Rotting to the Core (Keep Your Crowbar Handy Book 2) by S.P. Durnin

brown
carpet of dead needles, the engine noise from the approaching
vehicle continued to grow, and Jake frowned.
    “Whoever it is, they don't seem too concerned
with keeping quiet,” he mused, eyes searching the block to the high
school's west side.
    Kat nodded. “I know right? What's that about?
You'd think anyone who's survived this long would have enough sense
to keep a low profile, wouldn't you? I mean: make tons of noise,
attract tons of zombies... It's not rocket science, for heaven’s
sake.”
    Jake nodded noncommittally.
    Finishing up with her suppressor, Kat ran a
hand through her short, blue hair. “I mean, I know this is
small-town Ohio and all, but it takes some true genius to motor
about in something that loud, then wonder why every maggot-head in
the area follows you around.”
    O'Connor snorted. “Says the crazy-person who
insists on riding around with yours truly in a Humvee, that's not
exactly stealthy in any sense of the word, with a giant smile
painted on its crash-plate in the middle of the zombie
apocalypse.”
    Cho raised an eyebrow. “That's different, and
you know it. We use the Hummer to scout out routes for the Mimi,
not to take joyrides. Whoever that is, is puttering all over and
just attracting attention.”
    Jake had to concede her that point. Their
group had been trapped in his landlord's warehouse property for
over a month back in Columbus when the dead had first begun to
rise, and would never even have attempted the trek south if not for
George Foster's monstrous transport.
    When the gray-haired, ex-navy chief turned
Fixer first trooped their party down into the motor pool, hidden
under the government safe-house connected to the apartment tenement
he'd owned and operated, all of their jaws had nearly hit the
floor. The Mimi was a vehicle unlike anything the survivors had
seen. First of all, it was segmented, like a trio of subway cars,
and longer than one of those intimidating, double-trailer,
eighteen-wheeler trucks. Second, the nose tapered back from a
narrow, vertical, eight foot tall wedge that protruded from the
front (almost like a snowplow blade), and met seamlessly with the
first segment just before the vehicle's lead wheels. It hadn't been
difficult for them to imagine how easily it would push, or even
just ram right through, mangled cars that were surely littering the
roadways at that time. Its bottom hull sat a good three feet above
the ground, riding heavy independent axles and gigantic run-flat
tires. None of the segments had shown any obvious access hatches
and there was a 1940's circa, pin-up emblazoned on the side of a
dark-haired girl riding a bomb. Below her, hand painted letters
scrolled out “The Screamin' Mimi.”
    And the whole vehicle was pink.
    Not “kind of” pink, or “slightly pinkish”,
but the most hideous shade of Holy-Fucking-Shit-That-Is-Fucking-Ugly! Pepto-Bismol,
day-glow pink, any of them had ever witnessed.
    “This,” Foster had said proudly, in his
normal, gravely, cigar smoke-tinged growl, “is a MATTOC, a Mobile,
Armored, Troop Transport and Operation Command vehicle. Originally
designed for use in case of widespread riots during the aftermath
of Y2K. Her hull's covered with SEP skin. That's short for
synthesized electron polymer. Impervious to damn near any impact,
short of a nuke. Can't be cut, won't burn, and it's almost
frictionless. Developed initially for the outside of the space
shuttle, but it couldn't be produced in any other color and NASA
didn't want to be known for sending big, pink peckers into space.
Never mind that without all the wind drag, they coulda launched
missions using only an eighth of the fuel it normally takes to
achieve orbit. Pretty dumb for a bunch of eggheads, if you ask
me.”
    The survivors (Jake included) had been a bit
leery about betting their lives on Foster's bubblegum behemoth at
first but, given that other options were a bit thin on the ground
just then, had decided to take the risk. So they'd trained