The Dust: Book Two - Pursuit Read online

  ‘No you don’t .’ Jake said and sliced both hands clean off and the boat started to drift slowly once more.

  The vessel now reappeared on the other side of the bridge and Jake looked up. A naked women crashed into the river just a foot from his boat and then more flames fell from above as more bits of bridge were being set alight and turfed over the edge by the crazed infected.

  Jake sliced his blade from side to side as he thought he could see another body in the water ahead. The sea was red with blood and arms and legs were bobbing up and down on the surface. Jake looked ahead and could now see the Welsh shore but it wasn’t coming fast enough.

  Suddenly the boat crashed upwards and Jake fell back losing his sword over board. He rolled around in the now deeper puddle in the bottom of the boat and quickly realised another body was also in there with him.

  It was a naked teenage girl. She had one bloodshot eye and the other was just a black socket. She screamed spraying blood in his direction and then lunged at him, her long fingernails raking the air close to Jake’s face.

  The boat rocked violently from side to side as he grappled with the girl. He needed to get to his bag to get the pistol but the youngster was showing super human strength and pinning him down trying to shove his face into the water in the bottom of the boat. He brought his knee up and caught her in the buttocks and she fell forward letting go of Jake’s arms. He managed to roll away and kick her in the ribs as tried to turn around. She was now hissing and wailing and Jake kicked her again hard and he could hear a crack.

  Just as he was going to finish her off she grabbed his ankle and brought him crashing down. The teenager was now moving a bit slower but still managed to seize Jake by the throat as she went to bite his neck. Jake slammed his head into her nose and he could feel it give way under his forehead. The girl cried out but showed no signs of giving up.

  Jake managed a fleeting glimpse at the shore and it was getting nearer plus he could see a mudflat to his right. He had enough of this fight and just as the young girl was going to strike again he tipped the boat up. The next thing he knew was freezing cold water seeping through his clothes and hitting his skin, it took his breath away.

  He searched for his bag, he knew it would float and he could make out a dark lump on the surface so he made a grab for it.

  That was a mistake, it was the teenage girls head and she yelled at him spraying blood in his face. Jake used all his strength and pushed the head under water. He could feel the girl’s arms and legs kicking out trying to find his hands but Jake wouldn’t let go and kept on pressing. Suddenly the kicking stopped and he could feel the pressure ease off as the young girls lungs filled with salty sea water.

  He eventually let the teenager go and she slipped away with the tide, he now needed to find his bag.

  Searching in the gloom was tricky and the tide kept pulling him away from the upturned boat that was now stuck on the mudflat. With all his strength Jake swam up and close to the boat until his feet could touch the silty mud. There lying next to it was his bag, cord pulled tight to stop the water from getting in.

  Pulling each foot from the mud was arduous work as the squelched into the next suction pocket. He could see the beach on the Welsh side but walking it would take forever, over to his left the water was shallow but deep enough to swim. As he pulled his way towards the river he could see the first Severn crossing was now a twisting under the heat of the flames. Then with a huge twang the thick steel ropes gave way slicing through the smoke filled air cutting anything in its way. The bridge fell sideways and burning bodies fell from it in their hundreds, Jake was mesmerised by the sight of such a huge structure collapsing.

  The splash was titanic as the bridge crashed to the sea bed. Flames lit up the sky and smoke and steam rose from the murky depths. It was an apocalyptic scene that held everyone naked or clothed at its mercy. Jake regained some control and realised what would be coming next. There was no way something that immense could hit the water without sending through a massive wave.

  He had to move fast or he would be swept out to sea along with a thousand charred bodies in a whirlpool of red. Jake leapt into the water his head submerging and his cheeks feeling the cold of the estuary. He swam like Tarzan. Ignoring the pain he had endured in his battle with the teenage girl and the added weight of his clothes he pushed his arms into the water kicking his legs to propel him. As he neared the shore he could feel the swell of the river as the water was starting to push with the tide. He felt as though he swimming at an Olympic rate as the surge got faster, then his hand caught the hard pebbled bed. He touched his feet down and they crunched onto the stones. Stumbling out of the water his bag in one hand and the sea water draining from his clothes he fell to his knees when he reached the shale. Jake wanted to stay there, he wanted to rest but he knew had to get further in shore. Looking behind him as he stood Jake could see the water crashing down entangled with lumps of masonry and concrete. He pushed himself up and ran up the beach and onto the grass, the water chasing him down with every step.

  He made it, he pulled himself up the bank as the water slammed into the sand creating a huge wave to shoot up into the air and rain down on Jake as he rolled across the ground to safety.

  A few minutes later he crouched down by the side of the sand bank and watched as the bodies floated past. There were so many of them he lost count such a waste of life. The farm animals too, hundreds of them, Jake turned away. Only the thought of Amber and his parents gave him the strength to carry on. He prayed that Angel and the others would have been out of harm’s way also. Even the thought of Angel made his heart heavy, he wanted them all together. His Mother, Father, Amber and Angel and of course Lou Pepper, he wanted them all by his side.

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Blood Beach

  ‘Where, where have they gone?’ Lonny Gold slammed his fist down onto the steering wheel

  ‘That way boss.’ Archie pointed to the road leading off to the left just before the second Severn crossing.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Gold’s eyes were all over the road looking for his old truck.

  ‘Yes.’ Replied Harry James. ‘It went that way.’

  Gold swung the truck left but all eyes were on the bridge. ‘Look at that.’ Naked men were falling from the top of the A frames one at a time as if they were bungee jumping without the elasticated rope.

  ‘Why are they doing that?’ Harry James had his face pressed up against the glass.

  ‘Because they are fucking mental.’ Laughed Archie.

  Gold shook his head, he loved Archie, he had such a simplistic look on this whole shitty situation. If he had brains he would be dangerous.

  ‘Look at that!’ Harry James shouted pointing at a group of younger boys and girls setting fire to a horse.

  ‘The quicker we get past this bridge the better.’ Lonny Gold pressed down on the gas.

  ‘Fuck!’ Archie and Harry James called out in unison.

  ‘What, what.’ Gold was looking around still trying to keep the lorry on the road.

  ‘The other bridge, the smaller one.’ Harry stopped talking but kept pointing.

  ‘What?’ Gold couldn’t see.

  ‘It’s fallen into the sea.’ Archie replied mouth wide open

  ‘Are you sure?’ Gold looked in his side mirrors for confirmation.

  ‘It’s gone.’ Harry James was now hanging out the passenger window,

  ‘The whole world is falling apart boys but we are still here.’ Gold could now see the smoke and dust rising into the air. ‘The phoenix will rise from the ashes.’

  ‘Maybe a firefly this time.’ Archie patted the dashboard where Freddie had placed a sticker of the insect he had named himself after.

  Gold laughed. ‘Yes Archibald, like a Firefly. This lorry is the Firefly.’

  ‘Boss, boss!’ Harry James shouted. ‘Over there.’ He pointed to a small villager over top the right. ‘I can see the top of the truck.’

  Gold could see it too;
they were so close now he could smell Angel and the little girl. ‘I’m nearly there boys. Soon I will reclaim all that is mine.’

  ‘The truck.’ Harry James added. ‘I hate this stinking lorry Firefly or not.’

  ‘And the girl, Hannah.’ Archie smiled to himself.

  ‘Your prize Archie my lad.’ Gold prodded Archie’s arm. ‘Your fucking prize and you can do with her whatever you want. I promised you that and I always keep my promises.’ He slowed the truck down as he neared the village.

  ‘Look a sign.’ Harry James couldn’t make it out.

  The lorry got a little closer and the sign came into focus. ‘The Beach.’ Gold said nodding slowly. ‘Let’s have an evening on the beach my boys, you bring the cans and I’ll get the birds.’ He grinned to himself and brought the large vehicle to a halt.

  ***

  ‘This looks as good a place as any.’ Yanto said quietly as they parked the truck up. The mood was downbeat after just witnessing the demise of the first Severn Bridge.

  Angel was trying to hold back the tears; she had no way of knowing if Jake was safe. No one could have survived that wave if they had been in the water. She prayed to God that her boyfriend was okay and she didn’t even really believe in God. How could there be one after all this?

  ‘I’m sure he’s fine.’ Iris O'Neil rubbed Angel’s arm.

  ‘Are you and Jake now going out with each other?’ Lou Pepper asked.

  Angel smiled, the innocence of youth. ‘Yes honey, we are.’

  The six of them got out of the truck and walked down the small cobbled path that led to the beach. The wave that had passed through from the bridge collapse was subsiding and the carnage left in the wake was there for everyone to see.

  Twisted metal and lumps of concrete were strewn across the pebbled shore, bodies were everywhere. The most shocking thing of all was the sand and the silt was awash with the blood of the dead. The evening sun bounced off the loose stone and shingle and it sparkled the deep red colour of infected blood.

  Iris immediately shielded Alice’s eyes. ‘This is no place for children.’

  ‘I agree.’ Angel pulled Lou to her side to stop her staring at the many dead bodies.

  ‘We will find another place.’ Yanto turned to the two women. ‘There is no way Jake could get across here anyhow, not with all the debris.’

  ‘Look, down there, by the water.’ Hannah had wandered a few paced further and could now see figures moving on the shore.

  ‘What’s that?’ Iris couldn’t make it out.

  ‘We need to leave, now!’ Yanto suddenly realised what it was.

  ‘I can see shadows but nothing else.’ Angel shielded her eyes from the low spring sun but it was still too bright for her to make anything out.

  Yanto ran a few paced to grab Hannah. ‘We must leave.’

  Hannah turned to him. ‘There must be sixty, seventy of them.’ The fear was burnt into eyes.

  ‘Turn around.’ Yanto motioned to the others and started to run towards them.

  Angel moved slightly to the right and the shadows lifted. She wished she hadn’t moved when she was confronted with a baying mob of cannibalistic naked maniacs. Without speaking she grabbed Lou’s hand and turned.

  ‘Look Angel. It’s the nasty man.’ Lou Peppers words went unheard as the group retreated to where they had come from.

  ‘Oh my God fathers!’ They all heard Iris O'Neil’s voice as she clapped eyes on Lonny Gold and his two flunkies stood at the top of the cobbled path.

  ‘The nasty man Angel, I did tell you.’ Lou tugged at Angel’s sleeve.

  Yanto guessed who it was. He looked at Angel and her colour had drained from her skin. ‘Do you want to confront him?’

  The decision was taken out of his hands when Iris and Hannah had turned with Alice and made their way back down the beach.

  ‘Jesus Christ.’ Yanto pulled Angel and Lou back in the same direction. He fancied his chances against Gold and the two young lads but whatever he had done to those women had a lasting effect as they ran like the wind at the first sight of him towards certain death. He withdrew his sword. ‘Take the girls up there.’ He pointed to some larger rocks at the back of the beach.

  ‘I will return with my bow.’ Angel led the others away glad she had decided to bring her trusted weapon.

  Before Yanto could turn and fight the smaller group the ‘Infected’ were upon him. Now with two swords in full swing he sliced and chopped his way across the shingle killing and maiming as he went.

  From behind him he could hear gunshots and he had could see Iris O'Neil shooting from the safety of the rocks with Hannah’s handgun. Before he knew it Angel was standing by his side.

  She let off a volley of five arrows and they ripped through the paper thin skin of the infected taking seven out in one swoop.

  ‘We must defend the rocks!’ She shouted.

  ‘Understood!’ Yanto yelled back as he hacked at a middle aged woman who was running at him with a dismembered arm.

  More gunshots rang out and Angel could see Gold and his boys now in direct conflict with the ‘Infected’.

  Archie was blasting away at anything that moved and Lonny Gold was stood like an officer of the Empire his service revolver outstretched picking off easy prey.

  ‘We need to get back!’ Harry James called out with only a wooden log in his hands to defend himself.

  ‘We are going nowhere.’ Gold shouted back blasting another body back towards the sea. ‘Find those bitches and bring them back to me, alive!’

  Archie was loving every minute, he swung his shotgun now like a club skulls crushing on impact with the heavy stock. ‘This way boss.’ He moved slowly to the rocks.

  Angel aimed an arrow and fired it towards Gold and his party, it took out a naked pensioner stood only a foot away from Archie. The blood sprayed everywhere and got into Archie’s eyes. ‘I can’t see!’ He screamed.

  Gold came to his aid and just as he about to get pounced on by an athletic looking man Gold used his last bullet and shot him point blank in the face tearing it clean off.

  ‘It’s no use.’ Harry yelled. ‘Too many of them.’ He felled another body with his log as they got too close.

  ‘Stand your ground.’ Gold called back as he pistol whipped a naked woman to the ground.

  Before Harry James could reply he felt a sharp blow to the back of the head and he fell to the ground.

  ‘There’s the bastard.’ One of the women from the lorry holding a bloodied stone pointed at Gold.

  ‘Let’s kill him.’ A voice from behind her cried out.

  Sarah and Naomi Hardcastle were also in the group that had broken free but she was looking for her fiend Iris.

  ‘Mum, over there.’ Naomi could see the Irish woman shooting a gun from further up the beach.

  Sarah Hardcastle looked at her friend standing on the pebbles firing shots at the ‘Infected’. She had been so brave that morning when she and Hannah had taken Alice and the truck. Now look at her, defending her friends to the death. Sarah looked over at the boy who had raped her, a boy that’s all he was. The sick feeling in pit of her stomach was still there, she knew it would never leave. Maybe it was her time to stand strong.

  Yanto fell to one knee and slice the ankles of the large woman who had caught him on the side of the head with a rock she had thrown. The woman crashed to the ground screaming in agony.

  ‘It’s no use, we will be overrun very soon.’

  Angel released her last arrow. ‘We need more guns!’ She looked over at the young lad fighting with Lonny Gold. He was wielding an impressive shotgun.

  ‘You will never make it.’ Yanto shouted.

  ‘It’s our only chance.’

  Yanto knew she was right, they needed fire power. The only way he could get Angel to the boy was to lead the ‘Infected’ away from her. With two mighty rakes of the sword slashing an old crone standing only inches away from them he growled at the top of his voice and ran away from Angel.

&
nbsp; At first she wondered what her friend was doing but she could see it happening. With all the noise he was making the majority of the attacking bodies followed him. She looked behind her and Iris was watching her giving out covering fire.

  Holding a small dagger Angel ran towards Gold and the others who were preoccupied with their own battle to notice her advancing.

  Sarah Hardcastle too honed in on the young lad who was still swinging his shotgun like a club dislocating jaws left right and centre. Naomi Hardcastle could see the vengeance in her mother’s eyes and she could also see the direction she was heading.

  ‘Mum!’ She yelled. ‘Stay with me, he’s not worth it.’

  Unfortunately Lonny Gold could hear the girl screaming over the roar of the battle and clocked Sarah Hardcastle moving towards his right hand lad. ‘Archie, incoming!’ He yelled but the boy was too busy enjoying himself bludgeoning skulls.

  Gold smashed the teeth of a naked man standing in his way and barged past another. He intercepted Sarah Hardcastle as she ducked and dived through the many naked grappling hands and arms.

  ‘No you don’t.’ He huffed as he knocked her to the ground; he then punched her in the gut.

  Angel could see all this as she kicked and stabbed her way towards Archie and the shotgun.

  ‘Look out!’ she screamed but it was too late Gold had toppled Sarah over. Angel got to a few feet of Archie when she was knocked to the floor by a fat naked Spaniard. Stabbing at his blubber it didn’t seem to stop him as he held his chubby hands around her neck.

  Lonny Gold grabbed Sarah Hardcastle by the hair and slammed her head back down onto a sharp rock and her skull cracked like an egg.

  ‘Noooooo!’ Naomi ran through the mob and tried to jump onto the back of Lonny Gold but Archie who had now changed positions saw her advancing. He dived and knocked her off balance but in doing so he dropped his shotgun. Falling to the ground he jarred his knee and found himself lying on the shingle in agony.

  A thin woman of about thirty pounced on him and tried to scratch out his eyes but he just managed to hold her wrists and stop her. She hissed and howled and then pressed down again and Archie could feel his arms giving way. Then she disappeared, she had vanished and Archie couldn’t work out what was happening. As he looked over to see the woman dead on the floor next to him he noticed Naomi Hardcastle standing over him holding the shotgun, she had saved him.