Hey, Horror Freaks! Here's a brief excerpt from my forthcoming zombie novel,
DEATHBREED:
Harry, the Cascade Cab dispatcher, seemed intent on eating himself to death behind his cheap wooden desk. He kept his .38 wrapped in one meaty paw while the other dipped his French roll in a steaming tub of
au jus. He wasn't taking any chances, not with the things he'd heard. Weird shit was going down all over the country: Reports of plague, mass-murder and cannibalism. Some kind of new mystery virus... Riots, looting, cities burning. Martial law wasn't far behind. The President was supposed to give a speech tonight; he was always giving a speech and the more he talked, the less he said. It was no wonder people were freaking out.
As for me--Hell!--I figured it was all bullshit: media scare tactics, propaganda, the politics of fear and oppression. Whatever. There was always some new threat on the horizon. Most of 'em weren't worth worrying about. Even if they were, what the fuck did I care? I worked at a convenience store. My life was hell; how could it get any worse? This is what I thought, anyway, as I sorted through the stack of magazines. It wasn't much of a selection and I said so. "This all you got?"
Harry shrugged around a mouthful of roast beef. Apparently, the topic didn't interest him.
Goddamn fat bastard; the only thing I bet interested him was where his next meal was coming from. Look at him sitting there in his loud Hawaiian shirt, so fat he can't even get outta that chair...
I'd walked down here after my shift ended at the Lucky Mart because something was wrong with the buses. Naturally, there hadn't been any cabs, either. That's just how my luck works. Harry claimed he was short-handed; there was some kinda bug goin' around, but some guys hadn't even bothered to call in sick. He'd just sent his only driver out to drop somebody off across town; as soon as the guy called in, I was next in line. Meanwhile, I had nothing to do except watch Harry stuff his face and read crummy magazines. The cover stories were all bullshit: celebrity nosejobs, mafia trials and our dependence on foreign oil. I flipped through 'em until I saw a recent
National Report that caught my eye. The cover here had the cops arresting a black motorist: a grainy image of angry white men clubbing another poor bastard to death with nightsticks. The familiar caption (in big red letters) proclaimed:
CAN’T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG?
I had to laugh.
Harry raised one bushy Neanderthal brow at me and said, “What’s so fuckin’ funny?”
I held up the magazine cover.
He snorted as if it was the dumbest thing he’d ever seen. “The day we all get along is the day the world fucking ends!”
Harry scratched one of his tremendous man-boobs thoughtfully through his shirt. He leaned back in his creaky leather chair and said, “Look, kid. We’re the only animal what can’t get along with a goddamn thing on this crummy planet. You know what I mean?”
I nodded politely. Everyone loves a captive audience.
Harry kept right on talking. “Hell’s bells! If we ain’t killin’ each other over a dollar or a dame, we’re killin’ each other over race, politics, religion... An’ then, whenever we catch a break from killin’ each other, we start killin’ every other last goddamn thing in sight! Forests, animals, fish, whatever… Man’s an insatiable animal, kid. Our bellies are never full; we’re always hungry.”
With that, he seemed to run out of words. He picked his sandwich back up and tore off a chunk with his teeth. Whether or not this was supposed to emphasize his last point, I’ll never know. He kept staring at me, like he expected some kind of response. I had to admit, Harry had a point. I was about to tell him so when his radio crackled to life:
“—they’re all around the cab, trying to break in! Help! Call the cops!”Harry dropped his sandwich and clicked the mic. “Who the fuck is this? Where’s my driver?”
“—dead! They got him, dragged him out the front seat! I don’t know what to—”
“Whaddya mean, he’s dead? Who is this? What're you doin’ in my cab?”
“—help! You gotta send somebody fast! The driver had the keys. I’m trapped!”
“What are you, drunk? Get the fuck out—”
“—locked the doors. Oh, God! They’re eating him! They’re ripping off his—”“Now you listen to me, you motherfucker, if this is some kind of stupid goddamn prank, I’ll make you—”
The cab company window shattered. A pair of bloody arms covered in broken glass thrust themselves through the blinds and clawed at Harry’s face. The wind blew the stench of rotting flesh inside the tiny, one-room office.
The radio crackled with incoherent cursing and shrieks from whoever was trapped inside the cab:
“—One of them’s got a rock! He’s using it to smash through the glass! Somebody help—”
Harry moved remarkably fast for a man I’d never seen stand up before; I guess he pushed off hard with his stumpy legs because his chair wheeled backwards like a rocket against the far wall. The hands continued to flail through the broken blinds, trying to grab hold of prey that was no longer there. A low, frustrated moan came from whoever the attacker was. It was then that I noticed a curious thing: the attacker’s arms, while badly cut by broken glass, were not bleeding! The blood on its arms was dry, probably at least an hour old, because it had turned that rusty-brown color blood does.
Harry recovered his wits enough to swear up a blue streak that would have put a sailor to shame. He shot his .38 three times through the window. The blinds obscured his aim, but I heard at least one of the bullets smack wetly into its target. The hands suddenly withdrew. The moaning continued unabated.
I could hear the soft, slow
shuffle-crunch, shuffle-crunch of dragging feet on broken glass coming closer to the front door. It had a large glass panel in it with the cab company’s name and phone number stenciled in white. Harry was trying to tell me something but it came out garbled; I couldn't understand him. Nothing was making sense anymore. I tried to get to my feet.
Shuffle-crunch, shuffle-crunch…“Lock the fucking door!” Harry screamed at me, clutching at his ruined cheek with his free hand. Blood poured freely from between sweaty, fat fingers. He still hadn’t gotten up from his chair (I wasn’t even sure that he could) but he had swiveled around enough so that his gun was covering the front door.
Shuffle-crunch, shuffle-crunch…“Move it, asshole!”
I leapt up and sprinted to the door, fumbling with the lock. I had just barely got it clicked into the “locked” position when the attacker revealed himself for the absurd horror he was: a little old man wearing a French beret. His skin had a sickly, grayish pallor. Blue and purple veins stood out in stark contrast against the leathery flesh. His clothes were badly torn, as if a pack of wild dogs had been at him. As his head twitched to and fro, a hole in his neck bent and widened. I guessed that was where Harry had shot him a few moments before. He was covered in dried blood from head to toe and his arms and hands were dusted with tiny shards of broken glass. No blood seeped out from where the glass (or Harry’s bullet) had clearly penetrated the skin. His hands and mouth were plastered up against the door, leaving greasy, rust-colored smears on its surface. The maniac’s toothless, slobbering mouth worked spasmodically, trying to bite me through the glass. All this was terrible enough, but the eyes were the worst: gruesome, milky-white orbs, as if they’d dried up inside. Cataracts, maybe…
I suddenly recognized him from the Lucky Mart the other day; he’d bought some cigars and complained about our prices.
There! The cigars were still in his shirt pocket. His dentures must have fallen out; I distinctly remembered him as having teeth the last time I saw him. It was worse now, knowing him. This was someone I'd seen everyday.
Before the plague hit.I jumped away from the old man's awful presence. His eyes rolled clumsily in their sockets, trying to track my movement. I flipped him the finger and instantly regretted it. I couldn't be sure whether it was the significance of the gesture or simply the movement that set him off. If he'd had trouble seeing me when I'd moved away from the door, he didn't seem to be having any now.
He knew where we were and he wanted in! The old man made a strangled, guttural war-cry from deep in his throat, ending as a gurgling hiss. He began pounding his fists against the door; first slowly, then with increased vigor. It didn't take him long to build up a rhythm. Glass that cheap wouldn’t last long; with each hammer-blow of his fists, the pane rattled and shook.
Harry told me to get the fuck out of the way… It took me several confused seconds to realize I was blocking his line of sight as he kept shouting obscenities at me. I sidestepped out of the field of fire and looked wildly around the room. There had to be an exit or we were dead! Only one avenue of escape presented itself: a door marked “restroom.” I took several steps back and pressed myself against it. My hand reached for the knob…
I’m not sure exactly what happened next. Either the old man broke through the door, or Harry lost his cool and started shooting. Maybe both happened at the same time. For me, everything became a blur of motion, dark and terrible:
The glass door shattered.
Harry started shooting.
The old man stumbled through the opening, moaning and gnashing his teeth. Bullets whizzed out the door, or hit the wall, or hit the old man. I wasn't sure how many went where; there were too many to count. The creep’s body jerked with each shot. While the bullets did slow him down for a second or two each, this only seemed to make him madder and more determined to get at Harry. It was as if the crazy bastard couldn't feel any pain, only the inconvenience and backward force of the impact… It didn't make any sense; the guy should be dead!
As if to punctuate my point, Harry's gun clicked on empty.
I whispered, “Oh, shit!” (or something to that effect).
The shuffling horror checked his dogged advance--right after I whispered whatever it was I said. He cocked his head and stared… not so much at me, as through me. A ropey, brown strand of saliva drooled out from between his cracked lips. What the hell was he waiting for?
Harry started calling the old man every name in the book. Or maybe he was yelling at me. I wasn’t paying attention.
Whoever (or whatever) was on the other end of the radio started clicking the “send” button. All that came over the line was alternating sounds of static and low moans. I guessed whoever had called for help was dead.
I held my breath and tried to become invisible; the creep was standing right in front of me, head cocked like he was having trouble deciding which one of us to attack first. Perhaps the sound of the radio confused him; his milky-white eyes regarded me stupidly, unblinking and evil.
Harry cursed, wheeling back to his desk; he opened a drawer, pulling out an ammo box. The madman's bluish lips peeled back, revealing raw, toothless gums. He hissed softly and wheeled back in Harry’s direction. I thought how ridiculous the old man looked in his fancy beret and suppressed a mad giggle...
Harry started reloading his gun. First one bullet, then another. He only made it to two before he ran out of time.
As if a lunatic had suddenly twisted a key in his back and wound him up, the horrible old man lurched forward: arms outstretched, hands curled into claws, every part of him questing for Harry’s death. Perhaps he was drawn by the sound or activity coming from that corner of the room (I doubted if I’d been able to turn myself invisible).
Harry shot once: the bullet came out the madman’s upper back and impacted the wall next to my head. The old man’s left shoulder twitched, but otherwise gave no indication he’d been hit at all. He started moaning, louder now with each awkward step.
I instinctively ducked (in case more bullets were coming).
Harry’s second shot took the bastard square in the chest.
Dead center! It had no effect, but at least it didn’t come flying out the back like the first one did.
I briefly considered jumping on the maniac’s back to buy Harry more time to reload, but a second creep appeared in the door. He was a large black dude with a funny, square-shaped head; half his face was burned off and he was missing several teeth. One of his eyes ran down his cheek like tears of melted wax. The stench was almost as unbearable as the noises he made. Worse, I thought I could hear more moans rising in unison with him from down the street!
The old man reached Harry and grabbed ahold of his head. Harry let out a high-pitched, little girl scream and wet his pants as his face peeled off...
DEATHBREED Excerpt Copyright 2006 Todd Tjersland. All Rights Reserved.Read
Excerpt #2
**********Well, what did you think? Pretty scary, huh? Feel free to post comments.
I intend to put up more excerpts (possibly the first several chapters free) as the book draws closer to completion. As of this post, I'm just past the halfway mark on the first draft (46,500 words and counting). Stay tuned!
Webster's Online Dictionary
THE ICE HARVEST
