The Undead Day Nineteen (12 page)

With a snarl she rushes from the darkness slamming into the sentry staring ahead and not expecting anyone to come from the side. He yelps out, shouting but finding the point of the scalpel driving into his throat that hacks a hole shredding his windpipe and voice box. He goes down, gargling and choking as hot blood spurts from his mouth and slides down his ruined neck into his lungs. Lilly stabs into him. Slicing and hacking. Her aim deviating to drive the point through his eye. Killing him until he is dead. Killing him again and again. Killing him over until he lies ruined and destroyed. On her feet and the demon inside demands more so she kicks and stamps down, letting the beast free. She breaks the neck of the child on sentry. She breaks his nose, his jaw, his arms and his ribs. She gives back the pain she was given and more until that demon tells her to stop and take stock of where she is.

She gulps air, heedless of the rain pelting her face, heedless of the pain in every limb of her body. She drags the body out into the ground and stands to examine the door. A thick padlock looped through a clasp. She drops down to go through the pockets of the warm corpse. Cigarettes. A lighter. Bullets. A knife in his waistband. No key. She stands, thinking fast as the options present themselves. She could pry the clasp off with the rifle. She looks closer at the clasp. No good. The thing is flush against the wood of the door giving no space for something to be jammed in and the padlock is too thick to be beaten off without making a whole lot of noise.

She turns away, thinking of what to do as her foot catches on the plastic bag pushed back in the recess. She kicks it away then thinks twice and drops down to yank the thing open. Cans of coke. Crisps. Chocolate bars and a thick key on a black lanyard.

She grabs it and stands. Forcing the key into the hole that turns the mechanism within that frees the locking bar on the padlock that she slides from the clasp. She pushes the door open and peers inside to the pitch black interior. Back to the boy and she takes his lighter from his pocket and thumbs the wheel that creates the spark that ignites the gas coming from the opened valve. Flame is made. Fire that gives small heat and small illumination but it’s enough.

For a second she holds still. Knowing she is stepping into an armoury with a naked flame. Move now. Do not hesitate.

She gazes over the stacked boxes of ammunition and unused weapons. Rifles stacked against the wall. She spots the thing she was looking for. Boxes of them stacked on a crate to keep them off the floor. She opens the lid and takes several. Job done and she backs out, closing the door quietly behind her. She puts the padlock back on, slips the key from the lock and pushes it firmly into her pocket before taking the assault rifle from the boy’s dead hands. She checks it over, spotting the safety switch then finding the bolt which she yanks back. A shiny unfired round pops from the top.
Loaded, made ready, safety off.

She sets off again. Stalking back across the middle of the fort. Her hair slick to her scalp and coursing in rivers down her face and over her lips. Her skin ripples with goose bumps as the cold eats its way inside only to be sent back out by the fire in her gut that drives her on.

One foot after the other. Eyes staring ahead. Breathing hard. Hands gripping the weapon. She wills herself on. Determined and holding that rage in check until it can be used. Across the central ground she wades through the water and passes the old armoury while facing ahead and walking as though she is meant to be there. They could see her if they looked but they wouldn’t see it was Lilly. They’d just see a figure walking. She risks a glance and spots the soft orange glows of torches or lanterns giving some small light to the place where Liam and his four keep guard. Smaller amber ends glow. They’re smoking and relaxed.

Ahead she spots a figure coming from the police offices. A solitary silhouette holding a rifle that starts walking towards her. Whoever it is must be heading for the new armoury. That lad she took down was only on his own for a few minutes then. She keeps walking and slowly works to adjust her grip on the things she carries, transferring them from her right hand to her left which she also uses to hold the barrel of the heavy weapon. Her right grips the handle, bringing it up slightly as the figure walks briskly towards her. Whoever it is keeps their head down from the rain still pouring from the sky.

They close the gap between them. A boy but bigger than the one she just killed. A crew chief, older, wiser and faster. She watches his head, gauging the distance and checking to see if they’re in sight of Liam’s crew sheltering in the old armoury.

Only a few feet to go and still the lad keeps his head down, watching his own feet splash puddles.

‘Hey, you seen Zayden?’ She calls forward in an ice cold voice. The boy jerks his head up and spots Lilly staring at him. The fact that she’s carrying an assault rifle doesn’t register for such a sight is now normal to him. He grins back, smirking at the gossip that spotty Zay was going to fuck the posh bitch.

‘Nah’ he says with a sneer as the butt smashes the teeth from his face. He drops instantly. The sheer power of the strike knocking him down. She follows through. Hitting down again and again until he goes as limp as the last one. Blood courses from his face and ears. His skull fractures, splintering with a crunch and he lies dead from the bones pushing through his brain.

Eyes up. Head up. She stands stock still listening, watching. The rain so loud it blots everything else out. She looks down coldly, seeing the pulped head and brains seeping through the cracks of his skull and not a flicker of reaction shows. She drops down and pushes one hand into the gooey remains of his head, coating her fingers with blood and gore that she wipes down her own cheeks and through her hair.

On her feet and she breaks into a jog with her eyes fixed on the orange glowing lights that shine the most of all.

She hears the voices inside. Laughing voices. Cackling voices. Someone shouts and everyone laughs. Harsh sounds that carry clear. They laughed at her when Sierra beat her. They laughed when she was on her knees feeding Aaliyah. They laughed at the pathetic scum outside going hungry and cold to die in the rain. They gloated with mouths full of crisps and sprayed coke out across the floor. They beat her down. Punching, kicking and making her stand in the corner.

Her eyes grow larger. Her lips pulling back. Her face and hair smeared with blood and gore that coats her arms and top.

They left her brother outside to die. They left her brother to go hungry. Billy who has never hurt anyone. Billy and Milly who are innocent of all the sins of man. Children who have felt more pain than any ever should.

The eyes of a killer. We do the right thing or none of this is worth it.
She knew goodness once. She saw it. Nick. Beautiful Nick who kills everyday so others may have freedom.
Aye. That’s what it takes. That’s where the hardness in his eyes comes from.
Across that ground she goes. Running faster to be there. To be there now with a voice screaming in her head to be let out to kill.

She pushes her head through the strap of the rifle and slings it behind her. Freeing her hands. She holds one in her right and grips the pin with her left. Blowers told her what to do. Blowers who has the eyes of a killer too.
Twist and pull.

The laughing inside is loud. The smell of the cigarettes is strong and she strides in with eyes blazing and death in her gaze. A thing from a nightmare. A beast risen from the depths of darkness. Smeared in blood caked down her face and through her hair that lies matted across her shoulders.

‘SEE ME,’ she bellows the words with an intensity that brings instant silence and every head snapping over to the thing that stands in the doorway. Her chest heaves. Her head tilted down and she looks up, flicking her eyes from face to face. ‘See me,’ the beast inside growls the words out, projecting pure venomous hatred to every person in the room.

Twist and pull.

She twists.

She pulls.

The pin drops.

They rush to their feet, knocking chairs over but freeze when she holds the grenade up for all to see.

The blood drains from Skyla’s face. Aaliyah’s mouths drops. Sierra’s eyes stare fixed with the realisation of everything done wrong. Life plays out in that room at that second. Lives that flash before young eyes. A foe underestimated and in her they see the darkness of Howie projected for all to see. They see the hardness of Nick, Blowers and Cookey. They see Lani. They see Meredith They see someone who refuses to be beaten and has the will power to take the beating to come back stronger and meaner and with a brutality that pales their own malicious actions.

Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. There can be no going back. There can be no reprieve now. A thing done is a thing done. End it. End it now.
Kill.

She drops the grenade, steps out and closes the door. In the ensuing four seconds there is much noise from tables turning over. From voices screaming high pitched and young. From chairs being kicked away. From feet running. From cans falling to the ground. Four seconds of an air filled with a cacophony of sound.

She drops low. Her hand reaching up to hold the door closed. None of them made it. None of them tried to yank it open.

The muffled whump is loud but not as loud as she thought it would be. The thick walls deadening the sound to a low percussive bang that shakes the door and vibrates through the walls. In the midst of the explosion she detects smaller noises of objects being blasted aside.

A second of silence then the screams come. Not the screams of the panicked now but the screams of the injured and in pain. She doesn’t hesitate but is up, pushing the door open as she pulls the rifle round and steps in to see how one muffled whump has redecorated the room in shades of red.

The air is thick with explosive charge and the displacement of energy makes the hairs on her neck prickle and stand up.

The bodies lie everywhere. The ones closest to the blast torn apart and shredded but the human body is a densely packed thing of flesh and bone that is capable of absorbing blast energy. The ones further away were protected from the initial blast and simply lacerated by fragments instead. Burning hot fragments that seared deep into thighs and stomach and ripped fingers from hands. Scorching chunks of metal that embedded in stomachs and necks and opened the skin on faces that bleed heavily into mouths that scream in absolute pain.

The one closest to her is dead. A boy near her own age with his head mostly gone. She steps over him to the next one lying face down with the entrails from her stomach littering the ground beneath her.

Aaliyah is the closest one screaming and Lilly steps down with a heavy foot pressing into the girl’s neck, forcing her attention up to the rifle aiming down. They lock eyes. One terrified and one dispassionate and cold who simply turns and runs back out the door to sprint fast into the rain.

She gains distance from the room behind her, away from the light that spills metres into the fort. The screams come louder. Aaliyah’s more than anyone else’s for she has seen the devil staring down at her.

The detonation of the grenade and the screams that follow will draw the others. Lilly waits, watching, staring, scanning.

Pea stares hard. Her heart thundering in her chest from the explosion that reached the huddled survivors pushing together to share body warmth in an effort to keep the youngest and the oldest warm and dry. Some have already perished. Too weak from days of desperate survival and now, after the fear of yesterday, the fires and the destruction and working through today with cold hands and empty bellies they simply expire. An old man is held tight by his wife of more than thirty years. His life gone from his body as those around him weep and sob. A young girl, five years old with a frail body succumbs to the ravages of this new world and her body temperature plunges to a level from which it will never recover.

They saw Lilly being dragged away but both Sam and Pea knew that one pistol was no match for so many assault rifles. They fretted, worried and stared about desperate to see Lilly but the guards stayed close with sullen faces that leered and sucked teeth.

‘What was that?’ Sam whispers, leaning closer to her friend. Desperately cold and the shivers rack her body but she holds Milly close, willing her own warmth into the girl.

‘Police offices,’ Pea whispers back, holding Billy closer.

‘Shit,’ Sam hisses when the screams fill the air and for a second she fears the worse and her mind conjures images of Lilly being tortured but there’s more than one voice screaming and not all of them are girls.

‘Lilly,’ Pea mutters, blinking the rain from her eyes, ‘it’s got to be Lilly.’

‘There’s more than one person screaming…’

‘No I mean Lilly is doing something…Sam we have to move…get the pistol.’

Sam hesitates, the fear gripping her to hold her rooted to the spot but the screams come louder, pain filled agonising wails. ‘Joan, take Milly for me…’

‘What are you doing?’ Joan whispers back, checking round to see if the guards are close but the three boys have all moved to cluster together to stare towards the noise.

‘Is Lilly doing something?’ A man whispers through the crowd, heads turn to fix on Pea and Sam. Murmurs rippling with consternation, worry and some with hope.

Sam slides the pistol from her waistband, ‘Pea, give Billy to…’