Autumn

itself back up onto its unsteady feet. Before it could get up he kicked it in the face and it dropped back down again.
    ‘We should have a look around,’ he said, anxiously looking from side to side. ‘There’s bound to be more of them in here.’
    He was right. The deafening crash of the van as it ploughed through the glass doors had attracted the unwelcome attentions of a further five ragged cadavers which had been trapped inside the building. The clumsy remains of four shop staff and one delivery driver slowly advanced towards the three survivors. The battered body on the floor reached out a bony hand and grabbed hold of Michael’s leg. He shook it free and kicked the creature in the head again.
    ‘Fuck this,’ he spat. ‘We’ve got to shift them.’
    He looked around again and spied a set of double doors behind a bakery display piled high with stale, mouldy bread. Without saying anything else he took hold of the body at his feet by its shoulders and dragged it across the floor. He kicked open the doors and threw the remains of the man into a room filled with cold, lifeless ovens. Making his way back towards Emma and Carl, he caught hold of the next closest corpse (a check-out operator) and disposed of it in exactly the same way.
    ‘Carl,’ he yelled as he made his way towards the third creature. ‘Grab hold of another one, will you? If you’re quick they don’t have time to react.’
    Carl took a deep breath and grabbed hold of the nearest corpse in a tight headlock. With its thrashing limbs carving desperate, uncoordinated arcs through the stagnant air he hauled it over to the bakery and pushed it through the double doors. It collided with the body of the dead check-out operator which, a fraction of a second earlier, had managed to lift itself back up onto its feet.
    Sensing that quick action was needed, Emma ran over towards the others and shoved through the doors the remains of an elderly cleaner who, unbeknownst to Carl, had been staggering dangerously near. She dropped her shoulder and charged at the pitiful figure. The unexpected force of the impact sent the shuffling carcass (which had all the weight and resistance of a limp rag-doll) flying into the bakery.
    In less than three minutes the survivors had cleared the main area of corpses. Once the last one had been safely pushed through the double-doors Michael wheeled a line of twenty or so shopping trolleys in front to prevent them from pushing their way out.
    ‘Let’s get a move on,’ he said breathlessly as he wiped his dirty hands on the back of his jeans. He stood up straight and rested his hands on his hips. ‘Just get whatever you can. Load it into boxes and pile it up by the van.’
    In silence they began to work.

    As Michael packed tins of beans, soup and spaghetti into cardboard boxes he nervously looked around. The cold, emotionless faces of the bodies in the bakery stared back at him through small square safety-glass windows in the doors. They were still moving continually. They were clamouring to get out but didn’t have the strength to force themselves free. Were they watching him? Had they not acted quickly in locking the bastard things away, would they have attacked them in the same way that the lone body in the field had attacked him earlier?
    ‘Jesus Christ,’ Carl said suddenly.
    He was standing at the opposite end of the building to Michael and Emma, close to where the van had smashed through the entrance doors. His voice echoed eerily around the vast and cavernous room.
    ‘What is it?’ Emma asked, immediately concerned.
    ‘You don’t want to know what’s going on outside,’ he replied ominously.
    Emma and Michael looked at each other for a fraction of a second before dropping what they were doing and running over to where Carl was standing.
    ‘Shit,’ Michael hissed as he approached. Even from a distance he could see what had happened.
    Carl had been about to start loading the boxes into the back of the van when he’d noticed a vast crowd of diseased and rotting bodies outside. Their cold, dead faces were pressed hard against the windscreen and every other exposed area of glass. More of the creatures tried unsuccessfully to force their way through the slight gap between the sides of the van and the buckled remains of the supermarket doors.
    Emma stared through the van at the mass of grotesque faces which stared back at her with dark, vacant eyes.
    ‘How did they...?’ she began. ‘Why are there so many