Jimmy hesitated.

Feeling cocky about holding him off so easily, Nick strutted. "Yeah. That's right. You don't want no piece of me. I'm bad ah—"

His bravado ended when they attacked en masse. Crappola...

Hefting the ax, he swung at the first jock to reach him. The ax landed in a case, shattering it. Glass fragments flew all over them as Nick pulled it free for another strike.

But before he could angle it at them, Biff bit him in his good arm.

He cried out in agony, then head-butted the jock. He used the top of the ax to shove Biff back into his friends. Then he turned in one graceful arc and cocked his arm for another ax swing.

"What in tarnation is going on here?" Bubba snatched the ax from Nick's hand. He angled it at Nick like he was about to use it on him. "Boy, have you lost your ever-loving mind? Tearing up my store. Smashing my things ... You're lucky I'm not beating you with the ax handle."

Nick gestured to the jocks. "Bubba, they're zombies!" He held his arm up for Bubba to see the blood. "And they're trying to eat me!"

Bubba cursed. "Well, why didn't you say so?" Biff sank his teeth into Bubba's hand—something that was the equivalent of stepping into a den of rattlesnakes. Bubba punched the jock so hard, Nick swore he could feel it.

Biff stumbled back as the other two opened their mouths to hiss at them.

"Freakin' zombies!" Bubba returned the ax to Nick's hand, then grabbed a shotgun off the wall. He pumped a bullet into the chamber and took aim for the head of the jock closest to him.

The jock's eyes widened as he realized Bubba was about to blow him into his next lifetime. Shrieking, all of them turned and ran out of the store with an inhuman speed and a freaked-out gait.

It was like something out of Resident Evil mixed with zombie chimpanzees.

Bubba ran toward the door to get a better shot at them.

Before he could think better of it, Nick grabbed the shotgun right as Bubba fired. The barrel swung wide and instead of hitting the jocks, the shot blasted a huge hole right through the eyes of the picture of Bubba's mama that hung on the wall near the register.

Nick stared at the hole in absolute terror. Ah God. I'm so dead.

Bubba really loved his mama.

And he'd shot her right between the eyes....

The look of Satan's wrath on Bubba's face nauseated him. "Bubba ... I'm so sorry."

He stalked Nick like a hunting lion out for dinner. "Not half as sorry as you're gonna be. Make me shoot my mama. Boy, what are you thinking? What the hell's wrong with you?"

Nick had to stop retreating as he backed into the wall and had nowhere else to go. He held his hand up to stop Bubba from slaughtering him. "I couldn't let you kill them."

"Why ever not?"

"For one thing it's illegal... hello? You think the police are going to buy it was a zombie attack? I don't think so. And for another they're my classmates. Crappy classmates, but still. I have enough trouble coping at school. I'm pretty sure killing three members of the football team when we're coming up for a championship would ruin my rep forever."

Bubba snorted. "So what? In case you didn't notice, boy, your classmates are zombified. Had I not come down here when I did, they'd be ripping out your entrails and chowing down. So you ought to be thanking me, not shooting my mama in the head."

Nick swallowed his panic as he realized Bubba wasn't choking him. Yet...

"I know. But... they weren't dead. How can they be zombies if they're not dead first? Ain't that the first step?"

Bubba hesitated. "Well, that does pose a dilemma to us technically.... But only in the traditional sense of the word."

"How do you mean?"

Bubba scratched the whiskers on his cheek. "We're assuming their bokor raised—"

"Their what?" Nick hated whenever Bubba used one of his freaked-out words.

"Damn, boy, don't that school of yours teach you anything useful? Bokor. The person who creates and controls a zombie. What rock you been living under not to know that?"

Some people would probably call that rock "reality," but Nick valued his life enough to keep that sarcasm inside. It was hard ... but after shooting Bubba's mama, he needed every advantage.

Bubba rolled his eyes before he continued his explanation. "Most times bokors use corpses, but they don't have to. There's been lots of studies of chemical-induced zombies who weren't dead first."

Maybe that was true. But Nick wasn't buying it. "Yeah, but what if this is like Resident Evil and it's the Mother Virus coming to take all of us out? What then? Huh?"

Nick stared at his bite mark as reality sank in and his panic overtook him. The virus always started with a bite ... Zombie Zero. The first mark who started the apocalypse. And he was the one.

"Man, first I'm shot, now I'm going to be a friggin' zombie. At this rate, I'll never live to have my first date or a driver's license. Ah, gah! I've come too far to die a pedestrian virgin. Bubba, you can't let me die ... I only have seventeen more months and three days to my sixteenth birthday!"

Bubba cuffed him on the back of his head. "Man up, boy, and stop with that Hollywood crap. Zombie ain't contagious. You live in N'awlins, Nick, and I've been fighting them for decades. The only way to become a zombie is to be made one by your bokor." Bubba paused as if another idea occurred to him. "Now demon bites ... that's a different story. But them weren't demons in here. They were zombies. Plain and simple. So stop freaking out before / shoot you."

Nick took deep breaths to calm his racing heart. "Are you sure I can't catch it?" He couldn't even believe he was asking that. This had to be the most bizarre conversation of his entire life, which, given the usual weirdness of Menyara, was saying a lot.

"I'm positive. Believe me, I know my zombies."

Nick scoffed. Is it just me oris that like saying I know my elves and fairies? If it wasn't for the fact Bubba might kill him, he'd say that out loud.

"I still think we ought to disinfect the bites. Just in case it's some military-designed bioweapon."

"Disinfect what? What did I miss?"

Nick turned to see Mark entering the store. Yawning and scratching, he joined them from the door that led to Bubba's upstairs apartment where he'd been asleep on Bubba's couch.

Nick sighed in agitation. "See what you miss by sleeping late? Me and Bubba got bitten by zombies. I say they're contagious. This morning only one of the kids in my school had it. Now, I just got attacked by three more. It's spreading and it's going to infect us all. We need to do something before it takes out all the good-looking women and leaves us with only each other. Call out the National Guard or the CBC or something."

Bubba scowled at him. "The CBC? Is that one of those new anime people?"

Nick rolled his eyes. "No. It's that place where they talk about diseases and quarantine people when they're contagious."

"Bubba, Nick means the CDC inAtlanta."

Bubba made a sound of disgust that originated in the back of his throat.

Mark, who was barely a head taller than Nick, was still dressed in his zombie-hunting ghillie suit. Fluffs of Spanish moss jutted out from all the places where he'd tucked it in his clothes so that he'd blend in with the bayou. His face was streaked with camouflage paint and he wore yellow-colored contact lenses that had a rim of red around them.

Zombie eyes.

Also for camouflage.

But that wasn't the worst of it. As he stopped next to Nick, there was an odor so foul it took his breath.

Nick covered his nose to keep from being sick over it. "What is that smell?" It was like three-day-old cat vomit mixed with rotten asparagus.

Mark scowled at him as if he was crazy for even asking. "Duck urine. It keeps the zombies from thinking I'm human."

Nick snorted. "Yeah, well it keeps me from thinking you're sane."

"Give it up, Mark. The boy don't know nothing about surviving. He actually kept me from shooting zombies who were in the store trying to eat him."

Mark cuffed Nick on the back of his head. "Are you out of your mind, kid?"

"Ow!" Nick rubbed the back of his head where they kept slapping him. If they didn't stop, he was going to get brain damage. "And no. I was keeping Bubba from committing a felony. No offense, but 'he's a zombie, Your Honor, don't electrocute me' isn't a viable excuse. Believe me, I know. My dad's doing three life sentences 'cause he killed, and I quote, 'a crap load of demons who were trying to kill me and if I hadn't killed them, Your Honor, they'd have taken over the city and enslaved all you petty, pathetic humans.' The court's not real understanding of that excuse. They wouldn't even let my dad plead insanity because of it. So trust me, 'zombies needed killing' isn't a legit defense."

Mark shook his head in supreme annoyance. "Well, it ought to be."

"Hey, Bubba? You in here or are you dead?"

Nick cringed as he heard the newcomers.

Bubba handed the gun to Mark and whispered to the two of them. "It's Officer Davis. Don't say anything."

Clearing his throat, he ambled toward the counter up front as if nothing had happened.

Nick hid the gun behind a curtain, amazed by how well Bubba could act. He slid his gaze to Mark, who was finally peeling off his camo suit. Seven years older than Nick, he had shaggy, light brown hair and bright green eyes. His features leaned toward pretty, except for his squared jawline. He also had three days' growth of beard on his face, which made him look a lot older. But it was his build that Nick envied. No matter how much he worked out, he just couldn't get the kind of muscle definition that Mark had without even trying. It was so unfair.

"Can I see your bite wound?" Mark asked. "Could you bathe first?" Mark glared at him.

Sighing, Nick held his arm out so that Mark could inspect it.

He let out a low whistle as he touched the vicious bite, which was still throbbing. "Yeah, we might want to disinfect this."

Nick cringed. "It's going to turn me into a zombie, isn't it?"

"I don't know about that, but the human mouth is the germiest part of the body. You might get parvo or rabies or something."

Nick scowled at that unexpected response. "Isn't parvo a dog disease?"

"Yeah, but who knows what's happening in your school, kid. Could be loup-garous on the loose and that, my friend, is definitely contagious."

Nick jerked his arm back. "I'm not going to turn into a werewolf, Mark."

"Go ahead and mock, but I'm telling you, I've seen them down in the bayou. Many a night. A whole pack of them that shifted into humans. Walking in daylight, they could be right next to you and you wouldn't know it."

It took all of Nick's self-control not to belittle him for that load of horse manure. He wasn't sure what was more pathetic, the fact that Mark was comfortable enough with him to talk about it or that his friend actually believed it.

Deciding on the latter, he let Mark lead him to the bathroom, where Bubba kept alcohol and peroxide.

As Mark cleaned and wrapped the bite, Nick ground his teeth against the pain of the stinging alcohol. "Man, I look like a total goob with both arms wrapped."

"Nah, man, they're war wounds. Chicks dig scars. Means you're a manly man able to protect them."

Nick lifted one disbelieving eyebrow. "Then why don't you and Bubba have girlfriends?"

"I don't want the drama of it. After the last one burnt up all my clothes with my Jack Daniel's Black Label collection and tried to decapitate me with my CDs, I decided I'd take a hiatus for a bit. As for Bubba ... I better not talk about that. Let's just say I don't think he wants to go through that again."

Nick wanted more clarification. "Go through what?"

"That ain't none of your business," Bubba said as he joined them. He narrowed his gaze on Mark. "You should learn to be quiet sometimes."

"Yeah, well, I always say that marriage is fine for others, but remember that it only leads to one thing."

Nick grinned. "Lots of naked party time?"

"Nah, kid. Alimony." Mark stepped back to put away the alcohol.

Wow. They were both rays of sunshine that broke through the darkest cloud ... In hell.

Nick turned to Bubba. "So what did the police say?"

"That if any more of my neighbors report a gunshot over here, they'd yank my business license and throw me under the jail for it. Nosy biddy bodies."

Nick scowled. "Isn't that busybodies?"