The Zero Dog War (26 page)

Chapter Twenty-Four: Cheeseburger Hill

Undead Army of the Unrighteous Order of the Falling Dark

The Zero Dog Compound

Lawn

7:34 p.m. PST April 19th

Necromancer Jeremiah Hansen watched as his undead hordes laid siege to the huge house. A hundred or so feet away, the garage burned with a ferocity he found slightly unnerving. The structure was little more than a flaming skeleton with skin that shifted and danced, shedding angry red-orange light, breathing out smoke with dark, scorched shapes in its bowels. Mostly it resembled a waiting room in Hell, or perhaps the dentist office after a firebomb. Random ammunition cooked off with pops and bangs, and chunks of twisted, smoking wreckage and debris lay everywhere. Even sections of the lawn had started to catch fire.

Ever since the gelatin-plant inferno, he’d discovered a newfound appreciation and respect for the concept of fire. It wasn’t just for hotdogs and s’mores.

His zombie troops stayed well away from the flames, and he could feel their fear of it. That was fine, since he’d sent them away from the fire to assault the house from all sides. The group of mercenaries trying to reach their tank had been driven back into the house when his zombies almost overwhelmed them. The big demon with the fiery eyes had been a nasty shot, and that werewolf thing had been rather vicious with his golf club. Those two had thinned his undead ranks quite a bit, but after Jeremiah had blown up the garage, the fight had seemed to go out of them and they’d fled back to their mansion.

He stared at the big house. So many windows to break, so little time. And damned if the front door hadn’t been
unlocked
—though getting a zombie to open a doorknob remained a tricky bit of business. In the end, it had only taken minutes to begin pouring his undead minions inside.

Blake set his briefcase between his knees and fiddled with his PDA. “It seems more police are en route.”

Without a word, Jeremiah sectioned off a group of zombies from the horde and sent them toward the road to await the cops. A stalling tactic. He needed more time to storm the house and collect his new and improved paranormal zombies.

Gunshots rang out from time to time, sometimes in single shots, sometimes in bursts. A woman shrieked inside the house, and then a zombie crashed out a third-story window missing its head. Oops. Spoke too soon. The head followed a second later, tumbling through the air and moaning in frustration.

“I think it’s time I invited myself inside,” Jeremiah said.

“Superb.” Blake brushed ashes off the shoulder of his suit. “Enjoy yourself. I shall observe the festivities from here. I have an early morning conference call with
TIME
magazine to arrange the details of your interview.”

Jeremiah smiled. An interview with
TIME
magazine. Despite being a business-speak-spewing executive prick, Blake was worth every penny. Let’s be honest, who else carried a shockingly convenient incendiary grenade in his briefcase? Jeremiah’s mother had carried a bottomless purse the size of a pillowcase and even that elephantine handbag had never contained one of
those
.

Blake stooped down—like a chicken hawk swooping upon an unsuspecting fowl—and opened his briefcase. He withdrew the automatic pistol from beneath a sheaf of papers and handed it to Jeremiah. “This may prove useful in a contentious meeting.”

Jeremiah took the gun, liking the way the pebbled stock felt rough against his palm. He would bring his zombie honor guard, but hey, pimping a phat gat wouldn’t exactly hurt his street cred.

He put the pistol in his waistband and held his hand out to Blake. “You’ve been impeccable, Blake. Really. Good to have you on board.”

Blake stared at his hand for a moment, and then shook with him. His skin felt cool, almost cold. He favored Jeremiah with a slash of a smile. “Of course. I strive to excel.”

Jeremiah turned away, rounded up the zombie honor guard decked out in firefighter helmets, jackets and boots and used his magic to prod them all toward the house. They started toward it with a resounding moan—not quite the most inspiring battle cry, but one took what one could get.

He had a date with a certain pretty female mercenary leader who shot fire out of her hands and had incinerated his place of business when they’d first met. Oh yes, he did indeed have an offer she couldn’t refuse.

Around him, the zombies marched and moaned. Marched and moaned. Sounding exactly like a geriatric banzai charge.

Running.

Zombies everywhere now. Their plaintive moans echoed down the hallways and drifted out of open doorways. A few zombies even spider-crawled toward us across the hardwood and grabbed at our ankles as we sprinted past.

Toppled furniture, broken glass, wreckage and debris lay scattered everywhere. I had no time to mourn the money I’d wasted on the housecleaning service. I wove in and out of the wreckage with Jake running a half step behind me. He knocked zombies down with his barriers, pinned them against the walls, sealed off doorways and pushed us a clear path through their gnashing teeth.

We’d been forced away from the main stairwell by the flood of zombies and almost trapped by more zombies coming up the main hall from the southern end of the house. We’d had to circle around through several rooms to try and reach the main stairs again, but the wreckage and darkness slowed us.

I jumped over a toppled credenza, skidded a little on glass shards, but kept my balance. I had to slow to keep from falling. Dark shapes moved outside the windows, barely visible through the thin curtains. Jake vaulted the credenza and came down on the other side of me. I started to run again—

Glass shattered near my face, and I flinched away. A zombie arm shoved through the broken pane, grabbed my shirt and yanked me toward the window. I caught a glimpse of gnashing teeth and flat, dead eyes. Something moaned in triumph.

“Hands off, pus bag!” I screamed, wrenching the hand back, twisting and shoving hard at an unnatural angle until I heard the bone snap and saw the teeth of glass still in the frame bite deep into its flesh. By pure reflex I let loose the flames and sent a runner of fire up the stained jacket to light the zombie up like a tiki torch.

“Come on,” Jake yelled, pulling me away from the window. We ran again. A zombie loomed in an adjoining doorway, but Jake smashed his barrier into it, slamming it backward and leaving a huge, splintered dent in the doorframe.

We finally reached the stairs. No zombies on the steps, but plenty of them staggered toward us from all directions. Jake raced up the stairs first, barrier out and pistol aimed. I kept one hand on his back and watched, heart hammering, the mass of zombies gathering below us and pushing their way to the bottom step.

The second-floor landing was empty. I grabbed the banister post and swung myself around to the next flight, but Jake had stopped on the second stair and I bumped into him. He stood absolutely still, staring upward. I followed his gaze.

A zombie head tumbled down the stairs, thudding down step by step like a bowling ball. Hanzo stood at the top of the third-floor landing, ninja sword in hand and half-congealed zombie blood along its blade. Behind him stood Mai supporting Tiffany with an arm around her shoulder. Blood stained Tiffany’s arms up to her elbows, and lines of strain turned her beautiful face weary and older than it had looked the last time I’d seen her.

My heart clenched. I started to run up the stairs toward her, calling her name, but something grabbed me, a huge shape lurching out of one of the rooms and clamping a cold hand on my arm. I spun toward it. More shapes, dozens, stumbled out of the shadows and connecting halls onto the landing.

A flurry of gunshots sang out, so loud and so close my ears rang and I must have had cordite striping all over my face. Zombies swarmed all over me, clutching at me, pulling me away from Jake and darting their heads forward to bite. I slammed a fist into one gray, moon-shaped face and elbow crushed another head. Jake yelled my name. A flood of small creatures scurried down the stairs and threw themselves at the zombies. I saw one of them latch itself onto a zombie face and start tearing away. It was a little creature that looked like a sunshine-yellow platypus with wolverine claws, studded with spikes and a razor-sharp bill.

A zombie almost sank its filthy teeth into my neck. I jerked backward, kicking it in the chest. Another zombie pulled me off balance, and I shoved it away with a grunt of disgust. Too hard. I stumbled back, losing my balance. A fat old-man zombie tried to push me down, but I hit the banister and threw my weight to the side to avoid going over. I stood too close to the lower flight of stairs. The world spun as I bounced off the wall, hit the rail and toppled down the rest of the stairs to the ground floor. I slammed into several zombies working their way up the stairs like a wrecking ball. The stench of decay choked me and I struggled to breathe.

“
Andrea
!” Jake screamed.

I looked toward his voice, but my head spun and it was hard to find him. I pushed myself to my feet, blood rushing in my ears. The male zombie I’d partially landed on sat up and reached for me. I kicked it in the face. Eager, hungry moaning sounded all around me. I caught a glimpse of Jake as he flung out his hand. A zombie about to clamp down on my arm staggered back as a shimmering barrier opened between us.

“Watch out!” I yelled.

On the second-floor landing, Jake turned just in time to dodge a zombie lunge. He put a bullet in the top of its head from close range, spackling the wall with chunks our interior decorator would hate. More zombies pressed in on the second-floor landing, coming from every adjoining hallway and room. Too many for me to fight through. If I cut loose with flames, I might accidentally burn my own people—and I couldn’t risk that ever again.

Some of the zombies on the second-floor landing diverted toward me, half-falling down the stairs. The zombies I’d knocked over on my way down were already trying to stand up again. Behind me, on the ground floor, zombies pushed and shoved against each other, fighting to get to me at the narrow mouth of the stairs. I was completely cut off.

Jake backed up a couple steps as the zombies closed on him and then he wheeled back to me. “Run! I’ll cover you!”

“But—”

“I’ll find you!
Go
!”

I had one last glimpse of Jake, Mai, Hanzo and Tiffany fighting, driving their way down into the horde, but now the zombies coming down the stairs were halfway to me and more swarmed all around me, grabbing and tearing.

I back-fisted one zombie head and front-kicked another, sending the zombie flying back into its moaning comrades. I wouldn’t abandon my people. No way in hell I’d run off and leave them.

I called my magic to life and my next punch transformed into a flaming fist of death, straight into the face of a zombie. Its nose shattered and its head rocked back, but the real effect came when I pumped more energy into the spell and the zombie’s head burst into flames. I leaned back, pivoted and kicked the damn thing back into its shuffling friends, who stumbled away from the fire.

Another gunshot cracked through the air and a zombie near me went down. Then another. Jake still stood on the second-floor landing, his empty hand out, a barrier holding back dozens of zombies trying to get to him. His other hand held the smoking 9mm, but the slide was back, and the gun was empty. A zombie who had no legs from the knees down grabbed his ankle and dragged itself forward, mouth gaping, straight for his calf. Jake cursed and stumbled. He yanked his leg free, but hit the wall and fell back on the stair incline.

Somebody screamed. An instant later I realized the scream came from me. Crazy shifting firelight lit the stairwell and the halls as the head-punched zombie burned. In that light I saw a pack of Mai’s weird platypus creatures hopping down the stairs, past Jake, to swarm all over the legless zombie, tearing it to pieces.

Jake clambered to his feet again. He couldn’t lower his barrier to reload the pistol or all those zombies would fall on him. Hanzo hacked away at grasping zombie limbs that managed to get around the barrier. Jake stared down at me. I could see the terror etched on his face—terror for me. His eyes widened.

“Look out!” He pointed behind me with the empty gun.

I threw myself to the side without even looking. A woman zombie fell forward where I’d been an instant before. She would’ve pulled me down with her. More zombies came up from behind me, and the others from the stairwell had already begun inching around the burning remains of the zombie whose head I’d melted. Jesus, they were everywhere.

No time. I slammed down a spell into the carpet and a wall of fire flared up with a roar. The zombies staggered away from the heat. For a moment, the zombie line faltered and I caught a glimpse of a man standing at the far end of the hall dressed all in black with a Vandyke beard and watching me with an intensity that bordered on admiration. I recognized his face right away. Necromancer Jeremiah Hansen, the man I’d last seen in the office of his gelatin-manufacturing plant, right before Hell was born again on earth with me as its mother. The zombies closed in again, and some of them pushed their way through the fire, driven onward by the necromancer despite their hatred of flames.

I jumped over the woman zombie who’d almost had me. She pawed at my legs but couldn’t hold on. I leapt through my own wall of flames, feeling the heat scorch against me. I landed, threw myself into a roll and came up smoking but not on fire. The zombies had cut me off from the stairs. No chance to get back to Jake. Surrounded like this, I’d end up trapped in my own inferno.