Hell Hath No Fury...

by Elsa Carruthers

  Slowly, she led him outside, through the barn door. Peter walked with timid steps, and he held up his arm when the sunlight hit his face, moaning. Annie giggled. For the first time in a long time, Peter seemed happy.

  She led him out to the meadow next to the barn. She’d been worried about ticks, and sprayed herself with Deep Woods Off—she certainly didn’t want to deal with Lyme disease again, not after the summer she’d been having—but decided that Peter would probably be okay. His skin was a mottled, grey color, with blackish-purple sores sprinkled across his arms and legs, and she figured the ticks would probably leave him alone.

  She watched him, heart soaring, as Peter’s mouth widened. A barn cat had joined them in the field, and was rubbing against the tattered remains of Peter’s Levis. He grunted, seeming to delight in the feline’s attentions. Peter leaned over and scooped the cat up into his festering claws. He sank his teeth into the cat’s muzzle with one quick chomp.

  Annie gave a sharp tug at the nose ring with the gaff, and watched in horror as the ring pulled through the rotting flesh of his nose, falling off the end of the hook onto the grass with a plunk. Peter continued to gnaw on the cat’s head, sucking brains out through the holes where the cat’s eyes had been a moment before. Annie let out a shriek in spite of herself, and Peter looked at her, raising his eyebrows. He spotted the ring on the ground, and this time—Annie was sure—he was smiling, a wide, toothy, hideous grin. She pulled the pistol out of her waistband, flipped off the safety, and took aim.

  “Peter,” she sighed. “I don’t want to do this, honey. Please just go back in the barn quietly, and we can get back to our normal routine.”

  Peter straightened up, dropping the corpse and brushing cat hair off of his threadbare jeans. He continued to smile, and took a hesitant step towards her.

  “Please don’t,” Annie begged. “I don’t want to hurt you. I love you so much; please don’t make me blow your head off.”

  “Ahh-naaaa,” Peter groaned.

  Annie let the gun fall to her side, stunned.

  “Did you…did you just say my name?” she whispered.

  “Ahh-naa!” Peter repeated, edging closer, holding out his arms towards her. “Ahh-naa!” He stopped, cocked his head, and winked.

  Tears started to stream down Annie’s face as she stepped in to his arms. Peter was back; he still loved her, and everything was going to be okay. Her soulmate had returned to her, and…ugh. She recoiled a little in spite of herself. The smell of rotting flesh was repulsive, and her stomach lurched. She struggled to pull away, but Peter held on to her tighter as she squirmed.

  Annie started to scream, shrieking in a high-pitched, guttural wail at the top of her lungs. The last sound she heard was the cracking of her skull as Peter bit down to feed.

  Jennifer Allis Provost is a native New Englander who lives in a sprawling colonial along with her beautiful and precocious twins, a dog, two birds, three cats, and a wonderful husband who never forgets to buy ice cream. As a child, she read anything and everything she could get her hands on, including a set of encyclopedias, but fantasy was always her favorite. She spends her days drinking vast amounts of coffee, arguing with her computer, and avoiding any and all domestic behavior.

  True love never dies…especially in a world overrun by ravenous zombies! Zombie Love Song paints a terrifying picture of a nightmarish future where a totalitarian government actively performs cruel scientific experiments upon a poverty-stricken populace and undead “mutes” roam the landscape searching for a way to quench their insatiable hunger.

  Filled with dystopian social metaphors, ghoulish zombie imagery, frantic plot twists, and just the right amount of carnage, Zombie Love Song transports the reader on a thrilling journey that reveals how the apocalypse can somehow be less terrifying than the prospect of being without someone you love.

  Will our desperate heroine be reunited with her lost love before the “mutes” devour what’s left of humanity one bite at a time?

  Zombie Love Song

  By Jennifer Allis Provost

  I ran onto the porch and slammed the door; luckily, it was wood, not a flimsy screen. Still, it wouldn’t hold for long, not against what I was running from. I started to drag a wicker loveseat in front of the door, but stopped halfway. Not only did the door open out, the mutes could easily vault over the loveseat and grab me. Their prey.

  I flopped down on the cracked plastic cushions and released a cloud of all the dust that ever was. I hacked and sputtered until I could breathe and my vision cleared, only to come face to face with one of the monsters I was trying to evade. I shrieked as I fired my crossbow and dove behind the loveseat in one smooth movement, just barely covering my head as the remains of the creature splattered cold and wet across my back and neck.

  The first thing I noticed was the lack of smell; mutes had a rank odor about them that made a trash pit seem like a lovely place to lay your head, and the stench only intensified once they were dead. Cautiously, I lowered my arms and looked around, and then I noticed the splooge that covered me was orange. Pumpkin orange.

  Feeling like the village idiot, I stood and confronted my victim. I had just killed a jack o’ lantern and was now covered in a sticky, squashy mess. As I retrieved the bolt from the ruined vegetable, I took in the rest of the porch, decked out with paper skeletons and strings of bat-shaped lights. The irony of a zombie apocalypse occurring the weekend before Halloween was not lost on me.

  Of course, we didn’t call them zombies. Not in public where a Guardian could hear us, not indoors when our residence might be bugged, but we all thought it. The government called them mutations; we called them mutes. They were the result of too many people and not enough work. Instead of creating jobs, the government would offer to pay all your expenses if you signed the necessary paperwork to let them experiment on you. Then, instead of toiling away like the rest of us, you spent your days doing—well, I don’t know what. I’ve never not worked.

  But all the experiments had to do was exist, and take whatever drugs or gasses or tests the government foisted upon them. Sometimes, the drugs were good, and idiots became intelligent while bald men grew hair. Some lost hair, like my mom’s friend Lupi did. She had a beard, but after taking government drugs, it fell out. Then her skin turned purple, but a very nice shade.

  When the drugs were bad, you got mutes. They didn’t talk, or think, or do anything but eat. They didn’t care if their prey was alive or dead or rotting, they just wanted something to snack on. Every so often, we’d find one gnawing on a chipmunk or pigeon at the edge of the city, then the Guardians would come and collect the poor sap. Not that it mattered, since the mutes were technically dead.

  I admit, I have a hard time wrapping my mind around that one. Near as I can understand, the drug kills your body, but due to some mind-body disconnect your body doesn’t know it’s dead. I never knew that my body needed to know if it was alive or not, but I guess so. Who am I to argue with government scientists?

  This wave of mutes came at the tail end of the best weekend of my life. I met him Friday night at The Club, the local dive where kids who had just turned legal hung out until they found the nice places. I’d been sitting near the back with my usual crew when he walked in, wearing a plain black hoodie that he somehow made sexy. I’d never seen him before, but I knew the two he was with, and I made a beeline towards the threesome.

  “I’m Jesse,” he said, before I could ask either of our mutual friends. “Wanna get out of here?”

  I sure did. I can’t even tell you what we did that night other than we were together, talking about everything and nothing. Around midnight we ended up lying on the hood of his car, wrapped in a blanket while we watched the night sky. We spent Saturday and Sunday night the same way; somehow the warmth of Jesse’s arms kept me from caring about my cold, aching joints.

  Monday morning rolled around, the gray rain in stark contrast to the beautiful sun we’d enjoyed all weekend. I mentioned that these were the w
orst days for me, since the constant drizzle would keep my herd of siblings inside and driving me nuts, when Jesse said he would call into work. His mom and sister would be out all day, and we’d be able to curl up on the couch and drink cocoa.

  “Won’t you be punished?” I asked. Missing work was a serious offense in the New Republic, with punishments ranging from reduced wages to public humiliation. A few weeks ago, someone I work with left early without getting the proper form signed. The next day, he was flogged in the town square until his back was shredded and dripping red.

  I did not want Jesse flogged, not for me or anything.

  “I’ll be fine,” he said, flashing me that smile that had won me over from the moment we met. “I get a few sick days.”

  “Won’t your pay get docked?”

  “S’alright,” he replied. Still, I tried to talk him out of it; I didn’t like the idea of him losing money, or possibly his job, but he hushed me. “Listen, I’ll be fine. I’ve never used a sick day before. I’m not a habitual offender.”

  A smile spread across my face. Jesse was using his first sick day ever just to hang out with me, and I don’t think anything could have made me happier. “Well, just this once,” I replied.

  We left his car in the community lot. Vehicles weren’t allowed near the residences, not since the bombings orchestrated by the rebellion a few years back. They hadn’t happened near here, but we all bore the brunt of the rebels’ punishments, the least of which was that no personal vehicles were allowed within two miles of a residence. Since I normally walk everywhere (a personal vehicle is something my family just can’t afford) the two mile trek didn’t bother me, but the drizzle steadily increased to a cold rain. By the time we reached Jesse’s house, my fingers were numb and my teeth chattered away in my skull.

  “You look like a drowned rat,” observed Jesse’s sister after a quick introduction.

  “Manners, pest,” Jesse said as he playfully swatted her shoulder, and their mother apologized. Then they left, sister for school, and mom for work.

  “Where does your mom work? In one of the factories?” I asked. Most of the working mothers did factory work since the government aligned the shifts to mirror those of the school. The mill even had a daycare for those with small children.

  “Nah, an office,” he replied. “C’mon, I’ll get you something dry to wear.”

  And so we trekked soggy footprints across the carpet as Jesse led me to his room. I noticed that his residence was nice, far larger and in better shape than mine. I lived near the border, and while the walls were sound and the roof didn’t leak, that was about all we got. We had a separate kitchen and bathroom, and everything else was crammed into one large room with no closets or windows. Add the constant noise from the neighbors, and you have a recipe for madness.

  Jesse’s place, on the other hand, had what appeared to be several bedrooms (An actual room just for sleeping! What luxury!) and the hallway was carpeted. Carpet! He led me to a tiny, well-organized room, which I surmised was his by the black hoodie tossed across the bed. He rummaged around in his closet for a minute, then held out a flannel shirt and sweats.

  “I’m okay,” I said as I waved them away. Wearing Jesse’s clothes was a bit too intimate.

  “Hey.” He put his hand on the nape of my neck; despite the cold rain his skin was warm and dry. “You’re shivering. Just put them on, okay?” I nodded, and he pressed a kiss to my forehead. “Do you want to take a shower to warm up first?”

  At first I thought he was kidding. I was already cold and wet, thus negating my need for a shower…unless they had reliable hot water. Huh. Hot water. Separate bedrooms. With closets. Carpeting.

  “You have hot water?” I asked, and he nodded. “Are you rich or something?” I demanded. Not that I have anything against rich people. They just tended to work for the government and be total scumbags.

  “Or something,” Jesse replied. “We get this place ‘cause of my old man’s job. He works for the electric company, so he rigged up a hot water heater.”

  Electric company. I could accept that explanation, for now, just like I accepted those dry clothes. Jesse grabbed another set of sweats and left to change in the bathroom, instructing me to hang my sodden clothes over the door and meet him in the kitchen. When I did, I found him waist deep in a cabinet.

  “About that cocoa,” he said, his voice echoing in the depths of the cabinet. “The cupboard seems to be bare.” He held up a cocoa tin and turned it upside down to prove its emptiness. His head was still behind the door, so he couldn’t see the huge grin on my face. The empty cabinets and lack of cocoa proved he was like me, just a regular citizen trying to scrape by, not a rich boy slumming at The Club.

  “But I did find some tea,” he declared as he emerged from the pantry holding the box aloft like a trophy. “You look good in my clothes,” he said as he caught sight of me. The waist on the pants was so large that the drawstring bunched it up like a paper bag, and the shirt came to my knees.

  “I look like an elephant,” I corrected. Jesse shook his head as he folded me into his arms.

  “Only I get to see you like this,” he murmured, “which means that this outfit is my favorite.” Then he kissed me, soft and sweet, and I was so not cold anymore. When we parted, he held me a bit away from him, his brown eyes searching my face with such intensity it made me uncomfortable.

  “Tea?” I asked lightly.

  “Tea it is,” he said, and in no time we were snuggled on the family couch with a ratty old afghan and two steaming mugs of tea. The well-worn furnishings reinforced Jesse’s claim of not being rich, and I let myself relax against him. While he fought with the ancient Picture Vision in his quest for a gladiator movie, I burrowed further under the blanket, feeling so warm and content I was asleep before Jesse found good reception.

  When I woke in the unfamiliar room, I stiffened, only my eyes darting about. All children were taught that the government could take you at any time, for any reason, and if you should find yourself in such a situation the best defense was cooperation. Then I saw our empty mugs, and remembered that I was in Jesse’s house. I didn’t fight the yawn as I stretched, trying to work out the crick in my neck. My hair was still damp from the rain, and I remembered Jesse’s offer of a shower. A hot shower.

  I got up from the couch and discovered that Jesse wasn’t in the kitchen, so I padded down the hallway to his room. He wasn’t there, either. I also noticed that my clothes were gone, along with Jesse’s jeans and hoodie. Figuring that he was called into work, I headed toward the bathroom, the promise of a steaming shower calling my name.

  Imagine my surprise when I found Jesse lounging in a tub of bubbles.

  “You are rich!” I shrieked. I tried to storm out, but in an instant, Jesse leapt from the tub and blocked the bathroom door, dripping water and bubbles everywhere.

  “Sit and let me talk to you,” he said. I tried to glare at him over my shoulder, but those brown eyes got me again. I sat on the toilet, and Jesse crouched before me, his soapy hands taking mine. “Ask me whatever you want to know.”

  “Are you rich?” I asked.

  “No,” he replied with a small laugh.

  “Then explain this house, these bedrooms, all this hot water!” I demanded, my hands gesturing wildly at the tub. “If you aren’t rich, you must be a—” I stopped, because what he was—what he had to be—was too awful to accuse anyone of.

  “Go ahead,” he said softly. “Say it.”

  “Guardian,” I finished. “You’re a Guardian.”

  “Yeah.” That was all he said, one word to explain how he was a government flunky, how it was his job to round up the undesirables, experiments gone astray, little kids out after dark. A Guardian.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, snatching my hands away. “And what did you do with my clothes?”

  “I put them in the dryer,” he explained.

  “A special Guardian dryer?” I snapped.

  “No. A regular
dryer. My dad really works for the electric company.” He rose up on his knees, so his face was level with mine, and tried to nudge my chin towards him. I refused to budge, so he wiggled between the toilet and the wall. “Mina, don’t be like this. I didn’t tell you because I wanted you to get to know the real me, not just assume I’m one of those assholes.”

  “You are one of those assholes,” I pointed out.

  “No, I’m not.” He tried to tilt my chin towards him again; this time, I let him. “There are lots of Guard-ians. I patrol schools, keep the pervs and mutes away. I’m not allowed to round anybody up. I don’t hurt anyone. Seriously.” He smoothed back my hair, and got suds in my ear. “A lot of Guardians are jerks, that’s true. I only became one for my family.”

  “You did?”

  “After my mom had my sister, she wasn’t doing too good. We couldn’t afford medical care unless we got on a government plan. My dad was too old, so I signed up.”

  That was true; the government offered not only great pay, but medical benefits. You got to see real doctors, not half-baked witch doctors selling snake oil. “How much longer do you have to serve?”

  “As long as I want,” he replied. “Someday, I’ll quit.”

  “Someday?” He nodded. I could work with someday. “How do I know you mean it?”

  “What if I tell you something that almost no one knows? That I’ve never told anyone?”

  “Guardian secrets?” I teased.

  “Better!” he insisted, grinning at me.

  “I’ll be the judge of that.” He put his hands on my shoulders and gazed very intently into my eyes. I would have bought the serious act if he hadn’t laughed a bit.