Jebediah flopped to the ground, and Digger immediately went for the man’s face. He gnawed and chewed until he popped out the back of the man’s head wearing his metal plate like a hat. There was no hesitation in the armadillo’s next move. He turned and ran at the crowd of zombies. Digger launched himself into the crowd, and started gnawing and biting. The armadillo flashed his claws in all directions as he cut the people to shreds. Zombies fell crippled and bleeding on the ground. In a panic they began crawling away. Digger aimed for whatever orifice he could find, and ran at full speed. His triangular face made for a painful wedge as slammed headlong into whatever unwilling hole had the misfortune of being in his sights. The most painless deaths were when Digger hit their mouths, ears, or nose. The worst deaths came when he found their rectum, or for the unfortunate women that quickly learned the truly unpleasant limits of the female anatomy.
Jennifer and Josie watched as the last of their group, Jerry Jones, crawled across the ground as quickly as possible. Digger dripped with blood. Bits of intestine and pancreas were still clinging to his claws, and he was chewing an eyeball when he turned his attention towards Jerry Jones. There were two things people always said when describing Jerry Jones. Everyone said he was impossibly fat. It actually amazed most people to see the man walk. He was so large that people actually thought he looked like an overfull water balloon. The other thing people said was that he had the highest pitched voice in the parish. It was so high pitched that when he was a child kids used to call him “Whistle” because they all joked that only animals could really hear what he had to say.
“I think that’s enough meat, but where am I going to find the beans? Oh…wait…I know.” Digger slammed into Jerry Jones’ anus with brutal determination. Jerry Jones’ pelvis exploded as the armadillo burrowed into the man. Digger kept pushing forward. Jerry Jones diaphragm burst as the armadillo kept shoving his way towards the man’s mouth. Claws slashed and carved up his liver, kidneys, and appendix. Digger kept rampaging his way through the man. Even Jerry Jones’ heart wasn’t anything more than a brief speedbump on Digger’s journey. Ribs expanded and popped as the armadillo found himself nestled into the man’s chest cavity. One last surge forward, and Digger ruptured out through the man’s throat.
Digger squeezed himself out through the hole. Blood and shit clung to the armadillo,“I didn’t find any beans…but I sure did find some corn.” Digger shook like a dog. Blood and fecal matter went everywhere. His white fur was stained red, brown, and green. “So who’s next?” The armadillo turned his attention to Jennifer Scott Carhart-Williams, and Josie the flower girl.
Jennifer backed away and picked up a part of a tree branch, “Keep your…dog away from us.”
“Dog! Have you seen me chase a ball? Have I once dragged my ass across the ground? Have you seen me lick my balls? I’m gonna enjoy killing you!” Digger growled.
“They can’t understand you…why are you even trying to talk to them?” Jessup groaned.
“That’s not the point! I ain’t no dog!” Digger screamed.
“What’s wrong with being a dog? Everybody likes dogs.” Jessup’s voice was fading in and out, and he slurred all his words.
“Dogs are like the super codependent brownnosers of the animal world. You come home they’re happy to see you. You bring them a treat and you’re the greatest person alive. They’d sell their souls for someone to play ball with them. It’s disgusting to see another animal lower itself like that. No self-respect at all. They worship the ground you assholes walk on. They should be hunting in packs and raising all kinds of hell, instead they’re fat-lazy, and sleeping on your beds. Dogs disgust me.” Digger turned his attention back to the woman, and then ran at her. “Oh this is gonna be fun!”
Digger leapt for the woman’s mouth. Of course what he didn’t know was that Jennnifer was a star softball player in high school. So when Digger leapt for her face, she swung for the fences. The angry armadillo saw the tree branch swinging, and in his mind it was as if everything was moving in slow-motion. “I changed my mind! Not gonna be fun! Not gonna be fun at all!” The tree branch blasted Digger across the yard. He slammed into the wall of the house and crumpled to the ground. “Well that…sucked.”
“Come get some!” Jennifer was in a batting stance now. She was ready for the next time the armadillo came at her. Even Josie the flower girl picked up a branch and readied herself for the next attack.
Digger looked at the two of them and then back to Jessup, “Well Asshole? Are you going to just hang around, or are you going to help me?”
Jessup stared bleary eyed at the giant bloody puffball, “What you want me to do? I can’t even get down.”
“Just change!” Digger snapped.
“And how do I do that exactly?” Jessup mumbled.
Jennifer looked up to the man, “Are you actually talking to that…that thing over there?”
“Yes…”
Josie then asked, “Tell him to go away. He’s ugly and he smells like poo!” Then she ran over to Jessup and started hitting him with the branch. “Make him go away!”
“We just talk…he doesn’t actually listen to me.” Jessup tried to explain, but the girl kept hitting him with the tree branch. Each blow irritated the man more and more, but it was the homerun swing to the testicles that finally drove him over the edge.
Bones shifted, he suddenly began regrowing the leg that Jennifer and Josie had pulled off. Fur ruptured the skin. As he grew, his weight started crack the tree branch he was impaled on. When he completely changed he was too heavy, and the branch broke off. Unfortunately, he still didn’t have control of his body because the branch was puncturing the spine. So he hit the ground, and then the branch’s pointy end stuck in the dirt so that it propped him up. He howled and growled, but he couldn’t move any part of his body.
“Asshole? Asshole? Jessup the Asshole! A little help would be appreciated.” The armadillo screamed into the werewolf’s mind.
Jessup barked and howled some more. Jennifer and Josie watched as the werewolf and the weremadillo seemed to be communicating back and forth. Jennifer couldn’t understand either of them, but she knew whatever they were saying couldn’t be good for her so she began to back away. “Josie sweetie…we need to get out of here.”
Josie shrugged, “But the werewolf is a big stupid-head that can’t move, and we can keep beating the ugly stinky one away.” As if to prove her point, Josie used the stick to poke out Jessup’s eye. Clear fluid oozed down the stick as the eye burst. As soon as she pulled the stick away Jessup’s eye began to repair itself.
Digger ran right for Josie. She screamed and prepared to hit him with her branch. At the last moment the armadillo changed directions, and dove right for Jessup’s head. The impact lifted him up off the ground, and pulled the branch out of the dirt. Digger’s claws worked like mad to pull the branch out, and by the time they landed on the ground Jessup had a hole going cleanly through the werewolf that was closing rapidly.
Jessup stood up. Now it was Jessup and Digger versus Jennifer and Josie. The flower girl had just enough time to turn around to Jennifer and say, “I wanna go home.” Then Jessup clapped both palms together where her head had been. It sounded like thunder. Jennifer had been staring into the girl’s eyes right before her entire head just simply ceased to be. Instead there was just a headless body falling to the ground. Blood and brain matter oozed through Jessup’s clawed hands. Bits of skull punctured his skin, but as he began to open his hands the bone chips were pushed out as he healed.
Jennifer wasn’t going to go without a fight. She raised the tree branch and threatened her two attackers. She watched in horror as the werewolf gave a series of barks and howls, and then the armadillo responded with grunts and squeals. They were planning. She panicked and started running away. Jennifer pumped her legs as fast as they would take her. Meanwhile Digger tucked his legs up and tried to make himself as straight as possible. Jessup picked him up. At diggers current size it looked like t
he werewolf was holding a large furry football. Jessup took careful aim, and then reared back to throw.
Jennifer had almost made it to the tree line when Digger slammed into her back at almost two hundred miles an hour in a perfect spiral. The combination of his velocity, weight, and the denseness of his leathery shell made the outcome sudden and violent. Her entire torso exploded from the impact. Chunks of her went everywhere. The only things spared were her arms, legs, and head. Digger kept going and only stopped after he struck a tree. The tree broke at the impact point and toppled over. Then the armadillo rolled over to his feet and started trotting back. He was a little wobbly at first from spinning through the air, but he eventually found his balance again. Jessup walked over and scooped up Jennifer’s head. He swallowed it in one bite, and then went back to eat some of Digger’s leftovers.
A few hours later both man and armadillo had changed back to their normal selves. Jessup had no trace of injuries. He didn’t even have a scratch. “I’m surprised you came back for me.” He said.
“Let’s get this straight. I don’t like you…and even though I’m completely amazing in every way I’m willing to accept that you probably don’t like me either. Now pay attention Jessup the Asshole. As much as I hate you…you are the only asshole in this never ending land of assholes that can understand me. That means you can get me back home to Texas so that I can get revenge.” Digger snapped.
“Texas…I’m not going to Texas.” Jessup responded.
“Oh you’re going to Texas, or prepare for me to make my home in your ass until you decide to change your mind. How long do you want to spend with me up your butt? I’m thinking you’ll give in about the time my nose starts puckering that backdoor petunia. What do you think?”
Jessup looked at the carnage left by the little armadillo. Bodies ripped in half as he burrowed his way inside, some of them just exploded from being unable to contain him. Jessup thought about what the angry little armadillo might do to him, and then he shuddered. “Alright…Jesus. I’ll take you to Texas. We just have to get to my truck, and I need some clothes.”
“Yes…a truck would be good, but before we go to this place called Texas. We need to find that asshole that kicked me. I want to wear his balls for a necklace.”
Jessup shook his head, “You mean the guy that nearly killed both of us. You want to go find him? Fuck you!”
“I’m thinking it’ll be a different story now that you and I can change. Besides, I don’t know about you, but I’m not in the habit of letting anyone push me around. So you’re going to help me find him. Then it’s gonna be judgement day for that asshole. Then…and only then…you and me are going to head to Texas so I can get revenge.” Digger said.
“Find some random guy so you can get revenge, and then drive to Texas for more revenge. That’s a lot of revenge. How are we going to even find that guy anyway?” Jessup asked.
“I’m little, but I got big vengeance.” Digger snapped. “Finding that one asshole should be easy. You laughed and he impaled you to a tree. I think it’s a safe bet he’s gonna leave a trail that’s pretty easy to follow. I’m going to make it simple. You can get your ass kicked by him once and maybe die, or I can crawl up in your ass and make you wish you were dead.”
Jessup shrugged, “Not much to think about when you put it that way. Come on…we need to head to my house. So I can get some clothes. I’m not running around butt-naked just so you can kick somebody’s ass.”
Chapter Forty-Four
Danior stepped out of the bus in the Central City district of New Orleans. He’d ordered Johanna to drive to the worst part of New Orleans. He found it strange that the woman didn’t even have to think about it. Her first thought, and only thought really, was the Central City district. It didn’t seem that bad to him. Sure many of the houses were so close together that one person could reach out and touch both buildings, but Danior’s home growing up had been little more than a wagon pulled by his father’s ox. To Danior these homes were like palaces.
He walked across the street and knocked on the front door. An elderly black woman opened, “I’m sorry, but whatever you’re trying to sell…I’m not buying.” Danior didn’t speak as he evaluated the woman. She was too old to use as one of his soldiers. She might have knowledge of the city, but he could get information from others as he converted them. Really the only value she had to him was the home, and he’d just picked it at random. Danior’s silence unnerved the old woman, and she started to close the door. “Well have a nice d-“
Danior reached up and twisted her head completely around. It was one fluid motion, and lighting quick. There was audible pop as the woman’s vertebrae snapped. She fell to the ground twitching. Danior stepped over her and said, “Bring her in.”
Johanna nodded and pulled the old woman inside. Lula Mae helped with her legs. The others slowly made their way into the house. In the back of the house Danior found an old man connected to an oxygen tank. He gasped and wheezed with every breath. When his eyes met Danior’s, the old man’s face grew terrified, “Where’s Cathy? Where’s my wife?”
Danior looked around the room. The man was sickly….maybe even dying. He lay in an adjustable bed with an end table covered in pill bottles. Danior could smell the sickness rising off the man. It was clear by how clean this room was compared to the rest of the house that his wife had devoted herself to taking care of the man. Danior grinned as he saw a photo just above the bed. It was a young couple. A handsome black man with broad shoulders and a well-trimmed mustache holding a beautiful black woman in front of an old cypress tree surrounded by what Danior could only assume were friends and family. They made a handsome couple. The pack leader walked closer, ignoring the man and his pleading to know what happened to his wife. There was writing on the picture at the bottom:
Mr. and Mrs. Earvin and Cathy Cole
Married January 1st, 1958
Forever
“Please! What did you do with my wi-“ Earvin’s voice was silenced forever as Danior swung one of the heavy oxygen bottles like a club. Earvin’s face was crushed with the first blow. He grabbed at the air blindly as Danior prepared to hit him again. It took three swings, but Earvin finally stopped moving. The man had more life in him than Danior had expected. Danior pulled the oxygen bottle away and tossed it in the corner. Johanna and Lula Mae came in and waited for orders.
Danior looked at Johanna, “Clean this mess up.” Johanna nodded and began looking for cleaning supplies. Danior then looked at Lula Mae and handed her the money they took from the McDonald’s, “Bring me children.”
“Why?” Lula Mae asked.
Danior’s face twisted into a mask of rage. He didn’t like being questioned. He gave one hard kick. It hit her square in the chest and sent her back into the crowded living room. She hit the others and they all fell into a pile. “Never question me again!” Danior bellowed.
“Y-y-yes master.” Lula Mae trembled. Green blood ran down the side of her mouth. “I-I-I’m sorry.”
Danior sighed as he let the rage fade away. He knew he could just force his will onto them all every minute, but it made him feel too much like his father for his own comfort, and it took a lot out of him to control their every movement. Instead he settled for compromise, at least that’s how he viewed it. He’d only use his power to compel them when they refused, or when he just felt the need. He looked down at the terrified girl, “Go get me children, and take one of them with you.”
“Y-yes master.” Lula Mae scrambled out the door. Danior walked to the doorway and saw her talking to the young man Damien Judas Bergloglio. “The m-m-master says we have to go find some kids.”
“Why.” The wheelchair bound young man said mechanically through his speakers.
“I don’t know, but don’t ask him. He might hurt you.” Lula Mae said nervously.
Damon Bergloglio’s face twitched. It was the most the man had moved since Danior had first seen him. It wasn’t an expression, or anything really. It was like his
whole face just had one giant spasm. “Fine. We will go.” Damien blew through a tube and the wheelchair turned and started rolling down the road.
Lula Mae skipped around him singing, “Damien and Lula sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G! First comes love then comes marriage then comes Damien with the-“
“Do not even go there jailbait.” Damien responded.
“Don’t you like me?” The nine year old asked.
“Sure, but I am not even going to go there. Maybe in eight to ten years when I do not have to worry about Chris Hansen showing up to offer me cookies and lemonade. Besides, I left my long coat and white panel van at home.” Damien answered.
“I’m much more mature than I look. Do you think when we’re married you we can have a big family?” Lula Mae questioned.
“Corvette, gopher, bad, airplane, orange, Kelly Clarkson.” Damien was already frustrated by the girl’s persistence, and now he couldn’t even focus on the screen to pick the correct words to answer her.
“What’s wrong with you?” Lula Mae said. “You know if you’re going to be my husband and take care of me then you’re going to have to start to make sense. Dr. Phil says that it’s important to talk about potential problems while we’re in smooth water. He said not to wait until we’re in a crisis to come up with a crisis plan.”
“Doctor Phil. Why are you watching Doctor Phil.” Damien asked as he began to calm down.
“I don’t, but Mamma did. She loved Dr. Phil, but she’s gone now. So I’m the woman of the house, and a woman needs a big strong man to take care of her.” Lula Mae grinned innocently. “So when we’re married…do you want a big wedding or a little wedding? I want a big wedding with lots of ribbons and bows.”
Uncle Gary's Campfire Stories: Bayou Zombie Werewolves Page 43
