by RR Haywood
Twenty-Five
Blowers and Maddox fire as they run through commercial zones into the abyss of residential rural England where every front garden has either rose bushes or old sofas the council refused to come and collect.
It’s dark now. Night is here. Not that they notice because they have to run and run and keep running. Hundreds of infected came after them. Far more than they realised and even with them stopping to fire thirty rounds at a time each they still don’t drop enough to even hope to stand and fight but by drawing them on, Blowers knows they are giving the others a better chance.
‘On,’ he gasps, ejecting his used magazine to ram a new one home. Maddox complies because right now it suits him to run. It is the correct course of action to ensure his survival and his own survival is the primary objective. The thing he was waiting for is here. The night is his ally and a tool to be used. He can slip away when the time is right and disappear into the darkness while the confusion is highest. If he gets it right, Blowers will think he was taken and killed which will prevent any risk of Dave coming after him. This attack is a disaster for the others but a blessing for him.
They run hard through street after street. Blowers keeps his mind clear. He knows he can run for miles and that’s exactly what he intends to do. He plans to run and draw the horde on and away enough so he can go back and join the others.
‘Next corner,’ Blowers says between sucking air in, ‘we’ll stop and fire then sprint away…’
Maddox doesn’t reply. Not because he can’t speak but because he doesn’t like Blowers. He hates him. He detests the way the idiot switches between playing at corporal to being everyone’s mate. He thinks he is something special, something unique because he has a smidge of authority and can tell a few other idiots which way to face when they point their guns.
Maddox started the day believing he would be at the top table with the leaders and would show them his ability to think tactically and strategize. Instead, he’s been running about with stupid people all day. The insecurity over Lenski has been niggling too. The loss of his crews. The death of Darius. Finding out he is immune but being refused any more information. All of those things and of course the self-generated isolation.
‘Now,’ Blowers comes to a stop, turns and fires. Maddox does so too but his movements are not as sharp as Blowers. He slows a bit more gradually, turns a bit slower and fires when he is ready instead of when he is told.
The two rifles fire with bursts. Infected drop but more come. Sixty bullets are sent down the road in a matter of seconds and they score a handful of kills. Blowers pauses for a second, changing magazine while trying to see how many are left. Too many. Far too many. That’s a good thing though. He smiles grim and determined. More here is less back there attacking his mates. Divide the enemy and whittle them down. It’s a valid tactic.
‘Come on…’ his voice snaps off at the empty space next to him. He spins trying to see where he went but there’s no sign. ‘MADDOX?’ he shouts and casts a worried look at the horde charging down the street. ‘YOU FUCKING CUNT…’ Blowers runs on. Fuming, seething and knowing without doubt that if he saw the prick now he’d shoot him dead without blinking. Sulking is one thing, being difficult is another but cowardice in the face of the enemy is unforgivable. There is no choice now. There is nothing else he can do but run. ‘COWARD…HEAR ME? YOU’RE A COWARD…’
Maddox sprints hard. He saw the mouth to the alley as he turned when Blowers said to stop and fire. He duly fired and also knew that Blowers would change his magazine and do the same thing he’s already done each time they’ve stopped and try to count his kills to see how many are left. That’s when he went. Right then. He sprinted to the alley and the years of experience at running through estates show true. He changes his magazine as he goes, simply discarding the used one on the floor. The opportunity isn’t as perfect as he hoped. Ideally he wanted them to think he had been killed but you can’t always have the best of everything. He’ll find a car, a fast one and head down to the fort. He’ll get in quietly and see if Lenski wants to come with him. He knows he can get to the fort while these idiots are still here fighting. Lilly will ask him why and he already knows he will tell her he pissed Howie off so much he was sent back. The people from the equestrian centre will vouch for seeing him. The plans form as he runs. Get a car. Get to Lenski then go. Find somewhere far away and start again.
‘YOU FUCKING COWARD…’
His lip twitches at hearing Blowers’ raging into the night. He knew he would feel guilty at leaving him. Maddox is many things but he is very intelligent and he expected the rush of guilt but he also knew he would be able to ignore it. What they do is down to them. He is not one of them. Their way is not his way.
Blowers saves his breath for running. Maddox thinks he has a right to do as he pleases because he had a hard life. Everyone had a hard life. Cookey and Nick had hard lives. Marcy was broke. Paula was in a job she hated. Clarence felt abandoned and lonely after leaving the army. Roy was a social reject due to his mental health. Dave found work in a supermarket for fuck’s sake. The hardest most dangerous man in the whole country stacked shelves in Tesco. Blowers was no exception. He joined the Marines and had his life planned out, then in the final week of training, he broke his leg. At the time, it was thought the injury was bad enough to end his military career so he was forced to leave but not once did he look back and feel someone owed him something. He was so close to earning the green beret of the commandos. The green lid, but that’s what life is. It’s hard and brutal but you get on with it. Even his life before the Marines was shit and he doesn’t look back at that and think he is owed anything. That’s not how his mind works. He grew up on the edge of an estate like the one Maddox and Mo come from. His mum had a succession of boyfriends, too many, far too many and she fell in love with each one as they moved in, took over then moved out a few months later. He can’t remember how many times he was given a pack of sweets and told to go wait outside.
He found boxing, or rather, boxing found him. He was angry. He had a temper and was quick to fight. Too many different men in his house made him hostile to affection and weary of everyone. He got into a few scraps at school, was suspended, let back in, suspended again, let back in and on it went until he bust the jaw of another kid during lunchbreak. The other kid was the son of his mother’s latest boyfriend and was bragging at how his dad fucked Blowers mum.
The police officer that dealt with the incident took Blowers to the local boxing club and made him promise he would complete a month of training in lieu of being prosecuted. Blowers didn’t know the other kid wasn’t making a complaint after being told not to by his father.
Blowers found a new home and one he was welcomed at. He was good too. He trained hard and had enough respect to listen and learn. He fought in competitions and won. He grew tough and bigger and soon the men in his house avoided him as much as he avoided them. It was the hard eyes that did it. The thousand yard stare he perfected in the ring to show his opponent he was not afraid.
Now he runs on his own to lead hundreds of chemically pumped infected humans away from his mates and his family. He runs on his own to draw them away and buy time.
Twenty-Six
The pain is too much. She’ll die. It feels like she’s being split in two. She pushes knowing she has to push but wishing she could do anything instead of push. The veins in her neck bulge. Her face flushes deep red. Her mouth open, teeth gritted, eyes bulging. She grunts and makes noises and wants to scream but she can’t. Her fists ball. Her nails dig into her palms.
She breaks and breathes. Panting hard with sweat burning her eyes. Why hasn’t it come out yet? Why is it taking so long? Something’s wrong. She pants and makes ready as the next spasm hits with an urge to push.
It hurts more each time. A burning agonising pain that threatens to render her unconscious. It’s dark in here. Too dark. On the floor of her kitchen in a near on pitch black room she tries to give birth but the baby won’
t come. It’s been hours already and each time the urge comes so she pushes but it won’t come out.
She pants again. Drawing energy before the next one comes. She weeps and sobs, she whimpers alone and terrified for her baby. She tries to look down but can’t see past her bulging stomach and any attempt at moving sends waves of the wrong type of pain going through her. So she doesn’t. She stays on her back without water while sweating and losing fluids. She’s bleeding too. She can see the pool of darkening liquid spreading out round her body.
The next one is intense. She grits her teeth and pushes. She pushes until stars and lights bloom in her eyes. She pushes until her vision starts closing in and the pain increases to a whole new level. She cries out from the agony and tries to stifle the noises but it’s so hard. She wants her mum. She wants her boyfriend. Please, someone, anyone. There is no one. There is nothing but here and now and pushing a thing that will not come out. She will die here. Her baby will die inside her. The utter hopelessness of it all crushes her soul and breaks her heart into a thousand pieces.
Maddox and Blowers run. They each run for their own purpose. One to make the things chase and the other to get away and hide.
Blowers sprints down the next road. He needs the magazines from his bag which means sliding the bag off while running. He’ll have just seconds when he stops. Seconds to drop the bag, open the flap, grab a magazine and re-load. He runs it through in his mind, visualising each component move.
Now. He stops, drops the bag, takes a knee, opens the flap, grabs a fresh one and ejects the used one. Fresh one in. Bolt back, aim and fire. Sustained bursts under control. Several drop and he knows he gets kills but by fuck these bastards don’t stop coming.
Another magazine goes into his pocket and he’s up and running. Breathing hard. Sweating loads. He runs fast enough to keep ahead but steadily enough to get his bottle out and take a glug. Not much but enough to keep him hydrated and functioning. He glances up and fails to see any stars. That means clouds. Hopefully that means rain. Rain will be good right now. It’ll mask noise and give him a chance to hide somewhere and fire into them from behind.
Maddox runs in the fashion he learnt. In a zig zag manner instead of a straight line. It always worked when the police were chasing him. They were always too fat to go over fences and through gardens. Maddox wasn’t then and he isn’t now. He vaults fences and walls with ease and drops deftly to assess each new microenvironment before choosing his new path and running on. He weaves and takes hard lefts and rights while every now and then hearing the shots from Blowers assault rifle and others in the distance.
He needs water. He needs to catch his breath. He vaults a fence, runs through a garden and spies the next border is a six-foot high wall. He takes that with ease and drops down the other side onto a ceramic plant pot that smashes under his weight. He freezes at the noise, going still to listen. The garden is enclosed on all sides and the noise he made doesn’t seem to have caused a reaction from anywhere. He takes the time to open his bag and drink water deep into his stomach. He pours more over his face, sluicing the sweat away while a smug sense of freedom steals over him. Conflict too. The dig in his soul at ditching Blowers to deal with that lot on his own. Not my problem. He goes to move then stops at the sound coming from the house.
She hears the pot in the garden smashing. The big one her mum got her from the garden centre that she was going to grow tomatoes in. She pants as silently as she can, staring at the closed back door and willing the next contraction not to come. Not now, please not now.
It comes. It comes because her body tells her the baby has to come out. She clamps a hand over her mouth to stifle the noise but the pain is growing and tearing her skin. It gets worse. It gets deeper and more searing. She shakes and trembles while pushing and desperately trying to stay quiet.
Maddox stares hard at the back door. Someone is inside it. Someone panting hard and moving about. He stays still. His rifle lifting to aim. His eyes twitching left to right to take in the dark windows. He looks at the fence ahead and mentally prepares for the run and leap to vault the top.
The pain. It’s too much. Everything hurts now. She thrashes her head side to side to do something instead of scream. She has to push. She pushes and strains. Blood comes out. She can feel it hot and sticky on her legs. Blood like that isn’t right. Her baby is dying inside her. Her baby.
‘My baby…’
The words come out before she can stop them. The choking sob follows. She covers her own mouth then gasps as the pain intensifies as her body tells her things are going very badly wrong.
He edges towards the fence. He’s not that bothered if there’s an infected inside as he can outrun them and besides, he’s got a big gun. What bothers him is being spotted and the signal being sent as to where he is. That will tell the others where he is too. Time to go. He bunches for the run up as the words come whispered and broken from the back of the house. His heart misses a beat. His blood runs cold. My baby. He heard that. He hears the sob that comes after and the rustle of someone moving about. He hears a person in pain and a voice gripped by terror and fear. It’s not his problem. He runs for the fence.
The pain is so bad. It tears and burns like every nerve ending in her body is being jabbed with hot needles and cut with razors. She clamps her mouth and for a second she holds the noise back but it’s too much and she cries out in a voice of pitiful agony that drops guttural and broken as the need to push takes over.
He vaults the fence and drops to the next garden as the scream comes. A mournful wail of absolute pain. Another human in agony. A person suffering. He goes to run, to get away and be free but he falters, glaring back at the fence he came from. The noises drop off as he tells himself this isn’t his problem. Whoever it is will be fine. Whatever it is has nothing to do with him.
She screams again. She can’t not scream. She is dying. Blood is coming out. Too much blood. The contractions threaten to become convulsions. The urge to push becomes a spasm.
Maddox’s face twists as he fights the conscience inside. The voice of reason and goodness that tells him not to be an utter cunt and go help. He has his own life to lead. No one ever helped him so why should he help anyone now? Fuck whoever it is. Fuck everyone. The strong survive this world.
She claws back from the edge of the abyss that will pull her down to death. With the instinct of a mother she finds strength inside to do what must be done. She pushes. She growls wide eyed impervious to the pain. She strains and screams out. Blood sprays from her nose from the pressure bursting a vessel. Her head swims. Vision closes in but my god she pushes with one final immense urge to birth her baby. She can die. She doesn’t care but give life to her child. Please god, give my baby life.
It’s no good. As strong as she was in that second so her body weakens and the pain takes over. She breaks the push to sob as she starts slipping over the edge to plummet down into the dark abyss. It’s over. Her mum is dead. Her boyfriend is dead. Her child is dead. Everyone is dead. Her body prepares to die too. The brain knows the end is here and so it dumps chemicals to ease the passing. It floods her with calm while it dampens the nerve endings but to do that creates a degree of delusion in her mind. Images of her life swim through her mind.
Maddox creeps quickly to the window while the voices in his head argue bitterly. He has to run and go but the encoded strands of DNA in his system recognise the sounds of another human in distress and that resonance draws him closer. He peeks through the gap in the curtain to see a kitchen. It looks normal. He doesn’t see anyone. He frowns, ready to go as she moves on the floor and brings his eyes down as his vision adapts to the darkness inside the room. He spots the towels first. White fluffy towels stacked up. Then he spots her. A woman on her back with her legs bent and wide open. Blood on the floor. Blood on her thighs. Her stomach is swollen.
She murmurs softly. He’ll be back in a minute with the Doritos and salsa dip. She’ll phone her mum tomorrow and say how he sweet he was to go
out and get them for her. She smiles and sighs. Her head lolling side to side as her brain receives another signal to push. She snaps back to reality. Surging from the delusion to the awful now and the pain radiating through her body.
Maddox sees it. He sees the sharpness come back to her eyes and the way she grits, heaves and strains as every vein in her neck and head pushes from her skin. The noise she makes is almost inhumanly low and guttural. Like an animal but she isn’t an animal, she’s a person in distress. A woman giving birth who is bleeding out.
A second in time. A choice to make. The hardness of his life and all the bitter experiences weighed off against the now and in that second his mind gives self-justification that millions have died and millions more will die. She is just one more, that’s all. Just one worthless life that means nothing to him. She never helped him. She never did anything to make his life better. There is no connection. There is no reason to stay. Be cold. Be ruthless and live a life instead of dying here trying to help someone who will die anyway.
Twenty-Seven
Reginald fights. He takes life. He is a warrior. He is strong and wields his weapon with true majesty. He strikes and moves. He dances and feints left then darts in from the right. He is here, in the battle, in the moment.
Roy stands in the gaping hole where the window used to be. The glass and frame kicked out so he can find angle and space to draw and fire to help the three below him. Clarence, Dave and Howie fight a battle on all sides. Compressed almost back to back and all they can do is hold their tiny space while Roy fires to do what he can.
At Roy’s back stands Nick. Nick who holds the line on the upstairs landing at the top of the stairs as the infected charge up from pouring through the shop below. He lashes his axe left and right to hack through bone and limbs then boots them back down to trample the rest coming up. It’s dirty and hot. His hands, arms and face are streaked with blood and gore. His voice is hoarse as he grunts but that wry smile twitches on his face.