Prey for the Dead [Book 3]

by C. A. Earl

  Grabbing the top of the barrier with one gloved hand, Chris leaned back as the first two zombies flipped over and somersaulted past him, arms and legs flailing. The third got stuck halfway, the top of the barrier slicing through its almost translucent, disgustingly bloated belly. A slop of internal organs and foul smelling soup spilled free as the teenager hooked the barrel of his rifle into its belt and levered the body over. Down it fell, a string of moss-green intestines trailing behind it all the way.

  Gasping, Chris did his best to hold on as two zombies fell past on his left, then three on his right. With no perception of fear and as uncoordinated as ever, they tumbled down the slope one after another as the sound of a rumbling engine grew closer.

  Bulldozing its way through the rear of the crowd, the bus mowed down a dozen bodies before swinging over to a flat area of waste ground on the other side of the road. The mangled corpses left in its wake twitched amid a flood of pus and blood as Chris heard the sharp hiss of the shutters opening followed by sudden bursts of gunfire. Quickly assessing the remaining numbers of dead, the teenager concluded that there were probably now less than ten although his vision was blurrier than ever. Maybe it was the sickness or maybe it was the goggles; either way it was becoming harder to see. The next shape to appear, however, was unmistakeable.

  Looming in front of the barrier, the huge dead form of Harry Skinner leaned over and reached for the youngster before pitching forward just like the others. Chris failed to move as the falling monster struck his left side, the impact dislocating his shoulder and knocking the rifle out of his hand while also sweeping his feet away from the ledge. Losing his grip at the top of the barrier, he lunged instinctively for one of the vertical poles at its base, holding on with his one good hand as an iron grip dug into the meat of his calf. He screamed, knowing that the giant was hanging onto his leg, the extra weight testing every ligament in his straining arm. Chris was infected, he knew that. He was going to die, that was for certain. Yet somewhere within him a spark of defiance remained; an unyielding will to survive. He would not go easily.

  ‘Chris!’ yelled Ben, firing into the final two zombies’ skulls and rushing up to the barrier. Only as he leaned over did the forty-year-old see the writhing figure of Harry Skinner holding onto the youngster’s lower leg.

  Raising his rifle again, Ben aimed directly at the groaning giant’s head. ‘I’m sorry’ he said, pausing for an instant before discharging a flashing burst of gunfire. Amid a shower of bright crimson, the one-time farmer’s carcass tumbled backwards into the quarry.

  Taking a step back and dropping flat to the ground, Ben reached under the barrier. ‘Lift up your other hand!’ he yelled. ‘Give it to me!’

  Behind his goggles Chris McReedy’s eyes were watering with pain. ‘I can’t move it! I think it’s broken!’

  Ben looked at the youngster’s left shoulder, noticing a telltale sag in the uniform where the top of his limb had been dislocated. ‘Okay’ he said, quickly forming a plan. ‘Let me-‘

  Then it happened.

  Just like that, Chris’ gloved fingers slipped free from the metal pole. One second he was there, holding on defiantly. The next he was gone.

  ‘No!!’ yelled Ben, squeezing under the barrier and scrabbling to the edge of the shelf, already knowing that there was nothing he could do. He stared down into the chasm, seeing that it sloped out like a ski run about halfway down. A thick canopy of trees obscured the very bottom where scores of dead and one poor teenager had ended up. Other than a wisp of dust rising from the shifted earth, nothing else could be seen.

  Ben gasped, gritting his teeth. He had been keeping alive a vain hope that they might be able to do something for the youngster; maybe find some stronger drugs that would be able to fight the infection. None of that mattered now. Pushing away from the ledge, he drew his body back under the barrier and retrieved his rifle before slowly climbing to his feet.

  ‘You okay?’ asked a female voice.

  Ben raised his drooping head to see that Paige Ryder was standing right in front of him. A dozen of the passengers were off the bus behind her, some of them dragging de-animated corpses across the road to add to one huge pile of mangled bodies. The bus’s engine continued to rumble away in the background and Ashley Layton remained in the driver’s seat, his eyes fixed straight ahead. Ben exhaled and focused on the petite girl in front of him before giving an unconvincing nod.

  ‘So what do we do now?’ asked Paige, her hands on her hips.

  It took forty-five minutes for Chris McReedy to regain consciousness. Lying still, he strained to listen as sunlight twinkled through the nodding trees overhead.

  Silence.

  Complete and utter silence.

  The teenager’s mask and goggles were still in place, but the latter were smeared with some sort of grey/green gunge. Moving as slowly and as quietly as he could, he raised his gloved hand and wiped the lenses.

  The side of his head still burned like crazy and his bones still ached to their marrow, but Chris quickly realised that he was able to move his left arm again. The impact of the landing had somehow knocked the shoulder joint back into place (although it was still tremendously sore). The merest hint of a wry smile danced over his lips.

  I guess you could say that was lucky.

  Gradually sitting up, the youngster slowly looked around, gasping at what he saw. He was on top of a huge mound of bodies, some of them dry husks of skin stretched over splintered bones while others were bloated, jellified things in vaguely human shapes. Directly below him was the enormous frame of one deceased, half-decapitated Harry Skinner. All of the bodies were unmoving; de-animated. Dead for good.

  His mind whirling, Chris tried to work out what had happened. These bodies were not (in the main) those that he had tricked into falling over the barrier.

  A closer inspection confirmed his suspicions. Four of the nearest, less putrefied corpses had bullet holes right between their eyes.

  This was a dumping ground.

  Climbing slowly to his feet, the youngster turned to look in every direction. A steep slope led out from the shadows of the trees and back up from where he had fallen. It was an impossible climb - even for someone not ravaged with disease.

  With left and right obscured by thick walls of bushes, the only option was straight ahead through a thicket and out along a muddy track; a track no doubt already traversed by the dead that had fallen into the quarry ahead of him...

  He paused for a moment before again scanning the mound of twisted, rotten limbs. There, just a few feet away, was the rifle. Crunching through a sunken ribcage to get to it, he leaned over and picked it up, only then noticing the rotting soup of stringy bile and zombie juice all over his black uniform.

  Suddenly, it all made sense.

  His unconscious, unmoving body, protected by the soldier’s uniform and covered in the stench of the dead, had disguised him from the other zombies. The mask was horribly claustrophobic but there were clear advantages to wearing it, not least that it seemed to filter out their unbearable smell.

  Then and there, Chris made a vow. He was dying but he wasn’t dead. Not yet. The rifle gave him the means to kill more zombies - or more soldiers – until his body gave in. Until he took his final breath that was what he was going to do.

  ~ 9 ~

  Katie Reilly bit her nails for the umpteenth time and stared out of the bedroom window. Nothing had changed in the last seven minutes; the front driveway was still clear.

  Stepping over the pyjama-clad child playing at her feet, she crossed the landing and made for the other bedroom, again heading to the window. The view there into the back garden was likewise unchanged - devoid of friend or foe - although the freshly dug grave bearing Sarah Janson’s body sent a shiver down her spine as it did every time her eyes fell on it. Walking back to the first room, Katie estimated that she had checked each window over thirty times.

  ‘When are they coming back?’ asked Cassie, looking up from her newly acquired
collection of toys. ‘Bella wants to know’ she added, holding up her favourite.

  Katie smiled and leaned against the doorframe. ‘Oh, does she now? I’m not sure, Cassie. Not too much longer now, I hope.’

  As the child returned to her game, Katie’s smile vanished. It had been two hours since the others had left, two hours since Ben had hugged and kissed her like he was never going to see her again. Two hours since he had told her not to worry.

  Fat chance of that.

  ‘Can I wear this today?’ asked the little girl, breaking Katie from her trance. Katie looked down to see that Cassie was holding up a powder-blue party dress with sequins and glitter around the collar and hem.

  The woman’s breath caught in her throat. Her mind flashed back to the small child first seen in the hotel foyer and then later at the train station. Ben had mentioned that he couldn’t stop thinking about the fate of that child, and now things were reminding Katie too. The dress that Cassie was holding was almost the exact same colour.

  ‘W-where did you get that?’

  Cassie pointed to the bottom of the chest of drawers and then looked up expectantly. ‘Can I wear it then?’ she asked again.

  ‘Uh, sure. But after you’ve had breakfast, though. You don’t want to get it dirty before the others see you in it.’

  Cassie nodded and then giggled. ‘Harry will be surprised, won’t he?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘So, can I have breakfast now, then?’

  Katie rolled her eyes but then chuckled. In a world that had descended into hell it was nice to be around someone who still showed enthusiasm for the most trivial of things - even if they were just a little kid. Taking her hand, she led Cassie out onto the landing and then down the big staircase. The little girl chattered all the way about what shoes would match the dress and what jewellery they could find to complete the ensemble. Slightly detached, Katie nodded at every suggestion.

  Heading into the kitchen, the youngster hoisted herself up onto a stool next to the central island while Katie opened up the larder door.

  ‘Okay Cassie, what do you want?’ she asked, scanning the shelves inside. ‘There’s still some of those honey loop things and some wheat crumbles too. I think you’re a bit too young for bran flakes.’ While the little girl considered her options, Katie folded back the cardboard lids on three of the packets that had been left open. ‘Harry, you greedy sod’ she mumbled, shaking her head.

  ‘Um’ said Cassie, staring at the ceiling while twirling on the stool. ‘Do we have any milk?’

  Katie appeared from the larder with three packets of cereal in her hand and a bowl of sugar. Shaking her head, she put the items down in front of the child and stepped back. ‘You know we ran out yesterday. Now stop twirling and make your mind up.’

  Cassie immediately ceased spinning and began staring at the packets in turn, assessing the merits of each potential choice. ‘Ummm’ she pondered, tapping a finger against her bottom lip.

  ‘We can use water instead of milk’ said Katie, trying to speed up the deliberation process. ‘It all tastes the same anyway.’

  This was of course a blatant lie, but the small carton of long-life milk that they had found on arrival was no more. At that exact moment, Katie wondered if she would ever taste fresh milk again.

  ‘This one!’ chirped Cassie, finally making a decision and pointing to one of the boxes.

  ‘Ah, Wheat Crumbles. A fine choice, Madame.’

  Katie took the packet and wandered over to the sink to find a bowl. Behind her, Cassie started to sing to herself, choosing a song from her favourite boyband. Katie chuckled at every incorrect lyric as she turned the tap on and waited for the water to clear.

  It was then that she thought she heard something.

  Quickly turning off the tap, Katie spun around and told the little girl to be quiet. ‘Listen’ she added with a whisper, standing stock still. Cassie fell silent and slightly tilted her head. Behind the sound of the water pipes there was something else.

  Something from outside.

  The sound of an engine.

  Rushing from the kitchen, Katie sped along the hall and into the living room, pulling the curtains aside to look out of the front window. Coming up the driveway with a cloud of dust trailing behind it, was a huge military bus. Katie’s heart began to thump as she quickly ducked out of sight, dropping onto the sofa below the window.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Cassie, appearing in the living room doorway.

  ‘Just stay there for a second!’ hissed Katie. ‘If I say ‘run’, then we head to the hidey place, okay?’

  Cassie’s lips trembled as she nodded nervously.

  Summoning up courage to look again, Katie peeked over the edge of the sofa. Ben had been very clear on what to do if invaders appeared; zombies shouldn’t be a problem if she and Cassie stayed out of sight. Enemy soldiers, however, were another thing altogether. The contingency plan was to hide upstairs in the oversized laundry cupboard on the second floor. Harry and Ben had removed a large piece of hardboard from one of the wardrobes and used it to fit across the space and create a false wall. Four feet wide, the gap behind was already stocked with bottles of water and a plastic tub of snacks. In an emergency it would hide them, if only for a while.

  Nearing the front of the mansion, the bus turned and pulled to a sudden halt, scattering gravel up from the driveway. Katie scanned the length of the vehicle, noting multiple figures behind the smeared windows. Looking toward the driver’s cab, she suddenly recognised the man behind the wheel and swelled with relief. Unmistakeable in his familiar polo shirt and chinos, it was the dark-haired Scotsman, Ashley Layton.

  ‘Thank Christ!’ she exclaimed, turning and almost flooring Cassie in her excitement to get to the front door. By the time she swung it open, a group of mainly elderly strangers had already begun exiting the vehicle.

  ‘Katie!’ shouted Ashley, dropping from the driver’s cab and slamming the door behind him. ‘Quick, get inside. I think a few stragglers are following us.’

  Katie looked past the bus and strained her eyes to focus. There in the distance were a small group of zombies, maybe half a dozen, shuffling along near the beginning of the driveway. She nodded and stepped aside as the passengers, around twenty of them, hurried past her and through the front door, weariness etched into every one of their faces. Ashley joined the end of the line and by the time he met Katie in the doorway she was looking around him at the bus.

  ‘Where are the others?’

  ‘Katie, I-‘

  ‘Tell me. Where are Ben and Harry? Where’s Chris?’

  ‘Katie...’

  Katie Reilly felt her legs begin to buckle and she staggered back, needing the doorframe to stay upright. Closing her eyes for a second, she exhaled through clenched teeth and then surged forward, grabbing the Scotsman roughly by the collar of his polo shirt.

  ‘Tell me!’ she pleaded. ‘Where the fuck is my husband?’

  Thirty-five feet away, hidden behind a long bushy hedge that flanked the driveway, the owners of three pairs of binoculars watched with interest and prepared to act. Unconcerned by the six zombies away to their left, they focused first on the windows of the house and then the empty bus, eventually turning their attention to the open doorway and the couple remonstrating in front of it.

  ‘That’s it’ said the soldier in front, waving forward the twenty-two men crouched down in a line behind him. ‘Go! Go! Go!’

  ~ 10 ~

  Ben Reilly lifted his head up from the long grass and looked through the multiple links of the meshed fence. A stretch of wasteland opened up in front of him, with another recently erected fence at the farthest end and a collection of large buildings and car park even further back. A smattering of black-clad soldiers, moving like busy ants, patrolled the area outside the biggest building of them all.

  ‘That’s it’ said the female voice next to him. ‘That’s where they are.’

  Ben looked sideways at the prone figure of Paige Ryd
er and then craned his neck to see over his shoulder, peering down a slope at seven others watching from the edge of a small wood. Two of the former bus passengers stood with rifles in their hands while the skin-headed Dave Tattersall, holding onto his newly acquired pistol, was at the rear of the group. Facing front again, Ben looked through the fence and refocused on the soldiers in the distance.

  ‘They might just shoot me on sight’ he muttered.

  ‘I don’t think so. Not if they know for certain that you aren’t infected and definitely not if our people see you first. If this bullshit cover-up is still going on, there’s no way those bastards will shoot you in front of them.’

  ‘Well if they do, I’ll be coming back to haunt you...’

  ‘Look’ whispered Paige, turning to face him. ‘This is our best chance by a long shot. What other choice do we have - wait for Ash to get back here and then just rush this place? We’d be wiped out in seconds.’

  Ben’s chin dropped. ‘I know, I know. I just don’t want to be the one that fucks it up...’

  ‘Stick to the plan and you won’t. Now, let’s go ove-‘

  A rustle of leaves and a low groan stopped Paige mid-sentence. She turned and looked down the slope at a lone zombie, grey/green entrails hanging from a hole in its belly, entering the thicket right next to her group of colleagues. They immediately scattered, moving out of reach as the thing, unsure of whom to target first, lurched from one person to the other like the key player in a game of Blind Man’s Bluff.

  ‘Shit!’ hissed Paige, fearing that their cover would be blown. ‘Someone’s gotta take care of that thing!’

  Right on cue Dave Tattersall nodded to his nearest ally, a straw-haired former social worker called Sam Rickard. Both men rushed at the creature, grabbing its arms and dragging it back while trying to stay clear of its clacking jaws. Once away from the entrance to the wood they threw the writhing body down. It immediately sat up, only to be smashed back again by the swinging butt of a rifle.