Tiredness Kills - A Zombie Tale (5 page)

Kelly looked at him sharply,
taking in his whole appearance: his face splattered in blood from his fairly
fresh Zombie kill and dressed in a sparkling black tuxedo, complete with frilly
white shirt front, pink
dickie
bow and matching
cummberbund
, all with a light coating of brain spray and vomit
and chuckling away like a demented hyena. She did no more than drop the crowbar
that was in her right hand and land a hefty slap straight across Ant's face.

 
“Now control yourself!” she said with an edge
of kindness in her voice.

Totally stunned by the sudden
violation, Ant stopped laughing. “Ye, sorry,” he stammered. “I've never killed
anyone before and....”

“Yeah, whatever!” Josh cut
in, prowling pensively around the landing. “I've probably killed ten down
there, and if we don't get this fuckin' hatch opened we're gonna' have to go
and kill some more!”

Jordan took this as his cue
to climb up the fixed ladder and use his brawn against the stubborn hatch.

“You alright mate?” asked
Scott, putting his arm around Ant's shoulder in sympathy.

“Yeah, yeah. Just a minor
blip.
Gotta
' give my head a wobble!” he answered
calmly. “The bitch probably did me a favour; and god, man, that stuff stinks.
Can't see Fliss liking it!”

 
“We're gonna' get out of here,” said Scott
encouragingly. “And if we don't we're gonna' take down as many Zombie fuckers
as we can. And you're already one up on me so......!”

Their conversation was
interrupted by the exasperated voice of Jordan “This damn thing ain't budging,
I think it's double- locked from the outside!” he announced, jumping down off
the ladder after trying desperately to prise the solid hatch open with one of
the crowbars. “Looks like a plan B is needed!”

Josh punched the wall hard
with his fist, nearly breaking a finger.

“And you can pack that in,
you
muppet
,” growled Kelly “Self harming is the last
thing we need! Jon, you know the ins- and- outs of this building better than
anyone. What's plan B?”

“We need to get down to
stores
Kel
. There's food and drink and coded locks on
doors, so it should be a safe place to work from. The maintenance office is
next to it, and it's full of tools that we can use as weapons.
 
I've just checked the lift and the powers
gone. So that option's out. We're gonna have to go the scenic route I'm afraid!

And so six heavy hearts all
had to turn away from the hatch in the roof- and their one real hope of
freedom. They headed downstairs in single file, whispering instructions and
encouragement to each other. Jon had offered everyone the advice of making
their way downstairs to Stores which was deep in the bowels of the building and
which contained pretty much everything that was needed for survival.

 
Using Kelly's thick black eyeliner that she
kept in her bra, Josh had scribbled a basic map onto Scott's arm that would
give Ant and Scott at least some idea where to head if they lost sight of the
others. He also included the much -needed door lock codes that could mean the
very difference between life and death.

No zombies had ventured
through the heavy fire doors that separated the stairwell from the supermarket.
Ant was the first to peer through one of the long, thin panels of glass in one
of the doors, and that gave a glimpse into the awful happenings on the shop
floor. The Power Ranger was still handing out his own form of punishment to the
undead- although he appeared to be moving a tad slower than when they had
previously seen him. He motioned Scott to look through the other glass panel
and as Scott watched the amazing mop stick warrior, he too noted a slowing down
of the biker's movements, and what looked to be a tear in his leather armoury.

“God, I hope he makes it
through!” whispered Scott to himself.
 
Leaving a fellow biker behind meant going against his own moral code.

 
Sensing Scott's torment, Ant reminded him of Number
Three of their own devised set of apocalyptic rules: “Ignore all cries for help
from other humans. Don't even look at them. If they are wearing blood then it
is already too late.”

“Ye, ye I know,” replied
Scott, “Right, let's do this!”

The
sixsome
readied themselves behind the door. Again they whispered plans and
encouragement to each other, reiterating and instilling the belief that they
would all make it safely to the large storing area down below.

“We will always know where
you are mate,” Kelly whispered, addressing Scott. “That's how overpowering your
choice of after shave is!”

 
This created a small ripple of nervous
laughter among them, before Jordan cut in “Right, on three!”

The counts of 'one' and 'two'
passed in a blur as all ears waited for that all important 'three'.
 
When it came, the five men and one little
lady burst through the fire doors, brandishing weapons that they could only
hope would get them through this weird and crazy battle.

Thankfully, the chilled
aisles were clear as the leathered assassin was still attracting attention of
the most unpleasant kind.
 
For how much
longer though remained uncertain, as his mop swinging was becoming less and
less effective.

Shuffling along, low and
silently, they reached the end of the aisle and from here they could see out
onto the concourse, the main area of the food hall, and seating area. The scene
that played out before their eyes was horrifying!
 
If this was a battle then this was most
definitely the battle field.

 
The floor, which had previously been covered
with high-end beige tiles, was now
reddy
/brown and
smudgy in some places; but in others there were pools, several inches deep and
made up of slightly- clotting bright red blood. Some of these pools contained
limbs and other external body parts; others contained half- chewed internal
organs. If there had been any more remnants of breakfast in any of our six
known survivors, then it would have been showing itself right about now.
Instead, a bit of dry heaving was all that was managed.

 
However, what was truly the most disturbing
thing to witness was the complete and utter breakdown of humanity. From where
they were, they watched as a young teenage girl who had been fleeing from a mob
of crazy- eyed shuffling monsters and was desperately searching for somewhere
to hide, had slipped over in a deep red pool of someone else's misfortune. As
she scrambled to right herself, she became more and more embroiled in the
sticky residue, her shoes slipping constantly, her hands unable to make any
purchase in the warm gooey mess.

 
They were on her in seconds- pushing against
each other to get a bite of the fresh flesh on offer. She put up a fight
though, she really did, but it was in vain. When her haunting screams that had
filled the air stopped as her throat was bitten through by a previously
respectable looking and smartly dressed gentleman, it was thought that this was
probably a good time to move. Like birds fledging from a nest that could no
longer promise them any safety, they flew out into the unknown.

It took precisely ten seconds
for the group to become separated from each other; and the cause of the
separation was a famous charity bear mascot.

As they ran from the
supermarket, led once again by Jon, they found themselves directly in the path
of a growling furry beige bear.

 
Ant remembered straight away seeing it when he
had first arrived. The bear and a helper had been shaking buckets at the
customers as they walked through the door. Ant had chucked in a few coins, just
enough to make a jingling sound in the bucket, when the bear turned its head
and said in a thick
Brummie
accent,
 
“Bit over- dressed, mate- it's a motorway
services, not the Hilton!”

If anyone had witnessed
Anthony Langston looking straight at the lovable and popular charity bear, who
wears a bandage on his head, and practically spit out the word “
Tosser
!” just remember; there are always two sides to a
story!

The bear, who by now had lost
it's
bandaged head and part of
it's
paw-
 
along with a couple of it's
fingers( which must have been eaten somewhere along the line), was stumbling
around growling wildly, but unable reach anyone to feast
 
upon due to the huge amount of thick padding
around it's body. Instead, its large cumbersome torso and flailing arms were
knocking the living and the undead off their feet in equal measures.

“I knew you was a
tosser
,
Brummie
boy!” said Ant
again, with some satisfaction at seeing the man's twisted and tormented face.

It was this furry beast that
caused the small group to lose sight of each other.
 
Scott and Ant, with no alternative than to
trust their own survival instincts, headed straight back to the dark little
arcade area where they could crouch between the large gambling machines, which
had now thankfully lost their power.

 
As there was nothing happening here, the small
dark section was devoid of all life (or otherwise), giving them a small retreat
in which to catch their breath.
 
Scott
reached into a soggy pocket and pulled out two cola- flavoured Tip Tops that he
had grabbed from a freezer in the supermarket. By now they had completely
melted, but both men were grateful of the small sugary drink for now.
 

Ant pointed to the five
hundred shiny pound coins that littered the floor from the jack pot pay-out,
and they both quietly pocketed a few.

 
“Just in case!” whispered Ant as they edged
back to the entrance of the Arcade to survey the situation once more. Occasionally,
a groaning noise could be heard from behind the closed office door where they
had left Bryn and Andy a few hours earlier. Yet without knowing that particular
code number- and being slightly alarmed at the noises coming from within it-
they decided that ignorance was bliss.

Suddenly, they became aware
of a shuffling noise from just the other side of the thick curtain that was
sometimes used as a screen to close off the area. Both men automatically held
their fingers to their mouths.

Scott very slowly peered
around the curtain, holding his breath. Then quickly he snapped his head back
to look at Ant.

“It's only that motherfucker
that started it all!” he whispered frantically. “You know, the hooded chav that
nearly knocked my hash browns over! Well, I think someone ought to put him out
of his blood- lusting misery, don't you!” he asked Ant rhetorically!

Holding the crowbar that
Kelly had kindly given him, Scott crouched down, and, whilst peering through a
gap in the curtain, he waited until the vile creature was as close as possible
and then swung the weapon with all his might at the legs of the youth in the
messed- up blue hoodie.

The plan was to knock him to
the ground and then smash his skull in with the crowbar. Unfortunately though,
this sequence didn't go quite to plan. As blue Kyle lost his pathetic balance
he fell directly into the curtain, landing straight on top of Scott, with only
the thick material separating their flesh.

Ant scrabbled from his
crouching position, unleashing his already tried and tested Samurai umbrella
from its sheath and pointed it towards the pair. However, he was finding it
almost impossible to distinguish between the two as they wriggled frantically,
wrapped up in the curtain that had now left its holding and fallen to the
floor.

Suddenly, Scott felt his
shoulders being held in a vice- like grip and smelt the putrid breath of his
attacker burning his nostrils. There were only inches between their faces when
Scott had an epiphany. With every ounce of strength he possessed, he forced his
arm up so that his fist was level with the decaying tramp, and with a swift,
but firm tap on his palm, four long talons of pure metal sprang from his cuff
and straight through the eyes of his opponent. Thank fuck he'd chosen the
Wolverine claws!

Ant was nearly bursting to
break out in a victory dance, but chose instead to help drag the now
'permanently' dead Kyle off his mate. The hardest part was removing the blades
that were deeply embedded in the skull and were splattered in squished eyeballs
so it was with huge sadness that Scott made the decision to remove the claw
from his arm instead. He looked down at the bloody and messed up man and said
with conviction “Never mess with a man's favourite food, Shit Head!”