Surviving The Evacuation (Book 8): Anglesey (6 page)

“Then it’s something else,” Lorraine said. “And if you want to know what, go to the pub tonight and see what they’re selling. I bet he’s hoping Markus is dead so he can take over the inn for himself.”

“Where’s this trailer park?” Sholto asked.

“There’s a caravan site a few hundred metres that way,” Lorraine said, gesturing inland. “We came over in the spring. Heather Jones saw some smoke when she was fishing. It was just a house fire, but that got her thinking we should grab everything we could while we could. There were too many zombies in Caernarfon, so we stripped the houses this side of the River Seiont. There aren’t many and it wasn’t long before we ended up at the caravan park. It’s a holiday place, and it was mostly empty and shuttered. There were a few odds and ends, but anything valuable enough to be stolen had been removed at the end of the summer season. There was a restaurant, and a path that leads to the site through the fields somewhere…. there, I think.”

Ivy coiled around a battered signpost and over a broken stile that marked a footpath’s beginning. After months of unchecked growth, the blackthorn and bramble hedge constricted the path to a narrow two feet.

“You see it?” Sholto asked, raising his rifle.

“I do. It’s mine,” I said, lowering my voice. “Those rifles are quiet, but not silent.” Nor were we.

Perhaps it was the weeks of safety, or the relative ease with which the zombies around the clubhouse had been dispatched, or the sight of the island just a churning stretch of water away, but months of experience had been forgotten. The zombie had heard us approach and was beginning to stand. It hadn’t been on the path long enough for the undergrowth to ensnare it, nor had it been undead for much longer. Its red jeans, blue shirt, and thick cracked-leather boots were free of the mud that coated those who’d been infected before the stormy spring settled into this stifling summer.

I hauled myself over the stile and raised the fire axe over my head. There wasn’t room to swing it any direction but straight down. Bravado had made me volunteer, and as I pushed my way through the thicket of thorny spikes, I knew that was a foolish motivation. I had nothing to prove, not even to myself, not anymore, and I vowed to never be driven by such cavalier recklessness again. It was a vow that didn’t last long.

I focused my attention on the creature’s lumbering gait. Watched its arms catch in the vines and branches. Listened to the sound of cloth ripping on the blackthorn’s inch-long barbs. Saw its mouth gape open, and I brought the axe down, splitting its skull. It fell into the hedge, stripping leaves from breaking branches.

“I’d say that was as loud as a gunshot,” Sholto said.

“Loud enough to wake the undead,” Lorraine muttered, climbing over the stile.

After another hundred metres, the path ended in a thicket of blackberries that almost completely concealed a varnished gate. Two downward strokes of the axe, and we had a route through, and a clear view of the caravan site.

It was a mixture of once-white static caravans and pine-clad chalets, separated by weather-cracked picket fences and ragged ornamental hedges. Each was surrounded by a patch of withered grass covered in windblown debris. Ten yards in front of us was a curving asphalt road partially covered in a fine dust of sun-dried leaves. I saw what Lorraine had meant about their not being much here to salvage. It was a place for the summer that could be tolerated in the autumn, but which would have been empty during the winter when the undead rose. Since leaves didn’t trample themselves into dust, it was clear that zombies had had free rein of the site for the last few months. It was also evident that survivors had steered clear of it. There were no barricades, and little sign of struggle beyond a pair of broken windows either side of a faded, bloody palm-print. That made sense. Anyone who reached this far, even if they hadn’t known there was a refuge on Anglesey, would have made for the island. That begged the question of why Markus had come here. It was clear where we’d find the answer. There was no one in sight, but the sound was unmistakable. From the way they raised their weapons, Sholto and Lorraine had heard the noise, too.

“That way,” she whispered, gesturing with her rifle barrel towards a gap between two chalets.

Avoiding the drifts of crackling leaves, and the narrow constraints of the artificial alleyways between the caravans, I took the lead. I had my head cocked, listening to the sound of flesh beating against metal and wood, trying to confirm it all came from the same direction. The noise grew as the road curved inland. I raised a warning hand. Slowed. Stopped. Inched forward to confirm there weren’t any creatures lurking behind a low brick wall to my left. Head extended, but axe raised, I eased forward until I could see around the edge of the caravan. I saw them. At least twenty zombies were gathered around a wooden chalet sixty yards down the road. Splinters flew as they kicked and beat against the thin boards. It was a miracle those walls had stood for so long, but they wouldn’t stand much longer. I backed away, and Lorraine and Sholto did the same.

“At least twenty in sight,” I whispered. “So probably thirty, all told.”

“This is not what I planned for my summer,” Lorraine said, her hand dropping to the spare magazines in her webbing.

“We’ve a problem,” Sholto whispered. “A 5.56mm round will go straight through the chalet’s thin walls.”

“We can’t shoot them? Then we need to get them to move. I’ll be the bait,” I said. “I’ll lure the zombies away from the chalet and onto the road.”

“Then we’ll be as likely to hit you,” he said.

“So aim carefully,” I said, and didn’t wait for him to argue. I limped off, skirting a route between the huts and holiday homes, until I was forty metres inland of the encircled chalet.

The curving road once again hid the zombies from view, but I heard the creatures beat an arrhythmic storm against the wooden cladding. I took a look around, but the sound was loud enough to carry for a quarter mile. All the zombies on the site had to be gathered by that chalet. Probably. Instinct made me take a second look over my shoulder, and as I did, I could feel fear beginning to rise. Before it had time to become an excuse for inaction, I stepped over a fallen signpost for the holiday park’s restaurant and out into the middle of the road. If Markus was after beer and spirits, wouldn’t that be the more logical place to loot? In fact, wouldn’t anywhere be a more logical place than a caravan site that would have been emptied of anything valuable before it was shut for the winter? I took another few cautious steps, puzzling over what they might have found in these paint-faded temporary homes as an alternative to thinking about the undead, until the chalet and the zombies came into view.

“Hey! Hey, you! You alive in there!” I yelled.

The snapping, banging cacophony drowned out any reply, and it almost drowned out my words, but there was a leathery whisper as the two closest creatures swivelled their heads.

“Over here,” I yelled. “Turn around. I’m here!”

The two zombies pivoted as one. Their heads bucked and their mouths snapped as they lurched an uneven step towards me. I took an involuntary step back.

“Come on,” I said, and now I was talking to myself. I forced myself forward, shifting my grip on the axe. It wasn’t a great weapon for this, not with the lack of balance that came from a hand missing two fingers.

“Come on!” I yelled again, and another two turned. “I’m here!”

The zombie next to the chalet’s door twisted to its left, and its arms knocked into the creature next to it. That zombie slipped sideways and into a third.

“Turn around!” I yelled, my eyes alternating between the chalet and the creatures getting nearer with each shuffling step. With three fewer zombies slamming against the thin wood, my voice was finally heard. As one, the pack shifted, pivoting around. The two zombies nearest me were less than twenty metres away.

“Why haven’t you fired,” I murmured. “Fire!” I yelled, and then I realised. I was in the middle of the road, right in the path of any bullet. I skipped three steps to the left.

“Fire!” I yelled again. “I said—”

I didn’t hear the shot, but I saw the zombie collapse. It was near the back of the pack. Of course it was. I finally saw the obvious flaw in our plan. The roads weren’t straight, and the rifles were silenced. The zombies didn’t know the shooters were behind them, but they knew I was in front, now less than ten metres from the nearest grasping hands. I started walking backwards, keeping to the verge and out of direct line of sight of Lorraine and Sholto. I saw another zombie fall, and then turned my complete attention to the nearest of the undead.

I gauged the distance at eight metres and closing. Walking backwards, I couldn’t limp faster than they could stagger, and so I’d retreated as far as I could. Shifting my weight to my good leg, I skipped forward and swung the axe, bending with the blow. The blade bit into the knee of the nearest creature. The axe slid through rotten cloth and necrotic flesh. Bone shattered. I darted backwards as the zombie collapsed, thrashing its arms on the asphalt road. Ignoring it, I back-swung the axe. The shaft twisted in my now sweat-slick grip, and the head hit the second zombie in the side. It staggered a pace and doubled over. I raised the axe up, and hacked down on its head. It fell, but my mistimed blow had wasted a valuable second. The rest of the pack got nearer. I couldn’t tell how many there were. It was just a sea of open mouths and snarling faces. I limped back, told myself to stay calm and that I’d been in far worse situations, but somehow this felt different.

There were three zombies walking abreast, with at least two bobbing, lurching heads less than five feet behind. I ignored everything else, stepped to the left, and skipped forward, swinging the axe at head height. The blade sliced through its cheek, spraying teeth and skin and rotten muscle. The zombie staggered as I punched the axe into its ruined face. The creature fell, and I let the axe fall, swinging it back like a pendulum, twisting my grip and bringing it up and over my head, and down onto the skull of the second creature. The scalp split, bone broke, and its brain exploded as its head was cleaved in two. I dragged the axe free, skipped back as the third zombie lurched forward, arms outstretched. I swung at its legs and overshot. The shaft hit its shin. Remembering that old trick with the pike, I yanked the axe towards me. The blade hooked under its leg, and pulled the creature from its feet. I changed my stance and brought the axe down on its head just as it landed on the asphalt.

“Three down,” I murmured, skipping back apace, looking for the next threat. There were two of them, and that was all. There wasn’t time to wonder what had happened to the others. I assumed they’d been shot, and there wasn’t time to think any more. A snarling monster in a torn tweed jacket was limping closer. Only one arm was outstretched, the other hung uselessly by its side. The coat was missing its sleeve, the arm missing its hand. I slammed the axe into its knee. I heard a pop, and the creature collapsed. The axe-shaft was slick with sweat, gore, and blood. I raised it up, over my head, and then down in a great scything blow that connected with the second zombie’s skull. The axe bit into bone, but I lost my grip, and the weapon pinwheeled sideways. I didn’t look to see where it landed, but grabbed the hatchet from my belt.

I walked over to the tweed-jacketed zombie and slammed the hand-axe into its brain. I stalked back up the road, slashing the hatchet left and right, finishing off those twitching, writhing creatures. But then, almost abruptly and sooner than I expected, I realised they were dead. I was alone, the road was empty, and the chalet was out of sight.

There were seven bodies around me, and an eighth just a little way ahead. I was reasonably certain I hadn’t killed that one. I was right. The eighth zombie had been shot. I found four more zombies that had been shot before I reached the chalet. The rest of the small pack were banging on the doors and walls once more.

My heart was pounding in my ears, and only as it slowed did I hear the indistinct yells for help coming from inside.

“Shut up!” I barked. “You’re making this harder.”

A zombie turned. I took a step towards it, and it took a step towards me. “Come on, then. Over here.”

Someone inside yelled a reply I couldn’t make out.

“Shut up!” I yelled. I don’t know if the chalet’s occupants heard me, but the zombies did. Two more turned around. The lead creature sauntered towards me. It was another recent addition to the undead. The bows on the laces of its shoes were still tight.

“I said—”

The zombie collapsed. I glanced up and to my left, and saw Lorraine kneeling on the roof of a caravan.

“I said,” I yelled, even louder. “Shut up. We’re here to rescue you, though I don’t know why. You’re making this a whole lot—”

As its foot touched the asphalt, a zombie in a blue anorak collapsed, its coat billowing out behind it as it thumped to the ground. All bar one of the remaining zombies turned towards the sound of the falling body. They saw me, the obvious prey. I stood, silent, hatchet in hand, as they lurched towards me. One after another, as they moved away from the thin-walled wooden hut, Sholto and Lorraine shot them. In less than two minutes, only one zombie remained, languidly beating against the door to the chalet. There was no force to its blows. It was more like it was running its palm down the wood. It didn’t notice me until I was right behind it. Just as it began to turn its head, I swung the hand-axe down. Dragging the blade free, I walked away from the chalet.