“Go away.”
You’re afraid of me, son. There’s no reason to be afraid.
“You’re not my mother!”
A thump rumbled the door. Lisa and Justin backed away from it.
I can help you get what you want, son. I know what you want!
“Leave me alone!”
You wanna fuck Lisa, don’t you? Well open the door and I’ll give you everything you ever wanted.
“Go away!”
The door thumped again.
“You have any guns in the house, Lisa?” Russ shouted.
“None that I know of.”
You can’t shoot me, Russ.
“Shut the hell up!”
Justin didn’t know where to go. He didn’t feel safe by the door or by Russ. He was slowly making his way to the kitchen, while Lisa approached Russ slowly, one step at a time and taking a deep breath with every pace.
Glass shattered behind the front door.
“There’s the screen door. Russ come on we have to get out of here.”
Another bang –a dull one.
“Do you have a baseball bat or something?” Russ asked.
“Holy shit! There’s more in the backyard!” Justin shouted from the kitchen. Lisa ran into the kitchen and screamed. Her backyard was filled with people –or things. Ten, maybe twelve, maybe even fifteen. She couldn’t tell. All of them were staring into the window, showing off their black teeth with hissing grins.
Russ stumbled up behind them as another dull crash hit the front door.
“Where we going?” Justin asked.
A few of the things had walked up to the back door and began pounding on it. But for some reason Lisa didn’t feel as frightened as she should have been. She looked back to the man she had regarded as her protector. As long as he’s there, I’m safe.
“Only place to go is upstairs,” Lisa said.
They could hear gunshots in the distance somewhere to the south. Not single shots like before, these were automatics.
“We can wait it out up there,” Lisa said. “They’ll come and clean this up.”
More shots, and each time she heard the sound of a gun it gave her even more reassurance. There were people out there with big guns, and they were coming to rescue them. And as long as she stayed close to Russ, there wouldn’t be any problems.
“Better than nothing,” Justin said.
They sprinted over to the bottom of the staircase and bolted up. Justin was a bit slower –he made sure that he wasn’t stepping in puke at the bottom of the stairs. By the time all three of them got up the stairs the front door had cracked down the middle.
* * * * *
Justin and Lisa had just run by him into her bedroom, but Russ was frozen at the top of the stairs. His mother ripped the front door to pieces, sending splinters and dust into the air.
Russ couldn’t move. His mother was inside of his head, poking fun at his drama of the past. He was in a world where Jessica was lying on his bed back at his home, just next to her was Lisa. Both of them were smiling and giggling at him, but he knew none of it was real. As all this flashed through his head he could still see the dead face of his mother.
Her face was horrifically similar, and horrifically different from what it was when she had been alive. The basic shape and structure was there, but her skin was gray, and her eyes were like two gleaming red gems sitting in her eye sockets. They weren’t bloody, just red. Her hair had mostly fallen out. There was still a clump of what looked like silvery wire on the back of her head, but that was it.
Russ could hear Lisa shouting behind him. She had even grabbed him around the waist and tried to pull him into the bedroom. He couldn’t move. All life had literally been frightened out of him. But he could see something.
“Hurry the fuck up!” Justin shouted from behind. Lisa shrugged at him and tried a second effort at moving Russ.
“Stay away from him, bitch!” the creature shouted.
“Justin, help me!”
He rushed over and whipped Russ over his shoulder without much effort and ran back into the bedroom alongside Lisa. The creature hissed and charged them just as Justin slammed the door in its face.
The door shook. Justin looked stupidly at the door knob for a brief moment before it hit him that there was no lock. He pushed himself against the door.
“There’s no lock!” he shouted.
“I know!” Lisa grabbed at the bookshelf in the corner.
“This isn’t going to work,” Justin said.
The door shook again, and Justin nearly lost his balance.
Lisa pushed the bookshelf with everything she had in her. But it was barely inching across the carpet.
Justin looked helplessly at Russ who was jittering on the bed and staring into the floor.
“Help her, man!”
The door jolted again. This time it opened a few inches and a gray hand shot through. Justin pushed back on it with all of his weight, hoping the gray hand would snap off and pour blood all over the floor. A snarling hiss responded from the other side of the door.
“Hurry the fuck up!” he shouted.
“I’m coming!” Lisa screamed. The bookshelf was still six, maybe seven feet away.
Russ sat silently, still trembling on the bed.
“What the fuck is wrong with him?” Justin shouted.
“He’s my son!” The creature snarled at him from the other side of the door.
Justin pressed the door with every ounce of strength he had. Fucking things, he didn’t know what they were, but the surge of adrenaline he just got was about to turn him into a maniac.
“Fucking bitch!” He punched the door.
Russ stood up and took a quick glance around the room.
“Nice of you to fucking join us!” Justin shouted. “Fucking help her!”
He shook his head and focused on the stack of CD’s on Lisa’s desk.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
He walked over and grabbed one out of its case.
“Russ?” Lisa shouted. She was nearing the door.
He snapped it in half and shouted, “You’re not my mother!”
“Don’t do this Russ!” the creature shouted from behind the door.
He held half of the compact disc in a hand and ran his finger over the sharp, plastic edge.
I’m going to stab you in the fucking face.
Why are you going to do that?
You’re not my mother!
I can make your dreams-
Shut the fuck up!
“Let her in!” Russ screamed.
“Oh shit,” Lisa muttered.
Justin shook his head.
Russ walked up to him and punched him in the stomach as hard as he could. Justin doubled over and fell away from the door.
It swung open, and the corpse of Nelda Allen pounced on Russ.
He lied silently on his back with the sharp piece of plastic in his hand. It gently lowered its head and hissed, letting a stream of saliva land on Russ’s forehead.
“You will be with me,” it hissed.
The creature’s flesh was soft, like a ripened melon. Russ knew it because the creature had tried to dive into his mind one too many times. He saw into its head now. He could see everything inside. It wasn’t a human being. It was a germ, a virus, some sort of bacteria maybe. He couldn’t tell for sure. But they were telepathic, and it was a huge strength of them to have, but it could be used against them.
“You’re nothing but a soft, decayed body,” Russ said.
“Either way you’re coming with me!”
As it lowered its jaw and opened its mouth. Russ jammed the broken disc deep into its fleshy skull like a knife being driven into a water melon. There was no screaming. There was no hissing. It dropped dead on top of him in complete silence.
* * * * *
“You little piece of shit,” Justin muttered. His face flushed and both of his hands rolled up into tight fists."
“Justin, he save
d your ass,” Lisa said.
“You stay out of this!”
Russ backed toward the window, unsure of what to do next. He thought he could take him, no doubt, but it would take time. And they didn’t have time. A group of those nasty things was assembling at the back door. He wondered why they hadn’t broken through yet.
“There’s no time for this shit! There are a bunch of those things outside the back door. We have to get out of here,” Russ said.
Justin didn’t seem to be listening. He kept moving forward.
“Listen you fucking hothead, you’re going to get us killed!” Russ screamed.
“Justin –” Lisa began but was cut off by the sound of breaking glass from downstairs. She pushed the book case the remaining two feet to the door.
“It’s not going to hold them for too long,” Russ said. “You really want to die like this?”
Justin kept walking toward him, jittering. Russ stared into his eyes, wondering if he was seriously going to attack him. The tricky thing about jocks was that you never knew if they were serious or just trying to intimidate you. Most of the time they were trying to intimidate, at least from Russ’s knowledge. And when they did try to fight someone they usually ended up to be the one going to the hospital with a black eye and broken nose. Then their daddy’s bought them Corvette’s for graduation to make it all better.
Justin took another step and raised his fist.
“Justin, want to see me naked?”
He turned around and saw Mrs. Kelly, completely bare. He took a look around the room and noticed that Russ and Lisa had disappeared.
“W-w-what the hell is going on?” he trembled.
“I’m just sooooo horny.”
Justin took a couple of steps back and tried to look away, but couldn’t. He felt himself getting a hard-on.
“You want me, Justin, don’t you?”
He fell to his knees. He knew none of it was real, but her breasts were perfect, and her legs were beautiful. Justin had driven by almost every day and saw her outside, reading a book. Each day he thought about stopping and trying to bang her, but each day he kept going.
“Well, now is your chance.” She walked directly to him and thrust her groin into his face.
He backed away. “This isn’t real.” He shook his head and looked up at Mrs. Kelly with confused eyes.
“Does it matter? I see that bulge in your jeans. Let go of yourself and have a good time. The world’s going to be dead before too long anyway.” She thrust into his face again.
Justin didn’t resist.
* * * * *
Justin flopping on the floor like a fish on land was disturbing enough, but just as disturbing was how quickly and precisely the gunfire had halted. It wasn’t necessarily the fact that it had stopped that bothered Lisa; it was the fact that it had stopped so suddenly, like a scream being cut off.
And of course, there were also the more of those things. For some reason they hadn’t found their way upstairs yet. She could hear them downstairs and could picture the scene in her head. Ten of them, probably fifteen, walking below them and turning over every piece of furniture looking for flesh.
Russ was silent. He sat on the edge of the bed observing Justin, who had fallen into hallucination. He was vibrating as if there were a small electric current flowing through him. As long as it was silent Russ didn’t care. Any noise would bring those things up the stairs. The dresser in front of the door wouldn’t hold them out for long.
Lisa sat on the floor hugging her knees just off to Russ’s left. She glanced simultaneously at the corpse of his mother on the ground and at Justin’s twitching body.
“What are we doing?” Lisa whispered.
A crash came from down stairs. It sounded like a window. Lisa cringed.
“We gotta be quiet,” Russ whispered back, barely audible.
“Yeah, but we can’t just stay up here.”
Russ glanced toward the bedroom window, where the moonlight shined in and settled on the corpse of his mother.
“I don’t think the window is a good idea, Russ.”
“We don’t have a whole lot of options here.”
Justin stopped twitching and sat up.
“Holy crap!” he shouted.
“Shh!” Lisa said.
“I just had a freakish dream!”
“Shut up!” Russ whispered as loud as anyone could possibly whisper.
It didn’t matter. The footsteps had begun to climb up the stairs.
“Dumbass,” Lisa muttered.
“Shut up, bitch!” Justin screamed at her. He fell silent when there was a thump at the door. The dresser jolted outward.
Russ hustled over to the window and observed the drop. It looked about fifteen, maybe twenty feet down, and there was nothing to land on.
“Only way out!” he shouted.
Justin and Lisa looked to him, dumbly.
“I’m not going out there, man!” Justin shouted.
A creature hissed and burst into the room, its glaring red eyes quickly observing Justin. Lisa ran for the window and smacked into Russ. They both fell. Justin sprinted for it, but just as he got to the window he felt teeth sink into his neck.
Lisa hadn’t taken the time to notice that the creature had once been her mother.
14
To protect and to serve: That is what it said on her husband’s badge. Unfortunately he was obligated to it. Jennifer needed him, and if he only knew how badly perhaps he would be there, or perhaps not. Perhaps he was dead. She had heard the gun fight about twenty minutes ago. Alan had headed off in that direction, she was sure of it.
But Alan didn’t matter right now. Her life was in jeopardy. She lied down on the living room floor just under the window so the damn things couldn’t see her if they looked in. She thought of making a move to the basement to grab one of the shotguns down there. Alan had taken her to the shooting range several times and she was familiar with them. The damn things kick, but she couldn’t argue with the results. But if she went for it would they see her? Would they bust into the house and trap her down there?
Jennifer raised her head and peeked out the window. None of them were visible. Earlier about six were in her front yard, ripping her neighbor apart, stringing his intestines out onto the lawn then shoving them in their mouths. Were they really gone though? She raised her head a little more and looked. There was no one outside.
Panting, she crawled through the darkness on her hands and knees to the basement door. She knew the door would squeak. It always squeaked. Then those things would come bursting in and rip her to pieces.
She sat for a moment and thought about it. Sweat lined her forehead and most of her makeup was smearing. After her husband had left to go out again she had put on a pair of jeans and a white T-shirt that said: I HAVE PMS AND A HANDGUN. ANY QUESTIONS?
“Goddamnit Alan, I need you,” she whispered. Her eyes teared up, but she quickly cleared them and then tried to remind herself that he wasn’t going to come through the front door with a golden sword and a white horse to save her.
Jennifer slowly reached up to the door knob and rested her hand on it. If it squeaks, will they hear? Were there any around to hear it in the first place? She lifted her hand from the door knob and crawled over to the kitchen sink. Hoping to see an empty backyard, she raised her head just enough to look through the window above the faucet.
But it wasn’t empty. There were three of those monsters in the middle of their backyard, eating what looked like Scuzzy, their dog.
“Oh, God, Scuzzy,” she whispered. Because of Alan’s problem that golden retriever was the closest thing they had to a child. Scuzzy was as loving and as caring as any living thing Jennifer had been around in her life. No matter how bad of a day she was having, Scuzzy would be happy to share a loving smile –he always did.
Jennifer closed her teary eyes and looked away, but the image would be stored in her memory for a long time. Three of those things stood over Scuzzy's lifeless bo
dy. One of them had intestines in his mouth. One of them looked like it was eating his golden coat. The last had his head lowered to Scuzzy’s body –she couldn’t tell where– and was pulling away with a red piece of flesh in its teeth.
Why couldn’t I have let him inside?
She heard herself whimper and quickly hushed it by holding a hand over her mouth. Her eyes shifted to the basement door. It killed her to think about it, but those things were busy eating away on Scuzzy, and it might allow her some time to grab the shotgun from below.
She crawled over to the basement door and once again rested a hand on the knob. She turned it, and slowly pulled the door toward her. The squeak was there, and it always had been. Her teeth gritted together when she heard it. Did they hear?
She slowly stood up and peeked about the window. They didn’t. They were still eating poor Scuzzy. Jennifer flicked on the basement light and made her way down. It was waiting patiently for her in the gun rack on the north wall. She pulled it down and tiptoed to an old desk –where they kept their ammunition.
After filling her jean pockets with shells (they held three each, she didn’t bother filling the back ones), she filled the shotgun’s chamber and cocked it.
What now? She thought. Jennifer climbed back up the stairs and turned off the light, not bothering to close the door because it would creak. Then she crawled back into the living room and lied below the window again, setting the shotgun next to her.
She briefly thought of her husband again and wished how he would have been there. But she knew there was a good chance he was dead. He could have been involved in that gunfight earlier –she was sure that he was. The gunfire had since silenced just as fast as it had started. So fast it was almost frightening. Had these things bogged down the soldiers that quickly?
“Where am I going to go?” she muttered, wiping a panicked tear from her face.
The church.
She shook her head at the thought. Why there? What’s so great about it there?
There will be people there. You can be safe.
Jennifer thought about it as she raised her head to see out the window again. The coast was still clear. All she had to do was make it to the station wagon.
Super Zombies from Outer-Space Page 8
