Zom-B Angels

Book 4: Zom-B

by Darren Shan

Genres: YA Horror

Synopsis

After spending the last few months wandering around London—a city filled with the dead—B Smith has given up hope for any sign of normal human existence. But then B finds strange signs all over the city—a “Z” plus red arrows.

Following them, B finds the Angels—a group gathered in the hopes of combating the evil dead and the forces that introduced them. But all is not as it seems and it’s up to B to find out: What battle are they truly waging?

A Blackstone Audio production.

Release date: July 9, 2013

Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers

Print pages: 160

Sample

Becky Smith was at school the day the dead came back to life and took over the world. She tried to escape with a group of friends, but it wasn’t meant to be. Her heart was torn from her chest and she became a zombie.

Several months later B recovered her senses in an underground military complex. The soldiers lumped her in with the zom heads, a pack of revitalized teenagers like her who had somehow regained their minds. They were told by their captors that they had to eat brains to stay conscious, and had a life expectancy of just a couple of years.

B would probably have remained a prisoner for the rest of her days, if not for the intervention of a monstrous clown called Mr. Dowling. He invaded with a team of mutants, set the zombies free and killed many of the staff. B didn’t think he did it because he was pro-zombie—it looked to her like he did it for kicks.

Most of the zom heads were executed while trying to escape, but B made it out. She thought Rage might have gotten away as well. He was a self-serving bully who turned on his guards and proved just as clinical and merciless as they had been, casually killing one of the scientists before setting off on his own and warning his fellow zom heads not to follow him.

B roamed the streets of London for a while, mourning the loss of the normal world. It was a city of the dead, dotted with just a handful of living survivors. Some had chosen to stay, but others were trapped and desperately searching for a way out.

When B heard that the army was mounting a rescue operation, she went to offer herself to them, figuring they might be able to use her DNA to help other zombies recover their minds. But the soldiers saw her as a threat and tried to kill her. Once again the killer clown saved her. He slaughtered the humans, then asked her if she wanted to join him. B could think of nothing worse than teaming up with Mr. Dowling, his creepy mutants and an eerie guy with owl-like eyes who had shown an interest in her even before the zombies attacked. She told him to stick his offer.

Wounded, bewildered and alone, B wandered across the river and staggered into an old building, County Hall, once the home of local government, now a deserted shell. At least that was what it looked like. But as B stared out of a window at the river, a man called to her by name and said he had been waiting for her.

I whirl away from the window that overlooks the Thames. A man has entered the room through a door that I didn’t notice on my way in. He’s standing in the middle of the open doorway, arms crossed, smiling.

My survival instinct kicks in. With a roar, I hurl myself at the stranger, ignoring the flare of pain in my bruised, broken body. I curl my fingers into a fist and raise my hand over my head as I close in on him.

The man doesn’t react. He doesn’t even uncross his arms. All he does is cock his head, to gaze with interest at my raised fist. His smile never slips.

I come to a stop less than a meter from the man, eyeing him beadily as my fist quivers above my head. If he’d tried to defend himself, I would have torn into him, figuring he was an enemy, as almost everybody else in this city seems to be. But he leaves himself open to attack and continues to smile.

“Who the hell are you?” I snap. He’s dressed in a light gray suit, a white shirt and purple tie, and expensive-looking leather shoes. He has thin hair, neatly combed back, brown but streaked with gray. Calm brown eyes. Looks like he’s in his forties.

“I am Dr. Oystein,” he introduces himself.

“That supposed to mean something to me?” I grunt.

“I would be astonished if it did,” he says, then extends his right hand.

“You don’t want to shake hands with me,” I sneer. “Not unless you want to end up with a taste for brains.”

“I was an adventurous diner in my youth,” Dr. Oystein says, his smile widening. “I often boasted that I would eat the flesh or innards of just about any creature, except for humans. Alas, ironically, I can now eat nothing else.”

I frown and focus on his fingers. Bones don’t stick out of them the way they poke out of every other zombie’s, but now that I look closely, I see that the flesh at the tips is broken, a small white mound of filed-down bone at the center of each pink whorl.

“Yes,” he says in answer to my unvoiced question. “I am undead like you.”

I still don’t take his hand. Instead I focus on his mouth. His teeth are nowhere near as jagged or as long as mine, but they’re not the same as a normal person’s either.

Dr. Oystein laughs. “You are wondering how I keep my teeth in such good shape, but there is no magic involved. I have been in this lifeless state a lot longer than you. One develops a knack for these things over time. I was brought up to believe that a gentleman should be neatly groomed and I have found myself as fastidious in death as I once was in life.

“Please take my hand, Becky. I will feel very foolish if you do not.”

“I don’t give a damn how you feel,” I snort, and instead of shaking his hand, I listen closely for his heartbeat. When I don’t detect one, I relax slightly.

“How do you know my name?” I growl. “How could you have been expecting me? I didn’t know that I was coming to County Hall. I wandered in randomly.”

Dr. Oystein shakes his head. “I have come to believe that nothing in life is truly random. In this instance it definitely was no coincidence that you wound up here. You were guided by the signs, as others were before you.”

I think back and recall a series of spray-painted, z-shaped symbols with arrows underneath. I’ve been following the arrows since I left the East End, sometimes because they happened to be pointing the way that I was traveling, but other times deliberately.

“You have a strange accent,” I remark as Dr. Oystein releases my hand. “Where are you from?”

“Many places,” he says, slowly circling me, examining my wounds. “My father was English but my mother was Norwegian. I was born in Norway and lived there for a while. Then my parents moved around Europe–my father had itchy feet–and I, of course, traveled with them.”

I try not to jitter as the doctor slips behind me. If he’s been concealing a weapon, he’ll be able to whip it out and strike. My shoulders tense as I imagine him driving a long knife between them. But he doesn’t attack, just continues to circle, and soon he’s facing me again.

“I heard that your heart had been ripped out,” he says. “May I see?”

“How do you know that?” I scowl.

“I had contacts in the complex where you were previously incarcerated. I know much about you, but I hope to learn more. Please?” He nods towards my top.

With a sigh, I grab the hem of my T-shirt and lift it high, exposing my chest. Dr. Oystein stares at the cavity on the left, where my heart once beat. Now there’s just a jagged hole, rimmed by congealed blood and a light green moss.

“Fascinating,” the doctor murmurs. “We zombies are all freaks of nature, each a walking medical marvel, but one tends to forget that. This is a reminder of our ability to defy established laws. You are a remarkable individual, Becky Smith, and you should be proud of the great wound which you bear.”

“Stop it,” I grunt. “You’ll make me blush.”

Dr. Oystein sniffs. “Not unless you are even more remarkable than the rest of us. Without a heart, how would your body pump blood to your pale, pretty cheeks?”

Dr. Oystein makes a gesture, inviting me to lower my T-shirt. As I do so, he steps across to the window where I was standing when he first addressed me. County Hall boasts one of the best views in the city. He looks out at the river, the London Eye, the Houses of Parliament and all the other deserted buildings.

“Such devastation,” he mumbles. “You must have encountered horrors beyond your worst nightmares on your way to us. Am I correct?”

I think about all of the corpses and zombies I’ve seen… Mr. Dowling and the people he tormented and killed in Trafalgar Square… his army of mutants and his bizarre sidekick, Owl Man… the hunters who almost killed me… Sister Clare of the Order of the Shnax, the way she transformed when I bit her…

“You’re not bloody wrong,” I wheeze.

“The world teeters on the brink,” Dr. Oystein continues. “It has been dealt a savage blow and I am sure that most of those who survived believe that there is no way back, regardless of what the puppets of the military might say in their radio broadcasts.”

“You’ve heard those too?”

“Oh yes. I tune in whenever I am in need of bittersweet amusement.” He looks back at me. “There are many fools in this world, and it is no crime to be one of them. But to try and carry on as normal when all around you has descended into chaos… to try to convince others that you can restore order by operating as you did before… That goes beyond mere foolishness. That is madness and it will prove the true downfall of this world if we leave these people to their sad, petty, all-too-human devices.

“There is hope for civilization as we once knew it. But if the living are to rise again, they will need our help, since only the conscious undead stand any sort of chance against the brain-hungry legions of the damned.”

Dr. Oystein beckons me forward. I shuffle towards him slowly, not just because of the pain, but because I’ve almost been mesmerized by . . .