by Jim Couper
"That's exactly what I'm considering."
"What about the video cameras? Any signals?" Jane asked.
The colonel explained that volunteers who wore cameras must have gone face down then were tuned over and buried. Cameras showed zombies feeding, then ceiling, then sky, then black. Signals were good, but continued to show black. Sound pickup had been good, but there was little to hear. Before the colonel walked away he suggested everyone get a little sleep. He wouldn't order an attack before first light.
Morning arrived with overcast sky and a hint of drizzle. Doogie figured the time had come for the resurrection, but the two bodies in the pool did not rise of their own accord. They did not do anything. He poked, pushed and prodded. Nothing happened. Frustrated, he plugged in a radio, turned it on and tossed it into the water. It sizzled, flashed and a breaker tripped. The room darkened slightly, but the bodies did not move. Doogie pushed a broom onto the edge of the plastic pool. Water drained onto the tiles and the two bodies lay as flat as flounders on an ocean floor. The experiment failed, but more would follow with variations on voltage, solutions and float-times.
Doogie’s thoughts turned to the school basement, but before heading there he casually signalled his cohorts, indicating that they could dine if they so wished. The first innards ripped from the abdomens of the drowned pair got venomously spat onto the floor. No one had any more interest in the long deceased, even electrified deceased. Their brains too were dead, so no one cared to unhinge. Doogie wondered about the best before date on bodies. Did the tissue issue concern time of death or time of immersion in water? Henchmen consumed bodies that had been dead for a minute or two, although they did so with less relish than when consuming the living. They spat out anything that had been deceased longer. Necrophagy had no place on a zombie menu.
A search through drawers, lockers and cupboards uncovered a soft apple, a peanut cookie, half a bottle of soda and an opened bag of vinegar-flavored chips. Mort waited until Doogie went to the school basement before he could head to the cupboard with the supplies. The boy slept in a curl on the floor, but jumped up startled when the door opened. "I brouth food," Mort said as he handed the apple to the pale, chubby child.
"I hate apples," the boy shot back without any indication of gratitude. "You eat it."
Mort took a small bite from the red Mac and thought a sick skunk had died in his mouth. His cheeks puckered, his teeth ached and a bilious nausea rose from the bottom of his oesophagus. He spat out the offending piece that had turned black in his mouth.
"I told you," the boy mocked.
"Thith ith all I found," Mort explained as he handed over the remainder of the meal.
The lad examined the food like it might explode if his touch lacked delicacy then gave his assessment. "The pop's flat, the chips are stale and I'm allergic to peanuts. I'm going home." He pushed his hand against the door, but Mort wouldn't let it open. "If they know you in thith cupboard they eath you.”
"I gotta pee."
"Drink pop: pee in bothle."
"I gotta poo."
"Eath chips: poo in bag."
"You're disgusting."
"I zombie. We eath people."
"You're not eating me."
"I hath children. Love them."
"You mean zombies reproduce? You've got a weenie?"
"Hath children before I wath zombie."
"Why did you become a zombie?"
"Electrithity in earth."
"Maybe my gramma’s a zombie. She’s dead. Her name is Margaret. She’s nice. Do you know her?"
"We not talk. Don't hath names."
"She has white hair, wears glasses, always has an apron on and has false teeth."
"Donth know. No talk or get caught and eathen."
"I wanna go home. I wanna go now."
"I geth you home. Give 30 minuthes." Mort closed the door on the boy and made for the hallway. Before he got to the exit he heard the familiar chant of "brain." Looking back he saw three hollow henchmen lurching towards the boy who had leapt from the cupboard and was running towards a door to the outside. Despite his obesity the lad danced just beyond the grasping hands of his pursuers until they cornered him before he reached the exit. They closed in for breakfast.
"Why doon’t yoou chase him?" asked Doogie, who had just arrived. Mort, surprised by Doogie and the question, watched with a horror-stricken look seeping out of his rotted visage.
"I juth got here," he quickly lied. It surprised him that he could lie with ease and, he hoped, impunity. Among the living dishonesty had troubled him. Melody had been dishonest, he vaguely recalled, and that had troubled him. She had been unfaithful, but he couldn’t recall exactly what that entailed. Perhaps she hadn’t gone to church.
“Doon’t eat boy,” Doogie bellowed, then waddled towards the lad. Mort half-heartedly followed. Confused by what they should do if they weren’t going to dine on the boy, the stalkers stood and stared. The pause gave the prey a chance to dive to the floor and squirm past the legs of his numb pursuers. Outstretched arms belonging to Mort and Doogie were the only barrier between boy and hole in the wall punched by the army. With three zombies half-heartedly lumbering behind him the boy sprinted, intending to do an end run around Doogie, who looked incapable of throwing a tackle. Anticipating this manoeuvre Doogie moved faster than one would anticipate from a short-legged doughboy. The avenue of escape closed as if a dead end sign had gone up. The boy’s other avenue led towards Mort and that seemed just as unlikely a route to freedom. Stubby, white legs didn’t allow for fast travel or deceptive feints, so he came within easy reach. Mort's strong fingers, fingers that could empty a torso in seconds, landed on the boy's shoulder and then slipped away as the child shrugged past. Mort, Doogie and three faster zombie guards pursued the lad, but the two talking, stalking zombies fell behind.Doogie could not keep up and Mort hobbled no faster than Doogie since he had no desire to get hands on the escapee.
The pursuing zombies maintained a steady pace as the boy stumbled over rubble, got through the hole and angled across the lawn. Obesity soon slowed him and he gasped at the unusual expenditure of energy. With hands on knees he sucked air into weak, inedible lungs. Life expectancy could be measured in seconds.
Machine guns fired and patches of skin and hair popped off pursuers. To those who feel no pain this did not act as a deterrent. Bazookas missed their marks and exploded against school, cars and hillsides.
Mort and Doogie waddled directly behind the boy so that no shots came in their direction. For them pursuit was a lost cause. Their cadaverous compatriots closed on the pudgy prey faster than they did. Despite the warning to refrain from dining, the boy was destined to be catch of the day. Chasers drooled like a dam had burst before pouncing on him. Realizing the command to fast would not be obeyed, the talking leaders trundled back towards the school, keeping the boy between them and the guns.
Without a horn honk of warning, a red convertible roared onto the scene amidst the storm of bullets directed at the three chasers. Jane pointed Jesse’s powerful Mustang at the zombie bending over the boy and took out its legs: she had learned from the two women in the Jaguar. From the passenger seat Donald swung an axe, connecting with the pursuers’ heads, backs and knees. A token effort, he knew, but scythes, swords and Z-D-Cappers were not at hand.
Jane executed a spinning U-turn and aimed the car at the second undead, making sure she ran over the first on her way back. Undead number one dragged along under the low-slung car. Number two bounced over the fabric roof and Jane wished that Jesse had bought a fastback. She also wished Jesse was with her. When he phoned from the school and announced his plan to rescue the kids she learned that her hope for him was true. In a real crisis he abandoned his infantile humor and self-serving ways and stepped to the forefront as a police officer and a man. Desperately she wanted Jesse to survive and again fight crime beside her. His bad jokes would break the tension, they would be welcome. She might even give him the benefit of a chuckle from tim
e to time.
Undead cannibal number three, wearing an apron, dark glasses and white stockings, bounced sideways when the Mustang rammed her. Her dentures flew out. Jane spun the car, again driving over a pair of legs on the return to give the puss-filled pestilence another taste of Jesse’s summer tread. A permanent Pirelli imprint remained on the soft skin.
When the bumper connected with the last creature, and it went down, Donald jumped out, grabbed the beefy boy and tossed him over the passenger seat and into the back. The lad deflated his wimpy lungs wailing about the rough treatment. Jane realized she and Donald shared the field with two crippled zombies and a third that must still be beneath the car. Sharing the same thoughts, Donald suggested she finish off the monsters. Back and forth she drove, crunching bones until the two beasts crawled, like huge amoebae, across the grass. She parked a rear wheel atop a zombie head and took off with spinning tires. Bits of face flew out behind.
The time had come, Donald suggested, to get off the field and let the army do its job. Jane answered that running down zombies was such vengeful fun she would take one last pass. At 35 mph she headed directly at two jelly creatures that tried to sit up and she hit them flat on their chests. In the mirrors she expected to see carnage and viewed nothing.
“Look at the mess you’ve gotten us into,” Donald roared above the rattle of tools in the trunk and beer cans beneath the seats. In the mirror they saw bony hands clawing over the trunk.
“Drive towards those people at the edge of the field, but not too close,” Donald shouted. “Then go through the gate and onto Lillian St. then right into Tannis Park. But first slow down near the people.”
“I hope you’re not thinking what I think you might be thinking.” She slightly resented him giving her orders, but what he said was what she thought, so it didn’t matter where it came from.
“We must be on the same page,” Donald responded.
“How do you know the streets? This is my town.”
“I study maps, I remember. My life could depend on knowing how to get in and out of situations.”
“Impressive.” Before Jane could elaborate, black fingernails clawed through the fabric roof above the back seat.
“Slowing down,” Jane shouted and Donald pulled the heavy boy from the back seat and pushed him out the passenger door. In the mirror she saw that his rotundness helped him roll to a safe stop and no creature followed. Several people rushed to his aid.
“Now we need speed,” Jane yelled and the pony car raced out of the schoolyard and along a paved road. She hit speed bumps full tilt and envisioned the creatures being flattened and then thrown into ditches. No bodies appeared behind. Ignoring a dead end sign, she turned onto a dirt lane that led to a small park that overlooked the lake.
“Seat belts off, doors open, I’m going left onto that soft grass, we’re bailing.” Jane described her intentions clearly. “I don’t want to get hurt ... slowing down … oh shit.” The top half of a zombie ripped through the back of the ragtop. It grabbed Donald’s jacket, pulled him backwards and bared yellow incisors. Donald had executed Jane’s instructions, unbuckled his seat belt and prepared to open his door. A cliff loomed ahead and he saw himself sailing through the air while a zombie hoisted him from the passenger seat onto the canvass dining platform. Drowning would be quicker and more satisfactory if he could just keep teeth from his flesh for another few seconds. Death as hero wasn’t the worst fate, he thought, and then considered that might be his last thought. Shouldn’t life flash before him like a download playing in his mind’s eye? A chubby boy had been saved. Perhaps fatso would grow up to be a great leader and find the path to world peace. That was the least he could do. Perhaps Donald’s heroics would earn him a brass plaque at headquarters in Ottawa and a small statue in the park where he would breathe his last and think his last.
A second pair of creepy hands reached through a slit in the roof towards Jane. She grabbed the unlatched end of her seat belt, extended it to its full length and pushed the snap-end through a metal stay in the convertible top. She snapped the ends together so the seatbelt held the roof rather than her. She shouted to Donald to copy and he twisted his seatbelt through the metal roof truss and fastened it to the end next to the seat. Rooftop zombies inched closer. Jane released a J-hook and pushed a silver button marked Top. A powerful motor tried to lift the canvass but strained against seatbelts that held it down. Forceful, scabby fingers pulled at driver and passenger. Jane pounded the brake pedal, twisted the wheel and the car slowed as it skidded backwards from dirt track onto grass.
“One, two, three, do it.” Simultaneously Donald and Jane pressed their red seatbelt release buttons and the top snapped free. Two zombies slingshotted over the trunk, over the cliff and into the lake. With gear selector in neutral Jane and Donald jumped out and the car continue over the edge. The roof billowed like a parachute and the car fell in slow motion, landing on top of two jettisoned monsters that flapped their arms in a futile attempt to stay afloat. A third creature, wearing an apron, clung to the car’s greasy bottom and went down with the ship.
Jane and Donald peered over the edge and watched the convertible top ripping off like an umbrella in a gale and three zombies sinking deep into clear water.
“Jesse has lost his house and his car,” Jane laughed from the grass. “The department is going to go bankrupt paying him back.”
“We’ve got budget,” Donald added with a smile. “A new car is nothing. Might even be able to salvage that one. It was a soft landing. Only 50 feet deep. I can still make it out settling on the bottom. The beasts are with it. Just slight movement from them. They’ll die. I thought I was a goner back there. Had my last thoughts.”
“About loved ones?”
“No. Thinking about what my last thoughts would be.”
“I wondered what we would be like as zombies. Wondered if we would even know each other. My life didn’t flash before my eyes.”
Hugs and kisses from adoring parents almost suffocated the pair after an army jeep drove them back to the school. The colonel congratulated them and said he had lined up his mortars to blast the school and everything in it. Most of the staff hostages had escaped, but a few remained captive.
Jane and Donald wondered why the Colonel’s plan had not been carried out already although Jane was relieved it hadn’t. Jesse might be alive: his survival skills would surely cover that possibility. On the other hand, if the majority of the enemy could be eradicated in one simple exercise, the sacrifice of a human life did not amount to much. At least in the cold calculating eyes of the army it didn’t amount to much. Remaining volunteers who were too slow or too sick to run had expressed willingness to die for the sake of children, although they wouldn’t get their wish because the children were now free.
At the military station Jane caught the end of a conversation. One missing, and thought to be living, hostage was the superintendent of education who had been inspecting the school at the time of the invasion. With two children at home and twins on the way, she elicited maximum empathy. Eight months of pregnancy limited her mobility and were it not for Doogie’s fasting order she would have been a done dinner. A chubby teacher, near retirement age, stayed behind to help her although he could have escaped with the others. In 30 years of teaching he had done nothing of note and his meekness prevented him from being noticed and placed on the list of missing.
Sentiment among the military favored a rescue attempt before blasting the school to oblivion. Jane added that one of her officers should be considered missing and probably alive. Unaccounted for civilians exasperated the Colonel who could be heard muttering, "Why so difficult? If soldiers were inside I would bomb the bustards, ’scuze me.”
Doogie spent time visiting the school basement. To Mort's question about what went on below he curtly responded, "a goood prooject." Mort found no satisfaction in the vagueness, but curiosity was not a major part of his fogmire of a mind.
While on sentry duty Mort wandered the halls
, came upon a steel door, opened it and, without over-thinking the situation, descended 14 steel stairs to a dark, damp environment. A pathway flowed between heaps of rocks and rubble: muted voices came from ahead. Before he could decipher them he had to step aside for a hollow one who pushed a wheelbarrow full of dirt.
"Soo yoou come tooo bottom flooor." Doogie’s face cracked with a painful demi-smile as Mort approached. "We near the third coming."
A tunnel, large enough for a stooped man or a normal zombie, penetrated the basement wall behind Doogie. "Where thath go?" Mort asked.
"Tooo old garage. Sooon we surface. Yoou loook. I go up."
Doogie left Mort staring into the tunnel from which wheelbarrows and buckets of dirt emerged. The empty zombs moved faster than any he had seen and their speed made him envious. They even possessed a degree of dexterity as they swung picks and axes that, for the most part, missed each others’ arms and legs. The extra trickle of electricity from toiling beneath the surface worked miracles.
A minute after Doogie left his voice boomed over the address system, "We have hoostages. Talk toomorrow."
The Colonel's voice countered, "We negotiate now. If you do not respond in 15 minutes we will destroy the school and all in it."
No response came in 15 minutes or 30 minutes or in one hour or two hours. Doogie moved his troops to the basement in case the colonel carried out his threat, but it seemed unlikely. Human life had a perceived value much higher than reality, particularly when educational staff, the guardians of children, were concerned.
Twenty-four hours passed before Doogie returned to the microphone. "Want three for one. One big, healthy man, twoo others. Trade in hoour."
The colonel's assistant had trouble rounding up volunteers. Sacrificing one’s life for children was fine, but no one would step up to the plate with a note pinned to their back that said “eat me” in exchange for an adult. At the cancer ward the assistant found two frail volunteers willing to save an expectant mother, but large, healthy men were in short supply. A hospice produced a doomed male volunteer of middle age, who had AIDS. He stood relatively tall and looked strong despite the disease taking away some of his weight. The Colonel asserted that zombies couldn’t distinguish sick from healthy so it didn’t matter about being sick if it was a big adult male. His observations proved to be correct, but his satisfaction turned to disappointment when the zombies released the meek male teacher instead of the pregnant lady they expected.
