Six Days With the Dead (5 page)

‘
No, I’m just going, mustn’t distract you two from your work.’ Imran said, helping Alice onto the walkway.

Liz watched Imran as he climbed down the ladder and made his way across the garden. Just before he disappeared
from view he turned and waved to her.

‘
Eyes back in your head Lizzy, he’ll keep.’ Alice said, giving her a friendly nudge.

‘Hmm, yeh.’ She replied, blushing slightly, ‘Come on let’s get on with this’.

For the next four hours Alice and Liz walked the peri
meter of the convent. With no more sign of the Dead, the time passed slowly. The sunny morning passed into a lazy warm afternoon, with a pleasant breeze keeping them cool. The two chatted occasionally, always keeping one eye on the outside world. At one point Liz saw movement over by the tree line, a quick darting movement, barely even rustling the small bushes that ran along the edge of the woodland. She stopped, raised her hand to shield her eyes and stared intently at the area where she has seen something.

‘
What have you seen?’ Alice asked, following Liz’s gaze.

‘
I’m not sure… But there by that patch of blackberry bushes.’ she replied, pointing ‘I’m sure something was moving.’

Then with an explosion of leaves
, a large brown rabbit broke forth from its cover and darted from one patch to another. Liz smiled to herself. It was nice to think that not everything was dead outside of the convent walls. The rabbit would be quite safe from the slow shambling Dead. Being naturally a fast animal, combined with its nervous and easily spooked nature, the Dead would not find the rabbit an easy target.

The English country side had changed just like everywhere else since
the Dead rose. You never saw unprotected cows or sheep grazing in fields anymore. These beasts, which were used to dealing with man in one way or another, had soon fallen prey to the Dead. Liz was thankful that whatever brought the Dead back was limited to the human race. She didn’t relish the prospect of having to deal with a herd of Dead cows charging after them. Dogs, once domesticated, had mainly regressed into wild mongrel packs. Often starving, they would roam the countryside attacking the living or any livestock they came across. Able to dodge the slow moving Dead, they avoided attack easily. In fact if they were really desperate they would even dart in snatching decaying flesh from the limbs of the walking Dead. The bond between Humans and dogs was no more. In the dog’s mind the human had gone from friend and pack leader to food.

‘
I wonder if Charlie knows how to make live traps,’ Alice asked, breaking Liz from her thoughts, ‘We’ve seen one rabbit so there’s bound to be more of them out in the wood. If we can catch a couple of them alive perhaps we could breed them?’

‘
Good idea, I’ll ask him later… and the fur will come in handy when winter comes too. If this year is anything like last, we’ll need all the help we can get.’ Liz replied.

Last winter had been particularly bad. The refugees had been s
nowed into a derelict warehouse and it had been three weeks before enough of the snow had melted so they could get on the move again. They had even lost one of their number to hyperthermia. An old man had woken the group screaming, when his wife became one of the Dead in her sleep. She had attacked him but he was still alive, for a while at least. Charlie and one of the other men dealt with the wife and then all eyes went to the bitten old man. In the end he had gone for a walk outside with Charlie. An hour later, only Charlie came back. Liz always thought it would be better if you died then and there from an attack, rather than waiting the painful hour or so to turn. She had seen many people succumb to the bites over the years. People took the realisation they had been bitten it in various ways. Some fought with those they had loved, desperate to believe they would be the one that would be immune. But they never were and always came back just like everybody else. Some saw being bitten as an inevitability of life in this strange world, the acceptance of their fate, bringing an almost calm release for them. They could finally stop this constant fight to survive. Of course most of those bitten would want it ended before they turned. The thought of coming back as one of the abominations that had torn apart and consumed their loved ones, was beyond contemplation.

Killing yourself permanently was a difficult task unless
the group had a gun, which most didn’t. They had seen many botched suicides while they had been on the road, people who had hung themselves only to rise shortly afterwards. Blue faced corpses hanging from trees like monstrous Christmas ornaments. In the end, most of the bitten would have to ask a friend to make their passing quick. Thankfully Liz had never been asked to perform this final act for someone and prayed she never would.

Looking at her watch
, Liz realised their duty was nearly over. As if thinking of them made them appear, she saw Cam and Michael walking out into the garden.

Cam had been
quite a respected journalist and had found himself reporting the horrors as they swept across England. Sending front line reports for the BBC world service from the airbase at Newquay, he watched the world fall apart, body by body. He had spent time with the soldiers, keeping record of their battles for a world that would no longer exist and he soon realised this was a war Man could not win. With the dead rising on all sides, the battle lines with the Dead were impossible to draw. Broken regiments would join together again and again, until men barely knew the name of the man that fought and died next to them. By the time the army became too fragmented to work effectively, he had found himself with barely a dozen surviving soldiers on a beach. As the wave of the Dead bore down on them and with the sea at their backs, he thought his time had finally come. Then like a miracle a small cruise liner had come in to view. Seeing the soldiers, they had mercifully sent a launch out for them. Staying in deep water the launch waited for the surviving soldiers to swim out to them. The Dead with their uncoordinated movements were unable to swim after them, flailing in the surf like diabolic flotsam. He had stayed on the liner for two years, until that too had become nothing more than a floating tomb. Even on the seas the Dead would not be ignored.  He had finally left with a small group of other survivors, Michael being one of them. One by one they lost the other members of the group to the Dead, until there was only Michael and himself left. They finally came across the convent’s refugees after a further two years of hiding and trying to outrun the Dead. When the refugees had come upon the Lanherne convent, squirrelled away in the Cornish countryside, he finally believed there might just be a chance Man could not only survive but actually live in this world of the Dead.

Michael had been a warehouse manager, working for a large supermarket chain. He had worked hard, doing extra shifts to save enough money to treat his wife on their wedding anniversary. But their dream holiday cruise had tu
rned into a nightmare, as they sat terrified in their cabin watching the horror unfold on their television. They watched scenes of Governments around the world desperately trying to keep the Dead at bay and all failing one by one. They even saw one reporter and her camera crew torn to pieces by the Dead, the camera falling as they fled for their lives, only to catch their last moments for all to see. Safe on board the liner, he and his wife had been lucky to escape the devastation that engulfed the world in those first few weeks. Their once in a life time holiday, had luckily turned into a floating sanctuary. When many of the passengers, and even some of the crew had demanded they be let ashore, desperate to find their loved ones, the captain reluctantly allowed them to leave. As Michael watched the launch go back and forth with its human cargo, he knew these people were certainly going to their deaths. The passengers and crew that opted to stay eventually adapted to life on their floating island. Occasionally they would send launch parties onto the mainland for supplies or on rescue missions. But two years later their sanctuary turned into a blood drenched death trap. One of the passengers had had a heart attack and came back from the Dead while a crew member was trying to resuscitate him with the kiss of life. Tearing into the crewman’s face, the passenger had not only condemned the man trying to save him but most of the Liner’s inhabitants as well. As the dozen or so survivors boarded the launch to abandon the ship, Michael watched helplessly, as his wife was snatched from him by bloody hands. He struggled with those in the launch while it descended to the water below, desperate to save his wife but already knowing she was gone forever. Cam had been in the launch with him that day and they had stayed together, fighting for the memory of those they had lost ever since.

‘
Hey Liz, Alice.’ Cam said, nodding to the two young women as the two men reached the top of the ladder.

‘I heard we had Dead visitors earlier, anything since?’ He continued, looking at his bat.

His was different from the metal one Alice used. This one made of wood, had a dozen six inch nails driven through the end at various angles
, making it look like an improvised medieval mace. Michael on the other hand carried a crow bar in each hand and when the Dead attacked these would smash skulls with deadly speed.

‘
No, it’s been pretty quiet really,’ Alice told him, ‘Anyway, it’s all yours now, so we’re off.’

Alice a
nd Liz said their goodbyes, climbed down the ladder and began walking through the garden back to the Convent doorway. Running round the corner at top speed, shrieking as she ran, came Anne. Following mere seconds later, was Justin covered in mud and straw. Justin was only ten and as he and Anne were the only children at the convent they fought like brother and sister.

‘
Hey what’s the hurry?’ She asked, grabbing Anne as she almost ran into her.

Hiding behind her sister, Anne peeked out at Justin
, who had skidded to a breathless halt.

‘
What? I haven’t done anything.’ She said, giggling between rapid breaths.

‘
Yes you did, you threw a bucket of chicken poo at me, you fat head.’ Justin shouted, stamping is foot.

Justin was small for his age, but then growing up
in a world without regular meals would do that to a child. With Justin’s slim frame, wild sandy brown hair and large doe like eyes he had a fragile look about him, which the boy did all he could to dispel. Acting tough and putting on a brave face even when it was clear he was hurting.

Justin was only three when the Dead rose
, so he was too young to remember what normal life had been like. For Justin and Anne, this was all they had ever really known. Justin had never known his mother and father, as they had died early on in the war and had been brought up by his uncle Mark. He had loved and idolised his uncle and when Uncle Mark didn’t come back one day to their hiding place, his world fell apart. Justin didn’t know what had actually happened to his uncle but he knew deep down he would never see him again. When the refugee convoy rolled past one day he so desperately wanted to join them but was scared. He had followed at a distance trying to stay out of sight for hours. Until, out from behind a tree a man had stepped. Holding out his hand the man had just said ‘wouldn’t you prefer to ride in the wagon’ and the seven year old Justin had fallen into his arms sobbing, the relief of finding a friendly adult too much for him to bare. The man had gathered him up in protective arms, stroking his hair while hushing his tears. The man was called Rich and he and his wife, Nicky had taken care of Justin ever since. He was the child they had lost in those first few days. They were the loving uncle who just never came home. Rich and Nicky loved him as a son and he loved them as parents.

‘
What are you two up to now?’ Alice asked, with her hands on her hips.

‘
He started it.’ Anne whined.

‘
I don’t care who started it,’ Liz interrupted, ‘you don’t go throwing chicken poo at people, Anne.’ She said giving her a secret wink, ‘Now apologize to Justin.’

Anne mumbled a weak apology, looking at her feet.

‘Girls!’ Justin exclaimed and stomped off trying to look as much like the man he so desperately wanted to be.

The image slightly belittl
ed by the straw and chicken droppings randomly falling to floor. As Liz watched him leave, she realised that with Justin being the only boy here anyway near Anne’s age, they would probably end up together when they got older. She hoped they both survived that long, she didn’t like to think of her younger sister never knowing the type of joy that she shared with Imran.

‘
Have you done your jobs?’ Liz asked, looking down at Anne’s smudged dirty face, ‘Well obviously you’ve cleaned out the chickens, sort of.’ she continued picking a stray piece of straw from her sister’s hair. A cheeky grin crept across Anne’s face.

The two children had been put in charge of looking after the goats and chickens. Sister Catherine had shown them how to collect the eggs without ge
tting their hands pecked to pieces and how to milk and care for the goats. Anne didn’t like the goats, they were too boisterous and most of the time they didn’t seem too keen on being milked anyway. Thankfully, Justin had agreed he would look after the goats and she would care for the chickens.

‘
Yes, I’m all done.Sixteen eggs today and three more new chicks have hatched.’ She answered, kicking at a tuft of grass with her foot.