Lanherne Chronicles (Prequel): To Escape the Dead

To Escape the Dead

By

Stephen Charlick

Cover artwork by: [email protected]

© copyright: Stephen Charlick 2013

Chapter 1

Once again Liz was a ten year old child staring in wide-eyed horror as her father viciously tore strips of flesh from the screaming face of their neighbour. Even over the old woman’s frantic cries she could still hear her terrified mother beside her gulping air, desperately trying to force her shocked muscles into action. And then something snapped within Liz breaking her from her fear induced torpor. Whether it was the spray of deep red blood that suddenly splashed across the coffee table or the sickening glint of newly exposed cheek bone as her father pulled his head back to hungrily rip free flesh to feast upon, she could not tell but she could feel her lungs expanding with the sharp intake of breath she took to fill them. She knew this breath would only be released in one way, as a scream born of pure terror.

Then inexplicably her eyes flicked open. In the darkness of the mental ward they had made their home her heart pounded loudly in her chest. Something was wrong, she could feel it. The nightmare that had visited her nearly every night for the last five years didn’t normally end at that point. There were yet more scenes of horror to be played out before her body usually allowed itself to be shaken from this recurring dream. Liz lay there on the narrow hospital bed looking up at the dark cracked and peeling ceiling, listening to the sounds around her. But no matter how hard she strained to hear any sounds of panic or warning, she was only met with the soft rhythmic breathing of those asleep around her. Slowly she raised herself up onto an elbow and looked over at the curled up lump lying in the bed pushed close to her own. From the moonlight streaming through the tall barred windows she could see her five year old sister, Anne, was still sleeping soundly.

This world of the Dead was all Anne had ever known. She had been only a few months old when the Dead first blighted humanity, when they had ripped their way across the globe tearing into the living to feed their unquenchable hunger for warm bloody flesh and it saddened Liz to think that for Anne this world, where a savage death was but a wrong turn away, was what she considered to be ‘normal’.

Suddenly the muffled sound of a door banging somewhere in the building shook Liz from her thoughts. Pushing her thin blanket aside, she slowly sat up. With one foot already moving from under the covers, her hand subconsciously hovered above the handle of the sheathed sword leaning against her bed. Again the sound of second door slamming came to her. Peering past Carmella and Vincenzo sleeping soundly in two of the battered hospital beds they had pushed together, Liz tried to make out the shadowy door at the far end of the ward.

‘Not again…’ she whispered to herself, desperately willing her uneasiness to be nothing more than the leftover waves of fear from her nightmare. ‘Not here too…’

Barely two months had passed since they had been forced to flee their last place of refuge. They had been caught off guard one night and had awoken to find hungry mouths and the bloody hands of the newly turned Dead grasping desperately for their flesh. They had mistakenly thought themselves safe behind the high fences of the water processing plant but even there the Dead had found their way past their barricades. This time the silent passing of one of the older members of the group had brought death uninvited to their door. Left alone and unattended as his heart finally beat its last, he had risen to seek solace in the flesh of those around him and within what seemed like minutes the survivors had been overrun. With the Dead increasing their number with each mouthful of flesh they so eagerly stole from their terrified victims, the survivors simply didn’t stand a chance. Of the prospering group of forty-two men, woman and children only thirteen had managed to escape with their lives. They had left behind them any semblance of security to once again travel, huddled and silent in their horse-drawn box covered carts, hidden from the Dead all around them.

Just why the Dead attacked some animals and not others, no-one knew but it had been noted early on that, unlike with most livestock, the Dead simply seemed unable to ‘see’ horses as a source of flesh. So, with this tiny morsel of knowledge survivors took a step back from their reliance on man-made vehicles with their need for the increasingly unobtainable petrol to embrace, with just a few modifications, the slower, quieter and infinitely safer mode of transport from a time gone by. Seemingly overnight, horses had become worth their weight in gold and with their escaping caravan of two horse-drawn carts the survivors had found themselves ‘rich’ in a dead world. Not that this wealth filled their bellies or gave them restful sleep at night but at least it kept them alive until they could find a new home.

When they finally came across The Carmichael Institute deep in the Cornish countryside, it was with some trepidation that Charlie, an ex-soldier and their impromptu leader, suggested they approach the unknown group that had taken over the old mental hospital. Charlie had originally only asked that they be allowed to stay for a few days, trading their labour for safe harbour. But when their leader Daniels, whose broken nose and hard looks hid an intelligent and forward thinking mind, suggested that if they joined forces they could turn the Institute, with its palatial grounds and high walls into an impenetrable fortress safe for them all, Charlie knew he had found a man he could trust and work with. That was a little over a month ago now and despite some minor teething troubles, the new arrivals had settled in well to their new home.

Liz’s gaze swiftly glanced at the other beds in the ward, mentally ticking their occupants off the list of those who should be there. She knew Charlie, Michael, Cam and Tyrone were on watch duty with some of Daniels’ men patrolling the grounds. So apart from herself, Anne, Vincenzo and his pregnant wife Carmela, that left Paul, Tyrone’s brother, Tom, Sally, Phil and David that should be asleep in the ward. Unsurprisingly, Sally’s bed was empty. Liz had realised quite quickly what sort of woman Sally was, not that she blamed her in the least. You did what you could and you used what natural skills you had available to you to survive in this world, which is just what Sally did. Even before the Dead came Sally instinctively gravitated to men in authority. Only now ‘men with money and power’ had turned into ‘men that could keep her stomach full and protect her from the Dead’ and from the moment they arrived at the Institute she had made a play for Daniels. The fact that her bed was empty at this moment spoke volumes to Liz. Obviously Sally’s plan was working.

For a moment she felt a brief flash of concern when she saw that Phil and David’s beds in the far corner were empty. Next to Charlie, Phil’s large muscular frame and fearless attitude in battling the Dead made him one of their best fighters and she hoped that if whatever was setting her on edge proved to be something bad, he hadn’t gone too far away to be with David. Not that she begrudged Phil and David wanting some alone time, there was little enough privacy in the world as it was and when any moment could be your last, you grabbed every opportunity available to be close to those you loved. To look at them the two men certainly were an oddly matched pair, they were definitely a meeting of brains and brawn. Phil had been a butcher before the Dead arrived to change the nature of the world and even after five years of a near starvation diet the bulky muscle mass built from years of lugging animal carcasses back and forth had still managed to somehow cling to his tall frame. David on the other hand had been one of those countless office workers who had immersed themselves in world of computers and technology. Despite only possessing skills that were now completely redundant, David had managed to hold his own in this new world of the Dead and had somehow survived long enough to find his way to the water processing plant and to Phil. That was the thing, unless you were very lucky, it didn’t matter who you were or what you had done in your previous life, if you managed to survive this long there had to be something within you, some hidden talent or resolve that had kept you alive. So despite David’s shy and quiet nature, Liz knew his haunting brown eyes hid a steely resolve to stay alive.

Liz peered over to the two beds opposite her and even though they were shrouded deep in shadow, she could tell they were both occupied. She could hear Tom gently snoring while in the bed to his right Paul mumbled something incomprehensible in his sleep. Paul, Tyrone’s fourteen year old brother was deaf and had seen most of his classmates torn to pieces when a horde of the Dead had descended like a wave of death upon their school bus caught in a panic- fuelled traffic jam. Only managing to escape with his life through luck rather than anything else, the young boy had inexplicably managed to cross a town ripped apart by carnage and bloodshed to find his distraught older brother waiting for him at home. With no-one else to look after him, Tyrone had kept his younger brother alive and safe ever since and Liz believed Tyrone would make the ultimate sacrifice if it meant saving Paul, such was the love for his younger brother.

Even though Paul was only a year younger than her, Liz knew she wouldn’t be able to count on him to help in any effective way. Despite Charlie’s training in how to defend himself or disable the Dead, the boy simply didn’t have the natural ability in him. Glancing back to the door at the end of the ward, Liz silently slipped both her feet to the floor, grateful that at least if something was amiss she had Tom she could rely on.

Tom was forty-two and had spent much of his adult life as a London cabby. Miraculously he had managed to escape the widespread horror that had swept through the capital not only with his life but with his wife and two terrified young daughters in tow. After spending the first two years adapting to this new life and keeping his family safe in a remote cottage nestled by the coast, he had returned one day from a foraging trip to find himself suddenly alone. An open door banging loudly in the fierce coastal wind and an upturned kitchen awash with spilt blood were the only clues to what had happened but it was all he needed. The Dead had found his family, feasted upon them and turned them into lifeless abominations of their former selves. Later that evening what little hope he had abruptly faded when he found his youngest daughter’s corpse wandering a nearby lane in search of warm bloody flesh of her own to feed upon. Much of the skin and muscle had been stripped from her small chest and arms before she had died, leaving tendon and bone unnaturally exposed to burn their nightmare visage into his memory. Tom had wept uncontrollably as he fought to restrain the small angry cadaver in his arms, desperate not to add further injury to his precious child’s body. Eventually through his tears he had begged her for forgiveness as he slid a knife into the base of her brain, finally putting her to rest. For weeks he drowned in his loss, not caring if the Dead found him or not. His reason to carry on had simply been ripped from him by unknown snapping teeth and blood covered lifeless hands. Life, as he knew it, now lay shattered and torn at his feet, it no longer held meaning. He had no reason to go on. But then something changed within him as he sat weeping by the only grave he was able to dig for his family. From his grief a seed of anger took root. Blossoming and twisting into pure rage, Tom could take his own self-pity no more. Arming himself with whatever he could carry; Tom decided it was time to leave. The Dead would not claim this world as their own, his rage would not allow it and as he glanced at his daughter’s grave one last time he made a promise to himself and to her, he would reap revenge upon them all. How he managed to survive for the following two years slowly exacting his justice on the Dead one stinking corpse at a time, Liz could only guess but when he arrived at the water processing plant a year ago he had quickly proven himself an invaluable addition to their number.

Slipping silently from the bed, Liz truly hoped she was reading something into this uneasiness she was feeling, yet her fingers, almost of their own accord, slowly closed around the hilt of her sword by her side and with a slight flick of her wrist, she clicked the blade free of its protective sheath. She had spent too much of her young life fighting the Dead to ignore her intuition now, especially when their lives may depend upon it.

Suddenly a strangled scream echoed from somewhere within the vast building. With a surge of adrenalin flooding her system, Liz knew this was no scream born of the nightmarish terrors that visited each of them as they slept. This was the cry of death, close and horrific.

‘Shit!’ she whispered under her breath, realising their brief respite from the Dead was at an end.

Through death or dereliction of watch duty, the Dead were now inside the walls of the Institute and they needed to act, fast.

‘Tom!’ she whispered, barely able to hear her own words over the thumping of her pounding heart. ‘Tom, wake up!’

Almost immediately, at the sound of his name, Tom was throwing himself from his bed. Carelessly scattering what few possessions he had to the floor, he made a grab for the two scythes resting on a nearby bedside table.

‘What?...What is it?’ he asked, swaying slightly as his body tried to cope with the shock of being snapped from a deep sleep so abruptly.

‘There was a scream…’ Liz replied, knowing this was enough for Tom to know what she meant. ‘Wake Paul… we need to be ready.’

‘Lizbetta?’ came Vincenzo’s worried voice from the darkness.

Despite the horror of what could be happening, Liz still inwardly cringed at the young Italian man’s odd way of always saying her full name. She simply didn’t see herself as an ‘Elizabeth’; even her parents had always shortened it to Liz or Lizzy.

‘Wake Carmella…’ she replied, already moving herself to wake up Anne, ‘the Dead are inside…’

Vincenzo and Carmella had been tourists in London when the Dead suddenly pulled the world into a horror-fuelled chaos. Caught up in the panic that flooded the streets of the capital, the young couple had found themselves swept along in a sea of terrified faces. Unable to fight against this tide of panic stricken humanity they had found themselves being pushed into Paddington railway station. Vincenzo had no idea that even as he punched and fought to pull Carmella onto the unbelievably packed train, going to a place he had never heard of, that a wave of the Dead had already descended upon the station. Within seconds screams of pure terror began to ripple throughout the throng as people realised they were surrounded and wild panic took hold. Purely by chance, Vincenzo and Carmella had found themselves fighting to get on one of the older style trains. Unhindered by up-to-the-minute electrical door safety systems, this train could still move with its doors open. Others had not been so fortunate and even as the train began to lurch forward at a painfully slow pace, dragging those unlucky enough to still be crowded about its doors to their deaths under its wheels, the Dead found and feasted upon the terrified people on other trains trapped and unmovable on their platforms. They fell upon these trapped souls, increasing their ungodly number with each bite and chunk of stolen flesh they shoved into their mouths. But Carmella and Vincenzo had momentarily left behind the horrific scenes of bloodshed and madness as their train sped from the capital toward a destination hopefully untouched by the Dead. Unfortunately there was to be no escaping the nightmare that had suddenly descended upon humanity and as the driver received a radioed warning that they were only heading to yet more carnage he did the only thing that he could, he stopped the train. With a jolting lurch the train came to a sudden halt amid ploughed fields and small isolated farms. Many of the passengers decided to carry on by foot, hopeful that the government would soon have the carnage under control but Vincenzo and Carmella could see that their best chance was to wait out the madness far from the cities and the masses of hungry Dead they housed. Working for an elderly couple on a small farm, they earned their sanctuary while they waited for the nightmare to end. But days turned into weeks and weeks into months and still the Dead refused to relinquish their claim on the flesh of Man. When months finally turned into years, Carmella and Vincenzo realised there would be no waking from this nightmare where the Dead feasted upon the living and there would be no returning to their homes in Italy. This was the way of the world now and each day they survived in it, was a blessing.