Jez stopped walking towards Craig and seemed unnerved by the warning. "Behind his back? What like?"
"Dunno." The skinny man replied and walked around the edge of the ditch to get a better look. "Looks like a stick or sumfink. Can't see it prop'ly, to be 'onest wiv ya."
"Just stab the cunt!" the bearded man yelled. "Stop dicking around."
Jez took one step forward and Craig shook his head and said, "Don't do it." Craig didn't want to kill the teenager.
Craig relaxed his arms and revealed what was behind them. A carrier bag in one hand and a hockey stick in the other.
"What's in the carrier bag?" said the bearded man from above.
"Chocolate and some drinks." Craig responded quickly. "You can have it and we'll all go our separate ways. There's no need for violence."
"I think there is."
"Why? Our fight is with the dead, the Freaks."
"Not anymore." The bearded man stroked the whiskers on his chin and added, "They're just a nuisance now. It's survival of the fittest. And as far as I'm aware, you're outnumbered here and are in a slight quandary. We'll take your chocolate off of you, but Jez has a task to complete."
Craig looked perplexed. "And what task would that be?"
"Killing you." The man with the beard then began to laugh. "You're just a man that's in the wrong place at the wrong time. Nothing personal. It's just that this young man needs to do something if he wants to prove himself to us."
Jez looked up to the three men. He was clearly nervous and hesitant. He didn't want to do this.
"Do it now, Jez," the bearded man snarled. "Or there's gonna be two dead bodies in the next couple of minutes."
Jez ran at Craig and was immediately struck with the hockey stick that cracked him at the side of the head. Jez dropped his knife and looked unsteady on his feet. It wasn't as bad as it could have been, but Craig hit him again and took him out and watched the young man collapse to the ground. Craig then tried to scramble up the steep ditch, but was finding it difficult with his hands full.
The bearded man sent one of his guys, the skinny man, down the ditch to sort Craig out. The two bikers standing above began to walk away and the bearded man yelled at Skinny that they'd wait for him on their bikes once it was done. They seemed confident that Craig was going to suffer at the hands of this individual, which unnerved the thirty-one-year-old. Craig heard a groan and looked down. It appeared that the Jez character was still alive. Maybe he was just concussed.
Craig gulped and walked by Jez's motionless body, towards Skinny, who now had pulled out a knife. Craig had killed someone before, but he was still nervous. It wasn't something he wanted to do.
Skinny grinned at Craig, revealing a selection of rotten teeth, and tossed his knife from one hand to the next, almost playing with Craig. Craig was holding the hockey stick and this didn't seem to discourage the man, despite the advantages of having a longer reach, and the individual continued to advance towards him.
The skinny man giggled, "Man, I'm gonna fuck you up the way I fucked up that man in Slitting Mill. Him and his son."
"You killed an unarmed man and his little boy," Craig scoffed, but was angry that the individual responsible of two senseless deaths was standing in front of him. "Wow, you're such a big, tough man, aren't you?"
Skinny pointed the knife at Craig's face. He was three yards away. "You know, it's funny what we've become after just three months. Don't you think?"
"I don't think about it," was Craig's response.
The skinny man snickered and said, "Sure you have. Here we are, in a ditch, ready to fight to the death. Yet only months ago I was working in TGI Fridays, waiting on tables. What about you?"
"What's this?" Craig was confused by the man's ramblings. "Are you going to kill me, or tell me your life story?"
"That's not fair," the man spat, and now seemed hesitant. "You have that stick and I only have this knife."
Craig dropped the bag and hockey stick, placed his arms in the air and walked forwards, giving Skinny added confidence. "Happy now?"
Skinny laughed and lunged at Craig. Craig stepped to the side, grabbed the man's wrist, then put him in a shoulder lock, making the man drop the knife.
"What the fuck?" he cried. "You some kind of martial artist or something?"
Craig forced the man onto the ground, forcing his face in the dirt to muffle his cries, then picked up the knife and stabbed him in the back, through the heart.
He stood up straight and looked down on the man with sympathy. "Actually, I'm more of a Thai boxer," Craig announced to the now-corpse, panting hard.
More groaning came from the blonde-haired Jez and he began to move. Craig crouched down and put his finger to his lips, telling Jez to keep quiet.
"Jesus, kid," Craig laughed. "You must have a head like a rock."
Jez slowly sat up, started to rub his head and moaned, "My head is killing me."
"I'm not surprised."
Jez now began to rub his head with both hands, but suddenly stopped when he saw the body of the skinny man he knew simply as Hardy. He then looked up to see that the other two bikers were nowhere to be seen. Jez then looked at Craig in panic.
"Relax, kid," Craig snickered softly. "I ain't gonna hurt you. But I have to leave before your two friends come back. All you need to do is shut the fuck up and pretend you're out cold when they return."
Jez shook his head. "No. I can't do that."
"Look, kid," Craig laughed. "You're not listening."
"I can't do it," Jez repeated.
"You want me to kill you?"
"No, I don't." Jez shook his head and begged Craig, "Take me with you."
"What?"
"This was supposed to he an initiation test. I already failed when I refused to go into that house and harm that family."
"I saw what they did to the family. I stay not far away from them." Craig cleared his throat and asked Jez, "So, you wasn't involved?"
"No." Jez added, "It was disgusting what they did. There was no need."
"You must have been the guy that hung around the house." Craig remembered one of the men remained outside the house. It must have been Jez. Craig took pity on the youngster and asked him, "How long have you been with these guys?"
"A few days. They picked me up when I was on my own, minding my own business. Asked if I wanted to join them."
"And you said yes?"
"I thought it was a good idea at the time. They took me to see this man called Drake."
"Drake?"
Jez nodded. "Crazy bastard. You don't wanna know."
Craig grabbed Jez and helped him to his feet. They had been gabbing too long. "Come on then." Craig looked at the jacket that Jez had on. It seemed different to the one Skinny had on.
Noticing this, Jez told Craig, "It doesn't have WOE stitched on the back. Because I'm a newbie."
"Woe? Is that an acronym?"
Jez nodded. "It stands for—"
A voice from above, in the distance, interrupted Jez. "Hurry the fuck up, will you!" It was the voice of the bearded man and he was shouting at Hardy, the skinny man he sent down to kill Craig.
"Come on," Craig whispered to Jez. He put the knife into his back pocket, grabbed the hockey stick and the carrier bag, then helped Jez out of the ditch. They stood up once they were both out and their presence was clocked, from a distance, by the two men, both sitting on their bikes. They looked at one another in disbelief, then gazed back at Craig carrying the stick and Jez with his knife in his right hand. They rode away, not fancying their chances with a man that had just killed their associate that was known as Hardy.
Craig Burns was pleased with the response of the two bikers, as he was expecting them to come after the pair of them. Craig looked at Jez. He was rubbing his head and seemed unsteady on his feet. "You okay?"
"No thanks to you," Jez joked.
"I've made a decision," announced Craig. "We're going to go back to a house I'm staying at for tonight, only a couple
of doors down from that family your mates had killed, then we need to get more supplies. Maybe even move to a different place. And besides, you need the rest."
Jez held his hand up at Craig, turned to the side and threw up over the bracken by his feet. He spat a few times to remove unwanted chunks from his mouth, then rubbed his clammy head before straightening up.
"Sorry about that," Jez apologised.
Craig glared at Jez patiently and asked, "Finished?"
Jez smiled. "Must have been those two cracks to the head from that." He pointed at the hockey stick that Craig was holding.
"To be fair, you did come at me with a knife." Craig Burns put his arm around Jez's shoulder as the young man put his knife back into his pocket, and they both headed back to the house, back to Slitting Mill.
Craig and Jez's aching feet continued to traipse through the wooded area. Craig wanted to use the main road, but then later changed his mind. He decided that it was less hassle and less dangerous remaining in the woods, rather than being exposed and out in the open.
"Got any food back at this place of yours?" asked Jez. "My stomach thinks my throat's been cut."
"I've got scraps. But we now have this." Craig Burns held up the carrier bag, then coughed and spat to the floor. "I was thinking about going back to my own house tomorrow."
"Oh really. "
"Well, it's really a flat on Horsefair."
"Horsefair? What's a Horsefair?"
"You're not from round this area?'
Jez shook his head.
"Horsefair is the name of a road that goes by the town centre. It's nearly a two mile trip." Craig began rubbing the side of his itchy nose and grabbed a stray hair that was hanging from his nostril. He pulled it out and winced with some discomfort.
"Gonna go first thing?" asked Jez. "On foot?"
Craig nodded. "Don't have a choice in the matter. I don't have any wheels."
"Oh, bum flakes. "
Craig looked at Jez strangely after his unusual cursing.
Jez asked, "Will it be safe on foot, with the dead around?"
Craig guffawed, "It's not the dead I'm worried about."
They were near the house now, with darkness close, and Craig stopped walking and looked at Jez. "Any regrets?"
"Regrets?"
"About not killing me?"
"You were too quick for me." Jez blushed and scratched at his face. "Even without the hockey stick I think you would have done me. The life those guys live is too ugly for me. They're nuts, and that Drake person is insane." Jez looked around the area, pleased it was quiet and asked Craig, "So which one is yours?"
Craig pointed at the third house. "That one." He then nodded over to his right, to the house that Jez had been to with the other three gang members. Jez was too nervous and disgusted to do anything bad to the family. "Tomorrow, we need to bury that family," Craig told Jez. "I'm not leaving them in there to rot."
"Bury them? Where?"
"Their back garden. But first we get some kip."
Chapter Thirty
August 12th
Pickle woke up at six in the morning, brushed his teeth, then checked to see that Karen's room was still empty. He galloped down the stairs and exited the house. He looked over to the gate entrance and could see Jim Danson there, holding a bat. Pickle waved at Jim, but Jim stared at the former inmate and chose to ignore him.
"Suit yerself," Pickle chuckled.
He walked for a while and stopped when he was at the door of 6 Colwyn Place. He knew it was early, so he decided to peer through John Lincoln's window. John was sitting in his armchair and clocked Pickle straightaway. He rose from his chair and Pickle went back to the door, waiting patiently for the rotund fifty-five-year-old to open it. Once he did, Lincoln revealed a smile.
"Well, you're up awfully early," John cackled.
"I think yer know why I'm here," said Pickle.
"Let me guess," the large man spoke softly. "You want to go out and look for our three missing residents."
"Yer guessed right." Pickle nodded.
"It happens now and again," said John. "And besides, I thought you said that they'd be fine out there, with Vince and Karen's experience."
"The trouble is they have no wheels. It might be a simple case of driving along the Stafford Road and picking them up."
"That's if they're heading back this way." Lincoln scratched at his large belly and added, "So, is this you asking permission to take a vehicle out to look for them?"
"No." Pickle shook his head, a little annoyed with John's arrogance. "This is me telling yer that I'm taking a vehicle and I'm going out to look for them."
Lincoln's face developed into an angry one and gulped. "Don't you forget who took you lot in."
"True," Pickle licked his lips and added, "and let's not forget what Vince did to help yer make this community in the first place."
John Lincoln had no response for Pickle. He turned around and disappeared for a few minutes. Pickle wasn't invited into the house, so he stayed on the doorstep out of respect for Lincoln. John returned and gave Pickle a key.
He said, "Take the Range Rover."
"Thanks."
"I suppose you want me to go over to number two and get a weapon from the cellar, eh?"
"No, that's okay."
Lincoln never heard Pickle and sighed. "I'll get my shoes."
"Don't worry abou' it. I have that mace and ma machete in ma 'ouse."
"You're supposed to hand the weapon's in when you come back. Only the guard should be carrying. You do know that, don't you?"
"Kind of. But why? What's the point? A lot of others don't seem to bother nowadays."
"What if someone has a breakdown and goes mad and starts attacking folk?"
"Why would that happen?" Pickle began to giggle.
"Let's look at this fictional scenario." John cleared his throat and began. "Let's say that Paul Dickson and Derek Ferguson have a falling out one of the days. Derek and Paul end up in a scuffle and Paul stabs him."
"How come it's Paul that's stabbing someone in this scenario?"
"I'm just saying."
"Interesting thought." Pickle rubbed his stubbly chin and had a query of his own for John. "But what happens if the camp comes under attack and the people have nothing to protect themselves, because all the blades and bats are locked in the cellar of an empty house?"
Lincoln struggled for an answer.
Lincoln shut the door in Pickle's face, clearly upset that Harry Branston had made him look foolish. The former drug baron shrugged it off and was certain that Lincoln would be in a better mood by the time he returned with Karen, Vince and Stephen.
He went back into his house and grabbed his machete and mace that were in the living room. He exited the place and walked over to the line of vehicles that were by the wall and opened the Range Rover. He put the key in the ignition and got himself familiar with the controls. He turned the key away from him and the dashboard lit up. The vehicle had a full tank.
Before he could turn the key again and fire the engine, a figure from his right began making his way over.
He sighed and wound the passenger window down as Paul Dickson approached.
"How come you're up so early?" Paul smiled and joked, "You shat the bed or something?"
"No," said Pickle with a smirk. "I haven't done that in weeks."
"So what're you up to then?" Dickson asked.
"I'm gonna go pick up Karen and the rest."
"Great." Paul opened the passenger door and jumped in, shutting the door once he was seated. "I'll come with you."
Pickle glared at Paul and raised his eyebrows. "Er ... not sure if that's such a good idea."
"It's either that or I go for another walk over the wall."
"Yer didn't, did yer?" There was a surprised look on Pickle's face.
"Done it a couple of times." Paul raised his eyebrows and released a cheeky grin. "The boredom's killing me in this place."
"Yer carry on like
this and Lincoln will be puttin' yer under 'ouse arrest."
"I don't care what that fat shit does," Paul said. "The longer I stay here, the more I dislike the man."
"I think the feeling is mutual." Pickle smiled and started the engine of the Range Rover. "Yer may as well come along. Don't think I'm in Lincoln's good books anyway. And I could do with the company."
Paul joked, "Proper little rebels, aren't we?"
The vehicle moved and approached the gate. Jim Danson looked confused as Pickle stopped, and he approached the driver's side.
Pickle lowered his window and said to Danson, "Problem?"
Jim Danson was thirty-four years old, was of average height and weight, dark features and was married to a woman called Jennifer. They had been living in the street for years and had two children.
"Where are you going?" he asked with suspicion.
Pickle said with a straight face, "We're popping out to the shops. Need anything?"
Picking up immediately that Pickle was being sarcastic, the moody Danson huffed, "Does Lincoln know about this?"
"Yer saw me go to his house." Pickle couldn't understand why this man, who he hardly knew, was being so awkward. "How do yer think I got the key for the vehicle?"
"I better check."
Paul Dickson got out of the passenger side and went over to the gate himself.
"What the fuck are you doing?" Jim ran over to Paul, holding the bat in his right hand.
"Get it opened." Paul turned to face Jim, took a step forward and placed his forehead against Jim's. "We've got friends to pick up."
Jim began to shudder with nerves and took a step back. "I don't like the way you're speaking to me."
"Get it open, or I'll tear you a new arsehole."
Jim gulped and held his breath. He slowly walked away from Paul and went over to the gate. He reluctantly opened it, and Paul got back into the Range Rover.
Pickle gazed at Paul.
Feeling his look, Paul asked Pickle what was wrong.
"Yer have changed." Pickle pulled away and turned right at the junction, Jim slamming the gate shut behind them.
"Of course I've changed." Paul stared out of the passenger window and said further, "I've lost my entire family. That can fuck up any man, even a hard man like you."
Snatchers (Book 10): The Dead Don't Care Page 12
