Get Zombie: 8-Book Set (6 page)

“
What’s
happening?”

Barbara
turned around to face her mum and said:

“
This
will make it easier.”

She
punched her mum in the face, sending her sailing ten feet through the
air in a heavy WHOOSH, right into a thick bamboo shoot. It cracked in
two and fell over with a disturbing whine.

I
yelled out in protest and stood between them, but her mum pushed me
out of the way and shook her head at her daughter, then said to the
heavens, “Forgive me, Father, for I
know
what I do!”

Barbara
attacked her mum – to my horror – and proceeded to punch
and kick her and throw her onto the ground and into the bamboo
shoots. She even whacked a heavy length of bamboo on top of her mum’s
head in a sickening THUNK. Barbara got out a machete. Her mum
revealed a heavy medieval sword from her duffle bag and they both
took mad swipes at each other.

I
tried to stop them, but they kicked me out of the way, hard. I found
myself massaging various parts of my body.

They
began shrieking at each other, all those years of pent-up frustration
and anger finally coming through. I began to retreat. This wasn’t
my fight. There was nothing I could do – no matter how much I
tried. Someone was going to die, and I didn’t want to be around
when it happened – especially if it was
someone
I cared about.

I
ran with their battle cries at my back.

I
could feel the zombies above and all around me – staring from
behind the dark bushes. I knew they could hear them fighting. Any
minute now Barbara and her mum would be attacked.

Well,
maybe that was what they wanted. They knew what they were doing –
what all their screaming would do.

As
I jumped over a tree stump, I remembered what Barbara had told me,
about loving me, trusting me in killing her if ever necessary. And
then that scared Italian hiker popped into my mind like a jack in the
box. I hated how he had left his friends behind. What kind of human
would do such a thing? Not help? Not do
everything
in his
power
to save
the ones he cared for?

It
was a way to measure the love of a man.

I
stopped dead in my tracks, holding my breath.

Barbara
and her mum were clanking blades. Their voices were shrill and echoed
throughout the woods.

Then…
silence.

No
wind. No crickets. Nothing, except for a growing ringing sound in my
ears.

I
fixed my hair, then straightened my shirt…

…
and
ran back.

Twenty-one.

They were making zombie calls. They had stopped fighting
long ago. I ran faster, slipping and falling in mud every twenty
steps. The trees above me rustled, trying to scare me away from the
upcoming bad news bears.

I thanked the trees for their concern and ran even
faster, falling even more. When I reached the bamboo clearing,
zombies surrounded Barbara and her mum.

No one moved.

The undead stood under streaks of moonlight that melted
through the bamboo ceiling, reflecting in their eyes and made them
glow.

There was a waitress zombie with strips of muscles for
arms; a hiker zombie with a samurai sword through its neck; a nude,
muscular male zombie with no legs, resting on its belly – its
head poised (eyes wide and crazy); a little girl zombie with backward
legs; a butcher zombie, gripping two butcher knives and eating its
own dangling eye; a priest zombie, standing very close to three
zombie boys; and a surfer zombie with a surfboard sticking out of its
back.

Barbara and her mum had dropped their blades and were
holding hands, making no attempt to run. I moved back and stepped on
an empty bag of Doritos. Barbara and her mum turned around and looked
at me, surprise in their eyes, mouths agape. The crawling zombie made
a mad dash for me. Barbara’s mum jumped on its back –
feet going right through it. She yanked out its spine and used it as
a whip to take off the priest’s head, which flew toward me. I
shrieked and kicked it, sending it flying into the waitress’s
mouth. She ate the head.

Barbara and her mum picked up their blades. They stood
back-to-back, yelling at me to stay where I was.

The butcher zombie snuck up behind Barbara’s mum
and made to bite her. I yelled out in warning and she spun around,
cutting its head in half from ear to ear. The brain popped out and
the waitress zombie leapt into the air like a fish and caught it in
her mouth, then ate it.

Barbara butchered the child zombies, hacking them into
tiny cubes. The surfer zombie bear hugged her. She reached back and
pulled out a rather large portion of its ribcage. The zombie fell to
the ground, but was persistent, gripping onto her ankle. She fell and
yelled out as the undead surfer crawled over her, drooling and
growling. Barbara chopped at it, but in her fright only managed to
cut its ears and the front portion of its face, revealing a grinning
white skeleton. She reached out to me.

“
Not like this! Not in this way!”

Her mum was busy, struggling with the hiker zombie, the
sword in its neck shining moonlight. I ran up to the hiker and pulled
out the sword, leaping into the air and driving the heavy blade
through the back of the surfer’s head. Red showered loudly over
Barbara’s face. The blade was mere inches from her face and I
felt immediately guilty. She stayed on the ground, struggling to
breathe and spitting. Something was wrong with her. Her skin was
turning blue. She shut her eyes tight…and when she opened them
they were completely black.

I backed up.

She massaged her eyes and they were normal again. Her
mum was strangling the hiker zombie like an insane person. Its eyes
popped out and then there was the snapping of spine. Barbara’s
mum gave out a mighty yell and an equally mighty squeeze. She made to
rip off its head, slowly stretching the neck – the zombie’s
moan rising in pitch.

The hiker zombie’s spine whipped like mad from out
the lonely neck, slapping her in the face. She spun around and kicked
the zombie’s torso away, which landed onto a bamboo pike, moved
around for a bit, then froze. Barbara’s mum threw its head into
the air and punched it toward the waitress zombie – who was
feasting on the children’s remains like a chicken. The flying
head hit her in the face, hard,
exploding
both skulls into a rain of gooey bits.

Barbara and her mum then chopped everyone into tiny
fractions, dug a large hole with their hands, and buried everything,
topping it all off by sticking bamboo shoots over the gave to
disguise it.

Barbara accused me of meddling and ruining her plans. I
said nothing. She turned around and regurgitated, squatting. Her mum
walked up to me briskly and poked my chest with her finger, asking
why I had to come back – everyone would’ve been happy if
the zombies just had their way. She said more things, but I wasn’t
even listening. I was watching Barbara. Her mum noticed the perplexed
expression on my face and also looked.

Barbara was standing, facing us, eyes black as night,
her arms glued to her sides. She wasn’t standing upright –
she was more in a half-squat, like a standing crab, legs spread.
Perfectly still.

It was now windy. Her mum got her machete and slowly
walked toward Barbara with her free hand out, as if to keep her
daughter at bay.

She raised the weapon.

In a bust of energy, Barbara attacked her mum. The
machete cut into Barbara’s neck and got stuck halfway down her
chest…I could see her heart beating…My head grew
dizzy…I fell to my knees…Her mum yelled out for me to
help, weeping, pleading…I just stayed there…staring
with my mouth open as Barbara threw her hands into her mum’s
mouth…and tore her head in half with the sound of ripped
paper.

The corpse fell, twitching.

Barbara sat down and ate her mum.

I walked away.

I
looked over my shoulder and noticed that she was following me. She’d
stop whenever I stopped, hiding in the shadows of the hiking trail,
eyes glowing with moonlight. I wanted to run up and hug her, wanted
to kiss her, wanted to do so many things.

How do you forget someone?

How do you forget someone you still love? How do you
try to understand that this person doesn’t want you the same
way anymore? How do you forget?
My head hurt.
I had to move on.

Just keep walking, as fast as you can.

Look back for that very last time.

Nothing, but the dark pathway.

You’ll find it so painless now.

You will never see her again.

Soon enough, you’ll forget.

This is what you wanted…

…
to never remember…

…
since it’s easier…

…
to forget.

—
RCH

Get Kilt

A Zombie Pill

THE RECORDED MESSAGE

After the “incident”, a soldier patrolling downtown
Honolulu discovered a cellphone in a bus with burning tires. Although
the phone was damaged and deemed useless, a recorded message played
on a loop. This is that message:

I'm stuck in the office. I'm too
scared to go outside. Saidi, I love you. Oh, God...I hear them
outside.
I don't have much time, but if there's anything I
want you to know, it's that I love you and that I wish I was with
you....I can hear them outside in the hallway, running around,
looking for people to eat so they can get faster, stronger, better.
I'm so scared right now. They can run so
fast
. I saw one run
after a dog and actually catch the thing. The old hag ate the dog,
and then ran off, and I swear it was even faster than before. What is
happening to these old people? Are they possessed? This isn't normal.
Another one of those old...THINGS...picked up a small Honda and threw
it at a group of cops. They were all wiggling, squirming under the
car and crying for help. I had no choice but to vomit all over
myself. The cops were shaking...bleeding...pleading.

I'll never get that image out of my head. Especially when those crazy
old people started eating them. After they licked every bone clean,
the monsters ripped off their shirts and started flexing their
muscles and posing like champions. Some of them golf-clapped and
nodded in approval. I saw cops SHOOT them – right in the body,
sending those old people right to the ground. They just got right
back up again like nothing happened. These “people”...they're
like...like...
zombies
. They don't wanna stay DEAD. Creeping
Jesus. They just laugh and kill everyone. They seem so merry. They
laugh when they kill. So cheery. Why?

One of them smelled my musk and tried to smash their way into the
office. Remember that taser my boss, Mr. Murbag, gave me? I used it
on the zombie old woman – got her right on the forehead –
and didn't stop cooking her until her eyes popped out and dangled by
their optic nerves. It was quite a sight. God, forgive me. Oh, hunny.
Oh, my love. I wish I was with you, wife. I love you. I'm so scared.
I can't stop shaking. Timothy's dead. It happened in the copy room. I
saw the zombie....I saw the old man lift Timothy up high into the air
and snap his body in two like a pencil. His innards came out in a
hurry. The monster drank Tim's torso like a gallon of milk. They're
so strong. TOO strong!

How is that even possible? It's ridiculous! It doesn't matter now.
All logic is shit now. The whole island has gone weird. Things don't
make sense to me anymore. Where are the police? The soldiers? I don't
understand. I don't wanna die. I wanna be with you, Saidi. Please, I
miss you. I admit that YES I slept with Mary. If I'm gonna die, I
want to be honest with you. YES, I slept with your sister. Creeping
Jesus! Forgive me. I left her. She's not with me. I promise.
(Crying
sounds.)

Please pick up the phone. Dear God, I hope you're still alive. I hope
you're not on the streets.
(Crashing sound.)
No! Nooo! Take
your stinking hands of me, you old, dirty bastard!

OLD VOICE 1: Let's play jump rope with his guts!

MAN: Don't do it!

OLD VOICE 2: I have a better idea. Grab his feet. Let's make a wish!

MAN: Noooooooo!

(Big, wet ripping sound. Various splats. Eating sounds.)

OLD VOICE 1: I am invigorated!

OLD VOICE 2: I am filled with life!

(A woman screams.)

OLD VOICE 1: Someone's in the office!

OLD VOICE 2: Eat her!

(Screams. Static. Message ends.)

PART ONE

THE HOME

JANICE
ALTAIR

I
celebrated my 80
^th
birthday by getting drunk. Is that
pathetic? It felt pathetic. I wasn't even a drinker. And yet, all
those drunks were right! The alcohol killed my worries. My brain was
numb. I smiled. I was relaxed. I gagged down my beer and slammed it
down on the little glass table between me and the TV. On the screen
was a newsman rattling on about some crime that happened in downtown
Honolulu. Something about an old lady that held up a Japanese tourist
at gunpoint. I shook my head.