The Zombie Chronicles - Book 6 - Revelation (Apocalypse Infection Unleashed Series) Page 15

  The cold wind chilled me to the bone as I opened the rusty, cast-iron gate. The squealing hinges about gave me a heart attack. I knew we were trespassing on hallow ground, and I didn’t feel quite right about disturbing the eternal slumber of people’s loved ones.

  Suddenly, the deafening silence was pierced by the deathly shriek of a crow. I hoped it wasn’t a sign that we should have stayed out of the dark, deserted graveyard.

  Claire clutched her heart. “Stupid bird.” She shined her flashlight into the darkness and glanced around.

  I blew out a misty breath. “Crows and graveyards are a creepy combination. It’s so very… Edgar Allan Poe.”

  “Nevermore,” I mumbled.

  She shined the light around some more. “Well, it looks all clear.”

  “That doesn’t necessarily mean anything,” I warned in a whisper. “Just be on full alert and don’t let your guard down.”

  She nodded. “And no guns either. It’ll only attract any zombies who still have their ears.”

  “I know. That’s gonna be hard. It’s just…instinct.”

  “We’ll kill any zombies with our shovels and my axe, unless it gets out of control. If that happens, feel free to use your trigger finger.” Her eyes suddenly darted to the left. “Watch out!” she said, pointing.

  My stomach churned as I stepped around a rotting leg crawling with swarms of maggots. As I moved a branch out of my face, my eyes gazed over the ancient graveyard. Brown, crumbling, weathered stones covered in green lichen dotted the field in front of us. Some leaned, and others were toppled over completely. I peered around at row after row of dry earth and bare crosses. Every few spaces, a weathered and cracked gravestone jutted out of the ground. Dead leaves swirled as the wind howled, and spider webs draped the stones. An owl hooted, reiterating how creepy the place was. I just wanted to get in, get our answers, and get out, so we immediately started searching the gravestones for Jackie’s marker.

  Ivy covered some of the broken headstones, making it nearly impossible to make out some of the inscriptions. When I looked up into the trees, I saw two orange, glowing eyes staring at me. My heart skipped a beat when it shrieked from above.

  “It’s just an owl,” Claire said.

  I bit my lip hard. “I know,” I lied.

  The first name we came across on the weathered stones was Gina Solina. I traced my fingers gently across the lettering carved deep into the stone. Wow. Just thirty years old, born March 16, 1950 and died in 1980. I breathed in and out deeply, wondering again if I should be treading on sacred land. “Maybe we shouldn’t be here,” I said.

  “It’s fine, as long as we’re respectful,” Claire assured me.

  I swallowed past the lump in my throat and nodded.

  “Why don’t we start with the first one and work our way down?”

  I nodded again and began pulling away the ivy and weeds. Mist swirled in the path of my flashlight beam as I moved to the next one and the one after that. Our little stroll through the tombstones certainly gave me chills.

  A faint screech rang softly through the air, and I glanced around and flashed my light around the graveyard.

  “What?” Claire said.

  “I thought I heard something.”

  She looked around intently. “It’s just the rusty hinges on the gate, squeaking in the wind.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  She glanced around. “Wait…maybe you’re right,” she said.

  “It sounds like a bird, maybe hurt or something.”

  “Ew. Maybe zombies got it.”

  “It won’t take them long to finish off the appetizers and go to the main course,” I said.

  “Right.” She let out a long sigh. “Just keep looking.”

  Suddenly, I heard the strange noise again. I glanced around but didn’t see anything, and I was unnerved by the fact that I couldn’t determine the source of the strange, disturbing noises. A shiver ran down my spine, and I realized digging up a lifeless body in the zombie-infested darkness was not turning out to be one of my most brilliant ideas. I could have just told Nick some bogus story and sneaked out during the day, I thought, but it was a little too late for that.

  The high-pitched screech grew louder, and when something suddenly swooped down low, I instinctively ducked and covered my head.

  “What was that?” Claire asked.

  I glanced up at the sky and saw winged shapes flying erratically overhead. Their bodies looked like rats, but I knew better. “Bats!” I said, none too happy that we now had to worry about rabid creatures of the night as well as zombies.

  Claire shrieked, swatted at her head, then warded it off with her shovel.

  It was as if we’d stepped onto the set of some horrible horror film, complete with graveyard, mist, zombies, and flying bloodsuckers. The flapping of their wings was strangely soothing, like a soft spring rain falling all around us. The leathery, membranous wings were so thin that we could see the moonlight shining through them. When I glanced up and shined my flashlight at the bat, I got another surprise: Its wings were nowhere near the typical wingspan of seven inches, and it had white eyes. All I could do was stare at it and gasp.

  “Holy flying zombies, Batman,” Claire said, trying to break me out of my trance, “it’s an infected bat!”

  Chapter 23

  I shoved my flashlight in my pocket and held my shovel like a Louisville Slugger, ready to hit a homerun with the beady-eyed, undead, flying, screeching thing. It wasn’t that large of a creature, but I knew how deadly it really was; I wasn’t about to underestimate my opponent.

  Claire swung her axe at the bats and nailed one, then dropped the axe and went back to her original weapon of choice, the shovel.

  I swung my shovel at the cursed things as they screeched overhead. The zombified bat had long, razor-sharp fangs and a grotesque little face that looked like something between a black rat and a pug. It’s empty, white eyes were fixated on me. My jaw dropped when I saw all the drool and foam dripping from its mouth, as if it had the worst case of rabies in history. The steady rhythm of flapping wings echoed in my ears as it approached, and it let out a shrill shrieking. I swung with all my might, and the batted bat went flying and crashed into a nearby tombstone. I stared down at the rotting bat carcass and saw that it was as dead as a doornail. Another bat screeched from above. As it dived at me, I reared up my arms to swing. “Grand slam! Outta the park!” I screamed.

  Without a second for us to even breathe, three more foraging bats came at Claire and me, screeching and chattering in a chorus of fierce and hungry rodent lingo. Claire knocked one down, but two more still viciously attacked. I swatted at them with my shovel, but it did little to deter them. They had caught whiff of a potential human buffet, and they were hungry.

  I swung again, and a bat corpse flew backward and spiraled to the ground. As the last bat came at me, I ran at it and pounded it. My foot caught on something, and I fell with a crashing thud. I was suddenly staring into the hollow eyes of a skeleton, and I kicked it away.

  “It’s deader than those zombies,” Claire said.

  “Ha-ha.” Groaning, I sat up and tasted salty blood on my lip and felt a sting.

  Claire finished off the demon bat, and I was thankful for that. “Are you okay?” she asked, helping me up.

  I wiped the blood with my sleeve. “I’m fine.”

  “Good. Let’s just keep going before more show up.”

  I nodded, but I really couldn’t stop thinking about the infected bats and all the vampire movies I’d seen.

  After about ten minutes, Claire called me over. “I found it,” she whispered, her voice wavering.

  The scientists had fashioned a crude and simple gravestone for Jackie, with her full name and “Rest in Peace” under it. A bouquet of flowers, as dead as those bats, rested on top of the fresh soil, her burial mound.

  When Claire let out a soft sob, I stepped behind her and rubbed her back slowly, trying to comfort her. I stared into her sad eyes
for a moment, then hugged her, using my palms to massage away the tense, hard knots in her shoulders. We both loved Jackie so much, and her loss was still difficult to accept—the worst pain either of us had ever felt.

  As I embraced my friend, my lover’s cousin, I looked at the low-lying fog around us. Truly, it was how I felt in my head: hazy, foggy, and as if I was losing myself under some dark cloud. Claire and I were both spiraling out of control. We were, after all, in the middle of a graveyard in the middle of the night, digging up a dead body. I swallowed hard. Yeah, I’m losing it—big time.

  “Let’s hurry up and do this,” Claire said. She scooped up handfuls of earth and began tossing it aside.

  I started scraping the cold, damp dirt, all the while looking over our shoulders for the undead, bats, humans, or otherwise. I huffed as I shoveled at the cold dirt, and I swore when I was startled by a howl. “Did you hear that?” I asked, straining to listen for any movement in our vicinity.

  Claire scratched her head, spreading dirt across her forehead, and listened intently. “It’s just the wind.”

  With my imagination in overdrive, I resumed digging like a madman, sending a muddy shower of dirt and pebbles flying everywhere. I just wanted to get it over with, because it was beyond dangerous to be out there. For the next thirty minutes, we dug in silence, scooping dirt into a huge pile. Sweat poured down my back and face.

  Finally, my shovel hit a black vinyl bag.

  Claire’s eyes widened, and she started to dig faster, hoping we’d have our answer any minute.

  Then, in the distance, death moans sliced the air. There was another shriek, this time louder, shriller, and closer. Our little excavation had caught the interest of others who wanted to dig—right into our flesh.

  I looked at Claire, not sure what to say.

  She let out a trembling breath and cautiously peered over the edge of the hole we’d dug. “About six of ‘em,” she whispered. “That’s three a piece.”

  I tried to calm my racing heart, but it was no use. We were so close to being done, but we were not going to be able to make a clean break for it, and that pissed me off and terrified me all at once. A shower of dirt fell on me, but it didn’t slow down my ascent. When I reached the top of the hole, I heaved myself out, then braced my foot deep in the dirt and pushed myself up. As soon as I was above ground again, I saw the zombies hobbling toward me. I inhaled deeply to slow the pounding of blood in my ears, then raised my rifle, ready to fire.

  “No gunfire!” Claire said. “Only shoot as a last resort, okay?”

  I nodded and put my gun away.

  Holding her shovel tightly, Claire glanced at the zombies. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. You can either go straight back to hell, or I can send you there myself. It’s your choice, you slimy freaks!” she yelled, as if the zombies were willing to negotiate.

  They inched closer, moaning and salivating.

  Claire shot me a look. “Looks like they want it the hard way,” she said, gripping her shovel. She bolted toward the first zombie and pounded it in the head with her shovel, smashing its curly red hair into its skull.

  I decided to take the ones on the left. I gripped the shovel tightly, then methodically took aim. My jaw fell open at the grotesque sight before me. Dark, black blood poured from its mouth, as if was regurgitating motor oil. Long shards of glass protruded from its eyes, cheeks, and chin. The zombie’s entire body was covered in glass, as if it had been standing too close to a window during an explosion. Sharp pieces were embedded in every single inch of its horrific body. I swung my shovel in a giant arc and connected with its glistening head, hitting its skull with a bone-crushing thud.

  “Impressive!” Claire said before she went after the next glass-covered zombie. She swung the axe high over her head and buried it deep in the thing’s skull. It crumbled to the ground, and she planted her foot squarely in the center of its face as she pulled as hard as she could to free her axe. “Did that hurt?” she asked the zombie.

  For a response, the thing flailed a bit.

  Claire swung the axe into its head again. “How about that?” she mocked.

  “Are you okay?” I called over.

  “Yep. All’s well in the world.” She peered ahead. “But not for long.”

  More zombies were approaching from all directions, and I gasped at the horror now surrounding me. A fresh meal was near, and they moaned in excitement and anticipation. My heart beat rapidly against my ribcage as they fixated on our position. Swinging my shovel back, I whacked a zombie with straight, black hair and a bad complexion. It was naked, and bite marks lined its entire body, from its face all the way down to its feet. I obviously didn’t hit it hard enough, because the nude nightmare ambled back to its feet. I kicked it and sent it toppling over a nearby gravestone, then bashed its head in with a sickening crunch to finish it off. A wave of nausea flooded over me as black gore covered a patch of green grass.

  A zombie in a football jersey stretched out its hands, and I whacked it so hard that its severed, rotting head flew off its shoulders and into the grass. Gore exploded, and the zombies next to it were splattered with black blood.

  Another flesh-eater gnashed its teeth, snarling loudly. This one was dressed in a white nightgown with bloody hand marks all over it. I swallowed hard. The white gown told me it was newly turned; otherwise, it would have been covered in dirt and slime. I slammed my shovel in its chest, and it went down like a ton of bricks, just long enough for me to hit it again and put the wretched creature out of its misery.

  Even though we’d avoided using our guns, the zombies kept coming, and I knew there was no way we could take them all on. The cries of the dead grew louder and louder. The wanted to rip into our skin and pull it off our bones chunk by chunk, slurping on our blood as they feasted on our flesh.

  I grabbed Claire’s arm and pulled her behind a large headstone. “We’ve gotta get outta here, Claire! We’re way outnumbered.”

  “I just need a minute,” she said between gasps, “to see if it’s her.”

  “No! C’mon! We’ll come back later.”

  “No, Dean. We’ve come this far, and zombies aren’t gonna stop me now. I have to know!”

  “We’ll come back,” I urged.

  “It’ll be too late. They’ll devour the remains.”

  “They can’t unzip the bag.”

  “They won’t have to. I already did.”

  I swallowed hard. “So what do we do?”

  She thought for a minute. “Remember when you were complaining about all the toys in the car on the way over here?” she asked.

  “Yeah. So?”

  “You stepped on that cymbal-clashing monkey.”

  “And?”

  “Well, there’s a switch that makes the monkey play and chatter.”

  I instantly understood her plan. “Right! We could plant it on some grave stones away from Jackie’s grave.”

  She nodded. “Maybe it will distract them enough for us to get a quick look. If it’s her, she comes with us.”

  The thought was morbid, but we had to find Jackie a better, safer, more peaceful final resting place.

  As we ran to the car, a woman with one eye hanging out of its socket reached for me. I shot Claire a sideways glance. “Go get the monkey. I’ve got this.”

  She nodded and took off.

  I smacked the woman, then aimed for the next one that was coming at me, dressed in a grungy fluorescent shirt. It went down just as easily. Wiping my face, I stepped back and inhaled deeply.

  Finally, Claire returned with monkey in hand and turned it on. “It works!” she said when the thing grinned a toothy smile and started clashing its cymbals together.

  I grabbed the toy, and we fumbled through the dark, passing twenty-five tombstones as we went. I set the monkey on the headstone of a man named, ironically, Steven P. King, and turned on the switch.

  “Stephen King…as in Monkey Shines?” Claire said.

  I nodded and grinne
d. “I couldn’t resist.”

  “Perfect!”

  Claire and I let out a few whoops and hollers for good measure when the zombies began stumbling toward the noisy chimp. At that point, we knew Claire’s plan had worked brilliantly.

  “It’s working!” Claire said.

  I grabbed her arm. “Let’s go.”

  We circled around and made it back to Jackie’s grave while most the zombies stumbled in the opposite direction.

  “I’ll take the ones on the left,” Claire said.

  Without a moment to waste, I whacked a bald zombie so hard that its head cracked like a melon. The other one came at me, and I kicked it in the gut, knocking it into a dilapidated headstone left over from the 1800s. I spun around to see if Claire needed help, but she’d already taken care of business. When a wayward zombie approached her from behind, she turned on her heels and whacked it right in the face with her axe, then crushed its skull.

  Claire’s hands were shaking, but she wasn’t about to give up. “Do it! I’ll cover you,” she said.

  Without hesitation, I jumped back down into the pit. My own hands trembled as I gripped the vinyl bodybag. When I pulled it apart at the zipper, what I found staring back at me was none other than a dead zombie.

  Chapter 24

  I stared at the dead creature, wondering why fate was pulling such a cruel joke. I had hoped it was Jackie, that they’d kept their word and had given her a proper burial, but they obviously hadn’t. The zombie staring back at me had platinum-blonde hair with bangs. Her face was badly decomposed, and she was dressed in a dirty nurse’s uniform, with the name “Jeanie Towers” embroidered on it. “She’s…it’s not Jackie,” I called up.

  Claire let out a sob. “Are you sure?”

  “Positive.”

  “Then let’s get outta here!” she said.

  I looked at the zombie one last time, and its eyes suddenly blinked open. I couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe as fear and terror gripped me. Luckily, instinct kicked in, and I reached for my pistol. Snapping jaws lunged toward my face, but when I pulled the trigger, the single bullet cut through its cranium.