H
ayden watched
the blood drip down his shaking hands, cover the floor of the barn.
If only he’d made the decision to return sooner, maybe things would’ve been different.
I
t started
when he walked away into the night. The darkness was thick and suffocating. The wind was strong, which Hayden never liked. The wind always made things move; made it look like figures were following him, chasing him, pursuing him.
Constantly on edge. No respite. No relaxing.
Just the way of the world now.
Something that came with the territory of surviving alone.
He listened to his footsteps on the gravel, his heartbeat racing in his chest. But deep inside, as he climbed the hill, eyes just about adjusting to the moonlight, it was the voices of the people he’d met that echoed in his ears. The memory of Miriam. Of how she’d spoken. Of how she’d spoken to him like she’d known him for years.
Then she’d walked away from him temporarily, and he’d walked away from her permanently.
A taste of nausea built in his mouth. He knew he was wrong for walking away without saying goodbye. But he’d done what he’d done because there was no future for him with that group. There was no future for him with any group. Because when he was with groups, people died. Usually because of him.
He didn’t want to lose anyone else.
He didn’t want to be responsible for any more death.
So he walked away.
His feet were chapped, blistered. He couldn’t walk much more. He’d have to find somewhere to rest eventually. But with every pained step, the memory of Miriam filled his mind.
The wall.
The boundary between the north and the south.
A safe place beyond it.
He still wasn’t sure whether to believe it. But he’d overheard plenty of the other refugees discussing it in the background. Heard the rumours. The rumours of a good world beyond. A world where people survived. Where they led relatively normal lives.
But as Hayden walked into the dark, something unsettled him about that supposed normality. It didn’t seem right. Didn’t fit right. The world out here was dying, close to dead. And yet he was supposed to just crawl behind a wall and act like everything was normal, everything was fine?
He wasn’t sure he could do that. He wasn’t sure he could pretend. Not after everything that’d happened.
He heard a groan up ahead. A throaty, guttural cry. It didn’t scare him. Didn’t unsettle him. Not anymore. Zombies were just a part of the background now. Just a part of the world. Really, they represented the world. Hungry. Dying. Desperate.
In a way, he pitied them.
Hayden lifted the fire axe he’d found on his way down here and readied himself to attack the zombie. To put it down. Put it out of its misery. He couldn’t see it yet. And admittedly, it was weird that a lone straggler just happened to be walking along out here in the countryside.
There was something absurd about it. Something abnormal. Something...
He felt the tightness around his left arm out of nowhere.
He swung around. Smacked the zombie right across its face with the axe.
He couldn’t see it properly. Just that it was short-haired. Smaller than him.
Blood drooling down its chewed up face.
Hayden hit it again. Harder this time, aiming for the next. But the zombie just kept its grip. And as Hayden stood there fighting, he got a flash of something. A momentary flash in his mind.
Why are you still fighting?
The thoughts came thick and fast, all in the space of a moment.
If you’re fighting to survive, then why?
What is your plan?
What is your end game?
Do you really want to be alone forever?
And as the zombie lurched for his shoulder, the answer invaded his thoughts. Screamed around his mind.
No.
He didn’t want to be alone.
He wanted to be safe. Somewhere safe.
He wanted the people he’d escaped the prison with.
He wanted Miriam.
He smacked the zombie across its neck. Heard its spine split on contact.
The zombie tightened its grip for a second. Started shaking, convoluting, spitting out blood.
And then its muscles went limp and it fell to the ground.
Hayden stood there in the moonlight, which had burned through the clouds completely now. He listened to the wind brush against the trees. The light rain falling from the clouds above, making him even colder than he already was.
No.
He didn’t want to be alone.
He wanted to be in company.
He wanted to see what was on the other side of that wall.
He wanted Miriam’s group.
He turned back. Ran down the hill, back down the road that led to the farm. He ran for hours. Ran right into the brightening sky, the rising sun. Nothing stopped him. Not the pain in his legs. Not the bursting blisters on his feet. The knowledge of what he’d walked away from chewed at him, niggled at him.
He was going back.
Back to Miriam.
Back to her people.
He was going back to the farm.
Back to join them.
Back to...
He stopped. Stopped when he exited the woods. When he saw the hills leading down towards the farm, which was a few miles down the road.
The first thing he noticed was the smell.
Then the sounds.
The mass of buzzing flies.
The hundreds of dead footsteps.
His throat tightened up. He couldn’t think. Couldn’t comprehend what he was seeing.
Just that a mass of dead were swarming towards the farm.
The farm where Miriam and her group were staying.
The farm he’d walked away from.
Getting closer and closer by the second.
H
ayden kept
on sprinting when he saw the mass of zombies approaching the farm, approaching the cattle barn.
He wasn’t sure how many there were exactly. At least fifty. He couldn’t be sure where they’d come from. He definitely hadn’t encountered them on his walk away from the farm.
Didn’t really matter. All that mattered was they were here now.
They were here, and they were approaching the farm.
He had to get to Miriam and the group before the zombies did.
He had to warn them.
He had to help them.
He’d run so far, he couldn’t feel his legs anymore. His chest was tight, getting tighter by the second. He’d struggled with intermittent asthma as a kid. Told he had it, and then told he didn’t have it, then told he did have it all over again. He knew he could do with an inhaler right now. Something to ease his breathing. To loosen his chest.
No.
He didn’t have that luxury.
All he could do was focus.
All he could do was run.
He heard the moans of the infected getting louder the closer he got to the farm. At the current speed they were walking on the road to the left, he’d get there before them. Just.
But he couldn’t afford to slow down. Couldn’t afford to lower his pace.
He wasn’t sure he could hold this up much longer.
He kept his focus ahead. Kept it on the farm. On the cattle barns. He looked for movement. Looked for signs of life. A sign that Miriam and her group were still in there. That they were okay.
Or maybe it’d be better if they’d left. Maybe it’d be better if they’d gone.
His fist tightened around the axe.
No.
He wanted them to be there.
He wanted to help them.
He wanted to be a part of their group...
He saw the zombies drifting closer to the barn as he approached. A few of them turned. Looked at him across the field. Shit. They’d definitely keep moving to the farm now. He was leading them right fucking there. Just the help Miriam and her group needed. The final twist of the knife after turning his back on them.
No!
He could do this.
He could make it.
He could help...
When he entered the farmyard, he saw movement.
Inside the cattle barn.
And from the sluggish manner of movement, from the droning groans from the back of their throat, he knew exactly what kind of movement it was.
Zombie movement.
He lowered the axe. Crept towards the cattle barn entrance. Fuck. No. No. The dead couldn’t have made it here already. It explained why the horde of infected was drifting towards the cattle barn, though. Hayden didn’t know much about the nature of the dead, but they seemed to prefer working in groups. They were drawn together like ants. Like some kind of signal emitting from them, magnetising them.
Hayden heard the cries of the zombies in the distance. Smelled them getting closer to the cattle barn, closer to him.
But he kept his focus on the cattle barn itself.
On the footsteps drifting along the ground.
The low rumble emitting from the zombie’s throat.
He stepped around the cattle barn door. Looked inside.
He tried to keep him calm. Tried to keep his composure.
But when he saw the people lying dead on the cattle barn floor, he couldn’t.
Not when he saw Harold—the man who’d been in a bad way earlier—crouching over a young girl, chewing on her neck.
Not when he saw an old man’s intestines resting in his hands, a shocked look on his greying face.
Not when he saw the eight other zombies walking around the cattle barn.
Hayden’s chest tightened. He gripped the axe. Miriam’s group. They’d reached Miriam’s group, and they’d attacked them. They’d fucking attacked them.
He couldn’t let the thought go. Couldn’t just let it drop.
The people he’d walked away from.
More people he’d failed to protect.
Gone.
Hayden banged the axe against the metal door, the sound of the mass of zombies getting closer.
The zombies inside the barn lifted their heads. The coughing man moved away from the girl he was chewing, innards dangling down his chin.
He looked at Hayden with empty eyes.
All of them looked at Hayden with empty eyes.
Then, they walked towards him.
Hayden didn’t give them any time to act. Didn’t give them any chance to grab him.
He just swung the axe at the neck of the first zombie. A middle-aged guy with dark curly hair. One he recognised from the survivors.
Cracked his neck, put him down.
He swung the axe into the neck of a skinny ginger boy, too. He went down much easier. But it was always more difficult dealing with the younger zombies, from a moral standpoint.
The sound of that little snarl—that obvious child snarl—was enough to stop anyone with any level of empathy inside right in their tracks.
When the boy fell back onto the barn floor, still snarling despite his neck clinging on by a thread of bone, Hayden rammed the axe across his neck once again.
He took down the rest of the zombies. Took them down, one by one. And as he did, he saw Miriam. Saw her in his mind. Remembered what she’d said. About fighting for something. About keeping on going, doing everything they could, never giving up. Because that’s all there was now. That’s what made them human.
They fought for each other.
And he’d walked away.
He’d walked away and more people had died.
He’d fucking walked away thinking he was doing the right thing, and still, this happened.
He cracked the axe through Harold’s balding skull. Beat him repeatedly until his head was nothing more than a splatter of brain and bone on the barn floor. He kept on trying to drag himself up, trying to clutch at Hayden.
Hayden spat on him, rage building up inside. The zombies. The zombies had taken so much away from him. They’d taken everything away from him. They had to pay.
They all had to fucking pay.
He cracked the axe across the neck of the final zombie.
Then, when silence filled the cattle barn, he fell to his knees.
He crouched there, silent. Watched the blood drip down his shaking hands, cover the floor of the barn.
If only he’d made the decision to return sooner, maybe things would’ve been different. Maybe he could’ve helped. Or... fuck. At least he would’ve died fighting with them. At least he would’ve died for something.
At least he wouldn’t have died alone.
Like he was destined to.
Like he’d fucking chosen.
He squeezed his eyes shut. Smelled the zombies outside closing in on the barn, heard their footsteps getting closer.
If only he had the confidence.
If only he had the courage.
The courage to fight.
The courage he’d once had. But the courage that’d been taken away from him. Stripped away from him. Robbed.
He let all thoughts drift from his mind. Let himself forget everything, everyone, as the zombies’ footsteps started to fill the yard outside, as they approached the cattle barn doors.
And then he heard a click.
Felt something hard press into the back of his head.
“Drop that axe and stand up. Slowly.”
“
D
rop
the axe and stand up. Slowly.”
Hayden listened to the voice over his shoulder. He stared at the blood in front of him. The blood of the zombies he’d taken down. Refugees. Miriam’s group. Or rather,
former members
of Miriam’s group. Before the zombies attacked them. Before they turned.
From outside, he heard the zombies walking across the yard. They were so close. Whoever this group were—whoever it was holding a gun to his head—they were going to die in here too. “We—we need to get out or—”
“Like you got out last time?” a woman muttered. “Like you ran away?”
Hayden turned. The voice. He recognised the voice.
Behind him, behind the man holding a gun to his head, Hayden saw Miriam.
His heart fluttered. “You.”
“Yes, me.” She turned around. Swung the pipe against the neck of an oncoming zombie. Pushed it away. More zombies approaching, drifting in, escaping the falling rain. “You think you can just wander in and out of our company whenever you fancy it?”
“Miriam, I—”
The gun pressed further into the back of his head.
“What do you want?” Miriam asked. Two more zombies approached, flesh dangling off their withered bones.
“I… I want to join you. Join your group.”
Miriam smiled. She attacked the first of the zombies, another member of the group—an Asian guy called Prem—took down the other. “Which is why you ran away from us. Which is why Harold got bit.”
“I was afraid.”
“How many more times are you gonna be afraid?”
Hayden watched the rest of the group fight off the zombies. They couldn’t take them all on. And he wasn’t exactly safe, crouched here in the middle of the barn.
“I don’t know,” Hayden answered honestly. “But I want to give this a shot. I want to… to give it a try. I want to help you.”
Miriam backed away from the door. So too did more of her people. They watched as zombies crowded the entrance. No way out through that door now. No fucking chance.
“Do you want to help us? Really? Or do you just want to help yourself?”
Hayden wanted to tell Miriam all the things he’d done. All the lives he’d saved. Where he’d come from—a wimp. A fucking wimp with no purpose in life. To a fighter. To a leader.
He wanted to tell her how he’d got to where he was. And why he’d fallen.
But he couldn’t.
The man holding the gun to Hayden’s head lifted him up. Pushed Hayden towards the back of the barn.
“Everyone out through the back!” Miriam shouted.
They ran. Everyone ran as the zombies swarmed inside, momentarily distracted by the rotting cows. But not for long. Never for long. Not when there was movement.
Hayden reached the back of the barn. Saw some of the group climbing the wall at the back. Climbing towards an open window. He looked at the people around him. Old people. Children. The young and the fit might be able to make it up there, but the older folk were going to struggle.
He heard a crash. Heard flesh being torn by metal.
He looked around, saw four of the group fighting off the oncoming mass of dead. Miriam included.
All of them putting their lives on the line to protect the weak.
All of them stepping up.
Just like Hayden was supposed to.
He held out a hand to a short old woman with greying hair. “Take my hand. Let me help you up there.”
He eased the woman up onto a raised platform of hay. He wasn’t exactly the most muscular guy himself. But he had age and… well, moderate fitness on his side. That counted for something.
A shout from behind. One of the guys was surrounded. Swarmed by zombies. Hayden watched the undead wrap their hands around his throat, rip the flesh from his face, crush his skull.
Miriam and the others just kept on fighting.
Kept on holding the undead off.
Kept on doing what they had to do.
Hayden helped another person up. A little girl, no older than six. She was so skinny he could feel every bone in her body as he lifted her onto the hay.
She got up on top of it. She was the last one. Just Miriam and two others now. The two fighting. The two he should be over there helping.
He started to climb towards the window, ease himself outside.
And then he saw Miriam fall over.
Saw the zombies close in on her.
He let go of the window ledge instinctively. Ran over towards Miriam. He couldn’t control himself. Just had to get to her. Just had to save her.
He lifted the axe from where he’d dropped it earlier.
Pulled it back.
Swung it across the skull of the first of the dead, their gasps and moans filling the cattle barn.
And then he smacked another across the head.
“Take my hand!”
Miriam glanced up at him. He saw the look in her eyes. That puzzlement. That confusion. And that fear, too. The fear of trusting someone else. But above anything, that fear of trusting Hayden.
He hadn’t done anything to earn her trust.
Not until now.
She took his hand.
He pulled her up.
Dragged her out of the reach of more zombies.
Together, they ran towards the barn exit, towards the hay platform, towards the window.
When they’d climbed the hay, Hayden helping Miriam up, he heard a scream. A desperate scream, like a pig being slaughtered.
He looked back.
Saw the two men who’d been with Miriam on the ground.
Teeth ripping open their stomachs.
Undead feasting on their insides.
“Fuck,” Miriam said. “Fuck.”
Hayden watched the blood spray out of their bodies. He watched, and he knew he’d had a choice. He knew he could’ve tried to save them.
But Miriam was here.
She was alive.
He’d saved someone.
That was something.
That was a start—
He felt the hay give way.
Felt himself tumble away from the window.
The axe fall beside him.
Towards the oncoming undead below…