3.2 As the World Dies Untold Tales Vol. 2 Read online

  As if she needed urging...

  She heard the footfalls of the approaching zombies gaining on her and she didn’t need Ken flapping his hand at her like some sort of crazed traffic cop. Her body felt heavy, her large breasts heaving, her solid legs shoving her body forward. She hated running. She hated it with a passion, but the sound of the snarling, hissing zombies drawing closer was more annoying than her heavy bosom painfully jostling around.

  “Lenore!” It was Mr. Cloy’s voice.

  She swung around, wielding the coat rack like a sword and ended up smacking it into the bloodied and torn face of a female zombie scrambling over the trunk of a car to get to her. Lenore smashed the coat rack down on the thing’s head a few times, then used the end to shove the zombie off the car and away from her.

  “Just run! Just run!” Mr. Cloy’s voice urged.

  Her eyes flicked upward. Mr. Cloy’s tragic form stood on the edge of the building. He was listing to one side and looked scarily like a zombie already.

  “Run, Lenore!” His voice was ragged, but fierce.

  The zombies scrambled around the cars, coming straight for her. She whipped around and ran the last few feet to the truck. Ken threw open the driver’s door for her and scrambled into his seat. Turning, she threw the coat rack at the zombie three feet from her. Its feet tangled around the coat rack, and it fell. As it thrashed around, trying to get up, other zombies tripped over it, forming a writhing, moaning pile of dead flesh.

  Lenore heaved her body into the driver’s seat and slammed the door shut just as a horribly disfigured woman threw herself against it. Ken promptly locked the doors, sealing them safely inside.

  Lenore sat in silence for a few moments drawing in deep ragged breaths. Beside her, Ken stared at the female zombie clawing at the windshield.

  “Can we go now?” His voice was small.

  Lenore slid the keys into the ignition, then shook her head. “I don’t know how to drive a stick.”

  “Okay, switch!” Ken scrambled forward and over her.

  Cussing under her breath, Lenore slid over to let him behind the wheel. The steady thump of the zombies slapping their hands against the truck made her stomach churn and she avoided looking at the snarling faces outside the passenger door. The truck was either rocking from the zombies’ assault or all the trouble she and Ken had moving about so he could get into the driver’s seat.

  “Ouch, I need those!” Ken slapped at her hand as she tried to shove him off her.

  Lenore just snorted and tried not to end up groping him again. Finally, she managed to squeeze into the passenger seat over the damn console wedged between the seats and got her legs adjusted on either side of Cher’s carrier. The cat peered up at her through the grate and let out a low hiss.

  “Don’t make me feed you to the zombies,” Lenore threatened.

  Ken settled himself into the driver’s seat and fumbled with the seat settings.

  “Ken!”

  “My feet aren’t reaching!”

  The zombies smashed their hands against the doors and windows over and over again. Blood and chunks of flesh smeared the windows. Some of the zombies were munched down to the bone and one was thumping its stumpy wrist against the windshield over and over again.

  “I want to go now, Ken! Now!”

  Ken’s seat whined as he adjusted it and he screamed at her, “Hold on!”

  “Zombies, Ken. Zombies trying to eat us. Let’s go!”

  The seat finally seemed to be in the right position for Ken’s feet to reach the pedals and he turned on the engine. It roared to life, as did the radio. Both Ken and Lenore screamed at the sound of Kenny Roger’s voice booming out of the speakers. Lenore reached out and punched the radio off.

  “Oh, God, my heart hurts,” Ken exclaimed.

  Lenore hit him in the arm.

  “OUCH! That hurt!”

  “Them zombies eating your sweet flesh is gonna hurt a lot more. Drive or I will hit you again!”

  Lenore was determined not to die today and that was that.

  Ken shifted gears and cautiously drove forward. Lenore gripped the dashboard. The zombies were all around them now, moaning and howling, their disgusting bloodied hands clawing at the car. The cat let out a low yowl of disapproval and Lenore silently agreed with her.

  The situation was getting fucked.

  Ken carefully maneuvered the truck around the cars blocking the street. He was obviously nervous driving such a big vehicle. They both held their breath as Ken squeezed the truck between two cars. There was a loud screech as the back of the truck caught one of the vehicles. Lenore twisted around in her seat to look out the rear window. Some of the zombies were holding onto the truck bed. Maybe they were trying to stop the truck, or maybe hoping to be carried along with it.

  “We’re a freaking Happy Meal on wheels,” Lenore said with a frown.

  Ken grimaced as he inadvertently ran over a few mangled zombies crawling on the ground. “Oh, God, Lenore!”

  “They ain’t people no more! Don’t freak out!”

  Ken nodded and edged past a police car, driving close to Mr. Cloy’s store.

  Pushing on the horn, Ken honked twice and waved to the silhouette of Mr. Cloy on the roof above them. Lenore waved too, but she only caught a glimpse of their friend.

  There was a crash as something hit the truck bed and the vehicle rocked violently. Ken screamed and mashed on the brakes. Lenore whipped around to see Mr. Cloy’s body fall off the back of the truck. Blood was splattered all over the interior of the truck bed.

  “Mr. Cloy!”

  “Go,” Lenore said.

  “Was he dead? Was he a zombie and trying to get to us? Did he kill himself?”

  “Just go, Ken!” Lenore yelled at him. “Just go!”

  Tears wet her cheeks as she gripped the back of her seat tightly. As Ken drove on, she watched zombies gathering around the fallen form of their friend. She clenched her eyes shut and tried to erase the vision of his battered body from her mind.

  Main Street loomed before them. The living dead were scattered along its length. Some moved surprisingly fast in the direction of the truck. These zombies were less damaged than their much-slower counterparts. In some cases, it took more than one look to realize they were dead. The worst of the slow ones was the upper half of an old woman that dragged herself around the corner by her bloodied fingertips.

  Ken accelerated away from the shops and drove through the middle of town. His sobs filled her ears as his cat meowed in fear. The truck lurched a few times as they ran over one of the undead and the zombies lashed out at the truck as they passed.

  “Why did he jump, Lenore? Why?”

  “Maybe he was done with this crazy ass world, Ken. I dunno. He was bit. He was as good as dead. We all knew it.”

  Ken gripped the steering wheel with one hand as he wiped his face with the other. “I don’t know how to get to your house.”

  “I’ll tell you,” Lenore said. “And we’re going the long way. I don’t want any of those things following us.”

  The truck continued down Main Street and, one by one, the zombies they passed turned to follow.

  11.

  Hell Sucks

  Ken hated this new world. He hated it with a vengeance. It made him sick to his stomach. He just wanted to go home, go back to bed and start the day all over again. Of course, that was not an option. Instead he was driving his dead friend’s truck to the outskirts of town. The plan was to loop around to Lenore’s neighborhood using back roads. Hopefully, they would be in time to save her grandmother.

  A soft meow drew his attention to his precious little Cher sitting in her cat carrier. She didn’t look very happy with the situation and he didn’t blame her. Their life together had been relatively calm since the no-good-jerkoff had run away with the boy toy. But that was over and what lay ahead was shrouded in mystery.

  Ken hated mysteries.

  Lenore was silent beside him, her jaw set, her eyes fastened firm
ly on the road ahead. His heart went out to her. He couldn’t even imagine how she was feeling. Though he was worried about his family far away in Houston, he wasn’t as close to them as Lenore was to her grandmother.

  The town was tearing itself apart all around them. As he drove, he saw flashes of bloodied figures out of the corner of his eye. Suddenly, a figure darted out in front of the truck. They both screamed just before the truck hit the teenage girl and hurtled her off into the ditch.

  “She was one of them, right?” Ken felt like his head was going to explode. “Right, Lenore? She was one of them, right?”

  “There was blood on her. If she wasn’t one yet, she woulda been,” Lenore assured him.

  “Oh, God,” Ken literally felt his heart pounding in his chest. “I didn’t mean to-”

  “It’s okay. I saw blood on her. I did,” Lenore swore. “I saw it.”

  Ken nodded and swallowed hard. His hands shook as he drove and he tried to get a grip on himself. “Okay.”

  “I wouldn’t lie to you,” Lenore said in a firm voice.

  “Okay,” he said one more time. He bobbed his head up and down in affirmation of his words. “I believe you.”

  “Circle around on Cemetery Road,” Lenore directed.

  “Ugh! What if they are coming out of the graves?”

  “Then they’re probably all out and eating someone by now,” Lenore answered without a touch of humor in her voice.

  Ken flipped on his turn signal and drove the truck onto a very narrow dirt road. The old cemetery was just that: old. No one was buried there anymore due to restriction of space. Most people from the town were now buried around ten miles out of the city limits in a brand new cemetery with flat headstones and boring landscaping. The old cemetery on Cemetery Road was full of tall gravestones, mausoleums, and weeping angels. It was overgrown with weeds nowadays and the city was constantly harassing the holders of the privately owned land to clean it up.

  As Ken drove over the road that was rife with deep gouges, they both lapsed into sullen silence. The cemetery, off to Ken’s left, was quiet and devoid of anything living or undead. The high wrought-iron fence leaned dangerously in spots, but the graves were undisturbed. Wherever the zombies had come from, it was not the graveyard.

  The appallingly-potholed little road curved around behind the cemetery and under a canopy of gnarled, overgrown oak trees. The branches overhead created deep shadows under the canopy and Ken felt unnerved by the sudden gloom. The silent graveyard loomed in his peripheral vision. Even though he had seen the dead come to life, he was more unnerved by being so close to the hallowed ground of the cemetery.

  Cher let out a low, cranky meow.

  “It’s okay, sugar, we’re almost there,” Lenore said.

  “Where is the shotgun?” Ken asked suddenly. “Mr. Cloy said the shotgun was in the truck.”

  Lenore looked over her shoulder at the empty gun rack. “It’s not in the rack. Must be around here somewhere.” She began to feel around behind their seats.

  Ken gasped as a zombie stumbled into the area where the old road intersected with the residential street that led to Lenore’s house. It was a male, terribly mutilated and missing its eyes. It appeared to hear the truck, for it started to screech.

  Ken stomped on the brakes and stared at the creature in horror. Lenore yelped as she fell back into her seat clutching the shotgun.

  “Ken!”

  “What?”

  “Run it over!”

  The blind zombie wandered in front of them, its hands reaching out, searching for the truck.

  Ken could not believe what he was seeing. The eyeless sockets and empty chest cavity was the stuff of horror movies or an X Files episode. This close, the zombie was almost too much for him to handle.

  “Ken, run it over!” Lenore shouted again.

  Cher yowled anxiously.

  Ken shifted into reverse and pulled away from the zombie. Beside him, Lenore clutched the shotgun in both hands. Shifting gears, he took a deep breath.

  “Just floor it and hit it,” Lenore instructed.

  Ken swallowed and shoved his foot down onto the accelerator. The big truck roared forward and just before it hit the zombie, Ken squeezed his eyes shut.

  “Ken!”

  The impact was brutal. The truck was slammed to one side and the screech of metal grinding against metal filled the cab. Ken was thrown violently, his seatbelt catching him securely and pinching deep into his chest. The airbags exploded and the air filled with fine white powder.

  “What the-” Ken muttered, opening his eyes.

  It wasn’t the zombie that had smashed into the front of the truck, but a small car. Inside, a young woman was draped over the steering wheel. The windshield of her tiny, ancient car was shattered and glass glittered in her blond hair.

  Cher hissed loudly as Lenore moaned beside him. Ken straightened in his seat as Lenore raised her hand to her bleeding temple. She appeared dazed.

  “We need to get that girl and...” Ken’s voice trailed off. The front end of the truck wasn’t that badly crumpled, but it was listing to one side. He shifted gears quickly and tried to reverse. The truck didn’t budge. The tire was most likely rammed into the side of the wheel well and was not budging.

  “What the hell just happened?” Lenore said in a slurred voice.

  “An accident and-No! No! No!”

  The zombie he had been trying to hit hauled itself over the hood of the small car toward the shattered windshield. Its grotesquely gnawed fingers anxiously sought flesh. Another zombie, this one a woman in a pale pink housecoat, also reached the car embedded into the side of the truck, and tried to reach the unconscious girl.

  “Lenore! Lenore! We have to shoot them! Give me the gun!”

  She just stared at him blankly, still woozy.

  Ken snatched the shotgun out of her hands and fumbled with it. He didn’t have the slightest idea how to work the weapon. He feverishly searched for something labeled a safety. The characters on TV always talked about it on cop shows. He knew it had to be loaded and ready. Mr. Cloy always said he kept his weapons locked and loaded.

  He found a button and pushed it.

  The shotgun went off with a thunderous roar. The driver’s side window exploded beside him, showering him with glass. Deafened by the shot, Ken couldn’t even hear himself screaming.

  Outside, the female zombie managed to grab the girl’s hair and began pulling her toward her. Ken could feel his heart pounding as he tried to aim the shotgun at the female zombie. Just as he squeezed the trigger, the shotgun was knocked to the side.

  The blast caught the unconscious girl in the car full in the chest.

  Ken gasped.

  A hand, bloodied and chewed, thrust into the truck’s broken window, grabbing for him.

  12.

  It Gets Worse

  When Ken fired through the window, Lenore jerked upright and felt her brain careen wildly inside her skull. She gripped her head tightly between her hands and moaned softly. Between being deaf and her head feeling like it was about to explode, she felt alert once more.

  She had an inkling she may have been knocked unconscious for a few moments. The disorientation she felt after the crash was fading now. The world seemed to be coming out of the haze. Instead of feeling like she was moving in slow motion through a horror movie, she felt painfully-aware of the world in action around her.

  Ken screamed beside her and she turned to see a hand reaching through the shattered window. He thrashed around in his seat trying to evade the zombie.

  Lenore leaned over, still feeling rather sluggish, and saw the zombie try to grab Ken. “Help me! Help me!” Ken struggled with the seatbelt.

  Lenore pulled the shotgun off his lap.

  “I fired two shots! It doesn’t have any more!”

  She took aim at the horrible shredded face and pulled the trigger. The shotgun thundered and the zombie fell. The other zombies paid no attention as they continued to pull apart th
e girl in the car.

  “It’s dead. Calm down.” Lenore’s fingers found the button on his buckle and pressed it.

  Ken nearly crawled onto her lap trying to get away from the shattered driver side window.

  Lenore fumbled for the bag she had pulled the shotgun out of. More zombies were struggling to get into the car that had crashed into them. The feeding frenzy had the attention of the undead. For now they weren’t paying mind to the truck or its occupants. Lenore snagged the bag and yanked it onto her lap. Checking inside, she was relieved to see several boxes of shotgun shells.

  “Lenore, Lenore, I killed that girl they’re eating. I killed her,” Ken whispered in a trembling voice.

  “Can’t worry about that now,” Lenore answered and shoved the passenger door open. She dropped out of the truck and surveyed the surroundings. She heaved the bag over one shoulder and held the shotgun in one hand.

  “Zombies, everywhere, Lenore,” Ken hissed.

  “Window broken. Broken truck. Get out.” Lenore’s head was throbbing and her vision was a little off, but she knew they had to go and now.

  Ken slid out of the truck and dragged his bag with him. He snagged Cher’s carrier. He looked too pale and his eyes were huge in his pinched face.

  From behind the battered cars came the terrible sounds of the feeding frenzy. The crunching and slurping was enough to make anyone want throw up, but Lenore’s tummy was empty now. She swallowed firmly and pulled Ken along behind her.

  She could see her home just three houses down the block to the right. It was so close. If they could just avoid any of the really fast zombies, they could probably make it to safety.

  Ken breathed heavily beside her as they jogged toward the house. Though she didn’t want to, she reluctantly took a quick peek behind them. A badly-mauled zombie trailed behind them. Its leg was chewed to the bone and it was missing an arm. It was Mr. Thames, her elderly neighbor, who had been tending his yard when she had left for work not too long ago.

  Whipping about, she aimed the shotgun at his head and pulled the trigger. The shotgun merely clicked. It was empty.