The Undead: Zombie Anthology

by David Wellington

  After disrobing and assuming one of the easier positions suggested in the instruction book, I began to tie the piece of cloth around her neck. Since she wanted to try erotic-asphyxiation, I made sure it was a little tight, but only a little.

  However, as I tried to tie a knot in the scarf, I was horrified to see my hands moving of their own volition. My mind reeled madly as I was forced to watch my hands use the scarf to strangle Donna. I strove to exert some sort of control over my actions, but I was too weak.

  Now, Donna is lying on the floor beside the bed, dead. I have no sane defense against a murder charge. I can either kill myself now, or go through the hell of waiting for the state to do it for me eventually. I appear to be doomed. . . .

  * * *

  As the other eight cultists attacked, we broke ranks and began to scatter, running in all directions. In a blind panic, I unwittingly rushed right towards the temple. I did not manage to overcome my horror until I had crossed the earthen bulwarks.

  I turned to look back at the melee which I had just fled. The nine unstoppable cultists had each slaughtered one of my men, effortlessly crushing their throats with inhuman strength.

  Sergeant Patel had ended up near me, just on the other side of the earthen fortifications. He was a native Indian and had always impressed me as being a little too superstitious. Of course, having seen the horrors which were besetting my unit, I was ready to give greater credence to his peculiar beliefs.

  I saw that one of the monstrous cultists was approaching the sergeant from behind. I tried to yell to him and warn him of the danger. However, I don’t believe he heard me; he was screaming something about the cultists being ridden by Rakshasas. Apparently, my complete lack of comprehension was plain on my face. He thought for a second and then yelled that the cultists were zombies. He then went on to babble something about having to kill them with magic.

  He had climbed the bulwark and managed to reach me at exactly the same time that the Thug zombie managed to lunge forward and grasp him. Sergeant Patel and the monster began to struggle, Patel desperately attempting to keep the thing’s hands from his windpipe.

  I beat at the creature’s head with the butt of my rifle, but the thing didn’t appear to feel it at all. In desperation, I began to look around for something a bit more substantial with which to strike at the Thug. As I scanned the area, once again near panic, my eye happened upon the high priest’s scarf.

  At a loss for any other effective act, my fevered mind came to the conclusion that if the sash put the cultists down once, maybe it could do it again. Apparently, luck lay with the fevered that day, for as I put the sash about the thing’s neck, it suddenly closed about its throat with incredible force. Within moments, I was relieved and delighted to see the cultist once again lying dead on the ground.

  Having finally found a way to kill these beasts, we were eventually able to lay them all to rest. Unfortunately, our losses were grievous.

  When we entered the temple, we found it empty. It appeared that the last few members of the Thuggee cult had decided to throw themselves against us in a necromantic suicide attack.

  This is how the sash within the package you hold came into my possession. The thing is obviously some sort of unholy artifact of great power. Please place it under lock and key and avoid any temptation to examine or inspect the item.

  I’m not at all sure why I chose to preserve it. I have no clue as to what kind of use I could put it. For now, I think it will be best to treat it as a special family heirloom. Perhaps one of our descendants will be wise enough to find a proper use of the horrid cloth.

  Eternally Yours,

  Eugene

  * * *

  Cyrus Bristol was obviously not merely making a ploy at obtaining mercy. It has become horribly obvious that this situation is the result of an act of revenge on his part.

  That is my story. I don’t expect the police to believe it, but I pray that my family will. In moments, I plan to kill myself. I only hope that my afterlife will not be as terribly and foolishly mismanaged as my life has been.

  Oh my god! Donna just moved! She’s not dead! She’s getting up! Thank god, the nightmare is over, I’m saved!

  13 Ways of Looking at the Living Dead

  Eric Pape

  “I was of three minds

  Like a tree

  In which there are three blackbirds”—Wallace Stevens

  1.

  Darkness, whittled down by streetlights and ambient moonlight, spreads through oaks and willows, the preferred foliage for tombstones and crypts. Kelly runs through the cemetery, stumbling over vandalized tombstones and decaying bouquets. She runs in a sort of sideways, skipping tumble, looking back over her shoulder at the darkness. We cannot see through the darkness. We cannot see the things she flees.

  Kelly wears tight denim shorts over long, oyster-pale legs. Her shorts cut into the skin of her hips, revealing almond crescents as she escapes. Her belly quivers over her waistband, and on closer examination, a light trail of down fades into the top of her shorts. She wears a shiny black satin bra. She runs barefoot.

  Kelly has that fairy look, the pale skin and light hair, her tiny, swollen lips and a nose so small it’s nearly absent. Her large blue eyes animate the trembling of her lips. Her eyebrows, thick and darkly shocking under the fair hair, almost meet in the middle. Silver rings inscribe the pointed edges of her ears, her hair is molded short, and her bangs stick in the sweat on her high forehead.

  Even as she flees, Kelly bubbles with life. Life shivers along her skin and glows from her eyes. Life ruffles her hair and causes her toes to curl. Kelly’s life bursts from every pore, every follicle, from the way her fingernails bite into the meaty part of her palms to how her tongue folds over her bottom lip when she concentrates on the darkness.

  Sounds emerge from the shadows. Not voices, not roars, nor growls nor screeches, only a low shuffle in the leaf litter and over the lawn. A moan perhaps, so low in tone it might be the wind, or maybe it’s cars on a freeway far in the distance. These sounds strike panic in Kelly. Now she’s running practically backwards, her legs pumping and her belly seething. She breathes hard. She fails to see the oak, so intent on avoiding the shadows. The thick limbs arch from the trunk to the ground, the result of some trauma a few tree rings back. Sucker branches grow perpendicular to the curving angles of the bark.

  A naked branch snags the back of Kelly’s bra, and now she runs topless. Her breasts wobble, small, just enough subcutaneous fat to allow bounce and wiggle. Kelly seems not to notice. She stops, listens, much like a rabbit pausing in its headlong flight. She hears something she does not like, and she turns full around to run full out.

  Kelly enters the most populated part of the cemetery; the tombstones like thick stubble. She runs gracefully now, no longer in conflict over whether she should watch behind her or reach her goal. The dull sounds from the shadows grow louder. Kelly leaps over one of the few clean white graves on which the epitaph is legible. Her back arches in the full of the leap, her legs spread wide, front knee to her chest, back foot to her hip. Her arc carries her directly over the stone, three feet over the stone, and she is an antelope fully in flight. She knows the wolves are far behind her, and her leap carries that confidence.

  Just as she reaches the height of her jump, the turf breaks below her. First, fingers, puckered with maggots, then a hand like a cheese Danish, glazed with shiny fluids. An entire arm crashes from the scattered mud, and the hand clutches Kelly midair. Kelly doesn’t even have time to scream before she vanishes into the disturbed earth. The darkness thickens.

  2.

  The dead move slow and stiff. They fail to animate. The dead lack; it is in their nature to be missing. So they slowly overcome the victim, shambling in overwhelming numbers, to rip into the soft animated flesh for which they feel home sick. The dead are nostalgic.

  This is why they crave the brains of the living: to crack into a skull and scrape the bone clean of matter, not only in their hunge
r for the soft gray tissue (so much like chocolate pudding), but to consume, to devour the life they find inside. The dead embody flesh without the animation of intelligence. They move without direction, without the puppetry of all but the most negligible of electronic impulses. Nothing leads them but a hunger for animation.

  The craving for flesh has interesting consequences. They leak a lot. Fluids seep from every orifice and from orifices newly created by rot or violence. Thick liquids pool at their shuffling feet. Eyelids ooze humors. They leave a wet track behind. You never see the dry dead, the fleshless, skeletal, dusty dead. Rather, you see the various stages of decay, the newly bloody to the bloated and syrupy. You wonder what happened to the dead that have lost flesh. You can only speculate that the dead desire to continue the flesh, and when gone, the flesh no longer has the capacity to be jealous.

  Why then can the dead only be killed by a shot, or a blow, to the brain? If they desire brains, desire animation, how can they be stripped of movement by the loss of their useless intelligence? Or is there something else trapped within the confines of their skulls?

  3.

  Earlier, in the disquieting hours of the morning, at a laboratory located in uncomfortable proximity to a large cemetery, Dr. Roderick closes his eyes and lets out a long, slow breath. He’s tired. He’s worked too hard for too long. Though the laboratory gleams spotless, a raw smell pervades every corner of the white room. Why do I keep at it, Dr Roderick wonders, what drives me to this work? He thinks of his wife and begins to twist the simple gold band around his finger. He pulls off the ring, and puts it in his mouth, to taste the sweat and the cold metal. He bites down just a bit on the smooth edges, and then pulls it from his mouth. Slick with his saliva, it slips through his fingers and pings on the tile floor. He hears it bounce and knows he has to find it.

  Scrambling on his hands and knees, he’s so tired that he can hardly see straight. Strange lights flash in his peripheral vision. He finds the ring under one of the gurneys and realizes he must complete his work as he slips the gold band back onto his finger. He pushes himself to his full six feet two inches and brushes the dust from his stained apron. He pulls back a crisp white sheet to reveal the pale cadaver below.

  First body, first formula, he reminds himself. He pulls an old-fashioned brass syringe from a bulging apron pocket. The fluid inside glows green, fluorescent; it moves like a mayonnaise jar full of fireflies. With the needle against the dead vein in the arm, he presses the plunger. For a second, nothing happens, and then the air is filled with the smell of moss, of leaf litter and decaying pine needles. The odor fades and the body remains limp on the gurney. He makes a note in his journal.

  Dr. Roderick moves to another gurney. He pulls out a Technicolor multi-syringe, the kind they use in military movies, a needle-gun, loaded with amber fluids in various stages of yellow: piss yellow, citrus yellow, linseed yellow, and Dijon yellow. He hauls the corpse to its belly, exposing dark flaccid buttocks. He shoots the fluids in the left cheek and waits. The corpse exudes a yellow gas, completely odorless. Dr. Roderick coughs into his latex gloves as the gas fades into the ventilation ducts. Interesting effect, he thinks as he describes the reaction in his journal.

  Dr. Roderick moves to the next body. From the inexhaustible supply of syringes in his apron pocket, he pulls a stainless steel beauty, with retractable needle and clear glass vial. Very, very tiny bubbles play in the clarity of the fluid. This stuff, he thinks, looks like expensive and pretentious mineral water. He presses the needle to the carcasses’ neck and shoots the clear, carbonated fluid into the jugular. Dr. Roderick waits a full three minutes. The corpse seems then to clarify, the blotchy colors of death fade into a clear, brilliant peach, just a bit rosy on the cheeks, with glossy red lips. He looks more alive than I do, Dr. Roderick thinks, but the body never animates.

  After making his note, Dr. Roderick shuffles to the last body. So tired. The pressure builds behind his eyeballs and the blood rushes in his ears. His hands shake. The last gurney sits next to a rusted and stained sink. The drain is stopped up and a concoction of dark brown and dull green fills the sink halfway to the brim. There is a thick skin of long dead suds adhering to the sides of the sink. On the gurney next to the body, Dr Roderick sees the broken hammer, the rusted railroad spike, and an ancient rubber syringe, the kind used to baste turkeys. He pulls back the sheet on the last body to reveal a stinking hulk. He hammers the railroad spike into its chest, grabs the rubber syringe and fills it with liquid from the sink. He shoves the rubber syringe into the gaping wound and squeezes the rubber head.

  The wound sucks at the syringe, the skin puckering. The bloody, ragged edges of the puncture climb the plastic cylinder like lips, the dead chest now like a heaving mouth, pumping fluid to swallow. The eyes flutter.

  It’s done, thinks Dr. Roderick, it’s finally finished. I can stop now. I can go home and I can rest and have a snack and cuddle with my wife and see my kids again. I think I’ll stop on the way home and pick up some ice cream. Dr. Roderick doesn’t have time to think about anything else before he’s pulled to the gurney, where the jaw full of broken teeth is waiting for him.

  4.

  Let’s examine the language. We call them the living dead, but what does that mean? It seems, of course, an oxymoron, something like, to paraphrase George Carlin, jumbo shrimp and military intelligence. They seem, in fact, a paradox, something that cannot be, the living and the dead.

  Notice that the phrase is in the present tense and exhibits an existing state. These are neither the live dead nor the lived dead. By living, these dead currently give all the indications of a life being lived. But the word dead is final. Dead signals a condition that cannot be changed and cannot be mitigated. By living dead, we mean they live in the continuous state of a final condition. In this they are like alcoholics and AIDS patients. Alcoholics suffer from a progressive disease that never ends. They get a daily reprieve. Aids patients live with AIDS, searching not for a cure so much as a method for continuing to live with AIDS as long as possible. Zombies have a daily reprieve from the condition of death and live with their deaths as long as they can.

  The living dead then, are constantly between life and death, not alive but dead and not in a state of death but seeming to be alive. It follows that their victims are inordinately a part of an in-between demographic—the teenager.

  In comparison, the idea of the undead is a double negative. If you are undead, you are not dead and you are not alive. You are, in fact, a vacancy. Vampires are so much sexier than zombies because they are empty.

  Finally, let’s look at the word zombie. Zombie is an exotic word, almost funny. It references voodoo and Haiti, powdery substances, and Scooby Doo episodes. But it is also a descriptive term used to denote a lack of consciousness. “I was like a zombie last night,” we often say, and we mean that we were walking around without being conscious of what we were doing. “I had a Zombie,” which means that I had a powerful cocktail designed to make me unconscious as soon as possible. To be incognizant, unaware, doing stuff but unaware I am doing it. Zombies, then, operate as unconscious urges, that vast and unknowable realm of appetite and disorder. Further, they function as an excuse for that condition, in that “I cannot help but eat your brain, because I am a zombie.”

  If every dream is a wish, then to dream of zombies is to dream of an appetite without responsibility.

  5.

  We watch from behind barricaded windows as the living dead shamble through deserted streets. We’re not sure whether to be terrified or amused. Vast herds of the dead fill in the spaces between buildings. They flow like stuttering particles of light from a broken strobe, around turned-over autos, still flashing ambulances, streetlights, and sidewalk benches.

  A zombie shuffles and bumps into another zombie. The second zombie stumbles and disappears briefly in the crowd of sliding feet. It reappears, lacking an arm, which is picked up by a third zombie who uses it to clear a path for itself, sweeping the oozing limb back an
d forth like a scythe.

  Two zombies butt heads; they fall back dizzy. Their jaws fall off. Both zombies duck down to pick up the bottom half of their faces, butt heads yet again, and rise with the wrong jaws. They force the mismatched teeth and chins under their noses. Black skin merges with white skin and a full beard becomes an Abraham Lincoln anachronism.

  We load shotguns. We try and talk about ordinary things, such as the unseasonably moist heat and the way the Dog Star seems to glow just a little bit brighter than usual. In the atmosphere, in the crackling electrical silence between conversations, eyes widen and upper lips twitch. We pace a lot. We pull at our hair and we twist earlobes and stroke chins. We can’t seem to keep the waistlines of our pants in the right place. We run to the toilet to be sick.

  When the banging on the front door begins, we throw more furniture on the threshold, mostly steel case office stuff in that avocado shade someone thought was cheerful. There’s about seventeen of us sheltered in this red brick turn-of-the-century warehouse. From all parts of the city, we have gathered here, perhaps the last survivors, or the first victims. We don’t know. All the phones are down and the emergency radio network stopped broadcasting an hour ago.

  Dusty and rusted-out machinery litters the corners of the warehouse. Broken glass glitters under lantern light. Some bleary-eyed children nest on a stinking purple-green sofa, folded into each other like sleeping puppies. The racket at the door grows louder, and now it’s coming from the windows too. Dead hands grasp at the edges of warped boards. We run from window to window, from the cheap hollow-core office door to the aluminum truck entry in the back. We build up the barricades with whatever we have, until finally we use our own bodies.