Death Row Apocalypse (14 page)

“Listen, fuckface. If you don’t shut the fuck up, I’m going to feed you to those zombies myself, piece by fucking piece!”

Mike turned bright red and was about to explode in anger when without notice the door shook violently and opened enough so that a gore-covered hand came into view and grabbed the edge of the door. It then shook again from a second impact.

“Help me. Quick. I can’t hold it!” Lucy pleaded.

The door began to open. It then shook from yet another impact, and several disgusting hands now scrambled for something to grab. Some of those hands had nails hanging by a thread of skin, some had chunks of flesh bitten from them, and some had fingers missing, but all were visible in the gap between door and frame as it widened on each shudder. Inch by gruesome inch, the door opened, and Lucy strained under the force that the zombies applied. Less than five seconds had elapsed from that first impact and already Lucy was ready to give in. She could feel her thighs and calves shake against the forces. She liked to keep fit, but this was no Pilates workout.

“Help me, you dicks!” she yelled.

The door shook again from yet another impact! And there it was: a face was pushing its way though the gap. It was all over for her now. Unable to resist the mass of zombies pushing against the door, she slipped in the pooled blood and hit the floor, landing on her rump with a wet thump. She didn’t give up, though. With her back against the door and sitting in cooling blood, she lent back against it with every ounce of strength and weight she had.

Slam!
And along with a crunch, the door was pushed back into its steel frame. Lucy fell backwards, knocking her head against the door, and yelped. Looking up, she was surprised but happy to see that two of the cameramen had seemingly charged the door and successfully terminated the horde’s attack.

The remains of the zombie attack lay close to the door frame. Not fewer that fourteen severed fingers and one nose lay there and were a grisly reminder of how close the room occupants had come to becoming today’s evening meal.

The old man came forward and held his hand out and helped Lucy to her feet.

“Are you all right, little lady?” he asked with a warm smile and heavy Southern accent.

“Thank you. Yes, I am now,” Lucy said, and returned his smile. She then turned to the reporter. “Give me one of those tripods!”

The reporter looked back at her as if she were crazy. “Huh? That’s Channel 42 News property and—”

One of the cameramen figured out Lucy’s plan and spoke up. “Just do it, Mike!” he shouted at the shocked reporter, interrupting him.

The tripod was a professional model, easily able to take the weight of several men if need be. Her plan was to use it to anchor the door with the three tripod feet against the step that led to the raised floor. Lucy took the offered tripod and fastened the legs with the steel pins, then finally wedged the apex against the door.

“Perfect,” she said out loud.

Even though the door continued to shake, it was now barely a low rumble and rattled only slightly. Now that the immediate danger had been averted, the two cameramen gradually relaxed from their efforts keeping the door closed, and though the door seemed to be perfectly secure, they decided to stay exactly where they were for a little bit longer just in case.

Chapter - 11

- Sanctioned Murder - Last of the IKSM -

Ms. X, now dead and buried, had a number two, a bomb expert, an electronics guy, a financier, and two heavily built thugs. This was her terror cell, and I’d been given the interesting task of cleaning up the US—well, the part the cell currently lived in and specifically the house they rented.

The murder of thirteen girls was a shock to the entire country and possibly the world. Nothing in our history had prepared our nation for this kind of atrocity. My keepers asked me to “deal with it.” I was also requested to make sure that is was again questionable as to whether it was a revenge hit or some random serial killing. The message was to be a plain and simple one, one that the IKSM would not or could not misinterpret.

Having eliminated five of the seven members of the cell, I now focused my attention on the remaining two, a pair of ruthless thugs who knew no bounds to the cruelty they dealt out. I had already taken care of their comrades in my own special way, and these two would be my last. In fact, it was shortly after this little caper that my career was brought to a premature end—an end that was a little too soon as far as I was concerned.

It was cold, bitterly cold even for the old-timers who had seen only a dozen or so severe winters in the past seventy years. The long January nights were tough on the old and tended to cull the pensioners each winter and thereby keep their numbers under control. It was bad for the old folk but good for the state. New blood would buy up the deserted and abandoned properties, bringing a much-needed source of income to the local workforce.

Gradually over the past decade, the isolated region to the south of Ocean Pond in Osceola National Park became popular with not only the local teenagers, who would go on romantic walks with their first loves, but also with budding entrepreneurs looking to make a fast buck. One such property situated by the decent-size lake, Ocean Pond, had been renovated for the specific purpose of renting to vacationers or anyone willing to pay the exorbitant rates that the owners were charging. Built in the early twenties, the house had seen plenty of summers and enough subzero winters to keep any penguin comfortable. Within the better part of a century, the house had seen only three owners, and the third had been just two years ago.

It was here that Ms. X set up the headquarters of her cell. Hidden away in the backwaters of Florida, embedded deep within its national park, was a Brothers Grimm nightmare, with unimaginable acts of violence being wrought on the innocent.

It was the following spring that teenage girls started to disappear from nearby towns. Within the first week of April four girls went missing. In the second week another three vanished, and by week three, thirteen girls between the ages of fourteen and seventeen seemed to simply vanish without anyone seeing anything. Then within a week of their disappearance, the hacked and mangled bodily remains were usually unceremoniously dumped outside their homes.

It was in the second week that the state newspapers and TV stations started to take an interest in this seemingly Hollywood Horror story. They began by sensationalizing the events, and by interviewing the boyfriends and closest friends. They even started to create a shortlist of the likely suspects, usually starting with the distraught parents.

Two solid weeks of madness were endured by this tiny corner of civilization, while the female populace was placed on the endangered species list. TV interviews were literally broadcasting on a 24/7 basis, while the police were pulling in suspects from an ever-growing circle of potential murderers and sex offenders, the sheer number of that last category shocking quiet townsfolk, as the vermin literally crawled out from under the woodwork and were exposed for their divergent ways.

The news teams loved the story. As each week would come to an end, one could almost see reporters holding their breath in anticipation should yet another gaggle of girls disappear or dismembered body parts be discovered outside the home of one of the growing number of panicking parents. They weren’t disappointed either. So it went on, until eventually thirteen girls had gone missing, then turned up, their bodies resembling the contents of a slop bucket at the end of a busy day at the butcher’s. Each one had vanished without any clue or reason, leaving behind a distraught family and a town that had been plunged into a living nightmare.

The unnamed road off Forest Road was a favorite jogging route for Jenny. For the last two years she used it religiously as part of her training for the track and field events held each year. This year she was determined to win at least one of the highly coveted cups and had devoted almost all of her free time to preparing for the event. Each morning she would run to Ocean Pond and back, no matter the weather. Sun, rain, sleet, or snow, she would be out there pushing her body to new limits. After school Jenny would once again don her running shoes, T-shirt, and shorts and again make the arduous journey to the lake and back.

It was Friday, and it had been a long week. Her legs felt like lead as she labored during the uphill jog to the lake. Even her willpower was pushed to the edge on this fine spring morning. Fridays were always the most difficult, which made her even more determined to get to Ocean Pond without stopping. As she rounded the final bend and caught sight of the massive inland lake, sweat rolled down her back in rivers, while the salty water from her brow stung her eyes. Jenny came to rest by the lakeshore and, catching her breath, she bent over, breathing out heavily, then brought herself to full height, then bent backwards, drawing in the cool forest air.

Looking out over the lake toward the east, she took in the almost-magical view of the early-morning sun rising over the treetops. It was this sight that was partly the reason for her early-morning runs to the lake. The lake’s surface was so still, it looked more like an immense mirror than an expanse of water. The rising sun and every detail of the forest on the far side of the lake were mirrored perfectly in its reflection.

Jenny knelt down at the water’s edge. The shock of the frigid water caused her to gasp a little as she splashed her face with cupped hands. Then, bending forward, she sank her face into the almost-freezing waters and reveled in the cooling bliss that numbed her overheated skin. Pushing a little deeper, she sank her head until it was fully submerged while blowing the air from her lungs. For that moment she was truly alive and in heaven, if such a thing were actually possible.

Pulling her head from the cooling water, she felt a sudden knock from behind, and the last thing she saw was a blinding light as she passed from consciousness to a place without time, space, and pain.

The thumping in her skull was a sign that she was alive, but its intensity was such that Jenny started to wish that she was still unconscious. There was movement and voices, both of which she could not quite make out. The language was somehow wrong and seemed almost alien as she tried to recognize the accent through the incessant hammering coming from within her brain. She saw the movement again, but this time she managed to make out the source of the motion and tried to speak. A sense of dread hit her like a train as she realized she could not speak and could not move. The gag was firmly in place and kept her from spitting out what tasted like a soiled handkerchief. As Jenny struggled, she realized that all the feeling from both her arms was missing. As for her legs, once again there was no sense or feeling of any type coming from either. In fact, the only feelings she had came from her torso and head and nothing more. It was as if she no longer possessed arms or legs.

Jenny’s eyes flew open in panic as she focused on her left arm, and then she turned her head to her right side and stared in disbelief at her right arm. Both were lifeless and colorless appendages that really belonged to a cadaver. Taking in the unbelievable sight, she wanted desperately to wake from this dream. Tears welled up in her eyes as the desperation of her situation sank in. She knew beyond any doubt that she was going to die in this room, and she gave way to her tears and accepted her inevitable doom.

Jenny’s head was knocked to the side as a well-built hooded man slapped her roughly about the head, trying to wake her. When finally he was done, he walked out of her range of vision and then returned with a chain saw. Jenny lost control as he started up the machine. Tears and urine flowed in torrents as the hooded maniac revved the small petrol-driven machine, then brought it down. As the rotating blades made contact with her right foot, Jenny tried to scream, but her efforts were barely audible through the noise of the chain saw. Jenny’s right foot, having been severed at the ankle, dropped to the floor without so much as a single drop of blood being spilt.

The next cut was through her knee, and her calf fell to the floor. Jenny could not see what the man was doing. She saw the chain saw raise and lower. Each time it did so, all she felt was her body shake. She calmed slightly as she realized there was no pain and further reasoned that this must be some prank, a prank that had gone way too far. With her fear
With
d by anger, she intended giving this chain saw guy a good piece of her mind when he got a little closer.

The man with the chain saw never stopped, and having finished with her legs now repositioned himself to start on her left arm, specifically her fingers. It was then that Jenny noticed that at the tops of her arms were thick bands of rubber digging deep into her flesh, and she finally realized in horror what was happening to her. Put simply, each of her limbs had been isolated from their supply of blood. Without the supply, the arm drained and was literally dead. She would feel no pain no matter the operation performed on any of her limbs, which was about to be confirmed as the man brought down the whirring blades on her hand.

She wanted to die and tried to turn her head away as the man now started on her left arm. A set of hands grabbed Jenny’s head from behind, anchoring her field of view so that the dismemberment process would not, could not, be missed by the owner.

The fingers on her left hand were the first she saw to go. As the saw bit down into the knuckles, the fingers shook, then wobbled, then caught on the saw’s teeth, before they flew off toward the far end of the room and hit the wall. The next to go was her hand. The machine chewed through skin, bone, and gristle with as little effort as going through ice cream. The saw, having chewed through her joints, now chewed on the wooden table, instantly filling the air with wood chippings. Jenny screamed the loudest silent scream anyone could have produced as her mind reeled from the horror of the situation. This could not be happening to her. She wanted with all her heart for this to be a dream and wake from it. But no amount of dreaming, wishing, or wanting would save her from her destiny. It was the sheer lack of blood that had kept her mind from snapping until the very end, and when it finally snapped, her mind sank to a place cushioned and protected from pain forever.