The Undersurface
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This story is part of the Malton Chronicles. This story is fan-made, and is not officially part of any background history for Urban Dead. |
The cellar door slammed shut, and Clarke had trapped himself in a dank yeasty smelling grave. The barrel room of the Vaughan Arms. He hadn't meant to run to the cellar but with several advancing zeds and no ammo all the detective could do was run. He could hear the zombies raking at the wooden hatch, they could smell him.
Clarke frantically looked around the cellar. Unused barrels were hooked up to pipes which hadn't been pumped in ages. Crates lay in a corner covered in cobwebs and dust. Not even the spiders could survive the zombie apocalypse as the web appeared empty. The clawing at the hatch had turned to thumping as the zombies became more intent on eating Clarke's flesh. As Clarke moved barrels and shoved over empty crates he came across an overflow, leading directly to the sewers. The overflow was covered by a thin metal shutter which could be prized open. Clarke slid his knife under the shutter and eased it open, as he did a rush of air blasted through the open grate. He gagged as the smell of shit filled the already putrid smelling room. He inhaled heavily through his mouth and held it. Clarke eased himself through the gap and slid into the sewers. His shoes hit the filthy water, since the outbreak the sewage works and water companies had ceased to be active. Months worth of sewage which had been left to rot filled the sewer, but Clarke would rather face the smell than stay in the cellar with six hungry zeds.
After a few feet he became aware of a presence within the water. Something was moving in the shallow scuzz that was the sewer water. Something big. Clarke laughed to himself as a thought occured. Malton city zoo had had crocodiles, big scaly motherf*ckers. Where had they gone when the zombie hordes struck? Clarke looked over at the fetid water and could see it rippling. The water lapped up by the side of sewer on a walkway Clarke was currently stood on. It was a ridiculous notion to suggest that there was a crocodile in the water but Clarke couldn't shake the feeling he wasn't alone.
The sewer water began to lap up on the walkway, something was coming towards Clarke. His feet were beginning to get wet as the thing emerged from the murky water. Clarke slipped as he backed away from whatever it was and cracked his head on the wall. He slid down it and stared at the thing looming over him.
It stood there covered in the filth and crap of the underground, hunger deep set in it's eyes. Clarke shuffled back away, panicking. This thing had been living in the sewers for months, trapped with nothing to eat but whatever strayed into its realm and now Clarke was about to be another opportunistic meal for the thing. Clarke was pressed up against the wall a the slimey gunk of the storm overflows stuck to his hair. He tried kicking out but couldn't shift the zombie which was overcome with desire to eat. It bit his shoulder, sinking it's teeth into his soft skin. It tore into his muscle and made him yell in pain. His eyes rolled back in his head as he screamed again, the zombie was devouring him. Clarke kicked out again and tried struggling free. The zombie stopped and looked up. It's dead eyes looked into the detective's, there was no colour and no sign of emotion. The zombie slid down Clarke's body, who looked over the zombie and could see it's legs in the mouth of a crocodile. A four meter Nile crocodile clamped it's jaws around the undead creature and was pulling it into the water.
The irony of a zombie being eaten was one that couldn't elude Clarke as he staggered to his feet. Clarke swaggered down the walkway to a ladder. He took off his belt and tied it round his arm a la tourniquet. He found a vein and jammed the needle of a revivification syringe in. He wasn't dead yet, but wasn't prepared to let the infection take hold. Clarke climbed the ladder and shifted a heavy manhole leading him outside St. Jude's cathedral which was only a block away from where his friends were staying, Jouxson Cinema.
Clarke staggered into Jouxson and collapsed, as he slept he babbled about an escaped crocodile.
