So, girly night for me and Freya.
There was a wee bit of tension as we were eating our communal meal. Most people were nibbling at their food, their stomachs still a bit tender from their mass vomiting, but Nate and I savaged it. We’d been eating purely for sustenance for the better part of a month, so naturally when there was real food on the table, we smashed the shit out of it. I was like Cookie Monster with a rabid case of the munchies; spectacularly unladylike as I battered everything, making cooing noises of pleasure as I tried each new tasty morsel.
Ariel and I are not destined to be friends, that much is obvious. She burns sage, rubs crystals on herself and does yoga while dressed like something from Woodstock, and I do parkour and slay zombies in a tracksuit and trainers. She eats like a little bird, all dainty like, while I attack the table like a Viking feast, all fingers and slobber. If I had a flagon of mead, I’d be banging that shit against other flagons and spilling it everywhere in a raucous manner.
I’d much rather be me.
Anyway, there I am, having a great time, when out of nowhere, the Little Mermaid pipes up.
“Do you have to be so uncouth?”
Bear in mind, Ariel and Pax are from la-de-da families, born with a silver spoon rammed up their arse, so you can imagine how shudderingly posh her accent is. Superior, haughty, up her own arse so far she’s bent into a loop.
Now, I get this a lot. My accent is a little “common.” I wear tracksuits for comfort and my sport. I never wore makeup even before the apocalypse. Basically, people will like me, or they won’t, and I honestly don’t give a shit either way. I’m not going to bend to anyone’s expectations, and I’ll live my life however the hell I want.
So, when I get this, I don’t go aggressive. I go sarcastic. Because it’s a little like punching people with words and the body’s natural defence against stupidity.
“I’m busy eating right now,” I said amiably, purposefully talking with my mouth full to piss her off. “Could I ignore you some other time?”
The whole room went tense. Well, except for me and Nate, who carried on eating without a care in the world. Particles had a quick glance at Ariel, then to me, then to Ariel. He gave the woman a distinctly withering look.
Love that dog.
The Little Mermaid was a bit aghast. She’s obviously not used to her opinion being of zero worth in her little special circle of trust fund babies and it took her a moment to gather herself.
“How rude!” she declared.
Seriously? Is this girl for real? There I am, minding my own business as I feast for the first time in a month, when this snotty bitch pipes in that I’m uncouth and rude? This is usually the way with assholes like the Little Mermaid; they just expect the world to dance to their shitty tune and get all offended when the world flips them a middle finger in response.
She wasn’t done with her indignation as she turned to her beloved buffalo.
“Barclay, are you going to let her…”
I nearly snorted tomato out my nose. “Barclay? Is that your real name? Seriously?” I laughed again. “No wonder you disguised it as Pax. What’s your name then, Little Mermaid? Cecelia? Camilla? Eugenia? I bet it’s Ophelia or some shit, isn’t it?” I hardened my tone just a little while she was reeling. “Now listen, you uppity little fuck, you started this so don’t turn to your moisturises-his-scrotum-three-times-a-day boyfriend when I bite back. You’re the one judging and making comments, so if you’re not going to fight your own battle, I suggest you bite down on that silver spoon in your flappy trap and shut the fuck up.”
Nate carried on eating like nothing was happening. I love that about him. He doesn’t feel the need to butt in and defend me. He knows I can fight my own battles and lets me get on with them.
“I don’t think I like you very much,” declared Ariel, just a hint of quiver in her lip. Bravado.
“Oh no,” I said dramatically. “You don’t like me. Let me just sit here for a few minutes while I recover from this tragedy.”
Grace piped in then. “You obviously think it’s very clever to be sarcastic, don’t you?”
“Noooo,” I said.
Sarcastically.
“You know it’s the lowest form of wit?”
“Think of that one yourself, did you?” I snapped back, popping a cherry tomato in my mouth and presenting her with a cheesy grin as I chewed.
I’m such a people person.
It soon died down. Stupid people can’t deal with good sarcasm. It just highlights how stupid they are. It’s not the lowest form of wit at all; done right, it’s a fucking art form.
Anyway, after that little clash of heads, Nate announced he’ll be up and gone in the morning before anyone else rises most likely, so we’ve plenty of the day left to get the grim work of a mass grave done. Once we’ve got that boxed off, then we can start some real planning about the future.
Well, I’m absolutely beat, and I think it’s time I faceplanted into the blessed embrace of sleep. I’ll say goodnight, my dear reader.
Huh. I really need to give you a name. I can’t keep calling you “my dear reader” as… well… it’s pretty impersonal. I think we’ve gotten to know each other a little better. The more I write this shit down, the more I need to address it to someone. Dear Diary is… well... it’s a bit shit. Diary McDiaryface makes me titter, but it’s just too damn long.
Bah, I can’t think of this right now. So instead, dear reader, I’m going to sleep in a bed. Fuck yeah. Catch you on the flip side.
15th Entry
HELL’S KITCHEN
Holy fucking hell. Absolute carnage.
Nate disappeared first thing, must have been about 5am, as I heard the truck fire up and him piss about at the gates with the car, then he was gone. Once I was awake, I couldn’t drift off again, but I’d crashed out about 9pm anyway, so I’d had a damn good sleep, best I’d had in an age.
Freya was still asleep, Particles snuggled into her like a little teddy bear, her arm protectively around him. That little dog whore has done wonders for her mental state. Really helped her calm down and adapt. I’d probably be jealous if it wasn’t for the fact that Freya was just so fucking nice. I don’t think the woman has a malicious bone in her body and she looked like a fucking supermodel with no makeup on, hair everywhere, fast asleep.
Bitch. LOL.
I decided to head downstairs and make myself a brew. It was a bright morning and the simple act of sitting at a kitchen table with the sun just coming up, sipping at a steaming cup and enjoying the peace; well, that seemed like a little slice of serene normal after what had been a whole month of adapting to a new and broken world.
Of course, I’m not that lucky seeing as how Particles is currently using all his mystical ability to heal Freya’s anxiety.
Sat at the island was Ariel. I think she heard my eyes roll as I reached the foot of the stairs.
“You’re up early,” she said by way of greeting.
“Nothing gets past you, eh?” I said, thoroughly annoyed my plan for peace had been shat on by one of the two people I disliked the most.
I was surprised to see her reaction. She blanched a little, like the words had really stung. She didn’t respond with any comeback, or shitty condescension. Instead, she waited while I made my own brew and sat at the island, staring out the glass doors to the beautiful country morning. We said nothing for a little while, then her voice made me start a little.
“This is really happening, isn’t it?”
I was going to hit her with another rock of sarcasm to the face, but I stopped myself as I caught her expression.
Reality was sinking in. Her home, her family, her entire life… it was all gone. Now the shock of day one was over, and she was sitting alone with her thoughts, all the cracks were starting to appear.
The girl was still a bitch, no doubt, but she was still human. She still had people she loved, family that she’ll never see again, no skills applicable to surviving in a world of the damned.
That crushing realisation that you have no place in this new and shattered existence, that you will have to rely on the goodwill and the skills of others to survive, had hit her hard it seemed.
Instead of a barbed comment, I stopped my sassy mouth and just nodded. Sometimes I guess, the first step on the road to forgiveness is realising the other person was born an idiot.
“I’m sorry,” she said then, completely taking me off guard. “For the things I said last night. I was just….”
“Forget it,” I said, waving it away. “It was a stressful day. I’m not exactly known for my diplomacy.”
That got a rueful chuckle from her and I thought, maybe she’s not so bad. It’s no small thing to cough up that apology and take a hit to your pride. Probably doubly hard for someone used to getting what they want, whenever they want it. Maybe, just maybe, there was a little spark of hope for her yet.
Then everything went to absolute shit.
When the scream sounded, my heart almost stopped. It was a woman’s scream and all I thought was that I hoped it wasn’t Freya.
Ariel and I shared a brief look then headed for the stairs, which rise to the upper floor in a spiral with no visibility. I couldn’t see what was happening on the top floor but as I reached the top of the stairs, my breath caught.
Skye was down, blood everywhere as her throat was a ragged mess. Faith was the one screaming, her lover on the verge of death, no possibility of saving her. Hope was atop her, bloody chunks of meat grinding in her teeth while Faith screamed in blind grief and panic, frozen and unable to move. I guess the two women went to check on Hope and Jericho for some reason, maybe concerned about them because of noise as they were in the same bedroom.
When Nate and I examined the scene later, we pretty much worked out what had happened. Hope had, ironically, lost all hope. There was a bottle of pills virtually empty beside her bed and without doubt, that broken look that concerned me had evolved into full suicidal thoughts. She couldn’t face the world and her unhappiness any longer, no chance of a normal future ahead of her, and she just ended it. She clearly died in the night and then murdered her sleeping husband.
Faith and Skye were in the next room and must have heard the couple bumping about in the morning, gone to check on them as a pair, got no response from knocking on the door and decided to open it to see if everyone was okay.
That must have been when Hope lunged through the open portal, fixed her teeth to Skye’s throat and ripped out her jugular.
Even as Ariel and I watched in horror, Jericho—his belly chewed wide open to reveal a spill of intestinal loops—lunged after his undead spouse, clattering into Faith and bearing her down, his teeth savaging her face.
Fuck.
This was four undead now in the house and the door to mine and Freya’s room—with my little dude Particles in—was the one directly opposite. If she opened the door, there were four zeds in immediate lunging distance.
“Freya!” I roared above the din. “It’s Erin! Don’t answer, don’t make a sound, keep the door closed until I tell you it’s clear!”
The door stayed closed and the smart woman kept her mouth shut. Particles, as ever because he’s super smart when it comes to zombies, kept his little doggy trap firmly shut.
However, my bellowing from the top of the stairs drew every glassy eye my way.
“Ah, shit,” I muttered.
Guess where my loaded shotgun was?
Still beneath my bed. In a closed room. With four zombies now between me and it.
There was no way past them, so I had to draw them downstairs where there was space, then I could get up the stairs, get the shotgun and clean this unholy mess up.
It twitches my arse how fast some of these things reanimate. Hope and Jericho were the first to react to my voice, but it was no more than ten seconds before Skye twitched to life and judging by the god awful ruin of Faith’s neck and face, she wasn’t going to be far behind. All I wanted at the moment, though, was the fuckers to get away from my friend and my dog.
A door opened further up the hallway and Zion stepped out at exactly the wrong moment.
“What the hell is…?”
His sentence ended as Hope’s teeth drove deep into his arm. The timing was exquisitely bad, as Zion stepped into the hall just as Hope reached his door. He had no time at all to react and he unleashed a scream of pain—higher pitched than most girls surprisingly—before Hope ripped the chunk out of him. He fell backwards into his room, somehow kicking the door shut behind him.
Well, at least that was one less undead to deal with. Locking himself in his room as he died from his bite meant there was only four to deal with immediately, but fucking hell; we’d gone from ten spiritual lodgers to five in a minute. Freya was locked up safe, Ariel was behind me, Grace and Theo were in their bungalow away from the madness, which meant there was just….
Pax… Barclay… opened his door, just as a reanimated Jericho was passing by. I didn’t see what happened, because Pax didn’t get a chance to appear. All I saw was Jericho turn, his lips peel back, then he lunged through the open doorway. Gurgled screams followed and I nearly shit myself as Ariel hit a frequency of scream that could powder stone.
“Buffalo!” she screamed at a decibel level never achieved by the human voice until this moment.
Well, her buffalo just got served at an undead cook-out, and she lost her shit. I don’t mean just screaming with horror and grief. I mean a total psychotic break. She just screamed and screamed, her arms flailing like some demented puppeteer had got hold of her strings and was having a seizure. All the while she just screamed at that bone-jarring frequency, the sound like a rusty blade sawing down my spine.
I turned, wanting to get down the stairs, but she wouldn’t move.
“Ariel!” I roared. “For fuck’s sake, move!”
I was trapped between what was going to be a small battalion of five undead—once her buffalo was up and about again—and a screaming marionette. I wanted to make her come with me, but she was broken, I knew she was. She was just screaming in tongues, her eyes somewhere else, her throat tearing with grief. It broke my fucking heart, but I had to leave her. I pushed past her, tried to make her follow me down the stairs, but she pulled away, screaming “Buffalo!” in the midst of all her madness. She wouldn’t move and the undead yogis were almost upon us. The lips had started to peel back, the clawed grasp reaching out.
“Fucking hell, Ariel,” I almost sobbed. And left her.
The guilt of that will probably catch up to me at some point. I keep telling myself she was gone, she couldn’t be helped and logically, her grief was so spectacular, she’d have probably taken her own life anyway.
Yeah, keep telling yourself that, Lockey. That might make the guilt go a little quicker.
Fuck the apocalypse, man.
I hit the bottom of the stairs back into the open kitchen just as I heard Ariel’s screams gurgle and fade as she was assaulted by the zombies. I looked around frantically for a weapon, then stopped myself. Seriously, I couldn’t take that many undead in fucking melee combat and there was nothing heavy enough to swing. I wasn’t taking on five undead in a kitchen with a knife.
While my mind frantically tried to figure out what to do, I was drawn by a thumping behind me. I’d have laughed if my situation wasn’t so fucking dire.
Zombies aren’t too smart at coming downstairs. They just don’t have the coordination, so when Hope and her growing legion of undeath shredded Ariel, they all poured forward and a zombie avalanche came down the stairs, arse over tit, one after the other, piling up at the bottom. There was no way I could get past them to get back up the stairs, but I had a brainwave.
Now they were all down here, I could use my mad parkour skills to get back upstairs via the outside and get my shotgun. Brilliant. Go Team Lockey.
The shitstorm wasn’t finished though. Ariel’s ungodly screams were probably heard by Nate at the farm two miles away, so Grace and Theo had easily heard them. J
ust as I was opening the sliding doors to get outside, I heard running footsteps.
Grace and Theo’s bungalow joins to the main building and the door in is—yep, you guessed it—right next to the stairs.
Theo came thundering through the door at speed all wild-eyed and ran straight into the writhing undead mass at the foot of the stairs. He tripped, fell face first into them, and was summarily chewed in multiple places all at once.
“Oh, come the fuck on!” I roared in frustration.
Grace was just behind Theo and managed to stop falling into the mass, but like Ariel, her mind just fucking broke as she watched her testicle-faced husband ravaged like an antelope by undead hyenas, tearing bloody chunks out of him as the writhing blob of undead added him to their platoon.
She screamed, staring at the gorefest splashing at her feet, then a hand from somewhere in the writhing horror snapped out to grab her ankle. Jericho’s face slithered from the demonic blob of heads and limbs, tearing a mouthful of meat straight from her calf.
Just like that. In two gore-drenched minutes, the whole fucking lodge bar me and Freya were dead. It’s easy to see how the world got so boned so damn quick. Can you imagine this shit in a hospital? Man, that shit would have got exponential in no time.
With Grace doomed, I slid out the glass doors and ran to the side of the lodge, trying to figure out which window was mine.
“Freya!” I called out. I needed a little help. “Freya!” I didn’t know whether she’d be able to hear me, because holy shit, Grace was making as much noise as Ariel was. Absolute psychosis.
Lockey vs. the Apocalypse | Book 1 | No More Heroes [Adrian's Undead Diary Novel] Page 12
