Flip This Zombie - Jesse Petersen [54]
“Fuck! It’s free!” I shouted, glancing over my shoulder. We swerved and I forced myself to pay attention to the road, straightening out the wheel, but not before we started to skid on the loose gravel along the shoulder.
Dave unbuckled and flung himself into the back of the vehicle in one smooth motion.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” he cried.
In the rearview mirror, I could see the three of them sliding around on the metal cargo area of the van. Somehow the zombie had gotten his other arm out of his binds, which basically made him completely free. A few ropes around his waist and a child-sized t-shirt at his neck weren’t going to stop him, that was for damn sure.
With a growl, the zombie flipped over on top of The Kid before Dave could get a good grip on him. Robbie screamed and flopped in a desperate attempt to get free, but the creature was immovable. It leaned down, pressing its rotting, black teeth against the soft cotton of Robbie’s t-shirt in an attempt to gnaw on the child beneath him.
Dave flung his arms around the zombie and pulled back as hard as he could and the two fell across the side wall of the van at a weird, twisted angle.
Of course, I had to watch all this unfold in the rearview mirror, while at the same time I fought to control the vehicle. And it was a fight, because the van was completely out of control thanks to the shale on the shoulder. My brake was to the floor, but we kept sliding at an awful sideways angle. It took every ounce of strength in my arms to keep the vehicle from going completely off the street.
I failed.
The shoulder suddenly turned to a full-on embankment and that was it. We skidded a few more feet and then we were rocking, off-balance. We flipped and for a slow-motion moment I thought of the other car. The one where we’d found our current zombie companion.
How long would it take for the infected to flood our vehicle? To pull pieces of our bodies out and eat them while we still moaned in horror at the sight of it?
I hoped I’d die first so I wouldn’t have to see.
Then my thoughts were gone. The van rolled onto its roof. I heard The Kid and David grunting and the zombie moaning as they flew all around the back of the van. Their bodies banged against the neatly organized weapons cache that lined the walls and thudded against each other as they fought to avoid the still-clawing zombie fingers.
As for me, I was still buckled in (unlike Dear Old Dad in the earlier wreck) so I stayed in my seat, my body fighting against the strap with a painful series of tugs and thrashes.
The van was still sliding on its roof, but it was slowing down as it glided through sand and dust and the thin roots of desert plants. But the slide stopped abruptly when we hit something on my side of the car. Momentum made my head snap to the side and collide with the edge of my partly rolled-down window.
Stars erupted in front of my eyes as the world moved into a strange, surreal half-time movement. It was almost like I’d slipped into some kind of weird movie. I felt movement, I heard sounds. One of them was someone saying my name, slow and steady, “Saaarrraaaahhh…”
And then there was nothing else.
There was a bright light in my eyes. Like the kind a doctor or a dentist shines in your face at their office. Had I had a surgery? If so, there were some fucked-up dreams I’d been having.
“Sarah?” a voice said from what felt like was very far away. “Sarah, it’s time to wake up.”
I recognized the voice, but it wasn’t a family member. I had the odd, disconnected feeling that it was a doctor’s voice. Only there was something else that fluttered on the edge of my foggy memory. Something bad.
“David?” I squinted into the light, trying to make out the unseen person behind it.
There was a slight hesitation that made my heart leap, but then the person said, “He’s fine. Neither he nor the boy were badly hurt in the accident.