The Screaming (Book 1): Dead City (11 page)

“Zac. Are you alone?”

“Yeah man. In case you hadn’t noticed the worlds gone to shit. Needed some capital dint I.”

“Capital?” Zac said, puzzled by Daz’s blasé attitude.

“Yeah man, these computers will get me some coin and a bit a green, fund my way outta this shithole and away from those fucking butt munchers.”

“You’re stealing the computers?”

              Daz busily set about gathering his haul together, seemingly unfazed by Zac’s interruption. Zac stood, baffled by his actions, but found he had unknowingly lowered the cleaver and Mark was now standing in the door way.

“Alright mate?” Daz chucked the gesture at Mark as he glimpsed over his shoulder catching Mark in his gaze. Mark smiled, more relieved than anything.

“Gis a hand if you like?” Yelped Daz without breaking from stacking monitors and keyboards in boxes.

“You’re wasting your time. No one is going to want your stolen computers. There is no one.”

“I know a bloke.” Daz confidently replies.

“Is that your van outside?” Zac changed tack.

“Nicked it, dint I.” Daz, proudly announced.

“That could get us all out of the city.” Zac confidently stated.

“Vans full!”

“Full? There are others?”

“Na, just me and my stuff.”

“Please.” Mark whispered.

   Zac turned and looked at him, the desperation and fear clearly producing a rare display of verbal communication. Zac chose not to mark the occasion and turned his gaze back to Daz, who looked at Mark with a puzzled scrutiny.

“What’s up wiv Forrest Gump?”

“Oi! Nothing, He’s fine. Just doesn’t talk much, that’s all!” Zac Snapped to Marks defence.

“You want a ride? You pay your way!” Daz relinquishes.

“Okay. Thanks.”

    Shattering glass echoed through the corridor, rapidly cutting the conversation off. The newly united trio sharply threw their attention towards the classroom door and the obscurity of the corridor. Another splintering smash, quickly followed by the banging of wood. Mark yelped and quickly scurried away from the door to his comfort zone, behind Zac.

“I thought you were alone?” Zac floated the question over to Daz, without even blinking his stare away from the door.

“I am.” 

   Zac tightened his grip on the cleaver and raised it to his waist. Seeing Zac’s preparedness, Daz anxiously scanned the desks around him, eventually settling on a crowbar resting on the top of a stack of laptops. Zac slowly shuffled to the door. He could feel his pulse belting through his body and he suddenly found himself overheating with trepidation. He reached the doorway and paused to allow his eyes to adjust to the darkness before cautiously extending his head around the door. Nothing to the right. To the left was another classroom. The old wooden door was donned with a large colourful sign. A red background, fronted with multi coloured glitter letters that read,

“CLASS 3H MRS STRONG.”

   The scuffle of movement inside the classroom focused Zac’s attention on the door. A quick check back down the corridor and he started to slowly edge into the darkness and towards CLASS 3H. Mark had subconsciously extended his leash from Zac’s back and was clinging to the door frame of the computer room. However Zac was surprised to see Daz bouncing on his toes in the corridor behind him. The crowbar raised over his shoulder, grinning from ear to ear at the anticipation of what might lay beyond the door.

“On three!” Zac uttered.

“Just fucking open it, you poof.” Daz replied.

    No witty retort or suitable insult came to the front of Zac’s mind, so he saw little option but to open the door. He pulled out the torch, clamping it between his teeth and adjusted his grip on the cleaver. Then reaching forward, turned the handle and pushed the door open. As it creaked ajar he took a step back and raised the cleaver in one fluid relative motion. Nothing. Daz sniggered at Zac’s elaborate display, but his critic review was largely ignored. Zac edged into the doorway of the dark room. The torch flickered in his mouth as the batteries flagged. A quick shake of his head and the torch light darted across the room. A small huddle of movement in the corner of the room drew Zac’s attention and he focused the torch light on the cluster. Eight or so children, no more than 6 years old, stood in a close bundle against the back wall.

“It’s kids!” Daz bellowed from the doorway.

   Boys and girls, white shirts neatly fronted by gold striped school ties. Grey trousers and skirts hung over polished black shoes.

“Hi” Zac said with his comforting voice, so well perfected on Mark.

“I’ve found the light switch.” Daz proudly exclaimed.

   The large strip lights that hung from the tall ceiling, quickly flickered into life, eliminating every corner of the room in one giant overwhelming influx of grotesque degeneracy. The magnolia walls and the displayed achievements of CLASS 3H desecrated and tarnished forever with the crusted red coating. The tiled floor glazed with a pool of blooded entrails, centred by the large shredded corpse of an adult female, her rib cage torn apart and peeled open like fresh fruit. The reality struck Zac in the face like a right hook.

   The children were infected. A small boy scuttled around the almost fleshless bones of what was left of Mrs Strong, trying to find the last of the meat to consume. The huddle of children in the corner stared at Zac. Crimson fluid flowed from their eyes like blood stained tears for a mummy they will never see again. Mouths hung open over the stained shirts, presenting toothless, torn gums. Their teeth too weak to survive the tough bone of Mrs Strong’s chest plate. Arms hung at their sides, fingers shattered and broken. Zac felt a tear on his cheek and simultaneously a tug at his shoulder.

“Let’s go!” Daz forcefully whispered.

   Whispering seemed futile as the piercing shrill of the screaming children exploded into choir like harmony.

“Fucking leg it.” Daz cried.

   Zac turned and made for the door, sliding on the rink like tiles with the grace of a new born horse. As he hit the corridor he grabbed Mark by his collar, tearing his frozen grip from the door frame and practically throwing him down the corridor to the stairs. Daz was well away and had already reached the staircase when CLASS 3H burst into the corridor to chase down their next buffet. The three made quick work of the stairs and were soon tearing down the corridor towards the back door, though the gap was closing fast and the horde of little monsters would soon be upon them. Daz threw himself out of the door first into the fresh air of the playground, the van sitting temptingly in front of him. He turned and took hold of the door.

“Wait!” Zac screamed at Daz, who looked caught in two minds, primed to slam the door shut.

   Zac and Mark emerged moments later and Daz slammed the door with all his might, then stood stunned and panicked as it bounced back with a crack. A small mangled hand, gripped around the door frame, broken and blooded from the weight of the door. One of the children had managed to keep their hopes for another feeding alive. Daz bounced his weight off the door trying to force it to close. More and more fingers and hands streamed from the doorway like an army of ants from a flooded ant hill. The door swelled as CLASS 3H scrambled, scratched and insensibly hacked at its ageing wooden frame.

“Get in the fucking van.” Daz yelled.

   Zac didn’t hesitate, he jumped into the driver seat, turned the key and the van grunted into life. Almost instantly a chorus of shrieking beasts burst into harmony from all around, called to battle by the roar of the van engine. Darkened streets and desolated houses in every direction, exploded into life. The neighbourhood was waking up once again, and in moments, an army of flesh eating residents would be hunting down their breakfast. Mark jumped in the passenger seat and instantly put his seat belt on, locking the door with a furious panic. Daz could feel his muscles rapidly weakening. His arms started to tingle as the force on the barrier became too much for him to hold. One last defiant kick at the door and he was sprinting for the rear of the van.

“GO!” he screamed as he flung himself through the rear doors, landing with a thud on a blanket of crisp packets, newspapers and Happy Meal boxes.

   Zac put his foot to the floor and the van took off towards the closed chain link gate. A molten blanket of darkness was forming beyond the gates as the horde of rousing screamers, flowed towards the sounds of human life. One by one CLASS 3H had reached the van, a small brunette girl leapt and projected herself towards the fleeing vehicle, her small body striking the swinging rear door with a bone snapping crunch, before sliding off onto the concrete playground. A small boy was next to launch himself at the rear doors, receiving a swift kick to the face from the sole of Daz’s boot, sending him hurtling onto the playground and skittling two more pursuers to the ground. Daz chuckled at the achievement, but celebration was short lived.

   The van hurtled into the gate, a shockwave lashed its way through the van as the gate slowly buckled, bringing the van to a virtual halt. Instantly, a blonde girl was in the rear of the van and clawing at a defiant Daz. He raised the crowbar and drew it down with a forceful blow across the   head of the frenetic youth. Each blow tore chunks of flesh from her scalp but still she came, sinking her fingers into Daz’s stomach. The signal of intense, sharp agony reached his brain like lightning and he cried out, momentarily easing off on the crowbar defence.

   The tiny attacker saw her opportunity and lunged her wracked mouth into Daz’s chest, her fragmented teeth, carving through his pasty pail epidermis. Suddenly the van shunted forward, breaching the gate. The feeding juvenile was thrown back, tearing a mouthful of flesh from Daz’s chest and slumping out of the back door onto the road. Zac grinded the battered old van into second gear as it dropped onto the road. The ever increasing gathering of dysfunctional freaks honed in ahead.

Chapter Eight

   Fragmented splinters of glass exploded through the windscreen as blow after blow of thrashing limbs pulverised the battered old vehicle. They swarmed from every direction, like a flood of bodies, tearing through streets and alleyways, each fighting and jostling to reach the rusty old Ford and share in the spoils. Several had mounted the bonnet and begun the relentless bombardment on the rapidly failing glass barrier that teasingly impeded the vocally strident predators from their prey.

“What the fuck do we do? Zac screamed.

   He looked at the passenger seat, desperately hoping that Mark would offer a solution. But Mark was frantically trying to fit himself into the foot well, weeping and blubbering into his phlegm covered sleeve.

“Daz? Are you okay?”

“Fucking marvellous bud.” Was the sarcastic, laboured response.

   The ageing Ford arduously muscled its way through the ever increasing crowd. The windscreen fractured like frosted spider webs under the pressure of every volley of uncontrolled appendages. Daz turned and painfully crawled to the front, squinting through the gaps between the blanket of bodies outside. Zac glimpsed down at Daz, catching sight of the oozing mutilated wound on his chest. Feral, youth inflicted lacerations covered the arms and face of the increasingly pale kid.

“There. Get us down there.” Daz pointed to a narrow pedestrian alleyway over to the right.

   Zac paused momentarily as if his mind was processing the legality of driving down a pedestrian walkway before reality struck him around the face in the form of an arm penetrating the windscreen with an almighty crack. He threw the steering wheel to the right, aiming the car for the slim route, dislodging several hangers on. A spectacle of coloured sparks flowed along the passenger door as the dumpy rust bucket squeezed between the two brick walls, sending the wing mirror spiralling off over gardens. Tyres jostled and spun, in a vain attempt to gain traction over the accumulating carpet of body matter falling under the wheels.

   The rusty white bodywork had been irreversibly tarnished by the almost artistic paint job of scarlet and brown as the van burst from the alleyway like a champagne cork on to yet another residential road of back to back terrace houses.

“They all look the fucking same.” Zac barked as he boiled over with panic and frustration.

“Just keep going right.” Daz winced.

   Zac slammed the wheel to the left and accelerated away, bouncing the tatty transport off of an abandoned Volvo.

“I said, go right, you fucking tit!” Daz excreted before growling with pain once again.

“Shut the fuck up, I’m doing my best.”

   Zac negotiated the next couple of right turns, weaving through discarded cars, burning homes and what remained of devoured carcases, littering the road. Every street, mirrored the last, row after row of small houses and corner shops. Thick black smoke drifted through Victorian streets from countless fires with the freedom to burn on unchallenged. Though for distant alarms, sirens and bangs as items popped and exploded in fires, it had suddenly turned oddly quiet.

   His face looked like he’d been subjected to a mustard gas attack. With a fever at point ten on the man flu scale and sweat flowing from his head, Daz was struggling to remain conscious. He slowly slid back into the rear of the van and curled himself into a ball, as sporadic pulsing shudders started writhing through his body.

“Hospital.” More vocal expression from Mark, as he pointed to the road sign.

“NEWHAM UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL.”

   The large modern building looked more like a shopping centre than a hospital, with its towering glass reception and yellow brick exterior. It was only the cluster of forsaken ambulances littering the front that betrayed the building for what it was. Well maintained flower beds had been trampled into the ground by the surge of patients and subsequent infection fuelled monsters. Countless disembowelled corpses beset every yard of the grounds and the roadside beyond. The rickety Ford slumped to a halt.

“This is a very bad idea.” Zac mumbled.

   Shudders had escalated into convulsions and Daz was clearly suffering. He drifted through several stages of consciousness in the blink of an eye and his breathing was like an asthmatic old dog. Zac looked at him with a cocktail of compassion, fear and expectation tearing him up.

“Mark, you stay here, look after him, I’ll get some help or medicine. Okay?”

   Mark nodded, relieved to be staying in the van. Every line of his teenage face expressing every fragment of emotional anguish, that Zac struggled to suppress. Zac retrieved the meat cleaver from the dashboard and took a thorough look around for nearby freaks. Mark slid back into his foot well and pulled his backpack over his face, nervously manipulating the straps with his fingers. Zac took a deep breath, flung the door open and before he knew it, was sprinting across the car park towards the hospital entrance. Constantly checking all around him for pursuers he may have roused, he only broke his stride to glimpse into the back of an open ambulance for supplies. As expected the vehicle had been stripped bare and what was left had been irretrievably damaged by the massacre that had clearly taken place inside the vehicle. Green paramedic overalls and an old ladies walking frame were the only recognisable props that remained of a murderous display. 

   The automatic sliding doors stuttered open, gurneys soiled with blood and entrails lined the corridor, which stretched off into a dark reception area. Broken strip lights, hung from the ceiling and emergency lighting flickered sporadically. Zac slowly edged into the darkness, the cleaver primed in his right hand. To the right was a reception desk and large waiting area. A large flat screen television on the wall, blinked between snowy static and a large red screen with a message apologising for the technical fault, and guaranteeing transmission would soon be restored. To his left, Zac found two sets of double doors and towards the back of the room was a large stair case and an elevator. Zac turned to the first set of double doors.

“TRIAGE AND TRAUMA.”

   He slowly pushed the door open and edged inside. The room was set into three cubical areas for treating the most seriously injured. Victims of road collisions, heart attacks and accidents in the home. But that purpose had long concluded. This room was now a grave, a monument to humanities attempt to save itself. The room was dead and so were the occupants, their torsos laid on the tables and the surrounding floor bore a ring of blood and intestine. They had entered hoping for treatment, but instead finding themselves the main course in a grotesque greasy spoon. 

   Heart monitors, still alarmed with monotone constant beeping, hooked up to nothing more than fragments of discarded gristle. To the back of the room was a nurse’s station. A raised desk for admin and paperwork purposes. Behind the desk a line of cupboards donned the wall, each labelled with instruments, bandages and various other medical equipment. Zac edged over to the cupboards, checking under tables and behind privacy screens for any idle predator lurking. Zac selected a yellow “BIOHAZARD” plastic bag from a roll below the cupboards and opened the cupboard marked “GAUZE AND DRESSINGS.”

   He swiped, dressings of all size, before moving on to the next cupboard and grabbing bottles of sterile wound cleaning solution, scissors, tape, tweezers and a wound stapler, placing them all into the bag. He worked his way along the wall cupboards, before moving to the larger cupboards that ran underneath the rear counter. He pulled open the first cupboard, the sudden high-pitched yelling boomed from the back of the cupboard, as the dark form wriggled out into the flickering light. Arms flying towards Zac, who stumbled back, cracking his head on the cupboard above him sending him slumping helplessly to the ground as the creature sprung forward.

   The cleaver spiralled across the polished tile floor, Zac raised his arms in a last ditched defence and braced himself for the impending attack. Abruptly the screaming stopped, there was nowhere to go. This was it. Time seemed to be moving slowly, he waited, eyes tightly closed and every muscle in his body tensed for the impending pain of the first puncture of his flesh. But it didn’t come. He slowly opened his left eye and peeked over his filth covered arms. To his disbelief, the girl was sat in front of him, a relieved and exhausted smile filled her face.

“You’re normal.” The posh, home counties accent strangely out of place in the east end, even under these circumstances. 

“Erm…yes.”

“Are you the Army? Police? Is it over?”

“Erm.” Zac was in shock, she may as well be speaking Mandarin, as he struggled to process things.

“No.” Zac eventually replied to an expectant face, hoping that all her questions had been answered with that one answer.

   The smile dropped like a deflated balloon from her face and Zac knew his simple reply had got the message across. The young girl slumped against the cupboard door. Zac’s heart rate was starting to drop to a level of relative normality, though this was still well in excess of a normal. She can’t have been more than 22 years old. Her long brown hair, held up in a ponytail by a single elastic band, dirty blood soiled blue scrubs hung from her slim body. A pin badge on her chest read, NEWHAM UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL NHS TRUST. Below it, DR RICKMAN.

“You’re a Doctor?” Zac perked up.

“Ha, Yes.” She looked up, tears rolling down her face. 

“Good job, wouldn’t you say?” She sarcastically sniggered and gestured around the damaged scene of carnage.

“I need your help, please, my friend, he was bitten and…” He was cut short.

“Your friend… is buggered.” She barked.

   Zac slumped back, against the cupboard again. He thought about Daz, he was an idiot, and had circumstances been different, he probably would have crossed the street to avoid him. But things were what they were. Then he realised, he had only known Daz for less than a day, but seemed strangely affected by the thought of Daz’s almost inevitable demise.

“Dr Rickman.”

“Fiona! Fee.” Another interruption.

“Zac. Fee, I only met him today, but, well, we’ve been through a lot. He’s just a kid, he deserves a chance.”

“What was your first one?” She enquired.

“First what?” He puzzlingly retorted.

“The attacks! The first one you saw.”

   His mind went blank, it all seemed so long ago that this had all started, but it was only a few days. He worked his way back, the school, Emma, the journey across the city, the devastation. His heart sank. He hadn’t really had time to stop and consider all he had experienced over those few days. But where did it all begin? Then he remembered.

“A train, underground train. They attacked the carriage, killed…” A tear rolled down his face, he snorted as his nose started running and a lump formed in his throat. He was unable to continue.

   Fee looked at him, waiting for him to continue, but he didn’t. Silence fell in the room, all except the occasional sniff from Zac as he wiped his face.

“I was on duty, normal shift to start with. Waiting room was chock a block with patients, Ambulance bay was bumper to bumper. Busy day, but nothing new or out of the ordinary, except the bites. So many patients coming in with bite injuries. There was a woman, well a girl really, only about seventeen years old. She sat in the corner of the waiting room, holding a baby, maybe five months old. Suddenly she…”

   Fee looked up at Zac, who was leaning forward, hanging on every word, tear tracks, had left clean lines down his filthy face. Fee continued.

“She bit the baby.” Fee burst into tears but pushed on.

“The screams, the blood, there was total panic, some ran, some tried to help the baby, but it was too late, she had bitten straight into the little ones head, there were teeth left behind in the skull.”

“Why? How?” Zac pressed.

“It’s some kind of virus, passed on by the exchange of bodily fluids, blood, saliva, and it’s fast, impossibly fast. I’ve seen it. People changing in no time at all and there was nothing we could do.”  

   Fee broke down. Zac raised his hand and placed it on her shoulder. He gathered up the cleaver with his other hand, and grasped the BIOHAZARD bag.