Jailbait Zombie

Cowboy zombie grasped the rheostat knob and spun it to full power. He slammed the switch closed and muttered, “Brains.”

CHAPTER 44

I came to with my face and the front of my body burning like an attack from fire ants. I heard a sizzle.

I moved my arms and legs and more pain came from my wrists and ankles. Burns. That explained the sizzling noise. And the odor of charred meat.

My thoughts filtered though a wall of suffering. I realized that I had been flung onto the floor of the lab. I pulled my right arm up, then the left arm.

I regained my balance and slowly came to my feet. I brushed splinters and dust from my face and chest.

Everything hurt and I wanted to curl into a dark corner and rest. But there was no time for a pity party, I was free of the table and had to scram.

Smoke curled from the scorched and melted remains of the restraining bands. Sparks trickled to the floor. The electrical surge must have had too much power and blasted me off the table.

The overhead lights flickered. The transfusion machine had stopped click-clacking.

Cowboy zombie gazed at me. His orders had been to cook me with electricity, but now that I had escaped, he didn’t know what to do.

I did.

I leaped and grabbed him by the face, sinking my talons into the fissures of his skull. I threw him to the floor. I tore the table from its mount and slammed it over him. I jumped on the table, stomping hard as I heard bone crunch and flesh squish. I didn’t care how much this hurt my wounded leg, I kept stomping until trails of zombie goo ran from under the table. Too bad it wasn’t Dr. He

Where was He

My priority was to escape, recuperate, and then return to raze this place. I limped across the floor to the transfusion machine. Its promise of sustenance was what kept me going. I’d guzzle the blood and break out of the lab, then head for shelter.

One of the windows shattered and the curtain billowed open. Kimberly the zombie rushed in and swung an ax.

I dodged her first blow, but on the backswing she swiped the transfusion machine. The ax blade tore through the bag and it burst in a water balloon splash of blood. The delicious aroma licked at my nose. My stomach jumped from the pangs at losing this meal. I wanted to dive on the puddle of blood and lap it from the dirty floor.

Kimberly readied for another swing. I seized the ax handle above her hands and twisted. She held tight, ignoring the tearing sound from her shoulder. I gave another twist and her right arm tore free from the socket. I grasped a handful of her hair and cocked the ax back to sever her head. Her right hand let go of the ax and the dismembered arm dropped to the floor. It twitched and flopped.

“Don’t move a muscle,” He

The dismembered arm froze.

I turned.

He

Another window smashed open and the curtain gusted the air as it fell. Papers and dust lifted from the floor. A zombie entered and he waded through the debris. He carried a long metal pipe with one end flattened to a pointed blade.

He

What tickled him?

I hefted the ax and guessed the distance from me to him. I was going to bury this ax in his face.

Sonia clip-clopped into the lab on her bedroom stiletto pumps.

The zombie Reginald entered next.

Followed by Phaedra.

CHAPTER 45

Tendrils squirmed from Phaedra’s aura, signaling her terror. Spots of despair bubbled through her penumbra. Her right eye quivered in anguish.

Reginald held a thin steel cable fashioned into a leash around Phaedra’s neck. A pink bruise the size of a fist discolored the left side of her face. Her hair hung in stringy tangles. Her parka and jeans were dirty and torn. Both of her hands were bound together behind her back. She appeared tiny and fragile, like a porcelain figurine.

A red cloud of rage fell across my eyes. My kundalini noir beat against the inside of my chest. I was about to break off the ax head and throw it like a ninja star at He

My escape had been halted as surely as if a tu

I threw Kimberly to the floor between us to stall for time. Her arm dragged itself to unite with her body. I backed up to the wall.

The zombies could sneak up on me using that revenant collective consciousness. One could be ready to drop from the ceiling or bust through the walls.

My skin prickled with desperate frustration. A minute ago I was on the edge of escape. Now He

Kimberly picked herself off the floor and set her arm into place.

“What do you think of my new prize, Mr. Gomez?” He

Phaedra’s eye blinked faster and she shrunk from the doctor as if he was a giant roach.

Sonia lifted one of her feet. “We both wear a size six. We can share shoes.”

I yelled, “How did you get her?”

“Easy. By using my zombies.” He

“You’re going to make her a zombie?”

“Not just a zombie, but my jailbait zombie.” He

Sonia hugged Phaedra and patted the top of her head. “We’ll wear tiaras.”

“She’s only a kid. Are you going to kill her and then put her into your zombie harem?”

“Mr. Gomez, you make it sound so tawdry. So Phaedra’s a minor? Sixteen, for God’s sake. A hundred years ago she would’ve been an old maid by now.” He let that grin inflate into a triumphant smile. “I look forward to the opportunity. I’ve already told you that I can reanimate a subject-someone like her-into an almost human, rather, pre-undead condition.”

A new rage pounded through me. My fingers pressed dents into the wooden ax handle.

Kimberly rummaged through a metal toolbox, oblivious to the tension between He

Someone clomped up the stairs and in shuffled a zombie wearing a green polo shirt with the logo of Super Cheesy Pizza Delivery. She stepped around Reginald and He

Kimberly, Super Cheesy, and the bus driver spread out to form a zombie encirclement. Yet more footsteps clambered from downstairs.

“Where the hell did all these zombies come from?”

“You’ll be surprised how many people ride Greyhound,” He