Dead Bones - Six Pack. The Ultimate Zombie Collection

by Ian Woodhead

  The magistrate pulled the two remaining delegates to the corpse and wiped his gore-covered hands over their shoulders.

  “If you want to live through this, cover yourself with this shit!”

  They did not need telling twice. The two reached in greedily and pulled out chunks of offal, spreading it on their bodies like fine lotion.

  His officer had managed to give them a little room; the bodies at his feet were now in double figures. He scooped out some more of the stinking gunk and waddled over to the officer, who stood there panting. He threw the stuff on his back.

  “We need to get out of here, now.”

  The officer nodded. He pulled the door open a little wider and rushed out into the corridor. The magistrate followed, hoping to God that there was enough of the stuff on his vast body to stop the things from attacking him. He yelped like a frightened child when a corpse by his feet moved. It reached forward as if to embrace him. The magistrate watched, frozen in shock as it crawled up his leg. It made no attempt to bite him. The two delegates ran forward and pulled it off by its legs. They easily forced it into the kitchen, shutting the door.

  “What was all that about?”

  He shrugged. As if he fucking knew what these things were thinking. The officer had cleared the corridor and was fighting his way towards the door.

  “Come on,” said the magistrate, "We can’t allow him to disappear from our sight.” They ran along the hallway, avoiding the grasping arms from the dead that the officer had failed to kill.

  “Why do they keep reaching for us?”

  The magistrate so wanted to slap this pair of whining bitches. He shook his head and hurried to reach his officer. The man had now fought his way to the door. He looked around and nodded at the magistrate.

  “There’s not many outside, we should be okay now.” The officer opened the door and ran outside.

  He watched the man slice another two in half before he and the two delegates joined him. Together they ran through the deserted town, heading towards the market square. His house was just past the cage, about half a mile, squarely in the middle of the community. Once they got there, the magistrate knew that they would be safe, that place was impregnable.

  They stopped dead when they reach the square, the place was packed full with the dead, and there was no way around them.

  “What do we do now,” cried one of the delegates. “What the fuck do we do?”

  The magistrate saw a dozen dead faces turn and gaze at the panicking delegate.

  “No, that’s not right, we’re supposed to be invisible to them, you promised us.”

  The magistrate watched six of the monsters separate from the crowd and start to shamble towards them.

  He grabbed the panicking delegate. The Magistrate picked him up and walked towards the approaching dead. The delegate struggled, but he was no match for the magistrate's sheer bulk.

  "What the fuck are you doing? Let me go, you fucking bastard!"

  "I will." The magistrate said as he hurled the screaming delegate into the massed crowd to his left. He spun around and glared at the remaining woman.

  “I’d urge you to be quiet,” he hissed.

  The magistrate then nodded at the officer. “Clear us a path.”

  He watched the officer run into the crowd, cutting and slicing. The dead did not retaliate, but neither were they oblivious to the three arrivals in their midst. The magistrate followed his officer into the crowd, pushing the things away as they reached out, trying to grab them.

  “Help me!” screamed the woman behind him.

  He managed to turn his head, only to see her disappear under the mass of animated dead.

  “There’s too many of them!” shouted the captain of the guard. “They’re going to overwhelm us!”

  The magistrate pushed his way through the dead bodies; for once in his life he was thankful of his bulk. He saw the cage directly in front of him.

  “Make your way over there,” he said. He did not have a clue why the things seemed so attracted to them, but he figured that if they stopped them from touching, they might just all fuck off and leave them alone.

  He reached the cage and saw the opening cut through the bars. The magistrate squeezed his huge body inside and then pulled the officer in behind him. He retreated to the middle of the cage and tried to control his breathing.

  “They're leaving," the officer whispered, clearly surprised.

  He nodded and tried to grin, “Thank fuck for that,” he whispered back. “We’ll give it a few more minutes and then we can leave.”

  The officer tapped him on the shoulder.

  “I don’t fucking believe this”

  The dead in the square had all but disappeared. The magistrate watched in awe as three figures slowly approached the cage. Two of them were armed.

  He hurried over to the opening only to find two gun barrels shoved in his face. “David? What the fuck do you think you’re doing, let me out of here!”

  “Get back into the middle, you fat fucker,” David snarled. “I’d like you to meet someone. You already know Maddie, of course.”

  "I had hoped that you’d be dead by now,” Maddie said.

  From behind the two, the old lady approached the cage. She seemed to be gliding over the cobblestones of the town square. The magistrate tore his eyes off her just long enough to see Maddie run over to a parked van.

  “Hello there, Philip,” the old woman said in an impossibly sweet tone.

  That was not possible; he had told no one his real name. How on earth did this ancient bitch know his real name?

  Maddie had started the van and was backing it towards the cage. The captain of the guards realised what she what about to do and ran over to the opening. David lowered his pistol and fired once, shooting the officer in the calf. The officer fell to the floor screaming in agony.

  “Philip, I’m so relieved that this has now come to an end. Many good people have died and I was powerless to stop it. You were meant to die last year, you know.”

  The magistrate looked closely at the old woman, studying her face. He was sure he had seen her somewhere before.

  “Who are you?” Then she smiled, and it clicked. “Fuck! You’re the old bag who helped me out of the coach.”

  She nodded; tears had begun streaming down her face.

  “I couldn’t leave you there, Philip. Even back then, I knew that I was meant to let those dead people eat you. Yet, I just couldn’t.”

  “You saved my life.”

  “Yes, and look where that got me.”

  “We need to leave,” said David.

  The magistrate watched the girl climb out of the van. She looked at him and smiled. The bitch had backed it up against the opening so that there was no way he could get out.

  “So what, you’re just going to leave me here to starve?”

  Maddie laughed. “Fuck, no. It would take way too long.”

  David passed the old woman a small green object. It took a moment for him to work out that it was a simple water balloon, but the liquid inside was not water.

  The old woman threw it through the bars. It detonated against his shirt, covering him in even more blood.

  “What the hell is this?”

  “I knowingly sent my daughter to die, Philip.” She looked at Maddie.

  “Believe me, child. I do understand your pain," She turned back to Philip, "Before I did, I extracted some of her blood. Her capture by the last hunters started this chain of events that was impossible to stop.” She turned around and walked away from them without another word.

  “You can’t just leave me here!” He had begun to weep.

  “There are twenty hunters screaming across the landscape right at this very moment,” said Maddie. “The smell of that blood will send them into a feeding frenzy. Those bars will not be a problem. They are very strong, you know." She leaned in closer to the bars of the cage and whispered, pointedly. "It’s you that is the tainted one, you bastard. Your abundant flesh
will ensure that every last one of those evil fuckers die."

  He wrapped his hands around the bars and watched them leave, still weeping dramatically. He waited for the trio to disappear completely before he removed his blood soaked tunic and laid it over the wounded officer’s body.

  Philip pushed his hand deep into his pocket; he was sure his spare key to the cage was in there somewhere, if only he could find it.

  The End

  Human Filth

  Edited by Linda Tooch

  Chapter One

  He knew, deep down, that his constant fear of the others following him into his special place was both irrational and weak. It had occurred to Raphael that he was displaying the two main traits that so infuriated his siblings. He sighed, even if he could eliminate those two emotions from his psyche, they would only torment him with another one of his minor faults.

  Their constant cruel taunting had now reached the point where the words just did not penetrate. That deep hurtful ache only re-ignited when their mother joined in and contributed a few spiteful mocking words of her own. Of course, when she participated, his two brothers and three sisters just knew that punishment was not forthcoming and their occasional barbs then turned into a deluge.

  Raphael sat down and swung his legs over the station platform. His night sensitive eyes caught sight of two large brown rats perched on a narrow ledge on the other side of the station. His two visitors were squabbling over the carcass of some small animal. There was not much left of the animal, but he guessed that it was a bat. He took a deep breath. It was; his olfactory perception confirmed his suspicion. Raphael sighed and ran his tongue over his thin black lips. He had not eaten a bat for weeks.

  He closed his eyes, tuned out the sound of his own heartbeat, and pushed away the deep tension, forcing his mind to calm down. Within moments all his emotions vanished, leaving him feeling as inanimate as the stones around him. Raphael felt his mind-eye push through his flesh. The world around him erupted into a dazzling array of colours. He groaned aloud in delight, fighting to keep his eyes closed, knowing that if his eyelids did snap open, his mind-eye would retreat and it would be hours until he would be able to attempt this again. The vivid painted landscape did not last long; the colours began to lose their intensity until just muted greys remained.

  He gasped as his vision swept through the tiles, concrete, and stone, rushing at incredible speed, homing in on his sibling’s collective mental signatures. Raphael giggled and smiled when he found just a faint trace of their dull tunes. They were all together on the other side of their playground. Raphael watched them all explore an underground sewer, trying to catch a fish with a green plastic bucket.

  His mind-eye stayed with them for a few seconds before returning. None of their mind-eyes had detected his presence, of course. His mental agility out matched theirs, and that gave them yet another reason to hate him—at least it would if they ever found that out.

  Raphael would be devastated if any of them discovered his secret hiding place. This was his hideaway, his only retreat. One tiny area in Raphael’s enclosed world where he believed he could be himself without the fear of the others belittling him.

  He opened his eyes, allowing his vision to correct itself before he lay down, resting his body on the floor, enjoying the sensation of feeling the cold tiles beneath his rough skin. Raphael had not always enjoyed this retreat alone. His eldest brother had introduced Raphael to the joys of this hidden enclave many weeks ago.

  “I so miss you,” he whispered, trying to hold back the tears.

  The first-born was his mentor and his only real friend. In his presence, the other members of his family treated Raphael with a certain amount of dignity and respect. Even when the first-born was not around, none of his siblings had been openly hostile. The others feared the first-born. His sheer bulk, enormous strength, and speed saw to that. Even his mother had become very wary of him. Raphael did not believe that she actually feared him, but he suspected there was enough mistrust for her to consider putting an end to the first-born’s existence.

  His only friend might still be with him if it was not for one huge error. Raphael’s flesh quivered at the recollection of finding his mind-eye unexpectedly evacuating his body whilst he was hunting for food; looking back, he was so thankful he was alone at the time.

  He found his mind-eye had taken him to his mother’s private quarters. Panic set in, if she discovered him snooping, the taunts he received from his siblings would pale in comparison to what she would do to him.

  He felt like an insect trapped in amber, no matter what he did, his mind-eye refused to return. Raphael then saw her, his own mother lying on her bed, her discarded covering strewn across the floor. Her eyes were tight shut and the woman’s own mind-eye was dormant. She groaned out then spread her legs to expose her inner most secrets. Raphael’s own ragged breathing caught in his throat when another figure entered his vision.

  The first-born growled, he grabbed his mother’s ankles and pulled her roughly towards his own heavily muscled, naked body. His mother shrieked when he forced his large barbed phallus inside her. Raphael’s mind-eye fled the room and returned. He awoke, finding his lower body submerged in water. He wept, knowing how the scene would enfold.

  Within minutes, the sound of powerful screaming echoed throughout the many chambers. The shrieks were from the first-born; his agonising death chilled the very marrow in his bones. He wasn’t the only sibling to feel the first-born’s anguish as his mother tore the flesh from his body; Raphael’s siblings joined in with the dread, unlike him, they had no clue to why their strongest brother was dying.

  That event had forced him to reassess his own mortality; as he dragged his soaking body out of the water, he had fought back the urge to flee, to leave this place and explore above ground. Raphael might have even followed his desire through if his mother had not sent out her own mind-eye to call them to tend to her.

  His mother had shared out pieces of the first-born to all of them; it had not escaped his attention that he had received the smallest piece. He had sat in a circle with the rest of his family greedily feasting on his brother’s flesh.

  Just the thought of chewing on all that sweet tasting meat sent his body into spasms. The new experience of eating meat so different from his usual diet had altered both his mind and body. Before the consumption of the meat, he was often frustrated with his muddied thinking and failure to grasp simple concepts. The thin mist conspiring to confuse his thoughts was now gone. He began to question his identity and his relationship with his family. He was aware that his siblings were undergoing a similar transformation, and their own minds and bodies were getting stronger as well.

  Raphael also found himself craving for more of the same sweet meat. It was not that much of a jump for him to realise that his other siblings would too be sharing the same craving.

  “I will be the next one to go.” It felt strange to say those words out loud, but hearing his own voice gave him reassurance. There was no doubt in Raphael’s mind that if he stayed within range of his family then his demise was inevitable.

  He had never left the confines of the tunnels, none of the siblings had ventured above ground. Even the first-born had never left their nest. Unlike the others, Raphael had seen the sky, the rain, and the sun. He had also witnessed his mother catching the dead humans and smashing their skulls open to reach the only part of those shambling wrecks that was edible.

  Sneaking into his mother’s mind left Raphael exhausted and paranoid for hours after, but the discomfort was worth what he had so far learned. “I could leave right now if I so desired,” he murmured.

  Raphael silently got to his feet and turned his attention to the two rats still arguing over that lump of rotting fur. Both rodents were aware of his presence, but neither considered him a threat. He had eaten rat a few times in the past but only as a last resort. Their blood tasted bitter and the stringy, tough fibrous flesh took time to chew into a digestible paste, it made his
jaw ache. Raphael watched the larger rat rip off a section of wing; it dropped the piece and instead of clamping its jaws around the carcass, it dived on the other rat’s back.

  If he were going to undergo this journey into the world above, it would be astute to boost his energy supplies first. Raphael knew that the next feed would be hours from now. He may not even get any food, judging from his mother’s erratic behaviour. “You might even be on the menu, Raphael.” He shivered, he should not be so meticulous; food was food, even if it did taste a bit funny.

  He lowered his body then leaped off the platform, his powerful legs catapulting his body forward. Raphael’s feet and hands attached themselves to the wall a few metres above the two rodents. Like an enormous arachnid, Raphael used his legs and two of his arms to scuttle down the tiles. The rats stopped their quarrel as he approached and tried to flee in opposite directions. He snatched them both off the ledge with his second set of arms.

  Beneath the rough fur Raphael felt their tiny hearts beating like mad. Their frantic struggling soon ceased as he squeezed their bodies, taking his time as he applied pressure. He giggled as their bones cracked and splintered, the broken pieces tearing through the flesh and piercing the thin skin.

  He carefully positioned one of the rats back on the ledge and held the other one up to his face, watching the light fading from its eyes. “You should not take your situation for granted, rat.” That particular lesson had not come from his mother; his mentor had ensured he lived by that rule.

  Raphael applied more pressure, feeling the rats internal organs squeeze together until thick scarlet gelatinous slime burst from its mouth. He held the rodent above his head and pressed his fingers tighter, sighing as more of its mashed insides dropped into his mouth. He dropped the corpse and watched it fall between the lines, then he scooped up the remaining rat and clambered along the wall, heading deep into the tunnel.