by Mark Clodi
The lead girl was fast approaching the cube entrance, 'This is it.' thought Max. He ran up behind one of the three girls between him and the three zombies in the lead and swung the metal garbage can over his head, it made a resounding thud and the zombie girl dropped like a sack of cement.
When he was a kid, Max, like most of his generation, had watched cartoons. He was reminded of one in particular where the character would swing his guitar at his foes, making a grand ‘El-ka-bong’ noise as he struck them down. It was hilarious, the trash can, filled halfway, made the same noise as it smashed the zombie girl down.
A nice side effect of the strike was the loudness of the noise, Max had meant to scream out a primitive war cry, but somehow it came out as a faint gurgled squeal, definitely not the noise to wake the whole office as he hoped. The 'el-ka-bong', however, woke them all up effectively. As Max was readying a blow against one of the other girls, he heard Stewart screaming, “Get the fuck off me Steve! Get the shotgun, you Tom, you! Oh for fuck’s sake!” followed by the sound of her nine millimeter gun discharging, the girl, V, came reeling out of the cube opening and the third zombie, pushed her and the second girl past the opening into Kirkpatrick’s reception.
Max pushed forward into the second girl, who still hadn’t quite figured out just what was going on, she was slow, slower than the three women in the lead and dressed pretty nicely too, in a blouse and mini skirt Max could have admired on a living body, that thought led to revulsion and he pushed her all the harder forward, screaming, “Stewart I am behind them, there are five or six left!”
That got the two girl’s attention, they turned on Max like slavering beasts and his all out charge abruptly ended, at least he had the trash can between him and them, even if he could not raise it over his head to whack them, he could use it as a lousy shield to keep them a whopping eight inches away from his fleshy parts.
Stewart appeared behind the girls and Max ducked, mini skirt girl number one suffered what was probably her second fatal wound in the last twenty four hours as the back of her head was forced through the front of her face. Then Max saw one of the faster moving zombies jump Stewart from behind, after that he was busy dealing with mini-skirt zombie number two or was it number three? She was strong and Max had already been through a lot that day, she jumped up on him and her momentum, if not her mass, knocked him over onto his back. A shot gun blast echoed in the confined space of the office, but Max’s girl kept on coming. He tried to flip her over using an old high school move from his wrestling days. He had a moment to reflect that he never thought that wrestling would come in handy, but hey, just goes to show that everything you learn has a proper application.
The mini-skirted girl went flying, a testament to Coach Julian’s training and the laws of physics. Once again Max was up and on his feet. He reached down and grabbed his trash bin as another shotgun blast echoed in the hallway. Stewart was screaming something, Steve was screaming and even Tom was yelling as he pumped the shotgun for a third shot. The zombie on Stewart, V? No the other one, Max thought, had taken a gut shot from the side and was struggling to rise to her feet, she appeared to be watching Tom and while this was distracting Max the girl he was fighting took the opportunity to rush him. He bashed her with the trash can, maybe breaking her arm, probably not, it was not a good enough shot, it did make her scramble around defensively, it was enough that Max was no longer on the defense and he swung the trash can around and around trying to keep her at bay. The shotgun went off again and Max heard Stewart say, “For fuck’s sake Tom shoot her in the head!”
By this time the cries started coming from Kirkpatrick’s office, the door was shut and the screams were something Max knew he would never forget. Stewart was back on her feet and yelling more at Tom, then came to stand by Max, pointing her pistol at the mini-skirt girl number three, who promptly ducked into an open cube, Stewart did not fire, but turned and took three steps up to Steve, saying, “Gimme that!”, as she jerked her secondary pistol out of his hands, she held it up in front of his face and said, “Safety! Off!” While sliding the safety to the off position, then handed the gun back and said, “Now go make yourself useful while I track down Max’s new girl friend. Tom, go clean up the mess in the office, save who you can.”
Max and Stewart headed to the open cube when Max saw the girl climb over the walls to the next cube down the row, then the next, Stewart took a shot at her when she was making the second jump, and Max thought she had winged her, but the girl kept going, a few steps further and Tom was calling out, “Stewart! Is this a five shot or three shot? I think I am out!” The door to Kirkpatrick’s office opened and Tom immediately fired towards the head of whomever was there, yelling “Fooled ya! You dumb fuck!” the body toppled backward and the door was slammed shut again. Tom fired through it near where a woman’s head might be and leaned over to Steve and quietly said, “I am out, I gotta reload, they open the door you hold em off with that little twenty five.”
Meanwhile seeing the zombie girl fleeing back towards the stairs, Stewart said to Max, “She is running, we gotta go help the others if we can. C’mon.” Max followed her as she reversed course and headed back to the reception area. Tom was reloading shells into the bottom of the shotgun and Steve was watching the door. Occasionally a head would peek through the opening of the door, but Steve did not fire at it. The screaming had turned to groaning inside the office. Max heard a woman’s voice call out, “Throw down your weapons, and you won’t be hurt!” from inside the office.
Stewart replied, “Hell no honey, you just step out here and we will end your unnatural life for you. Nice and quick.”
Laughter greeted her words, “Not a chance, sweetheart! Max you out there?”
“Yeah, who am I talking to?”
“So you survived so far, eh Max? That guy Steve too? Better than I would have thought, or was it just luck so far?”
“Who the fuck are you?” Max called back.
“Oh just little ole Nancy, you remember me, right? Marketing.”
“Yeah, yeah, you tried to take a bite out of me yesterday, how could I forget?”
“Bingo, Maxo! Right in one, you guys gonna blow or end up like the other norms in here?”
“Let them go Nancy, let them go, I know you can, you don’t need them!”
“Oh but I do need them Max, oh but I do. This is powerful Max, like meth to an ice-head, only worse. I can’t give you back your buddies, they are all dead, my crew got a little too ‘over-zealous’, there was one still alive before your friend did that very naughty trick with the shotgun. So it is his fault she died, what a bad man he is!”
Tom looked sick in the pale light, but Stewart was quick to say, “Tom, they were probably dead anyway, you heard her, ‘meth to an ice-head’.” Then to the others she asked, “Do we believe her or blow this joint? We have at least one behind us and what if they left a door open somewhere when they came in?”
“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck. I don’t know if she is telling the truth, maybe they have hostages?”stated Max. Calling out he said, “Nancy, prop open the door so we can see if you have any others still alive in there!”
“Oh Maxy, that is just a ploy to try and blow my fucking head off, and you know it! I would rather you came in after them, it will make my job easier if it comes to fighting.”
“Fuck, don’t believe that bitch Max, she was in marketing!” whispered Steve.
“I know, I know, I know. How can we leave if there is a chance any of them are still alive? I know Dave is dead, and it does not look too good for Walt either, but all the others? I mean could they kill that many people that quickly?”
“They were sleepy Max, it wouldn't have been much of a fight. We gotta decide man, the door behind us could be wide open.” said Stewart.
“Fuck, why do I have to decide?” complained Max
Stewart just looked at him, as if reading the hopelessness on his face, then said, “We leave. Now. It is not worth one of us getting chowed by fucking superwo
man zombie in there. Lets go.”
Max just looked at Stewart, noting that no one was actually leaving yet, not even Stewart, then chocked out, “Not worth the risk, lets go.” Feeling a strange mix of relief and cowardice at the same time.
With that they started easing backward, Stewart made Tom give her the reloaded shot gun and whispered to him to lead the group back towards the stairway, to watch out for the girl who got away, and that she was going to try to take a shot at the woman in the office, by waiting for fifteen or twenty seconds after everyone else had gone out of sight. Stewart hid in a crouched position in the cube opening and aimed the shot gun at the hole in the door. In the poor light she was pretty hard to see and Maxed wished Nancy a violent, sudden end as he backed off towards the stairs. About halfway down towards the stairs they came across a lot of blood, but no body of Dave, the other 'naughty night pisser' whose blood they assumed it was. No zombie girl and no Jimbo either. Max warned the others that he had seen a male zombie run off this way too, and that Dave was now possibly a third zombie they would have to deal with.
“Shit this just gets better and better. How long do we wait for Stewart before we go back?” asked Steve.
“About three minutes or if we hear anything.” replied Max. They waited in grim silence waiting, for anything. After about two minutes Stewart came down the hallway to them, she was coated in blood, and smelled like road kill that had been laying in the hot sun. Noticing Max’s wrinkled nose she shrugged, “You have been worse, in fact you are not all that clean now, but I wasn’t bit, you weren’t either, right?” Max shook his head ‘no’, Stewart shrugged and continued, “So everything will be okay.”
“Not for the rest of the crew in the office.” said Tom
They all turned to look at him, and one by one, gave him a ‘what can we do?’ sort of look. “I think they were all dead already.” said Steve, “Lets get to the cars and get out of here.”
Chapter 21
They were not all dead.
From Nancy’s point of view the raid went far worse than expected, she had lost a couple of girls, and Jim, no real loss, for the gain of what? A meal? And the need to build her gang back up? And no fucking Fred. This was it, no more “Mrs fucking nice zombie gal”as soon as possible she was going to get her hands on some guns and learn, the hard way if necessary, how to shoot them.
The next time she ran into some police or hillbillies she would be prepared. Hell, where could she get bullet proof vests? She watched through the doorway as the one they called Stewart slowly departed. Obviously the living did not know she could see them with a sort of zombie vision that did not require light, and just as obviously they had been hoping she would stick her head out to a more favorable location, like where it could get blown off.
'Fucking Jimbo, what the hell happened to him? Max must have brained him, but where did Max come from? It is an office' Nancy rationalized 'he could have been hiding anywhere.' Something nagged at her thoughts, how could Max have sprinted up the corridor to bash them? That was it! He bashed in one of the girl’s heads with a trash can, like the kind you find in a bathroom.
Nancy waited until she heard the last woman enter the stairwell, then nodded towards V. “You got these under control V?” nodding towards an older woman, Kirkpatrick’s young secretary and a middle aged man who were all that was left of what Nancy thought of as her ‘Pantry’. Veronica, definitely worse for the wear, nodded back slowly and carefully her eyes never leaving the food.
“Okay, I will tell you what V, you can eat the first one of them who gives you ANY trouble, got it?” Turning towards the food, she repeated her question, “YOU got it?”they all nodded ‘yes’ vigorously.
Nancy slipped out the door towards the hallway. She was surprised to find Julie was not dead. The poor dear had been feigning her second death, lying like a slug with a bad head wound and most of her torso blow away in the office behind the desk. Nancy pulled her into the office and soothed her, saying, “I know it hurts Julie, I know, shhhh, shhh, it will be okay, you just rest up here. I will be back soon and we will decide what to do.”
Again Nancy made her way towards the bathroom, again she was brought up short, another girl was crawling out of the cubicles near the stairwell door! The second of the trio of girls, whom Nancy had expected to have been killed, was also alive and in good shape! 'Well, maybe this raid did not go so badly after all!' she thought to herself. 'Time to name this one I guess.' She mumbled to herself, “You! I never learned your name, Julie was ‘Gap Girl’, what do you want to be called? Old name or a new one? C’mon, I got things to do girl!”
The zombie stammered out, “I wa-was Julie too.”
“Oh of all the damn luck! Well ‘Julie too’ I can’t have two Julies running around and the original hardly likes ‘Gap Girl’ as a name, it is more of a title, what is your second choice?”
“Um-um, Trish? My old middle. Name.” said Julie who was now Trish.
“Fair enough Trish, you hide in this cube and keep your eyes out for anyone coming back from the stairwell and your ears on any sounds coming from the office. If you hear anything from the office bang on the bathroom door as you go by and run help sister Julie, got that? Otherwise, just yell for help and keep your head down?”
Trish, nodded yes and Nancy bent over in the hallway and picked up a dented trash can that was not too far from what Nancy suspected was her only casualty of this raid. Dented and gooey from hitting her gal, she walked the bin back into the men’s room. Sure enough the one there was missing. Not positive evidence, but goddamn good enough for Nancy. “Jimbo you lying sack of shit, you better hope someone else finds you before I do, ‘cause I am not going to be nice if we meet again.”
Nancy headed back to the hallway gathered up Trish and they both went back into the office with the others. Looking the situation over Nancy knew she had to do something about or for Julie, she would not leave her there handicapped, so it was time for healing or for finishing her off. Which one of the three left got to get eaten to see if they could stimulate Julie’s healing powers? Ah, a volunteer! The younger woman’s hand raised into the air tentatively, ‘This is great’, thought Nancy, ‘If only all the food would be so co-operative!’ Out loud she asked, “Yes?”as she pointed to the girl.
“I…I, gotta go pee, please! I really gotta go bad.”
“V, you up to taking the food into the bathroom for a quick pee and then bringing her back?”
Veronica nodded ‘yes’. “Good.”said Nancy, “Oh and bring the old woman too, you might as well get them both relieved at the same time.”
When they had filed out of the office Nancy turned back towards the remaining man. ‘I guess I was right, a choice was made.’
In the bathroom Veronica took up a position just outside the door while Amelia and Diane went into their stalls. Amelia knew she was dead, and that any chance of splitting the group watching them made the odds better than standing in the office waiting to be eaten or converted to a zombie. Kirkpatrick’s office was a dead end and she would have had to get past all the zombies if she had tried anything a few minutes ago. Now she only had to get past one zombie. As Amelia had hoped Nancy sent Veronica to watch them, she seemed to trust Veronica more. Nancy didn’t seem to notice how badly injured Veronica was, the shotgun blast had almost decapitated her and she could barely limp along, though she did seem more intelligent than the others under Nancy’s control. Now how to plan something with Diane?
“Diane.” she whispered, “Diane, if we go back into that office we are dead, we have to make a break when we get into the hallway, just run for the stairs, okay?”
“I…I can’t Amelia, I can’t run for long. Asthma. I will try, it is our best shot, I know, I am afraid Amelia, so scared I can’t hardly move. Do you really think they will kill us?”
As if in answer to that question, they heard a man screaming from Kirkpatrick’s office, loudly and in great pain. Amelia jumped up and hissed, “Now! Now while the noise may d
istract the other one!”
They rushed out of the bathroom doorway, Amelia clutching a wooden handled toilet plunger in her hand as they tried to make their escape.
Chapter 22
Jimbo was happier than he had been since coming back from the dead, finally away from that bitch Nancy he could be his own man. He had been maintaining a charade of ignorance and slowness since his last meal, when he had sneaked a bit more of the meal than Nancy had suspected. He thought he was thinking as clearly as he had before he died and even if his body was still slower than before death it was his mind that mattered with a good mind he could lay plans for his liberation and everything worked out well so far. He just had to make absolutely sure he never ran into Nancy again. Ever. That vindictive bitch would make him pay in spades if he were ever at her mercy again. His plan to make sure that never happened would be to form his own gang and eat, and eat and eat, every meal made him stronger and he would eventually gain enough power to no longer be afraid of anyone.
Once he made it out of the building he no longer felt so compelled to stay close to her, compelled to follow her every command like some sort of twisted masochist. Now he could eat when and what he wanted, and as much of the kill as he needed, no more second fiddle to a bunch of tiny bobbing, dressed up skanks. He exited the Mac Co. building and headed into the parking lot, looking to see which direction he could go, preferably towards a suburb somewhere to get himself a snack. Plus the risk was low, liberals didn’t have guns and in this part of town people drove hybrid cars and smoked dope in their back yards. They would pay for that now, it was only right. As he neared the far edge of the parking lot he saw a male zombie shambling around and he got that familiar taint of a feeling again, the one that said, “Come to me.” Nothing he could not break free of, but uncomfortable in it's own way. Could it be? The very man Nancy was looking for?
