Chris Pourteau - Tails of the Apocalypse

She didn’t know how long it had been since the little man who owned the store had shut off the lights and gone home. That was the last time they’d been properly fed. A few days ago? A week? Surly Shirley the parrot wasn’t certain.

They were in the deepest corner of the large mall with no window to the outside world. Surly’s experience of time had depended on shopping hours for over a decade. But the bird seed was almost gone. When she licked frantically at the small metal ball in her water bottle, not a drop rewarded her. She could hear the kittens crying in their box and the puppies scrabbling against the sides of theirs. The other birds had been silent for a long while. The animals around her were starving.

Even Princess, the pot-bellied pig, looked skinny. Humans had always coddled Princess. The pig, like Surly, had been at the shop for years because she was the owner’s favorite, and he couldn’t bear to sell her.

That was not why Surly had stayed in the shop so long. Princess was polite, well groomed, a pleasing, blushing pink. Surly Shirley was bedraggled at the best of times, her gray feathers always uneven, her yellow eyes cold and beady. Nobody talked to her. Nobody liked her. No one played with her or challenged her. Surly Shirley was bored. And boredom made her mean.

Even the owner had forgotten her original name, and Surly upheld her moniker with all the nastiness she could muster. She didn’t miss the humans at all, at first. But the dwindling bird seed and empty water bottle made her rock on her perch, nervous.

She’d figured out the latch on her cage years ago, much to the shop owner’s dismay. Surly let herself out and tried to check on the others. She landed on the cockatoo cage, carefully pecking open a bag of seed that lay on top, and letting it rain down on the sleeping birds. They squawked but began moving. There wasn’t much Surly could do about the water. They’d have to find a way out.

She knew she wouldn’t be able to save the others alone. As much as she loathed the pig, Surly knew she needed Princess’s help. So she flew down to the shop floor.

“Princess is a pretty piggy,” she squawked and clicked her claws on the cat carrier. Princess grunted. She knew when she was being made fun of.

“Pretty pig,” insisted Surly, “pretty Princess.”

The pig stared at her in the dim light. Surly tapped her beak on the box. The kittens began to meow softly.

The pig groaned as she got up from her pillow. She trotted over to the thin plastic cat carrier and sniffed it.

“Pretty pig,” squawked Surly again. Princess squealed at the box and then flopped against it, squishing it toward the wall. The kittens yowled, but the box’s flimsy top popped off as the container slowly flattened and they jumped out. Surly worked at tearing open a paper bag of cat food with her beak while Princess repeated the process with the larger puppy box.

“Princess is a pretty pig,” squawked Surly and flew back to her cage, closing herself in again, to think. She’d done what she could. Now she had to plan. The owner wasn’t coming back, that was clear. They had to go. Had to find fresh water. Light. Fruit.

Surly remembered fruit. It was rare that she’d ever gotten any. She’d usually had to steal it. The owner used to drink tea with a wedge of lemon in the morning. Surly had dreams about lemons, and the owner had caught her once making one of them come true.

“That’s why you’re such a sourpuss,” he’d scowled, but he sometimes gave her the wedges after that anyway.

She missed lemons. Maybe if they left the shop, she’d find some more. Surly Shirley ruffled up her feathers and shut her eyes to think as Princess turned over the large plastic container of dog treats and the puppies barked for joy.

It didn’t take long for the food to run out, except for some cans that the puppies chewed on but never got into, and a few sacks of birdseed that Surly pecked halfheartedly at. The kittens alone seemed satiated, eating the rodents that multiplied constantly. Surly Shirley had her own battles with the mice and rats over the bags of birdseed in the shop. And the lack of water remained. What little the animals could scrounge—from bottles left by the shop owner and the toilet the puppies dug their way into—was almost gone. Surly knew they couldn’t stay much longer. The problem was finding an open exit.

Surly was sitting on the shop’s cash register, staring out the window at the thick dark doors that led to the parking lot when the humans returned. The shrieks of someone enraged bounced down the hallway and echoed around her. Then she heard the boots.

“Welcome to Paws and Claws,” she said and whistled as she flew back to her cage. Princess looked up at her. The shrieks mixed with the deep shouts of several men, and the puppies ran to the door and began wagging their bony tails. A large group of people filled the hallway and tromped past. Surly squinted and pulled the cage door closed. The kittens stalked around their empty food bowls, meowing loudly.

“Hello, Paws and Claws,” she warned them again, and then immediately puffed her feathers and narrowed her eyes to small slits, pretending to sleep. A few of the men peeled off from the group and pushed on the pet shop door. It was locked. Two of the men picked up a heavy bench from the hallway and heaved it through the plate glass display window with a crash that scattered the loose animals. An arm reached gingerly around the jagged shards left in the frame to unlock the front door.

The bells bounced against the door as it opened. “Gah!” came a voice. The sharp yips of the dogs overwhelmed it. Surly opened one eye all the way, suspicious. The human was reeling back, its arm shielding the bottom of its face. “Something’s died in here,” he called back to his fellows. “Forget it.”

Surly appreciated the sentiment so much that she lifted herself up and added another dropping for emphasis. That’d convince them to leave, she thought. Her dislike made her temporarily forget the dire situation she was in.

“We need those tools, Walt. We have to at least look.”

The first human took a reluctant step into the store, kicking aside the tattered remains of a treat box. “This place is a wreck. It’s just a pet shop. What are we going to find here besides dead goldfish and dog crap?”

“Dental pliers,” replied the second man, pushing him forward. “And those claw trimmer things.”

A larger man drifted in behind them, holding up a bulky flashlight. He leaned down to pet one of the puppies. “Always hated this plan,” he grumbled. “They’re people. Can’t do this to people.”

“Really, Joe?” asked the second man, snorting and then spitting on the floor. “Next apocalypse you can decide what to do. Wasn’t my fault that bitch flaked out on the bounty. We had to do something with all those Infected, couldn’t let them run rampant the way they were.”

“I guess,” said Joe, “but what about that cure the trader told us about? Maybe we should check it out. Then we won’t have to—to declaw them and rip their teeth out.”

“That cure is a myth, Joe. Think about all those people hanging onto Infected they know. Like moms who can’t accept their kid is a zombie. The people who thought up this cure story are just trying to get people to willingly turn over their Infected. Pretend they’re going to get better and they can get some dangerous zombies off the street without a fight. But it’s a waste, killing all those Infected. They could make good workers. You don’t want to have to kill all those people do you, Joe?”