Ranger Martin and the Search for Paradise

by Jack Flacco

  “I think the first thing I’ll do is buy one of those fancy boats in the middle of the Pacific.”

  “You mean a yacht.”

  “Yeah, a yacht. Then I’ll load it up with all the cool foods I love eating like cereal, chocolate bars, pop, you know, all the stuff that I wish I had now but can never get my hands on.” He began stacking his chips in front of him, creating a wall of wealth. “Then I’ll get one of those big screen TV’s with surround sound so that I can watch Frankenstein and make the walls shake with thunder.”

  “Jon, I’m not too sure you’d want to do that on a yacht.”

  “Why not?”

  “If you shake the walls, won’t it loosen the screws and cause water damage below deck.”

  “They’re called rivets. No way can sound blow away rivets off a boat.”

  As Sunglow collected the cards and Jon continued to stack his chips in neat piles, Silver had something else on his mind. “Why didn’t you stand on seventeen? You asked for another card and got a two, but you could have gotten a five or higher. What made you think you’d win by asking for another card? The odds were against you.”

  Jon smiled then stopped fiddling with his chips. “Sometimes, you have to take a chance. Even if it means you might lose. How else are you going to win?”

  Silver remembered how he cowered in the car when the zombies first appeared in the parking lot of Brittle Donut Shop earlier that morning. He wasn’t willing to take a chance to help anyone. He realized he might have done something he now regretted. “It was my fault Mark died.”

  Ranger’s ears shot to attention to eavesdrop on the kids’ conversation.

  “Had I not hid when the undead attacked, Mark would still be here.”

  No one said anything. Sunglow fussed with the cards, straightening them while Jon patted his stacks to make sure the chips were even.

  “I should have been part of the fight. I should have prevented Mark from dying. Instead, I was afraid. I didn’t know what to do. They were coming from all directions, more than what I had ever seen before. I didn’t want to die. I wanted to live. It’s the only thing I thought would save me.”

  A silent moment grabbed the kids and wouldn’t let go. Someone had another view of the story. From his chair and with his back turned to the others, Ranger said, “Don’t beat yourself up, kid. Nothin’ in this world can brin’ back your friend. If anyone’s responsible, it’s me. I made the mistake, and I’ll have to live with it for the rest of my life.”

  The felt on the table suddenly became interesting to Silver as its softness treated his fingertips to richness. He glided his fingers along the surface while the thought of Mark dying at the hands of the chewers lingered in his ears. Mark’s cries wouldn’t let go. His stomach began to cramp at the thought that he could have been the one the horde tore to pieces. He rose and went to sit at the roulette table, wanting to be alone.

  “You’re a smart kid.” Sunglow looked at Jon. “You must have gone through a lot with your sister for you to have said what you said to Silver.”

  Jon gave his cards back to her, “I only told the truth. Every day alive is a day a gamble paid off.”

  It was then Ranger rose from his seat, wrapped the map together and stuffed it in his back pocket. Matty and Randy hadn’t come back, but he didn’t show any interest in finding them. “I’ll be back soon. I’m heading to the upper floors to see how safe it might be to find a place to sleep for the night.”

  When Ranger left, Sunglow dealt Jon another hand of Blackjack. “Aren’t you worried about your sister? She and Randy haven’t come back yet.”

  “Who, Matty? Are you kidding? My sister can clear a room of zombies in an instant.”

  “I noticed her dead-accurate shots in the parking lot.”

  “She’s amazing.” Jon leaned his elbows on the table, cupped his hands and widened his eyes, “Do you know what she did once? A few weeks ago, a roomful of eaters had caught us in a warehouse, ready to sink their teeth into our throats. They were blocking the only door where we could have escaped and chased us up a nine-foot shelving unit where we stayed waiting for the crowd to leave. They didn’t leave. As long as we were up there, they wouldn’t leave. The next day when the room filled with sunlight, she saw a rope dangling from the ceiling. At the top of the rope was a hole. I’m not sure if someone else had used the rope to climb into the place or climb out. It didn’t matter. Matty hopped on top of all the shelves, reached for the rope, climbed out of the building to the one door leading into the warehouse. I had no clue what she was planning.”

  “What did she do next?” Sunglow asked, having stopped dealing the cards.

  “She opened the door and screamed all sorts of nonsense to get the brainless to follow her. That gave me enough time to climb down the shelving unit and join her outside where we lost the crowd in the back alleys of town.”

  “Wow. But wait, how did you end up joining her to make the escape? She must have already been too far away for you to catch up with her.”

  “Easy, we agreed to meet at a spot in town just in case we’d ever get separated.”

  “Gotcha, from there you must have then headed to the back alleys.”

  “Right.”

  Sunglow smiled then said. “She is amazing.”

  * * *

  On the third floor, where the ice machine hummed softly and the sound of dripping water escaped one of the rooms, Ranger creeped the hall holding his shotgun. He scanned the doors for their room numbers. As he passed room 313, he noticed how one of the walls in the luxury hotel had black mold stains covering the length of it. He thought nothing of it. Building maintenance for the floor had gone the way of the change, and he thought it must have been months since anyone had taken a look at all the hotel’s defects.

  When he entered room 316, on the other side of the hall, he found the source of the dripping tap in the bathroom. Ranger tightened the faucet knob and the sound disappeared. He left the room and carefully walked to the end of the hall where he found the one room he was looking for.

  Room 323 resembled a midsize ballroom but with a luxurious king size bed sitting in the center and a large window to one side. In fact, when Ranger walked in, he had the look of satisfaction plastered on his face as he remembered why he was there. To his left was the bathroom, a hot tub to the side and a waiting sunlamp. He turned the light on and remembered the large mirror he and his wife Darla had used when they were last there. He stepped inside and saw his reflection on the wall over the sink, then saw Darla’s reflection next to him. He reached to the mirror, but she was gone. If only she could’ve come back to him, he thought.

  Outside into the adjacent bedroom he stepped, examining the lamps sitting on the nightstands next to the bed. A picture hung in the center of the wall above the bedpost. The scene depicted a forest with a stream running through it in vibrant pastel colors. He always loved the painting. It reminded him of how his mother used to walk to the stream next to the farm so she could have quiet time alone.

  In the corner of the room next to the bed was a set of table and chairs overlooking the Las Vegas view. Ranger strolled from the bathroom doorway to the side of the room remembering how he would awaken in the mornings to find his wife Darla reading in one of the chairs. As he looked out the window at the beautiful view of the Las Vegas strip, Ranger couldn’t stop thinking of his wife and the smile she would give him to make his world complete.

  “I thought you had packed our toothbrushes.” Ranger said, tossing the contents of his bag on the bed.

  “I thought you were going to do that.” Darla said, hunting through her luggage, hoping she had made a mistake.

  “Guess we’ll pick up a couple when we head out for dinner in a few minutes. I’m sure we’re bound to find somethin’ resemblin’ a convenience store in this town.”

  Darla dropped her purse on the bed, ran to Ranger and wrapped her arms around his neck. She planted a warm kiss on his mouth. After a moment, while still holding each other
, she said, “This is the reason I love you, Ranger Martin. You always come up with a solution to my problems.”

  Ranger smiled then said, “They’re just toothbrushes.”

  The echo of those moments streamed through Ranger’s head. The memories wouldn’t stop coming. He holstered his shotgun and allowed himself the freedom to feel Darla’s spirit inside him that had never left. It was the whole point traveling to Las Vegas at the hotel. He needed to see his wife again, and how he remembered her in all her beauty.

  He fell into one of the chairs, stared out the window and opened his mind to the images from the past.

  A hand released two toothbrushes on the bathroom sink.

  In the other room, Darla said, “Ranger? I think the cable’s out. I can’t get any channels.”

  “Have you tried flippin’ the dial on the TV to one of the lower numbers? Those cable boxes are weird that way.” He said as he strolled from the bathroom into the bedroom where Darla fiddled with the channels.

  “Ah, we have liftoff!” Darla said, finding the right combination of channels that worked to bring an image of the town’s hotspots.

  “See. Easy.” Ranger said, pulling his shirt from his pants and unbuttoning it.

  “I had a good time at dinner tonight.” Darla placed the remote next to the TV and lowered the volume by two notches. “The lamb was one of the best I’ve ever tasted.”

  “It was nice, wasn’t it?”

  “That mint sauce is something I wouldn’t mind learning how to make.”

  Ranger got halfway to unbuttoning his shirt when the sudden urge to crawl on the bed hit him. He then lay on the covers staring at the ceiling. Darla crawled on top of him, and snuggled her head on his chest. She wasn’t shy to take his arm and wrap herself with it. He laid his head on hers, feeling her warmth on his chin.

  “I’m happy.” She said.

  Those simple words meant everything to him. He held her tightly not wanting to let her go. It meant a lot to him knowing his wife was happy. He asked, “Are you disappointed we didn’t have time to get our rings?”

  “No.” She looked at him. “It’s your heart that matters to me, Ranger. You have a good heart.”

  The way she gazed at him with those large almond-shaped eyes melted him. He reached over and kissed her on the forehead.

  When the memories faded and the room materialized into reality, Ranger rose from his chair and drifted to the nightstand closest the window. He bent to one knee, turned on the lamp and felt the right side of the nightstand with his hand. He scanned the side but couldn’t find what he was looking for. He moved it and used his other hand to feel the other side. His eyes bulged and a smile quickly came to his face. He moved the nightstand even further to the side and tilted the lamp to where his hand had found his treasure.

  He stared at the side, but then collapsed to a seating position with his back hitting the side of the bed for support. His face became wet, as he couldn’t stop staring at the side of the nightstand.

  There, carved into the wood, halfway along the side, Ranger could see the etching of a heart and within the heart the initials R + D. It was so long ago, he thought.

  The memories returned. He found himself carving etchings into the wood. The shavings fell to the carpet next to the bed.

  Darla wrestled in the sheets and heard the noise of the knife scraping the wood. She rubbed the sleep from her eyes and sat up as the light of the morning filled the room. “Ranger? What are you doing?”

  He had finished the heart, now the initials.

  When he didn’t answer, she crawled to Ranger’s side and noticed him sitting there scrawling his initial on the furniture. “Ranger. What are you doing? You’re defacing someone’s property.”

  “Oh, I’m just adding a little ol’ somethin’ everybody can remember us by.”

  “Yeah,” Darla sat up with a wide gaze, “But that’s not yours.”

  Ranger smiled. “You can help.”

  “What?”

  “Sit down here next to me and add your initial.”

  It took Darla a moment before she gave Ranger her answer. “Really? I’ve never done anything like that before.”

  “C’mon.”

  It didn’t take long for Darla to hop from the bed, land on her knees next to Ranger and contribute to her husband’s illegal work of art. The Swiss Army knife felt solid in her hand as she added a large D inside the heart.

  The memory faded again and Ranger found himself staring at the initials with fond memories of Darla disappearing into the wood.

  Just then, after hearing a creak next to him, he turned his head. He quickly shot to his feet, wiped his face of the water and whipped out his knife from the holster strapped around his leg. One of the chewers had found its way into the room and was staring at Ranger with vacant eyes. It screeched at the zombie slayer and its smell filled the room.

  Ranger winced at the undead’s stench. His eyes also filled with hatred for the beast since the room had become a shrine for the memories of his wife Darla. The more the eater growled at Ranger, the hotter he became with anger. How dare it, he thought. How dare it enter into the room only he and his wife had enjoyed as their peaceful retreat. But the beast didn’t care, it screamed louder and pounced Ranger during his time of weakness.

  Had Ranger had his mind on the beast instead of his wife, he would have struck the chewer in its place killing it without a fuss. But Ranger’s heart had left him to be with Darla.

  The beast slammed Ranger’s back against the window and its shriek had alerted others to the presence of the demon killer. Three piled into the room behind the first and raced toward the former truck driver turned zombie slayer.

  Ranger shook his head of the memories of the room, Darla, their trip there and his life before the change. He knew whatever he tried, he could never bring those days back. They swirled in his mind, in his heart they would stay for the rest of his life.

  Anchoring his hand under the undead’s chin, Ranger held tight and swung his knife into the beasts head. It fell instantly at his feet. The other three dashed toward Ranger, but Ranger wouldn’t have it. His breath became shallower, his face turned dark with hatred, and his grip on his knife tightened further. The green blood from his first victim trailed from his knife and dripped on his boot. Ranger was ready.

  The first pounced on the slayer like an explosion that had triggered in the room. Ranger’s knife saw its victim and sliced through its neck without stopping. The eater’s life spurted all over Ranger as it fell on top of the other dead chewer.

  The second and third had climbed the bed and together they leaped toward their prey. They hit the window when Ranger ducked. Once they realized what had happened, they wasted no time yanking his arms. The first that was lying on the floor bleeding from the throat clutched its paws on Ranger’s leg.

  For another person, the situation could have proven impossible. Not for Ranger. He smirked at the challenge. He laughed. Without waiting any longer, he shook off the zombie that had attached itself to his leg. Its slit throat caused its head to hang partially to its side. It didn’t pose a problem. Ranger quickly maneuvered his arms away from the jaws of the other two. He grabbed them by the side of their heads. In a huge surge of energy, wound his arms and smashed their head together. They exploded into a green cloud. When one of them had fallen to its knees, he plunged his knife into its ear, sending it to its second death.

  With two dead, one on the floor drowning in its juices, Ranger sneered, repulsed by the time he had wasted at their hands.

  The third was chomping an inch within Ranger’s face in an attempt to bite its brother’s slayer, but Ranger had other plans. He tossed his knife on the floor next to the drowning zombie and hauled the third against the wall where the nightstand used to be. He pounded its head against it. One. Two. Three. Four. He kept pounding it as it turned to mush and a large emerald spot emerged on the surface. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. As Ranger’s final act, he threw the shaking undead on the fl
oor, grabbed the lamp on the nightstand and slammed it into what was left of the third’s skull. It died never to breathe again.

  When Ranger finally saw the last of the crowd, the drowning zombie gurgling on its knees, he shook his head having had enough. He dropped the lamp, retrieved his knife and pushed the zombie to the floor with his foot. He crushed its head with his heel and walked from the room.

  Left in his wake was a pile of undead, green footsteps leading away from the room.

  Chapter 10

  The next morning, as dawn poured its light through the fifth floor corridor window, a door opened to one of the rooms leading into the hall. Two bodies covered the floor. One of the bodies didn’t have an arm. It sat near the window where the sun’s rays lit the empty space in its rotting skull. The other body lay in tatters, having met a similar fate Ranger had dispensed to the zombies in room 323 the night before.

  Taking cautious steps, Sunglow peeked through the doorway into the hall, checking both directions to make sure nothing had survived the night. She inspected the bodies thinking nothing of stepping into a pool of congealed blood, which looked more like a jelly than anything else. She made a face in disgust, and walked across the hall to quietly rap on the door. She didn’t want to disturb anything from its slumber, so she waited patiently, holding her backpack on her shoulder.

  Jon opened the door.

  “Good morning,” Sunglow said then walked inside where Matty was drying her face with a towel in the bathroom. “How was your night?”

  “Good.” Jon said. He locked the door behind her.

  “I was wondering if you guys wanted to go downstairs to find something to eat. Ranger said we should always go in pairs. I figure, with the three of us, nothing ought to bother us. What do you think?”

  “Sure. What do you think, Matty?”

  Matty tossed the towel on the floor. “I’m fine with that. Let me finish packing.”

  They all moved near the bed where Sunglow saw it and said, “This looks like my room, but in reverse.”