Bad Blood (Battle of the Undead Book 1) (11 page)

“Hello
, Brit,” he said.

A talking zombie? Oh, no, it couldn’t be
. He was a vambie, an alpha zombie!

“Come to join me, my darling?” He then pushed out his thick, dark red tongue and licked the glass between us. It wasn’t Philippe. The Philippe I knew was a gentleman above all things. Whatever was wearing his body
…it was something else entirely.

“Back off!” I shouted at him. Beside me, Satan added a snarl.

I heard a loud crack, and suddenly, Philippe was flying at me through a shower of glass. I was so stunned he caught me square in the chest. I hit the ground hard and fast. He grabbed a fistful of my hair and was about to bite me when a streak of grey fur jumped over our heads and landed on his back. Satan was ripping at his clothes, pulling him back. I used the distraction to roll out from under him. He grabbed Satan and hurled him back down the corridor. I heard my dog whimper as he skidded onto the floor.

I forward rolled to my scythes, but he beat me to them, tutting at me like I’d eaten his last Oreo. I was close enough to smell his breath, if he had had any that is, but it was the oddest thing
—he didn’t smell of anything. His clothes still had a tiny odor of Philippe’s aftershave but, apart from that, he smelled like neither vampire nor zombie. He had all his vampire abilities, but for all intents and purposes, he was now truly undead.

“I have a surprise for you,” he said, his tongue lolling to the side of his mouth like a fat, red, and very dead caterpillar.

I frowned and was about to punch him, but stopped myself. “Philippe, please, you remember me.”

“Of course I remember you.”

“Then stop fighting me. Whatever happened to you, we can fix it when we get to Argyle.”

“K
…I…L…T.” He sounded it out like it was a foreign word.

“Yes
, that’s right. You wanted to take your kilt with you.”

The next sound that came out of his mouth chilled me to my already cold soul. It wasn’t so much a laugh
, but a forced cackle that seemed to resonate in his throat then break when it rushed from his lips to meet with the air. This was not Philippe.

I curled my fingers into a fist and punched him in the face. He stepped back with the momentum, straightened himself, and then spat out a spray of foul smelling blood—infected blood.

“Was that really called for?” he asked. He slammed into me.

He was strong—too strong—and quickly managed to yank my arms round my back. He then dragged me backward into the next room. This part of the dungeon was dedicated to Jack the Ripper. I could make out his cloaked figure astride a mutilated waxwork prostitute on a fake cobbled street. I struggled, and Philippe pushed me into the diorama’s glass barrier
, which broke, cutting me all over. I swallowed a cry and tried to keep my balance as he thrust me toward something in the corner of the display…the guillotine.

“Remember our old friend?” he hissed in my ear.

Of course I remembered the one human invention that killed vampires quick and easy. He forced me onto my knees and shuffled me toward it. I flexed my arms and pushed all my strength into struggling from his grip, a grip that was like a boa constrictor’s on a rabbit.

“Don’t make this harder than it has to be,” he yelled at me.

It was so strange to hear him raise his voice. I don’t think I’d ever heard him do that before. Philippe had always been soft-spoken, the voice of reason.

“Why are you doing this?”
I pushed out as he thrust my head into the curved wooden base of the guillotine.

“I’m—”

I heard a shout and a bark. A figure appeared over Philippe. Nicholas grabbed his scabby shirt and pulled him off me. He then swung round and kicked out at the wooden limbs of the guillotine, breaking it into to rubble

“Why, Nicholas, are you now the hero who saves the day?” Philippe laughed as he regained his composure.

“What happened to you?” Nicholas looked him up and down.

I scrambled round on the floor then swiped out my leg to trip Philippe. I then pounced on top of him.

Nicholas moved forward and grabbed his flying arms, pinning them to the floor above his head. “He’s been bitten.” Nicholas observed, pulling up his shirt to reveal a tapestry of teeth marks. His body had half healed them then apparently given up.

“Get off me!” Philippe struggled, and he managed to wrestle himself out from both our grasps. He got up, brushed himself down, cracked his neck
, then sped out of the room.

“Are you okay?” Nicholas put his arm around my shoulders.

I shrugged him off. “I’m fine.”

“Satan limped out of the building, and I followed him back to you.”

Satan had saved me!

“Come here,” I cooed, and the dog shuffled forward to me, tail wagging.
I fussed with him then picked him up to save his legs.

“I guess we found the alpha zombie.” Nicholas gave an odd look at the large dog in my arms.

“It’s him, but not him,” I muttered.

“We need to figure that out.”

We jogged to the exit to find the bus running and the door open to us. We climbed aboard and sat down on separate seats.

I can’t remember the journey back to the Dead Hare. I heard the three men arguing, but not what they
were saying. I just stared out of the window, Satan’s furry body still clutched in my arms, warding off a foreign chill that was attacking my skin.

Once back, I was gently taken by the arm and nudged through the gap left by The Dead Hare’s rolling blinds.

“What happened?” Tracy asked.

“We found Philippe,” I replied, staring at the walls. They were grubby and no longer had the sheen I remembered them having before.

“Where is he?” Kylie edged toward me. I could smell chocolate on her breath.

“He’s been infected.” Nicholas stood in front of me. “He’s very dangerous now.”

“He’s a zombie?” asked Dr. Watts.

“In a ma
nner of speaking.”

Nicholas was now pacing the room, deftly avoiding the almost statue-like pensioners and the jittery, sugar-fueled teens and kids.

“We need to move now,” Green said.

Nicholas looked around at the packed bags and nodded.
“Agreed.”

“Are you okay?”

I looked over at the voice to see Danny. Fresh vomit laced his lips, and his eyes were blood shot. Suddenly, all I could see was my own reflection in Philippe’s white, glassy eyeballs. I went over all cold and felt unsteady on my feet. He was gone forever. My friend was gone.

“Britannia?” Danny struggled up and edged toward me.

I caught him as he lunged to hug me. My hands grazed his rib cage. How had he gotten so thin so quickly?

John had stood up. Finally, he was participating.

“I know this isn’t something that everyone wants to hear.” He pointed at Danny. “He’s a lovely boy. But out there”—he now pointed to the door—“we need to move quickly.”

“He doesn’t have long left.” Dr. Watts looked down as she said it.

“We should wait then,” Tracy said.

“Yeah, outside isn’t getting any less dangerous. Let’s give it some time,” Josh added.

“Are you kidding? I can’t stand another hour in this place!” John threw his hands in the air.

“Well, you’re welcome to go out on your own anytime you’d like!” Tracy yelled at him.

She moved to intercept John’s line of sight of Danny, who’d now buried himself into the crook of my arm.

“We have to look at the bigger picture here. We can’t put the need of one above the whole group.” Green made a good point, albeit a callous one.

“You’re a bad man!” yelled Rose. Her little voice was high-pitched, and her cheeks ruddy with anger.

The whole room then erupted with voices. I didn’t take in what they
were saying. Instead, I picked up Danny and my bag then walked down to the underground red velvet room, Satan limping close behind us. I set him down on the couch and took a breath.

“What’s going to happen?” he asked.

“Nothing’s going to happen to you,” I replied. “I won’t allow it.”

Satan jumped up onto the couch so Danny didn’t have to bend to stroke him.

I took another breath, a long, pointless breath that rubbed against my ribs like barbs laced with acid. I lifted the side of my T-shirt and saw I was still bruised from my fight with Philippe. I must have been hurt bad for it to take this long to heal. I searched in my bag for my spare Rolling Stones last tour T-shirt, and changed. I stuffed the other one into my bag then ran a brush through my knotted hair.

“You should kill me.” Danny looked up at me, lip trembling.

“How old are you?”

“I’m seventeen.”

“I’m not going to kill you. If anyone tries, it’ll be the last thing they do.”

“But the doctor said
…”

“To hell with the doctor. It’s her kind that got us into this undead mess in the first place.”

“I don’t want to die, Britannia. The world may be harder now and life less…comfortable, but I don’t want to die yet.”

“I know, Danny. Sometimes we don’t get a choice in what we have to do. We just have to do it.”

I could hear the arguments still raging upstairs. Nicholas was trying to soothe matters in his snake-oil-salesman way, but that wasn’t getting the job done. The humans were scared. They were trying to gain back some precious control, any control over their radically altered existence. They needed a firm hand, not a forked tongue that hid long incisors.

“Can you walk?”

Danny shuffled off the couch and stood up. He wobbled a little, but he held his backbone straight so he stood tall.

“Follow me.” I led him back to the bar.

I pulled a nearby bar stool toward me and jumped onto it, then onto the bar itself. I stamped my foot on the counter, and everyone looked at me.

I was about to speak when I heard a muffled sound. Only now that it was quiet could we all hear it. It was coming from outside. My epic yet ill thought-out speech no longer of consequence, we all crowded round the metal rollers to hear what it was.

“It’s another survivor. We need to open up,” said Tracy.

Nicholas put his ear to the door. “Tracy, my dear, remember what we said before. No letting anyone in.
”

A thump from outside rippled the metal, making our ears ring. I then heard a familiar laugh.

“Let me in, friends,” said Philippe in the creepiest voice I’d ever heard.

Nicholas ushered everyone away from the door.
“Philippe, I do believe that you’re not quite yourself. Now, be a good chap and bugger off.”

“I’m more myself than ever now, Nicholas. I’m what we should be
, a master of the dead.”

“Master of the dead? What the hell does that mean?” I whispered.

“That I’m in control now, Britannia,” Philippe answered me through the door. “If you give us the humans, we’ll let you go.”

“We?” Nicholas threw me a worried look.

I wanted to ask where they had parked the bus, but I was afraid of tipping our hand. If Philippe knew about our mode of transport, he’d find a way to disable it.

I could feel the dull ache in my chest beginning to dissipate and my usual anger replacing it. This thing outside had killed my friend—exchanged him with a monster, a monster who wanted my wards, wanted Josh and Danny, Tracy and her children, and all the others I hadn’t really bothered learning the names of. People whom we’d so far managed to keep safe against the shuffling undead odds.

“Open the door, Nicholas,” I said.

Everyone gasped, and I turned to look at them. I hoped I conveyed in a look what I couldn’t say, that I wasn’t giving them up, but going out there to protect them. That it was the quickest way to get us on the road and away from a city overrun with flesh
-munchers.

“You can’t.” Nicholas pulled at my arm.

I resisted the urge to balk at his touch. Instead, I turned to look at him. I then looked back at our wards. I patted his hand. He nodded and started to open the shutters, just high enough for me to slide under.

I rolled beneath and heard them crash back down behind me. I had enough time to think maybe this wasn’t such a great idea before I flipped upright and came face to face with a very dead Philippe.

“I’m sorry we didn’t get to finish our little game of guillotine, Britannia,” he said.

“Me too
. I wonder whose head would have rolled in the end?” I replied.

I quickly darted my eyes about to count the zombies around us. About forty, all hanging back, waiting for their dinner call. I knew I could take the zombies, but Philippe was strong. He was an unknown variable in my plan. It’s not like I hadn’t killed vampires before—some had even been older than me. I just never imagined I’d be plotting out the steps to take Philippe’s head.

“Don’t worry, Brit. I don’t want to make you like me. One king of the zombies is enough. I will, however, end your miserable existence. If memory serves, you should thank me.” He smiled, and his broken, jagged teeth crept out from his gums. It was deeply gross and mesmerizing all at the same time.