Zombie Ocean (Book 2): The Lost
ZOMBIE OCEAN
Michael John Grist's books are on
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CONTENTS
ALICE
1.
DADDY
3.
TIDES
4.
OCEAN
WONDERLAND
8.
HOT DOGS
10.
FAMILY
LOOKING GLASS
12.
T4
13.
RAVI & AMO
ODYSSEY
14.
RAGNAROK IV
15.
TEACUP STORM
16.
5 YEARS OLD
17.
HAWAII
18.
MOUNT
19.
JAPAN
WEST
21.
JABBERWOCK
23.
CAIRNS
24.
SLEEPER CELL
25.
CERULEAN
ALICE
1. DADDY
Seven hours before the zombie apocalypse took away everything she ever knew, five-year old Anna lay in bed listening to her father read Alice through the Looking Glass.
"When I was your age," he said in the high voice he used for the Red Queen, "I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes, I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."
Wrapped up in the tight covers, Anna listened to the words intently. Her Daddy had a cozy brown voice that always kept her calm, and this was one of the few stories she could hear without the hurt becoming too much. It helped that her small bedroom was dark, and the covers were dark, and her Daddy's pajamas were dark; all except the yellow lightning bolt on his back, but she was used to that.
Darkness helped. Quiet helped. Impossible things didn't, but if she couldn't even enjoy imagining those, what did she have left?
"Tell me an impossible thing, Daddy," she said.
He smiled down at her. He had a dark and stubbly face, lit by the low orange light from the side-table lamp. She knew he wasn't all that old, but there was gray in his dark beard, twinkling like Christmas snowflakes. His brown eyes were warm and full.
"I could quote just about anything in this book, I should think," he said. "Card-men? Bread and butterflies? The Jabberwock?"
Anna smiled and closed her eyes. Her Daddy was another thing that didn't hurt her head at all. After the coma the doctors said that anything she already knew would be all right, and wouldn't make her head hurt. But the only things she could really remember from that time were Alice, her Daddy, and a vague sense of her mother.
Her mother had gone though. Only her Daddy had stayed.
"What about ham-fly?" she asked. "Or potato-bird?"
The hurt kicked in, a persistent throb that quickly spread through her head.
"Alright button," her father said softly. "I think that's enough."
She opened her eyes. "Tell me one. Just one then I'll go to sleep."
He sighed. "You'll be up all night, Anna."
"I won't I promise, just one."
Her father frowned, and tapped her nose gently. "One, all right. Let's make it good." He leaned back and thought for a little while.
This wait was delicious. Most nights it was one of their routines: to make up something new, something to dream about, something to chew and digest and make herself stronger.
"OK," he said at last, "I've got it. In the rainforests of Peru, some of the women wear birds instead of clothes. Did you know that?" His eyes twinkled. "They pleat the feathers together into beautiful patterns. Why?"
Anna screwed up her nose. That idea hurt her head sharply, like a lump of freezing snow behind her face. It was new and vivid. "Not just for fashion?"
Her Daddy chuckled. "Probably for fashion, ladies do like fashion don't they, but what else?"
The hurt thumped. She screwed her tongue up in her mouth. "So they can fly into the trees and get coconuts?"
"Good guess. Yes. They fly up for coconuts, then fly up higher and plant the coconut seeds in the tops of the other trees. Why?"
Her head banged and her eyes throbbed. "To make an arch? A rainbow out of trees. So they hang down on vines like a canary in a cage? So they become birds."
"They become birds by dressing up in birds, exactly. Like the caterpillar in his chrysalis. It's what makes them happy."
Anna sighed, part in satisfaction, part with the hurt. Her father stroked her forehead.
"You're getting hot Anna. That's enough now."
It was enough. Too much, probably. She'd have to lie silently and still for hours now before sleep would come, thinking through Alice's familiar adventures to clear these new images from her head. But that was OK. She'd be able to add them in to her collection soon, as their newness faded.
"All right," she said, narrowing her eyes to hurt-reducing slits. "But can we draw the bird ladies tomorrow?"
He stroked her face softly. "We certainly can."
Their drawings were pinned up around the room, as evidence of the adventures they'd been on together. The bird ladies would fit in perfectly next to the cucumber-men that lived on the ice volcano. It was too dark to see them now, but knowing they were out there stuck to the plain black walls made her feel good, like friends hovering in the darkness.
"Good night then, sweetie," her father said, and tucked her covers tighter around her.
She peeked up at him through slitted eyelashes. "Can I please see the Hatter? Just for a second."
He sighed and paused in mid-rise. "I don't know, sweetheart. He's tired from his injection. You're tired."
"Just for half a second? It's part of our routine."
He gave a bemused expression, wrinkling his eyebrows like he couldn't believe this child was his. "It is routine," he admitted, "that's true."
"Just a quarter of a second. I want to pat his head."
"You'll be up all night. But all right, a quick pat on the head and that's all."
He eased himself up carefully and left the bedroom. Anna steeled herself. The Hatter was the newest addition to their family, and the hardest thing for her to be around, but still she loved him. He was so small and helpless. It felt nice that she might be able to protect him, like her Daddy protected her.
Her father came back holding the Hatter. He was small and black, a baby Dalmatian with eyes that could still barely see. He made a soft mewling sound as her Daddy laid him down on the sheets by her face.
He was beautiful. Just the smell of him, all fur and milk and laundry-fresh from his new basket, made her head thump harder. The way his little head quivered and his ears shifted angles enchanted her, while the hurt grew.
This was something to fight for.
"Can I?" she asked.
Her Daddy nodded. He helped her ease her slim pale tan arm out of the tight covers, and rest it lightly on the Hatter's downy head. He yelped. Anna melted and ached inside.
"Right here," her Daddy said, pointing at a small white bandage pasted on the Hatter's back, between his tiny shoulder blades. "The doctor made the injection here, so we can never lose him."
"A chip," Anna said, pushing hard now against the icy wall of hurt. "But not a potato chip."
Her Daddy smiled and tickled the Hatter's round little belly. "A chip, that's right. He could go anywhere in the world and we'd find him. He'd find us, too. He'll protect us both, Anna, when he's big and strong."
Anna rubbed the Hatter's ears. He leaned into her hand sleepily. She loved him so much already. She thought about asking if he could stay in the room tonight, but she knew she'd never sleep.
Instead she carefully retracted her arm, and her Daddy helped her slide it back into the covers. "Thank you," she said quietly.
"You're welcome, angel. Now sleep well."
He picked up the Hatter. He tucked her in. He kissed her forehead gently, stroked her hair, then clicked off the dim lamp and eased quietly out of the room.
Darkness surrounded her.
She lay very still and pushed back at the hurt. This was the final routine that ended every day; trying to claim for herself whatever strange new ideas they'd come up with. The birdwomen took a long time to swallow down, and they hurt, though she had techniques that helped: most of them involved telling herself variations on Alice's adventures.
She looked up at the glowing clouds on the ceiling. These were left over from before, so they were OK, but so much else had gone. Her TV was a dim memory; her dolls, once scattered round the room ready for the next tea party, were all tucked away in boxes. She never went outside. She hardly ever left the room. Even looking at the pictures in the Alice books was too much. The most she could handle were the stories themselves, spoken in her Daddy's cozy brown voice.
At last she fell asleep.
When she woke six hours later her Daddy was standing over her, lit only by the glowing white of his eyes.
"Daddy?" she whispered.
He lunged toward her. His right hand glanced off her forehead and his left caught in her pillow, while his white-eyed face plunged closer like a nightmarish worm.
Anna screamed.
His forehead thunked off hers and stars popped across her vision. Instinctively she recoiled, ducking her head into the covers and burrowing deeper. The covers were so tight she could scarcely breathe, but now he was slapping at the pillows so she scrunched herself up at the bottom like Alice in a giant's pocket.
She gasped in hot stifling breaths. It was so dark and she felt dizzy, then his hand slapped hard at her back from above and she shrieked, "Daddy stop it!" but the words were muffled by the covers.