Cry Zombie Cry (I Zombie Book 5) Read online

  Cry Zombie Cry

  By Jack Wallen

  Copyright 2014 by Jack Wallen

  PUBLISHED BY: AUTUMNAL PRESS

  This book is a work of fiction. Unless otherwise noted, names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously (unless otherwise noted). Any resemblance to actual locales, events or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic format without express permission from the author. Please do not participate or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  Edited By:

  David Antrobus

  Heather Austin

  Claire C. Riley

  Halima Rahman

  This book is dedicated to everyone out there who has turned to music to help them through a rough time. As Shakespeare so brilliantly said, “If music be the food of life, play on.” And what better way to “play on” than with a bit of zombie apocalypse and metal. m/

  I also must extend a very special thank you to Aya and Mauser of UNSUN. I have been a fan of your music for a very long time and was honored that you wanted to be a part of this wicked little world. Here’s to more amazing music from UNSUN.

  Another special thanks to Kaizan Sharx and Trendemic+ for also joining in on this little ride through the apocalyptic landscape. Bethany and company owe you one.

  A final special thank you to super fan Jaki Marler for not just being a remarkable survivor, but for inspiring the character of Rizzo.

  And now, ladies and gents…shall we turn it up to eleven?

  chapter 1 | a mother’s worst nightmare

  It began as a low thrumming in the base of my neck. I wasn’t sure if the feeling was physical, mental, or what—but it was there, buzzing like a million cicadas dancing about my cerebellum. Slowly, almost painfully so, the buzzing migrated upward. As it crawled through my occipital and parietal lobes, the buzzing rose in pitch—one octave, two octaves. The sound reached my frontal lobe and this time the note climbed a mountainous musical scale so high I could hardly withstand the affront. The noise transformed into death-inducing white noise and then soared well beyond my range of hearing.

  I could still feel it—a thrashing pressure against the inner walls of my skull. Pounding, crashing, roaring to a breakneck mosh pit rave fueled by the apocalypse and driven by an inhuman desire to destroy anything and everything I could lay my hands on—walls, doors, human flesh and bone…but more so—brains.

  Eat. Pray. Love. Demolish. Unmake the human machine.

  The sound dropped back down within range of my auditory system and was joined by a certain familiar oscillation. My vision shaded to a blood-red rage. The meat within my skull boiled; the pain was unbearable. There was only one impulse coursing through my system—save every living soul around me from the same fate. They were everywhere—innocent people, shoving their way to get beyond my grasp. No one screamed, no one panicked. In perfect silence, the throngs of living meat pressed on by.

  They had to feel it, the suffering within. I couldn’t help not knowing.

  I stopped and wrapped my hands around the head of one of the unwashed masses.

  “Can you feel it?”

  Nothing. The man stared on, his eyes and mouth bereft of emotion. I let him pass. The salvation of the numb and lifeless served no purpose.

  The tide of the wannabe-damned continued past me. The pace of the onslaught came to a Hollywood slow-motion crawl and then every face but one faded from existence.

  “Jacob,” I cried out.

  The bullet hole in his forehead was gone, his face complete and filled with joy upon hearing my voice. He ran to me, his arms spread wide, ready to take me up in an embrace. As he approached, his eyes went milky white and the gunshot wound reappeared.

  “Bethany!” Jacob’s voice was barely recognizable, under the insufferable roar that spilled from between his lips.

  I could smell his sour breath, hear the tendons in his neck creak under the pressure of rage. Before he could wrap his hands around my skull…he fell to dust.

  Finally, it stopped. The sights and sounds of my hate-filled wonderland crashed down around me until all that was left was a dust bowl ghost town. Me and nothing. I knew Jacob hadn’t really been there. I wanted to cry out from the loss, but I’d traveled that road far too many times since I put the bullet through his head. As with every dead-end moment in my life, all I could do was move on.

  A hot, dry wind sliced across my cheeks and brought tears to my eyes. The ghost town reclaimed my focus. Something deep inside of me wanted to let loose the clichéd western-soundtrack whistle and pull my trusty pistol from a cracked and worn leather holster I knew wasn’t on my thigh.

  Cliché.

  Why does everything have to be grounded in stereotype?

  I had to reclaim the truth; no wind caressed my cheek, no pistol appeared at my thigh, and no ghost town surrounded me.

  Just as I turned my back on reality, the sound of a baby beckoned my soul onward. The cries began as a single, sorrow-filled whimper—a sound to bring any mother to her knees. A baby gently reminding its mother there are needs far more important than hers—needs that can only be met by kindness and the warm embrace of loving arms.

  The cry rose and multiplied until I was surrounded by a chorus of horror. A multitude of babies cried out for help…from me.

  “Jacob!” My voice ran rampant through the growing windstorm that rose and fell with each banshee-like cry.

  “Mommy hears you.” Again, I shouted above the wailing wall of infantile sound.

  A crack of lightning washed the area with blinding light and a near-deafening rumble. The sound faded and took the cries along for the ride.

  The silence that engulfed me was horrifying.

  “Jacob, come back to me. Please?”

  My call out to my son disappeared into the darkness.

  Another crack of lightning.

  The wailing returned; only this time, it came from within—a sound that shook the gray matter within my brainpan. Along with the sound came unbearable physical and emotional pain. I could feel the desperation in my baby’s cries. Logic threatened to dictate that the cries would evolve into a voice and that voice would speak the words I dreaded hearing:

  This is all your fault, Bethany.

  The cries shifted pitch and tone. From an impassioned accusation to a gentle request.

  “Bethany, wake up.”

  I could barely make out the words.

  “Come on, B, you’re having a bad dream.”

  When I finally managed to pull myself from the nightmare landscape, my body was wracked with sobbing convulsions. Snot and tears poured into the hands that cupped my face.

  My hands. Hands that should be holding my child.

  “He’s gone. My baby is gone,” were the only words I could think to say.

  “We’ll find him, B, I promise.”

  It was Echo; her tiny arms stretched to encompass my near-fetal body. She was strong beyond her young years and smart beyond the street.

  “It’s okay, Bethany. Cry it out if you need.”

  Echo rocked me. I wanted to shrug off the gesture, but for some reason I found it a comfort I couldn’t imagine going without. Instead of continuing the fight, I melted into her embrace. It was about time I disappeared into some other person’s core.

  “B-dizz, you better Trek yourself.”

  Jamal tossed off one of his favorite nerdisms. The wink that followed finally managed to bring as much of a smile as my face was capable of creating. />
  “Oh, Jamal, it’s too late. I’ve already wrecked myself.”

  Jamal laughed at the inside joke. “Nothing can take down ZeroOneZero. Not Superman, not Magneto, and certainly not the Zero Day Collective. You are their kryptonite, baby.”

  “What is ZeroOneZero?” Echo questioned.

  Jamal glanced my way, his eyes begging me to let him tell my story. I acquiesced. Who was I to deprive my best friend a moment of joy?

  “Fuck!” From the front of the Hummer, Josh shouted. His f-bomb dropped in time for the vehicle to chug to a halt.

  “Joshua.” Morgan’s voice pierced the rising tension. The leader of the Zombie Response Team always commanded a certain level of attention when her voice rose above a whisper—especially when her voice carried an accusatory tone. “Please tell me we did not just run out of gas.”

  Josh put the Hummer in park and dropped his head to the steering wheel. “That obvious, huh?”

  Morgan released a heavy sigh. “Fine. Let’s get the spare cans off the truck and fill the tank.”

  The sigh that spilled from Josh’s lips spoke volumes. He mumbled something under his breath. Morgan threw open the passenger door and jumped to the pavement below. Soon after Josh joined her, we could hear the rise and fall of the ensuing argument. After a moment of silence, Morgan peeked her head into the vehicle.

  “We’re very much out of gas. Don’t worry, the cavalry will arrive any moment.”

  Morgan shut the passenger door, and darkness descended over us once again.

  “Is she saying what I think she’s saying?” Jamal’s voice was alive with nervous tension.

  “They’re probably calling in the nearest Zombie Response Team to come to the rescue.”

  “Awesome,” was all Jamal could come up with.

  “Seriously? In which season of Doctor Who is this awesome? It’s near dark, we’re out of gas, and there are millions of zombies roaming the land. It’s only a matter of time before a small pack of the undead gets a whiff of our fresh meat and rambles our way. Once one of them has found our scent, he’ll drag all his friends along for the ride and we’re dead. I don’t know about you, but from my perspective that end game sucks.”

  Jamal reached out a kind hand and placed it on my knee. A thread of warmth ran up my thigh and continued on. I felt simultaneously calmed and excited.

  “B, we’re riding along with the Zombie Response Team. This is the kind of situation they live for. We have nothing to—”

  Before Jamal could finish his sentence, the sound wafted over the area. At first it was only one undead voice. It didn’t take long for that solo note to morph into a chorus.

  “Oh my God, they’re coming from everywhere!” My little ninja, Echo’s panic rose instantly. “What are we going to do?”

  Before order melted into chaos, we heard Morgan’s unmistakable army-issue footwear banging on top of the Hummer. She was locking and loading herself for the big gun on top of the truck.

  “We’re going to do exactly what we need to do—nothing.” The sound of my voice reached out to return Echo’s earlier favor and offer her every ounce of calm I had. She was just short of hyperventilating.

  So much for my little ninja.

  I was about to remind everyone to plug their ears when Morgan started firing. Joshua’s voice shouted booming cheers up to the roof of the Hummer. The shots and shouts went on for a good twenty minutes. I was afraid to peek my head out for fear an errant undead survivor would grab fistfuls of my hair, drop me to the ground, and bash open my skull. I’d seen the action so many times I could recount it, blow by blow, in my sleep.

  “Oh crap,” Joshua shouted. “Morgan, they’re slipping through!”

  Before my brain could make sense of Josh’s words, the Hummer began to rock. Through the tinted windows, sour-milk eyes peered through glass and into my soul. The jerking motion of the truck was joined by the all-too-familiar moans.

  “Joshua,” Morgan shouted from above, “I’m out of ammo. I need a reload, now!”

  Josh banged on the ceiling of the truck. “Ammunition crates are in the back, I can’t get to them.” Joshua turned toward me, his eyes twinkling with near madness. “If you have any ideas, we’re in serious need.”

  “Sound.” The single word dropped out of my mouth and fell on deaf minds. Post-Jacob, there was only one thing I could always count on to get me out of an undead situation.

  “Joshua, does this Humvee have a PA system?”

  Josh looked at me, curiosity arching his eyebrows. I couldn’t believe not one person in the truck had picked up on my thread.

  Josh nodded. “Yeah, it does; a damn good one, too. Why? You have a plan?”

  “I do. What kind of connection will the system take?”

  Josh pointed to an eighth-inch headphone jack connection. A bit outdated, but it’d do.

  “Anyone with headphones, I need them now.”

  Echo pulled her trusty phones from around her neck. It was a rare occasion to see her without them; they were her comfort, they brought her hope. I hated to do what I was about to do.

  “Wait, what are you doing? You can’t—”

  Before Echo could complain further, I sliced the wires to remove the plug. Echo’s eyes grew until they nearly overtook her entire face.

  “I promise I’ll fix them or we’ll get you another pair. Trust me, this is the only way we’re getting out of this.”

  My calming palm patted Echo’s knee. The touch seemed to cool her temper a bit. At times like this, a touch from the living was the only way to humanize a moment.

  “I need another pair. Anyone care to…?”

  Jamal hesitantly pulled his phones from his jacket pocket.

  “You don’t know how much this hurts. I just managed to get these babies broke in.”

  “Actually, Jamal, I do know. But the undead mafia is lining up for the buffet of a lifetime and I want to make sure they leave hungry.” Without prompting, the horde insisted itself upon the truck, once again; only this time, the rocking was punctuated by the jarring crunch of fists on metal.

  “Jesus, Bethany…hurry!” Echo cried out.

  I snipped the end of the headphones, stripped the wires, and connected them to the leads from Echo’s phones.

  The laptop slid out of its bag. A part of me wanted to see this play out in slow motion, with a killer soundtrack—but Hollywood had no business in this level of reality. In the end, no network would capitalize on this particular apocalypse.

  Or so I hoped. If someone managed to make a buck off the end-times suffering, that someone would pay for their transgression.

  I handed one end of the plug to Joshua.

  “Plug that in and crank up the volume.”

  “To eleven,” Joshua replied. I got the reference. There was no time to explain to the cockeyed stares from the peanut gallery.

  I booted up the laptop, plugged the cord in, fired up my audio player, and cranked up the sampled sound of the Obliterator. When the high-pitched, oscillating noise poured from the PA system, I thought my ears would bleed. Josh wasn’t kidding, the Hummer’s PA did go to eleven.

  The vehicle stopped tilting. The moans shifted to panic as the zombies fell away and either sped off or dropped to the pavement below to crack their own brains open and silence the pain.

  “It worked,” Jamal shouted, as if he’d doubted my plan. He glanced my way and quickly read the look on my face. “I never doubted you for a second.”

  Before anything more could be said, Josh opened the driver-side door and jumped out. Seconds later, the back of the Hummer opened and Josh rummaged around until he came up with gold.

  “Lock and motherfuckin’ load, my peeps.” Josh grinned at me and closed the door. A brief moment later, the driver-side door reopened and he climbed back into his seat.

  “Morgan’s ready for action. It won’t be long before the nearest ZRT unit arrives with some gas.”

  The statement danced around my brain in an out-of-sync step.
There was something afoot. I forced myself back a few moments in time to go over what had transpired. Eventually it dawned on me.

  “Josh,” I spoke up, my voice edged with caution. “How does the Zombie Response Team know where we are? I didn’t hear you or Morgan give our coordinates.”

  A sheepish grin slid across Josh’s face. “Oh yeah, that. Morgan and I are both chipped, so the ZRT HQ knows our location at all times. We realized this was the only way to ensure efficient rescue.”

  The realization struck Jamal as quickly as it did me.

  “Oh, that’s bad,” Jamal started. “We can’t have that. Those transponders have to be shut down immediately.”

  Josh turned his head toward Jamal and opened his mouth to speak. Jamal held up his hand to silence the bear of a man.

  “If the ZRT HQ can track you, anyone can track you.”

  Joshua seemed to release all the tension that had built up within his system.

  “We took that into consideration. So the transponders and receivers all shift channels at programmed intervals. Plus the two can only communicate with devices that have a special encryption key.”

  Jamal looked at me and nodded his approval that I may pick up the torch.

  “Josh, I could hack that system in five minutes. And I am just one hacker with limited resources. The Zero Day Collective has the world’s only limitless supply of manpower and bandwidth. They’ll find the frequency and when they do, they’ll find us. You need to disable those transponders immediately.”

  “Bethany, I promise you, these are secure. We have hackers as well. The IT team worked diligently to make sure this system was as secure and reliable as possible.”

  It was Jamal’s turn to pull up a soapbox.

  “You may have hackers on staff, but you don’t have Bethany Nitshimi. She is enemy number one when it comes to security. If it exists, she can get to it. But it wouldn’t take her level of skills to break into something as rudimentary as this.”