“If that’s what you want Charlie I will support you. If it isn’t what you want, I will also support you remaining our leader. I believe you have done well today keeping the majority of us alive as we traveled through very hostile territory.”
“Thanks Amanda, but no. Stick that fork in me. My leader days are done.”
“We ready to go?” Jack said walking back to us. He had the harness over his shoulder and two boxes of ammunition for himself and Amanda.
“How many zombies are you expecting to be in there, Jack?” I asked. Jack shrugged and answered, “No clue but this is America’s number one retail store, and as I said before, I like to be prepared.”
“Point taken.” Amanda said.
“Okay guys, by the look of me I’m guessing you’re both aware that I don’t go out rock climbing for fun on the weekends. I’m going to need some help getting this harness thing on and you’re going to have to show me how to use it.”
“No problem.” Jack said as he helped me into the harness. He then popped open one of the skylights. After a short “how to” class on using a safety harness I felt ready to give my first concert to the dead.
“Okay. I got this.” I said, “You two go ahead and get ready to shoot people while I get myself comfortable.”
I began to disappear down into the store. weaving my way through the metal framework and the piping which constitutes the ceiling of your local Wal-Mart super center, and arriving at a place near the front of the store that we all agreed would be perfect. It was right above where the customers would have entered which meant that directly below me was a wide open space. This gave Jack and Amanda enough room to sight as many zombies as their hearts desired and efficiently put a hole in each one’s head. I put one ear plug in and picked up the walkie talkie that Jack had hooked into the harness. “Mocking Bird to Pea Shooter, come back Pea Shooter.”
“Yes, Charlie.” Amanda’s voice said.
“No Charlie here, Pea Shooter.”
“Charlie, I swear to God I am not going to…” There was a short pause and I could hear her laugh come rolling into the store through the skylight. I figured I had just been made the butt of some joke. Amanda’s voice returned with a hint of laughter still on it, “We’re here Mocking Bird. Situation?”
“Ready to squawk. Are the pea’s loaded and ready?”
Jacks voice came on the line, “Mocking bird, check the back of your radio for the headset attachment. Please keep this in at all times so we can stay in contact with you.”
“Will do.”
“Mocking Bird, sing when ready.” Jack said and I could hear Amanda laugh again through the headset part of the radio. I took a breath and spoke a hesitant “Me, me, me, me” out across Wal-Mart. I wanted to test how well my voice would travel in here. The store was locked down tight, and there were no other sounds that could be heard save the televisions at the very back of the store. My voice was going to seriously carry in here. If I tried hard enough, I was confident I could get an echo. Taking a deep breath, I began to sing John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmit as loudly as I could.
His name is my name too.
C H A P T E R T H I R T Y - E I G H T
The initial thought that my voice was going to carry inside the store turned out to be a huge underassessment of what was going to happen. It rolled across the store like thunder shaking a house during a bad storm. I felt the words rolling out of me like the voice of God declaring that the evil inside was to be smote like Sodom and Gamorrah. I was pushing the limits of volume that I could muster and I knew my voice would suffer later, but the act of doing it was so much fun. I just couldn’t stop. The first few zombies came stumbling into view and then more and more came until there were at least twenty below me. Still the words kept flowing out of my mouth over and over and over. I didn’t know when the shooting had begun, and to tell you the truth, I could barely hear it. I was lost in my own act of bellowing into the emptiness below me. I would watch the zombies staggering towards the spot they had pinpointed the sound to be coming from. Every so often I would watch as one would get lifted off its feet and then slammed back to earth as a bullet tore through its head. I had no sense of time. I had no sense of anything other than my voice and the thirty-three words of the song going round and round. An infinite loop of thunder drawing the dead to their demise. It was beautiful, it was addictive, and it was cool beyond description. At least to me it was. To the others I believe it was annoying beyond description because before to long I heard Amanda’s voice in my ear saying, “Charlie, I swear to God, if you don’t start singing something else I am going to shoot you!” Behind her I could hear the voice of Jack say with laughter, “Call him Mocking Bird!” There was a moment of quiet in my ear before I heard Amanda say, “You’re both going to get a bullet.” Jack was still laughing. I, on the other hand, took the moment to pause and think of a new song to sing. I summoned up a deep breath and yelled, “I LIKE BIG BUTTS AND I CANNOT LIE!” before hearing Amanda’s voice in my ear again. “NO! God! Why did I think this plan was going to be a good idea?” Still behind her, Jack’s laughter.
I picked the talkie back up and said into it, “Taking requests. Anybody have a song they would like to hear?” As I waited for an answer I heard a roar come from somewhere beneath me. Most of the zombies were on the ground never to rise again. There were six left walking around, but they seemed to be losing focus now that I had been quiet for a few minutes. I began to look around trying to find the source of the sound when Jack’s voice was in my ear.
“Charlie? Was that you?”
“No. It sounds like we have a Neanderthal zombie somewhere in the store. Sec, I’m scouting for it.”
“Careful Charlie, we still have no clue what they are capable of.” Jack said. I didn’t feel that I needed to be told to be careful, but it was nice to know that he cared whether I lived or died.
“No worries Jack. I figure I’m high enough to be out of harms way.”
“No Charlie, don’t think that way. That’s how you get killed."
I was starting to realize just how vulnerable I was to anything that wasn’t a normal walk around brain dead zombie. I thought about retreating out of the store and rethinking my plan, but that was a bad idea. If I was in danger here, I would be a sitting duck while trying to walk my way back to the open skylight. Honestly, I thought, how much danger could I be in? Unless zombie Dracula was down there about to take to the air and dive bomb me, how could they even touch me up here? Then the roar came again. I knew I had to do something but was at a loss as to what it should be. I was of the opinion that doing something stupid was better than doing nothing so I sucked in a lungful of air and gave the loudest, longest Ric Flair “WOOOOO!!” that I had ever yelled in my life. I heard a loud bang as something impacted the metal frame of the building to the right of my head. I spun around and saw something falling back down towards the ground. As it bounced off the floor I realized that it was a soup can.
“It’s in the grocery section. It just chucked a can of soup at me.” Then the roar erupted again. I looked and couldn’t see anything moving below me other than the same six zombies. It seemed that whatever this zombie was it really didn’t like me screaming and yelling. I sucked in another lungful of air and began singing Every Rose Has Its Thorn as loud as I could. The roar that issued forth at me was earth shaking, and I saw something step out from between the grocery isles and hurl something at me. As the object came closer I could see that it was a package of Oreos. I made every attempt I could to catch them. They hit the metal frame of the store a few feet in front of me, the package exploding on impact. I found myself in the eye of an Oreo hurricane as the exploding packaging flung out its contents like buckshot pelting me with several of the cookies, most hitting me in the face, as they fell back earthwards. I started to laugh.
“Oh my God guys, that thing just threw a pack of Oreos at me. How strong would you have to be to get a package of Oreos up here?”
All was quiet for
a minute then Amanda was in my ear. “Charlie, I don’t like this. I want you back up here.”
“No can do, Pea Shooter. If I move I’ll be even more of a target than I am now. Remember its sound and movement that sets them off. I’m safer waiting it out here. Can either of you get a shot?”
“Soon,” Amanda said. “Jack is getting a harness on and is coming in so he can better hunt it. From up here we are limited in our ability to sweep the store by the walls of the skylight.”
“Cool beans, Pea Shooter. I’m fine, just going to get this thing good and mad at me so when Jack jumps in he should have an easy time targeting our stone thrower.”
“Charlie, I’m not kidding here, this is no time to start acting stupid. Do you understand me?”
“Me? Act stupid? When have I…” She cut me off. “I mean it Charlie.”
“That’s Mocking Bird, Pea Shooter, and I have a song in my heart.”
I started singing “It Takes Two,” by Rob Base. At long last I could see the figure step out of the isle and look up at me, but this time he didn’t roar. I stared down at him, but I didn’t stop singing. He seemed to be a man in his late thirties or early forties. He was wearing ripped up blue jeans, work boots, and his shirt was obscured by a brown jacket. He had a baseball cap on and the hood of his jacket was pulled up and over the hat making this guy look like a zombie version of the Unabomber. He stood there listening to me and I could see him starting to sway a bit. As I approached the chorus I said quietly into the headset, “Are you seeing this?” Amanda didn’t respond to me, Jack did.
“This is amazing, keep going.”
I sang, “My name is Rob I got a real funky concept”, the grocery throwing zombie continued to stand there looking up at me and swaying back and forth. “What the hell?” I heard Jack say over the earphone. “Change it up. Sing something else.”
I stopped singing and the swaying of the zombie slowed and eventually stopped. I was trying to think of something to sing. The zombie was now becoming more and more irritable. He was looking around at his surroundings as well as glancing up at me every few seconds. Finally finding some lyrics in my head I began singing “Wanted Dead or Alive” and the reaction was almost immediate. The swaying zombie picked up whatever was closest to him, in this case it was bottle of dish washing soap, and threw it at me. This one would have hit me in the chest if I hadn’t leaned back at the last moment.
“He doesn’t like Bon Jovi.” I said.
“Try something else rap.” Jack said. I thought about it and the only song that came to mind was something I thought Amanda wasn’t going to like. I drew in a breath and started singing as loud as I could.
“Now stop whatcha doin, cause I’m about ta ruin, the image and the style that you’re used to.”
Nothing was hurled at me. The zombie was standing still, looking at me. As I neared the end of the first verse it began to sway. In my ear I could hear Jack laughing, “I’ll be damned, he likes rap.”
There was no denying it. This guy somehow remembered these songs. The other six that were still below me made no show as to whether they liked the song choices or not, but this guy, my undead Unabomber, he was all about the music. I hated to see Jack kill him. I thought we may be able to use this guy to discover some fundamental truth about the zombies and their mental state, but there was no way I was going to be able to keep singing rap songs all night. I just didn’t know enough lyrics. I could do a few Will Smith or Eminem songs after this and throw in Regulators by Nate Dogg and Warren G but that was about the extent of my rapping knowledge.
Amanda’s voice was now in my ear. “Okay, as much as we don’t want to, we’re going to kill this guy.” A gun shot roared out across the store and I watched my number one fan fall to the ground in mid sway. Jack and Amanda finished the other six off in a matter of minutes.
“Come back up top,” Jack said in my ear. “We need to talk.”
C H A P T E R T H I R T Y - N I N E
“It seems that every time we think we know our enemy, he shows us how wrong we are.” Amanda said.
“That’s why I think it’s a good time for us to compare what we know about these zombies.” Jack said.
“Well I’m not really sure where to start.” I said to Jack.
“I suggest you start at the beginning of the day. Walk us through it with you, that way you should be able to remember each item as you originally came across it. The others can chime in as you list something they have experienced as well.” Jack said.
“The first zombie that Sass and I found was a guy who was running at the glass doors of the factory. He was running really fast, and he seemed to have no balance. He looked like he was going to face plant at any moment. When he hit the door, he hit it wide open. The impact flung him a good five feet backwards and killed him for good. He had leaned in with his head and had hit so hard it cracked the thick glass of the door.”
“Okay. We start here then. How many of you have witnessed these fast moving zombies?” Jack asked.
Everyone raised their hands.
“Do any of you have an explanation of why they are able to move so fast and hit so hard?” Jack asked.
“Yeah, Charlie and I were working out what we thought was going on earlier.” Sass said.
“And what were your thoughts?” Jack said.
“Jack, I don’t even know if we’re right.” I said.
“Doesn’t matter, tell me what you think?”
I looked around to the group and everybody was watching me. “Sass and I thought that it was kind of like a shot of nitrous, like in the Fast and the Furious movies. It was something they have, but only in a limited supply. It runs out eventually. Once they use up all of their speed or all of their strength, it’s gone for good.”
Jack was quiet for a minute before speaking. “I think you are absolutely right, Charlie. But let me give you a little science to explain your shot of nitrous. Do any of you know how the musculature system of the human body works?” Everybody looked at Jack with blank faces so I said, “I believe it’s been established that we are not a collection of high thinkers, Jack.” This brought some laughter from those of us that were secure in our cluelessness. Jack smiled as well.
“Okay let me give you a quick tour of it. I’m not going to get to technical so don’t worry. The muscle system of the human body is what moves the bones. These muscles come in pairs. One pulls the bone in one direction and the other pulls it back to where it was. It’s the bones themselves that provide us the strength we use because our muscles use the bones like a fulcrum, bending it to generate force.”
“Bones bend?” Veronica asked. “I thought bones were brittle?”
“Not at all. Bones are very flexible and very strong. They can bend and take quite a bit of punishment before they break.” Jack said.
“Okay how does this explain the turbo zombies?” Shawn asked.
“The muscles of the body are powered by the food we eat. After the energy from the food is gone then the body will start to break down the fat that has been stored up, but it takes much longer to turn that into energy. When this switch happens, you experience something that is known as “hitting the wall”. Amanda, I am sure you know this feeling from basic.”
Amanda frowned. “Yes, I know about hitting the wall. It’s hell. I really can’t think of any other way to describe it. You feel like your heart is going to explode. You can’t find your breath, you just keep taking gasp after gasp of air trying to get enough in, but you never do. You feel like any movement you make will be the reason they find you dead in the next few hours. You want to puke, but there is nothing to puke. You want to just stop, lay down, and pray to God that he lets you get better. But in basic you can’t stop. You have to keep pushing through it, and eventually, you will start to feel a bit better. You never feel as good as you did at the start, but you feel good enough to keep going.”
“What she is describing is your muscles running out of fuel. Your blood sugar drops, your body
wants to shut down so it can try to rebuild what has been depleted. Once the body switches over and starts converting the fat cells your body needs more oxygen to help process it. That is what makes you keep trying to draw in more and more air. You can get nauseous and dizzy, you can even pass out in some instances.” Jack said.
“Okay Jack, what does this have to do with the zombies?” Veronica said.
“I think this is what’s happening to the zombies. When they come back, they still have the muscle mass they had when they died. They still have the energy reserves they had when they died. With those two factors they are able to perform at the level they were at physically before death.”
“No Jack. It’s worse than that. They are able to perform at a higher level because they no longer feel any pain. There is nothing to make them stop.” I said.
Jack looked at me for a moment, “You’re right. Why didn’t I see that?”
“You’re saying that once they burn through these fuel reserves they get slower and slower.” Amanda said.
“Yes. That’s it exactly.” Jack said.
“Then why don’t they speed back up when their bodies transfer over to using the fat cells for energy?” Sass asked.
“I don’t think they can. I think the energy from the fat cells are only enough to keep them moving.” Jack said.
“Or maybe they can’t switch over.” I said. “Maybe the ability to burn the fat reserves is lost to them once they come back. It wouldn’t be unheard of for some of their systems to simply not work anymore. If they were unable to replenish their bodies need for energy, it would explain why they don’t get any faster and why they settle into that slow, Frankenstein like walk.” I said.
“That is a thought. They wouldn’t feel any muscle pain as they kept walking around so they would just keep going as fast as they could, which wouldn’t be very fast.” Jack said.
“Wait. What about rigor mortis?” Veronica asked.
“Yeah, shouldn’t these guys start locking up anytime now?” Shawn said.
A Good Distance From Dying Page 32
