Death Plague [Four Zombie Novels]

by Ian Woodhead

  He dropped to both knees and dove for the sock, but it was stuck under the lad’s trainer. He looked up and watched it bend over, drooling like a teething baby and reaching down to grab him. Ernest knew that if those grasping fingers got a hold of him, he was finished. He threw himself down and rolled to the side. There was no fucking way that he was going to allow one of Darren’s brain-dead friends to eat him in his own house.

  His ashtray was on the table across the room. He got back on his knees and crawled towards it. It wasn’t ideal, but he couldn’t think of anything else close by that he could use to defend himself. He knew without turning around that the thing was coming after him. Ernest reached up and grabbed the ashtray, throwing the contents into the lad’s face, then jumped to his feet and ran at him, smashing the improvised weapon into his mouth. He … it … staggered back and fell over the arm of the sofa. Ernest reached down and snatched up his sock and swung it around his head, waiting for the dead boy to get back on his feet.

  “Come on then, you bastard,” he snarled.

  The sound of his voice seemed to spur it on. The boy slowly stood up and shambled towards him. Ernest waited for him to get a little closer before he stepped forward and smacked him in the temple.

  “Fuck you,” he muttered as the body joined the other two on the carpet.

  He wiped the sweat off his forehead and resisted the urge to collapse onto his sofa. He clenched his fist hard enough to draw blood, hoping the pain would stop the shakes. Oh Jesus, just how close had he been to joining those filthy things? One mistake would be all it took.

  He left the living room, knowing that it would be unlikely that he’d ever go in there again. Ernest stared in revulsion at the sticky mark he left on the door handle as he clicked the door shut. It looked as though he’d just dipped his hand into a large pot of jam. He wiped as much of it as he could onto the sock, reminding himself to turn it inside out before he gave it back to Adrian.

  There was no choice, he had to check out the kitchen. He’d been hoping to leave it and head upstairs; after all, the door was shut tight, and he’d seen no evidence that the buggers were opening handles yet, but he needed another weapon.

  The soft-grip carving knife that he’d bought from that dodgy looking bloke in Leeds indoor market should do the trick. It was more like a short dagger than a kitchen knife. One punch into the eye socket, and they’d drop like a big sack of shit. He nodded to himself. Ernest had made up his mind.

  He hurried over to the door and listened for any telltale sounds of moving about or moaning. Ernest had made enough noise in the living room to excite any prone deadie who might have been lurking in the kitchen. The walls in this bloody house were paper thin; the sound carried right through them.

  This time, Ernest counted to five before he pushed open the door. He also kept hold of the handle and slammed the door into the wall. There was no way that he was going to fall for that trick again. When the door hit the cupboard and bounced back, Ernest nodded to himself, wishing he’d done that with the living room door.

  Thankfully, their kitchen was small and had no places large enough for a body to squeeze in, so it made his search a three-second affair. He padded over to the window and looked out into the blackness. He saw nothing but his own gaunt reflection. He sighed and opened the cutlery drawer. While he searched for his knife he couldn’t shake the notion that the girl in the living room had been waiting for him. He grinned as his hand grabbed the knife. Could that be possible? Had she heard him enter the house and hidden there, ready and waiting for him to come through? God, he fucking hoped not. He thought about them hiding under cars. Was it not the same thing?

  Ernest left the kitchen and shut the door. He stopped at the foot of the stairs and took one more deep breath before stepping over the dead girl. He took one last look at the open door, resisting the deep urge to forget it and run out before beginning his climb. He stopped halfway up. Oh fuck! The bathroom door was now open. He knew for a fact that it was closed when he’d first looked up here. He walked up a couple more stairs. Darren’s door was open too.

  “Darren? Is that you?”

  Deadies might crawl under cars and hide behind doors, but they sure as fuck couldn’t open a door. It had to be him.

  He heard the sound of glass smashing.

  “Darren!” he shouted.

  Ernest raced up the stairs, into his son’s bedroom, and over to the broken window. He looked out and saw a man in camouflage fatigues scaling the fence and over into the backfield. That wasn’t his son. He watched the man race across the field. God, he was fast. He disappeared over a fence on the far side.

  Just who the bloody hell was he, and more to the point, what was he doing in his house? Maybe it was another survivor just like him, or perhaps somebody else, like the Army for instance.

  It was bloody strange that none of them had seen a whiff of anyone official. It was usual not to spot a copper on Breakspear. They tended to leave the place alone, but Ernest thought at least one person would have called 999 by now.

  His thinking was disrupted when he heard something bang against the wall. The noise originated from the room next to Darren’s. Oh hell, that was his sodding bedroom. He rushed out, noticing for the first time that the padlock on his son’s door had been smashed off. His room door was still closed. He put the sock gently down on the carpet and grabbed the door handle.

  Ernest then let go. Deciding on a different tactic, he stood back, raised his foot and booted the door open. He stood on the threshold gazing in astonishment at the sight before him. His Brenda was sitting up in bed, wearing a nightie over her mud-streaked clothes, and eating what looked like the end of an arm. She tore out a lump of the meat and turned her head to face Ernest. She made no effort to get out of bed.

  Brenda then moaned and held the meat out in front of her. Ernest fell back against the banister. His darling wife was offering him the food. She wanted to share it. He looked down and saw the dried muddy footprints and drops of blood leading along the hallway and into the bedroom. Why the fuck hadn’t he spotted that earlier?

  His wife moaned again. He felt the grasp of his own mind slipping away. He looked at the knife in his hand, then back at Brenda who was still holding the meat out towards him. Oh Christ, it looked as though she was trying to smile. He couldn’t do this. Tears ran down both cheeks. Ernest shut the bedroom door and ran down the stairs. His three colleagues were waiting for him by the front door. They parted as he ran out of the house. He fell to the ground and threw up, then turned his head, and looked into their concerned faces.

  “Let’s get out of here.”

  Adrian nodded and hurried over to help him get to his feet. As they guided him to the gate, Ernest remembered that he’d left Adrian’s sock in the house. He hoped the lad would forgive him.

  Chapter Eight

  Candice Palmer waited for Chelsea Finchley to turn her head away before ramming another stick of gum into her mouth. Candice thought she’d gotten away with the sly move until her new mate punched her in the arm.

  “You lying bitch. I thought you said you’d run out of chuddy.”

  She rubbed her arm and contemplated just how Chelsea would react if she smacked her in the gob with her metal bar. “I never said anything like that. You’re hearing stuff again. It must be your age or something.”

  “I ain’t old, you cheeky mare. There’s fuck all wrong with my ears either.” Chelsea held out her hand. “Well, are you going to give me some or what?”

  Should she even be acting this way? Candice fished about in her jacket pocket, trying to find the chewing gum in amongst the rest of the rubbish in there. The pair of them were sleep walking their way through most traumatic event in their lives, and they were both acting as if nothing was really happening, as if what they had so far seen was the most normal thing in the world. She slapped a stick into the palm of Chelsea’s hand. “There you go, satisfied? I hope you’re aware that was my last one, and all the shops are fucking shut.�
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  “Have you always been a whiny bitch or is this a new development?” Chelsea grinned then stuffed the gum into her mouth. “Share and share alike, that’s what I say; besides, I got more fucking points than you.”

  “Bollocks!” snapped Candice. “How do you work that out? It was me who bashed in the dead kid’s head, and if you recall, it was also me who terminated our postman.” She reckoned that hell was already stoking the fires for when she finally bought her ticket. Killing in self-defence was one thing, but this? This was just down right evil. Thing is, no matter how many times she kicked herself, Candice just couldn’t help it.

  Chelsea glared back at her. “Yeah, but I took out the granny leaning against the side of that green van, and what about that fucking dog?”

  “Crap, that dog wasn’t even dead!”

  “Was too! Don’t matter anyway. I still have more kills, meaning more fucking points.”

  “God, you’re such a bloody liar. You so did not wipe out that granny. The decrepit old bitch was already dead before we found her, and the only reason she moved is cos you booted her.” She couldn’t stop this because for the first time since leaving school Candice actually found something she was good at. It wasn’t exactly something you had been able to type onto the screen when they had their careers advice though.

  “Wait, are you laughing at me?”

  Candice didn’t realise she had been smiling. “Course not. Look, we’ll call it a draw on the dog, ok? I ain’t accepting the old woman, though. Come on, we both saw the gunshot wound in the back of her head.”

  She looked at the end of her bar. It was still a bit gooey down there. Candice thought she’d wiped most of that lumpy stuff that had come out of the kid’s head on the grass verge by the post box. She must have missed a bit. Somewhere buried deep inside her head, there was a little voice, the voice owned by sanity, morality, reason, and empathy. That voice had not stopped screaming ever since this nightmare began. Not that Candice could hear the words. She had made sure that the voice stayed in a soundproof metal box. It was the best place for it. Her conscience would just have to made do with watching her actions through a window; it was the best plan of action.

  Chelsea pointed her own weapon at Candice. She had a cricket bat. Her end was in a worse state than the bar. What about those two kids gnawing on that dead cat then? Who did those two? It wasn’t fucking you, was it? And I also bet that you’ve conveniently forgotten about the bloke in the stupid hat, haven’t you?”

  How was this girl managing to cope? Had she locked away her conscience as well? Something told her that she hadn’t needed to, that Chelsea was a natural fuck up. Why not? Breakspear had plenty of those. Whereas the normal person, somebody with a well balanced personality would just fall to pieces in this situation, freaks like Chelsea would thrive.

  Freak or not, the girl had saved her life on more than one occasion. Candice certainly hadn’t forgotten about the guy in the hat, and she shuddered when she remembered just how close she had been to getting chomped on. The fucker had sneaked up on them when they were just coming out of that deserted house on the corner of Lampton Crescent, laughing and giggling, whilst holding onto the weapons they’d just found. If it hadn’t been for her mate’s quick reactions, her ticket would have been punched there and then. She would already be on her way down to hell.

  She hadn’t really spoken to Chelsea until they met at the party at Darren’s gaff tonight—well, more sort of bumped into each other. The stupid Goth bitch had spilled cider down the front of her new dress. Chelsea wanted to smack the clumsy fucker right there and then, and would have done, too, if that kid with the pink hair hadn’t suddenly started acting all funny and weird. When some do-gooder went over and asked him what was up, the guy fastened his teeth round his nose and bit the bastard thing off.

  The room just fucking erupted with people screaming and throwing up and everything. Stuff got all serious when this other lad went the same way as Pink Hair and headed for her. Chelsea had looked into the kid’s eyes and saw nothing behind them. It was like looking at the face of a doll. For some unknown fucking reason, the Goth chick pushed her out of the way and whacked the kid in the ear with a stiletto. They got out of the house pretty fucking fast after that.

  Chelsea lowered the cricket bat. “I could murder a kebab. You know, this zombie killing is bloody hard work.”

  Candice remembered watching her brother playing all those stupid zombie games on his 360 and getting seriously grossed out at all the blood, guts, brains, and body parts flying around the screen. It seemed ironic to believe that the zombie apocalypse had actually happened in her own neighbourhood! She knew that Robert wasn’t the only brat in Breakspear who was obsessed with on-line zombie killing. Half the kids at school were infatuated with those games. Quite a few of her mates’ boyfriends played them as well.

  “Hey, Chelsea? Do you play computer games?”

  The girl’s head bobbed up and down. “Oh God, yeah. Dead City Rising is my fave. I’m a fucking master at that game. I’ll tell you something for nothing though, killing zombies for real is like a thousand times more fun than the game.”

  “Do you really think that’s what they are?” Candice asked, wondering if the Goth had ever been laid. She suppressed a chuckle, trying to imagine some greasy scrote taking Chelsea up the arse while she continued to caress her precious game controller.

  “Well, what else could they be?”

  Candice shrugged.

  “You just better hope that they are,” replied Chelsea, “’cause if they’re still proper people, then that makes us two murderers, don’t it?”

  She had a good point there. They may have just got a disease or something that had turned them into homicidal lunatics. If the bastards had just attacked them and Candice and her mate just fought back, then she supposed it would be classed as self-defense. She watched a piece of crimson slop fall off the end of Chelsea’s cricket bat.

  They had actively been seeking the bastards out, though, and terminating their arses. Candice grinned. They were like zombie hunters or something.

  “What’s so fucking funny?” asked Chelsea.

  “We are Candice and Chelsea, the Amazon zombie warriors. Wiping the undead scumbags off the streets of Breakspear.”

  Chelsea laughed aloud. “Fuck yes, I so like that.” She grinned back. “I’m so hungry. I wonder if the chip shop is open.”

  Candice looked at her as if she’d gone soft in the head. “Are you having a fucking laugh? Do you honestly think there’ll be a queue of zombies inside Mike’s Fish Bar, all wanting battered brains and chips?”

  She watched Chelsea rubbing that metal ring she had through her bottom lip. Candice had seen her do that a couple of times before. It must be her stress reliever or something.

  “I ain’t fucking stupid. I mean they might have opened up before the shit hit the fan.”

  Candice decided there and then that it was a stress reliever. She must fiddle about with that fucking stupid thing when faced with difficult questions, like what is two plus two. The girl was proper thick.

  Chelsea sighed, placed the bat over her shoulder, and turned around. “Well, are you coming or what?”

  Her own stomach had started to growl now. The last thing that she had rammed down her neck was a sausage roll at dinnertime. “What the fuck for? It won’t be open. You know that.”

  “Well, have you got any better ideas?”

  The girl grinned when Candice shook her head. “I thought not.”

  Chelsea started walking down the middle of the street.

  “Wait up!” Candice shouted. She found that she couldn’t move her legs. She looked down and found a pair of grimy hands had shot out from under the car and fastened around her ankles.

  “Get the fuck off my legs, you twat!”

  She gripped her bar with both hands and then slammed it down. The end plunged straight through the thing’s wrist and smacked against the tarmac below. Its fingers flopped apart li
ke a dead jellyfish. The other hand tightened its grip. She hissed in pain and almost dropped the iron bar.

  The hand pulled back, knocking her off balance. She saw a bald head belonging to a middle-aged bloke emerging, its jaw opening and shutting like a snapping turtle coming out of its shell.

  “I said, get the fuck off me.”

  Chelsea had started to run back to help her out.

  “You’re too fucking late, you fat bitch,” Candice whispered.

  Those teeth were now centimeters away from her new trainers. Candice had no doubt that those pearly whites would slice through the fabric in two seconds flat.

  “Eat this, you fucker!” She finally wrestled the iron bar out of the thing’s arm and then rammed it hard into its mouth.

  “Are you alright?” asked Chelsea, panting.

  Candice rubbed her ankle, trying to get the circulation working again. There were going to be a right set of ugly bruises on that in the morning.

  “Of course I’m alright,” she replied. “And that, by the way, is twenty more points to me now.”

  She wrenched the bar out of the thing’s mouth. “Are you still wanting to stuff your fat face?” she asked, smiling, “Cos if you think that I’m traipsing all the way to the other end of the bastard estate on a knackered leg then you’ve got another think coming.”

  Chelsea waited for her to stop getting all pissy, gesturing for her to release her bombshell.

  “Cos I’ve got a better idea. Pick a number.”

  “Eh? What are you on about?”

  Candice grinned. “Pick a fucking house number. You can bet a pound to a penny that most of them are gonna be empty. Their kitchen cupboards and fridge are bound to be stocked up with shit loads of goodies.”