Read Holiday of the Dead Online
Authors: David Dunwoody,Wayne Simmons,Remy Porter,Thomas Emson,Rod Glenn,Shaun Jeffrey,John Russo,Tony Burgess,A P Fuchs,Bowie V Ibarra
“Maybe I won’t. That’s all that matters to me.”
She said nothing.
“You’re not infertile are you,” said Zimmer.
She looked him in the eye.
“In fact,” he said, “you’re pregnant.”
“How do you know?”
“Just guessed. The way you were rubbing your belly when we were watching those poor buggers, the way –”
“One of them is the father –
was
the father.”
“And you’re going to sacrifice your baby for a victory you may never achieve? Is that what you’re saying?”
“It’s … it’s for the future. I have a younger sister. She was born soon after the plague. She’s six years younger than me. She’s pregnant, too, and I want her children to have a world worth living in.”
“What about your child?”
“It’s … it’s the price we pay for freedom.”
“What did the dad think?”
“He understood.”
“Now he’s dead, and you’ll be dead too.”
Mya went over to Zimmer’s truck and squatted next to the trailer her lover and his two companions had attached to it hours earlier.
She was reaching under the trailer, feeling for something. Something that had been taped there so she could use in an emergency.
“What are you looking for?” said Zimmer.
“For a –” She found it, and froze.
Two figures came from the shadows, one of them a giant.
“Busy are we?” said Geller, still wearing his hat and sunglasses. Behind him the ’roid zombie snarled. Its teeth had been filed into points. Mya imagined them ripping through her lover’s flesh.
“Just … just checking the cargo,” said Zimmer.
“You should’ve done that at 5pm,” said Geller.
“Thought we’d check to see where this came from,” said Zimmer, banging on the side of the trailer they’d originally towed from Dover.
“Can you tell?” said Geller.
“Might be able to,” said Zimmer.
Then Geller looked at Mya. “What are you doing there, Asher?”
Mya jerked at the gun and the tape tore away. She leapt to her feet and trained the weapon on Geller.
He said, “Oh, I see what you’re doing.”
The ’roid zombie growled and moved forward.
Mya shuffled nervously.
“You’re Human First scum, aren’t you,” said Geller. “Both of you.”
“Not me,” said Zimmer. “I know nothing about –”
“Shut up,” said Geller. “Asher, put down the gun. There’s no escape.”
“Then you’re dead, too,” she said.
“I’m already dead,” said Geller.
“Well I’ll kill you again,” said Mya. “You know I can.”
Geller smiled. “There’s nothing you can do, Asher. Why do you fight? Your world is gone. It’s our world now.”
“We’re taking it back.”
“No you’re not,” said Geller. “Do you know why? You are too weak. You value things too much. You kept gold and money and antiques and art and cars, you stored these things. And did they save you? Jesus warned you, didn’t he?”
“I don’t believe in Jesus.”
“You wouldn’t,” said the black-clad zombie. “That’s why you ignored his warning: ‘Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy.’ But you did. And what for? Your money and cars are meaningless. Put the gun away, Asher. Give it up. Accept your fate.”
“You’re dying, Geller,” said Mya. “All of you. Tonight. Z-Worlds across the country are being hit.”
“Hit?” he said.
“We’re blowing you away.”
Geller snarled. “I am going to eat you, legs first. Make my way up your body, slowly. I’ll make it hurt so–”
She shot him in the face. His sunglasses shattered. The hat flew off his head. His skull erupted in brain and blood and he hit the ground.
The ’roid zombie charged. Zimmer legged it. Mya, panicking, started firing. Bullets pummelled the monster’s face, turning it into a bloody maw.
Mya kept firing but she’d emptied the clip.
The ’roid zombie stumbled towards her.
She backed away.
The monster was on her.
She cowered, screaming.
A gunshot made her ears ring.
She smelled cordite.
The ground shook when the ’roid zombie fell, smoke rising from where his head had been.
Mya looked up.
Zimmer was leaning out of his cab with a shotgun jammed into his shoulder. Smoke plumed from the double-barrel.
They looked at each other for a second and Zimmer must have read Mya’s thoughts.
“I keep it for insurance,” he said.
Mya nodded.
Zimmer said, “You get going, they’ll be here any second.”
“You what?” she said.
“Get in your’ boyfriend’s truck and take those people out of here, take them anywhere.”
“Zimmer, you can’t–”
“Just do it. You’re right. This is my last drive, they’ve told me. I tried not to think about it, but it’s over. I’m food. You’ve got your baby, now. Go, Mya, get out of here.”
“No,” she said, “I’ve got to set off the explosives.”
In the distance, a siren blared. Shouts and screams filled the air.
Zimmer asked, “Where’s the detonator?”
Mya gawped.
Zimmer said, “Where is it?”
“Under the trailer’s rear wheels.”
“How … how do you … you know …”
“You … you just open the cover and press the red button. You’ve got sixty seconds.”
“Jesus, plenty of time for them to rip me to pieces.”
“Zimmer, you don’t have to do this, you –”
“Go, Mya. Just go. Time I did something for the human race. I did nothing before all this happened. Nothing when I thought I was good, when I went to church. Go. Get in that other truck, now. I’ll give you a minute, then I’m detonating. How much explosives in that trailer?”
“Enough to make a crater out of Regent’s Park.”
He nodded. “Go, now.”
As she drove along the roads of Z-World, running over zombies as she went, tears streamed down her face.
She hoped Zimmer would have enough time.
She hoped he would not suffer.
She hoped.
Armed zombies fired at her, but they caused little damage. ’Roid zombies tried to stand in her way, but she drove over them.
She put her foot down, the big truck roaring down the road, past the cages full of children, towards the zoo’s entrance.
Mya felt sick. All these humans would die. But she couldn’t save them all. She would save two hundred, those in her trailer. That would be something. She wept, hating herself for letting those people in the cages and the enclosures die. But as her lover said, this was war. She’d been ready to die herself. Sacrifice was necessary. And at least the poor sods wouldn’t be eaten alive. Death would be very quick for them.
She smashed through the gates and hit the Outer Circle road.
Behind her, the sky lit up. An orange glow filled the darkness. And seconds later, an explosion deafened her and the lorry bucked.
Mya screamed as the trailer swung out behind her. For a moment, she thought she’d lose control of the HGV. But she managed to keep from tipping over. She accelerated.
If she failed to get far enough from the blast, the people in the trailer would be baked alive.
She felt the heat from the explosion now. The earth trembled. A dark cloud of debris and smoke suddenly started to spread from the epicentre of the blast.
It was catching her up, rolling down the road behind her like a wave.
But Mya kept driving. She had lives to save. Two hundred in the trailer, and one in her womb.
She drove without looking back.
Finally, as she left London, she slowed down and glanced in her side-mirrors. A great fire raged in the centre of the city, lighting up the night. The cloud of dust had covered Central London and was seeping into the outskirts now.
An hour later on the M1, seventy miles outside London at the Watford Gap Service Area, Mya stopped and opened the trailer.
The smell was terrible. Humans staggered out, crying and screaming. They were sweaty and dirty, covered in their own shit and blood. As they poured out, Mya noticed that some were dead. Dozens of them. They would have to be burned or soon they would rise up as zombies.
“Where do we go?” said a man, his bright blue eyes standing out against his dirty face.
“I … I don’t know,” she said.
“Where are you going?”
“North. Scotland.”
“Are … are you Human First?”
She nodded.
“Take us,” said the man.
“How?”
“In the trailer. We’ve been in it for twenty-four hours waiting for death. I think we can bear it for a few hours more if we know we’re going to live.”
The crowd had gathered behind him. They murmured in agreement: “Take us, take us.”
Mya thought for a second.
Then she said, “Take your dead out and burn them. There should be some fuel in the petrol station in the service area.”
“Burn them?” said the man.
“Burn them,” she said.
“But … you’re Human First, you don’t–”
“They’re not human anymore,” said Mya. “Do it. And keep watch. I’m going to have some shut eye in the cab.”
Mya fell asleep to the smell of burning flesh, and she dreamed of her unborn child, a daughter, she was sure, waiting for her nine months in the future.
THE END
THE ZOMBIE WHISPERER
By
Bob Lock
‘I’ve heard of a Horse Whisperer: a Dog Whisperer, even a Ghost Whisperer, but a Zombie Whisperer? You’re yanking my chain now, aren’t you?’ Doug said with a grin.
I shook my head. ‘Honest, I saw it myself; this isn’t a second or third hand account. It isn’t even an urban myth. I’ve watched the guy do it, more than once.’
Doug still looked at me sceptically. It’s been nearly five years since we came to London for a short-break holiday and the world fell afoul of the zombie plague which has almost wiped out humankind. Doug and his great ideas,
a weekend in London will be fun
, he said,
a change from boring, wet Wales.
We’re still here and Wales is one of the safest places in Britain, great. Anyway, no one has ever been able to get close to a zombie without the damn thing trying to rip your face off and shove it into its stinking mouth. I didn’t blame him for not believing me. I hardly believe it myself and yet I’ve witnessed it.
‘Go on then, tell me about it. I can’t wait to hear the punch line,’ he said with an exasperated sigh.
I rolled my eyes. ‘It’s not a joke, man. Honest, I
saw
a guy do it.’
He held his hands up, palms out towards me. ‘All right, already. Tell me about it!’
I nodded. ‘Okay. The first time was three months ago, after we had that bad spell of snow, remember?’
Doug nodded and made a hurry-up sign with his hands, he has an appallingly short span of attention.
‘Right, right, calm down. I was on my way back from rummaging around Tesco – there wasn’t much stuff left – I only managed to get a few tins of marrowfat peas and I bloody hate them but, hey, you never know. I could swap them perhaps …’ I shrugged and then carried on as I saw Doug’s patience was wearing thin. ‘So, I’m leaving the store when I see this guy just strolling along. He had his hands in pockets, like it was just another Sunday,’ I frowned, ‘or was it Saturday? All the damn days just seem to meld together now. Oh, as I was saying. He stopped when he saw me and raised a hand to wave. That’s when I spotted the zombie step out of a ruined car, which was wrapped around a lamppost, near the guy. I shouted to him and pointed.’
‘Did he run?’ Doug asked.
‘Nope, he just turned around, easy-like, as if he had all the time in the world. Which he
didn’t
because the zombie was only a few paces away and this was one of those fit types. You know the ones, no broken or shattered bones, no dragging leg, not too much damage done to it at all. It was a big bastard too, must have gone down with one hell of a fight before being bitten. Might have been a rugby player or something,’ I said.