Free Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion Page B

by one from the floors below. A small committee of Boneys emerges from the stairs and approaches me and Julie. They stop in front of us and fan out into a line. Julie backs away a little, her bravado flattening under their black, eyeless stares. Her grip on my arm tightens.
    One of them steps forward and stops in front of me, inches from my face. No breath wafts from its hollow mouth, but I can feel a faint, low hum emanating from its bones. This hum is not found in me, nor in M, nor in any of the other flesh-clad Dead, and I begin to wonder what exactly these dried-up creatures really are. I can no longer believe in any voodoo spell or laboratory virus. This is something deeper, darker. This comes from the cosmos, from the stars, or the unknown blackness behind them. The shadows in God’s boarded-up basement.
    The ghoul and I are locked in a stare-down, toe to toe, eye to eye socket. I don’t blink, and it can’t. What seems like hours pass. Then it does something that slightly undermines the horror of its presence. It raises a stack of Polaroids in its pointy fingers and begins handing them to me, one by one. I’m reminded of a proud old man showing off his grandkids, but the skeleton’s grin is far from grandfatherly, and the photos are far from heartwarming.
    Off-the-hip shots of some kind of battle. Organised ranks of soldiers firing rockets into our hives, rifles popping us off with precision, one two three. Private citizens with their machetes and chainsaws hacking through us like blackberry vines, spattering our dark juices on the camera lens. Monumental stacks of freshly re-killed corpses, soaked in gasoline and lit.
    Smoke. Blood. Family photos from our vacation in Hell.
    But as unsettling as this slide show is, I’ve seen it before. I’ve witnessed the Boneys performing it dozens of times, usually for children. They drift around the airport with cameras dangling from their vertebrae, occasionally following us on feeding trips, lingering in the back to document the bloodshed, and I always wonder what it is they’re after. Their subject matter follows a precise theme that never varies: corpses. Battles. Newly converted zombies. And themselves. Their meeting rooms are wallpapered with these photos, floor to ceiling, and sometimes they drag in a young zombie and make him stand there for hours, even days, silently appreciating their work.
    Now this skeleton, identical to the rest, hands me these Polaroids slowly and civilly, confident that the images speak for themselves. The message of today’s sermon is clear: inevitability . The immutable, binary results of our interactions with the Living.
    They die / we die.
    A noise rises from where the skeleton’s throat would be, a crowing sound full of pride and reproach and stiff, rigid righteousness. It says everything it and the rest of the Boneys have to say, their motto and mantra. It says, I rest my case , and That’s the way it is , and Because I said so .
    Looking straight into its eye sockets, I let the photos fall to the floor. I rub my fingers against each other as if trying to brush off some dirt.
    The skeleton does not react. It just stares at me with that horrible, hollow stare, so utterly motionless it seems to have stopped time. The dark hum in its bones dominates everything, a low sine wave prickling with sour overtones. And then, so abruptly it makes me jump, the creature pivots away and rejoins its comrades. It barks out one last horn blast, and the Boneys descend the escalator. The rest of the Dead disperse, sneaking hungry glances at Julie. M is the last to go. He scowls at me, then lumbers away. Julie and I are alone.
    I turn to face her. Now that the situation has settled and the blood on the floor is drying, I’m finally able to contemplate what’s happening here, and somewhere deep in my chest, my heart wheezes. I gesture towards what I assume is the ‘Departures’ sign and give Julie a questioning look, unable to hide the hurt behind