Wake Up Dead - an Undead Anthology by Adam Millard, Guy James, Suzanne Robb, Chantal Boudreau, Mia Darien, Douglas Vance Castagna, Rebecca Snow, Caitlin Gunn, R.d Teun Read Free Book Online Page B

ear.
    “Ahhh – you’re bleeding,” he moaned, ravenously . It was a deep guttural sound and it made Skye shiver.
    “Please,” she whimpered. “Don’t do this...let me go. I won’t tell. I won’t tell.”
    “No, you won’t; I’ll see to that. You made this more convenient by coming here. I won’t have to drag you out to Capstick Park . You’ll be much easier to dispose of.”
    When Dr. Taurian spoke, his lips brushed her ear, as well as the points of his fangs. Skye cringed, trying to squirm away from him, and again she could barely move without being wracked by pain. She squealed in response, which extended into her first truly audible shriek as he grabbed her and yanked her towards him, nuzzling at her neck and panting.
    “A caterwaul,” he insisted. “There are animals screaming down here all the time. They’ll chock it up to nothing but a caterwaul.”
    Her tormentor sighed as he lapped at her jaw-line, pressing his body against her. Skye trembled from the hurt and shook from her great gasping sobs.
    “Don’t worry,” Dr. Taurian whispered. “I realize that you are suffering terribly. I’m very humane. I’m an expert in euthanasia. It will only sting briefly, while I put you out of your misery...”

 
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    SUGAR SKULLS
    Rebecca Snow
     
     
     
    The crickets screeched like fingers down a blackboard as Jesse stopped outside the locked iron gate. Darkness soaked though the cemetery like the tears he’d cried into his father’s handkerchief seven years ago when the old woman had died. The chirping insects silenced as a figure stumbled close to where Jesse stood. The council laws stated that as long as he stayed a few steps away from the bars, he was safe. The extra chains looped around the entrance gate kept the walkers at bay but did nothing for the festive atmosphere the evening used to hold.
    The hike to the graveyard on this late October evening had taken longer than he’d remembered. He wasn’t surprised because he didn’t often take the trip at night, and the wakeful hoots of owls and scuffling of possums made him stop at random intervals to listen for the shuffling step of the dead. After the three years of a sort of siege, the council proclaimed that the town was safe enough with the walking corpses isolated in the boneyards. Jesse wondered what happened when someone died in his sleep or was killed in an accident. They couldn’t keep everyone under lock and key twenty-four hours a day. It was safer to be careful, so Jesse took his time.
    Reaching into the paper sack he carried, the teenager fumbled open a damp book of matches. His trembling fingers fumbled several times as he tried to find a match that would catch fire and then several more to ignite the wick in his lantern. When he’d closed the globe around the flame, his gaze returned to the bars. Arms stretched to their limits trying to grasp any part of his living form. Skin peeling like onions flaked from the underlying tissue. Bones jutted in odd angles having punctured through the surrounding flesh.
    The lamplight flickered across the dead faces. Their mouths hung open as they hissed and moaned for him to come closer. Jesse’s feet remained rooted to the spot where he stood. He lifted the lamp higher to illuminate the crowding corpses. Deceased friends and neighbors swayed in the dancing shadows. Old Mr. Barstow’s good Sunday suit hung from his emaciated frame. Dirt from his dig to the surface crusted the edges of his wedding band. Jesse remembered how Mrs. Barstow had howled at the funeral. Two weeks later, she’d walked in front of a bus. Scanning the small crowd, Jesse didn’t see her. She’d had a closed casket service, so there was a good chance that she was stuck eight feet under without enough motor control to tunnel through the soil. His second grade math teacher thrashed at the bars as if remembering the snake he’d put in her desk drawer. The entire library