Lanherne Chronicles (Book 3): Last Days With The Dead

by Stephen Charlick

  ‘Lucy? Lucy, what’s the matter? Are you alright?’ Came Andrews’ worried words, suddenly breaking through her mania.

  Lucy shook herself and looked deep into the concerned eyes that even now searched her face for meaning, and she knew she could not hurt him. His hands were free of the blood of her family, of that she was sure, and she somehow knew she could trust him. He was innocent and she would try to save him if she could.

  Finally tearing her eyes away from the young man knelt before her, Lucy looked down at the sleeping child in her arms. Gently, the back of her fingers traced along the child’s cheek and instantly she knew what she must do.

  ‘Here,’ she said, quickly passing the baby over to Andrews, ‘take him.’

  ‘Lucy?’ Andrews whispered, nervously glancing up and down the street.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Lucy managed to reply, her hand discreetly slipping into her pocket to clutch a shard of broken glass from the window pane that she had managed to hide.

  With that, Lucy noticed the Sergeant was staring in their direction, curious why they were taking so long.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she repeated, her voice barely audible as she swiftly stepped past Andrews.

  But Andrews could see she was about to run and reached out to grab her arm. Doing so, he pulled the hand holding the sliver of glass from her pocket. Already the sharp edges were cutting into her palm, but the young girl seemed unaware of it or the blood slowly dripping from her hand.

  ‘Lucy, don’t,’ he begged, seeing that Sergeant Ridge had just waved the others onwards, but was moving back towards them, his eyes narrowing in suspicion, ‘he’ll kill you, Lucy, please.’

  ‘What the fuck’s going on, Private?’ Ridge hissed, looking from Andrews to the young girl as he slipped the holdall back over his shoulders.

  ‘Sir?’ Andrews automatically replied, stepping slightly in front of Lucy, desperate that what she held in her hand went unnoticed.

  ‘I said…’Ridge began to repeat, but his words were suddenly interrupted by a blood-chilling scream from across the street.

  Whatever the annoying girl had been up to, had been instantly dismissed as no longer important, as Sergeant Ridge spun back to face the crashed coach. Suddenly, Pelling appeared running at full speed from behind the wreckage, an uncharacteristic look of wide-eyed terror on her face. She was closely followed by Sinclair and Grimes, their own face contorted into masks of pure fear.

  ‘Run!’ shouted Pelling as she sprinted toward them.

  ‘What the…’ Ridge began to say, but when Mallon stumbled from around the side of the coach, the corpse of a woman clamped to his neck, he knew what had happened, ‘Pelling!’

  ‘We didn’t see them until it was too late,’ said Pelling, reluctantly skidding to a halt. ‘They were on the other side of the second coach. Fuck! There must be over a hundred of them on the road. He just walked right into one, Mallon; he just walked right into the bitch.’

  Even as she said his name, Mallon screamed again. He was trying desperately to throw the woman off, but at last, the flesh she craved was within her grasp and would not let go until she had rightfully claimed her prize. Then almost as if in slow motion, the woman began to draw her head back. For a second, Mallon’s screams intensified as the flesh of his neck stretched and then finally tore. With a spray of blood violently erupting into the air to rain down on them both, the woman ripped free a chunk of the doomed Mallon’s flesh, and began to chew.

  ‘Christ!’ said Andrews, watching in horror as Mallon fell to his knees. ‘We’ve got to help him. We’ve got to help him!’

  ‘He’s as good as dead already!’ shouted Pelling above Mallon’s wet gurgling screams. ‘We’ve got to go! Sir! We’ve got to go!’

  Already more of the groaning cadavers were pulling themselves around the side of the coach, drawn by the promise of warm, wet, bloody flesh. At the sight of Mallon, some of them instantly fell upon him, tearing into this already weakening body with gusto, while others began to advance on the rest of the small group.

  ‘Andrews,’ Lucy said, tugging at the stunned soldier’s sleeve, ‘they’re coming.’

  Shaken from his shock by the young girl’s almost normal tone, he looked down at her. He briefly noticed the shard of glass was no longer in her hand before realising she wasn’t even looking in the direction of the approaching corpses, but back the way they had come.

  ‘Fuck,’ he whispered under his breath, as he saw the group they had already bypassed coming round the corner.

  ‘Sir,’ Andrews shouted, grabbing the Sergeant’s shoulder with his free arm, ‘they’re approaching from the right too!’

  ‘Shit,’ said Ridge, glancing at the forty strong crowd swarming slowly towards them, drawn by Mallon’s screams.

  With hungry corpses now approaching on two sides, he knew if they didn’t act soon, they would be swamped.

  ‘Back up. Back up!’ he shouted, looking up along the road behind them that was now their only chance of escape.

  Although this road also harboured its own walking cadavers, there were by far a lot fewer of them, and if they were quick and stayed out of arm’s reach, Ridge knew they should be able to run past them safely. He only prayed wherever the road led them, it wasn’t to their deaths.

  ‘Come on,’ Ridge shouted, ‘follow me!’

  Already the first of the cadavers had closed the gap between what was left of Mallon’s corpse and the rest of the group, and as one reached a decaying hand out to a stunned Grimes, Sinclair kicked it hard in the chest sending it flying back into the arms of its unnatural brethren.

  ‘Sinclair!’ Andrews shouted to the man who was now risking using his fists to punch back a man with much of the flesh stripped from one of his decaying arms.

  Turning, Sinclair deftly caught the spade Andrews had thrown him, and in a motion like he was swinging a bat, smashed another of the cadavers in the side of the head.

  ‘There’s too many of them!’ cried Grimes, pulling on the back of Sinclair’s jacket before tuning to run, ‘Sinclair, we’ve got to go. Come on, we’ve got to go now!’

  With one final shove at the decaying body of a lipless teenage girl, Sinclair knew Grimes was right. Within seconds, more and more of them were pouring from the other side of the coach. No matter how you looked at it, it was time to run for their lives. Spinning, Sinclair ran after Grimes. Ahead of him, he could see the Sergeant, Pelling, and Andrews, who was holding the baby in his arms, were each dodging around the corpses trundling towards them with arms outstretched. Despite Andrews slowing his pace to pull her along, the young girl was falling behind, and Sinclair could tell if he didn’t do something, any second she would feel the putrid touch of the death on her.

  ‘Time to get going, Girl!’ he said, barrelling the corpse of an old woman out of the way as he scooped a shrieking Lucy up into his arms, barely losing his stride in the process.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Andrews, holding the baby close to his chest as he pushed aside the arm of a faceless creature reaching for him.

  ‘Anytime,’ he replied, shifting Lucy in his arms.

  ‘Up here!’ shouted Ridge, pausing by the wide entrance to what looked like some sort of tourist attraction. ‘We’ll try to lose them inside.’

  They were soon running through a weed choked cobbled entrance, while on either side of them, flowering plants and creepers exploded out across their path. Jogging past a burnt out visitors centre, its vast windows shattered, and interior nothing but a blackened shell, Sergeant Ridge paused briefly for the others to catch up. Looking over their shoulders, his eyes suddenly widened in fear. Despite their running, the excited corpses were only twenty or so metres behind them, and all the while, more and more were appearing to join this parade of death. A wave of unbearable stench rolled off the approaching corpses, clouding all about them in a miasma of putrid rot, and Ridge fought the urge to vomit. The constant desperate groaning they made was vibrating deep in his chest now, such was the number of these hungry cad
avers with nothing but tearing into his living flesh in their decaying minds. Yet, if he thought there was any camaraderie among these denizens of death, he quickly realised he was mistaken. He saw many in the crowd falling to the ground, only to be trampled by their eager brothers and sisters behind them. There was always another savage corpse to take their place, and as he watched the advancing mob, his gaze darted from one hideous abomination to the next, each seemingly more vile than the next.

  ‘Move it!’ he growled, as Andrews ran past him, who for some reason was holding the baby, closely followed by Sinclair, carrying the girl.

  With their hearts hammering in their chests and with death on their heels, the soldiers ran past sad dilapidated gift shops and wild picnic areas, overgrown and reclaimed by the plants around them. At one point, a dead boy of around seven, stumbled out from the foliage and into their path, but Pelling, without even thinking, reduced his skull to a pulpy mass with her crowbar within seconds.

  ‘Down here!’ Sergeant Ridge called, darting along a wider path that led to a huge domed greenhouse, ‘Perhaps we can get through.’

  ‘Wait!’ panted Grimes, stopping when he noticed the grassy banks running either side of the path that rose to chest height by the time it reached the wide doorway. ‘If we can’t get in, we’ll be trapped.’

  But it was already too late, the others were already only a few metres from the double doors and Grimes could hear the cadavers closing in behind him.

  ‘Shit!’ he spat, eventually running forward even though he knew that if they failed to get inside the greenhouse, they would be trapped with the hungry corpses being funnelled directly along the path toward them and the bloody flesh they craved.

  When Grimes caught up with the others, it was clear from the dark smears and scratches covering the surface that the corpses had tried to get in here before. Whether or not that meant the domed greenhouse was secure, they would only know, once they got inside, or rather, ‘if’ they got inside. Already, the Sergeant was trying to shoulder open the door, to no avail. Each time he threw himself against the reinforced door, it would open only wide enough for a hand to pass through, before colliding with something large and heavy on the other side.

  ‘Fuck!’ Ridge snapped, looking through the gap. ‘There’s some sort of cart thing parked the other side, we’ll have to find another way in.’

  ‘Well, we’d better fucking hurry up and think of something.’ Said Pelling, finally dropping her crowbar and slowly swinging her assault rifle from its position on her back, her gaze fixed on the mass of cadavers already appearing at the end of the path.

  Glancing over his shoulder at the approaching horde, Ridge suddenly realised his mistake. He had led his team down a dead end, and unless he could think of something, this was not going to end well. It was then that he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. Snapping his head to his left, he saw that four cadavers had dragged themselves out from the nearby foliage, and were now walking up along the verge towards them. The first, the decaying remains of a dead woman wearing a pair of filthy green overalls, was already only a few paces from the lip, and as it looked down at the group below, its film covered eyes held only a promise of death for those in its sights.

  ‘Sir,’ cried Sinclair, looking to the Sergeant’s right where corpses were also starting to appear, ‘we’re getting surrounded, we need to do something!’

  ‘Get behind me,’ whispered Andrews, nervously pushing Lucy into the corner.

  The woman’s corpse was only a step away from the edge of the verge now, and the Sergeant knew he had to act before she fell upon them. Darting forward, he scooped up Pelling’s now discarded crowbar and hoisted himself up onto the shoulder height verge.

  ‘Come and get me, you rank Bitch!’ he growled, trying to draw the corpse’s attention from the soldiers below, ‘Come on!’

  Slowly, the woman’s body turned its head to look at the living man next to her. No sooner had she turned her hungry gaze upon him, than Sergeant Ridge quickly stepped forward. It almost looked as if he was to embrace her, but at the last second, he thrust his hunting knife upwards, deep into the withered flesh under her chin. With a grunt, he pushed the blade home, piercing through the roof of her blackened, fetid mouth, and up into her brain.

  Pushing the now lifeless corpse away from him to fall in the tall grass, Ridge ran to nearest of the large hexagonal panels that made up the structure of the huge dome. With a glance at the corpses ambling closer towards him, he dropped his knife at his feet and took the crowbar in both hands. With as much force as his adrenalin fuelled muscles could provide, Ridge took a mighty swing at one of the clear panels, praying it would break. With a dull ‘thud’, the end of the crowbar connected and bounced back off the surface, barely leaving a mark.

  ‘Come on, you fucker,’ he muttered under his breath, drawing the bar back to take another swing.

  Aiming for the same spot, the crowbar flew through the air again, but this time, he was rewarded with a smallest of cracks in the thick Perspex panel.

  ‘Sir!’ cried Pelling behind him, her tone telling him it was nothing good.

  Ridge looked back and saw that the main throng of the walking cadavers were only ten metres away now. With the prospect of warm flesh for them to dine on so close, they were doing all in their power to move their emaciated limbs as fast as they could to get to them.

  ‘Fuck! Pelling, buy us some time,’ he shouted above their deathly moaning, ‘Sinclair, you too, I want controlled weapons fire, just keep those bastards back.’

  ‘About fucking time,’ Pelling mumbled, raising her rifle to take aim on the nearest corpse.

  Keeping an eye on the corpses getting dangerously close on the grassy verge behind him, Sergeant Ridge swiftly re-adjusted his hold on the crowbar and prayed he could break through the panel in time. Then in a hail of bullets, the shooting started.

  ***

  ‘Christ! It’s them, we’ve actually found them,’ said Liz, looking through the binoculars as she clung with one arm to the top of the sign post. ‘They’re getting surrounded by the Dead. There’s something behind the door, they can’t get in.’

  ‘Is Charlie with them,’ asked Phil, leaning back so he could look up at Liz through the side hatch, ‘can you see him?’

  ‘Erm…’ Liz replied, looking from one unknown person in uniform to the next, ‘wait, yes, yes, one of the soldiers is carrying a baby, it has to be Charlie, right?’

  In the shadowy interior of the cart, Phil met Patrick’s worried gaze. They both could hear the hope in Liz’s voice and silently wondered which of them would be the one to remind her there was a distinct possibility it could be Lucy’s baby the soldier held. Phil was about to open his mouth when Liz spoke again.

  ‘I can see one of the soldiers trying to break his way through the greenhouse panels,’ she continued, briefly glancing back at her friends. ‘Fuck, the Dead just keep coming, there’s just so many of them, there must be hundreds. They’re not going to make it. Christ, they’re not going to make it.’

  ‘So do we try to help them?’ asked Karen, looking from one concerned face to the next.

  ‘We have to,’ replied Liz, already climbing back down from the top of the signpost. ‘We have to save Charlie.’

  ‘Liz…’ Imran began, helping her back into the cart, ‘it may not be Charlie, you do know that, right?’

  Liz paused halfway in the hatchway, the realisation that the child could indeed be someone other than Charlie, suddenly dawning on her.

  ‘It’s a baby, Imran,’ she softly replied, a look of determination on her face, ‘whoever it is, it’s just a baby, and we’ve got to try.’

  ‘Well, if the Dead are focusing all their attention on the soldiers, we’ll be no help approaching from the front. Did you see another way into the dome?’ asked Steve, finally breaking the silence.

  Liz gave Steve a brief smile, relieved she wouldn’t have to battle to convince them this was the right thing to do.


  ‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘there’s a smaller side entrance. If we can get through, we could try to open the door behind them.’

  ‘And if they do have Charlie?’ asked Karen, letting the question hang.

  ‘We get him back,’ Liz finally replied matter-of-factly, the sound of soldier’s gunfire still echoing ominously around them.

  ‘Right then, which way?’ Phil asked, taking Samson’s reins in his hands.

  ‘Take the next right,’ Liz began, leaning forward to look over Phil’s shoulder, ‘then that pathway should take us to the side of the Dome.’

  ‘Let’s just hope we have better luck getting in than they did,’ Phil said to himself, giving the reins a sharp crack.

  Just like all of them, Phil knew the soldiers would run out of ammo before the Dead ran out of hungry corpses. He had seen it before. The arrogance of the military’s reliance on their precious killing toys, made them think themselves invincible. Surely, nothing could withstand this hail of bullets, not even this army of the Dead. But they were always wrong. This foe was like none other they had battled against before. The Dead were relentless and with their ranks forever increasing, the military would ultimately lose. So, urging Samson forward with haste, he hoped for once this battle could have a different outcome.

  With huge overgrown flowerbeds and swathes of greenery flashing past them, Phil pushed Samson as fast as he dared along the cobbled pathways. The closer they got to the dome, the more they could hear the ceaseless moaning of the Dead beneath the rat-tat-rat sound of the soldier’s automatic gunfire.

  ‘They’re starting to panic,’ said Steve, looking at Patrick, ‘you can tell from the breaks between the shots. Whoever’s shooting, they’ve lost control of the situation and not taking the time to aim anymore.’