Holiday of the Dead

by David Dunwoody

  “Ghosts?” said Geoff and managed a nervous snort.

  “Shut up, stupid,” snapped Bruce.

  “Looks like some kind of gas,” said Belinda. “Did the firecracker light it?”

  “Light my gas,” said Geoff, but he was no longer laughing.

  “Hey,” said Lawrence. “Someone’s over there.”

  They all turned to look where Lawrence was pointing. Emerging out of the darkness was what appeared to be a US Marine in dress blues. The soldier’s stark white hat was unmistakeable.

  “Hey, Jarhead!” yelled Geoff.

  “Shhh,” said Heather. “Don’t make him mad.”

  “C’mon,” said Bruce. “It’s the Fourth of July, after all. We’re supposed to respect our soldiers.”

  “OK, Nutty Professor,” said Belinda. “We’re sorry.”

  “Hey,” said Heather. “It’s another one,” she said, pointing.

  They all turned to look. It was true. Another figure, but this one resembling a Doughboy from World War I, was ambling towards them.

  “OK …” muttered Belinda. “What’s going on here?”

  “Relax,” said Bruce, rubbing her back. “I’ll say something.”

  “Wait,” hissed Geoff. “Can you hear that?”

  They fell silent. Muffled voices, scraping and banging noises filled the air.

  “This is not cool,” said Bruce as Belinda clutched his arm.

  “What is going on here, guys?” asked Lawrence, pointing to three more figures, also clad in military regalia of different eras.

  As they gawped at the three new figures, the ground under their feet began to shift and move.

  “Oh, shit,” Geoff spat, staggering backwards.

  “They’re rising!” yelled Lawrence. “The dead are … rising!”

  “Is this … for real?” asked Heather, tears brimming in her eyes.

  “I think it might be,” said Lawrence, backing away.

  “These things can’t be coming for Saturday morning cartoons,” spat Bruce. “This is not good!”

  Gathering his senses, Geoff said, “Stay calm, guys. Stick together.”

  Their mounting terror was almost palpable.

  “What do we do?” asked Heather, tears rolling down her cheeks.

  “Light something,” said Geoff suggested. “Throw it at them!”

  Everyone scrambled for fireworks; mortars, Roman candles, bottle-rockets. Anything they could get their hands on.

  Trembling, they huddled together.

  “Wait,” said Lawrence. “Won’t these ignite the gas?”

  “He’s right,” agreed Heather. “This place is going to light up.”

  They looked around again. The Doughboy and the Marine were closest, but at least a dozen more figures were closing in.

  “And the Rocket’s Red Glare,” said Geoff, lighting his Roman Candle.

  Everyone else followed suit.

  “Here goes nothing,” said Bruce and held his breath.

  Geoff lobbed his at the Doughboy as the rest tossed their respective fireworks into the approaching crowd.

  Clouds of gas ignited in rapid flashing detonations that scorched grass and headstones. Another blast rattled the ground again, signalling fresh explosions beneath them.

  Screaming, Bruce and Belinda frantically patted each other as sparks had ignited their clothes. Their friends help, quickly extinguishing the flames. Several of the shambling creatures had also been set alight, but they made no attempt to douse them.

  Doughboy reached out for Geoff, moaning softly. Flinching, Geoff jabbed his Super-Deluxe Roman Candle into its open mouth as it began to shoot its fiery load. Flames shot down the creature’s throat, making its paper-thin skin appear glowing and translucent. Suddenly, belching flames tore out of its belly and engulfed the whole creature.

  Geoff backed away, uttering, “Awesome …”

  The rest of the fireworks began exploding and whizzing in all directions, striking the undead and bursting into flames. A bottle-rocket struck a World War II paratrooper in the eye, a tail of sparking flames shooting out of the socket.

  They fired off more and more, but their stocks were quickly dwindling and more and more creatures were appearing to replace those who sizzled and crackled on the ground.

  Todd and Trevor were standing at the gates, beers in hands, staring at the dazzling light display.

  “Damn,” said Todd. “Those guys are really setting them off.”

  “No shit,” agreed Trevor, sipping his beer.

  “This isn’t working!” cried Heather. “There’s too many of them!”

  Dozens of creatures were pressing in from all sides.

  “We’ve got enough for one more, guys, and then we make a break for the front gate,” said Geoff.

  The five lit another round of fireworks and threw them as grasping hands broke through the grass at their feet. Their shrieks mixed with the explosions from the fireworks.

  “Let’s go!” said Geoff, leading his friends in the direction of the front gate. The others followed without hesitation. The creatures were moving slowly enough for them to weave through, but their numbers were growing fast.

  Standing at the gates, Todd and Trevor stood and gazed across the cemetery.

  “Check it out,” said Trevor. “Here they come.”

  “Who are all those other people?” asked Todd, squinting.

  “Probably more fags with fireworks.”

  “Why are they running?” asked Todd.

  Concentrating on the five fleeing friends, they failed to notice the shifting ground at graves nearest to them.

  The group of friends reached the gate, gasping for air. Todd and Trevor began pointing and laughing.

  “What now, faggots?” Trevor managed between sniggers.

  “See, Belinda,” shouted Todd. “If you were with me, you’d be on this side.”

  “Let us out!” Belinda yelled.

  “Open the gate!” Heather chorused.

  The two boys’ laughter intensified, Todd clutching his stomach.

  “You and the rest of those freaks will just have to wait,” said Trevor.

  “C’mon, beg,” said Todd. “Beg and we might let you out.”

  “Listen, Trevor, you asshole,” snapped Geoff. “Those aren’t people! They’re dead!”

  “What have you been smoking?” said Todd, but a troubled frown marred his features as he glanced back at the approaching crowd. “So they’re zombies!” He laughed again, but it sounded hollow.

  “What would soldiers be …” Trevor stopped in the middle of the sentence.

  Shambling towards the five trapped friends, he could see a sailor in a dirty and moth-eaten blue shirt and denim bell-bottoms. Its flesh had almost completely rotted away, leaving bones peaking out here and there. A soldier nearby, in green fatigues, was dragging a foot behind him that was hanging on by slivers of rotting flesh. In the graves nearby, others were rising through the ground, clods of soil falling from their dead grey faces.

  “Oh, shit,” whispered Trevor, backing away. “Oh … shit.”

  Todd gaped at the horrific scene, but then managed, “Open the gate, Trevor. You know the combination. Open the goddamn gate!”

  Trevor was staggering backwards, muttering ‘oh shit’ over and over again.

  “Trevor, let them out!” yelled Todd. The five friends screamed at him.

  Todd grasped at Trevor, but he shoved him back, crying, “No, no!” Trevor bolted for the car. Todd started after him, but a cry for help stopped him short.

  “Help us!” the trapped friends were begging. It was Belinda’s that Todd concentrated on.

  He ran back to the gate as Trevor revved the car and sped away.

  A multitude of groans were rising on the wind as the shuffling mass drew ever closer.

  “I don’t know the combination,” said Todd, tugging at the chain.

  “Fuck it! Break for it!” yelled Geoff.

  Todd watched, helpless, as the five frien
ds scattered. Lawrence and Heather dashed in one direction, Geoff in another and Bruce and Belinda in another.

  Todd desperately yanked on the chain then, glancing around, he noticed a large stone. Grabbing it, he started smashing it against the chain.

  Belinda screamed. Looking up, Todd saw Bruce stop in his tracks. He dropped to his knees by a hole in the ground, screaming, holding his hands out.

  Todd watched in horror as one of the creatures fell into the open grave.

  “Belinda!” he cried out.

  Bruce scrambled into the hole.

  Belinda’s screams reached new heights. Todd frantically searched for options. The bars to the cemetery were too close together for Todd to slide through, but he had to try.

  With stone in his hand, he wriggled against the iron bars. His legs and even his chest cleared them, but his head was too wide, no matter which way he tried.

  Several creatures were moving towards him. Ignoring them, he kept trying. He had to help Belinda.

  Taking a deep breath, he drove his head through. The bars tore at the sides of his head. He howled in pain, but kept pushing. Cold iron tore at his ears and blood dribbled down his cheeks. With tears in his eyes, he finally sprung free of the bars.

  Swiping at the oozing blood, he ran to the hole where Belinda and Bruce had fallen inside. Looking down, he saw Bruce wrestling with the creature. Belinda was behind him, sobbing.

  With a scream, Todd jumped into the hole, knocking the creature onto its back. The creature grasped for Todd, but he raised the rock and brought it down on the creature’s skull with a sickening crack. He repeatedly brought it smashing down onto the creature’s head until the entire skull caved in, spewing brain and gore out into the sodden earth.

  Todd stood up to see Bruce cradling Belinda.

  “Keep hold of her,” said Todd. “I got it.”

  Another creature dropped into the hole, and Todd leapt at it, smashing it in the face.

  “Get out!” yelled Todd.

  “We tried,” said Bruce, holding a blood and dirt-smeared Belinda. “It’s too high!”

  Todd gave it a try, but loose dirt gave way in his hands.

  A third creature dropped over the edge and Todd struck out at it.

  Yet another creature fell into the hole while Todd was struggling with the previous one. It landed right on top of Bruce, pinning him to the ground. It bit into his shoulder and blood sprayed Belinda’s horrified face.

  Todd leapt at the creature, dragging it clear and then battered its head in.

  Geoff appeared at the top of the hole, panting and red-faced. “Can you get out?”

  “No,” said Todd.

  “Oh, shit,” he muttered, staring at Bruce and Belinda.

  “Just run, dumbass. Get the hell out of here!” yelled Todd.

  As Geoff hesitated, two creatures grabbed him and bit into the soft flesh of his neck and arm. He screamed as they stripped flesh away from his body and wrestled him to the ground.

  “Fuck!” cried Todd. Geoff’s cries quickly turned into feeble gurgles.

  Crying, Bruce was shouting, “Belinda!” The creature had managed to bite her on the leg and arm before he had fought it off and blood was pooling around her. “Belinda, please!”

  She emitted one last rattling gasp and then her eyes rolled back into her head.

  Heather and Lawrence had ran in a wide arch, dodging creatures this way and that, and had managed to work their way back to the gates. A vehicle was pulling up and they cried out in desperation.

  Several figures dressed in chemical response suits and respirators approached the gate. Heather and Lawrence huddled together, glancing over their shoulders as one soldier cut the chain with bolt cutters.

  The soldiers pushed open the gates as Heather repeated, “Thank you! Thank you!”

  Their gratitude was greeted with gunfire as two of the suited soldiers gunned them down.

  The soldiers entered, followed by several US Army HMMWVs and trucks. Several soldiers at the rear of the column re-secured the gates and stood guard as dozens of soldiers dismounted from the vehicles.

  Systematically, present US military went to work exterminating the ghouls of past soldiers, past patriots, past Americans.

  Bruce wept over the body of his dead girlfriend. “My sweet Belinda …” He was oblivious to the gunfire above them, but Todd wasn’t.

  “Jesus Christ. What the fuck is going on up there?” asked Todd. Tracers lit up the sky above them.

  “The Army? They’ve come to save us,” Bruce muttered between sobs.

  “Hopefully. Just wait. If they’re getting those things, we don’t want them to confuse them with us.”

  Bruce looked down at Belinda. Her eyes were closed. A tear fell from his cheek onto her already cold, pale face.

  Her eyes opened and glared up at the night sky.

  “Belinda?” uttered Bruce in shock. “Belinda!”

  Like an infant child taking in the world for the first time, she looked into Bruce’s eyes. The light that he found in her eyes, the light that once filled his heart with joy, was replaced with a cruel darkness. A milky film rested over her eyes like cataracts. She smiled.

  “Oh, Belinda! You’re alive!” he cried and bent down to kiss her.

  “No!” shouted Todd.

  As Bruce kissed his young love, for a moment it felt like their past kissed, but then he felt the chill on her lips and her stiff, searching tongue.

  He started to pull away, but Belinda grabbed his head and pulled him to her. This time, Belinda kissed with her teeth, tearing his lips away from his face. He tried to wrestle with her vice-like embrace, but she bit again into his shoulder.

  Todd jumped in, kicking her in the head, knocking her away as Bruce screamed. Bruce scrambled away as Todd smashed Belinda’s head with the stone. Tears fell from his eyes as his heart broke along with Belinda’s skull.

  In desperation, Bruce clawed at the loose earth at the lip of the grave.

  “I’m so sorry,” Todd whispered weakly. Chunks of Belinda’s hair and scalp clung to the rock in his hand. Her blood dripped from his fingers.

  An explosion rocked the ground nearby, knocking small bits of earth onto their upturned faces.

  Blood loss and pain finally started taking its toll on Bruce. Clutching his wounded shoulder, he crouched in the corner, whimpering through his torn mouth.

  Todd couldn’t bear to look at him. The boy’s face was mangled. His whimpering slowly ebbed away.

  The gunfire was getting closer, louder. Todd cringed in fear. A sense of impending doom filled his heart.

  Todd glanced at Bruce. His trembling was growing weaker. Todd and Trevor used to take great joy in humiliating others, making them cry, making them beg for mercy. The tables had turned and now he was the one terrified and praying for mercy.

  “I’m sorry I called you a faggot, Bruce,” Todd managed in a hoarse whisper. “I’m so sorry.”

  Bruce gazed at his former enemy through glazed eyes. Thoughts of his parents, of his faith, filled his mind as it spun towards oblivion.

  Seeing Bruce’s face grow pale, Todd began to whimper. As tears began to lace his cheeks, two masked figures appeared at the top of the grave. They looked down into the pit swimming with death.

  Staring up at them, Todd begged, “Please don’t hurt us.” He couldn’t remember if he had ever begged before. But now, he held his hands up in submission. “Please, help us.”

  For Bruce, it was as if time all but ground to a halt. As life drained from his body, he glanced up as another explosion rocked the grave. Tracers lit up the sky, and just out of the corner of his eye, Bruce caught sight of it. It was waving in the cold October night. Old Glory. The Stars and Stripes. The American flag. In all the chaos, he hadn’t noticed it before. Someone had placed the flag at the graveside, for the soldier whose home it would become.

  Bruce managed a rasping laugh as explosions and tracers lit up the night sky. The National Anthem filled his darkening mi
nd:

  “… and the rockets’ red glare

  The bombs bursting in air

  Gave proof through the night

  That our flag was still there.

  O, say, does that Star Spangled Banner yet wave

  O’r the land of the free and the home of the brave?”

  The masked figures opened fire.

  THE END

  ZOMBIE WORLD

  Death Perception

  By

  Calvin A. L. Miller II

  OK, so the letter read something like this:

  Mr. Christian–

  We received your request to live among the undead population at our ZOMBIE WORLD Theme Park Reserve. Your desire to journal it for your next book, “Death Perception”, is quite intriguing to us. We feel it’s a great match and have contacted your publisher to make arrangements.