Zombies! Episode 1 - Shawn of the Dead
Copyright 2010 by Ivan Turner
***
SHAWN was already packed and ready when the bell rang. Then he was out the door and heading for the staircase without looking back. It wasn't as if he didn't like Mr. Arrick or his class. There was something about classic literature that actually appealed to him. And learning it from a Scottish guy seemed to make it more real. But the school day was long and he had to be home before five o'clock, which gave him very little time to spend with Marcus.
Shawn thundered down the stairs before most of the other classrooms had spilled their occupants out into the hallways. That was the way he thought about it, the time of passing between classes. After eating so many students, the classrooms finally got sick and puked up the contents of their stomachs. That meant that everyone in the school, Shawn included, was just some disgusting vomitous chunk.
He needed to spend less time coming up with metaphors and more time thinking about Marcus.
At twenty three, Marcus was six years older than Shawn. That didn't really bother Shawn. He could do as he pleased. He wasn't sure how it would sit with his parents, though. Of course, the fact that he was dating a man would probably overshadow the age difference in their eyes. His mom would be okay with it, he knew. She was pretty open minded, having been taught the lessons of hatred as a child. But his dad would blow a gasket. My son?! A queer?!
Yeah, that wouldn't be so good.
On the Brooklyn streets at last, Shawn set a quick pace for the subway. It wouldn't do for him to be seen by his friends, some of which may have skipped their last class and waited. As it was, they would wonder what happened to him. If they caught up to him, he'd never be able to get away. A simple lie could go horribly wrong and he definitely couldn't tell them the truth. He had an image to maintain. One that kept him healthy.
Once out of sight of the school, he began to feel better. The train station was about six blocks away but it only took two blocks to clear the area of delis and pizza and Chinese places that the rest of the kids frequented. He was a regular at the pizza place and waved to the guy behind the counter as he passed. Shawn wondered if the guy owned the place. He wondered if his hopes fell when Shawn walked by without stopping in for a slice. Just how important was that two dollars and twenty five cents?
Three blocks from the school and three blocks from the train station and Shawn quickened his pace again. It was hot out, especially for a September day, but he'd be able to cool off in the air conditioned subway car. Of course, until then, he would boil in the sweltering station. He always missed the train by seconds. Granted, he only had to wait about three or four minutes for the next one, but that didn't do anything to dull the frustration he felt when he'd hit stairs and hear, Stand clear of the closing doors, please from the platform below.
Four blocks from the school and two blocks from the train station and he saw the zombie.
The sidewalk wasn't that busy but there was always traffic moving through the streets. As soon as the zombie came into view, Shawn was focused on it. Everything else faded. Even thoughts of Marcus slipped away. The zombie came shuffling around the corner, close to the wall. There was still almost a full block between them. Shawn couldn't see its face and couldn't smell its odor and yet he knew, he just knew what he was looking at.
The zombie had been a man, a white guy. Its hair was black or at least dark brown. Even at this distance, Shawn could see that its pallor had gone from the normal peach tone to a ghoulish sort of grey. The arms hung at the sides, moving only with the jerky momentum of the body rather than the careful rhythm of a human being. It wore a coat. It had to be close to eighty five degrees, sunny as it could get, but the thing wore a long rain coat. Shawn couldn't get a good look at the clothing beneath but he was pretty sure it was wearing sweatpants and a tee shirt.
What struck him the most about it was that there was no blood. Kind of like the guy at the beginning of Night of the Living Dead. You know, in the cemetery? He could have been a person if it weren't for the complexion and the way he walked, the way he just bounced off the wall. Though there was a bit of dried blood around his nose, there were no wounds. This thing had yet to kill and it hadn't been killed by another zombie. That meant it was the first. Shawn knew it was the first.
Every few steps, someone would come into Shawn's range of focus, close to the zombie but not close enough for it to take notice. They seemed to wrinkle their noses and give it a wide berth but gave it no further consideration. This, if nothing else, jarred Shawn out of his reverie.
Doesn't anyone realize what that thing is?
A block and half from the train station and his ticket to Marcus, Shawn stopped. On his left was a stone building with glass doors and no windows. On his right was a giant pile of trash including bags and furniture and paper and various articles of mayhem. Beyond that the traffic. And ahead of him was the zombie.
And the woman.
Shawn saw her even before he gave thought to how he was going work out his passing of the zombie himself. The woman was also a white woman, somewhere in her upper forties, dressed for the office, and totally engrossed in the small screen of her smart phone. She was also oblivious of the impending danger. Smart phone. Stupid woman.
By the time she got close enough that she could no longer ignore the smell she was already too close. The zombie caught her scent and pounced. It grabbed the arm with the smart phone and, with the strength of the truly famished, pulled it right to its rotten teeth.
The zombie bit down hard.
The woman screamed.
She did not drop the smart phone.
Shawn's bag was off his shoulders in an instant and he reached out for a length of pipe sticking from the pile of garbage. It came free, one jagged end jutting away from the boy. Rushing forward, he used his momentum to drive the pipe into the gut of the zombie.
Shawn had never hurt anyone before. Well, that wasn't entirely true. He'd grown up in a culture of fist fights but had somehow managed to avoid anything that included knives, broken bottles, and most especially guns. The feeling of the pipe entering the body was weird. He'd expected a sucking feeling, like the blood and tissue gripping the pipe, but that didn't occur. Instead, it felt like stabbing a pillow filled with rotten lettuce. The dead tissue inside the zombie didn't react to the intrusion of the pipe the way live tissue would. The dead tissue hardly reacted at all.
Because of Shawn's running start, the zombie was knocked away from the woman. It took with it a chunk of her arm but left behind the pipe. There was gore dripping off of the end of it but Shawn didn't take the time to notice. Adjusting his grip, he stepped forward and swung it down like a billy club just as the zombie was raising its head in recovery. Forged metal met hair and flesh and bone, all dead and desiccated, now destroyed. The zombie went down like a paper doll, its skull caved in and its undeath at an end.
Still holding the dripping pipe, Shawn turned to the victim. She was bleeding badly, the smart phone gripped tightly in her bloodless hand. She was mumbling something about 911 when he came to his decision. Saying a silent and righteous prayer, he brought the pipe to bear once again.
***
STEMMY let Anthony drive. It was one of the reasons they were a good fit as partners. Anthony liked to drive and Stemmy didn't. Anthony would sit in the driver's seat, the window open in the most frigid weather, a lit cigarette in his left hand. He always used the driving time to smoke. He didn't like to smoke in front of the perps and he didn't like to smoke in front of the victims. But he always smoked in the car.
Their partnership, thou
gh, was founded on more than just the driving. As detectives, each of the two of them possessed different skills. Stemmy was extremely intelligent with tremendous powers of observation. He'd notice if a button had come undone or a speck of dust had landed on your tie. Anthony was the charming one. He was tall and handsome with a shaved head and a meticulously groomed goatee. He somehow never smelled of cigarette smoke despite constant abuse of the habit. Stemmy was shorter, fatter, and dumpier. He was good in a fight. Despite the fact that his body type precluded any sort of muscular definition, his arms were solid as rocks and if those fists flew someone was getting hurt.
Stemmy was getting on in years. He was forty nine and had been a policeman for twenty seven years. He'd joined the force after graduating college with a degree in psychology that he felt was pretty useless at the time. Sure he could have become a therapist, helped people face down their problems, but that sounded pretty boring. The last thing he wanted to do was sit hour after hour and listen to someone bitch and moan. God had punished him for that attitude. In His mystical wisdom He had seen fit to grant Stemmy and his wife four daughters. Now it wasn't that Stemmy didn't love his daughters. Each one of them was a priceless pearl. And his wife was a gem, a tireless policeman's wife who always greeted him with a smile and waited until he had shrugged off the rigors of the day before presenting to him the problems of the household. But living with five women would make any man crazy. After all, not a one of them made a bit of sense.
Stemmy's given name was Johan. His mother had been from the Dominican Republic, a strong Spanish woman with fierce values. She had raised him with two hands, one firm and one tender. His father, Arthur Stemmy, was from somewhere in Europe. He had an accent that even Stemmy himself couldn't identify. When his mother had passed, poor old Arthur had lost a true step. He was a shadow of himself these days.
Anthony took one last long drag on the cigarette and flicked the butt out the window. That meant that they were almost there. He coughed once betraying the inner turmoil in his gut. He'd been to the doctor, Stemmy knew, but wouldn't say any more about it. A smoker like that just screams cancer, though. It had Stemmy worried. The last thing he wanted was for Anthony to have to go through that misery.
They pulled up next to a curb littered with garbage. Four patrol cars and a forensics van were already on the scene. He took in the scene as quickly as he could. The place was cordoned off with police tape. Both automobile and foot traffic were being diverted away from the area. With two black body bags laying on the sidewalk amidst a variety of stains, they didn't need spectators. The suspect sat in the back of one of the patrol cars. His hands were cuffed to the bar but he didn't struggle with them. He just leaned back, relaxing as if everything was proper. He was just a kid.
"Detectives!" one of the officers shouted as she ran over. Stemmy didn't know her and he didn't think Anthony did either. But a lack of familiarity couldn't stop Anthony from putting on the charm. He went and spoke to her quickly, as if they were equals, as if they were best friends. When he was done, he came back over to where Stemmy was standing, observing the scene.
There were statements from four eye witnesses. One of the victims was male and the other female. According to all four accounts, the male victim had attacked the female victim and the suspect had intervened, braining the male. Then he'd abruptly turned and finished off the female victim.
The two detectives went over to the patrol car where the youth was sitting calmly. Anthony summoned the same officer he'd spoken to before.
"What's his name?"
"Shawn Rudd. He's seventeen years old."
"Has he been read his rights?"
She nodded.
Anthony turned back to the squad car and addressed the suspect. "Shawn, my name is Detective Heron and this is Detective Stemmy…"
"What kind of a name is Stemmy?"
Anthony suppressed a chuckle. "Not really sure. You know that you don't have to talk to us if you don't want to."
Shawn shrugged. "I'll talk to you. I didn't do nothin' wrong."
"Four eye witnesses say you killed two people with a metal pipe. That sounds pretty wrong to me." That was the bit Stemmy couldn't do. He would never have been able to leave the venom out of his voice the way Anthony did. Anthony’s tone of voice was fluid, almost sweet. He made it a joke that they shared. But if Stemmy had said it, this Shawn Rudd punk would be able to read just how disgusted he was.
"That guy was already dead when I hit him."
"Was he already dead when he attacked the woman?"
Shawn smiled then. It wasn't a grin, neither sheepish nor cunning. It was a wide and genuine smile showing two rows of healthy white teeth.
"Why the woman, then?" Stemmy asked. He couldn't help himself.
Shawn looked up at the older detective. Stemmy could see that he looked at the two cops differently.
"She was bit. 'S only a matter of time after that."
Stemmy looked at Anthony and they walked away. This interview was finished.
"What do you think?" Anthony said, rubbing his beard.
"I think the kid's seen one too many monster movies," Stemmy answered.
Anthony nodded. "That's what they say in all those monster movies."
Stemmy laughed at that, couldn't help himself. They walked together over to where the two body bags lay. The coroner handed each of them a pair of latex gloves and stepped away.
Kneeling down, Anthony pulled a corner away from the first victim. It was the woman. Her name was Allison Ciccio and she was forty nine years old, the same age as Stemmy. As a detective, it was tough to see victims who were young, but it was tougher when they were the same age. You begin to wonder if she lived enough of her life. You begin to wonder if you have. Ciccio worked for the Department of Labor in a building two blocks away. She was married with three grown children.
The coroner looked sadly down at her. "The cause of death was clearly the blunt trauma to her head and the time of death was about an hour ago."
"I could've told you that," Stemmy blurted.
Anthony pulled the corner away from the other bag. The body inside was much different from the first. Allison Ciccio still had some color in her cheeks. If the two detectives hadn't seen so many dead people over the years they might have thought she was just passed out. This guy looked dead. His skin was taught and wrinkly, the color a grayish blue. His eyes and mouth were open, a piece of flesh still sticking out from between his teeth.
"John Doe," the coroner said. "He's got no ID on him. Cause of death is unknown and time of death is between ten and twelve hours ago." He looked squarely at Stemmy. "Could you have to me that, hotshot?"
Stemmy seemed unfazed. "I could tell you that he'd got a bashed in skull and that seems like a pretty obvious cause of death to me."
The coroner shook his head. "The tissue was already dead when the wound was sustained. The same goes for the puncture wound in the belly."
Anthony pulled the bag further down to inspect the belly. The hole was clear but there was something wrong with the blood surrounding it. It was blackish and gooey, not like regular blood at all.
Stemmy looked back over at Shawn Rudd, just sitting the squad car, his eyes on nothing at all. Despite everything he'd ever come to know, he shivered a bit.
***
IT was getting close to six o'clock by the time they wrapped up the preliminary paperwork on this case and Stemmy was itching to go home. The medical examiner's report wouldn't be in until the next morning and there were no other pieces of the puzzle presenting themselves right away. That report was the key. As much as he hated to admit it, Stemmy was beginning to think about monsters. If the coroner put the time of death about ten hours before the attack then that was consistent with Shawn's testimony that the guy was a zombie. Stemmy had talked with two of the witnesses. The first was a little old Chinese man who hardly spoke a word of English. The sec
ond was young girl who worked in the shop just around the corner. She'd been grabbing a hot dog from the corner vendor; Stemmy would catch up with the vendor in the morning. Both witnesses confirmed that the alleged zombie certainly looked and smelled awful. The girl had laughed when she said he looked like a zombie.
And he had bitten Allison Ciccio.
When all was said and done, Johan Stemmy was just glad to get back to his five women. The clock on his dashboard read 7:03 making him later than usual. He had missed dinner and Eileen would have had to put the kids to bed by herself. Well, that wasn't so bad anymore. Emma, at four years old, was still difficult. Eileen had to bathe her and make sure she brushed her teeth. She'd never outgrown the nighttime milk but at least it came in a sippy cup now instead of a bottle. She'd been a surprise, Emma. Her youngest older sister was twelve. That was Marisol. She was every bit of the troublesome teen in the making. Stemmy feared the next five years with Marisol. It wouldn't be like Lucia, who was now fifteen. Lucia was a little wild but too smart to get into too much trouble. If anyone should have scared him it was Antoinette. She was a classically beautiful girl. Lucia said that every boy at school turned his head to look at her when she went by. She said it often because it annoyed Antoinette. Lucia, pretty but not gorgeous, was jealous and resentful of her older sister. They didn't get along particularly well, Lucia pushing for a fight every five minutes. But Antoinette was as sharp as she was beautiful. She never took the bait. Stemmy always thought that if she would allow herself to be lured into an argument, just once, that it would do a world of good for Lucia.
Emma was curled up on the couch in front of the television as he walked in. Stemmy lived in an old Brooklyn brownstone. It was long and thin, four floors with a basement apartment. He'd inherited it from an uncle who'd never married just two years after he'd married Eileen. They'd been living in a Manhattan studio before that, just the two of them…with Antoinette on the way.
Uncle Albert's death had been one of the best things ever to happen to Stemmy.
He put away his coat to the tune of Dora and Boots singing about where they were going. Over and over. Emma looked up once, saw it was just plain old daddy, and went back to her show. No one else seemed to be on the ground floor. Upstairs he heard shouting.