Flip This Zombie - Jesse Petersen [79]
“Today you killed two of my bionics,” he said softly. “Not very good for my army’s record. I want to test them again.”
Dave rushed to my side. “Is that really what you think you’ve created? Look doctor, you can’t control these things. They may have more purpose, more drive, than your average walk-a-day living dead, but they can’t be controlled. If you don’t stop this now, they’ll turn on you. They’ll wipe out whatever’s left of the survivors.”
“I guess we’ll see,” Barnes said softly. “Worst-case scenario, you two will kill them and I’ll get to hone my skills at creation and keep testing them on you until they do destroy you. Best-case scenario, they turn you immediately and I end up with two new specimens and one sticky problem solved. Either way, I win, don’t I?”
From behind Barnes, Robbie shifted. “But—” he began.
Barnes spun on him. “What is it?”
“I-I thought we were going to keep them alive,” Robbie said. “I thought you said—”
“They’re too dangerous,” Barnes said, grabbing The Kid by the upper arms and tugging him closer. “They’re a threat to us, Robbie. And in this world, we have no choice but to eliminate threats.”
“Like your mom,” Dave said next to me. “And all those people down in the bunker with you. It seems like everyone else in the world is a threat, huh Robbie? Ever wonder when you’ll become one to him too?”
Barnes glared at David. “Shut up,” he snapped. He turned back to The Kid. “Now you, go to your quarters if you haven’t the stomach for what must be done. Now.”
The Kid stared at his father for a brief moment and then his gaze moved to us. And there was one thing very clear to me when our eyes met. Robbie was afraid. Afraid of his father, afraid of everything that had happened since the outbreak. On some level, he knew what was happening here. He knew it wasn’t right.
But he didn’t argue. He didn’t do anything except turn around and leave the room without so much as a backward glance for us.
My heart sank. He was our only chance for someone on the outside to help us. Now that he was gone, our options had faded out to just about nothing. Fight or surrender. And there might not be much choice there, either.
“You see,” Barnes said as the door closed behind his son. “With a little discipline you can raise an obedient child even in a post-apocalyptic world. I should write a book.”
“You do that,” Dave said quietly. “I’d love to read your thoughts on raising a man.”
Barnes’s face fell at the implication of my husband’s statement, and when his smile returned it was a harder, colder expression.
“Well, this has been fun, but it’s time for testing. Enjoy.” And then he reached across the desk and depressed a button hidden somewhere beyond my line of sight.
Profits aren’t everything. If you can get out with only your ass intact, that’s pretty good, too.
The three doors on the walls around the permeter of the room began to slide upward in tandem. I clenched at Dave’s arms as we watched the open space increase to reveal feet, legs… yeah, zombies.
Three zombies, to be precise, who rushed the room as soon as the doors cleared their rotting skulls.
And of course these weren’t normal zombies, either. I mean, that would have been bad enough, but these were bigger. Broader. Two of them I recognized as the ones Dave and I had collected earlier for Barnes. The third was dressed in the tattered remains of a military uniform, so I had to assume he was a much older friend of the “good doctor.”
Whoever they had once been, wherever they had come from, they were all but foaming at the mouth as they stared at the two of us, unarmed in the center of the room. They were all bionic zombies.
“They’re worked up,” Dave said softly as we shifted to stand back to back. “He’s given them something.”
“Excellent observation,” Barnes’s voice came from the speakers. “You’re correct that they’ve been drugged. I’m testing a new mixture to raise their intent to fight. It’s harder to rouse them than you might think.”
“Harder