Applause rang out within the room, sealing mankind's fate. My life's work, nay dream, was given wings and allowed to fly. With the acceptance of my peers came the green light to move forward to the next phase of what I was calling The Great Cleansing.
The monster ran at the window and began another round of pounding at the Plexi. We had all seen enough of my morbid nativity. As the wall descended, hiding from sight the screaming beast, the audience reseated themselves and began discussing the possibilities that lie ahead.
The wait staff drifted in on silent feet, carrying trays of pure delight – our own Christmas meal. Before the first course began, I stood to make one final speech.
“Thank you again for attending this special occasion. What you have witnessed is only the beginning. In a matter of weeks the world's population will be greatly reduced and the remaining humans will be desperate for salvation. That salvation will have a price. The wheels of commerce will briefly stop, but as Christmas time rolls around, capitalism will have a new savior – The Zero Day Collective!” As the last word rang from my mouth, I held a glass of wine aloft in a toast. The entire table joined me with a joyous hurrah.
“Merry Christmas to all!” I shouted above the excitement.
And so I'm offering this simple phrase, to kids from one to ninety-two, although it’s been said many times, many ways, Merry Christmas to you.
“Unto the world I bless my fellow man with this gift.” I smiled over the crowd and lowered the video screen once again.
On the screen the Quantum Fusion Generator was whirring to life once again. Although the revealing of the device wasn’t for another week, I had grander designs already set in motion. The virus had already been released. It was time for the first amplification.
The true Silent Night was about to begin.
This story takes place just before Jack Wallen's I ZOMBIE I series. For more by Jack, visit https://monkeypantz.net.
Crazed in Christmas City,
A party you'll never forget
by Jessica McHugh
The only gift Avery Norton received during her first Christmas in Taunton State Lunatic Asylum was a heavy dose of sedatives. While other patients decked the halls, she struggled to keep her eyes open so she could watch the snow slowly blanketing the lawn of the New England asylum. This year, she hoped for a visitor. Any visitor. She would've been happy to have the mailman give her a sincere “Merry Christmas” through the window before speeding away from the hospital, but even that was a long shot. Not as long as a visit from anyone in her family, though.
It had been over a year since Avery was incarcerated in Taunton Asylum, since her life went mad, since the start of the therapy to convince her (and then cure her) of that madness. She acted convinced most of the time, but she still had her doubts. If only the authorities in her life didn’t have such strong powers of persuasion. Especially her mother, Faye. It was Faye who laid the story out to the police. To everyone, actually. And she always told it with a wounded voice and perfectly timed tears brushed away by trembling hands. Avery tried to tell the police about how steady those hands were when she saw Faye lift two dead bodies into her trunk, but no one believed her. No one, except for her boyfriend Paul. He was with her when she saw her mother with the bodies. At least, she thought he was.
Unfortunately, there were so many more people there when the carnage was discovered. So many more people to see Avery on the blood-stained floor of the basement, huddled beside stacks of human remains. Besides, Doctor Aslinn seemed intent on convincing Avery that Paul's presence at the scene of “Faye's crime” was just another hallucination anyway: something Avery invented to deal with the guilt of her own killings. Even though Faye had admitted to hiding her daughter's homicidal tendencies, even to the point of helping her stash the bodies in the basement, it was never Faye's fault. Avery was the sick one, the blood-thirsty one. She was one who had to pay for those lives with her childhood.
“You are a murderer, Avery,” Doctor Aslinn stated time and time again. “The sooner you accept it, the sooner you can recover from it.”
But it was so hard to swallow. Those words, “you are a murderer, Avery,” seemed like such nonsense. Faye claimed her daughter suffered from blackouts, during which she was inclined toward violent outbursts that, at age four, caused her to kill a puppy. And a few years later, her own father. Avery was always strong, always scrappy, but she couldn't imagine killing anyone, especially at such a young age. It all seemed too difficult to believe. But the police sure seemed to believe it. The doctors, too. Or maybe it was just easier for them to take Faye's story as gospel and move on to locking away the next problem child.
But there were times when it didn't seem so difficult to believe she could kill. In her dreams, she saw the rabbits as she had on that day in the garden. She didn't want to hurt them, but her mother's lessons about dirty deeds urged her heart into craving their pain. They had betrayed each other with their bodies, and they had to be punished for their lust. Mocking her with their immodesty, the fornicating rabbits were yanked apart by the ears as Avery had done on that fateful day, but her strength was even greater in her dreams. The rabbits’ ears were ripped from their heads, along with the rest of their scalps, but Avery didn't shrink back at seeing their slippery skulls. She giggled, before digging to expose more. She sheared the meat from their faces, from their legs, paws, and bellies until they were no more than bone bunnies bouncing through a skin-strewn cabbage patch.
Those were the dreams that kept her up at night. But her conscious thoughts were no less bloody. In room eight of Taunton's juvenile ward, with her roommate Flint fast asleep, Avery would sit awake and think about ways to kill her mother. She hated herself for it, but hate often came with a small smile. Faye had ruined Avery's life, and for what? Just to keep her away from Paul? They hadn't done anything besides kiss, but as far as Faye was concerned, those few kisses had transformed Avery into a poisoned garden beyond salvation. Bad water pumped through her veins, causing her to grow wild, like the worst kind of weed. And what do you do with weeds? Rip them out at the roots and throw them in the garbage—or a crazy house.
Taunton could be considered the garbage can of life: chock full of weeds. Avery often felt like she was at the bottom of the bin, desperately trying to climb the sides for one glimpse of the world beyond, where flowers bloomed beautiful and rabbits were just sweet, fluffy creatures rather than the monsters they'd become in her mind. Worse was knowing that she was the real monster—to rabbits at least. She wondered if she had become some kind of boogeyman in the minds of the species. Had news of her attack on the Norton’s garden rabbits spread through the warrens as quickly as news of the other murders had spread through New England?
Mad thoughts like that didn’t help her case, even where her own beliefs were concerned. The deeper she speculated, the farther away sanity seemed.
Luckily, holidays distracted her from the horrifying past that so frequently haunted her present; for a while at least. Avery hadn't been allowed to participate in the Christmas festivities the previous year, as she hadn't yet proved herself docile enough for the privilege. Instead, she was loaded full of “vitamins” and plunked down in the day room next to Violet to watch the falling snow. Because of the annual holiday display at Taunton Green, Taunton had earned the nickname “Christmas City.” Although Avery couldn't see much detail, the display in the distance was still quite a sight to behold. With strings of white lights stretched and spiraled around pine garlands, Taunton Green taunted her with normalcy. While Bing Crosby and Kay Starr crooned carols through the hospital, Avery thought back on holidays past, drifting through her memory as slowly as the falling snow. She wondered if Violet thought about the same thing as she watched the window, but it didn't take Avery long to realize that the catatonic girl wasn't watching anything. Her eyes were fixed: staring rather than watching. It could've been raining gumdrops for all Violet seemed to care.
The other girls had been nice enou
gh not to brag about how fun last year's Christmas party was when they filed back into the ward. Sheila mentioned it unprovoked, but it was only to say how much she liked the guy hired to play Santa Claus.
“I got a peek at him without the beard,” she said. “I swear he looked just like Marlon Brando. I could've screwed him right there, Santa belly and all!”
That kind of talk made Avery blush, but she didn't mind it. In fact, she'd always enjoyed Sheila's lusty attitude, and had missed it in the past three months since Sheila had left the ward—under mysterious circumstances. One day, she left for an appointment with Doctor Aslinn, and she never came back. But after the surprise birth of her baby and the heartless confiscation of the child by the Taunton nurses only weeks before, Sheila hadn't been the same anyway. She stopped getting dolled up, even for visitors. Then, she refused visitors. Then, she was gone. The ward was rocked by unease, especially since no one had told Frankie, Taunton's only male patient living in a female ward, that he was the father of Sheila's baby. Or as the patients called the conception, “the worst game of Truth or Dare ever.” The birth was an impossible secret to keep, but considering Sheila's wide array of gentlemen callers, there was no way to prove who the father was. Although Frankie never mentioned it, when Flint told him of Sheila's pregnancy, it was clear the night of Truth or Dare (and the resulting question of paternity) crossed his mind.
The topic of Sheila's whereabouts was still a hot one. Even when her room was filled by another girl and Nurse Mathis began her lauded Christmas decoration of the asylum, the girls of Taunton speculated. Patients left Taunton all the time, but Sheila had been around for a while, and Avery really liked her. It was difficult to regard her as just another patient who didn't return from Dr. Aslinn's office.
But Avery wasn't about to let it ruin her holiday. As much as she wished she were celebrating on her own terms, on free terms, she was determined to make the best of it. She didn't want to be back in her mother's house, but she did long for Martha's Vineyard. She longed for the snow-speckled Gingerbread houses, the soothing aroma of cedar Christmas trees, and the delightful scents wafting through Edgartown.
And she longed for Paul. Not even his lips or words of affection. Just him.
But that ship had sailed. Sunk, more precisely. Avery couldn't go to the island any more than Paul would ever come to Taunton again.
The juvenile wards had been so well-behaved during the previous year's festivities that the Taunton administration decided to throw the patients a co-ed dance. The announcement inspired excitement in some girls and dread in others, but Avery was indifferent. She was just happy to be included. She would’ve been content to stand quietly in a lavishly decorated room while Nat King Cole sang to her from the radio, but she had a feeling there would be more entertainment than that. The hospital staff was just as excited about the holiday as the patients. They gave out little cards and gifts to ensure that everyone, including mute orphans like Violet, got something for Christmas. Avery had been too drowsy from vitamins to remember what the hospital staff had given her last year, so she was eager to get to the party and open her first gift to remember. She didn't care what it was, as long as it was better than the card she'd received earlier that day.
As Avery was brushing her silky black hair in preparation for the party, Flint had entered with mail in hand. She tied a red ribbon around her head and Flint sat on her bed, fanning Avery with the card.
“What's that?” she asked.
“Nurse Moore wanted me to give it to you. I think it's from your mom,” Flint replied.
Avery rolled her eyes as she sat down next to Flint. She flipped the card over and over in her hands, silently debating. Flint's fingers twitched in anticipation, and she started tugging on a string dangling from Avery's quilt.
“Well? Are you going to open it or not?” she finally asked.
“Did you get any mail?”
“Do I ever?”
“I can't believe your parents didn't send you anything for Christmas,” Avery said. “My mother hates me and she still sent me a card.”
“Your mother sent you a card because she hates you. You know whatever's in that envelope isn't candy canes and snow angels,” Flint replied. “My parents do everything they can not to think of me at Christmas. I was sent here around this time, after an incident that almost caused us to lose our house. Did I ever tell you that?”
“No, what happened?”
“What always happened. They left me alone...by the hearth, no less. I couldn't help myself,” she replied. “I didn't expect the tree to catch fire so fast. I thought I'd be able to watch it burn for a little while and douse it with my milk or something. But I watched for too long and the fire got out of control. My father was able to put it out before it spread too badly, but for my parents, it was the straw that burnt the camel's back.”
“That's horrible,” Avery whispered.
“Not at the time. When it was happening, it was beautiful. It was the best Christmas ever,” she said, her eyes glimmering with joyful tears. “Anyway, I'll give you some privacy.”
Flint started out, but Avery said “wait” and ran to the corner of the room. She pried up one of the linoleum tiles and reached into a secret hole in the floor. She set aside the diary she'd only written in once and grabbed what was hidden beneath. When Avery withdrew a box of matches, Flint's face lit up.
“Where did you get those?” she gasped.
“Tyler found them under the couch.”
“Tyler? As in Brianne's imaginary friend?”
“That's what she told me,” Avery replied and pressed them onto Flint's open palm. “You'll be careful, right?”
“Probably not,” Flint replied with a smirk, but when Avery moved to take the matches back, she said, “Okay, okay, I'll be careful.”
“With what?” a voice asked from the doorway.
Flint quickly pocketed the matches. After turning to the door, she dropped to the floor with laughter while Avery slapped her hand over her mouth to stifle her own. Frankie, however, didn't find his presence so amusing.
“I take it that means you don't like my outfit?” he asked.
Frankie was dressed fancier than Avery and Flint combined. From the lace on his bobby socks to the bow in his hair, Frankie was the very definition of “festive.”
“You look like my older sister,” Flint laughed.
“You look like someone who wants to get murdered,” Avery said. Flint and Franky stared at her awkwardly until she added, “Not by me. Jesus, you guys, I meant by the boys ward.”
“Oh, I can handle them,” Frankie replied, kicking up a ballet slipper.
“You were moved over here because you couldn't handle them, remember? Or maybe you don't remember—the concussion and all,” Flint said.
Nurse Radcliffe walked by room eight, caught one glimpse of Frankie, and said the word “no” fifty times in one breath. She grabbed him by the collar and towed him back to his room to change while Flint followed to see what was sure to be a tantrum to remember.
In the quiet wake, Avery sat on her bed, daring herself to open the Christmas card from her mother. Before she knew it was happening, her fingers sliced the envelope apart, revealing the rosy cheeks of a cherub on the branch of a Christmas tree. Avery had seen the card many times before and briefly wondered if sending such an obvious piece of home was the warning fire for her mother's attack. With the card open, Faye's bold handwriting immediately filled Avery with dread.
Dearest Avery,
Merry Christmas! I'm sure it doesn't seem as merry as usual, but we know that's for the best, don't we? We couldn't go on the way we were. I know I couldn't have lasted another year of hiding the truth—from you, and from the authorities. Still, it broke my heart to turn you in. You do know that, don't you, sweetheart? Yes, I know you do.
You wouldn't have wanted to be on the island this summer anyway. It was swamped with children—lewd ones at that—and your little friend Paul made a fool of himself
with some of the off-island girls. I suppose he figured he could do what he wanted because he wouldn't see them again. I always knew he was a bad seed.
I bet you're a little thankful you don't have to deal with that nonsense anymore. At least in Taunton you can stay safe and innocent...well, I suppose you wouldn't be there if you were innocent... but you know what I mean. In Taunton, you can focus on forgiving yourself for what you did to those poor people. And I'll try to do the same.
I do miss having you around. Life has changed so much since you went away. People stare at me like I'm some kind of monster just because I'm your mother. I try to tell them you're a good girl, that you're just a little sick right now, but they don't believe me. You have no idea how much that hurts, Avery. I've changed my daily routine so much, but no one appreciates it. I'm just the mother of the Martha's Vineyard Killer. I am the Martha's Vineyard Killer.
Avery read last sentence again. “I am the Martha's Vineyard Killer.” She blinked wildly and leapt off her bed. She ran from her room and slapped herself against the window of the Nurse's Station.
“Betty, my mother confessed!” Avery screamed at Nurse Moore. “Look, it says it right here in her Christmas card. She admitted to being the killer. I'm innocent, just like I said!”
“Calm down, Avery.”
“Please, just read it,” she said, sliding the card under the window.
Nurse Moore put on her glasses and started skimming over the card.
“Do you see it? She said 'I am the Martha's Vineyard Killer.'”
Nurse Moore looked up, sighing as she removed her glasses.
“Avery, this says 'I'm just the mother of the Martha's Vineyard Killer. I might as well be the Martha's Vineyard Killer.'” She passed the card back and Avery snatched it up with her eyes furiously scanning the words.