Despite a brief, deep sadness, Bill chuckled to himself. The societal obsession with zombies had been something even he had partaken of. “Hell, I think I listened to this show,” he muttered. He had read more than a few scripts for zombie flicks, a few of which he would have been the lead in.
A passing knot of shuffling dead rambled by on the street, never taking notice of the living meat standing in the shadow of a nearby house. Bill checked both ways before leaping out from the house and running.
Several wandering dead blocks away caught a flash of motion as the man traversed the street, darted across a parking lot and swung around a corner into a narrow alley between a hair salon and a frozen yogurt franchise.
No dead were lurking in the alley, and Bill let out the breath he had been holding as he rounded the corner. He knew that he had been spotted, and quickly went for the nearest door letting into a building.
Crossing mental fingers, Bill grabbed the doorknob and twisted. His heart sank to his stomach as the knob stopped in his hand. Twisting harder, he realized it wasn’t locked, simply frozen in place by many years of disuse.
From the corner of his eye, Bill caught movement from the direction he had come. The dead that had spotted him were coming around the building, feet shuffling, dead eyes focusing on their prey. “At least there aren’t any runners.” Squeezing the knob tightly, Bill turned it with strength enhanced by adrenaline. Internal mechanisms scraped and squealed, protesting their sudden torture.
The bolt withdrew, and Bill yanked hard on the door, popping it open, nearly losing his balance in the process.
“Adios, suckers,” he said to the advancing shufflers and stepped through the door just as black, rotting hands reached for him from the darkness beyond it.
4
Crouching next to the body, his knees shooting tiny electric jolts of pain thorough the joints, Doc Shoup touched the dead man’s neck. “Ayuh, he’s dead all right.”
“Of course he is, Doc. I put a bullet in his brainpan.”
“Don’t be sassy, girl. I’m just doin’ my job.”
Doc groaned as he stood up to lean on the counter, take some of the weight off his aching knees and ankle.
Filler stood next to Marian, arms crossed, a scowl darkening his face. “So, this Mitchell fella,” he said as he tapped at the body with a worn boot, “you say he’s got men, and they’ll come lookin’ for him, that right?”
Marian struggled to think through the throbbing in her skull. “Yes, men, eleven of them last I knew.”
“Anything you can tell us about them?” Bibi asked.
“They’re all bastards, each and every one,” Marian said. “Mitchell was the worst of them, which is why they took to following him. They would rob, kill, just wander around, you know?”
“Gypos? You serious, girl?”
Marian, a.k.a. “Lindy” looked up at Filler. “Yeah, I’m serious. They’ve been at it quite a while; very good at it, you know?”
Gypos were marauding bands moving from settlement to settlement, taking over and using up everything in sight, murdering and raping, moving on when nothing was left. They were considered to be just a step below Sores, and most shot them on sight, if they got the chance.
“Son-of-a… what the hell did you bring here, girl!”
“Now, just a damn minute Filler!” Bibi said. She wasn’t about to let someone come down on one of her girls for something she had no control over, especially if that someone was Filler. “It’s not her fault she escaped a psycho and came here. We’re just gonna have to handle it.”
Several others standing around were already muttering among themselves, discussing what had to be done to protect Junction.
“Well good-gawd-damn, ok then.” Filler said, looking at Bibi. “Tell you what, Janet; get every able body to my place in an hour for a little meetin’. We got to figure out some way to take these shit-bags out, if they get in here and take over we’re all done for.”
“We’ve dealt with worse, Filler,” Doc Shoup said.
“Don’t I know it, but we’re a man down with Laidlaw dead, and he was one of our best distance shooters. Fuck that Corey, I’ll toss his screamin’ ass into the burn-pit myself if he’s dumb enough to come back here!” Filler turned and stomped for the door. “Get everyone to my place, Janet,” he tossed over his shoulder before throwing the door open and stepping out.
Janet suspended normal business, sending her girls out to let everyone know that a meeting was happening at Filler’s in a hurry. She kept her shotgun with her, and the last few shells she stowed in a pocket.
Peering at Marian, she said, “We’re in for some shit, aren’t we?”
Marian nodded, tears leaking from beneath closed eyelids. “Yeah, we are. It’s been a while, maybe almost a year, since I ran away. Got a good cut in as I ran, but I had to, Janet. I wouldn’t have lasted there much longer. I was able to hook up with a group heading to Utah, had them drop me somewhere south of St. Louis. Bounced around until I made it here. I hoped it was out-of-the-way enough that he wouldn’t find me.”
“Bounced around” huh? No one just bounces around these days, girl. Life outside walls is dumb and dangerous.”
“Yeah, well, I did it,” the girl said defensively.
Lifting the shotgun from her lap, Bibi said, “These are part of our problem, or lack of ammunition for them. Filler’s got a damn arsenal, I’ve seen it. There’s no ammo though. I’d be surprised if there were five-hundred rounds total in all of Junction.”
Marian hung her aching head. “I’m sorry, Janet. I really am.”
“Don’t be girl, nothing you could do. Let’s head on over to Filler’s and see what we can figure out.”
5
Corey shivered in the cool night air. Brilliant starlight cast a faint glow over the landscape, creating a world of fantasy that seemed separate from the hell he normally lived in.
The noise of sick rats squealing had carried over the still air hours before. Now he prepared to advance on the houses and the Sores occupying the area, hoping they had eaten the tainted meat and were now sick themselves.
Moving with care, he crawled toward the encampment of Sores, taking his time, stopping to listen every few yards. Finally, he could raise his head and see the nearest house less than twenty feet away.
Cocking his head, listening, he could hear human groans off to his left. Pushing himself up into a crouch, Corey slid a hunting knife from the sheath hung from his belt and crept toward the noises.
The first Sore he came to was a female, young, probably no more than sixteen or seventeen years old. She was draped in a mix of sun-cured skins and threadbare clothes. Around her neck hung a necklace of diamonds and gold charms alternating with small white bones. Corey had no clue what the bones were, possibly animal but there was no way to know for sure.
Pinkish foam dripped from the corner of her mouth, splattering on the ground, forming a puddle. Her eyes had rolled up into her head, the veined whites bulging. Corey reached out, extended a fingertip and pressed it against one of the dead girl’s eyes. The turgid resistance of the orb sent a shudder of obscene pleasure down his spine.
Corey looked up, glancing around, as if he feared someone seeing him in his private moment of pleasure. Leaning in, face close enough to kiss dead lips, Corey looked into the eyes and whispered, “Work to be done.”
Emboldened by the dead girl, Corey stepped into the camp proper with an arrogant gait, knife in hand. Bodies lay scattered on the ground near the fire, the bloody remains of partially eaten rats spread among them. There were five near the smoldering remains of the fire, the dead girl made six. “At least two more around here somewhere,” he said to himself.
One of the bodies groaned, rolling onto its back, coughing. A gory spume of bloody froth erupted from the man, the heavier drops splattering over his face and shirtless chest.
Corey moved up beside the dying Sore, hovered over him, watching as pain wracked its body. A trembling hand scrabbled across blood-spatte
red dirt and grabbed Corey’s shoe. The fingers turned up, the gesture a cry for help. Spitting, Corey turned his back and checked the remaining corpses around the fire. All were dead, each having drowned in their own fluids. Moving back to the groaning Sore, Corey knelt down and punched his knife through the forehead of the man. He repeated the process with every corpse except the first girl. She shouldn’t turn for a while and he wanted to save her for later.
Faint moans drifted to Corey on the lazy night air. Cocking his head, listening, they seemed to be coming from the smaller house, to his right, the little cottage that people once referred to as the “mother-in-law” house.
Now that he stood on the grounds, he realized that the small group of houses and barns was not a small community. It was most likely a family homestead. Two larger homes, set about a hundred yards apart, and the tiny mother-in-law cottage, with several other outbuildings made up the full spread.
Following the moans of suffering, Corey made his way cautiously into the tiny house. Another of the Sores had collapsed just inside the door, its body still and cooling as he laid a hand on it.
The moans came again, louder inside the house. Stepping over the corpse, Corey took a second to spike it in the head before moving along the short hallway that led to the combination kitchen/living area, the bath and the single bedroom.
He found the woman in the bathroom, lying inside the old, chipped claw-foot bathtub. The bloody foam had poured from her mouth, over heavy, naked breasts into the base of the tub where it pooled around the plugged drain. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought this was the one the males had been rutting with as he watched earlier.
From his count, Corey was certain this was the last of the Sores inhabiting the area. “Hey there sweetheart,” Corey said. The Sore’s eyes rolled in their sockets to focus on the sound of his voice. “Got yourself in a bad way, huh?”
The woman reached for him, baring her teeth. Even in her suffering the savage rage still drove her. She had no strength left and her arm fell, slapping the side of the tub.
“That’s it, babe, just give over to it. You’re dead, sweetheart.”
Her eyes seemed to track his face as he spoke. Corey shivered when she suddenly locked eyes with him. Her bloodshot gaze seemed to bore directly into his soul, discovering his darkest secrets. She could see his murder of Frank Laidlaw. She could see his half-hearted offer to help Tool on the condom run for what it was. Part of him had hoped Tool would accept, so he could take the smooth, deadly fucker out of the picture, if given the chance.
Her gaze carved away his mask, ripped at the façade he wore like a tailored suit of skin. “Fuck you!” Spittle flew as he screamed at the dying Sore. He took two steps forward, knees pressing against the rim of the tub. The woman’s hand flailed weakly, fluttering against his legs and crotch.
Corey brought the knife down again and again, slamming it into the woman’s skull, burying it to the hilt each time, all while screaming “Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you!”
Corey’s knife hand stopped in mid-air, hovering there as he stared down at his handiwork. The Sore’s head was nearly gone, most of what it had contained now covering Corey, dripping from his knife hand, the tip of his nose, soaking the bulge in his jeans.
Spitting into the open skull-cavity, Corey stepped back and said “Fuck you” once more, this time whispering the invective.
Sitting on the toilet, using the outer curtain hung on the shower to wipe the gore from his face and arms, he took time to collect himself, settle his mind. Several minutes later he stood up and began the work of scaving, starting with the blood-soaked bathroom.
He found several bottles of pills in the medicine cabinet, as well as a pack of adult diapers beneath the sink, confirming his hope. The place hadn’t been picked over yet.
“Well thank goodness for big fuckin’ favors,” he said aloud.
He went about the business of scaving, forgetting about that first dead girl.
6
Quickly slamming the door shut behind him, hoping to prevent the outside zombies from getting in, Bill shoved at the dead thing grabbing for his face.
With the heavy door closed the darkness was pervasive, almost a physical thing that pressed against him much as the zombie was attempting to. He could see nothing in the thick black of what he thought may be a storeroom in the hair salon.
Bill snapped his head to the side. A sound like a rattling cough came from in front and just to the right of his position. Digging into the left front pocket of his worn khaki cargo pants, he felt and gripped the small disposable lighter he kept for starting fires. Holding it up in front of him, while scraping his feet backward along the floor, he flicked the thumb-wheel.
A bright spark flashed and died, leaving him seeing spots. He flicked the wheel again, and again a startling flash, with no flame. “Shit”
The rattle-cough came again, moving closer. The pitch-black murk revealed nothing.
Before he realized what was happening, Bill was going over backward, a strange feeling, time like warm taffy, stretching and stretching, enveloped him. He felt like he had fallen through a wormhole into infinite space, to fall forever in darkness. Then the second was over and his back twitched in pain as he struck the side of something firm, jamming a point in his pack into his back, just before his tailbone hammered the floor. He couldn’t be certain, but he thought he heard it crack.
He still held the lighter in his left hand, the same arm he wore the heavy gauntlet on. Flicking it once more, the lighter flared to life, the small flame illuminating the zombie less than a foot away from him, its body already leaning toward his fallen form.
Before he could react, the zombie came down on him, less like diving, more like a severely uncoordinated fall right into his face. He shoved out the arm wearing the gauntlet. The force of the dead thing knocked the lighter from his hand, darkness refilling the hole the little light had carved in it.
Pressing up, the gauntlet of iron and leather buried in the neck of the beast, Bill pushed back against the insistent force of raving hunger. Reaching down with his right hand, Bill gripped the handle of a knife and tugged.
He realized that the odd half seated position had pushed the pommel of the knife against his thigh, catching it in the cloth of his pants. Several frantic tugs later, enveloped by darkness and fighting to keep the zombie from getting any closer to his face, Bill knew the knife wasn’t going to come free.
Hand scrabbling on the ground beside him, Bill’s fingers wrapped around something, and released it just as suddenly. It felt prickly, and furry and strange in the blackness, and his heart leapt in renewed terror.
Unseen teeth snapped above him, the sound sharp, distinct, as if he could hear far better than normal. His arm began to ache from the strain of keeping the dead thing off him. It was only a matter of seconds before he would no longer have the strength to fight it back.
Slapping the floor, his heart drumming to make Keith Moon jealous, he grabbed the prickly thing, squeezed tightly, and slammed into where he was sure the head of the zombie was.
His aching arm and shoulder jerked with the impact and he nearly let the diseased thing fall. Drawing back in the dark once more he drove the prickly device hard into the skull once, twice and again, his arm jerking lower each time. “Fucking die you bitch!”
Whatever he was holding had crawled forward in his hand, and he could feel his grip slipping. With one last swing, twisting arm, shoulder and body as much as he possibly could he put every bit of strength left into punching through zombie skull into zombie brains.
With a sound like a thick dry stick being broken skull cracked and the prickly thing pushed into brain tissue.
Bill tried to guide the dead weight of the body away from him, but he had nothing left in his arm. The zombie slapped down onto his chest, pinning his arm between them.
The zombie smelled of dry-rot and dust, making his sinuses feels tingly. “Another Husker,” he muttered into the darkness.
&n
bsp; Unable to wait in the dark for another second, Bill rolled sideways, his pack catching against the side of whatever he had fallen into. Pushing with his right hand he was able to flip the zombie off him and sit up.
Pulling his pack off and around, Bill unzipped a pocket on the side and pulled out another lighter and a candle stub he kept stowed away. After closing his eyes, he flicked the flame to life, opening his eyes slowly. Lighting the candle, he held it over the zombie.
“Yep, another husker. Damn, you things are a sight.” Dry, flaking skin, patches missing, muscle showing. Moving the flame higher Bill began to laugh.
“A damn hairbrush, are you kidding me?” Protruding up from the doubly-dead thing’s head was a round bristled hairbrush, one used for styling. Bill laughed until he hurt, bleeding out terror and tension with each laugh.
Banging outside the door brought him back to the moment. There were still dead outside, and their noise would only bring more.
As he was looking up toward the door the hand holding the candle had dipped, bring the flame close to the dry zombie on the floor. The skin caught fire with a puff of gray smoke, and the body began to burn like it had been soaked in oil.
“Oh, shit!” Bill jumped up, grabbing his pack and slinging it over a shoulder. The body burned hot, bright and fast, flames reaching a full foot in height within seconds.
“Ok, this ain’t good.” Blowing out the candle, Bill stuffed both lighter and stub into a pocket and looked around for a door.
Across the room, through a maze of boxes labeled with various hair product logos, Bill could see a door and he made for it quickly.
Stopping beside one of the boxes, Bill popped the top open and grabbed three of the long green bottles inside. “Son of a bitch,” he said looking back at the body, which was now catching nearby boxes on fire. Just this one box of shampoo would be worth its weight in gold.
The shampoos, conditioners, and soaps in this one shop alone would have been enough to make him a King in the land of the dead.
Tales of Junction Page 11
