Snatchers: Volume Two (The Zombie Apocalypse Series Box Set--Books 4-6) (14 page)

Chapter Twenty Eight

The padlock on the garden shed was a struggle to get off, but Tommy had managed to remove the door off its hinges with a hoe that was left abandoned in the corner of the garden. He stepped into the shed to see that it was nothing special. Like any other shed, it had garden equipment like an electric lawnmower, a hedge trimmer, strimmer, spade, rake and a shovel amongst other things. In the left corner of the shed were deck chairs, empty plant pots and a pink junior bicycle.

He pulled out the shovel and left the shed. He exited the back garden of the place via the gate that was available. He was now in a wooded area and looked around for a spacious part where there wouldn't be any tough tree-roots hidden, and began to dig at the soil.

Eventually it was going to be Megan's grave.

It was only right that she had a burial, and he couldn't possibly leave her in her bedroom, rotting away. She deserved better than that.

Tommy was planning on using the house, and hoped that he would ride this virus out until things began to improve. The other three, her family, that had been dead for weeks, were going to be dumped in the garden and covered up with whatever he could lay his hands on. He didn't have the energy to dig four graves, and he didn't want to create one large hole to put all four in. To put Megan in a hole with three ghouls, despite them being her family once upon a time, didn't feel right to him.

The digging process took about an hour, and throughout the digging Tommy berated himself for Megan's death. He had got up three times during the night because of his paranoia of them things getting in from the other room, but he never heard Megan creep in and take his gun. The guilt plagued his mind.

He patted the earth with the back of the shovel once he was finished, and whispered a prayer for the young girl. His eyes looked up as gentle rustles could be heard up ahead. His eyes could see a fox trotting his way down the dirt path, most probably up to no good.

His thoughts went back to Megan.

She was only thirteen, barely a teenager, and it still pestered him how a thirteen-year-old girl had managed to fire the damn handgun in the first place.

How did she know that in order to fire the pistol, the trigger safety and the trigger itself, must be deliberately depressed at the same time? If the trigger safety is not depressed, the trigger will not move rearwards and allow the pistol to fire. She must have been playing with it for a while. There's no accidental firing; if the gun fires it means the person has done something to make that happen.

After the burial, he headed back to the house to start the exhausting task of removing the three bodies from upstairs.

When he entered the kitchen, he grabbed a tea towel off of a radiator and tied it around his face to shield his sense of smell from the rotting corpses. He then went into the cupboard under the stairs and pulled out a pair of pink marigolds, put them on, and went upstairs. He never thought that he needed the marigold gloves when disposing of Megan, but these creatures had been dead for weeks and could be carrying all kinds of infections that scientists haven't even discovered yet.

He decided to go for the heaviest member of the dead first and dragged the man by his legs, his head smacking off every step as Tommy progressed to the bottom, his injuries staining each step with congealed blood. He was then dragged through the living room, through the kitchen, and eventually dragged outside and dumped in the middle of the garden.

Ten minutes had passed, and the mother had also been placed next to her husband. Exhausted, Tommy was relieved that he'd left the lightest to last, and once he had been disposed of, he took the tea towel and marigolds off and threw them on top of the corpses. They stunk, but at least now they would pong outside, and not stink out the house.

He waved at his face as a couple of flies had already turned up. He was amazed how quickly these vile insects detected a dead body and were now ready to lay their eggs in the eyes, ears and mouth of the defunct beasts.

More buzzed around him. Where the fuck did they come from?

He slapped at his face and finally turned around and headed back to the house. There was still one more corpse to remove. The family dog, Buddy.

He went back into the kitchen and checked the same cupboard where he had got the marigolds from. He pulled out a thick Lidl carrier bag and left the house to go round the front that faced the main road with the woods on the other side. He sucked in a breath and realised he should have kept his tea towel and his marigolds on.

He picked the head of the black Labrador by both ears and finally put it into the carrier bag. He tied the bag in a knot and walked round the other side of the house to throw it next to the rest of the bodies. Returning to the front, he bent down and took a hold of the hind legs of the dead animal. He dragged the headless body around to the back garden and put it next to the others, quickly walking away from the hundreds of flies that seemed to have come from nowhere.

With the noise of the buzzing coming from behind him, Tommy headed back to the house and locked the front door once he was inside. After throwing up in the sink, Tommy went upstairs and was overcome by the smell of death before he reached the landing. He needed to do something about that.

He took out all the supplies out of Megan's room, including his own bag. With her blood and brain debris spread over the wall, it was a place he didn't want to stay, and also didn't have the water to clean the place up anyway. He dumped his bag in the room he had slept in the night before, as well as the food and drink Megan had been living on, and finally placed the camping stove and canister into his new room on the bedroom floor.

He went into Megan's room and opened her small window to allow some air in the place, then left and shut the door. He never wanted to go back in there, and the parent's room was in an even worse state with the dead being in there for over three weeks, but he walked in to open their window as well, being careful where he tread. He didn't think the opening of the windows would be a great help to filter out the smell, but he needed to try something.

After he had opened the window, he carefully tiptoed out of the room, making sure the soles of his shoes never made contact with the sticky blood on the carpet. He shut the door behind him and headed for the bedroom that used to belong to Megan's brother. He closed the door once he was in, and had a look around at the teenage boy's room.

It was tidy, had a desk with books and a now unworkable laptop. And the walls had three large posters. The poster at the foot of the bed was of The Beatles'
Abbey Road
album. The other two posters were of two young attractive girls. Their names were at the bottom of the posters. Michelle Keegan and Sarah Riley. Tommy shook his head. "Never heard of 'em." They were probably dead now, anyway.

Although the two bedrooms were out of bounds and there was staining on the stairs as well as the areas where he'd dragged the bodies on the ground floor, the place was more than liveable, and a lot more attractive than staying in a cabin in the middle of the woods. Despite the unnecessary and tragic death of a young girl, he felt reasonably content.

Perfect.

Or was it?

*

Karen Bradley had finally made it to the top; she had almost forgot how difficult it was, and once she was there she sat down on the grass. She ran her fingers through her greasy locks and promised herself that the first thing she was going to do when she reached Vince's camp was to wash her hair.

She made an
O
shape with her lips and blew out some air, in an attempt to kill off the sickness that suddenly crept upon her. She had no access to pregnancy tests, but with her nausea and being late, it didn't take a genius to work out what was happening. She didn't know exactly how long she had been pregnant. She couldn't even remember the last time she took her period, which was acceptable considering what she had been going through in the last three or four weeks.

She placed the shotgun down on the grass, and stretched out her arms behind her back, clasping her fingers together. Once she stretched off, a chest stretch that she remembered from her gym induction many months ago, she felt a discomfort in her breasts. She touched them, and for the first time they were sore and tender.
Yep. Definitely pregnant.

Karen had been vomiting since the beginning of June, but she had put that down to shock, witnessing people being butchered, and the dead walking. She never thought anything of it, until her and Pickle reached Wolf's cabin and she began getting a metallic sensation in her mouth. The vomiting and tiredness never made her think that she could be pregnant, because now, vomiting and tiredness came with living in this new world for most survivors anyway.

She lowered her head and began to sob. Her shoulders shook up and down, and fluid from her eyes and her nose was escaping. She lifted her head and cried, "I've had enough! I've had enough!" She wrapped her arms tightly around herself in a desperate way to be comforted, and continued to cry for a further two minutes.

She needed reassurance. She needed words to keep up her confidence and keep her strong.

She needed Pickle.

Chapter Twenty Nine

The four pairs off feet walked along the rail track with high trees on either side. They approached the black and white signal box. It was like an oversized shed, and Jack managed a smile when his mind was catapulted back to his childhood for the second time.

Jack remembered the image of the large guy in the signal box, dressed in a grey uniform, running out of the small building. He could see himself, Ian Bolton and Jason Marsden running for their lives, but giggling at the same time from the irate man.

"Another few hundred yards, and we can leave the track." Vince called out behind.

"
Then
where?" asked Shaz.

Jack managed to respond before Vince. "Over a fence near the Churchfields Primary School, into an alleyway, then that'll lead us to the Horsefair Road, in the town centre near the clinic. But we need to be vigilant; I ran into a bit of trouble there about a week ago."

"The clinic?" Pickle screwed his face and looked at Vince. "Yer went to Stafford for medical stuff, but yer never thought to try the clinic only a few miles away?"

Vince began to chortle and said, "We tried the clinic in the first week, but somebody had got there before us, so we had to rely on small shops to keep us going with basic stuff like painkillers, bandages—the kind of crap you can get in a first aid box. Not much good if you have a resident suffering from high blood pressure or you have someone with angina."

"Pretty good of you to go to that trouble," added Shaz. "It was a hell of a risk going all the way to Stafford and back."

"Would have been good for yer image, Vince," Pickle teased somewhat, his tongue firmly in his cheek. "Going back to the camp, victorious. The hero returns."

"In hindsight," Vince began, ignoring Pickle's comment, "we should have stayed where we were, but what's done is done."

"Not long now." Jack pointed slightly to his right, and he was the first to leave the track and walk through the grass towards the fence. It appeared that
Jack
was now leading the group, and he was also the first to climb the wiry fence, seeing that the alleyway was completely clear of any dangers.

The other three soon followed, one at a time, and Jack continued to lead the group down the alleyway, his hammer now being clutched in his right hand.

"This is the hard bit," Vince said with a touch of negativity in his voice. Pickle thought that he looked apprehensive. "As soon as we get to the end of this alleyway, we're on the town's main road, exposed and out in the open."

The end of the alleyway was achieved with no fuss, and all four members walked along the main road near the large clinic. Jack looked down the road and knew that five hundred yards to his left was where Sandy Lane was blocked off. It was also the same area where he and Johnny Jefferson were being chased in the jeep by a gang.

Jack thought about when he drove the jeep into the horde as they were being chased by the Mazda. The men in the Mazda were dragged out of their car and torn to pieces. Jack and Johnny then drove a further two miles to be greeted by a roadblock on the Armitage Road. They had reached the camp. This was Jack's first meeting with Vince. He'd never forget his first words: "Alright, mate? How's it going?"

The group could see that a few bodies were scattered along the area, as well as a few crashed vehicles. Limbs were strewn across the road that were probably the result of the destruction in the first week. The smell of death in the air was repugnant, but it was something that all four had smelt before.

Vince ushered them to follow his lead and walked under The Arches, a bridge that the trains went across, and he suddenly stopped in his tracks and saw Jack was standing still, lost in a world of his own.

Jack could see the Globe Island and the Mazda still sitting where it had been forced to stop. Its interior was covered in crimson and a pile of bloody leftovers were sitting in two piles near the car, but not a single ghoul was there. Where did they go?

"Come on, Jack." Vince's voice echoed as he stood under the bridge. He could see that Jack was lagging; the group had been walking and Jack was yards from them, standing alone. Jack Slade was brought back to reality, an unwanted reality, and jogged lazily towards the three of them and pointed up ahead. "There's our first sign of trouble."

Two ghouls stumbled from around the corner of one of the streets, but their presence from fifty yards away didn't cause too much consternation. Vince looked at Pickle and Shaz, and said with sarcasm, "I believe the machete-wielding people of the group should sort these Rotters out."

Vince bent over and decided to tighten his shoelace, but his shoulder was quickly tapped by Shaz who stated, "I think we're gonna need a lot more than two machetes."

Vince lifted his head and saw more coming from around the corner, many more. The group remained standing, unsure of what to do next, waiting for someone to speak up and make a decision. The watching continued, and now there was at least forty of the hideous things coming towards them.

"Where to now?" Pickle finally spoke up. "Back to the rail track?"

"No chance." Vince was adamant. "There's another way to get to the camp than just along this main road."

"We can go the canal way." Jack spoke up. "Through the town centre, and walk along to The Ash Tree pub, where the camp is."

"Vince," Shaz said, unnerved that the group seemed to be dithering. "I think we need to go."

"Well thanks for that, Captain Obvious." Vince urged the group to follow his lead. He pointed to the other side of the street.

They ran across the main road with Jack looking both ways while doing this, forgetting that the road-safety routine was probably not necessary anymore. They approached a side road and spent two minutes running down it until they reached the back of the Morrison's supermarket, and could see a horde congregating on the car park. The group were only a hundred yards from the hump bridge where they would then veer left, down a small hill and onto the dirt path that ran alongside the canal on the left. The path was nearly two miles in length and would come to a pub called The Ash Tree pub, only a few hundred yards from the Plum Pudding pub and Spode Cottage, where the camp was.

The horde on the car park were considerable in numbers, and the group guessed that the reason for their congregation was that a kill may have taken place.

"It's the only way," Vince whispered to the group, and urged them to hurry.

Four sets of feet pounded the pavement, bypassing the crowd of the dead to the left of them, and their presence was immediately noticed by two beasts who began to give chase the only way most of these things could, by stumbling and shuffling not so rapidly.

Their interest in Pickle, Shaz, Vince and Jack had slowly caught the attention of the rest of the dead, and eventually the whole crowd were after the group. Jack looked over his shoulder and saw the one leading the horde was almost galloping after them, quite quickly. On rare occasions he found that some were quicker than the rest.

His first experience of this was his return to Rugeley, when he had managed to acquire a BMW motorcycle. On his way to Hazelslade he went through Slitting Mill and was nearly pulled off the bike, and as he quickly turned around he could see some actually running after him. This scene had frightened him to death. Most had the same speed, but on this occasion some were quicker than others. He had no idea of the reason, whether it had anything to do with rigor mortis, or it was because of the age of the ghoul. The longer the thing had been dead, the more chance they'd be slower because of muscle wastage. Or was that bullshit? He could only guess.

The group approached the hump bridge that they couldn't yet see over. Jack remembered when he lived in Rugeley, when he was still with Kerry before he fucked things up, that when approaching this bridge in the car, the driver would have to sound their horn while approaching, to let other potential drivers on the other side know that someone was coming. The hump bridge was only wide enough for one vehicle at a time.

Vince turned, noticing that Jack was looking behind him, at the gang from the car park. "Quickly now."

Vince was the first to go over the hump bridge, and the rest quickly followed. "Oh fuck!"

Eleven creatures were on the other side, and quickly went for them. Pickle looked behind him, knowing that the horde from the supermarket's car park were seconds from approaching from the other side of the hump.

"Bollocks," Pickle snapped, and took out his machete and began striking immediately at the eleven in front of him. Shaz did the same, hacking at anything that came their way.

Three fell immediately and Vince finally waded in with the claw hammer, smashing the head of one and kicking out in a desperate, but effective, way of pushing the rest back. Pickle also adopted this method and ran and front-kicked a heavy-looking ghoul that flew backwards, knocking over another two. Jack came forward and smashed his hammer into the head of a Snatcher, but the tool was embedded into the top of the cranium and the creature fell to the floor, taking the hammer with it.

After ghoul number eight fell, Jack turned around and announced, "We gotta get the fuck out of here."

Vince and Shaz were first to barge past the three remaining ghouls in front as the first few of the dead, from behind, slowly emerged over the brow of the hill, their atrophy making the task harder than it would be for a human.

Vince and Shaz turned left off the road and went down the short decline and under the bridge. They were now on the dirt path that led to the camp, with the canal to their right, anxiously waiting for the other two to hurry the hell up.

Jack ran at the three remaining beasts, but fell to the floor. He screamed out as the three encircled around him, and Vince reappeared from under the bridge and back on the road. Shaz was the next to emerge to help, but Pickle told them to get back and went over to help Jack up himself.

Pickle struck one of the ghouls with his machete, but it was a poor attempt, and all the strike did was bury the machete into the creature's shoulder. Shaz and Vince screamed at them to hurry up as the dozens from the car park were now over the hill, and a matter of yards from Jack and Pickle. Pickle released the machete handle, leaving it in the ghoul's shoulder and grabbed Jack and pushed him away into Vince's direction before he was grabbed and taken down.

All three turned on their heels, but Pickle had ran into some trouble. Vince, Shaz and Jack turned around and saw two of the ghouls take a hold of Pickle. The former inmate grabbed one of the dead by the hair and forced it into a head lock. Using his sheer strength, he slowly removed the head from its neck and immediately dropped its gnashing head to the floor.

And then they saw it.

While Pickle was busy with the first one, the second grabbed Pickle's shoulders. Pickle brought his elbow back into its face, but was grabbed again and the creature reacted quickly and took a hold of Harry Branston's left arm and went to sink its teeth in the forearm area.

"No!" Shaz screamed out. Vince physically pushed Shaz back and grabbed Jack and threw him down the decline. "What's wrong with you fuckers, keep moving."

Vince turned around and took another quick look and saw the teeth of the creature sink into Pickle's arm. Harry Branston struggled and looked behind him to see the rest of them were only seconds away. He glared at Vince demonically and growled in a voice they could all hear, "Run, you fool!"

Pickle was pulled to the floor by the horde and Vince looked away and ran back down the decline, under the bridge, and met up with Shaz and Jack, pushing them back. "Come on! They're coming!"

"What about Pickle?" Shaz was in tears.

Vince ignored her and yelled, "Let's fucking go, people!"

"We need to go back."

"Move it."

"You can't just leave him there."

"He's gone."

Shaz tried to barge past Vince, but was grabbed by both Vince and Jack. Jack held Shaz and pointed at the declining path. They were coming. The creatures from the car park were shambling down the dirt path to the canal and were heading towards what was left of the group.

Pickle had been devoured, but they wanted more.