Zombie Island

by Gamboa, Allen

  “No fucking way.” Ben dropped to his knees and started chuckling to himself. Anastasia pulled herself off his shoulder and gave him a puzzled look.

  “Ben? What’s going on?”

  “Look!” He pointed behind her. “Just look!”

  “Fucking a, Ben!” Anastasia couldn’t believe their dumb luck. They clearly had a way off the island now. She quickly turned around and gave the kneeling Ben a tight hug. “We’re saved!”

  “Yes!” Ben said, burying his head in her soft shoulders as he cried and laughed at the same time. “We can get off this fucking island now!”

  Before Ben could stand up and let go of Anastasia, the girl was jerked roughly from his arms. The violent action sent Ben falling onto his back. He could hear Anastasia’s terrified screams as he quickly rolled to his feet. To his horror, Ben saw a giant zombie holding Anastasia above the ground by her neck. Ben noticed the blood splattered behemoth had a horrible grinning skull tattooed across his wide gore splashed chest. It was the same mean motherfucker that had accosted him on the beach yesterday. Now he was one of the hungry dead.

  “Ana!”

  The girl frantically kicked and screamed as the muscle-bound dead man easily lifted her up by the throat and drew her closer to his mouth full of broken and flesh flecked teeth. Ben charged the dead giant and was easily knocked back and away with the zombie’s huge free hand. Anastasia screamed for Ben, as the big Zombie tore a big chunk from her throat with his jagged, nasty teeth.

  A fountain of warm blood rained down on Ben as he lay at the zombie’s feet.

  “Anastasia!” Ben screamed, as he wiped her blood from his face. With a loud thump, the zombie dropped the headless girl’s body and continued feasting on her face. Angry, terrified and heartbroken, Ben jumped up and tried to shove the giant backwards. Tossing Anastasia’s half-eaten head away, the zombie reached down with a bloody hand and grabbed Ben by the throat. Choking and uselessly flailing at the big zombie, Ben tried to break free of his grip. Dead eyes just mocked his feeble attempts at escape. Ben felt everything start to slip away as the creature chose to squeeze the life out of him instead of eat him. Ben gasped for air as he realised the zombie was even more sadistic now than when he was alive.

  “Hey, ya fuck stick!” Joshua shouted from behind the zombie. “Pick on someone your size!”

  The dead man slowly turned to face the young Maori, still gripping Ben tightly by the throat. Trying to breathe and remain conscious, Ben could see his friend now standing defiantly in front of the giant. Joshua was almost unrecognisable covered in blood and zombie guts. The big dead man easily tossed Ben to the side and let out a challenging growl.

  “Come on, fucker!” Joshua growled back, flicking the gore encrusted expandable baton open. The dead man charged at the young man who easily side stepped him, then spun around and using all his remaining strength, slammed the baton into the back of the zombie’s head. The dead man’s skull caved in and he collapsed to the ground like a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound sack of cement. Joshua stepped over the zombie’s still form and smashed his skull into a fine, black, bloody pulp. Satisfied he was dead, or whatever the fuck you called killing a zombie, Joshua walked over to where his friend lay. Exhausted he dropped to a knee.

  “Ben. Ben!” He shook his shoulder. “Wakey, wakey, mate.”

  “Joshua?” Ben slowly opened his blood crusted eyes and saw his friend kneeling in front of him. “You’re alive?”

  “Feel like shit but yea… I’m alive.” He glanced around for any approaching dead. Seeing none he looked back down at his friend. “Let’s go home, mate.”

  “Ana?”

  “She’s gone, Ben.” Joshua said, trying not to look at her headless corpse. “I’m so sorry.”

  “No! No! No!” He pounded his fist on the ground and cried.

  “Ben,” Joshua rested a hand on his shoulder. “We need to get the fuck out of here, now!” Several of the hungry dead were starting to notice them and staggered their way. “We can mourn Ana later, right now we need to move it!”

  “Right, right.” Ben nodded. Joshua helped him to his feet and the two hurried over to where the jet skis were tied up. Joshua quickly loosened two of the ski’s ropes.

  “You know how to ride one?” He asked.

  “Yeah!” Ben hopped on the Sea Doo and quickly started it up. Joshua frowned then jumped on the other ski.

  “Joshua, you bloody prick!” A familiar voice came from behind. “Don’t leave me you twat!”

  Joshua looked back to see Samantha, bikini half off, sprinting toward him. A group of zombies were following right behind her. Joshua shook his head in disbelief, of all the people to survive.

  “Come on!” Joshua shouted. Samantha ran to the edge of the dock and made a mad leap for his Sea Doo. Landing like some drunk bachelorette on a mechanical bull, she hit the rear seat of the Jet Ski hard between her legs.

  “Damn!” Joshua said, amazed she’d made it.

  “Come on, ya idiot! Go!” She hit him hard on the back as the zombies that were following her fell into the bay.

  “Hold on!” Joshua said, as he squeezed the jet skis’ throttle, he still couldn’t believe Samantha had survived this long. In his head he could hear his Granddad saying that only cockroaches would survive a nuclear attack, maybe that’s what Sam was, a cockroach.

  The two jet skis bounced through the choppy waters of the bay toward Sydney. Ben noticed they hadn’t been the only ones to escape the dreaded island. Several other jet skiers, kayakers, paddle boarders and even a few small boats were out in the bay speeding for the main land. Ben’s arms were getting tired as the ocean waves assaulted the small watercraft. He was relieved to be fleeing the flesh-eating zombies but his mind kept replaying Anastasia’s gruesome death. He’d failed to protect her and Ben didn’t know if he could live with that. His heart was definitely broken. The warm salt water splashed his face, keeping him from falling into an adrenaline crash. Ben tried to wrap his mind around what had happened today but he just couldn’t get there. Crying, he steered the water craft toward the distant shoreline.

  Joshua could feel Samantha dig her long, well-manicured nails in to his back. He tried to remember when that was a good thing, now he was just annoyed. The Sea Doo bounced up and down across the ocean chop as Joshua opened the throttle almost all the way. He just couldn’t get away from that damned island fast enough.

  “You, on the jet skis!” A voice boomed through a megaphone. It was the Harbour Patrol, one of their boats was heading in Joshua’s direction trying to cut them off. “Turn around and head back to Cockatoo Island. I repeat, turn around and head back to Cockatoo Island! If you do not, we will use deadly force!”

  “Deadly Force?” Samantha said in disbelief. “We can’t go back there!”

  “No shit!” Joshua said, as he watched Ben make a sharp right turn ahead of them. “Hold on!”

  “This is your last warning! Turn back around. We will use deadly force if you don’t turn around!”

  There was no way Ben was going back to that island full of flesh-eating monsters. Deadly force or not he wasn’t going to let the freaking Harbour Police stop him from getting home and away from this nightmare. Turning the ski to the right, he gunned the engine. Over the whine of the accelerating engine and the crashing of the ocean waves he could still hear the megaphone. He still pressed on until the Harbour Police opened fire on him. Two rounds struck the Sea Doo, while a third hit him in the back of the head.

  “No!” Joshua shouted, as he saw his friends head explode. Ben’s body rolled over the side of the watercraft and into the ocean. “Ben!”

  “Keep going!” Samantha dug her nails deeper into his back. “They’ll kill us too!”

  “Fuck!” Joshua turned the ski to the left to avoid the Harbour boat. The police on board started firing at them too. Bullets smacked the ocean around them as Joshua frantically zig zagged away from the police boat. Suddenly the gunfire stopped as the Harbour cops focused their attent
ion on another boat that was packed with people trying to escape the island. Seeing this, Joshua opened the Sea Doo’s throttle all the way and headed straight for the mainland.

  SURVIVORS

  Sydney Australia

  Engine whining and desperate, Joshua ran the Sea Doo as far as was physically possible onto the Sydney shoreline. The young Maori was afraid of giving the Harbour Police another chance at shooting him. He didn’t want to end up like poor Ben. Joshua didn’t even know how he was going to explain any of this. As soon as the watercraft skidded across the sandy shore, Samantha leapt off the back and without a word to Joshua, ran towards the roadway. Joshua quickly glanced over his shoulder as he heard gunshots coming from somewhere in the bay. He could see the flickering of burning boats and the beams of the Harbour Police searchlights. Joshua swiftly climbed off the wrecked Sea Doo and crouched down behind it for cover. Searchlights swept the beach from the Harbour Police watercraft. Joshua heard the continued crack of rifle fire as the police shot down anyone that had escaped the confines of Cockatoo Island.

  Once the beams of the searchlights passed him by, Joshua stood up and quickly followed the fleeing Samantha up the rocky shore. He really didn’t have any kind of plan except to get as far away from Cockatoo Island as humanly possible. Joshua would focus on everything else when he felt safe enough. Right now, it appeared the people he hoped would save them were now trying to kill them.

  Samantha’s only thoughts were to get the hell off the beach and away from Joshua and all the other horrible shit that had plagued her this past weekend. She found herself sprinting up the side of the road and onto the highway. Samantha figured she’d flash her tits at some passing cars and get some old geezer to give her a ride home. Hearing the sound of a vehicle behind her, she turned, stepped into the road and reflexively lifted up her bikini top. Samantha didn’t see the big fire truck in time. The speeding emergency vehicle struck her head on at over sixty miles an hour. Samantha exploded like a giant watermelon. Her head flew off into the other lane of traffic, crushed beneath the wheels of an old VW hippie van. Whatever was left of the miserable young girls’ body was ground into a slushy, bloody mess as the fire truck continued down the highway. Sam’s blood-soaked bikini bottoms floated in the air for a few seconds before landing, with a wet slap, several feet away from where the young Maori stood.

  “Samantha!” Joshua dropped to his knees next to the highway, just stunned. Not that he really cared about her, but shocked at the suddenness of her death. Another fire truck, followed by a police cruiser sped past and over whatever was left of Samantha’s body, grinding her into the asphalt like some common roadkill. Joshua looked over at the crimson splattered thong that lay nearby. He remembered just hours ago how good Samantha looked in it. Now... now she was just a red paste on the roadway. The young Maori let out a loud wail of despair as he looked up into the sky. Sobbing uncontrollably, he dropped down to the sandy ground, his body fighting against the massive adrenaline dump. Shivering, Joshua curled up into a ball and passed out.

  About twenty minutes later the sounds of gunfire woke Joshua from his forced slumber. Groggy and still not sure what was going on, he glanced over his shoulder. The shots hadn’t come from the bay; they’d come from the shore.

  “What the fuck?” Joshua slowly stood up, still shaky from the adrenaline dump. That was when he noticed the black smoke clouds rising from inside the city. The sounds of distant emergency responder sirens and gunfire grew louder. “No!” Joshua shook his head. “No!” He walked back over to where the wrecked Sea Doo lay on the shoreline and grabbed the baton from where he’d stashed it inside. Joshua angrily flicked the baton open and turned and headed towards the besieged Sydney.

  THE END

  About the Authors

  Allen Gamboa is the demented mind behind The Zombie apocalypse series, Operation Zulu. He’s also been a contributor to the 5 Roads to Texas series.

  He’s a retired California Peace officer who spent his wayward years in the United States Air Force. He lives in Northern Nevada with his beautiful wife and kids. He loves everything horror and cake related.

  You can connect with Allen at allenkillszombies@yahoo.com

  Jason Wright is the CEO and Creative Director at Silent Studios Productions and has been in the PR, promotional, photographic and production industry for over 26 years. The company is best known for their work on jobs like Resident Evil 6 UK commercial and the Dead Island Riptide game launch, zombie wedding.

  He is perhaps better known for his zombie craving from which Silent Studios was born and has not only written the story Contamination and Underground, but has a few more in the wings which are due to be released over the next few years.

  Contributions towards many films and projects like Rise of Jengo, The Marauders, Vicious Dead, POV (Australia Short Film that won best film in Melbourne 2013) and many others have helped Jason and his team build their portfolio and accreditation in the horror world.

  Directing films is also a strength of Jason’s and at the moment amongst the projects he is involved in is TORTURE (2019), DEMON MIST (2013), ZOMBIE PLAYGROUND (2016) and ACID PIT STOP (2019) to name a few.

  Silent Studios Productions and Dead Silent Publishing have joined forces to publish a new type of horror styled books and with Jason and others from both companies they will produce two books a year and subsequent screenplays to be filmed by Silent Studios Productions in the future.

  You can contact Jason through the Silent Studios Website http://www.silent-studios.co.uk/

  Email on: jason@silent-studios.co.uk

  Official Face Book page Silent Studios can be found at:

  www.facebook.com/silentstudiosproductions

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  hive.