Dark and Deadly Land

by Richard Murray

  Pat vomited noisily as I tightened my grip on my knife. For the first time in my life, I hesitated. I knew what needed to be done but I was loathe to do it. My friend looked up at me before he pushed himself to his feet.

  “I can’t,” he said as he staggered from the room.

  Sweat formed on my brow and I raised a hand that was trembling to wipe it away. Seconds ticked by, each one bringing closer the chance of the people returning but still I hesitated. Mary opened her mouth but no words could form with what remained of her tongue.

  Her eyes moved to the knife and tears formed in her eyes as they met mine, pleading for release. I pushed away that thin veneer of humanity that being with Lily had brought me and allowed the darkness release. I raised my knife and stepped forward.

  ****

  Pat had entered the office opposite and sat on the edge of a desk, his head lowered as he stared at his hands. Red rimmed eyes met mine as I closed the door to the room that contained only the dead and crossed the corridor to join him.

  “It’s done,” I said and he flinched away from darkness in my eyes.

  He didn’t say anything, there was nothing he could say. He knew what I’d had to do and no doubt knew that I understood why he couldn’t do it. He wasn’t the monster I was.

  I pushed the office door almost fully closed, leaving just enough of a gap that I could see through and then took up position. These were the last offices along the corridor so anyone who made it that far was doing so to get to that room across the hall. Anyone who had reason to be in there would be the first to die.

  The wait wasn’t actually that long but it seemed like an eternity, lost as I was in that darkness that filled me. Every part of me ached to feel the release brought upon by the death of another. It took all of my willpower not to stride through the offices bringing death to everyone.

  Too risky, too much chance of someone escaping my wrath, or of me failing. So I waited, combat knife in one hand and the claw-like blade unfolded and held in my other.

  Eventually, I detected voices and the sounds of footsteps moving down the hallway. I peered through the gap and saw a shaven-headed black man walking alongside a six-foot tall blonde man with a thick beard.

  They stopped outside the office opposite and the blonde man laughed at some comment made by the other. I pulled open the door just enough to slip out and stood behind them as they reached for the door.

  “Locks busted,” Blonde man said to his companion who merely grunted in response as my combat knife slipped up between his ribs and into his heart.

  The blonde turned and his cry died on his tongue as the sharp point of the claw blade touched his throat. Pat stepped out of the office behind me with fury on his face and dragged the blonde man back inside.

  I looked along the hallway and saw no one, so reached down to drag the dead body into the office behind me.

  Once inside I dropped the body and turned to Pat to see him holding the blonde haired man down with one big hand as he held the club above his head with the other. His hand trembled with the urge to bring it down on the man’s skull but he had the sense to know we needed answers first.

  “Your name,” I said, voice as cold as ice.

  “Damien,” the blonde said in a sulky tone.

  “This one?” I asked with a nudge of the dead body with one booted foot. The blonde's eyes were all he dared move and he couldn’t see who I indicated from his position but he got the idea.

  “Levi.”

  “Where is your leader, this Ben?”

  “Cleaning up the mess,” he stammered.

  “Then what were you doing back here?” I asked as I approached him slowly, circling the desk to stand opposite Pat.

  “He told us to get one of the kids,” Blonde man said and paused.

  “Celebratory feast after your fight?” I asked and he blinked, startled.

  “Something like that.”

  My eyes met Pat’s and his were full of righteous anger. I smiled, a thin almost reptilian smile. “You want me to do this?” I asked. “It’s harder than in battle.”

  In answer, he brought his club down with all of his strength and a spray of blood spattered my shirt. He kept his eyes on mine as he raised the club and brought it down again and again until he heard the skull crack.

  I looked down at the bloody pulp that had been a head and felt a surge of joy. This was a different feeling than usual. The pleasure, the joy was intense but not quite the same as usual.

  “Come then my friend,” I said softly, voice an almost sibilant hiss of anticipation. “Let’s kill them all.”

  We didn’t creep or try to hide our presence as we strode along the corridor. We had no desire to avoid conflict. By my count, at least five had died and become zombies, five more had gone after Gregg and two had just died back at the office. At the very most they’d have twelve people left, all the kind of scum that would devour the flesh of children. I had no fear that they’d put up much of a fight.

  Each office was checked again as we passed and all were empty except the one that held the barbeque grill. That had a woman poking at the charcoal with a two-pronged fork, stirring them to life as she reached for the strips of meat.

  She died without even knowing we were there, a quick movement of my arm as I slid the claw blade across her throat and she was gone. I didn’t bother to wipe off the blood that covered my hands or clothes, it was my declaration to all who would see that I was death and I was coming for them.

  Cold rage boiled within me. Fury at what I had been forced to do, the lives I had taken in that office just because these people had decided to eat them one piece at a time. All so they could enjoy themselves with their captives for longer.

  I paused for a moment at the door to the office that was used as the communal area. A quick look before I ducked back, showed four people lounging around. Two men, two women. I held up four fingers for Pat and indicated that he would go left when we went through the door.

  He nodded and I leapt through. My knife slashed across the face of one woman who screamed as I buried my combat blade into the guts of a skinny man with rancid breath and missing teeth. I twisted it to tear apart his insides before yanking it free, spinning and plunging it into the chest of the screaming woman.

  Pat had followed along and used his club as though it were a bat, swinging it from under his arm and up into the jaw of the man who looked around with eyes wide at our entrance. A backhand across the face of the other woman sent her sprawling and then a might swing overhead crushed the life from the man and then the woman.

  He panted heavily but his face had lost none of the rage that we shared. I pulled open the door and we went to face the remaining people.

  Chapter 24 - Lily

  Cass slowed the van as we approached the abandoned airfield. It looked quiet which was worrying considering the field on the opposite side of the road was filling with zombies. There seemed to be too many to count and anytime soon they would realise that a few hundred metres along the road was a gate that would let them out of the field.

  Becky squirmed in my lap and I grunted. Four people in the cab of the van were entirely too many and since she was the shortest, Becky had a choice of either my lap or Gabe’s. She didn’t know him well enough yet – though no doubt that would change later – so I had the distinct displeasure of having her sat on me.

  “What do we do?” Cass asked as she peered first at the factory and then at the field of zombies.

  “No idea lass,” Gabe answered and then looked from her to me and Becky. “But you weren’t asking me were you?”

  His grin was infectious and I shook my head at him. There was something inherently likeable about him and he’d talked almost non-stop since we’d set off. Admittedly most of it was general chatter and flirting, he avoided any talk that might lead to questions about his family and friends or where they may be.

  Still, it was pleasant. He was an amiable person a
nd seemed to view the world through tinted lenses. Seeing the good in pretty much everything. Even the ambush had led to him meeting us, he said.

  I shook my head at him and smiled. “No one on guard so I assume they’ve done what they needed to.”

  “Someone’s there,” Becky said and pointed ahead to where a figure had risen from a crouch beside the wall. “I think it's Gregg.”

  Cass frowned and drove the short distance towards the waving figure. It was indeed Gregg and he ran up to the driver’s side window which his sister wound down.

  “Glad you made it,” he said with a grin and a curious look to our new friend.

  “Where are the other guys?” Becky asked.

  “We split up, I led some people away and they went inside.”

  “You didn’t go in after them?”

  “From the sounds in there, all hell is breaking loose,” he said. “I was just sitting here counting all those bloody undead and thinking I was caught between a rock and a hard place when you came.”

  “Drive up to the entrance,” I said as I pushed open the door. “We’ll go with weapons ready and if they need help we can provide it.”

  “For what it’s worth,” Gregg said as Becky slid off of my lap to the road. “There were sentries on the roof and the five guys who were chasing me all went inside. There’s been a lot of yelling and screaming.”

  “Damn,” I said as worry gnawed at me. I knew Ryan would be fine, or at least I kept telling myself he would be but there was always that little niggle of doubt in the back of my mind. Maybe, this time was when he had bitten off more than he could chew.

  I climbed from the van and was surprised when Gabe followed. He shrugged and winked.

  “Can’t be having you wee lasses doing all the work can I now?”

  His grin was so utterly infectious that it seemed to chase away my worries for a moment but they soon returned as we began the long walk up the narrow road towards the front doors of the factory. Cass drove slowly behind us and each of us readied a weapon.

  As we approached I could hear it, screams coming from inside. The cries of someone in incredible pain and my heart skipped a beat. It wasn’t Ryan, it couldn’t be. He’d be safe. I repeated that to myself over and over as I walked.

  The doors flew open as we approached and three men staggered out. We paused not quite knowing what to do but their attention wasn’t on us. They kept their gazes locked on the doors and raised weapons of their own.

  Redhead on the left had a pipe in one hand and chain in the other, while the brown haired man in a checked shirt on the right held a sledgehammer. The man in the middle with close-cropped dark hair and broad shoulders held a machete and was clearly in charge as he shouted instructions to the others.

  I looked to my friends and back to the doors as they swung open and out strode Ryan, followed by Pat. They were both drenched in bright blood and I suspected some of it was their own. I stepped towards them but stopped as I saw the twin looks of rage and hatred on their faces.

  The man in the checked shirt swung the sledgehammer at Pat who ducked easily and cracked his own club across the man’s face. Ryan meanwhile ran at the red head who swung the chain before him in a desperate attempt to hit him. Without pausing, Ryan dropped and slid across the loose gravel, his knife flashing out to slice through the flesh at the man’s ankle.

  Redhead screamed as he fell and Ryan silenced him with a swift cut across the throat before jumping to his feet and spinning to face the machete-wielder.

  “Who the fuck are you?” he screamed as Pat and Ryan approached him from either side.

  Neither spoke. Pat dashed in and swung a blow at the man’s leg. He jumped to the side and slashed at Pat with his machete, blood sprayed as Ryan leapt forward and thrust his knife into the man’s leg.

  He screamed and went down to one knee, hand pressed against the wound that was bleeding steadily.

  “Why’re you doing this?” he screamed as Pat struck his hand with a blow from his club and sent the machete flying to land on the gravel several feet away.

  Pat dropped his machete and ducked behind the man. He wrapped his thick arms around him and held him tight as Ryan approached. I shook my head at what I saw in his eyes, it wasn’t going to be pleasant.

  “Look away,” I said to the others as the claw bladed knife was raised in Ryan’s hand. I squeezed my own eyes shut as that blade entered the man’s eye and tried to block out the scream with my hands over my ears. It didn’t work.

  Someone gagged beside me and I realised it was Gabe. I didn’t expect him to hold open his offer to visit his sanctuary.

  The screams didn’t stop and I opened my eyes to see Ryan staring down at the blind man Pat held. He seemed to be considering what to do next as he turned the knife in his hand. He reached in and grabbed the man’s tongue, pulling it out as the screams gurgled to a stop.

  “Don’t,” I shouted and Ryan looked up and blinked as though noticing us for the first time.

  “You don’t know what he did,” he said softly and Pat looked back. His expression told me that I didn’t want to know.

  “I know but don’t. Please. For me, just end this.”

  My eyes were fixed on his and I saw the darkness there. He raised the knife and paused then with a growl he released the tongue and slashed the blade across the man’s throat instead.

  He looked away but not before I saw that darkness start to fade and I breathed a sigh of relief. A killer who killed for the right reasons I could love, but not one who delighted in torture.

  “Holy mother of God,” Gabe whispered as he stared at the two men, drenched in blood who stood over the body.

  I looked at him and saw horror writ on his face along with an expression of loss that I couldn’t explain.

  We slowly approached the two men, our friends, and partners to two of us. No one seemed able to muster anything to say and I was the same. What could you say to your lover when you’d just watched him blind a man before killing him?

  Gregg looked sick but his face still bore an expression of trust for his friends. He knew that what they did was for a reason. Becky didn’t seem to share that belief. She looked scared and disgusted.

  Cass drove the van stoically, her face showing nothing of what she may be feeling and I had no idea what that must be like, seeing the father of your unborn child do what he just did. Gabe couldn’t take his eyes from them.

  I looked across to Ryan who kept his eyes fixed firmly on me, face smeared with the blood of the dead. He bore no shame at having been seen doing what he’d just done. He was defiant, it was necessary his expression said.

  “Stay out here,” he said as I stopped before him.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “You don’t need to see what’s in there,” he said and I swallowed the urge to be sick.

  “Have a little too much fun did you, darling?” Becky asked though her voice trembled as he turned his gaze to her.

  “Not what we did,” Pat said and I glanced at him. Pain filled him and horror lurked behind his eyes. “What we found there isn’t something you should see.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked as hope flared. There was a reason for what they’d done.

  “The thing’s these… animals did,” Pat said. “Please. Don’t go inside.”

  I looked to Ryan who stared back. He seemed to understand my question because he nodded, the barest tilt of the head and I sighed in relief. I knew there’d be a reason.

  “It was bad?” Cass asked as she joined us, her hand reaching for her lover’s.

  “Worse than anything I’ve ever seen,” he said. “If I could kill these bastards a thousand times it wouldn’t be enough.”

  “Good enough for me,” she said as she locked gaze with mine. “You agree?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Anything that could bring this response… I don’t want to see.”

  “Who’s your friend?” Pat asked with a look of co
ncern.

  “This is…”

  “Gabriel,” Ryan finished before I could. “Hello, brother.”

  Chapter 25 - Lily

  “Brother?” Lily practically yelled as she swivelled her head between the two of us, trying to look for similarities in our features.

  “For my sins,” Gabe said with a sigh. “What have you done Ryan?”

  I shrugged. What could I say? It wasn’t quite the time for me to blurt out my secret life as a serial killer.

  “Erm, not to be a downer,” Gregg said as he looked back over his shoulder. “We should think about finishing up here.”

  He was right and we could all see that as the first zombies made their slow way through the gate further along the road.

  The seething hatred I had felt for the people in the factory had drained away along with a great deal of my energy, leaving me on the brink of exhaustion. I had little desire to use my remaining energy killing the dead.

  “Get the bomb inside,” I said to Pat.

  “Bomb!” Gabe said as he watched Pat climb into the driver’s seat. I had no intention of letting any of the others inside the factory and as Gregg moved forward to help, I stopped him with one raised hand.

  “Clear the area,” I said as the engine sputtered to life. “We’ll catch up once the bombs set.” I turned to go but paused and looked back. “Don’t look in any of the storage sheds.”

  “Why not?” Becky asked as I followed after the van.

  “You really won’t like what you find,” I called back.

  I didn’t watch the others leave, I knew they would. Lily understood what I hadn’t said, that the dark deeds committed in this place were not for them to see. It would warp them in ways that would forever alter who they were.

  Pat drove through the wide doors and onto the factory floor. I barely glanced at the polished skulls that hung above the door. My eyes moved over the stretched skin of a child that had been cut whole from a victim, the pile of bones shaped into spikes that had been set aside for some future use I couldn’t quite grasp.