This Land of Monsters

by Tim Gabrielle

  He stared at the mirror as a bloodied foot fell from the driver’s side door and hit the pavement with a thick, squishing smash. The monster in the car wore gray sweatpants, dark and crusty from a gash on its abdomen. Its left hand was wedged awkwardly in the inside door handle while its right hand sat wedged in the steering wheel.

  Nash stayed hidden behind the mangled car while he listened for any sign that it was a howler. He peered around the edge of the crashed vehicle as the hand on the door handle released and fell limply against its crusty leg. Nash stood calmly, knowing it was nothing more than a slowpoke, but kept his axe in hand just the same.

  He looked up the road to try and find Duncan but only found another slowpoke that stood alone in the middle of a pile of cars. The slowpoke in the car in front of him tried to slide itself out of the driver’s seat, only to fall to the ground awkwardly like a newborn deer. It grunted as it reached up and used the car door to help itself up. A loud creaking sound echoed loudly from the abandoned car as the slowpoke pulled itself up from the pavement. It looked Nash in the eye, its nose viciously broken from the fall, as dark blood flowed from its nostrils into its clueless, open-faced smile. It was apparent to Nash that there was a small part of all slowpokes left inside their confused exterior, memories trapped deep inside their new existence. The one that stood in front of him was no exception.

  It continued staring at Nash as the blood flowed freely from its nose and down over its lips and chin. It had started to show signs of malnutrition; its skin was dry and flaking away as a bite on its left arm oozed with infection, sending dark blue veins all the way to its fingertips. Its face was shallow, which made its eyes start to sink into the darkened circles that surrounded them. During his time spent with the smiling slowpoke, Nash hadn’t even realized that Duncan had doubled back in the trees along the road and crept up behind them.

  “Look at this fucking guy! You tell him a funny joke or something?” He leaned on the trunk of the car the slowpoke had sat in and smiled back at the grinning monster. It looked at Duncan curiously as its smile widened to the point where Nash thought the corners of its mouth would split apart.

  “Goodness he’s a smiley fucker, isn’t he?” said Duncan as he tapped the slowpoke in the gut with his bat. The monster slowly moved its eyes between the two of them, still pleased with the emergence of its new friends and oblivious to the danger that Duncan represented to it. Duncan slid his knife out of the sheath on his belt and let the sun glean off the shining blade.

  “Put your knife away,” said Nash. “Leave it be.”

  Duncan looked at Nash with a furrowed brow, and then turned back to the slowpoke as it slightly choked and splashed blood out of its open mouth.

  “I’ve had something stuck in here all day. Don’t you hate that?” said Duncan as he raised the blade to his mouth and used the reflection to look at his teeth.

  “Just leave him alone, Duncan.”

  “Can you believe this guy?” he said to the slowpoke while he pointed at Nash with his knife. He threw his head toward the sky and laughed, the echo pinging off the abandoned cars. The slowpoke looked to Nash as if awaiting a reaction, not breaking its smile for a single moment as it stood confused in front of them. Duncan abruptly stopped laughing and planted his muddy boot into the stomach of the slowpoke, sending it backward into the open car door. The metal hinges creaked loudly and gave way as the door folded backward with the weight of the tall, dead thing.

  “Get your shit together,” said Duncan as he walked over to the slowpoke and kicked it in the side of its head. “I’m gutting the next one!” Duncan stormed off down the highway like a petulant child.

  The slowpoke struggled to stand up, stumbling back to the ground a couple times before Nash covered his hands with his sleeves and approached it. Making sure to keep clear of its blood, Nash helped the slowpoke to its feet. It hadn’t even looked to where Duncan went, but stared at Nash with a saddened look on its bloodied face. Duncan’s boot had torn a fresh flap of skin away from its cheek and sent fresh blood flowing onto its tattered t-shirt. The smile it had previously had on its face had completely faded away and was replaced with a look of sheer confusion and abandonment as it searched Nash’s face for an answer.

  He reached into his bag and fetched out a bottle of water and threw the cap to the ground as he approached the slowpoke. He placed the bottle in the right hand of the slowpoke and it immediately started to hold onto it with both hands like a toddler. It squeezed the bottle a little and sent water bubbling out of the top like a geyser. A strip of red cloth was tied around its left wrist, with no lettering or logos at all; just a simple strip of ragged, dirty cloth, hung somewhat loosely from its wrist.

  “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

  It raised the bottle to its bloody mouth as Nash made his way around it and joined Duncan. Slowpokes didn’t eat, but they drank water. You could find them congregating at water sources, which was why bottled water was so special. You couldn’t be certain that their blood hadn’t contaminated a water source. He could see him not far up ahead as he rifled through an open trunk and muttered to himself as usual. Duncan pulled his head out of the truck with a lit cigar between his teeth and smiled while he gave Nash a thumbs up, his right foot up onto the tire of a car beside him. Nash thought he looked ridiculous, like some sort of cheesy sea captain, and if it had been anyone else he may have even laughed.

  A crow cawed loudly in the distance as a soft whizzing sound registered in Nash’s ear, seconds before a loud crunching came from behind him. He spun around to find the slowpoke with a confused look on its face, the bottle of water obliterated in a pool of water and blood on the pavement. The slowpoke’s hand was bloodied and mangled as it looked down at the busted water bottle.

  “Get down!” yelled Duncan from far up the road.

  Nash stood in shock and locked eyes with the slowpoke as its head cocked sideways and sprayed blood on the idle vehicles next to it. The slowpoke fell sideways, landing in a crumpled heap as its eyes somehow remained locked onto Nash’s. Nash gazed at the dead slowpoke as hands wrapped around his ankles and pulled him abruptly to the ground. He fell hard, landing on the hot pavement with a loud thud as the air vacated his lungs.

  “When I tell you to do something I mean it!” whispered Duncan, angrily. “There’s a sniper somewhere across that field.”

  Nash rolled onto his side and tried in vain to refill his lungs with air. His arms were bleeding, having taken most of the impact from his fall. He winced, his head radiating from connecting with the car as he fell.

  “Quit your bitching and help me search the tree line.”

  Hot air rushed into Nash’s chest as his airway finally re-opened from the fall. He rolled onto his chest and looked under the car with Duncan as they both tried to find the source of the gunshot. An overgrown field stretched out in front of them, spanning a few hundred yards from the road and ending at a small forest. He looked briefly at Duncan and saw no form of remorse on his stern face for pulling him so harshly to the ground.

  “I thought you’d done that,” said Nash.

  “I was giving you a thumbs up when it happened, dumbass. Did you see me holding a rifle in my other hand?”

  “Can you blame me for thinking that after you kicked him like that?”

  “Him?” said Duncan as he briefly broke his gaze on the trees to give Nash a look of disgust. “It was nothing but a dumb hillbilly. That sniper should have taken a shot at you for wasting a bottle of water on it. Don’t come crying to me when you’re thirsty.”

  As if Nash would go to him for anything other than tips on killing or smoking.

  There was a long stretch of silence as the two scanned the horizon together. The midday sun was intense, which made the pavement feel like hot, smoldering embers, as sweat dripped from their skin onto the scorching road.

  “Do you think he’s still there? We can’t lie here in the open all day,” asked Nash.

  “Why don’t you stand
up and give it a test. Go check on your friend over there.”

  The two remained still on the pavement, hesitant to even so much as breathe too loudly. The sun had started its final descent towards the horizon, but the asphalt still continued to bake them as they sat motionless against the broken car. Duncan lowered himself to the pavement, looking out across the field from below the car to try and see any kind of movement.

  “Do you see anything?” whispered Nash, seeing the rolled up Playboy still secured in Duncan’s back pocket.

  Duncan remained silent as he continued to scan the horizon. Nash sat with his back pressed against the car and scanned the trees behind them for any howlers that passed. Duncan turned and looked back at the trees, assessing them as a possible escape route before he returned his gaze back to where the shot had come from as an angry scream echoed loudly across the pavement.

  Four howlers screamed and smashed into each other as they made their way through the dead cars. The fastest of the group, two males, tore at their skin and left chunks of flesh and gore hanging from his chest. An older woman in a tattered housecoat, as well as a woman in her twenties, followed close behind. The older woman was covered in dark blue veins as her bloodied housecoat hung loosely from her frail body, while the younger woman looked as if she’d been turned within the last day or two.

  “Keep your head down!” yelled Duncan as he lunged to his feet and ran toward the woods behind them. Nash hesitated a moment, watching Duncan disappear into the woods as the howlers continued their sprint. He’d grown used to running and hiding from howlers, but snipers were a whole different story, and he was frozen in fear. Another whizzing sound filled the air as another bullet connect with the skull of one of the male howlers, sending it crashing to the ground about twenty feet from Nash. Nash finally sprinted towards the woods, his head down as he imagined bullets flying past him in all directions. He felt slightly relieved as he made it into the woods until his foot caught on a twisted root.

  “Duncan, wait!” he screamed, trading glances between the trees Duncan had disappeared into and the tangled root around his foot. He was grateful to have made it into the woods without being shot, but a more dangerous threat was now on its way, ready to bear down on him any minute.

  A vicious cracking sound echoed from the road as the remaining male howler slipped in a pool of blood formed from the dead slowpoke, breaking its leg and sending jagged bone through its skin as the two others flew past. The female howlers briefly became wedged between two cars as they made their way toward him, bottlenecking with each other as they each tried to force their way through The old woman made her way through first, gnashing her teeth and growling as she stepped forward. Her housecoat caught on the bumper of a car, sending a tearing sound into the air as she wiggled herself away from it. Her naked body was wrinkled and covered in dark veins from head to toe, showing that the infection had completely invaded her entire being. Nash freed himself but hesitated for a moment when he noticed the red strips of cloth tied around the two approaching women’s wrists.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” yelled Duncan as he lifted Nash to his feet by his arms. “Let’s go!”

  The two maneuvered the forest quickly as the younger female howler kept pace behind them. Her angry yelps filled their ears as they weaved in and out of the trees, hoping to lose her along the way. Younger howlers were better nourished than ones that had been dead for a while, making them much harder to escape or hide from.

  Duncan unbuttoned the leather snap that kept his knife sheathed in his belt and pulled out the shiny blade. Nash could see a nervous determination in him as he carefully adjusted his fingers around the handle of his knife, his knuckles turning bone-white. Duncan stopped and turned to face the screaming woman, the knife held out in front of him as she locked her furious gaze on him. Her black hair flew behind her in wispy strands, the left strap of her dirty white tank top fallen aside to expose her breast as she ran at them reaching for them. With better timing than either of them could have hoped for, Duncan sank the blade into her forehead as she crashed into him at full speed. The two of them went crashing onto the damp ground, the dead woman on top of Duncan with her chest pressed against his face.

  “Whoa! No thanks, honey!” scoffed Duncan as he pushed the dead woman off himself with a strained chuckle.

  He stood up and joined Nash while he looked down at the bleeding mass on the ground. As he stared down at her, Nash found it hard to ignore how pretty she had been as part of her humanity returned while she lay peacefully in the wet leaves. With the exception of the dark infected bite on her right forearm, her body was void of any of the typical dark winding veins found on older howlers.

  “She’s the third I’ve seen today with those red bracelets,” said Nash.

  “Who gives a fuck!” Duncan knelt down beside her and pulled the knife out of the top of her head. It created a squishy popping sound as blood flowed out of the slender wound. Duncan smiled up at Nash while he used his knife to jiggle her breast as it sat awkwardly outside her tank top.

  “Not too shabby, eh, Buddy Boy? Want a turn with her? I doubt she’d give you much trouble.”

  Nash responded with silent disgust and looked up to scan the trees for the old woman. They could hear her far back in the woods as she panted and howled in the distance, but to their benefit she’d gotten lost along the way.

  “You’re too serious, Buddy Boy. What happened to the male that was with these two broads?”

  “He fell back at the road. He must have broken his leg because he didn’t get back up.”

  “You gonna go back and make a splint for him? Maybe clean up those wounds on his chest? He probably saw you give smiley that bottle of water too. We don’t want him getting jealous, now do we?”

  Duncan sheathed his knife and began to walk deeper into the forest, but not before he took one last look at the half-topless dead woman. Nash knelt down and closed her cloudy eyes.

  “Really?” asked Duncan as he watched Nash kneel beside her

  Branches cracked behind them, followed by a sound they hadn’t heard in months; the gruff voice of someone other than themselves.

  Chapter 5

  “Don’t move,” boomed the voice from behind Duncan.

  Nash looked up from the dead woman and saw a large tank of a man who stood about five feet away. He held an automatic rifle, pointed directly at them. He wore dark camouflaged army fatigues with heavy black combat boots that weighed deep into the muddy ground. His thick, brown beard hung straggly from his face, his eyes hidden behind dark sunglasses.

  “Your weapons and bags; place them on the ground and step away slowly,” he said with an unflinching face.

  Duncan unclasped his knife from his belt and tossed in in front of him, followed shortly after by his bag. Nash took his time, unbuckling the axe from his own belt. He imagined it slipping out of his hands as he threw it forward—crashing into the man’s legs, and the man responding by opening fire on them. He took a steadying breath and awkwardly tossed the axe on the ground in front of them. Nash and Duncan both backed away from their belongings slowly, hands in the air.

  “Turn around and kneel on the ground with the boy,” the soldier ordered.

  Nash immediately kneeled. Duncan turned around slowly with his hands out to his sides and stared up at the man as he joined Nash on the ground. Nash could see a large hunting knife sheathed to the man’s boot, as well as smaller knives around his beltline.

  “Let’s just calm down, sailor,” said Duncan as he looked at the man with a determined gaze.

  The soldier ignored him. “I’m going to look through your stuff. Either of you so much as sneeze and your throat will be open before you blink.”

  He pulled his knife out of the sheath on his boot and plunged it into the ground in front of him. Nash’s eyes locked onto the long blade as it glistened in the afternoon light. If it hadn’t been for the threat of killing them, he would have seemed polite in the way he handled their belo
ngings. Nash had expected him to gruffly dump everything onto the ground, but instead he gently rustled through their open bags as if they were his own.

  “What’s your name, big guy?” asked Duncan as he watched the man finished rummaging through his pack and move on to Nash’s. The man ignored him and continued his search. It looked as if he were almost done until he froze, his eyes fixed on something inside.

  “How do you know this girl?” he said as he held up the picture of Melissa. Duncan let out a sigh as he looked down at the ground in frustration. The soldier hadn’t broken his gaze with Nash and waited in silence for him to reply.

  The image of the glistening blade filled his mind as Nash tried in vain to think of something to say. If he said he knew her, it could end badly; if he said he didn’t know her, it could end even worse. His eyes fixed on the knife again as he struggled to decide what to say. The man picked it up by its handle and placed it back into its sheath.

  “It’s okay, kid,” he said, speaking softer than he had before.

  “No. I don’t know her. We stayed in a house a few nights ago to get out of the rain and I slept in her bedroom.”

  Duncan gazed at Nash with a disgruntled face as he explained how he’d acquired the picture. The only thing that cut the silence was the distant sound of the housecoat howler, as she sobbed loudly and wandered naked through the dense trees.

  “I thought she was pretty. She just looks so happy and it reminded me of better days.”

  The soldier remained crouched in front of them, listening as he explained himself. Duncan looked at the photo, recognizing her from the house they’d stayed at during the storm. Another loud, high-pitched squeal echoed through the forest as the dead thing far behind them cried in frustration.

  “How far back is she?” asked the man.

  “Who knows? She wasn’t nearly as fast as this hussy,” said Duncan as he motioned toward the dead woman on the ground. Nash glared at him as Duncan’s eyes once again lingered on the dead woman’s exposed chest.