The Zombie Saga (Book 2): Burn The Dead (Purge) (9 page)

“What about the
uninfected?” Andrew asks. “Are we getting them out, too?”

“No. There’s no time. God
knows when it’ll be safe for Control to send a bus in here. Just make sure each
house is locked down, and concentrate on taking out the Necs.”

“Okay. No worries.”

The man points to a large
box by the entrance. “Take one of those with you. You’re bound to run out.”

I walk over to it, pull
the cardboard flap open and see that it’s filled to the brim with muzzles and
cable-ties. “
Bloody hell
, there’s a lot in here.”

“Well, you’re gonna need a
shit load,” the man replies. “As you can see we ran out of body bags a while
ago, so you’ll have to make do with what you’ve got. Just bag up what you can
and throw the rest on top.”

Andrew lets out a long
breath, clearly pissed off, and makes his way towards the entrance. “Fine.” He
then gestures with his head for me to go with him. “Come on, Cath. Let’s get
moving.”

I pick up the box, my mind
struggling to process what I’ve just witnessed, and what I’m about to do.

But still I find myself
leaving the church, behind Andrew, to round up a horde of flesh-hungry Necs.

As
the name suggests, The Mount is a steep street with a row of terrace houses on
each side. It stretches up further than my eyes can register, so I’m guessing
that there must be over a hundred in total.
We’re gonna need a bigger van.
To
the left of the junction is a primary school—the gates have been padlocked and
there are no obvious signs of life through the windows.
Thank God
.

Climbing out of the van,
gun gripped tightly, helmet on, we make our way to the first house.

“How should we do this?” I
ask Andrew. “One side at a time?”

“No. We zigzag. It’s
easier.” He points his gun to the first door. “Okay, Cath, we stay
methodical—start with number one. But more importantly, we stay together. Don’t
make a move unless I say so, or you have no other choice. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” I say with
haste.

Leading the way, Andrew
rings the doorbell. There’s no response. He pushes the button again, along with
a few hard knocks. Still nothing.

“Maybe they’re at work,” I
suggest. “It’s still early.”

“Might be.” He tries the
handle. It’s locked. He crouches down, lifts up the letterbox flap, and shouts:
“Hello. Is there anybody in? It’s Disease Control. We’re here to help.” He
listens out but hears no response. “Check the window, Cath.”

Knocking on the window, I
push my head close to the glass, but my helmet prevents me from going any
nearer. I almost pull the horrid thing off but don’t, to avoid a telling off
from Andrew. “Can’t see any movement. Don’t think anyone’s home.”

“Okay, next house,” he
says, letting go of the letterbox flap. “There’s no one here. And if there is,
then they’re safe enough.”

“What if there’re Necs
inside?” I ask. “Shouldn’t we check?”

“No. The place is clear.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because they’d be beating
down that door by now. The doorbell would have driven them out.”

“Oh, yeah. Good point.”

“Come on,” Andrew says,
“let’s just keep moving. It’ll be dark before we know it.”

The next house is the
same. Deserted. And the next. I’m beginning to think that everyone is at work,
or the Cleaner has asked us to sweep a street that has already been swept.

Andrew slams the side of
his fist hard into the door several times before we hear footsteps racing to
answer it. A middle-aged woman opens the door, her face a mask of panic. “Who
the hell are you?” she says. “You better be the police. I’ve called them three
times.”

“Madam, we’re not the
police,” Andrew replies, with conviction in his voice. “This whole area’s been
quarantined.”

“
Oh my God,
” she
says, bringing her hand up to her mouth as she gasps. “Why? What’s happened?”

“There’s been an outbreak
of Necro-Morbus in Crandale. So we need to check if your home is secure.”

“But what about the
police? And what about those people?”

“What people?”

“The people I called the
police about. Trying to break down my back door.”

“Is there anyone else in
there with you? Husband, kids, friends?”

“No, just me,” she
replies, shaking her head. “My husband is still at work. And my son is still in
college.”

“Madam, you need to let my
colleague and me inside your house to make sure it’s safe. Then we need to deal
with your intruders.”

“By all means,” she
replies, stepping to one side to clear our path.

I follow Andrew inside and
we sweep the house as fast as possible, making sure that every window is closed
and locked. More importantly, we make sure she doesn’t have any surprise
relatives hiding in any of the rooms.

Luckily she doesn’t.

In the kitchen, my eyes go
straight for the back door and the dark shadows that fill its glass panels.

“Is the door locked?”
Andrew asks the woman.

“Yes,” she points to the
top of the door. “Dead bolted.”

A fitting word.

“How many are out there?”
I ask her.

She shrugs her shoulders.
“Not sure. Maybe four or five. Hard to tell from here.”

I give Andrew a gentle
elbow nudge. “How about we check from the upstairs window. We may be able to
take them out from up there.”

“Good thinking, Cath.” He
redirects his attention to the woman. “Madam, I’m going to need you to go into
one of the upstairs rooms, out of the way. Any room with a good lock. Just in
case something happens. Can you do that for us?”

“Yes. Of course,” she
replies, trepidation in her tone.

The three of us exit the
kitchen, Andrew leading the way, the woman in the middle.

Upstairs, the woman locks
herself in one of the bedrooms. Andrew tries the door handle to be sure. We
make our way into a second bedroom, and take off our helmets, setting them down
on a wooden chest of drawers. Over to the window, which looks directly down
onto the garden, Andrew pulls the blind slightly to the side. I do the same at
the other end. Peering down I see four—no
five
Necs, bunched up outside
the back door. From here they look pretty fresh, most likely infected a matter
of hours ago—which makes doing this job all the more difficult. It’s easy not
to think of them as human when they’re looking like rotten monsters. But these?

Poor bastards
.

Taking a closer look, I
see that the group is made up of an elderly woman, three middle-aged men, and
one teenage girl. The elderly woman’s throat has been torn out; dried blood
splattered all down her beige blouse and blue cardigan. I can’t quite see where
the three men were bitten, but the teenage girl’s injuries are obvious; her
left arm is missing from the elbow down, fresh blood still dripping from the
wound.
Christ
, maybe one of those men is her father.
And
the
culprit.

I feel sick to my stomach
just thinking about it.

“Can you climb up on
that?” Andrew asks, pointing down at the thin, plastic windowsill, barely wide
enough to hold even
my
foot. “I’m too heavy. I’ll break it.”

“I’ll give it a go.”

Using the wall for
support, I step up onto the windowsill. I slowly and quietly open the small
window at the top of the glass, and then push my head through the gap.

I can hear the moans of
the five Necs below.

“Do you think you can get
a good shot from there?” Andrew asks.

“Yeah. I should do, just
about.”

Pulling my gun out of the
holster, I bring it up high and squeeze my arm through. Thoughts of dropping it
down to the garden fill my head. Even though I can’t properly line up the
sight, I still try to aim the gun as best I can. I fire off the first shot; it
hits a man’s skull. Thank God the tranqs come out silent. Only the sound of the
Nec falling onto the paving prompts any reaction, just a few additional moans.
I fire another, this time hitting the elderly woman in the temple. Then the two
other men. For some reason, I leave the teenage girl until last.
God knows
why
. What difference does it make? Something inside tells me to spare
her—if only for a few seconds.

Andrew takes hold of my
hand and helps me back down onto the carpet. “Nice work, Cath,” he says, with a
big smile on his face. “Great shooting.”

“Glad my measly frame
could come in use.”

“Exactly. A fat bastard
like me would’ve never got a clean shot through that tiny gap. Not in a million
years. None of the guys for that matter.”

“Thanks, Andrew.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Helmets on, we walk back
down into the kitchen. Time for the clean up.

Even though all five Necs
are sedated, Andrew still opens the back door with caution, gun pointed out in
front, ready to take out any hidden Necs. Outside, there’s a small mass of
bodies, laid out on the paving and well-kept lawn.

Surprisingly, I somehow
managed to strap the muzzle on the elderly woman and one of the men without
flinching too much. It’s getting easier. But Andrew securing the teenage girl
definitely helped.

We haul the bagged-up
bodies through the house and into the back of the van. Andrew makes sure that
the house stays locked down, and the woman remains inside.

On to the next house.

We lock down the next six
houses. No Necs, apart from three roamers coming up from Richmond. Andrew takes
care of them, and we load them into the van.

The street lamps come on
in unison as the winter sun starts to set, leaving the sky an orangey brown. It
fills me with such dread, such uneasiness, because the night is just around the
corner, and the darkness will only make matters worse.

By the forty-seventh
house, the van is getting pretty full, with everything from street and garden
roamers, to family members bitten, turned and lost in their own living rooms.
Such a vile, disturbing thing to witness, to be a part of. I know it’s an
important, worthwhile job, but it still doesn’t make it any easier. As we climb
The Mount, house by house, I forcefully put myself into a numb, protective
state. It’s an easier task standing behind Andrew—let him take the full extent
of mental torture. Let him be the bars of the cage that shield me from the
horror. He’s been here a million times before.

Andrew drives the van a
little further up the street; the engine straining from the weight of bodies.
Can’t see us filling it much more. There’s got to be at least thirty detained
Necs stacked up in the back, with only about half in body bags.

“Another four houses,”
Andrew says, stopping the van, “and we’ll head back to the church to drop ‘em
off.” He slips his helmet back on. “With a bit of luck the lorry’s already
turned up, cleared some of those Necs. Hate to see so many in one place. Looks
unprofessional if you ask me—especially without bloody body bags. Typical
Bristol-lot; can’t keep their Necs in order.”

“Where the hell is our
backup?” I ask. “Shouldn’t the bus be here by now? Help clear these people
out?”

Andrew climbs out of the
van. “I don’t know, Cath. It may not be ‘til morning, or at least when we clear
the church. There’s just too many of them. It’s still too dangerous for them to
get in.”

I shake my head in
disbelief. “I just hate to think of all those families locked up in their
homes, terrified, not knowing when help will arrive.”

“Better than being out
here,” he points out as he knocks the door. No one answers, so we cross the
road to try the opposite house. “I hate it as much as you, Cath. And I hate
being in such a fucked up situation. I’ve never seen such a big outbreak since
the stadium incident.” Just as he’s about to pound his fist on the door, he
stops.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

“Door’s ajar.”

My heart beating faster, I
follow Andrew into the house, guns at the ready, fully expecting to find the
worst. Even though it’s nearly dark, the hallway lights are off, which could
mean that no one’s in, or most likely, whatever happened here happened before
sundown. There’s just enough light to see, but easier for a pack of Necs to be
lurking in the shadows. He switches on the small torch attached to the top of
his gun, and a thin beam comes shooting out the front. I do the same, and the
light offers just a little more security. Poking his head into the living room,
Andrew scans for any Necs. He then stands by the foot of the stairs and pauses
for a moment.

“What’s wrong?” I whisper.

“Listening for movement
upstairs,” he whispers back.

I nod, and listen as well.
After a few seconds of silence, he leads me back down the hallway towards a
door, most likely the kitchen. Just as he’s about to open it, we hear footsteps
directly above us. My body clenches up as Andrew pushes past me, heading for
the stairs. We slink up each creaky step, praying that we don’t draw any
unwanted interest. At the top, we walk over to the first door. Andrew pushes it
with the tip of his gun. It squeaks open, and I see that it’s a child’s
bedroom, most likely a little boy from the posters of
Ninja Turtles
on
the light-blue painted walls. Andrew steps inside, kneels down and checks under
the bed. I open the wardrobe doors, only to find hanging clothes, scattered
toys, and a few boxes.

“Clear,” Andrew whispers.
“Next room.”

“Okay,” I quietly reply.

I recoil in fright when I
see the man standing in the doorway.

There is a little boy by his
side.

I nearly fire my gun as
the dread creeps over me, painting my skin with goosebumps. Andrew puts a hand
out to keep me behind him. I gladly take a step back; gun still pointed at
their heads.

“Hello,” Andrew says,
calmly. “We’re here to help.”

The boy and the man don’t
respond. I try to make out their faces, but the light is too weak.

“Have you been bitten?” he
asks; this time his voice is a little firmer.