The Queen of the Dead Read online

  The Queen of the Dead.

  ZOMBIE ASCENSION: Book Two

  Vincenzo Bilof

  Copyright 2013 by Vincenzo Bilof

  Cover art Copyright 2013 by Russell Dickerson

  Introduction

  In Love With the End

  By Joe McKinney

  Written in 1919, in the aftermath of World War I and the great Spanish Flu, a conflux of events that resulted in the destruction of whole nations and eventually consumed ninety million lives, William Butler Yeats’ poem “The Second Coming” describes a feeling, an experience, a zeitgeist, that continues to resonate today. Here is what he wrote:

  Turning and turning in the widening gyre

  The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

  Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

  Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

  The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

  The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

  The best lack all conviction, while the worst

  Are full of passionate intensity.

  Surely some revelation is at hand;

  Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

  The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out

  When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

  Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert

  A shape with lion body and the head of a man,

  A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,

  Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it

  Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

  The darkness drops again; but now I know

  That twenty centuries of stony sleep

  Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

  And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

  Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

  I’ve always loved that poem, and the fact that I loved it from my first reading has always troubled me. You see, Yeats was responding to events so desperate, so truly terrifying, that it feels almost indecent to take such pleasure in his words. But I can’t help it. I love the apocalyptic imagery, the sense of dread and impending doom. Yeats’ poem is the very essence of what horror, and especially apocalyptic horror, is trying to do – namely, articulate our morbid fascination with our own destruction.

  We are, as a species, in love with the end. Stories of disasters and plagues and godly wrath have fascinated us since we were cavemen huddled around the fading warmth of a dying fire. I can’t help but think some of this love with end is wishful thinking against our enemies. After all, the apocalypse is no fun unless you’re one of the ones surviving it. And it can be so much fun to imagine one’s enemies swept away by a flood, or strangled to death by the ravages of a disease, or even pulled to pieces by zombies. We have a mean side to us that lets us thrill at ruined cities and whole continents laid waste.

  But it’s not all about contempt for our fellow man. Quite the opposite, in fact. Yes, an awful lot of eggs have to get broken to make the post-apocalyptic omelet, and that means an awful lot of people have to get munched; but those of us writing in this genre, and especially in the zombie genre, are simply reinventing the survival story, which is as old as the hills. Noah had his flood. Odysseus had his Odyssey. Robinson Crusoe had his shipwreck. There is nothing new here. We’ve simply taken an age-old storytelling technique, and substituted zombie-ravaged continents for deserted islands.

  The point is not the destruction of the familiar, but the reinvention of the survivor. That’s what I loved so much about the book you now hold in your hands. Vincenzo Bilof has a knack for capturing the panic, the fear, the mindset of the survivor. Be it a psychologically damaged priest or the sister of a gangbanger or a tough as nails soldier or a stoned Slayer fan, all of Bilof’s characters share an inner power, a survivor’s mindset.

  I gravitated to them at once. I felt their panic as the world went up in flames all around them. I felt the desperation, the terror, and it was with that revelation that I thought of William Butler Yeats and his wonderful poem.

  You see, there’s a line in that poem that subverts all the horrors he describes. It is a line that, really, defines the survivor storyline.

  He writes: Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.

  Every survivor tale ever written has loosed anarchy upon the world. That is the essence of the tale, after all. Take a normal guy and flip his world upside down.

  But the word mere changes our perspective.

  It implies a sense that this can be survived. It offers opportunity, even a small window of hope.

  Now we are dealing with survivors. And survivors don’t just endure; they recreate the world in their image.

  They are gods.

  Vincenzo Bilof offers a few characters who might rise to this level. It all depends on how deep their inner reservoirs are.

  But I won’t give that part away. Know only this: you are entering the world of the survival story. Who will make it? Who won’t? I won’t tell you. But I will leave you with this one thought.

  Vincenzo Bilof knows his business. He is about to reinvent a classic tale. And in the process he is going to thrill you.

  If you don’t believe me, turn the page.

  Joe McKinney

  Lake Travis, Texas

  August 21, 2013

  PROLOGUE

  Father Joe Martinez didn’t consider himself homeless. Within God’s heart, he’d found a home after years of sin and self-inflicted torment. The boxing ring, drug addiction, prostitution—without these vices, he wouldn’t have discovered the healing power of faith.

  With his hands planted on his hips, he watched the television while the wide eyes of the elderly watched alongside him. The emergency vehicle sirens outside were becoming a maddening concert, and the Emergency Broadcast System’s wail provided the doom-laden soundtrack to a disaster.

  “Can your bag of tricks save the world, Father?”

  It was Frank who mocked him. The sharp-witted old man sat in his wheelchair directly across from the duffel bag Father Joe carried with him wherever he went. Vials of holy water, a gold-embossed Bible, crucifixes, pamphlets, rosaries; he had it all. Frank always called him a “God-salesman,” but he was used to the old man’s bullshit.

  The riots had already found their way to the retirement center, all the way from Detroit. The grouped denizens watched one of the country’s largest cities burn on TV, while their own rest home, a retreat from the horrors of life, was cleaned out of medical supplies by looters.

  Smoke drifted past the room’s window.

  Father Joe managed to move several patients into the room where he presided over Mrs. Jane Waters, who had requested her last rites. The woman lay in her bed now; she expired only a few moments ago, but nobody came to help with the body. She shouldn’t have been in her room in the first place; in a bout of clarity, Mrs. Waters requested that she pass in her own bed, which had been brought from her house.

  “I can go and get help,” Father volunteered. “I can get an ambulance to evacuate everyone.” A dozen sets of eyes watched him; men and women in diapers, with thin flesh stretching over skeletal joints.

  “Why the fuck would they come here, you idiot?” Frank asked. “We’re all looking at the bucket and we’re about to trip over the damn thing, and you think they’ll send help… to us?” He chuckled.

  The best way to deal with Frank was to let him run his mouth. Frank reminded him of the old men in Ciudad Juarez, men who wrestled with the heat and the violence; death was everywhere, and those men had known it.

  Mexico was a long time ago, and far away.

  “… Hundreds of people are flocking to Selfridge Air Base.” A news report showed images of a mob gathering on the runw
ay of the base from a helicopter’s aerial perspective.

  Detroit was under quarantine. But whatever was happening there hadn’t been contained.

  Frank had control of the remote and he turned the channel. A military officer stood in front of a podium to answer questions. His face was covered in sweat.

  “… At this time, communications networks are down. Again, the most important thing someone can do to make a difference is to stay inside their home. Exit from all public places and seek refuge inside your homes…”

  He held a silver crucifix in his scarred fist. It was his lot to travel between retirement homes and collect donations while providing his services.

  Frank had something more to say. Just like the old timer who sat outside the ring during the last fight. Heckling and booing, shouting that he was a useless thug who would never be champion.

  Father Joe couldn’t remember his opponent’s face, but he could remember the old man outside of the ring. He could remember his last punch.

  “Get outta here then, ye damn coward.” Frank’s red eyes shone in the television’s glare. “Don’t come back. Run while you still can.”

  He smiled and said, “I never was good at running. I was a better fighter.”

  “You’re no different than any other priest. Fucking liar.”

  ***

  A thousand flashing red and blue lights were parked in front of an intersection. Father Joe glanced to the other end of the street; there wasn’t a barricade, but the street was empty.

  As he approached the police cars, he couldn’t help but think how the streets of his home would look if the same thing were happening; a free-f0r-all would ensue, with the cops killing each other in a bloodbath that would tear the city to pieces. It would be reborn again, out of the ashes of the men and women who kept their sanity and their lives. Detroit would also be reborn.

  But they weren’t in Detroit; they were in Roseville, a few miles outside of the big city.

  A helicopter passed overhead, and the evening-clad street was filled with the chaos of argumentative voices and gunfire. The EBS siren blared, but it was nothing more than background noise.

  Police officers were positioned behind the barricade with their weapons drawn. An officer approached Father Joe.

  “You need to get back, Father.” The officer’s nametag read, S. Ninkovich.

  “Get back to what?” he asked. “My place is here. You need my help, and I need yours.”

  The man wiped the perspiration from his forehead and blinked at the priest. “Shit. There’s nothing to argue about. Not anymore.”

  Father placed a hand on his shoulder. “What’s your name? You call me Father Joe.”

  Even the irreligious were grateful for his appearance whenever the shit hit the fan. When lives were on the line, fear and anxiety replaced rational thinking, and there were many born-again Christians whenever a priest might be found in a disaster.

  “Sam,” the officer said as if startled from a dream. “Father… they’re coming. Right down the street… they’re coming.” He glanced over his shoulder at the barricade. “This is all we have… some of my people are staying home to protect their families.”

  Father knew what to say, but he understood the difference between doing the right thing and doing what would matter most.

  “All men die,” he said. “You can pray on your knees, or you can stand with God in your heart, with righteousness and strength to do what’s right.”

  The man was about to speak, but Father stopped him. “We don’t have time to be afraid. Let me help you; I have people at the nursing home down the street—the place has been looted and the staff ran off with whatever they could.”

  “You haven’t seen them. You don’t know what we’re really up against. But they’re coming.” He shrugged.

  Here was a man who was willing to give everything he had left to protect those who needed him most. God bless this man.

  “I don’t know what you can do. It’s bad, Father. Maybe… some of the others would like to see you. Maybe just to hear you. This might not go well, so helping you… I’m sorry. I don’t know. We’re going to stand our ground and do our job. We’ll do it, I promise you. I swear to you.”

  Father smiled at him. “I know you will. No man can die if God is allowed into his heart. How bad is it?”

  Sam looked away. “The National Guard’s in Detroit, but I guess… This is all that’s left. A bunch of hardasses here to take care of business. We responded to reports of looting here on Groesbeck, with all these stores and gas stations, schools… this is our home. Most of these people with me live here.”

  There wasn’t a plan.

  Men and women with guns. They pointed at flames, and some of them sobbed on dashboards or into open palms. Radio static was punctuated with screams and gunfire. They paced back and forth, wringing their hands, comforting one another, cursing and spitting, checking to see if their weapons were loaded, wiping sweat from their eyes, exchanging stories, or staring at the ruinous war around them. The EBS system’s wailing subsided, leaving the flashing lights atop the cars and ambulances to a dreadful silence that allowed fear to thrive, to breathe, to step out of the shadows and present itself as the beast which feasted upon the hearts of martyrs and saints alike.

  He turned away from the officer and stepped into an ambulance to see if there was something he could do for one of the wounded. No matter how much panic he heard outside of the barricade, how much chaos, how much agony, he accepted it all as a matter of course. He grew up in the sweaty gutters of a wounded town outside of Ciudad Juarez, where he would find sanctuary in fists and blood. He knew the tortured screams of junkies suffering from withdrawal and the cries of lonely women who were at the mercy of bejeweled pimps.

  Inside the ambulance, a woman wearing a salmon-colored shirt and a pair of white jeans sat beside a dead body. With short blonde hair and green eyes, she didn’t seem surprised at the priest’s sudden appearance.

  “They shot this man more than a dozen times, and he kept coming,” she said.

  He sat beside her and looked at the dead man. A bullet hole had punctured the forehead and blood crusted beneath the shuttered eyes.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  The muscles along her jawline clenched. “I’ve seen gurneys trail blood through the hospital. I’ve delivered babies from dead women. What if you found out you couldn’t help?” her eyes lingered on him while she awaited his answer.

  “I’m not sure I understand the question. I’m Father Joe, by the way.”

  “Kathy,” she said. “What if you found out your prayers weren’t worth a damn?”

  Here was a woman used to a schedule, to a carefully ordered, predictable routine, and her life had been interrupted. Of course she was pissed off, and she would take it out on the priest, but he was used to it.

  “I do what I have the power to do,” he said. “If it’s not good enough, then I can’t say it was useless, or a waste of my time, because how would I know otherwise? You tried to help this man…”

  Her eyes were disconnected, staring at a moment that was scattered among her thoughts. “Yeah. You could say that. On my way home from work. I work in Mount Clemens at the hospital. This man was on the street. He was dead, Father. I checked his pulse. Dead people were all over the street. My phone started ringing because they wanted me to come back to work. But this man opened his eyes and grabbed my hair. Pulled on it, but I don’t fuck around. I carry a piece. My father taught me how to shoot, and I just want to find him, get to him to make sure he’s okay. My mother, too.

  “This man grabbed me and I shot him. Point blank in the chest. He didn’t so much as flinch. Right across the street. It was a few minutes ago but it doesn’t seem like it. A cop shot him. A couple cops shot him until he took one to the head and flopped.”

  She looked at the corpse as if seeing it for the first time.

  “You’re not going back to work,” Father noted.

  Kathy laughed.
“Work? You’re a funny guy, Father. You got yourself a sense of humor. Yeah. Funny.”

  Sam Ninkovich. Kathy. Frank. All the brave officers outside. Thousands of people—he didn’t have the power to help everyone. He would help whomever he could, however he could.

  But there was Frank, who thought he was never coming back. A promise had been made and he would keep it. What kind of man was he if he couldn’t keep his promise?

  He used to promise himself that he would become a champion in the boxing ring. His promise launched itself through a powerful fist that shattered a man’s consciousness and killed him outright on a sunny day in April.

  The man at ringside, the heckler, had looked just like Frank.

  You become a bandit or a priest, Father Joe’s old man used to say to him, a line from a Western that played over and over again on Mexican TV. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

  “When you have to shoot… Shoot, don’t talk,” Father mumbled a line from the film.

  “What?” Kathy asked.

  “Praying,” he said.

  “I need to get home,” she said. “My parents need me. I take care of them. They’re old and they need me. I can’t stay here, but I don’t want to go back out there. This is safe, comfortable.”

  He clasped both of his dark, rough hands over one of hers. “You’re a good daughter. You’ll see them again very soon, I promise.”

  “Isn’t there some bullshit in the Bible about the dead coming back to life when the world’s about to end?”

  Father sighed. “Sure. And they’ve all got Coronas and cigarettes, so we’ll be throwing an end-of-the-world party. I’d rather watch pro wrestling than connecting this crap to some prophecy. Let the priests do that.”

  She gave him an “are you serious” look and her mouth opened to speak, but gunfire in close proximity drew their attention away from the conversation.

  Something terrible was sinking into the depths of his soul, as if lead were being poured into his belly. His feet were blocks of cement, and the same mortal fear that enslaved the free will of both Ninkovich and Kathy kept him from venturing back into the night. He closed his eyes and tried to picture lines from the Book of Revelation to find an answer, an archaic prophesy that might save the souls of the innocent, but he was powerless. His gut instinct was to find a way to solve the problem, but he was like any other priest who served beside an army during a war: lives would be lost, and he would stand witness.