Dead Man's Drive: A Rot Rods Novel (Rot Rods #1)

by Michael Panush

  Roscoe and the Captain spun around. Wooster poked his head out of the back of the garage, a thick cloth bundle in his arms. Angel was raising his pistol, aiming for the sky. There was a roc above him, looking like a feathery-winged, beaked dog suspended in the air. Angel’s pearl-handled automatic had punched a hole through its brown wing, letting a shaft of daylight leak through. The giant bird let out a powerful shriek. Roscoe had seen those kinds of birds before―but they’d been lacking everything but their bones. This was one of Strickland’s creatures, a living version of the undead flying monsters who had attacked the Surf and Sand Festival. The Roc spread its wings and swooped down, beak open to bite into Angel’s face.

  But Angel was ready. He dove to the side, his zoot suit billowing as he struck the pavement and rolled. His automatic flashed, blasting shots into the Roc’s skull. Brains sprayed from the freakish animal’s head and it came careening down into a jumbled pile of wings and limbs. Angel rolled over and shot the Roc again. Then he turned around and pointed into the sky.

  “Pendejo!” he roared. “Another one!” Sure enough, a second was already soaring away. It swiftly faded into an outline, a brown silhouette against the cloudless blue sky. Angel raised his pistol and tracked it, but the creature was already out of range. He swore in Spanish and holstered his automatic. “Such creatures are summoned of dark magic,” he said. “Its master will see what it has seen.”

  “Couldn’t be helped,” Roscoe said. He turned to the Captain. “Boss?”

  “Too late to change plans.” The Captain glared after the bat, his eyes cold. “We’ll go to Willow House and fortify it. Hopefully, the fisherman will arrive soon. In the meantime, I need all of you to pack for a few days and bring all your weapons and tools. You’ll take your own cars and form a convoy to Willow Point. If we depart now, we can―”

  Gentle footsteps pattered from the garage. The Captain turned as Felix approached them. The boy had Snowball in his arms, the little Yeti’s arms hanging over the boy’s shoulders. Felix’s white suit was unkempt and his tie was askew. Behind his black-rimmed glasses, his eyes were full of pure terror. He looked like a hunted animal.

  Felix moved closer to them and looked around. He squeezed Snowball. “Oh, gott,” he whispered. “It’s happening again. They’re going to come for me, aren’t they? And they will take me away and do the same to you.”

  “No.” The Captain knelt down and looked the boy in the eye. “No, Felix, they won’t. I won’t let them. We won’t let them.” He glanced up at Roscoe and nodded. That was command enough. Roscoe darted to his apartment and did his best to pack.

  He didn’t have much to bring besides a single spare suit and extra shells for his sawed-off. He tucked the gun into his coat and grabbed his crowbar. Roscoe headed back down, just as Angel was doing the same. Betty was already putting her valise into the trunk of her little coupe. Felix stood next to her. Wooster came out last, carrying another load to the Packard. He loaded it up and then slammed the trunk shut with the cold finality of a gunshot. They were finished. All of the drivers, along with Felix and the Captain, stopped and looked back at the garage. Roscoe went around to the heavy door and brought it rattling down. He wormed the chain through the lock and clicked it shut with his key. Donovan Motors was quiet. The sign above the garage seemed dusty and dim.

  The Captain removed his fedora. “We’ll return. I promise.” He walked over to his Rolls Royce and motioned for Felix to join him. “Come along, son. You can ride with me.” Felix hastened to be with his adopted father. Roscoe headed for his own car. The others followed. Their engines started in tandem, a chorus of rumbles and groans like thunderclouds getting ready for a storm. They roared out in a single convoy and started for Willow Point.

  Like the Captain had said, the drive wasn’t too long. Willow Point was a narrow spur of land, a sheer cliff jutting into Crimson Cove and overlooking the gray Pacific. Willow Point had always held a strange place in the annals of La Cruz history. It was scenic enough, with the ocean looming in the distance and shining like liquid starlight. Clusters of pine trees bordered the winding road leading to the Point, but they faded away before gray dirt and rock and left open ground until the straight drop to the sea. But the closeness to the coast and the high winds kept most tourists away and stopped anyone building a hotel or resort. There was the Willow House, named after the wealthy robber baron’s family who had built it and settled there. The family had a bloody history, ending in a grisly quadruple murder and suicide that ended their line for good. The old Victorian mansion remained, a decaying and haunted remnant of La Cruz’s past. Its pointed roof stabbed into the graying sky, shedding shingles and nearing collapse. Wide windows stared out like empty eyes.

  The drivers all brought their cars to a stop. The Captain was the first out. He pointed to a side road, which led to a copse of trees near the cliff. “Take the vehicles there. There’s a secluded parking spot, near an old Conservation Corps cabin. Our cars will be safe.” He looked up at the Willow House a wind stirred his gray trench coat. “We’ll wait in there.”

  It seemed like a decent plan. Roscoe parked his Deuce with the others and then went back to the manor. He headed inside through the open door. Felix and the Captain were already there. The boy was sitting on a couch reading a tattered horror comic by fading sunlight while Snowball curled up at his feet. Betty opened her purse, going over some occult supplies, while Angel examined his charms.

  Wooster tapped Roscoe on the shoulder. He pointed to the patch of rocky ground outside, where he’d set a few cloth bundles. “I gotta haul that inside, Roscoe. My arms still ain’t that strong. I’d be obliged if you’d help me.”

  “Sure,” Roscoe said.

  Wooster picked up one end of the cloth bundle and Roscoe got the other. Wooster had been lying about his arms. They were as strong as ever. “I heard tell you got some of your memories back. Even got a name.”

  “Carmine Vitale.”

  “Yeah.” Wooster walked over the wide porch of the Willow House. “You was some kind of Italian hitman. Killed all sorts of Guinea punks before you lost your memory and came on back as a zombie.”

  “Something like that.”

  They strode over to the nearest window, hauling the cloth bundle between them. Wooster dropped his end, and it tumbled down.

  “Carmine Vitale was a soldier. He was born in Sicily, lost his family, came here and then the Army sent him back. After the War, he went to work as a professional shooter.” Roscoe paused. “And all the murders he committed, all the lives he took, I can feel them boiling away in the back of my brain, threatening to slip out. The memories are coming back, and I don’t know if I can stop them.”

  With a snort, Wooster began to unwrap the cloth bundle. “At least you got that luxury.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You got a chance of stopping your memories. The rest of us have to put up with them.” Wooster tapped his head. “My past is still there, gnawing at me like a dog chewing up my insides. Every bank I robbed, all the men I betrayed, all the evil I done―I know it all, and it don’t seem to fade no matter how much good I do. Captain’s giving me a chance to atone and I’m grateful for it. But the evil’s still there.” He finished unwrapping the bundle. A .50 caliber machine gun sat under the cloth, along with an ammo belt. “It don’t never go away.”

  They assembled the gun. Roscoe knew how and now he knew why―a memory from Carmine’s army days in Sicily.

  “How do you stand it?” Roscoe asked. “How do you deal with the person you are now and the person you were then?”

  “Ain’t a person,” Wooster said. “It’s a beast. A wolf. It growls inside of me, howling and roaring and trying to get out. How do I stand it? A day at a time. I do my best to do good. I care for innocents, like that little Kraut boy over there and the girl. I keep that wolf chained up. And every so often, when the moment is right, I let him off the leash and let him do as he pleases.”

  It was a grim message, but R
oscoe supposed it was necessary. He threaded the ammo belt into the machine gun, pausing as a rumble of engines echoed from the winding road leading to Willow Point. The Captain perked up. Roscoe stared out the open door, while Angel and Betty hurried to the windows. A trio of large vans rolled down the barely-paved road. The stout vans, painted a dull, unimaginative gray, had “Strickland Industries” stenciled on their sides.

  The vans came to a sudden stop. The door to the first van opened, and Roy Roach emerged. He straightened his tie as he walked across the chalk ground, pushing up his sunglasses and staring at the house. He cupped his hands over his mouth. “Hello!” he called, shouting even though he didn’t have to. “Hello there, drivers!” He jabbed a thumb back toward the city. “I should thank you for clearing out of La Cruz. Getting you there would have been very messy. Mr. Strickland is like someone buying a used car. He doesn’t like any dents in the metal or stains on the upholstery.” He folded his hands. “You want to surrender? Beg for your lives or something? If you’d like to, you can.”

  Roscoe knelt down near the machine gun. “Sure!” he roared. “Come a little closer and we’ll talk!”

  “A sense of humor’s good to have,” Roach replied. He wasn’t bothering to shout anymore. “I always try to keep mine around. When I was having my skin flayed off, when maggots were shoved down my throat and hot coals rammed into my flesh, it helped quite a lot.” He put his hands in his pockets and grinned. His even white teeth were shining in the fading sun. “I was joking about you guys wanting to beg and surrender. Mr. Strickland won’t accept that now. He wants all of you dead.” He pointed to the house, counting on his fingers. “Dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, and dead.” He walked back to the vans. “So you can beg and scream if you want. You can curse at me too, or fight―or Hell, even make jokes. It won’t make a bit of difference.” Roach patted the iron side of the van.

  All the back doors of the vans opened. The metal rattled as it lifted and clanked clear. Darkness filled the vans. Shapes stirred. Figures stumbled out, slumped human forms moving in slow, jerking shuffles like they were trying to jitterbug but had forgotten the steps. They shambled close. The figures had rotting flesh, shaved heads and bones poking through milk-white skin. Hollow eyes stared hungrily at Willow House. They were the dead―zombies dressed in a rough gray uniform of Strickland Industries coveralls. The zombies clustered together, moving in a mob. These weren’t the dapper dead men who had been accompanying Roach earlier. They were the industrial dead, workers on an assembly line in Hell. They huddled together and then―like a signal had been given―shuffled towards the mansion in a pathetic charge.

  The Captain roared out orders. “Open fire!” he shouted. “Don’t let up! Angel, take the door―Betty, get Felix to the second floor and use your rifle!” He pointed to Wooster and Roscoe. “Pour it on!” he cried. “Don’t let up!”

  “Don’t have to tell me,” Wooster said as he reached for the trigger. The .50 caliber chattered and sent a wave of lead crashing into the first rank of zombies. Roscoe fed Wooster the line of ammo, holding the belt up to prevent a misfeed. Gunfire cut through the air and shredded dead flesh. Zombie bodies exploded, their bits and pieces spilling onto the soil. Wooster swept the crowd, strafing the flanks and then shooting into the middle of the horde. Several zombies went down, trampled by the corpses behind them as they rushed to the door.

  Betty grabbed Felix’s hand and ran to the old, crumbling staircase at the back of the foyer. She and the boy hurried up. “I have worked with such creatures many times, Fraulein Bright,” he said. “The head is the place to aim. Destroy the head and the body follows. Aim for the head!”

  “Thanks for the tip, honey,” Betty said. “Now here’s one for you―stay back and away from the windows, and keep that yeti of yours under control, and, for Christ’s sake, don’t watch!” She had her carbine rifle slung over her shoulder. They topped the stairwell, and Betty ran to the window and opened fire. Her bullets punched into the army of corpses. She aimed for the front of their line; her second shot detonated the skull of a zombie within arm’s reach of the front door. Brains flew in all directions as it toppled over backwards.

  Another zombie leapt up onto the house, digging its fingers into the rough wood of the wall. The fingers broke and splintered, but the zombie still found its handhold and clambered up. Its mouth opened. Buzzing echoed from its throat. A swarm of insects, a black cloud of flies, roared out of the mouth. They started to billow up, to sweep into the second floor and reach Betty, but Betty was ready. She fired again, scoring another headshot. The zombie’s skull shattered, and the cloud of flies dissipated, raining back over the undead horde as the dead man fell to the ground with a rattle. More corpses rushed over it, surging across the gravel onto the porch of Willow House.

  Angel waited for them in the doorway. He had the tommy gun now. The sub-gun hurled bullets as the zombies came charging in. Zombies went down, their limbs torn to scrap. The corpses collapsed in the mud, crawling on in silent determination. Angel pumped more lead at them, keeping the Thompson roaring until the gun clicked empty. He tossed it down and stepped back, pulling twin automatics from his coat. Angel opened fire, blasting away with both guns at once. The first zombie to the doorway got a bullet in the face. Its head exploded in a shower of gore. Angel spun to face the second zombie and kept shooting. The next cadaver was already at the door, and he wasn’t fast enough. It barreled into him, knocking him back with both arms.

  Angel and the zombie struck the ground. Angel put two bullets in the dead man’s brains, and the corpse went backwards, cracking hard onto the porch. The next dead man wasn’t so easy. It stood in the hallway, shuddering and convulsing as its eyes rolled into its skull. A crack and creak of bone resounded from within, and its head lunged out from between its shoulders, rising into the air on a length of spine. It looked like a snake cast of bone with a zombie’s chomping head at one end. The serpent of spine coiled around Angel’s leg and hauled him back. The head poised above Angel, its mouth falling open to reveal rotting teeth. Roscoe grabbed his sawed-off and ran to help his friend.

  He didn’t have to. Angel reached into his pocket. He withdrew a smooth pearl medallion bearing the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe. “Demon!” Angel hissed. “Dead man! Back to the grave with you!” Then he slammed the medallion against the creature’s forehead, pressing with all his strength. The reek of burning dead flesh filled the air. The zombie reeled back, its elongated neck whipping back and forth as smoke poured from it burned patch of skin. The head exploded, spattering Angel with gore while the body flopped dead onto the porch. Angel got shakily back to his feet.

  “You okay?” Roscoe called to him.

  “Yeah.” Angel glanced down at his zoot suit, now splotched with black marks from dead gore. “Ah, no,” he muttered. “Got my threads dirty. Brains―they never come out in the wash.” He grabbed one of his pistols and started shooting again.

  The far wall, closest to Roscoe and Wooster, crashed apart. The corpses smashed their way through the wall, ripping it aside with the sheer weight of their bodies. They forced themselves in, gouging their sides on the splintered wood in their haste to reach the living. Roscoe and Wooster turned from the machine gun. Roscoe aimed his sawed-off as more zombies came into the room. The sawed-off thundered in his hands, firing two shots and blasting two zombies down. He cracked it open and reloaded. He fired again as the corpses closed in, and this time he was close enough for the force of his blast to send the bodies rocking backwards and flying. He managed to reload before the next zombie reached him. The corpse tackled Roscoe. He scrambled back, rammed the muzzle of his sawed-off into the zombie’s mouth and pulled the trigger.

  Just as the zombie’s head vanished in the spray of gunfire, another chattering roar hit the air. Rosce glanced up to see Wooster running to help him. Wooster held the .50 caliber machine gun, carrying the heavy weapon aloft as it spat lead. The .50 bucked and shook in Wooster’s hands, but he had no need to hold it stea
dy. He simply poured on the fire. The .50 tore the zombies to pieces. Wooster fired until their dead flesh was obliterated. When he finished shooting, there was nothing standing before him, only slime on the walls.

  A groan near the door made Roscoe turn again. A zombie crept up, crawling on ruined legs and arms. Roscoe aimed his sawed-off, when a rifle cracked and the zombie slumped back dead. The Captain had shot it. With a practiced motion, the Captain worked the bolt on the old rifle and looked over at his drivers.

  “Report!” the Captain ordered.

  “Fine and dandy,” Wooster replied. “But there’s no more bullets for the Fifty.”

  “I’m okay,” Roscoe added.

  Angel placed new clips into his pistols. “Been better, man,” he muttered.

  Betty called from upstairs. “We’re okay up here, Captain. Some of them tried climbing the walls, but I shot them down okay. And Felix is okay, too. He’s a little scared, but they never got near him.”

  “I am quite well!” Felix called back. “And so is Snowball!” The yeti yipped.

  Before the Captain could reply, chanting echoed through the still air outside. Roscoe ran to the door and peeked outside. He walked over the zombie bodies, mangled and stinking on the ground. Outside, Roy Roach moved. He stayed behind the vans, keeping in cover. Roach had a book under his arm, leather-bound and ancient. He opened the covers and flipped through the yellowed pages and then looked up. He peeked out from behind the van and raised the book, showing the cover. His finger tapped on the illustration of the pentagram.

  Roach shouted to them. “Recognize this, ladies and gents? I hope you do. I’m gonna carve it into your foreheads.” Then he went back to reading, and his voice grew in power as a great wind whistled down from the ocean. It made the trees below Willow Point rustle like the whole land was whispering some terrible secret. The dust stirred. The wind grew in volume, howling through all the little holes and crevices in the Willow House. Roscoe could barely hear Roach’s voice above the tumult. He was speaking a dark language, not quite English and not quite Latin or Hebrew either. It was the language of demons, the speech of Hell. The ground before Roach boiled.