This was requested by my bro, Marrilyn: a zombie-comedy. And if you squint, you can also catch some "Bates Motel" references, :D

Six months earlier…

Cora Mills shook her head ruefully, looking out the window at the sun-baked landscape of dead grass and dried, wilted leaves. It was the worst drought the town had ever seen: rain was a long-distant memory, and the once-green fields were now brown and yellow and parched from baking in the thick heat for so long.

Everyone knew Storybrooke ran on those fields. No one would openly discuss it, seeing as marijuana was technically illegal, but it was common knowledge that those fields were the town's economy: it sure as hell wasn't the artisanal cheese stores.

There was a knock at the door. "Come in," she called, not taking her eyes away from the window. The door swung open, and she could hear the flutter of Dr. Whale's white lab coat as he strode into the room. She turned, raising an eyebrow at him. "Victor…Any progress?"

He nodded, a small smile spreading on his face. "Definite progress."

"Good." Cora settled into her desk chair with her mouth set in a grim line, absently straightening the framed picture of her daughter on her desk. "God knows, the money in this town is drying up even faster than the damn fields."

"I think I've done it," he said breathlessly. "I-I think I've created something that can fix this."

Cora raised her eyebrows. "I'm listening."

Victor brought out a flurry of papers and shoved them across the desk at her as he started explaining feverishly. "We've been testing on individual prokaryotic cells in the lab, and I think the basic theory can transcend to more complex cells with a few modifications. These cells were, by every scientific definition, dead. But with this—" he pointed to a long chain of letters and little number-subscripts, some chemical formula that was beyond Cora's high-school-level comprehension of chemistry—"with this, we can essentially resurrect these cells. We repaired the damaged DNA strands and revived the ATP conversion process…"

Cora furrowed her brow, trying to decipher the long-winded explanation as he went on. He pointed out more formulas, more diagrams, more chemical symbols, none of which made sense to her. He was in the middle of jabbering on about glucose when Cora held up her hand and interrupted him.

"Can you just explain to me, how this is supposed to help?" she asked, frowning.

Victor grinned, and pointed out the window. "Those fields," he said. "You think they're dead from the drought. And you're right, they are. But with my formula, I can mutate those cells enough to make them come back to life."

Cora sat up, looking at him with wide eyes. "You can bring the fields back?" she asked, hardly breathing.

"I can bring the fields back."

Today…

"AAAAAAIIIIIEEEEE!"

Regina's eyes flew open at the sound of the terrified screams outside her window. She jumped out of bed, stumbling toward the window to look: the residents of Storybrooke, running away in a frantic stampede as the stiff-legged, glassy-eyed corpses lurched after them.

"Goddamn it," she muttered, grimacing as one of the zombies sank his teeth into a man's neck and viciously ripped out his throat. Three or four others stopped to join in on the feast, bending over the bloodied body and slowly lifting chunks of flesh to their mouths.

Behind her, the door burst open; she whirled around with wide eyes, gasping as a zombie clumsily pushed its way in.

"SHIT!" she screamed, scrabbling backwards as it caught sight of her. Her hands frantically moved around, searching for something—anything—that remotely resembled a weapon, or at least something that could bash the brains out of the motherfucker.

Its footsteps were getting closer; her fingers closed around the bedroom lamp, and she tore the cord out of the wall as she swung it around. It caught the zombie in the back of its head with a sickening thud! Not enough to penetrate the skull, though; it threw its head back and howled, arching its back before coming back up with a furious growl and gnashing its teeth. Regina screamed as it opened its mouth, displaying a full set yellow, rotting teeth, and swung the lamp again.

"NO!" The zombie had grabbed it and ripped it out of her grip, and was now advancing on her as she frantically stumbled backwards—over the bed—tumbling to the other side—against the dresser—

"REGINA!"

She and the zombie both whipped their heads toward the door at the sound of Robin's voice. He looked at her, then flicked his eyes briefly to the zombie; almost as an afterthought, he fired a shot from his gun and hit it straight in the head.

"Are you all right?" he asked, not even glancing as the zombie dropped to the ground. He walked over, looking at her concernedly. "He didn't bite you, did he?"

"No," she said shakily. "Didn't get me. Can't say the same for my lamp…"

Robin twisted his mouth regretfully. "You did love that lamp."

"I did," she sighed.

They stepped over the body to sit down on the bed. Regina gripped Robin's hand, still trembling. "I've never seen so many at once before," she said. "But it's like there's a stampede or something. What happened, why are there so many of them?"

"I don't know. I woke up, and everyone was screaming." He held the gun, raising his eyebrows. "Lucky I had this after all, eh?"

"Robin…" Regina closed her eyes exasperatedly. "This is not the time for 'I told you so'."

"I'm only saying, it's a very effective means of protection." He glanced at the zombie on the floor, and nodded at it. "I think Larry would agree with me."

"Larry?"

"He looks like a 'Larry' to me," Robin shrugged.

Regina stared at him for a minute; then slowly trailed her eyes back to Larry, watching the blood and brains leak out of the gaping wound in his head. She swallowed against the bile rising in her throat, and looked back at Robin.

"So, where did you get the gun?"

I get lots of requests, and it may take me a little time to get to them but as you can see, you guys—I DO keep my word! So if you've requested something from me, rest assured, I will write it for you: I have them all in a To-Do List, so I haven't forgotten any of you.

Anyways, the next chapter will be much longer than this one, this is more of an introduction to the situation at hand. Still, reviews would be nice…PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE? (okay, I'm done being an attention whore for now.) But seriously, please review :D