Only Dead on the Inside

by James Breakwell

  Kids will smell like rotten food for the rest of the apocalypse.

  In the Dirty Clothes Hamper

  Will mask their scent.

  In an era without working washing machines, the odor might cause lasting brain damage.

  Inside the Dryer

  No electricity means a sibling can’t turn it on.

  It’s fairly soundproof. You could lose a kid inside for days.

  In the Bathtub

  Great way to trick your kid into taking a bath.

  No escape options. Doubles as a zombie feeding trough.

  Under the Bed

  Dark and low to the ground.

  Without vacuums to keep them in check, dust bunnies will grow bold and deadly.

  Pantry

  Dark and hidden.

  Kids will eat all the food.

  Crawlspace

  Hard for zombies to gain access.

  Spiders. You’re better off with the zombies.

  In the Closet

  Puts a door between your kids and any zombies.

  To fit in your kids, you’ll have to clean it.

  Tree House

  High above zombies.

  You’ll have to build it. There goes your weekend.

  THE PERFECT SPOT

  That subheading is a lie. There is no perfect hiding spot. The best place to find cover will depend on where you are, who you’re with, and what is chasing you. Use your best judgment, unless you’re anything like me. Then you should use your spouse’s best judgment.

  Still, as long as you stay calm, you can bravely cower somewhere until the zombies go away. And if they refuse to leave, well, you can always run or fight. Be sure to finish the chapters on those topics before you make your decision. If you’re stuck in a hiding spot right now, this is the perfect time to browse through them. It turns out all it took to make people read again was the end of the world.

  But if you’re not in stealth mode yet, follow these tips to get ready in advance. It might save your life or, even better, save you from getting yelled at by your spouse.

  Do dress your kids in appropriate footwear. Hiding can turn into running at a moment’s notice. There’s nothing worse than having to fight off zombies while you’re still looking for the other shoe.

  Don’t pick an uncomfortable spot. Whining will get you eaten. Bring extra pillows.

  Do wear colors that will blend in. Even a mindless zombie will notice a bright orange shirt in the middle of the woods. Your horrible fashion choices will finally catch up with you.

  Don’t forget kids grow. A kitchen cabinet is a great hiding place when your child is four but not when they’re sixteen. Either pick new hiding spots or train your child to be a contortionist.

  Do take a bottle or whatever else you need for hidden bathroom breaks. Don’t pee freely, especially if you’re hiding in a laundry pile.

  Don’t expect a short stay. Zombies don’t have any pressing engagements on their social calendars. They’re still more popular than you.

  Do pack snacks. A growling stomach will give away your position. Also, hiding is super boring, and the best thing to do when bored is eat.

  CHANGE OF PLAN

  If you’re too unmotivated to run away and too impatient to hide, fighting might be your best option. I’d tell you to read on to the next chapter, but you’re probably also too lazy and impatient to finish an entire book. Props for making it this far, I guess. For the rest of you, read on even if you don’t feel like killing zombies. As parents, you always need a plan C—and probably D through Q as well. I’m only giving you three plans. I’m a dad, not a machine.

  CHAPTER 7

  PACIFY THIS

  When you can’t run and you can’t hide, there’s only one option left: Fight. Well, I suppose you could give up and die, but that’s hardly ideal. Your spouse and kids would be super mad at you. No one likes a quitter.

  No matter how much of a pacifist you think you are, you have at least some skill at fighting. It’s in your DNA. If there’s one thing the human race is good at, it’s killing. Homo sapiens invented murder before they invented language. When Cain killed Abel, there wasn’t even a word for it yet. The ancient Hebrews eventually settled on “pwned.” Zombies should think twice before they mess with us. Too bad they don’t have enough brainpower to think even once.

  Parents with small children are especially good in a fight. It’s only natural. Every time a hiker gets mauled by a bear, it’s because the bear was defending its cubs. Protecting offspring makes animals act with supernatural aggression and strength. Basically nature found a way to take normal bears and make them even deadlier. It’s amazing they haven’t conquered the earth. And the only thing scarier than a mama bear is a mama human. They can kill with a single icy stare. I should know. My wife stopped my heart twice the last time I forgot to take out the trash.

  Parents will need every ounce of that primal adrenaline once civilization collapses. Zombies are a tougher foe than bears. Grizzlies can feel fear and pain, but the undead know only hunger. Plus, when you die, you don’t turn into a bear. That would be awesome. For the record, if I had to choose how the world would end, the bear apocalypse would be a much better way to go. I wouldn’t mind my loved ones dying if they all came back as pandas.

  SMASHING GOOD TIME

  While the only way to kill a zombie is to destroy its brain, there is no shortage of ways to get that done. Through thousands of years of trial and error, humans have tested every killing method possible—and impossible. No army could take itself seriously if it didn’t have at least one shrink ray on the drawing board—or on a tiny scrap of paper, if the ray worked. Even the simple act of punching a man in the face is covered in slightly different ways by hundreds of competing hand-to-hand combat systems. No other field has received such in-depth study, and for good reason. Reading a book will never be as fulfilling as karate-chopping someone in the face.

  There’s nothing I can say in this modest book to compete with the collective battle wisdom of the human race, so I won’t try. Instead, this chapter focuses on the unique ways parents can kill zombies that childless people would never think of. For inspiration, look no further than your own kids. To be a child is to be at war. Whether it’s a soft cuddly toy or a bike with fancy handlebar tassels, to a kid, everything is a weapon. Parents have been discouraging that behavior for centuries. Now we must act like our own violent sons and daughters if we want to survive. Finding your inner child means turning into an unstoppable killing machine.

  WAKE-UP CALL

  To fight effectively, you must be alert at all times. Zombies are most likely to catch you when you’re tired or distracted. As a mom or dad, you already feel that way 100 percent of the time. True parents can fall asleep anywhere at any time. But with the added exhaustion of the apocalypse thrown in, no matter how long you nod off, you’ll never feel well-rested. Caffeine is only a temporary solution. The world’s supply will run out quickly, leaving those who depend on it withdrawn and homicidal. To avoid both killing and being killed during the inevitable caffeine crash, you’ll need to do something else to stay alert. And that thing is panic.

  Other guides tell you to stay calm. They couldn’t be more wrong. Panic is good. It floods your entire body with raw, uncut adrenaline, preparing you to fight or flee without a second of hesitation. To survive in a world full of zombies, you’ll need to do a lot of both. Panic allows you to make quick, irrational decisions in moments of crisis, when slow, methodical logic would get you killed. It’s better to be quickly wrong than slowly right. The ability to act hastily without regard for what happens next is what separates us from zombies. It’s a founding principle of America.

  Panic will make you alert to the point of paranoia and fill your arms and legs with the flailing, undirected strength of a drowning swimmer, at least temporarily. You’ll be able to randomly thrash your way through any zombie horde. Having your kids nearby will help. If there’s a legitimate threat to your offspring, your bod
y will automatically pump all of its adrenaline into your system. There won’t be many dating options once the majority of the earth’s population is wiped out. Your chances of starting a second family are exactly zero. Your body will give you everything you need to fight off zombies and ensure the survival of the progeny you already have. It’s your job to use this surge in one frantic burst before it runs out. Panic wisely.

  For most parents, panicking comes naturally. If it doesn’t for you, here are a few dos and don’ts to keep in mind:

  Don’t calm down. A short-lived panic attack is almost as useless as no panic attack at all.

  Do make your kids panic, too. Tell them about your long odds of survival. Soon their bodies will be pumping out emergency hormones as well. Together, you’ll be unstoppable.

  Don’t panic too early. Freaking out is exhausting. If you do it when it isn’t necessary for your survival, you’ll be too tired to do it when you really need it.

  Do hyperventilate. Suck down air like the earth is running out. It’ll super-oxygenate your blood and prep you for feats of amazing speed and strength. It’s what pro athletes do.

  Don’t be ashamed. Other parents might look down on you for being afraid. Soon they’ll be dead, and you’ll be killing the walking corpses they leave behind.

  Do give it your all. Panic is an all-or-nothing situation. There’s no sense in saving up for a future panic. If you don’t do it right this time, there won’t be a next one.

  Don’t get loud. If you make too much noise, you’ll attract zombies. A quiet panic is an effective panic.

  Do lose control. You’ll only reach your true potential if you’re motivated by unmitigated terror. If you’re still using your brain, you’re doing it wrong.

  EVEN THE ODDS

  Once you’ve hyper-accelerated your heart rate with a healthy level of fear, it’s time to act. Your first duty in any zombie attack is to tilt the numbers in your favor. You do this on a daily basis without even thinking about it. Your kids come at you in groups and try to overwhelm you with sheer volume. A pack of children can ask a million questions per minute. This is not hyperbole. I’ve counted. Their hope is as you say “yes” to “Can I go the bathroom?” and “Do I have to wash my hands?” you might accidentally slip in an affirmative response to “Can we go to Disneyland?” or “Can I play with lighter fluid?” Hopefully those last two questions are unrelated. Mickey Mouse isn’t shy about suing.

  To deal with children, you have to spread them out. Send kids to different rooms to complete pointless tasks. That potted cactus doesn’t need someone to read it poetry, but your kids don’t know that. Once you’ve pulled this off, your children will be scattered enough for you to deal with them one by one, breaking their wills as you go. A happy child is a defiant child. Make them feel the existential angst that fills the pit of your stomach every second of your waking life. Then they’ll be too depressed to cause trouble.

  Dealing with zombie hordes in confined spaces works on the same principle. Your goal is to spread them out so you can take them down individually. If you’re at home, tactically withdraw deeper into your dwelling, dodging through doorways and over obstacles that will cause zombies to stumble and drift apart. If you have kids, your house will already be one big obstacle course, even if you try desperately to keep it clean. Zombie or not, anyone would be lucky to make it through that in one piece.

  To further split up the zombies, find the loudest, most annoying toy your kids own. In my house, it’s a large stuffed bumblebee that talks to itself at random hours of the night. I don’t care what the manufacturer’s tag says—that thing was made by Satan. In a zombie combat scenario, throw the toy one way and move the other. With luck, some or all of the zombies will head off to chase after it. Kill any that follow you, then take out the distracted ones from behind. This is a dirty, underhanded tactic. Congratulations, you finally have what it takes to survive.

  THE FAMILY THAT FIGHTS TOGETHER, STAYS TOGETHER

  Work your kids into zombie combat as best you can. A rotting zombie skull has the same breaking point as the rind of a watermelon, a conclusion I base on absolutely nothing. One of the many downsides of the pre-apocalypse world is it’s hard to find zombie skulls for testing purposes. Without the real thing, you’ll have to get creative when assessing your children’s skills. Before the world ends, buy as many watermelons as you can and set them up for a demonstration. Let your kids take a crack at them with their fists, feet, bats, and whatever else you think might be around when the zombies show up. If your kids destroy the watermelon to your satisfaction, let them help you in battle. If they don’t, well, at least you can still eat the watermelon.

  Children who are too small to help will need to be shoved aside and protected when the real combat starts. But if you’re cornered to the point where you have to fight, your kids won’t be able to stay out of the way. You’ll have to step over or around them the entire time. This should feel familiar. You’ve been doing it since the moment they first became mobile. Zombies, however, aren’t limber enough to dodge your children and will likely fall over. This adds another complication you don’t need. A zombie at ankle level is as deadly as one standing up. Do your best to stomp their heads before they can bite your children’s feet. This is one time when tall footwear will come in handy. I knew there was a reason every woman in America started wearing riding boots.

  Use the unreliability of your children to your advantage. If you’re trapped in a room with your kids and there are zombies outside the door, tell your children to be completely silent. They’ll immediately be as quiet as an erupting volcano. When the noise becomes deafening, stand to the side of the door and crack it open a little. The zombies will burst in and head straight for your kids. Kill the zombies from behind. Keep in mind it’s hard to estimate zombie numbers through a closed door. Hopefully the swarm will be manageable. I cannot stress enough how much trouble you’ll be in with your spouse if your kids die while you use them as bait.

  BATTER UP

  If you’re like most parents, you’ve spent thousands of dollars equipping your children for sports they’ve either already abandoned or will as soon as they discover video games and recreational drugs. All that gear gathering dust in your garage will have a new purpose once the world ends. Pads designed to stop sports injuries can also prevent zombie bites. Football and hockey gear will be especially useful. They encase kids in a hard plastic shell that rotting teeth can’t penetrate. The only problem is they also limit kids’ mobility and provide a lot more surface area for zombies to latch onto. In the zombie apocalypse, there are no penalties for holding.

  Athletic helmets are as effective on offense as defense. The best way to destroy zombie brains is with the sport that already destroys brains all the time. Put your kids in their peewee football helmets. Then blow a whistle and let them charge. The goal is a helmet-to-zombie-skull collision. If your kids are too short, they can still hit a zombie in the midsection and knock it over. Then they should stomp it with their cleats. Again, this isn’t an unknown phenomenon on the football field, so it should come naturally to your kids. If it bothers them, tell them to imagine they’re stomping grapes. The only difference is instead of a delicious wine, you’ll end up with a gory mess on your kitchen floor. Stock up on paper towels.

  If you prefer your kids to keep a bit of distance between themselves and the zombies, youth sports provide a variety of reach weapons. Baseball bats will let your kids thwack zombies from a few feet away. Metal bats have the most damage potential, but you can give your kids the wooden kind if they want to imitate their favorite players in the major leagues. The end of the world is no reason to stop having role models. If your kids have bad aim, give them softball bats, which are much wider than their baseball counterparts. The only way to miss with a softball bat is not to swing at all. Don’t be surprised if your kids still strike out.

  The sports weapons available to you will vary by region. In Canada, every child is born holding a hocke
y stick. It’s a wonder their mothers survive labor. On the east coast of the U.S., you can’t move up a tax bracket until your kid plays lacrosse. In the U.K., you’re not legally an adult until you own more than one cricket bat. For my American readers, cricket is a sport that involves hitting a ball, not smashing crickets with a stick—at least according to this angry correction note from my editor. This book now contains one real fact. It’s officially educational.

  Be aware, however, that if you let your kids use any of these weapons in your house, they’ll destroy everything you own. This will happen whether or not there are zombies. For veteran parents, this won’t be a problem. Only rookies still own nice things.

  TOY CHEST/WEAPONS LOCKER

  Not every family is full of burned-out child athletes. Some kids never do sports at all. Maybe they realize the futility of training for thousands of hours at a skill they will never use in the real world. Or maybe their bodies finally melded to the couch. Whatever the reason, not everyone has a used sporting goods store sitting around in their attic. Fear not. Your kids still own plenty of other objects that can kill or maim. Just check the warning labels.

  Most toys spell out in huge, scary letters how they can kill. That makes them easy to weaponize. If the warning says “don’t,” do. While all toys can maim children, only certain types can destroy zombies. Choking hazards won’t do any good against the undead. If a zombie swallows one, it can still bite, infect, and kill you. Don’t get bitten by zombies. Or by anyone, for that matter. That’s a good rule to live by, even when there’s no apocalypse.