The Undead Day Twenty (30 page)

‘Zade…’

‘You’ve got one…Hi,’ Heather says. ‘I heard on the radio…’

‘Eh?’ the woman asks, showing immediate concern at the sight of the assault rifle on the back seat.

‘Zade…’

‘You’ve got one…Mr Howie?’ Heather asks.

‘I’m not Mr Howie,’ the woman says. ‘We just met him.’

‘Zade…’

‘Paco, you’ve got one…have you finished it? You greedy sod. Hang on I’ll get another one in a minute,’ she rolls her eyes and looks up at the women in the van. ‘No I meant I heard on our radio…I’m with Mr Howie…’ Heather says, holding her radio up to show them. ‘They said thirteen of you got away?’

‘Oh,’ the woman says, clearly relieved. ‘Er yeah…they said to head for the fort?’

‘Yep, Fort Spitbank. You know where it is?’

‘We do…’

‘Zade.’

‘In a minute, Paco.’

‘Er, we’ll be off then.’

‘Yep, okay. Er…safe drive?’ Heather suggests, unsure on how you end a conversation with people that have apparently been held in forced servitude in a horse place.

‘Zade…’

‘Is that Paco Maguire?’ the woman asks, about to drive off but holding still for another second.

‘No,’ Heather says.

‘Oh.’

‘Yes it is,’ Heather says, unsure of why she lied and now realising she looks really stupid for contradicting herself.

‘Oh…er…bye then,’ the woman pulls away.

‘Zade…’

Nineteen

They come to a stop at the edge of the town. The High Street stretches away before them. Long and straight for hundreds of metres. A wide road with broad pavements on both sides and the sleek fronted tinted plate glass offices give the impression of affluence and wealth. Wrought iron benches. Trees in bloom with raised flowerbeds set in brick built ornamental cubes dotted along the road.

This town had money. A direct train line into London placed it firmly on the commuter belt, which attracted wealthy city folk who demanded decent services, designer shops and boutique stores. A blend of urbanised rurality where the city meets the country.

Now it looks foreboding with windows like eyes that stare down and doors that hang open like mouths ready to spew the infected at them.

‘On foot from here,’ Howie says, staring through the windscreen to the buildings ahead. ‘Marcy, you drive the Saxon. Charlie on Jess…’ he pauses to press the button on his radio.
‘Paula, we’re on foot from here. You drive Roy’s van…’

So it begins. The venturing into another town seemingly empty and devoid of life. A place that holds the things they need but a place that holds the greatest threats too. Reginald activates his screen to get the camera feeds running, tutting at the horsebox blocking half the view. Marcy clambers over the seats to take Howie’s vacated seat as everyone else jumps down and moves out.

Blowers switches into his role with a slow turn as he walks away from the Saxon and takes stock of the ground. The objective is to proceed up this road and find the side street then locate the archery sports place Roy needs. He looks up at the high buildings and the flats above the shops. He takes in the gaps between the buildings and the width of the road. A wide street like this is both good and bad. It gives greater room for manoeuvre but it also leaves them open to be flanked or encircled and that risk will only increase the deeper into the town they go.

Howie and Clarence take point while they wait for Charlie. Blowers motions to Nick and Blinky to take the offside of the vehicles. Cookey and Mo the nearside. He motions for Roy to go for the rear and cover Charlie while she leads Jess out already fitted with the new saddle.

‘Windows, doors…those gaps…keep turning and watching,’ he says to Maddox, his voice low and muted.

Jess comes out from the horsebox too fast. Her feet clanging the ramp dropped onto the road that sends a metallic thump echoing up the street. A slight rise in heart rates and a tensing of muscles in preparation from a noise that will signal where they are.

The great horse skitters and tosses her head. Glad to be free from the confines of the horsebox and now taking in the smells of this new place. Charlie soothes her long nose, reading the reactions as Jess starts to settle.

As Charlie mounts and settles into the new saddle so she smiles at the input Dave had during the saddle selection process. Which involved Dave staring for about ten seconds before telling her to use
that one.
She complied of course and quickly understood why. It was the D rings and straps that enabled pouches to be fitted behind the saddle that could be filled with magazines. It was the strap at the front too that Dave used to attach another pistol holster and the tethers, rings and hooks that were to be used to hold the axe in place. He even gave her another pistol.

‘Your sidearm remains with you. This one remains with the saddle. You will service and take responsibility for both.’

‘Yes, Dave,’ she answered quickly, watching him work to get the saddle how he felt it should be.

Now she twitches the reins and turns in a wide circle to see how Jess moves on the surface of the road. Another twitch, a click of her tongue and she moves on past the horsebox and Roy’s van to clip clop up past the Saxon and a grinning Marcy waving at her while feeling like a sheriff from a western.

‘On point, not too far,’ Howie says, his dark eyes still as brooding as before. Reginald’s words settled everyone else and helped lift the awful tension but not for Howie who has stayed as quiet as before.

‘Sir,’ Charlie says, geeing on to gain distance out the front.

Blowers stands ready, his rifle now not in the crook of his arms but held ready to fire. His left hand on the underside handguard, his right hand on the pistol grip with the forefinger held across the trigger guard and the barrel aimed down.

Maddox stands next to him. Still sullen, still frustrated, angry, pissed off, hot, fed-up and hating every second of being with these people. His mind keeps flitting back to Lenski, the fort, the crews now dead, the crews still alive, the six people Howie killed and a hundred other things.

‘Move out…Charlie, Meredith coming up to you.’

The procession starts. Charlie out front. Howie and Clarence behind her. Dave behind them. Nick and Blinky on one side. Cookey and Mo on the other. All of them staggered to give the best view. Rifles held tight. Bags on backs. Axes wedged down. Hand weapons ready to be drawn.

The signs of damage from the storms are almost non-existent. A few tiles lie broken in the road. A glass window cracked but held in place. Further they go into the town but slowly, carefully. A chimney stack from an old dwelling that survived the bombings raids of the Luftwaffe lies almost intact on the pavement. Nick cranes his neck trying to see where it came from.

‘Body here…looks old,’
Charlie’s voice through the radio. They all look forward to see her indicating off to the right side before trotting on.

‘My team, go out wider from the vehicles,’
Blowers transmits, earning a look round from Clarence and Dave.
‘Vehicles engines too loud this close,’
Blowers says in way of explanation. Clarence gives a thumbs up. Dave shows no reaction but walks on.

Minutes go by. Sweat drips down cheeks and foreheads. A heat shimmer rests above the road at an ever-steady distance. The sunlight gleams from the windows still intact. Blowers notices a lot of the windows at the this end are unbroken. A few doors smashed in here and there but the town looks good considering some of the hell-holes they’ve seen. This is obviously the commercial centre and he guesses that a Friday night wouldn’t have that many people here. The night-life must be centred somewhere else and the residential dwellings with be further out too.

‘Mr Howie, the road bends to the right,’
Charlie says into their ears.
‘I think that must be the side road Reginald saw on the map.’

‘What’s ahead?’
Howie asks through the radio.

‘Precinct area, Mr Howie…there is a small road going left that looks like it feeds to the back of the shops and away from the centre.’

‘Understood, hold that junction until we get closer.’

‘Reginald here, yes yes I do see that now. It had the appearance of a side road on the map but on checking the street atlas on a closer scale I can in fact see it is a continuation of the main High Street.’

‘Roger,’
Howie says. No funny comments, no quip, no questions either. Just a dull hard voice that makes Nick and Cookey look to Blowers who stares stoically ahead.

Blowers sees the layout as described by Charlie. A service road to the left just wide enough for a delivery lorry. The main road bears right down a slight hill to the specialist stores while ahead lies a wide plaza with signs forbidding vehicular traffic. Brand names of stores over doors and windows. Strewn litter picked up by the rainwater then dumped in gulleys and dips.

‘Charlie, go into that precinct, we’ll go right down the road…Blowers, when we find the sports shop put one of your team at the rear to watch the road we came up and the precinct…’

‘Roger, Roy’s at the rear now, Boss,’
Blowers transmits.

Charlie moves on and away at a steady pace. Her eyes scanning left, right and ahead. Her hearing straining to detect anything other than the engines and the sound of Jess’s feet. Meredith runs ahead with her nose down to the ground following trails left by the infected as they moved about. They were here. The things moved here. Many of them but the tracks are too many and varied for even her nose to discern clearly.

Blowers scowls at the sensation of being watched. His hard eyes flick constantly to the windows above them as though ready to see someone pulling back or the motion of a figure moving.

The procession follows the sweep to the right, feeling the slight decline of the road. Clarence stays at Howie’s side. Sensing the need to give comfort by closeness.

‘There,’ Howie says, pointing ahead to a double fronted store. A set of doors in the middle with huge plate glass windows either side. The right side window smashed in with a gaping hole, but then who wouldn’t break into a place with posters of crossbows in the window when the world is falling down?

‘Got it,’ Clarence says, his manner all business as he matches Howie’s curtness and solidity of tone.

‘Hold,’
Howie says into his radio, ‘
Dave and Mo upfront, building clearance.’

Blowers turns to see Mo running up from his position at the rear nearside. ‘Take Mo’s position,’ he tells Maddox.

Maddox stares at him then at Mo. A roll of his eyes. A reluctance in his bearing as he strolls slowly down to Mo’s position, giving Cookey a smirk as he passes.

‘Charlie, you okay?’

‘Fine, Mr Howie. All quiet.’

‘Charlie, it’s Paula. Is that shopping centre open?’

‘Yes it is, doors are smashed in.’

‘Howie, we can use that for supplies,’
Paula says.

‘Yep, we’ll get this done first…’

‘Boss, it’s Blowers. You okay if we turn the engines off? Can’t hear a thing over them.’

‘You don’t need to ask, Blowers. Do as you see fit.’

The engines stop. A silence settles broken by the ticks and clunks of vehicles cooling as they come to settle. Dave and Mo go forward. Rifles slung. Pistols drawn and held double handed as they work towards the front of the shop. Blowers wipes the sweat from his forehead and stretches his back from the uncomfortable sensation of his wet top clinging to his body. As he turns he spots Maddox reading a poster in a window. His rifle held in one hand at his side.

‘
Get your fucking eyes on,’
Blowers hisses into his radio. Maddox turns his head slowly then goes back to reading the poster.
‘Roy, you got the back?’
Blowers asks, furious at the gap in the defences.

‘I have…Maddox, stop staring at that window…’
Roy says.

Maddox stares at the window. Refusing to budge or turn. Refusing the order. Blowers seethes but stays where he is and denies the urge to run over and batter the twat up the street. He glances down to Clarence whose face shows exactly what he thinks. Howie watches the building as Dave and Mo test the door then start climbing through the window.

Blowers scans and watches, turning infrequently to see Maddox staring about as though bored. He knows Maddox is smart and knows this is just a show but the irritation is there. The refusal to do what everyone else is doing. They only stay alive by everyone doing their part. That’s what soldiering is. It’s a machine where the total is greater than the sum of it’s parts.

Everyone else feels the same irritation. Cookey watches his mate. Nick, on the other side of the vehicle, tuts softly and wishes for a few minutes alone with Maddox. Blinky scowls. She wasn’t part of whatever Maddox did before but she can see the effect he’s having on the team and that’s shit. He needs a kicking. She’ll do it with pleasure.

‘Silly boy,’ Paula mutters, wincing at the look of fury on Blowers’ face.

‘Maddox?’ Reginald enquiries softly.

‘Yep,’ she replies. ‘Only one way this will end if he keeps pushing Blowers like that.’

‘Indeed,’ Reginald says, mopping his brown with a handkerchief despite the air-conditioning only having been off for a few minutes.

‘Sooner the better too if you ask me,’ she adds.

‘Ground floor clear, Mr Howie,’
Mo says through the radio.

‘Okay. Both of you come out.’

Only then does Howie turn to look down past Blowers to Maddox still reading posters in windows and looking everywhere but where he should be. Clarence looks too but whereas Howie hides any reaction Clarence’s face says it all with an expression of utter distaste.

‘Pah,’ Mo sputters coming out the window brushing his hands over his face as he gets over the sill into the street. ‘Cobwebs,’ he says, trying to pluck invisible strands from his skin.

‘Blowers, your team up to Charlie. Have a look at that shopping centre…Roy? Get what you need. Marcy, Paula, you hang on here until Blowers reports back. Mo, back in your team.’

‘Sir,’ Mo says, still pulling webs from his face. ‘They get you?’ he asks Dave coming out the window behind him.

‘No,’ Dave says.

‘Why not?’ Mo asks as Blowers stares on wondering how the hell Mo can talk so casually to Dave.

‘Spiders are scared of me,’ Dave says as flat and dull as ever.

‘Really?’ Mo asks, a deadly killer in training and a gifted soldier but still as gullible as he is young.

‘Dave just made a joke,’ Cookey whispers.