Last Days With the Dead (29 page)

‘Mallon,’ Ridge continued, pulling himself to the doorway where Pelling was already scanning the area through her rifle sight, ‘get the girl and her baby up here
, we need to get out of here, pronto.’           

‘It’s clear,’ said Pelling, glancing back to Sergeant Ridge as he pulled himself free of the wrecked carrier, ‘for now at least.’

‘Well, at least that’s something,’ he replied, readjusting the straps of the holdall containing the infant’s body. ‘What about the Jackal or Grimes and Sinclair? Any survivors?’

‘There’s those two,’ she replied,
nodding further along the river bank where Sinclair was just pulling the unconscious form of Grimes from the water, ‘but the Jackal’s gone, we must’ve flipped right over on top of them, no way they could’ve survived, Sir.’

‘Fuck!’ snapped Ridge, pushing past Pelling to stomp over to Sinclair.

‘What the fuck happened?’ he said reaching Sinclair as he rolled onto his back, panting from exhaustion.

‘It just disappeared
,’ he replied, trying to catch his breath. ‘The whole bridge just went from under us, Sergeant. There was nothing we could do.’

Sergeant Ridge looked down at the two drenched men, his rage desperate for a release. Whatever had happened, he held these two partly responsible. 

‘You better fucking pray we get back to Carlyon bay in one piece, Soldier,’ he growled, ‘or I’ll feed you to these corpses myself, now get up!’

‘Sir,’ panted Sinclair, slowly pushing himself up from the mud and slippery rocks.

‘And if he doesn’t come round by the time we ready to go, we’re leaving him,’ sneered Ridge, tapping Grimes’ body with his boot.

‘Sir,’ repeated Sinclair, his brow creasing in worry as he looked down at Grimes.

Back at the rear of the overturned carrier, Mallon was helping Lucy out onto the stony riverbank, while Andrews organised their limited weapons and ammo supply.

‘How’s it looking, Andrews?’ Ridge asked, looking down at the small amount of salvaged weaponry.

‘Not brilliant, Sir,’ he replied, clicking a full magazine into his assault rifle, ‘we’ve got three clips a piece, and a dozen grenades.’

‘Shit,’ grumbled Ridge, looking along the river where already he could see one of the walking corpses slowly ambling towards them.

‘If you shoot them, more will come,’ whispered a traumatised looking Lucy.

‘Wh
at was that, Lucy?’ asked Andrews, reaching out to the young girl holding her baby. ‘What did you say?’

‘You
, you have to kill them with knives or clubs,’ she replied, her voice barely rising in volume as her eyes darted up along the riverbank, ‘if you use your guns, they’ll hear you and more will come.’

Sergeant Ridge’s eyes narrowed as he looked at the fragile girl. It was clear she had spent most of her life among the animated
cadavers; in fact, he wondered if she even remembered a time when the dead were motionless. Perhaps, just perhaps, she knew what she was talking about. For the time it took for the walking corpse on the riverbank to stumble on the uneven rocks and right itself, Ridge had made up his mind.

‘Right, I don’t want any weapons fire while we’re
en route to Carlyon bay, unless you have no other option,’ he began, pulling a long and wickedly sharp looking hunting knife from a strapped sheath on his ankle. ‘Fixed bayonets, knives, and anything you can shatter a skull with only.’

‘What? Sir, we…’
said Pelling, her annoyance clearly evident in her voice.

‘You heard me, sold
ier!’ said Ridge, cutting off her complaint before it began. ‘Hand to hand combat only.’

‘We need to go,’ said Lucy, her eyes nervously moving from the approaching corpse and up to the cliff side, ‘the sound of the crash will draw them to us
. We need to go now.’

As she spoke, all eyes drifted toward the young girl whose practical knowledge of living on the mainland infested with hungry corpses, m
ight be the only thing that could save them.  

‘Sir,’ said Andrews, handing Sergeant Ridge the soaking wet map
that he had found floating among the debris in the carrier.

Taking the map from Andrews, Sergeant Ridge forcibly tore his eyes away from Lucy and swiftly worked out the route t
hey would need to take. While his fingers traced lines over the wet paper, Mallon darted back into the carrier to look for anything they could use as a weapon.

‘Here
,’ he said, returning with a crowbar, a hammer, a spade, and heavy wrench he had found in the carrier’s tool box, ‘it’s not much, but with our bayonets, at least it gives us a fighting chance.’

Slipping her assault rifle over her shoulder, Pelling took the crowbar and tested the weight of it in her hand.

‘Yeah, this’ll do,’ she said, swinging the crowbar left and right, ‘I can work with this.’    

Keeping the hammer for himself, Mallon offered Andrews his choice of the remaining implements.

‘Shit, this day gets better and better,’ mumbled Andrews, reluctantly reaching for the spade.

‘Go for the knees first,’ said Lucy, looking from the spade to Andrews as he swung it back and forth unenthusiastically, ‘once they’re
down; use the blade edge of the spade to cut their heads off.  Make sure you do it quickly though.’

Andrews looked from his impromptu weapon to Lucy and back again, only
now seeing the everyday object as the lifesaver it could be.

‘Thanks,’ he said, swinging the spade this time with more conviction.

Lucy simply nodded back and readjusted the sleeping child in her arms. As much as she hated these men, even in her traumatised state, she knew at the moment she relied on them for her very survival. She needed them alive and prepared to deal with what was to come if she and the child in her arms wanted to see another day.

‘Here.’ Said Mallon, holding out the heavy wrench to Sinclair who had joined them with a pale looking Grimes leaning on him for support
. ‘It’s not much…’

‘Give it to Grimes
, I’m sorted, thanks,’ the large man replied, pulling a large machete like blade from a sheath strapped to his thigh.

‘Here you go, Grimes.’ Mallon continued, offering him the wrench, ‘
it’s your lucky day.’

‘Thanks,’ Grimes replied, weakly taking the weapon that would be the only thing between him and the hungry corpses.

As he took the heavy wrench, the unexpected weight caused him to drop his arm to his side.

‘Back with us I see, Grimes,’ said Ridge, noticing how pale and weak the man still looked
. ‘You’re just going to have to keep up.’

‘I understand, Sir.’ Grimes answered, pushing himself away from Sinclair’s supporting bulk.

For a moment, he rocked slightly back and forth on his feet, desperately trying to shake the dizziness that still threatened to overwhelm him.

‘Right,’ said Sergeant Ridge, giving Grimes one final glance before dismissing him from his concern, ‘
let’s get this show on the road. Pelling, Mallon, with me. Sinclair, keep an eye on the girl.’

‘Oh
, and you’d better keep that brat quiet,’ he continued, turning to Lucy to point at the child with his knife. ‘I’m not getting killed because of your inbred kid.’

Lucy pulled the baby closer to her and took an involuntary step away from the man. Of all of them, she hated this man the most. He had left her beaten family for dead and if he thought she would just let that pass, he was mistaken. With her mother now gone too, it was up to her to set things right. She would bide her time
, and when the moment was right, she would make him pay. One way or another, Lucy promised herself, she would see him suffer for what he had done.

***

‘See, if you go this way the lane veers off and doubles back all the way to here. That’ll add another four hours travelling time, easy.’ Patrick said, leaning over Phil’s shoulder to trace a line on the map. ‘But if we go down this offshoot and then down here, there should be a way through to this Eden place, and then it’s only a mile or so to the coast.’

‘But that was barely an access track when the map was made,’ he replied, taking the map from Patrick for a closer look
. ‘God only knows if it’s even passable after all these years.’

‘I think it’s a risk you may have to take
,’ Karen added solemnly. ‘I don’t want to be the voice of doom, but realistically, we’re cutting it too finely to catch up with Sergeant Ridge as it is. If you want a chance of getting Charlie back when he’s still on the mainland, we can’t afford any detours that will cost us time.’

Phil looked back at Karen and rubbed the back of his hand across his stubbly beard to help him think.

Once the last of the pack had disappeared from sight, they had made it through the gate of the field intact and alive, and had found themselves on a small lane fenced in on both sides by high wild hedgerows. Vast towering swathes of Hawthorn, Blackthorn, and Blackberry, battled for space and light with the rambling bushes of Crab-apple and soft hued Field roses. While at their bases, yellow primrose, bluebells, and a multitude of flowering weeds and grasses spilled out to reclaim the weather worn road surface. So dense was the overgrown foliage that in many places it brushed against the sides of the cart as they passed, and with no way to go back, they knew they had committed themselves to following the overgrown lane, wherever it led them.

‘What do you think
, Liz?’ he finally asked, his gaze finding his concern mirrored in her own eyes.

Liz chewed nervously at her lip, looking from Karen and back to Phil as she tried to weigh up the risks involved in taking the access track to Eden.

‘I think,’ she finally said, ‘I think Karen’s right. We’ve got to stop them before they get on that boat. We can’t afford to waste any time.’

With Liz making his mind up for him, Phil nodded in agreement.

‘Okay,’ he mumbled, flicking Delilah’s reins again, ‘let’s just pray to God that we can get through Eden somehow and back onto the road to Carlyon bay from there.’

Within half an
hour, they had arrived at the branch in the lane they had decided to take.  A large oak tree planted hundreds of years ago at the edge of a field, now shrouded the junction with its vast green canopy. At its base, a tangle of thorny sharp brambles choked much of the lane.

‘One of you is going to have to get out,’ Phil said, turning back to his companions
. ‘There’s not much space here, or light for that matter, and those thorns will likely cut the horses to ribbons if we just barge straight through. I need someone to lead Delilah through the gap on the side.  The side of the cart should push them aside enough for Samson behind us to be fine.’

‘I’ll go,’ said Steve, moving to open one of the side hatches.

‘No, I’ll do it,’ interrupted Patrick. ‘No offense, but you haven’t had eight years to get used to dealing with horses.’

‘None taken,’ Steve replied, moving back to waving Patrick through the open hatch with a smile.

Patrick jumped down onto a patch of bluebells, startling a small flock of chattering starlings in the hedgerow into flight. Briefly watching them take to the air in a flurry of iridescent black feathers, Patrick walked to the front of the cart.

‘Come on old girl, let’s get you round this corner,’ he said softly, patting Delilah’s neck.

Hooking a finger through one of the rings of her bridal, Patrick began to guide her past the thorny bushes.

Under the shadow of the oak’s large green canopy
, small golden rays bled down to the lane below, dappling the cart’s passing in pools of golden light. Rustling in the undergrowth around him, told Patrick it was not only the starlings that had taken offense to his intrusion into their idyllic home. An angry looking squirrel darted across his path to bark its displeasure, before disappearing into the thorny brambles to scamper up the trunk of the oak. Patrick couldn’t help but smile at the small creature’s tenacity. Delilah had almost cleared the bushes when the sound of more rustling and snapping of twigs caught Patrick’s attention. Expecting to see more of the squirrel’s furry friends, the smile slowly fell from his lips at the sight of the Dead thing on the ground pulling itself onto the path. To find this decaying abomination sullying a place of such life with its putrid stench and unnatural hunger, suddenly angered Patrick beyond reason. Giving Delilah’s muzzle a comforting stroke, Patrick walked over to the Dead thing. What sex it had been before snapping teeth had condemned it to this degraded existence, Patrick could not tell. Its mould covered limbs, riddled with burrowing larvae, frantically clawed at clumps of grass to pull itself further from the hedgerow, desperate to get to the living flesh suddenly within its reach. Patrick looked down at the creature now pawing impotently at his boot and hated it. Tugging his boot from the cadaver’s grasp, Patrick lifted his leg to stamp down on its skull. Following his movement, the Dead thing turned its rotten face up to look at him and as usual, nothing but an endless hunger burned within its film covered eyes. But as his boot fell to connect hard and fast with the creature’s skull, Patrick would have sworn the features on the Dead thing’s face had already gone slack, the unnatural animation fleeing its decaying muscles. Then with a wet crack, his boot shattered the putrid skull of the Dead thing, forever consigning its bones to be a blot on this picturesque corner of Cornwall.