The Undead. The First Seven Days (75 page)

The others all hear him laughing and cram into the small room to watch him do it again..
  ‘That’s fucking funny,’ Blowers laughs, wiping tears of merriment from his eyes. Big Chris and his men have crammed in and are laughing too.
  Hewitt lowers the Bridge and examines the control panel more intently. The zombies all start forwards again, trampling over the increasing numbers of squashed undead as they go.
  ‘Ha, watch this,’ Hewitt shouts out.

The zombies walk over the first half of the Bridge and, just as they get to the middle, Hewitt raises the closest half, which lifts up a few feet and blocks them from walking forward. The momentum of the zombies is too great and the first few rows get crushed as more keep trying to walk forward. Everyone in the control room laughs as Hewitt lifts it another foot or so and they watch the zombies getting crushed, on the monitors.
  Hewitt then drops the Bridge back down to normal level and they all fall forward as the barrier holding them in place is suddenly taken away. The room erupts in laughter as the zombies all fall forward onto their faces and Hewitt quickly raises the Bridge again, to stop them coming on to this side.
  ‘Hang on, I’ve got another one,’ Hewitt laughs, as he waits for the bodies to press against the slightly raised nearest section again.

The bodies keep pushing forward, until there is a massive horde pushing and trying to walk forward.
  Hewitt suddenly raises the nearest half of the Bridge and the bodies tumble forward and down into the river, as the barrier is once again released.

Howie bursts out laughing and looks at Dave as they remember doing something similar with a smaller bridge in one of the villages they passed through.

The bodies keep pushing forward and stepping out onto thin air, as they are pushed from behind by the pressing horde.
  ‘They just keep going,’ Hewitt says, bent over double, laughing, as they keep walking and shuffling  forward and dropping down into the river with a splash.

Big Chris, Malcolm and the big bald man are all laughing hard at the ridiculous sight, even Dave smiles as he watches the spectacle, until the last of the undead falls off the edge and down into the River Thames.
  ‘That was bloody brilliant,’ Chris says, with an enormous smile, showing his white teeth.

They all laugh and then start applauding Hewitt as he turns and takes a mock bow to them, laughing himself.

But, Darren is at the back, watching the undead fall off the Bridge, he smiles along with the joke, but, inside, he feels different.

This isn’t funny and they shouldn’t be doing this.

Suddenly, he feels very alone.
  He smiles and goes along with it, but his eyes are not laughing.

The truck moves off along a now clear Bridge and the men file back to their vehicles, laughing and joking. Howie gets into the driver’s seat as Tucker shouts down:  ‘What were you all laughing about and why did the Bridge keep going up and down.’
  ‘Nick was playing with the zombies on the other side, making them fall into the river,’ Blowers calls up, as he settles into the back of the Saxon.
  ‘That was bloody funny,’ McKinney says.

Howie had taken McKinney to one side, as they walked back to the Saxon.
  ‘McKinney, can you do me a favour mate?’ Howie asked him.
  ‘Yes, Mr Howie,’ McKinney replied.
  ‘I’m worried about Smithy, can you pair up with him and keep an eye on him, just in case he freezes again.’
  ‘Yeah, no problem, does he know you’ve asked me?’ McKinney asked.
  ‘No, I don’t want to make him think we’re watching him or anything like that, just keep an eye out - so he doesn’t get hurt or something,’ Howie says quietly, as McKinney nods and climbs into the back of the Saxon.
  ‘Right, you ready for this Dave?’ Howie asks, as he starts the engine and turns the Saxon in a wide arc to drive back down the Bridge.
  ‘Yes, Mr Howie.’ Dave replies as they move off, slowly waiting for the two four-wheel drive vehicles to catch them up.

They head back onto the main road to follow the route they agreed on. Within minutes though, the road is full of undead, back to shuffling slowly and again moving in the same direction as they are.
  ‘They’re ignoring us again, what is going on? They were going nuts for us at the hospital and now they’re not even looking at us.’ Howie says.
  ‘Maybe they know where we’re going and want to use their speed, only when we are static,’ Dave answers.
  ‘As crazy as that sounds mate, it does make sense. They ignored us all the way here and only came for us when we stopped at the hospital, and they did speed up. That could have got very messy if they had started running.’
  ‘Maybe moving faster makes them weaker,’ Blowers adds, from behind them.
  ‘I’ve been thinking that… at the services they were running and we were putting them down with ease, did you notice if they were weaker today?’
  ‘No, not really,’ Blowers answers.
  ‘But, if they only just started moving and it was only a bit faster, it might not be enough to make them weaker that quickly,’ Dave says.
  ‘Okay, that makes sense, but how do they know where we are, or where we’re going?’ Howie asks, to silence.
  ‘It can’t just be a coincidence, we are specifically going for Canary Wharf and they are certainly heading that way now,’ Howie adds. ‘They haven’t attacked Chris’s commune in large numbers or with the ferocity they’ve shown us.’
  ‘We’ve killed many of them, Mr Howie, that’s the only link, we’ve cut them back and they don’t like it,’ Dave says.
  ‘Well, do you know what I think about that?’ Howie asks. ‘I think fuck ‘em, I’ll keep killing ‘em every chance I get, until the last one fucking drops.’ Howie spits out his words, with venom in his voice.

Darren listens intently, a feeling of alarm inside him from Howie’s words. He respects this man deeply and would follow him anywhere. But now there is doubt creeping in, Howie wants to slaughter every one of them and that isn’t right. They don’t deserve that, do they? The voice in his head, the voice of his father speaks out, telling him this is not right. Howie has no right to do this. If he left them alone they might have left him alone. Howie is leading them all to danger with his reckless actions and will cause the death of all these people.

The voice carries on and Darren sits quietly in the back of the Saxon, with his mind deep in conflict.

‘
Bravo to Alpha.’
  ‘Alpha receiving, go ahead Bravo.’
  ‘The road looks almost blocked, can you make it through?’
  ‘Affirmative, we are moving through them, without issue.’
  ‘Roger that, we will close the gap and travel right on your tail to keep a solid line. Bravo to Charlie, close up on our tail and keep a solid line.’
  ‘Charlie to Bravo, Roger that, closing up now, nose to tail.’
  ‘Bravo to Alpha, we are nose to tail on you now, Bravo out.’
 
Dave climbs out of the passenger seat and gets Tucker down from the GPMG, so he can climb up and look out.

Once up-top, he scans the road ahead and the solid lines of zombies traipsing in the same direction as them.

The front of the Saxon pushes them aside or knocks them flat and the Saxon rocks with the constant bumps from the bodies it runs over. The power of the vehicle is immense and they force an easy enough path through.
  Dave drops down and pulls out another canvas bag full of grenades from a compartment and climbs back up to the look-out position, resting the bag between his body and the edge of the hole.
 
‘Alpha to units, be aware, be aware, grenades being thrown behind the convoy, be aware.’

Dave speaks into the radio and hears both units confirm their acknowledgment. He then looks back to see Big Chris’s vehicle within inches of the back of the Saxon and Malcolm’s vehicle within inches of Chris’s; keeping a solid line to prevent the hordes from slipping between the vehicles and isolating them.
  Dave pulls out a grenade and pulls the pin; he looks at the sides, the front and then back at the rear and the solid mass of zombies swarming into the wake left by the vehicles.

He pulls his arm back and launches the first one high in the air. It lands far beyond the back of the last vehicle. Within a few seconds, a muffled explosion booms out and bodies are seen flying up into the air and Dave can see a wide circle form as the deadly shrapnel rips through the densely packed bodies.
  He repeats the action; launching grenade after grenade behind the vehicles and, before long, he can see a distinct gap forming behind him.

Each grenade takes out several undead immediately, but the shrapnel takes more down with horrific injuries and those bodies are sent hurtling into others. Dave empties the bag of grenades and looks with satisfaction at the huge holes now forming behind them. He then turns and grips the GPMG and focuses it on the ones in front of him. He takes a practise sweep from left to right, aiming directly in front of the Saxon, then, nodding to himself, he squeezes the trigger and sweeps back right to left; aiming directly at head height and watching as skull after skull explodes like a row of melons. Brains and bones burst up into the air.

Dave extends the aim and keeps going, focussing, to keep the machine gun at head height and take as many heads off as possible.
  ‘Fucking hell, look at that,’ Blowers shouts from his position in the front passenger seat next to Howie.

They hear the muffled pops of the grenades thrown by Dave and then the sudden
whump whump
of the machine gun above them.
  The closest zombies are all mown down by the hail of bullets and Dave starts on the next load, taking heads off with each accurate sweep.
  ‘He’s getting bloody head shots with a heavy calibre machine gun!’ Blowers shouts, as the lads all pile up front to watch the work being done by Dave. All of them cheer as the heads pop like fireworks, one after the other.
  Dave keeps the motion going, sweeping steadily side-to-side, and cutting down swathes of undead. He extends his range and is soon taking them out at the sides too. A look of intense concentration is on his face as he aims directly at the heads and sweeps the bullets across to see head after head popping open and the bodies slumping down.
  The shooting to the sides means that Chris and his men see the awesome display being put on by Dave and they cheer and shout as they watch the skulls bursting open in precise lines.
  ‘Only fucking Special Forces would do something that crazy,’ Chris mutters to himself, but can’t help grinning at the sight of the craniums being popped open.
  They reach the Westferry Circus roundabout and wait in situ, as Dave continues with the machine gun, sweeping low at first and taking the closest ring out, then lifting the aim higher and higher with each sweep, until there are almost concentric circles of decapitated bodies lying all round the vehicles. Eventually, he stops and climbs back down into the Saxon, to a roar of cheers from the recruits and gives a slight smile, as he climbs back to the front seat, respectfully vacated by Blowers.
 
‘Bravo to Alpha, nice display.’
  ‘Charlie to Alpha likewise.’
 
Small words, but big compliments coming from such hardened and battle experienced men.

The Saxon sits on the exit road to Westferry Road, facing in the direction they need to go; at  a solid massed gathering of undead, stretched out as far as the eye can see. It is an undulating carpet of bodies once killed and now brought back to semi-life, with a hunger for human flesh. They hold position and don’t move an inch towards the Saxon.
  Howie gets out of the Saxon and walks round to the front, staring hard at the blocked road. His eyes move along the front row, sweeping across the horde. Dave joins him and they look ahead silently. The recruits come out to stand to the sides of them, one by one. Big Chris and his men, Malcolm and his men, all step out of their vehicles and walk forward to the front of the Saxon and stand with Howie.
  They stare at the lines ahead of them.

An enemy holding position in readiness for battle.

Thousands of enemy undead, waiting for these few to try and take them. They know these things can now move fast, if they want to, that they can change within a split second and become deadlier than the slow shuffling things they have faced already.
  ‘How far up is it?’ Howie asks.
  ‘Third on the left,’ Malcolm replies.
  ‘They can move fast now and they can change. They
will
change and they will come for us.’
  ‘Do you have a plan?’ Malcolm asks.
  ‘Yes,’ Howie replies.
  ‘What is it?’ Chris asks.
  ‘To go and get my sister,’ Howie replies.
  ‘How?’ Chris says.
  ‘Go in there and get her out,’ Howie replies.
  ‘There’s a lot of them,’ Malcolm adds.

‘There is.’ Howie replies. ‘Listen, you’ve all helped me get this far, but this is my issue. None of you have to do this with me, you don’t have to risk your lives for this.’
  ‘You’d go on your own?’ Chris asks, quietly.
  ‘Yes.’ Howie replies, instantly.
  ‘No, he wouldn’t,’ Dave speaks, with a firm voice.
  ‘Not without me, either,’ Blowers says.
  ‘Me, too,’ Cookey adds.
  Howie looks back to the lads standing to the sides of him, they look to him and nod firmly.
  ‘All of us.’ Blowers speaks for the group.
  ‘Okay, how?’ Chris asks.