Death and Taxes

by Galen Surlak-Ramsey

  “How do we know he’s even telling the truth?”

  “We don’t,” Nick said. “But if they’re trusting us to get their precious data, I’m inclined to believe them. Otherwise, they’d blow the place up and leave without us.”

  Clarice turned the thought over in her head, and, as much as she hated to admit he had a point and that she’d have to follow someone else’s plan, she capitulated. “We’ll help,” she said. “But when we’re done, they don’t even get to think about us. We’re getting out of here, going back to Kentucky and returning to being nice, normal, and boring. No, check that. We’re going somewhere else. We’re going someplace with a beach and a boat, and if I can’t be a pirate, I’m going to drink like one till I forget this hell hole.”

  Nick uncovered the phone and returned to the conversation. “Okay, we’ll help. But you lose anything and everything about us, including any contact once we’re done.”

  “Fair enough,” Dr. Forbes replied.

  “And three hundred grand in our bank account,” Nick tacked on. “Call it restitution for keeping quiet.”

  “Are you sure you want to blackmail us?” Dr. Forbes asked.

  “I’m sure that’s fair compensation and probably a lot cheaper than you guys having to play and worry about clean up,” Nick replied.

  Clarice grinned as the line went silent. She kissed him on the cheek and whispered, “Nice.”

  “Fine. Three hundred thousand,” Dr. Forbes said. “But that’s only payable if you get that research—every last bit. You miss any of it, you get none of it. Understand?”

  “Ask him about Martin and Ryan, too,” she interjected, tapping him on the shoulder.

  “Yeah, we understand. What about the others?” Nick asked. “Where are they at?”

  “I don’t know,” the doctor replied. “Your old friend isn’t in his cell, I know that much. He was moved to the cafeteria right before the system failure. As for your employer, Mr. Conner, he’s somewhere below you, mingling with the others.”

  Clarice cursed under her breath and thumped her head against the wall. She might not have liked Ryan very much, at all, actually, but she didn’t hate him enough to want to see him dead. Or worse. Maybe Martin had fared better.

  “Now, on to the matter at hand,” Dr. Forbes said. “What you’re looking for is two floors down. Take the south stairwell—it’s the one past the kitchen on the left. And if I were you, before I got too far, I might stop in that kitchen and grab a knife, assuming you haven’t already. The drawers by the stove should have one. If any of the fire stations along the way have an extinguisher or an ax still inside, I’d pick one of them up as well. I think you’ll find an ax to do a fine job of lopping heads.”

  “An ax, sure, but I don’t think a knife is going to help against a horde,” said Nick.

  “It’s better than nothing,” Dr. Forbes said. “And regardless of what you use, it works like all the tv shows and movies: you’ll need to cause severe trauma to the brain or sever the neck to kill a zombie. Anything less is a waste of time and effort.”

  “South stairwell, second floor down, stab them in the head,” Nick repeated. “Then what?”

  “That’s the tricky part,” the doctor answered. “Go right and at the end of the hall is a card scanner and code entry. The entry code is seven, five, fourteen, twelve, one, one. Write that down. That’ll get you through the first set of doors. For the second set, you’ll need an ID badge, and I have no idea where you’ll find one.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “I wish I were,” Dr. Forbes admitted. “And not any badge either, but one that says ‘Epsilon’ or ‘Gamma Access’ across the bottom. Most of our techs from that area have that, so, if you can, finding someone from that floor should suffice.”

  Clarice laughed and ran her fingers through her hair. “Is that all? Do we have to clean up this entire mess too?”

  Nick turned his back to her and cupped one hand over his other ear. “Where do we go after the doors?”

  “Once you get through those doors, it’s as easy as extracting a bit of DNA,” Dr. Forbes replied. “You’ll be entering a series of small offices. The hall will snake around and end at the lab. That’s where you’re headed, and that’s where the UCK is. We need you to grab it and a pair of backup hard drives nearby. Those hold a lot of information that hasn’t been transferred.”

  “The what?” Nick said. “Did you say ‘the uck?’”

  “Yes, the UCK,” Dr. Forbes repeated. “That’s what we call it. It stands for Universe Creation Kit. I’ll call you in the lab once you get there and walk you through some of the finer points. Any questions?”

  Nick glanced at Clarice, who only threw up her hands. “No,” he said. “We’re good.”

  “Outstanding. Now get moving.”

  The line went dead.

  Clarice’s eyebrows arched and she fixed the ponytail through her cap. “Guess we’re going then.”

  “Looks like it,” he answered.

  Right as Nick turned to leave the booth, Clarice grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him around.

  “What is—” he started to say.

  Before he could finish, Clarice pressed her fiancé’s back into the wall and her lips onto his.

  One intense, thirty-second make-out session later, the two stepped out of the police box, determined, refreshed, and grinning from ear to ear.

  Chapter Sixteen

  A few hours prior to Jack’s rendezvous with Ken Saunters, Ryan Conner, Tax Collector, was hauled out of his cell and put into a new, shiny room.

  Ryan liked this room much more than his previous one. It was larger, which meant he had more wall and floor to look at. It also had lights that hung from the ceiling, as opposed to ones embedded into it. This gave the room an intriguing depth when he looked up. The table he sat at was round, and he enjoyed this aspect the most since he could sit anywhere along the edge and still be presented with the same view of the table, as well as have the same access to the center. He was undecided if this made the desk a perfectionist or a communist. Maybe both.

  Ryan decided that whoever had engineered such a fabulously smart table should be given a raise. He considered the idea of giving the designer a tax break as well, but in the end, he chose against it. History taught him that a simple raise was always best, and surely the designer of such a smart table would understand it to be fair compensation. Now if the table engineer had produced a table specifically for the collection of taxes and nothing else, that was another matter entirely.

  On one side of the room stood a closed, steel door, and on the other side was a row of small desks, each complete with computer, monitor, printer and phone. None of those held any real interest to Ryan, even when they beeped, chirped, and rung from time to time. What Ryan did take an interest in, however, was the stream of papers the printer spat.

  Ryan pulled one off the ground and instantly recognized it as a tax form. Not only was that piece of paper a tax form, but so were all the others. Ryan took the piece of paper back to the table and began working with diligence. He stamped it here and there, and then triple checked that the form had the proper amount of smiley faces plastered across its header before placing it to the side. And when he was done with that form, he grabbed another, and then another and another. Soon the finished pile was ten pages high, and the more the pile grew, the more Ryan found purpose to his existence.

  His work continued without interruption for another twenty minutes, and then he noticed something strange. Three researchers stood in the corner of the room, clipboards in one hand, and cheap, black, ballpoint pens in the other. They scribbled and chattered amongst themselves, with carefree attitudes and friendly eyes. Two even laughed on occasion.

  Ryan paused and considered this new development.

  No civilian in his right mind would be so happy-go-lucky in Ryan’s presence, chiefly when taxes were concerned. Civilians normally cowered at the sight of a meager thousand or two lines
of tax law and begged for help when it came to a simple filing procedure. They didn’t shove more forms at the tax collector with bright smiles or laugh when an audit was completed. Only two sorts of people did that, those like Ryan Conner, Tax Collector, whom these men were decidedly not, and those who committed tax fraud.

  Ryan congratulated himself for seeing past the masquerade. He guessed they intended to slip past the system by covering their tracks with other people’s filings. Sadly for them, they hadn’t counted on his investigative abilities.

  Ryan pushed back the chair and stood, intent on settling the matter once and for all.

  The smiles on the research team’s faces were wiped clean in an instant. One whispered to the other, and then the third joined in on their private conversation.

  Ryan ignored their change of demeanor and stumbled toward them.

  The closest man yelled while the other two tried to work the door. Try as they might, the door refused to open and an argument started. The closest one reached for a pistol on his belt as the lights went out.

  Ryan tuned out their yelling and ignored the dark. Whatever they were saying, he didn’t care about in the least. Tax dodgers were all the same, trying the same old, tired excuses time and again. He closed the distance and grabbed one of their arms.

  A pistol fired six times in rapid succession.

  Ryan disregarded the shots and bit down as hard as he could. Warm blood flowed into his mouth and down his neck, tickling his tummy. Had he the facial motor skills to smile, he would have. But he did manage half a smirk and continued to chew. And the more he chewed, the happier he was, and the more screams bounced off the now bloodied walls.

  Hands struck his body and tried to push him away, but Ryan’s collection efforts were in full swing. Blood spattered in all directions, some of it his, most of it theirs. By the end of the struggle, Ryan was the only one who remained standing. He had no idea how much a human life was worth, but he’d heard that the government estimated people to be worth a few million dollars apiece. With some skillful bargaining, Ryan hoped that the three bodies at his feet would cover whatever balance remained for taxes owed.

  Ryan’s mind relaxed and enjoyed the feeling of accomplishment his job gave. In its quieted state, new memories surfaced. They were memories of more people that he had once seen. Memories of people like the three here who had gone to pieces.

  A single word settled into Ryan’s mind. Accomplices.

  Ryan snarled and swore to hunt each one down for as long as it took. But if he was going to bring down a tax evasion ring properly, he was going to need a few things first, namely pen and stamp. Though a search of the room only yielded the latter, in the deteriorated recesses of his mind, Ryan could picture a pen that he had come by recently. From what he could remember, it was in a room not far off, green and shiny.

  Ryan looked down at the floor where his now rising colleagues were. Perhaps with their help, he could find a way out of the room and get back to doing what he loved best.

  * * *

  Danita thought that the game of Escapes N Makes had turned out nicely. After all, she was now free to wander the halls, and there were plenty more of her kind to talk to. That was not to say that the game went flawlessly, as some of the new zombies were thrown by the three-word title.

  More concerning to Danita, however, was that she didn’t have Jack around to share the experience. He would have liked the game, she was sure of that, but more importantly, she wished for his company in general.

  So Danita resolved to find him. Even if this wasn’t Colmera Springs (the lack of Jack was a dead giveaway) she felt like she could find him soon enough. The problem was, she didn’t know where to start looking.

  A pair of zombies pushed past her, causing her to stumble. The one on the right held a rubber stamp, and he looked familiar, but she couldn’t place who it might be. The other wore a blood-stained lab coat over black, torn pants and smelled like gunpowder.

  At first, Danita opted not to follow them. She had already been down that passage and knew that after a few turns, it merely ended at yet another meal-teasing door. But then she realized that they might have seen Jack, or knew where he was, and went after them, calling (more of a sporadic grunt, really) as she did.

  And if they didn’t know where Jack was, maybe they’d be of some use tracking down the last few humans that still eluded her grasp.

  * * *

  The lab that housed Jack’s 1941, catalog product number 31A, green metallic shell, ballpoint pen was the Tau Seven’s physics lab. The biologists and chemists each wanted the honor of first round, controlled testing, but neither would yield to the other. Amid the quick draws of beakers, eye droppers, and coverslips, Gordon Black snatched the pen, brought it down to the physics lab, and used it to test fire his miniature trebuchet.

  The pen flew an impressive one thousand and twelve centimeters.

  The chemists and the biologists yelled at both the administrators as well as Gordon Black. They complained about silly things like contamination and the supposed historical fact that Medieval Europe never used the ballpoint pen in siege warfare, and certainly not one made in 1941. But like before, neither group wanted the other to beat them to the next round of testing, and thus, each begrudgingly allowed Gordon’s team to run standardized tests on the pen, until a clear pecking order could be established.

  To date, the physics team unanimously agreed that what they had was a ballpoint pen. Some went as far as to label it as an early-era WWII pen, but the lack of a theoretical model left this in doubt. In his notes, Gordon had made the small addendum, “covered in a slight, mostly dried goop that tends not to splatter upon impact. Goop does not appear to aid ballistics in any fashion.”

  The 1941, catalog product number 31A, green metallic shell, ballpoint pen sat in an airtight, cylindrical glass container. This container stood on its end atop one of the few clear workspaces inside the lab, flanked on either side by tiny weights and pulleys. How long the pen would stay there was anyone’s guess. The physics team hadn’t been seen in hours.

  Two opposing zombies, on the other hand, closed in on the pen’s position, and together they brewed a deadly confrontation.

  * * *

  Jack left the security station behind with a shotgun on the floor and a nice meal in his stomach. The zombie horde agreed to give Jack two points for the kill instead of the usual one because of his good form on the takedown. Despite Jack’s sudden jump in score, he left the game of Eats and returned to tracking down his elusive odor. There would always be a game of Eats, but he feared his smell might one day disappear for good.

  Jack continued tracking, his nose leading the way. His search took him down a side passage, one that hadn’t been open before and one that smelled like he did. Finally, he arrived at the source. A bit of Jack-smelling goop stuck to the bottom of the wall. He wasn’t sure how part of him got there, but there he was, unmistakable as ever.

  Jack reached down and with his finger, swabbed a portion off the wall and stuck it in his mouth. Not only did it smell like him, but it tasted like him, too, but with a hint of metal as well. Metal from something like a 1941, catalog product number 31A, green metallic shell, ballpoint pen if he were so inclined to take a guess.

  Jack looked around for a wayward pen but saw not a one in the area. But that didn’t dissuade him from his search, and he continued to sleuth. Fortunately, understanding what was—and what was not—a pen took a simple binary calculation. He first examined the door leading into another room. The item in question was something he was well familiar with, and his conclusion came quick. The door was big and therefore couldn’t be a pen. Next came a book. While smaller than the door, it wasn’t round, and Jack moved on. Then he found the fire extinguisher, which was too red. So on and so forth continued until at last Jack picked up the sealed container that held his pen.

  Examining this turned out to be trickier than the previous objects. What he held looked similar to the mental picture he had
of pens. However, pens didn’t come in a semi-clear shield, and this pen-like object did.

  Jack thought about the object for almost five minutes. After that, he decided it wasn’t what he was looking for, but it was a sign that he was close. No longer interested in what he held, he gave it a toss and directed his attention elsewhere.

  Glass shattered behind him, and Jack turned around. On the floor, a few feet away, lay his 1941, catalog product number 31A, green metallic shell, ballpoint pen. Hundreds of tiny glass shards surrounded the pen, and he wondered why he hadn’t seen them before.

  Jack reached down and picked the pen up. He turned it over several times, trying to determine whether or not it was a pseudo pen or the real thing. Three bites on its shell convinced him of its authenticity. He turned in place, left and right, and searched for someone to share in his joy. Sadly, no one else had joined him in the physics lab.

  Jack slumped and moaned.

  He wanted a friend. Not any friend, but a smart friend. One that wouldn’t be deceived by pseudo pens, and also one that would enjoy tracking smells of Jack. What he wanted were all the things Danita brought to their relationship. All he needed to do now was to find her.

  Jack turned and stepped toward the door, only to find Ryan Conner, Tax Collector, standing in the way. Another zombie ambled past, letting loose a feeding groan.

  Ryan, however, remained.

  Perhaps it was Ryan’s unusually blank and lifeless stare or his firm clutching of paper and stamp instead of gore and grime that tipped Jack off. Whatever it was, Jack guessed that this would be a less than cordial meeting.

  * * *

  Clarice threw open the drawer, and precisely as the good Dr. Forbes had said, a chef’s knife lay inside. “Sweet,” she said, taking the weapon and giving it a few practice swings. “Too bad it’s not a cutlass.”