tried to talk him out of the room when he heard a car in the parking lot, he went over to see and saw Amelia and Diane go into the lobby, before the woman banged on the door really hard with her hands, but the door did not give in. Then she told him it was just as well she would just save him for ‘later’ when she was hungry. Cory then hid in the closet again and when he heard the fight down the hall he opened the door to get help, when the zombies did not come out of the room he sneaked up really quietly to peek in side, where he got hit with the fire poker. Cory was from a small mountain town called ‘Eagle’ which Amelia recalled had gained some notoriety for a criminal case against a basketball star years before. He was very much alone in town and there was no question that he would be coming with them when they left.
“Cory do you have a radio?” Diane asked, breaking her silence after Amelia was done getting Cory’s story.
“No. Not really. I have an i-pod though, it has a radio.” he responded.
Diane sighed, as if knowing she got the right answer to the wrong question, “Hey buddy, would it be okay if Amelia tried to listen to your i-pod radio for a minute?”
“Sure.” Cory hopped off the bed and rummaged around in his suit case, half of which appeared to be full of toys, eventually he came up with the popular white music player, which he handed to Amelia, saying, “You turn it on here, and this, I think this is how you get to the radio, I never use it, so I don’t know.” As he spoke he pressed a series of buttons until Amelia, who had one earplug in could hear the static of the FM band.
“Thanks Cory, I got it from here.” Smiling, she thought of her i-pod which she had left sitting at home on her dresser. Kids.
Chapter 40
“Alright Fred, Bobby it is time to go find a DSD and Gameboy at the store, if you guys are ready.” said Jimbo.
“It is a ‘PSP’, not ‘DSD!’” cried Bobby, “I keep telling you!”
“Whatever, get your hiney moving out before I change your mind.” laughing Jimbo was amused that being a kid was the same whether you were a zombie kid or a living human, how would Bobby ‘grow up’? “C’mon Fred lets go, there is smoke over that way, that means activity and probably human activity, so we can eat along the way.”
The trio set off towards the smoke and soon enough they spotted a gang of zombies stopped in the front yard gnawing on a couple of bodies. Jimbo stopped when he saw them and hissed at Fred, “It is her Fred! It is Nancy and that gang of girls she has! Can you get her from here? And stop her? Like we practiced?”
Fred stopped, crouched down and concentrated on the group. “There is something Jim, something, but it is like she is strong or something, I feel she belongs to me, like a daughter or something, kind of like you only stronger, but man Jim she is strong. I..I think she notices me trying too.” Sure enough one of the women stood up and glanced in their direction. She stood up and it was like Jimbo could see the strings pulling the other girls up and into formation behind her. They all looked around warily and then Nancy started coming tentatively in their direction. Jimbo sent Bobby off to hide in some bushes to the side, thinking the boy was probably not strong enough to be of much use mentally or physically. Nancy looked huge, her size was the same, but it was like she was ready to burst out of her body. The girls behind her looked the same and Jimbo knew if it came to a fight that they were probably out matched. Mentally he felt Nancy’s icy grip straining at his mind, he resisted and he could hold her of, but just barely, the fight that took place in his head at that instant left him as tired as if he had been running all day long. Jimbo staggered to his knees as Nancy walked up to them.
“Jimbo, Jimbo, Jimbo, you dirty little fuck. After all I did for you? And this is how you repay me? By nurturing Fred back to health?” turning towards Fred she said, “Hello daddy! It is so bad to meet you at last! I was hoping you would be much less challenging. Oh I feel you, you dirty little slobberer! Get. Out. Of. My. Head!” Nancy then screamed as Jimbo yelled, “Yes Fred, get her Fred!”
While Nancy was fighting for her mind with Jimbo she had scant mental ability left to direct her girls to attack Fred, ‘Screw that fuck Jimbo, get this maniac off me!’ she screamed to the girls. The girls were not affected by Fred, as he was concentrating fully on Nancy and winning too, until the girls jumped him.
Jimbo leaped on one of the girl’s backs, bringing her to the pavement, but not taking her out of the fight completely, he assaulted another girl mentally, although he was technically her ‘sibling’, both of them having been created by Nancy, he employed the techniques he had originally used on Fred, getting his mind around and through the cracks of the girl’s mental armor in about half a minute. Her shields were surprisingly good, then again it was obvious she had been building herself up to repel Nancy. Jimbo stopped the girl, Julie in her tracks mentally, though the effort at slowing the girl, Trish, whom he was fighting and stopping Julie cold left Jimbo physically and mentally exhausted. Fred was having his own problems and in virtually the same boat as Jimbo, one opponent he had to hold off mentally, the other was getting ready to hack him apart physically. Jimbo wrapped his arms around Trish and held her down on the ground, pinning her. It was all he could do to keep both girls pinned and hope, beyond hope that Fred would win the battle.
As he lay there holding the girl down Jimbo contemplated bringing Bobby up behind Nancy, the problem was Bobby was weak, probably not strong enough to kill a zombie even if he had the jump on one and definitely not strong enough to take out a zombie as tough as Nancy, his use would be only as a distraction and he knew Fred had to have contemplated the same strategy and discarded it as well. Bobby remained hidden in the bushes, while Jimbo watched the melee and mental combat between Fred, Nancy and Veronica.
In the melee that followed Jimbo could barely follow what was happening. Veronica jumped Fred, but he sidestepped and ducked, throwing her off with apparent ease, only then a large rent appeared in his shirt, as if by magic and Jimbo realized Veronica had made the jump look easily blockable so she could slice Fred as she was ‘thrown off’, Fred staggered, prompting Veronica to roll towards him and swing the blade she had up towards his groin. Only Fred’s ploy was a feint too, instead of being down in easy slicing distance he lashed out with his foot kicking Veronica in her unprotected head, a blow that would probably have knocked a normal human back dazed or perhaps even unconscious.
Veronica rolled away and regained her feet, Fred did not follow up on his advantage and Jimbo could see/feel with his mind that Fred was still pressing his advantage on Nancy, trying to deliver a mental knock out punch so he could deal with her girls afterwards.
Jimbo realized this was a mistake, Nancy was pretty well cowed and Fred probably could have kept her incapacitated while he diverted some of his energy to defeating Veronica. Jimbo tried to compensate, but he was having trouble just keeping the two girls he had mentally pinned and physically he could see he was no match for Veronica. Soon enough Veronica was back on top of Fred, sliding to the side at the last minute while striking his leg with her hand, embedding the blade deep in Fred’s thigh. In exchange Fred bitch slapped her so hard that Veronica literally spun a half circle in the air before staggering away from Fred about ten feet. Fred stumbled, unable to follow up on his Herculean blow, this allowed Veronica the time to pull out another long kitchen type knife and run a half circle out around Fred, instead of striking at Fred Veronica feinted towards him and then did a flying leap at Jimbo! Jimbo tried to shift Trish in front of him but Trish moved at just the right time and Veronica ended up stabbing through Jimbo’s chest, through his shoulder blade and into the lawn beneath him!
Howling like a banshee Jimbo tried to keep his mental and physical grips on the girls, but he could not. Veronica joined the fight to free the girls from Jimbo’s mental hold, she must have sensed Fred was busy dealing with Nancy. This was a terrible risk for her to take, it left her wide open to Fred, however he was too busy trying to break Nancy to thrust in Veronica’s direction and as a result Jimbo was walled off from the girls. He knew he could regain control, he was more powerful than any of the three girls, in fact more powerful mentally than any two of them, maybe against all three with the tricks he know, however against all three it would take a little time. The girls, it seemed, were not going to give him even a little time. Leaving him pinned to the ground, watched over by Trish, Veronica and Julie leaped at Jimbo. Veronica pulled yet another kitchen knife from her clothing, whereas Julie just leaped at Fred. He almost ducked her, but in the end her hand latched on to his shoulder and spun him around, presenting his back as a perfect target for Veronica’s knife. She angled the sideways into the top of his spine, almost at the neck. With his spinal cord severed Fred toppled over and both girls jumped on top of his body
