"You shut up," said Norman, pointing at Chuck as he walked

  past him. "This is your fault!" Then he pointed at Angie and Park.

  "And you! I'm taking your car! My mother has to get to her heart

  doctor in Ashton."

  "Listen, sir," said Angie, growing increasingly nervous with each

  step the man took. "Maybe we can give you and your family a ride."

  "I never said anything about sharing, redneck bitch! I said you

  were giving me your fucking car!"

  Angie heard a door on her car open. She turned and saw Maylee

  climb from the back seat. "Mom?" said Maylee.

  "Get back in the car, Maylee!" said Angie, turning back to the

  older man.

  "No, get out of the car!" said Norman, still swinging the crowbar

  with each step. "Everybody out of the car!"

  "Please!" said Chuck, reaching out and grabbing Norman's

  shoulder. Norman wrenched away.

  "Keep your fucking hands off me!" he yelled, swinging the

  crowbar at Chuck. It connected with Chuck's chest. A loud sharp

  "crack" rang out. Chuck staggered back, blinking in surprise. Norman

  panted.

  Chuck reached up to his chest. He opened his mouth to speak and

  blood leaked out. He swayed, then fell backward and was still.

  "Great!" yelled Norman crazily. "Just great. Now he's dead and

  they'll blame me!"

  Angie and Park took slow steps backward. Toward the car. Park

  slid the rifle strap from his shoulder. "I really don't want to waste the

  bullet, buddy. So back off!"

  "You!" said Norman, pointing the crowbar at Angie. "You saw

  him! He attacked me! He might have been turning into one of those

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  53

  things!"

  Martha gave a moaning cry from the back seat of the wrecked

  car. "Norman!"

  Norman either didn't hear or ignored her. He stepped toward

  Angie and Park. "Now give me the car and we'll call it even."

  "You're not making the slightest little bit of fucking sense,

  asshole," said Park.

  "Fuck you!" yelled the man, raising the crowbar and running at

  Park.

  "Get to the car!" yelled Park to Angie. He moved to shoot. Angie

  moved to block Norman's run. There was no way he was getting to her

  kids.

  "Norman!" shrieked Martha. Norman stopped mid-run and

  frowned. He turned back to face the wrecked car. "What the fuck is it,

  woman? I'm getting the car! We're getting her to the doctor."

  "She's dead! Your mother is dead!" Martha yelled. The back

  door of the wrecked car was open. She sat in the back seat with her legs

  out and feet on the road. The much older woman, Angie guessed

  Norman's mother, lay across her lap. Norman's mother was still.

  "What?" said Norman.

  Martha was crying. "She must have died in the wreck!"

  Norman took a faltering step toward the wreck, then stopped.

  "Mom?"

  Norman's mother sat up and bit into Martha's cheek. Martha

  gasped in surprise, then screamed. Blood, thick and red, poured from

  her wound and down Norman's mother's face. Norman's mother reared

  back, tearing free a long strip of flesh from Martha's cheek. Martha

  shrieked, the muscles in her face exposed and flexing. Norman's mother

  moaned greedily and chewed.

  "Martha!" yelled Norman, running back toward the wrecked car.

  Norman's mother leaned back up and buried her wrinkled face into

  Martha's throat. Martha's shrieks turned to gurgles. Norman's mother's

  head bobbed back and forth as she chewed. Martha kicked and

  convulsed, blood and foamed saliva dripping from her mouth. Her eyes

  rolled back into her head.

  "Martha! Mom!" Norman yelled, stopping in the road and

  staring. "No!"

  Robert R. Best

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  "We gotta go," said Angie.

  "Fuck yeah we do," said Park.

  They turned back toward the car. Angie felt a hand close on her

  ankle. Angie cried out in surprise. She twisted her head around to see

  that Chuck had crawled across the pavement. Or rather, his corpse had.

  He groaned and jerked at her leg. Angie lost her balance and fell face

  forward onto the street.

  "Mom!" yelled Maylee, opening the car door. She had her bat

  ready.

  "Stay in the car, Maylee!" said Angie, lifting her head. She felt

  blood seeping from a split lip. Maylee stayed where she stood, door

  open, but did not approach.

  Chuck growled, tightening his grip on her leg. Angie flipped over

  onto her back just in time to see Park aiming the rifle for Chuck's head.

  "Don't do it!" she yelled. "Don't waste the bullet! Just get him to

  let go!"

  "Fine, crazy-ass," said Park. He slung the rifle over his shoulder

  and kicked at Chuck's arm. The kick was hard. Chuck shook from the

  impact but did not let go. He moaned a wet, gurgling noise and tugged

  at Angie.

  "Fuck you, you fucking fuck fucker!" said Park, kneeling.

  "Making me get down on my bad fucking knee. Fuck!" He grabbed

  Chuck's hand and pried the fingers away from Angie's leg.

  Angie scrambled to her feet. She ran the back of her hand across

  her lip and scowled at the bright smear of blood left behind. Park, still

  on his knees, wrestled with Chuck. Chuck writhed his arms around and

  growled. Park struggled to keep hold.

  "Keep him down!" yelled Angie, looking around for a blunt

  weapon. None presented itself. She saw that Norman had turned

  around. He stared at Chuck and Park. His eyes were wide and he held

  the crowbar defensively.

  She gave Norman a look. "Fuck it," she whispered. She stepped

  over to Chuck and brought her foot up over his forehead. She slammed

  down, pounding the sole of her sneaker against his skull. He blinked

  and moaned. She grumbled and slammed down again, harder. This time

  she heard a "crack." Chuck slowed a little but kept writhing and

  moaning.

  "Fucker!" she yelled and stomped down a third time, so hard the

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  55

  impact jarred her spine. There was a loud "pop" and thick globs of red

  shot out from behind Chuck's head, spreading across the asphalt.

  Chuck's arms went limp.

  Park let go. Chuck's arms fell to the ground. Chuck was still.

  Park stood, nodding to Angie.

  "I got him ready for you," he said.

  "Sure you did," she said.

  They both looked over at Norman. He was staring, mouth open,

  at them. The crowbar hung loose in his hand.

  Angie dragged the bottom of her sneaker across the road, wiping

  blood and bits of flesh onto the pavement. She looked at Norman. He

  stared at her.

  "What?" she asked.

  He dropped the crowbar, turned and ran. He ran past the wreck,

  past Martha's corpse and his chewing mother. He ran up the freeway,

  farther and farther away from Angie and Park.

  "Now where's he going?" said Angie.

  "Fuck knows," said Park, shrugging. He scratched at his beard.

  "Back to the car?"

  Angie nodded. "Yeah. I'll drive."

  Three

  Ella watched a tapir wander back and forth in its exhibit. The

  red-brown animal shuffled its feet and sniffed the air nervously with its

  snout.

  "Gary's upset," said Ella, leaning on the railing that separated the

  public from the exhibit. Beyond that was a deep concrete ditch to keep

  the tapirs from escaping. Beyond that was a fairly convincing re-

  creation of the creature's South American habitat. "He can tell what's

  going on outside."

  Tom stepped up next to her, pulling his Keeper vest around

  himself in an attempt to block the fall wind. "How the hell can you

  even tell them apart?"

  Ella rolled her eyes at him, pointing at the different tapirs in

  order. "That's Gary, that's Ricky, that's Bella, and that's Steve."

  "Steve?" said Shelley. She stood next to Tom, her arms crossed.

  "The same Steve as the chair in the breakroom?" She nodded to the

  tapir Ella had last indicated. "Is that his chair?"

  "Yes." Ella nodded. "But he can't sit in it because he's a tapir."

  Shelley shook her head, looking flustered, and walked away. Ella

  smiled. She liked flustering Shelley.

  "Where's my sister, Gary?" said Ella to the first tapir.

  "I doubt he knows, Ella," said Caleb from behind her.

  "I know," said Ella, turning. Caleb adjusted a rifle on his

  shoulder. Several other Keepers stood behind him. The closest, a young

  man just out of high school, nodded at the rifle.

  "Do you think we'll need that?" he said, looking nervous. He

  pushed his greasy black hair back and rubbed his hand across his face.

  "It's just tranquilizer darts, Lee," said Caleb. "In case one of the

  animals got out during the confusion yesterday."

  Ella shuddered, remembering the day before. It had been late

  afternoon and she and Lori had told the bus driver to let them off at the

  zoo. They wanted to visit Mom. Lori complained about having to still

  take the bus.

  "Another year," Lori said, "and I'll have a car."

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  "Nope." Ella shook her head as they walked across the zoo's

  parking lot. "Just me. Mom said. She also said I could paint it to look

  like a spaceship."

  "She said no such thing," said Lori, sticking her hands in the

  pockets of her denim jacket and drawing in her arms to block the cold.

  "Don't worry," said Ella. "I'll give you rides. But you'll have to

  wear an astronaut helmet."

  Lori rolled her eyes and Ella chuckled. It would be the last good

  thing that day.

  They made their way into the zoo and to the Communications

  Office. "Hey girls," Mom said, stepping over and hugging both of them

  in turn as they entered. "I gotta run back home real quick. Your

  dad's..."

  "Stepdad's," Ella said, quietly.

  "...car is acting up. I need to give him a ride back here."

  "I'll go with you," said Lori.

  "Sure," said Mom, smiling. She looked at Ella. "You coming,

  El?"

  Ella thought about it, then made the decision that would later

  make her chest hurt. "Nope. I'll wait here."

  So off they went. Ella spent a good thirty minutes making Caleb

  switch the view screens from camera to camera so she could look at the

  different animals. Then Lee ran in from the breakroom, pale and wide-

  eyed.

  "There's something bad on the news," he said. Ella and the others

  followed Lee back to the breakroom and crowded around the small TV.

  They saw a group of people holding down a screaming woman in

  front of a grocery store. The woman grunted and jerked, trying to pull

  free. A cop ran over, the news camera jerking to follow him, and pulled

  the people off her. He bent down to help her up and she bit into the

  cop's neck. The cop pulled away, clutching his neck in shock as blood

  ran through his fingers. He fell to his knees as the woman crawled to

  him. The group ran, knocking the camera over.

  Within a few minutes of channel surfing, they had gleaned what

  was happening. Corpses were moving and indiscriminately eating. Clip

  after clip of people running or dying. Sometimes both. And the ones

  that were dead got up and attacked. Caleb flipped to another local

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  channel and they watched the grocery store footage again.

  "Wait," said Shelley, leaning in closer to the TV. "Oh my god, I

  know that store. It's three blocks away."

  They all rushed back to the Communications Office. Caleb

  switched on as many screens as he could at once. The cameras outside

  the zoo all showed corpses gathering. Mangled and misshapen people,

  bent and torn and gnashing their rotten teeth. The cameras inside the

  zoo showed no sign of them. Just visitors wandering the zoo, most of

  them oblivious. A few were on cell phones and looking very worried.

  "Lock it down!" yelled Tom. "Before those fuckers get in!"

  "But Mom!" said Ella. "Lori!"

  Caleb looked at Tom, then at Ella. "I'm sorry, Ella. Your mom

  has a keycard for when they get back."

  He flipped open the panel that controlled the electronic locking

  system Gregory had recently installed. Another of his advances he was

  so proud of. The panel had two lines of switches. The ones for the

  animal cages were lit up red. The ones for the doors were lit up green.

  Caleb flipped all the door switches to red, using his palms to flip as

  many at once as he could.

  "No!" said Ella, stepping back and biting her thumb. She reached

  in her jeans pocket for her cell phone. Her heart dropped when the

  pocket was empty. She'd left her phone at home. She'd complained

  about it all day at school. It was a minor annoyance then. Now it was

  devastating

  Caleb looked at her and shook his head. "I'm sorry. We have to

  keep everyone safe."

  The TV showed increasingly worse images, culminating in

  graveyards filled with holes, some with corpses still clawing their way

  out. Any graveyard anywhere could easily produce hundreds of the

  things at once. Almost everywhere was overrun within hours.

  As the night went on, they slowly lost all contact with the outside

  world. The TV channels went out one by one. Then the radio channels

  followed. Finally, the Keepers were no longer able to reach loved ones

  on their cell phones.

  Finally, somewhere around 3 A.M., Gregory's voice came over

  the speakers. He said everything was fine, he was in the zoo and he

  would share more later. Before he clicked off, Ella thought she heard

  Lori screaming.

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  "Where did he call from?" Ella said, rushing over to the controls.

  Caleb looked at screens Ella didn't understand. He frowned. "I

  can't tell. That's weird. I should be able to tell."

  Then nothing the rest of the night nor into the morning, until the

  second call from Gregory came. The one where he told Ella her mother

  was dead and he had her sister. He had her sister and wouldn't tell her

  where. He'd hung up after she'd screamed at him. Again, Caleb had not

  been able to tell where he called from.

  A brief meeting had been held then among the Keepers. It was

  decided it was light now and the zoo appeared to be clear. They would

  look for Gregory and Lori themselves. Once they were all together,

  they could wait out the chaos outside. There was food in vending

  machines and in Zoo Bites, the overpriced restaurant set in the center of

  the zoo. There were water fountains. They could last for weeks if need

  be.

  Ella looked at Gary the tapir, then down at the concrete ditch

  keeping him in the exhibit. Tom nodded at the ditch, then looked back

  at Caleb. "I don't see how the animals could get past those. Isn't that the

  point?"

  "Not this way," said Caleb, indicating the front of the exhibit.

  "That way." He pointed to the back, behind Gary and his habitat. Set in

  the back wall, in concrete made to look like stone, was a door. The red

  light next to the door indicated it was locked.

  Ella nodded, looking at the door. Behind it and the concrete wall

  was a large cage, also locked with its own red light. The cages were

  used when the weather was really bad. The chances of both locks being

  accidentally opened were slim, especially with the electronic system

  Gregory had installed.

  "Gary's still locked in," said Ella. "Red light says so."

  "What happens if the power goes out?" said Lee.

  "Everything defaults to locked," said Caleb. He jingled keys on

  his belt. "That's why we still have old-fashioned keys."

  Caleb adjusted the tranquilizer rifle on his shoulder. "We ready?"

  Everyone nodded.

  "Then let's find them."

  They slowly made their way from building to building, looking.

  All the animals they came across were still safely in their exhibits. Ella

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  60

  gave them each a little wave as she passed. She grew more and more

  nervous as hours went by with no sign of Lori or Stepdad, but

  interacting with the animals made her feel a little better.

  The group rounded a corner. Ella looked around. To her left was

  the giraffe exhibit. A giraffe stuck out his long tongue to grab at the

  dried leaves clinging to a nearby tree.

  "Hey Lenny," said Ella quietly. "Sorry you're hungry. No one fed

  you yesterday."