The Undead Day Nineteen (34 page)

‘Wait for us,’
Howie’s voice panting from running so hard.

‘I can take them,’
Charlie says, counting the figures in the distance.

‘How many?’

‘Four or five…I can take them…’

‘Sure? Don’t be cocky…’

‘I’m sure. I can take them, Mr Howie. If it’s too much I will pull back.’

‘Go then…kill ‘em all,’
a growl of a voice that makes the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Jess rears, lifting her feet inches to slam back down as Meredith gives voice to throw her deep bark out in warning of what is about to come.

A twitch of her heels and they set off. Meredith and Jess shoulder to shoulder as they go through the gears to build to a sprint and Charlie lowers down with the instinct to let the horse go.

The noise is amazing. The sound of hooves thudding on grass. Five of them standing still and not moving.
See us. Come for us. Follow us.
It doesn’t matter that she plays into the game being set for them. All that matters is to be there to end them to stop them killing others.

‘Go then…kill ‘em all.’

‘Oh gosh this will never do,’ Reginald speeds up as Howie’s voice comes through the radio dumped on the table amongst the opened maps, sheets of paper, guide books and pens. The drone now forgotten on the floor of the van with the battery on charge from the 12 volt power supply outlet.

‘Are you okay?’ Kyle calls back having heard the mutterings from the back through the wedged open door.

‘No I am not okay. None of us are okay. We’re all fools rushing madly into something we know nothing about. I am most certainly not okay. Seriously, I ask you, how can anyone work in this situation? He goes charging off at the first sight of them and god forbid what the consequences might be. I do hope Charlotte is okay. I like Charlotte. She is a bright girl,’ he stands up then sinks back into the chair as he flattens the map out to view down at the town they are in.

‘The scale is too great,’ he huffs and goes back to the basic street map he found in one of the guidebooks taken from the golf hotel, ‘playing field…did Charlotte say she was on a playing field?’

‘She did,’ Kyle replies, holding the van at a low speed and following the bus in front of them.

‘Playing fields,’ Reginald flicks between the ordnance survey map and guidebook, ‘got it. We finally have a reference as to where we actually are in this awful horrid town. Let me see. This is the playing field but…oh gosh, oh gosh darned damn and gosh. What direction are we facing?’

‘I don’t know, Reginald,’ Kyle says, turning in his seat to look at the array of maps and books on the table.

‘
Anyone? What direction are we heading in? Does anyone have a compass?’

‘North east,’
Dave’s voice blares through as dull as ever.

‘Thank you, you are sure? Do you have a compass?’

No reply.

‘I think they are busy running,’ Kyle says.

‘North east, playing field is here and we are going to the side of it heading in a north easterly direction,’ he holds the blade of his hand down to align with the compass drawing in the corner of the map. ‘Right yes, going in from this side,’ he traces across the playing field to the other side and looks down at the densely packed lines.
‘Charlotte, it’s Reginald. You are heading towards the dead centre of town. The start of the main road through borders the edge of the playing field.’

‘GOT IT… COME ON JESS!’

‘Oh my,’ Reginald releases the long exhalation of air. The High Street runs at an angle away from the fields. A long straight Roman road that intersects another wide road that leads to the dual carriageway out of town and then all the way back onto the motorway. Fields and open land stretch out on all sides of the town. ‘What’s here?’ Reginald mutters. His eyes flicking faster and faster to pick out the signs for the churches, the pubs the Post Offices, police station, pharmacies. ‘Why are we being drawn here?’

Go back to the beginning and start again. The water was infected. People in the hotel drank the water and killed Neal. Mr Howie wanted to be sure it was the water so they found the treatment centre. Once that was confirmed, not that he needed to confirm as Reginald knew he was right but then people always want to know for sure, anyway, once that was confirmed he wanted to come into the town and warn any survivors not to drink the water.

The infection did not know where they were which is why it chose to infect the water for the whole of the area to target one man. Neal. Neal is dead so the objective is accomplished. He blinks and stands up to rub the temples of his forehead. The objective is accomplished. The infection has reverted to type and, knowing where the other survivors are, has set to infect and turn them. That’s it.

‘It can’t be,’ Reginald mutters, ‘that can’t be it…’ Why this song and dance of penises and body parts and bodies left lying. That infected man ran away from Charlie too. They don’t run away. They run towards to at least have a go at infecting someone. It might have got on the minibus or at least tried to get on the minibus. Why run off? This is a puzzle without a solution. He blinks and freezes. A puzzle without a solution requires a very advanced level of conscious intelligence. What came first, the chicken or the egg? That simple question has confounded scientists for years and still they cannot agree as to the answer. To even begin to contemplate the answer requires a level of abstract thought that the other player simply doesn’t have yet. He chuckles with the sudden thought of putting the infection in front of a Picasso and walking off as it crumbles to the floor in complete confusion of a mind so genuinely advanced that only those on the same wave length can truly appreciate it.

There must be an objective. What is the objective? What is the purpose of keeping Mr Howie and his intrepid exploring warriors so busy?

‘Oh gosh,’ he slumps into the chair, his eyes widening in realisation.

‘Going over a bump,’ Kyle calls out, driving the van over the kerb and through the smashed down fence already preceded by the Saxon and minibus.

‘
Got him.’

‘Yes,’ I shout with the others all grinning with malicious delight at the victorious tone in Charlie’s voice.
‘Well done, where are you?’

‘Playing fields, down the road on the left…there are more. I can see them on the other side of the fields.’

‘Wait for us,’
I speed up and breathe hard from the extra expenditure of energy.

‘I can take them.’

‘How many?’

‘Four or five…I can take them…’

‘Sure? Don’t be cocky…’

‘I’m sure. I can take them, Mr Howie. If it’s too much I will pull back.’

The sight of Charlie galloping out of the side road and turning so tight to give chase to the infected man running away is a sight that will stay with me in the catalogue of images seared into my brain since this all began. The axe swinging in her hand and her backside lifted from the saddle as she flowed with the motion of Jess banking at what looked like an impossible angle. Meredith couldn’t hold herself back and if I could run like Meredith I would have been up there with them. We all would have. The thrill of the chase is on us. The speed they went down that road was stunning.

We spared a second to view the body on the floor and the limbs ripped from sockets to point to a house that we ignore. Whatever is inside can fuck off. We’re chasing and not wasting time by stopping to look at dead dicks flopping about on the floor.

For a second I was going to refuse her request to go after them. Not being separated is our first rule now but this is different. Having a horse is a game changer and anyway, the tone of Charlie’s voice told me all I needed to know that she could handle it.

‘Go then…kill ‘em all.’
I turn to see Paula heaving for breath and Clarence bent double with his hands on his knees. ‘Paula, Clarence, on the bus. Everyone else ditch heavy kit. We’re going faster now.’

Bags get pulled from backs to be thrown in the back of the Saxon. The lads sweating with flushed faces but they’ve got legs left. I can see it. I can feel it. I strip my own bag off and ditch it in the back while glancing to Blinky who looks like she’s only just warmed up. She’s like Dave with a body already honed to physical supremacy with a heart, lungs and muscles used to sustained intense exercise.

‘Fuck me I feel two stone lighter,’ Nick says rolling his shoulders, ‘rifles or hand weapons?’

‘Hand weapons, Roy? You okay?’

‘I am,’ he replies, passing his bag to Paula on the bus, ‘be ready to feed me arrows.’

‘Will,’ she says, still gasping for air, ‘go…’

‘GO,’ I shout and we’re off. Running down the road feeling lighter and faster. The lads flanking the bus. Dave and Mo just behind me. Roy now running near the bus door. We pace into a stride just below a sprint. Legs pumping and eyes streaming tears whipped out by the wind rushing past our faces.

We reach the last house and the edge of the playing fields but have to go further down to get past the rows of vehicles still left in situ from when the world ended and the stupid twats stayed in their houses waiting for help that was never going to come. Only it was going to come. We were coming but the infection got there ahead of us. That thought drives me on and I aim for a gap wide enough to get the Saxon through and drop back to let Marcy punch through the fence.

She gives it some welly, not realising that speed does not equal power with the Saxon. A splintering of wood and I clamber after her as the bus comes next.

‘EMBUSS,’ Dave’s voice booms.

‘What’s that mean?’ I shout.

‘GET ON THE VEHICLES,’ Dave amends his order, ‘CLEAR GROUND. WE MAKE PROGRESS.’

He’s right. We don’t need to run to circle the vehicles now in such open land. Nothing can come near us without being seen well in advance.

We pile onto anything we can grab. I jump up to grab the open window sill next to Marcy. The lads pile into the back of the Saxon or get through the doors onto the minibus.

‘ALL ON? I lean back to make sure, ‘GO,’ I shout at Marcy who lifts an eyebrow.

‘I’m right here,’ she says, ‘ten inches from you.’

‘Sorry,’ I grin through the open window and glance ahead to see Jess and Meredith now at the other side of the playing field. A rush of emotion hits me. A rush of warmth at the sight of Charlie riding ahead and everyone caught up in the chase to kill infected. This is what it should be. Us chasing them. Not the other way around. We are the dangerous ones. We’re the ones that inflict harm. The living army. Fuck yes. I lean through the window to pull Marcy closer and plant a kiss on her lips as she turns her head in surprise. ‘I fucking love you,’ I blurt with a devil grin. This is what we were made for. To chase and hunt them down.

‘What the hell?’ Marcy grins, confused but glowing at the same time, ‘someone’s blood is up.’

‘COME ON…FASTER,’ I bounce on the spot, urging her to push on.

‘You’re nuts,’ she laughs but pushes her foot down a tad more to give the throaty engine in the Saxon a bit more life as Reggie’s voice comes blurting into my ear.

‘Mr Howie, this is the objective. There is no objective…I mean what we are doing now is the reason for being here.’

‘Not making much sense there, chum,’
I shout back over the noise of the engine and the wind rushing past my head.

‘Chasing them is the objective. We are being kept busy for the sake of it.’

‘For the sake of what?’
Clarence’s deep voice rumbles into my ear.

‘For the sake of being busy. We are chasing to be kept busy. The infection must be doing something else somewhere else. It must have a reason for keeping us occupied. Don’t you see? It fed us a few here and there yesterday to keep us heading in the direction it wanted us to go in where it was massing great numbers. This is a step ahead on that scale of thought process. To be fed and lured simply for the sake of it.’

I look at Marcy then ahead to see Charlie riding out of the playing fields to disappear out of sight on the other side, ‘
Charlie, report.’

‘Chasing…five…five running…I’m gaining…’

‘Bring her back, Mr Howie. We are chasing to no end. The people in this town are already dead.’

We can catch them. We can chase. We can be the hunters for a change and it feels good to be clinging to the side of a military vehicle leading a mini convoy across a field. It feels good to hear Charlie’s voice exclaiming in victory.

‘We must not do what is expected, Mr Howie. We must counter every move it makes. It’s a game of chess and we are going after the pawns to no avail. Call Charlotte back. Do not let the other player control you…’

Control us? Fuck me if that doesn’t have a sting in the tail.

‘
Charlie, back now…’
Paula beats me to the radio.

‘I can take them…’

‘BACK NOW,’
Paula shouts through the radio.
‘STAND DOWN, CHARLIE.’

‘…Standing down,’
I wince at the frustration in her voice as Marcy lifts her foot from the accelerator to let the Saxon glide to a long gradual stop.