Even dead, she really knocks ‘em dead, Richter thought, but then Harbinson’s squeal of terror ripped the room.
The scanner in Harbinson’s office was going nuts, 10-32s mixing with reports of suspicious persons and possible 10-10s and random assaults.
Richter ducked into Marla’s cubicle and grabbed her laptop. “You won’t be needing this, sweets,” he said.
By the time he emerged, Harbinson was on his knees, squealing, and Richter chuckled at the notion that the editor likely never figured going down on Marla would be anything like this. A red geyser spurted from the maw of his torn neck and Marla was already sniffing the air, blank eyes staring dead ahead for fresh meat.
Richter ran for the press warehouse. Because of the dangerous machinery, access was restricted and the metal doors easily bolted from inside. Richter could probably talk the press operator into changing the lead story.
He was toying with the headline of “Inside Job,” but this was big. Plus, the second rule of journalism, after the gratuitous use of blood, was to always lead with a hot chick or a puppy. Since no puppies had yet been harmed in the making of Richter’s first press association award, he would stick with the chick.
He entered the press warehouse as another scream, the next of many, echoed through the newsroom.
After securing the door, Richter powered up the laptop and sat down to his task. “Zombie Cult Shocker,” he typed.
Hell, if the press operator didn’t like it, Richter could always adapt it into a cheesy horror script. After all, typing was typing and words were words, when you got right down to it. Any mindless creature could do it.
He brought his finger to his nose, sniffing her scent, wondering if the brief exposure to Marla’s infected flesh was enough to convert him into a member of her cult.
Fuck it.
A zombie dead or a zombie living, what was the difference?
He had a deadline to meet.
So he typed.
NEED
By Scott Nicholson
The first moon was big and white in the sky. But now it is small and not round. So many things not the same anymore. Can't remember all of before. All of before was other me.
Truck, remember truck, me in front seat, the other person there. Hair long, yellow, I like my hand in it, soft. The moon on her face. Blue eyes, the dark part wide and shiny, like the water caves. Wind coming fast across my lips. Her mouth touches. The arms I had around her. She is close, warm like the sun that burns my eyes between times of moon. Her neck, smell of trees with flowers. I call her Page with my mouth. Quiet and full of breath.
Can't call now. I think things like Page and Hello and Help Me but mouth doesn't know how to make the words loud. Mouth doesn't move when I want to call. Mouth only knows one thing. Mouth that was touching her mouth then. Sound in my chest, over and over, fast when I touch her. A sound from before, but maybe the first moon made it, because I don't hear it now.
That was other me. Other me whose mouth touch Page wet and hear her call I Love You and moon shines in truck and I need and dark falls over moon.
Outside is thing like me now and head has red wet holes and eyes are open but don't see and hands of dirt come into the truck. I hear scream but thing's mouth does not move. Scream comes from Page's mouth. Hands of dirt reach, touch her neck the same way I touch, and her mouth makes hurt sounds. I grab hands of dirt and my mouth calls Run Page Run and I don't see her because the thing pulls me close, thing strong and smell like deep inside water caves, skin green like grass and white like moon, then mouth is open and black tongue slide over teeth gray as rocks and touch my face but thing's tongue not wet like Page's.
Teeth follow tongue into my face below my eye and I hear sound like walking in mud and hot wet on my face and I almost remember now what hurt felt like but I can't. My mouth makes sounds and I push and touch teeth that close and my fingers snap like sticks and hang from thing's mouth. I scream red and under the moon, fingers look like worms.
Hands of dirt hold me and I call Page, Page, but she is gone and I remember place she sleeps is behind the trees. My breath is rags like the thing's shirt and when mouth comes again I close my eyes and hurt and then I am walking away from the other me and into the long dark cave.
I remember some things clear like water but other things are still inside cave where moon never shines. The me that I am now touches trees, touches face, no breath from my mouth, I touch rags and the rags are my skin. No moon in sky, but sun, and birds make sounds and I smell birds and I need.
Dirt and blood and smell of truck and sweet Page like flowers and the grass where the sun has made it hot. I go away from truck and legs move and no more long dark cave. Smell of wet leaves and I go through trees and tree arms hold like Page holds other me under the moon. Tree arms sharp make rags in skin but no hurt so legs go away and take me.
Smell water and touch water and small wet thing moves so I pick it up and it is cold but it breathes and my mouth needs and my hand moves thing to my face. Warm and sticky and I feed and my mouth needs again. My legs go away and I am in trees and moon is in dark sky. Legs go where I need.
Trees make black lines. Eyes see light like moon but moon small on the ground. Legs go to light and out of trees to place where Page sleeps. Sound from mouth of dog and I smell dog and dog is warm and breathes and I need inside and I feed and still my mouth needs. I walk to light and hand pushes wood and glass and wood tears skin and I hear wet sound and I smell Page like flowers.
Page, my mouth calls but no sound as legs go to Page and her mouth makes sound like in truck and her hair yellow and I remember other me with arms holding and mouth touching but other me is in long dark cave and now I see her and smell her and her eyes are the color of sky in sun and my legs go and hers do not and I try to call Page, I Love You and my mouth touches her lips that are soft and my hand of dirt in long hair like before and my teeth follow tongue and her mouth is wet and she is warm and breathes and I want to hear the sound in my chest over and over again fast like before.
But nothing is like before and no sound in my chest. Her mouth calls words but my words make no wind because I think Page and Hello and Help Me but mouth only knows one thing now. Her mouth makes more sounds but not I Love You. Some things are clear like water and my mouth needs and I take her into the long dark cave where moon never shines.
And I need.
CARNIVAL KNOWLEDGE
By Scott Nicholson
The sky is hot with popcorn and apple caramel and the diesel exhaust of the big engines. Bright wheels spin, on fire with green and yellow jewels. Screams are tossed from the wheels, brittle on the air like thin shafts of ice. Broad organ notes lurch along to the beat of three. The pounding of the music against your skin reminds you of the thing inside your chest that used to have music of its own.
They cluster beyond the cage, those cruel breathers, those who walk. Mouths open wide, eyes open wide, they give money to the fat man in the long coat. A young one comes close, his mother tugs the back of his jacket, says words that have no meaning. You beg with your eyes for him to put his hand through the bars.
The wheels tilt and whirl, the organ trips faster, a man is laughing. You smell the hard bite of liquor on his breath, though he’s at the rear of the crowd. If you could hate, you would wish him in the cage with you. But you can only love.
You look past the crowd, for they will not return your love. Tents with striped roofs lean in different directions, sparks of light and tinkling coins and shouts spilling from the doorways. If you could walk, you would go among them, see for yourself what strange pleasures hide in each. But then you think that the tents may hold only more like you.
The fat man has fat pockets, bulging with money. He turns to you and smiles. You should hate this man, for he is the one who caged you. He rattles the bars with a long stick.
“Give ‘em a show, freak.”
You know the words but do not know what they mean. You only know that if you show your love
, the man will love you in return. They will all love you, though they eat air and spit air and you are as far from them as the tiny holes in the darkness above.
The crowd shouts and leans forward, their skin is electric. The wayward boy comes too close, you reach out to touch and love him. His mother screams and yanks him away. You look at the empty night that surrounds your fingers.
When you die, you should not know these things. You should not see and smell and hear better than when your heart made music. You should not taste.
The fat man beats the bars again and you cannot love any of these people, not the way you should, not with your mouth. You can only love yourself.
You raise your leg, the last remaining one. Flesh hangs in rags around a gleaming knot of bone. The meat is between your teeth and the crowd gasps and sighs and the fat man is smiling.
But they will never love you as you need to be loved.
You feed, you hunger.
You should not know these things.
A Matter of Taste
By Jack Kilborn
“Finish your brains, Phillip.”
Phillip pushed the jellied hunk away, using his stump.
“I don’t want any more.”
Mom squinted in his general direction; her eyes had long since dried up and fallen out.
“Don’t you like brains? All little zombie boys need to eat brains. You want to become rotten and putrefied like Dad, right?”
“Arrgghhhhh,” said Dad. He didn’t have a bottom jaw, so pronunciation wasn’t one of his strengths.
“You know I do, Mom. It’s just...”
“Just what?”
Phillip folded his arms and picked his nose with the ulna protruding from his stump.
“Phillip!” Mom chided. “Manners!”
“Arrghhhh,” his father concurred.
Phillip stopped picking.
“I hate brains.”
Mom took a deep breath, and blew it out of the bullet holes in her lungs.
“Fine. Finish your small intestines and you can be excused.”
Phillip made a face.
“I don’t want to.”
“But Phillip, you love intestines. Don’t you remember when you rose from the grave? You’d stuff yourself with guts until they were slithering out of your little undead bottom.”
Phillip stuck out his lower lip.
“I don’t want to eat this stuff anymore, Mom.”
“Arrghhhh,” said Dad.
“See, Phillip? You’re upsetting your father. Do you know how hard he works, hunting the living all day and night, to bring back fresh meat so you can eat? It isn’t easy work—he can’t move much faster than a limp, and most of the humans left are heavily armed and know to aim for the head.”
Phillip stood up. “I don’t like it! I don’t like the taste! I don’t like the smell! And most of all, I don’t like eating people I used to go to school with! Last week we ate my best friend, Todd!”
“We’re the living dead! It’s what we do!”
Phillip’s father shrugged, reaching for the child’s plate. He dumped the contents onto the edge of the table, and then lowered his face to the organs and bumped at them with his teeth—the only way he could chew.
“I don’t want to be a zombie anymore, Mom!”
“We don’t have a choice, Phillip.”
“Well, from now on, I’m eating something else.” Phillip reached under the table and held up a plastic bag.
“What is that?” Mom demanded. “I hear roughage.”
“It’s a Waldorf Salad.”
“Phillip!”
“I’m sorry, Mom. But this is what I’m going to eat from now on. It has apples, and walnuts, and a honey-lemon mayonnaise.”
“I forbid it!”
“Arrghhhhh,” Dad agreed.
“I don’t care!” Phillip cried. “I’m a vegan, Mom! A vegan! And there’s nothing you can do about it!”
He threw the salad onto the table and shuffled off, crying.
Dad shoved a piece of duodenum down his throat, then patted his wife on the bottom.
“Arrghhhh.”
“I know, dear. But what can we do? Blow off his head and eat him for lunch tomorrow?”
“Arrghhhh?”
“Good idea. I’ll fetch the shotgun.”
Mom limped in the general direction of the gun closet.
“Waldorf Salad? Not in my house.”
EAT ME
By Scott Nicholson
Eat me.
Kind of like in the old days, when you were dead and I was still alive.
Maybe it can never be the same, but when you’re dead, you have plenty of time to dream. So I’m dreaming, okay? What’s wrong with that? What’s the worst that can happen?
Oh.
God can show up.
Yeah, like that’ll happen. You think that bastard will show up now, since His happy little playground is nothing but a Ground Zero wasteland. That would be classic. I’d love to see the Big Guy serving himself up as loaves and fishes for the vacant-eyed, fuck-brained dead. Giving Himself to me and you. A joke of a communion that would be the last thing we ever had in common.
It ain’t happening, okay? Look, you love me and I love you, but let’s get one thing straight.
It’s over.
That first bite was sweet, and nothing has ever made me happier than seeing a string of my small intestine slapping against your cheek, then disappearing between those ever-luscious lips. For the first time in our relationship, I was actually giving instead of thinking only of my own needs. And my needs were plenty. Back then, I mean. Lately, they have gotten pretty simple.
Munch out, honey.
Eat me. It’s the least I can offer, after all you’ve had to put up with and all we’ve been through.
You ate my pain and you consumed my pathetic excuses, you swallowed my half-assed lies, you got down on your knees and begged me to forgive you when it was me who had done wrong. I twisted it all around, and every time I slipped, I blamed you for the banana peel. But that was then and this is now, as some lame pop song once said, back in that plastic, noise-overdosed reality that we gobbled like fast-food fries.
Now, you’ve got the upper hand.
Or the three fingers that are left, anyway.
I know, I know, I’ve queered the deal, I used to let you go down on me without a second thought. But things are different now, you’ve got to admit. I kept my soft places hidden, the memories and the scars and the sorrows, and I only gave you my face. Now you want it all. And I can only give so much.
Look, I said forever, everything, love, all those empty, pretty words. But I was skin deep. I kept my true meat to myself. But you’re hungry and aching.
Why should things be any different just because you’re dead and your teeth are sharp and wet and I’m on my back with my hands in the air?
You wanted me heart and soul. Go ahead, take my heart. It no longer beats and it never knew how to work anyway.
Sorry, I’ve got nothing beyond deep. No soul. But you already knew that, and it never stopped you before.
All I can offer now is all I have.
All you ever wanted.
So eat me.
THE MEEK
By Scott Nicholson
The ram hit Lucas low, twisting its head so that its curled horns knocked him off his feet. The varmint was good at this. It had killed before. But the dead eyes showed no joy of the hunt, only the black gleam of a hunger that ran wider than the Gibson.
Lucas winced as he sprawled on the ground, tasting desert dust and blood, his hunger forgotten. As the Merino tossed its head, the horns caught the strange sunlight and flashed like knives. Lucas had only a moment to react. He rolled to his left, reaching for his revolver.
The ram lunged forward, its lips parted and slobbering. The mouth closed around the ankle of Lucas' left boot. He kicked and the spur raked across the ram's nose. Gray pus leaked from the torn nostrils, but the steer didn't even slow
down in its feeding frenzy.
The massive head dipped again, going higher, looking for Lucas' flank. But Lucas wasn't ready to kark, not out here in the open with nothing but stone and scrub acacia to keep him company. Lucas filled his hand, ready to blow the animal back to hell or wherever else it was these four-legged devils came from.
But he was slow, tired from four days in the saddle and weak from hunger. The tip of one horn knocked the gun from his hand, and he watched it spin silver in the sky before dropping to the sand ten feet away. Eagles circled overhead, waiting to clean what little bit of meat the steer would leave on his bones. He fell back, hoping his leather chaps would stop the teeth from gnawing into his leg.
Just when he was ready to shut his eyes against the coming horror, sharp thunder ripped the sky open. At first he thought it was Gabriel's trumpet, harking and heralding and all that. Then Lucas was covered in the explosion of brain, bits of skull, and goo as the ram's head disappeared. The animal's back legs folded, and then it collapsed slowly upon itself. It fell on its side and twitched once, then lay still, thick fluid dribbling from the stump of its neck.
Gunsmoke filled the air, and the next breath was the sweetest Lucas had ever taken. He sat up and brushed the corrupted mutton from his face, then checked to make sure the animal's teeth hadn't broken his skin. The chaps were intact, with a few new scrapes in the leather.
" 'Bout got you," came a raspy voice. Lucas cupped his hand over his eyes and squinted as a shadow fell over him. The man was bow-legged, his rifle angled with the stock against his hip, the white avalanche beard descending from a Grampian mountain range of a face.
"Thank you, mate," Lucas said, wiping his mouth. "And thank the Lord for His mercy."
The old man kicked at the carcass, and it didn't move. He spat a generous rope of tobacco juice onto the oozing neck wound. Flies had already gathered on the corpse. Lucas hoped that flies didn't turn into flesh-eating critters, too. Having dead-and-back-again sheep coming after you was plenty bad enough.
Murdermouth: Zombie Bits Page 3