Demise of the Living (22 page)

He stood up and slipped the
stone into his pocket.

The car zigzagged around the
dumpsters lining the back alley and out of sight onto the
street.

“Good luck,” Mo said as he shut
the gates.

He turned and walked back to
the loading bay. On the ground lay Gary and the dishevelled
stranger.

The pair had started to
give off an awful reek. It was a tart smell, like something
starting to rot in the back of a refrigerator—the kind of smell
that stopped you breathing through your nose and forced your tongue
to the bottom of your mouth to try to escape it.

“Can’t leave you lying there,”
Mo said, struggling against the aroma.

He looked up into the open
loading bay. There was no one left. The moment Mo had shut the
gate, knowing they were again safe, the others had gone back
inside.

Mo spotted a metre-tall roll of
white, translucent plastic packing foam. Short of any other
material to use as a shroud,he fetched it and went about wrapping
the bodies.

***

“What are we going to do with
her?” Karen asked.

Shan shrugged.

“We can’t leave her out in the
corridor,” Karen said.

“Why not?” Shan asked, not
really paying attention.

Karen listed off, “Cause she’ll
start to stink the place up. ‘Cause she’s a health hazard. ‘Cause
she’s a human being and deserves some dignity.”

“
Kyle said she got AIDs
from shagging that Math teacher,” Shan said, rubbing her hands
against her jeans.

“What? That’s bullshit,” Karen
said. “And you’re just trying to avoid the point. We need to do
something about her body.”

“
Well,
you
can. I
don’t give a fuck.”

“
No, Shan, we need to do
it. If we don’t do it now she’ll start decomposing and it’ll get
worse. This is getting done. Now come and help me.”

“Can’t make me,” Shan
sneered.

Karen put her hands on her hips
and glared. Shan was right; Karen couldn’t make her.

Karen stood for a moment,
desperately trying to think of something to say that would convince
Shan to help, or at the very least, a parting jibe that would cut
at her.

Nothing came to mind.

“
Fine, then. Fuck
you.”

Karen turned and exited
the first aid room.

She walked the short distance
to where the body of Miss Alvarez lay. The blood had congealed and
lost its sheen. It was darkened and browner in colour.

Karen had pulled down a black
curtain from the drama class and draped it out alongside the
corpse. The plan was to roll the body into the cloth, wrapping it
up and hauling it outside.

She knelt down by Miss
Alvarez’s body and wrapped her hands around her slender ankles. The
flesh was warm and sticky. Karen lifted the legs up, surprised by
the weight, and swept them onto the black curtain.

Next she walked round to
her side with the intent of pushing her onto the makeshift shroud.
The blood had spread out like a halo from her wound. It soon became
apparent that unless Karen stood in the pool, she wouldn’t have the
leverage to tip the body over.

Instead she walked round
to the other side and knelt down on the curtain. She bent in and
took hold of Miss Alvarez’s hand, and pulled. Her floppy arm
whipped round with far less resistance than Karen expected, but as
she heaved, the whole body simply slid towards her, rumpling the
cloth.

Karen jammed a toe into the
body’s chest and tugged. This time the torso started to rise up and
over.

A moan slipped from its lips
and Karen screamed, jumping back.

Miss Alvarez slumped
forward and landed on the curtain. The moaning ceased.

Karen felt the rough brickwork
of the wall at her back and her heart hammering against the front
of her chest.

“What is it?!”

Karen turned round to see Shan
standing at the far end of the corridor.

Karen returned her focus
to the body on the floor. She pointed at it and said, “She... she
moaned at me.”

Shan marched down the corridor
to stand over the corpse. She put her hands on her hips and looked
down at the body.

Without warning, Shan
whipped her foot back and kicked the dead teacher in the head. Her
skull ricocheted to end up looking up at the ceiling.

“She’s still dead,” Shan
said.

She walked away.

“Where are you going?!” Karen
demanded.

“I need the toilet.”

“
Wait—
what
?” The toilets are
at the other end of the corridor.”

“I know,” Shan replied. “I’m
going to take a crap on Principal Wood’s desk.”

Karen screwed up her face and
shook her head. She shouted, “There’s something wrong with
you!”

Karen cringed immediately after
the last syllable escaped her lips. She had seen Shan beat girls
for less.

Shan walked on, turned the
corner, and left Karen’s view.

Her reply echoed back to Karen
from the unseen corridor. “Whatever!”

Shan’s glib retort did nothing
to allay Karen’s rising fear. Shan had always been wild and
spirited, but as the world fell apart there was nothing to
constrain her belligerence. Now her behaviour was more reckless and
dangerous and Karen didn’t think it would take much for her
friend’s allegiance to dissolve.

Chapter
11

“Look out, you’re going
to—”

The sound of meat and metal
colliding cut off the rest of Colin’s statement.

“You hit him deliberately,” he
said.

Billy hit the water spray and
the windshield wipers. The wiper blades squeaked their way over the
grimy glass, pulling scraps of bloodied flesh with it. It took a
few good swipes and a liberal amount of water before the view was
clear again.

“
What am I supposed to
do?” Billy said. “The road’s too narrow too dick about.”

Colin sat back in the seat,
deflated. Out of the side window he could see the looted shop
fronts, burnt-out cars, and decaying corpses, some lying still,
others shambling towards the car.

“Where do we go from here?”
Billy asked as they came up on a junction.

“
South. Your right,”
Colin said.

“I don’t know why we didn’t
think of this before!” Thomas exclaimed.

“Think of what?” Colin
asked.

With that, the car was filled
with the strumming of a guitar and the wheezing of a harmonica.

“What the hell?” Colin
asked.

“Where’s the button?” Thomas
muttered to himself.

The nasally vocals cut
off and were replaced by static hiss.

“Hey, I was listening to that,”
Billy complained.

“
Fuckin’ boo-hoo,” Thomas
said. “Ask John for a copy of the CD when we get back.”

“The radio—of course!” Colin
sat forward again.

“Ah, here it is,” Thomas said
triumphantly.

The thick blue digital figures
on the display whirled forward for a second before clicking to a
halt.

“Turn it up,” Colin said over
the headrest.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Thomas
replied, flicking the volume control round. “Shut up—that’s
it!”

A measured female voice came
across the speakers. It was cold and steady with no hint of
emotion.

“…
a package of initiatives
presented to the government by a combined military and scientific
think-tank...”

“Is that a computer reading
that?” Colin asked.

“Shut it!” Thomas barked.

“
...by the
Defence Secretary within the hour. The government has declared
martial
law. As of O-five
hundred hours this morning, lethal force has been authorized when
dealing with civil unrest. Persons not complying with a military
order can face summary execution…”

“
What?!
They’re shooting people now?!” Colin
asked.

“
I don’t know—I’m trying
to listen to this fucking thing!” Thomas shouted. “Now shut the
fuck up!”

“Turn it up. I can’t hear it
for you two,” Billy said.

“
...operating
under a shoot-to-kill policy between these hours. Under the state
of martial
law, the
government has issued orders to call up reservists and off-duty
military personnel to report to their nearest base regardless of
service branch…”

“
She just keeps saying
the government; who’s actually in charge?
Who’s giving the orders?” Colin asked.

“I’ve fucking warned you, shut
the fuck up!” Thomas exploded, scrambling round in his seat to
flail at Colin.

“Cut it out, you two, eh?!”
Billy called.

He stretched over to increase
the volume, but Thomas’ thrashing around knocked his hand and the
radio dial went tumbling to the floor.

The radio hissed
aggressively.

“
Ah!” Billy screamed.
“You battered my fingers, you clumsy fuck!”

The car took a wild swing to
the right, then heavily to the left as Billy over-compensated.

“The radio? You’ve knackered
the radio.” Thomas’ complaint was drowned out by the screech of
metal.

“Christ!” Colin squawked as he
was thrown across the back seat.

As the car continued driving
forward, the screeching grew more high-pitched and the car’s
movement more sluggish.

“What the hell? Are we caught
on something?” Billy said as he pushed down the accelerator.

The engine revved and a pair of
blood-stained hands slapped up against the right side rear
window.

“
Christ! They’re on the
car!” Billy shouted.

The smell of rubber and
the screech of tyres was increasing.

“You’re going to burn the
clutch out!” Thomas warned.

Hands started banging against
the rear window and the sound of moans rose above the shrieking
cacophony of mechanical noise. Then abruptly the screeching stopped
as the car jerked forward.

Still trying to recover his
balance, Colin was thrown forward in the seat in front of him.

“
Okay, okay! Everyone
calm down!” he shouted.

“What the hell was that?”
Thomas asked.

“No damage done—we just got
hooked up a little,” Billy said.

Colin looked across at
the door he’d been sitting next to. The glass had a seismic crack
sprawling out from the bottom, stretching all the way to the top.
Moreover, the door sported a crease, a raised line that widened and
deepened the further back it went. The plastic moulding was cracked
and white with stress.

Colin let out a gasp of spent
breath and shook his head.

“Don’t think John will be too
pleased with what we’ve done to his car,” he said.

“
We
? Was all this dick’s fault,”
Thomas said.

“Me?!”Billy snapped. “If you
hadn’t been throwing a hissy fit—”

“
Ho! Guys!” Colin said
loudly. “We’re almost at the school. Let’s focus, okay?”

The pair in the front of the
car stayed silent. Colin sensed it wouldn’t be for long.

“
Take a left down here
and it’s at the end of this road. You can't miss it,” he
said.

“Where’s the knob gone?” Thomas
asked, his head darting around.

“
We can find it in a
minute. We’re almost at the school,” Colin said.

“What kind of shitty radio has
knobs these days anyways?!” Thomas exclaimed, his head between his
knees, scanning the footwell.

“
It’s a retro design
statement. You can clearly see the thing’s digital,” Billy said,
pointing at the LCD display.

“
Guys, pay attention.
It’s just up here,” Colin said.

“
Get your hands off—I’m
driving,” Billy snapped, batting Thomas out of his way.

“I’m looking for the knob to
fix the radio,” Thomas snapped back, peering at the driver’s
footwell.

“I think it fell on your side,”
Billy said.

“Look, we’re here! Forget about
the fucking radio!” Colin barked. “I’ll nip out and open the
gates.”

“Hold on there,” Billy said.
“Three of them at the gate.”

“One each,” Thomas
suggested.

Billy held his hand out.
“I’ve got a better idea.”

He slapped his hand down on the
horn.

The zombies turned at the
noise.

“”Over here, you fucks!” Billy
shouted, his head halfway out the window.

“What are you doing?” Colin
asked nervously.

Billy honked the horn again.
The trio of creatures lumbered away from the gates and closer to
the car.

Shifting the car into
reverse, Billy backed up from the pursuing creatures.

“
Hold on,” he
said.

He slammed the gearshift into
first.

The car sped forward and
slammed into the three ghouls.

Billy pumped his fist and
whooped, “
Steee
-rike!”

“That’s your cue to get the
gates,” Thomas said to Colin.

“Shit,” Colin huffed.

“
What is it?” Billy
asked.

“The door’s jammed,” Colin
hissed, pulling at the handle.

“Give the keys to Thomas,”
Billy said.

Colin shook his head.
“I’ll just slide across—”

“
Give him the keys,
quick! Don’t fuck about,” Billy ordered.

Thomas’ hand was flat out
between the front seats.

Colin slapped the key into his
waiting palm and Thomas was out of the car.