Six Days With the Dead

by Stephen Charlick

  ‘That looks promising,’ Liz said, happy to see the small doe, ‘Surely that means there’s not that many of the Dead about.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Charlie replied ‘deer are small and quick, not the easiest thing to catch with just your hands, even harder if they’re Dead hands. And as they’ve never been used to dealing with people, like the cattle were, they’re not just going to stand there and wait to be eaten’

  ‘Ever the optimist,’ Liz said under her breath with a smile.

  Within half an hour of travelling through the shadowy lane, they saw a break on one side in the tree lined verge. Attached to a wide rusting gate was a creeper covered old sign post. Its paint was peeling and worn but they could just about make out the words ‘Silver Valley Lake’. Just beyond the gate, a gravel path led a little way before being swallowed up by the ferns and small saplings. They would have to use the areas with less dense coverage as a guide to the route the path had originally taken.

  ‘Right this is it,’ Charlie said ‘Imran, you’re with me. Oh, and your bow won’t be much good here so take a club or something.’

  Imran reached for a heavy looking section of pipe hanging on the wall

  ‘Hmm, not much finesse but I guess it’ll do the job,’ he said, testing the weight in his hand.

  Liz flipped open the top hatch and gave the area a scan. With the trees on both sides she could only see for a few metres before her sight was blocked.

  ‘Well, it looks clear, but then the Dead could be right behind every tree, so that’s not saying much.’ Liz said, popping her head back down to look at Charlie and Imran.

  ‘Great,’ Imran said, with a sigh, ‘come on big man, lead the way.’

  Charlie tutted before jumping down from the cart to look around. Out of the confines of the cart, the air was cool in the tree shaded lane. Golden shafts of sunlight broke through the canopy high above them, lighting small pockets of the dark wood. Insect and flying beetles, their iridescent bodies reflecting in the sunbeams, filled the air with life. A blackbird flew down from a nearby Chestnut tree to land on the gate post, his song a musical alarm showing his annoyance at their intrusion. Flitting off as Charlie walked over to the rusty gate, he continued to call from the safety of a high perch. Charlie, standing by the closed gate noticed a plank of wood lying on the floor. Kicking it over with his boot, he realised it was actually a second sign that at some point had fallen off the gate.

  ‘Friendly bunch the Donaldsons,’ he said, reading the sign that had the words, ‘Visitors not welcome- You Were Warned’ painted in badly formed letters.

  ‘This just gets better and better,’ Imran said, swinging one leg over the gate.

  ‘Just be careful,’ Liz said, worried that somewhere in the forest, Dead teeth ached to rip into their living flesh.

  With a serious look on his face, Imran’s eyes bore into her. He did not need to say the words, she knew he loved her and would do everything he could to get back to her safely. Jumping down onto the small gravel section that remained of the side road, Charlie removed one of his ice picks, readying himself for the tense walk before them. Within a few steps, the gravel gave way to grass, and then sooner than he had expected, to the ferns and large mounds of spongy moss that carpeted the rest of this wild forest. With a glance over his shoulder at the lone figure of Liz standing by the cart with her sword unsheathed, Charlie and Imran stepped forward into the shadows.

  As Liz watched the two men she loved most in the world disappear into the forest, she wished them luck and cursed the strange Donaldson family for choosing such an inaccessible home. It was one thing to do what you could to keep out the Dead but to totally shut yourself off from the living too was just bizarre. Not for the first time she thought of the children the Donaldsons had there, and was determined they should do something about the situation sooner rather than later. When they returned to the Lanherne Convent she would ask for a community meeting to discuss the Donaldson problem.

  Liz, standing with her back to the cart, stretched. Her legs were stiff from sitting all morning and her shoulder still ached a little from her fall earlier, so she was glad to be out of the cart again. The cool breeze whispering through the canopy covered lane was certainly a pleasant change to the stuffy cart interior. Pouring some of their water into a small bucket, she went to give Delilah a drink. Liz stroked the soft velvety muzzle while Delilah quenched her thirst.

  ‘There you go, you needed that didn’t you girl,’ Liz whispered, patting Delilah’s forehead.

  Once Delilah had finished, Liz pulled out a few of the burrs that had attached themselves to her main and then went to sit in the open hatch to wait for Charlie and Imran to return. With her legs swinging out of the hatchway, her sword in her lap and her head resting on the frame, she watched the patch of forest beyond the gate where the men had entered. Slowly closing her eyes she let her ears become accustomed to the sounds of the forest. Listening without seeing sometimes helped you concentrate on your surroundings, Charlie had said once. When she was still young, Charlie had even taught her how to locate someone in the dark when all she could focus on was their steady breathing. So with her eyes closed she let the sounds around her be the only things to fill her senses. She could hear Delilah’s slow heavy breathing, the swish of her tail as she flicked away un-wanted flies and the slight movement of her hooves on the lane’s surface. From the forest she heard the squirrels scampering, jumping from limb to limb, while the angry blackbird had now changed its song and was singing to its mate somewhere to the left. Insects of various sorts buzzed through the cool forest air, and she could even hear the distant soft sound of running water from somewhere. She sat like this for ten minutes listening to the life and Nature all about her, all carrying on regardless of the fate that had befallen Man. Most importantly though, there were no sounds from the desperately moaning Dead.

  And then with a shrill call the blackbird was back on alarm. Liz’s eyes flicked open to scan the trees before her for movement. Sure enough stumbling between the trees to the left of the gate was a Dead woman. Dressed in what appeared to be a blood stained and rotting vest and shorts the woman had a large section of her neck missing, torn out and eaten by her attacker, no doubt. Liz watched as the Dead woman kept losing her footing on the uneven mossy floor, falling down, only to slowly pull herself back up again. Even from where she sat, Liz could see the decaying skin on the woman’s hands and arms was ripping on the bark each time she pulled herself upright, while beetles scurried about on her grey mouldy flesh. She had not yet noticed Liz sitting in the cart and she was in two minds as to whether to just let her go by. But realising Charlie and Imran would only have to deal with her on their way back she thought it best she got rid of her now.

  ‘Hey, over here,’ she called to walking corpse.

  Slowly the dead woman, with one rotting hand resting on a tree turned to look at Liz. When she saw Liz’s living flesh only a short distance away, she instinctively reached for her with her free arm. It was pitiful to watch the Dead woman release her hold on the tree and continue stumbling towards Liz. Just when Liz thought the woman had regained her balance, she would fall again, tripping on something unseen in the undergrowth.

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake, I haven’t got all day,’ Liz said, jumping down from the cart and walking over to where the Dead woman was once again pulling herself slowly upright.

  It wasn’t until Liz was closer that she realised the reason the woman was so unsteady on her feet, was that one of them was missing. The blackened and shattered stump ended just above the ankle of her right leg. Fragments of bone protruded from the torn flesh, as insect larvae burrowed happily through the rotting skin. With the woman only an arm’s reach away now, Liz held her blade high ready to strike. The Dead woman moaning in desperation and hunger, launched herself away from the tree towards Liz. Dead hands suddenly fell to the floor as Liz’s blade swung through the air severing flesh and bone. The woman finding Liz now out of reach, lost what little bala
nce she had and fell face down to the floor. Turning her head so she could look up at the flesh she desired so much, the Dead woman was unaware that the blade plunging down towards her would sate that need eternally. Once it was done, Liz pulled her blade free of the woman’s rotting brain and turned to go back to the cart. But she stopped mid-turn, shocked. Standing behind her was a thin middle-aged man. He was dressed in dirty jeans, a stained T-shirt and Liz could see there were lice moving in his beard and hair. The fact that he had crept up on her while she was dispatching the Dead woman wasn’t what alarmed her, no, it was the bat swinging towards her head with speed that shocked her. In the split second before the bat connected with her skull, she noticed the smug smile on his face. Then as a flash of light and pain shot across her vision, her head was knocked sideways. Her blade fell from her hand and skidded across the lane, as her hand instinctively came up to the side of her head. Swaying on her feet, Liz pulled her hand slowly away from her head. She just managed to register that it was now wet with blood, before darkness swept her away into unconsciousness and she fell to the ground alongside the dispatched Dead woman.

  ****

  As the tree line closed behind them, Charlie and Imran soon got used to following the path that nature had begun to reclaim. Like many things, once they knew what they were looking for, it was easy to see. Using the largest gap between the trees as an indicator to the original path’s route, they walked slowly deeper into the wood. With every snap of a twig or rustle in the undergrowth, Charlie and Imran would pause, listen, and scan the area for danger.

  ‘Well, it doesn’t look as if the Donaldson’s have been slack with their clean-up duties after all,’ Charlie whispered, after reacting once again to a false alarm, ‘Now let’s just hope they’re in the mood for guests.’

  After about twenty minutes of their stop- start motion along the over grown path, Charlie and Imran came to a high wooden gate. Lichen and moss bloomed over the roughly nailed together surface, making Charlie think this entrance was rarely used. Running from the gate in both directions ran a six foot high wall of crawling ivy. Imran went over to the wall and brushed some of the ivy aside.

  ‘Clever,’ he said.

  It was clear that many years ago the Donaldsons had built a wall of interwoven branches, forming a screen that Imran assumed ran the whole perimeter of the lake they had created. Over time the woven screen had been used by the creeping ivy, so that it now resembled a solid wall of green leaves blocking off any sign of their island home. The Dead, not being able to see the island or any of the activity inside, would have no reason to push through the relatively fragile obstacle. Pushing aside a little more of the ivy, Imran made a small gap though which he could just about see what lay beyond. With his eye peering through the woven branches, Imran could see that the woodland ended abruptly a few metres from the screen. A thick carpet of high reeds and water grasses then led down to the dark lapping water of the large lake. Sitting in the middle of the lake, some forty metres from the shore was the island the Donaldson family had made their home. Looking like a metal fortress rising up from the water, the Donaldsons had surrounded the island shore of their home with tall sheets of rusting corrugated iron.

  ‘Well at least it looks like someone’s home,’ Imran said, noticing a thin wispy trail of smoke rising in to the air from behind the iron wall, ‘So, how do we let them know we’re here?’

  ‘Hmm.. not sure,’ Charlie said, ‘Last time someone was already here but from the looks of it they don’t use this gate very often, so perhaps there’s another way in?’

  Imran had another look through the gap in the wall of ivy hoping to see some human activity. It wasn’t until his eyes searched the shore line for another way in, that he noticed on the far side of the lake was a small row boat. Using the same principle as their covered cart, the boat had a wicker cover over it, making it look more like an upside-down floating basket. When a pair of thin looking arms began pulling a net up out of the water, he realised the boat had a passenger.

  ‘Hey, there’s a small boat on the lake, and someone’s in it,’ Imran whispered to Charlie. ‘Don’t know how we’ll get their attention though.’

  ‘You don’t need to be getting their attention arsehole, now fuck off!’ A gruff male voice said in a harsh tone from behind the ivy wall.

  Imran and Charlie exchanged a surprised look. They had been caught completely off guard. This person had managed to sneak up on them without making a sound.

  ‘I must be slipping.’ Charlie thought to himself.

  ‘Hello, is someone there?’ Charlie asked quietly, ‘It’s Sergeant Charlie Philips, I’m from the Lanherne Convent. Is that Mr Donaldson?’

  ‘One of them. Now, Fuck off! We’ve got no food to spare and don’t want your company,’ the voice interrupted before Charlie could continue.

  ‘How did you know we were here?’ Imran asked the disembodied voice, equally surprised that the man had caught them unawares.

  ‘We’ve been watching you lumber through the wood like a herd of elephants since the three of you got to the main gate,’ the Donaldson voice replied. ‘Didn’t you see the sign? or are you fucking blind as well as stupid.’

  Charlie had had enough of this. He was just going to give them their warning and leave them to it.

  ‘Look, as unpleasant as you lot are, I thought you should know there’s some psycho raiders in the area wiping out other outposts,’ Charlie said, realising this had been a total waste of time, ‘We were trying to warn you.’

  ‘Well now you’ve told us, Piss off back to your Nuns.’ the voice replied and with barely a rustle of leaves they could tell the Donaldson man had gone.

  That was all the interaction they were going to get with the strange family and Imran was glad of it.

  ‘Ungrateful bastard,’ Imran grumbled ‘come on let’s get back to Liz. What a waste of time this has been’

  Turning, Charlie and Imran began the walk back to the main gate through the forest, wondering if they were still being watched by an unseen member of the Donaldson family. It wasn’t until they had been walking for ten minutes when Charlie stopped, a look of shocked realisation on his face.

  ‘Shit! Run!’ He said, pulling Imran forward.

  ‘What?’ Imran asked confused, as they began to run. Any care they had taken to be quiet now abandoned.

  ‘He said he saw the three of us at the gate. They know we left Liz on her own,’ he replied, leaping over a small fallen tree.

  With those words, Imran put on a burst of speed and over took Charlie. Horrific images of Liz, flitted through his mind, and he prayed none of them would come to pass.

  ****

  As Liz drifted back to consciousness she could feel a strange tugging at her waist. Cotton wool filled her brain and her fingers tingled, but she knew she was alive for now and that was the main thing. She gently opened her eyes, the green leaves of the tree canopy high above her blurred in and out of focus. Trying to lift up her head a fraction, an explosion of pain almost made her black out again, dark shadows swimming at the sides of vision. To calm herself she slowed her breathing and without moving her head glanced down her chest. The man who had hit her was pulling at her belt, trying to undo her trousers. It didn’t take a genius to guess what he had in mind for her. Without alerting him to her now being awake she tried to move her arms slightly, but he had tied them tightly behind her. In fact the cord around her wrists dug deeply into her skin restricting the blood flow to her hands.

  ‘At least that explains the numbness spreading up my fingers,’ she thought to herself.

  Glancing to her left she could just make out the handle of her sword, too far out of reach even if she could move her hands. It was a sad fact but in this new world there were worse things than being raped. As long as she could stay conscious, Liz wouldn’t give up without a fight. The man, who she guessed was one of the Donaldson brothers, was fumbling with her belt buckle, his excitement affecting his dexterity.

  ‘
Come on you damn thing,’ he muttered to himself.

  As he spoke, Liz could smell his rancid breath, mingling with the stench of sweat and shit, just the thought of him even touching her spurred her into action. With his head so close to her waist, Donaldson didn’t see the knee that Liz jerked up with as much force as she could, until it slammed into the side of his head. With a yell he fell to the side, clutching his right ear. Liz fighting her body’s need to fall into darkness, pushed herself up on one elbow.

  ‘You fucking bitch!’ he said, spitting with fury as he pushed her back down to the road.

  With his face now inches from hers, she could see the madness in his eyes. This family had been on their own for far too long. Like a cancer, they had fed on each other’s depravity, twisting the norm to suit their own desires. Liz desperately tried to reach the can of pepper spray she had put in her trouser leg pocket but as he pushed down on her she just couldn’t move her arms out from under her.

  ‘Get off me you fucker!’ Liz spat in his face.

  ‘You want me to cut you up a bit first, cunt?’ the man said, pulling a knife from his belt, ‘I don’t mind fucking you while you’re bleeding.’

  The smile that spread over his filthy face made her want to gag. There was no point getting killed to stop him. She just had to pray Imran and Charlie would come back before he got bored with just rape, this one looked like he had other darker tastes. Using the knife to slice through her belt the Donaldson man began to pull down her trousers. Smiling with a crazy excitement, the man put his face down to her now exposed underwear. Liz tried in vain to squirm away, as he began nuzzling and smelling her through her knickers. With shaking hands he hooked his fingers through the band of her underwear, savouring the view as he slowly pulled the band lower.

  ‘Fucking hell, come on Imran,’ Liz thought to herself.