Unsheathing My Nozzle I Sprayed Flame into the Night
Albuquerque, New Mexico - Monday Night 11:58PM
Sunset Memorial Park
A spindly little bush was tickling my ass. I grunted and swatted at my lower back. I was squatting in the bushes outside the cemetery with a rather flatulent Hit Man. When in doubt on where to look for zombies try a cemetery. So between indulging in Mexican food and the spiciest barbeque in town I was tromping along side the Hit Man, flame throwers hidden underneath trench coats, stifling in the high desert heat, through the back alleys of Albuquerque seeking the undead. Sadly for me, this last adventure found me parked behind the flaming ass of my companion. I was fucking dying here.
The Hit Man, Boneless Frank and I had been in New Mexico since late Saturday and we had yet to see one freaking zombie.
Nada
Zilch
Big giant goose eggs
I was beginning to think this whole Weekly World News Report was a hoax. In fact the only thing we had managed to run afoul of was a small Tea Party Rally. Unfortunately, for them, Tea Party members bear a more than passing resemblance to the undead - dead, vacant eyes, drool dripping down their chins and arms waving about as if negotiating a simple city sidewalk was too much effort. Several of them nearly were fried by my trigger happy companion who saw no moral conflict between toasting a zombie and toasting a member of the Tea Party. They were both the undead and the spawn of Satan as far as he was concerned. Forget that he didn’t believe in Satan. That was beside the point.
“How much longer do you intend to keep us camped here Whistling Pete?” I asked the Hit Man.
“Frank are you picking up on anything?” The Hit Man asked.
“The area is clear,” Boneless Frank’s voice came through so clear it was like he was standing next to us. Being the brave soul that he is he had been encamped in our hotel room since Saturday night. He hadn’t even left the room to get something to eat, preferring expensive room service or the snacks in the honor bar to a proper meal. Socrates, who processed our expense reports, was going to piss his tunic.
But, having good onsite tech support is a necessity. Many a field mission had gone awry because someone wasn’t sitting back in a hotel room in his underpants or in an unmarked van somewhere. The expense was worth it. Besides Boneless Frank had Ms. Pac Man and Bubble Island on one of his laptops and I always enjoyed unwinding with a little gaming before going to sleep.
“In fact the whole town is clear.”
“I thought this was going to be a big waste of time,” The Hit Man said. “I sure wished you’d let me fry those tea baggers we ran into at Barbeque Bill’s this afternoon.”
“I am calling in this in to Denver,” said Boneless Frank.
“Let’s pack it up.”
No one needed to tell me twice. I jumped up and started running toward the car.
I tripped over a depression in the ground and went sprawling ass over tea kettle.
“Fuck! Owww!”
I sat up and massaged my sore ankle. The Hit Man was yelling at the top of his lungs and running toward me at top speed.
“Ooh Rah! Motherfuckaahhhhs”
He had pulled his flame thrower nozzle out of its holder and was pointing it directly over my head. My heart leapt into my throat and was beating like a frightened cat tied in a burlap sack about to be tossed in the river. Unable to scramble to my feet - mostly because I was afraid that the Hit Man would blast me with his flame thrower - I scampered on all floors into a coarse bush. I peer out in time to see the Hit Man blast our car with fire.
The car went up in flames. The bright orange flame ball hurt my eyes. I looked away.
An explosion
A metal chunk - I assumed what was left of a bumper or a door flew past me.
“What the hell!” I shouted at him. “That was a rental.”
“Damn I missed.”
Missed what? I didn’t have a good feeling about this. Boneless Frank’s voice sounded worried in my ear.
“What’s going on?”
“Our rental car exploded,” I explained with what I hoped was a nonchalant voice.
“You got the insurance, right?” asked Boneless Frank.
I had, but I am not sure it covered blowing it up with a flame thrower, at least not if the knuckleheads who rented it were the ones who blew it up.
“Get off your ass,” The Hit Man shouted. “This place is crawling with zombies.”
“You’re finally losing it,” I said as I extricated my broken down ass from the coarse bush I had been hiding in. “We haven’t seen one…
I stopped cold. We were surrounded by a limping drooling herd of the undead. The biggest herd I had seen in North America. Most of them appeared to be fairly fresh. Their undead flesh was translucent and waxy. Somewhere in town there was a funeral home or morgue missing a few bodies.
“Where the hell did these come from?”
“How should I know?” The Hit Man started blasting. “But, we found the mother lode. Start barbequing these bastards.”
I unsheathed my nozzle and started spraying flame into the night.