Call Me Zombie: Volume I: Rose

by Jasmina Kuenzli

  “He can’t be more than 13,” I say to the girl next to me. “Why is he in charge?”

  “14.” Tavi, a girl with long black hair in a braid, corrects me. “And don’t let him hear you say that. Boy is the picture of teenage angst.”

  “But she trusts him?” I nod at Malia, who’s leaning down to let him whisper in her ear.

  “Oh he’s a total genius when it comes to sneaking around. He actually followed me back from a food-gathering trip in Yorktown. I didn’t even notice.” She snorts. “Don’t ask how long it took to try to live that down.”

  A boy with sandy blonde hair and wide brown eyes trots up and punches her on the shoulder. “I’m never letting you live it down. You got followed home by a child, and you didn’t even see him. You, Tavi— “

  “Shut up right now, Soren, or I swear to God I’ll tell them about the way you and Traina met.”

  Soren shuts up at once, his face turning a furious shade of red.

  “Oh wait, I want to hear this story,” I watch the flush creep all the way up to Soren’s ears. “Sounds juicy.”

  “Let me just put it like this,” Mikey says, running a hand over his bald head. “They got to know each other very well.”

  “It was an accident,” Soren mumbles. “I didn’t know anyone was around.”

  “She thought you were insane.” Mikey, a man who looks almost as old as Jeffrey, though that could be the baldness, laughs.

  “She had good reason,” Traina says, walking up. “But I gotta say, Soren, yours was the first penis I’ve seen in a while.”

  “Wait, how old are you guys?” they seem a little young to be talking about this, but maybe they’re older.

  “I’m 20,” Mikey says. “Traina’s 15, Soren’s 16, and Tavi’s— “

  “Tavi is ageless, like the sun,” Tavi says.

  “That doesn’t even make any sense. The sun is, like, 4 billion years old.”

  “And at what point does something become so old that it is basically ageless?” Tavi asks. Traina rolls her eyes.

  “How old are you, really?” I ask.

  Tavi bats her eyelashes.

  “I’ll never tell.” She looks about twenty.

  “It doesn’t matter anyway. It’s not like anyone’s more or less qualified to do this sort of thing.” This comes from Soren, watching Tavi with a fascination that lends a second meaning to his words.

  Tavi doesn’t notice. “True, my young naked friend.” Soren’s face is now approaching the color of a stop sign.

  “He’s so cute when he blushes,” Mikey says, reaching over to pinch Soren’s cheek.

  “Stop it,” Soren bats his hand away, and the boys start play-fighting, slapping at each other, until Malia calls out, “Hey idiots, we’re going incognito here!”

  They stop immediately, and we proceed in silence. I blink for a few seconds, trying to banish the image of two other boys, one older and one younger, the incessant bantering, chattering, poking, fighting.

  I shake my head, wiling myself back to the present, checking my weapons. I’m taking a handgun and a few knives. I go over the throwing techniques I learned, with them and alone, in the dead of early morning when the Turk was asleep. One foot in front, one behind. Focus on the target. Draw an arm back. Throw with your whole body.

  We’re approaching the town square now, and my mind breaks away from maneuvers to flash back to the night I met Malia and all the rest, walking into a church with anger in my heart, yelling my defiance at the sky, explosions like fireworks, blood and fire. Feeling alive for the first time in months, Perce’s lips against mine in the midst of shouting and cheering. The happy exhaustion of afterwards.

  But that was before Levi. That was before yesterday, and a boy who wasn’t a boy but who yelled like one, lost and bleeding, screaming my name over and over, until he turned into a monster and I shot him. A boy who became a monster, who became black blood and guts on the ground and a nightmare that I’m afraid will come more in waking than in sleeping.

  What happened with Perce feels far away when I’m out here, facing what I’ve been trying so hard, with routine and kisses and dishes and everything else, to escape.

  ***

  I smell them before I see them.

  It never occurred to me how many corpses we left behind, how many zombies we left lying on the ground. The churchgoers all departed not long after the fight ended, fish streaming out and thanking God for striking down their enemies.

  And then the other zombies came, to feed on those who remained.

  The zombies don’t need brains to survive. As far as we know, any part of a human will keep them going. It’s just that they don’t die unless we go for the head, so we keep a focus on brains. Those movies never really let go of you, I guess.

  The stench is awful, and Malia passes around bandanas to cover our mouths while we creep by. If we’re completely quiet, the zombies shouldn’t notice us.

  But the wind is blowing toward us, blasting the stink right in our faces, and Soren gags a little. Immediately, Malia is at his side, hand over his mouth. “Shut the Hell up, right now, or I’m throwing you in there.” Soren turns pale and nods, and Malia ghosts away, back to Brent at the front, flashing me a smile as she saunters by. She would never have made good on her threat, but Malia likes it when some of the younger guys are afraid of her.

  She says it ‘Delegitimizes the misogynist upbringing that has saturated their subconscious.’

  I think she just likes to mess with people.

  I don’t see any zombies at first, because we’re not on the side of the church we killed them on. As we round the corner of the building, I see the remnants of my first night with the Hunters.

  I have to look away almost immediately, focusing on the surrounding buildings, watching for every threat, listening in case the shuffling that I hear inside the church comes any closer.

  But I can’t stop the images from being imprinted on my memory, no matter how brief their inculcation.

  Flashes of red and purple and gray, oozing, and the buzzards, picking and tearing with wicked sharp beaks.

  They’re roadkill, every single one of them, and we’re the ones that ran them over.

  But I don’t feel proud or triumphant. I don’t feel like I’m finally doing something, finally fighting back instead of waiting to die, like I did on that rooftop when I threw grenades and blew it all to Hell.

  I just feel sick.

  I glance back; I can’t help myself, and a buzzard pulls out something that’s stringy and tough. I swallow the bile that rises in my throat.

  My friends all wear similar expression of distaste, apart from Malia and Brent, whose eyes sweep over the scene as though they barely register it.

  Malia and Brent lead us to the right, around a red brick house with white shutters. We can’t risk alerting the zombies to our presence.

  Around the other side of the building, out of sight of the church, Malia holds up her hand for halt. Immediately, Traina and Lisa break off to either end of the house.

  Malia waves the rest of us to her and whispers, quietly. “I know it’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen, but you’ve got to keep it together. We killed them, I’m not going to deny it. We killed them, and we laughed, and we celebrated afterwards, and you are absolutely right to feel disgusting and sick and like you should be locked in a cell. We are murders. We have killed other people.”

  She pauses, and glances at me, eyes widening slightly at the look of alarm I must be showing.

  Malia takes a breath. “The fact that you still feel bad for these people, in spite of the fact that what they were when we killed them was nowhere near the minimum definition of human, in spite of the fact that they would have killed you and eaten you if you were lucky, if you had not acted, is exactly why you are alive and they are dead. We are humans, and I don’t want you to pretend that this doesn’t bother you.”

  For a moment her voice falters, and she falls silent. But she doesn’t cry, doesn’t crum
ple. She straightens her back and stands as tall as I’ve ever seen her, and when she speaks, her voice is infused with steel. “There is a time and place for guilt and grief. This is not it. You are not here to feel sorry for yourselves. If you want to do that, well— “she gestures to the gore around us. “Hang out here a while, and a zombie will come and put you out of your misery.”

  We all stand there in stunned silence, watching Malia. Her hair is sticking up in the back, and she has smudges under her eyes that speak to Mason’s warning, but in that moment she is invincible.

  “I’m not going to try to convince you that your life is worth more than theirs. You have to decide that for yourself. But I am going to tell you that there are people who are scared and lost, and they need our help. And you and me are the best they’re gonna get. We’re the only heroes around.”

  She looks at each of us in turn, making eye contact until we nod, slowly. Soren swallows and stands straighter when she looks at him. Tavi simply smiles her confident smile, and the look she shares with Malia is one of mutual respect and understanding. Jeffrey glances to where Lisa stands, bow at the ready, and then sighs, doing a half shrug that seems to say, might as well.

  We step out from behind the building and continue our creep around the center. No zombies disturb us, but I can feel them everywhere. It’s like they’re peeking out through the windows.

  Malia takes no chances, and we move as slowly as we can, emerging only when someone signals that it’s all clear. No one’s sure how good zombie scent and vision are.

  And if the Jackals find us first, zombies will be the least of our problems. Because of our cautiousness, we navigate between buildings painstakingly slowly, two at a time. I’m partnered with Tavi, covering her while she moves forward.

  Every now and then, movement flickers at the edges of my vision, but every time I turn, I don’t see anything.

  I think it’s just the fear and paranoia until I hear it. Shuffling, just around the corner.

  Immediately, I push Tavi to the ground, my hand straying to the knife collection at my belt.

  I consider the pistol. One move, a finger squeezing a trigger, and another one of them will be gone.

  But if I fire, the other zombies might here the gunshot. My best bet is to take it out silently, quietly, so that any noises don’t alert the others.

  I flip the knife over and over, willing myself to take deep breaths. When it sees us, I’ll only have one shot before it’s on us. I can hear it, shuffling closer.

  Three seconds…Two…One.

  I throw the knife as it pokes its head around the corner, grimy fingers clawing at the wall. It slumps to the ground.

  I walk up with another knife on hand, ready to finish the job if necessary.

  But it doesn’t even twitch, just lays there, motionless, black eyes still open.

  It is, or was, a woman, one of the high class business types, in a blue power suit and pink blouse, now ripped and stained with blood and dirt. Her brown curls snarl around her head, matted with dirt and black blood. My knife comes out with a squelch, and more blood oozes out of the wound. I wipe the gore on my pants.

  I stare at her for a few more seconds, until Tavi taps me on the arm, gesturing ahead. Malia has halted the rest of the group behind the next building, looking back at us anxiously. I wave to tell her everything’s okay, and Tavi and I break into a soft jog, not stopping until we’re enveloped in the others.

  From far away, she looks so human, a dead person with family and a job and a life that I snuffed out with a throw. She died because of me.

  Suddenly, a stinging pain erupts on the side of my face. “Get your shit together.” My vision blurs. Blinking, my eyes latch onto golden brown ringlets. Malia.

  “You can get all sentimental after this is over.”

  I swallow the snappy retort and nod. She’s right. If I hesitate for even a second, especially if we meet the Jackals, I could get everyone killed, or worse. I know what they do to girls. I know what I’m risking by not keeping it together.

  Brent, at the end of the white paneled house we’re now standing behind, whistles and holds up three fingers. Three more blocks, and we’ll find them. If they’re still alive.

  Malia hurries the pace, less concerned with noise as we move further from the church. Now we keep it at a hurried jog, ducking low and darting around corners. Lisa and Traina fan out on either side, running with their arrows knocked, a quick shuffling gait that leaves them free to watch for zombies, or worse.

  Soon, I know where we’re heading, not because of Brent or Malia, but because of the screams that emanate from it. Screams of terror and pain, mixed with pleading cries, “Please, stop! don’t take her, take me! PLEASE!” And then a wail, cut off far too quickly.

  The Jackals got here first.

  It’s the Chinook Activity Center, a huge white building with trailers sprawling on either side. The screams seem to be coming from the middle, but it’s impossible to know for sure. The Jackals could be anywhere. We’re lucky they didn’t post any guards.

  Two pops, gunshots, sound out, and Malia has to physically restrain Soren from rushing in. Arm still around Soren, she turns around to face us.

  “Me, Rogue, Tavi, front entrance. Jeffrey, Brent, Soren, back entrance. Traina and Lisa, hang back and stay high, go in if we call for you.”

  Jeffrey starts to run around, to come up from behind, but Malia shouts, “Wait. These aren’t zombies. They are real human beings. They are as fast as you are, they might be stronger than you are, and they are the worst kind of fucked up people in this world. Rogue, get over here.”

  I stand in front of them, and she nods. She might have wanted me to come for this reason alone.

  I can’t help but wonder if Ben is in there, if there’s a way that I can get him out, bring him back, let him dry out and detox, and maybe then we can start over. Maybe I can finally get him to—

  No. I don’t have time to think like that. Ben made his choices. He laughed when I ran away, he took innocent people into tents and did things that made them scream, he watched as the world fell apart and he did nothing to help me and nothing to stop it; he left me alone to pull the trigger and watch the rest of my family fall apart.

  So I tell them what I know. “These men may not be zombies, but they are killers. I don’t care what they say to you, I don’t care what they look like or how old they are. You do not want them near you with a weapon. And above all,” I pause for a second. “You do not want them to take you alive. Shoot as many as you can, and get as many of these people out as you can. If you can’t get them out, kill them.” I feel them tense at that, but I don’t say anything else.

  “Brent, how many are in there?” Malia asks.

  Brent just shrugs. “I don’t know. Last I counted was six, but there might be some inside that I haven’t seen.”

  “Okay. I want you guys to find as many as you can and get them out, but nobody’s gonna be a hero, here okay? If you’re outnumbered, you run like Hell. Got it?”

  We all make noises of assent, and she gets that wicked happy look again. “Let’s go.” Without another word, she whirls and starts sprinting for the blue double doors. Tavi and I are right behind her, our legs eating up the ground. We burst through the doorway into the lobby, waiting to see if someone will come and attack us.

  Nothing moves.

  The screaming starts again. It’s coming from a hallway at the end of the lobby, past plush chairs and rainbow motivational posters about fit and healthy lifestyles.

  Malia sprints after it, trusting the rest of us to cover her back.

  Luckily, the hallway seems to be empty, but I see a light on in one of the rooms, the yellow light a triangle through the cracked door.

  Malia skids to a stop just before she reaches the occupied room, boots squeaking on the floor. We creep as quietly as we can to the door, but the screaming’s so loud, we could probably stomp through without them hearing us.

  The screaming stops, repla
ced by a man’s sobs. “What do you want? Please just leave me and my family alone.”

  “Chad, I think this guy wants us to stop poking him.” I peek around the corner and see the back of a shaggy head and the outlines of a beard. I pull my head back in as another voice, this one youthful, high, and mocking, answers the first.

  “That’s silly, Travis, I don’t see why he would say that.”

  “Me neither. He seems to think we actually want something.”

  “Well, we do.”

  “Perhaps we should tell him what we want.”

  “Let me do it.” I poke my head around to see a figure in a white t-shirt, jeans, and cowboy boots approaching the figures huddled at the back of the room.

  It’s a family that cowers against the wall, a blonde woman and two children. She has her arms around them protectively, but I can tell by her ripped clothing and mussed hair that they’ve already roughed her up.

  Her husband stands a few paces in front of them, his skin riddled with cuts; blood dripping off his jeans and collared shirt. It looks like more than enough to kill him, or at least make him pass out. I don’t know how he’s still standing.

  The woman’s eyes meet mine over her husband’s head, and she shakes her head, ever so slightly, from side to side. She must think we’re just a couple of kids, sticking our heads where we don’t belong. I finger the knives at my belt. I wonder what Travis and Chad will think when I decide to make them bleed. Maybe I’ll cut them into pieces, slice until their bodies are nothing but agony. Maybe I’ll—

  A hand tugs on my arm, pulling me back. Malia whispers in my ear, “Behind us. Slowly.”

  We turn, and a boy stands in front of us. He’s just a kid, maybe sixteen. with a Rangers baseball cap worn backwards over blonde hair.

  But his wide blue eyes and paunchy belly only make the gun he’s pointing at us even more unnerving.

  He takes a step back, lowering the weapon. “There are two girls hiding in there.” He gestures over his shoulder at the room across the hall. “They won’t come out. They’re—they’re afraid of me.”