Chapter Eight: The Ludicrous Swimmer and the Cauldron

Bruce moved first, which was good, because I was fucking tired. The day was not going well, what with the hangover, the glass in my foot (now removed), the zombies and the evil grandma Moses. I think the kick I laid into her head opened up my wounded foot again. I could feel blood seeping into my shoes. Fantastic.

Bruce walked cautiously down the steps, knowing that I looked ready to snap, I'm sure. I would have moved cautiously around me and I like me. Bruce had every reason to truly hate me, but he didn't. Life is complicated. “Have you been in the back yet?” He glanced over the counter top, taking in the plastic bottle full of voodoo crap.

“No, not yet. It's on my to-do list.” I picked up my bag and put my umbrella in, before heading to the little door by the counter that led through to the kitchen.

“Are you sure you want to put the umbrella away? Might be more old people to hit back there.” Gotta love a man who can do sarcasm without sounding bitchy. He always just sounded happy. No matter what. Opposites attract I suppose.

“It's here if I need it. You coming?”

“Yep. You still have the amulet I gave you?” For a second my brain cycled through all the presents Bruce had ever given me while we were dating, and I wasn't coming up with anything until I remembered the ebony amulet I found this morning and had put into my purse. Oh, yeah, that.

“Yeah, I have it. What's it for?” I walked into the kitchen and passed a cauldron bubbling away with some evil smelling crap in it. It also had a couple of cockroaches looking like ludicrous swimmers in a tub of goo. I turned down the heat to a simmer and made a mental note to check on the little guys in a few. It would be interesting to see what a radioactive-zombie-making-voodoo potion would do to the most resilient form of life on the planet. That's me, always working.

“You'll see in a minute." I hated when he did that. Just answer the damn question. But I was too tired to be bitchy about it. “Think your boss will help clean this up?” Bruce had come to the open door to the deep freeze and I could see a pair of Joe looking shoes attached to some dead Joe legs hanging out. Probably what grandma-evil had been dragging..

“Maybe. Maybe. He doesn't much like other people working his town. It upsets him.” I shuddered a bit. My boss upset was not a pretty picture. Remember when I said my boss was a life-sucking vampire? Wasn't being poetic. That would be more or less accurate.

“I have to be at work soon.” I sighed and picked up the phone, getting ready to call the office. “Before we do this, do you know some other place to get pizza that doesn't have all that healthy shit on it?”

Zombie News

Okay, hope to have the new art up tomorrow with chapter eight, but in the meantime, here's some breaking zombie news straight from Ophelia's office:

http://purpleslinky.com/offbeat/five-signs-of-the-zombie-apocalypse/

http://purpleslinky.com/humor/satire/how-to-prepare-for-a-zombie-apocalypse-2/

Talk at ya all tomorrow, when the weather is warm and zombies are at the gate.

Chapter Seven: Smelly Bananas and Cigarettes

Just as the little evil voodoo elf in front of me smiled, I heard a noise behind me. I swung my umbrella around in a arching rap shot in the hope of blocking or at least stunning, whatever had made grandma evil smile. The heavy wooden handle vibrated in my grip as it struck a rather lively looking Voodoo-Joe-doll, which moments ago had been just sitting there in the middle of the pizzeria floor, completely inanimate. Just my luck. Now at least I knew what they were doing with the hemlock and plutonium. Crap.

The thing was over six foot, like Joe, had a hefty weight to it, like Joe, and smelled like cigarettes and smelly old bananas, also like Joe. Unlike Joe, however, it obviously had an oak skeletal structure, or some other hard wood, as my numb fingers would attest to. Zombie voodoo dolls. That's weird even for me.

The thing was glaring at me with its button eyes, or at least I think it was a glare. Hard to tell with buttons.

“You should have gotten your pizza down the street at Keno's like everybody else today.” Grandma evil was practically jumping up and down with glee.

“Yeah.” I dodged a chunky, white clad arm as the Voodoo-Joe-doll swung clumsily at my head. “But I hate that healthy shit.” I dodged away again, narrowly missing the still glowing green fountain. “All feta cheese and spinach with avocados...” I did a flip with a bit of a spin landing on top of the Joe things back. “I prefer grease..” I pulled on the hat, pulling it off and quickly rammed my umbrella into the soft head, yanking backward and pulling it off. “...and pepperoni.” I jumped off the now falling, smelly Joe and landed on my feet in front of the now gaping Grandma-evil.

“What...? Who the hell are you?”

“A refugee stranded in Kansas.” I rabbit kicked up into her small head, knocking her into the wall behind. “And all I want is some GOD-DAMNED-PIZZA!” I screamed the last into her prone form and stood panting, my feet aching with the wounds left from the earlier glass, and my head exploding with the even earlier tequila.

“You have got to start getting your anger issues under control.”

I spun around to see Bruce standing at the stop of the stairs that led from the street to the now rather wrecked pizzeria. He looked good with his hair short, still black, and his too pale skin. Dammit, I wanted him to look like crap. I looked like crap. “Yeah. You should be glad all the bottles in here are already broken.”

“Fair enough.”

We stood there, staring at each other for a few moments, wondering what to say, whether the other would speak first and all the other stuff people wonder when they see their ex. God, I hate Mondays.

Chapter Six: Radioactive Material and Hemlock

I held my umbrella at the ready with the heavy wooden end forward like a club, and contemplated my situation. The door to the street was about twenty-two feet away. Probably wouldn’t make it if I made a run for it, and it is entirely possible that it wouldn’t matter if I made it outside. Zombies don’t care if its day or night and any sunshine, even the filtered gray light coming through the clouds, would just hurt my eyes.

I glanced around the pizza parlor again. I noted that the little indoor fountain that had been a selling point for years at Joe’s Pizzeria was glowing a faint green in the dim light. Great. That didn’t bode well. Radioactive material as well as plastic. These guys, whoever these guys were who had used the Joe voodoo doll in the middle of the room, really were idiots. They deserved to have Joe eat their brains. And the rest of them too.



From around the corner, towards the kitchen area, I heard a bit of shuffling and I pressed myself against the wall, waiting for whatever was going to come round to see who had entered the door with its little ringing bell. Stupid bell. It was not going to improve my mood if I had to kill a zombie Joe. It would make me downright depressed. And if it was Bruce…well, I probably wouldn’t kill him, but I might hit him. Just to make a point. I could be in an alcohol soaked stupor right now, but noooooo…Bruce had to come to my party, make me break a bottle on him, get glass in my feet and end up here. Not to get a pizza, which I really needed, but to defend the planet from poorly done voodoo and zombie pizzeria staff. Dammit, my brain fired again, That was Bruce at my party wearing his own shirt. Not just some guy. Dammit.. Oh, yeah. I was going to beat the crap out of somebody today.



The shuffling got louder and then there was a thumping sound and footsteps and the sound of something being dragged. All coming closer. Just as a bit of white t-shirt peeked around the corner I swung the end of the umbrella in a sharp rap shot, hoping to hit in the head or throat area. I didn’t wait to see what I was hitting. That’s how you end up like Joe.

There was a sharp crack as my umbrella connected with someone’s head, and then a whole lot of cursing as whoever I had hit dropped whatever they were dragging and jumped back around the corner.

“Fuck! What did you do that for?’



For those of you lucky enough not to know, zombies seldom, if ever, speak in complete sentences. Usually it’s only one or two words like ‘Brains!’ or ‘No brains?’ Happily, this sentence eliminated the possibility that it was a zombie, but not that they deserved the head trauma.



“Where’s Joe? What the hell’s going on here?”



“Dammit! That really hurt, bitch! What the hell?”



“It was meant to hurt. And don’t change the subject. Come out here where I can see you. If I have to come to you, I’m going to be pissed.”

The white thing turned out to be a small woman dressed all in what was once a white dress, but was now smeared in what had to be blood and Goddess knows what else. At least I think it was a woman. The hair was gray and short, the skin brown and wrinkled, the head bleeding red, the expression annoyed, but not surprised, and the whole about five foot two and maybe one hundred pounds soaking wet.



“I think I’m going to need stitches!” A small brown hand was pressed into a wound on her forehead.



“Great. Then we should probably speed this up.” I waved my umbrella for emphasis. “First: What the hell is in the fountain? Second: Where is Joe and maybe Bruce? Third, and this one is important and your answer could result in me letting you get stitches or leaving you here with something a little more serious than that: Where is my FUCKING PIZZA!”



A slightly clever look took up residence in the wrinkled brown face. I probably should have worried about that more than I did at the time. “First: Plutonium and hemlock. Second: Joe is on the floor behind me. I don’t know any Bruce. Third, and I will answer you the same way you asked: NO PIZZA! And you should probably look behind you.”



Oh, crap.