A town at last! thought Cory as he looked down the hill at the buildings. The last few days wandering around the countryside had been peaceful but unproductive. Amongst the trees and fields there were no supermarkets or shops to loot, and he was down to his last tin of food. He got it out of his rucksack; there was no label on its silvery surface, it could be anything. Vegetables, fruit, dog meat; he’d eaten them all in the past. He was tempted to open it but decided not to; for all he knew the town might have been stripped of everything long ago. He noticed a few thin trails of smoke coming from the town, drifting into the sunlit sky. Cory lifted his binoculars; perhaps the town wasn’t dead? He’d come across a few settlements in the years following the day of rising; none had lasted long. The zombies overwhelmed some and everyone fled in a panic, but equally as often human folly was responsible for the downfall. Petty jealousies, greed, stupidity; all had caused organised groups of survivors to collapse into anarchy. Sadly for Cory, the few settlements that had persevered didn’t welcome outsiders. That’s probably the secret of their success. (more…)

“Hello, my name is Billy, and I am alive,” I say, as I do every week at these stupid-ass meetings.

“Hi, Billy,” the soft, sad voices of the eight other victims on stage with me echo through the mostly empty auditorium.  When the defeated speak in unison, the sound has no power to uplift.  In fact, it’s almost like a moan from my past.  I shiver as the soft breeze of a lost memory drifts just out of reach. (more…)

Thursday
April 20, 2003
5:23 PM

Two hours ago I killed my husband. Tom Everett Manning. He was 36 years old, a teacher at Mission High School. He had a masters in US history, and was under contract by a publisher to write a Civil War novel. Historical fiction was what it was. He was writing a romanticized account of the life of General Chamberlain. (more…)

“Why is it that the women who are so fuckable are always so fuckin’ insane?

“This last one was a real nutter.  I met her at a bar at the hotel where I was workin’ on assignment.  The place was full ‘cause of  the convention, and she walked in with the tightest little…well, I know I sure as hell wasn’t the only one lookin’.  (more…)

Exposure. That was what they called it in Mother Constance’s Kingdom of God. God ruled and Mother Constance was his Primate, Holy Reverend Mother to her people and a shepherdess to her flock. Wolves in sheep’s clothing were to be exposed and put out of the fold. Exile by any other name in the Zombie-Apocalypse was just as cold.

It was murder. (more…)

1

I drag a moist towel across my forehead and squint into the big brick oven. Hickory pops and crackles in the back corner of the deep fireplace below and keeps the oven at a stable 400 degrees. I double-check the little stainless steel thermometer, something I dug out from the charred ruins of Luigi’s Pizzeria.

The House smells yeasty, pungent and a little sour. Very slowly the aroma of crusty bread begins to claw at that sourness until it chases all but the last wisps of beery dough smell away. A sponge – that is a bucket filled with wet flour, sugar, salt, and yeast – bubbles and rises very slowly on the floor beside the table. I made this sponge with the last of our dried yeast a year and a half ago, but I’ve managed to keep it alive and flourishing, irrespective of the persistent chill, near constant rain, and perpetual threat of starvation urging me to cook the whole thing at once. (more…)

Hello all,

Your editors are once again running a bit behind on reviewing stories for publication and for the contest. So give us your patience, and we will give you more posts. Like this next one from Jeffrey DeRego.

-ed.

Surrounded by the limping hosts of doom,

With defeat closing in on our smiles,

We pray to the gods of thunder

For just five more seconds.

Don’t let us fall with

The empty sound

Of our gun

Going

click.

CHAPTER 2.

As the dawn broke, 65 year old Klaus Goddard walked with his cows back to the milking barn on his meager farm. Morning chores would not wait, war or no war. 1944 had been a hard year, particularly with so much of his crops and milk production being diverted away for the war effort. It had been so much harder after the Allies landed in France and began pushing the Wehrmacht back. It seemed inconceivable to Klaus that things could become so unraveled. If anything, 1945 appeared to be much worse. He sighed tiredly. Things had been like this back in the Great War too. It was a vicious cycle, it seemed. (more…)

The following handwritten account – found in a farmhouse in Lisdoonvarna, Co. Clare – was initially accredited to flamboyant Z War hero John Fletcher as it had been signed with his name.

At the time it was widely discredited as a forgery as its manner and tone did not reflect Fletchers famous idiosyncratic style, nor did his apparent timidity in the text match the warriors’ well known ferocity. However, new anecdotal evidence has recently come to light that hints at this documents possible authenticity.

The following abridged version, appearing here in print for the first time, was originally intended for inclusion in the biography: “John Fletcher: Corpse Killer!” but was excised by the publishers who feared that this unverifiable adventure would leave them open to litigation should it prove false. Also, Fletcher’s controversial actions during the War might subsequently have become open to serious revisionism. (more…)

In September Baelynn was still with us…although that always seemed to be a relative term given the circumstances of the situation. When I would make my visits to her in the hospital she wouldn’t know who I was. There were several times where she just didn’t respond to my visits at all. It’s a double edged sword in that when I would visit her I would feel depressed and when I wasn’t visiting all I could feel was a great wave of melancholy and overwhelming guilt come over me. High fevers, rapid aging of the skin and tooth decay and a plethora of other symptoms didn’t keep the doctors at ease, but it didn’t stop them from collecting their money and going on with their day-to-day activities either. They still gave their fake smiles and counted down until they could get their next fix on some cigarettes and coffee. I hated the doctors, but at this stage in the game they were my greatest allies. I wasn’t the only one facing these problems. Several other people that I worked with at the warehouse had family members dealing with the same illness. No one could really make any sense of it. My boss, Mustafa Alford, and I shared the same plight, though both his mother and son had fallen ill, so I’d say that his situation was slightly worse. (more…)