The Death in a Northern Town Trilogy (Books 1-3): Welcome To Dead Town

by Peter Mckeirnon

  Thud!

  Another starling dead.

  Thud!

  And another.

  More and more birds began to fall all around me and I had no idea what to do. So I crouched down, pulled my jacket over my head and hoped that one wouldn’t hit me.

  Silence.

  The sounds of birds falling to their death had stopped.

  I stood up straight, removed the jacket from over my head and slowly opened my eyes. It was a massacre. Birds lay dead all around me. What the hell just happened? I had never seen or heard of anything like this in my life. Had they been poisoned? Was it a mass suicide? My head began to hurt as I tried to comprehend what I had witnessed. Then I heard it again.

  Thud!

  Only this time it was followed by a car alarm coming from the staff car park.

  I walked, carefully navigating my steps around the dead birds that lay on the path till I could see the car park in front of me. A starling had fallen and landed on the roof of Stinky Puss face’s, sorry, force of habit, Simon’s car. The dirt bag himself was leaning against his car door, coughing and holding his stomach whilst trying to put his key in the lock.

  “Fuck me lar, have you seen all those dead birds back there?” said 80s Dave as he walked up behind me, headphones and sunglasses on with a cigarette in his mouth.

  Unable to find words, I looked at Dave and nodded towards Simon. Dave walked past me to see what I was referring to. Unsurprisingly, he took delight in what stood before him and wasn’t going to miss an opportunity to annoy his boss.

  “Hey Simon! Do you know you’ve got a dead bird splattered on top of your car?” he shouted, a slight smirk on his face as he puffed on his cigarette.

  Simon looked over to Dave and stared at him for a few seconds but did not respond. Instead, body shaking, he returned to the task at hand and attempted to put his key in the car door.

  Jittering uncontrollably, he dropped the keys and kneeling down to retrieve them, he grabbed his stomach once again and screamed in pain.

  “We can’t just stand here doing nothing, why don’t you go and give him a hand? I’ll stay here and try and get a phone signal. If I do, I’ll call for an ambulance,” I said, knowing very well that his response would be anything but forthcoming.

  “No chance mate, look at the state of him. He always looks like shit but never this bad. I’m not catching whatever the hell kind of illness he’s got. You go,” came the expected reply.

  Before I could respond, Simon lent forward and was violently sick. Have you watched The Exorcist? If you have you’ll know what scene I’m talking about. Well that was child’s play compared to what Dave and I were witnessing. It just kept coming and coming and coming. It wasn’t just the amount of vomit that was shocking but its colour too. At first it was dark brown, then it was light purple followed by a deep red then it was a mixture of all the colours together. If Hell had rainbows, then they would be the same colour as Simon’s puke.

  Upon seeing this, my mouth once again began to fill with saliva. I swallowed it back down in an attempt to stop the inevitable but it was a futile attempt at best and I threw up all over a dead starling. Dave pissed himself laughing.

  “It’s not a competition,” he said, turning his head to inspect my creation, “It’s quite artistic really. The way you’ve thrown up all over that dead starling. It makes it difficult to tell what bits came from you and what belongs to the bird. Shame this isn’t an art gallery, some ponce would pay good money for that!”

  Finally, Simon stopped being sick and quietly knelt there, next to his car, motionless, in a large puddle of puke.

  “Looks like he’s over the worst of it,” I said, wiping a small sliver of bile from my chin.

  It was then that Simon lost control of all bodily functions and shat himself. There was nothing he could do to stop it. He lent forward, grabbing his stomach again, in a hopeless attempt to halt the mass exodus of turd.

  Now Dave and I were stood a good 30 feet away and even we could hear the evacuation that was underway in his trousers, so you can understand how severe this was.

  Simon looked across to Dave and I with resignation in his eyes. A look that simply said “I’m spent, I have nothing left”. For Dave this was hilarious and he began to belly laugh uncontrollably.

  After a few horrific minutes, Simon’s anal Hiroshima finally ended. The man looked empty, internally and of mind. What colour he did have left, had drained almost completely from his face. Simon, who as mentioned, usually resembled a blistered tomato, now looked almost translucent as he closed his eyes and fell forward, face down in a puddle of his own vomit.

  “Bravo!” shouted Dave, applauding the horror show we had just witnessed.

  “As much as I’d like to ignore everything we’ve just seen and go home, we’re going to have to help him or he’s probably going to drown” I said, weaving my way around the fallen starlings as I walked towards the vomit pool where Simon lay.

  “Oh alright then, but I’m not touching him, you can do all the hands on work,” Dave replied, wiping away tears of laughter. “I know I said my arsehole is the strongest muscle in my body but even I might struggle to not shit myself if I catch what he’s got.”

  When we got to Simon it wasn’t a pretty sight. His body was either covered in excrement or vomit or both. And the smell! Have you ever smelt something so bad you could taste it? What am I saying, of course you have! If you’ve survived long enough to read this journal then your nostrils must have been subjected to smells capable of making your nose bleed.

  Both Dave and I stood for a moment looking at the mess lying in front of us, neither wanting to touch him.

  “Go on then,” I said, gesturing to Dave to turn Simon over, removing his face from the puke puddle.

  “OK,” he replied, lighting another cigarette.

  “Really?” was my surprised response.

  “Fuck that lar, you do it,” came Dave’s real answer.

  “No way, you should do it. Just see it as an apology for laughing when he shit himself,” I said.

  “Come on that was pretty funny lad. This smell isn’t though. It’s burning my eyes kidda. If I was to remove these sunglasses you’d see two burnt out holes were my irises used to be. And that’s coming from a man who smokes 80 a day without hardly any sense of smell or taste! No, you should do it. You like him more than I do.” Dave reasoned.

  “I like everyone more than you do.” I replied.

  “Fair point,” he agreed.

  Then suddenly, Simon raised his head, arching his back so that his body from the waist up was lifted off the ground, like a venomous snake preparing itself to strike.

  He stared straight ahead and with mouth open, let out a lengthy exhale before collapsing back into the vomit.

  “Interesting,” said Dave as he puffed away on his cigarette, flicking ash on to the back of Simon’s once again lifeless body.

  “Do you think he’s dead?” I asked, fearing the worst and with no idea of what we would do if he was.

  Dave placed his foot on Simon’s back and rocked him back and forth.

  “Oi Simon!” he shouted as his foot prodding continued.

  Stinky Puss Face did not respond.

  “Yep!” was Dave’s professional analysis, scraping the bottom of his boot on the ground in an attempt to remove any cross contamination.

  “Wow, impressive examination Dr Dave,” I said sarcastically.

  “Alright smart arse you fucking have a go,” he yelled.

  Hesitantly, I knelt down next to Simon, being extremely careful to avoid any contact. But it was no good, to check if he was alive or not I would have to touch him. This would have been an arduous task under normal circumstances but given his current condition, I found it extremely difficult.

  I reached out my hand and placed my fingers on his neck to check for a pulse. My fingers started to slip and slide as they sunk beneath the thick layer of puke and sweat that coated his skin.

  “Aw man
, this is disgusting,” I squirmed, using everything I had to keep the remaining content of my stomach actually in my stomach.

  “Is he dead or what?” Dave asked, ejecting a cassette from his Walkman, and changing tape sides.

  “I can’t get a proper grip on his neck to check, my fingers keep slipping. I could do with a scraper or scoop or something to get this gunk off,” I said.

  Dave looked around at our surroundings. You could see the seeds of an idea start to grow.

  “I’ve thought of something, don’t go anywhere, I’ll be right back,” he said, flicking his cigarette butt into the barf lake then jogging to the back entrance of the factory.

  With Dave away and Simon busy breaking the world record for holding your breath whilst face down in sick, I took a moment to think about what the hell had just happened.

  I scanned my surroundings and counted at least twenty five starlings splattered on the ground and that was only what I could see. Sorry, twenty six. I forgot about the one that landed on top of Simon’s car. God knows what it was like further afield. My mind ran wild with images of streets, housing estates and fields all covered in feathered death, birds smashing into cars on roads and motorways causing crashes and accidents.

  Then there was Simon. What the fuck had just happened to him? I’ve seen illness and I’ve been ill but I have never known anything so severe.

  Dave emerged from the factory, jogging back over to me and the almost definitely dead Simon. He was carrying what I can only describe as a cross between a 6ft plastic rowing oar, a shovel and a spoon. Kind of like a massive paddle. It was an odd looking piece of equipment and one that the cooks in the factory would use to scoop ingredients from barrels into massive caldrons used to make mayonnaise. The paddle was white of colour, tall with a rounded shovel head and made of hard plastic.

  “I’m back,” proclaimed Dave, slightly out of breath and lighting up another cigarette.

  “What’s that thing for?” I asked inquisitively.

  “For making mayonnaise,” came the perplexed response.

  “I know that knob head. I meant why have you got it?” I replied.

  For an intelligent man, Dave often completely misses the point of a question or conversation.

  “Oh right!” Dave’s brain finally switching in to gear, “For this…”

  He placed the shovel end of the paddle under Simon’s torso and pulled the handle down towards the ground, flinging him over onto his back.

  There was a horrible squelch from the shit in Simon’s pants as it squashed against the cold concrete floor before spraying out at either side of his trousers. He lay there, eyes closed and mouth open, motionless, with arms spread out. He looked like an angel only with wings made of poo.

  “There you go lar, you can check if he’s breathing and you don’t have to touch him, just put your ear to his mouth and see if you can hear anything,” Dave suggested with a smug pride; a smoke in one hand and the paddle in the other.

  “It’s amazing the way your mind works,” I said.

  “Thanks,” Dave smiled, puffing on his fag.

  “It wasn’t a compliment,” I replied.

  “Well I would have kicked him onto his back but I didn’t want to get any shit on my boots,” he explained.

  “You know Dave, I’ve never really regarded you as an overly caring and considerate person before but seeing you here now, with our boss, I’ve come to realise, I’m right, you really couldn’t give a monkeys what happens to him could you?”

  Dave removed his sunglasses. He meant business.

  “No John, I couldn’t give a shit. Remember this is the arl arse that still owes me money from working overtime for the last seven weekends. Every week I get my wage slip and it’s flat rate only, no overtime. He keeps saying he’ll sort it but the petty little prick never does and do you know why? All because I asked him if he had been burnt as a child and if that was why his face looks like melted cheese.”

  I looked at Simon, taking a closer inspection of his face.

  “You’re right, his face does look like melted cheese. More of a blue cheese dressing at the moment but I can see what you mean. Look Dave, I know old stinky here has his faults but we need to put that to one side. I mean, what are we going to do if he’s dead? I’ve been trying and I can’t get a phone signal at all so I can’t ring for an ambulance. The network must be down or something and it wouldn’t be right to just leave him here. I really want to call Emily too. I can’t quite put my finger on it but something about all this isn’t right. I don’t suppose you’ve got a mobile phone or are you continuing to deny the last 25 years even happened and it’s still 1988?“ I asked.

  “Hey don’t knock it kidda,” he replied, replacing his sun glasses. “It was a good year 1988. It’s the year that brought us some of the greatest movies of all time. There was Beetlejuice, written and directed by Tim Burton, jointly produced by Geffen and Warner Brothers, starring Michael Keaton in the title role with support from Geena Davies and Alec Baldwin. Then of course Die Hard written by Steve De Souza, directed by John McTiernan, starring Bruce Willis as New York super cop John McClane. Fucking awesome lad.”

  “Alright Barry Norman let’s stay in the here and now shall we. So have you got a mobile or what?” I groaned.

  “Yes I have,” he replied rather smugly.

  I was genuinely surprised by this. Dave with modern technology? Surely not!

  “Can I borrow it then?” I asked.

  “Well, I don’t keep it on me it’s too heavy,” he replied.

  “Too heavy?” My suspicion growing by the second.

  “Yeah it comes with its own briefcase because the battery is so big” Dave explained.

  I shouldn’t have been surprised by this but I was. He’s not called 80s Dave for nothing. It makes perfect sense that his mobile phone would be one of the very first released.

  Both Dave and I looked at each other and burst into laughter. Me because of how ridiculous it is to think that he has a mobile phone that needs its own briefcase. Dave was laughing because, well, he either agrees with this sentiment or he’s having me on. You can never tell with Dave.

  “How long does the battery last?” I asked, struggling to compose myself.

  “About forty minutes,” came the reply.

  Well that was me gone. Laughter took complete control and I no longer had the ability to govern my own actions. If you’ve ever had a laughing fit take hold of you then you know exactly what I mean. Tears streamed from my eyes, blurring my vision. My laughter became such that I produced no noise. I just stood there, mouth open, shoulders jiggling up and down, eyes closed with tears rolling down my face.

  I opened my eyes but I could barely see through the glaze of salty liquid that coated my sight. I could just about make out Dave’s shape as he lent forward holding his ribs with one hand and steadying himself with the giant paddle in his other.

  I blinked then wiped my eyes which helped slightly as I could now see that Dave, although a complete giggling mess, was attempting to light another cigarette.

  I blinked and wiped my eyes again. My vision was almost clear now. I looked at Dave who was still laughing and puffing on a smoke at the same time but I wish that was all I saw.

  Behind Dave, stood Simon. Well, what used to be Simon. His eyes were white and sunken, his skin tone almost see-through giving a clear view of the veins running beneath his vomit stained flesh. He stood lob sided, as if something heavy was weighing down the left side of his body. This gave the impression that his right shoulder was higher than the left. I remember thinking to myself at the time ‘How the fuck is he alive?’ He had just spent the last ten minutes face down drowning in his own bile! He shouldn’t be breathing let alone standing!

  Dave’s laughter began to subside as he realised something had caught my attention and I nodded gesturing for him to turn around and look behind him. He turned to find himself face to face with the manager formally known as Simon.

  “You look
different Simon. Have you changed your hair?”

  Simon slowly opened his jaw with strands of thick saliva protruded from top lip to bottom. A noise like nothing I have ever heard before bellowed from his mouth and with it came a smell so bad you could taste it, and it tasted like death.

  Dave took the full force of Simon’s death breath in the face but it didn’t seem to bother him. That’s the beauty of smoking 80 fags a day you see. It numbs the senses.

  He waited for Simon to finish roaring at him, then casually took a puff on his cigarette and blew the smoke in his face. Simon again snapped his slobber dripping mouth open then lunged forward at Dave in what looked like an attempt to bite his face.

  Simon’s arms were reaching out and grabbing at Dave wildly but luckily for my retro friend, co-ordination was no longer a skill that Puss Face possessed.

  “Fuck me lar!” yelled Dave as he side stepped Simon’s blundering attempts to grab him.

  It was quite a sight to behold. Simon would lunge at Dave, snatching at him madly and then Dave would side step to the right, moving out of the way. It would then take Simon a good few seconds to realise where Dave had moved to and the whole merry dance would start again!

  After a few minutes of this, Dave started to get bored. Simon on the other hand was relentless in his need to land his catch and looked like he could do this for an eternity.

  “He looks like he’s trying to eat you!” I yelled.

  “He can fucking try! I’ll rip his face off!” said Dave, side stepping the latest of Simon’s advances.

  “If this is about me saying your face looks like melted cheese or for laughing when you shat yourself then I’m sorry, there’s no need to go all Hannibal Lector on me kid,” he added.

  Simon turned to Dave and grabbed at him again.

  “Right that’s it lar, I’ve had enough of this. He’s going down!” Dave stated.

  “What are you going to do?” I asked.

  “This.” Dave replied, swinging the giant paddle he was holding, hitting Simon on the side of his face, knocking him to the ground.

  “Shit Dave! That was a bit hard,” I said with surprise.

  “Hard? The prick was trying to eat me!” he proclaimed.