Zombie Pickup Lines

Zombies got to have standards, and zombies love brains. Here are some compliments to get you inside the open skull of the one you love:

Baby, if that brain was mine, I’d be the luckiest corpse in the world.

Your brain is so thick and juicy, it’s like a bubble. I just wanna pop it. Nnn.

I just want to bury my face in your lobes. Haminaminaaaa.

They say love is blind. That’s why I’m gonna start back here with the parietal lobe.

BRAINS! BRAINS! BRAINS! BRAINS!

Hrrrm.  My last tooth rotted out of my head. Must be ’cause you’re so sweet.

I’d be a felon for that cerebellum.

Mrmmaaahmaonnn. That’s the sounds you’ll be making when I put my fingers in your brain.

Outside the Mall

It must be really nice and warm in there, Tina sighs, scratching at the barricade the humans set up. Granted, the sigh came out as a horrific death-moan, but the sentiment was there.

Greg and Mary are shot down from sniper fire and a couple more zombies take their place, clawing their fingers off in front of the barricade. That’s the way it goes. All it is is work, work, work, and then you die. Again. Makes the bodies get restless out here.

Zombie lives are so angsty and short-lived. Why, just today, Zach was biting Diana’s face when he’d just been biting Maria’s face not three minutes before. Well, Maria got so mad that she started a fight with Diana, tearing off her flesh in front of everyone. And of course, all the zombie men were gathering around and moaning lewdly at the girls. That’s just how zombie men are, a bunch of disgusting undead pigs.

Zombies are pushing at Tina, too anxious to wait their turn. They start pushing into her, all clumsy onto the ground. One of them steps on her head. “Stop it!” Tina wants to say, but again, all that comes out is a horrifying death-moan. Tina is so sick of zombies walking all over her. As the feet and broken stumps drag across her, she sees a small hole in the barricade where she can see the See’s candy shop and the Victoria’s Secret. She puts a bloody claw out and drags herself toward the mall. She wants, desperately, what those humans have. She wants that life, their clothes, their jewelry, the big shiny guns they tote around. It all seems so glamorous to her. Tina reaches out, stretching her arm as far as it can go with the large mass of corpses walking around on top of her.

She picks at the hole, splintering it away, showing her what secret life the humans live. Ooh! she thinks. A Bed, Bath, and Beyond! But as she tries to pick at the barricade more, a zombie steps right on her hand and severs it at the wrist. If she had any working tear ducts, she would cry, but all Tina ever does is moan horribly.

Road Trip (Revised) and North (New Chapter)

I’ve been changing around the zombie novella a bit. In particular, I’m doing an overhaul of the Jerm/Micah story arc.  Here’s a revised chapter and a new teaser chapter to whet your appetite:

ROAD TRIP

Jerm keeps pushing the CD into the Buick’s deck.

“Micah… hey Micah!”

“What?”

“CD player’s busted!”

“Shouldn’t be. Just got it installed last year. It’s probably the CD.”

“Well, keep better care of ‘em, jackass. I keep telling you that you need one of those books to keep all your CDs in it.”

“Hey, if you want music, then just sing something. Give me a break there, man. I’ve been drivin’ since Oklahoma.”

“Hey. Don’t worry about it, boss. Yer doin’ such a good job innyway.”

“Fuck you, man. Take the wheel. I gotta take a piss.”

“Ahh, bullshit. We should open a lemonade stand, we got so much stored back there.”

“You know we can’t take any chances openin’ the window, Jerm. One bug flies in and we could be zombies, too. So just take the wheel and shut yer trap for a sec.”

“Man, yer paranoid.”

“You gonna take the wheel or do you want to hold my junk for me while I go?”

“Yeah, yeah. I got it.” Jerm sighed, awkwardly switching over to the driver side and almost taking the car off the road.

“Careful, man! Keep it straight while I’m going or this car’s gonna smell even worse than it does.”

“Yeah, okay, Micah. Whatever, man… hope we can get to New Mexico soon.”

“Desert’s the place to be, Jerm. Not enough life around there to be zombie food.”

“Speakin’ of, we got ourselves a hitchhiker.”

“Just drive by.”

“But she’s hot.”

“Dammit, Jerm! Just drive!”

“What are you, gay?”

“At least let me put it back in my pants. Hand me the gun.”

“What? She ain’t a zombie.”

“She still has teeth, don’t she? We don’t know if she’s turning or what. Just hand me the gun.”

Without opening the windows, Jerm signalled for the woman to crawl into the passenger side.

“You guys are life savers. Name’s Jaclyn.”

“Jeremiah. This one’s my brother, Micah.”

“Kinda queer bein’ stuck all the way out here,” Micah said.

“Only one queer is you,” Jerm mumbled.

“My car ran out of gas a few miles back. I’m from Odessa, but I hear North is the way to go right now. I still can’t believe it, the dead walking around and everything. It’s crazy. I mean, I keep thinking it’s all just a bad dream I’ll wake up from… thanks for picking me up, guys. I was worried I wouldn’t see anybody out here.”

“Me an’ Micah are both comin’ outta Little Rock. Damn skeeters are turnin’ people into flesh eaters! Desert’s dry enough so they don’t breed at all, but Micah’s still paranoid. That right, Micah?”

Micah fishes through under the back seats for water bottles with actual water in them. “Yeah… so, Jaclyn. You up here all by your lonesome?”

“Well, I have some family headed up to the Northern states, see if they can get into Canada. I took longer getting out ‘cuz my boyfriend wouldn’t leave. I don’t know. Guess I was bein’ dumb wanting to stay with him in zombie country.”

“Naw. We were the same way. We all heard about it in other places but we thought we could all just shoot ‘em all dead and have a few beers to celebrate. It wasn’t like the movies, though. Even covered in DEET and holed up with boxes of ammo, we knew we weren’t gonna last against a third of Arkansas.”

Jaclyn pulls her sleeve down over her arm. “It’s terrible out there.”

“Here’s some water,” Micah offered.

“Thank you.”

“That rash on your arm… that’s from the heat?”

“Oh, yeah. It’s nothing much.”

“I can take a look at it.”

“No. Don’t worry about it.”

Micah pulled out his gun. Jerm swerved the car over to the side of the road. “Whoa, Micah! Holy shit! Quit playin’ with that thing!”

“I ain’t playin’. That’s a bug bite.”

Jaclyn shook her head. “No. It’s not–”

“Don’t lie to me, bitch. Our daddy had a bite like that before we found him gnawing on one of ma’s arms.”

“It’s just a little bite! I mean, it probably wasn’t even infected. Most bugs are just normal bugs, okay? I mean, if I start gnawing on people, you can shoot me.”

“Yeah, Micah! Maybe it’s not the end of the world. Just hold off for a sec!”

“Can’t take any chances. You and I both saw what happened to Little Rock, how fast it all happened. Jaclyn, please get out the car. You can keep the water. Here’s a few extra bottles, too. It’s not water, but you’ll thank me when you get thirsty enough.”

“You can’t be serious. Please! Just drop me off in the next town.”

“Micah–”

“Shut it, Jerm. Just step out of the car and there won’t be no trouble. You’re better off than when we found ya. Just be thankful for that.”

Jaclyn removed herself from the car, sobbing and cradling bottles of water and urine. When the door slammed, she dropped the bottles and put her hands on the windows. “Please!” she wailed through the glass.

Jerm looked straight ahead, not starting the car.

“What?”

“I ain’t talkin’ to you, man.”

“Just drive, Jerm. No more hitchhikers.”

A bottle of piss hits their back window as Jerm pulls away.

NORTH

“I’m gonna turn this car around.”

“Jerm, we did what we had to.”

“I’m not talkin’ to you.”

“You already said that.”

“I don’t like it, man. I come back home from fightin’ in one desert and now I’m out here in another. What the Hell, man? I’m back home and the killing just don’t stop. I don’t want to keep murderin’ people, Micah.”

“It wasn’t… Jerm. Listen to me. Back in Little Rock… that wasn’t our family out there. They were tortured, man. We had to put them to rest. And that girl was as good as dead, too.”

“Does that make it right?”

“They were already dead. We did what we had to.”

Jerm slams on the breaks.

“But she—Jaclyn—that girl back there? She was a human goddamn being! She was still alive, you jackass! You, me—we’re gonna have to live with that so don’t try to hide what we did with pretty words. It’s an insult to her and everyone else we left behind.”

“We did what we had to.”

“You already said that, Mikey.”

Jeremiah clicks on the only FM station running in the area and starts driving again. He keeps his eyes on the road; Micah stares out the window, looking at the barren landscape and the pink sunlight fading into the horizon. James Taylor is singing about fire and rain.

After about fifty or sixty miles, Jerm clears his throat. Micah looks ahead to see a buzzard with only one wing hobbling across the road. With the high beams on, they can see it only has one wing and its beak seems cracked and hanging slack.

“That thing dead?” Micah asks.

“Looks like it.” He starts to swerve toward the bird.

“Don’t… I don’t want to be scrapin’ bird parts off my car.”

“Whatever, man.” Jerm turns the while a little and they can hear the beak scrape along the side of the car.

Micah gives Jerm a look like he’s chewing on old gum and wants to find somewhere to spit.

“What? Just paint. Don’t worry so much, man. Take a nap for a while. We’ve both been up for a day and a half at least.”

Micah still has trouble sleeping but he’s able to fade away after not too long.

“Wake up!” Jerm swats at Micah. “It’s five in the morning and I think I’m seein’ things, like zombies outta the corner of my eye.”

“What the Hell’re you talkin’ ‘bout.” Micah rubs his eyes and stretches in his seat. It’s pitch black out but it will be morning soon. They awkwardly crawl around the seats to switch places. Micah grunts as he rolls the seat back up to the steering wheel. It sounds like a spine cracking.

“Where are we?”

“We just hit Colorado about thirty minutes or so back.”

“All right, Jerm. I got it.” He starts up the vehicle again and starts back down the highway.

The sun had just started peaking on the horizon. Something shadows were moving on the horizon. “Uh… Jerm?”

“What? I was just starting to drift off.”

“You know how  you said you were seein’ things?”

“Yeah?” Jerm took a second before he bolted upright. “What? Zombies?”

Micah pointed his finger toward the side of the highway. A large group of people were stumbling along the road, though it became increasingly obvious they weren’t people at all. They all had working legs, but some had chunks missing from them in most other places, maybe from the buzzards. The silhouette of a woman and child tripped over and pulled themselves back up to follow the group.

“Where the Hell do they think they’re going?”

“I’d reckon same way we are: North.”

Day in the Life

Wake up. Fall asleep. Wake up again. Shave. Shower. Stare at the discolorations on the tiles. Brush teeth. Breakfast. Job hunt. Eat sandwich. Make moustache with crust. Watch Youtube videos about zombie unicorns that shoot lasers out of their horns. Eat leftovers. Unbutton top button. Watch porn. Check email. Check Facebook messages. Write witty status update in hopes that someone will acknowledge existence. Eat ice cream out of the carton. Turn on Comedy Central. Set carton by bed. Fall asleep with chromatic glow pulsing against face.

Fire (Revision of “Blood,” part 2)

Josh and Theo drove in amidst a shrieking stampede of people and zombies. Given the overwhelming mass of flesh in the streets, it got to the point where they couldn’t tell whether they were running over people or avoiding zombies. A horde of people stood on the car, trying to break their way inside.

“Just step on it!” Theo screamed. Josh closed his eyes and did as he was told.

Vera stumbled out of Tobias’s reach, jumping from the table and running for the car. She was lost in the sea of people. Tobias, his father’s revolver in hand, aimed his sights into the crowd. He inhaled deep to keep from trembling. These were people. Tobias could try to shoot to maim, but then they’d be dead anyway. Zombie chow. Either way, they were going to trample Vera.

“Damn it!” he growled, squeezing the trigger. Something grabbed Tobias’s leg, ‘causing his shot to fire high. He hammered his foot against the creature’s face, not sure if it was among the living or dead. Face bloodied the thing let go of his foot. He stumbled back up to locate Vera in the crowd. No sign of her. Or Theo.

Tobias’s heart seemed to slow. Vera’s body was lost in the stampede. Theo, who had flung his door open to save her, was quickly taken by the crowd, which seeped into Josh’s car. Josh was thrown out and crush under the wheel as the car crushed everyone in its way, driven by a hysterical creature bent on safety. Vera was dead. Josh was dead. Maybe not this second, but it hardly mattered whether they were dead or dying. Tobias fired off a few rounds into the crowd around Theo, but he was too late. A wave of bodies crashed in like the ocean tide. He aimed at Theo’s head to save him the pain of being eaten alive, but a crashed into Tobias, throwing him from his perch, his gun flying from his hands. The wind was crushed out of his lungs out of him, but he managed to keep his footing and keep from being trampled. Somehow, he was able to pick out Theo’s dying cries.

Tobias ran with the crowd to keep himself from being crushed under frantic heels. They were trying to break into the Rapturist compound, a place where they could get cover from the horde. He crouched low and covered his head. Gunfire was spraying the spearhead of this phalanx. The guards were making a futile stand to keep the populace from entering the cathedral. The gunfire quickly died out as the unstoppable wave of people and zombies crashed through the windows and doors like a storm hammering against a crag. Tobias’s clothes were torn, bruises smashed all over his arms and middle. He gained a reprieve when the large lobby fanned out and he was crushed a little less. The crowd dispersed and Tobias went with where his section of the flood carried him.

Tobias remembered Raj saying that zombies could fall down stairs, but they had trouble climbing up. Still, Tobias was just as afraid of the people as he was the zombies. There were fewer people that trickled downstairs. He pushed his way down, following this tributary of lost souls into the basement. The hallway ended in a locked door: “employees only.” The people at the door were ramming into it with their shoulders, trying to push it down.

“Out of the way! You!” Tobias grabbed the arm of the largest man at the door, a man he vaguely recognized from his time in the militia. The man was built like a linebacker, weighted down with almost as much fat as muscle. He’d do fine. “On the count of three, we kick at the same time! Okay?” The man nodded, panting from exertion.

“One. Two~! Three!” They took their rear legs and shoved them into the door. For a second, Tobias thought it was going to give. “Again!” They kicked again and hinges began to give way. A final time  and the door cracked partway off its hinges, ready to be tossed down by the mob.

“Let’s go! Let’s go!”

The place they entered was pitch black and reeked of piss and blood. “Light switch! Find it!” The fluorescent lighting flickered on. Tobias almost wished someone would turn it off. People were pinned or chained to the walls, dying or dead. It was some kind of dungeon. The crowd walked through the room, dazed and fearful. Tobias spied a young woman in fair condition, if a little shaken up. Though her hair covered her face, he thought he recognized her.

“Sarah!” She writhed, as if the name gave her pain. “You’re Sarah Scarborough, ain’t you?”

“She won’t talk. She’s been raped too many times to respond to anyone anymore.” Tobias jumped at the croak of a man’s voice; he couldn’t have been sure that the man hanging there on the wall was actually alive or not.

“I was hired by Sarah’s husband…” Tobias started to say. It sounded strange now, as if it had happened to him in another life and he was just remembering. “To find…” His friends were all dead. He paused, staring into space, remembering that sound that could have been Theo. No. It had unmistakably been Theo screaming for death.

“What’s your name?” the man asked.

“Toby.”

“I’m Hermann. Dr. Hermann Schulz.”

This brought Tobias from his more painful memories. “You’re Dr. Z.”

His chuckle sounded like sandpaper. “Not by birth, I assure you.”

“Let me try to get you two out of those chains.”

“It won’t matter,” Hermann said. “The guards will be down here. They’ll kill us all.”

“The guards are dead. The city’s being attacked by zombies.”

“You act like that’s a better way to die.” Sarah began wailing. Dr. Schulz lowered his head.

“Somebody shut her up!” a man yelled and pounced on Sarah’s throat.

“Brady!” Tobias remembered the big man’s name. “Help me out!” Tobias tried to pull the man off Sarah. Brady took his hair and cracked his head against the wall next to Sarah’s head. This didn’t help her screeching. “Help me get them free, Brady!” He wasn’t sure if the man was dead or not, but it didn’t matter, as long as they could control the crowd.

The crowd, suddenly aware of themselves and their safety, began freeing the prisoners as well. Whether they were remembering their humanity or whether they just needed something to do to fight the fear, it didn’t matter. They all tried their best to break or pry the chains from the walls. Some worked on the barricades, stacking shelves and the shattered door up before the zombies arrived. There were many loud and strange noises, but no zombies. Instead, a thick smoke began crawling along the ceiling.

“Stay low!” Tobias yelled. “Stay! Low! The smoke won’t reach us down here!”

“Hell it won’t!” someone yelled.

“You want to run up there and die, go ahead! If you’re gonna stay here, just shut up! We need the air!”

They squatted down, staying silent for a good twenty or thirty minutes before Tobias noticed that the man was right. The smoke was still getting thicker.

“I’m going to go scout it out! Stay low!” He wrapped his coat around his face. Brady helped him clear part of barricade. “Thanks, Brady. I’ll be back.”

“Live and let die, brother.” It was one of the mottoes the militia spouted off to get themselves pumped up for raiding homes.

“Live and let die.” He clasped Brady’s hand and slipped out.

Blood (revision of “Blood,” part 1)

Jerm used to be scared of crossing bridges when he was a tyke. Their Ma told them stories about the three billy goats Gruff and Jerm was always afraid there was a troll hiding in the creek, waiting to eat them.

“Hey you troll. I’m the biggest billy goat Gruff!” Micha would cry at the foot of the bridge, imitating the fairy tale. “If you come out, I’ll poke out your eyes an’ shit in your brain!” Micah always liked to give his threats some color. “There! Now the troll won’t bother us. Come on!” And they would cross the bridge together to eat the best peaches and bring home the second best.

Micah felt like the troll now, skulking about in the dark, searching for the reverend. The guards were all leaving to the entrances to block off the incoming zombies and refugees. In spite of it being an emergency, he took the elevator to avoid notice. This was a zombie attack, not a fire, after all. Not yet.

“I have two spears,” the biggest billy goat Gruff would say. Micah was dressed in a guard’s uniform, courtesy of the man on the first floor. Nobody would recognize him, and there was blood on the shirt, but a second’s hesitation was all he needed. The guards were all at the door with their rifles. Like fish in a barrel.

“Hold i–”

“I’m not a zombie!” Micah shouted, raising one hand in the are. He pulled the trigger three times. The last man clipped his shoulder. The blood ran heavy and dark down his arm. Grimacing, he shot them in the head, one by one. He’d heard one of the local boozers call it “buying zombie insurance.” He breathed heavily. Normally, security would be tighter than a hawk’s ass in a nosedive. Perhaps this really was God’s intervention that he was able to get this far. Micah took one of the dead men’s rifles. He kicked at the door, backed up and shot at it. The door began to bust apart. He shot again at the door handle, picked up another gun.

“I have these stones to crush your bones,” said the eldest billy goat Gruff. The door gave way and Micah’s bullets painted the room red. He blinked once, knowing that he should be dead now. These men were all unarmed, shot in the back. They’d probably been praying. Micah tried to swallow down the horrible bile of guilt that threatened to tear apart his guts from the inside out. He closed his eyes and all he saw were corpses. Be strong. This is for Jerm. Cut the beast off at the head.

“Oh, God…” a man breathed, frightened. Did Jerm beg for his life? Did Micah’s brother know the reason why he had to die? This man had been standing at the pulpit, higher up than the others. Micah had only shot out his legs. He must have been preaching. That makes him…

“Father Taddeo. You have sinned.”

“God!” he shrieked. Micah butted the man in the face with the rifle. He surveyed the room, looking for surivors. There was an adjacent room, a kitchen, most likely added by the Rapturists when they moved in. The staff was still there. Micah unloaded his rifle into the room. They were going to die anyway and Micah already had blood on his hands. Better now than in the fire.

“Father, you have sinned,” Micah said with tears his eyes. He reached out, wiping a bloody palm on the man’s face. “Pray for forgiveness.” He dropped his gun, using his good arm to drag the wretch to the kitchen.

“Forgiii-!” he cried in pain.

“What did you say?”

“Forgi-hiv me! It hurts!”

There would be no escape for this wretched man. He would not know why he had to die. He need not know. He would merely suffer and die. The only mercy he would grant him was the gift of not becoming one of the undead.

Micah began by cutting out the reverend’s eyes. “I have two spears,” he said. “To stab out your eyes.” Micah started up the food processor, sticking the reverend’s hand into it. Then the other. “I have two stones,” he said, “to crush your bones.” The troll hiding under the bridge. Micah would have to kill him to protect Jerm. To protect Jerm, so they could cross the bridge together. The bridge, across the creek with the troll. The troll kept screaming. Micah dragged the troll to the meat slicer and slammed his face into it, setting the machine to auto slice. Micah fought with all his might to keep the troll there as the machine sliced him away, a little bit at a time. Finally, the troll stopped struggling. Micah turned on the gas stove and threw him on. He dragged all of the bodies inside the room, corpses to fuel the fire.

Micah walked back into the main room, up to the podium. He looked out the window at the sky.

“The sun is so close, Jerm,” Micah said, tears streaming down his face. “Why’s the sun so close when it’s so damn cold up here? I don’t understand… those peaches tasted good, didn’t they? Bet you’re enjoying one right now, you bastard.” He closed his eyes and put pistol to his temple. Jerm would have to cross the bridge alone.

Traditions (“Hindsight: Christmas Miracle” Revision)

“Oh, sweet baby Jesus,” Sarah says over and over to herself, teeth chattering. Her husband’s, Travis’s, old pickup truck didn’t insulate the heat well enough, in spite of the blankets they jammed throughout the interior, covering the windshield entirely. She looked out of the little peephole in the passenger side window, but there was no sign of Travis. Travis said he’d be back by sunrise. By sunrise, everything would be better again.

Her husband took the rifle but they kept a pistol in the glove compartment that he had taught her how to use. “Oh, sweet baby Jesus,” she repeated, huddled up in the old quilt her mother had made her when she was a child. It had animals painstakingly sewn into the fabric. She shivered. “Travis. Please be okay out there.”

Nights are the worst. Sarah sees creatures in the shadows, ones that are there as often as not. She usually never knows for sure until she can see the creatures well enough to hear their hooves crunch through the snow. One time, a squirrel jumped onto the windshield and tried to gnaw through it to get to them. Sarah thought, in a situation like that, that she would have screamed hysterically. But she just sat there, gun pointed at the squirrel, heart hammering against her ribs. Travis never woke up and she never told him about the incident, either. There’s enough terror in the daytime without Travis hearing about the sound the owls make when they’re dead. When undead birds sing, there’s no music in it. There’s just a low, long whistle. Sarah thinks that the owls sound deeper and sadder than anything she’s ever known. Nights are the worst, but Sarah chooses them. She’d rather stay awake through the horror than never wake up.

“Where are you, Travis?” the warm air leaves her mouth like a ghost. She huddles up in her animal blanket, hiding from the creatures in the night. Sarah feels warm in her mother’s patchwork. If the zombie outbreak had never occurred, she and Travis would be celebrating Christmas at her parents’ house in Michigan. They’d be eating ham and watching the wild turkeys hobble by outside the glass sliding window. One of their family traditions was to roast up chestnuts and eat them by the fireplace. She would always fall asleep there, feet toasty warm. Sarah dreamed sweet dreams back then…

* * *

It’s still night, but Sarah is following a star, almost as bright as the sun. It looks pale and lonely in spite of its light. She finds a barn where she can take refuge. There are people and animals inside. They’re all standing still, looking at something. Sarah has their pistol out; they’re quiet but they all look alive.

“What are you all looking at?” Sarah asks. No answer. She leans forward to see Joseph and Mary sitting over their child, looking every bit like the ones in her parents’ nativity set. “He’s our Lord and savior,” says one of the wise men. They’re all standing still and staring like in a painting. Sarah leans forward to look at the tiny child in the manger. Its jaw hangs loose. Its eyes are gray and dead. It reaches out to touch Sarah and she backs off. Mary’s neck is broken. Joseph’s jaw is missing. His tongue hangs loose onto his robes. One of the wise men, eye holes bleeding, lunges at her and she backs into a llama with filmy eyes and crooked teeth. It hisses and bites her.

* * *

“Sarah! Open up!”

She pulls out the pistol and points it at his head.

“Christ! Sarah!” he ducks. “I’m not a zombie yet! Put the gun down!”

She looks through the peephole. The sunlight is barely grazing over the trees, making the tops look yellow.

“It was a little farther than I remembered. But look!” He holds up the gas can. “It’s a Christmas miracle!

Sarah says nothing. “I think we have as much as three gallons, but the stations just tapped out now. We’re lucky that there was anything at all. People probably just haven’t used this one because of how far away from civilization it is.”

Sarah remembers her parents’ home, walking in and seeing the glass door broken, a corpse strewn out on the kitchen floor. Red entrails stretched out on white linoleum. She couldn’t even recognize it as her mother, or maybe she didn’t want to believe it at the time. Travis looks into Sarah’s glazed over eyes. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah…” she says, shaking her head. Those memories won’t do her any good. She has Travis and that’s all that matters now.

Her husband runs his hand through her hair and puts his lips to her head. “Check me for bite marks,” he whispers to her forhead. She shrinks back from his touch.

“God dammit, Travis! I don’t care if you’re turning or not.”

“Don’t say that.”

“No! No!” she swats away an arm aimed at comforting her. “It’s not like we can help it! I’d rather die too!”

“Sarah. This is important. It would kill me if I…”

“You’d already be dead. Just drop it.”

“All right. I just…”

“Drop it.”

They sit for a minute, looking out at the growing light outside. It’s a silent morning.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah says.

“For what?” Travis asks. Sarah has never apologized after these arguments, but then she wasn’t apologizing about the fight anyway. She made up her mind that she would stick with him when they got married, before she even knew that the dead could get up and walk again.

“I was asleep when you got back. I had… I had a bad dream.”

“Sarah, I’ve been thinking about something,” Travis says, clutching his gas can. “I don’t think we can do this anymore. We need to make good use of this last gasoline that we were given. We may be able to get close to the coast on just a few gallons. I don’t know why I thought we could hide out forever, but maybe immigration has settled down a bit. I mean, the initial scare is over, so I don’t think they’d shoot us unless we were the undead. Sarah?”

“Hmmm?”

“Sarah. What do you think?”

“About what?”

“Civilization.”

Sarah wraps her mother’s quilt around them both. “I think… I want to sleep together without taking shifts. I don’t care what happens today. I just want to sleep her with you.” She rests her head on his stomach.

“Merry Christmas,” she whispers.

“Merry Christmas,” he replies, setting the gas can at his feet.

Outside the window, the sunrise gives the snow a reddish hue. Just this one time, he pulls the quilt over both their heads and they dream sweet dreams.

Dirge (revision)

March 7, 2010

Dr. Miller and I have begun our research of the ice worms on the Malaspina Glacier, just a few hundred miles from Juneau. Our encampment is an ideal place, far enough from the lake and tourism but not far enough that we can’t get to civilization within a day in the case of an emergency. Just dig in the ice and you can find dozens crawling around, like little squirming hairs.

March 10, 2010

Counting worm mean density in glaciers is tedious, especially the process of staking off areas. If I wanted to dig holes, I’d have become an archaeologist.

Our survivalist, Eric, entertains Dr. Miller and I with his stories. He has a way of telling them that uses his whole body, like the time he was carrying a dead seal to the butcher (who is a good friend of his) to sell its skin and fat and to get its meat cut into seal steaks. This was actually the normal part for him; apparently, PETA was hanging out, protesting, and they saw him and chased him through the streets. He had to chuck the seal into the crowd just to get away. “What a waste!” he told us and laughed a deep laugh.  He keeps us in warm spirits.

March 11, 2010

More worm counting. It’s cold and I’m tired. My fingers are numb. My nose is numb. My ass is numb. I’ve been slacking off to chat with Eric. Dr. Miller keeps eyeing me. I can only guess she disapproves of my slacking off or my flirting with Eric, though probably both.

March 14, 2010

I am writing this the next morning. I’ve always been a lightweight, but the cold is soothing to hangovers.

Eric and I started the day talking about science fiction. He’s a huge fan of Conan the Barbarian. He said that there were two stories about ice worms that he had read, one called “The Lair of the Ice Worm” featured Conan but was not written by Howard. The other, preferred by Eric, was called “Valley of the Worm” and was about a man named Niord who battles a giant ice worm and dies.

Since he offered some of his vodka, I reluctantly admitted that my interest in ice worms had been birthed from science fiction writers like Peter F. Hamilton and Alastair Reynolds. I recalled one story in which ice worms were used to terraform the planet by excreting the bacteria used to birth new life.

It was a strange conversation, but I felt like a connected with Eric a little. Then came the vodka. Dr. Miller will be livid.

March 15, 2010

Dr. Miller was bitten by a man wandering about the glaciers. I’m writing as Eric drives us to Juneau. She’s finally asleep from the anesthetics we gave her, but I’m not so sure about her condition. I can’t tell what’s wrong with her except for the fact that the wound is festering. He seemed to have some form of leprosy, perhaps, his body was so decayed. Eric put the man down. I don’t know how else to describe it since he was acting like a rabid animal. I just have to remind myself that it was mercy; it’s amazing he was still alive. Though it may ruin our research, we’ve left our camp behind. There is a large volume of bears about. Strange. Polar bears never head this far south. I wonder if this is a result of global warming?

March 16, 2010

If anyone is reading this, I am dead. My name is Dr. Hermann Schulz and I have been attacked by diseased polar bears. Like walking corpses. Some of them have their flesh torn right off from the bone, but they still keep coming with a ferocity not of this world. I was here with Eric Nass and Dr. Nancy Miller. They are both dead. God help me, they are. Poor Eric, torn apart by mad polar bears. He was every bit the man, though that means little under the might of a bear. Dr. Miller was bitten and contracted the disease. She attacked us and we left her. I leave nobody behind, save a couple of aunts and an uncle. I don’t want to die.

March 17, 2010

Ice worms come out at night. Must have killed tens of thousands just walking around.

If they had mouths, what songs would they sing for us? Or would it all be drowned out by the screaming?

March 21, 2010

I’ve had a few days to think while I lay in the hospital. Living bear corpses hobbling around the glaciers and tearing into Eric with bloody nails. All still vivid memories. This may sound crazy, but I need to know what killed my partner and my friend. Eric told me about that story and Niord and how his friend sang a dirge for him after his battle with the ice worms and his death. I think I’ll start experiments on the ice worms promptly. Maybe they know something we don’t.

Threshold (revision)

Travis began to doubt whether Sarah was still alive. He glared at a stranger, daring the man to tell him that she wasn’t alive. He quickly got out of Travis’s way. Why now? For almost two years, neither of them had felt safe, but they were alive and together. Now that they were among people, they had let their guard down.

Before the outbreak, before the zombies, they used to spend nights making love with only the light of her favorite lavender candles. He always thought the scent was overpowering, but he’d grown to love it. What he wouldn’t do to bring back that night, and to bring her back. Even living in the truck for over a year, afraid of everything outside their doors, at least they had each other. There were times during the morning twilight, in that threshold between night and day, when they would cling to each other and never let go. Now he might never see her again. Dr. Z: if he ever found him, he would kill him…

* * *

He’ll never see him again. Jeremiah, his only remaining flesh and blood, in an unmarked grave in the dry plains of Texas. They had grown up together, taking turns on the slide. He and Jerm had done unthinkable things, but they’d done them to corpses. But even telling himself that didn’t make it feel right. They’d massacred their entire family. If there was any blood on their hands, that would be it.

Micah waits at the threshold of the Rapturist building. He could burn this place down, but he wouldn’t know if the heads of the operation would be dead. The gumshoe would find a way in. It was a matter of pride for a man like that.

Ever since that day, Micah had always told Jerm “We did what we had to,” even if he didn’t quite believe it himself. Well, there was just one more thing Micah had to do. This country is a cess pool, all stemming from this booming city of Juneau. He would purge it with a bath of fire…

* * *

“Burn him again.”

“I think he’s reached his threshold, Reverend.”

“Very well.” He laid hands on the hammer and the chain, simple devices of torture, used as an artist would use a paintbrush.

He hung against the wall, like a piece of rotting meat. Reverend Taddeo wanted to dance at the sublime beauty of it all. He had grown up never really believing in God or the afterlife, feeling guilty about it but not knowing why. Now that the dead had come back, Taddeo knew that there was a divine presence passing judgment on us all. The Rapture had come and God had spoken in his ears: “Thou art hath sinned. Convert the masses and thou art shalt be redeemed in the eyes of the Lord.”

“You will thank me later, Dr. Schulz. We are baptizing you, preparing you for the rigors of the new age where only the just are spared from God’s angels! We must all prepare for what is to come…”

* * *

“We have to be prepared. You guys are ready?”

“Hells yeah! That’s my girlfriend getting brainwashed in there!”

“Theo, she could just be there of her own free… never mind.”

“So, what’s the big plan?”

“I have a plan. Josh, we’ll need to borrow your truck. You ready?”

Josh exercised his strange ability to crack every bone in his body. “I was born ready.”

“Good. We make our move tonight…”

* * *

The zombies gathered at the threshold of the forest, seeming to have purpose and direction. They began marching toward the squatter camps set up around Juneau’s walls. They guards rang the warning bells, too late for the huddled masses clawing at the gates to be saved from the flesh-eating masses. The undead horde’s number tripled that night. The victims of poverty and overpopulation now hammered and clawed at the threshold, slavering and dreaming of blood.

Outside (revision)

I waited outside, cig slack in my jaw, glancing above the headlines of the Juneau Empire: “Zombie casualties record low,” it read. The politicians must be getting better at hiding the bodies.

At least the Dr. Z kidnapping story has finally gotten off the front page. The Rapturists have the media diddling their front pockets. Who even knows if that “Micah” is right about Sarah being  alive? They’d have no reason to keep her in there as far as Tobias could figure. Then again, why would Dr. Z be alive and kicking? Maybe I’m being used, but I was hired to see this through. Hired by a man who wants to see his wife again and see his first child born. Doesn’t sound so unreasonable to me.

I wasn’t part of the group that cleared out the Rapturist building, so I can’t say where they would likely be held. They say the old Sealaska building used to be a heritage center for the natives Indians. When the outbreak occurred, the big wigs all ended up getting eaten or turned. Like many other buildings in the area, squatters began taking the building as their own. Though it should have belonged to the native tribes by principle, Reverend Taddeo and his church provided a good amount of money to the mayor and the police. Many of the people inside were converted and given a place to live. Others were kicked from the premises. Some rumors say that a few people just vanished, but nobody knows that for sure. A lot of dirty rumors have circulated around that new-age cult, but nobody knows for sure one way or another. But it didn’t matter. He’d never seen the inside. He needed someone who could take him through.

“Toby! What are you doing around here?”

“Oh, you know,” I sniffed, spitting my cig into the gutter. “The whole detective schtick. I’ve gotten good at skulking around. Need some help with those groceries?”

“No. I’m okay. Look, about Theo…”

“Don’t even worry about it.”

“You don’t care that I hurt your friend?”

“I care, Vera. But you’re my friend, too. And Theo’s kind of a whiny cunt sometimes anyway.”

“I’m relieved. I was worried for a second that you were going to try to get me to come back.”

I shrugged. “We miss you, V. You know that. But, no, I’m not here to break your balls are carry you home or anything. Actually, I wanted to ask you what got you so obsessed with these Rapture guys? Thought you were going to Guadeloupe.”

Vera switched her grocery bag to the other arm. “I wish I could. There’s just no money for me to do it, not even with my cut. And what would I do if I got there? I don’t know anybody. The Rapturists support me. Brother Vance tells me there’s a place we can go, a utopia where people can live free from fear.” Must be the guy she’s banging now. “Theo always likes to stay inside where he thinks it’s safe, but maybe it’s not safe in there. Maybe it’s not safe anywhere. So, you know, I always wanted to travel, see the world. I want to go somewhere that’s not… here. You know? Theo would never go for it. He’s okay with the same fear and seclusion. I want to go somewhere and do something. I probably sound crazy.”

“No,” I chuckled. “I remember one time he used to play this old computer game, Warcraft. Sometimes he’d just take the microwave out of the wall, put it in his room, and play for days. The man loved Hot Pockets. See, that’s crazy. You’re just a delusional dreamer. There ain’t no promised land. Wherever you go, there’s gonna be zombies. Death.”

“And people. Life.”

“Exactly. Same thing.”

“When did you get so cynical, Toby? You used to be such a sweetheart.” Vera blew her hair out of her mouth, switching the grocery bag to the first hand.

“Still am,” I argued, snatching the bag from her. “Now, let’s go meet your new family. I’m curious what the appeal is.”