Zombies Don't Monkey Around #CoffinHop

Thursday's bloody-lovely Coffin Hop post is a selection from my short story "Master Marvel's Menagerie", included in the Post Mortem Press zombie anthology, DEAD SOULS. This story takes place in a Zombie Zoo of sorts, but don't let Master Marvel hear you call it that...Oh, and don't forget to leave a COMMENT with your EMAIL ADDRESS to enter to win an ebook copy of my illustrated horror novella, "Danny Marble & the Application for Non-Scary Things."

...We join two young men approaching the first stop in a zombie zoo AKA Master Marvel's Menagerie....

             The monkey house was the first occupied building on the path. They knew it would smell ghastly, but the odor was so pungent that they shut the door only seconds after opening it.

“Jesus, what do they feed those things?”

“Brains!” Jack growled again.

Sam opened the door and pushed his friend so forcefully that he tripped over his feet and crashed to the monkey house floor.

“Gross! I think I fell in shit!” Jack whined as he wiped his hands on his pants.

The interior was dim, but once Jack and Sam were front and center, a row of flood lights ignited the massive cage filled with what looked like a jungle playset.

“Jeez, what did you fall in?” Sam asked, seeing the slimy crimson stains on his friend’s pants.

All of a sudden, a fanfare blasted from the speakers and a legion of monkeys emerged from hiding. They leapt from their burrows and swung from the branches. They screeched as they scaled the sides of the cage and shimmied down twisted vines. In equal terror and wonder, Sam snapped a picture and he and Jack leaned against the gate. There wasn’t a single monkey without ratty fur. It dropped from their skin as easily as they dropped from the trees, but while some of the fur drifted down in tufts, the rest fell in sloppy chunks, weighed down by rotten flesh. The breeds were lumped together despite the fact that they obviously didn’t care for the company. The baboon chased the capuchin over the face of the cage until it finally caught its tail. It ripped the capuchin from the bars and retreated to a treetop. The boys watched in horror as it tore the monkey’s tail from its body. It gnashed its broken fangs and howled as it beat the capuchin against the trunk. The small black arm the baboon was holding ripped free at the shoulder and the body crashed to the bottom of the cage where the capuchin screamed and spat up frothy blood. The baboon had eaten half of the tail when a macaque flew past with its claws extended and slashed the baboon’s chest open. Its black heart fell like a rotten apple to the floor, but it paid the loss no mind; it still had tail left to chew. The macaque perched on a bloodstained rock and hissed at Jack and Sam.

“Look out! It's gonna throw shit at us!” Sam screamed.

“I don't think so,” Jack replied as the monkey dug its claws into the sides of its head.

The sound of its face tearing free of the fascia was one that knocked out the boys’ knees with a violent cringe. The face hung heavy in the monkey’s paw while the moldering muscle still twisted its expression. It heaved the sloppy mass at the bars, and though a good deal was caught by the cage, several bits broke through and spattered the boys in grey and red gore.

“I think I’m going to be sick,” Sam said, but Jack didn’t have time to say anything.

His stomach emptied over the monkey house floor, realizing only then what he’d fallen into earlier. Vomit, blood, chunks of flesh and fur, and even a few eyeballs decorated the concrete. He gasped and slipped on his own sick, but Sam was quick to catch him.

“Can we get the hell out of here now?”
            “You don’t have to ask me twice."

To read the full story, check out PostMortem-Press.com or Amazon.com to order your copy of DEAD SOULS, available in ebook and print. Please leave a comment with your email address to enter the contest. 

HAPPY COFFIN HOPPING!