I Kill Monsters

by Dennis Liggio

  "I'm really sorry," said Mikkel. "For your cousin and for having to deal with this."

  Lem shook his head and gave a half shrug. At least some of his anger diminished in Kenny's absence. "It's not all finished yet. I'll grieve when they're at rest."

  Mikkel nodded. "You been down there, man?"

  "Yeah. I removed the stuff Kenny put in front of the door, then opened it up enough to take a peek. They're zombies, alright," said Lem, pushing past a choke in his voice. "I closed the door, blocked it again and texted you."

  "I'm so sorry," said Mikkel. He reached out to put his hand on Lem's shoulder, but Lem shrugged it off.

  "There are no other exits to the room," said Lem. "Nothing of value in there besides them. We could seal it up permanently, but..."

  "But this is personal," said Mikkel. "I get it."

  I nodded. Nate was inside. Lem didn't want a zombie version of his cousin stumbling around in the basement of his aunt's apartment building for the next few decades.

  We went outside and grabbed a few duffel bags full of supplies from the van, which we had parked over the curb in front of the front entrance. In South Egan, most know our van and not to fuck with it. If you didn't know our van, as soon as you broke into it, you'd get the fuck out of there. It's full of weapons, plastic bags, medical supplies, and cleaners. An ignorant thief would think they broke into a serial killer van and would be scared too shitless to steal anything. In most other neighborhoods we park responsibly, but in South Egan, we're good to park haphazardly and make our job easier.

  Down in the basement, we suited up. When gearing up to fight monsters, there's always the question of maneuverability versus strength. For example, we can don ourselves with heavy jackets and equipment that helped defend about zombie bites, but then the stiff fabrics may give us trouble moving our arms to hit zombies or moving our bodies to dodge. Or we could go in there with big weapons, like axes or spears or something, but then we might find it's too tight a space to swing. But if we go for lighter jackets and smaller weapons, we might find zombies uncomfortably close and ourselves vulnerable. There's no right answer, but it's something we have to think about every time. We do make mistakes sometimes and get hurt, but one decision bad enough and it will cost us our lives.

  Suiting up, we looked like an odd pair. Mikkel had opted for leather. Black leather pants, black latex shirt, black leather jacket, black leather boots, black leather gloves, goggles. He looked like a refugee from a bondage club. Then he pulled out that damn katana he always insisted on and he looked like some comic fanboy fantasy. I've always questioned the usefulness of the katana and his lack of training with it. But Mikkel loves medieval weaponry and the katana hasn't failed him yet, so my words fall on deaf ears.

  I shared the leather boots and goggles, those felt essential. I didn't wear leather pants. I hated the damn things. Protective or not, they weren't comfortable, they chaffed, and they always made my balls sweat uncomfortably. I instead wore some old thick jeans, a long thick knit sweater, workman gloves, and an old army jacket. I strapped the machete to my belt, but I went for one of my favorite go-to weapons: the lead pipe. It seems more of an emergency choice, but I can't count how many times a lead pipe has been effective when everything else wasn't. It was short, quick, and blunt. It never got stuck in monsters and it would cave in a zombie skull as easily as anything else. In lead pipe we trust.

  Now came the part of suiting up that always killed any chances of looking cool: helmets. Especially with biters, helmets were essential. A good helmet needs to be protective, minimally affects your hearing, sight, and peripheral vision, but also isn't a liability enemies can use against you. Unfortunately, all the cool looking helmets violate these requirements. The helmets that were useful always looked strange and/or dumb. For example, in this case Mikkel wore an old football helmet. I wore an old World War I German Kaiser helmet with the big spike on top. I had never killed anything with the spike... yet.

  Mikkel and I turned to look at each other and laughed.

  "I'll never get over how ridiculous you look with that on," said Mikkel.

  "At least I don't look like a linebacker for the bondage club football team," I said.

  We laughed again and took off our helmets. Now was the time to psych ourselves up. Normally we're trolling the sewers, old tunnels, our places outside of town. We don't have warning and have to react. But if we know we're throwing ourselves into a shark tank immediately, like with an enclosed room full of zombies, we want to get ourselves ready for the reckless and near suicidal task we were about to start. We both have our ways of getting ready for the Main Event. I like singing songs, particularly punk songs. Mikkel liked a good drink. Generally we compromised.

  "Whiskey," said Mikkel with a smile, pulling out a bottle of Maker's Mark.

  We both took a slug off the bottle, feeling it race through our veins. Mikkel handed the bottle to Lem so he could take a sip as I queued up a song on my phone. We each took another drink of the bottle, then engaged in a rather throaty sing along to Murder By Death's As Long as There is Whiskey In the World. We wanted our pulse up, our confidence high, and our fears low.

  When the song ended, we looked at each other.

  "Ready to do this, brother?" said Mikkel.

  "Ready as ever," I said.

  We put our helmets back on. We looked at each other and laughed again. Then we brandished our weapons and looked at the door. Lem was at the door, acting as gate keeper. He had already moved most of the things barring the door. He'd let us in and close the door after us. He wasn't coming in: staying out here was the sane man's decision. Of course, Mikkel and I have never been quite sane. If you had been thinking of challenging that statement, I point to the fact that I was dressed like the Kaiser with a lead pipe and Mikkel had on a football helmet, black leathers, and was wielding an internet-bought katana.

  We nodded to Lem. He yanked the door open, standing to the side. Weapons in front of us to push back any attackers at the door, Mikkel and I plunged into the room, the door closing behind us.

  The room suddenly filled with moans. They may not have heard us while we were singing in the hallway, but they heard us now. There looked to be about six of them. They were all teenaged kids and most were gangly and thin. They all looked like someone's little brother. Some were even wearing jerseys for the New Avalon Brassmen. If it wasn't for their grayish skin, their twisted faces, and their zombie-like moaning as they lurched toward us, I would have thought they were just some kids hanging out.

  Of course, as I watched, Mikkel beheaded the nearest one with his katana, so if they had been kids just hanging out, we were some seriously sick individuals.

  The death of one set the others into rage. Where before they were shuffling and stumbling, now their movements quickened with anger. One ran at me and lunged. I dodged and he banged into the door behind us.

  "Is that you guys?" said Lem's muffled voice. "Do you need the door open?"

  "No!" I shouted. I stepped forward and slammed my pipe down on the head of the zombie at the door. His forehead collapsed into pulp, his expression going slack and vaguely regretful. He slid down to the floor.

  I turned around just in time to see two zombies barrel into me.

  Actual zombies are a little different from Hollywood zombies. We're not even quite sure they're truly undead. If a person is bitten by a zombie and "dies" from their bite, they will get back up and lurch around looking to bite people. That's the same as Hollywood. But it's not some supernatural animation of tissue. If a zombie has a broken arm or the flesh stripped off it down the bone, it can't move that arm. If you sever its spine, it's pretty much dead and done. A zombie still needs the nerves and muscles to move. It will just keep moving toward you if you only destroy incidental tissues not needed for locomotion like internal organs, soft tissue, etc. That makes them nearly as durable as most movie zombies in practice. It means they are particularly well-equipped to deal with gunshot wounds which fail to strike their
brain, spine, important nerves, or muscle connectors. Zombies are best taken care of with blunt or cutting weapons. Also chainsaws, but chainsaws are their own problem.

  Because these zombies had fully functioning anatomies, they could run, jump, and move about as well as a normal person. While they might shamble and stumble when unaware, when they were riled up and full of... uh... zombie adrenaline, they could act like hooligans in a dirty, bitey fistfight. Of course, treating it like a fistfight and punching back was a bad idea, as it would get your fist bitten. Luckily, this wasn't a problem as these two zombies were trying to drag me to the ground rather than trade punches.

  I went stumbling backward as the two zombies barreled into me. One of them lost its balance as soon as it struck me, falling flat on its face. The other stayed on its feet as it continued to push me backward. I didn't catch my footing before I crashed up against the wall next to the door, the zombie continuing to use its weight to push me at the wall. It was up close in my face, its jaw snapping as I kept pushing its thrashing form away from me. I suddenly saw the usefulness of the face guard on Mikkel's football helmet.

  My arms were half pinned and I couldn't get the right leverage to push him off. The zombie was taller than me and this was the one zombie that wasn't gangly and thin. Why did I get all the husky zombies? All I could do was get my right hand up to head level. I didn't have the leverage for a killing stroke, so I did what I could to keep myself unbitten: I took the lead pipe and stuck it into the zombie's mouth horizontally, as if it were a mouth guard.

  The zombie kept trying to push me against the wall, but now I was safer, as I didn't have to deal with a snapping zombie mouth. He could only make comically garbled moaning sounds around the pipe, which now had zombie drool on it. I struggled to pull up my other arm. As I did this, I felt something grab at my leg. Looking down I discovered the second zombie had crawled across the floor to grab me.

  "A little help here, Mikkel?" I shouted, but didn't give up my own struggle.

  I finally got my left arm free and up in front of me. Now that I was holding both ends of the lead pipe, I pushed my arms forward. I heard a crack that I think was the zombie's neck and I finally managed to push him away. He stumbled backward a few steps then fell to the ground. The momentum also sent me a few steps forward - or would have, except after the first step I tried to pick up my right foot and discovered that there was still a zombie holding onto it, so I tumbled to the ground face first.

  This was perhaps not my best moment of monster hunting. Usually fighting zombies is brutal and messy, but typically not so clumsy. Luckily the front of my helmet protected my head as it slammed down on the floor. I saw stars for just a moment, then began twisting to face the zombie that had tripped me. He was presently trying to bite my foot through my leather boot and only succeeding in getting slobber over my laces.

  I kicked my leg out but the zombie held onto it, smearing more slobber all over my boot. I pulled myself to a sort of sitting posture to swing the pipe at the zombie and hopefully not hit my own leg. As I leaned forward, I was suddenly grabbed from behind. This was the other zombie, the one whose neck I thought I had broken. Either it hadn't broken or even with that injury, the zombie would not be deterred. I felt the creature's weight on me as he tried to bite my neck, as if he were a classic vampire instead of a zombie. Luckily I was panicking, so I was doing enough thrashing that he couldn't get a chance to sink his teeth into me.

  "Mikkel, where the hell are you?" I shouted. After he had started this shindig with a clean beheading, I had killed one zombie and had been grappling with two others. Since we only saw six zombies, that meant he only had two of his own. I didn't expect that would cause him so much trouble. What was he doing? Was he having a cigarette in the corner?

  The zombie at my foot was now trying to crawl up my leg. Perhaps in his primitive zombie mind he realized the boot was no good. Meanwhile, the zombie behind me who seemed to think he was a vampire was still trying to chomp down. Because he was on my back, there was no good way I could swing the lead pipe and hit him. I would have as much chance of bashing myself in the head with it. For a brief moment I considered angling my head in such a way that the spike on the Kaiser helmet would stab him but I decided that was a more stupid idea than usual.

  Though I wasn't a fan of Vampire Zombie behind me, there was little I could do unless I could get up or change position. Foot Zombie was effectively holding me down and crawling farther up on me. My legs were pinned, there was weight on my beck, but my arms were at least free. Moving anything else would be a feat of strength. With a roar, I pulled my entire top half forward, Vampire Zombie included, and swung for the fences with the lead pipe.

  With a loud dink sound, the pipe hit Foot Zombie in the head. It wasn't a full on, skull-collapsing, brain-destroying hit, but it seemed to be enough. Foot Zombie fell to the side, looking almost dazed.

  I felt teeth clamp down on my shoulder. I shouted in pain, but realized the bite probably hadn't broken my skin. Between the jacket and the thick sweater, the teeth didn't go far enough in. It still hurt, but I at least figured I wouldn't be taking another oral antifungal. Between you and me, that stuff gives me weird gas.

  Spinning around, I tried to dislodge that damn Vampire Zombie, but he kept on my back, zombie teeth still stuck in my jacket and sweater. I tried getting to a standing position, but with the zombie's weight and his lack of cooperation in getting up, I stumbled back down again.

  "Goddammit, Mikkel, where - " My shout was interrupted by a schlunk sound and the Vampire Zombie on my back went limp due to a katana through the head. The limp body slid off me onto the floor.

  Mikkel walked over to the last zombie, the Foot Zombie I had hit with a glancing blow, and drove his katana through the zombie's head. I noticed that this zombie was Lem's cousin Nate.

  Cleaning and sheathing his katana, Mikkel walked over to me and offered his hand. I grabbed it and pulled myself up.

  "Where were you?" I asked.

  He nodded over to the other side of the room. I noticed four zombies dead, their blood splattered against the walls. That wasn't counting the first one he had decapitated. That was two more zombies than we had counted.

  "Two were hiding in the trash," he said. "I got them too, but it took longer." He looked down at my lead pipe. "We really need to get you a katana."

  "So what, we can be the Ninja Nowak Brothers?" I said.

  "Samurais use katanas," he said. "Ninjas use a much shorter sword known as the Ninjato."

  "You're really missing my point," I said.

  Lem thanked us for the help, but he had no money to pay us with. We had expected that much. But he did have a case of beer to share with us, so we were obliged to hangout for a while and toast his dearly departed cousin.

  Before the heavy drinking, Mikkel demanded I go down to the Pork Chop Express so we could check my bite. As I thought, the bite hadn't broken the skin. But there was a real nasty bruise in the shape of a bite and it hurt like hell. He put all the disinfectants on and bandaged it up. He told me to take the anti-zombie infection pills and I told him to fuck off. We're family; it's okay.

  Due to the post-job drinking I didn't arrive home until one in the morning. I was dog tired and crawled into bed, only taking the time to shed my boots and my jeans before I slipped under the covers. Laying face down like a dead man, I supplicated myself to the gods of sleep, letting them take me to a drunken slumber. Unfortunately, the bite on my shoulder throbbed for hours. When morning came, I felt like I hadn't even slept.

  We were taking turns tailing Jessica from home to work and work to home, looking for something odd. Luckily for me, Mikkel took the morning shift since he wasn't planning on sleeping after our zombie excursion. It was my job to follow her when she left work in the evening. As I turned over in bed, I was glad I didn't have to tail her in the morning. But it still meant I had to go to work.

  The Job That Ate My Brain

  "What did you do last night?"

/>   "Oh, I killed a few zombies in the basement of a decaying building with my brother."

  "Wow, that's amazing! I'm glad we have people like you to protect us!"

  This conversation never happens.

  It just doesn't. Instead I was listening to the grating voices of two of my coworkers, Steve and Reese, as they described their own answers to what they did last night: drinking binges, club conquests, and a girlfriend who supposedly couldn't get enough. I didn't even care enough to suggest that some of that might be exaggeration. I just squinted under the fluorescent lights and tried to keep my head down. My shift was starting in a few minutes and I wanted all the rest I could get. My shoulder still throbbed, though less insistently than the night before. I wanted desperately to be sleeping, not about to go through a full day of work.

  "You look like you might have actually had as good an evening as those guys are claiming."

  It was Yasmin, one of my few coworkers I actually liked. She had a coy smile as she put on her headset and prepared for the shift.

  I would have liked to tell her how I had fought a group of zombies with nothing but my wits and a lead pipe, narrowly escaping infection. I would have told it in a wildly heroic style, trying to impress her probably more than I would normally admit I wanted to. But I had also been down that road before. Despite our website and a few others, the average New Avalonian did not believe that beneath their feet in tunnels lurked things from their nightmares. At best she might think I was being cute with a funny story. But that was a very best case scenario. More likely she could think I was a crazy person and would not want to associate with me ever again. I wasn't going to tell her anything about my other job unless she believed it first.

  "Oh, no, nothing that special," I said. "I just hung out with my brother."

  Yasmin looked me up and down again, noting the dark circles under my eyes and my slouched posture. She then gave one of her cute smiles. "You and your brother must be pretty hardcore partiers."