The Undead the Second Week Compilation Edition Days 8-14

by RR Haywood

  ‘KUM BA YAH MY LORD….KUM BY YAH!’ Cookey bursts into song at the top of his voice making us all splutter with laughter, ‘we’re in a church,’ he shrugs and starts again with Blowers and Nick joining in with him. By half way through the first verse we’re all singing and screaming the words out as loud as possible, Clarence and Dave booming away with their deep bass voices. Giggles keep interrupting us but the sound fills the church.

  ‘DARRENS A TWAT MY LORD KUM BA YAH’ Cookey sings the first words as Blowers starts laughing hard. Again we join in with his new lyrics and blast the words out. The howling outside ceases and we all pause waiting for the frantic attack to begin but instead they start again, louder, harder and distinctly more aggressive. As soon as they start we start and the next few minutes are spent pitching our voices against each other with Cookey making up new versions for each verse.

  Then it’s over and the nights work begins in earnest. Strong concerted attacks start at the main doors and from the annexe. Growls sound out and even from in here we can tell they’re faster and moving with stronger purpose now. The first of the loud ragged thumps at the door cease and then start again with a combined fury echoing throughout the high walls.

  ‘Form up,’ I shout the order and we gather at the main doors, knowing it won’t take long for them to break them open. The pews we stuffed in will slow them down but not for long.

  ‘Fire in groups. Blowers you take Tom and Lani, Dave will take Cookey and Steven, Clarence you’re with me and Nick. Keep an eye on that back door. We fall back steadily using the pews to fire from as we go. Unless they all come flying in at once in which case just run.’

  ‘COVER,’ Dave shouts at the same second as the windows all along the wall we’re facing implode beneath the force of launched missiles. Glass fragments fly deep into the room as rocks bounce down on the wooden pews. We scoot forward and press ourselves against the wall either side of the main door. With no windows directly above us we should be fairly safe. Rocks, stones, and smashed up paving slabs come flying through the windows. More glass shatters and I wince at the damage being caused to such a lovely old building. A cacophony of noise clamours all around us. Howling from the undead screaming in hunger and frustration, loud solid bangs from the doors, the splintering crash of breaking glass. We stay quiet, with Dave and me peering round the edges of the recess checking the doors.

  ‘Doors breaching,’ Dave says loud enough for everyone to hear. The doors slowly start to give under the merciless weight of bodies being slammed against them again and again.

  My rate of breathing increases and my heart slams inside my chest. Sharp focus comes into my eyes. A sense of excitement. Adrenalin getting ready to be released. Rage and fury start to build but I won’t let them control me now. The cost was too high and I faltered the last time. It needs to be focussed and used sparingly. Kill quickly. Move quickly. Conserve energy. The doors start to give, gradually splintering and creaking with each successive thump. Then they split as the locks give and a small gap forms in the middle.

  ‘Ready Dave?’ I shout over to my friend. We lock eyes smiling at each other and seeing the sheer impatience for it to begin.

  ‘Yes Mr Howie,’ he growls back.

  ‘Blowers, make ready to fire…wait…wait…NOW!’ The doors give, slamming back against the pews and giving enough gap to allow the first two snarling monsters through. Blowers, Tom and Lani lurch round to face into the recessed area and unload six shots within a split second massacring the first two zombies.

  ‘HOLD!’ I raise my hand and watch as the next lot negotiate the bodies of the first two blocking the path. The bodies get pulled back and I realise Darren must be close enough to watch and control them. Instead of powering through they focus on slamming into the doors again and again, trying to force the gap to widen.

  ‘Dave, Cookey, Steven go up and fire through the gap…NOW’ they surge in with Dave going low to fire his barrels out through the gap, Steven fires above him and Cookey jumps in as Steven drops back. A very slight pause and they start again, harder and more powerful. I catch a glimpse through the gap of one of the bodies being used as a battering ram. Held by several others it is slammed repeatedly into the gap pulping the already destroyed body.

  ‘My lot….NOW,’ I drop down, copying Dave’s movement so I can fire with Clarence above me. Our shots are taken and we drop back. Another pause and then a huge crash as Darren sends a whole group surging forward to slam into the doors. The impact sends the pews back a couple of inches and before we have time to react and push them back another round crashes in and forces the gap to widen even more.

  ‘FALL BACK,’ we move out and take cover behind the first of the pews. More crashes and the doors widen with each massive impact. Then four of them burst through, snarling and scrabbling to be the first ones to take our flesh.

  ‘FIRE,’ Blowers shouts and his group stand to unload all their shots then drop down to quickly re-load. The four undead become dead again as hundreds of pellets rip them to pieces but more take their place.

  ‘FIRE,’ Dave’s turn to shout and they fire into the recessed area, shredding the zombies to pieces. As quick as they fall more surge in and I shout my turn. Firing our weapons and dropping down to re-load as Blowers takes over. Blowers, Dave, Me and we repeat the action again and again until the bodies start to pile up and create a natural obstacle.

  Loud bangs sound from the door behind us but its outward opening and will take more to break through.

  ‘Windows,’ Dave yells. I look up to see an undead clinging onto the windowsill and trying to rip the lead lining out. He grasps the lining between his hands while more zombies underneath yank him down hard, bringing the lead with him.

  ‘Fuck me that’s clever,’ Cookey shouts as we re-load. More undead appear at the windows, hoisted up high and ripping the lead down forming holes big enough to get bodies through.

  ‘I’ll take them,’ Dave shouts as more zombies appear at the windows. We continue to fire into the killing ground of the doorway. The reduced range of the shotguns is vastly outweighed by the awesome fire power and the slaughtered corpses stack up. Blood and gunky pieces of flesh coat the walls, dripping down to pool on the floor. The doors and pews get peppered again and again by the pellets and the room reeks from the constant firing. Eardrums hurt and heads ache but they go unnoticed as we fire again and again.

  A single howling zombie balances on the narrow sill above our heads and drops down. Dave is there instantly knives drawn and the thing is dispatched within a second, its head dropping from its neck and rolling across the flagstone floor. The back door is taking a hammering but holding firm. More undead clamber onto the windowsills and start dropping in only to be met by Dave spinning and dancing through them with his deadly knives. Not one of them takes more than a couple of steps before they’re made dead again. Steven, Tom and Lani all stand with their mouths open watching mesmerised as Dave dances with his athletic grace, stretching, kneeling, leaping and spinning.

  ‘Wait till he gets warmed up,’ Clarence shouts above the noise.

  ‘Start moving back,’ I yell out in alarm as the fresh surge of zombies coming through the doors pick up some of the corpses and start using them as shields, gaining ground as the pellets slam into the cadavers but lack the power to rip all the way through the meat.

  As one we move back a couple of pews, Blowers taking the time to extinguish the candles as we retreat. Lani drops her shotgun for a second and runs at the undead falling through the windows with her meat cleaver drawn and ready. She slams the blade into a neck and extends her foot to kick it back before spinning round to slice the blade deep across a zombie face.

  ‘Keep firing,’ I shout and we let rip with the shotguns. All order is gone and we all fire at will, re-loading and firing both our barrels into the mass. The cadavers being used as shields quickly get shredded and discarded but fresh ones are swiftly taken up.

  ‘Time to go, FALL BACK,’ I yell out as they almost r
each the edge of the threshold. Once there they’ll be able to spill out to both sides and start surrounding us. We fall back steadily, kicking candles out with our feet and plunging the room further into darkness. Dave drops back towards our group and kills the zombies coming at him rather than rushing into their ranks and leaving us exposed.

  ‘REAR DOOR,’ Blowers shouts as the wood splinters from the sustained battering.

  ‘ON IT,’ Clarence bellows and shoves his shotgun into his backpack, taking up his axe he marches to the door and stands ready to repel.

  ‘KEEP GOING,’ I shout and we fire our weapons at them as we negotiate the pews. They breach the edge of the recess and surge into the church, moving off to the sides. The shotguns are now rendered useless as they fan out. Mine gets shoved back into my bag and like Clarence I take up my axe and grip it two handed. Ready. Waiting. Eyes fixed. Growls sound out from zombies and humans as we retract into a tight bunch and edge back closer and closer to the door.

  They attack. Suddenly and with ferocious intent and it’s down to this again. Hand weapons and fighting to survive. My axe comes alive in my hands. An old friend that feels familiar and just right. I swing out slicing deep into a neck and severing the head. Pull back and strike out again cleaving a skull open and spilling brains onto the floor. A quick glance shows me the annexe door is breached and Clarence is putting his own axe to deadly use, repeatedly chopping into each zombie that tries to clamber through the broken door. He checks round and sees us retreating and drops back to join the group.

  As we reach the door, Dave, Clarence and I take the front and fight them back while the others drop through one by one.

  I go next leaving the two best fighters repelling the attacking zombies. Clarence next and Dave stands his ground as we draw breath and watch in wonder as the man holds steady and kills anything that dares get close to him.

  ‘CLARENCE…PULL ME QUICK AND SLAM THE DOOR,’ Dave’s voice booms out. He knows that to take a step backwards will send them surging into the doorway and we’ll never be able to close it. With on hand on the open door Clarence leans out and grabs the back of Dave’s rucksack. With a mighty heave he pulls Dave clean off his feet and into the room with us. Slamming the door shut with his other hand he drops Dave and shoves his body against the door. A single key lock holds the door but it’s enough to hold for a second while we cross into the tower stairwell and slam that door behind us too. Again just a single bolt gets rammed home.

  ‘Get re-loaded and have water if you need it,’ with the door closed I speak into pitch black until Dave and Nick rummage through their bags and turn small torches on giving us enough light to see.

  ‘Is there another door at the top?’ I ask Dave.

  ‘No, the stairs spiral up to a landing then start again. They get much narrower as they go higher.’

  ‘Okay, original plan then. We retreat slowly and keep cutting them down as we go. Everyone okay? Anyone hurt?’

  ‘My feelings are a bit hurt Mr Howie…I think I might need some counselling,’ Cookey jokes.

  ‘You need sectioning mate,’ Blowers adds, ‘fucking Kum by Yah? Where did that come from?’

  ‘That was brilliant,’ Tom laughs, ‘I remember singing that at school.’

  ‘See, stick with us Tom it’s a laugh a minute…just don’t let yourself get caught alone with Blowers,’ Cookey says in a serious tone.

  ‘Eyes front,’ Dave interrupts to the sound of the first door splintering open followed a second later by loud thumps at the door just a few feet below us.

  ‘Get into pairs, how are we for cartridges?’

  ‘We’re okay but they won’t last long if we keep that rate of fire up.’ Dave answers.

  ‘Stick with the shotguns for now and we’ll switch to hand weapons when we get further up…here they come.’ The doors bursts open and the space instantly fills with the snarling faces of the undead. ‘Change of plan,’ I shout and step forward with my axe, swinging it down to chop deep into the shoulder of the first one through the door. ‘Use hand weapons now and save the shotguns for when they send the best ones through…Tom up front with me.’ The staircase is wide enough for us to stand side by side and have enough room to swing down and batter them away. Tom responds quickly, joining me at the front as they pour through the door and start climbing the stairs. Dave drops down behind us and holds his torch so it shines down the stairs illuminating them and trying to blind them at the same time.

  Undead rush forward and I slice them down, cutting heads off and very slowly giving ground. They quickly muster and start attacking in greater numbers. Snarling vicious beasts with clawed hands, bared teeth and a wild feral way of moving. Tom does well for his first proper fight and he soon gets the hang of it, slashing away and cutting down into their heads. The bodies drop and roll backwards but soon get trampled underneath the ever encroaching fetid zombies.

  ‘Next two,’ I yell out, keen to swap round and conserve our energy and knowing how tired my arms got when I first started swinging my axe about so knowing Tom must be feeling it.

  ‘Ready Mr Howie,’ Cookey right in my ear. I press back against the wall as the lad steps past me and starts cutting them down. Breathing hard I move further up the stairs as Nick takes over from Tom.

  ‘You did well mate,’ I say to Tom between breaths.

  ‘Thanks,’ Tom looks at me with a glint in his eye that I’ve seen many times from the lads after a fight and I know he’ll do well from now on.

  The horde presses the attack and with every minute that passes it feels their attack becomes fiercer, more ferocious and determined. Slowly giving ground, one step at a time it’s not long before Cookey and Nick swap round with Blowers and Steven and I realise our two best combatants are holding their turn for when they’re really needed the most. Blowers, a proven warrior steps in to take his turn, swinging out and culling their numbers with now practised ease. Steven seems wild though, he swings out too hard and repeatedly slams the axe into the wall at his side jarring his arms and damaging the blade. His screams of fury seem more fear than anger. It’s too dark to see his face but I already know there’ll be a wild look on it. He seems too intent, too angered and far too eager as he hacks and swings away with wild abandon. Both Dave and I shuffle closer getting ready to take action. Clarence steps down and taps my shoulder, motioning that he’ll take over from the skinny lad.

  ‘Steven, move back,’ he ignores me and keeps swinging out, missing more than he’s hitting and I notice that his strikes are getting more arms and torso’s than heads or necks. Blowers has to work harder to compensate for the ones Steven keeps missing and it’s not long before they are pressing closer towards us.

  ‘MR HOWIE!’ Blowers yells in alarm at the sudden surge of bodies pushing forward. Dave is there instantly, shoving Blowers aside with his shoulder and dropping down a couple of steps to hold a central position. Holding the torch in his mouth his arms spin out, slashing the blades across throat after throat. Sprays of hot blood pump out as the bodies sink down to slide down the already wet slippery steps. He drops down and quickly moves the blade amongst their legs severing Achilles tendons and more bodies sink down. They use their arms to keep clawing and dragging themselves up but they create a moving obstacle that the others find difficult to negotiate. Steven, seeing the pause in fighting lunges in front of Dave and starts hacking away at the packed zombies. Screaming with fury he slips on the wet steps and crashes to the floor, sliding down the stairs until his body impacts on the front of the horde.

  We roar in warning and surge down to beat them back but it’s too late. Teeth are already sinking into Steven’s legs and thighs. He screams with agony and tries beating them off with his hands. Clarence, Dave and I all work like demons to slash down, hack at them and drive them back. Clarence, roaring like a bear scoops up a man size zombie that writhes and gnashes in his hands. The giant man launches the snarling creature down into the front of the horde and the momentum sends them all staggering and falling a
way.

  In the brief pause Dave drops and grabs Steven by the collar, dragging him away from the front as Clarence and Lani take front position, Lani taking up Steven’s fallen axe instead of her meat cleaver.

  ‘Fuck it,’ I spit the words out as I see the ragged mess of Steven’s legs. The material has been torn away, flesh is hanging in strips down to the bone. Blood pisses out everywhere and the poor lad is screaming in agony, begging to be saved and not left to die. Tom turns away too distraught at seeing his friend dying. I quickly draw my pistol from my belt and fire a single round into his skull blasting the back of his head off. Looking up I see Dave, Blowers and the rest staring at me before turning back to the matter in hand.

  ‘Blowers, keep Tom at the back.’

  ‘Got it.’

  ‘I’m okay Mr Howie,’ Tom shouts in the darkness but there isn’t time to discuss it and I look down to see Clarence and Lani forced to give more ground, moving steadily back towards us.

  As the stairwell turns into an ever decreasing circle so the steps become narrower until only one can stand out front battering them back. Likewise they can only send a few cramped zombies forward at once but they do send them. They keep sending them. They send more and more and we rotate our turns and swing our axes until our chests are heaving from the effort and our arms and shoulders are on fire and every few minutes we are forced to move back.

  Some of the zombies take up the tactic they showed downstairs and use the dead cadavers as shields to hide behind while they charge up at us. Slowly at first then more and more of them try it until every zombie that comes up is somehow holding a dead body in front of it. The end result is the same but it takes far more effort and wastes vital energy hacking into corpses that are already dead and we give more ground until we’re getting onto the first landing.

  Someone hands me a bottle as I step back from my turn and I first pour the water over my sweat soaked skin before gulping it down quickly. No jokes from Cookey now. No banter or defiant shouting. This is messy, draining hard work and our low energy levels are dropping by the second. I realise I can see better and looking round I see a window set into the side of the wall with bright moonlight shining through.