“Close your eyes, I’ll be gentle.” Jamie whispered, intending on giving me a little personal moral support. However, one of the microphones nearby picked up her husky voice loud and clear and that statement was immediately uploaded to the website and linked to a hot rotating .gif of Jamie dancing in a one-piece mini-dress. Two minutes later, thousands of people heard it, an hour later it was over one hundred thousand and became her defining catchphrase.
She took the spoon and knife and scooped up a small spoonful into my mouth. The mushy texture was a bit of a turn off, but she’d seasoned the meat with just enough ginger to take away that gamy wild taste I was expecting.
Our supporters yelled, “Think of the money!”
I chewed twice and swallowed. She continued feeding me in this way and in no time my plate was clean.
Julian paced back and forth between the teams and the audience and cheers erupted from our supporters when he held up my clean plate.
The other teams weren’t having the same kind of luck with their meal. Quaid was trying to monopolize the scene and was lobbing pieces of meat from across the table at Norris’s gaping mouth. Norris was doing his best to catch, chew and swallow them down, but you could see he was getting a bit annoyed with Quaid’s antics. Lydia was yelling at Derrik and shoving piece after piece of meat into his mouth causing him to puke up some stringy bits down his strait-jacket. But Meng was having the most difficult time of all. Esther refused to eat any of the squirrel meat, apparently petrified that she would catch the fever and become like Yvonne.
Norris finished his meal and then Derrik, but Esther still refused to eat the squirrel regardless of Meng’s pleas and screams of ‘Kiasi’, coward in Singlish, from the audience.
It became apparent that Esther’s refusal to eat the squirrel was contrary to Sheldon’s plan with the show. There was a point when the cameras panned away from Meng and Esther and onto Gemma in her bikini as she was forced to adlib an interview with Julian so that Sheldon could huddle with her and try to talk her into eating the meat. There wasn’t supposed to be an elimination today. Even if he shot additional post interviews back in Singapore and stuck in a bunch of extra footage of Berjalan penyakit, so far he only had six hour-long episodes in the can. If Esther didn’t eat the squirrel, three of six teams would be eliminated and that was one too many this early in the show. He’d lose at least two full episodes of the twelve contractual episodes he’d promised his superiors.
But Esther refused to cooperate. She looked tough and ready for difficult challenges with that body building figure, but underneath she was really just a nervous housewife with a fitness addiction. She’d decided that she was through with the whole shebang and kept repeating, “I want to go home. I want to go home. I want to go home.”
Defeated, Sheldon signaled to Julian and Gemma that it was time to announce Team 3’s elimination. Gemma walked to the center of the screen and faced the audience, “Ladies and Gentlemen, Cera fans and zombie freaks, we have a situation. Esther,” she pointed back at Team 3, “refuses to tuck into her fine bush meal, prepared under instruction from one of the greatest chef’s to ever come out of South East Asia.”
Boos and jeers were thrown from the audience in Esther’s direction.
Gemma got down and dirty with her monologue, loving the attention as it gave her a chance to show her verbal spontaneity skills honed as a radio DJ. “Ladies and Gentlemen, for Esther’s failure, her utter lack of competitive spirit and teamwork, yes, and her kaisi attitude to complete the simplest of tasks, we are forced to eliminate Team 3. Please, take her out of my sight. You make me sick!” She ended in a shriek of derision.
The crowd vented their rage at the events happening on the green screen in front of them as Meng was led and Esther dragged along on her dolly out of frame. They spit and cursed and pulled at their hair.
“Special thanks to Julian Ng for his participation,” Gemma pointed with her long painted nails to Julian who waved to the audience, “Three teams. A growing zombie threat. Mass hysteria in Malaysia. Who will be eliminated? Who will win the million dollar prize? Who will be the next one to catch zombie fever? We’ll see you for the next episode of Cera’s Amazing Rally Showdown!”
The audience cheered and shrieked and clapped their clappers.
“CUT!” Sheldon yelled.
The screen went blank.
Crewmen slapped each other on the back cheered Sheldon for successfully masterminding an event with a live Berjalan penyakit and a live audience. Sheldon thanked everyone and climbed into his mini-bus to get a little thinking time. His head was swirling at the heady prospect of short clips and commercial outtakes he could pull from the cooking segment. But thanks to that ungrateful bitch Esther, he’d have to think of some more events on the fly. If only he hadn’t used a live audience, he could have re-filmed the ending and have Meng stuff some bakkwa into his teammate’s whiney little mouth.
Events, events. Hmmm. How about Malay events?
There it is.
He could pad the show with a culturally exploitive event. There was still a half a day of sunlight left, plenty of time to throw together a few competitions. What if he used the beach as a backdrop, some cheap indigenous items for props and a few gift certificates as prizes, then slot it in to the show as an episode before today’s elimination? Ha, that was it.
He came back out of his trailer after twenty minutes of shallowly deep thought and addressed the teams, “All right, Teams, congratulations on making it to the top three! You’re so close to the million dollars now, can you smell the money?” Sheldon sniffed at imaginary wads of cash in his hands. “We were planning on giving you the rest of the day off to lounge around in our secure and heavily guarded beach front hotel, but that’s just not going to happen now. We weren’t intending on eliminating teams today, so we have to create some more footage. The good news is, in lieu of worrying about losing out on the grand prize, there will be some special prizes for today’s events given out to first, second and third places respectively.”
Still thinking on the fly, Sheldon said, “We also need some more footage of the teams running through Malaysian backcountry. So please, remove your partner’s restraints and start running your little behinds down the road to our hotel about three kilometers away. We’ll post signs along the way. You need to run to the hotel as fast as you can with your cameramen. Leave your bags in your cars. Don’t worry about being attacked by zombies around here. I have it on good authority that the Port Dickson area is IHS free and most of the residents have evacuated south, so you shouldn’t have a problem with any of them either.
Oh, one other thing. Meng and Esther, you still have to participate in the rest of the day’s events. Okay, lah? What are you waiting for? Go o’redy!”
Chapter 7
JAMIE unbuckled the strait-jacket and helped me off the dolly. I did a few stretches and actually felt pretty good. I had a full stomach and was in high spirits. We were still in the game and could relax and have a good time for the rest of the day. Only a couple more teams left. All we needed to do was outlast Lydia and Derrik, then with a little luck and if the rest of the elimination challenges tested overall physical fitness and not brute strength, we may have a chance against the Ang Mohs. As though to prove my point, as we ran down the winding road following the red Cera flags posted every half kilometer on the road, we easily sprinted by the other teams. Quaid was the only other truly physically healthy person, but Norris couldn’t make it fifty meters without stopping, grasping his knees and wheezing.
As we ran, Felix made intermittent hooting noises so that we’d look back at the camera as we ran down the hill. I’m sure he was instructed to do so. If you think about it, the footage would look like we were being chased along the forested road towards the towering, gated hotel up ahead that seemed quite out of place on a hillside surrounded by kampongs and rural farms.
As we got closer to the hotel, we were surprised to see that it appeared as if it were still under cons
truction. The hotel had twelve stories, but the only two top floors had been completely renovated. The rest of the floors were nothing but concrete shells. Weeds and tropical plants were taking over the lower floors. However, half of the ground floor was complete and I could see the lift ascending to the eleventh floor.
No wonder Sheldon said the hotel was secure. If we were staying in those two top floors, it was like a concrete fortress in the sky.
We sprinted up to the gate and tried to enter but it was locked and the guard station out front abandoned. I walked the length of the chalky stone wall surrounding the front of the hotel until I came to an impassable and insect-filled section of forest. There was a service entrance just beyond the thorny overgrowth, but I could see it had been bricked up from the interior long ago.
So we stood at the gate and waited under the planted palms the other teams to arrive.
Five minutes ticked by.
Esther and Meng, along with Lydia and Derrik approached, not putting in much effort, half-walking and half-running. Quaid and Norris brought up the rear a short time later. It looked like the run had sucked Norris of all his energy. About twenty meters behind them, the crew inched along in their lorries and vans, staying behind the teams so as to stay out of the camera. Since running to the hotel was a rather spontaneous decision on Sheldon’s part, an upset Gemma couldn’t jet ahead to the hotel to cool her heels until the filming was complete.
I wondered if Tucker and Zombie Yvonne would be staying in the same hotel or if they would be held somewhere else.
Sheldon jumped out of the air-conditioned RV as they pulled up and banged on the gate with a crow bar supplied by his driver. A Malay woman in a mustard yellow hotel uniform and hijab, the traditional head scarf, came to the gate. She was rather plain looking and bookish with wire-rimmed glasses and no make-up. Her gold nametag said, Suriana.
She unlocked the gate with a key from a zip line from her waistband and pushed it open with a loud squeal.
“Welcome to Port Dickson Cove Suites. My name is Suriana. I’m the General Manager of this fine establishment. Consider me your humble servant for the length of your stay. As the hotel has been fully booked by your production, you may proceed to your rooms.” She looked down at a piece of paper she held in her hands. “I’ve been instructed to take the teams and host to the ambassador suites on the eleventh floor. Mr. Sheldon you will be staying in the Sultan’s Penthouse on twelve. As for the rest of the crew, we’ve provided some lovely tents and portable toilets out back on the tennis courts beside the Cove’s fountain and pool. As our hotel restaurant is currently under renovation, your evening meal and continental breakfast will be brought in by catering truck at the appropriate time.”
“What about Yvonne and Tucker?” Esther asked, clearly still shaken from what she’d witnessed earlier. “They can’t stay here. I refuse to stay here if there’s a zombie on the premises.” Meng put his arm around her shoulder in non-verbal support.
Suriana looked perplexed.
Sheldon stepped forward, “Nothing to worry about. They’re on their way to the quarantine station we drove by this morning at the state border. I wash my hands of them. It’s not the production’s problem that they decided to help that boy who was obviously infected with Berjalan penyakit.” He pointed his finger at the teams, “Let that be a lesson for you. If you stray from the rally, we are not responsible! We will keep you safe if you do as we say. Now go to your rooms and freshen up, you smell like a squirrel cage and you’re attracting flies.”
We followed Suriana to the lift. She chose a key from the zip line and inserted it into the panel next to the doors and pushed the up button. “I’m the only one with a key. The stairway has been finished to the fourth floor only. This lift is the only way up or down. If you need anything you have an intercom linked to my office here,” she pointed to the half of the lobby that was finished. There was a glass door but we couldn’t see inside as there were drawn flower curtains that had been hung from the interior.
The interior of the lift was surprisingly immaculate and modern. When we arrived at the eleventh floor the doors swooshed open to a lavish five-star interior. There was lush carpet, original paintings on the wall and expensive fixtures. Our rooms were equally impressive with large jetted tubs and four poster beds. The hotel may not have been completed for what it was originally intended, more likely as a tourist beach stop, but for what it was, it was surprisingly impressive.
“This place is really nice,” Jamie commented.
“It’s kind of like a durian,” I joked, “all poky and hard on the outside, but once you inside, there’s something delicate and sensuous.”
“Yeah well, I bet the original investors went bankrupt and some wealthy Malaysian in the area saw the value of a clandestine boutique hotel fortress high above and away from prying eyes.” She replied, raising her eyebrows as she pulled off her stained tennis outfit and tossed it into the rubbish bin next to the bureau. “Look at all the luxury soaps and shampoos in the bathroom. Here, touch the sheets, that’s some thread count. I’ve heard about these types of places. It’s invitation only for married men in the upper-class social circles of Negeri Semilan looking for a discretionary rendezvous with their mistresses.”
“I think it’s kind of romantic,” I stripped off my outfit and it joined hers in the bin.
“We’ll have a very comfortable night snuggling in this bed,” she was rolling on the king-sized mattress, stretching out in her skivvies. “Oh, it’s so comfortable.”
All I wanted to do was lie beside her on that bed designed for forbidden trysts, but I still had squirrel juices smeared down my neck and a chunky piece of meat stuck between two molars that needed a good flossing to be removed. I slipped into the bathroom and left the door half open in the event Jamie wanted to join me. The shower had three heads, a huge one hanging from the ceiling that fell like rain and the other two pointing from the walls onto different parts of my body. It felt great. There was plenty of hot water and I chose a particularly nice smelling lavender shampoo and green tea body wash, luxuriating in the smells and physical sensations from fizzing soapy chemicals that made my skin tingle.
As I was showering, I heard the buzz of the intercom beside the door, then Jamie opening the door and speaking to someone for a few moments.
I turned off the water and asked, “What do they want now?”
“See for yourself,” she had come inside the bathroom. I opened the shower door. Jamie was standing there holding up the tackiest CARS t-shirts I’d seen so far. They were blood red and had grey zombies with black eyes reaching out underneath the Cera Amazing Rally Showdown logo. Splats of green blood had been painted on the back and sleeves. “And don’t forget the hats,” She pulled on a tight fitting black baseball cap with a patch on the front that had a squirrel in crosshairs. “We’re supposed to wear these for the events later. Can you believe this crap? Sheldon has definitely lost it.”
I could see Jamie was turning negative and we couldn’t have that. She could be a real downer if she started down that road. “We’re puppets in a show that has no script. There’s nothing we can do. They have to give the million dollars to one of the teams. We’re so close now. I don’t think your reputation as a fashionista will be too tarnished if you’re seen in that get-up for a couple of scenes. If anyone can pull off those clothes and make them look good, I’m sure it’s you. Now, get undressed, you have to try this shower. It’s heaven.”
Jamie showered and I changed into the Cera t-shirt, tied the front into a knot in front of my belly to accentuate my figure and hide the zombie print and found some jean shorts that didn’t look too bad with the blood red color. With my white trainers and hair pushed through the back of the hat in a pony-tail, I was back to looking cutesy-cute again. I took out Jamie’s jean shorts and laid them with her Cera clothing on the sitting chair next to the bathroom door. When Jamie came out of the bathroom in one of the hotel bathrobes, drying off her hair with a towel, I did a 36
0 degree spin, modeling my outfit, “Huh? Huh? Cute, right?”
She flicked the towel at my butt. I jumped and squealed. She laughed and I did too. We couldn’t take all this stuff too seriously. We needed to keep it light, regardless of what had happened to Yvonne.
Jamie chased me around the room flicking me with the towel and we ended up on the bed jumping up and down like children when the intercom buzzed yet again.
I pushed the button on the front panel.
“Please show some respect for the property. That bed you’re jumping on was imported from France.” Suriana’s said commandingly through the speaker. How did she know what we were doing? I looked around the room quickly. Were there cameras spying? It was a mystery to me. I couldn’t see any obvious signs of surveillance equipment. If there were cameras, they must have been concealed in the lighting, vents or fire detectors.
I whispered in Jamie’s ear, “The walls have eyes and probably ears. Don’t bring out your phone. We don’t know who is watching. Change and let’s get downstairs. I’m getting the creeps now thinking about what goes on in these rooms, especially if it’s being recorded.”
Downstairs wasn’t really any better with the creepiness factor. The crew was back to pretending this was just another reality show. They were running around setting up the events on the beach and on a grassy patch under palm trees. We were told to sit beside the fountain where the rest of the teams were waiting, dressed in the same Cera uniforms.
I was a bit resentful that Meng and Esther were still here, but I understood the process. They were officially out of the running for the grand prize and it would just look better for the camera if there were four teams competing in this evening’s competitions.
Everyone silently watched as crewmen attached curved knives to the ends of long bamboo poles with lashings and duct tape and stuck a line of thick steel spikes into the grass. Other crewmen were on the beach close to the water where the tide had pulled away leaving the sand thick and firm. They were unrolling what looked to be burlap sacks and lining them up side by side. My imagination ran wild. I pictured elongated knife fights with zombies imported for the show and kept at a distance by the ten meter long poles, then finishing the event with beheadings and placing the heads on those jutting barbs like medieval pikes. The burlap sacks would be for bodies which would be pushed unceremoniously into the sea for burial.
Zombie Fever: Outbreak Page 13