by Gayle Katz
Charlie had a good chuckle. “Well played, really clever.”
“Hey, Charlie,” whispered Owen. “I see fake zombies but no real ones.”
She smiled. “Just wait, Owen. They’ll come out soon.”
“Gotcha,” he said, leaving to refill his tray.
Charlie kept an eye on Stewart and Zan, as everyone was enjoying the party and not paying her much attention. She watched as someone won at the poker table with the extremely large bet.
When her eyes flicked back to Stewart and Zan, they were well on their way to an argument.
“I saw you look at her! Don’t tell me you didn’t!” yelled Zan.
“You’re ridiculous!” yelled Stewart, but not as loudly.
Charlie chuckled. “So much for acting skills.”
“I can’t even talk to you anymore. Leave me alone,” called out Zan.
“Fine,” said Stewart, walking away from her.
“Hello,” said Rina. “Is everything OK?”
“Why, thank you,” he said, taking a glass of champagne from her. “My date got mad at me. Nothing new there,” he said.
“Well, don’t worry about that. We have some entertainment coming,” she promised.
He smiled. “That’s great. Say, you’re the infamous Rina Orzola, am I right?”
She nodded. “That’s me.” She shook his hand.
“I’m Derek White,” he said.
“Nice to meet you,” she said. “Have you played any of the games yet?”
Stewart shook his head. “No.”
“You should try the blackjack table. That game is free. You have a chance at winning a car.”
Stewart looked taken aback. “A car? That’s mighty generous for a special event.”
She shrugged. “It was donated by the dealership down the street.”
“I see,” he said, smiling. “I’ll give it a try, as my Porsche is getting a bit finicky after a couple years.”
“Have fun,” she said, going to chat with someone else.
Stewart headed to the blackjack table. Might as well give it a try. He wasn’t surprised when he saw the prize was a small, cheap car, but it was donated after all.
zzz
Owen and Charlie chatted in the back of the casino.
“I think on our breaks we should head back to the basement to see what’s going on.”
“I’m in agreement,” he whispered back. “I have this strange feeling something is up.”
“That’s good enough for me,” she answered.
A few minutes later it was 8:30, so the pair of them slipped out the back to the break room. But instead of going inside, they detoured to the stairwell and headed down.
“I don’t see anyone around,” he said.
“Of course not,” she replied. “They’ll be up to no good at the party.”
“Say, I hope you didn’t drink any of the champagne?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No, why?”
“I have a bad feeling about it.”
“Crap. OK, let’s go have a look, then we can let Stewart know about a possible problem with the drinks.” She quickly picked the door and opened it.
She looked at Owen. He was scrunching up his face and pacing.
“Do you need to go to the bathroom?”
“No, it’s those drinks we were handing out.”
“Just go,” she said.
He laughed. “I didn’t have any. But I have a really bad feeling. It’s worsening.”
“Fine. You stay here and send a text to Stewart. If he doesn’t reply, run upstairs and find him. I’ll be quick and get back.”
Owen smiled, relieved. “OK, good luck!”
“I’ll leave these napkins in the door in case you need to find me.” She took the extra napkins from her apron belt and placed them in the door to keep it from closing.
Charlie went on ahead. She peeked in the small windows of some of the rooms, but no one was there. She was about to check the last two rooms when the door of one of the rooms opened. She whirled around and panicked. She grabbed the doorknob nearest to her and turned, but it wouldn’t open. Where would she go?
Perhaps she could just say she had gotten lost?
zzz
There was no response, so Owen decided to head back upstairs. Then he got a ping on his phone.
“It’s happening!” said Zan.
“Be right there,” he texted back.
zzz
“It figures. People are turning and Rina has disappeared,” said Stewart.
“Hey look,” said Zan, pointing up at the tall casino wall in the back.
“Oh, a window. I wonder if that’s how they watch the floor, besides the cameras.”
“No doubt,” said Zan.
“OK, I’ll head there. You stay here. Do not stab anyone unless they’re a zombie.”
“Right,” she said, pulling her dagger out of her evening bag. One guy ran past her. “Lose the zombie makeup,” she called out.
Then she watched as three zombies advanced on an elderly lady and her husband.
“Hey there,” called out Zan. It appeared they had already had a victim, as a body was lying on the ground. These were definitely zombies. She charged forward. The nearest one went down as her dagger hit its brain through the eye socket.
The other two zombies were confused. They knelt down, but then quickly realized that he was a zombie just like them.
The zombie went to stand back up, but Zan plunged a dagger into its head. The third zombie grabbed onto her arm and was trying to bite it.
“Go ahead, loser,” she said, and quickly killed him.
By now, it was chaos on the floor.
“Zombies!” some people cried out. These were the smart ones. The not so smart ones, thinking it was all a game, weren’t running around in terror. She shook her head and wondered how Stewart was getting along.
zzz
Charlie hung from the underside of the sprinkler piping system. She watched as four zombies and Rina Orzola headed down the hall.
“I know you’re there,” Rina called out. She then opened the other door, the one that Charlie hadn’t had time to check. Then Rina left.
About twenty zombies came out of the room.
“Oh crap,” said Charlie.
zzz
Owen rushed into the casino. He saw a zombie heading for him. He immediately knew it was a zombie and not a worker in disguise, so he pulled out his dagger and plunged it into the zombie’s head. The zombie went down.
“Owen! There you are,” called out Zan.
“Zan! Where’s Stewart?”
“He went to the lookout up there. Where is Charlie?”
“She’s in the basement.”
“Good.”
“Say, that champagne must have been spiked.”
She grimaced. “Already figured that out.”
“You OK?” he asked.
“Of course. Immune, remember?”
“I know, but I always worry that they’ve stepped up their game.”
“Well, if I was going to turn, I already would have.”
Owen looked around at the mess surrounding them. Many people had taken off. He saw Jay frantically calling the police for backup. The mayor was off having fun zombie hunting. She seemed to be a natural.
“OK. I’m going to dispose of all the champagne,” said Owen, “and make sure no one drinks any more of it.”
“Good,” said Zan. “I’ll try to convince the others that they should leave, that it’s not safe here.”
“Yeah, that works. I think that only some of the champagne was tainted, not all of it.” Owen grabbed a bottle off a table and poured it out onto the floor.
zzz
Stewart had managed to break into the security room. There was one man inside dressed in uniform.
“Have you called the cops?” asked Stewart. “It’s chaos on the floor.”
“Yep, already did that,” he said.
Stewart walked over to
the large monitoring system. He pressed a button and a drive popped out.
“Hey! What are you doing?” The security officer tried to push him aside.
“Getting rid of evidence.” He smashed the drive onto the floor, and then proceeded to stomp on it. Plastic bits went flying. Stewart then picked up what remained inside, and placed it in his pocket. “Remember that there are no zombies in Portland.” Then he left.
zzz
Down on the floor, Jay was scuffling with Rina. He had her hands behind her back. “You are under arrest.” He managed to get handcuffs on her.
“Why is it my fault that zombies have broken out?” she yelled at him.
“It’s a failure to provide adequate security for guests. We have at least five dead on the floor. It’s a safety hazard. It’s a health department hazard. It’s a food safety issue. Need I go on?”
“OK, I think we got most of the zombies,” said Jane, rushing up. “Is she under arrest?” Jane asked.
“Yep. I have no idea why you started this,” he said to Rina.
“Probably doing another test to see if the zombie injection actually works,” said Jane.
“What’s the point?” said Jay. “These guys are going around in circles. Say, where are the kids?”
“Owen and Zan are over there. I don’t know where Charlie and Stewart are.”
“OK, let me get her out of here, then we’ll go look.” He took off in one direction, while Jane headed off in another.
“Are you friends with her? You know she comes to our meetings sometimes,” said Rina.
“I know. She tells me all about it. Why do you think we’re here tonight?”
“I thought you were on a date?” she said, laughing.
“Very funny.”
“Anyway, you have nothing to arrest me on.”
“I do,” he said, as he locked her into the first squad car that had shown up. “Take her away and book her on every charge you can think of.” His colleague nodded and drove her away.
Chapter 15
________________________________________
“Um. This is awkward,” said Charlie, trying to hold onto the sprinkler pipes. Some of them started to creak under her weight. Her hands and her arms started shaking. She wouldn’t be able to hold on much longer.
She peered down at the twenty-four or so zombies below. Rina must have been experimenting on people or something. She gathered that these zombies were to be released into the casino as part of the zombie fun.
Some of the zombies saw her and reached their hands up to her. Some just brushed the undersides of her legs. She braced her feet to wrap more tightly around the pipes.
Finally, she couldn’t hold on any longer. She released her hands and plunged down into the waiting zombies below.
zzz
Stewart entered the casino hall. By now, it appeared that the mayor had gotten most of the guests safely out. The police and paramedics were running around, seeing if any of the people on the floor were still alive.
“Why would she do this?” screamed Jane near the blackjack table.
“Hey. Take it easy,” said Jay, having returned from outside. He was rubbing her back.
“This gang is so fu,” then she stopped and looked at Zan and Owen. “Fudged up. The more I try to infiltrate, the worse it gets.”
“Well, the solution is to stop getting involved then,” Zan suggested.
“Well, who else is going to do it? You’re just kids.”
“Say, anyone see Charlie?” asked Owen. “I left her in the basement but haven’t seen her come back.”
“No,” said Stewart, joining them. “I think we should head down there and look.”
“OK, Jane, you stay up here. I expect the press is on the way. You can talk to them. The police will put up a notice that the casino is shut down,” suggested Jay.
“OK,” she said. “I’m wiped out anyway.”
“You folks go downstairs. I still have an errand to run,” said Stewart, looking around the casino floor.
zzz
Charlie could have had a rougher landing, but she crashed into several zombies, who also collapsed to the ground. As soon as she was down, she pulled out her dagger. It was easy taking out the zombies on the ground. She simply raised her dagger and plunged it into an eye socket. Then she pulled it out, and did the next one. She got about five this way, before they regrouped.
“Oh crap,” she said, as several of the zombies had managed to pull themselves back up into a standing position. “Well, at least the guys in back can’t get through, so this evens out the odds, six to one.”
zzz
“I left her down here,” said Owen, pushing open the door. He was glad that she had blocked it so they didn’t have to pick the lock.
“Oh! Oh!” said Zan, as she saw the zombies in the hallway.
“Charlie!” called out Owen.
“I’m stuck!” yelled Charlie. “I’m surrounded by zombies! They are trying to eat me! I can’t kill them fast enough.”
“We’re coming,” called out Owen. Zan followed quickly after him, with Jay in the rear.
Charlie wasn’t spending much time killing zombies. Instead, she was trying to push them away from her so she could at least kill one or two, before having to defend herself again.
zzz
“Hey! We have a problem,” said one of the police officers, running up to Mayor Jane.
“What is it?” she asked, as she helped do cleanup.
“Um, it’s believed this was a distraction,” he said.
“A distraction? A thousand guests are a distraction? What could be worse than this?”
“Um,” he said, trying to get it out. “Dozens of zombies have just escaped from Ray Orzola’s clothing factory.”
“But we shut that down! Where is Jay? Stewart! Kids!” She looked frantically around.
“The police chief recommends that we shut down Portland.”
“What the?” she said.
“Curfew! Right now. Everyone stays locked safely inside.” Then he rushed off.
“Dammit!” she cried, pulling out her cell phone.
zzz
“I got two!” said Zan, stabbing her way through the crowd.
“Me two,” said Owen.
Jay had managed to shoot a few of the zombies in the head.
“Hey! Get back! Don’t let them take a bite out of you,” said Owen.
“Been there, done that,” said Jay. “I’ll be fine.”
Zan smirked “I knew it!”
“Knew what, kid?”
“Behind you!” she cried at him.
Jay turned and pushed the zombie to the ground. Jay kicked it a few times, before taking his gun and shooting it in the head. The zombie quickly dropped back to the ground.
Zan and Jay smiled at each other.
“Where did these guys come from?” asked Owen, pushing another zombie to the ground.
Soon the zlayers had the zombies thinned out. Zan ran to one end of the hall while Jay ran to the other. That spread out the remaining zombies, getting them away from Charlie.
“Wait! Where’s Charlie?” called out Owen.
“Up here,” she called out.
He looked up. She was hanging from the sprinkler pipes.
“I should move my things up here since I’ve been spending a lot of time here recently.”
“I think you can come down now. There are only a few left.”
She dropped to the floor, landing on both feet.
“Nice,” he said.
“No problem,” she said. A zombie came at her, but she quickly plunged her dagger into its head. “So, these guys are regular zombies. Not like Warcola’s wife?”
“Yeah, good thing for that.”
“Are they related?” asked Zan, keeping an eye on two zombies at the back.
“If I could get him to open up to me, so I could really figure it out, then that would be great,” said Jay. “But I don’t think he’s in the zombie gang. H
e just got some info he shouldn’t have.”
“Stupid zombie gang,” said Zan, getting ready to dispatch the final two zombies.
Owen had been running around checking all the rooms. “That’s it,” he said. “No more zombies.”
“See you upstairs,” said Jay, heading to the door.
“Good job, team,” said Charlie. “Let’s go home.”
As they walked up the stairs, Owen asked. “What just happened?”
“I’m thinking a distraction for the big event,” said Zan.
“What? A distraction?” asked Owen.
They entered into what remained of the casino. The room had once been opulent and grand. Now it was stained with blood, champagne, and broken glass. The room had been cleared of people, except for a few police officers taking photographs.
“So, the police are saying it was a bad shooting,” said Stewart, coming up to the team.
“Seriously?” said Zan. “When is Portland going to get its shit together?”
“Sorry, but that’s the way it is. Can’t freak out people. It’s a tragedy, but fortunately, more lives weren’t lost.”
“Great,” said Zan.
“Well, team, I suggest we head for home,” said Stewart. “We don’t know what’s ahead of us tomorrow.”
As they dragged their feet to the main entrance, Mayor Jane came rushing up to them. “Hey, guys! We have a more serious problem ahead of us.”
Everyone groaned.
“What is it, Jane?” asked Stewart. “Can’t it wait until morning? The zombie gang is going nowhere.”
“Um, well, it could. But the problem is that this zombie party was only a distraction. The real fun was happening at Orzola’s clothing factory.”