Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 2): Siren Songs (32 page)

As expected they allowed him to go, and provided
the bikes and trailers. They scared up a map of the area, which Liam
realized was critical to his plan because there were so many twists
and turns in the hilly country. He would never have thought of that.

They seemed hesitant to allow him to return with
weapons, but Liam explained how the two young boys could have been
saved if only they had real weapons, and not just sticks. He bent the
truth just a little, they really died because they let themselves be
surprised by the zombies...

It all happens so fast in real life.

Liam had two items on his agenda for the evening.
The first was to talk to Drew about an idea he had for getting both
bikes safely on the road. The second was to get a few hours of sleep.

He caught up with Drew back at Grandma's tent.

“Hey, Liam. I kind of lied to you about my
parents. I'm here by myself.”

“Are your parents outside the camp?”

Drew had a look of embarrassment. And sadness.

Oh crap.

“They're dead, aren't they?”

The other boy nodded.

“I'm so sorry. But why didn't you just tell
me that when we met?”

“It feels better to pretend they're alive.”

Liam considered whether that was true. Was he
pretending Victoria was still alive? Even thinking about her now made
him wince with pain, but what about all the other hours of the day
when he wasn't directly thinking of her? “I lost my friend,
too. I don't know what to say about your parents, but you can hang
with me however long you want.”

Drew lit up slightly at that. He was clearly
trying to put on a brave face.

“OK, wingman. I want to go over my plan with
you. Step into my office.”

The two boys sat on the ground in front of
Grandma's tent, talking in the hushed voices of a palace coup. It was
dark by the time they had everything fleshed out. When they were
finished, Drew seemed impressed. “Where did you think of such a
complicated plan?”

“It's called
maskirovka
. A Russian
word for deception. It's one of the odd things about history my dad
taught me. I'll tell you about it when we reach my house and we're
high-fiving.” He laughed at the thought. Willing it to be true.

“For the next part of my plan, I'm going to
sleep.”

He crawled into the tent next to Grandma,
sprawling on the open floor since he had no sleeping bag. It didn't
matter to him in the least. He set the alarm on his watch for 3 a.m.,
and immediately dozed off. It felt as if a moment later his alarm was
ringing. He turned it off, but lay there for a few minutes in a
dreamy fog. He'd been having a dream about Victoria. He was stepping
on her hand over and over and he couldn't make himself stop.

He sat up in the tent, and asked Grandma if she
was awake. She started in, like she had also been thinking in the
darkness. “Liam, I heard some of your plan while you and Drew
were discussing it. Even if it doesn't work, I'm proud of you for
trying it. Getting us all the way home on bikes would be an amazing
feat. Hayes would never expect you to do such a thing.”

Inwardly he smiled. He knew Hayes would be
tracking some dead zombie up on the north side of the camp boundary.
They'd slip out the south. Dad would call the deception a force
multiplier.

See dad, I DID listen.

“Well Grandma, should we get to it?”

It wasn't long before they were organized and
moving. Liam walked Grandma down the path to the main road, where the
bikes were waiting. Two of the council members were there as well.
Making sure they really left perhaps.

Drew was a few minutes late, but he arrived in
good order. He was carrying a small rifle on his back. He saw Liam
eying it. “It was my dad's. I only have a couple rounds, so it
isn't much use.” He started that statement happy, and ended
sad. Liam figured it was because he couldn't pretend his father was
alive while he said that.

“Better to be safe than sorry,” was
Liam's reply. He wanted to keep things positive with Drew.

Liam carefully loaded Grandma into one of the
trailers. It was built to hold two children sitting side by side and
facing backward, but the diminutive lady fit in the same space rather
well.

“You kids don't have a pillow handy do you?”
She said it as a joke, but the female council person ran back inside
the administration building and retrieved a small camp pillow. It
wasn't much, but Grandma was grateful. “I'll make sure it makes
its way back to you when I'm done.”

“No, you keep it. I don't do much sleeping
here anyway.”

There were no crowds to see them off. As they
pulled away, Liam looked back and only saw the two leaders waving
goodbye. Mr. Lee hadn't returned from his task.

Liam whispered over to Drew as they glided down
the gently grade of the valley road. “I guess I expected more
people. I don't know why.”

Drew nodded, but focused on his driving.

They passed tent after tent, weaving in and out of
parked campers, only stopping once to adjust their bikes. Soon enough
they were at the front entrance and heading for open road. Lots of
cars were parked in the fields nearby. There was no room inside the
camp anymore. If there were guards at the front gate, Liam didn't see
them.

Fifteen minutes later they were huffing up and
down the hilly back road. The moon was bright enough, but still low
on the horizon. It would give them enough light to ride the paved
roads with nice yellow lines down the middle.

They pedaled without incident to the first
intersection. It was a Y-split giving them two options in the proper
direction toward home. Liam's plan kicked in. “OK guys,”
he was talking loud enough so Grandma could hear as well. “This
is where we go in different directions. Drew and I have been over the
routes and we're both taking a different way to my house. If anyone
is following us, they won’t be able to get us both.”

“I trust you Liam. Lead on.”

“Me too, Liam. I'll reach your house. I
promise.”

“You know what to tell my parents if you
find them?”

“Don't sweat it. I'll tell them what you
told me.”

I trust you too, Drew.

Liam reached out to shake Drew's hand. He didn't
know why he did it, but it just felt proper given the gravity of the
situation. Drew reciprocated with a big smile. “We got this!”

Liam watched as he pedaled away to the left.
Looking right, he knew his journey would take him on the alternate
path. Hayes couldn't be on both.

Like Grandma said, we all have to take chances in
this new world. Liam knew he was taking a big chance now.

5

Riding on the back roads was uneventful for the
first hour. It had been a long time since he'd ridden a bicycle and
the trailer added some heft on the hilly terrain. It also tended to
sway if he got going too fast and he was worried about having an
accident on the dark roadways.

He arrived at the first major cross street he'd
face on his way home. It was a four-lane highway with two lanes in
each direction separated by a grassy median. The intersection was
something out of a war zone. He paused while he took in the scene in
the low pre-dawn light.

None of the stoplights were working, nor were any
of the tall light posts. The intersection itself was crammed with
cars, as if people decided they were going to ram themselves through
with or without the aid of the signals. Cars had stacked up in all
directions with several wrecked vehicles surrounding the whole mess.
Some were charred hulls, scoured clean down to bare metal.

One large concrete mixer had hit the whole
congregation at high speed and plowed into the middle of the
intersection before it lost all its kinetic energy. Its engine bay
was a blackened, burnt-out mess. The cars it had hit were much worse
off. Very hard to see if anyone had been in those cars.

To his right was a place he knew from his younger
days—the county library. It was a small building as libraries
go, but it was relatively new and Liam remembered it with sarcastic
wit as the place that never had anything he wanted to read.
Apparently this area had no interest in zombie or horror books.

Y'all should have read those books!

Now no one would ever get the chance. It had been
burned to the ground, along with a fast food place and a gas station.
Maybe the gas station caught fire and torched the other two nearby
buildings? Maybe some angry residents took out their frustrations on
these places? Maybe it was a freak lightning strike? Any number of
scenarios could have happened here.

There were no people around. So he began pedaling.
He had to ride well up the cross street to find a gap in the traffic.
He then had to walk his bike through the pile up of cars and follow
the far side of the road back to the intersection. While walking he
saw some of the cars had moving creatures inside. The windows, much
like the car exteriors, were blackened from soot from the nearby
fire. He kept as silent and as low as possible as he rolled by them.

There were several grooves in the grass off the
side of the raised highway. Vehicles were still getting through this
intersection, but had to be a daredevil to drive along the canted
hillside—the only route clear of debris. A bicycle could still
fit on the flatter portion of the road grade. A good thing too as the
hill looked very dangerous.

Once on the other side of the intersection he
could look back on the devastation. The mangled traffic. The hulks of
cars. The hollowed out buildings. Nothing of value was left in sight.

God help us all if this is happening
everywhere.

As he was standing there a man ran up behind him.
He had been hiding behind some nearby clutter. He had a gun trained
on Liam before he could even consider riding away.

“What's your business here?” The look
in the man's eyes was not right. No doubt some things happened here
which would affect anyone.

“I mean you no harm. Me and my grandma are
just passing through.”

“Grandma, eh? Mind if I take a look?”

Liam hesitated. Unsure. He thought of the last man
who held a gun to his head to rob him. Someone had shot that guy at
the last possible second. He didn't think anyone was going to save
him this time, assuming this guy had the same bad intentions.

“Umm, she's asleep. We have nothing of
value.”

The man wouldn't take no for an answer. He moved
to the back of the trailer, looking at Liam as if daring him to stop
him. When he reached the side of the trailer he peeked into a gap in
the canvas outer shell. He started to giggle.

He then tore off the canvas flap so he could see
the rear compartment.

He was bawling in laughter.

“You are more messed up than me, carrying a
woman like this around. I
salute
you!”

He threw down the flap again and took a bow.

“Please sir. You and your grandma are
welcome to proceed.”

He was bent low. Liam needed no second invitation.

The laughter receded as he rolled away.

He felt better once back into the isolated country
road network. The trees provided cover from the living and the dead.

The light of the morning was growing. It had taken
him fifteen minutes to get around the blockage, and now the sun was
blaring bright just beneath the horizon. Soon it would be visible.

Pedaling along he would often see zombies standing
in stream beds, open fields, and in the woods. Alone they weren't
much to look at. He could probably walk up to any one of them and
spear them out of their misery. Were they standing out here waiting
for a human to happen by? Did they pause in the night, as a type of
sleep period? What made them surge in larger groups? And what special
skills, if any, did the zombies around here possess? The colonel said
there were many different flavors of zombies in America now. What
were they like in Alaska? So much he didn't understand about these
new creatures.

As he coasted on the bike, he reached over his
shoulder to reassure himself the small spear was still strapped to
his back. What he did know was that anytime he was spotted, the
zombies would react with anger and begin moving in his direction,
even if they had no hope of catching him. Much like his journey on
the train, he seriously wondered if every zombie he was now passing
would show up at his doorstep at some point in the future like a
bloodhound finding its way home. They were able to follow the train.
Could they follow something smaller and quieter?

He picked up his pace.

On one long straight stretch of road Liam was
distressed to see people standing in the middle of the pavement in
the distance. He stopped his bike and tried to ascertain if they were
living or dead, but he couldn't see them clearly.

Push through or find an alternate route? The
age-old gamer's dilemma.

He looked at his map and decided a detour would
take him in a wide arc that he simply didn't want to add to his day.
With the rising sun he'd undoubtedly encounter more people, and the
sooner he could get home the less friction he'd have with the
natives.

He pushed.

As he got closer he knew they were humans. It was
a group of about six men. It was a roadblock. He could turn around,
but they'd already seen him. Plus, they had a truck nearby.

He decided he'd have to go through.

Playing it cool, he rode right up to the men with
a purpose, stopping about twenty feet short and then raising his
hands.

The men looked rough. The type of country boys
with overalls and filthy ball caps. Liam felt the knock of panic.

“Halt! Who goes there?”

The men laughed at their own—probably
well-worn—roadblock joke.

“I'm Liam Peters. Boy Scout. I'm on a
mission for the Boy Scout camp out by Interstate 44.”