65 Proof

by Jack Kilborn

  “Man hungry too,” I told him.

  He beckoned me over and we struggled with the pantry for a while, not budging the door a centimeter. Zabzug’s drool smelled like a sour musk, and being right next to him made me realize how big he really was. Three times my mass, easy.

  And those appendages of his had incredible strength behind them, putting huge dents in the thick steel door.

  But it was all for nothing. The pantry stayed closed.

  Voice Module 195580

  Record Mode:

  Zabzug explained to me how he crashed by drawing a very detailed schematic in the dirt. His ship runs on a bastardized form of fission, using a refined chemical to help control the reaction. I guess the chemical could best be described as a form of lubricant, as oil was used in combustion engines back on ancient earth.

  So basically he’s stranded here because he ran out of oil, stalled, and got sucked into the same wormhole as me.

  We made some limited talk about putting my power supply into his ship, but the parts were so fundamentally incompatible that it proved impossible.

  Zabzug tried eating some plants, doing me one better and actually swallowing a few. He became violently ill. I must admit to some perverse amusement at watching black foam erupt out of the top of his head like a volcano, but that only served to remind me how hungry I was.

  Two intelligent species, meeting for the first time in history, each with the capability of interstellar travel, and both starving to death.

  It might be funny if it were happening to someone else.

  Voice Module 195581

  Record Mode:

  After a week together, I consider Zabzug a friend. He’s told me much about his planet, which seems to be located in the Hermida Galaxy. Like humans, his species have used up their natural resources, and have begun scouring the universe for food, fuel, and building material.

  He’s much better at learning English than I am at learning his language. He’s gained such a mastery of it that he made his first joke.

  We were resting near his ship, talking as usual about how hungry we were, and Zabzug told me, “If you weren’t so ugly, I’d consider eating you.”

  Funny guy, that Zabzug.

  Voice Module 195582

  Record Mode:

  Zabzug is starving too. His skin has lost its luster, and his eyes are glazed.

  We still have animated talks, but the silence often lasts as long as the chatting.

  I’m hesitant to tell him about the dog people, about what I consider my genocidal crime.

  But they’re all I can think about.

  I finally spill the story. Hopeful he won’t judge. Hopeful that he might know where to search for more.

  To my surprise, Zabzug seems to know what I’m speaking about, and he’s able to draw an exact picture of their species.

  “Hrucka,” he told me. He awkwardly explained that the hrucka were like pets to his species.

  It made sense. Evolution doesn’t create just one species of animal in an ecosystem. The hrucka must have been put here.

  Or stranded here.

  Which might mean that somewhere, on the planet, there’s another ship like Zabzug’s.

  He’s very excited by this prospect, and we decide to conduct a search first thing tomorrow.

  Voice Module 195583

  Record Mode:

  We searched for three days.

  We didn’t find anything.

  Voice Module 195584

  Record Mode:

  Zabzug came into my ship at night as I slept. The viscous drool from his mouth dripped onto my face and woke me up. In one of his appendages he held a sharp piece of pipe, the one I had been using to roast dog people. Upon my awakening, he yelped and dropped the pipe, hurrying from my ship.

  I suppose he’s having the same problem that I had with the dog people. Respect for an intelligent life form versus the overwhelming need to survive.

  But he’s in for a surprise.

  I’m going to eat him first.

  I stayed awake the rest of the night, standing guard with the pointed pipe. He had the strength advantage. I had the speed advantage. We both seemed to be of similar intelligence, and both had the ability to use tools.

  His eyes might be a weak point, but they were always covered by that face plate — Zabzug even wore it to sleep. His skin was covered with scales, and though they looked moist, they were hard, almost metallic, to the touch.

  The vulnerable point was his mouth. It was crammed full of sharp teeth, but maybe I could jam something down his throat and into all the soft parts inside.

  At the first peek of sunlight I’ll go to Zabzug’s ship with my spear.

  What does alien lizard taste like?

  Voice Module 195585

  Record Mode:

  He didn’t come out all day, and I couldn’t find a way in. There isn’t a seam on the entire ship. No cracks or ridges or anything to pry or beat open. After several hours of trying, I decided to just wait. He’d have to come out eventually.

  He wanted the same thing I wanted.

  Voice Module 195586

  Record Mode:

  The bastard ate my hand.

  Chomped it off at the wrist. I fell asleep, waiting for him to come out.

  But I got him…haha…I got him…jammed the pipe down his throat, into the soft stuff.

  Dead. He’s dead.

  Zabzug, my friend, is dead.

  I used my belt as a tourniquet for my hand, but it didn’t stop the bleeding.

  I had to use the solar matches to close the wound.

  The pain…so much pain in my wrist.

  But the hunger…the need…is even stronger.

  I’m going to cut him open now.

  Voice Module 195587

  Record Mode:

  I’m full! What a wonderful feeling! For the first time since I landed on this planet, I’ve eaten until I’m ready to burst.

  I’m so happy I don’t even notice the pain.

  Voice Module 195588

  Record Mode:

  Zabzug lasted for a whole month.

  Some parts were delicious.

  Some parts, not so delicious.

  I ate everything. The inedible parts were boiled into soup until every calorie and nutrient was leeched out.

  I even gained a few kilos.

  And now, with the last of the soup gone, with the hunger pangs returning, I am afraid.

  Voice Module 195589

  Record Mode:

  Four days since I’ve eaten anything. Zabzug had stretched out my belly, and I drink a lot to keep it full, to try and fool it into feeling sated.

  My belly isn’t fooled.

  I’ve managed to get into Zabzug’s ship, using a key. It’s a tiny sphere he’d been keeping in a pocket. When it touches the ship, the portal opens.

  I’ve fully explored the interior, trying to gain an understanding of how it works. The vessel is a marvel of engineering, with a navigation system light-years ahead of ours. The technology is even more valuable than the iron-rich planet I’m stranded on.

  If I can get off this rock, I’ll be the wealthiest man in the universe.

  The first thing I’ll do is get a limb graft…no, the first thing I’ll do is have a banquet. A feast that will last a month. I’ll gorge myself like the ancient Romans, purging between courses so I can cram in more food.

  Such a beautiful picture.

  Voice Module 195590

  Record Mode:

  My wrist isn’t healing right. It doesn’t seem to be infected, but the wound keeps opening.

  I think it’s a symptom of starvation. My body is conserving its energy, and deems healing unnecessary.

  I’m so weak it’s an effort to even stand up.

  I have to do something. If I stay here, I’ll die. Perhaps there’s food somewhere else. I’ve scouted at least fifty kilometers in all directions, but I need to pick one and keep moving.

  I decide to follow the sunset. I’ll
leave tomorrow.

  I have no other choice.

  Voice Module 195591

  Record Mode:

  I don’t know how far I’ve traveled. Perhaps a hundred or a hundred and fifty kilometers. I’m in a desert now, and ran out of water a few hours ago.

  My tongue is so thick it’s hard to speak.

  I fear sleep, because I don’t think I’ll wake up.

  Voice Module 195592

  Record Mode:

  I can’t move another step. Thirst is worse than hunger. I’m hallucinating. Hearing things. Seeing things. I even had a fever-dream, imagining a space ship crashing in the distance…

  Voice Module 195593

  Record Mode:

  A week has passed.

  Obviously, I didn’t die in the desert. I was rescued. Well, sort of.

  That ship I’d imagined I saw — it really did exist. A salvage ship, which had made a run at retrieving the trailer full of ore we’d lost.

  They also got sucked into the wormhole, and were spit out here.

  Their ship is damaged beyond repair. They’d been here for only a few days, and saw my Voice Module unit glinting in the sun.

  They listened to it, unfortunately.

  Marta, the woman, said she didn’t judge me. She understood.

  The man, Ellis, didn’t say a word to me.

  I received fresh water, medicine for my wrist, and synth rations.

  “We have enough synth rations for a month,” Marta told me. “And we’re hoping for a rescue.”

  But all three of us knew that a wormhole rescue has never been attempted. It’s suicide to go near those things.

  I eat, and drink, and try to regain my strength.

  I’ll need it.

  Voice Module 195594

  Record Mode:

  I got them while they slept.

  Ellis, with a large rock to the head.

  The rock made a mess. I smothered Marta. Not bloody, but it took a while.

  One month rations for three people equals three months rations for one person.

  I’m sorry I had to kill them. I truly am.

  I’m not a monster.

  Voice Module 195595

  Record Mode:

  Is this thing still working?

  Play Mode:

  Is this thing still working?

  Record Mode:

  It’s been…how long has it been since I used this? Many months. Perhaps years.

  I stopped shaving, and my beard reaches my chest.

  Where did I leave off? I think it was with Marta and that guy, I forget his name. The one I killed with the rock.

  It was for their synth rations. I paced myself, ate small portions, but still finished them too quickly.

  I knew what was next. I knew it from the beginning.

  When the rations were finally gone, I ate the people I’d murdered.

  Humans, it turns out, are the best meat. Better than dog people. Better than alien lizards.

  They sustained me for a while, but then they were gone too.

  I began to starve again.

  Days, maybe weeks, passed, and I began to whither away. Though I knew hunger well, it didn’t make the pain any easier.

  At night, I watched the skies. Watched them with a yearning. Hoping for another ship to crash on this planet.

  And one did.

  Astronomical luck?

  Hardly.

  Only one survivor this time. Angela something. She explained.

  The ore-filled trailer from my ship, the Darion, didn’t become lost in space. It’s in orbit around Wormhole GG54, daring salvage ships to try and take it.

  Many ships have tried. None have succeeded. They get pulled into the wormhole and pushed out here.

  It’s a giant, baited trap.

  According to Angela, five ships have already been lost.

  There’s a good chance they’re somewhere on this planet.

  I asked Angela how large her crew was.

  She told me there were seven. All dead.

  When I killed her, that made eight.

  Eight.

  Mmmmm.

  But that’s not enough. It’s never enough. I always run out.

  I need to find those other ships. And I think I can. The Organic Brain on Angela’s ship is still functioning, and it created a partial topographical map of the planet.

  The map pinpoints the other crash sites. Some, only a few kilometers away.

  I need to move fast. There may be survivors.

  The longer I wait, the thinner they get.

  Another flash fiction piece for Small Bites. I’m a huge fan of zombie movies, especially the Italian gut munchers. It’s pretty obvious with this piece.

  “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 i
n the general direction of the gun closet.

  “Waldorf Salad? Not in my house.”

  Written back in college when I thought good writing had to sound flowery and imagery was more important than story. I was wrong on both counts. I can’t help noticing, looking over this collection, how many stories of mine have some sort of religious foundation or overtones. That’s what happens when you’re raised Catholic.

  She comes at night.

  I push the rocking chair to the balcony so I may watch her, antique cherry that squeaks and protests much like my old bones. This affords me a towering view of my back yard; the hedges trimmed to lollipops, the fountain cherub eternally spitting water, the ocean in the distance.

  The sun takes a lazy bow and exits, raking orange and purple fingers across my acres of thick lawn. Years ago, it was champagne cocktails and croquet. Now, I can’t even recall the last time I walked the grounds. An acquaintance, deceased like most, once described men as fine single malt — fiery and immature when young, mellowing with age.

  I am finally palatable.

  The portrait of my younger self hangs above the fireplace, stern face and eyebrows tempered with resolve. Eyebrows that have grown gray and bushy and without direction.

  Once, I would settle for nothing less than crushing all opposition.

  Now, I’ll settle for some honey in my tea.

  I watch as the mist arrives, a soft, ethereal blanket, glowing in my yard lights.

  She always comes with the mist, and I feel my pulse quicken, warming me. I drop the blanket from my lap — I don’t need it anymore.

  The first sight of her is magic. Awe and wonder, feelings known only to the young and to me. Worth more than I have ever earned. She is clothed in translucent blue, the color of the moon, a robe that moves like silk. Her face is always peaceful, her movements sure, and I am both enthralled and pacified. Her dance is nature and life, ebb and flow. Slow, languid turns and comfortable poses, arms always beckoning, the tune known only to her.

  Beneath my balcony she stops and smiles, as she has for many years.

  “Dance with me.”

  Tonight I shall.

  I grip the armrests of my rocker with gnarled hands and tremble to my feet. The thousand pains that plague my days, the gagging pills that keep me beating, the nights of disquiet — all nullified by my resolve. I finally have the strength to know I have none left. The hand has been played, and folded.

  Legs shaky, a yearling, knock-kneed and wide-eyed, I lean over the railing. Into her arms I fall, and break…