“How will you fix it?” Cody asked.
“I'm not sure, but we'll figure it out eventually.”
Marlaina and Aiden shot their rifles in the air. Down below the people turned toward the crest where the people Aiden had rescued from the Jesus Town goons stood waving with them. Sheriff Wilson and his wife identified them through a pair of binoculars. They waved back to their son and daughter. It was good to have them back. Marlaina had been saved. Hours later, the group that Aiden and Marlaina led were introduced to the town.
"These people have suffered a great deal," Aiden said. "I want to ask all of you never to mention this event. Please do not ask anyone to speak about it. As long as they are home with us again, we have no need to know whatever it was that they had to endure. None of us should ever inquire about it. Nor should they tell us a thing about it. I want you to agree with me that this will be treated as though it never happened. I'm asking for a community vote on this, before we do anything else. If you agree we should not ask nor talk about what happened to them, please raise your hand."
The vote was unanimous. It was not to be mentioned. Forever. To all who lived here, it would be said that it never happened.
#
So, they went on with their lives, leaving much of the unwanted world behind them. This ensured them a more normal view of life than drudging up old tragedies might have allowed. They were freed of the recent past, of memories that could not die from lack of repetition in a thousand mouths. Instead, all of them had become innocent again.
The walking dead were a thing of the past. Over five to ten years, they would surely die out for lack of food. If not, hunters would decimate them, reducing them to final extinction. Besides, they had no way of replacing lost members.
"Someday," Aiden told his son, "we can return to our old homes, but I don't think we should do that. Already the homes that are left in Lancaster are grown up with vines. Trees are growing here and there in the streets and sidewalks. I think it's best we never go there again. I think this is the new world, and we should stay up here and never venture out."
"I agree," Cody said. "I have nothing to return to. Life in Jesus Town was no good if you know what I mean."
Marlaina missed high school and college, but in the new world such places were not necessary. Eventually, she and Aiden would go down there and salvage books from the libraries. They'd raid and pillage what was left of the over grown colleges and universities for text books, tools, and the paraphernalia of science. They could rescue some things they had lost. Eventually, knowledge would be reborn, and the lessons they had learned would be recorded.
The Zombies of Lancaster Page 24
