Zombie School

by Aaron Jenkins

I had no idea what it was.

  School was pretty much the same. I tried to stay low and not bring much attention to myself. I didn’t need Mr. Melbourne sending another message to my mentor on top of everything else. Plus, I didn’t want anyone to see that I had been patched. I didn’t want to have to try to explain that to anyone. I wasn’t the best of liars.

  “You still confined to hard labor?” Trevor asked me that Friday after school had ended. All week I had blown him off, telling him I was grounded until further notice. I told him to head to zone C alone and find something to do, but he didn’t think he would have much fun by himself.

  “Yeah,” I nodded. “I can’t go anywhere, Trev.”

  “Can’t you sneak out?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe. But I’m not going to.”

  “You’ve turned into a real drag since that night,” Trevor replied.

  “I screwed up. Bad. I could be dead right now. Or worse, a Stiff. If I screw up again, I will be. I just have to wait this out.”

  “Come on, man, your mentor’s not gonna report you. He may be tough, but he’s not like that. Besides, a night at the Hub is harmless.”

  “Maybe, but I can’t risk it. Why don’t you find someone else to go with you?”

  He knocked absently on the locker he was leaning against. “Nah, I don’t want to hang out with those oafs anyway. Maybe you can come to my place for a while.”

  “Your mentor won’t even let me step foot on the farm. Not after I cost our community the only human stock we had. I’m still sorry about that by the way.”

  He shrugged. “It’s my fault for having you do my work for me anyway. My mentor has been hounding me since then, making me show her the procedures step by step every day. Thanks for not telling her it was my idea to go tracking that night, or that I was there.”

  “No reason both of us should get into trouble,” I said passively.

  “Anyway, you got a wicked cool scar to show for it. Let me see it again.”

  I gave him an annoyed look. Then I parted my pale lips and grinned wickedly. I turned my left side to him and slid up my sleeve. The pale blue skin was cinched together by metal clamps, a little bruised, and the skin was rough and fractured around the edges. It was too cool.

  “Thriller,” Trevor said, running his finger along the ridges of the sutures.

  I folded my sleeve back over it. “Relax. I don’t want anyone to know.”

  “Man, I’d be showing it off to everyone.”

  “I don’t want to have to try to explain.”

  He nodded with understanding. “So I guess you’re gonna be in social purgatory for a while.”

  “Looks like it. It could be worse.”

  “How?”

  “I could be in zombie purgatory,” I replied.

 

  I went straight home after school. I rode the bus with Trevor until we reached our stop in square 1 and then walked the rest of the way home after seeing him to the farm. My mentor had forbidden me from riding my skateboard, and riding the bus was faster than walking.

  My mentor checked his pocket watch as I shuffled past the living room. He was always checking it when I came home, making sure I wasn’t late, making sure I knew he was paying attention and keeping an eye on me. It was getting annoying, but I guess I had earned it.

  “Zellner,” I heard him call after me.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m going straight upstairs to do my homework.”

  “I want to talk to you,” his voice returned.

  I cringed. The last thing I wanted was a conversation with my mentor. He hadn’t said much to me beyond lectures on proper human tracking protocol after he told me that he was going to have me patched, and that he would do his best to protect me from expulsion. I was smart enough to stay quiet and behave. After all the ways I had screwed up, the less I heard from my mentor, the better.

  I stepped into the living room. “Yes, sir?”

  “Have a seat, Zellner.”

  I swallowed. I sat in the seat across from him, the coffee table separating us. My mentor removed his glasses, folding in the temples and sliding them in his front pocket. His eyes were closed and his head was lowered in reflection. I squirmed in my seat. I couldn’t handle the anticipation. If he was going to have me locked away in the Stockade, then I’d want him to just tell me and get it over with.

  He opened his eyes, his good eye gazing fixedly at me, and the blank depth opposite it somehow gazing even more relentlessly.

  “Zellner,” he began. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while. And I wanted to ask you first. Do you want to be a human tracker?”

  The question caught me off guard. I blinked repeatedly, trying to elicit an answer, but finding myself unable to do so.

  My mentor leaned forward. “What I mean is, are you prepared to do the hard work and do you have the discipline to be a human tracker? Not to go out and break the rules by going to another zone where maybe there is more activity, but you don’t have jurisdiction in, and look for trouble. That’s not what a human tracker is.”

  “I know,” I replied.

  “You don’t seem to know. After everything I’ve taught you and tried to instill in you, you do something like this. What you’ve done is cause for expulsion, Zellner.”

  “I know.”

  “If I chose to report this, you would be exiled from Revenant, sentenced to the Stockade.”

  “I know.”

  “Is that all you have to say, Zellner?”

  “I don’t know what else to say.”

  My mentor sighed. “You still don’t understand, Zellner.”

  “Understand what?”

  “That there are consequences for your actions. That these things are serious. It worries me, Zellner. There are certain rules and laws in place for a reason. Because before they were in place it led to bedlam, and almost destroyed this town. Do you understand that?”

  “Yes,” I said sheepishly.

  “But you don’t really understand it. In theory, yes, but not in practice. No, not in practice. That’s pretty obvious,” he mumbled to himself. He looked up at me. “Mayor Hillard is having a demonstration tomorrow. You’ve never seen one of the mayor’s demonstrations, have you?”

  I shook my head. I had heard about them, but I was usually in school, or had better things to do, like hanging out with Trevor. I wasn’t that interested in listening to one of the zombie man’s longwinded speeches.

  “I think we should attend, you and I,” my mentor said. “I think it would be a good experience for you.”

  I shrugged mildly.

  “Tomorrow,” he said simply. “I think it will be enlightening.”

  It wasn’t an invitation I could deny. I waited for him to say something more, but he didn’t. “Sir?” He gazed up at me. “Why didn’t you report me? To the council and Mayor Hillard?”

  He twisted the face to one side in contemplation. “Because I haven’t given up on you. Not yet. There’s something there. It’s up to you to cultivate it. I can only do my best to put you in the right direction. Even though you broke the rules, there was no malice, no attempt to usurp or destroy. You just have to realize that there are consequences to breaking these rules. Tomorrow.”

  I nodded numbly.

  “Go on upstairs and study, Zellner.”

  I hesitated, wanting to say something more.

  “Zellner,” he said sternly. “That was not a request.”

  I sighed with frustration. I stood and sulked out of the room.

  Zombie probation sucked.

  20. THE ZOMBIE MAN

  My mentor woke me after dawn, shortly after he had returned from his human tracking expedition. I wasn’t accustomed to waking up early on weekends, and I stirred myself to consciousness languidly and sullenly. The mayor’s demonstration would be that morning, at the town square in zone C. I dressed slowly and met my mentor in the living room, after feeding on my morning brain morsel. I felt a little more alert afterward, and my me
ntor quickly hustled me off toward the bus station. We rode the bus silently, my mentor sitting rigid and reading from his weekly copy of the Zombie Times. The bus arrived in zone C and he hurried me off toward the town square.

  It looked different during the day. It was mild and austere, and the buildings weren’t nearly as inviting without the soft electric glow sheltering them at night. The buildings’ facades faded into the background of the white sky, making them ordinary and dull looking. At night zone C smelled of freshly fried meat and electricity and vigorous death. This morning it smelled only like rotting flesh.

  The zone’s streets and sidewalks were a bustle of activity, Wakes streaming up and down them, attired in suit, ties and other business wear. All business was conducted here, since it was the only zone with power, and the government offices were at the far end of the zone. Zone C was the central area of Revenant, surrounded on all sides by the seven other zones that had been sectioned off after the town was founded. Each zone had a community leader who reported back to the mayor and was responsible for maintaining the peace, safety, and production of the area.

  We arrived at the town square as they were finishing setting up the stage. To the right of the stage was a large crate that looked almost like a garage, with a big door that flipped open, and at the front of the stage was a podium and microphone, with two speakers set up at each edge. Wakes had already begun to assemble before the stage, and my mentor pulled me through the throng to try to get me closer to the front. I didn’t know much about the mayor’s demonstrations and I had never really bothered to learn. Politics were boring, and as far as I was concerned, had little consequence