Because from his vantage point, it looked like the zombies were getting the better of them. Nick was covered in blood from various bite wounds while the female seemed to be doing a better job at keeping them off her.

Summoning his powers, Caleb sent a mental wave to the zombies to disperse them.

They didn't listen. If anything, it made them even more aggressive against Nick.

"What the c.r.a.p?"

As a demon, one of their first learned powers was to be able to control the dead. It was the lesson Nick was supposed to be learning right now.

But Caleb's powers were useless against the zombies.

How could this be? It didn't make sense. Not that it had to make sense to thoroughly tick him off.

And then he realized why he couldn't control them.

They weren't dead. These zombies had been made from the living. The living he could possess or influence, but he couldn't control them without their cooperation.

Growling in frustration, Caleb flew toward the street, into the shadows, where he took human form. The demon in him wanted to blast the zombies into oblivion. But that would blow his cover and he'd already learned the hard way three years ago that his powers didn't work on Nick.

If he exposed his powers and Nick saw them, there was no way to undo it. He'd be screwed and Nick would never trust him again. Of course, he could try the clumsy and inexact human method of memory loss by bashing Nick on the head.

It might work.

Or it might give him a concussion.

Worse, it might kil him.

And since Caleb's survival hinged on his ... best not to chance it.

So instead, he rushed into the al ey to help them, then drew up fast as he realized the girl with Nick wasn't a girl after al .

She was a demon, too.

A Charonte demon, to be precise.

Oh Dsseldorf, this was getting complicated. He shielded his powers immediately. The problem with the Charonte, they were highly territorial and didn't tolerate other demons in their domain. Ever. To them, if you weren't Charonte, you were garbage, and al garbage should be eaten. Literal y. Slowly and with relish-or, more often than not, with barbecue sauce.

Since the Charonte were one of the most powerful branches of demon, it served him best to stay off her radar.

And menu.

But why she was with Nick and not attacking him, he had no idea. Charonte didn't normal y a.s.sociate with anyone unless, as previously noted, they were on the menu.

"Nick!" Caleb shouted as one of the zombies went for Nick's neck. "Behind you!"

Nick turned around as he heard Caleb's shout to see Brett Guidry, one of his cla.s.smates, coming at his back. Grateful Caleb had returned, he indicated Brett with his chin. "We've got to get these guys to Bubba's. Anyone got a clue how to do it?"

Simi looked at him. "They gotta be breathing?"

"Yes," Nick and Caleb said in unison.

"Wel , pooh." Simi poked her lips out. "That just takes al the fun out of it." She let out a dramatic sigh.

Nick was overwhelmed by the herculean task. How did three high school students get a dozen zombies to Bubba's store without getting eaten?

Why didn't I stay home?

Look on the bright side. ...

Trouble was, he didn't see a bright side.

I knew I should have taken up lumberjackery and not the one where you shoot snot out your nose or the other one he didn't want to think about while fighting. 'Cause face it, both of those would be worthless right about now. Rather lumberjackery where you break Army of Darkness with a chainsaw al over the Deadites and send them into oblivion.

Or at least send them out of his sight.

The zombies closed in. Nick braced himself for more hand-to-hand (literal y, in his case) fighting.

Suddenly, Simi grabbed him and Caleb by their hands and ran with them to the corner. She hesitated under the street sign. "Where's Bubba's?"

Nick pointed down the street toward the store.

"Okay." Simi released their hands. "You boys run on and I'l get them there right behind you."

Nick shook his head as al the lessons his mom had taught him roared to the forefront. "That's not right. I'm not about to leave a girl to be eaten by crazies."

Caleb looked over his shoulder to where the zombies were closing in fast. "Folks, we stand here arguing and we're going to die." He grabbed Nick and pul ed him forward. "Let her be the bait. We need to get the doors open." Nick would have fought him too, but Caleb's grip was too fierce, leaving him no choice except to fol ow or lose his other arm.

They only got half a block before two more zombies stepped out of the darkness to attack them.

Nick cursed as he pul ed up short and kicked the first one back into the al ey. "How many of these are there?" Caleb shook his head. "I'm beginning to wonder if Madaug didn't license the game to Sony or something. Where are al of them coming from? Racc.o.o.n City Cloning Farm? What is going on here?"

Nick stepped back to avoid being bitten. "We're about to get our b.u.t.ts kicked. That's what's going on." He scissor-kicked the zombie closest to him. Then he looked to see Simi leading the others closer. "I'm beginning to feel like Jim Bowie at the Alamo."

Caleb knocked the zombie in front of him back. "Yeah, but we're not going to die."

I wish I could be so sure of that. 'Cause right now, things were not looking good for him and if he was a betting man, he'd be betting on the zombies.

Even so, Nick pushed his fear and panic down and kept moving toward the store, drawing the zombies along behind him while he continued to beat them off. Gah, if one more of them touched his wounded shoulder, he was going to forget the ban on kil ing them and go hog wild-chainsaw or not. "I real y don't like being the dangling carrot."

"Better than being the dead duck." Caleb smacked the zombie closest to him.

He had a good point with that.

Nick was the first one to reach the store. He opened the door and cal ed for Bubba, Madaug, and Mark. "We got a group coming in. You might want to widen that room and be ready to lock it tight."

But getting them into the store was hard enough. Into the room ...

Where were the X-Men when you real y needed them?

Nick grabbed the cattle prod that Bubba kept hanging on the wal behind the counter ... again for those "just in case" moments. He was beginning to not only understand Bubba's paranoia, but be grateful for it.

Bubba was right. You never knew when these things could come in handy. It did pay to keep a cattle prod and ax on hand. The necessity of the rocket launcher and blasting caps remained to be seen.

At least the cattle prod would make it easier to corral them.

But the moment Nick touched the prod to the zombie closest to him, Brett, he realized Mark and Bubba had made some serious modifications to the voltage. This wasn't a typical cattle prod to move people along. This one was meant to stun and stun hard. The jolt was so severe, it drove the zombie to the floor like a mil ion-volt stun gun.

"What the ... ?" Nick gaped at Bubba, who grinned in al his unabashed glory.

"Neighbors don't complain when I shock people, only when I shoot them."

Mark agreed. "But the downside is it's a pain to drag them out of the store, and if you leave them in here, when they can move again, they're usual y pretty p.i.s.sed and looking for blood."

Madaug, Caleb, and Simi continued to try and beat the zombies into the holding cel .

Nick zapped another zombie that was going for Simi. It was actual y kind of fun. He'd touch them with the prod. They'd scream and then flop to the ground like dying fish. Made him wonder what would happen if they were wet, but he wasn't s.a.d.i.s.tic enough to test that curiosity. Lucky for them.

He shocked another one who went for his head and sent the zombie flailing. A guy could get used to this, especial y if he didn't go to jail for it.

By the time Nick had stunned the last one and Bubba and Mark were dragging the first one into the room, they made a "shocking" discovery.

As the voltage wore off, the zombies returned to normal.

"Get your hands off me!" Brett snarled as he shoved Bubba back. "My dad's a lawyer and I'm going to sue you for offensive touching."

Bubba arched a brow. "You might wanna rethink that, boy.

'Cause if I'm going to get sued for offensively touching you, I'm going to make it worth my while. Think about it." Brett's face paled. He looked around the store as if he was waking up from a nightmare. "How did I get here?" Nick angled the cattle prod at him, stil not trusting that he was completely normal. He'd seen that movie too many times where the idiots think the monster's gotten over whatever had it possessed, only to turn back into the monster and kil them the instant they let down their guard. No way. He wasn't about to become intel igent-zombie kibble. "You were trying to eat my brains, you psycho."

Brett gaped at him. "What?"

Caleb nodded. "It's true, dude. You went for Gautier's throat, and mine too."

Madaug took the prod from Nick so that he could examine the p.r.o.ngs on the end of it. "Wow, Nick. You found the cure.

That's how we fix it."

"Electrocution?" Nick tried not to smile as he thought about seriously zapping Stone.

Madaug nodded. "The voltage works on the central nervous system. ... I'm thinking it works like a power surge that causes the programming to dump and essential y reboot to the original that existed before they played my game. It reverses everything. Nick! You're a friggin' genius." Nick rested the cattle prod up on his good shoulder. "Wel , someone slap my b.u.t.t and give me a hero cookie." Simi stepped forward and slapped him on the right cheek.

"Hey!" Nick snapped, rubbing his offended b.u.t.tocks.

She blinked innocently. "You told me to. Or would you rather have had one of them men slap your b.u.t.t instead?" Nick was horrified by the mere suggestion. "If someone is touching that part of me, I'd much rather it be you than one of them." Or better yet, Kody.

"Us too," the guys said quickly.

As they stood there, one by one the zombies came out of it.

Al of them were disoriented and baffled by what had happened to them.

And none of the twelve guys on the floor remembered having played Madaug's game.

None of them.

Nick scowled at Madaug. "You think when I shocked them that it caused some kind of memory loss?" Which real y worried him since he had a memory lapse himself about how he'd gotten in that courtyard at the Lalauree mansion. Had he been a zombie and not known it?

Please don't let me have eaten any brains.

That was the only thing he knew that could make his mom's powdered eggs taste good.

Madaug scratched his chin as he thought about it. "I don't know. We need a case study."

Bubba paused and turned toward him. "Case study how?"

"We have to get to Brian, shock him, and see," Madaug said. "It's the only way to know for sure since he's the only one I know for a fact was turned into a zombie after playing my game."

Not to be one to ever interject logic into anything, Nick laughed nervously. "You do know he's in jail, right? And that the police tend to get a little perturbed at people who show up there with cattle prods and stun guns. I'm just saying." Simi jumped up and down. "We could get the police to shoot him for us!"

Mark scoffed. "Our luck, they'd shoot him with a real gun and kil him. Then we'd learn nothing." Like that was the worst fear they had at the moment. ...

Yeah.

Madaug didn't relent. "We've got to either get him out or we get in to see him and stun him. Otherwise we don't real y know if this is going to work. It could be temporary and they could turn right back into zombies. Think about it." Nick was thinking about it. He was thinking of spending the rest of his life in jail, provided his mother didn't kil him first. "I don't guess any of you former zombies would like to go into the holding cel until we sort this out?" Brett seized him by the shirt. "I don't know what game you and geek boy are playing, Gautier. But you get in my way as I leave and I'l wipe my boots on your bal s." Nick cringed involuntarily at a threat that went down his spine like a shredder.

Before he realized what was happening, Simi had taken Brett's hand and squeezed it so hard Nick heard the bones break.

Brett cried out.

Simi held his hand in hers without letting up. "Nick is a friend of the Simi's. You threaten him and you make the Simi real y unhappy and want to eat your head. Trust me, not something you want me to think about. Now go away mean person or the Simi wil tel akri she don't know what happened to you and your masticated form. Not that I like to lie, but there are deceptions to every rule. And you're about to become one." She shoved him back toward the room. "Now get in there and be quiet."

By their faces, it was obvious none of them wanted to obey.

But none of them had the backbone to stand up to Simi.

Bubba grinned. "I like your friend, Nick. She doesn't mince words, does she?"

"Not real y." But then some of the words she didn't mince real y didn't make sense, and who the heck was this akri she kept mentioning? He must be some serious bada.s.s to corral her.

Mark locked the hidden door and shut the wal so that no one entering the store could see their new prisoners.

Caleb frowned. "What if they start cal ing for help?"

"Won't do them any good," Bubba said. "It's soundproof and made with enough metal that no cel phones wil go through neither. They're there until we let them out." Mark let out a nervous laugh. "Then let's not get kil ed and starve them to death."

Nick stared at him. "Mark, there are many, many reasons I don't want to get kil ed doing this other than just starving the ex-zombie hostages." He looked over to Madaug. "Or go to jail. I cannot stress enough how badly I do not want to go to jail and how badly I do not want to die."