The Zombie Whisperer (Living With the Dead) (13 page)

“It’s important,” the Colonel said with a thin smile.

I shifted with his cool tone and the way he looked at me. Like a shark. Empty and merciless. To him, we were just another job to deal with, a part of his checklist to destroy the zombies.

“Stop stalling and being dramatic and tell us what the deal is with the… baby,” Dave said.

I smiled that was the first time he’d called him or her a baby rather than a thing. Apparently he was developing his own parental instincts. Faint, but there.

Robbie motioned to Josh and the two of them got up. I braced myself for an attack, but instead they pulled out a white board on wheels and spun it around to reveal a bunch of numbers and test names.

“Wow, you prepared everything but a Power Point presentation,” I breathed.

Josh nodded. “We didn’t want to waste energy building a slide deck.”

I blinked. “It was a joke, but okay. Go ahead, tell me about my zombie baby.”

The room collectively gasped and all eyes jerked to me. I shrugged. “I’ve never been one to ignore the elephant in the room.”

Dave gave a snort. “That’s for damn sure.”

“Shut it,” I advised gently. “We have to hear this.”

Josh cleared his throat like he didn’t know how we could joke around, but then he motioned to the chart. “We ran a series of tests on your blood and the amnio fluid. We then ran comparisons on known zombie samples and samples from Dave’s collection.”

“What kind of tests?” Dave asked, all the joking gone from his tone.

Robbie shot him a look. “We tested against the serum, we compared profiles for typing and we did a DNA test.”

I folded my arms. “But I’m a thousand percent sure I know who my Baby Daddy is.”

Nicole snorted. “A Maury reference, nice. You know, he was on the West Coast during the outbreak. Zombie-fied.”

“Not much of a leap, but we can talk about that later,” I said. “Right now, finding out about zombie baby and all.”

Nicole shrugged. “Sorry.”

“You did start it,” Dave whispered helpfully.

I glared at him, said nothing and motioned for Robbie or Josh to continue. “What were the results?”

Josh paled and Drea touched his hand like she was trying to support him and in that moment my whole world seemed to fade a little. To get quieter, more focused and oh, so much worse. No one made that face before they gave good news, that was for sure. No one hesitated this long, either.

Luckily, Robbie didn’t have the same squeamishness. He got up and pointed to the white board.

“There are a variety of results. First, the comparison of the baby’s blood to a zombie sample was conclusive.”

He smiled at me and I shook my head. “Conclusively
what
? Is the kid a zombie or not?”

“Oh, sorry,” Robbie said. “Not. Not a zombie. The amnio fluid is clear, not black sludge, which would probably be a first indicator. And the blood samples don’t match as far as make-up and consistency.”

Relief flooded me and I was glad I was sitting down. Little Zombie was not a little zombie after all.

“But?” Dave pushed, seemingly less affected by the good news and pressing for bad like it was going out of style.

Josh cleared his throat. “We did find some zombie properties when we compared your blood to the baby’s.”

“Wait, I thought you said no zombie properties?” I asked, pushing to my feet. Josh took that as a threat, apparently, because he backed up a step.

“Okay, so here’s the thing about Dave. When you look at normal zombie samples or fluids, the cells are completely enveloped by zombie DNA mutation. The cells are dead, but pumped alive by this… this invading force caused by the virus created here in this lab. They’re all just… surrounded.”

“Okay,” Dave said, but I could see the interest in his eyes. He wanted to know what the deal was with his zombie-ism. “And?”

“The difference between you and them,” Robbie picked up where Josh had stopped as Josh searched through a pile of papers for something. “Is that your cells are being attacked by the zombie mutation, in fact it’s happening all the time, but because you were exposed to the serum immediately after the first bite, your cells constantly regenerate, rebuild, so a cell is attacked by zombie infection and it immediately regenerates. That’s why you’re stronger, you’re faster, you have like twice the amount of cells you should.”

Josh held up a still photo that looked like it had been taken off of a microscope. Pink cells, probably from a stain placed on the on the sample, were being attacked by black stuff. The ones damaged were already black around their ragged edges, some were grey and solid, like they were dead. But there were others, dozens of others, hundreds.

“These are pictures from Dave’s sample?” I asked as I reached out to take it and we put our heads together to examine the evidence of his super powers closer.

“No,” Josh said. “Um, that’s from the baby.”

“Okay,” I whispered as pressure stated to build in my chest. “Okay…”

Dave put his arm around me waist and pretty much held me up. “What does that mean? You said no zombie but this black stuff looks pretty zombie to me.”

“It is,” Josh said. “But like you, the baby is super-producing healthy cells. Cells that defeat the zombie cells, cells that just overpower them due to their sheer volume. Nadia, can you-”

He waved in my direction and Nadia nodded, then got up and started toward me.

I put my hands up, ready to defend myself even as Dave shoved me behind him.

“What the hell are you doing?” he snapped.

She flinched. “I just want to look at Sarah,” she reassured him softly. “I’m not going to do anything.”

I peeked around his shoulder at her. She didn’t look crazy or like a zealot. She looked kind of… sad. Like she felt bad for me.

“Fine,” I said I moved toward her. “But if you do anything to me or my baby, he’s going to go zombie on your ass. You won’t like it.”

I motioned to Dave and she nodded. “Understood. Can you lean on the edge of the table there?”

She pointed to a table up against the wall behind us and I did so. She lifted my shirt a little and glanced at me. “Have you noticed changes in your body?”

I shrugged. “Pants were tight today, I figure it’s part of, you know, growing a fucking baby in my uterus.”

“Yeah, but your stomach didn’t look like this three days ago.” She pointed and I looked down. There was definitely a bigger swelling there. A real baby bump, as the stupid tabloids used to call it when referring to celebrities a year ago.

Robbie nodded. “The cell issue is making the baby grow faster. Considering the growth we saw in the lab and the progress we’re just seeing visually, I’d say you’ll have him in six months rather than nine and he’ll be fully developed. If the rate increases, which it might, we could see a baby from you in even as little as four to five.”

“Wait, I thought you said I was already four and a half months along!” I burst out, touching that belly swell protectively.

Nadia nodded. “Actually, that explains the misalignment of your last cycle with the growth of the baby. You
are
three months pregnant, but the baby’s growth was charted at about four and a half months along. Three days ago, anyway.”

I swallowed. “So what does that mean? When this baby comes out in two weeks or six weeks or six months-”

“It won’t be six months,” The Kid interjected and I glared to shut him up.

“When it comes out,” I continued. “What is it going to be?”

Colonel Fenton shoved to his feet suddenly. He had been curiously quiet until now, but he stared at me as he said, “That’s the big question, isn’t it? Monster or man? Super soldier in child form? Or just a zombie after all?”

I swallowed at the possibilities. At the look in his eyes.

“What are you going to do?” I asked, straightening up from the table to meet his eyes. He didn’t look away, though I wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or not.

“What is there to do, Sarah?” he asked with a shrug. “We wait for your baby to come and then we see.”

Another wave of relief crested over me. “So you aren’t going to take it.”

“Him,” Josh corrected.

I glanced at Dave.

“Him?”

Nadia nodded, as if to verifying Josh’s statement in case we didn’t believe him or didn’t understand. “Closer inspection of the pictures, plus the DNA analysis says it’s a boy.”

Dave stared at me, just stared. “A boy,” he finally repeated under his breath. “Well, that’s… something.”

“I assume we aren’t under lockdown,” I asked.

Fenton smiled slightly. “You’ve never been under lockdown. I think your ability to go outside the perimeter of the fence today should have shown you that.”

“I had your girlfriend as escort,” I hissed. “And she had plenty of ways she could get rid of me or stop me. It wasn’t exactly the freedom train out there.”

He frowned and shot a quick glance to Lisa, who shrugged.

“Well, if it hasn’t been made clear, you have never been under lockdown,” he said. “If you want to go, feel free, though I can’t spare the fuel to return you to Montana. You’d have to find your own way home.”

I dug my fingers into my palms at that. We’d escaped this city once, I knew we could do it again.

I just didn’t fucking want to. Once was more than enough.

“Seems like we have a lot to discuss, so since we aren’t in lockdown, my husband and I are going,” I said, grabbing Dave’s hand and dragging him toward the door. “Thanks for the information.”

With that, we left, slamming the door behind us. We headed down the stairs toward the sleeping quarters in silence, but there were all these unspoken questions, all these unspoken fears between us. And they were going to have to be addressed sooner rather than later.

Which sucked since I could kill a zombie like nobody’s business, but I still sort of hated interpersonal conflict and avoided it whenever possible.

Chapter Twelve

Baby books are great, but never underestimate the power of the advice of other moms… or your own instincts.

I stared out the window of our room. It was dark outside, of course, but there were still some flickering lanterns around the fence line for the watch to see by. Behind the fence, I saw the occasional dart of movement and I knew what it was.

Zombies.

“I’m sorry.”

I turned from the window to look at Dave. He was standing in the candlelight by our bed. In the weird light, he looked a little…
gray
. Not quite zombie gray, but still…

“What? Why?” I asked.

He sat down with a thump on the hard and uncomfortable dorm mattress (in Montana we’d had a king-sized super awesome bed, I would like to mention) and shook his head.

“I should have been more careful,” he explained. “I shouldn’t have let you get pregnant.”

I know I should have acted with a little more compassion, but I admit, I snorted.

“Please, that’s the most ridiculous statement you’ve ever made. And that’s saying something, David, because you’ve said some hella ridiculous things in all our years together.”

“No Jokey Sarah, please,” he said, covering his face with his hands.

I pursed my lips. Shit, he was really busted up. With a sigh, I came over and sat down next to him, wrapping my arm around his shoulder and smoothing my hand over his warm skin to comfort him.

“Baby, come on,” I said. “You and I are married and we do what we do when the lights go off. It’s not 1952, you aren’t somehow gender-bound to ‘protect’ me from babies… or zombie babies. Or zombies with babies, even, when you come right down to it.”

He lifted his face from his hands and shot me a look.

“Sorry,” I said with a smile. “Jokey Sarah has a strong grip on me. I try to make her hide, but she is mean and powerful.”

He smiled back and then stared from my face down my body to my poochy stomach. “So, how are you digesting this?”

“Not well,” I admitted. “I mean, super baby with zombie attributes, growing in my stomach at some kind of accelerated growth rate. Sounds… scary.”

He nodded. “Totally scary.”

I touched the newly swollen stomach that said, “Hey there’s a kid in here, check it out.”

“But, you know, it’s not a zombie. And it’s a boy. And he is probably going to be sort of awesome.”

Dave seemed to ponder that for a while. “I hope so. But, um, what if we fuck it up as parents.”

I laughed. “I’m sure we’ll totally fuck it up as parents, David. We’ll swear too much and I’ll be snarky and you’ll make him read comic books that will scare the shit out of him. He’ll probably end up just like The Kid, God help us.”

Dave laughed. “That wouldn’t be so bad, I guess. The Kid is a little shit, but he’s also sort of amazing in his own way.”

“So we’ll shoot for that, okay? We’ll make sure our little boy is a little shit, but amazing in his own way.”

“Seems like a plan.” He lay back on the narrow bed, toeing off his shoes as he yawned.

“Dave,” I said. “I still want to help here. That may mean I’m going to go out sometimes. That may mean I’m going to fight zombies.”

He squeezed his eyes shut. “Yeah, I know. And you know that I’m still going to be snippy about it and overly protective.”