March of the Dead (Killing the Dead Book 11)

by Richard Murray

  Those bodies had piled up, and piled up. One atop another, broken and battered by the force of the Horde pushing against them, they had been forced down to the road and the ones behind had climbed over them.

  This seemed to have continued until a ramp of bodies had formed that reached half-way up the damned wall. When the zombies climbed it, they were high enough that Lou’s people could jab down with their spears and kill them, but that just made the ramp higher.

  So, they had the bright idea of burning them. Petrol from the fuel trucks was sprayed over the horde and then, improvised Molotov cocktails were lit and thrown down to shatter amongst the dead. They burned surprisingly well and for quite some time.

  The fire would burn away some of the ramp, but eventually, it would die down and they would just keep on coming. Hell, the fire didn’t really stop the ones from the back forcing the front forwards anyway. I caught a glimpse of bodies stumbling through the flames.

  “Crap,” was all I said and then coughed as I got a lungful of oily, black smoke. “Go, go back.”

  Georgia, it seemed, had the good sense not to try and talk, so we walked back in silence. Which was good for me since I was trying to estimate how much time we had left. It wasn’t looking good.

  “You bastard,” she snarled as we finally cleared the smoke. I lifted one hand to my mouth as I coughed to clear my throat and cocked an eyebrow in query.

  “We can’t hold this fucking place and you know it,” she said. “I reckon you’ve known that all along.”

  “You’re not wrong,” I replied. It was imperative that I keep her on my side until the very end and so I chose my words carefully. “None of them need to know.”

  “Why’re you telling them… telling me, that we’ll take this place then?”

  Her hand tightened painfully around my arm, nails digging into my skin and I tried my best to show a friendly smile, though I feared it was likely more of a grimace.

  “Because I’m going to kill them all,” I said and she came to a dead stop, forcing me to do the same.

  “What?”

  “How much fun will it be?” I said and paused a moment to cough up my lungs once more. “How much fun, to kill everyone here?”

  “Explain.”

  Her tone was tense, but curious too. The thought of so much chaos and murder might just be enough to keep her in line.

  “Why kill just one person here or there? With the raiders and the people here, there’s probably around a hundred and forty. They’ll all die here.”

  “How?” she asked and loosened her grip on my arm a little. “Tell me.”

  There was an excitement in her voice that spoke of desire and her breathing quickened a little as she listened to me.

  “The raiders think we will take this place for them, Lou thinks we will have the raiders fight and die while they escape and all the while, neither group will be leaving this place.”

  “How can you stop them?”

  “Tomorrow, when Lou’s people are on the wall fighting and our raiders are resting, I shall empty the contents of the fuel trucks inside the walls.”

  “And?”

  “We’ll light it and watch from the north wall as the whole place burns.”

  It was weak, and the best I could come up with on the fly, as tired as I was. But it seemed to do the job. Her cheeks had a little more colour to them than I recalled and her pupils dilated as her mind conjured images of what she imagined we would do. Finally, she gasped.

  “Why didn’t you tell me this?”

  “Well I wanted it to be a surprise for you,” I said and added as inspiration came to me. “It’s why I’ve been distant, I wanted a grand gesture for you. A fitting deed to consummate our relationship.”

  She was silent for a moment and the seconds dragged by. I was sure she was going to call me out and ruin my plans, but instead, she just laughed.

  “Sounds like fun,” she said and my smile for her was genuine.

  Chapter 22

  After a hot meal of some kind of spicy noodle concoction, I led my merry little band of raiders out to the wall. The fires beyond were dying down but still had a ways to go before it would allow the zombies to be a problem and I suspected that it would be a long boring night with little to do.

  Lou met us at the bottom of the wall as he directed his people back to the building. He acknowledged my presence with a nod and continued to speak to one of his spearmen. I waited patiently, casting an eye over the crowd to ensure all were behaving.

  “Keep yer hans tae yerself,” a voice behind me said.

  When I turned to see what was going on, I was confronted with an older gent staring down one of my raiders. An arrogant looking youth of about nineteen. The older man had one arm protectively out, forming a barrier between the raider and a young woman. I bit back a harsh word as I hobbled over.

  “Gonna make me old man?” the raider said, puffing out his chest and stepping up to the other man.

  “Aye ah will, I’ll barnie ye if ye want.”

  Other raiders were gathering around, sensing a fight about to start and I increased my pace as the young raider hefted the steel bar he held.

  “Come on then you old fucker!” he snapped and raised his steel bar.

  Blood sprayed across the older man and the girl he was protecting as the young raider dropped his weapon, both hands going the wide gash across his neck that was spraying his blood a surprising distance.

  I turned to the silent raiders and raised my voice so that all would hear me, even above the moaning of the crowd and the shocked murmurs of the Fortress folk.

  “When I say there will be no fighting with the people here, I mean it. Anyone who considers this a problem, step forward now.”

  No one moved and I nodded once as I flicked the blood from my knife and turned back to the older man.

  “If you have issues with any of my people, come see me.”

  “Nae man, none,” he said as he held up his hands before him. The fear was radiating from him in waves and I held back a smile as Lou joined us.

  “Everyone inside,” he bellowed and the shocked crowd began to move.

  “You fuckers! Get on the damned wall,” Georgia shouted and my own band of scum obeyed.

  “Was that necessary?” Lou asked. He wore a look of distaste, mouth turned down and brow furrowed as he stared at the dead raider.

  “Only way to maintain discipline,” I told him and lowered my voice as I watched the passing raiders warily. “Prepare your people, morning is going to be the best time to leave.”

  “So soon?”

  “This place will be overrun by this time tomorrow,” I said with a shrug. “Up to you if you’re still here by then.”

  “I think I might have a bit more of an understanding about defending a base,” he said. “This isn’t my first defence.”

  “Against people, I would defer to your training. Against those things out there… the choice is yours but if you want your people to live, you need to leave.”

  He sputtered a reply but I wasn’t listening. Instead, I was mentally preparing myself for the arduous task of climbing up the rope ladder with a swollen knee and no pain relief. It wasn’t going to be fun.

  Since I couldn’t put too much weight on that leg, I had to resort to holding tight to the rope ladder and pulling myself up as I just used my good leg to brace myself before reaching up once again. It was slow going but I didn’t expect to have to run for my life at least.

  Once at the top, I found there was little for me to do. Georgia had everyone in position. The vast majority of our happy raiders were spaced out along the southern wall, while a small complement of four were directed to the east. I didn’t expect much to worry about from that direction and if we had to, we could easily reach them before any problem got too out of hand.

  The wall was seventy metres in width at the southern wall which meant we had one raider for every two metres of wall. Not ideal, but since only the Ferals could climb. We should
be ok.

  I looked beyond the wall and wasn’t exactly heartened by what I saw. The fire had died down to a slow burn, but the undead didn’t seem to notice or care. They just kept moving forward until they couldn’t go any further. Then they dropped and the ones behind walked over them.

  The ramp they had made with their bodies had grown by a good few feet since I’d seen it earlier that day. Which was a problem, since the fire should have incinerated enough of the dead flesh to make the ramp sink a little.

  “We’re ready,” Georgia said.

  “Any that get within reach, we need to kill,” I said. “At some point, we’ll have to either risk them reaching the top or spray them with more fuel and light them up.”

  “Goody. I’m always willing to set things on fire.”

  “I’m sure you are.” I offered a slight smile to show I was just teasing a little. At least that’s what I hoped it meant. I wasn’t exactly sure how such things went.

  “You gonna be good with your wonky knee?”

  “I’ll be fine.” A little stung by her doubt if I were honest. “Get ready.”

  The zombie’s heads were still a good few feet below the top of the wall but they could raise their arms, reaching out for the prey they knew to be there. All along the wall, the men and women of the raider group readied the long spears that had been left for them to use.

  I reached down and grabbed the one by my feet. Nearly eight feet in length with a pointed steel head that was about eight inches in length. It had a short steel cross-guard to stop the spear going through the flesh too far. I was eager to try it out.

  As hard as it was to brace myself with my injured knee, I stood sideways on and held the spear in both hands, pointed down towards the zombies. It was so very easy to jab down and push that sharp point through rotted flesh and the skull beyond.

  A zombie died and I felt… something. It wasn’t the joy I had felt when killing the Raiders, it was a generally pleased satisfaction. For every one I killed, another person might live. I was fighting not so much for myself, but for my friends and the other survivors. There was something pleasing about that.

  I jabbed down again and again, losing myself in the rhythmic act. It was mindless work with little real skill involved. Jab, pull back and jab again. Blood and brain matter coated the end of the spear and the heat from smouldering corpses was almost unbearable.

  The flies at least, large and small alike, seemed to avoid the burning bodies and concentrated on hovering around the larger mass of undead still waiting to climb the ramp.

  Minutes turned to hours as the evening drew on, night falling and taking with it the light. Before I could issue an order, some of Lou’s people climbed the wall behind us, each of them holding a light. When a woman placed one down beside me, I realised they were the solar powered lights that you stuck into the ground beside your garden path. They must have been laid out all day storing up the sunlight.

  They brought more than just light, they brought bottles of water and snack foods too. Not as filling as a full meal, there were at least something to keep our energy up for the night's work. I gave thanks to the man who handed me several energy bars and he scowled but didn’t reply.

  A brief break to eat and drink was all we had and then the slaughter continued. They fell in their hundreds, then thousands, all along the wall and for every one that died, dozens more waited to replace it. We kept up the killing.

  By midnight, the tops of the zombie’s heads poked over the wall for the first time. I held back a curse and revised, once again, the timeframe I had to work with. It wasn’t good.

  I jabbed my spear from the eye of a shambler as it reached for me and pulled back, only to jab forward again into the next zombie that was already trying to claw its way over the one I’d just killed.

  “This isn’t working,” Georgia called through gritted teeth. I couldn’t disagree with her, to be honest.

  It was there, a feeling in the air around me. A growing unease in the raiders as they began to realise that there were too many for them to hold back. I dropped my spear.

  “Hold them here, I’ll get the fuel pipes. We can burn a few of them.”

  Georgia nodded and stabbed down at another zombie, her attention focused almost entirely on the growing number of arms that seemed to be trying to reach her. I hurried over to the ladder.

  Going down was easier than trying to climb up at least. Gravity was on my side and in a short time I was on the ground and making my way to the fuel trucks, with only a few curses for the twinges of pain from my knee.

  I didn’t bother grabbing the flexible tubes from where they lay on the ground, I just pulled open the valve and let the fuel spill out. The heavy stench of petrol filled the air and I hurried on to the next. Once that was opened, I took one last look at the wall and made haste towards the building.

  Lou met me at the door, a backpack on his back. Behind him, his people were gathering, each with a heavy pack on their back and more than one carrying boxes or weapons. He gave me a nod of greeting and gestured me inside.

  “Here,” he said as he thrust a small black plastic device my way. It looked like a garage door opener.

  “Detonator?”

  He nodded and said, “saw you coming. I was watching from up top and figured it was time.”

  “An hour, tops, and the wall will fall,” I said. “Once they start clambering over it, those raiders will run for it.”

  “We’ll be gone by then,” Lou said and hesitated before adding, “we’re taking the radio with us. Once we get set up, do you have a message for me to send?”

  For a moment, I wondered what he meant and then realisation hit. What message could I give to my friends though? What message could I send to her that would be worth a damn?

  “Tell her. Them. That I tried to make amends,” I said finally.

  He gave me a curious look but didn’t pry and I was grateful for that at least. He gestured to the stacked pallets around him.

  “All the PE-4 we had has been placed. Taff assures me that as soon as you press that button there’ll be an almighty explosion and anything within these walls we made will be killed.”

  “PE-4?”

  “Plastic explosive. High yield.”

  “That should do,” I said. Then out of curiosity asked, “why did you have so much with you?”

  “We were supposed to use it against the undead in Glasgow,” he said and looked away as though embarrassed. “Destroy bridges and refugee centres. Kill as many as we could, but after the first… I couldn’t do it. Not while the living were still in there with them.”

  “Fair enough.”

  Seemed like a silly reason not to do it. Sure, a few of the living would have died but it would have meant that there would be a lot less undead to try and kill you later. Foolish sentimentality.

  “Good luck,” he said after an awkward moment of silence.

  I didn’t need to reply, didn’t need to answer since I would never see him or any of them again. The social niceties that I had been forced to endure for so long were no longer relevant. In a few short hours, I would be dead.

  Chapter 23

  Lou led his people out under the cover of darkness, not that anyone would have noticed since up on the wall they were fighting for their lives. In the short time I had been gone, the ramp of bodies had reached sufficient height that the undead could clamber awkwardly onto the top of the wall.

  I watched them fight for a few minutes after the last of Lou’s people had gone. They dropped their spears and returned to using their own weapons. Clubs and knives, hammering and stabbing the skulls of the undead as the bodies piled ever higher. I turned away from them.

  Someone had thoughtfully left the ladder hanging down from the hole in the ceiling and I somehow managed to climb it without doing an injury to myself. Not easy when the rope ladder is hanging free, allowing it to swing wildly as you try to climb with just one good leg.

  The first floor was empty and dark, t
he sounds of life had departed and soon enough all that remained would be the dead. It seemed fitting to be in such a place, with a high ceiling and so reminiscent of a mausoleum.

  Attached to one wall was a metal ladder. Aluminium would be my best guess and bolted to the wall. I climbed it slowly, emerging from the hole in the roof a short time later. A chill wind had begun to blow and as high as I was, about forty feet if I were to guess, it was a relief from the unrelenting heat.

  I rubbed at my arms as goosebumps rose on my skin and stepped carefully onto the walkway that had been erected around the top of the roof. It wasn’t much to look at, made of scaffolding poles for the frame with wooden boards to provide something to walk on.

  They hadn’t bothered with a railing which I could understand, time being what it was, they likely planned to add one later. Not that it was much help to me since I was a little unsteady on my feet. Still, I would persevere.

  As I walked towards the southern end of the building, I could look down and see the top of the western wall below me and the river just beyond. Moving with some speed, and still deep, despite the heatwave we’d had.

  I reached the southernmost point and stopped to watch the raiders fight and die on the wall. My fingers turning the plastic detonator device in my hand as I didn’t try to keep the smile from my face.

  Seven dead. Seven raiders who wouldn’t murder and rape anymore. Eight, another one died as I finished my count, legs pulled under him by a particularly vicious zombie. His screams filled the night as they tore at his flesh.

  Georgia moved with a deadly grace, barely standing still for a second as she moved along the wall, Hori Hori used to deadly effect. Where she walked, the zombies died and I almost regretted not being able to kill her myself.

  Another raider fell, then a second and a third. The screams of the dying mingled with the moans of the undead and bravery turned to fear. First one stepped back, then a second and before my eyes it became a full retreat.

  My laughter rang out as a raider turned to run, only to fall flat on her face as a Feral leapt onto her back, its blackened claws raking deep furrows in her skin. The raiders retreat became a panicked flight.