Beyond the Barrier: Zombie Town One-shots

It's Alive

(Sorry for taking so long with this. I've always either been busy or couldn't stay up to write. But anyway, here's a new BtB one-shot! And they're doing Zombie Prom, the musical I referenced in Do I Look Green?, in fact that reference came from the song I named this one-shot after! This one just came from the realisation that if Zed played Jonny in Zombie Prom, he'd have to wear makeup to look human at the start of the play instead of to look like a zombie for the rest of it, then I added Eliza and a bit of Bonzo and this happened)

Maybe they were trying to be progressive, or ironic, or something but Zed just found it funny that Seabrook High had decided to put on Zombie Prom as their school musical that year.

As much as he loved singing and dancing, he hadn't really given acting a try before but it was obvious they were going to cast one of the actual zombie students to play Jonny and when he heard about the show's story, he couldn't not audition. The role was practically made for him. A zombie in love with a human girl in a picture-perfect high school fighting for his rights? He was sure he'd inspired the drama department in making their choice. It was practically his freshman year experience except the zombie had started out human.

He was the only zombie in the show, but that didn't mean he wasn't in good company. Addison was, of course, his co-star as Toffee, Bree was playing Toffee's friend Candy, Lacey and Stacey were her other friends Ginger and Coco, Tracey was Jonny's friend Josh and Bucky had somehow landed the role of Eddie Flagrante, the reporter. Zed had to admit, the character did have a certain flare for dramatics that Bucky pulled off not-so-surprisingly well. What was odd, even if Bucky had made a few changes recently, was how enthusiastic he was about zombie rights in the show. It was like he'd gone from one extreme to the other.

Bonzo had been all too eager to get on board, even if there wasn't any place for him in the cast, and Zed couldn't help wondering how he was handling both music and painting sets. He did have a sneaking suspicion, however, that Bonzo was also doing it so he could watch Bree during rehearsals. He'd already caught his friend casting glances over to her side of the stage here and there. Zed couldn't blame him, he found himself distracted by Addison's performance to the point he'd miss his cues.

And Eliza... she was on the tech crew. Zed expected her to be excited about it but apparently not. Or, well, she did seem happy enough with the job itself but she never looked too pleased to be at rehearsals, watching them onstage. He shrugged it off at first but it was always playing on his mind.

The one thing about Seabrook having a real zombie to play Jonny in Zombie Prom was that instead of making him up to look dead from halfway through the first act, Zed would have to be made up to look fully alive up until halfway through the first act. Bonzo immediately volunteered to try turn his friend temporarily human; a face was just another canvas, as far as he was concerned, and he always liked to challenge his art skills. One day, the three of them were in the wings while the humans of the cast were out onstage running lines. Zed was sat in front of Bonzo on a stool, forced to put up with having one hand clamped around the top of him head holding him in place, or turning and tilting him back and forth and up and down, while he was attacked from all angles with a sponge and a brush, alternatively.

Zed took a chance while Bonzo had to squeeze out more of the cream and looked at Eliza, who was checking light cues on her laptop, with a smile.

"This'd be so much easier if I could still just swipe right, huh?"

She slowly lifted her gaze to him with the most unimpressed look she could muster.

"I swear, if you bring that up one more time I'm gonna rip both your arms off and stow them in my locker and you'll never play football again."