Fidget Vs. The Zombie Apocalypse: Part 3 (2017)

            Barb sat in the passenger seat of Fidget’s car. Neither of them spoke. Barb stared out the window of the car at the empty sidewalks of the city. Her transparent reflection stared back at her from the glass panel between her and the outside world. The vacant eyes of her translucent self appeared haggard, like a ghost separate from her body. Barb stared through her ghost-self to the city beyond in search of a sign of life. She wanted to believe the zombie outbreak was limited to their school but after everything she had seen she knew that was not possible. Fidget spinners had saturated popular culture. Everyone had one and now, if what she witnessed in the classroom happened everywhere, fidget spinners had turned them all into mindless zombies.

No matter how much she tried Barb could not avoid the gaze of her reflection. The blood stains on her skin and clothes reminded her of what she had done to her classmates. Even though it was in self-defense she could not forget their faces as she bludgeoned them with a baseball bat. A tear rolled down Barb’s cheek, wetting the dried blood crusted there. She wanted to go back to yesterday when life was simpler, when she was just a nobody. At least in anonymity she was not required to be a hero. A hero was just somebody that got other people killed, leaving them alive to deal with the fallout. She looked over at Fidget, his eyes burned with a hellish intensity as they barreled down the road. They had not spoken for what felt like hours, even though it had just been a few minutes. She knew she could trust him but the image of him hacking Brett to pieces was burned into her memory. She turned back to the company of her reflection and their desolate surroundings without a word. If she was honest with herself, she was scared of what Joss had become too.

            Joss stared out the blood-smeared windshield of his car. The engine rumbled as they rolled through the deserted streets. His heart raced as adrenaline pumped through his veins like fire. The spinner in his pocket lay dormant but he was still alert. He needed to discover the source of this zombie outbreak. He needed to fix it before it got worse. For the first time in his life he was a hero. It felt different than he imagined, though. Joss thought being a hero meant being in control. The feeling in the pit of his stomach was anything but the cool composure of the protagonists in action movies. If anything, Joss felt discombobulated. He had never felt so out of control in his life. He looked over at Barb. She had not looked at him since they got in the car. He knew she was afraid of him because of what he had done back at the school. Something came over him in the heat of the moment and he lost control. There had been no time to think. He just acted. But now, after it was all said and done, he did not enjoy reflecting on it. As he tried to push the thoughts from his mind the spinner in his pocket burned against his leg. Joss could see the skull’s eyes on the spinner glow in his mind’s eye. It felt like they were peering into his soul. Joss tried to distract himself by looking out at the city around him but nothing could take his mind from the mysterious object in his pocket.

Joss sped through a red light and veered around a corner. A pack of zombies stumbling out of a convenient store greeted them by running into the intersection. Their eyes were glazed over and blood dripped down their faces. They looked more like zombies than the students at the school. Some form of accelerated cell deterioration must have taken effect in the hours since everyone had changed. Despite this, Joss could see they were just kids, some punks skipping school downtown. They ran at the car, feral in their intensity.

            Joss did not slow down. He refused to allow himself to think. He needed to act. They were not kids. Not anymore. They were monsters. Joss pressed the gas pedal into the floor and barreled through the zombies. They scattered like bowling pins, limbs and blood flew in every direction. Joss engaged the windshield wipers in silence. The blades swiped at the blood on the windshield and only succeeded in smearing it enough so the road was visible enough to continue driving.

Joss’s mind kicked on again as anxiety gripped him. The zombies had stared directly at him before he drove through them. They seemed to be looking for him and Joss wondered what impulse would drive the creatures to seek him out. He needed answers and he knew just the person who could provide them.

            More zombies began to pour into the streets from shops and business buildings, spinners in hand. Joss did his best to avoid them but sometimes careening into a pack of them was inevitable. Stomach acid rose in Joss’s throat as the windshield wipers struggled against layers of blood and brain matter. He could barely see through the front window. He rolled down his window and stuck his head out to see more clearly and veered right at an intersection into a neighborhood. The smell of blood and guts baking from the heat of the engine made Joss want to vomit but he willed himself to keep driving.

“Where are you taking us?” Barb asked, finally breaking her silence.

“My dad’s place,” Joss replied, continuing to lean out of the car window while veering through the quiet, neighborhood streets.

“How do you know he’s not a…ya’ know….” Barb hesitated. Despite everything she had been through it still felt ridiculous to admit they were in the midst of a zombie apocalypse triggered by fidget spinners.

“Trust me,” Joss said, “he’s not one of them.”

            Joss took a moment to glance over at Barb. She was watching him from the passenger seat. Behind her glasses he could see that despite her better judgment, she trusted him. Joss smiled and returned to driving.

            Barb relaxed a little. Joss seemed to liven up now that he had a plan. His eyes cooled and looked welcoming when he smiled at her. He looked like a friend. She smiled back and watched the houses pass by through the blood-smeared windows of the car. She lived in this neighborhood. It was funny to her that she and Joss lived so close to each other but never knew it. Maybe if they had spent more time outside they could have been friends. Maybe if she had been brave enough to stand up to Cindy or Brett she would not have felt so alone. All of these thoughts raced through Barb’s mind. The clarity of hindsight filled her with regret. She rolled down the window. The smell of blood mixed with the crisp October air filled her nostrils. It felt nauseating and refreshing at the same time. It distracted her from her thoughts. She breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that most of the zombies would be kids, and therefore would be at the schools, not home in the suburbs. As this thought played through Barb’s mind her comfort suddenly changed to fear as her stomach turned at the thought of what she and Joss would have to do if they encountered any of these children. They were just kids themselves, thrust into horrific circumstances. The kids they would be killing were only victims of their own horrible circumstances. Barb silently thanked her father for not allowing her to buy a fidget spinner while simultaneously cursing herself for what she knew she would have to do. She gripped the baseball bat in her lap as an ear-piercing shriek filled the air.

            Joss and Barb turned to see a middle-aged woman running across her front lawn. She was clad in a bathrobe and slippers with a spinner in her hand. Her dead yellow eyes were locked on Joss. She screeched again and attempted to fling herself through the passenger side window. Joss slammed the brakes and the creature missed the window, bounced off the windshield and slid down the hood of the car. She grabbed at the side of the car but her momentum carried her forward. There was a sound of bones snapping and the zombie’s arm tore itself from her body at the shoulder. The arm hung limply across the hood as the woman collapsed on the ground in front of the car.

            Barb and Joss steadied themselves as they stared through the bloody windshield. They looked at each other, unsure of what just happened. Their hearts raced. Suddenly the zombie sprang to her feet and she threw herself over the hood of the car.

“Drive!” Barb yelled instinctively.

            Joss slammed the gas pedal into the floor and the car rolled forward, knocking the woman back. The creature screamed as it hit the pavement again and the car rolled over it. Barb and Joss could hear the sound of bones crunching as the tires crushed the zombie. Then the car lurched forward and stopped. Joss pressed the gas pedal but was only met with resistance and the sound of gears grinding. He hit the brakes and flicked the keys in the ignition. The car engine died and Joss swung the door open. He shoved his hand in his pocket and wrapped his fingers around the spinner as he stepped out of the car. There was no sign of anyone else in the area as he walked around the front of the car. There was no sign of the zombie. He looked up to see Barb standing on the other side of the car, a bat slung over her shoulder.

“You check out the car. I’ll keep a look out,” Barb said. Joss nodded and crouched down to look under the car.

            As Barb scanned the houses that lined the street she hoped she looked more intimidating than she felt. She white-knuckled the bat in her hand. Every muscle in her body felt tight, like at any moment they would snap from the tension. Silence filled the air until she heard Joss scream. Her muscles immediately sprang into action. She felt as if her body moved on its own, as if some animal instinct that had lain dormant within her was now awakened in this new crisis. Barb rounded the side of the car and found Joss sitting wide-eyed on the pavement. He was staring under the car.

“What happened? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Barb said, readying her bat in case a ghost actually appeared.

            Joss did not respond. He just pointed under the car, trying to catch his breath. Barb got to her knees and followed the direction Joss pointed. Underneath the car she could see the woman. She was still alive, her body jammed into the pipes and gears of the undercarriage. Her upper torso and remaining arm hung from the back axle of the car. She screeched and clawed at the ground in an attempt to drag herself free from the undercarriage of the vehicle. At the sight of Barb she shrieked again and weakly swiped at them with her remaining limb.

“What do we do?” Barb asked.

“I don’t know,” Joss said. “I thought she was dead at first until I got close and she tried to grab me.”

“She looks pretty stuck,” Barb said, examining the guts and body parts wrapped around the underside of Joss’s car. “Can we walk?”

            As if in answer to Barb’s question, a series of shrieks resounded through the neighborhood. The woman under the car screeched again in response. Joss and Barb looked at each other in horror.

“I think we should take the car,” Joss answered.

“Well then let’s get this bitch out from under your car before the entire neighborhood knows we’re here!” Barb said as zombies began to emerge from houses.

“How?” Joss asked, “She isn’t exactly easy to reach.”

“Just use your spinner, blade thing.”

            Joss reluctantly agreed and pulled the spinner from his pocket. If he was being honest he was afraid to use the spinner after what happened at the school. He did not know where it came from and he had a feeling that he was not as in control of it as he thought.

            Joss slid onto his stomach and held the spinner out in front of him. Barb stood over him with her bat as he inched under the car. The underside of the car radiated heat and the pavement was hot to the touch. Joss tried to prevent as much of his skin as possible from scraping against the rough, hot asphalt. He army crawled toward the woman and tried to not think about how claustrophobic the underside of his car was. He could only drag himself backward and forward and could not see what was happening outside. It was just him and the zombie under his car. Joss prayed his fidget spinner would cooperate and he could kill this woman fast.

The zombie shrieked again when she saw Joss crawling toward her. The zombies outside returned the screech. Joss could not see them but their cries echoed underneath the car. They sounded much closer now. Joss wished they would decay faster so they could not move so quickly. He watched the woman in front of him. He was just out of her reach as she clawed at him.

            The skull’s eyes on the spinner glowed as Joss held it toward the zombie. He hoped it would start working soon. When the woman saw the spinner she let out a blood-curdling yell that echoed around the underside of the car. Joss instinctively moved to cover his ears. When the ringing quieted he could hear Barb fighting off the new horde of zombies behind him. He heard the crack of a baseball bat over a zombie’s skull as its body fell. The car dipped under the force of a zombie hitting the hood. Joss was flattened into the pavement by the underside of the car and he dropped his spinner. The woman pulled hard when the car dipped and managed to free herself. Her body ripped and blood spilled everywhere as she flopped to the ground and dragged herself toward Joss, intestines still wrapped around the axle, trailing behind her. Joss panicked and tried to back away but his hand slipped in the pool of blood flowing toward him from the woman. He felt the woman’s cold, dead hand grab his arm and he saw her open mouth moving toward his face. Black ooze dripped out of her mouth and over her blistered gums. Her breath smelled like death. Bile built in Joss’s mouth as he gagged. He tried to pull away but the zombie’s grip was too tight. This housewife had apparently spent her days doing yoga or some other form of exercise before joining the ranks of the undead.

Joss tried to use his other arm to hit the zombie in the head but he could not build up enough force in the claustrophobic space under the car to deter the woman from her next meal. The spinner’s eyes glowed from where it lay on the ground next to Joss. He felt paralyzed with fear. His heart raced. His stomach turned. He could feel sweat pouring down his face from the heat radiating off the car. The woman’s jagged and yellow teeth were inches from him when a steel blade appeared from nowhere and stabbed through the side of her head. Blood and brains flew everywhere and covered Joss’s face. Joss grabbed the spinner as he felt someone grab him by the ankles and pull him from underneath the car. He thought for sure Barb had been overpowered and one of the zombies had turned on the woman for a chance at a meal. He readied himself for a fight. When his face was clear of the car he looked up and saw Barb standing over him. She offered him a hand and helped him to his feet. Joss looked around and saw pieces of zombies scattered across the street.

“What happened?” Joss asked.

“He saved us,” Barb said, pointing to the side of the car.

            Joss looked to see an older man getting to his feet. He was dressed in camouflage and brown combat boots. Every inch of his body was covered from the neck down. He wore a belt lined with knives and guns and had a shotgun strapped to his back. This guy looked like Rambo if he had spent his entire life preparing for a zombie apocalypse. As his eyes adjusted to the light, Joss realized he knew who this man was.

“Hello, son,” the man said.

            The smell of the blood dripping from Joss’s face mixed with the cocktail of adrenaline and anxiety pumping through his veins became too much. Joss wretched and vomited on the asphalt.