The Scrubs (14 page)

He knew he should walk away and leave this mess for someone else to find, but he desperately needed a ride.
 
By now, the cops would be all over the freeways with an APB that matched his description.
 
He couldn’t turn down the opportunity.
 
He had to take this car if he wanted to stay out of jail.

So what if this guy had something bad?
 
The motherfucker was dead now.
 
And who was to say it was contagious anyway?
 
If he’d had the super monkey pox or other such shit, he wouldn’t be allowed to walk the streets.
 
The government would have him under glass in some lab.
 
As long as Straley didn’t touch this rabid freak’s mangled flesh, he’d be cool.
 
He was as sure as Hell keeping the windows down for the next hundred miles or so.

Straley eyed the road in both directions.
 
He saw no vehicles, nor did he expect any.
 
This was why he’d chosen to keep to county roads.
 
No one would be combing the backwaters for him, at least not yet.
 
He hoped to catch a ride from some yokel who’d take pity on a lonely hitchhiker and then he’d jack the ride from his Good Samaritan.
 
He wouldn’t have to do that now.
 
Even though the Caprice was a piece of shit, it was running.

He eyed the road in both directions again.
 
Still nothing.
 
He reached across the man and unbuckled the seatbelt.
 
It whizzed back with pieces of the man’s flesh embedded in the material.

Straley went to move the guy and hesitated.
 
He didn’t relish grabbing hold of an inside-out body.
 
He swallowed hard.
 
“Come on, James,” he murmured to himself.
 
“You can do this.
 
It’s either this or federal prison.”

He filled his mind with the four hundred large, the chance to get away as planned and the opportunity not to have to walk any farther.
 
With no more hesitation, he grabbed the Caprice Man by the tee shirt, avoiding his flesh, and yanked.
 
The man’s wasted frame came away easily.
 
He weighed less than Straley expected.
 
The single tug hoisted the man from behind the wheel, out the door and onto the blacktop.
 
With momentum on Straley’s side, he dragged the man over to the drainage ditch at the side of the road and rolled the body in.
 

The thing moaned when it struck the bottom.
 
Hearing the dead man speak surprised the hell out of Straley.
 
He lost his footing, tumbled into the ditch and didn’t stop until he crashed into the body.
 
Straley stared at the Caprice Man.
 
He tried to ignore his condition, but couldn’t.
 
The man’s chest rose and fell between shallow, awkward breaths.
 
Blood leaked freely from his seemingly skinless body.
 
Straley couldn’t understand how the son of bitch was still alive.

The Caprice Man stirred and looked up.
 
His thousand-yard stare locked onto Straley while his mouth opened and closed, the words never managing to pass those terrible lips.
 
Straley sat transfixed by the ruined man’s fight to survive.
 
He jolted when the Caprice Man jerked out an arm in his direction in a plea that needed no translation.
 
Straley shook his head.
 
Disgust fueled his decision.

The Caprice Man’s arm wavered before his strength left him and it hit the dirt.
 
His fingers clawed the ground in an attempt to reach Straley.
 
Then he dug with his legs and gained traction.
 
Straley backed away, scrabbling on his butt, and the broken man gave up.
 
He looked at Straley through bloodshot eyes and croaked, “Help me.”

Straley shook his head again.

There was no helping this guy.
 
If Straley tried to save him, he screwed himself.
 
It wasn’t an option.
 
If he took the Caprice Man to the ER, the cops would take him down.
 
Why the hell he was even thinking about hospitals?
 
This guy was fucked.
 
He was dissolving.
 
No doctor on earth could save him.
 
There was no point.
 
This guy had minutes at most.
 
He couldn’t save the Caprice Man if he tried.

The Caprice Man repeated his plea.

The sound of the Chevy grew louder in Straley’s head.
 
The idling V8 missed a beat and then recovered.
 
Who was to say the engine wouldn’t cut out all together?
 
He jumped to his feet and clambered up the ditch.

A spurt of energy fed the Caprice Man’s dying body and he lunged.
 
He caught one of Straley’s heels and Straley slid back down into the ditch.
 
The Caprice Man slapped a raw and bloody hand on Straley’s wrist.
 

“Help me,” he demanded.

“I was going to get help,” Straley lied.
 
His gaze fell from the old man’s battered face to the hand clamped to his wrist.
 
Partially clotted, jellified blood leaked between the man’s fingers and ran down Straley’s wrist.
 
Shit
.
 
The son of bitch touched me.
 
 

“Help me,” the man repeated.

“I’m trying,” Straley said, his words nearly
strangled by disgust.

The Caprice Man’s gaze bore deep into him.
 
His eyes held the wisdom of the streets and they saw through Straley’s bullshit.

Straley couldn’t stop the lies.
 
“I’ll get help.
 
Hang in there.”

The Caprice Man’s strength deserted him, and his hold on Straley withered to that of an infant’s.
 
Straley shook off the man’s grasp and groped his way back up the bank before the man could regain strength.

Straley stopped at the top and stared down at the figure slumped below.
 
“I’ll send help.”

The Caprice Man shifted.

Straley snatched up the duffel and ran over to the rumbling Caprice.
 
He stopped when he reached the car.
 
There was no way he was sitting in the thing with all that gore splattered everywhere.
 
He tugged free the checkered shirt tied around his waist and wiped the steering wheel, seat and windshield as best he could.
 
The shirt moved the gore around instead of cleaning it off.

He was wasting precious minutes.
 
The road remained quiet.
 
It needed to stay that way.
 
He couldn’t be found here, not under any circumstance and certainly not like this.
 
He had to go, and now.
 
The cleanup job was far from perfect, but it was passable.
 
He bottled his disgust, used the shirt for a seat cover and slid behind the wheel.
 
When he threw it in drive and hit the gas, the engine faltered.
 
He thought it was going to die, as the Caprice Man surely would, but the Chevy began to roll and then rapidly picked up speed.
 
Straley tried to put the man’s ruined face out of his mind.

DRAGGED INTO DARKNESS

The following story is from the book,
Dragged into Darkness
, available from Amazon Kindle.

Acceptable Losses

The landing craft bobbed clumsily on the waves.
 
The damned things were so unstable when they didn’t have a full accompaniment of men to act as ballast.
 
Captain James Clelland’s six-man team was no substitute.
 
The ride back would be better.
 
The boat would be full.

They were half a mile out and Clelland could see the carnage on the beach.
 
He didn’t want to look at it or think about it.
  
There would be plenty of time for that when they arrived.
 
There would be sights and sounds that would eat through his soul for a lifetime.
 
He leaned on the side of the boat and stared into the sky, ignoring the flotilla of boats approaching the beach in a fan formation.

Puffy white clouds passed gracefully across the sky.
 
He was astounded by how similar the clouds were to those back in England.
 
Somehow he expected them to be different, at least exotic.
 
Clouds from the North Pacific should have been different.
 
He didn’t know how or why, but they should have been.
 
Floating on the wrong side of the sky maybe, he thought.
 
He could have watched the clouds all day but the stink was invading his nose.
 
The beach was close.

“Right, kit-up everyone,” Clelland ordered.

“Make way for the Lord Mayor’s Bucket Boys,” Sergeant Williams announced in a mock pompous and officious voice.

Clelland hated the term that had attached itself to his men like a limpet mine.
 
It had started in the mess hall after their second or third mission.
 
The problem was the phrase was too apt.
 
The real Lord Mayor’s Bucket Boys picked up horseshit after the annual procession.
 
His Bucket Boys picked up something different after the battles were waged.
 
The stench of what they handled was no less disgusting, and most couldn’t stomach the work. Turnover was high.
 
His men always had a choice, of sorts.
 
He didn’t.
 
He was Oracle’s right-hand man.
 
He was the only man perfect for the job.
 

Clelland tied a handkerchief around his head, over his nose and mouth.
 
Others did likewise.
 
The Lord Mayor’s latest Bucket Boy pulled on a gas mask.
 
After a couple of trips, the mask wouldn’t be necessary.
 
The stench would offend, but not disgust.
 
A handkerchief, scented maybe, was all that was needed for a Bucket Boy.

Clelland tapped the private with the gas mask on the shoulder.
 
“Take off the mask,” he told him.

Confused eyes stared back from behind the mask.

“Take off the mask, soldier.
 
That’s an order.”

The private did as he was told.
 
“Sir, the stink?”

“Harris, it’s in your best interests to keep the mask off.
 
You’ll throw up.”

“But if I have the mask…”

Clelland raised a hand to silence the lad.
 
Hysteria was creeping into the private’s voice.
 
“You’ll vomit.
 
If the stench doesn’t do it, the sight will.
 
So, it’s better to vomit with the mask off than on.
 
Then you won’t have to breathe in the stench of your own spew.
 
So, keep the mask off.”

Williams, not wise-cracking for once, nodded.
 
The Australian knew better than most.
 
He’d been with Clelland since the discovery.
 
“Puke now.
 
Mask later.”

Clelland pulled out a scented rag and pressed it into the private’s hand.
 
“Use it when you’re done.”

Harris couldn’t speak.
 
Fear, anguish, whatever it was Clelland saw in those innocent eyes strangled the private’s vocal chords.
 
In a month’s time, those eyes would be hollow and darkness would be the only thing lurking behind them.
 
Nothing would ever disturb the private again.
 
Clelland knew.
 
He stared into those same eyes in the mirror every time he shaved.

The sapphire blue ocean changed to blood red.
 
Pink caps that should have been white rode the tops of the red waves as they crashed onto the decimated bodies of fallen soldiers.

“Brace yourselves boys,” the helmsman warned.

Clelland’s team grasped handholds and waited for impact.
 
The boat ground to a halt on the beach.
 
The bow door dropped, digging into bloodstained sand and crushing dead bodies.
 
No one rushed off the boat, ready for action.
 
There were no Japs to take on.
 
No one left to kill.
 
Clelland’s men took their shovels and trudged onto the beach ignoring what they trod on.
 
As Clelland disembarked, he patted the vomiting Harris on the back.

The place was different but the story was the same.
 
The Japs had won at the expense of the British.
 
They’d been particularly ruthless on this occasion.
 
Besides the bullet-riddled and grenade-ravaged corpses, he recognized the hallmarks of ritual decapitation and disembowelment.
 
The battle over, they’d set about the wounded with their samurai swords.