Jack Zombie (Book 5): Dead End

by Flint Maxwell

  Tim comes down almost as soon as I land, leaving Norm up there to linger, staring down at us with his hands on his hips. I think he’s beyond scared. He’s not even cracking jokes.

  “Come on, Norman,” Tim says. The way he says it reminds me of a strict parent. Norm lets out a deep breath, closes his eyes then opens them slowly. Eventually, he starts to make his way down.

  We go to the door. No light spills out from inside. It is noticeably cooler. I sweep the right while Abby sweeps the left and Norm and Tim watch our backs.

  Nothing.

  Tim and Norm file in. Tim pulls out a keychain flashlight. I’m grateful for it.

  We are in the corridors beyond the mall, the spaces for the stock rooms — employees only. The walls are brown and stained with splotchy paint and scuff marks from stock carts. The floors are stone, chipped — the color of weathered grave markers.

  Directly in front of us is a door that reads POPCORN PALACE DELIVERY. Next to it is a Finish Line and an Express clothing store stock room. All the doors are shut, blacker blackness seeping out from beneath them.

  We walk on down the corridor passing Starbucks’ and Auntie Ann’s Pretzels’ rooms, then take a right. To the right, the corridor stretches about a five hundred feet. Doors on the left, fuse boxes on the right.

  The air is warmer here. I feel my blood rushing, pulse thundering. Norm’s breathing is hitched. Tim’s teeth chatter. The only one who seems to have some semblance of calmness is Abby. She walks like the gunslinger she is. I’m proud of her.

  Halfway down this new corridor we come upon a pair of dead legs and a waist. Where the top half is, I don’t know. It’s so old and rotted that it almost doesn’t smell…almost. Blood stains the walls near here as if a great battle was fought.

  “I think I’m gonna be sick again,” Tim says.

  I hear Norm patting him on the back and Tim gulping down whatever is making its way back up. As we pass the legs, I cover my mouth and nose because the air around them is so sharp, I’m liable to have a coughing fit.

  I step over its gray Reeboks and head for the double doors in the distance that surely lead out into the mall’s main walkway.

  From behind us, a low moaning echoes outside.

  We all snap our heads in the direction of the noise.

  “Zombies,” Norm says. He’s right. That guttural death rattling could be nothing else. At least we have the dumpsters blocking us off from the parking lot and the hole in the fences. But I’d give up those barriers if it meant being reunited with Darlene and Cupcake. Plus, the front doors aren’t going to hold up for long. Sandbags aren’t tons of metal. Sandbags topple over when enough force is pressed against them. I shudder, not wanting to think about that or zombies or anything living that should be dead, like Walter and the rest of his red robed douchebags.

  “Always is,” Abby whispers.

  I turn back toward the door, make sure the safety is flipped off my pistol, and say, “Let’s go.”

  78

  By the time I reach the double doors, I hear another voice. It’s soft whimpering. It comes from the shadows outside. I lean forward and peek through the crack. I see an abandoned kiosk that used to sell phone cases or something.

  I don’t see the source of the whimpers, but I know them even without ever hearing Cupcake whimper like this before. My muscles quiver, but my middle goes rigid. I find I’m squeezing my gun hard — any harder and I’m going to contort the sandalwood grip. It’s Cupcake, all right, and those aren’t whimpers of fear, they’re whimpers of pain —

  “What the hell should we do with the mutt?” a man with a gruff voice asks.

  Another person, this one a woman, chortles high and melodic. “Kill it,” she says. “Break its spine.”

  They walk in front of me. The man drags Cupcake by the scruff of his neck. Cupcake freaks out. The whimpers turn into yelps; it hurts my heart just to hear.

  Just as I’m about to burst through the door and kill these two bastards, I feel a clammy hand on my bicep. It’s Norm. He shakes his head and says, “No, let it go.”

  I’m brought back to that summer all those years ago, remembering how I didn’t have any choice in the matter of the original Cupcake’s death, how that damn dog just got sick and died, and how I would’ve done anything in my power to stop it. That Cupcake was old and in pain.

  This one is not. He’s one of the best things besides my family and Darlene worth giving a damn about. I have to save him, even if it is a trap.

  And that’s just what I do.

  I shrug Norm off of me.

  Cupcake’s yelping has bled into almost human-like shrieking — shrieks of pain and anguish, the type of sounds you’d expect a dying man to make.

  Then I kick the door open, faintly aware of Norm’s sigh behind me and the sounds of their clicking weapons over the metal double doors banging off the outside walls.

  The man holding Cupcake by the scruff of the neck looks surprised as all hell. He has a gun on his waist, and he lets go of Cupcake who takes the newfound opportunity to gnash at his hand. The dog goes from cute to Cujo in less than a second. I hear the crunch of bone and punctured flesh clamped between Cupcake’s jaws. Now it’s the man’s turn to shriek.

  But I don’t let him shriek long — I pull the trigger of the big gunslinger gun that once belonged to a nice fella named Zack, and I blow a plate-sized hole in this particular clergymen’s chest.

  The gunshot roars and echoes all throughout the empty mall. There’s about a bucket’s worth of blood. But what really sucks is the fact I can’t see his robe get drenched in the stuff. There’s no contrast here; all the robe does is darken, as if he’s been caught in a rainstorm. It’s a morbid wish, I guess, but at least the son of a bitch is dead.

  Another gun goes off behind me. We outnumber them for now. The woman screams. I turn around to see her catch a bullet in the chest, spin around, and fly into the empty kiosk. Glass breaks with the force of her face smashing the display cases. The sound is horrible, but watching this bitch who said to break my dog’s spine die instead of Cupcake is satisfying.

  Cupcake, claws clicking on the shiny mall floor, rushes over to me. There’s a big smile on my face. I bend down and he hits me so hard, I’m knocked over on my ass for the third time.

  “Don’t have time for this shit,” Norm says. He points ahead, where down this wing of the mall, a group of red-robed men and women (probably fifteen of them, who are all carrying weapons) make there way around a large and broken water fountain.

  The first shot whizzes by my skull. It’s so close, I can feel the wind on my left ear. Cupcake yelps again. The shot buries into the pillar outside of a store called Spencer’s Gifts. Rock dust flies into the air. Pebbles land on the tile in the entryway. My ears are ringing.

  “Jack, time to go,” Abby says. “Now!”

  “Darlene,” I say to Cupcake. “Darlene, where’s Darlene?” I pull the ripped piece of fabric I found on the fence from my pocket. Cupcake, in all his fear, leans forward. His nose twitches as he sniffs at it. Then he turns toward the fountain and the group of enemies coming for us, only a few hundred feet away, and he barks. His body goes rigid, tail pointy. He’s like one of those dogs you take hunting. It must be the Beagle in him, with those floppy ears.

  I stand up, aim the gun at the lead clergy man. Two shots. Two bodies drop. My hand shakes with the power, bones clatter. It’s like catching a fastball on the wrong part of a metal bat.

  Then I do something stupid. I’m always doing something stupid. It seems like it, but what choice do I have?

  I look down at Cupcake. He’s growling, standing his ground, still pointing in the direction of the water fountain while the rest of my backup hides behind a bloody and defunct kiosk.

  “Ready, boy?” I say, barely able to hear myself over the ringing in my ears from the gunshots. Cupcake looks up at me, teeth bared, but his eyes as gentle and human-like as ever.

  “Let’s go!”

  Faintly, I
hear Abby and Norm screaming after me, but I ignore it. I have to. I charge the group of clergymen like the last soldier who knows his death is inevitable. Might as well go out with a bang.

  79

  What happens is not what I thought was going to happen. How many movies have I seen where the good guy, vastly outnumbered, make his last stand by charging the opposing army head on? Usually works, right? The bad guys are so caught off-guard, they turn tail and run from the lone hero.

  Not what I got.

  None of the clergymen, save a few, break rank. Now instead of fifteen, I’m dealing with about a dozen. Gunfire ripples through the air. Automatic weapons, more advanced than the Dirty Harry I’m touting. Shots nail the floor right in front of me. It’s my turn to break rank. Cupcake is already way ahead. I dive behind a mess of upturned tables — thankfully, they’re some kind of metal — right in front of a Starbucks built almost directly into the fountain. Mirrors to my right, running along the wall opposite of the clergymen toward the shuttered entrance of a JC Penny’s, shatter and burst into glittering shards as they hit the red iron benches and the floor beneath.

  Cupcake hides on the opposite side of the fountain, eyeing me. His eyes faintly glow in the darkness, almost like a cat’s eyes. He leans out, cranes his head at me as I fumble in my breast pocket for more rounds to plug into the six-shooter.

  Shots spray into the table protecting my life and the floor around me. A napkin holder on one still-standing table explodes in an array of paper and smoke. The idea that that could’ve been my head, crosses my mind.

  Now, more gunshots from the way I came. Thank God, a sense of relief. My backup hasn’t forgotten about me.

  I put the gun over the edge of the table, making sure no part of my flesh is exposed — I’ve been shot once before and I don’t want to be shot again — and I pull the trigger three times.

  I don’t know how successful I am, but I hear one man scream out. More glass breaks. More shots go off.

  I lean over the side this time, pull the trigger the remaining three times. I take off the face of a woman whose hair is done up in a tight bun. She spins with the force of the shot, drops dead. Another one of the clergymen falls fast to the floor and uses her bloody-pulp body as a human meat shield. So much for camaraderie and honoring the dead, right?

  I’m back, fumbling for bullets, my heartbeat racing so fast, I think I’m close to a heart attack. I load the rest of my ammo — which is only four rounds. The Magnum wasn’t meant to be my main gun; it was meant to be my backup, but I’d left the rifle in the fiery chaos outside.

  Cupcake whimpers, his eyes boring into me. Then his teeth bare and he snarls. What? The eyes leave me and go above the table. It takes me a moment to realize what he’s snarling about, and only when the clergyman’s shadow mutes the shine on my gun do I really know what Cupcake is growling at. I look up just in time.

  Pull the trigger.

  The slug hits beneath the man’s chin. I hear every tooth eviscerated. A rain of blood drenches me, and the dead man falls forward, pushing the table up and over my body.

  Shit.

  The clergymen who aren’t currently shooting at Norm, Tim, and Abby waste no time in reminding me why I needed the table. Bullets ripple into the floor. I scrabble up, feeling their heat much too close to me, and dive around the water fountain, nearly smothering Cupcake.

  The shots don’t stop once I clear the battlefield, but Cupcake pays no notice. He stands over me — I’m on my back, heaving — and he licks my face with all too much slobber. If that doesn’t knock me out of this current shellshocked state I’m in, I don’t know what will.

  Luckily, it does.

  I push Cupcake off gently and get up on my knees. He wags his tail as the shots continue murdering our ears. I hope Abby and Norm and Tim can handle it because they’re going to have to do it without me. “Darlene, where’s Darlene, boy?” I ask Cupcake, holding out the piece of fabric. He sniffs again, nose twitching and goes right back into that pose that looks oddly like an exclamation point to me.

  I sigh and nod my head. Of course Cupcake is pointing toward what looks like a food court on the other side of the fountain, the side where the rest of the clergymen with their assault rifles and shotguns blast off at what’s left of my family.

  And of course I only have three shots left.

  “Good boy,” I say to Cupcake. He’s still rigid, but as I go to scratch him behind his ears, he relaxes, sits back on his haunches, though his ears twitch with every thundering gun blast. “Who’s a good boy?”

  He sticks his paw out. It’s so much like the junkyard Cupcake I once knew all those years ago.

  “You go hide over there.” I point to the JC Penny’s shuttered opening, which is cracked enough for Cupcake to barely squeeze under. “Yeah, go there and wait for me.”

  He whines and looks at me with those human eyes as if to say I don’t wanna.

  “I mean it. I’m going to save your mommy. We’ll be right back for you.”

  Cupcake lowers his head, floppy ears drooping.

  “It’s okay, boy, I’ll be back. I promise. And I’ll have Darlene with me,” I say, then lean down and plant a kiss right between his brown eyes. He seems to perk up after that. So do I. Cupcake, much like Darlene, Norm, Abby, gives me hope. I stand up and grip my gun tight, waiting for Cupcake to go toward the JC Penny’s. Reluctantly, he goes and I crouch toward the other side of the fountain, not risking a look back at this dog that’s stolen my heart because I keep telling myself it’s not going to be the last time I see him. It’s not.

  I take a deep breath.

  A man screams as a bullet hits him. I don’t see him, but I hear his body thud on the floor. I think that’s my cue.

  Well, here goes nothing.

  80

  On the other side of the fountain, the side opposite the Starbucks, is a Verizon Wireless store. I get about three feet outside of it before a robed man who is hiding across from me behind a pillar outside of the Kay Jeweler’s notices me. He screams, “Behind us! Behind us! The fucker’s coming from behind.” Then he raises his weapon, which is some tiger-striped assault rifle I thought only existed in video games, and pumps a few rounds in my direction.

  I don’t think I’m quick enough. For a second, my heart quits beating and I think I’m surely dead, but I hit the floor hard as I dive out of the way, feeling my bones jolt and bruises already beginning to form on my hip, and I know I’m not dead yet.

  Glass from the Verizon Wireless display case flies toward me. I’m hit with these big shards. I grab one, reminding me of that sun-scorched zombie in the front of Doc Klein’s Honda out on the highway.

  I pull myself up. The shots toward me on this side have stopped, but the shots down the wing of the mall I came from, where Norm and Abby are, haven’t. It’s like World War III out there.

  I do, in fact, look toward the JC Penny’s, only to make sure Cupcake wasn’t hovering and got hit by a stray bullet. He’s not there, though, thank God. Relief floods me.

  Then, I get an idea.

  I scream out. Loud.

  Three bullets isn’t going to be enough to get to wherever Darlene and Carmen are.

  Then I cut my arm with a piece of glass deep enough to draw blood. I rub my hands in it and leave bloody streaks on the floor. I don’t have enough time to let the blood pool.

  I scream again and lay down on my stomach, making sure my gun is out of reach.

  Now, no shots ring out. It’s quiet except for the steady pulsing in my head.

  The man near the Kay Jewelers cries out, “I got one! I got one! Guys, I think I got one.”

  A barrage of shots follow his voice — Norm and Abby and Tim making their last stand, hoping to avenge me.

  The shots stop now. They must be reloading. Sure enough, I hear frantic footsteps coming toward me.

  “All right,” a voice says, the same voice who’d shouted seconds earlier. He puts the toe of his shoe into my side and nudges me. I’ve seen
enough dead people on my travels to know how to act, and I think I’m doing a pretty damn good.

  “I got him! I got him!” he shouts, practically jumping.

  Distantly, Norm yells, “JACK!”

  “Jack, huh? Jack no more, buddy,” the clergyman says. I hear him shuffling. It stops abruptly; I think he’s noticed my Magnum. It’s a nice gun, I don’t blame him for falling for my trap. His robe brushes my face as he bends over me, reaching for the weapon.

  I grip the glass tight, and make my move.

  The clergyman barely has a chance to scream as I spring up, lithe as ever, and bury the shard into his pudgy stomach. Blood spurts out of the fresh wound as I pull the glass away and stab him again in a spot nearby. Warmth floods my hand — both our blood mingling together. I can’t imagine what I look like right now — I don’t want to imagine.

  As the clergyman drops to his knees, dropping his assault rifle in the process, I stare at him with flinty eyes. “Jack Jupiter,” I say. “Still am.”

  He dies.

  With the Magnum back in its holster and the rifle now in my hands, I’m brimming with confidence. I don’t decide to go around the fountain now; I decide to go over it. I climb the second level, my boots getting enough traction because the fountain is bone dry and probably has been for awhile now, and I shout without really meaning to. The heat of battle gets to me; it gets to us all.

  I aim down my sights. There’s five clergymen and women still standing. The rest are in bloody robed heaps. I pull the trigger and gut shot the two closest men. They scream out and jump as if they’d just been stung by a bee.

  The other three turn their attention on me. As one of them swings to aim and fire, a bullet from the left wing — the wing where Norm, Tim, and Abby are — catches the man in the side of the head. An explosion of red and pink brains goes out of his left ear. It’s gross, but I have no time to study the macabre scene. I aim down the other two. Two shots in the shoulder spins a woman around as if she were a ballerina — but the shots also take her arm off…well, mostly. It hangs by a rubbery cord of muscle and gristle. My adrenaline is at maximum capacity. I can’t believe this. I’m going to get out of this mess. I’m going to win.