Sandman

by William W. Johnstone

  Several miles down the road, Darrel brought the car to a tire-squalling halt when Andy spotted a car parked on the shoulder of the highway, a young couple standing beside it. The hood was raised, signaling car trouble.

  Andy lowered the window and the young man stuck his head inside, smiling.

  “Boy, am I glad to see . . .”

  His eyes widened, the words jamming up in his throat as the bloody nakedness of the car’s occupants registered on him. He opened his mouth to wail in terror. But Andy rammed his hand into it and grabbed his tongue.

  The young man tried to pull back, to get away from this obscene horror. He couldn’t. Andy’s hard fingers dug into his tongue and held on. With his free hand, Andy reached up and poked out one of the young man’s eyes.

  The wild pain-filled shrieking that collected in his throat was cut off by the hand that filled his mouth. The corners of his lips were split from the widening, and blood leaked down from them.

  The young man’s feet did a strange dance on the shoulder of the road.

  Andy and Darrel and their ladies thought it amusing. They grunted and hooted and slobbered and clapped their hands.

  Andy thought he’d never had so much fun.

  He ripped out the young man’s tongue, and swiftly grabbed the back of his neck, with both hands, dragging him halfway into the car.

  The young woman who’d been standing by the disabled car finally broke free of the paralysis that had rooted her there, and fled. She ran, screaming, across the desert, Mona and Mary right behind her, grunting and calling for her to stop.

  Her young man had been dragged all the way into the car. Two sets of mouths with very sharp teeth punctured his neck, and sucked the hot flow of living blood.

  In the moon-splattered desert, the young woman tripped and fell, heavily, the impact knocking the wind from her. Naked bodies pounced upon her, ripping the clothes from her, forcing her to stand up.

  She screamed until her throat was raw.

  But Mona and Mary marched the wailing, weeping, near-hysterical naked young woman back to the blood-splattered car, forced her into the back seat.

  All semblance of reason left her when she saw the pale and bloodless face of her young man.

  His breathing was a wet gurgling, pushing out of his bloody mouth. His throat had been gnawed at.

  Blood spattered the windows, the dash, the floorboards, and the upholstery of the luxury car.

  She was pushed onto Andy’s lap, in the back seat. She screamed, shrieking even louder as he bulled his way inside her.

  Darrel shoved the bloody young man over the seat into the back, so the women could have something to drink after their race across the desert.

  As they lapped greedily at the open, still-pumping throat, Darrel pulled out onto the pavement, and they motored along at a sedate forty-five miles per hour.

  The lights of a truck drew closer behind them. An eighteen-wheeler whose driver was based in Alabama. South Alabama. He pulled out to pass, took another startled look at the antics going on in the back of the car, then swung back, reaching for the mike to his CB.

  “Breaker one-nine for anybody. This is the Goose talkin’.”

  “Come on, Goose,” his speaker crackled. “You got the Lone Arranger here.”

  “They’s a-fuckin’ up yonder!” Goose radioed, his four-watt CB jacked up to a hundred watts . . . at low output.

  “Who and where, you dumb hillbilly?”

  Goose searched for a highway marker. None to be seen. “I’m about six or eight miles outside of Kearny. Southbound.”

  “If you’re all lit up like a Christmas tree, Goose, then I’m right behind you.”

  “That’s me. Come on.”

  “I see you, Goose. Hold what you got. I’m givin’ her all she’s got.”

  “So is that ol’ boy in the back seat. Good Lord God Almighty! There ain’t a stitch of clothes on none of them people.”

  Lone Arranger pulled up close. “Lemme by! Lemme by! I wanna look.”

  “I was here first. But I can’t figure out what that stuff is all over the back window. Looks like something splattered.”

  “It looks like blood to me.”

  “Blood!”

  Mona and Mary chose that time to twist around in the back seat and look out the blood-splattered rear window. They grinned at Goose.

  The sight of their wild eyes and bloody mouths and faces just about caused the Goose to lose it all. He slammed on his brakes and the Lone Arranger had to do some fancy driving to keep from climbing Goose’s donkey.

  The Lone Arranger cut around the Goose’s tire-smoking rig, his trailer swinging wildly for a moment. When he got it under control, he grabbed for his mike and started cussing.

  “You stupid asshole! What’s the matter with you?”

  No reply from the badly shaken Goose.

  “Goose! Where are you, Goose?”

  Nothing.

  “You’d better talk to me, you hillbilly!”

  “I’m right behind you, Lone Arranger. Look here. You take a good long look when them two gals grin at you, boy. Then we got to call the cops.”

  “Call the cops! Have you lost what little brains God give you? Man, I ain’t wrote in my little book since some time yesterday.”

  “I don’t even know where my log book is! Can’t be helped. We gotta call the cops.”

  Lone Arranger was about to tell the Goose that he wasn’t about to do that. Then Mary and Mona pressed their bloody, evil, wild-eyed faces to the rear glass and grinned at him.

  The Lone Arranger screamed like someone had just stuck a rattlesnake into his boot.

  When he finished cussing and hollering he picked up his mike and called the Goose. “Yeah. I see what you mean. You been on nine, Goose?”

  “Ten-four. But I can’t raise a soul.”

  “I’m hearin’ you ol’ boys jabber,” another driver cut in. “I’m on the north side of Tepehuanes. You want me to call the cops and give them a message? Come on. They call me the Cowboy.”

  “Yeah, Cowboy. This is the Lone Arranger. Call the cops and tell them there’s a dark blue Lincoln Town Car comin’ dead at them. Naked people inside. There’s blood all over the inside of the car, and splattered on the rear window. You ten-four all this, Cowboy?”

  “Man, are you puttin’ me on?”

  “Hell, no!” Goose hollered.

  “OK. I’m pullin’ into a service station now.”

  “Tell the cops me and the Lone Arranger will be right behind them,” Goose radioed. “We’ll keep them in sight.”

  “Ten-four. I’m out of the truck now.”

  About two minutes later, the Lone Arranger radioed to the Goose. “The crazy son of a bitch is signaling for a left turn, Goose. What do you wanna do?”

  “Let’s stay with them, Arranger. You got a gun?”

  “Damn right. You?”

  “We ain’t supposed to carry them, but I do. Got a shotgun. I’m right behind you. If there’s a county mountie listenin’ to all this, you better answer me!”

  “Calm down.” The voice came out of the speaker. “I’m listening. I just caught the call from the city dispatch. What’s your twenty?”

  “We’re about three or four miles north of town. Turnin’ southwest on a dirt road. There’s a billboard on the southbound side of the highway advertisin’ a motel.”

  “I know where you are. I’m rolling.”

  Mona and Mary held up the body of the young man and grinned out the rear window.

  Lone Arranger grabbed for his mike. “Deputy? They got a dead body in the back seat with them. He’s got blood all over him. And I don’t think this is any college prank, Deputy.”

  “Ten-four. How many in the car?”

  “Four or five. Alive. I can’t be real sure on that.”

  “Stay with them if you can. But don’t put yourselves in a position to get hurt. Ten-four?”

  “Ten-four on that.”

  The deputy, a ten-year veteran on t
he force, and aware of what was taking place in and around Tepehuanes, was rolling wide open and saying a little prayer he hadn’t spoken since childhood. He cut off at the intersection, fishtailing upon hitting the dirt and sand, and with the truck lights in sight, went roaring down the road.

  He had to stand on his brakes when the car and the two trucks braked suddenly. After he got his unit under control, the deputy bailed out, a riot gun in his hands. He kashucked a round into the chamber and yelled for those in the car to step out, hands high.

  Both truck drivers had dismounted from their cabs and were standing close to their rigs.

  “We got shotguns in the cab, Deputy,” Goose called softly. “You want us to get them?”

  “All right. But don’t use them unless I give the order, understood?”

  The drivers nodded and climbed up to grab their shotguns and climbed back down.

  “I said get out of that car!” the deputy yelled. “Now do it!”

  The back door of the big car opened slowly, the drivers and the deputy tensing.

  The body of the young man was shoved out onto the ground.

  He was headless.

  “Good God!” the Lone Arranger muttered, tightening his grip on the pump shotgun.

  The young man’s girlfriend was pushed out the other side of the car. She fell naked to the ground, her throat and neck bloody. She appeared to be alive.

  In a way.

  “Get out of the car!” the deputy hollered.

  An object was flipped out of the Lincoln. It landed at the feet of the deputy. He stared in horror at a mouth-open, eyes-open bloody head that appeared to have been torn from a torso.

  Goose and the Lone Arranger both fought hard to keep from puking.

  The engine of the Lincoln roared into life. Back tires spinning, the car turned around, its headlights catching the men in full glare.

  “Fire!” the deputy yelled.

  Shotguns roared in the night, buckshot whanging and sparking off metal. The headlights were knocked out. One front tire was blown off. The windshield was shattered.

  Yet the car kept coming at them.

  The three men jumped out of the way as it crashed into the deputy’s unit, knocking it to one side, and leaving the radiator punctured, steam hissing white in the night air.

  The heavy car backed up and tried to run over Goose.

  Squalling, he jumped up between his tractor and trailer and fired once. A side window exploded as the buckshot tore into the back seat and struck flesh.

  Goose watched in horror as part of a woman’s face was torn away, exposing the whiteness of jawbone and a row of teeth.

  She grinned at him.

  Lone Arranger and the deputy fired at the rear of the fast moving car, knocking out the tail lights and part of the rear window. The deputy ran into the center of the road and watched as the buckshot-riddled car turned toward Tepehuanes.

  He ran back to his unit and called in, alerting his substation and the PD.

  As he tossed the mike to the seat, the Lone Arranger started screaming.

  The deputy looked. Then he stood rooted by his car, eyes unbelieving, hands clutching the shotgun.

  The bloody young woman was walking toward the truck driver. Her throat had been torn out. Her arms were outstretched, her hands clawed, reaching for the man. Her face was very pale. Her lips red and full. She smiled, exposing unusually long teeth. Very sharply pointed.

  She was speaking in a language none of them could understand.

  The Lone Arranger lifted his shotgun and yelled for her to stop. “I’ll shoot you, lady. Stay away from me.”

  She spoke again. One word. They all understood that. “Blood.”

  “She’s one of them things that ain’t supposed to be real!” Goose yelled.

  “Tell her, not me!” Lone Arranger said.

  The woman grunted.

  Kept coming.

  Lone Arranger pulled the trigger. The charge hit the woman in the shoulder. She was knocked down. Got up. Grinned at him.

  There was no blood coming from the hideous wound.

  Screaming his fright and disbelief, the Lone Arranger climbed back into his cab and locked all the doors, hollering for someone to get that crazy woman away from him.

  Goose bailed out on the other side of his rig and tried to reload his empty shotgun. His hands were shaking so badly he dropped all the shells onto the ground. He got down on all fours and frantically began searching for them.

  The bloodied, throat-torn, wild-eyed woman turned slightly, upon spotting the deputy.

  She held out her arms to him, beckoning him to come to her.

  The deputy backed up.

  He could see the whiteness of bone at her shoulder. No blood.

  He could not recall ever being so scared in all his life.

  The woman screamed at him, a chilling scream. Then she began to walk toward him.

  He had seen that shooting her did no good. He ran around his unit.

  She kept coming, following him, grinning at him, motioning for him to come to her.

  Still on his hands and knees, not knowing what was going on, the Goose felt a hand close around his ankle, over his cowboy boot.

  “Turn loose of my foot, Arranger!”

  “I ain’t got your foot!” the Lone Arranger yelled from the cab of his truck.

  “Well, if you ain’t got it . . . who has?” Goose was afraid to look around.

  Slowly he turned.

  The headless body of the naked young man was behind Goose, one pale hand holding onto his ankle. Cordlike tendons hung down from the gaping wound where his neck had been. Like Goose, the headless man was on all fours in the dirt and sand.

  With a shriek that would have been the envy of any Indian on the warpath, Goose jerked his foot out of the boot, and he climbed up the Lone Arranger’s rig, onto the hood, and then onto the top of the cab.

  The headless man pushed himself to his feet and then stumbled around the area, running into trucks and trailers and the deputy’s car.

  The deputy jumped into his crippled, steaming unit and grabbed up the mike. Calling in. Frantically.

  “Bring a net out here!” he screamed into his mike. “Two nets.”

  “Bring a what?” dispatch replied.

  “Some big nets! Nets. Like you’d use to catch a bear or something. Just bring them, and don’t ask questions. Man, I’m in trouble. Hurry up. Officer in trouble. Shots have been fired. Respond code three.”

  “Are you being attacked by a bear, Fifteen?”

  The glass on the driver’s side was splintering, the woman pounding on it with a rock.

  “I’m being attacked by a zombie!” Fifteen screamed into his mike.

  “A zombie!”

  No reply.

  “Repeat that last transmission, Fifteen. Did you say you were being attacked by a zombie?”

  Fifteen was in no position to reply. He was fleeing his unit, out of the passenger side. A bare bloody white arm was sticking through the broken glass on the driver’s side.

  Fifteen ran slap into a naked, bloody, headless horror that grabbed him in a cold deathlike embrace. The naked flesh smelled of the grave.

  With a strength born of pure fear, Fifteen broke free and jerked out his .357, emptying it into the horror, the slugs knocking the thing backward, away from him.

  The woman came after the deputy then, at a stumbling run, grinning and grunting as she came.

  The deputy ran toward the Lone Arranger’s truck and climbed up onto the top of the cab, joining Goose.

  “Y’all get off my truck!” Lone Arranger squalled, almost out of his mind from fear. “Hurry up! Them things is comin’!”

  “We would if we had some place to go,” Goose screamed.

  Lone Arranger grabbed up his CB mike. “Halp!” he screamed.

  A pounding stopped his yelling. He turned his head. Looked directly into the eyes of the naked woman.

  He screamed in terror, and tried to drop the rig in
to gear. But she splintered the glass with the rock, stuck her arm through the hole, cold bloody fingers reaching for the Lone Arranger.

  The Arranger bailed out the other side and jumped, landing right on top of the headless man, both of them rolling on the sand.

  Lone Arranger got to his feet first and took off for Goose’s truck, the headless man, waving Goose’s boot, right behind him.

  “I’ll send help!” Arranger hollered, climbing up into Goose’s rig.

  “Come back here, you coward!” Goose screamed, trying to keep his bootless foot out of the clutches of the wild-eyed woman.

  Arranger rolled up all the windows, and quickly locked the doors.

  The headless man was right behind him, climbing up onto the long hood of the truck.

  Fifteen and Goose were stomping on the fingers of the young woman as she tried to climb onto the top of the truck on which they were trapped. She was howling insanely, snapping her jaws together and slobbering as she reached for their feet.

  Arranger dropped the rig into gear and took off, across the desert, swinging in a wide half-circle, heading back to the dirt road.

  Maybe.

  The headless man was standing on the hood, holding onto the twin airhorns on top of the cab. Arranger just couldn’t see where he was going.

  “Get off there!” Arranger screamed.

  The headless man hunched his naked hips against the windshield.

  “Ain’t this a hell of a note!” Arranger muttered. “I’m quittin’ truckin’. If I get out of this mess, I’m goin’ to work at the shoe factory with Bubba.”

  He grabbed up the CB mike. “Halp! Somebody—anybody—halp!”

  Around and around the desert they roared, Arranger yelling and the naked headless man on the hood hunching his hips against the windshield.

  “Kick her in the head!” Fifteen hollered to Goose.

  “I can’t get no purchase!” Goose yelled. “I ain’t got but one boot on.”

  Holding onto the airhorn with one hand, the headless man pounded on the windshield with the heel of Goose’s boot.

  The windshield began to splinter under the hard strokes.

  Red and blue flashing and revolving lights appeared in the distance as a half-dozen police and sheriff’s department cars howled up the dirt road.