Diana Rowland - Even White Trash Zombies Get the Blues

“Angel, I’m not much bigger than you. I don’t have the brawn, so I had to use the brains.” She tapped the side of her head. “Besides,” she said with a shrug, “it wasn’t a total lie. His dad was killed by a zombie.”

“Yeah yeah, I know,” I retorted. “Pietro was banging Ed’s mom, his dad found out, shot her, and then Pietro killed his dad. Then, since you worked with his mom, you had access to her notes and research.”

Dr. Charish sat back and regarded me with something that almost— almost —looked like respect. “My goodness. Marcus said you were clever. Perhaps I was wrong about why he wanted a relationship with you.”

Right then I silently vowed that at some point I would slug this bitch in the face, hard.

She spread her hands. “Anyway, yes, I approached Pietro and told him what I knew, convinced him that I wanted to continue Dr. Quinn’s research. I could see the greater potential even if he could not.” Her smile was chock-full of self-satisfaction. “Then I bided my time, waiting for the breakthrough that would make my plan possible.”

“Sofia’s artificial brains,” I said.

“Did you know Pietro paid for her entire education?” Dr. Charish asked. “Sofia had an interest in medicine, but he convinced her to go into neurobiology. Supported her the whole way, while making sure she specialized in fields that would benefit him.”

Okay, that was more than a little manipulative, but I already knew that about Pietro. “And you hired her to make sure you could keep an eye on her and what she was doing.”

“Of course,” she said. “And with Pietro’s blessing as well, since it kept her close.” She chuckled. “That made things much easier all around, since it can be unwise to cross that man.”

“I can’t wait to see what Pietro’s going to do to you,” I said.

She lifted an eyebrow at me. “Do to me? For what?”

“For crossing him,” I said. “He told me he’d never allow any of the zombies under his protection to be harmed in any sort of research.”

“Angel, I didn’t cross him.” She leaned in close and smirked. “He simply made an exception in your case.”

She chuckled at the stunned look on my face. “Can you blame him?” she asked with a tilt of her head. “He’s been grooming Marcus for bigger and better things for a long time now, and it didn’t take much persuasion on my part to convince him that the last thing he wanted was to see Marcus hooked up with barely literate trash.”

I felt as if a fist had closed around my chest. She stood and raked her gaze over me. “Let’s get you cleaned up and fed, shall we?” she said with a bright smile. “We need you at your best!”

With that she left the room, leaving me to stew in my hate and fear.

Food was brought in for Philip and me, once again on plastic cafeteria trays. Cheeseburgers and fries this time, and, of course, a side of brains.

The amount of brains they were giving me was generous—which either meant they didn’t know how much I needed, or they expected me to burn them off. Considering how much Dr. Charish clearly knew about zombies, I had a bad feeling it was the second reason.

Philip twitched then went still again, eyes remaining closed. I had a feeling he was awake and was trying to get his bearings without giving himself away. And he’d have probably pulled it off if I hadn’t been paying close attention—also known as “bored out of my mind.”

“Hey, Philip,” I said. “There’s no one else in here or the observation room, but I’m sure they’re still monitoring us.”

He opened his eyes and looked at me. I allowed myself a moment of self-congratulation that I was right about him being wide-awake. He sat up, eyes flicking around the room, taking in the blood that covered the floor and us.

“There’s some food for you,” I said with a nod toward the second tray. “Brains too, which you’ll want to eat, I’m sure.”

A flicker of disgust passed over his face, and I almost laughed. “Yeah, I know,” I said. “But your instincts will take over quickly enough.”

“He shot me,” he said in a low voice. Frowning, he pulled his shirt up, but even through the dried and congealed blood it was obvious he was unwounded. He ran his hand over his chest. “That’s amazing.”

“Yeah, it’s fucking miraculous…as long as you’re tanked up.”

“Tanked up?” He gave me a puzzled look.

“Well fed on brains,” I explained.

“Ah. Well that shouldn’t be a problem,” he said.

I lifted an eyebrow. “Uh, right. Well, here’s the deal. The more you exert yourself, the more brains you’ll need. So your days of weight training and ten mile runs are over.”

His brows drew together as he opened his mouth to argue, but I cut him off. “You still don’t get it, do you?” I said. “You don’t need to do all that training anymore. The zombie part of you takes care of being strong and fast, and all it wants in return is brains.”

He considered that for a moment. “But if I had sufficient brains, I could train to improve, right?”

Frowning, I shrugged. “I guess. Honestly I have no idea. I’ve never been much of a fitness chick. And I’ve never had so many extra brains that I would’ve been able to test it out.” Not that I’d want to. I still had nightmares about high school phys ed class. I pulled the second tray over to him. “Here. You need to eat.”

He lifted the plastic fork, hesitated, then dug into the brains.

“Jesus,” he mumbled, an expression of bliss crossing his face.

I grinned. “Yeah. Crazy shit, huh?” I let him eat for a few minutes. “Why on earth would you volunteer for this?” I asked him when he was nearly finished with the contents of the tray. “Did you know what you were getting into?”

A faint smile twitched the corner of his mouth. “Well, I didn’t know I would be shot and then…”

“Eaten?”

“Well…yes.” A bit more of a smile revealed itself. Maybe this guy had a personality after all. “We were told it was an experimental program with a high risk of death.”

“Again,” I said, “why the hell would you volunteer for something like that?”

“Because we were also told that if the procedure succeeded we would be unstoppable.” He ran a hand over his chest again. “Invincible.”

I sighed and leaned back against the wall. “Dude, you really should’ve read the fine print. It’s all candy and roses as long as you have the brains, but just see how you feel after you’ve been without for a few days.” I picked at a flake of dried blood. “This is all about making super zombie soldiers or some shit, right?”

He frowned and didn’t answer, which was all the answer I needed. I smiled thinly. “You look like the kind of guy who’s been in the military.”

“Three tours in Iraq,” he answered gruffly.

“Okay, well, I imagine there’s lots of exertion, right? Now can you see yourself lugging a cooler of brains around with you…?” I trailed off. God, I was slow sometimes. Dr. Charish had found a better use for fake brains than feeding civilian zombies. Zombie super soldiers. Unstoppable and invincible.

Philip didn’t seem to notice my shift in mood. “They’ll take care of me. I have no doubt about that.”

The door swung open, and the man in the suit came in. “Yes, we’ll take good care of Philip,” he said, confirming my suspicion that they were constantly listening in. “In fact it’s time for him to come with us so that we can see what he’s capable of.” Philip scrambled to his feet and stood at attention. I rolled my eyes.

“Take him,” I said dully. “Happy fighting. Rah rah, and all that shit.”