Ranger Martin and the Zombie Apocalypse

by Jack Flacco

  Randy crouched and blew a sigh of relief. He kept still, allowing the snake to come near. Paying attention not to scare it, he placed his left hand on a skull, his palm facing up. The snake glided on the bones as if it floated in air. Randy whispered, “Come on. Come on.” A deceptive smile grew on his face. His right hand pulled out a three-inch splinter from his back pocket he had leftover from the desk he had destroyed back at the warden’s office. “Come on. Come on.”

  The reptile slid on Randy’s left hand. He closed it with a gentle clasp as would a flytrap on a prey. The boy rose and brought the slithering animal to his face. He stroked its head with his thumb, holding the snake with his other fingers. Then, with the flick of his thumb and index finger, Randy snapped the snake’s neck. Death was quick and painless.

  Once again, Randy crouched. He placed the snake on a dry skull, sliced off its head with the splinter, turned it around, and sliced off the tail. In one smooth motion, he drew the sharp tool through the length of the reptile, splitting it open. With the wide edge of the splinter, he gutted it, and scrapped the entrails on dry bones to remove any parasites. He cut a bite-size piece of the snake, setting the rest of it on his lap. He tore at the raw meat with his teeth and ate.

  After having consumed half the snake meat, Randy sat quietly, licking his lips and rubbing his tummy. It was the first real meal he had since he awoke in jail. Nothing compared to having a full stomach. When he discarded the leftovers, he studied the bones closest to him. His gaze penetrated the holes in the skulls. The holes also appeared in the legs, arms, ribs, hands, and other bones. He poked his finger in one of them and it fit perfectly.

  Anxious to continue with his flight, he rose as he scanned the pit for a way out. The snake must have come from some place, his head swam in thought. Perhaps it came from a crevice in the wall or a crack in the ceiling. Snakes do come from walls, right? He shook his head, unsure.

  In the far corner of the pit, the faint shaft of light glowing through a narrow passageway enticed Randy. He strafed along the wall not wanting to step on any more bones. If a snake could live in a pit of dead bones, who knows what else slithered in that pile. At the opening of the passageway, he barely had enough room to crawl. Had he had extra weight, he wouldn’t have fit.

  The damp, musty smell made his nose itch, but he didn’t sneeze. The passageway grew wider as he squeezed his way through. When he reached a dead end, he found the source of the light. It penetrated from a small crack through the wall. With as much strength as he could gather, he pressed against it. It stayed put. He tried again, this time more forceful. Again, it stayed put. As her rubbed his hands clean, he noticed the dirt and dust flaking off. One word came to mind: erosion. He pulled out the splinter he’d used to gut the snake and picked at the wall. When it’d lodged in the crack, it broke in half. No more splinter. He nodded having made up his mind. Pulling back, he steadied himself and gave the wall one good kick where the crack leaked light. In quick succession, he gave two more blows. It did not stay put. He slammed a hole through it, flooding light into the passageway.

  Relief washed over him as hope filled his face. He kicked the wall a few more times creating rubble he tore out by hand. Once he made the hole big enough, he slipped in, falling into a rail at the bottom of the machinery room floor. With jackrabbit reflexes, Randy hopped against the wall. His breathing steadied.

  Hanging from the ceiling, tungsten light bulbs rendered the room warm with their glow. The light contrasted the cold, blue sky peaking through the top of the grimy, barred windows. The bulbs’ rays fell on Randy’s tired eyes. They’d seemed brighter when trapped in the shaft. His thoughts began to race again. Except for a handful of undead, where did all the prisoners go? Who did those bones in the sewers belong to? When will his memory return?

  Examining the machinery and pipes, he guessed the sewers dumped their contents into the processing facility where the clean water then fed through the jail. With curiosity leading the way, he snuck around the outer perimeter of the room. Rust and mold covered all the machines. A fine effervescence coated the walls. He edged closer to a metal ladder and climbed it, leaving the lower floor. Making his way up the ladder, he spotted a toolbox twenty feet away in the opposite corner of the room below, pressed against the wall. He changed his mind and descended to investigate. Without warning, something appeared above.

  Randy heard the rustling on the metal grade. One of the undead dressed in a guard’s uniform stood overhead. It scanned the area below and pitched from side to side not seeing him.

  * * *

  After a full dinner of canned tuna and turkey, Ranger and Jon tossed a baseball around while Matty helped Wildside unload the fertilizer packages and gasoline from the truck. They hauled four packages of fertilizer and set them on an empty pallet. The gas containers went to the side. Wildside didn’t mind work. Ranger worked hard outside, and he figured he could repay his generosity by doing his part inside. Besides, he requested the items and it wouldn’t seem right asking Ranger to also unload them.

  “How long have you been down here?” Matty asked.

  “I’ve lost track, a few months at least. Ranger found me in my house, ten miles down the road, passed out with those critter-munchers taking a piece from of me.”

  “Wait a minute. You were bitten by one of them?”

  “Yeah.” He lifted his pant leg to show her the round bite mark on his right calf.

  She stood there motionless without an expression, but without fear.

  “Don’t worry, I don’t bite. I figure I should have turned into one of those meat-choppers months ago. I’m still here. I guess that’s a good thing.”

  “You look fine.” She flashed a quick smile.

  “He ought to be fine.” Ranger interrupted, throwing Jon his last pitch. “Those things don’t spread like that. They don’t have viruses.”

  Matty hopped on the pickup’s hatch, and sat with her slim legs dangling at the knees. Ranger threw the baseball glove on a shelf, drifted to the hatch and leaned on it.

  “All I know is those puss-suckers transformed some other way, starting from the West all the way to the East Coast.” Ranger shook his head. “Not a virus. No virus can do what I’ve seen with my family and friends.”

  “Maybe it’s from the water.” Jon said, tossing the baseball into the air and catching it.

  An abrupt silence hit the room.

  “I saw this movie once, and all the people in the town became zombies by drinking the water. Government experiment stuff is what it was.”

  “Our government wouldn’t do that to us.” Wildside blurted.

  Matty opened her arms, throwing her eyes everywhere. “Look where we are. This was not built by the Romans.”

  Wildside snickered. Matty hadn’t picked up on his sarcasm.

  “Anyway,” Ranger removed his cap and began strolling away. “I’m turnin’ in. We’ve got plenty of food in the fridge. Uh, the facilities are right around the corner. And there are lots of bunks upstairs and another facility. Make yourself at home.”

  “Thanks.” Matty nodded.

  “Can I come?” Jon waved his hand.

  “If it’s all right with your sister, you can sleep on the bunk next to mine.”

  Anticipation covered Jon’s face, cupping his hands, praying to her to say yes.

  “Fine. On one condition: Ranger makes sure you brush your teeth.”

  “Oh, Ranger doesn’t have to make sure, I’ll do that myself!”

  “Go ahead.” She said, smiling at him.

  As Ranger dragged his feet up the steel staircase, Jon scampered ahead squeezing him to the side.

  * * *

  Silence covered Randy’s steps. One foot after another, he dared not arouse the suspicion of the evil gripping the room. Randy crept along the side of the walls disappearing into a corridor between the machines. For a moment, he collapsed with his hands to his knees in silent relief the guard creature did not spot him. Had he gone all the way to the top of th
e ladder, Randy would have lost his life. He needed to get to that toolbox without alerting the foot-dragger.

  Peeking from the side of one of the machines, Randy spotted the evil wafting back and forth, not moving from its position. If Randy didn’t know better, it stood guard at the top of the ladder. Perhaps it smelled Randy as a predator would sense a prey.

  Randy had other things on his mind. If he can distract the monster long enough, he can get to the toolbox, considering the toolbox remained in the monster’s line of sight. With a quick stride to his step, the boy made it back to the hole he had created from the pit of bones in the sewer system. He gathered a few broken rocks, plunging them into his pocket. Sneaking in the same way, he slithered against the wall, once again to reach the bottom of the ladder. Around the ladder he went, tracing the rail scaffolding the monster stood on. Randy’s back pushed against the rail, between the creature and the toolbox that called his name from twenty feet away. Pulling a rock from his pocket, he tossed it as far left as he could.

  The monster spun to the sound. It beamed its pale eyes in the distance. Its cold stare, decomposing flesh, and putrid mouth anticipated movement. It blew air from its mouth in frustration. It did not see movement. Under its watchful eye, it waited.

  In the meantime, the toolbox had disappeared. Behind the machinery, Randy opened it. Empty. He removed the upper shelving. The box’s contents consisted of a hammer and a long screwdriver. Bingo.

  He sat there for some time relishing the victory.

  Without as much as a hint of noise, the beast took hold of Randy by the hair and smashed his head on the side panel of a large machine. Not thinking straight, maybe because of shock, maybe because of the surprise, Randy pounded the creature’s foot with his fist, forgetting he had a hammer in front of him. Screeching, the entity released the boy, allowing him to flee. The zombie followed, still holding clumps of Randy’s hair in its hand.

  Randy messed up. He wished he had taken the tools when he had the chance. He left them there instead. Stupid move. He had to fix it. He decided to lure the monster away from the toolbox. He ran through the room waving his hands in a frantic dance. Dodging in and out of the corridors and aisles, the zombie-guard kept pursuit. He led the monster around to the opposite end of the room, away from the ladder and the toolbox. But something happened to the beast along the way. It dropped the chase and returned to where it first found him. Somehow, it knew the boy’s intentions. Impossible, Randy thought. How could it? They had intelligence?

  Reluctant to act as bait again, he tried a different approach. A more aggressive one. He dashed to a wide area of the room to where he could see the zombie-guard. He emptied his pockets of the rocks he had taken from the broken wall. Clenching one of the rocks with his right hand, he aimed it at the monster and shot it. It missed the creature. The beast had a personality. The corner of its mouth rose slightly. Never one to give up, Randy shot another rock at the thing. This time, it hit the nuisance in the chest. The eater delivered a loud, deafening roar. But it did not move. It knew the boy wanted the tools and he had to return sometime.

  All right, Randy thought. You want to be stubborn. Fine. He chose the lightest, flattest, sharpest rock he had and cradled it in his right hand, between his thumb and index finger. It’ll be just like skipping rocks on a pond. The monster growled a nauseous gurgle. Winding his arm behind, Randy pitched the rock clean through the air, slamming it into the beast’s skull. In an instant, the creature dropped in convulsions near the toolbox.

  “Yes!” Randy pumped his fist into the air. Nothing can stop him now. He jogged to five feet from where the creature laid. Its body still jolted in spasms. All he had to do was rip the toolbox from the dying creature. But fear clung to his stomach from his last encounter with the undead in the warden’s office. He waited. Patiently he paced. Not until he saw the tremors slow to a few twitches did he get closer.

  When the tremors stopped, the corpse lay motionless. No more taking chances for Randy. One quiet step after another, he walked until he stood over the body. He kicked it. No response. One more kick. No response again. It laid there with the rock piercing its skull and large, white eyes staring, empty. It had to be dead. Randy crouched and stole the hammer from the toolbox first. With a smile, he slipped it into his pocket. The screwdriver came next. In a sudden burst of rage, the eater shot up, snatched Randy from behind the shoulders, opened its mouth, and lunged straight for the boy’s jugular.

  Not this time. Before its teeth penetrated his skin, Randy grabbed the screwdriver from the toolbox and plunged it into the soft part of the corpse’s collar bone. Releasing the boy, green slime squirted from its neck. It screamed in agony. Shaking off the shock, a surge of adrenaline coursed through his veins. Randy jumped the creature, pulled the hammer from his pocket and beat the zombie’s head mercilessly. Lime guck splattered over everything, including Randy’s face. He had reduced the skull to a big bowl of mush.

  Panting hard, Randy dropped the hammer, rose from the mess and began wiping his face clean with his shirt. As a final cap to his transformation from boy to monster killer, he spat on the dead creature’s body.

  Chapter 6

  The makeshift kitchen came complete with a fridge, stove and microwave. A table and a set of chairs stood in the middle where a single incandescent bulb hung. Wildside leaned against the counter scrapping the inside of the tuna can with his fork into his mouth. Nothing like having a midnight snack while everyone slept. Everyone being Jon and Ranger. He offered some to Matty but she shook her head. She kept staring at him.

  “This used to be an old military silo during the cold war days. The government had renovated it years ago when the cold war ended to act as a mini-base of operations in the event of terrorist attacks on American soil. Ranger found it traveling to Utah. About a week or two later, he found me.”

  “What happened to your parents?”

  “I suppose the same thing that happened to everyone else. Came home and they were gone. I didn’t know what to make of it until the next day when I woke up and something was gnawing on my leg. I screamed so loud, I swear, my voice traveled clear across town to the old church with the deafening bells. That’s when Ranger barged into my room, grabbed the calf-biter by the hair, slammed it on the floor and drove his heel right through its skull. I’ve never seen anything like it since. Green slime sprayed everywhere. I’ve been down here since.”

  “Don’t you miss the outside?”

  “Why? Everything I need is here. I get to play with all the cool stuff Ranger brings from his supply runs and, well, it’s safe here.”

  Matty tried to send him signals to see if he’d respond. The tilt in her head, the bangs over one eye, the lick of her lips, she even slipped her hands in her pocket to accentuate her breasts with her arms pressed to her side. Did she have to be so obvious? “Don’t you get lonely?”

  “Sometimes. I think about what my parents must have gone through. The terror they felt. The idea they might never see their home or me again. I don’t want the same thing that happened to them happen to another person I love. It’s better I stay away from everyone.” He tossed the empty tuna can in the trash under the counter, and washed his fork in the sink.

  She got the message. He blamed himself for his parents’ disappearance. She would’ve liked to have said something comforting, but what? It wasn’t his fault. And she didn’t know what to say anyway. She’d just met him. This caused her to remove her hands from her pocket, and straighten her head to flip the bangs from her face. She needed to change the subject. “Is Ranger his real name?”

  “Yeah, it really is.” Wildside smirked. “Did he tell you the trailer park ranger story yet?”

  “How could I forget? It’s not every day I meet someone proud to be a bastard.”

  Lying on his bed on the second floor with his eyes open, the corner of Ranger’s mouth slightly rose as he listened to the kids talk about him. Satisfied he could entertain, his eyes shut in blissful sleep.

&n
bsp; “What about you? Is Wildside your real name?”

  “Ranger gave me the name after I told him the story of when I had built a crude smoke bomb in my ninth grade science class. I couldn’t believe how well it worked. Everyone was working on their own projects. You know the kind: Is bottled water more pure than tap water? What effect do additives have on crystal growth? Not me. I had convinced the teacher I was working on finding if all dishwashing detergents produce the same amount of bubbles.” He chuckled. “Boom. My parents had grounded me for a week. The principal had to close the school to get it fumigated.”

  “Why did you do it?”

  “I don’t know.” Liar. His chin touched his chest then shot her a devilish gaze. “I wanted to know if I could.”

  She leaned against the counter. “You do have a wild side.”

  They laughed for the first time and connected. Teen anxiety, growing pains, whatever it was called, they felt alive. Not as a girl and a boy rescued from eaters. As like-minded persons wanting to share experiences.

  “What about you?” he pulled bottled water from a package on the counter, twisted the cap, and swigged a gulp.

  “Me?” she bit her lip, not knowing what to say. No one’s asked her that in a long time. “I’m from Boston.”

  “If I wanted to know where you lived, I would have asked. What I meant was what happened to your parents?”

  “I’m not sure.” She shrugged, not wanting to talk about her personal life. Maybe she could distract him instead. From behind her back she pulled her shiny .45.

  “Whoa, now that’s a nice piece. Where did you get that?” He set his water bottle on the counter.

  She handed him the silver weapon. “It was my grandfather’s. He used it in some war, not sure when.”

  Rubbing the top of the barrel, he checked the aim with one eye closed. He admired the gleam, the craftsmanship. It sparked a nod. “It’s beautiful. You’ve taken good care of it.”