The lanky young fella's back went ramrod straight.

  He whipped around fast, all set to plead his case.

  He'd barely opened his trap when, whoosh, a cold glimmer flashed before his eyes.

  Next thing he knew, blood spurted from his neck like a geyser.

  His eyes bugged out in horror.

  He didn't even get a peep out before he hit the dirt.

  The last thing his peepers registered was that drop-dead gorgeous face, now splattered with blood.

  Billy Jean stared icily at the stiff on the ground.

  The bone blade she'd used to do the deed vanished into thin air, and she nonchalantly wiped the blood from her mug.

  Sniffing that familiar coppery tang in the air, she craned her neck up toward a certain room in the hotel.

  The bloodthirsty glint in her eyes flared up like a bonfire.

  Sure enough, Michael Joke's blood still had that killer allure for her.

  Even from a mile away, she could smell it clear as day.

  She couldn't get her mitts on his blood, but there was a sorry substitute close by.

  Billy Jean shifted her gaze to the fresh corpse and whipped out a new eating utensil, a see-through glass straw.

  She jammed it into the carotid artery, and blood shot up through the straw like a fountain, making for a real gore show.

  The second the blood hit her tongue, Billy Jean's face scrunched up.

  Tasted like crap, just as she'd figured.

  Especially with Michael Joke's blood scent lingering in the air, this stuff was like drinking mud in comparison.

  A few days back, she could choke down a few more sips, but today, one was one too many.

  Billy Jean decided she wasn't gonna torture herself anymore and nixed the idea of eating.

  Looked like it was high time to scout out some new grub.

  The team leader and the young fella with a single eyelid were now parked outside the room door.

  Saying they weren't nervous would be a bald-faced lie; their palms were slick with sweat.

  That zombie gal hadn't given them much to go on, just told them to knock and see if anyone answered or made a peep.

  “Team leader, you reckon there's a zombie in there?”

  The one-eyed young fella whispered.

  The team leader wasn't sure as rain either, but he had to man up.

  “Step back a bit. I'll give it a knock. Before the world went to pot, this wouldn't have fazed me, but now? The more normal something seems, the weirder it is.”

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  The young fella with a single eyelid tightened his grip on his ax like it was his last lifeline.

  “If I gotta go, I go.”

  He shoved the team leader aside.

  “Team leader, I'll do it.”

  Before the team leader could bat an eye, the young fella with a single eyelid stepped up and rapped on the door.

  “Tap tap tap.”

  Those three knocks echoed like gunshots in the dead-silent corridor.

  The team leader sucked in his breath and went on high alert.

  One wrong move, and he'd spring into action.

  His buddy was loyal, and he wasn't about to chicken out either.

  In what felt like a year but was really just a minute, the two of them were on pins and needles.

  They'd cooked up all kinds of nightmare scenarios in their heads, but never expected the crickets after knocking.

  The young fella with a single eyelid and the team leader traded glances, and then the young fella raised his fist and pounded a few more times.

  They waited, and still nada.

  The young fella with a single eyelid got a little gutsy.

  He started hammering on the door and hollering,

  “Anybody home? If you ain't dead, give me a sign...”

  He yelled his lungs out for a good few minutes, but it was still quieter than a tomb inside.

  The team leader and the young fella with a single eyelid let out a huge sigh of relief.

  Their hearts, which had been in their throats, finally dropped back down.

  Just then, “Boom...”

  The team leader and the young fella with a single eyelid hit the deck, shaking like leaves.

  “We don't know nothing! Don't off us! We'll be your slaves, swear it!”

  “As long as you don't kill us, we'll do anything you want!”

  They were sweating bullets, begging for mercy like their lives depended on it.

  After a few minutes, they smelled a rat.

  Except for that one big bang, it was just their own voices bouncing off the walls.

  Only then did they peek open their eyes and look up.

  In that swanky corridor, they were the only souls, living or dead.

  All they saw was a busted picture frame sprawled on the floor in front of them. That must've been the noise-maker.

  The team leader and the young fella with a single eyelid:!!

  The team leader, who was kneeling on the ground, started patting around like a madman.

  “Huh! Where'd my contact lens go? I know it was around here. Why can't I find it?”

  The young fella with a single eyelid, also on his knees, joined in the hunt.

  “Where's my ear-pick? Dammit, where'd it go? ear-pick, come out!”

  These two big bruisers, who'd been groveling for mercy a minute ago, were now on a scavenger hunt.

  “Bang...”

  Another thing crashed to the floor.

  The team leader and the young fella with a single eyelid's spines turned to ice.

  Fuck all!!

  They were up and running in a flash.

  It took them half an hour to get in the hotel, but just a minute to skedaddle.

  They burst out of the hotel, bent over, hands on knees, gasping like fish out of water.

  Big globs of sweat dripped off their foreheads.

  “Huff huff... Damn it, this ain't no way to live,”

  The one-eyed young fella wheezed.

  “Thank God it was just a scare. Huff huff...” the team leader panted.

  After a while, they caught their breath and straightened up.

  The corpse of the lanky young fella, lying in a pool of blood up ahead, smacked them in the face.

  Both of them were gobsmacked.

  Dead... dead?

  After making sure it was their pal, the young fella with a single eyelid sneered. Serves him right.

  The team leader, on the other hand, felt a little down in the dumps.

  This meant of the supply team he led, it was just him and the one-eyed young fella left.

  Just then, a frosty voice rang out from behind them.

  “How'd it go?”

  The team leader and the young fella with a single eyelid's spines tingled.

  Just hearing that voice, they knew who it was.

  When had she slunk up behind them?

  Silent as a spook, it was creepy as hell.

  Hard to imagine if she'd wanted them dead a minute ago, they'd probably be pushing up daisies.

  The lanky young fella must've met his end at her hands too.

  The two of them turned around, looking like they were walking the plank.

  Anybody who didn't know better would've thought they were headed for the chopping block.

  But when they did a 180, they were floored.

  Was this drop-dead gorgeous gal, who looked like an angel, the same zombie that had them shaking in their boots?

  She'd been wearing a hat before, all bundled up.

  They'd thought she must look like something out of a horror flick.

  After all, zombies usually looked like they'd been through the wringer, rotting and all.

  Turned out she wore the hat not because she was ugly, but because she was too beautiful.

  She was a knockout.

  If they hadn't known she was a zombie from the jump, they'd never have believed this fairy-like creature was one of the undead.

  “Don't you want your eyes anymore?” the cold voice chimed in again.