Day 343 - Untitled Zombie Story Chapter 6.1 - (1,140 words)

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UNTITLED ZOMBIE STORY

By Wayne Webb

Chapter 6.1

“So Margaret is a hostage?” Derek was asking Ben.

“Technically you could call her that, but not really no.” Ben was pained by the question and it was obvious in his voice.

“Think of her as a guarantee, a bond if you will. You have me and we have her. There’s a balance, you know like a balancing out of the risk in letting me go with Ben. And I must say…” Angela turned in the passenger seat to look at Derek. “I’m not in the least bit worried about either one of you, so hostage? No.” She smiled and sat back facing the road again.

“Right, but she is still being held somewhere, her safety or at the very least her freedom, under threat. Am I wrong there?” Derek was pressing the point, neither the excessively cheerful Angela nor the embarrassed Ben were sharing much more than the effective swap out of the person in the passenger seat. Derek still had no idea where they were going.

“Well you can look at it that way if you want to, that’s your prerogative. “ Angela sounded amused while Ben said nothing.

“Do I have much choice in the matter? After all I am being taken to god knows where, to do god knows what for a reason again only the divine being would know.”

Ben snorted. “There is no god.”

Angela’s face tightened in a non-smile for the first time since arriving in the car, she was less than happy with Ben’s definitive claim.

Derek saw his opening. “How can you say that?” He asked plaintively, as if Ben were chipping his atheistic ax at the core of beliefs he did not really hold.

“Can we just focus on the road please?” Angela stated, and there was a command implicit in the way she said it.

“Good idea.” Muttered Ben.

They drove further along the dusty roads in silence, having taken a turn into deeper and desolate country roads a few miles out of the city and heading south. The quiet in the car gave Derek time to rest and reflect on what he knew, which was not much at all.

The new passenger had been perky, flirty and relatively gregarious by comparison to the two men in the car, but now she was silent and frowning with the talk of god. Her mood got deeper and darker as measured by the expressions on her face until she could not hold it in any longer.

“Just because you don’t believe anymore, it doesn’t mean that you are right.” She said and in a way that brooked no argument and was intended to seal the debate in her favor.

Ben gripped the wheel harder, so that his knuckles went white as he tried to hold his views to himself.

“You may not believe in GOD Ben, but HE believes in you.” Derek was trying to twist the knife a little firmer, playing the stress on the GOD and the HE so that Ben would understand the capitalization in spoken English.

“Oh please, not you too?” Ben’s white knuckles gripped tighter and changed in hue again to red. “I NEVER believed before, and now? Please? What are you people retarded?”

“Language!” Angela exclaimed.

“Retarded is not a fucking swear word, okay? Fucking is a Fucking swear word, retardation is a description of decreased mental ability. Perfectly fucking acceptable for the purpose for which it was intended thank you very much.”

“How dare you! I’ll have you know that my sister was ‘challenged’ from a birth defect and using the “R” is an insult to all those brave…” Angela started her speech with a haughty and superior tone and Derek could see Ben winding himself up further and further the more she spoke.

“Oh for fuck’s sake! An insult? That is not a fucking insult! An insult would be – hey you ‘developmentally challenged person’ you are stupid! That is a fucking insult. Hey you? You’re a stupid, arrogant and ignorant cunt! That’s a fucking insult for fuck’s sake!” Ben was screaming his annoyance now. The car was wavering in the road and he was fighting to keep it level, all the while getting faster and faster as his tensed up muscles trod heavier on the gas pedal, speeding them up and increasing the tension even further.

Derek said nothing, he had no idea if God existed but the divisive subject had put a cat among the pigeons and the not sharing information with him was driving his need to divide and conquer the people not telling him what was happening.

Angela reddened in the face and she pulled a radio from her pocket, and held it in one hand and affected her ‘power’ face. “Just watch yourself, after all we have your mother… hostage.”

Ben snatched the radio walkie talkie from her hand and threw in to Derek in the back seat in the space between seconds, Derek caught it deftly and put it under his legs where Angela could not see or get to it.

She began to reach for something in her other pocket and as her arms were maneuvering into position, a gun appeared like magic in Ben’s hand, the barrel pointed at her left temple and held it there steady despite the movement of the car.

Ben was no longer watching the road, he had his eyes firmly fixed on his passenger and where his gun was pointing. The car was aimed straight ahead and there was no bend in the road for miles. He waited a few seconds before calmly saying “And we have you.”

The car was slowly speeding up and Derek could feel the body wobbling as they crossed the old speed limit, a concept that only existed in memory these days.

“There’s no need to do anything stupid!” Angela was now very far from chirpy, she was starting to feel panic and fear at the edges of her skin, nipping and biting at her nerves.

“Well no there was not, but you had to go there didn’t you? How can I believe you now? All that God nonsense? You know what caused this, or you say you do and yet you still god-bother? How can I trust you to be able to fix the machines now?”

“Keep your eyes on the road! You’re going to kill us all!” Angela’s voice rose an octave, but Ben did not budge, her eyes were sweeping the road ahead, not fixed on any one thing so he was not in immediate danger, not yet.

“What machines?” asked Derek.

Ben kept his eyes on the passenger, Angela looked at Derek wondering if she could or even should say what they were talking about.

No one answered and the car was rocketing forwards finally seeing an oncoming bend in the road.