Safety Lost (Killing the Dead Book 3) (17 page)

“Keep the rifles.” I said, “They will be more of a hindrance to us than a help.”

“Ok that’s fine. You four will go out during the day and I have another group that will head out at night.” Matthew said.

“I’ll gather them some food and water to take.” Lily said and with a nod headed out of the cottage.

“We will need some weapons. If you have any knives, they would be appreciated.” I said.

“Knives aren’t much use against the zombies” Matthew said, “I have a few that you can take your pick of though. Wait here and I’ll go get them you.”

As soon as Matthew was out the door Pat turned to me, “Why did you say no to the guns? We will need more than knives.” He demanded.

“The last thing we will want is to fire off a rifle and bring every damn zombie in the area down on us.” I said.

“I thought we were supposed to be making them follow us.” Gregg said.

“Throw a stone at one of them and you will get its attention. If you fire a gun you won’t know which ones you have alerted. You could easily find yourself surrounded. At least if you throw a rock you know which ones attention you are getting and can control the situation.” I said and the others fell quiet as they considered my words.

“Fair enough I guess. We will still need better weapons than knives.” Pat finally said.

“Look around you. We are surrounded by woods. With the right knife we can make our own weapons.” I said and when I saw their confused expressions I added, “Remember those books I took from the mobile library?”

“The ones that were left back at the stables” Cass said.

“Yes them. Well I had plenty of time to read them when I was stuck in the house when I hurt my ankle. I can’t remember everything in them, but I recall enough to make a spear or a bow.”

“What the hell kind of books did you have?” Pat asked.

“It was a book on the stone-age tribes of ancient England and it had examples of the weapons they used, what materials and that sort of thing. I have no idea where to find flint to make an axe head, but with the right branches, we could make an effective spear and possibly a bow.” I explained as patiently as I could.

“Would a spear of a bow be much use against a zombie?” Cass asked.

“I have been thinking about this. If we work in pairs, one person with a spear. You could pierce the skull but more importantly you could keep the undead at bay or even use it to knock them down. The other person could then use a club of some sort to crack the skulls.”

“It could work I suppose” Pat said though he sounded sceptical.

“We can give it a try at least. We will have some time to practice while we are out there keeping watch for the undead.” Cass offered.

The door opened and Lily walked in with a couple of heavy rucksacks and Matthew following behind. Lily placed the bags on the table and Matthew placed a holdall beside them.

“Food and some bottled water. Enough for a couple of days in case you need it.” Lily said.

“A selection of knives for you.” Matthew said with a gesture to the holdall. “Take what you need and then head out. Let me know how it goes when you get back and good luck.”

With a final nod to each of us, Matthew left the cottage and we began gathering our belongings and readying ourselves for the days task. I was rooting through the holdall when Lily pulled me to one side.

“Be careful out there please and look after the others.” She said.

“Oh I will. You be safe here. John and that other person will likely turn today.”

“I know” she said sadly. “I shall make sure they don’t hurt anyone.”

With a final squeeze of my hand she turned and went into her room. I saw the others were ready and I hastily pulled on my jacket and boots before grabbing a couple of sheathed combat knives that had likely been taken from a soldier’s body.

“All ready?” I asked and received acknowledgement from each person before leading the way out of the cottage with a grin.

Chapter 23

“You see anything?” Pat asked.

I glanced down to see him looking up at me from where he sat beneath the tree. A long and fairly straight branch lay across his legs and a small pile of wood shavings covered the floor from his attempts at sharpening a point on the branch.

“Nothing yet. It seems quiet and dull at the moment.” I said before turning back to staring across the hills.

We were high up into the hills and I was currently standing in the highest branches of a tree as I surveyed the land. Cass and Gregg had headed further to the south and we had parted ways two hours ago.

If I turned around I would be able to see the woods that hid our campsite from view, while to the east I could just about make out the motorway and the town of Kendal. It was depressingly quiet and I was sure that I would die of boredom before too long.

I climbed carefully down the tree trunk. The last thing I needed was to fall out of a tree and break my neck. A somewhat ignominious end for me I would have thought.

“What do you think?” Pat said as I reached the ground. He was brandishing his spear and I made a momentary show of admiring it.

“It looks good to me, though you will need to harden the end.”

“How do we do that?”

“The book mentioned something about using a fire to do it. I will have a think, though if you find any flint we should be ok.” I said.

“What does flint look like?”

“No idea.” I answered with a laugh. “We will figure something out.”

“This is for you anyway.” Pat said and pushed the spear into my hands.

“What about you?”

“I have this” he said and pulled a lump hammer from the rucksack.

“Where on earth did you get that?” I asked as I inspected the hammer. It was essentially a small version of a sledgehammer. A short handle that allowed it to be swung one handed and a rectangular head of solid metal.

“Found it on a building site on the way here.” Pat said proudly.

“Well it will certainly do some damage.” I said and glanced around. “Which way do you want to go?”

“Too far to the east and we hit Kendal, too far north and we hit Windermere. We won’t be especially welcome at either.” Pat said.

“Why wouldn’t we be welcome at Windermere, I thought it had some people and soldiers?”

“Couple of thousand people there and no way of feeding them all for long. Matthew told me that when Howard suggested they brought our camp to Windermere they were told politely but firmly that they wouldn’t be room for them.”

“Have you spent much time with Matthew?” I asked curiously. “What is he like?”

“He’s alright. Used to be a policeman and knows how to keep people under control.” Pat said as he pulled the rucksacks straps over his shoulders.

I knew that it would be likely that I would end up meeting ex-police or military at some point, but the idea of being in such close quarters as a former police officer was a cause for concern. If anyone was likely to be suspicious it would be him.

It would possibly be worthwhile disposing of him first. Accidents were almost unavoidable and at the first chance I would ensure he had one.

When I saw that Pat was ready and awaiting instruction, I led the way roughly north-east through the woods. The land around us rose and fell which made spying any approaching threats awkward at best.

My intention was to reach the road and travel along that for a short distance. Any buildings close by would have already been cleared out by the scavenging teams and so we could ignore them.

“There’s one” Pat said softly and pointed to our right.

I followed his arm and saw a lone zombie walking through the woods. It was definitely one of the shambling types. With a nod to Pat we made our way through the trees towards it.

The sound of our passing soon alerted the zombie to our presence. It was unavoidable with the fallen leaf mulch and twigs that we were walking over, but it was still galling that we were so noisy.

It turned towards us and I saw that part of its jaw was missing. The hair along one side of its head had been torn out along with some skin and the clothes it still wore were filthy and torn. I readied the spear as it started towards us.

When it was almost within reach I stepped forward and thrust the spear at the zombie’s throat and missed. The thrust was off and all I managed was to peel some of the skin off its neck. I took two quick steps back out of its reach and Pat swung his lump hammer. The skull shattered and the zombie collapsed without a sound.

“You might want to practice with that” Pat said as he laughed and I had to resist the urge to turn the spear on him.

“I think you are right” I said as calmly as I could as I moved away from him. I needed distance between us and I made a show of examining the corpse.

Neither Pat nor I had any intention to bury the body so we left the remains lying on the frozen ground and continued on our way. Around noon we crested a hill and saw a group of a dozen or so undead headed south.

“Do we bother with them?” Pat asked.

I crouched beside a tree and watched the zombies as they moved southwards. They were moving through a large grassy area. Beyond them to the east was the road and if they continued south they would have the chance to turn back north and head towards our camp.

Ideally we would either turn them east or follow them south to make sure they didn’t turn back north when they came up against the road. We could of course just leave them be and hope for the best but I was bored and in need of some entertainment now that I was finally free of the confines of the camp.

“Let’s turn them north.” I said.

“Why north?”

“We can lead them to Windermere and let the soldiers deal with them.”

“That sounds kind of dangerous.” Pat said as his brow furrowed in thought.

“Not at all. You said yourself that a couple of hundred soldiers were at the town right?”

“Yeah I guess but why don’t we just leave them be?”

“Well if we leave them, then they may end up hurting someone further south or coming back north and finding our camp. Surely it’s better to eliminate them entirely” I said with my most earnest expression.

Pat nodded doubtfully but voiced no more objections so with a grin of utter delight I picked up a handful of loose pebbles and set off down the slope towards the undead.

As I neared them I stopped running and called out to the zombies. I threw a few pebbles for good measure and managed to hit at least one of the undead on the shoulder. It didn’t hurt it in any way but it helped get their attention.

A low moan rose from one of the zombies to the rear as it finally noticed me and I saw the others stop and turn towards me. As they raised their ruined voices in chorus, I turned and ran north at a gentle jog.

The undead were no match for me when it came to speed but they did have the advantage of not needing to rest. I was soon winded and slowed to a walk. I kept glancing behind me to see that they were still following and when they started to gain ground on me, I would set off running again.

I kept going for a couple of hours. Pat stayed close though not so close as to be noticed by the zombies as they followed along tirelessly. The going became easier as I came across a main road and aside from a few cars that had been pushed to the side of the road, I encountered nothing of note.

My intention was to get them moving along the road and then duck into hiding until they had passed. From what I remembered of the map, any road that I encountered would lead directly to the town.

Once I saw all of the undead were on the road behind me I started to increase my pace and soon their moaning was fading. I glanced back to see that they were still moving steadily along the road.
      

Alongside the road beside me were trees and tall strand of yellow grass. With a final check behind me I ducked into the undergrowth and crouched behind a tree. I waited as the minutes ticked along. The sound of the undead was growing ever louder as they came towards me.

I held my breath as the leading zombie passed my hiding spot and continued along the road. My muscles were aching with the need to move and I shifted slightly as I tried to ease them. In moments the zombies had passed and were walking along the road. I breathed again.

“Ryan” whispered Pat and I cast my gaze around until I saw him further along the road. I crept along through the tall grass towards him.

“It seems to have worked” I said with a wide smile.

“Windermere isn’t too far ahead.” Pat said quietly.

“You’ve been here before?”

“Yeah with one of the scavenging teams.” He said.

“Well then, lead the way and let’s see if we can find somewhere to watch what happens.” I said.

Pat moved along through the brush as the ground rose beneath us. More trees covered the top of the hill and we soon lost sight of the road. It didn’t take long to find a spot that overlooked the road and we could see the undead as they travelled north.

I could see the first houses on the outskirts of the town and further along the main road a barricade had been erected. It was too distant to see much but we heard the pop pop pop of the guns as they fired on the zombies.

It didn’t last long and the undead were soon lying lifeless in the road. A truck with military colouring came out from behind one of the houses and headed towards the corpses.

We kept watch as a group of people started to clear away the remains before we started back south.

“You see, that wasn’t too bad was it?” I asked Pat.

“I guess not. They managed to clear them out easily enough.”

“Of course they did and no one was hurt.” I pointed out.

Pat nodded and we continued walking through the trees back towards the south and the camp. He seemed to have nothing to talk about and I was fine with that. I had several ideas forming and I had a great many things to plan out. I hummed quietly as I walked.

Chapter 24

I arrived back at the cottage after dark and as I walked into the candle lit room I found Lily sat at the kitchen table eating a bowl of pasta.

“Your friend has been here again” Lily said with a smile of greeting.