My family and I just went on the most amazing road trip of all time! Dad said we would follow historic Route 66 all the way to Los Angeles. I’d never been to the West Coast before, so I was really excited!

~ Chicago ~

We packed up the van with all our stuff and our dog, Sparky. Mom and Dad planned to leave Sparky with our friend Mrs. Palmer, but when we got to her house, we noticed something really strange.

The Palmers’ door was unlocked, and a light was flickering on and off in the living room. The Palmers’ cat was dead, lying in a pool of blood — but that wasn’t the worst part. Mrs. Palmer raced into the living room and lunged at us! There was something wrong with her face. It was all gray, and half of her cheek was falling down. Dad knocked her back, and we all ran out to the van.

As Dad started the engine, we saw that the whole neighborhood was just like Mrs. Palmer, and they were all rushing toward us. Dad hit the gas hard, and I heard him say a bad word. Then we were racing off at top speed!  (I think we might have knocked down one or two of Mrs. Palmer’s neighbors with our van along the way.)

~ St. Louis ~

I met my new friend Timmy in St. Louis, while we were checking out the Gateway Arch. It looked really cool, and we wanted to take more photos, but the sick, gray people kept getting in the way.

Mom says they’re called zombies and, once they get the zombie sickness, they’re not actually people anymore. That’s why it was okay to break into the gun store and get guns and ammunition to shoot the zombies when they tried to get us. Anyway, Timmy had gone through some really tough times. His mom and dad had turned into zombies, so he had to run away. We decided he could come with us to L.A.

~ Amarillo ~

After driving for a long time and having to shoot some zombies when we stopped for gas in Tulsa, we made it to Texas. There’s a big Cadillac ranch in Amarillo, where the cars all stick out of the ground, and Mom and Dad wanted to stretch their legs, so we decided to visit.

That turned out to be a bad idea — the place was full of zombies! Mom and Dad ran out of bullets, and we had to fight them with Dad’s golf clubs. We almost got away, but one of them got Timmy. I tried to help, but I couldn’t. I miss Timmy.

~ Albuquerque ~

The further we drove, the more zombies we came across. Plus, there were thick green clouds in the air. I thought we would never see real people again! When we got to Albuquerque, though, we found a whole bunch of people that were happy we weren’t zombies either!

One of them was Emily. She was really pretty, except for a bite mark on her arm. We talked a lot while our families ate dinner together. I thought that Albuquerque would be the best place ever, but then Emily’s eyes turned milky white and she started snarling and biting at me, so we had to hit the road again.

~ Flagstaff ~

We were all pretty tired by the time we got to Flagstaff. To make things worse, our van was breaking down. Mom and Dad said we had a lot of desert ahead of us, and the zombies were getting worse than ever, so we needed a new ride. Luckily, after looking high and low, we found the best ride ever — an armored school bus! I decided to call it the Executor.

~ L.A. ~

After scavenging for more food and bullets in Kingman and Barstow — and fighting off more zombies — we finally made it to L.A.! All I can say is, “Wow!” I’d never seen the ocean before, and it’s really amazing. It’s so blue — well, aside from the part that we made red with zombie blood. But the rest of it is all blue, like, forever.

We met up with other survivors, like Tom, who’s teaching us how to make bullets. In between learning survival skills, I’m enjoying the rest of my summer break, relaxing on the beach. Plus, we had such a crazy adventure getting here that I’ve decided to make a game out of it...

~ About Hit Z Road ~

In Hit Z Road, the competitive zombie survival game by Martin Wallace, you and your friends race to reach the West Coast alive.  It’s everyone for themselves as players bid each round to determine the order in which they choose a path through adventure cards of increasing difficulty, while also managing resources — adrenaline, ammunition, and gas — to overcome the challenges ahead. In the end, you don’t have to be faster than the zombies — you just have to be faster than your friends!