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A note on my novel Zombies...
Please realize before reading this novel-in-progress that it is meant to
be a spoof of (and fond tribute to) George Romero's zombie movies Night of
the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, and Day of the Dead (my personal favorite).
It is also a tribute to horror writers/filmmakers everywhere, in a light-
hearted, if extremely graphic, way.
Suzanne L. McAllister
This novel, Zombies, is copyrighted by Suzanne L. McAllister
1989-1993.
It is being distributed through electronic billboards for open
reading.
The author would like to mention that it is not finished, and I
would appreciate any/all comments and constructive criticism. I
can be reached via the following BBS's under the handle Raccoon:
The Treasure House (313) 548-7979
GIFs'R'US (313) 398-1638
Earth's Dreamlands (313) 558-5024
Collector's Corner (313) 541-7323
Or by mail:
539 Leroy
Ferndale, MI 48220
ZOMBIES
Dedicated to George Romero
(filmmaker magnifique!)
CHAPTER 1
Caryn looked around the store and sighed. Another long,
slow, boring midnight at Gas'n'More. Being a full-time
college student made working the graveyard shift necessary,
but that didn't mean she had to like it. A yawn caught her
by surprise and she glanced up at the Marlboro clock over
the wide glass doors. Twenty to three. The after-bar rush
had tapered off and until about five-thirty or so she
wouldn't see more than half a dozen people. Then would come
the factory workers, in for their sandwiches, donuts,
coffee, smokes, and gas, all of which was ready and waiting.
She refilled her coffee cup and made another pot, then
took two No-Doz. She'd had so much caffeine in the last five
months, since starting midnights, that it barely had any
effect on her any more other than stopping her yawns. Going
behind the counter, she set her cup beside the ashtray
beneath it, lit a Newport, leaned back against the register,
and gazed out the bank of long glass windows at the big,
brightly-lit sign out front and gas pumps. No traffic moved
beyond them. Though the gas station/mini mart was located at
the junction of two major streets and a freeway, it was
surprisingly slow at night. Most of the people who came in
at this time were cops for their free coffee and soda. They
kept an eye on her, knowing that she was alone all night.
That wasn't really necessary, she thought. Few people
stopped in tiny Berkley Park off the interstate since there
was a rest stop two miles back.
Actually, Caryn thought as she glanced over at the
thick textbook on the other side of the U-shaped counter,
this does work out great if only I could get more sleep, but
that's what I have to put up with, staying in the dorm and
sleeping in the afternoon after classes. I get paid to study
while I'm here, more or less, and I'm carrying a 4.0 grade
average. Two more years and I'll be home free: a high-paying
job at the hospital, a car and place of my own... and
probably a new boyfriend long before all that if Dave
doesn't quit his shit. But right now I need him to drive me
back and forth until I can afford to get a car. She felt the
familiar depression settle over her at the thought of him,
and smashed out her cigarette roughly.
A teenage couple came in just then, giggling and
holding onto each other, both wearing brown and yellow
jackets from the high school; the same good old Beaumont
High Caryn had graduated from three years ago herself. These
kids seemed so young and immature, she thought. Welcoming
the distraction from her thoughts, she not only waited on
them but talked with them for a few minutes about the school
and teachers they knew.
When they were gone she eyeballed the thick biology
textbook again. But it was a Friday night and she had the
next two days off, so why study now? No, she decided, this
would be a junk night. Leaning over the counter, she grabbed
a copy of the National Enquirer from the rack on the other
side of the register and was soon absorbed in other people's
problems.
Ryan Callahan was having a rough night. If it wasn't
bad enough that he'd had a fight with Mike and Anita after
driving all the way up here to stay with them for the
weekend, he'd gotten pulled over for speeding. Now, sitting
on his bike with the cop behind him checking his license, he
went to light a cigarette and discovered that his box of
Winstons was empty. It was a great fucking night, all right.
The cop walked up and handed Ryan's license and
registration paper over. "You've got a clean record, so I'm
going to let you off this time. But watch the speeding-
there's been some bad accidents on this freeway because of
it."
Ryan was surprised, and knew how easily he'd gotten
off. The fake insurance certificate had held up. "Thanks,
officer, I will."
But as he pulled off the shoulder and back onto I-24,
he saw that the cop stayed right behind him. His speedometer
needle sat steadily at fifty-five until he saw an exit ramp
ahead, with the name of some town he'd never heard of over
it, and a brightly-lit gas station sign not far away from
the freeway. I'll get smokes there, and dodge this cop. He
headed for the sign, making a complete stop at the end of
the ramp instead of his usual glance-and-go, but the cop
still followed as he turned into the gas station.
Yup, a great fucking night.
The clerk looked up from behind the counter as the door
signal burred and said, "Good morning." Ryan grunted and
walked past her to the coolers, staring in at the frozen
foods.
Asshole, Caryn thought, and decided to keep an eye on
him. With that long hair and torn jeans he looked
suspicious, and though the store had never been robbed that
she knew of, there was always the possibility that it could
happen. Relief flooded through her as she saw the white and
blue police car pull up outside. The door signaled again,
and she said, "Hi, Frank, how's your night going?"
"Not bad. How about you?" Officer Frank Zambone and she
were friends after both working the graveyard shift for the
past few months. The other midnight cop, Mike Boujenah, was
more formal and aware of his duties, but if it was slow
Frank would stand in the store and talk to her, keeping his
radio on and listening for the rare call.
"Oh, slow, as always," she said, flicking her eyes in
the direction of the suspicious guy, and he nodded slightly.
Satisfied, Caryn flipped back a couple of pages in the
tabloid she'd been reading and pointed out a story about
zombies in South America, which were reportedly heading up
into the United States. "Would you look at this..."
Ryan stared in unseeingly at frozen pizzas, burritos,
and egg rolls, seething in silence. Why didn't that asshole
cop leave? He and the clerk were laughing over something,
but he could feel eyes boring into his back. He moved over
to the next glass door, barely seeing the premade sandwiches
there, not wanting to leave until after the cop did but
knowing he looked suspicious being all alone in here with
the girl cashier. Especially since he'd driven up here
straight after work at midnight in his grubby work clothes,
and though he was used to the prejudice anyone on a
motorcycle got, he didn't like it. But as it sank in what
he was seeing, he decided to get something to eat so he'd
look less suspicious and, now that he thought about it, he
was hungry. If that cop decided to take another good, long
look at his insurance certificate he might see that the date
had been whited out and re-typed in, and Ryan couldn't
afford to have his Harley impounded now, not out in the
middle of Nowhere, Ohio. He had a couple hundred dollars on
him, his entire paycheck, but most of it was for his rent
and not to bail himself out of jail. He grabbed a large
submarine sandwich and walked across the store to the soda
coolers, hearing the cop's radio crackle and hoping he'd
gotten a call and would leave.
Caryn watched as Frank answered the call, frowning as
he asked the dispatcher to repeat the code. "What? At the
graveyard? Ten-four, I'm on my way." He turned to her. "I've
got to go. There's a disturbance out at Eternal Rest,
probably some kids goofing around, but the caretaker called
and said something about graves being dug up so I've got to
go check it out." Lowering his voice, he added with a glance
across the store, "Don't hesitate to push that button if he
starts anything, Caryn."
"I won't. Hope it's nothing serious," she replied, but
felt a worm of trepidation coil in her stomach. She simply
didn't like the look or attitude of the man who was reaching
into the Pepsi cooler.
"I'll be back as soon as I can," the cop said as he
hurried out to his squad car, then took off with his lights
flashing but the siren off.
Ryan walked up to the counter and set down his sub, a
large bag of Doritos, a two-liter of Pepsi, and tossed in a
Snickers for good measure. The clerk, a small, slender girl
who almost looked ludicrous in an orange and brown smock two
sizes too large, smiled at him and said, "Will that be all?"
But the smile didn't reach her cold dark eyes, and he could
feel the dislike coming off her in waves. But that was okay,
because he didn't like her either.
"Yeah. No, wait, gimme two packs of Winston, box if ya
have it, too." He pulled out his wallet and threw a ten
dollar bill on the counter. "That cop a friend of yours?"
Her fingers danced over the register's keys lightly as
she answered, "Yeah, he works midnights too. That'll be
twelve-oh-seven."
"What?!" Ryan leaned over to see the numbers on the
register window for himself. "For this? You gotta be
kidding!"
She stiffened, angry. Every other person who came in
the place complained about the prices, but what did they
expect from a twenty-four-hour convenience store? Here was
another idiot she'd like to poke in the eye with a
screwdriver, the only kind of weapon she had in the store.
"Cigarettes are two bucks a pack, the soda's
two-twenty-nine, chip's're two-fifty-nine, candy's sixty
cents, and the sub's two-fifty-nine plus tax."
Smartass bitch, Ryan thought, annoyed. She was stuffing
his things in a white plastic sack as he pulled his wallet
out again and tossed three singles by the ten, grumbling,
"How much d'ya charge for gas, five bucks a gallon?"
"Dollar eighty," she said shortly, getting the
cigarettes from the rack over her head. She wished either
he'd leave or Frank would come back. He didn't like
customers smarting off to her and usually said something
when they did.
"D'ya have a microwave?" Ryan asked, taking the sub out
of the bag and breaking the plastic wrap open. "I got a long
ride tonight and I ain't eating this cold."
Damn, Caryn thought, but she pointed. "Over there,
right next to the Frozen Coke machine."
Later, both of them never forgot that moment, the last
normal time of their lives before the world irreconcilably
changed.
The door burred and Caryn looked over, froze, then
screamed at the top of her lungs. Startled, Ryan whirled
around, dropping his submarine, and stared with his mouth
hanging open.
A man had walked into the store, and as the door swung
closed on hydraulic pressure behind him, it had torn off
half the heel on his bare right foot. The chunk of meat slid
outside as the door completed its function. But the man
didn't react, since he had quite obviously been dead for a
while and didn't feel it. He was dressed in a black suit,
white shirt, and maroon tie that were liberally caked with
green slime, and his skin was a pasty greenish-white with
mold growing here and there. He lurched toward the counter
but seemed unaware of it and bumped into the magazine rack
that fronted the register, knocking copies of the National
Enquirer, Weekly World News, Star, and Globe to the floor.
As they fell Ryan spotted one headline that caught his eye:
ZOMBIES REPORTED IN SOUTH AMERICA- PIX INSIDE! South
America? he thought crazily. They sure migrated fast, 'cause
this dude is surely dead as dogshit and smells even worse.
Slipping on the papers, the ghoul tried for the counter
again and managed to bump a cigarette display aside with one
stiff, flailing arm. The girl had backed up as far as she
could go and was flattened against the Lotto machine, hands
over her mouth, eyes bulging like brown marbles in her face.
The critter was after her, Ryan realized. It wanted to eat
her like he was going to eat his sub, only the zombie didn't
have to nuke his intended meal to warm it up. And once he
noticed the break in the counter only a foot or so to his
left he would be able to get his dirt-caked green paws on
his prey.
Without thinking about it Ryan reacted. Running around
the outside of the counter, he swung the heavy bag in his
hands, the two-liter of soda catching the zombie glancingly
on the side of the head and knocking him down. The weight of
the bag made Ryan stagger, and when he turned back, the
critter was slowly, jerkily getting back up, one side of its
head looking oddly crushed but still intact, its flat
colorless eyes now on him. "Fuck!" he said, looking around.
Again without thinking, acting on sheer primal instinct
which said __run if you can't fight, __Ryan darted around
the counter and grabbed the girl by the arm. She was
wide-eyed and pale with shock, and felt like a moveable doll
under his hand. "C'mon, we gotta get out of here," he said,
pushing her toward the windows and urging her to climb the
counter. There was only one break in it, and the ghoul was
too close to that for them to be able to use it. He urged
her over then followed, twisting his ankle in the wooden
magazine racks that fronted the counter. He sprinted past
her to the doors, flung one wide, and yelled, "C'mon, you
goofy bitch! Isn't the smell enough for you?"
Caryn's eyes were wide and shiny, blank now. She
followed him docilely out the doors and past the gas pumps,
under the high roofs on struts over them, and out to the
street. Ryan paused and looked in both directions, but the
long black road was dark and deserted. Across from the gas
station was a cheap strip mall, all the stores dark and
silent, while to his left was the freeway and on the right,
a Mexican restaurant. Nothing moved in the eerie dense
silence. He glanced back over his shoulder and saw the
zombie still bumping around inside the store, his rakish
Harley parked just to the right of the doors. The urge to
get on the bike and just go, hop on that freeway and escape
this madness, was strong in him yet Ryan couldn't do that.
His fear of the unknown was greater than what he already
knew as a threat. He saw little or no choice; whatever was
happening, it was in both their best interests to go back in
that store, get rid of the ghoul, and stay put until the
cops came back or something else happened.
He grabbed the cashier by the arm again and turned her
around, not seeing the slack, blank look of shock on her
face. As they walked back across the parking lot he
explained what they had to do, looking around to make sure
more of the rotting fuckers weren't coming at them. As he
pushed the doors open and shoved her in before him, Ryan
grimaced at the stench that filled the store, as if hundreds
of pounds of hamburger had gone rancid. The zombie was on
the other side of the counter, near the Frozen Coke and
fountain soda machine, and turned its head to look creakily
at them as they again climbed behind the counter to relative
safety.
Nothing to use as a weapon in sight. Ryan looked
around behind the counter, glancing at the girl, but she
looked frozen in shock and didn't move. The zombie, which
obviously wasn't running on all cylinders, managed to wander
back their way and bumped straight into the counter again,
this time knocking the cigarette display off, grunting in a
flat, desperate tone. "Do you have a knife? Gun? Anything I
can use to stop that fucker?" Ryan said desperately,
wondering if the thing would ever figure out how to get
behind the counter. But even if it didn't it had to go,
because the putrid, gassy smell was about to make him puke.
"Bitch, wake up and help me!" he yelled, going over to shake
her. "Come on, think! That thing sees us as chow and we're
gonna be its chow if we don't kill it- for good!"
The zombie bumped the counter again ineffectively, then
looked down and saw what was stopping it. Gears seemed to
grind in its rotting brain and it raised one knee, trying to
climb over it.
Caryn was thinking of how she often thought of poking
people in the eye with a screwdriver--usually customers who
gave her a hard time, like this idiot--since that was the
only weapon of any kind in the store. You had to stop their
brains to kill them, she thought dazedly, and managed to
say, "There's screwdrivers hanging over the sink in the back
room."
"C'mon, show me," Ryan turned and vaulted the counter
beside the Lotto machine, then tugged at her shoulder.
"Climb over, that'll confuse old deadbrain there long enough
for us to get them."
Feeling like she was trapped in someone else's body
who'd had a massive Novicane shot, Caryn did as he said and
led him into the back room. Over a stainless steel double
sink was a rack of screwdrivers ranging from tiny to huge,
and with an exclamation of triumph Ryan grabbed a
two-foot-long Phillips. "This'll do. You stay back here and
lock the door behind me in case it gets me instead of me
gettin' it."
"That door doesn't lock," Caryn said woodenly.
"Then come on! What, you take a 'lude? Wake up, bitch!
Deal with it! Here, take this. We gotta kill that fucker and
lock them doors before more come." Ryan thrust a slightly
smaller straight-slot into her slack hand, which closed over
the screwdriver mechanically, and went to the doorway to the
store proper. "Shit. He's corralled now. How we gonna get
'im?"
Caryn peered around him hesitantly. The zombie was
wandering around behind the counter, bumping into it,
apparently having forgotten how it'd gotten in there in the
first place. Its blindly waving hands knocked over a rack of
greeting cards, then bumped the lottery machine and a ticket
popped out. "That one's probably a winner," Ryan muttered,
and shook his head. "Well, what d'ya think?"
The thought of more things like that invading the
store, trapping them, galvanized Caryn to action, though she
didn't think there were more, that this was an isolated
incident. "Guess I'll be bait," she said slowly. "You can
creep up behind it. How's that?"
The smile he turned on her surprised Caryn. When he
wasn't frowning, this was one handsome guy. "Thatta girl.
Let's do it before I pass out from the smell."
"No kidding," she agreed, then took a deep breath and a
better grip on the screwdriver, and walked out into the
store. "Hey... you," she said hesitantly, cringing when the
zombie looked over at her and drooled. "C'mon, thing, you
want me, come and get it." She sidled over to the break in
the counter, glancing behind her to make sure she had plenty
of escape room. The front door was only a few feet away and
she decided to break for that. The idiot biker might think
there were more, but Caryn doubted it. One zombie was enough
to stretch her brain to the breaking point and there was no
way she was going to consider that there might be more
outside.
Ryan stayed in the doorway until the thing was out from
behind the counter, reaching for the girl who was backing
away at the same rate it came at her. He'd revised his
opinion of the clerk, seeing that she was showing some balls
now. When the critter was about two feet in the clear he
moved, running up behind it and driving the long metal
screwdriver into the back of its head.
The zombie's skull simply fell apart, grayish-green
mush splattering in all directions as the body lost all
animation and fell down decently--and fully--dead. Both of
them backed away, Ryan grossed out over the putrid shit that
had splashed on him, Caryn turning away and retching, but
she didn't vomit. "Get... rid of that before I puke," she
said chokingly, and ran into the back room.
Ryan shrugged. So much for her balls, but they'd been
there when it mattered. He grabbed one of the zombie's arms
and pulled, but it came off. "Fuck! I dunno if I can. The
thing's falling apart like a jigsaw puzzle." But he finally
thought to grab the shoulders of its suit jacket and managed
to drag it out the front doors, then paused and looked
around the silent area. No one or nothing moved, not even a
car. Maybe I should just go, blow this place. But who knows
what's going on everywhere else--it could be worse--and if I
gotta be trapped somewhere during a zombie epidemic, at
least this place's warm and full of food and beer. Could be
worse is right.
He closed the double glass doors and twisted the knob,
making sure they were locked by jiggling them. "Okay, it's
gone," he called, and she walked out of the back room with
her face white as a sheet.
"Now what do we do?"
"You think I know? It's probably best if we just sit
tight and wait and see what's goin' on. Do you have a
radio?"
She nodded and went behind the counter, kicking aside
greeting cards and packs of cigarettes, and pulled a small
black and silver jambox from beneath the counter. "It's not
police band, but there should be something about what's
going on," she said as she set it on the counter and plugged
it in.
But only regular music and talking greeted her sweep
across both AM and FM dials, nothing unusual, but she left
it on an easy listening station she sometimes listened to,
low. "Shit, I wonder what's going on. Frank got a call to go
to the graveyard just before he left."
"Frank? Oh, you mean the cop. I dunno. Hey, can you
turn off the sign?" Ryan turned and pointed out the glass
windows. "That might be why that thing came here. It sure
couldn't smell us in here."
"Yeah, all right," she agreed, going into the back
room. Moments later the big lit sign out by the street went
dark, then the lights over the gas pumps, and finally the
pumps themselves. "I can't turn out the lights in here or
the coolers go, they're all on the same switch. I know
'cause we had a power outage before and everything went."
"Hmmn. I see what you're sayin'. We're like a big sign
sayin' SMORGASBORD HERE to them critters when they see the
store lit up, even if the sign's off."
"What do you mean, "them critters"? How can you
logically think there's more of them out there? And I don't
even think that was a zombie, maybe some kind of sick joke.
Just because we saw one, whatever it was, doesn't mean
there's more."
Ryan was getting annoyed. "Jesus, what're you, a
Vulcan? I never heard such cold logic in my life from
somebody who was so terrified they couldn't move ten minutes
ago."
"Like you said, I've got to deal with it," Caryn
snapped back. "And no, I'm not a Vulcan, I'm a college
student."
"Oh god help me, an intellectual," Ryan sighed, and
turned away. "Another know-it-all."
"Screw you, buddy!" Caryn snapped. "You don't like it
here, leave. I sure don't want you here."
"My name's Ryan, Ryan Callahan," he said, disliking
being called "buddy".
"I'm Caryn Jackson," she said, her anger draining out.
"Okay, so what now? We wait until something happens?"
"Yeah, I guess so, unless you'd like to take your
chances in zombieland," he shrugged. "I'm happy here."
"God, do you have to be such a smartass?" she frowned,
going to refill her coffee cup. "I wish you would leave,
'cause I'm already sick of you."
"Same here."
Though Caryn didn't want him in the store, she had no
way to make him leave and hoped that Frank would come back
by and make him go. She carried her cup of coffee behind the
counter and as she set it down, her eyes fell on the
telephone and widened. "The phone! Damn! Why didn't I think
of it sooner!"
Ryan had picked up his bag, took out a pack of Winstons
and his bottle of soda, and was sitting up on the counter
near the lottery machine, smoking and tapping his ashes on
the floor. He took a drink from the large bottle, wiped his
mouth with the back of his hand, belched, and said, "Waddia
gonna do, call the cops and tell 'em we killed a dead guy?
They'd sure believe that."
Hearing a normal dial tone in her ear, Caryn punched in
the numbers for the dorm. "First I'm calling home, to see if
anyone's up. Shit. It's busy. Probably Marsha talking to
Jeff for half the night again." She pressed the cutoff
button, then glanced over at him. "As a matter of fact,
that's a good idea. The cops might-"
Ryan was torn by indecision. On one hand he didn't want
her to call them, because if they came out again they might
just check his insurance certificate and that'd be the end
of his Harley. On the other hand, a gun and authority might
come in handy if more of those things were wandering around
out there, which to him there were. As far as Maeve
Callahan's third son Ryan was concerned, if there was one,
there was more.
Caryn dialed the police station, getting a busy signal,
and tried again. The other end rang, then a tired voice
said, "Berkely Park Police, Sergeant Boujeneh speaking."
"Mike? This is Caryn down at the gas station. Has
anything... unusual... been happening?" "This had better be
important, Caryn. I've been getting a lot of prank calls
tonight, I can't contact Frank, and I'm not in the mood for
any shit."
Her heart began to pound, the receiver trembling in her
hand as it shook. "About zombies? It's not a prank, Mike, we
saw-"
"Is Frank there with you?" he snapped angrily.
"No, a customer is staying here because-"
"That's enough, I'm too busy for this shit." He hung up
and Caryn stared at the phone in disbelief. "He hung up on
me! He didn't believe me! He said he's been getting prank
calls about zombies!"
"Then there must be more," Ryan said, frowning. "Caryn,
maybe we should get on my-"
The sound of squealing tires, clear in the silence,
made both of them turn toward the windows. Headlights were
turning into the gas station's dark parking lot, wavering
and bumping as the car jumped two of the parking blocks, and
suddenly accelerated across the blacktop toward the
building. It barely missed a set of gas pumps, and Ryan
yelled in horror as he saw it heading straight for his
Harley. But he didn't have time to even move as it crashed
into his bike and then hit the building, smashing the large
motorcycle between it and the bricks. The store shook and
bottles clinked in the cooler, several items falling off the
shelves, as he sprinted for the door. Forgetting he'd locked
them, Ryan shook the doors, lost in fury and screaming
threats at the unseen driver. Just as he unlocked the doors,
the car's driver's door opened and someone dressed in dark
clothing fell out onto the blacktop. Caryn, who was behind
Ryan, saw who it was and screamed, "Frank! Oh, no, Frank!"
Still furious about his bike but suddenly remembering
the danger they were in, Ryan calmed himself with a
stupendous effort and relocked the doors. Staring out, he
watched as the cop dragged himself up off the ground and
staggered toward them. Ole Frank the cop had had a run-in
with a zombie, maybe more than one, it looked like. Blood
covered his dark blue uniform, turning it black. Big chunks
of flesh were missing from his neck and arms, his shirt torn
and hanging in shreds to show raw flesh beneath. He
staggered toward the doors and collapsed again only a foot
away, then lifted the top half of his body and stretched one
arm toward them. Through the glass they could barely hear
his voice: "Help... me... came to warn you, Caryn...
things.... zombies..." It trailed off and he fell face-first
onto the pavement, and didn't move again.
Ryan suddenly staggered sideways from a shove and fell
against a stack of soda crates, the bottles clinking. Caryn,
still screaming, was fumbling with the door lock. "We've got
to help him!"
He pushed her away from the doors with less force than
she'd used on him and held the handles securely as he turned
to face her. "What, are you nuts? He's dead, and now he's
gonna turn into one of those things. Looks like he went a
coupla rounds with a zombie George Foreman. Don't you watch
movies? Once you're bit by those things and die you turn
into one of 'em."
She bit her lip, crossing her arms over her chest and,
shuddering, looked over his shoulder outside. Then she
froze, unable to speak. Ryan turned his back to the doors
and took a couple steps away, frowning, thinking about his
bike and wondering if the cop at the station would believe
them now.
Caryn was staring at a shambling group of zombies
crossing Pressburg Road toward the gas station, five or six,
only their forms distinguishable in the dark. But there was
no doubt that they were zombies; just the way they stumbled
and lurched gave that away. She would've known something was
wrong just by the way they were walking, if it could be
called that. And they were arrowing straight for the store's
lights at a snail's pace, but it was fast enough for her.
"Ruh... ruh..." she forced out, and managed to point,
her mind back to being on Novocaine.
He looked up, annoyed, then noticed the pallor of her
face. "Caryn? What's..." he turned and saw them right away.
"Oh fucking shit. Critter patrol. How thick are those
doors?"
"Not thick enough," she managed to say, holding onto
herself with a dint of will, wanting only to run out the
back door and never stop running. "Kid broke one of them
with a skateboard last month."
"We've got to block them off, then," Ryan said. The
zombies were just crossing the sidewalk and the lead one was
stumbling over a concrete parking block into the lot. "We
might have enough time. What can we use?"
"I don't know." Caryn's eyes swept over the front of
the store and she shrugged.
"Soda crates!" Ryan pointed to the displays of Coke,
Pepsi, 7-Up, and Faygo stacked up against the front windows
to the left of the doors, which he'd fallen against when
she'd shoved him away from the doors. It looked like there'd
been a recent delivery, since the crates--each containing
three eight-packs of bottles--were stacked eight and ten
high. "C'mon, help me. Even if they break the windows it'll
take 'em a while to get past these."
As she went to help, Caryn's eyes were on the five
zombies--skipping over Frank's motionless body--which had
reached the gas pumps about ten feet from the front of the
building. None of them seemed to be connected to reality, as
two were repeatedly bumping against the gas pumps,
apparently unaware that all they had to do was step around
them, while another had fallen over one of the concrete
parking blocks and was still trying to walk face-down on the
ground. One woman, who was missing her jawbone and had a
dark, gaping hole below her exposed front teeth, lurched
steadily toward the lit store with determination, unaware
that half her coffin was still attached to one of her legs
and being dragged along behind her. The fifth zombie was
lurching along in the lead, but stumbling, slowed by a
missing foot.
They stacked the soda crates in front of the doors,
leaving most where they were to protect the windows though
they were much thicker than the door glass, and built a wall
about five and a half feet high. Ryan's arms ached and his
back was sore when they got done, but both felt much safer
with the crates blocking the doors. As they rested, leaning
against the crates, something bumped in the night.
Caryn peered between the bottles, being much shorter
than the wall. "Here they come."
Ryan looked over the top, being six-one. One of the
critters was still bumping against a pump, but the other
four had achieved their goal and were fumbling around with
the door handles, stumbling over the cop's body and ignoring
it. They'd stacked the crates tightly against the doors,
which opened inward, and since they were locked, they didn't
bump against the crates, so unless the glass was broken
there was no danger of them being knocked over. The zombies
scratched and bumped uselessly against the glass, one of
them having the intelligence to try and pull on the doors,
but when that didn't work, it went back to beating its hands
uselessly on the glass.
"I think it'll hold," Caryn said with relief. "I don't
think they're strong enough to break it."
"Yeah, and the way the one I dragged outside fell apart
I bet they'd come apart before they were able to break the
glass," Ryan agreed, grimacing at the memory and glad that
he'd put the first zombie's body--and parts--on the side of
the store.
"Ugh, don't remind me," Caryn shuddered, moving away
from the barricade. "Now I guess we wait."
Ryan's stomach growled as he leaned against the crates,
his back to the thumping zombies. "I'm going to get
something to eat. Where'd my sub go?"
"That thing stepped on it, so I threw it away. Get
another since you did pay for it," she said, going behind
the counter, but her eyes kept straying to the
partially-seen forms beyond the glass. "I don't think I
could eat right now."
"They're gross, but I'm still hungry and I don't plan
to starve to death in a store full of food," Ryan said,
going to the sandwich cooler and taking out a roast beef sub
that cost a dollar more than the bologna and salami one he'd
paid for.
Caryn watched unobtrusively as he heated up the
submarine and hopped back up on the counter to eat. He'd
also gotten a large bag of red-hot chips and another, cold,
bottle of Pepsi from the rack without paying, and she
decided to keep track of what he ate and charge him for it
later. There was bound to be rescue, and things would go
back to normal, so he wasn't going to eat all night for
free. She tried to turn her attention to a magazine, but it
was dry and boring and the zombies still bumping against the
doors and windows outside kept distracting her. A tabloid
might have kept her interest better than Newsweek, but she'd
read all of them already.
"Caryn, have you thought of what we'll do if no one
comes by morning? Obviously the cop you talked to doesn't
believe us." Ryan said, wiping his mouth on a piece of paper
towel and tossing his empty wrapper in the trash. "I mean,
who knows how many of these things are on the loose, or how
widespread it is. It can't be happening just around here."
"I had to do research on American burial traditions for
my Cultures class last year, and in case you don't know, we
bury people in two caskets. There's the one you see at a
funeral, and it's lowered into a cement box that has a heavy
lid. That's law, Ryan, and everyone who isn't cremated or
put in a crypt is done like that. So don't think that the
graveyard's empty, because most of them probably can't get
past the cement lid on the second casket."
"How'd you find all that out?" Ryan asked curiously,
still eating hot chips.
"Went over to the graveyard and asked the caretaker. He
even gave me a tour of the place and answered all my
questions. I got an A+ on that term paper, too." Caryn went
and poured herself another cup of coffee. When she came
back, she added, "Even the ones in the crypts can't get out.
The doors are locked against vandalism, especially around
this time of the year. Halloween's in two weeks."
"Yeah, no shit. Now that you mention it..."
"Get real. What's Halloween got to do with this shit
going on?"
"Just think how this looks in some European countries
where they're still real superstitious. They must-"
Angrily Caryn interrupted, "For all we know it's a
local thing. I can't believe the whole world is being
invaded by killer zombies."
"I can, 'cause it's better than believing in false
hopes," he snapped back. "I never think things are going to
be good 'cause when they aren't, you just got kicked in the
face again. Look at my fucking bike out there! I just got it
fixed!"
Caryn stared at him momentarily. "Jesus, are you ever a
pessimist. You have control over things that happen to you,
you know. If you don't put yourself in a position to get-"
Now he interrupted her. "Oh yeah? How'd I have control
over the fact that my mother abandoned me and my brothers
when I was five and I was raised in an orphanage? That was a
great start, Caryn, believe me, and it hasn't gotten any
better no matter how hard I've worked at it. So don't spout
that bullshit about control to me," he finished angrily,
half-shouting.
She recoiled and felt tears well up. "I-I'm sorry," she
said, frowning, trying to stop herself from crying. She'd
never been able to take a man's angry voice, not after her
father. It had seemed that he was always yelling at one or
the other of them. But she lost the fight and before she
could wipe it away, a single tear coursed from the corner of
her eye and down her cheek. She ran into the back room,
where there was a small bathroom, and locked herself in.
Why'd I have to get locked in here with an uneducated,
bullheaded biker? Jesus, why not Frank or Jim or even Dave?
Ryan watched her go with amazement replacing his anger.
The goofy bitch had been __crying. __Over a stupid argument?
Of all the people on Earth he could have gotten stuck with
during an unexpected emergency like this, why her? Sure
there were worse people--the soon-to-be-a-zombie cop
would've been--but she wasn't his dream girl, that was for
sure. Well, at least she wasn't bad to look at. That was
something. She could have looked like the fat and
pimple-dotted clerk who worked midnights at the 7-Eleven
near his house, but at least that woman was an interesting
conversationalist and didn't treat him like shit because he
had long hair and rode a bike. Or, even better, he could
have been home in his comfortable little house... but then
it had a lot of windows that he would have had to board up,
and he might have ended up like most people in zombie movies
he'd seen: ghoul fodder.
Caryn came out of the back room with her face blotchy
and eyes red and wouldn't look at him, instead heading back
to the long wall-length walk-in cooler and disappearing
inside. A moment later he heard the blowers stop and the
lights inside went on. He caught glimpses of her in there
between the rows of shelves and realized with some amazement
that she was filling the cooler. In his mind she went beyond
goofy to being an asshole; why work when you didn't have to?
Even if her bosses survived the zombie epidemic, would they
care if her work wasn't done? Why did she care?
Caryn was filling the cooler to have something to do,
to keep her hands and mind busy, and to get away from Ryan.
God, how she hated that opinionated, uneducated, pessimistic
son of a bitch! Uneasily she wondered how long they'd be
stuck in here together; much longer than morning, which was
only a few hours away, and they would be on the verge of
killing each other. Then, with such a shock that she almost
dropped the six-pack of beer she was about to put up on a
shelf, Caryn realized that no matter what happened from now
on, __everything __she knew was irreconcilably changed. Even
if this was a put-on or a joke or something not real, which
she was too much of a realist to know better than, the past
couple of hours had changed her. If someone had walked up to
her and asked how she'd react in an emergency like this, she
would have said that she'd be calm, cool, collected, and
efficient; that how nurses acted and wasn't she training to
be a nurse? But now she knew different. She had freaked out
and frozen, completely lost control of herself. She didn't
see that that didn't matter; she had come through when it
was needed. Caryn only saw that she had clutched up under
pressure.
She unthinkingly shoved the six-pack of Bud Dry onto
the shelf and moved over to the next, pushing the single
bottles of beer and wine coolers forward and filling the
racks from boxes behind her, still lost in thought.
Ryan, meanwhile, was staring over the wall of soda
crates at the dark night, past the zombies still worrying
the doors, to the bulk of the police car and, though he
couldn't see it, his bike crushed between it and the wall of
the store. He had put so much work, energy, and money into
that machine that he couldn't quite believe that it was
gone, but intellectually he knew it was. Not even the
handlebars could have survived that collision. His treasured
Ultraglide was scrap metal.
This was not the place he wanted to be during what was,
apparently, a zombie epidemic or whatever you wanted to call
it. Though only the front wall was glass, and the windows
three inches thick and pretty much unbreakable by the stupid
critters, it was hard to defend. And if three or four had
found them, then there was probably more on the way. They
had to get out of here, but how?
Caryn jumped, startled, when Ryan stuck his head in the
cooler and said, "Where's your car parked? I can't see it
out there."
She sighed and stretched, easing her sore back. "I
don't have one. My boyfriend's been driving me back and
forth to work, and I live on campus."
"Oh, that's just fucking great. How are we gonna get
out of here?" Ryan leaned against the cooler's metal
doorframe, cool but not cold since she'd had the blowers off
for at least half an hour.
"Leave? But why? The cops know we're here, and we've
got food, heat, and shelter."
"But it's not safe. Look out front. There's five
zombies out there now, plus your cop friend when he
reanimates, and there's bound to be more. If they came here,
for whatever reason, there's gonna be more. And if they
break that glass we're fucked."
She walked down the long, narrow isle toward him and
Ryan backed out of the cooler. "I don't think they can break
the glass. Besides, there's a back door, and nothing out
back but dumpsters. We've got plenty of room to run. I
think-"
"And we're still fucked, but fucked on foot. Those
things are pretty damn stupid, it looks like, but I don't
think it would take us long to get tired and be ambushed or
something after running for a couple of hours." Ryan said
over his shoulder as he walked toward the counter, Caryn
following after closing the cooler door and restarting the
blowers without thinking about it.
"Well, then, you are more than welcome to leave, front
door or back," Caryn snapped, annoyed at being interrupted.
"I never wanted you to stay here in the first place."
Ryan barely heard her. He was standing at the bottle
crate barricade again, staring past the zombies at the
police car. A faint plume of exhaust was barely visible
behind it, and that gave him an idea, whether she wanted to
come along or not.
"Are you ready?"
Caryn took a deep breath and shifted her heavy backpack
slightly. Though it usually held her textbooks, it now
contained items that just might insure her and Ryan's
survival out in zombieland. "No, but I guess I'll have to
be."
"Just remember- if anything happens to me, go straight
to the police station. If that's been... infiltrated...
well, then, good luck." Ryan stood posed and ready by the
back door, which was unlocked, his hands on the long metal
bar.
"Infiltrated? Where'd you learn a big word like that?"
Caryn cracked nervously.
Ryan grinned back at her. "At the movies. C'mon, let's
do it."
Before she was ready, he hit the door's bar and was
out, running. Alarms sounded as the security system was
breached and Caryn flinched as she followed. The heavy steel
door grazed her foot as it began to close behind him and she
stumbled, but recovered quickly and followed Ryan's running
form around the side of the store, the alarms silencing as
the door shut behind them. Just as she caught up to him,
Pressburg Road in sight, he stopped dead and she plowed into
his back, knocking him over and falling on top of him in a
sprawling tangle of arms and legs. If they hadn't still been
on the side of the building that would have been the end of
them, but the zombies around front couldn't see them yet.
"You asshole!" he hissed in a loud whisper.
"Well, you-"
He twisted around and clapped a hand over her mouth,
holding the back of her head with the other. They were
laying on their sides with legs still entangled, facing each
other, on the cold hard blacktop. "Sssh! Look toward the
road!"
Caryn would have bitten his hand if she could have, but
he had it cupped over her lips. Instead she did as he said,
craning her neck as his hands loosened... and gasped, but
didn't scream like she wanted to. In the glow of a
streetlight near the freeway overpass were zombies, what
looked like an entire shambling army, coming out from
beneath the bridge and heading their way. From the graveyard
on the other side of the freeway, Caryn realized. They were
less than half a mile away, and coming along slowly... but
steadily. They could be outrun, but for how long?
Ryan slowly removed his hands from the back of her
neck, and mouth, somehow regretting leaving the feel of her
long, soft, silky hair. Her body, pressed against his from
chest to foot, was firm yet springy in places... one place,
in particular. But he forced himself to ignore the feel of
her breasts against his chest as he whispered, "We have got
to get out of here, especially now, but be quiet until we're
both in position. I don't know if they can smell us, but
we're going to have to take the chance. We'll go ahead with
the plan... you ready?"
"As I'll ever be," Caryn whispered back, squirming away
from him and getting up, unbalanced by her heavy backpack.
Her body tingled from the feel of his, hard and muscular,
unlike her boyfriend's, which was soft and paunchy. Ryan got
up too, absently brushing at the ripped-out knees of his
jeans, and glanced at her. Caryn nodded and ran out in front
of the store and across the lot, reaching the parking blocks
at the end before she stopped. The zombies gathered around
the doors had just seen her and were turning around slowly,
creakily. She glanced around quickly, saw that the road was
clear to the west though eastward came the zombie army from
the graveyard, and called, "C'mon, you stinking things! You
want me, come and get me! Dinnertime if you can catch me!"
Ryan watched from the side of the building. His opinion
of Caryn Jackson was changing fast. Now that she'd
apparently recovered from the shock of the situation she was
not only dealing with it, but dealing with it well. Brave
girl, he thought, watching from hiding as the critters
turned and started for her. Instead of turning and running
like he was sure she wanted to (God knew he did), Caryn held
her ground, glancing back and forth between the two groups
of shambling walking dead. She was so unusual, he thought.
Terrified to the point of catatonia one minute, then in
charge and taking action. She'd argue with him fiercely, or
just back down and get upset. There was no telling what
she'd do next, and if they got out of this Ryan was
seriously considering asking her out. The fact that she was
very pretty helped this decision.
As his thoughts had run on, the zombies had shuffled
past the police car and were now passing the first set of
gas pumps in a loose group, one of them walking into a pump
but this time figuring out how to get around it after a
moment of creaky thought. They were less than fifteen feet
from Caryn, who looked ready to vomit or bolt, maybe both,
as the wind shifted to blow in her face. It was time for
Ryan to make his move. He braced himself, then darted around
the side of the building toward the police car, circled it,
and reached for the open door. But as his hand closed over
the top of it, another hand--cold and clammy even through
his white sweat socks--closed around his ankle and he looked
down to see the cop's open mouth about to close over his
calf, jeans or no jeans.
Frank had finally reanimated.
Ryan jerked his leg away but the hand didn't let go,
and Frank's teeth clicked together with an audible snap only
inches from his inteneded place. Lifting his other leg, Ryan
kicked the cop directly in the face and his head snapped
back, nose smashing flat, but his head didn't explode into a
pile of grey stinking mush like he'd thought it might. The
cop was a lot fresher than the first zombie had been, and
would take a lot more abuse before being felled, Ryan
realized with a shudder of terror. He stomped on the cop's
wrist as his head snaked back to try for another bite and
the hand let go, Ryan dancing out of his reach without
thinking; unfortunately, he also moved out of the reach of
the idling police car.
"Ryan, hurry up, they're getting close- both ways!"
Caryn called in desperation. "What's wrong?"
He turned and looked at her, then back at Frank, who
was jerkily getting up on his unsteady legs. "Your fucking
cop friend is after me! I can't get into the car!"
As Ryan backed up again, Caryn saw Frank rise up from
the ground on the other side of the police car from her line
of vision and totter forward like a baby just learning to
walk, his legs shaky and rubbery as rigor mortis hadn't yet
set in. The sight of him tore into her soul. "Get in the
other side!" she yelled, backing up as the lead zombie from
the group that had been in front of the store reached the
parking blocks about six feet from her. "Hurry it up, I'm
running out of room here!"
Ryan hurried around the car and yanked open the front
passenger door, then crawled inside and started cursing. A
computer terminal took up much of the room in the front
seat, and he had to squirm around it before he could plop
into the driver's seat. Then he looked up to see Frank's
vacantly grinning face coming at him from the open
door--he'd erroneously assumed that Frank would try to
follow him around the car, but he hadn't--and he screamed as
he realized that he was trapped, thinking he was dead,
zombie fodder, and possibly soon to be one of the
flesh-eating critters himself.
Then Frank crumpled like a deflated balloon and he
looked up to see Caryn beyond, her hands flying to her mouth
and beginning to cry. Looking down, he saw the handle of a
long screwdriver protuding from the back of the cop's head.
Thank God she'd remembered it was stuck in her belt, since
he'd forgotten about his own. "Hurry up and get in," he
said. "They're following you."
She stumbled around the police car, hearing the
driver's door slam shut, and fell into the passenger seat,
quickly closing her door though she had to fumble to feel
for the handle through tear-blurred eyes. Shock was again
taking her to its twilight region, her brain overloaded by
the horrors of the night. She sat and cried silently, tears
streaming down her face and not noticing the lumpy backpack
behind her as Ryan wheeled the police car out of the lot,
leaving the zombies and the brightly lit store behind.
Ryan floored the car down the long dark road toward the
brightly-lit town, vaguely noticing that the sky was
lightening to his right. It was false dawn, but it meant
that daylight would come and that thought buoyed his
spirits, as did their escape from the store. As they swept
around a tree-lined blind curve and the town sprawled before
them, he slammed on the brakes as hard as he could and the
police car slewed sideways, shuddering to a stop with its
already-crushed reinforced bumper only inches away from the
two cars smashed together in the middle of the road. "Jesus
God, what happened here?" he exclaimed, his hands damp with
persperation on the wheel he clutched tight enough to turn
his knuckles white.
Even through her shock Caryn could get an idea of what
had happened. There were no bodies, but in the glow of a
nearby streetlight the blood everywhere was quite
noticeable. It was splashed both inside and outside the two
cars, and on the ground around them. One of the cars, a
black late-model Ford Escort, had the driver's door standing
open and in the gleam of its dome light they saw a single
severed arm sitting on the bloody seat, an indistinguishable
tattoo on its wrist. Most likely these two cars had
approached from opposite ends of the road coming around the
blind curve and maybe there'd been a zombie standing in the
middle of the road or several off to the side, just enough
to distract the drivers so that they collided. And,
unfortunately, must have gotten out of their cars.
After staring for a minute, Ryan shifted the car into
reverse and backed up to a nearby driveway, which led into
the empty parking lot of one of the many strip malls that
lined the road into town. He drove through the lot,
bypassing the accident, and once back on the road beyond it,
floored the gas again. The brakes now felt rather spongy and
a small red light had come on over the gas gauge, but there
was no time to worry about that now.
Neither spoke as they raced down the dark, silent road,
the police radio occasionally crackling, but only static
came through it. Then they swept around a long turn and were
in the town of Berkley Park proper and as soon as they
sighted the long main street, Ryan slammed on the brakes
again, throwing Caryn into the dash but barely noticing or
that he bounced off the steering wheel himself.
It was a scene out of the worst nightmare, brightly lit
by streetlights and their headlights. Zombies shambled here
and there, some with an obvious purpose in mind (such as the
one determinedly attacking the front of the 24-hour
laundrymat while they could hear desparite screams from
inside) while others simply wandered around blankly,
apparently having no idea what they were doing. Several were
gathered around a car in the middle of the street ahead of
them and in the glare of the police car's bright headlights,
both Ryan and Caryn could quite clearly see that the zombies
were hanging inside the car through the open windows and
chowing happily on whoever had been driving. They were now
zombie fodder, several of the critters leaning in the
windows and squabbling weakly over the priveledge of getting
the freshest food.
Ryan rolled up his window, glancing over to see that
the passenger side was already up. Caryn was staring out at
the carnage with her mouth hanging open, blood trickling
from one nostril, but obviously she didn't notice she'd been
hurt. "Hey, wipe your nose, it's bleeding," Ryan said, his
voice sounding shaky even to himself. "You think there'd be
anywhere safe?"
"I... I don't know," Caryn said, absently swiping at
her nose with her arm and grimacing as she touched the
bruised member. "All the people are sleeping... sleeping and
not knowing... Jesus, we have to go to my house! And the
dorm!"
"Okay, we can do that," Ryan agreed, half for her peace
of mind and half to get the gruesome scene before them out
of his face. He let up on the brake and the red light on the
dash went out momentarily, then reappeared, glowing like a
mad dog's eye in the darkness. "Which way?"
"Go up three streets and turn left," she said,
squirming around to rid herself of the backpack and looking
away as they passed the car surrounded by zombies. In the
rearview Ryan saw that two of them, who hadn't been able to
get into the group chowing down on the unlucky driver,
shambled away from the other car and began to follow them,
arms out and hands grasping at thin air as the police car
sped away. Free of the pack, Caryn slouched down in her
seat, not caring to see any more of what the town had
become.
Ryan slowed as he approached the corner, swerving to
avoid a little kid zombie that he saw at the last minute,
and made the turn a tad too fast, but the well-maintained
police car let him get away with it. Tires squealing they
flew around the corner onto a residential street lined with
elms that stood sentenial along both sides like silent
warriors who didn't care to get involved in this battle.
The street was still and silent, mostly dark but for a
few scattered porch lights and lit windows here and there.
"Looks pretty quiet. Maybe they haven't gotten this far,"
Ryan said without thinking, then realized that if the
critters had gotten to her family he was giving her false
hope.
"No such luck. Look there." Caryn pointed as they
passed a small white house, its porch light burning, and in
its glow they saw two zombies shambling up the driveway to
disappear in the darkness on the side of the house. "Oh,
shit, I hope they're okay! God damn it..."
This was the first time Ryan had heard her swear and he
glanced over at her, surprised and realizing how upset and
tense she was. "How much farther?"
"Two more blocks. We're about the farthest house out of
town," she said, nervously staring out the passenger window.
"That's why I had to stay in the dorm. I couldn't walk all
that way twice a day back and forth to class."
Cruising at about twenty-five, they passed the dark
silent houses, seeing no more zombies and raising Caryn's
hopes.