Zombies Ever After: Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse, Book 6 (40 page)

ICBM or not, the Secret Service guys had a look about them. He'd
seen it before. Elsa had said it herself.

The honey badgers were up against the wall.

Liam and Victoria managed to get the groggy girl to the top deck.
It felt good to be in the sunlight of the day but tilting his head
upward only reminded him something was heading his way from above the
sprinkle of clouds.

“You think a missile is already on its way?”

“I don't know. What do your books say about this?”
Victoria laughed and then grunted as the girl's feet got caught on
the top step.

“They all say we should be running...”

“But?”

“Well, you and I could jump in the water. Probably escape.
But what about those people in the beds downstairs? They're going to
die if this boat is destroyed.”

Before she could answer, a fifty-foot fast-moving orange racing
boat ripped through the water as it approached from the north. When
it neared the edge of the barge, the pilot decelerated and reversed
the tuned engines expertly, so the long, thin wedge of a boat slid
right up next to bulky freight-hauler. As it settled in the water, a
lithe blonde woman in a tight-fitting black outfit climbed from the
open-topped driver's area near the back onto the deck of her boat and
then hopped to the barge. A menacing-looking drone detached from a
metal frame attached to the back of the boat. It floated up with two
guns that hung out from its lower frame. Unlike the other drones,
this had been painted dark gray and was marked as U.S. Air Force
property.

“Greetings, sports fans,” the woman shouted as she
approached. The gray drone was loud. The four large fan blades cut
the air next to its master. The noise and wind it generated made it
hard to hear. The other drones—the ones that had been down in
the hold—also floated above them, but they were smaller and
quieter than her new guard dog.

“Hello?” he replied.

She tapped something on her hip, and the monster drone backed off.

“Ah, better? We can at least talk for a few moments without
that
thing
bothering us. My name is Elsa.”

“We know! You're nuking us. What could we possibly say to
you?” Victoria yelled, ignoring the fact it had gotten quiet.

Liam used the time to look her over. Her outfit was similar to a
wetsuit but seemed much more flexible. He was almost embarrassed at
the level of detail it revealed of the woman's figure, but he saw it
for what it was: protection against zombies. She wore gloves and
simple boots. There was no skin showing below her head. The skin went
up to her chin—

“Ah, young man. I see you're admiring my...assets, huh?”
She smiled, but her tone made it sound like he was ogling her.

“It's a zombie-proof skin, isn't it?”

“Yes. DARPA has the coolest toys. Somehow, a senator on some
appropriations committee got funding for this getup. He was convinced
a zombie shit-storm was coming, and he wanted his very own suit of
armor so he could survive it. I think he'd watched too many movies.”

She walked absently on the wide decking at the front of the barge,
and Liam couldn't help but notice she was showing herself off as she
moved about.

“He got them to make the damned things! Imagine my surprise
when my team found them. It was part of a whole kit. Some zombie
author made a list of what you'd need to survive, and Senator Doofy
used that list to prepare, right down to a weird pickax he was
going to carry. Naturally, I ensured I got one of the female versions
so I wouldn't look like I had a diaper on under a man's version.”

“How do you—”

“Don't ask, kid. All you need to know is why I'm wearing
this.”

“Um, because you started the Zombie Apocalypse?”
Victoria said with an intentional uptalk.

“Ah, you sound like my daughter,” she motioned to
Debbie, “when she plays her part.”

Liam let go of the girl's hand. She fell to the metal surface, but
he made sure it wasn't far enough to hurt her.

“Your daughter? She mentioned her mother was coming,”
Liam spoke while he took a step away from Debbie.

“Wouldn't you? She's the only good thing left in my world.
She was finally going to have a new father...”

He became distracted by his thoughts. Internally, he tried to
visualize how he could use Debbie as leverage to free himself and the
people on the boat. If he had a gun, he might be able to do it, but
with drones watching his every move that didn't seem likely. He
wasn't even sure what he'd say.

“Guess again,” she shouted. “Why am I wearing
this suit?” Liam could barely hear her now that she'd moved
backward, but her motions were clear. She was waving someone up from
inside the cabin of her racing boat.

“Mom!”

His heart passed on several beats.

Elsa guided Lana up onto the deck of her boat, then indicated she
should stand there. She looked tired and bruised—her hair had
been shaved from a chunk of the left side of her head. What was left
on that side barely reached her ear.

“Don't you move,” Elsa said to him. Victoria had also
taken a few steps forward. “I have another surprise,” she
said with a cackle.

The next person to come out of the cabin made Liam's blood flow
backward.

“Dad?”

2

The shock of seeing his dad lasted only long enough for his heart
to restart. He ran the final few yards to the edge of the barge and
threatened to jump onto the flat top-deck of the cigarette boat. His
mom was zip-tied and had a gag in her mouth. Her eyes were
sad—focused on him.

His dad—

“Liam Peters. I'm pleased to re-acquaint you with your late
father. I had some trouble finding him. He was buried, don't ya
know?” Her laugh was malicious.

His dad was a zombie. The creature—he willed himself to see
it as something other than the man who was once his father—was
attached to a loop at the end of a metal bar held by another man
dressed in the funky skin. The zombie stumbled as the man pushed him
onto the deck. It saw Lana and tried to lean toward her, though the
man kept it in check.

“What are you doing?” he shouted. “You dug up my
dad?” he said with a frantic voice.

Victoria held firm to his arm, but she emitted a shriek, like she
was fighting back the horror.

“Liam, there's something you should know about me. I'm a
"just do it" girl. I never quit. I never roll over. I never
lose my focus. Once you killed my lover, the gloves came off.”

He'd been there when her fiancé died, but he didn't kill him. A
point she probably already knew, since she'd watched it with drones.

“I've followed you. Your family. Your friends. I've been
trying to get you all in one place, so I could have the pleasure of
killing them all in front of your Grandma, but I've got to hand it to
you people. You are hard to catch. Those three black girls you had
with you in the mine? Where did they go?”

He stood, stone-faced, while looking at his parents. Even if he
knew where the strange girls had gone, he'd resist telling her.

“It doesn't matter. You left some people in your MRAP—Hayes'
MRAP—down in Busch Stadium. Didn't you? I figured it was
abandoned, but my intel says no one went in before it magically drove
away after you were gone. That means someone was still inside.”

Mel and Phil are alive?

“You've been very lucky. Too lucky, I'd say. Is your Grandma
pulling your strings?” she said matter-of-factly. “I
wonder.”

Unwilling to give her the pleasure of seeing his anger, he kept
still.

“I don't care,” she spoke with venom. “Rose is
still AWOL, though we traced her call to you. We'll find her. For
now, I'll settle for them,” she said as she pointed at Mom and
Dad. “The two people you care about more than anyone else in
the world. Plus, Victoria and Marty,” she chuffed. “I've
got you here,” she pointed to Victoria, “and Marty is
with my sleeper agent. She should be here soon enough to see the
fireworks.”

Grandma's alive, too?

It became hard to hold back. He wanted to yell and scream and
rescue Mom, but he didn't know how that could happen. And if Grandma
was around…

He stood there. Emotionless on the surface.

Jerry thrashed against his brace, causing Lana to side-step.

“If you jump, I kill them all,” Elsa said to Lana,
without bothering to look at her.

Lana's eyes re-focused on Liam.

Elsa pointed at Mom. “I found her with no problem. She
followed you to Forest Park. In a tank!” she giggled. “Yeah,
funniest thing. She used that old tank to cross the dead land between
the St. Louis Arch and Forest Park—looking for you. I found her
gawking at the home you blew up, Liam. It was a simple matter of
intercepting her, separating her from her Polar Bear pals, and
stuffing her into this speedboat with her late husband. It's been a
real interesting ride, let me tell you.”

Liam felt heartbroken for his mom. She had started crying, though
she fought it.

His mind was afire with ten different feelings. He'd been
betrayed. Friends were still alive, he thought were dead. Grandma was
alive. Line after line scrolled through his train of thought until he
reached the final one.

“It can't end like this,” he whispered to Victoria.

There had to be a way he could save them all. Had to be.

Throughout much of his journey, he'd felt like he had a guardian
angel watching over him. Someone there to pull the trigger to remove
threats at just the right time. That angel had used an entire towboat
and its barges to run down Duchesne back in St. Louis. That piece of
“good luck” actually started the whole process which
brought them all to this moment. Maybe it would have been better if
they'd perished there. Now, more people were going to die.

Because of him.

“Liam, we have to do something. Fast,” Victoria said
out of the side of her mouth. They couldn't be heard by Elsa because
of the distance between them, but she seemed to understand their
motives.

She cut the tether on his dad.

“God. No. Please.”

3

The zombie that was formerly his dad used his newfound freedom to
lunge at the person facing him. Liam found it strange to think first
of how his mom's neck had been cleared of all distractions—her
shaved hair suddenly made perfect sense. It was the exact spot where
the zombie attacked.

The Quantum Virus was about to claim another victim.

He pulled out the knife given to him by Brandyweis. It was a huge
military knife with one sharp serrated edge. He judged it to be
similar to a Bowie knife, which was one of the weapons in
World of
Undead Soldiers
. Not a very good one, he noted. It could be
thrown in the game—something he'd never done before.

Lana, knowing she was doomed, let herself fall backward. The
additional weight of the Dad-zombie propelled them across and down
the slick, rounded surface of the motorboat.

As they moved, he threw the knife as hard as he could at his
father. He used all the hatred he had for Elsa and what she'd done by
digging him up and putting him in front of his mom. It sank into his
dad's side, but there was no question it would serve no role in
stopping him. The knife's only function was to make him feel that
he'd tried.

Lana fell into the water with the zombie, beyond his sight.

She didn't want me to see her die.

“You bitch!” he screamed as he lunged at her. Victoria
held his arm, which he both fought and relished. The man behind Elsa
had a gun trained on him.

Elsa tapped her side, and the gray guard dog lurched so it sat
between them as well.

“No more weapons! We're not done,” she said with
finality.

Liam was burning with anger—and despair, but as with so many
encounters of late, he felt helpless in equal measure. Maybe he could
have reached her and pushed her into the water, but then the drone
would kill Victoria and everyone else. And he couldn't be sure he'd
best the woman in the water.

She held up her wrist and spoke into it. “Janey
Fitzhume-Hayes, come on down,” she added a laugh before
dropping her arm.

“I know she's not a friend of yours, but I figure killing
her will pass the time for us until my consolation prize arrives.
Once Marty is here, we can wrap this up and I can get back to the
responsibilities of seeking the real prize: Rose Peters.”

“Why? Why are you doing this? None of this makes any sense.
What do my grandmas have to do with the world?” he replied with
embers of anger flaming high.

The drone moved so they could talk, though the man's gun remained
pointed at him.

Elsa looked at her wrist like she was checking the time. “I've
got time to kill. Why not.”

She moved to the edge of her boat. Close enough to talk normally.

“The world was doomed, kid. The Spanish Flu was the key.
That's how we found the Quantum Virus. Looking at preserved samples,
we were able to extrapolate its structure down to the sub-atomic
level. A smart immunologist
whom you know
noticed the base
composition had changed over the course of the few years we had good
enough microscopes to get down to that level. He deduced the virus
embeds itself in a host and needs about a hundred years before it
activates. Because our, um, helper virus used the code from the
Spanish Flu strain of Influenza, and because that had been building
itself for those hundred years, it became much more virulent than we
ever imagined. Ironically, those with the most immunity were the
people alive during the time of the original epidemic in 1918,
although some elderly people also had limited immunity from spending
so much time with their older immune family members.”

She laughed, though not as heartily as before.

“Once we started, we had to ride the bucking bronco all the
way to the end. We're managing this crisis so that when the Quantum
Virus runs its course, we'll be there to pick up the pieces.”