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    Tales from the Shadows: Short Story Collection, #2
    Tales from the Shadows: Short Story Collection, #2
    Tales from the Shadows: Short Story Collection, #2
    Ebook370 pages6 hours

    Tales from the Shadows: Short Story Collection, #2

    By James Loscombe

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    About this ebook

    Come walk in the shadows with me and see what horrors I will show you

     

    Tales from the Shadows Volume 2 is a collection of fourteen thrilling short stories totalling more than 100,000 words.

     

    The stories in this collection include:

     

    Alien Virus

    The Rescue

    Hole

    Beaches

    Bad Dreams

    Son of the Sea

    Mind Reader

    The Dust

    The Depths

    Snowbound

    The Long Way Home

    Fatter

    Not Quite Dead

    Payback

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJames Loscombe
    Release dateNov 2, 2020
    ISBN9781393152187
    Tales from the Shadows: Short Story Collection, #2
    Author

    James Loscombe

    James Loscombe has been publishing under various pen names for the last five years. He lives in England with his wife Tamzin and their sons Jude and Oscar.

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      Book preview

      Tales from the Shadows - James Loscombe

      FREE STORIES

      Members of my mailing list get sent a free copy of every short story I publish, usually before they are available to buy.

      If you would like to join them then you can sign up here:  http://jloscombe.com/subscribe/

      ALIEN VIRUS

      Eric raised a hand to shield his eyes from the flashing dazzling spotlights. There had to be a hundred people at the bottom of the hill. The news vans were parked outside the mall, half a dozen men and women in uniform grey suits holding microphones were staring at cameras. Men - they were all men, he noted - wearing utility vests full of pockets moved the cameras around trying to capture as much of the milling crowd as possible. People with iPads talked into phones and paced back and forth. Not one of them looked up at him. It was getting dark though, so maybe they couldn't see him.

      In the middle of the crowd there was a space. About as big as a grave, with the same flat edges as one. It looked freshly dug. It was empty. The crowd didn't know what to make of it. He could hear the muttered repetitious speculation.

      One by one the camera lights turned red. The men in utility vests stopped moving. The people with iPads stopped talking into their phones. The men and women in grey suits stopped fussing with their hair and stared seriously into the lenses. They were too far away for him to hear, but that didn't matter. They didn't know any more than the late night shoppers. The only reason their speculation would be given more weight was because someone was paying them to say it on camera.

      He watched them for a while, flapping their arms and turning to draw the viewers' attention to what was going on behind them. He turned away when they lost his interest, which didn't take long.

      A woman was standing on the hill. She was small enough to be mistaken for a child. Her hair was tied back. She was wearing dirty jeans and a green fisherman's jumper. They looked at each other.

      Who are you? Eric said.

      She told him her name was Belinda, but he could call her Linda.

      What do you want Belinda? he said to make a point. He wasn't going to be her friend. If it annoyed her, she didn't show it.

      I think you saw what happened, she said. He tried to place her accent, maybe American, maybe Canadian.

      I might have done, he said.

      She was holding something in her hand. His first lunatic thought was that it was a gun. Then the light shifted and he saw that it was only a phone. Are you going to talk to those guys down there?

      He half-turned then stopped himself. He didn't need to see them to give an answer. No.

      Belinda nodded, as if that was what she'd thought and that she respected him for it. Of course you're not going to talk to those idiots, her look seemed to say, you're too smart for that. Want to talk to me instead?

      Why would I do that?

      She smiled, and in the half-light he could see how a smile like that would get a lot of men to do whatever she wanted. He looked away. I just want to know what happened, she said. And if you tell me, there's stuff I can do for you in return, dirty stuff your wife would never agree to.

      What's in it for me? he said. He wasn't sure he was into whatever she wasn't offering, but it was best to get it out in the open, then they both knew where they stood.

      What do you want? she said.

      He thought about it. A dozen possibilities went through his mind, but none of them was as appealing now as if would have been that morning. He decided he didn't want anything at all. He started walking, meaning to go straight past her, down to whatever was waiting for him on the other side of the hill.

      Belinda held out her arm and if he hadn't stopped in time she would have clotheslined him. What did you see? she said, leaving her arm up so he'd either have to push it away or walk around it to get past.

      Grave robbers, he said.

      I'm serious, she told him. I want to know.

      You sure about that?

      I'm sure.

      You won't believe it, he said.

      Try me.

      What was the harm in telling her? It wasn't like she was going to believe it. Even if she did, no one would believe her. He considered what would happen if they did, which was so far outside the realm of possibility that no bookie would give odds on it. But if they did, if enough people decided that it tallied with the facts as they knew them, would it make any difference? He didn't see how. It was already too late for anything less than military intervention and by the time word got around it would be later still. So he couldn't see what harm it would do and a crazy part of him wanted to see how she would react when he told her.

      What happened? she said again.

      Eric smiled. I was standing up here, he said.

      The whole time? she said. She lowered her arm, looked around and wondered what anyone would be doing up here. He knew that's what she wondered because she asked him.

      Eric shrugged. My girlfriend broke up with me. I was thinking. About ending it all, he thought, but she didn't ask that and he didn't tell her.

      So you came up here to think. Then what?

      I watched the sun set. It was beautiful.

      In the mall.

      There were people coming in and out. I could hear some of the louder one's talking. Some of them were drunk.

      How did the hole get there?

      He smiled. I saw a shooting star. He pointed, moved his arm in an arc. It went right across the sky. No one else noticed.

      Belinda nodded along as if this confirmed another source, but he knew she didn't have one. So far he was the only one to wake up, but others would follow soon.

      Looked like it landed right in the car park. I watched it for a while, thought there might be a fire or something. But I didn't even hear a car alarm go off. I turned back to the people. They weren't doing anything interesting, but at least they were doing something. He'd needed to see that. It was like background noise, something to occupy the part of his mind that was prone to move him away from difficult thoughts that he needed to think.

      Was the hole there then? Belinda said.

      Eric shook his head. The hole came later, and you shouldn't put so much emphasis on it. The hole isn't really that important.

      I want to know about the hole, she said.

      Fine. Have it your way.

      She nodded, satisfied that she'd scored some kind of point. In reality she'd given him an easy way out because he wasn't lying when he said the hole wasn't important. It was a consequence, not the cause of everything that was about to happen.

      There was an earthquake, he said.

      And it made a perfectly coffin sized hole? she said, as if that was the craziest thing she would hear today.

      No. It softened the ground. They made the hole.

      And who is they?

      He jerked his head back to indicate the people who were still hanging around behind the cameras. None of them were looking up the hill, the possibility of being on television was much more enticing.

      They dug the hole? Belinda said.

      Eric smiled. She was getting close to the important question now. He was leading her, but she was doing an admirable job of following.

      Why would they do that? she said.

      Someone told them to.

      Oh really? she said, in a tone that suggested she was not buying what he was trying to sell. And who did that?

      And why? he suggested.

      Exactly.

      He looked at her for a moment. It was too dark to make out her details clearly, but she cut a fine profile in the darkness. For a moment he reconsidered his initial decision to turn down her advances. They did, he said.

      Who?

      The shooting star. It wasn't really a star you see, I was wrong about that.

      What was it then? she said with mild disbelief. She was humouring him now.

      A ship.

      She didn't believe him. Of course she didn't. Why on earth would she? It was a crazy story being told by a crazy man. It might teach her a lesson about approaching people who were minding their own business, but she wouldn't have a lot of time to put that lesson into practice.

      What sort of ship? she said.

      A spaceship, he said. His voice was level and calm. He knew it was true, he was more interested in her reaction.

      You're telling me it was mind controlling aliens?

      I said you wouldn't believe me.

      Belinda took a deep breath. To her credit she didn't leave, but, judging by the expression on her face, her opinion of him had changed. He couldn't blame her. Two hours ago he would have felt the same way.

      What was in the ground? she said.

      Likely she had already dismissed his story as fantasy, but maybe she was trying to get at the truth a different way. A coffin, he said. That much should have been obvious.

      Why would... aliens... she said the word as if it tasted bad. Why would they want a coffin?

      Because of who was in it, he said.

      And who was in it?

      Eric smiled. Here they were at last. If he was going to back out then this was his last chance. He worried that if she did believe him then it would be all over the internet before sunrise.

      Who was in it Eric?

      A King, he said. If she believed him then he would have to accept the consequences.

      Why?

      It was such an open-ended question that he could have answered anything at all. He might have delayed her all night with it. But they were here now, and he wanted to get it over with.

      Eric?

      Because he was murdered.

      By who?

      He paused, considered how to address a question like that. You know about the speed of light? he said.

      Belinda nodded. Of course she did. Everyone did. That you can't travel faster than the speed of light is a basic principal of physics.

      It took five-hundred years for them to travel here, he said. It was good for her to have an idea of the scale they were talking about. This was far beyond the human concept of years, decades, lifetimes.

      They must live a long time, she said. It was flippant, designed to belittle him, he didn't answer. But it was the truth.

      "They came because they lost contact with him. He was an emissary to Earth. He was here for a thousand years, sending reports back to them until one day they stopped.

      You're telling me he arrived here during the sixth century?

      Eric nodded.

      And he was here until the sixteenth?

      Eric nodded again. And then he was killed.

      And buried here?

      That's right.

      She fell silent, processing the information he had given her and trying to work out whether there was a grain of truth in any of it.

      What do these aliens look like? she said.

      He could see a newspaper. Not one of the large ones that mainly concerned themselves with politics and the economy. One of the small trashy ones that had an endless fascination with who was sleeping with who. In it he was standing at the top of the hill. The likeness wasn't great, it was too dark for her to get a detailed description of him. There was a smaller man standing next to him. He had an elongated face, eyes like black eggs and glowing skin. That's how she was planning to recover the situation. There would be a headline like Local man claims Aliens to blame for earthquake.

      Eric wondered what she would think once he'd told her the rest of the story. He smiled. You can't see them, he said.

      You mean they're invisible? She was no longer trying to keep the disbelief out of her voice, and that was reassuring because if she didn't believe it then it didn't matter what he told her.

      They aren't invisible, he said. They're very small. Microscopic.

      Belinda smiled as if she'd caught him out and Eric smiled as well because now they were at the crux of the story and this was almost over. One final question and they could go their separate ways.

      If they're so small then why is there such a big hole for the coffin?

      They're inside us, Eric said. They're hive minds, but there are multitudes. And when they find a host a collective works as an individual. The man who was buried was the King's host.

      She didn't say anything. He looked at her and she looked back at him. He wondered if the hive inside her was going to choose that moment to activate, but it didn't.

      It's a very elegant system when you think about it, he said.

      Ah-huh, she said. He couldn't tell anything from the tone of her voice. And when you say inside us...

      Eric nodded. The funny thing was that he didn't feel any different. His hive was active. He knew they were there and knew everything about them, but it felt like his own thoughts. If Belinda questioned his sanity then she wouldn't be the first of them to do so. Of course, he had no way of proving that any of it was actually true.

      She didn't try to stop him as he walked past and he didn't turn back to look at her. He was leaving something of himself behind on the hill. But there was work to be done. His future, all their futures, was now in the hands of creatures too small to see with the naked eye.

      THE RESCUE

      Sam stood at the floor to ceiling window on the twelfth floor and looked down. There were no cars moving, no people walking and no lights on in any of the other buildings. Most importantly, there were no zombies.

      He was alone.

      He watched for a while longer, to be sure, and then turned away from the window. He had set up a small camp bed in the corner of the room. His bag was on what had once been a conference table. It had a touch screen display embedded in the middle, but there was no power to it now.

      Sam pulled open his bag and took out a tin of tomato soup. He didn’t have any way to cook it, because a gas stove was too heavy to carry. And he didn’t want risk of burning the place down by starting a fire. So he ate it cold while sitting at the conference table with his back to the window. He drank half of a two litre bottle of water he’d found in the supply room, and thought about what to do next.

      From his inventory of the supplies, he calculated that he could stay in the building for a couple of weeks. If he wanted to eat more than snack food, then he might need to go to the local shops. But, that was easily manageable.

      He climbed into his sleeping bag before it was dark. It was warm and comfortable, but not a scratch on the luxury hotel he had stayed in a few weeks earlier. The beds there had been so soft, and the duvets so thick, that it had been like sleeping on a cloud. He might have stayed there forever, if not for the basement full of zombies he'd found the following day.

      Since that incident he’d done a more thorough job of checking the buildings he stayed in. He didn’t want to get into a confrontation with the zombies because that only drew attention. It was far better, in his opinion, to do everything possible to avoid them.

      He pulled out his current book and wiggled down into the sleeping bag. He’d never been much of a reader before, but once the power had stopped working there wasn’t much else to do. Now, he got through three or four books a week and book shops were as important to his survival as supermarkets.

      Tonight he was too tired to read for long. He’d been on the road since first light, looking for somewhere to set up base. He’d found the current building before noon and spent five hours making sure there was no one else there.

      He yawned.

      Sam folded down the corner of his page and set the book on the floor next to his bed. Then he pulled his hands inside and curled up so that only the top of his head was visible. He closed his eyes and began to drift off to sleep.

      He wasn’t sure whether he’d managed to fall asleep before he heard the scream. A fraction of a second afterwards, he was wide awake and climbing out of the sleeping bag.

      He tripped and stumbled across the room to the table. It was stupid of him to have left his weapons so far away, when he knew that the night was when he was most vulnerable.

      Sam grabbed the axe and stood in a half-crouch, waiting to see whether he would hear the sound again.

      His heart raced and he choked down short, shallow breaths. He didn’t hear the scream again and began to wonder whether he had imagined it. It was possible, and it wouldn’t even be the first time something like that had happened, but he didn’t think so.

      He could still hear it in his head. It was real, but distant. Someone else was in the building with him.

      He crept towards the door. There was no light except for the moon, which seemed to be a spotlight on him.

      A part of him wanted to call out. The scream had sounded like a call for help, but if that was the case then it meant there was danger. His number one rule for surviving the zombie apocalypse, was to avoid danger.

      Sam crept past the abandoned desks. There were thousands of pounds worth of computer equipment on the floor, and it was now all worthless.

      He shook his head. He needed to avoid distraction. He had to focus on finding the person who had been screaming. His life might depend on it.

      He searched the twelfth floor but didn’t find anything. It was all exactly as he remembered when he’d searched it before. He went to the fire exit.

      Since the zombies had come, he’d grown used to fire escapes.

      When he was halfway down to the eleventh floor, he heard the scream again. This time followed by a low guttural moan which he had come to know meant there were zombies nearby.

      Not just nearby, but in the building, beneath him.

      Sam swore under his breath.

      The scream came again and this time he could hear words. A woman begging for help.

      He shuddered. If someone was asking for help then they must know, or at least suspect, that there was someone close by who could give it. Did they know he was there? And, if so, how? What had he done to give himself away?

      There was still the option of going back up. He could leave whoever it was to deal with the zombies and hope that they didn’t survive. Even if they screamed his name and where he was hiding, the zombies wouldn’t be able to understand. They wouldn’t come looking for him unless he gave them reason to do so.

      Sam gripped the axe handle more firmly.

      He could go back up, but he knew that he wouldn’t. If he was in trouble, then he would want someone to help if they could.

      He started going down again. The last scream still echoing around the stairwell. He told himself that he was just going to see what the situation was. He wasn’t committing to anything more than that. If there was no chance of helping, then he wasn’t going to step in and die by the stranger’s side. But if he could help then he would.

      On the eleventh floor he heard them clearly. It was humbling to realise how close they had gotten to finding him. Almost as if, whoever was screaming, had known exactly where he was. If he managed to get them out of this, then he would want to know how.

      Sam pushed open the door.

      He could hear the zombies. This close up, the sound had extra layers, not only random moaning as it seemed from a distance. They grunted and muttered as well. It wasn’t quite language, but perhaps the remains of it.

      Shadows on the wall confirmed that there was more than one of them. He counted four of various sizes.

      He crept between the desk dividers, keeping low and out of sight. Soon he was able to see them.

      The zombies were still fresh and moved with surprising speed. They had gathered around a glass fronted office.

      Sam ducked down behind a desk, clutching his axe as if it were a baby, and watched.

      At first he couldn’t see who the creatures were so eager to get to. Then they moved around and he saw her in the office.

      Dark hair hung over her face in tangles, her eyes were wide with terror. She had her back to the far wall and couldn’t get any further away from the zombies.

      Sam thought it was a miracle that the glass had held out this long. He didn’t rate her chances of surviving when the zombies broke through.

      It was still possible to walk away, but he didn’t think he could do it. While the zombies had their backs to him, the woman looked out of the office and stared him straight in the eye. It was impossible for her to see him, but she screamed Help me! and he knew that he would.

      Sam stood up, not wanting to draw the zombies attention until he was ready to do something with it. He swung the axe and felt the reassurance of its weight. Once he started his attack he would have to finish it, one way or another.

      He wiped a hand over a day’s worth of stubble and tried to work out the best approach to take.

      In the end he didn’t get much of a say in the matter.

      One of the smaller zombies turned and moaned, which caught the attention of the others. One by one they turned around and saw Sam standing there ready for them.

      He swung at the first one who came towards him; a former teenage girl with black eyes and blood running out of her mouth. It opened its mouth to moan and Sam saw pieces of skin stuck in its teeth.

      He took the zombie’s head off in one swing. It spun through the air to his left but landed at the same time as her body did, right in front of him.

      The next one came closer, a former teenage boy. It might have been Sam’s imagination, but he thought it moved a little cautiously now. After a moment, the two others (the former parents?) came as well. Sam began backing away.

      A little help? he called out.

      Over the zombie’s shoulders he saw the woman in the glass room shaking her head. He could see the look of terror on her face and knew that she wouldn’t be good for much now.

      He swore under his breath. He would have to take care of it himself.

      Sam swung the bloody axe back and ran at the teenage boy zombie. Its hair was long and matted to its face. It wore a black t-shirt with some band on it that Sam had never heard of.

      He struck the zombie in the shoulder and pulled the axe free with a sharp tug. The zombie raised its arms to grab him. Sam swung again, this time hitting it in the arms and causing no damage except to spin it around so that its back was to him.

      He swung again and this time got a clean hit. The zombie-boy fell to the floor with its head beside it.

      Sam backed away again, he was panting and his heart felt as if it was going to burst out of his chest. He had two more of the creatures to deal with before he could take a break though.

      Who’s next? he said.

      The two older zombies flinched as he spoke, as if they still had a little understanding of what he was saying.

      The woman came at him. Blood from the last person she had bitten covered her hands.

      He swung too early and the axe passed in front of her. The momentum turned him around and by the time he corrected for it they were both on him.

      Sam felt hands on his arms, pulling him closer.

      He struggled and managed to get one arm free, pulling himself away from whichever one of the creatures had him.

      Not willing to give up yet, he swung again. The axe glanced the top of the female-zombies head, shearing off her hair and some of her scalp. She didn't fall. He swung again and this time managed to get the neck.

      She fell to the ground, and if his initial count was accurate, that left only one of them to be killed.

      Sam leaned against the wall and tried to catch his breath. He wished that he’d kept one of the smaller one’s until last.

      He looked around to make sure the zombie wasn’t coming for him.

      Where are you? he muttered under his breath.

      He couldn’t see.

      A sudden movement caught his attention and he raised the axe before he turned. For a moment he only saw a dark shape running towards him. He was surprised that a zombie was able to move so quickly.

      He was about to swing when he saw that it wasn’t a zombie at all.

      The woman threw her arms around him and he stood there. His only thought was that he’d almost killed her.

      You saved me! she said.

      I almost killed you! Sam said.

      She let go of him and stepped away. What?

      You can’t go running up to someone like that, he said. The adrenaline was still coursing through his veins. He never would have spoken to her like that otherwise. I thought you were a zombie. I almost killed you.

      She lowered her head. I’m sorry.

      Sam shook his head. Did you see where the other one went?

      It went out the stairs. You scared it away.

      I scared it away? he said, unsure whether she was serious, or making a bad joke.

      She nodded and he realised she was serious.

      You couldn’t scare zombies. They were incapable of human emotion. If the zombie had gone, then it was not good news.

      Come on, he said.

      Where are we going? she said.

      We have to get out of here.

      She hesitated for a moment and then followed after him.

      Her name was Christine, but everyone called her Chris. Until a few days ago she had been living by herself in a farm house outside the city. She’d only come in to look for supplies. The zombies that Sam had killed had been a family that had taken her in. One day the father, Dominic, had come home from a scavenging trip not feeling well. By the afternoon his wife and children had turned and they’d come after Chris. She’d managed to escape through an upstairs window and they’d followed her.

      There was no sign of the father zombie in the stairwell. Sam led her back up to the twelfth floor so he could collect his things. Then back down so they could make a run to another building.

      He hated going outside after dark, but in the current circumstances, he didn’t feel as if he had much choice.

      They stopped at the door and Sam went out to make sure the coast was clear. It unnerved him that there was no sign of the zombie, but he couldn’t afford to think about it now. Later, when they were safe, he would need to work out what it meant, but not now.

      Come on, he said, ducking back inside to get Chris. We need to move quickly.

      She followed him onto the street.

      There was no sound as they made their way along the footpath, keeping close to the buildings. If there were zombies close by, then they were keeping quiet. Which was something else he would need to contemplate if he got through this alive.

      They tried the doors of the next building they reached but found them locked. The same was true at the next several they tried. Sam had the axe and might have been able to break in, but he didn’t want to draw attention to them.

      Is there somewhere else we can go? Chris said.

      He thought about it. Tall buildings were safest, but it was beginning to look like that wasn’t an option. Let’s just keep moving, he said.

      Chris heard it first. Sam was so preoccupied with trying to find shelter, that the low moan didn’t even register with him. It was lucky for him that she was there, otherwise the zombies might have got him without a fight.

      Sam! she said.

      He turned around and saw that she had stopped.

      A lone zombie stood in the middle of the street.

      Is that him? Sam said.

      Yes, she said, her voice a whimper. He already knew that she wouldn’t be able to put up a fight.

      Wait here, he said.

      Where are you going? she said.

      He ignored the

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