Norris had his intact group arranged in a circle facing outwards so that each man had his back covered and already a ring of dead lay split and sprawled on the bloody ground surrounding them and the more dead that fell, the safer they were within that rapidly emerging protective wall of stinking carcasses. Other groups attempted to follow likewise but most found themselves hindered with a dead or injured man and no other quintet possessed a Norris, a quick thinking and experienced officer to organise them. I considered throwing myself upon his mercy but I still had options before things became that desperate.
Dolan sat squinting at his game, behind a trio of burly sergeants each with steel drawn and I ran forth, trying to look and sound composed, which took a great deal of effort.
“Sir, speaking as a man who, like yourself, is experienced in dealing with the dead, might I make the suggestion that we make preparations for the safe deliverance of the colours.” I gestured airily to where one trooper lay sprawled on the floor, his intestines being drawn like sausage links by a hungry zombie. “It hurts to even think such things, you see, I truly want to defeat these dastards but, as you know sir, our primary responsibility is to those two invaluable pieces of cloth presented to us by Queen Victoria herself, bigad. The time has arrived and now we must put the colours first, because I truly believe we’ve reached the stage where our most prized possessions are in very real danger and should therefore be sent on horseback, to somewhere they can be protected.” I wiped my forehead and tried to look sad. “It pains me dearly to leave you, sir, in the regiment’s hour of need, but I’m willing to make the personal sacrifice of any glory you’ll all bestow upon yourselves by remaining present, to ensure the colours’ safety.”
By God but I hoped that would do it. If I knew these maniacs like I thought I did, then bringing the colours into it had a far greater chance of success than if I’d offered to ride out with his wife and child.
“Sir, are you listening? I can be off with the colours on a fast horse in two minutes flat…just say the bloody word.” I was standing in his personal space and had long since lost my composure.
He moved a pawn against another and removed it from the board. “Sorry, Strappy, what was that?”
“Oh to the blazes with it man!”
There was no getting through to the master strategist, at least not until he’d first succeeded in defeating himself. Oh the luxury of being able to switch off like that, to be unaware your command was dying all around and that you looked like a complete idiot. If I hadn’t known it before, now there was no escaping the fact - The colonel was dicked in the nob, stark staring insane, bedlam bound and a threat to my life span.
But he still held the protection of three heavily armed and capable looking fighting men and so I nodded to each in turn, drew my pistol for show, and endeavoured to remain close by.
Through the broken gates, the dead were now entering en masse, mainly to stagger toward the greatest concentration of potential sustenance; the prisoners. Though worryingly, some zombies found themselves in strange positions, one slipping over on the mess that had collected on the latrine step as it left, another two shambling from the direction of the stables and I wondered if they were also entering from the north and if any men had ever been positioned there to counter them. To one bull interrupted whilst feeding from a trough of oats, it mattered not, and I watched with amazement as it plunged into a zombie, smashing it into the eastern wall, red chequered kilt and all, severing it in half at the belly.
Amidst it all, Skinner and Muir had commenced squabbling over a fresh topic and were both close enough I could hear the shouts and insults above the occasional crackle of carbines, the screams of men and that ever present and incessant humming omitted from the dead. And this time, it was Muir I had to agree with.
“Bring those men back, we need them here.”
“I toold yee to mind the prisoners, Meejor.”
Muir’s eyes bulged. “Where are they going? What…why are they heading to the stores…what is the matter with you? We need them here, damn your eyes, Captain.”
I could hardly believe it myself, but Skinner had sent five men down to guard the whisky, even as we were being overwhelmed. It truly was absurd, to the few remaining non-drunkards, but probably about par for the golf course to the average Scot.
“That Scotch mayt be the last in all Scotland foor all yee knoo, Meejor, soo stand doown, I tell yee, oor accept yeer feyt.”
“My fate? My fate is the same as yours, you horrific murdering throwback.” He was already marching after the men and called out to their backs. “You there, I order you to stop at once or I’ll have you courtmartialed.” He shouted before his head disappeared in a mist of red, his body continuing for several more steps before the legs collapsed from under it.
There was barely a man in the garrison who missed it, despite being ball deep fighting for their lives, as Skinner holstered his smoking pistol and screamed at the five men to get down below, to save the Scotch and for everybody else to fight like their very lives depended on it, or else.
And if there was any man who couldn’t by now see it, he never would, that Skinner was more harm than good, more so even than myself, the devil himself in uniform. That he’d slaughter another officer, this one technically superior, and liked, even if not respected; clearly the man was out of control and capable of killing everyone and probably would too. But who remained to do a damned thing about it?
The fighting lulled, at least around what remaining Scots Greys still fought for the regimental interests, as most now glared, stunned, at the giant, from all corners of the field, to Muir’s stiff headless corpse prone in a heap of cow dung and back to Skinner.
It was a pivotal moment, more so than when Duff was murdered, as this was one of ours and had been acting in our interests. As with all coups, mutinies and revolutions, there first needs to have been a general discontent, preferably a burning one and for some considerable time before that critical spark with the potential to inflame the people occurs. We had that here, two of the three required ingredients to upset the prevailing order prior to establishing a new one. What we lacked however was that final critical element, a man to take charge, to rally the troopers and do to Skinner what was needed.
Oh, I’ve no doubt there were those subconsciously scanning for me, where I stood concealed behind my wall of sergeants and in turn, I noticed the hands twitching around carbine stocks. Yet even now, not one man had the decency to shoot the murdering bastard.
“Aboot yeer business yee scoondrels.” He approached a zombie and wrenched its head off with his hands.
The men had stopped altogether now, some measuring the distance to the gates, one going as far as removing his cross belt and throwing it to the floor.
“I sayd, aboot yeer business.”
But they continued glaring at him.
“The man’s a meeniac.”
“I soold my honoor for thes.”
Skinner didn’t much take to being the object of such sudden scrutiny and showed his displeasure by piercing a nearby trooper through the gut, for the crime of ‘looking at him funny.’
Someone shouted an obscenity and then another and then everything changed…
…As more zombies tipped inside from atop the walls, two Greys now ran for them, sprung off a bale of hay and attempted to pull themselves over.
Skinner shot one in the back as the second was caught on the rampart and had his throat mauled by a kilted demon.
That was the moment the whole debacle finally fell apart as every remaining Scots Grey abandoned any pretence of formation or of fighting order to instead fight only for themselves. I feared there’d be a sudden rush for the stables and for my particular horse who was ready to flee at a moment’s notice, but now the horde too flocked from that very direction and if anyone had the same idea as myself, they soon forgot it. The only men apparently remaining focused on the dead were the prisoners and I saw several Greys approach the small groups before beggi
ng to be allowed to join and fight with them - Funny how things can change. Some were permitted, because let’s face it, it was no time for being petty about sides or of insignificant past disagreements, but I saw three Greys turned away, at least one with a sabre slash across the face. It really was the luck of the draw and not one I cared to chance personally. But fight, the prisoners still did, which was a credit to them, but being chained to each other the way they were, it wasn’t like they could escape anyway.
With a deafening blast and the cutting of a thousand fragments through air, the final cannon unleashed its double shot of canister, this barrage actually striking in a way that could be considered half useful and a large arc of the dead were pitched backwards, most too obliterated to stand again and I saw the grinning shooter behind draw his sword before charging and screaming headlong into a pack of zombies, the maniac.
For the most part the sheep, pigs and everything else plodded away from the dead but stayed close enough to watch whilst regarding the whole event with curiosity.
But now the courtyard was becoming too crowded for old Strappy’s liking and it was time to have another go at our glorious leader, for my very life depended on it.
“Sir, for the love of God, St Patrick and Ireland itself, you must order an evacuation. Half the men are attempting to run for it anyway…just waiting for the bloody opening, I can assure you…so might as well make it official. Come on, man, this must be it, if the dead don’t kill us, we’ll be killing each other at this rate…would you just take a look.” I pointed wildly at the ghastly scene, to Skinner who was busy thrashing away with his sabre at anything and everyone with complete indiscrimination.
Skinner was insane and in the process of bringing the whole lot of us down with him, while Dolan was insane but largely harmless, I knew who I’d rather take my chances with, even as he sat there, pigeon perched on his wrist like some divine answer would come to him through the bird.
“I’ll make this easy for you, Colonel. Each sane man grabs a horse and we fight our way through the front gates and head for the Highlands, yes?” I was shaking him by the shoulders at this point, his three sergeants looking more and more agitated by the second. “Colonel, sir, it’s our only hope and much better than being trapped like rats in a sinking ship. Now’s your chance to save life, rather than take it…do some good for a change, something you’ll truly be remembered for and it’ll be more than anything I ever did, I can promise you that.”
Some might think me noble for trying, to save him and his soul, but of course it was all for my benefit. Would that still count?
I thought I’d actually got through to him because he looked away from his chess game towards me, twitched slightly, and actually held my glare with a freckled smile.
“But the regiment, Strappy, my command? It was all I ever wanted…I…I can’t give it up…not now we’re so close to winning this place back.”
My mouth gaped at that and I twisted around, shaking both arms towards the carnage. “Oh to the blazes with it man! Take a look about you…it’s bloody gone!” I frothed at the mouth and knew there was no winning with Dolan and at some point during the last minute even his sergeants had abandoned him and he still couldn’t see it.
I stamped my foot and that’s when it came to me - Salvation! Of course, there was one way but I had to act now.
I ran for the barracks as my cumbersome cavalry blade repeatedly caught between my legs, through the doors and down the steps, along the corridor and passed the cheese and whisky store with its five guards drunk and barely able to stand, but defending it to the death.
Around the corner was the room the officers stashed their plunder, ill gotten gains taken from Scotland - And now my lifeline.
Under past administrations it had been where the regiment’s vast quantity of papers were kept and contained desks, drawers, cabinets, book cases and storage boxes, the old records doubtless burned and in which now were stored valuables of officers most likely dead. Either way, they wouldn’t miss it and weren’t here to complain so I pulled open and apart anything that would, searching for that one item of extreme value. I threw away art, sculptures, trinkets and all kinds of rubbish until I found the gold coin heavy in a pouch, nice and simple, which Dolan could quantify within seconds and that would be that, done deal, debt paid and goodbye forever you psychopath.
There was a shrill cry from the door and I whipped around to find McGregor, mouth agape, his clean shaven face awash with perspiration, face red, hair ruffled. “You fiend, that’s Captain Skinner’s loot.”
Something inside me dropped and I raised my hands in some futile placatory effort, and found myself unable to speak, not that it would have mattered anyway because he’d already disappeared, his feet pattering down the corridor and screaming for Skinner to come quick because Captain Jack Strapper was filching what rightly belonged to him.
A black cloud fell over my vision. It was one of my silly self-defence mechanisms that initiate at such moments, just to give me a jolt and start me into taking the correct measures, which in this instance was to fly.
I was out the opened door in two giant strides, already looking to the left from where McGregor was crying to Skinner and pointing an accusatory finger my way. They both clocked me together and the berserker began angrily bounding down the corridor in my horrified direction, each boot step stamping impossibly loud within the narrow confines, his enormous snarling form filling the entire picture to my fore.
It was as desperate a situation as the time I shot the colour sergeant whilst Lynch pointed his gun at my head from twenty paces on those bleak Irish moors. And even with a primed pistol in my belt, not to my surprise, my hand made no instinctual move toward it. Theoretically I could face Skinner and shoot him, or hide and shoot him in the back, but come on. One bullet fired from a quivering hand? Under such circumstances, I did not fancy my chances and it mattered not that I had limited options since he was even now approaching with appalling speed. No, far safer to flee, to hide and pray he forgets.
So I ran the other way…
…And that was when my crook leg began giving me bloody hell.
But my brain blotted out the pain for long enough to slink around the corner to where a half dozen doors lead to an equal number of soldiers’ changing facilities. I chose the fifth door down, assuming I wouldn’t make the sixth and entered, closing the door, already scanning the surroundings for a place to conceal myself.
Cavalry uniforms hung off rails and hooks or were folded neatly in piles of ten or twenty in the army’s usual overly neat way. There were tunics, breeches, boots, sashes, belts, gloves, helmets, boots and everything in between. But there were no doors, compartments, chests or anything else in which I could crawl and hope to remain until after the apocalypse, of which mine was about to end.
Outside, the doors opened and closed as the angry footsteps struck the floorboards with an impossible force and I turned white as the blood left the surface of my skin to pool in my legs and internal organs.
I saw the pile of uniforms already strewn in the corner, like an angry trooper, unable to find his size, had discarded a great many. I limped toward them, grabbed an extra pile of breeches on the way and buried myself beneath the lot.
“Who that?” Came the muffled sob.
“What the devil?”
I couldn’t see a thing beneath the mass of clobber but sensed the warm lump in human form buried likewise to my side. Whoever it was made a wailing noise, too loud for my liking and continued to weep incoherent babble.
I clenched obscenely hard to a handful of tunics and felt my knuckles turning white. “Will you shut up!”
He sniffed and made a disgusting bubbling sound with his sinuses. “He’s dead. They killed him.”
“Yes, yes, yes, we’re all bloody dead, now keep it down would you.” I snarled as heavy boots clapped on the floorboards outside.
“He’s dead.” He repeated like an idiot and that was when I realised who it was.
He continued snivelling and spoke in palpitations. “The major was the only one who was ever nice to me, and they killed him.” He unloosed a disgusting salvo of phlegm from his nose. “I’ll kill whoever did that to him.”
I dug him again in the ribs. “And if you don’t shut it he’ll kill the both of us, now listen here…I’ve had just about enough of…” I gasped - The answer was right next to me the whole time. I felt the hope brim inside and had to rapidly change tact, making my voice sound as nice and friendly as possible. Not easy under such strain. “Jimmy,” I said most soothingly, “aye, the major was a good man and was quite taken by you, what? Oh and me too, you see, as I was to he. And I was most shocked when Captain Skinner shot him. What’s that, you ask? Captain Skinner shot him? Aye, it was Captain Skinner what did it…saw it with my own two peepers.”
“It was?” Came the high pitched sigh mixed with what could only be described as incredulity, which was funny, because it was an emotion one wouldn’t expect him to possess.
I moved away the tunics so I could see his puffy face, let him see my warm, sympathetic smile, unholstered the pistol and cocked it presently, holding it out to the idiot. “You know how to use this?” I hoped he would because I jolly well didn’t.
Not Dead Yet: A Zombie Apocalypse Series - Books 1 - 2 Page 43