The Undead. The First Seven Days (64 page)

But the infection has evolved and learnt and instead of purging this body, to control it fully, it slows the rate of infection down and works slowly to infect it without killing it. The infection still pushes forward and slowly takes over the body, but it does so gently and re-programmes its own very nature.
  The infection is on the inside of this group now and it can wait.

The infection gains a hold within the brain and then uses the still living host body to watch through its eyes. It can see the resistors sitting to both sides and opposite - all of them are putting fluids into their mouths and making loud noises as they talk and smile. The infection can feel the vibration of the vehicle, through the body of the host, and can see through the eyes and hear through the ears - and it works hard to understand what it is witnessing.

The memories and images accessed from the billions of hosts it has already possessed make it easier to comprehend and the infection realises that it must stay hidden and be as covert as possible, while slowly taking this body over.
  Darren leans forward to ease a sudden dull pain in his stomach and looks to the front of the vehicle to watch out of the windscreen. The infection observes the one they called Howie at the front of the vehicle, operating the controls - the smaller one that does so much killing is next to him.

The infection sends no signals and makes no effort to control any part of this body. It silently slips into the cells and Darren shifts as dull pain hits at different parts of his body.

  ‘You all right mate?’ Tucker asks him, concerned at the look of discomfort on his face.
  ‘Yeah, I’m alright mate,’ Darren replies as the pain eases off and he settles back to rest on the journey, as the deadly infection quietly consumes his body from within.

___________________________________________

The Saxon Armoured Personnel Carrier moves along the now empty motorway, passing fields of wheat and crops left untended and wilting in the strong sun. The strong bright rays bounce off the bare tarmac, keeping a permanent heat shimmer just ahead of the heavy vehicle and Howie has to squint, due to the bright glare bouncing back at him. Beads of sweat slowly slide down his face and even Dave looks red in the face, for once.
  On a normal day, it would take only a few hours to reach London, but, without traffic, hold ups, accidents or the normal day-to-day congestion, they move swiftly.
  The rural fields slowly give way to the urban sprawl of Greater London. The houses by the side of the busy main roads are blackened from the constant daily smog of the exhaust fumes. The houses look rundown and uninviting, after the beauty of rural England – their fronts made even worse as the signs of devastation slowly start to appear.
  At first, they see doors hanging off houses and windows smashed in. Some of the buildings are burnt out and some still smoulder as the fire slowly eats away, threatening to flare up and re-ignite. As they pass further into the urban mess they see burnt out vehicles and signs of extreme civil disorder; debris litters the road and streets, the front gardens of houses have their contents strewn about and then the bodies start to appear. A few cadavers litter the roadside but, within a short distance, they increase dramatically. Bodies torn apart from horrific injuries tell a tale of extreme violence. Bodies still clutching bats, knives and sticks lie still in pools of congealed blood; swarms of flies buzzing round them and spreading disease from corpse to corpse. The rotting flesh is already falling apart and the rate of decay increases as the high temperature slowly cooks the bodies and provides ideal breeding grounds for the writhing maggots eating them away.
  The rats would have slowly eaten everything in sight, until just bones were left. But the rats were taken by the infection. The world’s greatest scavengers have been used up and now their bodies add to the decay.
   As the group venture deeper, the visible signs become worse: bodies everywhere and nothing is left undamaged. The area looks like a war zone, with the road pitted and scarred from running pitch battles - bodies left where they fall.

The Saxon follows a clear route through main roads and the numbers of dead increase with every passing minute.

The recruits all fall silent and lean forward to peer out of the windscreen at the horrifying scenes before them, even Howie and Dave remain silent and watchful as they pass through.
  ‘MOVEMENT,’ Cookey shouts from his position as look-out on the General Purpose Machine Gun, fixed to the top of the Saxon.
  ‘Where?’ Howie shouts back, easing some of the speed from the vehicle.
  ‘OFF TO THE RIGHT, SOMEONE SAW US, THEN LEGGED IT,’ Cookey shouts down.
  ‘Okay. mate,’ Howie calls out. ‘I suppose we’re going to see more people here. I think I’d run away too, if I saw us coming,’ Howie remarks to Dave, who nods back, but remains silent, as usual.
  The main road continues towards the City: traffic lights and pedestrian crossings now dull and lifeless.

Houses give way to cheap shops that could not afford the higher rent and rates nearer the City. These too have been looted, trashed and burnt out and the contents thought useless to the looters, have been cast aside on the pavement and road.
  ‘Fuck me, it’s hotter than hot,’ Howie says to Dave as he breathes in the heavy air.

The heat is made to feel worse by the increasingly oppressive scenes in front and to the sides of them. Thick black smoke plumes into the air from a raging fire that is off to the left, but still they keep going forward further into the densely populated City.
  ‘WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT,’ Cookey shouts down in alarm.

Dave leans forward and stares at an object leaning against a lamppost, further ahead, down the road.
  ‘Is that a body?’ Howie asks.
  ‘Looks like one, Mr Howie,’ Dave answers.
  ‘What the fuck…?’ Howie questions, as they draw nearer and get a clear view of an adult male hanging with a rope round his neck; the top of the rope is looped over the top of the street light curvature.
  ‘Is that a zombie?’ Howie asks, to no one in particular.
  ‘There’s another one,’ Dave points to a second body hanging in the same manner, but on the other side of the road.
  ‘Who’s done that?’ Howie mutters to himself.
  As the road sweeps round the next bend, there are bodies hanging from every lamp post; twisted and gruesome. Some of them are clearly undead from the state of their injuries and the sickening pallor of their skin - some are not so clear. As they drive on, Cookey looks to each body with morbid interest and can’t help but take in the macabre scene unfolding in front of him.

Fear creeps up his spine as he tightens his grip on the handles of the machine gun.
  ‘This is interesting,’ Howie says to Dave. ‘I bloody said it, didn’t I - every half an hour something happens.’
  ‘You did,’ Dave replies.
  ‘Someone has been very busy here,’ Howie says.
  ‘Some people… one person couldn’t do this,’ Dave remarks, as he looks to the bodies hanging high up the side of the lampposts.
  The road sweeps round the next bend, only for the scene to become more horrific.

A large, stately building is on the left, with wrought iron gates and an iron fence running alongside the pavement.

Each iron spike of the fence has a head impaled on it; a myriad of different expressions. One of them is even smiling - most have their eyes open – but not all of them have the red bloodshot eyes of the zombies.
  ‘This is fucking, gruesome,’ Blowers says, in the silence of the Saxon.
  ‘Where’s the bodies?’ Tucker asks, as he takes in the impaled heads.
  ‘The road signs are covered,’ Dave says to Howie.
  ‘What?’
  ‘The road signs are covered or painted over, look.’ Dave points to a large sign that once would have depicted the route ahead, but is now covered in a layer of black spray paint.
  ‘Same over there, Mr Howie,’ McKinney points to another sign off to the left.
  ‘Are you following the road map, Dave?’ Howie asks, alarmed that they will become lost.
  ‘I am,’ Blowers says. ‘We need to just keep going straight on and follow the signs for the City…’
  ‘Well, that might be a bit difficult now, mate - any other ideas?’ Howie says, calmly.
  ‘Just keep going straight, I think I know where we are on the map and we just stick to the main road. I remember they put the letter ‘C’ on the roads that lead into the City,’ Blowers says.
  ‘Well… what if they’ve covered them up too?’ Tucker asks, as the recruits in the back all stare at him.
  ‘What?’ Tucker says, looking back at them.
  ‘Then we just follow the covered up bits,’ Howie calls out.
  ‘Oh, yeah - course,’ Tucker says, sheepishly.
  ‘Why cover the road signs?’ Howie asks.
  ‘To make people get lost?’ Tucker states.
  ‘AHEAD ON THE RIGHT,’ Cookey shouts and they look ahead to see a junction on the right is blocked by several burnt out cars pushed end to end.

They pass slowly, expecting to see a barrier formed beyond it, just as Howie and Dave saw in Portsmouth - but the road is clear and empty behind the cars.
  Another junction on the left has the same thing, burnt out cars stacked to block the entrance. The Saxon continues on the main road and soon comes to a large roundabout with three exits: one on the left, one ahead and one on the right.

The left and right are both blocked up with vehicles. The road is wide and many vehicles have been pushed together, to fully block the exits.
  ‘Looks like they’ve been pushed there and then burnt out,’ Howie says, as he looks to the vehicles all melted and fused together, in one big clump.
  ‘Same on both sides,’ McKinney states.
  ‘Good job we need to keep ahead then,’ Howie jokes, but it falls flat in the tense environment.
  ‘Do you think this is being done on purpose to keep us going ahead?’ Curtis Graves asks.
  ‘They wouldn’t know we were coming,’ Howie replies. ‘Whoever has done this, couldn’t know we were going to be coming along today.’ Howie says, confidently.
  The Saxon keeps a steady pace, not too fast that Howie wouldn’t have any reaction time, but not too slow to make them an easy target either.
  ‘I haven’t seen any zombies yet,’ Howie says, after another few tense moments of driving in silence.
  ‘No, none.’ Dave replies, flatly.
  ‘This is getting creepy,’ Tucker says.
  ‘Getting creepy? It’s been fucking creepy for a long time,’ Blowers says. ‘Are you all right Smithy?’ Blowers adds, looking to Darren.

‘Yeah mate, why?’ Darren asks him.
  ‘You look pale mate, and you’re very quiet.’
  ‘Nah, I’m all right, just tired, that’s all,’ Darren says to him as the recruits all look at him with concerned expressions.
  ‘Honestly, I’m fine - just feeling tired. Didn’t get any sleep last night,’ Darren smiles.
  The lads all turn to face forward again and see more junctions blocked off with burnt and molten vehicles.
  ‘SMOKE AHEAD,’ Cookey bellows out and, within seconds, they see thick black smoke billowing up into the air further up the road.
  ‘Make ready with your weapons, make sure you’ve got magazines in your pouches and your water bottles are full,’ Dave says to the recruits.
  ‘Already done, Dave,’ Blowers says and again makes the word
Dave
sound like the word
Sarge
.
  ‘What is that?’ Howie asks as they drive closer and closer to thick black smoke.

A distinct smell hits them, before they get close enough to see what is causing the fire; a smell of roasting, rotting meat.
  ‘Ah… that’s fucking gross,’ Cookey shouts.
  ‘Tell him to come down and close the hatch,’ Howie calls out and the message is passed to Cookey who drops down and seals the hatch shut, with a sigh of relief.
  ‘That fucking stinks up there,’ Cookey moans, then takes a long drink of water.
  They reach the area of the smoke and see a large public park on the right side of the road; open gates leading into a big green area with football posts and a children’s play area. A massive mound is burning in the middle of the green area.
  ‘I guess that explains where all of the bodies went,’ Howie says, as they slowly drive by.

Dave rummages around the switches in the front and finally flicks one on, a whirring noise starts up and cool air is pushed out of the vents.
  ‘Ah… that’s fucking better,’ Cookey remarks, as he wipes sweat from his brow.
  ‘Is that to just circulate the air in here?’ Howie asks Dave.
  ‘Yes, Mr Howie.’
  ‘Not too long then, it’ll burn more fuel,’ Howie says, to groans from the lads in the back.
  ‘We don’t want to have to blow up another fuel station do we?’ Howie calls out.
  ‘Would it be bad if I said yes?’ Nick jokes, as the others snigger.
  ‘You’re all just delinquents,’ Howie replies, as they keep going.
  The Saxon continues on the main road, which goes into a nicer area with big, Victorian brick buildings on both sides; coffee shops and expensive boutiques on nearly every corner. Every one of them is looted and smashed in.
  The junctions are still boxed off and soon they start to see vehicles positioned on both sides of the road, end to end. Large vehicles, vans and trucks parked up and blocking both sides - just a wide single lane running down the middle of the road. The parked vehicles narrow the road and they see a large truck parked across the road ahead of them. The trucks on both sides now have cars stacked on top of them, forming high walls and a dead end ahead.
  ‘Perfect ambush position,’ Dave says, quietly.
  ‘We’re okay in here, aren’t we?’ Howie asks him.
  ‘From most things yes, small arms won’t be a problem,’ Dave replies.
  ‘What about the tyres?’ Howie asks.
  ‘Run flat,’ Dave replies.
  ‘Okay, at least we can back away, if we need to,’ Howie says, as he brings the Saxon to a halt a few hundred metres back from the truck parked across the road.
  They sit in silence.