Killing The Dead (Book 15): The Gathering Storm

by Murray, Richard

  The man kept on screaming, his cries echoing off of the trees. In normal circumstances, he would take a little time to die. In the apocalypse we were living through, he likely had minutes until the zombies reached him.

  “Fuck me,” Gregg muttered as we pushed through the trees.

  He seemed upset and I could only assume it was because of what had just happened and wondered if he would want to talk about it. Some people always seemed to want to. Not like it could change anything, but still, they would try as though they needed to set it right for themselves.

  “Don’t worry,” I said as I patted him awkwardly on the shoulder. “He’ll be dead in a minute then you won’t have to hear him.”

  Gregg just looked at me and shook his head before pushing on through the woods. I gave a half shrug and wondered how people coped with trying to be comforting all the time.

  I soon put it from my mind. There were twenty-seven people waiting in a building up ahead and I was very much looking forward to killing them too.

  Chapter 18

  The research facility rose up out of the trees at the top of the hill, giving anyone inside a good view for quite some distance around them. I guessed that the man sat in a deckchair on the highest roof was the one who had seen the zombies marching down the road.

  While we had seen the building poking up from the trees as we paddled down the river, we’d been hidden by the overgrowth on the banking which was likely the only reason they hadn’t sent someone to meet us.

  Either that or they fully expected us to paddle all the way to Dunkeld where their people there would pick us up.

  The wall, as expected, ran around the building leaving a good twenty or thirty feet of open grass between it and the main building. While there weren’t any guard towers, it did have a generous amount of razor wire running across it and was only eight feet by my estimation.

  I could deal with that so long as I could find a way to climb to the top of it. Which could very well be a problem. The treeline ended a good ten feet from the wall and while the grass and weeds had sprouted up in that open space, there was nothing remotely climbable.

  The main building was a series of blocks that looked like they had been stacked one atop the other in a haphazard manner. That provided plenty of open rooftops for the raiders to lounge and watch the grounds.

  Getting in would be a little harder than I’d expected.

  I tilted my head and listened to the cries of alarm as they realised the zombies were walking along the road. They’d heard the screams of their colleague and a few had gone out to check. It didn’t take them long to come running back.

  “What now?”

  Gregg was watching me when I turned to look at him and I gave a half-shrug of my shoulders. “No idea. I’ll figure something out though.”

  “That’s it! You’ll figure something out!” He gave me an incredulous look. “I thought you had a plan.”

  “No. Most of the time I just make it up as I go along.”

  “Seriously! Bloody hell, mate. I figured you were always planning things a dozen moves ahead of the rest of us.”

  “Sometimes, sure. Most of the time I just go for what seems like the most interesting option.”

  He shook his head, muttering beneath his breath for a moment. It seemed that I had disillusioned him a little and ordinarily that thought would have amused me, but just then, I had a base to break into.

  I turned towards the road as a gunshot echoed across the hills. It was swiftly followed by another, then another and soon it was as though thunder were unleashed. I shook my head at their foolishness. That noise would attract every zombie for miles.

  “People are moving,” Gregg said with a nod towards the building we could see above the wall.

  True enough, those that had been loitering on the rooftops had disappeared as they made their way out towards the steel-railing gate. They would spend a great deal of time shooting between those bars but it wouldn’t be enough.

  The weight of numbers would soon force it open or the dead would pile up before it and the others would clamber over them, the pile rising higher and higher until they could spill over the top. Then there would be panic and chaos and a race to get inside.

  “Come on,” I said and rose to my feet.

  Without a word I set off at a jog, running through the weeds and tall grass without trying to hide. There was no one left to notice us anyway.

  “Take off your jacket,” I instructed and did the same with my own as we reached the rear wall.

  “Oh crap,” Gregg muttered but did as I said.

  He took off his own leather jacket and passed it to me before positioning himself beside the wall. He linked his fingers together and bent forward at the waist, holding his hands out for me to step onto.

  I flashed him a grin as I tossed first mine and then his backpack over the wall and then readied myself, one foot resting on the palms of his hands. With a nod, I pushed up and away and he lifted me with a grunt, propelling me upwards. My fingers closed over the rough stone at the top of the wall and I clung on, Gregg swearing below me as he struggled to hold me up.

  My jacket went over the razor-wire first and then Greggs followed. I pulled myself up, with Gregg pushing from below and rested my wait on the covered wire. The jackets held and it bowed down beneath my weight without my flesh being ripped to shreds.

  Gregg took a half dozen steps back and sucked in a deep breath before running at the wall and leaping. One hand caught the top of the wall and the other my hand. I tottered for a moment, almost pulled from the wall by his sudden weight, but held on, barely.

  My arm shook as he pulled himself up, onto the covered wire beside me. He grunted and wiped the sweat from his face with one hand as he turned to look at me.

  “Now what?”

  “Hold down the wire.”

  He did as instructed and I carefully, lifted myself over it, balancing precariously on the top of the wall. If anyone was in the building and looking our way, there was no way they would miss us. Moving slowly, I grabbed the top of the wall and lowered myself down and then gestured for him to do the same.

  My arms trembled as I held myself in place, watching Gregg lift one leg over the covered razor-wire and then the other. He did the same as I had, lowering himself until he was clinging to the top of the wall.

  With one hand I reached up, grabbing and the jackets and tugging at them, lifting and pulling until they came free of the wire. First one, then the other. I let them fall and then lowered myself as far as I could before I dropped down.

  Pain shot up my leg as I hit the ground hard with my injured foot. I leant back against the wall for a moment, jaw clamped shut while Gregg gathered up our jackets. I slipped mine back on as he picked up the backpacks and nodded my thanks as I took mine.

  The gunfire from the front of the building had begun to slow. An indication that the undead were at the gate and the press of bodies was making it harder for them to find targets. They had to aim rather than just fire into the mass of bodies.

  I limped a little as we set off across the grass. We each had our knives in hand and we headed towards a plain grey door. We slowed and came to a stop beside it and I reached out for the handle.

  “Locked,” I said and let my head hit the wall as I thought furiously.

  Of course, it would be locked. That was pretty typical of my luck of late and it would only make things harder. I glanced up, gauging the height of the building and realising it was way too high for us to climb.

  “What now?”

  “Few options. We can break a window, alerting everyone inside or we can look for another door.”

  “What about…”

  He cut off as the handle turned and he pressed himself back against the wall, knife raised as I did the same. I readied myself to lunge and paused as a frightened face looked out at us.

  “It’s not safe here! You need to go!”

  She was only sixteen by my guess, her face dirty and bruised.
The jeans she wore were as filthy as those of the man I had killed and despite the cold, she had only a light t-shirt on. She stared at us with wide eyes and gestured towards the wall as though shooing a dog.

  “Please. They’ll kill you! Just go.”

  “Who are you?”

  She turned to answer Gregg, though she kept a wary eye on me and the knife I held.

  “Doesn’t matter. I saw you climbing over the fence. If they’d seen you…” A shudder ran through her at that and she gestured once more. “Please. I don’t want to see you hurt.”

  I was, to be fair, a little confused. I’d expected a great many things would be inside the building, a person showing concern for a stranger was not one of them. That made things clear to me. She was definitely on Lily’s do not kill list and the people holding her there were definitely on it.

  “How many men are inside?” I asked, voice growing cold.

  “N-none,” she said voice catching as she perhaps sensed something of the darkness I was going to unleash. “All out shooting the zombies.”

  “And women?” Gregg asked. “Any… any children?”

  “Eight of us. No children. They don’t let us keep them.”

  Gregg’s face lost a little colour at that and I nodded slowly. I was going to very much enjoy killing them all.

  “Are you all prisoners?” I asked, needing to be sure.

  “Y-yes.”

  “Then you’re in luck. We’re here to save you.”

  She stared at me as though I were mad and that almost brought a smile to my face. Almost. A shiver ran through her as she looked into my eyes and she dropped her head down, looking away.

  “Please. Just go. You can’t help us.”

  “You’d be surprised,” Gregg said. “You know your way around inside I’m guessing. Can you show us the lowest floor?”

  “I-I could, but why?”

  “Just show us, please.”

  She bit her lower lip and looked back over her shoulder into the building. She was terrified. That was clear even to me but even so, she had risked herself to warn two strangers she probably thought were going to try and steal supplies in the chaos. That told me she had a reserve of courage that she could tap.

  “O-okay.”

  With one arm, she held the door open as she stepped aside and let us through. I went first, heart beating so rapidly in my chest I could feel it on my skin. I gripped my knife tight and blinked as my eyes adjusted to the dim light.

  We were in a corridor, the walls covered with crude graffiti. Doors set into either side hung open and as we passed, I glanced in and shook my head. Senseless vandalism was all they contained. Papers were strewn across the floors and graffiti on the walls.

  Chairs had been overturned and flung around while anything that had been on the desks was spread around the room. It was as though the people there had no concept of planning ahead. They would destroy the place they called home, devouring what resources it had and leaving nothing in their wake.

  When they had run out of nearby places to loot, they would starve. They had nothing stockpiled for the future. It was short-sighted and infinitely stupid.

  “Down here,” she said as she turned a corridor.

  She stopped and I raised a hand before Gregg before he could turn the corridor. He glanced at me his one eye widening as we clearly heard a man speak.

  “You! Get your ass over here.”

  “W-what is it?”

  “I said get your ass here, now!”

  She shook her head, taking a step back, almost glancing over at us and barely managing to avoid doing so. Her body shook and we pressed ourselves against the wall as a man’s heavy footsteps came towards her.

  “Stupid bitch, I tell you to do something, you fucking do it!”

  A man, all broad shoulders and thick arms grabbed her and she pulled away, stepping back towards the other side of the corridor, forcing him to turn away from us so that he could continue to berate her.

  “Don’t back away from me, bitch!”

  “S-sorry, Silas. R-really. I am.”

  “You fucking will be.”

  His hand moved down towards his belt and that darkness inside of me swept out of me.

  Two steps forward, my left arm wrapping around his neck, hand covering his mouth as my right thrust my blade into his back, again and again, and again. Blood sprayed, covering my hand as I stabbed at him almost frenziedly, so strong was my rage.

  As he slumped in my arm, the girl's eye’s widened as she stared into mine and I pulled back my blade and thrust one last time, into his skull.

  I dropped his body to the floor and breathed deeply, feeling the exultation rush through me. I clenched my jaw and forced it down. It was not the time for that rush of pleasure. That would come later. First I had a task to do.

  “We’d better move quick,” Gregg said quietly to the girl. He approached her as though she were a skittish deer. “Come on now, downstairs and then we’ll see about getting you away from here.”

  She nodded once, a single jerk of her head but her eyes never left mine. Full of fear and something else, something I was not used to seeing. Perhaps it was hope.

  Chapter 19

  The distant sounds of gunfire were growing quieter as we descended the stairs. The girl brushed a strand of dirty hair from her face as she turned towards us at the bottom.

  “It’s dark in here.”

  “We have torches,” Gregg said and pulled his from his pocket.

  He flicked the torch on and I did the same, shining it through the door as she pulled it open. More bland, whitewashed walls made of breezeblock. As impersonal as it could possibly get. Most of the rooms had been used for storage by the looks, but even down in the dark, they weren’t immune to the vandalism of the buildings new occupants.

  I wrinkled my nose as we passed one room, the aroma that was seeping out from beneath the closed door was enough to tell me they had been using it as a bathroom. I shook my head and we carried on.

  It wasn’t a large space and it didn’t take long to traverse the corridors, pausing now and then to look at the walls. I called a halt finally and Gregg turned to look at the wall I pointed to.

  “Why that one?”

  “The only one made of plasterboard and not breezeblock.”

  He grunted but stepped up to it and rapped his knuckles against it, nodding as he listened to the sound that came from it. I heard the slight difference as he knocked on the breezeblock wall to the right of it.

  “Yeah, sounds like there’s space behind it.”

  I tilted my head to one side, listening to the sound of distant gunfire, and gave a soft grunt. “You think you can open it quickly?”

  “Shit.”

  The girl watched our interaction with wide eyes and a confused expression. I had no way of offering comfort at that moment as all that remained of me was the killer, eager to set about my work.

  Gregg ran his hands over the wall, searching for some hidden trigger to open it. When he didn’t find anything, he slid his knife down the almost invisible gap between the plasterboard and the breezeblocks beside it and pushed down.

  “Your friends,” I said to the girl. “Are they close?”

  “First floor.” Her voice was small, full of fear. “Most of us are in the one room.”

  I didn’t ask what they were doing there and realised I probably didn’t want to know. I had enough reasons to kill the raiders anyway.

  “Get them and bring them down here.”

  “What! No! They won’t come.”

  “If they don’t, when that body is found they will be in more than just a little trouble.”

  Her eyes widened further at that as realisation came and she swallowed hard, before spinning on her heel and running back the way we had come.

  “If she goes running to the raiders, we’re fucked,” Gregg said as he pried the plasterboard away from the wall.

  It had been hastily erected and only lightly attached at the four corn
ers. In the darkness, it was easy to see why it hadn’t been noticed whereas if the building's lights had worked, someone would have been curious long since.

  Whoever was hidden behind there had certainly thought things through.

  “Got it.”

  The false wall came free and Gregg pulled it to the side, before leaving it to lean against the far wall. A corridor had been revealed to us, short but leading to a solid door with a keypad set into the frame beside the handle.

  Gregg glanced once at me and shrugged before moving forward and typing in the code that Lily had given to us. A small display above the keypad glowed green and the click of a lock turning was audible.

  Before Gregg could reach for the door, I stopped him with a hand on his arm. I jerked my head to the side and he stepped back as I grasped the handle in my left hand and my knife my right.

  I pulled it open and waited, prepared for an attack but when none came, I stepped through the opening. Gregg shone his torch in, lifting it high enough that the beam passed over me to illuminate another corridor.

  “Hello?” I called out, knowing that time was short.

  “This doesn’t feel right, mate.”

  I took another step into the corridor and pulled out my own torch, flicking it on once again and shining it ahead of me. A figure stepped into view, coming around a corner at the end of the corridor and I shone my light directly at them.

  They raised their hand before them and took another step towards us. “Hello?” I called once more but no reply came.

  The woman, wearing a knee length skirt and white lab coat over her sweater, took another step forward. She reached out, hand pressing against the wall and leaving a dark smear in its wake. I reversed my hold on the knife and began to smile.

  “Shit, mate!”

  I waved him to silence and began walking towards her, increasing my speed with each step, heart hammering in my chest as adrenaline filled my limbs with strength. I raised my knife and prepared to end her un-life.