The Left Series (Book 7): Left Amongst The Corpses

by Christian Fletcher

  Smith waited for me in the same spot I left him, a few feet away from the gunned down islanders. He gazed to the west, holding his rifle upward with the butt resting on his hip. I noticed a glazed look in his eyes and an almost contemplative expression on his face.

  “What’s up?” I asked, handing him one of the oars.

  Smith slung the rifle across his shoulder and took the oar. He nodded west towards the town. I turned to where he was looking and saw what looked like smoke and a dust cloud hovering above the rooftops around half a mile away.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Looks as though those islanders are storming through town,” Smith said. “We’ll have to move real quick or we’re going to get cut off from the harbor.”

  “Then let’s go, Smith,” I squawked. I didn’t want to spend any more time than I had to, being trapped inside the port town.

  “This is going to be a tough old gig, kid,” Smith huffed. He sounded as drained as I felt. We were both dead beat. “Okay, let’s get on the move.” He waved the oar forward in a batting motion.

  I spun around in a slow circle, checking the rooftops and the rising rocks on the opposite side of the courtyard for any hostiles. Smith and I trod across the red paving slabs and headed to the walkway that led into the hub of the town. More erratic gunfire rattled from between the buildings to the south. I glanced over the orange tiled, sloping rooftops and saw the smoke clouds to our left. It felt as though we were walking straight into the lion’s den. The only thing going in our favor was the fact the towns undead were attracted to the islanders shooting their way through the streets.

  The pathway led to a road running horizontally to a beach to our right. The road curved round to the left, heading back out of the town. A chain of boarded up, two storey bars and nightclubs with wooden and brick façades and crumbling, unlit neon signs lined the opposite side of the road.

  “Looks like this was the place to be back in the day,” Smith muttered, waving his oar at the buildings across the street. “You got The Coconut Grove, The Pink Lemon, Malibu Club, Johnny’s Juice Factory, The Broom Closet. I bet this street used to be jumping.” He dabbed his oar at each nightspot in turn.

  A growling noise caught my attention and I turned my head to the right towards the beach. Several figures lumbered from the shadows of the overhanging verandas.

  “This street is not so much still jumping but crawling, with undead, Smith,” I said. “Take a look.” I pointed north to the sea.

  “Ah, okay,” Smith said in a deadpan tone. “Probably best we avoid any lengthy skirmishes and just keep heading straight to the harbor.”

  “I agree wholeheartedly,” I said. “But the problem we’ve got is the undead are coming down one side of the street and there’s a bunch of blood thirsty islanders over on the other side. That leaves us exactly with which direction to take?”

  “We go straight ahead,” Smith said, pointing the blade of his oar at the bar directly in front of us. “We keep going through roads and buildings and don’t stop unless things get too heavy.”

  “You’re fucking crazy, man,” I sighed, but saw the logic in his plan. I glanced to the right as we crossed over the street. “I wonder why those dead goons aren’t going towards the gunfire.”

  “Maybe they are in a roundabout way,” Smith said. “Maybe they got lost around the streets or were trapped inside a building someplace and who really gives a flying shit anyhow, Wilde?”

  I shrugged. “Yeah, you’re right,” I sighed. “The only thing that matters to us is they’re on our tail now.”

  “Don’t sweat it, kid,” Smith said. “We’ll give them the slip easy enough.”

  I huffed at his casualness. “I’ve heard that one before.”

  “Ah, quit whining, Wilde,” Smith scorned. “We’re still alive ‘aint we?”

  “Only just,” I muttered.

  We reached the entranceway of the bar, which was aptly signposted ‘The Great Escape’ in green lettering above the boarded up door. Smith dug the blade of his oar in the narrow gap between the board covering the doorway and the wooden pillar to the left side of the jamb. He levered the oar handle backwards and forwards until the partially rotten board cracked and the rusty nails pinged out of the pillar. The board thudded onto the wooden porch step in two pieces.

  “There you go, kid,” Smith said, smiling crookedly at me. “We’re in business already.”

  I pointed at the door, which was still firmly closed despite the covering board being broken away. “We still can’t get inside the place and what makes you think there’s a back way out of there?”

  “These kinds of places always have a back way out, kid,” Smith said, barging the door with his shoulder. “How else do the doormen throw drunks out and beat the shit out of them afterwards. They ‘aint going to do it out on the street in front of everybody.”

  “I hope you’re right,” I muttered, glancing back down the road. I figured the undead were around thirty feet from us and gaining ground.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  Smith barged the door of the ‘Great Escape’ bar harder with his shoulder. The wood around the lock and the latch gave way with a creaking, splintering sound and the door burst inwardly open.

  We stayed still for a few seconds, studying the bar’s gloomy interior for any sign of movement or any sounds of the undead. We saw and heard nothing. Only a dusty, damp stench combined with stale beer and even staler sweat wafted from the open doorway.

  Smith nodded into the murkiness inside the bar. “Come on, Wilde Man, let’s go. And keep your fucking oar handy.”

  Smith ducked his head and stepped through the doorway. I glanced to our right and saw the undead still approaching. They had now clustered together, forming a weird kind of huddle as they plodded forward. I turned to the left and saw the smoke rising above the rooftops and heard raking gunfire from the islanders still marauding through the south side of town. Luckily, the mob still remained out of our line of sight but I wasn’t sure how long we could stay out of their way.

  I tried to gain my bearings as to the parts of the port town I’d already been through. The slum housing areas in the hills were far away to the south. The municipal building where I’d set off the hurricane warning was further on, near the town square someplace and the harbor was right across on the far side of La Bahia Soleado. I didn’t recognize any of the part of town Smith and I found ourselves in. We’d just have to hope we could reach the harbor without any obstacles blocking our path.

  “What the hell are you doing out there, Wilde?” Smith called from inside the bar.

  “On my way,” I muttered and moved through the entranceway with a bad feeling rolling around in my guts.

  The bar interior was decked out in dark wood. The bar counter stood directly in front of the doorway and all the wooden chairs and tables were either upturned or lay in busted up pieces on the floor amongst countless smashed glasses and broken bottles.

  “Shit, I wonder what the heck happened in here,” I said.

  “It’s what’s happened everywhere, kid,” Smith groaned. “And the worst thing is, I can’t see an unbroken bottle of booze anyplace inside this shit hole.”

  Smith sounded disappointed. He was probably ready for a slug of the hard stuff by now.

  “Hadn’t we better keep going?” I asked, jabbing my oar in the air but aiming it at the rear of the bar area.

  Smith was busy leaning over the countertop and looking around the shelves and the floor behind.

  “Come on, Smith,” I sighed. “We can have a drink when we get back to the boat and away from this goddamn town.”

  Smith slammed his oar on the countertop in frustration. “You win some, you lose some,” he muttered. He shuffled behind me, looking slightly dejected as we moved through the narrow bar room.

  I pushed open a dark wooden door that hung lopsidedly, almost completely removed from the hinges. The door squeaked and wedged open against the wooden floor. A narrow corrido
r led to the ladies and gents bathrooms on the right and another door marked ‘Fire Escape’ in white lettering sat directly opposite us, around fifteen yards away at the end of the passageway.

  “See, I told you,” Smith said, grinning smugly. “These places always have a back door.”

  I nodded. “Let’s just hope it opens up okay.”

  Growling and snorting noises echoed through the corridor. I turned my head and saw the undead massing in front of the bar’s front doorway.

  “Go give the door a shove, kid,” Smith said.

  “Shit, we’re trapped in here if it don’t open,” I groaned, walking at speed to the fire escape exit. A slight feeling of dread caused my guts to summersault.

  One of the wooden boards gave way under my left foot a few feet in front of the exit door. The wood was obviously rotten and folded like cardboard beneath my weight. I lost my balance and stumbled forward. My left foot sank below the floor’s surface, dangling down and touching nothing solid. The wooden floor beneath my right foot creaked and snapped but didn’t give way. I felt a solid cross beam underfoot.

  Smith skirted around me then grabbed my right elbow to stop me from falling. We both stopped moving and stared down at the floor.

  “The floorboards are totally rotted out, kid,” Smith said.

  “No shit,” I snapped.

  “If you look through the hole you’ve made, it looks like we’re standing above the basement or some kind of beer cellar below the bar,” Smith said, nodding to the broken boards surrounding my left foot.

  I looked down and saw a murky blackness beneath me. The faint light shining into the corridor from the front door slightly exposed a dank room beneath the floor. Cold air and a stench of mildew wafted up from the shadowy basement and I thought I heard a voice whispering somewhere down there. A cold shiver ran down my spine. I took a glance behind us. The undead shuffled one by one through the bar doorway, coming closer to the passageway we were stuck inside.

  Smith held me firmly in place but I couldn’t move forward. I glanced into his eyes. He still looked calm, like he always did.

  “What are we going to do?” I whispered. “I can’t move and I won’t be able to get out of that basement if I fall through this goddamn floor.”

  Smith took a brief glance back down the corridor. “We sure as shit can’t stay put, kid. If we stay here, we’ll all end up in that basement fighting those ugly fucks as they tumble down on top of us. We have to try and get to that fire exit. We’re only a few feet away.”

  “What have you got in mind?” I asked, trying to suppress the rising feeling of panic.

  The undead leading the pack trudged through the broken furniture and glass covering the bar room floor. They moaned, raised their arms and clasped their hands in a grabbing motion at the air around them, probably anticipating tearing Smith and I to shreds.

  “The floor feels pretty solid beneath me,” Smith said. “I’ll pull you towards me and as soon as you hit the boards beside me, I’ll move to the fire exit and give it a nudge open. Got it?”

  I nodded. It sounded like a reasonable plan. What could possibly go wrong?

  “Ready, kid?”

  I nodded again. Smith gripped my right elbow harder and yanked me in a rough, jerky movement across the width of the corridor. Both my feet landed solidly on firm floor boards. I smiled briefly and sighed in relief. Smith moved forward towards the fire escape and I followed on his heels.

  I heard a creak then a snap, the fire exit seemed to rise and the floor disappeared. Smith and I were plummeting downwards, along with shards of rotten and broken wood.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  The stench of damp seemed to increase tenfold while I fell the few feet down from the corridor into the dank basement. The world seemed to be a spiraling kaleidoscope for a few seconds. I knew pain was coming.

  Smith came off relatively unscathed. He landed on the hard, concrete base of the basement floor. I wasn’t so fortunate. I crashed ass first on top of a pile of plastic beer crates. It kind of broke my fall but didn’t fully absorb the impact.

  “Ah, dog shit with onions,” Smith groaned.

  I lay still for a few seconds, gaining my breath with the tops of beer bottles jabbing in my back. The wind was knocked out of me and I felt like I’d been run down by a truck. I knew I was still alive, even though I didn’t feel particularly vibrant. I knew I had to move, I knew what was coming. I still grasped the oar in my hands and was aware I’d have to use it in the next few seconds.

  I rolled to the right and fell down another couple of feet onto the hard ground. My legs buckled under me and I smelled the dank, damp concrete a few inches below my nose. The floor felt hard, clammy and cold, soaking through my clothes.

  A firm grip hauled me to my feet.

  “We need to move, kid,” Smith muttered in my ear.

  I glanced upward and saw bodies moving towards the hole we’d created in the upper floor. One of those shambling figures fell onto the stack of beer crates I’d landed on. Then another body tumbled through the hole and smashed head first onto the concrete basement floor. The second figure didn’t rise but the one on the beer crates rolled over, groaning and wailing as it collapsed a few feet away from us. The creature staggered to its feet, grasping at the dank air.

  Smith moved forward, swiping his oar in a swinging, sideways motion. The blade crunched against the side of the ghoul’s head and it fell back against the beer crates, causing the bottles to rattle against each other. More bodies staggered closer to the hole above our heads. We were trapped in the damn basement. The feeling of fear replaced the pain of the fall.

  “Help us,” a voice drifted through the gloom.

  The whispered words forced my flesh to goose bumps. I spun around. Two skinny figures shuffled out from behind some beer barrels. Smith clicked on his flashlight and shone the beam over our new acquaintances. The light revealed two young, twenty-something Caribbean girls, thin, covered in dirt and looking totally terrified.

  “Oh, shit,” Smith groaned. “More excess baggage.”

  I waved the girls over towards us. The taller one on the left was wrapped in a white blanket. Long, frizzy and unwashed black hair hung around her head and her dark eyes were wide with fear. The girl to our right was shorter and had a green sleeping bag draped over her shoulders. She wore denims and a grey sweater underneath the sleeping bag. Her dark hair was short and tousled. The remains of long applied makeup smeared their faces. The good times of the bar were gone forever. Both girls hurried across the cellar to join us.

  The girls shrieked when two more zombies tumbled through the broken floor above.

  “I’ll take out these motherfuckers,” Smith shouted, handing me the flashlight and moving towards the writhing undead. He set to work, clumping the ghoul’s heads with the paddle blade.

  The two Caribbean girls gasped in shock at Smith’s brutal actions.

  “Who are you?” I asked. The only thing I could think of to say.

  “I’m Ronda and this is Mia,” the taller girl said, gesturing to her friend. “Who are you?”

  That was a good question. Who the hell was I and did I even know? They looked so scared and lost; I couldn’t help but feel for them despite our dire situation.

  “It’s a long story. I’m Brett and this is Smith.” I gestured to my right as Smith battered another zombie who fell through the ceiling. “Maybe this isn’t the best way to introduce ourselves but we really need to get out of this damn basement.”

  I turned away from the girls to witness Smith battering another fallen ghoul into the cellar but I knew we couldn’t keep up the process forever. The girls winced as Smith clobbered a male zombie’s head with the oar.

  “We used to work here in the bar but hid down here when the dead came,” Ronda said. “We are so scared so we rarely go out of here. Only to grab some food when we can. Now we hear gunfire outside and we don’t know what the hell is going on.”

  It was a sad tale but we did
n’t have time for the why’s and wherefore’s of what was happening around St. Miep.

  “We need to get out of this basement right now, girls,” I yelled. “Where is the exit to this damn place?”

  Ronda pointed beyond my right shoulder to a rickety looking wooden ladder in the corner of the basement. “That’s the way up to the bar but it goes up right in front of the counter. It won’t get us beyond the dead. You let them in here.” Her eyes narrowed, in an accusing expression.

  Yes we had, unwittingly. But we didn’t have time for arguments.

  “Is there any other way out of here?” I yelled.

  The shorter girl, Mia pointed to the wall to our right. “The basements are connected all along the street. The door is over that way to the next building.”

  ‘The Doors of Your Mind.’

  “Okay, how do we get through?” I barked.

  Smith had obviously picked up on our brief conversation and rushed to the bolted wooden door in the wall to the right of the beer crates. He slammed back the bolts and wrenched the door open. A further waft of mold and damp blasted out through the open door.

  “We don’t know what is in there,” Mia wailed.

  “It’s got to be better than what the hell is in here,” I yelled, as another couple of zombies tumbled down through the hole in the ceiling. One body landed on top of the beer crates and the other crashed heavily on top a metal keg, producing a loud clanging sound.

  “Come on, hurry it up,” Smith barked, holding open the cellar door and waving us through into the blackness beyond.

  I herded the two girls forward and shone the flashlight so the light beam shone through the doorway. The halogen light illuminated yet another dank cellar, stocked with half empty wine racks and metal beer kegs in rows across the floor. Huge cobwebs coated the ceilings and a couple of big black rats scuttled out of the light and away into the dark corners.