I moved forward a fraction more, and could now take in the whole scene. Two bodies lay on the floor, being slowly consumed by eight infected people. One woman had managed to detach an arm from one of the corpses, and was sitting slightly apart from the others, seeming to relish her new-found food source as she tore another lump of flesh from the bone. A man was pulling the intestines from a gaping wound in the corpse nearest to John and me. Recoiling from the scene, I stepped backwards, stepping on a beer can which had been knocked off the shelf earlier. This exploded with a pop and propelled itself across the aisle in the general direction of the infected, emitting a hissing sound as it finally came to rest against the opposite wall. The infected reacted as one, looking in our direction, getting to their feet and moving towards John and me.
Instinctively I lifted the shotgun to my shoulder and fired at the nearest, which happened to be the woman who was eating away from the others. She had left the half-eaten arm on the floor, and her main instinct was now to infect John and me. I fired, removing the best part of her skull, and she fell to the ground as I staggered backwards from the recoil. John, who had moved behind me and was now standing in the middle of the aisle, opened fire, putting three rounds into a man’s head before he finally fell to the ground. By now Miles and Brian had also opened fire from the other end, taking out the nearest infected to them, but unfortunately they were all moving in our direction.
My next shot was at a man less than five yards away. The centre of the shot pattern hit him in the nose, and his head seemed to explode as if I had placed a stick of dynamite in it. Then Miles fired again, but his intended target stumbled forward, tripping over the woman’s discarded arm as he did so, and the nine .33-calibre balls caused five or six bottles of wine to explode only three feet away from John’s head. John just managed to drop another infected before he was covered in wine and peppered with shards of glass from the exploding bottles. He realised the error of his ways and moved back to where I was standing, and of course now looked a sorry sight. Brian and Miles dispatched the last two infected as I turned my attention to my son. He was covered in red spots, some of blood and the others red wine.
“OK, John, don’t move,” I said as I carefully plucked a shard of glass from his cheek and then another from his forehead. John reacted with an “ouch” as I removed another from the right side of his neck. He extracted one more from the back of his right hand. Miles had joined us.
“You all right, John? The guy moved at the wrong time.”
“Hmm, well, at least I can’t find any holes anywhere,” replied John.
Brian arrived beside us, and the four of us walked to the top of the store, whence we could see all the way along the aisle that ran past the tills to the other end. Everything was clear. If there were any more infected, they would have been upon us by now after the amount of noise we had created.
Ruth appeared in front of us as we neared the entrance.
“Are you guys alright?” she shouted. “I thought you’d like to know we have company.”
We men looked at each other as we quickened our pace to reach Ruth.
“Two men and a woman have joined us – apparently, they heard all the noise you lot were creating. They seemed harmless enough,” said Ruth.
The five of us walked through the double exit doors back into the sunlight. Our little group was talking to the three strangers beside John’s truck.
“We have cleared the store for you, Mum,” said John as the four of us joined the group.
“Hi. Yeah, sounded like you had yourselves a few problems,” said one of the newly arrived men. “I’m Fred, and this is my wife Tina and our next-door neighbour, Ronnie.”
“Hello all,” I replied. “Yes, I think we’ve had enough excitement for one day.”
Fred was middle-aged, tall and very slim, with longish hair and a full, well-trimmed beard. He was dressed in smart-casual clothing. His wife was also well dressed, in red jeans and a smart blouse. She had very short hair for a woman and a pretty face, although her breasts appeared slightly too big for her slim figure. Ronnie was completely different, a man of under six feet and definitely overweight, dressed in scruffy jeans and a well-used blue t-shirt. He had not shaved for a couple of days, as the stubble on his plump face was starting to turn into a beard. He seemed to be in his late twenties or early thirties.
“Did you manage to clear the store of those infected people?” asked Tina.
“Yes, as far as we know we got the lot,” replied John.
“Thank goodness for that. We’ve run out of food, water and a few other essentials,” Tina continued.
“Do you live far away?” asked Brian.
“Just over there,” said Fred, pointing in the direction away from where we had entered the shopping area.
“We’d best get a move on, folks, before any more infected turn up,” warned Miles.
“Well, Fred, Tina and Ronnie, I suggest you grab yourselves a shopping trolley each and collect whatever you need before it all disappears,” I said. “Mary, time for you to get a move on too. John and I will wait out here, just in case.”
Miles went with Maria; Brian with Linda; Mary, Josephine and Ruth went together; Bill and Rose, and Mat and Sara paired off; and our three new acquaintances formed a sixth group. Each person took a trolley except for Bill and Rose, who decided to share one. After a couple of minutes of trolleys rattling away, John and I were left on our own, a slightly menacing silence falling over the shopping area, which would normally be teeming with life at that time of day.
The silence was broken, however, as a single crow flew over, cawing loudly, then another and another, and soon there were hundreds of them circling over the car park, finally finding the courage to land out of our sight. Then a group of magpies landed near the lamp post from where we had cleared the corpses earlier. Rats started to appear from their hiding places, making their way to the nearest decomposing body. A dog barked in the distance and then another, a little closer.
“John, when these rats start to breed, we’re going to have a real problem,” I said, watching one not 15 yards from us disappear under a dead woman’s skirt. “Magpies and rooks shouldn’t pose too much of a problem at this time of year, as it’s past their breeding season, but rats can breed at any time.”
“Not much we can do about it at the moment. I’ve just realised we haven’t had any rain for a week now,” commented John.
“John, we’ve just dispatched eight infected people, we have various members of the crow family in their hundreds if not thousands flying about our heads, and I’ve just witnessed a rat disappearing up a dead woman’s skirt directly in front of us, plus there are dead people lying all over the place! Whatever made you think of rain?” I said in exasperation.
“The big black clouds up there, which appear to be coming our way,” replied John.
Looking behind me, over the top of the store roof I could see some very threatening clouds. Almost immediately, I felt the first spots of rain hit my face. Then the heavens opened, and John and I climbed quickly into the truck and sat there in silence listening to the rain drumming on the roof. When I was driving the taxi – which seemed like a million years ago now – if no work was coming in I used to love the rain, and usually I would be asleep within 15 minutes. Today was no exception, and the next thing I knew John was shaking me.
“Dad, they’re back, and they need some help.”
It was still pouring with rain.
“James, wakey, wakey! We’re getting wet!” Mary shouted at me, peering through the passenger door window.
John and I jumped out of the truck, and started to load the supplies in the back, getting slowly soaked in the process. Brian and Linda were loading up their MPV, but there was no sign of Miles, Bill, Mat and our new acquaintances. John and I started on the last of the three trolleys when Mary, Josephine and Ruth left us to it and got into th
e truck to escape the rain’s increasing severity.
As John and I finished loading and started to get into the truck, the other groups arrived. Miles and Bill were frantically loading up their own vehicles, while the ladies got into their cars. Brian shouted out to Fred, “Do you want a lift? We have plenty of room.”
“Yes, please,” Fred replied.
Brian got out of the MPV, opened the tailgate, and started to help Fred and Ronnie load their supplies into the back.
“John, do you think our new friends will want to come to B&Q with us?” I asked.
“We can only ask,” said John looking at me intently.
I returned his stare.
“OK, OK, I’ll get wet again,” I said eventually.
I got out of the truck into the increasing downpour and trotted over to the MPV where Brian, Fred and Ronnie were putting the last of their supplies in the back. In a louder voice than usual over the pounding of the rain, I said, “Fred, do you want to come with us to B&Q?”
“Yes, we need some torches and more batteries, and ASDA appears to be cleared out,” replied Fred. “Some timber would be good – I can then do a better job of blocking up our windows and doors.”
“Yes, me too,” said Ronnie.
Brian shut the tailgate and all three men got into the MPV, while I headed back to John’s truck, shouting “Let’s go!”
John turned the truck around in the shopping pedestrian area, heading back in the direction from which we had entered. Most of the vermin had disappeared, obviously seeking a drier location, although I did notice a few rats still feeding in the sheltered area by the cash machines as we exited the main shopping precinct. Little streams of dark brown water started to run across the car park, trying to find the lowest point, and the rain was so heavy that small pieces of rotting flesh and clumps of blood started to move along in the larger rivulets.
I kept checking the door mirror as John picked his way through the rotting corpses lying in the car park to make certain the rest of our group was keeping up with us. Finally, we reached the main road, and as we picked up speed the drumming of the rain on the truck increased to such an extent that we all sat in silence. John turned on the air conditioning as the temperature in the truck started to rise. For once, the air appeared to be fresher and, as the underlying smell of rotting flesh was washed away by the heavy rain, it was amazing how much better I started to feel.
We negotiated the three roundabouts and were soon approaching the B&Q entrance. Due to the central reservation in the road, John had to go back to the roundabout, but instead of going all the way round he did a U-turn, which brought us to the entrance of the B&Q car park, where we went in. Negotiating his way around a number of corpses, and sending a flock of crows squawking into the air, John finally pulled into one of the disabled parking bays directly opposite the main entrance, avoiding two bodies that lay on the dividing lines between them. The rest of our convoy followed, Brian pulling in next to us, Miles and Bill parking in the bays directly opposite. Mat pulled in next to Brian’s MPV.
John and I checked our guns and ammo, and then surveyed the car park for any signs of human movement. There were still a few cars scattered over the large parking area, probably owned by the unfortunate souls who never returned home, but nothing moved. Even the vermin had been forced to shelter from the persistent heavy rain. John turned the engine off, and the drumming of the rain on the truck roof sounded considerably louder.
“OK, John, who’s going to get wet again first?” I asked.
“We’ll let you and John check out the store first,” said Mary, smiling.
“I agree with that,” said Ruth.
“That’s a great idea, Mum,” added Josephine.
“We don’t know if the doors are open yet,” John commented.
John and I turned our attention to the store. Although the entrance lobby was made of glass panels, a row of pallets laden with bags of garden compost lined the outside of the store and an even taller stack of plastic storage containers was in the lobby itself, completely blocking our view of the interior.
John looked at me and said, “Time to go”.
“Let’s do it,” I answered.
We got out of the truck together, guns in hand, and made our way to the left towards racks of wilting garden plants, finally receiving a much-delayed watering. We arrived at the automatic glass sliding doors, but of course with no power they did not move. Looking through the glass panels, we saw two men apparently looking at the plastic storage bins. John tapped on the glass to attract their attention, and both of them turned and moved towards us, heads down, coming to an abrupt halt as they hit the glass panels. Looking up at us, their faces a mask of pain and with the bright-red eyes and intensely black shiny pupils that appeared to penetrate one’s very soul, John and I inadvertently took two steps back – with guns raised, which had now become an automatic reaction. After the few seconds that it took us to recover our composure, John commented, “This could be a bit tricky, Dad”.
“Yeah, so how do we get the doors open with these two hovering around the entrance?”
“The way I see it, we have two options. We distract them by making a noise at the other end of the lobby where the exit is, which should give us enough time to get the doors open, or we shoot the windows out and go in with guns blazing, so to speak.”
Miles and Brian had now arrived at our side.
“We go in with guns blazing,” said Miles. “There’s no time to mess about, James. Besides, I’m getting wet.”
“I’ll second that,” said Brian.
“As this is a democracy …” I said.
Cocking the semi-auto shotgun, John followed my lead with the Ruger.
“Let’s do it, then,” he said.
The infected were standing next to each other by the right-hand door window, banging their heads against the reinforced glass.
“We only need to take out one of the door windows, guys,” Brian noted.
“We need to get closer, Miles,” I said. “If you take the one on the right, I’ll take the left. John, Brian, you act as back-ups just in case it doesn’t go according to plan.”
Miles and I moved to within three feet of the window, both of us taking aim.
“On the count of three, James – one … two … three.”
The boom! of the two shotguns rang out in unison across the now thoroughly soaked car park. The glass crystallised into myriad pieces, punctured by two three-inch-diameter holes, and both infected staggered backwards. Miles’s target fell to the ground immediately, whereas mine staggered about for a few seconds, crashing into the plastic storage boxes, even though the right side of its head was missing, before finally collapsing to the floor. John walked up to us.
“That went amazingly well,” he said.
He kicked the shattered glass panel, which fell to the ground, scattering thousands of pieces into and outside the store. John stepped over the door sill and entered the store, followed by Brian. Miles and I followed them into the lobby area. Brian was now at John’s side as they went from the lobby into the main shopping area. Miles and I stood at the store entrance, observing their progress past the customer service counter on their right. Directly in front of them was the garden furniture, with parasols still open. They reached the main walkway, which extended to their right and left the full length of the store. They were approximately halfway along its length when both stopped, John looking to the left and Brian to the right, and they then quickly turned and looked at each other.
“Run!” they shouted in unison, and headed towards us at a trot.
“Dad, we have a problem,” said John. “There are hundreds of them.”
“They’re coming from both sides of the store,” Brian added.
“And directly in front of us!” Miles observed, as a number of infected had negotiated a path through the gard
en furniture and entered the main walkway.
We could see at least 50 approaching from the right as we looked beyond the line of checkout tills, but our view to the left was partly blocked by large boxes containing barbecues.
“I suggest we hold our ground at the lobby entrance,” I said.
This was about ten feet wide, and the other side of it was separated by rows of trolleys.
“I just hope we have enough ammo,” Miles added.
Fortunately, the barbecues on the left and pallets of Miracle-Gro and other fertilisers on our right created a 15-yard channel to the main walkway. We took up position in the lobby entrance and waited for the first infected to enter the channel, all of us glancing at each other apprehensively as the infected approached ever closer. Those that had been directly in front of us were the first to enter the narrow channel and they approached us at their normal stumbling fast walk.
“Shoot the ones directly in front of you!” shouted John.
Three infected men were leading the attack, with two women and a teenage girl directly behind. We opened fire, my first shot taking out a middle-aged man in front of me and one of the women directly behind. The other four infected also dropped to the ground, plus another man that was still in the centre of the walkway. More infected seemed to appear from the garden furniture section as they were now joined by the 50 or so from the right. These were joined in turn by another ten to twenty previously unseen infected, which had come from our left.
Miles and I soon found ourselves reloading as the body count increased. We were creating a pile of corpses only ten yards in front of us, as more infected climbed over their companions in a frantic effort to sink their teeth into us, eventually adding themselves to the growing heap as Brian and John shot them as they reached the top. While Miles and I reloaded, I noticed 20 or so infected on our right that had passed through the tills. They started to enter the other end of the lobby area, but fortunately we were separated by the lines of trolleys parked there, which normally forced customers to walk around the store instead of passing directly through the lobby to the exit doors. Miles and I again added our firepower to that of our struggling companions, and Brian backed off a couple of steps and started to feed more shells into his shotgun magazine as the rest of us kept the infected at bay.
Infected- The Beginning Page 24