Fleshbags

By Gerald Dean Rice

Even before the explosion in the industrial area on the south side of the city they started showing up. There was something wrong with them. Anybody could see it. They leaked from every orifice and their stomachs were translucent bags showing rotting internal organs. But the ones the police had shot and killed were worse. Aggressive, fast, cannibalistic. The people still trapped in the south side of the city will fight, run, hide, and many will die. Can a young father get to his daughter? Can a husband and wife save a neighbor? Can a nurse make it home? Can an ex-con get out of the city? Can a cop keep control?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Razorline Press
• Release date: Jul 7, 2011
• ISBN: 9780983854708

Gerald Dean Rice

Okay, my last biography was loooooong and boring. I didn't realize how dull it was until I actually tried to go back and read it. Blah-blah-blah. Anyway.I'm Gerald Dean Rice. Used to be Gerald Rice--I suppose I still am, but all future works shall include my middle name. It's a rebranding thing.I've always been into horror. When I was in kindergarten my mother took me right from school to see Creepshow. I saw a ton of stuff I shouldn't have when I was a kid.I got a book of ghost stories when I was 11 for Christmas. These were the days before YA novels, unless you picked up one of those namby-pamby VC Andrews books. Okay, scratch that; I've never actually read a VC Andrews book.But the more I read and the older I got the more I wanted to write my own stories. I tried my hand at writing comic book stories with my best friend in high school, but we had no clue how to break into comics. I submitted my first story to Cemetery Dance back in 2000. It took somewhere around 7 months for the to respond.I was so proud even though they'd rejected me. The truth of it was it wasn't a very original story and it was very straightforward. There was a whole lot I didn't know about writing back then. But I learned pretty quick and have since had stories published in print and on-line.My first novel, "The Ghost Toucher", was published in 2010. It was born out of several failed novel-writing attempts and I'm immensely proud of what I created. I've since put out a couple short collections of my own and a few zombie shorts.My newest project, "Fleshbags" was just published. I kind of had a "In Treatment" thing in my head like when Paul's patients have some aspect of them reflected in his personal life. I blended my characters that way (tough to explain what I mean). But it's definitely something different than you've ever read and I'd suggest giving it a try.

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Fleshbags

By Gerald Dean Rice

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2011 Gerald Dean Rice

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Fleshbags copyright © 2011

The Dead Child © 2011

All stories written by Gerald Dean Rice.

Cover art copyright © 2011 by Russell Dickerson

http://www.darkstormcreative.com/

This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons, places or events is purely coincidental and unintended. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical or written, without express permission from the author.

For more information about the author, please visit his website: www.feelmyghost.webs.com, the Gerald Rice Fan Page on Facebook, or follow his tweets @GeraldRice.

ISBN: 978-0-9838547-0-8

All rights reserved.

To Selah

My Protector

By all rights, this man should have been dead. No pulse, no blood pressure, but he was moving. Gene had had to strap him down to keep him from trying to get up. Every time he tried to look at that neck wound the man lunged at him, tried to bite him.

There was no way Gene was going to be able to bag him. The best he could try was chest compressions.

Hope you're not too attached to this shirt, buddy, he said under the facemask, grabbing the medical scissors. The man’s smell was repugnant; the mask was the only thing making it barely tolerable. Gene sliced open the front, making a flap he put over the man's face. He jumped back at the sight of the man’s abdomen, grabbing for his cell. He’d made a habit since he’d gotten the smart phone of taking pictures of the more interesting people who’d gotten on his bus. The man’s skin was sleeked with sweat, but specifically at his belly the skin was transparent and Gene could see the internal organs inside his body cavity. The large intestine appeared swollen and black. He could barely make out the small intestine, shriveled and red and the stomach looked like it had ruptured.

Gene pounded on the window.

Matt, we gotta report this! This guy’s really sick. He’d never had anybody who looked infected before. What was it—ebola? Marburg? Whatever, he was certain a facemask wasn’t enough. Matt, stop the bus.

What? Matt called back.

Pull the bus over and stop. We gotta… we gotta pull over.

We’ll be at Beaumont in three minutes.

The man tugged at his restraints, but he wasn’t getting out.

No. This guy… he’s got something. We have to call somebody. The CDC or somebody. We can’t take him to the hospital.

What? What do you mean he’s got something? Got what?

I never seen anything like this before. I… don’t know.

Clear fluid flowed freely from the man’s mouth. Gene looked at his gloved hands. He’d touched the man no fewer than two dozen times, he’d had to have gotten whatever that stuff was on them. Was latex protection enough?

The man’s insides shifted. His head thrashed from side to side as if he were in pain. He convulsed and Gene’s training went into effect. He gave the man who should have been dead five milligrams of Haldol in a bulging vein in his wrist and that seemed to agitate him even more. He yanked his hand free from the restraint, giving himself a compound fracture of the wrist in the process and slashed at Gene with the ragged exposed bone.

He leapt back, but the man must have been emboldened because he ripped his other arm out of the restraint a moment later. Rather than undo his legs he reached for Gene and overturned the cart, falling at the EMT’s feet.

Matt! Matt! Help—this guy’s loose!

Gene kicked at his hands as he reached, crawling closer on his elbows. The hand with the broken wrist locked around his leg and Gene screamed as the bones of his ankle were crushed. Even in his agony, he knew there was much more than what he’d seen. No, not even living men were this strong. He tried to kick again, but putting weight on the broken ankle sent shards of lightning from his foot to his brain and in the next instant he was on the floor.

The man turned over and his insides spilled out into a clear loose sac hanging from his abdomen. He crawled over on his elbows and Gene made the mistake of pushing away at his face when the man chomped off two of his fingers. Somewhere Matt was yelling but he didn’t see him, only this man who had no business moving around. That clear fluid was gushing from his mouth, spattering Gene in the face. But just like his screams or Matt hammering at the man’s head with whatever it was in his hands, it didn’t matter.

By the time the explosion happened he was dead.

Hour 1

All we need you to do is stay calm ‘til we get this all sorted out." Capel rapped on the hood of his cruiser and smiled at the man in the backseat. Poor guy probably didn’t have anything to do with any of this madness, but they had to be cautious. He stood and felt the belch coming before it erupted, loud and bassy. He should have taken it easy with those hot peppers during lunch.

Scuse me? Capel spun and looked at the officer coming out of the gas station.

What? Mumford said.

Thought you said something.

No, but it’s pretty cut and dry in there. Guy wanted cash. His gun wasn’t loaded, the cashier’s was. He nodded to the man in the back of Capel’s cruiser. Don’t think he had anything to do with it.

How do you know?

Cashier says he’d paid cash for his gas already. He was coming back in for change.

So what the hell do we do with him?

No priors, no warrants. Same as everybody else—let him go.

No, I mean this guy’s got unpaid parking tickets.

Mumford rolled his eyes. You wanna babysit with what we got goin’ on?

The Fire Department was already down on Fifteen Mile putting out a four-alarm fire, while every spare officer was ushering everyone off the street. Capel and a chosen few were searching for people matching a particular description with orders to shoot on sight.

He’d only seen two of them so far. But Captain Lewis had warned them to be cautious when approaching. They didn’t know if these guys were terrorists or what. Biological suicide bombers, maybe, but the two he and Mumford had run across were naked, saggy, and bloated, their guts hanging out of them while they frothed at the mouth. They didn’t listen, didn’t lie down and when Mumford shot the one that lunged at them he popped and goo got all over Capel. It stunk, but he was thankful that was all. If it was acid or something his head and chest would have been burned.

He popped open the rear door. Look, I’m gonna let you go. But your license is suspended, so you’re not taking that car. It’s going to stay right over there at that pump.

The man shook his head. But I need my car. I gotta pick up my kid.

Look, not my problem. Consider yourself lucky you’re not going to jail today. If my plate wasn’t already full, you’d be hanging with a few of my closest friends. He jangled the man’s keys in his hand. I’m gonna keep these.

How am I supposed to get in my house?

Capel nodded and took the car key off the ring. He tossed the rest into the man’s lap and gestured at his hands. Gimme.

Whoa-whoa-whoa! Mumford shouted behind him. Contact-contact! We got contact! Capel whirled, slamming the door at the same time. Mumford had his gun drawn on a man in tattered clothes coming around a corner. It looked like he had a bag of garbage hanging off his stomach—just like the other two—swaying back and forth with each twitchy step. Capel drew his gun and stepped over, keeping it pointed at the ground. At least this one wasn’t naked.

Stop right there! Capel said, raising his gun. Of course, just like with the other one, he didn’t. He knew if he opened up now Mumford would do the same, but the problem was the gasoline pumps between them. In the heat of the moment, shots could go wide. Capel didn’t want to start a barbecue. They were going to have to draw him away from the pumps before they took him down. But he had no intention of getting within arms’ reach again.

Loman caught the door with his knee before it shut. If everything was going to hell, he didn’t want to be waiting for it handcuffed in the back of a police cruiser. He waited until both officers were far enough away before climbing out.

Traffic was light for lunchtime and what cars there were did at least sixty-five on Sixteen Mile. He had to put as much distance between him and the officers before he got arrested for real.

Loman had to get to his daughter. Whatever was going on, the police obviously wanted to keep people from heading south and that was the direction he needed to go. Kiddie Kamp was on Livernois just north of Fourteen. He’d seen the roadblocks lining Sixteen and wondered what they were for. He heard several shots and turned to see the cops shooting some guy. Something looked wrong about him (other than the getting ventilated), but he didn’t know what. But then he realized the guy was still standing. Was the guy coked out?

Never mind that. Can’t get involved.

There was a police cruiser parked in the middle of the street about a quarter mile away. He turned in the other direction, the wrong way, but he wasn’t interested in getting put in the back of another squad car. Especially with a pair of handcuffs on.

Speaking of which…

He ducked between the gas station and another building. His stepfather had been a Wayne County Sheriff’s Deputy. Loman had always been fascinated with the stories he came home with and one in particular had always stuck with him. Michael had told him about these Chinese gangs and how they slipped handcuffs by dislocating their thumbs. It hurt like hell, but when Loman was fourteen he’d taught himself how to do it.

He looked around to be sure no one was watching and stepped over the bracelets, putting them behind his back. He’d never learned how to do it with them in front of him. After a few deep breaths he wrapped his left thumb over the link connecting the bracelets and yanked. It felt like his thumb was on fire, but nothing gave.

How long has it been since I’ve done this? he asked aloud. He’d probably done it last at some party in his early twenties. He tried again.

Still nothing. He hoped he didn’t wind up breaking his hand. He had to get it right and soon, before his hand swelled up and there was no way for him to get them off. Loman had a moment of panic, imagining an employee coming out of this building for a smoke and spotting him, flagging down the officer down the block and him having to run for it with his arms still behind his back.

Keep cool, he said to himself. He took a moment to pop his knuckles and then wrapped his other thumb over the links again. He remembered now; his angle had been all wrong. Loman leaned over like he’d done all those years ago. It had to be swift and certain to dislocate the thumb.

He closed his eyes and counted swiftly.

"One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight-nine-ten!"

There was a pop, louder than his knuckles had been and the bracelet slid right off his hand. Loman held it in front of his face, forcing himself not to scream before he opened his eyes. He looked and was amazed at how foreign it looked. For a moment he registered it as something he was holding, not the thing he used to write with.

Relocating it was going to be just as painful and he didn’t want to wait until the pain stopped to start it all over again. He grabbed the thumb, extended almost to the tip of his index and pulled back and it slipped out of his grip and back into place.

Loman danced around, a high-pitched whinny escaping his mouth. He couldn’t help it this time.

After the pain had subsided some he snapped the bracelet on next to its mate and cradled his wounded hand. He never mastered dislocating his other thumb and would have to live with the handcuffs until later.

He hoped whoever that was the police had shot was the only one they were looking for, but he doubted it. He’d seen manhunts on the news and they never looked

Reviews for Fleshbags

[tothebonereviews · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Positives: It was nice to read a zombie tale that wasn’t obvious. We know they’re zombies, but Rice doesn’t beat us over the head with the undead thing right off. The zombie action unfolds slowly, subtly, and that makes it more creepy. Rice proves you can write a good zombie story without falling back on excessive splatter and gore every couple of paragraphs. Negatives: Rice needed to focus this story. The premise was good, but there are too many character arcs here. By the middle of the story, I needed a chart to keep them all organized! He needed to tighten the narrative and give the ending more of a powerful impact. Summary: If you like zombie tales, this will entertain you.