(05/16/05 Dear me, this seems to be spreading! Let me know your comments at grzesiak@gmail.com)

(05/16/05 Also, this was written for NaNoWriMo 2004, which is why it's so freakin' long.
That also explains the continuity errors. Disregard those, I'll fix them someday. Honest.
It also explains the complete lack of formatting; this is still just a draft document.
Copyright (c) 2005 Joseph Grzesiak, all rights reserved, and so on and so forth.)


Book I - In Which The Narrator Introduces Himself, And Sets The Stage

Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story of that greatest of men,
He who traveled far and wide, across ocean, mountain, continent and sea,
Who struggled valiantly against the will of the gods,
And who saved his country from a zombie scourge.

You heard me, Muse, a zombie scourge.

Sing of that man, that Jonathan Brewer, he who became renowned,
For his skill against the scourge, against the plague;
Brown-eyed Jonathan Brewer, the blacksmith, the son, the brother,
And probably the uncle, too; he never really talked to his siblings,
And for all he knew they had a couple kids, and come to think of it,
He may also be a grand-uncle, who knows.

But sing of that guy, Muse, and relate of how Jonathan Brewer, brave Jonathan,
Tall Jonathan, clean-shaven Jonathan saved Parliament, saved the Queen,
And saved truth, justice, and the American way,
Even though there was no America, really, so maybe he saved the British way,
But that just doesn't have the same ring to it,
Regardless, though, he killed a lot of zombies.

O Muse, set the stage, so I can stop appealing to you for aid and get on with the story.
O Muse, to use the vocative case, which is really archaic and a pain in the ass to decline,
And you Latin scholars out there will agree with me;
Yes, you, the one in the back, nodding your head in agreement,
You're the one I'm talking to. Goddamn vocative case.

But Muse, setting the stage, spoken to a modern audience,
With your hi-fi players and your dee vee dee sets and your tight suspenders,
They need to understand that this history is not their history, no,
But a counterfactual version of their history.
Kind of like those stories in which Hitler won World War 2,
Or the South won the American Civil War
(and not the War of Northern Aggression as some people would have you call it,
no, but let's not get into that now).

But yes, Muse, as I was saying, a counterfactual saga,
A world sent on a different path, soaring through the cosmos,
Then taking a wrong turn at Albuquerque and not ending up at the Pismo Beach of our world,
But rather the cave of Ali Baba of the wrong world,
But this world, this bright-eyed and dewy-grassed world, is not the wrong world,
But the right world, the world of our story, the world of our saga,
The world of our zombie plague.

As ships with white sails skimmed the surface of the sea,
As alliterative authors anguished as all audiences ached,
The conquistadors and colonists spread from Europe to the New World.
Thick ships with wooden planks quivered -- yes, quivered, ships do that --
Or maybe the arrows quivered as they plunged into the mast,
For the men on board these ships were bored, deathly bored,
And so they practiced archery, shooting shaft after shaft into mast after mast,
Ignorant of the rhyme that a future author would force,
Since who rhymes shaft with mast, anyway?
Maybe shaft with maft, or shast with mast,
But I digress: these ships were crossing the ocean, following Columbus,
That Genoese navigator, that Italian explorer, he, who with the blessing of the Queen,
That really hot Spanish queen, you know, she was kind of a wild one, nudge nudge,
But with the blessing of that small-eared queen he discovered the New World,
Which from here on out I shall call America,
Even though it's still vague where that name came from,
This name will stick, and I'll blame it on the cabin boy,
The snot-nosed cabin boy,
Dear cabin boy,
America Americus.

Now that's a copout if I ever saw one.

These explorers and conquistadors and traders,
These Europeans of fair hair and blonde skin, or blonde hair and fair skin,
Either way, they were Europeans, and they had forgotten the old gods.
The Greek gods, the gods who forced this story, the gods who set this world in motion,
Maybe they didn't create the world, but they kicked off this plot.
Just bear with me and you'll see.

Zeus, powerful Zeus, mighty thunder god Zeus, he was bored.
B to the O to the R-E-D, he was bored.
Almost as bored as the sailors with their archery, and their masts and shafts,
But he wasn't so bored as to shoehorn a rhyme,
No, jealous Zeus had little to do with so few believers;
He went down among the mortals every now and then,
Trying to get a little nudge-nudge among the women,
But pillars of fire and oxen just didn't 'do it' for the women of that day,
And mighty Zeus grew cranky.

Cranky as a newborn baby denied his rattle,
Cranky as a football hooligan denied his crowbar,
Cranky as an old man, virile Zeus looked for something to do.
He thought about Prometheus, traitorous two-faced Prometheus,
And wondered if he should take mercy, and call off the vulture,
But that'd set a bad precedent, he decided,
A precedent that would lead to worse things.
Things like, like, well, he couldn't think of anything,
But damnit, he wasn't about to go back on his threat,
So he poured out a 40, and whispered how sorry he was,
And Prometheus, daily-tormented Prometheus, was still pissed.

But back to powerful and cranky Zeus, the Zeus who was bored,
So bored, he looked down at the mortals and saw them crossing the ocean,
And Zeus, with his knowledge of disease, and immunization, and epidemics,
Mighty knowledgeable Zeus, he hatched a plan.

For you, O modern reader, this is where the counterfactual history begins,
Well, maybe it began a few lines earlier where I started talking about Zeus,
But here's where it really gets going.
Medicinal Zeus, he saw that smallpox was endemic among the Europeans,
And it was pretty nasty, what with the pox and the sores and the pus,
But they were used to it there, and it wasn't really all that bad
Once you got down to it.

Mighty medicinal Zeus, with his eyes of fire, he saw that the natives of America,
The noble savage, the tabula rasa, the untouched canvas,
They hadn't been exposed to smallpox, the dreaded disease,
And he knew in his heart that such a disease would kill millions.
Or maybe tens of millions, he wasn't quite sure, but it'd kill a heckuva lot.
(Zeus used words like heckuva, you bet, since he was a Minnesotan, then.)

In his boredom, his plan came to fruition, his wicked, evil plan,
But really, that depends on your point of view;
He didn't think it was wicked or evil at all, no, he was saving the natives,
Saving them from a painful death from smallpox,
Saving them from being exploited by European traders,
Saving them from ultimately having to run casinos and make billions in profits,
But even that was way down the line, and didn't really make up for all the heartache,
So even though this was just a prank on the Europeans because he was bored,
He still thought it was kind of a nice thing to do.

Zeus with his eyes of fire and his arms of lightning and his ass of thunder,
He reached down from the clouds with his fingers of mist,
Or maybe he just did all the work in his lab in the sky,
Either way, he altered the DNA of smallpox, making some minor changes,
A little bit here, a little bit there,
Swapping an A with a T or a C with a G, or some other combinations thereof
And as a result, creating zombiepox.

He left the Europeans, the fair-breathed and blonde-tongues Europeans immune,
Figuring the joke would be on them, ha, what a riot,
They thought they'd colonize a new continent and instead infect everyone,
Turning the rolling hills and creeping moss and towering forests into zombie homelands,
Wouldn't that be funny?

The blissful Europeans sailed on, and landed in Barbados, and Cuba, and Florida,
And Brazil, and Venezuela, and Mexico, and New York, which was once New Amsterdam,
But none of those places were called that then, no,
But they landed there anyway, so I guess their maps were still good enough.
They landed, and offered beads for land, or guns for whiskey,
Or killed them all, or converted them to the One True Faith,
Anyway, they did all the stuff they did in your history, the one you learned,
The one with Pocahontas and John Smith and Squanto,
With Plymouth Rock and Columbus and Cortez,
They did all that stuff too, those colonists, those men of arms and God,
Except this time, they also had zombiepox.

The Indians began dying, which was mostly cool with the Europeans,
Since, hey, now the land's all theirs,
No need for muskets, for bayonets, for the armies with the pain and the hurting,
The armies of Europe, with cannon, and sergeants, and sieges,
And the really cool plumed hats on the halberdiers,
You know, the guys with the big axes who stand around the Pope?
Those guys. They're snappy dressers.
But the Europeans were happy, and praised God for striking down the pagan,
And Zeus, snickering Zeus, he was waiting for the punchline,
His punchline, which was about to alleviate millennia of boredom,
This punchline: those Indians weren't staying dead.

It happened slowly, starting here, then there; the Indians clawed their way forth,
Digging through dirt, through loam, through soil,
Or clawing their way out of the closet if the bodies were stored there,
And some of them were, because a lot of people died at once,
And you can't bury everyone at once, since digging a grave takes effort.
So the bodies piled up, and then a week later, they reanimated,
They started attacking friends and family alike, these denizens of the grave,
But don't forget, some were denizens of the closet.

The zombie plague spread, north to Canada, even though it wasn't called Canada,
And south to Paraguay, even though it wasn't called Paraguay,
But I, your humble narrator, have to amend this story to fit within your world,
Your narrow, preconceived notions of geography,
What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba?
And what do you know about how zombies define their lands?
But I digress; the point is, they all turned into zombies, and right quick.

These zombies were dangerous, to be sure, these grey-skinned zombies,
They would come at you and moan, and the first few people who saw them said,
"Hey, uh, um," and then they were eaten, devoured arm, leg and tenderloin,
Which is apparently a delicacy in the zombie world,
Especially since the zombies prefer steak tartar, and other raw foods.
These zombies, these grey-skinned zombies, this horde of the undead
Roamed the great plains of America, which, as you may recall,
Was named after the cabin boy, the snot-nosed cabin boy,
The dear cabin boy, America Americus.

The English fled in terror, as did the French, and the Spanish;
The Portuguese said "Holy shit," or the equivalent thereof in Portuguese -
Don't ask me, I don't speak Portuguese,
But the terror spread, and the colonies disbanded, even the Dutch,
The Europeans, the fair-cheeked and blonde-chinned Europeans fled,
And the zombies took over.

It wasn't a complete dealbreaker, though, as the Europeans kept at it,
They'd land, build a stockade, add some cannon, and start chopping down trees,
Diverting rivers, clearing land, and doing all the traditional colonial stuff,
But those zombies, those grey-skinned zombies, they came, and came, and kept coming,
And they'd eat the colonists, and damn, but that sucked.

The zombie plague, though, didn't affect the Europeans, which was part of Zeus' plan,
Mighty Zeus, cranky Zeus, his ineffable plan to bring some amusement to his life,
The plague only affected the natives, and it affected pretty much all of them,
Except for a few who isolated themselves completely, like the Incas,
Those mountain-dwelling Incas,
Up in Machu Picchu and Monte Cassino and those places,
They decided enough was enough, and cut off contact with the lowlanders,
Refusing to trade, refusing to travel,
Even refusing visitation rights, which pissed off more than a few divorced Incan parents.
They were pretty upset, which is understandable, but they got over it soon,
Pretty much at the same time they realized that everyone outside their village was a zombie,
And they gave up on shopping for Christmas gifts then,
Since, really, zombies won't care if you spend a lot of time picking out something nice,
Something with thought put into it, not just a random present, or a gift certificate,
Which is even more of a copout than America Americus,
That snot-nosed boy.

So colonization halted, and Europe was pretty pissed, both generally and individually,
As there were a lot of people who expected to get rich and quick,
Since their last get-rich-quick schemes failed to get them rich, let alone quickly,
And this one was going to pan out, but the damn dirty zombies fouled up the deal,
So voices were raised, and fists clenched, and vows made that
"Something Must Be Done!"
And something was indeed done, and laws were passed, laws by Parliament,
Laws mandated by kings and queens,
Laws prohibiting zombies from holding public office,
Those grey-skinned zombies,
Prohibiting them from being on the streets of London after dark,
The thought being that Londoners, clear-eyed and weapon-toting Londoners,
Would be able to identify zombies during daylight and take care of matters themselves,
Even though no zombies came back across the Atlantic,
Since the zombies, those grey-skinned zombies, despite their inhuman strength,
Their inexorable pace,
Their rancid odor,
The grey-skinned zombies could not swim,
And Europe breathed a sigh of relief.

Years passed, and decades, and centuries too, and the New World was left to the zombies,
And Zeus laughed, because that was a pretty good joke, wasn't it?
He figured the Europeans would eventually overcome the zombies, and that'd be fun to watch,
But it'd also be pretty fun if the zombies got back across the ocean,
The blue, whitecapped ocean, full of sharks and water,
More water than sharks, though,
And if the zombies could only get across the ocean, then he could have some real fun,
But why rush things?
Over two hundred and fifty years passed, and father begat son,
and son begat grandson,
And grandson begat great-granddaughter, who didn't want to marry,
but grandson was adamant,
So great-granddaughter married, and begat great-great-grandson,
and the circle of life went on.

Even in the Americas, life went on, despite the zombie plague,
Self-sufficient villages still existed, and defended themselves against zombie raids,
And every now and then, the plague would infect another village,
And more zombies were created.
These zombies, unfortunately, did not decay like an ordinary corpse,
A maggot-infested, bloated, stinking corpse,
Like the corpses you'd normally get from a dead person,
These grey-skinned zombies took decades to decompose,
And by the time one fell apart, more had been created,
Which sucked, too. A lot of things sucked.

The zombies, the grey-skinned zombies, they were the zombies of yore,
The zombies of Romero,
The zombies that can only be killed by destroying the brain,
The zombies that you, O modern audience, knows and loves,
Or maybe fears, depending,
Since some of you, O modern readers, have posited that the zombies,
The grey-skinned zombies,
The inexorable horde, have posited that they represent the
inevitability of life,
And of death,
In that no matter how far you run, how much you struggle,
You will die,
And then get eaten by zombies.
Or maybe not, if the zombies are a metaphor, you know,
But this could also tie into the argument that zombies,
The flesh-eating baby-crunching zombies,
That the zombies are not the true enemy,
That despite their ceaseless hunger and tireless pursuit,
People should fear other people, and not the zombie,
For what does the zombie know of good and evil?
What does the zombie know of jealousy, of rage?

Nada.

So maybe the zombies are analogous to the certainty of death,
Or maybe they're a powerful statement on the risks man poses to himself,
Or maybe it's all about the communists,
Like Invasion of the Body Snatchers, with the pointing and the screaming,
But that's not the point, O reader, for these zombies are just zombies,
With no social commentary,
Just millions and millions of zombies hungering for human flesh,
Sweet, juicy, succulent human flesh,
Full of vitamins and minerals, good for a growing body,
But the zombie bodies don't grow, and they don't need to eat,
But eat they do, and it's sucks when it happens.

Book II - In Which We Meet Our Hero, Jonathan Brewer,
Who Has Yet To Slay A Zombie

Jonathan Brewer, tall Jonathan, clean-shaven Jonathan, was a blacksmith,
And a son, and a brother, and maybe an uncle, but we went over that before,
He was a blacksmith, and that meant he could swing a mean hammer,
And you'll see later on how smashing a zombie skull with a hammer works darn well.
Jonathan, brown-eyed, unmarried, brave Jonathan, he was quite a catch,
And the women of London fluttered their eyelashes,
And dropped their handkerchiefs,
And shouted "Tuppence a roll, guvna!"
But Jonathan, steady Jonathan, he ignored their pleas, and continued with his work,
Being the devoted and conscientious man he was,
Even though he was a little intrigued by the last proposal,
But no! He was a man of honor and his word,
Even though he hadn't given his word to anyone lately,
He still was determined to stay chaste.

He owned a shop, a small smithy, where he pounded horseshoes,
And other metal implements, such as plows, and scythes,
And occasionally a chastity belt,
But not the ones with metal spikes everywhere,
Other than just that once, but that was a special occasion.
His smithy was quite ordinary, much the same as any other smithy in the city;
Glowing forge, buckets of water, anvil, leather apron, embalmed zombie in the corner,
Which was a family heirloom, you see,
The head was smashed in quite thoroughly, but the taxidermist did a great job,
The one over on Market Street, tell him Jonathan sent you, he'll treat you right,
But the heirloom zombie, the pallid, grey-skinned heirloom zombie, loomed ominously,
Watching over Jonathan day and night,
Haunting him,
Reminding him of his father's achievements.

You see, Jonathan's father, William, was quite the zombie slayer.

Jonathan looked up, brave Jonathan, doubting Jonathan, and saw his father's zombie,
With the smashed skull, and the ragged fingernails, and don't forget the grey skin,
And thought, what has he accomplished? What has he done?
By the time his father was twenty-five, he had slain dozens of zombies,
Rescued a few damsels,
And even saved truth, justice, and the American way,
Even though it wasn't the American way, but the British way, and we've gone over this before,
And Jonathan felt inadequate.
All he had done in his twenty-three years was live in London,
Apart from some vacations to the Continent,
Europe, that is, not the Dark Continent of Africa, nor the Zombie Continent of the Americas,
For it was known as the Zombie Continent, and romanticized,
Which is pretty hard to do, because, you know, zombies aren't romantic,
But adventurers and treasure-hunters dreamed of the vast riches in the Zombie Continent,
Especially in the vaults of the zombie Aztecs,
Those grey-skinned zombie Aztecs, the human-sacrificing Aztecs,
Even though human sacrifice didn't translate to zombie sacrifice,
And it didn't even stay as human sacrifice,
Since the zombies, the human-eating zombies, they had no society, no culture, no religion
Just imagine.

Jonathan looked up again, raising his eyes, looking at the zombie,
And thought again, what can he do? He's just one man, one lonely man,
Though one tall, and brave, and clean-shaven man,
And a man, not a zombie, not a grey-skinned undead ghoul,
Which he hates.
That is, he hates the grey-skinned undead ghoul,
Not that he's a man, which he loves pretty much,
Well, I guess he loves his humanity,
Which isn't that much to ask of someone who grew up in a world full of zombies,
Always scared by his mother, "Clean your plate or the zombies will get you!"
And the zombies in the closet (see above),
Which scared the children of Europe,
The snot-nosed children of Europe,
And the idea of the zombie entered the popular consciousness.

By this time, all of the Europeans, the blonde-throated Europeans,
They knew of the zombies; after all, it had been a couple dozen decades,
Or a dozen score years,
Either way, people were used to them, despite the occasional scare,
And it was reflected in the styles of the day;
Shakespeare, floppy-hatted Shakespeare, bearded-chinned Shakespeare,
Even wrote of the zombies, not in his major plays, no,
But in his lesser plays, or his minor plays, actually, his bad plays,
Such as Zombiolanus, or The Merry Zombies of Windsor,
And the people of London, the long-necked people of London,
They attended his plays, and clapped, and dreamed of stringing up the zombie,
Even though hanging wouldn't kill a zombie,
It'd be therapeutic in the least.
Plus, the Londoners, the Thame-rivered Londoners, they could bludgeon a hanging zombie,
The hanging grey-skinned zombie,
They could bludgeon the zombie with a truncheon,
Or a bludgeon,
Or a bludgeoning truncheon,
Or any of the wide varieties of blunt weapons,
And it'd feel real good to bash that zombie.

But back to Jonathan, free-of-stubble Jonathan, he looked at that zombie a third time,
The stuffed zombie, the one above the mantle, not the one hanging in the town square,
And thought, how can he justify his existence? How can he live up to his father's example?
He cried, "Am i really important?"
And he used a lower-case I, you see, so, uh, he's really wrestling with the issue.
"What is the meaning of my life," asked Jonathan, in his smithy, surrounded by his life,
"Am I to do nothing more than make horseshoes, and plows, and scythes,
And the occasional chastity belt, the one with the metal spikes, but just that once?"
Falling to his knees, his firm, muscled knees, he put his head in his hands and sobbed,
For he had never slain a zombie,
Nor enjoyed the love of a good woman,
Nor slain a woman,
Nor enjoyed the love of a good zombie,
And growing up alone in London, well, it made a guy curious, and people talked,
And yeah, he experimented when he was in school, but so did everyone,
So Jonathan, aquiline-nosed Jonathan, sobbed.

Zeus, mighty Zeus, slightly less bored Zeus snickered from his mountaintop,
Because for no particular reason he had his eye on Jonathan,
Jonathan, the blacksmith of London, the descendant of the zombieslayer,
Well, maybe he had a particular reason, but Zeus wasn't about to share it,
Since he's a god, after all, even if he's only a Greek god,
Jealous and fallible, not omnipotent and omniscient,
But he was still a pretty cool guy, and could see a lot from up there,
And he saw Jonathan, stiff-backed Jonathan, and knew he was destined for greatness,
Not the greatness of a mass murderer,
Well, maybe the greatness of a mass murderer, if you count zombies,
Since before he died, Jonathan would kill more than his share,
Which could count as a mass murderer,
After all, that saying goes, kill one and you're a murderer,
Kill a thousand and you're a conqueror,
Kill a million and you're a god,
So I guess kill between one and one thousand and you're a mass murderer,
And Jonathan, soon-to-be zombie-slaying Jonathan,
He probably killed several hundred zombies in his lifetime,
So I guess he was destined for the greatness of a mass murderer after all,
And Zeus knew that.

As brown-eyed Jonathan sobbed, misty-minded Margaret Wells neared his shop,
Heard his sobbing, and thought, "Lo, is that strong-thewed Jonathan,
The blacksmith, the guy who has a thing for zombie women,
Which is kind of creepy, but maybe it's just a rumor,
Is that him, crying in his shop?" Long-haired Margaret, blonde-haired,
Blonde-haired like the Europeans spoken of before,
Since, coincidentally, as a Londoner,
She was also a European, and thus blonde-skinned and fair-livered,
Or something like that.

Margaret, misty-minded Margaret, she was a woman of no mean means,
Her father had passed, and her mother, and her brother, too,
Who was kind enough to make a fortune and die without an heir,
So she was pretty filthy rich, and boy, did she like it,
And misty-minded though she may be, she was wise sometimes,
Wise enough to see that her inheritance was not infinite,
That her investments, though wise, as wise as grey-eyed Athena,
Not grey-skinned zombies, mind you,
Her investments would not be enough to support her,
And since she still had her youth and her beauty,
Which, compared to the rest of the Londoners, and especially to zombies,
Was pretty impressive,
But then, it's not hard to look good when the competition is a ghoul,
Or has been eaten by a ghoul,
Regardless, she was determined to land herself a husband,
Preferably a rich, handsome husband,
Someone who could support her way of life,
Not that she was shallow, no, she'd marry for love,
Romantic love, platonic love, any kind of love, really,
As long as the guy still had money, piles and piles of money,
Yet the insightful observer will see that she's not marrying for money,
But for a shitload of money.

Jonathan, hammer-swinging Jonathan, he didn't have a shitload of money,
Not even a fuckton of money, but he had enough to get by, and live comfortably,
Which was good enough for him, but Margaret, dear, sweet, gold-digging Margaret,
That wasn't good enough for her, nowhere near, but I'm making her sound bad,
And she wasn't really all that bad, she just knew what she wanted,
And she wanted a rich husband, which Jonathan could never be,
But Jonathan knew people, and those people knew people,
And why would she close off those avenues when she needed to network,
After all, once she was rich, she could dump him like a bad habit,
But he didn't know that, and she didn't bother to tell anyone,
So they were pretty good friends.

Steeling herself to the sight of the stuffed zombie,
To the heirloom zombie on the wall of the smithy,
Which was pretty weird if you asked around, but no one really said too much,
Since William Brewer was a renowned zombie killer,
And it makes good business sense to advertise that in a semi-literate society,
Kind of like hanging out a shingle to advertise a law practice,
And since hanging out a zombie would only invite vandalism,
The heirloom zombie stayed inside, out of sight, out of mind,
Except for the people who entered the smithy,
At which point it became very much in sight, and in mind,
And that started to verge on creepiness.

Steeling herself again, since she did it a moment ago and then did nothing,
She entered the smithy, carefully avoiding the sight of the zombie,
The grey-skinned stuffed zombie, courtesy of the taxidermist on Market Street,
Who was really a nice mensch, he also ran a great deli,
But that's still beside the point,
The point being, Margaret looked away from the zombie,
And looked straight at Jonathan,
Tall, brown-eyed, snot-nosed Jonathan, clad in leather apron,
Hammer in hand,
Soon to be a zombie-smashing hammer, but neither of them knew that,
And Zeus may have known, but he wasn't telling anyone,
Especially not Margaret, who stood before Jonathan, and said,
"So, have you ever killed a zombie in the pale moonlight?"

Jonathan stood speechless.

"I always ask that of all my prospective husbands," misty-minded Margaret said,
Tossing her hair casually, almost flirtatiously,
But certainly not flirtatiously, since Jonathan wasn't rich,
She tossed her hair anyway, and Jonathan, tall, brown-eyed Jonathan,
He looked at brown-nosing Margaret, and said,
"What the living hell?"

Margaret, coarse-corsetted Margaret, sighed and stared,
Thinking, and with her verbose verbosity, said,
"You bloody idiot."

"Takes one to know one," retorted Jonathan,
Well-educated, well-bred Jonathan,
And yes, that was a little sarcastic, but only a little,
Since he was pretty well-bred, not noble in any sense of the term,
Well, I guess he acted noble, but not like nobility, in that he was a good guy,
Fed ducks, and gave money to charity and all that, but he wasn't upper class,
And his education was pretty good, but left some to be desired,
Since, after all, he was a blacksmith, and the son of a zombie slayer,
A famed zombie slayer,
A zombie slayer for the ages,
But he was a pretty ordinary guy,
So I wasn't all that sarcastic.

Margaret sighed again, and stared again, and with just as much verbosity,
The verbose verbosity of before,
Said, "I am looking for a man who can hunt zombies,"
But she used fewer words than that,
Even though I used that many to describe what she said, and could have used fewer,
But I'm trying to be descriptive here.

"A man who can hunt zombies," Jonathan repeated, and involuntarily,
Though with voluntary muscles, not the involuntary ones that control breathing,
And digestion,
And certain aspects of the male anatomy, which really is involuntary,
Despite what some women think,
Those nasty, shrieking harpies,
Not that your humble narrator is bitter, but c'mon, it's got a mind of its own,
And so with voluntary muscles but without conscious thought,
Jonathan looked up at the stuffed zombie,
And realized she meant him.

Margaret, impatient Margaret, sighed thrice,
"Yes," she said, omitting the obvious "You fool",
"Yes, I need a man who can hunt zombies, and since your father is dead,"
She said, crossing herself,
"God rest his soul, I come to you."

Jonathan looked around at his smithy, his life, his livelihood,
Looked at the zombie heirloom,
Looked at the hammer in his hand which was soon to smash some zombie skulls,
Though neither of them knew it,
Thought about his life in London, thought about his father,
Who disappeared mysteriously, and without a trace,
And was generally assumed dead,
Since zombie hunters who disappear generally are devoured and eaten,
And zombies don't leave too many traces,
He thought, and wondered what his father would have thought of him,
Whether he should leave his shop, and everything he knew,
And hunt zombies,
Those grey-skinned zombies,
Those unnatural ghouls,
Which kind of reminded him of Methodists, but that's beside the point,
And said,
"Uh, okay."

Book III - In Which A Zombie Mysteriously Attacks Jonathan On The Streets of London,
Which Normally Are Free of Zombies, And Thus It Is A Mysterious Attack,
And Not A Regular Attack, Which Would Be Expected By Thugs Or Ruffians,
And Not Zombies,
Which Are Mysterious

And lo, Jonathan, mighty-armed Jonathan, though he was of lean and hungry stature,
Since he hadn't had lunch, or breakfast, or elevensies,
And he had recently seen Julius Caesar, which featured the great speech of Marc Antony,
"I come to decapitate Caesar, not to bury him,
For the evil that men do live after them, especially if they're zombies,
While the decapitated are oft interr'd with their bones,
So let it be with Caesar,"
And yon Cassius had a lean and hungry look,
Though Jonathan just had a lean and hungry stature,
Which you probably have a good idea of by now,
Lo, Jonathan, mighty-armed Jonathan, stepped forth from his shop into the street,
The street of London,
Filled with Londoners,
Both alive and dead alike,
But mostly the alive ones,
In that the dead ones were in the occasional hearse, being taken to the cemetery,
Or the Thames for cheap dumping, depending on the cost of the funeral,
But fortunately, no undead, which meant no zombies,
Since they couldn't cross the Atlantic, as everyone knew,
And as Jonathan and Margaret both knew,
So it was kind of a surprise when a zombie lurched out of the shadows.

Lurched, the zombie did, with shambling, hesitant steps,
Not the Olympic sprinting zombie with which you, dear reader, may be familiar,
Not that the Londoners knew of the Olympics,
Well, they knew of the ancient Olympics, as they were all educated in the classics,
Moliere, Sartre, Blanc,
(They were all dead by then, right?)
But they didn't know of the modern Olympics,
And they certainly had no concept of a sprinting zombie,
But you do, and the point is, this zombie didn't sprint.

It lurched again, coming forward, slowly, steadily, almost off-balance,
Since did you know that a walk, a steady walk, is really nothing more than a controlled fall?
Zombies and humans alike fall forward, and only by virtue of their other foot,
Their glorious other foot,
Do they maintain their balance and proceed in a forward direction,
But the zombies do it a lot slower, since they're the risen dead,
Not to be mistaken with the risen Lord,
And oh boy, were there some theological ramifications of the living dead,
But that's for a later chapter.

So the zombie advanced, and Margaret screamed and clutched Jonathan's arm,
His right arm, his hammer arm,
Which meant he could not swing his hammer,
His soon-to-be zombie slaying hammer,
And he was pretty annoyed at that,
So Jonathan, brave Jonathan, despite the stream of urine running down his pants,
He cast wispy Margaret aside, stood before her, and boldly declared,
"You, sir!" pointing his hammer at the encroaching zombie,
"I demand you make your intentions known!"

The zombie stepped forward again, resolute, determined,
And moaned with vacant eyes,
Dead eyes,
Eyes that couldn't quite focus on Jonathan,
Which reminded him of that last night at the pub,
Which was pretty fun; there was this great girl there, and if you got her drunk,
Well-

Jonathan's reverie was interrupted by another scream,
And his breeding came to the fore,
Eugenics, though he be unaware,
His father's zombie-slaying genes,
And he swung his hammer, his mighty hammer, connecting solidly with the zombie,
The grey-skinned zombie,
Connecting solidly with the zombie's arm,
And he triumphantly shouted, "Ha-HA!"
Yet the zombie advanced,
And his triumphant shout faded,
While Margaret screamed, "The head! Hit the head!"

"Uh, right!" he quickly replied, and swung the hammer again,
Aiming at the zombie's temple,
That is, the temple by his forehead, as opposed to a religious structure,
Since, as discussed before, the zombies had no religion;
It was back up around the Aztecs if you want to check.

The hammer arced through the air, soaring, flying on wings of angels,
Or arms of blacksmiths,
And crunched into the zombie, shattering bone, splintering brain,
And squirting some goo onto Margaret, who, in her typical style,
Screamed again, this time something about incompetence,
How heroes aren't supposed to get zombie goo on the leading ladies,
Even though Margaret wasn't really the leading lady,
Despite her protests.

The zombie collapsed,
The grey-skinned, skull-caved zombie,
And Jonathan exulted in his triumph, for he was now a zombie slayer,
A position of some distinction in society,
For most zombie slayers were adventurers, jacks-of-all-trades,
Men who traveled to the Americas to prove themselves,
To be the first kid on their block with a confirmed kill,
Bold men, brave men,
Men with a fatality rate approaching that of, of,
Of something that dies really fast,
Because these amateur zombie slayers died really fast,
And those who lived, those who slayed zombies and returned to tell the tale,
They were pretty cool, and kids looked up to them,
And men bought them rounds at the pub, but they didn't have triumphal parades,
Which pissed some of them off,
Especially those who recently saw a performance of Julius Caesar,
And had their minds full of glories, of laurel wreaths, of riding in chariots,
Even though the guy whispering, "Remember, thou art mortal," would get old,
It'd still be pretty cool,
But zombie slayers didn't get those, and so, neither did Jonathan.

He still killed his first zombie, his first grey-skinned zombie,
And he was pretty damn proud of himself, and he preened,
Just a little,
Then a little more,
And he strutted around a bit,
In circles around the zombie, the dead zombie,
Well, the dead-again zombie, this time it was really dead,
Since the brain was destroyed, and that was the key part of slaying zombies,
Or you could burn them, but until the brain burned up, you had a zombie torch,
Running around, moaning, setting other things on fire,
And scaring the cat,
So it generally was more preferable to just bash their heads,
Or shoot them,
Or decapitate them,
Or other creative ways, but there you have it,
Jonathan Brewer killed a zombie.

Margaret, goo-splattered Margaret, got to her feet,
Brushed away the bits of zombie, of hammer-smashed zombie,
And looked sternly at Jonathan,
And said, in a firm voice,
"I fully expect you to do better than that when we get to America,"
For, as she was about to say, they were headed to the New World,
"For, you see," she said, "We are headed to the New World,
And I shall pay you well for your aid,
And you shall kill many zombies,
And grow famous,
And write a book,
And live off the proceeds,
But not live well enough for me to consider you as a husband,
So don't get your hopes up."

Jonathan shrugged, and wiped the head of his hammer,
His zombie-smashing hammer,
On the ragged clothes of the zombie at his feet,
The zombie that he had just smashed,
The zombie that probably would have killed itself,
Had it listened to Margaret's verbose verbosity for any length of time;
Jonathan, on the other hand, was used to her, and shrugged it off,
And shrugged a third time;
Departing to the New World would be a big step in his career,
He'd have to close his shop, of course,
He had no apprentice, and he rarely spoke to his siblings,
Or his nephews or nieces, if applicable, of whom he was unaware,
Again, see above.

He stood, hammer in hand, pondering his career options,
Of whether to stay in London and pound things with his hammer,
Or go to the Americas and pound things with his hammer,
But in London, the things he pounded generally didn't try to eat him,
Whereas in America, the things he pounded probably would try to eat him,
And that could be considered a dealbreaker for some people,
Specifically those people who don't like to be eaten,
Not that Jonathan was a big fan of it,
Being eaten and all,
But considering his father, and the pressure put upon himself,
Not only by himself but by society, since you know, people talked,
"Isn't that the son of William Brewer," they'd say, "the famous zombie hunter?
And he's just a blacksmith," they'd tsk behind their hands,
And Jonathan wouldn't be famous, and would die alone and unloved,
Except for the mechanical woman he was building,
But if he went to the Americas, there may be real women there,
And come to think of it, Margaret was a real woman,
But she just told him not to get his hopes up, so he dropped that line of thought,
And went back to thinking about being eaten by zombies,
And how that would suck,
And about smashing zombies with his hammer,
And how that would rock,
And he hummed to himself,
"If I had a hammer,
I'd hammer zombies in the morning,
I'd hammer zombies in the evening,
All over this land,"
And that decided it. He had his theme song, he had his hammer,
He was going to be a zombie hunter.

Book IV - In Which Margaret Explains Herself To Jonathan,
Who Didn't Really Pay Attention, Since He Was Still Happy About Killing A Zombie

Jonathan, Jonathan zombie-slayer, Jonathan the blacksmith,
Jonathan who suddenly wondered if he locked his shop,
Was on a boat, or was it a ship,
He didn't really know, he wasn't a nautical guy,
Even though he made various iron implements for a ship,
Or maybe for boats;
Either way, he was on board and under way,
With Margaret, moneyed Margaret, who spoke with honeyed words,
With words such as, "I'll give you a lot of money,"
And, "You'll be famous,"
And, "Put your pants back on,"
Which was really all because of a misunderstanding, heh, he could explain,
But she didn't want to hear it,
And he put them back on anyway, since she was financing the voyage,
And why rock the boat,
Or maybe ship.

The waves crested, the water roared, the sea dragons stayed hidden,
Thanks to the rock in Jonathan's shoe which he purchased,
Purchased from a traveling salesman,
A salesman of various and sundry goods, and services,
Though Jonathan didn't inquire as to the services,
But one of the goods caught his eye, that of a magic rock,
A rock that would keep away sea dragons;
He was skeptical at first, of course, as all rational men are,
Educated in the classics, he knew his Greek, and his Latin,
And knew that the hoi polloi were persona non grata,
Even though he sometimes mixed his Latin and his Greek,
And even though 'hoi' was the definite article anyway, he didn't need the 'the',
But that goes to show that he wasn't all that smart,
Though he was pretty smart,
So he was skeptical about the rock, and asked for a demonstration,
And the salesman, the traveling salesman, the wandering salesman,
Clad in clothes, like most salesmen, and most men in general,
The salesman said, "Well, do you see any sea dragons about?"
And Jonathan was convinced, so he bought the rock, and put it in his boot,
Figuring that was the best place to keep it,
Since a stone in the boot would keep one awake,
And he figured he needed to stay awake to fight zombies;
This made perfect sense to him.

Margaret stood next to him on the deck,
The swaying, wooden deck, the deck covered with vomitus of seasick sailors,
And seasick blacksmiths, of which there was at least one on board,
Meaning Jonathan, who wasn't feeling all that well,
And the stone in his boot bothered him,
And he still wondered if he locked the door to his shop,
And whether everything would be stolen by the time he got home,
If he got home,
And he dwelled on being eaten by zombies,
Or being captured by zombies and then being eaten,
Or being abandoned and eaten,
And he began to wonder, just what was that zombie doing in London,
And why was he going to the Americas with just a rich woman,
Though he had his hammer, his zombie-slaying hammer,
What the hell was going on?

Margaret stood next to him again, or maybe it was the same time,
Since it's hard to delineate when one stops and starts standing,
If one does nothing but stand,
Which she was doing, while Jonathan pondered,
On the nature of things,
De rerum natura,
Though he had never read Lucretius, but he heard of it,
And he pondered on zombies,
And she stood, which was the important thing,
And said,
"So I guess you're wondering what the hell was going on,
And what that zombie was doing in London,
And such,"
In reply, Jonathan looked at her, raised one eyebrow,
And said,
"Uh, yeah."

This, dear reader, is exposition,
In which I retell what Margaret tells Jonathan at this time,
Distilling it, crystallizing it,
Presenting the crux of the issue,
That being, there were a lot of zombies around,
Which everyone knows, but that's how she started,
Thinking that she'd start slow and build on that,
So she said there were a lot of zombies, and Jonathan nodded,
Since there had been a lot of zombies for well over two hundred years,
And it was pretty obvious.

Margaret explained that she needed a slayer,
A zombie slayer, to slay the zombies,
The grey-skinned zombies, the hordes of the underworld,
The stalkers of the night, the eaters of baby kittens,
And that an army would be much better, but she couldn't afford that,
Not if she wanted to support herself while she looked for a husband,
And a bodyguard would work just as well,
A brave, hammer-wielding bodyguard,
Preferably someone who had already killed a lot of zombies,
But those guys were expensive too,
So she picked Jonathan,
And nodded her head firmly.

"Uh, okay," Jonathan said with his usual determination,
His usual fierceness,
And didn't say what was really on his mind, since he wanted this job,
He didn't say that he was still unsure about why the two of them,
Strong-jawed Jonathan and thin-necked Margaret,
Why the two of them were going to the Americas,
Where there were zombies, a lot of zombies,
And just what she had in mind.

Before Margaret explained, I must explain,
Well, actually, this is well after she explained, but before you hear,
Before you hear her explanation, hear this:
This is written in dactylic hexameter,
Dactyls being a metrical foot of a stressed syllable,
Followed by an unstressed,
And then another,
Like camouflage,
Or holiday,
Or zombieking,
If that were a word,
But the point is, each of these lines is really made up of six feet,
Six metrical feet,
Each foot being a dactyl,
And if it doesn't look like that to you, blame the translator,
Who may have taken some liberties with the original text,
Sort of like Fitzgerald versus Dryden, in their translations of the Aeneid,
Fitzgerald, the looser, Dryden, the shoehorned heroic verse,
Dryden, who forced an English rhyme into every couplet,
Because the Latin prose rhymed,
Fortunately, this doesn't, so I'd be surprised if the translation,
The translation which you are reading, the translation before your eyes,
If this very translation is made up of rhyming couplets,
Though it wouldn't surprise me if the dactyls are long gone,
La da da, like that.

So Margaret, moneyed Margaret, misty-minded Margaret,
Margaret of the coarse corset, and the blonde liver,
She started talking about that zombie in London,
Which got Jonathan's attention, since, as he well knew,
There aren't any zombies in London,
Especially since there are laws against them,
Such as the laws prohibiting zombies from gathering in public places,
Or operating printing presses,
And so the zombie attack was a big surprise,
So Jonathan listened, and Margaret explained,
And said that she thought someone was trying to kill her,
Possibly by using a zombie,
Which on the surface seemed overly complex, since even this London,
This counterfactual London,
Still had thugs willing to kill for money, and to use a zombie for this,
A grey-skinned zombie,
Didn't make much sense.

Jonathan took this in, strong-toothed Jonathan, holding his hammer,
Briefly thinking about cutting a notch in the handle for each zombie,
Then discarding that idea, as he planned to kill a lot of zombies,
And a notch for each would destroy the handle,
The aged wood handle,
And leave him nothing but the head of the hammer,
Which wouldn't be that useful, heavy though it may be,
Since the handle is equally important when it comes to bashing zombies,
And to Zeus, mighty Zeus, who was still watching and waiting,
He thought that Jonathan made a good choice,
For Zeus knew that Jonathan was to slay many zombies,
Those zombies of the Americas,
And he'd need that hammer.

Hefting his hammer, he hmmed halliteratively,
Thought about the use of zombies as assassins,
Evaluating the difficulty of importing one from overseas,
And setting it loose in the streets of London,
The twisty little streets, all alike,
And about the problems of controlling a zombie,
Since they can't be controlled,
Or can they?

Margaret continued her explanation,
Her exposition, her telling of her tale,
And she began to drift into a few tangents,
Talking about her family, her brother,
Her father, and how he was an honorable businessman,
Never would do anything corrupt,
The only things under the table would be his legs,
And his feet, unless he propped them up on a chair,
And the rumors she heard about shady deals of his,
Why, those must have been started by a jilted associate,
Or someone who got the raw end of a deal,
A fair deal, she insisted, considering her father,
But all of those rumors,
And there were a lot of them,
Were just damned dirty lies.

But, well, she continued to explain,
And remember, this isn't verbatim,
She said that maybe there was a little truth to that,
That possibly, just possibly, her father had maybe bent a rule,
Just a little, or something equally minor,
That was just blown out of proportion, that's all it was,
Just a misunderstanding,
Yet Jonathan read between the lines,
Even though she was speaking, and not writing,
And began to deduce that maybe there was a problem with her father,
Her deceased father, who was wealthy, remember,
And maybe that problem carried over to her,
Which might explain that zombie in London;
Actually, it would explain an attempt on her life,
But it still wouldn't explain a zombie,
And he was involved, too, since he killed that zombie,
Which still gave him no small measure of pride,
But whoever sent that zombie, assuming someone did,
Would be pretty annoyed that he bashed its head in,
So he shuffled his feet and hid his hammer behind his back,
Just in case.

The ship sailed, the wind blew, the sails snapped in the breeze,
And Jonathan realized that maybe Margaret wasn't telling him everything,
That maybe there was something more to this than just killing zombies,
But considering that was all he was hired to do,
He was okay with it, and looked at Margaret,
Morose Margaret, who, don't forget, was a Londoner,
And a European,
With all the attributes apportioned thereunto,
So he said, "Uh, so, about the zombies,"
And was pretty proud about the skillful segue,
Even though it was pretty awkward.

"The zombies," she repeated, staring into the sea,
"The zombies, my father, business deals, sweet Lord, Jonathan,"
She continued,
"Jonathan, zombie-slaying Jonathan, I can't tell you everything,
For what if the zombies captured you,
With their clawing hands, and their fetid breath,
And made you talk? What then?" she asked,
Implying that he may crack under torture.

Indignantly he denied that, saying, "No!" and "Of course not!"
Also "Poppycock!" and then he giggled because he said cock,
And completely ignored the absurdity of zombies capturing someone,
Instead of eating them,
As zombies tend to do, quickly and ravenously
And he fell for her diversion, hook, line, and sinker,
Which gave her reason to grin, and keep all of the details to herself.

And time passed, and Margaret and Jonathan stood next to each other,
In the manner of two things that are near one another,
Like bookends on a bookcase, with no books between them,
But a little closer than that,
And she thought about her father, and what he had really done,
And since we're in her mind right now, we get to find out,
But remember, Jonathan is still blissfully unaware,
And blissful he is,
Dear, sweet Jonathan,
Playing with his hammer,
And humming his theme song,
While Margaret thought about her father,
And his involvement in a Haitian voodoo cult,
His funding of it, with his vast riches,
Riches that Margaret has inherited, and invested,
Riches on which she relies until she finds a husband,
But back to her father -- her father's riches,
The falling out he had with the founders of the cult,
His mysterious disappearance,
And then the zombie that attacked her and Jonathan in London;
It all started to come together.

Maybe, Margaret had thought, maybe in America, she can find an answer,
A good answer, too, one that will satisfy her,
Once that will put to rest all of the questions about her father,
About the Haitian voodoo cult,
About zombies, especially about zombies in London,
And about Jonathan, humming his theme song;
She watched the waves, and the clouds, and wondered just what the hell she was doing.

Book V - A Flashback, In Which Your Narrator Recounts The Events Of Margaret's Father,
His Business Dealings, His Coworkers, His Investments,
And The Haitian Voodoo Cult,
Can't Forget That

In this chapter, dear audience,
Audience of mine, audience reading this,
Or hearing this, if it's recited,
Or being subjected to this work in another format or medium,
Dear audience, this chapter will explain the history of Margaret Wells,
And her father, Herbert,
And what happened to him, and what happened to her,
And how the zombies got involved.

Herbert, honorable Herbert, was a merchant,
A man of business,
A man about town,
The town being London, and sometimes Paris, too,
And occasionally the few towns in the Caribbean,
On those islands that were cleared of zombies, those small islands,
The islands that would be great resort destinations,
If only there weren't zombies in the hemisphere;
He was a pretty rich guy.

He had a business, Herbert did,
A business involving importing goods,
And exporting goods,
And moving goods from one place to another,
Buying low, selling high,
Moving certain goods that may have happened to be legal in one place,
And illegal in another place,
But that was just on the side, really,
And he was a legitimate businessman;
After all, everyone with an import/export business is.
Couldn't be a front, no.

Herbert grew wealthy,
Wealthy like a businessman who has shady dealings,
Who smuggles things out of sight, out of mind,
Things like crown jewels,
Or criminals,
Or zombies,
Well, we'll get into that in a moment,
But he'd smuggle what it took to earn more cash,
Though he wouldn't tell his family, no,
They considered him a very honorable man,
A man above reproach,
A man who would never smuggle a zombie,
A grey-skinned zombie,
Telling themselves that their father played with puppies,
And fed ducks.

His business was innocent at first,
His ships carried legitimate cargo,
Really legitimate, that is, not "legitimate",
Like "legitimate business" above,
He was honest and carefree, and his soul soared,
On wings of eagles, on arms of blacksmiths,
He was wealthy, but not that wealthy,
And when someone asked him to smuggle this one tiny thing for him,
Just that once,
He began to have second thoughts about being honest,
And to have third and fourth thoughts about getting really rich,
Stinking filthy rich.

So Herbert smuggled one tiny thing, just that once,
And got paid pretty well for it, too,
Paid like people get paid for doing little things for criminal organizations,
Who try to hook people early, and then blackmail them into doing other things,
Which is pretty much what happened to Herbert;
He smuggled this, he smuggled that,
He smuggled a knick and a knack and a paddy whack,
But after smuggling a crate of stolen shillelaghs to Ireland,
His conscience began to nag at him,
Considering he was newly married, and had some children,
A son and a daughter,
And the astute observer will deduce that the daughter is Margaret,
Whom we have already met.

With a nagging conscience, Herbert told the criminal organization he was done,
He didn't want to smuggle any more,
He was done, he was out, he was going straight,
But that didn't really work out,
As can be expected,
And the mob made him a deal he couldn't refuse,
That being,
Keep working for them,
Or they'd kill him and his family,
And after he thought that over, he realized that there was a good side to the deal,
And a bad side,
The good side being, if he kept working for them, he'd stay alive,
And the bad side being, if he stopped working, he'd die,
Which would suck,
Considering he had no plans for death,
And had plans to go bowling the following weekend.

Thus Herbert didn't clear his name,
As he had intended,
Since clearing his name would broaden his horizons,
Allow him to do things,
Things like, not being hanged,
And not being jailed,
So those things had to go on the back burner,
On the to-do list,
And he kept himself busy with other matters,
Matters like smuggling contraband,
Moving things in and out of London,
And praying his family would never find out.

He laundered his money, cleaning it,
That is, by routing it through various other businesses,
Amending the books, playing with accounting,
And not actually physically washing the money,
As the joke is often made,
And this money was willed to his children, and given to them as gifts,
Dodging inheritance taxes, and setting them up for life,
Everybody wins, he thought,
Well, except him, if he's caught,
And his family, by extension; their money would be forfeit too,
So maybe once administration steps in, nobody wins,
And the whole smuggling thing may have been a bad call,
But that became moot,
Since some people became dead.

The dead people were alive first,
In that they were people, and not zombies,
Since it was still linguistically unclear whether zombies were alive,
And whether you could kill them,
Or if they were already dead,
And you just ... killed them again,
But the point, here, is that real people died,
And the criminal organization got a little antsy,
Worried, too, concerned that the authorities would catch onto them,
Considering that some of the dead people were found in the streets of London,
Which tends to draw attention,
Even in the London of that day.

The mob worried, and anguished, and angsted,
But not the typical teenage angst, with the white facepaint and the bad poetry,
"I am Azrael Lord of the Underworld,
My pain is eternal, and unappreciated,
I suffer in blackness,
I, too, cry,"
Not that angst, but the angst of the criminal,
Concerned that he may be caught,
May be punished,
May no longer have the disposable income for hookers and opium.

Herbert got a little nervous, too,
Given that the criminal organization was nervous,
And when momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy,
So he began looking even more for an out, for a way to get free of this,
And his gaze,
His figurative gaze, he wasn't literally looking at this at the time,
His gaze fell upon a group of worshippers in the New World,
A small religion, but growing,
A religion that offered salvation,
Not salvation of the soul, but salvation for his dilemma,
A religion that preached the purpose of a man is to love a woman,
And the purpose of a woman is to love a man,
And the purpose of a zombie is to eat brains,
It was a Haitian voodoo cult.

It started long ago, in the island of Hispaniola,
Where a priest turned to a priestess,
And said,
"Come on, baby, let's start to make,
Come on baby, let's make some zombies, oh yeah, oh yeah,
Make some zombies with all your might, yeah, yeah,"
Or something to that extent.

In Herbert's eyes, in his still-living eyes, in his non-zombie eyes,
He considered his options,
Those being, one, stay with the mob, which was getting unpredictable,
More so than it already was, since they were the mob and all,
Or two, the enemy of his enemy is his friend,
And to try to get in good with the cult,
And use them for protection,
Or manipulate them against the mob,
Or something, damnit, he was thinking on his feet here,
But one way or another, he was going to come out of this smelling like roses,
Like fresh, sweet-smelling roses, not the roses that stink,
Since a rose by any other name would still smell as sweet,
I guess he'd come out of this smelling like roses anyway,
That is, assuming his determination was enough,
And he sure hoped it was.

The Haitian voodoo cult was small at the time, but growing,
Gaining in worshippers, not just in zombies,
And the key part about this cult is that their religion incorporated zombies,
The zombies of the Americas,
It was probably a theological offshoot of premature Rapture theology,
And some itinerant preacher claiming that the end times had come,
That the dead would rise from the graves and ascend to heaven,
And that the trials and tribulations foretold,
Foretold in the Revelations of St John the Divine,
That the pain and anguish was here,
And the zombies walking the earth were an indication of this,
And some people bought it, since, well, it made some amount of sense,
And the cult grew.

What people didn't know, though,
Actually, some people knew, these were the people in the upper echelons of the cult,
Since they tend to know what's going on in cults, and so on,
What people didn't know, except for the people who knew,
Was that the cult had spent a great deal of time investigating zombies,
And researching them,
Determining just what it was that caused zombies to rise from the grave,
Or from the closet,
And though they had no concept of germ theory,
What with their poor optical equipment,
They could tell that Europeans weren't zombies,
And the natives of America were,
And maybe there was something to this;
They captured natives who were not infected,
And deliberately infected them, turning them into zombies,
Seeing what knowledge a zombie retained,
Learning what knowledge a zombie could learn,
And not much in either case, they determined.

Their zombie labs, their underground zombie labs,
Both underground in the sense of hidden from the public eye,
And physically below sea level,
Their zombie research continued unabated,
And the occasional breakthrough happened,
Such as a native that was immune to the zombie plague, despite exposure,
Despite repeated exposure, such as having him shake hands with a zombie,
A grey-skinned zombie,
Which didn't shake hands as much as stretch its arms to the native's neck,
And try to eat him,
Which the voodoo cultists strictly prohibited, since the native,
The immune native,
Was pretty unique and they wanted to keep him alive.
This guy's important, remember him, we'll get back to him later.

These cultists, these priests and priestesses,
These Haitian voodoo adherents and aficionados,
They were pretty scientific, by the standards of their day,
In their investigations of the zombie plague,
Investigating the onset of the disease, the duration of infection,
Contagion, death, and rising again, sometimes on the third day,
And in retrospect, they were a damned evil bunch,
What with their deliberate infection of natives,
And their regular creation of zombies,
But from Herbert's perspective,
Since he didn't know too much about the zombie stuff,
He just knew that the mob didn't like the cult,
From his perspective, his rather distant perspective,
They seemed like a good organization to counter the mob,
And he threw in his lot with them.

The voodoo cult, the Haitian zombie cult,
They could use a good English smuggler,
A man with nothing to lose and everything to gain,
Or so he told them; he actually had a lot to lose,
His money, his home, his wife, his children,
Everything the mob threatened to take away from him,
But the cult didn't need to know that, or so he said,
And his lot was thrown in with them.

Herbert, honorable Herbert, well, mostly honorable,
Honorable in his own mind,
Except for the stuff that wasn't, but he didn't dwell on that,
Since there was no point in it,
And, after all, he was rejecting that, turning against it,
Didn't that make him a better person,
Being someone who was tested by evil, who was tempted,
And who ultimately rejected it,
Wasn't that person stronger, more moral, better
Than a person who was never tested at all?
Wasn't rejection of temptation better than lack of temptation?
But then, Herbert thought, isn't temptation by its definition,
It's very definition,
A taint on something otherwise pure,
And that someone who has never been tested, a blissful innocent,
Wouldn't their faith be stronger, Herbert thought?

Herbert dwelled on that, on the philosophical question,
And it stayed in the back of his mind,
But he joined the cultists anyway,
Not telling the mob, of course,
Since they'd do something awful to him, and his family,
Maybe feed them to the sharks,
Or even to the Methodists,
And he worked for the mob,
And for the Haitian voodoo cult,
That cult of zombies,
The mob being blissfully unaware,
And cult using Herbert against the mob,
And Herbert suddenly wondering how he'd get clear of the cult,
Given their supernatural nature,
What with the zombies and all.
Maybe he could triple-cross people.
The Methodists weren't involved yet, after all.

Ultimately, Herbert disappeared,
After all, you, dear reader, shouldn't know all of the backstory,
Else the story would have no hold over you,
And the plight of Jonathan and Margaret would be uninteresting,
That strong-armed blacksmith, that young lad seeking adventure,
The soon-to-be zombie slayer, the son of the zombie slayer,
And that wistful woman, that rich woman, that golddigger,
That woman seeking a husband, but also seeking answers,
Seeking to learn what happened to her father,
And maybe her mother and brother, too, come to think of it,
She always thought they died in a very ordinary manner,
Everyone gets run over by a runaway carriage, that's a very proper way to die,
No questions there, but maybe she should ask questions,
But, dear reader,
Let it be,
Those words of wisdom,
Let it be.

Book VI - In Which Our Devoted Hero And Heroine Reach Haiti,
Which Is Called That Just So Everyone Gets A Good Idea Of Where It Is,
Since In This World It's All Of Hispaniola, Rather Than Just A Third,
And They Wonder About The Haitian Voodoo Cult, Of Which Jonathan
Is Still Unaware

Haiti, noble Haiti, heavily-wooded Haiti,
With the sprouting towns and cities, cleared of zombies,
Now populated with men, and women, and flowing commerce,
Sugarcane, molasses, rum, high technology,
Haiti was the place to be in the Caribbean,
More so than the continent, the zombie-infested continent,
The continent that didn't have sprouting towns and cities,
But rather the occasional heavily-fortified fort,
Fortifying the coast against zombies,
Trying to expand control inland, but failing miserably,
Again, due to the zombies,
But as stated, Haiti, lovely Haiti, had no zombies,
And they liked it that way.

Margaret and Jonathan stood on the deck of the ship again,
Side by side, like before, except this time a little closer together,
Not that you should read anything into that,
Since Jonathan was humming his theme song and playing with his hammer,
While Margaret dreamed of a rich husband,
A husband that was filthy rich,
A husband that could smash zombies like the best of them,
And wouldn't it be great if Jonathan were rich,
As he already had the zombie-smashing aspect down pat,
But since he wasn't, that eliminated him from contention,
So he'd just be a zombie-smashing bodyguard for her,
Which was more than okay in her mind.

Their ship neared Haiti, specifically, it neared a port,
The port of Port-au-Prince, which was settled by the French,
And still controlled by them, as was most of Haiti,
For the British had conquered and cleared zombies from the Antilles,
And Jamaica,
And Puerto Rico,
While the Spanish were working on Cuba,
Those determined Spanish,
Since Cuba was a pretty big place, it was tough to kill all the zombies,
But that didn't stop them from trying.

Port-au-Prince appeared in the distance, coming up over the horizon,
An indication of a rounded world,
But there were still some flat-earthers who denied that,
Who claimed that the world was shaped like a frisbee,
An item unknown to the people of this day,
Yet known to you, O audience,
And that the earth was curved on the surface, but ultimately flat,
But these guys were idiots, and everyone knew it, even back then.

The ship neared, and closed to the quay,
Swaying with the waves,
And the sailors flashed to attention, coiling ropes,
Or pulling them, or tying them,
Generally looking busy,
Doing the things that sailors do when ships come to dock,
Since their minds were occupied, of course,
Occupied by the things that occupy all sailors when they come to port,
Things like hookers,
And blow,
And opium, and alcohol, and tobacco,
But mostly the hookers.
Sailors like their hookers.

The captain of the ship, one Captain Smith,
A very unique name for a very unique man,
As Captain Smith was more than a archetype of a sailing captain,
He not only had the broad-rimmed hat, and the flintlock pistol,
And the rolling gait to his legs acquired from years at sea,
And not from what you'd expect, being a sailor and all,
Look, he just walks that way because of his sea legs,
Not his -- oh, forget it,
He really was just an archetype, completely as you'd expect,
Except not.

He approached Margaret Wells, the rich Londoner,
The woman terrified of zombies, though she deny it,
We all remember how she screamed at the zombie in London,
And her dependence on Jonathan to slay it,
How she was displayed as a helpless figure,
And if someday she started killing zombies,
Wouldn't that be great character development?

The captain approached her, and said,
"Ma'am," or maybe, "Miss," either way, he was deferential,
"We're at Haiti, you see," he continued,
"Port-au-Prince to be precise, and, ma'am,
We'd like to thank you for sailing with us,
And would like to ask you to please keep us in mind for all of your sailing needs,
Such as sailing to other places,
Or even sailing here again, from another place,
Should you end up there," and he took a breath,
For he was a pretty long-winded guy.

Margaret, the wealthy European, who in another time,
Another place,
May have been condemned as a colonist, or an imperialist,
Or an exploiter of the natives,
Using her money to keep the working classes down,
For what did she provide to society, what goods did she create,
What services did she offer,
She was a parasite, a filthy parasite of the upper class,
Draining the blood of the bourgeoisie,
The blood that oiled the machinery of capitalism,
Revolt! and power to the people!
Would be the cry,
But that would be some centuries off,
Since nobody wanted to try to organize the zombies,
What with their grey skin and their hunger for human flesh,
The workers of the world had no intention to unite anytime soon.

Margaret, though, she looked at the captain,
The stereotypical captain,
And thanked him for her service with profuse and flowery speech,
With her verbose verbosity, and her lugubrious language,
And the captain was quite pleased with himself,
For he got to talk to a real live woman,
Which doesn't happen much on board a ship, you have to make do,
Dressing up the first mate and all,
Which sometimes can backfire on you.

Jonathan watched this exchange, humming his theme song,
For he liked it, it had rhythm,
And he suddenly realized, he had music,
He had rhythm,
He didn't have his girl,
But really, who could ask for anything more,
Then he suddenly realized, he certainly could ask for anything more,
Such as no more zombies, since they were kind of scary,
And a lot of money, for he wouldn't mind having a lot of money;
Damnit, he could ask for anything more, and he would ask for more,
And he'd start by asking Margaret for more money,
He deserved a raise, he thought.

Jonathan, blissful Jonathan approached Margaret,
Rehearsing his speech in his mind,
For he wasn't confident in his ability to think on his feet,
He had a tendency to get tongue-tied, and forget what he was trying to say,
So he practiced it, and how he would walk up to her,
And say something about how nice Margaret looked,
To throw her off balance, he learned that from a pamphlet somewhere,
And say how hard he had been working, and how he was performing above expectations,
After all, hadn't he killed a zombie without even dying once,
And he deserves more money, and he'd state a price,
Far over what he would settle for,
Hoping that she would provide a counteroffer, and they could negotiate,
And ultimately, he'd end up with a higher salary than before,
Perfect for hookers and blow.

Jonathan, tongue-tied Jonathan approached Margaret,
And opened his mouth to speak,
In the tendency of men, who open the mouths prior to speaking,
But Margaret turned to face him,
Misty-minded Margaret, who wasn't all there, sometimes,
Except for her single-minded devotion to finding a rich husband,
She was always at her full faculties regarding that,
Margaret, stereotypically blonde Margaret,
Suddenly looked to Jonathan like someone different,
Like there was something there that wasn't there before,
If this were a less serious piece of work, I'd describe the angelic chorus,
The ray of light,
All of that, but since this isn't, Margaret just struck Jonathan in that way,
Not with her fist, but in the other way,
And Jonathan forgot what he was going to say.

"Yes, Jonathan, zombie-slaying Jonathan," Margaret asked,
"Is there something on your mind?" and thinking quickly,
In the way that he doesn't think quickly,
Jonathan replied, "Uh," and changed the subject,
And pointed at the city of Port-au-Prince,
Saying, "So, uh, this is where we are?"
And Margaret, impatient Margaret, sighed, and rolled her eyes,
And said, in a moment of Zen thought, "You are where you are."

Jonathan thought that was pretty cool.

The two of them debarked, and stood on the docks, looking at the city,
The French city, which had four French Quarters,
Being a city divided into four quarters, all of which are French,
And Margaret knew someone here, who used to work with her father,
And thought that'd be a good place to start,
For her father's notes and records at home in London mentioned a colleague,
A French colleague, in the French quarter of the French city,
A colleague named Francis,
Who may be able to further the plot.

Swiftly Margaret strode the streets,
Again, alliteratively,
And with determination Jonathan followed, keeping a tight grip on his hammer,
For he feared what would happen if they encountered a zombie,
Especially if he didn't have his hammer,
His zombie-slaying hammer,
Since he used it to slay zombies, and it follows that he would use it again,
Especially if he's going to slay between one and one thousand zombies;
See above, he'll have the greatness of a mass murderer,
But, come to think of it, perhaps that should be the greatness of a multiple murderer,
Given that a mass murderer kills lots of people in one place,
Like, say, a post office,
And a multiple murderer kills lots of people over time,
Like, say, someone who kills lots of people over time,
And since Jonathan and his zombie-slaying hammer would kill zombies individually,
His fame would be more like the fame of a multiple murderer,
Who takes pride in individual craftsmanship, no assembly lines here,
No mass production, no,
Jonathan, the blacksmith, the craftsman, he put a little bit of himself into his work,
And was not about to cut corners by killing zombies en masse,
But rather would bash them one at a time, thank you very much.

They strode the streets, these two, one with a hammer,
One without,
Jonathan being the one with a hammer, and Margaret without,
Yet Margaret led, for she had a purpose,
Walking like a woman possessed with a purpose,
Because, as stated, she had a purpose,
That purpose being to find her father's colleague Francis,
And ask him, what happened to her father,
And why are zombies attacking her,
And does he know any single guys who are really rich?
That last question was the most important one, of course,
Yet she wouldn't forget to ask the other two,
Being the dutiful daughter she was,
And also, being terrified of being eaten by zombies.

Through the streets they strode, side by side,
Closing in on Francis' place of business,
Which Margaret knew, thanks to asking a man in the street,
Who may have been intimidated by Jonathan and his hammer,
Though I have trouble imagining how intimidating he could be,
Especially if he's humming his theme song.
Regardless, they got directions to Francis' office,
And off they went, despite the fact that Jonathan,
Sweet Jonathan,
Was distracted by the French Quarter,
But most especially those ladies on the balconies with their beads;
He was kind of interested by that.

Shortly after, they arrived, standing outside his door,
His tall, wooden door, framed by a doorframe,
As doors tend to be, especially in the French Quarter,
And also in the other three French Quarters,
And above the door was a sign hanging out into the street,
Reading, "Francis S. Quire, Esq."
Margaret read the sign in her head, being the literate woman she is,
While Jonathan pretended not to notice her moving her lips.

Through the door they entered, quite swiftly, and also with purpose,
And the old triangle, it went jingle jangle,
Since Francis used it as a door chime, it was a pretty economical choice,
Much better than buying a new doorbell, what with the expense,
And the packaging, so wasteful, who needs all of it,
So he re-used a triangle from his schooldays, when he was in the band,
He played a mean triangle, Francis did,
With the ring and the ding and the nonny nonny hey,
And with a theme song in his head, Jonathan entered,
Followed by Margaret, who did not have a hammer.

Francis, the accountant, the businessman, the esquire,
Coincidentally named Francis S. Quire, heh, that's pretty good,
He sat behind his desk, which was in a side room,
Not the room that Jonathan and Margaret entered, but adjacent to it,
And behind him was a window, which was open,
Ominously open, as we shall soon see,
Or read, or hear, depending,
But Francis was an elderly man, aged in years,
Aged like a fine wine, or a cheese,
If we assume the wine or cheese has worked in accounting for decades,
In which case he's precisely like a wine or cheese.

Jonathan looked about, and was decidedly not at home,
As his collar was blue, not white,
Though it actually was a sort of dingy grey, to be honest and literal,
But he worked with his hands,
Though Francis technically worked with his hands, too, with quill and ink,
For some reason Jonathan's hand-working was considered to be somewhat lesser,
And the rage began to build in him, for he was an artist,
Hammering iron into shape,
And what did this parasite do, other than extract wealth from the sweat of his brow,
And the brow of other workers,
Damn it, this wasn't right, Jonathan thought, this wasn't fair,
But what could he do about it, since, after all, smashing Francis with a hammer,
A heavy, zombie-slaying hammer,
Would be counterproductive, as Jonathan would be caught, and jailed,
And could bash no more heads;
This would take some more thought.

Margaret stepped forth, and began speaking with Francis,
Jonathan paid little attention to this, for he was still fomenting revolution;
Margaret inquired as to Francis' health, how he was, how were the kids,
And to each Francis replied that he was healthy, he was doing well,
And there were no kids, she must be mistaken,
Much to her embarrassment,
But Margaret, swift-footed and swift-witted Margaret, she recovered quickly,
Changing the subject to her father, Herbert Wells,
And his mysterious disappearance, which to her was mysterious,
But perhaps to Francis was not mysterious,
And thus she asked, hoping for information,
Information of the sort that would clear up the mystery regarding her father.

This came as a bit of a surprise to Francis,
Given that he didn't know that Herbert was dead;
Rather, he thought Herbert had retired to the South Seas,
Quite odd, Francis thought, and he explained to Margaret,
Wistful Margaret, orphaned Margaret,
He explained that some years ago, Herbert had requested that Francis,
Tax-avoiding Francis,
He had requested that Francis sell his investments,
And transfer the funds to a certain Haitian religious group,
It all took place on this date, he said, and presented a piece of paper,
Containing the very order Francis spoke of, and signed by Herbert himself,
And Margaret was quite bewildered.

Her confusion lasted mere moments, however,
For though she be confused and misty-minded, she was also swift-witted sometimes,
As observed before,
And that date was months after her father's disappearance, and ostensible death,
And it seemed quite curious that he would sell his worldly goods,
(That is, except for the goods that he had already sold and transferred to her),
Even more curious that the funds would be transferred to a Haitian religious group,
For while it may be a faith-based charity, her zombie senses started tingling,
And she suspected that perhaps this transaction may not be wholly legal,
Possibly even quite illegal.

She asked, both quickly and swift-wittedly, of Francis where this letter came,
Thinking that she could trace it back, and uncover the mystery of her father,
And possibly even her mother and brother,
Unless, of course, that runaway carriage was just a horrible accident,
Which happened in London in those days,
But she could get that much-ballyhooed closure,
Come to peace with her missing father,
And maybe, just maybe, get a lot of money in the process,
Or maybe even a rich husband,
She kept her eyes open, you see.

This question is one that Francis likely could have answered quickly,
With few words, such as a name; a name would be very useful,
For Margaret could then ask that person where he or she got the letter,
And ultimately get to the source,
But unfortunately for her, and for Francis, he was unable to answer quickly,
For a zombie fell through the window behind him,
The ominous and foreboding window mentioned earlier,
And with a dull moan, the zombie clutched at Francis' head,
And his throat, and his face,
Really, any part of him that it could reach,
And rather than courteously answering Margaret's question,
Which she really would have liked to have had answered,
Francis instead screamed, and fought against the zombie,
Which moaned in response.

Margaret screamed, again something about incompetence,
Jarring Jonathan out of his reverie,
He was daydreaming, you see, imagining a world full of zombies,
All lining up to be smashed in the head,
And he was doing the smashing,
It was a good dream, and he wished it could come true;
Fortunately, Margaret's shouting got his attention,
And he saw the zombie in front of him,
The grey-skinned zombie,
The zombie trying to eat Francis,
And he realized that he had a chance to kill another zombie,
Which would give him a career total of two.

Jonathan leaped into action,
In the fashion of a heroic figure leaping into action,
And he brandished his hammer, and pointed it at the zombie,
Summoning up his courage, he shouted,
"You, sir!" and to his chagrin Francis turned his head,
Thinking he was being addressed,
And the zombie didn't turn his head,
Being a zombie and all,
But rather kept attacking Francis,
Poor, distracted Francis,
Who started to get mauled and eaten,
Which led to another scream about incompetence from Margaret.

Jonathan leaped into action again,
This time, actually leaping into the fray,
Swinging his hammer willy-nilly,
Back and forth,
Up and down,
All over this land,
Raining blows on the zombie,
And the occasional one on Francis, which was unintended,
And quite accidental, he was very apologetic after the fact,
But the fact remains, he was bashing the zombie quite feverishly,
And he done bashed it good.

With one strong blow, one strong blacksmithed-armed blow, the hammer came down,
Down onto the head of the zombie, the grey-skinned zombie,
The zombie that was trying to eat Francis,
The accountant, the colleague of Herbert,
The man with the information that Margaret wanted,
That was the man who was being eaten by the zombie,
And that was the zombie that was being bashed by Jonathan,
Bashed done good, it was, and the hammer came squarely down on the zombie's head,
Squishing it, like one would squish a watermelon with a large hammer,
Yet Jonathan, unlike those who would squish a watermelon with a large hammer,
Did not warn the first ten rows of the audience that they will get wet,
And Francis, and to a lesser extent Margaret, did get wet,
Which is an unfortunate side effect of bashing zombies in the head,
For their heads tend to squish when hit with hammers,
And squished heads tend to make a mess.

Jonathan stood triumphantly, holding his hammer high above his head,
As a ray of light came in through the window and framed him,
O conquering hero,
O zombie-slayer, man with a plan, and with a hammer,
A hammer that has now slain two zombies,
And soon to slay many more,
Jonathan was quite proud, and thought of strutting around in a circle,
Like the last time he killed a zombie,
For a celebration dance in the endzone would be something to speak of,
And would be a hallmark of his successful zombie slayings,
And people would say that he's fired up, he's in the game,
He's really motivated today,
But since he was standing behind a desk, in a very small area,
And there was a dead zombie at his feet,
And Francis, too,
There wasn't that much room for him to dance,
So instead he shook his hips a little, and waved his hammer in a circle,
Thinking that maybe he'd come up with a different dance,
A new dance for each zombie,
And that'd be pretty cool.

Margaret was less than appreciative of his dancing prowess,
As indicated by her first post-battle comment, that of,
"You dancing fool!"
And she pointed at the ground, not at the zombie,
But at the body beneath the zombie,
The body of Francis,
The dead body,
Of dead Francis,
Who died during the battle,
And suddenly Jonathan felt a little guilty,
For maybe he was a little too careless with his hammer,
The zombie-smashing hammer,
Which may have inadvertently become an accounting-slaying hammer,
Yet this concern was unfounded, for a quick investigation,
An investigation of the dead accountant's body, that is,
Not of the dead zombie's body,
The investigation revealed that the accountant had been quite severely mauled,
Which led Jonathan to believe the zombie was responsible,
As the hammer does not generally leave tooth and claw marks,
And the zombie, upon further review,
Was red in tooth and claw,
Most likely as a result of eating an accountant.

Margaret's comments continued, and ranged from,
"You moronic imbecile," to "Your cockamamie plans,"
And then she giggled because she said cock,
And Jonathan laughed a little too,
But they both settled down pretty quickly, since they were adults,
But mostly because there was a dead zombie at their feet,
And a dead man, too,
And it was again pretty strange how a zombie in a town free of zombies,
On an island free of zombies,
How that zombie attacked them,
Or more accurately, attacked the man who could help them,
Almost as if someone were trying to impede their progress,
Which was just silly, after all, for who could control zombies?

"We need to work quickly," Margaret said, now that she had settled down,
And Jonathan agreed, though he know not what he agreed to,
So he stood there, hammer in hand, looking imposing,
And somewhat threatening,
And hoped that another zombie would come in that window, for if it did,
He would bash it again, for he was ready,
He'd defend himself, and Margaret by extension,
Though she wasn't defending herself against zombies,
Or even defending Jonathan,
But rather rifling through stacks of papers,
And flipping through books,
And digging through drawers,
Looking for a ledger, a record, anything that could be of use,
Hoping against hope that she'd find some sort of mechanical tool,
A tool that would let her speak with the dead,
So she could ask Francis' corpse where that order originated,
But, failing that, she could ask Jonathan to quickly smith one,
Though she changed her mind on that quickly once she saw him,
Jonathan, zombie-slaying Jonathan,
Once she saw him wiggling his hips again and practicing another dance,
So she abandoned that train of thought entirely,
And just started looking through the papers.

Margaret found something, something useful, that may help her in her quest,
That is, she found Francis' log of daily activities,
For being an accountant, he was pretty meticulous about things such as that,
Not only did he log every transaction, but also the minutiae of daily life,
Including what he ate, and his bowel movements,
Which was kind of gross, but she read it anyway,
Hoping there would be something in there about her father,
Not in the bowel movements, but in the rest of the log,
And there was, O benevolent deity, there was!, and she exulted,
Given that she could now advance the plot,
Thanks to the note, the small note in the corner,
Which said that a man named Samuel Watson,
A military man, a man of means, and a man of muskets,
Had hand-delivered a note from her father,
On the day that Francis said he received that note,
And to her, it seemed that these were related,
And that this Samuel Watson, who delivered the note,
Possibly received it from her father,
Or received it from a man who received it from her father,
Or some derivation of that,
And that this was her lead, and she could investigate,
And maybe even resolve the zombie plot at the same time.

"To America!" she cried, for the log indicated that Samuel Watson,
The delivery boy, though he be a man,
Arrived from Fort Macquarie on the Atlantic coast,
Roughly around where modern-day Virginia is,
Though it wasn't called Virginia at the time,
And wait, what's this?
What's more, she flipped through the log a little further,
And found some suspicious things;
Glancing at Jonathan, who was still gyrating, she felt safe enough to research,
Despite the rapidly-cooling bodies of the zombie and of Francis,
And she began reading a little more in the log,
In the record of all of Francis' transactions,
Which may not have been a good idea for him to keep, since it had everything,
And I mean everything,
Including all of the illegal smuggling that he and Herbert had been doing,
Smuggling goods, smuggling services,
Smuggling hookers and blow,
Or opium, too,
And where they stored all of their goods,
Including in the storeroom at Fort Macquarie,
Which seemed somewhat intriguing.

Jonathan kept dancing, being the dancing fool he was,
Happy that he had killed a zombie, though a little sad he didn't save Francis,
And was a bit surprised when Margaret grabbed him by the arm,
His muscled, zombie-slaying, blacksmith arm,
And pulled him out the door, and down the street, saying,
"Jonathan, we have to go to America,"
And, "Jonathan, we have to get away from that crime scene,"
And, "Jonathan, keep your pants on,"
Which wasn't his fault, but his belt was loose, and it was slipping,
And his pants tended to fall down,
So he held them up with one hand,
And his hammer in the other,
His zombie-slaying hammer, which had slain two zombies,
Which was more than he had slain in his entire life,
So he was really on a roll,
Though he looked somewhat foolish stumbling through the streets,
The streets of Port-au-Prince,
Holding up his pants with his hand.

Margaret led them back to the docks,
Back to the ship which had carried them across the Atlantic,
And up the ramp, back onto the deck,
Which surprised the captain, who was still there,
Doing captainy things,
Unlike the sailors, who had abandoned the ship for the taverns,
To do sailory things,
And he greeted them warmly, asking if he could assist,
And Margaret, mildly-determined Margaret,
She politely requested that he raise anchor and sail to America,
The continent of zombies,
Of millions of zombies,
Of so many zombies they were uncountable,
Like grains of sand on the beach,
Or drops of water in the ocean,
Or zombies in America,
For that was a phrase used in the day to describe something uncountable,
And the captain,
Well,
He wasn't too pleased with the idea,
Since he was used to being alive,
And had gotten to like it,
Being alive,
And going to a continent full of zombies,
Of millions of grey-skinned, flesh-hungering zombies,
Was probably not conducive to continued life,
Which he said, in so many words,
Much to Margaret's dismay.

She tried another tactic, and rather than politely requesting,
She breezily bribed, and said that he would be rich,
Because she was rich, and had money to spare,
Which wasn't really all that accurate, while yes, she did have a lot of money,
She had budgeted it quite well for the next several years,
Given that she had no income and needed to maintain her way of life,
At least until she married someone filthy rich,
But she had the money, and maybe could give some of it to the captain,
And just tighten the corset for a few months, live a little more modestly,
But then, she thought that she'd rather die than go without her soy mocha latte,
And changed her mind, telling the captain that no,
She wouldn't bribe him,
But would pay him a fair rate,
And that Jonathan, zombie-slaying Jonathan,
Who had just slain another zombie, so he was on a hot streak,
He would defend the captain from zombies,
The kind of zombies that would eat the captain,
Who looked at Jonathan, and snickered a little,
Since Jonathan was again swinging his hips,
While holding his pants up with one hand,
And realized he could use a good laugh; his sailors weren't all that funny,
So he agreed,
He would take Margaret and Jonathan to Fort Macquarie,
Which wouldn't be all that dangerous to him, really,
Considering it was a fort full of soldiers,
A fort that had its own dock, a well-defended dock, no less,
So there was no danger to him or his ship,
And Jonathan, blissful Jonathan, dear, sweet Jonathan,
It has to be admitted that he was pretty funny to watch.

Lo, the captain agreed, and the bo'sun rounded up the sailors,
And the ship departed,
Departed the French Quarter, departed Port-au-Prince, departed Haiti,
And set sail for America, the land of zombies,
And far above, in the clouds,
Zeus looked down,
And snickered.

Book VII - In Which Jonathan And Margaret Arrive In America,
And Learn More About Her Father,
And A Little About The Cult,
And Get Attacked By Some Thousand Zombies,
More Than Jonathan Could Ever Defeat Alone,
Stay Tuned

The ship, and yes, it was a ship, not a boat,
The ship crossed the Caribbean, and sailed up the coast,
Up the peninsula of Florida, and past Georgia, and the Carolinas,
Even though they weren't called that,
And occasionally the lookout in the mast above would shout out,
"Zombies landward!"
Or a variant of that,
And people would crowd the railing, and point, and shout,
For there would be zombies landward, as indicated by the lookout,
Roaming the shores, moaning unintelligibly,
Most likely hungering for human flesh,
Which was a deduction from afar, as no one wanted to get close enough to find out,
Not even Jonathan, with his hammer,
Since ten thousand to one odds were pretty daunting.

Fort Macquarie, the isolated British outpost, lay on the coast,
Overlooking a small inlet with its own Plutonian shore,
The land had been cleared beyond the fort, nearly five hundred yards worth,
Before the rolling hills were covered by the trees,
Tall, silent sentinels, hiding the zombie menace,
The soldiers didn't like the trees much, which is why they cleared the land,
Which by now, was pockmarked with craters from the mortars and cannon in the fort,
All pointed inland, none towards the sea,
As they had no real concern that another European power would attack,
Since if they wanted to get killed by zombies themselves,
There was a lot of available land elsewhere.

The fort, with its wooden stockade, its towers, and its gate,
Was used as training grounds for anti-zombie military units,
Given that the zombies tended to attack periodically,
Drawn by the smell of human flesh,
The rich buttery taste,
And the soldiers, with musket and cannon,
Would stand on the wall and shoot the zombies,
Which, being zombies, tended to advance in a predictable way,
And those soldiers blew up a lot of zombies.

Now, gentle reader, you may think that these forts and muskets,
These weapons of iron and wood,
Would eventually depopulate the Americas of the zombie threat,
But they could only kill zombies so fast,
And the zombies kept making more zombies,
What with the infectious zombie plague and all,
So the concept of killing all the zombies was kind of a long-term plan,
Like something with compound interest,
Versus quarterly dividends;
Just like that.

Rosy-fingered Dawn brought another day, pink, hale and hearty,
Like a newborn babe, squalling as it is brought into this world,
Screaming, with that ear-piercing shriek,
The kind that wakes parents, and keeps them up all night,
Slowly driving them insane from lack of sleep,
And frustration, that ever-building frustration,
Until they finally snap, and throw a beer bottle at the referee,
Remember when daddy did that, sweetie? Remember?
But I digress.
Rosy-fingered Dawn brought another day, and their ship neared the fort.

Jonathan turned to Margaret, and with characteristic wit, said,
"Uh, what are we doing here, again?"
Margaret, ever-patient Margaret, except for her dealings with Jonathan,
Rolled her eyes skyward, as in supplication,
Begging mighty Zeus, or Jesus, really, whoever would answer,
Wishing for just a brief moment of intelligent conversation,
Or a rich husband,
And she replied, "Jonathan, bemused Jonathan,
I am here to find Samuel Watson,
And determine what he knows about my father, and about Francis,
Who is now dead, no thanks to you," she said with a pointed glare,
"And for you to kill more zombies, for that is why you are here,
And that is why I pay you, so don't lose that hammer," and she looked away,
Gazing at the fort, ever-growing in the distance,
Much in the same way she gazed at Port-de-Paix,
Which was a couple years ago -- she gazed at Port-au-Prince in a much different way.

The ship neared the dock, in the cove overlooked by the fort,
And the captain, the bowlegged captain, turned to Margaret and Jonathan,
Thanking them for their company, and praising Jonathan's wit,
Saying he should go into stand-up, or improv,
Which confused Jonathan, since he had no idea of what was going on,
And he was still looking for a belt, as holding up one's pants gets tiresome.
Closer to the dock the ship neared,
And docked, in the manner that ships dock with docks,
And Margaret and Jonathan debarked again, finding themselves on the continent,
The zombie continent,
And as this was Jonathan's first trip to America,
He thought it would be pretty funny to stick his hammer in the ground,
And say, "I claim this land for the Queen of England!"
So he did it, but no one else laughed, because it wasn't really that funny.

They were greeted at the dock by a number of soldiers, which was to be expected,
As the garrison was concerned about zombie invasion,
Even by ship, for though the zombies had no naval technology,
One can never be too sure when it comes to zombies,
Sneaky grey-skinned zombies,
Who would take any advantage they could find, if it meant they could eat,
Devouring hapless humans, cracking the bones, eating the marrow,
Those untrustworthy zombies would stab you in the back if they could
Or so the garrison thought,
They were kind of biased against zombies.

Margaret introduced herself, and introduced Jonathan as her bodyguard,
Casually pointing out that he had slain a few zombies in hand-to-hand combat,
And that he was a professional zombie-slayer,
Which gave Jonathan no small amount of pride, overhearing this,
Since it finally occured to him that since he was being paid,
And he was killing zombies,
And he was being paid to kill zombies,
That made him a professional zombie-slayer,
And made him feel all growed up. He was a big boy now.

She continued the introductions, explaining that she was here to meet with Samuel Watson,
The soldier, the messenger, the associate of Herbert Wells and Francis S. Quire,
And that she wouldn't mind meeting the commander of the outpost,
Given that she was a rich woman, albeit a civilian,
And wouldn't he appreciate the company,
Plus, he could meet a bona fide professional zombie-slayer,
And maybe get some tips for his troops,
Or so she said.

The lieutenant at the docks,
Or leftenant, actually, given that this was an British outpost,
Though they often look the same, there is a technical difference
That being, one is spelled l-i-e-u-t-e-n-a-n-t,
And the other, l-e-f-t-e-n-a-n-t,
Which is the more accurate one in this case,
As the officer at the docks was a leftenant,
And he agreed that the commandant would likely be delighted to dine with her,
And that the soldiers would be delighted to speak with Jonathan,
Provided he kept his pants on, and didn't dance too much,
And that he'd find Samuel Watson for her, right quickly, too.

Our two heroes thought this a reasonable deal, and they followed their escort,
Into the protection of the fort they went, two by two,
For Biblical allusion if nothing else,
Jonathan and Margaret side by side again, as they had been on the ship,
More than once, no less,
In fact, they had been side by side quite often in their adventures so far,
Going back to when they departed Jonathan's shop in London,
Which suddenly came to the forefront of his mind again,
Had he locked his shop?

He pondered that as he followed the soldiers,
Brave, red-coated soldiers,
Soldiers in training to defeat the zombie menace,
Soldiers of the 60th Royal Regiment,
Those who dreamed of someday being part of the famed Black Watch,
The 42nd Royal Highland Regiment of Foot,
Which earned its nickname not through a black tartan,
But through the emblem of the rotting zombie featured on its standard,
Earned from decades of fighting the zombie horde,
Such as its noble defense of the civilian withdrawal at St. Augustine in 1724,
Or its bold recapture of the zombie-infested town of Kingston in 1688,
Or its famed reinforcement of the embattled Fort Macquarie in 1756,
And lest you think that I just foreshadowed an attack on the fort,
An attack while Jonathan and Margaret were present,
Keep in mind it's only 1750,
So the Black Watch certainly did not come to the rescue here.
Not that I'm hinting at anything.

The escorts guided Jonathan and Margaret to a meeting hall,
One within the walls of the fort, of course,
As a meeting hall outside of the fort would be quite foolish,
Unless it were a zombie meeting hall, which the English had never seen;
Maybe the Spanish, they were still working on Cuba, perhaps they had seen one,
But the meeting halls with which the English were familiar were inside the fort,
And here they were told to wait, and wait they did,
But not for too long, for Samuel Watson soon arrived.

Samuel Watson was a tall man, a brave man, a clean-shaven man,
Possibly related to the tall, brave, clean-shaven Jonathan,
Though neither of them knew it,
Although come to think of it, isn't everyone related to a certain extent,
Fifth cousins or something, you have to go a ways back, but you'll get there,
Much like how thousands and thousands of people claim descent from Robert the Bruce,
Or William de Normandie,
Or Elvis,
Well, in the latter's case, they claimed that he was a descendent of them,
You should see how people amuse themselves in the afterlife.

Samuel Watson was still tall, brave, and clean-shaven, though,
And was dressed in a snappy uniform, with the red coat,
And the brass buttons,
And even some epaulets, for those who know what epaulets are,
If you don't, just pretend they're some nice decorations,
Since he was decorated pretty nicely.
He nodded his head at Jonathan, who waved his hammer back,
And bowed to Margaret, and kissed her hand, who did not wave a hammer back,
And inquired as to what services he could provide,
And how he could be of assistance.

With flashing eyes, Margaret explained what she knew about her father,
And about Francis,
Though she didn't mention Francis' untimely death, she was kind of embarrassed about that,
But she did say how her father had sold all of his goods,
And given the money to the Haitian voodoo cult,
And that the order came months after his disappearance,
And that Samuel Watson, the very man to whom she was speaking,
Had bore that note to Francis S. Quire,
Which led her to believe that perhaps he had seen her father,
Or had seen someone who had seen him,
Or had seen someone who had seen someone who had seen him,
Or some level of that; she wanted answers,
And she wanted him to provide them.

Mister Watson, Watson of unknown rank,
Though quite clearly a man in the service of the Queen,
Nodded thoughtfully, and rubbed his chin,
And hemming and hawing, he explained that no, he didn't know Herbert Wells,
Nor did he know anyone who knew Herbert Wells,
But that he had been minding his own business in London,
Or so he said,
When actually he had been drinking and carousing in a tavern in London,
And had made it known that he was soon to depart to the New World,
And Fort Macquarie in specific, with a layover in Haiti,
And a strange hooded man gave him a note, and a lot of money,
A shitload of money, in fact, and requested that he deliver the note,
And that was all he knew.

Margaret was a bit distracted by the shitload of money,
Which was to be expected, given her golddigging nature,
But she listened carefully to what Samuel had to say, and thought about it,
And wondered if he was telling the truth,
The whole truth, and nothing but the truth,
Or if he was leaving part of it out,
Since it seemed strange that a stranger would ask a strange task of him,
But perhaps the hooded man was part of the Haitian voodoo cult,
And perhaps it had already spread to London,
Which would explain the zombies in London, wouldn't it,
And perhaps her father was still alive in London,
Wouldn't that explain a lot?
Well, maybe not, but her mind was racing,
And you can't blame her if she made a few logical jumps here and there,
But she was a devoted daughter, and she wanted to find answers,
Along with a lot of money, and a husband.

Jonathan watched this exchange in silence,
And thought how nice it would be if Margaret were to find the answers she sought,
But moreover, how cool it would be if he could go back to London,
And kill zombies there,
And see if he locked his shop,
And kill even more zombies,
Since he could probably get the chicks now that he's a professional zombie slayer,
With the figurative notches in his hammer's handle,
No more mechanical women made in the smithy for him, no sir!
Only real live English women,
And maybe some French women,
And that Thai one he read about in the back of a pamphlet somewhere.

Samuel pondered a moment, and offered his condolences,
Wishing he could provide more assistance,
Such as a description of the hooded man, which would be useful,
Except the only description he could recall was that the man was hooded,
And strange,
And in a tavern in London, which doesn't really narrow things down.
He did remember that he was at the Monkey's Paw,
Just off Russell Street, past the Covent Garden Market,
And that may be a place to investigate, assuming she returned to London.

Margaret listened to this, and thought about taking ship back to England,
But then remembered that her father had stored goods at Fort Macquarie,
Or so Francis' logbook had indicated,
And that perhaps Samuel Watson knew more than he was letting on,
So she asked, in a subtle, roundabout way,
Whether her father had stored anything at Fort Macquarie,
And suddenly realized that she wasn't very subtle, but rather blunt,
And flushed quite thoroughly.

Taken aback by her forthrightness and her boldness, Samuel said,
"Miss, you are forthright, and bold," which is less redundant than it may seem,
For he hadn't said that he was taken aback,
Which is really beside the point,
The point being, he was impressed,
And he came clean,
Or, well, he came cleaner, and it was still up in the air whether he was completely honest,
But he did say that he had worked with her father before,
Which may explain why someone used him as a courier,
And that her father had stored goods at Fort Macquarie,
But that was long ago, back in the forgotten mists of time,
Or just a couple years ago, either way,
But he really had nothing more to say, except that she should possibly go to London,
And investigate the Monkey's Paw,
Just off Russell Street, past the Covent Garden Market,
Because that would likely advance the plot,
Hopefully in a way that made sense.

Margaret thanked him, and thought about it,
And thought some more, and then started thinking about zombies,
Because the zombies tended to be on her mind,
Likely as a result of being attacked by them on an alarmingly regular basis;
At this rate, she should be due for another zombie or two any minute now,
Which, coincidentally, was about to happen.

Jonathan and Samuel and Margaret, the three of them,
Were all suddenly started by a shout,
And a clanging alarm bell,
And more shouting, dozens of voices,
Calling out, "To the wall!" and "To arms!"
And notably, no calls of "Put your pants back on!"
Which reassured Jonathan, as he was a little nervous about that now,
But Samuel abandoned them, and rushed out the door,
Leaving Margaret and Jonathan by themselves,
All alone, the eye of the storm, with chaos raging around them,
And Jonathan, tall, brave, brown-eyed Jonathan,
Looked at Margaret, and said,
"Uh, since we're alone,"
And she quickly brushed past him into the courtyard,
Since he wasn't rich.

Jonathan followed, and the two of them quickly stood aside,
As swarms of soldiers swarmed past them in swarms,
All clutching muskets, except for those who did not,
All rushing to the wall, except those who did not,
All acting quite professionally, except those who did not,
Such as Jonathan, who waved his hammer, and cheered them on,
And thought about all the zombies he'd kill,
That is, if the zombies overpowered all of the soldiers,
And smashed through the gate, or scaled the wall,
Flowing over the stockade to devour everyone inside,
He'd kill a lot of zombies then,
Or so he thought.

In the distance, beyond the wall and over the hills,
Far out of sight of Jonathan and Margaret,
But not out of sight of us, O reader,
For we are omniscient in this world,
Or, at least, I am, and your omniscience is dependent on what I will tell you,
Such as this:
There were riders coming in from the treeline,
Skirmishers, men on horses,
Soldiers who ride out to look for zombies,
And then ride back shouting that zombies were coming,
Which would them be shot and exploded and killed,
Thus training the young soldiers in the 69th Royal Regiment,
Training them how to kill zombies,
How to march in straight lines,
How to point their muskets,
And why it is better not to be a sailor,
Though the men in the navy often claimed to be the best branch of service,
Given that there were absolutely no zombies in the Royal Navy, none at all,
And when I say none, I mean there is a certain amount,
More than they are prepared to admit,
But all new ratings are warned that if they wake up in the morning,
And are a zombie,
They're to tell their captain immediately,
So that he can take every measure to hush the whole thing up.

But the skirmishers came riding,
Riding, riding,
The skirmishers came riding, up to the stockade gate,
Their musket-stocks a-twinkle,
Up to the stockade gate,
Which, conveniently, had been opened to them,
For that was part of the plan,
Though occasionally on these expeditions the gatekeepers played a joke,
And forgot to unbar the gate,
And let the skirmishers in,
Which led to much pounding on the gate and shouting,
Things like, "Let us in,"
And, "I order you to let us in,"
And "Oh god, they're eating me,"
Which was pretty funny to the soldiers at the gate,
Since they didn't get to ride horses.

The skirmishers entered the fort, and the gate closed behind them,
The heavy wooden bar falling into place,
And the walls were full of soldiers in neat rows,
Muskets held high, ready to be loaded, pointed, and discharged at the enemy,
Once the enemy were within range, of course,
Because these were trained soldiers,
Which is what Margaret said to Jonathan, who started to get a little nervous,
Since there were millions and millions of zombies on the continent,
Even though only a few thousand were probably nearby,
And he began to panic,
So Margaret said that these are trained soldiers, Jonathan,
They're here to protect you,
And he said quietly,
"It won't make any difference,"
Which caused them both to pause, since James Cameron hadn't made any movies yet,
Let alone ones about aliens.

The zombies began to filter from the treeline, some hundreds of yards away,
Off in the distance, well beyond the reach of muskets,
And cannon,
And mortar,
But the cannon and mortar were being prepared, with shouts, and men running around,
And gunpowder, and shells, and bombs,
As we continue the march of war
And the zombies came closer.

The zombies, the grey-skinned zombies, the unorganized mob grew closer,
Stumbling across the hills and dale,
Following the dusty trail,
Walking between shell craters, or over them, as the case may be,
As the zombies, the uneducated zombies continued their advance,
Caring not for what they walked on, or through, or in,
Not even the zombie who stepped in a steaming pile of horse manure hesitated,
Whereas a human would lift his foot, and sniff, and grimace,
And try to wipe the sole of his shoe on the grass,
Which would get the big chunks, yeah, but it'd still be pressed into the cracks,
And it'd dry, and stink, and everyone in the office would ask,
"Who stepped in horse shit?"
And the poor human, the horse-beshitted human, would hide his shoes,
Until he could get to the restroom and wash them off,
All the while praying no one would come in and ask why he's washing his shoes in the sink,
The zombies had no concern of that,
And they advanced, even through horseshit.

The mortars began to fire, and the cannon, and the shells streaked overhead,
Bombs bursting in air,
And when the smoke cleared,
The zombies were still there,
Scattered, admittedly, since the exploding bombs tended to toss them like rag dolls,
Willy-nilly,
Which is a phrase not used often enough,
Much like higgledy-piggledy, nowhere near as common as it should be,
And the zombies were tossed higgledy-piggledy,
But they got right up and kept advancing, those undead ghouls,
Except for those whose heads were squashed, or blown up, or pierced by shrapnel,
Those zombies stayed dead,
Or deader than before,
So the mortars and cannons were still pretty useful.

Four hundred yards out, and three hundred, and the zombies advanced,
And more salvos of shells sailed out,
Landing among the zombies, exploding with great fury,
Bringing personalized messages from the men inside the fort,
For during their downtime, when they were bored out of their mind,
They would write messages to the zombies on the shells,
Such as,
"Tally ho,"
And,
"Pip pip,"
And,
"Wear some goddamn pants,"
And these messages inscribed on the bombs were carried to the zombies,
Who did not read them,
Being zombies, who lack all faculties of thought, including literacy,
And critical reasoning,
Which, had they possessed it, may have encouraged them to try a different attack,
As the mindless frontal charge against a fortified position wasn't working too well for them,
And artillery of their own, or even crude siege machinery, would be of some use,
But the zombies instead kept up their regular mode of attack,
And the Europeans were pretty okay with that,
Since it made it easy for them to blow up the zombies.

Two hundred fifty yards, and the zombies kept coming,
Putting one foot in front of the other,
Or one hand in front of the other, for the zombies who lacked legs,
They moved a little slower than the bipedal zombies,
But they still had a job to do,
And that job was, eat human flesh,
And crush their enemies, and see them driven before them,
And hear the lamentations of their women,
Though that was more of a guideline than a rule,
As they pretty much just tried to eat human flesh.

On the walls of the fort, the British officers called out orders,
Such as, "Prime and load!"
Which the soldiers knew from years of training, and they worked quickly,
Placing their guns on half cock,
Snickering because they said cock,
Opening the firing pan, by pushing the frizzen forward,
Not backward, but forward, this is important,
Then taking a single cartridge out of a box on their right hips,
One box per man,
Dozens of cartridges per box,
And biting off the end, spitting it to the side,
Careful not to spit on another soldier, that tended to make them cranky,
And tapping a small amount of the powder into the pan,
And closing the frizzen, pushing it backwards,
Which is why it had to be pushed forward before,
And the musket stayed at half cock,
And they snickered again, because they said cock.

The soldiers then poured the remainder of the powder down the barrel,
The long metal barrel of their musket,
And followed it with the musket ball,
Not a rifle bullet, for, you see, rifling was not yet in widespread usage,
Which is why the soldiers fired en masse,
Hopefully, with enough muskets firing, some would shoot zombies in the head,
But that can't happen until the muskets are loaded,
So they continued loading,
Drawing the ramrod from the stock, and pushing the cartridge the length of the barrel,
Then withdrawing the ramrod from the barrel, maybe tapping it once or twice more first,
All of this taking less than fifteen seconds,
As these men were professionals,
Please, do not try this at home,
Mostly because you do not want zombies in your home.

The officers called out more orders, this time something different,
Shouting, "Make ready!"
Since the soldiers had already primed and loaded,
And the men ratcheted the hammers to full cock,
Yet no one laughed, since they were professionals, remember,
They'd only laugh once or twice,
Well, maybe three times, if they had a case of the giggles,
Which can be contagious, even if you're on a firing line,
With thousands of zombies attacking you,
One good joke, and you can completely lose it,
But not today, not now, no,
The soldiers kept their focus on the zombies, the advancing zombies,
But Zeus still snickered up above.

More mortar bombs and cannon shells streaked overhead,
Or erupted from the gun emplacements, in the towers spaced throughout,
The fearsome weapons of war blew up more zombies,
Kablooie,
Kersplat,
More and more zombies got schmucked,
And Jonathan and Margaret heard the explosions, and the artillery fire,
And thought, cool, maybe they'll kill all the zombies,
But then they remembered that killing a few thousand zombies would have little effect,
Given that there were a few million zombies,
But every little bit helps,
And Jonathan and Margaret stood off to the side, out of the way,
Staying out of sight,
Watching.

"PreSENT!" called out the officers,
Those men standing behind the soldiers,
The guys who bought their commissions, thinking that women love men in uniform,
Planning to spend a year or two in the service,
Then resign their commission, and swap war stories,
But then they were posted to the continent,
Where there were zombies,
A whole lot of zombies,
And their plan of one weekend a month and two weeks a year was kind of thrown off course,
Which sucked, it really did,
But they didn't gripe to their men, they were too professional,
Much as the soldiers professionally loaded their muskets,
The officers professionally griped amongst themselves,
And when they gave the order, the soldiers lowered their muskets at the zombies,
The encroaching mass of grey-skinned zombies,
The zombies that wanted to eat them, one and all,
And stood motionless, not one barrel wavering, awaiting the next command,
Secretly hoping the next command was, "Get the hell out of here! Run! Run!"

Another barrage of bombs, another cacophony of noise buffeted their ears,
The artillery let loose again, blowing up more zombies,
Who drew closer, ever closer, two hundred yards away,
And the officers shouted out, "Fire!"
Indicating that the soldiers should discharge their muskets,
As opposed to warning them of a conflagration within the fort,
For freedom of speech is curtailed within the military,
And while one cannot yell "Fire!" within a crowded theater,
One also cannot yell "Fire!" in regards to a fiery blaze,
Since the soldiers may misinterpret that and shoot you.

They shot at the zombies, however, the hundreds of soldiers on the walls,
And the top of the stockade disappeared in a cloud of white smoke,
And some zombies fell over,
Some zombie heads exploded like ripe watermelons,
Which seems to be the standard of measurement by which head-shaped things explode,
Much like information is measured in Libraries of Congress,
As in, this new book contains as much information as eighteen Libraries of Congress,
Or how weight is measured in Volkswagen Beetles,
As in, this asteroid weighs as much as thirty-two thousand Volkswagen Beetles,
And if you, O audience, has no idea what a Library of Congress is,
Or a Volkswagen Beetle,
Just roll with it, it's all good,
The important thing is, some soldiers killed some zombies,
But there were a lot of zombies left out there,
And they kept advancing on the fort,
Intent on feasting on the ripe human flesh inside,
While the soldiers inside the fort kept shooting the zombies,
Intent on not being feasted upon by the grey-skinned zombies.

The zombies came closer, and the soldiers fired again,
And again, volleys of musket fire, and mortars and cannons,
Arcing their projectiles in parabolic arcs,
Or they would be parabolic arcs if they were firing in a vacuum,
But the air resistance threw off the geometric symmetry,
Although in a predictable manner, which was nice,
For each time they fired a shell with the same amount of powder,
They could expect that it would land in roughly the same spot as before,
So they blew up lots of zombies that way,
And the hundreds of soldiers on the walls shot a lot of musket balls,
Most of which missed the zombies' heads,
But enough found their mark to kill a few more zombies,
Which was the ultimate goal of every volley.

Seventy-five yards, and a volley,
And fifty yards, and a volley,
And twenty-five yards, and the officers gave another order,
"Fix bayonets!"
Implying that the soldiers should attach their bayonets to their muskets,
As opposed to repairing them,
For if the muskets needed repair at this moment in time,
That soldier was pretty screwed,
Since though Jonathan was a blacksmith, and a talented one at that,
He had no time to fix a bayonet,
And was already swinging his hammer in the air, preparing to fight zombies,
So they were out of luck there anyway,
But fortunately, their bayonets were in good condition,
And each soldier, one by one down the line,
Slid their socketed bayonet over their musket barrel,
The socket bayonet being a great technological improvement over the plug bayonet,
Which plugged into the open barrel of the musket, hence the name.

The zombies reached the wall of the fort,
And their dull moan echoed throughout the stockade,
More of a moan than a groan,
Although a groan would be more accurate than calling it a shriek,
Which it was nowhere near,
Well, it was somewhat near,
In that both are vocalizations,
But it was a low, dull vocalization,
Like a moan,
And that echoed,
As did the dull thud of their fists against the gate,
For they could not open it from outside,
Being zombies,
And the gate being barred,
So they pounded again and again, futile but rhythmic,
And you could probably hum along to the bass beat,
If you ignored the fact that it was made by hideous undead ghouls,
Who would rather eat you than beatbox with you.

There were a lot of zombies,
So many, in fact, that they began to pile on top of one another at the base of the wall,
Stepping on the backs of their brethren,
Inadvertently forming a human ramp up to the top of the stockade,
Which in different circumstances would be pretty cool,
But the soldiers inside the fort didn't see it that way,
And they stabbed downwards with their bayonets,
Stabbity stab.

Soon, the zombies began to crest the wall,
Like a swarm of ants up a tree,
Or a swarm of soccer hooligans towards something easily destroyed,
Such as London,
And the inevitable wave of zombies crashed against the stockade wall,
And spilled over the top,
Leading to bloody hand-to-hand combat,
Which was only bloody on the side of the British soldiers,
As the zombies couldn't really bleed,
Although they did ooze ichor or goo if you smashed their heads with a hammer,
As Jonathan was well aware.

Margaret began to back up a little, somewhat apprehensive,
And she couldn't really be blamed, for the zombies kept coming over the wall,
Despite the reinforcements that came out of the barracks to replace fallen soldiers,
And to haul away the wounded,
And to offer encouragement,
Such as, "Stab him in the face,"
And, "Stab him again,"
And, "Oh god, we're all doomed,"
Which wasn't all that encouraging,
Though it was somewhat prescient.

Jonathan stepped back a pace or two as well, fingering his hammer,
Staring at the zombies over the wall,
Mentally trying to estimate how many there could be,
Assuming each zombie weighed roughly one hundred thirty pounds,
Allowing for some desiccation,
And would be about five foot seven, or so,
So, it'd take ... about that many,
Carry the two,
The remainder is .. about that, good,
Divide by pi,
And perhaps Jonathan's math was a little off,
Considering he came to an estimate of -e^i(sqrt(2))
It's likely he didn't get an accurate guess of the number of zombies,
But it was mostly irrelevant, since there were a lot of zombies anyway.

He saw Samuel Watson running through the courtyard, a stack of papers in hand,
Running into a small building near the back wall,
Then emerging, but without that stack of papers,
Only to sprint back to from where he came,
And emerge from there with another stack of papers;
He repeated this a few times, and Jonathan watched,
Wondering what was going on,
And Margaret began to get a little antsy,
Since the zombies were starting to come down the stairs as well.

Not all of the soldiers were dead, far from it,
But enough gaps in the line had formed that the zombies,
The grey-skinned zombies,
The undead ghouls that had crested the wall were filtering into the fort itself,
Where they were met by more soldiers, and another barrage of musket fire,
And bayonets, and stocks of muskets used as clubs,
There was carnage everywhere.

Jonathan suddenly realized he was needed,
And he raised his hammer, and shouted his battle cry,
And first checking his pants, to ensure they were tightly fastened around his waist,
He waded into the fray,
Swinging his hammer left, and right,
Doing his best to make sure he only hit zombies,
But sometimes it was hard, since there was a lot of confusion there,
But lo! One, and two zombies fell!
And Margaret, bold, confident, scared out of her wits Margaret,
She stood back, slowly inching further and further away,
Watching Jonathan slay zombies,
Watching Jonathan zombie-slayer,
Watching Jonathan shout his theme song as he laid about with his hammer,
Which probably unnerved a few of the British soldiers,
But that was a reasonably fair trade, since he was killing zombies.

Three, and four zombies died beneath his onslaught,
Or died again,
Or were incapacitated,
Damnit, linguistics still hadn't caught up to the undead,
Despite two and a half centuries of fighting them;
It was generally acknowledged that they were killed,
But since they were already dead, that was a sticky point,
Which more than once came up in a legal trial,
Where the defendant claimed he was not responsible for killing the victim,
In that the victim was clearly a zombie,
And thus could not have been killed,
It was pretty confusing all around,
But a good rule of thumb is that bashing a zombie in the head with a hammer,
A strong, blacksmith's hammer,
Counted as killing them,
So Jonathan had now killed six zombies, four of them in the last few minutes.

Samuel Watson rushed through the courtyard again, grabbing Margaret by the wrist,
Pulling her along, despite her protests,
Protests like, "Where are you taking me,"
And, "What about Jonathan,"
And, "You know, those pants are pretty nice,"
But Samuel ignored those, and pushed Margaret into the small building near the back wall,
The building where he had been ferrying papers,
And said that there was a tunnel out of the fort,
An underground tunnel, which led to the shore,
And at the exit of the tunnel was a longboat,
Perfect for a few people to use to escape,
Good enough to get them to the safety of the water,
And from there, to a nearby ship,
And Margaret thought that this was quite a useful idea,
Blonde-armed, blue-legged European that she was,
But wasn't about to leave without Jonathan,
Dear, sweet, zombie-slaying Jonathan.

By now, the walls had been completely abandoned,
Except for some zombies eating legs, or arms, or the occasional torso,
And the fight had moved to the center of the fort,
And Jonathan was in the middle of it, smashing about with his hammer,
By now, he was up to seventeen dead zombies,
That is, seventeen today alone, which gave him nineteen for the season,
Twelve of which were killed with one hit apiece,
Which is a remarkable bashing average, better than almost any other zombie slayer,
Good enough to get him into the professional leagues,
But he wasn't concerned with his statistics, he was a team player,
He was happy bashing zombies for the sake of bashing zombies,
Even though he was technically in a contract year,
Since Margaret had only hired him for a year,
And if he performed really well, he might snag a multiyear deal,
One with hammer endorsements.

He bashed zombies, and bashed them again,
But not the ones that were already bashed in the head,
For a good solid bash had already taken care of those,
And he slowly withdrew, as did the other soldiers, backing up towards the dock,
Suddenly wondering where Margaret was,
And whether he'd still get paid if she were to die;
He figured he probably wouldn't,
But maybe she had made arrangements with an accountant,
But maybe she had made arrangements with the dead accountant,
Which would make the whole matter moot,
So he decided right then that he would find Margaret,
Somewhere in this mass of zombie melee,
And rescue her,
Sweep her into his hands, and back to London, where she would be safe,
Yes, that was his plan, and he was sticking to it.

Margaret and Samuel watched Jonathan from the safety of their safe spot,
And shouted to him, but not too loudly, as they did not want to draw the attention of the zombies,
Since neither of them had a gun, let alone a hammer,
Not even a small ball-peen hammer, nothing,
And if the zombies came after them, well,
They'd have to jump in the tunnel, and close the trap door behind them,
And bar it, and escape, abandoning Jonathan to his fate,
And though Margaret was slightly tempted, since if he died,
She wouldn't have to pay him,
For some reason she didn't want him to die,
Especially through her own action, or omission of action,
And so she called to him, singing out across the field.

Jonathan saw her, and heard her, too, but couldn't quite make out what she was saying,
So he raised his hammer and waved, briefly, taking the time from the combat to acknowledge her,
And he smiled hesitantly, thinking that she was just cheering him on,
Which was nice of her, really, they could use the encouragement,
Since they were pretty much being slaughtered by the ghouls as they fought,
And if Margaret couldn't provide heavy firepower, why, she could still raise their spirits,
By chanting something like,
"We've got hammers, yes we do,
We've got hammers, how 'bout you?"
Or,
"Jonathan, Jonathan, he's our man,
If he can't do it, no one can!"
She wasn't chanting that, or anything remotely similar to that,
But Jonathan didn't know, so he made the best guess available,
And estimated that Margaret was shouting -e^i(sqrt(2)),
Which didn't make much sense to him,
But then, his math was kind of shaky.

Margaret muttered something about sheer incompetence,
And bloody single-mindedness,
And how this man was going to be the death of her,
But she raced out into the fray, dodging left, and right,
Avoiding outstretched zombie claws,
Not that they actually had claws, but that their fingers were claw-like,
Coming near to Jonathan and the small band of soldiers left alive,
And shouting t