Stay Dead 3: The Condemned

by Steve Wands

  Old Sparky was the name given to the facility’s old electric chair. It had only taken nine lives, but Garth just loved the way it looked. It exuded all that classic electric chair charm that bloomed fear into all that saw it. A chair in which no man would ever want to sit. All he had to do was point and his disciples walked over to it.

  “A fine throne,” Cane said, smiling as he stood there naked, covered in dried blood and shit, “a fine throne indeed.”

  Without saying another word they carefully removed it from the display. Two of them were wearing bloodied guard uniforms, while another wore only prison-issued boxers that hung loosely around his pale waist and a partial skin mask that sat high on his head, clinging on account of the congealing blood.

  10 WHAT’S LOVECRAFT GOT TO DO WITH IT?

  (back to top)

  The yellowed IBM only had a few hits on fleshbound books. Rachel read through all the results, and most of them were about a fictional grimoire mentioned in the stories of horror writer H.P. Lovecraft or in the Evil Dead movies directed by Sam Raimi. She could find no results related to any real book of a similar nature.

  She couldn’t shake the feel of the leathery skin-bound book from her dreams. Despite her educated mind telling her that it couldn’t be real, a primal instinct burning in her chest told her it was. Her dream felt more like a memory than a dream.

  “Maybe Tran will have some insight,” she thought and headed to his quarters.

  Rachel was always one for collaboration. She found bouncing ideas of other people always opened things up. Sometimes just talking to someone about what was on her mind proved helpful. As if listening to a spoken concept revealed things about it that otherwise might have gone unnoticed. Even simple and obvious things.

  Gregory Tran slept on a small cot with a rough sheet pulled tightly around his shoulders and tucked under his arms as he slept. The sheet felt more like a painters tarp than any sheet he’d slept on before. Regardless, he slept like a rock. Fatigue had a way of making even the most prissy of men sleep like newborns in less than desirable situations. Drool oozed from the corner of his mouth and dampened the pathetic lump of a pillow on which he rested his head.

  It had been a long day, like every day since he’d took up residence in the mountain. Fueled by caffeine and desperation. When the opportunity for sleep was presented Tran had no problem closing his eyes and shutting down. Unfortunately, it was never for long. Four hours was considered sleeping in. He’d been asleep nearly an hour by the time Rachel began knocking on his door.

  Rachel knocked several times before Tran stumbled to the door. His eyes were barely visible and Rachel wondered if he was even awake.

  “Sorry Gregory, I didn’t know—”

  “I hate you.”

  “Wow. And here I thought we’d made fast friends.”

  “No offense, Rachel, but right now I’d rather sleep than have a friend. But since you’re here and I’m now awake, come in.”

  “I’ll be quick, promise.”

  They sat down at the small the utilitarian table and Tran looked as if he were sleeping sitting up. Rachel noticed he hadn’t put his glasses on and realized she’d never seen him without them. He could almost be handsome, she thought.

  “So…” Tran said, hoping to get the ball rolling.

  “Okay, do you know anything about H.P. Lovecraft, or the Necronomicon?” She asked, raising an eyebrow and giving Tran a look that suggested she expected an adverse reaction.

  “Dead writer, and a grimoire of sorts. I used to play with some…friends,” Tran hesitated on the word “friends” as if this were the first time he’d thought about them and simultaneously wondered if they were okay, or if they were dead and walking about. “We would play card games sometimes. Magic, D&D, things like that. Lovecraft came up often.”

  Rachel nodded, figuring that if Tran had friends and did anything for fun it would be something nerdy like that. She didn’t want to tell him how she and her brother used to play Magic, but if they were to be here indefinitely it was a commonality that might have to come out.

  “So you don’t know much about it?”

  “No, not much. Just a cursory knowledge, really. Read a handful of his stories. But that’s really it. Why do you ask?”

  “Okay, I’ll tell you, but you have to promise me you won’t think I’m crazy. Okay?”

  “I can’t make that promise.”

  “Fine, whatever.” She looked at him for a moment, embarrassed but then went for it, “I…had a very vivid dream. More than a dream, I think. It felt real. And in it, I was writing in a book. A book bound in flesh. Maybe the whole thing was flesh, I dunno. So, I wanted to look into it.”

  Tran, now looking a bit more awake, replied, “Let me get this straight. You had a dream and then thought to come here and stop me from having one of my own?”

  Rachel smiled in that awkward forced way where showing teeth was supposed to serve as an apology. “Sorry. So, how about any other books like that? You know, bound in flesh, written in blood, that kind of thing. Ever hear of anything like that?”

  “The kind not in movies, or fiction? No. Now can I go back to sleep?”

  “Yes, but when you wake up, can you come get me. I have an idea.”

  “Well, by all means, lay it on me, what’s the idea?” He looked at her the way a man who’s been online at the DMV for too long would’ve looked at her.

  “Sleep induction. Or maybe a medically-induced coma. So I can explore these dreams more.”

  “Great. You’ve found a way to rest while everyone else works. Next you’ll be talking about exploring the astral plane.”

  “That’s a great idea,” she said. “I didn’t even think of that.”

  Tran rolled his eyes and stood up. “Good night, Rachel. See you in a few hours.”

  “Good night, Gregory. Sleep tight.”

  Tran’s head hit the lump of a pillow and he closed his eyes. He pulled the rough canvas-like sheet over himself and took a few deep breaths as he calmed himself and readied his mind for dreamland. But after he took those breaths he rolled over onto his back and opened his eyes. A sigh of aggravation escaped his throat. The gears in his mind were turning. He was wide awake and no matter how badly he wanted to sleep, he knew he wouldn’t be able to. “Damn it, Rachel,” he muttered, throwing the sheet off his body and to the foot of the cot.

  Getting up he grabbed his glasses and hurried for the door, hoping to get Rachel before she’d gone back to her room. As he opened the door and stepped out Rachel stood against the wall and smiled at him.

  “I knew you wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep. I’m the same way.”

  “Oh, we’re so alike,” he said in a mocking falsetto. Then, returning to his natural tone said, “Guess I’ll sleep when I’m dead, or never again.”

  “Jeez, you’re a little grumpy when you don’t get your sleep, Doc.”

  11 IN THE KINGDOM OF CANE

  (back to top)

  King Cane sat in a cell with two of his disciples; Leonard Breener—whom took to wearing a skin mask—and Aiden Bradley. Both convicted murderers. They sat with one of the correctional officers they had locked up for safe keeping. This particular one was an admirer of Garth Cane. He was a wicked son of a bitch, loved jamming his dick in the King’s filth-covered ass.

  Officer Willard Blaird was one of the worst human beings Cane had ever come in contact with, which spoke volumes as Cane was surrounded by the worst of humanity. Of course there were the wrongly convicted, and the honorable criminals like bank robbers and drug dealers (those guys were like rock stars in and out of the joint). Most, however, genuinely deserved to be in there. Blaird was no exception, despite the badge that was now sitting pierced in his breast.

  Aiden, or Mr. Bradley, as Cane liked to call him, had handcuffed the pig to a bed frame. He’d been beaten for days on end and had very little fight left in him. He was part of the last group of guards to be overtaken by the inmates. He was restrained and gagged,
covered in sweat, blood, semen, shit, and piss. His face was bruised so badly he could barely see or even open his eyes. Not that he wanted to, anyway.

  “Did either of you ever read about Jeffrey Dahmer?” The King asked.

  Mr. Bradley nodded, and Leonard simply said, “Yeah, the sicko who ate people, right?”

  “Sicko?” The King smiled and tapped a finger to his head reminding Leonard that he had a part of someone’s face raggedly cut and wrapped around his head by a shoelace, “Should any of us really be throwing terms like that around, Lenny?”

  “No, your Majesty. You’re right.”

  King Cane nodded at this, smiling bemusedly. The he continued, “Dahmer, you see was—and, Mr. Bradley, please join in if you feel so compelled to do so—an American serial killer. Born in the good ol’ U.S. of A. He was a quiet kid, neglected by his dear old mother, like so many of us. But maybe the bitch knew that something was wrong with her little Jeffrey. He used to kill animals when he was very young. Impaling heads on spikes. He was very much an inspiration, which I’m sure you could tell by the new decorations I had put up. Much homier now, don’t you think?”

  The pig weakly nodded in agreement.

  “And Jeffrey carried on much the same way into high school, although, by then, his weirdness was more than evident. He was a social outcast and a full-blown alcoholic before he could drive. I like to think I was a lot like him in school. Aside from his ability to drink like a fish. See, he was smart as a whip but bored as shit in school. His mind was on other studies. Just like mine.”

  The King looked at his two disciples and noticed that they already appeared to be zoning out. This angered him, but he also knew that all they wanted to do was get to the good parts—the good part of the story and the good part of playing with the pig. Despite his mounting frustration, Cane went on.

  “Anyway, I could go on about Jeffrey all day long, his is truly a fascinating tale. But in the end all he wanted was a fuck buddy. A living thing with no will of its own—much like the zombies that are now eviscerating the world— with which to have his way. He would take a drill,” Cane lifted one off the ground and held it as if showing a potential buyer, “and he would try to lobotomize his victims. Not all of them, mind you, just the last few. None of his patients survived longer than two days.”

  This made Mr. Bradley grin, as one of their own lobotomy experiments died on his third day and reanimated several minutes later.

  “Let’s see if you make it four days,” Cane said as he squeezed the drill to life and plunged it into the top of the pig’s head. Mr. Bradley and Leonard tried to hold his head still as he screamed and squirmed.

  “This’ll be good for your sinuses, too,” Cane chuckled, reversing the drill to remove it and then plunging it into a new spot.” Gray matter glistened on the drill bit and blood oozed from the man’s head.

  “Let me try!” Mr. Bradley pleaded. “Come on, gimme a turn.” His bloodlust had become insatiable and Cane smiled at his protégé.

  Cane stepped back, the drill sitting in the man’s head. Mr. Bradley jumped to his feet and nearly squealed in joy as he pulled the drill out and found a new spot in which to drive it in. By now the pig had stopped fighting and his breathing was very labored, but Cane didn’t care. He wasn’t trying to create Dahmer Zombies, he was just paying homage to one of his idols and having a little fun. His enthusiastic disciples would kill the man in minutes. He was too devastated to survive much longer. That he lasted this long was surprising.

  King Cane then turned to Leonard and asked, “Are you jealous, Lenny? Would you like a turn too?”

  “No,” was his reply, “No, I just want to fuck him. I wanna fuck his dead pig ass. Ya-you k-know he d-d-d-did me…?”

  “He did a lot of us, Leonard. Don’t be ashamed. We had no control. Now we do. We’re not animals. We can control ourselves, unlike this pig. A slave to his darker cravings. No, we can control it.”

  “P-please?”

  “Oh, fuck it, go ahead, have a romp. Just be sure to lock it up when you’re done. Annnnd, Mr. Bradley, can you finish this block off by the evening? We’ll be having visitors soon and I don’t want them to interrupt our offering.”

  “Absolutely, sir.”

  The King then walked away leaving his disciples to do whatever they wanted to that little piggy. He ran his fingers along the cells of his other Dahmer Zombies. Once they reanimated he’d decided to keep them as they were and locked them in their respective cells. It was a neat little collection, he thought with pride. Willard Blaird would make number 33. He thought they could make a fine trading card set.

  Cane lingered at the last cell on the row, staring at the dead thing still wearing its correction uniform. They’d nailed his hat to his head and cut his face off, revealing the muscle tissue beneath it. It sat lazily on the bed, looking at Cane with dulled, unblinking eyes.

  “Don’t worry, won’t be long now, piggy. Won’t be long now…”

  12 JAILHOUSE LOCK AND LOAD

  (back to top)

  Torrent gripped his M-4 Carbine and stood just to the side of the service door as Dusty opened it. According to the blueprints, they were about to enter the facilities administration wing. Torrent stepped through the threshold and swept the area. Taking a knee he flagged Alpha team in. Terry covered the rear and secured the door behind them.

  The hallway was dimly lit and the place was a mess. Shattered glass littered the floor and bloody handprints decorated the walls, accompanied by what Torrent knew to be drag patterns. Wide paths of blood with smaller heel marks off to the side painted a picture of someone dragging a dead body down the hallway. The patterns were textbook. He’d seen many of them in his day, but what was alarming was how many of them there were. He guessed the rioting led to a power reversal and the inmates slaughtered everyone not in prison garb.

  Torrent neared the end of the hall and took a knee. His team did the same. “Okay,” he said, “There are three control centers to this place. We need to secure each of them and then we need to clear out. We then need to eliminate or confine anyone not in a cell block. By the looks of the place that might be a lot of people.” He paused for a moment, listening to a scream in the distance before continuing, “We’ll maintain radio silence unless we get separated.”

  “We should be close to the first control center,” Harburn said, pulling out the blueprint from the dossier which he had folded and kept in his chest pocket.

  “Correct. That leaves one on the opposite end, and one in the center. And since we had a welcoming party, I’m sure they’ll be guarded. Once we lock the place down, I’ll radio the Nest and Bravo Team will be dispatched.”

  “We should just radio them now,” Dusty said, as he looked around nervously. “We could use the manpower.”

  “If we can’t lock it down, we bug out, and the Nest sends a gift basket of M39s.”

  “That’s what we should’ve done to begin with!” Dusty said, rising from his knee.

  Terry silently agreed, and didn’t wish to voice it. He knew Dusty was just spittin’ words on account of his nerves. Some guys were just wired that way.

  Torrent opened the door cautiously, Dusty just behind him, finger on the trigger of his suppressed Beretta M9 sidearm. Torrent kept his rifle in hand. As the door quietly opened John could smell a sweaty yeasty odor in the air and before he could figure out what it was he heard the whoosh of air and the grunt of effort as a fire axe came crashing into the door jamb.

  Wood splintered into his face.

  “Contact!” Dusty yelled.

  Torrent kicked the door open full force and it connected with the unseen attacker. The axe remained stuck into the jamb as the impact of the blow knocked the attacker to the ground. Torrent stepped out and so did Dusty, both men looking in the opposite direction. Torrent saw two more attackers in orange wearing a hodgepodge of riot gear. One had a helmet and an elbow pad, the other a shield and a baton. They screamed like animals as they charged, and Torrent took them dow
n like animals. He squeezed the trigger of his rifle and gave each one a three round burst. One center mass, the other in the head. Dusty came up alongside and shot the grounded attacker point blank in the head as he tried to scurry to his feet.

  “This way, let’s move.” Torrent led the way down the corridor, trying not to step in any slick puddles of blood. They had to move quick. The dead outside would’ve certainly began reanimating by now, and it wouldn’t be long before any dead unfriendlies on the inside started twitching back to life. Torrent hated the fresher ones, they moved quicker. They couldn’t run, of course, but they were quick on the grab and shambled with voracity.

  A big son of a bitch came around the corner, naked aside from the riot gear and wielding a shotgun he no doubt acquired from the prison’s armory. It was standard issue, except for the razor wire wrapped around the stock of the gun and what looked like testicles hanging off the front. Dusty fired two shots, both being deflected by the large riot shield. The maniac laughed and yelled, “My turn!”

  But before he could pull the trigger, Torrent sprayed a line of fire across his shins, shredding the lower part of his legs into pulp. The maniac’s wild laughter turned to agonized screams as he toppled to the ground. Torrent finished him off with a burst of rounds to the back of the head. The red mess he stepped over as he continued down the corridor looked like the pretentious dreck of a Fine Art major’s masterpiece.

  As they moved closer to the first control room, incarcerated lunatics with police issue weapons jumped out from every door and corner. They were clumsy and noisy and little more than a nuisance at first. Easily being put down by Alpha team. Within sight of the control room door another naked inmate stepped into view. His body was covered in deep slashes and his complexion was the color of dust. His lips were dry and cracked and they bled as he grinned at them. In his right hand he held his dick and balls like a gun and in a raspy voice said, “Boom. Boom.”