The Zombie Adventures of Sarah Bellum (17 page)

A tinkling sound replaces
the churning rumble, like the gentlest of wind chimes. And the
painting gradually illuminates again – its surface alive,
bubbling and criss-crossed with reflections, like translucent
mercury.

"It
is
a
curse…" I whisper.

"Parlour-trick, more
like," says Carvery.

The cockerel hops down
from the armchair, his cushion of love forgotten. Instead, he struts
up to the undulating surface of the living painting, eerily
illuminated from within. He approaches, bobbing his head at the
multi-faceted image, making keening and crooning noises.

Not six feet away from
him, a white hen abruptly emerges from – no,
through
the
painting. Sparkly droplets scatter into the air around her, as she
skitters across the floor.

"Another hen-house?"
Carvery suggests wryly, as the Casanova cockerel gives chase,
circling around us in pursuit. "Looks like this is your
department, Sarah."

The avian pair do another
circuit of the portrait gallery, and then both dash headlong into the
silvery surface of the picture again, sending concentric rings out
from their point of impact.

Carvery and I exchange a
look.

"Ready to get more
egg on your face?" he remarks.

"No," I scoff.
"I think we should wait right here."

"Suit yourself."
He turns and knocks the cushion off the armchair, before sitting down
in its place, drumming his fingers on the stock of the gun. "Let's
see what else comes out of that wall next."

The gallery is quiet once
more, just the play of light on the walls, from the mysterious mobile
surface of the end painting.

Yes – what might
come out next…? Chicken? Zombie?
Monitor lizard…?

But it's a familiar
sound, that reaches us first. And not through the wall – from
outside, in the corridor.

"Is that what I
think it is?" I whisper, frozen still, and straining my ears.

Carvery angles his head
slightly.

"Could be," he
nods.

"Hi-ho, hi-ho…"
I murmur.

"Off to work we go…"
Carvery grins.
Oh, God
… "I'm up for a bit of Ben
and Jerry."

The chanting draws
nearer.

"I think I'll chance
the hen-house again," I decide. "Don't think I want to be
the only one who brings nothing to the gunfight."

Carvery looks down at
himself, with a shrug.

"You brought me,"
he says. "What else did you want – a wheel-gun?"

I think immediately of
the Gatling in the basement.
The armoury!
And those tunnels –
maybe there is another way into the bunker…

The cockerel's head pops
back out of the painting, looks at each of us, and disappears again.

There is a very definite
creak on the floorboards, outside the door.

Carvery gets to his feet,
and stands at my shoulder. Both of us facing the approaching danger.

"What am I, your
human shield?" I demand.

"Soft landing,"
he says, checking the gun briefly.

"What?"

"Count to three,"
he says.

"Why?"

"Two, then."

"What for?"

He shakes his head and
clicks his tongue.

"Useless," is
all he says, and the butt of the gun catches me right under the chin,
flipping me neatly over backwards.

The surface of the
painting feels like a tepid outdoor pool – barely any
resistance at all. I feel it strike, envelop and transfer me through,
all in a flash.

I've barely managed to
draw a breath, having landed flat on my back on – not straw
this time, but sand – when something lands right on top of me.
Hot, hard, and smelling like traitorous hormones kicking in…

"Next time, when I
say count, you count," Carvery scolds, elbowing his way back off
my body, and getting to his feet. "Right. Where are we?"

I push myself up, more
slowly. A dim, golden light filters from a passageway ahead, onto
pale yellow stonework. Smooth and architectural – not like the
dark dank passages we were in before.

Looking back, for our
point of entry, there is nothing but a blank stone wall. No magical
painting, no art gallery – and thankfully, no Frittata
brothers…

I grip a nearby ledge to
pull myself to my feet, and find Carvery already staring at
something, right where I had rested my hand.

I jump away.

It's a sarcophagus. The
face is painted onto the outside, with glamorous strokes of an
Elizabeth Taylor
retrospective.

Hieroglyphs on the walls
swim into focus as I look around.

"I can't handle
this," I breathe.

"You were the one
who was talking about a curse," Carvery points out. He knocks on
the lid. "Anybody home?"

"You're not funny."

"I wasn't being
funny. Someone might want to be let out of there."

"Or might be shut in
for a reason," I contradict.

A shadow moves in the
passageway, and alerted, I cry out.

"Who's there?"

"I didn't say
Knock
Knock
," Carvery jokes.

A faint voice replies,
fading as if moving away from us.

"Home…
home…"

"Homer!" I
call. Relief floods through me, incontinently. "Wait!"

Leaving the spooky
sarcophagus behind in the chamber, we head out after the pattering
zombie. Oh dear. His pink dress is quite the worse for wear, and the
crochet shawl merely a shred or two of white cotton.

"Homer, where are
the others?" I ask. "And where is this place?"

Although twisting and
turning, the passages are still light and sandy. And eventually, open
out into a broader, pillared hall.

At the end, the early
sunrise is starting to appear, glinting off a river.

"I think I'll get a
roof terrace like this one when I renovate my next house,"
Carvery smirks.

Palm trees wave gently
beside us as we step outside. Strange birds soar overhead.

Where the Hell are we?

"Home," says
Homer N. Dry, happily.

Oh, no
…

CHAPTER
TWENTY
:

DROOL OF THE NILE

The palm trees form an
avenue at the bottom of the broad stone steps, leading to the water's
edge. My brain is trying not to register the pyramid-shapes on the
far bank. It's an optical illusion, I tell myself. Some sort of
ultra-modern virtual reality art installation…

Carvery is crouching on
the sandy flagstones, testing the groutless joins, with a
strange-looking
Swiss Army
kind of tool, full of
identically-shaped blades. He squints at the thinnest one critically,
as it barely slides in and out of the gap.

"Thinking about how
many bodies you could fit under a patio this size?" I observe.

"I think it's
fully-booked already," he remarks, straightening up. "Now
where's the little gray tranny off to?"

The zombie Homer N. Dry
(trailing grubby white crochet and bedraggled locks of blonde Sunday
wig) has made it down the steps – only falling on his face
twice – and is scampering lopsidedly towards the riverside.

As the sun clears the
pyramids on the horizon, the shadows in the water reveal a ship
moored. Very similar to the one in the painting, but it looks as
though it has had some work done since the original. The demonic
totem at the figurehead is still there, and the prow is the same –
but instead of the sails, it now features a raised houseboat deck –
and a paddle-steamer propulsion system.

"I hope they're
expecting him, whoever it is," says Carvery, as Homer lives up
to his name, homing in on the vessel. "Or this is going to turn
into
Death on the Nile
real fast."

"There they are!"
a distant figure shouts, from the same direction. "Carver –
Sarah – down here!"

It's Numb-Nuts, my
housemate. Waving at us, from the deck of the ship.

Of course, she would
still be alive. Seeing as she hasn't spent at least the last hour in
the company of girlfriend-batterer-in-denial Carvery Slaughter. A
couple of zombies, an immigrant taxi-driver, and a drunk Ace Bumgang
wouldn't pose any comparable risk to her safety…

Homer leads the way up
the rope-suspended gangplank, and once aboard, I'm cannoned aside by
Miss Fuck-Tart launching herself at Carvery, making weird
abandoned-stray-cat noises as she burrows into his arms.

"Whatever…"
he sighs.

Could he sound as though
he could even care less?

"Glad you have made
it, Sarah
Bellummm
," says that zombie voice, which makes
my spine tingle, and I turn to see Crispin approaching. With a tray
of drinks! It seems like hours since that last Gin Sling…
"Welcome to my Five a.m. Lounge."

I try to concentrate on
downing the drink, keeping my nose in the glass, and not on devouring
him with my eyes. And what a sight for sore ones he is…

"It's very
impressive," I say at last, replacing the empty glass again.
"You have a great home entertainment set-up here."

He waves a hand
dismissively.

"Just the basics,
just the basics," he moans. He gestures for me to join him on a
couch, in the prow of the ship. Wading birds dart in and out of the
reeds on the riverbank, and delicate insects skate across the water's
surface. "Mother insisted that we drop in regularly, so it was
necessary to make visiting arrangements as simple as possible."

"Oh – she's
still alive?" I surmise. I swat a mosquito as it lands on my
arm, settling into the satin cushions.

"No. Just
demanding," he sighs, and turns towards me, leaning in. "I
seem to remember that the last time you and I were on a couch
together, we had some unfinished business, Sarah
Bellummm
…"

Oh, my…

But before that thought
can be followed by any action, a shadow falls across us – and
Luke, the Nigerian cab-driver, slumps onto the end of the sofa.

"You know, my
ancestors probably built those things," he announces, pointing
towards the pyramids.

"There is a certain
resemblance, indeed," Crispin agrees. "Perhaps we can
introduce you to them later…"

"Home…
Gooood…"
a familiar
zombie-groan interrupts.

Homer emerges from a door
to one of the suites in the houseboat section, changed now into
Diana
Ross
red sequins and trailing a feather boa, and waddles away to
the bar. Carvery and Whatsername have disappeared somewhere else on
the ship. I'm wondering how long it will take for bits of her to
start floating past.

But also – isn't
there someone else, that should be in our group…?

"Ace Bumgang!"
I say in recall, far too loudly, as Luke spills his Tequila. "Is
he here too?"

"Sure, sure…"
Luke brushes himself down. "He's being ill over the starboard."

I get quickly to my feet
and hurry to the far side of the boat, overlooking the water. Ace is
leaning on the railing, forehead on forearms, groaning as much as any
zombie.

In fact I have to check
as I approach, that he still looks comparatively alive. A bit pale,
perhaps…

"Seasick?" I
greet him, timidly.

"Hangover," he
replies. "I yacked up in the water just now, and a crocodile ate
it."

Crocodiles?

I join him and look over
the side of the ship, greeted by the yawn of another giant reptile. A
number of them float lazily, treading water in the slow current
beside the boat, like bad-tempered logs set adrift.