The Undead_Day 22

by R. R. Haywood

  ‘Good morning,’ the woman says, her hands still on the pram’s handle.

  ‘WHY?’ Howie rages, charging at her as Dave rushes to his side but the woman wilts back with fear in her face and Reginald feels the rage coming from the hive mind that makes Jess rear and Meredith bark. ‘WHY?’ Howie roars the word, the woman flinches, colliding into the back of the car but Howie moves fast, gripping her hair. Dave right behind him ‘TELL ME WHY?’

  The woman snarls. Chemicals dumping inside but Howie’s rage is greater than hers and he throws her aside, sending her smashing through a table and into chairs holding infected who scatter and fall but Howie stalks after her with Dave forever at his back. The two of them carving a path through infected panicking to get away.

  ‘TELL ME WHY?’ Howie grabs the woman, sending her on again into another set of chairs, spilling infected over the wet road. His pure anger making them wilt back and away. There is no answer to his question, but the sight seared into his mind demands reason, demands cause.

  The woman rises from the floor into a crouch, an animal snarling and readying to bite with her lips pulling back. The noise around the street rising as the other infected do the same with palpable aggression sweeping through.

  ‘There you are,’ Howie says, his eyes blazing. ‘I see you…’

  ‘I SEE YOU…’ a chorus of voices coming back from every infected man, woman and child speaking out in perfect synchronicity. Blood-curdling in delivery. Spine-chilling in intent. ‘I SEE YOU,’ they say again, louder, harsher. A second of life held in perfect poise where nothing moves and no sounds are made save for the drips of water falling from blocked drainpipes and the overhanging thatched roofs. Tappy swallows, widening her eyes at the feeling, at the sensation, like an electric current passing through them all. The second before battle. The second before carnage and it will last forever.

  Then the still silence ends and the world around her explodes in noise and chaos with voices howling and guns firing.

  Eighteen

  Day Twenty one

  She wakes early, transitioning from deep sleep to wide awake within a second. She never used to do that. Cassie used to wake slowly and doze for ages before finally rolling out of bed to drink several cups of coffee before even contemplating the day ahead. She always felt tired when she woke too. Like the stresses of life were constantly weighing heavily on her shoulders. She didn’t work but she never needed to. Her family were wealthy. Her father a man of position and influence. Her mother from good affluent breeding stock, but still, Cassie would wake feeling irked and irritated. Pissed off and ready to lay into whoever got in her way.

  She once considered she might be bi-polar but then reasoned, to herself, that she was simply high-maintenance and all the best women were a little bit batshit crazy.

  Now she wakes instantly and feels not only refreshed, but invigorated with it. Like a new energy is inside. A thrumming that makes her want to rise and get stuck into the day. She doesn’t ache or feel fatigued. She’s not getting stress headaches or migraines either. Her hair feels thicker, her skin is positively glowing. Her complexion the best it ever has been.

  Sex. Lots and lots of sex. That’s what she tells herself, sitting up in bed and looking down at the perfect form of Gregori stirring to wake. She can’t get enough of him. His brutality. His gruff voice so deep and gravelly. The way he looks at anything he is unsure of as though he will kill it. She loves his ugliness too. The viciousness of him. That he was a killer only adds to the thrill of it all, like a vulnerable, wounded beast that only shows its soft underbelly to her and in return, she soothes him in the darkness. Kisses him long and slowly. Makes him drinks and food. Rubs his shoulders and nags him relentlessly, as a good woman should. Less whore. More wife.

  Mind you, the clean living, clean eating, less pollutants in the air, simplistic existence of their world may possibly be all contributing to her heightened levels of energy and feeling of well-being.

  ‘You sleep,’ she says quietly, lowering to kiss his cheek as he stirs awake.

  ‘I wake,’ he says, deliciously gruff and deep.

  ‘No,’ she says firmly, softly, drawing the back of her hand over his cheeks, soothing him back to slumber before rising, washing, dressing and heading down to the kitchen, pausing to wrap her arms around the boy already at the table, kissing the top of his head and feeling nothing but love in her heart. ‘Sleep okay?’

  ‘Yes, Casseee,’ he replies, giggling when she blows a raspberry on his neck. She moves off, opening the back door to breathe in the pure clear air, staring for a few seconds in awe of such a gorgeous morning and the sun rising over the horizon. Birds singing, insects making noise. Rabbits in the fields.

  She turns the gas stove on, idly wondering how long it will be before the gas stops coming from the pipes, the water too. When does that stop? She makes coffee, giving thought to the future, and such dreams they are too. Grand and grandiose. Large and largesse.

  ‘What does largesse mean?’ the boy asks. She blinks, smiling faintly. He’s done that a few times now and passed remark on something she was sure she thought silently and not said out loud.

  ‘Er, it means being generous, giving to others…’ she says as she pours water into her mug, glancing back to his thoughtful expression. She stirs the mug and walks over to sit in the chair facing him and leans forward to stare into his eyes, studying for it, searching for it. The boy smiles, his little face so scrummy, making her smile and reach out to tickle his cheeks. He giggles at the touch and affection, happy and content as the thing within him comes forward and the smile fades, the expression of a child diminishing to that of something else. ‘Is it you?’ she asks.

  ‘Yes,’ the boy says, the infection says.

  ‘So strange,’ she says softly, her hands still on the boy’s cheeks and suddenly it feels wrong to be holding his face. Like the very act is patronising and she pulls back, wrapping her hands around the hot mug of coffee. ‘How are you?’

  ‘I am here,’ the boy says, the infection says. ‘I am in many places. In some I lose hosts in others I take more hosts…’

  ‘It’s a greeting,’ Cassie cuts in. ‘It’s how people interreact with each other. I say, hello, how are you and you reply, hello, I am fine thank you, how are you…so, hello, how are you?’

  A pause. ‘Hello, how are you?’

  She smiles, nodding once in show of a job well done. ‘Spot on, so what’s happening now? The spiders didn’t work did they?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘If throwing over ten thousand raving zombies at them doesn’t kill them then a few spiders will only piss them off.’

  ‘They were isolated from each other. I am more. I am many. I am thousands. They are few…’

  ‘All true,’ she says, sitting back to sip from her mug. ‘And common sense dictates that your larger numbers should be enough, however…common sense has gone out the window. Hasn’t it? I’m in the kitchen of a shitty little country house in the middle of bumfucknowhere talking to a…a thing inside a child…and that’s after I spent the night in the bed of an Albanian serial killer so yes, I would rather suggest common sense has now left the room…’ she sips again, studying the boy who would normally laugh at her turn of phrase and for saying rude words, but the boy isn’t here right now. Only the thing inside that listens and watches her.

  It was in the evening two days ago, on the nineteenth day since the world fell that Cassie first knowingly spoke to the hive mind collective conscience of the thing that caused that very event to happen. The thing she had seen within the boy’s eyes came forward to speak while Gregori was running laps around the house and stopping to do all sorts of weird and wonderful strength training. They were in the garden, idly watching him and shouting silly words of encouragement every time he went by.

  ‘I am here, Cassie,’ the boy said, the infection said.

  ‘Where else would you be, silly,’ she replied, poking her tongue out at the same second as seeing the ageless
thing in the boy’s eyes and a complete change in expression that made the boy look like some kind of medical mutation of an adult trapped in the body of a child. She swallowed, blinking a few times. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

  ‘I am here, Cassie,’ the infection said, studying her.

  ‘Who are you?’ she asked quietly as Gregori ran by a few metres away.

  A pause. Time to think. ‘I exist. I have life. I am a singular entity possessed within the host bodies of millions…’

  She searched for joke, for humour, for a trick and found none. She looked for the boy but couldn’t see him. ‘Okay,’ she said, not knowing what else to say. ‘Hey, I’m Cassie…’

  ‘I know who you are.’

  ‘Not creepy at all,’ she whispered, her eyes darting to Gregori with a fleeting thought that maybe she should call him over but then paused, looking back at the thing, at the boy. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Life.’

  ‘Right. I see. Er…I’m not sure what to say to that.’

  ‘I have life.’

  ‘That’s good.’

  ‘I am life.’

  ‘Also good.’

  ‘I want life.’

  ‘Yep, got that.’

  ‘Howie seeks to kill me. I am a fetid decaying evil that must be eradicated. I am a darkness on the land that will be killed. Howie will not stop until he cuts down the last host to watch it bleed and die…’

  ‘Right, er…I could talk to his mum? Tell them to leave you alone?’

  ‘He cannot be taken. He is taken but not in the true state of being. His hive mind is powerful and different to what I am. I was made but now I exist. I was one thing before but now I am different. I was the cull before the cure but now I am the cure…’

  ‘Er...not sure what to say really…’

  ‘I seek words to use that you will understand…’

  ‘That might help.’

  ‘I know all things from all minds. I am all things in all places. I am the leader of many in many places…I am Krye…’

  ‘Don’t cry…I’m sure it will be okay.’

  ‘I am Krye.’

  ‘Oh, you mean the Albanian thing. That creepy old man from the hotel…the head of everything…right.’

  ‘I am Krye.’

  ‘Yep, you just said that.’

  ‘I use context to express understanding.’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘I was in the water. I took Doctor Neal Barrett and gained knowledge. I am the cull before the cure. I was one thing before but now I am different. Now I am the cure for a species that only knows to break and harm. I was made but now I exist…I have many, but I cannot stop Howie. Howie seeks to kill what we are. His strength grows. His power is great. He has a hive mind but he is lesser than I but greater than I…’

  ‘What’s the cure?’ she asked, struggling to understand the barrage of words flowing from the boy.

  ‘I was one thing. I was the panacea. I was to cure all things but there are too many hosts. I am now changed to cull but I will cure…’

  ‘Fuck,’ she said breathlessly as Gregori sprinted past. ‘A virus? You’re the virus?’

  A pause. ‘I was made to cull...’

  ‘You’re it. The infection thing?’

  A mountain facility within Switzerland. An engineered virus designed to cure everything but changed to what it is now and released on the world. To cull the population before the cure is given. Cassie gained that understanding as Gregori ran laps around the house while she listened to a thing inside a child.

  ‘When is the cure released?’ she asked, trying to get it straight in her mind.

  ‘I have gaps of knowledge. My knowledge is gained from the minds of the hosts but there are many I do not inhabit.’

  In a way, it was still like talking to a child. Emotionless and stilted, confusing too but she felt entirely compelled to listen and sat mesmerised while working through the jumbled facts and statements.

  ‘I finish,’ Gregori said, walking over to join them. His chest heaving from exertion, his body glistening from sweat.

  Cassie startled at his presence, blinking at the sight of him then at the boy and she saw the thing within retract as expression and life came back to the boy’s face who grinned up at Gregori and chatted on like nothing had happened.

  She spoke to it again when putting the boy to bed, then many times during the next day. When Gregori was out checking, when he was exercising, when she and the boy were pottering about here and there, picking wild flowers from the meadows. The thing inside only coming out when Gregori couldn’t hear.

  The whole Howie thing became clear. Howie was infected but not the same strain as whatever the thing inside the boy is, and over the last twenty or so days, Howie had grown in strength and now posed a real risk, vowing to end the infection, to kill it, to kill all of it. It was a joke. A silly thing on top of all the surreal ridiculous things going on, that one man could do so much damage, but he wasn’t just one man. He was a group that was growing and getting stronger.

  Now, on the twenty-first day since it all started, Cassie sits at the table of their kitchen in their bumfucknowhere isolated country house after spending the night in the bed of an Albanian serial killer while talking to a hive mind infection thing within a child. Still, could be worse. She could be still living in London and waking up stressed and angry.

  ‘Well, no offence but whatever you are doing is not working. Tell me, why do you hide from Gregori?’

  ‘Gregori does not like what I am.’

  ‘Gregori loves you.’

  ‘Gregori loves the boy. I am the boy. Howie will find me. Howie will kill me. If I die the boy will die…’

  A jolt inside. A surge of protective love. ‘It won’t happen. I won’t let it, we won’t let it…Howie’s in the south right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Okay, and you know all of the people with him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ve got an idea…’

  Motion above them. The bed creaking as Gregori rises and yawns a noise floating down that makes Cassie wince. ‘Oh wow, you can hear everything…tad embarrassing…soz, listening to us playing trains and tunnels every few hours…’

  The toilet flushes. Footsteps on the stairs coming down.

  ‘Go now, we’ll talk later…’ she watches it retreat again, the life coming back to the boy’s face as he suddenly grins and swings his legs. ‘There he is,’ Cassie smiles.

  ‘Who?’ Gregori asks, walking in with just a pair of shorts on.

  ‘My two handsome men!’ she laughs. ‘All scrummy and lovely…right, who wants breakfast?’

  A blissful morning. A blissful afternoon. The three of them playing in the gardens, kicking a ball, filling a paddling pool with water. Eating, snacking, running about and listening to music and it’s not until evening that Cassie learns Howie is missing.

  ‘Missing?’ she asks, not understanding. Their conversation snatched and rushed while Gregori showers.

  ‘I do not know where he is,’ the boy says, the infection says.

  ‘He’ll turn up…’

  He doesn’t turn up and Cassie starts to worry. Fearing that Howie, whoever the hell he is, is making a run for the north, that somehow he knows where the boy is.

  ‘What wrong?’ Gregori asks, seeing her standing in the open front door staring out with her arms folded.

  ‘Nothing,’ she says, offering a tight smile. ‘Listen, you’ll always protect him right?’

  ‘I no understand this.’

  ‘The boy…and me, you’ll always protect us, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ an answer given, instant and deep as he looks out, trying to see what she is looking at.

  ‘I just got spooked for a minute,’ she says, rubbing his arm.

  By bedtime, Howie is still missing and she sits on the boy’s bed, frowning at the infection. ‘The young one, Mohammed? He killed some hosts in a little village?’

  ‘Yes. Maddox is there. A baby. Th
e baby Maddox delivered when Simon Blowers died but came back. I have seen their vehicles. They are empty. They are gone. I do not know where.’

  ‘Fucked up,’ she whispers. ‘so fucked up…but at least they’re not heading this way. Tell me when they appear…’ she hesitates with an instinct urging her to kiss the boy goodnight and stroke his cheeks until he sleeps but not wanting to do anything like that while the infection is there. Touching it feels wrong. Like giving affection to a complete stranger. ‘Er…listen, I don’t know if you need sleep but the boy does…’

  It goes instantly. Retracting away and the boy smiles sleepily, yawning and fidgeting to get comfy and only then does she kiss him goodnight and wait till he slumbers.

  ‘Blinky is dead,’ the infection says the next morning in the kitchen as soon as Cassie walks in.

  ‘What happened?’ Cassie asks, sitting at the table.

  ‘I have gaps in my knowledge…’

  Howie disappeared. Mohammed was seen in a village with Maddox. Then they disappeared too. Now they are in a house in the countryside and a grave in the earth has been filled with Blinky’s body.

  ‘Well it sounds like someone kicked the shit out of them,’ Cassie says after hearing they’re all covered in injuries. ‘Pity only one got killed…who did it?’

  ‘There are gaps in my…’

  ‘Just say I don’t know…’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Much better. Must have been other people…I wonder what happened? Well, anyway, one down a dozen or so left to go eh? Frightened me a bit though, the thought of them coming here. Bring more to us but not close. I want a whole circle around us. Lots and lots…as many as you can…but keep Howie busy…Gregori is coming down, we’ll speak later…’