“That she did,” I replied.
As we dumped the remaining weapons onto the floor of my van, movement along the ground caught my attention. Fearing one of the zombie kids had somehow flanked us, I turned toward the sound. I recognized the little shit immediately.
Yes, our cat, Azazel, had returned from wherever she’d gone, and she was darting straight for the open doors of our home-on-wheels.
The discomforting node of guilt, fear, and worry brewing in the pit of my stomach abruptly dissipated. Glancing at Clare, I discerned the same relief in her watery eyes.
“Where do you suppose she’s been?” Casey asked me.
Azazel halted in her tracks, gazed up at me and the kid, and offered us a casual meow. I noticed a pink ribbon tied around her neck.
“That’s new,” I said, utterly perplexed as to how our cat had managed to accessorize while we were preoccupied with the moronic ranger.
Naturally, I didn’t have time to wonder for long. We needed to stow the rest of our gear and get our asses out of there. Seeing my precious furbaby also reminded me that I still had to switch my shoes. The last thing I needed was to drag Ranger Bob’s tainted blood across the floor of my vehicle.
So, once Azazel had leapt into the van, vaulted over the pile of weapons, and strolled toward her half-filled water dish, I crawled over to the closet, tucked my goo-coated sneakers inside a garbage bag already half-filled with my contaminated clothing, and slipped on another pair.
After double-knotting my laces, I hopped down from the van and retrieved the shortwave radio from the spot where Casey had set it before embarking on his daring rescue. Unfortunately, it was still attached to the wireless antenna that he’d affixed to the pine tree. I couldn’t fault the kid for leaving it behind. He’d been too focused on saving his mom (and us, too).
With zombified scouts breathing down our collective necks, I knew I’d have to detach the antenna and leave it hanging from the tree. Luckily, though, I’d stowed two extra spools in a kitchen cabinet—for just such a dilemma.
Two shots from George’s rifle snapped me back to the present. A couple of eager zombies had wandered down the driveway.
“Joe,” Clare screamed from inside the van, “get your ass in here!”
She and Casey, who’d retrieved the last of his belongings from the defunct station wagon, had already clambered inside the vehicle. George, remaining on guard near the open doors, and I were the only ones left outside.
I’d just managed to lug the radio back to the van and set it beside our pile of firearms when the damn thing crackled to life.
“This is John, calling Joe. Hey, little brother, are you out there?”
“Holy shit!”
Although I’d unplugged the shortwave from the exterior outlet, I hadn’t yet turned it off. Obviously, its battery had enough juice to operate the device.
I grabbed the mic. “John, oh, my god, I can’t believe it.”
“Man, it’s good to hear your voice. Where are you guys?”
“We’re still in Mississippi, heading your way.”
“Negative, don’t come to Saint Louis. Laney and I are already headed up north.”
I grinned. Up north. A phrase that likely meant nothing to people who’d never lived in the Great Lakes State. But to Michiganders—or former Michiganders—it wasn’t simply a direction; it was a place. A sacred place, referring to our summertime haunts in the Upper Peninsula or northern counties of the Lower Peninsula. The family “cottage,” so to speak. Typically near or on one of the state’s eleven thousand lakes.
“Where are you now?” I asked.
Clare tugged my sleeve. “Come on, baby,” she whispered, nodding toward the ever-noisier road behind me. “Time to go.”
“We’re in Indiana,” John continued. “Stopped for the night in the middle of some farmland. Thought I should try the radio to see if you or James were on.”
“Glad you did,” I replied, ignoring my wife’s insistent yanking. “So, have you heard from him?”
“Not yet. The Detroit area got hit pretty damn hard.”
My chest tightened at his comment. The news wasn’t surprising, of course, just difficult to hear.
Clare, meanwhile, ceased being polite. She leaned over the shortwave, grabbed my shoulders, and spun me around, so fast that I dropped the mic.
One look, and her interruption made total sense. Several undead scouts had jogged into the campsite. A mere fifty feet of dirt and grass lay between the van and their hungry maws, and the creatures were closing much faster than I’d anticipated, especially based on how lazy and sluggish many of them had seemed on the road. Perhaps they’d decided to jack up the pace after sensing their next meal was escaping.
George, who’d already climbed into the van, picked off a few of the closest creatures, but she wouldn’t be able to stop them all.
OK, enough fucking around.
I needed to get myself and my companions out of harm’s way. Hastily, I grabbed the dangling mic, scurried into the van, and shut one of the rear doors.
“Crap, John, we have to go,” I told my brother. “There’s a massive horde of zombie boys and girls headed our way.”
“Sorry?”
“Uh, yeah,” I replied, struggling to close the other door. “We ran into some kind of camping retreat with three hundred zombie scouts and their chaperones.”
“That’s fucked up.”
“Tell me about it. Listen, we’re hoping to make it to Big Bear in three days.”
Clare signaled for me to wrap it up. The kids were close. Too close.
“Be safe, I’ll…”
Before he could finish his thought, I yanked out the wire antenna, tossed it onto the ground, and secured the rear doors. Clare dashed toward the front of the van, and I rapidly followed.
Jill frowned as I darted past the sofa. “Nothing like waiting till the last minute, huh?”
Ignoring her, I slipped into the driver’s seat, fished the keys out of my jacket pocket, and fired up the rig. The engine rumbled to life just as several undead children propelled themselves against the rear and sides of the van.
Although I’d never admit it to my mother-in-law, she was right about my poor timing. If I hadn’t been so sore and drained of energy, so relieved to get Azazel back, and so delighted to hear from my oldest brother, I likely wouldn’t have waited so long to get the hell of there.
Knowing the hissing, groaning kids and their adult-sized chaperones could easily swamp the van, I shifted into drive and stepped on the gas.
“Joe, where did Azazel get that pink ribbon?” Clare asked, gazing at our cat, who was napping on a blanket behind my wife’s seat.
“No idea,” I responded.
Clare reached down to caress our purring furbaby. After a few seconds of maternal bonding, she faced forward again and secured her seatbelt.
“Everybody OK back there?” I asked, glancing in my rear-view mirror.
Casey and George nodded from the dining nook, and Jill grumbled something incoherent from the couch. I assumed she was about as “OK” as you could expect from a disgruntled mother-in-law not long for the living world.
A moment later, I busted through the tripwire, exited the crowded campsite, and cautiously drove down the tunnel of trees leading to the Williams Cemetery. The overhead branches formed a lower ceiling than I’d originally thought. They scraped eerily along the van’s roof. But before I could worry about how low the limbs hung, Casey shouted from the rear of the van.
“Joe, the kids are picking up speed!”
He’d moved to the back to keep an eye on our pursuers.
“Have they hit the trail yet?”
“They’re just getting there,” he informed me. “Course, it’s hard to see with only the brake lights.”
I flipped a switch on the dashboard, and the van’s exterior floodlights blazed in front and back.
“Oh, that’s better,” he said. “Yep, they’re definitely inside the tunnel now.�
�
“Terrific. Just what I needed to hear.”
Chapter
17
“It’s too bad she won’t live! But then again, who does?” – Gaff, Blade Runner (1982)
Despite the dogged pursuit from Troop Undead, we eventually exited the creepy tunnel of trees—only to enter the fantastically creepy graveyard. The place seemed bigger than I’d previously thought, filled not just with weathered tombstones but also with overgrown shrubbery, untamed weeds, and more trees than I’d expected.
Not sure why the layout—and state of it—surprised me. The Williams Cemetery was a century-old graveyard nestled within a national forest. Before the zombies arrived and fucked up the world, the rangers had likely had more pressing daily tasks than maintaining an abandoned burial ground.
I shut off the floodlights mounted around the roof. The standard headlights shed enough illumination to see the access road that linked to the pedestrian trail we’d used to escape the overrun campsite. I figured if there were zombies beyond the cemetery, the brighter lights might attract them. Then, we’d have double the fun.
One look at my side-view mirror to verify that we’d put at least a hundred yards between us and our pursuers. Just one glance. That was all it took to lose focus and inadvertently run over an obstacle along the trail.
The van tilted to the right before slamming back to the ground and continuing onto the access road. Murmurs of concern drifted from the rear, followed by a disgruntled shout from you-know-who.
“Watch it, dummy!”
“Sorry, guys.” I glanced at the side-view mirror again—but more quickly this time. “Looks like we hit a tree stump.”
“You mean, you hit a tree stump,” Jill hollered.
“Yes, thanks for clarifying,” I grumbled.
Although I’d bought brand-new, heavy-duty, all-terrain tires in preparation for our long-ass road trip from Louisiana to Michigan, I must’ve hit the short, ancient stump just right. Or just wrong. Perhaps it had an unusually sharp edge, or maybe I’d simply weakened the tire tread with two full days of zombie-fleeing antics.
Whatever the case, I’d managed to puncture the front driver’s-side tire. I couldn’t hear a hiss over the rumbling engine, but I could certainly read the gauges on the dashboard from the air pressure monitor I’d installed the week before. While three of them reported normal pressure, one of them (the one in question) indicated an unhappy sensor. A very unhappy sensor.
Shit. It’s like the damn Mardi Gras Indian all over again!
The semi-slow leak hadn’t forced me to drive on the rim yet, but it definitely made our ride more lopsided and the steering more difficult. Still, I had no choice but to press onward and upward. Literally.
As we crested a low hill overlooking the back half of the cemetery, I spotted an old bridge in the distance. The same one I’d noticed on one of the forest maps I’d downloaded before the apocalypse hit New Orleans. Supposedly, it would lead us to the other side of the Homochitto River and, hopefully, ensure a clean getaway from the tiny terrors chasing us.
If, that is, my punctured tire could hold out a bit longer.
“Hang on, everyone!” I shouted as I veered down the hill.
Even with the bum tire, we descended the slope too rapidly, causing the front end of our van to slide to the left, just enough for us to hop over an old headstone alongside the road. The vehicle lurched to a halt, the wheels still spinning fruitlessly, the engine straining to dislodge us.
“Dammit!” I lifted my foot off the gas pedal and shifted the van into park.
Clare scanned the eerie graveyard through the grimy windshield. “Now, what’s wrong?”
“We’re hung up.” I glanced at my wife, noting her furrowed brow. “We’re riding too low to get off the headstone, so I have to change the tire.”
The furrows only deepened. “But, baby…”
“I know,” I replied grimly, unhooking the tire iron from under the driver’s seat. “That’s why I have to hurry.”
Before she had a chance to protest again, I climbed out of the vehicle and assessed the situation. I had to work fast to jack up the van, remove the flattened tire, and replace it with one of the two spares I’d stowed beneath the undercarriage. Gazing at the hissing tire impeded by the slanted tombstone, I knew the task wouldn’t be easy, but luckily, the job didn’t require a separate jack.
Why? Because while revamping my home-on-wheels in preparation for the zombie apocalypse, I’d installed four jacks beneath the van to help stabilize her whenever we camped for the night.
They were the kind of lifts typically used on recreational vehicles, so I only needed to crank down the nearest one, enough to raise the van a few inches, and switch the tires—assuming I didn’t misplace any lug nuts in the process.
Unfortunately, though, as soon as I knelt beside the tire, I detected an advancing ruckus—even over the van’s rumbling engine. The zombified scouts were closing fast. I turned toward the sound, spying several moonlit silhouettes cresting the hill. Even if some of them lost their balance and tumbled down the slope, nothing would prevent them from reaching me before I could get the tire changed. But what choice did I have? If I didn’t complete the job, we’d soon be surrounded by a sea of determined undead.
“Fuck.” I hopped to my feet, knowing I’d unintentionally trapped us in a hopeless situation.
Suddenly, I heard one of the rear doors creak open, followed by a series of gunshots. Through the open driver’s-side door, I noticed Clare still sitting in the passenger seat, trying to wrangle a disgruntled Azazel into the cat carrier. Obviously, my wife wasn’t the one with an itchy trigger finger.
As the gunshots continued to sound, I figured Casey and George had decided to thin the herd a bit. I appreciated their efforts, but I knew they couldn’t stop all the little carnivorous fuckers before at least one of them closed the gap.
Standing there like a brainless lamppost, I gripped my tire iron and wondered what to do. I was about to dive back into the truck and opt for waiting out the horde when I heard my wife’s voice.
“Mom, where the hell ya think you’re going?”
Following Clare’s concerned gaze toward the rear of the van, I spied Jill trudging around the corner. Oddly enough, headed in my direction. As she neared me, I noticed a spray can in her right hand.
Even in the moonlight, I recognized the label: Fix-a-Flat tire sealant. That shit had saved my ass on more than one occasion. I’d meant to stock up on a case of the stuff during my prepping phase, but I’d never gotten the chance.
True, it wouldn’t fully restore the air pressure in the slowly sagging tire, but at least it would prevent the leak from causing even more damage. Maybe I could then rock the van off the headstone and flee the hungry brats in time.
Jill halted in front of me, extending her hand. “The kid had this in his wagon.”
I reached for the can, but she pulled it toward her chest, shaking her head, and glanced back at the approaching mass of zombies.
When she looked at me again, her sickly face had taken on a grim determination. “I’ll do it.”
“But, Jill…”
She shook her head, more emphatically this time. “No argument. You have a wife to take care of and—”
“Mom!” Clare stood between our seats, gripping Azazel’s carrier. “What the hell are you doing?! Get back inside!”
Jill smiled wistfully at her daughter, then turned back to me. Despite the ever-loudening din of moans and gunshots behind us, I heard her next words clearly.
“Joe, we both know I’m dead already. Clare does, too. Even if she’s not ready to admit it.”
“Are you sure?”
I didn’t know what had compelled me to ask. I merely felt that I should.
“Yes. I’m sure.”
I hesitated, about to protest—for Clare’s sake—then sighed with relief. “Thank you, Jill.”
She nodded stoically. I offered a pensive smile. And we shared a fleetin
g moment of understanding. My mother-in-law was fading fast. Soon, she’d become a liability—a danger to the rest of us—and she knew it.
“Stop screwing around, Mom,” Clare insisted, setting the carrier on the ground and edging toward the open door. “Joe, you, too.”
I doubted she’d heard her mother’s words over the approaching cacophony. If she had, she would’ve done more than simply protest. She would’ve leapt over the driver’s seat and tried to drag us both back inside.
It was bad enough that Jill and I stood beyond the relative safety of the van. The longer we delayed, the more likely we’d both perish at the grubby hands of numerous underage zombies.
Ignoring her daughter, Jill said, “I never liked you. Never thought you were good enough for my Clare.” Not a shred of dishonesty in her words.
“I always suspected as much.” Smirking, I gazed toward the herd headed our way. Time was short, but words needed to be said. “You thought I took your daughter away from you.”
“Well, in some ways, you did,” she replied, glancing over her shoulder. “But none of that matters now.” She fixed me with a fierce gaze. “You’d better protect her.”
“On my life,” I promised, “I’ll make sure she’s safe.”
Jill smiled at me—something she’d rarely done over the years. “I know you will.” Then, with a final burst of strength, she steered me toward the open door and prodded me forward. “Now, get inside!”
As I climbed into the van and tossed the tire iron on the floor, Clare peered around me—her brown eyes wide and worried, like that of a wild animal trying to safeguard her brood from a vicious predator.
“Mom! What are you doing?”
With a solitary tear running down her ashen cheek, Jill shifted her gaze toward her daughter’s fretful face.
“Goodbye, sweetheart. I love you so much, and I’m so proud of you. You’re the best thing I ever did.” She sniffled. “So, just keep being you. Take care of yourself, OK?” She smiled. “And my grandcat, too.”
Clare lunged forward, practically climbing over me to reach her mother. “No, this is crazy!” Her voice choked, and the tears flowed. “Mom! Mom, please! You don’t have to do this!”
Zombie Chaos Box Set | Books 1-4 Page 59
