The Way of All Flesh

by Tim Waggoner

  The man-demon rushed forward and swung the hammer at David’s lower jaw, dislocating it with a single blow. The impact caused David to lose his balance, and he fell to his knees. He expected to hear Simon award a point to the man-demon, but the youth remained silent for a change. He simply watched, his expression unreadable.

  The man-demon continued pounding on David, dancing around him, striking blow after blow to his head, chest, shoulders and back. With each blow he chanted three words, words that David now understood.

  “I am Death! I am Death! I am Death!”

  Broken and bleeding, David collapsed to the floor—a floor made of concrete, not insect carapace—and stared up at his attacker, a man who had killed both his sister and his ex-wife. Blood covered the head of the man’s mallet, smeared the front of his rain poncho—which wasn’t made of lizard skin now but ordinary plastic—and stippled his face. When he smiled, David could see dots of blood on his teeth.

  “By now the rest of the undead fucks you led here have broken into the high school and are happily gorging themselves on yummy survivor meat. And you know what? I don’t give a shit. Once I finish you off, I’ll cut Marie’s vocal cords—didn’t have time to do it earlier—and then I’ll hunker down in here and wait for the zombies to finish clearing out the school. When their bellies are full, they’ll go into torpor, and I’ll sneak out. Of course, until then, I’ll have more fun with Marie. With your sister too. Don’t worry; I won’t fiddle with Kate myself. I’m not into dead chicks—truly dead ones, I mean. But I think I’ll cut some chunks off her and see if I can get Marie to eat them. That should be good for a few laughs.”

  David looked toward the table and saw Marie as a jaundiced, milk-eyed thing that snarled and snapped as it glared at the man-demon. He looked to Sarah’s body, still hanging from the ceiling, and saw that it looked the same. He tried to look at Kate, but somewhere along the line the man-demon had injured his neck to the point where he couldn’t turn his head. He feared he might be paralyzed, but he could still wiggle the fingers on his remaining hand, even though most of them were broken. But he didn’t need to see Kate to know that she would now appear as human to him as her killer.

  Simon spoke then, his voice so soft David could barely hear it.

  “Why have I been hanging around you, David?”

  David could no longer speak, perhaps due to damage from the mallet, perhaps because he no longer saw himself as human. But he could still think. Not as fast as he could when he was alive, and not as clearly, but if he concentrated hard enough, he could do it.

  You want to find out if I’m—he struggled to recall the term Simon had used—the One.

  “The One who can do what?”

  Overcome? No, he’d used a fancier word. Transcend. Transcend hunger.

  “So tell me—do you still feel hungry?”

  David didn’t have to think about it. Hunger had been his constant companion since he’d returned to an awareness of his identity. What had that hunger driven him to do in the months before that? How many people—and other zombies—had he killed and devoured? He didn’t know, and for that he was grateful. But didn’t transcend mean to go beyond? What was beyond hunger?

  Simon had answered that question for him when they were in the elevator rising to the hospital’s highest level—a trip David was beginning to suspect had really been into the innermost depths of his own mind.

  More hunger, of course. But a hunger so far beyond the annoying sensation in your wittle tummy-tum-tum, as a blazing supernova is beyond a flickering match.

  The Gyre was that hunger, and according to Simon, it lay at the center of everything. Which meant it was within him too, for was he not part of everything?

  Yes. I am hungry. So, so hungry…

  The man-demon stepped forward and raised his blood-smeared mallet.

  “Enjoy oblivion.”

  But as he started to literally bring the hammer down, time seemed to slow to a crawl for David. He turned his awareness inward, searching for the part of him that was connected to the Gyre. But what he found instead was his connection to the other zombies. The link had been forged at the hospital—with Simon’s help, he suspected. It had allowed him to pinpoint Sarah’s location, helped him rally the others to his side, and he tapped into it one last time.

  His awareness expanded, fragmented, and he found himself looking through the eyes of every zombie who had followed him to the high school. They had managed to break down the door that led to the backstage of the Performing Arts Center, and now they rampaged through the halls of the school, sinking teeth into succulent flesh, tearing into soft bellies with bare hands and drawing forth the sweet treasures that lay within. They feasted to a backdrop of screams, moans and sobs, and it was like a symphony to their inhuman ears.

  It began with Maribel. She and Lindsey knelt on the cafeteria floor, sharing what was left of a four-year-old boy, but then Maribel stopped chewing. She looked at Lindsey for a moment, and then she spit out the mouthful of meat, reached out and touched her fingers to the side of Lindsey’s face. Lindsey snarled and tried to pull away, thinking that Maribel intended to steal the food from her mouth. But the flesh of Maribel’s fingers had merged with hers, making it impossible for her to draw back. It happened swiftly after that. The bodies of the two women flowed together, absorbing the child’s remains as they did so. Bones, organs, skin, hair—all liquefied, becoming a yellowish goo from which pseudopods extruded and reached for the closest flesh to absorb—zombie or human, living, dying or dead, it didn’t matter. Meat was meat, and it was all good.

  David’s awareness centered on his physical self once more, and time resumed its normal course. He managed a final thought before the mallet smashed into his skull.

  It is accomplished.

  Nicholas didn’t stop pounding until David’s head was reduced to bloody paste. He stepped back, breathing hard, sweat pouring off him. He hadn’t had this much exercise in a while. It felt good. He resolved to be more active from now on.

  Marie hissed and gnashed her teeth at him. She’d strained against the barbed wire so much that it had cut to the bone. He wasn’t worried about her getting loose, though. He’d made sure her bonds were secure.

  “Shut up,” he said, but there was no anger in his words. He was in too good a mood.

  He walked to the workbench, put down the gore-encrusted mallet, then removed his rain poncho and dropped it to the floor. The plastic was useful for keeping bloodstains off clothes, and if he’d still lived in a world with police officers, that knowledge might’ve come in handy. But law enforcement was a thing of the past, like fast food, infomercials and stupid cat pictures on the Internet. He no longer had any need to conceal his activities. Besides, he missed the smell of blood on his clothes.

  The rain was beginning to slacken, but it was still coming down hard enough to mask any sounds that Marie made. Perhaps it wouldn’t be necessary to sever her vocal cords. He’d like it better if he could hear her react as he enjoyed her. What the hell, he decided. Today had been a special day, and he might as well finish it off with a bang. So to speak.

  He removed his clothes, folded them neatly and placed them on the workbench. It was chilly inside the shed, and the sweat on his body made it feel even colder. He didn’t shiver, though. He had too much control to permit that.

  He took a pair of scissors from the workbench and walked over to the table where Marie lay, his cock hardening in anticipation. She snarled and snapped, and if he hadn’t known better, he would’ve thought she was angry with him. But of course she was a zombie now, and despite her ridiculous theories that some vestige of human intelligence remained inside their undead brains, he knew better. She was nothing more than an animal now. But that was all right. Even animals had their uses.

  He cut the tape holding Grace’s head to the bloody hamburger mess that she’d made of Marie’s cunt. He lifted the head up to his face, kissed it on the forehead, and then hurled it at the concrete floor as hard as
he could. It hit, bounced, rolled, and when it came to a stop, Grace’s blood-smeared mouth no longer moved.

  He looked at Marie and smiled.

  “And then there was one. But you have nothing to worry about. At least, not for a while. I plan to take my time with you.”

  He directed his gaze to the black blood and shredded flesh between her legs.

  “Looks like I won’t need any lubricant.” He grinned and began to climb onto the table.

  But before he could enter Marie’s ruined vagina, the shed burst apart with a sound like thunder. Moving with the instinct and speed of a threatened predator, he leaped off the table and scuttled under it as splintered wood and roof tiles hit the concrete floor, followed by frigid rain.

  His first thought was that he had no weapons close by. He’d left the scissors on the table. He could reach up and… His thoughts then slammed to a halt as a massive form loomed over him.

  The creature was large as an elephant. No, larger. The size of a small whale, at least. It seemed to have no definite form, its surface expanding and contracting randomly in a way that made Nicholas think of an amoeba. It possessed no features that he could see, but its flesh had a familiar jaundiced, leathery aspect.

  Tendrils emerged from the mass and lashed outward, fast as cracking whips. Nicholas flinched, thinking they were coming for him, but instead they wrapped around Grace’s head, Lillian’s and Sarah’s bodies, along with Sarah’s discarded limbs. It took mere seconds for these parts to liquefy and be absorbed into the mass of flesh. And then a tendril extended and took hold of David. Within two blinks of an eye, he had been absorbed as well. Nicholas expected the creature to absorb Marie and Kate next, but for some reason, the great fleshy mass left them alone.

  When the tendrils had finished their work, they were reabsorbed into the creature’s body. Then the massive thing just sat there, almost as if it was waiting for Nicholas to make the next move.

  He crawled out from underneath the table and stood in the cold rain, not allowing himself to shiver. He glanced at the tabletop, saw the scissors were still there. He looked to the workbench. It had been knocked over when the creature had torn the shed apart, and his tools were scattered on the concrete floor. He didn’t think much of his chances of getting his hands on any of them before the creature could strike.

  “I don’t know what the fuck you are or where you came from,” Nicholas said, “but you’re nothing compared to me. I am Death! I—”

  A dozen thin tendrils emerged from the mass, streaked toward Nicholas’s tools, snatched them up and then shot toward him. As they went to work, Nicholas thought he much preferred being on the other end of the blade. And then his control shattered and he began to scream.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Kate opened her eyes and saw Marie looking down at her. She was smiling, but there was worry in her eyes. She was also naked.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked.

  “Like someone shot and killed me.”

  It was raining. Not hard, little more than a sprinkle, but the water was cold. She shivered as she tried to sit up. A wave of dizziness hit her, and Marie took hold of her arm to steady her.

  She looked around. The shed had been reduced to kindling, and a huge mound of yellowish flesh rested on the grass close by. It looked like someone had performed several thousand liposuctions, airlifted the fat to Lockwood and dumped it all on the high school grounds.

  She looked at Marie again. “I thought you were a zombie.”

  “I was. I’m not anymore.”

  She looked between Marie’s legs, and Marie laughed. “Don’t worry. That’s fixed too.”

  “Good thing. I have plans for it.” She frowned. “I don’t remember anything after Nicholas shot me. Is he…”

  “He’s gone. Cut into a million tiny pieces and scattered to the wind.” She nodded toward the mass. “It refused to take him. Can’t say as I blame it.”

  “And just what is it?”

  “It doesn’t have a name per se.”

  Kate turned her head and saw the voice belonged to a skinny teenage boy wearing a Megadeth T-shirt and jeans. It was the same boy she’d seen with David during the visions she’d had of him being human. The one who looked like Simon Milligan.

  “It calls itself Quidam. It’s a Latin word which means ‘one unknown or one who cannot be named’. It’s also a term used in French law. There’s a lawyer or two in there, and I suppose that’s where it got the idea from.”

  “Where’s David?”

  “You don’t need to ask me,” the boy said.

  At first she didn’t understand what he was talking about, but then she felt her brother’s presence through their shared link, and she knew.

  “He’s…in there.”

  The boy nodded. “More than that, he’s the predominant personality. That means he’s in the driver’s seat.”

  “I know what predominant means.” She looked at the flesh mound. “David?” she thought.

  No answer.

  She rose to her feet with Marie’s help. Then she removed her rain poncho and slipped it over Marie’s head. It wouldn’t do much to keep her warm, but it was better than nothing.

  She then turned to the boy. “Who are you? You look like a kid who used to live in our neighborhood when we were growing up.”

  “His name’s Simon,” Marie said. “At least, that’s what your brother calls him. That’s why he looks human too. He took the image from David’s mind.”

  “But he’s not human?”

  “Technically speaking,” Simon said, “I’m Blacktide. Pleased to make your acquaintance.” He bowed.

  “You’re…what?”

  “I was right about where the zombie plague came from,” Marie said. “Well, kind of. Simon is a virus, one so highly evolved that he—it—achieved self-awareness. And because viruses mutate so swiftly, it wasn’t long before his intelligence surpassed ours.”

  Kate was having a hell of a time processing this. “So you’re an evolved flu bug in human form?”

  “I don’t have physical form, not as you’re thinking of it anyway. You only imagine you see me. I’m present in everyone on Earth, zombies and survivors both, but only as a virus. I can communicate with you because I’m inside you.”

  “Sounds dirty when you put it like that. So you killed off most of the human race, and turned almost everyone else into zombies, for what? Shits and giggles?”

  “Once I was inside everyone, I could see that it was only a matter of time until you killed yourselves off, along with the rest of the ecosystem. Including me. Without hosts, I’ve got nowhere to live. In order to preserve my own life, I had to find a way to save your species. Phase One of my plan was taking a fictional scenario your race created—the zombie apocalypse—and using it as a template to recreate myself. It took a few decades, but I managed.”

  “You’re supposed to be more intelligent than us, but you plagiarized your grand scheme?” Kate said.

  “I prefer to think of it as not reinventing the wheel. Once I reduced the human race to a number that was a little easier to work with, I began searching for someone who could be the catalyst for the next phase. Hunger—raw, unthinking, animal need—has ever been at the core of your species, and all that you term evil springs from that need, that selfishness. The major religions your people created were on the right track. They just weren’t able to effect any real, lasting change. But I could. I wanted to find someone who could transcend need. Someone who could understand that while existence may ultimately make a meal of itself, we need to do all we can to get it to slow down and chew its food thoroughly.”

  “You lost me on that last part.”

  “Let’s skip the philosophy then. David was the One I was looking for. He was able to ‘die to the self’, as the Buddhists say, move past his individual needs, and—” he gestured toward the Quidam, “—ta-dah.”

  “Phase Two is complete,” Marie said.

  “What’s Phrase Three?” K
ate asked.

  “The Quidam will do what any good virus does. It will spread. It will sweep across this planet, absorbing humans and zombies alike, until only itself exists.”

  “And then you…”

  Simon smiled. “‘Will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.’ Your people had a saying: ‘If God didn’t already exist, it would be necessary to invent Him’. Another idea I ‘borrowed’ from your kind.”

  She looked at the Quidam. “So David is in there.”

  “Sarah too. Your niece and nephew will join them, once the Quidam absorbs everyone else in Lockwood. It’s not as difficult to reconstitute a consciousness as you might think.”

  “So why haven’t you absorbed us already?” Kate asked. “Did you want someone to gloat to first?”

  “The Quidam has others plans for us,” Marie said. “That’s why it healed you and made me human again. It needs us.”

  “For what?”

  “The Quidam can force the Joining if it wishes,” Simon said, “but the process is more efficient if it’s entered into voluntarily. Less of the individual’s personality is lost. And, of course, if people try to resist, they could damage themselves and each other, perhaps to the point where Joining is no longer possible. So you two will precede the Quidam and act as its ambassadors. You will spread the new gospel to both humans and zombies, and attempt to convince as many as you can to choose the Joining.”

  “You want us to be disciples? Fuck that noise! And how the hell are we supposed to talk with zombies anyway?”

  “I was one, remember?” Marie said. “The Quidam made me human, but not all the way. I’m still part zombie, enough so that I can communicate with them, at any rate.”

  Kate looked more closely at Marie and saw that her skin had taken on a slight yellowish cast, and her eyes had a slight cloudy film over them. She had to force herself not to step away from her lover.