by Jacob Rayne
It was a great way to see if the newcomers had what it took to deal with the dead.
More often than not, the terrified rookies never returned.
‘Anything yet?’ Frank said, unable to get to the door for his colleagues.
‘Ssh,’ Will hissed, ‘If he hears us it’ll give the whole fucking game up.’
Frank looked to Gareth, who shook his head.
They waited, unable to keep the smiles off their faces.
Brian opened his eyes and found that he couldn’t open the bag.
His gaze went straight to the face of the dead woman as though drawn by a magnet. She was beautiful, with striking but unusual facial features.
He glanced around, making sure he and the beautiful girl were alone in the room, then his faltering hand reached into the bag.
His hand moved slowly towards the shapely mound of her left breast. The nipple was pale pink and erect. It was the first time he’d seen a bare breast in the flesh and he longed to touch it, even if it did belong to a dead girl.
She’ll never know, will she? he smirked.
He cupped the breast, savouring the way it felt, but feeling a little disturbed by the coldness of her flesh. The lack of a pulse was distinctly unsettling.
He drew his hand back as if burnt, as the realisation of what he was doing sunk in.
No wonder I don’t fit in, he thought with a frown.
A wave of nausea crashed over him and sent him running for the toilets. He made it just in time to let the rush of vomit out into the toilet pan.
Bending double, he let out a second load, then stayed over the toilet, waiting to see if the sickness had passed.
From his hiding place inside the bag, Dale heard footsteps approaching. He grinned for a second, to get it out of his system, then closed his eyes so he could see just a fraction of what was going on.
Heavy breathing filled the air above him; the kid must have been shitting himself. He allowed himself another brief smile, then fell still.
Unseen hands drew the zip slowly open.
Dim light flooded in through the gap.
The zip came up from Dale’s feet, towards his face.
It was up to his navel now.
Almost time for the big surprise.
Dale implored himself not to laugh and give the game away.
The zip drew level with Dale’s throat.
He could see the kid’s arms. They looked much paler than they should have been.
He couldn’t see Brian’s face yet, so he couldn’t see him either.
In that split second he decided that he’d wait, let the kid get over his initial shock. Then, when he reached into the bag, he’d grab his arm.
Yeah, that’ll be fucking incredible. He’ll squeal like a stuck pig.
The zip opened over Dale’s face. The light stung his eyes a little. He froze, waiting for Brian to get used to the sight of his cadaverous features.
It was a second before his eyes adjusted to the light, but when they did, he realised that it was not Brian that he was looking at.
55
Will was grinning from ear to ear when he heard the first scream.
‘That’s our cue, folks,’ he said, inching the door open and sneaking inside.
Gareth and Frank tiptoed in behind him, hands over their mouths to stifle their chuckles.
Will reached the door to the morgue and froze, looking through the frosted glass.
He could see Dale’s pale frame, lurching across the room.
He’s done a hell of a job with the makeup this time, Will thought with a smile.
The screams from the room were real terrified ones, the best they’d ever heard.
The poor kid must be shitting himself, Will thought, his shoulders shaking like he was drilling the road.
‘Give it a second longer and we’ll go in,’ Will said.
His companions nodded, both grinning like morons.
The screams from the morgue made Brian wonder what the hell was going on.
The taste of vomit clung to his nose and throat.
His heart started to pound, making his pulse sound in his ears. He spat out a strand of vomit-tinged saliva, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and stood up.
The kid’s screams were truly impressive. It actually sounded like the poor sod was in pain. Will and his two friends doubted that he’d ever come back.
‘Poor fucker’s terrified,’ Frank said.
‘Yeah, let’s go in,’ Will said.
He turned the handle and slowly pushed the door open.
The grin on his face disappeared when he saw the pale, naked woman standing over Dale’s bleeding body.
A bloody scalpel glinted in her hand.
She snarled, exposing yellowing teeth.
‘What the fuck?’ Will shouted.
Gareth barged him out of the way and ran out of the door through which they’d come in.
Frank moved past Will and grabbed the fire extinguisher off the wall.
The woman followed Dale as he backed away from her. His back hit the wall and he realised that he was cornered. Blood streaked his face, running down onto his clothes.
He pressed his back into the wall and used it to stand up.
As he did so, the scalpel flashed through the air, rending his stomach.
Glistening spools of intestine drooped from the wound.
Dale looked away from the nightmare figure and concentrated on shoving his guts back into his body.
Blood poured over his hands and spattered down onto the floor.
While Will watched in stunned disbelief, the figure aimed another scalpel strike at Dale’s throat.
Frank charged in and slammed the butt of the fire extinguisher into the back of the woman’s head. Her skull shattered with a crunch and a spatter of dark blood. She jolted forward, her strike missing Dale, who was too hurt to move.
The woman hissed and turned to face Frank. He took heart from the thick blood and gobbets of brain that seeped from the side of her head. He thrust the fire extinguisher again, splintering her cheek and mashing her lips against her teeth.
She cried out in anger and stabbed the blade towards Frank’s face. He just ducked back in time to avoid being blinded in one eye.
Dale staggered over to Will, who ushered him towards the door.
Frank saw the scalpel wink in the light as it again came towards his face.
He managed to get the fire extinguisher up in time to block the blow and the weapon flew from the woman’s hand and buried itself in the wall behind Will.
Frank slammed the heavy metal extinguisher into the woman’s face, smashing her cheek and bursting her nose across her face.
The blow would have felled most opponents, but it seemed to only make the woman more furious.
Frank flung the weapon at her feet and ran for the door.
Will took one look at the screaming corpse and followed.
56
By the time Brian had plucked up the nerve to investigate the scene in the morgue, everyone had gone.
Only a pool of blood and a few yellowed teeth remained. He saw the scalpel embedded in the wall, drops of scarlet dripping from the handle and landing on the floor.
His mind struggled to process the information that his eyes were showing him.
Head swimming, legs on the verge of buckling, he somehow thought to punch three nines into his mobile.
Having not had time to plan what he was going to say, the information came out as nonsense. The operator promised him that someone would be on the way soon.
Grimacing when he saw how pale his friend had become, Will bundled Dale into the back of his car. Frank climbed in after him.
Their attacker’s blood-covered hands beat a ferocious tattoo onto the windows before the car pulled away.
Dale was panting, his hand clamped to his stomach in a vain attempt to keep his guts inside. Blood was soaking through his shirt in a dark patch and was thick on his hands. It was already st
arting to drip down onto the back seat of the car.
Will drove like a man possessed, realising that his colleague didn’t have long.
In the absence of readily available victims, Carla (named after Dwayne’s late mother) clung to the shadows.
As she caught sight of her reflection in a shop window, she turned her hands back and forth like it was the first time she had seen them.
She tried to figure out where she should go. This was the first time she’d been out in the open, so it was a daunting yet exhilarating experience.
The shadows were friends, keeping unwanted attention from her blood-smeared body.
The policeman who turned up at the morgue was more sceptical than Brian had thought.
‘So, let me get this right,’ he said, a sly smile caressing his features. ‘Two body bags were delivered here around midnight. You took a look at one then tossed your cookies. While you were in the bathroom you heard noises – screams – from in here.’
Brian nodded.
‘You came back in here to find—’ the cop checked his notepad for the details – ‘this pool of blood, the scalpel in the wall and some teeth.’
‘That’s right,’ Brian agreed. ‘Well, you can see the room is as I left it.’
The cop had a quick look round, but Brian could tell he wasn’t really interested.
‘Well, leave it with us, we’ll get to the bottom of it, Sir.’
Brian felt sure he was being fobbed off and he wasn’t happy about it. ‘But someone could be hurt. Look at all the blood.’
The cop pulled a face like Brian had shit on his leg. ‘We’ll get to the bottom of it, Sir.’
Brian shook his head and walked out. When he got home, he looked through his paperwork for a contact number for Will.
57
Jack Simons had been Baz’s housemate for the last few months.
He’d been only too glad to help Baz through his grief after the loss of Chirs, Max and Bobby. The gruesome stories Baz had told about the ‘Thing in the barn’ were hard to believe and had made him worry for his friend’s sanity.
Jack woke with the sound of dogs barking in the back lane behind his house.
It was a nice change from waking screaming in a panicked sweat.
The year since the events that had gone down at the barn had been an eventful one.
Baz had told him all about it. He’d lived vicariously through his friend’s graphic tales.
They’d buried their friends; shed many a tear for each of them.
He’d watched Baz lose his girlfriend as a result of his rage and win a close fought battle with the bottle.
His friend was much stronger now, it seemed he’d successfully put it all behind him.
But now he was acting strangely again, and had disappeared in the middle of the night.
Frowning at the sudden rush of noise at this ungodly hour, he glanced out the window.
The dogs were going berserk out in the back lane, running round frantically in a circle, snapping their jaws wildly at something that he couldn’t see.
They were the Alsatians that belonged to the old twat a few doors down.
‘Will you shut those fucking dogs up, people are trying to sleep,’ he bellowed.
The dogs barked louder in reply.
Jack cursed louder, slammed his hand into the wall by the side of the window.
Then he shrugged on his dressing gown and set off out to see just what the hell was going on.
58
Will was helping Frank to support the increasingly pale and weak Dale as they made their way into the hospital reception.
Will and Frank sat in the waiting area while Dale was rushed to theatre immediately.
Will checked his mobile phone to see that he had three missed calls, all from the same number.
‘Sweet Jesus, who would be ringing at this time?’ he pondered aloud.
‘Shit, the kid,’ Frank said. ‘Wasn’t he inside the morgue?’
‘Fucking hellfire, you’re right, Frank.’
Will jabbed the dial button and listened to the phone ring. ‘Brian?’ he asked when a shocked-sounding voice answered.
‘W-what happened?’
‘A prank went seriously wrong, kid. Dale was in one of the bags, ready to give you the scare of a lifetime. He was going to grab you when you opened the bag.’
‘That’s really clever.’
‘I know, it’s a longstanding trick. Always gives us a laugh. Nothing to worry about, just a little scare.’
‘Very fucking mature,’ Brian spat.
‘Get over yourself, kid,’ Will snapped.
‘Ok, so what happened?’
‘The woman in the other bag mustn’t have been dead, she got out and attacked Dale. Sliced him up right nice.’
Brian said nothing.
‘You still there, kid?’
‘Yeah.’
‘What’s up?’
‘That woman was dead. I saw her with my own eyes. She wasn’t breathing and she had no pulse. There’s no way she could be up and walking around.’
‘Well, son, she is. We’re waiting at the hospital to see how Dale checks out. Come up here if you like.’
‘Right.’
59
The dogs were still barking loud enough to wake the dead when Jack reached the gate of his back yard.
He pulled it open gingerly, baulking a little at the smell of death that raced into his nostrils.
One of the dogs was attacking something on the ground.
It looked like a bundle of rags, curled up against the alley wall.
Jack’s wide eyes noticed that the bundle of rags was bleeding profusely from wounds in its arms.
‘Holy shit, are you ok?’ he asked, moving in and delivering a solid kick to the dog’s ribs. It turned to him, baring its blood-smeared teeth, then let out a low whimper and ran away.
‘Are you ok?’ Jack asked, leaning down and helping the fallen figure. Blood soaked the cobbles beneath her.
‘Been better,’ the girl conceded.
As she rolled to her side, the filthy blanket she’d been hiding behind moved to reveal her face.
Her flesh was pale, almost to the point of being see-through, and her eyes were milky as though covered in thick cataracts.
Her teeth were barely visible through the slick mass of blood that covered most of her face.
‘Thank you,’ the girl said.
For the first time Jack felt unease.
He’d always had a mistrust of the homeless, even more so after what had happened last year.
The idea of them camping out in his back street was not a comforting one.
Much too fucking close to home.
‘You need me to call you an ambulance?’ he asked.
The girl didn’t reply, just darted off in the same direction the dog had gone.
Jack furrowed his brow.
It wasn’t until he got round the corner that he saw the other dog, its throat torn out, a dark pool of blood glistening beneath its ravaged form.
60
Carla saw blue flashing lights at the corner ahead of her.
Instinctively she knew they were bad news, the men in dark uniforms likewise.
She peeked round the corner to see what was going on. It was hard to think; the thirst was interfering with her mind. The small amount of blood she’d managed to get from the dogs had been just enough to give her a taste for more.
There were two police cars parked on the curb opposite the corner. A man with a gun stood at the end of the alley across the road. Yellow crime-scene tape was strung around the door to the morgue.
The lights cast a strange glow over the scene.
Carla knew her best bet was to get away.
She climbed the fence into the yard next to her, keeping to the shadows as she crept towards the house. She climbed over the next three fences then dropped into the darkness.
A cop with a torch was peering over the fence towards her. His torch beam
played across the ground at her feet. She drew them back, feeling a mixture of fear and excitement.
The cop turned away. Carla moved towards the fence, ready to drop to her knees in case he should turn to face her.
He disappeared down the alley at the side of the house, the tune he whistled betraying his position.
She scaled the fence into the next yard and ran to the corner, concealing herself when she saw the torch beam coming down the alley towards her.
The cop was still whistling as he came back into the yard. He didn’t seem to realise that she was here.
The torch beam flicked over the wall to Carla’s right, the bearer not giving any indication that he knew there was an intruder.
He was still whistling when she dived on him.
They hit the deck, Carla on top. He cried out and rolled.
They switched positions a few times, both of them disoriented by the exchange.
Carla recovered first, clamping a hand around his throat, to stop him crying out again.
She squeezed until his eyes rolled back in his head, then let him slump to the floor.
After a second’s debate, she grabbed his head and twisted it savagely to one side. His neck broke with a sickly crack. She hid the body and forced the back door with her bare shoulder.
There was no one in the house, she could sense it.
Smiling, she made her way into the hall.
She crept up the stairs, peering into the bedroom where there was a small hatch set into the ceiling. Her instincts told her she could sleep up there without being discovered.
She scrabbled up the wall and hauled herself into the loft where she lay down on the soft yellow insulation and was asleep within minutes.
61
Jack’s eyes grew wide at the savagery that had been inflicted on the hapless canine.
As he drew closer he saw wide slashes down the animal’s flanks, then saw the raw wound where its throat had been torn loose by savage teeth.
His skin crawled as he remembered Baz’s stories about the thing in the barn. That had inflicted a similar level of torment on its victims.
He shuddered at the thought of a repeat of those events.
