World Zombination

by John Kloepfer

  “So we’re all good, then?” Ozzie said.

  “Think so . . . although, what’s the plan now?” Zack asked.

  “I’m going to call Nigel and let him know what happened,” Ozzie said. He turned to the control panel and tried to use the communication system, but the whole thing was shot. “Uh-oh. Looks like we’re on our own . . . and this plane is done for. The engine is out of commission.”

  Outside, the fierce wind pelted the plane with gusts of sand.

  “Great. So, where are we, anyway?” Zack asked.

  Ozzie checked the GPS navigation system, which was still working. “We’re in Giza,” he said. “Near Cairo—it looks like there’s an airport there. Maybe we can find another plane.”

  Zack, Rice, Zoe, and Madison looked at him blankly. Zack was horrible at geography. Whenever it was time to study the world in school, map time turned into nap time.

  Olivia stared at the four of them, her eyebrows furrowed incredulously. “Egypt, you guys,” Olivia said, “by the Pyramids . . .”

  The four kids from Phoenix nodded, their eyes lighting up. “Oh yeah,” they all said at once. “I knew that!”

  “Sure you did.” Olivia rolled her eyes. “Man, you Americans really are bad at geography.”

  “Well, aren’t you just a little miss smarty-pants from Canada,” Zoe said.

  A few moments later, the sandstorm stopped just as quickly as it had started. Rice stood up and popped open the door. A little bit of sand whisked into the cabin. “I can’t believe we landed smack dab in middle of the Pyramids,” he said. “How lucky is that?”

  “Not that lucky, man,” Ozzie said. “The airport’s on the other side of the city, and by now Cairo’s probably completely zombified.”

  “Great, then we’ll have a chance to check out the Pyramids,” Rice said, a hint of wonder in his voice. “One of the seven wonders of the ancient world!”

  “Come on, dude,” Zack said in the tone he had to use when Rice was about to make a bad decision. “We have less than a week to get to China and back to the Caribbean—we don’t have time for all that!”

  “It’s all good,” Ozzie said, looking at a map in the cockpit. “We have to go past the Pyramids on our way to the airport, anyway.”

  “Yeah, baby!” Rice jumped for joy and hit his head on the top of the plane. “Ouch!”

  “All right then,” Zoe said. “Let’s get this show on the road.” She snatched up the mayfly sample container and led the way into the desert heat.

  Everyone followed Zoe. Zack felt his sneakers sink and fill up with sand immediately.

  They walked around to the back of the plane and inspected the wreckage. The damage was permanent, the engine still smoking from the midair blowout. It wasn’t pretty. As they went around the side, Zack could see that the left propeller was bent and hanging off the wing.

  “Soooo, I’m, like, starting to sweat already,” Madison said, wiping her brow. “How close are we to the airport?”

  “More like how far,” Ozzie said. “It’s far away, but we should be able to make it. Hopefully we can find some kind of vehicle. Keep your eyes peeled.”

  “Ugh!” Madison groaned. “If someone finds a car with AC, I’ll give them a million dollars.”

  “You don’t even have a million dollars to give,” Rice said.

  “Yeah, but if I did, I totally would,” she said.

  Rice pointed up ahead and led the way toward the Giza Necropolis—a land of the dead pharaohs. The Sphinx and the Pyramids were right in front of them. Despite everything else, Zack had to admit that was pretty cool.

  “Arf!” Twinkles chased after Rice.

  The hot wind struck them from the northeast and gave them a stinking whiff of rotting flesh. They could hear the undead groans coming from the city of Cairo in the distance. From the sound and smell of it, the capital of Egypt was completely overrun with zombies.

  As they passed beneath the giant Sphinx, Zack caught a glimpse of a nearby gift shop for the Pyramid tours. Walking by, he saw something that made his stomach churn and his heart sink with worry. The place was abandoned, but an image in the window showed a large, colorful can of Spazola Energy Cola.

  “Guys, check it out,” Zack said to the rest of his friends, pointing at the advertisement for the super-zombifying soft drink. “We have to be careful. There could be super zombies around here.”

  They nodded and proceeded carefully. When they caught up to Rice and Twinkles, the pair was behind one of the Pyramids, standing over a large rectangular hole in the ground. A staircase led into the desert floor. The area was roped off, with warning signs posted everywhere: DANGER! EXCAVATION IN PROGRESS. DO NOT ENTER.

  “Rice,” said Zack as he walked up behind his friend. “We have to stick together, okay? We just saw a sign for Spazola. There could be super zombies around here.”

  “Sorry, man,” Rice said. “I just got a little overexcited. . . .”

  “I don’t understand what you’re so excited about,” Zoe called to Rice. “It’s just a bunch of rocks piled on top of one another . . . whoop-de-do!”

  Rice turned and pointed up to the massive structure towering over him. “Pile of rocks? You call that a pile of rocks?” He swept his arm across the view with a grand gesture.

  “I mean, I guess it’s a pyramid-shaped pile of rocks?” Zoe said, screwing her face up and tilting her head to one side.

  “And at least we’re in the shade,” Ozzie said. The sun was starting to edge toward the west. It’d be dark in a few hours.

  “This is where the pharaohs of ancient Egypt were buried,” Rice continued. “Well, not really buried, more like mummified. Nobody knows for sure how people built them.”

  Rice looked down into the blackness of the tomb. “Check out this excavation site. Did you guys know this is near where Nigel was excavating for his TV show? That was over twenty years ago! They must have reopened it recently,” he said. “That was where he lost his leg!”

  “How do you even know all that?” Olivia asked.

  “Because, unlike some of us who shall remain nameless, I didn’t just watch every episode of Unnatural Wonders, I studied it.”

  “No wonder that dude’s such a weirdo,” Zoe said. “Who would want to spend their time in an underground cemetery?”

  Rice ignored her. “I read somewhere that the builders were put in secret villages while construction was going on so that no one would know where the pharaoh’s treasure was buried. Then the new pharaoh would kill all the builders just to keep the secret safe. . . .”

  “That’s insane,” Ozzie said as they all gathered a little closer.

  “Wanna hear something really crazy?” Rice asked. “Some people think that it wasn’t even the Egyptian pharaohs and their labor force who built the Pyramids. Some people think that this wasn’t done by humans at all but by ancient aliens who came to Earth thousands of years ago and brought super-advanced engineering techniques. How cool would that be?”

  “Cooler than standing around while the world gets taken over by super zombies . . . ,” Madison said.

  “Please tell me you’re not one of those people who believes in ancient aliens,” Olivia said.

  “I would tell you I’m not,” Rice said, “but then I’d be a liar.”

  “Can we leave, please?” Zack tried to interrupt. He was growing more and more anxious to get on with their mission.

  “Hold on a second,” Madison said. “Who has the mayfly sample?”

  Zoe held up the jar. “I got it. We’re good to go.”

  “Wait,” Ozzie said. “Put it in Rice’s bag. It’ll be safer in there.”

  “Good idea.” Rice spun his backpack around on his shoulder. He unzipped the bag and held it open as Zoe stepped forward. “Whoa, Zoe, watch out. There’s a scorpion on your foot,” said Rice.

  “Nice try, skeezball,” Zoe sneered. “But I’m not falling for that trick. I invented that trick.”

  Zack looked down at his sister’s shoe and sa
w a shiny black scorpion perched on the toe of her sneaker, its tail curled over its head like it was about to attack.

  “No, seriously,” Madison said. “He’s not joking around!”

  “Huh?” Zoe was about to place the mayfly container in Rice’s pack when she looked down and saw the critter on her foot. “EEEEEEEE!” she shrieked and kicked her leg. The scorpion sailed through the air and landed a safe distance away, but as she freaked out, the larvae jar slipped out of her hand.

  Zack’s eyes bulged out of their sockets as the container vaulted over their heads and fell into the deep dark pit of the Egyptian catacombs.

  Clink-clank-clunk!

  Zack listened for the sound of broken glass but heard nothing. He breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently Nigel’s fancy jar was made out of expensive plastic.

  But even though it was safe, they still had to go get it back.

  “I’m so not going down there for that,” Zoe said, peering over the scary hole in the ground.

  “Cool with me. I’m not afraid of a little adventure,” Rice said, already making his way down the steps of the excavated tomb. “Check me out. I feel like I’m in my own action movie.”

  “What would that be?” Zoe asked. “Idiotic Jones and the Temple of Dumb?”

  “Just make it snappy,” Olivia said. “We don’t have all day, and this place gives me the creeps.”

  They all peered over the hole as Rice descended to the bottom of the tomb and disappeared into the shadows.

  Zack saw Rice’s flashlight click on at the bottom of the black pit. A few seconds later, Rice called up to the rest of them, “I can’t find it!”

  “What do you mean, you can’t find it?” Zack called down. “It couldn’t have gone very far. . . .”

  “Well, I don’t see it, man!” Rice’s voice hollered out of the darkness. “Someone come down and help me!”

  “Hold on a second, I’ll be right down,” Zack said to his buddy, then turned to the rest of his friends. “Who’s coming with me?”

  Zoe and Olivia looked away awkwardly. “Um, we’ll keep watch!” Zoe said.

  “Now you’re going to be a scaredy-cat?” Zack asked his sister.

  “Someone has to keep Olivia safe,” she replied, and Olivia nodded.

  “Yeah, I don’t really do the whole haunted-catacombs thing,” Olivia said. “Sorry.”

  “Fine. Me and you, Oz,” Zack said. “Let’s go.”

  “Roger that,” said Ozzie. “You in?” The two boys looked at Madison.

  “Yeah, I guess so.” Madison sighed. “I always kind of liked haunted houses anyway. Come on, Twinkles!” She started down the steps, holding Twinkles in her arms. Ozzie followed them down next. Zack turned to Zoe and Olivia.

  “Okay, so you guys stay topside and make sure nothing weird happens up here.”

  “Come on, Zack. Hurry up,” said Rice, gazing up from down below.

  Olivia made a sour face and pointed down the makeshift staircase at Rice. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure all the weirdness is down there already.”

  Zack carefully walked down into the catacombs and gulped as he entered the dimly lit tomb.

  Rice shone his flashlight in every corner, but there was no sign of the mayfly container. “I don’t know what could have happened to it,” he said, scratching his head. “We better keep looking. Maybe it rolled down there.”

  Zack looked “down there” and squinted into the darkness where the light from the flashlight faded away. “Dude, I swear if you’re messing with us right now, I’m going to seriously rethink our entire friendship.”

  “Come on,” Rice said. “Why would you think I’d be messing around right now?”

  “Because you do it all the time,” Madison said, tapping on the flashlight app on her iPhone. “Now let’s find this thing and get going. It reeks down here.”

  The tomb had the musty stink of an attic that hadn’t been opened in a decade—and was filled with dead people. The four of them walked slowly, scanning the floor for the mayfly container.

  “What’s the dealio?” Zoe’s voice yelled down from above.

  “It’s not down here,” Ozzie said, looking all around.

  “It has to be down there,” she said. “I watched myself drop it down there.”

  Zack called up to his big sis, “Then why don’t you come down here and find it yourself?”

  “Nah, I’m good,” she said. “I trust you guys to find it on your own. Besides, me and Olivia need to keep lookout.”

  “Whatever,” Zack muttered under his breath, as he followed Ozzie, Madison, Rice, and Twinkles farther into the underground tomb.

  Zack had never seen anything like this place. It looked like one of those scary crypt sublevels in a video game. Except this was for real.

  The flashlight’s beam and the glow of the iPhone illuminated a black spider skittering its way up the wall and vanishing into a jagged crack in the stone ceiling. Zack’s heart jumped, and a surge of panic hit his nerves, but he sucked in a deep breath and forced himself to keep walking.

  “Hold it,” Ozzie said, putting his arm out so that they all stopped in their tracks. Madison and Rice aimed their lights down in front of them, while Zack knelt to examine the dirt-covered floor.

  A set of footprints tracked across the ground, one normal shoe print followed by a long streak, as if the second step had an exaggerated limp. What the . . . ? Zack thought. Could there be zombie mummies down here? If that was the case, things might be about to get a whole lot worse. A separate streak squiggled through the dirt, suggesting another object that might have been kicked.

  “That could be our mayfly jar,” he said. “Looks like it might have gone that way.” He pointed in the same direction as the footprints and headed deeper into the catacombs. They followed Ozzie to the end of the hallway, Twinkles trotting behind them. Another corridor connected to their own and they all stood in the center of the intersection. Ozzie glanced down at the ground once more, but the footprints were lost in a jumble of other crisscrossing tracks.

  “Which way do we go?” Zack asked.

  “Maybe we should split up,” said Ozzie.

  “No way,” Madison said. “Haven’t you ever seen a horror movie? Splitting up always ends badly.”

  A low, gurgling moan came from the shadows, sounding at once far away and right around the corner. Zack could hear the shuffling of feet.

  “I want to go whatever way that’s not coming from,” Rice said.

  “This is messed up,” Zack said. “The container could be anywhere.”

  Before they could decide how to proceed, Twinkles took off to the right and made the decision for them.

  “Twinkles!” Madison called after her pup, but the little dog wasn’t listening. He scampered off, barking into the darkness. Madison darted after him, leaving the boys behind.

  “Madison, wait!” Zack shouted.

  “Shhhh!” Rice said. “There’s obviously other people down here, and I’m pretty sure they’re not going to be people-people.”

  “Or mummy-people. Maybe a few archaeologists?” Ozzie said.

  “What about zombie mummies?” Rice asked. “What would we even call those? Mummzies?”

  “No, zummies!” Ozzie said.

  “Good call, man.” Rice gave him a high five, although, zummies weren’t exactly something to celebrate.

  “Will you guys be quiet and help me look for Twinkles?” Madison called back to them. “He went down that way, and I don’t see him anymore. . . .”

  “Don’t worry,” Ozzie said, and turned to Zack and Rice. “I’ll go help her out. We’ll check things out down there. You guys go that way and we’ll meet back here in five minutes, okay?”

  “Okay,” Zack and Rice said, and Ozzie took off after Madison.

  Zack and Rice went in the other direction. As they trekked through the underground hallway of the Egyptian catacomb, Rice began whistling “Whistle While You Work,” the tune sung by the seven dwarves in Snow White.
r />   “Could you please not whistle right now?” Zack asked, trying to be nice, but it came out harsh.

  “Sorry, man. Just trying to lighten the mood,” Rice snapped back. They continued in silence when Rice stopped suddenly.

  “Did you hear that?”

  Zack did. About five feet in front of them came the sound of wheezy, dried-out lungs. The boys froze.

  “What the heck was that noise?” Zack asked in the faintest of whispers.

  Rice shined the flashlight up and down the catacomb walls. The light waggled down the dark stone tunnel. A blurry figure charged out of the shadows, tottering into the flashlight’s beam, and Zack caught a flash of the zombified mummy. Its bandages had started coming off, revealing its decaying flesh. Bones squeaked and muscles crackled at the slightest movement. It was over a thousand years old and it was coming right at them.

  “KKRRAWGH!” the mummy zombie rasped, swiping its arms at the boys. Zack ducked just in time before the zummy clawed his face.

  Zack came up from a crouch and stared the zummy in the face. The zummy’s eyeballs stared at him, googly-eyed in the beam of the flashlight. The decrepit corpse cackled, and Zack swept up his leg with a hard, winding kick, nailing the zummy’s shin.

  Its shinbone snapped, and it sunk to one leg. Rice hopped forward with a pro-wrestling stomp and shattered the long-dead pharaoh’s brittle skull. The skeleton clattered to the floor.

  Rice panned the flashlight along the base of the walls, checking every nook and cranny. The light flickered—the battery was low.

  “How do you think those mummies are coming back to life?” Zack asked as they walked through an open doorway.

  “Maybe the zombies in Cairo got extra hungry?” Rice guessed, stopping on the threshold of an ancient room. The chamber was lined with multicolored, ornate coffins standing erect in neat organized rows, every one of them open.

  A few of the Egyptian coffins had been knocked over and damaged. The bodies were gone and trails of slime were dragged all over the place, smearing the floor with undead gunk. This site had obviously been zombified. But where are all the archaeologists? Zack thought nervously. Even more important, where are all the mummies? And most important of all: Where the heck is the mayfly larvae container so they could get out of this place?