Major Karnage Read online

  MAJOR KARNAGE

  GORD ZAJAC

  ChiZine Publications

  FIRST EDITION

  Major Karnage © 2010 by Gord Zajac

  Cover artwork © 2010 Erik Mohr

  Cover design © 2010 Corey Lewis

  All Rights Reserved.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

  Major Karnage / Gord Zajac.

  ISBN 978-0-9813746-6-6

  I. Title.

  PS8649.A39M35 2010 C813’.6 C2010-902883-X

  CHIZINE PUBLICATIONS

  Toronto, Canada

  www.chizinepub.com

  [email protected]

  Edited by Helen Marshall

  Copyedited and proofread by Brett Alexander Savory

  MK numbers 1-4 originally published by Kelp Queen Press

  For Alicia

  MK#1: MAJOR KARNAGE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  MK#2: KARNAGE UNLEASHED

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  MK#3: KARNAGE BEHIND BARS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  MK#4: KAMP KARNAGE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  MK#5: PRAY FOR KARNAGE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  MK#6: ALIEN KARNAGE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  MK#7: LESSONS IN KARNAGE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  MK#8: KARNAGE GOES TO TOWN

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  MK#9: DOUBLE THE KARNAGE, DOUBLE THE FUN!

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  MK#10: ALIEN KARNAGE

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  MK#0: ZERO HOUR!

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  BACK COVER

  MK#1: MAJOR KARNAGE

  CHAPTER ONE

  Karnage woke strapped to his bed. It was a welcome change from the straitjacket and the Hole, but the catheter still stung like a bitch and he had to scratch his nose something fierce. The sickly pink glow from the overhead fluorescents was giving him a headache. He shut his eyes. The smell of rotting piss and shit from dirty bed pans filled his nostrils.

  So, Karnage thought, this is retirement.

  He could hear Heckler’s hysterical laughter coming from elsewhere in the ward. One of the nurses—probably Fridge— barked at Heckler to shut the fuck up. There came a shout of “fuck you” from Velasquez, followed by a much more colourful stream of invectives in Spanish—the kind only Velasquez could conjure with that magic vocab of hers. Fridge—it was definitely Fridge—shouted at Velasquez. Velasquez shouted back. Karnage did his best to shut it all out. He knew where it was all going to end: sooner or later, out would come the stun gun, and after a long series of screams, Heckler and Velasquez would be electrocuted into silence.

  Karnage felt movement near the foot of his bed. He ignored it. Whatever Fridge wanted, it could fucking well wait until he was good and ready. Even if it meant getting electrocuted.

  “Major?” a voice whispered. It was Cookie. What was he doing out of bed? Karnage squinted one eye open. Cookie stood over Karnage’s bed, leaning on his IV drip, his head wrapped in bandages.

  “Major,” Cookie whispered, “are you awake?”

  Karnage half-opened his eyes. “Sit down next to me. Try not to be noticed. I don’t feel like dealing with these assholes yet.”

  Cookie gave a half-nod and sat on the bed near Karnage’s head, turning his body away from Fridge.

  “What’s on your mind, Corporal?”

  “I finally got it figured out, sir.” Cookie looked around, making sure Fridge was well out of hearing range. He leaned in closer and in a low voice said, “I’m not crazy.”

  “That a fact?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What about them voices you been hearing in your head?” Karnage said.

  “That’s what I figured out. They ain’t voices. They’re communications.” Cookie tapped his bandages. “Figure it’s got something to do with these electronics in my head.”

  “I thought the doc said those things’d clear up them voices?”

  “Nah,” Cookie grinned. “They just clarified ’em. Cut out all the background noise.”

  “That a fact?”

  “Yes, sir, it is.”

  “Hmm,” Karnage said. “What sort of communications you been getting, Corporal?”

  Cookie leaned in close to Karnage’s ear and whispered. “They’re from outer space.”

  “Outer space, eh?”

  Cookie’s face fell. “You don’t believe me.”

  Karnage looked Cookie straight in the eye. “Cookie, you ain’t never lied to me yet. No matter how crazy they say you are, and no matter how much they muck with your brain, I reckon you ain’t never gonna be able to tell a lie with a straight face. But I’d be lyin’ if I said I weren’t sceptical. Keep going. Communications from outer space. You been interceptin’ communiques from enemy spy satellites?”

  “No, sir. See, this is where it gets interestin’. These communications? I think they’re comin’ from . . . aliens.”

  “Aliens, eh?”

  “I mean the extraterrestrial kind, sir.”

  “I had a feelin’ that’s what you meant,” Karnage said. “What makes you think these communications are extraterrestrial in nature?”

  “Well, sir, I done cracked every code known to man—from Navajojibwe to SuperSanskrit—and this ain’t like nothing I ever seen before.”

  “Now that’s sayin’ something,” Karnage nodded. “Wait a minute. What do you mean ‘seen’? You been writing this stuff down, Corporal?”

  Cookie took one last look around before rolling up his sleeve. Lines of jagged squiggles ran up and down his arm. “I been transcribin
’ these here messages, Major.”

  “They look like squiggles,” Karnage said.

  Cookie nodded. “That’s exactly what they sound like, sir.”

  “They sound like squiggles?”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “I don’t know, Cookie. They all look the same to me.”

  Cookie grinned. “That’s what I thought, too, at first. Just random squiggly noises. But there’s a pattern to ’em. Took me forever to start noticing ’em, but that’s what I been trained to do. There’s all sortsa variations. You gotta listen carefully to pick ’em up.”

  Karnage took another look at the markings on Cookie’s arm. They were red around the edges, like Cookie had been pressing too hard when he was writing it down. Probably scribbling like a madman to get it all down, Karnage thought. He still couldn’t see any differences. Karnage looked at Cookie’s earnest face.

  “Cookie,” he said. “If anybody’s got the ears to pick up on that sort of stuff, it’s you. Go on, Corporal.”

  Cookie beamed. He wriggled closer to Karnage’s head and pointed at the first squiggle on his wrist. “You see this here? This is how all the messages begin. It’s like a greetin’ or something. And this one right next to it? That always comes next. I think it’s a kinda confirmation code. Lets the sender know the transmission’s bein’ received.”

  “They look the same to me,” Karnage said.

  Cookie’s head bobbed up and down like a parakeet. “That’s what I thought, too. At first. But the second is tilted just three degrees to the left. See?

  Karnage looked again. “Yeah, now that you mention it—wait a minute. This is all in your own handwritin’. How do you know it ain’t just yer scrawl that’s gone and tilted three degrees?”

  Cookie stiffened. His voice was clipped. “Sir, I transcribed it exactly as I heard it, sir.”

  “You mean to say you can hear a three degree tilt?”

  Cookie nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  Karnage looked Cookie up and down. “Cookie, you are impressin’ me all over again.”

  Cookied relaxed. A smile pulled at the corners of his mouth. He warmed to the subject. “I can’t make much sense outta the rest of it yet. Just seems like a lot o’ gobbledy-gook. But there’s certain patterns that keep popping up. I think it’s a numbering system.”

  “Numbers, eh? Numbers for what?”

  “Well, if I had to guess, I’d say they’re co-ordinates.”

  Karnage’s pulse quickened. “What kind of co-ordinates?”

  Cookie shrugged. “I don’t right know, Major.”

  Karnage strained against his bonds. He desperately wanted to grab Cookie by the shoulders. “Could it be military targets? Some kind of tactical strike?”

  Cookie hesitated. “I-I don’t really want to guess here, Major—”

  “Guess, Corporal! Guess!”

  “Now you gotta realize I’m just conjecturin’ here. . . .”

  “Cookie!”

  Cookie leaned in within inches of Karnage’s ear. “Well, if I had to guess . . . I’m thinking these are plans for some kind of . . .” Cookie’s voice became the barest of whispers. “. . . invasion.”

  Invasion!

  The word set off fireworks in Karnage’s brain. His ears burned. His blood pumped hot and fast through his body.

  He always knew this would happen. There would always be another battle. Always had been. Always would be. It had just been a matter of time. And now, after all these years, that time had finally come.

  Karnage strained against his bonds. His voiced boomed with his best drill sergeant bark. “Corporal! We’ve got to act fast! Call the general! Mobilize the infantry! Get me my rifle! Get me outta this bed! Uncle Stanley won’t get the drop on us this time. There’s a battle needs fightin’ and we’re the grunts to do it. Don’t just stand there, Corporal! Do something! Velasquez! Heckler! Koch! On your feet, soldiers!”

  “Major, please,” Cookie frantically jerked his sleeve back down over his forearm. “Fridge’ll hear you!”

  “What the hell’s going on over there?” Fridge unholstered his stun gun. Blue sparks danced across the metal tines. “You boys need a little lesson in discipline?”

  “No, Fridge,” squeaked Cookie.

  “We don’t have time for this!” Karnage wriggled and struggled so hard the bed’s casters bounced on the floor. He jerked his head at Fridge. “Cookie! Crack him across the neck like you did those Uncle Stanley skerks back in Kabul! You can take him!” Karnage turned to the other patients. “Come on, troops! Mobilize! He can’t take us all. On your feet, soldiers!”

  “Nobody do nothing stupid,” Fridge pointed at Velasquez and Koch who were in the middle of rising up off their beds. They halted. They looked from Fridge to Karnage and back again.

  The doors to the ward burst open. Doctor Flaherty walked into the room. His balding bespectacled face wore a wide grin. A pair of nurses flanked him on either side. They were the spitting image of Fridge though they went by the names Mammoth and Skyscraper. Straggling behind them was a less portly and slightly hairier doctor they’d never seen before. His ID tag read “Johnson.” He looked furtively from side to side as he scribbled notes on a clipboard. Flaherty was in mid-sentence, gesturing grandly into the room.

  “And in here we have—Stevens, what’s going on here?”

  Fridge slapped the stun gun back down to his side. “The ol’ major is having a freakout. Nothing I can’t handle, Doctor.”

  Flaherty eyed the stun gun. “Indeed. Let’s see if I can’t get through to him first, hmm?”

  “Doctor!” Karnage barked. “Get me outta this bed. This is an emergency!”

  Flaherty turned to Johnson. “You’re in for a real treat here. The major isn’t usually this talkative. Normally all we can get out of him is his name, rank, and serial number.”

  Karnage struggled against his bonds. “Doctor! We have a situation here! Time is of the essence!”

  “Major,” Flaherty’s tone was soft and cordial. “I’d like to introduce you to Dr. Johnson. He’ll be replacing Dr. Kubota, who opted to resign after that little incident last week. Dr. Johnson, may I introduce you to Major John Karneski.”

  “Karneski?” Johnson’s jaw dropped. “Do you mean . . . is this Major Karnage?”

  “We prefer to refer to our patients by their given names here. Isn’t that right, John?”

  “That’s Major to you, asshole,” Velasquez shouted from her bed.

  Johnson reached a hand out towards Karnage. “It’s an honour to meet you, sir.”

  Flaherty grabbed Johnson’s arm. “I’d advise against that, Johnson. It’s always a good idea to give the major a wide berth.”

  “But he’s strapped to the bed,” Johnson said.

  “Still, one can never be too careful around the major. Isn’t that right, John?”

  “Doctor, you are wearin’ my patience down to a bloody stump! I don’t have time for this rigamarole. You gotta let me outta this bed on the double before the enemy gets the drop on us!”

  “What enemy, John?” Flaherty asked.

  Karnage sneered. “That’s the big question mark, isn’t it? Who is the enemy? Who can you trust? I thought I knew who the enemy was. But then some civilian assmonkey is stickin’ medals on my chest with one hand while shovin’ my sorry ass into this hellhole with the other!”

  “John, I can understand your frustration, but you’re going to have to learn to let go.”

  “Doctor, you are interferin’ with a military operation! That is in direct violation of military ordinance number—”

  “John,” Flaherty’s tone grew firm. “There are no more military ordinances. There is no military. Your continued persistence in believing in this delusion—”

  “Delusion, my ass! You can take your world peace and your Nagasaki treaties and shove ’em down your piehole! You know what your problem is? You got the wrong guys locked up, that’s what. There are enemies out there just waitin’ to pounce on you when your gua
rd is down. Like a lion stalkin’ a herd o’ gazelle. You get me? And when guys like me get locked up while guys like you run the asylum, you gotta wonder just what the hell went wrong with the world. But the enemy doesn’t care about the why. They’re just waitin’ out there with their seventeen inch bayonets . . . waiting for the right time to shove those blades right up your ass! That time is lookin’ to be now, Doc. So you best unfuck yourself and lemme outta this bed!”

  Flaherty turned to the other patients. “Who did this? Who riled him up like this?”

  Fridge jerked a thumb at Cookie. “The old major was fine until Chucky there started hovering over his bed.”

  Cookie squeaked.

  “Charles?” Flaherty turned to Cookie. “Was it you?”

  Cookie stared at the ground. He nodded.

  “What did you tell him, Charles?” Flaherty said.

  “You don’t have to tell him shit, Corporal,” Karnage said.

  Cookie looked at Karnage, then Flaherty. He quickly darted his head back down again. He gripped his forearm tightly.

  “What do you have there, Charles?” Flaherty asked patiently.

  “Nothin’,” Karnage said. “He’s got nothin’!”

  “Let me see your forearm,” Flaherty said.

  Cookie made another squeak and slowly pulled up his shirt sleeve, revealing the squiggles. Flaherty looked at the mass of writing, then at Cookie. “Are you hearing voices again, Charles?”

  “They’re not voices!” Karnage shouted. “They’re alien communications!”

  “Aliens?” Flaherty’s eyebrows rose so high they nearly met his receding hairline.

  “That’s right! Aliens! Extratee-restrials! Unidentified Flying Objects of Death! You get me?!”

  “I’m afraid I do.” Flaherty sighed. He turned to Cookie. “I’m very disappointed in you, Charles. You should have come to me. I’m here to help.”

  Cookie fingered his bandages and whimpered.