Transformation Read online

  Cullen huffed and sighed. “OK. Egg would you like a shot?”

  Egg shook his big shiny head and looked at his feet.

  Cullen cooed at him. “C’mon big guy, it’s OK. You can take a shot. You like to kick or punch?”

  Egg shook his head.

  “Wait a minute.” Cullen was smiling and nodding his head. “I remember. You like to bite? You want to bite him don’t you?”

  Egg looked up, eyes glistening, his mouth a smile of jagged nasty teeth that partially filled the gap of his cleft. It looked almost as if he had teeth falling from his nasal cavity. He opened and closed his mouth and clapped his hands.

  “OK Eggy, go take a bite. One big bite.”

  Egg was a bit taller than Sal, but not as solid. He came at him taking a few long awkward steps, grasping for his arm. Sal walked backwards to the edge of the expressway and Egg stopped. He looked sad, frustrated and turned back to Cullen and wailed.

  Cullen waved his rifle at Sal. “Now you have to stand still and let Egg get a good bite. Or else . . . “ He kept waving his rifle at Sal.

  Egg turned and smiled and came at Sal again. This time Sal waited for him at the railing. He could’ve easily jumped off. The railing wasn’t’ more than three feet high, but he was a good forty feet above the ground.

  Cullen cheered Egg on as he lunged at Sal. When he was within arm’s reach, Sal hit Egg in the side of the head with his open hand to stun him. Sal was great at mowing down the dead but was actually a lousy fighter. This Egg kid made him feel like he was fighting a deadhead. Give it a good head shot if you want to live. But that wasn’t his endgame. Sal grabbed Egg by the shoulders and pushed him backwards and over the railing. Egg flailed and screamed as he went over the edge. He screamed for a few seconds, and then went silent.

  Cullen doubled over laughing. “That was classic! Oh my god, that was just classic! You made that look easy man!”

  Sal just glowered at him. He didn’t feel proud or amused that he had to push a simpleton off an overpass, but he did what he had to do. Now he had one less person to deal with.

  Cullen walked up to Sal smiling, shaking his head. “You see the key is to not panic. Everyone else I put old Egg on panicked.” Cullen raised his arm in a defensive gesture. “They raise an arm like this and get a chunk taken out of it. But you! Cool as a cucumber man.”

  Cullen looked around. “I guess everyone had their shot. Eddie, I am assuming you are a pass.”

  Eddie didn’t answer.

  Gerald was still on the ground. He was looking at Cullen and waiting for a command.

  Eddie worked up the courage to say something. “We should just take him back.”

  Cullen dropped his shoulders and sighed. “You should not have followed us out of the mall if you didn’t want to do the job like a man.”

  When Cullen turned to taunt the young boy Sal made a move. He was banking on Eddie not attacking and Gerald was at a disadvantage on the ground. He slammed into Cullen’s back and knocked him on his face. His rifle slid a few feet away.

  Gerald was startled and reached for his rifle, but Eddie already had his gun pointed at his head. He froze.

  By the time Cullen gained his feet, Sal had his gun.

  “OK young man, let’s go.”

  Cullen mockingly imitated him. “OK, young man,” he laughed. “What? What are you going to do old man? You going to shoot me?”

  “I will if you don’t do as I say.”

  “Right.”

  “OK, sit down and put your arms around the railing.”

  “No.”

  Sal raised his rifle.

  “Fuck you,” Cullen smiled.

  Sal was pissed. He couldn’t kill this kid but hated the thought of letting him get away with this shit. This wasn’t the time for humans to be acting like this, he thought.

  “So you want me to shoot you?”

  “I know that you won’t shoot me.”

  Sal addressed Eddie, but kept his eye on Cullen.

  “I’m leaving and you can come with me if you like. I can tell you don’t belong with these two. Thanks for the help by the way.”

  “Watch it Eddie. He just wants to ass fuck you,” Cullen said.

  Gerald giggled.

  “I don’t want to go with you. You killed one of ours. You are the enemy. And I wasn’t helping you. I was stopping Gerald from getting himself killed by him.” Eddie paused. He’d said enough. Maybe when the time was right he could help this man, but for now he had to go along with Cullen and the gang.

  Gerald looked at Eddie with a startled expression. He broke into a smile.

  “OK,” Sal started backing away. He got a good forty yards back from the three. He watched as Eddie put his hand out and helped Gerald stand up. Gerald patted Eddie on the back and smiled.

  Sal continued to walk backwards. The three boys just stood there watching him.

  “Stop. Put the weapon on the ground.”

  A female voice behind him startled Sal. He cursed himself for not looking around. Mostly he was mad at himself for forgetting that there were two people in their party unaccounted for. He tossed the weapon over the edge of the expressway and turned around with his hands in the air.

  “Really funny asshole.” A blonde, a semi-attractive girl in her early twenties, held a shotgun pointed at Sal’s chest.

  “Dickhead.” A heavyset girl said. She was blonde too and the girls looked to be sisters. While they looked quite alike in many ways, this girl was heavier, shorter and not as pretty. She was unarmed and had a dull look in her eyes that explained why.

  The girls made Sal turn and walk back towards the three boys.

  “I see you’ve met Hope and Dawn. The fabulous Baker sisters,” Cullen was all smiles.

  “Where’s Egg?” It was the attractive blonde, Dawn. She was a bit walleyed, had a few crooked teeth, and odd scaring on her temples.

  Cullen gestured towards Sal. “Ask him?”

  Gerald giggled. “He pushed him over the edge there.”

  Dawn looked stunned, shocked. “Poor Egg.” She turned on Sal. “Why the fuck did you do that?”

  Sal just looked her in the eyes. “Because poor Egg was trying to take a bite out of me.”

  Dawn glared at Cullen. “You asshole. You’re supposed to stop him from doing that.”

  Hope was looking over the edge, walking back the way the boys had come.

  “I see him. Egg. He’s down there.”

  “Of course he’s down there.” Cullen sneered.

  “No, I mean he’s walking around.” She cupped her hands over her mouth. “Egg! Up here!”

  A mournful wail echoed up from below them.

  “Oh shit.” Dawn was next to Hope and peeking over the edge.

  “I see them.” Hope was looking at a large group of shit bags that were coming towards Egg. But he was safe.

  Egg had fallen on top of a city bus. The expressway ran over one of the parking lots for the cities massive transportation system. There were hundreds of busses below them.

  “How’d he survive that fall?” Cullen was looking over the edge. He sniffed and cleared his throat and let loose a big wad of mucus.

  Eddie had come over to look. “Looks like he landed on that bus. Maybe the roof broke his fall. It looks pretty dented in like maybe it absorbed a lot of the . . . “

  Cullen walked off.

  Egg was jumping along the bus roofs as a few of the dead pounded on them from below. Egg was panicked and was running away, his gait a long awkward motion that involved his head bobbing and his arms flailing. He jumped from bus to bus and almost slipped off several times.

  Sal couldn’t believe his eyes. How’d these kids last so long, he wondered. They were all ignoring him to look over the edge. He considered pushing a couple over but the remaining ones would most likely shoot him. Almost as if they could read his thoughts, Cullen and Dawn turned quickly around. They walked away from the edge and kept a sharp eye on Sal.

  “So what are w
e going to do with him?” Dawn motioned to Sal. Without waiting for a reply, she turned and barked orders at Eddie and Gerald. “You two, go help Egg get back up here. Hope, you watch them from above and help steer them clear of the shit bags.”

  She turned back to Cullen who was giving her a dirty look. He hated when she took control like this. He was supposed to be in charge.

  “I say we just off him here and now,” Cullen gestured at Sal with the barrel of his gun.

  Dawn rolled her eyes. “He said bring them back, both of them.”

  “I don’t care what he says.”

  “Well I do, and you should too if you know what’s good for you.”

  Cullen harrumphed and turned away.

  “You’ll see. You aren’t better than us. You are one of us now.”

  She turned her attention back to Sal.

  “Where’s the woman?”

  “He won’t say,” Gerald said.

  “I don’t know,” Sal spoke up. “We got separated.”

  “No plans as to where you would meet up if you got separated?” Dawn asked.

  “No. And if there were, why would I tell you?”

  Dawn handed her gun to Cullen. She walked over to Sal with her eyes locked on his.

  “Because unlike Cullen here, I’m not a violent asshole. I’m a reasonable person. You will live or die based on your usefulness to me. You could go either way in my book.”

  Either way? Sal thought as she came right up to him. She locked eyes with him and he didn’t see a flicker of what was about to come. Suddenly one of her hands was gripping his belt and holding him close and the other was fishing for his cock.

  Sal tried to back off but she came right along with him laughing hysterically the entire time.

  “It’s getting big for me. Real big,” She screeched.

  Sal grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her away. He was red-faced with anger and embarrassment. He didn’t even try to hide the bulge in his pants.

  She took her weapon back from Cullen and walked off as if nothing happened.

  “What was that all about?”

  Cullen spoke up. “It was a test. She wanted to see—hell I don’t know. All I know is you seemed to have failed.”

  “What? How do you know that?”

  “Because her clothes are still on.”

  Sal nodded and spoke to himself more than anyone nearby. “That’s a good thing.”

  But Cullen heard him and chuckled.

  “No, it’s not.”

  20.

  Ben was a lazy son-of-a-bitch. He was lazy by nature and not too bright, but he was street smart and very charming (when he needed to be and only to certain people). He was also blessed with a health and vigor that defied all the abuses heaped upon it. He ate fast food and junk food almost exclusively. Unprocessed food hadn’t passed his lips but a few times in his life. He was sedentary, lacked all hygiene, drank, smoked (both tobacco and weed), did drugs (usually ignorant of what they were, where they came from, and what their effects may be), and had any number of diseases coursing through his veins. Normal people were usually jealous, even incensed, that such a physique and healthy heartiness was given to someone who squandered it so when they had trouble getting out of bed or walking up a flight of stairs. Their only solace was the knowledge that such a lifestyle would catch up with him soon enough.

  But so far it had not. Ben lay on the roof until the high wore off and still hadn’t gotten up enough of a motivation to hunt down Everet and Rachael. He wanted easy times and good living right now. He was damp from laying on the roof all night and wanted to get dry. He stripped down and laid all his clothes out across the tiles and the hot sun baked them dry in no time.

  He was hungry and knew he could find loads of shit to eat in the hundreds of houses right at his feet. He could get a vehicle too. He was done with all the crap. A warm breeze blew over his naked body, and he wanted nothing more to do with the dead or Everet and Rachael. He looked around from his perch and saw that the dead had moved away. They all seemed to have wandered back downhill. He wanted to head north and find someplace better to land. He dressed and shimmied down the pipe, walked uphill a bit, and circumvented all the lowest points of the city in order to get to the highway. It was elevated and last he saw clear of the dead and living alike. After a brief stop to eat and find the keys to a car, it was north and back to familiar grounds.

  He was still popping pills to keep himself going and to keep the pain at bay. The pain was much less than it had been, but better safe than sorry he told himself every time he swallowed a pill or two. He found himself picturing his arrival at the park and what it would be like and realized he had to adjust his expectations. He didn’t even know if the place was still there. And if it was maybe it was filled with the dead or empty as a tomb. He would just have to wait and see. But he couldn’t help but think just how much it would suck if there weren’t at least a few survivors.

  A few minutes later and he was on Highway 1, heading North. It was a nice day and Willow would have wanted to sit at the beach and build a fire, smoke some weed, and drink. And she would work the scene. She was always on duty, stealing, begging, conning, lying—whatever it took to get cash. She was a master manipulator, the real trick of it being the ability to choose the mark that would be easiest to manipulate. She would flirt with guys and distract them while Ben stole their shit, sometimes going as far as letting a man take her behind a building or private spot where Ben could show up and give them a proper robbing. They’d tried more complex schemes a time or two but the payoff wasn’t much more than a few hours on the take and the risks were far greater.

  Ben began to get mad at Willow. Why’d the dumb bitch have to go and get herself killed. He missed her. She made sure they ate, could beg and steal a fortune in just a few hours, and she was very good at relieving Ben’s tensions. She was eager, energetic, and nasty. Ben got stiff thinking about her and considered rubbing one out real quick. But what little wisdom he had told him to keep on the road. Better safe than sorry.

  He drove on wishing he had a joint. He’d already decided to stop for some booze first thing. He got off at the exit that would take him into Seaside, just north of Monterey proper and full of all the shit he desired.

  He was driving past the Home Depot, the Embassy Suites was cattycorner to it, and kept right on past the police station. He didn’t notice the people standing around the parking lot entrance to the monolithic hotel but they saw him.

  §

  Cooper, Ellen, and Rachel were saying their goodbyes in front of the Embassy Suites. Trevor was still inside and came out after them, moving slowly.

  Cooper was amazed when Trevor showed up in the room last night. He couldn’t believe he’d gotten out of all those webs. But it must have been a trial as he looked exhausted and gaunt. Cooper got a glance at his fingers and saw that they were blunt and the nails looked smudged at the end. Trevor was awake all night, coming and going.

  Cooper had wanted Ellen to come with him and Rachael, but she wanted to stay with Trevor and Trevor wanted to stay in Monterey. Rachael told them about the self-sufficient vacation houses she and Everet found and explained how to get there. They decided that would be the place to go hole up. Ellen promised to bury Everet’s body in the area around the houses. She and Trevor took the SUV and left. Cooper had a strong feeling it would be a long while before he saw her again.

  Rachael and Cooper were going to find another vehicle on the way out of town and started walking. They heard the roar of an engine in the distance and got out of the street. They stopped and listened as the engine got louder. They couldn’t tell where it was coming from as the sound bounced everywhere.

  Suddenly the roar of the engine exploded in volume as a car turned onto the street they were on, screeching around the corner, rear end fishtailing. It shot towards them but they felt safe concealed behind shrubberies on the side of the Embassy Suites. The car roared passed.

  “Holy shit,” Rachael said
. She looked terrified.

  “That who I think it is?” Cooper asked.

  “Yes.”

  “You sure? I don’t think he saw us here if it was him.”

  “I hope not. What do we do?” Rachael watched Ben’s vehicle disappear down the street.

  Cooper wasn’t sure. Chase him down? Catch him or kill him? Just let him go? There seemed to be no good options.

  “Should we follow him?” Cooper asked.

  “I don’t want to,” Rachael said. “I want to steer clear of him.”

  “I don’t know. It feels bad to just let him go free.”

  “You want to kill him?”

  “No, I can’t do that.” Cooper remembered the men he had killed such a short time ago. He knew he could kill if he was threatened, but having done it already he was actually less likely to want to do it again.

  “I guess we let him go,” Rachael said, obviously uncomfortable with the decision. But she wasn’t going to kill him either and didn’t want to be responsible for a prisoner.

  Cooper was relieved. He had Trevor’s mission to consider and was conflicted about leaving Ben free in the world.

  §

  Ben was quick about it. He tapped the plate glass window of a liquor store with his bumper bringing it down, even though the door was wide open. It was looted and empty. He backed the car out and drove down to the next stop.

  He came to the giant drugstore but it had too much metal framework to drive through so Ben had to get out and use the door. He walked straight to the liquor aisle even before his eyes adjusted to the dark. The moaning and the shuffling didn’t scare him. He cursed the inconvenience of it. He picked up a dark bottle, it felt thick and heavy enough to do the job and ran down the aisle, swinging down on the first corpse he saw.

  He dropped a few with the bottle but there were more coming, a lot more. Ben turned to run but the opposite end of the aisle was already blocked.

  What the fuck are they all doing in here? Ben started climbing the giant shelves. Bottles fell and crashed to the ground. He straddled the top. He looked around and saw at least three potential ways out. But first he was going to get what he came for.