Soma (The Fearlanders)

by Joseph Duncan

  She sat forward and rolled down the passenger window a couple inches, letting the symphony of the night’s varied creatures waft into the car’s interior: the cheeping of the crickets, the buzzing of cicadas, the trilling of frogs, the twittering of birds. The sonata of the night was so much louder now than it was before the pandemic. She did not know if it only seemed that way because the things of man were silenced or if there were actually more creatures out there making noise now that man wasn’t poisoning the environment with pesticides and pollutants. Whatever the reason, it was soothing. It reminded her of her father’s farm.

  She sat there, listening to the frogs croak and the crickets chirp until the sky began to lighten. All through the night, she dipped in and out of her memories, basking in the warmth of her recollections but retreating from the pain those memories held hands with. When at last the pastel light of dawn stole over the valley below, Soma checked one last time for the dog that had driven her to cover and then opened the door and stepped out onto the pavement.

  She scanned her surroundings for danger and seeing none started down the road toward the houses in the distance.

  A breeze stirred through her hair as she walked. There were rainclouds moving in from the west -- moving rather quickly, she noted. She hoped she had time to reach shelter before the rain came. She was cold, and she did not relish the thought of being cold and wet.

  The highway sloped more steeply now. She passed an intersecting highway called Bell Church Road. Posted at the crossroad was a sign for said church, all but swallowed by a net of rampant honeysuckle, blossoms butter yellow and sweetly redolent. When she was a little girl, she would pick honeysuckle blossoms and pinch off the stem to suck the drop of nectar out of the trumpet-shaped flower.

  Her father had taught her that trick.

  As she walked, Soma tried to figure out which of the houses the light had come from the night before. She could see a sprawling trailer park and several stick-built homes, but none of them looked occupied. Of course, that might change when she got a little closer. She was still almost a mile away.

  She walked as the sun rose up before her, melting the dew from the grass. The early morning fog retreated from its warmth. Soma turned her face to the light, closing her eyes for a moment, enjoying the feel of it on her cheeks and forehead. It would be another beautiful day if the clouds at her back did not deliver on their promise.

  She made it to the road that serviced the trailer park by mid-morning. The name of the trailer park was Mack & Mac’s Mobile Home Court. She knew because there was a big hand-painted sign at the turnoff. She paused to check the cracker box dwellings but did not venture onto the property. All of the homes looked abandoned, lawns overgrown, windows busted out. Many of the buildings had storm damage—siding stripped from the walls, roofs ripped off or collapsed inwards. A tree had flattened one of the trailers.

  God hates trailer parks, her father always said, and Mack & Mac’s looked it.

  A feral cat twitched around to look at her as it navigated a porch rail. Startled, the animal vanished into the weeds in a streak of black fur.

  The sight of the animal made her belly snarl in hunger. Her sudden lust to eat the creature dismayed her. She had always liked cats. She and Nandi had owned several over the course of their marriage. Scaredy Cat, Fat-butt, Charlie… She did not care to calculate how many cats she had eaten when she was a deadhead. She knew it was a lot. Unlike dogs, cats were immune to the Phage. They had fared well during the zombie apocalypse, but only after they quit cozying up to their former masters to be petted.

  She stroked her belly, fighting the compulsion to chase after the feline. Would this always be a part of her psyche now, this compulsion to kill and eat every living thing she encountered?

  She suspected it would be.

  She continued on, testing her will against the hunger, trying to force it away from her thoughts. She must have strict control of it if and when she returned to her family. She would kill herself before she placed any of her loved ones in danger.

  Up ahead was a white stick-built home with a privacy fence. It was a two-story bungalow with an attached garage and several outbuildings. But for a few missing shingles, it also appeared to be in good repair. The house faced north, its broad sidewall perpendicular to the hillside. Several of its windows would have been visible to her while she sheltered in the Corsica the previous night.

  Soma wondered if the light had come from this house. She tried to look in the windows but they were blankly reflective, blacked out maybe or blocked with dark curtains. She didn’t hear any sounds of activity coming from within the house.

  She decided to explore it. See if she could scavenge any supplies from the dwelling. Maybe even stay there for a day or two. It was fenced, solid looking, in good repair. It would make a good base of operations until she could get a vehicle running and go in search of her family.

  As she headed for the gate of the house’s privacy fence, she heard the barking.

  “Oh, no! Not again!” she cried.

  She twisted to look back up the road and saw the dog about a quarter of a mile away, loping toward her energetically. Strangling a cry, Soma dashed for the gate as fast as she could run.

  But “fast as she could” was a relative description. Her muscles and joints were stiff and balky. About the best she could manage was a lurching shuffle. The gate was just twenty yards away, but she was not sure she was going to make it there before Chomper ran her down.

  Oh, please, God, please, let me make it! she prayed.

  She shuffled for the gate, lips peeled back from her teeth.

  Chomper closed the gap between them with terrible alacrity, barking enthusiastically. YARK! YARK! YARK!

  The dog was just a few yards away when she made it to the fence. She fumbled with the latch of the gate, fingers made clumsy by terror. Dropped it. Grabbed it again. Twisted it on its rusty pivot. She yanked the gate open, threw herself through it.

  Chomper tried to follow, but she caught him with the door as she shoved it closed behind herself. The dog snarled, trying to muscle his way through. His head whipped back and forth, teeth snapping, ropes of saliva twirling in the air, but he withdrew with a yelp as she threw her weight onto the gate. She slammed the gate shut and then fell back against it in relief. A moment later, the whole fence shuddered as the big dog flung himself against it. He barked in frustration, jumping to peer over the top of the edifice, ears flopping comically. Soma headed for the front porch, afraid the animal would jump over the fence in a moment or two. Jump over it and take her down. He was relentless.

  The front door slammed open. A tall man in denim jeans and a red flannel shirt burst out, holding a rifle.

  “Please, don’t shoot!” Soma cried as he sighted down the barrel at her.

  Surprise flashed in his eyes. He drew his head back from the rifle an inch or two and then he closed his right eye again and sighted down the barrel. Gray smoke belched from its bore.

  10

  She was so certain he had shot her that it was several seconds before she realized the man had fired off to the side of her, that he was not actually aiming at her, and that she was still alive -- so far as you could call a reanimated corpse alive. For a moment time seemed to pour out like some viscid fluid, and she could have sworn she felt a burning sensation in the middle of her forehead. And then she realized that if she had been shot in the head, she would have been dead before the report of the rifle even made it to her ears.

  Behind her, a chunk of the privacy fence snapped and flew away. Splinters of wood peppered Soma’s back and she ducked down with a yelp. On the other side of the fence, Chomper gave out a surprised yelp. Soma wheeled around, ears ringing, and saw the dog in full retreat, his body flashing by in the gaps between the fence boards.

  The mongrel bound across the road, tail tucked between his legs, and vanished into the underbrush on the far side. The bushes shook as he hauled bricks through the woods. She didn’t think she’d
ever seen a dog run so fast.

  “That mutt is really becoming a pain in my ass,” the man said, lowering his rifle. Soma turned to face him, head still hunched between her shoulders, as the man came down the porch steps. His face shifted into an expression of concern. “Are you okay?”

  Soma opened her mouth to answer but found that she had forgotten the trick of speaking.

  “You talked, didn’t you?” the man asked. “I didn’t just imagine that?”

  Soma nodded, finally found her tongue. “Y-yes. Yes, I speak.”

  Well, stammered would be a more accurate description.

  As the man drew closer, she was stunned to silence once again. He was dead like her. He was so well preserved, however, so fleshy and plump, that she had mistaken him for a living man. He was not. Now that he was standing a few feet away, she could smell the death odor on him, see the unnatural pallor of his skin. Other than the smell and a slight hollowness to his eyes and cheeks, she would not have known he was a zombie.

  “I’m Perry,” he said with a grin. He cradled the rifle in his left arm so he could extend his right hand. “Perry Clark. Do you remember your name? Some of us don’t.”

  Soma blinked up at him. He was tall, handsome, with shaggy salt and pepper hair, a big bushy mustache and long, almost morose features. He had a big square chin, big nose, squinty blue eyes. She took his hand and shook. “Soma,” she said. “Soma Lashari.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” he said. With his Southern drawl, it sounded like one word: pleasetameetcha.

  She nodded, taking her hand back. He had huge, work-roughened hands. His hand had swallowed hers when they shook. “The dog…?”

  Perry scratched the back of his head, looking across the road where the dog had vanished. “Oh, he’s been hanging around, trying to get at my rabbits. He didn’t hurt ya did he?”

  “Rabbits…?” Soma scowled.

  “I raise rabbits,” the man said. He glanced at her, one eyebrow arched. “You know, for the meat. A zombie’s gotta eat, right?”

  “Zombies…?”

  “Pardon me. Most dead people don’t like using that word. The folks in town call themselves Resurrects, like that makes it any better. As the Bard might have said, ‘A zombie by any other name would smell just as bad.’”

  “Folks in…?”

  She could not seem to string more than two words together. It was the shock, she supposed. If she didn’t shake off her confusion soon, her savior was going to think she was mentally deficient.

  Too late. He already did. She could tell by his expression.

  “I’m not brain damaged,” she said, a little too forcefully. “Just… a bit overwhelmed.”

  “You must have just awakened,” he said sympathetically. “Everyone’s a little groggy when they first wake up. The gears in your noggin…” He twirled a finger around his ear. “They’re still a little rusty, you know? How long has it been? Since you came back, I mean?”

  “The, uh… night before.”

  “Just two nights ago?”

  She nodded.

  “Where’d it happen?”

  She turned away from him, gesturing vaguely to the west. “Oh, an empty field, back that way. Near an industrial park.”

  He nodded. “Ah, yeah. I know where that’s at.”

  “I’m looking for my family,” she said, glancing back at him carefully. “But I don’t know how long I’ve been gone, or even where I am.”

  “Oh, honey,” the tall man said, patting her on the shoulder. “Why don’t you come inside and we’ll get you straightened out? I’m sure you have a lot of questions. Maybe I can answer some of them for you.”

  She hesitated. She wanted to trust him, but…

  He saw the suspicion in her eyes and laughed gently.

  “Don’t worry. I don’t bite,” he said. “Not my own kind, anyway.”

  His laughter reassured her a little. Enough to coax her up the steps and onto the porch. She hesitated again, there at the front door, thinking of spiders and their sticky parlors. “You promise you won’t hurt me?” she said.

  “Darlin, I wouldn’t hurt you if you asked me to,” the big man said. He gestured toward a white wicker chair. The porch had several pieces of rattan furniture and a nice porch swing, the sort of chair her father would have called a glider. “If you feel better sitting outside, we can talk out here.”

  She considered it and then decided to be brave. “No. No, thank you. We can go inside.”

  “Okay.”

  He held the door for her. She smiled up at him as she entered. She never would have entered a strange man’s home when she was alive, not without Nandi, but that was Before. And he had a kind face. A little sad, but kind.

  You can tell a lot about a person by their face, she believed. Time unerringly stamped a person’s disposition on their features, be it kindness and generosity, or cruelty and greed. Perry’s face, even in death, was unmarred by bitterness or malice, just a few faint crinkles around his eyes. Laugh lines.

  The man entered behind her. “If you’ll pardon me for saying, you look a little worse for wear. I was just fixin’ to have a bite of breakfast. Would you like something to eat?”

  Her lips wanted to say no, but her stomach said, Yes! Yes!

  “I, uh… if you have enough…”

  “I got plenty,” he assured her. He leaned his rifle against the wall beside the front door, opened his arms wide, and said, “Welcome to Casa del Clark!”

  They had entered a small foyer. She expected the interior of the house to be messy, but it was tidy and clean, clean enough for her to suspect that Perry was cohabitating with a woman. The hardwood floors were polished to a shine. Perry’s shoes were lined up on the rug as orderly as soldiers at attention. The house was dimly lit, as Perry had covered all the windows with heavy blankets, but there was enough light peeking around the edges of the sheets to see by. It confirmed her suspicion that this was the house she had seen the glint of light coming from last night. If she looked out the living room window right now, she could probably see the Corsica she had spent the night in at the top of the hill.

  She examined the photos hanging on the living room walls and saw that there was indeed a pretty young woman posing beside her host in several of the pictures. The woman was honey blonde and plump with a big sunny smile and freckled cheeks.

  “Was this is your house before?” she asked, following him into the kitchen.

  “No,” Perry said. “I lived in Mac’s Trailer Park before the Phage. I moved my stuff in here after I came back. This used to be my landlord’s house. Willard MacDonnell. Nice enough fellow. Big fat guy. He wanders by from time to time. He ain’t woke up yet. I know it’s awful to say, but I hope he doesn’t. If he does, I guess I’ll have to move out.”

  “Is the woman in the pictures your wife?”

  He paused to look at the photos on the wall. Soma saw him twisting a wedding band on his finger. “Former wife,” he answered. “She’s dead. Dead-dead, as they say.”

  “I’m sorry,” Soma said.

  “Water under the bridge,” Perry said with a shrug. He looked down and saw that he was twisting his wedding ring around and around and separated his hands. “I miss her, of course. Sometimes more than I can bear. But there’s nothing I can do about it. She has gone to seek the Great Perhaps. Perhaps, someday, I’ll join her.”

  That last sounded like a quote, but she did not know whom he was quoting. There were certainly plenty of books on the living room walls. Shelves and shelves of books, mostly hardbacks.

  “My husband’s name was Nandi,” she said. “He… he was alive the last time I saw him. My daughter, too.”

  “So you want to go look for them?”

  Soma nodded.

  “I get that,” Perry said. “I really do. But you know you’re still dead, right? I don’t mean to be cruel, but you’re a zombie, and zombies and live folk don’t get along too well.”

  Soma nodded, looking down at the floor. She squar
ed her shoulders and looked up at him appealingly. “Can you tell me where I am, Perry? What year is it? And what’s happened to the world while I was gone?”

  Perry smiled. “I’ll tell ya everything you want to know, but first let’s eat. I’m so hungry I could eat the ass end of a rag doll.”

  11

  He set a plate on the table in front of her. On the plate was half of a rabbit. It was raw and skinned, just bones and veins and pink striated muscle tissue. He did not provide her with silverware.

  “I know it seems gross now that you’re yourself again,” the man said, circling around to the other side of the table, “but it’s best to eat it raw.” He sat down at his plate and scooted in. “Raw meat staves off the hunger longer. The fresher the better. We can still eat regular food like fruit and salads and potato chips. It’s all just nutrients and calories, right? But the Phage prefers raw flesh. Brain and organ tissue seem to work the best. The Phage will repair some of the damage that’s been done to your body if you give it enough nutrients to work with.”

  “Is that why you look so…?”

  “Alive?” Perry chuckled. “Partly. I was inside my house when I turned into a zombie. Didn’t have the sense to open the door and walk out. I just wandered around in circles until I woke back up to myself. Wore a path in the carpet. That’s why my body doesn’t have so much wear and tear. Also, I survived up until about two years ago. I haven’t been dead as long as some folk have. You’ll see all kinds when you go into town. Most are middlin’, like you. A few are like me, hardly look dead at all. Others will just about make you lose your lunch. Just bone and gristle. It’s awful. I think I’d kill myself if I looked like that.”

  Soma nodded, staring down at her plate. The hunger was like a ball of fire in her guts. She tested her will against it and found to her satisfaction that she could resist it, even with raw flesh sitting just a few inches away from her. That was good. That was encouraging.

  “Go ahead,” Perry said, nodding toward her plate. “You ate meat before, didn’t you? What’s the difference between cooked and raw, really, only that it doesn’t look so much like the critter it used to be after you cook it? You can hide it in breading and fancy it up with veggies and garnish, but it’s still the same thing. It was still alive once. Human beings are carnivores. We were before the Phage, and we still are. It’s hypocrisy to pretend we ain’t.”