Can You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?

by Max Brallier

  A letter opener. You swipe at the beast. Swipe again.

  Beside it, a compressed gas duster. You have one at your cubicle at work for cleaning Cheetos crumbs out of your keyboard.

  You take it in your hand, holding it like a grenade, and wait. The thing sways back and forth, eyeing you, then lunges over the desk, mouth wide, ready to bite. You jam the can in its mouth. It gags. You stab the letter opener into the base of the can. There’s a hiss—then the can bursts, shooting compressed air in every direction and blowing the thing’s head wide open in a furious blast of red.

  Your heart races. Pounds against your chest. Close one. You collapse in the desk chair. Reload the RCP90. Chunks of brain and skull on your face. You wipe yourself off and, reluctantly, head back out to the hall to rejoin your team.

  The Angels continue working their way up through the building. On every floor, zombie resistance—and on every floor, that resistance is put down.

  Finally, you approach the top. A sign points to the observation deck. Everyone gathers around the door, weapons high.

  “Ready?” Jones says.

  No one says anything. He kicks open the door. You take them in—a hundred dead tourists.

  They immediately run for you. Tanner leads the way, swinging the scythe. Whiskey grabs a zombie kid—teeth snapping—and throws him up over the fence to the depths below. You back your way into a corner. Drop on one knee, trying to make yourself as small as possible. You’ve made it this far. Not going to die now. Anything gets close, you shoot it in the brain.

  Finally, the zombie tourists are all dead.

  “Head back down, men,” Jones says. They do. You wait behind. Watch as Jones lights the flare, holds it high, and red smoke fills the air.

  And with that, your job is complete. Jones puts his hand on your shoulder. “Let’s go.”

  If you want to stay behind, click here.

  If you’ll leave with Jones and the rest of the Angels, click here.

  WATCH OUT FOR STEAMROLLERS

  Fuck fuck fuck.

  You see Al dive into the hole after Sully. You turn, away from the hole, away from the monsters—and you run like hell. Fish follows your lead, sprinting behind you.

  You tear across the lot, fast as you can. You throw a glance over your shoulder—some of the beasts go in the hole after Sully and Al. Others chase you.

  Then, suddenly, you’re in the dirt.

  An upturned rock sent you falling. It’s going to be the goddamned death of you. Unbelievable.

  You look up, dirt in your eyes. Fish sprints past you.

  One of the beasts lands on top of you. Buries its teeth in your ankles. You twist, ignoring the pain, and throw a useless punch. Another one lands on you—your leg twists, awkwardly, and your shin snaps. Pain radiates up your leg.

  You bury your head in the dirt, grind your teeth. Goddamn it, you’re going to die here.

  You get a glimpse of Fish up ahead. He’s climbing something. Can’t tell what.

  The beasts get off, take off after Fish. Blood turns the dirt around you black. You manage to roll over.

  You see Fish.

  And he’s driving a giant motherfucking steamroller. He looks at you. His expression switches from scared to apologetic. You know you’re done for. You give a woozy, defeated thumbs-up, just before one of the monsters bites the thumb off.

  The stupid things don’t have the sense to move. They stand in the way. Fish rolls right over them. Completely squishes them.

  And then the shadow of the steamroller is upon you. You’re on your back, head up, watching. You close your eyes and let it take you.

  Over your feet first. Indescribable pain. Bones shatter. Muscles burst. Organs liquefy. Your body literally flattens.

  Over your knees. You hear them crack and shatter.

  Up your thighs. Your testicles pop. Blood floods your underwear.

  Then the pain subsides and your eyes open and you watch, oddly fascinated, as the steamroller runs over your chest, and, then finally, over your face…

  AN END

  TO THE BRIDGE!

  Panic flooding you, you follow the crowd. It’s running with the bulls in Pamplona—new title: running from the zombies on the East Side.

  You make your way through the maze of cars. You catch quick glimpses of the panicked faces of passengers. Some leave their cars. Others try to but fail—the mass of running bodies making it impossible.

  Screams fill the air behind you. You just keep moving. Run up and over a car. You pass an abandoned convertible BMW Z3. Always wanted one of those, you think. Free, right there.

  It’s a two-level bridge. Bottom is strictly for vehicles. Top is supposed to be for pedestrians, but cars have filled the narrow pedestrian lane. Most of the zombies seem to have gone for the lower level. You run around the side, up the pedestrian path, and onto the upper level.

  You’re surrounded by people, all fleeing at top speed. Fuck me, I’m out of shape, you think. But you don’t stop. Keep going, even when it feels like your heart is going to burst out of your chest. Four or five minutes later, you’re nearly halfway across the bridge.

  And then it all goes to shit.

  Bullets tear through the air. The man beside you drops—his chest blasted apart. More fall to the ground, screaming.

  You drop behind a car. The rear window above you shatters. You peek your head around.

  It’s the Army. At the opposite end of the bridge your freedom is blocked by the USFUCKINGARMY.

  The firing stops. Then a loudspeaker, megaphone, something:

  “STOP! THIS IS THE UNITED STATES MILITARY! THIS AREA IS UNDER QUARANTINE. RETURN TO THE CITY.”

  Behind you, people scream—the zombies like a giant meat grinder—a wall of death—destroying every living thing in its way. Coming right for you.

  Ahead of you, the Army—ready to drop anything moving—walking dead or not.

  Get into the nearest car? Click here.

  Keep moving forward, finding safety where you can? Click here.

  Turn around, back toward the zombies and away from the Army? Click here.

  FIVE LONG MINUTES

  “Alright, asshole, I’m in.”

  Limpy hoots and hollers.

  Jones leads you to the middle of the closest intersection. You look up. Thirty-ninth and Eighth. The Harley headlights bathe you in blinding white light.

  “Ready, kid?”

  You spin the crowbar in your hands. “As I’ll ever be.”

  Jones puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles, piercingly loud. Man, you’ve always wanted to be able to do the two-fingered whistle. If you live, you’re gonna get him to teach you how.

  Jones slaps you on the back, says good luck, and walks away laughing.

  You raise the crowbar. Grip it tight with two hands. Spread your feet in a fighting stance. You take quick side steps, turning, looking in every direction.

  The Angels sit on their bikes, standing, smoking, watching. Bastards…

  A sound to your left. You spin. Heart pumping.

  Here comes the first one.

  A thin Asian woman. Bloody shirt, barely there. Skin rotted away to nothing. Entire rib cage visible.

  Just before it reaches you, you sidestep and swing the crowbar with everything you got. Connect. Crack it square in the face. Contact reverberates down the bar and through your hands. You take the zombie clean off its feet and it lands on its back.

  No hesitating.

  You flip the crowbar and slam the sharp end through its face.

  You don’t have a chance to breathe. A cold arm tight around your neck. You swing your body down, flipping the thing up and over your back.

  It hits the cement hard—but in a second it’s up. Businessman. Torn suit. Entire calf muscle gone. Bone protruding from its lower leg.

  “That’s one minute!” one of the Angels shouts.

  The businessman thing steps forward. You bring your foot down hard on the protruding bone. It snaps. The thing f
eels no pain—but the broken bone maims it and it falls awkwardly to the ground. You swing, nail it in the side of the head. It moans. Reaches out for you.

  Three more strong swings. Chunks of skin and hair fly off. You rear back, aim, and follow through. Its head damn near comes off.

  The Angels clap.

  You pant. Pull a piece of the dead thing’s skin off your face.

  Out of the shadows come three more. A little girl, and what looks like her parents. Tourists. Probably spent a year saving up for their trip to the Big Apple—then they get there and end up as fucking zombies.

  “Two minutes!”

  They start out stumbling, then walking, then full out sprinting. Fuck. Three at a time?

  You backpedal, mind racing.

  Do you want to handle them all at once? Click here.

  If you’d rather try to separate them and take them on one at a time, click here.

  RUN FOR IT!

  Before you even realize it, you’re out of the cab, running. Pandemonium surrounds you. A mass evacuation to anywhere but here.

  You steal a look behind you. Mayhem. More of the things coming.

  You collide with a group of children—kids on a school trip or something—and crash to the ground.

  A police cruiser screams by you, hopping the curb. You get a quick glimpse of the cop behind the wheel, face panic-stricken, as he flies past, plowing through a pile of curbside garbage and newspaper racks.

  An ambulance swerves to avoid hitting the cop car and smashes into a streetlight with so much force that the pole snaps in half at the middle. The top falls to the street, landing on a van and sending people scattering. Sparks fly as the electrical wires dance on the streets. A zombie, curious, stumbles over to one and reaches for it. It fries. Shakes violently and falls to the ground. Then, horrifically, it rises again.

  The police cruiser hops back onto the street, tires squealing. The horn honks. Too late. A man flies up over the hood, rolls over the roof, and hits the ground with a sickening thud. The cruiser doesn’t stop. It swerves again, avoiding one man but hitting another. The cop loses control. The car spins on to the entrance ramp to an underground twenty-four-hour parking garage and crashes into the wall. Then, as gravity takes over, it rolls down the ramp.

  You rise. Chaos all around you. Your heart races.

  Don’t stop, don’t look back, just run? Click here.

  Run down into the garage, hoping for refuge and help from the police? Click here.

  Run for the bridge and hopefully Brooklyn? Click here.

  UH-UH—I’M NO TEST PATIENT

  You pry the officer’s fingers from around your arm, jerk away, and run.

  The first shot gets you in the shoulder. Goddamn it, Christ! Hot pain in your flesh—like fire. You stumble. Catch your feet. Keep running.

  You don’t hear the next three shots. Don’t even feel them. And that’s probably for the best…

  AN END

  THE BRONX IS UNDEAD

  Yakuma puts the two bloody samurai swords on the soft leather wraparound.

  Rick drives like a man possessed. You watch the city fly by. The river. Thick crowds of people.

  “This is a nice limousine,” you say.

  “Yup,” Yakuma says.

  “This is a nice limousine!” you shout up to Rick. He doesn’t respond.

  You pour yourself a Cîroc and club soda. Down it. Pour yourself another. Lean back. Try to relax. Not working.

  You watch Yakuma. She has her eyes closed. She looks peaceful.

  “So uh—you and [LEGAL EDIT] ever, y’know.… back here?” you ask.

  Her eyes open. “What do you think?”

  Damn. You should have worked harder on fielding those grounders in Little League.

  Rick cranes his neck. “Miss. We’re coming up on the bridge. Doesn’t look like the police are letting anyone through.”

  “You know the cop?”

  “What cop? There’re two hundred up there.”

  “Recognize anyone?”

  He sighs, then cuts across two lanes. “Yeah, Lou, same as always.”

  “What time is it?” she asks Rick.

  “Eleven thirty-six.”

  “So handle it.”

  Rick cuts across another lane, cutting off traffic. The partition window closes, but the intercom stays on. The car comes to a stop. You listen with bated breath. Yakuma puts her bloody hand on yours.

  “Hiya Lou.”

  “Hey Rick. Sorry, no one through.”

  “I got you-know-who in the back.”

  “Rick, I could if I would, but I mean no one. Orders from the mayor.”

  “Game starts in a half hour.”

  “There’s not gonna be a game today; you nuts?”

  “It’s the Sox. They’re playing. He’s got to get to the stadium.”

  “Rick—”

  “Lou, it’s the Sox.”

  “Ahh, Christ. You know I’m going to catch hell for this, right?”

  “Not when [LEGAL EDIT] turns a game-ending double play to secure us a playoff spot.”

  “You son of a bitch. Go.”

  Yakuma smiles. The car begins to roll. You hear the cop telling people to move, it’s an emergency.

  “Holy shit, it worked,” you say.

  “Of course. He’s the king of the city.”

  Twenty minutes later, you pull into the Yankee Stadium parking lot. Just as a massive horde of the dead are arriving…

  If you want to stick with the plan and make your way inside Yankee Stadium, click here.

  No way. Too many zombies out there. Keep driving. Click here.

  LADY, STOP!

  You barely stop to think. You claw at the mountain of chairs and cabinets you just piled against the window, bringing them crashing to the ground. You grab a chair by its legs and swing. The glass cracks.

  “What the hell’re you doing?” Walter shouts.

  You don’t know what’s gotten into you, but you’re impassioned and unstoppable. You give the glass two more hard whacks. Finally, it shatters. You push a cabinet aside and climb over and through. You’re lucky—the heavy echo of gunfire is distracting most of the beasts. Those that do notice, you simply run past.

  “Hey! Stop!” you shout.

  You’re running downhill—focused squarely on the woman. She’s fast approaching the massacre. Up and to her left is the military—tanks, soldiers, guns galore. In front of her and to the right—more zombies.

  You kick it into overdrive. Two-year-old pair of Vans smacking pavement. You close in. Leap. Tackle her from behind, just feet from the battle ahead, and together you hit the cement.

  Bullets whiz past you. Over you. The woman kicks and screams.

  “She’s already dead. Your daughter’s already dead.”

  The woman goes limp in your arms. Breathes heavily, near hysterical. Need to get out of here. Then the woman does something you’re not expecting—punches you in the nose. Your eyes water and your grip loosens.

  The woman is up. Bullets fly past her.

  You see the daughter. Beneath the gray skin, the bloodshot eyes, the swollen lips, you can see the resemblance. Same hair, so blond it’s white. She was a cute little six-year-old. Now she’s a zombie with a huge, bloody mess of a hole where her right eye should be.

  The mother sweeps up her daughter. “Oh God, oh God—Ruby, what happened? Oh God.”

  “Lady, get the fuck down!”

  You reach up to get her. At that same moment, Ruby sinks her teeth into the side of her mother’s face. The mother screams—confused, in shock at what’s happening.

  And then—an instant later—the next round of gunfire starts up. And bullets tear through the three of you.

  AN END

  SORRY MOM, DRINKING

  You let it go to voice mail, sit down, pop open a bottle of Coors, and turn on the TV. Your mind is entering full denial mode now to combat the stress of the past hour. You quickly flip channels—can’t handle any more news.
Thank God for DVR—man’s great contribution to society in the twenty-first century. You put on some early-season Simpsons. Your pacifier. Relaxing. You drink more.

  The phone rings two more times. You turn it off.

  You go through the beers like they’re water. Well, not quite like water—you never drank seven bottles of water in an hour. Empty bottles pile up beside you. You begin playing basketball with them, tossing the empties into the sink. Violently—just asking one to shatter. Finally, one does, splashing glass across the counter and onto the floor.

  Sirens outside. Nonstop. Some right out front. Some pass in the distance. It’s a nightmare. You keep drinking—drink enough, maybe you’ll wake up from the nightmare.

  The sun is setting, casting an eerie orange light through the window and into the apartment.

  You’re hammered now. But the gnawing feeling—the fear—won’t leave. You need something else. Not beers. Something prescribable.

  You go to the bedroom. Root through your ex-girlfriend’s stuff. She moved out two months ago and hasn’t come back to collect it. You find a fat plastic bag stuffed with her pills—various blue and white and pink pills to deal with anxiety and depression. You grab the bottle that reads ALPRAZOLAM on the side. Unscrew the top. Dozens of little blue ones. Xanax. Bingo. Instant relaxation.

  This is way out of character, you think to yourself, as you toss four into your mouth and raise the bottle of Coors. But, well, it seems like the world is falling apart—and as long as you’ve been alive, that’s pretty out of character for the world. So, it—

  BLAM!

  You cough, spitting out the pills, and jump about a mile into the air. The bottle drops and the little blue guys scatter out across the wood floor. You mentally check your pants for shit. All clear.

  Gunshot! That was a FUCKING gunshot! You try to wrap your head around that.

  You tiptoe to the door. You press your head against it and listen. You can just barely make out a low moaning sound. You grab a hockey stick from your closet—an old, beat-up thing you found lying in the trash one day and figured shouldn’t go to waste.