The Legend of Jimmy Headshot (Shingles Book 6) Read online

  The Legend of Jimmy Headshot

  Rick Gualtieri

  Authors & Dragons

  Contents

  1. A WORLD WITH AN END

  2. THE COMPLAINING DEAD

  3. THERE GOES THE NEIGHBORHOOD

  4. EAT OR BE EATEN

  5. UNSAFE HOUSE

  6. TAKING OUT THE TRASH

  7. DAY OF THE DEAD ANIMALS

  8. A COLD DAY IN HELL

  9. SURVIVAL OF THE SHITIEST

  10. THE CHITTER CHATTER OF LITTLE FEET

  11. HELL’S HAMSTERS

  12. THE DOLLIES OF DOOM

  About the Author

  Also by Rick Gualtieri

  ABOUT AUTHORS & DRAGONS

  1

  A WORLD WITH AN END

  Few ever give serious thought to what they’ll be doing when the world finally gives the human race the finger. That’s probably for the best since people are generally delusional assholes—thinking they’ll go down in a blaze of glory rather than crying, begging, and pissing themselves. For most, dignity is the first thing out the window when the reaper comes calling.

  My given name’s Jacob, but fuck that shit. You can call me Jimmy and, in case you’re wondering, I’m not most people.

  The shit hit the fan when I was three hours into an online death match of Pulp The Dead. I’d finally fragged the opposing team leader, Aristocunt69, and was throwing him some epic shade about how much I enjoyed fucking his mom. Unfortunately, my victory celebration was cut short by my father’s screams coming from our front door.

  “What the hell is wrong with you? Stay back. Oh my God! Mother! Are you okay?”

  The fuck?

  My grandma’s response was an inarticulate shriek, which told me that, whatever was going on, okay was likely not part of the equation. I probably should have cared more; after all, she was my grandmother. But the truth was, she was a dried up old bitch who’d been leaching off my parents’ kindness ever since Grandpa had gotten drunk on the job and fallen into an industrial-sized sausage stuffer. She was irritable, hogged the bathroom, and perpetually smelled of mothballs.

  Oh, and she gypped me on my birthday by handing me a card with two dollar bills in it. Two fucking dollars! That wouldn’t even buy a blowjob in the bad part of town, much less some Xbox Live hours. And yet I was still forced to write her a thank you note.

  Needless to say, I was still bitter.

  While I considered this, Dad’s entreaties continued. “Stay back, I say!” Sadly, his pleas apparently fell on deaf ears. “Honey, get the kids! Keep them safe.”

  Yeah, right. Mom could barely fight off a stress headache whenever I got less than a B in school. How the hell was she going to keep us safe from anything more threatening—pop a Xanax and hope for the best?

  “What’s happening?!” my mother cried.

  “I don’t know. This lunatic just bit nanny!”

  Hold on. Bit?

  My mother’s shrill voice cried out again. “What is that thing? What happened to its eyes?”

  Despite what my English teacher would have my parents believe, I wasn’t an idiot. I quickly put two and two together, a smile crossing my face.

  “Jimmy Headshot signing off, losers.” I logged out of the server, pulled off my headset, and shut off the TV.

  I’d been waiting for this moment my entire life.

  It was about goddamned time.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  I stepped out of the family room and headed toward the kitchen. If what I suspected was true, there wasn’t time to properly equip myself. That would have to wait for later.

  Now was the time for action.

  I only paused as I passed my little sister’s room. Darlene sat on her bed, a vacant stare on her face as she continued playing with her dolls, despite the commotion going on up the hall. How I despised her.

  Still, I had to give credit where credit was due. I’d always pegged her as the first to go when the apocalypse finally hit. But, from the sound of things, someone else was about to claim that prize.

  “Fine, take second place,” I muttered with disdain and started walking again. Brainless doe-eyed nimrod. I doubted she had anything to look forward to other than a short, painful life as a walking hors d'oeuvre.

  Whatever. She wasn’t my immediate concern. From the sound of things, whoever was fighting with my father was winning. Kinda served him right. If you’re going to pay for a goddamned gym membership, Dad, then maybe you should fucking use it on occasion.

  I reached the kitchen and went straight for the utensil drawer. Most movies would have you believe that a butcher knife is the thing to grab, but they’re full of shit. If the thing at the door was what I thought it was, then that would buy me nothing more than a quick and bloody death. People tended to forget that the human skull is pretty damn thick. You could try slicing it open, but all you’d be liable to do is break the blade or get it lodged in bone, neither of which would do dick to save your ass from the thing trying to eat it.

  I opted instead for a simple steak knife. Not ideal, but serviceable. Stabbing was the way to go, at least until I got my hands on some better hardware. I turned to leave, but then stopped in my tracks. Ugh! I could have slapped myself. Heading into combat without backup was a newb move at best. Fuck that noise. I stuffed the first knife into my belt then grabbed another.

  Duly armed, I headed toward the front hall and my destiny.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  I’ve never been what one might call sentimental. Fuck no. Tears were for pussies. If you skinned your knee on the playground, you got right back up and made whichever fucker tripped you eat grass. That’s how I lived life. Nevertheless, I felt my eyes grow misty for a moment at what I saw waiting for me.

  No, it wasn’t my parents fighting for their lives, or my grandmother bleating like a sheep while she cradled her bleeding arm. It was the thing trying to get into our house—a zombie. A real, motherfucking, rotting in the flesh zombie. There was no mistaking it for anything else. Its eyes were gone, and the skin around its mouth had been torn away, partially revealing its jaw. Several of its fingers were obviously broken, but it didn’t appear bothered in the least. All it seemed to care about was the soft flabby skin on my father’s neck—its teeth clicking together in anticipation of the bite to come.

  It was absolutely fucking beautiful.

  Mind you, that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to kill its ass with extreme prejudice. “Not on my watch, asshole.”

  Mom noticed me and stepped in front of where my dad was locked in a life or death struggle with the undead, momentarily blocking my view. She quickly put on her patronizing parent face. “Why don’t you run along and play, Jacob? One of...err...Daddy’s friends is here and he’s...showing off his new...Halloween mask.”

  “You’re fucking kidding me, right?”

  “Language, mister,” she scolded.

  Goddamn, she was an idiot. I could see where my sister got it from. “Listen and listen close, Mom, because I’m only going to say this once. You see that thing? That means it’s over. The world as you know it is gone. The old rules are going right out the window. All of them. Including the one that says I have to listen to your shit. Now get the fuck out of my way!”

  My mother wasn’t what you’d call an alpha dog. Despite the fact that I was twelve and she was...well, old, we locked eyes, and she blinked first. But still, motherly instinct can be a tough thing to overcome. I’d made her shut her pie hole, but she still didn’t move out of my way.

  Fine by me. The living room was pretty wide anyway.

  I stepped around her, sparing
a quick glance at my grandmother. She was sitting on the couch staring at her wounded arm. The poor mothball-scented fool. She had no idea what was happening. But I couldn’t deal with her just yet. Dad was rapidly losing to the creep trying to force its way in. I wasn’t quite ready to let that happen.

  Despite him being a two-hundred-pound jellyfish in a power tie, I still held a marginal amount of fondness for my father. Besides, in the coming collapse of society, there would always be a need for warm bodies to lug shit around. No point in wasting good cannon fodder.

  A small end table sat next to the door, a place for my parents to drop their keys when they came home from work or shopping. But today it served a different purpose—a stepping stool to catapult me onto the zombie, piggyback style. “Yippie ki-yay, shit eater!”

  “Jacob!” Dad cried. “What are you...UGLLLTH!”

  His words were cut off as the zombie shoved one of its decaying hands into his mouth. Just as well. I concentrated better when I didn’t have to listen to people bitching.

  I greeted our visitor by way of jamming a steak knife in its eye socket—enjoying the sensation as I penetrated gristle and shoved the pointy end deep into its diseased brain.

  The effect was almost immediate. It ceased struggling and pitched forward, the momentum and my added weight enough to knock Dad to the floor beneath us. Heh. It was like we were the bread in this life or death sandwich, which made the zombie some seriously fucked-up lunch meat.

  Dad, predictably, ruined the moment by freaking the fuck out. “Get it off me! It’s going to...”

  “Shut up.”

  “Huh?”

  “I said quit your whining. It’s dead.” I got up off the corpse, grabbed it by its hair, and lifted its head. It was quite deceased. “See?”

  Dad scrambled out from under the body, climbed to his feet, and then promptly kicked it in the face.

  Whatever makes you feel like a man, tough guy.

  After several more seconds, in which I’m sure we were both waiting to see if he’d suffer a stress-induced heart attack, he turned to me. “Young man, we need to have a talk about your language.”

  I dusted myself off, then pulled out the second steak knife. “I have a better idea. Why don’t you go find something useful to do, like go fuck yourself.”

  “I’m your father, and I will not have you disrespecting me.”

  So this was how it was gonna be. Can’t say I was surprised. “Fine. We can talk about that all you want,” I replied. “But first, I have one loose end to tie up.”

  Before either of my parents could question me further, I stepped past them both and slammed the knife into the side of my grandmother’s head.

  2

  THE COMPLAINING DEAD

  Despite what you might have seen on whatever dumbass movies or TV shows you enjoy—and believe me, I’ve seen a lot of them—knives don’t slide through bone like it was butter. You gotta jam that shit in hard...usually anyway.

  Grandma was old and her bones were brittle, so I managed to pierce her brain and save her from the indignity of having to kill her again later. I wasn’t sure what mothball-encrusted afterlife her soul went off to, but I like to think she was thanking me from there.

  My parents were somewhat less understanding, especially Dad.

  “MOM! You killed my mother!”

  “She was already dead. She just didn’t know it yet.” I tried to yank the blade out, but it was stuck fast. Oh well, no loss. A single steak knife wasn’t going to win the war of survival. It was time to suit up and get ready, but first I needed to secure the premises. Rule number one of the zombie apocalypse: the undead are like cockroaches. If you see one, that means there are a shit load more around.

  Before I could do that, though, Dad collapsed to his knees in tears. Fucking pussy. Sentiment would only get you one thing in this new world: dumped into a shallow grave.

  It fell to me to man up, but then, I kinda knew it would.

  The dispatched zombie was blocking the doorway, leaving it open and us vulnerable. I dragged it all the way in, then shut the door and locked it. The last thing we needed right then was another of those fuckers wandering in while my parents were busy blubbering over the loss of Grandma’s monthly social security check.

  “Y-you listen here, Jacob Perkins,” Mom sputtered. “You’re grounded. Killing Grammy is bad. G-go to your room.”

  “Was headed there anyway,” I replied with an unconcerned grunt.

  I again passed Darlene’s bedroom on the way. She continued to mindlessly manhandle her dolls as if nothing had happened. Fucking twat-brained cootie magnet.

  “Wanna play with me?” she asked, holding out a naked Barbie as if I’d even scratch my ass with it.

  I walked on, leaving her hanging. Hopefully comprehension would dawn in that dullard brain of hers and she’d realize that the days of dollies were at an end, but I doubted it. Barbie and Ken’s dream house, hah! It would soon be nothing but a burning wasteland littered with corpses.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  Once I reached my room, I got straight to work. There was little doubt in my mind that we were living on borrowed time as far as the power grid was concerned, so I quickly turned on my laptop and began scanning social media for news.

  I was more concerned with finding out how bad things were than what had started it all. It’s not like I was some pencil-necked scientist. Besides, anyone who’s ever watched a zombie movie knows they almost never tell you how the outbreak got started. Biggest fucking cliché of the genre, but I could kinda see their reasoning. Once society collapsed, it was pretty much a moot point.

  Twitter proved to be useless. There were a few users reporting zombie sightings, but they were drowned out by replies calling them racist assholes for not using p.c. terms like “undead American.” Fucking social justice warriors. Even at the end of days, they couldn’t pull their heads from their asses.

  Facebook was just as bad—awash with idiots trying to take selfies as the undead advanced upon them. It was little surprise when most abruptly stopped responding to the “Cool picture, bro!” comments they were getting.

  Disgusted, I turned to Google News. Surely there was at least one outlet more concerned with Armageddon than click-bait about who the Kardashians were fucking today.

  It’s pollen season again. Are you prepared?

  What can you expect from this weekend’s box office?

  Scientists have identified a new strain of pesticide-resistant flea.

  BREAKING NEWS! The dead walk among us!

  Finally! From the look of things, it was already bad and only going to get worse. People were panicking in the streets. Unsurprisingly, the more who panicked, the more who died and were reborn as walking brain suckers. The masses were so fucking predictable.

  Already several cities had declared martial law. Congress, meanwhile, was busy debating whether to blame Russia or North Korea rather than coming up with any useful solutions.

  In short, the world was pretty well fucked. I did a quick calculation in my head and predicted we had maybe a week tops before society as we knew it devolved into total anarchy.

  I couldn’t help but smile.

  Hell, I’d been waiting for this shit for years—ever since that day back when I was three and Mom left the TV on while she did the laundry. The cartoons eventually ended, and Night of the Living Dead came on.

  It was as if destiny itself was calling to me. Who I was and what I was meant to be became instantly clear. From that moment on, I spent every waking hour making sure that when the time came, I’d be ready.

  Let the rest of the world cower. I was here to eat Frosted Flakes and kick zombie ass.

  Pity for the undead, Darlene had finished the last of the Frosted Flakes this morning, the little bitch.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  My parents were still busy whining about Grandma. From the girl-like blubbering coming from my dad, I doubted it was going to end anytime soon. Not even my sister’s mewling that her fu
cking dolls were hungry and wanted lunch seemed to get through to them.

  Fine. I had more important matters to deal with anyway. First was armoring up. I’d purposely played a ton of sports over the years, not because I gave a single shit about teamwork, but because I wanted to see what they had to offer as way of protection. Word of advice, asking your parents for tactical body armor is a good way to get dragged to a therapist’s office and labeled something stupid, like sociopath or borderline psycho. But ask for some elbow guards so you don’t break your neck skateboarding, and they’ll be all up in that shit.

  So I played their silly game, gradually amassing a collection of padding, plating, and helmets all with one endgame in mind—this day.

  The outfit waiting for me in my closet protected my vitals while allowing for maximum mobility. Best of all, it breathed. Not every source agreed on what attracted the dead, but there seemed to be a general consensus on sound and smell. Even if that wasn’t the case, I wouldn’t be doing myself any favors wearing armor that gave me swamp ass thirty seconds after putting it on.

  That took care of defense. Now came the real fun: offense.

  I stepped from my room to the sound of my father still begging Grandma’s corpse to wake up.

  Good luck with that. Even if she did, I’d put the bitch right back down again.

  I made good use of my parents’ grief by heading to their bedroom. Dad had bought a twelve gauge a few years back, right around the time the media was going nuts over some bullshit about clowns trying to lure kids into the woods. His idiotic circus phobia aside, I knew where he kept it and, more importantly, the combo to the safe where he stored the ammo.