Killing the Dead (Season 2 | Book 2): Dark and Deadly Land (13 page)

“You really don’t have the people to clear the whole town either do you?” I said. “Especially since you’ll no doubt have new ones keep trickling in.”

She looked at me, her face scrunched up as she squinted my way. Finally, she grunted and nodded. “Aye, spill over from Carlisle to the east.”

“And you’re planning on using the fertiliser on the golf course,” I said. “With a wall around it and all this wheat you have, you can start to grow crops.”

“You’re a clever bugger I’ll give you that,” she muttered.

“So what do you want from us?” I asked. Lily shot me a look that said I was pushing too hard but I wanted to know. “You’re surrounded on two sides by a growing number of the undead, the sea on another and at some point likely more undead from the south. No wall will hold them out if their numbers keep growing so, I ask again. What do you want?”

Bess stopped and turned to me, she seemed to be debating what to say and opened her mouth a few times before closing it. Eventually, she sighed. A sharp exhalation of breath and then she spoke.

“We need them gone,” she said. “We’ve not the people to do it but if we could get rid of most of those on the streets then we could clear the houses. Salvage what we could from them and the shops and actually have a chance of surviving the summer.”

She paused and spat over the side of the wharf into the sea water and cleared her throat before continuing.

“There’s some new zombies,” she said and seemed unsurprised when several of my friends nodded agreement. “They’re not great at it but they can climb. We’ve had them over the fence twice and lost people each time. We won’t survive long if we don’t do something.”

“What is it you think we can do that you can’t?” Lily asked.

“You’ve been out there a while and survived which means you’re tough,” she said. “We’ve sent people out to try and draw them away but it doesn’t work. None have come back. You look like you’ll have a chance and if you fail… you aren’t our people.”

“Ruthlessly pragmatic,” I agreed. “Admirable and the right sort of attitude you need.”

“Why would we risk our lives for this?” Gregg asked as the others asked the same.

“You want a boat ride across the bay, we can arrange that. If you decide not to help us, you won’t set foot on one of our boats and the only way north is through Carlisle. Good luck with that.”

“What sort of distraction do you need?” Lily asked. She at least seemed to be contemplating the old woman’s words. “I’m guessing something big to pull them away for good.”

“Fire,” I said before Bess could answer. She muttered something I didn’t catch and looked away. “A lot of fertiliser and some spare fuel. You want us to set off a bomb don’t you?”

“A bomb?” Gregg said with a gasp that was echoed by the others. Lily at least looked to be thinking about it rather than just reacting.

“Loud enough to get their attention, plenty of smoke for them to see and if done in the right place a lot of flames to attract them. They’ll walk straight into it if done right,” I said.

“Aye,” the old woman muttered. Her expression all the agreement I needed.

I had to admit, the idea had some merit. Even if they didn’t burn themselves up, having them walking in the direction of the flames would likely mean they’d just keep on walking and away from Haven.

“Where?” Lily asked.

“There’s an old airfield a few miles north-east of here,” Bess said.

“Airfield?” Becky asked, her interest piqued.

“Closed down in the sixties. It’s a business park now. There’s a factory there that makes furnishings. Not much use to us but lots of flammable things.”

I happened to be facing the right way to catch a glimpse of Aiden’s face when she mentioned the factory. He paled and a look of abject terror crossed his face. No one else seemed to notice it so I left it alone, I’d ask him about it later.

“Now if you’ve finished badgering me, we’ll go speak with Ethan,” Bess said. “Not that he’ll need to say much since I’ve just told you every bloody thing.”

The crotchety old woman was amusing and I decided that I liked her. I’d slit her throat given half the chance, but still. She was entertaining.

We followed the older woman into the Office block that sat beside the Mill. Since the apocalypse began it had seen some changes. Few desks remained and all of the computers and electronic equipment had been taken out.

Lighter sections of carpet suggested filing cabinets had been pushed up against one wall and since taken out to provide space for the ‘off duty’ people to lounge around in relative comfort compared to the starker warehouses.

The man Bess led us to was older than me, perhaps in his early fifties. Salt and pepper hair swept back over his male pattern baldness and he still had a slight paunch beneath his shirt. He looked us over as he spoke quietly with her and then approached, a wide smile on his face and arms spread wide in welcome.

“Hello to you.”

“Hey,” Lily said while the rest of my friends nodded or muttered greetings.

“I understand that Bess has explained our situation to you already so I won’t repeat what she’s said. You think you can help us, yes?”

“If you can offer us a ride across the bay then we can certainly discuss it,” Lily said and his smile faltered a little. I held back my grin and rested my hand on the folded knife in my pocket.

“Bess said… I was under the impression that you would do this thing,” he said with a glance back to the woman in question. She shrugged and when he turned back, she stuck her middle finger up at him. I liked her more and more.

“We think it’s possible to do what you want but at the same time, we aren’t interested in a suicide mission.”

Ethan’s smile had disappeared and along with it the false joviality he had been showing. He cast a glare back at Bess.

“You want a boat yes? Well since money is worthless and you have nothing on you that we could have any interest in, the price of passage is to do this. If you don’t do it, then leave. Now.”

“We could just take a boat,” I said in an over loud whisper to Lily who flashed a furious look my way that said quite plainly,
you’re not helping.

“They are guarded and you won’t find any others on the coast,” Ethan snapped. His irate tone had been noticed and several of the men who had been lounging around climbed to their feet. I widened my grin at the violence that seemed about to erupt.

“Fine,” Lily said. “We’ll do it. I just wanted you to know that we aren’t throwing away our lives on this.”

The look she gave me was enough to make me release my hold on the knife and sigh. I’d hear about this later. I didn’t quite grasp why she was so mad, the man was clearly an idiot and the world would be a better place without him.

I flicked my eyes towards Aiden and saw him looking down at his feet, his sister was attempting unsuccessfully to get his attention and I made an educated guess as to why.

“What about the people that are there?” I asked and Ethan stopped, mouth open. He appeared dumbfounded for all of a minute.

“People?” Lily asked with suspicion fairly dripping from her voice.

“There are some… people there,” Ethan admitted. He looked me up and down as though seeing me properly for the first time and not entirely happy about it.

“Why didn’t you mention them?” Gregg asked.

“It’s nothing,” Ethan waved his hands as though to wave away our concerns but my friends wouldn’t be put off.

“People, any people, being there are not ‘nothing’ to us,” Lily said.

“They are not nice people,” Ethan said.

“They’re bloody arseholes,” Bess added.

“Let me guess,” Becky said as she stepped forward to join the conversation. “Bunch of men with weapons who steal from you? Abuse the people they capture and kill anyone who stands against them?”

“Something like that,” Ethan muttered.

“Bloody cannibals is what they are and you know it Ethan, don’t you lie and say you don’t.”

The leader of Haven glanced at Bess then back to our group and seemed to deflate a little, some of his pompous nature draining away.

“Yes, we suspect that to be the case.”

“Why wouldn’t you tell us this?” lily demanded.

“Because they wanted us to say yes to their stupid idea,” Gregg snapped. “No way, no fucking way are we doing this. Cannibals!”

“What makes you think they are cannibals?” I asked. “Have you seen proof?”

“We suspect it,” Ethan said.

“How do you know about them if you’re stuck in here?” Pat asked.

“The undead line one long wall,” Bess said before Ethan could. “If you’re careful you can get out past them by land or sail up the coast a ways and come ashore behind them.”

“We’ve not just survived on the things we found here,” Ethan said. His fake joviality was entirely gone and he waved away the men who had risen to back him up. He seemed almost defeated. “Two scavenging parties failed to return before one man came back from the third. He told us they’d been attacked.”

“He also told us what he’d seen,” Bess snapped.

I held up one hand to cut her off and looked over at the young man and women we’d found back in Keswick. Aiden seemed to be trying to shrink back away from the rest of us as though by doing so he could avoid having to speak. Lily followed my gaze and glanced questioningly at me.

“What about it Aiden?” I asked. “Anything to add.”

“No,” he said. A single word, a denial and a refusal all in one. I pulled free the knife in my pocket and flicked it open, the deadly claw-like blade just long enough to slice down through an artery.

“You sure about that?” I asked as I stalked towards him.

“Ryan! Stop,” Lily shouted as she reached for me but I was past her. I seized the boy’s shirt and slammed him back against the wall of the building as I pressed the sharp point of the blade to his throat. His sister reached for me but one look to her made her stop in her tracks.

“Anything to say?” I asked politely as I pressed down on the knife. A small bead of blood appeared on his neck and he gulped.

“It’s all true,” he stammered, his words almost tripping over themselves in a rush to get out. “Those people are insane, you can’t make us go back there. Please, please!”

He began to weep, body shaking with the great wracking sobs that gripped him. I let him go with more than a little disgust and folded the knife before dropping it back into my pocket and turning to face the dumbstruck crowd of people behind me.

“Well then, won’t this be fun,” I said with a grin.

Chapter 14 - Lily

Aiden sat against the wall, his body shaking as he fought against the memories of the hell he’d been through. I shot a furious look at Ryan which he ignored as he sat on the edge of a desk and scratched absently at the fur on Jinx’s head.

Emily was signing furiously at us, at her brother, but he wouldn’t respond and the rest of us didn’t know what she was trying to say. With a heavy sigh and even heavier heart for what I had to do, I crouched down before the young man.

“Aiden. Aiden, listen to me.” He raised red-rimmed eyes and looked at me with such a forlorn expression that I had to resist the urge to reach out to comfort him.
Not yet, not now.

“You know about these people?”

“Yes.”

“We need you to tell us,” I said carefully. “Tell us what you know.”

He sucked in a deep breath and wrapped his arms around his chest, hugging himself as he willed himself to stop shaking. I waited as patiently as I dared. The restless shuffling of feet came from behind me and I held up one hand to them without looking round. A signal to wait.

“Before it started to snow,” he began. “We’d run from a farm we’d been staying at when it got overrun.”

“Just the two of you?” I prompted as he paused.

“No, we had Ben with us. It was his family’s farm and he was the only one who made it out.”

I glanced to my right to see Emily staring at me, big brown eyes begging me not to ask these questions. I swallowed what I was going to say and nodded for him to continue.

“We wandered for a while. Sleeping where we could, never staying anywhere long. Ben wanted to see the sea, he thought it would be the best place to go and we had no other ideas.”

He shrugged at the memory and even now, looked like he regretted that choice.

“One night, we were sleeping in a car that had been abandoned on an empty road when they found us.”

“The people…”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “They were kind at first. Brought us back to the factory where they’d set up home. Told us that as long as we worked hard, we’d have a place with them.”

“How many of them…” Ryan began but I cut him off with the wave of a hand.
Later for that.

“There were men, women and kids so we thought we’d be safe,” he said and a sob escaped him. He clenched one hand into a fist and pressed it against his mouth to still the sounds until he was back in control.

“Food wasn’t great. We didn’t have a lot, usually just enough for a few days at most but we got by. People looked out for each other. Then it started to snow.”

“It was bad up here?” I asked gently.

“Yeah,” he said. “Several feet of snow fell in the first few days. We were stuck inside but we thought it’d be ok. It’d settle and we’d be able to go out looking for food and stuff again. It didn’t.”

“What happened?” I pressed.

“The food ran out,” he said simply. “Jack and Pete, they went out into the snow anyway to try and find something. They never came back.”

He sucked in a deep breath and brushed at his eyes with the back of one grimy hand. He shook his head, though at what I couldn’t say.

“Zombies still came though. The cold didn’t stop them and we were all together, huddled under blankets for warmth. Three people died in that attack.”

“It’d been snowing for a week,” he said. “We’d had no food for four of those days, Jack and Pete had gone out the night before and not returned then we’d had the zombie attack. It was too much for her.”

“For who?” I asked.

“Angie,” he said. “She was nice to us but a bit strange. We found her hanging in one of the backrooms. She’d stood on a chair to do it, used some of the cloth they had at the factory to fashion a rope.”