Gray plastic bins flew through the air as the knuckle-dragging mutants bottlenecked at the metal detectors, dragging the black vinyl straps and weighted metal stanchions like a zombie chain gang.
“Rice!” Zack shook his best friend as hard as he could.
Suddenly, Rice’s eyes popped open. “Gotcha!” He smiled, jumped up, and dusted himself off, slinging his pack over one shoulder.
“Dude! You really need to stop doing that!” Zack yelled as they dashed for the boarding gates.
A short way down the wide, endless corridor, an abandoned golf cart was parked in front of a BurgerDog X-press. The boys hopped in, and Zack sat behind the wheel.
“Thanks for saving me back there, man,” said Rice.
“Sorry it wasn’t Ozzie,” Zack replied sarcastically.
“What’s your problem?” Rice asked.
Zack sighed. “You know, it’s just, like, you’re my best friend and stuff, and then Ozzie shows up and it’s, like…” Zack couldn’t bring himself to tell Rice about his sickening fear of dropping to number two on his best friend’s speed dial.
All of a sudden, a huge pack of googly-eyed ghouls thrashed out of a bookstore, sending the twirly racks of postcards and bestsellers crashing to the slime-spackled linoleum. “Umm, Zack?” Rice interrupted. “Can we maybe talk about this later?” He pointed at the staggering green-eyed monsters.
Zack pressed the GO pedal, and the cart took off under the BurgerDog GRAND OPENING banner that hung across the high ceiling. They zoomed through the terminal, toward the distant boarding gates and away from the gathering zombie swarm.
A few minutes later, they hopped off the cart and stared out the giant windows overlooking the runway. “Where are they?” Rice asked.
“I don’t know, but they better get here soon,” said Zack, looking back the way they came.
The zombies were marching up the shiny metal corridor, their jaw muscles tightening and flexing. Their veiny necks flared with pulsing blood vessels and tendons, and their mucus-fed throats expanded and contracted with regurgitated phlegm. They waggled their arms like a parade of sleepwalkers, and from a distance, it seemed that all they really wanted were hugs.
Then, through the window, Zack saw the hot blast of a jet engine, and a commercial airliner pulled into view. Ozzie saluted from the cockpit. Zoe and Twinkles sat in the copilot’s seat. She waved “hello” to the boys with the puppy’s paw.
“Quick!” Rice raced over and opened the door to the boarding tunnel.
Zack dashed for the open entrance, looking over his shoulder at the dense mass of snargling fiends behind them.
“Wait!” Rice screamed.
But it was too late.
There was no boarding tunnel, and Zack was already treading air like Wile E. Coyote off the edge of a cliff. He hovered for a moment and then fell between the terminal and the airplane. He caught the edge of the doorframe, swinging one-handed by his fingertips. A curious bunch of gnarly-eyed traffic controller zombies gathered below, gazing up with tongues wagging. Zack dangled above his doom: a fifteen-foot free fall into the waiting throng of brain-craving mutants.
“Zack, gimme your other hand!”
“I can’t!” Zack cried, barely holding on.
Rice’s eyes burned dark with supreme confidence. “Yes,” he said, “you can!”
Zack flung his free hand up, and Rice snagged his buddy’s wrist, pulling him up from certain death. Zack scrambled back up to the boarding area.
“Thanks, Rice,” Zack huffed as Rice helped him to his feet. “Sorry about…you know.”
“It’s cool.” Zack and Rice clasped each other’s thumbs as if they were about to arm wrestle and hugged it out, patting each other firmly on the back.
But the tender moment was interrupted as Zack caught sight of the herd of gruesome zombie brutes getting even closer, growling and gnashing what remained of their teeth.
Snap! Snap!
“Grahrlgh!”
The zombified airport personnel waddled into the waiting area.
“That way!” Rice pointed across the boarding gate to a staircase. The boys raced away from the zombies and descended under a sign with arrows pointing the way: 
GROUND TRANSPORTATION/ BAGGAGE CLAIM.
The zombies chased clumsily after Zack and Rice, tumbling undead-over-heels down the flight of steps. The boys took off running through the lower level as the ghouls toppled into a hideous pile of snapped bones and decomposing skin behind them.
Straight ahead, the baggage carousel rotated cheerfully with a single unclaimed suitcase taking a ride on the merry-go-round.
Zack and Rice hopped on and squatted down, riding through the black curtains of the restricted area. Outside, they jumped off the carousel and dashed into the bright mid-morning sun.
Looking back, they saw the blurry figures of zombies staggering across the runway, wavering like a mirage in the gas fumes of the jet and the desert heat radiating off the asphalt.
Straight ahead, a staircase lowered from the front side of the airplane. Zack and Rice climbed aboard. The staircase rose, and the hatch shut.
The boys collapsed into the safety of first-class air travel.
Zoe stood over her brother and his best friend. She looked almost happy to see them. “Good job, geekazoids,” she said.
Zack and Rice panted, exhausted, and Twinkles licked the sweat off of Zack’s forearm.
Ozzie poked his head out of the cockpit. “Welcome aboard, fellas!” He was wearing big sunglasses and a headset with a microphone and an antenna. “Couldn’t tell if you were gonna make it back there.” He chuckled.
“Close call,” Zack panted.
Ozzie flicked some switches and shifted the throttle. “Grab a seat, guys. We’re ready for takeoff.”
And with that, the jumbo jet started to rumble.