by Ian Woodhead
Rossini shrugged his large shoulders. “For fun, I guess … although I enjoy spreading happiness and joy, I have come to realize that I can never fully apply myself if I’m not happy myself, and I really do enjoy killing people. Slaughter the dead before they slaughter you, folks!” He blew across the top of gun-barrel, then flashed Kenny a dazzling white smile. “You see, I’ve made millions from that catchphrase. Of course, being the vacant-eyed piece of shit that you are, you won’t have a fucking clue what I’m talking about.”
Kenny stared hard at Rossini’s perfectly angled features, green eyes and shoulder-length blonde hair. There was something else too he hadn’t noticed until now. A flash of green at the cuffs of his grubby uniform suggested hints of metal beneath the fabric, like armor?
He groaned out loud when all the pieces fitted together. He lifted his eyes and gazed at the huge streetscreen at the far end of the building, facing the alleyway. It now displayed the garish images of three athletic men, dressed in bright blue one-piece garish outfits, attempting to kill a dead thing chained to a filthy wall. Oh fuck, the show’s host stood directly in front of him.
“There we are, I just love it when one of the herd actually recognizes me.” Rossini walked over to the constable, then bent down and started to go through his pockets. He paused to chuckle when he pulled out a black leather wallet. “Hey Kenny, can you believe this?”
He threw the wallet towards him. Kenny picked it up when it landed beside his knee. His fingers traced the silver-stitched logo of Rossini’s highest rated show, Celebrity Slaughter, on the back of the dead man’s wallet.
“Well, at least the little bastard died by the hands of the host from his favorite show. Not many kids would be so lucky.”
Kenny opened it and took out the kid’s hunting license, sighing when he saw that the kid’s license had been revoked.
“Yes, like I said, my mission is to spread happiness and joy, but while doing that I scout for potential guests for my show. You should be glad that your delicious sister found me and not some poison peddler. If that had happened, you would have missed out on all this glorious fun!” Rossini walked back to Diane and wrapped his fingers around hers. “Now, since you’ve already said yes, I suppose it would be bad manners not to tell you what you’ve agreed to …”
“You don’t have to, you fucker. It’s obvious that you want me on your show.”
“Well done, and I think that my terms are very generous. In fact, I think you have the stamina to last more than a couple of bouts.” Rossini chuckled. “Hell, I might even let you watch me fuck her tonight. Won’t that be something to look forward to?”
Diane was trembling, on the edge of breaking into tears, but she gulped deep breaths to control herself.
Kenny eyed the gun that had flown out of the constable’s hands when this monster had shot off the top of his head. There was no way that he’d allow Rossini to brutalize the only family he had left. Better to die than let that happen. They had to get away from this freak as soon as possible. He was bound to have some back-up waiting for him down a side street somewhere.
God, he was so weak, he needed to play this carefully and keep this fucker appeased until his strength returned. Taking a deep breath, Kenny twisted his body and gazed up at Rossini. “Thank you. Thank you for saving my life. If you hadn’t shown up, I would be dead now.”
Rossini nodded. “That’s right, you would be dead, you’d stay dead too. Now, it’s time that we made tracks. I need something to eat.”
He walked over to Kenny and wrapped his thick fingers around his wrist. “I’m surprised that you’ve lasted so long. There’s hardly any meat left on your bones.” The man then pulled out a pair of handcuffs and snapped one bracelet around Kenny’s wrist and the other around the wrist of the dead constable. “I’ll be ten minutes,” he said, pushing Diane over to Kenny, then ran down the alley.
“Has he hurt you?”
Diane shook her head. She sat down beside him and wrapped her arms around his waist. “I’m so sorry, Kenny. I didn’t know where else to go. Our normal suppliers have gone to ground. He was the only one willing to trade.” She sighed. “How the fuck didn’t I recognize the clown, his face is everywhere. Kenny, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, you did what you promised, you got me another supply. We both know what would have happened to my body if you hadn’t found me more drugs.”
“Do you feel okay?”
He shrugged, not knowing the answer to that one. “I wish I had a saw. I’d even settle for a penknife.” He tugged on the chain, feeling the weight of the dead man pull his arm back to the ground. “It’s ironic really; zombie Kenny would have liked to have been handcuffed to his lunch. Oh baby sis, I’m buzzing on the shit the Green Knight has jacked into me.” Kenny was feeling a lot better. Though his strength had yet to return, his determinative was bolstering. “Look, we’re both alive, that’s the main thing. I promise that I won’t let him touch a hair on your head.”
“How the fuck are you going to stop him?” Diane asked, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Oh God, he could come back any second!” Leaning over Kenny she dragged the constable’s rifle off the body. “I’m not going to let him touch me, no fucking way.”
He clamped his hand over her mouth and looked up at the sight of the man rushing over to them. Kenny dropped the gun and pushed her head into his chest. Rossini’s expression didn’t falter as he raised his own gun and pointed it at Kenny’s face. There was no sign of shock or betrayal; if anything, the smug bastard looked amused.
“You’ve really hurt my feelings now,” Rossini said, chuckling. “No, really. I thought that at least one of you would honor our agreement. It looks like you’ll both have to work very hard to get back on my good side.”
“Don’t you ever shut up, you conceited asshole?” Diane got to her feet and grabbed the gun, keeping it pointed at his face. “Give me the keys for the handcuffs … right now, or I swear that I’ll blow off your head.”
Kenny saw no submission in Rossini’s eyes. He just kept his steel gaze fixed on Diane and defiantly smirked.
“Honey, you really are a feisty little piece. I’m so going to enjoy breaking you.” Switching his focus to Kenny. “Do you seriously believe that I’d leave the gun here if I didn’t know that it was empty?”
Diane tensed, like a large cat about to pounce. Rossini was still laughing. She pulled her finger and nothing happened.
“I did say.”
Screaming with rage, Diane kept squeezing the trigger. Each time a dry click sounded it was accompanied by Rossini’s chuckles.
“Okay, you’ve had your fun.” Rossini reached down for his own gun. “Time to get back to …”
Kenny was surprised when his sister rushed over to Rossini and slammed the gun butt into the side of his head. The man dropped like a brick. Kenny stared, not sure if he could believe his own eyes as Diane stood over the felled TV presenter, staring at the gun in her hands with a look of distaste and shock on her face.
She looked at Kenny. “Have I killed him?”
“Who gives a shit? Find the keys and get me off this body!”
Diane started to search through Rossini’s pockets.
The euphoria that came with the resurrection drugs was starting to flatten already. Kenny was concerned that the shot he’d been given was fast-burn.
Diane was struggling with the lock on the cuffs and cursing. Kenny turned his head just enough to see that their self-proclaimed savior wasn’t quite as dead as he’d have liked. Rossini was on his hands and knees and shaking his head from side to side. Kenny tried to shout a warning, but his reaction was too slow. Rossini’s arm lashed out and snatched a handful of Diane’s hair.
“Enough fucking about,” Rossini snarled. “Toss me my gun, or I’ll kill the fucking pair of you.”
Diane cried out and stopped struggling when Rossini’s grip tightened. Kenny felt his muscles start to lock up. If he didn’t score pretty soon he’d
be back to square one … Even so, he had no intention of giving that dickhead his gun back.
“Fuck you,” snarled Kenny, lunging forward; grabbing Rossini’s leg, he sank his teeth into it. Rossini howled. “Let go of my sister, or I’ll chew your leg off,” Kenny threatened.
Rossini was quick to comply. Diane kept the gun pointed at the Green Knight while Kenny got his feet, licking blood off his teeth and said, “Time for you to go now … It’s been a fucking blast.”
First standing straight and then crouching to feel the wound just above his ankle, Rossini said, “You’ve fucking infected me, you crazy bastard.”
“That’s right, asshole. Maybe you can write that into your show?” Then as Rossini shuffled away toward the end of the alley Kenny yelled after him, “At least you got the drugs to keep you alive … you lucky dog!” knowing there was no silver lining to being bitten by a dead man.
Diane grabbed his hand. “Come on,” she said. “I know where to get you some more stuff.”
“You said he was the only one who had any.”
She smiled at him. “That was before we had a gun!”
Chapter Two
That annoying mouse, scampering around the wall of his mind, seriously wound him up. Tony Johnston wished that he could push his arm through his ear, wrap his hand around its body and squeeze until its jellied insides pushed out from between his fingers.
“Will you stop that?” snarled Tony. “This is my game. My downtime, stop it with all that fucking scratching!” His anger boiled over, almost throwing him out and back into dull reality. If anything, the furious scrambling increased.
“I told you to cut it out!” Tony’s violent scream disturbed a flock of birds roosting on the beams of the skeletal building behind where he stood.
Tony’s mental whirlwind blew away his unwelcome visitor, leaving him feeling, for the first time since arriving, clear-headed and able to focus on the task at hand.
He counted to five to ensure that his head really did contain only one mind before he opened his eyes. Tony gazed up at the starless sky, trying to follow the group of black dots as the birds swooped inside the ruined gothic church on the other side of the street.
Mice can’t speak.
The birds, buildings, none of this ruined cityscape existed except in the core of a very elaborate electronic device attached to the top of his head. He lifted his arms and chuckled when his hands slid across his smooth head; there was no grey helmet here.
It’s not your head, it’s my fucking head.
Oh, this had to stop, like right now. How could he focus with that bleating noise at the back of his mind giving him the guilt-trip every time he opened his mouth? It was worse than listening to the wife. Tony relaxed his mind just enough to let the mouse poke its head out of the hole, then dropped a lifetime of irrelevant childhood memories on it.
Get out of that one, you little fucker!
With that irritant out of the way, he believed he’d be able to enjoy this game without the annoyance of that other voice. He hadn’t a clue where it had come from, unless, somewhere in the city, somebody else was plugged into to one of these things.
“Yeah, that sounds about right, just had a crossed line or something.” Tony chuckled to himself, his voice sounded so weird, lower, much deeper. “Hell yeah!” he said, admiring the thick muscles on his right arm. “Look at me, I’m a fucking barbarian!”
With this rippling body, he’d be able to cause so much havoc on one of those stupid game shows. Tony ran his fingers down his front, feeling the hard ridges of muscle under his finger. Hell, with this body, he’d even be able to take on the Green Knight himself. Now that would be a laugh-a-minute thrill ride. He’d have to have a sword, or maybe even a double-headed axe, something sharp enough to slice Rossini’s head clean off his fat body.
“Come on now, Tony, throw yourself into this game.”
He grinned and allowed his mind to let go, just like Joseph had shown him. He closed his eyes, trying not to think about the fact that he’d just closed his virtual eyes. This is mad enough to melt my head.
The fabricated scenario memories slammed into him. “This is intense!” he managed to gasp, before alien thoughts weaved through his familiar memories, rapidly expanding, until nothing remained but the name he was born with.
***
Tony Johnston slammed his back against the brick wall and scooped in a huge mouthful of fetid air into his burning lungs. He jerked his head back to where he’d just raced from, making sure that it hadn’t followed him again. He had to find somewhere to hole up, even if it was just for a couple of hours. His body couldn’t take much more of this punishment.
He casually brushed his hand down the sweat-stained, heavily muscled arm, wondering when he’d become so unfit. Not that long ago, Tony could have completed a food run without even breaking into a sweat.
Get out of my body!
Tony blinked, not too sure if he’d just heard something. He turned and peered over the blackened bricks, seeking out any building that looked remotely secure. Even a building with a door attached would have sufficed. The chance of him finding any wood in this blighted city was about as remote as finding an open burger van in the next street. Where the hell was he anyway?
“Does it really matter?” Tony found himself shaking his head to answer his own question. All the forgotten cities all looked the same anyway: streets of charred stone, with the occasional rusted vehicle to break up the monotony of grey. Oh, and shambling dead. He couldn’t forget those fuckers. The ruined buildings stretched on forever, “Why did I venture further into the city?”
He’d had no other choice but to attempt to lose his pursuers in here.
Ever since first light, the bastards had not drifted away from his scent. The fact that he’d actually woken up without finding a dozen bites on his body was a major miracle. What the fuck possessed him to lie down in the middle of that field? Just because the high grass made him invisible obviously didn’t mean that those dead things wouldn’t be able to smell him.
The shock of standing up this morning and finding hundreds of the bastards surrounding the field had almost stopped his heart. After somehow managing to evade the grasp of all those emaciated arms, losing them in the city seemed like the only logical choice.
“Yeah, because none of them would ever think to follow you in here Tony, you dumb bastard.” At least out in the country he could see them coming. In here, there could be one, three, or twenty of the bastards just waiting to pull him down behind the next ruined building.
Sure, he’d made a mistake, another one. Even so, Tony still didn’t know how the dead were managing to keep one step ahead of him. He’d put over a mile of distance between him and them before reaching the outskirts of the city. How were they able to get in here so quickly?
You had better keep my body alive, you off-world shit-raper.
He was alone now, though. For the first time in ages, he saw no undead fuckers anywhere in the vicinity. The welcome relief of their apparent absence slowly filtered through Tony’s system. Their unusual behavior in here was really scaring the shit out of him. He couldn’t shake the feeling that those things were hunting him, like a pack of wild dogs stalking a small deer. “That’s stupid,” he muttered. Who had ever heard of any of them showing signs of coordinated activities? They operated by instinct alone, everybody knew that.
Why could he not shake the notion that no matter where he fled, that uneasy feeling of being watched would never leave him?
Tony clamped back on his musing when a pile of small stones tumbled down from the remains of a broken statue of a soldier riding a horse. His stomach lurched at the sight of three dead things appearing from around the corner of a grey, concrete tower block.
“That’s not fair!” he yelled. Tony couldn’t care less about them homing in on his voice. Just by watching them clamber over the rubble strewn across the road, they already knew where he was hiding. “Why can’t you give a guy a single
break?”
His fingers curled around the barrel of the shotgun. Although he’d not found any shells for it in over a week, the weapon was far from useless. The solid wooden stock made a very effective club. “I’m not going to run from you this time,” Tony snarled, leaping over the wall and walking towards the three shambling corpses.
He stopped next to the rusted remains of a car. Gripped the barrel of the gun in both hands and waited for the dead things to shuffle closer to him. Tony focused his attention on the blond, long-haired zombie that had gained some distance over his two companions. It looked more alert than the other two. Tony lifted the gun above his head, watching in amazement as the blond-haired zombie lifted its head. “Fuck me, that’s a cool trick. I wonder what else you can do?”
Tony’s smirk fell away when recognition dawned. This was the same one who had almost caught him while he trying to get out of the field this morning. How had Tony not noticed that until now?
It’s one of the first ones! Run, you fucking retard. Turn around and get out of here. I don’t want to die when you go back to your other body.
It took another step, then halted. Tony gazed in disgust at the rotting green fabric hanging off the zombie’s thin frame. Beneath what remained of the shirt, he noticed a tight collection of circular holes just above the creature’s heart. This one had taken several gunshots already.
“Fuck you, bitch,” snarled Tony. “Your luck has just run out.”
The dead thing gazed at the other two who were now level with it before looking back at Tony. The jaw creaked open. “Honey,” it said. “Do you want two eggs with your bacon or just one?”
Tony sighed heavily and clapped his hands to deactivate the VR simulator. The constructed scenario dissolved into a mess of multi-colored pixels, leaving him standing in the middle of his recreation room. The blond male zombie morphed into his young wife, currently looking at him with a mixture of amusement and impatience etched on her face.
“You’ve been on that for over two hours,” she said, shaking her head. “Surely it can’t be that good.”