Get Zombie: 8-Book Set (14 page)

Hershey's
wheelchair was nearby...and empty. I got out and walked to Fred's
car. He was in there, all right.
Dead
, and still dressed in
his football uniform, with the helmet on, too. Everything, including
him, was burnt and steaming and stink. I couldn't believe it –
I was
crying
. All I could think of was making my brother
comfortable. I yanked open his broken door and dragged him out by his
hands.

Is
he really dead?

We
fell to the dirt. I called out to him. No response. He smelt like
baked pork. My crying came full blast. I couldn't control it. I had
to see his face. I had to see MY brother's face one last time.
Memories flooded my mind: Of us at the beach when we were kids, of
him teaching me how to swim...how he had all that patience for me.

I
pulled off his helmet, and his face came with it, leaving behind a
grinning skull. A grunt in the woods and the sound of galloping. I
looked over my shoulder, and Hershey was all over me. The ambulance
drove up, but it was filled with supelders that leaped out and
grabbed my arms and ripped me apart. The zombies were laughing. They
played tug-of-war with my intestines.

It
was odd how peaceful it all felt. There was no pain. It felt like I
was going to be all right. There was no guilt. I lived a good life.
An honorable life. I even found myself forgiving these...misguided,
old people. Even as my head fell off my body and rolled across the
dirt, I forgave them.

Last
I saw, one of the zombies played jump rope with my guts.

“Gotta
keep my heart rate up!” the old woman said.

JANICE

Jackson
told me he thought he was dying. His body hurt too much. That last
fight did him in real good. He wanted me to kill him. Said that if I
didn't kill him, he would stab himself to death. “Nothing
personal,” I remember him saying. He just wanted the pain to
stop.

“Damn
these nerve fibers,” he said. “I can't live like this.
Just pull the plug. If you really love me, you'll do it.”

That
was a rotten spot to put me in. I took his face and looked into his
eyes. He wasn't
afraid
. I tried reasoning with him, but he
just rolled over and covered his head with a blanket. I locked him in
the bedroom for his own protection and paced around the living room,
careful to not step on the gore stains, and tried to think. I was
panicking, and I had to force myself to take in deep breaths and calm
down. Where was Clair? She'd know what to do. She could handle this.

To
my horror, I heard a flush and a retching. I found Jackson in the
bedroom's bathroom with his head in the toilet, choking and looking
pathetic. His body shook, hands flopping on the wet floor, palms up.
Freaking out, I ran over and yanked his head out from the water. He
fell on my lap, and his face was blue. He vomited water all over my
lap. I kept saying, “My love! My love!”

His
heart stopped, and the only thing I could think of doing was finding
some way to keep him alive.

The
pill.

The
one I found on the ground. That was the answer!

I
took the Kilt pill out from my purse and shoved it in Jackson's
mouth. I massaged his throat, and he swallowed with a GULP.

One
second...did it work?

Two
seconds...was he dead?

Three
seconds...work, work, WORK!

He
opened his eyes, and said, “Thanks for not killing me.”

Was
he being sarcastic? Maybe. Maybe not.

He
said he saw Heaven. God told him the secret to life, and that was to
“chill out”. He wasn't afraid of dying. I kissed him, and
I could tell that the pill was working. (And believe you me, I could
tell it was
really
working.) He grabbed at me and pulled me
close to him and we rolled around the bed. We were going to get
naked, when the scream of a siren stole our attention. Jackson put on
his pants and snatched a pair of scissors. I held his hand as we
walked into the living room.

Someone
outside yelled, “Fire!”

The
front door was blown to smithereens, and a group of supelders –
a cook, a priest, and a ballerina with a bazooka – ran in and
apprehended us. The priest zombie said, “We hereby arrest you
by demand of Her Highness...Pepper Ann.”

They
dragged us into the ambulance kicking and screaming. (
We
went
kicking & screaming – not them.)

The
roads were littered with broken cars and trucks and mopeds and buses
– many of them piled on top of each other. Everywhere I looked
reminded me of a junkyard. We came to a pile of burning trucks. The
ambulance went faster and just plowed straight through. Screaming and
terrible yelling outside. Supelders, waving around flaming swords and
non-flaming golf clubs, chased people here and there. Gunshots.
Police officers running around confused. Disoriented babies crying.
Honolulu in chaos. Was the whole
island
like this? A military
helicopter flew over the city. A man on a horn says, “The whole
island is like this. To everyone who is alive, please stay where you
are. Do not anger the elderly. It is folly.”

He
threw down cans of Spam for anyone still alive.

The
ambulance came to a stop, and the zombies looked at each other,
giggling, and dragged us out. We arrived at Dresela's Hope. The
church. Pepper's special place. Inside was like a factory, with
zombies in yellow hardhats, moving boxes, shifting them around on
conveyor belts and making big piles. The word KILT was on each box.
Pepper sat on a tall throne made of human skulls. A toilet was
nearby. In the middle of the place was a HUGE, crude hole. A little
bit of smoke rose out from it. Pepper was chatting with a coworker
and checking off things on a clipboard. The coworker was Dr. Kilt. He
looked like he had been weeping.

“So
after I make this batch, Mom, I can leave? You'll let me go?”

Pepper
laughed.

“Don't
be silly,” she said. “I'm keeping you
forever
.
Your expertise is too valuable. Your brilliant, scientific mind is my
missing ingredient.”

“But
you promised!”

The
old woman repeated what he said in a childish, whiny way.

“But
you proooommmmissssed,” she said. “Waaah, waaah,
waaaaaaaahh.” She made her hands into fists and wiped away fake
tears. “Awww. Somebody call the waaah-mbulance.”

Dr.
Kilt looked at me. His eyes were filled with tears and fears. He
reached down and flipped up the clipboard from Pepper's hands and ran
off. She stood and pointed.

“GET
HIM!” She stomped the ground like a spoiled child. “He
mustn't get away! We need his braiiinnn!”

Three
old zombies tackled him and, literally, kicked him into an office.
Dr. Kilt put on his glasses and went to work, looking at charts and
tapping on beakers and lighting Bunsen burners. It was impressive. He
meant business. The zombies tied our hands behind our backs as Pepper
walked toward us.

“I'm
a little busy,” she said. “I'll deal with you guys
later.”

I
spat at her, but she just opened her mouth and ate my spit. I took a
threatening step forward.

“What
are you gonna do to us?”

“Eat
you for dessert,” she said. “Any
more
brain
busters?”

I
stood next to Jackson. He was silent that whole time. It looked like
he was sleeping standing up, and he drooled a little. Something about
his aura was different. He was
changing
. The urge to flee from
him came instantly. Zombies were preparing a table with food. Pepper
licked her lips and walked toward Jackson. She took his hand and
sucked on his fingers. “Mmm,” she went, looking at me,
grinning.

I
lost it.

“Take
your mouth off of him!”

Jackson
woke up.

He
grunted, and smiled. Pepper caressed his face with the back of her
hand.

“Glad
you're seeing things my way...lover,” she said.

My
stomach turned and I puked. Pepper jumped back, displeased. She
turned to a zombie.

“Get
this vile scum away from me!” she said. “Tie her to that
pole and surround her with wild dogs attached to chains.”

So
they did.

Dr.
Kilt walked out from his office with a tray of vials.

“Here's
the next batch, Momma,” he said.

Pepper
took the tray and smiled and fed the doctor a cookie.

“Excellent,”
she said, tapping his head. “Eeexceeellleeennnt.”

A
zombie with a bowl walked up to her.

“Egg
salad?”

Pepper
waved the zombie away.

She
walked over to the hole in the ground and put on a stereotypical,
black, pointy witch's hat and started chanting. The hole let out a
looong
burp
. More smoke rose. And then something weird
happened. The smoke – I swear on my husband's grave –
turned into the shape of...Hitler.

Adolf
“The Devil” Hitler.

He
saluted.

“Heil
Hitler!”

Pepper
clicked her heels together and saluted back.

“Heil
Hitler!”

The
Hitler-smoke ghost grew bigger.

He
hovered around Pepper and went INTO the vials of Kilt. Lightning shot
out from the tray and a big wind blew everyone's hair back. Dr. Kilt
was sobbing and shaking his head.

“I've
made a terrible mistake,” he was blabbing. “God, I am
looking up at you. Please forgive me! Forgive and forget!”

Hitler
flew out of the tray and went back down into the hole. Pepper
gathered the surrounding old people and gave them more Kilt. They
were reinvigorated. They bowed to Pepper.

“Thank
you, My Highness,” they all said, kissing her hand.

Pepper
smiled.

“Thank
you, My Lowness.”

And
then the zombies all went back to work, loading the boxes of Kilt
into hearses. Pepper drank a vial of Kilt and started dancing around
– full of energy – full of life.

“I
am God!” she screamed. I mean really screamed it. “I am
Ga'hhhhhhhhhhhd!” A huge painting of Hitler on a triumphant
horse was on a wall. Pepper pressed a red button, and the painting
slid to the right, revealing a large monitor with an image of Oahu.

“Victory
is near!” she said. “Soon, I will turn Oahu into my
personal playground – my own little paradise. HEAVEN. Total
control. I can do what and WHO I want. The dream of dreams! I will be
Queen! Living like a god! And I will
create
like a god: I will
repopulate Oahu with the supelderly and make a master race. We are
faster, better,
sexier
. First Oahu, then the world!
Finally...there will be peace on earth.” Then she threw her
head back and clawed at the ceiling, and yelled, “Hawaii kann
nicht eher zur Ruhe kommen, bevor die faul Frage ausgeräumt
ist!”

She
spun around and pointed at me.

“And
NO youth in my new world! We can't stand the sight of babies, kids,
teens, adults! It's like we're looking at a rapist or a baby killer
walking out of a courthouse. The youth have committed the sin of
wasting their lives, worrying about bills and car insurance and
hurricane insurance and ex-lovers and venereal diseases and job
security and bills – constantly worry about money and bills,
bills, BILLS. Idiots! They should be focusing on BLISS. Get it? See
what I did there? Listen, bitch. Everyone dies, but no one really
lives. So many waste their lives. What a waste of
life!
Even
now, talking about them makes me so angry!” She said that last
part with grinding teeth.

“Bring
in the sacrificial pregnant woman!”

The
zombie workers do just that, and the baby is ripped out from woman's
belly and is tossed about like a football.

“Keep-away!”
the monsters laughed.

Pepper
took the baby...and let it suck from her wrinkled and somewhat long,
black nipple.

On
the large screen, I saw supelders conquering a military base. They
took control of the tanks and planes and took them for joy rides. Dr.
Kilt told her that they must train the zombies quickly before the
mainland took action against them.

“Mein
kampf,” Pepper shrugged. She put on a captain's hat, and the
screen blinked and showed battleships. “With my fleet, we will
be unstoppable. Get the battleships ready for
battle
!”

The
words “In-coming Message” filled the screen. An old
captain asked for more Kilt – and
quick
. His men were
getting nuts – going absolutely crazy – craving more
Kilt. People were getting slow and looking for ways to get more
energy. One man had already swallowed a cat
whole
to harness
its cat-like powers. But it was just embarrassing. The wild cat tore
out from the old zombie's belly and spooked everyone and hissed and
ran off and jumped into the ocean where it was never seen from again.
Pepper instructed Dr. Kilt to fill the hearses with more boxes and
disperse the pills to as many zombies as possible – and to toss
them from helicopters, if possible.

“You
can't run an empire with sloths,” she said. Everyone nodded,
and went, “Mmm, mmm.”

Pepper
yawned and tossed the baby into the hole in the ground. A demonic
burp came out, followed by an offensive odor. She explained that she
liked the Devil because he let them do whatever they wanted.
Although, she said quite honestly, she didn't like how he was like a
dad that's never home. Thunder erupted in the giant hole. The
building shook. Pepper was scared.

“I'm
sorry,” she said. “Please don't kill me.”

Right
then, Jackson ran from the throne and growled and began tearing off
many zombie heads and pulling off many zombie arms and legs and
hands. He untied me. Jackson was a supelderly. He ran into the lab
and knocked everything over and started a big fire. He jogged out,
covered in flames. I screamed for him, but he just ran for Pepper
with his arms out, ready to strangle her. Pepper looked around,
confused.