by Haywood, RR
We reach the last house and the edge of the playing fields but have to go further down to get past the rows of vehicles still left in situ from when the world ended and the stupid twats stayed in their houses waiting for help that was never going to come. Only it was going to come. We were coming but the infection got there ahead of us. That thought drives me on and I aim for a gap wide enough to get the Saxon through and drop back to let Marcy punch through the fence.
She gives it some welly, not realising that speed does not equal power with the Saxon. A splintering of wood and I clamber after her as the bus comes next.
‘EMBUSS,’ Dave’s voice booms.
‘What’s that mean?’ I shout.
‘GET ON THE VEHICLES,’ Dave amends his order, ‘CLEAR GROUND. WE MAKE PROGRESS.’
He’s right. We don’t need to run to circle the vehicles now in such open land. Nothing can come near us without being seen well in advance.
We pile onto anything we can grab. I jump up to grab the open window sill next to Marcy. The lads pile into the back of the Saxon or get through the doors onto the minibus.
‘ALL ON? I lean back to make sure, ‘GO,’ I shout at Marcy who lifts an eyebrow.
‘I’m right here,’ she says, ‘ten inches from you.’
‘Sorry,’ I grin through the open window and glance ahead to see Jess and Meredith now at the other side of the playing field. A rush of emotion hits me. A rush of warmth at the sight of Charlie riding ahead and everyone caught up in the chase to kill infected. This is what it should be. Us chasing them. Not the other way around. We are the dangerous ones. We’re the ones that inflict harm. The living army. Fuck yes. I lean through the window to pull Marcy closer and plant a kiss on her lips as she turns her head in surprise. ‘I fucking love you,’ I blurt with a devil grin. This is what we were made for. To chase and hunt them down.
‘What the hell?’ Marcy grins, confused but glowing at the same time, ‘someone’s blood is up.’
‘COME ON…FASTER,’ I bounce on the spot, urging her to push on.
‘You’re nuts,’ she laughs but pushes her foot down a tad more to give the throaty engine in the Saxon a bit more life as Reggie’s voice comes blurting into my ear.
‘Mr Howie, this is the objective. There is no objective…I mean what we are doing now is the reason for being here.’
‘Not making much sense there, chum,’ I shout back over the noise of the engine and the wind rushing past my head.
‘Chasing them is the objective. We are being kept busy for the sake of it.’
‘For the sake of what?’ Clarence’s deep voice rumbles into my ear.
‘For the sake of being busy. We are chasing to be kept busy. The infection must be doing something else somewhere else. It must have a reason for keeping us occupied. Don’t you see? It fed us a few here and there yesterday to keep us heading in the direction it wanted us to go in where it was massing great numbers. This is a step ahead on that scale of thought process. To be fed and lured simply for the sake of it.’
I look at Marcy then ahead to see Charlie riding out of the playing fields to disappear out of sight on the other side, ‘Charlie, report.’
‘Chasing…five…five running…I’m gaining…’
‘Bring her back, Mr Howie. We are chasing to no end. The people in this town are already dead.’
We can catch them. We can chase. We can be the hunters for a change and it feels good to be clinging to the side of a military vehicle leading a mini convoy across a field. It feels good to hear Charlie’s voice exclaiming in victory.
‘We must not do what is expected, Mr Howie. We must counter every move it makes. It’s a game of chess and we are going after the pawns to no avail. Call Charlotte back. Do not let the other player control you…’
Control us? Fuck me if that doesn’t have a sting in the tail.
‘Charlie, back now…’ Paula beats me to the radio.
‘I can take them…’
‘BACK NOW,’ Paula shouts through the radio. ‘STAND DOWN, CHARLIE.’
‘…Standing down,’ I wince at the frustration in her voice as Marcy lifts her foot from the accelerator to let the Saxon glide to a long gradual stop.
Adrenalin is pulsing but unused and I jump off the side to pace out onto the grass with my whole body thrumming to be back on the chase. Doors open, the lads jump out, Blinky bending to puke on the grass. Blowers looks like he’s seething but holds his tongue.
‘Mr Howie,’ Reginald calls out as he scurries towards us and stops dead blanching at the unused fury etched on every single face of hardened killers denied the chance to hunt those that have been fucking us over for so long. ‘I am sorry,’ he says as though this is his fault, ‘but…’
‘Not your fault,’ Nick growls, ‘fucking shit cunt fucking TWATS,’ he turns away to vent into the open air.
‘You sure about what you said?’ I ask him.
‘I am sure,’ Reginald says.
‘Then you did the right thing,’ Clarence says from a few feet away, ‘let it go lads, let it out…it’ll come again,’ the soldier knows the feeling inside of us all and walks past to clasp a shoulder or pat a back, ‘let it out…simmer down now…’
‘Charlie, where are you?’ Paula demands through the radio, her eyes fixed on the hedgerow, ‘Charlie? Report…Charlie? REPORT NOW…WHERE ARE YOU?’
Little ones. We fight.
Every head snaps up with eyes fixed on the hedgerow. ‘CHARLIE REPORT,’ Paula demands.
‘…conta…cont…peo…vivors…’ Charlie’s voice breaking with static but the tone is clear and we burst back to the vehicles as I thumb the button on my radio ‘hold on, we’re coming…’
The lack of reply is terrifying but the unmistakable sound of an assault rifle firing from somewhere in the town centre is even worse.
Twenty Six
The distance across the playing field is covered in seconds and with her eyes fixed ahead she lets the shaft slide out through her hand to grip the end and start the swing. Meredith goes out a bit wider, cutting off any chance of the five going down the side of the hedgerow. That the five don’t run or move but just stand waiting is something Charlie realises isn’t right, but then everything is weird now and five less infected is five less infected.
They do run but not towards the attackers or deeper into the fields but back to go through the openings in the hedgerow and out of sight. It matters not, the chase is on. The prey has been sighted and they will be hunted down because you cannot outrun a horse and a German Shepherd with a whooping woman swinging an axe.
Meredith goes first. The smaller of the two animals and again it’s almost as if they plan it with Jess easing her speed for a fraction of a second as the dog slips ahead into the street beyond with an instant transition from open to enclosed. Houses on one side. Big, expensive and detached that give a commanding view of the fields so sought after in this little town.
The five sprint up the road as the hard right turn is made by the three giving chase. The residential street gives way to garage forecourts advertising quality second hand motors with three months parts and labour and a free satnav with every purchase. A supermarket petrol station so glossy and new compared to the family owned and run fuel station across the road with old style pumps and a friendly service of big smiles and warm greetings. Dry cleaners, shoe repairs, charity shops and a bookmakers complete the change from the living section to the business section and the five lead the three to the junction of the High Street and another hard turn to the right.
‘Mr Howie, this is the objective. There is no objective…I mean what we are doing now is the reason for being here.’
Reginald’s voice in her ear but the words go unheard and her head fills with blood pounding through her brain. ‘COME ON JESS,’ she screams the words drunk on the hunt like a barbarian charging across the open plains to attack the Romans who flee before her. She is conscious of Reginald speaking and somewhere in the back of her mind she even registe
rs the fast tone of his voice which means he has something important to impart but all she sees is the corner coming at them at a speed too great to take. The ground is tarmac. The horse cannot take a corner that fast.
Lean.
Not the word but the essence of the meaning to give counter balance. An adjustment of weight that seems to bend the laws of physics.
More.
She leans harder, further over to the side as Jess takes it at nearly full speed, seemingly flexing in the middle.
Hold on.
This isn’t happening. This isn’t real. The shops swish by and they gain on the five with every second of running. The infected in a straggly line with the fastest at the front and the biggest and slowest at the rear. So close now and she feels the pulse of organic energy flowing from dog to horse to her and she lifts to start the swing of the axe to time the impact. Her eyes fixed on the broad back of the one at the rear.
‘Charlie, report.’
Howie’s voice. He sounds different, his tone is dark. She grips her thighs hard to press the button with her left hand with the axe swinging in her right.
‘Chasing…five…five running…I’m gaining…’
‘Bring her back, Mr Howie. We are chasing to no end. The people in this town are already dead.’
She can take them. The one at the back is close now. Her eyes flick up to the four ahead taking a hard left onto a wide road running through the centre of the town.
‘Charlie, back now…’
Paula’s voice clear and commanding. The order given. Reginald was speaking. He said something about chess and control.
‘I can take them…’ Charlie shouts into her shirt, her hand shooting back out to grip the reins.
‘BACK NOW,’ Paula shouts through the radio. ‘STAND DOWN, CHARLIE.’
Discipline over all else and despite the blood lust of the chase she pulls back on the reins and thumbs the button on her radio, ‘…Standing down…easy Jess, easy….Meredith stop.’
Frustration all round but compliance nonetheless and Jess eases down from the gallop to a canter to a trot to a steady walk with her head tossing back. We had them.
Meredith slows instantly and stands panting with the lips of her mouth stretched back to get more air into her lungs. Her big tongue flopping out but her eyes remain set on the corner where the big male at the back ran round.
Adrenalin coursing for the fight that was right there. The glory of the battle to capture the feeling they had yesterday. To defeat the darkness and bring light. To be righteous and strong and fight with Jess and Meredith. She clicks her tongue, a dull sound of pent up aggression that demands to be released but order has to be maintained. At that second she thinks of the four lads outside Finkton academy staring down a horde many times their number. The calmness of them and the discipline shown by Blowers as he shouted the orders to take aim and commence firing. That’s the difference right there. The ability to hold your head and take the orders given despite every bone in your body demanding to do otherwise.
With a last look at the corner she twitches the reins to turn the horse as Meredith growls low and deep in her throat. Her lips pulling back to show teeth and her hackles rising to stand on end. Charlie pauses, thinking it’s the five waiting to be chased again. There might even be a few more round that corner.
‘Come on…’ Meredith doesn’t budge but stands her ground as Jess turns to face the same way despite the tug given on the reins to turn about. Then Meredith is off. Charging at the corner with Jess bursting to speed behind her.
Little ones.
She was unprepared for the jolt from static to running and has to grip the reins and clamp her thighs to steady her balance as the horse gallops after Meredith. They take the corner to see a long straight road bordered by shops with smashed in windows and busted open doors and lined on one side the massed horde of the infected thick and fresh and deep in number that stare in fetid glory.
In instinct she reaches for the button on her radio but two people cannot transmit at the same time and Paula’s worried voice comes into her ear.
‘Charlie, where are you?’
In that second Charlie sees Meredith is not going for the thick horde but for the other side and the people being held by more infected pulling them back into the recessed doorways of the stores. Normal people with normal eyes that suddenly have infected hands taken from over their mouths to scream in terror at being dragged from their homes by people they knew. People who only wanted to bite and rake their skin to pass the virus but who were held back by the hive mind of a virus learning the elements of deceit and deception.
‘Charlie? Report…Charlie? REPORT NOW…WHERE ARE YOU?’
In that same second she can see there are too many infected to fight but Meredith is running in and there are people here. Real people.
Little ones. We fight.
She tries to press the radio button while sliding the axe in the buckle and pulling the rifle round and all the time on a horse in motion. ‘…CONTACT…CONTACT…PEOPLE HERE…CHILDREN AND SURVIVORS…’
That’s it. That’s all there is time for. The horde break from the right as the smaller horde on the left release the people they were holding. They stream out with one side in wild panic and the other with wild rabid hunger at being unleashed to bite and open skin and feast on the flesh of the living.
She fires the assault rifle aiming into the ranks on the right. Scoring kills and maiming more that drop or get slammed aside by the power of the rounds. A solid sustained burst of fire that empties the magazine in seconds to render the rifle useless and inert. It gets roughly pushed back as the axe is pulled from the buckle to be thrown up and over with a hand that clamps onto the shaft to let it swing down and round.
All thought is gone, there is only this time in this place. There are children here and they must do the right thing for the right reasons. Besides, nothing in this world will stop Meredith now and she is team, she is pack and the pack fight together.
‘ON,’ Charlie screams and aims for the front line of the horde sprinting across the road from the right. Seven hundred kilos of horse moving at thirty miles an hour and they slam the first aside to be sent spinning into the lines behind. The axe swings, cleaving and driving into shoulders, necks and heads as they charge on. Meredith goes left to take the ones coming in behind the screaming people.
Charlie and Jess charge on down that first line but no sooner have they struck and moved on but more are coming in behind to take the place and close that all too small gap.
They reach the end and turn on that sixpence to charge back into the fray. The bloodlust rises. The aggression that was held in check is released and Charlie snarls with the job at hand as Meredith takes a big woman down to tear the throat out. They race back down the line but the realisation hits home that running up and down will do nothing. There are too many surging in and already the survivors are being ripped from feet to be slaughtered on the grounds by mouths biting and clawed hands tearing them apart. This isn’t about taking hosts, this is about the brutality of a foe showing what it can do.
You can’t save them all. The words hit home at the sheer scale of the attack being launched and the feeling of impotence. She draws her pistol to fire into any face bearing red eyes. Skulls blow out but it’s a pittance. The horse rears and slams down killing one more but it’s not enough. There are too many.
In the confusion of battle she spots Meredith launching herself bodily at a group of infected going for three small blonde haired girls clutching each other and screaming in abject horror and there it is, the battle line is drawn. We fight here. We fight for these three little ones. We die for these.
So be it. So be it for the glory of the fight and the name of the living army that brings light to the darkest of days.
‘GO ON,’ she roars to spur the horse who snorts and bares her teeth while charging with her bulk to rid the infected lunging at the girls. This is the line. This is where we hold and we do not yi
eld. As Jess runs so Charlie twists and slides off to land by the girls. They were two against two hundred but now they are three. A woman, a horse and a dog but the line is drawn and for each other and the protection of the three little ones they fight. Jess spins to use her rump to slam them away. Meredith bites and rags and Charlie swings that axe with strength flowing through her arms and her hair flying out with each turn and spin.
‘GO BACK,’ Charlie screams at the girls, using her body to physically force them back towards the recessed doorways.
Four come on hard and fast and charging with the strength of freshly turned bodies and those four are removed by Jess running them down. Four more come. Five more. Six more. More and more but the axe gets kills and Charlie ducks to launch one over her back to be bitten through the neck and Meredith runs to shepherd the girls back into the doorway as Jess spins round on the spot removing a dozen from their feet to be trampled by a rage building to explode as she rears up to land and kill.
‘DOORWAY,’ Charlie screams at them, ‘GET IN THE DOORWAY…’ It’s no good. The girls are too afraid to move. Terrified witless and frozen to the spot in fear.
Charlie grabs the first by a thin arm and launches her through the air into the doorway, the second follows and the third is launched screaming and wild in panic. In that second the last of the other survivors is killed and the remains of the two hundred now turn to the last to be taken and a howl is taken up that sends a shiver running through Charlies body but she grips the axe and hunkers down with a dog that gives voice at her side.
Jess rears. Whinnying with her own primeval scream and showing what majesty truly is. A beast of power and grace of height and width.
Charlie feels the pulsing energy sweeping through her. The pure animalistic rage to harm those that threaten. To do harm and to never end the harm you give for the sanctity of life and all that it means.
Jess whinnies louder. Meredith howls. Charlie screams and the undead charge towards one doorway.
‘Aye,’ Charlie grins at them, evil and cold with the darkness of Howie flowing from her eyes, ‘bring it....’