“Young lady, young man?” said Flex. “Our intention is to make ‘em dead. It’s what we do. No zombie left alive, folks. That’s our motto.”
“You should listen to him,” said Gem. “He’s funny sometimes, but when he’s not, he’s really, really not.”
*****
CHAPTER FIVE
“Koko?” said Nelson on the radio. He’d planned to wait till morning to call his friend, but had cracked after he’d smoked another bowl, and now grinned like a kid with cake as he gripped the radio tight.
“Who is this?”
“Manny didn’t tell you?”
“Manny?”
“Your friend. Manuel.”
“Wait … Nelson?”
Nelson looked at the group listening in. “Ha ha! You figured it out!” he almost yelled into the transmitter.
“Oh, my God! Where are you?”
“I’m on a damned radio, so where do you think I am? At the sandwich shop!”
“Don’t leave,” he said. “I’m coming.”
“Don’t, bro,” said Nelson. “Everyone says it’s too dangerous at night.”
“You’re worth it, Nel. I can’t tell you how many times I have thought of you since we parted. So many.”
“Past friendships are like juice in my tank,” said Nelson. “Just knowing I might run into good people one day keeps me going.”
“You’ve always been deeper than folks gave you credit for, Nel.”
“Koko it sure is good to hear that weird voice of yours again. We’ll be in town tomorrow. We’re bedding down here for the night and going zombie hunting tomorrow.”
“They told you about the women?”
“Yeah, they did. Sounds like a buncha Red-Eyes.”
“Red – oh, yeah. So that’s what you called them?”
“Among other things,” called Gem.
“Who was that?” asked Koko.
“Gem Cardoza. One of the best women left on the planet.”
“She taken?”
“Shut up, man … I heard you were!”
“I am,” laughed Koko. “My wife just slapped me.”
“Okay, Koko,” said Nelson. “I can’t wait to meet her. And see you again. Tomorrow, come by the sandwich shop when the sun comes up.”
“Try to stop me,” he said. “Manuel, you still on?”
“Si, Koko. What’s up?”
“Why didn’t I ever call you Manny?”
“No clue. It’s cool, though.”
“See you all tomorrow. Don’t let anything happen to Nel before I can give that skinny bastard a hug – hey, you’re still skinny, yes?”
“As fuck!” said Nelson.
“As half a fuck,” seconded Gem.
*****
Sarah was kind enough to hand the keys over to the group of strangers as her ride showed up to take her back to her house. Manuel went with her, and by 11:00 PM, they were alone.
“Can we get a short meeting before we hit the sack?” asked Max. “Isis and I have some thoughts.”
“That’s putting it mildly,” said Gem. “No doubt you two have been working things out all night.”
“True enough,” said Isis. “But it’s all to our benefit, so no jealousy.”
Nelson and Flex pushed two tables together, and everyone sat around them. “Okay,” said Isis. “From what they said, it sounds like a lot of the Red-Eyes survived. I can’t say for sure that none did in Kingman because we weren’t everywhere at once. Where we did see them, they died.”
“You’re saying we can’t be sure how many got up and walked off.”
Nelson snapped his fingers. “This explains a lot. You guys know how I don’t forget anything?”
Everyone nodded. “Okay. Which means when I drove around town logging where the dead zombies were for disposal, I saw a lot more than we eventually burned in the pit.”
“Come again?” asked Flex.
“First I drove around. Then I made mental notes of how many were where. Didn’t write anything down because I didn’t need to, but I stored it all up here. And even stuff I don’t really understand I’m storing still goes up here.”
He tapped on his temple with his index finger. “When I went around with the cleanup crews, a lot of them were gone. And I can tell you now, most of them were Red-Eyes.”
“Most or all?” asked Isis.
“Nah, they were all Red-Eyes. All female. But it was subtle, and sometimes I thought the bodies had been messed with. You guys remember it took like three days before anyone really wanted to start the cleanup. I did my work in those three days.”
“What do you mean they were messed with?”
“Dudes where chicks were, some missing altogether. I just think I figured at the time somebody was clearing out bodies on their own. You know, like with one of the little golf cart haulers or something.”
“We did have a great little community,” said Dave Gammon. “Lots of people chipped in without saying anything. I can see how you might not have thought twice about it.”
“Yeah,” said Nelson. “But now I can’t stop thinking about it. Some of the Red-Eyes must have just gotten up and walked away. But they sure as hell didn’t stay in town. We didn’t lose anyone.”
“Enough of the perimeter fence was breached afterward, they probably made a clean exit from Kingman,” said Flex. “Strange.”
“Nobody’s preying on the Kingman people, are they?” asked Taylor. “Somebody definitely would’ve said something over the radio.”
“Kingman’s people are well-armed,” said Max. “Or at least they used to be. And well-trained. If these things retained any intelligence, they know that.”
“You think they hunt other areas? Go where there’s a large group of survivors and just pick off the weak after the sun goes down?” asked Dave.
“You know how we all still carry arms with us?” asked Nelson. “I always have a belt full of stars and I even keep this now,” he said, whipping out a Smith & Wesson 9mm pistol.
“Your point?”
“My point is they used to prey on everyone,” said Nelson. “Now the gas is gone. Isis, how would that affect them?”
“The absence of the gas?”
“Yeah.”
Isis shook her head. “We knew what was happening from the early experiments Dad told us about. He said when the zombies moved, it wasn’t from a signal from the brain to the extremities; it was from each individual cell in the body moving toward fresh, human meat. It coordinated the body somehow. I still don’t understand the science behind it.”
“Fuckin’ zombie science,” said Nelson.
Flex shook his head. “Look. We gotta really understand what we’re walking into here. I need to radio Hemp.”
He turned toward Gem and the radio was already in her hand, held out. He took it, turned it on, and flipped the channel.
“Hemphill Chatsworth? Hemphill Chatsworth, come in old chap!”
“Your British accent is horrendous,” said Dave.
“You ever heard a Canadian try to do my voice?”
“No, why would …. Oh, gotcha. Never mind.”
“Flex, is that you?”
“Yeah, brother. Got some bad news, but depending on how you answer this question, it might not be as bad.”
“What’s the question?”
“The question is how the hell do the Red-Eyes make a comeback?”
“Say what?”
Max laughed. “Say what? Since when does my dad say that?”
“Is there enough gas coming out – no, fuck that. Was the gas really all the way stopped?” Flex looked around. “Clear enough, yeah?”
Everyone shook their heads.
“Flex, if I understand you correctly – and I’m not sure I do – then you are asking me if I believe the earth gas ever stopped entirely?”
“Yeah, Hemp. If I’m standing five feet from that tube in Lula, I can’t see anything. Get up close, there you are. Bubbles.”
“You’re wondering
if while the Red-Eyes were making their last stand, and the regular rotters were falling in their tracks, we just assumed the gas had completely stopped.”
“How much would it take to sustain them?” said Gem. “That’s the real question. Would what’s coming out of the ground now be enough?”
“It clearly isn’t,” said Hemp. “We’ve had people die – they stay dead. No sign of life, no zombies, no nothing.”
“Oh, Hemp. You are getting old. We pierce their brains, remember?”
“Oh, yes, what am I even thinking of?” he said, embarrassment in his voice. “Charlie mentioned that to me earlier today.”
“One thing, though,” said Gem. “We haven’t had any pregnant women die,” said Gem. “Thank god.”
The entire group got shivers down their spines and almost shook like a pack of dogs after a downpour.
Everyone looked at everyone else. Dave Gammon finally broke the spell. “Hemp, you still there?”
“I am,” came the voice. “Fill us in on the situation before Charlie drives over there tonight.”
“That’s just it,” said Gem. “The people of Athens don’t go out at night. These Red-Eyes are nocturnal, and they’re obviously a lot closer to Athens than Lula.”
“Out of necessity or secrecy?” asked Hemp.
“Clarify?” asked Gem.
“He’s asking if they do it because there’s some reason they can’t expose themselves to daylight, or if they’re smart enough to know we sleep at night – easy pickins,” said Flex.
“So, a lack of physical abilities during the day?” asked Taylor.
“Until someone lays eyes on them, studies them if possible, there is no way to know how or why they exist as they do,” said Hemp.
“Someone?” asked Gem. “I’m surprised you’re not in the car already.”
“Oh, I’m coming. Charlie’s packing now. But we’ve got enough mice now, and I have a couple more experiments to do.”
“Bring Punch with you when you come,” said Flex. “We might need his skills.”
*****
Early the next morning, Hemp and Charlie were in the lab. “Okay, come on,” said Hemp. “Bring that box there. The Plexiglas one with the mouse in it.”
He carried a large acrylic tube with a fitting on one end and a conical shape on the other. Placing it against the ground, he pushed it deep into the dirt.
“Okay, lower the box onto this.”
“This is like porn,” said Charlie.
Hemp shook his head.
“You’ve never seen this movie?” she asked, smiling. She centered the box onto the tube.
Hemp slid open the rotating vent louvers on the top, allowing anything coming up through the tube to bleed out for a few moments, then he closed the louvers again.
“How long?”
“Ten seconds … now.”
She lifted the box off and the insertion point self-sealed. “Okay, now we experiment.”
“I love this part.”
“Miss it, do you?” asked Hemp.
“Miss working with you in the lab,” said Charlie. “Don’t miss zombies, except in the abstract.”
“We did get awfully good at killing them, didn’t we?” asked Hemp.
“Feels like I’m about to go to my high school prom all over again.”
“I think you miss it too much,” said Hemp. “I hope you have no call to return to it.”
“I’m too old for that shit now – what we did back then. Good thing we’ve raised a stable of fighters.”
“It’s all they’ve known – these last months without zombies must have been strange for them, come to think of it.”
Charlie bit her lip. “Yeah. I never really thought of it like that. Sad, really. If you’re born into it, it’s just life, right? Not scary, really, if that’s all you’ve ever known.”
Hemp nodded. “I have noticed, though. It’s harder for the young ones to not be on the lookout.”
“And yet, even as watchful as they are, they’ve never seen these … are they all women? Did I hear that right?”
“Yes,” said Hemp. “And the worst of the women, it seems.”
“So, the strongest women are the worst?”
“They’re the most dangerous women,” said Hemp. “And in their case, yes. Worse for us.”
Hemp inserted a tube into the box, left it there for a moment, then removed it and held it up to his eyes.
“Okay. No oxygen content.”
“Now comes the horrible part.”
“You want to do the honors?”
“Yes, I told you it’s the horrible part!”
Hemp shrugged and Charlie took a long needle with a small plastic handle on one end. She inserted it through the top of the box, lined up the mouse, and jabbed it straight down.
“Dead hit,” said Hemp. “Stopped its heart. You okay?”
Withdrawing the needle from the mouse, it slid out easily as the mouse slumped onto its side. “Better than him. How long?”
“It takes a bit longer, if you recall from the rats,” said Hemp.
“Watched pots,” said Charlie, putting the needle back on the table.
“Let’s go button up our luggage,” said Hemp. “We’ll bring all the WAT-5 we made.”
“It barely fooled the original Red-Eyes. Who knows if it will work at all now?”
“We’ll know more when we see if this mouse awakens.”
*****
CHAPTER SIX
Finished packing their small suitcases, Hemp and Charlie returned to the mobile lab.
“Wait,” said Charlie. “Let me look.”
Hemp shook his head. “Go ahead.”
Charlie opened the door and peered around the corner at the table where the Plexiglas case sat.
“Holy fuck, Batman.”
“It’s alive?”
“No, sir. It’s as still as a dead leaf in a vacuum chamber.”
“I’m not even sure what that means.”
“If it’s a vacuum, there’s no … wait. Okay, never mind. It’s still dead.”
They entered and closed the door behind them.
Standing before the cage, they stared at the mouse inside.
“It’s a relief, actually,” said Hemp. “But we’ve got one more experiment to do. I’d have done it simultaneously, but we’ve only one suitable container. Let’s put this one in tray #1.”
“I speak Chatsworth,” said Charlie. “I’ll do it.”
Hemp chuckled as Charlie put on nitrile gloves and went to the container. She unlatched the hinged bottom and held it closed while she carried it to a plastic tray. Holding the box over it, she swung the lid open and the mouse dropped onto it.
“Gonna try the preggers mouse now?”
“I’m glad we caught one,” said Hemp. “I was beginning to lose hope.”
“You’ll have to be the one to kill her,” said Charlie. “Solidarity, ya know?”
“You? With the pregnant mouse?”
“We’re both chicks, and we’ve both been pregnant, so yeah, I guess so.”
“Sure. Box her up.”
“How long is this going to take? I want to get going.”
Hemp let out a sigh. “Charlie, I’ve been thinking about it. They’re not going to investigate anything until the morning, and we can get an early start. They’re not far.”
“I know,” she said with a sigh. “Plus, we need more time here, and it’s only going to get later.”
“This is why we’re compatible,” he said. “Radio them and let them know we’ll be there just after dawn.”
*****
They repeated the process with the pregnant mouse, and after Hemp inserted the needle into its heart, careful to avoid the fetuses within its belly, they took another break.
This time, they went inside and ate a dinner of broiled chicken and macaroni and cheese.
“Just when I think we’re organic and shit we eat a whole buttload of mac and cheese.”
“We made
the cheese and milk, and we raised the chickens free range,” said Hemp. “Pasta is pasta.”
“Cool. I feel good about myself again,” said Charlie, patting her belly.
They returned to the mobile lab and walked in without fanfare or anticipation this time.
They realized immediately they should have rethought that. The female was standing on her hind legs, facing away from them.
Hemp and Charlie stopped in their tracks, mouths open, staring.
The once-dead, male mouse was also on his hind legs. He stood perfectly still, facing the female.
“I have chills zipping down my spine,” whispered Charlie.
“Not like I do,” said Hemp.
The female turned to stare at them. When she opened her mouth and let out a high-pitched squeal, the male mouse leapt from the table and scurried toward them.
Hemp sidestepped and quickly snatched a broom with an attached dustpan and hurried toward it. It had hit the ground, rolled for a moment, then was back on all fours. Hemp was at it in two strides, and using the broom, swept it into the pan and pressed it against the plastic with the broom.
“Hurry, get a container.”
“This will have to do,” she said, grabbing a large, cylindrical glass beaker. She held it beneath the dustpan and he swiped it downward, depositing the now-alive mouse inside.
It could not get the traction to crawl up the glass sides, so no lid was necessary.
Unless things changed drastically.
“Okay, okay,” said Charlie. “Let’s take just a second to think about this.”
“I may need more than a second,” said Hemp. “Was she … controlling him? Did she wake him?”
“He wasn’t moving at all when we put him over there. When she shrieked, he came running.”
“A command?” asked Hemp.
“Fuck!” said Charlie. “Hemp, I don’t want to do this again. I thought I might miss it, but now that it’s a possibility, I don’t want it. Ever again!”
“We may not have a say in the matter. What we do now will be more important than ever to complete before we go tomorrow. Let’s bleed off some of the ambient gas.”
Charlie nodded, and they opened the valve on an oxygen tank, then inserted the box onto the vertical tube.
Dead Hunger | Book 10 | The Remnants Page 5
