EXTRACT FOR
Uprising
(Christopher Newman)
"Hey ugly, get that cart will ya!" the kid with the skater's baggy t-shirt under his green Dil-Mart vest yelled. The ghoul in the red mask swiveled its head as the teenage boy hollered. Through reddish haze it spotted the wayward shopping cart rolling away from an elderly couple that had just abandoned it.
"Stupid thing, standing there like it ain't got nothing to do," the teenager complained to a shopper passing by. "Where the hell are the other two spookies?"
Terry Jackson yawned as the creature shuffled off towards the cart. He scratched at an armpit as the bright sunshine cut into his aching skull. He had been out late with Billie Mae Upshaw last night. Despite the pain in his head he smiled. The two seventeen year olds had their fun with a stolen twelve pack of beer, a perfectly concealed parking space, and no one to bother them.
"Gotta shake this hangover," Terry smirked, his thoughts returning to the warm activities of the previous evening. "Billie Mae said she's got a surprise for me after work."
***
RWC number 120321 (which was engraved on its forehead plate) was owned and operated by the Dil-Mart Company; however deep in its mind it remembered when it had first come into awareness. The zombie recalled the taste of the solitary other it had managed to feast upon before the other others came and captured it. The hunger for hot bloody flesh and the over-powering need to procreate still echoed within its limited consciousness. That taste swayed before it in memory like an exotic dancer just out of the reach of a sex starved man. Had its tear ducts not completely dried up months ago it would have cried from its hungry despair. It would prefer to stagger over and rip out the offensive yelling creature's throat, but the Jaw Restraining Device kept its mouth firmly closed. It hated that thing attached to its face. The first night after being fitted with the JRD the zombie had tried to rip it away, only to find it securely fastened to its jaw and cheek bones. It despised the JRD only slightly less than the others who ordered it around and kept it in bondage. The siren call of hot blood and raw flesh sang inside its skull, demanding it free itself from its bonds. But the effort was futile; the other's created bindings held it firmly in check. It heard the former resident of its body as it wailed and cried for it to cease listening to the orders from central part of its brain. It begged, cajoled, and criticized the ideas of killing and creating more zombies.
Number 120321 ignored all this thought and released an angry growl as it complied with the young man's instructions despite the howl of protest from its parasitical boss planted deep within its brain. . It was only able to brush the still warm handle of the cart before it rolled away and became wedged between two cars ten feet away. With a sad groan of despair it lumbered forwards once again and walked after the cart, between the red minivan and a pickup truck.
"Aaahhh," it moaned and latched onto the handle of the cart.
"Aaahhhhh." A pair of utterances responded to 120321's groaning. The RWC looked up to see five men and two women who were holding the other two Dil-Mart owned RWCs by the thick belts around their waists. Each belt housed an electronic device that delivered a nasty electrical shock should the RWCs move past the boundaries of the Dil-Mart parking lot. One of the men had a fishing pole and was reeling in the errant cart 120321 had been chasing.
The ghoul cocked its head at the others and saw they were cutting off the belts, masks, and JRDs of 029336 and 038232 with heavy scissors, grunting and sweating as they did so. The smell of so many others so close by made 120321's hunger flash hot into its rotting brain like an explosion. "Hurry! Quicker, Vera, or we're gonna get caught, damn you!" one of the others growled at an other female who snagged 120321's belt.
There was a spitting hiss. 120321 looked to the faces of its kin, still locked behind the black ballistic plastic restraints. The others were spraying something from a clear bottle onto the sides of the device that held each RWC's jaws together. 120321 cocked its head to the other side to watch; the liquid seeped into the hated device quickly. It widened its white cataract filmed eyes as the black device fell off of 029336's face, revealing a yellow toothed grin of excitement. The fine red mask covering 120321's face was torn away next, leaving only tattered remains that fluttered all around the forehead plate bolted to its skull. It felt the wetness upon its face. Soon the jaw restraint fell off as the liquid melted the plastic around the bolts.
"Y'all get in quick!" a big wide shouldered man snarled. "Y'all need to move before they realize they're free!"
120321 watched as the strange men and women who had freed it jumped into the van with a speed it could only hope for. The red vehicle peeled out of the parking space moving forward between the two cars parked on the other side of the dividing line. The ghoul moaned in full voice for the first time in months. Its cry was again echoed by its compatriots. The hot organic portion of their mind demanded they undertake the action they were reborn for. The creatures turned as voices drifted their way.
We're free! the commanding part of its brain exalted. Eat! Kill!
"I can't believe Betty Sue thought I was stupid enough to believe y'all would go to the movies without me," a sixteen year old girl chattered in a thick Southern accent to her boyfriend as they walked past. "Y'all didn't think of leaving me behind, did ya Roy?"
"I'd never go anywhere without you, Becky," the sandy haired boy responded, automatically and mechanically. The pair of adolescents passed by without even noticing the danger and paid the price. "What the f...." Roy yelped.
Three undead creatures garbed in blue jumpsuits attacked them. 120321 snagged the girl's right arm and the side of her face with clutching, anxious hands and hugged her fiercely. It lunged forward to sink its horrid teeth deep into the whiteness of the teenager's neck. Biting down hard and rocking its head back, it tore a messy chunk out of her throat. A spray of crimson blood splattered both 120321 and the girl's face as it shot between them, painting a nearby car in red gore.
"Grrggh" Becky managed to gurgle out of the gaping wound in her neck The zombie bit another hunk out of her, this time from her shoulder. The salty taste of the warm meat sang upon the creature's black tongue as it chewed frantically and swallowed. The other he was feeding on slipped from its ecstatic grasp and slumped to the ground with a wet groan. 120321 turned to watch her companion fighting with other two of its kind. The two other WalMat RWCs pulled the screaming boy to the ground, tearing red dripping pieces of flesh from their victim as 120321 staggered past. Fountains of blood shot up and streaked the pavement with long red smears and splattered the ground.
More... make more, the voice in the center part of 120321's brain implored it. The creature reacted by stumbling toward the teenage slave master who had ordered it around for months now.
"No... stay a-away from me!" Terry backed up nervously after seeing the red feral grin plastered across the face of the approaching RWC. He grabbed a cart and pushed it hard at 120321, hoping it would help delay the zombie. The cart struck the creature's shins and it pushed at the offending object with flailing and nerveless hands.
"H-help! Somebody call the cops!" he shouted and turned to run into the shopping center. 120321 watched its prey run blindly into the front quarter panel of a car as it pulled out of its parking space. The teenager was flung to the ground and the old woman behind the wheel reacted too slowly and ran over the boy's legs. The crunch and snap of bone were quickly followed by the attendant's shrill scream. The old lady stopped the car and opened her door. It thumped 120321's right hip so it fell over onto the skater-boy.
"Aaahh!" 120321 groaned happily as it landed on him. Terry Jackson was shrieking while the ghoul spewed its putrid breath into his face.
"No!" The boy screamed only once before the creature bit off his nose, immediately flooding his eyes and blinding him with his own scarlet fluid. 120321 choked down the warm chunk of flesh and sheared through the attendant's left cheek with its next attack.
"Oh dear Lord!" the elderly woman bellowed. She'd finally managed to get out of her vehicle and spot the assault. As she turned to reach into her car for her cell phone, the first two victims, now zombies themselves, pulled her out of the car and onto the warm asphalt.
"L-lord... arrgh!" she managed to blubber as Becky and Roy shredded the wrinkled flesh of her throat with their sharp teeth. The old woman slapped at the pavement as Becky bit once more, this time ripping out enough of the skin on the old biddy's arm to expose the white bone underneath. Roy ended the woman's screams in a wet cry by tearing out her throat, completely covering himself with her bright red blood.
In the span of only two minutes, the three freed RWCs had recruited four new members into their fraternity before the first alarms were raised at the WalMat shopping complex in Purcell, Oklahoma.