Snatchers: Volume Two (The Zombie Apocalypse Series Box Set--Books 4-6) (55 page)

Darker days for everyone.

Chapter Fifty One

Pickle was taking a stroll around the camp, and could hear the engine of the HGV that was blocking the right part of the barrier. He reached the barrier area, and took a peep in the cab to see Vince and another man he didn't recognise. Pickle placed his hands on the back of his head and yelled at Vince to get out. He knew exactly what he was planning on doing.

Vince couldn't stop thinking about the abundance of food that was left in the hangar and the house, and with Gavin and his crew gone and some of the Rotters from the shed had been destroyed, it seemed ridiculous to leave the supplies there.

"Can't you just leave it?" Pickle yelled up, as Vince was trying to hopelessly manoeuvre the truck so that it was facing the Armitage way. Pickle could now clearly see the other man that was with him, but didn't know his name.

Vince shook his head and stuck his head out of the opened window. "I can't leave it. I'll be an hour...tops. You guard the barrier for now. I'll be back in one piece. No worries."

The HGV eventually moved away, pulled itself up the hill and entered the village of Armitage, leaving Pickle and the guards on the only remaining HGV, shaking their heads at his behaviour. They knew he was doing it for the right reasons, but thought his actions was crazy.

*

"How're you feeling now?" Karen handed Shaz a cup of water.

Shaz took the cup and answered, "Okay, I guess."

"We all get bad days." Karen then winced with guilt for what she had just said.
We all get bad days? She's lost her son, for Christ's sake!
Karen groaned, "I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking."

As if Shaz knew why Karen was feeling bad, she smiled and kissed her friend on the cheek. "It's okay. Don't worry about it. I feel a bit daft," Shaz spoke with a quiver. "I shouldn't have said what I said before."

"You were down...and no wonder, after what you've been through."

"I just miss Spencer. And my husband, of course. But it's Spencer's death that's tearing me apart. I try and bury it sometimes, but it resurfaces."

"Bury it?" Karen shook her head. "How on earth can you do that? Your child has only passed four weeks ago or so."

"In the early days I could do it," said Shaz. "In the beginning I was running around with a cleaver, going from house to house, trying to survive. But since I got to Wolf's place, and now here at the camp, I'm not as occupied and it's given me time to think more about Spencer."

"You need to grieve."

"I know." Shaz took a slurp of her water, then placed it by her side.

"At least you've got us." Karen the began to laugh. "I know that's hardly any comfort for you."

"I probably would have gone mad if it wasn't for you guys." Shaz then thought about the incident with Gavin and the shed. She then cast her mind back to when she was struggling with a small group of the dead at the Ash Tree. If it wasn't for Jack Slade, she would have been killed right there.

She was damn lucky to be still alive.

"It's no holiday camp," Karen admitted. "But things will soon settle down. We've come this far, haven't we?"

Shaz smiled and licked her top teeth. "Ew. I haven't brushed my teeth in ages."

"You manky cow," laughed Karen. "I can't really talk. I haven't washed in a while."

"I better ask Vince for some toothpaste, if he's got it." Shaz then looked up and saw Karen staring at her sadly. "What is it?"

Karen blew breath out of her mouth. She was becoming emotional. "Sorry. Must be my hormones."

"I wonder if—"

"I love you, Shaz," Karen blurted out.

Shaz smiled; the three words that had come out of Karen's mouth had made Shaz's eyes turn watery "I love you, too."

"You and Pickle are the only friends I've got left." Karen sniggered a little, clearly embarrassed. "If anything happened to you..."

"Nothing is going to happen. We've done our bit. How many women in the camp have had to fight to survive like we have?"

"To be fair," snickered Karen. "Most of the women here are pretty old."

"Anyway," Shaz began to cough, which interrupted her sentence. "we're into week five and we are still going."

"Exactly." Karen beamed, and placed her hand comfortingly on Shaz's. "And I've also made a good friend."

Shaz leaned over and planted a miss on Karen's cheek. "You're not just my friend. You're my sister."

*

The HGV effortlessly mowed down the crowd of the dead outside the hangar. Heads splattered as the front of the powerful vehicle made impact, and wheels crushed many others.

Vince turned to his colleague and announced, "I have no idea how many more are left in the hangar." His nervous colleague acknowledged Vince and caressed his shotgun, hoping that he wouldn't have to use it.

"I'll go around again and see if it entices more of them out. Then we go and load this baby."

Vince thrashed the vehicle and took a peep in the wing mirror. There were dozens crushed all over the road. He remembered that there was about seventy being cooped up in the shed by Gavin, and guessed that there should hardly be any left in the hangar—if there were still any left.

Once the large vehicle had completed the drive around the hangar, Vince could see that just another two had stumbled out of the large square hole where the automatic shutters used to be.

He pulled up the vehicle, jumped out, and removed the two fiends with his machete. His associate was next to jump out of the articulated vehicle, and began unclipping the curtains, ready for it to be loaded.

To the left of him, Vince noticed that there was an abandoned HGV with its curtains open. It looked to have a few pallets of supplies, and he guessed correctly that the driver must have been loading it before Karen had struck him, before she entered the hangar with her machete drawn.

Wiping three spots of dark blood from his face, Vince took a bold stroll into the hangar to find that only three remained. "Piece of piss." Again, these three were destroyed with one strike to the head each. The gore was predictably messy, but was something that he had been desensitised to weeks ago.

Vince knew that there was a forklift truck outside, but the problem was that three Rotters were skewered to the forks, which was down to him, so he decided to look for others that had enough diesel in them. He came across three in the hangar. The first two were flat, and there was one sitting idle by the empty canteen. Vince turned the key that was already in the ignition, and saw that this truck was also in the red. He tried to pull the vehicle forwards and grinned when it began to move. He decided to use it until it eventually died on him.

The forks went into the gaps of the first pallet. He lifted the pallet a foot off the ground, and tilted the forks so that the pallet wouldn't topple over if he had to make a sudden stop or went over a bump outside. He turned the truck around and drove backwards, looking over his shoulder, so he could see where he was going.

Some twenty minutes later, the truck had conked out altogether. Vince jumped off the truck, passing by the bloody remains of Gavin's sister, and headed for the large door that used to have shutters. He stepped outside to see that he had managed to place fourteen pallets onto the HGV. There was two left inside—not worth coming back for, and Vince was pleased with himself.

"The truck's flat!" he called over to his colleague.

The man nodded and began to close the truck's curtains.

"Right." Vince clapped his hands together. "Let's go home. I was gonna try the house as well, but this is enough." He looked at the wheels and the front of the truck. He winced once he could smell death. There was body parts and blood all over the front, and the tyres were caked in guts from the early massacre when Vince had ran over the Rotters.

Vince shook his head as he climbed back into the cab. "Gonna have to give this baby a wash when we get back. It's fucking dirtier than my browser's history."

Twenty minutes later, Vince had returned to the camp safe and sound.

Chapter Fifty Two

July 11th

The morning was just as gloomy as the one that had greeted them the day before. The clouds were almost black, and the rain came down at a moderate rate. Karen peered out from the window and had been awake for an hour. She was still dressed in the clothes that she had slept in: long blue socks, shorts, a green T-shirt that she had had on for days, wrapped with a smelly dressing gown. It wasn't her best look, but in the caravans it was cold on a night since the temperature had dropped a few days ago.

She walked along the cold floor, and slipped her feet into a pair of pink slippers her granny would have been embarrassed to be seen in. She then headed for the door, despite the falling rain, and opened it. She sat at the edge of the living room carpet and plonked her feet on the first step.

She gazed out, rubbing her tummy, and saw a young man with his hood up, walking by. "You not talkin' to me?" Karen teased.

The young man lifted his hood and began to snicker. "I'm sorry, Karen," David Watkins responded. "I was in a world of my own."

"Where're you off to?"

"Vince wants me to patrol the hedge?" He looked at his watch. "It's nearly eight."

"You seen Pickle?"

David shrugged his shoulders and puffed out his bottom lip. "I think he's being put on the barrier today."

"Oh."

"What about what Vince did yesterday evening?" David perked up, and there seemed to be excitement in his voice. "I can't believe he came back with all that food."

"Calm down." Karen huffed, "It's not as if he single-handedly killed the rest of those cocksuckers. He mowed most of them down with the HGV, so I heard."

"Still..."

Karen could see the admiration the young man had for Vincent Kindl, and it was making her sick.

David said, "You don't like him, do you?"

"He allowed your friend to die just days ago, with that stupid test of his. Why do you admire this man?" Karen waited impatiently for an answer, but once three seconds were up, she added, "Most of the hard work had been done. He just went in there, came back, and is now taking all the glory. Just remember where he was before I turned up."

"We."

"What?"

"You said:
I
turned up.
I
was there as well."

"Right." Karen didn't have the heart to tell David that he was about as much use as an ashtray on a motorbike, so refrained from hurting the fifteen-year-old's feelings. All he did was cry, whine, and throw up.

"It's freezing in here," whined Sharon Bailey from behind Karen.

"You're awake then."

Shaz was also dressed in a dressing gown, and sat next to Karen. They huddled together and Karen explained that she needed some air.

Karen looked at David with suspicion. "Aren't you going to be late?"

"Er...yeah." He stood staring at both women that were cuddling with one another, and stood motionless with his mouth opened.

Karen pointed at David and said with a smirk, "I hope you're not having sexual thoughts about us two."

"No," he protested furiously. "Of course not."

"If you go back to your caravan and smash one out with the image of me and Shaz,
I'll
know."

Young David blushed and put his hood back up. "I'll see you later," he spoke as he shuffled his way to the edge of the camp.

"You're a cruel bitch, Karen Bradley," Shaz laughed hard, tears were forming in her eyes. "That poor boy."

"At least it's got you laughing again." Karen placed her arm around her good friend. "So it was worth it. Come on. Let's get out of the rain."

*

"Where are you going, Branston?"

Pickle turned around as soon as Vince's voice bellowed from behind him, and could see that the man was joking.

"Just seeing how the father and young boy are doin'." Pickle peered into one of the windows of the caravan to see that the living room was empty. "Must be still asleep."

"Remember you're on the barrier in a few minutes."

Pickle nodded, and as Vince began to walk away Pickle snickered, "Oh, by the way. Well done on yesterday evening. Great job." Pickle began to clap and Vince started to laugh.

Vince lowered his head, almost shamefully. "I did tell the residents that Karen did the groundwork."

"Groundwork?" Pickle looked aghast. "She saved our lives. And yer lapped up the admiration when yer arrived back last night."

"Trust me." Vince smiled. "They'll all know by the end of the day."

"They certainly will," Pickle said. "I'll make sure o' it."

A man by the name of Lee Johnson walked by, and Vince called him over. Lee was a young man in his twenties, with dark features. He strolled over, and began speaking about something that was alien to Vince. "We're gonna get a guy to drive over to the Ash Tree, see if Colin's okay."

Vince looked confused, and then peeked at Pickle who also had no idea what the young man was waffling on about.

"Didn't you know?" asked Lee, clocking their puzzled faces.

"Know what?" Vince was growing impatient.

"Colin was due back ten minutes ago." Lee shook his head. "Jesus, the communication in this place is awful. I sent Dave to go and tell you."

Another individual emerged from behind the caravan. He seemed to have been running, and the sweat glistened on his forehead. The man was called David Chatting.

"Vince!" Dave called out, with what little breath he had left.

"It's okay." Vince held his hand up. "I already know. Fuck me, I really do miss the text message."

Vince announced that he'd check it out himself, stormed off and was called after by Pickle. "Yer want me to come with yer?"

"I'll go myself." Vince stopped in his tracks and stared at the three men. "He's probably asleep. If he is, then he's in big trouble."

"And if he's not?" asked Lee Johnson.

"Then he's probably dead," Vince said coldly, making both Lee and David's frames shiver with fright. "Then we're
all
in trouble."

Pickle smiled, thinking that Vince was being melodramatic. Vince turned his back and stormed towards the barrier.

"Wait up!" yelled Pickle. "I'll come with yer, whether yer want me to or not."

"Get your machete ready." Vince spoke.

"If yer think we'll need them," Pickle said, trying to catch Vince up, "then we should take more men."

"We'll see what the situation's like when we get to the top of the hill. We'll get a good view from there."

Once he passed the Spode Cottage and arrived at the barrier, Vince ordered the guards to move the HGV back. They did as they were instructed and Vince pointed at a yellow Ford Focus. "That'll do."

Both Pickle and Vince got in. The car pulled away and headed for the top of the road. The car stopped suddenly once it reached it, and both men stepped out.

"You have binoculars?" Pickle asked.

Vince shook his head, almost embarrassed that it was something he didn't possess.

"I can see four figures by his car. They must be Snatchers." Pickle stood with his hand above his eyebrows, trying to get a better look. "Maybe he's fallen asleep. I can't see if the doors are open."

"Colin's usually reliable." Vince sighed, "It's not like him to mess up. Let's go down and check it out."