Devouring The Dead (Book 1) (24 page)

“Rosa. She seemed nice.”
Tom looked down at the grounds and was pleased to see no more zombies seemed to be approaching.

“I guess so. She’s pretty. But she’s upset, she just lost her friends. And that’s our fault
, Tom. It’s our fault they’re dead.”

“Look
, they knew what they were doing when they rescued us, they didn’t have to, they...”

Jessica looked at Tom. He knew she w
as right. Rosa, Don, and Angel, had come to help them and it had ended up getting two of them killed. He took his eyes away from Jessica’s. He could feel her guilt burning through him and he could feel it rising in him too, swelling up from his gut.

“It wasn’t a complete accident, you know?” said Tom looking down at the silent bus.

“What do you mean?” said Jessica frowning. She put a hand on his shoulder.

“It was Brad.
He was fighting with Don. That’s what caused the crash.”

“Then maybe something good
will come of it then. Brad’s dead, probably buried in the bus beneath a tonne of bricks. We’re better off without him. I wouldn’t be surprised if he did have something to do with Amber’s death.”

Tom didn’t want to get drawn into gossip and conjecture. “Well
, he’s gone now. You should get back downstairs, it’s getting cold up here. Why don’t you go help Jackson? I’ll stay up here and keep watch for a while.”

Jessica gave him a quick hug and paused in the doorway. “Any dramas
, you come get me, okay? We’re in this together now. We have to look out for each other.”

“I will,” he said as she left. Alone, Tom resumed his watch from the church tower, looking at the city as darkness began to gather once more. The zombies in the yard below were not growing in number, although they weren’t leaving either. He looked beyond the park to where they had come from, the city skyscrapers now distant
, a mere memory. Would they really be able to get to the airport or was he just dreaming? It was a short distance, but it felt like it was on the other side of the planet.

Tom continued to watch the city as the sun set
over burning buildings and people dying. He saw the dead soldiers in the streets, the crashed cars, and empty homes. Knowing the church was secure, he paid little attention to the walls below and even less to the bus. If he had, he would’ve noticed the loose bricks tumbling from the front of the bus as something stirred beneath its belly. He would’ve noticed a hand reaching out from beneath it, an arm extending out, the fingers digging into the mud, grabbing onto the long grass as a body crawled out from underneath the silent vehicle.

C
HAPTER SEVENTEEN

Jackson had found the kitchen cupboards bare of food, only a sad and lonely packet of ginger-nuts hiding in one dark corner. He had drawn the curtains across the window, so he remained out of sight of the zombies outside, and could roam throughout the room freely without worrying about being seen. If he drew them to the kitchen, then both exits out of the church would be compromised.

The
door leading out of the church was shut, but not locked, and he quietly opened it to check their surroundings. Immediately behind the door were a couple of dustbins. A small paved path lead directly to another yard in the church grounds, but it was empty and useless; there were no vehicles and the house beyond it stood abandoned. He pulled the door shut, careful not to make any noise.

“God rest your soul, Mary,” said Jackson resting on the bench briefly. Like a bolt of lightning to the head
, it suddenly hit him he was very old. What was a man in his sixties doing running around like this? He should’ve gone back to his wife when he had the chance, but he had left it too late. He closed his eyes and pictured his wife as he had last seen her. He had left for work and she was sat at the table munching on toast and marmalade. Now that she was retired, she liked to take a lazy breakfast, only washing and dressing when she’d eaten. He could remember kissing her goodbye, as he had done every day for the last forty years, the only interruption being when she had spent a few nights in hospital three years ago, to have a hip replacement.

He couldn’t feel her anymore. He didn’t believe in ghosts or psychics or premonitions
, yet somehow he knew his wife was gone. He vowed he would light a candle for her.

What of the rest of the city, the millions who lived in this great metropolis? He couldn’t accept they were gone, not all of them. Surely the infection had been contained somewhere? Surely there were systems in place to contain this type of thing? He had seen the country change a lot in his lifetime
: strikes, riots, political demonstrations, bombings, buildings torn down, and bigger, taller ones erected in their place, financial institutions failing only to be usurped by others. Merchants and prophets of doomsday had predicted the end every time a bomb went off in the Middle East or a plane fell out of the sky, or an economic crisis struck the west; they had all been wrong. The end would be a bug; a tiny organism infecting every living being, for which there was no cure.

Jackson wondered how he would die – would he be devoured by one of these creatures or die
fighting. If living meant running from place to place, hiding and feeding on scraps, then he would look forward to seeing Mary again.

There had been a bucket beneath the sink and he’d filled it with tap water. Scooping up a cluster of plastic cups from a box on the floor
, he went back into the church to find the others. Wallowing in self-pity was a fool’s game, Mary had told him that many times.

‘
Make yourself useful, Jackson,’ she’d told him. ‘The past is the past and the future is yours.’ He couldn’t help but smile. She had told him that when he was made redundant, shortly after they wed. At a low point, she had helped him, stood by his side, and never doubted him. All he could do now was live up to her ideals. He would help these people, these friends who were scared and lost; he would die fighting if he had to.

They had gratefully taken the water,
draining the bucket completely. He had to go back twice more to fetch more buckets full of water. When he returned the second time, he found Benzo standing.

“You feeling better
, Benzo?” Jackson asked, filling his cup with more water.

“Yeah, thanks to Jess. My arm’s sore
, but it’ll be fine. Let me help you.” Benzo took the bucket from Jackson and they passed by Jessica who was trying to get a mobile to work.

“Any luck?”
Benzo asked, topping her cup up.

“No.
Caterina was the only one with a phone and there’s no bloody signal. I can’t get anything.”

“Have you tried getting on the net?”

“Yeah, it won’t connect. Battery’s fine, but...” Jessica slammed the phone down on the pew beside her. “Waste of time,” she sighed.

She followed
Benzo and Jackson to Christina, who was talking to Rosa. She had stopped crying, but her face was red and Jessica felt guilty for not offering her more support. Rosa looked young too, certainly no older than Jessica. She had golden girlish locks that twisted around her face and Jessica had already noticed she had a curious way of twitching her nose when she was about to speak.

She took Rosa’s plastic cup and scooped it through the bucket, filling it with cool fresh water.

“Here,” Jessica said smiling.

Rosa took it and sipped. “Thanks.”

Jessica guessed from her clothes that Rosa had been on her way to or from work. The clean cut of the dress, the simple colours, and the basic hemline, still managed to look good on her though; it showed off her slim figure.

“Rosa was just telling me how they managed to survive in the pub for so long,” said Christina.

Caterina had gone to lie down and fallen asleep so Christina had decided it was a good time to talk to Rosa. She looked so young and helpless sat alone as she was. Nobody should be allowed just to sit there in the church crying, without someone at least offering her some consolation. Christina had gone over and just held her until she’d stopped. She wished she’d done the same for Linda back at the office, back when Linda had still been alive.

“It wasn’t easy. We had to keep quiet all day. The rooms upstairs in the pub were locked apar
t from the bathroom and a storeroom. Don slept in the bathtub at night. Angel and I slept in the storeroom.”

“How did you manage for food and water for so long?” asked
Benzo.

“Well
, we still had running water from the tap and Don found some boxes of whisky, so drink wasn’t a problem. Apart from that, we survived on a diet of peanuts and pork scratching’s.” She offered Benzo a timid smile.

“Man I would kill for some pork scr
atching right now. I’m starving,” he said.

“I searched the kitchen
, but we’ve had what little there was. I’m afraid that’s going to be it until whenever we get out of here,” said Jackson. He put the bucket on the floor and sat down beside Christina.

“Tomorrow?” she said. “
You offering to nip out to KFC for us, Jackson?”

They laughed and the sounds echoed around the hollow church,
their laughter bouncing off the high ceiling. The grinning gargoyles seemed to laugh with them.

“Don’t even talk about KFC,” said
Benzo. “My mouth is watering for that finger lickin’ shit right now.”

They laughed again and Jackson felt better. If they could still laugh in times like this
, then it meant they hadn’t all given up hope. There was still some humanity left in them.

“Well
, I’ve been thinking about tomorrow. I was talking to Tom too. Despite how things are out there, we still think the best course of action is to aim for the airport,” he said.

“I second that,” said
Benzo immediately. “It’s not that far and if there’s any way out of the city, that’ll be it. The roads are clearly a no-go. I reckon when we get to the city airport, we’ll find help there. My dad always said that in a time of war, the most strategic place of attack, or defence, are the arteries in and out of the country. It stands to reason that the government would keep the airport open.”

“I’m not sure,” said Christina. “I could see the airport from my office and I couldn’t see a lot going on. I didn’t notice any planes coming or going.”

They thought for a moment. “Can I say something?” asked Rosa quietly.

“Absolutely
,” said Jackson. She spoke with such a low voice he had to lean forward to hear her.

“The airport may or may not be a way out of the city, I don’t know. But I don’t want to leave the city. I want to go home. I want to see my parents and know that they’re okay. Are we not better to go home and wait there? It won’t be long until the police or the army
, or someone comes to help.”

“Rosa, you could try and go home if you think you could make it through those streets,” said Jessica, “but I think you’d be better off with us. We saw the police and the army. They came, they fought, and they lost. There’s no one else coming.”

“What do you mean? There must be.”

“It’s true,” said Christina. “I saw
an army helicopter crash. We came from the city and it was carnage.”

“
We saw the soldiers on the streets, Rosa,” said Benzo. “Even with their guns and tanks, they couldn’t stop them. The infected just kept coming and killed them all. In the end, they were overrun.”

“It’s been three or four days now since this started,” said Jackson. “If there was any help coming
, it would be here by now. We’re on our own. We have to fight for ourselves and each other. Rosa, I promise you that if you want to go home, you can, nobody will stop you. But you’ll be on your own.”

He took her hand and grasped her small hands in his.

“Come with us. I’m sorry about your friends, but the reality is, your parents are most likely dead. They may have escaped the city, they may be fine - but they won’t be at home. They won’t be waiting for you there. Come with us.”

Rosa didn’t answer and looked around the silent group. They were looking at her expectantly, hopefully.
She looked up at Jessica, into her deep brown eyes so full of hope. Jessica curled her hair around her ears as Rosa looked at her. Finally, she withdrew her hand from Jackson’s and she nodded.

“I’ll come with you.
The airport, eh? So you lot got a plan? Is one of you a pilot?”

“
No.” Benzo looked at Jackson. “Actually, do we have a plan?”

“Not much of one. Look
, it’s nearly dark out and it would be suicidal to be out there in the dark on foot. I say we bunk here tonight. It’s quite safe and secure, and apart from half a dozen zombies at the door, they don’t know we’re in here. I know we’re hungry, but at least we have fresh water. We have heat too. We can light all those candles.

“In the morning
, we’ll feel better, more refreshed. Getting to the airport, well I’m not sure how best we can do that. It’s not far, but it’s going to feel like it’s a hundred miles away once we get out on the road and we’re fighting those things off.”

“What if we don’t go by road?” said Jessica.

“You grown wings?” Benzo said sipping his water.

“I mean we’d have to go by road initially
, but the Thames goes right there. If we get to the river, then we can avoid all the zombies on the road and sail to the airport. It’s quicker and safer.”

“So you’ve grown a boat then?”
Benzo looked at her like she had gone mad. “Where are we going to get a boat from?”

“Hang on
, Benzo, I think it’s a good idea,” said Christina. “The river’s not far from here at all. Provided the zombies are thinned out, we can run right through them. Five minutes of healthy cardio and we’d be at the river. There’s a marina near Limehouse station. We don’t need a boat or a ship. Shit, a plank of wood will do. All we need is something that floats. I’d rather do that than go by road the whole way.”

“Well the bus is out of action,” said Jackson. “I don’t fancy looking for another vehicle. There’s not much chance you’d find one out there before they’d be on you.”

“Fair enough. But I’m not going out there unarmed,” said Benzo.

“Me neither,” said Rosa. “If something comes for me
, I want to be able to defend myself.”

Jackson looked around the church. “No problem,” he said. “Look around. We can
make plenty of weapons from here. There are some crosses on the walls - they look heavy, like they’re made from oak. Those candlesticks over there are thick and solid; they’ll drive through a dead body with enough weight behind them.”

“These bibles aren’t bad either,” said Jessica picking one up, tossing it from one hand to the other. “They’re leather
, hard, dense, and easy to hold. Smash someone in the face with these and they’re not getting up in a hurry.”

“What about holy water?” said
Benzo.

Everyone looked at him before bursting out in laughter.

“Kidding guys, kidding!” he said laughing.

“What’s going on?” said
Caterina. She had been woken by the voices and came to see what they were talking about. Jessica was holding a bible. “Not having a prayer meeting without me, are you?”

“
How’re you feeling?” said Christina.

“Better
, thanks.”

“
Right, well if you guys are all right, I’m going to see Tom,” said Jackson. “He’s keeping a look out from the top of the steeple and he’ll be getting cold. I should go and...”

“No, it’s al
l right, I’ll go,” said Benzo. “Maybe you can check on Reggie, he’s been out like a light since we got here.”