by H. L. Murphy
“Right,” I gasped between throbs of agony. “I had nothing better to do while undead fucks eat our coworkers than to hide behind a door just so you could fall on my nuts repeatedly, causing excruciating agony. That’s me, Mr. Selfish. What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“Finn?” Cooms called from somewhere behind Madalina.
“Yeah, I’m here,” I answered. Glancing past the Gypsy Whore, I could see Cooms checking out Madalina’s exposed ass. Cooms was one of the few men in the building that hadn't fallen prey to her gypsy vagina magic, and from the look on his face Cooms was of the opinion a Zombie Apocalypse presented a unique opportunity to correct that oversight. A word of warning died on my lips as an entirely new wave of mind breaking agony pulsed forth.
“Holy shit, brother,” Cooms gushed,”you really saved our asses.”
“How many made it?” I asked as I struggled to my feet. Christ on fire, how long were my balls going to hurt? Shouldn't my brains gating mechanism block this shit out? Of course not, Finnegan my lad, you’ve inherited your father’s remarkably high tolerance for pain so no blocking out for you. Don’t you feel special? “I think I'm going to puke up my lungs.”
“Madalina, me, and three others,” Cooms explained. He walked up to stand next to Madalina even as she stepped away from me, very clearly wanting to be in her good graces. Calculating eyes ran over Cooms, estimating his potential value in both the short and long term. Whatever sums Madalina came up with must have met her standards because she smiled at Cooms, and stepped closer to him. It was fascinating to observe the exact moment a Succubus sinks her claws into her prey.
Terrifying, but fascinating none the less.
“The others are catching their breath,” he continued. “We had to haul some serious ass to get in here.”
For the first time, I really noticed the room behind the two. It was the ladies upstairs restroom. The roof access stairway came out into the ladies restroom. Wow. Never would have guessed. Since I’ve never gone to the roof what the hell do I know about where it dumps out.
“What’s your plan Cooms?” I asked. My balls had, at long last, ceased their incessant complaining, but my stomach took up the clarion call. It twisted suddenly, nearly sending me back to the floor. It felt like I hadn't eaten for days, but I ate just a few hours ago. I glanced at my watch and realized I ate over six hours ago. Even so, I shouldn't be feeling this way. What the fuck?
“You okay?” Cooms asked. I didn't realize it, but my hand had risen from my groin to my stomach.
“Yeah, no problem. Just some residual pain from having someone drop onto my groin that should probably lay off the donuts,” I snarked. Madalina narrowed her eyes the way I've seen predatory animals do just before hey strike. “What is your plan?”
“We’re headed to the roof, brother,” Cooms said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. And in retrospect, it was. Why else would you come up to the roof access stairwell. Okay, Finnegan, get your head on straight.
“After that, what are your plans after you get on the roof?” I expounded, though I really didn't think it should have been necessary. I was starting to remember why I preferred not to work with Cooms. Good guy, but every conversation with him was a constant uphill struggle.
“There’s a fire escape somewhere along the roof,” he smiled his used car salesman smile. “We find it, go down it, and then book for the cars.”
“You…you have your car keys?” I asked slowly.
“Uh, keys?”
“Yes, keys,” I said, my tone going hard instantly. “Little metal things about an inch and a half long, use them to unlock doors, start engines. You know, keys?”
“Well,” Cooms stammered and shot a quick glance over to Madalina before he tried again. “Don't need keys. I know three cars in the lot with spare keys hidden on the frame.”
“Are you sure those cars are still here?”
“Oh, yeah,” Cooms smiled again, and I knew he was full of shit. He had no fucking clue whatsoever whether or not those cars were there or not, and I wondered whether they existed at all. I turned to call bullshit when the sounds of many hands beating against a door drove all such thoughts from my mind.
“You can try the roof if you want, might even be a good idea,” I said quickly, feeling the press of panicked people shoving forward. “But if you don't have keys, don't count on driving away. My keys are in my bag above my locker. I know most of you do something similar. I'm going for my bag, then I'm out of here. If you want, you can follow me over and try for your things while I'm there.”
“How do you think your going to get past those…things,” Madalina asked, fear and haughtiness warred for dominance. Her expression held only the utmost disdain for me, my mental acuity, and anything which might come out of my mouth, but her knees were trembling. Of course, it's hard to be haughty when you're trying desperately not to piss yourself.
“I'm going to use the steel frame work to cross over the zombies, the security wall, and then climb down the load bearing pylons to the lockers. My feet will never touch the ground,” I explained to everyone. The pounding at the door was growing more insistent as the undead both heard my voice, and possibly sensed their prey about to escape. “Oh, and I doubt the zombies can climb the framework.”
“Don't call them that,” Madalina shrilled at me. I wanted to grab her by the hair, march her to the door, throw her to the zombies, and let her explain her thought process to them as they chewed on her narrow ass.
Instead, I tried to ignore her. See what an evolved man I am?
“Follow me or not, your choice,” I told Cooms, then turned away to climb the stairs until I could cross over to the nearest framework. If you've never seen a support framework it looks something like two parallel lines of steel beams, and contained within these parallel lines are diagonal beams which serve to strengthen the entire assembly. The space between the top beam beam looked to be four, four and a half feet. Not too terrible, even at nearly six feet tall. I could work with that. The beam, though, was only four inches wide. That part truly sucked.
What’s that? You think four inches is plenty of space to walk on? Maybe on the ground, but thirty-five feet above the ground was another story. My now merely sore testicles attempted to crawl up into my skull the second I reached for the framework.
Wonderful.
I swung out onto the framework, and nearly vomited from stark terror. No, it wasn't the height or the mass of undead below. Not even the thought of falling into the midst of ravening flesh eaters really disturbed me. I nearly lost my grip on the cross beams and plunged to my presumably untimely death because of spiders.
Fucking arachnids.
Yes, that's right. The big, tough Texan is fucking terrified of arachnids. An ex-girlfriend once suggested that I research the eight legged monsters in order to conquer what she called an irrational fear. Previously, my fear may have been a tad bit irrational, all the reading she gave me changed that. I then knew the many and varied ways that arachnids completely suck. She single handedly turned a mild aversion into a full blown phobia. We broke up the same day she turned up on my door with a Black Widow tattooed above her vagina.
Who does that? How did she think that was going to work? Her arachnophobic boyfriend would simply overlook the extremely butt mud inducing Black Widow directly above the spot said boyfriend wanted to insert his prized manhood?
No fucking way.
I told her to kick rocks and never darken my doorway again.
I know, I'm digressing again because I don't want to face up to putting my hands anywhere near the eight legged fuckers. A deeper, more inhuman sound bellowed from just the other side of the ladies room door, which pushed all thought of arachnids to the back of my mind. Whatever the fuck is there sounded about ten thousand times worse than what I’d faced so far. That's when the zombies began slamming against the door in unison.
“Yup,” I squeaked as masculinely as possible while struggling not to piss myself. “I'm the fuck out
of here.”
Spiders be damned, I slid along the framework and was quickly joined by, goddamn it all, Madalina and Cooms. It was possible more people were trying the framework, but I couldn't tell since I was too busy trying not to fall thirty-feet to a crunchy, splattery death.
Yeah, I just made splattery a word.
When the ladies room door came down, the screams from the bathroom served only to drive me faster. The framework shuddered suddenly, and I heard as someone called out in abject horror, and could only assume someone had lost their grip. I risked a glance back and watched as an electrician from the after market modification program landed on one of the aircraft stands. From the cracking, popping sounds, I was certain the poor bastard must broken half his bones in one fell swoop. Excited, highly motivated groans closed on the unfortunate as he began crying out in agony.
“Fuck,” I whispered, saying a mental good bye to yet another coworker. It was the most inexplicable feeling, the sudden loss of men and women I had rarely spoken to, but had known the better part of a decade. Not at all like losing a loved one, but more akin to an old friend not seen in years.
“Move,” Madalina shrilled again. There was just something about the tone of her voice that grated on my fucking nerves. Honestly, I'd just as soon listen to whatever was on the other side of the ladies room door as it recited War and Peace than listen to one more word from the Gypsy Whore. “Get out of the fucking way. They’re coming.”
“Really?” I asked innocently. My free hand came up to my chest in a faux wounded manner. “I hadn't fucking noticed the horde of fucking undead trying to eat me alive as I saved you.”
“Finn, this isn't the time,” Cooms called out. He knew she was being a crazy bitch, but there was every chance Madalina was going to use her Gypsy vagina magic on him so Cooms took her side. I understood his motives, I really did. I thought he was an idiot for falling prey to her wiles, but I understood. “We really need to move along.”
I set my jaw and turned back to the task at hand, but I made a mental note to circle back around to little Miss Shrill. Focus on getting to your family, I told myself over and over. Turning the other cheek just wasn't in my repertoire, so I was grinding my teeth to keep from speaking. Not being able to walk away from trouble was why I spent my twenties in one shit job after another, and in closer contact with the police than I really wanted. Never did time, but I certainly came to understand the many and varied ways the police can violate your civil rights without leaving you any recourse. That time in my life did nothing to alleviate my issues with authority.
Within mere seconds of finally wrestling my attitude under control, the Gypsy dropped open her cock holster and ruined my moment of blissful self control.
“Go faster, asshole. You're going slow on purpose,” Madalina shrilled, and in my mind an image of a pressure gauge about to dip into the forbidden red zone sprang into being. “I need to get out of here now. I can't be here. I have to go home. Oh god, what am I touching? Fuck, this is disgusting. Why didn't you kill those things instead of running away? You ran away, you fucking coward.”
Enter the mental pressure gauge bursting into a million pieces.
The tone of her voice rotated into higher frequencies, usually reserved for dogs, bats, and my last fucking nerve. I understood the woman losing her shit, the situation was one perfectly formulated to cause one to lose their shit. With anyone else I might have felt some compassion, but Madalina had gone to great lengths to alienate me. Sooooo…
“Well, I tell you what you do, fuckwit,” I turned to shout in her face. “Go on back to the ladies room and explain to the fucking zombies how you're just so fucking special they can't eat you. Unlike any swinging dick in this place that can spend money on you. Oh, or why don't you work your way down there and work out a little quid pro quo deal with some of the zombies. You know, trade a little head in exchange for them not eating you alive. Hell, it worked well enough to get you a job you never fucking do. Tell me, because I've really been curious about this, did you just have to suck him off, or did you have to swallow as well?”
Yeah, that's me. Very fucking mature. We’re being hunted by zombies, crossing a steel framework thirty-five feet above the shop floor, and I bring up the ignominious past and chuck it in her face. Although, I doubt that's the worst thing she's had on her face. It's very possible she did what she thought was necessary to secure a decent job and avoid working a dead end, minimum wage job.
On the other hand, no one forced the bitch to run her mouth at me.
I turned back to crossing above a sea of zombies, reaching over their heads for us and calling out their inhuman need for our flesh. Behind me I heard someone call out, “damn dude”. The security wall posed no issues for us as we all slid over it.
Below, the Canadian helicopter program swarmed with zombies and living people still fighting. I could see where my coworkers had rolled a hydraulic cart against the security door, keeping the majority of the undead on the other side of the wall. Smart move, but it still seemed as though enough of the undead got through to turn more
Goddamn it.
Another fifty yards to a support beam, and I planned to slide down the beam into the break room. In the break room I would grab my bag, climb on top of the lockers, and then climb onto the office ceiling behind the break room. After that, I thought it would be a straight shot to the parking lot. All we had to do was get there and we were home free.
“We’re almost there,” I called back over my shoulder. I was moving at a fast clip, but I guess I wasn't going nearly as fast as I thought was because I glanced back to see Madalina less than a foot away. Jesus fuck, I guess she was serious about moving faster.
What the fuck?
Was she crying?
Fucking crying?
I was not in touch with my feminine side, and couldn't stop the disgust from showing on my face so I turned away. Too many years of being told to suck it up when things went bad to give a rat’s flying fuck about the pissing and moaning of one utterly useless person receiving a much needed verbal slap down. The only exception to the suck it rule were my wife and daughter. They can tell me their woes till the sun goes nova.
“You fucking shitheel,” Madlina cried at me between sobs. Thirty yards to go, and I could separate myself from this Gypsy Whore. “You fucking piece of shit. How fucking dare you?”
“Doesn't really take much daring to tell the truth,” I said over my shoulder. The sneer in my voice was unmistakable. “I count myself lucky to be among the few men who have not been stupid enough to fuck you. Contracting incurable venereal diseases is nowhere on my fucking to do list.”
One day. One day I would learn to keep my fucking mouth shut.
I was directly above the side of the WIP, work in progress, crib when the fucking Gypsy drove her foot into my rib cage. All the air in my lungs rushed out, and I started to fold in on myself when the fucking bitch kicked me in the face. A stupidly expensive shoe, once known as a sneaker, impacted my jawline with surprising strength. My hands came away from the steel beams. As I fell, my vision focused in on the semi angelic features of Madalina Hurgoi, contorted into a look of pure hatred.
As I fell away fate spared me, if you can call it that, the long fall to the concrete floor. Instead, I dropped twelve feet before my shoulder struck one of the metal storage bins, and I spun wildly out of control. My spin stopped suddenly as I came into cruel, unyielding contact with the solid floor.
Blinding pain ran through my body half a second before the lights went out.
Interlude Two
He stood within the door of the bathroom watching as the lesser ones, finally given direction, swarmed towards the escaping flesh. The change had robbed Him of the gift of speech, for the moment, but it was His will which drove them. More of the Lesser entered the bathroom, falling upon those too timid to risk the stairway or the ceiling framework. It was the Other which led the flesh onto the framework, intent on showing the flesh the way to safety. F
or Him, the flesh was of far less consequence than the fate of the Other.
The Other must not be allowed to remain extant.
He walks past the Lesser as they devoured the flesh, to enter the stairway. His blood red eyes traced the framework to the escaping flesh, and the Other. The flesh He once was recognized the fleeing forms. He puts designations to the individual flesh, then decides to test their resolve. He struck out, His clenched fist impacted the lower steel beam of the framework. The steel folds around His knuckles, the vibrations shake one of the flesh loose. He remembers the flesh’s designation as Jake Williams, a middle aged man with a fondness for old Chevy’s and strippers. The Lesser swarmed the flesh in moments, rending the protein rich flesh in seconds.
The remaining flesh crossed the security wall quickly, and He was about to redirect the Lesser when one of the flesh, a female designated Madalina Hurgoi, attacked the Other. He watches as the Other fell from the framework, out of sight. The sounds which reached Him are welcome, but not inherently lethal. The Other is extant until He can prove otherwise.
He turned from the stairway to descend to the shop floor where He exerts His awesome will over the horde of the Lesser. As one, the Lesser howled their obedience, provoking a verbal response from the flesh on the other side of the wall. The flesh screamed in defiance and terror, the knowledge of their imminent fate unbearable to their pathetic minds. In a tidal wave of fury, the Lesser surged against the security doors, many of the Lesser were crushed by the weight of their brethren. Again they surged, again more of the Lesser ceased to be extant as the horde struck. He roared his will, and the Lesser seized the edges of the doorframe and pulled. The doorframe pulled loose of the wall, drywall cracking and falling away. Again He roared, and the Lesser surged over those holding the doorframe. The Lesser battling the flesh of the far side of the wall had not been fairing well, and would soon have ceased to be extant. The surging horde served as the overwhelming reinforcements needed to carry the battle. As He walked through the new doorway, He searched for the Other. Despite having seen the Other fall, He cannot see the Other anywhere. The flesh He once was recalled several small spaces in this area that the Other could have fallen into. He stalked around the massive airframes, seeking the Other with every step. He must consume the Other before the process can complete its primary cycle. The Other would become a significant obstacle otherwise.
