APOCALYCIOUS: Satire of the Dead

by K Helms

  Joe turned back to Doris. “Remind me not to make you mad, Joe Flores,” she said admiringly between breaths.

  Joe smiled and winked at her. “Yeah, let that be a lesson to you,” Joe said with a wry grin and then clutched the handles behind the wheelchair and sprinted down the hallway, pushing the chair.

  “You’d better run, you pussy!” he heard from the biker who now sounded like he had a terrible head cold. Joe didn’t respond. Doris came before his pride. He wheeled her into an open elevator; blood was streaked on the walls and floors of it. The light inside the vacant car kept dimming and flickering with a disconcerting electrical sound. Joe debated for a moment whether to use it or not, before pushing the number three on the wall beside the door.

  To Joe’s relief the elevator rose smoothly to the third floor, lurched to a stop and the doors slid open, but halted halfway. Joe pried the doors open wide enough to push the wheelchair through and out into another hallway. He stopped again and scanned the unexplored area.

  The fluorescent lights blinked and buzzed and he heard yelling and screaming that made him think that he might have stopped on the mental ward floor. He hadn’t been certain that taking Doris to the hospital had been the right decision from the start and now he was absolutely sure that he should have taken her to his parent’s house; his mother Rosa, would have known what to do.

  Cautiously, he wheeled her down the hall, prepared to defend Doris and the unborn baby with his life, if need be.

  “Joe…the baby…is coming…” Doris cried in a labored voice.

  “Alright, baby…” he didn’t know what else to say. Suddenly a white uniformed nurse burst into the hallway and barreled toward them.

  “Get out! Oh God, get out!” the nurse screamed frantically at them.

  From behind her three men and two women staggered from the room she had exited; they saw the newcomers and lurched in rapid jerking steps toward. Joe gave a quick study of their faces. Blood was smeared all over their cheeks and chins and dripped down the front of their clothes.

  The nurse tried to rush past them into the waiting elevator, but Joe grabbed her by the arm

  “Let me go!” she cried miserably through her tears, “they’ll kill me…”

  Joe shoved the nurse into the first opened room and thrust Doris in behind her before he turned and locked the wide, heavy, wooden door. He wasn’t sure the lock would hold; it appeared to be built more for privacy than security. Joe shoved a dresser in front of the door to block it and he turned back to Doris and helped her onto the bed.

  “The baby is coming and you are going to deliver it!” he ordered the nurse, pointing a finger in her face for emphasis.

  “I…” she began, and then started to shiver violently. Joe slapped her hard across the face leaving a red welt, and then grabbed her by the shoulders. “Do your damn job.”

  She seemed to regain some composure and her training began to exert itself. She shot Joe an angry look and he nodded in approval. Anger is better, he thought.

  Doris screamed from the bed. “It’s coming Joe!”

  The nurse bent to Doris and removed her panties from under the maternity dress. Joe could see that her hands were still shaking but she seemed to have enough focus to do what she was trained for.

  “OK, honey, the baby is coming right now. I need you to give me a good push.”

  Doris screamed and Joe heard the groans and guttural calls from the hallway. Something slammed against the door with a boom. The nurse looked nervously at Joe.

  “We’re OK,” he said reassuringly and strode to an I.V. stand and broke the metal pole from the wheels and took a position between the women and the door.

  The door boomed again, harder this time, and from behind him, Joe heard Doris scream again. As she did the guttural sounds beyond the door grew louder, more urgent and the door boomed again, again and again echoing like explosions through the closed off room.

  “The head’s out, honey, now give me one more hard push,” said the nurse with a wavering voice.

  Doris screamed again and the nurse pulled the baby free. She wrapped the baby in a white blanket and whispered to Doris. “It’s a boy.” The nurse looked back toward Joe, wondering what would transpire next in this little kidnapping.

  Doris began crying and held her hands out to hold her son for the first time.

  The door suddenly cracked open, breaking through the weak lock and slammed against the dresser. Joe ran forward and began thrusting the metal rod at the intruding hands, but they kept pushing. The sharp metal cut their hands, two fingers were severed from one of the hands, but the hands didn’t recoil as they kept pushing. More hands appeared in the crack, pressing the door into the heavy dresser and opening slowly further. Joe braced himself at the end of the dresser and yelled for the nurse.

  “Help me!”

  The nurse nodded apprehensively and handed the baby to Doris. She moved to stand beside Joe, pushing back against the dresser. He saw a shoulder emerge from the crack.

  “Dammit, dammit, dammit!” said Joe as the dresser slid backward inch by inch. He pushed harder, his face red with straining, but still the dresser crept inward in incremental lurches. He looked at the nurse. “Get Doris and the baby, and lock yourselves in the bathroom,” he told her.

  The nurse ran back to Doris and helped her to her feet, and although the new mother’s feet slid on the afterbirth she didn’t fall as she staggered away.

  “Go!” Joe screamed as the dresser was pushed further back, and he saw one of the doctor’s torsos squeeze through. The doctor clawed at the air with a mindless growl.

  Joe began to sob heavily, knowing he was failing, and then the dresser lurched forward enough for the doctor to scramble into the room and he fell on top of Joe. Another one followed and fell on him too, and Joe watched in horror as their jaws dislocated before him, and then they slammed shut, one on Joe’s shoulder and one on his forearm. “GO!!!” he screamed at Doris.

  “Joe…” she cried as the nurse grabbed her under the arm and began pulling her to the bathroom.

  Another lifeless doctor and the two equally deceased nurses entered the room, their jaws snapping open and shut with violent force as they clamored over the dresser for Doris. She looked at Joe, the light had extinguished from his eyes and blood pooled beneath his unresponsive form. The only movement that came from him was when one of the doctors clamped their jaws down on him and shook him violently, like a shark, ripping ribbons of flesh from his bones.

  The nurse gave up on Doris and darted to the bathroom, she slammed the door shut behind her and Doris heard the click. Doris didn’t move. She couldn’t.

  “Joe,” she whispered, and she watched as the whites of his eyes swam with red and those dark brown eyes that she loved to lose herself in became a milky white. The doctors stood clumsily and she watched in amazement and shock as Joe stood as well.

  Doris held her free hand out to Joe while clutching the baby to her breast with the other, her chin trembling with emotion.

  The doctors and nurses converged on Doris, their jaws; locking open wide then slamming shut like bear traps on her flesh. Joe walked forward and looked at her for a moment and she thought there was recognition there, but then Joe grabbed the newborn from her arms, the umbilical cord still attached, and brought it up to his face to sniff it.

  She watched in horror as Joe opened wide those jaws and then slammed them shut on a chubby leg.

  She heard the baby cry out; he had healthy lungs on him, and that was good, wasn’t it? Then she heard no more until she woke up dead and felt nothing but a hatred and hunger.

  Chapter 17 - The Maiming of the Shrew

  Waynesburg, Pennsylvania

  Whispering Willows Apartments

  Hito finished screwing plywood over the windows of their apartment with a cordless drill until the batteries were spent. The power had been out for about six hours and he was amazed at how this plague had spread so quickly. The news on his emergency radio had repeat
ed over and over that survivors were not to go outside, but rather to hide until the crisis had passed. Unfortunately, the crisis within his own home seemed just as bad to him and he wondered if outside could be any worse.

  Four days of being stuck with Victoria was wearing on him quickly. He peeked out the peephole of his front door and saw his next door neighbor, Jack Hamilton, dressed only in his underwear, lumbering across the parking lot. Dried blood covered his torso and Hito noticed that the man’s feet were almost black. He supposed it was because all the blood had pooled down there after the circulatory system had stopped pumping. The walking dead man also seemed to have a heavy load of poop in his drawers, which sagged and left brown steaks down the backs of his thighs. Jack didn’t appear to be embarrassed at that little mishap, though. It seemed that the dead had even less pride than he did himself. He shoved a chair under the doorknob, careful not to make too much noise, and turned around.

  Victoria stood glaring behind him. “Are you going to go out and get us some food today or just stay in here and hide again?” she whispered fiercely.

  He sighed. “I am not going out there, Vic. I just saw Jack staggering through the parking lot and it’s hard to tell how many more of them are out there.”

  She snorted in disgust. “God, you are pathetic. I know! Why don’t you let me go out there and get your food? I seem to be the only one that has any balls in this house.”

  “Vic, c’mon,” he said, reaching out to touch her. She jerked her shoulder back from him with an expression of revulsion.

  “You know, I should have married Eddie. He was a lazy piece of shit, but at least he was a man.”

  Hito felt a flood of rage as months of pent up anger seized him. All the stress, all the disappointment, all the suppressed emotions pulsated in his head. No one knew how hard it had been to keep these feelings inside and still try to do his best every day in a desperate and vain attempt to make his wife happy by sacrificing himself, and for what?

  Nothing. That was what. And that was what replaced the sudden rage. Nothing. He felt something inside him snap, then nothing. He felt nothing when he watched his fist shoot out and punch his wife in the face, sending her front teeth flying from her mouth. He felt nothing as she sprawled backwards and crashed into the torch lamp behind her, knocking it to the floor with a crash. He felt nothing as she lay motionless on the beige carpet bleeding from her busted lip and gums. He felt nothing when he saw the dried carcasses of dead bugs in her hair from where they had collected in the bottom of the lamp’s globe and spilled upon her when it broke. He felt no more disgust at her phony religion or their sham of a marriage. He felt nothing as he dragged her to the front door and moved the chair out of the way, clicked open the dead bolt and swung the front door open. He felt nothing as he pulled her unconscious body by the wrist onto the concrete slab they had called a front porch.

  “Hey! Jack! You hungry, boy?” he shouted, as if he was calling for his old faithful dog. Jack turned; a yellow discharge of infection ran thickly from his eyes and nostrils and covered his lower face and the front of his filthy man boobs, as he moaned his affirmation. Hito heard more groans coming from the parking lot and felt for the keys in his pocket. The corpses lurched toward the unconscious woman, bleeding on the stoop.

  He glanced down at her with a blank expression and then sprinted to where his Ford Ranger was parked. He started the engine and fired up the heater. Hito almost didn’t hear Victoria screaming his name as she was engulfed by a swarm of hungry corpses. He put the truck in gear and pulled out of the lot and turned left toward destiny.

  Chapter 18 - The Queen City King

  Two weeks after infection

  Cincinnati, Ohio

  Ahmed bin Muhammad didn’t know what his new moniker meant; he only knew that it sounded a lot more gangster than John Jay Walker and the nickname ‘Good times’ that he hated so much before the pandemic had engulfed the earth.

  He and a group of survivors had holed up in the King’s Heights manor and had immediately dubbed themselves, ‘The Black Confederacy’. As irony would have it, the ever growing hordes of undead had become a more perfect Union and the south Queen city would not rise again.

  Now, mere days since he had formed the Confederacy, it consisted of only himself, his sister, Wanda and one scrawny white girl with stringy, dirty blonde hair named Beth.

  Corporal Shere Howard of the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force had her M4 leveled at center mass and took a quick inventory of Muhammad’s pathetic group. Her make shift squad had been ordered to fan out to cover more ground. This was an order that she followed with silent dread and anger. Her C.O., Lt. Forbes, was a full time uniformed cop from Columbus, Ohio and a part time soldier in the Ohio National Guard. Forbes was basically an accountant or some other type of office pogue. The term metro-sexual would have used his photo as a prime example. Pompous and full of himself, he was assuredly going to cause the death of many of his troops.

  The civilians were all armed, but only the unlucky or stupid weren’t these days. Only the man stood with his sidearm extended toward her. She really wasn’t that worried though, he held it on its side like all the thugs in the movies did and would probably end up spraining his wrist if he fired it that way. He stood, making a large target while Shere crouched on one knee, her 5.56 carbine was a lot more accurate than his .22 revolver, with her training and his lack of discipline; there really was no reason to prove herself here. Her job was to round up civilians from the King Heights block and have them transported to a secured detention center before another transfer to Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton for processing. Still, there was always danger involved; whether it was by the Black Confederacy, various other gang remnants or by the hordes of dead bodies that would like nothing better than to initiate her into their own faction.

  “Whatchoo think you gonna do, bitch?” Ahmed yelled from where he stood, it was a distance of about twenty yards.

  “You are to drop your firearms and come with me!” said Shere routinely, but nervously. She felt too exposed out in the open courtyard. There were just too many angles she couldn’t see and from those angles she was aware that the dead could easily come pouring out and surround her. She had been rounding up refugees for the last two days and most had surrendered with the promise of food, water and some hope of a future.

  “Fush you!” screamed Beth, letting loose a barrage of spittle from between her mangled and decayed teeth as she un-holstered her own revolver. Shere could see the tell-tale sores on her face and the horrible dental hygiene of a meth addict.

  Shere heard Ahmed laugh and mimic the white girl “Yeah, fush you…you drop your firearms and you can be my number two bitch!”

  Shere sighed. “Do as you’re told and I can help you,” she reasoned. Her duty dictated that she protect the citizens of this country no matter how pathetic they were.

  Ahmed laughed again, “Yeah I’m gonna put yo fine ass in my stables, fo’ sho’.”

  This was where the job got difficult. Killing zombies was pretty clear cut, you just shoot them in the brain pan – case closed. Dealing with the living always posed a more difficult problem. It didn’t matter what color they were, how old or what gender, they never wanted to give up their property. You always had to convince them that it was for the best. She could understand these people not wanting to give up their possessions, to a point, but when you are facing the distinct probability that you will be forced to cannibalize those closest to you just to stay alive then she believed it was a good time to go to where the food was.

  “You will be given food, water, shelter and medical treatment,” she reassured, trying hard to sell it, even though she was relatively sure that these three amigos and their contributions to society wouldn’t be missed all that much if she cut them down where they stood.

  “I got yo food right here, bitch!” screamed Ahmed. He grabbed his crotch with his free hand that was covered in gold rings which Corporal Howard was reasonably sure hadn’t be
en there last week. Ahmed added “It’s a Manwich…’cuz it’s bigger than a sandwich!” and howled with laughter.

  “Damn right, baby, it's fushin' huge” verified Beth.

  Shere took a deep breath. It was men like this that had given her race a bad name. There were plenty of good black men that were smart and successful, but their numbers were far eclipsed by these ass clowns. She took another deep breath to clear the reoccurring thought of shooting him. “I’ll try one more time,” she told herself in a hushed voice and then said in a louder voice, “Your government is trying to protect you.”

  Ahmed laughed long and hard. “And some skinny little black bitch like you is gonna protec’ me?”

  “This is your last chance. Throw the firearms on the damn ground!” Shere had been patient, but her pride was strong and she did not like being laughed at by this sewer rat that had probably been leeching off the system his entire life. She had given up two years of her life to serve this country and to ensure this idiot’s freedoms and now he was disrespecting those sacrifices. The muscles in her jaws clenched in anger.

  “Why don’t you put me on the ground, bitch,” yelled Ahmed, as he looked over at the women with an exaggerated expression of bravado filling his face.

  Shere lowered the barrel of the M4 and shot Robert E. Lee in the kneecap. “Done,” she whispered triumphantly, “Ladies?” she asked, raising her voice over the din of Ahmed screaming obscenities at her as he writhed on the ground.

  Shere watched in amazement as Wanda dropped down beside the defacto leader of his tiny, ridiculous gang, consoling him. What was wrong with some women? It seemed like the worse they were treated the more loyal they were to those that mistreated them. Beth, whose bright scabs stood out in stark contrast to her milk white skin and who was obviously drugged out of her skinny white mind charged toward the Marine. Shere waited until the meth whore was close enough then raised the butt of her carbine in front of her at shoulder level and smacked her sharply across the bridge of her nose, breaking it instantly, while also sending two rotted, black teeth flying from her open mouth. Beth fell to the pavement, out cold; Shere secured her wrists behind her back with a thick zip tie then walked over to the other two.