The Undead Day Twenty (46 page)

Blowers cannot see. He cannot hear. The pain is gone and he barely feels the dull thuds of bodies slamming into him. That he still stands is from will power alone. From courage and an allegiance to duty before death, and he knows his death is here. He’ll go as a soldier. He’ll go as a warrior with discipline and dignity. One single sound penetrates his head. A new sound of a thing unheard for many days. A beautiful sound of a new born baby crying out as Maddox pulls it free, cuts the cord and blinks from the spray of blood hitting his face. The baby cries. A new-born boy who inflates his lungs to mark his place and right to live in this world. Blowers grins in a face battered and soaked with blood.

‘By sea…by land’ the words come mangled, broken and whispered. The motto of the Royal Marines. His biggest regret in life was that he failed his Commando course but now he has earned his badge. He has earned his beret. ‘We win…’ the final words whisper as his heart stops and he drops slumped and inert to be trampled by the feet of the infected who go over him into the kitchen.

To the last they feel it. To the last they feel his heart stopping and the loss of one from the pack of the hive mind. Where Blowers was there is a void. An emptiness that sees them falter and weaken. A sapping of energy that is sensed by the other side who screech out with the victory of taking one of Howie’s. The infected becomes emboldened. It becomes stronger as though the taking has given it strength. It pushes harder, snarling louder, raking faster. They are mortal. They are not unkillable. It has proved this. It will take more. It will end it here in this shitty little town that burns with flames and runs red with blood.

Cookey staggers away. Rendered weak and dumb. Charlie launches from Jess to cover him. Running to get in front and fight them back to protect Cookey mouthing words that don’t come. Heather runs in with her machete swinging to join Charlie as Cookey’s legs go weak and he falls to his knees. Meredith barks loud and deep and with Paco and Jess clearing the door she pushes through the legs and bodies into the hallway to the body of Blowers. She drops on him. Her body covers his. The whole of her protects him. Her lips pulled back as she lashes out at anything coming close. In between each bite, she licks his face and whines with an instant change from raging wild beast to an animal consumed with grief.

Thirty-One

He roars with defiance as he holds them back and it takes but a second for him to realise they are not there. He staggers back. Confused and raging. His chest heaving. His hands balled to fists to fight. This is not the hallway. Maddox is not behind him. He spins round, his hard eyes wild and still filled with the lust of battle but it fades away. All trace of the emotions he had ebb away and his breathing slows.

It’s light now but grimy and grey. He’s in a street so ruined and destroyed it looks like something from the Second World War. An old park lies in a square behind rusted railings. The slide has fallen down into a pile of rubble, rusted swing chains nestle amongst the yellowing grass. The sky is streaked blood red and the clouds look heavy and threatening. The place is unfamiliar. He looks round for the others but they aren’t here. He’s alone. A feeling of a presence. Something malevolent and evil that is coming closer. He can’t see it but he can feel it.

Blowers starts walking. The feeling increases, like being watched and hunted. He starts jogging, then running then sprinting as fast as he can to be away from here.

His left eye feels weird. His vision blurs. He tries to call out but his voice is silent. He looks behind to see dark shadows flitting between the ruined walls. Dark shapes of things that are evil with intent. A laugh echoes round, rolling to bounce off walls and buildings. The laugh becomes a dry hacking cough. Twisted and not right. Like a taunt. The fear grows inside him. They are coming for him. A certainty. A fact. He makes himself stop running to face his death with bravery and courage. He is a soldier. He doesn’t run away but faces the enemy. He stiffens to stand proud while wishing the others were with him. He wants a joke from Cookey. He wants to feel Clarence’s size next to him. To have the boss lead the line. He wants Meredith to push her nose into his hand and lick his face that suddenly feels wet as a whine is heard that rolls round the buildings.

The fear inside grows but he stiffens and holds. His hands once more bunch to fists. His hard eyes glare. He twitches at the sensation again. A shooting pain in his left eye that loses vision for a second before swimming back.

Movement on his right side. He spins to see a flash of black fur and a long tail running behind the broken wall of a house down the street.

‘Meredith?’ he calls out, his voice hollow and strangely flat in this awful place.

A bark. It’s Meredith. He knows that bark anywhere. He sets off running towards where the noise came from but when he gets there she is gone.

Another bark. He turns quickly to see her now standing in the middle of the road further down. She barks again. She barks to tell him to move. To get away. She spins to go, turns back and barks.

He starts after her, calling her name. Whispers from the sides ripple down the street. Predatory inhuman sounds. Meredith barks, louder now, more urgent. That feeling of being hunted comes back. He sprints hard. Running over rubble and heaps of slag on the road. Veering round old cars rusted and left for years.

They give chase. Whatever they are. He cannot see them but feels them. He hears the feet pounding and the whispered grunts and calls. The cackling laughter comes again. Meredith barks but he cannot close the distance between them. She stays at a fixed point leading him on.

He takes a corner to see Meredith outside the doorway to a church. Her mouth open, her huge tongue hanging down to the side as she takes the head rub from the big man at her side.

Blowers slows to a jog to a walk and looks on with only the barest sense of confusion inside.

‘Corporal,’ the man says, nodding curtly.

‘Sir,’ Blowers says, coming to a smart stop as he snaps out a salute.

‘Sergeant not a sir,’ Big Chris says, grinning with white teeth showing through his bushy black beard. Dressed in army fatigues and only then does Blowers realise he’s wearing the same.

‘Sergeant,’ Blowers says.

‘Inside,’ Chris says, casting a look of distaste round at the view. He clicks his tongue for Meredith to run on through the open doors. Blowers follows. Unsure of where he is. Unsure why Big Chris is here but knowing this is normal.

Inside the church is lit with hundreds of candles that burn and flicker to fill the space with golden light. The floor is swept clean and the air smells sweet. A contrast of the sterility of the broken world outside to somewhere that has the warmth of life.

‘Marine marine in a boat…living proof shit can float!’ Malcolm laughs striding towards him with his hand out. ‘Not bad for a bootneck.’

‘Thanks,’ Blowers says, shaking his hand. ‘If you want a job done properly…don’t ask a Para…’

‘Twat,’ Malcolm laughs.

‘Fuck you,’ Blowers grins.

The smile on Malcolm’s face eases, his face earnest and sincere, ‘seriously, you did well…you took loads out…’

‘Thanks,’ Blowers says in his simple, self-effacing way.

‘When you two have finished finding a room,’ Chris says, his voice as deep and rich as Blowers remembers which makes him wonder why he remembers that. Chris is dead. Malcolm is dead. Oh.

‘Fuck,’ Blowers says then blinks as he remembers Meredith was here. ‘Oh no…no…not Meredith…’

Chris looks at him in puzzlement then round to see the dog cleaning herself by the alter. ‘Oh right. No, it’s not what you think it is.’

‘She’s not dead then?’

‘She’s not dead. Listen, we don’t have much time.’

‘Eh? What’s going on?’ Blowers says, wincing at the pain in his left eye then suddenly feeling a burning agony in his left hand. ‘And who is that?’

‘That’s Meredith,’ Chris says, turning to smile at the slim blonde haired woman walking towards them.

‘Hello, Simon,’ she says, lifting a hand in greeting.

‘What the actual fuck,’ Blowers mutters, ‘Hello, Miss…the dog’s called Meredith…’ he tells Chris.

‘She’s not,’ Chris says. ‘We don’t have time. Ready for orders?’

‘But…’

‘I said ready for orders, Corporal?’ Chris booms. ‘Now listen up.’

‘Yes, Sergeant,’ Blowers snaps, coming to attention.

‘You cannot let them win,’ Malcolm says, walking over to stand next to Chris.

‘Me?’ Blowers asks.

‘They will achieve one race if you stop now,’ Meredith says
, walking over to stand on Chris’s other side.

Blowers stares from one to the other. His eye hurts. His hand too but he is a soldier and this is orders so he ignores the pain to listen.

‘Blowers,’ Chris says, speaking in a tone that belies the importance of what he says, ‘Ask Reginald about the merging. He’s on our side, you can trust him. Listen to him, the man knows what he is doing.’

‘Yes, Sergeant…er, what’s merging?’

‘It’s what Paco is now,’ Meredith says softly, coming forward a step to smile at Blowers. She looks radiant and so healthy, a huge smile of clean teeth and the light shines from her blonde hair.

‘I don’t understand, Miss,’ Blowers says.

‘He is halfway from them to us,’ she says, reaching out to lay a hand on Blowers arm that tingles with warmth.

‘But Paco’s on our side.’

‘One race is what Paco is,’ Meredith says. ‘That’s what it will achieve. A thing that cannot feel…’

She smiles warmly at him. She is beautiful in a way he has never seen before. She shines with goodness and love and the virtues a soldier longs to fight for and suddenly he doesn’t want to go anywhere.

‘You are so brave, Simon,’ she says, holding his eyes on hers. ‘So brave…’ her hand reaches out to touch his cheek. ‘It is your choice if you stay here…’

‘Am I dead?’ he asks simply, honestly.

‘In a way, right now yes, but you can go back.’

He nods and tries to speak but he can’t take his eyes from her. She is everything. She is purity of grace and love. She is warmth and not death and blood, she is not the heat of the battles and the things he has to do.

She holds his gaze and smiles with that warm soft hand touching his cheek. ‘They cannot become what Paco is. Our species will die. Paco still has a trace left…they won’t.’

‘I can’t stop that,’ Blowers says, his voice low and muted, almost a whisper. Nothing else exists save her. All else ceases to be. It’s warm here. Not hot, not cold but just right. The light is bright yet soft. Fragrance in the air. Her voice captivates him, holds him entranced. To stay here right now is all he wishes for. No pain, no sadness, no fatigue, no death or conflict. Just this woman who he doesn’t know but he wants to know. He wants to know her forever. For always.

‘You can,’ Meredith says. Her eyes full of pain, sorrow, love and hope all in equal measure. ‘But we want you to stay with Howie. You are what holds them together. You are the glue that binds. Without you, Howie will go on his own with Dave. He will not risk the lives of the others.’

‘Mr Howie won’t fail,’ Blowers says quickly with a surge of defensive pride.

‘Simon,’ she moves closer, staring into his brown eyes normally so hard but now full of anguish and hurt. She falters, hesitating as though not wishing to say the words she knows must be said. He is in pain. He has done enough. He has given all he can and it’s wrong to ask more. She stiffens, lifting her head and speaks softly, warmly and with regret. ‘Right now Cookey is outside the house. His will to fight is gone. Charlie and Heather are fighting
for
him but they cannot do what Cookey is capable of doing. Blinky charged the ones following her but she too feels your death and falters as Cookey is, as they all are. Some will survive but not all and those deaths will crush Howie. He will go on alone with Dave.’

He watches her speaking. Entranced by the way her mouth forms the words and the way the tip of her nose moves ever so slightly as she speaks. What she tells him goes deep into his heart and causes distress but his fight is over. He has done what he can. To go back is to go back to pain and suffering but then Cookey is down and she said others will die.

She pauses to stare deep as though scrutinising his bare soul. ‘Howie is an exceptional man. What he has inspires others to follow him but…’ she pauses again, biting her lip before continuing. ‘Every time Howie turns round, you and Clarence are there. You and Clarence validate him. You give him the courage to make decisions and lead. You give him that power to inspire. More will come, Simon. More will join you. Your team will grow and so will your responsibility but it’s you that has to be there to guide them. Without you holding them together, Howie will become a killer as cold as Dave. He needs you…’

She smiles with the sadness he feels inside and reaches to take his hand in hers. His palms calloused and hard from fighting, his knuckles bruised, his hands those of a warrior that she rubs and holds close.

‘Time here is different,’ she says quietly, thoughtfully and suddenly she is but a girl holding the hand of a man, shyness creeps into her features, a coyness that bewitches him. ‘And…you will come back here…’ she adds lightly.

‘I will?’ he blurts.

She nods with a wide grin spreading across her face that melts his heart, ‘you will,’ she laughs.

‘When? Tomorrow?’

‘Not tomorrow,’ she laughs.

‘Ah that’s too late then…’

‘You must do what has to be done first.’

‘I will…I’ll go do it now…will I see you when I’ve done it?’

She bursts out laughing with a sound that brings delight to the church, ‘you will…and I will see you too.’

‘Okay…so I’ll get it done really quickly and come back.’

‘Do you know what coming back means?’ she asks, trying to be earnest but laughing with delight again.

‘I don’t bloody care,’ he says, grinning at her laughing. ‘If you’re here.’

‘You,’ she says, holding his eyes on hers, ‘are worth more than you will ever know, Simon Blowers.’

‘Thanks,’ he says in the Blowers easy way of taking praise. ‘You’re so pretty.’

‘And you are most handsome,’ she says, dropping her tone to show she means it. ‘Everything you have done is right. Do not for one second think you have done wrong, Simon. Will you go back to Howie?’

‘I will. I promise…but I’ll come back here yeah?’

She laughs again, unable to stay serious. ‘Yes! Yes you will come back.’

‘Okay. So like…that’s a date?’

‘A date? Yes. Yes, it is a date. I’d like that very much.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay, so…er…if you’re Meredith what’s the dog’s name?’

‘Bear, she is called Bear.’

‘Okay. I can’t wait to come back though.’

‘I cannot wait for you to come back…but…there will be work when you do come back.’

He shrugs, unbothered, ‘always work to do.’

‘So you will go back to fight?’

He stares at her with a raw honesty pouring from his features, ‘I’ll fight for you, Miss.’

‘Okay,’ she says, with equal raw honesty. ‘And I will wait for you.’

‘I’d like that,’ he says with a vulnerability that makes her move a step closer.

‘I will. I promise.’