the hearse started away from the curb just as the corpse came screaming out of the mausoleum. The cadaver sped after the car, but couldn’t catch up; ahead, the road was clear.
Gary looked over at the corpses assembled by the hill. Even as he watched, they knelt; he shifted his gaze to the top of the slope.
A lone figure stood there, arms upraised, beside the cross; even at that distance, heGary could tell the figure was very large, almost a giant. It turned toward the cross, set its shoulder against it and pushed; the cross went over, and the figure set its foot upon it, lifting a single defiant fist skyward. As if in approval, the assembled corpses cried out in a deafening chorus. Gary clapped his hands over his ears, turning.
Ahead, two corpses were rushing up the road, directly toward the hearse. Max plowed right into them, the Caddy’s massive bulk tossing them like ragdolls. Sailing straight back, one landed in the car’s path yet again. It sprang up, and tried to jump onto the hood as the hearse closed in; but the front end struck it before it could clear the grille. It flew head over heels high into the air, clipping the roof, rolling over the trunk to the road.
Max swerved around a tree-lined left-hand jog. The cemetery’s southern gate appeared. It was shut, a pair of bodies impaled on the spikes at its top, five corpses standing before it.
Max floored the gas pedal, ramming three of them at seventy miles an hour, smashing them back against the gate; a chain snapped, and it swung wide. The Caddy roared through the arch before the other corpses could grab it. Max steered wildly to the right, skidding onto the street beyond the wall, then raced forward, leaving River Rest Cemetery far behind.
Chapter 11: Pluralism
They arrived at the house to find Buddy’s car sitting out front, and Buddy and company waiting in the living room. That came as no surprise- Max had given Dennis a set of keys before the funeral.
But Gary hadn’t been expecting to see Father Chuck, Mr. and Mrs. MacAleer, and their son Jamie. The priest had wound up in Buddy’s car during the panic; the MacAleers had been unable to reach their house on the south side of town, and hadn’t known where else to go. The center of Bayside Point had been overrun.
“Corpses must’ve come from those emergency morgues,” Max said. “And the old graveyards.”
Dennis was looking through the picture window at the hearse. “How’d you get that bullet-hole in the windshield?” he asked Gary.
“There were some River Rest escapees on the Squankum Bridge,” Gary answered. “A police car was stopped on the divider, and the cops were blasting away at them.”
“They shot at you deliberately?”
“Slug came through one of the corpses. Made a hole the size of your hand in its back. Just missed me. Sprayed glass all over the front seat.”
“One of the cops had a riot gun, for Christ’s sake,” Steve put in. “Didn’t slow those fucking things up at all.”
“Should’ve aimed at their legs,” Max said. “Can’t walk without kneecaps, even if you are a zombie.”
“You said the downtown was burning?” Father Chuck asked.
“Sure looked like it from the bridge,” Gary said.
“They had Molotov cocktails,” said Mr. MacAleer. “That’s what they hit our car with.”
“I think we should go down into the bomb shelter,” Aunt Lucy said.
“Just what I was about to suggest,” Max said. “But a couple of us had better stay up here to keep watch. There’ll probably be some troops through here soon. We’ll want to go with them.”
“Why wait?” Uncle Buddy said. “I say we should get off this damn peninsula right now. We’re going to be fucking trapped here.”
“We’re already trapped here,” Max said. “We want to link up with some heavy ordnance before we do any travelling.”
“
“If we had some grenade launchers and an APC, I might agree with you,” Max said. “We don’t. Didn’t you hear what we said about those cops on the bridge?”
“We can shoot ‘em in the knees,” Buddy answered. “You said so yourself.”
“You gotta shoot ‘em in the head,” his son Dave added. “That’s the only way to kill zombies. Any idiot knows that.”
Buddy shot him a ferocious glare.
“We don’t want to tangle with them at all,” Gary said.
“Fucking A,” Max added. “And there’s no way we can get off the peninsula
“I wasn’t talking about going that way,” Buddy said. “We already tried Rt. 35. They had it blocked. That’s why we headed down here.”
“Well then, there’s the Route 88 Bridge, the one over the canal. But there’s another big graveyard out that way.”
“Me and Lucy already reminded him,” Dennis said.
“And I shouldn’t have listened to you,” Buddy answered. “Maybe they’re not waking up there.”
“And maybe they are,” Lucy said.
“You’d have to be out of your mind to try it,” Max went on. “So what does that leave? The Route 33 bridge, down at the bottom of the peninsula. But you’d have to go through the southern part of town. And as we know from the MacAleers, that area’s crawling with them. So why don’t we just go down in the shelter and listen to the radio? Maybe things’ll blow over somehow. Maybe the Air Force’ll napalm the whole goddamn town. We’d come through that just fine.”
“You have it all figured out, don’t you, wise-ass?” Buddy grated.
“A lot better than you do,” Max said.
“He does, Buddy, he really does,” Aunt Lucy said. “Let’s get down in the shelter now.”
“That’s it, Lucy,” Buddy snarled. “Side with the son of a bitch. Stab me in the back.”
“Come on Dad,” Dave said. “Don’t be such an asshole.”
At that, Uncle Buddy turned and cocked his fist back. “I’ll punch your lights out, you little bastard.”
“Please, please,” Father Chuck said, “For God’s sake, let’s try to keep ourselves under control.”
“Who’s not under control, faggot?” Buddy demanded.
“Listen, Buddy,” Dennis said. “This isn’t doing anyone any good, and you know it.”
Buddy glowered at him, simmering.
“I’m so scared, Buddy,” Lucy said. “
“All right,” Buddy said at last. “But if college boy there is wrong…”
Max just smirked at him, then looked at the others. “Anyone willing to stay up here with me? I might need some backup if we get visitors.”
“I’ll stay,” Dennis said.
“Dennis, no,” Camille said.
“You know I’m pretty handy with a shotgun, Camille,” he answered. “None of those things is going to get near me.”
He and Max went over to the couch, took up the Remingtons and bandoliers of cartridges.
“Bring the other guns and ammo back downstairs,” Max told the others. “Leave the shelter door open, but close it up tight if I tell you to.”
“What if we hear gunfire?” Gary asked, picking up a Heckler and Koch.
“Just wait till I yell, okay?”
“What if you want to get in after we lock up?”
“I’ll tap three times quick.”
