In truth, I owed a pair of voodoo practitioners—the Beauvoir sisters—for my continuing education. Each had separately told me about the Infernal—an apparently hellish plane of existence where all humans were destined to end up after death—and the interdimensional breach that had jumpstarted Earth’s doom. But, frankly, even with all the evidence hinting to such an otherworldly realm, I still had trouble swallowing the idea of another dimension, much less a multiverse.
I glanced at the skeptical faces around me.
“You really think it’s smart to camp by a cemetery during a zombie apocalypse?” Clare asked. Although she’d shifted Azazel’s carrier onto the floor and unbuckled her seatbelt, she had yet to vacate the comparative safety of our fortified home-on-wheels.
“I do.” I smirked, leaning inside to shut off the engine and the lights. “Besides, I intended for all of us to sleep inside our vehicles. Not exposed outside, under the stars.”
Clare smiled tentatively.
“OK,” George said, “let’s do this. I’m too exhausted to find another spot anyway.”
“Me, too,” Jill agreed as she turned, presumably headed back to her makeshift bed. “But I still think you’re an idiot.”
Leave it to my mother-in-law to keep it real.
Chapter
4
“Just one bite, one scratch from these creatures is sufficient. And then, you become one of them.” – Red Queen, Resident Evil (2002)
All disgruntled kidding aside, Jill didn’t look too healthy. She’d always had a fair complexion, but over the past day, all color had drained from her face. Her skin, even her lips, had turned ashen, and beads of perspiration had appeared on her forehead—despite the fact that it was a chilly autumn night, and with her slender frame, she tended toward coldness, not overheating.
Perhaps her fever had broken—not that it would make much of a difference. Regardless of the trouble Casey and I had endured at the vet clinic in Gloster, I suspected the antibiotics and painkillers we’d swiped were having little to no effect on Jill’s spreading zombie infection. No matter how long she dutifully swallowed them, they’d likely never reverse her current condition—a supernatural illness that most of Earth’s scientists had had no time to study, much less cure, before succumbing to it themselves.
I caught Clare’s worried expression. Obviously, she’d noticed her mother’s worsening situation as well. With a half-hearted smile, she picked up Azazel’s carrier, flipped on an overhead light, and walked toward the back of our home-on-wheels.
Turning to George and Casey, I said, “You’re welcome to sleep in the van with us. We have plenty of room. But it might be safer for you to stay in the wagon… in case we have to speed outta here at some point.”
Their eyes flicked toward my vehicle, a disconcerted expression on their faces.
George recovered quickly, her smile pleasant and sincere. “Thanks, Joe. We appreciate the offer. But I think you’re right… better for us to use both cars. In case, like you said, we have to make a quick getaway.”
The real truth, the one neither George nor Casey wanted to come right out and admit, was that they had no desire to be unconscious only a few feet from a soon-to-be-undead time bomb sleeping in our van.
Honestly, I couldn’t blame them. I wasn’t too thrilled about it either.
All of a sudden, I heard a loud hiss. Concerned that Jill had finally morphed into a monster and was on the attack, I scrambled back into the vehicle.
Luckily, nothing so dramatic had occurred. Clare had simply let a pissed-off Azazel out of her carrier.
The poor kitty had been cooped up for a long time. But though eager to be free, she obviously hadn’t enjoyed emerging from her cage so close to Jill’s feet. Cat-hating nemeses could be unsettling like that.
After performing her typical downward-facing dog stretch, Azazel sniffed a puddle of putrid goo—presumably a drop of pus from Jill’s infected wound.
“Azazel, no!” I shouted, lunging toward her.
“Jesus,” Jill snapped, “you startled me!”
Naturally, I ignored my mother-in-law and focused instead on my beloved cat. “Shoo, kitty! Get away from that.”
But my warning was unnecessary. One sniff, and Azazel recoiled, scrunching her tiny damp nose—just as she usually did whenever she got a whiff of something she found distasteful, like vomit or kumquats.
I sighed with relief, suspecting my feisty cat would no longer be curious about the deadly stuff—and, likewise, would keep her distance from Jill, a woman she hadn’t much liked before the ill-fated zombie scratch occurred. Just in case, though, I wiped up the goo—and spritzed some diluted bleach on the spot.
“Jesus, Joe,” my mother-in-law grumbled, “I’ve never known you to be such a clean freak.”
Apparently, she had no idea that, in a moment of frenzied panic, I’d wiped up evidence of the zombie infection that would ultimately kill her—thereby sparing Azazel from a similarly ghoulish fate. Regardless of our rocky relationship, I inwardly relaxed. Jill was suffering enough—I didn’t want her to realize how unnerved I felt… not only by her impending transformation but also by the possibility of her contaminating the two individuals I loved most.
“If you’re in such a cleaning mood,” she added, “you might want to focus on the exterior. I can smell the stench from in here.”
Although I, too, had gotten more than a few unpleasant whiffs of the blood, guts, brain matter, and zombie goo smeared across the van—and longed for a chance to scour her thoroughly—the odor wasn’t as noticeable to me as it apparently was to her. Perhaps the zombie infection coursing through her veins had heightened her olfactory senses—in preparation for her flesh-seeking afterlife.
Whatever the case, I refrained from responding and chuckled awkwardly instead, trying to distract Jill from my true motives. As I stood up, though, my knees popping from the effort, I caught the forlorn expression on Clare’s face. A mixture of horror and sadness, as if an emotional civil war raged within her soul: one side terrified for her furbaby, the other longing to save her mom… and acknowledging she couldn’t.
As ridiculous as it might sound, I understood exactly how she felt. Even after enduring years of derision from my mother-in-law, I didn’t want to watch her succumb to such a gruesome death. Even she didn’t deserve that.
“I’ll help Casey secure the campsite.” I smiled halfheartedly. “The sooner we can all get some rest, the better.”
Clare stared at me numbly, and Jill merely nodded, perhaps too tired and weak to say anything snarky.
As I stepped outside to rejoin George and Casey, I realized they’d shut off their own vehicle, headlights included. But even in the spotty moonlight, I caught a sympathetic expression on each of their faces.
Obviously, they’d overheard the incident with Jill and Azazel. Still, I wasn’t certain why they pitied me. Because I was forced to deal with an ungrateful mother-in-law? Or because they thought I was tortured by her slow fade into zombiedom?
With a shrug, I focused on more pressing matters. “George, could you guard the campsite while Casey and I set up a tripwire around the perimeter?”
The pity in her eyes hardened into resolve. “You got it.”
So, while she stationed herself atop the battle wagon, her weapons at the ready, her son and I strolled to the back of the step van. After unlocking the rear doors, I clambered inside to retrieve some supplies. Clare had joined her mother on the couch, and Azazel had curled up on the passenger seat up front—though I could see little more than her dangling tail. Once I’d grabbed what I needed, including my jacket from the stuffed closet, I hopped to the ground and shut the doors again.
As it turned out, I had more than enough twine to encircle the entire campsite. Not that I was surprised. Any good prepper should keep plenty of string, rope, and, of course, duct tape in an easy-to-access spot.
The trouble was… I didn’t have any disposable items to secure to the line—things that would c
lank together if someone or something broke through our perimeter. No empty cans or bottles to signal us. Nothing I was willing to lose. We needed something that would alert us without alerting the whole damn forest.
“No worries, Mr.… I mean, Joe,” Casey said. “I’ve got just the thing.”
After snagging the car keys from George, he unlocked the back of the station wagon and pulled a ratty blanket aside. Much to his mother’s chagrin, he’d uncovered a case of empty beer cans he’d apparently forgotten to toss out before everything went to hell.
Man, I really like this kid. He’s resourceful as shit.
From her perch atop the vehicle, George glanced from the box in her son’s arms to his face. With squinting eyes and a shaking head—the full disapproving-mother treatment—she said, “You’re lucky this whole apocalypse thing happened, young man, or you’d have some serious explaining to do.”
Casey flashed his mother a sheepish grin but said nothing in his defense. Three years shy of his twenty-first birthday, he wouldn’t have been able to purchase alcohol legally, but that had never stopped teenage boys from snagging some beer—especially in southern Louisiana. With a halfhearted shrug, he shut the door and followed me into the woods with his case of empties.
Using my tape measure, I marked off a large square around the campsite, then together, Casey and I unwound the twine, methodically tied it to the ring-pull tabs on the cans, and secured the line to several bushes and tree trunks. In the end, two dozen beer cans surrounded us, tied together in pairs spaced about ten feet apart, hovering only about four inches above the ground.
If an unwanted visitor stumbled into our campsite, triggering the line, the cans would hopefully rattle against each other loud enough to awaken us—and warn us of any potential danger before he, she, or it busted into our vehicles and tried to snatch their pound of flesh.
Satisfied with our makeshift security measure—and too exhausted to set any other booby traps—we returned to the vehicles.
“Well, we’ve done all we can for now,” I told George. “I suggest we all get inside, lock our doors, and grab as much sleep as we can.”
With an agreeable nod, she jumped down from the wagon’s roof. Simultaneously, the rear doors of my step van opened, and Clare poked her head outside.
Having helped my wife through many tough situations over the years, from health scares to the loss of loved ones, I knew her expressions well—and yet, I’d never seen her face more pinched and drawn with concern.
“Joe, she’s not doing well. I don’t think the antibiotics are helping at all.”
Before I could respond, George circled around the battle wagon.
“How’d she get infected?” she asked me.
“She got scratched by a zombie back at her house. I hoped it would heal, but…”
George bit her lip pensively. “Any chance she was sick before getting scratched?”
But Clare had passed the point of deluding herself. “She was fine a few days ago. Before the scratch.”
George nodded sadly. “I’m sorry. I really am.” Then, she offered a comforting smile, the kind everyone needed when life seemed to serve up only shit-sandwiches.
She’d probably worn that motherly expression a lot lately. Like… when her husband had returned home as a zombie, and her poor son had been forced to shoot his own father. She’d surely given Casey that same smile then, and now, it was all she could do for Clare.
We all knew the sad truth, even if no one wanted to voice it: Jill was going to die soon and ultimately transform into one of the foul creatures that had irreversibly fucked up our world.
Unless someone was willing to put her out of her misery.
And we all know who that unlucky bastard’s gonna be.
“Okay, kiddo,” George said as she nudged her son toward the front of the station wagon, “how ’bout you and I have a little chat about that beer?”
“Come on, Mom, really?”
Without a word, she unlocked the driver’s-side door and gestured him inside.
Casey took one look at her stony face and reluctantly scrambled across the front seat. Once he’d settled onto the passenger side, she slipped behind the steering wheel and shut the door.
Despite Casey’s look of displeasure, I doubted George intended to give him any crap about the beer. She was simply offering me and Clare some space.
To do what exactly… I wasn’t yet sure.
Chapter
5
“Look, worst-case scenario, you put her out of her misery. Just as long as you’re prepared for that, and I mean, sure.” – Sam, Ginger Snaps (2000)
Clare gazed around the moonlit campsite, perhaps checking for any uninvited guests, before hopping down from the van and shutting the doors behind her. With a pensive smile, I took her hand, and we strolled toward the perimeter of the campsite—incidentally, on the opposite side from the cemetery trail. No matter what I’d told the group, even I didn’t want to stand too close to a graveyard.
You know, just in case I’m wrong. Which, as we’ve discovered, so rarely happens.
For a moment, the two of us lingered in the moonlight. Still gripping my wife’s hand, I scanned the surrounding woods. Every rustling shadow alerted my “spidey sense,” making me wish we’d stayed closer to the van. But a gentle breeze and the far-off sounds of a burbling waterway were all I could hear.
Otherwise, the forest was eerily quiet, seemingly devoid of life. Although numerous zombies likely roamed across Homochitto’s vast acreage, it felt as if all the native creatures—from the crickets and squirrels to the wild turkeys and white-tailed deer—had fled long ago. Just as I’d noticed on the bayous south of Gonzales.
Recalling the awful sight of an eviscerated cat in a pet store back in New Orleans, I couldn’t really blame them for running away. When it came to devouring flesh, innards, and brains, undead humans weren’t picky—or biased. But, oddly enough, as fascinating as I found the idea of a mass exodus of freaked-out fauna, it wasn’t the topic uppermost on my mind.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there when you and Jill were attacked,” I whispered, squeezing Clare’s hand.
She nodded glumly. Though she likely believed my guilt was sincere, she knew it wasn’t for Jill’s sake. I simply felt bad because my wife was suffering, grieving an unspeakable event—even if it hadn’t happened yet.
Clare and I had always empathized with each other. If I felt stressed and overwhelmed, she did, too—and together, we’d try to solve the problems plaguing us. Both of us had always believed that anyone who failed to harbor such deep, intertwined emotions toward their significant other was likely in the wrong relationship.
After a silent moment, she leaned against my chest, resting her head on my right shoulder. In response, I merely held her tight, waiting for her to unload the burdens in her heart. When she finally spoke, though, she didn’t say what I’d expected.
“I really thought you were dead.” Her voice wavered. “Felt like my heart was gonna shrivel up and die. I just couldn’t imagine life without you.”
We’d already had a similar conversation back at Jill’s house, but I didn’t blame her for rehashing it. The same thought had been whirling around my brain since waking up in my courtyard on All Souls’ Day.
“Me neither.” I kissed the top of her head. “If I hadn’t gotten to you in time, I’m not sure what I would’ve done.”
Although I’d always been a survivor at heart, I knew I couldn’t have endured her death either—especially not in such a hopelessly undead world.
Still, I figured her mother’s impending doom was presently her main priority. It genuinely surprised me that it wasn’t.
She giggled, turning her face toward mine. “You always said if I died, you’d go on a rampage, killing as many evil people as possible. And that Azazel would be your sidekick. She’d even have her own little Uzi.”
I snorted. “I said all the stupid people. That may, or may not, include the evil ones. Course
, evil would be a close second on the list.” Abruptly, I recalled the murderous hicks who’d almost offed me in Ray’s neighborhood—and the depraved people of Gonzales who’d brazenly killed a slew of hapless motorists as well as their fellow citizens. “On second thought… maybe evil first, stupid second.”
She grinned. “That’s the misanthrope I know and love.”
Then, she reached up and gently scratched my goatee. “I think you have a bit more gray than you did before Halloween.”
Her comment didn’t offend my vanity. I knew that my wife, rarely critical of a person’s appearance, wasn’t displeased with my salt-and-pepper beard. Rather, she was troubled by the stressful, near-death, hair-aging experiences I’d endured in the past three days.
While I no longer possessed the lean body I’d had when Clare and I met, the goatee had been a near-permanent fixture throughout our relationship—and my wife had always loved it. Frankly, that still surprised me. Most women I’d known, even those who’d seemed to like my goatee, expected guys to shave off their beards when they finally “grew up.” But Clare and I had been together for seventeen years, and she’d never once asked me to remove it.
In fact, a few years after getting hitched, I’d made the mistake of shaving my entire face. We were living in Los Angeles at the time, and thanks to a lengthy heatwave, my goatee had grown itchy and uncomfortable—so I decided I’d be cooler without it.
But when I exited the bathroom, sporting a smooth, clean-shaven face, Clare screamed. And not in a good way—not the kind of screaming you’d hear during the throes of passion. No, it was more like a screech, the sort of shrill cry my wife typically unleashed whenever she spotted a giant cockroach skittering across the kitchen floor—or, worse, crawling up her leg.
Three weeks later, much of the goatee had returned—and I never made the same mistake again. Just trimmed it once a month. Nothing more.
Zombie Chaos Box Set | Books 1-4 Page 51
