Star Drawn Saga (Book 2): Lost Among The Dead

by Stephen Charlick

  ‘Kai!’ she cried, dashing back in search of the source of the commotion; fearful at what she may find.

  Darting round a corner Fran suddenly skidded to a halt. Despite the gloom she could clearly make out Kai’s prone form slumped on the ground while, standing over him a male figure was reaching down.

  ‘No!’ shouted Fran, her stomach twisting in fear at what she was seeing.

  At the sound of her cry, the stranger’s head suddenly snapped in her direction. It was only in that moment as she caught the reflection of light bouncing off a pair of glasses, that she realized this unknown man was in fact alive. For a second he looked at her, frozen in place. Then, as if sensing Fran was about to act, he made a quick grab for something on the floor by Kai’s side and threw himself backwards. Suddenly Fran was bathed in a blinding block of light as the stranger crashed through the, until then, unseen door behind him. Shielding her blinking eyes from the bright morning sun that had unexpectedly flooded the gloom, Fran stumbled forward; dropping to her knees as soon as she reached Kai’s side.

  ‘Kai!’ she gasped, her shaking hand cupping his pale check; trying her best to ignore the worrying streak of blood on his forehead. ‘Kai are you alright? Can you hear me? Speak to me, Kai, can you hear me?’

  ‘W… what, what hit me?’ he at last groaned, his hand tentatively reaching up to touch his temple.

  Kai felt his fingers coming away wet and looking at them, was confused as to why they were now covered in red.

  ‘Shush, it’s alright, it’s alright,’ she cooed, taking his now bloody fingers in hers as if to spirit away his worry, ‘scalp wounds always bleed a lot… it’s… it’s probably hardly a scratch.’

  ‘What? I d…don’t understand,’ he mumbled, clearly dazed by the attack as he shook his head as if trying to clear his thoughts. ‘What ha…happen?’

  ‘You were attacked,’ she replied, gently trying to part his hair to measure the extent of his wounds. ‘When I came round the corner some bloke was standing over you and when he saw me he took off.’

  ‘Man?’ said Kai, shifting his position slightly so he was now sitting with his back resting against the shelf; his dazed expression slowly fading. ‘W…what man?’

  ‘Who knows,’ shrugged Fran, letting Kai’s bloody hair drop back into place, grateful it wasn’t as bad as it first appeared, ‘I didn’t get much of a look at him. Tall-ish, I think. A beard, glasses... Oh, and I think he had tattoos. You know the full sleeve type, all over his forearms,’ she continued, gesturing with a flutter of blood covered fingers to her own arm.

  Nodding his understanding, Kai slowly tried to get his feet under him to stand.

  ‘Hey, take it easy,’ said Fran, unsure whether to help him up or gently ease him back down, ‘there’s no hurry... just take your time to get your breath.’

  ‘W…we should get b...back to the cart,’ mumbled Kai, determined to get his feet. ‘Who knows if he’s alone or not… and Tom’s on his own.’

  ‘I think Tom can take care of himself,’ Fran replied, instantly regretting her choice of words, ‘No, Kai I mean…’

  ‘It’s alright,’ he muttered, waving away her apology as he used the shelf to steady himself. ‘Fran, it’s okay.’

  It was then that he noticed the tins scattered at their feet, one of which was dented and the lip smeared in blood.

  ‘G…guess we weren’t the only ones sh…shopping,’ he stammered, nodding to the tinned sardines, baked beans and canned soups strewn about the floor.

  ‘Hmm,’ huffed Fran, bending down to pick up a small tin of mushroom soup. ‘Christ, you know when life’s really hit the shits when you’re prepared to kill someone for a can of fucking soup… Come on,’ she continued, angrily shoving the tin into one of her pockets, ‘let’s get you back to the cart, get that cut cleaned up. I’ll come back and get the rest of this stuff later… Do you need a hand?’

  ‘No,’ he replied, slipping his machete back into the sheath on his belt before cautiously pushing himself away from the shelves to finally stand on his own, ‘I’m fine… a bit d…dizzy and… and I’ve got a b…banging headache but I think I’ll be okay.’

  ‘You’re sure?’ she asked, searching his face.

  ‘Yes, Fran,’ said Kai, leaning forward to softly kiss her lips, ‘honest.’

  ‘Okay, if you’re sure you don’t want to rest a bit first,’ she reluctantly relented with a nod, knowing Kai may be foolish enough to accidentally put himself in danger but it would be left up to her to get him back to the cart if anything happened and she doubted he’d knowingly ever place her at risk.

  ‘I’m sure,’ he repeated, smiling as he stole a second gentle kiss, as if hopeful to stem her flow of worry, ‘and I’m s...sorry I scared you.’

  ‘Good,’ she whispered, leaning forward to steal a kiss of her own; the fear of what could have happened to him making her reluctant to let him go, ‘perhaps,’ she continued, her moving lips barely parted from his, ‘perhaps this’ll teach you to wait by the door next time someone tells you.’

  ***

  The man sat in the bushes holding his breath, terrified that his very breathing would alert the two strangers of his presence. Clutching the sack containing the cans to his chest, as if to smother the sound of his hammering heart, he cursed himself that he hadn’t thought to remove the last of his find the previous evening when he had had the chance. As it was he had dropped a few of the precious tins during his attack and escape but he knew there was nothing he could do about them now; the strangers would surely have taken all that he left behind, claiming it as their own.

  ‘Shit! Shit! Shit!’ he thought to himself, only slipping from his hiding spot once the voices inside the storeroom began to fade, ‘what the fuck and am I going to tell Sam?’

  ***

  ‘Keep still,’ whispered Fran once they were both back in the cart; gently dabbing at the cut on Kai’s head with a wet cloth.

  ‘I am k…keeping still,’ he mumbled, wincing slightly as Fran caught the edge of his cut. ‘Here, let m…me do it,’ he continued, taking the wet cloth from Fran.

  ‘Big baby,’ she admonished, rolling her eyes as she relinquished her hold of the fabric. ‘Tom, do you remember where we put that antiseptic cream?’ she went on to ask, starting to rummage through a box she had pulled out from under one of the benches. ‘I know it was here somewhere.’

  ‘Other side,’ he replied, glancing back over his shoulder at her, ‘not that there’s much left… I guess you might be able to squeeze something out of it though... So this bloke, he just scarpered after clocking you one?’ he went on to ask Kai, after he saw that Fran had indeed found the tube of antiseptic cream and had started to go to work on extracting the meagre remains. ‘And you didn’t see anyone else? He was on his own?’

  ‘Well, I certainly didn’t see anyone else waiting for him when the door flew open,’ interrupted Fran before Kai could answer. ‘Raiders, they always travel in packs, relying on their greater numbers to get what they want… and anyway, surely we would have seen some sign of them on our way through Chacewater? A gang of those fuckers is never easy to miss,’ she went on to say, giving up on squeezing the tube for slicing the end of it off entirely to extract the last of the cream. ‘Kai,’ she gestured, asking him to tilt his head slightly towards her and into one of the beams of light coming through a spyhole. ‘Could have been a scout I suppose,’ she muttered, gently applying the small dollop of antiseptic cream from the top of her finger. ‘You know, checking out the general area for a larger band coming up behind them.’

  ‘If it was, he must be one lucky bastard,’ mused Tom, sounding unconvinced. ‘What are the chances of finding someone’s stash like that…admittedly it’s hardly a life changing amount of food but it could’ve kept someone going for a few more days if they were desperate.’

  ‘W…we found it by ch…chance,’ noted Kai, once Fran had applied the cream to his head wound. ‘P…perhaps we shouldn’t have taken it,’ he went on the sa
y, his face taking on an expression of somewhat guilty regret. ‘P…perhaps he was the one who was d…desperate and needed it.’

  ‘Someone tries to smash your head in with a tin of peas and you still worry about us keeping what he dropped in the process,’ Tom chuckled, shaking his head as gave Star’s reins a sharp tug to pull her to a stop. ‘Right, I need a pee,’ he abruptly announced. ‘We should be okay for a few minutes, we’re flanked on the right by a high hedge and on the other there’s a tennis court which I can see is empty.’

  With that statement, Tom twisted in his seat and began to climb back to open one of the side hatches.

  ‘You need to do your business?’ he casually asked Bob, as he pushed his way past the small dog. ‘Because it’s now or never, Mr.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll take him,’ said Fran, unbolting the side hatch, ‘I could do with going myself… might as well do it now if we’re stopping anyway… Kai?’

  ‘Erm... no, I’m fine,’ he replied, taking a second the gauge if he needed to relieve himself anytime soon. ‘Do you want me to keep watch?’

  ‘No, we should be okay for a quick wee,’ said Fran, knowing that she would keep vigil over Tom and vice-versa as they each answered the call of nature. ‘Stay here and just give us the heads up if any of the Dead turn up further down the road.’

  With that she followed Tom through the open hatchway out into the warm autumnal sun.

  ‘You can…’ she started to say, lifting Bob out of the cart before she realised Tom had already unzipped himself and was sighing with pleasant relief as he stood by the side of the cart emptying his bladder, ‘go first.’

  ‘Sorry,’ he whispered, glancing over his shoulder at Fran without stopping his flow, ‘I did say I needed to go.’

  ‘Yes… yes, you did,’ she smiled to herself, leading Bob a few paces away to where Star patiently waited to be on the move again. ‘Bob, Star, Star this is Bob,’ she continued, slapping the mare’s neck affectionately as she made the brief introductions, all the while scanning the hedgerow on her right for movement. ‘And you’re going to be the best of friends… aren’t you?’ she went on to say, briefly glancing down at the small dog by her feet. ‘One nip at Star and you’re out, buddy... got it?’

  Whether the animal understood her, she had no idea, but from the way Bob seemed more interested in sniffing at one cart’s wheels and then cocking his leg against it than paying Star any heed, she hoped he had sort of got the message.

  ‘Finished,’ she heard Tom say from behind her, the sound of his zip being pulled up punctuating his statement.

  Glancing over her shoulder she noticed Tom had already turned his back to her, allowing her the smallest amount of privacy they could afford.

  ‘We should make the river in about half an hour, perhaps less,’ said Tom without looking back. ‘Then if we can find a safe spot you can give that mutt a wash.’

  ‘Safe?’ Fran muttered under her breath, doubting anywhere was truly safe in this world anymore as she began to unbuckle her trousers. ‘Fat chance on finding safe!’

  Later, once she was done and slipping her trousers and underwear back up over her thighs, she saw that Bob had abandoned his exploration of the immediate area around the cart and plonked himself down by Tom’s feet.

  ‘Well someone’s determined to make friends,’ she thought to herself, noticing the way that Bob was resting his head on the top of Tom’s left foot, looking forlornly up at him. ‘Come on, Bob,’ she said aloud, re-adjusting her belt, ‘the nasty man doesn’t like dogs, especially smelly ones… you’ll get no love there…. Come on, boy.’

  Other than a brief glance in her direction, Bob made no attempt to move; his preferred perch apparently chosen.

  ‘Oh, no you don’t, mate,’ chuckled Tom, forcibly removing his foot from under Bob’s chin. ‘You’re her problem; don’t try switching to me now.’

  ‘See,’ smiled Fran, bending down to lift a dejected looking Bob up into the cart, ‘told you so… what a meanie.’

  ‘Yep, she’s right,’ Tom mumbled in response, following Fran as she clambered in after Bob, ‘I’m a monster.’

  Despite the man’s clear disinterest in him, this didn’t stop Bob from following him to the front of the cart where he then curled up at the man’s feet once again.

  ‘Oh, Bob,’ sighed, Fran, reaching to pull the hatchway closed now that they were all inside, pausing briefly when she noticed two shambling Dead figures some twenty metres down the road behind them. ‘Come on,’ she at last continued, bolting the hatch and dismissing the two wandering corpses as just two more hungry cadavers in a world of the Dead, ‘Tom doesn’t want you under his feet, come on… come over here.’

  ‘Oh, just leave him, Fran,’ said Tom, gathering up Star’s reins once again with one hand while waving off her concern with the other. ‘It’s not for long and he’ll be getting a much needed bath soon anyway… you might as well leave him… That doesn’t mean we’re best of friends or anything,’ he continued, switching his attention to the animal by his feet. ‘So don’t get any ideas, mate, okay?’

  ‘Sure,’ answered Fran, a smile twitching at her lips as he noticed Tom give the top of Bob’s head a somewhat awkward but friendly pat. ‘If you say so.’

  ***

  ‘Anything yet?’ asked Fran, some twenty five minutes later as Star steadily pulled them along a road running parallel with the slow flowing river.

  ‘Not really,’ Tom whispered back in reply, his eyes scanning the overgrown river bank on their left, ‘there’s still too much of a drop to the water. Getting down there will be the easy bit, it’s if we need to get back up again in a hurry… you ever see those nature documentaries with all the Wildebeest or Zebras or whatever trying to climb a steep river bank during migration…’

  ‘And all the while the crocodiles are having a right old time, picking them off from the water’s edge,’ finished Fran, knowing exactly what he meant. ‘Yeah, I see what you mean.’

  ‘What about over th…there?’ said Kai, pointing over Tom’s shoulder to where the road and the river running alongside of it started to curve to the left; while to the right, just beyond a broken gate bordered by brambles on both sides, was some sort of track leading into a wildly overgrown meadow.

  ‘What? On the corner near the willow?’ asked Fran, turning to look through the viewing slit at the huge weeping willow tree on the opposite side of the road to the dilapidated gate.

  ‘Yeah,’ Kai replied, suddenly noticing something else that made him smile. ‘In fact I’d b…bet the road drops more level with the r…river right there.’

  ‘Why? What do you know?’ said Fran eyeing the man she loved suspiciously.

  ‘You d…didn’t see it?’ he smiled, raising his eyebrows in mock surprise.

  ‘Just tell me?’ sighed Fran, playfully poking Kai in the ribs. ‘Come on, spill.’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ Kai smiled, wriggling to get away from her prodding. ‘There was a traffic sign. It was almost t…totally overgrown, we just passed it. It said w…warning road ahead l…liable to flooding. And if the road floods...’ he went on, pausing for her to fill in the gap.

  ‘Then there can’t be much difference between the level of the road and the river,’ she completed, comically punctuating the point with her finger as if she had just had a ‘lightbulb’ moment. ‘Yeah alright,’ she continued, smiling as she rolled her eyes, ‘I’ll give you that one… Tom?’

  ‘Well, we’ll find out soon enough,’ Tom replied, glancing back at Fran and Kai. ‘Now… who wants to deal with the corpse when we get there?’

  ‘Corpse? Oh, crap,’ huffed Fran noticing the cadaver that had appeared stumbling through the broken gate.

  As she watched it almost fell but at the last minute managed to find its footing amid the clumps of weeds choking the base of the gate and made its way out onto the road.

  ‘Well, I guess….’ she began to say, reaching for her crowbar when Kai spoke.

  ‘I’ll d…do i
t,’ he said, his hand closing over hers.

  ‘Kai, you…’ she started to protest.

  ‘I n…need the practice,’ he continued, ignoring the worried look that sparked behind her eyes. ‘Y…you know I do… and there’s o…only one.’

  ‘He’s got you there… on both counts,’ said Tom, looking back at Fran.

  Fran looked from Tom to Kai and knew they were right. There was nothing she could say that would deter him and no real justifiable reason why Kai shouldn’t put down the cadaver on his own. But he was wrong in one thing, by saying there was ‘only one’ he had immediately and quite out of hand, belittled and underestimated the threat that he would face and Fran knew such an underestimation could very quickly end up getting you killed.

  ‘Okay, Kai, this one’s yours,’ she at last agreed, removing the crowbar on the cart’s wall to hand it to him. ‘But I’m coming with you… just to make sure more of its Dead friends don’t suddenly pop up out of the blue,’ she quickly added. ‘Deal?’

  ‘You d…drive a hard b…bargain,’ he smiled, testing the weight of the metal bar in his hand. ‘Okay, deal!’

  ‘Well, going or not… it’s show-time,’ whispered Tom, pulling on Star’s reins to bring her to a halt.

  ‘Show time,’ repeated Fran, the brittle smile on her lips doing little to hide the worry she felt. ‘Go in fast but controlled,’ she went on to say, her hand hovering over the bolt on the hatch as she gave Kai a brief impromptu pep talk. ‘We don’t know if any more of them are nearby so try to make your strike before it starts moaning if you can, … oh, and mark your target the moment you starting moving, you may not have time to think about it once it’s seen you.’

  ‘Fran,’ whispered Kai, ‘I have d…done this a f…few times.’

  ‘I know, sorry, it’s just,’ she started to say, her love for him making her overly concerned for his safety. ‘Well… you know.’