Coldbrook (Hammer)(158)

‘Chaney!’ Vic shouted.

‘Eyes and ears,’ Chaney said, and Vic closed his eyes and covered his ears. The sound of the gunshot was still deafening.

‘Our turn,’ Chaney shouted. ‘After you.’

Vic wasn’t going to argue. He stepped across the gap into the duct housing. The others were already descending the ladder, and he could just make out Holly’s head in the erratic torchlight.

Chaney came across, grunting when he had to bend almost double to get through the hatch.

‘We only lost one,’ Vic said.

‘One too many.’ Chaney turned and aimed his gun at the hatch. They could see through the length of the bus, across the compound to where the two trucks were now burning ferociously. And as they watched, figures lifted themselves into the bus through broken windows, scrambling towards the back.

‘There might still be guys outside,’ Vic said quietly.

‘Yeah.’ Chaney chewed his lip, his heavy beard moving back and forth. He blinked a few times, then turned and looked below them. They could hear the echoing sound of people descending, crying, and an occasional gasp as hands or feet slipped. A torch’s beam lit the upper part of the duct, but lower down Vic could see the flicker of flames. Drake’s people, Holly had said. He was glad she’d gone back down.

‘Chaney! Chaney!’ Shouting.

‘Jesus. That’s Hitch!’ Chaney said, recognising a friend’s voice.

‘On top of the bus! Me and a woman, don’t think there’s anyone else, don’t think there can be, there’re f*cking hundreds of them.’

‘Got ammo?’ Chaney shouted. He fired as a zombie leaped across from the bus, pumped the Remington, clicked on empty.

‘Some,’ Hitch said.

‘Then shoot your damn way in here!’ Chaney pulled Vic back from the open hatch.

Shooting. Vic heard cries of alarm from below as the explosions echoed down the metal duct. Then a woman dropped down from the bus’s roof, feet propped on the bus’s emergency window frame, and as she crouched and stepped across hands grabbed her legs and pulled. Her eyes went wide and she screamed, falling forward, her face striking the duct’s edge with a sickening crunch. She went slack and the zombies pulled her into the bus, and as they started biting Vic shouted, ‘Hitch, now!’

Hitch dropped down between the bus and the duct, then sprang up into the opening, a heavy pistol clasped in his left hand. Vic grabbed one arm and Chaney the other, and they hauled him inside. His jeans seemed to catch on something and they pulled harder. Then two zombies rose in front of the opening, holding on to his legs.

‘Gun?’ Vic said. He took Hitch’s gun and leaned over his back, shooting first one and then the other zombie in the face. He didn’t register who they might have been, not even their sex. They fell away and Hitch scrambled inside. It was then that Vic realised they had another problem.

He glanced down the five-feet-wide shaft. The nearest kid was maybe twenty feet down, with another twenty to go before they reached the first damper across the duct. Those lower down had already worked their way around that structure, descending the same way he’d ascended less than a week ago.

And the duct access cover was outside, buried beneath twenty bodies.

‘Go,’ Chaney said.

‘But—’

‘Go. Your family.’ He snatched the gun from Vic’s hand and pushed him, grasping his belt so that he didn’t tumble from the small platform.

‘No time to argue,’ Hitch panted. He smelled of fuel and sweat, and there was vomit and blood plastered across the front of his leather jacket. Unblessed indeed.

Vic knew that every moment counted. So he grabbed the ladder and started down. Hitch came after him, and for a few seconds Vic heard Chaney grunting and cursing. The weak daylight from above flickered. Vic looked up as he climbed down, and past Hitch he could see Chaney struggling on the small platform.

‘Chaney!’

‘Coming.’

‘Now.’

‘Yeah, yeah.’ More shots, and the light seemed weaker now. Killing them as they come in, Vic thought.

A child cried out and Vic looked down. He’d trodden on a kid’s fingers. ‘Go on. Quick!’ Three children huddled on the damper blocking the duct, one of them clasping an electric torch, waiting for their turn to worm through to the next part.

‘Shit!’ Chaney shouted above them. ‘Shit!’ The gun fired twice more before it ran out of ammunition. ‘Okay, coming down, better get your asses in gear.’