Hellspawn (Book 6): Retribution Read online

  “Help me lift it!” Max grunted.

  The men snarled and moaned as they took the strain of the machinery. Hobbling across under the burden, Max directed them to the row of carriages which lay nearest to the office building. Lining it up under the side of the passenger car, he hurried back and repeated the process with a second.

  “I don’t like the noise. It’ll pull them straight round the ends of the train and onto us.”

  “Not if they see food on offer.”

  “Shit,” Matt cursed under his breath. This plan was beyond insane, but he still held back from calling it off. In truth, he wanted to see if it would actually work as much as the others.

  “Last one!” Max called.

  Dropping the fourth motorised jack under the body of the carriage, he showed the three other operators which buttons to use. It wasn’t difficult. Up for up. Down for down. Positioning the arms against the solid chassis, they tested the strength while they were still unhindered by the dead. All along the four car section, the wheels left the track and the sounds of strained metal could be heard pinging as the weight shifted.

  “Good, this’ll work. I need a man inside each of the two central cars. Wave and holler to draw them over. Once they’re gathered below the steps trying to get to you, just jump out the other side and we can do some squishing.”

  “Squishing? What are you, four?” Matt laughed.

  “Ok, we crush them to death. Pop their brains and organs. Shatter their bones. Is that better, Mr Correct Language Usage For My Age?”

  “Much better,” replied Matt, hoisting himself into the left hand carriage.

  Spying Tim moving through the next one along, he leaned out through the open door and waited. Perched six feet above the tracks, they would be out of danger as long as they kept a safe distance from the flailing arms. The crash of broken glass indicated that their festering admirers were making their way through the building. Pouring out through the back doors, the first half dozen fell flat on their faces down the steps. Lacking any kind of moral decency, the second wave stepped on the tumbled zombies, breaking bones.

  “You could’ve helped them up, you arseholes!” Matt shouted to get their attention.

  Undaunted by their abusive companions, the broken undead flopped their useless limbs to try and get at the warm meat. The third wave of pursuers finished them off. Boots and shoes flattened the weakened skulls, denying them the meal they had been craving since waking into undeath.

  “That’s it, you stinking bastards, come and get a bit of Scottish meat!”

  “Is it just tougher and less appealing than English meat?” Tim called down from the next door.

  “Tougher and prettier, you cheeky fucker!”

  “Only when you’re wearing your skirts!”

  “They’re called kilts!”

  “They’re called kilts, but they’re skirts. You lot just love a bit of cross dressing north of the border.”

  “Your mum seemed to enjoy seeing what was up my skirt.”

  “She’s a zombie, you sick bastard! She wanted to bite it off!”

  “Here they come, watch for their hands!”

  Unable to see the mechanical lifting equipment and the men stood by it, the undead filtered down the tracks and gathered below the gesticulating prisoners. Two hundred, then four, then six, the dead just kept coming.

  “I told you they preferred southern meat!” Tim shouted.

  Matt studied the crowd and saw that, indeed, Tim had attracted more of the stinking monsters. Giving him the finger, he called over his shoulder, “We’re going to have to run like the fucking wind once these go over. There’s too many to get them all.”

  “Okeydokey. Ready when you are, boss,” Max replied.

  Over a hundred wide and thirty deep at the furthest points, the shape of the horde resembled a pair of low hillocks with the blue carriages as the lowlands.

  “Ready?” called Tim.

  “Your mum certainly was,” Matt called back.

  “Enough with the mum jokes. What are you, four?” Tim mocked, turning from the adoring crowd.

  Matt did likewise, climbing down onto the tracks and giving the signal to Max. A sudden surge in revs from the labouring engines preceded the wheels rising even further. Slowly but surely the section of four cars rose until it reached the peak of its centre of gravity. Leaving the guiding arms, the three hundred foot length of steel and glass tipped over. The wheels slipped from the track, crashing to the stones, and sending them skittering towards the prisoners. The deafening crump of the trains impacting was like the hammer blow of a giant’s foot slamming into the earth. The ground beneath their feet shuddered at the shock of two hundred falling tons.

  “Let’s get moving!” Matt ordered.

  “Oh, that’s gross!”

  Looking to where Tim was pointing, they all recoiled. All around the edge of the settled weight was a mashed green paste oozing out, trickling between the grey ballast. Taking a few paces away from the spreading filth, Matt grimaced and said, “Good work. I prefer to be chased by that goo than the zombies it came from.”

  The groans of the remaining creatures was markedly quieter since the compression of their companions. Risking a glance, Matt climbed carefully up the axle and looked over. A couple of hundred were left, climbing back to their feet after being swatted aside by the devastating impact. Almost without thinking, Matt looked down through the reinforced glass. The majority were truly dead, the skulls fracturing and driving slivers of bone into the brains. A small number were still ‘alive’; horrifically crushed and writhing weakly against the unbreakable barrier. The emerald mulch spread into the crammed cavity below the train, coating the glass completely. On the pure green window, things moved, creating a strangely fluid undulation on the wet, teal covering.

  “Boss, we need to go!”

  Snapping out of the morbid fascination, Matt jumped down.

  “Mind your step. We need to be quick, but if you twist an ankle on the stones you’re going to be in trouble. Ready?”

  Weapons drawn, the others nodded.

  “Good. Let’s get moving.”

  Chapter 11

  “We can slow down now, lads,” Matt said, looking over his shoulder.

  The undead were faring no better from the loose shale and raised tracks than the prisoners. Tumbling and staggering, their progress was markedly slower than the living men, even at a slow walk.

  “Shall we just kill them?” asked Andrew.

  “Be my guest,” Matt replied, stopping on the tracks.

  “I meant all of us.”

  “You take the lead, we’ll follow.”

  Looking between the Scot and the unsteady corpses, Andrew knew this was a kind of test. He would earn a modicum of respect if he played this right. It might even end the constant jibes of his fellow prisoners about the non-consensual encounters from his past life.

  “Ok, I’ll get started,” he said, pulling the bar from his pack and wrapping it in a cloth to prevent a recurrence of the earlier mishap.

  Marching towards the approaching threat, his bravery waned in direct correlation to his proximity to the pustulent abominations. Hearing the crunch of stones to his rear was the only thing stopping him from running in terror back to the safety of the other men. The loose gravel shifted under each step, but he could compensate by shifting his weight to balance. The zombies, their brains rotten and corrupt, could only fall and then stand again, over and over. It was like watching a crowd of drunks try and navigate a boat that was battered by wind and crashing waves. Further back along the track, a half dozen undead had managed to brain themselves by hitting the steel rail during their tumble.

  “We could probably just let them do the job for us,” Andrew called back, looking at the six true corpses between the crowd.

  The other prisoners just grunted noncommittally.

  Sighing, he positioned himself to the side of the right hand track. Veering towards him, the first two monsters got their fee
t caught on the raised metal and fell conveniently at his feet. A quick blow to each peeling scalp ended their torment. It was only the second time he’d faced off against the once living inhabitants of England properly. Despite knowing they were effectively a single organism whose only purpose was to consume, he still differentiated the corpses. The elderly lady with her matted purple rinse. The shop workers with their stained nametags. The man who was in the process of getting a haircut, one half partly finished. The black gown still secured tightly around his neck but twisted to the rear, making him look like a festering imitation of Dracula. The young children, which were the worst. Having little in the way of meat to begin with, the undead gave them no quarter on account of their age. Little remained of the poor things.

  “Snap out of it for fuck’s sake!” hissed Matt, slashing the claymore through a toddler who was close to attacking the daydreaming prisoner.

  “Sorry,” Andrew replied, crushing another child’s head. The pigtail tore away from the decayed scalp, falling at his feet.

  Matt saw the look of horror and gripped him around the neck. “Don’t think about what they were. I know it’s hard, but they’ve gone to a better place. These things aren’t kids, they’re monsters. Now kill them all!”

  “Ok, boss.”

  “Good,” Matt replied, hacking away with abandon.

  The task proved far easier than Andrew had imagined. On flat, open ground, the dead were formidable in numbers. On the tracks, they couldn’t amass enough cohesion to attack in force. Falling at the feet of the prisoners, they were quickly dispatched. Tim had suffered a half-hearted bite to the forearm from a zombie who had manged to stay upright. The reinforced fabric was unmarked, proving its value.

  “Good work. I may give you a little extra once we get the hotel cleared,” said Matt.

  “You’re too good to us, boss,” said Max.

  “Yeah, yeah. Let’s hustle. We still need to get through the station and lose those bastards,” he replied, indicating the increasing number gathering along the chain-link.

  “We could just kill them through the fence,” offered Andrew. The small measure of respect shown during the recent cull by Matt was addictive. He wanted more.

  “No. We’d be here all day and night. Probably all week too. Look how they just keep coming.”

  Andrew looked at either side of the track and Matt was right. They staggered into view between the homes and businesses. Although small in number, their relentless appearance showed no sign of stopping. It might be that they would eventually stop, but their tired arms would give up swinging long before the remorseless dead gave up yearning to eat.

  “I see what you mean.”

  Trudging the last half mile, they came to the shadowy, canopied, station platforms. Milling around on the raised concrete were a sizeable horde of rotters.

  “What do we do?” asked Max, peering out from an abandoned train carriage.

  “We don’t go through them, that’s for sure.”

  “How far is the marina as the crow flies?”

  “About a quarter mile that way.” Matt pointed south east.

  “I think we’d be better off cutting the fence and making off while they’re still wandering along the fence behind us,” suggested Andrew.

  A few hundred were amassing further back up the road at either side of the weak barrier. The greater number were slowly gaining ground and adding their own weight against the thin metal barrier. They still had a small window of opportunity to get clear before they reached critical mass and filled the open space like a coming tide.

  Matt weighed the options and called it. “We cut through. I knew there were going to be a lot of the bastards, but not this many.”

  The men dashed for the edge of the track line and Tim pulled a set of bolt croppers from his pack. Snapping the links, he made a sizeable hole for them to squeeze through. A chorus of groans from the station indicated they’d been spotted and Matt turned to see the swarm surge towards them. More came from the dark corners, a lot more. Several hundred became thousands.

  “Go, go, go!” he urged, pushing the others through.

  “We need to get out of here!” Andrew shouted in panic.

  The horde from the station was nearly on them, as was the increasing number shambling their way down the fence line. Between the two groups, they would be completely cut off from retreat as soon as they committed to the final push. The dozen prisoners were butchering any individual who was moving faster than the main bulk of the converging horde.

  Matt felt a moment of uncertainty, but hid it from the men. No retreat.

  “Let’s go! We head for the river!”

  Ducking through the sundered fence, he jogged after the fleet footed convicts. As if a tap had been turned on, the dead poured from every alley and road. Panic was starting to spread through the team as they were slowly surrounded. Sprinting towards the Littlehampton bridge, Max staggered to a halt and looked back, eyes wide with fear. “What do we do, boss?” he begged.

  Matt caught up and saw the route was closed by a wall of filth which gurgled and raised their arms in greeting.

  “We’re cut off!” Andrew gasped.

  Matt was readying himself for a last stand. What a clusterfuck. You should’ve planned this better, said his logical voice. “Shut up and let me think!” he growled in reply.

  “We can try and fight our way back to the tracks,” said Paul.

  “It’s suicide,” moaned Max.

  As if confirming his assessment, the snipped fence completely collapsed under the massive weight of pressing undead flesh. They joined the others like two separate pools of mercury melding into one vast force.

  “We climb down!” Matt shouted, peering over the rim.

  “We what?”

  “We climb down the steel supports and get to the bank. We can take a couple of those rowing boats tied up over there!”

  Joining him at the wall, they could see the scabby looking wooden vessels. If their outward condition was anything to go by, they would probably sink after ten yards. Given the choice between drowning in the frigid water, or being torn apart by black teeth and rotting fingers, the men made their choice. Carefully hopping over the steel wall, they started to descend the columns and cross braces. Matt stayed back, rending the flesh of the dead with his two handed sword.

  “Boss, come on!”

  Cutting down five more in quick succession, he slipped the huge weapon onto his back and vaulted the barrier. Spinning in mid-air, his feet landed safely on the other side. The two hordes converged into one and reached for him. Shimmying down the steel column with scant regard to his safety, the icy surface added to the unstoppable impetus.

  “Matt!” yelled Tim as the big Scotsman hit the crossbeam.

  Losing his grip, Matt pinwheeled his arms, trying to deny gravity and will himself back towards the solid supports. The earth was unheeding of his demands and pulled him down into the chilled embrace of the River Arun. Hitting the water, the snapshot of his men staring down in horror imprinted itself on his mind before the brackish liquid flowed in to blind him. Fighting the agony of submersion, he kicked for the surface. Conversely, Matt felt like his skin was on fire from the near freezing water, as if a million red hot needles were stabbing him repeatedly. Breaking through the murky surface, he gasped for breath and tried to maintain composure. In the back of his mind, a video played. It was from a show, or an advert between a show, he was certain. A calm, female voice explained that you mustn’t fight the all-encompassing pain. Ride it out, don’t thrash. Conserve your energy and breathe slowly. Just float until you’ve acclimatised. Easy for you to fucking say, said his chattering inner voice.

  “Swim for the boats, boss!”

  “We’ll get you out!”

  Bobbing slowly away from the scuttling men on the bars and stanchions, he tried to focus. The blazing inferno across his body had faded, replaced by numbness which started to spread into tired muscles. Think of your family, you pussy! Yo
ur ancestors wouldn’t just lay back and die!

  “Easy… for… you… to… say,” Matt stammered, teeth chattering hard enough to hurt.

  “You’re nearly there!” called Andrew, hopping down onto the ice crusted bank and racing for the small boats.

  The others were in hot pursuit, motivated by both adrenaline and the dead peering over the wall. A succession of splashes made them turn towards the noise.

  “Move! Now!” Andrew shouted, waving an arm at him.

  Matt made the mistake of turning over in the water to discover the source of the disturbance. Crushed so tightly against the lip of the steel wall, some of the corpses were expelling their decayed innards into the river through open mouths. Thinner, weaker zombies were being damaged so badly their flesh gave in and the spines separated, dropping the upper half of their bodies into the water. Like fleshy corks straight from the bowels of Hell, the half creatures floated on the current, directly towards him.

  “Hay, move your arse! Kick those fucking legs!” Andrew yelled. Jumping into the boat, it rocked under his weight until he steadied himself. Holding out an arm, he beckoned towards the fading Scot. “Come on, we need you!”

  Matt’s body was close to shutting down. It surprised him how quickly his immense strength had ebbed away into the flowing water. How long had he been in the river? Ten minutes? Twenty? Gauging the distance to the bridge, the logical voice suggested it was less than two. Something lashed out and hit him in the face. Striking forth with his last ounces of energy, he sank into the murk again. Instead of finding a hungry corpse trying to fasten onto him, his hands discovered a snake, long and thin. Why would a snake be in the water? asked his inner voice, weak with hypothermic delirium. Wasn’t a snake meant to be smooth? The corrugations on the snakes thin body were strange. Holding on to the mysterious creature for comfort, he started to draw a breath. Water flowed into his aching lungs and he coughed violently underwater, drawing yet more gritty liquid through his mouth. The snake snapped taut, as if it was about to strike and he was pulled roughly from the silent, enshrouding gloom.