Journal of the Living

by John Moralee

  On unsteady feet Leela and Kim helped each other out of the cellar – with me leading the way. They both looked like they didn’t trust me. I didn’t think they really believed me until they stepped outside and saw the devastated village. The first escaped woman was running across a field away from us. Leela and Kim called to her – but she didn’t stop or slow down. There was no sign of the blonde woman. I wondered if she had fled into the woods or was hiding in the ruins.

  Leela looked around, coughing. “The bikers are all dead?”

  “I think so.”

  “Good. Did you kill them?”

  “Me? No. I was being tortured up there in the church when they got attacked by the Pure Bloods.”

  She frowned. “Who are they?”

  “You haven’t heard of the Pure Bloods?” I was surprised. I had thought everyone knew about them.

  “I wouldn’t have asked if I knew,” Leela said. “Are they the good guys?”

  “Not exactly. They are better than the bikers, I suppose. They don’t abuse their prisoners. The Pure Bloods are another group a bit more organised and better armed. They have a military base in Oxford. They are all immune to the zombie virus. They do take in survivors – but there’s a big catch.”

  “What’s that?”

  “They inject newcomers with the virus as a test to see if they have so-called ‘pure blood’ like them.”

  “What happens if you don’t have ‘pure blood’?”

  “You turn into a zombie and they kill you.”

  “They sound mad.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “That’s why I hid from them until they had finished killing the bikers. They’re just as dangerous. They didn’t take any prisoners today. They just shot everyone. And then they tossed them on that pyre to burn.”

  Leela stared at the burning bodies. “Is that where my granddad is?”

  “Unfortunately, yes.”

  “I have to see him.” Leela scrambled over to the pyre, where she fell to her knees and sobbed. “No – that’s my granddad. They threw him on the fire like he’s a load of rubbish!”

  There was nothing I could say. The other girl – Kim – pulled Leela away. “Don’t look. He’s gone. Nothing you can do.”

  “All my family is dead now,” Leela said. “What am I supposed to do?”

  “You can both come with me,” I said. “We’ll be safer in a group. I’ve got friends who can help us – if we can get back to them. You’re welcome to come with me.”

  “Go with you where?” Leela said. “There’s nothing in this stupid country any more! It’s all like this! A living hell!”

  “There’s a country estate where I left some supplies. It’s about a day’s walk. It’s better there.”

  Kim narrowed her eyes. “What if we don’t want to go with you, mate?”

  “I’m not going to force you. You’re free now. You can do what you like. I just think it’s better to stick together. There are bad people out there. Plus the zombies.”

  I noticed Kim had picked up a jagged piece of glass as a weapon. “What do you reckon, Leela? Can we trust this bloke?”

  Leela coughed before answering. No offence – but I don’t want to go with you. I’ll just stay my friend Kim. We’ll be all right without you. You can go on your own.”

  “Your grandfather wanted me to protect you.”

  “I don’t need protection from a man! We don’t need you! I’m sick of men! You’re all a bunch of -” Another bout of coughing doubled her up.

  Kim went to her side. “You okay?”

  “Hard breathing,” Leela said. “The smoke. My throat hurts.”

  I reached into my jacket and pulled out the ginger beer. “Here. Drink this. It will ease it.”

  “Thank … you.” She accepted the can and gulped some of it down – then she passed it to Kim. “It’s good. Have some.”

  Kim sniffed the drink. “Ginger beer? You couldn’t find a lager, mate?”

  “All I could find,” I said.

  “Guess it will do,” she said, swigging it. “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

  Leela straightened up, breathing heavily. “I suppose we could stay with you for a while – but if you try anything creepy, Ben, I’ll kill you.”

  Kim was crushing the empty beer can when she frowned. “Hey – Pipa’s coming back!”

  Pipa was the woman I’d seen running away. Now she was running in the opposite direction back to the village. Running and screaming. The reason for her panicked flight was obvious. There were some zombies in the field, lumbering after her. I counted ten – no – more. Twenty. At least that number. They were spread out and moving in her direction. They were not the only ones. There were more in the distance.

  “We should have expected zombies,” I said. “They must’ve been attracted by the noise of the battle last night. They must’ve heard the shooting and started walking. It’s taken them hours to get here – but I bet more are already coming from other directions.”

  Pipa ran up to Kim and Leela. “We’re all going to die. They’re everywhere. We can’t escape.”

  “No, we’ll get out,” I said. “I’ve got a gun. Grab anything you can as a weapon and follow me.”

  We left the village in a hurry.

  ENTRY TWENTY-THREE

  We encountered a zombie as we fled the village. It lurched out of the woods gnashing its yellowed, broken teeth. It was a big purple-faced man dressed in a green tracksuit with half his guts exposed. He was dragging a twisted foot chewed by rats until his toes were just bones. He wasn’t much danger. He would never have caught us in a million years – but he did start to moan and come after us. His moans could attract more, livelier zombies. Because I was bad shape after being tortured, I would have shot him in the head – wasting a valuable bullet from my revolver – but my three new companions attacked him before I could. Leela, Kim and Pipa smashed his head in with bricks, sticks and a long metal spike respectively. Pipa jammed her spike through his eye into his brain – then pulled it out with brain tissue sticking to the end like pink porridge. They continued to attack him even after his brain was splattered on the ground. Kim battered his head with her rock. Pipa kicked him a few times until she burst into tears. She even spat on the dead man before walking on.

  “I wished he’d been one of them,” she said to the others. She meant one of the biker gang that had held them captive. Leela and Kim murmured in agreement. All three of my new female companions flashed me a nasty look as we continued as if blaming me for something. Their experiences with men had been so bad that I was sure none of them wanted to be following me – another man - even though I had rescued them from the cellar. They were all sick of men.

  About a mile on we spotted some more zombies on the road and in a field – so we left the road and continued through the woods. Eventually we reached another road without having another zombie encounter. Earlier I’d told Leela and Kim it was a day’s walk to my old camp – but that was hugely optimistic estimate. I had not taken into account the state of my health – which had been ruined by being tortured. Billy had worked me over so every part of me ached. The painkillers were wearing off and I was exhausted.

  “I need a stop to rest, guys.”

  “What?” Kim said. “We need to keep going. The zombies might get us if we stop now.”

  “They won’t,” I said. “We’re past them now. They were all on their way to the village.”

  “Let’s just leave him,” Pipa said. “We don’t need a man to save us. I’m not even sure he wasn’t one of the gang. He is wearing a biker jacket.”

  “I got it off a dead one,” I said. “I was not part of the gang.”

  “That’s true,” Kim said. “I remember all of their faces, Pipa. He wasn’t with them.”

  Pipa pouted. “Still – he is a man. We can’t trust men. Not after what they did to us back there. He could be taking us to somewhere worse. Let’s just leave him and go.”

  “And go where?” Leela said. “Ben k
nows this area better than we do. We’ve been prisoners for so long we don’t know what is out here. We need him. We all need a brief rest anyway. My feet are dead sore. I need a break, too.”

  We rested for twenty minutes. I swallowed a couple of painkillers and gave Leela some for her pain. Leela asked me to explain why I’d been held prisoner by the bikers. I started telling her about the ambush and then the chase that ended at the town where Angela attacking the bikers.

  At the mention of Angela’s name, Kim’s eyes widened. “I don’t believe it. You have a friend called Angela? I know an Angela! She was here when I was captured. She was always planning to break out. She caused the gang so much trouble they locked her naked in a shed with just some raw potatoes to eat as punishment. They left her there for two weeks intending to break her – but something must have happened because they never did bring her back. Quinn told us they had killed her – but I never believed them because they didn’t show us her body. I knew she had escaped! It’s not the same Angela, is it?”

  “Yeah, it is. I found her locked in a shed. She never told me about her past – but I knew it was bad. No wonder she shot those guys.”

  “Good on her,” Kim said. “What happened after she shot at them?”

  I told them about releasing a whole bunch of zombies. That was part of my story my new companions liked because it had resulted in the deaths of several bikers. They were sad to hear Angela had been shot. Then I mentioned encountering Billy. His name made them all angry.

  “Didn’t Angela recognise him?” Kim said.

  “No.”

  “That’s weird.”

  “She wouldn’t have,” Pipa said. “Remember he had a beard when Angela was with us? He shaved it off later on. He looked completely different then. We didn’t know his name was Billy, either. They were pretty careful to not use their real names around us at the beginning. They wanted to remain anonymous – but after a while they stopped caring because it wasn’t like the law would ever return.”

  “You’re right,” Kim said. “Go on, mate.”

  I went on to finish my story, ending with how Billy had captured and tortured me.

  Kim was first to speak. “You were lucky he didn’t do worse. We all knew Billy. He was an evil psychopath. Loved inflicting pain. Did you see him die back there?”

  “No,” I said. “I don’t know what happened to him. Quinn’s dead, though. Leela’s grandfather saw him die of a bullet wound.”

  “Billy will have escaped somehow,” Kim said. “You can bet on that. He probably convinced the Pure Bloods to let him be their leader. It wouldn’t surprise me. I met him a few months back when I was with a group of good people. We were living in a caravan when he showed up on his own. He acted all friendly and I trusted him. He tricked us to come back with him to his camp, which he promised was a safe haven. He lied. They murdered my friends.”

  “I hate him,” Pipa said, gripping her spike tighter. “If I ever see him again, I’ll stab him with this!”

  “And I’m smashed his pretty-boy face in,” Leela said.

  Our mutual hatred of Billy helped improve our alliance by the time we were ready to continue. Leela started walking on the grass beside the road because the gravel was too rough on her bare feet. She kept wincing.

  “You okay?” I said.

  “No. I need some shoes,” she said. “And some fresh clothes.”

  Pipa nodded. “I’ve been wearing this stinky T-shirt for months. The pigs wouldn’t give me anything else to wear. I feel so exposed. Ben, I don’t suppose you know where we can get some new clothes?”

  We were approaching a junction with a sign. “There’s a small town that way. I passed through it a couple of weeks ago. There were some fashion shops. They looked looted, though. And I did see a few zombies.”

  I was hoping they would not want to go. I didn’t like going into urban areas without being armed to the teeth.

  “I can’t go on wearing this,” Pipa said. “I think we should go there. I’m not afraid of some zombies. Not after what I’ve been through. We can’t walk around dressed like this. I feel naked.”

  “We all need new clothes,” Kim said. She looked at me. “Especially you, mate. The Fonz wants his jacket back.”

  “It would be safer to avoid the town,” I said. “I wouldn’t recommend going that way. We might find a farmhouse on the other road where the people left some things behind.”

  Leela, Kim and Pipa moved away and discussed it without me for a couple of minutes. Then Leela spoke for the group. “Ben, you don’t have any clothes for us where we’re heading – so we might as well make a detour. We need food and water, too. And better weapons against the zombies than this stuff. We all want to go that way. We’ll say goodbye here if you don’t want to come.”

  I sighed. “Okay. I’ll go – but I’m just saying we’d better be cautious. No rushing into the town to get ourselves murdered or turned into zombies.”

  “You lead the way,” Pipa said. “Then if you get killed, we’ll know you were right.”

  ENTRY TWENTY-FOUR

  Buxtonbridge was a small town in Oxfordshire just a mile down the road – a destination for tourists and casual shoppers before Day One. Now it was probably a haven for zombies. I thought it was foolhardy going to the town without good weapons and a good plan – but Leela, Kim and Pipa were keen to do some shopping for clothes and other essentials after their ordeal, so we trudged along the road until my legs were hurting.

  The town came into sight around noon. We stopped and observed it from the woods. There was a garden centre and a small Waitrose on the road leading into the market square, where the girls could get some clothes in the boutiques. From a safe distance, we studied the area, looking for dangers. The streets appeared deserted except for a few decaying zombies in the square. The presence of the undead probably meant no living humans were in the town – which was good for us.

  The garden centre seemed like the best place to go first because it could contain some garden tools for upgrading our weapons. Pipa wanted to check out the Waitrose first because she was hungry – but I was sure the store would have been ransacked of all food. Weapons were more important. Kim and Leela agreed with me. My new group followed me to garden centre. It was quiet as I approached, with the girls watching my back. The automatic doors had been pried open by looters so I could see into the store as far as the checkout counters. I saw no zombies among the aisles of garden equipment – but it was fairly dark inside and it was possible there were some inside. There were two ways of continuing – silently or noisily. Noisily had an advantage if I’d been fit and armed with a good weapon – because it would attract any zombies lurking inside to the entrance, where I could see them and then fight them in the sunlight. The second option – silently – was something I didn’t like doing unless I had no choice. In an area where we didn’t know how many zombies were nearby, it was the safer of the options, though.

  “Okay – I’ll go in to look for some tools with Kim and Pipa. Leela, stay here and watch our backs. Tap on the window if you see more zombies. Kim, Pipa, come with me. Keep together when we’re inside. No going off alone.”

  Kim eagerly joined me at the doors – but Pipa stayed back. She was shaking her head. “Just a sec. Why does Leela get to stay outside where it’s safe? How the hell is that fair? I don’t want to go into that place. It’s dark and we don’t even have a torch.”

  “Leela’s got an injured foot,” I said. “She can’t run like you, Pipa. Besides, we need to make sure the exit is clear. That’s why one of us needs to stay outside. Leela can be our lookout.”

  “I could do that job,” Pipa said.

  “I’ll go inside if Pipa wants to swap,” Leela said. “I’m not afraid.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Pipa said, a smug look on her face.

  “No,” I said. “Leela, you need to stay outside. Pipa, you’re not swapping. You’re going with us.”

  “Who made you boss?” Pipa said. “You
think because you’re a man you should be in charge?”

  “No – but we need the fittest people inside. You’ve already demonstrated you can kill zombies with that spike. If you come with me, you can pick a better weapon for yourself. You want a better weapon, don’t you?”

  Pipa grumbled – but she joined us at the entrance. I stepped into the dark entrance and listened as my eyes adjusted to the gloom. Kim and Pipa followed me into the store. There was a labyrinth of aisles ahead. To my right there were some racks of gardening books and a deserted teashop for visitors. On my left were bird houses, displays of seed packets and sacks of flower bulbs. Ahead was a section containing lawn furniture and barbecue equipment. Most of the aisles had been looted and trashed. A sign pointed to the gardening tools at the far end – closer to the other side of the store which opened up to an outdoor area for greenhouses and outdoor plants. A mildewy smell got stronger as I left behind the comforting sunlight and entered the twilight world. Kim and Pipa were so close I could hear them breathing in the semi-darkness.

  “Is that you breathing loudly?” Kim whispered.

  “No,” Pipa said.

  Oh – hell.

  A zombie jumped out from behind a stack of fertiliser, slamming into me, knocking me to the floor. The mildew smell was coming from inside the zombie’s mouth as it breathed on me. I saw its fleshless skull and rotten eyes and teeth. It was on top of me, trying to bite, as I struggled to push it away. My hands were trapped under it and I could not escape. Someone yelled. I heard a whoosh of air and heard a crunch. Something cold and wet splattered my face. The zombie stopped moving. I freed myself from under it, gasping, aching, confused.