by Mark Clodi
“This is WWEB, you’re on caller.” said the dj.
“Yes, hi, I am in a car heading down interstate twenty five north, we need to know if interstate seventy west or highway six are clear and how to get through town to Arvada. I can report that there are several major accidents on interstate twenty five, but no people or zombies up on the highway. The accidents block the northbound highway near exit one ninety nine and almost fully block it near the Hampden avenue exit. Can anyone give us advice on where to go?”
The dj paused for a moment, then said, “Okay ladies and gentleman we have a woman in need of assistance, has anyone been out on the highways since yesterday evening? If so how are they? Or has anyone gotten through from south Denver to Arvada? How did you do it? Anything else caller?”
“The zombies are not all slow and shambling like one of your last callers said, they can be very quick and strong too, we ran into one at the Mac Co building where we were holed up for quite a few hours. The zombies, I think they gain strength from eating…eating us, then they move quicker. I have seen this with my own eyes. And they can talk, so be wary of everyone, some might pretend to be ‘alive’ to get close enough to you to attack.”
“Oh-kay caller,” the dj sounded dubious, “The information is out there people, watch out for talking, fast moving zombies. Good information or bad? Call in with road advice and your opinion on the zombie’s speed and voice capabilities.”
The phone clicked and the dj went off the air, but remained on Diane’s cell phone, “What do you mean they can talk? Like they could call me on the phone? Are you serious?”
Diane replied, “Yeah, deadly serious, the one we met refrained from eating us right away, she had some sort of ‘gang’ going and wanted certain members of the gang to eat us. She was also speaking to one of our co-workers through the door, they had a gun, but thought we were all dead, so apparently did not want to risk fighting this…woman for no gain. She spoke to us and to him, told him we were all dead, she lied to him.”
“Shit.”
“What?” asked Diane.
“Double shit. People have been calling, a few mobile types, like you. They had nowhere else to go.”
“What do you mean?”
“I gave them directions on how to get here.” he whispered.
“You gotta get out of there! You don’t know who you were talking to, you need to get out now. How long ago was it?”
“I gotta go.” The phone went dead and music came on the radio, the dj promised to return after a brief moment to refresh his cup of coffee.
Diane held her phone away from her face and stared at it a moment, then looked at the radio. The canned music continued to play.
Chapter 31
Jimbo, felt the tug on his will growing as Fred fed on the mother they had found defending her three kids. No father was present and there was a mini van in the garage, along with an empty space where another car would be parked. Jimbo had taken the first kid they found without a thought, a twelve or thirteen year old brat with a baseball bat. He had slammed the kid down, driving his arm through the bat into the kid’s shoulder, knocking him to the ground, leaving him broken, but alive for Fred. Next had come the mother, not much more of a challenge, she too had a baseball bat, a shorter one, like for little league. Jimbo smacked her in the face, stunning or knocking her unconscious, once he was sure she was down, he turned to make sure Fred was gnawing on the ‘hero’ while he turned towards the other kids, a younger girl and her older brother, who was probably ten or eleven, who knew with kids? Not having any kids of his own Jimbo could only guess at their ages. Both brats were screaming and Jimbo knocked their heads together in a comical way he had seen on a classic episode of the three stooges at some point in his life. That is when they started screaming in earnest. ‘I thought it was supposed to knock them out?’, grimacing he backhanded the little girl, who rolled over and crawled under the bed, he took the boy and bit deep into his young, fleshy neck, enjoying the hot, spurting blood that filled his mouth.
When it was over and his appetite was sated, the girl was hiding under the bed, the mother unconscious and Fred was finishing up the first kid. Jimbo looked at the boy in his arms, undamaged except for a ripped out throat. He knew, instinctively, that he could gain more energy from consuming the flesh of his foe, but he also knew that if he stopped eating now the body would reanimated under his direct control. Sure Nancy and maybe even Fred would have some ability to boss around Jimbo’s creations, but ultimately he thought they would serve him first.
Jimbo waited until the kid started to revive, then pushed the savage zombie beast towards his former mother. The kid started in on her feet and Fred, done with the first one, started in on the other end. Disgusting. Jimbo was feeling much, much stronger. ‘It is in the blood.’, he thought, ‘Whatever makes us come back is in the blood, it gives us life now.’ He made sure the mother was eaten, and damaged enough to not revive, same with the older kid. Then he turned towards the bed. The girl had to be younger, six, maybe seven. Not too strong, probably less upkeep, but hey, Jimbo could not make everyone into zombies.
Once the mother was finished, Jimbo grabbed the boy, who was still half wild and together they flipped the bed over and grabbed his paralyzed sister. Fred tried to butt in on this treat, but Jimbo backhanded him. Then Fred concentrated and Jimbo could feel the ‘pull’ urging him to get the fuck out of Fred’s way. Jimbo squared his shoulders and spoke to Fred, “Not. Yet. We will get you up and running, but give this one to the kid and I so I can get stronger, like you mister ‘kid and half a mom eater’, and so the kid can at least get as strong as you are. As a team we are better off having the same amount of power than having one super strong member. I won’t be a Nancy on you and won’t have you pulling that shit on me either. I rescued you man, so back off this time.”
With apparent reluctance Jimbo felt the pressure compelling him diminish and he turned for his half of the little girl, the boy had drained most of her blood from her throat and Jimbo ended up sitting down to a larger meal than he had anticipated, eating quite a few of the girls internal organs, he had not wanted to really, just felt doing so would give him the most ‘bang’ for his eating experience. By the time he was through the boy was sobbing. ‘Fuck’, thought Jimbo, ‘Now I gotta counsel the little brat through this shit?’
“Hey, cut it out.” Jimbo concentrated and tried to get the kid to stop crying mentally, it worked. The boy's mind was almost like a path inside of his head and if Jimbo concentrated he could see where the rows of faint light went, which must be the kid's thoughts, and slowly he could divert them. He was lost in thought over this and become so involved with the process of sorting through the kid’s mind that he lost track of time. By the time he came back to reality he had made the kid forget that his first victims were his former family members, and set it up so that when they left the house, he would think they had eaten the creepy neighbor man and his bully son that the boy had feared for years instead. The boy was almost happy by the time Jimbo left his mind. Fred watched everything from the edge of the room while he gnawed on one of the mother’s legs. He looked much better and Jimbo focused his attention on Fred’s mind briefly. There was resistance there, but he could get through enough to see that Fred was doing some serious thinking about trying to control Jimbo or trying to work with him. Jimbo tried to subtly nudge Fred into the ‘work with Jimbo’ and ‘Jimbo is my savior’ mode of thinking. He thought he was successful but it was so much harder than he imagined it would be.
As a brief afterthought he tried to turn his minds eye inward to examine his own brain. There it was, exposed for the world to see. ‘Fuck’, he thought, ‘what to do about this? I can’t be running around all open to everyone.’ He thought about it for a minute then came up with an analogy, clear cloudless day was what he was seeing in his own head, what he needed was a cloudy downpour or better a heavy fog, so others could not see his thoughts at all. Going with the weather theme he concentrated and slow
ly saw his mind fog up until he was looking at a storm cloud, with internal eye instead of a clear sunny day. The cloud surrounded his head, obscuring all his ‘running lights’ from view. Better still he was pretty sure if anyone tried to play 'Moses' and part the water vapor protecting his mind, he would know about it. Would it hold against Nancy? He did not know, he suspected it would hold against Fred though. One thing for certain his manipulations had left him hungry again, unusually so, he wanted more food.
“Well Fred, what have you decided? Are we a team or are you going to try and be my master? We are once removed, one of the zombies you created, a real bitch by the name of Nancy, wanted you dead, I saved you and brought you up to strength. You can probably figure out why, I didn’t like following Nancy’s orders. I am pretty sure she can find us if she concentrates hard enough and I would like to have you there to protect me from her when she shows up, waddya say?”
Jimbo knew his manipulations had worked before Fred even answered, almost without thinking he could see how Fred was thinking. He had done it.
“I think I would rather work with you than have to watch my back all the time. Besides I remember Nancy, she was a fake bitch in real life, a hollow core, a true salesma-woman. I never liked her, but she did her job. What did you do to your head and the boy’s and to me?” asked Fred.
“Well, Bobby, he was getting all sobbed up about eating his mom and all, I can’t stand whiny crybabies, so I have fixed him to think this ain’t his mom, right Bobby?”
“What?” came Bobby’s reply, “This is Mr Thompson’s house. His kid had an xbox three sixty and they would never let us play it. Thompson was mean, he yelled at me and I am glad he is dead.” Bobby’s eyes were glazed and unfocused.
“See?” asked Jimbo.
“And me?”
“Well you were trying to make a decision and snapping to judgments, I just, kinda told you to weigh your options. Nothing else. I honestly can’t do anything to you, that took all my efforts and left me starving, I think it is because you are like, my creator’s creator or something.” replied Jimbo.
“Ah. I see. What about you. One minute I though I could almost see or hear your thoughts now I can’t see anything. How did you do that?” asked Fred.
“Well, er, I kinda thought, you know, if maybe Nancy showed up, I would try and make it harder for her to get inside my head. I think I can teach you how to do it too.” In his mind Jimbo was thinking furiously, then a thought came to him. Backdoors. Like in all those computer hacker movies, maybe he could set up a backdoor in Fred’s defenses to give him a chance if Fred and his relationship went south.
“Right now though, I am hungry. What I did takes a lot of energy, and I will teach you how as soon as we get more meat, you guys game?”
“Yes, I could use it, I think Bobby is okay.” Fred drawled.
“I ain’t hungry no more. But I will stay with you, okay?” said Bobby
“Bobby my boy I would not have it any other way.” As the three left the house Jimbo was thinking of rainbows.
Chapter 32
Standing in the kitchen staring at her hand Nancy and Veronica were interrupted by Trish and Julie coming down the stairs together. The girls stopped, realizing that something major had happened, then Julie ventured, “What is with the smoke and smell?”
“Well Julie, I am so glad you asked” replied Nancy, “I was curious to see just how well we could mend and ran a little test with the oven. This.” She held up her hand, “is my hand, five minutes ago my smallest finger was a blackened, blistered claw, now, it is fully functional, without even scar tissue to impede it's movement. What do you think of that?”
“Um, it is good, right. Good?”
“Yeah Julie it is good. I feel immortal, I think with enough humans in me, us, we will be immortal. Are you girls hungry? I could use a bite, but would rather wait for a few hours if you can handle it.” Somehow Nancy knew they were mostly full and would not resent waiting either. This was something she needed to sit down and explore with them too. How secure was her hold over them and how, exactly did it work? Time would tell, right now they needed to get through the next few days, find a few more people to eat, maybe make a couple more girls to go along with them. Replace Jimbo? Hm worth thinking about he did have more mass and muscle then the rest of them. Oh and track down that lucky fucker Fred too. She would find him, it was inevitable.
Chapter 33
Max thought 'Hey this ain't too bad.' for a gut shot man walking down the stairs of the apartment building he was doing okay. Then came the shooting, a bullet winged off the metal support pole near Max’s head and sent him ducking to his hands and knees before he quite knew what he was doing. The pain from that maneuver was terrible, he dropped the revolver and saw it clatter down two flights of stairs past Tom, who turned and said, “Did they hit you! Did they hit you?”
“No, no, keep going, just…painful.” Max replied. He pulled himself up to the rail level and slid his legs down the stairs first, it was slow, but the agony was more bearable if he kept his body in more or less a straight line, bending made everything so much worse. 'And that was bending forward.' thought Max, 'Stretching up would open the wound more and…' just thinking about it made him nauseous.
Tom had ducked down below the railing too, this left them both partially exposed on the stairs that faced the parking lot, but kept them almost hundred percent obscured at all other parts of the descent. Unfortunately a hundred percent obscured did not mean a hundred percent safe, the thin painted wood of the railing did nothing to stop the bullets from flying through, just made them more inaccurate.
“Speed Tom, you gotta go faster, I gotta go faster or they are gonna put someone at the base of the stairs where we want to drop off. Plus they see us every time we turn towards the parking lot.”
Tom just looked at Max and Max knew the slow pace was on account of his wound. Still Tom went faster and got a stairway ahead of Max. This separated the gun fire into two locations and while Max thought he was in the middle of a gunfight, the reality was that very few bullets were coming their way, just enough to make them keep their heads down and slow their progress. Max did remember to grab the revolver on his way past it, he tucked it into his pocket, figuring even if he could fire it, his hands were shaking so badly and that he probably would not hit anything anyway.
They arrived at near base of the stairs with no more than an extra hole in the front of Tom’s jeans where a bullet had narrowly missed his shin. They finally made it down as far as they could safely go, onto some concrete steps facing the back of the apartment complex. The one final flight of stairs led to the ground, however it was facing the parking lot where all of the bullets had been coming from. Between the flight of stairs they were on and the next there was a landing where Tom intended them to go over the railing and out the ‘back’ way, which bordered on a creek with one of Denver’s many bike paths running along it.
Tom pointed to the railing, “We gotta go over that railing, it is about a five foot drop, the kids hang and drop from it all the time, but the landing is going to be on a hill covered with gravel, probably not good footing. Stay to the right side, it will be harder for anyone to see you if you are there. Ready?”
Max nodded ‘yes’ and Tom pointed to indicate he should go first. As Max slowly went down the stairs feet first he heard Tom scrambling around behind him, and then heard the explosive sound of the shotgun going off. Knowing that was his cue, he moved as quickly as he could to get over the railing, opting for the ‘head first’ method, instead of the much slower ‘climb over, hang and drop’ method. His next thought was ‘Five feet? More like fifteen!’ He hit the ground and blacked out after rolling onto his back.
Tom meanwhile fired several shots into the parking lot at moving men, he did not think he hit anyone, but they kept their head’s down, which is all he wanted. He reloaded the shotgun, fired one more round and then slung the gun over his should by the strap and hopped over the fence, he did hang a
nd drop and had to modify his trajectory when he saw Max laying on the ground below him, unmoving. He landed on the slope and rolled to one side, into the foundation of the building, then stopped on his butt, sliding to a stop on the loose gravel next to Max.
He nudged Max, who moaned and said, “C’mon Max we area almost there buddy, get moving!”
Max groaned again, “Five feet! That ain’t five feet Tom!”
Tom shrugged, “Well I didn’t expect you to go head first off the damn thing! Can you get up? Oh shit you’re bleeding again. Better get your band aid together first.” He leaned over Max and pulled the towel back around his stomach cinching it closed as Max had done before. The bleeding was not stopped, merely staunched for the moment. He was just helping Max to his feet when a voice above them shouted down, “Hold it right there boys or we will shoot!” Max and Tom stopped and slowly half turned around to look up at a man holding a rifle on them, the tentatively raised their hands and the man said, “That’s right, keep em where I can see em…”
His next words were cut off by the sound of a pistol from behind Max and Tom, the man yelled as he was shot in the arm or shoulder, spinning around and falling behind the barricade. Turning back towards the creek Max saw the patrol car on the bike path behind them. Tom wasted no time helping Max down the hill and climbing in after him into the back of the car. Steve, now driving the car, took off down the bike path while Stewart turned to Max and Tom.
“How’d it go?” she asked, as if nothing unusual had happened.
Tom spat out, “I got Max fucking shot! For clothing!” turning to Max he said, “I am sorry Max! I am so sorry!” While saying so he pulled up Max’s shirt to reveal the bloody towel wrapped around his stomach.
Max winced and said, “Yeah, Tom. I am sorry too man.” Then thinking about it he said, “You didn’t know, the same thing could happen when we get to Steve’s sisters or my place, you didn’t know man, you couldn’t have known.”