Magic, Mystery & Zombies: YA starter set

by Elle Klass

  The pain in my leg was a dull ache as I stuffed my hand into my pocket and pulled out a set of keys. My father’s set to Earnest Earl. Sarah and my mom held each other. Their wild eyes searched my face as I shuffled past them, unlocked the cabin door and saw them downstairs.

  The unmistakable rumble of another boat pounded in my ears as I quick-checked each room. I limped onto the deck. The man stood on it, staring straight through the fog ahead at another boat, a few feet larger, heading towards us. It was moving so quick the water spray caused waves to hit our boat as we cut a sharp left.

  I lost my balance and fell against one of the benches. Luckily, my good leg hit the deck first, padding the fall for my sore leg. The man braced himself, wrapping his hands around the railing, as his legs slid and he screamed in pain.

  From the other boat, blank, glassy, lifeless eyes stared at us as spray from our boat washed over his face and he fell over the railing, his back a mess of blood and tangled flesh. He hit the water like a sack of rocks and sank.

  “I wasn’t planning on harming anyone,” said the man after several seconds, breaking our silence.

  I glanced at him. His forehead wrinkled, he met my gaze. “You held my father at gunpoint!”

  He stumbled over his words. “It… it was empty. I just wanted to get away and,” his eyes shot toward the deck, “I didn’t want to kill any more of those things.”

  Anger seethed inside me as I realized what he meant. “No! You wanted my family to do it. Why risk your own life, right? Oh no! Risk a stranger’s life instead!”

  He pulled himself into a sitting position, resting his back against the railing. “I didn’t think of it like that. But you are a veritable killing machine. If I’d have known that, I’d have taken you instead.”

  Clenching my jaw, I stared him down. I remembered him ordering the rest of us to stay in the van. He was simply hoping to survive in what had become a dangerous world in a few short hours. It was survive or die, and I couldn’t be angry because he wanted to live. “Why don’t we take a look at that leg?”

  Chapter Five

  Bryce at the helm, the man and I hobbled downstairs. I grabbed the first aid kit and tore open an antiseptic packet. I dabbed at the blood on his leg as he spoke, “I’m Jack. Jack Glenny.” He tilted his head and his cheek pinned up in a cringe. “I worked at the marina for twelve years. I’ve never seen anything like this. I don’t have an explanation for what’s happening. I show up for the night shift, same as I do five days a week, and in the office I see the owner’s wife, Jenna, eating her husband, Harvey. What’s the world coming to?”

  He asked as if I had any answers. I was simply a teen girl trying to save her family. His eyes watered as I met his gaze. “I don’t know.”

  His gaze shifted down as I wrapped a bandage over his leg. “But you… you seem like maybe you know something.”

  I sighed. “The bullet only grazed you, so you should be good in a day or two.”

  I stood to put the kit away, he grabbed my hand. “What about you?”

  I wasn’t sure if he meant ‘what do you know’ or was asking about my own wound. My bruise was in a place he certainly would never see and no doubt would heal itself in a day or two and I didn’t like or trust him enough to tell him about the premonition. “It’ll heal,” I said, wrenching my hand away.

  My dad staggered from his bedroom. At first I thought he’d turned until he sat at the table across from Jack and said. “Maddie, your mom and Sarah are resting. Now’s the time to put our heads together and come up with a plan.” Like clockwork the door to the cabin opened and in walked Bryce.

  “I talked with my mom. She and my sister are heading back to her family’s home. They were in the airport! Do you believe that, in the airport while all this is going on?” He took a breath and wiped his palms down his jeans. “Their flight was delayed and I told her strange things were happening. So I put Earnest Earl on a course to Italy.”

  Jack stood. “You what? This boat can’t handle those waters. You’re going to kill us!”

  “Wow!” my dad countered. The strength he used to form the word and unleash it with intensity seemed to drain the life out of him. His pale eyes drooped as he worked to form each of his next words. “He’s a seaworthy boat and if we’re careful and don’t hit any storms we’ll be in plenty good shape to get to Italy.”

  I stood quiet, watching the menfolk do their thing and beat their chests, and observed my father -- far too many chiefs and testosterone in the cabin. The only woman in the room, I had to be the estrogenized voice of reason. I cleared my throat in the same way my mother would. “A plan?” I asked, raising my brows and smiling.

  Three sets of male eyes peered at me as if they’d all forgotten I was in the room. “Yes,” agreed my father.

  Within a few minutes they’d devised a working plan. Bryce would take first shift steering the boat, which, oddly, nobody was currently at the helm, and Jack would take second shift. I jumped on third shift, beating my father to it. He needs rest, lots of rest. I walked with him, arm in arm, to the bedroom. With a struggle, his body stiff, he lay down next to my mom.

  I remembered throwing his muscle relaxers into the trash can at home on my medicine raid. Going to it now I found them and opened a bottle of water. I strolled past Jack who was already asleep on the bench that folded into a sleeper. The boat wasn’t big but it slept six comfortably.

  I stuffed the pills in my dad’s mouth and brought the water bottle to his lips. He drank then eased backwards onto the pillow. “I love you, Dad,” I whispered.

  “I’ll be fine, Maddie, and I love you,” he whispered in response as I pulled out the trundle and lay down just beneath him.

  “Maddie, Maddie,” called my mother from the other side of a long dark tube.

  “Mom, where are you?” I called. “I can’t see you.”

  “Open your eyes, Maddie.”

  I slid my eyes open to my mother’s worried face. Deep wrinkles like I’d never seen embedded in her forehead. “Mom,” I sat up, placing my palm against her wet cheek. “What is it?”

  She sniffled but kept her voice low, “Honey, I think, I think your father. Umm,” she drew her tongue across her lips as her eyes shifted to the bed.

  I leapt from the trundle. “Dad, Dad,” I said urgently, shaking him.

  “Maddie, stop. He’s gone, Maddie. His body is cold.” Her eyes went from sorrow-filled to wild in a split second. “We need to be quiet. That man is asleep on the other side of the curtain and I don’t trust him,” she whispered in a harsh tone.

  I put two fingers against my father’s wrist and felt for a pulse – nothing. I pressed my hand against his forehead and it was cold, not freezing, but it didn’t radiate the heat it should. Desperate, I brought the two fingers to his neck and felt. I waited, holding in my tears and my breath. My dad couldn’t be dead or one of the deaders stalking around. He was my dad -- strong, courageous, and indestructible.

  There it was, a thump. I waited and another thump. “He’s still alive, Mom,” I said, squeezing my eyes to stop the flow of tears and wrapping my arms around her. “He’s alive, but barely. His pulse is weak.”

  “Are you sure?” she asked through her tears.

  “Mom, do you think he’s turning into a…” I couldn’t say it, even though I knew it. There was no other explanation. Sure, his heart was beating, but the thumps were far apart, not fast like a living, healthy person.

  Her wild eyes shifted around the room. “No, no, hold on,” she walked to the pull-out wall drawers and grabbed something from the top one. In the dark I couldn’t tell what it was until she drew closer to me.

  “Pantyhose?”

  “We can use these to tie him to the bed,” she stated, holding her head high.

  We were going to tie my father to the bed that had no bed posts. How on earth were we going to do that? He still had a pulse, but for how long? Is this how they died and came back?

  She was already ripping her pantyhose
as I stood and placed my hand over hers to stop her. “Mom, there are no bed posts.”

  “Then we’ll be creative.”

  My mom had gone bananas and so had I as we worked as a team to tie my father’s wrists together along with his ankles. It was ludicrous insanity but, like my mother, I didn’t want to believe that this was the end of the road for the man who made me Saturday pancakes and bacon, taught me to ride a bike, and was finally accepting that I was an almost grown up person.

  We finished and took a step back, eyeing our handy work. He wasn’t going anywhere. My mom was especially proud of how she’d rigged the pantyhose around his wrists to the pull-out dresser drawers. My dad hadn’t moved voluntarily once but I’d felt a warm breath or two while working on his wrists. Whether it was the drugs I gave him or his body changing, he was knocked out, and due to be ripe and madder than a wasp when he woke up… if he woke up.

  “We can’t tell anyone, Maddie. This is our secret.”

  She’d lost it, gone completely over the edge. “We need to tell Bryce,” I insisted.

  “You can tell Bryce, but that man, he can’t know. He’ll kill him for sure,” she urged, her face solemn, replacing her crazed expression.

  We turned our heads simultaneously to a rustling on the other side of the curtain. That meant Jack was up. I put my finger to my lips then whispered directly into my mom’s ear, “His name is Jack. I don’t trust him either, but if he’s up that means Bryce will be off duty soon.”

  Her eyebrows lowered. “Off duty,” she mouthed.

  I nodded in response. We waited side by side, lying on the little trundle, until we heard Jack leave the cabin. A few minutes passed that felt like hours and the cabin door opened again. I peeked out the curtain to see Bryce.

  “Psst,” I said, holding my finger to my mouth for him to stay quiet, my other hand holding the curtain.

  He followed the noise and stared at me with blank, questioning eyes. I motioned for him to join me. Slowly he walked my way. I opened the curtain wider and he joined us in the little room. His eyes stared ahead at my father, then to my mom, then to me.

  Chapter Six

  “What’s going on here?” Bryce asked.

  We told him the story and, even as I said it, I knew I should have simply put a spiked tool to my father’s brainstem, but I couldn’t. He was my father and he still had a heartbeat and he was still breathing, so technically he was still alive, only drugged heavily and tied up.

  I thought more about the entire zombie illness that swept through the city. The brainstem controlled all the involuntary actions such as digestion, heartbeat, breathing, the stuff that happens in our bodies that we never consciously think about and cutting them off at the brainstem was an effective death. So did zombies have thought processes? They growled instead of talked. They heard noises. Jack warned us against the noises when I fired the rifle. Can they see or do they know only because of sound? I flip-flopped the thought over and over in my head.

  After a couple minutes, oblivious to anything but what was on my mind, I remembered Bryce mentioned his father talking after he turned, saying ‘we-yak’. Did that mean something? And how did he talk if he turned and, heck, how did they turn?

  I scrambled into the kitchen and sifted through the top drawer. I knew my mom kept a pad of paper there. When I found it, and a pen, I ran to the bathroom and grabbed the thermometer then back into the bedroom. Bryce and my mom stared at me with narrowed eyes.

  “What are you doing?” asked Bryce.

  “I think I have something, maybe. Listen carefully, a zombie’s brainstem works, maybe even their cerebellum and temporal lobe, but those are the most ancient parts of our brains. We know they hear, but can they see? They can’t reason or talk. So Dad’s heart will keep beating and he’ll keep breathing. Mom, take this notepad and record his pulse every two hours.” All that rolled off my tongue so fast that I didn’t take a breath until it was all out and I shoved the notepad, pen, and thermometer into my mom’s hands.

  My mom looked at me curiously but said nothing as she took the items. Her eyes then shifted towards my father, tied and bound by pantyhose on the bed.

  “Slow down. Maddie. Are you suggesting we study your father?” he asked with raised brows.

  That was a great question, but my answer dismayed even me. I needed a reason to keep him alive. Great! All I needed now was a white lab coat and pocket protector and I’d be a certified loony scientist. “Yes, in a manner of speaking.”

  The room was silent for several long seconds that felt like several long hours. Their eyes stared at me, unwavering, until I finally spoke again, avoiding the entire test-dad-subject. I looked Bryce square in the eye. “You said your dad turned but talked. He said something like ‘we-yak’. It has to mean something for his brain to hold onto that phrase. Think Bryce. I can’t be the only one with answers, we have to work together.”

  My mom’s eyes left me and trailed to my father. She then opened the notepad and pressed her fingers to my father’s neck.

  Bryce stumbled over his words as he shifted uneasily on his feet. “I don’t know what it means.”

  “Think, Bryce. You said your dad is an environmental scientist. A project he’s working on -- maybe?”

  “OK, Maddie. I’ll play with it. Maybe it means something,” he said, hanging his head in sadness, then left the room.

  I gazed at my father and understood the sorrow that comes with losing a parent. Mine lay on the bed but was no more my father than his was the last time he saw him.

  Chapter Seven

  We managed to keep my father and his condition under wraps. We brought Sarah in to help my mom. They took shifts taking his vital signs and kept up with medicating him. They even worked out a system to feed him water intravenously and used female menstruation pads beneath him to soak up any bodily function leakage. We all took turns moving and massaging his legs and arms. My mom insisted it would keep his blood flowing. I didn’t know how long this would last or when we should let the drugs wear off but he was hydrated and alive.

  I gazed over the vast ocean. We were a speck of nothing, floating on the water. A shadow brushed over me and I wrapped my hands around my chest and shivered, then it went away and the bright sun was beating against my head again.

  I gazed upward and the sky, almost divided in the middle, was sunny and bright on one side with a couple puffy clouds but the other side was dark and foreboding. Heavy clouds thick with moisture hung low.

  Over the past several days, Bryce had spoken with his mom each day and encouraged her to stay inside. She’d kept her eyes on the news and didn’t have much to report from Italy. Life was still going on as normal until last night. She gave him her first report of violence. A man had wandered onto a school’s grounds and taken a bite out of the shoulder of a teacher who’d noted the man wandering around the campus and urged him to leave. The violence in the states was all over the international news now. It was spreading, but how?

  The sound of Bryce’s and Jack’s voices from overhead brought me out of my deep thought. They were discussing rerouting the boat to avoid the storm. I glanced at the sky again then wandered inside. The menfolk could figure it out. I had more important things on my mind. Sarah and the cat sat on the built-in sofa. She punched buttons on the radio and static squawked at her.

  “I can’t get a station. Did Bryce talk with his mom yet today?” Sarah asked with concern.

  I shrugged. “I don’t think so. I didn’t ask,” I answered, sitting on the sofa beside her and folding my legs beneath me. I clicked the TV that had been getting intermittent reception, static blazed from each channel and snow covered the screen. The barely audible squawks and deformed figures of yesterday were absent.

  “I’m worried, Maddie. Every day, more and more stations become static. I’m beginning to think we’re the only people left alive in the entire world, except Bryce’s family. I feel so isolated.” She rubbed her palm against the velour of the sofa. I glanced around for
the cat. When he wasn’t in Sarah’s lap or purring in her ear he sat in the window of the bedroom Sarah slept in. I figured that’s why my mom’s allergies hadn’t acted up unless there never were any allergies and they used it as an excuse not to have any pets.

  “It sure feels that way, but there are others out there.”

  Her voice broke my pet thoughts. My mom strolled out of the bedroom, humming, and went straight to the kitchen where she pulled lunch meat, sliced cheese, butter, pickles, and various other condiments out of the fridge. She grabbed a pan and cut off a huge chunk of butter and dropped it in where it slowly melted.

  Mom stopped humming then said, “Sarah, honey, can you grab the bag of French fries out of the freezer and spread them on a pan? Maddie, why don’t you set the table.” She continued humming as she prepared our lunch.

  We didn’t have gourmet meals, but mom made it work. She inventoried the kitchen and doled it out to make it last as long as possible, but when she’d opened the fridge I noticed how empty it was getting. Mom didn’t complain; she did what she needed to. All the normal luxuries in life were gone now. It was survival but we’d need food, and soon, before we made it to Italy.

  I set the table then went onto the deck and up the stairs where Bryce and Jack were still debating and planning a course of action.

  As I grew closer Jack mentioned, “The heavy wind has us cruising at 31 knots.”

  “We’re making good time but it’s not fast enough,” Bryce said nervously.

  I cleared the ladder and stepped onto the top deck. Bryce’s green eyes smiled when they met mine. “Hi, Maddie,” he said as I halted beside him.

  “What’s up?” I asked, my eyes darting from Bryce to Jack. I knew Bryce was anxious about his mom and sister but was trying to lighten the mood.

  “We’ve lost radar,” Jack stated after clearing his throat.

  “Really? The radio is static too and we’ve completely lost TV; nothing. It’s like the world is dead.”