by Frank Tayell
“Won’t you just die?” he bellowed. One hand around its throat, the other grabbing a fistful of damp soiled cloth, he picked the creature up and threw it across the path. Even in mid-air the zombie’s limbs didn’t cease their frenetic thrashing. It landed in a heap. Chester stalked towards it.
“Won’t,” he screamed, kicking its arms out of the way. “You.” He kicked it in the head. “Just.” He brought his foot up. “Die.” He stamped his heel down on the creature’s skull. Bone cracked, brain and brownish-blood oozed out.
He took a breath, and another, and turned away from the dead creature. He looked at his arm. He was going to die. He had to—
All thoughts and plans vanished as he looked around and saw the undead, hundreds of them, all heading towards him. He wanted to fight, but if he did he’d be torn apart. He didn’t want to die like that. He turned and ran towards the edge of the park. When he reached the high railings he glanced over his shoulder. They were following him, and there seemed to be more of them. He’d expected to run from hundreds, not thousands.
“Where’d they come from?” he murmured as he climbed up the fence and jumped down the other side. He gave the railings a shake. They seemed solid. But against that approaching horde he knew they wouldn’t last long.
Leaving a bloody smear from his injured arm on his clothes, he searched his pockets for a weapon. His hand closed around the revolver. He’d forgotten it was there. It felt heavy in his hand and slick in his grip as blood dripped down from the wound on his arm. He switched it to his other hand. It was too loud to use effectively against the undead - he’d learnt that lesson a week before - but what did noise matter now? Ineffective or not, it was a reassuring weight and the only comfort he had. Eyes darting left and right, he began walking down the road.
He threw one last glance at the towering transmitter, that British parody of the Eiffel Tower that was nearly as tall, yet was just another iconic landmark in a city that had dozens on every street. The car was parked underneath it. In the back of the car, along with the diesel and the generator, were his spare weapons and the rest of his gear. There was no way of reaching it now. No, he’d find an empty house. There were plenty of those since the evacuation. And then he could die quietly without—
A snarling face lurched out from the gap between two parked cars. Automatically, he raised the gun and fired. The bullet hit the zombie in the chest. The force of the impact spun the creature sideways so it rolled across the car, but it didn’t fall. He fired again, the shot entered just above its shoulder spraying out pus and bone. The zombie didn’t notice. One arm now useless, the other swung out and around, almost as if it was trying to swim towards him.
Stilling his frustrated rage, he took aim before firing for a third time. The bullet entered between the creature’s eyes, blowing the back of its head off. It collapsed to the ground, and for a brief moment Chester actually felt better. The feeling evaporated when he heard an ominous creak of metal from the park behind him. He started walking. Then came a sharp crack and a resounding gong as the railings broke under the weight of the undead. He ran.
He jogged down the dark road, across an alley, and climbed a low brick wall. On the other side was the car park of a large Victorian house some optimistic investor had converted into a hotel. He dropped down onto the asphalt just as a pair of creatures lurched out from behind a parked van. He didn’t hesitate. He raised the revolver, paused, aimed, waited until those snapping mouths got closer, then fired. Once. Twice. The creatures collapsed. By sheer luck he’d hit both zombies in the head, but the second shot had only been a glancing blow, shattering the skull but not destroying the brain. The creature twitched on the ground. He ignored it and ran out of the car park and down a side road. It ended in a cul-de-sac. An alley ran left and right at the end. Judging by the painted lines it was meant to be a cycle-lane, though a plethora of industrial bins turned it into more of an assault course. But the bins belonged to shops, he reasoned, and one of those would do. All he needed was somewhere inside, and he’d only need it for a few hours.
He turned to the right and stopped at the first door. He recognised the type instantly. Underneath the bright paint was a thick metal security door. If he had time and his tools he’d have no trouble breaking in. But he didn’t have time. He kept going. The next door was the same. The third one was just wood. He scanned the alley until he found a twisted metal bracket amongst a broken and dumped pile of self-assembly shelves.
He levered the door open. The wood splintered with a crack as nearly as loud as the gun’s retort. Revolver ready, he kicked the door inward. It was dark inside, and as he stepped forward, a zombie tumbled out.
He screamed. He bellowed. He fell backwards. Despite the undead weight on top, he managed to get the revolver up and between them. He pulled the trigger. The gun exploded, spraying warm gobbets of necrotic flesh over his face. The zombie stopped moving.
Spitting and retching, Chester heaved the corpse off and pulled himself up. He wiped his eyes clean with his sleeve. There was another creature in the doorway and two more stumbling along the hallway behind. He raised the gun, and pulled the trigger. It clicked empty. He turned and he ran and kept on running until he was lost in the suburban side streets. He guessed an hour had passed since he was first bitten and even if by some miracle that bite hadn’t infected him, getting sprayed with that zombie’s brains would have done. He didn’t know how long he had left, but death was inevitable. The only choice he had now was in the manner of his death, and he didn’t want that to be in the streets, torn apart by the undead. That meant he had to find somewhere to hide. And he had to find it quickly because that incessant slouching shuffle was moving inexorably closer.
He crossed the road and climbed over a gate running between two semi-detached houses. As he walked down the path to the back garden, trying not to tread on discarded toys, he tripped on a coil of abandoned hose. He stumbled into the wall, his shoulder hitting it with a dull thump. From inside the house he heard a noise. It came from something too large to be a pet. Quickly, he crossed to the fence and climbed over into the neighbouring garden, then into the next, and the next until he felt safely far enough away from that occupied house.
He looked at the garden he found himself in, then at the dark windows. He listened. He could hear nothing but the distant wheezing of the undead. There was a ceramic flowerpot standing on the patio. He kicked it over. He listened. Nothing. He stamped down on the flowerpot. It broke loudly, but not loudly enough to echo. He listened again. Still nothing. Good enough. He broke into the house.
It was dark, as every house was dark since the power was cut. He took out his small flashlight and quickly checked the rooms downstairs, then upstairs. The house was empty. The light flickered and went out. He shook it and slapped it against his palm. It came back on. When did he change the batteries? He couldn’t remember. There was no point finding new ones now. He looked at his hand. Blood still ran freely from the bite, and it flowed slowly down his hand to drip onto the floor. He thought of bandaging it, but what was the point?
He went into the kitchen. There were a few packets of microwaveable rice and those just-add-water noodles, but he didn’t need food. He wouldn’t need food ever again. He rummaged around, first in the kitchen, then in the living room, until he found a green bottle at the back of a cupboard. The label was printed in Cyrillic and it smelled vile, but he’d drunk worse. He took a long draft. He breathed out. And again.
“So this is it,” he said to himself. “This is how it ends.”
He collapsed onto the sofa. As he did, he knocked the flashlight, turning it off. As the room was enveloped in darkness he was engulfed by a sudden wave of fear. He scrabbled for the light, searching for the button. He turned it back on.
“I don’t want to die.” The words sounded pitiful. Weak. He hated self-pity, but there was no one else anywhere who would feel sorry for him. There was no one who would miss him. Not even McInery. Theirs was a relationship borne
of convenience and necessity.
“Have children. Have friends. Do something with your life. That’s what you said, wasn’t it, Dad?” He grunted. Shook his head. “Well, no chance for that now. So what’d you say about my life? Did I do something?” Had he ever done anything? He didn’t need the judgemental silence to know the answer. He had spent his life as a crook, except for those brief periods he had spent as a con.
Wanting to slip quietly into death, he closed his eyes, but sleep eluded him. He opened his eyes and picked up the revolver. He was going to die. All that was left was choosing the manner of his death. He opened the revolver and spilled the cartridges onto the coffee table. They were all spent.
“Figures,” he murmured. But he had one more round, the one given to him by Cannock. The man had said he should keep it separate because ‘a time might come when you’re grateful for that one last shot.’
“You were right about that, Cannock,” he muttered, as he fished the cartridge out of his pocket and laid it down on the table.
“Yes, one last shot. End it. End it quick.” He stared at it for a moment and then thought of Cannock. He wondered whether the man had betrayed them. When he had delivered that truck full of vaccine had he known it was poison? Maybe not, but probably yes. And he knew why, too. He and McInery were loose ends. Cannock wanted them dead. Or his employer had. They should have guessed the moment Cannock had said who his employer was. He’d guessed it was someone high up in that rarefied atmosphere where organised crime and politics met; where murders were committed by war and thefts through the courts. He just hadn’t expected it to be the Foreign Secretary who, the last they’d heard, had become the Prime Minister.
Chester thought back to their childhood. Cannock had never been someone you wanted as your friend, just someone you didn’t want as your enemy. Chester, being twice the height of his peers, had fallen in as the more visible danger when the two of them went around bullying and robbing their neighbours. But it was Cannock who was the real threat. He always had been. Right up until he disappeared.
Maybe, Chester thought, Cannock might be dead too. That thought pleased him. It made sense. He was a loose end too. A politician like Quigley was unlikely to leave someone like Cannock around. The man was a thug, hired muscle, useful to navigate the slums of the underworld, but of no more use than he, Chester, was.
They’d done the jobs they were asked to because there was no real alternative, just as they’d done before the outbreak, before they had known who their employer was. Then the evacuation had been announced and Cannock had arrived with the vaccine. And he’d given Chester the box of ammunition, and the extra round and told him to keep it safe.
He took a swig from the green bottle. It was a stupid weapon, really. Cannock had been carrying a sniper’s rifle that he’d said had been destined for the SAS until the outbreak hit, and all he’d left Chester was an ornate revolver. He loaded the gun, but then he hesitated. There was something missing. What if his body was found? It might be. Someone might come looking for food or shelter. They’d see his body and think him a man who’d given up. He’d done so many things in his life, but he’d never done that and wouldn’t want it thought of him after his death. No, he’d leave a note.
“Not an apology,” he said firmly to no one. “Just an explanation.”
By the dim glow of the occasionally flickering flashlight he began searching the house. He found paper and pens in a bedroom at the front of the house. It was a kid’s bedroom, he thought, judging by the posters on the wall and the Crystal Palace scarf pinned to the wall above the bed.
He sat down at the small desk by the window and propped the light so it shone down on the paper. He glanced out at the street outside. Were zombies attracted by lights? It didn’t matter. He picked up a pen, and then found he didn’t know what to write.
“My name,” he began “is Chester Cars—” the light went out. He shook the torch. Nothing happened. With nothing but a thin glimmer of moonlight coming through the window, he stumbled around the room until he found a clock by the bedside. He changed the batteries and turned the torch back on. Then he looked down at the words on the paper.
“N’ah. Who starts with their name? I mean, what’s the point in that?”
What was the point in writing anything? There was plenty to say, but no one he would ever say it to. Then he looked deep into his own soul. There had been a few triumphs, but they were crowded out by oh-so-many regrets. There had been moments of joy. Some, but not enough. It was a better life than he had expected he’d have but he now saw that it had been a life utterly wasted. No one who came and found his body would know who he was and, he realised in a final blow to his soul, they wouldn’t care.
He balled up the paper and dropped it in the bin. Carefully he put the paper and pens back in the desk. No one would mourn him. Not Cannock, not McInery, and he didn’t want the pity of the likes of them. And then he realised that he knew no one else. A solitary tear rolled down his cheek.
He picked up the flashlight, went back downstairs and returned to his perch on the sofa. There was no point putting it off. He took one last swig then picked up the loaded gun and raised it to his temple. The barrel felt cold against his skin.
“If,” he said loudly, “I could do it all over again, then I would do absolutely everything completely differently.”
But he knew well enough that everyone invoked that particular deathbed wish, and knew just as well that it was never granted. He closed his eyes and pulled the trigger. It clicked.
He stayed motionless for a moment, thinking time, in its last moment, had slowed to a glacial crawl. He blinked. It hadn’t. He opened the revolver, turned the cylinder so the live cartridge was in front of the hammer. He raised it to his temple and pulled the trigger again. Click. Again. Click. Again. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.
“Cannock, you bastard!”
He dropped the revolver onto the sofa. He didn’t need to take the cartridge apart to know what Cannock had done. He had given him a dud and done it deliberately, so in this last moment, in this exact eventuality, Chester would have that ultimate possible relief ripped from him. He wept. He cursed. He asked “why me?” Frustrated with the silent walls, he stood up and paced the room. He could find a rope, of course. Or make one easily enough. But hanging wouldn’t work. He’d still turn. Slitting his wrists wouldn’t do any good either. He was trapped. He would die and then… He hoped he wouldn’t know. Above all things, he hoped that he would truly be dead.
He slumped down against the wall and waited to die.
Hours past.
He fell asleep.
7th April
He woke up and wished he hadn’t. Lost in despair, he finished the bottle, then found another. He drank it. He passed out.
8th April
His neck ached. He raised a hand to rub his eyes and realised his hand ached more. His wrist. The bite. He looked down at it. The bite marks had turned angry red. The gouged lines tracking down his arm looked inflamed. Perhaps it was infected.
Infected. The word echoed around his half-conscious brain. Infected. He’d been bitten. He was going to turn. Wishing he hadn’t woken up, he looked around the room. In the clear light of dawn it seemed even smaller than it had before.
Dawn. Was it really morning? He stood up and walked over to the window. Moving the curtains carefully, he parted them and peeked through the gap. The undead were outside. A few were in that stationary half-crouch they adopted when they had sighted no prey for a while. A few more moved down the road almost as slowly as the smoke drifting lazily from the chimney of a house opposite. He glanced up at the sky. It was morning. He didn’t know what time, but it was early. He tried to work out how long it had been since he’d been bitten. A day? A day and a half? Longer? He wasn’t sure. Not that knowing would help. His mouth was dry. He was thirsty. He was hungry. He raised his hand again, and as he did, blood beaded up through the broken scab.
He should do someth
ing about his arm, he thought. But why? He couldn’t think of a reason, but self-preservation kicked in, and he found himself wandering through the house, rooting through cupboards and drawers, looking for a first-aid kit. He didn’t find one, but found a stack of clean white sheets in the linen cupboard. He tore one into strips, and was about to start bandaging his arm, when he wondered whether he should clean it first. Again, he couldn’t see a reason why.
“If you have to do a job, do it properly,” he murmured. That was what his old man had said. And though the old man had been talking about dealing with witnesses during a bank robbery, the principle still applied.
He found a bottle of disinfectant in the bathroom. It was meant for toilets, but that was good enough for him. He emptied the bottle over his arm. It stung. Then it burnt. He staggered over to the bath and turned on the taps. Nothing came out of the cold. He tried the hot. The water came out, draining from the house’s tank.
He rinsed his arm clean. Then stuck his head under the tap. He left it there for a few minutes, revelling in the feeling of it, revelling that he could still feel something. Finally, he turned the water off and bandaged his arm.
“So what now? Go back?”
That was the plan. He would drive to the transmitter, lure the undead away, then go back and check that the area was clear. Only then was he meant to return to McInery. Then they’d lead the technicians there to wire it all up. But did he want to return? He had thought of leaving. He’d been planning it. This was his opportunity. Except, what about the bite?
“Then I’ll wait. Three days, that’s how long I’ll give it. If I don’t…” He didn’t want to say it out loud. “I’ll wait three days.”
And with that decision made he realised he was feeling hungry. He’d brought food with him, of course. It was in his bag, but that was still in the car. He went back to the kitchen and took out the packs of rice.
“Cooks in two minutes” he read. But a microwave needed power and that meant electricity, and there was none of that. He could eat it cold, but… no. He’d light a fire. Fire meant matches. It also meant smoke. Smoke. That jarred something in the back of his mind. Something important. Out of the window. The house down the street. There had been smoke coming out of the chimney. He ran over to the curtains. There was. There was smoke coming out of the chimney. He watched it for a moment until he was sure the house itself wasn’t on fire. No, it wasn’t. And that meant there was someone inside.