by C.G. Banks
road passed through. There musta been at least two hundred mudheads standing around as patiently as mudheads possibly can, waiting I saw, to pass through. But orderly, almost in straight lines even. And all along the reach of the fence were fist-fulls a Red Eyes, howling through those bullhorns. As the lines passed through the fence I saw a stream of mudheads moving deeper into the city and way down the street where they were heading I could make out more dump trucks by the smoke pouring outta the exhausts.
Well now I was in a pretty pickle. To get into the city I was gonna have to go in through the gate. The fence was a humdinger, musta been twelve feet high and ringed with concertina wire. And even from where I was I saw it wasn’t no ordinary fence but more along the lines of what you used ta see to keep prisoners from busting out. Now the mudheads I could deal with, but those goddamn Red Eyes…hmm.
Thought about it for a while. And hell even though I was officially a member of their little club I couldn’t see myself cozying up with that bunch. I remembered the one who’d come up on me in the cave where they’d stored all the Liv-ers, and the look in its eyes. Like it’d been playing with me. And then when I’d gotten away from it how it’d gathered up a posse to hunt me down. No, I didn’t trust those fuckers as far as I could throw a fifteen pound sack a shit.
But I was here and the city was there. And I had the Red Eyes too. Which pretty much makes me a fearless motherfucker. So…I ain’t much of an Einstein but I had taken precautions several miles back when I’d seen the sunglasses laying in the road like they were waiting for me. I reached into my tattered shirt pocket and pulled em out. Thick black lenses on a black frame. Perfect. I slipped em on and hoped you couldn’t see my eyes shining through.
Because it was time to join the crowd.
First thing I did was get my mind right. Ever since the Red Eye thing hit me I’d been feelin more normal, human really. I know it sounds crazy since I’ve already admitted to catching the screaming red-ass much easier and ripping through people’s flesh is what I’ve described as the main feature of those motherfuckers, but it’s the truth. Crazy as it seems, I’d been feeling more human. But I guess it really wasn’t much different from those nutty-ass serial killers saying they always felt most alive when they were killing some unfortunate somebitch. Life is like that.
Now I know that death is too.
I tried to go blank slate. Stumble around and generally look as God-awful stupid as I could and everything would probably go fine. I just didn’t want to get held up by those goddamn Red Eyes at the gate and end up in the back of one of them dump trucks. But time was wasting and there didn’t look to be any better time than now. There were still hundreds moving through and I hadn’t seen a damn one of em stopped for nothing. Hanging around here, I thought, could only lessen my chances getting through.
So I tried to look eat up with the dumb-ass and shambled out to the road. I still had a coupla hundred yards to go so I worked on my acting skills the whole way. That and I looked for another bunch a mudheads to fall in with. It didn’t take long. All I had to do was follow the stink.
Within fifty yards of the gate the crowd was thick as molasses and I moved along with em just fine. And the thing that struck me the hardest was the calmness. Every one of those mudhead somebitches was moving along like they was waiting in line to see a movie. But unlike the Old Days there wasn’t a bit of talking going on. Everybody just moved forward in complete silence. The only sound was the hell-raising coming from the Red Eyes with the bullhorns.
The closer I got to the gate the heavier the traffic, but I was still worried to the gills that when I got there I’d feel a hand on my shoulder and the gig would be up. Like I’ve said before, life now sure ain’t no bed of roses but at least it’s familiar. Giving it up for the back of a dump truck and a bonfire didn’t ring a lotta happy bells in my head.
Regardless, turned out I was worried about nothing.
When I finally got to the entrance I just passed through with the horde of others. The hourglass shape of the crowd simply squeezed tight and then blossomed on the other side and I was through. I even got the mind that I wouldn’t’ve had any trouble Red Eyes or not, but I wasn’t willing to take off the sunglasses to test the idea. Better safe than sorry my old Mamma used to say.
Of course it only hit me once I was on the other side of the fence that I hadn’t seen any mudheads that was leaving. For just a moment I kinda thought I should have studied this thing a bit longer but now it was just a little too damn late.
The sprawl of the city stretched out before me like one of those apocalyptic movies I used to like. Everything at first-story level was trashed. Glass everywhere, burnt out cars and bones all over. However bad I remembered it’d been at Momma’s during the first run a this shit, I was now mighty glad I hadn’t been here. Wherever here was. Because it musta been a massacre on a scale undreamed of. I could almost still hear the screams that got sucked up by the buildings and concrete.
But there was another thing too. Just like I remembered, after the first onslaught most of the mudheads had gone back to trying to be human. I had a picture in my head of that damn UPS guy delivering the head to my neighbor’s front door and then getting attacked by the dog on the way back to his truck. Here was much the same.
Mudheads strolling along looking at the wreckage left behind through smashed out windows. Some fuckhead at a hot dog stand doling out pieces a bodies on sticks to a line of customers now sedate and quiet. Some, it looked like, had come up with the same idea I’d had a while back, and shambled around in Versace suits and Neiman Marcus dresses, slimed and funked up to the hilt. But there was the occasional flash of familiarity. I heard a scream somewhere above my head and as I turned to look I saw glass shattering about four floors up and a body come hurtling down, screaming like a banshee. It hit the concrete about ten feet in front a me and busted open like a watermelon. Well that did it let me tell you. While the body was laying there in a growing puddle of blood and juice and just before it would start kicking again, every fucking mudhead, myself included, surged forward for the free buffet. And that’s how it went for a while. My brain clicked into a hold pattern and it was like piranhas attacking a cow carcass. I don’t know if I actually managed to get to the fresh body or not but I came to my senses sometime later with a mouthful of goo and a coupla scattered fingers in my lap. I was pressed up against the doorway of some shop and the mudheads moving about were calm again. From where I was I could easily see the big red spot on the sidewalk where the body had landed but that was it. Well almost…there was one old bastard down on his hands and knees, his skinny naked butt pointing up in the air, lapping the blood up like a dog. There was a pair of dentures lying next to him and I wondered if that was his problem in the first place: no choppers.
I brought my hand up to my forehead and felt the security of those sunglasses. I got to say I was relieved. This shit was all new to me and I wanted to fly below the radar as long as possible. Thanking my lucky stars (if I still had any) I groaned to my feet and just stood there against the side of the doorway. A coupla mudheads pushed past me to get inside the dark building and I let em go. I could hear other sounds coming from farther back but it wasn’t nothing to interest me.
And let me tell you, these motherfuckers were everywhere. Naked, clothed, short, tall, old and young. I even saw three babies scurry by like cockroaches in the kitchen at night and that did give me a little twinge. But they scuttled off around the side of a building and were gone. I decided to try the other way.
The sun got blocked up by a thick black bank a clouds and before you could say “leg on a plate” there was a huge crack of thunder and the clouds just shit rain all over us. I stood in the middle of the street along with what I figured to be thousands of others looking up into the onslaught. And as it came down I thought, this is the first time. At least since the Change. I stood there getting wet with the people of the New World and even though it was cool it really didn’t make me feel one goddamn bit better.
It stopped just as soon as it started and for a little while nobody moved. We all just stood there in the crowd, some with their hands out like they were waiting to get a present, and let it all, pardon me, soak in. Then everything went back to fucked-up normal.
I walked deep into the night trying to find relief from the crowd but it was just about impossible. The meal I’d had in the street kept the chicken bone in my throat quiet for a good while but it came back with a vengeance with all the smell of rotten flesh hanging in the air. After a while I couldn’t take it no more and zeroed in on this mudhead walking alongside me. I grabbed that bastard by the hair and pulled him in tight. Sunk my teeth into his face and chawed him right down to the ground. The crowd around us just kept on passing by and I really couldn’t blame em. Mudhead flesh just ain’t the same. It’d do in a pinch but the juiciness just doesn’t bring on the bells and whistles like a Liv-er does. Like comparing oatmeal to a ribeye. But like I said: anything in a pinch.
When I finished up with that shambler I squeezed through the crowd to an alleyway. I could see there was some action even here down toward the end but I’d gotten used