The Shuffling Dead Box-set

by Ian Woodhead

  He reached the door, took a deep breath and turned the handle. The room was empty, Emily dropped to the floor and looked under the bed, he could have kicked himself for not thinking of doing that. She looked at both of them and shook her head.

  “Looks like you’re right,” he said. “The house is empty.”

  He walked up the window and gazed out; the deadies were moving away, he couldn’t believe just how many of them were out there. It looked like a crowd of football fans all moving in one direction, it was eerie and absolutory fucking terrifying. Emily joined him at the window; she took one look and darted to the door.

  “Come on” she cried, “They’re going, that means we can too.”

  She was at the landing and running down the stairs before either of them could speak. Ernest looked at the woman in puzzlement before they both hurried to catch her. Emily had the door open while they were coming down the stairs; it looked as if the deadies weren’t coming back just yet. They reached the garden gate and watched the girl run down the street.

  “We won’t be able to catch up with her you know?” Mrs Watson said. “Do we let her go?”

  He shrugged, “I’m sure we’ll catch up to her eventually, come on, it’s almost over.” As he grabbed her hand, they both heard what sounded like a crack of thunder; they turned to see Emily fall to the ground with the top half of her head missing. Ernest spied a couple of soldiers running up to the prone body. He pulled Mrs Watson back towards the house.

  “What do we do now?” she sobbed.

  He clicked the door shut behind them. “Now we hide.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Emma Reynolds’s television had been showing static now for the best part of two hours. She looked at the clock on the mantelpiece; it said it was a quarter past five, it had been showing that time for three years. Emma tutted, not believing it was nearly six o’clock; she’d forgotten to make tea again.

  “That will never do.” She muttered to herself.

  She got up and turned the channel over; if it was nearly six then the early evening news should be on. Of course they would only show the bad stuff, they always did. The only good news they’d shown recently was the silver jubilee last week. That was grand; they’d even had a party on the street just like the old days. Everyone helped out, she’d even made a couple of plates of sandwiches herself, just cucumber and tuna spread, nothing too fancy.

  Emma changed the channel over, deciding the news would be too depressing. She laughed as the static continued to show. The Benny Hill show was on; he was such a funny man.

  She picked up the cup of cold coffee that had been stood on the table beside her for the past three days. Her son, Steve had made her it when he last visited. She took a sip and winced. There was too much sugar in this tea, she wondered if she’d picked up Arthur’s cup by mistake.

  Emma remembered filling up at that street party when her old friend, Ethel turned up with her new husband. Those tears soon dried when she saw the profound change in her old friend, she used to be such an outgoing girl back when they were all single. Ethel, herself and Mavis Watson all used to go into Bradford on a Saturday night and party. Now Ethel was as quiet as a mouse, she jumped a foot every time her husband spoke, the poor thing. Emma remembered just what a little terror that Dennis Flynn used to be when he was little. Good lord, he was such a nasty piece of work. He nearly got expelled for hitting that young girl from Form Two with that lump of wood, he showed no regret when the teacher pulled him away.

  Bullying was the one thing that Emma really did hate. The teachers had sent her little Steven home this afternoon; they said that he’d been picking on that kid, Ernest Belmont again. What utter nonsense. Her little Steven was such a kind and thoughtful boy, he wouldn’t hurt a fly. It didn’t stop her husband from giving him a good hiding and sending him to bed with no tea.

  She turned the television off and walked past the urn containing her husband’s ashes sat on the mantelpiece above the fire. Emma decided to check on her boy. If he was still awake, she’d fix him up a nice plate full of dripping sandwiches. Arthur wouldn’t know, he’d already gone to work; he started his night shift at five.

  Emma opened the door leading to the stairs, he had been so worried lately, the silly man. For weeks now he’d been saying that the business was going to go bust, as if that would ever happen. People would always buy British instead of all that silly foreign rubbish. He’d bought the family a brand new Austin Princess last year, that car was the envy of the street, a good solid British car.

  She opened the door to the spare room, packed with old furniture and bin bags full of rubbish and smiled; her little darling was fast asleep. She gently closed the door; she’d leave him where he was, it was best not to disturb him. Emma wandered into her own bedroom and weaved through the dozens of supermarket carrier bags full of rotting food and stopped at her dressing table.

  A fly crawled out from a hole in a shrink wrapped packet of thin cut beef steaks that her home-help had bought for her two months ago and flew up to the woman and landed on her cheek. She brushed it away and picked up a bag of sugar from the pile eight deep stacked up in front of her. Arthur always needed a cup of coffee from when he came home after his shift, she couldn’t remember if she had any left downstairs.

  Arthur just loved his sugar. Emma gazed out of the window onto the street, the surging tide of shuffling dead were just outside her door. The old woman’s eye’s shone, she couldn’t believe it, the street party was still on. No wonder she’d been feeling a little lonely. Emma hurried out of the bedroom.

  Mavis would be there and Ethel. Emma needed to see her friend to warn her about that Dennis Flynn. She made her way down the stairs, humming to herself. When she reached the bottom, she completely forgot what she was supposed to be doing, and then Emma noticed the bag of sugar in her hand. Arthur must want a cup of coffee, he always wanted sugar in his drink, and it was strange that she didn’t hear him come home.

  The bag dropped from her hand when she saw the silver jubilee plate on the shelf just above her head.

  “Oh my lord! Of course, they are having a street party today.”

  She grinned and opened the front door and stepped out into the warm night. Six of them lead by her dead son, peeled away from the main group and shambled towards her. Emma walked up the path, hoping that they wouldn’t be too upset at her for not bringing any sandwiches to the party.

  Chapter Twelve

  His occupants had stopped banging against the side of the interior of his van a few moments ago. The silence made a very welcome change, and his headache was particularly grateful. At first, Dennis had assumed it was because of his proximity, perhaps they could smell him and their inability to reach their next meal was causing them to lash out in frustration. It seemed to be a fine theory until he remembered that his van was supposed to be airtight, it was an old security van.

  It almost brought a tear to his eye when he’d pulled the tarpaulin off the vehicle earlier tonight. He’d been storing the van in a rented lock up for years, he had of course made sure that the vehicle was still driveable and road worthy, even when he’d retired from his extra-curricular activities, he couldn’t bear to have his precious van destroyed.

  There was always a chance, no matter how unlikely, that he may need to use it again. He chuckled to himself; he really was prepared for every eventuality.

  There had been many times in the past few years, particularly on days when his self control had weakened, when he’d considered getting the vehicle crushed. If the authorities ever found it, the forensic department would have a party. Even he had lost track of just how many people had spilled their insides in the back of his van.

  He took out a pack of sandwiches from the glove compartment and placed them on the seat next to his, he’d made them earlier when he’d realised just how busy he would be. Unlike his disastrous attempts at making hot chocolate, his sandwich making skills were now well honed. He suspected that his previous skills of usin
g a sharp knife and the joy he felt when he cut things up probably accounted for his unexpected new talent.

  The headache was now beginning to fade as the tablets took effect, like the sandwiches, they were another commodity that he had brought with him; it paid dividends to be well prepared.

  It was a shame that he hadn’t been sufficiently well prepared when he’d first spotted those two brats. If he’d been carrying his rifle they and the mouthy one inside the house could be in the back of his van by now; he had plenty of room. Dennis suspected that his headache had begun right at the moment that the kid had poked his head out of the window, waving that shotgun about, he hated unpredictable events.

  The survivors had been few and far between, he suspected that they’d either gone into hiding or got out of Dodge City. There wasn’t much in the way of dead people too for that matter, he couldn’t explain that ambiguity.

  Dennis took a huge bite out of one half and sighed in bliss as the flavours of spiced pork and sun dried tomatoes just exploded in his mouth. They were his two favourite foods. He swallowed and paused for a moment, enjoying the hot spice tingle on his lips. He’d heard that human meat had a similar taste to pork. It astonished him that he hadn’t thought of finding out until now.

  He took another bite and decided that it was time to look in on his guests; they had been rather quiet for a while now. Dennis slid back the metal door, revealing a clear, thick Perspex plate set into the wall. Four pairs of eyes stared back at him. He focussed on the girl, Claire, and settled down to a staring contest. Hell, he wasn’t even sure that she could even see him. After a minute, he gave up; it was like trying the stare down a marble statue. It was creepy how none of them were moving; they reminded him of four lizards in a glass tank.

  Dennis switched on the main light and three fluorescent tubes bathed the back of the van in bright, white light. He shook his head, not so much as a twitch, even their pupils didn’t contract.

  The lights showed in their naked glory just what they had done to the other girl; he had trouble actually finding any piece of her larger than an apple. He saw a few scraps of clothing, a couple of splintered bones and lots of thick, lumpy scarlet gore splattered around the walls. He watched a chewed up morsel of the girl slip from a large hole in Albert Pannier’s chest cavity. It slid down and plopped onto the floor. Dennis just had to find out why they were compelled to feast on human flesh, there had to be a logical reason. He thought perhaps there might be some chemical or nutritional protein present in the living human body that they needed in order to stay re-animated. Perhaps some long forgotten primal carnivorous instinct kicked in once they’d been contaminated and transformed them into nightmarish monsters.

  He switched off the light and shut the plate. He picked up the remains of his sandwich and stuffed it into his mouth. Perhaps they just killed because they enjoyed it. Dennis enjoyed killing people; after all, he had never been able to find a logical reason for his own homicidal behaviour.

  Seemingly unanswerable questions niggled him. He had no clue why they’d consumed the blonde girl but left the one with the lips rings with just a lump missing from her thigh. He picked up the other half of his sandwich and took a bite. Trust him to ask questions that had probably never been asked before.

  His chewed up food almost ended up on the side window when he spotted a very familiar figure stumbling out of a house a couple of doors down, it was scary Mary with her docile husband just behind her. Dennis watched her for a few seconds with a huge grin plastered all over his face. The stupid fat fuck kept falling over, trying to clamber up her garden path, oh God what an amazing sight and what a glorious opportunity. He reached for his pistol and placed a single round in the chamber, oh lord! He was so going to enjoy this. It would be the ultimate revenge for putting up with the endless insults and snide remarks from that uneducated and spiteful big tub of lard.

  She had now reached her gate; he prepared to open his door. His only regret was that the bitch wouldn’t suffer. Oh, he would have walked a mile over broken glass to have been given the chance of stuffing the screaming and sobbing woman in the back of his van with his guests. He was sure they would have taken more than a few hours to consume her.

  His chewed up food did splat against the glass when he saw more movement glimpsed in the corner of his eye. Dennis sat back in his seat, unable to grasp just what he was seeing. A vast swarm of the things shambled and lurched towards his location. Jesus Christ, they were everywhere. It looked like the whole of Breakspear was out there, he guessed that he wasn’t that far from the truth with that statement. They filled the road, the pavements and the gardens on either side. Mary and her husband joined the mass and he lost them in the crowd. Dennis felt like a goldfish looking out as a school of piranhas swam past his bowl. Despite knowing that he was safe in here, he still felt his heart beat double up. God, what a rush, he tapped on the side window as they passed his van, a little disappointed when none of them even glanced up. His guests had started up the moaning song again; he guessed that they must know that their comrades in arms were on the march. Now that was a valid question, just where were they marching to?

  He banged on the partition. “Hush up back there. You’ve been very naughty zombies; you are not going out to play with your friends.”

  Dennis giggled and felt a mental gear slip. Did he really just say that? Within moments, the swarm had passed by; he watched them get further away through his wing mirror, thinking that must be the strangest thing that he’d seen so far tonight.

  His eyes darted forward when he heard the sound of an engine. He wasn’t the only one to hear it. A young couple streaked out of a house further up the road, right into the path of an approaching armoured car. The vehicle screeched to a halt. Dennis watched gob-smacked as half a dozen masked soldiers leaped from the vehicle and pointed weapons at the pair, they forced them to lie on the floor face down with their arms behind their back. A moment later, another vehicle approached and stopped behind the armoured car.

  It looked a bit like a van the local dog wardens used. Two people wearing white bio-hazard suits stepped out and slowly walked towards the couple on the floor. Each one held a long pole with stiff wire hoops on the end, they fastened the hoop around the neck of the sobbing people and pushed them into the back of the van, they weren’t being very gentle.

  “It looks like the game has moved up a notch,” he murmured. “There are new players in town. Events are about to become very interesting.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  There had been a very subtle in change hierarchy. It was something that he’d seen happen all his life when he got together with a group of people. Kevin had, as per usual, been relegated to the bottom of the pile. Stephanie stood with Darren, searching the street for any sign of the shambling horde. He stood behind the pair, looking at this bayonet and wondering why he didn’t hold a gun like the two in front of him.

  “Can see you them now?”

  Darren nodded, “Fuck me lass, you’ve got sharp bastard eyes.”

  She smiled and glanced behind her. “No thanks, Darren. You ain’t my type.” Stephanie winked at Kevin, but by the time he’d smiled back her head was facing the front again. He sighed.

  Darren cradled his shotgun like a bloody teddy bear. He hadn’t let go of his new toy now he had seen the mess it made of people. Darren had used it on Edgar and the soldier earlier, and remarked that he was curious to see why his old pal was hiding under the stairs, like it was perfectly acceptable to put everyone’s life in danger just to satisfy his own curiosity. He thought that he might have been sitting on a huge cache of weapons. If the gun hadn’t worked, they would all have been fucked.

  After all that, they found that the storage cupboard was empty but they did discover that the soldier was wearing some very curious protective covering under his fatigues. His legs and arms were covered in flexible tightly meshed armour. Stephanie told them both that it wasn’t standard issue. In a combat situation, only the torso was prote
cted. They both looked at her in astonishment as she reeled all this out. It turned out that his trembling new girlfriend was in the bloody armed forces. She snatched up the pistol from the chair and within seconds, she had pulled it apart. Stephanie showed them where the ID plate had been filed off and the unusual rounds in the magazine. She concluded that the soldier wasn’t regular army, probably private security force or a mercenary. Darren had agreed with her, moving his head up and down like a fucking nodding dog, and didn’t object when she stuffed the gun down her jeans.

  Kevin moved forward and stood beside Stephanie. Three pairs of eyes were transfixed at the sight before them; Kevin felt his spine turn to water as hundreds of them slowly made their way through the estate.

  “Jesus! Look at that bastard go!” shouted Darren, pointing at a house opposite where they were.

  Kevin gaped in horror as a young lad leapt from an upper floor window; he rolled on the grass below and limped out of the garden gate. They could hear him screaming from where they stood.

  “Come on lad,” urged Kevin, “You can do it.”

  Even limping, he was out pacing them.

  “I’ll bet anyone a tenner that the cunt gets eaten.”

  Kevin groaned aloud when he saw a couple of the dead emerge from a garden in front of the boy, he swerved to try to avoid their flailing arms, he managed it but then tripped up over his own feet. As he went down several of the things homed in and just fell on him. Kevin closed his eyes and tried not to burst into tears.