The Smoky Corridor

35

Wade the Zombie stared at the ghostly boy standing in front of him, the first human soul he had encountered since the beast had sprung out of the darkness and bit him.

“Who are you?” the ghost boy asked.

“Ah boo blot blow, blasder,” Wade grunted in reply.

“Huh?”

“I do not know, master,” Wade grunted more clearly.

That made the ghost boy smile.

“Did you just call me master?”

“Yes, master.”

A second ghost boy drifted into the room. Instinctively, Wade jumped forward to put his body between this new boy and his master.

“Must protect master!”

The new boy laughed. “What did that drool bucket just say?”

“He said he had to protect me because I’m his master.”

“Seth? What’s going on here, little brother?”

“Well, Joseph, I found this feller stumbling around down here in the dark.”

“You think he’s a …?”

“Sure looks like one.”

“Mush problect blasder,” Wade grumbled.

“Sure sounds like one, too!”

The boys turned to face him again.

The older one spoke: “Not for nothin’, pal, but were you recently bitten by a zombie?”

Wade turned to the younger one.

“You may answer,” said the master.

“Yes, master. Yes. I was bitten.”

“And you escaped before he could crack open your skull and scoop out your brains?”

“Yes.”

The two boys both looked very pleased with his answers, the younger one more than the older.

“Hot diggity dog, Joe, he’s callin’ me master!”

“That means he’s your zombie slave, Seth!” said the older boy. “We can make him do all the stuff we can’t do no more! We can finally get this show on the road!”

The ghost boys moved closer.

“Hop on your left foot!” snapped the younger one, the boy called Seth.

Wade hopped.

“Pick up some firewood and drop it on your toe.”

Wade did that, too. It did not hurt.

“Say, Zombie Man,” asked the older boy, “do you know how to operate a furnace?”

“Yes.”

“You packin’ any matches?”

The zombie reached into his pants. Showed the ghost boys the box of wooden matches the man he used to be always carried in his pants pockets to light his smokes and pick his teeth.

“Hot diggity dog!” said Seth.

Then he and his brother started singing.

Mine eyes have seen the glory

Of the burning of the school …