The Dark Times: A Zombie Novel

by Dane Hatchell

  “Good to know. If you’re not here in the morning, it was nice meeting you.” He hoped he hadn’t offended the old woman too badly. He imagined she was a nice person, despite her physical appearance. It was wrong for him to judge a person’s value by their looks. He knew this to be true on some level, but as a cop, his experience had taught him it is possible to tell a book by its cover.

  He could still hear that old lady coughing her guts out after the office door closed and he was halfway to his room.

  *

  It took some jiggling and back and forth motions to get the room key to slide into the slot. The keyway was in dire need of lubrication, and the doorknob felt loose and rattled when he turned it.

  The moment of truth, he thought, and flipped on the light switch. Ta-Da!

  A lamp on a small table by the bed came on, showing one of its three bulbs had gone to be with Jesus. No overhead light at all, not even on the ceiling fan, which wasn’t all that unusual as most bottom end motels kept lighting to a minimum to cloak the quality of their care in mystery.

  The walls were painted a light tan. Dark brown carpet cushioned his steps, and he imagined it held years of hidden treasures he had no plans of searching for. The twin size bed had been properly made and covered with a deep chocolate colored comforter. The middle of the bed sagged as if a horse had been sleeping in it, or from marathon trick sessions of the local entrepreneurs of the evening. I would name this room Fifty Shades of Brown, he thought. Even the pictures on the wall had browns for dominant colors.

  The smell was worse than the appearance. It sort of reminded him of his high school gymnasium, only worse. It was apparent that Miss Tammy didn’t lie when she said the room had been cleaned. The problem, though, was the musty old sweat sock stench was in a battle with overwhelming bleach odor. It was like trying to mask the stench of jock itch and foot fungus with the entire sanitation department of San Antonio. His nostrils burned as he looked around the room to see if he could find a window to open. No luck, the one covered by thick drapes was just a solid piece of glass.

  Rico tossed his bag to the floor and set his helmet on the chest of drawers—the only real furniture in the room— right next to the 20 inch TV.

  The room was warm enough for him to run the A/C unit under the window. He turned it on ‘Fan’ to blow some fresh air in, and found an overhead fan in the small bathroom to get some circulation going. It wasn’t much, but it was at least something.

  He plopped down on the bed and contemplated where he was on the map and what direction he might be heading. How should he choose? Did he really have a choice anyway? Were consequences in life all from choices by free will, or was everything predestined by God or the universe to begin with? What if he just put a bottle on a map, gave it a spin, and drove toward wherever the open mouth pointed? As intriguing as that sounded, it just seemed too irresponsible. He could head west and find his fate somewhere in New Mexico. Or even just take a simple route and follow the interstate through Louisiana into Mississippi or Alabama. The possibilities were endless. It was just a matter of where. Rico liked it. He liked not having to be somewhere. All those years on the force had him chained to one small area on the planet. His time away from the job had him tied down to a woman whom he strived to always please. Now he only had to please himself. Making a decision tonight on which direction to go was just too much of a burden. He decided on enjoying a little more freedom from responsibility. It could wait until the morning.

  However, before morning, he needed to scrub off some of the day’s grime and get some sleep. Before he could do any of that, he had to get the dry taste of gym socks and disinfectant out of his mouth.

  The air in his room had already begun to clear. Now seemed like a good time to find that ice maker and Coke machine. Too bad he didn’t have a decent cigar to light up and enjoy celebrating his new adventure.

  Once outside, the cool night air offered immediate relief. There was no traffic along the road in front and no activity in the parking lot. Looks like everyone’s bedded down, he thought. His footfalls bounced off the sidewalk as he rounded the corner to the hum of machines.

  The Coke machine was the most modern piece of equipment he’d seen since stopping off in this neck of the woods. Amongst the variety of cola, diet cola, and un-cola, one brightly lit button offered 12oz of relief in a can of Big Red. He fed the machine a dollar bill and it gobbled it down without choking it back up. The can dropped from the dispenser with a loud clunk. Rico reached down to get his quarter and retrieve the drink.

  “Hi there,” a woman’s voice said.

  Rico had been so caught up in his thoughts that the introduction startled him. He froze and jerked his head toward the voice.

  The moment he spotted her, Rico just wanted to be back in the musty room, minding his own business. He had seen her kind almost daily on the streets of Killeen. They basically all dressed the same. She wore a skimpy skirt and a tight shirt over an almost meatless frame of a body. Her ratty blonde hair looked like it hadn’t been brushed since last week. This one had a set of fake tits—probably a gift from her boyfriend-turned-employer to boost sales. She partially hid behind a dangling purse. Track marks ran the entire length of her right arm. This girl was a junkie whore and didn’t try to hide that fact in any way.

  Rico had dealt with enough of life’s throwaways to deduce she was between the age of twenty-two and twenty-five. Which, to the untrained eye, would seems outrageous, because she didn’t look a day younger than forty-five. The daily drudge as a prostitute had worn the glow of youth off her skin and left tanned, wrinkled hide. The obvious drug habit had further depleted precious resources and emaciated her body. Her eyes sunk in and dark circles pooled underneath, exacerbated by her pale complexion. A rash left its mark on her right knee, probably from habitual scratching while on the stuff. The only question was about what the stuff might be—crack, meth, or heroin?

  “You a cop?”

  Well, it didn’t take long for it to come down to business, he thought, and reached out and grabbed his drink. Rico latched his gaze to hers. When it was clear she wasn’t scared and wasn’t going to run off anytime soon, he played his next hand. “Depends on who’s asking.” He popped the top on the Big Red and swallowed a mouthful. “You a prostitute?”

  “Depends on who’s asking,” she said coldly, as if she wasn’t interested in playing any games. The pain of her condition didn’t hide in her expression. It was obvious she was going through withdrawals now. She needed money. How far would she go to get it?

  Fuck this shit, Rico felt a haunting memory return. He stiffened his body and tried to push it from his mind. He turned to walk away—hoping to escape both the present and the past.

  “You gonna leave that quarter?” she called.

  The desperation in her voice jerked at his heartstrings. “You want it?” Rico turned, seeing that he had left the quarter in the change slot of the soda machine.

  She bit the bottom of her lip and gazed hungrily into his eyes. A few seconds later, she waved an impassive hand. “No, you take it.”

  It was just a stupid quarter. This woman needed more than that to get her out of a bind. But even if Rico reached into his pocket and gave her the money she needed, it wouldn’t repair what was broken in her. It would only oil the machine for a little while until the rust of addiction would clog the gears once again. Only the machine would have worn a bit further, threatening a final break down. There was simply nothing he could do to save her. In fact, if he gave her the money now, she might overdose and die because of his sympathy. He had to be stronger than that; a bitter lesson he had learned from his past. This time when he turned and left he wouldn’t have second thoughts.

  “You don’t know what you’re missing,” she called out.

  Rico gave a dismissing wave in the air, not bothering to look over his shoulder as he briskly walked away.

  Despite his disdain for the woman’s profession, he couldn’t help but wonder why she was h
anging outside this motel. It was basically in the middle of nowhere. Surely, she was smart enough to realize there was more money to be made in bigger cities. He knew that was a bad way to look at it, but it was true just the same.

  “Name’s June Melon,” he faintly heard her say. “In case you change your mind.”

  I’m sure for the right price I can call you whatever I want, Rico thought as he rounded the corner and headed back to his room.

  Chapter 7

  Either he had moved enough fresh air into the room, or his olfactory nerves had fried enough that the horrible stench no longer bothered him. The comforter must have weighed thirty pounds and was too warm to cover with. The sheets, at least, were clean, but felt like they were made from a grade of cotton slightly softer than burlap. He layered two of the flat pillows to get his head at a comfortable angle, and after a few minutes of squirming around on the mattress, he finally settled in. Rico wondered if the mattress was stuffed with chicken feathers.

  A million thoughts swirled through his mind as his eyes shut. The past and the future posed questions he hoped to have answers for soon. Sleep edged in like a drug, extinguishing the tiny fires of turmoil one by one, easing the officer into its warm embrace.

  Bam! Bam! Bam!

  The dream began as a nightmare, just as it had done countless times before. He was at Pop’s bar that fateful night—aiming the gun at the target. Something was different about it. He lifted his gaze from the barrel sight. The bullets had found their mark, but it wasn’t one of the walking dead taking them in the chest and face. It was his mother.

  This just couldn’t be! His mother wasn’t there that night. He rubbed his eyes—praying she would be replaced by the undead—but she remained.

  But this wasn’t her. Not his real mother. Something inside told him so. He aimed the gun again. She stared back. Her eyes told him she was scared and asked why her own son would raise a hand to take her life. She had always loved him and supported him. Why this?

  Bam! Bam! Bam!

  The body collapsed to the floor with arms splayed wide. She was dead, and he had killed her. However, when he stepped over and looked down at her unmoving corpse, her face no longer looked back. The dream returned to the familiar scene. A rotting, stinking corpse who had come to life had died a second time.

  Rico’s eyes opened before the dream finished. The A/C fan hummed in the background, and he tried to focus on the unfamiliar objects in the room to get his bearings.

  Feeling miserable, he wondered how long it would be before the nightmares would stop. How many others suffered like him? What else was floating around in the universe, biding its time until finding Mother Earth to infect? It was one thing to fear the horrors of war perpetrated by men. At least both sides had a fighting chance. How would man fare against a much nastier alien invasion? The possible scenarios were endless.

  He tried to shake his thoughts away from the unknown. In the dark, his imagination only made the monsters larger. His mother had disrupted his dream. Was she okay?

  His mother had been on medication for the past several years to treat her dementia. The pills didn’t cure anything but did help make her life manageable. Still, his dad had grown too old to take care of her by himself. She had been in a nursing home for over a year now. Contact with the outside world was near nonexistent. The television in her room stayed on the Animal Channel, so she had been completely isolated from the events of The Spook. The regimented lifestyle of the home suited her well. Wake up, eat breakfast, go to craft class, eat lunch, play bingo, take nap, eat supper, and then down enough drugs to keep her asleep until morning.

  Thoughts of his mom shifted to a time when he was a teenager in high school. Back when he was chubby from overeating. Back before he had gotten in shape to join the Coast Guard.

  Pete Knoles had been the biggest bully on campus. Rico always wondered what made him tick. Pete picked on everyone—even football players who were bigger than he was. His presence exuded an aura of intimidation.

  Rico didn’t escape Pete’s evil eye. In fact, Pete never missed an opportunity to make fun of his weight if he were in sight. After Rico returned to Killeen from his four years in the Coast Guard, he had never seen Pete again until the day after The Spook. Pete had met with some bullies much tougher than him. The guy who dished it out the most finally met his match.

  Rico remembered a time when Pete had him on the ground:

  “Leave me alone, Pete. I didn’t do it.”

  “I don’t care if you didn’t do it, Rico the geek’o!”

  Rico was 15 years old. Pimples and braces all over again. He was just outside the gym by the soccer field. His jeans were covered in grass stains. Pete put on a show as his classmates gathered around.

  “I swear I didn’t do it.”

  “Somebody took my Little Debbie Zebra Cake from my locker. And the only person it could be was you, you fat fuck!”

  Pete kicked Rico in the chest, leaving a shoe print on his striped shirt.

  Most of the other kids laughed, something Rico never understood. There was nothing funny about violence. As Rico gazed around for help, there wasn’t one sign of sympathy in his classmates’ expressions. He wanted to cry but willed himself not to. Not in front of everyone.

  Pete started making piggy grunts, which made most of the other kids join in. The event was one of the most humiliating of his life.

  “Rico the geek’o ate my Little Debbie cake. You’d eat the whole world if someone let you.”

  But that had happened years ago. And it proved to be a pivotal point in his life. From then on, Rico made a conscious effort to limit how much food he ate while in high school. The void he had been trying to fill with empty calories for momentary pleasure was overshadowed by his desire for respect. Mostly the desire for self-respect.

  And what of Pete? Despite every negative thing Rico could think about the man, he would have relived Pete’s abuse over and over again if it meant Pete wouldn’t have died the way he did.

  Rico had taken a statement from an eyewitness to how he met his death. Pete had come back to Killeen to visit a few of his buddies on April 1st. They were smoking outside a bar when one of the walking dead approached him. Despite the amount of blows he threw into the thing, it never went down. When more zombies showed up, his friends scattered. Pete only got more pissed off, and vowed to ‘Fuck them all up.’ That had turned out to be the worst—and last— decision Pete made in his life.

  The ghouls that overwhelmed him didn’t bring a quick death. They went for the arms and legs first. Pete had screamed until he was hoarse. When EMS collected the remains of the body, the only thing identifiable was a tattoo on a chunk of flesh.

  Rico watched the ceiling fan slowly spin overhead. The moonlight leaked into his room past the curtains, casting distorted shadows on the wall, just as the past leaked into his mind, distorting the hope he held for the future.

  Was he being selfish? Was he guilty of deluding himself that there was actually a new salvation that awaited him somewhere else?

  Maybe I should just go back home—spend some time with Mom, he thought, knowing her days were near the end. I could try to heal the gap between Dad and me too.

  Too many questions and second guessing finally tired him to the point where he fell asleep again.

  When he became aware in the nightmare, he was aiming down the barrel of his pistol. This time, the target was Pete, the school bully. Pete was no longer a teenager, and what remained of him could barely be able to be called a man. Pete was torn to ribbons and covered in blood.

  Rico’s stomach twisted in knots. The killing never got any easier.

  Bam! Bam! Bam!

  *

  A noise startled Rico from his sleep. He felt a bit more rested, but his body ached for more. The ceiling fan blew cool waves of air over his cheeks. The room had no clock, and if he still had his cell phone, he would have used it to check the time. The remote control for the television was on the nightstand. He reache
d for it and pointed it toward the television.

  Before he pushed the ‘on’ button, something bumped hard against the wall.

  That’s just great. How much longer am I going to have to hear the headboard in the next room bang? He wished the guy next door would hurry up and shoot his wad to get it over with. Well, at least she’s not screaming, Oh God! Oh God!

  Then he did hear a scream. It was a female’s voice, but it didn’t come from the other room.

  He sat up in bed, pushing the cobwebs from his mind. The screams came from outside his door, sounding distant. Really? For a place this backwoods, he would have thought the last thing he had to worry about was getting a good night’s sleep.

  “What the hell’s going on?” he said under his breath.

  Rico tossed the sheets aside and stretched his tired muscles when he stood. Hopefully someone had just arrived drunk and was still in a partying mood. He certainly didn’t want to deal with any shit going down tonight.

  Rico was at the window pushing back the curtains when he heard the screams again. Fortunately, the moonlight was bright enough to fill in the areas between the anemic street and parking lot lights.

  Nothing unusual was going on out front. His bike was right where he left it, as were the other vehicles he parked next to when he arrived. However, there were more cars parked by the road than he remembered. He must have slept harder than he thought not to be bothered by the rumble of engines and headlights flashing through his window.

  A mini-van was parked behind his bike. Beside that was a nice vintage Corvette. Whoever had decided to stop for the night in such a fine car was probably lost.

  He looked over at the gas pumps. An older white Ford pickup set at pump number 2. For some reason the truck’s hazard lights were on. There was no one at the pump, and the gas station didn’t appear to be open. Maybe that’s how this motel made its business. If a motorist found themselves in the middle of nowhere and the only gas station for miles is closed, they just stayed for the night until the pump opened. Not a bad racket.