Using the dashboard like an operating table, Greg flopped Twinkles on his back and started pushing at his tiny rib cage with his pinky fingers.
“This is to keep the blood pumping to the heart,” Greg explained.
“Try not to break him,” Madison said. Greg lifted the puppy’s muzzle, pulled down its chin, and opened its mouth, which glistened with teeny-tiny pearly white fangs.
“Now I’m going to blow air into its mouth and inflate the lungs,” Greg said. He puffed a long breath into Twinkles’s open snout, then pressed the Boggle’s itty-bitty chest again, counting to five. He gave the dog another breath, and Twinkles’s eyes popped open.
“Look!” Madison said. “It’s working.” Greg gave the dog one more sequence of chest pumps and leaned in for the third round of mouth-to-snout.
All of a sudden, Twinkles lurched up off the dash and plunged his tiny fangs into Greg’s bottom lip. Greg howled in pain, as the reanimated Zoggle clamped its itty-bitty teeth down deep into his kisser.
“Aaah-ha-ha…Aaaaaaah-ha-ha!” Greg shrieked. He grabbed the zombified puppy by the midsection, yanked hard, and ripped it from his lip in a bloodred spurt. Greg heaved the evil little creature out of the open window. Twinkles sailed, snarling, through the air, and splattered on a craggy patch of roadside bedrock. Greg’s mouth poured blood.
“Greg, how could you?” Madison cried. She stopped the car and smacked Greg in the face again, then hopped out and jogged to the spot where Twinkles had landed.
“Owwwww,” Greg yelped. “Stop doing that!”
At the side of the road, Madison stood over the lifeless puppy, her hands glued to her face. Zack and Rice left Greg behind in the Volvo, blotting his bloody lip with a BurgerDog napkin and wincing in the mirror on the back of the visor.
Twinkles lay motionless on the smooth beige rock. The boys stood behind Madison as she wept for her puppy. The crazed zombie grimace had vanished, and now the tiny dog just looked as though it were sleeping peacefully.
“Well, we can’t just leave the poor thing lying in the middle of the desert,” Madison whimpered, teary-eyed.
“You’re absolutely right, Madison,” Rice agreed. “Twinkles will make an excellent specimen.” He reached down for the zombified dog, but Madison slapped his hand away.
“Back off, twerp,” Madison cried.
“But, Madison, we have to—”
“Rice, just shut up, okay?” Zack pleaded. He knelt next to Madison as she lifted poor Twinkles off the cool flat rock and placed his body gently in her purse.
Back in the car, the mood was gloomy. Madison drove on ahead until Rice broke the silence. “Does this mean Greg is going to turn into a zombie now?” he asked. Zack said nothing, quietly rooting for the zombie virus coursing through Greg’s bloodstream.
“I hope not,” Greg said. “’Cuz that would not be too cool.”
“You know what else isn’t that cool?” Madison asked, stomping on the gas pedal. The engine revved and sputtered. Steam rose from under the hood of the Volvo, and the smell of scorched gasoline seeped in through the air vents. The fuel gauge pointed to E. “That we’re out of gas!” she shrieked, slamming the steering wheel in frustration. Hoooooooonnk! The car horn blared across the zombie desert. A tortured moan swelled in the distance.
CHAPTER 15
After a quick debate, which Madison won by decree, it was decided that Zoe would join them on foot.
“She’s still family,” Madison pointed out.
“Sure she is,” Rice said. “The Addams family.”
Greg yanked Zoe so hard by the leash that her head almost popped off. Rice gathered the assortment of hand weapons he’d chosen from the garage and passed them out accordingly: a shovel for Zack, a crowbar for Madison, a sledgehammer for Greg, and the Louisville Slugger for himself.
As they began their march into the desert, zombie Zoe proved to be good motivation for them to keep moving at a steady pace. If they stopped, she’d be in hot pursuit, snaggletoothed inside her lacrosse helmet. And if they pushed ahead too quickly, she anchored them, like she was a bulldog being dragged on an unwanted stroll.
They walked this way for three eternal minutes before Greg opened his mouth. “Can a dog-zombie really turn people-persons into person-zombies?” he murmured.
“Hopefully,” Rice said. “Then we won’t have to listen to you try and think.”
“One more word and you’re dead meat,” said Greg, pounding the heavy hammer into his open hand with ease.
“You couldn’t take both of us, even with that sledgehammer,” Rice said.
Speak for yourself, Zack thought. The idea of Greg attacking them without a weapon was terrifying enough.
“Yer kidding, right?” Greg said. “I’d mop the floor with the both of you.”
“Will you guys quit your macho talk? My puppy is dead, and there’s nothing we can do about it! And Rice? Greg would crush, like, fifteen of you at once.”
“Not if I were zombies, he couldn’t.”
Zack chuckled to himself and pictured the epic battle: Bansal-Jones vs. fifteen little porky Rice gremlins. Now Greg sidled up to Madison. They walked together and held hands. Zombie Zoe brought up the rear, slobbering behind her face mask in slow, mindless pursuit.
“I’m hungry,” Rice said, tapping his gut. “Aren’t you hungry?”
“I haven’t eaten since the food fight. And Madison ruined my cake!”
“Gimme your hand,” Rice said, opening a canister of the ginkgo tablets from Albertsons. Zack shot his friend a cockeyed glance. “No, seriously, I swear I wasn’t making it up.” Rice tapped out a few pills into Zack’s open palm, and then some into his own. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever been up this late before,” he kept talking.
“What time is it?” Zack yawned.
“Like two thirty in the morning, I think.” Rice raised his handful of ginkgo.
“You first,” Zack insisted.
“Zombie garlic,” Rice toasted his friend and tossed the pills down his throat.
“You two dingleberries better not have any secret snacks up there that I don’t know about!” Greg barked loudly.
“Yeah,” Madison said. “What are you guys eating?”
“Ginkgo biloba!” Rice called. “Want some?”
“The ginkgo doesn’t do anything,” she said. “We already tried it, remember?”
“Suit yourself, Madison.”
As they walked onward, the underbrush thickened gradually on both sides of the road. A chorus of desert insects blurped and tweeted. With every step, the terrain grew more and more perilous, all flat stones and cacti, bloodroot and sagebrush. Ahead of them, an abandoned pickup truck flashed its hazards under a Joshua tree, which flared and dimmed in the light’s slow flicker, marking the end of the checkpointless back road.
Greg and Madison caught up to the boys, who had stopped dead in their tracks.
“Graveyard…” Zack pointed, his index finger trembling.
It was surrounded by a black wrought-iron fence. A white stone mausoleum stood dead center, flanked by row upon row of much smaller headstones. A shovel was stabbed in a large pile of dirt beside three freshly dug grave holes.
“Come on, guys. Let’s go check it out,” Madison said with a renewed sense of purpose.
“I’m not so sure that’s a good idea,” Rice said.
“Fine.” Madison slapped the end of Zoe’s leash into Rice’s chest. “Then it’s your turn to zombie-sit.” Greg snatched the baseball bat away from Rice and saddled him with the sledge hammer instead.
Madison grabbed Zack’s arm, leading him toward the cemetery. “Bring the shovel. I’m not touching that other one,” she added.
“Why do we need the shovel?” he asked.
“We’re going to give Twinkles a proper burial,” she said, dragging Zack along. The dirt road cornered sharply and wrapped around the back of the graveyard.
“Come on, Zo,” Rice said, tugging the leash toward the pickup truck,
dragging the sledgehammer with difficulty. “You two have fun at your funeral.”
Madison hauled Zack through the open cemetery gate. Greg followed, jumping deliberately on all the graves, as they made their way into the graveyard.
“Greg, stop being so immature,” Madison said.
Greg ignored her, leapfrogging over a row of stone crosses. “Yippee!”
“Dude, are you all right, Greg?” Zack asked.
“Chill, bro! I’m fine.” Greg’s lip looked nasty, all clotted and chunky.
“All right, be nice,” said Madison, sighing. “I’m gonna go find something to use for Twinkles’s tombstone. Then we’ll hold the service. You should start digging.” She left her bag with Zack and wandered to the other side of the graveyard.
Zack walked cautiously between the rows of graves. Using one of Rice’s flashlights, he began to read the headstones. Before every name was the abbreviation for a specific military rank: PFC, Maj., Col., Lieut., Gen. These are all soldiers, he realized. Well…Twinkles was a real trooper, too, Zack thought. After scoping out the area some more, he found the perfect spot for the dog and started to dig.
Over by the pickup truck, Rice had finished tethering Zoe to a signpost. She was panting wildly, straining for Rice with outstretched arms, clasping and unclasping her hands with intent to claw. Rice whipped out some ginkgo and started firing pellets into her mouth. He stopped and looked at the back of the truck, then called over to Zack. “Dude, this truck’s got military plates and a siren! I think we might be closer to that air force base than we thought….”
“Yeah, I think this is an army graveyard,” Zack called back. “What does PFC stand for?”
“Private, First Class,” Rice answered.
Twinkles Miller. Puppy, First Class. Zack planned out the little dog’s epitaph. He glanced at the shovel protruding from the mound of soil and the three empty holes in the ground.
“Who digs graves by themselves at two in the morning?” Zack shouted.
“I don’t think I want to know the answer to that question,” Rice responded.
“Are the keys in the truck?” Zack asked Rice.
“Hold on,” he said. “Let me check….”
Zack started to dig again, keeping his eye on Greg, who had just put down the baseball bat after a rousing duel against three imaginary zombies: “Hah-ho, en garde, zombie!” Greg then wandered over to the mausoleum and picked up what seemed to be a king-size fountain soda. The wiener dog mascot winked at Zack on the side of the cup.
“Yo, someone’s been eatin’ BurgerDog!” Greg wrapped his lips around the straw and ripped a long noisy sip from the undertaker’s flat, lukewarm backwash. “Not cool, bro. If the Gregster can’t eat the Dog, then nobody can eat the Dog.”
Zack began to dig faster. What was taking Madison so long?
Suddenly, a wet, heavy splash sounded off the marble doorstep of the tomb. Zack lifted his head and looked over toward the mausoleum. Greg was puking. Everywhere.
CHAPTER 16
Madison stepped around the corner of the towering stone vault, carrying a flat slab of desert rock. Greg heaved and stumbled toward her. Zack ditched the shovel and walked over to see what was happening.
“Argh! I’m…dying….”
Madison backed away as the pale-faced bully bobbed and swayed before collapsing at her feet. She crouched and put her hand under the back of his head.
“Oh, Greg, what happened?” she said.
“I don’t know,” he coughed. “It musta been Twinker-bell….” Greg was really sweating now. His eyes were puffy, heavy-lidded, struggling not to close.
“I knew it,” Zack said. “Madison, back away from zombie Greg.”
“He’s not even dead yet,” Madison said. “I’m not abandoning someone when they’re on their deathbed…. Ick!”
Greg grunted. A snot bubble burst off his nostril and splashed the back of Madison’s hand. “Eww, Zack, get over here. He’s all drippy and…just ewww.” Greg coughed, and a blob of green mucus dribbled off his chin. “Quick, it’s gonna get me,” Madison said, referring to the trickle of Greggy slime.
“What am I supposed to do?” Zack said, kneeling down next to her.
“Hold out your hands,” she instructed. Zack obeyed. “Now hold his head.” And she plopped Greg’s head into Zack’s hands and wiped the snot off on his jeans.
“I’m not holding this kid’s head,” Zack said. But Zack was holding his head all right, cushioning Greg’s skull ever so tenderly.
“Don’t let me die, dork,” Greg gasped. “We’ve got a huge soccer game next Saturday….” His eyes rolled back, and his body slackened.
“Oh my God, he just died. What do I do?” Zack asked, flustered.
A few moments passed, and Greg regained consciousness, still human. “Zack,” he croaked, “here.” Greg was holding Rice’s phone. “I didn’t really toss it…. I was gonna keep it for myself…. These things are sweet as H-E-double hockey sticks….” Greg passed out again.
Zack stood up and placed the phone in his pants pocket. He lifted Greg under his knees at the top of his soccer socks. “Come on, Madison,” he said. “We gotta get him tied up before he changes into a zombie. Grab his wrists.”
Greg’s body swung heavily between them as they shimmied past the tomb. Struggling and straining with his weight, Madison dropped Greg’s arms, and his head hit the dirt with a thud.
“I need a break,” she said, dust-clapping her hands.
“Not now, Madison!” Zack urged. “Come on.” They started to lift the unconscious lug and nearly buckled under the massive strain of Bansal-Jones’s deadweight. Just then, Zack’s jaw dropped to the soil along with Greg’s heels as a huge menacing shadow appeared out of nowhere, darkening their path.
“Hey, I thought we weren’t taking breaks,” Madison said. But when she saw Zack’s face, she turned and dropped her half of Greg’s carcass. WHUMP!
It looked like an absolute sideshow freak, six and a half feet of decaying zombie flesh. It was wearing some kind of industrial blue jumpsuit, the left breast embroidered with the name LONGLY.
Longly’s face had more or less collapsed, slumping down the cheekbones in an avalanche of muck. A heaping cluster of bulbous lumps was growing off the side of his bald head. His mouth hung open, drooping jaws unhinged, flashing a mouthful of yellow pointed daggers. He lunged.
Madison shrieked and fell backward, scrambling in place. The butts of her hands and the heels of her shoes dug in the loose dirt and then slipped, going nowhere in a puff of dust.
The deformed, moldering colossus folded in a quick spasm of rigor mortis and clamped his meathooks around Madison’s ankle. Eclipsed by the zombie’s wide, black shadow, Madison kicked, frantic to get away, but the great zombie brute was too powerful.
Now acting on pure impulse, Zack launched Twinkles’s soon-to-be headstone through the air like a Frisbee. It slammed hard against the zombie’s head, and the diseased undertaker wrenched around, bellowing. Madison twisted free of the creature’s clutches.
Zack picked up the baseball bat, gripping it tightly, and circled around the enormous zombie gravedigger. He swung hard and drove the top of the bat into the monster’s hip. But it just kept coming, swiping madly for Zack’s tasty little brain nugget.
He’s too tall, Zack thought, unable to reach the zombie’s beastly head. Zack swung again, this time connecting with its knee, thinking that perhaps he might chop the thing down to a more manageable size. He longed for the ax lying idly on the garage floor.
Next, Zack gave the zombie giant’s midsection a good whack and heard its innards slosh around inside of its belly.
“Hit it on the head, Zack!” Madison yelled.
“I’m trying!”
Suddenly, the towering undertaker pounced jerkily, mere inches from wringing Zack’s pencil neck with its giant, knotted hands. But Zack was too quick and dove between its bumbling legs.
Zack bounded up the marble steps and hopped onto the
stone banister of the mausoleum. The undead monster spun around and grunted in confusion. But Zack was already in position, looming well above the gigantic zombie, the bat cocked back straight over his head.
“Now you see me,” Zack said, allowing the zombie to turn around and give him one final look.
“And now you don’t.” WHAM! Zack brought down the Slugger on top of the zombie’s skull as hard as he could. The zombie swooned and crumpled in a heap of dislocated bones and flayed bubbly skin.
“Way to go, Zachar-ee!” Madison cheered. They were both so excited that they failed to notice what was happening right beside them….
Greg was waking up.
CHAPTER 17
Zack jumped down and stepped on the defeated zombie’s chest. He threw his arms up victoriously, but then quickly backed away. One blow to the head was little more than a catnap for this thing, and Zack had no idea when it might wake up.
Across the graveyard, Rice broke into a sprint. He ran as fast as his short little legs would carry him, flailing his arms and pointing.
While Madison clapped cheerfully for Zack Clarke, zombie chaser, Greg’s torso lifted straight off the ground, stiff as a board. His bent, shadowy outline jerked forward.
“Madison!” Zack yelled. “Behind you!”
Zombie Greg’s cold dead fingers curled around her calf, and Madison tried to leap away. But the zombie super jock’s viselike grip was unshakable.
“Help! I can’t budge!” Madison screamed,
Zombie Greg wrenched his head back and swung his neck to one side. Rice flung himself at Greg and dropped his shoulder into the reanimated psycho-jock. But Rice was no match for the Gregster’s brute strength. Rice bounced off zombie Greg, who clamped his toothy mug onto the back of Madison’s leg and bit down hard.
“Ooowwwwwww!” she wailed, and dropped to the ground. Greg whipped his head from side to side like a dog playing tug on a chew toy. He snarled and chewed.
Zack reached the bloody fray and swung the bat hard, clocking zombie Greg in the temple. Bansal-Jones slumped to the ground. Too little, too late. Madison had been bitten, and the superb delight of clubbing Greg over the head was now only bittersweet. Madison sobbed in the dirt, her leg bearing a gnarly red gash. Rice was rubbing his head, dizzy from the spill.
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