I Zombie I [Omnibus Edition]

by Jack Wallen

  Leave it to Jamal to turn pillaging into a science. I nodded and took my basket toward batteries and other sources of energy. Even before I reached the wall of power, I spotted the first two items we needed─solar chargers and inverters. As I stuffed the basket full of goods, an idea hit me. I turned to Jamal. “How hard would it be for us to make miniature Obliterators for everyone to carry?”

  When Jamal faced me, his lopsided grin told me everything I needed to know.

  “That’s brilliant, B.” His gaze darted around the room. “We’ve got everything we need here to fabricate them.” He rushed to a shelf and snatched a miniature recorder. “With these as a base, it would just take a bit of modification to the circuitry and the embedded system to crank out the Obliterator with enough decibels to repel the undead.” Jamal grabbed the remaining miniature recording devices from the wall and filled his basket. With that taken care of, he danced around the room like the Tasmanian Devil, grabbing resistors, transistors, tools, and everything necessary to realize our new Personal Edition Zombie Repellant.

  “PEZR,” I shouted.

  Jamal tossed me the “What choo talkin’ ‘bout Willis?” look.

  “Personal Edition Zombie Repellant,” I added.

  “B, you’re trippin’,” responded Jamal. “More like Prevent And Destroy Zombies.”

  “Are you listening to yourself, Jamal? PADZ?”

  We laughed until it hurt.

  And then the tears came.

  It had been so long since I’d let slip the shell of fear, the idea of simply living life had become foreign. Laughter. Joy. When did they become such strange angels to my life?

  Jamal stepped into my space. I shook my head and held up a hand to stop him. “I need these tears, Jamal. Right now they are the only connection I have to my soul.”

  Without a second nudge, Jamal turned and finished grabbing what he needed to make the PEZR system a reality. As the tears continued to fall, I turned back to shopping with a grapefruit-sized lump of guilt in my throat.

  “I love you, Jamal,” I said softly.

  “The feeling is very much requited, Bethany.”

  I sighed as the tears shifted from sorrow to joy.

  two | an attack and a proposal

  Back at our makeshift headquarters, Jamal took the basket full of electro-goodies and disappeared into his workshop. Morgan watched him zip by and tossed a quizzical glance my way.

  “We looted an electronics store,” I explained.

  Morgan nodded and then tilted her head toward the War Room. We had cleared what had been the dining area of the house and set up a table covered in a white sheet. On the sheet, we’d begun mapping out New Salt Lake City. It was crude, but did the trick. She rested the whole of her body weight against the table and sighed. When she spoke, her voice was just above a whisper. “Josh did a bit of scouting while you were out.”

  “That sounds ominous,” I replied.

  “Ominous doesn’t do it justice, Bethany.” She looked up, her eyes heavy with the weight of fear. “We either seriously underestimated the amount of undead inside the wall, or the wall doesn’t completely seal in the city. Either way, we’re fucked. New Salt Lake City isn’t as secure as we’d hoped.”

  I hated to drop more bad news in her lap─but what choice did I have? I took in a deep breath and said, “Zombies aren’t our only concern, Morgan.” Without hesitation, I dove into recounting the Thelemite scene.

  When I wrapped up the story, Morgan nearly screamed. “Crowley? As in the Aleister Crowley? Like Ozzy Osbourne, ‘Mr. Crowley’ Crowley?”

  I nodded. “The very same. The problem with them is they have no boundaries. The golden rule doesn’t comply with their hedonistic tendencies.”

  “Fuck.” Josh’s booming voice shocked us out of our intimate and intense moment. He leaned his head into the room and said with urgency, “We have a problem.”

  “When do we not?” demanded Morgan.

  “Screamers,” was all Josh needed to say.

  We scrambled to our action stations─ready to kick as much undead ass as we could. Morgan, Josh, and I stood sentinel at the front windows of the house. Echo and Rizzo climbed to the roof, ready to launch their Cupid’s arrows into the hearts and minds of the monsters. I insisted Jamal continue working on the new devices.

  “How did those bastards not trip the Obliterator?” Morgan asked.

  Guilt and shame flooded my system. The first line of defense was my responsibility. The Obliterator had never failed─until now. On this playing field, a single misstep could result in the big sleep. I wasn’t ready for that level of nap. I appended yet another note to self to look into my creation.

  Slowly and silently, I raised the window in front of me. I slipped the barrel of the suppressed pistol through the crack and prepared to unleash hot hell.

  Just as I was about to squeeze off a first round, something whizzed through the air and embedded itself into the eye of the Moaner. It took no time to realize that either Echo or Rizzo was the shooter. I wanted to personally thank them, but now was not the time.

  The sound of a single Screamer rattled the glass and my nerves.

  “Where is it?” I demanded of time and space.

  My question was answered by the distant roar of the Screamer.

  “Come on,” I whispered, ignoring the gathering of Moaners collecting in front of the house.

  Josh’s voice cut through the tension. “Morgan?” he asked.

  “Little busy killing things,” she responded.

  “Yeah…but this can’t wait.” Josh deftly sent a single gray matter torpedo through the skull of a Moaner.

  “The only thing that can’t wait at the moment is me reloading. Hit me!” Morgan screamed.

  As Josh tossed her a fresh magazine, he shouted over the din of death, “Morgan, will you marry me?”

  Cease fucking fire.

  Both Morgan and I snapped our heads toward the grinning giant of a man. With a nod to irony, Josh had been on one knee, blowing holes through the heads of zombies. Now, the gesture served a very different purpose.

  “You’re kidding, right?” asked Morgan.

  “What better time to ask you than when we’re doing what we do best?” Josh answered.

  In the background, the death squad drew nearer and the Doppler effect of the distant screech warned of imminent danger.

  “Kids,” I said hesitantly, “I hate to kill the romance, but…”

  It was too late. Morgan had Josh’s neck in a death grip and her lips sealed onto his. As much as I wanted give in to my inner romcom and celebrate the engagement, we had a fortress to protect.

  I turned back to my window, took aim, and…watched an arrow plow into the bastard’s eye and out through the base of his neck. “Good job, girls,” I whispered.

  As Morgan came up for air, the unholy roar of the Screamer entered the scene. He rushed into a collection of Moaners and tore into them, ripping limbs from torsos and crushing heads with bare hands.

  “Fuck,” Morgan said, and took aim.

  “Wait,” I shouted. “Let that nightmare take out the others. It’ll save us ammo. Once the shuffleboard slayers are dead, we’ll destroy the mad bastard with a single shot.”

  Arrows rained down from above─into the Screamer’s neck and right thigh. The monster ignored what would bring a human down and continued stripping its fellow undead Americans of meat, bone, and life. Rotting entrails splashed in a brown and black arc against the Simpsons-blue sky.

  There was but one Moaner left. He wavered in his bright orange jersey. In bold white letters on the back, the name Jeremy Hunt stretched from shoulder to shoulder. I half expected the two to square off in the street before us, Sharks versus Jets style. Finger snaps and jazz hands.

  “Browns fans,” Josh said, his voice heavy with sympathy. “They get screwed even when it’s not football season.”

  Instead of a musical theatre showdown or an end zone celebration, the Screamer punched his fist throu
gh the chest of Moaner Jeremy, grabbed his spine, and crushed it. The Moaner dropped with a wet thud.

  Final death was not enough. The Screamer dropped a torn and tattered jackboot down onto Jeremy’s skull. Once the brain bowl was beyond recognition, the rage machine went to work on the dead undead’s chest.

  “Now, Josh,” I shouted to the closest thing we had to a sniper.

  The Screamer locked onto my voice, unleashed a rage-filled roar, and raced toward the house. Josh steadied his arm against the window frame, took in a breath, and squeezed the trigger. I wanted so badly for the moment to drop into a slow-motion, Hollywood climax where the audience could track the path of the bullet until it pierced the flesh and bone of the beast. Instead, a millisecond after the shot rang out, the Screamer dropped, like a bag of rotten meat, to the pavement.

  We stood, motionless and silent, unsure if another gang of Moaners would come out to play. The only sound to be heard was the metal-inspired beat of my heart. When I was certain the battle had finished, I leaned my back against the wall and slid to the floor.

  “So…a wedding?” I asked.

  Both Josh and Morgan turned my way and smiled.

  “That might just be the best news I’ve heard in a very long time,” I added.

  The scampering of shoes interrupted the sweet moment.

  “That was so bad-ass,” Rizzo shouted.

  “Who shot the sheriff?” asked Echo.

  Josh raised his hand. Echo raced to him and gave the beefy mitt a high five. “Do you ever miss?” she asked.

  Josh shrugged.

  “So,” I prodded Morgan. She instantly blushed.

  “We have a mess to clean up.” Morgan put a stop to what I’d hoped would be the big announcement.

  I gave her my best now look. She smirked and heaved a big sigh before saying, “Josh just asked me to marry him.”

  Echo and Rizzo unleashed a pair of squeals to shame a league of Screamers. The piercing sound of high-school glee brought Jamal from his cave.

  “What’s going on?” Jamal cried out.

  Echo danced over to Jamal and chanted, “We’re going to have a wedding.”

  Before the celebration could get too out of hand, the sound of Jacob crying stopped us short.

  Echo shot me a glance and said, “I got it, Bethany.”

  I shook my head and replied, “That’s okay, dear. I need to hold my baby.”

  Before leaving the scene, I turned to Morgan and offered her an ear-to-ear smile. “You and I…we’re going to plan the hell out of this bitch.”

  Tears leaped onto Morgan’s cheeks and fell to the floor. I wanted to pull her into a sisterly embrace, but I knew the tears were the product of joy, not sorrow. Instead, I gave her a simple peck on the cheek and raced off to baby Jacob.

  *

  Jacob was pulling at his feet, his cheeks blotchy from the act of crying out for his mother…me. The second he heard my voice, the screams subsided and turned to hiccups and coos. Before reaching into his crib, I snatched up the RF blocker and jammed it into my back pocket. It hadn’t taken long for Jamal to locate the source of the signal my baby emitted. It had taken him even less time to figure out the device was the same type the Zero Day Collective had used on Sergeant Leamy. Attempt to remove it, and the explosion would end the dearest, most important life on the planet.

  The RF blocker prevented the signal from transmitting. It was a crude fix, but it worked. So long as the device was within a five-foot radius of Jacob, the Zero Day Collective received nothing.

  I felt Jamal’s hand on my lower back before he spoke. “Hey.” His whisper brought an immediate peace flooding through my system. “How’s the big guy?” Before I could answer, he caught wind of the reason Jacob was less than happy.

  “Oh, wow,” Jamal said as he backed away. “That’s some powerful funk he’s got brewin’ in his pants.”

  “Wanna change him?” I asked.

  “Is our relationship contingent on whether or not I do?”

  I turned to face Jamal and said simply, “No.”

  “Then no,” he answered quickly. “But I will happily stay by your side while you do.”

  “Looking away,” I added.

  “Of course.”

  I set about changing Jacob. His sweet smile and bright eyes brought a warmth to my heart nothing could ever replace.

  “Do you think it’s possible we could deactivate the chip in him?” I asked.

  Jamal took a seat next to the makeshift changing table. He stared at the floor and hummed a predictable tune.

  “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik,” I said.

  Startled, Jamal stopped. “Say what?”

  “You always hum that Mozart tune when you dive into the safe place of thought.”

  He smirked and shook his head. “Nuh uh.”

  Without so much as missing a beat, Jamal went back to humming. I decided not to interrupt him this time and finished up changing the soiled diaper.

  With the deed complete, I unsealed what Jamal had dubbed Schrödinger’s Diaper Bin, dropped the Jacob bomb inside, and returned the lid. We had to opt for overly cautious with Jacob’s diapers, as the undead were drawn to human scent. There were few smells as powerful as baby shit.

  “Does it stink or not? We’ll never know,” Jamal joked.

  “Oh…we know,” I groaned.

  “As to your earlier question, now that we have access to an electronics super store, deactivating that chip moves from possible to probable. We already know the frequency. All I need is to build a device that would emit an electromagnetic pulse tuned to the spec of the device. Get me back to that shop, and I can make it so.”

  “I love it when you talk Picard to me,” I said, my voice teasing the big sexy. “Tomorrow, the two of us will take another trip.”

  “This time prepared…for anything.”

  “And everything,” I added, and planted a warm kiss on his lips.

  three | from the grave to the cradle

  “SITREP,” Faddig shouted over the constant hum of the train. He longed to return to his silenced quarters, but there were matters to attend to.

  There were always matters.

  This time, however, Faddig knew the Zero Day Collective was about to gain a massive upper hand in the war against Nitshimi and humankind.

  “They’ve stabilized, sir,” the grunt said nervously as the world’s most powerful living human stood dangerously close. Commander Faddig was thought to be the sole ruler of the ZDC, and thus the fate of humanity. With a single command, Faddig could destroy everything.

  “Open the door,” Faddig ordered.

  “But, sir,” the grunt objected.

  Without a word, Faddig sent a bullet through the soldier’s head.

  “Next man up,” the commander barked.

  Another red shirt stepped forward, grabbed the handle of the door, punched in the unlock code, and pulled open the entryway.

  Within the steel chamber, a collection of men and women stood─confused and silent─their bodies frail and emaciated, their eyes sunken and mouths ravenous. Connected to each right arm, an IV fed a muddy brown liquid from a collection of glass and stainless steel canisters that formed a single device. Connected to the device, another, thicker tube disappeared into a wall.

  It was only hours ago the confused men and women had moaned like lowing cattle.

  Transformed, reborn anew.

  “Very good,” Faddig whispered. “The Genesis Cradle is holding.”

  Upon hearing his voice, the prisoners turned and faced the speaker.

  “Repeat after me,” Faddig shouted. “I must bring back Bethany Nitshimi.”

  The voices, rough and wavering, soft in volume but strong with intent, echoed back the proclamation.

  Faddig continued, “Repeat after me. I am the property of the Zero Day Collective.”

  The ghost-like humans complied.

  “Repeat after me,” Faddig paused, weighing the heft of power in his heart and mind. “Work m
akes you free.”

  The fading humans repeated the haunting phrase.

  The commander sneered and whispered, “Hail the apocalypse,” and turned back to the grunt. “How are we doing on locating the tracking device?”

  The face of the underling paled. Faddig grabbed him by the hair and jerked him nearer. “You have twenty-four hours to pinpoint the whereabouts of that baby, or you’ll join them in the cradle or be served on my dinner plate.”

  Faddig shoved the grunt to the floor and exited the room. His expensive leather shoes clicked against the metal floor as he made his way to the car marked Medical. He placed his hand on a stainless metal pad until the scanner verified his identity. The entryway slid open on perfectly machined casters to reveal an over-bright room filled with the best medical equipment dictatorship could buy.

  The doctors spotted Faddig and snapped to attention.

  The commander cut to a very quick chase. “How is Subject 001?”

  “Recovering,” answered Dr. JayLynn Duchamp. Her long red hair was pulled up into a bun tight enough that it threatened to tear the flesh on the sides of her head. Her pie-round eyes blinked.

  Subject 001 lay prone on a hospital bed. At the sound of Faddig’s voice, his eyes fluttered open and his lips parted.

  “I…” 001 whispered.

  “You what?” asked Faddig.

  “I failed you,” finished Subject 001.

  Faddig nodded. “Yes, you did. Don’t worry, my dear creature, you’ll get another shot.”

  “I am Jacob Plummer?” Subject 001 questioned softly.

  “Why, yes,” Faddig placed a loving hand on the undead man’s cheek. “Yes, you are.”

  The Commander turned to Dr. Duchamp. She snapped a salute to her forehead. “Yes, sir?” she barked.

  “You will not eat, sleep, shit, or fuck until the thing lying in that bed is fully recovered. Is that clear?”

  JayLynn swallowed. Her cheeks instantly flushed, her incredibly long legs nearly buckling under the weight of fear. Faddig grabbed a handful of the woman’s lab coat and yanked her to him. “I believe you were asked a question. Are you not of sound enough mind to answer said question? If not, then I’ll be forced to reconsider my choice of you as the head of medicine for the ZDC. If I’ve made a mistake, my only option is to dispose of said mistake.” Faddig leaned in until their lips nearly kissed. “Am I in error, Duchamp?”