The Dead Hunger Series: Books 1 through 5 (41 page)

“Should we have our masks on?” asked Charlie.

Hemp shook his head.  “Neither has generated any vapor except once since we got them.  Not enough food intake.”

Charlie stood away from the zombie for a moment, staring at it vacantly.  It stared back, but with more purposeful intent.

“Babe,” she said.  “Why don’t they get any smaller?  Thinner, I mean?  They haven’t eaten anything.”

“No calorie burning going on,” said Hemp.  “They’re pretty much what they were when they died.”

“Can they get bigger when they eat a lot?  I mean, do they take a crap or pee or anything?”

Hemp shook his head, hesitated, then shrugged.  “Good question.  We’ve never seen any zombie excrement that we know of.”

“I guess it would be easy to tell it,” said Charlie, with a wry smile on her face.  “Instead of corn, it’s probably have gold rings, maybe a fingernail or two in it.”

“You’re a disturbed woman,” said Hemp, laughing.  “Who’d have thought I’d fall in love with the likes of you.”

“I’m irresistible,” she said.  “Do you really love me?”

Hemp looked at her.  “Like mad,” he said.  “I think from the moment you stepped out of Flex’s Suburban and bent down to talk to Trina.”

“Quick to fall?” she asked.  “Or am I just that amazing?”

“No to the former, absolutely to the latter.”

Now Charlie’s stare was directed at Hemp, and while she didn’t profess her love for the professor, her look told him everything he needed to know.

“Okay, down to business.  I’m going to apply the oil to the hand first,” he said.

He walked up to the gurney and the creature’s arms immediately began pulling at the leather straps, its muscles flexing beneath its opaque, black-veined skin.  Most of the skin around its teeth had rotted away, and deteriorated flaps of oozing tissue hung by mere fleshy threads, ready to peel away as it worked its jaw in an obscene display of dead hunger and desire.

Hemp stood calmly beside the male creature and removed the cotton swab from the small test tube sized bottle.  He spread it onto the epidermis of the zombie in about a dime-sized circle on the back of its hand.

The result was instantaneous.

The thing’s hand began to sizzle as the zombie erupted into a low moan-hum, his left side shuddering all the way to his hand.  The dime-sized spot of oil began to sink inward, deeper and deeper until a clear hole appeared.  Then it began to attack the edges of the hole, and it grew larger and larger until it ate away the entire thumb side of the hand – dissolved it into nothing.

“Jesus, Charlie!” shouted Hemp.  “Quick, get your mask on!”

They both went to the pegs by the door and pulled the gas masks off, quickly sliding them over their heads and drawing the rubber straps tight.

When they turned back, the zombie’s arm was swinging free, as if trying to reach out to grab its tormentors.

“His whole fucking hand dissolved, Hemp!” shouted Charlie.  “He pulled it right out of the strap!”

“Look,” said Hemp.  “It’s working its way up the arm.”

As they watched, little by little, the creature’s arm was melting, seeming to deconstruct cell-by-cell in front of them.  What remained dripped onto the concrete floor of the makeshift lab.

As they watched, the disintegration slowed, and then stopped just below the elbow.

Hemp looked from the gurney to Charlie.  “Keep your mask on, Charlie,” he said, his voice muffled through the mask.  “I’m not sure if any fumes are associated with what we just saw.  I didn’t see any visible vapor, but there has to be something generated from that process.  The urushiol is affecting them as sodium hydroxide might, but infinitely faster.”

“Acid?” asked Charlie.

“Lye,” said Hemp.  “Let’s get another strap over his stomach and that free arm.”

“Should we call anyone else in?”

“I’m fairly certain we’re okay,” said Hemp, walking to the drawer and withdrawing another nylon strap.  He threw one end to Charlie and they wrapped it around the arms of the male zombie, securing it with a ratcheting winch on the back of the table.

“That ought to hold him,” said Hemp.

“More tests?” said Charlie. 

“Absolutely.  Do you know what this means?”

“It means we’ve found something that will eat them away,” said Charlie.

“A new way to hold them off, but unless it actually kills them it’s good for naught.”

“It doesn’t take much,” said Charlie.

“I’m interested in seeing how little it does take.”

“Going to dilute it?”

“Down to almost nothing,” said Hemp.

Hemp returned to the table and lifted his mask, sniffing the air.  “Stinks, but not like toxins,” he said.  “Just like a morgue.”

Charlie walked and stood beside him.  “That’s one reason I want them out of here,” she said.  “I’m sick of smelling them – or not smelling them.   Rotting flesh is a smell you shouldn’t ever get used to and fuck if I don’t smell them anymore.  I don’t know how you can.”

“Extensive training,” he said, smiling.  “Okay, I’m going to dilute this with hot water.  Charlie, would you heat a small glass in the microwave?”

Charlie pulled her mask off, left the lab and went to the office bathroom to get the water.  She popped it in the microwave for a minute and carried it back in the lab.   On her way back in, I saw she looked to be in a hurry, but waved at her.

“How’s it going?”

She turned.  “You might want to get Flex and come in if it’s okay with Hemp.  Amazing shit so far.  How’s his head?”

“I don’t know, but he’s been lying down for a while now.  If it’s significant, he’s going to want to be there.  Give us a minute.”

She closed the door again.  I went into the bedroom where Flex, who had a bit of a headache, was lying down.

“Babe, you want to hit the lab?  Apparently something about the experiments with the oil is a success.”

Flex opened one eye, then yawned and stretched.  “Yep, might as well.  If I sleep much longer I’ll be up all night.”

“C’mon, then,” I said, holding out my hand.  “How’s your head?”

He stood and took my hand and we walked to the lab.  “Better.  Not perfect, but better.”

Flex was well aware that any headache, considering the onset to this disease was a crazy killer migraine, was of concern to everyone.  He was sure to let everyone know that while it hurt, it was nowhere near a migraine, and hadn’t gotten any more painful.

Cynthia had gone to bed early with a sore throat.  She’d taken some of the Nyquil we had from one of our pharmacy stops, and was resting pretty soundly, so I thought it best to let her be.

I opened the door.  Hemp and Charlie looked at us and waved us in. 

“Results?” said Flex, then looked at the zombie.  “Holy shit!  What happened to his hand and wrist?”

“Urushiol,” said Hemp.  “Just a dime-sized swab on his hand.  It was instantaneous – the initial reaction, that is.”

“My God,” I said.  “What are you doing now?”

“I’m diluting it and I’m going to try something else.  In the cavities.”

“Where?  Nose?  Mouth?” I asked.

“I’m thinking eye,” said Hemp.

“I used to drop acid in my eye,” said Charlie.  “Back when I was young and stupid.  Windowpane.  Just put it on my eye, let it dissolve and take me where it would.”

“I don’t even want to get into the damage that could’ve done to your eye, much less your brain,” said Hemp.  “But I’d be more concerned with the eye.  I’ve done acid, but it’s what’s called blotter on the street and was created in a professional lab with good controls on the ingredients.  I imagine your source was a bit more of a mystery.”

“Wait, wait.  You’ve done acid?” Charlie was smiling.

“I had some damned good ideas on acid – unfortunately I didn’t write them down and all I remembered afterward was that they would’ve changed the world – but not the actual idea.”

“Yeah, me too,” said Charlie.  “I had the same ideas.”

We all laughed, and it felt good and kind of strange in the presence of a zombie. 

And to be precise, neither zombie laughed.  Not even a snicker.  The female was still horizontal on her gurney, covered in a sheet.  So to be fair, she might have cracked a smile, but we’ll never know.

Old one-arm didn’t.  I think he might have still been pissed about the whole missing arm thing.

Hemp had stocked up the drawers from the mobile lab and withdrew a dropper from one of them, tore the package open and squeezed the rubber tip.  He dipped the plastic receptacle into the Urushiol and water mix.

“Very diluted.  There is literally around 100 parts per million in here now,” he said.  “That’s an educated guess in case you were wondering.”

“I wasn’t,” I said.  “But I’m impressed anyway.

Hemp started walking to the gurney, but then stopped midway.

“Hmm,” he said.

“What?” asked Charlie, Flex and me at the same time.”

“I have another idea.”

He walked back to a drawer and pulled out a small spray bottle.  He unscrewed the sprayer and took the glass of Urushiol and water, pouring it in.

“I want to spray it,” he said.  “First off, that way I don’t have to adjust the table again, and second, in the real world we’d never be administering it with a dropper.”

“True enough,” said Flex.  “When you’re ready, doctor.”

“That would be now,” said Hemp, turning with the spray bottle.  “Charlie, want to do the honors?”

“Hell yes,” she said, taking the bottle from him and dropping her mask again.  She nodded at us and we pulled ours down, too.

She stood about two feet away and extended her arm to within a few inches.  The creature’s horrid face contorted and the tongue flitted and darted, the rotting gums oozing pus as the spray hit the thing in the eyes.

Then it started screaming.  Literally screaming.

And its eyes foamed pink-black, like one of those snakes you used to light on the 4
th
of July and the little tablet just kept growing longer and longer until it burned out.

Only this thing wasn’t burning out.  Soon the foamy shit was erupting from its eye sockets, as though it were rejecting everything inside its skull.  The mouth fell open, the gnashing stopped, and Charlie staggered backward to escape the jettison of flesh and fluids from the monster.  We all moved out of its direct path to avoid being slathered in the shit that now flew six feet from the thing, splattering on the floor. 

Hemp saw the other gurney was in danger of getting hit by the excrement or whatever it could be classified as, and he jumped over the puddle, unlocked the wheel on it and quickly rolled it out of the way.

“Fuck!” shouted Hemp, in an uncharacteristic bout of potty-mouth, no doubt contracted from me and maybe Flex.

Then the zombie’s head strained the leather strap that held it onto the gurney, rocking back and forth.  The flow of whatever it was the thing was spewing had dropped to about half the velocity now, and was all over it.  As we watched, it slowed even more, and finally just ran down what remained of its chin and down its chest.

Standing there, we said nothing.  We simply watched the event conclude. 

Charlie stared at the bottle in her hand.  She looked at Hemp.

“Did that just happen?”

Hemp pulled a towel from the counter and walked to the zombie, who now slumped as much as a strapped-down zombie could slump.  He wiped away the bloody bile and foam from the thing’s face and withdrew a small LED flashlight from his lab coat pocket.

He shone it through the eye socket.

He turned back to us.  “I can see the back of the skull.”

“What?” asked Flex.

“The brain,” said Hemp.   “It’s completely dissolved.  It’s there.”  He pointed to the floor all around us.

“Wow,” I said.  “Hemp.  This is a new weapon.”

“Next on our shopping list,” said Flex, “are some garden sprayers.”

“Think more powerful,” said Hemp.  “Commercial fire extinguishers.  And they’re right here.”

Beneath our masks, everyone was smiling so wide the entire grins couldn’t be seen through the faceplates.  When we left the lab, all four of us just a minute later, we ripped off our masks and Charlie kissed Hemp on the lips.

“I love you too, professor.  By the way,” she said.  “Cleanup on Aisle 5!”

I was really starting to love that girl.

We got the sweeping compound and did the cleanup together, allowing Flex a pass.  His head did still hurt a bit, and we weren’t altogether heartless.

Hemp was as happy as I’d ever seen him.  I knew part of it was because of the discovery and part was because his sweetheart just told him she loved him.

And even as he celebrated the new discovery and embraced Charlie’s professed love, I knew in my heart he was thinking about Max, and how he would’ve enjoyed sharing all of the good news with him.

Of course we all thought of Max.  We all missed Max.

But we had our Hemp, and while we couldn’t completely understand all the chemical processes going on with this new weapon at our disposal, he sure did have us.