by Mark Tufo
“No. Frighten them.”
“Frighten them? Big fucking deal, pretty sure I already have that base covered.”
“Not like this,” Manny said.
“Stop Tim, please!” Scarlett begged off. “Just let them go, go somewhere else, I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll put my shields down, I promise.”
“That’s enticing Scarlett, not going to lie, but you can keep hiding in your ivory tower. It’s all right. This way you have a front row seat to the death of your children. I wouldn’t want you to miss out on that. I’m giving you closure in this most uncertain of times. That’s pretty decent of me, if I say so myself.”
A screech came over the zombie airwaves. This time it was different, more frenetic. I could feel my pulse quicken. It was like Manny had tapped into something that was hard-wired from man’s earliest days. Like being frightened of spiders or snakes. It was a fundamental, universal fear. I gritted my teeth and did my best to close out the sound; even so, I could hear multiple screams from upstairs. Whatever he was doing, it was working pretty well. I kept waiting for the grating noise to trail off, but if anything it was increasing. It was possible he could drive them catatonic. It might not be as much fun to eat someone who wasn’t crying for mercy, but I could eat in silence and Yorley wouldn’t be trying to kill me. I could live with the tradeoff.
I’d retreated as far as I could to get away from the sound. It was still there on the peripheries though. Won’t be long now! Excitement was beginning to mount within me.
“What the fuck?” I could feel this acrid taste moving across my tongue and sliding down my throat. “What is that? Tastes like I ate an ash tray.”
Manny was still bellowing, and I was reluctant to investigate too deeply. All I could think was that Manny had eaten a handful of cockroaches to take the edge off his hunger. Little fuckers were probably crawling up the wall, and he just couldn’t help himself to a little snack. I stayed with that thought for a little while longer and then really didn’t think about it anymore. The thought of finally getting to Yorley’s succulent flesh dominated above all else. The great tenor finally fucking warbled off, and the resultant quiet was like a gift from the heavens.
“Now or never.” I took a step, the loud crunch of exploding plastic had me look down to a small brown vial. The realization of what that was and what it implied was not lost on me. “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?” I screamed out loud.
“This is MY body! Those are my children! You cannot have either of them!” Scarlett stood before me.
There was no time! No time at all. She’d taken an entire bottle of antibiotics and she’d made sure to push them through the stomach lining in record time, not allowing me to ralph them back up. I could stand here and try, but if it didn’t work then what? I started bolting for the stairs, oblivious to any danger. Yorley was at the top of the steps, but she was slumped to the side, blood trickling from her nose, and she looked as if she’d just downed ten shots of tequila.
“Soon!” I told her as I pulled her over. Her face and head bounced off the top stair. “I’ll be back!” The war within this body had begun in earnest. The antibiotics on their own would not cure what ailed us, but it would put this body in jeopardy for a while, from within and externally. As soon as Yorley regrouped, she’d kill us, so I had to inflict as much damage as quickly as I could, and the first order of business was letting Scarlett know just how big of a mistake she’d made.
Two men were in the first room I came to, one by the door and one on the bed. Both were incapacitated. It wasn’t them I gave a shit about; it was the two young children on the far side that held all of my interest.
“NO!” Scarlett screamed. A savage pain rippled through my stomach. I lurched to the right as my legs stopped taking my commands for an agonizingly long second.
“They … are … mine!” We… I said with heavy exertion. I looked like a puppet with a drunken master as I jerked my way across the room, forcing my limbs to keep going. Manny was in full-on panic mode dealing with the flood of medicine and white blood cells that Scarlett had apparently been stockpiling. Bitch must have been gleaning information from my memory, because she knew exactly what to do. The difference was that she was not me. This fight, while intense, was still a foregone conclusion. I would vanquish her once and for all. The older brat’s eyes grew wide as I got within his field of vision. He sat up slowly.
“Mom?” His eyes were seeing his mother, his instinctual brain quite another, as he was attempting to push further away, toward the wall.
“Miss … me?” I hissed.
The word, “help” got lodged in his throat. He was terrified, and that was fine with me. Scarlett was kicking and screaming, pulling on everything she could think of in a vain attempt to halt my progress.
“Come … to … momma.” I outstretched my hands. The halting movements were making the boy more scared. With great difficulty, I was able to wrap my hand around his upper arm. Scarlett was losing her fucking mind as I simultaneously leaned in and pulled him closer.
“Can’t do shit about it!” I grabbed a chunk of his bicep between my teeth. A burst of blood blew through the gap and into my mouth like the sweetest of ambrosias. I sighed with ecstatic victory. The boy’s screams of terror and pain, intermingled with his mother’s wails of grief, completely masked over Yorley’s approach. I’d only known she was there when I felt the cold steel of her barrel press up against the base of my skull.
“NO!!!” I swore I would never go through the dying process again. I rallied all that I was and flooded into the boy, just as I heard the dry click of a firearm misfiring. You would be hard pressed to find a deeper and heartier laugh given once I realized Yorley had missed her opportunity. I was now imbedded deeply into the body of Joshua, Scarlett’s son. I looked up to her, her eyes nearly obscured by the volumes of tears that they were drowning in. I had not yet marshaled myself to put the boy in his proper place. All in good time. For now, all I could do was watch and savor my victory.
Scarlett screamed in rage as she pushed Yorley back. “It’s me!” Her gaze shifted to the knife on Yorley’s belt. Whether Yorley was still out of it or she saw something in Scarlett that made her trust her, I don’t know, but she allowed Scarlett to grab the knife from her calf-sheath.
“No, mommy no!” Joshua put his hands up to fend off the attack. Scarlett drove that knife deep into his—OUR—skull! Neurons were shooting off in all directions, confusion, fright, acceptance, blasted through everything we—I—knew. A white light brighter than the surface of the sun seared my very being, and then I was alone. Darkness, everlasting darkness and the frightening reality that I would be forever alone.
“Don’t worry,” a deep, gravelly voice said. “I’m here now. I missed you once, but that won’t happen again.”
* * *
My name is Timothy, and I’m in hell.
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Also by Mark Tufo
Zombie Fallout Series book 1 currently free
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