From the knot of staff officers lingering behind the line with the general, a solitary horseman peeled off and headed westwards, at a gallop, no less. Hello - We’ll soon be having more unwanted company, thinks I.
The smoke had largely cleared and there was an eerie silence as it drifted across the calm Edinburgh sky. I was joined up top by a trio of curious officers, a number of troopers and even some of Duff’s men had come to watch the spectacle.
Then, in one smooth impeccable motion, each and every man in the front rank raised their rifles. It was like a perfect wave of steel and wood, of Enfield rifles, as they each levelled and pointed at the oncoming herd. I saw a colonel with a raised sword at the tip of the right flank and then he brought it down and I saw a second ripple, this time of smoke and fire as that thin line disappeared behind a fresh cloud of smoke. My eyes flicked back to the dead whose front rows were struck, as though a plodding rhino had been clubbed about the legs with a large stick. All it did was acknowledge the strike, before continuing to push onwards as gaps opened up within them only intermittently.
Seconds later there was another rolling flash from within the pall, as the rear rank fired, and more dead went down but even more were struck without even realising it.
I’d been so mesmerised by the raging battle that I didn’t notice until now that the prisoners were being marched back through the courtyard, job done and thank you very much chaps - Now back to the cells for you lot. They filed past Duff, manacled and miserable, in the direction of the stone steps that lead into the abyss, each expression grim and weary.
Stunned, Duff shook his head and marched up and down the procession, grabbing wrists, shoulders, chains, waving his arms about and demanding to know what of it, who they were and why in the blazes were they all so emaciated.
“I’ve not seen the like since India, bigad, where a mouthful of water can strip the flesh from your bones. You there…stop and tell me what’s what, what?”
One man stopped and was customarily whipped for his trouble and then Duff threatened the whole lot of them with a court martial lest somebody furnish him with a satisfactory explanation.
Not five seconds after the prisoners were safely out of sight did the aid to General Mackenzie hurtle into the courtyard, horse scraping to a halt as he waved around a piece of paper and demanding to know who the devil was in charge. His horse panted obscenely, yet was given no respite as, what I saw to be a middle aged colonel, clattered between the various mingling groups in search of an officer.
It was Duff who spotted him and now marched in his direction, securing his shako as he did. “Major Duff, sir, and…”
“…Ah, yes, Major…General Mackenzie’s compliments and why the fucking hell are you not on the hills?”
The major stepped back and thrust out his chest. “Why am I not on the hills, sir? Can’t you see, Colonel? I’d have thought it bloody obvious. And I must register my objection to the use of that tone, sir.”
The crop shook in his hand. “Damn you and your objection. Can’t you hear the infantry? You’re supposed to be there…you and your toy guns, to rake the dead, protect the division,” the colonel took in the barracks, the nearby men standing and watching, the animals and dearth of proactivity and threw up his arms, “and yet you’re not even ready, as Scotland stands on the brink. Do you want your name in the history books, Major? Because it will be. You’ll be the man, Major Duff, who doomed Britannia. Now move yourself, this instant!”
Major Duff stepped back further, then forward again before shouting loud enough for everyone to hear. “My orders, sir, are to sally out with the Greys…and, as you can damn well see for yourself, sir, they’re damn well more preoccupied with goat herding, for whatever reasons I can only comprehend, than with saving Britannia. And don’t think I haven’t bloody well tried, what? But getting answers around here is like trying to get a shilling from a sour faced Scotchman.”
“Officers? Where are they?” Seethed the colonel.
Duff’s red face darted about and appeared on the brink of breaking down. “Why, there’s one right up there sir, atop that wooden contraption…staying well out of the way and no doubt pissing in his breeches.”
My chest thudded and then again as I made eye contact with the colonel from across the gulf. I gasped and edged back amongst the others watching the battle but thankfully he turned his attention back to Duff.
“And the colonel? This Dolan man…where is he?”
Duff let out a bark.
“Is that all you have to say for yourself?” Another volley echoed across the sky and the colonel twisted quickly to look through the gates. “Now you listen to me, Major, this is the last place I need to be right now, so I suggest you find the colonel…this instant…no, no, how dare you try and interrupt…find the colonel, this instant and get your worthless buttocks to the Braid Hills…our right flank…and flay the enemy. I will see you broken, Major, just you see if I don’t, so don’t make me come back here because next time I’ll bring the bloody general with me and he don’t travel alone, you see…why are you still standing there, damn your eyes. Now move!”
And with that the man wheeled around and clattered out the way he came, expertly leaping three ditches as he did, yet not making the connection.
Another volley alerted me to the battle where, on the infantry’s left, enemy stragglers were attempting the hill, sensing easier flesh, only to find their legs lacked the strength and what little minds they had, the coordination. They tumbled back down, bowling over their brethren before others stepped over them to attempt the same physically impossible task. But whilst it was all laughs on the left, over on the right it was a different matter.
Where we should now have been arriving to mop up those dead who, by cognition or instinct, attempted to outflank our boys on the right, instead there was nobody there to face them. Indeed, somehow, a large gathering of the dastards found themselves so far out and isolated from the rest that they now approached the infantry line almost side on.
A plucky officer on horseback saw the threat and then a company peeled off from the end of the line to deal with it, the job that was supposed to be ours. I had no doubt they could handle the challenge, at this point, but it meant that valuable firepower was diverted from the main force at the front.
Dolan emerged and sat at the table that had been assembled for him. Duff wasted no time and marched straight over, red faced and flaring and I only wish I was privy to the details of the resultant conversation. There was no misinterpreting the body language however, Duff flailing around wildly as the colonel leaned back, hands clasped behind his ginger head.
This continued for at least a minute, whilst I watched with fascination then finally, Dolan stood and strolled back inside, leaving a perplexed major seething on the spot.
A few minutes later, the colonel returned - Covered in pigeons. He resembled something from the folklore of some wild and long extinct culture, and good riddance. It was the most inanimate I’d seen Duff since his arrival. Then Dolan resumed his seat, twitched several times and began moving chess pieces about the board like some master field marshall, perhaps even Wellington himself.
Duff threw up his arms, span around then bawled across the courtyard. “Shropshire Royal Horse Artillery…secure the guns, mount your horses…we’re off and good riddance to this mad house.” He stomped across the cobbles without giving Dolan another thought but then checked his step and rubbed his eyes, half way to the gates, and glared over at Skinner, who was busy closing them. Duff hesitated a mere second before approaching the berserker. “I beg your pardon, sir? What is the meaning of this? In case you hadn’t noticed, there’s a bloody battle raging on, and being soldiers, we’re off to fight in it.” The man really did have no sense of peril and now approached to within a single pace of the red headed giant.
Skinner knocked him on his arse with a backhanded slap across the face, probably doing him a favour. “Watch who yee speaking to oor next time I’ll feed yee to t
he dayd.”
Surprisingly, Duff had the good sense to remain floored and nursed his reddened cheek as Skinner strode toward the Shropshires, in limbo over whether to accost their commanding officer’s assailant as a group or else remain stood impotent and do nothing. In the face of the man, they chose the latter - A wise choice.
“Now yee all listen to me. As yee’ve probably already guessed, we’re not gooing anywheres, least of all to fight the dayd, to be toorn apart by some stinking zombie just because a general says soo. Soo I’m giving yee each a choice. Either yee fayt and survive with us, or yee can each goo doown to the cells and rot, and believe yee me, we’ll still find a use foor yee all.” His voice easily carried above the constant crackling of rifles as he circled the lot of them like a lion would puppies, his blade still in its scabbard.
For my money, it was an easy decision, but then, not being a proper soldier, I didn’t have the long and short of those who were.
All sixteen men, along with their bruised officer chose to go down and I watched and scratched my head as they were each disarmed and manhandled before disappearing down those ugly stone steps, escorted by thirty bullies in cavalry uniform.
And that was when I saw the guns, four of them, each unaccompanied and in the face of the ongoing battle not far away, were all too tempting.
With a small team of men, I had three moved to face the gates at the south wall, the most likely place the dead would enter. Thinking myself clever, I then double shotted each with canister filched from the Shropshire’s wagons and left them in position in the likelihood they’d be required.
I then had the fourth gun detached from its wheels and hauled up the watchtower. The wooden boards and crossbeams creaked from the weight, the combined strength of six Macs required for the task of heaving at the rope wound around a pulley. It swayed and banged with every tug and at one point I worried that given the right angle and force, it would smash through the planks. It didn’t though and whence up top I had the wheels reattached and set the contraption to face the point at which the dead would likely approach. Along with the cobble projectiles, I’d say the watchtower was one place the dead would want to stay clear of. An apocalypse it may have been and despite my decaying bowels, there was no reason why my remaining time on earth couldn’t at least partially be used in light hearted moments with the lads and it was clear they now regarded me as one of them. Some of the boys even patted me on the back as I triple shotted the gun with a smirk, and more than one begged to be the man allowed to light the fuse.
Who was I to refuse such a reckless request? After all, I didn’t wish to be near the gun myself when it went off and woe betide too, any dead within its destructive range.
The fun was such it was easy to forget a battle for Scotland was presently waging and with the watchtower now crammed with men from the tallest nation on earth, finding a decent view proved tricky. This was compounded by the smoke, which not only covered the entirety of the infantry but had also drifted over on the breeze so that only sections of Braid Hills were visible at any moment. It was all still ongoing though, because at no point had the distant crackles of volley fire ceased or even slowed and it was one thing that up until now I’d not considered, whether this was a good thing or not.
“If the general wins, we’re in for it.”
“He woon’t win, he’s too far ootnumbered.”
“The colonel knows what he’s doing, I think.”
“Best we can hoop is he softens ‘em up foor us.”
Then a pigeon flew over the wall, glided across the courtyard and dived through the opened window of Dolan’s pigeon coop come office. It was the sixth bird I’d counted in the last thirty minutes and I knew they’d be spitting murder at us from behind the safety of the castle walls. I had no doubt that even now they’d be watching us through their spyglasses; generals, brigadiers, noblemen, perhaps even royalty. They’d see how we’d not sallied out, to play our part, to die just so others could live. Well, they could all go rot for all I cared.
A strong gust cut across the capital and then the fields were visible, revealing the piles of dead where each volley struck the horde and how they’d continued pushing forwards, only to be hit by the next volley, creating a fresh pile as straight as a stack of corpses could be, a fresh obstacle for those behind to scale. But scale they continued to do because the heaps of corpses were now uncomfortably close to the infantry, who continued reloading and firing like the well drilled machines they were; the infantry of Britannia, the only soldiers in the world who trained with live ammunition.
But not even these facts could prevent this latest development from unfolding on Braid Hills. The infantry had been well dug in, but now their right flank began to turn as the Black Watch were ordered to wheel around, like a hinge on the kilts of the 78th Highlanders in the centre. This manoeuvre was necessary to prevent them being outflanked by the thousands of dead who now staggered across the meadow grass on the vulnerable right. There, after several volleys, the dead advance slowed but the line was now bent, which meant the push towards the centre increased as less firepower was concentrated there, where it was needed most. And at the very angle of the bend, where Highlander met Watchman, that was where they were most vulnerable and that was where, by instinct, the dead stumbled toward.
Horrendously, the Black Watch were forced to wheel yet further around on the line as the dead began to emerge in greater numbers even further to the north and now there was the very real danger the infantry could be surrounded. The firing slowed as the Watch took its new position and there now resembled almost a right angle at the critical point.
Every man atop the tower knew it, we could all see how the battle was progressing and we all knew how it was we who’d failed the nation by not sallying out to protect the right. And if those watching from the safety of the garrison walls felt bad about it, they kept it to themselves. Indeed, our collective silence said it all.
But what choice had we now? We’d already made it, or had it forced upon us, and couldn’t now change it anyway. And regardless of the battle’s outcome, we’d only live as long as we could hole up here and to the devil with everyone else.
In contrast to the centre, the dead who fell on the right did not do so in orderly lines resulting from organised volley fire, no, they approached scattered across the entire plane, so ragged they were, but it was certainly enough to cause problems. The numbers were now so thick that the Black Watch were ordered to pace back, giving themselves more breathing space to fire off those extra few volleys, but causing havoc with the formation as the Watch began to overlap the Highlanders, exposing to an obscene degree the right flank of the latter where the leading dead, always the tallest, always the freshest, were almost upon them.
Indeed, the dead were so close now that the commander had no alternative.
General Mackenzie gave the order.
I couldn’t hear it, but I did see the simultaneous unsheathing of two and a half thousand pieces of razor sharp steel that glinted in the light. Three seconds was all it took for every bayonet to be affixed to the ends of the rifles and then each man stood rigid, toy soldiers from this distance, rifles pulled into sides, seemingly unmoved as to the moment. It was a bravery I could not even comprehend, unable as I was to imagine how it would feel to be one of them, preparing to charge with comrades, life long friends and brothers into that dense mass of certain death - Poor fools.
The eerie silence stretched on, the whole world silent as the breeze appeared to breathe, as men looked left or right to their friends, to mutter words, perhaps of good luck, or goodbye.
Then Mackenzie cut his blade through the air and three colonels shouted the order to three regiments…
…and then two thousand five hundred men charged, lead only by their steal, into that mass of zombies.
Along the entire length of the former line still stood solitary men, intermittently spaced, maybe twenty or thirty of the entire infantry, who refused to charge, paralysed by fear
as they were. Sergeants and corporals, whose job was to remain behind the line, barked out orders, giving them one last chance, levelling pistols, demanding they charge. Perhaps four or five did. I counted to three and then small wisps of smoke drifted up from the weapons as the remainder were pitched back, three seconds later the crackles reported on the breeze.
The line struck the solid mass and that mass shuddered and stalled under the pressure, the indescribable sound carrying back to us as men along the entire front crashed into it. Some were thrown back, a few leapt into the abyss screaming, most remained stood and pinned in a new and delicate equilibrium born from two giant forces colliding, the men thrusting repeatedly with their points. For the most part, whether a soldier survived the initial contact was largely dependant on where that first strike plunged. Those who found a head pulled their blades free to thrust and jab and poke again. Those who missed then had to deal with an unrestricted zombie, thrashing and clawing at them whilst their weapon was stuck, buried inside chests and necks or lodged between ribs, the strength of the suction often preventing a return.
The line was being overlapped and not just from the sides but also from above and below as the dead strained to find any and all means to arrive at their prey. I saw one obscene zombie launch through the air, landing on its back behind the kilts of the Highlanders before rising and coming at one unfortunate fellow from behind. Another man was pulled into the void, then another and another and again, along the entire front, men turned, threw down their weapons and ran back only to be shot down by sergeants.
The general, along with a half dozen staff officers on horseback trotted toward the melee, picked out an opening where so many redcoats had been vanquished and charged in a forlorn, desperate bid for something, but what? I watched as the six horses struck the mass, sending dead hurtling back through the air. They came to a stop somewhere inside that horrific mess and slashed down and everywhere with sabres but any gap they created was quickly closed as more took their place and then horses were being pulled down and the men upon them. Mackenzie raised his sword up high, seemed to be screaming something and was then wrenched off, to disappear in the fog.
Not Dead Yet: A Zombie Apocalypse Series - Books 1 - 2 Page 38