Stoned Dead

Jack and Mel had just finished sharing a joint when they saw their first reanimated. They were each lying on their own shabby couch in their equally shabby living room in their shabby student digs, enjoying the high. The cable had been out all day, so they sat watching the static on the TV with the volume turned down. It was surprisingly entertaining when high.

Mel glanced out of the window and decided that he was hallucinating.

"Dude, are you sure this shit is good?" Mel asked, gesturing vaguely at the half-full baggie of weed on the coffee table.

"It's the same shit I always buy," Jack replied.

"Well, either I'm tripping balls or there's some weirdo staggering around in the front yard."

Jack peered out the window. "I see him too," Jack reassured his friend.

Neither one of the college students was inclined to do anything but watch and laugh as the weirdo stumbled across the yard and pressed himself against the picture window of the living room. They figured it was a joke, some new type of prank cooked up by the freshmen in the dorms, the ones with too much time on their hands. As pranks go, it was pretty good. The guy was even rubbing something thick and coagulated on the window that was probably barbecue sauce standing in for blood.

"I hope he's gonna clean that off," Jack remarked idly.

After a few minutes ticked by, they decided that the joke had lasted too long. Since it showed no signs of stopping, he and Mel finally hauled themselves off of their couches and went outside.

Jack was big, beefy, and very athletic. He played on the university's rugby team. He tended to get a lot of female attention. Mel, on the other hand, was short and thin. Still, he was an excellent wingman, learned in the art of peeling girlfriends away from their hot friends so Jack could go in for the kill. The relationship wasn't one-sided, either. Mel sometimes hooked up with the best friends, and some of them were almost as hot as their girlfriends. Mel was not, however, an athlete, despite his much-loved home defense Louisville Slugger he brought outside just in case.

"Hey!" Jack shouted. "Get out of here, dude! And wipe that shit off our window, bro!" The man turned toward them and stumbled forward, and that's when they realized it wasn't a joke; that it was, in fact, deadly serious. As the man turned, his guts began falling out of his belly, looking like bloody sausage. His guts may have fallen entirely if some of them hadn't gotten caught on his shirt. This was no freshman prank. It was real. It smelled awful. Mel gagged and hooked his t-shirt up over his nose. It didn't help all that much.

"How is this even possible?" Mel asked through his t-shirt, bat at the ready. He imagined that if it wasn't for the pot he'd be puking his guts up.

"I don't know, bro," Jack said. "I'm not pre-med or anything, but I'm pretty sure this guy should be dead."

The man continued to stumble toward them.

"Get back, man," Mel said, an icy, primal fear spreading across his chest. "Get back or I'm gonna bury this bat in your head, man."

Still the man moved toward them. He was making a sort of grunting hiss that people usually didn't make. Jack balled his fists up, poised to coldcock the apparition when it got close enough.

"I wouldn't touch that if I were you," Mel said. Jack backed off. Mel raised the bat and smacked the man in the face with it. The blow had clearly broken his jaw, but he still kept moving.

"Hit him again!" Jack shouted.

Mel hit him squarely on the side of his head. The man went down. Mel rubbed his bat on the man's pants and then wiped it in the grass to get rid of the bits of blood and brain.

Jack hurled. Mel was silently pleased that he was tougher than Jack at something.

"We need to call the cops or something," Jack said, wiping the chunder off of his chin.

"Are you serious? We're stoned and there's a bag of killer weed on the table.

"Hey man, when they find this dead guy in the yard they're probably going to knock on the door and start asking questions, like 'How did you miss the dead guy on your lawn?' So we should probably tell them first."

"Shit." Mel took out his cell phone and dialed 911.

"It's giving me a busy signal," Mel said, perplexed.

Jack wasn't listening. His gaze was all the way down the street.

"Did you hear me?"

"There's another one," Jack said. "Down at the end of the street." Mel turned in that direction.

"More than one," Mel said, squinting.

"Maybe we should go inside," Jack said.

"Uh huh."

Once inside, they turned to the TV, but still they only got static - until the power quit working. Meanwhile, the street outside became more and more crowded with - they didn't know what to call them.

Mel found a hand-crank radio in the kitchen cupboard, part of his half-assed emergency kit, and wound it up for a minute or so. Then he turned it on and found a station that was still broadcasting.

"...psychotic episode," said the DJ on the radio. "I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. The dead are coming back to life and biting the living. The dead are eating the living. This isn't a joke. This is serious. I wish it wasn't. I wish it was a psychotic episode.

"We also have reports that when someone is bitten, they die and then reanimate. Don't allow yourself to be bitten at all costs. They move slow, but once one gets hold of you, that's it.

"There's a crowd of them around the station. They're trying to get in, pushing against all the doors and windows. We're going to broadcast as long as possible, but we can't get to the generator shed to refuel it.

"We could use some help. If the Army or the National Guard can hear us, we're at 220 Radio Road in Wilmington, North Carolina. Please help us. Please, if you can hear us, help us!"

Jack and Mel listened to the radio announcer for awhile longer, but when he started repeating what he already knew they switched the radio off. By then there were reanimated at every window and door pushing against the glass.

"Where the hell are they coming from?" Jack whispered. "Why are they here?"

"Maybe they heard the radio. We have to get out of here," Mel whispered back. "If they get in here, we are fucked."

"We've got no way out," Jack said, fear rising in his voice.

"But we can go up."

"Maybe they can too."

"Let's get all the food and water and weed into the attic. They won't be able to pull the staircase down. We'll nail it shut."

"Then what?"

"We wait for the cavalry, bro."

Two Days Later

"...Judgement Day is at hand. Repent, sinners! The dead have risen! Jesus is coming! Give up your evil ways before it's too late! Prepare for the..."

"Turn that shit off," Jack barked for the fiftieth time, annoyed.

"There's nothing else on the radio," Mel argued.

"I'd rather listen to nothing than listen to that."

"Okay." Mel snapped the radio off. "I'm bored."

It was hot in the attic in which Jack and Mel had barricaded themselves along with a few day's worth of food and water, three if they stretched it. Jack spent his waking hours prowling the space like a tomcat, checking the hastily nailed boards guarding the door for signs of weakness, not that it mattered. They were out of nails.

The plan was to wait for the Army or the National Guard to show up and rescue them, but so far no Humvees or tanks or troops had appeared, nor did they hear any reassuring bursts of approaching machine gun fire. The only thing Jack saw when he peered out the window were the reanimated shuffling up and down the street. Some of the reanimated had managed to catch a dog or something dog-sized and were crowded around it, their hands and faces red with its blood. Jack felt for the animal, whatever it was.

"We're gonna run out of shit soon," Jack said. "What are we supposed to do then?"

"Man, someone's gonna come for the survivors," Mel said. "Relax. Let's blow a J or something."

"I don't think this is a really good time to get stoned," Jack said. "What if we have to fight or run?"

"I can't think of a better time to get stoned," Mel said. "There's no way they're gonna get up here," Mel assured him. "Not before we come down, anyway. It'll help pass the time."

Mel lit a joint and passed it to Jack. It only took them a few minutes to reduce the joint to a roach.

"I got cottonmouth bad," Mel complained.

"Do not drink the rest of our water," Jack said. "Speaking of which..." He moved to the corner of the attic where they were keeping the bucket they used to empty their waste in. Mel could tell by the sound Jack's pissing made that it was almost full. They'd have no choice but to dump it out of the window soon, even though Jack was of the opinion that it would attract the reanimated to the house.

Just as Jack was finishing up, their ears pricked up at the sound of a helicopter.

"Thank God," Mel exclaimed.

"Don't thank God yet," said Jack. "They've got to see us. I'll climb out onto the roof and wave."

"I'll come too."

It took a moment and considerable elbow grease to pry the attic window open, but they finally raised it enough to clamber out on the roof. As an afterthought, Mel took the much-depleted baggie of weed, some EZ Widers and a lighter with him onto the roof. He doubted that the Red Cross would provide them with ganja. The sound of the helicopter continued to get closer, and it was heading right for them.

"Awesome," said Mel. "I think they see us!" It was then that he noticed that the chopper was oscillating left and right, as if the pilot was not in complete control of the vehicle. It continued to head more or less toward them.

"It's gonna crash!" Jack shouted. "Jump!"

"I'll break my legs!" Mel complained.

"Jump, God damn it."

They ran to the lowest edge of the roof, some twelve feet off of the ground. Jack jumped first, his athletic skill combining with some ancient arboreal instinct that made him drop and roll with the landing. Mel did not roll, and he felt a crippling pain as his ankle bent sideways upon landing. Jack ran away from the house without looking back, unaware that Mel was crippled by his landing off the roof. Mel followed Jack as best he could, and he almost made it to the relative shelter of the oak tree in the neighbor's yard when the helicopter hit the house, smashing it to bits. One of the bits smacked Mel in the back of the head and he went down like a sack of potatoes.

Mel awoke to find Jack squatting over him, smacking him in the face. He instinctively put his arms off to ward off the blows. Why the hell was Jack hitting him?

"Cut it out," Mel said, his tongue and lips heavy, as if he were very drunk. "What the fuck?"

"Get up, man!" Jack fairly shouted. "We got to get out of here before these fuckers eat us, dude!"

Indeed, the reanimated were beginning to move towards the noise of the helicopter crash, which meant that they were also moving toward Mel and Jack from both ends of the street.

Jack put his hand out and pulled Mel to his feet. Mel staggered for a few moments before his good leg was under him. Leaning heavily on Jack's rugby-hardened frame, the pair moved as fast as they could, darting between the reanimated as they made grabs at the fleeing young men. The going was slow, and they had to double back and detour to avoid the reanimated, but eventually they got clear of main crowd of reanimated who were attracted by the disaster that had befallen Jack and Mel's run-down little house.

"I can't keep this up much longer, bro," Mel said. "I've got to get off this ankle, and we've got to find a place to hole up again."

"No shit," Jack shot back at him. "And some weapons would be nice too. Let's bust into one of these houses," Jack suggested, inclining his head to a little two story house not to far from where they were.

"What if someone's in there?" Mel asked.

"Maybe they'll help us."

"Or shoot us. Or eat us, dude," Mel cautioned.

The three-legged creature that Mel and Jack had become limped painfully to the porch of the little house. Jack banged on the door. There was no answer. He tried the doorknob next, but the house was locked.

"Break it down!" Mel ordered.

"If we break it, how are we going to keep the reanimated out?" Jack hissed through his teeth.

"If we don't get off the street now we're going to be a reanimated Happy Meal," Mel shot back.

Jack shouldered the door with considerable force. After a few more hits, the door gave way and they slipped inside.

"Hey," said Mel, sinking into the nearest chair. "Put something in front of that door."

"Shhh!" commanded Jack. "We don't know if any of them are in there. We've got to clear the house before we lock ourselves inside."

"With what? We don't even have a sharpened pencil."

"I'll find something while I check the house, I'm sure," Jack said optimistically. "Hopefully a gun or something. Sit tight."

When Jack encountered his first blind corner he became almost panic-stricken that his hands were empty and devoid of weapons. Parting with Mel had for some reason undermined his self-confidence. He needed something stout to carry should he need to bash a reanimated. He looked around, but nothing jumped out at him as being a useful makeshift weapon. He opened a closet door and found nothing but coats and gloves and hats. The need to find a weapon only got stronger within him. With a sudden flash of inspiration he took all of the coats off of the hanging rod and dropped them into the floor of the closet. Then he removed the rod. It was longer than Mel's lost Louisville Slugger, but it would serve the purpose. It was solid and had some heft to it, even if the sweet spot delivered less force than Mel's beloved baseball bat had.

Screwing up his nerve, he peered around the corner into the kitchen. The door to the refrigerator was wide open, and a reanimated was squatting in the corner eating what looked like a raw pot roast. Jack didn't look to closely; instead, he retreated a few steps down the hall.

The reanimated would have to go, he knew, but he was reluctant to pick a fight with it. Still, it would be better to attack it while it was occupied instead of when he was in the reanimateds' sights. He returned to the kitchen, walked up to the reanimated and swung at his head with the dowel rod. It connected with a nauseatingly wet thud. The reanimated went down and was still.

The room smelled of rotting meat, so Mel moved to close the refrigerator. The second reanimated was on the other side of the door, effectively hiding itself from Jack until the refrigerator door was closed. Jack was taken totally by surprise. The reanimated was an old woman, but her grip was like a vice around his left bicep. She began to pull herself toward him, her mouth open in seeming anticipation of the first chuck she would take out of him.

Jack was too close to her to swing his weapon effectively, so he thrust it at her chest. He heard an almost unnatural crackling as the rod broke her sternum along with several ribs. Jack waited for her to go down, but her grip on his wrist was as strong as it had been before butting her with the rod. He thrust the rod at her again and again. Dark, thick blood oozed from her chest, but still she would not release her grip.

He had time for one more attack before the reanimated would bite him. Operating on instinct, he poked her in the nose with the closet rod with all the strength he could muster. Her nose was completely flattened onto her face. She fell, easing her grip on Mel's bicep enough so that he was able to twist his arm free.

The kitchen had two exits beside the doorway to the hall. One was a door that led to a back porch, and the other was a door that led into the basement. Jack decided not to search the basement. Instead, he shut the door, bolted it with a completely inadequate bolt, and wedged a kitchen chair under the doorknob. He didn't know if the chair would stop a reanimated, but at least it would make a clatter as it was pushed over, giving them at least some kind of warning.

Having cleared the first floor of the house, Jack went upstairs. It seemed like each step screamed his presence as he put his weight on it, a squeak like a thunderbolt that would surely attract a reanimated. None appeared at the top of the stairs, however. He checked one bedroom and then the other and found nothing human or formerly human. The bathroom was similarly empty.

Out of curiosity he opened the medicine cabinet. Most of the cabinet contained the regular items and medicines he did not recognize, except for one: Vicoden. Jack put them in his pocket for Mel. If they could dull the pain enough, maybe he'd be able to walk or run from the house when the time came, and Jack had a feeling that the time would come sooner or later.

After Jack left the living room to check the rest of the house, Mel could not help but to focus on his ankle. He discovered that he could move it a little bit, although at the cost of some pretty serious pain. That meant it probably wasn't broken, which was good news. Unhappily, Mel could hardly put any weight on it at all without an exquisite agony shooting up his leg. He sat back down.

Mel recalled hearing that you weren't supposed to take off your shoe with an ankle sprain unless you were about to receive medical attention. If he took his shoe off, he would never get it back on again. He limped over to the couch and put the ankle up onto the coffee table. Elevating it provided some relief, but he wished he could ice it down. He thought about getting some from the kitchen until he realized that without power there was no ice. It was hard to believe that he was living in a world without ice.

Mel heard footsteps on the porch outside. They weren't normal footsteps. They were slow and shuffling as if an army of the very old were gathering for an attack. What attracted them, anyway? Could they smell the living? Could they hear them? Could they remember that he and Jack had fled to this house. Whatever the reason, Mel knew he was in trouble. It was only a matter of time before one of them figured out that the front door was not secure.

Mel's first instinct was to call out to Jack for help. Fortunately he realized that yelling was sure to bring the reanimated through the door. Until Jack came back, he was on his own. He limped over to the front door. The frame had been partially broken, so it was impossible to latch or bolt the door. The best he could do was to put the chain on it, which he did as quietly as he could. He didn't have much faith that it would hold once the reanimated started pushing on it.

What he needed was something he could use to brace the door. The chair in the living room was too light, and the couch and coffee table were too heavy for him to push with his sprained ankle, and they would probably make a shit-load of noise if he tried. Mel felt the seconds bleeding away, taking him that much closer to the moment that the reanimated would find the front door. He limped back to the couch and put his injured leg back on the coffee table. He figured that he might as well be comfortable until the reanimated came storming in.

A few minutes later Jack came galloping down the steps. Mel put his finger to his lips, but Jack was oblivious to it.

"Hey," he said in a normal, conversational tone, "I found some Vicodin for you." He tossed the bottle of medicine to Mel who fumbled and dropped it.

"Shut up, dude!" Mel said in a strangled whisper. It was too late. The reanimated moved to the source of the noise that had come out of the front door. The chain became taught as the reanimated began pushing on it, their hands creeping around the door as they grabbed at whatever living flesh might be inside. Jack instinctively began pushing the door closed, leaning his powerful frame into it.

"Don't bother with that," Mel said. "There's no way to keep it shut. We have to get out of here."

"Back door," Jack replied. He grabbed Mel and pulled him up. Mel leaned on his shoulder as they moved awkwardly toward the back of the house. They were about halfway to the kitchen when they heard the door chain snap and the door bang open against the wall.

Fortunately, the back porch was free of reanimated. As they made their way down the steps, the reason became apparent. The yard was surrounded by a four foot fence. There were a few reanimated along the perimeter who had been wandering around until Jack and Mel made their appearance. They turned and started toward the boys, but they were stymied by the fence.

"I don't think they can climb," Mel said. "If they could they'd be in here already."

"Maybe, but we can't stay in this backyard forever. We need someplace to hide, like another house."

"I don't know if I can get over the fence," Mel said. "Maybe you'd better go without me."

"No way, broheim. We stick together."

"Thanks, man."

"Best wingman ever." They bumped fists.

"So, where do we go over the fence?" Mel asked.

"Where there are the fewest reanimated," Jack replied. "We'll coax them over, whack them with my club, and go over when it's clear."

"Sounds good to me."

It took about ten minutes to beat all of the reanimated down along the back fence. Jack's arm ached, but the job was done. He helped Mel over the fence, an awkward and painful business, then hopped over it himself. Panting, they looked at the back of the house they found themselves in the backyard of. A lone reanimated was staggering down the driveway between the houses.

"What do you think?" Jack asked.

"It looks okay from back here, but we should probably go around to the front and peek in the window first.

"Okay."

On their way to the front, Jack paused long enough to cave in the head of the lone reanimated.

Unfortunately, the curtains were drawn in the front windows of the house, making it impossible to see inside. The neighborhood reanimated started to close in on them, adding a certain urgency to their decision-making process.

"We should go to another house," Mel said. "One where we can see."

"We don't have time," Jack said, watching as the reanimated shambled toward them. "How many could there be in there, anyway? A couple, at most."

"Could be a large family," Mel speculated.

Jack tested the doorknob. It was unlocked.

"I'll open the door a crack and make sure the coast is clear," Jack said.

He opened the door. He hadn't cracked it more than a few inches when it was pulled out of his hands. Multiple reanimated came spilling out onto the porch, surrounding Jack and Mel and closing in tightly. Mel stepped back onto this bad ankle and collapsed onto the porch. It turned out to be a blessing, because it was easier to crawl away from them.

Jack had no such luck. He was striking as many as he could while trying to avoid being bitten at the same time. Mel, clear of the action, looked around for some kind of weapon, but there was nothing, not even a rock. He resolved to enter the fray empty-handed and try to pull the reanimated away from Jack, and he was just about to do so when a minivan pulled up to the curb.

"Help me!" Mel screamed.

"He's done for," the driver of the minivan said. He was a rough-looking guy, and Mel distractedly noted that the minivan probably didn't belong to him. "Get in!"

"I can't..." Mel stammered.

"Get in before you get bit," the driver said. "I ain't gonna wait forever."

Mel looked back at the swarm of reanimated surrounding his friend. He couldn't tell if Jack was bitten or not.

"Now!" the driver said.

Without making a conscious decision, Mel limped over to the minivan and climbed in through the side door painfully. The driver stomped the accelerator before Mel could close the door. He stared guiltily out the back window as the reanimated began to rip Jack apart.

I thought that would be me, Mel thought, reaching into his pocket for his dope. I thought that would be me.