Gena Showalter - A Mad Zombie Party

As commanded, Ali begins to work her way out of the fray, stumbling and crying—but she isn’t trying to avoid being bitten, either.

I’ve seen enough, the urge to slay, to do what I was born to do, too strong to ignore. I launch forward. Or try to. Frosty grabs me by the waist to hold me in place.

“Not yet.”

“We have to help them.” Why can’t he see that? “Let me go or I’ll...I’ll...”

My eyes widen as, one by one, zombies begin to vomit and fall away from slayers. The soft glow of our cars’ headlights are powered by a special battery and illuminate what happens next, allowing us to witness the tinge of gray leave their skin and the red fade from their eyes. When the transformation is complete, all hint of rot gone, actual human spirits float into the air like balloons, ascending higher and higher before vanishing in the darkness.

I am baffled as the process repeats...and repeats. “How...” I begin. Only I don’t know what to ask. Slayers are actually saving zombies—Cole used the word literally—and they are doing so without becoming infected by the toxin or needing an antidote.

Cole stretches his arms wider, offering both limbs as snack packs to the next line of hungry fiends clamoring forward.

“I don’t think the slayers can take much more,” Frosty says. “Work your way in front and force zombies to back off.” He isn’t done issuing the order before he’s pounding forward, shooting every creature he passes in the back of the head. The undead drop like flies.

I pull myself from my awed stupor and stay close to his heels, slashing at any teeth and hands aimed in his direction. Along the way, the fine hairs on the back of my neck rise, and I stiffen. I’m being watched again, I know it, but I can’t pause to look around.

We make it in front of the slayers without a scratch, but I see zombies coming in hot from behind the group and keep going, meeting the newcomers head-on. I slash, elbow and kick, always ducking to avoid fingers snagging in my hair, hopping to the side to avoid being grabbed by the ankles.

“Gavin,” Cole calls. “Car!”

They’re leaving? Yeah, probably for the best. By now, they have to be as weak as newborns. I only fight harder. Retreat isn’t in my wheelhouse. A few minutes later, the sound of squealing tires registers, then high beams are shining up close and personal. Zombies stumble backward to avoid being burned by the light, and suddenly I’m without an opponent.

Panting, I take stock. The horde has backed away from the slayers. Ali and Jaclyn are lying on the ground and moaning in pain, more riddled with bites than the others. Guess they tasted better.

Girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice. Boys are made of snakes and snails and rattlesnake tails.

The childhood song plays through my head as Cole, Gavin and Frosty fire up their hands. The group wasn’t abandoning ship, after all. And now, I’m once again awed as the flames on Cole and Gavin extend to their shoulders...correction, all the way to their rib cages. All three boys crouch beside the girls and flatten one hand on the chest of one girl and the other hand on the chest of the other. The girls catch fire and scream, bucking and fighting to get away, but eventually they settle down, their wounds healing right before my eyes.

“Sorry about this, my man, but you need it whether you agree or not,” Cole says, then flattens his palm against Frosty’s chest.

Frosty grunts and lurches backward, quickly severing contact.

“Hey,” I shout as I bound over. “You don’t get to touch him without his permission.”

“This isn’t any of your business,” Cole snaps at me. “Stay out of it.”

I open my mouth to reply—

“Stay out of it,” Frosty repeats. With less heat, but still. A rebuke is a rebuke.

Boys!

I look away, the hairs on the back of my neck practically dancing now, and spot a girl standing beside a tombstone. Her face is cast in shadows, but I can see her hair stretches all the way to her waist, where the light shines. The strands are so black they gleam blue. Is she a civilian?

When I take a step toward her, she scrambles backward. If she can see me, she’s not a civilian. One of Cole’s new recruits, here to observe the battle? To learn?

“Hey,” I call, and she bolts. Nope. Not a recruit. I give chase. Anima wouldn’t be stupid enough to send someone to observe us so openly. Right?

Right, because Anima no longer exists. I wonder how many years I’ll have to remind myself of that fact before it actually feels real.

Maybe the girl witnessed the fight but doesn’t know she’s a slayer. Maybe she’s freaked out. Or, maybe she’s a spy from my brother’s camp, because River still cares about me and wants to know I’m okay.

A pang of homesickness nearly slices me in two.

A zombie steps into my path and I twist to the side, nailing him in the eye with a dagger as I whiz past him. Only then do I realize I’ve moved out of the light. My heartbeat picks up speed. Am I headed into a trap?

At my right a shadow shifts, and I stop, turn. A sharp sting explodes in my neck...my arm...my neck again. Definitely a trap!

A wave of dizziness nearly topples me as I pull three darts out of my skin. Well, well. Two of my theories are now vapor in the wind. The girl doesn’t work for my brother and she knows she’s a slayer. For her weapon to affect me, she had to shoot it from the spirit realm, where I’m currently located. That’s not something civilians can do, even by accident.

The only other option that makes any sense is...Anima.

“Camilla!” Frosty’s voice echoes through the night, anger causing the “a” to vibrate.

The dizziness fades, and I breathe a sigh of relief as I stuff the darts in my pocket.

I step toward the girl, who hasn’t moved from the trees. She steps backward, into a higher beam of light, and I see that she’s pretty, with wide frightened eyes and skin covered in freckles; one moment she’s standing in place, frozen in terror, the next she’s running away.

I kick into gear, prepared to follow her again—

“Camilla!”

But I can’t leave Frosty behind. I just can’t. Cursing, I backtrack. He’s my first priority, not the girl.

Cole and Frosty are nose-to-nose, arguing.

“—like I told you,” Cole is saying. “I had to make sure you’d heal from a zombie bite without the antidote. That was the only way.”

“And I told you weeks ago I didn’t want the ‘save the bastards’ ability. Camilla!” he shouts a second later.

I haven’t been spotted, I guess. “Guys,” I say. And...did Cole just admit he shared the ability by using dýnamis on Frosty?

Neither boy faces me. They just keep staring daggers at the other, but at least some of the tension has drained from Frosty.

Across the way, Ali is standing between Gavin and Jaclyn, pushing the two apart. “Enough!”

“I would slap you,” Jaclyn growls at the smirking man-boy, “but it would be considered animal abuse.”

“I’m sorry,” Gavin replies, “but I can’t hear you over the sound of your bitchiness.”

“Children.” Ali slaps Gavin’s shoulder before waving a finger at Jaclyn. “This is no place to continue your weird seduction of each other.”

“I’m not seducing. I’m punishing. She allowed too many zombies to bite her,” Gavin says. “I can still see the toxin under her skin.”

Jaclyn throws her arms into the air, clearly exasperated. “Don’t fight them, you told me yesterday. Fight them, you told me today. Why don’t you make up your stupid mind?”

“Guys!” I shout. “There’s a girl out there. She tried to sedate me.” I show them the darts. “We need to find her, like, now.” Before it’s too late. Hell, it’s probably too late already.