Valley of Death & Zombies Page 21

  The sun had already cleared the rim of the valley and he felt time was moving much too fast. “Damn it Billy, where are you?” He whispered.

  He found a plastic baggie with cookie crumbs, an empty water bottle and was sure they belonged to the kid. After looking around for a few more minutes he spotted some tall grass that seemed to have been recently walked through heading north. He followed slowly as he limped with a bad knee and a leg wound from the meat fork in his upper thigh.

  Boris barked, and bounced a little to the right, trying to draw the snake away from the boy. The snake followed the movement and shook it's rattle faster. Billy couldn't remember if he'd pumped up the BB rifle, since the last time he'd fired it, and whispered a little prayer that he did as he lowered the rifle into firing position.

  He saw himself, in his mind's eye, wearing a cowboy hat with a neckerchief and a big Remington rifle before he tried to take aim. The snake slid away from the boy, staring only at the dog, as Billy aimed down the rifle barrel and tried to get a bead on the snake's small, quick, and erratically moving head.

  His eyes opened wide when he saw, beyond the snake, only a few hundred feet away, a big gray bus with the letters ICE written on the side slowly following a police car down the road into the valley. Billy focused on the snake and pulled the trigger yelling “Cavalry's here! Woo Hoo!”

  CHAPTER 13

  Without being able to immediately remember where he was, Jeremiah opened his eyes and was shocked to realize the previous evening had not been a nightmare. He had dozed off while sitting in a kitchen chair he had placed against the trailer door. Breathing through his mouth to avoid, as much as possible, the foul plethora of smells all around him he rubbed his eyes and secretly hoped Charlie had died while he had been asleep. I know it's not right to wish that Lord, but I can't help it. He's going to die anyway. No one can go through life in his condition. He's got to be in unimaginable pain- and all I can find to relieve it is some aspirin. He thought and prayed.

  He stood and felt like his legs had gone to sleep. Then felt rubbery and tingled at the same time. Walking unsteadily through the filthy living room he pointedly did not look at the faceless man and peeked out through the curtain. There was no sign of his friend Issac who had apparently become a homicidal monster several hours earlier. The wooden recliner was splattered with drying blood and bits or skin. There were dozens of rabbits eating from the ruined garden and drinking from the stream as sunlight filtered into the small clearing. If he hadn't witnessed, and been a part of, the mayhem himself he would have looked upon the view as almost enchanting.

  Of course, the two corpses in the stream did make it hard to see it as anything other than what is really was- a scene of bloody murderous violence and madness. Checking his watch he saw it was a little after six o'clock and was surprised to discover he felt hungry. The monkey hooted inquisitively curled up in a furry ball in Charlie's lap. It's eyes blinked up at him as he turned toward the kitchen.

  “Good morning Cheetah.” he said, walking past the bloody recliner. He didn't look at Charlie, as he went into the kitchen and tried to find something to eat.

  Her name is Cha-ka, you asshole. Charlie thought, as he tried to breath under the filthy towel that had been placed over his face. He had slept, or passed out, several times since the Bible thumping bastard had worked on him earlier. If I live through this I will find some way to kill him or at least see him dead, he thought. Then realizing his soul was on the line, he dismissed the idea with great reluctance. His face, or the remnants of it, felt like biting fire ants were crawling all over it. He wondered if they really were ants or if he was imagining it. Housekeeping had never been a priority for him and he couldn't remember the last time he'd sprayed the trailer for bugs. As the crawling biting sensations on his face continued he couldn't help remembering the trails of ants he'd seen in the kitchen yesterday and moaned softly. He tried to move his hand. There was no movement. Paralyzed be my own stupidity. Fuck.

  With Skynyrd’s fangs still deeply embedded on the sides of his head, he wondered if the crown of thorns felt as bad to Jesus as this felt and then wondered if just thinking that was sacrilegious. He heard the kid whistling in the kitchen, and tried to speak but a weak gurgle was all he could manage. Cha-ka hooted softly again from his lap. Her small simian fingers stroked and patted Charlie’s hand, but he couldn’t feel it.

  Several hours earlier Jeremiah had spent thirty agonizing minutes trying to find a way to remove the large python's severed head and mouth without doing even more damage to Charlie. The snake had unhinged it's jaw to swallow him but hadn’t managed to get past his forehead before being killed. The teeth were curved like fish hooks and dug deeper into Charlie’s head each time Jeremiah had pulled on it trying to remove it.

  He finally decided to let the paramedics do it, if he could get help for him. It was when he gave up on removing the snake's head that the monkey scared him more than anything else last night.

  Cha-ka had sat quietly on a shadowy bookcase, holding a ragged piece of Charlie's facial skin. She watched in silent fascination as the strange man tried to remove the snake's head. Cha-ka was a happy monkey since her old enemy Skynyrd the python was finally dead, yet equally heartbroken as she listened to her master grunting in pain in his recliner.

  When the stranger picked up a knife she feared he would hurt Charlie and flung herself from the bookcase onto his head scratching and screeching loudly.

  Jeremiah, having no idea what new monster was attacking him, screamed, dropped the knife and ran toward the bathroom. She had wrapped her small simian hands into his hair, pulling and screeching loudly, while he stumbled across the room bumped into the wall and finally made it to the bathroom.

  Charlie did something he thought he'd never be capable of doing again- he laughed and didn't even care that it sounded like a gurgling frog as he watched Cha-ka ride on the Bible thumping kid's head when he ran into the hall screaming.

  Looking in the filthy mirror, behind the sink, he saw a Capuchin monkey sitting on top of his head with two hands full of his hair. He lowered his hands and stopped shouting as they stared into each others eyes through the mirror. She held his hair, but had stopped pulling on it as they kept eye contact.

  “Hello. My name is Jeremiah.” He said, in a soft gentle voice, as his hand reached slowly into his pocket. He realized it was, most likely, a helper monkey like his uncle Andrew got to assist him with things around the house after his tragic accident.

  He had been on stage playing his harmonica, as part of a band, performing for a Children's Hospital fund raiser. When it was time for his solo he was doing great and the crowd loved it as he went close to the edge of the stage playing his heart out. Jeremiah later saw the video of the fall. With his eyes closed Andrew tripped on an extension cord and fell head first onto a group of kids who were absolutely no help in breaking his fall. The saddest part wasn't the accident itself. It was when some of the kids tried to help him up and in doing so, jostled his spine in such a way that he ended up permanently paralyzed.

  Hoping this monkey had a similar weakness for hard candy, as his uncle's monkey, Kong, he unwrapped a mint and slowly raised his hand up so it could see it. Cha-ka looked and sniffed at it, but didn't release his hair.

  “It's okay, you can have it, just leave me some of my hair.” he said, in the same soft tone of voice.

  Cha-ka grabbed the candy from his palm and held it with both of her small hands, as she continued to sit on his head. After sniffing it, her eyes widened and she took a bite. She held the mint with one hand and patted Jeremiah's hair back down from the unruly mess it was to a slightly less messy style with the other.

  “Are you going to be nice now? Your friend in there sure could use your help.” He said, lowering his hands to his sides.

  Cha-ka jumped onto the sink holding the mint, patted her chest and pointed back to the living room.

  “All right Cheetah, let’s go try to help him.” He said, walking out, as t
he monkey climbed onto his shoulder and continued to munch on the mint.

  Since their initial encounter the monkey and Jeremiah worked well together trying to help the faceless paralyzed man. He'd found some old letters, while looking for medicine in the kitchen cabinets, and discovered his name was Charlie Fitzpatrick Farro. He also knew he was going to die without serious medical attention and soon. His first aid experience was nowhere near as extensive as Issac’s had been, but he knew that it was a genuine miracle Charlie was alive at all.

  The flies had been his biggest concern earlier, as they kept crawling on the raw meat of Charlie's face. After soaking a towel in water he laid it gently over his bloody pulpy facial area, careful not to cover where his nose and mouth holes were so he wouldn't suffocate. Hoping the towel would deter the flies was only part of the reason for doing it though. He was ashamed to admit the pitiful man had been scaring the devil out of him while he tried to think what to do next.

  In the filthy kitchen he found and opened a can of corn. Jeremiah ate it cold, straight from the can, feeling he and Charlie were quickly running out of time. Staring at the plastic bottle of hydrogen peroxide as he chewed cold corn he felt uncertain what to do next. He picked up the bottle and read the faded label. Over the years he’d used hydrogen peroxide on various cuts and scrapes, but was unsure if using it on the Charlie's badly torn face was a good or bad idea. He was certain it would keep wounds from being infected with germs, but thought the pain might kill him.

  Opening the bottle of aspirin he laid five white pills on the counter and used an unopened can of corn to smash them into powder. After retrieving the plastic turkey baster he'd seen earlier, in a drawer, he scooped the powder into the empty tube and filled it with water. The monkey watched Jeremiah curiously, from on top of the Python's severed head stuck to the top of Charlie.

  “It's okay Cheetah. It's so Charlie will feel better that's all.” He said, and filled a plastic bucket with water and carried them both to the table beside the recliner. Taking a deep breath, he tried to remove the towel which had dried out since he placed it on his face earlier. It had become stuck to the drying blood on Charlie’s 'face' and required a little tugging to remove. The man gurgled loudly and his head twitched spasmodically as it was finally pulled off. Cha-ka hooted and looked confused.

  “It will be okay.” Jeremiah said softly, hoping he was telling the truth. The flies had found ways under the towel and were everywhere under it. He thought of Jesus dealing with lepers and looked at the man’s remaining eye. It looked dull and dry and he wondered how stupid he could have been. The man has no eyelid- of course it's dried out. He quickly splashed some water onto it from the plastic bucket and shooed away the flies.

  He held up the turkey baster filled with water and powdered aspirin, and said “Try to swallow these aspirins. I've got to do something that will probably sting a little, before I go for help.”

  The eye rolled and looked up at him as Charlie grunted.

  “I've got to go for help or you will die. Cheetah will be here to give you water using the turkey baster until help comes. Try and swallow the aspirin.” He said, and slipped the plastic tip into the hole where some of his teeth could still be seen as well as a twitching pink thing which he thought might be his tongue. He squeezed the rubber bulb of the baster and Charlie swallowed. Some leaked out, through the side of his face that was gone altogether, but he was certain most of it was swallowed.

  After getting the monkey to handle the baster, showing her how to draw water from the bucket and squirt it into Charlie's mouth several times, he felt it was almost time to go. He peeked through the window and saw several rabbits eating peacefully. If the crazy people were around he doubted they'd be that calm and turned back to the man in the recliner.

  “Mr. Farro, If you can understand me, please listen. I don't want to know the depth of your depravity.” he said, gesturing to the pornographic magazines scattered around the room. “I am commanded by God to hate the sin, but love the sinner. You make it extremely difficult to do so, but I will pray for you. And if something should happen to me, out there, just remember something brother Derek told me once at church. God writes straight with crooked lines. God Bless you Charlie, and you too Cheetah. I'll be as quick as I can, but there’s one last thing I have to do. It may sting a little but it should keep the flies off of your-” he coughed “face.”

  Charlie had been so happy to have something to drink he'd tuned out most of what the kid had been saying until he heard may sting a little. His vision was horrible. It was like trying to see through an ice cube so he couldn't identify what the kid was lifting up over his face.

  When the hydrogen peroxide splashed on his skinless face he gurgled loudly and shook his head violently, for several seconds, until he passed out from the pain.

  Unable to watch the Charlie’s 'face' foaming, Jeremiah petted the softly hooting monkey on top of her head and whispered “Take care of him Cheetah, I'll be back with help.” He checked outside again and everything looked serene enough. Locking the door behind him, he went out on the porch picking up his oak table leg club and hurried back the way he and Issac had come last night.

  Maria cried as she pawed through the dozens of photographs that had been in the old crate for decades. They were pictures of concentration and prison camp survivors, most showing emaciated people to the point of being little more than skeletons with skin stretched over their bodies. She cried as she pulled out the photos and tried not to look at the horrors of World War II hoping as she sifted through them there might be something useful in the old crate.

  As she was about to give up she felt a metal tube and slid aside the remaining photos revealing four round metal cylinders a few inches long and a little thicker than a can of soup, on the bottom of the crate. She managed after a few minutes to read the letters on one of them.

  The word was Stielhandgranate and all the little cans had a rough cord hanging out of the bottom. Maria wondered at the word that was stenciled on the little canisters, Are they food, medicine, a weapon? After pulling all the cans out and setting them on the floor she was prepared to look through another box. She almost missed a piece of paper rolled up and tied to one of the cords. Carefully unrolling the brittle yellowed paper she read the note.

  Dear Skunk Butt Remlap,

  Thought you might like a few noise makers for New Years or to help knock out any old tree stumps you may have. These are some of the potato masher grenades we found at that whorehouse in Remagen. The rest I used on General Douglas Steltmiers's Mercedes he was going to have shipped back to the states. I think the engine block probably landed on the moon. (Ha ha) Anyhoo, have fun and just remember these are five second delay grenades so be careful. And Happy New Year Stinky

  Bama Boy a.k.a. Chet Scarbrough

  Maria looked at the canisters, while a mischievous smile lit up her face. There was a metallic crash from below followed by a surprised grunt. Crawling to the hole, she had climbed through earlier, she yelled down in the garage until she saw three undead men snarling up at her.

  “Hey, you hungry? Want to wrap your lips around something yummy? Well, eat this!” She yelled pulling the string on one of the grenades, dropped it to the garage floor and crawled away from the hole as fast as she could, giggling.

  The zombie who used to be called Paco looked down at the metal thing and picked it up. The others continued grunting and leaping up trying to get in the crawlspace where they had just seen the girl.

  Maria reached the end of the crawlspace, as far away from the hole as she could go and waited. She continued to wait as she wondered if she'd read the note right. It's been almost thirty seconds, maybe they don't work anymore. she thought, reaching for another grenade. After pulling the cord she threw it toward the hole. It had just fallen through when a tremendous explosion shook the attic crawlspace and filled the air with plumes of smoke, dust, and screaming from below.

  Her smile disappeared as the floor beneath her shifted and
shook for a several seconds. When it seemed to be holding steady again, she crawled for the exit. She was almost there when the second grenade exploded. The floor tilted violently, crates fell, and she screamed as the garage collapsed in on itself and darkness took her.

  Colonel Lester was reclining in the bathtub, wearing his boxer shorts which had the words World's Sexiest Grandpa printed on the backside. His wife Barbara had given them to him as a Christmas presents years ago. His face was still bright red, from embarrassment, because Phyllis Remlap had helped him into the bath after Josey left. He stared at his wrinkled toes and couldn’t think of anything but his grandson. He’s not dead. He’s a tough kid. Josey will find him. Oh God, please let him be okay.

  Phyllis tapped on the door and came in, every few minutes, to make sure he was okay and on her third visit he finally said “Damn it Phyllis, either stay in or out. I'm feeling much better but your coming in and out is getting more than a little annoying.” It was true, his complexion had lost the grayish pallor it had when he first discovered Billy was gone.

  She walked in and looked at the window. “Would you like to talk?” she asked, closing the toilet seat lid and sitting down.

  “I'd like that. I just wish I could go out there and find that boy myself. If anything happens to him I'll just die, I know it.” He said, staring blankly at the shampoo bottles along the edge of the tub.

  “I know you're worried Bill. But aside from looking like a fashion model from Hell that Josey looks like the kind of young man that can get things done. Including finding that grandson of yours.” She looked out the bathroom window and muttered something more.