Already I feel the sear of the infection, my body offering up little resistance. I've been shutting down, muscles twitching, throat closing, stomach ceasing to rattle and growl and my heart a bare whisper. I haven't felt my toes for a day and what bothers me is that I no longer care.

"My dad made the best waffles," I tell Jeremy, staring at the clouds. "He'd leave the b.u.t.ter out overnight so it was soft and melty. I'd drown them with syrup." I run the tip of my tongue against the roof of my barren mouth, trying to remember the feel of it.

I'm so wrapped up in the memory that seeing the bird doesn't make sense, doesn't penetrate the fantasy I have in my head of a table heaped with food. But then the bird screams and I jolt up, my head colliding with Jeremy's chin, snapping him back.

"Oh my G.o.d!" I shout. "Oh my G.o.d!" There's a tiny spit of land cresting over the horizon. Exerting every force I can muster from my muscles, I hold my hand up, trace the curve of a tree with my finger. We draw closer and closer, the island growing larger and larger, the infection inside me roaring hotter and hotter.

I'm weeping, barely able to move.

Jeremy sags against the wall next to me, red gashes covering his body where the rope's rubbed him raw. I put my hand on his foot and he twitches, leans toward me. "We made it, Jeremy," I say with cracked lips.

He leans toward me, his mouth finding my knuckles. He's so weak now, so torn apart from struggling that he can barely bite, and what hurts more than his teeth grazing my flesh is the sting of salt from his lips penetrating the raw skin.

My eyes blur with tears. "We made it," I whisper. Overwhelmed with a crush of emotions so intense I can't even untangle them, I hug him tight, press my face into the curve of his neck and pretend his struggles are joy at being saved.

Thin Them Out By Kim Paffenroth, R. J. Sevin, & Julia Sevin

Kim Paffenroth is the author of the zombie novels Dying to Live Dying to Live and and Dying to Live: Life Sentence Dying to Live: Life Sentence. A third volume in the series is due out later this year. Paffenroth is also the editor of the anthologies History Is Dead History Is Dead and and The World Is Dead The World Is Dead. A new novel, Valley of the Dead Valley of the Dead is due to come out around the same time as this anthology. is due to come out around the same time as this anthology.

Julia and R. J. Sevin are the proprietors of Creeping Hemlock Press, which launched its own line of zombie novels this summer with Kealan Patrick Burke's The Living The Living. Together, they are the editors of the Stoker-nominated anthology Corpse Blossoms Corpse Blossoms, and individually they have each published fiction in Fishnet Fishnet, Postcards from h.e.l.l Postcards from h.e.l.l, War of the Worlds: Frontlines War of the Worlds: Frontlines, Cemetery Dance Cemetery Dance, and the anthology Bits of the Dead Bits of the Dead.

All of George Romero's zombie films-Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead Dawn of the Dead, Day of the Dead Day of the Dead, etc.-feature at least one character who spends the entire movie being shrill and obnoxious and totally impervious to reason. In Night Night it's Harry Cooper, who is cra.s.sly possessive of the presumed safety of the cellar. In it's Harry Cooper, who is cra.s.sly possessive of the presumed safety of the cellar. In Day Day it's Captain Rhodes, the unreasoningly aggressive military commander. it's Captain Rhodes, the unreasoningly aggressive military commander.

When author Carrie Ryan-whose story you just read if you're reading the book in order-saw Night of the Living Dead Night of the Living Dead for the first time, she thought it was stupid: The characters are in so much danger, but rather than working together they spend the whole movie bickering with each other in a pointless way. But then someone explained to her that that was the whole point: Romero was saying that this is what humanity is-that we're doomed by our inability to just get along with each other even in the face of life-or-death challenges. After that, she completely changed her mind about the movie. "This made the film absolutely brilliant to me," she said. for the first time, she thought it was stupid: The characters are in so much danger, but rather than working together they spend the whole movie bickering with each other in a pointless way. But then someone explained to her that that was the whole point: Romero was saying that this is what humanity is-that we're doomed by our inability to just get along with each other even in the face of life-or-death challenges. After that, she completely changed her mind about the movie. "This made the film absolutely brilliant to me," she said.

In the face of current calamities-global warming, economic collapse, AIDS, overpopulation-to which humanity's response has been mostly just a lot of pointless political sniping, Romero's warning seems more pressing than ever, and our next story is another that plays with the idea that interpersonal drama can be an even bigger problem than zombies.

He was on his back, looking up at the sky.

He felt a little cold, but overall not too bad. Hearing sounds to his left, he turned his head. Another person stood nearby, eyeing him. Her face, hands, and arms glistened red, and she held something pink in her hands, which she raised to her mouth. Slurping sounds followed, then she wiped her hands on her dress.

He sat up and examined himself. He too was covered with red. He tried to say something, but all that came out was something between a roar and a moan. The red lady returned the greeting, so he thought she might be friendly after all.

He pulled aside the tatters of his shirt, and found a large hole in the middle of him. That must be where the cold was coming from. He reached into the hole and felt around. Mostly it was squishy, but nearer the back, there were hard parts, too. He thought the hole looked nice, all colorful and mysterious, and he thought it might be useful, as a place to put things. But he couldn't think of anything he had to put there.

He stood up and took a step toward the red lady. The stuff on her neck wasn't shiny and wet, like the stuff on her mouth and hands, but all caked and dark. Even so, she looked very pretty. The sun made her blond hair shine, where it wasn't matted with the red stuff. He tried to touch her hair, but she growled and pulled away.

After a while, they both sat down on the pavement. She still wouldn't let him touch her hair, but she did let him hold her hand. There was a big, shiny metal band around her wrist. That looked nice, too.

He looked around. A large blue sign nearby read WELCOME TO LOUISIANA. Another sign, not far from that one read, simply, I-55. He didn't know what either sign meant, but somehow he did.

There was a roar, and a metal thing on wheels stopped near them. The people who got out of the wheeled thing didn't have red stains on them. They weren't missing any parts. They were whole, but he didn't like the way they looked. They looked ugly and plain. They also had ugly, dull metal things in their hands. The ugly people smiled and laughed and pointed, then the dull metal things roared louder than the wheeled thing had. He fell on top of the red lady, laying there till he heard the wheeled thing roar off.

Sitting up, he found she no longer pushed his hand away, but she also didn't move. This made him sad. He took the metal band off her wrist. Now he had something to keep in the hole in him.

The other people had seemed much happier and more satisfied by what they did, and he wondered if he could ever be whole like they were. He doubted it. But sitting there in the fading light, running his dead fingers through such luminous blond hair, he didn't feel completely empty, either.

"Okay." Zach brought the Jeep to a halt. "We're on foot from here."

To his right, Ted grunted something and the two men hopped out. In the back seat, Wayne looked at his gun and wondered if he should have shot them both as soon as Zach threw the vehicle into park.

The opportunity pa.s.sed, Wayne stepped from the Jeep and into the early morning light. Not even nine o'clock, and already the Louisiana air was cloying. The interstate sliced through a dense pine forest. They'd stick to the shade for as long as they could.

At the rear of the Jeep, they suited up: backpacks stuffed with supplies (in case they got separated and were unable to return to the Jeep), gloves, hinged face-shields, filtered dust masks, and wooden baseball bats. There was also a furniture dolly, for boxes. Wayne grabbed it.

"Cars are tight here," Zach said, real low. "Keep quiet and watch your a.s.ses. If you get bit, I'm calling the Doctor." He patted the .357 Magnum on his right hip. The b.a.s.t.a.r.d had actually painted it white. There was a small red cross on the grip. A .40 Taurus rested beneath each arm.

"What if you you get bit?" Wayne asked, grabbing a bat. get bit?" Wayne asked, grabbing a bat.

"Then I'll I'll see the Doctor." see the Doctor."

"That one is mine," Ted said, pulling the bat from Wayne's hand. His dark eyes, darting leftrightleftright, resembled empty zoetropes. There was more than a little crazy there.

"Oh-kay."

"It's the marks right here." Ted pointed at some deep gouges in the business end of the bat. "That's how I can tell. This is the one I always use, it has the marks." He turned and trotted off.

Wayne looked at Zach, who nodded once and walked away. Wayne grabbed another bat, slipped it through a loop on his belt and, pushing the dolly, followed them onto the interstate. Since their little community of survivors had come together four months ago outside of Baton Rouge, they'd searched over forty miles of I-12. They now moved along the choked northbound lanes of I-55, and were less than fifty miles away from the Mississippi border.

Zach and Ted walked shoulder-to-shoulder two paces ahead of him, chuckling over stories they'd told each other several times before. They'd been buddies before the outbreaks, and it didn't seem fair.

Wayne didn't have any real friends among the three-dozen men in the warehouse. Ian was trustworthy enough but pretty unpleasant to be around, always talking about needing p.u.s.s.y, always picking at his ears and nose and fingernails and scalp. You'd think with a perpetual hygiene jones like that, he'd smell a little better than he did. Then there was Sue, who he hardly knew, really. It was hard to talk about things now in any normal way, but he guessed he wasn't really interested in her religion or her favorite music, anyway.

But G.o.dd.a.m.n Ted and Zach went on chatting about the Saints and the n.i.g.g.e.rs and the f.u.c.king Waffle House like any of it still mattered. Scanning the area for dead folks, Wayne wondered again if he should just pull his piece and pop each of them in the back of the head. He wondered if he could.

"That one there," Zach said, indicating an 18-wheeler a few hundred feet away.

"What about those?" Ted was talking about the four smaller delivery trucks between them and the semi. "Could be some good s.h.i.t in there."

"Could be. Probably is," Zach said. "But we try the big truck first. Find what we need and get the h.e.l.l out of here."

Wayne looked around. No movement anywhere, only cars and trucks b.u.mper to b.u.mper for all-time, some of them unscathed, some blackened and twisted, others gla.s.s and steel tombs whose misshapen and sun-baked occupants watched soundlessly as the three men strode between them.

It would be so d.a.m.n easy now. A little later, and he'd lose his chance to get the drop on them. The whole thing could fall apart. And if his suspicions were true-if the last five guys to die on supply runs with Zach and Ted had been popped to keep rations fat back at the warehouse, couldn't they already have the drop on him? Could he be walking toward his execution?

"Slow day," Wayne said. Ted grunted again.

"The f.u.c.k you talking about?" Zach asked. Wayne could hear the disdain in his voice.

"None of them around yet."

"Yeah," Zach said. "So far so good, I guess."

About twenty feet from the semi, Zach cursed. The loading door was partially open, and the ground around the truck was littered with rusted and broken kitchen appliances-toasters, blenders, indoor grills-sitting among the faded and disintegrating remains of cardboard boxes. They lifted the door and peered into the trailer. The boxes near the door were weathered and rippled. Toward the back, they were intact, their contents as useless as the trailer in which they sat.

"Okay," Zach said. None of them were surprised. "We'll go back and check the smaller trucks, and then we'll-d.a.m.n."

"What?"

"Here we go." Zach nodded in the direction from which they'd come. A few hundred feet away, a lone form shuffled toward them.

"Ah, jeeze," Ted said. He scampered onto the cab of the semi, shielding his eyes and scanning the area. "Three more. Half a mile or so north."

"No problem," Zach said.

"Just stumbling around-they don't know we're here yet."

"Good. Now get down before you fall and break your f.u.c.king leg. I'll leave your a.s.s, I swear."

"I got this one," Wayne said, leaving the dolly and walking toward the slowly moving corpse. Fifteen feet away from the thing, he stopped. He smelled it through the dust mask. In a van to his right, what had once been a small boy of no more than three years watched him from its car seat. Desiccated hands pawed at the restraints. There was no one else in the van.

The other thing was closer, but not by much. It was a slow one. Its flesh was purplish-black and swollen, and its ma.s.sive, rigid stomach was split down the middle like a tomato rotting on the vine. Its gaze rarely rose from the ground, and it seemed unable to lift its head. Its eyes lifted in its sockets and found Wayne. It tried to grunt, hands twitching at its sides and trembling upward. Wayne pushed down his face-shield and lifted the bat.

Three blows, and the corpse went down, its head a lumpish black sack. Wayne walked to the van and opened the door. A dry yelp escaped the dead kid's drawn lips. He placed the blunt end of the bat to the side of the child's head and pushed. It didn't take long.

There was a Batman action figure on the floor of the vehicle. He picked it up and placed it in the child's lap. Saying nothing felt wrong, but nothing he could think of sounded appropriate. As he shut the door, he noticed two cases of water in the back of the van along with several unmarked boxes. He went around back and checked them. Each contained various canned goods, as well as several packs of pasta and ramen. Whoever had left the kid had been in a hurry.

He looked around. No walking corpses, no sign of Zach or Ted. They'd moved on, taking the dolly with them.

Wayne removed the face-shield and wiped sweat from his brow. He plucked a bottle of water from the van and, pulling the dust mask beneath his chin, downed it. His heart raced, and just like that, the silence and the heat were almost too much. He felt alone and small, and he wanted to be with Zach and Ted, even if they were maybe going to try and kill him today.

Wayne tucked three bottles of water under his arm and walked until he saw Zach and Ted. They were standing at the rear of an unmarked truck that had stalled in the wildly overgrown gra.s.s beside the freeway.

Ted looked back and smiled. "You're not going to believe this," he said.

Wayne handed them each a bottle of water and let what he was seeing sink in: pallet upon pallet of military rations, the kind he and his family had lived off of in the weeks following Katrina.

Wayne said, "d.a.m.n."

"Yeah," Zach said. "d.a.m.n."

There were hundreds of boxes, each containing sixteen complete meals. From what he could see, several pallets toward the back were piled with cases of bottled water. The same stuff as in the van.

"See that," Ted said. "FEMA is good for something after all."

"Okay," Zach said, all business. He hopped into the truck, ripped away the thick plastic wrap securing the boxes to the pallets, and began tossing boxes down to Ted and Wayne.

The dolly held five boxes. Wayne pushed it back to the Jeep, walking behind Ted and Zach, who each carried one box.

The first trip was without incident.

On their second run, Ted got a chance to use his bat. The thing that clambered like a lizard out of the forest was naked, creeping around on the ragged stumps of its arms and legs. No ears, lidless eyes, lipless mouth. Ted enjoyed putting it down.

"d.a.m.n," Ted said on their third trip to the truck. He knocked back a water bottle and belched. "Can we start the truck? Maybe move it or something?"

Zach stared at him for a moment, blinking, his face glistening with sweat. Dark stains seemed to emanate from the guns beneath his armpits. "Yeah, Ted," he said, half-grinning and nodding. "Sure. But first we have to clear out all these pine trees, maybe cut a path all the way to 190."

"I don't know," Ted said, shrugging. "I was just saying."

"Yeah, yeah. Okay. Moving on. We need to load up what we can for now and come back tomorrow with the truck. We'll get Seth to-"

Somewhere nearby, a dead thing howled, long and mournful.

"Aw, c.r.a.p." Ted said. "Where the h.e.l.l is that coming from?"

"There," Wayne said. Not far from where he'd encountered the first corpse of the day, another form stood. It howled again, louder and longer. There was urgency in the thing's voice.

"Oh, s.h.i.t," Zach said. Here and there, the creature's call was answered. "Not good. Run."

They ran, their bats raised and ready. On either side of the interstate, the walking dead emerged from within the cool confines of the forest. Soon there was a chorus.

They overtook the howler. Not slowing, Ted took a swing at it. He missed, staggered, and almost fell, dropping the bat, and then the Jeep was in sight. Zach leaned against a tree, winded. Ted bent over, his hands on his knees, panting.

"You not going back for your bat?" Wayne asked, his back to the Jeep.

"Why the f.u.c.k would I do that? There's like six more in the back of the Jeep," Ted said, and Wayne shot him in the face, blowing away most of his jaw. Ted dropped, mewling and clutching at where his chin used to be. Blood poured between his fingers.

He should have shot Zach first-Zach was always more on the ball and now he was just gone, dropped from sight. "s.h.i.t," Wayne said, and Zach appeared from behind a tree and started firing the Tauruses.

Wayne got the Jeep between himself and Zach. From all sides, the dead closed in.

You knew it was a real s.h.i.t day when killing the cla.s.s cat was the high point.

That was the first thing Sue did in the morning, and her mood had not improved. Mr. Stripestuff had been pretty sickly for a while, was probably fifteen years old and going blind, and there was no way anybody in the warehouse would take adequate care of him after she left. She hoped they'd have a little more compa.s.sion for the kids she'd be leaving behind, but deep down she doubted it.

She let him lick the sc.r.a.ps from a can of tuna mixed with a packet of old government-issue powdered creamer and a couple of crushed Tylenol PMs. Then she laid him in her lap and petted his head for a while, then she put a towel over his face, and a plastic bag over that. She thought not about how she should just set him free, but how slim his odds were out there. She was doing him a favor, but it wasn't easy for either of them. She was gentle, gentle as she could be while getting the job done, and she laid him in his bed for the cla.s.s to find.

They were on lockdown and Sue couldn't get downstairs to the trash in the night. She had no place to stash Stripestuff in the couple of upstairs offices where the orphans lived every minute. In the daytime, the kids-the non-orphans at least-got into everything, even downstairs where they were supposedly not allowed. Might as well make the discovery foreseeable and respectful. Educational, too, she thought, wondering if maybe she was getting a little teacher in her after all. Then again, each and every one of these kids had already seen death firsthand in unimaginable manners and quant.i.ties. What could they learn from a cat? Her smile evaporated.

The cla.s.s-such as it was, twenty kids spread over ages three to ten, being overseen by a clerk and a dental a.s.sistant, whose only qualifications were that they looked looked like teachers, both being middle-aged females-found him in his bed, having pa.s.sed peacefully in the night when they a.s.sembled at eight. After a little death-lesson-c.u.m-ceremony by Sue, they interred him by wrapping him in plastic sheeting and throwing him out one of the second-story windows into the piles of red earth of the unfinished construction site next door. The plastic came partly unraveled and the cat fell a little short of the dirt, landing on the warehouse's own blacktop. What could you do but pull the shades? The kids mostly cried or moped, but not Jayson, which just confirmed everything Sue felt about him. like teachers, both being middle-aged females-found him in his bed, having pa.s.sed peacefully in the night when they a.s.sembled at eight. After a little death-lesson-c.u.m-ceremony by Sue, they interred him by wrapping him in plastic sheeting and throwing him out one of the second-story windows into the piles of red earth of the unfinished construction site next door. The plastic came partly unraveled and the cat fell a little short of the dirt, landing on the warehouse's own blacktop. What could you do but pull the shades? The kids mostly cried or moped, but not Jayson, which just confirmed everything Sue felt about him.

He was just lucky he wasn't an orphan.