Blood at the Premiere: A Day One Undead Adventure

by RR Haywood

  The words give them a fresh burst of energy that suppresses the burning lactic acid in their thighs and the stitches forming in their sides. The lights get closer, the silhouetted buildings looming bigger and foreboding. Smaller lights fitted to the high end walls show now and Henrietta gains the impression of warehouses and commercial units.

  Rose runs. She has no choice but to run, but the agony in her hand spreads down her wrist into her arm and every step taken sends a juddering spasm of fresh pain burning into her body. Her stomach heaves over and her mouth fills with saliva as she gets the tugging sensation at the back of her throat, preparing to vomit. Her vision starts to close in, becoming blurred and tunnel-like. Her hair is being ripped out in chunks from Henrietta gripping and pushing so hard and her legs don’t feel like her own now, but still she runs. Still she goes on with one step after the other in a never-ending nightmare of pain and terror.

  Objects are stacked nearby. Planks of wood, machinery and piles of bricks and wooden pallets. Brian weaves them through and on towards the lights now shining bright and beckoning. Henrietta notices the things stacked and stored and makes the connection. There must be a way from that commercial area into this section. She spots the chain-link fence, high and well maintained, but there must be a gate, an opening, something, anything.

  Brian reaches the fence slamming bodily into the wire as though hoping he could simply pass through it. He bounces off and starts running down the fence line searching for a way through.

  Dolan and Bennie reach the fence with Henrietta pushing Rose right behind them. An air of rest, of needing to stop and draw air, fills the group but again Henrietta pushes, kicks and shouts at them to follow Brian.

  ‘Through here,’ Brian gasps with his spare hand scrabbling at the thick sliding bar of the gate. He shoulders into it, forcing it open and falling through with the knife dropping from his hand as he trips and goes down.

  Henrietta shoulders Dolan through while using her leg to kick at Bennie’s arse to keep him moving, and all the time still gripping Rose’s hair to force the now-silent girl through the gate. She jerks Rose on, finally releasing her hair before darting back to slam the gate closed and push the thick metal bar in place. She looks down at the lock seeing the hole in the sliding bar ready for a padlock to be pushed through to lock the gate. No padlock.

  The infected reach the fence, slamming into it in the same manner as before. The lights shine down on all their undead glory of shredded skin and teeth bared and gnashing.

  They’ll get through the gate. It will only take an elbow to knock the bar. She scouts round for something to jam through the hole as Brian rushes to her side holding a thick screw which he jams and twists into the bar.

  Brian gives the bar a quick test tug. It holds fast, buying them time to make distance, but that means more running and in turn that means getting Dolan, Bennie and Rose up and moving.

  They find themselves in a compound with a flat expanse of ground between modern constructed steel-framed commercial units and a clear exit road leading away.

  Rose sways on her feet. Feeling drunk, drugged. Her hand doesn’t hurt now. Nothing hurts. Everything hurts. She looks round, wondering where she is as her left wrist is grabbed and once again she gets pulled along. She tries to keep up but her legs feel so weird, like she’s wading through mud.

  ‘Stop that,’ Henrietta whispers angrily at her. ‘Pick your bloody feet up.’

  ‘Soz,’ Rose slurs and tries to walk with her feet up, taking big moon steps.

  ‘Down the road, yeah?’ Brian asks, turning round to see the infected piling up along the fence and working down closer to the gate.

  ‘I think so,’ Henrietta says. ‘We need a car. We really need a car.’

  ‘I can’t keep going,’ Dolan says weakly, clutching his sides and looking very pale. ‘Need to stop.’

  ‘We can’t,’ Henrietta says for the hundredth time while still holding that tone of respect and deference.

  ‘Shit.’ Bennie is first to give voice, wincing at the burn going through his retinas as the first sensor-activated floodlight comes to life, blasting the ground with pure white light that triggers the rest of the floodlights. Night becomes day. Pure bright lights designed to detect the smallest of movements. Hands lift with involuntary actions to shield pupils dilated from the darkness they’d run through. They hold still, wincing, blinking and waiting for their eyes to adjust.

  Henrietta blinks down at the ground, shielding her eyes and looking at the filthy state of her feet so black and covered in shit, grime and dust. Red flecks of blood that go from her shins up her thighs and on her blackened hands. A loud bang comes from the fence with the body weight of a heavy-built woman crashing into a middle section that sags between the posts. Still blind from the light, but it’s time to go and the growling masses at the fence launch harder and more frenzied into the thin metal that will surely break before long.

  ‘Rose, come on!’ Henrietta shouts at the girl, dragging her on. Henrietta tries to look round to stare another warning at the girl but blooms of colour spread in her vision still adjusting to the floodlights. She pulls harder, cursing and feeling that angry hatred building up. ‘Stop being so fucking selfish…ROSE…stop dragging your feet…’

  Still the girl plants slow, heavy steps heel first and sways side to side, yanking Henrietta back from the momentum gained.

  ‘ROSE.’ Henrietta turns on the young woman with fury spilling out that dries instantly at the sight of the ashen face and Rose’s eyes rolling back sickeningly in a face covered in blood. ‘Rose?’ The tone changes to instant concern as Rose’s legs finally give out. ‘Oh my god…Rose…’ Henrietta tries to catch her falling but fumbles and the girl hits the ground hard.

  ‘Fucking leave her,’ Dolan shouts, still shielding his eyes from the glare overhead.

  ‘She’s hurt,’ Henrietta says, scanning Rose’s face and trying to find the wound.

  ‘Was she bit?’ Brian drops back, trying to peer down.

  ‘No…she never went near them. Rose? Can you hear me? She’s covered in blood.’

  ‘So are you,’ Brian says, looking in horror at Henrietta’s face.

  ‘I don’t know where it’s from.’ Henrietta takes in Rose’s deathly pale skin that contrasts so starkly against the blood. ‘Where is she injured? Rose? Can you hear me? Where did you get cut?’

  ‘Fuck,’ Brian gasps, lurching forward, ‘her hand…look at her hand.’

  ‘Her hand? Oh shit…’ Henrietta grabs the girl’s wrist to lift the hand up and watches as the thumb flaps back, almost severed from the glass shard that sliced deep into the web of skin from palm to the ball of the joint. ‘Oh my god…’ Henrietta mutters at the sight of the bone on show and the noodle-like tendrils of nerves, sinew and muscle poking through the ruined layers made worse by the frantic, sustained run. ‘She was screaming…Rose? Rose?’ Henrietta looks up at Rose’s face and her lips moving as though mumbling. Blood has sprayed deep over Rose’s blue denim jeans and across the ground back to the gate they’d come through. Henrietta touches her own face, realising what was hitting her when she was running. Guilt and despair flood in. The torment of an instant awareness that Rose was screaming from pain. The wound is deep, too. Sickeningly deep and the agony must have been unbearable. Tears spill from Henrietta’s eyes as she looks round for something to use to tie onto the bleeding wound.

  ‘Leave the fat slut,’ Dolan wails, pacing round in a circle as he keeps looking back to the fence now thick with ranks of infected straining to get through.

  ‘We need a cloth, a rag…something to…Rose? Rose, can you hear me? You’re going to be okay.’

  ‘No, she’s bloody not,’ Dolan shouts. ‘Fucking leave her…’

  ‘The fence,’ Brian shouts as the fence starts to buckle from a horde of undead flinging themselves into the links, the posts and the gate that all start to give.

  ‘Give me your shirt,’ Henrietta shouts, trying to think of what to do. Got to
stop the bleeding, but…she looks up at the thick trails of blood realising the damage is already done. Pints must have been lost.

  ‘Henri…the fence…’ Brian shouts the warning again, louder and more urgent.

  ‘Rose, you’re going to be okay…help me get her up…’

  ‘Fucking leave her,’ Dolan shouts, pacing away towards the exit road.

  ‘Brian, help me get her up.’

  ‘She’s too heavy.’

  ‘I’ll carry her,’ Henrietta snaps, grabbing at Rose’s left wrist in an attempt to pull her up, but Rose just swings round, a dead weight being dragged.

  Brian grabs her under the right arm while Henrietta pulls at the left wrist, but it’s still not enough and Brian’s exhausted, shocked body starts to tremble and shake from the effort.

  ‘Dolan, help us…’

  ‘Fucking ditch the fat…’

  ‘BENNIE,’ Henrietta shouts, ‘help us…’

  ‘The fence, Henrietta,’ Brian sobs the words out, feeling impotent and useless. He drops to a crouch trying to push his hands through the girl’s armpits from the back as Henrietta grabs the top of her jeans. They heave together, getting Rose almost upright as Henrietta drops down to press her shoulder into Rose’s stomach while Brian pushes at her back.

  ‘It’s down,’ Dolan screams. The fence crashes with a sound of taut wires snapping and concrete posts breaking in half. A dull thud. A twang of metal and a roar of voices no longer human that fill the space with hunger and a need to rip flesh from bone.

  With veins bulging from his neck Brian lifts the heavy girl up as Henrietta drives her shoulder forward then powers up on her legs lifting Rose from the ground.

  ‘GO.’ Henrietta sets off pounding the hot, rough concrete with bare feet and a heavy weight pressing into her shoulder. With Brian at her back they run for the exit road and the promise of deeper shadows, but more floodlights ping on, illuminating their route for everyone to see.

  The running before was hard. Carrying Rose earlier was hard, but now it’s far worse. Energy levels drain. Fatigue kicks in. Strength wanes. She holds Rose in place with her arm looped up and presses down while her other arm acts as a counterweight, stretching out wide. They get onto the road as the undead behind fight against one another to get over the fence and stagger after their prey.

  She can’t do it. Rose is too heavy. She pushes on, gritting her teeth with tears of effort and guilt and despair pouring down her face. Grinding the steps that radiate pain in every muscle. One foot after the other and she cries out from the utter desperation. Bennie runs ahead still clutching the bottle of whiskey and Dolan with one hand clutching his side.

  Blood pounds through her ears and every step threatens to be the last as she staggers and works to stay upright with Rose held tight. She can’t give up. Rose was screaming and she pulled her up by the hair. The poor girl was crying out in agony and faltering in step from blood loss but she got dragged, pushed, hit and shouted at to keep going. A young girl so innocent. It was Henrietta’s fault they went to her apartment, too. Henrietta’s fault they got inside the building. Henrietta’s fault they didn’t lock the door and had to run out. All of it. All of it is Henrietta’s fault and now the girl is dying on her shoulder with no hope of finding a hospital or calling an ambulance. She screams out from the unfairness of it. Hating herself with a staggering depth.

  ‘HENRI,’ Brian screams. He knows this was her fault, knows Rose is suffering because of her. ‘HENRI…DROP HER…’

  Henrietta blinks at his words, snapping the torment from her mind as she runs on with agonising fatigue lapping at her muscles.

  ‘She’s dead, Henrietta,’ Brian sobs his own misery at seeing the lifeless girl bouncing on Henrietta’s shoulder. His hand presses into her neck, searching for a pulse. He lifts her hand, the injured one, and stares down at the wound that’s no longer bleeding from a heart no longer beating. Eyes lifeless. Breath gone. The life of the girl has left. ‘She’s…’ he sobs the word out still, running to keep up, ‘she’s dead, Henrietta…’

  ‘SHE’S NOT,’ Henrietta screams, denying his words.

  ‘She’s dead…’

  ‘SHE ISN’T DEAD.’ Henrietta refuses to yield. They can save her. They can find a hospital or a car and drive her away from here. They can do something. This is London in modern times with help on every corner. Young girls don’t die from blood loss from a cut hand. It doesn’t happen.

  ‘Henri…’ Brian weeps at the dead girl and the things chasing them and being in an unknown place with pain coursing through his body. ‘She’s dead…you…you got to…drop…drop her…’

  ‘NO.’ Henrietta pushes that despair into anger that explodes, giving a fresh burst of energy that pulses through her body.

  The infected are gaining. Brian can hear them. They’re not going fast enough. They need Henrietta to keep them moving. With his heart breaking into a thousand pieces he does what needs to be done. He reaches out a hand while running and grabs Rose’s hair. Sobbing for forgiveness. Tears streaming down his face. He falters, unable to fulfil the action, but they’ll die if he doesn’t. They need Henrietta. Henrietta has to keep them going. ‘I’m sorry,’ he mouths the words at Rose and yanks her hard from Henrietta’s shoulder to fall and spin and hit the ground with a crunch of bone.

  Henrietta lurches from the sudden removal of the weight and screams out as she tries to stop and turn but Brian barrels into her, forcing her to keep going. ‘She’s dead…’ Brian shouts the words, hoarse and angry and sad and heartbroken.

  ‘GET THE FUCK OFF.’ Henrietta tries to fight past him but the man pushes her on getting whacked in the face and chest.

  ‘She’s dead…go…please just fucking go…’

  ‘Henri…’ Bennie begs from ahead. ‘Come on…’

  ‘We’ve got to leave her.’ Brian slams his body into Henrietta’s, physically driving her away while his own limbs fill with searing, agonising pain.

  Sobbing, weeping, crying out and screaming into the air, Henrietta gets pushed down the road. She turns frequently, every few steps, and sees the girl lying prone and still and dead on the ground. The things roar after them with the first few veering towards the fallen Rose but turning away as though she holds no worth to them.

  That despair fuels her gut, which pumps power into her legs that drive on with a need to be away. To run and run and never look back. She sprints past Dolan who cries out at being overtaken and finds enough energy to go faster. She gains on Bennie snatching the bottle from his hand, which she flings to the side and snarls in his ear. ‘Run.’

  Down the exit road and onto a tree-lined wide avenue bordered by big detached houses set back behind high walls.

  She spots the taxi, the indicators flashing from the hazards left on and the driver’s door left open. The goal is formed. The objective is set and she sprints ahead leaving the others behind, driven by a furious rage surging through her veins and a mind filled with images of Rose screaming out in pain as Henrietta grabbed her hair. The taxi gets closer but Rose gets closer still. The girls scream. The pain in her voice that Henrietta didn’t pick up on.

  The driver’s door is wide open and the engine ticks over quietly. She vaults the bonnet, landing deftly on the wing and sliding down to spin and dive for the driver side. Inside the vehicle, she slams the door closed and looks down to see an automatic gearbox. Foot on the brake and gulping for air, she slams the stick into D and floors the accelerator. It’s a slow diesel engine designed for stamina not for speed, but the vehicle pulls away. A black London cab slewing over the middle of the road towards the other three lurching and staggering worse than the things behind them that are now so close.

  She pushes the cab on, building speed until the last minute when she slams the brake and yanks the wheel round. Brian reaches the back door first, wrenching it open to dive in. Dolan next, once again shouldering Bennie away in desperation to save his own life.

  ‘GO, GO,’ Brian roars from the back, recoverin
g enough to stretch a hand out and pull Bennie in. Henrietta hits the pedal again, feeling the cab pull forward as she turns hard to go back the way she came and away from the things. The cab goes slow, the power building too gradually, and the beasts impact on the solid metal frame with huge bangs and thuds. Dolan screams and drops to the floor, covering his head while Brian pulls Bennie down onto the back seat shouting for Henrietta to go.

  She keeps her foot pressed down, fishtailing the vehicle across the road as she struggles to gain control. She slams into a row of parked cars, setting off alarms that warble and flash lights. They bounce into the middle of the road, building up speed and pulling away. The fastest of the infected keeps pace, slamming his face into the cab as though to bite through the metal to the flesh inside. The diesel engine works to drive the wheels that spin faster and build speed down the road.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Trust your instincts and hope for the best

  Habit of hand kicks in. Conscious thought fades with only the ever-present instinct for survival guiding her actions. At the end of the road she steers left, not realising she turns the wheel and adjusts the pressure on the accelerator to complete the manoeuvre into a new hell.

  London is burning, scorching from cars ablaze and buildings shooting flames that lick the sky with a roaring intensity that dwarfs the death and suffering of the mere humans beneath, and that death is everywhere. Every turn of her head brings a new horror to be seen. A man on fire running from a doorway while the frenzied monsters chase him down and heedless of those flames they bring him to the ground, scorching faces and burning flesh as they tear into his cooking skin.

  A truck on its side embedded through the corner display windows of Next. Bodies lying trapped and screaming underneath as the infected drop to feast.

  London dying with people being hacked apart by the teeth of their loved ones and clawed hands that rake at soft bellies to slice them open and scoop the innards glistening fat and wet into their mouths. A woman clutching a baby runs from a side street screaming for help, but no help can be given and the two that chase lunge in to take her legs. Down she goes with the baby flying off to land and roll to the feet of a woman that drops and bites without mercy or hesitation. The mother watches as her child is torn apart by teeth that rip into her flesh.