Donna of the Not Undead (...of the Not Undead Book 1)

by Bryan Mosier

  " Det var så fantastiskt . Och så smart att offra din bil så att du kan utrota dessa otäcka varelser innan de kunde göra någon ytterligare skada . Du måste vara så modig , du lilla daredevil dig.“ says Helga with a tone of admiration in her voice that is completely lost on the socially clueless Justin.

  “Uh, yeah, I meant to do that” says a confused Justin.

  As he takes out a zombie little person with his Dodge Charger, Bryan notices that he, Brandon and Melody are the only ones left that are still moving. The vast majority of the zombies are either road meat or scattered about in such a way that getting away from them should be easy. Never the one to let the youngest member of their party get the one up on him, Bryan decides it’s up to him to defend the honor and pride of his fallen comrades. Watching Brandon as he slips and slides his way around the parking lot, sending azombie flying in the air to land face first into the windshield of an abandoned Pontiac and another being ground into mush under the large knobby wheels of his truck, Bryan sees the perfect opportunity to put the youngster in his place. Gunning the gas, Bryan sends the Charger along a trajectory that will intersect Brandon’s path in such a way as to t-bone him at the intersection of two parking aisles. With a laser like focus, Bryan feathers the throttle, adjusting his speed so that the vehicles collide in such a way that he might only disable the vehicle without causing any harm to the driver. In his intense focus and desire to be the last survivor of this impromptu demolition derby, Bryan forgets about the other remaining contestant. As the Chargerraces down the aisle towards impending calamity, out of the corner of his eye Bryan catches a glimpse a shiny, deep blue object coming towards him. With realization coming to late, Bryan grips the steering wheel hard as Melody’s little blue vintage VW bug clips his back, passenger side tire causing the Charger to veer off of its intended path, sending it on a collision course with a parked delivery truck some twenty feet away. Feeling the jolt of the sudden, jarring impact Bryan’s teeth are rattled, causing him to bite his tongue so hard that he can immediately taste the familiar metallic tang of blood in his mouth. Looking back, Bryan cansee that Melody’s little VW didn’t fare well either, the collision leaving the front end a twisted mess, the front left wheel jutting out at an unusually sharp angle.

  Having seen the sacrifice that Melody had made to spare him from Bryan’s intended onslaught, Brandon can think of only one way to repay her. Slowly looping back, circling the parking lot in wide arching path, Brandon slowly lines his own vehicle up in a path with Bryans now disabled Charger. Pausing momentarily to determine the best angle of attack, Brandon then pops the clutch and jams the gas pedal to the floor, sending a cloud of smoke billowing out from under the rear half of the truck. As the truck speeds towards Bryans helpless Charger, Brandon keeps the gas pedal pressed hard against the floor. Just as he is about to achieve as suitable ramming speed Brandon suddenly feels the entire truck beginto jerk and sputter, the engine sounding as if it is being starved of fuel. Without warning the truck’s engine goes silent and Brandon is left with only what forward momentum he has left to reach his intended target. Hands over his head with his face tucked into his knees, Bryan sits waiting for the inevitable impact. After several anxious moments, Bryan meekly raises his head and peeks out through his fingers, trying to figure out why he hasn’t been slammed by Brandon’s four-wheeled mechanical homage to redneck bragadociousness. As he opens his eyes he is surprised to see Alex and Darla peering in the passenger side window, the rest of the group behind them snickering. Further back, sits Brandon’s truck, Brandon himself kicking the tires and cursing it for being such a gas hog. “Come on out of their tough guy” says Carla, the sarcasm in her voice doing more to emasculate him than all the ribbing and taunting he suffered at the hands of the football jocks in P.E. class the last four years of his life.

  “What happened?” he asks in confusion.

  “Ran out of gas” says Alex as he shrugs and points to the still irate Brandon.

  Brandon, looking over at Melody still standing by her little blue VW, an expression of loss on her face, walks over and offers his condolences.

  “Sorry you lost your little bug, I know you liked it.”

  “Her…I liked her. She was a sweet little thing. Oh well, what’s done is done.” Turning to go Melody adds“Y’know, those things seema lot bigger on the inside.”

  Looking about the parking lot, taking in the resultant carnage from their impromptu demolition derby slash zombie splatterapalouza, the group starts to make their way towards the front entrance. As they turn the corner to get past one of the mangled cars littering the parking lot. With a quiet gasp, Brandon lets a quiet“Oh no” escape from his lips. Running through the labyrinth of mangled automobiles they others watch as he climbs over the hood of a rusted Ford pinto. Catching up to his brother, Alex quickly sees the object of his little brother’s attention. Sitting amidst the maelstrom of mangled metal is a dingy brown 1979 Plymouth Road Runner. “That’s mom and dad’s car says Brandon. They were here.” Turning to his brother, tears forming in his eyes, his gaze darts back to the carnage displayed on the asphalt. “You don’t think…they weren’t in there…were they?”

  Mustering as much confidence as he can, Alex calmly says,“No, they weren’t in that mess of zombies. We would’ve recognized them.”

  “But they were here! It’s their car!”

  “I know, but they aren’t here now and knowing that gives me hope. Now come on, we need to get in there before it gets too late.”

  As Alex and Brandon rejoin the group they begin to make their way to the front entrance of the massive big box store but are caught off guard as a zombie, its entire lower half severed, having been ground into the pavement under the wheels of their derby cars, lets out a snarling growl as it violently lurches forward. Using its arms to drag itself forward, the pathetic creature twists and jerks in an awkward motion, its attempts at forward momentum being hampered by the fact that rotten corpses really don’t have that much muscle tone.

  “Stand back” yells Melody “we got a twitcher!” With that she pulls out her beloved go to stumble bum slaying weapon, the katana blade, its sleek, mirror blade shining in the mid-morning light. With a single, quick violent slash the zombie is relieved of the roughly eight-pound burden of its head, the body immediately going limp as the blade slices through its neck.

  “Okay, let’s get inside before any more of them nasty buggers showup”, says Alex.

  Chapter 14

  Walking towards the main entrance of the massive big box store it becomes clear to everyone the reason why the zombies gathered at the entrance had not managed to make their way inside. Looking at the space where the large, automated double sliding glass doors should be, they find the glass doors have long since been shattered leaving in their place a gaping maw of bent steel and glass fragments. As they step forward into the entranceway, glass crunching under their feet, the walls lined with half a dozen soda machines and a coin op crane machine still full of the cheap stuffed animals, all brightly colored cartoon bird shapes with perturbed expressions on their faces. Moving further into the entranceway they find the second set of doors also are missing but this time, jammed into every inch of space is a massive pile of the trademark blue and gray shopping carts that used to litter the parking lot when customers were either too busy or too lazy to return them to their storage bin. The mountain of carts fills the entire space with some carts having been jammed into such tight fitting spaces that the woven metal wire frames that make up the body of the carts have been bent and contorted to fill every gap.

  “Holy crap, who the hell did this?” says Brandon.

  “Somebody must have tried to barricade themselves in” adds Melody, pointing to the fact that most of the carts seem to have been jammed in place from the inside of the store.

  “How the hell do we get in now?” asks Bryan.

  “We gottamove this crap out of the way” concludes Carla.

  “That’ll take forever” co
mplains Bryan,“and I don’t want to stay out here if we don’t have to. We’re sitting ducks right now for another bunch of brain biters to come pin us in here.”

  “Then we better get started. Come on, let’s get toit” commands Alex. Helga, you and Melody keep an eye out for any nasties that might want to sneak up on us okay. As he points back towards the parking lot, Melody grabs Helga by the elbow and leads her back through the opening where they came.

  “Don’t go toofar” warns Darla.

  “We got this, don’t worry” replies Melody, a confident swagger in her tone.

  “Brandon, can you climb to the top of this pile and see if anyof the ones up there are loose.”

  Not getting any response, Alex tries again,“Brandon can you…”

  Looking around everyone suddenly realizes that Brandon is nowhere to be seen.

  Rushing out to the parking lot and seeing Melody and Helga perched on top of an old Buick station wagon, Alex feels a weight forming in the pit of his stomach, having hoped that Brandon had just wanted to stay with Melody. “Have you seen Brandon?” he yells to Melody who just gives him a confused shrug, shaking her head.

  Running back into the entranceway the look of panic clearly evident on his face, Darla is the first to say,“Calm down, he’s got to be here somewhere.”

  “What if…” starts Alex but the thought is so terrible that he can’t stand to say the words.

  “Don’t even think about that, we’ll find him.”

  “Hey guys, what are you all waiting for?” comes the familiar voice that, upon hearing it, almost makes Alex weep with joy.

  Looking around though he can’t see where the voice is coming from.“Where the hell are you” he says with anger starting to build with the realization that his little brother has once again gone rogue.

  “I’m in here, see.”

  Looking through the mountain of twisted metal, Alex can see a shape moving on the other side of the pile of carts. “How the hell did you get in there” asks Alex.

  “I went through the door.”

  “What door?”

  “The little door that they used to pushthe carts in through.”

  “Where?”

  “Outside to the left.”

  Running outside, the group turns to find a small blue door that looks like a miniature garage door. Having apparently been hidden from view by a couple of overturned shopping carts, the little blue door was the means by which workers would return the corralled carts back to the storage bay inside the store so that people entering could have them ready for use upon entering. Kneeling down, Alex starts to look inside but is suddenly startled as Brandon sticks his head out and says“What’re ya waitin for, let’sgo.” Waving for Melody and Helga to come along, the group scrambles through the little door. Barely tall enough for a shopping cart to roll through unimpeded, everyone except Melody has to squat low or crawl on hands and knees to get through the opening. Once in, Brandon grabs the handle on the short roll up door and brings it back down and quickly flips the locking lever, closing the entrance off so that no one can get in from the outside.

  As the group walks into the store, the chaos of the parking lot is reflected in the aisles and on the shelves and racks of the All-Mart. The usually orderly rows, mathematically spaced to ensure maximum efficiency of space usage balanced with an ergonomic directional flow of customers, are now in shambles. The circular clothing racks, organized by article types, size and color are a hodgepodge of random pieces of clothing strewn about as if they were tossed haphazardly without care. The floor is littered with all manner of merchandise that would normally be placed on shelves, following a carefully laid plan to ensure ease of access.“Wow, this place is a mess” whispers Brandon. “Yeah, looks like this place got hit hard once everything went to shi.. ur I mean when things got bad” says Alex as he sheepishly looks over at Darla who returns his gentlemanly self-censorship with a slight smile. “Do you think the place is empty, I mean, somebody had to put up that barricade” says Bryan as he gestures over his shoulder pointing a thumb at the pile of shopping carts plugging the whole that was the store entrance.

  “More importantly” adds Darla,“did any of those nasty stumble bums get in. We better give the place a once over before we start looking for provisions.”

  “Good idea” says Alex. “I think we better stick together on this one though, we don’t really know what to expect and I don’t want anybody getting caught off guard without backup.”

  With an agreeing nod, Alex and Bryan manage to free a couple of shopping carts from the barricade and with that the group starts to make their way through the store. Coming to the first intersection of two main aisles, littered with the remnants of what used to be a large display of bottled water, apparently on sale for three forty-nine with a coupon, the contents of said display having been completely pilfered, the group decides to turn right and make their way towards the pharmacy section of the store. Walking up to the counter and looking into the space usually occupied by the pharmacist and his assistants, the chaos and disarray of the shelves reveals that the pharmacy was one of the places that was heavily looted once civilization broke down. “Man, looks like the druggies hit this place hard” says Bryan. “I bet their ain’tnothing stronger than a Tylenol PM back there.”

  “We should probably look anyways though; you never know when you might need something if somebody gets sick or hurt” suggests Carla. With that Brandon hops up on the counter and then, reaching a helping hand down to Melody, pulls her up to start sifting through the bottles strewn about the floor behind the counter. As they hop down behind the counter, Alex asks“Do you guys even know what to look for?”

  “Nope, but I’m sure this will help” says Melody as she pulls a large pharmaceutical reference manual from under the desk where the assistants would fill the prescriptions.

  With a shrug of approval, Alex leaves the two youngsters to their work. Suddenly a loud squeal comes from one of the aisles off to the left, one marked with a large lavender placard with the words“Personal Care” in a delicate script font. Looking around, Alex realizes that Carla, Darla and Helga are nowhere in sight. With a renewed feeling of panic in his gut he rushes to the aisle and upon making the turn up the aisle his senses are overwhelmed with a rainbow of color and artificial fragrances. There in the middle of the aisle stands the three girls, each with an armful of shampoos, conditioners and other assorted bath products.

  “What the hell?” mumbles Alex to himself.

  At that same instant, Bryan and Justin come sliding around the corner at the opposite end of the aisle, Justin brandishing a large metal fork used for barbequing.

  “What’sgoingonWhat’sthematter” comes the stream of syllables muttered in a single, gasping breath from Bryan.

  With an embarrassed look on her face, Darla sheepishly shows Alex their discovery. “Apparently personal hygiene wasn’t much of a concern once people thought the world was coming to an end.”

  “That’s what you squealed about, you found some shampoo?”

  “Not just shampoo, conditioner too” adds Carla, attempting some sort of defense for their girlishness.

  “You wouldn’t understand, it’s a girl thing” says Darla, seeing the disapproving look on Alex’s face. “We’ve been cooped up in that smelly hardware store for days.”

  “Girls” says Bryan, shaking his head as he and Justin turn to go back to their own foraging.

  Walking back to the pharmacy counter, Alex finds Melody and Brandon have been hard at work. Neatly stacked on the faux granite, hypo-allergenic, bacterial resistant surface, the two youngsters have started to form several large stacks of bottles.

  “What have we got here”, says Alex as he starts to look over their work.

  “Well, starts Brandon, we’ve kindastarted dividing this stuff up by what we think it does. This pile here” gesturing to the first pile closest to Alex,“is pretty much antibiotics as best we can figure. And this pile hear” gesturing to the ne
xt, much larger pile“is anti-infalma…inflamorat..”

  “Anti-inflammatory” finishes Alex.

  “Yeah, that”

  “And that pile there is stuff we don’t know what they do.”

  “Didn’t the book tell you.”

  “Yeah but it was a bunch of big words.”

  “You mean like“Inflammatory” quips Alex.

  “I know what that means, you butthead, I just can’t say it.”

  Grabbing a bottle from the pile of unknown medications, Brandon starts to read the name printed on the label. “Vigarahrah?” “Vigarayray?”

  Taking the bottle from the confused youngster, Alex looks at the label closely and says“Oh, Viagra”

  “What does that do? Is it an anti-imflammatory?”

  Feeling his face getting warm, Alex begins to stammer“Well, its, um, it’s not an ANTI-inflammatory, its…um more like…well…I guess you could say it’s more of a PRO-inflammatory.

  “What? Why would you want something to..” begins Brandon

  “Don’t worry about it, I don’t think we’re gonnaneed it anyway” says Alex as he sits the bottle back on the pile of unknown medications.

  “Whatever” says Brandon concealing a sly grin as he turns back to Melody who is sitting on the floor sorting through more bottles.

  Walking down the aisle Alex meets up with Justin and Bryan to see what they have managed to procure. Seeing a giddy, boyish smile on both of their faces, Alex stops to ask“What are you two smiling about?”

  “Oh nothing much” starts Bryan, his hands conspicuously hidden behind his back.

  “What have you got there” asks Alex, his curiosity peeked.

  “Oh nothing really. Just the new issue of RasslefestMonthly is all” says Bryan as he pulls the brightly colored, glossy paged magazine from behind his back. Seeing the magazine Alex lets out an audible squeal of joy as he snatches the prize from Bryan’s hands.

  “Is this the one…” starts Alex but his question is quickly answered before he can get the words out.