ZOMBIE BOOKS

We need to move, now.”  I try to sound urgent, but not too forceful.   Just enough of a pressing tone to keep us from being consumed.
Her head snaps up and she searches the dry hills around the lake.  She spots him, off to our left and along the lakeshore.  Her knees buckle so bad I have to catch her and guide the quivering girl to the ground.
“Noooooo!” she screams.
And then I get it.  Now I understand.
Tom.
The zombie keeps hobbling toward us, and I try to pull Amy to her feet, but she won’t budge.  Knees in the sandy dirt, hands fallen limply on her thighs, Amy sobs openly and loudly at the figure making its way toward us.
Then she starts to gasp, and it sounds like Amy is about to compose herself.  Filled with hope, I tell her how sorry I am, but if we don’t get moving he will attack us.
That’s when she turns to look at me.  Her mouth has flat-lined.  Her eyes are swollen red and leaking.  The color is gone from her cheeks, and her intention is clear.
“No,” I protest.  “No. Don’t you dare.”
“Good-bye, Kyle.”  Her gaze falls to dead space in the distance.  “You better leave.  My brother is coming, and he has always been jealous of boys who hung around me.”
“Amy…”
“Ha! He might even kill you for it,” she says with a terrifying smile.
“I need you,” I mutter.
“Over here!” she yells to Tom.  “I’m here, Tommy!  I’m here!  I knew I’d find you.”  Amy’s last sentence trails off to a sad mumble, quavering with the sobs that are fighting their way up her throat again.  “You should leave now, Kyle,” she says again.
And I see no choice.  I pick her up and start to drag her, but the little girl turns and grabs my ear, cutting her nails in deep until I let go.  Once freed, Amy runs headlong to her brother.  I scream, but it does no good.  She falls into his waiting arms, and I watch, aghast, as Tommy eats his little sister on the bank of Long Lake.
◊◊◊
My name is Kyle Moore.  I live in a world that has become a wasteland.  Humanity is all but extinct.  Just like the desert flowers, you may get lucky and encounter that one soul who blossoms and gives you hope.  But even the desert rose doesn’t bloom forever, and when it dies you will still be lost, wandering a wasteland full of creatures wanting to kill you.
My name is Kyle Moore.  I had a friend named Amy.  She showed me that humanity still exists.  She proved to me that I was still capable of charity and even love.
My name is Kyle Moore, and someday I will die.  Until that day, I will fill this world with so many great deeds that I will face death as a man seasoned with the salts of the earth.
My name is Kyle Moore, and I am a zombie hunter.

Nature teaches beasts to know their friends.
W. Shakespeare
Coriolanus
CHAPTER 3
He Who Was Last
It all came down in a flash.  We were warned, but not truly ready.  Hell, who was, really?  The PSA said that infected humans were swarming cities and generating damage on an unimaginable scale.  Listeners were ordered – not advised or strongly urged – to seek shelter and protect themselves, utilizing defensive measures that reached the highest extent of the law.
Read: Law enforcement cannot protect you.
Read: If you have a gun, be prepared to use it.
Read: Welcome to the day in which you must take your life into your own hands.
What did they think we would do with instructions like that?  Did the broadcasters actually believe we would come together as a society and defeat this menace like some rebel alliance in a sci-fi flic?
Have you ever watched your neighbor’s reaction to an emergency?  I remember a few years back when a brush fire in the neighborhood got out of control and threatened a few homes.  Some idiot decided to burn the remains of a small tree he had felled, without realizing that the mound of dead, dry wood was really just a pile of kindling the size of a minivan.
Whoosh, baby.
Soon his whole yard and a neighbor’s tree were on fire.  And what do you think the good folks on my street did?  Jack, that’s what.  They called for the fire department, then stood there with their camera phones and recorded the guy struggling to save his house.  Perfectly able men and women talking about what a shame it would be if his house burned, and how they hoped he doesn’t set any other houses on fire, and not to worry since the fire truck will be here in no time.  Meanwhile, you have one guy running around with a yard hose trying to douse a fire that is licking forty feet into the air.  In a word, it looked like a puppy pissing on a bonfire: Pathetic and completely impotent.   But no one was concerned, because our highly advanced public services network will come to the rescue.  We don’t need to risk making our clothes smell like smoke.  We have firemen for that.
Don’t look at me, ‘cause I just stood there with the rest of them.  I knew someone had called for a fire truck, and I wasn’t about to be the one to run in and start throwing water on this guy’s out-of-control yard project.  Not because I couldn’t help.  Frankly I didn’t care.  Idiot’s off burning down his own house, what’s it to me?  He’s always been a bit of a jerk, and it’s not like a need him.  So I did what any 21st century teen would do.  As his house began to catch, I posted a pic online with the caption, “Damn… Now my s’mores are gunna taste like this guy’s priceless memories.”
That was just a yard fire, and no one did anything.  Now take our dependence on emergency services, add our indifference to the suffering of others, and imagine that you