The Undead the Second Week Compilation Edition Days 8-14

by RR Haywood

  His foot hits something hard. He slides the edge of his boot along the object feeling the shaft and broad double blade; Howie’s axe. He must be close. Whatever took place happened here.

  ‘MR HOWIE,’ he roars, his voice edged with fear. ‘MR HOWIE,’ he screams again, casting about to peer into the gloom. Bodies still thrust into him, only to drop and die quickly as the ground becomes soaked with pints of blood spurting out from so many cut arteries.

  In the distance, the constant staccato thud of the GPMG fills the air and the sound of the Saxon engine roaring to life. Clarence must be organising an attempt to retreat and leave.

  There are bodies on the floor here but Dave can’t tell if they’re from the previous battle or something to do with Howie. Too dark and his arms are kept busy killing as he gains fleeting glimpses of the corpses littering the floor.

  ‘HEADLIGHTS,’ Dave roars with unbridled power, ‘GIVE ME LIGHT.’ Seconds pass before the tunnel is lit. The press of bodies block the light from flowing through, but just enough reflects from the ceiling of the tunnel for him to see what he is doing.

  The engine of the Saxon raises in volume, they’re going to be bugging out which means they’ll be coming down here, and the only way to do that is to fire into the central part of the packed ranks of undead.

  He has to find Howie. He must be here somewhere. He drops down, using one hand to pull bodies over while his other flicks out keeping the lunging undead at bay.

  Sweat drips from his red face, breathing becoming harder from the heat. Bodies get turned and kicked aside. Heads grabbed to be examined for the briefest of seconds.

  Frustration builds as the undead press their attack harder, keeping him too occupied to concentrate on finding his leader.

  Dave rarely feels anything. His mood is level and constant in the most trying of times. But tonight he has felt fear and right now, he starts to feel rage building up. Rage that these things are preventing him from doing what he wants to do. They just keep coming and coming in a relentless wave and there is no space to do anything.

  Every time he tries to shove a corpse he finds another zombie lunging in. The rage and frustration build and finally explode. Dave reverses his knives and goes to work, spinning with utter savagery to slice into every throat he can reach. Arms spin and his body weaves and dances. The blows are harder now, much harder than normal as he uses the violence of the rage to drive him on.

  Within seconds he’s cleared a space and the mound of cadavers slow the ever advancing horde. Taking the few seconds he has created, he moves swiftly back to the pile of bodies, driving his hands deep into the rotten soft corpses.

  There. A patch of dark, curly hair that he would recognise anywhere. Howie buried under two huge bodies. Dave yanks them away and stares down at the blood encrusted face of Howie. His fingers prise the human heart from his mouth and flings it away. Howie is Inert and without response. Dave wipes the filth and gore from Howie’s face and turns with a snarl as the horde gain the ground he just cleared.

  Howie is here and he’ll be damned if they’re having him back. Dave doesn't know if Howie is alive, dead or turned but what matters is that Howie is by his side again. Grasping his shoulders, he quickly heaves him to the side of the tunnel and turns back as the attack surges in. Standing his ground with Howie’s lifeless body behind his heels, he fends them off, refusing to let them have his beloved leader.

  The Saxon screams out and starts moving, the lights wavering and dancing and bodies all around start being ripped apart from the heavy calibre bullets flying through the air.

  The undead turn and start towards the new threat, intent on preventing the vehicle from escaping. Dave drops down, grabbing ruined corpses and dragging them over to pile on top of Howie, taking care to keep his head and chest clear so he can breathe.

  He gets in close, using his own body and those he has just killed to create a protective barrier over Howie’s form. The GPMG drops more undead which Dave grabs and heaves over to pile up. As the vehicle comes into view he hunkers down. His quick mind has already thought of trying to get Howie into the vehicle, but he knows that only by keeping the forward momentum will the Saxon get through. So he does the next best thing and protects him from the heavy bullets whilst waiting in the stifling darkness.

  More bodies fall under the constant firing, the sounds become muffled and distant as both Howie and Dave start getting crushed under the bodies. Dave fights to keep the pressure from Howie’s chest and keep his mouth clear. He uses the bodies as a shield, leaving just enough space for Howie to breath.

  The crush of the bodies builds as the death given out above sends the corpses onto the pile but Dave refuses to give in. Bracing himself with tears of pain streaming down his face he holds still, taking quick gasps of heated air as he desperately fights to keep the press from Howie’s upper body.

  Pitch darkness now and time passes slowly. Just the muffled thud of the GPMG as it sweeps by, voices distant and weak. He waits, holding steady with a fierce grimace.

  The weight on his back is immense and pushing him down harder and harder. Time stops.

  Seconds become minutes and gradually the sound of the GPMG drifts further away. Mr Howie will be pleased to know the vehicle got away. Only a few lives may have been saved but that’s enough.

  He waits and holds steady, knowing that the tunnel and parking levels will still be thick with the undead. His knives are gone, dropped somewhere during the desperate movement to drag the bodies into a shield. He has one more knife attached to his belt but that comes later. All he has to do now is wait and hold these bodies away from Mr Howie. One hand planted either side of Howie’s head, his knees driving into the hard concrete and he holds them off. Hands burning with pain, his back feels like it will snap in half any second, sweat pours from his face and tremors start shaking through his limbs.

  In the absolute silence that follows he becomes aware of a very faint feeling of air being moved in front of his face. There are too many bodies packed in to allow any form of breeze or wind so there is only thing it can be. Dropping his head to listen, then feels the softness of warm breath blowing against his ear. Faint but there.

  ‘Stay alive Mr Howie,’ Dave murmurs as quietly as he can, ‘just stay alive.’

  Three

  Lani’s method of ignoring the undead and simply driving through them works well, in fact it works too well. Keeping low and moving fast she ducks and weaves through the swirling ranks, letting their momentum carry her a few feet before forcing into the next ring and being swept along. As Dave slaughters she gently works further in, plunging into the darkness of the ramp, knowing Howie was taken in this direction.

  The heat within the enclosed ramp is staggering, making her wilt and gasp for breath. Groans from every direction and the constant shuffle of feet scraping along the floor. Course shouts and voices screaming out from further back on the top level but she pushes on, feeling and groping her way through the ranks.

  As a human heart is forced into Howie’s mouth, stifling his screams and filling his throat with fresh blood, Lani stumbles by. Just inches away but with the dense ranks, the lack of light and the ground already covered in bodies she has no hope. But still she works on with an ever growing fear of failure inside her stomach. Even if she finds him, it might be too late. He could be dead or turned and with so many hundreds, possibly thousands, of undead still surging in she has no hope.

  Down the ramp and she finds herself on the second level of the car park. The undead here don’t swirl or turn but simply push on, driving the train further to the top level.

  They don’t attack and they pay no attention to Lani as she pushes and shoves through them. The outer wall ends as the ramp gives way to the second level parking zone. Like an unwanted guest, she is forced to the side and away from them.

  The relief is immense. The crushing sensation of being trapped within so many rotten bodies is lifted and the stench of the undead breath becomes fresh air. Filthy, bedr
aggled and gasping for oxygen, she staggers free, walking further into the car parking level. Moonlight streams through the open sides, orange flickering from the ceiling and walls due to the flames of the burning buildings in the High Street.

  Maybe Howie got here and broke free like she did. She casts about, searching the shadows and running through the many sections. Tears stream down her face at the thought of losing him. It doesn't seem real or right. Howie wouldn’t go down like that, not like this. He was the one to fix these ranks away from everyone else.

  Nobody could survive against that many. Maybe Dave but they weren’t after Dave, they were after Howie. He was gone, lost, dead.

  Shaking her head, she refuses to accept it. Howie is alive, she can feel it. She doesn't know how but something deep inside tells her that he is alive. They fear him for a reason, for something he has that no one else has got. What that might be is beyond her frame of mind at this time so she runs on, continuing to search for Howie.

  Light and sound fill the distance behind her. The sound of firing and the powerful headlights of the Saxon. The GPMG blasting into the ranks to force a path. She spins round catching sight of the vehicle as it powers down the ramp, forcing swathes of undead out the sides to spill onto the parking level.

  ‘WAIT,’ Lani screams and starts sprinting towards the ramp, cursing herself for going so deep into the parking area. Shouting again and again but she knows the sound of the machine gun and the close quarters fighting going on behind the vehicle will be drowning her out.

  The undead forced out from the ramp fill the space between her and the descending Saxon. Almost too late she realises that they’re not just swirling and moving now, but have reverted back to the full on attacking monsters, teeth bared and faces contorted with primeval rage.

  Coming to a hasty stop, she grips the handle of the meat cleaver and starts moving away. Several break free from the group to surge towards her.

  With a vicious backswing she takes the first one down, driving the sharp edge deep into the throat. Dropping and spinning round she comes up behind the next one, slamming the cleaver into its ankle and almost driving the blade clean through the bone. As the body falls she kicks it hard, forcing it into the path of another one lunging in. It goes down with limbs entangled and Lani wastes no time in slicing its throat as she backs away.

  They keep coming, charging towards her but she’s fast and light, and like Dave she moves with power and grace. Feinting left to get them lunging that way, only to jolt right at the last second and chop down, severing through the spinal column.

  Grunts of exertion sound out as she keeps backing away, sensing the ever increasing size of the horde spilling out from the vehicle ramp. The Saxon has gone and even the thud of the GPMG is dull in the distance.

  They surge in as fast and as mean as ever before. The silvery moonlight giving them a look of pure horror. Yellow flickers dance from the flames still raging and she fights quickly, knowing she’s about to be overwhelmed.

  Three come in fast, two males and a female. She ducks and slices deep into one of the males groin, driving the blade deep to open the vein. Coming up from a spin, she grabs the female undead by her long, blood soaked hair and yanks her head back, forcing the undead to stagger backwards and using her as a shield. With one hand guiding the zombie woman she feints and moves as more come in hard. The female she grips lashes out, thrashing her hands with violent motion which serves to batter at those lunging in.

  Losing ground with every second, Lani keeps swinging out and finally shoves the woman into two more lunging in. They all go down in a heap but the size of the group coming in is just too much. Alone, separated from her team, she screams with fury and charges in for the attack, refusing to let herself be cowed by the presence of so many undead.

  Howls rip the air apart, low growls that rise in pitch and volume. Animalistic and guttural. Body after body falls under her cleaver but more fill the space, backing her closer to the wall where there is no further space to retreat.

  They sense her fear; they know she will be taken. There’s nowhere else to go now so they come in for the final charge, unabated fury pumped by harsh chemicals released from glands on overdrive. The infection raging and pushing the hosts to get this finished, take them all, destroy them and be done with it.

  A nasty place to die, Lani muses to herself. A filthy multi-level car park in some shitty seaside resort that had its heyday thirty years ago. Alone, without Howie, without any of her group. Having survived being bitten once and to end like this. Fuck it. Fuck them all.

  Lani roars with defiance and fights back, swinging her cleaver with wild abandon. Adrenalin courses through her body, her heart pumping to drive her on and overcome the fear of her imminent death. Howie must be alive, he must be, so everyone one of these killed means one less that can hurt him.

  But as strong and as fast as she is, the numbers are simply too great and their violence simply too strong. The adrenalin eases off, the rage burns out, fear grows and a sudden longing to be anywhere else rises. Somewhere warm and beautiful. Images of her homeland fill her mind; the lush green jungles and the white sandy beaches lapped by crystal clear waters.

  No coming back from infection this time. She beat it once and god only knows how that happened, but this time they will tear her apart. She can see from the violence of the charge that there will be no gentle nip, no sensual kiss of death while they hold her gently. Her form will be ripped apart as hundreds of filthy mouths take deep, savage bites.

  Her arm becomes heavy and slow as the finality of her life becomes apparent. If she was on the line with her team she would never falter, but the very fact of knowing she is done for saps her strength faster than ever before.

  A new sound reaches her tired ears and her sad eyes look up as she strikes out feebly. Sweat stings her eyes, hair plastered to her forehead.

  Barking. Deep, powerful barking coming from the beast that never tires. Meredith barks loud and strong, letting Lani know she is coming. Lani’s heart beats stronger, fresh energy pulses into her limbs. Meredith barks and fills the air with her growls, then she’s upon them with a snarl. Several undead are removed from their feet as the almighty power of the dog drives into them at a flying leap.

  Her jaws go to work, grip savage and shake, grip savage and shake. Her snarls and growls are louder than theirs, her strength greater, her speed faster. Lani is the only other female in the pack and Meredith fights to protect her.

  Her pack are separated and spread out, but now they are two and two can fight better than one. Meredith gives voice and tells them who she is. She tells them she has killed many and will keep killing them.

  Lani fights with vitality, just knowing Meredith is with her. That pack instinct is as strong in the human mind as it is within the animal. Something to fight for, something else to protect and defend.

  The two females of the pack destroy the horde coming at them. Big undead males, strong and pumped up with testosterone but they all fall from the deadly cleaver and even more deadly teeth. Two females, hot, tired and pissed off, unleashing hell within the parking level.

  The undead find that they are no longer gaining ground, but are being forced to give it. Pushed back as the energy of the two bursts from their souls. Lani screaming with defiance and working straight ahead while Meredith bounds in loops round her, keeping her flanks and rear safe.

  Onto the vehicle ramp and they fight down, plunging further into the darkness. The heat of battle surges through them and just enough light comes through the open sides to see the foes as they present themselves.

  Having gone after the fleeing Saxon, the crowds of undead have thinned out considerably and the two find themselves dealing with less and less adversity as they work their way slowly down onto the first level and move away from the ramp into the parking area.

  Breaking free from the fight they move quickly, running to gain distance before turning at the far corner and realising none of the undead have come after
them. Gasping to gain control of her breathing, Lani spits and bends double, the meat cleaver hanging from one hand as sweat pours from her brow.

  Meredith pants noisily, dragging ragged breaths in and her long tongue bounces as it lollops down from her mouth. An incredible thirst rages in Lani, a dry throat that sucks all the moisture from her mouth. The heat is unbearable, truly draining and her legs feel week, shaking from the after effects of the constant fighting and running.

  Meredith’s stare is fixed towards the ramp. Every few seconds she holds her breath and cocks her head to listen, and only when satisfied there are no threats does she continue the noisy panting.

  Feeling dizzy and faint, Lani backs to the furthest corner of the parking level and rests her back against the wall. Her legs give out and she slides down with fresh tears making tracks to join the rivulets of sweat pouring down her cheeks.

  He is alive. She knows it. He must be alive but the only problem is where? Completely drained and unable to summon the strength to keep going, she wills herself to get up and find him but the energy expended from her body is claiming the high cost. Hands shake as she lifts the bloodied meat cleaver and even Meredith sags down next to Lani, positioning herself to face the ramp.

  Lani reaches over to push her fingers through the long thick fur of Meredith’s back, feeling the hair and the warmth coming from her body. Licking her dry lips she tastes the filthy metallic tang of blood in the air. Dreaming of fresh cool water, iced lemonade or a cold can of coke, she feels the first pull of sleep tugging at her eyes.