Brian Keene: Jack's Magic Beans

“You girls ready?” Jack asked.

“Yes,” Sammi whispered. “Let’s quit stalling. The smell is getting worse back here.”

“Okay,” Jack whispered. “Let’s see what is what.”

He led them forward, trying not to look at the carnage, trying not to hear the sounds their shoes made as they stepped through a glistening tangle of stripped flesh or intestine, or the slow drips of blood falling from the stains on the ceiling. Jack wondered how the blood had gotten up there. He could read nothing in the splash patterns. They were everywhere—a crisscross of crimson.

At the end of the warehouse was an employee restroom. The door was slightly ajar. Although it was dark inside, they could make out the form of a woman crouched in front of the toilet. The seat was up. Her shoulders rested on the rim. Her head was deep inside the bowl. Water dripped from the faucet, and the mirror on the wall was shattered. The edges of the white porcelain sink were splashed with red, just like everything else in the warehouse. A sign on the wall next to the bathroom admonished all employees to wash their hands before returning to work. The irony filled Jack with a sick sense of dread.

He turned back to the others. “So far, so good.”

“Maybe they’re all dead,” Sammi whispered.

“Let’s hope so. Just stay quiet and stick together. Okay?”

Angie and Sammi nodded in understanding. Marcel appeared distracted. His eyes were shut and his expression was pained. One hand clutched the length of wood. The other rubbed his right temple, fingers probing deep into the flesh.

“Marcel?” Jack reached for him. “What’s the matter? I know you said you were okay, but you don’t look so hot.”

The older man glanced up at them. His eyes were red and watery. When he spoke, he sounded tired.

“What’s up?” he rasped. “Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention. What did you ask?”

“What’s wrong with you, dude?”

“My fucking head hurts. That’s all. I think Sammi’s right. It’s just the stress. Exhaustion. Just need to get some painkillers.”

“You okay to keep going?” Jack asked. “We can stop if you need to.”

Marcel nodded. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. Lead on, kemosabe.”

“Kemo-what?”

Marcel frowned. “You never saw The Lone Ranger?”

“No,” Jack said. “I think my grandfather used to watch it when he was a kid.”

“Never mind.”

They approached the large double doors that led out into the grocery store. Jack and Angie peeked through the windows, while Sammi and Marcel hung back.

“Holy shit,” Jack moaned.

The slaughter in the stockroom paled in comparison to what awaited them in the store. They smelled the carnage even through the closed doors—a noxious brew of blood, piss, shit, bleach, ammonia, and other chemicals from the household cleaning products aisle. The stench made their eyes water and their throats and sinuses burn.

“I don’t see anybody moving,” Angie whispered after a moment. “Maybe they all left. I say we make a run for it.”

“What do you guys think?” Jack asked Sammi and Marcel without turning around.

A loud crack rang out behind them. Sammi breathed a long, drawn-out sigh. Marcel laughed—a bubbling, high-pitched croak.

Jack and Angie turned around. Sammi stared at them, her head cocked to the right, her eyes glassy. A thin ribbon of blood trickled down the side of her face. Marcel stood behind her, gripping his club with both hands. The other end—the piece with the nail in it—was embedded in the top of Sammi’s skull. The mop-handle spear slipped from Sammi’s fingers. Her knees buckled. Marcel released the weapon and Sammi toppled to the floor. She thrashed on her side, arms and legs jittering, mouth agape.

“Fuck!” The razor knife shook in Jack’s trembling hands.

“She was stealing from me,” Marcel explained, his voice calm and self-assured. “She was stealing my thoughts. I had to teach her a lesson. Had to curb that shit.”

“Sammi?” Jack whispered, hoping she’d respond. Her convulsions grew weaker.

“You guys would have done the same thing,” Marcel said. “She was inside my head, stealing everything I thought about. If you’re taking her side, then I have to assume you were stealing from me, too. And that means I’ll have—”

Angie’s scream cut him off. “You son of a bitch!”

She lunged at him, swinging the pack of steaks. The frozen meat collided with Marcel’s head, stunning him. Jack heard the crack, even over Angie’s cries. Marcel’s head rocked backward. Grunting, he staggered to the side. Already his ear had begun to swell. Before he could recover, Angie hit him again, breaking his nose and driving the splintered cartilage up into his brain. Marcel made a gulping noise. His eyes fluttered and his hands clenched, then unclenched. A single tear slid down his cheek. He fell forward, his body jittering on the floor next to Sammi. As they watched, Sammi’s movements ceased and Marcel’s slowed. A dark stain spread across his pants. The sharp smell of urine filled the air, mixing with the store’s miasma.

“He’s still alive,” Jack said, watching him flop around.

“No he’s not.” Angie dropped the steaks and checked Marcel’s pulse. “He’s dead.”

“But he’s moving. And he pissed himself. Look at him.”

“That’s just the last few electrical impulses from his brain. It will stop in a minute.”

Even as she said it, the convulsions slowed more, just as Sammi’s had. Marcel’s limbs twitched a few more times, and then ceased. Jack watched with a mixture of awe and revulsion.

“How did you know how to do that?”

Angie shrugged. “I didn’t. My grandfather was in Vietnam. He served in the First Cavalry and went through all that hand-to-hand combat training. He told me once that if you hit somebody in the nose just right—and hard enough—it would kill them. I was never sure about it until now, though. Guess he was right.”

“Jesus…”

Angie knelt by Sammi and felt her throat, checking her pulse as well. Jack watched with trepidation.

“Is she?”

Angie nodded. “Yes. She’s dead. Poor kid.”

“Damn.”

“Were you friends?”

“Not really. I mean, we knew each other. But that was all. She dated a friend of mine for a little while.”

“Yeah. I kind of got that impression while listening to you talk in the freezer.”

Jack tried to swallow. His throat felt tight, his breathing constricted.

Angie picked up Sammi’s spear. “You okay, Jack?”

“Yeah. I just… I’ve never seen anything happen like that before. Never saw somebody die.”

“Neither have I, until today.”

“It’s not like in the movies, is it?”

“No,” she agreed, “it’s not. Not at all. But we’d both better get used to it. I’ve got a feeling that’s the new world order.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think you were right. Your theory—the magic beans? The beanstalk?”

“Seriously?”

Angie shrugged. “Why not, Jack? I mean, shit, it’s not like I’ve got any better ideas. None of this makes any sense.”

“But if the Prozac protected us, then why did Marcel snap like that?”

“He said he’d missed a dose. Maybe that was all it took. One missed dosage and you go nuts like everybody else. Perhaps it just took a while to catch up with him. Maybe the Prozac had to leave his system first.”

Jack glanced back out at the store. “If that’s the case, then we’d better stock up on meds before we leave. God knows when we’ll find some again.”

Angie leaned against the wall and sighed. She closed her eyes. Her body shook slightly.

“You cold?”