We shouldn’t take them all. No matter what Mother Gum says, she might need some. But… one or two. That would buy us the time we need.
Clare stumbled over the uneven floor as she moved towards the cases. She caught herself against the wall and chuckled. “Bit dark in here, huh?”
Henry’s lips twitched—in a smile or a grimace, Clare couldn’t tell. She took another step towards the shelf then hesitated. From her angle by the wall, she could see around a stack of crates. The wooden boxes, filled with what looked like rusted machinery, created a simple wall around the shed’s back corner. A gap had been left, wide enough for a person to walk through, and inside, an odd shape lay among more hay and sack clothes. It looked strangely like a human hand.
She tilted her head to the side. It was a human hand. The fingernails were starting to peel off as decay split the skin. A hollow. Dead, at least. One must have made it over the wall.
She took another step forward then stopped again. The fingernails were short. They had clearly been cut. The hollows had all either grown long fingernails or lost them since their transformation.
This is wrong. This is very, very wrong. Clare turned towards Henry. She barely had the chance to open her mouth.
Dorran hit her side. Clare’s world spun as he pulled her down and pinned her to the floor. Her nostrils were filled with the scent of hay, dust, and rotting flesh. She heard the smack of an axe hitting the wood above them, but it took a beat to recognise what it was. Dorran was already up. He grappled with Henry, gripping the axe’s handle, the weapon suspended over their heads.
Clare rolled onto her side. She felt dazed, as though the fall had knocked something loose in her mind. Everything seemed to be happening too fast. She couldn’t make sense of it.
Two more men were running towards them, crude weapons in their hands, their thin hair haloed by the light coming from the open shed door. Bloodless lips were pulled back from teeth as their earlier apathy vanished.
Dorran disengaged from Henry to dodge a pickaxe aimed for his knees. He leapt back, putting himself between the men and Clare.
Get up. Fight! Dorran needs you! Clare searched for a weapon—and found none. That part of the floor was bare except for hay, and the three men stood between her and the farming implements. Her brain was slow to give her an answer, but then she remembered the knife she had tucked into her jacket pocket.
One of the men was almost on top of them, a length of chain clenched in his fists, aiming for Dorran’s throat. Clare was close to his legs. She pulled out the knife, flicked the blade open, then stabbed it into the only place she could reach: his thigh. A spray of hot blood burst across her fingers.
Sickening horror latched on to Clare. In the moment, she had forgotten they were fighting real, living humans. The blood slicked her palm, and she lost her grip on the knife as the man staggered back, the blade still embedded. He released a choked, gurgling scream as he hit the blockade of crates, knocking them over and exposing the shed’s back corner.
Bodies had been heaped there. Men and woman of all ages were in different stages of decomposition. The temperatures had been cold enough to slow the rot, leaving grey skin to fester.
Limbs were tangled in unnatural angles. One head faced the ceiling, lips open in a sigh of surprise. Hazy eyes gazed at the rafters. Her throat had been cut, and the ragged line of flesh ran from under one ear to the other. Beside her, half draped across her, was a man’s body. His mouth was also open and held in place. A screwdriver protruded from between his teeth, stabbing up towards his brain.
These were never hollows. They were people. People who saw the sign for Mother Gum’s Nest and took a chance on visiting.
Clare’s balance was gone. A rushing noise filled her ears. She turned to look for Dorran. He was forced back, pinned against a barrel. He lifted his leg and slammed his foot into his attacker’s chest. A bone cracked. The man fell back, face contorted in pain. He coughed, and a dribble of blood ran over his lip.
“Clare.” Dorran was back at her side in a heartbeat, grabbing her shoulders. He pulled her up. She struggled to get her legs under herself, clinging to his jacket for balance. Henry dislodged his axe from the wall. The man with the knife in his thigh staggered closer.
Dorran pulled her towards the door. She ran with him, desperate to be out of the killing shed, away from the collection of bodies. A spit of rain hit her cheek as they made it outside. Dorran swung sharply, slamming the shed’s door behind them before catching Clare’s hand and leading her forward. Ahead was Mother Gum’s house, and just beyond that would be their bus.
All of the cars scattered about the compound… I think we just met their owners.
Tears burned Clare’s eyes as she dragged in ragged breaths. They skidded in the cold mud as they ran for their escape. As they came out near the house’s front, Clare saw Mother Gum waiting for them on the porch.
Her hair was gone. Instead of the soft downy white, her head was covered with roughly cut grey stubble. She held her old hair in one hand, the plait bundled up so that it wouldn’t drag on the ground. A wig. Without the softening hair, it was starkly obvious that the rosy cheeks were rouge, and the watery green eyes held a spark of severity.
She faced their bus, watching as her children unloaded the supplies—a routine she had undoubtedly watched many times before. A rumble grew in Dorran’s chest, escaping him as a furious snarl. Mother Gum swung towards them, her mouth puckering with anger and shock. She leapt back with unexpected agility, away from Dorran’s path. He wasn’t aiming for her, though. He was moving towards the four men and women carrying boxes out of the bus.
This time, the element of surprise was on their side. The two women scattered. One man dropped his burden and lifted his fists. The other hesitated, torn between running and fighting.
Dorran’s fist snapped past the first man’s defences, connecting with his jaw and dropping him to the ground. That made the second man’s choice for him. He turned and fled towards the hall.
“Drive,” Dorran barked. He forced metal into Clare’s hand. Then he ran past her, disappearing around the bus.
Chapter Seven
Clare stared down at her hand. Dorran had given her the bus’s keys. She was still caught in a fugue of shock, and it took a second to pair the keys with the word drive. Then she aimed for the bus’s open door and leapt aboard.
Mother Gum was yelling. The grandmotherly, warbling tone disappeared in a slew of profanity. She was giving instructions to her children. “Don’t let them leave. Slash the tyres.”
Clare struggled to get the key into the ignition. Adrenaline roared through her, but it felt muted, as though all of the noises and sensations were coming through a veil. She didn’t know where Dorran had gone, and it frightened her that he was no longer with her.
The engine clicked over and came to life. She put the bus into gear and leaned onto the accelerator, her motions coming more from muscle memory than conscious thought. Tyres dug through the mud as the bus rocked forward. Dorran was nowhere to be seen.
Where is he? I can’t go without him, I can’t leave him behind, not here. She leaned over the wheel, searching through the field of broken-down cars for signs of movement. People were coming towards her. The lanky, too-thin men and women of the compound carried machetes, their loose brown clothes billowing in the wind and spitting rain.