“And what will that tell us?”
“Who's behind all of this. Whoever made that virus obviously has access to advanced technology. Maybe there's some biotech firm that discovered the cure to Cancer or whatever, and they're sitting on that cure because it accidentally cured all other diseases. Maybe they wouldn't want to cure everything at once? Al said as much.”
He admired her spirit.
“Wow. I thought I was the one who cooked up conspiracies,” he said with a chuckle.
“I saw what you asked the computer,” she said while smiling.
The most important question was one he'd thought up in the moment. He wanted to know where Elsa's greatest enemy—his Grandma Rose—was hiding. Now that Elsa was dead, he wasn't going to assume everything would suddenly return to peaceful mode. The zombies were out there, getting stronger day after day. The Operation Renew convoy was still heading for St. Louis, with all the military units left from the East Coast along with millions of survivors. Elsa said she was in line to become president of the United States. That's why she wanted Grandma Rose out of the way. But he had to suspect she was more involved with the virus itself.
“Where's my Grandma?”
“Not that one,” she said with bright eyes and a smile.
“I asked it where your parents are hiding.”
“The answer was the same for both, wasn't it?”
“Pretty close. Both are in Colorado.”
“If they have Grandma, maybe it will help to be so far away from her. That way they can't make her operate the Quantum computer and tell them where we are. Or where it is. They'll never figure out where we went.”
He wasn't so sure. Drones hovered above the water, like they were lost. If Elsa was dead, maybe it was over.
“What do you think Al meant by non-linear time? Is that like time travel, or something?” he asked, while watching the water.
“I have no idea. Hans seemed to think this all began during the Spanish Flu in nineteen-whatever a hundred years ago. That seems to add up in a strange way. I guess we'll know when we find it.”
Colorado, here we come.
Even as he sat there thinking, the drones seemed to perk up. They all began going upriver, out of Cairo. He turned that way to see a gigantic cloud of dust envelope the shore up that way. Like a herd of cattle arriving at the watering hole.
“Liam, look. I saw that cloud on the way in.” Victoria pointed the way he faced. “Come on. We have to go.”
She took off up the bank—in the opposite direction. The drones weren't just going up the river; they were also coming across the waterway. Toward him.
No, toward their dead leader.
“I wish I could kill you over and over,” he said to her body.
Then, as with so many of his adventures, he ran. He couldn't help watch Victoria's fancy jeans as she scrambled up the rocky shore toward the treeline.
“Eyes forward, mister,” she laughed, somehow knowing he was already drawn that way.
He felt hope return. He had his running partner again.
Epilogue
Twenty-one days since the sirens.
Lana woke up with a wet cough. She'd washed ashore after falling in the river tied to her dead husband. The very thought of it made her shiver, no matter the heat of the new day.
The start of her journey was chaotic as she and Jerry floated between the parked barges or got sucked underneath them. The current carried them ever downriver, ensuring all she needed to do was hold her breath and keep kicking her feet. Soon the barges of Cairo fell far behind.
Eventually, her hands broke free of the zip ties. That's when the real fight began—against the current. She paddled until nightfall, unable to get out of the main channel. Once it got dark, and exhausted beyond words, she gripped some driftwood and let the river take her where it would. Sleep finally took her—until she ran aground.
“Liam,” she thought. “Please be OK.”
When she fell from the barge—out of his sight—she fought to keep her distance from “it” as the dead man flailed in the water with her. The thing that her husband had become—a zombie—had no traces left of the loving person he once was. The father of her only son.
Elsa had them together in that speedboat all the way from St. Louis, and that was enough of a hell for her. Jerry had been chained to the decking, but his vacant eyes and mud-stained and blackened skin were haunting echoes of his former life. She desperately wanted to know how it was possible to dig up a dead man and bring him back to half-life, but she had no interest in talking to Elsa. Several volunteer Polar Bears had helped her get back to her son in Forest Park, only to be greeted in an ambush by the crazy woman and her strike team.
Those four men and women were dead because of her.
Liam is going to die because of me too. I lost him.
“Cut yourself some slack,” she argued with herself, “keeping tabs on Liam was never easy, even before this sickness struck.” In fact, she and Jerry had spent the better part of the last six months arguing with him over his behavior. While Liam did fine in school, he often blew off homework so he could hang out with his friends. Computers. Tablets. Texting. Every distraction she could think of that drove a mother insane—he was into it. Everything but school work.
At least he wasn't into drugs.
That gave her some comfort, but online games were their own kind of addiction. The event that drove Liam out of the house involved gaming—he'd spent the night at a friend's house, but neglected to tell anyone where he'd gone. After a night of alternately crying in fear that he'd hurt himself and screaming in anger that he did it on purpose to hurt them, she and Jerry were ready for war. When Liam walked through the front door the next morning as if nothing had happened, she snapped.
They grounded him. Took away his laptop. Tried to make his life miserable. His response was that he'd go to the library and play his game. No big deal.
After much yelling and anger, she “woke up” at the back window of the house holding his laptop. She'd been thinking about throwing it through the glass. His apparent lack of concern over anything made punishing him impossible.
Getting him out of her sight was the only solution. She was ever thankful Jerry handled the logistics with Grandma Marty so that she could stay out of it. Her love was absolute, of course, but her anger flared up from depths previously unknown. She wanted him gone—just for a while.
And she'd felt guilty from the moment he'd walked out.
Day after day she argued with Jerry to let him come back. And each time he would respond that his time away would do everyone some good. Liam would realize what it was like to live without mom and dad to cater to his every need, and they would get some much-needed peace and quiet for the summer. They could recharge batteries for the start of school in the fall.
She wanted to go visit him at Grandmas, but Jerry insisted that would only diminish the punishment. He cut a deal with her that they would go see him on his birthday.
The sirens killed the world before that meeting could take place.
So much time wasted on arguing.
The disputes with Liam were trying enough, but she'd also argued too much with Jerry. Their disagreement over “visiting rights” with Liam had driven a wedge between them. The crevice widened after it became clear Liam and Grandma had gone out into the city. It all happened because she'd sent him away.
“I'm so sorry Jer. I wasted our last days together being mad at you. I should have spent my time telling you how much I loved you.”
Their relationship was more a brushfire of tension and small arguments than all out war, but maybe that would have been better. One big battle to get it all over and done with.
The weak consolation was that she'd forgiven him before he passed away from his infection. That was too late to matter, though.
And here at her rock, she was utterly alone. There was no sign of Cairo. Not even any barges. She wanted to believe Liam could have survived Elsa, but she was
completely in control. It was unlikely he did.
“I'm going to find out,” she said to the water.
She cautiously rose to her feet and took a few tentative steps through the shallow water near the bank. Something pulled hard at her right leg, making her hop in surprise.
“Oh no,” she said as she remembered what was attached to her.
The rope was longer than it seemed while they were swimming. About ten feet by the looks of it. Jerry's leg was tied on the other end, and his body had wedged into some larger rocks just out of the water. She figured wave action pushed him out.
“You have to do it, Lana.” The words gave her courage as she got close enough to touch the blade in his side. With the burly knife, she could put the zombie down for good.
She gripped it and her heart rumbled to life. Her breathing increased, and she lost herself in tunnel vision.
“He's already dead, Lana.”
The face was hidden—a fact for which she was glad—but it seemed to be sleeping on a big rock. His skin had cleaned up considerably in the water. The dirt and discoloration of the grave had been washed away. Dirty or not, it could flip over and bite her in two seconds. She steeled herself for the final act of their marriage.
“I love you, Jerry. Goodbye.”
She was pulling at the knife when the zombie spoke.
“I love you, too.”
###
Musings of an Author
Thank you for reading Zombies Ever After! This is the sixth book of my young writing career. Liam, Grandma, and Victoria will return!
Have a second? Please rate this book. It really helps independent authors such as myself. Just don't give away any of the secrets!
I hope you'll return for the next installment. Sign up to the E.E. Isherwood mailing list so you'll know when it arrives.
Thank you, as always, for spending time in my world.
E.E. Isherwood, September 6, 2016
About the Author
E.E. Isherwood is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse series. His long-time fascination with the end of the world blossomed decades ago after reading the 1949 classic Earth Abides. Zombies allow him to observe how society breaks down in the face of such withering calamity.
Isherwood lives in St. Louis, Missouri with his wife and family. He stays deep in a bunker with steepled fingers, always awaiting the arrival of the first wave of zombies.
Find him online at www.zombiebooks.net.
Books by E.E. Isherwood
E.E. Isherwood currently has six books in the Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse universe. At least three books are planned in the Eternal Apocalypse series. He also has two high-octane post-apocalyptic stories in the Revolutions Per Mile series. Visit his website at www.zombiebooks.net to be informed when future titles are launched.
The Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse series
Book 1: Since the Sirens [BUY ON KINDLE]
Book 2: Siren Songs [BUY ON KINDLE]
Book 3: Stop the Sirens [BUY ON KINDLE]
Book 4: Last Fight of the Valkyries [BUY ON KINDLE]
Book 5: Zombies vs. Polar Bears [BUY ON KINDLE]
Book 6: Zombies Ever After [BUY ON KINDLE]
***
The Eternal Apocalypse series
Sky Dancers
Dazzle Ships
Heaven's Vanguard
Book 1: Sky Dancers [BUY ON KINDLE]
Elle leads a typical life inside her Doomsday bunker. Eat. Sleep. School. Repeat. Until she finds a crack in the roof that lets in forbidden sunshine. She realizes much of what she's been told about why she's locked up underground has been a lie. At first she wants to run far away with her newfound freedom, but she's pulled back inside when she learns that not all of the lies were false. The threat to her people is real, and it's been with them the whole time.
Book 2: Dazzle Ships [BUY ON KINDLE]
Book 3: Heaven's Vanguard [BUY ON KINDLE]
***
OTHER TITLES
The Revolutions Per Mile series
A new series of driving adventures from post-apocalyptic author E.E. Isherwood.
Book 1: Post Apocalyptic Ponies [BUY ON KINDLE]
When the world ended, Perth Hopkins was one of the lucky few. She jumped in her father's sports car and drove like a girl possessed to escape the nuclear fires. Today, years later, she drives as a high-speed courier between the small farming towns in the breadbasket of a new nation. She's learning the rules of the road in the safe interior—the pony pastures—but she craves the speed and danger of the interstate. Those routes are run by the older girls... When one of those girls shows up in her life, she's forced to consider whether she really wants to see what's over the distant horizon.
Book 2: Post Apocalyptic Mustangs [BUY ON KINDLE]
###
Connect with E. E. Isherwood
Thank you for being a reader of my work. I value your support more than I can say. I also love interacting with fans. To contact me, yell at me, become a beta reader, or find more stories about the end of everything, look for me online:
Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/eeisherwood
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Visit my website: http://www.zombiebooks.net
In the next universe I've already written the next book in this series. I need to hop over there and grab a copy of Book 7 so I can share it with you.
Since the Sirens: Zombie's 2nd Bite Edition: Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse, Books 4-6 Page 89
