Death Plague [Four Zombie Novels]

by Ian Woodhead

  Before he went down the stairs, he paused at his eldest son’s bedroom door. He’d caught Brendan smoking earlier this evening. The stupid boy thought that he wouldn’t be able to smell the smoke if he leaned out of the window. The lad was a moron, just like his mother. He often wondered if the boy was actually his.

  Just as he had promised, he’d forced the lad into the dog cage. Talbot put his ear to the door. There was no sound coming from the other side, which was a little odd; Brendan hated the cage. The last time Talbot had put him in there, he had howled for nearly twenty minutes. He couldn’t hear anything, not even quiet sobbing.

  His internal warning system kicked into action. Something was wrong. He grabbed the handle, pushed open the door, and then flicked the switch. The naked bulb bathed the room in harsh white light. He saw his first born son on all fours, and still in the cage just under the window. Talbot immediately noticed the other, smaller cage lying in front of Brendan.

  “What the fucking hell have you done?” Talbot shouted.

  The occupant of the smaller cage was in Brendan’s left hand. His son slowly looked at his father, and an emotion that Talbot hadn’t felt for many years made an unwelcome appearance: it was fear. The only thing he saw in his son’s eyes was his own reflection.

  The terror that he was so used to seeing was gone. The boy dropped the bloodied remains of his pet hamster and opened his mouth in a snarl. Talbot turned away, unable to look at those blood-stained teeth; his son began to moan, and pawed at the cage door.

  The key to the padlock was in Talbot’s top pocket, and for the moment it would stay there too. He closed the bedroom door and hurried downstairs. He hadn’t a clue what had happened to Brendan, nor did he really care. The boy had obviously taken something; it looked to Talbot that smoking was only the start of it. He was just glad he’d caught it when he had; if the little bastard was taking drugs then being locked in a cage was the best thing for him.

  Fuck knows where the boy’s mind was, probably orbiting the next planet in the solar system, whichever one that was. He grabbed a red marker pen off the windowsill at the foot of the stairs and left Christine a short note on the whiteboard that he’d fastened to the wall next to the coat hooks. He ordered the bitch not to disturb Brendan. Talbot knew that she’d leave that door well alone, especially after the last time.

  Three weeks ago he’d left a note of a similar nature before he left for work, but before he did, he’d sellotaped a single hair across Brendan’s door and the frame. It didn’t surprise him to find that the hair had been snapped in half upon his return. It did surprise his wife when he confronted her with the evidence. He’d never forget that stupid look upon her dozy face just before he used her back and chest as a punch bag. Talbot felt his loins stirring again. He opened the front door and stepped out into the cool night air; after he destroyed the lad’s face he might have to pay a visit to his boss’s place on the other side of town, the Stockholm Club. He always felt the urge to fuck someone after he’d fucked someone up.

  That barmaid, the one with the tiny tits, had given him the hint that she needed a big man to look after her the last time he’d visited the place. Talbot walked down his garden path and stopped at his car door. She'd do very nicely. Talbot liked his girls young, pliant, and with just a touch of innocence left.

  Chapter Two

  Marlene Jeffrey gave the car’s front tire a hard kick. Her violent action failed to help her situation in any way, but the sporadic burst of violence did make her feel a touch better, at least for a few seconds. This was so bloody unfair. She did not understand why the engine had suddenly decided to stop. This car was brand new; this sort of thing was not supposed to happen to modern cars nowadays. Marlene closed the bonnet, wondering why she even bothered to open it in the first place.

  She’d just have to ring the garage and tell them to pick it up. Marlene pulled out her phone and scowled when she noticed the time. She couldn’t stay with the car, there was no way that she could be late for work. Marlene’s scowl grew deeper when she found she had no signal. She’d just have to ring from the club’s phone instead. “Stupid modern technology,” she muttered.

  Still, it could have been a lot worse. Marlene daren’t think what she would have done if her pride and joy had chosen to stop whilst she was in the middle of that rough housing estate. Marlene always used the Breakspear housing estate as a short cut on her way to work. So far, she had yet to encounter any trouble in there, and despite the rumors, the place had always seemed quiet enough.

  The local rag was always full of horror stories coming from Breakspear. She did suspect that half of them must be made up—the place couldn’t be that bad. Even so, Marlene knew that she shouldn’t take such risks, even if cutting through Breakspear did cut thirty minutes off her journey and save her a fortune in petrol.

  She gave the tire one more kick before bending down and tapping her knuckle on the side window. Marlene’s passenger turned his head and gave her a shy smile. The woman noticed the hopeful look spread over his face, as if somehow her getting out of the car and gazing in confusion at all the incomprehensible components under the bonnet would somehow magically make the car go again.

  The man occupying the passenger seat had only just started working at the Stockholm Club. This night would be Thomas Maryland’s third shift. She had doubts whether he would still be working with her this time next week. If he did go, it would be a real shame. She really liked the young man. All the floor staff got on with Thomas. His personable manner and his no-nonsense approach to getting the job done was a breath of fresh air. It was unusual to see those qualities in kids nowadays. The lad’s undoing would be the chaos and upset that seemed to follow him like a diseased shadow.

  Marlene had not really considered herself to be a superstitious woman. Sure, she’d avoid walking under a ladder, but she put that down to common sense. Her opinion didn’t carry that much weight at the Club; she hadn’t been the one who had given him the job. The owner of the Stockholm Club, Bernard Crowley, was the total opposite of her. Marlene had even stopped the man from crossing himself after Thomas had once walked past him.

  On Thomas’s first evening shift, they’d had two stabbings in the car park, several windows broken, and a bunch of kids had tried to set the trade bins around the back of the Club on fire. Last night, the cooker in the kitchen blew up. Was it coincidence that Thomas had been near all the events just a few minutes beforehand? Marlene involuntarily shivered, hoping that tonight would pass without incident.

  Marlene opened the passenger door, ushered the lad out, smirking when he walked to the front of the car, and clicked the bonnet shut. Her dad would not have allowed the car to beat him. He would have been straight under that bonnet, and he would have usually got the thing going again. Marlene saw Thomas sigh. That poor sod would have less of an idea than Marlene about what was wrong with the car.

  She had already found out that Mr. Crowley had checked out the new boy’s checkered previous work history and found that trouble really did follow the young man around. It had surprised her that he had hired him on in the first place.

  “Does this mean that we’re walking, Marlene?”

  “Yeah, it looks that way,” she replied. “I don’t have a clue what’s wrong with the stupid car. No worries, though, we’re not that far from the Club.”

  The car had worked fine until he got into it. She pushed that dangerous thought to the back of her mind, collected her bag, and locked the car. This wasn’t his fault. There was nothing wrong with the boy, it was just a bunch of coincidences.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “What have you to be sorry about?”

  He took a deep breath. “Well, if you hadn’t gone out of your way to give me a lift, this probably wouldn’t have happened.”

  Marlene decided that silence was the best response to that answer. There was no way in hell that she would buy in to all that nonsense. There was a logical reason for everything, it was just a matter of e
xamining all the evidence.

  She looked up and down the deserted high street and decided that her car should be safe here. There were plenty of streetlights plus a few other cars parked close by. Thankfully the other cars looked flashier then hers, so if somebody did decide to have a go, they’d try the other cars first. Marlene then quietly chuckled, imagining some car thief trying to make off with a car that wouldn’t even start.

  The main road was usually busy with traffic, although tonight the place was deserted. She couldn’t explain that one.

  “Do you know what time it is?”

  Marlene glanced at her phone, noticing that there was still no signal. That was so weird. “It’s just gone past seven,” she replied. A slight unease crept into her body and settled in the pit of her stomach. Something just wasn’t quite right.

  “We won’t be late, will we?”

  “Don’t fret,” she answered. “We have plenty of time.”

  “Oh, I’m not fretting,” replied Thomas. “I just wondered, that’s all.”

  The unease lifted just a little when she saw a youth stagger out of a chip shop further along the street. He looked three sheets to the wind, but at least they weren’t alone.

  She snuck a glance at Thomas. He was rather tall for his age; she already knew that he’d just turned eighteen. He also had the right build to match his height. With those soft facial features, shoulder-length, dirty blonde hair, and easygoing manner, he ought to have a mile-long queue of girls demanding his attention.

  It did surprise her when Thomas had happened to let it slip that he was still single. She briefly wondered if he was gay.

  “Thank you for the lift, by the way.”

  “You’ve already thanked me twice, Thomas,” she said, smiling. “Like I said the last time, don’t worry about it.”

  She turned away but could still see his eyes giving her own body the onceover. Mr.

  Crowley preferred his waitresses and female bar staff to wear low cut tops. There was probably some law against that, but Marlene didn’t really mind. Thomas was certainly getting an eyeful. She mentally shook her head. There was no way he was gay; he was probably just a bit shy.

  Her love life wasn’t exactly blossoming at the moment. Thanks to her last boyfriend dumping her in favor of a newer, younger model, she had a cold, lonely bed to look forward to after her shift finished. Finding out that her Jonathon had been sleeping with some kid just out of school had really got under her skin. She was only twenty-nine, herself. Since when was that too old? It wasn’t as if she was ready for the scrapheap or anything.

  Thomas was probably the same age as her ex-boyfriend’s new tart. Marlene might feel young, but there was no way she’d consider dating the handsome young man beside her. The boy’s mother was probably just a few years older than Marlene was. She vaguely wondered if Thomas’s mum felt that she was ready for the scrapheap.

  She smiled to herself. It was such a shame, really. Marlene had seen much of his chest and arms, and he did have a good-looking body. The rest of him was probably just as easy on the eyes as well. Marlene paused and tried to push those erotic thoughts to the back of her mind. Christ, what was wrong with her tonight?

  “You’re the only person at work who’s actually nice to me, Marlene.”

  She abruptly stopped and gazed at the lad in astonishment. Where the hell did that come from? “Don’t be silly,” she replied. “Of course the others like you, why wouldn’t they? I know for a fact that Dominic thinks you’re a smashing lad.”

  Thomas sighed. “I’ve seen that oh so familiar look appearing in their eyes, especially last night when that oven exploded. They did like me when I first started, but now? Their attitude has altered.” He shrugged. “It’s happened so many times now, I could write the bloody script.”

  “They were only accidents, Thomas. Nobody blames you.”

  He started to nod; she didn’t think he believed her.

  “They all say that, at least they do at the beginning, until other stuff goes wrong, and then one by one they all start to look at me. I’m a Jonah you see, bad things happen to people when I’m around—never to me though; I’ve noticed that, never to me.”

  She shook her head, wishing that the pleasant lad with the easy smile would come back. Marlene wasn’t comfortable in handling situations like these. “I’m sorry, Thomas, but I don’t believe that, they are just random occurrences. There’s no such thing as a Jonah.”

  “Thank you, Marlene, that means a lot to me, really it does, but you are in the minority. I already know that Mr. Crowley regrets taking me on. My uncle owns an engineering firm; he got me a job there just after I left school. Mr. Crowley rang him up last night.”

  “What’s wrong with that? He was probably just checking your references. It’s standard procedure.”

  Thomas shook his head, “He’s already done that, last week. This time he was asking my uncle if there had been any accidents while I worked there.”

  He thrust his hands deep into his pockets and kept on walking.

  Marlene hurried to catch up with him. She was at a loss as to what she could do; the lad had some serious issues, that was obvious. She still believed the events at the Club were unrelated to the tall, silent lad next to her. Marlene also suspected that she was the only one who believed that. Thomas would be lucky to be still working at the Club tomorrow night.

  The boss didn’t hesitate to get rid of employees who could potentially harm his business, even if it wasn’t their fault. She expected that Thomas would be called into the office as soon as he arrived.

  They both stopped again and stared as a convoy of military vehicles turned onto the main road and slowly rumbled past them.

  “What the hell is going on?” she muttered. Her heart dropped a beat when she saw two soldiers sitting in the cab of a large lorry with gas masks over their faces. This was not good.

  “Maybe we’re being invaded?” asked Thomas.

  Marlene counted eight armoured cars, a couple of Lorries, and five plain white vans. She backtracked through her mind, trying to remember anything on the news that would warrant a bloody convoy going through the middle of Bradford. She watched the last one retreat into the distance. They appeared to be heading towards that rough estate. Well, that figured, maybe the police had decided to call the big boys in.

  Marlene turned to Thomas. “Invaded? Come on, Thomas, who the bloody hell would want to invade Bradford?”

  He shrugged. “Dunno, maybe Leeds has declared war on us.”

  She grinned, thinking that could have been a reality if both the football teams were in the same league. “Come on, you. If we don’t hurry up, we really will be late.”

  Marlene took one more look behind her before she caught up with Thomas. Seeing that collection of vehicles was going to play on her mind all night; something was going on. As if she didn’t have enough to think about. They were almost at the Club now; she could see the building from here.

  Marlene gazed up at the lad. “Look, Thomas, I’ll have a word with the boss tonight. Despite still thinking that this theory of yours is a load of baloney, it’s obvious that you believe it. The boss knows lots of people. Maybe he can find you a job where you don’t come into contact with other folk.”

  The lad grinned and hugged her. He smelled of Old Spice. Marlene’s dad used to wear that. She felt a little depressed when he let her go.

  “I’m not promising anything, but I’ll do my best. By the way Thomas, nothing bad is going to happen tonight, do you hear me?”

  He shrugged. “I hope not, but I stopped tempting the three sisters of fate a long time ago.”

  “Just out of interest, did anything odd happen while you were working at your uncle’s firm?”

  He nodded. “On the first day, the lathe operator got his finger crushed.”

  “Oh Jesus,” she muttered.

  Thank you for reading.

  Embrace of the Dead

  By

  Ian Woodhead

&
nbsp; This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright November 2011 by Ian Woodhead

  Revised and edited October 2014 by Linda Tooch

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, scanning or otherwise, without prior permission of the author.

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  Prologue

  James Darwin watched in exasperation as his two best friends scurried up that rusty metal ladder bolted to the sewer wall. The comparison of their frantic movements to that huge rat that landed on Adam’s shoulder wasn’t lost on him. It wouldn’t be all that surprised if they started to squeak like that fucker as well.

  “You’re both a set of cowards!” he shouted. “It’s gone now; your pathetic bleating scared it away.”

  The curved sewer wall amplified his shouts, making his voice sound twice as loud. Adam and Oliver both paused on the ladder but they didn’t turn back. James tutted in disgust as they climbed out onto the surface, leaving him alone.

  Were they still up there? Hanging around to see if he’d follow them up? Well, if the yellow twats were intending to wait then they’d be hanging around for a long fucking time; James had no intention of joining them.