The Return of the Living Dead

Hey, Frank! Let's wrap it up and go home. What do you say?

I got another hour's work to do. The kid'll stay, and I'll show him the ropes.

Okay. Lock up for me before you go?

Fourth of July weekend, buddy boy. Got to move.

Yeah. You have a nice Fourth, and I'll see you Sunday at the barbecue.

You'd better believe it. I'll be there with bells on.

Kid, I wanna tell you something, and I mean this sincerely.

No matter what happens, don't name it after me.

Take it easy, Frank.

That Burt's a joker.

- Freddy, follow me and learn something. - Okay.

We got an order here from the St. Louis University Medical School.

They want two adult female skeletons with perfect teeth.

That's a 2-AF-PT.

So you come over here to the "A" section. That's "A" for adult, see?

Then that's divided up into two sections.

That's divided into the "M" for male and the "F" for...

- Female. - Good boy. Now the "PT."

Suppose you think that's "pretty tough." But no, that's...

- Perfect teeth. - Very good.

Now you get some excelsior over there and lay it in that crate.

Make a nice little beddy-bye for this little lady.

Okay.

Good work. We want her to be comfortable.

Now help me get her in. Grab her legs.

Okay.

Now you get some of that Styrofoam popcorn, spread it all around.

Don't be stingy. Uncle Burt's paying for this.

More, Freddy. Okay, that's fine.

Now spread it around. That's right.

- You're doing very nice work. - Thanks.

You'll be fine in the warehouse business.

- Where do we get all these skeletons? - They come from India.

- India? - International treaty.

All skeletons come from India.

- No kidding. How come? - How the hell do I know?

The important question is, where do they get all the skeletons with perfect teeth?

I'm going to ask you a serious question.

How many people you know die...

with a beautiful, perfect set of choppers in their puss?

Nobody I can think of.

No. I think there's a skeleton farm over in India.

Jesus!

Come on, kid. Follow your uncle here.

Here we go. I don't have to tell you what these are for.

Here we've got the prosthetic devices, all around here.

- Look under there. Wheelchairs. - Right. These are great.

Here's something you don't see very often. You're a privileged person.

These are split dogs for veterinarian schools.

- We get a lot of orders for split dogs. - That's really rad.

Don't fool around, you're learning.

Over here, Freddy, is where we keep the fresh cadavers.

We sell these to medical schools and to the US Army for ballistic tests.

Say hello.

We usually got more inventory than this...

but we're expecting a shipment on Monday.

How many bodies are in here usually?

You don't want to be overstocked.

Like the restaurant business...

you don't want your inventory to lose its freshness.

Tell you what I'll do, kid. Teach you how to fill out these shipping forms.

Look alive.

- We gonna party tonight or what? - We are gonna party.

- Where we gonna party? - I don't know. Somewhere.

We can go to the park.

We can't. The cops will shoot us if we go back to the park.

- I ain't in no mood to die tonight. - I like death.

- I like death with sex. And you, Casey? - Yeah, so fuck off and die.

When we gonna party tonight, Tina?

That'd be rad, but I have to meet Freddy when he's done work.

- Where you supposed to meet him? - At this medical supply warehouse.

No, he got a job? What a dick.

Shit, why didn't you say so? Why don't we all go pick Freddy up?

He always knows where there's a place to party.

Frank?

Yeah, kid?

What's the weirdest thing you ever saw in here?

I have seen weird things come, and I have seen weird things go.

But the weirdest thing I ever saw just had to cap it all.

Yeah? What's that?

Let me ask you a question, kid.

Did you see that movie Night of the Living Dead?

That's the one where the corpses start eating the people, right?

Sure. What about it?

Did you know that movie was based on a true case?

Come on, you're shitting me, right?

I've never been more serious in my life.

That's not possible. They showed zombies taking over the world.

They changed it all around. What really happened was...

back in 1969, in Pittsburgh, at the VA hospital...

there was a chemical spill...

and all that stuff leaked down into the morgue...

and it made all the dead bodies jump around as though it was alive.

- What chemical? - 245-Trioxin, it's called.

It was to spray on marijuana or something.

And the Darrow Chemical Company was trying to develop it for the army.

And they told the guy who made the movie...

that if he told the true story, they'd just sue his ass off.

So he changed all the facts around.

What really happened?

They closed it all down...

and the army shipped all that contaminated dirt...

and all those dead bodies out.

And they kept it a secret.

How come you know about it?

A typical army fuck-up.

The transportation department got the orders crossed...

and they shipped those bodies here...

instead of to the Darrow Chemical Company.

Hello?

Hi, honey. No, I'll be home in about an hour.

You keep the pot roast hot, okay?

Sure, I love you too, honey. Yeah. Kiss, kiss.

Wanna see them?

- See them? - The corpses.

What are you talking about?

- They're down in the basement. - No.

- Come on. - No way.

Mind the third step. It's a bitch.

They just brought the bodies here and left them?

You know the army.

- They've been here all this time? - 14 years, as I recall.

No kidding?

There they are.

There's bodies in there?

Shit. Look at that.

- You say that thing was alive? - So they say.

Oh, God.

- Do these things leak? - Hell, no.

These things were made by the US Army Corps of Engineers.

- Hello, dear. How was your day? - The usual, crap.

I'm sorry.

- What's for dinner? - Your favorite, lamb chops.

I had them for lunch.

It's me checking in from Station 3 at 1600...

make that 1601 hours.

I'll be home all evening. Right.

It's nerve-racking to live around that equipment all the time.

They have to be able to reach me 24 hours a day, wherever I am.

- You know that. - All that microwave stuff affects my oven.

When we find them, you can have it taken out.

- But when will you find them? - Christ, Ethel, I don't know.

Maybe we'll never find them.

We've been through all this before. They could be anywhere.

- Where the fuck are we going? - To party.

To pick up Freddy.

- What the fuck is Freddy up to these days? - He got a job.

- No shit? What job? - He's a stockroom clerk.

That sounds like a shitty job.

It isn't the President of the US, but he makes money to buy stuff.

- Maybe he'll buy something from me. - He don't like your kind of stuff, Suicide.

How come you guys only come by when you need a ride?

'Cause you one spooky motherfucker.

You think I'm spooky? What the fuck do you think you are?

- Man, what a hideous, ugly place. - I like it. It's a statement.

- Come on, let's go get the prick. - No.

- Why not? - It might freak out his boss.

That's not nice.

What does he think we are, weird or something?

- What time does Freddy get off? - 10:00.

- I ain't sittin' here two fuckin' hours. - We could go drive around.

- I don't got gas. You wanna buy some? - I was kidding.

- We could go fool around in there. - You mean that cemetery?

Let's do that.

What do you want to do, turn over gravestones?

No, I just want to look around the graveyard.

I ain't never seen one before.

- You never been to a funeral? - I never knew nobody that died.

I don't think this is a good idea.

- What's that? - Road flares, ass-wipe.

- What do you want with those? - I just want to party.

What are the road flares for?

This place is a mess.

- It looks like your pad, Scuz. - I heard that.

Frank?

Are you okay, kid?

I don't know. I don't feel so good.

Christ, what a stink.

- What the hell happened to the body? - It must have melted when it hit the air.

Close the goddamn thing.

Christ, I never smelled anything like that before.

I think I'm gonna be sick.

I don't guess we'd better tell Burt about this.

- It makes us look stupid or something. - I can still smell that stuff.

It must be in my nose or all over everything.

I'd better spray some deodorant around here.

What was that?

Sounds like a dog.

A dog?

Wait a second. Listen. You hear that?

What the hell's going on here?

What's wrong with him?

Shit!

- What are we gonna do? - We're gonna kill it!

What are you doing? Stop!

Jesus!

- Are we fucked? What's happening? - The cadaver.

- What's it doing in there? - I don't know. It sounds sore.

- What are we going to do? - Lock it in.

Hurry! Jesus Christ!