by H. L. Murphy
‘You do whatever you want, but do yourself a favor and don't marry an Irishwoman. Find yourself someone less likely to turn on you, like a nice, quiet little shark. Every last Irishwoman I've ever known has a hair trigger temper and they all have red hair. It doesn't always show, but they all have it. It's in their goddamn souls. And with the hair comes a great big batch of crazy.’
Dad would know, he married my Irish mother.
“That's not fair,” Lizzy answered almost immediately.
Bullshit, I thought, it’s completely fair after the years of emotional black mail I'd been subjected to. Today I strike a blow for oppressed men everywhere. No longer shall my brothers be held prisoner by quivering lips and crocodile tears! We will take our rightful place amongst the manipulative, amongst the bearers of emotional clubs, and we shall turn your own weapons upon you and you shall feel our pain.
What the fuck are you gibbering about?
Shut up. I don't have time for this right now. I'm trying to preserve Lizzy’s sanity.
Where was this enthusiastic determination to protect the delicate psyches of those around you before? You know, when you were getting your ass kicked all over Stuart?
Go. Away.
“I've always trusted you, Angus,” Lizzy spoke softly, just a touch of remorse in her voice. “I just don't like being treated like porcelain.”
“You're a lot of things, my love,” I gathered Lizzy into my aching, dildo abused arms, “but porcelain isn't one of them. Believe me, Lizzy, you really don't want to see what's in the crate.”
Moving at ridiculous speed Lizzy reached up to slap a lip lock on me I could feel in a particular spot south of my belt buckle, and then just as fast my petite, delicate flower of a wife slapped the ever living shit out of me. I think the shock value of her action stunned me far more than the open handed slap. An innocent, too happy smile spread across her face as turned to leave.
“H-h-hey,” I stuttered out. “What was that for?”
“Playing the guilt card,” she returned, sashaying her lovely rear end just that touch more to emphasize what I wouldn't be getting that night.
No good deed goes unpunished.
I am seriously not in the mood to put up with you right now.
I’m not terribly surprised. Quite a shock in my opinion. Completely bereft of any type of psychological training to cope with the unexpected, the totally unknown. Yet somehow, you have managed not to tumble into the pitch black pits of insanity. That in and of itself is an accomplishment to be proud of. Attaboy, you hairless fucking primate, you finally stopped eating insectoid vermin removed from a pack mate and began using that enormous melon you call a head for something other than a hat rack. Bravo!
Alright, I am not that much of a gaping prolapsed asshole. Please feel free to shut up and fuck off back into the darkest corners of my mind.
Why? So you can continue to exist in a vacuum of knowledge secure in the erroneous belief that Homo sapiens is the end all be all of evolution? God forbid you be faced with critical evidence to the contrary. Whatever will you do now? Burn a few thousand books? Jail the intellectuals? I know, I know! You can determine whether or not the accused is in league with Lucifer by dunking! If the accused drowns, they were innocent and can travel on to the loving embrace of a benevolent deity who permitted the righteous to suffer unspeakably at the hands of His servants.
Maybe I just need a few fucking minutes to come to terms with what I saw, is that alright with you, cocksucker? Maybe this is just too much on top of the fucking zombie apocalypse. PMC killers, the late Zombie Queen, and whatever the fuck poor Danny Green turned into have been stalking me since the day this all started, and I've done my best to roll with the punches. All things considered, I'd say I've done a bang up job. Death, impalement, hallucinations, none of it has had the sheer mental weight attached to that rust covered piece of Soviet shit sitting right there. So if I think it's a good idea to proceed with caution and take a few prudent steps maybe you could get the fuck off my back.
“Finn,” James repeated for what had to be the fifth time.
“Huh? What? What's wrong?” My eyes searched the bay for trouble.
“You're mumbling. Sounds like you're fighting with yourself,” James explained in the same tone of voice you might use with an angry animal. Soft, soothing tones meant to put one at ease. “And losing. It's okay, Finn. I know it's been difficult for you. All the stress, the fear, the expectations of everyone around you. No one can be expected to shoulder all that forever.”
Now it was my turn to gaze implacably upon my best friend through slitted eyes. Though his tone was one of genuine concern, I knew a viper waited amongst the reeds for the opportunity to strike.
“You fight it all you want, but sooner or later the truth will come out,” James placed a supportive hand on my shoulder, creeping me out no fucking end. “Just admit to yourself, if nobody else, that you loved being hit in face by a huge cock.”
“Prick,” I breathed out, slapping James’ hand away.
“Exactly,” he smiled. “You will be much happier if you can just admit your latent homosexual tendencies. Stop hiding from it. Embrace it. Become one with the cock. Accept it, love it, and try not to gag as it slams into the back of your throat you fucking pervert.”
“Fuck off to the machine shop, you goofy bastard. There's a wielding machine against the port side bulkhead,” note my correct use of nautical terms in a quasi professional manner. “Grab the machine and a set of goggles.”
“Why?” James managed to ask around uncontrolled giggling.
“I'm going to seal this piece of shit so no one else on the boat has to live with…” I trailed off, not willing to verbalize what we'd seen. At least, not yet. Maybe later after a lot of thinking and drinking.
“Yeah, and we should probably check the rest of the hold in case there are more where that came from,” James said. He made it to the hatch before I couldn't resist firing a revenge salvo.
“Hey, James,” I called. He turned without speaking to listen. “It's nice to see you practice what you preach.”
“What?”
“Oh, it's just that I figured you must have embraced your own inner pole smoker since you have a gargantuan mushroom stamp on your forehead.”
His eyes practically popped out of his head as he spun and rushed from the cargo hold. Thirty seconds later I heard his explosion of pure rage, two decks up and thirty feet away. Unlike me, James would have a penis head shaped bruise directly over his eyebrows for days. The whole crew would see it and he would have to live with their silent judgement or explain the bizarre events which led up to the bruising. I don't know which potentiality pleased me more.
I'm not sure whether James simply couldn't find the torch or whether he maintained reservations concerning his self control around the giver of mushroom stamps, but I had gone through the remainder of the immediate stack by the time James returned, wielder in hand. There were three more steel crates covered in Cyrillic writing with one crate actually bearing a scratched and faded sickle and hammer emblem. A part of me reasoned it was my responsibility to examine the contents of each crate before sealing them, but that kind of thought was difficult to make out over the tumultuous screams of denial from my reptilian brain.
“Do me a favor and set up the welder by that first crate,” I asked James as I eyed the other three crates. “Then get out of here.”
“Why?” James demanded. Even though I wasn't facing him, I could feel his eyes boring into me. Maybe he resented my assumption of authority, fuck knows I'd call someone out in heartbeat for kind of arrogance. Or maybe he suspected my true intent, that I was going to look into each and every crate. I intended to scar my psyche much further than ever before by intentionally exposing whatever lay within to my wretchedly small understanding of the universe.
“I have…to…see it…with my own eyes,” I managed.
“No you do not,” James stated in no uncertain terms.
“You
don't want to know, that's fine,” I responded without taking my eyes from the crates, ”but I need to see it. I'll never be able to let this go. You know me. It'll sit in the back of my head forever, gnawing at me until I can't think of anything else. I look now, and it won't be so bad later.”
“Alright, I'll stay with just in case,” James offered slowly, unwillingly.
“Thanks for offer, but you should leave in case something in there melts my face off,” I joked shakily. One could almost say my voice trembled although I would quickly shove my foot into someone’s groin for saying any such thing. I was not afraid. A little concerned, yes, but not afraid. Trepidatious is an excellent word to describe my limited emotional capacity. Not afraid. Just wanted to make that abundantly clear before moving forward.
“Good point, besides the lookout spotted a boat putting off from the shore, too far to gauge the number of passengers,” James explained as he backed slowly out of the cargo hold. “Might need me there to negotiate with whomever.”
“Whomever? My, oh, my, what have you been reading in your free time?” I snickered. Or maybe it was more of a nervous titter. Why do I feel the need to justify myself to a bunch of bunker dwelling cupcake munchers?
“I'll lend you my copy of Oxford English for Retards,” he jibed from the hatchway. “You'll like it. Plenty of pictures and small words. Oops, I forgot you were from Texas, so I guess you'll enjoy the pictures.”
“Remind me what sister slamming Podunk hole in the wall inbred shit hole you were hatched in? Arkansas? Kentucky? Someplace with hills and mountains so your sisters and cousins can't beat you on a straightaway?” I sneered over my shoulder.
“Wow, what a dick,” James started, but I cut across him.
“Is something I'm sure you've never heard a woman say after you drop trow,” I snarled again. “Now fuck off already.”
“Mother fucker,” James mumbled as he left. “Hope your face gets eaten by scarabs…”
With my best friend, my wife, and everybody else out of the way I stepped up to the emblem bearing crate and popped the top.
An hour later I emerged shaken and confused from the cargo hold onto the main deck to the pitch black of night. At the best of times I could not be considered a skilled welder, but I got the job done. And along the way managed to burn my forearms enough to prove it. Ocean spray fell over me as I emerged and a measure of relief lifted my spirits from that room, from those crates. Several deep, invigorating breathes later seemed to restore my will to carry on.
“Oh, fuck, you're still alive.”
It wasn't the sentiment, but the voice which sent my spirits spiraling into the depths of psychotic rage. It was a voice I knew, a voice I recognized from having rescued its owner, a voice I despised because it belonged to the most whinging, self centered twat waffle ever birthed in the lap of unearned luxury. I knew the voice of Farah Fuckwit because it had become inextricably linked to the loss of everything I died to secure for my family. Fury welled up from the pit of my soul until I could see nothing but a red haze. Lightning like, I spun to level my forty-five onto the pinched face of the prodigal Fuckwit.
This is not the most productive action you could be taking.
Shut. Up.
I can't shut up because I'm not actually speaking.
Shut. Up. She deserves to die. She stole everything we need for the family. Everything.
No, they stole everything we need for the family. Is she's here, where's Carroll?
Goddamn it. That's a good point. I don't see His Rotundness anywhere.
So maybe talk to the Fuckwit before you empty her already vacant cranial cavity?
Goddamn it, can't you argue in my favor every once in a while?
What do you think I'm doing now?
Goddamn it. Stop making so much sense.
“You fucking slack jawed, bow legged, two dollar whore,” I spat in her face.
Oh, good, start with the flattery right off the bat. Way to smooth talk her into seeing things your way.
“Tell me where my brother is,” I screamed in her face. Farah leaned away, not wanting to be quite so close to the source of saliva showering over her. As a counter to her evasion, I shot out my free hand to seize the hair on the back of her head. The moment Farah felt my grip tighten on her greasy locks she let out a shriek I'm sure was heard in Montana. Nails dug at my skin, blood rolled across my flesh, and I rammed the muzzle of my pistol against her forehead. Thankfully the screaming devolved into breathy whimpering. “Where is Carroll? And where are the supplies you stole, bitch?”
Seconds ticked away as Farah whimpered, whined, and tried her damnedest to convince me to take pity on her. The show came to an abrupt end as my eyes found hers and locked on. In that instant I learned something about the whole ‘windows to the soul’ shinola we've been force fed our entire lives.
It's true.
For maybe the first time in my life I looked into someone's eyes and gazed into their soul. I wish to fuck it had been almost anyone other than Farah. It wasn't so much that her soul was corrupt or diseased as I imagined the Don Juan of Rape’s had been before I splattered him all over the street. No, Farah’s soul was cold, barren of anything remotely close to beauty or ugliness. She could do whatever she pleased and felt no remorse, no guilt, only the pleasure of the moment. It struck me that I just gazed upon the soul of a sociopath.
At some time during my realization Farah must have seen her fate played out in my eyes because her entire demeanor altered. Instead of cowering, Farah became aggressively confident.
“You aren't going to shoot me as long as I know where your supplies are,” she sneered.
“Where is Carroll?” I demanded.
“Who fucking cares,” came out of her mouth even as James tried to interject. In place of a cutting remark, I drove the butt of my pistol into the bridge of Farah’s nose. Not hard enough to break anything, just hard enough to hurt like a son of a bitch. Blood, tears, and obscenities poured forth in great quantities.
“If you don't tell me where my brother is, I'll skin you alive and use you for chum,” I whispered into Farah’s ear. Interesting that in the dreamt of moment of vengeance my actual concern wasn't for the food, bullets, and sundries we worked so hard to find, but for a man I called brother. It didn't matter he exercised piss poor judgement, he was still my friend, still my brother.
I just wanted him back safe and sound.
So I could kick his ass sideways for being a dipshit.
“Where?” I repeated, caressing the side of her face with my pistol.
“Bad Eddie has your precious fucking brother,” Farah smiled through blood coated teeth. “He's dead by now.”
Chapter Four
The Ties That Bind
No matter how I argued, threatened, or, yes, begged, Lizzy wouldn't hear of me shooting Farah Fuckwit. Lizzy’s reasoning centered around me not losing the sense of humanity and kindness she had always loved in me. Since she is half of my world I eventually gave in and allowed Farah to be locked in an empty broom closet, with one hand cuffed to a steel pipe.
It had been suggested by certain people, namely Lizzy, that someone other than myself conduct any further interrogations. Although I believe the phrase used was more along the lines of ‘attempts to gather information’.
Potentially, beating her with a rubber hose. Basically the same thing, right? Moments like this have always convinced me I made the right decision in not going into law enforcement. Wouldn't have lasted a week before my first excessive force complaint. If someone else desperately ached for the opportunity to subject themselves to the sociopathic nonsense that made up Farah’s thought matrix, I was only too happy to hand the job off to them.
So instead of sliding a grapefruit into a sock and introducing said object to Farah’s ribs at fifty miles per hour, I returned to the cargo hold. And the crates containing more inherently disturbing nightmare fuel than the entire zombie apocalypse. As I gazed upon the containers a sense of how inadequate a
couple measly little welds truly were. Hidden beneath the mass of hot pink dildos I uncovered a brand new spool of chain. Chain I welded to the deck, then welded to the crate, and then welded to the deck on the far side of the crate. I ran welds around the entirety of the lid, then completely around the base of the crate. No one would be moving or opening these crates anytime soon. Most especially me.
“You might want to seek professional help,” James said from behind me. I turned to see my friend staring in bewildered awe, his eyes ran over the extensive welds, the chains, and the still wet painted warnings imploring all to stay out of the crates or have their faces melted off.
“Maybe,” I considered the statement genuinely. “But it's unlikely anyone with the required training survived the Outbreak. At least, anyone inside the quarantine zone.”
“So you do think the Outbreak is contained?” James asked, coming to stand next to me.
“I fucking hope so,” I breathed. “The only other option is unthinkable. Can you imagine how quickly the undead could spread across the south under the control of Zombie Green?”
“Hordes of brain dead zealots pouring into major cities? How is that any different from before Outbreak Day?” James asked, voicing his distaste for near constant influx of protesters, swiftly changed to rioters, showing up in most major cities over the past few years.
“Point. What did the Prodigal Fuckwit have to say?” I inquired. From within a shirt pocket I withdrew a cigar. Away went the cellophane wrapper, and the cigar band despite there being no one left to point out my manners faux pas, and I used my karambit to slice off the very tip. Somehow, without even hearing it, I knew James was about to ruin my year. Blue smoke billowed about my face as James dropped the other shoe.
“After you broke up their little play session, Bad Eddie and somebody called the Surgeon,” James hesitated when I shivered at the mention of Milo Fitzpatrick’s alter ego, “took their show on the road and headed south. Farah says the two recruited a small army of cuckoos and ran a hostile take over of the West Palm Beach convention center. Appearances to the contrary the convention center has been easy to fortify and defend against wandering hordes of undead, and what few survivors make the mistake of trying to take shelter inside end up joining the Circus Minimus.”