No Flesh Shall Be Spared

by Carnell, Thom

  "You bastards!" he hissed as he cast another investigatory glance around the room. And then, as he leaned over and got a closer look inside, he whispered to himself, "These look like…bites. Who would do such a thing?"

  Disgusted, Jeffrey abruptly stood upright and distractedly lowered the head panel of the casket. With his mind a thousand miles away, he turned and took a step back. His plan was to head to the foyer where an arrangement office was. There he’d make a call to the police to report the incident. As he was in the process of turning, the recognizable sound of movement on carpeting came to his ears again just seconds before he came face to face with the figure of a man standing a few feet away from him.

  For fuck’s sake, I almost bumped right into him!

  The man, who appeared to be wrapped in some kind of shiny cloak or large shawl, stood silently staring. The dim light outlined his form, making it look as if there were a halo surrounding him. His face however, remained hidden in a constant shadow.

  "What the fu…?" The curse escaped Jeffrey’s lips before he could stop it. For a split second, he moved to cross himself and ask forgiveness for swearing in this place of God. "Who are you?" Jeffrey asked in his most authoritative tone. He hoped that whoever this guy was he wouldn’t notice Jeffrey’s knees quivering or the shiver in his voice. "What are you doing here?" He raised an accusatory finger toward him and then, pointing back toward the body of Mrs. Jacob, demanded, "Did you do this…?"

  The stranger leaned forward, his face slowly coming into the subdued light. He stood there gaping back at him, his eyes empty of emotion, much less signs of intellect. Jeffrey stared into a face devoid of any semblance of humanity, an altogether empty slate. He’d seen this look on a person’s face before. It was the blank face of the dead and yet here the man stood, staring malignantly at him.

  With a low groan, the stranger reached out with an unbelievable speed and grabbed Jeffrey roughly by both shoulders. He pulled and drew him quickly closer. His mouth worked up and down, snapping at the air, as if he was making an attempt to take a bite out of Jeffrey; to bite wherever his lips first came in contact with bare skin. Jeffrey struggled momentarily and then having gained a solid footing, pushed against the man with his free arm and shoulder. The figure stumbled backward, almost tripping over his own feet. He came to a teetering erect posture and slowly, uncertainly, stepped again toward Jeffrey.

  "Get the fuck back," Jeffrey shouted, fear casting all thoughts of forgiveness or impropriety to the wind. Pushing him back once again, he brandished the metal rebar. "Dude, I will bash your fuckin’ skull in!"

  The man before him gave no indication whatsoever of understanding. He just kept coming onward, opening and closing his mouth, and giving off the familiar stench of the recently deceased. Jeffrey had smelled it a thousand times and knew it instantly for what it was.

  "AAAAAAAAAAH…" the man groaned as his arms reached out once again for Jeffrey and for the soft skin that lay at the base of Jeffrey’s throat. In the dim light, Jeffrey caught a quick glimpse of something which circled the man’s wrist. The shiny surface of the thing seemed to dance in the soft light. It was a medical wristband from St. Mary’s, a local hospital. Jeffrey recognized their Holy Mother logo. As the man’s hands took hold of his collar, Jeffrey was able to make out in the dim light a name typed on it: Robinson, John J.

  Jeffrey shoved the dead man back once again, his brain at once understanding the wristband and its significance. With a grunt, he cocked the rebar up over his head and then brought it down straight into the center of his attacker’s forehead. A sound that reminded Jeffrey of a time when he dropped a watermelon at a family picnic punched through the silence of the chapel. Repeatedly, Jeffrey pistoned the rebar up and down and John J. Robinson’s skull caved inward, the bones collapsing in upon themselves. A soft jellylike substance dribbled out of the ruined cranium and coated the metal protruding from it. The man went rigid then fell, stiff legged, backward to the floor.

  Silence returned to the chapel, falling like an anvil.

  "What the fuck was that?!?" Jeffrey shouted, his voice climbing octaves like stairs. "Jesus Fucking Christ!"

  He cast another quick apologetic glance to where the crucifix usually hung high on the chapel’s wall and crossed himself. He then bent down and took a moment to examine the now still figure lying before him. He just wanted to make sure it was who he thought it was. Once he’d confirmed it was indeed Mr. Robinson, he fell backwards into a sitting position and sat, legs akimbo, trying to piece it all together.

  That guy was fucking dead. I made the goddamn removal from St. Mary’s myself. How the hell was he just walking around?

  Jeffrey ran his hand through his hair and tried to think.

  Jesus, was he just trying to fuckin’ bite me?!?

  Getting up on all fours, he crawled over and checked the body one more time, pulling back the plastic shroud and counting the four rectangular scorch marks that had been left when the defibrillator pads were used on the man’s chest.

  It was Robinson all right.

  He was just fuckin’ dead, goddamnit !

  As he knelt there trying to figure this whole mess out, behind him, from inside the Aaron, a set of small thin fingers slid into view from under the head panel, quietly forcing it up. Mrs. Jacob’s twisted features rose into view in the dim light, eyes wide and mouth moving as if she were silently gasping for air. The lid continued to move silently upward as she pushed against it. She struggled—due to the awkwardness of the Aaron’s construction and the fact that she was still bound up in her shroud—to sit upright. As she moved, the linen around her fell away to reveal a frightfully thin chest on which two flat sagging breasts sat against the lattice work of her rib cage. She pulled herself to the uppermost part of the head of the casket and slid a frail thin leg over the edge. Without making a sound, she climbed out with the stealth of a seasoned predator.

  Jeffrey was still sitting trying to sort through the last few minute’s events. His back was exposed to both the altar and Mrs. Jacob. Suddenly the silence was broken when he heard a slight creaking of the wood behind him. He swiveled his head around and caught sight of Mrs. Jacob climbing out of the casket and struggling to stand erect.

  "Uuuuuuh…" she moaned as she took her first tentative steps toward him. "UUU-uuuuuuuhhh…"

  "Fuuu-uuck me!" Jeffrey sighed as he scrambled to his feet and spun to face her.

  This just wasn’t possible…

  Without really looking, he took a small step back and reached with his hand behind him for some kind of physical mooring on which to tie his mental instability. His searching fingers found the ridges on the rebar, and with a quick jerk, he wrenched it out of Mr. Robinson’s crushed skull. Using all of the muscles in his shoulders, he brought the metal rod around—Babe Ruth style—and connected with the side of the old woman’s head. A sickening, wet sound reverberated through the stillness of the chapel.

  Welp, if she wasn’t dead, I’m going to have a helluva lot of ’splaining to do.

  The old lady teetered on her feet for the briefest second like a Jenga tower. Then, with the side of her head caved in, she fell with a gut-wrenching thud. The sound of her body hitting the carpet was one Jeffrey didn’t think he’d ever forget. It was so final, so utterly incontrovertible.

  "OK…" Jeffrey said aloud as he looked at the scene around him, "I am outta here!"

  He turned on his heel and quickly made his way up the chapel’s aisle and through the open double doors. He skidded to a stop halfway across the foyer once he realized the rebar—now coated with a stew of blood, bone, brain matter and cerebral fluid—was still in his hand. In disgust, he dropped the metal bludgeon to the carpet and wiped his hands on the thighs of his pant legs. Taking a brief glance back at the now gently swinging doors of the chapel, he continued on to the hallway and its visitation rooms.

  Jeffrey took the left down the corridor and his progress slowed as his mind continued the laborious task of processing all that had
transpired in the past few minutes. The very fabric of what he thought possible had been torn forever asunder and he figured it would be best if he tried to gain a little perspective before executing his next move.

  "Ok, so… time to recap," he said aloud and he looked up the hallway and then back in the direction from which he’d come.

  For whatever reason, the dead folk in this place don’t seem to want to stay dead. They’re getting back up and walking around, fer fuck’s sake. That much is pretty goddamn obvious. For another, they seem intent on doing me severe bodily harm. By luck or by providence, I’ve managed to not let that happen. I’ve been able to put them all back down before they could inflict any damage. How long that dumb luck will last is anybody’s guess.

  What was proving difficult to get his mind around were the whys and wherefores of how it was all possible. Dead folks just don’t get up after they’ve been pronounced dead, did they? Something, some small sliver of information began chewing at the back of his subconscious like a rat gnawing its way through wood. Maybe it was something he’d read. Maybe it was something he’d heard. He knew there was an answer, but for the life of him, he just couldn’t force the concept to congeal.

  The hallway was as it had been moments before, bereft of sound and cloaked in a cover of silky darkness. The shadows played at the corners of the corridor and, given recent events, each held a promise of silent menace. Far off, the drone of the big walk-in refrigerator cycling on could be heard through the austere walls. None of it mattered much to Jeffrey. He was still busy freaking out over what just happened in the chapel. He cautiously walked down the hall toward the back of the funeral home, passing first the empty visitation room now on his right and then past the room where Mrs. Devon lay.

  As he crept past the doorway of the second room, a slender hand—fingers clenched like arthritic claws—reached out for him from within the inky blackness between the door and its frame. Jeffrey tensed as the rumbling of the refrigerator ceased, but continued moving down the hallway. Suddenly, he was grabbed roughly by the back of his shirt’s collar and his body was jerked to an abrupt halt. The force of his forward momentum pulled the late Mrs. Devon through the doorway and out into the hallway even as he skidded to a stop.

  Mrs. Devon creakily stood near him dressed in the same olive green dress Jeffrey himself had put her in. A strand of pearls accented the outfit and a single rose corsage adorned her lapel. "Mother liked things simple," her children had told him during the arrangement conference. He’d even made a note of it in the woman’s case file. Jeffrey spun around and twisted away from her with all of his might, his motion sufficient to break her feverish hold on him. Midway through, he lashed out with his closed fist.

  He had to admit it… he’d really put his back into it.

  When he connected with Mrs. Devon’s face, his accuracy was nothing short of impeccable. He drove the far side of his fist up under the tip of her slightly upturned—suitors had once called it "coquettish"—nose. The force of the blow shattered the woman’s cartilage, driving the bulk of the hardened material upward through the soft, spongy cribriform plate of her ethmoid bone and on through to her brain. The sharp edges of the cartilage punched through and bisected the lobes of her freshly awakened brain, effectively shutting it back down before it had a chance to become fully aware.

  "Mom liked simple…" Jeffrey whispered, out of breath, "Mom got simple."

  The woman’s head jerked back with terrible force and she toppled, slamming her head into a small wooden credenza which sat on one side of the hallway. Her body crumpled to the floor like a marionette whose strings had just been cut.

  Bending over, Jeffrey roughly pulled apart the front of the woman’s dress, buttons popping and bouncing on the floor like Mexican jumping beans, and double checked the autopsy incisions he sewed up himself…just to make sure.

  From his crouching stance, he looked up toward the door at the end of the passageway marked "Employees Only." The shadow-draped hallway beyond was the only thing visible through the small Plexiglas window set in the door at just about chest height. Further in, he could just make out the dull glow of the light coming from the office as it illuminated the ceiling from across the loading area. He stood up, took a deep breath, and resumed his now tentative journey back down the darkened hall.

  Shit! Shit! Shit!

  When he reached the door, he rose up on tiptoes and peered hesitantly through the window in all directions. Inside, nothing stirred. Jeffrey held his breath and again closed his eyes, willing himself to listen through the door for any sounds of movement. He tilted his head back and focused all of his attention on his sense of hearing. The soft chug-chugging of the washing machines and the distant droning voice from the radio were the only sounds that reached his attentive ears. With a soft sigh, he let out the breath he’d been holding and opened his eyes.

  In the dim twilight of the hallway behind the door, he noticed that he could no longer see the light shining up onto the loading area’s ceiling. The small window was completely dark. He leaned closer to try to figure out what could be obstructing his view.

  Suddenly, right in front of him, separated only by the thin wooden door, an eye opened in the blackness.

  "Jeez-us!" Jeffrey gasped. Another of those things was right on the other side of the goddamn door! He took a stumbling step backward away from the door just as Mr. Lodene came through with his arms outstretched and his fingers spasming.

  Mr. Lodene exhaled an odor of decay and putrefaction through his stitched together jaws as he came, naked as a jaybird, through the still swinging door. As his face came into the half-light, he made an effort to pull his lower jaw into a toothy snarl. With muffled, popping sounds the stitches tore themselves loose from their moorings in the soft flesh of his gums. His mouth ran crimson with dark blood and the thin twine hung from his lips like strands of dental floss. He took two loping steps forward and clawed feverishly at Jeffrey’s shirt. His mouth chewed emptiness and dribbled long, syrupy strings of saliva. Now locked in a macabre two-step, the men—one alive and the other quite dead—twisted and stumbled back down the hallway, each attempting to gain control over the other. Suddenly, the back of Jeffrey’s calves bumped up against Mrs. Devon’s prone body and he fell backward over the dead woman. Mr. Lodene, having no choice in the matter, fell right along with him.

  The tumble put Jeffrey in an exceedingly precarious position. His legs had become entangled in the limbs of the twice dead Mrs. Devon and the nude Mr. Lodene was now on top of him, his face all fetid breath, slimy saliva, and snapping jaws. There was not a lot of time for Jeffrey to think, but one thing was abundantly clear from the microbiology classes he’d taken in college: getting bitten by one of these dead things was probably not the wisest of moves. Being careful to avoid the dead man’s hungry mouth, Jeffrey grabbed him by the throat—his fingers choking and crushing flesh. It was difficult to get a firm grip on the man’s neck as a result of the "skin slip," which made the flesh slimy and slippery. He finally got a solid grasp and Jeffrey extended his arms, holding the man and his ravenous jaws at bay. It wasn’t that difficult to control the dead man. It seemed as if death had stolen away a lot of his strength along with his heartbeat, but Jeffrey knew that one small mistake would send those snapping jaws down to meet the yielding meat of his neck.

  The sternocleidomastoidius muscle, he thought, in another of those odd moments.

  This was all well and good, but it still left Jeffrey flat on his back with a newly awakened corpse on top of him. He knew he needed to be quick and to act decisively. No telling if there were more of these things wandering about… as weird as that sounded. Mr. Lodene struggled in his grasp, pushing against Jeffrey’s outstretched arms, scratching at his chest and biting at the air and snarling. Inspiration struck and Jeffrey, with a sudden redirection of his energy, pulled Mr. Lodene down toward him—fast. At the last instant, Jeffrey jerked his head to the side and continued to pull the dead man past him, rolling out from unde
r as he did so. Using all of his upper body strength, he smashed the dead man’s forehead against the carpeted floor again and again, stunning him.

  Jeffrey quickly wriggled the rest of the way out from under the now dazed, prone form. He quickly clambered around and took control of him from the back by grabbing two large handfuls of hair. Entwining his fingers in the greasy strands, he continued bashing the man’s face against the floor; once, twice, three times. A wet spot was soon visible on the carpeting, leaving a distorted Shroud of Turin-like image. By now, Jeffrey had gained a more proper footing and yanked the dead man almost upright. Shifting directions, he hoisted his bulk up and off of the floor. He then twisted at the waist and drove Mr. Lodene’s forehead down against the corner of the credenza that Mrs. Devon fell upon on her way to the floor. Repeatedly, he pounded the dead man’s skull against the corner of the table. The sharp corner of the wood crumbled under the onslaught. Jeffrey finally ceased his assault when he noticed a substance which resembled grey cottage cheese covering the corner of the wood’s surface. Jeffrey released Mr. Lodene and the dead man slumped downward, falling on top of Mrs. Devon.

  "I am not," panted Jeffrey as he stood up, his shirt now splattered with blood and brains, "responsible for any of this shit!"