Plague Of The Revenants

by Chilvers, Edward

  “So what are you?” She asked at last. “Military man?”

  “Yeah,” I replied, not looking at her. “Or rather former military man. When the shit got so bad we deserted one by one. There’s no army left now. As you might imagine we were hit pretty hard.”

  “So I heard,” said Kit. “So you got a weapon of any kind? A gun?”

  “Just the clothes I stand up in,” I told her. “Ran out of bullets and broke my assault rifle shattering the head of one of the revenants in the woods only this morning. Left my backpack behind making a hasty retreat from a swarm.” I didn’t care for stories. I decided right away that if I were going to continue the façade of being a military man, an occupation I in fact knew next to nothing about, my best hope of pulling it off would be to talk about myself and my past as little as possible.

  “Sounds like you’ve seen some shit,” said Kit.

  “Yeah? Well anyone who hasn’t is already one of them,” I said with a shrug.

  I looked at the girl before me, noticing her for the first time. She must have been in her mid-twenties with long auburn hair; average height, average build, slightly above average looks but then maybe I was biased. I hadn’t seen a real woman for so long. She continued to regard me with suspicion. I could see she disliked me but was fascinated by me at the same time. “How did you get separated from your unit or platoon or whatever you call it?” She persisted.

  “They died,” I replied solemnly. “When things got really bad we deserted our posts, went to fend for ourselves in the town. We were holed up in this loft for over a month until the food ran out, had to go searching for more. We ran straight into a swarm. I was the only one to get away. I headed back to the loft and half starved to death until I was able to get out.”

  Kit looked at me. “You don’t seem half starved to me.”

  “No? Well believe me I am. You’d better have some food for when we get back to that camp of yours.”

  “You’ve got some fucking gall demanding five star service when you’ve only just got here,” snapped Kit. “You’re ex-army so you’re used to being in charge I suppose? Think us civilians aren’t worth shit? Well a fat lot of a good you did us. Look at all this.” She gestured to the world around her. “The world virtually ended and fuck all you guys did about it except hiding out in lofts until you got the chance to run for your precious little lives.”

  “You fight like sheep, you know that?” I snapped at her. “Weak and cornered. I’m amazed you lasted as long as you have.”

  “Hey, fuck you!” Retorted Kit angrily.

  “Whatever,” I shrugged. “At least I’m not afraid to kill. You’re going to need a man like me around if your performance of this afternoon was anything to go by.”

  “We’ll see about that,” muttered Kit. She folded her arms and cast an anxious glance towards Block who was even now bleeding out in the cab of the truck. I sighed heavily, realising I needed to make much more of an effort than this. “I know you think I’m being harsh but my criticism has a serious side,” I told her, my tone conciliatory. “You need to stop pussyfooting around with those bastards. They aren’t human anymore, you know that?”

  “I’ve seen enough of them,” muttered Kit. “And maybe they’re not human now but one day there might be a cure.”

  “Forget it,” I told her sharply. “Nobody’s going to come up with a cure. Not now, not ever. You get bitten, you’re gone and the best thing anybody could do is take you down before you kill anybody else.”

  “Sounds like a pretty heartless attitude,” retorted Kit.

  “An attitude that’s kept me alive up until now.”

  Kit said nothing to this. I decided to change the subject. “So anyway, where are we headed?”

  “We’re holding out in a church,” she replied. “There are seventeen of us, mostly survivors from the village. There used to be more but, well…”

  “If they fought as poorly as that I’m not surprised,” I said flippantly, but Kit’s pained expression immediately caused me to regret my words. I started to apologise but she waved me away.

  “We’ve been hit hard but there are still families,” she said. “Me, my dad, a few others. My mum was one of the first in the village to get bitten, took my brother with her when she turned.”

  “I suppose a church is as good a place to hide out as any,” I said with a nod, declining to be drawn into the circumstances of Kit’s own personal tragedy. “Thick walls, heavy doors, high windows and if you get a break in you can always retreat to the tower.”

  “I gets cold at night,” replied Kit, staring off into the distance. “And we’re only just into September.”

  “Are we?” I said in surprise. Truth be told I had completely lost track of the days and the seasons. All I remembered was that when we were first sent over to the stadium to bury the bodies it was the height of summer. I was amazed the time had gone so fast. “How did you all come to be holed up in the church?” I asked her.

  “We’re lucky in that we’re isolated from any towns,” replied Kit. “Strange, but I used to hate it whilst growing up. Nowhere to go, nothing to do. Strange to think it saved my life. When the infection first hit my dad acted. He got as many people as possible into the church, pooled our supplies and boarded it up as best he could. This kept us going for the first few weeks. After that we had to start scavenging.”

  “How many of you were there originally?”

  “Fifty,” replied Kit with a heavy sigh. “But we’ve had five newcomers.”

  “So of your original fifty just twelve remain?” I asked in surprise.

  “Yeah well they’re vicious bastards those revenants,” muttered Kit angrily.

  “And let me guess: of those still left most of them are the elderly, the infirm and children. Anybody who could fight has already been out there and been lost.”

  Kit bowed her head and said nothing.

  “Who’s in charge?” I asked.

  “My dad.”

  I nodded. “Your dad a military man? Local politician?”

  “He’s the local vicar.”

  I threw back my head and laughed out loud. “I see it all now,” I chuckled. “You’re trying to pray this infection away!”

  I regretted my words straight away. Kit looked at me angrily and was in the process of retorting as I raised my hands in an apologetic gesture when all of a sudden the truck veered violently from one side of the road to the other. I seized a hold of the sides and clung on for dear life as Kit made herself low on the floor. I snapped my head towards the driver’s compartment to be greeted with the sight of Farrow desperately trying to repel the newly turned revenant from his throat. The brakes were slammed on and we were both thrown forward and I tumbled over the cab of the truck as the vehicle came to an abrupt stop in a ditch where it lay at an angle on its side. Aside from a few bruises I was otherwise unhurt and recovered myself straight away. I retrieved my hammer which had fallen a little way down the grass verge and ran around to open the driver’s side door. The two of them fell out straight away, Farrow still grappling with the revenant although I could see that with the deep gash to his throat he was weakening by the second. I raised the hammer and smashed it hard into the revenant’s head, shattering it against the open driver’s side door. The revenant fell back and was still. Farrow lay on the floor moaning softly, his mouth opening and closing. Kit knelt down beside him. I grabbed hold of her and pulled her away. “Are you fucking crazy?” I exclaimed.

  “But he’s still alive!” Protested Kit.

  “Alive in name only,” I retorted. “Even without the epidemic there wouldn’t be much we could do for him.”

  “But we can’t just leave him!”

  I looked towards Farrow, slumped against the driver’s seat, blood cascading down his shirt from the gash in his throat. For now he was dying but judging from the size of his wound I estimated he would turn in a matter of minutes. “Come on,” I said urgently. “We have to get out of here.”

&nbs
p; “But the truck…” began Kit.

  “Fuck the truck!” I exclaimed angrily, motioning towards its upended wheels. “You think we’re going to be able to put our shoulders to it? That was a loud crash we just made and they’ll have heard it for some distance. The best thing we can do now is take what we can and get out of here.”

  Kit seemed about to argue but the appearance of a revenant shambling down the road towards us soon changed her mind. She grabbed a rucksack from the back and slung it over her shoulder.

  “Quickly,” I said. “At least we’ve got the supplies.”

  “Two days of tins don’t mean shit when we’ve lost two good men and a truck,” muttered Kit bitterly as we started hurrying away from the scene at a brisk pace.

  We set off down the road at a brisk pace. Kit had her head down and was silent. I didn’t doubt she was taking the loss badly. Just before we came into the village Kit turned us off at a footpath and we walked down a long track by a field. I saw the church tower a long way off of course and as we got closer I was somewhat reassured at its isolated position, set quite a way back from the village with only a single solitary farmhouse for company and nothing else in any direction except open fields. “Did you know them well?” I asked eventually, unable to bear the silence any longer.

  “All my life,” replied Kit sullenly. “Farrow was a mechanic whilst Block was a plumber.”

  “Tradesmen huh?” I said thoughtfully. “Good people to have around at a time like this.”

  “Yeah until they get fucking killed,” spat Kit. “This is a disaster, you know that? An absolute fucking catastrophe.”

  “It’s not as bad as you think,” I said in all serious. “Now you’ve got me.”

  Kit turned her head to look at me closely. “You’re a real cold blooded piece of work, you know that? The way you dealt with those revenants. I can believe you were a trained killer.”

  “You need somebody who doesn’t hesitate,” I replied. “If it wasn’t for me you’d have been dead back there as well.”

  “I suppose I should thank you for saving my life,” said Kit, although her tone was sarcastic.

  “Forget it.”

  “Maybe you’re right,” said Kit after a while. “Maybe I was a little hesitant, maybe we all are. It isn’t my fault I have a soul.”

  “Shame the same can’t be said about those things,” I retorted. “Listen Kit, I know you think I’m being harsh but you’re got to face up to reality here. You sound like you’ve lost a lot of people by being soft and that’s the harshest thing of all.”

  I found myself unused to talking to somebody of the opposite sex, unused to talking to anyone who wasn’t either a prisoner or a guard. Perhaps this was why I was so blunt with her. At the same time I found myself liking Kit. It was no surprise to me she had survived so long.

  “I suppose you’re going to try and take charge once we get back to the church?” She said. “What with you being ex-army and everything.

  “Probably, yes.”

  “Well you probably won’t have that much of a problem,” muttered Kit. “My father certainly isn’t going to stop you. You’ll find his outlook is strictly civilian. He never wanted to be in charge anyway. His position just means people look up to him.”

  “And I suppose he isn’t a tyrant?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Well if I take charge you’ll find I’m not a tyrant either,” I told her. “In fact I think I’ll leave the day to day governance to your dad. My expertise hardly lies in spiritualism or the distribution of rations. It is like you have just said; I know how to kill those things and not much else. Hear what I’ve got to say when we get back to your camp and we’ll see how things pan out.”

  I examined the church critically as we entered the graveyard. I daresay architectural historians would have made more of it but to me it was just a perfectly standard church standing in an acre or so of graveyard. It had a tall tower that commanded a good view over the surrounding countryside helped by the fact of the church being constructed on a gentle hill. There was a chancel, a nave and a vestry sticking out of the side. There were four stout doors, all of them with thick hinges and thickly built; the revenants stood no chance against them. The windows were large but the lowest was at least head height and as I had never seen a revenant climb I considered them well suited to repelling undead attack unless you had a swarm come along and the creatures began climbing on top of one another. All in all I was impressed despite myself.

  I hung back a little whilst Kit approached her father and told him the bad news. The older man was shocked but not as shocked as I would have imagined him to be. I suppose he was getting used to such grim news by now. In time Kit looked up towards me and I took that as my cue to approach. “My name is Reverend Justin Thorpe,” said the man, coming forward in turn to greet me. “I wouldn’t exactly say I’m in charge here but the people tend to look to me for guidance.” Reverend Thorpe was a tall and weedy looking man with a long and pointed nose that looked as though it belonged in a book and a shiny bald head with just the faintest hint of red hair to the sides, a trait he had doubtless once shared with his daughter. He also had a pronounced limp which I imagined would make him quite useless for going out on foraging expeditions.

  “Just call me Grant,” I said officiously as I returned his handshake. “It was Sergeant Grant back in the real world but I daresay such titles mean nothing these days.”

  “Sergeant Grant,” repeated Thorpe, as though the two words were somehow magical.

  “Don’t get too excited, Dad,” said Kit cautiously. “One man hardly makes an army. We’ve still lost our two best men.” She turned to me. “Can you fix a water supply or mend a car?” She asked me archly. I shrugged and replied I could not. “Well Block and Farrow could do both of those things,” she said. “The only thing I’ve yet seen you do is kill. It’s going to take more than that to get us all out of here alive.”

  “Killing those things is a pretty good start if you want to stay alive and not hide up in a fortress for the rest of your lives,” I retorted sharply. “Killing those things is, after all, what is going to keep us all alive out here.”

  Kit scowled at me at walked off. I could tell straight away that she neither liked nor trusted me and I was hardly surprised at this. My experience of prison taught me that those confined to tight spaces and a tight knit group were always wary of newcomers, thought they were bad news. In this last point perhaps Kit was correct. Only time would tell.

  “Kit is very strong-headed but all the same I get the feeling it is you I have to thank for saving her life,” said Reverend Thorpe, as he led me into the church. The clergyman spoke clearly but I could see he was still suffering the loss of the other two. A man with iron grey hair in his late fifties or early sixties approached us. “I’ve just heard the news,” he said solemnly. “A tragic loss.” He turned to me. “Kit is still pretty cut up about it but I don’t suppose you were able to recover the bodies?”

  “I’m afraid not,” I said with a shake of my head, realising with a pang of remorse that I had not seen to it that Farrow would not turn either.

  The man with the iron grey hair shook his head again. “We’re down to sixteen now, you know Justin,” he said solemnly. “If you count our newcomer here that is. Plus we’ve lost another van and added to that we only have supplies for another day.”

  “I know, I know,” said Reverend Thorpe worriedly, ringing his hands together. “I suppose we could stretch to two days if we went down to emergency rations but there’s no denying we need a safe spot from which to scavenge.”

  “They don’t exist,” said the grey haired man firmly. “I’m out on that tower all day and they’re everywhere, completely spread out and it’ll be just the same in the houses. I hate having to make these runs as much as you but well starve if we don’t find food soon.”

  “Settle down,” I told them, trying to sound reassuring. “I know I’ve only just got here but I do have some experi
ence of survival. Let me just get the lay of this place and we’ll put our heads together, see what we might come up with.”

  The other survivors were a mixed bag and I found myself surprised at them having survived so long. The man with the iron grey hair, I soon discovered, was named Tom Hammond and he was a retired police officer who had come up from London in the hope of a quiet life. He was divorced and had two children lost somewhere in the sure hell that was the capital but at least he’d never had to see them die. There was one other young man aside from myself, a burly looking farmer named Paul Burns who was in his late twenties. He came up to greet me warmly. “Good to see you,” he said, shaking my hand with a vice like grip. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you.” He lowered his voice. “It’s a real burden me and Kit have had placed on our heads having to go out all the time and cater for the others who can’t hunt or scavenge. Fresh young blood is exactly what we need.”

  “Less of the talk of blood,” I said, trying to sound cheerful. “We must hope those days are soon to be at an end.” We laughed awkwardly at a weak joke. There was a middle aged carpenter by the name of Samuel Frey whose wife, Jeanette, had also survived. They had no children. Most worryingly of all there were four orphaned children, all of them under thirteen as well as five survivors over the age of seventy-five, one of whom, a lady by the name of Enid Dell who must almost have been ninety, appeared to be suffering from some form of dementia. The elderly all slept together in the vestry which at least could be made snug and cosy. The others slept in camp beds and on top of mattresses in the nave. There was no heating to speak of and even though it was only September the stone walls seemed to radiate the cold. There were no complete family units. Many of the children’s parents had survived to enter the church only to perish during the hunt for food. I looked critically over the children dashing around whilst the bewildered elderly looked on and immediately declared them dead weight in my own mind.

  But first impressions are often misleading. I later learned the elderly were not nearly as useless as I first suspected. Mrs Dell needed a lot of care and I didn’t think she would last much longer, especially if she had to go through the winter, but the others tried to help with cooking and a very strict, matronly lady names Mrs Brome took the children in hand and attempted to teach them maths and English during the day. Once more my experience of the prison came in handy. In order to get through the day when confined to a restricted space people needed to keep themselves busy. The children and elderly were not exactly useful to us but at the same time they did no harm. Still, I was hardly enthused by what I saw that day. Of sixteen survivors nine were either too old or too young to be much use. Reverend Thorpe was lame whilst Hammond, despite his independent spirit, could not move as fast as he used to. There was a reason he had retired from the police. That left myself, Kit, Paul and possibly Mr and Mrs Frey if we were really pushed. Added to this the group had no guns and only a few golf clubs and iron bars to ward off the revenants if they decided to attack. Such a defensive existence could not last and people were already looking to me for ideas, believing me to be an ex-army man who had survived the very worst of the outbreak.