Sven the Zombie Slayer (19 page)

As they gained speed, the mass of zombies began to thin out, and Sven spotted clear road ahead of them. Lorie must have spotted it too, because she let out a happy hoot.

After they broke away from the throng, Sven slowed and checked his mirrors to assess the damage. They were dragging four zombies with them—the ones with their hands caught in the door.

Without consulting anyone, Sven decided on a course of action. He spotted a cluster of three zombies who were milling in place and aimed the car so that the zombies hanging on to the right side of the car would be swept off by the zombies in the road.

“Get away from the door,” he said. “Now.”

Sven floored it.

Impact.

The car shook as the hanging zombies made contact with the zombies in the road, bones crunching and shattering. Sven looked over his shoulder and saw that Jane and Lorie had moved away from the door, anticipating the impact. The collision wrenched the door open, and sent a spray of disintegrating fingers, palms, and forearms—brittle remnants of the infected—into the backseat.

But all of the clinging zombies hadn’t been swept off. There was still one hanging on to the open door. It wore a long-sleeved, black and white striped shirt, its legs dragging on the pavement as it held firmly to the car door.

Jane was kicking at the Waldo zombie but she couldn’t make solid enough contact to get the thing off.

“Hang on,” Sven said. “Get deeper into the car. I’m going to get that thing off.”

Sven looked back at the road. It was mostly clear now, except for a scattering of stopped cars, the vehicles on the road now thinning out. Sven could see the Waldo zombie streaming from the car in his right hand mirror. Sven gripped the wheel tightly with both hands and found his target—a stopped UPS truck in the road at the next intersection. He sped up and aimed again.

“Hold on back there,” Sven said. “I’m going to peel this one right off.”

There was a bone-crushing clunk, and the Waldo zombie was gone. All that remained was one striped-shirted zombie arm, streaming from the open car door.

49

Lorie was beginning to calm down. She crawled over to the open door, and with the toe of her running shoe, began to flick zombie pieces out into the road. Most of the bits were fingers and forearms; the zombie flesh was so dry and brittle that it barely seemed real, and the parts crumbled so much that it was hard to get all of them. How could they be so strong and so breakable at the same time?

Once Lorie had flicked all of the zombie parts that were large enough to flick, she looked at the smaller bits of zombie flesh that were now reduced to a powder, packed tightly into the grooves of the backseat foot well.

“Sorry Sven,” Lorie said. “I don’t think that’s gonna come out without a vacuum. They’re so...they’re so dry. Like crumbly cheese.”

“That’s okay,” Sven said. “We’ll figure something out when we have a chance. Good mental image by the way—the cheese I mean, disgusting. They are really dry. I wonder if that means anything.”

“Probably that they’re dehydrated,” Jane said. “Right? I mean what else would it mean and how would that help us?”

“I don’t know,” Lorie said. “Maybe it’s important.” She thought that it was.

“The first one,” Sven said, “the first zombie that attacked me this morning, he was my friend, Lars. He wasn’t like that. He looked like he was deflating or something, but he was bleeding. And the second one I saw, my neighbor, he wasn’t dry either.”

Jane nodded. “Vicky wasn’t dry like this either.”

Lorie shook her head. “But that was a while ago, maybe they’re all changing somehow. It’s like a cold or something, and it goes in stages. Now they’re all dry and crumbly, and maybe later, they’ll be all better and it’ll be over.”

No one said anything for a while, and Lorie remembered that her ankle hurt where one of the zombies had grabbed her. She poked at it. It was tender, but she didn’t think it would be a problem for her to get around. She wouldn’t be able to run as fast though, that was for sure.

“Are you okay?” Jane asked.

Lorie looked up. “Yeah, I’m fine. My ankle’s a little sore but it’s gonna be okay.”

“She’s a tough kid,” Sven chimed in. “How’s Evan back there?”

Lorie turned to look at Evan, and realized that she hadn’t heard him say anything for a while. Come to think of it, she didn’t remember him moving in a while. He was huddled in the left corner of the backseat, his face in his hands, his body turned away from Lorie and Jane. He wasn’t moving.

“Are you alright?” Lorie asked. “Evan? Are you feeling okay?”

Evan didn’t respond.

“He’s probably just had a bit of a shock,” Sven said. “We all have. It’s understandable.”

“Evan?” Lorie asked again.

Evan still didn’t respond, and he wasn’t moving.

Lorie slid over along the backseat and reached for Evan’s shoulder. Just when she was about to touch him, Ivan hissed, and Lorie turned to see that the cat had jumped on top of the front passenger seat’s headrest. Ivan’s tail was fluffed up and he was swiping at an invisible something in the air.

“Ivan!” Sven said. “What’s gotten into you?”

“It’s okay,” Lorie said. “I’m sure he’s had a shock too, like you said.”

Ivan hissed and swiped again. Then Sven swerved around something, and the cat lost its balance and skittered down the front of the headrest, making a deft landing in the seat. Then Ivan got up on the armrest next to Sven. The cat looked straight at Lorie.

“Hi,” Lorie said. “It’s okay,” and she extended her hand to Ivan. He sniffed at it, then rubbed his head in it.

“Good cat,” Lorie said.

Ivan meowed.

Then Lorie turned back to Evan and was about to put her hand on his shoulder when she felt claws digging into her legs. Startled by the sudden pricks of pain, Lorie turned away from Evan to find Ivan balancing in her lap, hissing and shadow-swiping at her arm.

It’s as if he’s trying to tell me something, she thought.

“Ivan!” Sven said again. “Be nice. We’re all in this together. I’m sorry Lorie, he’s usually very nice. I don’t know what to tell you. He is a nice cat most of the time, really.”

“It’s okay,” Lorie said, looking at Ivan. She was half frightened and half curious. Cats had always liked her before. Maybe this one didn’t. There was a first time for everything. Or maybe he was trying to tell her something. It was a silly thought, and Lorie knew it, but she couldn’t shake it.

“Here,” Jane said, “I’ll take him,” and pulled the screeching cat off Lorie.

“Evan?” Jane asked. “Are you alright?”

Lorie turned back to Evan.

“Evan?” Lorie asked.

This time he reacted. He took his hands away from his face, resting them on the window, and began to push his slumped body upright.

Ivan hissed again, and Lorie turned to see that Jane was barely able to restrain the cat in her arms. Something obviously had Ivan spooked.

“Evan,” Lorie said, “it’s gonna be fine. We got away. We’re gonna find a safe place and we’ll be fine.”

Lorie put her arm on Evan’s knee as he turned to face her. She meant to comfort him. He was taking it worse than she was, and he needed a friend. She could usually make him feel better about things.

But when Lorie saw Evan’s face, she pulled her hand away.

50

Evan was pale-faced, shivering, and looked like he was on the verge of death. Jane didn’t like it.

“Lorie,” Jane said, taking the girl’s arm. “Go sit up front with Sven, okay honey? He needs all the help navigating that he can get.”

The girl nodded, and climbed over the armrest into the passenger seat. When she sat down, she looked back fearfully at Evan, seeming glad to be away from him.

Ivan began to calm down, prompting Jane to relax her grip on the cat that just a few moments before had been frantic with terror...or something. Jane had never realized how strong cats were, or at least how strong this particular cat was. She knew that if Ivan had fought against her grip a little longer, he would’ve gotten away and inflicted whatever damage he had intended.

“Evan?” Jane said. “How you doing over there?”

“I don’t feel that great,” Evan said. “Maybe I’m carsick or something.”

Jane nodded, suspecting motion sickness wasn’t it at all. What if Evan had the same thing that Vicky had—that all the zombies were afflicted with? Could they all catch it from him? They were all in the same car together, after all. Jane thought back to that moment earlier in the day when she had scolded Sven for being reluctant to take Lorie and Evan on. She began to think he had been right in a way. They could all be in serious trouble now, if it turned out Evan had the zombie flu or whatever the hell was going around turning people into monsters. Turning Vicky into—

Jane felt herself choking up with tears and made herself stop.

“Maybe we can stop soon,” she said, “and get you some Dramamine. Do you want some water or maybe a bite to eat right now? That might make you feel better.”

“No thanks.”

“He hasn’t been feeling well for the past few days,” Lorie said, turning around. “He has a cold.”

Evan nodded. “Yeah, but I was feeling better today and I was going back in to school and...” he trailed off.

“Okay,” Jane said. “Well, we’ll get you something as soon as we can. Maybe try to sleep for now, if you can.”

“I’ll try.” He put his head back in his hands and turned away to lean against the window.

He doesn’t have any zombie virus, Jane thought, feeling silly. He has a cold. He’s had it for days. The boy was going to be fine. She let out the breath she was holding.

He’s going to be fine, Jane told herself again, but in spite of the positive self-talk, she began to feel in her pockets for any sort of weapon. She didn’t have anything. The utensils she had used earlier in the day were gone, used up along the way. Her gun was in her bedroom, back on
Lewis Mountain Road
, now miles away.

“We have to get some weapons,” Jane said.

“That’s where we’re going,” Sven said, “we’re gonna stop at the gun store up the way.”

“Good,” Jane said. “I know the one.”

Jane felt unsteady and exposed, holding on to the door for fear that it would open again, in a car with two teenagers, one of whom looked to be on the verge of death, her bodybuilder ex-boyfriend, his cat, and no weapons.

Ivan looked up at Jane, tilted his head to one side, blinked, and licked her nose.

51

Sven saw the next wall of zombies in time. He tapped the brakes, and the car stopped well away from the gathering of infected, no out-of-control skidding, no screeching of brakes, no arrival in the midst of the zombies.

“Sorry,” Lorie said. “I didn’t see them in time, I guess I’m not that good at this navigating thing.”