A half an hour later, they were standing on the runway of the air base. A straight-backed, broad-chested Canadian fighter pilot in a tan uniform walked out of the hangar. The pilot sauntered up to Andy and gave him a quick manly hug. Andy pointed back to the kids illuminated in the headlights of the car.
“So this is the precious cargo?” the pilot asked, staring down at them. “My name is Chet, and I may or may not be your pilot this evening.”
Ozzie took the lead and saluted back, stiff as a board. “Oswald Briggs, sir. Junior Commando First Class, sir.”
“Boy, you grow up in the military or something?”
“Sir, yes, sir!”
“All right, then,” he said, turning to look at Zack. “I understand that you think that thing’s cousin can help you make the same antidote that saved America the last time.”
“That’s right, sir.”
“And that this particular cousin’s in Orlando, Florida?”
“Yeah, but not just anywhere in Orlando,” said Rice. “Her last known whereabouts are Bunco’s Fun World.”
Zack jabbed his buddy in the ribs with his elbow. “Right again, sir.”
The Canadian fighter pilot thought for a moment, grabbing his chin and looking at the sky. “I’ll take you on one condition,” he said. “We do this my way. We get in, get what we need, and get out. We’re not staying in the outbreak zone any longer than we have to.”
“Deal,” Zack said. “Whatever it takes.”
A few minutes later, they were all wearing earmuffs and flight goggles as the military plane roared out of the hangar.
“That there’s a Lockheed C-130 Hercules, four-engine turboprop military transport aircraft.”
“Sweet,” Zack and Ozzie said in unison.
In the back of the cargo hold, Rice was now busy cutting a small mouth-hole in Madison’s sweatshirt to pop in a couple of ginkgo pills. He tossed a few in then held her jaw shut until she glugged down the pills.
Within seconds, zombie Madison dropped like a sack of potatoes near the emergency parachutes as the ginkgo immediately paralyzed her nervous system. Zack and Zoe caught her by the elbows before her head smacked the floor and laid her out to nap.
Zack then hunkered down on the bench in the back of the cargo hold between Ozzie and Rice to try to get some much-needed rest. He looked over at his sister, who had just lain down and was already out like a light, snoring over the roar of the rumbling plane engine. As the plane cruised to higher altitude, Zack’s eyes grew heavy and he could finally relax. Almost instantaneously, he gave in to sleep and slipped into dreamland.
Zack awoke with a start to the sound of screaming and shouting. He jolted up and leaped to his feet. Madison’s ginkgo coma had worn off and she had wriggled her face through the mouth-hole in her hoodie and had bitten Chet in the Achilles tendon.
“It bit me!” The pilot’s voice boomed from the cockpit, waking both Rice and Ozzie from their slumbers, too. “It bit me!”
Up front, zombie Madison was rampaging around the flight deck, possessed with the rage of undeath while the pilot thrashed wildly, clutching his Achilles heel.
“You guys get her under control,” Ozzie said, gesturing to zombie Madison. “I got Chet.”
Zack and Rice ran forward and tackled zombie Madison, wrestling her into submission while Ozzie watched the Canadian Air Force pilot zombify at his feet. “Hey, man,” Ozzie spoke to the delirious pilot as the zombie virus coursed through his bloodstream. “You’re about to turn into a zombie. You have to take these.” Ozzie gave him a small handful of ginkgo pills.
“Will this keep me from turning into a zombie?” Chet asked.
“Well, not really,” said Ozzie. “But it’ll keep you from turning us into zombies.”
Meanwhile, Zoe was still sound asleep, snoring contentedly with her hands under her face like a pillow.
With Madison contained, Zack tried to stuff another ginkgo pill down her putrid zombie throat. He covered her mouth with his hand to make the ginkgo go down, but she kept nipping at his fingers with her undead chompers. “Ouch!” Zack squealed.
“Blargh! Puhtooey!” Zombie Madison spat out the ginkgo pills.
Finally, with Rice’s help, the two of them got Madison to swallow the ginkgo, but the jet was losing altitude at a rapid pace.
Ozzie jumped behind the board and started clicking at the control panel, setting off an alarm.
Zoe opened her eyes at the blaring noise. “Please tell me I’m dreaming,” she said, snapping to attention. “Ozzie, what’s going on?”
“Guys,” he said. “I got some good news and some bad news.”
“What’s the good news?” Zoe asked, standing up.
“The good news is we’re right over Fun World,” Ozzie said, looking at the coordinates on the display grid.
“What’s the bad news?” Zack questioned.
“The bad news is we’re going down.”
BLAOW! An explosion erupted on the left side of the jet by the wing, and Zack could see smoke through the window. The plane jerked in midair to one side, and Chet the Canadian fighter pilot rolled out of the cockpit and into the back.
“Somebody help me get this dude into that seat over there!” Ozzie yelled over the explosion.
Ozzie and Zack grabbed the unconscious pilot and propped him up in the ejector seat, equipped with a self-deploying parachute. As they strapped Chet in the seat, his eyes popped open with blank, white ferocity and he clacked his teeth, biting at the air.
“Whoa.” Zack flinched back and Ozzie immediately hit the release button. The top of the cockpit flipped open, and the seat shot up into the sky. Zack and Ozzie watched in the windy vortex of the open-air cockpit as the parachute deployed and the zombie pilot floated down into the clouds.
“Okay, our boy’s safe. Now everybody grab a parachute vest,” Ozzie said, cracking open the emergency glass case. “We’re about to be over Bunco’s. I’ve set the coordinates of the plane to land in the Atlantic, but we’re going to have to jump into Fun World.”
Zoe grimaced, still a little groggy from sleep. “That doesn’t sound fun at all!”
Ozzie showed them all very quickly how to put on their parachutes as the fighter jet descended over their destination. “After you jump from the plane, count to ten Mississippi and then pull the rip cord. Got it?”
“Got it.” Zoe strapped her conked-out zombie BFF to her chest, ready to tandem jump out of the plane.
“On the count of five,” Ozzie said, fastening his flight goggles into place. “Five!”
“Four,” Zack said nervously.
“Three.” Rice’s eyes gleamed, ready for his first ever skydive.
“Arf!” Twinkles barked from Zack’s parachute pack.
“One!” Zoe said quickly, and leaped through a passing cloud.
“Hey, you skipped two!” Zack said, but Ozzie was already jumping, followed by Rice.
“Cowabunga!” Rice’s voice trailed off as he went free-falling through the air.
Zack’s stomach sank to his feet. He closed his eyes then jumped out of the jet plane with Twinkles, bug-eyed, peering out of the pocket of his pack.
One Mississippi.
Two Mississippi.
Three Mississippi.
The warm Florida wind battered Zack’s face as his speed multiplied by the force of gravity per second. Eight Mississippi. A squeal from Twinkles blended with the air whooshing past their falling bodies. Nine Mississippi.
Out of the corner of his eye, Zack could see Rice Superman-ing through the open sky like a pro, then in a blink he lost sight of his friend. Ten Mississippi. Zack yanked the cord like Ozzie had told them, and the parachute discharged skyward, catching the breeze with a jolt.
Zack and Twinkles floated over the Florida peninsula. A bird’s-eye view of Fun World appeared beneath them as if they had been dropped into a board game come to life.
But it wasn’t a game. And Zack knew it. This was a matter of life and eternal zombifica
tion: the living versus the undead. One misstep and humanity would be history.
He zoomed over the zombie hot zone and landed feet first with a clang on a bed of chain-link. The parachute came down over his head and tinted everything red.
“Whoa!” Zack was looking down from fifteen feet in the air onto a complex of state-of-the-art batting cages. He tugged the parachute’s tent away from him and scoped the amusement park.
From where Zack had landed atop the batting cages, Fun World forked off into three multicolored cobblestone pathways with palm trees and gumball machines lining the sides. Huge twisting roller coasters soared across the sky. A red-white-and-blue monorail system weaved its way around to the different sections. This place would have been perfect except for the sluggish, foot-dragging swarms hobbling beneath him.
Hundreds of undead freaks meandered through the park. Their baleful wails of brain-craving desperation permeated the hot tropical air.
Zack looked over his shoulder to check on Twinkles.
The little pup was just fine. His tongue hung from his mouth as he panted. “Ruff!”
“Come on, Twinkles,” he said to the pup. “We gotta get down from here.”
Zack detached the parachute from the shoulder straps and then took off the sweatshirt he was wearing. He pulled the drawstrings of the hood tightly together and knotted them. Then he placed Twinkles in the sweatshirt and tied the sleeves together, and slung it over his shoulder like a knapsack.
With Twinkles secure, Zack began to crawl backward down the giant fence backstop. Halfway to the bottom he looked down. The zombies were on their way, staring up at him, snorting and salivating. He knew he had to bail now or else they’d get him for sure. He took one more step down the chain-link and then dropped the rest of the way. As he landed on the pavement his left leg buckled in such a way that he was fairly certain his knee was never going to be the same ever again. But he had to keep moving.
As soon as Zack caught his footing, an acne-faced, teenage zombie freak lurched right in front of him. The teen’s nose was ripe and clammy and looked like a steamed pork dumpling. Its body reeked as though it had been sprayed recently by a skunk.
Zack dodged around the undead stinker, gagging and coughing, then dashed into the high-tech batting cages. He grabbed a baseball bat leaning in the corner. It had been a while since he’d held one. The cold, hard aluminum felt good in his hands. Zack looked at the zombie coming his way. “You’re in trouble, son.” He whirled around and popped the subhuman zombie stink bomb in the gut. Then he brought the bat up under the ghoul’s chin with a crunchy splat.
“Clickity-clap-clackow!”
Zack swung away from the fallen ghoul, bat at the ready. The zombies were converging upon him, his back against the fence. Zack ran over to one of the many gumball machines that the park was famous for. Tied to the candy machine’s metal foot, a large zombified rottweiler growled and slobbered rabidly. It had on one of those plastic lampshade collars around its head. Twinkles yapped at the zombie dog.
Zack hauled off and shattered the glass sphere containing the gumballs with the butt end of the bat. Bucket loads of gumballs spilled onto the sloped pavement, and the gathering swarm of zombies started to slip and stumble.
He shouldered his way past the shuffling ghouls and found himself at a fork in the road. The zombified moans howled all around him. He had to be careful, but he wasn’t scared. Fighting off zombies was one of the few things he was actually good at. Zack did a quick eenie-meenie-miney-moe then went for the center path that led into the middle of the theme park. He ran ahead in search of the others with Twinkles in the crook of his arm, doing his best not to be noticed by the zombies meandering around every corner.
Before long, Zack caught a glimpse of two familiar-looking figures up ahead. Rice and Ozzie were leaning over the control panel for a ride called The Viper—a mean-looking black-and-green roller coaster with two consecutive upside-down loops in the track. Zack waited for a pack of four zombies to go by: two undead parents with their rezombified offspring attached to child leashes. Zack crept behind the zombies as they passed and approached the Viper ride.
A huge sign for the roller coaster hung over the entrance to the waiting line with a creepy picture painted on it of a viper consuming its own tail.
“Guys, what the heck are you doing?” Zack yelled, skipping over a puddle of zombie sludge underneath the sign. “Where are Zoe and Madison?”
“We’re going to ride this roller coaster and get a bird’s-eye view of the place,” Ozzie said without missing a beat. “Hopefully we can spot them from up there.”
“Exactly,” said Rice. “We’re probably going to have to ride it a few times to get a good layout of the park.”
“Come on,” Zack said. “We have to find the girls and Olivia to see if she can even help with the antidote.”
“Zack,” Rice said seriously. “Get on the roller coaster.”
“No way, man,” said Zack. “I love roller coasters just as much as the next guy, but we can’t just leave my sister out there in the—”
“Dude,” Ozzie cut Zack off. “Get on the roller coaster.” His voice was stern and serious. The zombified moans were still howling all around them. Zack spun in the opposite direction and gazed upon the high-density zombie swarm converging on the platform. The flesh-guzzling mutants had grappled over the metal maze that designated the waiting line and they seemed impatient.
“You know how to work this thing?” Zack asked as he watched Ozzie fiddle with the controls.
“Think so,” Ozzie said.
“You think so?”
“Let’s do it, Oz,” Rice said, hopping into one of the roller coaster cars and pulling the padded restraints down over his shoulders, locking himself in place.
Ozzie hit a combination of switches as the zombies stumbled onto the platform, climbing over and crawling under the metal handrails like a jungle gym. The roller coaster started to move forward slowly, and Zack and Ozzie jogged alongside, hopping onto the ride.
“Arf!” Twinkles barked, squirming out of Zack’s lap, totally spooked by the ride.
“Twinkles, come back!” Zack shouted, grabbing for the pup, but he had already pulled down his mechanical restraint and locked it into place. Twinkles trotted quickly through the maze of shuffling zombie feet and raced down a wooden staircase at the back of the platform.
“Twinkles!”
The roller coaster cranked slowly up a thirty-foot peak angled forty-five degrees to the starry night sky. Below them, the zombified hordes shrank to miniature beasts ambling along the earth like voracious insects.
“Look!” Rice shouted. “Over there!”
Zack and Ozzie swiveled their heads in the direction that Rice was pointing his finger. One of the fighter jet’s parachutes was tangled in the branches of a tree.
“After the ride,” said Zack, “we’ll start there.”
“Sounds good, buddy,” said Rice. “Now hold on tight!”
CLACK! CLACK! The thrill ride cranked to the top of its mountainous track and— WHOOSH!
Rice shrieked like a girl in a horror flick as the roller coaster shot ferociously down the steep decline. The skin on Zack’s face rippled and flapped from the high-speed plunge. Ozzie whooped at the bottom as they vroomed up again into a mind-shattering corkscrew and through a tunnel on the edge of a man-made bluff. When they came through on the other side of the tunnel, the night sky seemed to swirl brightly with stars.
Then the coaster slanted upward again, and all Zack could see was the face of the near-full moon. They flipped upside down on the front end of a double loopty-loop, and Zack felt his entire stomach nearly jump through the back of his throat. As his stomach began to settle, the coaster car rumbled around a rocky bend and came to an abrupt stop, which jerked the boys forward into their padded restraints and then slammed them back hard in their seats.
The ride was over, but the zombies were quickly filling up both sides of the platform.
“Guys!” Zack shouted, throwing the restraint up over his shoulders. He spotted a clearing down the back steps of the platform. “This way.”
Ozzie followed Zack and jumped out. Rice tried to do the same, but his shoulder restraint wouldn’t budge an inch. “I’m stuck!” he shouted. “Help!”
Zack skidded to a stop and doubled back to help his friend, who was now under zombie siege. “Ahhhhh!” Rice shrieked. The herd of undead lunatics clawed at the ride.
Ozzie bounded ahead of Zack and with Zack’s new Louisville Slugger dealt a blow to one of the zombie freaks. Rice’s eyes were bulging out of his head as he tried with all his might to lift the shoulder harness off his torso.
The mob of rezombified mutants gave off a visible wave of thick, stinking heat as the impenetrable wall of sunbaked bodies came toward Zack, Rice, and Ozzie, one ankle-twisting step at a time.
“Get this thing offa me!” Rice shouted, slamming up on the metal restraint repeatedly. Just then, one of the zombies flopped off the platform and into the car in front of him.
“Ghlarghlephlarph!”
Zack jumped into the seat behind Rice’s and pulled back on the harness. He jiggled it side-to-side, trying to trigger the release mechanism, but nothing was working.
In front of them, Ozzie, with his bare hands, pummeled the undead freak in the neighboring seat. This zombie was out, but they didn’t have a moment to spare.
With one last shove from Rice, the latch gave way and the mechanical restraint released. He scrambled out of the roller coaster and leaped to the zombie-free side of the platform faster than Zack had ever seen his buddy move in his entire life.
The ghouls groped and clawed their way across the roller coaster tracks while the boys sprinted off the platform and down the wooden staircase.
As the boys raced to ground level, a trio of snaggletoothed ghouls shambled up the steps, impeding their descent.
“Blarghle!” The trio of cantankerous hellions slothed forward. They were three skinny zombie dudes in torn tank tops and Bermuda shorts. A bunch of nubbly boils blistered all over one lumbering brute’s face. Another one’s mug was set in a grimace of wild-eyed, tooth-baring hideousness. And the third one sputtered thick bits of spittle off of its hot, stinking breath as it snarled grossly.
The Zombie Chasers #5 Page 4