Slack of the Dead: An X-Day Scenario

By rjtoth@aol.com (RJToth)
Date: 19 Feb 1995

(Dedicated to whomever married me in Pittsburgh last Friday. I swear I was
faithful for the whole 24.)

Imagine this.

A band of SubGenii realized their latent extramammalian talents too
late--thanks the occluding haze of observation-comedy tv signals ("Did you
ever notice those hairs in your rectum? Aren't those weird?"), perverse
radio broadcasts, USSR/CIA Death Satellites, etc.--and mailed in their
$30--or more, adjusting for inflation--on, say, June 30 '98. Any number of
fuckups occur--postal rate hike, armed insurrection, an invasion of
para-shooting Turks, Huns, Cossacks, whatever--and the checks DO NOT
ARRIVE.

They mailed their checks---but they're stuck! The saucers are speeding
through the aether between the planes and THESE POOR BASTARDS ARE WAITING
FOR THEIR MEMBERSHIP CARDS. (The rest of us, of course, can chuckle at
their plight, and rightly so--but imagine it. A little abject terror is
good for you.)

Now, a lot has been written about X-Day, about the specifics of its trials
and holo-costs, about the following orgasmic rapture. The possibility has
always haunted me that the bodies of conspiracy dupes WILL NOT BE
DESTROYED in the initial salvos--that their souls will be RIPPED FROM
THEIR DESERVING PINK FLESHY CARCASSES yet those selfsame CARCASSES will
remain ANIMATED and ON THE HUNT FOR WARM MEAT.

"Goddamn, if they ain't fast," grunts one almost-Reverend, swinging his
legs over the top of a chain-link fence as an army of ravening WALKING
DEAD snap at his soles. The automatic slung around his neck is NO DAMNED
GOOD, of course. Can't kill those dead fuckers--like shooting
Gainesburgers--and he's certainly not going to blast his way in Dobbstown.
He'll keep one bullet, of course...it's the only honorable thing...

Physical death, of course, has robbed the DUPES of their PSYCHIC JAWS--you
know the kind. Look at kindly old Father McGowan--his INVISIBLE TEETH
lapped hungrily at the ORIGINAL SLACK of thousands of SubGenii as he
dabbed them with his turgid "HOLY" water in profane BAPTISM rites. His
ears sprouted YELLOWED MOLARS as he chewed on the sins of DELUDED
SUBGENII. And we won't mention the POWERFUL SEX MAGICK he tried to squelch
in others JUST AS HIS OWN HAD BEEN STOLEN BY HIS IMPOTENT AVATAR.

Nothing so METAPHYSICAL now, of course. Now he just wants a taste of SUB-G
JERKY...

Ah, and who's this clawing at that fence as the left-behind SubGenii rub
their twisted ankles? Why, it couldn't be sainted old MRS. GLENFLANGEN,
couldn't it? Whose ECTOPLASMIC INCISORS ripped into our souls with every
pledge of allegience? Whose TRANSCENDENT DENTATA gnawed at our BEST SELVES
with every LIE AND MADE-UP FACT shoved down our throats? Maybe those
unfortunate too-late apostates should have left a few more apples...looks
like old Mrs. Glenflangen has a hearty appetite...

Let's leave this disturbing scene. The only morals it holds, I
guess--besides a plea for George Romero to make another fucking zombie
movie, and for Sam Raimi to FIGHT THE MACHINE, BABY! DON'T LET THEM GET
YOU, TOO! WE'VE LOST TOO MANY ALREADY!--are ancient ones: THEY want US
BAD. THEY WANT WHAT WE HAVE--and THEY DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT "IT" IS! And,
of course, SEND IN YOUR CHECK EARLY. If that fails, of course, AIM FOR THE
HEAD.

See you on the battlements.

---The Rev. Rob

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