Zombies! Episode 3 - Love Bites (8 page)

Marcus worried over him. They said goodbye
with what looked like a handshake but held more affection. Then
Marcus went off to conduct his own business.

The first thing he did was go back to his
apartment. Stripping off his expensive clothing, the clothing that
made him look good, he pulled out a pair of baggy jeans and a dark
blue hoodie. The T-shirt he put on was big and thick and all white.
He had dark blue sneakers that matched the sweatshirt exactly.
These he slipped on over his feet and left the laces wide open. He
could never stand loose shoes so he'd jury rigged a clip under the
tongues so that the loose laces really were just for show. Finally,
he went to his closet and dug into some debris for a locked metal
strongbox. Inside was a Remington, which he pulled out, checked the
magazine, and secured to a velcro sealed holster inside his
sweatshirt. He put two extra magazines into his pockets.

With the disguise complete, he slipped
quietly out of his apartment and down the back stairs. He didn't go
out the front of the building, didn't want to be seen on the
security camera. Instead, he went to the basement and used a
service entrance. He'd use the same entrance when coming back. One
night, after getting the super piss drunk, he'd lifted the key to
the entrance and had a copy made. Marcus remembered just how
nervous he'd been that night. It was something he'd done for
absolutely no rational reason. It just made him feel good to have
the power to come and go unnoticed. Now it was paying off.

Down the street and into the train station.
It was ten minutes to Grand Central where he transferred to the
Lexington Avenue express and rode it out to the Bronx. It was
really dark when he got off the train and the streets weren't
exactly safe. He was always careful not to wear gang colors but
that didn't necessarily mean they would leave him alone. Even with
the gun, he wasn't totally safe so he needed to be on his guard. He
had a twelve block walk that would take him into a very abandoned
warehouse district. Most of the buildings were falling apart and
their ownership was up for grabs. The whole area suited him
perfectly.

Waiting for him on a street corner were the
three men he'd come to meet. They were dressed in grey hoodies and
dark denim. One of them wore sunglasses. When he reached them, they
exchanged greetings, both verbal and physical.

"How'd it go?" Marcus asked.

The man with the glasses took them off
showing dark sparkling eyes. "We lost it."

Marcus' tone remained neutral. "How did that
happen?"

"We cornered some bitch in an alley but some
guy came to rescue her."

"Some guy?"

"He had a gun. He just shot the thing in the
head, like he knew what it was."

Marcus thought about that for a minute. "Was
he a cop?"

The man nodded. "Pretty sure. I think he knew
the girl, too. I think they live in the building."

"Is there any way he can trace the thing back
to you?"

"Nah, man. How's he gonna do that?"

Now Marcus' eyes glowed and he showed some
anger. "You'd better be sure." He addressed the three of them. "So
there's no mistake. If any one of us gets tagged, he's on his
own."

They all nodded. They'd had this conversation
before.

When it was settled, the man replaced his
glasses and led Marcus and the other three up the street. They
moved through a rusty chain link fence and up to one of the
warehouses. It was a giant structure, three stories high and
thousands of square feet. Inside, it had a huge empty space in the
center with prefab corridors built into the sides. There was an
upper level, but only running along the back. Marcus assumed that
there were offices up there; he would have one.

"It's good," he said. "When can we have
it?"

"Deed's up for grabs," said the man in the
glasses. "We just need the cash."

"Not a problem. What about the builders?"

"That's harder. I know a contractor who can
do most of the work for a decent price but it ain't gonna go
unnoticed. People are gonna want to know what's going on down here
where everything's supposed to be shut down."

Marcus waved him away. "That's not a problem.
We're starting a business, right? We need some exposure."

The other man shrugged.

"What's our stock like?"

"Those things ain't easy to find. We got four
right now."

"Any women?"

The man with the glasses nodded. "Just one
but she ain't pretty."

"Let's have a look."

The man led them outside and around the back.
There was an old aluminum shed there. The doors were rusty but the
handles were new and the padlocks were the best that money could
buy. The man with the glasses had the key and he unlocked them. The
other two men pulled out flashlights. One was handed over to
Marcus. As he stepped forward, the first thing to hit him was the
smell. It was the most repulsive thing he'd ever experienced but he
couldn't show that kind of weakness in front of these characters.
So he choked down his revulsion and stepped inside. The floor was
dusty and the walls were dirty. There was a musty wet quality to
the air. He shined the light around the room and caught each of
them one at a time. There were three men and one woman, all chained
to the walls. Two of the men were older. They'd been homeless men.
They wore faded pants, one brown and one green with the remnants of
button down shirts. One man was unmarked, as if the plague had come
to him through the air. The other had a deep leg wound. His pants
were ripped and stained black. In the torchlight, Marcus could just
see the ragged flesh hanging from the wound. The third man was a
business man. He was missing three fingers on his right hand. The
suit he wore was grimy and stained with blood. There was also some
dried blood around his mouth. This zombie had fed. And finally
there was the woman. When the man in the glasses had said she
wasn't pretty, he hadn't been kidding. It didn't matter that she
was, or had been, grossly overweight. It didn't matter that her
black and grey hair was a tattered mess. Some other zombie had made
lunch of her. Although the blood had dried and the wounds had
crusted over, the dress she wore was torn apart at her midsection
and there were not one but three gaping cavities where the
attackers had torn into her.

Marcus made a show of looking at them,
shining his light on them one at a time and giving ample pause. As
they struggled against their chains, he stood stock still,
practicing meditation techniques and focusing on the walls behind
them rather than the zombies themselves. When he felt he'd shown
enough strength, he turned and left the shed. The others
followed.

"Anyone looking for them?" he asked.

"I'm sure there will be. Not the street guys,
though."

"We need more, at least a dozen before we
start."

"Probably more than that," the man in the
glasses said.

Marcus nodded. Getting more wouldn't be a
problem, though. Some people will do anything for money.

***

ARRICK
dozed more than slept through
the course of the night. He sat in the chair, which was
uncomfortable, even with his feet propped up on the bed. Exhausted,
he thought several times that he should leave. Really, what was he
staying for? Suzanna was either going to get better or she was
going to die. He was afraid to take her to the hospital and she
refused to go anyway. So she lay sweating in bed, moaning out her
sufferings, and he listened for a while, then dozed, then listened
some more.

A sudden change in her breathing brought him
fully awake. He was disoriented, unsure of the time. Sitting in the
dark, he peered around the room. All he could see was shadows.

"Suzanna?" he whispered, looking over at the
lump of blanket and sheet on the bed. He reached over to her, put
his hand where he thought her leg should be, and wound up with a
handful of empty blanket. Startled, he leaned forward and probed
for her but the bed was empty.

"Suzanna?" he called out a little louder. He
looked around the room but couldn't see anything. He listened but
he couldn't hear anything.

Standing up, Arrick called out her name once
more and received the same response. He was frightened. Carefully,
he made his way into the hallway. Desperately, he wanted to run
from that apartment. He wanted nothing more than to be safe in his
own home. But still something held him back. Perhaps it was the
same misguided loyalty that had prevented him from leaving her in
the first place.

"Suzanna?"

Then he heard it. The sound of air moving
through a tunnel, a horrible macabre moaning. Until that moment, he
had doubted. Any sane person would doubt the existence of zombies.
Suzanna had doubted also. She had just been sick. But all disbelief
disappeared entirely in that moment. He couldn't see her. She was
in front of him but it was too dark to see. She was just a
silhouette in the hallway. For a moment, a brief moment in which he
hated himself, he was attracted to her all the more. The shape of
her shadow and the helplessness of her condition appealed to him in
a way that he would hopefully forever bury from that moment on. For
then he switched on the light in the hallway and saw her face. Her
dead face with empty eyes.

Almost all of the color had fled from her
cheeks. The eyes, though undamaged, stared at nothing. They had
this glazed look that wasn't even lucid enough to mistake for
hypnosis. They were windows into the world of death. John Arrick
screamed and sobbed all at once. He didn't know what the
thing
in front of him was. But he knew that he was terrified
by it.

That was his last thought before it launched
itself at him. They collided in a tangle of awkward limbs and
gnashing teeth.
The teeth! Stay away from the teeth!
Arrick
brought his forearm up under her chin and felt her lips and tongue
split from the impact. Blood and spit splashed on his arms and
face. Trying to keep his balance, he gave ground, staving off snap
after snap of teeth and neck. They tumbled into the tiny bathroom,
light from the hallway spilling in on top of them. Awful sounds
struggled out of her throat, or maybe his. He wasn't sure. They
slipped on the bath matt and went down. Arrick banged his head on
the toilet bowl and went dizzy for a moment. Suzanna's head was in
his lap and he felt her mouth grab hold of his inner thigh. Without
a thought, he reached with both hands, gripping her hair and
pulling her head up. She clawed at him with her fingers.
Thank
God Suzanna hates long fingernails!
With her head under his
control, Arrick propped his feet against the wall for leverage.
Whipping her backward, he slammed the back of her skull against the
tub. He must have pulled the blow because there was nothing but a
dull thud and she kept struggling. If anything, she was stronger
now than she had ever been. Having the advantage, though, and
having got the feel for it, he repeated the blow, this time with
much more force. The sound was louder and there was a noticeable
effect. Suzanna's strength ebbed. Her limbs flailed wildly now
instead of under any sort of control. Arrick was beginning to feel
confident.

He slammed her head down again.

This time there was noticeable yield. Blood
dribbled from her ears and her flailing limbs fell to
twitching.

So he did it again.

And again.

And again.

With each blow, the impact was softer. Blood
and spittle from her ruined mouth splattered everywhere. When he
felt wetness behind her head, he let go and struggled his way out
from under her. He didn't look down, didn't want to see what she
had become and what he had done to end what she had become. Suzanna
may have been the queen of all the nasty bitches, but she hadn't
deserved this.

Running the water in the sink, he washed his
hands and face. Then he fled.

This time he took the train home. There would
be no more cabs. His body ached from his confrontation and it was
all he could do to conceal the blood stains on his clothing. He
kept to the shadows and rode in an empty car, not hard to find at
four o'clock on a Sunday morning.

When he finally reached his apartment, he
threw himself inside and slammed the door shut behind him. He
locked it and put up the chain. He stripped off his shoes and his
clothing and stuffed them into a garbage bag. He stripped the
sheets off of his bed and threw them into the same garbage bag.
Using the cleaning supplies he'd bought the night before, he once
again scoured the apartment from top to bottom. By the time he'd
finished, his head was aching and his muscles were on fire. There
was a twinge in his back that would worsen as he slept. It was
close to 7:30am by that time and he threw himself into the shower.
As he washed himself he began to relax. He was able to distance
himself from the events of the past few hours. And just as he was
becoming comfortable, secure in his thoroughness, he noticed a
faint scratch on his inner thigh. And then he sneezed.

***

So concludes episode 3 of
Zombies!
Next month, Dr. Denise Luco has to convince two lawyers, a
bureaucrat, and a public relations man to take
Head Shot
off
of the shelves. Maybe a tour of the
Ward
, the
Zoo,
and the
Butcher Shop
is just what they need. You'll get a
closer look at Anthony Heron's life at home, how he's dealing with
his cancer treatment, and the effect his new job is having on his
personality. Please come back in a month for
Zombies! Episode 4:
The Sick and the Dead
.