Zombie Bitches From Hell

by Campbell, Zoot

  “How cheery and gay,” says Tim.

  “How unoriginal,” says Greg. “Welcome to P-Town.”

  ***

  We sit down to a meal in a former restaurant that overlooks the water. The breeze is light, the sun strong for this time of year and gulls walk on sand with plovers and other small birds. There are rocks out about a hundred yards offshore with seals on them.

  “This place really is beautiful,” I say.

  “Yeah. Used to be worth almost a thousand dollars a square foot for a house out here. Lots of Boston peeps and New Yorkers. A lot of queers have money. No kids to spend it on or save it for and almost every household with two earners. Those were good times. Not that we still don’t throw a bash now and then,” says Ryan. “There are about two hundred of us at ‘Fort P-Town’ now. Every now and then a few leave. A lot of guys want to find their parents or brothers and sisters or even old loves. It’s not an easy adjustment. It’s great here, don’t get me wrong, considering I mean, but it’s still a prison even if the bars are sand, surf and a pile of junk blocking the town line at the peninsula neck. Occasionally, a guy or two just vanish without so much as a ‘see ya later’ but I figure everyone has to deal with farewells in their own way.”

  “It’s still way better than any place else we’ve seen. You wouldn’t believe it,” I say.

  “We’ve heard some reports mostly over the radio and sometimes we’ll catch something on a boat CB. We have a lot of boats docked here—moored I should say—we decided to destroy all the docks to make landing more difficult. We don’t know how organized the zombies are.”

  “My guess is that they are evolving and from what we’ve seen crossing the country, it won’t be long before they really organize,” I respond. I continue with a brief description of what we’ve been through. Tim adds his comments and the table, which now has about twenty guys listening to us, is getting updates on the state of the union. It’s not what they want to hear but when we’re done, we get thanked and there’s a lot of ‘boys, you got balls’ talk. Most of them have been living some kind of delusion about how serious it all is. The student priests especially have been talking a great deal about God’s judgment and all that horseshit and they even convinced a bunch of the guys to attend church on Sundays. My own views I keep to myself but if they think God has figured out a way to help, I can’t avoid thinking that maybe he should not have let the plague happen to begin with. Just me though and I guess it can’t hurt if these guys find some solace in their prayers.

  The meeting breaks up and Ryan tells a twenty-something named Terry to show us to our quarters. Terry was a Broadway dancer and he tells us about some of his adventures on the great white way. He tells us there is an old boarded-up dinner theater on the east side of town and he’d love to re-open it someday and start putting on shows.

  “Where is the place?” I ask knowing or hoping or dreaming or wishing that that is where Jen is. How could she still be alive? I think.

  “Let’s get you two settled in and I’ll take you over. Okay?”

  Tim looks at me. “That would be fun,” he says.

  Terry waits outside while we unload our gear in an old motel that’s in the middle of town. I would have preferred a water view but I think it’s better to be in the middle of things on the theory that there is safety in numbers.

  “Let’s do the tour,” I tell Tim.

  “I know what you’re thinking and I think I’ll pass. I’m toured out, Captain and I think I’ll settle in, maybe walk a little.”

  “Suit yourself,” I say as Terry honks the horn. “I won’t be long.”

  Terry heads north and there are people walking around like everything is normal, like the good old days. No women of course, but the guys are in groups, smoking, standing around being social. Some are on porches, sitting on porch steps, candles, kerosene lanterns lighting the untended gardens and overlong grasses that smother the picket fences and stream up through cracks in the pavement. Terry pulls up to a very tall lighthouse at the northernmost point of the Cape and turns the lights of the Jeep off. We watch the waves roll in.

  “Is the theater around here?” I ask.

  “About two blocks away,” he says. “I just want to sit a spell. I used to come here every summer. It was great. My parents had a cottage near here but one of those nor’easters tore the hell out of it and they ended up selling the land it used to sit on for like ten times the amount they paid for it. I guess they were motivated by watching me watching all the guys. It wasn’t easy for them.”

  “Were you here when the plague hit?”

  “You mean the GaGa, right? When you say plague to a queen, we usually think AIDS.”

  “Yeah, the GaGa.”

  “I remember the night I first heard of the virus scare. I didn’t know quite what to do so I simply went to bed after locking and double locking the doors. Even that was not enough; I got up and nailed the windows shut. Almost broke a few but I was careful. Got back into bed and thought and rethought my life. My bedroom was dark, the ceiling the blue of dusk, the furniture deep gray. I had my headphones on and was listening to the love theme from Terminator II, my favorite part of the film. As the music rose and fell, I could envision the scene as clearly as if I were in the theater. Michael Biehn, the hero of the first Terminator movie, was bathing in a lake in the woods, his well-scarred body tan except for the cheeks of his rear end which were the color of mayonnaise. There was the Arnold Schwarzenegger Terminator hiding in the woods peeping through the limbs of some blue spruces, his red light eyes bright as Christmas ornaments on the Rockefeller Center tree. He watched Michael wash himself, particularly observing how the wan sunlight caught the peach fuzz coating on his ass, that beautiful double scoop, vanilla ice cream ass. Terminator’s eyes narrowed and glowed fiercely staring at the twin hemispheres of masculinity. He could take it no longer but strode out through the trees and, as if to show his peaceful intent, raised his hands in the air and said, ‘I come in peace, no pun intended.’ Michael slowly turned and said, ‘I knew you were there, big boy. What took you so long?’ Here, the violins and oboes made a lilting crescendo as Terminator grabbed Michael and nibbled the back of his neck.

  “It was only a minute before his hydraulic reproduction pod penetrated those buns and when he orgasmed his machine oil into Michael, he blew him up from the inside, showering the serene lake with bits of blood, colon and stool in a most egregious fashion, startling a pair of mallards into flight and making the fish jump for a hundred yards in every direction. It was such a sad ending for our hero, but Terminator learned the dangers of man-love and would never be a threat to humanity again, not if he had anything to say about it. As the oboes and piccolos danced their sad dance in my headphones, Terminator took what was left of Michael and carried him to an old well nearby, tossing him in as a tympani thrummed away and the music ended with three cymbals crashing as the lifeless body fell down the shaft and landed in an antique wheelbarrow that some wayward youths had dropped down a few years earlier as a prank on a local pig farmer. Surely, no cinematic scene could have been more profound. I dabbed at my tears with the brittle end of my pillowcase and cursed my mother for insisting on starching my bed linens. Jesus, they were stiff as a priest’s collar and crunched all night long as I moved to the inner rhythms of my sleep. I wish real life was more like the movies.

  “I had started seeing my ex-wife, Susan, again. Old loves die hard and while I had fallen in love with Robert, Sue never left my heart, my achy, breaky heart which creaked and groaned when I re-lived those moments with my childhood sweetheart. Unfortunately, Robert had discovered my liaisons with her by following me one day and seeing the two of us at a small café in the village. We were only talking, but it might as well have been a major doggie-style sex party on the sidewalk. Robert is one of those ‘hold it in, then explode’ types so I was not prepared when he cross-examined me that night as I lay in bed early complaining of a headache. He caught me in the lie and when I told him he should
mind his own beeswax, he went temporarily insane. He smashed his fist down on a glass cocktail table that I had lovingly purchased at a designer close-out sale at Bloomies. The glass split into large triangular shards and he picked one up, entered the bedroom, and holding it like a dagger said, ‘I’m gonna cut your fuckin’ heart out if I catch you cheating on me. Do you understand?’ Well, of course I understood. I held the sheets tightly under my chin as if that over-starched 400 count Egyptian cotton could offer any sort of protection against a shard-wielding queen on a jealous rampage. Even his slight lisp had vanished like a blackbird in the night. The moments he spent looming over my prostrate form seemed like hours. I’d thought he would never leave. But eventually, the door to our apartment closed and I knew he had gone for a walk to cool down and contemplate how he could make up to me for being so violent.

  “As I thought about it, I felt every inch like Michael Biehn bathing in the lake. Robert was my Terminator and I was filled with romantic notions of man love and how truly repulsed I was when I saw Susan’s breasts in her tight-fitting Gucci T-shirt. Those things are so gushy—yikes, nothing like a good hard set of pecks on a real man. Governor Arnold, where art thou? Art thou in the woods espying me? Robert? Robert, please return unto me.

  “I’m just a die-hard romantic, I guess. I put on my headphones again and longingly listened to the love theme from Godzilla. Oh sad Jurassic monster, come to me. Trumpet your tragic growls. I am here. Needless to say, I slept soundly as a log considering the world was coming to an end outside my window.”

  I’m thinking, what the fuck? when he says, “Let’s walk to the theater. It isn’t but a few hundred feet away. It’s a beautiful night.”

  “Whatever you say.”

  He takes me over to the building that used to be one of the biggest attractions in P-Town, tells me how many Broadway stars would do summer stock up here and on that stage. Next door is a shuttered ice cream stand with the sign hanging off at a forty-five degree angle. Uncle Benny’s Luscious Cream Shop.

  I walk back and forth in front of the theater. Looks completed deserted; boarded up real tight. I don’t want to seem too curious.

  “This place must’ve been something in the day,” I say.

  “Yeah, used to be great. Let’s get going. I’m tuckered.”

  We get back in the Jeep and he drives me back to the motel.

  “Don’t suppose you need company tonight?” he asks.

  “No. I’m pretty tired. It’s been a long day.”

  “It’s been a long year,” he says.

  “Thanks for the tour,” I say.

  “Anytime.”

  The Jeep disappears into the night and the lull of distant waves and the smell of salt air surround me.

  CHAPTER 23

  The moon hasn’t risen yet and I’m thankful for small favors. I can easily remember where the Brookstone Dinner Theater is thanks to Terry’s tour. I stick to alleys and dark corners, avoiding lighted windows. I can hear guys laughing as I pass a house and see candles on a table, shadows moving and some even dancing. Life goes on, I think to myself. The irony of these guys being some of the last men on Earth is not wasted on me. I hear the sound of a car behind me and duck behind a large stand of dune grass near a tattered picket fence. It’s one of the jeeps on patrol with its top down and two men sitting in it armed with rifles. They have those over-top mounted searchlights and for a second I think I’m spotted as the light catches me but the grass is so thick and the breeze blowing it around is a perfect cover. It goes by and I can hear Bruce Springsteen music on the CD player as it passes. It turns at the next corner and the motor noise diminishes to a whisper and then silence again. I walk hurriedly, being extra careful to notice places I can quickly hide in.

  The dead neon sign of the theater looms against the black sky, heightened by the fact that the building sits high on a sandy hill that drops off at a steep grade to the water. I go under it and walk around the back looking for a way to enter. Nothing. The backdoor is nailed shut with three pieces of weathered plywood. The same for all the windows. The place is tighter than a bank vault. If Jen was inside, she couldn’t get out. If she had gotten out, she’d have been summarily shot; that was the rule, wasn’t it? Ryan had made that amply clear. Any female seen on P-Town ground was to be exterminated. Whatever foolish hopes I had been holding onto all this time were for nothing. I sit up against the back of the building and watch the small waves lap at the shore, little furlings and unfurlings of black water against an empty beach. I should be thinking about what to do next. Stay? Keep moving? But to where and for what?

  I start down the hill to the water and notice about halfway down that there is a large drainpipe that opens onto the hill. It’s about four feet in diameter and looks like a storm drain. I’m thinking if any place needs storm drains, this is it. The whole town is only a few feet above sea level. But this drain does not lead toward a road but back to the theater. I take out my flashlight and shine it inside. It’s dark as hell of course but there is nothing in there; no standing water, not flotsam. Nothing. Actually, it’s so clean it looks new. Why haven’t the P-Town residents blocked this off? Maybe they checked the building already and deemed it empty. Maybe they figured no one would bother wading up a drainage pipe. They must be getting more comfortable than they let on.

  I crouch down and head into the pipe. The flashlight beam glistens off the aluminum sides but gets blurry straight ahead. Still, I continue and at the end the light catches a small doorway, more like a hatch. I pull on the handle and it slides open easily as if on well-oiled hinges. A smell of feces, garbage and an indeterminate odor of rotting flesh makes me close the door again. I turn and lean on it, rethinking things. Am I insane? What am I supposed to find in here? But the answer is made for me. The door is shoved open and two bitches leap out and grab me, drag me back in, their grip on my arms like vices. My voice is lost in the wind and the sand.

  I’m dragged to what I am sure is my certain death. The odor is overwhelming; rot, putrifaction, shit, cess; every disgusting smell that humanity has ever encountered and a few more for good measure. Now I know why no one came up this way.

  “Why don’t you cunts get it over with and kill me?” I ask real dramatic and all when, in fact, I have let go a few ounces of piss into my pants. “Come’on, you fuckin’ bitches! Come’on!” I even sound ballsy to myself. But they are most definitely not listening.

  I’m pushed through a door of an oak-paneled saloon, something out of the roaring twenties or whatever they used to call it. There are bitches standing like department store mannequins all along the walls and some ten or so are sleeping in a heap in a corner like cats. Most are naked, but it’s impossible to get any more detail because it is so dimly lit.

  A tall, dark-haired one enters the room from an arched doorway. On either side of her are girls that stand at least six feet tall, straight-haired and milky-eyed. They chatter their teeth imperceptibly. The main bitch stops and the two side bitches approach and pat me down. I go to kick one of them but her hand grabs my leg feeling every bit as if a pit bull has clamped his jaws on my thigh.

  They then get on either side of me and hold me by the arms and shoulders; feels like I’m tied to an oak tree.

  “Kent,” the head bitch says. “How nice to see you.” Her voice is raspy like two pieces of sandpaper getting rubbed together.

  “How do you know my name?” I ask. Then it dawns on me. Seconds pass. “Jen? Is that you?”

  Tears run down my cheeks as I see the absence of human light in Jen’s eyes. This whole trip has become meaningless, and yet I would have gone crazy not knowing her fate had I stayed back in Denver.

  Jen is truly evolved, she’s one of the talkers. She explains to me that the bitches are organized along the lines of beehives only there are more “queen bees” than a real hive, which has only one. She tells me that the hives are in communication with each other but does not explain how and that most of the zombies do not speak but respond to sub
tle non-verbal signals given by the queens. It becomes obvious, as if it wasn’t obvious long ago, that the bitches are taking over the Earth, evolving into something powerful, albeit undead. I’m thinking this is not necessarily a bad thing. After all, guys did a way less than perfect job for the first ten thousand years or so.

  “Jen, are you going to kill all the men?” I ask and then realize it sounds like I’m pleading for my life which at this point I don’t give two shits about. At least I’m thinking that but you never know. People can bullshit themselves into temporarily believing anything.

  “Do you still love me?” I ask her. Holy crap, I think, I never thought I’d ask such a lame question.

  “Sure,” she says trying to take the sandpaper edge off her voice and looking into my eyes. Those white, milky eyes don’t say much but there is something there that ain’t good. “Of course I do.” I know for a fact that when you ask someone a question with a yes or no answer, the “of course” is bullshit, complete and total.

  “Have the women taken over the whole Earth?” I ask.

  She looks at me as if to say, what’s it to you?

  “Yes. We have left small islands for the men. We need them. When the time for the circle to close arrives, things will be different.”

  She explains they attempt to keep at least ten percent of the twenty to twenty-five year old bitches pregnant.

  “But how do you get the guys…” I ask forgetting that most guys will fuck anything that moves. I had a friend named Andy from Iowa who did sheep. Lots of guys do their dogs. It’s a sick world but I’m not the one to judge.

  “Let me show you,” she rasps. I follow her into what was obviously a storage area. There are three wooden tables dimly lit and on the tables are three guys each naked face down. They are guarded by six bitches, two for each guy. There are buckets full of stool and vomit at the edges of the room, a slop sink and a neat row of plastic cups on a shelf near a sink. Jen nods her head to one of the bitches who goes to the sink and lifts a long neck beer bottle out of it.