Night of the Living Dead (27 page)

Ben stated, "I can carry the kid."

Cooper’s eyes shot daggers at him from across the room, but the little man said nothing.

Ben ignored him, asking Helen, "What’s wrong with her? How’d she get hurt?"

"One of those things grabbed her—" she answered.

Cooper cut in, his eyes averted, "Bit her on the arm."

Shit
, Ben thought. Tom had mentioned that the girl was hurt, but Ben had yet to see her with his own eyes, hadn’t thought to ask exactly
how
she had been injured.

Helen noticed his expression. "What’s wrong?"

"Who knows
what
kind of disease those things carry?"

Helen just stared at him — the same thought had been on her mind, of course, since the television stressed how important it was to get the wounded medical treatment.

"Is she conscious?" Ben asked.

"Barely."

Cooper piped up again. "She can’t walk, she’s too weak."

Ben looked away, fighting the urge to spring across the room and beat the rest of that obstinance out of the man. The frustrating thing was, if the girl was sick with something, Cooper was probably right — Ben had gotten back to the house by the skin of his teeth; he couldn’t imagine carrying a child through a mile of that.

But that didn’t mean he had to like it, so he yelled, "Well,
one
 of us could try to get to the car!"

Cooper sneered, "You gonna turn it over by
yourself
?"

"You can’t start the car," Barbra scolded them, "Johnny has the
keys
."

That’s when Ben set aside his irritation with Cooper long enough to consider what Barbra was saying. Maybe she wasn’t just blabbering after all.

Crossing to her, he knelt down and asked, "
You
have a car?"

Even Cooper looked interested in the answer, but Barbra didn’t say anything, just looked at Ben with that same drunken expression.

"
Where?
" Ben stressed. "Where is it?"

Barbra shook her head and spoke in that same sing-song voice, as though she were addressing a silly child. "You won’t be able to start it."

Ben was losing his patience. "Yeah, yeah, I know, but where
is
it?"

But before she could answer, they were all startled by a sudden loud moan from outside the front door.

The dead had been quieter than usual while they were having their way with Tom and Judy’s remains. But now that the flesh was dwindling, they were no longer satisfied, but
revitalized
, aroused with the desire for more. They descended upon the house like sharks drawn to blood, vocalizing their need louder than before.

They wanted more ...
more
... and what they wanted was inside that house.

Ben rushed to the window, saw them coming. He gripped one of the boards tight, grinding his teeth in fear and frustration. But what could he do? At a loss, he turned around and flipped on the television — maybe the next broadcast would provide something useful for a change.

Cooper had also hurried to the window, but unlike Ben, he remained ... and was christened with his own front-row presentation of what they faced. It was one thing to hear it on the television; it was something else to see it with his own eyes.

"Good Lord ..." he whispered.

The dead were not completely out of sustenance just yet. As a group, they had moved closer to the house, to the source of more ... but as individuals, they continued to feast upon the remnants of Tom and Judy. A hand here, a foot there, other parts which Cooper could not recognize, and was glad for that.

It was true. The dead were
eating
the living.

The anchorman was talking on the television now, and Cooper forced himself to back away from the window and try to pay attention. He strode over to sit near his wife, while Ben hunkered down almost directly in front of the television set.

"
... being monitored closely by scientists and all the radiation detection stations,
" the anchorman was saying. "
At this hour, they report the level of the mysterious radiation continues to increase steadily. So long as this situation remains, government spokesmen warn that dead bodies will continue to be transformed into the flesh-eating ghouls.
"

Cooper had just gotten settled when his agitation forced him back to his feet. The movement caught Ben’s attention — the high-and-mighty bastard glanced over his shoulder at him, gripping that rifle of his to send a message.

He wouldn’t be so goddamn tough
, Cooper groused,
without that gun
. But he knew to keep that opinion to himself, so he said nothing. Instead, he crossed the room again, peered out through the window for a brief moment, then turned away once more in repulsion.

"
All persons who die during this crisis,
" the anchorman continued, "
from whatever cause, will come back to life — to seek human victims — unless their bodies are first disposed of by cremation.
"

The anchorman paused, then spoke with renewed energy.

"
Our news cameras have just returned from covering such a search-and-destroy operation against the ghouls, this one conducted by Sheriff
Conan
McClelland in Butler County, Pennsylvania. So now let’s go to that film report...
"

The image cut away to an exterior which could have been shot down the road, so far as Ben could tell — the trees and large, grassy lawns looked familiar enough. A rural house stood in the background, a police car waited in the foreground, and in the middle a crowd of men, all carrying guns.

"
All law enforcement agencies,
" the anchorman narrated, "
and the military have been organized to search out and destroy the marauding ghouls.
"

As the image switched to a closeup of even more men, mostly civilians but all still armed, something nagged at Ben, itching at the back of his mind that something wasn’t right. But he couldn’t place what it was at first, so he continued listening.

"
Survival Command Center at the Pentagon has disclosed that a ghoul can be
killed
by a shot in the head, or a heavy blow to the skull.
"

For the first time in hours, Ben brightened, if only for a moment. He had been right!

"
Officials are quoted as explaining that since the brain of a ghoul has been activated by the radiation, the plan is: Kill the brain, and you kill the ghoul.
"

The sound quality changed as they switched to the recording from the field. Police officers in uniform exchanged comments with others who were not, while a reporter waited for a moment to jump in with his questions.

Ben tuned that out for a moment — two things were bothering him now, but as if in compliment of each other, he figured out what they each were.

The first, the one that had bugged him from the moment they had switched to the film footage, was the
time of day
in which it was shot — broad daylight. When he had noticed the daylight during the earlier interview with the military officer and his two companions, Ben had presumed that it had been filmed somewhere on the west coast, where the sun might not have set yet. But this footage, which the anchorman claimed had "just" returned, looked like mid-afternoon, whereas it was now nighttime across the entire nation.

They’re misleading us
, he thought.
They’re trying to prevent further panic at best, or boldface-lying to us at worst. This has been going on longer than they’re willing to admit.

The second thing was this bit about mysterious radiation having "activated" the brains of the dead; the notion had made him skeptical earlier, and it did so again. He believed the part about destroying the brain — he’d come to that conclusion on his own, seen the evidence with his own eyes — but as for "mysterious radiation" being the cause, he just didn’t buy it. Again, he was no expert, but to his knowledge irradiating the brain would, if anything, be a possible
solution
 to the problem; the accelerated particles would tear the awakened synapses apart, break down the cells ...

The real problem is
, he realized,
that they don’t have a
clue
 why this is happening or what is causing it. But this must be their best working theory, so they’re presenting it as fact.

Damn. This situation wouldn’t be going away anytime soon.

On the television, the reporter finally got in close enough to try for an interview, "
Chief? Chief McClelland, how’s everything going?
"

The man turned around, and Ben was surprised to learn that he wasn’t a conscripted civilian — he seemed a little too rough around the edges to be a competent police officer. He carried a rifle on one shoulder and wore a large bandoleer across his girthy chest. He also wore a Fedora-style hat, and tucked into the hatband were what appeared to be three wrapped cigars, as if the man intended to pass them around to celebrate a newborn.

"
Ah, things aren’t goin’ too bad,
" the Chief replied. "
Men are takin’ it pretty good.
" He looked over the reporter’s shoulder and shouted, "
You wanna get on the other side of the road over there!
"

"
Chief
," the reporter asked, bringing his attention back around, "
do you think we’ll be able to defeat these things?
"

"
Well we killed nineteen of ‘em today right in this area. Those last three we caught tryin’ ta claw their way into an abandoned shed, they musta thought somebody was in there. There wadn’t, though. We heard ‘em makin’ all kinda noise, we came over an’ beat ‘em off, blasted ‘em down.
"

From off camera, someone shouted something Ben couldn’t understand, and the Chief answered, "
Yeah, okay!
"

Desperate to hold onto this interview, the reporter jumped in, "
Chief, uh ... if I were surrounded by six or eight of these things, would I stand a chance with them?
"

"
Well there’s no problem. If you had a gun, shoot ‘em in the head, that’s a sure way ta kill ‘em. If you don’t, get yourself a club or a torch — beat ‘em or burn ‘em, they go up pretty easy.
"