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

by Peter Mckeirnon

  “Look mate I’m sorry I yelled down your ear. That was completely out of order. But we’re in the shit here and you wallowing is not going to help the situation,” Tin Tin said.

  “Sorry Tin Tin I wasn’t thinking. I just really miss her. For almost every day of the last 2 years I’ve stood at my till, looking out to the mobile phone shop opposite, watching Jess at work – watching her with customers, playing with her hair when she was bored and constantly spurning the unwanted advances of her slime ball boss. Before you say it again yes I know I have never spoken to her and the fact that I could never find the courage to tell her how I feel is tearing me apart,” he said, tears filling his eyes.

  “You are going to have to pull yourself together or it’ll be something worse than sorrow that will be tearing you apart. We’ve got major problems here and I’m not sure what we’re going to do. Whilst you’ve been sobbing your heart out, I’ve been assessing our situation and it’s a lot worse than I thought it was going to be if I’m honest. Not only are we trapped in here with God knows how many zombies out front, we also have a very limited amount of food and drink. Sure we’re fine right now but in a few weeks? And that’s if the front of the shop holds out. If zombies continue to grow in numbers and push against the window the way they’re doing then well, Steven my friend, we’ll be fucked and your pretend girlfriend will be far from your mind when you are being eaten alive by the undead,” said Tin Tin.

  Steven walked towards the shelving units piled up against the window and entrance; the deathly groans of the undead increased in volume with every step.

  “Do you really think they could break through?” Steven asked.

  “There’s every chance they’ll break through. I don’t think the glass used for the window came with a zombie proof guarantee but I’d say we’re safe for now. I can’t see anything getting in as it stands,” Tin Tin replied.

  Tin Tin had barely finished his sentence when a creaking sound filled the air followed by panelling dropping from the ceiling. Then suddenly and without warning, a man fell heavily to the floor landing between him and Steven. He was wearing a Runcorn Shopping Centre security guard uniform and Tin Tin recognised him instantly as his colleague and friend Neil.

  Neil and Tin Tin had worked together for many years. It had been Neil that trained Tin Tin in his duties in how to catch a shop lifter whilst causing little disturbance, how to sense when trouble was brewing and how to keep calm in the most volatile of situations. Neil had taken his younger colleague under his wing and together they had worked hard to keep the shopping centre a relatively crime free environment.

  “Please don’t eat me!” Neil pleaded, lying motionless on the floor.

  “Neil its me , what the hell were you doing up there? It’s good to see you. I was starting to think we were the only ones still alive in this place,” Tin Tin said.

  “Tin Tin? Man, am I glad to see you. Help me up will you, the fall has taken the wind out of me,” Neil answered as his colleague helped him to his feet, “Thanks pal. I see you’ve barricaded yourself in here well enough and who’s this you’ve got with you? Steven isn’t it? I remember you. You’re the guy that sits at his till all day staring at the girl who works in the mobile phone shop opposite. How long have you been here?”

  Neil immediately got the impression that he may have said something he shouldn’t have because Steven was now fighting back tears and walking away from the conversation to hide his obvious upset.

  “Don’t ask,” Tin Tin said in response to Steven’s obvious upset. “We’ve been here since yesterday morning. The first thing we did was secure this place. How about you?” Tin Tin asked.

  “The same. I’ve been trapped inside Iceland with two of its employees. But the problem with Iceland is that almost all of the food is frozen so with nothing to cook anything in, no oven or microwave, we’ve not really eaten anything. Well, we’ve had some Pringles and ice cream but that’s not exactly nutritional. The ice cream is a bugger to eat too. We have been using the plastic lids from boxes of Pringles as spoons. That’s how I ended up dropping in on you guys. I figured I could navigate my way through the false ceiling that runs across each shop till I got to Wilko’s. If it was zombie free I was going to liberate a microwave so we could cook up some real food,” Neil replied.

  Neil had been running through the shopping mall when he was cut off by zombies blocking every exit. Luckily for him, he arrived at Iceland just as two of its employees were securing the shop and he managed to roll underneath the lowering metal security shutters just before they reached the floor.

  “Real food? There’s more nutrition in the cheap confectionery me and Steven have been eating than there is in the food from Iceland. There’s nothing but low quality meat pumped full of water to make it look bigger and better than it actually is. No thanks. Anyway, Iceland is the last place you want to be. When the electricity fails, and it will, you’ll be surrounded by thawing meat. The place will smell worse than the zombies,” Tin Tin responded.

  “Actually that isn’t the real reason why I was crawling through the ceiling. I had no intention of taking a microwave or returning to Iceland. I just needed a story to get out of there. The two guys I was with are next to useless. They’ve done nothing but cower behind the frozen pizza section eating tub of ice cream after tub of ice cream whilst mumbling to themselves that the army will come and save us. Bloody useless. But you’re a friend and a good one at that so I guess I can come clean. I was thinking that if Wilko’s was zombie free, then I’d chance escaping through the doors at the back of the store that lead out to the car park. My car is there,” Neil revealed.

  “Escape? Are you crazy? There’s no telling how bad it is out there. I mean, you can hear the noise from outside the shop right? There must be thirty to forty zombies trying to get to us and the numbers are rising. We’ve covered up the front windows and entrance so they can’t see us but they just keep coming. It’s like they somehow know we’re in here,” Tin Tin replied.

  They all looked over to the front of the shop and listened to the undead moan and groan whilst slapping their hands against the glass front of Poundland.

  “They can smell us,” Neil replied.

  “What did you say?” Tin Tin asked.

  “Zombies. They can smell the living. It’s the same over at Iceland. The metal shutters are down, the shop is secured and they can’t see us but they still keep coming, crowding outside the entrance. The closer you get to them the louder they moan too. Here watch this…” Neil said, walking to the front of the shop.

  The closer Neil got the louder the zombies groaned. He pressed himself up against the shelving barricade and the noise became unbearable.

  “Please make it stop!” Steven pleaded, pushing his hands hard into the fluffy pink ear muffs still covering his ears.

  “You see?” Neil said moving back towards Tin Tin. “They know we’re here and more will come. It’s only a matter of time before they force their way in. That’s why I’m leaving. That and I need to see my family. You know my wife is pregnant and my boy… Christ if anything has happened to them I don’t know what I’ll do, I really don’t. You guys should come with me. You can’t hold out here forever. Come with me, we can go to my place. We will be safe there I know we will. What do you say?”

  “Let’s say we do come with you and you’re wrong? What if Wilko’s has been compromised? What do we do then? Steven asked.

  “We keep going. This is a big shopping centre. If we can’t get out through Wilko’s then we find another way. So what do you say? Are you guys in?” Neil asked.

  “We’re in,” Tin Tin replied.

  “Hey hang on a minute, I haven’t agreed to anything,” Steven moaned feeling pressured into committing to something he wasn’t sure of.

  Steven had never been the most decisive of people and he did not respond well to change. It was his indecisiveness that had led to a long and forgetful career as a Poundland checkout assistant. He had been given many
opportunities over the years to change employment but had always declined. He was happy simply coasting along at the discount store, telling friends and family it was only temporary whilst he wrote his screenplay. The screenplay that was going to propel him to stardom and a new life away from Runcorn and from a job where he had to ask customers if they would like to buy a twin pack of out of date After Eight Mints for £1 every time they passed through the checkout.

  “So you’re going to stay here are you Steven? On your own singing soppy love songs to yourself, grieving over a girl you used to stalk, eating Brazil nuts just waiting for zombies to break through the shop window and tear you limb from limb?” Tin Tin said.

  “Maybe,” Steven said defiantly, moving to walk away.

  As he turned, his foot slipped on a discarded wind up radio and he fell into the shelving barricade, bringing the unit crashing down, exposing the window and the forty plus zombies pressed up against it.

  “Right well I’m in, when are we leaving, now? Give us a bunk up Tin Tin, I’ll go first,” Steven said, moving below the hole in the ceiling tiles where Neil had fallen, eager to leave following his accidental unveiling of the zombies at the window.

  “Before we get going we should grab some bottles of water and maybe some of those cereal bars. They should be easy enough to carry without slowing us down. We’ll need the fluids and energy. Don’t worry fellas, we’ll soon be out of here, trust me,” Neil said.

  Without the shelving units covering the window, the zombies became manic, ferociously pounding their hands and heads against the glass in relentless pursuit of the human flesh which was now on show.

  With the undead visible, Steven, Tin Tin and Neil felt compelled to move and move they did. After filling several Poundland carrier bags with food and drink supplies, they left the store by climbing on shelving and escaping through the hole in the roof, scurrying carefully along the false ceiling towards Wilko’s.

  Neil took the lead with Tin Tin and Steven following closely. Every slink and slither forward was done so with great care and precision. One wrong move and they would find themselves falling through the fragile ceiling panels to the floor below and, now they had moved past Poundland, what lay beneath was unknown. Still, they knew the shopping centre well and they knew how many shops they had to pass over before reaching their destination.

  Crawling through electrical wires and thick dust, the trio continued over the betting shop and the slot machine casino until their painstakingly slow journey reached its end and they were finally above Wilko’s with the sounds of panpipe music filling their ears.

  “I think we’re here,” Neil whispered.

  “No it’s Wish You Were Here,” Steven replied.

  “What are you jabbering on about?” Tin Tin asked irritably.

  “The music, it’s panpipes Pink Floyd, listen…” he replied and then began to sing along to the music.

  “How I wish, how I wish you were here,

  We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,

  Running over the same old ground,

  What have we found?

  The same old fears.

  Wish you were here,”

  “I friggin’ don’t wish you were here at the moment. I’ve already warned you once today about your singing,” Tin Tin growled at Steven.

  “Stop bickering you two and keep the noise down,” Neil whispered.

  Neil gently lifted a ceiling tile and peeked into the store below. Wilko’s was fully illuminated with the bright lights revealing what appeared on first glance to be a zombie and human barren store. Directly below him was a wooden patio table and chair display. Just as Neil was about to tell the others that the shop looked safe for them to enter, the all too familiar noise of shuffling and groaning was heard over the mind numbing sounds of panpipes Pink Floyd.

  “What do you see?” Tin Tin asked.

  “A problem,” Neil replied.

  Shuffling into view came what was, just over a day ago, a young and fresh faced Wilko’s employee by the name of Darren. The past twenty four hours however, had not been kind on his complexion. His once pink skin was now a light grey with protracted dark veins clearly visible under his decaying flesh. Dried blood covered his mouth, neck and red employee shirt.

  Darren was a popular member of the Wilko’s team. His bubbly character was a hit with customers and he was always willing to go the extra mile when it came to customer care. He was liked by everyone… everyone but his manager that is. His manager took her job seriously and believed the key to a successful store was a regimental workforce and she saw his friendly demeanor as nothing more than a nuisance and a barrier between him and his day to day duties.

  Neil watched as Darren slowly stumbled towards their location, stopping occasionally to sniff the air, using his decaying nose to catch the fresh human scent that Neil, Tin Tin and Steven had brought with them.

  The zombie store assistant let out a hellish groan and lifted his head to face the ceiling above. Neil quickly shut the tile.

  “How well do you know the people that work in Wilko’s?” Neil asked his companions.

  “I don’t, not really. Apart from Darren that is. He always stops by for a chat when he sees me. Lovely fella. I reckon if it wasn’t for his nagging boss he’d spend all day chatting to people,” Tin Tin replied.

  “Well he’s stopped by again, only this time he wants more than a chat,” Neil replied.

  Tin Tin lifted the ceiling tile to see the cold, dead face of Darren looking back at him who once again groaned towards the ceiling. The store assistant’s mouth opened wide enough to give a clear view of his blue cracked tongue and beyond that his pale putrid throat.

  Tin Tin had almost closed the ceiling tile when he heard the noise of objects being knocked from shelving units. He shifted his eyes to his left to see Darren’s boss and nemesis shuffling over to join her employee. She too was covered in dried blood from her mouth to her waist.

  “Separated in life but together in death,” he said to himself.

  “What is it, what do you see?” Steven asked.

  “Dead and hungry store assistant has now been joined by dead and hungry store manager. I don’t suppose anyone remembered to bring any weapons or were we too busy bagging up cereal bars and energy drinks?” Tin Tin asked his companions whose lack of reply spoke volumes. “I didn’t think so but luckily for us, I have a surprise in my trousers.”

  Steven and Neil’s faces projected a look of both horror and surprise as Tin Tin reached inside his trousers and retrieved his trusted hammer - the same weapon that had been instrumental in securing Poundland a day earlier and it displayed the blood stains to prove it.

  “You’ve crawled all the way from Poundland to here with that tucked down your trousers? That can’t have been comfortable.” Steven asked with a look of discomfort on his face.

  “Yes I bloody did and a good job too as this hammer is the only defense we’ve got. Now, what I suggest is that you and Neil slowly lower yourselves… STEVEN!”

  As Tin Tin was explaining his plan, the ceiling tiles underneath Steven broke away and he crashed heavily into the wooden garden furniture below. Through blurred vision he could see the zombies approaching and could hear his companions screaming for him to move but the fall had taken the wind out of him and no matter how hard he tried he could not rise to his feet. Instead he held his stomach in pain, rocking from side to side.

  Darren, the zombie store assistant, had almost reached his intended target and with the meal in sight began his descent, leaning over the fallen Steven whilst gnawing his drool sopping mouth. The cold gloops of foul drool dripped from his mouth onto the back of his victim’s neck.

  Steven somehow found the strength to reach out his right arm finding a splintered wooden table leg from the broken garden furniture. With only seconds to spare before the teeth of the undead store assistant chewed into his exposed neck, he turned his body and with the table leg in hand, speared it through Darre
n’s left eye. With the zombie dead he breathed a sigh of relief but much to Steven’s dismay it wasn’t over yet because now he had Darren’s boss and nemesis, to contend with.

  He tried again to rise to his feet and this time managed to stand on one knee. On doing so, his blurred vision intensified and the room began to spin. He felt like he wanted to vomit and was uncertain of his surroundings. He was sure now that the fall not only winded him but had most likely given him a concussion. He shook his head swiftly in an attempt to clear the cobwebs but this only aided his symptoms. As the room started to spin, all he could do was watch as the swirling zombie moved closer towards him.

  “Steven! Look at me, Christ man look at me!” Tin Tin screamed. “Focus on my face, don’t try to look at the zombie, focus on me.”

  Trusting his friend, Steven looked up to the ceiling and concentrated hard on Tin Tin’s face. At first he could see two faces but he scrunched his forehead and narrowed his eyes. Quickly the two became one and his vision returned.

  “Are you good?” Tin Tin asked, to which Steven nodded a reply. “Then you better catch this.”

  Tin Tin dropped his hammer which Steven, to his own astonishment, caught expertly with both hands. In one fluid movement he stood on both feet, turned his body around and swung the weapon at Darren’s boss. It was a perfect hit, fracturing the skull whilst sending her falling into the nearby shelving units. Wanting to make sure she was dead, he staggered over and repeatedly pelted the hammer into her face.

  Looking over the puddle of blood, flesh, shattered skull fragments and dried out brain that used to be the head of the Wilko’s store manager, Steven wiped away the beads of sweat that now seeped from his forehead. He needed a second to compose himself, to let his breathing return to its normal rate and to take stock of everything that had just happened. Then he staggered back to where he fell from the ceiling.

  “Are you two coming or are you going to stay up there hiding like a pair of wimps?” said Steven who then fell to the floor and vomited heavily, “I knew I shouldn’t have eaten all those chocolate coated Brazil nuts.”