The Cabin in the Woods

Dead, Curt thought. They must be, because they’ve got things crawling out of their mouths and holes in their skin, their faces, their heads, and-

And Jules was screaming for him again, almost naked and sitting up, trying to pull away from where a skinny, small boy had impaled her against the ground with a fucking knife! The boy-

— Zombie! Curt thought, That’s all they can be, what they must be- wore old-fashioned clothing, had long hair caked in mud, and when he glanced back at Curt his eyes were milky white and terrifying.

He held Jules’s wrist and tugged his rusty blade from her hand, eliciting a scream that chilled Curt to the core.

Behind her, a lumbering, fat woman reached around and pressed the rusted teeth of a saw against her throat.

Staring at his lover’s terrified, screaming face Curt could not avoid seeing what happened just behind her, as the zombie woman’s stomach seemed to flap open and spill three burning coals from a cauterized interior. They tumbled onto Jules’s head and fell down her back, and the pleasant country air was suddenly alive with the stench of burning hair and scorched skin and flesh.

The woman pressed herself against the back of Jules’s head and pulled the saw across her neck. The teeth snagged on skin and parted it with a terrible ripping sound, like wet cotton being torn.

And Curt shoved aside his shock and leapt forward.

He dove past Jules and knocked the zombie woman aside, seeing as he did so that there was a huge third shape lumbering toward them from the shadows.

“Fuck away from her!” he screamed. The mother-zombie fell aside, saw twanging/ at the air. Jules’s scream had died out and she was leaning forward, but as he turned to help her the kid-zombie’s arm swung and the knife’s rusted blade buried itself in Curt’s arm.

He roared in fury, shock keeping the pain at bay for the precious few seconds it took him to try and pull it out. He couldn’t, so he grabbed the kid-zombie’s arm instead and tugged hard. The thing came close, no expression at all on its face-and that was the worst thing right then, worse than the shock and Jules’s crying and the idea What the fuck is going on here? — the complete lack of expression on the faces.

No signs of life, Curt thought, and he grimaced as he punched the kid-zombie in the face with his left hand.

He felt the nose give way and parts of it crumbled off. It didn’t seem to faze the kid-zombie at all, but it did shove him back so that he let go of the blade.

Curt stepped in front of Jules and tugged the blade free of his arm, screaming as he did so, bending to see how bad the damage was, mind working at twice its normal speed as he tried to figure out just what the fuck he was going to do next. Carry her no can’t carry her too slow fight them all maybe but that punch didn’t-

He heard a chain rattle, looked up, and saw that big-zombie had arrived. He was maybe six and a half feet tall, almost that around, and unlike the others he did exhibit some basic human emotion.

He grinned.

Something dropped from his hand and hit the ground at his feet, connected to his hand by the chain Curt had heard rattling. It was heavy, and metallic, and though the trees filtered the moonlight Curt could still see the ugly teeth of an old-fashioned bear trap, broken, just one jaw left. As he wondered what had happened to the other jaw, big-zombie swung the makeshift mace and chain with terrifying speed. Curt fell forward and tried to protect Jules, but the heavy metal whacked the side of his head. He fell, grunting, seeing the shadow of the weapon pass by above him as it ricocheted from his skull. Flat side not teeth side, he thought with vague relief, trying to rise to protect himself from another blow. But dizziness hit him and he stumbled, blinking blood from his eye and mumbling, “Ju… Jules…”

“Curt!” she shouted, and her throat sounded raw.

In front of him, Curt saw Jules trying to stand, reaching for him with one hand while the other clasped the bloodied mess of her throat. Her nudity made her pathetic now, and their loving seemed a million years away as he watched the bear trap swing around again and bury its teeth in her back.

She screamed and arched forward, reaching back to try and pry the thing loose, blood spewing from her ripped throat and down across her chest and stomach. And when she fell forward Curt thought it was because she was trying to walk toward him, but her legs would not obey

He shook his head and cleared his vision, dashing forward to grasp her hand but only just missing as big-zombie started to haul her backward.

Her fingers dug into the earth and rucked up furrows of rotting leaves and damp soil.