HVZA (Book 2): Hudson Valley Zombie Apocalypse 2

by Zimmermann, Linda

  “Woman does not live on Flintstone vitamins alone,” she said in her defense, as Eddie rolled his eyes. “And don’t think I didn’t see you stuff those packages of Little Debbie brownies in your pants!”

  Cautiously looking out the windows to the front and the back, they actually considered making a run for it right then and there, but a passing patrol car ended that thought. Better to be patient and wait until dark. Plus, “PyroEddie” had more chaos to spread.

  Becks was amazed at the sheer quantity of dangerous and toxic chemicals stored in the embalming room. The place must have done a booming business over the years, or they might have just ordered extra amounts when people first started dropping like flies. Funeral homes actually became one of the most dangerous places to work in the early days of infection, as more than one embalmer was surprised and killed when the corpse got up off the table and attacked. In fact, it happened with such frightening frequency during the first few months, that the majority of funeral homes closed their doors and refused to accept bodies at any price.

  This had prompted most towns to establish “cremation service centers,” which more often than not, were just hastily dug pits where bodies would be dumped on top of piles of scrap wood, sprayed with gasoline, and ignited. Even then, someone had to keep an eye open—and a rifle handy—for any flaming corpses trying to climb their way out. For people who died and switched right away, the course of action was clear and swift. But those who took hours to turn zombie fooled a lot of people into a false sense of security. Many fatal mistakes were made before the true nature of the infection, the ultimate death of the body, and switching to zombie mode was fully understood.

  In any event, this particular funeral home was packed to the gills with formaldehyde, methanol, and many other hazardous and highly flammable solvents and chemicals. Becks happily switched into laboratory mode, and working quickly and efficiently together, they made Molotov cocktails of sorts; only these were not made to be thrown. Utilizing the packing material that was stuffed into cadaver orifices to prevent seepage, they made combinations of wicks and corks for the bottles of flammable liquids they placed throughout the house in closets under clothing, in the backs of cabinets, and dresser drawers, but primarily around the perimeter of the basement, up into the walls and on the wooden supports of the old house.

  They needed the flammable fumes to be concentrated enough to be susceptible to ignition, but not so strong as to illicit suspicion and prompt a search. Their job was made easier by the intense smell of bleach everywhere, which they enhanced by pouring even more bleach in areas where they were concealing their incendiary devices. With only bucket brigades and fire extinguishers at their disposal, the designated firefighters of New Ridgelawn wouldn’t have a prayer of stopping this fire if they didn’t react immediately and in all the right places.

  Their last act before retreating to their nest, was to put some sturdy wooden crates near a basement window that led to the backyard, to use as a stepping stool. They also removed the nails that had kept the window shut. And finally, they made damn sure that Eddie could fit through that window!

  Around 3:30pm, the women of the town who had been assigned to do the cooking and serving began to arrive at the house. They lit all the sterno cans under the serving dishes—which was the reason why Becks and Eddie didn’t place any incendiary devices anywhere near the parlor—and began heating all the food they had spent the entire day preparing.

  In the past year, there was only one other time the women had all seen so much food in one place—for the recent funeral of Mr. Reggie. Everyone knew the brothers had storehouses of food stashed all over town, and kept the most and best for themselves—how else do you manage to stay so fat in the middle of a zombie apocalypse?—but as long as the residents kept getting their meager handouts, they weren’t going to make a peep. Jennifer’s attitude of acceptable levels of abuse and degradation in exchange for rations was most definitely not the exception in town; it was the rule.

  Of course, not everyone was so docile and accepting of the tyrannical leadership, but they were also not so brave and bold as to sneak away in the night and go it alone.

  “Oh hell no, are those meatballs I smell?” Eddie moaned, starting to salivate like one of Pavlov’s dogs, or at least like a Doberman with a Twix bar.

  Becks had just also caught a whiff of what smelled almost as good as her mother’s meatballs.

  “Yeah, afraid so,” Becks replied, wondering just how many people she would be willing to kill to have a good home cooked meal. Eddie must have been thinking the same thing.

  “We could run upstairs, shoot everyone, grab the meatballs, and run,” he said in a tone that made Becks wonder if he was really kidding or not.

  “Yes, but consider this: what’s the most abundant source of meat in town?” Becks asked, making herself queasy by her own intimation.

  “Ugh! You mean they’re probably ratballs?” Eddie said, grimacing.

  “Well, how many herds of cattle have you seen in northern New Jersey lately?”

  “I draw the line at rats!” he exclaimed. “I will eat just about everything else, but I’ll be damned if I’ll eat a filthy rodent!”

  “Amen to that! You’re preaching to the choir, brother,” Becks said, confident that she would never be so hungry that she would ever have to stoop that low.

  The funeral party arrived already rip-roaring drunk, if the over-the-top wailing and crying were any indications. It all sounded so phony and staged that it became extremely irritating after just a few minutes, and it went on for a couple of hours, when finally there was a genuine and lovely moment. Someone with an exquisite tenor voice did a stirring and heartfelt rendition of Danny Boy. Becks actually dared to leave their nest and creep to the basement stairs to better hear the lovely singing.

  Unfortunately, the drunks with their awful voices then started giving their pathetic renditions of Danny Boy; so many times, in fact, that Becks wanted to scream. She had to press a coffin pillow over each ear to muffle the terrible caterwauling. But hour by hour, voice by voice, the singing and talking subsided, until finally the house was blissfully silent. It was at that moment that Becks and Eddie started the final countdown.

  Exactly one hour later, they left their nest, opened the basement window, and got out their disposable lighters. There was an awkward moment in the darkness that probably called for someone to give a heartfelt speech, but instead, Eddie just gave Becks an affectionate bear hug, and they both wished each other good luck.

  They started in the storeroom which held all the liquor. Eddie felt it was something of a crime against humanity, but they opened a few dozen bottles of some of the most expensive alcohol money can buy, and poured out the contents all over the other cases of booze. He couldn’t resist a few sips here and there, and Becks pretended not to notice. After all, this could be their final moments on this earth.

  As Eddie lit the first wad of packing material in their homemade incendiary device, they realized the alcohol was nothing compared to the potent power of the embalming chemical cocktail Becks had mixed up. Just seconds after lighting the bottle, which was wedged up between the walls, there was a frightening whooosshh…BANG, and the dried wood structure of the old house seemed almost anxious to succumb to the intense flames.

  “I think we have to do this really fast!” Becks whispered, somewhat shocked by the ferocity of her own device.

  “You think?” Eddie said, smiling by the fire light, clearly delighted. “Let’s spilt up and really get this party started.”

  In the less than 60 seconds it took them to race around and light the majority of the bottled cocktails in the basement, there was already a thick layer of choking, black smoke roiling along the ceiling.

  “That’s enough. Let’s get the hell out of here!” Becks said, in between coughs.

  She scrambled out of the window first, and then Eddie handed out all of the packs and gear. With all the food in his pockets, he just barely squeezed thro
ugh, and not a minute too soon as tongues of flames were already darting out the window. They had so much pent up nervous energy from being trapped in the basement for so long, they wanted to take off running immediately, but there were still patrols on the streets, and they needed to make sure everyone’s attention was drawn to The Capitol.

  They went around to the back of the house, where Becks was delighted to see her bladed hockey stick still leaning against the tree where she had left it. Making their way to the yards in the back, where the Doberman was once again tied to his doghouse, this time they came in prepared with packaged snack cakes and a bag of pork rinds. Buttons and Smidgey got their fair share, as well, and none of them made a peep.

  Crouching behind the huge doghouse for cover, Becks and Eddie waited impatiently for someone to come running out of the house and sound the alarm, but perhaps they had done their jobs too well. Flames had already spread to the first floor, and even at this distance they could hear the little explosions as each successive cocktail ignited. Apparently, though, everyone inside was so drunk they had no clue they were about to be roasted alive.

  Minutes passed, and the roaring flames quickly chewed gaping holes in the walls, which in turn, added oxygen to fuel the fire’s relentless path of destruction. To Becks, it almost seemed like the fire was a living thing, spreading through the structure along the veins and arteries of its support beams and rafters. Like Eddie, she became mesmerized by the sight—until she heard the pitiful cries for help from those who were finally regaining consciousness, and awakening to face the fiery pit of hell that surrounded them.

  “Fire, fire!” an old man on patrol a block away yelled, as he hobbled toward the burning building, alternately shouting and blowing his whistle.

  Some residents in the area looked out their windows to make sure it wasn’t their house on fire, and then went back to bed. Others, when they realized it was The Capitol, hurriedly got dressed, so they could enjoy the show. A few, fearing the loss of rations, actually ran to try to help. Soon, all of the patrols were converging on the conflagration, but the structure was already so fully engulfed by the time they arrived, they just stood there with their buckets of water and fire extinguishers in their hands.

  Many turned away and went home when they heard the screams of the victims choking and burning inside. A few people in flames jumped out of windows, but the smoke was so deadly it quickly overwhelmed most of the funeral party, who had passed out on the parlor floor and sofas. The big question was whether Mr. Riley and the Big Gorilla got out, but in the mass confusion, no one knew.

  Hurrying toward the front gate with the aid of their night vision goggles, Becks and Eddie did not see anyone, and hoped that they, themselves, had not been seen. They chose to go this way, instead of over the rows of cars at the west end of town, because they knew the ATVs and motorcycles were often kept here, and they wanted to get as far away as they could, and as fast as they could. The only obstacle was a lone female guard standing in the plywood and two-by-four watch tower at the gate. Shooting her would attract unwanted attention, and it would be difficult to sneak up the tower and climb the ladder without being seen.

  After a brief discussion, Becks removed her goggles and leather jacket covered in silverware. She then ran out of the darkness toward the tower yelling at the top of her lungs.

  “Fire! They need everyone’s help. Hurry!”

  The terrified woman in the tower was probably a slightly overweight soccer mom driving an SUV and hosting a monthly book club at her house with tea and finger foods BZA, and was now a haggard-looking shell of a human with patches of hair missing from anxiety and malnutrition, and eyes so dark and sunken they almost weren’t human.

  “But…b-but my post…they’ll p-punish me…” she stammered, breathing heavily for the exertion of just speaking.

  “The Capitol is on fire! They need everyone’s help. NOW!” Becks shouted, looking as frantic and worried as she could manage.

  “The Capitol!” the woman cried, picturing all that wonderful food inside burning to a crisp, but not giving a thought to the potential loss of what was left of the governing body.

  On wobbly legs, and with great difficulty, the woman descended the ladder. Becks stood by to help in case she fell, and actually put her hands on the woman’s back and shoulder to steady her the last few rungs. The woman was wearing a thin, threadbare wool coat, under which Becks could easily feel her protruding bones. Becks thought that there were zombies who were in better shape than this poor creature.

  Becks wanted desperately to give this women some energy bars and a bottle of the Flintstone vitamins, but that would surely give her away. She was also tempted to have Eddie just throw this sack of bones over his shoulder and take her with them, but if she was anything like Jennifer, she would rather stay in this virtual concentration camp and wither away than fight for her life.

  “Hurry,” Becks said, giving the woman a little push down the street toward The Capitol. “I have to get everyone else.”

  As the woman ran as best she could—looking very much like a skeleton marionette operated by a spastic puppeteer—Becks pretended to run east along the fence, until the woman was out of sight. Then she hurried back to the gate, where Eddie had already undone the latch and swung it open. Becks jumped on the closest ATV, but Eddie had his sights set on a big, old Harley. Revving their engines, they lurched forward through the gate and stopped. They had to close the gate behind them, because they didn’t want to have zombies overrun the town and kill any more innocent people.

  Becks felt a great sense of relief as they zoomed down the street. They were home free, and with any luck, they might even be able to make their way to Interstate 287 that very night. If there was an early morning Army patrol, they could be having bacon and eggs at the Picatinny Arsenal for breakfast, right after they took a long, hot shower. Her wonderful fantasy got derailed, however, just a few blocks down, when Eddie veered to the left and stopped by the curb.

  Becks followed, and saw that he was looking at the pile of freshly dug dirt that covered the grave of his wife, next to the grave of his son. She decided to say nothing and give him a few moments to say goodbye, and tell them they could rest in peace now that his revenge on the brothers was most likely complete. When these few moments stretched to a full minute, and then almost two, she couldn’t remain silent.

  “Eddie, we really have to go,” she said nervously, scanning the street for patrols, or zombies drawn by the noise.

  “I can’t go,” he replied, as though he was a million miles away.

  “I’m sorry, what?” Becks asked, not believing her ears.

  “I can’t leave them.”

  “Oh, Eddie, I know this is hard. But they’re gone. And the best way to keep their memory alive is for you to keep alive,” she said, placing a sympathetic hand on his arm.

  “No, no, that’s not what I meant,” Eddie said, much to Becks’ relief, which unfortunately was short-lived. “This is my town, and I can’t leave all those people. Donnie, Jennifer, that pathetic woman in the tower, they all need me. And how do we know that the last Riley and his henchman are all dead? I need to stay to make sure this is really finished, and I need to stay to help these people!”

  “Eddie, I need your help!” Becks insisted. “And you can best help these people by getting back to one of the Army bases and letting them know what’s going on. They are planning an offensive in the spring, and can air drop supplies in the meantime, with food and medicine and-”

  “No, my place is here,” he stated unequivocally. “You can make it on your own, I know you can. And when you get back, you can send help.”

  “Eddie, don’t do this!” Becks pleaded, as he turned his motorcycle around. She was naturally concerned for his safety, but admittedly, she was more concerned about being alone again, and yes, even afraid.

  Eddie took off his pack and put it in his lap, and rummaged deep down into it. It took some effort, but he pulled something out and handed
it to Becks. It was a bloodstained chemistry book.

  “If I don’t make it, don’t let the world forget about Little Eddie,” he said, pressing the book into her hands.

  This was the library book for which Little Eddie had been shot and killed. Becks knew at that moment that there wasn’t any force on the planet that could change Eddie’s mind about staying, and for all she knew, he was making the right decision. There were no guarantees they would make it to 287, or that the Army would even be able to send help before most of these people perished.

  “Eddie…I…” Becks voice trailed off, at a loss for words as so many emotions competed for supremacy.

  “Just be as brave as Little Eddie was, and you’ll be fine,” he said, gripping her hand tightly for a moment, before speeding back toward New Ridgelawn.

  Becks put the book inside her jacket, hit the throttle, and headed away from New Ridgelawn. She had only known Eddie for a short time, but it seemed like a lifetime. She felt as though she was saying goodbye to her big brother; a brother she might never see again. For a second or two, she thought she should turn around and go back with him, but she still believed her best way to help the people of this town, and all the towns still standing, was to get back to civilization and work on better ways to eradicate the ZIPS once and for all.

  Chapter 12

  The bitter night air stung Becks’ face as she sped away, leaving Eddie and New Ridgelawn behind, but it felt good. It felt like freedom.

  The cold had driven most of the zombies from the streets, and the few that remained were easily avoided by taking the ATV up and over lawns, debris, and even the occasional dried up corpse. Becks headed straight back to Sparrow Lane—not to stay, because that was too risky if the brother or any of his minions had survived and came looking for her—to get to her stash of precious MREs.