Chapter 6
The Saga Continues, with Chapter 6 of the Great Collaborative Zombie Novel!
Chapter 1: Gratuitous Cleavage Shots By Zeth
Chapter 2: I Suck at Coming Up with Names and Titles, by Vlad
Chapter 3: Mr West, by Zeth
Chapter 4: Up and Out, by Leefy
Chapter 5: Zombie City Escape Club, by Vlad
Chapter 6 by Mike
Chapter 6 by Mike
Mr. West reached cruising altitude with little problem and set the plane on autopilot so that he could study the maps in the cockpit. He checked to make sure his cell phone still had signal and connected up to the Internet.
Homeland Security had apparently quarantined a 300-square mile radius around St. Louis. The cover story being spread was that terrorists had unleashed a deadly dirty bomb. Surprisingly, there appeared to be not even a single blog suggesting the powerful Parasol Corp might be involved despite St. Louis being their R&D headquarters.
A buzz from his phone informed him a text had arrived.
How the hell did they know I was airborne?
The text message gave him grid coordinates and a flight plan. Mr. West scanned the flight maps for his new destination…
Meanwhile, 20,000 miles directly under his feet, Sam was starting to get a little nervous. His brain snorted at that. Palms sweating, teeth-chattering, bladder-bursting, Sam’s brain concluded “a little nervous” was an understatement as he hid under an abandoned car watching a group of shuffling zombies walk into each other aimlessly. He noticed the sign in the distance with a post-card-happy family and tourist-trap-welcoming smiles: “Welcome to Beatty, MO, Home of the Brain, Population 5913.” Beatty’s only notable contribution to the world had been 1974’s Nobel-Prize winning Neurologist, Jake Faxon. Little was known about his work in town only that he had discovered some rare brain disease. He’d retired from the Parasol Corporation some years back and come back here to live with his only daughter, Jesse Jane. Sam shook his head wondering why he had decided to explain all that to himself out of the blue when he remembered where he was.
He could still he his editor, Miles, flustered and packing rapidly in their small two-room office. Mile’s five-hair comb-over had flipped up making it hard for Sam not to smile. His boss had told Sam this zombie-thing could be his big break. He’d been writing small articles for the local newspaper, the Beatty Beat, for nearly a month with little to show. Until three days ago, the biggest story he’d been able to cover was when a local girl had a fight with her boyfriend and set fire to his dad’s illegal marijuana field. Half the town ransacked the local Krispy Kreme and White Castle leaving a trail of greasy-powdered pillaging in its wake.
Even as Miles was climbing on to a bus taking evacuees to Fort Pastor, he was shouting at Sam, to “do him proud.” Counting off the plethora of options Sam had for survival at the moment, he keenly wished Mile’s advice and some random zombie would eventually bite him on the ass. From somewhere down the road and behind Sam came a keening sound that brought the zombies to a stand-still. The zombies started to move almost purposefully away from the sound leaving the main road and running into the corn fields beyond. Eager to see what had driven them off, Sam scuttled out from under the defunct wreck. Oil and dirt staining his face, Sam was quite a sight in his crumbled sport coat and torn pants. It should have been little surprise then when someone standing in the bed of the red pickup speeding toward him pointed a rifle in his direction.
“WAIT! Don’t shoot!,” Sam yelled jumping up and down. “I’m not a zombie!”
The pickup came to a stop a few feet from him, and the person in the back jumped down with the gun still trained on him.
“I got him, Pa, what do ya think?”
Sam was knocked over; she was country-fried hotness. Redheaded with picturesque freckles, she stood casually aiming the Remington 12-guage at his head wearing a well-worn tan Stetson, a white tee begging for mercy and skin-tight, faded blue jeans. The only thing he couldn’t figure out was how the hell she could aim given the size of her-Sam mentally slapped himself.
Look at her eyes, dumbass, she’s not someone you want to offend just now.
Out of the driver’s side of the truck, a man stepped down. Older, grayer than the pictures he’d seen, but Sam recognized the face. It was Dr. Faxon. He was wearing an I-Pod with some odd attachment around his neck. The odd keening sound that Sam had heard earlier emanated loudly from the device.
Sam found his voice and cleared his throat.
“Plea-please da-don’t shoot. I’m Sam, am a reporter from Beatty. I stayed behind to report on the story.”
The doctor looked at him with a pained expression and removed his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose.
“Put the gun down, Jesse, zombies don’t talk in full sentences. He may be stupid, but he’s definitely human.”
Chapter 1: Gratuitous Cleavage Shots By Zeth
Chapter 2: I Suck at Coming Up with Names and Titles, by Vlad
Chapter 3: Mr West, by Zeth
Chapter 4: Up and Out, by Leefy
Chapter 5: Zombie City Escape Club, by Vlad
Chapter 6 by Mike
Chapter 6 by Mike
Mr. West reached cruising altitude with little problem and set the plane on autopilot so that he could study the maps in the cockpit. He checked to make sure his cell phone still had signal and connected up to the Internet.
Homeland Security had apparently quarantined a 300-square mile radius around St. Louis. The cover story being spread was that terrorists had unleashed a deadly dirty bomb. Surprisingly, there appeared to be not even a single blog suggesting the powerful Parasol Corp might be involved despite St. Louis being their R&D headquarters.
A buzz from his phone informed him a text had arrived.
How the hell did they know I was airborne?
The text message gave him grid coordinates and a flight plan. Mr. West scanned the flight maps for his new destination…
Meanwhile, 20,000 miles directly under his feet, Sam was starting to get a little nervous. His brain snorted at that. Palms sweating, teeth-chattering, bladder-bursting, Sam’s brain concluded “a little nervous” was an understatement as he hid under an abandoned car watching a group of shuffling zombies walk into each other aimlessly. He noticed the sign in the distance with a post-card-happy family and tourist-trap-welcoming smiles: “Welcome to Beatty, MO, Home of the Brain, Population 5913.” Beatty’s only notable contribution to the world had been 1974’s Nobel-Prize winning Neurologist, Jake Faxon. Little was known about his work in town only that he had discovered some rare brain disease. He’d retired from the Parasol Corporation some years back and come back here to live with his only daughter, Jesse Jane. Sam shook his head wondering why he had decided to explain all that to himself out of the blue when he remembered where he was.
He could still he his editor, Miles, flustered and packing rapidly in their small two-room office. Mile’s five-hair comb-over had flipped up making it hard for Sam not to smile. His boss had told Sam this zombie-thing could be his big break. He’d been writing small articles for the local newspaper, the Beatty Beat, for nearly a month with little to show. Until three days ago, the biggest story he’d been able to cover was when a local girl had a fight with her boyfriend and set fire to his dad’s illegal marijuana field. Half the town ransacked the local Krispy Kreme and White Castle leaving a trail of greasy-powdered pillaging in its wake.
Even as Miles was climbing on to a bus taking evacuees to Fort Pastor, he was shouting at Sam, to “do him proud.” Counting off the plethora of options Sam had for survival at the moment, he keenly wished Mile’s advice and some random zombie would eventually bite him on the ass. From somewhere down the road and behind Sam came a keening sound that brought the zombies to a stand-still. The zombies started to move almost purposefully away from the sound leaving the main road and running into the corn fields beyond. Eager to see what had driven them off, Sam scuttled out from under the defunct wreck. Oil and dirt staining his face, Sam was quite a sight in his crumbled sport coat and torn pants. It should have been little surprise then when someone standing in the bed of the red pickup speeding toward him pointed a rifle in his direction.
“WAIT! Don’t shoot!,” Sam yelled jumping up and down. “I’m not a zombie!”
The pickup came to a stop a few feet from him, and the person in the back jumped down with the gun still trained on him.
“I got him, Pa, what do ya think?”
Sam was knocked over; she was country-fried hotness. Redheaded with picturesque freckles, she stood casually aiming the Remington 12-guage at his head wearing a well-worn tan Stetson, a white tee begging for mercy and skin-tight, faded blue jeans. The only thing he couldn’t figure out was how the hell she could aim given the size of her-Sam mentally slapped himself.
Look at her eyes, dumbass, she’s not someone you want to offend just now.
Out of the driver’s side of the truck, a man stepped down. Older, grayer than the pictures he’d seen, but Sam recognized the face. It was Dr. Faxon. He was wearing an I-Pod with some odd attachment around his neck. The odd keening sound that Sam had heard earlier emanated loudly from the device.
Sam found his voice and cleared his throat.
“Plea-please da-don’t shoot. I’m Sam, am a reporter from Beatty. I stayed behind to report on the story.”
The doctor looked at him with a pained expression and removed his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose.
“Put the gun down, Jesse, zombies don’t talk in full sentences. He may be stupid, but he’s definitely human.”