Zombieboy

Chapter ph

“An umbrella? For the rain?”, Katie asked wonderingly, “And no knives? Boys are stupid.” Still this pronouncement did not keep her from opening the bread and smearing peanut butter and jelly from the jars onto the pieces with her fingers. Her dad looked down at her then sat down heavily by her side.

“Still he might save us, if he brings the gun, that could get us out of here. You making some of those for me or do I make my own?”, Chuck cracked a beer and pushed the broken water to Katie, who, by way of an answer pushed the bread and jars towards her father while she gobbled down the messy sandwiches she had made herself.

Kyle made it to Katie's house without any problems, it was only a block away and the front door was smashed open. Pushing his way into the house he put his pack down and made his way to Chuck and Missy's bedroom. Along the way he passed Chuckie Jr.'s bedroom, which was empty, the cradle sat like a forlorn object backbit by a pale blue LED night light.

It was dark in the house, too dark normally for Kyle to have seen anything and he stopped in the hallway as he thought about this, his eyes seemed to see thing differently, the darkness was still noticeable, however he could see well enough to avoid using lights or running into the walls, the ambient light coming in from the side window, little more than indirect street lighting inside was enough. Starting again he continued on down the hall. The door to their bedroom was shut and when he tried the doorknob it was locked. 'What's this?', Kyle thought. He knocked on the door softly.

“Missy? Are you in there?”, he called in his sing song voice. No one answered. He tried the door again, no luck, it was locked. He looked in the tiny, tiny hole in the doorknob, his mom could always open it by doing something with the smallest screw driver Kyle had ever seen, when he tried it nothing happened, he had never been able to unlock a door with the tiny screwdriver. Next Kyle tried his shoulder, like the Engineer had done. Unfortunately for Kyle his mass was not enough to force the door in, the thought of running full tilt at the door and slamming into it did not occur to Kyle, instead he went back and got his aluminum baseball bat.

His first swing struck the door in the middle and sunk in with a satisfying crunch. Three more blows and he was through the hollow core exterior and had cracked the interior layer of the door, a few more good hits and he had a hole in the door that he could see through or reach his hand through if he wanted to. First he looked through it. In movies something bad always happened to your hand if you stuck it in a hole. Usually it was some old lady (nineteen year old) who stabbed your arm with a knitting needle or a pair of scissors. Kyle liked his arms, even if they felt kind of numb right now. Looking in he saw the dark room lit up with bright rainbow colors of a living human. Kyle had tried not to look at Chuck or Katie too much, it made him...hungry...he didn't want to hurt them, he didn't think he could hurt Chuck, he was an adult and Kyle was just a kid, and maybe not Katie, she was awfully strong too. This body though, it was not Katie or Chuck, or even Missy or Chuckie....who was it? He found that he could slip into normal vision if he tried hard enough, but it was so dark in the room he couldn't see anything unless he used his special night vision.

Licking his lips, Kyle called in hungrily, “Hello? You alright in there?”

No response. Kyle bashed the hole in the door bigger, no knitting needles in his hand or arm! Eventually he had the hole big enough that he could see into the rest of the room and it was empty. He felt comfortable putting his hand through the door then and after many fumbled attempts he got it unlocked and open. Holding the bat raised up he approached the living body cautiously. Nothing. It was a woman, not too old, like Miss Wallace maybe. Kyle poked her with the bat. He didn't know her, she didn't move. He went past her to the light on the right side of the bed and found the switch to turn it on, then turned back to the body. The woman still wasn't doing anything, though she looked okay to Kyle, better than okay, she looked....delicious. Nervously licking his lips again he said in a whiny, pleading whisper, “Wake up lady! Please wake up!”

He knelt down by her head and smelled her, she smelled like his mom after a long day in the sun playing on her softball league, like sweat and sunscreen. His face hovered near her ear and the side of her neck, the colors, the rainbow pattern were bright and swirling beneath his face. “Wake up lady, please....please...” Kyle nipped at her neck, not drawing blood, he leaned back quickly, “No!” escaped his mouth, but his body said 'yes!' and he found himself leaning forward again. This time he bit her hard enough to draw blood. He sat there for a repulsive moment sucking the side of her neck like vampire, before a moan escaped the young woman's lips. Kyle had a vein, his body knew where to bite, even if he did not. The blood was spurting a warm salty rainbow into his mouth, the woman did not make a further complaint after her initial moaning. Kyle's stomach was still that of a little boy and after twenty minutes it was full to the point of bursting, he felt more alive than he ever had before he felt stong and powerful he felt...he felt high. He kept his mouth on the woman, not wanting to take anymore of her blood in and not wanting it to spill on Chuck and Missy's carpet or mess up their bedroom. Yet he could not take any more, he pulled back and noticed that ragged hole he had bitten into her neck, it was leaking blood slower now and he scrambled for the kleenex on Missy's side of the bed, grabbing them he pushed them into the woman's neck and started pleading with her not to die.

“I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I didn't mean it! I was just so tired, I was just....I...hungry and you were just there and....don't die! Lady please don't die!”, Kyle's voice sounded insincere even to him and he broke down and cried. He was conflicted in his head, knowing what he was and knowing what he had to do to survive, his experience left him incapable of finding a middle ground to reconcile his actions with what he thought his actions should have been. Why hadn't she woken up when he smashed in the door? What was wrong with her? She couldn't have stayed asleep, she couldn't have. Looking at her slowly dissolving rainbow colors he noticed the medicine bottle by the side of her head, pushed half under the bed. He picked it up, it was empty.

'Oh.', he thought, somehow feeling better, but worse too, the bottle was medicine, she probably took the medicine to die, Kyle had heard of that, in tv and when his mom talked about his uncle Ronnie. Kyle didn't have an uncle Ronnie. Probably the woman had taken the medicine and was going to die, Kyle just finished her off first. Or maybe she wasn't going to die. Looking at her Kyle didn't think she was going to make it. Her colors were bad. The pale young woman had kleenex sticking to the side of her neck and her lifeblood was slowly seeping out onto the floor. Kyle looked at his stomach, he had gotten blood on his shirt, his belly was big again and he was getting tired again. All thoughts of bringing Chuck his box drifted out of Kyle's head and he crawled under Chuck's bed, and nested in between the old winter blankets and shoe boxes he found there.

He didn't actually sleep, just reached a point of inactivity as his body digested the raw life force he had taken in. While in this sluggish state the rest of the wounds the engineer had inflicted upon him disappeared, his skin regained its healthy tan and his half mended skull fully healed up. The energy he had was more than sufficient for these wounds and the excess worked wonders on his boy body, making him stronger and more agile than he had ever been, the changes were not all physical, a neurologist would have been astounded at what he saw going on in the boy's head.

Kyle was back to himself in only three short hours, it was nothing like the original change that had taken place the first time he had fed, the groundwork had already been laid for the event that he would encounter more food. His body focused first and foremost on healing any damage it has sustained and it did so rapidly, then it sought to restore him to what he had been before becoming infected, when that goal was reached, the rest of the energy was split into a reserve for later use and strengthening his current frame for anticipated conflicts. It was nature and natural selection at its most virulent.

His eyes sprung open and he let out a gasp, “Oh know! Chuck needs that box and I forget about it!”, he pushed his way out from under the bed on Chuck's side. He looked at the nightstand and opened the wee double doors in the bottom of it, revealing several books sitting on top of a metal box. Sliding the box out from under the books Kyle lifted it by the black plastic handle and placed it on the bed. He tried to open it, it was locked. It was heavy too. Very heavy. Shaking it Kyle heard papers and something metal inside the box. He could hear the stuff quite clearly, his sense of hearing seemed better than it had been before. Standing up straight Kyle listened for breathing, from the young woman on the other side of the bed. Nothing. As he crept around to her side, afraid of what he might see Kyle was again assaulted by the desire to use the bathroom. He scooted towards the toilet he could see in Chuck's bathroom and barely made it before his bowels exploded in a nasty smelling mess. While sitting on the toilet he noticed one of his crocs was missing from his journey under the bed, he could also see clearly down Missy's side of the bed and there was no one there. Finishing up his toilet he stood up and walked back into the bedroom, only after double flushing the 'economy' toilet and washing his hands extra long under the tap. The woman was gone. Ducking down he looked under the bed for his croc. He snagged it from where it was wedged under a blanket and put it back on his foot. Circling back around the bed he picked up the box and tried not to notice the blood trail in the carpet leading from Chuck's room.

He made his way back to the living room, picking up his bat along the way. At the front door he thought about putting his back pack back on, then decided not to, he figured Chuck and Katie would want to come back here to pack up or hide out, so he would leave his stuff here. He did change his shirt, stuffing the dirty one down under all the rest. His hand touched his wind up LED flashlight and he thought he better bring it with him, in case Katie or Chuck needed it to see. So he stuffed that in his the front pocket of his overalls. Sitting his pack neatly by the door he kept the bat in one hand and carried the box in the other. He noticed the blood trail leading from the front door to the street and up the street he thought he could make out the lady he had...bitten. Kyle was going down the street and turned his back on her abruptly, shutting her and what he had done to a far corner of his mind.

...back ..home.. next...