Creepy and Terrifying Zombie Stories for the Month of Halloween 2022

Creepy and Terrifying Zombie Stories for the Month of Halloween 2022. Yes, they are creepy but some are quite amusing. I think you’ll enjoy this anthology of brains and blood!

Good evening, it’s Spooky Boo Rhodes from Sandcastle, California. Today is October 1st and we all know what that means! Only 30 days until Halloween! Let’s start celebrating right now with a zombie episode. I was quite ready to show you Night of the Living Dead on my YouTube channel tonight, but unfortunately ,false copyright claims on the public domain video made it difficult so I improvised. I’ll still show you Night of the Living Dead, but to the beat of some really fun zombie stories from the creepypasta library starting with my.

Get ready for Zombie night, the perfect way to kick off the month of October!

If you would like to follow along and read the stories while you listen, visit my creepypasta website at www.creepypastascarystories.com/halloweenzombiestories2022

Now let’s begin…

Primordial Instinct by Spooky Boo Rhodes

The night air is crisp and cool as your eyes flutter open to the sound of your beating heart. The pounding is faster and louder than it should be. Every beat feels like an explosion coming from the aching pain in your head.

The last thing you remember is someone attacking you from behind. The excruciating pain of his teeth in your neck burned your skin as your screams filled the night. Your fingers tore at his face pulling pieces of it off with your nails. You grabbed the largest rock you could find and bashed it into his skull, hearing the sickening crack of his cranium into his brain. Cold brain matter splashed on your face as he fell to the ground then you ran until your lungs burned and gave way to exhaustion.

The memory is dull and doesn’t seem to matter anymore. The festering wound in the back of your neck hurts and you know you must get to a hospital. The buzzing sound of a fly stops as you slap at your neck and feel something cold ooze between your fingers. Confused, you look at your hand. A sticky dark green, almost black substance that reeks of death and decay coats your palm and slowly drips to the ground.

You want to get up but you can’t feel your legs or even your arms at this point. Your useless limbs ignore your commands as you will yourself to move.

“What the hell is wrong with me?” you cry out to the empty night. “Somebody help me!!” Your voice carries and fades into the cold, dark air. It echoes into the blackness of the quiet city that ignores your pleas of help. You hear the rustling sound of feet on the ground and incoherent grunts of other people nearby but no one comes to your aid.

At what point did she feel like a zombie?
The smell of rotting meat fills your senses as you slowly push yourself up from the ground. Looking around, you realize the stench is coming from your very own body. You look down at your tattered clothes and ashen grey skin, and in a bolt of confusion and terror, the memory of your attacker fades as the scent of fresh meat wafts in front of you. On instinct, your legs carry you to the origin of the delightful smell and as you stare at the others feasting upon the flesh of the crying woman, your stomach aches in hunger. She stares at you with watery eyes, seemingly unable to either run or scream. Blood spatters over her neck and face from somewhere beneath her shoulders. You follow the trail to the group of rotting corpses feasting upon her intestines.

No! Your brain screams but the sound you hear from your lips is a low grunt. As you fall down to your knees and begin to tear at the woman’s flesh, grabbing handfuls of bloody entrails, your consciousness slowly fades into a little black hole and ceases to be.

 

Bite of the Greasy Dead

by MakRalston

It was such a simple order: two number twos, a number nine with honey mustard, and a Bitey Kids meal. It was so simple, in fact, that I didn’t even bother to notice who ordered it:

A person. An actual person. And not just any person: Bruce. Big Bruce, as we called him. I was about to correct him when he apologized and did it himself. He’s been here enough times to know we don’t serve number twos anymore, it’s even crossed-off with spray paint on the menu sign. And even if we did, I’m not sure Big Bruce needed two of them, anyway.

“Okay, forget the number twos, my bad. I’ll just stick with the number nine and the Bitey Kids meal.”

“You got kids, Bruce?” I asked through my headset. There was a little delay before he responded:

“Nah, but- “ he stopped himself, clearing his throat, “I, uh, collect the toys,” he admitted, somewhat embarrassed, “It reminds me of when I used to come here with my dad before- ”

“Was he infected?” I asked.

“Y-yeah.”

“I’m sorry, Bruce. Uh, first window for me, okay?”

I watched Bruce nod through the drive-thru camera as he pulled around to my window.

“Seven-seventy,” I said, taking Bruce’s cash from him, “How’ve you been, Bruce?”

“Fine, brother,” he said, “You?”

“I’ve been good.”

“How’s, uh, what’s her name?”

I glanced across the kitchen to the other window, watching Tina push open the zero-contact window toward a customer. I turned back to Bruce:

“Tina,” I said, “She’s fine. Thanks,” I smiled, extending my arm through the side window with his bag, grease staining the brown paper that sagged at the bottom.

“I pray to God one day y’all will get those Bitey Burgers back. It’s killing me, man.”

“I know,” I said, “Corporate’s teased the idea, maybe doing a veggie option or somethin’, but they don’t wanna risk another outbreak, y’know?”

“I don’t blame ‘em, brother. I should really cut back, myself…but sometimes we need our comfort foods,” he smiled, nodding as he pulled away into the night. I bid Big Bruce a farewell wave before turning to the drive-thru camera again: empty, as usual.

Bruce was right, y’know: we’d get more business from actual people if we had more actual food. I get the Mad Cow really restricts the burger and dairy options but…there’s gotta be more to fast food aside from cheeseburgers, right? What do lactose intolerant people eat for cryin’ out loud?

See, most of the time it’s not actual people that walk through our drive-thru. Call ‘em the infected, walkers, flesh-eaters, biters, or the obvious…zombies, corporate is very strict about us calling them one thing and one thing only: customers.

Our so-called “customers” started showing up some four weeks after the first reports of the massive outbreak. Now, if you’ve watched any horror movies, you might wrongly assume these things to be the living dead. They’re not. Brain-dead, perhaps, but these are infected individuals. We never imagined that BSE could transfer through cooked meats or milk products, but here we are.

The world’s a different place, now, and we had to adapt.

Look, I’ve seen some shit, literally, too: like that dookie some idiot dropped in the sink in the men’s restroom. But not even that could’ve prepared me for what happened on week five.

It was horrible, and that’s even an understatement: literal corpses lining the floor in our dining room, blood splattered all over the walls and ceiling, and those screams; those awful screams. I admit…I took this job for the minimum wage and the chance to work alongside Tina, but after seeing what I saw, the fifteen bucks an hour didn’t come close to compensating.

But thank God I have this job, ‘cause there aren’t many left.

We were this close to bombing the shit out of ourselves: total atomic annihilation. They were gonna corral survivors into bunkers and obliterate the nation from here to kingdom come but…plans changed all of a sudden.

Some scientists found out that the reason for the widespread attacks orchestrated by the infected was due to a specific compound found in the brain. I guess the biters really liked whatever was in ‘em. So, the worldwide governments began pumping the stuff out: manufacturing it, claiming it was chunks of cow brain from all the millions of inedible cattle around the world. A few backdoor handshakes later and…well, we have where we’re at now.

Every fast-food chain was approached with this “billion-dollar” idea: hand out samples of the compound to the infected and receive “financial compensation.” We don’t have an exact dollar figure still, but it must’ve been a lot because they all immediately adopted the program within weeks.

Every couple of days we get shipments of “compound patties” at our backdoor. Now, they claim it’s “cow brains”, but after we forced our lead shift manager to watch Soylent Green, he’s convinced the stuff’s made out of dead people, and we’ve been placing our bets ever since. Regardless of their content, however, the “compound patties” go like hotcakes for the infected. They can’t get enough. And because they’re so busy eating the patties, they’ve got no reason to attack people. Thus, crisis solved…right?

I work at this place called The Bite. It’s not as well-known as the big-name chains, but we keep busy. Essentially, we’re McDonald’s mixed with Checkers (or Rally’s if you’ve survived out in the Midwest, God help you) in the sense that our drive-thru is split in half, with one side devoted to genuine fast food, and the other for, well, the zombies.

Tonight, Tina’s on “compound duty” while I’ve got the regular side. We’re hounded up the ass to keep the sides separated to avoid cross-contamination. We do our best but…I can’t help but visit with Tina on and off.

Aside from us, there’s Dennis, our shift manager, Rebecca, our lobby cashier, George, our lead cook, and Chuck, the GM, who happened to surprise us tonight with a routine “evaluation” which has Dennis, Mr. “Employee of the Month”, shaking in his non-slip boots. Personally, and honestly, I’m not very concerned. It’s Thursday; Thursdays are never busy.

“Oh shit,” Dennis said, wrapping a tight fist around his chin as he bit down onto his knuckle.

“What?” I asked. He pointed to the drive-thru camera behind me, showcasing Tina’s drive-thru side: one hell of a line. And by line, I mean mass horde of the infected.

Did I mention that, on the “compound” side, it’s always busy?

I went with Dennis to grab another frozen box of patties from the freezer, being sure to “wash my hands” as I was told (‘cause God knows that’s helping), but I was stopped when he noticed that Chuck had beat us to it. He looked worried, those calculating eyes of his darting around as trembling fingers gripped onto that company phone. I mean, he was standing in a freezer, but he looked more jittery than usual.

“Dennis, a word please,” he said, looking at me and prompting my excusal. I shrugged Dennis off, turning back to the kitchen where George met me with his eyes.

“The hell’s going on? I’m outta patties.”

“I know,” I said, “they’re having a meeting or something.”

“In the freezer?”

I nodded. I wasn’t going to interrupt my higher-ups, even if we were running low on inventory. After all, it’s pretty stupid that we even bother to cook the things in the first place. Our “customers” clearly don’t care. Corporate said it was something about “keeping up appearances” or something.

The freezer door popped open with a metallic clank after a long, foreboding silence. Neither George nor I mustered up the audacity to say anything. Chuck then marched right past us in a beeline from the freezer in a tizzy, leaving Dennis in his dust. He approached us, not saying a word.

“So…?” I said, trying to read his face: it was a blend of surprise and sheer panic. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

“Spit it out, man,” George said, “You got the patties or not? Tina’s running low and I’m all out.”

Dennis shook his head with a glazed-over, fear-stricken look in his eyes.

“The truck,” he sputtered, “it tipped over.”

“What truck?” I asked.

“The truck full of patties,” he said as matter-of-factly as he could’ve. “The driver took a sharp turn and it tipped. Within seconds it was swarmed by a mob of roaming biters,” Dennis shook his head, his thoughts catching up with his mouth, “He shot himself, the driver. Before they could get to him.”

“Hold the phone,” George said, resting his spatula against the hot metal with a fading sizzle, “you’re telling me we ain’t gettin’ any more patties cause some jackass took a wrong turn on I-95? The hell are we supposed to do?”

“Sit tight,” Dennis said, refusing to make eye contact with either of us.

“Sit tight?” George scoffed, “Is that what corporate said? Man, fuck corporate, man.”

The realization of the situation finally dawned on me, physically pushing me back before I could speak:

“So, we’re just supposed to sit here?” I asked, unsure of what really to say.

“Chuck said there’s a protocol for this,” Dennis said, folding his arms and lowering his voice, “He also said they’re going to come for us, Steven.”

“Come for us?”

“Without the patties, they’ll be forced to seek after any available…well, brains they can smell. Namely…ours.”

It was at this point when we were interrupted by Tina, who was attempting to appease the growing crowd outside her window.

“George, where the hell are the burgers? I got dozens of hungry customers waiting.”

George chuckled with a wave of his head, tearing his hairnet from what little hair remained atop his scalp.

“There’s been a menu change, Honey,” he said, “and we’re all on it.”

“Wait, what?” she snapped.

“Just, everyone calm down, alright? There’s a protocol in place for our safety,” Dennis said, Sullivan-nodding toward us underneath that “You are NOT Replaceable” sign, plastered beneath the red-eyed security camera. He shot his gaze over to Chuck, who was still preoccupied with his extended phone call. “Right, Chuck?” Chuck looked up from his call with a blank expression. He clearly wasn’t reading the situation. “We’ve got a protocol in place, correct?” Dennis reiterated. Chuck didn’t say a word, and instead of replacing his silence merely placed a finger over his poised lips.

“The hell is that about?” George said, extending a finger at the one crossed over Chuck’s mouth.

At this point, our commotion prompted Rebecca to stroll into the picture, who really didn’t do very much, given the fact that our lobby hadn’t seen an ounce of life for over three months. Her job was probably another one of those ‘keeping up appearances’ charades our corporate overlords seemed to love so much. Basically, they were paying her to play games on her phone.

“Can someone please tell me why it’s so damn loud right now? Jeez.”

We all stopped our bickering and realized Rebecca was right: even without our raised voices, it was loud…outside. There must’ve been at least a hundred of the infected out there. Of course, the glass drive-thru window behind Tina only showcased a good handful or so, but from every corner of the building we could make out the groans and cries of the flesh-eaters; their bodies flailing against the walls of the building as thuds echoed throughout our tiny kitchen. We all instinctively looked over at the camera feed, watching straggling biters roam off the main highway and into the mob, which looked like a bundle of roaches (something we were used to, here).

Then the sound of glass shattering sent the group into a type of shared paralysis. None of us could move. And, even if we could, where would we go?

The pitter-pattering of spongy feet across the lobby floor sent me into a type of fight-or-flight I’d never experienced before. I scrabbled toward the fire extinguisher, yanking it from the wall, and aiming its nozzle into the stagnant darkness of the lobby. I felt the eyes of everyone else, including Chuck, burning into the back of my head, drilling thoughts into it to tell me I was crazy. I was.

After what seemed like a year of waiting, a face emerged from the blackness: a mangled, pudgy corpse-like face. It was that of a large man, his body pulsating with a vile stench of greasy oil and decayed flesh; flesh that hung from his dark face, oozing with puss that seeped out of every pore.

I didn’t hesitate to spray the shit outta him. And when the extinguisher did little to deter the infected, I gripped the nozzle and began beating the zombie with everything I had. Once I landed several blows to the top of that mangled head, the zombie fell, limp, onto the floor.

The inside of the building was now completely silent, aside from my non-slip sneakers as they crept up to the body, lying face-up with white, hazy eyes reflecting the dimly fluorescent ceiling. I kicked the side of it once to make sure it was dead. It was, or at least…dead enough.

The sound of something clinking against the hard flooring broke my panting. I bent down, pinching my nose hard as the oozing, bile-like smell continued to fill my nostrils.

It was a toy. One of our plastic toys from the Bitey Kids meals. It must’ve fallen out of the zombie’s pocket when I kicked it. I instinctively shot my glance to the unconscious face below me.

I must’ve not recognized him due to the decay. It was Big Bruce.

“Okay, what the hell?” I shouted, turning to Chuck and Dennis for answers, ‘cause at this point, I severely needed some. Chuck raised his hands in innocence, lowering them for me to calm down, though he knew we were all tired of his silence by this point.

“You’ve got five seconds to start talkin’,” George said. Chuck sighed.

“I’m gonna be so fired for this, but what the hell,” Chuck said, lowering his defenses and breaking his silence.

“Being fired is gonna be the least of your problems, man,” George said. Chuck nodded stilly.

“The Bitey Corporation received a large sum of money from the U.S. government- “

“How large?” George snapped.

“I don’t know…pretty damn large. They did some company-wide data analysis and realized they were better off post-outbreak, especially compared to our competitors.”

“So?” I said.

“So,” he said, breathing in heavily before he spoke again, “-so they started putting shit into the food.”

“What kind of shit?” George asked.

“I don’t know!” Chuck shouted.

“Bullshit!” George snapped back.

“Tallow!” Chuck admitted, “They started using beef fat for the oil!”

I watched as George’s face contorted from rage to a frightening realization. He looked back at me, then at the others, then at Chuck.

“So, you’re saying we’ve been turning people into zombies?”

Chuck nodded, looking down at the floor. There was a staggering group sigh as we all realized what was going on. I looked up at Tina, perhaps the only safe one through all of this, given the fact that, ironically, she didn’t eat meat.

The rest of us, though, were screwed.

“How come it didn’t work on Bruce until tonight?” I said, pointing at the body before us.

“They just implemented this new strategy,” Chuck said, shaking his head, “Only the newest shipment had the beef oil on it. That’s why.”

George let out another sigh as heads continued to snap from face to face, eyes locking and unlocking.

“So, what’s the plan now? What’s this…protocol?”

“The protocol is we hang tight. The cops have been dispatched, but the only road to this location- “

“-is the road where the semi flipped,” Dennis nodded.

“So, you’re saying we’re fucked,” George said.

We all realized we were. The only way we could buy some time was to-

No, we couldn’t-

I looked around at the others. I wasn’t alone in my thought process.

“What’re you all looking at?” Chuck asked with a raised, defensive voice. George nodded at us and grabbed him by the arm.

“If I’m going,” George said affirmatively, “you’re going too, you son of a bitch.”

“What’re you talking about? We’re supposed to- “

“Hang tight?” George asked, “In case you didn’t notice, we’ve got a hole the size of Texas through the front window. They’ll be coming in any second.“ George began dragging the lightweight Chuck through the kitchen, he turned to face us amid Chuck’s cries for help. “If any of y’all have eaten here since the last shipment, I suggest you follow us. At least you’ll die with some dignity.”

George nodded a goodbye as he pulled Chuck through the opening in the glass window. I prompted Dennis to follow me as we upturned a handful of tables and barricaded the hole. As we shoved the tables in place, one by one, we could hear the trill screams of Chuck and George, followed by silence for but a moment, before the tearing of skin and snapping of bones resonated from the parking lot outside. We both queasily winced at the noises, gritting our teeth, and bearing it as we returned to Tina and Rebecca in the kitchen.

Both of the girls quickly adopted the terror plastered on each of our faces. I could tell they wanted us to comfort them or offer some reassurance, but both of us stood without a word. That is, of course, before the inevitable next question arose:

Who’s next?

Another loud crash jolted us all from our silent stares; mine toward Tina, and the others toward the floor, stained with rancid blood oozing from Bruce’s wounds. Time was running out, and the lack of sirens meant we were still on our own. The inhuman and disfigured voices chanted in unison around the walls of the small building, all reprising their collective request of: “BRRRAAIIINS!”

“Alright, who’s next?” I said, sucking back a gasp of air and holding it tightly within my chest. The gazes from the others met mine, none in shock as if we all had the same idea.

“We can draw straws,” Dennis said, “there’s some in the lobby.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Rebecca said, “you’re the one that got us into this shit, Dennis. You oughta go first.”

“Me? I didn’t- ” he paused, noticing he was outnumbered. He slowed his voice, “I didn’t do anything. Chuck merely asked that I kept quiet as to not scare you all. I had no idea about the beef. I swear.”

Maybe it was the fact that the brink of death was so close but, for whatever reason, I believed him. Obviously, Tina did too.

“Straws, then,” Tina said. I nodded, hemming back a raspy cough as I stepped over Bruce’s lifeless body on the floor, retrieving a handful of straws from the lobby. I felt a shiver run up my spine as I turned to face the glass window behind me: there were more of them.

The infected studied me with wide eyes, ripping from their sockets without lids to hold them back; their tongues glued to the chilled glass hazed with what hot breath they had left. I swallowed a warm mouthful of spit as I returned to the others with the straws.

Tina cut them up with one of George’s kitchen knives. We all watched as she scrabbled the various lengths around in her balled-up fist, unable to tell the difference between them.

She held out her hand and waited. None of us dared to start.

Screw it.

I grabbed a straw, somewhat on the taller side. I was safe.

Tina immediately followed. The largest. Thank God.

Then Rebecca. She reached in, yanking the smallest out.

“Shit. Listen, you can’t- ” she fearfully stared back at all of us, “-I’m pregnant.”

Dennis’s mouth dropped open at the bombshell. I honestly didn’t have a comeback for this one.

“Bullshit,” Tina said, calling her bluff.

“It’s true, Tina,” Rebecca said, nodding spastically.

“How many weeks?”

“Twenty.”

“Boy or girl?”

“Girl.”

Her answers were pretty snappy. If she was lying, she was doing a damn good job.

And that’s when the biter entered the pictured.

See, despite our bureaucratic straw-drawing debate, the crawlers outside were far less cordial. It didn’t matter that we were deciding who would be their next meal. To them, all that mattered is that they got it.

I don’t know how he got in, but he did. Out of nowhere, this walker ran in and clasped his jaw, unhinged like a snake, right down on top of Dennis’ head, peeling some of his scalp off and cracking straight-through his skull, spraying his blood all over that “The Customer is ALWAYS Right” sign he had just put up last week.

We tried our best to pry the thing off of him, but our efforts were in vain. Tina rushed by me as she pulled the emergency exit door shut. Somehow, the biter must’ve figured out how to use a door handle. Rebecca then handed me the knife Tina used to cut the straws, and with one stab after another, I jammed the thing through the biter’s face, causing it to spasm and gargle on its own blood until it, too, fell limp.

Rebecca helped hoist me up to my feet, overlooking the mangled corpse on the kitchen floor. We were both silently waiting for the thing to twitch when that emergency back door began to rattle from behind Tina, the squeals of the infected pushing their way through. Tina pounded on it as she screamed for them to stop. They didn’t, of course. They kept slamming on it, and I feared that cheap-o door wouldn’t be saving us for much longer.

“What now?” Rebecca said, heaving with her chest. She looked at Tina and me, back and forth.

“Now,” Tina said, pulling the now red-bladed knife from the biter’s face, “you go outside, Becca.”

“What?” I said. What was Tina-

“Look at her,” she said staring intently at me, “Does it look like she’s twenty weeks pregnant?”

“I dunno,” I shrugged desperately, “How am I supposed to know?”

“Trust me, she’s not.”

“I am! You’ve gotta believe me!” Rebecca shouted.

“They’re gonna bust through that door any minute,” Tina said, “and the cops still aren’t here so we’re all gonna die if someone doesn’t go outside.”

Tina held the knife up at Rebecca, who turned to face me.

“What happened to women and children first, huh?” she cried.

“If you insist,” Tina said, shouldering Rebecca toward the door, causing her to trip over the body on the floor. I took a step back as the ensuing catfight began, ending with Rebecca being pinned against the emergency exit at knife-point. “Sorry Becca,” Tina said as she unlatched the door, forcing Rebecca into a swarm of the infected. Her screams shot through the tiny kitchen until Tina slammed the emergency exit, muffling the shrill shrieks.

Tina sighed aside the “Fresh, Not Frozen, Beef” sign and pulled herself through the kitchen with what little energy she had left, Rebecca’s screams cutting off as it was probable they reached her vocal cords on their way up to her brain.

Everything became silent then, aside from the hum of perpetual moans that plagued the place, and the ice machine. Tina stood before me, wiping away a tear and sniffling.

“I sure hope she was lying to us,” she said. I nodded as I extended an arm, embracing her.

“Y’know, there’s something I’ve never told you, Tina,” I said.

“What?” she said, her voice muffled as her cheeks dug into my shoulder.

“It’s nothing,” I said.

“No, go on,” she said. I swallowed.

“If somehow, I get the chance…I wanna take you out,” I said. Tina laughed against me.

“Deal. Just as long as it’s not fast food.” I felt her smile widen against my arm.

As I held onto her so tightly amid that cramped-up kitchen, my nose atop her blonde locks, my lips pecking a kiss, the only thing that began running through my mind, now, was the taste of that number nine I had on my lunch break, and how it smelled just like the inside of her head.

I AM A ZOMBIE

by Sadofreedomist

I am a zombie, and it’s not so bad. I’m learning to live with it. I’m sorry I can’t properly introduce myself, but I don’t have a name anymore. Hardly any of us do. We forget them, like anniversaries and PIN numbers. I think mine might have started with a “T”, but I’m not sure. It’s funny, because back when I was alive, I was forgetting other people’s names. I am finding that irony abounds in the zombie life, an ever-present punch line. But it’s hard to smile when your lips have rotted off.

Before I became a zombie, I think I was a businessman or young professional of some kind. I think I worked in one of those stifling office jobs in a highrise somewhere. The clothes clinging to the remains of my body are high-quality business-casual. Fine gabardine slacks, silvery silk shirt, red Armani power tie. I would probably look pretty sharp if my intestines weren’t dragging at my feet. Ha.

We like to joke and speculate about our remaining outfits, since these final fashion choices are usually the only indication of who we were before we became no-one. Some people’s are less obvious that mine. Jeans and a white t-shirt. Skirt and a tank-top. So we make random guesses.

You were a plumber. You were a barista. Ring any bells?

It usually doesn’t.

No one I know has any specific memories. We recognize some things- buildings, cars, Armani ties- but context eludes us. We are here, we do what we do. We lack excellent diction, but we can communicate. We grunt and groan, we make hand gestures, and sometimes a few words slip out. It’s not that different from before.

There are a few hundred of us living in a wide plain of dust outside some large city. We don’t need shelter or warmth, obviously. We stand around in the dust, and time passes. I think we’ve been here for a long time. Despite my dragging entrails, I am in decay’s early stages, but there are a few elderly ones here who are little more than skeletons with clinging bits of muscle. Somehow, it still extends and contracts, and they keep moving. I have never seen any of us “die” of old age. Maybe we live forever, I don’t know. I don’t think much about the future anymore. That’s something that’s very different from before. When I was alive, the future was all I thought about. Obsessed about. Death has relaxed me.

But it makes me sad that we’ve forgotten our names. Out of everything, this seems to me the most tragic. I don’t miss my own, but I mourn for everyone else’s, because I want to love them, but I don’t know who they are.

Today a group of us are going into town to find some food. How this expedition begins is one of us gets hungry and starts shuffling towards town, and a few others follow him. Focused thought is a rare occurrence with us, and we follow it when we see it. Otherwise we would just be standing around groaning. We do a lot of standing around groaning, and it’s frustrating sometimes. Years pass this way. The flesh withers on our bones, and we stand around, waiting for it. I am curious how old I might be.

The city where the people live is not that far. We arrive around noon and start looking for living flesh. The new kind of hunger is a strange feeling. You don’t feel it in your stomach – of course not, since some of us don’t even have stomachs. You feel it just…everywhere. You start to feel “more dead”. I’ve watched some of my friends go back to being full-dead, when food is scarce. They just slow down, and stop, and become corpses again. I don’t really understand it.

I guess the world has mostly ended, because the cities we wander through are decaying as fast as we are. Buildings are collapsed. Dead, rusted cars fill the streets. All glass everywhere is shattered. I don’t know if there was a war, or a plague, or if it was just us. Maybe it was all three. I don’t know. I don’t think about things like that anymore.

In a cluster of broken down apartment buildings we find some people, and we eat them. Some of them have weapons, and as usual we lose some of our number, but we don’t care. Why would we care? What’s death, now?

Eating is not a pleasant business. I chew off a man’s arm, and I hate this, it’s disgusting. I hate his screams, because I don’t like pain. I don’t like to hurt things, but this is the world now, this is what we do. Of course, if I don’t eat all of him, if I leave enough, he’ll rise up and follow me back to our dusty field outside the city, and that might make me feel better. I’ll introduce him to everyone, and maybe we’ll stand around and groan for a while. It’s hard to say what “friends” are anymore, but maybe that’s close. If I don’t eat all of him, if I leave enough…

But of course I don’t leave enough. I eat his brain, because that’s the good part. That’s the part that, when I swallow it, makes my head light up with feelings. Clear memories. For about three to ten seconds, depending on the person, I get to feel alive. I get traces of delicious meals, beautiful music, perfume, orgasms, sunsets, life. Then it fades, and I get up and stumble out of the city, still dead, but feeling a little less so. Feeling OK.

I don’t know why we have to eat people. I don’t understand what chewing off a man’s neck accomplishes. We certainly don’t digest the meat and absorb the nutrients. My stomach is a rotted bag of dried bile, useless. We don’t digest, we just eat until the weight forces it out our ass holes, and then we eat more. It feels so useless, and yet it keeps us walking. I don’t know why. None of us really understand why we are the way we are. We don’t know if we’re the result of some strange global infection, or some ancient curse, ore something even more senseless. We don’t talk about it much. Existential debate is not a major part of zombie life. We are here, and we do things. We are simple. It’s nice sometimes.

Outside the city again, back with the others in the dust field, I start walking in a circle for no reason. I plant one foot in the dirt and pivot on it, around and around, kicking up clouds of dust. Before, when I was alive, I could never have done this. I remember stress. I remember bills and deadlines, Asset Retention Reports. I remember being so occupied, so always everywhere all the time occupied. Now I’m just standing in a wide-open field of dust, walking in a circle. The world has been distilled. Being dead is easy.

After a few days of this, I stop walking, and I stand still, swaying back and forth groaning a little. I don’t know why I groan. I’m not in pain, and I’m not sad. I think it’s just air being squeezed in and out of my lungs. When my lungs decompose, it will probably stop. And now, while swaying and groaning, I notice a dead woman standing a few feet away from me, facing the distant mountains. She doesn’t sway or groan, her head just lolls from side to side. I like that about her, that she doesn’t sway or groan. I walk over and stand beside her. I wheeze some kind of greeting, and she responds with a lurch of her shoulder.

I like her. I reach out and touch her hair. She has not been dead very long. Her skin is grey and her eyes slightly sunken, but she has no exposed bones or organs. Her death outfit is a black skirt and a snug white button-up. I suspect she used to be a waitress.

Pinned to her chest is a silver name tag.

I can read her name. She has a name.

Her name is Emily.

I point to her chest. Slowly, with great effort, I say. “Em..ily.” The word rolls off what’s left of my tongue like honey. What a good name. I feel warm saying it.

Emily’s cloudy eyes widen at the sounds, and she smiles. I also smile, and then maybe I’m a little nervous, because my tibia snaps, and I fall backwards into the dust. Emily just laughs, and it’s a choked, raw, lovely sound. She reaches down and helps me to my feet.

Emily and I have fallen in love.

I’m not sure how this happens. I remember what love was like before, and this is different. this is simpler. Before, there were complex emotional and biological factors at work. We had long checklists and elaborate tests to be passed. We looked at hairstyles and careers and breast sizes. And sex was there, in everything, confusing everyone, like hunger. It created longing, it created ambition, competition, it drove people to leave their houses and invent automobiles, space craft, and atom bombs when they could instead just sit on the couch until they died. Animal cravings. Subconscious urges. Sex made the world go ’round.

This is all gone now. Sex, once a force as universal as gravity, is now irrelevant. Ambition and longing have left the equation. My penis fell off two weeks ago.

So the equation is deleted, the blackboard erased, and things are different now. Our actions have no ulterior motives. We shuffle around in the dust and occasionally have lumbering, grunted exchanges with our peers. No one argues. There are no fights, ever.

And Emily is not a complicated process. I just see her, and walk over to her, and for no reason, really, I decide I want to be with her for a long time. So now we shuffle around in the dust together instead of alone. For whatever reason, we enjoy each other’s company. When we have to go into town to eat people, we do it at separate times, because it’s unpleasant, and we don’t want to share that. But we share everything else, and it’s nice.

We decide to walk to the mountains. It takes us three days, but now we are standing on a cliff looking up at a fat white moon. At our backs, the night sky is red from distant cities burning, but we don’t care about that. I clumsily grab Emily’s hand, and we stare at the moon.

There’s no real reason for any of this, but like I said, the world has been distilled. Love has been distilled. Everything is easy now. Yesterday my leg broke off, and I don’t even mind.

 

The Ending

by Theredhawk345

The ending. A fitting term. It has, in fact, ended. I write this from my one small corner, the small space that I worked to deem “safe”. Every day, every horrible day is a struggle to stay sane. Ah, I am getting ahead of myself. I suppose I should start with a brief summary of what happened. My name is Ridley Peirce. I made a living as a freelance writer. I had a studio apartment in Toronto. I drove a Ford F-250. I lived on junior mints. And yet, I was still happy. Doing my passion, living in peace. Then it happened.

I use the term “it” because the public in general was never informed what it was. The widest speculation was that it was some result of pollution, thus is the general politician’s idealism. It took effect on the 16th of June, 1998. I remember it vividly. I was not getting any good deals on my scripts, so I was down on my money. I went to the corner store to get a few groceries, and I heard it. An absolute blood-curdling scream. I glanced toward the front of the store. Everyone was running. My first thought was a murder. I had never seen a murder, but I had seen a man get mugged, and that alone was not pretty.

It was then that I saw my first infected. In life, he was a middle aged man, probably worked construction, he was dressed like it. Now, in this state, he was clammy and pale. He had a long claw mark on his left arm, and his eyes were bloodshot and puffy. He is not alone. A careless shopper had gotten tangled in the crowd of frantic people, and the infected had gotten to him. To his good fortune he had had a quick death- his throat bitten out. He, as I had later figured out, was one of the lucky ones. The infected ate his corpse as I and the other panicked shoppers watched. A loud bang resonated in the air. The owner of the store had gotten his .12 gauge shotgun, and very quickly eliminated the infected. As soon as the infected who was in the way of the door was clear, I was out the door. My mission in life was now to get to my truck. I kept my Colt .45 in the glove compartment. I had a feeling that whatever these things were, there were more.

I made it to my truck, I climbed in, I locked the doors, I fumbled for my keys, and roared off down main street. I was shaken, and didn’t know where to go. I looked back, and saw the infected crowding around the store, attracted by the noise. As I drove by some houses and a coffee shop, I saw a large group of them. They were dressed like normal people. A company T-shirt here, a dress there. I was clueless. All that I knew was that I needed to get away from these things as fast as I could. Now, on me, I only had my knife, my .45, my keys, my wallet, my zippo, and some quarters. Not the best selection to fight the hoard with. As I drove toward my house, I saw not more, but tons more. On the sides of the road, Near houses, IN houses. as I drove, far exceeding the speed limit, I would occasionally glance out my window. I saw people running from the infected. People fighting the infected. People getting eaten by the infected.

I pulled into my driveway. I saw my neighbor running out of the building. I saw an infected version of my landlord running after him. I remember shooting him. Guess he won`t be bothering me about rent anymore. I ran inside. I ran to my apartment. I locked the door, and barricaded it with my dresser and bed. I board up the two windows. I gather my wits. I needed to find out what was going on. I turn on the T.V. Nothing. I sat down, and I waited. That was 5 days ago. I ran out of decent food 3 days ago. Running water stopped just before that. Oh, god, the dehydration is horrible….But I still have my handgun. 4 rounds. enough for 3 infected. if it comes to that, I’ll know what to do.

Zombie

by Animedugan

I can’t stop running… because he’ll be behind me. I know that he will catch up to me. That man… no… that thing… that monster.

I will take you a few hours back.

It is October 13th, 2003. Five of my friends and I made a dare… stay in the old abandoned school yard at the edge of town overnight… bring no weapons, no cellphones… nothing but the clothes on our backs and a flashlight in handy. And one particular rule that I would later come to regret… do not meet up with each other. You are to stay alone in a separate parts of the building. For the entire night.

As my friends and I entered the school building, we looked at each other, nodded, and went our separate ways, switching our flashlights on. I looked back briefly, seeing my friends’ flashlight lights disappear in the distant darkness. If only I had called it off then… if only I knew… if only I had listened to the freaking “superstitious” neighbors, then we’d all be safe. But me and my so called daring nature decided to take this dare head on.

It wasn’t long before I reached the end of one of the hallways. I plopped down into the corner, flashlight in both hands, and I began to wait for what seemed like forever. I started to play around with my flashlight a little bit, thinking of how to gloat to my neighbors that there was no so called “Dead Man” in the building… that me and my friends all came out alive and well, and no one else but us was in that building for the entire night. I chuckled at the thought.

That will show them what they get for trying to scare us.

It was then, that I heard it. That scream. That loud, agonizing scream. No doubt, it was the voice of one of my friends in the distance… but it seemed like it wasn’t too far off. In normal situations (without any dares involved), a person would immediately jump to their feet and run to the rescue.

Not me. I assumed it to be a way of trying to scare me… a way for me to lose the dare entirely. Ha! Who do they think they are messing with? That won’t fool me. I thought, smiling to myself. As I think back to that time, I regret not running to the direction of the scream… then they’d have been safe.

THUNK shfffffff

What??

THUNK shfffff THUNK shfffff THUNK shffff THUNK shffffff

One of my friends again, no doubt in my mind. Trying to scare me again. Making uneasy noises to make me “shake in my boots.” It was coming in my direction.

THUNK shffffff THUNK shfffff THUNK shffffff THUNK shfffffff THUNK shfffffff

It was then when I realized one of the rules of the dare… no one was to meet up at all.

They’re just giving up like that? Or maybe they are desperate to get me out of the dare.

With this, I turned off my light, thinking of scaring them as punishment. I moved myself behind the lockers, and peeked around the corner. I would jump out from behind and scare the bejesus out of them. I snickered quietly to myself, my eyes finally adjusting to the darkness. I saw the dark shadow of one of them approaching, slowly but surely.

THUNK shfffff THUNK shffff THUNK shffff

That’s right. Come closer. Face your punishment.

THUNK shffffff THUNK shffffff THUNK shfffffffff THUNK shfffff

I froze, my heart nearly stopping. The figure was closer now… but larger than any of my friends at all. It had to be six… no… seven feet tall at least. It was large, like a muscular man. It was becoming clearer and clearer. This wasn’t one of my friends. Not at all.

THUNK shffffff THUNK shffffff THUNK shffffff THUNK shfffff THUNK shfffffff

As it drew closer, I noticed something large behind it… it was dragging something. Something… human sized.

Oh no… OH GOD no… Please, don’t be what I think it is. PLEASE GOD…

THUNK shfffff THUNK shfffff THUNK THUNK

Without thinking, my head slowly looked up… at this thing… this large, muscular thing with blood-stained bandages wrapped tightly around its head. The only thing showing was his eye… his horrid, bright yellow eye that looked like it belonged to a deadly predator. Its body… completely covered in grotesque scars, that almost hid his grey-green skin. It had the body of the man… but I knew… this was no human.

WHAM!!!!

I jumped, cupping my hands over my mouth to suppress any sort of noise whatsoever. I didn’t want to look… but my head moved on its own, looking directly next to me.

I held back my scream… it was one of my friends… well, I could tell from her blood-stained clothes. Both of her arms were twisted in different directions, and what’s worse… her face. It was completely caved in to the point of no recognition. Her head was completely turned around, as if to have been struck with such force, that her neck did a 360. Tears of fear and overwhelming grief flowed from my eyes. This monster… killed her… and threw her with such force onto the ground in front of him… directly next to me.

THUNK THUNK THUNK THUNK THUNK THUNK

My eyes darted in the direction of that… thing. It was walking away. Slowly, but I knew that it was going in the opposite direction. I waited until it was out of my field of vision to move again.

I have to reach the others… if they get caught…

I shuddered at the vision of my four remaining friends dying at the hands of that monster. So quietly, I set off to another end of the school.

It took a while, but I finally reached a narrow hallway, which I seemed to remember one of my friends disappearing to. I walked swiftly down the hall…

That STENCH. That horrible, raw stench of meat…

…And there it was. The remains of what used to be my friend… splattered everywhere… flattened like a pancake. The ceiling… the walls… the floorboards. Covered in blood and human meat.

Without thinking, I screamed in terror, falling flat on my back, my white shoes being stained with the blood of my friend. I scrambled backward on my hands and feet, away from the horrific sight. I stumbled up to my feet, and turned around.

It was right in front of me… growling like a hungry wolf ready to strike, his horrid yellow eye fixated on me. I stopped breathing.

Slowly, its right arm reached behind its back and grabbed something… something huge.

My only description of what I saw… a six foot-tall meat cleaver, sharper than anything that I have ever seen. Covered in fresh, dripping blood.

It lifted the giant cleaver over its head with both hands and swung down with great force. My reflexes caught up with me, as I dodged it sideways, hearing it cut clean into the floorboards. Without a second thought, I ran. As fast and hard as I could.

I HAVE TO GET OUT!!! OH GOD, I HAVE TO GET OUT OF HERE!!!!!!!!

With each doorknob I felt, I stopped and tried to open it. But every one I hit was locked tight. And each time I stopped, I could hear his loud, slow footsteps directly behind me… getting closer each time. So I continued to run. No stopping, no breaks. I couldn’t. He’d KILL me.

Now, I bring you back to the present… and I have found it. The exit. I finally found it! I stumble, jumping at the knob of the door, laughing uncontrollably.

Finally, I’m free! I’M GODDAMN FREE!!! SWEET OUTSIDE WORLD!

Kachickachick

What? No… NONONONONONONONO, this isn’t right!!!!! THIS ISN’T…

Shlick

I look down. The end of a sharp meat cleaver is pierced through my chest.

N-no… how? I was so close! I was so…

October 20th, 2003
After a long search, the bodies of the five missing high school students were found in the abandoned schoolyard at approximately 7 a.m.

Each student was slaughtered and massacred beyond recognition.

The sixth student still has yet to be discovered…

Zombie Fungi

by KingStraton

I’ve done plenty of research into this and now I am certain what I say is 100% true; there are still parts I don’t understand but that’s the reason I wrote this report, so others could give me their own theories.

I am 19, I go to school at Angelo State University in San Angelo, Texas. I grew up in Waco, a city in northeast Texas. I lived down there with my mom and my then 18 year old brother, David. I was 15 at the time. David was a genius, the soon-to-be-valedictorian already had scored a fatty scholarship at UT. He wasn’t a nerd by any standards. He was a starting basketball player and a power-lifter, literally a perfect child. Anyways, the Smithsonian Society or one of national honor things had a trip for seniors that year, to send 15 lucky young brain-children to Brazil to study plant life. Most people would kill NOT to go on a trip that consisted of putting leaves in beakers but David went ape-shit and begged mom to go.

It was probably three weeks he was gone; he left during Christmas break and actually missed the holidays that year but he loved it, so we were OK with it.

So fast forward to the day he got back from Brazil he could’ve skipped about a week of school justifiably but:

He had his first game.
He wouldn’t miss school for the world.
I remember the day he got back and we picked him up at the airport; he looked perfectly fine, healthy and happy. In fact, he wouldn’t stop blabbering about the God-damn plants on the way home. I was surprised mom didn’t drive off the road and kill all of us just for a moment of silence.

It wasn’t until a couple of days later that I noticed something weird; it was after David’s first game, and he looked like hell. He was pale, walked everywhere like he was exhausted. He just said it was the first game that blew him out. I didn’t have the nerve to tell him he shouldn’t be tired cause he played terribly and coach hardly put him in. He still got up every morning, went to practice and school, each day looking worse and worse, paler, moving slower and slower. After about a week, my mom insisted he go see a doctor. All of us went, I had to make sure he was OK, I was legitimately scared for him.

It was at the office when we saw it, he pulled his shirt up to put on a stethoscope of something and we saw a large green, algae-like growth on the side of his ribs.

I can still remember my mom’s shocked expression as she shouted, “David!? Why didn’t you tell us about this before?”

His only explanation was a blank expression for a whole minute, even after mom yelling at him over and over for an answer.

Eventually, he managed, “It told me not to tell…”

After that, he was put in the hospital over night until we could figure out what the hell was going on. It was probably a whole month that he lay in the hospital. I visited him everyday, as soon as I got out of school.

I could describe each visit but frankly they were bland and he said nothing, ever.

It was on February 2nd 2008 that it happened. I was laying in bed listening to some music, my typical nightly routine before I went to sleep. I felt kind of hungry. I got up and crept down stairs in hopes of snatching a midnight snack of some kind. It was at least 1 a.m. and I was tired. My half-blurred vision led me to the refrigerator. I remember hearing footsteps. MOM! I quickly, but quietly tip-toed behind a wall where I wouldn’t be visible. Then I heard it, the words that would haunt me forever. David’s voice whispering angrily at no one.

“No, no I won’t do it. I’m not ready to die…”

Eventually his argument with the non-existent voice grew louder until he was nearly yelling.

“No, I won’t, I-I won’t!” Eventually I grew the balls to peak around the corner.

“David?” I asked as if to act like I hadn’t heard his shouting.

I flipped on the light, knowing what I saw would be terrible. But I was wrong, it was terrifying. His eyes were rolled in the back of his head, clumps of his hair were missing, he had scratch marks all over his body from where he had apparently clawed himself. David looked around, apparently now blind from his condition.

“David? It’s me! Your brother?” David looked around and replied softly, just when I was certain of what he said, “Goodbye…”

Suddenly, his whole body lost control as if he had been tazed, his arms flailed for a moment, and he fell over, cracking his head on our dinner table.

Blood poured onto the ground as his muscles slowly relaxed and he collapsed into a heap on the floor. Dead.

The police report stated that he died from his condition, not a suicide, not anything, just died of natural causes. I made it along; no one believed me when I told them of what I saw so quickly I stopped telling people. And with a closed casket funeral, I was the only one of our friends and family to see him looking like a zombie. Other than my mom who was in utter denial about the whole thing, and ended up on her deathbed from similar symptoms herself a couple months later. Like anything else, it just kind of disappeared.

After researching the topic and essentially making it my hobby to research throughout high school, I have accumulated the following facts: in certain parts of Africa, Brazil and Thailand there is a rare fungus commonly known as  ‘Zombie Fungi’. It infects certain species of ants and essentially possesses their small brains so they will walk to a decent place for the fungi to reproduce. Then the fungi kills the ant and spreads in its new area.

After the accident, I grew a green clump on my leg; I had it surgically amputated early on before it had the chance to grow. I don’t know if David was the first, I don’t know if my mother infected anyone, there’s a chance though. I don’t know about the other 14 kids, however, I do know it is out there, and there is no cure.

Persuaded

by XanCrews

It’s been two weeks since this whole thing started.

It all started with a tanker accident. It was all over the news. Everyone thought it was just another oil spill. There were plenty of volunteers – plenty of people wanting to help the poor, defenseless animals. Plenty of victims.

Within hours of the tanker accident, it started happening. The animals had gone crazy; they were scratching and biting the clean-up volunteers. They said that it was an adverse effect to whatever was in that tanker.

Rescue workers were still trying to get the crew out of the ship. They could hear screaming inside. There were screams to open the doors, but that’s when it all went to hell – as soon as they cut the door out.

There were six minutes of broadcast before it went silent – six minutes of screaming and agony. The ship crew attacked the rescue workers like rabid baboons. They were breaking bones and tearing flesh. The people on the shore weren’t fairing any better. Those that had been attacked by animals were attacking everyone else. It was worse than any war zone report; it was sheer brutality, and yet the broadcast still went on for six minutes. There was six minutes, and then blank faces. Nobody could explain what was happening. They tried to continue with the regular news, the economy, the weather, and a cute human interest story, but they couldn’t make us unsee what we saw.

I tried to continue with my regular existence, but every time I switched on the news or walked by a news stand, it was there: this big mystery. They had some explanations: it was an infection, or maybe brain parasites, but it didn’t matter. It wasn’t the infection we were afraid of, it was them.

Four days after the initial report, a state of emergency was raised…and yet, we’ve all seen this before. It’s in every zombie movie, ever. People didn’t know who to trust. People were stockpiling food and weapons. Some tried to flee, but it seems every zombie movie was right. They didn’t make it. Three days later, they arrived in my town.

I expected moans, shuffling corpses, and dismemberment, but that’s where the movies lied. They ran through the streets, screaming. I remember running to my front door as fast as I could, locking, barricading, and doing anything to make sure it would stay shut, and then I headed for the window. I was on the second story and I could see the carnage. They were unstoppable. They were aware.

A group of them made their way through a building across the street. They jumped straight through plate glass windows. Even the shards slicing through them made no difference; they just kept coming. My barricade wasn’t going to hold. I rushed around my flat, grabbing supplies and jamming them into the most secure room of the flat. I went back for one last look across the street, and I wish I hadn’t. In a second story window, my face met one of theirs. They knew where I was. I quickly dashed into the room and locked the door.

I don’t have any kind of panic room or a secure basement, so the safest place I could think of was my bathroom. There were no windows, and only one door; it had a lock. I had filled my sink and bathtub full of water so I could stay for a while. I sat there in the dark room with the distant screams in my ears.

I began to feel like I may have overreacted; it had been two hours with no sign of them. It actually got quieter and I thought they had moved on. Maybe I could leave the room and get to the kitchen. I could grab some more food to wait it out. A crash came from the front door. There was the sound of someone running full force into the door and knocking down the barrier behind it. There were a couple more crashes before I knew they were inside. There were rapid footsteps moving around the flat, a couple of screams and then a bang on the wall beside me. My eyes were open to their widest, even in the pitch black darkness of the room. There was another bang, and then another. They knew I was there and they knew I was scared.

This was the zombie nightmare I had been expecting from the start. I had nowhere to run. There was only so much time before they would break in. I sat with my back to the door, hoping my extra weight would make it harder for them to get in. Then it got worse.

“Why don’t you open the door?”

There was a voice on the opposite side of the door. There were no screams or moans, just a quiet, whispery voice. And then more of them.

“We’ve come for you.”

“You’ll be happier if you open the door.”

“It’s not so bad…”

The whispery voices became a cacophony of noise trying to persuade me, to break me, to fool me. I had heard that the moaning of zombies would drive people insane but this was worse – a siren call. I sat in the darkness and hoped and prayed that they’d get bored, but they don’t get bored and they don’t leave. I managed to use the mirror to peek under the door, only to be greeted by horrible unblinking eyes, blood smeared faces, screams, and more horrible whispers. That was two days ago.

I don’t know what to do anymore… Maybe it won’t be so bad…

 

This Zombie Apocolypse Sucks

by Killahawke1

This is some ol’ bullshit!

I tell ya what; this here zombie apocalypse ain’t livin up to what it was supposed to be. Nothing ain’t goin right and everthin’s happenin at the worst possible time!

First, it had to happen when I was back home in Texas vistin for a spell. Second, it had to be smack dab in the middle of the hottest summer on record. Third, and if that ain’t already bad enough, them zombies had to be runners, not shamblers, but runners; and them sumbitches are fast too!

I was like everybody else; I played the games, watched the movies, and never missed an episode of the TV shows. I fantasized about the day them zombies would show up and bite the shit out of everyone, especially all of them sumbitches at the credit card companies. I was so sick of them bill collectors harassin me like a bunch of ol’ buzzards. I couldn’t answer my phone without usin my fake foreign accent.

<Ring> <Ring>
“Duhh harro.”
“Hello, may I speak with Mr. Swanson?”
“Duh, he no here!”
“When do you expect…”
“Duh, he no live here no more! He move to ‘udder’ place! You call here no more!”
Eventually, they caught onto my ruse. But ya know what, I was gittin to a point in my life where I wanted to be a more better person; more sensitive and such. Ya know, I wanted to be more like Owen Wilson. So I took the very next call and was as polite as I could be and that debt collector was still all condescendin to me. He said, “Mr. Swanson, you need to be responsible with your finances! When can we expect payment on the balance due on your account?”

I was like, “You can expect payment anytime you’d like! How about this, why don’t you pick a date and we’ll both git to be surprised on that day when you still ain’t gotcha yur money!”

I might could be more like Alec Baldwin. He nice and all, but still keeps a temper to himself.

Nope, this zombie apocalypse ain’t nuthin like it shoulda been. There ain’t no fully stocked grocery stores just waitin to be plundered. There ain’t no runnin water, no lights, no food, no guns. Shit, even the pets have turned on us. The other day, I saw this old man git his ass kicked by a Chihuahua, a Chihuahua!

Yup, there ain’t no stashes of guns, no super smart science folks discoverin some obvious cure from a house plant that’s been starin back at them this whole time. There most definitely ain’t no pockets of civilization, waitin with open arms to take in a prodigal son who’s come wanderin in from the wilderness. None of that happened.

I always imagined that I would be this badass lone road warrior who wandered place to place, gettin into adventures and such. My pistols and my shotgun would be my only companions. Oh, and a sword! I’d want a sword too! I’d carry it on my back like He-Man done did in them cartoons I was fond of when I was a young’n. Ooh, Mama hated them cartoons. One time she caught me watchin one after school and she howled like a goddamn screech owl, “Sweet Jesus! Why don’t that man got no clothes on and why do all’em girls look like whores of Babylon?”

I count my blessins to this very day she never got a good look at what them Thunder Cats were wearin.

Poor Mama, bless her heart. I had to put her down myself, but she’s in a better place now. She’s up in Heaven with Jesus, bummin cigarettes off of St. Peter in front of them pearly gates. So, it was during my annual obligatory visit to the farm when the shit done hit the fan. I didn’t know what I was gonna do with Mama! She really was in no shape to be evadin hordes of ravenous zombies and such. There ain’t no nice way to put it, but she done definitely let herself go in the past few years. My Aunt Sissy said that she got so big, they were fraid for her life every time she sat in her favorite rockin chair. They went through at least two porch cats before they decided to do something about it, poor little bastards. They had to reinforce that ol’ chair with lug nuts, just to support her big ass with any level of confidence. She told everyone that Dr. Harris said her weight gain done come from a glandular problem. “Hmph, a glandular problem?” I said, “Mama, the only gland you have problems with is your saliva gland.” Heh, heh, heh. But honestly, she did have a weight problem. She could not “weight” to eat. Hahaha! I shoulda been one of them professional joke tellers.

Well, we were about to hightail it out from the farm when that girl from up yonder showed up on our front porch. What was her name again? Jenny? Yeah, Jenny, that real sweet girl with the fucked up eyes. It was a damn shame too, cause it was next to impossible to have a serious conversation with that girl. I tell ya, she was so bugged eyed, she looked like a big ol’ bullfrog wearin eye shadow. She had this one eye that was normal, but the other one would do whatever the hell it wanted to. Damn, I dared anybody to try and converse with her normal like and not get a serious case of the heebie jeebies. You couldn’t tell if she was lookin at you or lookin at your boots. You believe me, that’s mighty distractin when a fella’s tryin to organize his thoughts proper like.

I did hear, though, that eye of her’s could see around corners too, just like magic! But I ain’t one to gossip, so ya’ll didn’t hear that from me.

Oh, she used to babysit for all them Tayler kids, but they let her go after only one night. I heard it was going real good’n all until that crazy eye of her’s got to zippin and zappin this way and that. Well, it damn near scared the livin bejesus out them kids. You could see kids divin out the windows, bustin down doors and crashing through walls just to get away from her. Although I reckon, there was some good to came out of all that. For that night forward there was no problem disciplinin them kids. All ya had to do was say, “If you don’t mind me, I’m gonna get ol’ Jenny to come stare at ya’ll!”

What the hell was I talkin about? Oh, we came out of the house and there was lil Jenny. She was all dirty and tore up like she had a run-in with a pack of ol’pissed off coyotes. The three of us locked eyes. It felt like we stared each other down for eternity. One bloodshot eye stared at Mama and the other one fixated on me. Well, more like in the general location of my left elbow, but I understood her intent. Well, whatever goes on in their heads, I could tell it was workin overtime trying to decide which one of us would taste better. Not to be insensitive or nuthin, but it wasn’t really a difficult decision if ya were lookin for more bang for ya buck. It didn’t matter how long you’ve been dead, you can tell the difference between a snack and a banquet. A low growl began to emerge from the girl. It got louder and louder, then she charged at Mama.

What happened next, I swear on my daddy’s grave is the honest truth. If I’m lyin, then rattlesnakes don’t like to shake their rattles. Lil Jenny jumped on top of Mama and they crashed to the ground. She then bit down on Mama’s throat…then…then out of the blue she stopped! She looked up at me (well kind of, but I’ve already sufficiently beat that horse to death), she had this look of confusion, no, more like bewilderment. She sniffed at the bloody mess she made of my mama. She smacked her lips a couple of times like she was tastin somethin peculiar and finally made a face like she had just tasted the nastiest thing to ever exist on God’s green Earth. The look of revulsion that spread across her face almost made me bust out laughin. Then it hit me, I knew that face. I knew it very well! Mama had given Miss Jenny “Nyquil-face”, ya know, that face ya make after drinkin that green shit for a cold! That got me thinkin, after all this time, you’d think they woulda come up with somethin better than that nasty “Green Death” flavor. Cherry tastes like shit too!

Anyways, that gave me the opportunity to gather my wits about myself and I pulled out my handgun. I aimed it real careful like at the face that was now stickin its tongue out and gaggin. Before I pulled that trigger, I thought to myself, “I knew it! I knew it! That old woman was so mean, if anythin ever tried to eat her up, it would either spit her out or curl up and die.”

Mama was pretty much done in. I made sure it was permanent. She was a proud woman and I knew she would want to keep her dignity even in death. It’s the least I could do because truth be told, ya’ll know there ain’t nuthin more pathetic than when a fat zombie tries to run you down.