The Undead. The First Seven Days (96 page)

She walks in and steps up on the metal plate to open the driver’s door; a body falls out on top of her making her scream. The rest race forward to see the corpse rolling off to one side and the woman on her arse having been pushed back.
  ‘Is he dead?’ the woman asks in shock.
  ‘Dead or undead?’ the ex-soldier jokes, moving forward to punt the head of the corpse with his boot. The body rolls over to reveal normal human features, dead but normal.
  ‘Nah, he’s normal dead,’ the ex-soldier remarks.

The woman police officer gets up and climbs gingerly back into the cab.
  ‘Check him for keys,’ she says, going through the controls.

Clarence bends down and quickly pads his pockets to find a set of keys and passes them up to her.

She inserts the key and starts the engine, the fuel tanker rumbles to life, spewing out a cloud of black smoke, which quickly dissipates.
  ‘I’ll take the van, you drive this behind me,’ Clarence shouts up.

They start back to their vehicles and all stop and wince as the gears are crunched painfully behind them. They turn back to see the woman police officer sticking her middle finger up at them and laughing.

After an hour of driving, they are parked up and standing round the front of a florist’s window; dead and wilting flowers in the display.
  ‘Well this is the address,’ Clarence says, examining the map book, the list provided by Sergeant Hopewell and then looking up at the building.
  ‘That’s definitely not a gunsmith,’ the ex-soldier remarks.
  ‘Nope, must have changed it,’ Clarence replied.
  ‘Who would turn a gunsmiths into a florist?’ The woman asks.
  ‘Where’s the next one?’
  ‘Never mind that, where’s all the zombies gone?’ the ex-soldier asks nervously, looking about.

They all look up and around, becoming increasingly aware of the lack of undead.
  ‘I don’t know, they must be massing somewhere,’ Clarence says quietly, ‘You’re right though, this is eerie.’ A feeling of being watched descends on the group.
  ‘There’s one more place we can try, it’s not too far,’ Clarence says, very aware of the uncomfortable feeling amongst them, hands gripping weapons tighter and the jokes now gone.
  They load back into their vehicles and drive on, again following Clarence as he handles the map on the steering wheel and works his route as he goes; treading through narrow cobbled streets and past the once boutique shops of this southern English hamlet.

Clarence feels the creeping sensation growing up the back of his neck;
there should be signs of life by now. The zombies can’t all have gone, or there are even other survivors, maybe. But then, being this close to the Fort would mean those able to, would have fled to them by now.
  Movement in the fields to his right catches his eye, a break in the hedgerow and a flash of distant colour. He slows down, but keeps moving along the country lane, constantly looking to the right and waiting for the thick hedge to end. Finally, he sees a large gate further up and slows down to take advantage of the gap. He brings the van to a stop and stares hard into the fields. What he sees is staggering, a long, thick line of people all moving at the same speed, in the distance, across the top of the fields.
  The vehicles behind him stop, the drivers getting out to come forward and stare through the gate. Each of them stopping and staring with shock at the thousands and thousands of zombies stretched out in a long line, moving from left to right.
  ‘Which direction are they heading in?’ One of the policeman asks.
  ‘North,’ Clarence replies. ‘The main road into the area is that way. They must be going to meet the rest coming down.’
  ‘Fucking hell, there’s thousands just there,’ the ex-soldier says quietly.
  ‘Right there for the taking too,’ Clarence replies. ‘We can’t get to them though, the vehicles will never make it across those fields and the distance is too great for these things,’ Clarence adds, raising his assault rifle for effect.
  ‘Where are they feeding in from?’ The woman asks.
  ‘I don’t know, over that way I guess,’ Clarence inclines his head in the direction they’re moving from.
  ‘The same way we’re going,’ the woman police officer states, quietly.
They break away without further talk; heading back to their vehicles and moving off slowly down the lane, watching the horde slowly move across the top of the fields through the gaps in the high hedgerow.

The country lane twists and turns, following the ancient hedgerow for several miles. Signposts indicate an historic town further ahead, various smaller signs urging the travellers to stop at points of interest, eat a pub lunch, rest in a picnic area, walk round some monuments or spend money on the crap punted out to unsuspecting holiday makers.
 

Something about the signs make Clarence think of Sarah again. In the Services he was always deployed overseas, fighting war’s and battles in far-flung corners that meant nothing to him. Flown in, briefed, trained, deployed, mission executed and moved out again. A couple of weeks rest and then another one. The various missions and countries blend into one long memory of deserts, jungles and snow covered terrain, inner city ghettos and months spent living out of bedsits, watching subjects from windows and building lifestyle profiles that meant nothing to him.
  The Services and the type of work he was involved in meant he could never talk about what he did or where he had been. Over time the connections that once existed outside the Service slowly eroded until all that was left were the people he knew inside. But then, over years, they too slowly fell away as younger fitter and leaner men came through the ranks and men like Clarence, Chris and Malcolm felt like dinosaurs.

They left the Services, but the skills they had harnessed and built, simply did not transfer to civilian life, and like so many highly skilled but older soldiers they were drawn to the world of mercenary soldiering with the promise of action and high wages. They all said it was for the money, but, in reality, it was the only way of clinging onto the life they had built. - working with people who knew those same deadly skills and being able to belong to something.
  Former officers started security companies back in the UK and quickly contacted their former men, offering them steady wages and a dedicated role. Clarence responded to that, after years of mercenary work left a nasty taste in his mouth; shady deals done in back street cafes were not his idea of honour. His mammoth size and appearance meant he was perfect for door work, often his mere presence prevented most incidents from escalating, but even then, the constant hours in the seedy nightlife, full of cocky idiots with gelled hair and tee-shirt muscles, soon wore him down.

Managers and bar owners were obsessed with: profit, reputation, health and safety, log sheets, toilet checks and head counts. Clarence’s size, appearance and deep voice, made him a target for many women. Women who loved the idea of being with a tough man with a tough reputation, but Clarence was a professional, not a steroid addicted bouncer obsessed with image and wearing a shirt two sizes too small - and those drunken women repulsed him.

He had intelligence and knowledge that just did not correlate with his appearance and after years of being seen to be a big tough idiot left he accepted the type of woman he was likely to be with.
  But now, something magical had happened. Something he had never known before. A beautiful, educated and intelligent woman was interested in him.

The way she spoke to him, not patronisingly, but speaking to him as an equal; touching his arm or shoulder, leaning forward and staring into his eyes, left him almost breathless. The desperation of the world and the utter violence and degradation of mankind just in the last seven days, the hopeless feeling that no matter how they fight back or what they do, it’s all pointless. Those feelings now mixed with a warm tingling feeling, of something different he had not felt before. Light in the dark. A single rose amongst weeds. Hope where there was none. Something to survive for. Something to fight for.

The road sweeps round to a long wide junction; from the left are streams of zombies pouring from the town and heading into the fields to shuffle and stagger along in dead silence, rotting walking corpses. Drawn to a meeting place where they will gather and mass in readiness of war.
  The vehicles stop back from the junction, far enough back to be able to respond if they turn for the attack, but they don’t turn, they don’t pay any attention at all..
  ‘We can’t get through that lot without picking a fight,’ the woman police officer says after jumping down and walking up to stand by Clarence.
  ‘Yeah, you’re probably right,’ Clarence replies, wishing they had the Saxon with them and the GPMG.
  ‘So, the motorway to the north is that way then?’ she asks, looking down at the map.
  ‘Yeah, that must be the gathering point. The main motorway running south from London, I guess, if all these get to the various junctions feeding into it, then the main group will scoop them up as they come.’
  ‘Maybe they’re heading somewhere else?’ she suggests.
  ‘That,’ Clarence replies. ‘Is just wishful thinking. Come on, we’d better get back.’
  ‘Err, slight problem - this is a narrow lane, and that is a big fuel truck and I’m not reversing it all the way back.’
  ‘Good point, you’ll be needing the junction then,’ Clarence says, turning back to look at the fuel truck.
  ‘Yep.’
  ‘How will you do it?’
  ‘Pull out to the right, reverse back to the left and swing back in to this road,’ she replies quickly.
  ‘Right…’
  ‘That’s what I thought,’ she bites her bottom lip, staring at the constant stream heading across the junction.
  ‘Well, the fuel tanker is big and heavy and, as long as you keep motion, you should be all right, and we did say we wanted to take a few of them out,’ Clarence rumbles, quietly.
  ‘No, you said
you
wanted to take them out.’
  ‘Yeah, but I can’t drive that thing, or can I? Is it hard?’ He asks.
  ‘Yes it is, bloody hard, you’ll stall the engine before you get more than a few metres, don’t worry I’ll do it,’ she turns and walks back to the fuel tanker, pausing as she climbs up into the cabin and looking at the junction.

She nods to herself and slowly pulls out from behind Clarence’s van, moving slowly up to the wide junction.
  Clarence watches, as she seems to slow down, almost stopping, then, at the last second, the fuel tanker surges ahead, pulling over to the extreme left and brushing against the hedgerow.

The tanker then pulls quickly to the right, moving out of the lane and into the junction. The front of the tanker impacts on the line of undead staggering across, striking them from behind and shunting them all forward. The collective ramming drives them into the backs of the zombies in front, acting as a giant scoop and propelling them forward. The momentum causes them to either fall out to either side or drop down onto the ground to be dragged along by the front of the truck or squashed by the massive wheels, causing blood and guts to be pumped out onto the road surface.
  The zombies neither slow down nor speed up, and they take no avoiding action as the truck pummels them out of the way.

The fuel tanker pushes out into the right side of the junction then brakes hard forcing the zombies caught at the front to be propelled forward. A loud grinding of gears can be heard as the woman police officer quickly works to engage the reversing gears and start moving backwards. The rear of the truck lacks the solid wall of the front and the zombies behind are simply crushed by the rounded edge of the tanker and the jutting out metal ladder. The tanker reverses quickly, driving backwards further down to the left until the front goes past the entrance to the lane. Once again the tanker brakes hard and the gears crunch as she selects a forward driving gear and pulls away quickly, swinging the front round and back into the lane, ploughing through more zombies as they blindly shuffle back across the junction.
  As the front of the tanker draws level with Clarence, he steps out and applauds with respect, smiling broadly at the excellent driving skills shown. She smiles back and salutes as she drives onwards past the waiting vehicles.
  Clarence gets back in his van and tries to do a three-point turn in the road, but the narrow width of the lane and the length of the van make it a seven-point turn - eventually he succeeds and moves out of the way for the other vehicles. They move closer to the wider section of the junction to complete their manoeuvre and, within minutes, the vehicles are driving back down the lane behind the fuel tanker.

Dave and Jamie move quickly to the edge of the estate, jogging in silence with fluid movements and neither showing signs of exertion. They stop at the country lane leading into the estate.
  ‘The estate is here with one lane leading in, but they could use the fields on either side,’ Dave says, examining the area.
  ‘The fields have high hedgerows, and they’re thick with brambles which will we be hard to push through,’ Jamie replies.
  ‘The natural path will be this lane, we can’t do anything about the fields but we do have a choke point here - the hedges on both sides are very high and the lane ends abruptly as it enters the estate. They will come down the lane and fan out into the estate and sweep through, but most of them will keep going straight down the centre main road.’ Dave explains. ‘The first trap should be here on the central road about halfway down, we then work back, setting more traps as we go. They will be crammed into the lane so they will naturally spill out to the sides and move down through the estate, using all available space. So we set one here and then more further out to the sides. That way there will be the maximum number of them in the area when the traps go off.’
  Jamie listens in silence and watches Dave with keen interest, tracking his view to look at the same places.