Authors: Richard Johnson
“I was kinda
wantin’ to go fishing, but your idea’s probably better. Let’s go with that.”
“Punch it
then,” Marquell said and took another drink. Then he tipped forward and snored
loudly as he fell asleep in an instant, spilling his beer.
Russ leaned
over and grabbed the can, nearly driving off the road before finishing it
himself. “Party foul, alcohol abuse.”
Food poisoning.
It’s a pretty common occurrence in most apocalyptic scenarios, whether it be in
the aftermath of a meteor strike, financial ruin, sex-bot uprising or, in this
case, a dreaded zombie and military invasion combo. Food poisoning is also just
as likely to kill you as anything else in the heretofore-mentioned catastrophe.
Charlie was
finding this out the hard way as he struggled to keep pace while becoming more
dehydrated by the minute. Sam had told him not to eat apples off the ground,
but Rob had convinced him otherwise. Of course, the big guy seemed just fine
while Charlie wanted to die. “Man, I need some water. And thank God we brought
toilet paper,” he said while holding his stomach.
“Eat one of
those spiky plants over there, it’s what they call a succulent and should
quench your thirst,” Smokey replied, once again trying to prove how in touch
with nature he was.
“Succulent?
Wasn’t that your nickname in high school?”
Charlie’s
eyes flashed daggers at him. “Shut it, Left-Nut.” His head was pounding and he
was in no mood for Left-Nut’s mouth. He went over and began to chew on the aloe
vera-looking plant. It was bitter and slimy, but it would do until they found a
stream. “And we have to ration our water better next time,” Charlie said while
choking the plant down. “We went through our supply way too fast. Rob, I’m
looking mostly in your direction.”
“No fair. I’m
a big boy, I gotta drink a lot.”
“At least on
this old country road we’re making some good time now,” Smokey said. “With the
Koreans scouting ahead we’re bound to find water soon.” Following the gravel
road west from the Maniac house had been a solid decision so far, and they had
covered more ground in the past few hours than the rest of the day combined. At
this rate, so long as no Chinese patrols were in the area, they would reach
Cantonville in several days. If Charlie could stop pooping every five minutes.
Pong, the
younger of the Koreans, came walking back towards the group in an excited
state. After Left-Nut bungled the translation horribly, Pong was able to
convince everyone to hurry their pace by using hand gestures and high-pitched
noises.
Soon the road
took them around a bend in the forest where they caught up with Ping, now doing
recon while hiding in some bushes. Ahead they saw a large compound surrounded
by recreational vehicles with a fading billboard out front.
Sam read the
sign aloud: “Crazy Pat’s R.V. World. Prices so low, they’re crazy.”
Ping crawled
out from his spot and held up two fingers, then made a walking motion with
them.
Charlie was
still not thinking clearly because of his condition, and was starting to get
reckless. “Okay, so there’s just two people here. I think. We might as well
introduce ourselves with the numbers we have. We need water, better directions,
and if we could get one of those R.V.s… well, that would be tits.”
“Not good
idea,” Vlad said. “No element of surprise.”
“I don’t give
a shit,” Charlie said. He pointed to the Koreans. “They still have some bullets
left and can keep us covered.”
“Not coming
with to get shot. Good luck,” Vlad said and found a nice spot in the shade.
“How you say, amateur hour?”
Charlie
shrugged. “Katya and Sam, stay in the back and everybody fan out. Don’t provoke
these guys, but don’t take any shit either. They have more than enough to share
the wealth.”
Ready for
bear, they marched through a small gap in the cyclone barbed wire, then spread
out with Charlie in the lead as he walked towards a run-down trailer. A man and
a woman sat outside on a wooden deck, enjoying the mild weather with some iced
tea and carrot cake.
“Hello
there,” Charlie said as he approached with his arms up in a gesture of peace.
“Lovely day we’re having,” he added while his stomach gurgled and took a turn
for the worse. Charlie stopped walking and gritted his teeth momentarily until
the pain passed. It did, but he was liable to shit his pants at any moment, and
that would do little to help him negotiate.
“Sure is. But
I bet you’re not here to pontificate about the weather though, now are you?”
The mobile home salesman was in his mid-fifties with a silver comb-over and a
beer belly. He was sharp, straight to the point, and keen on making a sale.
Which was not going to happen that day.
“No, sir,”
Charlie said. “Not exactly.”
“I take it
you’re here to shop for mobile homes then? That’s good. That’s real good,
because I’ve got a lot of top-end models here at rock-bottom prices. They don’t
call me Crazy—”
“How rock
bottom are we talking?” Charlie asked and grimaced as the knot in his gut
twisted again.
Crazy Pat’s
demeanor went south in a hurry as he looked to his female companion. “Hell, I
think we got some more freeloaders here.” He looked back to Charlie as the
others in the group slowly drew closer. “I’ll make this nice and simple. If you
got fifty thousand dollars cash money, we can do business. Can’t let you take
one of my babies off the lot for less than that. As you can guess, these aren’t
exactly being produced anymore.”
“That’s
horse—”
“It is the
supreme law of the business jungle, supply and demand,” Pat said, rather
pleased with himself. “You have to pay to play my friend.”
Charlie
looked closer at the man’s wheelchair-bound companion, and it became apparent
that the term “crazy” on the sign was a rare bit of truth in advertising. The
woman was covered in makeup, flawlessly gorgeous, and entirely made of
synthetic materials. She was a high-priced sex doll.
Of course,
Left-Nut noticed this as well and came up right next to Charlie in a hurry.
“Hot damn, you got yourself the Maserati of bang dolls right there. Is that an
x-class or are my eyes deceiving me?”
Crazy Pat was
plainly agitated. “Now you watch your smart mouth. Cassandra is a classy lady,
and I won’t have you disparaging her.”
“Shut it,”
Charlie said to Left-Nut and then addressed Pat once more. “Look, while we
chat, is there any fresh water we could fill up with? We haven’t come across
any in a while and we’re awful thirsty. We do have women and children with us.”
His stomach gurgled so loudly that Pat could hear it all the way on the porch.
“No freebies
around here. There’s a lake about two miles down the road.” He looked to the
doll. “What’s that, sweetheart?” Then he nodded at Left-Nut. “She doesn’t like
the way Whitey there’s looking at her. So I’m gonna ask you to kindly leave.
Unless we can do some business after all?”
For whatever
reason Left-Nut was feeling bold, and took a step towards the salesman. “How
about we just take one of those shiny new R.V.s with us?” Licking his lips,
Left-Nut didn’t take his eyes off the doll as he continued, “Even better, why
don’t I take little Cassandra there on a trip to pound town?” He winked at the
doll. “What do you think about that, classy lady? Up for a ride on the baloney
pony?” It might have been the first time a doll had been threatened during the
commission of an attempted armed robbery. Thankfully, those types of statistics
were no longer kept in post-governmental America.
Pat calmly
whispered something to his pseudo-girlfriend, raised a pistol he had concealed
behind his table, and cocked the hammer back. “Make a move and Powder there
dies first. Feeling froggy?”
Charlie was
about to intervene in the tense standoff, but then shut his mouth as a light
bulb went off. Could this be it? The moment Left-Nut had finally mouthed off to
the wrong person? The moment he would die a painful death because of said mouth
running? Charlie held his breath – and his stomach – and hoped so.
Cautiously,
Vladimir opened the front door of the mobile home from inside and emerged
directly behind Crazy Pat. He held his knife to the man’s throat. “Negotiations
have taken turn in our favor, yes?”
But Pat
played it cool. “Not from my perspective. You could kill me, but that won’t get
you want you want. No, nothing but fifty thousand dollars will do that.” He
whispered again to his doll, “Close your eyes honey, I don’t want you to see
this.”
Vlad laughed.
“I guess we find out.”
“You see,
first you’ll have to find the keys that I’ve buried in the forest. Then you’ll
have to find one of the batteries hidden in a different spot. After that,
you’ll need to travel twenty miles to town just to haul some fuel back.”
Vlad removed
the knife from the man’s throat and Crazy Pat nodded. “Glad you came to your…
hey what are you doing?” Vlad had stepped away from Pat only to put the knife
against the doll’s supple neck instead.
“Negotiations
open once more,” Vlad said dryly.
Once calm and
collected, Crazy Pat was now about to crack. The love of his life, albeit a
weird and non-reciprocating one, faced certain decapitation and possibly worse
if Left-Nut had his way.
Charlie
watched and waited, ready to give the signal for his Korean allies to shoot. If
it happened to come after a certain somebody got gunned down, well, all the
better. But Katya ruined his plan in an instant, stepping in front of Left-Nut
and entering the line of fire. “This is getting out of control and we are
better than this. No one has to get hurt.”
Vlad tilted
his head in confusion and pulled the knife away slightly. They were close to
obtaining desperately needed transportation, by hook or crook, and the nun was
about to ruin it. He put the knife back. “She doesn’t speak for me. Keys,
battery, gas. Where are they?”
Charlie shook
off his selfish haze and came to his senses. “She’s right, Vlad. We are better
than this. Put the knife down and we’ll be on our way.”
Vlad’s arm
trembled in anger for a few long moments and then he backed away in disgust.
The disturbing and ridiculous confrontation was over. After a few choice
parting words, the gang retreated from the compound and went on their way down
the gravel road while battling sore feet, fatigue, thirst and anger.
Nobody spoke
for a few minutes until Smokey broke the ice. “That guy needs a checkup from
the neck up. Crazy douche.”
“I’d like to
take a crack at his girlfriend though,” Left-Nut said and looked off into
space, undoubtedly forming some sort of lurid fantasy in his depraved mind.
“She was a cutie. Nice boobs. Firm pooper.”
“Would you
stop talking about that damned blow-up doll?” Smokey said.
“It’s not a
blow-up doll, it’s a finely handcrafted work of art. That you put your dick
in.”
Charlie
halted in his tracks. “You know, Left-Nut and Vlad, we better get on the same
page about…” he stopped midsentence, closing his eyes. “And I just shit my
pants.”
*
*
*
The lake was
right where the crazy bastard had said it would be and the group reached it
within an hour. But the water didn’t look anywhere near potable. It was covered
with moss and algae and had a definite green tint to it.
“Lots of
critters in that soup,” Rob said. “I wouldn’t drink it.”
“No problem.
We just start a small fire and boil it first,” Sam said, eager to add his Boy
Scout skills to the mix. “Katya, can we use your pot?”
“Yes,” she
answered clearly. It was amazing how quickly her voice was coming back,
literally and figuratively.
As they
neared the water’s edge, Vlad and Smokey went to investigate an abandoned van
parked nearby. From their reactions they had found something of note.
“Gross as it
is, I gotta get cleaned up,” Charlie said and headed for the water. “Katya, if
you could get that going, I’d appreciate it.”
“Of course,”
she said and took the kindling Sam had gathered. Soon she had a small fire
roaring and was eager to bring the discolored water to a boil. Like Sam,
proving her usefulness was a high priority.
Smokey and
Vlad joined the others by the lake to show off their discovery while Sam jumped
into the murky water and swam out, like any boy his age would do in a similar
circumstance.
Charlie was
enjoying his swim as well. The thick water was warm and actually very soothing
on his many bumps and bruises. After walking a while in soiled underwear, the
value of getting clean could not be overstated.
Smokey held
out his hand. “Check it. Somebody’s picnic got interrupted and they left a few
joints and sandwiches behind.”
“And vodka,”
Vlad added happily before tipping a clear bottle back.
“The
sandwiches were trash, of course, but these bad boys look just fine.” Smokey
lit one up and took the first toke, hard. As in, almost the whole thing.
Left-Nut
grabbed it next and took a much smaller hit, coughing loudly. He turned to one
of the Koreans standing guard nearby. “Hey, Donger, you want a hit?”
Smokey
frowned. “You mean Pong?”
“That’s not
his real name either,” Left-Nut said.
Rob took the
joint without asking and finished it off with relish. Then he turned
philosophical. “I’m enjoying this for sure, but I do wonder what happened to
whoever left it behind. I mean, did they get eaten by zombies or the slime
monster from
Creepshow Two
?” He shivered while pointing to the water
that Charlie and Sam were swimming in. “That movie gave me nightmares for
months. No way I’d go in that nastiness.”
“Feels pretty
good to me,” Charlie said. “A little slimy, but overall not bad.”
Vlad set the
cheap handle of vodka down. “Enjoying your soak, eh? Would be better to be
driving to destination.”
“Just drop
it,” Charlie said.
But he
wouldn’t drop it. “Should have killed that man and taken recreational
vehicle. Could have been to base in less than one hour.”