89.4 Zombie Radio

Dalton and I walked until the crack of dawn. We were exhausted, hungry and both fearing the worst had happened. I was doing my best to try and drown out the thoughts, but no matter what I did, they always came flooding back. My image of the stranger we picked up continued to change, and he kept getting bigger, with more piercings. When he started to grow demon horns I knew I was going insane. I should have at least learned his name when I met him. I should have told Layla to be careful. This is all my fault.

I glanced in the distance and seen the shadows of civilization up ahead. I had my fingers and toes crossed that when I got up the road, I would see sign that read "B-View is right here." I was also praying for it to have a map on it that had an arrow pointing to where Layla was at. How the hell were we supposed to find these girls in this town anyways? We didn't even know if they were here. I was starting to feel even more crazy. I decided to voice my concerns to Dalton, and see if he had any ideas.

"Dalton, I've been thinking. How the hell are we supposed to find them?" I asked.
"Well, I was thinking we search every street relentlessly until we see that guy's rusted out truck," he replied. I hadn't thought of that. Thank God one of us still had our wits about us. I looked up and read the Billboard overhead. "Jesus Is Lord Over Bellevue," it said. We were headed in the right direction, and that was a good feeling. So B-View, stood for Bellevue this whole time. I'm glad Jesus was lord there, because we were going to need all the help we could get.

When we finally got within the corporation limits, the sun was finally up over the horizon, and it looked like it was going to be a nice day for a relentless search, if there was such a thing. I just hoped there was a convenient store up ahead. If I didn't get something to drink soon, I was going to throw up in my mouth and start swishing the puke around. I'm not sure if it would have made me feel better, but it would have made me forget about how dry my mouth was.

We were about a mile into the town and I finally found a vending machine. I wanted to take revenge on every pop machine that ever ate my dollar right then and there, but before I could even get my bat out, Dalton was handing me two dollars. I bought two waters, and we continued down the road until we reached what looked like main street. Dalton and I looked at each other, and we knew what the other was thinking. Where did we go from here?

"How long do you think it will take us to search this whole town?" Dalton asked.

"I think if we really try, we can have it done in a day," I answered. "I'm not sure how big this place is, but it can't be too big if its not on any map."

"You've got a point there," he replied. "Do you think they're here?"

"God I hope so," I said. "Which way do you want to go now?"

"Coin flip?" Dalton asked.

"Coin flip," I answered. "Let me flip it this time. Heads we go left, tails we go right."

Dalton handed me the quarter and I gave it a proper flip. I finally felt like we did something right on this trip. Damn I was good at flipping coins. It soared into the air and I caught it on the way down. I flipped it one final time onto my wrist, and moved my hand. It was heads, so Dalton and I proceeded to head left.

"How should we do this?" Dalton asked.

"Well, I say we find the city limits, and then start combing up and down the streets, until we walk every inch of the town," I said. Another mile or so down the road, and suddenly I felt my pocket starting to vibrate. I dug through the contents and found Roxy's phone. Someone was calling, but who could it be? I wasn't sure Roxy had given anyone her number, other than Layla, even though it was probably the smart thing to do. Truth be told, I'm not one hundred percent sure if anyone else even had their phone. I looked at the number, and almost feinted. It was Layla.

"Who is it?" Dalton asked. I didn't respond as I answered the call.

"Layla!?" I shouted. "Are you okay!? Where are you!?"

There was no response on the other line for a few seconds, all I heard was someone breathing heavily on the other end. I knew immediately I wasn't talking to Layla. It was him, and now was my chance to try and pry some information out of him.

"You fucking son of a bitch!" I screamed into the phone. "What did you do with them!?" The only answer I got was a sickening laugh. I wanted to throw the phone into the car parked right next to me, but I knew it wouldn't help me at all.

"Now, now, that's no way to greet someone," the voice replied. I decided to maybe play it calm, and try to extract some answers from him. I'd have to play along with this sick fuck for now.

"You're right," I said. "You know, I never caught your name at the campsite."

"Ah, now that's better. My name is Lucky. My mother named me that, because I was born with a tumor in my lungs. The doctors said it was a miracle I even made it out of the womb alive," he informed me. "So let's play a game, you ask a question then I'll ask a question. You know my name, but I'm honestly not sure I can recall yours. Mind telling me?"

"I'm Bob," I said.

"Ah yes, I remember now. You were the one who stopped the bus in the first place. Bet you're regretting that now aren't you? You don't have to answer that, in fact, its your turn to ask a question."

"Alright, very simple question for you Lucky. Are they okay?"

"Well, that depends on your definition of okay I suppose. If you're asking if they're alive, then yes, they are," Lucky answered.

"Who the hell are you talking to!?" Dalton yelled. I looked at him and put my finger over my lips. I couldn't risk him messing this up. He got the message though and Lucky and I continued on.

"Well, now its my turn. So, why are the two of you trying to rescue these girls anyways?" he asked.

"Well, its just me and my friend Dalton here. We're guys, and they're girls. I think I'll let you do the math on that one," I replied. "My turn, where are they?"

"Ah, well, that question I can't answer in detail, but just know that you're on the right track," Lucky said. "I read the texts they sent, I know where you're headed towards, and to keep things fun, I'll tell you its the right place. Where exactly in the town of Bellevue we are, well... That I have to keep a secret. I hope you accept my apologies. So Bob, how do you take your coffee?"

"What the fuck kind of question is that? If you must know, I don't drink coffee. I hate the after taste," I answered.

"Okay, well then let me rephrase the question. If you were going to drink coffee, how would you take it?"

"Probably with as much cream and sugar as humanly possible," I said, still bewildered by the question.

"Good to know Bob. Okay, now its your turn."

I knew I had to learn as much as I could about this bastard. Layla and Jessie's lives were depending on it. I had to choose this next question carefully, and to be quite honest, I was running out of questions. I couldn't think of anything, but I wanted to keep this game of ours going.

"Umm, what are you doing right now?" I asked. Not the brightest of questions, but hell, it just might work.

"Well, that's actually a good question. I like you Bob, I love telling people about my day. First off, let me tell you what I did earlier in the day. First off, I went down to play with the girls. I played the trust game with them, and the quiet one lost. Which means the feisty one gets to spend some time in the coffin. My grandma was buried in it, and one day, I got bored and decided to dig it up. Who is the feisty one anyway?"

"You haven't answered my question, why should I answer yours?" I replied.

"Ah, keen on the rules Bob. I like that. Okay, I'll continue my story. Before then, we had a pissing contest and ate breakfast. It was a fun morning to say the least. Now I'm at an old drug dealer friend of mine's house, digging through his stash and trying to find some... party favors. That's what I'm doing right now Bob. Oh, there was a guy with these two. I think his name was Gabe Spencer or something like that. I read it off of his little diary after it fell out of his pocket. It probably wouldn't have fallen out, had I not chopped his legs off first, but these things happen. He should be able to keep Betty and Veronica well fed for a little while though, and that's a good thing."

I winced after I heard about Gabe's gruesome fate, but I was more worried about these "party favors" Lucky was talking about. Also, who the hell were Betty and Veronica? Please tell me those weren't the nicknames he gave Layla and Jessie. Please tell me he wasn't feeding Gabe to the girls for breakfast. Now I had to use a question to figure out exactly what he meant, but first, I had to answer one of his questions.

"Well Bob, I'm starting to get bored with this game, so I'll ask one more, I'll give you your last question, and then I have to get back to the girls," Lucky said. "So Bob, do you prefer your girls alive or dead? Me? I prefer them dead first, or as close to it as possible. The bodies start to stink after a day or so. Luckily with the modern miracle of heroin, its possible to keep them pretty close to dead without actually killing them,"

"Well, I'm not a fucking psycho last I checked, so I guess my answer is I prefer them alive, and if you touch either of them, so help me God I will kill you!" I shouted. Lucky must have thought something I said was funny because he couldn't control his laughter. The more he laughed the madder I got. When he finally calmed down, he decided to divulge some more info on what exactly he had been up to.

"Well Bob, it wouldn't be fun if I didn't toy with them just a little. Touching them, is just a small part of my... testing process. Oh, and you should've seen them together. It was magical."

I could only imagine what that meant. I just hoped by the time we found them they were still mentally stable. From what I've observed so far, Lucky was king of the mind fuck, and I could only imagine the things they had been through. I was beyond mad, but I knew I couldn't let my anger get the best of me. I had to know for sure they were still okay. I had one last question, so I had to use it wisely.

"Is there any way you can prove to me they're still okay?" I asked.

"Ah, good question Bob. I think that's a fair thing to ask. After all, no sense in rescuing a couple dead bitches, am I right? I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll give you a call back when I get home and prove to you they're still alive. Until then Bob, have a wonderful day." Lucky hung up the phone before I had a chance to say anything. Damn it, this was not good. So many questions left to be answered.

"I take it that was our man?" Dalton asked. "What did he say?"

"Well, he's going to call us back. The rest of it, you really don't want to know," I replied. Dalton and I continued down the road until we reached another Bellevue corporation limit sign. Then we made our way back down the street and started to comb through the neighborhoods. The town was safer than I thought it would be. Most of the zombies must have already cleared out of the town. Occasionally, the random zombie encounter would pop up, but it was never more than three at a time, and we had no trouble handling them.

I had to laugh at this town though. All of the zombies we killed were usually teenage girls with the town's high school name pasted on them somewhere. A few had it written on the ass of their pants. I never got that, girls get mad at you if you look at their ass, but then they put words there. Maybe its just me they get mad at though. That would make a lot of sense. Hell if I was a girl and I seen a guy like me looking at my ass, I'd kick him in the balls. At least I'm honest about it. I won't lie, it felt good on occasion to knock the girls who wouldn't give you a first look, much less a second, on their ass. The bashing their brains in part was just icing on the cake. I think Dalton was a little disturbed at the pleasure I took from it however.

"You are enjoying this just a little too much man," he told me.

"Sorry Dalton, I hated high school," I replied. "I'm just living out a fantasy I've had since seventh grade."

We combed up and down the street for a few hours, until we were back to where we started. So far we hadn't seen any signs of human life anywhere. There were plenty of rusted out trucks lying around, but none of them were the one we were looking for. I vaguely remember the truck, but I knew when I saw it I would know it. I remember it was blue, and there was a bumper sticker on the back of it. I couldn't quite remember what it said though. I remember trying to get close enough to the sticker to actually read what it said when I was driving the bus. Bumper stickers should have been made illegal before all of this. People like me are easily distracted by them.

Roxy's phone started to ring and I pulled it out of my pocket, dreading what I was about to hear on the other line. I didn't even say hello, I just listened in and waited for Lucky to start talking. There was nothing for about a minute or so, just heavy breathing. Then I started to hear the girl's voices in the background. I couldn't make out what they were saying, but they sounded like they were in pain. I could hear one of the voices getting louder, and I made out that it was Jessie's voice. I'd recognize it anywhere now.

"Well Bob, I know you're there. So you wanted to know if they're still alive," Lucky said. "Well, here's one of them right now. Say something for them!"

"The shadow is talking to me!" Jessie screamed. What the hell did that mean? Was that was Lucky was calling himself? She couldn't have been any less helpful. I could have used a street name or an address. Something that would help us find them. I was hoping Layla was more help.

"Where's Layla!?" I screamed. "Put her on the phone!"

"Oh, that's her name? Good to know Bob. Well, here she is. The lovely Layla."

Layla just let off an ear piercing scream that almost ruptured my eardrum. What was he doing to them? Whatever it was, it couldn't be good. This didn't do much to boost my morale. Now I was afraid that even if we got there, they were never going to quite be the same ever again. I wasn't going to give up though. It would take nothing short of a nuclear bomb to keep me from finding them, and from the look in Dalton's eyes, I knew he felt the same.

"We're having so much fun right now. Wish you were here," Lucky said before hanging up the phone. I went to throw the phone into the ground and Dalton caught my arm. He took the phone out of my hand and tried his best to calm me down.

"I know man! I feel the same way, but don't do something stupid like break our only means of communication. Just chill out, we're going to find them," Dalton said. I knew he was right and took a deep breath. I closed my eyes and counted to ten. It helped, and we started to comb the streets once more. We had walked all the way back down to where we had first came into town and I was just about ready to sit for a second to rest my legs.

"Bob! Holy shit! Look!" Dalton yelled. I looked where Dalton was pointing and saw it. It was a blue pick up truck, turning onto one of the streets in the distance. Dalton and I didn't waste any time in running to where we had seen it. When we got to the corner, we started to power walk the streets, hunting for where he could have gone. A few more blocks and we finally found the truck. It was parked on the side of the road, not in front of any house in particular. It was going to be a crap shoot as to which house he was hiding in. I glanced up just in time to see the door to one of the houses open up.

"Oh shit," I whispered. Dalton looked up and spotted the same thing. We immediately took cover behind the truck.

"What should we do?" Dalton asked.

"I don't know, jump in the bed and pray we don't get caught," I answered. Dalton and I didn't hesitate to follow the sketchy plan, and we hopped into the back of the truck like trained ninjas. I heard Lucky approach the truck and I just hoped nothing possessed him to look in the bed. He opened the door and started the engine. God damn this truck was loud. How we didn't hear it going down the street is beyond me. He started down the street as Dalton and I scooted towards the front. I was hoping being towards the front would prevent us from being seen in Lucky's mirror.

Dalton and I did our best to keep steady in the truck. Lucky was an insane driver. Swerving at ridiculous speeds made it feel like the truck was on two tires most of the ride. Luckily, it wasn't a very long ride and we arrived at our destination. A large, cedar, A-frame house with a long gravel driveway. It was surrounded by trees and it appeared Lucky had boarded up the windows, maybe trying to fortify the house for zombie attacks.

Lucky turned off the engine and went inside the house. Dalton and I stayed as still as we could. I wasn't quite sure what to do yet. I knew we were there, I knew we had found what we were looking for. This was it, the showdown. We only were going to get one shot at this, so I figured it was time to come up with a plan.

"Dalton, are you ready for this shit?" I asked.

"I don't know if there's really any getting ready for something like this, but I guess I'm as ready as I'll ever be," he replied.

"Well, how many bullets do you have left?"

"None, I used them all in that graveyard fight," Dalton answered.

"Shit! I think I have maybe two left," I said. "I think guns may be out of the picture."

"Well, I guess we're in for a fight then," Dalton said.

"Fuck it, I'm ready... Let's do this," I replied. We hopped out of the truck bed and approached the door. I knew it might be best to try and keep things quiet. I didn't know what Lucky would do if he knew we were coming, and to be honest, I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to take him. A zombie was one thing, but a psychopath was a whole different story. I grabbed the knob on the door and turned. It was surprisingly unlocked, which was actually a bit unsettling. I opened the door and Dalton and I went inside. "The showdown," I thought to myself. I looked at Dalton and he nodded back. This was it, please God, let this one thing go right.