So that made the older officer and the young private the only greenhorns in this newer, leaner Squad X. Stark wondered if they’d been chosen for the same reason he suspected he’d been the first time. In the short time he served with the other squad members in Iraq, he learned that none of them had family at home. Stark was an orphan and grew up in foster homes, and the others had no surviving parents or siblings. In other words, no one would miss them if something bad happened. He had a daughter now, so maybe that no longer applied. Back then, however, the Army must have thought if the men were expendable, it would be easier to keep secret whatever waited in the sink hole. God knew what they had to do to keep a lid on the above-ground zombie attacks; Stark was sure he didn’t want to find out.
Breathe a word about this to anyone, and you will disappear.
General Claiborne had said those words to him as he lay in a hospital tent. Stark had been convalescing from wounds inflicted by their temporarily crazed captain. Temporarily crazed was exactly how the Cap put it, claiming that when he finally emerged from that meteorite-shaped space ship that he wasn’t in control of himself—that the aliens had invaded his mind, showing him things no human was ever meant to see, and he was lucky to escape. Surely a temporary psychosis that caused you to knife your fellow soldiers was forgivable, wasn’t it?
The general must have thought so, because here the captain stood now, right alongside them. Cap must have been body building for the past eight years, because he looked even more like an ape than Stark remembered. He vowed to set one shotgun shell aside for the big son of a bitch, just in case.
General Claiborne cleared his throat. “Gentlemen, I’m sure you have a lot of questions. Let me bring you up to date on why you’re here.”
He talked for the next five minutes, speaking so rapidly that a fleck of spittle flew out and hit Stark on the nose. But Stark hardly noticed as he listened to the account of what was happening to the independent incorporated city of Nilbog. The general said it had a population of 3,958, although in the past six hours, thermal imaging showed that number had been halved.
Next to him, young Private Roy swore under his breath.
Once finished detailing their objectives, General Claiborne nodded at the new guy Stark suspected was their C.O. “Colonel Edwards, this is your team: Roy, Horner, Stark, Lester, and of course Cap. He’s the only one here who has seen this before, so he’ll be your number two.”
Stark grimaced. The general obviously referred to Cap being the only one to have been inside the space ship. As if Cap had special knowledge, that raving, psychotic fuck. The rest of them only endured a horrific battle right beside the ship and nearly died. No, no—that wasn’t even important enough for the general to acknowledge now, except to press him into service again.
General Claiborne didn’t appear to notice him fuming. “You have your orders. The town has been quarantined, so you can move quickly and without detection. But if you are detected or captured, you know what to do.”
Dumb ass militia members, that’s all they were now. Certainly not U.S. Army grunts, although who was gonna believe that crap, really?
Typical Army bullshit. Hopefully it would never come to that. In his footlocker, a suicide pill of cyanide had waited next to the pile of fatigues in a little tin box. Stark knew he was supposed to carry it in his breast pocket and use it if necessary. He’d left the pill behind and hid Min’s picture in his pocket instead.
“We will hold the front line,” the general continued. “You have three hours. Go.”
Three hours until what? Until they firebombed the town? Until they invaded with regular forces? Shit.
The team saluted the general and followed Colonel Edwards to the bridge. The soldiers there held aside the coils of razor wire to let them pass.
Stark walked for a moment with his eyes closed, willing his heart to slow down. From their weapons, uniforms, and orders, this all had the feeling of a disaster in the making. It took him years to get over his last Squad X experience. He’d vowed never to repeat it, and yet here he was again. What was he thinking?
Min.
He imagined his daughter’s picture in his pocket warming his heart, spreading vitality through his body. Protecting her was the reason to go through this. The only reason.
Stark opened his eyes and allowed that feeling to carry him the rest of the way across the bridge.
Plan 9 Production Room in the Midst of the Storm
Bio Duck FX & Ghouls:
(L-R) Angela Pritchett, Camille Keaton, Sid Wood, Mariah Johnson
Bad Day at Sammy’s. (L-R) Matthew Ewald, Tori Teller.
4 Heroes. (L-R) Matthew Ewald, Chris Duncan, Mr. Lobo, Brian Krause.
Stark vs. Cap. (L-R) John Patrick Barry, Kurt Skarstedt.
Chapter 17
JEFF
The blow to his head only knocked Jeff out for a second, but it took him another second to remember where he was: in the loading dock of Sammy’s Grocery, lying under a pile of heavy boxes.
And bodies.
Oh, shit.
Sammy and the zombie struggled on top of him, a confusion of limbs and screams. As Jeff rolled away and regained his feet, Danny took another ineffective swing with the piece of firewood.
Jeff raised the shotgun. “Damn! I’ll hit Sammy!”
The zombie was once a man with a white dress shirt and tie, but it was now a thing with a face blackened as if by fire. It had long legs that easily straddled Sammy as it dug its thumbs into his eyes.
“Shit!” Danny walloped it between the shoulder blades. He might as well have been hitting a rhino. Before he could succeed in making the monster let go, twin jets of blood shot up from Sammy’s eye sockets. Sammy shrieked. Finally, Danny kicked it in the side, and it rolled off its victim.
Jeff aimed at its stomach and pulled both triggers of the shotgun. The twin explosions deafened him in the confined space. The recoil was so powerful that it nearly knocked him down.
In the dim light, it was hard to see what happened, but when the smoke cleared, he saw the zombie lying several feet away. The shotgun had cut it in half.
Danny dropped to his knees. “Oh shit, Sammy. What do we do?”
Jeff felt dizzy. He crouched and tried not to drop the gun. The top of his head ached where the box had landed on him. He stared at their dead friend’s cratered face.
Where there was one of those things, there could be more. “We gotta keep moving.”
Danny ran a hand through his hair. He nodded and stood up, holding his bad shoulder. “First Mac, now Sammy. Not sure how much more of this shit I can take.”
“Hey, I got two questions. How did that thing get in here, and is there a clear path to that woman’s car?”
Danny stared blankly at him. For the first time Jeff could remember, his friend had the appearance of someone who’d looked his own mortality in the face. It was how he’d felt that afternoon, after the meteor nearly hit their plane. Where was the wise-cracking womanizer now? He would have given anything at that moment for Danny to smile and say something insulting. Instead, he saw only fear.
In the silence, Jeff opened the shotgun’s breech in the way he’d seen Sammy do it. He pulled the two spent shells from the exposed barrels, and then fished two fresh ones from his pocket and pushed them in.
Danny stared the dark piles of boxes around them and at the door. “Okay. I’ll look outside, and you make sure we don’t get blitzed again.”
Jeff nodded. He closed the shotgun’s breech and raised the gun to his sore shoulder. He wasn’t sure whether to aim at the door or the loading bay behind them.
Danny got a grip on the door handle. He took a deep breath. “Here we go.”
He pulled it open.
A zombie stood just outside. It was a bald man with a scalp the color of moss. It looked up and scowled.
Danny slammed the door and braced his back against it. “Fuck!” A moment later, the door jumped in its frame as the zombie threw itself against it from th
e other side.
Jeff reached past him and closed the deadbolt.
That word, deadbolt, struck him as funny. If he ever got out of this, he and Paula would open up a lock-and-key business and sell zombie bolts. Dead Zombie Bolts, two for a dollar. Shotgun shells for fifty cents extra.
He glanced down at the ruined face of the store’s proprietor and tried not to descend into bouts of crazed laughter.
***
Before they returned to the front of the store, Jeff at least had the presence of mind to retrieve the key ring. Sammy still clutched it in his right hand. As Jeff gingerly pulled it free, the dead man’s fingers spasmed open.
Danny stared aghast. When Jeff offered him the keys, he shook his head. “It’s all you, man.”
They started back to the others. As they moved, Jeff tried to scan around them in a complete circle should more zombies lurk behind the piles of boxes and antiques. Only Sammy and Toby knew the plans for all this crap—maybe they were going to open a second store—and now one of them was dead. Or at least he was dead until he decided to get up and attack them.
Jeff wondered at himself for almost losing it back there. The urge to laugh. Really? The mutilated eye sockets of a dead man weren’t something to laugh at. But he realized this was another symptom of extreme fatigue and stress. The day had long since moved past the border of unreality. So he tried to forgive himself.
Just don’t let it happen again. These people are depending on you.
Back in the main area, Jeff closed the door behind them and fished out the key ring. He found the door’s correct key on the first try, thank God.
A handwritten sign on the wall said, STORAGE ROOM—EMPLOYEES ONLY.
Employee. Just one now.
Toby must have known Jeff was thinking about him. He walked up as Jeff dropped the keys back into his pocket. “Why are you locking the door?”
“Nothing good on the other side,” Danny said.
Toby looked as mean and ignorant as ever—tooth missing from the front of his mouth, tangled curls of dirty brown hair dangling down his jowls—but Jeff felt sorry for him. Toby had always been the saving grace behind the store. He kept it going when Sammy seemed to be doing his best to run it into the ground with one health code violation or another. What would happen to the business now, assuming Nilbog survived the night? Hell, what would happen to Nilbog?
A lot of questions. Death was never easy, despite how the zombies made it look. Jeff didn’t know how to break the news to him, so he just blurted it out. “They got Sammy.”
Toby looked blankly at him for a moment. He glanced at the locked door to the storage room and then back to Jeff. “Sammy?”
Jeff didn’t know what else to say. He couldn’t give him details. Wouldn’t. That would be too cruel.
“Didn’t he have…” Toby began. “The Taser doohicky?”
Jeff shook his head. “Uh uh.”
“His…” Toby looked at the closed storage room door again, then down at his feet. He was carrying an empty potato chip bag, probably the one Criswell had been helping himself to as the others left for the back door. He crumpled and then released it to flutter to the floor.
Jeff lightly touched his shoulder. “Come on. Let’s get back to the others.”
***
Jeff wanted nothing more than to shoot his way out to his Jeep and then tear ass back to the house to see if Paula was okay. Wasn’t his wife’s safety more important than a grocery store full of mostly strangers?
Except that was also cowardice talking, and he knew it. Who was to say that plan would even work?
He felt like an Army colonel at a briefing as he stood on one side of a display table full of bulk foods in cellophane gift bags. The group faced him from the other side: his co-pilot, the mother and daughter, Toby, the Owens boys, and the actor. Except for Criswell, who crossed his arms and stood like he had a six-inch plug of wood stuck up his butt, they all appeared ragged and afraid.
They’re looking to me for leadership. So be it. “All right, so here’s our problem. Somehow, those things found a way into the back of the store. That’s where they got Sammy. And it won’t be long before they get in the front.”
Criswell frowned. “So what you’re saying is we’re all going to die.”
“Quiet.” Danny didn’t look up from his feet. “Someone important is talking.”
So much for being a great leader, Jeff thought. “I—I don’t know what to do. The best thing I can think is to arm ourselves. Then maybe we can fight through them.”
Rachel Rooter stared at the back of Emily’s blonde head. “What about my daughter?”
“I don’t know. Just keep her hidden. I’m sorry.” What else could he say? Your daughter might be the first person to die? “All right. Let’s arm ourselves the best we can.”
Kind of a lame speech. If Paula were here, she’d know the right thing to say. She would give him the strength to get through this. But now all he could do was fly through the mental turbulence of Sammy Morrison’s empty eye sockets.
He found himself staring at a shelf display of plates and tea cups decorated with hand-painted apples. As if the world were a cheery, normal place.
Danny approached, cradling his bad shoulder. “You okay?”
“I gotta know if Paula’s okay. She was all alone when I left her.”
“I’m sure she’s fine, man.”
Good try. Throw in a tasteless comment about her bra size, and I might even believe it. But you look too scared. “Danny, our house is beside a graveyard.”
“It’s going to be okay.” Danny patted his arm and shuffled off.
Jeff watched him go. The fluorescent light overhead sounded like a dental drill. It made him want to scream.
***
While the others spread through the aisles to scavenge weapons, Jeff searched again under the checkout counter. There were a couple drawers he hadn’t tossed yet.
Yes.
His search rewarded him with another handful of shotgun shells, which he stuffed into his pocket. But more importantly, next to the shells lay a huge black handgun. It always made Paula chuckle when they watched TV together and he tried to identify the weapons they saw, usually incorrectly. “That’s a Dirty Harry gun, right?” he once said about an enormous revolver they saw on a cop show. “It’s called a Magnum,” she said, smiling. That’s what this one looked like.
Danny was peering over his shoulder, so he gave the Magnum to him. It made him feel better to know Danny held the other gun—and since they were the only two with firearms, he knew it might be up to them to protect the rest. The others’ makeshift weapons would only be crude placebos.
It turned out he might have been harsh on that judgment. The invention Jimmy Owens presented was creative, if nothing else. He’d taken advantage of Sammy’s eclectic inventory to locate a box of Fourth of July sparklers. These he attached to condoms filled with lighter fluid.
Jimmy smiled when he saw him looking. He held up a grill lighter. “What do you think?”
“I’m thinking, ‘How about a little fire, Scarecrow?’”
Wasn’t that a sign of a good leader—to be able to joke and encourage camaraderie, even when you didn’t feel it? He was sure Jimmy would see through his false bravado and frown. But the young man only laughed and returned to creating his bombs.
Jimmy’s younger brother, Justin, emerged from the back hallway carrying a chainsaw as big as he was. Despite his misgivings, Jeff showed him how to operate it. “Just point it away from the others, all right?”
Toby used a pocket knife to sharpen a wooden tent pole into a spear. As he worked, he brushed away the tears streaming down his cheeks. His partner’s death must have finally been hitting him.
Jeff turned away from him to come face to face with Criswell. The actor held an axe.
It wasn’t a bad weapon, but Jeff couldn’t hide his distaste for the other man. Criswell was so uptight, he hadn’t even taken off his black bowtie. “Gonna cut
down some trees?”
“Yes. At the legs. Just stay out of my way when I start swinging.” Criswell glanced down at Jeff’s knees. “Or don’t. It doesn’t matter to me.”
Jeff sighed and walked off. The only person whose weapon he hadn’t inspected was Rachel Rooter’s. He looked down Aisle One and saw her and her daughter standing near a rack of over-the-counter medicines. Ah, well. It didn’t matter as long as she kept the girl out of the way.
Danny leaned against the display table of bulk foods, testing the weight of his handgun. “What a shitty day this turned out to be.” He looked up at Jeff. “Ready to go?”
“Yeah, let me, um…” Let me go throw up first. “Let me use the can. I’ll be right back.”
***
Once in the tiny men’s room, he surprised himself by not getting sick after all. It wasn’t like that afternoon at the airport, when he’d been struggling through the after effects of a massive adrenaline dump.
He inspected himself in the mirror, noting the tension lines around his eyes and mouth, inspecting his short brown hair and wondering how he might look as a corpse—or a zombie. Try not to think you might die in a few minutes.
Death wasn’t easy. Wasn’t that what he was thinking earlier? It was true. Although up until now, he’d only had one real experience with death, when his elderly mother wasted away, and it was nothing like this. He still thought about her—sometimes every day, sometimes every few days—most often in the middle of the night, when he woke up at three A.M., needing to pee, and then couldn’t get back to sleep. The darkness of his bedroom and weight of his blankets pressed down on him at those times, squeezing out the memories.
She’d been in the Nilbog Health Care nursing home at the end. Stopped eating on a Sunday, stopped drinking water on Monday, and stopped being awake on Tuesday. With the permission of the staff, he and Eddie removed the breathing tubes from her nose and decided to let her go. They closed her door for privacy as they sat an all-nighter at her bedside. They watched the tortuous rise and fall of her chest, wiping the saliva that collected at the corners of her mouth until it dried up. She would inhale and exhale, and then they would wait for her to inhale again. Two seconds, four seconds. Was this the end? Then she would gasp, and it would start over.
Plan 9- Official Movie Novelization Page 15