Page 11 of Zinnia and the Zombie
Zinnia hung suspended in her restraints, still dazed by the impact. Her head throbbed where it had slammed against the headrest but nothing felt broken, just bruised and battered.
The ship lay tilted at an odd angle, and what had been the floor now formed a steep incline. Smoke curled up from shattered wall panels, filling the cabin with an acrid scent. A dense mat of vines covered the viewport, cloaking the interior in a dim green haze.
“Jaxx?” she croaked.
No response.
She turned her head, wincing at the sharp pain in her neck. He was slumped against his restraints, his head hanging forward, arms dangling lifelessly. The sight sent a spike of fear through her chest.
“Jaxx!”
With trembling fingers, she fumbled with the clasp of her harness. It gave way suddenly, dropping her onto the tilted floor, and she slid several feet before catching herself on a twisted piece of paneling.
Pushing herself upright, she crawled back up the incline towards him. His skin had lost all its golden luster, and turned a dull, ashen yellow. He looked… lifeless. Even more lifeless than the statue she had first believed him to be.
“No, no, no,” she whispered, searching frantically for a pulse. “Don’t be dead. Please don’t be dead.”
His skin was cool to the touch, but soft—not the hard metal of his stasis form. For several terrible seconds, she felt nothing beneath her fingertips. Then—there it was. A pulse. Faint and slow, but definitely there.
Relief threatened to turn her knees to water. She braced a hand against the bulkhead to steady herself and sucked in a deep breath.
“Jaxx, can you hear me? Please, my zombie. I need you to wake up.”
His pulse seemed stronger when she checked it again, and his skin was already warming. She gently shook his shoulder, but his head just lolled back and forth limply.
A sharp crack from somewhere in the ship’s hull distracted her. The smoke was growing thicker, and the acrid smell had intensified. The memory of a dozen disaster movies flashed through her mind—crashed vehicles always seemed to explode. She had to get him out of here.
There was no way she could carry him, but perhaps… Looking around frantically, she spotted a wall panel that had broken free in the crash. It was flat and about six feet long—it would have to do.
She slid it beneath the pilot’s chair, then reached for his harness, struggling with the clasp for a moment before it snapped open. His weight immediately slumped forward, nearly crushing her, but she managed to brace herself against the pilot’s chair enough to lower him onto the panel.
The panel made dragging him possible, if not easy, her muscles screaming in protest. She backed down the tilted floor towards what remained of the ship’s exit hatch, which now faced upward at an awkward angle. The door mechanism was jammed, but the crash had created a jagged tear in the hull nearby.
She pushed the panel with Jaxx through the opening first, wincing when she heard it clatter against the ground, then squeezed through herself. Outside, the air was humid and heavy with unfamiliar scents—decaying vegetation, strange flowers, and the metallic tang of the damaged ship.
She looked up and gasped.
They had crashed at the base of an enormous skyscraper—though one unlike any she had ever seen, with sweeping curves and impossibly thin spires. They must have hit one of those spires but enough of them were damaged that it was impossible to tell. The entire building was crumbling, great chunks missing from its facade, vines and other vegetation reclaiming the structure. Beyond it, she could make out other skyscrapers in similar states of decay, stretching out in every direction.
They had landed in the ruins of a city—a vast metropolis swallowed by jungle like some alien version of a postapocalyptic New York.
Another loud crack from the ship snapped her attention back to their immediate danger. Grabbing the edge of the panel, she dragged Jaxx further away from the wreckage, her muscles burning with the effort as she tried to put as much distance between them and the ship as possible.
A fallen wall section from the nearest building created a small alcove—a natural shelter. She pulled him towards it, the panel sliding jerkily over uneven ground and scattered debris. By the time she maneuvered him into the sheltered space, she was drenched in sweat, her breath coming in gasps.
“Made it,” she panted, collapsing beside him.
For several minutes, she simply lay there, letting her racing heart slow. The normal sounds of the jungle resumed—chirps, calls, rustles—replacing the silence after the crash. No explosion came from the ship, but wisps of dark smoke continued to rise from its shattered hull.
When her breathing steadied, she turned to him. His face was peaceful in unconsciousness, but the gray pallor of his skin terrified her. Remembering how her touch had seemed to strengthen him before, she gently placed her hand on his cheek. His skin was still soft, still yielding to her touch, but cool—almost cold. The scaled areas over his temples were harder but it wasn’t the hardness of his stasis form. If that form protected him, why hadn’t he resumed it?
“Jaxx,” she said softly, still stroking his face. “Can you hear me?”
No response.
“Please wake up,” she whispered, her voice breaking. “I don’t know where we are, or what’s out there, or how to help you.”
She put her hand on his chest, feeling the slow, shallow rise and fall of his breathing. At least he was alive. But for how long? What if he never woke up?
