Chocolate Zombie, a short story

It's Star Wars meets Peaky Blinders meets Ted Lasso.

The Galactic Football League series by number one New York Times best-selling author Scott Sigler

is now a free, unabridged podcast.

The GFL is a star-spanning, high-action, high-stakes, coming-of-age story

set against the backdrop of a professional football league 700 years in the future.

That's the Galactic Football League series.

Search for Scott Sigler, S-I-G-L-E-R, wherever you get your podcasts.

Counterbalance, a high-fantasy audio drama.

Season 2, coming 15th of October, 2023.

Learn more on Treelunas.com.

Hello, junkies! Surprise, surprise, surprise!

I have a surprise episode for you.

I am in the middle of preparing for a new...

a new way to do my podcast.

This quick little story is a result of that experimentation.

This story is not part of the Rookie or the Crypt.

It's a quick little ditty I did for astronomer Pamela Gay way back at Balticon 2012.

We were on a panel. She told me to write stuff.

So I wrote some stuff because Dr. Pamela Gay is awesome.

And when she asked me to write stuff, I write stuff.

I won't spoil the story.

But let me quickly tell you what's going on here.

In December of 2022, I will be changing the weekly Sigler in Place livestream.

We will open each show with a brand new bit of serialized fiction.

I will read live for 20 to 30 minutes.

Then we'll do the other fun stuff we do every week, like chatting with the junkies,

showing pics of our dogs and other junkie pets, doing Siglerbrations.

We shout out your amazing accomplishments and more of that good stuff.

We'll take that 20...

to 30-minute reading and edit it for video and for audio.

We'll be posting the video to YouTube and other various social media spots.

The audio, though, that will be edited down for Sunday's episode

on your usual Scott Sigler Audiobooks podcast feed.

What does this mean, FDO?

You are asking right now.

Well, I will tell you.

It means you're going to get brand new serialized fiction every Sunday.

You won't be able to buy it anywhere else.

When it's in first run mode, it won't be on Audible.

It won't be on Amazon.

It won't be anywhere.

We're going back to the good old EarthCore days.

And if you want the story, you've got to tune in every Sunday.

Or, you know, you can ignore the whole thing and binge it when it's done.

But let's be honest.

You'll probably forget because of all the meth you're doing behind the garage when Nana isn't looking.

So you'll just forget.

So what I'm saying is you might as well just mainline my goods every Sunday

to make sure you get your story.

Do it every Sunday because that's what the cool kids will be doing.

So, with all that said, here is your surprise story entitled Chocolate Zombie.

Enjoy.

It wasn't all bad.

At least the zombies didn't like chocolate.

What they did like was meat.

And there wasn't a lot of meat on the station.

Not unless Dave counted himself as meat, which the zombies seemed inclined to do.

And Dave most certainly did not.

I assure you, I am not meat, Dave said.

On the monitor, Lizzie sneered.

Now, Dave, you know that's not true.

You are very much meat.

And if I may be so bold, you look really delicious.

We all think so.

Dave cleared his throat.

He was right.

Lizzie seems so normal.

Well, kind of.

She hadn't slept in three days by his count.

And that's what caused the dark circles under eyes that constantly flicked left and right.

Eyes that never focused on one thing for more than a half second.

That's also what caused the limp hair, the shaking hands, and that ragged respiration.

The paranoia?

Lizzie had never really trusted anyone before.

But now it was on another level.

The drug.

dried flecks of blood on her chin? That was not caused by insomnia. That was caused by Pavel.

Dave was going to miss Pavel. David always told Pavel to lose weight. Pavel should have listened,

and while he was at it, maybe got on the goddamn treadmill once in a while.

Pavel's favorite joke had been, you don't have to be fast to outrun a zombie,

you just have to be faster than the guy next to you. The irony? Dave had turned out to be faster

than Pavel. Go figure. Lizzie, you guys have got to stop eating the paste, Dave said. You would

say that, Lizzie said. You want us to starve. I don't want you to starve. Then come out of the lab

and feed us, Dave. She and the others would eat him. There was no doubt about,

that anymore. He'd watched the Pavel recording 15 times already. Every time he deluded himself

into thinking this wasn't happening, that the crew members he'd traveled with for seven years

weren't killing and eating each other, that the woman he'd met in training and proposed to

on this very trip wasn't looking at him right now like he was a pork chop, he watched the Pavel

recording. Pavel hadn't gone quietly. Or quickly, for that matter.

Lizzie was a doctor. And so were Paolo and Ngebe. And as such, they avoided Pavel's vital organs

for days. Dave could have rationalized what they did, maybe, if they had used anesthesia. But

they didn't. They also could have cut Pavel's vocal cords, done something to stop the screaming,

the crying, the begging. But they hadn't done that, either. He didn't know who these people

were anymore.

Just three months ago, they'd been the brightest of the brightest. The best of the best. Some of

the top young scientists the world had to offer. An eight-year trip to the outer arm of NGC 2481

to set up a base where humanity would eventually explore the outer rim of a black hole. Eight

years out, ten years on, eight years back. Their youth, most of their adult life, given to the

project. Given to humanity.

Given to history. Those that lived would return to Earth in their fifties or sixties, and they had

all agreed on one thing. The sacrifice was worth every minute. Every second.

You're not going to get me, Lizzie, Dave said. We can fix this. We can work together. Find

something else for you to eat. There is nothing else, Lizzie said. You ate all the bacon buddy

bars, Dave.

He hadn't.

I hadn't eaten them all. Not yet, but there weren't many left. Half a bar for breakfast, half for

dinner, and he had five bars left. Algae paste still flowed from every faucet on the ship, and

even the flavorator still worked. He could have had algae that tasted like cheese, beef, chicken,

apples, oranges, and a dozen other taste sensations. Trouble was, since they'd gone into orbit at

XV-284, the algae had changed.

It made Dave puke. If he'd think chicken-flavored algae tastes peculiar going down, he now knew it

tasted far better than when it came back up. I'm out of bacon buddy bars, Dave said.

You're a liar, Lizzie said. You always were a liar, Dave. And you think I don't know about you

and Carmen in the fuel generator room? Maybe we can focus on the fact that you want to kill and

eat me, then handle our relationship issues later?

Lizzie smiled. You've got that out of order, lover. It's eat you, and then kill you. Eventually.

Dave closed his eyes, but he couldn't get rid of the vision of an armless,

legless, still-twitching Pavel. He could have very well been part of the Pavel dinner party

if he hadn't been allergic to whatever genetic mutation had occurred in the spirulina algae

that made up 90% of the station's food supply.

Those were supposed to be treats. Each crew member got one a week. Chocolate. A treat,

but mission planners hadn't wasted weight on empty calories. Twelve ounces of salted bacon,

wrapped in seaweed, topped by one layer of corn cake, a second layer of concentrated fruit,

the whole thing coated in chocolate and topped with ground almonds and walnuts.

He was still alive because of candy bars. He couldn't eat the station's food,

and that was the only reason he wasn't a paranoid insomniac looking for a human snack.

The others ate the algae. That made them want to eat people who didn't eat the algae.

And Dave was the only one left.

I'm not meat, Lizzie.

You already said that, Dave.

I'm not. We can fix this.

She smiled and shook her head. There were red smears on her teeth.

Her gums were bleeding.

There's nothing to fix, you cheating bastard, unless I can reprogram the flavorators to make

me some bread. Then I'll fix a sandwich with you in it.

Dave's hand moved of its own accord, reached out and slapped the disconnect button.

Lizzie's horrific face blinked out.

Dave stared at the control panel, listened to his own ragged breathing.

There was no rescue.

No one could come get him.

There was no place to run.

They wanted him dead, and that left him with only two choices.

Cure them all, or kill them, one by one.

The End

Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper.

In this new thriller, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community.

Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced.

She suspects connections to a powerful religious group.

Enter federal agent V.B. Loro, who has been investigating a local church for possibly...

The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family.

But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone is watching Ruth.

Chinook.

Starring Kelly Marie Tran and Sanaa Lathan.

Listen to Chinook wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, I'm Jennifer, a founder of The Go-Getter.

At Go Kid Go, putting kids first is at the heart of every show that we produce.

That's why we're so excited to introduce a brand new show to our network, called The Search for the Silver Lining.

A fantasy adventure series about a spirited young girl named Isla, who time travels to the mythical land of Camelot.

Look for The Search for the Silver Lining on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts.