Free Snatchers (Book 8): The Dead Don't Pray by Shaun Whittington Page A

to the centre of the aisle, shotguns sitting in the trolleys, then stopped when Pickle told them to. Pickle and Bentley put their weapons on the floor, and began filling the trolleys with tins of beans, ravioli, spaghetti hoops, tuna, salmon—pretty much everything they could get their hands on. The four men then left the supermarket, without having to be involved with any more killing, and went to the pickup and began unloading the tins into the empty barrels. This process took nearly ten minutes to achieve. Lee headed back to the tanker, whereas the remaining three were about to get back into the pickup.
    "Where did he come from?" Bentley pointed at the exit of the place where a lone member of the dead shambled towards them.
    "We'll just run it down," said Rick, desperate to get out of the place and back to the safety of the Sandy Lane camp.
    Pickle turned the shotgun around, and sighed, "It's okay. I've got it."
    Lee sat in the tanker, and Bentley and Rick sat in the passenger seat of the pickup, whilst Pickle removed the Snatcher by smashing its head with the handle-end of the gun. Once he did this, he turned around and headed back to the truck, but suddenly stopped by the bonnet. He looked past the vehicle and was staring at the supermarket. Noticing this, Lee wound the window of the tanker down and yelled, "What's up?"
    Pickle pointed. "There's somebody on the top floor o' the supermarket. A young girl ... I think."
    "A staff member?"
    "Maybe."
    Pickle never said a word more. He marched back over to the supermarket, gun still in his hand, and Lee jumped out of the truck and went with him. Bentley stuck his head out of the truck's window and yelled after them, "Where're you going now?"
    "We've seen someone!" Lee yelled back. "Won't take a minute!
    "You want company?"
    "No. Just make sure nobody steals that tanker," Lee joked.

Chapter Sixteen
     
    Daniel Badcock had ordered two guards to help him search the empty houses of Sandy Lane, Cross Road, Burnthilll Lane and Hill Street. Two others checked the fences. A dead fiend was found in the changing rooms and had killed someone, which meant that one of those things had managed to get in. But how did it get in? Did it somehow climb over the fence, or was it an infected human and had turned inside the camp? Whatever the reason, it frightened Daniel that one of them were inside, and saddened him greatly that young Kyle had to experience an awful and unimaginable death. Searching the houses seemed desperate and silly, but after what had happened to the school, he wanted the vacant ones checked once more for peace of mind.
    Daniel sent two people round to tell residents to stay inside until told otherwise. The only people that were allowed out were the guards. Although nearly one hundred and thirty people occupied some of the houses around the area, there were many other places that were barren. In the first week, a lot of the houses were left by families as they fled to pastures new, hoping to reach somewhere safer, but some had turned inside their homes and other families had committed suicide.
    He started at the end of Hill Street and worked his way down, very slowly. He had three houses to go before finishing with Hill Street, and opened the door to another three-bedroom semi-detached. He began checking the ground floor for any irregularities.
    Once the living room and kitchen was checked, the first floor was next. The twenty-three-year-old peered his head into the bathroom, then checked out the bedrooms. The last room was the main bedroom. It looked clean and untouched, but Daniel knew that in this house a mother was found dead after her daughter had turned.
    She had killed herself.
    Daniel rubbed his head and sat on the edge of the bed. He was exhausted, and his jaw still throbbed now and again from the attack.
    Putting his machete to the side of him, Daniel slowly dropped his head in his hands. He had never felt so tired.
    "Come on." He tried to get himself motivated.