Zombie Granny: A Blue Moon Investigations Short Story Read online

  While we had been binding them, I had explained my very loose theory to Frank. My hypothesis was that if a hypnotist could induce a state where they acted as zombies and would continue to do so until they were given a code word, or in the case of the zombie granny, given such a shock that they were brought back from their reverie, then that was what we were witnessing. I further hypothesised that the drug found in Edna’s blood was going to be the tetrodotoxin stuff that James had been talking about earlier or some derivative thereof. This was either how he got them into the state to induce such a deep hypnosis or how he kept them there. I was stretching, I knew it. However, it was the only idea I had. The only question that remained was why?

  With our two zombies immobile and the crowd of people in the previously busy street now thinning, I hooked the backpack over my shoulder and set off down the road toward The Casino Nightclub where I hoped to find some answers. I did not ask Frank to come along, I had no wish to place him or anyone else in danger but I expected he would follow me anyway. He did.

  ‘Is there a plan?’ He asked as we began to meet with smoke. I could not see the origin of it but remembered he news report saying that fires had been started at the previous zombie attack sites.

  ‘The plan,’ I began, but failed to finish, as a zombie crashed through a store front window to my right and grabbed me. The zombie was a strong, athletic, twenty-something guy who was taller and heavier than me and had caught me by surprise. I went down underneath him, toppled by his momentum, my right arm pinned beneath me with the zombie twatting stick in my hand. My left arm in his grip. He bit into my shoulder. Even with three layers on, it still hurt and I started to see the benefit of the zombie armour Frank had placed in the back pack.

  I flipped and shoved him away, and managed to slide my arm out from underneath me. Athlete zombie’s teeth had lost their purchase as I did but he just lunged for my face and would have bitten a chunk right out of me had I not shoved the end of the twatting stick directly into his open mouth. Frank had grabbed his shoulders in a bid to wrestle him away from me and between us we managed to get me out from beneath the man. I was still trying to avoid hurting the guy, still convinced that he was just some bloke that had been drugged and hypnotised.

  ‘Grab the duct tape!’ I yelled to Frank.

  ‘We might need a plan B.’ Frank said, lifting the pack and backing away.

  I turned to see what he was looking at. Six more zombies coming right at us, shuffling and groaning and looking hungry.

  Bugger.

  My intention to avoid hurting anyone was looking doubtful. Accepting it, I rolled away from athlete zombie and kicked him hard in the side of the head as I went. Noble concept abandoned, my new plan was to survive.

  ‘Frank, find a weapon. This is about to get real.’ I shouted to psyche myself up.

  I lifted the zombie twatting stick ready to swing as he appeared beside me with a katana. ‘Dammit Frank, No.’ I screeched. ‘These are fake, hypnotised zombies. Do not kill them. Injuries will be hard enough to explain to them when they come around. Put the sheath on it and bash them with it. Okay?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ He mumbled, somewhat embarrassed by his own bravado. Then they were upon us. With weapons to hit them, they were easy enough to put down but there were more coming. The smoke swirled, shrouding us like a thick cloak and caught between the buildings on a breezeless day. We had barely progressed down the road towards The Casino Nightclub and the lack of advancement was annoying me.

  ‘We need to get to the nightclub, Frank. They don’t move fast so we are going to charge through them. Right?’

  ‘Okay.’ He replied, clearly nervous and ignoring it.

  Not bothering to offer any further explanation I steeled myself to charge through the line of zombies that came at us. I grabbed the shoulder of Frank’s jacket so I would not lose him and broke into a sprint.

  Then stopped.

  Stumbling towards me from the smoke was James. There were maybe another ten zombies around him, some ahead, some behind but all coming towards us as we were the only people remaining in the street. Everyone else had fled. He was stumbling along in the group, arms out and groaning like the rest. Where the zombies’ eyes were deranged, his were just terrified. He spotted me and risked a wry smile.

  He was faking!

  The zombies were upon us again, so I hit the first one over the head as gently as one can with a wooden club, then ducked into the lunge of the next one and whacked him under the chin.

  ‘James!’ I yelled. ‘Lie down.’

  He looked confused, but obeyed the instruction. I still had one hand on Frank’s jacket in fear of being split up. ‘OK, Frank. Let’s go!’ I found myself yelling again. What can I say? It was an exciting situation.

  At a charge, we closed the distance to James, knocking zombies over like pins as we went. It proved to be much, much easier than trying to knock them out without hurting them. Frank and I scooped an arm each without even slowing down and we were running down the road with James between us, his heels dragging along the concrete

  More smoke swirled around us and I spotted fire behind a window as flames were licking at the woodwork inside. Sirens could be heard in the distance; police and fire brigade and probably paramedics. All were needed.

  Suddenly, the smoke cleared, we were just metres from The Casino Nightclub entrance and there were no zombies in sight. I dragged James and Frank through the open door of the Victoria and Eagle pub to get us off the street. Checking that nobody, and no zombies were inside, I slammed the door behind us. It felt slightly safer for a moment.

  ‘What is going on?’ James asked between deep breaths.

  Now that we had at least a few seconds to re-group I ignored his question. I had questions for him instead. ‘James, did the hypnotist create the zombies?’

  ‘Yeah! He did!’ he replied, astounded. ‘How did you know?’

  ‘Lucky guess.’ I said rather than waste time on conversation. ‘Next question. How are you not affected?’

  ‘Oh. Well, when we arrived, the chap had an assistant lady and she was handing out canapes. She was very insistent that everyone have one, but it smelled like fish and since I am a vegan, I faked putting it in my mouth and slipped it into my pocket instead. Here it is.’ He announced, producing a rather fancy, but now sadly battered blini looking object, with a leaf, a blob of something edible and a shake of spice over the top.

  ‘Thank you.’ I said, taking the canape and placing it into a little bag I had pulled from one of my many pockets. An investigator keeps things like that just in case evidence pops up. ‘Then what?’

  ‘The Great Howsini asked everyone to sit and launched into his show. It was weird though, not like his usual act and I noticed that everyone around me had stopped moving. It was like they were unconscious, but their eyes were still wide open. The weirdest thing was that he was telling them all that they were the walking dead, the most terrifying zombie creatures that needed to feed on human flesh. I was scared because they were all starting to groan and make growling noises, so I played along. The assistant lady threw open the doors and he sent us all out to kill, kill, kill. That was what he said, “Kill, kill, kill!”

  Right then. ‘Gents you can come with me if you want, but you may be safer staying here. The Great Howsini is about to learn the error of his ways.’ I was going to find this idiot and punch him in the pants. Bring zombies to my town, real or not and you pay for it. The problem being, that I had no idea how to find him.

  ‘James do you have a picture of him, or can you describe him?’ I was hoping he was going to be easy to spot and that I could catch him here. If not, I would catch up to him later, but by then the adrenalin would be out of my system, I would be thinking with more reason and would find it far harder to justify hurting him.

  ‘No need really.’ James said. ‘That’s him over there.’ He pointed.

  Across the street a man in a suit that screamed stage show act, with its sequinned
seam up the trouser leg and overly long jacket tails was carrying heavy sacks towards the car park. He was in his late thirties, a good fifty pounds overweight and had very little hair left. What there was formed a black ring around the sides and back of his scalp. The effect making his scalp look like a round mountain, rising above particularly dark clouds. Behind him, a woman of similar age and figure was weighed down by more sacks. I pulled out my camera and started filming. Then, I handed it to James with the simple instruction to keep it rolling.

  The Great Howsini’s real name was Dave Gough. The lady was his wife, Brenda. She was a chemist. Once cornered, they had given in immediately and confessed their story to the police that had arrived on the scene moments later. I was getting to be known by the local police as my job had a habit of landing me in the vicinity of dubious events. But for once they had skipped over the bit where they arrested me and had allowed me to remain at the scene. The Goughs were caught red-handed with bags of cash and goods stolen from shops, bars and restaurants that they had subsequently set fire to in order to cover their tracks. Missing money and goods would be discovered at the other zombie attack sites when the ash was sifted.

  James’s original research into how to make a zombie had been bang on the money. Brenda was a chemist by trade and could legally obtain the tetrodotoxin which she had made it into a drug that would render a person ingesting it in a state of semi-suspended animation. Full of ego, she had bragged how deliciously complex it had been.

  The police had departed with the Goughs in cuffs. We trudged wearily back through a desolated and partly destroyed Rochester High Street. We passed Fire Brigade teams putting out fires. We paused at my office to lock up and at Frank’s bookshop, where we found the door wide open but the contents unmolested.

  I was bitten, battered, bruised and tired, but also elated. It was time for a cold one and I was buying.