New Z Land 2 - The Davies Debut

So here's an update for New Z Land, introducing my favourite character, Davies.

The skinhead shrugged and spat on the floor, “Small talk. Conversation. Guess it’s wasted on you military types...”

Wren rolled his neck. It popped twice.

“Fine, what’s your name then, soldier boy?”

“Wren...”

“Like the bird? Like a bloody Sparrow?”

Wren smirked and shrugged, “Yeah, like a Sparrow. What about you?”

The thug sat upright, his chest puffing out like a toad’s. Wren could see the muscle fibres underneath the thug’s vest tense up. He assumed the skinhead had had some augmetic work done to enhance them.

“You can call me Tanner.”

“Is that your real name, Tanner?”

“What’s it matter?”

Wren shrugged, “The way I figure it, if we’re going to be fighting for our lives on some God-forsaken island prison, I want to at least know the names of the people who might save my life, or whose I might have to end...”

Tanner grinned. He was missing three teeth, “Like I said, you can call me Tanner.”

The man sat next to Wren gave a snort and adjusted his thin rimmed spectacles before folding his slender arms across his chest.

“Oh, and what’s so funny, Four-eyes?” Tanner glanced and noticed the man’s dog tags, the same as Wren’s, “You two Squaddies or something?”

The thin, spectacled man said nothing; he didn’t so much as even raise an eyebrow to Tanner’s inquiry. Wren simply chuckled.

“Oh what’s so funny then, little Sparrow?”

Wren stretched his arms behind his head, feeling the clasps of his cuffs dig into the base of his skull. It gave him a sense of cold reassurance of his fate, “Davies won’t answer you.”

“Why? He mute or something?”

Wren looked to Davies. He looked back with an arched, inquisitive eyebrow and an air of confidence before closing his eyes and turning to face the floor once more.

“No. He’s not mute. He just has a rule; he won’t talk to people he thinks he can kill...” Wren turned again, “Isn’t that right Davies?”

Davies remained silent.

Wren chuckled and looked back to Tanner, “Y’see, the thing with Davies is, he bloody thinks he can kill every sod he’s ever met... Truth is, I bloody believe him too.”

So there you go. My resident silent badass, Davies.

Enjoy!

Craiggy.

New Z Land.

So, I've had this idea for a story for quite some time now and I thought I'd finally put it into words. The whole concept I was going for is a sort of Battle Royale (Or Hunger Games, if you'd prefer) come Running Man come Zombie survival story. There are still some logistical issues to work out with some of the number details, but aside from that, I'm quite happy with how this has turned out.

The air was filled with the stench of smouldering, rotten flesh and the sound of gunfire and cannon shots. Wren watched as hordes of Infected ran as best as they could to escape their fate. Some followed blind instinct; some retained the most remote amount of intellect from before their infection. All fell before the bullets and flames of the Purifiers’ weapons. That’s what they’d come to be known as, Purifiers; a select regiment of highly trained military specialists whose job was to prevent further spread of the infection and contain the outbreak as best as they could. It was thankless work. It was horrifying work...

The infection began in Switzerland as an attempt to create a super treatment that promoted heightened cellular regeneration. Reports show that during testing, all results on the animal subjects exceeded prior expectations and human trials began almost immediately. This was where the complications set in and the infection was born. Something about the treatment affected the human brain differently to that of the animal subjects in that it corrupted the neural electrical impulses to the point where only rudimentary motor skills and instinctual needs remained. In the majority of the human subjects, all shreds of personality and individual thought processes ceased to be and the subject became autonomous, and violent. The treatment mutated, becoming the infection; though fortunately it could only be transmitted through the mixing of bodily fluids such as saliva or blood. Unfortunately, however, the increased base instincts left the infected with an insatiable hunger for flesh - animal or otherwise - and as such, their primary function became to feed, and therefore bite, thus spreading the infection even further. One final downside to the infection is its initial nature as a regenerative treatment. Once infected, a human victim would heal any but the most severe of wounds and the infection would take over their neural process, leaving them in the same autonomous state, and also due to the cellular restructuring imposed by the infection, their muscle tissue generates at a higher rate, leaving the Infected stronger than the average human being.

The result was catastrophic; entire towns and cities became infected and national militaries did their best to contain the madness and bloodshed, but it was already too late from the moment the infection was released. That was when the Purifiers were formed.

Wren sighed as he raised his rifle and fired three successive shots, stopping three Infected that were approaching him. He removed his helmet and ran a hand through his sun-bleached, pale brown hair, lank with the sweat from being confined underneath his full, visored helmet. It was hot work; hot, thankless work...

That was four years ago. It had been four years since the beginning of what became known as the Purification War; four years since Nathan Wrenigan did his part to make the world a safer place, and only a year since his arrest and court marshal; only four months since his sentencing and allocation to the Island.

The Island, formerly the country of New Zealand, was the final result of the Purification War. Essentially a compound for those Infected who were captured and studied. The entire country was surrounded by walls one hundred and fifty metres tall and reinforced with Inconel 625, the same alloy used for fastenings on spacecraft and one of the strongest alloys known to man. Within these walls was a fully staffed military installation that maintained the security of the Island. It was unknown just how many Infected there were on the Island, because each year, every country (of those that remained after the Purification War) elected and transferred five of their most dangerous prisoners to the Island where they then fought to survive in a glorious, televised battle of skill, wits and determination;  and, should they make it to a specified extraction point at the end of their allotted time period, they would be rewarded with a full pardon of their crimes and allowed the rehabilitative therapy required to integrate them back into society. The catch was that there had never been any survivors.

***

Smoke obscured Wren’s vision. He took the brief moment of respite to change his ammunition clip, locking in a full one and placing the few spare bullets from the old clip into a belt pouch. He checked his watch and gestured to his squad to move in on the target, a small Vietnamese village reported to have shown the starting signs of infection. With the deft efficiency that had been drilled into them daily as recruits and then perfected upon transfer to the Purifiers, Wren and his unit moved in. Six minutes and twenty eight seconds it took them to quiet what little resistance they met from the villagers. Six minutes and forty three seconds for Wren to realise that something wasn’t quite right. Seven minutes and eighteen seconds for him to finish checking one of the corpses; there was no sign of infection. It took a further three minutes and twelve seconds for Wren to break into a boarded up hut and find a single child, no older than nine, chained up and foaming at the mouth, their eyes bloodshot and full of hunger and rage. Fifteen seconds later, that child had a hole in its head as Wren looked down the length of his smoking pistol. In total, it took ten minutes and forty five seconds for Wren to realise there had been a huge mistake. It took ten more seconds for him to wake up, his eyes jolting open. He looked around him, at the other people nearby, and at his hands and feet, manacled together and tethered to the bench he was sat upon. A dream, a memory, a vision that would haunt him until his dying day; which, now that he was on his way to the Island, might not be too far in the distance.

“Oi, soldier boy!” Came a gruff call from across the seating compartment of their transport helicopter. Wren tilted his head and gave a weary glance to the source of this disturbance, a bulky, muscular man with the classic shaved head and piercing eyes attributed to thugs and brutes.

“I’m talking to you, pretty boy!” Wren had never been referred to as pretty in his life. He had what some might call an ‘awkwardly handsome’ face, with a slightly crooked nose from one too many breaks and a scar that cut through his left eyebrow from a stray bullet that accompanied the one on the tip of his chin from a knife fight in Bangkok, but with green eyes that absorbed every scrap of information around them. He glanced down; his frame was lean and well built, muscular, but through hard work and training rather than exercise for showing off; a working body, not a display model.

Wren glanced back to the skinhead and sighed,

“Me?”

“Yeah, you. You’re one of us Brit lot, right? Where’re you from?”

The thug’s accent clearly gave him away as being from somewhere around the greater London area. Wren shook he head and toyed with his dog tags, his entire sense of being summed up on two tiny pieces of metal.

“I asked you a question!”

“What does it matter? We’re both ending up in the same place...”

So there we go. Please, let me know what you think as I really want some feedback on this project.

Much love,

Craiggy.

Not your average 9 to 5.

So, it's been a while since I posted anything, and that's mainly down to the fact that A: my hard drive's still out of action, and B: I've not really had much time to myself recently since starting my new job, but I have had a few ideas here and there. These ideas have been a bit random to say the least, coming in the form of objects or phrases rather than plothooks or storylines, and just fitting a story around said thoughts. The following is one of those thoughts, the opening speach was stuck in my head for days and so I had to figure something out around it. Here's hoping something more will develop.

“Coffee, black, and sweet. And a woman, black. I don’t care if she’s sweet.”

Horatio cocked a brow and smirked at the attending waiter before waving him away. He turned his gaze to the man sat across from him. Samuel gave a tut as his eyes moved around the room, observing the numerous dancers in various states of undress and the groups of unwashed, uncivilised, leering men drooling over them as they writhed around poles, chairs, or even each other.

“What’s the matter, never seen a place like this before?” Horatio asked,

“No, I’ve seen enough. It’s the clientele that disgust me.” Samuel adjusted his tie and rested his clasped hands upon the table, “Why did you call me here?”

“Business, of course.”

“I understand that. What I meant was, why here of all places?”

A corseted woman, braided hair hanging down to her shoulders and swaying in time with her hips as she walked, made her way to their table and set down a large cup of coffee before moving to sit on Horatio’s lap and nuzzling his neck. He smiled and ran a hand over her ebony skin before taking a long look over her, “Why? Isn’t it obvious? I’m hungry!”

Without another word, he moved his lips to her own neck and licked it gently before grinning and glancing to Samuel. Horatio’s canines extended and sunk into the soft flesh of the woman, dark blood trickling from the two wounds. The woman gasped, but soon shifted from shock to pleasure as the sensation fully washed over her. Samuel had seen Horatio feed before, and it still unsettled him.

“Fine. What job is it this ti-“

Horatio raised a hand to silence Samuel whilst he finished his ‘meal’, “All in good time lad.” He licked the woman’s neck once more, sealing the two small puncture wounds. The woman stood and Horatio placed a fifty pound note into her stocking, slapping her rear as she left. He chuckled and glanced back to Samuel, “I love dining out, there’s always such a fine selection of exotic cuisine. I had a Chinese the other night that-“

“Enough! The job. What is it?” Samuel heaved a sigh and ran a hand through his chestnut hair, neatening it behind his ears before adjusting his tie once more.

“Alright, relax lad, I’m just having some fun.” He set a briefcase on the table and slid it over to Samuel. Opening it, he found files on several individuals. Samuel looked up at Horatio, an eyebrow raised inquisitively,

“This is more than usual.”

“And your pay will be more than usual too, don’t worry.”

“Did you have a deadline in mind?”

“Before Christmas would be nice, saves me buying extra cards.”

“Geez, I’d hate to see your naughty list then.” Samuel closed the briefcase and stood, taking it with him. He gave Horatio a respectful nod and fastened the buttons on his suit jacket, “Usual protocol, half up front. I’ll contact you when it’s finished.”

“That’s why I like you Sammy, you get results. You don’t ask questions. You’re open minded.”

“I’m running hit jobs for a vampire, I have to be...” he turned and left, glad to have the pounding bass and the panting masses of hound-like men behind him. Horatio was a dick, a lousy bloodsucking dick, but he paid well, and that was all that mattered to Samuel.

He walked down the crowded street and looked up and the sky. It was a cloudy night, with not a star to be seen, and just the faintest hint of the moon from behind its vaporous cloak. There was a chill on the air that was very uncharacteristic of July, but then, Samuel mused, this was Birmingham. He found himself an empty bus stop and sat down, glancing into the briefcase once more; six files, six targets. Knowing Horatio, they probably weren’t all Creepers either. He chuckled to himself. Samuel had coined that term when he first branched into this line of work, ‘Creeper’, as in something not natural, or likely to be considered creepy. It was a coverall phrase for every supernatural bug, beasty and bewilderment that he’d come across, all of the nasties from folklore and media; vampires, werewolves, ghosts, goblins, you name it, Samuel had probably met one.

He was what they referred to as an Oddman, a Fixer of sorts; he was a guy who got things done for those who would much prefer to stay out of the mortal eye. An errand boy for the creatures told about to children to give them nightmares. He still hadn’t figured out how to describe it on his C.V.

So there we have it, more from Samuel soon I hope. I already have a lot of ideas bubbling around about where I want to take him etc.

Enjoy!

Peace out and much love,

Craiggy.

Over a Coffee...

This is an entry I'm submitting for an upcoming writing competition. It's for love stories, but I don't really do traditional love stories, so here's my spin on one. Hope you enjoy!

There wasn’t a drop of rain that day, which always made Josh feel better. In fact, he thought to himself that he couldn’t actually remember when it had last rained, which felt odd considering that it was the end of August, breaking into September. The sun made it easier; Josh could happily sit with his book and read, keeping an eye on his favourite coffee shop across the street from the bench he frequented. He wasn’t so keen on the rain, because it meant he would have to sit inside, and then there was a high likelihood that he would be served by ‘her’.

Now, there wasn’t a real issue with being served by her, Josh mused. In fact, it felt delightful, to be so close to her and being able to talk to her without any form of pretence other than genuinely wanting a cup of coffee and somewhere dry to read his book. That was the closest that Josh ever came to actually holding a conversation with her, with Harry... He knew that she liked to be called that, that she thought Harriet was an old fashioned name and made her sound like an old lady, and not the twenty three year old philosophy graduate that she was. Josh knew a lot about Harry, from bits of conversations that he’d overheard on rainy days, or from bits that he’d found out when he’d managed to garble out more than just a drinks order in the past. One thing he definitely knew about Harry, was that he loved her. From her reddish brown hair to her pale blue eyes, from her slight overbite to the tiny scar on the back of her left hand, Josh knew that he loved her.

Josh had never been one to express his feelings. When he was a child, his mother used to be amused by the fact that, should he ever fall over and scrape his knee, rather than cry and bawl, he’d simply sit up and look at the graze with mild interest before wiping it off and carrying on with whatever he was doing. The truth was, Josh was scared. Not a lot scared him in life, but the thought of telling Harry how he felt rattled his nerves more than any scary film or rollercoaster ever could. That was how he knew this was love. He’d had feelings for girls in the past, at college and at university, and he’s struggled to talk to them, but eventually he found the courage. With Harry though, the thought of her rejection was just too much for Josh’s mind to process; so there he sat, on that bench, every lunch break he got. He sat there, and he waited, and he watched her, hoping to finally get the courage to say something.

***

“Harry, that guy’s outside again. Want me to move him on?” The cafe manager asked as he cleared a table. He looked at Harry and she shrugged, “No, its fine. He usually leaves after a while, and besides, I think it’s kind of cute.” Harry finished making a table’s order for them and then watched as Josh stood from the bench and left, right on time, without so much as a glance at the cafe. She sighed; sure, she understood how people could see it as creepy, to have a guy sit outside the coffee shop nearly every day. She could even see why people had started to label him as a stalker, but she ignored it. She knew he was an okay guy; he’d even been into the coffee shop a few times, when it had been raining, and he was genuinely pleasant, if a little awkward, but she thought it was cute in an odd sort of way. Besides, she thought, it’s not like he wasn’t attractive. How many other girls could say they had a six foot something guy with hair that always had a windswept look to it, and eyes that felt like they could read a person’s thoughts coming to the place they worked just to see them? Not many... And that made her feel the situation was that little bit more special.

***

Inevitably, the rain came, which brought Josh indoors. He could feel his breath grow heavier as his nerves rose. It felt as though his heart was pounding against his sternum, but knew it was just his imagination, otherwise he had a serious medical condition that he was unaware of. He tried to appear as calm as possible, book in hand, eyes scanning across the words but not really taking them in. He glanced outside at the downpour, at his bench that stood vacant across the street. Perhaps he should invest in a decent umbrella, he thought to himself.

“Oh, hi there.” It was her, cheerful as always, despite the weather. Maybe that was just part of the job, Josh thought, but it was nice to see her smile on a day like today. Perhaps today would be the day when he finally said something other than a drinks order. He swallowed and took a deep breath, looking at her, “A large coffee please, black, but...” “With a small jug of milk on the side in case you change your mind, I know.” She smiled and gave a wink as she jotted the order down. Was he really that predictable? Or had she really paid that much attention to his visits in the past? Either way, something warm bubbled inside of him that manifested itself as a smile of his own, and one that lasted for the rest of the day.

***

The next day, he resolved he’d finally say something. He had to! She remembered his order, so there had to be something between them, and he couldn’t ignore that. That morning, work passed like a blur. He had too much on his mind to think about accounts. He didn’t even pay much attention to the walk to the coffee shop, but as he stood there, there was a crowd blocking the street. There was an ambulance, and mutterings in the crowd about a road accident. There was a woman in one of those metallic shock blankets, drinking from a takeaway cup and trying to talk to a police officer whilst wiping away the tears from her swollen, reddening eyes and cheeks. Josh stood back; he waited until the crowd had died down, but Harry was nowhere to be seen inside. With a sigh, he turned and walked away.

The next few days passed in a haze for Josh. He could call no actual recollection of what he’d done to mind, but still he found himself sat on that same bench, watching. He’d missed his chance, he thought. Stupid, how he’d let that crowd shake his nerves so he didn’t see Harry. He felt like that ordeal had placed a block around his mind, preventing that courage from coming back. But still, he sat and watched. He’d finished his book a few days before, so had nothing to cover his intentions with. He felt bare, on display, but still he wanted to see her.

It’d had been three days now, and he’d noticed that Harry hadn’t smiled much. Sure, she gave a smile to her customers, but it looked false, like she didn’t have the same passion for her job anymore, that same passion for life. He frowned and stood, ready to stride over and say something, but he stopped as he watched her set down a coffee cup and a little jug of milk on the table he usually sat at. That was his order. Was she waiting for him? He blinked as she looked out of the shop window, staring at him, at the bench. He smiled and waved. He felt like an idiot, standing in the middle of the street, waving, but she simply stared. It was as if she was looking past him, not seeing him. He stopped. He turned to look at the bench, a knot grinding itself against the wall of his stomach. Head hung low, Josh walked away as rain began to fall.

***

“You okay?” Chris, the manager, placed a hand on Harry’s shoulder. She shrugged as she looked to the still steaming cup of coffee on the table, “Yeah, I’ll be fine.” She moved to the counter, busying herself with polishing glasses and putting cups away, still glancing to the coffee, and beyond it to that old bench outside as the rain came down heavier. “You know, the police said that it could’ve happened to anybody, that it was an accident...” She dabbed at her eyes with a spare napkin, “So why did it have to be him?” Chris shrugged as he began cashing up the till, “I don’t know, kid. I’m sorry.”

Harry put the last glass away and took off her apron, sitting at the table with the coffee, facing the seat where he would’ve been; where he should’ve been. It was raining. He was always here when it rained. She felt tears begin to trickle slowly down her cheeks as she gave a weak smile, holding out her hand to the empty seat, “Hi, I’m Harry. What’s your name?”

End.