Zombocalypse Now (5 page)
The police station isn’t far from here on foot, and you decide that, since your fellow pedestrians are mostly concentrating on running in mad panic, you’d better head over there and tell the authorities what you know. Someone seems to have abandoned a city bus in the middle of the street, further complicating the flow of traffic, but by keeping a careful watch and altering your route as needed, you manage to get to the station without invoking the wrath of any walking corpses.
As you approach, however, a blood-curdling scream fills the air. You race ahead to see a terrifying, gory mess—zombies are everywhere, gorging on helpless bystanders in an undead feeding frenzy. As far as alerting the cops to the zombie outbreak, you know what? You’re pretty sure they know.
If you hightail it out of there,
turn to page 105.
If you think the police station would be an ideal place to wait this whole thing out and try to find a way past the zombie mosh pit to the relative safety inside,
turn to page 20.
38
What the hell. You use your wrench as a crude shovel, and discover that the ground under Princess’s grave is surprisingly soft and easy to dig into.
It’s as if the grave wants this
, you think. No, that’s crazy. Anyway, it’s just an experiment, you assure yourself. It’s not playing with dangerous, supernatural forces that you don’t understand. It’s science!
After digging a sizable (if somewhat shallow) grave, you and Ernie dump the almost-headless zombie into it and cover it with earth. “Hmm,” Ernie says when you finish. “How long do you think we have to wait?” For a minute, it looks like all your trepidation was for nothing. Suddenly, though, a hand bursts through the ground. The zombie claws its way out of the grave, looking much healthier than when you buried it moments ago. In fact, it seems several feet taller and extremely well-muscled. Also, for some reason, it’s now wearing a cape.
An evil laugh comes from the creature, and you begin to regret your decision. Ernie makes a little whimpering noise. “You have done well,” the zombie says in a booming voice that cuts to your bones. It reaches out and brushes its hand against an oak tree, which instantly rots through and starts moving unnaturally, dripping ooze as it sways. There is no breeze.
“Now bow down before the Zombie Lord.”
What evil have you wrought? If you charge at the Zombie Lord and desperately try to beat it back to death with your monkey wrench,
turn to page 144.
Are you kidding? That thing made a zombie out of a friggin’ tree. If you obediently bow before your new master and hope he decides not to kill you,
turn to page 255.
39
You dismantle your makeshift barricade and crack the door open a hair for the tiniest peek outside. The room is dark, so you smell them before you can see them—the stench that was a dull reek in the kitchen stings your nostrils the moment you sniff the air coming from the other room. You open the doors just another smidge and gasp.
Zombies are packed in shoulder to shoulder like undead sardines. Your surprise alerts their dull, pickled brains to your presence, and soon they’re pushing through the swinging doors like Play-Doh being squeezed though a Fun Factory.
You’re not so much killed as utterly devoured. In minutes, there’s no trace of you to be found outside of some happy zombie bellies.
THE END
40
As you drive away, the figure on your trunk falls and hits the curb with a crack. Yowtch. If you’re wrong about this whole zombie thing, you may have just killed a guy. You look back through your rear view mirror, however, and see him stand up on twisted legs and immediately attack the driver of a passing ice cream truck. That makes you feel . . . ew. Mixed. At best.
Ernie lives on the far side of town, but with some creative driving that involves more than a little reliance on sidewalks, you manage to clear the heart of the zombie infestation. When you finally get to his house, you’re startled by your friend’s appearance. He already looks like he hasn’t slept in days.
“Zombies,” Ernie says carefully after you explain what’s going on. “Okay. That makes sense.” He rushes to his window and peeks through the blinds. “Are they crawling out of graves or being helicoptered in? Did anybody see you come here?”
“I don’t think so,” you say, not sure which question to answer first. “It looked like they were making more zombies by biting regular people. I didn’t see any helicopters. Or a lot of soil or anything.”
“Okay. Okay.” Ernie is deep in thought. “I have some theories. They could be military. I know for a fact the army has been working on classified experiments on cadavers at an underground facility in the New Mexico desert. Who knows what could come from that?”
Government experiments. That sounds pretty bad. “What else have you got?” you ask.
“Well, how much do you know about para-religious suicide cults?” Not a whole lot, you confirm. “Basically, there are forces in the world that defy logical explanation,” Ernie continues. “I’m not prepared to rule out Satan worship or ancient pagan black magic or contact with extra-dimensional beings. If people have tapped into any of these forces, zombie infestations are the kind of thing you might expect.”
Extra-dimensional pagan devil worship. You feel a little pale. “Anything else?”
“There is one more theory,” Ernie says. “You’re not going to like it.”
“What is it?” you ask.
“You have to promise not to laugh.”
“Ernie, just tell me.”
“Fluoride.”
You laugh. “It’s not fluoride, Ernie.”
“No, I have a whole file!” your friend insists, grabbing a bunch of papers out of a desk drawer. “They used it to pacify the anti-war population in the sixties! What if it’s been building up or something? Can you get too pacified? Like,
zombie
pacified? I don’t know. What do you think we should do?”
If you decide to follow up on the military experiment angle,
turn to page 90.
If you think it all sounds more like ancient dark prophecy stuff,
turn to page 153.
If Ernie really won you over with his carefully-reasoned fluoride argument,
turn to page 224.
42
You head south to drop off Billy, and although Prudence tries to explain to him that she wants to return to her own family, it doesn’t seem to get through. Finally when you reach his property, he gets out of the car and you and Prudence simply drive away, leaving him there bewildered.
“Are you sure you want to leave it like that?” you ask.
“Oh, it’s okay,” she says. “He doesn’t know where I live.”
Prudence’s home is much farther, and way off the beaten path—it’s almost dark by the time you reach what turns out to be a small, dusty community of simple folk in well-worn clothing. One woman rushes up to you as soon as you pull up.
“Thank Heaven!” she says. “Prudence, I thought we’d lost you, too! The Prophet left with most of the menfolk to fight off those things. They never came back. Who will lead us now? What will we do without a Prophet?”
“You have a Prophet,” Prudence says, remaining completely calm and surprising you as much as anyone. “Look into your heart. You know this to be true.”
The woman doesn’t seem convinced, but is grateful to you for saving Prudence and offers you a place in the compound. She kind of gives you the willies, though, and you’re not sure how appealing you find the whole cult lifestyle. On the other hand, this might wind up being the safest place you’ll find to weather the zombie storm.
If you accept the offer,
turn to page 271.
At this point you’re already halfway to the large, metropolitan city to the north, and it may have fared better than your town did. If you decide to head toward the big city instead,
turn to page 83.
43
Afraid to fall asleep, you curl up in the corner of Ernie’s kitchen with your back against the refrigerator and your eyes peeled wide. Needless to say, when your friend comes downstairs, you’re not looking your best. “Yow,” Ernie says. “Are you okay?” You assure him that you just had a hard time sleeping.
“Here, you should eat something,” he continues, opening up a cupboard and grabbing a donut. “Are you hungry?”
Yeah, hungry for brains.
“No! No, I ate already,” you say. Everything’s getting foggy, though. Where are you? What are you doing here? You can’t be certain if the confusion is due to the lack of sleep, or if the sickness is starting to take hold. Don’t think like that! Just calm down. Clear your mind. Go to your happy place, and think about the one thing in the world that can make you content.
Brains.
Oh, crap. “Ernie . . .” You’re losing it. “We . . . need to talk . . .”
“Yeah, I know,” he says. “Listen, about yesterday. I’m sorry about all that fluoride stuff. You’re right, we should go find your aunt Candice and see what she can tell us. Or at least make sure she’s okay.”
“No,” you stutter.
Brains.
“Need to . . .”
Brains.
“You . . . go . . .”
Brains brains brains
. “BRAAAAAAAIIIIINNS,” you finally moan as your thoughts fade away into blackness.
By the time Ernie figures out what the hell you’re talking about, it’s too late for him, too.
THE END
44
What’s the worst thing that could happen? To be honest, you’re proud of yourself. Instead of just fighting or fleeing various undead threats, you’re going to do some scientific research, hopefully saving the life of this poor animal, and maybe the rest of the world to boot. You make a comfy little bed for it, grab a few slices of cold pizza from the fridge (you never did eat anything at dinner) and set about learning all that you can from your new friend.
The first thing you discover is that the little guy is stronger than you thought—that overturned laundry basket sure didn’t hold him like you thought it would. The second thing is that he’s way, way faster than you. And the third thing is that when he gets hungry, that kitten doesn’t screw around.
Zombie victims only become zombies themselves if they escape their attackers with at least some of their brain intact. That’s not the case here. The cat leaps onto your face, chews through your skull and devours the gooey gray matter in about a minute and a half.
You get eaten by a zombie kitten.
THE END
45
Actually, the spot where your family used to go camping isn’t too far from here. And better yet, you’re pretty sure there’s a ranger station somewhere in these mountains that you might be able to hole up in.
It takes you another day, but you find the cabin (right about the time you start worrying that you both might seriously die of thirst). It’s abandoned but well-stocked with food, water, and a rifle. Billy gives you hunting lessons, and you start to settle into a routine.
After a few weeks, though, Billy is starting to go stir crazy. He decides to head out alone to reunite with Prudence, his lost true love. You’re not terribly sad to see him go, since based on the enthusiasm he displays cleaning game, there’s something not quite right with that kid. His absence leaves you all the more isolated, but the gun training serves you well, particularly later that winter during a close call with a zombie deer.
You never find out how the rest of the world fares, but no one ever comes to check on the ranger station, so that can’t be a good sign. You live out the rest of your days in solitude. Bitter and alone, perhaps, but hey, you survive.