Generation Z (Book 4): The Queen Unthroned

by Meredith, Peter

  Stu and Neil shared another look. Neither were much good at bluffing and Gunner knew they were about to give in. “Besides, do either of you really think you can pilot The Wind Ripper through a harbor stacked with Corsair ships?”

  The look came again between them. Neil knew next to nothing about boats and had become irritatingly clumsy to boot. Stu, who had much more experience, didn’t think he could out-sail any Corsair captain, especially with a half-zombie as his only help. It seemed Gunner was right, they were doomed without his help. But would he really help them, or was it all a ruse? Was he going to turn them in to the Corsairs to make up for the fact that Joslyn was going to deliver the real goods?

  Reluctantly, Stu said, “Maybe you can come with us. I want to know what the catch is. What do you want in return? You aren’t going to risk life and limb for nothing.”

  Gunner tried to make a snort of derision; however a man without a nose couldn’t exactly snort. It came out as an unsettlingly wet “gushy” noise that made Stu grit his teeth. “I’m risking life and limb just standing here.” He gestured with his stump at a hippo-sized zombie struggling in the water ten feet away. It had been in the water so long it seemed to have forgotten how to use its legs properly and was making little headway in its effort to get at them.

  “I’m not afraid of death,” Gunner told them. “But as to what I want, hmmm, I haven’t decided yet. I’m thinking Christmas dinner. You know, with all the fixings. And not just one, either. I want it to be yearly. Maybe I’ll ride up to the mansion on one of them floats. And I want the dinners cooked by the Governor. She can cook, right?”

  Stu had been envisioning the same thing, only sitting across from him was Jillybean. He glanced over at Neil, who was staring at the zombie with dread fascination. The queer little man jerked as if coming awake. “Yeah, she can cook. But I think we should get this on the table. If you double-cross us, I will kill you, pure and simple.”

  This made Gunner laugh which only sounded marginally better than his snorting. “You could try. I don’t think you have much of a chance, but stranger things have happened. Come on, we got to get moving. If the bandits catch us here yapping, everyone loses.”

  “What about the boat?” Stu asked as Gunner walked right past it.

  “We’re leaving it,” Gunner said. “The river is gonna be guarded just like the roads. If you want to get safely through we’re gonna have to take to the woods. You gonna be okay with that, Neil? Back when I knew you, you were a little squeamish about getting your Crocs dirty.”

  Neil looked up at Gunner and promptly stumbled over a root. “That was then. I’ve changed a good deal since you knew me.”

  The snot-sounding snort came from beneath Gunner’s mask again. “Besides being a zombie and a few scars, I’m not seeing it.”

  It took Neil a moment to figure out what had changed about him. “These are hiking Crocs for starters and this sweater vest is new.” He held it by the lower hem and pulled it out away from his body. “I guess that hole is new, too. I should think about sewing that up. I’m not so good at sewing. But I’m okay at pottery. That’s new, too. I took it up last spring. It didn’t last, but I made some bowls.”

  “Yeah, you’re completely different,” Gunner scoffed.

  In the growing light, Neil looked to be getting grayer by the second. He began to mumble. “Everything I ate from those bowls tasted earthy. I used to think it was bad for me, like I was eating some of the clay and it would build up in my bowel and that I would pass a brick eventually. I’m not worried about that anymore.”

  Gunner glanced back. “Okay, new and improved Neil, why don’t you quiet down?” They were passing through suburban Olympia, angling southwest. Like a disease, nature was swallowing the city, encroaching from all sides including from below. The streets were buckled as much from the weather as from the trees shooting right up through the asphalt.

  Everything was overgrown, which made travel dangerous. And it wasn’t just the zombies that seemed to lurk in every shadow, eating the dying grasses or pulling down branches to their faces, there were bandit scouts as well. These were far more dangerous and trouble came quickly.

  It started with a shot from an out of sight sniper. The bullet kicked off the broken cement a few feet from Neil. He turned slowly from where the bullet had gouged the street to where the echoing gunshot had come from. Then he blinked into action, bringing his gun up.

  “Don’t,” Gunner warned him. He had slunk behind a tree and now gestured across the street to an apartment complex where four zombies were gazing blankly to the south. All four were grey, haggard females with pendulous breasts that hung past their swollen bellies. The beasts weren’t huge, probably not much more than five hundred pounds. “Just get down.”

  Stu hauled Neil behind a bush as the sniper shot again, hitting almost the same spot. “He’s not much of a shot,” Stu remarked.

  “I think he’s better than he’s letting on,” Gunner whispered. “He’s two blocks up in that brown apartment building. If he wanted to kill us, he would indeed be a terrible shot, but if he wanted us to return fire and have those four beauties come after us, then he shot well enough.”

  Neil was slowly piecing things together. “If we fired, then those four will come after us…”

  “And maybe more,” Gunner added.

  “Yes, and maybe more. We’d run of course. Where?” He looked to his right at a narrow street that seemed more like an alley due to all the trees growing up along it. A perfect spot for an ambush.

  Stu had no idea if any of this was true. Normal people didn’t think like this. Then again, bandits weren’t normal people. Slaves had to be taken alive and unharmed if they were to have any value, which meant ambushes had to be set up.

  “So, which way do we go?” he asked. Back and far around seemed like the only logical direction.

  Gunner formed a knife with his good hand and pointed it at the four zombies to their front left. “Keep quiet and trust me. They won’t even see us.” He had his battle axe slung on his back next to his hump; he pulled it off. “Come on,” he said, then ran hunched over towards the zombies. They were gazing south, trying to figure out where the gunshots had come from and didn’t see the three humans slipping behind them, edging against a row of parked cars that looked as though they belonged in a junkyard.

  “Simple as pie,” Gunner murmured as they took a turn around the nearest apartment building where they ran into another zombie. This one was also female, only she was eight-feet in height and strangely lean, which made her look even taller. With a harsh grunt, Gunner jumped high and came down, embedding his axe in its forehead before it could even growl.

  As Gunner was working his axe out of the thing’s head, Neil was gazing placidly up at the top of the building across from them. “Look. Green smoke. It might be a signal, right?”

  “Yeah,” Gunner agreed. He handed Neil his bloody axe. “I think you might need this. I’ll take the gun.”

  “Sure,” Neil said, grinning. Stu thought the axe looked way too large for such a small man. Then again, he wasn’t completely a man anymore. He gave it a practice swing and nearly fell over.

  Gunner laughed his harsh laugh, clapped Neil on the back and then took off, heading around the side of the building emitting the smoke. “Watch my back, Stu,” he ordered, before walking backwards away from the building, his rifle trained upward. They were in a courtyard that had a rusting playground square in the middle. One of the swings gave a mournful squeak in time with the soft wind.

  Stu had his own rifle trained on the building in front of them. There were so many windows he didn’t know which one to point at. Like Gunner, he chose to aim at the upper floor windows and thus missed the zombie that came charging out of a first floor apartment. All he saw was Neil, rushing past him, the black axe raised.

  He turned the rifle on an arc, aiming to kill the roaring monster, only Neil was directly in his line of sight. Even the axe blade got in the way of a head shot.
Stu hesitated, hoping that Neil’s zombie strength would do the trick. Neil swung a ferocious stroke at the monster and buried the axe in its chest…uselessly. The zombie wasn’t even slowed. It slammed into the small man and only the axe handle that Neil smashed into its mouth kept his face from being bitten off in one bite.

  Just as a shot rang out behind him, Stu rushed up and shot the zombie with the bore of his M4 pressed against the thing’s head. A rain of black blood sprayed out in all directions coating Neil, who was still grinning as he licked his lips.

  “I used to hate this stuff,” he laughed.

  “Oh, Neil,” Gunner groaned at the sight. “Just stop. We’ll get you some fresh blood later, okay? Now we gotta hightail it out of here.”

  Zombies and bandits were pouring into the area. Although the bandits wore grey camo and moved with more stealth than the average survivor, a few small battles broke out between them and the zombies. Gunner aimed for one of these, slinking from building to building until he saw an opening where only three huge males squatted over a dead bandit eating strings of intestines like it was hot mozzarella.

  Gunner hurled a rock across a parking and into the windshield of a Dodge Ram. Immediately, the three beasts charged at the truck and tore it to pieces. The doors were ripped off, as was the hood and the front passenger seat. While they were at it, Gunner led Neil and Stu away.

  “Jillybean used to do things like that,” Neil said, staring back at the dead bandit with something like longing on his face.

  “Distracting the dead?” Gunner shrugged. “Anyone with any sense knows to do that. Hey, stop looking at that guy, Neil.” He slung the rifle and grabbed Neil’s arm. “There’ll be plenty to eat further on.”

  There wasn’t more food further on, however. There were only more bandits and more zombies.

  Chapter 50

  Gerry the “Greek” Xydis was the last to leave with a bomb tucked up under his shirt. He was pale and twitchy. Jillybean didn’t think it was possible for anyone to look as guilty as he did.

  The second he was gone, she thundered, “Leney!” in a voice heard from one end of the camp to the other. He had been two tents down, limp on a cot, his snores loud and steady. Blearily, he poked his head out, and the moment he did, she ordered. “Break down the camp. It’s time to destroy the Black Captain.”

  “Huh?” he asked, squinting down at the ocean where only the Queen’s fleet could be seen. “He’s here?”

  “No. He’s hiding in his little rat’s nest. We’re going to have to smoke him out.” This reminded her that she would need a metric ton worth of smoke bombs for her next attack. “Let’s get these lazy slobs out of bed.”

  Even if they wanted to sleep, few could have as she began issuing orders in her usual manner. It was something akin to a verbal barrage of artillery. If anything, she was louder that morning, and her words came faster. Few could keep up with her. “Shaina, get my belongings on board the Queen’s Revenge. Yes, the new white ship. Donna, head down to see the Bishop. I’d like to borrow two of his ships with a skeleton crew for each. Steinmeyer! You’re taking over as Commander of the Fleet and if you lose three ships, you’ll be losing three fingers.”

  And so on, and so on.

  No one could match her energy, which she aided with amphetamines and black coffee. In a feat that probably had no rival in history, she loaded an army of two-thousand soldiers, along with all their stores and belongings on board a hundred and thirty ships in under six hours.

  Her men, who had been up all night, were too tired to grumble and it was an eerily silent fleet that was about to set sail when Knights Sergeant Troy Holt came walking along the beach, a pack on his back, his rifle slung on one shoulder and a new spear in hand. Amazingly, he knelt in the sand in front of the Queen.

  “Bishop Wojdan has asked me to act as ambassador for the Guardians,” he told her in a flat voice. “I am to ascertain the truth behind the Corsair threat and assess her Highness’s mental stability. I am also to protect her Highness and fight for her as long as the fight is deemed just.” He wouldn’t look up.

  “Try not to sound so excited about the idea,” she replied. “I wouldn’t want you to strain anything.”

  Donna chuckled, while Leney only sneered. “I don’t like it,” he said of Troy. “He’s basically saying he’s a spy.”

  “But an honest one,” Jillybean replied. “I doubt he’d tell a lie if his life depended on it. Watch. Troy, what do you think of me? Do you like me?”

  Troy didn’t hesitate for a second. “No. Not in the least. A hundred and fifty people are dead because of your ego. You are an evil, evil person. There’s nothing about you that I like.”

  “Not even my new boat?” She pointed behind her at the Queen’s Revenge; Troy only ground his teeth. Jillybean turned to Leney. “See? He’s painfully honest. Luckily for him, Eve thinks he’s cute. She might not kill him.”

  Leney still looked like something was curdling in his gut. “That’s disappointing. After all their hard work, the boys would love to see one of these holier-than-thou types swinging from the masthead. Just a thought, your Highness. It might be good to, you know, throw the dogs a bone once in a while.”

  “Treat them like dogs and they’ll behave like dogs,” Jillybean sniffed. “Treat them as men and they’ll behave like men. Leney, I want you to take Knights Sergeant Holt under your protection. If something happens to him, I’ll hold you responsible in a reciprocal manner.”

  “Reciprocal? What’s that?” He had a guess and he didn’t like it.

  She stared out at her fleet laying at anchor and answered without looking back at him. “An eye for an eye. That’s how I do things, Leney. You’d be wise to remember that.”

  Leney’s eyes shifted away at the threat.

  Oblivious to what was really being said, Troy tried to explain that he didn’t need anyone’s protection. “I’m a Knight and equal to any five of you.” He wasted his breath. The only person in need of protecting more than him was the Queen herself. She came on board the Queen’s Revenge and found very few friendly faces.

  She stalked right up to the least friendly of them, a tattooed gorilla of a man named Greg Bennet. “Why aren’t you on your knees?” Despite what the Bishop thought, her insanity was an effective shield. Her men might have respected her skill in battle and her immense intellectual capabilities, but they were afraid of Eve. And rightly so.

  Because they know that I’ll do what it takes to…

  “Shut the hell up,” Jillybean growled without taking her eyes off Bennet. She had her hand in her coat pocket where she carried a small frame .357 Taurus. She stared him down to his knees. Without taking her eyes from his she said, “Leney, tell me everyone on this damned boat is kneeling.”

  There was a quick rustle of cloth and quite a few thumps. “All but your pet Guardian.”

  She turned and Troy dropped to one knee. “Please excuse me, your Highness,” he said with some difficulty as his jaw was almost completely clenched shut. “I was told to give you every courtesy due your rank, but I’m new to, uh, royalty.”

  “Learn quickly,” she answered. “As for the rest of you…” She took the gun out of her pocket. “When I come on board, you kneel. When the captain comes on board, you come to attention. You did neither. If it happens again I will make an example of at least one of you.”

  Her anger, which was explosive one second, disappeared entirely in the next. “Everyone up. I want to see what this baby can do.” She slapped her hand on the rail of the Queen’s Revenge. Her excitement over the ship was all an act designed to turn the crew’s focus from her to something they enjoyed.

  It was a new crew on a new boat and as the sails were raised, the shrouds tied off and the booms adjusted it was obvious that its pecking order had not yet worked itself out. There were a number of scuffles and near fights.

  As captain, it was up to Leney to divide his sailors into three watches and assign duties to each. Having judged them as they got unde
rway, he made his decisions. The third watch was sent below, while the second found places to wrap themselves against the cold and keep out of the way of the first, which led the fleet out to sea.

  Jillybean stood on the soft teak deck of the Queen’s Revenge her hair spinning and whipping like flame in the gusting wind. She gazed up at the mountains of snow-white sail. They reminded her of the winter peaks of Colorado and, for a time, melancholy struck her, overshadowing the great dissatisfaction she had with the ship.

  There was nothing in particular about it that she could point at and say: “There. That’s the problem.” In many ways it was a perfect ship. Certainly it was the finest she had ever sailed on.

  The Queen’s Revenge was a double-masted thoroughbred. She was sleek and trim. Her hull was so clean that she seemed to skate across the top of the water instead of pushing through it. She was so fast that Mark Leney allowed her sails to sag just a touch. Had they been drum-tight, she would have raced away from the rest of the fleet as if they were nothing but garbage scows.

  From the top of her seventy-foot-tall masts to the bottom of her keel, she was brilliantly, magnificently white. Everything about her spotless and beautiful. And yet the Queen was not happy with her. Nor was she exactly happy with Knights Sergeant Troy Holt, who always stood at the bow, staring straight back across the deck at her. She liked to stand at the bow on occasion and watch the keel knife through the low waves. But now she couldn’t. The judgment coming off him was colder than the wind.

  Tell Leney to push him over, Eve suggested when they were miles from Highton. It’ll be quick and relatively painless. With his armor, he’ll sink like a stone. No fuss, no muss, no rotting carcass. She tittered at her joke.