by RR Haywood
As one the others scream out at the pain and fear rushing through Blowers. Charlie yells for Jess to go faster. The horse belts it down the roads, taking corners hard and fast. Every muscle in Cookey’s body tensed. His face a mask.
Pack must come now.
A pulse from Meredith calling for the pack. Come now. Hold on Brother, hold on. I’ll come to you.
Hurts. Can’t see.
HOLD ON BROTHER.
Too many.
I’m coming mate.
Too many, Cookey. Can’t see. I can’t see.
I’m coming, Blowers. I swear it.
The vision in his left eye gone. His right misted, blurred and the agony is searing. He stabs, braces and takes the pain for the voices of the pack willing him to hold on.
Maddox curses, his grip lost again. He tries and feels his way over the legs to the feet then back up as he tries to pull the cord down. He glances to the hallway and sees Blowers flailing blind and bleeding heavily. He sees how close they are and knows he has but seconds. Julie is silent. She isn’t screaming. He looks again to see blood still seeping from her that tells him her heart still beats but slow and weak. It has to be now. From the stomach down. It has to be now.
In the precinct Howie, Dave and Clarence slay with frantic fear driven energy under a torrential rain that cools their skin and drips valuable fluids into their parched throats. Mo, Marcy and Paula scream as they fight out from the shopping centre and Nick batters a savage path from the shop front. The hive mind is upon them. The intrinsic connection to each that flows and tells them Blowers is going down. He can’t see. Pain everywhere. Too many against him.
Meredith snarls and takes them down. Her body twisting, lunging and fighting to get through into the house but they press in harder, closing the gaps and preventing her getting through. They charge hard to push and strain with the goal of taking one of Howie’s now so close.
Blowers braces and holds. His body battered and hurt. Blood pouring from his nose. The vision in his left eye gone. The knife held in his right hand puckers a throat as he flails out with his left fist.
Howie roars out as Roy fires his last arrow, drops his bow, draws his sword and drops from the window to land on the bodies beneath him. The pressure is immense. The sense of victory in their foe who can taste the death of one of theirs. He slashes out wild and frenzied. His face contorted to beat them back and break free so he can to Blowers. They all do it. They all fight to get free. The infected compress. Sacrificing so to feed the weapons of the living army to keep them pinned and held as it drives harder into the hallway and tastes the blood of Simon Blowers.
Blowers weakens. Blood streaming from wounds all over his body. He stabs with his right hand and pushes his open left hand into the face of an infected woman. The pain from his eye is agonising and burns. His head throbs, his legs start to shake and tremble. He holds them with everything he has. He grits to brace and not yield, to hold the line.
Maddox digs the point of the knife into her stomach. What must done will be done. He cuts her. The sharp blade peels the flesh apart so easily it sickens him. He is killing her. She will now never recover or have life. With the torch in his teeth, he operates on the blood soaked floor to cut through a human being to save the child within her.
Blowers feels more pain than he has ever felt in his life. His left hand on the face of the infected woman who thrashes faster than he can react. His fingers go into her mouth. He pulls back but she bites hard and deep with a crunch through the bone on his little finger. He screams and slams his forehead into hers. Skulls meet. Stars flash. She goes back, tearing his finger from his hand as she goes. He roars out, incensed. The final rage explodes as he batters the soft bodies in front of him. The stump where his finger was sprays blood but he rams that broken hand into their faces. He stabs, kicks, bites and headbutts as he goes back towards the kitchen. Voices in his head. Voices in his mind. Cookey screaming. Meredith exerting her will. Charlie riding Jess. He feels them all. He feels each and gives thanks for knowing them. He gives grace for the honour of serving with them. In the final seconds of his life he wishes them well and to carry the fight on.
Julie is dead. The blood has stopped coming from her. Her heart has stopped beating. The baby will die. The infected are coming. Blowers is losing. The others aren’t fast enough. Maddox cuts down and pushes a hand in to feel the baby’s feet. He cuts again and works to find the cord.
Blowers starts to fall. He has done what he can and no more can be asked. Power flows into him. A will exerted from the others driving their love into his heart. He grunts and fights to rise up to use his body to block them. His head swims, his legs buckle then stiffen as he snarls and digs in to hold.
Maddox cuts to see the legs and reaches in to pull the cord down and free from the tiny limbs.
Jess takes the corner and powers on with a burst of speed towards the huge crowd pushing into the doorway of the house. They ride into a scene of hell. Of bodies strewn and more raging and snarling as one dog attacks them like a beast from a nightmare. The flames from the houses blown to light a path bathe a fiery glow. Smoke plumes thick and black. The rain pours. Cookey grips his axe as Charlie fixes the door in her eyes. A signal sent. A message received and it is to that point that Jess aims. Jess who flies on feet that bring thunder and doesn’t flinch as she slams into them with a power unbeknown to mere humans. Only she can do this. Only Jess can move them away in such a way. Only Jess can hold this point and she does. By the goodness of God she smashes them back and turns on a sixpence to rear as Cookey slides back to land with his axe swinging.
A screech of tyres. Headlights sweep the street. The Toyota revs loud and solid as it drives hard with the wall of rage that is Paco. Heather was aiming for the door to do the same as Jess but sees the horse already there. She stamps on the brake and heaves the wheel round. The vehicle slews out with the passenger door already opening as the wall of rage comes out to join the fray.
Blowers cannot see. He cannot hear. The pain is gone and he barely feels the dull thuds of bodies slamming into him. That he still stands is from will power alone. From courage and an allegiance to duty before death, and he knows his death is here. He’ll go as a soldier. He’ll go as a warrior with discipline and dignity. One single sound penetrates his head. A new sound of a thing unheard for many days. A beautiful sound of a new born baby crying out as Maddox pulls it free, cuts the cord and blinks from the spray of blood hitting his face. The baby cries. A new-born boy who inflates his lungs to mark his place and right to live in this world. Blowers grins in a face battered and soaked with blood.
‘By sea…by land’ the words come mangled, broken and whispered. The motto of the Royal Marines. His biggest regret in life was that he failed his Commando course but now he has earned his badge. He has earned his beret. ‘We win…’ the final words whisper as his heart stops and he drops slumped and inert to be trampled by the feet of the infected who go over him into the kitchen.
To the last they feel it. To the last they feel his heart stopping and the loss of one from the pack of the hive mind. Where Blowers was there is a void. An emptiness that sees them falter and weaken. A sapping of energy that is sensed by the other side who screech out with the victory of taking one of Howie’s. The infected becomes emboldened. It becomes stronger as though the taking has given it strength. It pushes harder, snarling louder, raking faster. They are mortal. They are not unkillable. It has proved this. It will take more. It will end it here in this shitty little town that burns with flames and runs red with blood.
Cookey staggers away. Rendered weak and dumb. Charlie launches from Jess to cover him. Running to get in front and fight them back to protect Cookey mouthing words that don’t come. Heather runs in with her machete swinging to join Charlie as Cookey’s legs go weak and he falls to his knees. Meredith barks loud and deep and with Paco and Jess clearing the door she pushes through the legs and bodies into the hallway to the body of Blowers. She drops on him. Her body
covers his. The whole of her protects him. Her lips pulled back as she lashes out at anything coming close. In between each bite, she licks his face and whines with an instant change from raging wild beast to an animal consumed with grief.
Thirty-One
He roars with defiance as he holds them back and it takes but a second for him to realise they are not there. He staggers back. Confused and raging. His chest heaving. His hands balled to fists to fight. This is not the hallway. Maddox is not behind him. He spins round, his hard eyes wild and still filled with the lust of battle but it fades away. All trace of the emotions he had ebb away and his breathing slows.
It’s light now but grimy and grey. He’s in a street so ruined and destroyed it looks like something from the Second World War. An old park lies in a square behind rusted railings. The slide has fallen down into a pile of rubble, rusted swing chains nestle amongst the yellowing grass. The sky is streaked blood red and the clouds look heavy and threatening. The place is unfamiliar. He looks round for the others but they aren’t here. He’s alone. A feeling of a presence. Something malevolent and evil that is coming closer. He can’t see it but he can feel it.
Blowers starts walking. The feeling increases, like being watched and hunted. He starts jogging, then running then sprinting as fast as he can to be away from here.
His left eye feels weird. His vision blurs. He tries to call out but his voice is silent. He looks behind to see dark shadows flitting between the ruined walls. Dark shapes of things that are evil with intent. A laugh echoes round, rolling to bounce off walls and buildings. The laugh becomes a dry hacking cough. Twisted and not right. Like a taunt. The fear grows inside him. They are coming for him. A certainty. A fact. He makes himself stop running to face his death with bravery and courage. He is a soldier. He doesn’t run away but faces the enemy. He stiffens to stand proud while wishing the others were with him. He wants a joke from Cookey. He wants to feel Clarence’s size next to him. To have the boss lead the line. He wants Meredith to push her nose into his hand and lick his face that suddenly feels wet as a whine is heard that rolls round the buildings.
The fear inside grows but he stiffens and holds. His hands once more bunch to fists. His hard eyes glare. He twitches at the sensation again. A shooting pain in his left eye that loses vision for a second before swimming back.
Movement on his right side. He spins to see a flash of black fur and a long tail running behind the broken wall of a house down the street.
‘Meredith?’ he calls out, his voice hollow and strangely flat in this awful place.
A bark. It’s Meredith. He knows that bark anywhere. He sets off running towards where the noise came from but when he gets there she is gone.
Another bark. He turns quickly to see her now standing in the middle of the road further down. She barks again. She barks to tell him to move. To get away. She spins to go, turns back and barks.
He starts after her, calling her name. Whispers from the sides ripple down the street. Predatory inhuman sounds. Meredith barks, louder now, more urgent. That feeling of being hunted comes back. He sprints hard. Running over rubble and heaps of slag on the road. Veering round old cars rusted and left for years.
They give chase. Whatever they are. He cannot see them but feels them. He hears the feet pounding and the whispered grunts and calls. The cackling laughter comes again. Meredith barks but he cannot close the distance between them. She stays at a fixed point leading him on.
He takes a corner to see Meredith outside the doorway to a church. Her mouth open, her huge tongue hanging down to the side as she takes the head rub from the big man at her side.
Blowers slows to a jog to a walk and looks on with only the barest sense of confusion inside.
‘Corporal,’ the man says, nodding curtly.
‘Sir,’ Blowers says, coming to a smart stop as he snaps out a salute.
‘Sergeant not a sir,’ Big Chris says, grinning with white teeth showing through his bushy black beard. Dressed in army fatigues and only then does Blowers realise he’s wearing the same.
‘Sergeant,’ Blowers says.
‘Inside,’ Chris says, casting a look of distaste round at the view. He clicks his tongue for Meredith to run on through the open doors. Blowers follows. Unsure of where he is. Unsure why Big Chris is here but knowing this is normal.
Inside the church is lit with hundreds of candles that burn and flicker to fill the space with golden light. The floor is swept clean and the air smells sweet. A contrast of the sterility of the broken world outside to somewhere that has the warmth of life.
‘Marine marine in a boat…living proof shit can float!’ Malcolm laughs striding towards him with his hand out. ‘Not bad for a bootneck.’
‘Thanks,’ Blowers says, shaking his hand. ‘If you want a job done properly…don’t ask a Para…’
‘Twat,’ Malcolm laughs.
‘Fuck you,’ Blowers grins.
The smile on Malcolm’s face eases, his face earnest and sincere, ‘seriously, you did well…you took loads out…’
‘Thanks,’ Blowers says in his simple, self-effacing way.
‘When you two have finished finding a room,’ Chris says, his voice as deep and rich as Blowers remembers which makes him wonder why he remembers that. Chris is dead. Malcolm is dead. Oh.
‘Fuck,’ Blowers says then blinks as he remembers Meredith was here. ‘Oh no…no…not Meredith…’
Chris looks at him in puzzlement then round to see the dog cleaning herself by the alter. ‘Oh right. No, it’s not what you think it is.’
‘She’s not dead then?’
‘She’s not dead. Listen, we don’t have much time.’
‘Eh? What’s going on?’ Blowers says, wincing at the pain in his left eye then suddenly feeling a burning agony in his left hand. ‘And who is that?’
‘That’s Meredith,’ Chris says, turning to smile at the slim blonde haired woman walking towards them.
‘Hello, Simon,’ she says, lifting a hand in greeting.
‘What the actual fuck,’ Blowers mutters, ‘Hello, Miss…the dog’s called Meredith…’ he tells Chris.
‘She’s not,’ Chris says. ‘We don’t have time. Ready for orders?’
‘But…’
‘I said ready for orders, Corporal?’ Chris booms. ‘Now listen up.’
‘Yes, Sergeant,’ Blowers snaps, coming to attention.
‘You cannot let them win,’ Malcolm says, walking over to stand next to Chris.
‘Me?’ Blowers asks.
‘They will achieve one race if you stop now,’ Meredith says, walking over to stand on Chris’s other side.
Blowers stares from one to the other. His eye hurts. His hand too but he is a soldier and this is orders so he ignores the pain to listen.
‘Blowers,’ Chris says, speaking in a tone that belies the importance of what he says, ‘Ask Reginald about the merging. He’s on our side, you can trust him. Listen to him, the man knows what he is doing.’
‘Yes, Sergeant…er, what’s merging?’
‘It’s what Paco is now,’ Meredith says softly, coming forward a step to smile at Blowers. She looks radiant and so healthy, a huge smile of clean teeth and the light shines from her blonde hair.
‘I don’t understand, Miss,’ Blowers says.
‘He is halfway from them to us,’ she says, reaching out to lay a hand on Blowers arm that tingles with warmth.
‘But Paco’s on our side.’
‘One race is what Paco is,’ Meredith says. ‘That’s what it will achieve. A thing that cannot feel…’
She smiles warmly at him. She is beautiful in a way he has never seen before. She shines with goodness and love and the virtues a soldier longs to fight for and suddenly he doesn’t want to go anywhere.
‘You are so brave, Simon,’ she says, holding his eyes on hers. ‘So brave…’ her hand reaches out to touch his cheek. ‘It is your choice if you stay here…’
‘Am I dead?’ he asks simply, honestly
.
‘In a way, right now yes, but you can go back.’
He nods and tries to speak but he can’t take his eyes from her. She is everything. She is purity of grace and love. She is warmth and not death and blood, she is not the heat of the battles and the things he has to do.
She holds his gaze and smiles with that warm soft hand touching his cheek. ‘They cannot become what Paco is. Our species will die. Paco still has a trace left…they won’t.’
‘I can’t stop that,’ Blowers says, his voice low and muted, almost a whisper. Nothing else exists save her. All else ceases to be. It’s warm here. Not hot, not cold but just right. The light is bright yet soft. Fragrance in the air. Her voice captivates him, holds him entranced. To stay here right now is all he wishes for. No pain, no sadness, no fatigue, no death or conflict. Just this woman who he doesn’t know but he wants to know. He wants to know her forever. For always.
‘You can,’ Meredith says. Her eyes full of pain, sorrow, love and hope all in equal measure. ‘But we want you to stay with Howie. You are what holds them together. You are the glue that binds. Without you, Howie will go on his own with Dave. He will not risk the lives of the others.’
‘Mr Howie won’t fail,’ Blowers says quickly with a surge of defensive pride.
‘Simon,’ she moves closer, staring into his brown eyes normally so hard but now full of anguish and hurt. She falters, hesitating as though not wishing to say the words she knows must be said. He is in pain. He has done enough. He has given all he can and it’s wrong to ask more. She stiffens, lifting her head and speaks softly, warmly and with regret. ‘Right now Cookey is outside the house. His will to fight is gone. Charlie and Heather are fighting for him but they cannot do what Cookey is capable of doing. Blinky charged the ones following her but she too feels your death and falters as Cookey is, as they all are. Some will survive but not all and those deaths will crush Howie. He will go on alone with Dave.’