World Down: A Zombie Novel

by Walker, Callum Bennington Goldworth

  I grabbed my rifle and grouped up with the others.

  “Ok, the lieutenant wants us to scout for survivors. The hospital has been silent for over twenty-four hours. That means it could be crawling with the infected,” said Thomo.

  “Put your masks on. Jake, Maddison, you two and Hussain will protect the jeeps. The rest, follows me inside.”

  Me, Jacob, Mason and Thomo walked up to the hospital doors. Thomo held his combat shotgun to the door and peeked through the slit, taking point. I was third inside, after Jacob.

  “What were they using this pace for?” I whispered aloud as I looked upon the outer warehouse loading dock. I held my rifle stock steady, any sort of movement I was ready to pull the trigger. I told myself nothing was going to catch me off my guard.

  “Testing place for the world's most contagious, deadly diseases,” joked Jacob. “No, I’m only kidding, I don't know.”

  We saw no sign of anything around us, so we continued up the steps to some really fancy hospital clinic doors. Thomas entered first as was usual for him. This was the real building, I thought, we were inside now.

  We opened to a grizzly scene in the white sterile corridors. It was a pile of bodies, some in patient grabs, others in lab coats, leaning against the door. One doctor on the reception had been eviscerated, his intestines splayed out on the floor. I wanted to be sick, but I swallowed it all and stepped forth into the haunted hospital. The silent hospital, save for our light footsteps.

  “We go down here first,” whispered Thomas, pointing to the dark corridor with the flashing light at the end. Of course, it had to be this way first I thought to myself.

  The corridor led to other departments, one was covered in darkness, the other lit up with light from windows. “Mas, Blake, search left,” said Thomo. “Jacob, with me.”

  I took one long look down the dark recesses of the hallway leading right, and was very glad I was heading in the other direction.

  “You gotta be kidding me,” muttered Jacob. “Flashlight on,” said Thomo, and the corridor lit up in light.

  Me and Mas continued with our search down the brighter left side.

  There was a trail of blood on the floor, leading around a corner. My heart skipped a beat as I hopped around it. Then I found the source of the trail down the end.

  A woman had been beheaded and dragged across the marble floor, her feet splayed up in the air against the wall, between a child’s picture, and her neck was exposed at me. As if she had been dragged by her feet up against it.

  “Fucking hell,” whispered Mason with an uneasy breath as his eyes met the grizzly sight.

  I checked inside one of the wards, and found a red mess in one of the beds. I dared look at the others. There was nothing, no sound, no nothing, no eyes peering back at me from the dark. I left it as I found it. Coming out into the hallway, Mason stopped me.

  “Wait,” he said, shining his light upon the wall where a sign read.

  WAYFEATHER INSANE ASYLUM

  “It's a nuthouse!” Whispered harshly Mason.

  A distant scream assaulted my ears, piercing the air like a blade. It was followed quickly by a shotgun blast. Thomo and Jacob had made contact.

  There was still a section of the wing to check, but we retreated, only one word was said.

  “Quick!” I shouted. We ran back, following the blood trail, back around the corner, to where the corridor split off into the two wings.

  “Thomas!” I shouted.

  “Jacob!” Mason screamed.

  Lights flickered in the dark hallway, I saw movement behind two figures. I didn't know how long the corridor was, how deep it went. The lights moved as if the holders were running, and out of the dark came running one of them. It was Thomas. Panting, red faced, scared.

  He turned and flashed the light on the end of his shotgun down the hallway, and I saw the reflection of at least twenty dead ones, advancing, crawling, stumbling, running with anger and teeth. Oh god, the snarls, the taunts of the dead, they suffocated my ears. Their eyes were reflected blue and purple.

  Jacob was still running, trying to escape. I could see his flashlight face the ground and waver, dimming as he ran towards us. Thomas lit up the chasing pack with his shotgun blast, I raised my own gun, but I did not know where to shoot as they were in darkness. Thomas’s light shined at them, but Jacobs fleeing light shined at us, blinding us to our targets. I shot at where the Jacobs light was not, to the right of him, but I could still see them, eyes peering in the dark, there were so many of them.

  Jacob was close but not close enough, he came out of the darkness with blood all over him, dripping from the top of his head. He collapsed as shadows from the dark emerged, dragging him back to the recesses of the abyss. He screamed.

  “Help me! Help me!”

  “Nooooo!” Shouted Mason as he unloaded his entire magazine into the onrushing creeps. Then he and I ran away at full speed, leaving Jacob to die. Thomo was already ahead of us, he had looked at reception to make it safe for us to retreat.

  He shot behind me at the chasing monsters, the pellets, they whistled past me. I had just seen Jacob die, my gosh. Our survival mode kicked into gear and we fled, until we reached the doors we had come in, and sealed them shut with an iron bar. Bodies rattled against the doors, it was a narrow escape, but there was no way they could slam the doors open. We were safe again, but we had lost Jacob, Pvt. Jacob Mathews was down.

  “Fuck man, Jacob, why the hell did we come here?!” Mason cried angrily, emotional and heartbroken in the outside of the depot.

  “It was the lieutenant's orders,” answered Thomas in a deadpan tone.

  I caught my breath and looked away, counting my fortune and how lucky I had been that I’d survived. I steadied my breathing and looked to that same sky once more, silently wishing that I had died instead of Jacob.

  Burial - Day 12 - Jess

  I stared in disbelief at the calm winds outside my window, blowing over the fields of high grass, and steep streams of clear water. I had no idea what was happening in the world, what horrors awaited me if I picked a direction and drove on.

  I had just buried Gareth in the field, I used the workout to build some muscle, something I would need if I were to survive in this world. I ate the last of the chicken in the freezer, and hoarded all the sweets and candy in Lilys backpack. My dad’s body lay on the table in the kitchen, and Susie and that mysterious girl had confined themselves to the upstairs bedroom. We had not spoken, not properly yet, and I didn't know what to do.

  I had to do something with his body soon. What would he have wanted? To be buried in the field, under a tree perhaps? Or burned on a pyre? I knew I could do it, there were blocks of wood just for it in the barn.

  “What is it Jess?” Lily asked me. I was sitting with my legs crossed next to his body, rocking back and forth like a mad woman.

  “I love you Jess,” she said, taking my hand. She was so sweet.

  “What do you think Dad would want?” I asked her, an eight-year-old child, of what her dead father would have wanted. This was so fucked up. I hadn't been prepared for this in my life. It was wrong. I had struggled to tell her he had passed away yesterday, it was all a blur actually, the past day. Just sadness and frustration remained in my memory.

  “He liked nature,” said Lily, and I wiped my tears off my face and stood upright. She was right. My Lily was right, he loved nature.

  “Good, go on, play with Mike,” I said leading her away.

  “I want to stay with you though,” she insisted, holding my hand tighter. I respected her wishes and followed her out to the living room where Mike was play with some old toys, Susie's old toys I imagined. I hadn't seen her since last night when she came down for an ice pack for some reason. She gave a wayward glance to me and my dead father, then met my eyes as they were filled with anger at what had happened. I left Lily to play with Mike and went outside with a shovel.

  I soon came back, and carefully dragged his body away to the pit I had
dug, right next to an old oak and a small one between the fields. I placed him there, as gracefully as I could, and beckoned Lily to come over, to say goodbye.

  “Mike, come, he saved you too,” I said. Those words reminded me of how he saved a little boy he had no responsibility for. I teared up, for my dad was a hero. I kissed his forehead, and then encouraged Lily forward. She gave him a little peck on the top of his cold head, and then I told her to spend a minute thinking of him, after which I spoke a few words.

  “Dad, I loved you, we all loved you. I’m awful at speeches, but I know you will forgive me. It was always in your nature to forgive, and forget, but we will never forget you. You were my world at one point, and I’m sure your memory will inspire me for many years to come.”

  I took some of the dirt and threw it over him.

  “Goodbye Dad, I’ll always love you, my father, my everything.”

  I could not stop my eyes from welling up with water. I sobbed, out loud, in front of Lily. It was an ugly, but true sound. Mike stared at the ground with his hands together, and my sister cried.

  I couldn't take it anymore, I kneeled at the foot of his grave and looked up. The trees I saw were vast, the large one must have been over five hundred years old. I thanked them both for guarding his body, then whispered to the children to go inside and pack their things.

  After about thirty seconds I looked behind to see them walking inside the house in the distance across the fields. I hadn't left them out of my sight since the incident, but I had no fears of Susie putting them in danger. She couldn't hurt a fly.

  I saw her in the window, looking down on me as I picked up the shovel, and began to bury him properly. My father, Richard Lively. My rock.

  Suddenly, my father’s hand rose up and grabbed mine, then he snarled and opened his mouth, flashing his rotten teeth at me. He was one of them dead things now, and he jumped at me. I screamed and pulled away from him, then screamed again while gripping the shovel, but this time I wasn’t scared, I screamed in anger, whacking him over the head and sending him back into the ditch I had dug. I wept again after he fell and went silent, for the second and final time now.

  An hour later it was done. I stared at the patch of dirt and relaxed, leaning on the bloody shovel, admiring his spot on the great green hill. It was done, I had given my father his leave. Now it was up to me to protect Lily. I trudged back through the mud and arrived back to the house. Immediately I found a scrupulous visitor in the kitchen. A rat the size of a small dog.

  “Gross,” I uttered while walking about in my worn, tattered, and now muddy flats. I leaned on the sink, and dropped my head low, thinking of all that had happened these past few days. What were we to do now? Where were we to go? Mom had abandoned us; dad had died protecting us. My brother had long abandoned us. I was all alone, I felt alone, aside from the unnerving present feeling that I was not.

  I turned my head and eyed Susie in the doorway to the stairs. She looked fed up, bags under her eyes as large as mine, larger in fact. I turned my entire body to face her.

  “We need to have a serious discussion,” I spoke to her, the first words I’d had the nerve to speak to her.

  “What is there to say?” She said in a scared, unlike Susie voice. I gave her the obvious eyes and did a double take. As if she would speak to me like that.

  “How about we start with how my dad is dead?” I said.

  “My father is dead too!” Susie shouted back. I dipped my head frustratedly. As if she could compare her pain to mine!

  “Ok, who is that girl?” I asked. “Is she your sister? Your friend?”

  Susie looked down in shame and nodded.

  “A friend I didn't know about,” I nodded my own head sarcastically, wiping the snot from my nose that had ran from my countless hours of crying.

  “She was my father's friend,” said Susie.

  I just rolled my eyes. Whatever I thought. As if an old man would have a young girl as his friend. Unless he was a freak.

  “Don't tell me your father was some kind of pervert?” I spoke, with a grin, almost forming a smile on my face, for the first time in days. She gave me a blank, expressionless look. Then the penny dropped, her father was all I joked and more. Why else would Gareth call him diseased? I wanted to throw up as I connected the dots. She wore dirty, flirtatious clothes, and had bruises on her arms, of course she was his sick fantasy.

  “I can't stay here,” I spoke in my head and aloud.

  “I can't either,” Susie said.

  “Oh, you want to hit the road with me?!” I smiled, sarcastically again, but I wanted to cry, laughing at fucked up things was a way for me to shield how I actually felt.

  “None of us have driven before, neither of us can cook, or lived on our own before,” I said.

  “You're leaving? Please Jess, let me go with you, I’m scared.”

  “You covered for him, didn't you?” I put her on the spot.

  She didn't answer, she couldn't, for she was too ashamed of the truth. I started packing food from the fridge into my duffel bag, I had only one fresh t-shirt left from the five I packed, damn that wardrobe, damn me for picking only five! The last one was a pink cartoon one that I usually wore for bed but I’d wear anything if it were clean in these circumstances. Susie stepped towards me as I packed all manner of things away. I was stealing from her kitchen right in front of her but I didn't care, she was harmless.

  “Jess you need to reconsider, I have things that can help you, we’re friends aren't we, best friends!”

  “There's no electricity, no clean running water. You don't offer anything, but bad company, and two more mouths to feed,” I shrugged her off and grabbed my duffle bag, then headed into the living room to see how the children were packing. Lily was sitting on the sofa, her pink backpack stuffed to the brim with clothes, toys and food. Mike was lying on the floor stretching himself. It reminded me of my cat Charles. He was probably dead now. I was fond of that cat.

  “Come on, you all packed? Mike, get up off the floor and stop being an idiot. It's time to go,” I extended my arm to Lily and pulled her up off of the sofa. Mike followed with his ragged creased and foul-smelling shirt. He’d had no change of clothes for days now, poor kid.

  “Jess please don't,” Susie said as I walked past her and out the front door with my sister.

  “I've no one left, my mom, my dad, my brother, they all left me, I’m on my own!” I adamantly told her.

  “I need to do what's right, I've got to protect her.”

  “Jess!” Cried Susie as I unlocked the car doors. The sky above was filled with grey clouds and a strong wind blew my hair back.

  “Lily, Mike, wait here, I’m going to try and drive this thing, just to make sure I can before I let you in.”

  I sat in the driver's seat and placed the keys in the engine, then pressed my foot to the pedal. I changed to a low gear and drove slowly, I had watched my dad for years, but I knew this wasn't going to be easy. Reversing I tested my skills, I was ok at this, I thought.

  Taking the calculated risk to drive back to the city, I called Lily and Mike to come inside. Once they were in, I looked at them in the rear-view mirror. They were so innocent but so scared. I wasn't going to let them down. I had to find people, good people who cared, not the vile type we had encountered. I felt that was harsh on Susie. She was just as scared and now she was alone too, but I couldn't have her around Lily, she had shown herself to be weak and foolish, I wouldn't let her weakness and foolishness harm my family again. I drove, quietly and carefully, out the driveway and onto the road, leaving my best friend sobbing on her porch.

  We drove away for five minutes, seeing the death and decay all around us. Corpses littered the country roads, husks of shapes of people lurked in the fields, slumbering dead or alive I could not tell. I kept my eyes fixed on the road. Abandoned tents were strewn down, as if set upon in the night. Fifteen minutes later we came to a village with dead traffic, there was no way through. I looked in the rear-vie
w mirror, Lily and Mike were half asleep.

  I turned the car around and went back out onto the road the way we came as night descended. It felt like we were the only people in the world, as I turned the headlights on. We drove and drove on in our endeavour to find safety, eventually finding ourselves down on a narrow country path. I began to get scared as night fell. We would sleep in the car again I thought. A fear struck me as I imagined sleeping in the field again in pitch black. Last time it was fine, as I had my Dad and Gareth with me, albeit while he was still sane. Now it was just me and the kids. I wanted to turn back as the road got narrower and the turns got more and more steep in the forests. As my mind wandered to what was out there in the dark, the headlights lit up a hooded figure, holding his arms out in front of the car to stop us. It gave me such a fright I screamed and woke the children, thank goodness for seatbelts, or I would have launched right through the window screen and into the arms of this mysterious figure, who now was walking toward our idle car with a crowbar in hand, and a menacing glare.

  Lt. Richards - Day 13 - Blake

  I woke to the sound of a hundred voices calling out for help as the morning light shone on my rifle.

  “Blake, rise and shine mate, we’re here,” said Maddison as she shook me. I opened my eyes to find myself in one of the jeeps, as we bumped slowly along the road to the Exhibition Centre. There was a large wired fence around the various compounds and crowds of people wanting to come into the safe zone.

  “Oh my god!” I said upon seeing them all.

  “Calm down Blake, they are just as scared as us,” said Mason from the driver’s seat.

  “I am calm,” I told him as we approached.

  “Please save us! Please,” they shouted.

  The military roadblock allowed us to pass, while they fought back against the baying crowd. Inside, the camps were larger than they were when we left them on the 8th day of this thing. It was now the morning of the thirteenth day of this outbreak, and catastrophe after catastrophe had occurred since then. We had lost Jacob and James, and my own mother. God, just thinking about her made me tear up.