She was dead once more. Sort of.
We didn’t go for her right away. We wanted to be sure she was really dead before we got too close. She was perfectly still, her chest unmoving, and I motioned for Thomas to follow me into the prep room.
Lying like that, in her peaceful, viewing-room position, Julie Johnson didn’t look as crappy as she had just a few short hours before when she’d tried to attack Thomas. As a matter of fact, she looked quite a bit like her living self.
“You ready, Brian?” Thomas brandished the pencil cross in his left hand. “Get ready to blitz her with the Aqua Net when she comes to.”
As I slowly pulled the hairspray out of my pants and aimed the nozzle six inches above Julie Johnson’s upturned face, I glanced over at Thomas, who was growing impatient. “I was thinking…maybe the Aqua Net isn’t such a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“It blew up Mr. Carpenter…well, kinda…you saw what was left of him. The ashes and that one fang. I don’t think we should make Julie explode.”
“Why not, for creep’s sake? She’s a damn vampire, Bri. You saw her yourself. She tried to kill me.”
“Actually, she tried to bite your toe.”
“Same diff.” Hot spots of color had risen on his freckled cheeks. “You want her running around Pleasant Valley drinking people’s blood? If not, you better use the Aqua Net.”
“If she blows up like Mr. Carpenter did, I think my dad might get in a lot of trouble. Plus, I don’t think her mom and dad would like it too much if there wasn’t a body in her coffin.”
Realization and understanding dawned on Thomas’s face and he nodded vigorously and snapped his fingers. “Gotcha. Good thinking, Bri. Okay, forget the Aqua Net. Use the stake instead.” Thomas tiptoed closer to the table. “Get ready…on the count of three…”
I raised the ruler above Julie Johnson’s hard, round breast.
“One…two…THREE!”
Thomas pressed the Ticonderoga cross firmly against Julie Johnson’s forehead. Her skin sizzled and popped, smoke rising from her face as her eyes, now gleaming and blood-red, flew open and rolled in their sockets. She hissed and writhed, her body convulsive and coiling like an enraged cobra, slithering and sliding along the slick vinyl table. Her hips bucked and her head thrashed from side to side.
Thomas was panting and wheezing as he bore down on the pencil cross, pressing it more firmly into Julie Johnson’s forehead, which had begun to melt like candle wax. His glasses were slipping slowly down the bridge of his nose, and he shouted, “Now, Brian! Stake her in the heart! Hurry!”
With a long, low yell, I brought the ruler down in a forceful downward motion, planting the sharpened end directly above Julie Johnson’s left boob.
I waited for the jets of blood and gore to follow the staking, but there was none, and I know now that the kill was clean only because she had not fed before the slaying.
I’d managed to plant the ruler, which was printed with the words Pleasant Valley Elementary School in big red block letters, about six inches deep, and it jutted obscenely from the undead cheerleader’s stony chest like some sort of alien appendage.
She screamed and sat upright, knocking Thomas aside, flailing and snapping in a dizzying whirl of blond hair and pink taffeta, her fangs clicking together like a pair of wind-up chattering teeth. Her hands wrapped around the protruding ruler and tugged viciously. She shook her head from side to side and long strands of yellowish-green spit flew from the corners of her open mouth.
“Gnarly!” Thomas said.
And then, Julie stopped fighting. Her hands fell from the ruler. Her furious face grew slack. She went as stiff as a corpse should be, and fell back on the table. Her arms slid off the edges and dangled limply in the air.
In the commotion, I never heard my mother come into the room.
Thomas stood at the head of the table, brandishing the Ticonderoga cross as I sprinkled Julie’s corpse with garlic powder.
And that’s when my mother began to scream.
***
In the end, everything worked out okay. My parents decided I didn’t need therapy after all and life pretty much went on as it always had. I was grounded for a month and had my bicycle taken away, but that was okay because it meant I didn’t have to wear my helmet, and I still saw Thomas every day at school.
Between the hours of nine and three as we walked the halls of Pleasant Valley Elementary School, trying desperately to avoid the wise guys who spent their time squashing my brown bag lunches and thumb-rubbing the lenses of Thomas’s glasses, we would always be Safety Boy and the Red-Headed Horr.
But by night we were vampire slayers.
***
There you have it, ladies and germs, the tale of how I became a hunter of the undead. A lot of years have passed since that late-September afternoon in 1982, but I’m still in the business, known around the world only as McCoy.
I traded in the plaid earflap cap for a brown boonie cover and it’s pretty sharp. A few years ago, after I’d been tossed around by quite a few vampires, I learned that a bicycle helmet can come in pretty handy when you’re fighting the good fight, so I bought one—yellow, of course, with black racing stripes—and covered it with round red reflectors. My weapons are a lot less primitive now, but I am always armed with a can of Aqua Net.
I left Pleasant Valley twenty years ago. Now, my home is wherever my next job takes me. I’ve slain over seven thousand blood suckers in my time, and make a pretty good living. You’d be surprised at how much someone will pay you to obliterate a vampire.
A few years ago my parents retired to Florida where my father spends his days golfing and my mother spends hers bitching about the heat.
As for Thomas? He still lives in Pleasant Valley. He married a local girl and they have a couple of red-haired, freckle-faced sons. McCoy Funeral Home is now Horr Funeral Home. Thomas and his family occupy the third floor of the house and his boys are strictly forbidden to go anywhere near the basement. I visit Thomas every so often, and as the local mortician, he keeps his eyes peeled for signs of any undead activity and calls me when he grows suspicious. We are both determined to keep our small hometown vampire free.
Myself, I’m single. I’ve loved some women, been disappointed in a few, and was even attacked by a couple when my guard was down. Sometimes, even when you watch for obvious signs and take the strictest of precautions, you just never know what lurks beneath the surface of a human shell, so I find that it’s better to travel life alone.
If you ever find yourself in a dire situation, look me up. You can find me on the web. I’m always on call.
Oh, by the way, in case you’re wondering…Pleasant Valley really was teeming with vampires back in the day. Thomas and I eliminated every one of those bastards, including the head vampire, over a slow two year period.
But that, my friends, is a tale for another day.
The Terrifying Legend of Jim
by Alva J. Roberts
Jim lumbered through the woods, putting one foot in front of the other in a robotic fashion, the whole while remembering to loom menacingly. The menacing looming was important—there was no telling who was watching. After all, he had no desire to lose his charter with IMMA, the Insane Mass Murderers Association. He had a hell of a time gaining membership and the last thing he needed was to lose his charter over a technicality.
Following all of the IMMA guidelines was a huge pain in his ass, but he needed the benefits package. It was almost impossible to get health insurance when you were a mass murderer. It was a high risk job and the rates were outrageous if you tried to get it on your own.
“The land of opportunity, my ass,” Jim said to no one in particular, his voice about three octaves higher than it should have been given his massive frame. An entrepreneur just couldn’t get a break.
A chorus of giggles echoed through the night. Jim’s only response was a labored sigh.
Teenagers…again.
How stupid are they? Th
is was his territory, been killing in it for nearly fifteen years. After all that time, you would think they would get smart enough not to come to Camp Wannadiealot. But no, every summer it was the same thing. Teenage campers partying and fornicating all over the forest. It was just too easy. What Jim wouldn’t give for a change of pace, maybe a bus full of nuns, or some corporate types on a retreat. That would be nice. He had his fill of young, naked, nubile bodies and keg parties.
Jim sighed again as he pulled out his registered Deadly Instrument of Death. The name was a little redundant but the IMMA was not known for its originality. Had Jim known about the weapons registration policy, he might not have joined, despite the benefits package. According to IMMA guidelines, paragraph twelve, subsection A:
All charter holders must register their Deadly Instrument of Death, to be known as a DID for the remainder of this document, within thirty-six days signing of this agreement. It is the aforementioned charter holder’s responsibility to keep his DID well maintained and within easy reach at all times. It is also the charter holder’s sole responsibility to check the DID database available at imma.org, as no two charter holders may employ the same DID in any one of our seven continental United States regions. Use of the same DID will be viewed a copyright infringement, and is punishable by one hundred and sixty (160) days in jail, a fine of up to one thousand ($1000) dollars and will be viewed as a breach of contract, thus rendering this document null and void.
It wasn’t until Jim began reviewing the DID database that he realized how hampering the clause was. There were over one hundred registered members of IMMA in his region alone, which made the DID pickings pretty slim. Jim ended up with a…stick. It was a very intimidating stick to be sure, nearly two inches thick, with a couple of nails protruding out of it, but it was still just a stick.
Jim adjusted his skull-like mask and shook his head, trying to snap out of his funk. He had a quota to meet, and with the economy in shambles, he had better damn well meet his quota or he could say goodbye to his IMMA membership.
“Whoooh, party up, bitches! Why don’t you get me another beer, taint licker,” a voice screamed from up ahead.
Jim smiled. There was one at every party. No matter how humdrum he found his job, killing a real asshole always made him feel a little better about life.
“A killing we will go, a killing we will go. Hi ho the merry oh, a killing we will go,” Jim sang to himself as he stalked forward, his high pitched voice making it sound like a demented trip to munchkin land.
***
“I don’t know, Tommy…in the forest? Can’t we just get a hotel when we get back to town?” a buxom young blonde with vacant eyes said.
“Ah come on, Lisa. You don’t know what it’s like. I told you before, I got a genetic condition. If I don’t do it every twelve hours, I could die,” Tommy said, his golden blond hair flowing around his shoulders, his muscles rippling beneath his letterman jacket.
“Well…I wouldn’t want you to die.”
Jim nearly snorted out loud. Tommy was a football player and, in Jim’s rather extensive voyeuristic experience, the young quarterback did not need to make his story so elaborate. A ‘hey baby, let’s do it’ would have worked just as well and saved both Tommy and Jim a lot of time.
Not much later, the sounds of heavy breathing filled the night. Jim tapped his fingers against the tree next to him in impatience and twirled his stick between his fingers. If they would just hurry up, Jim could catch the late, late, late movie on cable. Steel Magnolias was on, and Jim needed a good cry.
“Oh, Tommy, you’re so good,” the girl moaned.
“I know, baby, I know. I am soooo good at this. Oh, yeah!”
It was time.
Jim stepped out from behind his tree and stalked forward, careful to never move faster than a quick walk (another IMMA guideline). The blonde writhed on top of the football player in obvious false ecstasy. She was overdoing it, but Tommy didn’t seem to notice.
In fact, Tommy didn’t notice much of anything. He didn’t see Jim walk over to them. He didn’t see Jim raise his Stick high into the air. He probably noticed when the thick oak smashed through the front of his skull, spraying his brains through the air in bloody waves of gore, but it was impossible to tell for sure.
Lisa noticed. She sprang to her feet, let out an ear piercing shriek, and took off running.
Jim shrugged and followed after her. “Three, two, one,” Jim counted out loud, a satisfying crack echoing through the woods as he pronounced the one.
“Ahhhhh, my ankle. Help me!”
Jim strolled forward and swung the Stick like a baseball bat. It slammed into her head with enough force to knock her eyeballs out of their sockets and across the clearing.
Jim surveyed his work, appreciating the blood splatter. There was a real art to what he did. Not that most people appreciated his work, but how many people could get the blood spatter to form the shape of a skull like that? Or the little pony next to it? Not many, that was for damn sure.
***
“Come on, Shane, toke up. We gotta smoke this shit before we get back to camp. That Megan sure is a tight-ass. She’d prolly call the cops and shit,” Matt said as he erupted in a fit of coughing, his slender frame shaking so hard he looked like he was having seizures.
“Yeah, but she’s smoking hot. I heard if you get her drunk enough, she gets crazy,” Shane said, running his hands through his red greasy hair.
Jim listened. He was a good listener...his girlfriends always said so. It was one of the reasons he chose his particular career path. Well, that and a virtually unstoppable need to kill. But the listening was still a big part of it. He idly wondered what the pair would say if they knew their friend, Tommy, had died not twenty feet from where they stood.
“Yeah, but you gotta put up with her until then.”
“Yeah, she’s like…um…ah…dude, did you bring any Doritos?”
“Fuck yeah, back in my tent. I got one of them big things of Red Vines, too.”
“Whoa, were you like a boy scout? Always prepared and stuff?”
Silence greeted the stoner’s question.
“Dude?”
Jim hit his cue perfectly, tossing Matt’s decapitated head at the boy’s feet. It was always hard to time such things, especially when you were dealing with someone who was stoned. But Jim was a professional. It was just like his grandma always said—there was no use doing something if you were going to be a half-ass shit-stick about it.
“DAAAMMMNNN,” the boy screamed and ran for the woods.
Jim sighed yet again. Scream and run, die, scream and run, die—it was always the same. Maybe Jim was in a rut—maybe that was why he was so bored with his work. Maybe he should switch things up a bit. He would come back for the stoner. How far could someone that stoned run?
Jim turned back to the campsite, stopping to appreciate his artistic blood spatter before walking away. A unicorn and a rainbow. Now that had style.
***
“Did you hear that?” Megan stumbled to her feet and thrust her hands into the pockets of her huge sweatshirt that completely hid the shape of her body.
“It was just Lisa. Tommy’s just letting her ride the bologna pony. What about you? You want some beef in your taco?” Blake sneered and made thrusting motions with his hips, the campfire casting strange shadows across his muscular and fit body.
“God, Blake, you are so gross. I’m going to see what that was,” Megan said, sipping straight tequila from the bottle as she walked toward the woods.
“I didn’t want to bang a dyke anyway,” Blake said, pounding his beer. “Hey, Kevin, we got any more beer?”
“Beer’z goood,” Kevin mumbled from his prone position on the ground, his huge belly pointing skyward like some strange misshapen altar to a lost god of beer.
“I didn’t ask if it was fucking good, I asked if we had any more of it. If I wanted an opinion, I’d ask your mom if she liked it when I stuck it in her ass.” Blake kicke
d Kevin in the ankle for good measure.
Jim stepped forward into the ring of light around the campfire. This kid was a real asshole. Jim was going to enjoy this.
“What the hell? Shane, why the fuck are you dressed like that? You look like a retarded gas station attendant going trick-or-treating.”
Jim cocked his head to one side. He didn’t say a word. There was nothing in the IMMA guidelines about talking, but Jim was rather self-conscious of his high-pitched, whiney voice. When he was on the phone he was often mistaken for a woman. Speaking while he was at work generally ruined the effect he was going for.
“Are you trying to scare me? Fuck you.” Blake unzipped his pants and shot a stream of urine across the clearing to land on Jim’s boot. “Looks like you scared the piss out of me.”
Jim’s hand darted forward, his Stick flying across the clearing in a powerful underhand throw that smashed into Blake’s most vulnerable area. The cocky jock dropped to his knees with a howl of pain.
“Ahhhh…I’m gonna…nggh…kill you.”
Jim walked over and jerked his DID free, then spun around and smashed it into the back of Blake’s neck, the long nails severing the spinal cord. But he didn’t kill him.
“Whatesh goin’ on,” Kevin mumbled from his prone position.
Jim stomped down hard, crushing the drunk man’s neck.
Blake whimpered at the sight. “Why…are you doing this?”
“It’s my job,” Jim said in his high pitch lisp before bringing his Stick down against Blake’s temple. For just a second, Jim could have sworn the boy was laughing.
It Was a Dark and Stormy Night... Page 7
