Jack Lewis - Fear the Dead - A Zombie Apocalypse Book

Justin stood up. “But why the pretend people? What comfort does a block of plastic give you?”

I was about to answer, when I heard the door open behind me.

I span my body round toward it and reached down to my belt for my knife, but it was no use. David was stood in front of me, and he had a shotgun pointed at my head. His arms were shaking and his eyes were wild. I couldn’t even tell if he recognised me.

“Sit on the floor. Hands behind your heads. And get away from Leila.”

Chapter 14

He pointed the shotgun at us but he couldn’t seem to choose between me or Justin, and he adjusted his aim so that he was in the middle. Presumably this meant he’d be able to shoot either of us should he need to.

How long had it been since I last saw him? I must have been half a decade at least, and those five years hadn’t been kind to either of us. The hair above his temple had receded so that his fringe was reduced to just a small patch just above his forehead, and his once dark hair was flecked with grey. His cheeks were sunken and the bones protruded against them, and there was a lost look in his big brown eyes. He was six foot two inches tall, but his back looked slightly crooked, and his arms were definitely thinner. Although he was looking straight at us, there was something vacant in his eyes.

“C’mon, Dave, lower the piece,” I said. “If you fire that thing we’ll be covered in infected. You know that as well as I do.”

Instead of putting the gun down, he trained it on my face.

“Rather see an infected than you.”

He didn’t mean that, I knew. David was terrified of the infected, always leaving the killing to Clara and me.

“Where’d you even get it?” I said, trying to think of anything to say to calm him down.

He sucked in his cheeks. “Lots of farmers round here. Farm houses. Animals. Guns. You can get a lot of stuff, if you look for it. Found the generator outside a barn.”

His words spilled out of him in quick-fire succession, so fast that that it was like they were on a spinning conveyor belt that David couldn’t control. He’d always been like this; a little on edge, the wrong side of erratic. He’d gotten a lot worse since I last saw him.

He took a step forward. “Hands behind your head. Move away from there.” He jerked his gun to his left. He looked at Justin.

“You asked about Leila, about why I have her. Simple – I like people but I don’t trust the real thing. Leila doesn’t get angry, doesn’t talk back,” he said. He looked straight at me. “Leila wouldn’t just abandon me.”

The way he spoke worried me. David was the cleverest guy you could meet when it came to mechanics, science, and practical things like that. But, as Clara had explained to me before I met him for the first time, he had some problems growing up. There were some things about the world that he couldn’t comprehend and struggled to cope with, and things like emotion were always a foreign language to him. Clara always knew just how to handle him, but I was useless at first and it took me years to get on his level.

“Who are you?” asked David, looking at Justin.

“He’s with me,” I said.

David tutted. “Watch this one. Your sister will die and then he’ll just leave you to fend for yourself.”

Justin nodded. “Don’t worry, he’s already told me I’m on my own when we get to the -”

I interrupted him before he said the word ‘farm’. The last thing I needed was David knowing where we were going. If he knew we were going to his dad’s house he’d want to come with us, and I didn’t need that.

There was a small part of me that knew that I actually owed it to him, letting him come along, but I tried to suffocate that side.

Justin didn’t seem to be scared by David, but I was worried. Deep down he had a kind heart, but the problem was it sometimes got clouded by poison. He used to have rages that he struggled to control, and you didn’t want to be around when he took the lid off.

David took a step backwards, never taking his eyes off us for a second. He reached to the counter behind him, took hold of some rope and threw it at our feet.

“Tie your wrists together.”

I looked at the rope. It was ragged and worn, and there was what looked like a chicken feather embedded into it. I glanced up at David. There was an intense look in his eyes, and I could see his finger resting on the trigger of the gun. Would he really do it, I thought? Could he kill me? The old David couldn’t have, but it had been so long since I last saw him. A man can change a lot when he’s left to his own devices.

I put the rope on my wrist. The material was rough and scratched against my skin, and I struggled to tie a knot with one hand.

“No,” said David, “Not your own wrists. Tie yours to the boy’s.”

My head sunk. The last thing I needed was to be tied to Justin. He made enough dumb decisions for himself, and there was no way I was letting him get me killed too.

“No David,” I said in as calm a voice as I could. That was the trick with David when he was mad; calm words and soothing tones.

He walked across the room and stood over us, the shotgun bearing down on our heads.

“Tie them together. Now. Won’t ask again.”

I looked at my brother-in-law’s face. I remembered how, years before this, we used to go to the footy together. He’d buy the pies and I’d buy the beer - that was our system. We watched our home town get promoted one season and then relegated the next. He’d been groomsman at mine and Clara’s wedding, and he’d helped me rewire our house after a dodgy electrician screwed us over.

He wouldn’t hurt me.

I got to my feet and stood in front of him. I forced a smile on my face, and I reached over to grab the shotgun. “C’mon Dave. Don’t start things like this,” I said, and move my hands toward the gun.

David took a step back. Quicker than I could react, he span the gun round and jabbed the butt of it hard into my face. I felt my nose crack and a kind of fizzy pain exploded in my head. Blood spurted out and dripped over my skin, warm and thick, and dropped onto the floor. I put a hand to my nose and when I pulled it away, it was covered red.

The pain screamed through my head. My heart was hammering and I felt a rage start to flow through my limbs. I looked at David. This wasn’t the same man as I used to know. I could feel my breaths coming quicker and shorter. My face was getting hot, flushing my capillaries with blood as my brain took in the sensory information of having my nose broken and translated it into anger.

“You motherfucker,” I choked out.

Nobody did this to me.

I leapt forward and smashed my fist into his face. This time David’s nose popped, and as his bone crunched he let out a cry. He dropped the shotgun to the floor, and I could see water welling up in the corner of his eyes.

I dropped my fist and took a step back.

“You big baby,” I said, trying my hardest to cool down.

He looked at me and his eyes were so intense they almost burnt red. He had blood all over his fingers, and when he touched his cheek he left a red smear.

“You left me,” he said. “We both lost everything. Right when I needed you, you left me.”

I shook my head. I was done with this. Right now, getting a car didn’t seem worth it.

He moved toward me. “You left me to die!” His screaming voice echoed off the stone walls.

He swung his fist toward me, but this time my reactions were quick enough for me to move my head to the left and make him miss. I ducked down a little and sank my fist into his belly. The wheezing sound he made told me I’d struck home and I had knocked the wind out of him. I pushed him to the floor.