knowledge, they all knew his wealth and his business empire created information tendrils that reached further than any of them could imagine. Nobody indicated they wanted to leave.
“Good,” Clay said. Clay was sat in a plush armchair, a cigar planted between his teeth. The smoke rose lazily in the air, dissipating as the air-conditioned room he was in sucked the particles of burnt plant matter away. Nobody else smoked. Nobody else was allowed to, and it wasn’t feasible with the respirators they wore. In Clay’s mansion, you only smoked what Clay said you could, and sometimes he would even offer you one of his own. Unlikely that would be happening anytime soon. There was a high probability that Clay would suddenly get very stingy with his stash. Cigars were likely something that was going to be in very short supply soon.
It didn’t matter that Clay was in a different room from them, these were still the rules to follow. For now, with the ever-present risk of infection, Clay was locked away in his master bedroom. The fifty-inch TV set that had been set up in one of the mansion’s living rooms was how he was now video linking with his most trusted commanders.
“The plan now is to fortify this position. I want it locked down, nobody in or out without my express permission.” Clay took another pull on the cigar, the smoke lingering in his mouth before he blew it out. “Some of you will
be going out first thing tomorrow morning. There are several warehouses I want you to hit, but the military presence is too strong for us to try that tonight. Tonight I want you to get some sleep whilst we wait on your blood test to be returned.”
“And if any of us are infected?” the man to Brian’s direct right asked.
“Then you will be isolated until such time as we need to deal with you. Any other questions?” The room indicated that there weren’t. “Then that will be all for now. Brian could you stay behind please.” The other three men gave Brian a glance that he couldn’t determine due to the paraphernalia on their faces. It could have been curiosity, pity or jealousy. Either way, Brian could do without it. He watched as the three men left, the last one closing the door behind him.
“Take that shit off your face Brian,” Clay insisted. Brian hesitated for a moment, and then stripped off the mask.
“What can I do for you, Mr Clay?”
“Of all my men, you are one that I trust more than most. You have proven to me countless times that you are loyal. And yet I always wondered why you never made a power play for your own organisation.”
“It was never something I was interested in. I’m a follower rather than a leader.” That was the truth. Brian didn’t feel he had the temperament or the desire to lead. He was more than happy to grow rich serving someone else’s agenda. Rich, that was a laugh now.
“Well, that’s good to hear. Would be a mistake for someone to try and overstep their station in life. I trust you noticed Gary’s absence from the room.” The man Clay was referring to was perhaps as close to a second in command as Clay’s organisation had. It was said that Clay declined to trust anyone implicitly, which was probably why he had lasted so long. But Gary was perhaps one of the few men who got his ear the most.
“I did Mr Clay.”
“He was absent because he thought he could instigate a coup against me. Very foolish if you ask me, I have eyes everywhere. Be good to get his blood tests back so I can deal with him personally. As I am sure you can imagine, these events are turning out to be very stressful to me.”
The Lazarus Strain Chronicles (Book 2): The Rise Page 10
