The Way of All Flesh

by Tim Waggoner

  He sat for a few moments longer, listening to the moans of the zombies as they fed, wishing he could feel even a small part of their satisfaction. Then, moving as silently as the shadows that cloaked him, he got down from the counter and made his way toward the back exit.

  Chapter Nine

  David had no idea how long he walked, wasn’t even aware of which direction he was going. He was focused on a single goal: to get Lizzie as far away from the carnage on the playground as he could. The specifics of what had happened were already becoming fuzzy in his mind, but there was one detail that remained agonizingly clear.

  My boy…my poor, sweet boy…

  Once more he saw Steve’s headless body lying on the ground, brain matter, bone fragments and blood—so much blood—spread around the monster pickup’s front wheel. His son had ended his life as roadkill. He still didn’t understand who or what the ivory-fleshed demons were, but after what they’d done to Steve, his feelings for them had turned from fear to burning hatred.

  What about the one with the rifle? She shot the two males that had been riding in the pickup. And she didn’t try to shoot you when you left with Lizzie.

  The thought was his, he was fairly certain of that, but the voice he heard in his head belonged to Simon. He glanced around, but the youth was nowhere to be seen. David carried Lizzie down a sidewalk in a residential area, but he wasn’t sure what part of town they were in. Given the ruined state Lockwood had fallen into—rotten wood, crumbling brick, cracked stone, all covered by greenish-black mold—everything tended to look the same to him. He had the sense that they might be near the university, but he wasn’t sure. What he was sure of, however, was that they were alone—for the time being, anyway. Simon would doubtless make another appearance sooner or later. David hoped it would be much later.

  He was at a loss to explain why the demon—another female, this one a bit taller than the one he had…taken care of—had helped him. He thought he had encountered her before, but it was more of a feeling than an actual memory. He hadn’t recognized her. How could he? Aside from minor size differences, the damned things all looked the same to him. But when he’d first turned to look at her back at the playground, he’d felt as if he’d known her somehow. More, he’d felt a sense of kinship, as if they were connected in some way. But that was impossible. He was human and she was…whatever the fuck she was.

  All right. So maybe she had helped him for some unknown reason. Or maybe she’d killed the two male demons for reasons of her own. But he couldn’t explain why she’d let him leave with Lizzie. He’d pointed at Steve’s lifeless body in an attempt to communicate with her. He hadn’t expected it to work, but maybe it had. Maybe she’d understood that one of his children had died, and that all he wanted to do was protect his other one. Maybe, maybe, maybe! Who gave a damn why the needle-toothed bitch had done what she’d done? He’d seen the other three demons slaughter people with wild abandon, and while those men and women had been insane—adults and children alike—they had nevertheless been human. So, fuck the demons. They killed his son, and if he got the chance, he’d kill them too.

  “Daddy?”

  He stopped walking and looked down at his daughter. She’d raised her head to gaze at him, her mouth smeared with blood, thick ropy strands of dark red stretching from her lips to his neck.

  She must’ve coughed it up, he told himself. He felt a distant throbbing in his neck, and he had a vague memory of Lizzie gnawing on his flesh as he walked. He allowed both of these details to recede into the fog that enshrouded his mind. Having a fucked-up memory came in handy sometimes.

  “It’s okay, sweetie. We’re safe now.”

  She looked around, blinking as if she’d just woken from a deep sleep.

  “Where’s Stevie? Where’s Mommy?”

  He didn’t know what to say to her. How could he tell her that her brother had been killed while engaging in a cannibalistic feeding frenzy? What if she remembered participating as well? The memories could traumatize her. Or worse, maybe they wouldn’t traumatize her at all. Either way, David wanted to avoid the subject.

  “I don’t know.” It was true in her mother’s case. He had no idea if Sarah was alive or dead. Given the current state of the world, he didn’t know which was preferable.

  She licked blood from her lips, and grimaced when she tried to swallow. “My chest hurts.”

  David hadn’t forgotten that Lizzie had been injured, but it wasn’t until that point that he remembered the severity of her wounds. Her entire chest had been ravaged by a shotgun blast delivered by the female demon, the one he’d…he’d… He had a flash of memory, of tasting something sweeter and more intoxicating than anything he’d imagined possible. It had been as if he’d tasted the very essence of life itself. He remembered how much he wanted to keep tasting it, how hard it had been to pull himself away, to deny his own need for that of his child. But in the end he’d done it. He’d spit out…

  He didn’t want to think about that anymore, so he let the fog take it.

  Given how badly Lizzie was hurt, it was a miracle she hadn’t bled to death while they’d been walking. Her voice was clear and strong, even if her manner was drowsy. She didn’t act like she was on the verge of dying, but how much longer could she live, as badly wounded as she was?

  He fought to keep the worry he felt out of his tone. “I know, honey. You’ll be okay. We’ll get you to a doctor and…” He trailed off. “That’s why I walked this way! The university has a hospital!” Even while running on autopilot, it seemed he’d been trying to take care of his little girl.

  Lizzie yawned, strands of bloody saliva stretching between her teeth. “I’m sleepy, Daddy.”

  “Try to stay awake, honey. We’ll be at the doctor’s soon.”

  “Okay. I’ll try.” She nestled her head into the crook of his neck once more and began gently nibbling his flesh, like a toddler chewing on a pacifier.

  David tried not to think about what his daughter was doing to him as he resumed walking once more, moving at the fastest pace he could manage with his injured foot, heading in what he hoped was the direction of the campus hospital.

  Several times during the trip to the hospital cannibals approached them, emerging from ruined buildings or dark alleys. They sidled in close, sniffing the air as they came, like animals scenting prey. David knew they were drawn by the smell of Lizzie’s blood. His too, probably. He’d gotten banged up pretty good back at the playground. He snarled at the cannibals like an animal himself, and after a moment’s hesitation, they backed down and slunk off in search of easier prey.

  Every time the cannibals retreated, David felt a sense of primitive satisfaction at teaching the sick freaks an important lesson about life in the jungle: Never fuck with Daddy.

  Lockwood University Hospital was located on the northern edge of campus. Both Steve and Lizzie had been born there, and while David couldn’t consciously recall the most direct route there—or any route, for that matter—he just continued walking and trusted his instincts to continue guiding him. They didn’t fail him; he reached the hospital in what seemed like a relatively short time, and Lizzie, although still listless, remained awake.

  The hospital hadn’t escaped the transformation that had befallen the rest of Lockwood, although it had undergone a more dramatic change than most structures in town. Instead of merely falling victim to rot and dissolution, the hospital building had been replaced by a gigantic spinal column. It rose a few hundred feet in the air, David estimated. It was hard to tell for certain, since the upper levels of the structure disappeared into a yellow cloud-like mist. At the top of the structure, visible only as a dark silhouette through the mist, was a large dome-like shape. David had no idea what it could be, but the sight of it stirred a primitive fear deep inside him. Bad place, he thought. That’s what it is.

  Each floor of the structure was represented by a single vertebra, and there were… He did a quick count of the visible levels and came up with twenty-eight. How
many vertebrae were in a human spine? If he’d ever known the answer to that, he’d forgotten it, along with so many other things. This structure was far larger than the original hospital had been. It had been four stories high, or maybe five. Either way, it sure as shit hadn’t been this big. This thing looked like a goddamned monument or something, albeit an extremely morbid one. A thought struck him then.

  As huge as the spine was, it should’ve been visible from any point in Lockwood. But this was the first time he could remember seeing it. Even when he and Lizzie had been approaching the structure, he hadn’t seen it. They’d simply turned a corner and—boom!—there it was. He told himself that the mist must’ve kept it hidden until they were close, but he didn’t believe it.

  The “hospital” differed from the other buildings in town in one more important way: instead of looking old and weathered, the bones that comprised the spinal column were clean and polished to a shine. No cracks, not even a spot of mold. He supposed that made a sort of twisted sense, considering this was supposed to be a place of healing. Bad enough the place looked like a giant’s spine. What patient would want to come here if it were dirty as well?

  David continued toward the hospital, hoping that despite its grotesque makeover, he’d be able to find help for Lizzie there. The parking lot wasn’t in as good a shape as the building, however—space lines faded, asphalt cracked and riddled with potholes, light poles bent or broken, the lot filled with rust-eaten husks of abandoned cars.

  As he wended his way through the maze of empty vehicles, it occurred to him that he’d been carrying Lizzie a long time. Even as tiny as she was, he still should’ve been tired by this point—arms weary, shoulders aching—especially after receiving his own share of wounds at the playground. But he felt fine. He decided to add that to the ever-growing list of mysteries he’d encountered since finding himself inhabiting this nightmare world. Whatever the reason for his stamina, he was grateful for it.

  He was also grateful that his hunger, while still gnawing at his insides like a nest of fire ants, was manageable. It wasn’t that the sensation of utter and total emptiness had subsided, but rather that he’d become accustomed to it. He’d never suffered from migraines, but he’d had a charming, if somewhat foul-mouthed, aunt who did. Regardless of how bad her pain became, she still continued with her everyday routine. He’d once asked her how she managed to keep chugging along while enduring what to most people would be crippling agony. I’m gonna feel like shit no matter what I do, she’d said, so I figure I might as well go on living. It’s my way of saying “fuck you” to the pain.

  “Fuck you, Hunger,” he whispered.

  As he reached the edge of the parking lot, he passed a minivan, tires rotted off the rims, side door missing, surface covered with the ubiquitous Lockwood mold. A soft rustling sound came from within the vehicle, and Lizzie pressed herself against him tightly.

  “Daddy, I’m scared!”

  A shadow stirred inside the van.

  “That’s a pretty little girl you got there—and she smells delicious.” A man’s voice, deep and heavy with need.

  David put Lizzie on the ground. “Stay behind me,” he warned.

  She grabbed hold of his legs, and he could feel that she was trembling. He wished she hadn’t done that. He’d need to move freely if he had to fight.

  He curled his hands into fists, squared his shoulders and tried to look as intimidating as possible. “Come near us and I’ll kill you.”

  “You’ve shouldn’t have set her down,” the man said. “What if I have friends, and what if they’re sneaking up behind you as we speak?”

  David didn’t fall for it. He kept his gaze fastened on the van’s shadow-filled interior. “Lizzie, is there anyone behind us?”

  After a moment, “No, Daddy.”

  “That’s what I thought. Nice try, asshole.”

  The man laughed. “Good for you, David!”

  The voice changed. It was somewhat higher pitched now, and definitely younger sounding.

  Simon emerged from the shadows and climbed out of the van, grinning. “Glad to see you and your mini-me made it. Too bad about your boy, but that’s how the skull pops, huh?”

  Lizzie’s grip on his legs tightened. “I don’t like that man, Daddy. He’s scary.”

  David looked over his shoulder at his daughter. “You can see him?” He’d come to accept that Simon was nothing more than a product of his own mind, another aspect of himself, a fragmented piece of his personality that he’d only imagined was a separate person. But if Lizzie could see him too…

  He faced Simon once more. “What do you want this time?”

  The youth held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Only to help. I came ahead to let them know you were on your way. After all, it’s not like the world has cell service anymore.”

  Before David could ask what Simon meant, a square section of bone in the lowest level of the gigantic spinal column slid aside, and a nurse came walking out, pushing a wheelchair before her. The chair’s frame was made of surgical instruments held together with barbed wire, and its wheels were formed from coils of intestine stretched across metal rims. The chairback was a human rib cage, the ribs stretched outward to provide room for its occupant, and the seat was made from three rows of three human skulls lashed together with metal rods and more barbed wire, making for nine in all.

  The nurse was a short, overweight woman with a cherubic face and short black hair. She wore a white uniform along with rubber-soled shoes that made soft plap-plap-plap sounds on the asphalt as she approached. The chair wheels creaked softly as they turned, the intestines making wet squelching sounds.

  Seeing how heavy the woman was made David wonder why so many healthcare workers seemed not to take care of themselves as well as they did their patients. One of his regular customers at Country Time Buffet was a respiratory therapist in his sixties who chain-smoked like a fiend. What kind of denial did a guy like that have to be in? He saw the results of smoking every day with his patients, and yet he continued—

  The world then shimmered before his eyes, and when his vision cleared, he saw not a titanic spinal column but a normal-looking hospital building, just as he remembered it—with one exception. The grounds hadn’t been tended to in some time, and the grass and shrubs had grown wild. The wheelchair looked normal too, but the nurse had become a horrid yellow-skinned creature with a single clouded eye. The other eye was gone, and a patch of jaundiced skin had grown to cover the socket. Most of her hair was missing. Only sparse tufts remained on a scalp covered with scar tissue, and David wondered if she might’ve suffered burns at one point. Her uniform was torn and soiled with bloodstains and dirt, and a nauseating stench wafted from her, an overpowering odor of rotten meat and sulfur.

  The sky was no longer pus-yellow. It was a normal night sky, clear, with a nearly full moon and stars scattered from horizon to horizon. His heart ached at the sight, and he wished he could freeze this moment and remain here forever, looking out into a universe that, despite whatever changes occurred on Earth, remained constant.

  “Don’t fool yourself,” Simon said, his voice sounding harsh and guttural now. “The universe is dying too. Has been since the day it was born. It’s just not in any hurry, that’s all. It likes dying, and it wants to draw out the process as long as it can. It’s like that old joke: How does a masochist commit suicide? Very, very slowly.”

  David was still gazing up at the moon, and he didn’t take his eyes off it. He didn’t want to see what Lizzie looked like right now, and he sure as hell didn’t want to see whatever awful thing Simon had become. He was relieved a few moments later when his vision swam once more and the world returned to—if not to normal, then at least to what he’d become accustomed to. The nurse, still corpulent but completely human looking, smiled as she wheeled the chair up to them. She looked down at Lizzie and said, “Get on, honey. We’re going to take you to see the doctor.”

  Lizzie still gripped his legs tightly, and D
avid turned around and gently pried her hands free. She, too, looked human, although she still possessed the horrible chest injury. He helped her into the bizarre wheelchair, wiped the blood from her mouth with his sleeve as best he could and told her everything was going to be all right. She looked doubtful, especially when she reached down to feel the skulls that served as the chair seat, but she gave him a brave smile and nodded.

  The nurse wheeled Lizzie around and started heading back to the entrance of the bone hospital. David finally worked up the courage to look at Simon and saw that he was still his usual smirking self. David wondered if the boy had changed at all, and then he remembered how he’d spoken with a low, inhuman voice, and he decided not to think about it anymore.

  Simon grinned. “Denial can be a useful tool at times, can’t it?”

  “Yes,” David said. “It can.”

  Walking side by side, the two of them followed after Lizzie and the nurse.

  Kate lay on her mattress, staring up at the ceiling. Her room was on the second floor of the high school. Even with the first-floor windows boarded over and sentries posted on the roof twenty-four hours a day, none of the survivors felt comfortable sleeping on the first floor, Kate included. Since the school had no heat, the room was chilly, but she’d cast aside her blankets when she’d lain down. She wanted to feel the cold. Her room was dark too, but not because she wanted to avoid attracting zombies. All the survivors had chosen rooms that had no windows, and she was no exception. She had a small battery-powered lamp she could turn on whenever she felt like it, but she definitely did not feel like it now. Not after what happened tonight.

  Her rifle lay on the floor next to the mattress, but she kept her 9mm beneath her pillow when she slept. The pistol was easier to grab hold of and fire in the dark, and she liked the reassurance of feeling its solid form beneath her head. She sometimes thought of it as the After Blacktide version of a teddy bear.