by Luke Walker
He knew this girl. Her face. He knew it.
She turned from him and he caught a brief glimpse of her profile. Although quick, the sight was enough to convince him he’d been wrong. Although she was around the same age as he sometimes pictured Geri, this girl wasn’t her.
‘What’s that?’ Stu said, head cocked.
‘Someone’s coming. Quickly,’ the girl said and ran for Cathedral Precincts. They sprinted after her, reached the road and dashed into a narrow passageway between buildings. Claustrophobia pressed in on them for a few horrible seconds. Then they were out to Bridge Street, completely exposed.
The girl ran to the other side of the road and vanished into a side street. Ignoring the pain in his side, Will tightened his hold on Karen’s hand and followed the girl. She’d stopped beside a shop window. No glass remained in the frame and although it was narrow, it was still wide enough for a person to slide through.
The interior of the building stared at him. Will stared back. The runners were coming closer.
He pushed Karen behind him, Stu and Mick behind her, and followed the girl into the gloom of the building.
Thirty Nine
Mick slid down next to the girl and shifted position until he was as comfortable as he could be. His movement disturbed dust and he held his breath until the urge to sneeze passed.
‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered to the girl.
She gave no reaction and remained facing out of the window and Mick realised she wasn’t snubbing him. She didn’t care about his aggression or disbelief. Despite meaning his apology, Mick was too scared and too exhausted to press it. He studied the street below and saw no movement. At least twenty minutes had passed since the girl had brought them into this clothes shop and led them up here to a stockroom, but the running people, whoever they were, hadn’t yet appeared.
Will joined him and crouched low against the wall below the dirty window.
‘Anything?’ he whispered.
‘Nothing.’
He peered behind them and could just make out the shapes of Stu and Karen in between two piles of old boxes. Karen’s head rested on Stu’s shoulder. Mick studied Will for a moment, then faced outside again.
‘Are you all right with this? I mean, with Geri?’ he whispered.
‘What the hell are you talking about? Of course I’m not. Are any of us?’ Will kept his voice low. Even so, Mick hoped their conversation wouldn’t carry across the little room. He paused, then continued as patiently as he could.
‘No, Elton. I mean, you and Geri.’
Will stared at him and Mick wondered if now was as bad a time to mention it as any other time.
‘Me and Geri? What the hell, man?’
‘Don’t give me that. I know how you felt about her and how it messed you up when it all went down the toilet.’
‘Jesus.’
Will shook his head and Mick waited.
‘Fine,’ Will said. ‘I admit, this is some shitty stuff. It’s not every day you hear from your dead girlfriend, but all that matters is keeping Karen safe and getting out of here.’
‘Good. Just remember that.’
‘Why?’
Mick glanced back at Stu and Karen, their shapes almost indistinct in the shadows.
‘I don’t know. None of us have a clue what’s going on; we’ve already lost Andy and I’ve got a bad feeling, all right?’
Will’s smile was weak. ‘I’ve had a bad feeling since I woke up in my old house and it was on fire.’
Mick allowed himself a soft laugh and thought of Andy laughing in the pub before everything changed.
‘I’m sorry about before. In the flat. When I said it was too much to ask. Geri. She doesn’t mean us any harm. I know that. I’m just scared out of my mind.’
Will’s reply came in a rush.
‘It’s all right. Don’t worry about it.’
Mick let a few moments of silence pass
‘Who do you think was coming?’ he said to the girl. His mind let go of Andy begrudgingly. He’d taken the bat from Will at some point without registering doing so. The chilly wood felt welcome in his hands.
‘Don’t know. The cannibal ones, maybe. This is their area,’ she replied.
‘Cannibals. Fuck me.’
‘How long before we can move?’ Will whispered.
‘When it’s safe.’
Mick rubbed the bridge of his nose, eyes closed. When he opened them, the shadows across the street moved.
‘There,’ he whispered.
‘I know,’ the girl said.
The figure, crouching low and scuttling like a spider, emerged from the shadows outside the flats of Cathedral Precincts. It was male although Mick couldn’t think of it as a man. Its movement was exactly like a spider and an instinctive disgust filled him as they watched it. The figure ran to the building beside the clothes shop and returned a moment later with five others, all creeping out to the street and all dressed in the same torn rags. They huddled in the centre of the street, appearing to confer before running back to the buildings opposite. In seconds, they had vanished. The girl didn’t move.
‘Are they gone?’ Mick whispered to Karen, and Stu slid over the dirty floor towards them.
‘Maybe,’ the girl said. She looked from the window for the first time since crouching there. ‘They weren’t the cannibals.’
‘No?’ Will muttered.
‘No. The cannibals would have gone through every building, every room until they found us.’
She slid away from the window and stood.
‘We should go before they come back.’
‘Who the fuck were they?’ Mick said.
‘They don’t have names. None of us do. Not anymore.’
They’re from outside.
The girl’s words echoed in Mick’s head and he did his best to shake the memory of them off. It wouldn’t go.
This is bollocks. This is all a load of shit, Mick thought.
He wanted to believe that, to believe the real world was right here with them and this was all a load of images somehow stuck in their heads.
Cannibals, for Christ’s sake. Shadowy figures in dark streets, hunting for them. A teenage girl without a name, telling them the people outside weren’t people; they were things from outside, whatever the hell that meant.
Outside the world. Outside anything that makes sense. Outside anything good and safe. This is real. You better accept that. Or those things, and that’s what they are, those things will come for you and they’ll tear you apart.
They followed her towards the stairs, Mick a step behind her. He pictured the route they’d taken across the shop floor—a mad dash through racks of jeans and shirts from the broken window.
Get back outside and get the hell out of here.
The girl moved with the curve of the steps. At the same time, a gunshot crashed out to echo around the stairway.
The girl smashed into Mick, knocking him into Stu. She managed to turn her face. Blood coated her neck and narrow chest. Her mouth opened and she dropped.
‘Run,’ Mick whispered.
He shoved Stu and heard screams. His own.
They ran back up and barrelled down the corridor towards the stockroom. Cheers and mad shouting followed them.
They were followed by the sound of people running up the stairs.
Forty
Seconds from the stockroom door, Mick shoved Will and Karen towards another door. Will smacked into it and ran inside a narrow kitchen, Karen a step behind.
‘In there,’ Mick yelled to Stu.
They crashed into the kitchen and Mick pointed to an open cupboard door.
‘Mick …’ Will began.
‘Do it.’
Will grabbed Karen, they ran to the cupboard, and Mick pushed Stu.
‘Go,’ Mick shouted and feet pounded through the corridor. Stu pushed him back and there was no time left to think. Mick ran to the far door, Stu behind him. They fell into a small staff room and bracketed either si
de of the doorway. The only illumination came from moonlight shining through a window in a far corner.
Someone opened the kitchen door. Panting breath followed a whisper. Then a giggle. Mick’s skin grew cold.
‘Hello?’
The voice was oddly gruff.
‘You here?’
Another giggle.
Then a sliding step over the kitchen floor.
Mick stared at Stu who showed his hand, all his fingers splayed. Mick blinked sweat from his eyes.
Another sliding step.
Stu’s fingers: four.
Another step.
Three.
Another step and another giggle.
Two.
The last step.
One.
Mick and Stu moved at the same time, both screaming. Mick swung his bat at the figure in the corridor; it caught him in the face. The man fell back, and Stu came low. His knife plunged into the man’s side; it coughed blood over Stu’s lower arm. Stu twisted the blade, ripping a great hole in the man’s body. Blood gushed. Mick smashed into him; another gunshot crashed out, and Mick shoved the man backwards. The man’s insides splattered on to his legs. The two figures behind him smacked into the wall in the corridor and both fell. Another gunshot roared and something buzzed past Mick’s ear.
Bullet. That was a bullet.
He shoved the man down, swung his bat and hit another in the chest. As he dropped, Mick swung his bat again and caught the man in the neck. He fell, choking. Then cold metal dug deep into the exposed flesh of Mick’s stomach and he realised his shirt had come untucked a moment before he realised the third man had a gun shoved into him.
‘The woman,’ the man with the gun said. ‘Want the woman.’
‘What?’ Mick whispered and the man dug the gun in further to Mick’s stomach and still his flesh was much too cold.
The man eased himself upright and stood with his back against the wall. He paid no attention to his friends, one dead and the other still choking. His face wasn’t clear in the dim light; Mick could smell him, though. The stink came as mix of sweat, dirt and decay. In his torn clothes and in the muck covering him, he was a bag of filth.
‘Woman. You killed the girl. You give me the woman.’
‘The girl? We didn’t kill her. You did.’
The man pulled a little of his scarf from his mouth. Mick held his scream inside.
The man’s mouth was open in a grin. Animal teeth, each one a jagged fang, were visible. Most were stained red and the killer’s breath reeked in ways Mick couldn’t let himself think about.
‘Should have been you. Was her. You killed her.’
Stu shifted and the man didn’t look at him.
‘Stay. Or he’s dead.’
Stu froze. Mick risked a glance to his side and down. Stu was weaponless. The knife he’d taken from Andy’s body jutted from the stomach of the first man, and even if he grabbed it, the guy with the gun would have plenty of time to move first.
‘The woman.’
A tickle touched Mick’s ear. He clenched his jaw and it came again. Scratching it would be suicide. Sweat fell into his eyes. The tickle touched him a third time and Mick realised what it was.
A breath.
His eyes darted to his right and the corridor was nothing but shadows.
A scent. Perfume. Something warm. Something clear. Then:
Mick it’s all right, call her, it’s all right Mick.
Horror filled him just as joy did.
‘The woman,’ the man said, and Mick understood it was for the last time.
He looked towards Stu again but couldn’t see his face.
You motherfucker, he thought at the man with the gun. I’m going to fucking kill you.
‘Karen,’ he shouted. ‘Will. Come out.’
‘Mick, what the fuck?’ Stu whispered and the man laughed.
‘Shut up,’ he said.
A door opened somewhere behind, then Will spoke. ‘Mick? Everything okay?’
A solid wall of self-loathing smacked into Mick as hard as it could.
Oh, you son of a bitch.
‘Yeah.’
He couldn’t stop the break in the word and he wondered dimly if the man would shoot him right now.
Soft steps approached from behind, just a few of them before a sharp intake of breath. Then Will yelling:
‘You fucking …’
The man was looking over Mick’s shoulder, his grin widening into something horrible.
A savage burst of rage exploded inside Mick. His arm struck the man’s wrist, he heard the gunshot but didn’t feel it. And without having seemed to have moved, he was pressed against the man as if they were about to kiss. The man slammed against the wall and something cold and hard hit Mick’s fingers.
Pressure slammed down on his forearm, his fingers registered the trigger a second before his brain did.
Then he fired the gun over and over, howling his fury as he did so.
Forty One
Karen stepped to Mick and placed a gentle hand on his arm. He whirled to her and there was a horrible moment during which she thought he would hit her.
‘Karen?’ he croaked.
‘We’re okay.’
He let go of the dead man who slid to the carpet. Karen deliberately didn’t look at the great smears of blood coating the wall. The stink of it was bad enough.
The man fell to his side and she couldn’t help but to look at the mass of gunshot wounds in his stomach.
She closed her eyes, took a breath and opened them again.
‘Thank you,’ she said.
Confusion filled Mick’s face. ‘For what?’
‘For killing him.’
He gave her a shaking smile and glanced at his arm. Karen followed his gaze and hissed.
A bullet had grazed Mick’s forearm. Blood rolled from the wound to drip onto the carpet.
‘Just a flesh wound,’ Mick whispered and held his hand over it. His mouth trembled and Karen kissed his cheek.
‘We’ll get something to cover it, okay?’ she said and he nodded.
She glanced at Stu leaning against the opposite wall with his arms wrapped tight around himself.
‘All right?’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ he whispered and took a few deep breaths. Without speaking, he ran to the girl’s body, kneeled and touched her face. He ran back to them, met Karen’s eyes and shook his head.
I wish this hasn’t happened to you, Karen said to the nameless girl but it didn’t help.
Gripping the bat Mick had dropped, Will held it over the remaining man. He’d stopped choking and gazed upwards, hate on his face. Karen stood close to her husband and welcomed the anger filling her.
‘What’s your name?’ she said.
He said nothing.
‘I’ll give you a choice. You talk to us or we’ll beat the hell out of you.’
Mick let out a nervous laugh and she understood it. The words didn’t belong to her any more than her anger did. She’d become someone else if only for a moment.
‘I mean it,’ she said to the man.
‘Fuck.’ He coughed. ‘You.’
She moved a moment before she realised she was about to. One movement of snatching the bat from Will and bringing it down on the man’s chest.
He doubled over, coughing, trying to breath, and Karen’s rage sang in her blood.
‘What’s your fucking name?’ she screamed and he carried on coughing. His saliva spattered on her leg and she hissed in disgust despite the spit only landing on her jeans.
‘Karen,’ Will said, reaching for the bat.
She moved it out of his reach and held it an inch over the man’s forehead. Despite his struggling breaths, his eyes widened and she relished the fear in them.
‘Why are you trying to kill us?’ she whispered.
He coughed weakly. ‘Don’t belong here.’
He coughed again and blood flecked his chin.
‘I know we don’t belong here. We d
on’t even know where here is or what we’re supposed to do.’ Karen closed her mouth and cocked her head.
‘Karen?’ Will said and she jerked a finger up to quieten him. The breath beside her came again. She stared at the man on the floor. Her rage, quiet for a moment, returned and keeping it inside took all of her willpower.
‘Stu.’
He stared at her.
‘Get the knife,’ she said.
‘Why?’
‘We’re going to need it.’
He slid past her, squatted beside the dead man and as soon as she sensed all eyes moving from her to Stu, she lifted the bat. The man on the floor opened his mouth, drawing breath.
Karen brought the bat down on his head as hard as she could.
Forty Two
Will couldn’t stop his squeal as the man’s head cracked. Blood flew in all directions and Will smacked against the wall, hand raised over his face to shield it from the blood. The man lifted a shaking hand; it dropped and his final breath joined the blood and teeth bubbling out of his broken mouth.
‘What the hell?’ Will screeched, hating the girlish pitch to his voice.
Karen lowered the bat to her legs and spoke without looking at him. ‘Did you hear her?’
‘Hear who?’
‘Geri.’
Will struggled for a reply and gave up when none came.
‘I did,’ Mick said and flinched when Karen stepped close to him. ‘A minute ago. When I …him, down there. He had the gun on me and I heard her. She told me it was all right to call you like he said to, she said …’
‘It’s okay. You did what you had to,’ Karen said.
‘It’s not all right. I risked you getting hurt.’
‘Yeah, but I’m fine.’
Karen squatted beside the wall and rested her hands on the handle of the bat. Will had to force himself to move close to his wife. He glanced at Mick, saw his desperate need to apologise for calling to them, and gave him a quick nod. He put a hand on Karen’s shoulder and she leaned her head into him.
‘What do you mean, you heard Geri?’ he said.
‘She was here. She told me about him.’ She pointed at the man she’d killed. ‘A rapist. A child rapist. I was probably too old for him.’ She let out a sobbing laugh and gripped the bat again.