Vinyl Destination

by Millard, Adam

  Marcia slowly lowered herself back down behind the bar, where she was met by a wall of expectant faces.

  “What’s it look like out there?” Goth Girl asked.

  “Not good,” Marcia said, “but the doors are clear at least. We should be able to make a run for it!”

  “What about the professor?” Clarence asked. “I mean, without being politically incorrect, I just don’t think he’ll be able to keep up.”

  Shit. She’d forgotten about Hawking. As she stared into his sad, defeated eyes, she saw something, a flicker, but nothing more. Go on without me, they said. I’ll only get you all killed. At least, that’s what she hoped he was trying to communicate; in truth, he was saying, You’d better not fucking leave me here with a roomful of dancing zombies! Don’t you know who I am? The human race is screwed without me… I wasn’t going to say anything, but I’ve perfected time travel. I have the blueprints stashed away in my knicker drawer at home. It’s all there, all except for one vital piece, which is still in my head.

  “He wants us to go on without him,” Marcia said, reaching down to squeeze his immobile hand.

  No! You fools! Don’t you—

  “Right, come on then you lot,” Marcia said to Goth Girl, Drunk Boy, and Clarence. “Let’s get out of here before the professor changes his mind.”

  Fine, go then, see if I care… no, please, I didn’t mean that… you absolute selfish wankers…

  “Run straight for the door. Any zombies get in your way, don’t even think about dancing with them; it’s all just a ploy to get close enough to bite you. Don’t stop running until we’re clear of the building, and Clarence…”

  “What?”

  “Get as many photos as you can on the way out. This is going to be front-page news tomorrow, if we live that long.”

  34

  Watching the chaos unfold, the Pit-Dweller couldn’t help feeling a bit awkward despite itself. There was something so sordid about it, but try as it may to look away, there was simply no use.

  And to think I wasn’t gonna come out tonight, it thought, sounding more like John Inman than ever before. The zombies had been a fluke, but the Pit-Dweller was still just as proud of them as a Birmingham mother on her son’s first court date.

  When three young men suddenly bolted from the toilets in a mad dash for the door, it wasn’t about to let them go that easily.

  “I don’t think so, you little bastards,” the Pit-Dweller said, swooping down like an eagle after dormice.

  They were soon joined by four others; two men and two women. Having jumped the bar on the other side of the room, they’d apparently picked the same exact moment to hightail it out of there.

  Just before they reached the exit, the Pit-Dweller enveloped the lot of them in its ancient evil miasma, cackling like Vincent Price as it overtook the group of desperate stranglers. If they noticed its presence, they didn’t give anything away, but as they went crashing through the door and out into the street, the Pit-Dweller knew they wouldn’t get far. It wouldn’t be long before it brought them and everyone else in this godforsaken town to their knees.

  35

  “You can’t keep me tied up like this,” protested not-quite-Bill. “This isn’t Guantanamo, and I’m not some Jihadi twat-bucket from Durki-Durkiland! I’m your father, and I demand you loosen these ropes right now, or I’ll ground you for the rest of your natural life.”

  Ted sighed. “I’m pushing fifty, Dad,” he said. “Your grounding days are over.”

  “Perhaps we should untie him,” Edith said, gradually putting the final pieces of a jigsaw puzzle (the difficult one with the baked beans on it) into place.

  “Finally,” not-quite-Bill said. “Sense at last!”

  Ted had known his mother would crack; she’d always been the forgiving type, like when the newspapers had gotten caught recording private phone conversations. “Look at it this way,” she’d said. “If Hugh Grant had been up to his usual terrorism, people wouldn’t be so quick to complain.” Or when Harold Shipman was found guilty of fifteen murders, with another two-hundred-and-thirty-five ascribed to him, she’d said, “To be fair, his victims were getting on a bit. If you think about how much they would have ended up costing the NHS, it’s hardly surprising that a doctor took the time and effort to do something about it.”

  Yes, Edith Butcher was an exceptionally forgiving person, but Ted had never believed her to be completely off her rocker. “We can’t untie him, Mum,” Ted said. “Look at him. He’s swelling before our very eyes…”

  “Exactly,” she said, still studying the baked beans puzzle on the table before her. “If we don’t untie him soon, those ropes will cut off the circulation to his arms and legs. He’ll just be a blobby stump in a chair, and I don’t want that, not in my kitchen.”

  “Look, I promise I won’t try nothing, uh-huh,” he said, repressing the residual quiver in his upper lip. “I don’t fancy going out anymore; those days are behind me. All I want is some food and a nice lie down. This has been a very stressful night for me. To say I’m all shook up would be an understatement.”

  Ted was torn. On one hand, he knew it wasn’t right to keep his father bound like this; on the other, the man in the chair wasn’t truly his father anymore, just some bloated guy in a gaudy, glittering outfit. If there was some way to get his old man back, he doubted they’d be able to figure things out and implement it before…

  “Quick!” not-quite-Bill suddenly blurted out. He looked positively terrified. “Something’s happening. Untie me before…” He groaned and began to shudder violently, sliding backwards in his chair.

  Edith abruptly quit her puzzle and launched into full-bore panic. “Oh, Ted, quick! Do something before he has a heart attack!”

  Ted raced over and began briskly untying the ropes, wishing he hadn’t done them so tight in the first place. “It’s okay, Dad,” he said. “I’m setting you free! Everything’s gonna be alright…”

  Still seated in his chair, not-quite-Bill continued to writhe and moan. Ted didn’t want to think about it, but the sounds and smells now emanating from his father’s trousers suggested he’d be needing a good cleaning up after this. The scuff-marks on his blue suede shoes would be the least of not-quite-Bill’s worries when his arse was completely covered in shit. Clean up your own backyard, Ted couldn’t help thinking, which only seemed appropriate to their situation.

  No sooner had Ted undone the final knot when his father lurched violently forward, landing face-first with a meaty slap on the linoleum. Ted moved the chair out the way and turned the man over, trying in vain to avoid inhaling his pungent stench.

  “Is he dead?” Edith asked. “Oh my God, is he breathing?”

  “He’s breathing,” Ted said, watching his father’s chest rise and fall. “I think he’s just passed out from the… sudden weight gain.”

  And it had been quite sudden indeed. Not-quite-Bill's sparkly jacket only had one button left on it; the rest of them had popped off and whizzed across the kitchen like little plastic bullets as he’d ballooned up. The man was so packed into his trousers now, it was remarkable to think that they’d ever fit him.

  “We need to get him out of these clothes,” Ted said, wincing at the thought.

  “I was thinking that back when he was still late 60s Elvis,” Edith said.

  “Get his boots off,” Ted said, grabbing not-quite-Bill under the arms. “He’s turning into Fried Banana Elvis. Fuck knows what’s going to happen to him next.”

  With his boots, trousers and jacket finally removed (they’d ultimately had to cut his clothes off), all that remained was a bloated old man with an Elvis quiff, sprawled out upon the shit-smeared lino. Ted hadn’t seen anything so sad and pathetic since Tom Cruise decided to use Oprah’s sofa as a trampoline.

  “What’s… uhhh… what happened?” not-quite-Bill muttered, coming to. It must have been quite confusing for him; after all, a minute ago he’d been late 60s Elvis.

  “Dad, just lie still,” Ted
said, looking away in disgust. It was all he could do to keep the vomit down. For the first time that night, he was glad his mother had forgotten the fish-fingers, as they most certainly would have made an encore appearance by now. “We’re going to get you to the hospital.”

  A panicked expression formed upon not-quite Bill’s newly distended face. “I hope you’re at least going to dress me first,” he said, crinkling his nose. “Has someone farted?”

  “Let’s get him into the bathroom,” Edith said. “I can finish my jigsaw later.”

  Once they’d cleaned him up, they sat him on the toilet and discussed their options, which were: (1) hope this whole thing were just some mass-delusion, and that everything would go back to normal of its own volition, or (2) become overnight Christians, grab a bible, and start praying. As far as choices went, they were both pretty terrible.

  “I’m not going anywhere, am I?” not-quite-Bill asked dejectedly. “This is it for me.”

  “Don’t talk like that,” Ted said. “There must be something we can do.” But there wasn’t, and he knew it.

  “You could do something,” not-quite-Bill said, just as a tiny plunk sounded in the water beneath him.

  “Anything, Bill,” Edith said, stroking his chubby shoulder.

  “You couldn’t knock me up a peanut-butter sandwich, could you?” not-quite-Bill asked imploringly. “Thank you, ma’am.”

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Ted asked. “I mean, you’re already sitting on the toilet. Do we really want to tempt fate?”

  Gripping both sides of the bowl, not-quite-Bill grit his teeth and grunted, “If you don’t mind, I’ll have some peanut butter sandwiches and a couple of bananas, and if you tell me no, then so help me God I’ll start singing again!”

  Edith rushed out the door and down the steps, the sound of her footfalls followed by the clattering of plates and the refrigerator door opening and slamming shut. It wasn’t but a minute later before she’d returned.

  “Here you go, Bill,” Edith said. She was carrying a stack of sandwiches tall enough to play Jenga with. Setting the plate on the edge of the sink, she slowly took a step back, nervously anticipating his next move.

  “I’m not an animal, you know,” he said, gesturing to his fat, naked body. “A little privacy wouldn’t go amiss, uh-huh.”

  “Of course,” Edith said. “I’ll go and finish my puzzle. Ted?”

  Frankly, Ted didn’t know what to do. He knew that leaving not-quite-Bill to his own devices was probably a bad idea, and yet the very sight of him, seated on the commode like a shaved grizzly, prompted Ted to reconsider. “Okay, but I want you to shout if you feel something happ—”

  “Oh, dear, he’s dead isn’t he?” Edith gasped. The fact that not-quite-Bill had slumped forward, face-first, into the sandwiches – there were worse cushions to have when your time came – seemed to answer her question well enough. Sinking to the floor beside him, she sobbed and wailed until the man on the toilet no longer looked like Fried Banana Elvis, nor late 60s Elvis or even black-and-white Elvis.

  It looks like Dad, Ted thought. And it was. Gone were the ridiculous sideburns, the quiff, and the quivering lip that made him look as though he were in the throes of a perpetual stroke. His silver hair – what was left of it – had returned, and the red, bulbous nose suggesting a youthful fondness for liquor was back as well, squashed onto his face in the manner of a drive-by tomato shooting.

  “Oh, this is horrible,” Edith blubbered.

  Ted hugged her. “It’s okay, Mum. Dad’s in a better place now.”

  “No,” she said. “I mean, look at all those wasted sandwiches…”

  36

  Geoff and Barry – or Jake and Elwood, since they’d donned black hats and shades – had somehow managed to bounce most of the undead patrons either out the door or back into death. It was easy if you knew how; all you had to do was wait for them to get close enough, and one swift hook to the side of the head was usually enough to knock it clean off. The zombies were pretty useless without it; all that remained were confused bodies, bumping into shit, tripping over shit… it reminded Geoff (Jake) of the days he worked down at the clinic, handing out methadone to zombies of a different type.

  “You’ve got one on your ten,” Geoff remarked casually.

  Barry, who’d been busy cleaning up the few remaining zombies with heads, turned around and said, “Yeah, I see 'im… Hey, that’s no zombie!”

  And it wasn’t. It was some skinny, Jheri-curled pimp in a red leather jacket, moonwalking back and forth while periodically pausing to kick his leg about, as if trying to shake off a recalcitrant spider.

  “Shamone! Shamone! Check-da-mone, WHOOOO!!!” he said. “Sham… hey, wait a minute, it’s the motherfucking Blues Brothers, Shamone!”

  Geoff doffed his hat and whipped it at him, taking his cue from that little fella, Oddjob, from the James Bond films. Turns out it only works if the brim is razor sharp, however; the fedora simply bounced off the pimp’s shoulder, as useless as a pair of tits on a tropical fish.

  “Y’all know how rude that is?” Leroy admonished him, kicking the hat across the room and executing a perfect 720 degree spin. “Shamone!” he screamed, grabbing his crotch. The invisible spider had surely reached his nuts by now.

  “Elwood, take him out!” Geoff yelled. A headless zombie had latched itself onto his back, riding him bareback as if his name were Seabiscuit.

  Barry (Elwood) lunged at the pimp, who countered with a dainty little sidestep. Momentum carried the burly bouncer-cum-Blues-Brother forward, sending him somersaulting over the bar top.

  He landed hard on his back, knocking the wind right out of him. It didn’t help that he’d also hit a beer bottle ass-first, its neck having ripped through the seat of his trousers and… entering him. It hurt like hell, but presently he was too distracted by the strange man back there with him to let it over-bother him much.

  “Oh, I know you!” Barry grunted, extracting the bottle from his anus with an audible pop. “You’re that mad professor… What’s your name again?” He snapped fingers repeatedly, the way certain idiots do when they’re trying to recall something they probably never even knew in the first place. “Hawkins, ain’t it?” he said. “Simon fucking Hawkins!”

  Not quite, but close enough. Professor Hawking nodded in response with his eyes.

  “What are you still doing here? Don’t tell me. Your minders fucked off and left you to fend for yourself. Bastards. There ought to be a law against leaving your disabled clients to fight off zombies on their own. Broken Britain, that’s what it is, mate. I blame the credit crunch.”

  Just then, the professor’s eyes rolled back into their sockets, and a steady BEEP, BEEP, BEEP began to emanate from… wait, was that coming from inside his head?

  “What’s that noise?” Barry asked, but the professor was no longer paying him any attention. “Hey, mate, your head’s beeping. Just thought I’d let you know. I mean, that might be something you need to get looked at… and it’s getting louder and faster, too…”

  Stephen Hawking, CH CBE FRS FRSA, physicist, cosmologist, author of A Brief History of Time and Fifty Shades of Relativity, had suddenly become a ticking time-bomb.

  I knew it was a good idea to install that self-destruct trigger, he thought, as the red digits on his retinas counted down from ten… nine… eight… seven…

  “Mate, you’ve got numbers in your eyes,” Barry said, taking a closer look. “That can’t be right, can it? I mean, I know you’re practically a cyborg already and whatnot, but…”

  He’d begun counting along now; it was hard not to.

  Three… two…

  “Oh, I get it,” Barry said. “You’ve made a bomb out of y—“

  37

  The rooftop of Knickers was blown sky high, raining bricks and mortar upon the unsuspecting town. If you’d have looked up a moment or two after the blast – though doing so would’ve seared your eyes and the rest of your face as well – you just
might’ve seen the smoke and flames parting as something ethereal passed through them. The Pit-Dweller had been stealthy thus far in its assault on Bellbrook, keeping mostly to itself, but it was amazing how quickly all subtlety went out the window when your ass was on fire.

  Down on the street, the people fled in droves, trying to get as far away from ground zero as possible.

  “What the hell just happened back there?” Marcia gasped, panting. A large chunk of brick landed several feet away, leaving a dent in the pavement. “And the first person to mention aliens is gonna get a kick in the nethers.”

  Clarence shut his mouth before he could speak. So what if he believed aliens were responsible? He also believed that the majority of his charm emanated from his crackers. Without them, he’d be powerless.

  “We need to get off the street,” Goth Girl said. If it wasn’t for her pasty white face, they wouldn’t have known she was there in the dark. “We’re asking for trouble out here. Whatever’s going on, we need to lay low until it’s over.”

  “Who died and put BLECH Siouxsie Sioux in charge?” Drunk Boy demanded to know. He was cantering along just behind, bouncing off walls, shop frontages, and anything else he stumbled into.

  “Screw you, pisshead,” Goth Girl said. “If you’ve got a better idea, now would be the time to say.”

  “Love, I haven’t even got a clue where I am…” he mused. A long strand of frothy drool dangled from his chin, finally breaking off and splatting on his shoe. “I’m shurprished I’m shtill alive after what all I’ve had ta drink tonight…”

  Just then, the giant letter 'K' from the Knickers marquee fell from the sky, crushing Drunk Boy into the ground. 0.92% BAC sprayed out in all directions, coating the cobblestones with his boozy blood. It was all very horrible and, Marcia thought, horror film cliché.

  Goth Girl was just about to scream when a dark, morose voice inside her head interrupted: