The Left Series (Book 4): Left In The Cold (5 page)

“There’s no way we’re lugging that thing around with us, Smith,” I scolded. “I’ve nearly broken my back carrying that damn box around too many times.”

“Relax, kid,” Smith sighed. “I’m just going to take the contents out and put them into some more portable bags.”

Smith was proud of his collection of handguns and we were going to need plenty of weapons when we ventured into the unknown.
The box must have contained nearly a million dollars in cash but I didn’t see how it was going to be relevant during our journey. Smith shoved the money and weapons into belts, holsters, rucksacks and the pockets of his cold weather parker. Wingate groaned as Smith stuffed wads of excess cash into her own backpack.

“Do we really need all this money?” she protested.

Smith ignored her and continued to pack.

Milner shook each of our hands and wished us luck when the six of us were finally ready to go. We were all dressed in cold weather gear
, gloves and woolen hoods, with our loaded packs on our backs. I felt as though we were embarking on an expedition across the Antarctic. Cordoba, Smith and Gera carried the rifles while Batfish, Wingate and I made do with M-9 Beretta handguns. I was no rifleman and preferred the smaller, easier to maneuver weapon. 

Batfish had improvised and modified some webbing to make a harness so she could carry Spot against her belly. We’d wrapped the little guy in a blanket inside the harness to try and keep him from getting too cold.

We traipsed to the front door and I noticed several armed Marines guarding the entrance to the bar. I guessed Van Outmen and his pals were going to be kept under strict detention until we were long gone. I took some maps and local guide books from the racks surrounding the reception desk. Nobody had suggested any sort of destination and we were simply heading out into the snowy wilderness.

Milner unbolted and unlocked the front door then opened it up. A cold wind whipped inside the lobby and into our faces.
The snow was still deep outside but had ceased falling from the slate gray clouds, hanging low in the sky.

Milner bowed his head in sorrow as we trudged through the doorway into the cold, white world beyond.
I wondered what horrors and hazards lay in wait for us, whichever path we took.

The snow made crumpling noises under our feet as we trekked across the parking lot. I turned back and saw Milner close the front door. That was it, no going back.
One door closes, another one opens
, or whatever the saying was.

“Any suggestions to where the hell we’re headed?” Wingate turned and shouted above the wind.

I unfolded one of the maps but it was impossible to read as the wind blew the damn thing in rippling flutters in front of me.

“Press it up against my backpack,” Cordoba suggested, turning her back to me.

I did as she said and the others crowded around to study the map.

“We’re about eight miles west of the outskirts of Glasgow City,” Smith said, pointing to our location. “I know it’s not a good idea to head for heavily populated areas but we won’t last long out here in this cold.”

I nodded in agreement.

“Even eight miles on foot is going to take us a while in this snow,” Smith continued. “I think we should maybe head for the city and take refuge wherever and whenever we can.”

The others all agreed. I didn’t see what else we could do. We were back to living each day as it came, fighting the elements, fighting the undead, fighting to survive in an unknown environment.

Chapter Seven

We trudged through the snow in relative silence for what seemed like hours. The deep snow, hilly terrain and heavy backpacks were strength sapping and I badly needed to rest. We walked by clusters of tall trees laden with snow on their branches, across white covered barren fields and over dilapidated wire fences. The Glenross Hotel was well and truly out in the Scottish wilderness.

We came across an isolated barn and stopped to rest out of the wind for a few minutes. The barn roof was half collapsed under the weight of the snow and Smith wouldn’t stay inside when he saw a rat scurrying around the decaying stack of hay bales. Smith hated rats and was more terrified of the furry rodents than he was of walking flesh eaters.

The first zombie I’d seen for a while, staggered out of a wooded area shortly after we left the barn. The creature lumbered towards us and fell over a few times in the snow. It was wrapped in nothing more than brown colored rags and wailed and moaned as it tried to stand. Gera took aim with his M-16 and dispatched the ghoul with one single shot to the head. The gunshot echoed around the sparse landscape and I hoped no more undead would be attracted to the sound.

Cordoba slid waist deep into a snowdrift on the opposite side of a wooden fence. Gera and I grabbed her arms and pulled her out.

“I think we’re standing on what’s left of a road,” Smith said. “That dip in the ground Cordoba fell down was probably a roadside ditch. Let me take a look at that map, Wilde Man.”

I pulled out the map from my parker pocket and we huddled around in a circle.
Smith studied the map intently. He pointed to a few block shaped objects along a line that I guessed was a road.

“If we follow this road west, we should come to this small village, right here. Maybe we can take a break and rest up for a while in one of the houses.”

“Sounds good to me,” I said. “I’m done.” 

I was glad when the others agreed and we followed the snow covered roadway at a slow pace. The white covered rooftops of the houses honed into view after around a mile further down the road.
The buildings were all constructed of chunky stone and only one storey high, spread around at odd angles to the road. I rubbed the snow off of the village signpost and was pleased to see the place was delightfully named ‘
Killnockie.
’ I tried to pronounce the name quietly in a Scottish accent, but the noise sounded like I was trying to clear my throat.

“Are you okay, Brett?” Cordoba asked. “I heard you coughing.”

“Yeah, I’m good,” I muttered. “Just trying to speak Scottish.”

“I’m sure they don’t sound like that, Brett,” Batfish chuckled. “Which house do you think we should
try, guys?”

“Man, these places look old,” Gera mused, staring at the buildings.

“They were standing long before we were born and they’ll probably still be standing a long time after we’re gone,” Smith said, rather morbidly. “Let’s try this place, right here.”

He led the way through a small front garden that contained a few mounded dome shapes, which were impossible to recognize under the
thick snow.

Smith banged a gloved fist on the front door. “We don’t want to go inside if we’re not welcome.”

Gera wiped away a layer of snow from one of the front windows and it fell from the pane in a thick slab. He peered through the glass but shook his head.

“I can’t see shit inside that room,” he sighed. “The windows are covered in condensation on the inside.”

“You’d think these remote places would have been safe from the disease,” Wingate said. “The people could have hidden away and cut themselves off from the rest of society.”

“Maybe they have,” I said. “Scotland seems pretty deserted from what I’ve seen of it. In fact, I can’t remember seeing a living person since we’ve been here.”

“Well, it don’t seem like there’s anybody home,” Smith said, banging on the door a second time. “Let’s see if we can find an easier way in through the back.”

We followed Smith around the side of the stone house, through the garden and around the rear of the building.
The back of the house looked out onto miles of open countryside, blanketed beneath thick layers of snow. Smith brushed the ice off the rear door handle and tried turning it. He butted his shoulder against the door but it remained firmly in place.

“Looks like we’ll have to break a window,” he muttered.

“Won’t that let the cold inside?” Wingate whined. “We have to warm up or we’ll be in danger of catching hypothermia. We’ve got little in the way of medical supplies and we all need to get out of the cold for a while.”

“Yes, Doc,” Smith groaned at being scolded. He turned back to the door and gave the wooden panel by the lock a series of hefty kicks. The layer of snow on the door frame spattered outwards under the heavy impact of Smith’s boot and showered us
as we huddled at the back entrance. The wood next to the jamb splintered and gave way. The door opened slightly but was warped into the frame and scuffed across the interior stone slab floor.

“We’re in,” Smith muttered.

“I’ll enter first,” Gera volunteered. “We got to check the coast is clear before we can relax.”

Nobody argued with Gera and he hunched over his M-16, leading the way through the doorway. We followed him inside the house in a vertical line, with me being the last to enter behind Batfish.
The interior was dark and dank with a stench of mold wafting through the place. The layers of snow covering the window panes blocked out the natural daylight. I turned and pushed the door closed behind me, leaving us in near darkness but at least we were out of the freezing wind. The house was eerily silent and I felt uneasiness rise within me. Entering an unknown property, not knowing the layout of the place or what lay beyond the room’s confines always filled me with dread. 

Wingate fished around her parker pockets and pulled out a flashlight. She clicked the switch and the LED bulb blinked into life, illuminating the room. We stood in a small kitchen with a
gray flag stone floor, brown wooden paneled walls and a spindly rectangular table, surrounded by four stools in the center of the room. A row of glass fronted cabinets hung from the wall next to the back door. A brown countertop ran in an ‘L’ shape beneath the cabinets and along the adjoining wall to our right. An old fashioned, white fronted refrigerator stood in a recess in the wall to our left. Smith moved towards the refrigerator and opened the door.  I immediately caught a whiff that smelled like long since spoiled milk.

“Jesus, something smells a little ripe in there,” Smith snorted, covering his face and closing the
refrigerator door.

Wingate searched through the closets but mice had shredded whatever was left of packets of dry food on the shelves.
She removed a couple of tins with almost disintegrated labels.

“I think these contain soup,” she said, shining the flashlight over the tins.

“We’ve got all the tins we need,” Smith sighed. He unclipped his webbing and slid the pack off his back. “I need to put this damn thing down for a while.”

We all followed suit, removing our heavy backpacks and dumping them in a pile next to the back door. I rolled my shoulders, relieved at the load taken off my body.

“We better check the place out,” Gera said, gripping his M-16 rifle and edging towards the closed door in front of us that led to the rest of the house.

“I’ll come with you,” Cordoba said. “It’ll be quicker and easier if the two of us check out the other rooms. You guys stay here and we’ll give you a call when we’ve cleared the place.”

We nodded in turn and Cordoba removed her own flashlight from her parker pocket. Gera snapped the kitchen door open and Cordoba shone her flashlight into the darkness beyond. A musty, stale stench wafted through the air, out of the blackness. The smell reminded me of a crypt, of long dead people.

Chapter Eight

Gera and Cordoba moved slowly through the kitchen doorway into the dark, wooden paneled hallway. Two rooms with closed doors sat on each side and the front door stood directly in front of us. I didn’t like the feeling I was enduring in the pit of my stomach. Maybe it was just because we hadn’t been inside a new place in a while but my intuition, or whatever it was, rarely proved me wrong. My gut instincts had helped keep me alive all through the apocalypse and now the gauge was pulsing in the red.

Cordoba placed her gloved hand on the handle of the first door to the left and nodded to Gera. He returned the nod and she flung open the door. Gera moved into the room beyond and Cordoba followed, out of our line of sight.

“I don’t like this,” I muttered. “Something doesn’t feel right.” I felt shaky and my guts turned over.

“Since when did anything feel right,” Smith huffed, oblivious to my dubious reservations.