Deadweight | Book 2 | The Last Bite

by Forster, Paul

  “I will take your feet, your nose, your ears, and your cock. Tell me, are they coming?” he threatened. His mouth was watering at this partially butchered slab of breathing meat.

  “Yes. They’re fucking coming! They won’t take you, that bitch wants you, but you’re going to die here,” he answered. He was in pain and dying, but he was determined to have the satisfaction of letting Mason know he too would be dead soon.

  “Of course I’m supposed to die,” Mason replied. He picked up the pistols, shoving one in his belt and the other his jacket, checking the soldier for the spare magazine. “What are my options? How do I get off this fucking tub?”

  “You don’t,” he said. The soldier coughed as the words left his lips.

  Mason struck down with the knife at the midpoint of the soldier’s foot. He yelped in pain, the blade only going halfway through. Mason pushed down hard, slowly forcing the knife all the way through. “How is this supposed to go down?”

  “We were to jump overboard at 21:00 hours. Swim 200 metres out and be picked up by a boat team. You’re fucked, they’ll shoot you in the face before you hit the water,” he said and started laughing as he accepted his own fate.

  The anger brewed up in Mason. This wasn’t how he was going to die, on a floating hell of his own making. The frenzied attack lasted less than a minute. The soldier was dead within the first ten seconds as Mason repeatedly struck him with the large blade. Pieces of flesh had flown off in multiple directions as the blood-drenched him. He turned his attention back to his first victim and pulled him off the top bunk, landing on top of his colleague. His aim had been true. The puncture wound went through the back of the neck and out of the front. He lifted the limp wrist up and looked at the time, 19:00. A few short hours to go, may as well grab a bite to eat.

  The knife made quick work of the bodies, and his greed quickly polished off several chunks of flesh. He had nearly forgotten how amazing fresh, warm and bloody meat was. Not the tainted stuff, not that cold hard rubbery slab of meat he’d been given on the Reckoning. Warm and straight off the bone.

  He’d been allowed ten glorious minutes to feed before the first of the civilians came investigating.

  “He’s one of them! Get it!” the shout was clear, as were the thundering footsteps towards him from the small, poorly armed mob. Mason lazily lifted a pistol and fired off several shots. A scream of pain and a hasty retreat. He knew his meal was over. Time to leave. He sheathed the knife and grasped both pistols in his hands. His only hope was to get overboard now and hope the welcoming party wouldn’t be waiting. He was a powerful swimmer, not that he knew where he would swim to. But away from the soon to be scuppered ship was a good start.

  As he walked down the poorly lit corridor he passed the mob member he’d injured and put a round into his chest. The rest of the mob hadn’t stuck around to help their fallen comrade. The ship was chaotic with plenty of fights to pick. He hoped for a moment they’d wisely left him alone in order to bravely throw an infected OAP or child overboard instead. The sharpened tooth brush stabbed into the back of his neck confirmed that wasn’t the case. These people were so far gone he couldn’t smell them anymore, they smelled like the dead, like him. It was too hard to distinguish them. There could be fifty of them or just him. Mason reached behind him and shot the man in the gut before turning his attention in front as the fire-axe wielding maniac took a swing at him, missing by an inch. Both handguns discharged at his torso, felling him.

  “Just piss off, all of you!” he expressed. He fired shots into the darkness ahead as he edged forward. More footsteps approached from behind, and Mason fired until the guns ran dry. He dropped one to the floor as he hastily reloaded the other. “I can go all day!”

  He saw the hatch 20 metres ahead and picked up his pace. Anything that appeared to move, he’d fire at. Climbing through to the stairs, the pipe struck his head, tearing his ear and opening up his cheek. Two more shots instantly punished the attacker.

  Bodies of feeders and the living littered the deck. The recently turned fought with the soon to be turned as the armed crew shot anyone who tried to get too close as they protected the wheelhouse. Something pushed him forward from behind. He could see the tip of the blade pushing out through his chest. Motherfuckers!

  Mason tried to reach behind him to remove the object, but it was no good. The mob was maybe ten strong. Armed with the most basic of weapons, but each ready to die. Mason fired off every round he had until the pistol was empty, he’d killed or wounded half of his attackers but it wasn’t good enough. He tried to get the Bowie knife into play, but it was big, heavy and cumbersome, and it was just clear from its sheath as they knocked him to the ground. A collection of box cutters, potato peelers and pipes being brought into action against him. His own weapon wrestled from him as he was slashed and stabbed repeatedly.

  That Bowie knife really was quite the sight as they brought it down onto his neck. It took three or four powerful strikes to remove his head.

  They didn’t dwell on their victory. There were plenty more beasts that needed dispatching, and the number of uninfected were decreasing with every confrontation. First the head and then the body were tossed overboard. The mob gathered itself for a moment before moving on to their next target, a freshly turned feeder devouring what remained of a middle-aged man. They would spend what little time they had left, fighting to survive, unaware the feeders weren’t their only enemy.

  Chapter 34

  The countryside still kept its beauty despite the chaos of the world. The speed and height the Lynx flew at obscured most of the monsters that roamed the ground below. Occasionally, a large herd would be spotted, sometimes standing still waiting, other times slowly moving, following a scent or glimpse of a potential meal. Some even tried to follow the helicopter once they saw it.

  The intelligence, for want of a better term, suggested that William Johnson owned a farmhouse somewhere in the countryside, possibly near a series of villages. That was it. Land registry records were no longer available without accessing the physical servers in Plymouth. The site itself was out of town and easily accessible. That’s why two rescue camps had been set up within half a mile of it. When they fell thousands were added to the ranks of the dead. It would take an army to take the unsecured offices, and those in charge deemed it too risky. Far better have a series of small teams exploring the various likely areas than risk the manpower that was needed elsewhere. Johnson was a punt. He may be dead, he might not have the answers they needed. This was a job for specialists.

  Spencer had marked the day’s targets from satellite images on a map that each man had a copy of. It was hard enough telling apart the dead from the living from the helicopter, how they managed it from space was miraculous. Hundreds of small communities had been identified and contact initiated where possible. So far none had seen or heard of a William Johnson, but each offered some information on their area. Spencer had used this with the satellite imagery to prioritise his targets. Today’s properties had all been identified as being occupied by the living by the satellite images and backed up by those on the ground. In over four hours they had visited three of the four properties.

  The first they hadn’t even bothered to land. A dozen dead wandered the grounds and the doors to the house and the small cottage open.

  The second property they landed and searched. An emaciated couple was in bed together, perfectly still, holding hands. They’d been dead for at least a week.

  At farm number three, they were greeted with ineffective gunfire. The firefight had been one-sided. The door gunners earning their keep, ripping to shreds those foolish few armed with shotguns and small calibre rifles. Spencer and his team disembarked the helicopter half a kilometre from the farm building and hurried on foot to the site under cover from the chopper. Two survivors wept over the bodies of their fallen and swore at the soldiers as they continued to clear the buildings. Another bust. It had taken time to secure the farm and the two survivors were not cooperat
ive.

  Mackland’s Farm was the last property, a dairy farm a few miles from the village of Thornhurst. The helicopter landed in an empty field, a fair distance from the farm. The soldiers spread out and advanced forward. The helicopter sprung back into the air and continued to keep moving, able to answer any call for help that may be made.

  The field was open; it provided awful cover and only minimal concealment with the long grass. The four men moved quickly until they reached a stone wall that bordered the farmyard. The wall was easy to climb over and the four soldiers separated into two-man teams, each clearing outbuildings. The cowshed had fifty bodies piled up, all grey skin and dry grey blood.

  “Can I help you?” a young male voice enquired.

  Billy may have been green, but Mike wasn’t. The fact this young man had got so close to them was impressive. Both raised their rifles. “Who the fuck are you?” he asked. Mike was angry with himself, this lad could have ended them both.

  “Mark, this is my home. Who the hell are you?” the young man replied. Mark Mackland was in his early twenties, he looked tired and worn down. The price you pay for living in the middle of the apocalypse.

  “This your handiwork?” Billy gestured to the dead feeders.

  “Me and my dad,” Mark said. He didn’t know what to make of these soldiers, why there were here now.

  “Tidy work,” Billy complimented, impressed.

  “We stopped burning and burying them a few weeks ago, couldn’t spare the calories.” Mark was too tired to be afraid of the soldiers.

  “Your dad, is he close?” Mike questioned. He was keeping one eye on this kid, and the other darting around looking for others. He caught Spencer’s attention and signalled him.

  “He’s in the house,” Mark replied as he looked at his home.

  “Alone?”

  “Kind of,” Mark answered. He was sheepish, even evasive.

  “On your knees, mate, hands on head,” Billy ordered, and stepped forward with a cable tie and bound Mark’s hands behind his back.

  An older man emerged from the farmhouse, a shotgun resting casually in his arms, Gary raised his rifle to cover the man but Spencer directed him to lower it.

  “You okay, Mark?” his father asked. John Mackland was in his fifties. He walked with a slight limp and a plain expression on his face. He was a beaten man, hanging on to this life for his family.

  “Yes dad, they’re army.”

  Spencer stepped forward from his position and walked towards John, lowering his rifle.

  “We’re looking for a William Johnson,” Spencer stated. He produced the picture and showed it to John. “We need to find him.”

  John looked at the picture closely but crossed his head. “I don’t recognise him. If he was from around here, I’d probably know him. Johnson?” he responded. A flicker of recognition in John’s eyes.

  “Yes, William Johnson. He’s a scientist,” Spencer said, he hoped this worn down survivor may have something to tell them.

  “We don’t have a need for too many scientists here. But there was a Johnson family that had a farm out beyond Thornhurst. It was probably a good few years ago,” John offered. He was trying to recall the details, but even if he had known them, in his current state he would have been unable to relay them.

  Spencer produced a map and showed it to John. “Can you point to it?” he asked. John looked carefully, but it was all a blur. He crossed his head and walked back. “Anyone else in there?”

  “Just my wife, Annie,” John answered and looked back to the house.

  “Dad, no,” his son chimed in. Mark turned away, he couldn’t look. Embarrassment and shame washed over him. He had tried to put an end to the nonsense weeks ago.

  “Sir, can you bring her out please?” Spencer told him, he was respectful but wary. They were obviously hiding something, but hadn’t been hostile. John obliged and slowly wandered into the house.

  “You’ve got to understand, this farm and his family, they were his life. When we slaughtered the cattle, it chipped a piece of him away. When mum went to the rescue camp, he thought it was for the best. When we found her. It broke him,” Mark revealed, he was desperate for them to understand.

  John appeared from the house, Annie behind him. Her mouth was bound with a rag stained with her own grey blood. Her right arm missing below the elbow, the stump had healed over with scarred grey tissue. Her other arm and what remained of the damaged one were tightly wrapped to her body with bungee cord. She had obviously turned weeks ago; she wasn’t a wife or mother anymore; she was just another bloody monster.

  Spencer kept his game face on, the world was fucked. He wasn’t about to make this man suffer any more than he had to. “Thanks, sir, I think we have everything we need,” Spencer said and signalled his men to withdraw. John stood bemused as the soldiers moved away from the farm. Mark put his hand on his father’s back, the creature behind looking at the pair. It gazed at them with hate. It had long become used to being unable to satisfy its hunger. It could wait for its chance, the desire would always be there, its instinct told it to wait.

  “That was fucked up.” Billy had barely waited until they were out of earshot from the farmers before he spoke.

  “Have you not been paying attention? This is all fucked up.” Mike said, but the other two thought it.

  “Time to head back, get the mad bastard on the blower to take us home.” Spencer was done for the day. Half a lead was all they’d achieved, but that was better than nothing.

  Chapter 35

  It had been good to stretch her legs. The unpleasantness had at the very least provided a fresh meal for Natasha, even if the prospect of explaining it to William wasn’t one she relished. With any luck, he’d still be busy in his lab and she could shower and change before he even noticed that she’d left. Everything was as she had left it. She undressed in the garden, aware that a careless smudge of blood from her clothing would give her visit away. Cautiously, she entered the front door and listened for William. Not a sound.

  She ran to the kitchen, dropping her bag of goodies off en route before throwing the blood-soaked clothes into the washing machine. She knew blood was a tough stain to get out, but she had to try it. The cycle began, and she rushed up to the bathroom and hopped into the shower. She might have got away with it. The water ran red. She had made quite the mess. She had wanted to do something good and had it had gone bad. She didn’t blame herself; she wasn’t even sure she cared, but she knew it was an act of kindness she wouldn’t be repeating soon.

  *

  The boy was conscious but strapped to the table in the lab. Its skin colour was nearly normal, but it still acted like one of the creatures. There was less anger, more agitation as it was poked and prodded. It couldn’t speak, William hadn’t expected it to. Its groans were little different than before. The week after the first injections, it was time for him to look inside. With the scalpel in hand, he sliced a strip of flesh off the boy’s forearm. Little more than two inches long and half an inch wide, the sample came away cleanly. The flesh looked healthier than any feeder William had seen, but it didn’t look like that of a normal human being. He held it up to a light. It was red rather than grey, but it was too dark. Under a microscope the problems were obvious. The scarring was easily visible, but how close did he need to get? The microbe was gone, only the damage it caused remained.

  William took two more slices and laid them next to the first. The appearance was consistent. The truth was in the tasting. Would another creature go for the small slither of meat? They hadn’t reacted to the boy since he had been experimented on. Not a great sign of success. William had hypothesised that they may sense the boy was food rather than one of their own, but they hadn’t. William picked the slightly thicker strip of meat. It was a little more bloody, and he hoped that would appeal to them. He produced a metal rod from a selection of instruments, two feet in length it would be sufficient to pass through the meat into the cage. The female feeder was his preferred su
bject for this task.

  He jammed the meat through the bars. But she showed no interest. He may as well have given her a copy of his thesis on obesity in domestic cats for the interest she showed. He put it in front of her eyes, hoping to get her attention, but nothing. She was all but in a trance. They all had been staring forward, occasionally treating themselves to a light sway. This is how a lot of the feeders acted outside. Some would roam continuously hunting for food, others would stop and wait for food to come to them. Why didn’t she react? The meat was right under her nose. If she was outside and a human so much as passed wind within fifty metres, she would have sprung into life.

  This was a failure, surely. William drew it back and sniffed. It smelled like uncooked pork, but it was a faint smell. His nose was nearly as good as hers, and neither the boy nor the meat appealed to him by smell alone. So why was he surprised it did nothing for her? In frustration, he pushed the rod back into the cage to the feeder’s mouth. “Just fucking try it!” he growled. His anger had grown, he was so close and yet if they wouldn’t eat it, he probably wouldn’t be able to either. The rod knocked out two teeth of the creature as he forced the meat inside its mouth. And then it happened. Her eyes kicked into life and she instantly began chewing the flesh. It was barely a mouthful, finished in just a few chews and a swallow. It began clawing at the bars. This was the most active it had been since William had captured it.

  He pushed through the other two slices, which were gratefully devoured. He looked to the boy, then to the feeder. It wanted more. Why not give it more? His instruments were varied, some would grace any laboratory in the world, others more at home in an abattoir. He produced a large cleaver and quickly approached the boy, then slammed it down. He struck just below the elbow, high on the forearm. He had expected to go clean through the bone, but he had rushed his blow. The cleaver had passed mostly through the flesh and bone, but it needed him to push down on the embedded blade until the crunch confirmed it was through. The boy reacted little differently than he had when the smaller samples had been taken.