The Queen of the Dead

by Vincenzo Bilof

  Jim descended the stairs, his cold gaze sweeping over the survivors who looked up at him for salvation.

  Ed grabbed Alexis by the hand and looked at Jack. He nodded his thanks and led her out of the room. Where would they go? Jack hoped they found someplace safe while he waited for death.

  Jack sat against a wall and wheezed, holding his bare belly. He coughed up blood and watched the priest stand among the survivors. Damn, he was tall. He towered over everybody. Jack only wished he had the strength to shout and get more people out of the killer’s path. At least now, he didn’t have any regrets; Ed and Alexis would be safe. He did the right thing. It would’ve been nice to say goodbye to his mother, to tell her he was sorry for being such a screw-up.

  A shadow fell upon him, and he looked up into the smiling face of his brother.

  Covered head-to-toe in gore, Jerry was alive. He knelt beside his dying brother and brushed a lock of hair away from his face. There was nothing to say between them. It had to be this way. Jerry was the last person he would see, and he was okay with that. He was thankful; the priest wasn’t the one who killed him, but someone who killed him long before, many times over.

  Jerry locked his hands around Jack’s throat and squeezed.

  ***

  Patrick’s strong arms hugged her tightly and they lay together on the floor of the office. He dozed in an ocean of her damp, red hair.

  “I can still do this with you.” He kissed her ear lobe when he woke. “We can be together, and nothing will stop us. We’ll go away and hide in another state, or we can stay here.”

  “I’ll do whatever you want,” Mina said. “I’m sick. I haven’t had my meds in a long time, but that’s no excuse for what happened. Jim was supposed to help me find you. Vincent wanted to help, but he decided to help Shanna, instead.”

  Patrick sat up and dressed himself.

  Gunfire cracked and popped outside.

  Mina wanted to see what was happening, but it exhausted her to jump into zombie heads. She knew she was doing it. There was no denying what was happening to her. Patrick gave her the strength to see the world for what it really was, and she was being used. Patrick used her, too, but she didn’t mind. The government used her, Daddy used her, and Jim used her.

  Jim was still alive, and he was at Selfridge. That’s where Father Joe wanted to go.

  He’ll kill everyone he can, the voice reminded her. Whom do you want to save? You want to do something, don’t you? Who lives and dies? You can decide… you can decide the fate of the world. It belongs to us.

  Patrick looked at the window while holstering his big gun. The battle was close. She wanted to go back to the priest because he helped her, but she was with Patrick. They didn’t have to fight anymore. She could tell all the zombies to leave them alone and they could live happily without any trouble. They didn’t have to hide from anybody.

  “Do you still like me?” Mina asked, stretching her thin, pale flesh on the floor while arching her back like a cat. “It’s been a long time. I used to think about you but I wasn’t sure if you even remembered me. If you would want me. I wanted to find you, but I haven’t taken all the medications and I… have just been confused.”

  “You’re rambling,” he said and sat on the edge of the desk. “Those things out there are just like the ones from your nightmares, aren’t they?”

  Tell him the truth, the voice said. Tell him that it’s your fault. Tell him what you’ve awakened. Tell him about US.

  Patrick was never supposed to show the video. He did it. It was his fault, not hers.

  “I’m not afraid of them,” she said. It wasn’t like her to hide things from him. She squirmed uncomfortably, trying to find the right words, the right way to tell him. Now they were together and she couldn’t chase him away. Her fingers were shaking and the headache clouded her mind; she was still tired from watching Jack die, and it was hard to breathe. The carpet felt like it was glued to her back from all the sweat. She had never been on edge before, had never felt irritated or upset, but she didn’t want to face his questions.

  “Hold me,” she said.

  “It was the video,” he said.

  How did he know? Of course, it had to start somewhere. She didn’t want to feel his next words, didn’t want him to be upset with her. Maybe if she told him about Jack and Selfridge, he would forget the whole thing.

  “It’s your fault,” he said, “this whole thing is your fault. There’s something wrong with you and I don’t know what it is, and I don’t give a shit. I was about to win the court case and get the rights to our videos back. You shut down my studio. You shut down everything we worked for. My life was invested in Modern Fantasy.”

  “I told you to keep the video safe,” Mina said.

  “You betrayed my trust,” Patrick said. “I took you off the street and gave you a home. I told you… I said things to you I never said to anyone before. I put it on the line for you, and I almost got it all back. You’re going to make it up to me.”

  She was eager for his next words. It didn’t matter what he wanted her to do, as long as he wanted to be with her.

  You’re nothing more than a piece of meat to him. He doesn’t care what happens to you. He only wanted you because he’s desperate. He has something in mind for you, and you’re going to help him. Are you stupid enough to think he loves you?

  “Just tell me what I have to do to be with you,” Mina said. “I waited for this, for so long. This is all I’ve ever wanted, and I won’t ruin it. I apologized to you before and now you have to trust me again. You have to believe that I’m sorry and I want this to work.”

  “But you ran off that with crazy fuck,” Patrick said. “I don’t need your excuses. I need your pussy and your body. Do what I say and I’ll think about forgiving you.”

  His attitude was hardly surprising, but he changed somehow. He was colder. The hidden tenderness which he would reveal in the shadows had been removed from his soul.

  “You see this gun?” Patrick waved it at her again. “I learned killing people is something I enjoy. That’s why I was a cop for so long. I used to imagine myself as the killer, and the other cops used to think I was screwed up because none of it bothered me. But see, I’ve been shooting people in the face ‘cause it’s fun. And all this shit that’s happening outside—shit you caused—will be over soon. The people left standing will need entertainment, and they’ll want the most disgusting thing we can give them, ‘cause they’ve seen blood and horror. We’ve completely dehumanized our race for good, and you’re going to be on camera with zombies and sex slaves… Snuff films… I’m talking Modern Fantasy’s comeback.”

  He was pacing the room, waving the gun around his head while he talked. Mina watched him, unsure what to say. His plans for her future hadn’t changed, and Patrick hadn’t changed, either. The ambition was still there, along with his love for sex. All the kind words and confessions were probably an act to make her stay with him, but he didn’t need to lie. He used to feed her and hold her. Even if his love was a lie, at least she had somebody who cared about her.

  When her stomach rumbled, Patrick stopped pacing.

  Even the priest cares more about you than this turd.

  “The zombies can’t hurt me,” she said. “We can do whatever we want. We can go away together and you can hold me forever. Maybe I can eat animals and it won’t be so bad. I can handle the nightmares now. If I’m with you, I can deal with it.”

  “Listen to you. The opportunity of a lifetime’s in front of us and you want to talk about fantasies. Living in the wild like savages. We can be savages right here. You won’t need animals, Mina. We can have anything and anyone we want. They’ll worship you…”

  Silly, isn’t he? He forgot you’re in the room.

  Patrick was ranting about movie subplots and the millions of women who would kneel at his feet and beg for the privilege to lick his balls. Mina was listening for the firecracker-sounds of gunfire. Maybe she could find the priest. Maybe they
could go to Selfridge together, or maybe she could save them from where she stood. If she closed her eyes and swam through the minds of the dead legions, she might be able to make the zombies stay away. Maybe she could use Jack to kill Jim once and for all. Maybe things didn’t have to be this way.

  Patrick stopped ranting and paused. He was wearing his jacket and his gun, and he ran his fingers through his hair, looked at the ceiling, and searched the shadows for a sound.

  Tires squealed and an old engine sang. Mina forgot she was naked.

  “Showtime,” Patrick said.

  Air was pushed from her chest and the carpet disappeared from beneath her. She heard thunder like she was back outside in the storm again, and she thought maybe her head was about to come off.

  The room was hot and there was light everywhere. She put her arm over her face as flame reached into the conference room where she made love to Patrick. The front end of a pickup truck sat on dry wall, and generic pictures that had been plastered against the wall were beneath the truck’s tires. The door opened and a man jumped out and nearly fell onto his face.

  He coughed while steam rose from the shiny armor he wore. It was a knight in shining armor, only it wasn’t. The knight looked like the guy who came in with Patrick and the others.

  Three people inside the truck’s bed slumped over the side and slipped out. Their faces were black and skin melted away from their bones; the remaining flesh was pink or red or black, blistering and cracking. Skulls twisted and mouths opened to reveal rows of teeth and black tongues that jumped in their jaws like fish out of water. Black blood was pouring out of their gullets and hitting the carpet with a sizzle; whatever had been in their stomachs had become like the boiling oil that castle defenders used to pour on soldiers who climbed the walls.

  The knight grabbed an axe from inside the truck and steadied himself. “You,” he pointed to Patrick; the former detective grinned like a clown who’d been given a million dollars.

  “You murdered Stacy,” the knight said, “she was all I had, you bastard!”

  “Jeremy, glad to see you again,” Patrick said, “come have a piece.”

  “Wait!” Mina stepped between them. Her arms were stretched and the fur between her legs still glistened with moisture. In the firelight, she looked like a skeleton with nipples and a wig of tangled red hair glued to her scalp.

  The knight let his hands fall and the axe thumped into the ground. His mouth moved and he tried to speak; a line of blood trickled over his left eye and three horizontal slashes through his cheek absorbed the tears that trickled out of his eyes. Shoulders heaving, his voice shook.

  “I don’t want to die. Please.”

  One of the burning people grabbed the knight’s steaming shoulder pads. He let go of the axe and reached for Mina. She grabbed his fingers and momentum carried her forward into his arms. Something hot and wet dripped onto her back as she buried her face against his neck. The knight staggered and she fell atop him, the jolt between her legs as she landed on his chest plate rocking her over. He wept as one of the burning people pinched his eyeball and pulled it out like a meatball from a plate of hot spaghetti. The eye stretched until the zombie popped it into its mouth and squished it with human teeth.

  Mina bit into the side of his face that was already damaged, pulling skin into her teeth while he sobbed. One of the dead sat near the knight and bit into his forehead; it sounded like someone biting into an apple. A tooth cracked and another was embedded in the knight’s forehead as the zombie scraped off flesh and hair.

  So you want to save these people? Seems like you’re enjoying yourself.

  One look at Patrick with his arms crossed, patiently watching the feast, reminded her what he wanted from her. What he wanted her to be.

  With her hands full of Jeremy, she closed her eyes and searched for Father Joe.

  VEGA

  The rooftops of houses were touched by flame as the epidemic of light spread along reaching tree limbs that cracked and withered, leaving skeletal branches to bask in the orange glow.

  Vega picked up the Larue rifle; the weapon felt heavier. She shifted the rifle into a different position and couldn’t get comfortable.

  “The priest and that crazy hobo,” Vincent said, “they’re fighting their war.”

  “I don’t want to understand it,” she said. “Father will kill a thousand people to save one. I know his type. He was a desperate man, almost like he couldn’t hear himself talk.”

  “Only time a man would do that is if it’s someone he cares about,” Vincent said.

  Vega couldn’t rip her eyes away from the burning trees. She wanted him to keep talking, to fill the silence between them. There was a question that she forgot, a feeling she wanted, an answer she needed; it was something she might recognize in the child version of herself, but she wouldn’t know what to call it.

  A long time passed before she blinked again. “Can you think of someone like that? Someone who makes you forget everyone else can die—someone who makes you forget that people will follow your passion but not your dream, because their dream is already dead.”

  It wasn’t until after he answered did she realize there was a specific answer she wanted to hear. “I don’t know. The priest, in his head, he’s thinking there ain’t nothing else around him. There’s only him and whoever he wants. Everybody else is just a statue or a hologram like in the movies. I know what it feels like, but I don’t know how I know.”

  “The general told me what comes next: we run and hide, run and hide, until we get to where we’re going. We’re going to watch people die, watch our shelters collapse—and it doesn’t matter if it’s predictable.”

  Standing in the firelight, Vincent’s exposed arms were slick with sweat, and both hands flexed on the grips of Uzi machine guns. Clips were shoved into the pockets of his tactical vest; their eyes locked. A glint of metal flashed between his lips.

  “Staring at them clips,” Vincent said, nodding at her ammo-loaded vest.

  “Not much to look at,” Vega said. “Bob—you met him—he used to say I’d actually be pretty if I bought myself tits. I always figured they’d get in the way of ass-kicking.”

  He chuckled. “Some niggas wear fur coats and shit, and they got chains ‘round their necks, wearing suits and jewelry. I ain’t saying I’m a thug, but all those videos and movies… that ain’t what hustlin’ looks like. When I earned it, I wore that shit at home. Wore it on TV, too. I did all that shit when I was washing my dollars with a car dealership. I lived in Grosse Pointe… Vincent ain’t even my real name.”

  She wanted to find his shadowed eyes because she wasn’t sure what he looked like. She saw them on the lawn in the morning light, but that was the last time she could see anything. When they were looking for Shanna.

  How much time passed?

  Vega said, “I’ve seen everything in the light of fire and storm, and there’s nothing but blood and dust. It’s like we’re just voices now, coming out of the shadows.”

  Humidity and fluorescent lighting inside the counseling center refocused her attention when they stepped out of the office. The electric hum made her blood sing; she was in battle mode, allowing the monster to step out of its cage. She was just entering another room, but she was alert, and it didn’t feel right. The dead were everywhere, and it was easy to be unlucky. All it took was one bite and she would be like John Charles, the poor bastard.

  Vincent swept his machine guns over the furniture-filled spaces, black-bordered inspirational pictures hung on the walls with lighthouses and hot-air balloons, words like ADVERSITY and DEDICATION displayed in bold letters. Anti-discrimination policies were tacked around a receptionist’s window.

  The front door opened as if a child were struggling with it. Vega held her breath; it would be smarter to take up a defensive position, and it would have been even smarter if a makeshift barricade had been pushed in front of all the doors. Their fellowship had split apart—everyone went their own way—and nobody gave
a shit.

  Vega’s finger was glued to the trigger, her eye focused through the optic sight. A man crawled through the doorway, but his grunts and faint chuckles stopped her from blowing him away. The zombies didn’t make so much noise. She had control of her weapon, and steam rose from the black man, who smiled with a mouth missing several teeth.

  “That’s the way to do it,” General Masters said, his voice losing its vitality to a tone that seemed relaxed. “Some of that ol’ time shit. Yeah. Like that. Just like that.”

  She removed her eye from the sight. The general coughed and spat up blood, but he crawled on, trailing blood along the floor, smoke rising from his charred skin. One side of his face looked like raw hamburger.

  He stopped his journey and craned his neck to look at Vega and Vincent. He was bleeding and burnt, and he smiled his crooked grin.

  “Are they all dead?” Vega asked. She held no illusions about helping the general, and his smile was enough for her to know he didn’t want it.

  “We’re dead when we’re born,” the general sounded like a cat that struggled to cough up a hairball. “We need to know how to live… before we can die.”

  Vega knelt beside him and set her rifle aside. She turned him over to his back; he smelled like over-cooked meat. His smile didn’t waver.

  “What the hell…” She needed the right words to continue.

  “That’s right,” the general said. “Fighting against ourselves. It’s what we do. For my country.” He reached up with his hands and pulled himself up by her collar. She let his hands hold on, his eyes bulging out of his head. “You see it. This is what we’ve always wanted. But the flag, the idea, the freedom, the love… It’s worth this… Worth all of it…”

  “You’re bit,” she said.

  He released her. “Nobody can hurt the priest,” he turned to his stomach and laid his face upon the ground, the back of his head exposed.