Chapter 4

As the door to the apartment rapidly began to splinter behind her, Kathy turned and ran for the balcony. She had no clear plan to follow from there. Panic and terror drove her in that direction,so she followed unquestioningly.

 

Her fear made her fingers slow and stupid. The simple act of pushing the latch slider down and opening the goddamn door seemed almost impossible. Behind her, the cheap pressed-wood door to the apartment let out a sharp pop! as a crack rent the length of it in a jagged line. The next blow made the door tent inward at the seam of the crack, and splinters flew.

 

FuckshitfuckshitfuckfuckingCOMEON! She got the latch to slide down, finally, and violently flung the glass door open. It zipped across its track briskly, and it slammed into the other side hard enough to shatter the large pane into a zillion winking fragments. Kathy dove through this brilliant, dangerous confetti and landed in a crouch on the balcony, then leapt straight up and clambered like a monkey onto the railing. Not even once considering that the ground was fifty-some-odd feet below her, Kathy jumped up from the two-inch-wide railing and scrabbled to pull herself up onto the balcony straight above her. Her pumping adrenalin gave the girl a wiry agility of the likes she'd never even suspected she possessed - she flung herself effortlessly over the railing above her, executing a pull-up that smoothly flowed into an aerial full-body vault. She landed on her feet and was immediately seized by the arm from behind with a strong, warm grip. Kathy whirled, a war-scream caught in her throat, and was pulled into the strong, bosomy embrace of a towering, middle-aged woman. She stifled Kathy's shriek against her green blouse and rapidly hauled her backwards into the woman's own apartment. She wrapped the confused and struggling girl tightly against her with one giant arm whilst pulling the door shut behind them with the other. Kathy's mind was derailed by this new and strange turn of events, and all she could think to do was push and fight against the incredibly strong embrace of the woman who, apparently, lived in the apartment above hers.

 

"Stop it! You crazy little thing, you stop fighting Misha right now! I save you, stupid girl, stop it!" the woman hissed down into her ear. She smelled of talcum powder and flowery perfume, and her speech was heavily accented, as if she hailed originally from Eastern Europe. She gave Kathy a short, sharp squeeze that instantly crushed the air and fight out of her, ugh! Kathy went limp, and the woman brusquely flung her onto an over-stuffed love seat.

 

She whispered, "You are crazy little thing, to fight me so! I come out onto balcony when I hear the monsters break your door in, and I hear you screaming. I was going to pull you up to my balcony, but ... you do it yourself just fine. You could be gymnast, eh? Ha."

 

Kathy stared up at the woman and her surroundings warily. Misha was at least six feet tall, broad-shouldered, crop-haired and square-jawed. The woman was endowed with a massive pair of breasts that threatened to rip assunder her plain, lime-green blouse at any second. The aging woman was somewhat overweight, but was visibly muscular - she'd easily overpower the average man, and give most strong men a run for their money. The apartment itself was dark, plainly furnished, extremely neat and smelled of boiled cabbage and Febreeze. There were a proliferation of trophies and medals on display on the walls and on top of a long shelf that ran the length of the far wall - trophies that were adorned with figures who were throwing massive barbells aloft in various poses of power and triumph.

 

"I ... I don't really know what's going on. Can you tell me? Can you explain this all to me? I was ... I was sleeping, and I woke up and on the TV there were these things, and Stacy's gone and she got bitten last night and are they really dead, are those things actually fucking dead -" She was sobbing, suddenly, and Misha sat heavily beside her, to rock her back and and coo "Ssshhh, ssshhh," in a low, husky whisper. "Be quiet, little girl. Don't cry, you are too lovely and young to cry, okay? Sshhh ..."

 

Kathy was, on a dim and far-away level, completely amazed by her own tears. When was the last time she'd cried? Like, for real crying, not pretend-so-I-can-get-my-own-way crying. It felt good, to weep into the polyester swell of the woman's massive chest, and be held in her strength. It felt like coming home.

 

"There is a virus. It is man-made, but no one has come forward to say that they were the ones responsible. If you are bitten, it will kill you within a day." Misha hesitated, then continued, speaking low and easy into the top of Kathy's head. "When you are dead, you arise again quickly, and then you are no longer human. You are a monster. You understand?"

 

Kathy nodded yes. She was covered in gooseflesh again. Misha rubbed her arms and back with rough, strong hands. "Don't cry anymore, little girl. You are safe here with Misha."

 

Her voice muffled by the rock-hard pectoral that topped the basketball swell of Misha's right breast, Kathy said, "What are we going to do, now? They ate the all cops outside. I saw it on the TV, I mean literally I saw it happen. All the rest of them are busy fighting the zombies everywhere else, and they're all probably getting eaten, too. There's no one left to come save us."

 

"Misha does not need saving," she responded gruffly. "Misha will be saviour for us both. We will hide here, little girl. We will hide and wait and be as quiet as mice on this little couch. And we will see what happens next. This is all we can do."

 

So they lapsed into a species of apprehensive silence, and they waited. For some reason, the incoming wave of the undead invaders had chose to skip the sixth floor and pillage the seventh floor instead. Vague thumping and high-pitched caterwauling could be heard drifting through the ceiling from up there. It was best to try and block it out, so they did ... and, afterwhile a while longer, Kathy fell into an exhausted sleep. Misha cradled the sleek creature against her massive chest and stroked her hair, and remembered a girl in her past who had felt much like this one in her arms.

 

Misha would protect the precious one who slept so soundly against her. She would smash to pieces any fiend who tried to force its way into her home. She would break them, each and every one of the foul things.

 

Still naked, Pagan heaved himself up off of the floor and, stepping over his erstwhile henchman's dead body (gotta clean that shit up, nigga shit himself when I blasted him) he had look at the soon-to-be-deceased motherfucker who'd dared to ruin his post-coital bliss by hammering on the fucking door.

 

It was a cop - two cops, actually, a younger dude and an older, Hispanic pig who was sporting a drinker's nose and a heavy, greying moustache. They both had their guns drawn, and they both looked terrified.

 

"Open up, it's the police!" the older cop shouted at the door. The two cops exchanged a look and then the old bull continued his rap; it came out sounding tired and rehearsed.

 

"There's been an act of bio-chemical terrorism. Martial law has been declared. You're not safe in your home, or anywhere else except the closest Safety Zone. Come out, and we'll take you there." The younger cop was already shaking his head - his eyes said, they're gone or they're dead, so let's just kick the goddamn door in and get on with this shit. The older cop began to count silently - One, two, three ... Pagan watched the guy's lips move and stifled back the urge to count aloud with him. Rescuers (sort of) ... a small, small part of him was touched, kinda. In fact, if the oinkers had just knocked, recited their little speech and then moved the fuck on, Pagan would have been content to let them go on their way. But no, of course they had to fucking stick their snouts where they plain just didn't belong - here the fuckers were, gearing up to kick in the door to his honeymoon suite ... to barge in on his perfect love with their guns and their moral bullshit ... no, these motherfuckers weren't going to be alive for much longer. Fuck that. He scooped the Glock up off the carpet, and took another peek through the smeary little fish-eye lens. The cop was mouthing eight, nine ... while his young partner readied to slam a booted foot into the door, looking all Captain America and shit.

 

"... TEN, MOTHERFUCKER!" Pagan hollered, and shot through the door at knee-height, BAP BA-BAP BAP BAP!

 

Agonized screams. His madman's intuition told him to get out of the way, so Pagan dropped his fat bulk onto the floor and rolled to the right just as a couple of .40 caliber bullets smashed through the newly-ventilated door and whistled through the air where he'd just been standing. There was a poof of plaster dust from the ceiling, and someone began to shriek and wail in the room above.

 

"Fuck! My legs! You COCKSUCKER, my LEGS!" the older cop screamed, and another volley of shots punched holes through the splintering door. There was the whine of a riccochet outside, and quite abruptly the younger cop stopped making any noise.

 

"Shot him! You fucking shot him, you son of bitch!" Hispanic Pig cried out. He sounded teary-eyed and shocked.

 

"Naw, homie, you shot him. Riccochet, you dumb fucking pig. And you shot someone upstairs, too. You fucking suck, yo."

 

"What the hell is the matter with you, man? You fucking shot at us!"

 

"I can hear you cryin', pig! I can hear you cryin' like a little bitch out there! Your shit is weak, Cuz."

 

"Of course I'm fuckin' crying, you blew my fucking shins to pieces and my partner's brains are all over my fucking FACE!"

 

"What a bitch," Pagan snorted at the man, and warily circled around the door, moving his foul flesh with the noiseless grace of a bloated shadow. How many rounds did he have left in the Nine? The cop had body armour on: he was naked and vulnerable. How to get a kill shot?

 

"You know what, Cuz?" Pagan chuckled, "I think I'mma just leave you out there to bleed. Fuck it. I've got a dead bitch to screw, I'll deal with you after, fuckin' busted-ass Ponch-lookin' motherfucker."

 

Another shot punched through the door in response. It tinged off of the bedframe, and the big mirror that was attached to the long dresser instantly shattered. "Yeah, fuck you too, nigga," Pagan muttered. He ambled over to the bed, flipped it over - and Stacy, who by now had struggled mostly free of her restaints, lunged forward and sank her teeth into his leg, just above the knee. Her milky eyes locked onto his. She almost looked like she was smiling around the fatty piece of his hide that was clenched in her mouth.

 

Oh you fucking BITCH!" he roared, and he smashed the handle of the Glock into the side of the dead thing's eye socket. Her eye popped out (glup!) and dangled beside her bulbous nose by the corded optic nerve. However, this was not nearly enough to make her release her jaws; instead, Stacy began to viciously chew at the flesh between her teeth, ripping skin and sawing into meat with her dull human teeth. Pagan howled up at the ceiling ... oh Jesus pole-smoking Christ, it burned. He fought against shock and seized his undead lover by the underside of her lower jaw, then squeezed for all he was worth. Her mouth popped open fully and Pagan tumbled back to land heavily on his bulging ass, whup. Blood was pumping from the ragged tear on his leg in gouts. The she-thing tried to come after him, clawing and flailing, but she was still tied up enough that she couldn't reach him - so the dead girl grabbed hold of the shag rug and began to drag the bed forward with her arms, teeth bared in a death's head grimace.

 

"Goddamn it! You bit me! You fucking bit me, you fucking bitch! Now I'm FUCKED!!! ARRRGH!" Pagan pistoned his stubby sausage legs at her, battered her. A rib snapped beneath his foot. Her already-broken nose was smashed and flattened entirely. She streaked his cellulite-bubbled appendages with bloody scratches; he shrieked profanity and kicked even harder, looking like a naked lunatic who is riding an invisible bicycle. Stacy snagged one of the kicking feet with both hands and promptly bit into his toes, crrrrunch. Blood sprayed and drooled from the corners of her mouth.

 

"OH HOLY FUCK MOTHER OF GOD FUCKING FUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!!!!" he screamed, and drove his free leg at her head as hard as he could. The blow drove Stacy's skull at a downward angle, and her neck, long and graceful in life, snapped with the sound of a dry branch being stepped on. Her jaws reflexively relaxed and Pagan immediately pulled his foot free of her mouth's severing grip. The three smallest toes were all dangling by shreds of meat and tendon, looking abused and forlorn at the end of his foot. Blood was gushing out rapidly, and the pain ... oh sweet baby Jesus, the fucking pain.

 

He stumbled to the bathroom, limping and lurching like he was afflicted with polio. Tears of agony streamed over his saggy fat cheeks and dripped onto his flabby tits. He wrapped a towel tightly around the wound above his knee. He had another look at his foot and promptly threw up into the tub. It was a fuckin' hideous mess. Pain screeched up the nerve highway from the mutilated toes, it raced up the fat man's leg and sunk iron fingers into his inner thigh. He was fucked. The virus was in his bloodstream, working its vile magic. His life was now officially a stop watch, ticking inexorably down to zero.

 

But, in spite of all this, Pagan's cock was hard. Rock hard.

 

"I'll show you, you bitch. I'll fucking show you." He grabbed a second towel and wrapped it around his foot tightly, then staggered his way over the Adidas bag. Crying a little, Pagan rummaged through the bag with shaking hands. He was panting harshly. He pulled out a small meat cleaver, ten inches long and wickedly sharp. He turned to face the girl's awkward, dragging approach and fell on her. He seized her clawing hands and pinned them with his knees to the floor, then rammed the blade straight into the zombie's gnashing mouth. It penetrated easily, slicing her tongue in two and cutting through the back of her throat like butter. He fucked her mouth with the cleaver, slamming it in and out, smashing out teeth and churning the inside of her maw into a mass of wet, stringy meat.

 

"Suck THIS dick, punk bitch! SUCK THAT SHIT, YOU DEAD WHORE!" Abruptly, he threw the cleaver aside and leaned forward, pinning the back of her head to the floor with his hands. He pushed his erection into Stacy's open eye socket. He pushed it all the way in and started grinding madly.

 

"Bitch," he panted, "cunt, whore, slut, fuckin' take it, fuckin' take it, ohhhhh you fuckin' bit me, you fuckin' BIT me, ohhhhhhhhh fuck YOUUUUUU-"

 

Pagan came then. He spewed his load into her skull and screamed in triumph as he did so. The orgasm transcended his pain and sent him into a world of prism-scattered colors and vivid constellations of star-burst explosions. It was better than heroin. It was better than anything, ever. He spewed his load into her brain and, for a brief moment in time, he was like a God.

 

It made the death sentence of her bite seem petty. What was death, in the face of such ecstasy? How could such a trifling concept even hope to stand against the ecclesiastical glory of this communion? He'd die a million times over to experience this moment again, even just once.

 

Pagan fell off the dead girl and rolled away to lie on his face, out of reach of her rending nails and broken teeth. He felt calm, powerful, and full of new meaning. He understood, now, that the vagina was merely a rudimentary sexual orifice. To truly appreciate the experience of penetrating her body, a man simply must fuck a woman in the brain.