Fear the Dead (Book 3) (12 page)

17

A throng of
people packed the square. When we got closer I saw that it was the Vasey
campers. They looked terrible. Their bodies swayed in the wind like weeds and
their faces were gaunt. They wouldn't have looked out of place marching with
the infected.

Sana stood
at the head of the Vasey group. Her hair looked like wild tree roots twisting
into her skull and her eyebrows arched above angry eyes. She looked like some
kind of witch who had spurned society and spent her time isolated in the
forest. She held a hatchet in her left hand, and there was a pale patch from
where the wedding ring was missing from her index finger. I realised that
everyone else in the Vasey group had weapons too. Some of them had thick logs
of wood, whereas others carried hammers, knives, axes. The look in their eyes
said that they were ready to use them.

When we got
to the edge of the square Billy charged ahead, his mallet clenched in his hand.
He looked like a warlord running into battle. I knew that if he got there
first, he was going to sink the mallet into the forehead of the first person he
reached. If that happened, blood was going to flow.

I started running
and in a few seconds I overtook him. The bullet scar on my leg ached with the
effort. Sana looked up at me, and there was fire in her eyes.

“You,” she
said, her words dripping with acid.

I held my
hand in the air. “Let’s all just take a second and calm down,” I said.

“Fuck off,
gimp,” she said. “We’ve been shut out of this place for too long. You’ve kept
your food from us like the fat pigs you are, and now look. We’re starving.”

Across the
square, behind the Vasey group, I saw Ewan. He stood in his shirt and trousers
like a worker commuting to the office who had stopped to see what all the fuss
was about. He had a wide grin on his face, as though he loved what he saw.

Sana waved
her hatchet in the air. “It’s about time we took what we deserve. We want a
share of the food. Enough to feed us all.”

Victoria
joined me at my side. Despite how tired she had seemed in her office, she’d
managed to shed that for now. Her posture was straight and her shoulders firm.
She stared into the angry faces of the Vasey campers.

“How the
hell did you get in here?” she said.

Sana screwed
up her face. “It’s amazing how persuasive a bunch of pissed off people with
weapons can be.”

“So you
forced your way in?”

“We waited
long enough for you to invite us, but you’re happy to let us die out there on
your doorstep. It turns out that your fences don’t mean shit when your people
don’t have the balls to guard them.”

“We should
talk,” said Victoria.

“We’re done
talking,” Sana spat.

It was the
most life I’d seen from Sana in a long time, a far cry from the defeated woman
who had travelled with us before Bleakholt. It was like she’d taken grief and
turned it into bile and anger.

If Victoria
was worried, she didn’t show it. She crossed her arms, straightened up a little
more, added a couple of inches to her height. Her face was set in steel. When
she looked like this she was scary, as though she could step forward and tear
your head off.

“If you’re
done talking, then I suggest you get the hell out of my settlement.”

“We’re not
going until we have food,” said Sana.

The Vasey
group murmured behind her. They waited for Sana to do something. It was if they
were looking for a cue, like Sana would give a sign and then the riot would
break out and they’d release their built-up anger. I wondered where Moe was.
This seemed like the kind of thing he’d relish.

I stepped
forward until I stood in front of Sana. From a couple of feet away, she smelt
horrible. It was an unwashed, damp smell, like a dog coming in from the rain.
Her shoulder bones stuck out against her blouse like a coat hanger.

I tried to
force a smile. “We can talk about this,” I said.

Sana swung
the blunt end of her hatchet at my leg and caught me on the bullet scar. Molten
pain ripped through my leg and made it burn from calf to thigh. I stumbled back
and held my leg tight as if gripping it would squeeze the pain out.

Sana raised
her hatchet in the air again. “Let’s take what we’re owed,” she shouted.

The Vasey
campers lurched forward. Between sick bouts of pain I glanced at them, and the
way they moved reminded me of the infected. They marched in step, their faces
angry and eyes lifeless. They had only one thing on their mind; the drive for
survival.

Billy, Steve
and Lou stepped forward, their own weapons in their hands. A few more Bleakholt
settlers joined them. They were like two opposing armies meeting for battle.
Their nostrils flared, and adrenaline shot through their veins and made them
grip their weapons.

“Enough,”
boomed a voice, loud enough to echo off the cobblestones and into the air. I
turned to the voice and saw Alice. She stood like a barrel-chested general, her
strong arms crossed in front of her, a stern look on her face. Something about
her made everyone stop what they were doing, and even Sana didn’t move.

“You stupid
bloody cow,” Alice said to Sana. “Can’t you see what you’re doing?”

“Fuck off,”
sneered Sana. She looked past Alice, straight at Victoria. “I’ve got a message
from Moe. Share your resources, or we’ll destroy everything. We’ll burn the
crops into ash if that’s what it takes. Share with us, or we all have nothing.”

Victoria
stood at Alice’s side. The two women looked more than enough to hold back the
Vasey settlers. Hell, I’d put them in front of the wave of infected and see
what happened. I think if the infected took one look at the two of them, they’d
turn back.

“Get the
hell out of my town,” said Victoria.

“This isn’t
the end,” said Sana. She turned away. “We’ve done our job,” she said to the
Vasey group.

The Vasey
group trampled away, the march of their footsteps thudding on the cobbles. 
After they left the square and walked out of sight, Victoria’s shoulders
slumped. Her posture sagged, like a balloon bleeding air. Alice stood firm, her
arms crossed.

Ewan walked
across the square. He put his hands together and clapped. The mocking slaps of
his palms echoed across the square.

“Well
handled, Victoria,” he said. “I’m sure they won’t be back.”

I watched
Victoria’s face as she thought of what to say. Doubt crept into her eyes, a shadow
that moved across the glimmer. She turned to face us, and the doubt was gone,
as if she had put on a mask.

“Show’s
over. Steve, Billy, get back to your jobs. Come on people.”

Everyone
filed away to their respective jobs. Alice went to the fence, ready to maintain
the metal that guarded the perimeter. Steve traipsed back to the mayor’s office
where he’d be the sentinel at the top of the stairs. He tapped his baseball bat
against his shoulder like a batter who had been thrown out of a game.  Lou walked
away, though I didn’t know where she’d go.

“Got a sec,
Kyle?” said Victoria.

Before I
could answer, she walked across the square. She sat on a black bench that
pointed at the fountain. She raised her hand to me, beckoned me over to her.
She patted the seat next to her. I walked over, the pain seeping through my
leg. I slumped into the bench.

“What
happened to your leg?”

“Got shot.”

“Were you in
the army?” she asked.

I laughed.
“Do I look like I was in the army?”

“They need
cooks and stuff.”

“I was a
teacher,” I said, smiling through the pain in my leg.

There was a
silence between us. Trees at the edge of the square blew in the wind, their
thin limbs swaying.  A sparrow swooped overhead, flew in loops around the
square and then departed east. Within a few seconds it had cleared the town and
turned into a black speck in the distance.

She smiled
at me sadly. “I can’t hold this together myself, Kyle. I know I must seem like
I hate the campers, but I don’t. Sending them away kills me. I wish I could
share food with them. I wish I didn’t have to see how skinny they look.”

I knew how
it felt to have to choose between options where no matter what you did, someone
had to suffer. Sometimes it was like you were leading everyone to hell, and no
matter what decision you made somebody would come off worse. Your conscience
was a dam that kept your soul from spilling out, but every wrong decision you
made punched a hole in it.

“The fact
that you have a conscience but still make those decisions is what makes you a
leader. It means you’re the only person who can do it,” I said.

Victoria
shook her head. “I’m not strong enough.”

“You’re the
strongest person here.”

“There’s too
much going on.”

I leant
forward, rested my arms on my legs. “It’s nothing you can’t handle.”

“You must be
feckin kidding. Between the infected that are coming, the stalkers nesting a
stone’s throw away, we’ve got it bad enough. But then there’s the campers.
That’s a problem that’s not going to go away. And Ewan’s always going to be
waiting for me to slip so he can take power. Everything’s turning to shit.”

“Everything
was already shit. Things are just getting – “

“Shittier?”

“Exactly.”

Victoria
scratched her wrist. The skin was red and raw. “I need you to do something for
me. I need you to go and talk to the leader of the campers.”

“You want me
to talk to Moe?”

She nodded.

I sighed. I
didn’t want to disappoint her. Victoria's willingness to make tough decision
made me respect her, but I couldn't talk to Moe again. I’d done that once, and
it almost ended with me killing him. If I had to look into his sneering face
again, I didn’t know what I’d do.

“I’m the
wrong guy for this,” I said.

“You’re the
only guy.”

“I’m sorry
Victoria. But I can’t.”

She let out
a long sigh, as though she were recycling the bad air out of her lungs.

“We’ve got
to fix this. If we don’t, something is going to happen sooner or later. Once it
does it will be too late.”

I didn’t
know what to say. I wanted to tell her that I’d do it, but I just couldn’t. She
was right, I knew. The situation between the Bleakholt settlers and the Vasey
campers needed to be fixed. But I wasn’t the man to fix it.

I stared out
across the square. In the distance were the outlines of the rocky hills that
formed a barrier between Bleakholt and the horrors further south. Such a
natural defence was rare, and I knew that there couldn’t have been many more
places like this in England or Scotland. I knew that we should do everything we
could to protect this place, and my part in that should have been to talk to
Moe. But I just couldn’t do it.

I closed my
eyes and took a deep breath. When I opened them, a man ran across the square.
His cheeks were red and his mouth was wide open as he sucked in air. There was
a look of shock on his face. Victoria leant forward and craned her head to get
a look.

“That’s one
of our scouts,” she said.

She got to
her feet, walked toward him. The man stopped a couple of feet in front of her
and bent over. He took a few breaths. When he lifted his head, his eyes were
wide, and his face was like chalk.

“I’ve seen
them he said,” choking down air. “The infected. My god, Victoria, there’s so
many of them.”

Victoria
looked at me, and the blood drained from her face, made her skin turn the
colour of concrete.

“They’re
here,” she said.

18

Billy
unlocked the gate and slid back the bolt. The metal fence rattled in the wind
as if it were shaking from fear. Lou stood to my side and stamped her feet on
the ground to warm her legs. Steve tapped his baseball bat against his palm and
looked out across the plains outside the fence.

Charlie held
out a package in his hands. “Now remember,” he said. “This stuff is ancient,
and it’s volatile. The slightest bump could spark it off. Whoever volunteers to
carry it is taking a massive risk.”

“Surely it
can’t be that bad. Doesn’t it need fire to set it off?” said Steve.

His cheeks
were lined with stubble, and his hair was shaved short, though not to the
scalp. His hair was flat and featureless, like the hair of an Action Man
figure. When he spoke his chubby cheeks puffed out, and he had a look in his
eyes like he was constantly in a daze.

Charlie screwed
up his face. “Where did you get your chemistry degree?” he asked.

“I don’t
have a degree.”

“Then maybe
you should listen to me.” He turned to look at me, as though I was a more
sensible person to explain it to. “I recommend everyone else should stay at
least twenty feet away from the person carrying it.”

Billy pulled
open the fence door. Beyond the safety of Bleakholt’s borders lay an open plain
of swaying grass that had faded into brown with the cold of autumn. Clumps of
trees were scattered around, and in the distance were the hulking hills that
dominated the landscape. They stood watch over everything and cast their
shadows over the ground before them. Every so often the wind dislodged rocks
from the top which rolled down the sides, making it look like the hills spat
them out.

Charlie held
the explosives in front of him and waited for someone to take them as though he
were playing pass the parcel. The walk to the hill passage was a mile. That
wasn’t too far normally, but a hell of a distance when you carried something
that could blow you to pieces. It was days like this that I missed the safety
of the classroom.

“I’ll take
it,” I said. I still felt like I had a lot of making up to do for everything
I’d put the group through.

Lou looked
at me, her eyebrow arched. “No offence Kyle, but with your leg I wouldn’t trust
you in an egg and spoon race. What if you stumble and blow us all to hell?”

“I’ll be
fine.”

“The girl’s
right,” said Steve. “I’ve seen you limping around. Give it to me. They used to
call me safe hands when I was in the school footy team. Best goalie they ever
had. Pass it here, Charlie. Billy, be a mate and hold my bat.”

Charlie
passed over the explosive and breathed with relief when his hands were empty.
Steve held them as though he were holding a football. I half expected him to
start doing kick-ups.

“Okay guys,
let’s get this over with,” I said.

It was a
strange feeling as I stepped out of the fence. I’d only been in Bleakholt for a
week, but I’d already gotten used to being away from the Wilds. It was
interesting how accustomed you got to safety. I didn’t like the feeling of
getting soft; it meant I wouldn’t be ready if someone stirred the shit pot.
Beyond the fence I felt like I was climbing a mountain without a safety rope.

A chilly
breeze blew on the plain. The grass crunched underneath our boots. Billy looked
from side to side, scanning the area as if he expected danger to leap out at
any moment. At least it was daytime. There might be infected hiding behind the
clumps of trees, but we knew there wouldn’t be any stalkers.

“So how’s
this going to go?” said Steve, trailing a few feet behind us.

“What do you
mean?” I said.

“Well what’s
the plan?”

“We blow up
the passage way and create a blockade of rocks from the hill. It’ll cut off the
infected.”

“But they’ll
still get here, won’t they? They’ll just take the long way round.”

I shook my
head. “The infected aren’t specifically looking for us. They just walk. If
something blocks their way, they’ll go in a different direction.”

“And if they
don’t?”

“Then we’re
fucked.”

“Oh.”

Billy tapped
the baseball bat against his shoulder like he was on the way to a game in the
park. “That doesn’t scare you, Steve?” he said.

Steve walked
with the explosives held in front of him and carefully stepped over loose
stones that lay on the floor.  “Think it was Churchill who said ‘The only thing
to fear is fear itself’.”

“Think we’ve
got a hell of a lot more to be scared of than that.”

“Well I’m
also scared of birds,” said Steve.

Lou stopped,
put her hand to her eyes and stared into the distance. A crow swooped overhead
and flew in loops over the plain.

“You better
give that to me,” she said.

Steve
stopped. “Why?”

“You’re
really afraid of birds?”

He nodded
sheepishly. “I know it’s weird.”

He looked
genuinely ashamed, as though we were going to make fun of him. The fact was
that everyone was afraid of something. Steve had it good, in a way. The
infected were everywhere, there was a nest of stalkers nearby, and the only
thing that scared him were birds. It was nothing to be ashamed of. I once knew
a guy who was scared of worms.

Lou sighed.
“You’re right that it’s fucking weird. Give me the explosives.”

Steve passed
the explosives over to Lou. She took them with care, made sure of the weight
before straightening her back.

“Now you
guys get the hell away from me. Keep at least twenty feet apart. No sense in us
all exploding into pieces if this goes off.”

Steve and
Billy gave Lou a wide berth, not that Billy needed to be asked to do that. He
hadn’t so much as looked at her since we had set out, the terrible secret they
kept weighing heavily between them. I walked next to Lou and matched her
strides.

“What the
hell are you doing, Kyle?”

“You’ve
risked your neck enough times for me. Thought I’d give you some company.”

We were
halfway across the plains now. The wind blew through my sleeves and down the
gap between my coat and my neck. The hairs on my arms stood on end. I was
looking forward to getting this over with and getting back into the safety of
Bleakholt.

“You should
walk with those two,” said Lou.

“That’s kind
of what I wanted to talk to you about,” I said.

Lou said
nothing, just carried on walking. Maybe she was hoping the conversation would
stop.

“We’ve all
made mistakes,” I carried on. “What you and Billy did was heartless. No point
trying to pretend otherwise. And in another time, I’d be sickened by it. But
the fact is that things are different now. Nobody owes someone else their
survival. You have to look out for yourself.”

“Easy to say
that, but it’s not true, is it? All you’ve ever done is look out for people.
First Justin, now Alice and Ben.”

I hung my
head and watched the grass as I trampled it with my boot. “I’ve made mistakes.”

“Like you
said, haven’t we all.”

“I felt weak.
Vasey was finished, and the wave was heading towards us. I didn’t know what
else to do other than keep moving. Is what happened to Sana’s son my fault? Ben
getting sick? Faizel dying?”

“Technically
I’m to blame for that.”

Flashes of
memory hit me. Faizel’s eyes fading, and his skin turning grey. Watching in
horror as Lou sank her machete into his neck and cut him until his blood poured
out and welled onto the floor. At the time it was the only sensible thing to
do. He’d been bitten and he was going to turn. Lou saved us from the danger of
him being infected, and she saved Faizel from the torture of becoming one
himself. She was the only one with the guts to do it.

“I know how
you feel Kyle,” said Lou. “Part of me feels cracked like an egg, or something.
The other night I couldn’t sleep so I tried to remember how many people Billy
and I stole food from. How many people we left to die just for our own selfish
survival.  Your mistakes have nothing on mine.”

She turned
and looked at me, a faint smile on her face. It wasn’t happiness or her usual
brand of sarcasm. It was something more genuine. As though she were trying to
comfort me.

Her boot
fell on the rough side of a stone and made her step twist a few degrees
off-kilter. Without thinking she shifted her weight and tried to stay balanced,
but it was too late. Lou tripped and tumbled to the floor, gripping the
explosives to her chest.

My breath
caught in my chest, and my ribs clamped. Blood pounded through me as I watched
her fall. I sucked in air and held it in my lungs as I waited for the boom of
the explosion and for her to be blown into oblivion.

Then I
sighed and let out a trail of panicked breath. Lou stood up as slowly as she
could, held the explosive tightly. To our right Billy and Steve stopped and
watched with wide eyes.

“Jesus
Christ,” shouted Steve.

Adrenaline
shot through me. “You lucky bitch,” I said. They were the only words that
popped into my head.

Lou nodded.
Her cheeks had turned porcelain white, and her shoulders shook. She would no
doubt try and shrug this off in a few minutes time, but I knew she was shaken.
She was in no state to carry the explosives.

“You better
give them to me,” I said.

Lou shook
her head. “Has your leg miraculously healed?” she said.

I looked to
Billy and Steve. “Steve, get over here.”

Lou handed
the explosives to him. We walked on, this time giving the explosive carrier a
wider berth. The near-fatal accident hammered through to us how dangerous this
actually was. I think each of us would have given anything just to stop and go
home. Back to Bleakholt and the safety of the fences. The hill passage was a
quarter mile away now, so we didn’t have long to go. We just had to be wary.

A clump of
trees were to the left, just to the side of Steve. I pictured his boot hooking
underneath a root and sending him crashing to the floor.

“Be
careful,” I called over to Steve.

“You think
I’m just going to trip and blow myself to hell? Don’t worry about me.”

He passed
the clump of trees and stared at the floor to make sure nothing could make him
trip. While he looked at the floor, he didn’t see the infected step away from
one of the trees, its body so thin that the trunk had hidden it. After a few
steps he heard it, but he was too late. The infected reached him and grabbed
his shoulders.

 Steve took
a step back. The infected dipped its head at him, teeth gnashing, trying to get
a bite of his flesh. Steve fell to the floor, and the infected landed on top of
him.

 My heart
dislodged and leapt to my throat. My stomach filled with the chill of fear. The
crow still swooped overheard but its swirls and loops were at quarter speed, as
though time had slowed. I waited to see if the explosives would detonate after
hitting the ground for a second time.  Maybe he would be okay. Maybe we’d get
lucky twice in one day.

A boom shook
the ground as the explosives blew. The force of it, even thirty feet away, hit
me in the chest and knocked me onto my back. The sound rang through my ears,
jarred my head like a pneumatic drill on my skull. It echoed through my head so
loud that my brain shook and I couldn’t see straight.

I looked up
in the air and saw it fill with a gush of blood. Mud sprayed across us like a
fountain and pattered against down against the floor. My eyes filled with dust
and started to sting, so I put my hands over my face. Chunks of Steve’s flesh
were tossed in the air and then rained down on the ground in clumps.

When the
dust settled there was a sour smell in the air, like gun powder gone damp. I
moved into a sitting position, thankful that I could still move. Overhead the
crow still swooped and looped, unaffected by the explosion below it.