The Zombie Chronicles - Book 5 - Undead Nightmare (Apocalypse Infection Unleashed Series)

by Peebles, Chrissy

  When my gaze turned to Lucas, I couldn’t help but notice that he was in worse shape than he’d ever admit to any of us. Droplets of sweat rolled down his blotchy red face, and I knew he was burning up. “Lucas looks horrible,” I whispered. “We need to find shelter and some meds…and quick.”

  Nick felt Lucas’s clammy forehead grimaced. “How you doin’, buddy?”

  “I feel like I’m inside an oven,” Lucas whispered.

  “You guys stay here with him,” Nick said to me, Claire, and Jackie. “I’ll take Val, Kate, and Asia to find a secure place and look for some kind of antibiotics. Be careful. We’ll be back soon.”

  “Got it,” I said, giving him no argument, and the four of them walked away.

  ***

  About an hour later, Nick came back and led us to the local Bureau of Motor Vehicles office, a cold, nasty place that even zombies apparently avoided; all things considered, we couldn’t really blame them. “We didn’t find any gassed-up cars, but we’re bound to find one somewhere in this town.”

  We laid Lucas down on the bench in the waiting area, and he groaned as he tried to get comfortable.

  Behind the counter were a few desks, and the place was only dimly lit by the light coming in through the high windows; it was somewhat of an added bonus that the windows weren’t too low to the ground.

  “We could probably spend the night here with no trouble,” Kate asked.

  “I-I don’t know about that,” Lucas stammered.

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s hotter than the lake of fire in here, and the air conditioner is on the fritz,” he said, giving her a weak half-smile.

  I had to admire the guy; even burning up with a fever, facing a zombie apocalypse, and suffering from a possibly life-threatening infection, he still had jokes.

  “Shh,” Val said, moving the hair off his sweaty forehead. “It’s hot because you’re burning up and the air conditioner isn’t working because there’s no electricity. You need to rest,” she said in a more nurturing tone.

  “Let’s just find the lab,” Jackie said. “Lucas can rest here, and when we find some wheels and the medicine he needs, we’ll come back to get him. We’ll all be much safer once we’re on the road.”

  Lucas began to laugh deliriously.

  “Gosh. His fever is getting the best of him,” Val said. “We’ve gotta hurry and—”

  “No, no…it isn’t that,” he stammered. “It’s just that…she’s, uh…talking about grand theft auto while we’re sitting in the BMV. Don’t you find that…isn’t it a little…ironic,” he said, but he couldn’t even smile this time, and his eyes began to roll back in his head.

  “Lucas!” Val screamed, gently rubbing his forehead. She looked up at us in desperation. “Like I said, we’ve gotta hurry.”

  “I don’t wanna stay in this town,” Asia said. “I’m all for hauling our butts out of here. Can’t we just find a vehicle, and then get Lucas some medicine once we get to the lab? They’re bound to have antibiotics and Lucas can rest in the car. Prancing around town looking for a pharmacy is wasting time.”

  “What if we stay the night and search this place high and low and turn up nothing?” Kate said. “We definitely know the lab will have medicine.”

  Jackie sighed. “The lab is not a pharmacy.”

  Val shook her head. “We need medicine now. I don’t think waiting until we get to the lab is a good idea. Especially with all the problems we could run into, like herds or downed trees blocking roads, it could take two or three days to get to the lab. And what if we have to hide out for a few days for some unknown reason? Lucas could be…it might be too late for him by then.”

  “Val’s right,” Claire said. “We didn’t plan on staying at that nursing home, but the flood and the storm forced us to. Something like that could easily happen again. We can’t take any chances with Lucas’s wellbeing.”

  “I won’t risk Lucas’s life,” Nick said. “He’s my best friend.”

  Lucas’s eyes finally fluttered back open. “Why couldn’t they have stabbed me back at the old folks home? That place had an entire pharmacy.”

  “Murphy’s Law,” I said, trying to lighten the mood.

  He closed his eyes as sweat dripped down his chin. “Yeah…go figure.”

  “There’s gotta be a pharmacy or drugstore here somewhere, right?” I said.

  “Sure,” Val said. “If worse comes to worst, we could find a vet. They have antibiotics for animals.”

  “Very funny, Val,” Lucas whispered. “I know you don’t think all that highly of me, but calling me a dog is just—”

  “Hush,” she scolded. “I’m serious. We’d just have to adjust the dosage, that’s all.”

  “I’m so sorry to be such a pain,” Lucas said, breathing heavily.

  “You’re not,” she said.

  “I’m seeing stars,” he said, barely conscious. “Lots and lots of light and stars. I think I’m…”

  “Lucas?” Val asked, shaking him a bit. She looked up at us in a panic. “He’s out cold,” she said frantically. “We need to find him some medicine ASAP, or we’re gonna lose him.”

  Nick’s gaze hardened for a moment, as if he was ready for battle. “Claire, can you stay with Lucas so he can rest?”

  “Uh…sure,” she said, sounding a bit nervous.

  “Good. We’ll leave you with the gun, but you should be pretty safe in here. The rest of you, let’s split up in two teams,” he said. “Dean, you take Val and Kate, and Jackie and Asia can come with me.”

  Val glanced up at him. “So what? You trust me now?”

  “You shouldn’t take it personally, sis. That serum was coursing through your veins, and we just didn’t know what it was gonna do to you.” His gaze drifted to me and Kate. “Keep a close eye on her, little brother.”

  “Nick, you know I’d never hurt them,” Val said softly.

  “Not intentionally,” he said, “but things are different now. Not everything is in our control.”

  “Right,” she said. She gently laid Lucas’s hand on his chest and got up.

  We said our goodbyes to Claire, Nick, and Asia, and as soon as my brother deemed it was clear, the two girls and I made our way outside. I stopped in the doorway to kiss Jackie goodbye, and as soon as the others disappeared around the corner of the building, I motioned my team to take off in the other direction.

  We hid in a group of bushes, then darted across the street into a patch of towering ferns. A light thud from behind made me swing around, my heart thumping, but I was relieved to find that it was only coming from branches swaying in the wind, hitting the shutters behind me. We weaved slowly between trees, cars, buildings, and vegetation, until we turned the corner and saw a building with a huge, horizontal, black-tinted window. Small, tinted windows were on each side, but all the glass was littered with bullet holes. The sign above the front door read, “Max and Tina’s.”

  Kate pointed straight ahead. “I say we start right there,” she whispered.

  “We need antibiotics,” I said, “not a cheeseburger.”

  “A cheeseburger sounds good to me,” she said, “but what we really need is a phonebook to look up the address of the pharmacy so we don’t waste time hunting for the darn thing.”

  I sighed. “This town isn’t that big,” I said.

  “I know, but every precious second counts,” Kate said. “You saw how bad Lucas looked back there.”

  “She’s right,” Val said. “Some Yellow Pages would be great, since we can’t exactly Google it.” She peered in through the small bullet holes. “I don’t see anything. I’m gonna go in and check it out.”

  “Lemme just double-check,” Val said, glancing in one more time “I don’t see anything moving around, but we need to break out a window just to be sure.”

  Kate spun around. “Don’t break the big one. It’ll make way too much noise.”

  Nodding in agreement, I swung the bat at one of the smaller windows, shattering the glass.


  “Nice, slugger,” Val said, clapping.

  Blood dripped from my hand, and I wiped it on my jeans.

  “Whoa! Are you all right?” Kate said.

  “Meh, it may as well be a paper cut. I’m fine. Can you stay out here as a lookout?”

  “Sure,” Kate said bravely, squinting against the sunlight. “Got plenty of practice doing that last night while you were up on the roof with As—”

  “Good. Thanks,” I said, cutting her off. “C’mon, Val.” I kicked out the rest of the glass so my sister could crawl in, and then I followed behind her.

  Inside the restaurant, the stench of rot was overwhelming. My boots crunched glass with every step I took, and as I glanced around, I gripped the bat tight in my hands.

  “Looks like there’s an office upstairs,” Val said.

  “It’s too big of a risk to take just for a phonebook.”

  “True.”

  “You see any flashlights, guns, weapons, or ammo? Anything we might be able to use?” I asked, knowing she had spectacular night vision.

  “Nope, nothing like that.”

  “Just our luck.” As soon as the words left my mouth, I heard a noise coming from the back, and my senses went into overdrive. “What the heck was that?”

  She let out a long breath. “Trust me, you don’t wanna know.”

  “Let’s go. We don’t have time to fight zombies unnecessarily,” I said, tugging at her sleeve.

  She didn’t answer, and everything was suddenly quiet—too quiet.

  “Val,” I whispered, “what do you see?”

  “Zombies.”

  My stomach clenched. “Then let’s get outta here! I know this is a restaurant, but I don’t wanna be on the menu.”

  She gripped my shoulder. “They’re dead, Dean.”

  “Really? Then what was that noise?”

  “Like I said, you don’t wanna know.”

  “Val, could you quit with the riddles? What the heck is it?”

  “A rat, nibbling on—”

  “Fine. You’re right,” I said, holding up my hand to stop her; I didn’t need any more visuals because I had enough nightmares already. “I don’t wanna know.”

  “Told you.” She paused, then continued. “Looks like there was some kind of battle in here. All their heads are missing.”

  “Good. That’s one for the home team,” I said. In the dim light, I walked over a headless torso with mangled arms, then made my way to the wooden hostess stand. “There’s gotta be a phonebook here somewhere,” I said, rummaging through menus and papers. I was no stranger to dead bodies, but I did occasionally feel pity for the zombified humans. I only hoped the decapitated former humans were in a better place, because I was sure living a zombie existence had to be an unending nightmare. They really were better off dead.

  “Found it!” Val said, holding up a very thin phonebook. She hurriedly leafed through it, turning to the page where the drugstores were listed. “There’re only two in this town, one inside a grocery store and another on, uh…Hunt Street. It’s called Oliver’s Pharmacy.”

  “Is there any kind of map?” I asked.

  She flicked through the pages until she found one in the back. “Looks like the grocery store’s closest, about a half-mile from here. We can get there in just a few—”

  She was cut off by a moan echoing from outside, and a cold chill shot through me. “Kate!” I yelled. I rushed to the window and crawled out it.

  Outside, three corpses lay at Kate’s feet. The one closest to her was twitching its long, green fingers. Clutching her crowbar, Kate leapt into action, swinging her arms down and finishing it off with one solid blow to the temple.

  “Looks like you’ve got things under control out here,” I said, happy to see that the girl could handle her business.

  “Geesh, some people.” She smiled at me and shrugged. “I tried to tell him this restaurant’s out of business, but he didn’t seem to wanna listen. Then again, maybe that’s because one of his buddies already gnawed off both of his ears.”

  Val shrugged, then looked at me. “Why do blondes get to have all the fun?”

  I chuckled, and we headed in the direction of the pharmacy. The town seemed empty as we walked in silence down the sidewalk, ever cautious, passing broken fences, cracked windows, and brown lawns overrun with thick, green weeds, dandelions, and thistles. We hurried past abandoned vehicles, filthy streets, and piles of litter. The smell of animal feces was so strong as we passed one building that I gagged. The only thing missing were tumbleweeds rolling down the empty, lifeless roads.

  A gust of wind blew a tattered graduation card past my feet. I stared down at the picture of a graduation cap and grew very sad. Broken dreams, darkness, and nightmares were all that was left, but I intended to change that. I had to make sure to get that serum in the hands of the experts so it could be modified and save the world from zombies and hybrids and all that unnecessary death and chaos.

  When we turned a corner, I caught sight of a huge, raggedy garden. In the center was a fountain, empty except for some brown, stagnant water in the bottom, its stone angels covered in mildew, surrounded by the remnants of dead flowers. Standing beside it was a zombie with wild eyes, clutching a limp, lifeless cardinal. Its chomping jaws bit into the bright red feathers as it tried to take a huge bite, but the second it caught the sight of us, it decided it would rather have a meatier meal than poultry. It dropped the poor bird and limped in our direction, reaching its rotting arms toward us. Stumbling on the strewn garbage, its tongue smacked, and it drooled in hunger, a stick, green stream of slime pouring from its chomping jaws.

  I gripped my bat and ran at the corpse and kicked its right knee cap out, causing it to fall sideways with a grunt. The air split as I swung fully at lightning speed, thrusting all my anger into the zombie. It was dead in seconds.

  “Good job,” Val said.

  “You rock,” Kate said, her blue eyes twinkling in the bright light.

  The blood- and slime-stained bat suddenly felt cold and heavy in my hands, and my face showed no expression. I felt cold and heartless as the girls motioned me forward. I’d killed it without a shred of remorse. I’d never felt—or not felt—that way before, and I didn’t like how natural it had come. Have I grown as cold and disconnected as Nick? I worried. Am I becoming…someone different?

  “There’s the grocery store,” Kate said, pointing to a relatively small market.

  Val peeked in the big front window, and I pressed my face against the glass. It was hard to see because it was so dark inside, so Val’s serum-enhanced vision again came in handy. “I don’t see anything, and I mean that literally. The shelves are completely bare.”

  “I’m sure survivalists went after all the food and supplies, but I highly doubt they cleared out the antibiotics,” Kate said, peering inside.

  “Let’s hope not,” Val said as she began to pry the double-doors open. “Give me some help, would ya?”

  We all started pushing on the doors and managed to slide them apart just wide enough to slip through.

  “Well, I stood guard last time,” Kate said. “No fair that Dean gets to do all the exploring.”

  Val chuckled. “Dean,” she said, “looks like it’s your turn to play lookout. I would, but she’s gonna need my freaky eyes in there.”

  I nodded as the girls slipped inside the dark store. Glancing around, I scanned the empty streets. Fallen leaves in autumn colors swirled in the air, cluttering the roads, lawns, and sidewalks in front of old buildings, shops, and a beautiful church. The stained-glass windows of the chapel glistened in the sunlight, and the bell tower brought back memories. I could still remember the sound of the church bells ringing out, still see my mother in her beautiful red dress and heels. I recalled a special Mother’s Day, when I’d written her a poem and a plant I’d potted for her in Sunday school with my own hands. As I gazed up at that dreary, lonely bell tower, I remembered my mother’s beaming smile, and the sentimental words she
’d spoken to me that day came to mind: “Dean, you have the biggest heart of anyone I’ve known. You always care more about other people than you do about yourself. You’re unique and special, and I’m proud to call you my son. I love your zest for life, your enthusiasm when taking on challenges, and the young man you are becoming. I love you so much, honey, and I can’t imagine my life without you.”

  The memory of those words hit me hard. Now, my mother had no idea if I was alive, if any of us were. My heart sank as I realized how sad she had to be, how terrified for us, wondering if the cure had worked. I knew she feared for Lucas too. Lucas was Nick’s best friend, but his mother had been a lifelong friend of ours, so it had come as no surprise when she asked our mother to be Lucas’s godmother, and Mom thought of Lucas as one of her own. If only there were a way to get word to her that we’re all okay.

  My emotions surged as I continued staring at the bell tower. I hoped my parents and grandmother were okay, and I said a quick prayer and asked God to keep them safe and to somehow bring them comfort. My parents were my role models, and if not for their endless support and encouragement, I wouldn’t have been who I was. Even there, in that horrible ghost town, with a good friend possibly dying and my sister and other friends half-zombified, I could feel my parents’ love and support urging me on, telling me to keep fighting and to never give up. I missed my family, but it felt like a lifetime had passed since we’d left the island. Even in the short time I’d been away, I felt like I was becoming a different person. Do I still have that big heart my mother loves so much, I wondered, or am I just a killer now, cold and calculating, like one of the zombies themselves? I could only hope I was still the young man my mother loved so much, one she’d still be proud of.

  A twig snapped behind me, and I swallowed a lump in my throat as I spun around on the ball of my foot. I swung my arms back, gripping the bat tightly. Garbled sounds rang in my ears as a grotesquely decomposing zombie lumbered toward me. Bloodstains spotted its face and white shirt, and its head drooped as it tromped along, its hands hanging at its sides. It reached for me, but just before it could grab me, I spun and landed a kick straight into its rotting chest. As it staggered back, I delivered another powerful blow with my boot, this one slamming into its ribs. It landed hard, and I put it out of its misery once and for all.