It Was a Dark and Stormy Night...

by Kurtz, Matt; McKenzie, Shane; Strand, Jeff

  Some hero, eh?

  I awoke to the sensation of a spinning mind and a throbbing forehead. Had Benny done this because I was becoming too much of a control freak? I had been what most would call the “leader” of the group since its formation. Had it been my actions that allowed for such things to happen?

  The answer is “yes.” I royally fucked myself when I allowed us to leave, rather, leave with a woman, her daughter, and her fucking insane, never-satisfied-with-what-he-had husband. My mind said “don’t,” and I didn’t listen. I hated myself for the next few hours the three of us sat, waiting for Benny’s return. I couldn’t even look the girls in the eye I was so ashamed.

  Hours later he finally came back, running with only a small purse full of candy bars and one bottle of water. Great, right? On a high note, an hour later, after saying he “secretly made his way through the back,” that same horde I spoke of earlier came-a-knockin’. They should have made the movie, Benny of the Dead, ‘cause that prick practically stole the scene, only he didn’t have a Winchester, he had a family. And that was when his game of cat and mouse and real and not so real came to a screeching halt.

  In our botched escape, Marissa was bitten. One of those things, what used to be a pretty young girl wearing a desecrated and soiled blouse, sunk her rotted teeth, or what remained of her teeth, into that child’s arm. I’ve never heard a scream like that before. A mother calling for her now-dying child. It was a death sentence, and it happened right in front of Jenna. And there was nothing she could do, nothing any of us could do.

  I went a round with the rabid thing, fighting my tears as the girl kicked and screamed. The pain was so much. Too much for such a beautiful child. I snapped the thing’s neck, the skin soft and warm, depending on the location. It was slimy, and smelled a horrid smell I dare not describe other than the word “rot.” The Infected fell back motionless, and I scooped up Marissa, carrying her over my shoulder, and grabbed Jenna by her arm, saving them both. Benny was caught up in some internal battle, and didn’t even lift a finger while his daughter cried his name.

  “Benny, come on!”

  The four of us made it outside through a series of offices on the first floor, finding sanctuary through a now broken window. We found ourselves in an alley, and that was where the infection claimed Marissa. Whatever this thing is, it works quickly—or had so for the little girl—bringing death just minutes after exposure. I knew I shouldn’t have brought her. Part of Benny must’ve rubbed off on me, I guess. But I am positive that was the only way I could get Jenna to follow. I was damned either way.

  I could feel the pain she was experiencing. Her loss was at such a cost that I couldn’t stand to watch her cry. I left her there to meet up with Benny.

  “I’m sorry, Mike,” Benny said with a sense of lucidity in his tone. Tears streamed down his face as he watched the Infected enter the building en masse, searching for us. There was a realization, enlightenment with the sight. “I’ve killed my family, and quite possibly, I have cost you your life. I can see clearly now. You were right. This entire time, Mike, you were right. My impatience was always a curse.” He turned to me, smiled, and put his hand on my shoulder, rubbing it. “My mother always told me that my attitude, my temper, would get the best of me one day. She’d always worry, saying that I would die young if I wasn’t careful.”

  I couldn’t find the words to respond to his confession. I knew then and know now that he’d done better than most. So many had already died, our expectancy had been surpassed days ago. He just needed to listen.

  “Look at me,” he said, breaking the silence between us. “I’m only twenty-eight.” He choked up for a moment. “I’ve taken everything I’ve loved and cared about, and thrown it down the damned drain. I should have listened to you. I should have listened to my mother…”

  The way he was talking, he knew it was too late, that there was no reversing the world’s reactions to his actions, his “can do” attitude in a “don’t do” world, and I felt immensely sorry for him. No man deserved to feel that way, to go through what he had. But it didn’t change the fact that one phrase I’d heard so much as a child cycled through my mind: I told you so.

  And then it happened. Marissa reanimated and attacked her grieving mother. Though we had only met weeks ago, part of me loved her and Marissa. And I knew she felt the same about me, if only somewhat.

  Benny ran and pushed his daughter off with so much force that she went airborne and crashed into a dumpster head first, which in turn caught some of the horde’s attention—they were in the street roaming aimlessly until then. Marissa was motionless, possibly dead. Jenna was dying. And Benny just looked to God and let out a scream.

  The last “don’t” he’d ever commit: Don’t ever alert the horde.

  “She’s been bitten,” I yelled, trying to pull him out of his daze.

  It was only a matter of time before she’d pass, and I couldn’t take it anymore. Something inside told me, “Don’t leave them,” but I found it hard to reason with such a preposterous request.

  The last thing I saw him do was kiss his wife. Then the Infected found him. Some chased me, but I never looked back. Not even once. What was done was done, and I rubbed my hands clean of it.

  ***

  Benny and his family died on a gloomy day, the sky filled with gray tones, clouds even darker than their background. I ran until I could run no more. And here I am, finally. In my house. Safe and sound. I even have Donut! My boy survived this whole time, his bags of food long gone. Never did I have a doubt, I guess. Just never really thought about it. Haven’t thought about much since my return. Being alive is good enough for me.

  And when the next batch of survivors comes across my doorstop, they’ll read my sign: No Bennys Allowed!

  Wasteload

  by Kevin Wallis

  Jenny looked at Jeremy’s naked body and tried not to laugh. She had never seen nipples so hairy on skin so pasty. They looked like the eyes of an albino werewolf.

  “You ready, baby?” Jeremy said. “Cuz I’m about to bring the heat. Gonna sex you up real good.”

  Jenny wondered again what the hell she was doing here with Mr. Color Me Badd. Just get it over with, she thought. She hoped her friends in the other rooms of the warehouse were faring better.

  Jeremy lowered himself over her splayed body and entered…she thought. She was anything but new to this practice, and Jeremy’s manhood, ha ha, boyhood, was hard to discern through his scraggly nest of pubic hair.

  As Jeremy pumped like an epileptic Sasquatch, Jenny closed her eyes and cursed herself for letting Traci and Holmes talk her into this.

  “The warehouse is abandoned,” Traci had said.

  “We can bust out a window. Just the six of us. All night.” Holmes had smiled. Horniness layered his face like makeup.

  So here she was, being ridden by a scrawny nobody with hair ripped from the eighties and a body ripped from a concentration camp. She—

  “I’m coming!”

  “Not in me, you’re not,” Jenny said, visions of birthing muskrats suddenly raging through her head. She pushed her partner away.

  Jeremy’s eyes widened, his moans getting louder. Louder. Louder still, crescendoing to screams, the screams to shrieks.

  She crab-walked backwards and stared at Jeremy, her own eyes widening now. Jeremy bent over, clutching his junk and wailing like a prepubescent schoolgirl.

  “What the fuck?” she whispered.

  Jeremy stood, arched his back, and gazed down at his rod. The head was red and swollen, like an apple speared by a twig. It pulsed, seemed to breathe, then exploded in a haze of blood and semen like the backfiring muskets from the old Bugs Bunny cartoons.

  A streak of white burst from Jeremy’s exploding hog and plopped wetly on the ground between Jenny’s thighs. She jumped up, back-pedaled, her hands sliding through the remains of Jeremy’s pride and joy as she scurried.

  The glob of goo thrashed around on the floor, then shuddered and lay
still.

  Oh. My. God, Jenny thought. That’s a...a...

  A sperm the size of a baseball stared up at her, its foot-long tail streaming behind it like an enraged snake. At least she thought it stared. It had no eyes, yet she could feel its gaze on her, its hunger, its need for the exposed lips between her legs.

  The sperm lunged like a rabid flying squirrel. Jenny swung her arm and batted it away. It landed in the corner of the room and turned toward her again. Before it could come for her, Jenny leapt over Jeremy’s fallen body and sprinted for the door, slamming it behind her.

  Screams greeted her in the lobby, screams she recognized as Traci’s. Her friend burst from one of the warehouse’s back rooms, naked and panicked. She rushed toward Jenny, then turned toward the door from which she had emerged.

  Her lower back was covered in blood.

  Shoulda known she preferred it that way, Jenny thought. She always did walk kind of funny.

  She grabbed her hysterical friend and spun her around. “Where’s Holmes?”

  “Dead!” Traci shouted. “His pecker! It...it...”

  “I know, Traci. I saw it. Just calm down. Where’s Debbie and Sanchez?”

  More screams from a third room answered her question. It was Debbie’s turn to run to her friends, her screams more sobs than shouts. Blood plastered her face. Figures, Jenny thought.

  Before Jenny could reach her, Debbie stopped running. She lurched once, her knees buckling. Her lips curved upward through the blood, and she fell face first on to the floor.

  From Debbie’s bare ass, a thin white tail wiggled, then disappeared into her like a burrowing worm.

  In the silence that followed, Jenny heard trembling words escape Deb’s grinning mouth.

  “I’m a Mommy now.”

  Jenny grabbed Traci’s limp arms and dragged her toward another room, hopefully one without a dead, dickless boyfriend.

  Safely barricaded behind the door, Jenny took a moment to calm her frantic friend and reassess their situation. They were in an office, an old wooden desk in the center of the room. Aluminum lockers stood along one wall. A closet bisected another wall, its white door in drastic contrast to the lime green floral wallpaper.

  Okay, she thought. All of our guys are dead. Gigantic sperm-monsters exploded from their tallywhackers. One of them screwed Debbie in the face, and now she might be dead too.

  She turned to Traci. “This was a great idea, girl.”

  Traci shrugged and wiped snot from her nose. “Sorry, Jen. I just wanted to be with Holmes. He’s hung like a—”

  “Okay, I got it.”

  “Seriously, have you ever seen those nature shows? He’s like a human zebra.”

  “Dude, enough, Trace. I don’t—”

  “It, like, brushed his knee—”

  “He’s not hung like anything anymore, Traci. And there are at least two more pieces of spunk out there hunting our vajayjays. Let’s take a look around, try to find something to help us get out of here.”

  Traci crossed her arms over her breasts and shivered. “Or at least some clothes. It’s freezing. I could cut glass over here.”

  The office was plain and nondescript; just a desk, lockers, and a closet. Jenny opened the desk drawer and pulled out a thick, leather-bound book.

  “Look, Trace. A photo album.” She opened the book, gasped, giggled. “It’s porn. We just screwed our boyfriends to death and now we find porn.”

  Hundreds of pictures filled the album. Men humped women, women humped women, men humped men, one chick humped something furry. Some pictures featured so many naked, sweating bodies that they became indistinguishable from one another. A grimacing face here, legs intertwined with necks there. Mouths open in pleasure, mouths full of flesh. One showed a caped dwarf straddling whom appeared to be Jack Spratt’s wife, nearly smothering in the folds yet grinning like Rumpelstiltskin gone worse.

  “Look at the walls in the pictures,” Jenny said. “Lime green, flowers.”

  The two nude women looked at the walls around them. The same vomit-inducing pastels blinded them.

  “We’re in an old porn theater.”

  “Let’s see what else we can find.”

  Traci walked to the lockers and opened one. She yelped as dozens of boxes collapsed to the floor.

  “Latex gloves,” she said. “Hundreds of ‘em. And lubricant. Tubes and tubes of it. And, oh look, dildos.” Jenny shook her head. Only Traci could describe dozens of dildos falling to her feet from a mysterious cabinet like she was describing what she had for dinner last night. Which probably wasn’t far from the truth.

  Jenny had been examining the closet on the opposite wall. “Cleaning supplies. That’s all. Boxes and boxes of unused cleaning supplies. Lysol, Mop-N-Glo, wood cleaner. Not a single box opened.”

  “No wonder this place is filthy,” Traci said. “No one ever bothered to clean it.”

  Clarity dawned. Jenny grabbed Traci by the shoulders. “We’re in a porn theater,” she repeated. “A porn theater no one ever cleaned.”

  “So?”

  “Traci, can you imagine how much bodily fluid had been tossed about in here like so much salad? How much jizz fired across the rooms like giants snorting milk through their noses? And now we’re being stalked by giant mutant sperms.”

  Traci looked confused.

  “Dammit, Trace, it’s wasted sperm. They must have grown among the filth of this place until they mutated!”

  “But they were in our guys. How did they get inside them?”

  “First of all, if you ever call Jeremy my ‘guy’ again, I’m punching you in the throat. Second, I don’t know. Maybe even the air in here carries enough grime to morph a person’s regular sperm into giant Sperminators or something.”

  “My God, Jenny. Do you know what this means? That’s what they do, that’s all they do, and they won’t stop, ever, until you are pregn—” Traci’s eyes protruded into fear-blinded orbs. Jenny only had a brief moment to see another thrashing flagella wiggle its way into Traci’s virginia before her friend smiled and fell backwards. Then the white sperm-tail was gone.

  “Goddammit,” Jenny muttered as she ran from the room once more, slamming the door in the middle of Traci’s blissful words.

  “I’m a Mom—”

  Jenny quickly scanned the lobby for the third cumbeast. Nothing. Eyeing one last door on the far side of the lobby, she ran toward it and ripped it open.

  Bad idea.

  “Now that is one big fucking sperm.”

  Its white dome grazed the ceiling, its pulsating sides snuggled between opposing walls like a wet soccer ball slammed into a shoebox. Its creamy exterior oozed with millions upon millions of baby swimmers. Its tail flopped against the tile floor, cradled beneath its hulking body.

  Jenny could make out a small section of wall behind the Spermasaur. She saw the tops of pink curtains hanging from a large window and settling around the outside of the monstrous wad.

  Jenny felt it watching her, hungry and horny.

  Chunks of white began to drip from the thing and wiggle toward her, tiny balls of ivory trailing slithering flagella behind them. Like waterfalls of milk, the sperm cascaded from their parent and streaked toward Jenny.

  She ran, not knowing where to go. The porn studio seemed to have grown from a small, abandoned warehouse into some palacial, ever-shifting mansion.

  From the corner of her eye she spotted Debbie, still lying prone in the corner of the lobby. An enormous splash of blood spread from beneath her naked body. From beyond her friend, Jenny thought she heard a baby crying.

  Screw that.

  Figuring the office was her safest bet, Jenny sprinted that direction, legs pumping, breasts bouncing. She heard the slithering of hundreds, thousands of sperm chasing her. Her snatch tingled as if calling them home.

  She whipped the office door shut a split second before the first of the sperm could follow her inside. Quickly judging the size of the crack under the door against the size of her pursue
rs, she decided that she was safe from the intruding jizz.

  Now what? She felt like she was in some bad horror story, too ridiculous to comprehend.

  Traci still lay on the floor. Her belly was swollen grotesquely, throbbing and straining against whatever horror was trying to escape.

  Jenny scanned the room, remembered the boxes of gloves and lube, and grinned.

  ***

  Jenny lost track of time as she worked, readying her weapon. Throughout her toils, she could hear the baby sperm smashing against the door, demanding entrance to the room, to her womb.

  She had dragged Traci to the corner, praying that the thing inside her stomach would stay home until she could escape.

  Now she was ready. She checked her set-up for the hundredth time. It’s the best I can do, she thought, and pulled on the laced-together mop-head strings she had tied around the door handle in order to open it from the far side of the room.

  The sperm spewed forth, charging with unabated anger and unquenched hunger…straight into a seven-foot tall, spermicidally lubed condom of latex gloves.

  Jenny had spent hours tying the gloves together and slathering it with the sperm-killing gel. Now it stretched across the doorway, stapled to the roof with the backs of her earrings, opening its rubber arms and inviting the sperm to their doom.

  She had hoped the sperm were mindless enough not to realize the fate of their brethren who died in front of them, and her intuition was paying off. From behind the enormous rubber, her view of the carnage was blocked, but she could hear their death-cries and envision their demise as wave after wave of spooge-bombs slammed into the lube-caked latex.

  Then a rumbling sounded from beyond the condom. Jenny knew what was...coming. She grasped her weapons. In her right hand, a hot pink King Dong Progasm 3000, double-headed for those nights you’re feeling extra randy. In her left, a Beaded Back Door Rotator XL. Both toys dripped spermicide. She prepared to meet the Queen Sperm.