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

by Peter Mckeirnon

  Steven’s companions jumped down from the ceiling and joined him in Wilko’s; Tin Tin offered his friend a drink and Neil surveyed the store. It appeared empty with the shutters at the front entrance stopping any zombies from entering. The automatic doors to the back of the store, leading to the car park and ultimately Neil’s vehicle, also appeared secure.

  “It looks like they were the only ones. There doesn’t appear to be anyone else here, dead or alive,” Neil informed.

  “I wouldn’t be so sure,” Steven replied, wiping drips of energy drink from his mouth. “They both had dried blood around their mouths so they’ve eaten recently and someone must have secured the store.”

  “Maybe it was Darren and his boss that secured this place, they could have turned afterwards,” Tin Tin offered.

  “True, but that doesn’t explain the blood. There must have been at least one other person with them, but I suppose there’s nothing to worry about. They are probably dead now anyway,” Steven replied.

  “We should get moving, my car is just through the doors at the rear of the shop but first let’s grab some tools to defend ourselves. I reckon the gardening and DIY sections are a good place to start,” Neil suggested, rushing away to find some weapons.

  “How are you holding up? That was a nasty fall man, you’re lucky to be alive,” said Tin Tin, placing an arm around his friend and helping him slowly walk away.

  “I’ll be honest mate I thought that was it, I really did. I felt I was going to die and for a moment there I gave in and was ready to meet my maker. Then I saw the zombie coming towards me and I thought fuck that shit, I want to live! Thanks for helping me focus and for the hammer. I got lucky grabbing the table leg for the first one but if it wasn’t for you I would probably be zombie fodder right now. I’m ok though, really. It’s nothing a few pain killers won’t sort out,” Steven replied.

  “Well we’re in the right place,” Tin Tin replied, taking several boxes of strong painkillers from a nearby shelf. “I’ll be keeping an eye on you though. You’ve more than likely suffered a concussion so no more zombie killing for the time being, leave that to Neil and me.”

  Tin Tin and Steven walked to the gardening aisle and were greeted by Neil stood statuesque with a shovel in hand looking directly ahead.

  “Hey Neil, I dig the shovel! Get it? Dig the shovel?” Tin Tin smiled.

  Neil didn’t appear to appreciate the joke but he did acknowledge his friend’s presence and pointed to what had taken his attention. Lying on the floor ahead of them was a pair of bloodied and torn legs; the rest of the body was obscured by a shelving unit. All three cautiously walked towards the legs with the extent of the injuries becoming clearer with every step. Steven gagged and quickly placed a hand over his mouth in an attempt to prevent further digested chocolate nutty confectionery from escaping. The legs were barely recognisable with muscle and skin almost completely stripped from bone. It was really only the shoes still covering the feet that gave them away as legs.

  “Well I guess now we know where the blood came from. The three of them probably locked themselves in here hoping they’d be safe but two were already infected, turned and made a meal of the third. Poor bastard,” Tin Tin surmised.

  “Guys, you’ll want to see this,” said Neil, who had walked ahead to the other side of the shelving unit.

  Steven and Tin Tin joined him to see that the upper torso of the body was missing and in its place lay a trail of blood leading away from the legs and out of sight. They followed the blood until finally they found the missing torso and it was not what any of them were expecting.

  The upper torso stopped dragging itself and lifted its head upwards, sniffing the air intently. It then turned its putrid head to face them. It was female and was wearing a Wilko’s uniform.

  “Well you were nearly right Tin Tin. She must have turned whilst Darren and his boss were busy ripping her stomach apart. I guess zombies don’t eat other zombies,” Neil said, gripping his newly acquired shovel.

  He walked towards the zombie which tried to meet him half way by dragging her torn body towards him. Using the shovel he swung hard, smashing the side of her head and flipping what remained of the body over onto its back. He lifted the shovel high then thrusted it through her head, cracking the skull then pushing into her brain.

  “Please tell me killing zombies gets easier after you’ve put down your first one,” he asked Steven and Tin Tin who both shook their heads in response.

  The three of them walked towards the rear exit of the store, stopping only in the hardware section where Steven helped himself to a crowbar and Tin Tin replaced his hammer with a bigger sturdier model which he then used to smash through the window panels of the automatic doors. They exited to the car park and walked towards Neil’s car, a silver Chevrolet Matiz. He could hear Tin Tin and Steven sniggering behind him.

  “Before you say anything it’s the wife’s car, mine is in the garage,” Neil tried to explain, worried that he would lose man points.

  “Listen, I’m heading home to Weston Point. I can drop you anywhere you want to go just as long as it’s not too out of the way or, if you like, you can stay with me. There’s plenty of room at my house for you guys. It’s completely up to you,” Neil said.

  Both Steven and Tin Tin gave each other the smallest of glances. It was all they needed to make up their minds. Neither of them had much in the way of family, with only their parents living in Runcorn. That one small glance was enough to show that they both felt the same. They would both take not knowing if their parents were alive over returning home to find them dead, or worse.

  “We’re staying with you, we’re stronger together but there’s one thing you need to understand,” Tin Tin spoke in a quiet and serious voice. “As long as you are driving that car, Steven and I have the right to take the piss out of you relentlessly, no matter how many zombies you kill along the way.”

  “Hey I told you, it belongs to my wife!” Neil protested.

  They entered the vehicle and took their seats. Neil driving, Tin Tin in the front passenger seat and Steven choosing to lie down in the back - the effects of his concussion demanded he did so. Neil wanted nothing more than to be home with his pregnant wife and young son. His body ached with the fear that something had happened to them. Steven and Tin Tin were more than willing to help him get home. They both believed that staying together would be considerably more desirable than going their separate ways.

  Or so they thought…

  Journal Entry 6

  Whilst the rest of the house slept, my brother sent me swinging down the dreaded rope ladder that hung from the spam store room window, leading to the front of the house. The same place where a day earlier, Butty had killed and chopped up five members of the ever increasing undead population, nailed their body parts to the house then placed their putrid decaying heads on spikes outside his front door. Why he had sent me out front I wasn’t too sure but, armed only with a meat cleaver, I gingerly clambered down the ladder and waited for him as instructed.

  With morning sunlight quickly infiltrating the lessening darkness, I looked properly upon the faces of the spiked heads for the first time and they were indeed the people my brother had described. I found myself transfixed, unable to move my eyes from their pale, disgusting faces. The zombies I had encountered up to this point had all been mobile and, after they had been disposed of, I never felt the need, or indeed had the opportunity, to stick around. But now I had the chance to study their faces in detail.

  A white glaze covered the eyes belonging to the cold, putrefying heads of the undead, the iris and pupil being no longer visible. Covering gaunt and sunken features, the skin appeared thin and grey of colour. It’s no wonder I had not recognised them on first viewing. This infection, disease, sickness or whatever you want to call the cause of the zombie outbreak had quickly ravished and twisted the once pink, living flesh that belonged to the people I had been privileged to call friends.

  Standing out there on
my own with the heads of my dead pals for company was terrifying and I had never felt so alone. Then without warning a harrowing wind whistled through the leaf deprived trees that surrounded the front of my brother’s house, swiftly followed by the sound of broken twigs snapping below heavy footsteps. I gripped the meat cleaver tight and nervously moved backwards, walking between the row of spiked heads and placing my back up against the house. Whatever was coming, I wanted to be in the best position to defend myself.

  As the heavy, clumsy sound of shuffling feet dragging along the ground got closer and the groans that now accompanied it became louder, the knot in my stomach tightened. I was alone and, unless the rotting zombie heads planted on top of the spikes in front of me were about to magically spring back to life and offer some much needed tactical advice, I was going to go with the one plan I had which was to run at the fucker and hack away at the dead bastard’s head as fast and as hard as I could. Only, I didn’t have chance to put my plan into action as just as I was about to attack, my brother shuffled his size nines around the corner of the house holding several large wooden stakes whilst doing his best zombie impression.

  “Fuck sake Butty you nearly got a meat cleaver through your head you crazy shit!” I yelled.

  “Brilliant, I knew it would shit you up. That’s why I sent you out here on your own. As for the meat cleaver, I know you John, there is no way you would have attacked without getting a good look first. You wouldn’t risk killing someone living, you’d make sure they were dead first,” Butty said.

  “Well try a trick like that again and I might just make an exception. What are you carrying anyway and where did you come from? You never came down the rope ladder?” I asked.

  “Of course I didn’t. It’s a bloody death trap that thing. I climbed down a retractable ladder from my bedroom window around the back of the house. As for what I’m carrying… Something every man should never leave the house without - protection. Come with me and I’ll show you why I dragged you out here at this ungodly hour,” he said.

  Really, a retractable pissing ladder and he made us climb that ‘death trap’ as he put it only the night before. I’m sure he does stuff like this for his own amusement.

  We walked away from the front of the house to the steep stone steps leading up to Weston Road and where 80s Dave had parked the Ford Thunderbird. It was difficult to see anything from our lowered position such was the extent of the overgrowth. Even without greenery the mass assortment of leafless trees and bushes was enough to obstruct our view of the road above almost completely.

  “When this was Nan and Granddad’s house they never would have let the front garden get in this state. Granddad used to be out here every day weeding and tending to his flowers. Now look at it,” I said.

  “Beautiful isn’t it. Absolutely perfect. For years you’ve been moaning at me to sort it out and let’s just say that I had. What would you see now?” Butty asked.

  “I don’t know. A lovingly cared for garden with no overgrowth? Or even just a freshly cut lawn. Anything would be better than this,” I replied.

  When our grandparents passed away they left everything to Butty and me. I got the money, which I used to buy a home to raise Emily, and Butty was left their house. That was thirteen years ago and my brother had not so much as watered a plant since. In his neglect, the once picturesque and lovingly tendered garden was now more like a jungle than anything, or it would be if it were summer. At this time of year, deep into winter, it was a mass of knotted and tangled twigs and branches.

  “No overgrowth? Without the overgrowth we would be exposed and I don’t just mean to zombies but survivors also. These are desperate times we’re living in John. A house this big… it would not take long for someone to take their chances and try to loot the place. Or worse, a group of survivors could try to take it for themselves. Then where would we be? Fighting the living as well as the dead and that’s the last thing we need. This overgrowth is camouflage. Just like the rotting undead body parts stuck to the walls are hiding us from zombies by masking our scent, these bushes and trees hide the house from other survivors. And you thought I was being lazy all these years when in fact I was doing what I’ve always done. I was preparing for the apocalypse,” Butty said, puffing his chest out with pride as if he had worked hard to create a garden Alan Titchmarsh wouldn’t want to tackle.

  Once again he was right. Thirteen years of neglect had indeed created enough overgrown bushes, brambles and trees to camouflage the house. One day the nutty bastard will be wrong and I hope to God I’m there to piss on his chips when he is.

  “Grab a wooden stake little brother, this is the plan. Nailing zombie parts to the house is working so far but it’s a task that needs to be repeated every couple of days. Rain, wind, snow, cold… they are exposed to the elements 24/7 and need to be kept fresh. So we need a plan B should plan A fail and the zombies pick up our meaty scent. Now the path down to the house is steep and from what we know, co-ordination isn’t something the undead possess. My guess is that, should they attack from the front, they wouldn’t have the ability to successfully manoeuvre down the pathway and would no doubt fall flat on their rotting arses. Even more likely is that they will ignore the path all together and just come tumbling over the wall, falling into the overgrowth. If that happens, I suspect the twisted, tangled twigs and branches would contain a few of them but not many and that’s where these stakes come in. We’re going to hammer them into the ground. Some pointed vertically and others on an angle. Should zombies come plunging over the wall then they’ll be met with a stake through the chest or whichever body part the wooden spike penetrates. For those that survive the fall the other stakes that we place on an angle should take care of them. It won’t kill them of course just trap them and that leaves us with the simple task of strolling over and smashing their brains in. Easy! Let’s get started with these and then I’ll get the other fifty I’ve got stored around the back of the house,” Butty said.

  “Fifty? Christ Butty I’m recovering from a bad back, what are you trying to do, cripple me?” I moaned.

  “Don’t worry little brother, I don’t expect us to do it all by ourselves, just to make a start that’s all. It’ll soon be time for me and Dave to go on the ciggy run so you can get Emily and Jonathon to finish things off. I’m sure they won’t mind. In fact, it was Emily that helped me make all the stakes. She’s a good kid is our Emily,” Butty said.

  I’ve said it before and I’ll no doubt say it again, I really do need to limit the amount of time my brother spends with Emily. She should be spending her free time with her friends. Not concocting plans to zombie proof the house with her crazy Uncle Butty. Then again, these days her only friends are Jonathon and 80s Dave. Shit she’s doomed!

  We spent the next hour hammering wooden stakes into the ground. It was exhausting work and unfortunately for me, the pain in my back had returned with force. It felt like someone had reached inside my skin and grabbed hold of my back muscles then violently started twisting and squeezing. Butty was like a machine, hammering stake after stake into the ground, stopping occasionally to cast his crazy judgemental eye over to my progress only to ‘tut’ and shake his head at how little work I had done. After the fifth or sixth disapproving glance from my brother I chose to ignore him. I was trying my hardest to keep up and thought I was doing a bloody good job considering my injury. Plus, I had more important things on my mind than seeking my brother’s approval, like what I had seen earlier through the window in his attic.

  Images of those poor people trapped at the Pavilions had been playing heavily on my mind. Whether they knew it or not they were done for. Every zombie in Weston Point was heading their way and there was nothing we could do to help them. I felt helpless. Looking through my brother’s telescope I had witnessed the struggle those people had and still were experiencing at the hands of the undead. The fields surrounding the Pavilions were scattered with victims, both human and zombie alike, products of the bloodied battle that had ra
ged through the night. Unfortunately for the survivors, for every zombie slain, more were waiting in line. It was a never ending fight and one they couldn’t win. Not on their own anyway. But who could help? There was nothing we could do, that was for sure. Any attempt to assist from our little band of survivors would be certain suicide and I for one had no interest in putting myself or my family’s lives in danger. I’m including Jonathon and 80s Dave in that statement because that’s what they were to me now, family. Jonathon being my daughter’s boyfriend had become the closest thing to a son-in-law I was likely to have and Dave, well, he is quite possibly the only friend I have left that isn’t dead or undead and he means as much to me as Emily and Butty.

  Talking of Dave, it was whilst struggling to hammer stakes into the ground that a strong whiff of cigarettes filled my nostrils.

  “Morning Ace, what the fuck are you doing outside? It’s freezing and this window’s letting a draft in. I’m so cold my nipples look like blueberry muffins!” Dave shouted, puffing on a cigarette whilst leaning out of the window I had climbed down from earlier.

  “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m helping my crazy brother zombie proof the house,” I replied.

  “I heard that,” Butty groaned, hammering in another stake.

  “Helping? From up here lar it looks like you’re slowing him down. You get yourself back in the house and make us a brew and I’ll take over down there. If we leave you to it you won’t be finished in time for the next apocalypse never mind this one,” Dave said, making to climb down the rope ladder.

  “Stay where you are Dave, Emily and Jonathon can finish off down here. We’ve got a ciggy run to go on and I know just the place. Go and get yourself ready, I’ll be up in a minute,” Butty said, hammering in the last stake of his shift and wiping the sweat from his brow.