The Undead Day Sixteen

by RR Haywood

  ‘Gregoreee,’ he grins wide, bursting into the room claps his hands in excitement, ‘Gregoreee.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Guess what, Gregoreee.’

  ‘What?’ Gregori stares hard at the boy, once again trying to muster what he knows is his most terrifying glare, but it goes completely ignored.

  ‘S’Sunday! Sunday! Sunday Gregoreee,’ the boy skips and laughs up to the table, ‘it’s Sunday today, Gregoree.’

  ‘What?’ Gregori widens his bulging eyes and makes his lips pursed and thin in the pre-murder look he reserves for those marked for special treatment.

  ‘Ha!’ The boy laughs, ‘can I do it?’ The boy makes his eyes wide but pushes his head forward to far. His lips he stretches out into a wide smile thinking it’s the same as Gregori.

  ‘Did I do it?’ He asks in a muffled voice holding the pose.

  ‘No.’

  The mimic is forgotten as the boy jumps up and down on the spot, ‘Sunday, Sunday, Sunday.’ Clapping his hands he takes the final step towards Gregori and grabs his big hand between his own, ‘Sunday, Sunday, Sunday,’ he sings and swings Gregori’s left hand side to side.

  ‘What Sunday?’

  ‘Today is Sunday.’

  ‘Sunday?’

  ‘Sunday, Gregori.’

  ‘Why is this good?’

  ‘Happy meal!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘We’re gonna have a happy meal.’

  ‘What is appymill?’

  ‘Happy meal! We have a happy meal on Sunday. Mummy always gets me a happy meal.’

  ‘I not know this. No appymill.’

  ‘Happy meal!’

  ‘You said this. I not know this. Not this thing. No.’

  ‘You can have one too,’ the boy gasps as though this is the best idea he has ever had, ‘Mummy always has coffee but you can have a happy meal…what one do you want, Gregori?’

  ‘No. Not this appymill. Not do this. We go.’

  ‘Fish fingers, ‘the boy holds one finger up, ‘or…or…chicken mcnuggets or…fish fingers or…burger…’

  ‘We go. You get ready.’

  ‘Yay, we gonna get a happy meal…me and Gregoreeeee.’

  ‘Boy. I not do this. We not go this place appymill.’

  ‘It’s not a place,’ the boy giggles, ‘its food!’

  ‘Food? What food? Come. We go.’ Gregori ushers the boy towards the front door, mindful that the heat will cause rapid decomposition of the corpses in the cellar, which in turn will stink the house out and attract unwanted attention.

  ‘Fish fingers!’ The boy states with a disdainful shake of his head, ‘Gregoree… Mummy said they’re not really fishy fingers…’

  ‘Ssshhh, Boy. We quiet now.’

  ‘Oh they’re not here,’ he says lightly, ‘they gone far, far away.’

  ‘Who not here?’ Gregoree pauses at the front door to glare down at the boy.

  ‘They’re not here. I’ve never seen a fish with fingers and Mummy said they’re not reeeaaalllly fish fingers but then why are they called fish fingers? Do you like the chicken nuggets?’

  ‘Boy,’ Gregori snaps, ‘how you know they are not here.’

  ‘Because they’ve gone.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Far, far away.’

  ‘How you know this?’

  The boy’s attention holds long enough to give Gregori a false sense of hope that he will explain how he knows the things are not here, but that attention soon wanes as he looks up brightly, ‘cheeseburger! You can have a cheeseburger.’

  ‘Chisburger?’ Understanding finally dawns, ‘burger with chis?’

  The boy nods quickly, ‘cheeseburger…and you get a toy.’

  ‘Toy? This is the quick food?’

  ‘No,’ the boy shakes his head sadly, ‘sometimes the queue is soooo long and soooo boring and Mummy says I got to stop fidgeting.’

  ‘Come,’ Gregori leads the way, feeling the comfort of the two pistols in his waistband but knowing they’ve each only got one full magazine each. Two new knives are taken from the kitchen to complete his arsenal of weapons that are now gripped and ready.

  ‘But I like it when it’s busy,’ the boys chirps up, ‘cos Mummy and me go to the car and we eat in the car and listen to music.’

  Gregori leads them down the path they ran up last night. Watchful as ever, he scans the grounds off to one side and the entrance that comes into view ahead.

  ‘Do you know where it is?’

  ‘What?’ Gregori whispers.

  ‘McDonalds!’ The boy giggles.

  ‘McDonalds? Appymill? Chisburger? I know this now. No.’

  ‘We can find another one, Mummy said there are lots and lots of McDonalds all over the world.’

  ‘No world. No McDonalds.’

  ‘McDonalds didn’t go anywhere,’ the boy states knowingly.

  ‘It go. Everything. It go or it dead.’ From the entrance lane they emerge slowly into the street with the ugly man peering left, right, ahead and behind while listening, scanning and sniffing the air.

  ‘But the houses are here,’ the boy points out.

  ‘So? Houses not people. People die. Everyone dead.’

  ‘McDonalds didn’t die.’

  ‘No people to make the chisburger.’

  ‘Oh that’s alright,’ the boy smiles, ‘Mummy made burgers at home, you can make the burgers in McDonalds if you want to, Gregori. I don’t mind.’

  ‘I no make chisburgers,’ Gregori stands upright to glare down at the boy again, ‘I Gregori,’ he says tapping his own chest with the hilt of a knife, ‘I kill. I ugly man. I no make chisburgers. I Gregori.’

  ‘Silly Billy,’ the boy giggles, ‘Mummy said anyone can make burgers or fish fingers…’

  ‘Not Billy,’ Gregori snaps, ‘Gregori. I kill. No make chisburgers.’

  ‘But its Sunday,’ the boy explains, ‘we have to have a happy meal.’

  ‘No Sunday,’ Gregori stands his ground.

  ‘Yes it is,’ the boy stands in front of him.

  ‘No. Monday.’

  ‘Yesterday was Saturday and today is Sunday because it is Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday and Sunday…’

  ‘Wrong. Monday.’

  ‘Sunday,’ the boy’s face flushes red.

  ‘No appymill. No quick food. Quick food bad,’ Gregori prods the boy in the stomach, ‘fat. Bad fat. No quick food. No Chisburgers.’

  ‘But,’ the boy folds his arms, ‘it’s Sunday and we always have a happy meal on Sunday.’

  ‘Boy. Everyone dead. Look,’ Gregori points round at the road and the few corpses dotted about lying festering in the hot morning sun, ‘dead. They die. No one make the chisburger. Come, we go.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Boy,’ Gregoree hisses, ‘we go. NOW!’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I go,’ Gregori takes a step away, ‘I go and you stay.’

  ‘Don’t care,’ the boy pouts.

  ‘Good,’ Gregori nods, ‘I go.’

  ‘Don’t care.’

  Gregori walks off knowing the boy will chase after him. A knowing sense of predictability that the boy will not want to be alone. After a few steps and he allows himself a rueful smile. A few more his eyebrows twitches as he prepares for the sound of running feet. A few more steps and the smile fades but he doesn't turn to check, that would be weakness and this is the game of life.

  Gregori gauges the distance at fifty metres and growing. Sixty now which he knows to a child must be like a mile. He keeps walking and at the one hundred metre mark he stops, spins and draws breath to bellow for the boy to move. But seeing the boy standing still in his shorts, red shoes and his little arms folded, he snaps the words off before they leave his mouth.

  With blonde hair and tanned skin, the child could be in the Hollywood movies but even from this distance Gregori knows the boy will not budge. His face is set in stone, the little eyebrows down to form a fierce scowl.

  ‘HA
PPY MEAL,’ the boy yells.

  ‘NO.’

  ‘HAPPY MEAL.’

  ‘NO.’

  The boy cocks his head to one side and half turns before rotating back to face Gregori with a small smile on his face, ‘HAPPY MEAL?’

  It’s a question this time, a loaded one too by the sounds of it.

  ‘NO.’ Gregori folds his own arms, taking care not to cut himself with the knives held in his hands.

  ‘FINE!’ The boy lifts his folded arms a few inches and drops them down with a visible sign that he isn’t budging.

  Gregori does the same. A slight lift and a drop. The boy plants his feet wider. Gregori does the same.

  Seconds tick by. There’s no movement from either of them. The boy turns his head to the right, then back at Gregori, who swivels his eyes trying to see what the boy keeps looking at.

  The first one comes from the smashed in doorway of a house. An adult female, obese in size with long, dark hair and dressed in shorts that are way too tight. Rolls of fat hang over the waistband as she staggers slowly onto the road and shuffles round to face them.

  Gregori’s eyes narrow as he flicks back to the boy, who is watching him intently from across the distance. The boy doesn't turn or look but somehow knows that the woman was there and she would be coming. Gregori holds position and in turn, watches the boy and the woman. That she is obese is considered as the reason for the slow movement. They were fast last night but then yesterday daytime they were slow too.

  He looks up at the sky and considers the change in day to night having an effect on the speed of motion.

  Behind the obese woman, another shuffles into view, then another from across the street. A door bangs open with a thud as an undead stumbles out onto the pavement. There’s four now with eyes locked on the boy. He looks back to the boy to see him staring off to the other direction. Gregori looks to see a handful from that side, four, no five. All adults and all covered in dried blood.

  He shows no reaction. Not a flicker of emotion as he watches the boy watching him. The things shuffle and stumble with stiff legs that seem unable to bend at the knees. Heads loll side to side as they walk in a tick tock fashion towards Gregori and the boy.

  Gregori feigns boredom and taps his foot as though killing time.

  ‘HAPPY MEAL?’ The boy shouts across. Gregori inwardly winces and pauses before shouting back, ‘NO.’

  All eyes are on them and the first sound of a drawn out, grumbling groan comes from the things.

  ‘THEY EAT YOU,’ Gregori shouts, then instantly wishes he hadn’t as even shouting that makes it seem like he’s getting ready to barter.

  ‘DON’T CARE,’ the boy shrugs, ‘HAPPY MEAL.’

  ‘NO. THEY KILL YOU.’

  ‘NO. YOU’LL KILL THEM. HAPPY MEAL!’

  ‘NO APPYMILL.’

  ‘FINE.’

  ‘I NOT KILL THEM. THEY KILL YOU.’

  ‘FINE. DON’T CARE. IWANTMYSUNDAYHAPPYMEEAAAAALLLLL’ the veins in his neck bulge as they pump the blood into the boy’s face, burning crimson from the effort of the screech.

  ‘BOY…COME,’ Gregori shouts the command, ‘COME.’ He shouts louder, ‘NOW.’ He slaps his legs and even goes to whistle.

  ‘IWANTMYSUNDAYHAPPYMEAAAAALLLLLL.’

  ‘NO APPYMILL. COME NOW OR I GET YOU.’

  The boy’s face screws into the darkest, most malevolent look Gregori has ever seen. It’s dark and brooding, with eyes fixed on the Albanian hitman. A switch is flicked and Gregori strides towards the child. Neither of them pay the slightest heed to the undead shuffling ever closer they continue in their battle of wills.

  ‘I SAY NO,’ a bellowing roar from Gregori.

  ‘HAPPYMEAL,’ the boy roars back.

  ‘I COUNT THREE… THREE BOY… YOU COME I COUNT THREE,’ Gregori tucks the knives away and holds out his right hand showing three extended fingers while the other jabs the air and points at the boy.

  The boy doesn't reply but stares with eyes ablaze with rage.

  ‘ONE,’ Gregori strides forward on powerful legs and holds one finger up.

  The boy’s face grows darker still.

  ‘TWO,’ two fingers held up and the distance is closed. The boy drops his folded arms to make tiny fists as he prepares for the fight.

  ‘THREE,’ Gregori is on him, grabbing the boy’s ear he tries to twist it in the same way his own ear was twisted as a child. The boy flails and kicks, refusing to yield to the pain of a gripped ear. Gregori spins on the spot as the boy turns and kicks hard at his shins. Fists pummel his stomach, hips and groin. One connects to the right, sending a shooting, sickening pain through Gregori’s gut. He grunts and drops to his knees as the boy spots the new target and aims for the head.

  Gregori reaches out to grab the back of the boy’s shirt. In one swift motion he drags the boy in, bends him double over his bent leg and raises his right arm ready to deliver the first smack on the boy’s backside.

  A growl sounds as the first lunge comes in. A quick glance and several are on them, teeth bared and hands clawed into talons. Wrapping an arm under the boy’s stomach, he explodes back from the power of one leg and sends himself sliding back with the boy held safely to the front. Landing on his back, he’s gained three feet before the undead turn and lunge after them.

  ‘HAPPYMEALLLLL,’ the boy squirms and fights without heed of the danger. A deft twist, right hand down, left arm wrapped round the boy, left foot sliding forward and the Albanian is up in a perfect position to deliver a driving kick of the right foot into the stomach of the closest undead who folds double and staggers back into the next.

  Gregori spins and, having already identified the next target, he lashes out with a fist into the face of the obese woman. The density of her absorbs the blow. She’s got legs like tree trunks and although her nose bursts open, she doesn't flinch or rock. After a quick adjustment of pace and position, a blade appears in Gregori’s hand and whispers across her throat as the metal slices through the layers of skin, fat and tissue of the neck.

  ‘SUNDAYHAPPYMEALLLLL.’

  With the knife in hand, the Albanian makes light work of the slow beasts. One handed, with the squirming boy held tight in his other, his movements are neither rushed nor hurried but exactly where he needs to be with the most minimal of effort and expenditure of energy. The fresh kills seep and spurt blood onto the already hot surface of the road and the air fills with the metallic tang of iron.

  With the grunting undead slain, the only noise is that of the boy huffing audibly as he squirms to be released from Gregori’s grip. After a final check round, he releases the child who drops, spins and comes back for another attack with tight fists and hard feet raining blows into the now passive serial killer.

  Gregori takes the pain without reaction. That most rare pulse of anger he felt just seconds ago is now entirely gone as he stares down dispassionately and takes care to hold the dripping blades away from the child. Life is not a precious gift to Gregori and he has taken it so many times that the very act of killing is a job done by a professional without regard for the moral consequences. Yet he holds position and lets the boy beat him. He allows the fists and feet to pummel until the boy exhausts the pure fury pent up inside and the crimson, flushed face sweats freely. The boy’s arms drop and he stands back with a heaving chest and eyes still brooding with flashes of temper.

  ‘You finish now?’

  The boy nods and looks up with not a flicker of apology but pure defiance in his eyes, ‘It’s Sunday,’ the boy pants, ‘I want my Happy Meal.’

  Gregori stares round at the death surrounding them. The torn flesh lies so ripe and open and the flies already settle to lay eggs within the warm, moist bodies. A corpse lies with intestines strewn behind like a string of glistening sausages. Red, bloodshot eyes glare lifelessly into the sky and mouths, encrusted with blood, hang open as the deadly drool still drips out. He takes the sight in and looks back to the boy who stares up. Not round at the death, not at the corpses b
ut up at Gregori. The boy pays no heed to them. The concept of death comes with age but a child of this age should be screaming with terror at the sight.

  The boy swallows once, blinks and looks back up as though pained. ‘Please,’ he murmurs, ‘please can we have a Happy Meal?’

  Gregori lifts his eyebrows as the boy changes tack. The boy still shows no sense of remorse, or guilt, or apology, or worry, or concern apart from having the thing he wants.

  ‘Yes,’ the word comes out from Gregori before he realises it, ‘yes, we do this.’

  ‘Really?’ The boy’s face morphs into a wide grin and the eyes of a child, ‘can we? Really? Really, Gregoreeee?’

  ‘Yes…but…’ Gregori holds a hand out then stops to stare at the dripping knife held there, ‘but…we need the rule. You no do this again,’ he points round at the bodies.

  ‘I didn’t kill them,’ the boy says innocently, ‘you did it.’

  ‘No. No shouting. No hitting.’

  ‘Okay!’

  ‘This I mean,’ Gregori says, ‘you make noise…they come…you die.’

  ‘Noooo,’ the boy laughs with delight, ‘you’re here, silly.’

  ‘No. They come. You die.’

  ‘No, no, no,’ the boy sings and reaches out to take Gregori’s hand, ‘they can’t kill me.’

  ‘Off,’ Gregori tugs his bloodied hand free before swapping it over with his non-bloodied hand, ‘they kill you. You die.’ He starts walking with the boy holding his hand, ‘they bite. You die. They cut. You die.’

  ‘No,’ the boy laughs and skips, ‘you’re here, Gregoreeeee. They can’t kill me.’

  ‘I not always be here,’ Gregori says firmly, ‘I go toilet…I go sleep…I go away…they come you die.’

  ‘Are you having fishes fingers, Gregoreee? Do they have fishes fingers in Albaniania.’

  ‘Albania. No. You listen. I go. They come. You die.’

  The boy giggles with a skip and swings the hand he grips so tightly, ‘no, no, no…you can have chicken nuggets if you like.’

  ‘Chisburger.’

  ‘You want a cheese burger?’

  ‘I eat chisburger.’

  Eleven

  ‘Is he alright?’ Jagger asks as Lani heads back into the main room and walks over to the hole in the wall created by the Saxon.