The Undead Day Twenty (41 page)

Twenty-Six

The pain is too much. She’ll die. It feels like she’s being split in two. She pushes knowing she has to push but wishing she could do anything instead of push. The veins in her neck bulge. Her face flushes deep red. Her mouth open, teeth gritted, eyes bulging. She grunts and makes noises and wants to scream but she can’t. Her fists ball. Her nails dig into her palms.

She breaks and breathes. Panting hard with sweat burning her eyes. Why hasn’t it come out yet? Why is it taking so long? Something’s wrong. She pants and makes ready as the next spasm hits with an urge to push.

It hurts more each time. A burning agonising pain that threatens to render her unconscious. It’s dark in here. Too dark. On the floor of her kitchen in a near on pitch black room she tries to give birth but the baby won’t come. It’s been hours already and each time the urge comes so she pushes but it won’t come out.

She pants again. Drawing energy before the next one comes. She weeps and sobs, she whimpers alone and terrified for her baby. She tries to look down but can’t see past her bulging stomach and any attempt at moving sends waves of the wrong type of pain going through her. So she doesn’t. She stays on her back without water while sweating and losing fluids. She’s bleeding too. She can see the pool of darkening liquid spreading out round her body.

The next one is intense. She grits her teeth and pushes. She pushes until stars and lights bloom in her eyes. She pushes until her vision starts closing in and the pain increases to a whole new level. She cries out from the agony and tries to stifle the noises but it’s so hard. She wants her mum. She wants her boyfriend. Please, someone, anyone. There is no one. There is nothing but here and now and pushing a thing that will not come out. She will die here. Her baby will die inside her. The utter hopelessness of it all crushes her soul and breaks her heart into a thousand pieces.

Maddox and Blowers run. They each run for their own purpose. One to make the things chase and the other to get away and hide.

Blowers sprints down the next road. He needs the magazines from his bag which means sliding the bag off while running. He’ll have just seconds when he stops. Seconds to drop the bag, open the flap, grab a magazine and re-load. He runs it through in his mind, visualising each component move.

Now.
He stops, drops the bag, takes a knee, opens the flap, grabs a fresh one and ejects the used one. Fresh one in. Bolt back, aim and fire. Sustained bursts under control. Several drop and he knows he gets kills but by fuck these bastards don’t stop coming.

Another magazine goes into his pocket and he’s up and running. Breathing hard. Sweating loads. He runs fast enough to keep ahead but steadily enough to get his bottle out and take a glug. Not much but enough to keep him hydrated and functioning. He glances up and fails to see any stars. That means clouds. Hopefully that means rain. Rain will be good right now. It’ll mask noise and give him a chance to hide somewhere and fire into them from behind.

Maddox runs in the fashion he learnt. In a zig zag manner instead of a straight line. It always worked when the police were chasing him. They were always too fat to go over fences and through gardens. Maddox wasn’t then and he isn’t now. He vaults fences and walls with ease and drops deftly to assess each new microenvironment before choosing his new path and running on. He weaves and takes hard lefts and rights while every now and then hearing the shots from Blowers assault rifle and others in the distance.

He needs water. He needs to catch his breath. He vaults a fence, runs through a garden and spies the next border is a six-foot high wall. He takes that with ease and drops down the other side onto a ceramic plant pot that smashes under his weight. He freezes at the noise, going still to listen. The garden is enclosed on all sides and the noise he made doesn’t seem to have caused a reaction from anywhere. He takes the time to open his bag and drink water deep into his stomach. He pours more over his face, sluicing the sweat away while a smug sense of freedom steals over him. Conflict too. The dig in his soul at ditching Blowers to deal with that lot on his own.
Not my problem.
He goes to move then stops at the sound coming from the house.

She hears the pot in the garden smashing. The big one her mum got her from the garden centre that she was going to grow tomatoes in. She pants as silently as she can, staring at the closed back door and willing the next contraction not to come. Not now,
please not now.

It comes. It comes because her body tells her the baby has to come out. She clamps a hand over her mouth to stifle the noise but the pain is growing and tearing her skin. It gets worse. It gets deeper and more searing. She shakes and trembles while pushing and desperately trying to stay quiet.

Maddox stares hard at the back door. Someone is inside it. Someone panting hard and moving about. He stays still. His rifle lifting to aim. His eyes twitching left to right to take in the dark windows. He looks at the fence ahead and mentally prepares for the run and leap to vault the top.

The pain. It’s too much. Everything hurts now. She thrashes her head side to side to do something instead of scream. She has to push. She pushes and strains. Blood comes out. She can feel it hot and sticky on her legs. Blood like that isn’t right. Her baby is dying inside her. Her baby.

‘My baby…’

The words come out before she can stop them. The choking sob follows. She covers her own mouth then gasps as the pain intensifies as her body tells her things are going very badly wrong.

He edges towards the fence. He’s not that bothered if there’s an infected inside as he can outrun them and besides, he’s got a big gun. What bothers him is being spotted and the signal being sent as to where he is. That will tell the others where he is too. Time to go. He bunches for the run up as the words come whispered and broken from the back of the house. His heart misses a beat. His blood runs cold.
My baby.
He heard that. He hears the sob that comes after and the rustle of someone moving about. He hears a person in pain and a voice gripped by terror and fear. It’s not his problem. He runs for the fence.

The pain is so bad. It tears and burns like every nerve ending in her body is being jabbed with hot needles and cut with razors. She clamps her mouth and for a second she holds the noise back but it’s too much and she cries out in a voice of pitiful agony that drops guttural and broken as the need to push takes over.

He vaults the fence and drops to the next garden as the scream comes. A mournful wail of absolute pain. Another human in agony. A person suffering. He goes to run, to get away and be free but he falters, glaring back at the fence he came from. The noises drop off as he tells himself this isn’t his problem. Whoever it is will be fine. Whatever it is has nothing to do with him.

She screams again. She can’t not scream. She is dying. Blood is coming out. Too much blood. The contractions threaten to become convulsions. The urge to push becomes a spasm.

Maddox’s face twists as he fights the conscience inside. The voice of reason and goodness that tells him not to be an utter cunt and go help. He has his own life to lead. No one ever helped him so why should he help anyone now? Fuck whoever it is. Fuck everyone. The strong survive this world.

She claws back from the edge of the abyss that will pull her down to death. With the instinct of a mother she finds strength inside to do what must be done. She pushes. She growls wide eyed impervious to the pain. She strains and screams out. Blood sprays from her nose from the pressure bursting a vessel. Her head swims. Vision closes in but my god she pushes with one final immense urge to birth her baby. She can die. She doesn’t care but give life to her child. Please god,
give my baby life.

It’s no good. As strong as she was in that second so her body weakens and the pain takes over. She breaks the push to sob as she starts slipping over the edge to plummet down into the dark abyss. It’s over. Her mum is dead. Her boyfriend is dead. Her child is dead. Everyone is dead. Her body prepares to die too. The brain knows the end is here and so it dumps chemicals to ease the passing. It floods her with calm while it dampens the nerve endings but to do that creates a degree of delusion in her mind. Images of her life swim through her mind.

Maddox creeps quickly to the window while the voices in his head argue bitterly. He has to run and go but the encoded strands of DNA in his system recognise the sounds of another human in distress and that resonance draws him closer. He peeks through the gap in the curtain to see a kitchen. It looks normal. He doesn’t see anyone. He frowns, ready to go as she moves on the floor and brings his eyes down as his vision adapts to the darkness inside the room. He spots the towels first. White fluffy towels stacked up. Then he spots her. A woman on her back with her legs bent and wide open. Blood on the floor. Blood on her thighs. Her stomach is swollen.

She murmurs softly. He’ll be back in a minute with the Doritos and salsa dip. She’ll phone her mum tomorrow and say how he sweet he was to go out and get them for her. She smiles and sighs. Her head lolling side to side as her brain receives another signal to push. She snaps back to reality. Surging from the delusion to the awful now and the pain radiating through her body.

Maddox sees it. He sees the sharpness come back to her eyes and the way she grits, heaves and strains as every vein in her neck and head pushes from her skin. The noise she makes is almost inhumanly low and guttural. Like an animal but she isn’t an animal, she’s a person in distress. A woman giving birth who is bleeding out.

A second in time. A choice to make. The hardness of his life and all the bitter experiences weighed off against the now and in that second his mind gives self-justification that millions have died and millions more will die. She is just one more, that’s all. Just one worthless life that means nothing to him. She never helped him. She never did anything to make his life better. There is no connection. There is no reason to stay. Be cold. Be ruthless and live a life instead of dying here trying to help someone who will die anyway.

Twenty-Seven

Reginald fights. He takes life. He is a warrior. He is strong and wields his weapon with true majesty. He strikes and moves. He dances and feints left then darts in from the right. He is here, in the battle, in the moment.

Roy stands in the gaping hole where the window used to be. The glass and frame kicked out so he can find angle and space to draw and fire to help the three below him. Clarence, Dave and Howie fight a battle on all sides. Compressed almost back to back and all they can do is hold their tiny space while Roy fires to do what he can.

At Roy’s back stands Nick. Nick who holds the line on the upstairs landing at the top of the stairs as the infected charge up from pouring through the shop below. He lashes his axe left and right to hack through bone and limbs then boots them back down to trample the rest coming up. It’s dirty and hot. His hands, arms and face are streaked with blood and gore. His voice is hoarse as he grunts but that wry smile twitches on his face.

In between Nick and Roy is where Reginald fights. He sweats too. His arms and hands are streaked with gore and filth and but he grips his weapon hard and screams out as he kills another one with a roar of righteous glory spilling from his lips. He is Dave. He is Clarence. He is a fighter and protects his team from the enemy.

‘You alright mate?’ Nick asks, turning in the second’s pause while the infected gather themselves for the next charge up the stairs. Reginald blinks at him, his face a mask of rage and battle-lust. ‘Righto,’ Nick says, nodding at him. ‘Good work…’

Reggie stiffens and slams his fly swatter down on the next spider coming at him. A big one too. A big body and thick legs but he kills it and dances back to spin and check the flanks. More come. More drop from the ceiling and charge out across the floor. Reginald roars and brings his mighty right foot down to kill. He swings his battle-swatter and sends another back to the spider-hell from whence it came.

‘Reggie…one on my head,’ Roy says calmly as he draws back and looses to strike one in the neck lunging at Howie who gives a curt nod of thanks before smashing the next two down.

‘Not so hard eh, Reggie?’ Roy mutters through gritted teeth at being swatted round the back of the head.

Reginald doesn’t reply. He is gone. He’s in the killing zone. The time to lay down his pen is here. It is time to take up a weapon and fight and so, as Nick takes the next dozen coming up, so Reginald takes on the money spider abseiling down.

‘REGGIE…’ Howie shouts between kills. The press coming in is too much. They’re just about holding but not gaining ground and there is no hope of fighting out right now.

‘He’s killing spiders,’ Roy shouts down.

‘Eh?’ Howie asks, risking a glance up as he swings his axe round taking a head off. ‘Roll call…’ he grunts.

‘Pardon?’ Roy asks, drawing back to fire.

‘
ROLL CALL…’
Dave booms.

‘Ah got it, Reggie, Mr Howie wants a roll call,’ Roy says, turning his head a fraction to speak to the small man behind him.

‘I am somewhat occupied,’ Reginald snaps back, delivering the final blow to the brave little money spider who fought a good battle. Reginald even nods at it in respect of a duel well played. ‘Gosh, this is hot work…’ he spins to check, sees he has a chance and thumbs the radio under his shirt. ‘
Roll call for Mr Howie….Er…Paula, Marcy and Mo, how are you holding up?’

‘VERY FUCKING BUSY ACTUALLY,’
Marcy bellows through the radio.
‘BIT OF HELP WOULD BE NICE YOU KNOW…’

‘Yes yes, we’re all busy my dear. We’re all fighting you know. I’m sure someone will come when they can…’
Reginald pauses, thinking of who is next,
‘Charlotte? Roll call for Mr Howie…’

‘Fine…Cookey get that one…YES! Good shot…we’re fine, Reggie. I’m with Cookey and Blinky…we’ve drawn a few hundred away from you…’

‘Well done,’
Reginald says gravely and wisely and full of gravitas as Nick calls a zombie a cunt and punches him back down the stairs.
‘Roy? Roll call for Mr Howie…’

‘I’m right here,’ Roy says.

‘Oh gosh of course you are. My mistake. Heat of the moment. Right er…ah yes, Blowers and Maddox? Roll call for Mr Howie…’

‘The fucking prick has ran off,’
Blowers gasps through the radio.

‘Who has?’
Cookey asks, cutting in front of Reginald who tuts in irritation.

‘Maddox the coward…HEAR THAT YOU FUCKING COWARD? I WILL HUNT YOU DOWN…’

‘
You okay?’ Howie’s voice blurts rushed and full of background noise of voices snarling and hissing.

‘Yep,’
Blowers voice comes back,
‘got a few behind me…leading ‘em away…I’m fine…you want me back to help Paula and Marcy?’

‘We’re good, Blowers,’
Mo’s voice cuts in.

‘WE’RE NOT BLOODY GOOD…I PUNCHED MYSELF IN THE NOSE,’
Marcy shouts.
‘AND THERE’S FUCKING SPIDERS EVERYWHERE AND PAULA ATE ONE…’

‘It’s Charlie…we’ll do what we can with ours then get back to Paula and Marcy…’

‘Paula ate a spider?’
Cookey asks.

‘If you’s does get back,’
Mo says,
‘go for the back doors into the shopping centre…cut the flow off…we’s gotta get out in a bit as we got a small fire going on…’

‘IT’S NOT A SMALL FIRE, IT’S A HUGE FUCKING FIRE…PAULA…ONE IN MY HAIR GETITGETITGETIT.’

‘
Er…It’s Heather here…um, so like…do you want us to do the back doors?’

A split second as everyone pauses to take in what they just heard.

‘Heather, it’s Roy, everyone else is pinned down…they need help…do what you can…’

‘We will.’