Showdown At El Pollo Loco
Title: Showdown at El Pollo Loco
Medium: Fanfic - Supernatural: Dean and Sam Winchester, guest starring TK & friends
Artist:
pdragon76
Disclaimer: It’s Kripke’s world, we’re all just living in it. *snaps fingers, points*
Summary: Dean and Sam learn there's more to KFC than meets the eye. More to a kid named TK, too.
Note to Mom: Dean says "damn". And, um, "fart". But just once each, I think. And he’s really sorry about it, too, but he says he can’t help it. There's also some guts flying about. But purely for plot furtherfication. It’s totally gratuitous very tasteful.
Note to TK: This is inspired by YOU, kiddo, and your AWESOME TOES OF DOOM. No chickens were harmed in the making of this fic. Killed, yes. Harmed? Never. I am a vegomatarianist. I would never harm an animal. UNLESS IT WAS A ZOMBIE ANIMAL. *makes with the stabbity* I got
kimonkey7 to look at this, and she cleaned up my grammar and cut out a LOT of Dean’s bad language. So now you is allowed to read it, Bucko. I hope you like it, TK. I had fun making it for you.
When they reached the outskirts of Eau Claire, Sam flicked open the notebook in his lap and found the directions he had copied down.
“West Heidel Agricultural,” he relayed to Dean. “Moors Road.”
“What do they teach you at an agricultural school? Milking cows? How is that useful?” Dean was hungry. He’d wanted a chocolate éclair ever since Sam had mentioned Eau Claire, but they still hadn’t passed a bakery, and it was making him cranky. They were in the country, for crying out loud. He should have been able to spit and hit a baker.
“Are you still sulking? We’ll get you an éclair later. Zombies first, pastry after. You know the rules, Dean.”
Sam was right. Zombies were serious business. You couldn’t leave zombies running around, because they wanted brains. And people weren’t really willing to hand over their brains, as a general rule. They needed them for work, or school, or playing computer games and watching Doctor Who. All the good stuff, you needed a brain to get it done.
Dean liked zombie jobs. They were simple. Find zombies, don’t get killed by zombies, get rid of zombies. It had a beginning, a middle, and an end. Lots of other jobs weren’t like that. They had beginnings that wouldn’t turn into middles, and ends that felt an awful lot like beginnings. Some jobs didn’t seem to start at all. You just looked up and all of a sudden you were in the middle of them. And when that happened, it was just plain confusing.
So, Dean liked zombie jobs. You knew where you stood with a zombie. And mostly, you were in and out pretty quick. You could be having a turkey sandwich and a root beer by midday when you were working a zombie gig. And speaking of poultry…
“So, this job. You said they were zombie chickens?”
Sam checked his notes. “Yep.”
“Seem to you like we’ve had a lot of zombie chicken jobs lately?”
“Well, there was that one in Arkansas a few months back. And yeah, come to think of it…didn’t we clear out a zombie coop near Yosemite in May?”
Dean squinted, trying to recall. “Oh, shoot. Yes. We did. I remember that. You lost a good pair of jeans that day.”
Sam shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Shut up.”
“You slipped on those zombie chicken guts good. Fell off that gangplank and split those babies right up the back. ‘Member? You had your butt swingin’ in the breeze all the way back to the motel.” Dean threw back his head and laughed, dropped lazy hands to the bottom of the steering wheel. “Oh, man, that was hilarious.”
“Yeah, as I recall, you were a real adult about it.”
“What?” Dean protested indignantly as he turned down Moors Road. “I helped you up.”
“If by ‘helped me up’ you mean laughed till you choked and had to put your head between your knees, then yes. You helped plenty.”
“Oh, cry more, you big baby.”
“Anyway. Here we are.” Sam pointed to the school entrance on their left. “Pull in here.”
Dean maneuvered the Impala into the driveway. He could see a gaggle of people assembled in the parking lot, and he headed towards them.
Sam closed his notebook, tossed it on the seat beside him. “We really have had a lot of zombie chicken jobs lately. I wonder what’s going on?”
Dean killed the engine, shrugged. “Well, I dunno, but before I get out of this car, I want a gear check. You bring a spare pair of jeans, Slippy McButtsOut?”
Sam kicked open his door with a lot more force than he needed. “Shut up, you jerk.”
*********************************************************************************************
They were too late to save the principal. Word was already spreading through the crowd of people milling in front of the administration block of West Heidel Agricultural School. There were some horrified gasps from the parents as the news rippled from one person to the next, then some cheering as the whisper reached the students in the back. At first, it had seemed like a banana muffin made by the eighth graders was responsible, but on closer inspection, a parent had confirmed that the zombie chickens had overpowered Mr. Singleton near the Home Ec building. There seemed to be some confusion over why he had been a target. Didn’t zombie chickens want brains? Everyone seemed to agree it must have been a really short snack.
Dean took immediate control of the situation, patted the air with his hands as he called for the crowd’s attention. “Okay, everyone, if you can all just calm down and listen to me for a minute. Real sorry to hear about your principal and all, but the fact remains you have a problem with some zombie chickens. But you don’t need to worry, ‘cause me and my brother have some experience dealing with zombie chickens… and if you all just stand out here and stay together, we’ll have this sorted out for you in two shakes.”
He leaned towards Sam, who was smiling reassuringly at everyone. “Do we have a contact? Who called us?”
“Bobby said some guy named TK.”
Dean turned back to the crowd. “There a guy named TK around?”
He was startled by a voice behind him. “Winchesters, right? You’re Dean and Sam?”
They both turned to look at the boy who was coming toward them from the direction of the school buildings. Dean eyed him suspiciously. He was young - couldn’t have been more than thirteen - but he was marching across the parking lot like an drill sergeant and Dean doubted those fatigues were part of the West Heidel uniform. “Who’s askin’?” he hedged, and the kid adjusted his glasses impatiently.
“Name’s TK. I’m running this operation.” TK glanced at his watch. “You guys are late.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Why don’t you follow me, before anyone else gets their brains pecked out.”
Dean and Sam looked at each other in surprise, then Dean shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “I’ll buy that. Why not?”
**********************************************************************************************
TK had set up head quarters in the library, and Dean wasn’t sure if it was to keep the research books handy, or because he watched too much Buffy the Vampire Slayer. There were two other kids perched on the edge of the study table near the reference section. They stopped talking and looked up as TK approached.
“These those Winchesters?” asked the skinny dude with too much hair. Dean thought he looked a bit like Sam, back when his brother was just a pipsqueak in desperate need of an atomic-wedgie. Actually, nothing much had changed. Sam was still a pipsqueak in desperate need of an atomic-wedgie. He just thumped back a lot harder these days.
“Yeah,” TK waved his hand distractedly at the two kids. “This is my crew.” He pointed to the boy with the mop hair. “That’s Brackett.”
“Brackett?” Dean repeated. “Don’t hear that every day.”
“He’s from Brackett,” TK explained slowly, as though Dean was a little dense.
Sam coughed so that Dean wouldn’t hear him laugh, but he didn’t do a very good job.
TK motioned to the girl with the bright striped top and pigtails next to Brackett. “And that’s Miranda.”
Dean winked, pointed at her. “Let me guess: Miranda, as in South Dakota?”
“No.” She rolled her eyes. “Miranda as in Miranda. I’m from Newark.”
“Oh.” Dean shoved his hands in his pockets and decided he should probably shut up.
Sam turned to face TK. He jutted his chin towards the desk. “What are those things?”
TK stepped up and lifted one of the fluorescent colored munitions from the table. “This?” He held it up so they could get a good look. “This’s a Dr. Lonnie Johnson Super Soaker 50. Original chassis, but I’ve made some modifications. Grain filled tank, feed gets filtered through here,” TK indicated a thick section of the barrel, “with the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix.” He hiked up the weapon and leaned his cheek against the side, squinted down the sighting. “If you get a clear day? With no wind? You can shoot a pellet fifty feet with this sucker.”
Dean blinked, pivoted to face Sam. “Why don’t we have those?”
Sam raised his eyebrows. “Wow. They must come in handy.”
“They do,” TK confirmed. “But only against small zombie chicken pods. This thing’s a little… bigger. That’s why I called you in.”
Dean yanked on Sam’s sleeve, eyes still on the super-soaker. “Can we get one of those? We need to get one of those.” He glared at TK. “Where did you get that?”
“Well, I made it, actually.” TK pointed to the map spread out on the table beneath the other super-soakers. “This isn’t exactly the first zombie chicken job we’ve handled. Maybe it’s time I brought you guys up to speed.”
******************************************************************************************
“So, you guys know KFC, yeah?” TK tapped the map, where he had marked up various outlets across the country.
Dean puffed out his chest, slapped his belly. “Know it? Dude, I practically keep that place in business.”
Sam got a pinched look. “Dean, completely emptying the warmers in every Kentucky Fried Chicken store you pass is nothing to be proud of.”
Miranda folded her arms and raised her eyebrows. “Yeah, congratulations. And you’ve been financing a major zombie chicken operation.”
Dean made a face at her. “I have not.”
“Have to.”
“Have not.”
TK interrupted. “Well, actually, yes. You have to. Look, we’ve done a lot of research on this. Things were okay up until Colonel Sanders died waaaaaay back in the eighties. Kinda hard to believe they even HAD chicken back then, but whatever. He wasn’t into zombies, is the point. His son, though… now that dude is into some serious dead chicken stuff. And he has this entire KFC thing set up with refrigerated trucks and everything. He can have a hundred zombie chickens from one coast to the other in under three days by road. I even heard he has a private jet. And if that’s true, well…” TK looked up at Dean and Sam, shook his head. “We can only do the best we can. That’s all we can do. And KFC’s just got this deal with the board of education for lunches, so me and Brackett and Miranda, we’ve been sneaking around the schools here in Wisconsin, pretending we’re students - kind of like undercover. But there’s more and more pods springing up, and they’re getting bigger. I have some other teams… kids I know. We’re all spread out, but we keep in contact, help each other out. My mom’s… well, she knows what’s going on, so she helps where she can. But mostly she’s only good for driving us places. She can’t really get involved. So mainly, it’s just us.” He nodded toward Brackett and Miranda.
Sam stared at the map intently. He nodded, crossed his arms and rocked up onto the balls of his feet. “Okay, so why do you need us? What’s the plan?”
TK looked from Sam to Dean and back again. “I figured out a way to wipe this entire lot of zombie chickens out in one go, but we’re gonna need the school bus. And the barn in the cow paddock. And some explosives.”
Dean perked up, suddenly looked a whole lot more interested. “Whoa. What?”
TK grinned. “I said we need some explosives. That’s where you guys come in.”
**********************************************************************************************
Dean listened carefully to the plan, and had only one gripe when TK was done explaining.
“We can’t just go buy you some dynamite, kid. People take a purchase like that pretty seriously. You need permits and stuff. We don’t need that kind of attention.”
TK looked disappointed. “Well, we need a--”
“Big bang,” Dean agreed. He rubbed his jaw as he thought over the problem. “Doesn’t have to be big, actually. We load up the school bus with the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix, then you three draw the zombie chickens into the barn. Sam and I’ll handle the bus. All we need’s a well-placed spark near the gas tank. Instant Anti-Zombie Napalm.” He nodded. “Awesome. That could actually work.”
Sam frowned. “W-w-wait. How are you gonna blow up the tank?”
Dean jingled the Impala keys in his jacket pocket as he headed for the door. “Watch and learn, little brother. Watch and learn.”
**********************************************************************************************
“When did we get those?” Sam asked in surprise as Dean pulled the flares out of the trunk.
“Remember that job in Key West?”
“No.”
“Oh, that’s right. You weren’t there. Well, Dad and me were runnin’ this poltergeist thing on a charter boat and I stole--” Dean paused, eyes flitting to the three kids flanking his brother, “obtained them in lieu of payment.”
“You jacked them?” TK asked reproachfully.
Dean looked down at the flares in his hands and then at Sam’s stony face. “No,” he told TK defensively. “I didn’t jack them, I just… Look, you want me to blow up your school bus or not, kid?”
TK’s eyes traveled from the flares to the big yellow school bus parked on the edge of the lot. He shrugged. “Okay. I guess we don’t have a lot of choice. Whatever.”
“School bus goes booooom!” crowed Brackett, and he gave Miranda a high-five.
“Awesome,” she agreed.
They were loading the last bags of the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix onto the floor of the school bus when Sam caught Dean’s eye. “We’re replacing those flares, Sticky Fingers. Next time we go through Florida, that’s our first stop.”
“Dude, it was a billionty years ago. Boat probably sank by now.”
“Yeah,” Sam agreed, thumping down a bag. “I wonder why.” He staged a dramatic re-enactment for the benefit of Dean’s conscience. “‘Oh, look, honey, our boat’s sinking. Why don’t you bang off a flare and get us some help.’ ‘Why, certainly, dear. Oh, dang. Our flares appear to have been stolen.’”
Dean flapped a hand. “Alright, alright. We’ll replace them. Jeeeez.” He cracked the top of the first flare with his bowie knife and started sprinkling the powder over the bags. “Okay, so nobody light a match right now.”
**********************************************************************************************
Dean stopped the bus outside the open doors to the barn and followed Sam down the stairs into the fresh night air. He paused on the bottom step and wondered aloud how long it had been since he boosted a school bus.
“Twelve years,” Sam reminded him, in the sort of voice that suggested he was still pretty disgusted. “You nearly ran over Mrs. Carthaus near the basketball courts.”
“Oh, yeah. That’s right. Old Lady Farthouse. She moved pretty quick for a grandma.”
“I got hauled into the principal’s office,” Sam continued, with no small amount of resentment. “They called Dad. He was furious. I had to sit there with him and wait until you lost interest in your little joyride.”
“It was twelve years ago, Sam. Get over it, you nerd. And I didn’t lose interest. I lost power. I ran out of gas out on I-90.” He chuckled as he hopped down onto the grass beside his brother. “If that thing’d been solar powered, I’d still be cruisin’ the streets of Tijuana right now.” He floated a hand in front of him, face tilted back and eyes closed as if Mexico was printed in full color on the backs of his eyelids.
“Dad would have hunted you down and grounded you into the next century,” Sam scoffed.
Dean blinked. “Sam, he did hunt me down and ground me into the next century.” A burst of white noise from his pocket cut short the stroll down memory lane.
TK didn’t just have zombie-killing super-soakers. He had walkie-talkies, too.
“See this?” Dean held up the transmitter in front of Sam’s face. “This kid is organized. We should have these.”
“We do, Dean.” Sam produced his cell. “They’re called phones.”
“Yeah, but these are way cooler.” He pressed the button. “Breaker, breaker, this is Red Leader, do you copy?”
There was a staticky noise, then TK’s fierce whisper crackled back at them.
“Will you SHUT UP! We’re right on top of them. Are you guys ready with the bus?”
Dean grinned delightedly, depressed the button again. “Copy that, Ghostrider.” He got a hurried, “Thunderbirds are go,” in before Sam yanked the transmitter off him.
“God, you’re such an idiot.”
Dean smiled so wide his face almost cracked in half. “Yeah. An idiot with a screwdriver,” he agreed, holding it up for Sam to see.
Sam raked both hands down his face. “The worst kind,” he groaned as he boarded the bus again and slid behind the wheel.
Dean didn’t care. He was already flat on his back, pulling himself under the chassis. He tapped a finger on the fuel line, tracked it to…
Gotcha. Some days Dean Winchester truly loved his job. He just never really got tired of punching holes in things with a screwdriver.
“Alright, remember - drive slow!” he shouted, when the fuel was running freely from the ruptured chrome box. He started to shuffle out from beneath the bus, had to yell “NOT YET, YOU DOOFUS!” when Sam dropped the clutch and nearly squished him flat.
*********************************************************************************************
It was a sight to behold. When TK said it was a large pod, he’d really meant it.
First came Brackett, flashlight beam bobbing violently over the grass in front of him as he legged it towards the barn. Then Miranda, maglite pressed between her arm and her side so the light splashed up over her multicolored top; her face white and creased with alarm in the stark glow. Her pigtails slapped in her face as she risked a backward glance over her shoulder.
TK brought up the rear - running backwards - the super-soaker trained into the darkness. “Go! Go! Go! GO!” he was shouting, voice rising in pitch and urgency as the black bubbling shadow behind him gained in both momentum and size.
Dean had never seen four hundred zombie chickens at once. And he couldn’t really see them now, either, which is why he hollered at Sam: “Hit the lights!”
Sam punched the switch for the floodlights inside the barn door, and the two powerful halogens mounted on the roof came on one - WHOMP! - after the other - WHOMP!
Daylight spilled down on the thundering mass of zombified birds. They weren’t so much running as stumbling off each other in the general direction of the barn. Feathers flew up and fluttered in the air as poultry bounced off poultry. Wings hung askew and beaks pointed every which way but forward. Beady chicken eyes dangled out of their sockets like tacky earrings. Frothy drool damped puffy little zombie chests.
Dean had seen some crazy stuff in his time, but nothing quite prepared you for the sound of four hundred chickens groaning Booooooooooorrrrrrrrrrrrkkkkkk! in much the same tone that any normal zombie would say Braaaaaaiiiiiiiinnnnnss!
“Dude,” he called to Sam. “These zombie chickens are totally messed up!” He pointed. “Half of ‘em are treadin’ on their own eyeballs!” Dean couldn’t look away from the approaching Birds of Doom. They were as spellbinding as they were disgusting.
Miranda had overtaken Brackett, and collided heavily with the side of the barn to Dean’s right. She gathered herself up, panting. “I know,” she agreed, eyes bright above an adrenaline smile. “Isn’t it awesome!”
Brackett ran directly into Sam three times, like a confused sparrow at a pane of glass, before Sam collared him and shook him loose of his panic. “Hey! HEY! You’ve arrived,” Sam assured him.
A hollow doonk! doonk! doonk!doonk!doonk! brought Dean’s attention back to TK as he came charging towards the barn, firing Anti-Zombie pellets back into the hoard of chickens as he came. Dean saw a couple of chicken heads clearing the pack to catch the pellets, then heard the startled BEEYERK! from each zombie chicken as they encountered the explosive effect of the Brain Dissolving Mix. Chicken guts sure could fly, Dean noted.
TK didn’t stop when he reached the barn doors. Dean and Sam and Brackett and Miranda took cover to the left and right of the shed while the chickens surged through the entrance in pursuit of TK and his deadly grain.
“NOW!” Miranda shouted as the last of the zombie chickens flailed their way over the threshold, and the four zombie hunters converged on the doors, slapped them shut and slammed the slidebolt home.
“Did TK get out?” Brackett scrabbled to look in the window, and Dean pressed the side of his hand against the glass above Brackett’s head; peered in, too. It was hard to tell. There was a lot of grain on the floor near the far end of the barn, and chicken heads were popping like corn, left right and center as they feasted on the bait. It was getting pretty messy in there. The school bus stood in the center of the shed floor, obstructed their view of the door through which TK should have made his planned escape.
“I can’t see,” Dean admitted.
“Can’t see what?” TK asked at Dean’s ear, and Dean jumped a foot, clapped a hand over his heart. He sagged against the barn’s outer wall.
“Jeeez, kid, you just nearly gave me a heart attack.”
TK wiped some chicken guts off his hands onto his cargo pants, shouldered the super-soaker. He looked at Sam and then Dean, a glimmer of a smile on his grimy face. “So, you guys wanna blow up four hundred zombie chickens, or what?”
*****************************************************************
Miranda did the honors, dropped the match onto the start of the gasoline trail into the barn. And then they all ran like hell.
Gas tank must have been a little fuller than the gauge had indicated, because when the bus went up, the KERBOOM! shook the ground beneath the school and deposited the roof of the barn a hundred yards west. Dean thought all his Christmases had come at once when a freak splat of chicken guts got flung higher and further than any other debris and hit Sam right in the face. Dean laughed so hard he almost peed in his pants. His brother was gonna smell like a Chicken and Biscuit Bowl for a week, which stopped being funny right about the time Dean remembered they had to ride in the same car.
The tired band of zombie fighters picked their way through the rubble of the barn, squished a few stubborn, twitchy chicken necks underfoot as they explored the results of a successful mission.
On the way back to the parking lot, Dean wondered how many bags of the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix TK could be persuaded to part with, and if he only accepted cash or if credit cards were okay. ‘Cause Dean planned on buying as much of the stuff as he could fit in the car.
Stinky Sam might have to walk.
The lot was now deserted, and Dean figured you couldn’t really blame people for taking off when you started blowing up barns full of zombie chickens. It wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, this life. That’s for sure. But it was his kind of life, and he felt pretty good standing there beside his car and his chook-splattered brother. They’d killed the zombie chickens, met some awesome new contacts, and if Dean could just find himself a bakery and get a chocolate éclair, this night was gonna go down as damn near perfect.
A lone car swept slowly into the lot, headlights raking over the small band of hunters as they said their goodbyes. A horn tooted.
“That’ll be my mom,” TK explained, lifted a hand toward the car in acknowledgement. “Just a sec!” he shouted.
The thin, warbling response barely reached them on the still night air. “Braaaaaaaaiiiiiiinnnnsss.”
Dean and Sam exchanged frowns.
TK rolled his eyes. “In a minute, mom!” He smiled tightly at Dean and Sam, extended a small card in his hand. “So, if you guys ever run into any trouble, or you need help or anything…”
Dean took the square of paper, blinked at it. He squinted at TK. “You have business cards?” His reproachful gaze shifted to Sam. “Now, why don’t we have business cards?”
Sam sighed, grabbed his brother by the shoulders and pointed him towards the Impala. “Okay, I smell like guts, and we’re going now. It was nice meeting you TK. You run a pretty tight ship. We should keep in touch.”
TK nodded. “You, too. Thanks for your help.”
A faint gust of wind carried the word again across the lot, “Braaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnsssss,” and Dean paused, halfway into the car. He twisted towards TK.
“Dude, is your mom a--”
“Zombie princess? Yes,” TK blurted, his voice pitched somewhere between defensive and defiant. He straightened up, eyes darting from Sam to Dean like a runner stranded between two bases.
Dean caught Sam’s eye across the top of the Impala, then looked back towards the idling car across the lot. “Oh,” he said uncertainly. “She doesn’t happen to--”
“Eat people’s brains?” TK finished. He shook his head emphatically. “No.”
Dean narrowed his eyes. He knew sometimes things that seemed simple were actually kind of complicated. And when it got complicated, it was best to keep things as simple as you could. His fingers drummed the smooth black of the Impala’s finish until he came to a decision. “Well, when you got this many zombie chickens runnin’ around, it pays to have a man on the inside.” Dean nodded, bounced his knuckles off the car roof. “See you round, TK. Say hi to your mom for me.”
Medium: Fanfic - Supernatural: Dean and Sam Winchester, guest starring TK & friends
Artist:
pdragon76
Disclaimer: It’s Kripke’s world, we’re all just living in it. *snaps fingers, points*
Summary: Dean and Sam learn there's more to KFC than meets the eye. More to a kid named TK, too.
Note to Mom: Dean says "damn". And, um, "fart". But just once each, I think. And he’s really sorry about it, too, but he says he can’t help it. There's also some guts flying about. But purely for plot furtherfication. It’s totally gratuitous very tasteful.
Note to TK: This is inspired by YOU, kiddo, and your AWESOME TOES OF DOOM. No chickens were harmed in the making of this fic. Killed, yes. Harmed? Never. I am a vegomatarianist. I would never harm an animal. UNLESS IT WAS A ZOMBIE ANIMAL. *makes with the stabbity* I got
kimonkey7 to look at this, and she cleaned up my grammar and cut out a LOT of Dean’s bad language. So now you is allowed to read it, Bucko. I hope you like it, TK. I had fun making it for you.
When they reached the outskirts of Eau Claire, Sam flicked open the notebook in his lap and found the directions he had copied down.
“West Heidel Agricultural,” he relayed to Dean. “Moors Road.”
“What do they teach you at an agricultural school? Milking cows? How is that useful?” Dean was hungry. He’d wanted a chocolate éclair ever since Sam had mentioned Eau Claire, but they still hadn’t passed a bakery, and it was making him cranky. They were in the country, for crying out loud. He should have been able to spit and hit a baker.
“Are you still sulking? We’ll get you an éclair later. Zombies first, pastry after. You know the rules, Dean.”
Sam was right. Zombies were serious business. You couldn’t leave zombies running around, because they wanted brains. And people weren’t really willing to hand over their brains, as a general rule. They needed them for work, or school, or playing computer games and watching Doctor Who. All the good stuff, you needed a brain to get it done.
Dean liked zombie jobs. They were simple. Find zombies, don’t get killed by zombies, get rid of zombies. It had a beginning, a middle, and an end. Lots of other jobs weren’t like that. They had beginnings that wouldn’t turn into middles, and ends that felt an awful lot like beginnings. Some jobs didn’t seem to start at all. You just looked up and all of a sudden you were in the middle of them. And when that happened, it was just plain confusing.
So, Dean liked zombie jobs. You knew where you stood with a zombie. And mostly, you were in and out pretty quick. You could be having a turkey sandwich and a root beer by midday when you were working a zombie gig. And speaking of poultry…
“So, this job. You said they were zombie chickens?”
Sam checked his notes. “Yep.”
“Seem to you like we’ve had a lot of zombie chicken jobs lately?”
“Well, there was that one in Arkansas a few months back. And yeah, come to think of it…didn’t we clear out a zombie coop near Yosemite in May?”
Dean squinted, trying to recall. “Oh, shoot. Yes. We did. I remember that. You lost a good pair of jeans that day.”
Sam shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Shut up.”
“You slipped on those zombie chicken guts good. Fell off that gangplank and split those babies right up the back. ‘Member? You had your butt swingin’ in the breeze all the way back to the motel.” Dean threw back his head and laughed, dropped lazy hands to the bottom of the steering wheel. “Oh, man, that was hilarious.”
“Yeah, as I recall, you were a real adult about it.”
“What?” Dean protested indignantly as he turned down Moors Road. “I helped you up.”
“If by ‘helped me up’ you mean laughed till you choked and had to put your head between your knees, then yes. You helped plenty.”
“Oh, cry more, you big baby.”
“Anyway. Here we are.” Sam pointed to the school entrance on their left. “Pull in here.”
Dean maneuvered the Impala into the driveway. He could see a gaggle of people assembled in the parking lot, and he headed towards them.
Sam closed his notebook, tossed it on the seat beside him. “We really have had a lot of zombie chicken jobs lately. I wonder what’s going on?”
Dean killed the engine, shrugged. “Well, I dunno, but before I get out of this car, I want a gear check. You bring a spare pair of jeans, Slippy McButtsOut?”
Sam kicked open his door with a lot more force than he needed. “Shut up, you jerk.”
*********************************************************************************************
They were too late to save the principal. Word was already spreading through the crowd of people milling in front of the administration block of West Heidel Agricultural School. There were some horrified gasps from the parents as the news rippled from one person to the next, then some cheering as the whisper reached the students in the back. At first, it had seemed like a banana muffin made by the eighth graders was responsible, but on closer inspection, a parent had confirmed that the zombie chickens had overpowered Mr. Singleton near the Home Ec building. There seemed to be some confusion over why he had been a target. Didn’t zombie chickens want brains? Everyone seemed to agree it must have been a really short snack.
Dean took immediate control of the situation, patted the air with his hands as he called for the crowd’s attention. “Okay, everyone, if you can all just calm down and listen to me for a minute. Real sorry to hear about your principal and all, but the fact remains you have a problem with some zombie chickens. But you don’t need to worry, ‘cause me and my brother have some experience dealing with zombie chickens… and if you all just stand out here and stay together, we’ll have this sorted out for you in two shakes.”
He leaned towards Sam, who was smiling reassuringly at everyone. “Do we have a contact? Who called us?”
“Bobby said some guy named TK.”
Dean turned back to the crowd. “There a guy named TK around?”
He was startled by a voice behind him. “Winchesters, right? You’re Dean and Sam?”
They both turned to look at the boy who was coming toward them from the direction of the school buildings. Dean eyed him suspiciously. He was young - couldn’t have been more than thirteen - but he was marching across the parking lot like an drill sergeant and Dean doubted those fatigues were part of the West Heidel uniform. “Who’s askin’?” he hedged, and the kid adjusted his glasses impatiently.
“Name’s TK. I’m running this operation.” TK glanced at his watch. “You guys are late.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Why don’t you follow me, before anyone else gets their brains pecked out.”
Dean and Sam looked at each other in surprise, then Dean shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “I’ll buy that. Why not?”
**********************************************************************************************
TK had set up head quarters in the library, and Dean wasn’t sure if it was to keep the research books handy, or because he watched too much Buffy the Vampire Slayer. There were two other kids perched on the edge of the study table near the reference section. They stopped talking and looked up as TK approached.
“These those Winchesters?” asked the skinny dude with too much hair. Dean thought he looked a bit like Sam, back when his brother was just a pipsqueak in desperate need of an atomic-wedgie. Actually, nothing much had changed. Sam was still a pipsqueak in desperate need of an atomic-wedgie. He just thumped back a lot harder these days.
“Yeah,” TK waved his hand distractedly at the two kids. “This is my crew.” He pointed to the boy with the mop hair. “That’s Brackett.”
“Brackett?” Dean repeated. “Don’t hear that every day.”
“He’s from Brackett,” TK explained slowly, as though Dean was a little dense.
Sam coughed so that Dean wouldn’t hear him laugh, but he didn’t do a very good job.
TK motioned to the girl with the bright striped top and pigtails next to Brackett. “And that’s Miranda.”
Dean winked, pointed at her. “Let me guess: Miranda, as in South Dakota?”
“No.” She rolled her eyes. “Miranda as in Miranda. I’m from Newark.”
“Oh.” Dean shoved his hands in his pockets and decided he should probably shut up.
Sam turned to face TK. He jutted his chin towards the desk. “What are those things?”
TK stepped up and lifted one of the fluorescent colored munitions from the table. “This?” He held it up so they could get a good look. “This’s a Dr. Lonnie Johnson Super Soaker 50. Original chassis, but I’ve made some modifications. Grain filled tank, feed gets filtered through here,” TK indicated a thick section of the barrel, “with the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix.” He hiked up the weapon and leaned his cheek against the side, squinted down the sighting. “If you get a clear day? With no wind? You can shoot a pellet fifty feet with this sucker.”
Dean blinked, pivoted to face Sam. “Why don’t we have those?”
Sam raised his eyebrows. “Wow. They must come in handy.”
“They do,” TK confirmed. “But only against small zombie chicken pods. This thing’s a little… bigger. That’s why I called you in.”
Dean yanked on Sam’s sleeve, eyes still on the super-soaker. “Can we get one of those? We need to get one of those.” He glared at TK. “Where did you get that?”
“Well, I made it, actually.” TK pointed to the map spread out on the table beneath the other super-soakers. “This isn’t exactly the first zombie chicken job we’ve handled. Maybe it’s time I brought you guys up to speed.”
******************************************************************************************
“So, you guys know KFC, yeah?” TK tapped the map, where he had marked up various outlets across the country.
Dean puffed out his chest, slapped his belly. “Know it? Dude, I practically keep that place in business.”
Sam got a pinched look. “Dean, completely emptying the warmers in every Kentucky Fried Chicken store you pass is nothing to be proud of.”
Miranda folded her arms and raised her eyebrows. “Yeah, congratulations. And you’ve been financing a major zombie chicken operation.”
Dean made a face at her. “I have not.”
“Have to.”
“Have not.”
TK interrupted. “Well, actually, yes. You have to. Look, we’ve done a lot of research on this. Things were okay up until Colonel Sanders died waaaaaay back in the eighties. Kinda hard to believe they even HAD chicken back then, but whatever. He wasn’t into zombies, is the point. His son, though… now that dude is into some serious dead chicken stuff. And he has this entire KFC thing set up with refrigerated trucks and everything. He can have a hundred zombie chickens from one coast to the other in under three days by road. I even heard he has a private jet. And if that’s true, well…” TK looked up at Dean and Sam, shook his head. “We can only do the best we can. That’s all we can do. And KFC’s just got this deal with the board of education for lunches, so me and Brackett and Miranda, we’ve been sneaking around the schools here in Wisconsin, pretending we’re students - kind of like undercover. But there’s more and more pods springing up, and they’re getting bigger. I have some other teams… kids I know. We’re all spread out, but we keep in contact, help each other out. My mom’s… well, she knows what’s going on, so she helps where she can. But mostly she’s only good for driving us places. She can’t really get involved. So mainly, it’s just us.” He nodded toward Brackett and Miranda.
Sam stared at the map intently. He nodded, crossed his arms and rocked up onto the balls of his feet. “Okay, so why do you need us? What’s the plan?”
TK looked from Sam to Dean and back again. “I figured out a way to wipe this entire lot of zombie chickens out in one go, but we’re gonna need the school bus. And the barn in the cow paddock. And some explosives.”
Dean perked up, suddenly looked a whole lot more interested. “Whoa. What?”
TK grinned. “I said we need some explosives. That’s where you guys come in.”
**********************************************************************************************
Dean listened carefully to the plan, and had only one gripe when TK was done explaining.
“We can’t just go buy you some dynamite, kid. People take a purchase like that pretty seriously. You need permits and stuff. We don’t need that kind of attention.”
TK looked disappointed. “Well, we need a--”
“Big bang,” Dean agreed. He rubbed his jaw as he thought over the problem. “Doesn’t have to be big, actually. We load up the school bus with the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix, then you three draw the zombie chickens into the barn. Sam and I’ll handle the bus. All we need’s a well-placed spark near the gas tank. Instant Anti-Zombie Napalm.” He nodded. “Awesome. That could actually work.”
Sam frowned. “W-w-wait. How are you gonna blow up the tank?”
Dean jingled the Impala keys in his jacket pocket as he headed for the door. “Watch and learn, little brother. Watch and learn.”
**********************************************************************************************
“When did we get those?” Sam asked in surprise as Dean pulled the flares out of the trunk.
“Remember that job in Key West?”
“No.”
“Oh, that’s right. You weren’t there. Well, Dad and me were runnin’ this poltergeist thing on a charter boat and I stole--” Dean paused, eyes flitting to the three kids flanking his brother, “obtained them in lieu of payment.”
“You jacked them?” TK asked reproachfully.
Dean looked down at the flares in his hands and then at Sam’s stony face. “No,” he told TK defensively. “I didn’t jack them, I just… Look, you want me to blow up your school bus or not, kid?”
TK’s eyes traveled from the flares to the big yellow school bus parked on the edge of the lot. He shrugged. “Okay. I guess we don’t have a lot of choice. Whatever.”
“School bus goes booooom!” crowed Brackett, and he gave Miranda a high-five.
“Awesome,” she agreed.
They were loading the last bags of the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix onto the floor of the school bus when Sam caught Dean’s eye. “We’re replacing those flares, Sticky Fingers. Next time we go through Florida, that’s our first stop.”
“Dude, it was a billionty years ago. Boat probably sank by now.”
“Yeah,” Sam agreed, thumping down a bag. “I wonder why.” He staged a dramatic re-enactment for the benefit of Dean’s conscience. “‘Oh, look, honey, our boat’s sinking. Why don’t you bang off a flare and get us some help.’ ‘Why, certainly, dear. Oh, dang. Our flares appear to have been stolen.’”
Dean flapped a hand. “Alright, alright. We’ll replace them. Jeeeez.” He cracked the top of the first flare with his bowie knife and started sprinkling the powder over the bags. “Okay, so nobody light a match right now.”
**********************************************************************************************
Dean stopped the bus outside the open doors to the barn and followed Sam down the stairs into the fresh night air. He paused on the bottom step and wondered aloud how long it had been since he boosted a school bus.
“Twelve years,” Sam reminded him, in the sort of voice that suggested he was still pretty disgusted. “You nearly ran over Mrs. Carthaus near the basketball courts.”
“Oh, yeah. That’s right. Old Lady Farthouse. She moved pretty quick for a grandma.”
“I got hauled into the principal’s office,” Sam continued, with no small amount of resentment. “They called Dad. He was furious. I had to sit there with him and wait until you lost interest in your little joyride.”
“It was twelve years ago, Sam. Get over it, you nerd. And I didn’t lose interest. I lost power. I ran out of gas out on I-90.” He chuckled as he hopped down onto the grass beside his brother. “If that thing’d been solar powered, I’d still be cruisin’ the streets of Tijuana right now.” He floated a hand in front of him, face tilted back and eyes closed as if Mexico was printed in full color on the backs of his eyelids.
“Dad would have hunted you down and grounded you into the next century,” Sam scoffed.
Dean blinked. “Sam, he did hunt me down and ground me into the next century.” A burst of white noise from his pocket cut short the stroll down memory lane.
TK didn’t just have zombie-killing super-soakers. He had walkie-talkies, too.
“See this?” Dean held up the transmitter in front of Sam’s face. “This kid is organized. We should have these.”
“We do, Dean.” Sam produced his cell. “They’re called phones.”
“Yeah, but these are way cooler.” He pressed the button. “Breaker, breaker, this is Red Leader, do you copy?”
There was a staticky noise, then TK’s fierce whisper crackled back at them.
“Will you SHUT UP! We’re right on top of them. Are you guys ready with the bus?”
Dean grinned delightedly, depressed the button again. “Copy that, Ghostrider.” He got a hurried, “Thunderbirds are go,” in before Sam yanked the transmitter off him.
“God, you’re such an idiot.”
Dean smiled so wide his face almost cracked in half. “Yeah. An idiot with a screwdriver,” he agreed, holding it up for Sam to see.
Sam raked both hands down his face. “The worst kind,” he groaned as he boarded the bus again and slid behind the wheel.
Dean didn’t care. He was already flat on his back, pulling himself under the chassis. He tapped a finger on the fuel line, tracked it to…
Gotcha. Some days Dean Winchester truly loved his job. He just never really got tired of punching holes in things with a screwdriver.
“Alright, remember - drive slow!” he shouted, when the fuel was running freely from the ruptured chrome box. He started to shuffle out from beneath the bus, had to yell “NOT YET, YOU DOOFUS!” when Sam dropped the clutch and nearly squished him flat.
*********************************************************************************************
It was a sight to behold. When TK said it was a large pod, he’d really meant it.
First came Brackett, flashlight beam bobbing violently over the grass in front of him as he legged it towards the barn. Then Miranda, maglite pressed between her arm and her side so the light splashed up over her multicolored top; her face white and creased with alarm in the stark glow. Her pigtails slapped in her face as she risked a backward glance over her shoulder.
TK brought up the rear - running backwards - the super-soaker trained into the darkness. “Go! Go! Go! GO!” he was shouting, voice rising in pitch and urgency as the black bubbling shadow behind him gained in both momentum and size.
Dean had never seen four hundred zombie chickens at once. And he couldn’t really see them now, either, which is why he hollered at Sam: “Hit the lights!”
Sam punched the switch for the floodlights inside the barn door, and the two powerful halogens mounted on the roof came on one - WHOMP! - after the other - WHOMP!
Daylight spilled down on the thundering mass of zombified birds. They weren’t so much running as stumbling off each other in the general direction of the barn. Feathers flew up and fluttered in the air as poultry bounced off poultry. Wings hung askew and beaks pointed every which way but forward. Beady chicken eyes dangled out of their sockets like tacky earrings. Frothy drool damped puffy little zombie chests.
Dean had seen some crazy stuff in his time, but nothing quite prepared you for the sound of four hundred chickens groaning Booooooooooorrrrrrrrrrrrkkkkkk! in much the same tone that any normal zombie would say Braaaaaaiiiiiiiinnnnnss!
“Dude,” he called to Sam. “These zombie chickens are totally messed up!” He pointed. “Half of ‘em are treadin’ on their own eyeballs!” Dean couldn’t look away from the approaching Birds of Doom. They were as spellbinding as they were disgusting.
Miranda had overtaken Brackett, and collided heavily with the side of the barn to Dean’s right. She gathered herself up, panting. “I know,” she agreed, eyes bright above an adrenaline smile. “Isn’t it awesome!”
Brackett ran directly into Sam three times, like a confused sparrow at a pane of glass, before Sam collared him and shook him loose of his panic. “Hey! HEY! You’ve arrived,” Sam assured him.
A hollow doonk! doonk! doonk!doonk!doonk! brought Dean’s attention back to TK as he came charging towards the barn, firing Anti-Zombie pellets back into the hoard of chickens as he came. Dean saw a couple of chicken heads clearing the pack to catch the pellets, then heard the startled BEEYERK! from each zombie chicken as they encountered the explosive effect of the Brain Dissolving Mix. Chicken guts sure could fly, Dean noted.
TK didn’t stop when he reached the barn doors. Dean and Sam and Brackett and Miranda took cover to the left and right of the shed while the chickens surged through the entrance in pursuit of TK and his deadly grain.
“NOW!” Miranda shouted as the last of the zombie chickens flailed their way over the threshold, and the four zombie hunters converged on the doors, slapped them shut and slammed the slidebolt home.
“Did TK get out?” Brackett scrabbled to look in the window, and Dean pressed the side of his hand against the glass above Brackett’s head; peered in, too. It was hard to tell. There was a lot of grain on the floor near the far end of the barn, and chicken heads were popping like corn, left right and center as they feasted on the bait. It was getting pretty messy in there. The school bus stood in the center of the shed floor, obstructed their view of the door through which TK should have made his planned escape.
“I can’t see,” Dean admitted.
“Can’t see what?” TK asked at Dean’s ear, and Dean jumped a foot, clapped a hand over his heart. He sagged against the barn’s outer wall.
“Jeeez, kid, you just nearly gave me a heart attack.”
TK wiped some chicken guts off his hands onto his cargo pants, shouldered the super-soaker. He looked at Sam and then Dean, a glimmer of a smile on his grimy face. “So, you guys wanna blow up four hundred zombie chickens, or what?”
*****************************************************************
Miranda did the honors, dropped the match onto the start of the gasoline trail into the barn. And then they all ran like hell.
Gas tank must have been a little fuller than the gauge had indicated, because when the bus went up, the KERBOOM! shook the ground beneath the school and deposited the roof of the barn a hundred yards west. Dean thought all his Christmases had come at once when a freak splat of chicken guts got flung higher and further than any other debris and hit Sam right in the face. Dean laughed so hard he almost peed in his pants. His brother was gonna smell like a Chicken and Biscuit Bowl for a week, which stopped being funny right about the time Dean remembered they had to ride in the same car.
The tired band of zombie fighters picked their way through the rubble of the barn, squished a few stubborn, twitchy chicken necks underfoot as they explored the results of a successful mission.
On the way back to the parking lot, Dean wondered how many bags of the Anti-Zombie Brain Dissolving Mix TK could be persuaded to part with, and if he only accepted cash or if credit cards were okay. ‘Cause Dean planned on buying as much of the stuff as he could fit in the car.
Stinky Sam might have to walk.
The lot was now deserted, and Dean figured you couldn’t really blame people for taking off when you started blowing up barns full of zombie chickens. It wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, this life. That’s for sure. But it was his kind of life, and he felt pretty good standing there beside his car and his chook-splattered brother. They’d killed the zombie chickens, met some awesome new contacts, and if Dean could just find himself a bakery and get a chocolate éclair, this night was gonna go down as damn near perfect.
A lone car swept slowly into the lot, headlights raking over the small band of hunters as they said their goodbyes. A horn tooted.
“That’ll be my mom,” TK explained, lifted a hand toward the car in acknowledgement. “Just a sec!” he shouted.
The thin, warbling response barely reached them on the still night air. “Braaaaaaaaiiiiiiinnnnsss.”
Dean and Sam exchanged frowns.
TK rolled his eyes. “In a minute, mom!” He smiled tightly at Dean and Sam, extended a small card in his hand. “So, if you guys ever run into any trouble, or you need help or anything…”
Dean took the square of paper, blinked at it. He squinted at TK. “You have business cards?” His reproachful gaze shifted to Sam. “Now, why don’t we have business cards?”
Sam sighed, grabbed his brother by the shoulders and pointed him towards the Impala. “Okay, I smell like guts, and we’re going now. It was nice meeting you TK. You run a pretty tight ship. We should keep in touch.”
TK nodded. “You, too. Thanks for your help.”
A faint gust of wind carried the word again across the lot, “Braaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnsssss,” and Dean paused, halfway into the car. He twisted towards TK.
“Dude, is your mom a--”
“Zombie princess? Yes,” TK blurted, his voice pitched somewhere between defensive and defiant. He straightened up, eyes darting from Sam to Dean like a runner stranded between two bases.
Dean caught Sam’s eye across the top of the Impala, then looked back towards the idling car across the lot. “Oh,” he said uncertainly. “She doesn’t happen to--”
“Eat people’s brains?” TK finished. He shook his head emphatically. “No.”
Dean narrowed his eyes. He knew sometimes things that seemed simple were actually kind of complicated. And when it got complicated, it was best to keep things as simple as you could. His fingers drummed the smooth black of the Impala’s finish until he came to a decision. “Well, when you got this many zombie chickens runnin’ around, it pays to have a man on the inside.” Dean nodded, bounced his knuckles off the car roof. “See you round, TK. Say hi to your mom for me.”