Autumn Disintegration Read online

  “I can’t watch,” Caron said, half-turning away but then looking back when curiosity got the better of her. Hollis stared intently as Stokes, Jas, Gordon, and Webb scuttled away to a safe distance, leaving Harte on his own trying to light the limp rag-fuse of a petrol bomb with the intermittent flame coming from a frustratingly unreliable cigarette lighter. A sudden flash of orange appeared which made him jump back with surprise. Realizing that the rag was finally lit, he hurled it toward the wall of cars. It ricocheted off the roof of a beaten-up 4 × 4 before exploding into flames. A chain reaction spread instantly across the petrol-soaked crowd, an arc of fire racing to the right and left and back out over the decaying hordes. Harte ran for cover.

  “Looks like it worked,” Caron said, relaxing again. The people down below congratulated each other and laughed and pointed as the bodies burned.

  “Thank God for that,” Hollis sighed. “They’re lucky it’s not them that’s on fire. If the wind had caught the fumes like last time they would have—”

  A sudden explosion tore through the air outside. Fuel had leaked from the damaged petrol tank of a hearse (complete with coffin and body) and the resulting ignition blew it up into the air, flipping the long, box-shaped vehicle up and over. Its charred chassis clattered back down to the ground several meters behind the spot it had originally occupied, crushing scores of unsuspecting corpses.

  Outside, the survivors ran for cover.

  * * *

  “Bloody hell,” grinned Stokes, “that was close. You could have been standing on top of that, Webb.”

  “I was standing on top of it a couple of minutes ago,” he replied, subdued. “Good job Harte took his time getting the fuse lit.”

  “Piss off,” Harte snapped. “It was your lighter that slowed things down, nothing to do with me.”

  “I think we’ve got a problem here,” Jas said ominously, taking a few tentative steps forward and peering through the heavy cloud of dense black smoke which was drifting low across the scene from the burning bodies and the blazing hearse. He shielded his eyes and looked down into the gap in the barrier where the hearse had originally been. The flames there had died down and now he could see movement.

  “What is it?” Gordon asked nervously, moving a little nearer but being careful not to get too close. At first Jas didn’t answer, instead pointing at the wide gap which had appeared in their defenses. A mass of furious bodies was beginning to quickly scramble through.

  “Block it up!” Jas screamed, his voice suddenly hoarse with panic. “Block the fucking hole up!”

  Webb and Stokes peered into the haze, still not sure what was happening. Harte immediately realized the danger and sprang into action, sprinting over to the nearest of the two diggers and hauling himself up into the cab. He started the heavy machine and rumbled toward the lumbering bodies, trying to work out how best to stop, or at least stem, the flow of dead flesh pouring through the ruptured barricade. Suddenly forced into action, Webb swung his nail-skewered baseball bat around with scant regard for his own, or anyone else’s, safety. Even Gordon was forced to fight. He battered a single crippled creature to the ground with a bloodied fence post, standing over it and repeatedly slamming the wooden post into its face, continuing even when the decaying monster had stopped moving. Stokes scampered out of the way and climbed into the other digger, hand on the ignition, ready to get involved only if he had absolutely no alternative.

  Harte blasted the digger’s horn. Still fighting, Jas looked up and stepped back out of the way as the vehicle moved toward him, rolling relentlessly over the dead and squashing them into the mud. On the other side of the breached barrier, a short distance into the advancing crowd, he could see the roof of the wreck of another car which he could use to block the hole left by the still-burning hearse. He accelerated again, carving another deep and bloody furrow through the sea of cadavers, then shunted his way out through the gap and into the crowd. He concentrated on the car just ahead, doing his best to block out the fact that now, for the first time, he was completely surrounded by corpses on every side. Shutting out the noise of their, tireless hammering on the sides of the digger, he stretched out the vehicle’s scoop, then smashed it down and punched a hole through the roof of the car. He slammed the digger into reverse and powered back, slipping out through the gap again, then veering over to the right and wedging the wreck across the breach.

  * * *

  All around the digger the chaos continued. The smoke and constant movement made it almost impossible to see what was happening clearly. Looking down from the flats, Hollis estimated that more than fifty corpses had managed to push their way through the barricade before Harte had blocked the gap. Around half that number had already been destroyed, most of them obliterated by the digger.

  “I should go down there.”

  “They can take care of themselves,” Caron said. “They made the mess, let them clear it up. Idiots, if they’d just slow down and think before they…”

  Her voice trailed away to nothing as she watched the fighting continue. Several cadavers had surrounded Gordon. It might have been bad luck or inexperience on his part, but he’d somehow allowed himself to be cornered. His back was pressed up against a section of wire-mesh fence and he cowered as the dead approached.

  * * *

  “Get out of the way!” Jas shouted, noticing the other man was trapped. “Move!”

  Terrified, Gordon looked for a way out. He was about to drop to his knees and try crawling away through the mud when the bodies attacked. Their movements were sudden, surprisingly controlled and inexplicably coordinated. It was almost as if they were working together.

  “Get down!” Jas screamed again. Running forward, he unsheathed the machete he’d been carrying on his belt and began to lash out at the twisted creatures. He sank the blade into the small of the back of the first of them, cutting deep into its already partially exposed spinal cord. He then yanked it free and immediately struck out at the next nearest corpse. It was much smaller than the first, disarmingly childlike. He looked away as he slammed the blade down onto the top of its head, center-parting what remained of its lank, greasy hair and splitting its skull.

  Now that he found himself facing only one opponent again, Gordon managed to force himself back into action. He fumbled around for the fence post he’d been using as a bludgeon, then picked it up and swung it into the side of the third corpse’s body, smashing its pelvis and giving it a far more serious hip problem than the one he himself suffered with. It collapsed into a puddle of bloody rainwater.

  “You okay, Gord?” Jas asked, wiping his blade clean on the back of a slumped body lying next to him. Gordon was standing over the corpse he’d just crippled, pounding its face with the fence post.

  “Fine,” he said between angry grunts of effort. “Nothing to worry about.”

  Stokes watched from the safety of the stationary digger. Webb continued to hack down those cadavers unfortunate enough to find themselves within striking range of his baseball bat. Jas too had returned to the fray and was chopping at the remaining figures which lumbered toward him. Harte continued to operate the other digger, stretching the articulated arm out over pockets of attacking corpses, then dropping the heavy metal scoop on their unsuspecting heads, crushing them instantly. Stokes might have found their slapstick demise funny if he hadn’t been so bloody terrified.

  * * *

  Hollis and Caron looked on from the safety of the flats.

  “Looks like they’ve got everything under control now,” Caron said optimistically.

  “I know, but I really don’t like this.”

  “What’s the problem?” she asked. From where she was standing the survivors on the ground seemed to be doing well. The sudden surge of dead flesh through the barrier had been stopped and those which had made it through were being destroyed quickly and with very little effort.

  “Watch him,” Hollis answered, pointing at Gordon again. “He’s not used to this. He’s not as quick as t
he others.”

  He was right. Rather than move toward the corpses and attack, Gordon instead held back and waited for them to come to him, perhaps hoping that someone else would take action before he had to. Four decayed figures closed in on him now.

  “Look!”

  With remarkable coordination the four bodies suddenly increased their pace and launched themselves at Gordon. At the last possible moment he lifted his fence post and skewered the creature immediately in front of him through the abdomen. In a desperately defensive action he swung the post—with the limp body still impaled on it—from side to side, knocking two more of the foul figures clean off their clumsy feet. To Caron’s relief, Jas returned to his side to help him finish off his rotting assailants.

  “Did you see them?” Hollis asked.

  “Yes, but—”

  “Did you see the bodies?” he asked again. “Did you see what they were doing? The fucking things were moving together like pack animals.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “I tell you, they’re working together!” he insisted. “It’s like they’re starting to realize they’re no match for us on their own. Damn things are fighting in packs!”

  17

  “You okay, Webb?” Hollis asked as the two men met on their way to the communal lounge. It was just before nine in the morning, much later than most of them usually dragged themselves up out of bed. The effort of the previous two days of fighting had exhausted everyone and an early, relatively undisturbed night had followed. Webb’s eyes were glazed. He still looked half-asleep.

  “Slept like a fucking log,” he answered with his usual lack of tact. “I’m still fucking knackered.”

  “You were out there for a long time yesterday. Those things might be falling apart, but they still take some getting rid of when they’re coming at you.”

  “Didn’t see you out there much.”

  Hollis shook his head.

  “Didn’t feel like it,” he replied evasively. “Smacked my head when I was out with Lorna yesterday morning. Still hurts.”

  “You know,” Webb said as they walked, gradually becoming more animated, “someone needs to go out there and tell those things that they’re dead. You should have seen how they were going for us. I swear they’re getting faster. I mean, they’re still slow compared to you and me, but they’re quicker than they used to be.”

  “You’re right,” Hollis agreed. “It makes no sense, but you’re right. We’ve just got to be careful and not take any chances. It’s like—”

  “One of them bit me!” Webb interrupted. “Don’t forget that! Fucking thing tried to take a chunk out of my arm!”

  “Yeah, you’ve already mentioned that.”

  “We just need to keep doing what we’re doing. If we can get rid of a load of them every day then we can keep pushing them back, and if we can do that we’ll— Christ, can you smell that?”

  As the two men neared the door of the flat Hollis suddenly became aware of the smell of food being cooked. He couldn’t tell what it was but that didn’t matter. He was starving and the smell made his mouth water and his belly growl. Stokes appeared from the other direction, moving with more speed than he had for weeks. The powerful aroma was like an alarm call.

  “Morning, boys.” He grinned cheerfully. “Grub’s up!”

  Stokes and Webb barged into the crowded flat and Hollis followed close behind. Harte and Lorna were in the small galley kitchen cooking on portable gas burners. Driver sat on his backside re-reading the same two-month-old newspaper he always read. Jas and Gordon stood at the window. Only Caron, Ellie, and Anita were missing. Jas glanced back over his shoulder to see who had arrived.

  “Morning,” Hollis said as he walked over.

  “Morning,” Gordon mumbled.

  “What are you looking at?”

  Jas sighed dejectedly. “The bodies, same as always. I was just trying to see if we actually achieved anything yesterday.”

  Hollis peered over his shoulder. The morning had been misty so far but the sun was gaining strength and was beginning to burn away the haze. At the foot of the hill he could see where the battles with the dead had taken place over the last two days. There was a definite scar of dark discoloration where the bodies had been butchered and brutally battered back but, from this distance, it was hard to see how much land had actually been reclaimed. The reason for Jas’s lack of enthusiasm, however, was painfully obvious: no matter how much ground they’d gained, there was still an incalculable amount of work left to be done. Hollis lifted his eyes beyond the barrier and looked deeper into the crowd of corpses. It looked no different: still as large as ever, maybe even bigger. There were tens of thousands of bodies left to destroy, maybe more. For every one they’d hacked down, hundreds seemed to have taken its place.

  “Going to take a little while, isn’t it?” he said, deliberately understating the scale of the problem.

  “Going to take forever,” Gordon agreed, leaning his head against the glass.

  “Is it worth the effort?” Hollis asked. No one answered.

  “I busted my balls yesterday,” Jas complained, “and risked my neck. And for what? Wasn’t worth shit.”

  “Of course it was,” Webb shouted across the room as he waited for his food. “Look how many of them we got rid of.”

  “Yeah, but look how many are left.”

  “Thousands,” Gordon said quietly. “Millions, even.”

  “Less than yesterday, though,” Webb continued, grabbing a plate and filling his mouth with breakfast. “And we ain’t got to get rid of the lot of them, just enough so we can push what’s left back some more.”

  “It’s not worth it,” Hollis announced. “Forget it, it’s not working. Don’t go back out there today.”

  “Has that bang on the head knocked you stupid?” Webb asked. “’Course we’re going back out.”

  “What else are we gonna do?” Stokes added, helping himself to food. “If we’re not out there killing them, all we’ll be doing is sitting in here watching them.”

  “Haven’t actually seen you take one of them out yet,” Jas sneered.

  “Piss off,” he spat, sending a spray of partially chewed food splattering over the kitchen worktop.

  “Watch what you’re doing,” Lorna protested, screwing up her face in disgust and wiping away his greasy spittle with a damp cloth.

  “At least I’m out there,” Stokes protested, picking up his plate and carrying it over to the window, still chewing. “There’s some folk here who’ve done nothing to help. At least I’m out there.”

  “Okay, okay…” Jas said.

  “Look at him,” Stokes ranted, pointing accusingly at Driver. “Lazy bastard sits and reads the same bloody newspaper all day, every day. We have to force him to do anything useful.”

  Driver glanced up from his paper but didn’t react.

  “You’ve made your point,” Jas sighed, “now shut up.”

  “And there’s Caron,” he continued, still eating and still ranting. “Can’t remember the last time she went out and did anything worthwhile. Spends all her time sitting with Anita, and she’s no good either. Christ, how much looking after does she need? Just another fucking excuse if you ask me.”

  “Well, maybe I’ll be able to do more to help now,” Caron said. The others turned as she walked into the room. She looked drained, her face ashen.

  “What do you mean?” Harte asked. Caron tried to answer but she couldn’t. She slumped into the nearest chair and held her head in her hands. “What do you mean?” he asked again, crouching down in front of her. “What’s happened?”

  Caron cleared her throat and wiped her eyes.

  “She’s dead. Anita’s dead.”

  “You’re joking,” Stokes said stupidly.

  “Like she’d joke about that, you fucking idiot,” Harte snapped angrily.

  Hollis turned back to look out of the window, trying to absorb what he’d heard. Even when the world was so full of death, this
sudden loss was almost impossible to accept. He could hear the others talking, some crying, but he kept his emotions locked tight inside. He didn’t want them to see that he was completely fucking terrified at the prospect that whatever had killed Anita might still be hanging in the air he was breathing now. The next gulp of air I swallow, he thought, might be the one that kills me. He could see the reflections of the others behind him in the glass, and he sensed that they were all thinking exactly the same thing:

  I might already have it. We all might. And there’s fuck all any of us can do about it.

  18

  He had to get out. It was always hard being trapped inside with the others but it was worse than ever this morning. He understood why, of course, but that didn’t make it any easier. He just had to get out.

  Webb walked down the hill toward the fenced-off area where he’d previously fought with the dead for sport. He didn’t feel like fighting today. He had his baseball bat with him as always, but he now carried it for protection only. As dumb and insensitive as he frequently was, in his own way Webb had taken the news of Anita’s death as badly as anyone. He wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box, but even he’d quickly made the grim realization that what had killed her could probably kill him too. He could cope with thousands of decaying bodies, but this was something else altogether. A germ or a virus. Something invisible and undetectable which he couldn’t punch, kick, or smash into oblivion.

  He’d left the others talking about the body. They were arguing about what they should do with it. None of them, him included, wanted to go anywhere near the corpse. Stokes had been saying that he thought Caron should deal with her, because she’d already spent so much time in the same flat and chances were she already had the germ inside her. Caron argued that they’d all got as much chance as each other of catching it, and that just scared everyone even more. Gordon said they needed to do something quick in case she got up again and started walking around. Harte told him to shut up and get a grip, that that was never going to happen. Gordon became hysterical, ranting about how Harte didn’t know that was the case and how they couldn’t afford to take chances. Harte threw him an ax and told him to go to her flat and chop her body into pieces. Gordon had started panicking and threatened to attack Harte before he went anywhere near Anita’s body, and … and that was when Webb had got up and walked out.