by Jason Offutt
“What the hell?”
He looked around for something, anything long enough to push this living dead guy away from the door so he could get inside. A branch. A branch about six feet long and as big around as a salami had fallen atop the Dumpster that sat next to the tree line. Karl moved away from the body and grabbed the branch, breaking off smaller limbs with furious snaps he should be alarmed with, but he didn’t have time to worry about the noise. He had to get inside.
“Sorry, Kelly,” Karl said softly, and pushed the trimmed branch into the side of the bloated, fungus-covered corpse. It didn’t move. “Shit.” Karl pushed harder; Kelly lay still, if not slightly jiggly. Karl shifted the branch to press beneath Kelly’s ribs, and the body moved. Karl smiled and he shoved again, then the branch snapped near the tip, the jagged wood ripped Kelly’s shirt and stabbed into his flabby gut.
“Jesus Christ.”
The branch pulled open the shirt across Kelly’s torso; gray fuzz covered his hairy gut. The lump, a knobby ball on a stem, sprang from the center of Kelly’s chest. It grew from Kelly’s sternum. Holy shit. The sharp end of the branch lurched forward under Karl’s continued pressure, and split Kelly’s skin. A small cloud of yellow spores shot into the air.
Karl dove back dropping the branch, the palms of his hands scraped the pavement as he landed on the weed-choked parking lot; the rifle that hung over his shoulder clanked behind him. “Holy shit,” Karl hissed as the yellow cloud dissipated into the afternoon. Fungus. Fungus was eating this man. What? Karl shot to his feet, ignoring the throbbing pain in his hands. His eyes scanned the parking lot in front of the store, the corpses still under the talons of the great, black, greasy birds. Nothing else moved. His eyes shot back to Kelly. The cloud of spores was gone, but the stem and disco ball growing out of Kelly’s chest moved, throbbed. Karl took a deep breath and ran for the door, leaping over Kelly’s face and landing inside the back room.
Inside the store, the lights were still on, but nobody was home. Stacks of beige boxes loomed around Karl as he walked through the storeroom, looking over his shoulder toward the still open door, the stem and party ball still pointed toward the sky like the devil’s erection. It was going to blow soon, Karl knew, and blow a larger cloud of yellow spores into the wind. What the hell was happening? Karl had never been claustrophobic, but good old Kelly had fixed that.
Near the employee exit sat a small bank of security cameras. Karl paused and watched them flip through their sequence. Nobody in books. Nobody in shoes. Nobody in cosmetics. Nobody in children’s clothes, sporting goods, or automotive. Good. He pushed open the aluminum employee door and walked silently into the world of Wal-Mart and the fuck away from dead, fungusy Kelly. Shattered glass from the gun cabinet littered the floor of the sporting goods department. Somebody else had your idea, Hoss. Just be glad they’re gone. He reached an arm through the shards of glass and felt for boxes of bullets. There were only four left of his caliber.
“Shit,” he whispered. Karl shoved the boxes into his backpack, and pulled it back onto his shoulder. That wasn’t enough. He took a .22-caliber rifle from the cabinet, and slung it over his shoulder as well. He knew the little gun wasn’t powerful enough to take down much, but he couldn’t be picky when that’s all there was. He grabbed as many boxes of .22 cartridges he could stuff into his backpack and left sporting goods.
Karl stayed to the perimeter of the store, trying to keep out of the open, like in zombie movies. Zombies. Could fungus cause zombies? Karl paused for a second. Had I read something about some fungus turning ants into zombies? Fox News? CNN.com? The Daily Show? Where the hell had I heard that? He shook his head. Zombies were in bad movies. There’s no such thing in real life. Besides, these things didn’t act like zombies were supposed to. Not at all.
Glass crunched under Karl’s feet as he walked through the pharmacy, empty white medicine bottles scattered across the floor with each step. People should have raided the pharmacy for painkillers, antibiotics, cholesterol medicine for an America that was still fat after the apocalypse, and birth control pills, but Karl knew those prescription medicines were an afterthought. A red letter on a white banner stretched across the shattered pharmacy window read, “Wal-Mart Has No Ophiocordon: Check Back Monday.” Monday came and went, my friend, Karl thought. No more Ohio-cum-on for you.
The food aisles were near the front, but close. Karl walked through baby clothes, girls’ clothing, then … Clink. Karl froze. Something hard and plastic had hit the store’s tiled floor; he knew he wasn’t alone. Another clink. Someone was in women’s clothing. He crossed the aisle into the men’s section and ducked behind a rack of men's shirts, half-off.
“La, la, la, I’m ready for love ...” danced shakily through the air. Karl looked around a teal golf shirt that hung from his hiding place. A woman, maybe 21, stood in front of a mirror, her long auburn hair hung to the middle of her back. Karl’s heart thundered in his chest. The woman stood not 20 feet away, she breathed, she walked, she sang. She didn’t cough, she didn’t bleed, she didn’t die, she didn’t sport a big ball of fungus on a stick out of her sternum. She was okay. Karl suddenly realized he held his breath.
The girl spun, looking at her reflection in each pane of the three-way mirror and Karl saw her face – she was plain, like teachers he’d had in high school, but in the empty land of the Outbreak, you couldn’t be too choosy. Besides, she might be pretty if she tried. But what in the hell was she doing? The girl smiled at herself in the mirror, unzipped the peach sundress she wore and let it fall to a pile at her feet. Karl almost gasped. The girl stood naked, admiring herself in the mirror before she plucked another dress from a rack and held it in front of her. Good Christ, the world’s come to an end and she’s trying on clothes. She dropped the plastic hanger to the floor (clink) as she slipped into a hot pink mini. Karl stood slowly on wobbly legs.
“Hello,” he said unevenly. “Don’t be afra ...” The girl spun to face Karl and screamed. “I’m not going to hurt you,” Karl said.
She stood, clutching the front of the hot pink dress, her eyes wide, green; her freckled face, framed by flaming red hair, pinched with terror. Karl stepped from behind the clothes rack and gently laid both rifles on the floor.
“I don’t know what you’ve been through,” he said softly, and slowly stood again, his hands held open to her. “But if it’s how I’ve spent the past month, I’d be scared, too.” He took a step forward. She didn’t move. “My name’s Karl. What’s yours?”
Karl thought for a moment she might run, but she didn’t. She released the front of her dress and let her arms drop. Hmm, front’s not much better than the back, but still, not bad. “Jenna,” she said flatly. Karl pulled at the collar of his red flannel shirt. It had gotten hot in the store.
“Jenna,” he said. “I’m happy to meet you. I haven’t talked to another human being for weeks. I’m ...”
“Do you have the, the thing?” she asked, panic starting to rise in her voice. “The Outbreak. You don’t have the Outbreak, do you?”
Karl shook his head; Kelly’s gray, fuzzy body growing with fungus loomed before him. He shook his head again, trying to dislodge the lump wedging open the back door.
“No. I don’t. I was around people when the Outbreak started and they died. I didn’t. I don’t think it wants me.” He paused for a second, and looked at Jenna’s freckled, frightened face. “Have you been living here?” he asked. Jenna nodded. “The people still around, some have gone kinda crazy. I see that some of them broke in here to take things,” he said. “Don’t mind me asking this, but how come you’re alive?”
She looked down from Karl’s gaze, and pulled on the dress she’d dropped. “I, I found a place they didn’t look for. I stayed there until they were gone.”
“I’m sorry,” Karl said. “But they’re not gone. They’re out there. There aren’t as many people as there used to be, but there are still some.” He took a step forward. “I’m going to head north to Kansas City. There
’s supposed to be a shelter there, and it’s supposed to be safe.”
She looked at him, her eyes heavy with fear. “I don’t want to go out there.”
Karl forced a smile. “Look, Jenna, you can’t stay here forever. Eventually the electricity will shut down. The water will shut off. The food will spoil. And more people will come. You don’t have to say yes, but I wish you would. Would you come with me?”
Karl looked at her for a moment, drinking in the sadness from her face. He wondered about her family, her friends. He wondered if she’d watched them die. He held out his hand to her. Jenna slowly took it; her touch was warm, soft. Karl’s arm quivered slightly as he held her graceful fingers.
“Great,” he said. Karl picked up his rifles and walked toward the front of the store. “First, we’ve got to get you into a pair of jeans and some hiking boots.” Jenna stopped.
“No,” she said, and pulled her hand out of his.
Karl turned to look at her. “Why?”
“Because,” she said, running the palms of her hands gently over the fabric covering her stomach. “This looks really good on me.”
Are you fucking serious? “Fine,” he said and turned. Jenna followed him like a puppy. “We need food that’s light and won’t spoil,” he said, walking through the food aisles. He stuffed the remaining space of his backpack with stick after stick of beef jerky, and packages of dried fruit. “I’ve killed some rabbits out in the woods, but it makes too much noise. I’m trying not to let anyone know where I am.” Jenna nodded as he spoke, eating Cap’n Crunch out of the box.
“Can we take these?” she asked holding three cereal boxes.
“It’s not very efficient,” he said.
“But I like it.”
Karl grinned again. He couldn’t help it. “Okay, but you get to carry them, unless we can find a car or truck, then you can have as much Cap’n Crunch as you want.”
She grabbed six boxes. “My car’s in the parking lot.”
“You have a car?” he spat, the words louder than he intended. A grin split his face. “Then, lady, we’re in business.”
Jenna giggled in front of Karl for the first time sending pangs of tension raking through his mind. Man, that giggle’s going to get on my nerves.
July 4: Allenville, Missouri
Chapter 7
Son of a bitch. July 4. Craig was a patriotic man, as patriotic as they come, by God, but as he looked at the Jeff Foxworthy “You Might Be a Redneck if …” tear-off calendar on his kitchen counter (today’s was “… your bumper has more stickers than a NASCAR race”), he knew July 4 in this town meant the Block Party. The night when everyone sat in his yard, breathed his air, and plotted his death. Bastards. Craig wished all his neighbors were dead. Maybe they were. It had been pretty quiet the past week or so. Only Posey was around to bitch at him, shouting from across the yard. The old man had gotten clever though, bold. He and his fat wife sat on their front porch night after night in their canvas Kansas City Chiefs lawn chairs, staring at him when Craig knew Posey should have been inside the house watching The Weather Channel. Or maybe The Weather Channel routine was just a ruse to lull Craig into believing this psychotic mastermind was just an amiable old fart who gave a damn about the rainfall in Jacksonville.
“I’m not fooled by your shit, Posey,” Craig said aloud. It was one thing to say something aloud in the yard because the insane old man had the voodoo about him, but inside the safety of Craig’s house, he could say whatever he wanted. And he did. When he reached inside the refrigerator to grab his morning Budweiser, it wasn’t there.
“I gotta go to the goddamned store,” Craig spat. The closest beer was at the grocery store, and Craig hated going to the grocery store anytime but between 2 and 4 a.m. when Posey’s TV was off and he felt safe. Any other time there were people at the store who wanted to talk with him. People who said things like, “Isn’t it a beautiful day?” or, “Hey, McAllister. How’s it goin’?” Why, it’s goin’ fine. And no, it’s not a beautiful day. The sun’s so bright I can see your fuck-ugly face, asshole. Between 2 and 4 a.m., the grocery store was different; filled with aisle after aisle of food, and that was it. No people but the occasional drunken college kid buying frozen pizzas, or the lone weirdo buying his groceries for the week. Craig knew that was usually him. He didn’t care.
The bedroom window on the north side of Craig’s house slid open and he slipped out, dropping onto the neatly trimmed grass. As he hit the ground, a smell brushed his nose. There was a fire somewhere; something was cooking. Craig hadn’t always crawled in and out of the window of his own house. Just since he realized Posey was out there watching him, plotting, that Craig knew he had to be all secret agent when he came and went. The old man couldn’t see this side of the house, and if he couldn’t see it, he couldn’t see Craig. If he couldn’t see Craig, he couldn’t fuck with his head. Craig pulled the window shut, unlocked his pickup and stepped in. The old Toyota fired up softly and Craig backed it slowly into the street, Posey’s house crawled inch by inch into his view.
“I hope you’re planning on running that rust bucket into a tree?” Posey hollered as Craig reached the end of his drive and backed into the street, the man sat still in his chair. Craig cranked the wheel then straightened it, popped the clutch into first gear and gunned it away from Posey’s house. “And take off that damned seat belt,” Posey screamed as Craig tore down the street. “I’d hate for you not to kiss the safety glass. If you hit it just right, it’ll taste like brains.” The street dipped halfway down the block and Posey was gone from Craig’s head.
Old, deciduous trees hung over the streets of Allenville like the scene from a Bing Crosby movie. There might as well have been a parade, and a song as middle-America-1940s as this place was. Where were the people? Craig wondered. There were always some damned thirty or forty-year-old women trying to care what they looked like power walking up and down the streets, but not today. Where were the cars? Where were the kids playing in yards? It was a Saturday morning, for Christ’s sake; Jeff Foxworthy told him so. Craig pulled his pickup onto Main Street, not bothering to do more than pause at the stop sign. Why bother? Nothing but birds moved in this town. Hmm. There seemed to be a lot of them circling in the sky near the grocery store. And was that where the smoke came from? Wonder what’s going on? The sweet, barbecue smell grew stronger as he drove. Maybe the Block Party was going to be somewhere new this year.
Then he saw the bodies. The first one was at Sonic, splayed over the pavement like it was taking an uncomfortable nap. He pushed hard on the brake pedal, sending the Toyota into a squealing halt. The body was that of a carhop, maybe 18. Hell, they were all maybe 18. She lay on the pavement of the empty drive-in restaurant, her right hand still gripped the lip of a tray; the soda, burger and fries it once held spilled from her fall a day before, maybe two. Craig looked hard toward the girl, her skin was gray and fuzzy, and what was wrong with her chest? Did she have a tumor or something? Conjoined twin, maybe? What the fuck was between her boobs? Posey. The old man’s killing everybody one at a time. Craig’s chest grew tight as he stared at the dead girl. Bastard’s going to kill us all. His eyes shot from the dead girl toward the surrounding stores. The few cars sat idle in the parking lot. No lights shone from inside the big, blocky Budget Barn store, or from the neon outside. No movement. Wait. Something moved near the edge of a Volkswagen Beetle. Craig put the truck into first gear and crept forward. Another body lay on the sidewalk between the Beetle and Trimmed Locks Salon and Spa, fuckin’ Herbie probably smiling at the kill. Then Craig saw the movement – a turkey vulture tore at the face of a woman in a power business dress. A stalk with a knobby ball at the end rose from her chest. He punched the gas pedal, shifted into second gear, and tore down Main Street.
Craig had seen death before. Construction jobs begged accidents. So did drunken car wrecks. He’d never caused either, but he’d been around when they happened. Nothing short of war could have prepared him for the grocery store. He
pulled the pickup into the store parking lot and stopped, his breath pulled away by the sheer volume of shit. A pile of human bodies, as tall as the darkened Burger King next to it, sat smoldering, the blackened human remains stacked like firewood. Two fire trucks and an ambulance sat quiet in a ring outside the dying human bonfire. Craig pulled a red handkerchief out of his back pocket and tied it across his nose and mouth, then slowly drove around the pile. There was no life here, only death. Three firemen and an EMT lay on the gray pavement in puddles of their own blood, stalks of something, what was that? Mushrooms? grew from their bodies. What was happening here? He pulled next to one of the fire trucks, stopped his Toyota and got out, gagging at the oddly sweet stench of burning bodies.
The fire, which had probably burned for days, was now a blackened, smoldering hell; seared, fleshless skulls grinned into the sky. The firemen had tended the fire (for Posey), Craig realized. But what killed them? What killed all these people? Staring at the mass of smoking remains, Craig resisted the urge to grab a pole off the fire truck and poke the pile. Something had happened in town, something bad, something maybe even biblical. Why hadn’t it happened to him? He grabbed an ax off the truck, its steel head heavy in his hand. He still had to go grocery shopping and didn’t know what to do if he met anybody. He slid the ax into the front seat next to him, drove the Toyota to the front door of the store, and got out.
Florescent lights bathed Craig with shadowless light when he stepped through the automatic doors and into the store. He stood just inside the store silently; his fingers gripped the ax handle tightly. Music didn’t play from the store’s speakers; the greeter wasn’t there to welcome him. Craig saw no shoppers, no employees, just a mess. Boxes littered the floor, many ripped open, their contents of cookies and uncooked pasta scattered everywhere. There must have been a fight here. People making a run on the grocery store. Damn. A cough. Craig’s fingers tightened their grip on the ax handle at the sound of the cough. He wasn’t alone. He walked toward the sound, careful not to step on something that might crunch. The canned meat aisle was mostly empty, a few cans of potted meat and chunk chicken still on the shelves. Canned vegetables and condiments were picked pretty clean, as well. The Mexican food section was also stripped bare. Well, Beaners in town get hungry, too. Craig stepped slowly into the wide produce and meat aisle, the refrigerated sections and rows and rows of fresh fruits and vegetables still stocked with meat and produce. Maybe the looters were thinking of the future, not the present. Then he saw the man. A man in a trench coat, his arms and pockets stuffed with packaged meat, stood, struggling to pick up a bag of bright, red apples in his already filled hands. The man saw Craig, the bag of apples dropped to the floor.
