James Loscombe - The Bitter End

“Come on,” said Joel and led them away down the pavement.

Ben took a final look back. One of them had fallen over and at first he thought the others were helping him up but they weren’t. Black blood squirted lazily up at them as they tore into the flesh of the one who could no longer stand. Ben felt bile rise in his throat as he realised they were eating him.

“Ben!” said Aaron sharply and he turned away from the gruesome scene. The others were a few metres ahead of him and he jogged to catch up.

Ahead there was a petrol station. There were cars around it but they appeared to have crashed there rather than parked. Joel led them towards it.

They stopped around the corner and Joel held a finger to his mouth. Ben waited and watched. The shop was dark and he could detect no movement inside, the cars didn’t move. He could hear insects. It started to rain.

“Lets go,” said Joel and one by one they followed him across the road to the garage.

Red plastic petrol cans were piled up across the forecourt. Joel grabbed one and threw it to Aaron.

“Diesel,” he said.

Aaron nodded and went to the nearest pump.

Joel threw the next can at Ben, “Petrol, unleaded,” he said.

Ben nodded and set to work but he kept an eye on Joel and Daniel. They walked away together and at first he thought they were going into the little shop but they walked past it. They were supposed to be getting food but the Thresher’s had been coming here for years and had probably long exhausted the little stores supplies.

A few minutes passed, he filled up the first bottle and was working on the second. A shadow passed across his vision and he looked up thinking it was Aaron come to give him a hand or Joel and Daniel back from wherever they had been. But it wasn’t. It was one of the people. A woman.

Close up she looked, on the verge of death sick. Her skin was coming off her cheeks in clumps, revealing a black and green infection beneath. Her eyes bulged from her sockets, the pupils large and vacant. When she opened her mouth he saw rotten teeth stumps. Remembering what he had seen happen to the man who had fallen down he stepped back and almost suffered a similar fate when he stumbled over an empty petrol bottle.

He held up his hands. He didn’t want her to get to close, the idea of her diseased hands touching him brought the bile back up his throat.

Ben waited for her to do something but she just looked at him with those big vacant eyes. He wasn’t even sure if she could really see him. Then she opened her mouth and a big purple tongue fell out and rested on her chin spilling blood red drool down her already ruined top.

He took another step back and wondered where Aaron was, shouldn’t he have come over and offered to help him. Or was he in a similar position. Maybe he just hadn’t noticed. Ben didn’t know if he should be scared or not. He took another step back.

This was stupid, he realised, there was nothing to be scared of. She was a sick, and probably weak, woman. She could’t hurt him, she probably just wanted him to help her.

“I’m sorry,” he said, holding his hands in the air as if she was pointing a gun at him. “I can’t do anything for you.”

She growled. A low sound that started in her throat and came out of her mouth as a sticky wet moan. Then she lunged towards him, wobbling like she was drunk but with her mouth open baring her fractured blackened tooth stumps. She put out her arms as if to grab him and he took another step back. He hit something soft and wet that gave like a patch of damp grass.

He tried to push himself away but fat hands wrapped themselves around his arms and held him tight.

“Let go,” he said through gritted teeth and tried to force his way free but whatever had hold of him didn’t budge.

Now the woman was on top of him, her mouth open wide so that he could see her black insides and smell her rancid breath. Her hair hung in clumps from her head between red bald patches that seeped and oozed white puss. She lowered her head towards him and he tried to kick her away but missed.

They didn’t move quickly but they didn’t need speed. She came towards him slowly and purposefully, a wild hunger in her otherwise vacant eyes. The hand behind him held as tightly as stone. Ben realised that he was in serious trouble.

He kicked at the woman again and this time struck her knee. It buckled out backwards and must have been agonising. She limped a little after that but otherwise didn’t seem to notice.

Ben looked around but couldn’t see Aaron. It was a dangerous world and there was no shame in calling for help. “Aaron,” he shouted at the top of his voice.

“Bit busy at them moment Ben,” came the reply from somewhere to his left.

Ben managed to crane his neck around and see that Aaron was in a similar situation to him. If the person holding him down was as big as the one holding Aaron then there wasn’t a lot he was going to be able to do. He was as big as a house.

He struggled some more but the mountain behind him didn’t budge. He kicked at the grotesque woman to keep her away but she kept coming and he was running out of strength, energy and will. He glanced over at Aaron and he didn’t seem to be having any better luck.

If he could just get to his gun, he thought, he could shoot her and as big as he was the guy behind him would still back off if he had a gun pointed at his head. Not that he could get to his gun. He couldn’t even move his arms.

The woman came at him again preceded by her vile stink and trailing chunks of skin that fell from her every time she moved. Her mouth opened, she lunged forwards and he leveraged the giants grip to pull both his feet into the air and strike her with both feet hard in the chest.

Her skin gave and for a moment he thought his feet were stuck. She staggered back, his feet came free and her head exploded. For a long time he just stood there looking at her.

He turned and saw Joel across the street, rifle in hand. Another explosion of sound followed explosion of head and Ben was pulled to the ground along with the now headless mountain. He still hadn’t released his grip.

Ben managed to pull himself free and stood up in time to see the two attacking Aaron disappear in a cloud of bile, blood and other bodily fluids. He walked over and offered Aaron a hand up.

He was breathless and terrified. He looked around convinced there were more coming. He took out his gun and aimed it wildly at bushes and trees and lamp posts, anything that could be mistaken for a human being.

“Put that down, you bloody idiot,” said Joel crossing the street and shouldering his own gun. ”

“What the fuck!” said Ben, while putting his gun away as instructed.

“Petrol,” said Joel. Ben looked over at Aaron and saw that he was back at the pump, although he looked up scanning the area while he worked. Joel stood guard while Ben and Aaron finished doing their jobs.

“What are they?” said Ben, as he put a full can on the pile. His heart had stopped racing but he was still having trouble processing what had just happened.

Joel shrugged. “Vamps gone wrong I reckon.”

“Gone wrong how?”

“Go out in the day, don’t they. Maybe it turns them mad or something. They don’t just want your blood either, they’ll eat you down to the bone. Good job they aren’t quick. You keep your eyes and ears open and they’re easy enough to avoid.”

It was only when they were walking that Ben realised Daniel was gone. He asked Joel about it and Joel told him he’d gone to get food and would meet them back on the boat. They arrived on foot and found him there with the car, throwing bundles and bags up to Mrs Thresher.

When she saw them coming she stopped, stood up and waved happily at them. Half an hour later they were moving.