The Undead Day Nineteen (21 page)

Sixteen

‘I got new socks…new socks so fuck you,’ the water sprays down with ice cold jets that send shivers through his body, ‘it’s so fucking cold…but I got new socks,’ he sings while he showers. He sings a tune of new socks and cold showers. ‘And all the ladies will see my new socks and be like
hey Cookey your new socks are so cool
.’ His voice lifts to high notes and drops down through octaves with a melody that lilts and tilts as his mind makes it up on the spot. ‘And I’ll will do my sock dance, yeah my sock dance and the sock dance goes like this…’ he jigs under the flow. Arms bent but in at his sides making circles as he weaves left and right in a disco funk of dance that will make the ladies love his new socks. ‘Oooohhhhh Blowers don’t have new socks and Nick don’t have new socks and Mo Mo Mo Mo don’t have new socks but me! I got new socks! Cos I got new socks on and I’m dancing…’

Nick and Blowers smoke outside with Howie watching Mo and Dave practise fast draws of their pistols from their holsters. Clarence cleans the GPMG in the back of the Saxon. A way of venting. Releasing the pressure. Each to their own. The day before was a day of magnitude and this time is needed. Paula organises. Reginald and Roy in their room talking quietly about books they have both read. Clarence’s hands work the moving parts, stripping the weapon down to brush through and apply oil. Blinky in the kitchen opening tins passed to her by Kyle and stirring pans of food simmering over the fire. Charlie in the shower of her room washing her hair slowly and enjoying the sensation of the cold water sluicing the grime and sweat from her body. Marcy next to Roy’s van using the wing mirror to pluck errant hairs from her eyebrows as she listens idly to Howie and the lads chatting, and while everyone finds something to do to let the tension ease out, so Cookey dances and sings his song of new socks.

They killed so many. They walked into something they should never have walked out off. The hive mind that only ever came on when Howie slipped into the most intense of emotions came upon them like a wholly natural thing. How do you process such things? How do you deal with what you witnessed, took part in and survived? You don’t. You pluck eyebrows. You smoke and chat. You clean a machine gun. You draw pistols from holsters and comment on the minutia of detail about grip and stance. You make lists of things people need or talk about books. You wash hair and lose yourself in the motion of a repetitious act you have done a thousand times before. You open cans and stir pans while listening to an older man chat amiably and you sing and dance about new socks.

In the corridor a man walks tired and sleepy, rubbing his sore eyes from waking to a new day. He is a big man, broad shouldered with heavy limbs.

‘Hey, you alright, mate?’ Blowers calls out. Howie and Nick both turn to stare through the doors at the big man they recognise from the night before. He looks awful. Rubbing and blinking the sleep away and still half asleep.

‘Coffee in the kitchen, mate,’ Nick says watching as the man waves a hand and walks on towards the main room.

‘Yeah so Cookey has a new dance,’ Blowers says, continuing his conversation about Cookey in the bedroom.

‘New dance?’ Marcy asks, staring at the tiny hair trapped between the ends of the tweezers.

‘New sock dance,’ Nick says as the others chuckle at the thought of Cookey. Clarence grins in the back of the Saxon as Mo and Dave both pause to turn and see what the others are chuckling about.

Blinky walks out from the kitchen to stare at Neal sitting at the table writing in a book. She watches him for a few seconds, staring intently.

‘What you writing?’ She asks without preamble.

Neal looks up blinking at the sudden intrusion as he puts his thoughts into words, ‘it’s my diary,’ he says politely and sees the sudden lack of interest form on Blinky’s face as she walks off.

‘Blinky, ask Kyle how many bowls we…too late, she’s gone. Neal? You should be able to use the bathroom in a minute.’ Paula smiles at the scientist and heads to the kitchen, her mind full of lists of things to do while she worries about having to feed everyone at the same time. ‘Kyle, how many bowls have we got?’ She asks, walking into the kitchen so full of smells of cooking and heat.

Neal goes back to his diary. Pausing for a second as he reads back over the last few words to regather his train of thought. Movement in his peripheral vision but the feeling of safety stops him looking round. His stomach grumbles in response to the smells drifting from the kitchen. His left hand reaches out for his mug of coffee that he picks up and lifts to his mouth while his eyes remain fixed on the page below.

The impact is immense. A big man running at full speed and with such force that it drives Neal’s head down into the mug that breaks into pieces that slice into his face as he continues the forced descent to strike the table top with a hard thud. Pressure on him. Forcing him down and it happens so fast his mind pays no heed to the shards of mug shredding through his cheeks and smashing teeth from his mouth and he only thinks of the spilled coffee ruining his diary. A sensation on the back of his neck. Pain. Intense and worsening as the teeth bite deep into his flesh. He tries to scream and only at that point does he become aware of the searing agony coming from his mouth that fills with hot choking blood. He tries to rise, an instinctual movement of a violent reaction to get away from the danger but the weight is so heavy it takes him from the chair onto the floor and it’s only when the chair is sent scattering away to bounce into other wooden chairs that Paula stops talking to Kyle and Blinky and turns her head to the kitchen door.

‘What’s that?’ She asks, ‘Blinky, have a look for me…Er, where were we?’ She says, turning back to Kyle.

‘I was saying you have enough food for three days after today,’ Kyle says, smiling as Blinky snaffles a biscuit from the side, ‘if you use this place again that is.’

‘Hmm, we probably shouldn’t but it is a nice place,’ Paula muses.

Blinky gets to the door but watches the plate of biscuits on the side. She glances back to see Paula chatting to Kyle and grabs one with a quick grin at Kyle who smiles back. With a mouth full of custard cream she pushes through into the main room to see Neal on the floor with a big man flat on top of him biting into his neck. Blood everywhere. The coffee mug broken on the table with blood covered shards on the floor. Neal thrashes, bucking to get away but the man on top attacks with demented fury. She doesn’t hesitate. She doesn’t flinch but spits the biscuit out and runs into the fray.

‘CONTACT,’ she bellows, spraying bits of custard cream from her mouth. That one word is the only thing she has time to shout as she dives into the back of the man with her hands balled into fists that whack punches hard and fast into the sides of the head. Beating harder and harder with enough force that would knock a normal person unconscious. He pays no heed but bites down harder with a terrible sound of gnashing and skin tearing. Blood spurts up from the wound as Blinky drops to force her left forearm under the throat of the attacker. He drives down harder, preventing her arm to get under him. She grabs the back of his head with a fistful of hair and wrenches up enough to get her arm under and through the gap of the crook of the neck. She clamps on, tensing hard and with every ounce of strength in her body she heaves away, pulling the body with her to roll across the floor. She clamps harder, her arm cinching tighter and tighter to strangle the infected from behind.

Everyone outside reacts instantly. Howie, Blowers and Nick dropping cigarettes and coffee mugs to turn as one and charge inside. Clarence ditching the gun to leap from the back as Mo and Dave sprint behind the three lads. The tweezers drop from Marcy’s hands as she bursts from the mirror of the wing mirror. Meredith explodes from static to full on running in a split second, her body low and streaking across the grass with lips that pull back to show big white teeth. The horse rears, the sudden motion of everyone making her startle. Paula in the kitchen spins from Kyle to charge at the doors with the cook right behind her.

Into the dining room they pour. Everyone running at the sounds of the fight taking place. Experienced eyes take in the scene in a second. Neal face down with a bite mark to the back of his neck. Blood on the table, the chair on its side a few feet away and Blinky flat on her back trying to grip a big man spraying blood from his mouth that bucks and writhes with wild thrashing side to side. He breaks free, rolling before surging up to his feet with a speed that belies his big size.

Dave draws, a blur of motion of his hand whipping the pistol from the holster. Howie, Nick and Blowers run in front of him and as he runs he aims, searching for a gap to fire. Mo goes wide, drawing his own pistol and trying to make room to get the angle to fire. Nick gets there first, one step ahead of Blowers and Howie and he slams into the big man at full speed. The big man takes the impact with a snarl coming from his mouth and awful red bloodshot eyes that blaze at the others coming at him. He keeps to his feet, ignoring Nick trying to drive him back. Blowers hits them both. His own form adding to that of Nick. Howie next and he slams in but the man is like a rugby player refusing to be taken down.

‘MOVE,’ Clarence bellows with the challenge set and made.

Howie, Blowers and Nick star burst away, sinking to roll to the sides as a big man hits a big man. Clarence lifting Anthony from his feet to carry him back through tables and chairs that get sent spinning. With a roar, Clarence lifts and dumps Anthony down onto a solid pine table that splinters instantly with over two hundred and fifty kilos of meat coming down with accelerated gravity. On the floor and Clarence slams fists down one after the other. The nose is broken and the jaw is smashed but Anthony is a big man and able to take punishment. He thrashes wildly, bucking so hard it unbalances Clarence. An arm lashes out, back-handing Clarence away who gets sent to the side. Howie dives in. His own fists hammering but he too gets pushed off as Anthony surges up to his feet. Nick goes for the legs but bounces off. Blinky goes in low then lifts at the last second to slam a headbutt into Anthony who simply swats her to the side and she sails off to scatter chairs and tables aside.

‘Fuck that,’ Marcy comes up short, veering off at seeing Blinky getting thrown.

Two things happen next. Two things that do not lose. One is Dave who, while running hard, re-holsters his pistol and draws a knife which he spins to hold with the blade pressed up against his forearm. The other is Meredith who not only saw her beloved Nick get hit aside but also her beloved Howie, her beloved Blowers, her beloved Clarence and her beloved Blinky. She streaks. A blur of black and tan with a deep snarl that resonates without fear. She goes high, launching from the ground with a mouth opening that clamps onto a neck and she drops, letting her body weight bring the enemy down but the enemy doesn’t go down and she dangles from his neck. Her own body weight supported by the grip of her mouth on the throat. She rags and thrashes to ruin the flesh that splits apart as the blood flows down over her muzzle.

Dave is next. Dave who vaults high with an arm outstretched that hooks round the top of Anthony’s head to anchor his own form that drops down onto the big man’s back.

‘Let go,’ Dave says simply, his voice flat and dull. A stab into the left eye. A stab into the right eye, blinding Anthony. ‘Let go,’ Dave says again, unable to cut into the neck with Meredith thrashing side to side.

Mo darts in. The opportunity is there. The legs exposed and he whips behind Anthony slicing through the Achilles tendons to the legs that suddenly cannot hold the weight of the body. They go down. Anthony with Meredith hanging off his neck and Dave hanging off his back and as they land so Dave steps away and stares down as Meredith finishes the job. Her paws now finding Anthony’s chest to gain traction and she rags the neck to bits. Biting in, wrenching left and right. Biting again and again as the artery is opened and the blood spurts far across the floor.

Paula, on seeing the others going for the attacker, heads straight to Neal. She gets to his side and rolls him onto his back. Her fear of the blood now less from the memory of her own mouth biting into the infected yesterday.

‘Oh shit,’ she gasps at the sight of the ruined mouth and the chunks of coffee mug embedded through the lips and cheeks. Teeth missing and blood spilling out from the holes. Neal chokes with an involuntary action as his lungs start to fill from the blood pouring down his windpipe.

‘Christ,’ Marcy at her side but she recovers her wits faster than Paula, ‘Neal…you’re okay….you’ll be okay.’ She gets to his head, staring down with an intensity as she cradles his dying form. Neal stares up. Conscious and alert to the spasms of pain running through his body. Blood seeps over her lap from the bite to his neck and Neal’s eyes fill with fear. This wasn’t meant to happen. He was safe here. This wasn’t meant to happen. Pain in his stomach and through the agony of the second his eyes go wide with realisation that the infection is inside him. He grunts, clutching the intense pain in his mid-section. He chokes again, coughing to get the blood from his lungs but it’s coming down too fast.

‘Cut me,’ Marcy wrenches her hand out from under Neal’s head and thrusts it to Paula, ‘cut me…DAVE CUT ME.’

Mo is there, running from behind Anthony to Marcy and his blade flicks across Marcy’s palm opening a wound.

‘Mo,’ Paula shouts, holding her own hand out. Another cut and two bleeding palms press into the wounds on Neal’s face. Embracing the man as he lies dying.

‘You’ll be okay,’ Marcy says, her voice soft and soothing, ‘you’ll be okay, look at me…look at me…’ Neal can’t look at her. Panic grips his body. Panic that tries to rid the fluid from his lungs and panic that finds his mind shutting down from the lack of oxygen and panic from the pain worsening in his stomach.