The Undead. The First Seven Days (52 page)

  They place their assault rifles back in the Saxon and then walk with him towards the horde.

  The sun feels uncomfortably hot.

  The zombies have turned towards us and started their slow shuffle, but I parked well back, to give us time to arrange ourselves - so there is no immediate rush.
  The recruits gather round Dave, holding the knives self-consciously out in front of themselves, glancing at each other and at the horde.
  ‘Now you can stab them in the chest, but that won’t kill them - it buys you time and the weight of the thrust can drive them backwards - but it is not a killing blow. Do you understand,’ Dave asks and looks at them in turn as they nod. ‘The only sure way that I have found of killing them is the neck and head. Even after repeated stabs to the chest and abdomen they still fight back, so they don’t die like normal people - but they do bleed. The bleeding is different though, a few stabs that would normally render a man lifeless within seconds does not seem to affect them in the same way. The way round that is to cause them a massive loss of blood that even they cannot cope with. Now watch.’ Dave walks towards the horde holding his knives down at his sides, the nearest undead is an adult male, middle-aged and fat. He is wearing a pink, frilly dressing gown that is open; his wobbly bits dangling, as he shuffles along.
  ‘Now take it easy, Cookey - I know what you are looking at,’ Blowers mutters, to a few sniggers.
  ‘Yeah, you’re just jealous ‘cos he’s bigger than you,’ Cookey retorts.
  Dave turns back to look hard at the lads who fall silent under his intense gaze. Then he simply walks up to the zombie and stabs him once in the chest and leaves the knife embedded in. He quickly steps back as the zombie bares his teeth and lunges forward.
  ‘See here, this one is now stabbed through the chest with a long-bladed weapon. This would normally drop even the strongest of men, but he does not even flinch,’ Dave calls out and the recruits watch with interest as the undead continues to shuffle, with the knife handle sticking out of his chest.
  Dave steps in and stabs with the other knife, driving that one down into his lungs.
  ‘So now, he has two knives in his chest. I have punctured one of his lungs, but still he does not react, nor does he slow down,’ Dave points at the undead.

  He then steps forward and quickly pulls both blades out, causing the zombie to stagger forward a little from the pressure of the pull.
  ‘Now, a lot of the damage from stabbing is done when the weapon is removed. The embedded blade can cause a seal around arteries and capillaries and the removal of the weapon breaks that seal, but here we see that although there is blood loss from the wounds, it is far more reduced than with a normal person. Their blood congeals much faster than ours, which means that they can withstand injuries such as this.’ Dave turns back to the recruits to make sure they understand. Most of them nod and murmur with interest.
  ‘So, a stab will only be of use if it has a single purpose to drive them back, like this,’ Dave lunges with frightening speed and stabs repeatedly into the chest and abdomen of the zombie. His arms blur and although I have seen him move in several battles now, I am still amazed. The zombie is forced backwards from the many punctures and eventually falls down onto the ground. Dave steps away and faces back to the recruits, not in the slightest out of breath.
  ‘He is still alive, or dead… undead.’ Dave scratches his head and stares down at the zombie trying to rise back up. ‘Anyway, the repeated wounds have not killed him, so we have to look to the rapid blood loss.’ Dave steps forward and sweeps his blade across the zombie’s throat, stepping behind him and facing back to the recruits.
  ‘See the arterial blood spraying out? There is nothing known that can congeal, stop or replenish that amount of blood loss in that short space of time.’ The recruits watch the bright red jet of blood spurting out in waves from the throat, soaking the pink dressing gown and the ground beneath. Within seconds, the zombie rolls over and is still.
  ‘So, we go for the throat or the brain, but the brain is protected by the hard casing of the skull and requires a significant use of force.’ Dave steps to the next zombie and lightly taps the point of his knife into the skull.
  ‘The skull has to be thick to prevent injury to the brain, so here I am hitting the skull with light force, and other than causing minor puncture wounds, I do not affect the brain at all. Now… as I increase the force used, you will see that even a significant amount does not penetrate the bone.’ Dave keeps walking round the adult female zombie, digging the tip of the knife into her head. ‘Now, in order to penetrate and drive into the brain, you must apply direct force, do not sweep or slash. Drive the point of the weapon directly into the top of the head.’ Dave pulls his arm and slams it down, causing the knife to dig into the skull. Then Dave lets go and the body falls to the ground, with the knife still stuck in the head.
  ‘Blood is slippery and can easily cause you to lose grip on the handle, and you need a similar amount of force to pull the knife back out. You can see that with a wet handle and the weight of the body dropping, you could lose your grip and then have no weapon.’ Dave bends over and grabs the fallen zombie female by the ankle, dragging her over to the recruits.
  ‘I want each of you to feel how hard that blade is stuck in.’ The lads all gather round the female zombie’s head and take it in turns to pull at the handle; remarking to each other, in serious tones, how really hard it is stuck in there.
  This has got to be one of the most surreal scenes I have ever witnessed.

A group of eighteen year old lads standing round a dead zombie, discussing how well the knife is stuck in her brain, in a quiet village, in southern England.
  Dave then puts a foot on the zombie’s shoulder and pulls the knife out; then leans down and wipes the blood on the back of her nightdress.
  ‘Right, I want each of you to find a zombie and try it out,’ Dave says, as he cleans the blade.

  Blowers, Cookey, McKinney and Smith all move forward to do as Dave says. Tucker hesitates then he too moves into the crowd.
  I watch the lads dodge round and through the zombie horde and try to avoid their last second lunges. Blowers and Cookey both go for the same zombie and start arguing about whose it is, until Tucker grabs the back of the head and slices cleanly through the neck and drops the body, before smiling and walking back to Dave, leaving them both staring; open-mouthed.

  A determined look crosses Cookey’s face and he stalks off to viciously pull a head back hard and gouges down into the flesh, sawing away until he almost decapitates it from the body. Eventually, they are all dead, apart from the zombie child who drools and starts toward Dave. The rest all watch with mixed looks of horror and revulsion. Dave stares hard at the zombie and starts forward with his knives. Before he has taken two steps I have rushed in with the axe and sliced clean through the neck and the body falls slowly to the floor; blood pumping out onto the hot tarmac. I stare back at the recruits until they all look down to their feet or off into the distance.
  ‘It’s not a child any more – they are not people. They will kill you and turn you into one of them. Don’t hesitate next time.’
  I walk back to the vehicle with a mixture of feelings; guilty because it was still a child’s body and everything we are ever taught in life is to protect children at all costs; they are the future. Even though I told them it wasn’t a child, it has left me feeling numb.

The fuel gauge drops steadily and I realise the biggest flaw of having a vehicle this size is that the fuel consumption is so high. We will need to re-fuel before too long.
   Dave looks at me, having followed my gaze. I can see that he remembers the last time we tried to re-fuel, by putting diesel into a petrol only tank. We almost got caught by a massive horde as night fell.
  ‘Don’t worry mate, I’ll make sure it’s the right kind this time.’
  ‘Thanks, Mr Howie.’
  Before long, we pass through yet another village but this one is devoid of life. I slow down, so we can look closely, but there are no blood stains or broken windows. Nothing. This doesn’t feel right; every village we have passed through has had some zombies in it.
  ‘Who is on look-out?’ I call back to the recruits.
  ‘McKinney,’ Reese shouts back, as he is the closest to my end.
  ‘Ask him if he can see anything from up there.’

Reese stands up and speaks with McKinney, who yells down.
  ‘He said no, Sir. He can’t see anyone.’.
  ‘Strange,’ I say and Reese continues leaning forward to look out of the front window.
  ‘Certainly is quiet,’ Reese murmurs.
  ‘What’s up?’ One of them calls from the back.
  ‘We’re going through another village, but it is completely dead, if you’ll pardon the expression. There’s no one here,’ Reese calls back to them.

I hear more of the lads shuffling along to try and glimpse out of the front windows.
  ‘Can I open the rear doors to look out?’ One of them shouts, it sounds like Blowers, but he must be at the back and the vehicle is loud.
  ‘Good idea,’ I shout out and the message gets relayed.

I suddenly hear more noise from the massive wheels going on the road. We drive out of the village and into a country lane. There are wooden signposts stuck into the verge advertising a Farmers Fete this weekend. Then, as the road bends round, I see the top of a large white marquee in a big field off to the left. As we get closer, I can see the tops of cars and vans parked in the adjacent field and a gap in the hedge connects the two fields. The signposts indicate to turn left for parking and I slow down to try and get a better view, but the hedgerow is too high. I hear McKinney shouting and I decrease the speed even more, waiting for the message to be relayed.
  ‘McKinney says they are all in the field by the tent, loads of ‘em, Sir,’ Reese leans forward and tells me.
  ‘Well, we’ve got to have a look, really,’ I say to Dave, as I stop the Saxon.
  ‘There are bloody loads in there, Sir,’ McKinney says, as I clamber up onto the roof.
  I stand up and look over the hedge and see a large flat field with a big white marquee off to one side. There is a roped off circular central area and then some smaller tents and marquees round the outside. This explains where all of the village zombies have gone - they are all here. Hundreds of them have gathered in and around the large marquee. Hundreds of undead in various types of nightclothes or completely naked. From a distance it looks like some weird sex party or a fancy dress shindig, with everyone coming in their pyjamas.
  ‘Fucking, look at that,’ I mutter to myself. ‘You don’t see that every day, now do you?’
  ‘No, Sir,’ McKinney answers.
  ‘Well, we can’t stop and kill every zombie we see - but I feel bad if we just leave them here for some poor helpless soul to wander into,’ I say to McKinney.
  ‘Do you want me to use this, Sir?’ I look at McKinney and he taps the top of the GPMG.
  ‘Dave, how much ammo do we have for the GPMG,’ I shout down and then see Dave is already climbing up onto the roof.
  ‘Oh, sorry mate, I didn’t mean to yell.’
  ‘That’s okay, Mr Howie - we’ve got loads,’ Dave says.
  ‘All yours then, McKinney,’ I say to him and move off to the side, so I am well out of the way.

A large grin forms on his face and McKinney yanks back the lever and aims the gun into the middle of the horde. He the hesitates, for a few seconds, and glances at me again.
  ‘Mate, you don’t have to do it, someone else will…’ I say to him.

He shrugs and lets rip with the heavy machine gun.

The noise invades the quiet air and the zombies immediately start falling as they are torn apart by the heavy calibre weapon. The recruits all look up at McKinney and I know some of them will be jealous that he has the chance to use it and kill so many. Movement catches my eye and I see Dave waving at me, pointing to the GMPG. I shout out for McKinney to stop firing. Once silent, I shake my head from the sudden cessation of noise and look down at Dave. He has got a large metal container out from the back of the Saxon and opens the lid. The things inside are instantly recognisable, and I’ve seen them a thousand times on movies, but never in real life.

Hand grenades.
  Dave gathers the recruits round him, apart from McKinney, and shows them how to remove the pin and keep hold of the lever, then pull the arm back for a long throw. Dave leads them all up the lane and into the car park, then through the gap in the hedge, until they are in the field and staring at the already reduced numbers of the zombies.

I can see Dave talking to them, but cannot hear what he is saying - from his movement I guess that he is telling them to throw it far and then find cover.

There is a large tractor with an evil looking, giant metal contraption fitted to the end. Dave leads them all over so that the tractor attachment is between them and the zombies. He then pulls the pin out of his grenade and uses a big overhead sweep of his arm to launch the grenade into the middle of the packed crowd, shouting ‘GRENADE,’ as he does so.

The explosion that takes place a few seconds later is a lot bigger than I expected and I see several bodies blown up a few feet into the air and many more drop down from the shrapnel ripping through legs and stomachs.
  Dave then makes them all take turns to throw a grenade each and shout ‘GRENADE,’ as they launch it. McKinney and I watch with “…ooh’s” and “…aaah’s” like a fireworks display - as the grenades explode and cause devastation to the horde.
  The zombies closest to the exploding grenades are obliterated with each loud percussive bang. The lads finish lobbing their grenades and I can see that they are smiling and laughing at the carnage that has been caused.