Canister X – A.P. Fuchs: Zombie and Superhero Novelist, Blogger, Superhero and Horror Movie Reviews

Copyright 2010 by A.P. Fuchs. All rights reserved.
21: A Trek for Food

It’s been two days since I last posted. To be honest, I forgot about you. See, there’s something about Selena that you need to understand: Time dissolves when she’s around. The passing of moments are barely acknowledged and if they are kept track of, it’s done on a subconscious level and never on purpose. You know when to eat, to sleep and all the rest, but I don’t recall looking at my watch until just this morning, the digital date informing me how long it’s been since I told you about Selena’s dream. Some reading this might say two days isn’t a long time. You don’t understand. In the world I live in, one filled to the brim with the undead, two days is a very long time. Add being reunited with the love of your life after you thought you killed her and Time has no meaning.
Hold on a second . . .
. . .
. . .
Selena asked what I was doing. I thought it might be best to keep this blog a secret. For now. See, girls are finicky like that: they want a guy who needs them, but not one who really needs them. The sad part is, it’s hard for us guys to find that balance.
Anyway, I just said I was writing down some thoughts about the zombies and coming up with a game plan to keep us safe. In a way, it was partially true, but it’s killing me to keep this blog from her. But this thing needs to be written in case something happens to me. There needs to be a record of trying to live on this zombie-infested planet. And if I’m going to be the one to write it, I’m going to do it my way and include the girl of my dreams.
Back to the task at hand: Selena. I know some of you are sick of hearing about her, but it’s important I share everything with you. You’ll understand in the end—if I live long enough to get to the end or even if there is an end.
Food is scarce. We’re not starving, but it’s becoming a challenge to find what we need as either what is found is already rotten, or I end up being the one to clean out an abandoned pantry or kitchen cupboard and there’s not much there to begin with.
Selena and I went on a food hunt yesterday. She insisted on coming, though I pleaded with her to stay at the apartment for her own safety.
“I’d feel safer if I was with someone,” she said. “Besides, I can hold my own, if we need to.”
“I’m sure you can,” I said, though I didn’t really think so. She never struck me as the warrior type. Further–and, yeah, think of me as a politically-incorrect/insensitive/ignorant fool—but, despite the whole “all for equality” mantra that was so prevalent in society, the reality is the children were the first to be eaten, then the women, then the men. Girls are just not as strong as guys. Save for a few exceptions, we dominate. Hunters and gatherers and all that jazz. As for Selena, she’s the kind of girl who, when you hug her, you can feel her frailness. Not that she’s weak, but her frame is small and I’ve never seen her lift anything heavy. Even when she used to give me a good squeeze, there wasn’t a moment where I went, “Okay, that’s enough.”
Digression over.
Selena and I hit the streets. I was armed with my razor-covered baseball bat. She had a cleaver from the kitchen. Unless we had to weave around fallen vehicles or rubble, I made sure she was beside me the whole time.
It took an hour, but we made a direct line from my apartment north to Chinatown. Back in the day, it was one of the most colourful areas in Comptropolis. The curved and rounded roofs with their swooping eaves stood high and proud over elegant shops, some made of solid glass except for their structural supports. Neon signs hung in windows; others naming the restaurant or store in big, bold oriental-styled letters. A tourist attraction, sure, but there was more to it than that. There was a sense of history and cultural pride, something that was lost in most other parts of the city when Comtropolis made its mad dash for modernism.
The downside of searching Chinatown for food was the Chinese used a lot of fresh ingredients in their cuisine. By now, all of it would be rotted. However, the Chinese were also wizards at drying foods and I hoped we could round up a bag or two of rice, noodles, powdered soups and dehydrated vegetables.
At the edge of Chinatown, Selena and I stood side by side.
It had been a quiet walk over. Any undead we saw were quickly avoided by us ducking in behind zipcars or under benches or in bus stops. But here in Chinatown, we had a big problem: the undead roamed the streets, many of them gathered in packs. I counted at least thirty zombies from where I stood.
“Think they see us?” Selena asked. Her voice wavered and I guessed she was still upset over her dream and what she saw before her was too much for her. But to be honest, it is too much. For anybody.
“Not yet, but they will. All it takes is one. After that, they all see you, like their brains are connected somehow.”
“What do we do?”
“Sneak around. I want to hit The Wok over there.” I nodded in the restaurant’s direction.
Selena peered down the street. It took her a moment, but it appeared she finally saw the burned-out sign reading THE WOK. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “What’s the plan?”
It was then I really wished she wasn’t with me. If anything happened to her . . . (and yeah, I realize my feelings for her are messed up and I’ve done things too horrible to be forgiven for, but you trying living in a world filled with zombies and do better. No, really, go for it. I’ll be right here if you need me.)
“Here’s the deal,” I said. “Stay close. They come near, first try to avoid them. If you can’t, lay into them with that knife of yours. Just be careful it doesn’t get stuck in them and you lose it. Cool?”
“Okay. You be careful.”
“I will.”
We started in, cautiously, nearly tiptoeing. Less than five feet from where we started, and an undead guy with mottled deep gray skin saw us. He changed direction and started toward us, feet dragging. He brushed past another zombie—a girl with no nose and blood running from her chin—his shoulder scraping strongly against hers enough to turn her so she faced us. On our right, another one saw us.
“Keep going straight,” I said. “Don’t go out of your way to get them.” I did want to take my bat across their undead skulls, but with Selena by my side, getting to The Wok in one piece was more important.
We went around another vehicle, eyes trained forward on the restaurant. More undead saw us. More drew closer.
The moment the dead guy with deep gray skin brushed his fingers against my shoulder, I swung the bat into his head. The razors caught on his skin and peeled his nose and cheek from his face. I raised the bat high then brought it down on his head. The bone cracked and the creature fell to its knees. Selena yelped. I took the bat across the zombie’s head again. It’s neck broke and its head snapped to the side; the razors on my bat took more flesh and bone with it. The zombie fell over.
Selena screamed and an undead dude who was too overweight for even a zombie had his hand on her shoulder. Shrieking, she tried to pull away. The zombie gripped her right shoulder and jerked her toward her. About to come in with the bat, I was stopped when another zombie stepped in front of me. I jabbed the bat into its chest, then brought it around so I clocked it in the back of the head.
Selena turned on her heels, raised the cleaver, and brought it down on the zombie’s wrist. She wasn’t strong enough to have brought the cleaver clean through, but the force was enough to give the undead man pause and look at his hand. That was enough time for me to make two giant strides over to it and bring the bat across its skull. The creature fell to the ground. I went over to its arm, put my foot down on it, then ripped the cleaver from its wrist and handed it to Selena.
“Here,” I said.
She took it.
“Hold it harder. Try chopping instead of just slamming it into something.”
She nodded.
More zombies closed in.
“Watch out,” I said, referring to myself, not them.
I lunged forward, bringing my bat down into every undead head that filled my vision. Men, women, even children received a blow to the head. Some stayed down, others didn’t. Those that stumbled to the side or fell but got back up received another swing. One guy’s head burst on impact. I don’t know what that was about. It was almost like hitting a watermelon. Over-decayed, maybe, though his skin wasn’t in too bad of shape.
A little girl with no lips grabbed hold of my leg and tried to bite my thigh. I brought the base of the bat in between her face and my leg, then pried it back over my leg like a crowbar, loosening her hold on me. Taking a step away, I wound up and brought the bat into her face in a golf swing. The force was enough to lift her off her feet and go flying, a spray of blood hitting the air with her.
To my right, Selena hacked into an old man with no shirt. She ripped the cleaver from the side of his neck. Blood spurted out in an arc. She brought the knife in on the other side.
“I got it,” I said, moving in. She removed the blade and I took the bat across the old guy’s head. The flesh and bones of his neck gave way and his head went flying off his shoulders.
Taking Selena by the hand, I brought her close then ran with her past a couple zombies and in between two more. We were almost at the restaurant.
“Get behind me,” I said and began swinging the bat side-to-side. Every zombie that got close got struck. On one of them, my bat got stuck in between its neck and shoulder and I had to pry it loose while waving off the undead man’s hands as he tried to grab me.
With a shriek, Selena brought the cleaver down and into the man’s forehead.
“Nice,” I said.
“Thanks.” She grinned. It was the first time I saw her smile all day.
Forcing myself to remain focused, I took out another zombie and Selena and I made it to The Wok’s front doors. They were glass and the glass was smashed. Others had been here first.
We ran inside and was immediately greeted by a mound of bodies, mostly piles of bones and gobs of dry and wet flesh. Anything obviously humanoid was lost in the grue.
“Disgusting,” Selena said. “Stinks.”
“Awful, I know. Let’s go.”
The groans of the dead filled the air behind us, as did their banging and clamouring as they made their way into the building.
“We don’t have much time,” I said.
We ran through the dining room, past turned over tables and strewn-about white tablecloths smeared with blood. I accidentally kicked a severed arm when I ran by it.
We burst through the kitchen doors. Silver pots and pans lay everywhere. Metallic cupboard doors hung open and bare. The deep freeze door at the back of the room was also open.
“Pantry. Pantry. Pantry,” I said.
Selena stayed close to me as I walked around and scanned the room.
“Sure this place has food?” she asked.
“I didn’t say I was sure. Just never been here. Most everything between my place and Chinatown has been picked clean. This area was the next stop on my list.”
Footfalls thumped against the ground in the other room.
“Hurry, Marty. Hurry,” she said.
“I know.”
But I couldn’t see the pantry.
The kitchen door swung open.
The dead shambled in.
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I love the book production process, everything from conception straight through to the final product. Sure, some stages are more fun than others, but it was the book production process that got me into self-publishing to begin with and, a bit later, becoming a full-fledged traditional publisher.

I don’t think many people realize how much work goes into making a book. There’s more to it than writing and packaging it. So much more. Did you know that for each book Coscom Entertainment puts out, I go through a bunch of possibilities for fonts just for the chapter titles alone? Did you know that it takes me over a day and a half to format the book for print and the various eBook editions? Did you know that making a cover is more than just having a picture and putting text over it?

Never mind the editing phase, the rewrites, the research, etc.

The above is why is bothers me so much when a book receives a non-constructive bad review. Sure, if you don’t like something, by all means, you can express that. But it’s the “how” you express it that’s important. Don’t rail on a book and say you hated it without giving reasons as to why (preferrably politely). A lot of work goes into these things and I think so many people out there simply don’t understand that. Even when you review a movie, don’t just say it sucked and move on. I mean, really, as if you could do better.

It’s an important point to make because the Internet has given everyone a voice, which is fine, but–despite popular belief–it hasn’t made everyone an expert.

Anyway, below are a few shots of the first-draft manuscript for my just-written and soon-to-be-released zombie novel, Possession of the Dead, the sequel to my shoot ‘em up undead novel, Blood of the Dead.

I’ve kept the pics small so as to ensure the text is hard to read. Don’t want to give anything away too soon.

Copyright 2010 by A.P. Fuchs. All rights reserved.
20: Selena’s Dream

Selena awoke screaming. I was in the next room about to write you something else, but instead was jolted from the first few sentences by Selena’s shrieks and her kicking at the couch. I ran into the room. She was on her back, arms flailing, legs coming down on the worn couch cushions heels first. I’ve seen her sleep before. Back when we were dating, she told me about the occasional nightmare, but not once did she talk about freaking out like she was doing on my couch just now.
Her eyes were closed.
I called her name.
She kept screaming, kept kicking.
I called her name again. Nothing. Just hysterics-while-sleeping.
I thought about going over to her and putting a hand on her shoulder and giving her a little shake. I didn’t. Didn’t want her to lash out at me and besides, I figured, if she was flipping out this bad on her own, what was a little shake by me going to do? It was kind of like watching an epileptic having a seizure: the most you could do was wait it out and make sure they didn’t hurt themselves in the process.
Finally, after several long minutes, her screaming and flailing ceased. She opened her eyes, sat up abruptly, face shiny with sweat, and tried to catch her breath.
I waited a few moments before saying anything. “You okay?”
Still panting, she looked at me. “I saw them, Marty. I saw them. So real. So flippin’—” She coughed. It was a deep cough, one loaded with phlegm. She winced as she tried to stifle another one.
“I’ll get you some water,” I said and hit the kitchen. When I came back and handed her the glass—water jugs are still around, for those wondering; water doesn’t suddenly disappear when the world goes down; don’t trust the movies—she held it for a while before taking a sip. Once done, she set the glass down on the coffee table and kept looking around the living room as if expecting a zombie to jump out at her at any moment.
“We’re safe here,” I said. “We’re up high. Everything’s locked. It’s okay.”
“It’s not that,” she said. “Well, it is. The dream, Marty. So real. Vivid. Every face. Every sound. Every smell. Never had smell in a dream before.”
Come to think of it, she had a point. I don’t remember ever smelling anything in my dreams either.
“Want to talk about it?” I asked.
Back when she and I were together, we were real good at confiding secrets, talking all night and overloading each other with information. It seemed she remembered that because a calm came over her face and the way she looked at me indicated she trusted me to spill her guts.
I sat beside her and listened.
“I was in a hallway,” she said. “Dark. The walls were silver. I knew that because there was the occasional bit of light that seeped into the hallway from the rooms that ran off it and it illuminated the wall enough to see they were silver. You know, tinfoil-like, but not crinkled. The floors were silver, too. Same with the ceilings. I remember thinking in the dream that I wanted to find a light switch so I could see the light shimmer off the walls. It’d be like being inside a diamond.
“So that’s what I did: looked for a light switch.
“The air smelled like lemon cleaner, but also like compost. Real weird combination. As I went down the hallway, I heard footsteps behind me. I stopped, turned around and far away at the opposite end was a human-like shadow. I could tell by its posture that it was female and that it was dead.
“It started moving toward me.”
She took a deep breath. I already felt my heartbeat double with apprehension.
“I turned and picked up my pace,” Selena said. “The undead woman’s footsteps got closer together and I didn’t have to look back to know it was stumbling toward me with everything it had. I tried running, but no matter how hard I dug in, I still couldn’t get past going at a walking pace.
“Moans filled the hallway. Low, hollow moans that at first didn’t sound like it would come from the undead. Then groans started and the growls. That one coming up at me from behind wasn’t alone. The hallway I was in just kept going. Silver walls all looking the same, no sense of distance or goal at the end.
“I glanced over my shoulder. A pack of female zombies were, like, twenty feet behind, if that. Their grubby hands were already reaching out for me. Dark hair, their mouths open, all naked. What was bizarre was their pale skin didn’t appear all that decayed, from what I could see. Didn’t matter, though. That gray was disgusting. So lifeless, so wan and empty of blood. Makes me shudder just thinking about it. I could smell them, like cooking oil left on the stove hours too long after a deep fry.
“My thighs burned. I kept running anyway until it was like my legs were filled with sand and every step forward was like lugging tree stumps for feet.
“The undead moaned and growled.
“Dead hands grabbed my shoulders and pulled me back. I fell and hit the floor. I remember looking at the silver ceiling beyond their dead faces, the silver reflecting the scene below. There were over a dozen of them now, all naked and dead and crowding over me trying to get a piece. A pair of hands reached down and tugged at my clothes. I wore a hospital gown. They tore that off then sharp dirty fingernails poked their way into my skin, through the flesh and in between the bones of my ribcage. They just kept digging. Soon they were in far enough they were able to curl the ends of their fingers around those bones and they started to pull.
“I howled, but not from pain. I just howled because I thought that was what I was supposed to do.
“Blood sprayed everywhere. Bones snapped. They pulled my ribs away from my body, my flesh hanging off the bones like tattered rags. The undead women brought the bones to their lips and sucked the meat off before chewing on the bones themselves.
“I glanced at my chest and saw nothing but a wet, black bowl spurting blood and bubbling over with internal organs. They ripped my lungs from my body. I stopped breathing. My stomach, guts, liver, kidneys—everything—they tore free and brought the red and dripping chunks of meat to their mouths. Blood dripped from their faces and splashed onto my own. I wanted to scream but, again, I couldn’t breathe. All I could do was scream inside my head. I tried kicking and using my arms to push them away but I couldn’t move.
“The wet sounds of them eating . . . I can still hear them now. Those sounds.” She pressed her palms to her chest and stomach as if checking to make sure she was still intact. “They just ate and ate.”
Her lower lip began to quiver. I wondered if I should try and hold her. I was about to reach out for her, but she said, “Marty, it was so real.”
“You’re safe now,” I said.
“No, no one’s safe. They’re out there. We’ve both seen them.”
“They don’t know we’re here.”
She picked up her glass of water and took a slow sip. When she was done, she held the glass with both hands. “I don’t know how long that’s going to last.”

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Praise the Dead by Gina Ranalli is now available at the following on-line retailers:

Paperback:

Amazon.com
Amazon.ca
Amazon.co.uk
Barnesandnoble.com
Other On-line Retailers

eBook:

Amazon Kindle
Drivethruhorror.com
Smashwords

Synopsis:

Young Andrew Perry has what he calls “The Power of Resurrection,” and he wields it like a toy wand, reanimating animals and people as he sees fit, primarily for his own amusement. But when this strange power begins to amplify, he decides he must be destined for more than merely roadside parlor tricks.

In another part of the country, a girl named Lindy possesses a power of her own, a power that threatens both her health and her sanity. The ability to hear and speak to birds, at first terrifying, soon gives birth to insight that suggests there is more going on than she perceives.

Day by day and year by year, each child becomes more aware of the other and the inevitable confrontation that is fast approaching. Each must build their own army and prepare for the final showdown between Good and Evil. Caught in the middle, the rest of humanity must choose a side, especially when the dead begin to walk.

Who will honor the living . . . and who will Praise the Dead?

The last Coscom Entertainment release: Magic Man Plus 15 Tales of Terror by A.P. Fuchs

For our full list of books, please see: www.coscomentertainment.com

Copyright 2010 by A.P. Fuchs. All rights reserved.
18: Selena

I’m not ready for this.
Selena’s supposed to be dead, and not just dead, but undead.
I would know.
I killed her.
Yet there she was, human, on the other side of my door. Through the fisheye lens of the peephole, there doesn’t seem to be a mark on her face. I can’t see the rest of her body, only a dark blur beneath the neck. I hope the rest of her is all right but it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if I’ve finally lost it and all this is an illusion, some kind of wishful thinking that is manifesting before my eyes.
I can scarcely breathe. A dead weight is on my toe. I kick it away and hear my baseball bat roll awkwardly to the side, one of the pieces of glass glued to it breaking as it moves across the floor.
Hand shaking, one eye still glued to the peephole, I slowly unlocked the door, felt my way up the doorframe to the chain, unhooked it.
She stood there on the other side, brown eyes wide and uncertain, a million thoughts clearly racing behind them.
Something moves in the peephole, small, delicate, flesh-toned.
Knock, knock.
Then again, only louder.
“Yeah,” I said, but my voice is only a whisper.
Any strength I had within was gone and I found myself on the floor, a sharp pain racing up my tailbone and into my lower back.
“Marty?” I hear through the door. “Is that you? Please, let it be.”
For the longest time I would have given anything to hear her call my name again and now that it’s finally happening, I wish she was gone.
Like I said, I’m not ready for this.
Heart speeding, pulsing in my throat and thumping through every vein in my body, I braced myself against the door and, using it for leverage, slowly pull myself up.
“I’m here,” I said. Same thing. My voice was a whisper.
Fingers trembling, I turned the door knob and pulled, the door weighing a thousand pounds and then some. It took two hands to pry it open.
Still leaning against it, I took in the sight before me. My heart was empty, hollow, void of feeling and life.
Selena stood a couple feet from the door, barefoot, wearing nothing but a grubby garbage bag, which hung on her like a dress from the dark.
“You’re alive,” I rasped.
“Marty, I need to come in,” she said.
We stood there in silence, my mind void of thought. This was Selena, the girl from long ago and the one who changed everything for me. She was here, alive, at my door in a world of zombies.
“Then who’d I kill?”
I barely mouthed the words but she must have heard them because she said, “Who’d you kill?”
I killed you, I thought. I beat your brains out and unloaded on you all my hate and pain and— “Come in.”
I moved from the door and she stepped into my apartment.
Crnch.
Selena shrieked, dropped to the floor and cradled her foot. I knelt down beside her.
She had stepped on that piece of glass that had broken off the bat.

* * *

There was only one way to handle this: pretend she wasn’t her and clean her up. After that, I could figure things out. If living in a world filled with the undead had taught me anything, it was that sometimes you had to stop feeling, stop caring, stop being what it meant to be human and just go through the motions. Survival was like that whether physical or otherwise.
I always hated “otherwise.”
Selena was now sitting my cough, me kneeling before her, her foot in my lap. I ignored how good it felt to hold her heel in my hand and suppressed the memory of the time I kissed every inch of her body, starting with her feet. I gently removed the piece of glass with a pair of tweezers then pressed hard against the wound with a cloth. She winced. I told her it was going to be okay. A moment later she reached down and her hands replaced mine. Again I had to fight the resurgence of memory when her soft hands trailed against my own.
I stood, took several steps back, and began pacing.
It was silent for a long time and I wasn’t sure if it was because she was too busy attending to her foot or if it was because silence was what happened every time you ran into an ex.
But this wasn’t “running in.” She had come here intentionally.
“Everybody’s dead,” she said.
I stopped pacing. “I know.”
“Except me and you.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
“You can’t.”
“I do.”
“No, you can’t,” I said firmly.
“The city’s empty, Marty.”
“Some might be indoors, like us. Besides” —I strolled over to my window and looked down onto the street— “they’re out there.”
“I know. I saw a million of them on the way over here.” I turned to face her. She glanced up from her foot. “I don’t even know how I made it here without them touching me.”
“Where we you?”
“Home.”
The last thing that I wanted was to come across as a creepy ex-boyfriend even though I was one hundred percent certain that was how she viewed me and she was only here because she had nowhere else to go and it was better to be with someone than no one at all, but I had to tell her. “Selena, I was just at your place.”
Her eyes went wide.
“Yeah, for real. I was there. I came to see you. I had to see you.” The last bit obviously made her uncomfortable because after I said it she immediately went back to tending to her foot.
“Okay, fine,” I said. “Regardless, I was there. There were zombies in your apartment. You weren’t. I checked the whole place, so unless you were hiding somewhere over there that I don’t know about and didn’t bother even peeking to see what the commotion was about, you need to tell me where you’ve been and why only now you decided to come see me.”
She looked up from her foot but not at me. “Okay, I’ll tell you. Just listen and believe whatever you want. I was home. I heard the dead, the groans, the biting of flesh. I don’t remember you being there or seeing you and it may just be shock right now so I’m forgetting something, but I remembering walking and walking.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “Wait.” She glanced down at the garbage bag covering her. “Oh no.” She sniffled. She glanced up at me, tears dripping down her cheeks. “I have lost something or something happened or…”
I came over to her, sat beside her and put a hand on her shoulder. She pulled away.
“Sorry,” I said.
“No, it’s just that I was walking and I don’t know for how long then I looked down on myself and…and I wasn’t wearing anything. Nothing. I—” She paused and took a deep breath. “I don’t know how I lost my clothes or if one of those things tore them off or what, but anyway I found this” —she touched the garbage bag— “put it on and realized I was close to your place.” She turned away and shame coated her voice. “I didn’t want to come.”
I took a deep breath. “I understand.”
“Sorry.”
“You need to get cleaned up. I’ll give you something to wear. We’ll take it slow and figure things out. Just know that we’re safe for now, okay?”
“Thanks,” she whispered.
I left the room and headed to my bedroom. Once inside, I leaned against the wall. She didn’t want to come here and only did out of desperation.
I wished I knew what happened to her.

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Coscom Entertainment has launched a giant Kindle book sale for its zombie, monster and superhero titles. (Viritually everything is on sale.)

The following books are now available for under $3 for Kindle users.

Snatch ‘em up fast because we don’t know how long we’ll be running this super-sale.

Here’s what’s available:

Monsters and Horror -

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Zombie Jim by Mark Twain and W. Bill Czolgosz

Alice in Zombieland by Lewis Carroll and Nickolas Cook

Animal Behavior and Other Tales of Lycanthropy by Keith Gouveia

Anna Karnivora by W. Bill Czolgosz

Bigfoot War by Eric S. Brown

Bits of the Dead: A Zombie Anthology edited by Keith Gouveia, illustrated by Sean Simmans

Blood of the Dead by A.P. Fuchs

Dead Science: A Zombie Anthology edited by A.P. Fuchs

Don of the Dead by Nick Cato

Emma and the Werewolves by Jane Austen and Adam Rann

Hound: Curse of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Lorne Dixon

Magic Man Plus 15 Tales of Terror by A.P. Fuchs

Mr Jitterbones: A Jack the Ripper Story by A.P. Fuchs

Praise the Dead by Gina Ranalli

Revolt of the Dead by Keith Gouveia

R.I.P. by Harrison Howe

Robin Hood and Friar Tuck: Zombie Killers by Paul A. Freeman

Snarl by Lorne Dixon

The Summer I Died by Ryan C. Thomas

The Undead World of Oz by L. Frank Baum and Ryan C. Thomas

World War of the Dead by Eric S. Brown

Vicious Verses and Reanimated Rhymes: Zany Zombie Poetry for the Undead Head edited by A.P. Fuchs

Zombie Fight Night: Battles of the Dead by A.P. Fuchs

Zombifrieze: A Zombie Graphic Novel by W. Bill Czolgosz and Sean Simmans

Superhero -

Axiom-man (Axiom-man Series, Book 1) by A.P. Fuchs

First Night Out (Axiom-man Series, Episode No. 0) by A.P. Fuchs

Doorway of Darkness (Axiom-man Series, Book 2) by A.P. Fuchs

The Dead Land (Axiom-man Series, Episode No. 1) by A.P. Fuchs

Axiom-man: Of Magic and Men (full-color comic book) by A.P. Fuchs

Axiom-man: Black Water (Axiom-man Series, A Cthulhu Story) by A.P. Fuchs

The Wraith (The Wraith Series, Book 1) by Frank Dirscherl

Valley of Evil (The Wraith Series, Book 2) by Frank Dirscherl

Cult of the Damned (The Wraith Series, Book 3) by Frank Dirscherl

Thanks.

Copyright 2010 by A.P. Fuchs. All rights reserved.
15: Before, Part II

The zombie came, arms outstretched, reaching for my neck and shoulders. I stepped to the side; she narrowly missed me. The zombie had its back to me but before I could raise the bat, long, matted brown hair swirled around and a pair of yellow teeth burst forth from a pair lips along with a terrible hiss. Those eyes, sunken and dead, looked at me with such hunger that I couldn’t believe Selena would—Selena…Selena…it wasn’t Selena.
The zombie grabbed hold of me, locking its arms around my waist. My own arms were free. I dropped the bat on purpose and shot out my hands and held back the dead girl’s head so her snapping jaw wouldn’t take a bite out of my face. I had to know for sure. The girl’s skin was bumpy and boiled, gray and lifeless. Chipped, yellowed teeth snapped up and down in front of a shriveled tongue. Vacant eyes kept staring straight ahead, just past me, as if seeing something that wasn’t there. It just kept snapping its mouth open and closed and open and closed and…those eyes.
They weren’t brown.
They were blue—faded—but blue.
Thank God.
I shoved the dead girl away from me, quickly crouched down, picked up the Louisville, then let her have it across the skull. The shards of glass along the bat’s weighted end lodged themselves into her head. I ripped them clean out, dragging along bits of flesh and bone with it. Syrupy blood splashed against the floor. The zombie teetered to the side. I came down on her head with the bat again. She fell. I stepped on top of her stomach and plowed the slugger into her face at least twenty times.
She made me think she was Selena.
After her face and head were good and gone and was nothing more than a stringy mess of skin, blood and bone, I finally stepped off her and moved to the side.
Then I heard something coming from the direction of the bedroom.
I kicked what was left of the dead girl’s head just for good measure.
She made me think she was Selena.
She made me think…
That sound again.
The bedroom.
I moved toward it.
Selena’s bedroom was just down the hallway, the room on the right just before the bathroom at the end. I’ve been down that hallway hundreds of times before and there was one time in particular that I’ll always remember. More on that in a second.
The Louisville unexpectedly grew heavy, my heart pounding knowing what I might find. The hallway’s white walls seemed oddly out of place all of a sudden, the white an awful contrast to the dark world Comtropolis now found itself in never mind the darkness in my own heart telling me I didn’t belong in such a bright place as this.
I hoisted up the bat shoulder height and stood in front of the bedroom door. Inside, dull thunks echoed, at first just one then a whole series of them. They stopped then resumed. Stopped then resumed. Then kept on going, each thunk nearly matching the frantic beating of my own heart. It took a moment for me to realize that tears had formed at the corners of my eyes. I thought I was already all cried out over her. Now…
My breathing sped up and no matter how hard I tried to slow it down, I couldn’t. Throat dry, I clenched the bat, reached out—and opened the door.
Thunk, thunk, thunk. Thunk, thunk, thunk.
Across from me, in between a pink-quilted bed high enough above the ground for a princess and an ornate dresser up against the wall beneath the window, was a girl who I’d recognize anywhere, back turned to me, repeatedly walking into the wall, her head smacking against it as if trying to beat out black and tormenting thoughts.
Selena.
She wore black pants, a gray sweater a couple sizes too big, no shoes. Her wavy brown hair hung loose halfway down her back.
My arms ached to reach out and hold her.
Thunk, thunk, thunk.
I wanted to speak, to get her attention. My voice caught in my throat and the words didn’t come.
I stepped in further, each foot dragging a dumbbell.
Thunk, thunk, thunk.
“Se—Selena…” I barely managed.
Thunk, thunk, thunk.
I went closer, about ten feet away.
“It’s me. Marty. Are you—” My voice caught again. I cleared my throat. “Are you—” I wanted to ask if she was okay but something inside me said that if I asked that, that when I saw her it would hurt even more.
Only a few feet behind her now, my bat still raised.
She kept pounding her head against the wall.
“Selena…” I reached out and touched her shoulder.
Selena kept hitting her head.
I tried again, this time pulling a bit on her right shoulder to help turn her around.
She did.
She was dead.
Her gaunt skin was like skim milk, her brown eyes pale and vacant. Dry, cracked lips that hadn’t seen a drink in who knew how long grinned then displayed yellow teeth just like the other girl.
My arms dropped, the bat suddenly too heavy for me to carry. I still held onto it though I couldn’t bring it up in between us when she lunged at me. A dull thump boomed inside my skull and the back of my head lit up in dry pain. It took a second to realize I was on the carpet, Selena on top of me, seeming to weigh twice as much as she did when she was alive though no extra weight showed.
Growling, her mouth went immediately to my neck. I jerked my head to the side, bought a few inches, the let go of the bat and pulled my hands up between us and pushed her off. Rolling over, I scrambled to my feet, Selena somewhere behind me. Running to the opposite side of the room near her closet, I planted my feet firmly, raised my fists and got ready. She darted toward me, low, guttural groans dripping from her mouth like drool. She didn’t recognize me or care who I was.
The realization almost paralyzed me then, her not caring. Felt too much like how she treated me after we’d finished dating.
My bat was on the other side her.
She latched onto me with both hands, her grip hard and firm, squeezing the life out of the muscles just beside my neck. On instinct, I shot my first out, punching her in the chest, the force strong enough to cause her body to bend at the waist. She straightened in no time then came in again, this time forcing me into her. I went with this, shooting my weight forward, knocking her to the ground so this time I was on top. Of all things to think or feel or notice, when I drew my hands in between her arms to break her hold on my neck, it reminded me of the time she had once put her arms around me, drawing me in for a kiss. I had similarly reached in between her arms, gently pulled them down then ran my hands across her cheeks and brought her face close to mine. Our lips locked, tongues searching the other’s, nothing but passion and love.
A kiss of need.
Now, I put my hands to her face again, this time gripped her hard, my fingers close to her ears, my thumbs on her cheekbones. I bent my arms at the elbow then shot them straight out, slamming the back of her head against the floor.
I did it again, this second time fazing her.
I got off her and ran for my bat. When my fingers wrapped around the wooden handle, it was like coming home. Movement behind me. Spinning around, I was greeted to a blur of brown hair and gray material. I cracked the bat across her face. Her body reeled to the side. One giant step closer and I brought it down on the back of her skull. Her neck cracked. She dropped to her hands and knees.
Whatever tenderness for her that was in my heart vanished and was replaced with the life-giving breath of rage.
“You took everything from me!” I screamed.
The bat came down, plowing once more into her skull. Her body dropped by my feet, prone, face down. I got on my knees, rolled her over, her dead eyes now blood shot, her face a mish mash of ripped flesh and blood.
“I loved you and you destroyed my life! I hate you! I hate you!” And I brought the butt end of the bat down into her nose, crushing it.
Selena coughed, threw up blood, then tried to attack me though the attempt was feeble.
“How could you!” I shrieked. “How could you!”
Nothing but low groans escaped her lips.
She didn’t hear me.
She didn’t care.
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Copyright 2010 by A.P. Fuchs. All rights reserved.
12: Time = Meaningless

One of the things I noticed about the nature of time ever since the zombies came was that it no longer held any meaning. Living alone with only my back to watch had set me on a very open schedule. Day and night, though still separated by blue and black skies, were a non-issue. I slept when I was tired. Stayed awake when I wasn’t. No job to go to anymore. The boss and my co-workers were either dead or walking around dead. People took want they wanted when they wanted it, and those of us still alive, it seemed, preferred indoor life.
But time also had a new meaning when around the undead. See, movies and books and video games prepared us for it—kinda—helped us get lost in the moments when the dead came around and tried to kill you or the heroes in the stories. Only one habit was practiced when you watched on your projecto-screen the dead coming for the living: survival. It didn’t matter how long it took or which way it took you.
Same thing happened lying there on that sidewalk. I heard their low, raspy moans. I saw the sky above. My thoughts raced and yet I could think through each one clearly: get up and run; get up and fight; lie there and die; lie there, fight a little, then die some strange heroic death after one last stand.
So what did I choose?
I got up and fought.
Getting to my feet was the easy part; the adrenaline pumping through my system took care of any effort getting up that quickly might have took under normal circumstances. My head swooned a touch, my only thought locating my bat. There it was, off to the side a few feet, lying there like a sword begging to be plucked from a stone. I grabbed hold of the handle and felt its power surge through me.
Eyes level, I saw the dead approaching, a whole group of them, at least a dozen, the mass of dead flesh, gray and decayed stepping steadily toward me, their eyes bloodshot and dreamy, transfixed on me, their next meal.
I took a few steps back as I leveled the bat. Then I set my feet shoulder-width a part and wound up like a star hitter waiting for the pitch.
Closer. The dead came forward.
When the first one—a burly old broad with shoulder-length, dust-covered blonde hair—reached for me, I swung the bat hard and swift into the side of her head. Her neck snapped, the flesh along one side tearing from the impact. I came up from the other side, cracked her skull, ripping the blades through her flesh, and watched her tumble to the side as blood leaked from her ears.
An old man came in from the left and tried to grab me with his no-longer-functioning robo-arm. I brought the bat down on the apparatus just as a little kid who appeared about eight years old wrapped his arms around my waist and tried to take a chunk out of my stomach. I brought the butt-end of the Louisville down into the top of his head, shoved him away, then drove the bat between his legs like that Tiger Woods guy from years ago.
More zombies appeared. Lots more, coming in from each side, making their way around the smashed hover-cars crowding the street.
I got out of there.
The dead tried to run after me, most of them falling over as they suddenly tried to propel their legs faster than they could handle. Some stumbled a few steps then started walking regular pace, seeming to think they’d still be able to catch up with me. Nothing doing.
I ran home.
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To make way for the upcoming Gallery Books (an imprint of Simon & Schuster) reprint–with AMAZING new cover art–of The War of the Worlds Plus Blood, Guts and Zombies by H.G. Wells and Eric S. Brown, the Coscom Entertainment edition has to retire, which means this first edition of this aliens vs zombies undead extravaganza won’t be around for much longer.

This is your last chance to pick up a copy, and we at Coscom Entertainment have no doubt this first edition will become a book you’ll treasure for years to come.

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Paperback:

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The story:

The invasion begins . . . and the dead start to rise.

There’s panic in the streets of London as invaders from Mars wreak havoc on the living, slaying the populace with Heat-Rays and poisonous clouds of black smoke. Humanity struggles to survive against technology far beyond its own, meeting fear and death at every turn.

But that’s not the only struggle mankind must face. The dead are rising from their graves with an insatiable hunger for human flesh. Friends, neighbours and loved ones lost to the war of the worlds are now the enemy and the Earth is forever changed.

It’s kill or be killed, if you want to survive, otherwise you might become one of the walking dead yourself.

The last Coscom Entertainment release: Bigfoot War by Eric S. Brown

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Copyright 2010 by A.P. Fuchs. All rights reserved.
10: Running

It didn’t take long for my thighs to begin to burn. I was never an athlete by any stretch of the imagination, but I was never an out-of-shape loser either. I don’t know what I weigh now but last I checked I was sitting around 170 pounds, and at 6 feet, I have the advantage of long legs. Gaining distance between myself and those shamblers was the easy part. Maintaining that distance was another issue altogether.

I’m out of shape. Fine. I’ll admit it, and ever since the city fell apart, navigating around its streets has become more of a challenge.

Lungs beginning to ache, baseball bat growing heavy, I rounded an alley some 10 blocks from my place. Perhaps there I could take a breather and wait things out. Nope. At the end of the alleyway, about five undead had their backs to me, and judging by the way they were hunched over and slightly bobbing up and down, they were feasting on something. Just seeing them made my jaw clench and my blood boil and I instinctively increased the grip on my bat. Just to club them one good. Man, what a thing. But they were five and I was one and for some reason I was interested in living again.

So I ran elsewhere.

I just ran.

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