Life Among The Dead (Book 2): A Castle Made of Sand (4 page)

After turning the engine over, he maneuvers
the guitar through the backrests and sets it on the backseat. He
sees the approaching figures coming down the ramp from street
level. They walk at a jog, aided by gravity until straight ground
takes them off guard, causing one to clumsily fall.

He pulls away from the parking spot, running
over the policeman’s corpse on his way to the ramp. As he drives he
ponders what he heard on the news, and, considering, he doesn’t
feel bad at all as the bodies crumple and slap upon his hood.

The sun is bright compared to the gloom of
the parking lot, and it shines down warmly, chasing away the
morning frost.

The Altima enters bedlam, and Dustin punches
buttons on his stereo to scan through the discs in his changer. He
wants something to suit the carnage, to match the strewn bodies and
walking corpses, the abandoned cars and smoky air caused by nearby
fires. He finds the next selection more fitting. Angry sounding
rock. The kind of music that, when he isn’t careful, always results
in a speeding ticket.

He cruises the streets in this living
nightmare, trying to get home. He has to backtrack several times
after becoming trapped in dead ends of traffic. Groups of ghouls
trail his movement. They accumulate into a horde in his rearview as
if he’s the Pied Piper of the undead. He knows he can’t have them
on his heels should he make it home, because he’ll have no way of
getting out of the car. Losing them isn’t an option, and he can’t
get enough speed to drop from their sight.

Dustin pulls his car next to some abandoned
military vehicles and sandbag barriers then hops into the backseat.
The factory he works at had given all its employees coats with the
company name embroidered across the back. So now he wiggles down
against the floor, among his plastic shopping bag of trash and
empty bottles of wiper fluid, and he covers himself with the coat,
praying the dead just pass him by.

##

A desperate man hunkers in the back of a
deuce and a half. He’s a soldier, part of the time. The reservist’s
typical 9 to 5 is as a claims adjuster. Today is beyond anything he
had signed up for. He got the call of duty that morning to help
maintain the peace since the first to fall were the first
responders, then the mission failed epically. He ran, just as the
others had. As far as he knows, he is the last one alive.

Corporal Silva had climbed onto the back of
the truck to hide. He is low on munitions, and if he wants to make
it home he needs all the rounds he can salvage. The man was
gathering magazines from the abandoned rifles of his comrades. The
recovered ammo now lays on the street beyond usefulness, lost in
the man's haste to get away from a horde that seemed to come out of
nowhere. Dozens by his panicked count.

Locked-in on his location, the dead clamor
for him. He must cover his ears against the maddening pleas of the
hungry dead, who seem to be begging to be fed. Roaring above their
wailing, drowning them out, comes the most glorious sound he has
ever heard. He knows it will be his salvation.

“Is that the rooster song?”

##

Dustin can’t believe his ears. It’s the very
same singer he had listened to earlier this morning, only now she
is being played loudly in the middle of the street. He can’t fight
the urge to look, so he slowly rises from the cramped and filthy
floor of his car to kneel with his hands upon the crumb dusted
seat. He looks over the backrest and out his window, watching a man
dance to the music, drawing the zombies towards him.

The guy is donning an old fashioned hockey
mask while performing Kelly Peel’s signature moves and gyrations.
The dead certainly appreciate the show, for they eagerly hobble
towards him and pass Dustin once more. The peculiar figure doesn’t
seem scared in the least, for he continues to mimic the pop star’s
suggestive dancing as the corpses draw near. He obviously wants
them as close as possible.

Dustin can no longer see the carefree figure
shrouded by the zombies. He cranes his neck to peer around the
backs of the departed, but it’s no use, for they’ve clogged the
view completely.

A loud staccato erupts, drowning out the
innuendo heavy tune. Dustin ducks below the seat at first, but just
can’t help peeking up over headrest. The dead begin to dance a
convulsive shimmy before falling to the asphalt. Heads pop open in
geysers of thick gore, and the dancing Peel fan now crouches behind
one of the sandbag bunkers, manning a .50 caliber machine gun. The
weapon shakes violently as it spews its projectiles into the hungry
zombies. Once the gun goes silent, and all the dead lay still on
the road, he simply heads off, taking the music with him.

Dustin climbs back into the driver’s seat. He
isn’t sure if it was the man’s intention to clear the dead for him
or just a personal vendetta, and he doesn’t care. He just wants to
get moving.

During his quick trip into the back, he had
lost his pistol. While retrieving the gun from the floor mat, he
hears a sound. More shuffling feet approach his car, so he tries to
start his engine, but it’s being stubborn, and all the warning
lights are flashing behind his steering wheel. He has to give up on
the key to point his gun at his window when a hand slaps upon the
glass.

“Whoa! Don’t shoot!” A heavyset man in
fatigues puts his palms up. “I’m alive.”

The rotund soldier proceeds around the Altima
after the driver releases the door locks. He removes an olive drab
bag from his shoulder and an assault rifle from his other. “Thanks
for the rescue.”

“Uh… Sure thing,” Dustin has no qualms taking
the credit.

“A swarm of them just came outta nowhere,”
the soldier says. “Where’re you heading?”

Dustin doesn’t mind the man joining him. He
figures it can’t hurt having a soldier along,
even
this
doughy
-
boy
. “Out of town,” Until he saw
the state of the city, he had planned to go home and wait it out.
Now all he wants to do is find a quiet place.

“Can you by any chance take me to West
8th?”

“That’s a bit out of my way, actually.”

The soldier aims his rifle at the driver.
“I’m afraid I have to insist.”

The Altima rolls. “Where is West 8th
exactly?”

“Just beyond Shepard Park, west of the city.”
The soldier relaxes his weapon. He starts taking magazines of
varied fullness out of his bag so he can combine the rounds and
make a few containing the full capacity. “Sorry to force this on
you… I have to get home, see if my wife is all right. Say
goodbye.”

“Goodbye?”

“I got bit. Means I’ll be one of them soon.
When those fuckers surprised me, I couldn’t hide fast enough. One
of them got my calf.”

Dustin knows the mishap was indirectly his
fault for leading them to the scene, but he isn’t about to say as
much to the guy.

“These things are like sharks, man. Sharks on
land. Always on the move, looking for food. They track us by sight,
sound, and smell.”

“Smell?”

“Blood. They can smell it. At least, that’s
what it looks like.”

“What are they?” Dustin asks with frightened
wonder.

“Zombies.” The man taps one of his new
magazines against his palm like he was taught in boot camp to align
the bullets and prevent jamming. He loads it into the carbine.
“I’ll make you a deal. Hunker down at my place, or take my wife
with you, and I’ll give you my gun and show you how to use it.”

Although he doesn’t like the idea of having
to take care of someone else, he knows he’d fare better with the
rifle. Ultimately his guilt over leading the dead to the man’s
location guides his decision. “Deal.”

The solider digs in his cargo pockets. “Do
you want some beef jerky?”

“Sure.” Dustin always skips breakfast,
preferring to graze from the vending machines at work. That type of
eating isn’t so much about the sustenance, but more of an
anti-depressant--frosted happiness with sprinkles.

“Once, after coming back from the field, my
wife found a pouch of Levi Garrett in my gear. Now she always sends
me out with pounds of this stuff. It’s actually quite a good
substitute, and much healthier than chew.”

The man is silent, staring at a cell phone in
his hands that he had removed along with the jerky. “I’ll never get
it back to him, I guess.”

Dustin is too busy navigating around the dead
autos to fully understand the soldier’s meaning. “What’s that?”

“A guy dropped his phone when we were
mobilizing. He got put on a bus before I could get it to him. I
just figured I could give it to him at the debriefing when this was
all behind us.”

The soldier feels a twinge of guilt as he
puts another person’s phone to his ear after punching a series of
numbers.

“Calling home?” Dustin asks.

“Yeah… It’s busy,” He stashes the cell away
then stares out the window. His hands tap upon his thighs
nervously. “With the holidays coming up, she’s probably taking
orders.”

“What do you mean?”

“She has a rather successful home baking
service.” Corporal Silva digs into yet another of his many pockets.
“You may have seen her treats around the area. Pies, cookies,
cakes, and such.” The soldier holds a photo for the young driver to
steal a glance at.

The man’s wife is a morbidly obese woman that
he does recognize from logos.

The man goes on to say. “She’s always loved
baking.”

No
shit
, Dustin gives a grunt
of approval, having learned long ago saying the wrong thing to the
wrong person could cost him dearly.

Dustin turns the music down so they can talk,
but his passenger sits in contemplative silence. So Dustin tries
for conversation. “I once thought about joining the military. Was
boot camp as bad as they say?”

“No.” The man laughs. “It was worse. Think
about a world where everything you say and do is wrong…”

Sounds
like
my
life
.

“…where you wear tee-shirts and tighty
whities with your name stenciled into them. All must be folded in
the most anal manner possible and stored in a tiny locker. Lord
help you if it ain’t perfect. Hard as it was, I always look back at
it and laugh, thinking that it was the best mistake I’ve ever
made.”

The man pauses and chuckles when the youth
stops at a stop sign. “What are you doing? You’re not going to get
pulled over.”

“I forgot.” Dustin feels embarrassed as he
pulls onto Park Boulevard.

“It looks quiet.”

The vehicle brakes hard and every warning
light illuminates on the dash.

“Gas! Gas! Step on the gas!”

Dustin tries but is too late, and the car
dies. Turning the key doesn’t revive the Altima. It doesn’t even
make a sound.

“Don’t bother,” the solider says sadly. “Your
alternator is shot. We’ll be hoofing it from here.”

The kid gathers his things from the back
while the soldier investigates what caused the sudden stop--a
Kevlar helmet lying in the road. The ‘brain bucket,’ as his
compatriots call it, was left by a fellow soldier. There’s no
nametape on it to tell who its owner may have been. The solider is
about to offer it to his companion, but can see he is already
overburdened by enough. A bag is slung over one arm and a guitar on
the other. “That stuff will just slow you down.”

Dustin ignores the warning, not about to
leave his things behind. The two begin the trek through the
park.

“Farnsworth! Farnsworth!”

Kelly can hear Randy scream from upstairs.
She has allowed the man to pack up his possessions while she
watches the people gathering just outside the gates of her
property. It's a large estate for a single person yet far below
what she can afford. She always expected to have children with the
man she married. Of course, this was her intention before meeting
the guy she ultimately wed, because he is no one to have kids
with.

“Where the devil is Farnsworth?” Randy storms
into the foyer.

“I sent everyone away,” she tells him
absently.

“Why didn’t you just tell me that over the
intercom? I’ve been yelling for fifteen minutes.”

“Power’s out… And it was funny.”

“Are they still out there?” he asks her,
heading to a different window to look for himself.

The mob of gawkers all turn to something on
the street that catches their collective attention. Slowly they
proceed like a swarm around Kelly’s neighbors. She’s never met the
family but has waved to them when coming or going. The opening of
their gate had prompted the movement, when they tried to leave
their home in a convertible but failed.

As far as Kelly knows, the people are of no
public interest, so the paparazzi shouldn’t be as fervent as this.
The journalists are getting more than snapshots and sound bites,
they are taking actual bites. Though her neighbors are strapped
into their seats by their safety belts, the mob tears at them and
fight each other over their flailing limbs. Kelly has to look
away.

“I can’t believe what I’m seeing,” Randy
says, unable to take his eyes off of the carnage. “Is someone
making a movie?”

Kelly is unable to talk. She feels sick to
her stomach and has to sit down. She feels bad for the family, and
wishes she had done more than just exchange courteous waves in
passing. And she wishes she could do something now to help them,
but she’s too scared.

Tires screech to a halt outside. Kelly is
curious but can’t bear the thought of looking out the window again.
“What is it?”

“It’s Wayne Gretzky.” Randy nicknames the man
based on the hockey mask he wears.

The aggressive journalists leave the
mutilated family to converge on the newcomer, who meets them
readily armed with a machete. The man fearlessly engages them,
hacking away at their necks and heads. He slaughters the lot in the
middle of the street, in broad daylight. Bodies and body parts lay
strewn on the asphalt, and when the last of them falls to his blade
he sets his eyes on the Peel residence.