Snatchers (Book 3): The Dead Don't Cry

by Whittington, Shaun

  Both of the assailants were now on the ground with their bats, and Pickle could see Average raising the shotgun, but his attention had been distracted when the frightened, middle-aged driver, with the engine still running, slipped his truck into reverse and quickly backed up.

  Out of sheer panic, the driver had decided to abandon his four passengers and leave with just his wife.

  Average, completely ignoring Pickle, Karen, Paul and Jade, ran to the truck and quickly put two cartridges into the windscreen. Pickle could see right away that both the man and woman were suffering with injuries and that death, due to blood loss, was a possibility.

  Average then turned to Paul Parker and nodded to Mangy. Mangy then ran over to Paul and they began to wrestle to the floor and ended up tumbling to the side of the road. Jade went after them and landed a boot in the man's stomach.

  "For fuck's sake!" Average snarled, and began reloading the shotgun with another two cartridges. "Get out of the way. I'll sort them out myself."

  Pickle, who was standing on the other side of the road and was a fair distance from Average, ran over to Karen and pulled her by the arm. "Run!"

  While Pickle and Karen ran into the woodland at the left side of the road, Paul Parker was still wrestling with Mangy and was oblivious that Average was going to shoot him, once Mangy had managed to get off.

  Average eventually said, "Let him go! I've got him!"

  "Paul! We need to leave!" Jade screamed.

  Noticing that Average had reloaded the gun, Paul staggered to his feet with Jade and they both ran into the woods to the far side of the road. Average tried to pull the trigger, but the gun didn't discharge. "Fucking antique," he snarled. He tried again and released a cartridge, only taking bark from some of the trees. Paul and Jade were too far gone now. By the time he swung the gun over in Pickle and Karen's direction, they had also both disappeared into the woods on the other side of the road, opposite to the direction where Paul and Jade had fled

  Average sighed and helped up Mangy. "You lot are fucking useless."

  Specks dragged himself back onto his feet and brushed himself down. "That guy must be army-trained, or something."

  Average looked at Specks and Wiry and scolded, "You two dicks went down like a sack of shit."

  Wiry sniped back, "Well, next time, you fucking do it, instead of standing there, barking your orders."

  "Don't forget, I've got a shotgun."

  Specks laughed, "Yeah, but does it work?"

  Average lifted the gun and pointed it at a nervous-looking Specks. "Let's see, shall we?"

  Specks gulped hard and could smell the barrel of the gun that had already released a few cartridges.

  Mangy casually walked over to the bickering group and looked over to the pick-up truck. "Okay, that's enough. We got what we wanted."

  "What?" Wiry walked over and put both of his hands on his head, and then walked over to the shattered windscreen of the pick-up truck. "You mean this?" He pointed at the windscreen. "Is this what we wanted? Two dead middle-aged people who just wanted to see their son."

  Average said, "At least we've got the truck. Besides, they're not dead yet." He walked over to the pick-up truck and looked into the driver's window. The man and woman were in severe distress. The man had suffered wounds to his chest, whereas his rotund wife had injuries to her face and throat.

  They both struggled, and Average stared at them for another minute and watched them both die in morbid fascination, before dragging them out of the vehicle, and leaving them at the side of the road for the birds.

  Chapter Ten

  June 24th

  It was Sunday morning. After spending the night in the woods and having alternative sleeps, something that they were very much used to by now, Pickle and Karen rose to their feet, their throats dry and their bellies growling to be fed. They decided to walk through the woods that had managed to be Snatcher-free so far, and reluctantly drank a little by the nearby stream, then continued with their walk.

  In hindsight, the group should have ignored the pick-up truck and continued with their walk to Rugeley Town, despite the potential dangers. They were dehydrated and hungry, and Karen knew that from the point where they were now, they could still get to Rugeley via the woods. Once the two came to the end of the wooded area, there'd be a gravel path to walk up to, which would lead them to the top of a hill called Cardboard Hill, where she used to play sometimes as a child.

  Pickle never questioned Karen if she knew where she was going; he just followed her. The situation had become desperate. They didn't have a tangible destination in their minds; they just wanted to go somewhere, anywhere, where there was a chance to eat, drink, and possibly have a sleep that lasted longer than five hours.

  Although the couple in the truck had initially put the group off from going back to Rugeley with their stories of looting, violence and hordes of Snatchers, Pickle and Karen's options were scarce, and knew that just one vacant house with scraps of food and a bed, could keep their bodies alive for a few more days. And just because the electricity had gone a few days ago, it didn't mean that running water had ceased just yet.

  The ex-inmate briefly thought about the sports centre, and was certain that it would have been perfect if they hadn't have already attracted those things. He felt for Jade, and knew she blamed the group for bringing the carnage to her; but they were on foot, and desperate times called for desperate measures. Pickle was confident that Paul and Jade had managed to flee unharmed, as it seemed to take an age for the gun to go off, and when it did, it was just the one gunshot.

  The two survivors were casually strolling through the woodland and had not exchanged a word for the fifteen minutes that they had been walking. Their feet trudged through the greenery, and their necks twisted every time a rustle of a tree or a snap of a twig could be heard. Karen was the first to eventually break the silence. "So, where do you think they are?" Karen was referring to Paul and Jade who they had lost during the violent struggle. She sniffed and emptied each nostril onto the floor.

  Pickle shrugged and answered, "Who knows? Probably miles away by now. It's amazing how much yer can run when yer attacker has a gun. They've ran one way, and we've gone another, so we could be a fair distance apart. No point looking for them; we'll just run into more trouble."

  "So you've no intention going back for them?" Karen queried, and began inspecting the inside of her left nostril with her pinky.

  Pickle shook his head. "It'd be like trying to find a needle in a haystack in these woods. Besides, they're not our priority; we're starving and our bodies need water more than anythin' else."

  "Tell me about it. My mouth's as dry as a scabby cock."

  Pickle threw Karen one of his disappointed-father looks, but Karen ignored it and asked, "What do you think has happened to those men?"

  Pickle thought for a moment and guessed, "Probably had a good night's sleep, and are now off to rob someone else."

  "Pricks!"

  "I agree; they didn't have to shoot that poor couple, but those kinds o' people have got a better chance o' making it than people with families. I suppose most people could be considered a threat now. People will do anything and everything to survive; it's just the way we are." Pickle ran his fingers through his thin, dark beard and released an elongated exhale of breath. "So where to now, Bradley? You know this place better than me."

  Karen looked around and gazed through the trees. "If we keep walking, we'll get to the end of the woods and come to a dirt path that has a hill. At the top of the hill is a place where I used to go to as a child, called Cardboard Hill. I know there used to be some kind of shack up there."

  "I have a feeling that that place would already be spoken for." Pickle smiled and released a chesty cough, like a forty-a-day smoker. Christ, not another virus.

  "Maybe." Karen nodded in agreement. "But that's not the reason we're going that way. The top of the hill gives a view of the back of Rugeley. We'd be able to see what places were swarming, th
en maybe we could try the emptier streets and get a place for the night."

  "Like the house in Heath Hayes? And look how that turned out." Pickle was teasing Karen a little, and waited for her sharp response.

  "Yeah, but this time we won't have Jason Bonser leading them to us in their hundreds." She then looked at Pickle for a reaction. "What do you think?"

  She could tell by Pickle's face that he was devoid of ideas and made a facial expression telling Karen that he would go with her plan, as there was nothing else he could think of. "What if this...hill is infested?"

  "Why would it be? It's a hill; a steep fucker. You've seen those cocksuckers try and climb stairs; their legs can't take it. Not only that, but the hill should be clear of humans as well."

  Now she had the ex-inmate confused and he responded with puzzlement, "I don't understand what yer mean."

  "No mad bastard with a house is going to go and head for a hill and be exposed out in the open."

  "If they see us, these things could still get up this hill yer talkin' about." Pickle reminded Karen, "Stile Cop, Heath Hayes and the sports centre—no matter where we go, these things usually find us in the end. Their determination should not be underestimated."

  Karen did her best to convince Pickle. "We made too much noise at Stile Cop with KP shooting Davina and Isobel screaming. Heath Hayes was our own doing. If we had killed Jason Bonser, he would never have led a horde of them our way. And as for the sports centre: they were already heading for us in their dozens anyway. We didn't have much of a choice."

  "I hope yer right."

  Karen smiled at her companion and playfully slapped him on the back. "Shit, so do I."

  Chapter Eleven

  Jack woke up with a fright, and found that he was being shaken by Johnny.

  Jack looked up at his skinny features; the blue boiler suit was almost hanging off him, and Jack widened his eyes in a way of waking himself up a little quicker. He then immediately thought that something was wrong and bolted upright, twisting his neck from side-to-side, scanning the factory area. "What is it?"

  "Calm down. It's nearly ten 'o'clock," announced Johnny.

  "What? Really?"

  "You slept for nearly thirteen hours."

  "Shit." Jack began to laugh and scratched the side of his hair where the grey was. He thought about the last time he had slept so well: Glasgow City Centre, at his four-star hotel. "We're gonna have to go soon." Slade then began to rub his forehead, thinking back to his sleep. "Man, I haven't slept like that since..." Jack allowed his sentence to trail off and Johnny could see wretchedness emerging on Jack's face. Jack then shook his head, angry with himself.

  Johnny asked, "What's up?"

  Jack lowered his head, tears forming around his eyes. "My son's been dead for only a few days and I'm laughing. That's not right."

  "You have to laugh some time or another."

  "A few days?" Forty-year-old Slade was annoyed with himself that any kind of positive emotion had managed to seep through only days after Thomas had had such a violent death. He thought to himself that if this was the old world, and he was caught by a relative, laughing, days after his son's death and before his funeral, they would be baffled and not impressed if he expressed such an emotion. He was supposed to be mourning the loss of his son. Or maybe he was just being too hard on himself.

  Johnny put his hand comfortingly on Jack who was clearly upset. "I bet it doesn't feel like a few days, though."

  "No it doesn't." Jack rubbed his face with both hands moving up and down. "It feels like weeks, months even."

  "Tell me about it." Johnny began scratching at his chest, his hand was underneath the boiler suit. "It feels like I've been in here for a year. It's just so boring. I even started telling myself jokes the other day. Trouble is, I've heard them all before."

  Jack smiled and added, "You're a good man, Johnny. You didn't have to bring me in. I don't know how to repay you."

  "Well," Johnny began to joke. "You can cover my back when we're out there, 'cos as soon as I see one of those things, I'm gonna be shitting a brick."

  "You'll get used to it, trust me."

  "You think?" Johnny looked around the factory, and although he feared what waited for him outside, he wouldn't miss the four walls that he had been surrounded by in the last couple of weeks. Added Johnny, "I was thinking about what you told me last night. I'm not sure I can handle it, to tell you the truth."

  "Yes you can," Jack scolded. He turned to Johnny and placed both hands on his shoulders and glared at him, not in a threatening way, but in a way to give him a boost. "Listen, I left Glasgow when this all kicked off. I travelled four hours on the M6, crashed the car, then took a motorbike to Rugeley and then Hazelslade, almost getting pulled off the damn thing by a horde of them. I then found my son. Then a good friend of mine was raped and butchered by two men, then I was picked up by a woman who took us back to a house, which then was invaded by hundreds of the fucking things. We struggled to escape; then the van got a flat and we ran into a sports centre; my son then died and I hung around when the rest escaped and the things broke into the place—"

  Johnny tried to get a word in, "Look—"

  "I also tried to hang myself," Jack continued, "but the belt loosened and I fell into the pool and tried to escape the crowd inside the centre. I then got outside and killed a few, before escaping over the fence in soaking wet clothes."

  Jack then stopped, knowing he was getting carried away, and took a breath in.

  Johnny cleared his throat. "I suppose when you put it like that, it makes my story look a bit bland."

  Jack guffawed, "I'm not comparing. I'm just saying: it's not a holiday out there, but after a day or so, you kind of get used to it. I know that sounds a bit weird—"

  "Just a bit." Johnny rubbed his hands off of his bald head and sighed, "I suppose I can either come with you, or eventually die slowly in this place."

  "Not much of a choice, is it?"

  "Not really." This time Johnny's eyes began to fill with tears. "But I do want to live."

  Jack then rattled the supervisor's keys in front of Johnny, and a wide beam emerged on his face. "Then we go as soon as we're ready." Jack was hoping that more of the dead hadn't materialised since he saw the two the other evening. It was information he still hadn't shared with Johnny.

  Johnny nodded, but the fear was written all over his face, and his body quaked with the nervous adrenaline shooting through his body. "Okay."

  Chapter Twelve

  Karen Bradley and Harry Branston slowly trudged their way through the Staffordshire greenery and was relieved to have found a dirt path. Walking on the uneven ground and long grass was beginning to tire them out and make their ankles ache.

  Karen announced, "I think I know where I am now."

  Pickle cleared his throat and spat into the grass to the side of him. "Yer said that five minutes ago."

  "I know, but I recognise this path. I've been up here once or twice." Karen then pointed to her left. "Stile Cop is that way, about a mile away."

  Relieved that their journey through the place had been a quiet affair, they carried on and eventually came to the edge of the woods. Once they left the area, Pickle and Karen could see that they were now at the bottom of the hill that was nicknamed by the local residents of Rugeley as Cardboard Hill. There was a lot of shrubbery to walk through, but Karen told Pickle that once they reached the top, the other side of the hill was clear.

  On the flat part of the hillside was a small section of woods where a cabin stood, but at that moment, they couldn't see it. Pickle twisted his neck from side-to-side and stretched his arms, almost pulling his back out. He made an exaggerated moan when stretching, and Karen reprimanded him for making such an unnecessary and strident noise.

  Asked Karen, "Your back?"

  Pickle nodded. "It's givin' me a bit o' bother." He then stood on one leg and began to stretch his quads.

  "Your legs as well?" This time Karen was grinning. "You ol
d fart."

  "Don't forget, I'm twenty years older than you, young lady," Pickle cackled; he then looked up to the hill and made a long whistling noise. "That's some walk. So Rugeley's on the other side o' that hill?"

  "More or less. Why don't we rest a while, if you're getting stiff."

  Pickle agreed and sat on the grass bank and began to stretch his hamstrings, by stretching his foot back and reaching to touch the toes. He held the stretch for fifteen seconds, and did the same with the other leg.

  Karen licked her dry, cracked lips and put her head inbetween her knees. "God, I miss my lip balm." She then looked at Pickle who was staring into nothingness. She gave off a warm smile and put her arm around him while she was still standing. "You're shrinking, Branston."

  "What?" He slipped out of his daydreaming and turned to his partner in crime. "What yer on about?"

  "I said: You're shrinking."

  "Yer think I'm losin' ma muscle mass? I do feel leaner, but then again, we ain't eaten proper in days, 'ave we?"

  Karen sat and snuggled up next to her friend, giving her hot feet a welcomed and deserved rest. She then produced a small smirk on her face and glared at him with a scowl. Noticing this, Pickle asked her if there was anything wrong. "You know," she began, "over the weeks, with all the shit we've been through, and all those hours of chats that we have had, I still don't really know you that well. I know you can handle yourself, and used to be a drug dealer, and you like men..."

  "What else do yer wanna know?"

  Karen shrugged. "I just feel you know more about me, than I know about you. You've told me a couple of stories, but most of the time when we talk it's related to survival, food and avoiding those things."

  "Okay." Pickle was sitting down and was resting the palms of his hands on his knees. He said with a sly grin, "What do yer wanna know about? Ma childhood? Ma teens? What 'bout ma first kiss?"