by Jim Couper
“Yeth,” he finally sputtered in response.
“Wonderfool, I been loooking.”
“Yeth,” Mort repeated.
“We walk loong time. Foooting doofficult.” The voice had some kind of British accent plus a bubbling sound as if under water.
Mort thought deeply then replied, “Yeth.”
“Yoo talk poor: sooon yoo improove.”
Sentences formed in Mort’s head, but he knew that when he tried to get them past his loose lips the resulting noises would sound strange, so he made it simple.
“Whoo are oo?” he asked without the intention of mocking the whale’s speech. Their conversation sounded like hungry cows on their way to the barn.
“Oo am I? I’m Doogie Hooper. I need loootenant. Yooo are him. I knoow I wooold find yoo.” Doogie pointed to Heady and then to his own two companions, “Soldiers of misfortoon in army of gloom. More in wooods. Must find them. Yoonite them. Are yoo twoo with us?”
Mort understood the sparse words although Doogie spoke like a drowning bovine. The big picture had no clarity. What did he mean by with us? Mort asked, “Wath happen too oo?”
“I droowned. On froozen lake. Throo the ice. Before I knooo it … drooned. Doo I loook it? Retained water.”
“Yeth,” Mort succinctly responded.
“My skin drooping off. Doo yoo have tape? I’m oot. My shoolder’s looose.” Doogie dumped the bag that hung from his shoulder onto the ground as if to indicate it usually carried precious tape.
“Yeth,” Mort whispered and tipped his own pack. A half-roll of silver tape that a car had driven over rolled across the forest floor and down the hillside. Another near-empty roll landed flat.
Dirt-colored curls clustered tightly atop Doogie’s head. Pale skin that must once have been extremely white, made Mort think that Doogie must be of Scandinavian extraction, possibly Mongolian. Somewhere from up the Nile.
Doogie could pass for a statue of Buddha that had not weathered well and since Buddhism was a religion Doogie must be Catholic, from Cathay, capital of Mongolia. Deductive reasoning pleased Mort. He could figure anything out.
“Goood to talk tooo yoo,” Doogie said, interrupting Mort’s meandering mind. “Want the stoory. Coourse yoo doo. Electricity mooves in ground from radio wave station. Mooves few hundred metres every oor. That wooke us. Whoot a hooot! Alive. And goood foood. Doon’t yoo love joocy finger foood?”
The red stains down Doogie’s front showed the kind of meal he referred to. Mort’s eyes followed the red and then realized Doogie was naked. His belly protruded so much it didn’t matter that the emperor wore no clothes. He could pass for an obese woman the way his breasts puffed out and grey flab sagged to his knees.
“Remoove yoor footwear,” Doogie continued. “Current gets intoo yoo throo yoor fooot. Yoo’ll talk more; feel goooder.” Doogie held up his foot for Mort to inspect and little but bare bone showed on his sole. Flaps of worn, dirty skin hung over the sides.
“Noo pain: much tooo gain. On rocks use shoos so fooot doesn’t wear tooo much.” As Doogie talked he unwound the last of Mort’s tape and wrapped it around his shoulder to bind drooping flesh. “Yoo want to knoow more?”
“Yeth,” Mort answered.
“Of coorse. When doo we soldiers of misfortoone moove, yoo think? When electric waves wake more. Sooon we moove to oor destiny. Take oover land and harvest former roolers.”
Mort pried off his heavy hiking boots, the ones that pulled him to lake’s bottom, and a trickle of energy flowed into his body as he padded on needles beneath pine trees. Rather than being an instant jolt − like plugging in a light − it arrived as if coming from an AAA battery connected to his toes.
“Yoo’ll need these,” Doogie said opening his sack and offering something to Mort.
After fingering the item Mort realized he had been handed sunglasses and put them towards his head, jabbing the arms into his eyes. The blue, ruby-studded frames didn’t fit and did nothing for him style-wise so he pushed them over Heady’s ears, first poking her eyes. She had been bent over, shielding her yellow orbs, but immediately came to life and began strutting around the glade as if demonstrating a new style of eyewear on a fashion runway.
Doogie handed Mort a heavy brown pair and the moment the dark lenses cloaked his eyes he felt relief from the constant irritation of light. Why hadn’t he thought of that?
23
After the sun bid goodbye to the mountain tops, Jane and Jesse looked at each other and realized they would be unable to go home from the police station without risk of being riddled by bullets from a nervous teenage sharpshooter with his first gun . The day of zombie wrangling had sped by so fast that neither noticed the arrival of dark. Curfew meant no one would come in to relieve them, which was beside the point because, in all the chaos, no one had scheduled a night shift and none of the new recruits had volunteered to do graveyard.
No matter how much Jane would like to see the drug lord eaten, she couldn’t leave him alone all night in his cell beside three crazed flesh eaters and it wasn’t because of his constant whining about the stink and his rights. Her duty was to protect one and all. A zombie feeding would be entertaining, Jesse had suggested, and none on the force would shed a tear if someone made a meal of the Englishman.
They dragged mattresses from cells 3 and 4 and paused to observe the captives, but the stink gagged them and they rushed to their offices. Jane kept a sleeping bag for such an occasion while Jesse rounded up standard jail issue sheets, which, despite being washed a hundred times, still showed spots where body fluids he didn’t like to think about had spilled.
Two doors separated cells from offices but didn’t stop an aroma townsfolk called eau d’zee from permeating all. Thoughts of pizza, hamburger or Chinese were accompanied by thoughts of entrails being ripped out and downed in a few bites. The ungodly stench had kept food from their thoughts for the entire day, a busy day. Media reps pounded constantly on their doors and the parade of scientists taking a look at the captives didn’t stop until nightfall.
“Coffee and muffins is all I can handle at the moment,” Jane suggested.
“I was thinking steak, rare, with beets and carrots," Jesse answered. "And a glass of red wine. Ugh, I can’t even joke about it. I’m with you on this one. I’ll order up. What’s your dining pleasure?”
Before Jane could say “cranberry” and discuss a delivery method a howl came over the intercom that connected offices to cells. Jesse, closest to the door, took the lead and when they got to the cells one zombie lay on the floor awkwardly biting into duct tape that bound its legs.
“They’re gonna break outta here,” screamed the hysterical Englishman. It was the same scream his addicted customers used as he broke their fingers when they didn’t pay.
Jesse replied, “Nothing to worry about buddy; they’re just preparing. Every night at seven, here at the cells, we have meet your neighbor social hour.”
“Don’t get funny, you sarcastic shit. I’m saving your life by warning you.”
“We gotta re-cuff ‘em,” Jane sternly ordered and went to a locker and pulled out three stainless steel pair. “How do we do it?”
“Carefully,” Jesse replied.
“Okay. I open the door, you go in. Cuff the ankle of the one on the floor, drag him to the bed and cuff him to it. The tape should hold on his arms, watch out for teeth. Get the next one on the wrist and cuff him, or her, or it, to the other bed. Cuff inmate number three to the door. Numbers two and three have their heads wrapped in tape so you’re not in danger. They can’t bite. But look out for the first one.”
“Ok, it’s a plan,” Jesse nodded. “But before I go in there I gotta tell you what I’ve been thinking. You’ve seen TV, watched horror movies. There’s always a sidekick, sort of funny, comic relief. That’s me. You’re the hero-boss. You know what happens to the sidekick?”
“Nothing ever happens to Robin or Jimmy Olsen, they just go along for the ride. Are you worried they’re gay, l
ike boy toys? Worried I see you that way?”
“I’m thinking horror movies, not superhero movies: films with zombies and crazed killers. I’ll tell you what happens. The sidekick is second to go. Right after the wild teens who are drinking, screwing and drugging. That scares me.”
“No problem. If you’re scared I’ll do it.”
With that Jane yanked open the door, clamped a shackle on the ankle of the prone zomb and dragged him to a bed. She did the same to the second and finished the plan to perfection with number three.
“They don’t weigh much,” she informed Jesse. “But you can sure feel their strength. Amazing strength.”
“Thanks for doing that. I had a déjà vu that gave me a premonition that I was just a few steps from my grave.”
“We’re not finished yet. You secure those loose legs and those gnashing teeth.” Jane handed him a roll of tape and held the cell door open so he could squeeze past the cuffed zombie and finish the job.
Jesse understood he had no choice. Every dangerous situation required action and he had received an order. Still, the thought of being in a cell with three flesh-crazed monsters terrified him because he knew he had expendable sidekick stamped on his forehead. As he brushed against the one at the door a latrine of stench made him want to shower with lye. Its head bobbed and he could hear teeth snapping under the layer of silver tape. He reached the zombie with loose feet and it danced and kicked and snapped at him. Jesse carefully got down on his knees, unravelled an arm’s span of tape and stuck the end to an ankle that kicked out at him. He edged closer and the other foot flew at him, like a karate kick and despite a delivery that started slowly, it landed on his jaw. It hit hard and rigid and a rivulet of blood seeped from his lip and dribbled down his chin. The zombies sensed the blood and started twitching and pulling against cuffs and tape while muttering a chorus of … brain.
Jesse heard Jane shout, “Get out of there,” but he had a job to finish. He swung his feet across the cement floor to knock the zombie’s legs from under it, but the creature froze like a bronze statue planted in cement and the full force of Jesse’s thrusting legs did nothing to topple it.
“Forget it,” Jane shouted and he knew why he was assistant and she the boss. She cuffed the enemy with ease and professionalism and he couldn’t even knock one over to bind its legs. This lesser task may have challenged him, but he wouldn’t quit. He fashioned a length of tape into a circle and slid it across the floor under the legs of the kicking zombie. When its feet came down inside the circle he pulled and a wad of tape stuck around its feet. Jesse did this several times and the more the zombie hopped the more tape stuck and less movement it had. Each time Jesse got a little closer until he reached its ankles and wrapped a dozen layers of tight tape around them. Jane yelled, “Watch out for its teeth,” but before he could back away the zombie had fallen forward and, through a tiny opening in the swaddling over its mouth, managed to nip into Jesse’s neck. In response Jesse jumped up and mummified its head.
When they got back to Jane’s office Jesse slumped into a chair and moaned, “I knew it. I’m a goner.”
“What do you mean?”
“I got bit by a zombie. I’m going to turn into one. And then I’m going to attack you and eat you. You have to kill me. I’ve seen it. You have to make preparations. I don’t wanna be a zombie. I don’t wanna eat my friends.” With that Jesse bent over into hands that filled with tears, sweat and a little blood.
Jane left him to his misery while she went to the bathroom and brought back a first aid kit. Without a word she bandaged his wound then spoke. “Movies don’t reflect life, especially horror movies. How many psychotics have you locked up that stab people in the shower and practice taxidermy on their mothers? Has anyone ever arrested a serial killer wearing a goalie mask? I could go on.”
“But you don’t know,” he said quietly. “We’re in new territory. I might turn. Or I might become Godzilla or Cannibal Lecher. What if it’s true? What if I become a zombie? You’d be alone here. What if I wake up at 3 a.m. and I tear you apart?”
Jane sighed at the unlikelihood of the situation. “I’ve got a backup plan. I bought a Z-D-Capper.”
“Cool, I saw them on TV. Tried to get one. Sold out everywhere. How did you get your hands on one?”
“Used some police persuasion and parted with $600.”
“Wow, that’s a steep mark-up. Gotta see it.” He perked up when Jane brought the customized tree pruner out of a cupboard. Jesse ran his fingers over the two curved scythe-like blades and cranked the handle, putting tension on the scissors like an old cross-bow. The blades snapped with the sound of giant shears slicing a tree limb.
“That’ll get them,” he declared proudly, then slumped in his chair as he realised the purpose of the sharp, shiny blades was to separate his head from his body the instant he transformed. Again he cranked the handle that armed the blades and pulled the trigger so they snapped shut. “We have to test this thing. Can I try it out in cell two?”
“No, not yet.”
“How about cell one?”
“Wish you could. There’s a dead tree at the back door, about three inches thick. See if it will take that down?”
Jesse passed lockup on his way to the back door and saw an undead prisoner hopping around its cell. The druggie slept in the middle of his cell, where he had dragged his mattress and blankets, out of reach of grasping hands and chomping teeth. Jesse went back, told Jane and asked if it would be within the line of duty to try the Z-D-Capper on a zombie that resisted arrest.
“It isn’t exactly doing that.”
“Yes it is. It refuses to sleep. That’s resisting a rest.”
“Glad you haven’t lost your kindergarten humour. You must be feeling better.”
Jane grabbed a ringing phone and Jesse headed for the dead tree challenge.
Motion detection lights that normally flooded the parking area behind the police station didn’t activate when he opened the back door and stepped out. A smashed sensor hung by loose wires. Street lights that should illuminate the alley had also been broken and glass littered the laneway. Beside a fence, just five yards away, stood the target dead tree, its black bark barely visible. Jesse edged towards it then heard noise: possibly a shuffling of feet. A mumble he did not recognize as human rumbled across the parking spots. He steadied the de-capper, thrust it left then right, peering into blackness for anything that moved. First he smelled it and then he heard it, but he never saw it. Blindly he thrust the de-capper into the night and pulled the trigger. Its blades snapped but he felt no resistance: no head tumbled. Although bitten by a zombie and doomed to die and awaken as one of them, he could still defend the fort: he could be a fallen hero, a martyr even. Two cats sped along the lane as he reloaded. They hissed and a large dog snarled as it chased them. Something bumped Jesse’s back and he spun around and saw the station door’s protruding handle. Enough of this, he thought and hopped inside, slammed the weighty metal slab and secured sure both lock and deadbolt.
Jane answered a call from a woman who reported noises from prowlers in her backyard. Had the caller been living on an ice-floe, Jane wondered? It would take too much time and energy to start explaining about a zombie presence so Jane told the woman to watch TV or pick up a newspaper. “Dial 911 if the noises continue. That will connect you to the army. They’ve come to Peachland to help.”
Jesse stumbled in, panting and describing his fright outside the back door. In mid-sentence he paused then continued with a non sequitur, “Since curfew has started does that mean no coffee and muffins? I could reach the deli in a 20 second sprint. But its doors might be locked. Looks like I won’t even get a last meal.” He sat behind the front desk and mentioned they had not finished their discussion about what she would do if he became a zombie at 3 a.m. “You can’t decap me if I smash your door and get a piece of you before you wake up.”
“I’ve been keeping an eye on you. Normal so far. But I’ve got a plan. Part of it is tha
t you put that decapper back in the cupboard, loaded.”
“Care to share the rest with the class?”
“If I share then you might develop a counter plan.”
“Fair enough. But I’ll tell you my plan. Should I remain human and zombies attack, our front door is the weak point. Everything else is solid and barred. First thing we have to do is roll some heavy desks against the door to make sure it can’t be opened.”
“But it swings open to the outside.”
“Of course. We tie the inside handle to desks and if it gets opened the desks will keep them out.”
“You forgot how strong they are. Is that your entire plan?”
“No. Part two. Put one foot behind the other, back into cell four and lock myself in. Nice and safe. Can’t be hurt, can’t hurt anyone. Win win. You get cell three if there’s an attack. Suite four will be my home for the night no matter what. You hide the keys.”
“Good idea. My back-up plan should arrive in a few minutes. Two soldiers stay in the station tonight. They come armed with coffee and muffins. And a bottle of wine, courtesy of Colonel Maychew and the winery. We’re no longer on duty. The army has an interest in observing you. They want to see you become a zombie. Cameras will be set up: the de-capper armed.”
“Great. I’m becoming a celeb zomb. I’ll do talk shows. I’ll need a ghost writer for my bio.”
“From what I understand the undead don’t do good interviews. Don’t have much to say. Can’t say it.”
Loud thuds from outside suggested an attack had started before they had made preparations to defend. Voices shouted to be let in. Two soldiers with coffee, muffins and donuts got a tour of the station and cells: the sight of live zombies fascinated them. If not for the stink they would have stayed and observed.
Jane and Jesse enjoyed their snacks while a soldier filmed the captives then set a camera on a tripod and pointed it at Jesse’s mattress in cell four. The army men didn’t touch the wine, but joined the police in games of poker and rummy; force vs. force. Police would have won if they hadn’t overindulged in wine and got giddy. At 2 a.m. they headed for their beds and tossed about until first light. During the night the two soldiers changed shifts and a new duo sat in opposite corners playing games on their phones.
