Johnny didn't really understand what Jack was talking about; he even thought that Jack was unsure himself, as he didn't seem convincing in his explanation.
Johnny went into the bathroom and tried both hot and cold taps from the bath and the sink. Nothing came out, and Johnny cussed under his breath. He tried the taps again, but his efforts was ineffectual. "There's no running water," Johnny announced. "I did try earlier."
"Shit." Jack stroked his chin in thought. "There's a kettle full of water downstairs, some juice and a few cans of vimto. It'll have to do for now."
"I'll have a can; is that okay?"
Jack's nod of the head informed Johnny it was okay by him, and Johnny trotted down to the ground floor, leaving Jack Slade alone upstairs.
Jack walked into the bathroom and inspected his features in the mirror that was hanging over the sink. Even after a couple of weeks, his hair looked a little longer—that was to be expected in the long-term. His thick eyebrows hadn't been plucked for a while either. He knew that if he didn't pluck, his monobrow would return. His toenails needed trimming as well. It seemed like a trivial thing with the world they were living in, but with time on their side, Jack decided to prune himself, even if he did smell like a horse's arse.
He walked into Kerry's bedroom and went through her dresser drawers. He pulled out a little white bag and found some nail-cutters. He looked to the right of the mirror and saw a school photograph of Thomas. He must have been only five years old. Jack took the photograph and gently lay it face down, and stroked the back of it as if it was a living thing.
He peered into the mirror and thought, God, I'm looking old. His annoying stubble over the last few days had now turned into a thin beard, and he scowled at the grey bits at the chin area.
Jack then looked at the back of the picture frame of Thomas and picked it up. He sat on the end of the bed, gave off a heavy sigh, and turned the frame around to see the picture of his boy. He was beautiful. His dark eyes and gleaming white smile twanged Jack's heartstrings, and he looked at his boy's cute, overgrown Beatle haircut.
With his forefinger, he stroked his son's hair on the picture and released a small laugh. Thomas was a nightmare to take to the hairdressers.
When Kerry first took him, Thomas had his mouth open and cried while the patient lady was cutting his mop. The loose hair had fallen into his mouth, which made him panic and upset. Sometimes Kerry would have to drag him round for his haircut; he would spend the whole time, from leaving the house to once his hair had been finished by the hairdresser, screaming. Other times she didn't have the mental and physical energy, and would give in to him when he refused to go.
Jack placed both hands on the back of the frame and lay back on the bed. His sobbing was loud, and the tears ran plentifully down the side of his cheeks and onto the bed sheets, staining them a little. He held the frame tighter against his chest, as his heart continued to break, and wished briefly that the leather belt in the sports centre hadn't weakened. If it hadn't, he would have been out of this nightmare for good.
A few minutes had passed, and suddenly Jack heard the voice of Johnny from the bottom of the stairs. "Jack! You need to come down and see this shit!"
Jack wiped his eyes quickly with the backs of his hands and headed for the window. The curtains were already closed, and he peered from them. There were two pick-up trucks sitting outside the street, and Jack could see eight people, six men and two women, standing around the vehicles. None of them were armed with fire-power, but all were holding some kind of weapon, whether it was a knife, a baseball bat, or a cleaver.
Johnny returned from downstairs. "Did you hear me shouting?"
Jack nodded, and continued to observe what was unfolding. "You get a better view from here."
Johnny asked, "What's happening?"
"Hazard a guess," Jack began. "These people are trying to survive, but at other peoples' expense."
"What?"
"They're robbing the whole street." Jack then beckoned Johnny to take a step forward to stand next to him, which he did. They both watched out into the street. "And whoever puts up a fight, gets punished."
They both glared out as a father, whose family were outside their house, was thrown to the ground. Jack looked to the side to see his wife—he presumed—and two little girls crying as the man struggled to get to his feet.
Jack and Johnny heard one of the men shout, "You don't ever tell me to go and fuck myself again. You hear me, cunt?"
Two big men, carrying baseball bats, walked over to the man as he staggered to his feet, while three others went inside the house to see what they could get. The men began swinging their bats at the individual. He collapsed to the floor after receiving his seventh blow and his wife and children screamed so loud, one of the men yelled at the woman to shut the fuck up.
As the two men with bats walked away from the victim lying on the road, another individual from the truck, a red-headed woman, went over to the man, pulled out her knife and stabbed him three times in the back.
The man never got back up. He was dead.
"Fucking hell," was all Johnny could muster. And Jack Slade knew how he felt. He wasn't expecting that; he was expecting the man to get a bit of a slap and be told to be on his way; that was it. It seemed incredible to Jack that the country was only in its third week of this disaster and people were already behaving like this.
Jack looked to Johnny. "I wasn't expecting that."
Johnny's frame shuddered and felt like slapping Jack for bringing him out of the factory; starvation didn't seem so bad after seeing that. "We gotta get out of here."
"No chance. I'm going nowhere." Jack was pig-headed, and Johnny could see the determination scrawled over the man's face.
"Didn't you see what—?"
"Of course I did, but I'm not backing down to bullies. Fuck 'em."
"So what're you gonna do?"
Jack peered out of the window and saw that the gang were starting from the end of the street and working their way down.
They were three houses away from them.
Jack looked at Johnny and gave him a psychotic smile. "If they come in," Jack began. "I may have to introduce them to Mr Bar." Jack crouched down in the dim room and picked up the crowbar and revealed a smile reminiscent of Alex from A Clockwork Orange.
"You're fuckin' nuts."
"Possibly." Jack snarled, and puffed out his chest. "I've got fuck all to lose, Johnny. I've already lost everything. I am gonna hide, but if my back's against the wall..."
Chapter Nineteen
Jade and Paul moved as swiftly as they could through the woodland, as the creatures from the woods now moved towards them in healthy numbers. Jade had her arm around Paul's waist and was desperately trying to help him move. His foot was broken, and every time the thirty-one-year-old accidentally put pressure on the damaged area from the animal trap, he would release a cry of pain.
Jade kept on looking behind her as they both struggled to move in unison.
"Don't look back," Paul scolded with what little breath he had left. His breathing was inconsistent and he was already tiring. "Just keep moving. Every time you look back, you slow down."
"I'm sorry," Jade was now in tears. "They're—"
"I don't want to know. Just keep looking ahead, and keep moving." Paul was certain that Jade's full sentence was going to be: They're gaining on us.
He didn't need to be a genius to work that out. He could hear the noises of movement getting louder and louder from behind him. He didn't need to look, and he didn't want to look; he knew that the future appeared to be drastic for the both of them.
"Turn left," Paul commanded.
They both turned left and Jade took another peek behind her, despite Paul telling her not to only a few seconds ago. The paranoia was making it hard for Jade not to turn around, but the image of her being grabbed and pulled to the ground and then experiencing dozens of mouths taking chunks out of her well-toned body, repulsed and frightened her. She co
uld now see at least twenty of the things, stumbling and groaning in their direction. She was hoping that they would soon be giving up.
Fat chance!
"Argh!" Paul screamed out as he went over his already-damaged foot and Jade stumbled as he lost his balance; they both fell to the ground.
They wasted valuable seconds while they straightened themselves up. They went back to the old position, with Jade's arm around Paul's waist for support, and Paul's hand around Jade's shoulder, and the two progressed the best they could with only three working legs.
"We need to speed it up," Jade stated the obvious.
"I can't," Paul snapped. "It hurts like a bastard."
Jade was quaking with panic and screamed, "It's gonna hurt a whole lot more if we don't hurry the fuck up!"
Paul was still moving with Jade, and they could see through the trees that there was a road up ahead. Paul went over his foot again and exclaimed, "Jesus Christ!"
"Come on!" Jade screamed; her heart was now banging the inside of her chest, quick and hard. She looked at Paul; he was exhausted. There was no way he was going to make it. She was sure of it.
She looked around again, and could see them in their loose formation; the nearest one was now only ten yards away.
Jade could see the tears streaming from Paul; he really was pushing himself through the pain barrier. He was struggling to catch his breath, and he was leaning on her and getting heavier, which suggested to Jade that he was becoming weaker. Trying to move on one working leg must be really difficult, almost impossible, she thought.
"We're nearly at the road." Jade gave Paul a false smile, in order to give him some false hope, but he shook his head. "What is it, Paul?"
With his gasping breath, Paul struggled to get out his sentence. "And what do we do once we're at the road? We still have to keep moving, and these things are not going to stop, ever."
Shit; he's right.
Jade looked up to the sky and her lip wobbled with emotion. She had never been a bad person, and would like to have thought that she could go back to her house one day and see if her family were still around, but she couldn't do that if she was dead.
She wondered if her parents were still alive; and if they were, she was certain that they were probably distraught that their little girl hadn't come home yet.
What worried Jade the most, was her father. He knew she had gone to work that day, and she was certain that her pig-headed father may have taken the car and took a drive to the sports centre to see if there was any sign of his little girl. With the state the sports centre was in when they left, with the hundreds of ghouls around and inside the centre, she feared that there was a possibility that her father may have been killed looking for her. But she wasn't sure. She wasn't sure of anything; and the only way she was going to know if her family were okay was to achieve her overall goal, and that was to go back home.
A few scenarios could greet Jade Greatrix if she made it back home. Her parents could have turned, or they could be alive and hiding in the house. She wanted to know if they were okay. She was desperate to know.
She had a choice to make, and she made it with a heavy heart.
Jade cried, "May God forgive me."
"What are you talkin' about?" Paul spoke.
Jade looked at him, removed her arm from around his waist, took his arm off around her shoulder and pushed him to the ground.
She heard Paul scream, "Jade! No, Jade! Don't leave me here! Jade! No! Jade! Jade!"
Jade placed the palms of her hands over her ears as Paul continued to call out for her. Her guilt was immense, but her need for survival was even stronger. She was now out onto the road, crossed it, and went into the woods on the other side. She was in tears, but she wanted to live. Christ, she wanted to live!
Once she was a few yards into the woods, she removed her hands and heard the awful screaming from Paul Parker as he was being grabbed, bitten and torn to bloody pieces by many hungry fiends. There would be nothing left of him eventually, and Jade constantly begged God to forgive her as she walked briskly through the woodland. Once the cries had stopped, she stopped walking and sat against a tree.
She brought her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. She then rocked back and forth, and overcome with guilt and shame for what she had done to a man that looked after her over the past few days, she screamed out, "I'm sorry!"
It wasn't the greatest thing to do while there were prowlers about, but it was something she just couldn't hold in.
What was she going to do now?
Chapter Twenty
"So how long you thinking about staying?"
Karen was sitting on a tree stump in the enclosed, suffocating garden that let in little light, while Pickle was in the corner, near the fence, and was doing press-ups. Both guests looked at one another and were both wondering if this was the old man's way of telling them not to make themselves too comfortable.
Karen eventually answered the man. "It won't be for long."
"Just a wee while." Pickle walked over, slightly perspiring and out of breath, and patted the man on the shoulder as a friendly gesture.
Wolf was convinced he was amongst good people. If they wanted the cabin for themselves, he was pretty certain that the Pickle character would be able to snap him in half. "I fancy a walk. Wanna come?"
Both Pickle and Karen nodded their heads and Wolf went back inside for the shotgun. He was gone for a matter of seconds and soon returned with the weapon tucked into his left arm. He put a set of keys into his pocket, and then began coughing. His coughing was so loud and violent, he ended up clearing his throat, turning away from his two guests, and spat onto the grass. He apologised right away.
"That's okay." Karen then pointed at Pickle jokingly. "He does it all the time."
Once they all left the place, Wolf locked the tall wooden gate behind him and told his two guests that they were heading for the very top of the hill.
In silence, they all eventually reached their destination, with Pickle helping Wolf with his last few steps, as it appeared the sixty-nine-year-old was struggling. Once they all got to the top, they took in the view and it brought the childhood memories flooding back for Karen.
The bottom of the hill was surrounded by a huge hedge, all around, apart from a twelve-foot gap where Karen was looking. That gap led to the football field and the back of the Pear Tree Estate of Rugeley Town. She used to pass through that gap to get to where she was now, Cardboard Hill, and would spend hours with her friends. The hill wasn't officially called Cardboard Hill, it was just a nickname. It didn't have a name as such, it was just a large, steep hill that gave off the view of the woods when looking to the right; looking to their left revealed the sight of the football field and the estate, and Flaxley was behind them—another area of the town.
"It's nice up here." Pickle released a smile and tried to ignore the sight of the smoke that was coming from burning buildings from afar.
"It was," Wolf chuckled. "I had the occasional bother with kids in the past, but I suppose this outbreak, or whatever the hell it is, puts my bother with kids into perspective a little."
"What kind o' bother did yer have?"
"Just people breaking into the cabin, trespassers, that kind of thing."
Karen reminisced, "I remember, when I was a kid, you used to be able to see the cabin. The trees weren't so dense."
"I built the fence a few years ago." Wolf then sat down, and the other two did the same, one on either side of him. "I was getting sick of coming up and finding it vandalised, and I just let the trees grow. The trouble is, I don't own the hill, just the cabin, so anyone can come up here. Joggers, dog walkers, junkies—we used to get them all."
Pickle nodded down the hill, towards the gap in the hedge, and said, "I see what yer mean 'bout them things." They looked just in front of the gap where the hill began to incline. There was five ghouls lying there, hundreds of yards away at the bottom of the mount. They could see a little movement, as
if they were still trying to climb their way up. They were clawing at the ground, desperate to move, but the steepness of the hill was eventually too much for their weakened muscles in their legs.
Pickle then turned to Karen. "Why did you call it Cardboard Hill?"
She thought for a second, almost as if she had forgot herself, and said, "We used to break bits of cardboard off, walk up to the top of the hill where we are now, and slide down. You can imagine how popular this place was whenever we had snow."
A comfortable silence enveloped the three of them and all, but Wolf, closed their eyes, feeling the gentle wind lick their sweaty faces.
"You guys can stay here for as long as you want, you know," Wolf announced. The comment came right out of the blue, but it was a welcomed comment, and Pickle and Karen managed a smile on their faces. "But I need you guys to do me two favours."
"I'm happy to earn my keep, Wolf." Pickle waited for the 'favours' that Wolf was about to ask.
"Same here." Karen nodded.
Wolf smiled his yellow grin, and turned to the ex-inmate and admitted, "I don't have much supplies left, Pickle. But if you and Karen could find it in yourselves to loot a few houses over there, preferably empty ones," he pointed at the back of the Pear Tree Estate, "my place is your place. Take anything you can from the street, food, water, batteries, buckets—anything. What do you say?"
"I think that's a fair deal," agreed Pickle. "We do need a break, both mentally and physically from the woods. The cabin is just what we need."
"I'm glad you agree." Wolf patted his own legs. "These old things are finding this hill troublesome these days, and I can't even run the length of myself. If I went with you, and we ran into trouble, I'd just slow you down."
"We'll go soon," Karen said, and Pickle nodded his head in agreement. "There should be nothing there that we're not used to."
"Well, my dear," Wolf said with a slight embarrassed look on his face, "I have very little experience of what could be down there, because I've been hiding up here since day one."
Snatchers: Volume One (The Zombie Apocalypse Series Box Set--Books 1-3) Page 67