Dead Men (and Women) Walking (29 page)

“
I’m going to open,” Lou
said. He started to stagger towards the door. “Don’t!” I hissed.
“He could be bluffing about the key!”

“
What if he’s not? I didn’t
kill him. I’m going to open the door.” He stopped half way across
the room, uncertain.

“
Jack?” Billy said. “Did
Ginny put you up to it?” We looked at Jack. “She won’t inherit my
dough unless the cops are certain you didn’t kill me. So if you
didn’t, open.” Persuasive. We stared at Jack. His hands trembled.
He looked at a panel of buttons on his desk. If he pressed the
green one, it would open the door.

Later, I learnt that he
opened the door the night Billy died. Billy had forgotten his key
at home. He wanted to take a leak. He asked Jack to open the door,
and Jack did.

They’d watched Billy in the
screen until he reached the toilets. They claimed they always
turned off the toilet screen – not the camera, just the TV – each
time one of them visited the Gents. It wasn’t different that night,
but when they turned the TV on again, all cameras weren’t
working.

Cops learnt that someone had
hacked into the CCTV server and disabled all cameras except the one
watching Control. The cops asked, Why? It gave evidence that Jack,
Greg and Lou were inside Control at the time of the murder, and the
cops never stopped asking, why did the hacker leave this camera
running?

The hacker erased several
files from the server, for the cameras had captured them as they
entered the building and they couldn’t leave such evidence behind.
The deleted videos left a track. The assassins (the police though
it was a duo) entered KP’s office block at 7:00 pm, probably
disguised as cleaning staff. One went to the server room and the
other to the Finance Office neighboring the murder scene. Each hid
in his room all night. The one in the Finance Office did the
killing.

The police believed the
killers had insider help. Of all KP Pharmaceutical’s staff, only
Greg, Jack and Lou had a motive, and one of them must have seen
something at 7:00 pm when the assassins sneaked in, or at 4:00 am
after the murder. KP’s management however refused to cooperate with
the cops. Mr. Pemprey argued that the inquiry would make KP
vulnerable to spies. That’s why the cops had failed to get the
murderer.

“
Was it you, Greg?” Billy
said. “You knew I mentioned you in my will. Is that why you killed
me?”

We turned to Greg, who sunk
to a sitting positing. I think he wished he could keep sinking and
vanish into the floor.

“
Lou,” Billy said. “My old
friend Lou. You didn’t like me. Tell me the truth and I won’t hurt
you. I promise. I only want to know the truth so I can rest in
peace. Don’t let me find out. Tell me what happened after I walked
out of the room.”

“
I didn’t do it,” Lou
said.

“
Okay,” Billy said. “Here I
come.”

The doors opened. Billy
walked in. The doors automatically closed behind him. A suffocating
stench filled the room. I suddenly couldn’t breath in the solid
air. Billy grinned. I don’t know why I thought it was a grin on his
face. He exposed all his teeth and stuck out his black, rotting
tongue, which looked like a giant maggot. Worms crawled out of his
mouth. His eyes were most terrifying. They looked like worms
squirming inside balls of glass, giving the illusion of light and
life.

I think that’s when my
bowels burst and warm liquid soaked my pants. Jack passed out. Greg
broke down and wept. Lou collapsed to his knees, screaming, “Denis!
He planned it! I swear I didn’t want to do it but he threatened me
and he hired the assassin and he rigged the system and he gave the
cops limited access to the server an – ”

“
Shut up!” Billy howled.
This time his voice was terrifying. It thundered in the room and I
thought the noise would break all the TVs and blow out the window.
Lou fell silent. Greg stopped weeping. “Was it about
Vep?”

Lou nodded. He’d lost his
voice. He kept his eyes on the floor. He couldn’t stand looking at
the zombie. I too couldn’t look at the horror. I kept my eyes on
Lou’s neck.

“
Vep Industries,” Billy
said. “Our biggest rivals. I started to suspect he was selling
secrets to them about an hour before I came on duty that night. He
acted very fast to eliminate me, too quick for me to think of it as
the motive. I’d have visited him before I came here. Sorry for the
trouble, Greg and Jack.” He paused. I looked up. His eyes were on
Greg and Jack. “Okay, Lou,” he continued. “Let’s pay Pemprey a
visit.”

Lou didn’t think of
resisting. He walked out ahead of Billy, after Billy had punched a
button and opened all doors. They went down to the parking lot. I
watched them on the TVs, not believing what had happened. They got
into a Security Van in the parking lot. I think Lou drove. As the
white van had sped out of the gates, I heard police sirens in the
distance. That’s when I collapsed in shock. For several days, I
could see and hear, but I couldn’t eat, move, or talk.

Since then, nobody has ever
seen or heard of Lou and Mr. Pemprey. The latter’s neighbor,
wakened by a scream, said he looked out of the window at about 3:00
am and saw the white van parked at Mr. Pemprey’s drive. At 5:00 am,
cops found the van abandoned near Wittle’s Cemetery, where they’d
buried Billy.

Penelope Allen is a
gainfully employed, internationally published Canadian poet who
enjoys travel, photography, museums and exercising her vocabulary
daily. While she discovered her penchant for poetry late in life it
didn't curtail her enthusiasm one iota. Penelope is positive that
without the wonderful writers, who frequent the web, she'd still be
wallowing in rhyming couplets. Currently, she's a moderator on two
Internet sites and, by invitation, a poetry editor for a newly
established publication.

David Bartlett
is a print journalism major attending Emerson College in
Boston, MA. He has long harbored an interest in horrific and
supernatural fiction, and his favorite literary works include: "It"
by Stephen King, "The Haunting Of Hill House" by Shirley Jackson,
"The Descent" by Jeff Long and "The Girl Next Door" by Jack
Ketchum.

Guy Belleranti creates
fiction, poetry and puzzles from the hell heat of southern Arizona.
His work has appeared in many publications including The Eternal
Night, AlienSkin, Futures Mysterious Anthology, and Nocturnal Ooze.
His homepage on the web is:
http://www.authorsden.com/guybelleranti

John Benton is a freelance
writer and game designer. He has worked with Alea Publishing Group
and Dog Soul Publishing. His homepage is
http://badwrongfun.50webs.com/

Donna Taylor Burgess’s
has appeared in genre publications like
The Book of Dark Wisdom
and
Bare Bone
. She is also the editor of the Naked Snake Chapbooks and NSP
Paperbacks.
http://www.nakedsnakepress.com/

Emily M. Z. Carlyle’s previous
credits include “He Tastes Like the Sea,” published in THIRTEEN
magazine. She resides in Maryland.

Originally from Wayne,
Indiana, Patricia A. Collins currently resides in Texas with her
husband.

Debra Colvin is a freelance
artist who lives in Riverside, CA. More examples of her art can be
found at
http://www.llothcat.com/
.

Dilman Dila
lives in Uganda.  Dilman has published
several short stories, in ezines, print magazines
and anthologies, and has worked with Kenyan filmmaker
Kinyanjui Wanjiru on a couple of screenplays.

Brian Jaime is a freelance
writer and English Major in West Covina, CA where he writes a wide
range of creative, editorial and business pieces. In addition to
being a writer, he has also been an accountant, human resource
manager, English tutor and entrepreneur. He believes that, when it
comes to writing, any response is better than no response.
His
latest work can be found in the newly released anthology
Embark to Madness
. In
addition, his writing has also been seen in
FlashShot
and
The San Gabriel Valley Tribune.
More
information can be found on his website,
www.brianjaime.com
.

Michael A. Kechula is a
retired technical writer.
Switching
to fiction in 2003, his works have won first prize in 6
writing contests, second place in 1, and honorable mention in
2.   His stories have appeared in 43 online and
print magazines and 12 anthologies in Australia, Canada, England,
and the US.  He's authored 6 books of flash fiction tales, and
a self-study book that teaches beginners how to write flash
fiction. He is the editor of
Flash Tales
Magazine
(
www.flash-tales.com
).

Aurelio Rico Lopez III is a
devoted fan of the macabre and a scribble junkie from Iloilo City,
Philippines. Over the years, his fiction has been featured in
various anthologies such as COLD FLESH (Hellbound Books), TRIP THE
LIGHT HORRIFIC (Rage  m a c h i n e  Books), SHADOW BOX
(Brimstone Press), STAR-SPANGLED ZOMBIE (Maniac Press), and THE
BLACKEST DEATH I & II (Black Death Books).  More of
his dark tales are scheduled to appear in RAW MEAT (Carnival of
Wicked Writers), MIND SCRAPS (Rage  m a c h i n e 
Books), THE BLACKEST DEATH III (Black Death Books), and MIND GAMES
(Maniac Press).

Mark Henry Medina resides
in the Philippines, where he is working on his Bachelor’s degree in
information technology. He can be reached via his website at
http://marcs-day.deviantart.com

Benjamin A. Nendza is a
freelance artist living in Florida.

Tanya Nehmelman
lives in Northern Illinois. She enjoys writing
short stories, children's stories, poetry, and my favorite horror
stories. Her work has appeared in various electronic
publications.

Lee Pletzers is the
author
of Blood of the
Wolf
,
Nightmare
,
A Season of Darkness
and also the
SF/Horror
Crossover
for which a sequel is currently being written. His
novel
Re-Entry of Evil
was released in August 2004, published by SPX Press. His
personal page is
www.leepletzers.com

Ognjen Popovic currently works mostly as a
freelance artist. He has always been inspired by cover
artworks and illustrations for computer games, books and heavy
metal. During his lifetime so far, he focused on fantasy
art, with his portfolio including work for computer games, movies,
music bands and role-playing companies. Being also the student of
informatics, his intensions in the future are to work on the
graphics for computer games, or even engulf into some coding as
well. His style leans to achieve realistic images with lots of
shading, though he doesn't mind using Illustrator for vector images
(tools of trade are Photoshop and Maya 3D). He has been a
computer magazine writer for many years, and was the
contestant of the World Karate Championship in Osaka,
Japan.

Banned from the indie wrestling
circuit where he terrorized both fans and opponents as the King
Kong Kid, the world's tallest midget wrestler, Brian Rosenberger
now scares the literate. His writing can be found numerous places.
Just look. He hails from Parts Unknown but perfects submission
holds in Cincinnati. The choke's on you.

http://home.earthlink.net/~brosenberger/

Jennifer Schoonover was
born a couple of generations ago to fairly normal parents. She
worked at West End Games from 1996 to 1998. Since then she has
worked as a freelance editor, writer, and advertising copywriter
for such companies as The Mountaineers Books, Haworth Press, EN
Publishing, Æthereal Forge, Tabletop Adventures, and JAGS. Jennifer
currently resides in Pennsylvania with her husband, her daughter,
three cats, two parents, and a brother. She recently launched her
own RPG company.
http://kumapageworks.org/FireWater/

E.P. Spader is a systems
analyst and freelance author. He lives in his birthplace of
southern New Jersey with his loving wife, Kayce and his three
beautiful children: Justin, Dakota and Sydney. Like so many others,
he aspires to write the Great American Novel.

Tristan T. Tenorio
resides in the Philippines and graduated with a
degree in political science. He is also an aspiring freelance
writer.

G. W. Thomas is
Editor/Publisher of RAGE m a c h i n e Books. He sells POD
paperbacks through Lulu.com and ebooks through Renebooks.com. Check
out his hub site at
http://ragemachinemag.tripod.com

Shawn Westmoreland can be
reached via his personal website at
http://www.charmingbastard.org/