Sam smiled throughout Bleckner's rantings. I found myself increasingly curious as to the source of his good humor.
I was roused from these wonderings by Bleckner's flabby hand upon my shoulder.
"All right, then," he said. "Peter, do you have anything to say before the men watch you exact justice?"
I looked up. The men, as Bleckner called them, looked only mildly interested in any of it. Murder and killing and zombies were nothing new to them. Whatever was about to transpire would be only one more in a long line of gory deaths they had seen in the past few months. Probably, Bleckner's idea to wrap a mundane, everyday murder in so much ceremony felt excessively formal to them-like carefully presenting a McDonald's hamburger on a sterling silver tray.
I stared hard at Sam-this crumpled, sad, yet furtively smiling man. And it was difficult, in that moment, not to smile a little bit myself.
Bleckner's preamble to our combat had been full of rhetoric, declaiming that far from being animalistic or base, violence was natural and authentic-especially violence between humans. All the great societies had known this, Bleckner declared, spouting off names of Greeks and Romans that I had long since forgotten (if I'd ever known them). Yet somehow, Bleckner seemed anxious about how to commence the proceedings.
"Do I just say `go' or something?" he asked, unsure of himself. "Or maybe `fight' would be good? What does that boxing announcer always say? `Let's get it on!' That's it."
"Any of those, really," I told him.
"Ahh," he said, relieved in general, but a little annoyed that I hadn't picked one in particular. Bleckner stepped back from me and addressed the assembled gangsters.
"Well, then," he said. "Let's ... get it on!"
Not great, but it would do.
A few of the gangsters cheered. One hooted. One, standing near Sam, said: "Yew gonna git eaten, boy. By a damn zombie! How you like them apples?"
Before I advanced on my opponent, I chanced a quick glance at the windows of Gunther Hall that faced the fighting pit. ("Fighting circle" was actually more like it. There was no indentation in the earth.) Much to my relief, the windows were entirely empty. Not a single face peered out to see what was about to transpire.
My smile became even harder to contain.
Then I was upon him.
Sam assumed no fighting stance, and at first, I feared this meant he might simply go limp and allow me to kill him as quickly as possible, which was not in my plans. But when I gripped him around the shoulders and attempted to throw him down, he began to fight back. He punched me in the face twice-clearly hurting his hand-then gripped me on each shoulder like a grappler.
I gripped Sam by his own shoulders and fought against himalbeit halfheartedly-by tugging and jostling. He wasn't stronghunger and stress had taken their toll-but he was still more powerful than he looked. I pushed him around a little, eventually maneuvering him over to the edge of the fighting pit, where a marble Doric column had been overturned to serve as a boundary marker.
Sam started kicking my legs. I decided to use this. I let one of the kicks connect, and acted as though Sam had struck home. I fell to one knee and managed to pull Sam down with me. We toppled awkwardly, and then rolled.
Soon, I was on top of Sam. I began raining blows down on his ears and shoulders. Not as hard as I could, but enough that it seemed real. (Clearly, it seemed real to Sam, whose face was a picture of terror as he struggled endlessly against me.)
The men around us became further invested in the match. Some stood up and walked closer. One of them said: "Eat his brain, zombie!"
After landing several more blows, I Pulled Sam closer and fell forward on him in an almost-amorous position. I put my mouth to the side of his head as though I was preparing to bite his ear off. Then I began to whisper.
"Hey," I said. His eyes rolled wildly, still consumed by fury and terror.
"Listen," I rasped in his ear, all the while flailing away. "I'm only gonna say this once. I'm gonna stand up and go after the provost. The moment I turn toward him, I want you to jump over that column and lay yourself down flat on the ground."
I pulled myself up off of Sam's ear and looked him straight in the face. He looked bewildered, as if he could not quite believe what was happening. I landed a theatrical blow to the side of his head, not really connecting, but kicking up a lot of dirt and gravel. I gave Sam a wink.
He managed a little nod back at me.
That was all I needed.
I jumped backward off of Sam, in an awkward dismount. Then I stood up fully. I paced back and forth, like a snake weaving as it prepares to strike again. Sam got up too, but only halfwayremaining in a sort of three-point crouch by the Doric column. The men around us were all cheering now. ("Yeah, zombie!" "Finish him!" "Eat that motherfucker!")
Never once looking away from Sam, I allowed my snakelike weave to drift over toward Bleckner. (He was applauding the violence, and saying "Yes! Yes!") Then, abruptly, I turned and faced him, and several things happened at once.
The first thing-which I only half-noted from the corner of my eye-was that Sam threw himself face-first over the fallen Doric column. This did not seem to alarm the gang members around him, as it was obviously not an attempt to escape. (If anything, his ducking behind the column likely appeared an insane, last-ditch attempt to hide from me.) It was clear, as he landed like a sack of potatoes on the other side of the expensive marble, that he wasn't going anywhere.
The next thing that happened was that I stepped in close to Bleckner. He smiled at me brightly and stopped applauding, instead, opening his arms to give me an encouraging pat on the hack. He opened his mouth (I'm sure to say something like "Good goin', my boy. Very authentic of you!"). As he did, I gingerly opened the black vest that covered his white business shirt and snatched three of the grenades that hung inside, pulling out their pins in the same motion. "Whaaa-" was all the astonished Bleckner had time to say.
I turned and lobbed the grenades at the three largest clusters of gangsters, just as I had rehearsed in my mind. It made a triangle, with the fighting pit in the middle.
For an instant, the gangsters looked on, confused. One of them gently prodded a grenade that had landed at his toe. Then he realized what it was and screamed, "Oh, fuck!" I fell to the ground and covered my head with my hands.
"Don't just stand-" Bleckner cried, but he was cut off by three explosions in quick succession. The detonations were very loud. The ground seemed to jump beneath me with each blast. My mouth and nose were instantly clogged with dirt. There was a sound like a rain stick as airborne dirt and gravel fell back to the earth. Then I began to hear the screams.
I stood up cautiously, and found myself in a world gone gray and brown with dust. Men and parts of men were scattered all around, many of them emitting cries of horrible pain. I rubbed my dirtencrusted eyes hard, trying to clear them. There was an automatic pistol on the ground a few feet from me. I picked it up and began killing gangsters with it.
A few of the men-likely those who had been at the far edges of the fighting pit-were largely unharmed by the blast, and were now fleeing into the forest. I let them go. The vast majority were dead. A few were only wounded or dazed. Of these, I began to make short work, stalking through the dusty camp, putting bullets into brains.
"Sam!" I called as I went about this grim task. "Sam, can you hear me?! Are you all right?"
I shot a staggering, blinded gangster in the back of the head.
"Yeah," a voice called tentatively from the dust. I had been more than a little disoriented by the blast, but as I turned in the direction of the voice, I saw that Sam was huddling on the far side of the overturned column. I shot a gangster through the forehead as he moved toward Sam, dropping him dead at Sam's feet.
"Sam, go open the door and let everyone out of Gunther Hall," I shouted, whirling around on my heels to check for more survivors (and to make sure they did not survive). Sam hurried to the door and undid the chains and wrench while I put down two more gang
members who had staggered to their feet and found their guns. The dust had finally begun to clear properly, and I got a good look at the dimming blue sky. Sunset was practically here. We were going to make it!
I heard the creak of the door to Gunther Hall swinging wide.
"Peter!" Sam cried.
"Is everybody okay?" I called.
Then I felt something hard and cold pressed against the back of my head.
"Drop that gun," a familiar, sonorous voice cried.
It was Bleckner.
I obeyed.
Bleckner took a step back. I turned slowly to face him. A look of utter disgust and betrayal corrupted his face like a wound. Along with blood. Lots of blood. Bleckner's formerly white business shirt was now an obscene blotter of dirt and dark red splotches.
"Why, Pete?" was all he said.
Sam began to approach us, but Bleckner turned the gun on him and Sam halted in his tracks. The crowd of friendlies still stood by the door to Gunther Hall, and it would be easy for Bleckner to cover them in a single sweep of his weapon.
"Stop right there," Bleckner said.
"Look, it's time to give up," I said to Bleckner. "Your whole gang's dead."
He turned his gun back to me.
"Shut up, you ... zombie," he said, uttering the z-word like a most pernicious racial slur. "We could have had a wonderful, real world together. A place for real men. But you just ruined it!"
"Okay, seriously," I told him. "Look around. It's over."
"No, it's not," he said. Then, to my astonishment, he dropped the gun. (I thought perhaps I had misheard him.)
"I'll kill all of you," Bleckner said, his voice growing distant and maniacal. "I'll kill you all."
Bleckner turned again toward Gunther Hall and the assembled friendlies. At first, this action did not alarm me, as Bleckner appeared to be unarmed. Then I saw him reach for his chest, as if scratching his armpit. I guessed what he meant to do a moment later, and took off toward him as quickly as my zombie-stumble would carry me.
By the time Bleckner had reached the crowd-most of whom had braced themselves, as if anticipating a fistfight-he had the grenade out of his vest and was holding it aloft. The pin had already been pulled.
I reached him and jumped on his back.
"Run!" I rasped to the onlookers as Bleckner and I fell forward.
We landed on the ground, atop one another. My first impulse was to try to wrest the grenade from Bleckner and throw it away, but in the fleeting instants that followed, it became clear that there would not be time. For all of his womanly fleshiness, Bleckner's grip on the little metal oval was as strong as any man's.
Instead of trying to free the thing, I used both of my arms to pull Bleckner's outstretched hand inward and toward us. Then I rolled over, and pinned the grenade between our bodies.
Then I waited.
They say that when you think you're going to die, your life flashes before your eyes. Zombies (who are not, strictly speaking, alive) don't seem to experience this. I would have welcomed the distraction a quick review of my life might have provided, but it did not occur. I had nothing to remove my thoughts from the realization that, in a matter of moments, I was going to explode. Yet-and I realize this might be a little hard to believe-my thoughts were not for myself.
As I lay there-holding the thrashing, gnashing provost to my breast-my only concerns were for those around me.
This was a failure. I had failed them. While being blown apart would, yes, probably mean a cessation of all consciousness for me, it would also mean the loss of my friends' only ticket out of Knox County and safe passage to the Green Zone.
I pictured the army helicopters landing on the hill, some sort of official-looking general guy getting out (all medals and epaulettes), and Sam and Vanessa trying in vain to explain to him that the Kernel really had been here, and had been exploded a second before the army had shown up.
I pictured Sam presenting the general with my smoking, halfdestroyed Cedar Rapids Kernels baseball cap. Sam would smile up at him hopefully, and the stern general would do an about-face, order his troops back onto the helicopters, and they would fly away.
Yes, that was almost certainly what would happen.
But ... (There always seemed to be a "But.") Perhaps I had accomplished a few things. It was not "success" by any stretch of the definition, but I had helped the friendly humans defeat Bleckner's gang. My Kenton colleagues would once again have control of their hilltop. I hoped that with the two groups merging, they would find themselves stronger than either had been previously. Maybe they would even be strong enough to make a break for the Green Zone together-though that would be another story, one that I would not be around to see.
It is also worth noting that, in this instant of frozen, impending doom, I had no real anger left in my heart for Sam. He had protested his innocence to the last-even going so far as to blame anotherbut did I believe him? In the end, no. I didn't. I'd decided I'd never know for certain, but he had likely been the one.
The world going to zombie-hell, and his one friend (and possible love interest) was electing to make a final stand with a girlfriend rather than with him? Yeah, I understood it. It was an irrational, murderous, selfish lashing out, but I understood it. And I think I may have even forgiven him.
Anyhow, the grenade exploded, and everything went black.
It was serious blackness. Epic blackness. I saw nothing. I felt nothing. I heard screams, but they were muffled and distant.
There was only numbness.
I assumed I had been killed or was dying. Dying a zombie's death. Those were the only explanations that made sense now. It was so, so very black.
Perhaps I was now only a head. I remembered having read articles about scientists during the French Revolution trying to discern how long a head lived after being guillotined. I thought I remembered the results as having been inconclusive. (But if it was a few seconds for humans, then maybe it was a little longer for zombies.) I resolved to relax, and let the nothingness overtake me.
Instead, a hand overtook me.
Before I understood what was happening, I was extricated from a ball of gore that had once been a college provost. Tiny, strong hands gripped me by the scruff of the neck and pulled me up. A portion of Bleckner's neck fat-separated from the rest of his body by the grenade-had been covering my eyes like a fleshy blindfold, and it slid off and fell away as I was pulled upward.
I looked down and saw the remains of Bleckner's dead body. He had been pulverized. His chest and neck turned into mincemeat. The double chin had been blown away completely, revealing a skeletal jaw and chemically whitened teeth. His eyes were remarkably intact, and looked almost sentient. I nearly would have sworn they looked on as Sam pulled me up from the wreckage.
"Jesus, Pete," was all Sam said as he righted me. "Are you okay?"
"I think so ... ," I began to say, but paused, unsure.
Sam helped me to my feet and stepped away. I stood awkwardly, and looked down to investigate my own body.
My chest, like Bleckner's, was 'a mess. My rib cage seemed to have held, but not the skin covering it. The damage got worse the farther up I looked. I reached up to touch my face and neck where I could not see, but there wasn't much to touch. I could run my fingers around the individual tendons in my neck. Scraps of burned flesh fell away. When I reached for my face, I felt muscle and bone, but little skin. I could still manage to speak, but my voice was now little more than a wheeze.
I looked over at Sam. He regarded me wide-eyed, clearly wondering if he should say anything.
"Am I ready for my close-up?" I asked.
That broke the ice, at least, and he smiled.
"Maybe for an anatomy film," he responded. "I can't believe that didn't kill you. But I guess your brain is okay, huh? The grenade just ... really fucked up your front."
I shrugged.
"I've been a proper zombie all this time," I told him. "Maybe now I finally look like one. Scary and so forth.
"
The rest of the group approached me warily, including Vanessa and her daughters.
"Hey," I said. "You guys don't need to see this. Not the kids, at least."
As I finished uttering these words, my nose fell off, my own body seeking to emphasize my point.
"Shit-you saved us, Peter," Vanessa said. "That was incredibly brave."
"Yeah," said Sam. "That was really gutsy."
"Probably best not to mention guts right now," I told him. "My rib cage looks like organs trying to escape from a zoo."
Other members of the group stepped forward-some recoiling when they saw my state-and expressed their gratitude.
"You fucking saved us!" shouted Puckett. "Way to kick some ass, Mellor."
"No problem," I told him.
"Say `thank you,' " Vanessa said to her daughters.
"Thank you," said Sarah, who regarded me cautiously from behind her mother's leg.
"You helped," I told her. "You told everyone to get away from the windows."
"Yeah," she said, averting her gaze from me.
I touched my forehead, but felt only skull.
"Has anybody seen my hat?" I asked. "I don't feel like the Kernel without it."
Everybody looked around.
A moment later, I overheard Kate, Vanessa's sister, talking to one of her daughters.
"Do you want me to do it?" she was asking. Apparently, one of her daughters had found the hat but was afraid to bring it over to me.
A tiny voice said, "Yes."
Kate stalked over, holding the hat.
"Here," she said, thrusting the hat into my hands. It was remarkably intact.
"Thank you," I said, placing it atop my skull. "Now I feel like me."
As if signaled by the safe return of my headwear to its rightful place, all at once we began to hear the din of approaching helicopters-a chop-chop-chop sound, like a distant factory press.
"Is that ... ?" Vanessa wondered.
"Got to be," I said.
"Quickly," Sam shouted, "let's all get to the top of the hill!"
Exhausted and bedraggled, our group made one final, hasty ascent of the hill at Kenton College. We passed school buildings riddled with bullets, overturned and pillaged supply sheds, and at least three corpses. There were other, random things: A dead goat. (WTF, right?) A giant, bullet-riddled statue. A toilet just a freestanding toilet, not connected to anything.
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