They Rise (Book 1): Zombie Outbreak

by Morgana Wray

  I respired slowly and pinched my armband. With my eyes squeezed shut, I started to count. My heart wasn’t racing at high speed anymore. Calm had slowly been restored to me. When I eventually opened my eyes, I could see everything clearly again. The haze was gone.

  I pushed myself up to my feet. I could see the wreckage of the helicopter a few feet away. The crash site seemed dangerous. There were plumes of smoke streaking from the holes in the battered helicopter. I could smell fuel too as I approached the wreck. I knew the thing could blow at anytime. But my attention was focused on the plastic bag that was balanced on the lap of one of the occupants of the helicopter.

  My hands gripped the handle of the helicopter door. I pushed my body weight against the door and yanked on the handle. The damn thing would not budge.

  “Come on, you bugger! You have got to be shitting me!” Hot sweat streamed down my panicked face. “I really need that. I have got to get to that.”

  “Can you fucking hear me in there?” I bashed my hands on the door before me.

  The passenger in the seat slumped forward, bashing her head against the windscreen. Her face had been turned 180 degrees. Her neck must have been snapped backwards by the brute force of the crash. Her haunting gaping eyes were staring straight at me. Her mouth was agape and her tongue curled back in her mouth. It was an unnerving sight to see. My belly was in knots over seeing something like that.

  But that wasn’t the cause of her death. There were two bullet holes in her temple. She was already dead before the helicopter hit the ground. My earlier observations were right. It would have been a miracle if anyone on-board had survived the hailstorm of bullets that had been emptied into the crashed helicopter.

  “I need to get that open! Fuck! Fuck!” I cursed loudly, slapping my forehead with both palms.

  I was trying to rid myself of my frustrations. I kicked the helicopter door angrily. I kicked it three times before coming to the rational decision that going psycho at the door would not unjam it. I had to be more clever. I spotted cracks on the glass of the window. That was a weakness. I could exploit that.

  I wasn’t going to punch the glass. I could tell from the indents that it took considerable force to cause damage to the glass. The shooters must have used a long range assault weapon with very powerful ammo rounds. I needed something tough to get through that glass.

  “That will do!” I shouted to myself as my eyes fixated on something roundish.

  I grabbed the sides of the bloodied severed human head I had previously unceremoniously discarded. The flipping thing was snapping it’s jaws at me. The decapitated head had a hole in it’s face, with blackish juices dripping from the hollowed eye socket.

  “You dirty bugger.”

  “Let’s put you to some proper use, shall we?” I managed a vague grin, kicking the lower jaw of the head in the grip of my hands.

  The jaw was torn from the severed head in my hands very quickly. I had put in a lot of force behind that kick. Now that the threat of being bitten had been averted-I was free to launch an assault on the cracked bulletproof window of the helicopter.

  I took the one-eyed human head and bashed it into the centre of the spider crack of the bulletproof window. I could hear the sound of the skull fracture in my hands. The crack was barely affected by my new human battering ram.

  “This is not happening! This is not freaking happening to me!” I slammed the severed head into the crack on the glass even harder and with burning fury. “Come on.”

  I slammed the glass window harder. I slammed into it with the human head like a man possessed. The spider web crack in the bulletproof window got even wider. It eventually caved in after one final thump against the face of the cracked glass. By the time I was done, the face of the head I had used as a hammer was severely disfigured beyond recognition. I had never broken a face in such a violent manner before, and I had had my fair share of drunken pub brawls. I swiftly discarded the jawless human head, tossing it into nearby blades of grass.

  I shoved my hands through the window, pushing the dead woman’s body backwards. Her open eyes made me feel uncomfortable about doing what I was about to do. It felt as if she was watching me or something.

  “This is so weird. Now, don’t be looking at me like that. I need the stuff you have got.” I gulped down some spit. “Why am I even talking to a stiff? What the bloody hell am I doing stealing from the dead?”

  I was about to do something that went against my morality. As a Catholic, I had strong principles that I did not often stray from. I did not want to be disrespectful to the dead. I did not want to starve to death either. I did not want to leave a child to die. There was a first aid kit in there that could at least help with the bloodied mess on Diane’s arm.

  “You rest easy now. Nothing can hurt you anymore. You don’t need to see this.” I put a hand over her eyes, pushing her eyelids shut.

  There wasn’t the luxury of time to think. Instinct took over and I reached out, snatching whatever I could reach from where I was stood at the window of the smouldering helicopter. I had just pulled the plastic bag from the lap of the dead woman in the helicopter when I noticed the backpack on her back. I pushed her back and loosened the straps of the backpack on her. Pushing her on the side of her face, I noticed the other dead passenger. His face was masked by the helmet on his head.

  The guy next to her was impaled by one of the bent helicopter blades. His guts were hanging out. I did not bother with him. There was nothing on him and his hands were stiff on the controls of the helicopter. I felt some sense of empathy towards the guy. He died with a smile on his face. He must have really loved what he did.

  “That is some way to go-taking a big fat blade to the stomach.” I shook my head adroitly, snatching the backpack from the back of the dead woman in the helicopter.

  “This looks like the good stuff. I’ll save that for later. The doctor pepper will give me the rush I need. Definitely got to go for the doctor pepper,” I babbled a few words, twisting open the cap of the doctor pepper.

  I gulped down the contents of the plastic bottle in my hand and licked drops of sugary liquids from the tip of my lips. The growling in my stomach wasn’t so severe now. But I could still hear some slight rumblings. I was less disoriented by the faintness of the head that had caused some havoc to my thought process and my vision.

  I felt revived to the extent that I had almost forgotten about the death trap-the ticking time bomb behind me. Guess not having hunger snapping at your arse can make you a bit aloof and comfortable. I was comfortable in that moment, but I wasn’t that stupid. No one is.

  Precious supplies now secured, I was free to depart from the crash site. I could smell the fumes of fuel getting stronger. The fire on the tail of the helicopter had moved closer to the fuel tank. That dripping noise from the open fuel tank of the wrecked helicopter sent alarm bells ringing in my head. There was just one singular thought in my head-I needed to get the fuck out of there before the scrap of metal behind me blows.

  “Come on kid! We have got to bail!” I scooped Diane up in my hands, throwing her roughly over my shoulders.

  I ran as quick as I could with everything that I was carrying, the unconscious kid included. There were some faint rumblings behind me and then it happened. The helicopter blew up, letting out a very loud bang. My ears rang, as the force of the blast knocked me to the ground. I still had Diane on my shoulder. She landed on top of me. My back felt rather sore from being slammed to the ground forcefully.

  I had been flung several feet away from the blast. I shoved Diane gently off my chest. I could barely keep my eyes open. There was some dirt obscuring my view. I frantically wiped my face on Diane’s pants. They were less messy than anything on me.

  “You are going to love this, kid. Hopefully, you don’t peck at my head when you wake up. Here goes nothing.” I threw her head back, pouring some doctor pepper down her throat.

  There was some coughing. Then her blue eyes rolled open. Diane seemed d
isoriented and dazed. She looked as if she was completely clueless as to where she was.

  “What happened to the guys chasing us? How did we? How did we get here?” Diane gnashed her teeth in anguish, as she tried to push herself up.

  “Let’s just say that they can’t hurt us anymore. The bad guys are gone, kid.” I flashed a warm smile at her. “No sudden movements, okay. You’ll do yourself some damage.”

  Her eyes were angry. But not quite as mad as when we had just gotten acquainted. She raised her eyebrows scornfully at me. “Did I not tell you not to call me kid? I hate being called that! You make me so arrrgh!”

  “Glad to see you are in good spirits. We should head for the road. I can see it from here, now,” I spat the words out, avoiding eye contact with the fuming Diane.

  She reminded me of one of my ex wives. She was always in a foul mood. I never could quite work out why I got with that one. It must have been all those funny exotic things she did in the sheets. She was a sprightly Asian thing with a temper on her. I was gutted when she packed it up and left. I wasn’t gutted because she left. I was more gutted about how dull my bedroom life would become so suddenly. Or so I told myself.

  May, 2003, London.

  I remembered that dim, cool evening. The orange-pink sunset graced the edges of the horizon of the dull blue skies. There was nothing too remarkable about that evening. I had just done my last tour-some place in the far east. The exact country escapes my memory. I had just touched down at the airport and was almost home when the flashing lights of a signboard above a small restaurant hit me in the face.

  “Stop the car! I need to get out!” I yelled at the driver, almost kicking the back of his seat in excitement.

  “You want to get out here?” The driver spoke respectfully in a foreign accent that sounded European. “You pay forty pounds!”

  I pulled the cash out of my wallet and stuffed it in his outstretched hand. “Thanks for the ride, friend. I really am hungry for something that doesn’t taste like horseshit.”

  “You like Chinese then?” the driver’s coarse voice filtered through to the back of the cab.

  Jumping out of the car, I smiled gingerly at him. “I have never had Chinese in my life, mate. I am just a really hungry son of a bitch.”

  He had a gleeful look on his face as he drove the cab away, abandoning me and my light luggage at the doorsteps of the Chinese restaurant. I slung my duffle bag over my bulging shoulder and trotted past the front door of the restaurant. There was a strong smell of assorted spices wafting into my nostrils.

  “Gosh that is strong. Wonder if the food tastes as good as it smells,” I mumbled under breath.

  I didn’t think anyone had heard me. But a stern female voice soon jolted me. The steely, calm, raspy female voice came from behind me. She sounded Asian. That wasn’t surprising as I was in a Chinese restaurant. I turned back and there she was. The smallish lady with almond eyes that commanded such a forceful voice.

  “You have to try something before you can decide if it is good or not good. Don’t be a party pooper.” The smallish Chinese woman smiled at me as her roaming eyes glared at my uniform. “So you are a soldier?”

  “Uh, I didn’t mean it that way. The place looks good,” I apologized profusely. “Yeah, I am a soldier. I just came back into town and I saw this place while I was passing by. I thought I’d give it a try.”

  She batted her eyes suggestively at me and walked slowly and steadily away from me. I followed her lead instinctively. I could tell from her body language that she meant for me to walk behind her. I did get an eyeful. Her rear end was definitely rounded in the most alluring of ways. I fought back the saliva that was almost dripping from the side of my lips. I hadn’t been with anyone in two long years of hard fought battle in some God forsaken country.

  I wasn’t going to kick opportunity in the teeth and fuck this up. I had to be smooth and clever about how I approached this exotic flower. The smallish Asian lady soon paused abruptly in front of a table located in a seemingly secluded corner of the restaurant. She raised her eyes and pushed her lips apart. “You sit here. I will be back to take order.”

  She pulled my chair out for me and I pretended to lose my footing. I braced myself, deliberately placing my hand over hers. Our faces were close together. Her breath was warm on my neck.

  “So sorry for that. That was clumsy of me,” I did the best puppy dog eyes imitation that I could do.

  “You don’t have to apologize. I will be back to take order.” She withdrew her hand from underneath mine.

  The smallish Asian woman disappeared very quickly behind a curtain that was made of beads. I rubbed my neck and stretched out my feet. I thought that perhaps she had seen through my act and decided to deploy an evasive move. I had my bag of rotten tricks to pull chicks prepped and ready for deployment. I was sure that smallish Asian beauty must have encountered blokes like me that had pulled a similar stunt to mine in the past. She definitely must have had a steady stream of hormone-driven blockheads constantly hitting on her. Maybe I should just have simply told her that I wanted to get under her skirt. That might have been a way easier prospect than languishing in an obscure corner of the restaurant with pulsating feelings of sexual frustration rushing through me.

  I didn’t want to admit it to myself but I wasn’t sure that I had what it took to bag this Asian kitten. I wasn’t that smooth. But I wasn’t the type to quit without a fight.

  True to her word, the smallish Asian lady returned to the table. She had a notepad in one hand and a pen in the other. She tightened her face and proceeded to speak.

  “You ready to make order now?” her eyes beamed brightly.

  “Yes! Yes!”

  “I think I shall have the duck and some chow Mein! The noodle soup? Is that any good? Do you think I should try that?” I scratched the back of my head looking at her as ignorantly as I could.

  “Oh yes! The noodle soup is tasty!” the smallish Asian woman nodded concurringly. “You can have that with some spicy chicken.”

  She soon penned down my order on the notepad and hurried back behind the curtains. She did not return to my table. The food was brought to my table by a grumpy-looking bald man. He didn’t look too pleased to be setting his eyes on me. I was beginning to suspect that the smallish Asian woman had said something to him. I was beginning to suspect that he was her father, or a father figure of some sort.

  “Here is your food! You eat! You pay and you go!” the bald man shot me an unfriendly look before slamming his chubby fingers on my table. “Got it!”

  I looked at him with disdain behind my eyes. I didn’t appreciate his bullying tactics. Whatever he was. I was sure that he was an overpowering figure in her life, stifling any chances of progress that she might have had in this life which she had been flung into. I could see the signs. They were subtle but they were as clear as day to see if you were observant enough.

  “That lady? Did you slap her around in the back? Or maybe wrap those sausages you call fingers around her throat in the back when she doesn’t bow to your whims?” I raised my voice angrily at the chubby, bald man before me.

  “You are nothing! You will never be anything to her! So eat your fucking food and get out before I decide to break something and throw you out!” the bald man scoffed at me, dismissing my justified enragement at his appalling behaviour towards the waitress.

  I suspected he was a really bad man. He had proved me right with his threats. I could see the violence behind his dark eyes. There was nothing there but coldness and pure apathy towards anyone that wasn’t himself or did not look like him. Someone had to put that fat fuck in his place. Someone had to cut that ego of his down to size. I wasn’t going to back down. I waited for my moment. It was gifted to me quickly. I did not have to wait long.

  “People like you are just full of lip,” fat bald man laughed, as he turned his wide back on me and stumped away from my table.

  I plucked the hot noodle soup and chased after him. Plac
ing my hand on his shoulder, I shouted to him. “hey, pig face! I have got something for you!”

  The second he turned around, the hot noodle soup went flying in his face. Screams tore through his chubby lips. I decked him in the face and belly. He did not go down easy. To my surprise, the fat fuck charged at me and rammed my back against the wall. That hurt like hell. He nearly dislocated my shoulder. I was beginning to understand that he wasn’t joking when he threatened to break something.

  He wrapped his meaty hands around me and started to squeeze the life out of me. I could barely breathe. The air could barely squeeze into my lungs. Was this some sort of crazy karma? I didn’t get killed by bombs in the wars I had lived through but I was going to be squeezed to death by bald fattie here.

  I struggled. I struggled for my life to get out of his grip but it was no use. His arm felt like a damn machine crushing the life out of me very slowly. I was growing faint in the head very quickly as my brain got starved of precious oxygen. I was almost slipping away when I heard a bang followed by a thud.

  I fell to the ground. My eyes caught a glimpse of the person that I owed my life to. It was the smallish Asian woman whose honour I was fighting for. Turned out I was the one that needed saving.

  “Well I didn’t see that coming. Saved by a girl. It’s kind of kinky but embarrassing.” I coughed loudly, as I struggled to catch my breath.

  “You know what they say-biggest ones fall easiest.” Asian lady grinned at me.

  I scrambled to my feet and kicked the fat guy in the side of his bloated belly. He was knocked out cold but I was happy to get that kick in. That put a smile on my face.

  “Was he forcing you to do things? Things that you didn’t want to do?” I grimaced, putting an arm round her shoulder.

  “He was not a good man. I cannot say what he did to me. He knows people that can make life hard for both of us.” Asian woman wore an earnest look on her face. “You are hurt. You need hospital.”

  “This is nothing! What I need is a drink!” I flapped my hand around dismissively. “Do you have a name? What should I call you?”