Zombie parents from oute.., p.1
Zombie Parents from Outer Space, page 1
ZOMBIE PARENTS
FROM
OUTER SPACE
Copyright © 2022 Storyberries
All rights reserved.
Storyberries books are created on the traditional lands of the Yugambeh people. Storyberries acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of all land and sea countries throughout Australia, and pays respects to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders past, present and emerging.
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Zombie Parents from Outer Space was written by Jade Maître. Cover art by Studiostoks. Book design by Jade Maître.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
For permission requests, write to the publisher at read@storyberries.com
First published in 2022 by Smart Projects Consulting trading as Storyberries.

My little brother was whining again.
“Pleeeease!” he wailed at Mum and Dad. “Just one more go at Minecraft!”
But Mum and Dad weren’t having any of it. Their arms were folded. They were always unmovable when our screen time alarm went off and our time for the week was finished.
Max didn’t realise it yet because he was only six. But I was ten, and knew the ways of the world. Believe me, there was no hope arguing when our time to play was up. That’s why I already had my zombie book out, and was reading it with half a glance, while eying off Max with the other.
“I didn’t get to finish the Great Pyramid!” he cried. He had collapsed on the floor, because not having the X-Box in his hands had presumably made him unable to walk. What anguish. He looked up at our parents with tear-stained cheeks. But they weren’t buying it.
“You’ve been playing…” Mum checked her smart watch. “One hour. Any more than that and you’ll be impossible.”
“Addicted,” added my Dad.
I saw my Mum’s eyes flicker back down to her smart watch, and at the same time, heard a gentle little buzz.
“Work…” Mum murmured. She looked at Dad. “Can you watch the dinner? I’ve got to answer this email.”
Dad looked at his phone. He pressed some buttons.
“Reminder in twenty minutes,” he said.
Mum went to her study and Dad started reading the news on his phone. The two of them had already forgotten Max and his breakdown.
Max, realising that the conversation was over, decided to forget about his complaining and wandered off to his room. I went back to my zombie book.
That was the last time everything was normal for us. None of us realised what was about to happen to our ordinary family, and how everything would soon be destroyed.

I first realised something was wrong when I woke up the next morning by myself. Usually Mum came and woke me every morning. Then, when I didn’t get up, she’d nag me for a while. Finally she’d dump me out of bed and I’d have no choice but to put my clothes on.
That was when I’d usually come to the kitchen. Toast would be ready on the table, and my sandwiches would be already packed in my lunch box, wrapped and ready to go. I just had to gulp my breakfast, brush my teeth, get my shoes on, and I was done. Ready for school.
But this morning, Mum didn’t wake me. So I woke at the time she’d normally be kicking me out of bed, only to find an ominous silence.
Curious, I got up. The house was dead quiet. There was nobody in any of the rooms. There was no breakfast on the table. There was no packed lunch waiting by my schoolbag.
I went to Max’s bedroom door and saw a light coming from under the sheets. I went to his bed and pulled the covers back.
There was Max on a tablet, playing Minecraft like crazy.
“What are you doing?” I whispered urgently. “Mum and Dad are going to crack it!”
But Max didn’t answer me. He didn’t even look up. He was so obsessed with his game that all I could hear was his heavy, focused breathing, and the little clicks of his fingers as they pressed the Home screen button. His face was about two inches from the screen.
“Max!” I hissed at him. “Stop! I’ll tell Mum and Dad!”
But I could hardly believe it. Max totally ignored me.
His eyes were glazed. His finger was moving back and forth.
“That’s it,” I muttered. “You’re in so much trouble…”
I stalked to Mum and Dad’s bedroom. The door was closed. It was only then that I hesitated. Might they be sick? Would I be disturbing them? But it was after eight, and I knew they’d want to know about Max playing the tablet on a Monday morning. Last time he’d played for two hours without them knowing, our parents had cancelled our computer access for two whole weeks.
I tapped quietly. Then, when nobody responded, I turned the handle and pushed the door slowly open.
I peeked in.
What I saw made me gasp out loud. I couldn’t believe my eyes!

Mum and Dad were sitting bolt-upright in bed, playing a game on their phones. Believe me when I say I’d never seen them playing games before. I knew some people’s parents played games, but mine said that games ruined your brain.
They didn’t seem to mind using their phones for everything else, mind you - finding good restaurants and reading the newspaper and sharing photos with their friends - but playing a game? In bed in their pyjamas, at 8am, before school started? Never.
The second shocking thing was that they weren’t just playing games like you’d think a parent would play. Most parents I’d seen playing Candy Crush on their phone at the playground usually sort of pretended they were doing something else. You know, like with one eye on the screen and another on little Timmy who was about to kill himself hanging upside down from the giant rope spider.
But no, my parents wouldn’t have noticed if I’d come running into the room crying that there was an axe murderer in the house. They were totally enthralled. Like Max, their eyes were wide and round. The blue light from the screen made their faces seem alien and drawn.
They didn’t react when I walked into the room, and still less when I came up close and stood beside them. I reached out and put my hand on Dad’s wrist - they get me to do that when I want to interrupt about something - but still I stood there, my hand on Dad’s wrist, and he didn’t even flinch.
I craned to have a look at the phone screen, but it just looked dark, with a whole lot of numbers flickering across the screen. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.
“Dad?” I said.
No response.
“Mum?”
There was no reply from either of them. Just the soft tap of their fingers on the screen, and the quiet, almost slumberous breathing of someone who is intensely trying to make it to Level Eleven.
“You know, Mum and Dad, too much playing on your phones will turn you into zombies?”
They didn’t even register. I went to take Dad’s phone, but he expertly whipped it out of my reach, still playing that weird numbers game.
Well I wasn’t going to climb all over him. I still had my dignity.
I went and made myself breakfast. And as I sat there chewing, I tried to work it out. Was it something in our air-conditioning unit? Had I missed something? The release of some really cool game that I didn’t know about? I just couldn’t understand it. Something was seriously wrong.
And as I finished my breakfast, I knew. There was only one place I could go to find out what was going on.

School. The kids at school knew all about the games that were just hitting the app stores. It must be some kind of new game. I needed to find out what.
I pulled on my clothes and grabbed my school bag. School was at the end of my street, so I didn’t have to rely on Mum and Dad driving me like some kids did. I could just walk there, in less than seven minutes.
And that’s what I did. I left my family to their gaming, and closed the door behind me.
A few minutes later, I was walking the same old route and starting to feel a bit better. The leaves were starting to change colour, and the air was getting cooler. It felt good on my face. I got nearly all the way to school when I realised that I hadn’t seen many people on the way there. That was strange. Then I realised, I’d been running late this morning. My Mum hadn’t woken me up like she usually did. I must have missed the bell.
I picked up my pace a bit.
When I got to the school, I made my way to my classroom. I felt a strange sensation to see that there were hardly any kids in the playground.
Those that were hanging around the handball courts were all playing on their phones. Not taking photos of each other and texting like they usually did. No - they were all in their own little bubbles, eyes wide, faces tinged the same shade of blue I’d seen with Max and my parents.
Well, it wasn’t some kind of school holiday that had stopped my parents from waking me up; I could cross that off the list. There were too many kids here for that.
Before I could wonder any more, I saw my best friend Abhishek hanging out the front of my classroom and walked over.
“Hey,” I said.
As you have probably guessed, Abhishek completely ignored me. I thought that was impossible, at first, because Abhishek doesn’t have a phon
“Hey!” I said again. “Abhishek! It’s Roman!”
That was a big fat Nope. He didn’t turn. He didn’t even blink. Not even slightly. He was just tap-tap-tapping with his finger. Then my heart stopped in my chest. I could see his heart rate and blood pressure were flashing up on the screen. No joke, his heart rate was more than two hundred. TWO HUNDRED! And he wasn't even moving.
"Hey, Abhishek. C'mon. Stop playing that thing," I said to him urgently. "We've got to get you to the Principle's office."
His face was tinged blue. I wondered if he was dying. I had to do something fast.

I’ve never been the type who paid too much attention when the teachers were giving first aid classes at school. So I didn’t know the first thing about what to do with Abhishek, whose face now seemed so blue that it was almost alien-like.
It was also as still as a statue, his eyes frozen wide. But still, his finger was tap-tap-tapping on his step-tracker. Tap-tap-tap. It was creepy. It was wrong.
Then the breeze seemed to die down all of a sudden and I realised that all of the kids in the playground were tapping in unison. Tap-tap-tap. The hollow sounds rang out across the concrete expanse and bounced off the buildings.
Tap-tap-tap. Imagine that. The almost-imperceptible thwock! of hundreds of fingers all tapping their watches and mobile phones at once. The sound rose to a crescendo. It took over the school. Tap-tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap-tap-tap.
I didn’t know what to do, but I knew I had to do it quickly. I grabbed Abhishek under the arms and started to drag him towards the Principal’s office. He felt really heavy and I couldn’t do it easily, not in the least because his body was relaxed like he was slouching in a beanbag, and his arm remained stretched out at an angle in front of him so he could see the screen on his wrist, and he didn’t seem to realise that someone was dragging him at all.
Still, I managed to get him off the bench. I got him off the bench and had just dragged him up the steps and started heading towards the middle of the playground when, all of a sudden, everybody’s fingers stopped moving. I knew, because all that tapping suddenly stopped.
The air went silent. Utterly silent. Completely silent. Not a bird twittered; not a cricket sang. Not a device buzzed or beeped into the air. It was as quiet as when a television screen has just been switched off. As though we were all little robots that had suddenly been unplugged.
Then, in a very freaky fashion, everyone took a breath, at exactly the same time. A big gasp filled the air; the sound of a hundred kids in unison.
Next thing I knew, a slow whine began from somewhere outside the school, past the school gates and the entrance to the bus stop and the road. It sounded like a whistle - no, a wind tunnel - maybe even the drone of a motor over mountains.
The sound rose and rose. It got louder and louder. It started hurting my ears. I placed Abhishek gently on the ground and put my hands over my ears as the sound got even louder still, and turned into a screech, like a car braking suddenly before it hits a brick wall; like an engine when something has gone very, very wrong.
Then all of a sudden, a bright light appeared in the sky, brighter than I’d ever seen before, and I realised it was coming from the biggest silver spider I’d ever seen, reaching its mechanical legs across the corners of the sky, looming over the school buildings, whistling and screeching and making a noise like I’d only ever heard in the movies. It was real-life surround-sound. And before it had even sank to the ground, right in the middle of our playground, I realised what it was.
It was a terrifying spaceship.

All of the kids in the play-ground who had been so immobile only moments before suddenly stood up straight. Then their heads snapped up in unison as they stared at the bright disc that was lowering over our school yard. They stood frozen, looking upwards, their faces bathed in a green and purple light.
I was freaking out. There was no way I wanted to be in the way of that great silver shining thing, wailing and shooting out strange bluish sparks.
I tried to drag Abhishek away, towards our classroom, but he surprised me. He suddenly shook me off with a strength I didn’t realise he had. He didn’t even look at me; his face was still craned upwards, staring at the sky.
I tried once more to pull him back. But he seemed to be possessed with a weird kind of superhuman strength that I knew he didn’t have before today. Both of us were usually what you would call weaklings, that no amount of football or wrestling could save us from. But not today. Today Abhishek was as strong as some kind of chubby Hercules.
He pushed me away with a bone-thumping lurch. I fell to the ground. And I could only watch as he began to shuffle towards that great shining machine.
“Stop!” I croaked, because I was terrified, and my voice had dried right up in my throat. But my cry was drowned out by a slow rising murmur as all the kids in the playground started walking towards the spaceship in that same strange, shuffling gait.
Next thing I saw was all the teachers also emerging from their classrooms and joining the zombie throng. I saw my teacher Mrs Rana walking with the rest of them. Only unlike the others who wore a dulled, dumb expression, she had a little smile on her face.
Though she looked stunned and kind of absorbed, for a moment I forgot my fear, and in my excitement I called out to her. I thought she must be aware of all this like I was, and there was someone experiencing this shocking event who was awake like me.
But she walked right past me, her hand at a strange angle. It was only then that I realised she was taking a selfie, and that’s why she had that weird look on her face.
She was taking a selfie with the spaceship.
Intently, like it was no danger to her at all.
She couldn’t have been more wrong.
As the humming intensified once more, I heard a rumble and realised that people were no longer just emerging from classrooms. They were also coming from the neighbouring houses, which were located on the street beside the entrance to our school. Fifty people or more. Nearly everyone in the immediate radius.
That’s when I realised the problem was way bigger than I could ever have imagined. Here were old grandmas and grandpas, people you’d never imagine harbouring a secret desire to play FIFA games or wear a smart watch, shuffling out of their houses and making their way slowly towards the school, their faces upturned to the sky. They joined the throng of school kids, teachers and neighbours, to collect in a weird, intense zombie huddle beneath the great spidery spaceship.
Then, just as suddenly as this whole thing had started, the screeching finally stopped. Once again, that unearthly silence fell over everyone.
I could feel my heart in my ears. A strong sense of dread gripped me. I couldn’t explain it.
And now, in that stillness, there was a brief and horrible moment where everyone actually realised where they were.
It was the quickest of moments. The most split of seconds. Their gait changed; they looked at each other in surprise to find themselves in the playground.
Then they looked up, and saw the giant spaceship, crouched over them like a predatory insect.
Abhishek saw me across the heads of all those people. His eyes met mine. For a split second, he woke up from everything that was going on and he saw me. His eyes were full of fear.
“Help me, Roman,” I saw his mouth move.
That’s all there was time for.
The bright light flared.
Then everyone disappeared.

My courage left me at that moment. I hardly knew what I was doing. I was alone in the playground. The giant spaceship still squatted above me, humming in a satisfied way. I realised with a heart-dropping certainty that I was now the only person left in the school.
I felt exposed and vulnerable. I wanted to run, but I was afraid that doing so would draw attention to me; that it would make that great metallic monster - or whoever was controlling it - realise that they’d missed someone. That there was someone still alive on the ground.
