My Zombie Summer (Book 1): The Undead Road (11 page)

We entered a dark hallway. The faint sound of a radio came from a room on the other end. Quietly we sneaked our way to the door. Jewel peeked with me.

Some equipment was spread on a table—including working computers—next to water heaters and vents. This had to be their utility room. I quickly made out the silhouettes of Mom and Dad. Sam and Sanders were easy to spot. I wasn’t sure about the others.
Harold
was one of them, but who were the other three?

“It’s weak. I recorded what I could,” a man said. “I think you’ll like it.”

“Let’s hear it before we come to conclusions, Harold,” Sanders replied.

I tapped Jewel on the shoulder. We pulled back. No need to get caught.

When Harold pressed play, I heard a choppy voice, one I’d heard before:
“Cecil Bell . . . Kansas . . . repeat . . . cure! . . . three nine . . . zero seven . . . one seven . . . Longitude negative nine four . . . eight . . . three eight one . . . respond . . .”

The message ended. Weak signal? No kidding. They played it a second time. In all that static and fractured sentences, one word stood out to me:
cure
. A cure for the pandemic—a cure against Vectors—and it was in Kansas? This was great news, and
Cecil Bell
rang a bell in my memory. Was he the guy that we’d heard on the radio, when all of the turnings first occurred?

“Bring me a map,” Sam said. “You have those numbers, Harold?”

Paper rustled in the room. “Yeah—looks like we’re missing a few digits . . .”

“Let me look,” Dad said. They were in luck. No one knew maps better than Dad. “Kansas City. It’s not far from here. Two . . . three hundred miles, I think.”

“If what you’ve said of the girl is true, we should look into it.” That was Mason’s voice.

As I pulled away, Jewel whispered, “What girl?”

I put a finger to my lips.

“Poor child,” Mom said. “I can’t imagine what she’s going through.”

“The girl is doing fine,” said Sanders. “She is for now, at least.”

“Glad to hear,” Sam said. “If they have a cure—”

“I don’t like it,” said Black-Bandana—Cody’s dad. “How can we be sure this isn’t a hoax to lure us out of the compound? Remember the last time people asked for help? We were ambushed. Left for dead. I don’t think chasing after a cure is a good idea, Samantha.”

“You think I haven’t considered the risks?” she reprimanded him. “If there’s a cure, we need it!”

“To save the girl?” I guess Dad really cared.

“Yes,” Sam answered. “To save her . . . and us.”

“Us?” Mom asked. “We’re not infected, are we?”

“Depends,” Sanders said. “From the research I’ve conducted—and I need more time to evaluate the girl’s blood to know—it’s starting to make sense.” The man paused. I didn’t want him to stop. “The three
types
, as you call them, are completely relevant. I have reason to believe that there is another, less recognizable type. Using your terminology, I would call it
Type Zero
.”

Type Zero?

I wasn’t savvy on my scientific terminology, but I guessed he meant an infection that preceded the others—a human who carried the infection without becoming a Vector? Given the way Kaylynn had kept her distance, more so when I had an open cut, it made sense. It explained why she’d eaten my jerky so fast, and why she went after canned meats over other goods.

Kaylynn had the infection inside her?

I didn’t want to believe it.

“If Kaylynn dies, she’ll turn?” Dad asked.

Sanders sighed, and then he chuckled slightly. “That’s an appropriate way to put it—calling these creatures
Vectors
, I mean. A vector carries and transmits disease, like flees on rats during the bubonic plague. That might explain why these creatures don’t eat each other. They can tell the difference somehow.”

“Don’t laugh,” Mom said. “Her life is at stake!”

You go, Mom!

“My apologies. I meant no disrespect to the girl. If I am to understand what we are dealing with, I need better samples and equipment. The blood you collected for me is, sadly, unusable—the blood is useless once the host turns. I suspect a dormant pathogen is the cause of this. It has the same symptoms as a virus, but that’s not what it is.” I looked inside again. The doctor held something up that made his face glow. A smartphone? Since the blackout, I didn’t think those could work. “The girl’s blood Type is O Positive. She hasn’t displayed any symptoms, so the pathogen is dormant inside her. I honestly have no idea what to make of it.”

“If she hasn’t turned, can she still infect us?” Mason asked.

“Certainly!” Sanders cleared his throat. “If her body fluid enters someone’s bloodstream, they would be infected—just like any disease.” The moment he said that, I touched my lip and felt sick. Good thing I didn’t try to steal first base. Even if I had dared, Kaylynn would’ve pummeled me into a shallow grave. “What puzzles me,” Sanders added, “is how selective this pathogen is. I suspect something unnatural here, and I wouldn’t throw bio-engineering out as a possibility.”

“A weaponized disease?” Dad asked.

“That’s on the bottom of my list, but in the realm of possibility. I can’t know without a better facility, as much as I like this one.” He lowered his phone. “If you plan to investigate, I want to come with you.”

“It’s agreed, then,” Sam said. “I’ll organize a team. Since you think it’s so dangerous, Jackson, we’ll send only our best. That means you,” she paused for a second, “and you.”

“Me?” Dad said. “I’m glad you think so, but I can’t just up and leave my—”

“I haven’t decided whether to send you packing because of what your son and that girl did,” Sam said. “This act will make up for it, and it’ll save the girl.”

I tightened my fists. That was blackmail. If Kaylynn wasn’t in the equation, I would’ve said
screw it
and left the compound ages ago. But Dad likes to play the hero with guns blazing, which was his other weakness.

“I know your tactics better than anyone,” Mom said. “If you’re going, then so am I.”

“Hold on,” Mason said. “What about your kids?”

Thank you, Mason. I was worried for second.

“Maybe Candice will watch them?” Dad said, squashing my hope.

“Can we tell them about Kaylynn?” Mom asked. “It may help them understand what we’re doing.”

“I wouldn’t. No need to raise false hope.” Sam sighed. “If I weren’t needed here, I’d go with you.”

“My sons will want to go,” Jackson said. “How ‘bout it, Sam?”

“Your older son, yes. The youngest stays.”

The monitor flickered. So did the lights. They went out for a second, leaving us in darkness. Not good. If the others ran out, they were sure to catch us. I didn’t want to know what they would do to spies. The lights turned on a second later. A hiccup in the generators.

“Samantha,” Sanders said. I could hear his heavy steps. “Keep those with Type O blood under close observation. I wish I had more concrete evidence to support this, but it may prevent another outbreak.”

“Understood Doc,” Sam replied. “Thanks for all you’ve done.”

Mason stepped out into the hall. I never heard him coming. I tugged Jewel back, covering her mouth too late. The deputy didn’t move, until he gestured down the hall. He was letting us go. Relieved, we flew down the hallway. Before I knew it, we were back in my room.

I jumped into the bed and pulled the thin sheets to my chin. Jewel sat in one of the chairs, breathing hard. My head was swimming with so many questions. What the hell was going on? Why did Mason let us go?

“Hey,” I said to Jewel. “What do you think about all this, about Mom and Dad going?”

“I don’t know,” Jewel replied. She looked anxious. “I don’t like it, but I want Kaylynn to get better.”

“Me too,” I said. “Should we let them do this?”

She nodded, but it wasn’t a resolute or confident nod. “If anyone can save Kaylynn, they can.”

I smiled, grateful that she had agreed with me. We’re not always on the same page when it comes to important stuff. Now we were. Mom and Dad entered the room a short minute later, thin smiles on their faces.

“You look better,” Mom said. “Ready to go?”

They tossed me my clothes. I dressed. We left.

Infected or not, I was coming back for Kaylynn.

That night, after we’d left the healthcare center and returned to grandma’s house, Dad told us what Jewel and I had already overheard. We knew the clue on the radio would lead to a cure for Kaylynn, so Mom and Dad accepted the mission. They left the next morning. Black-Bandana Man picked them up in a white Dodge Ram. His older son, the one with the cleft chin, rode passenger. Cody came by to see them off, although he clearly had the face of someone who got left behind.

I wasn’t too worried. No one in the compound had Dad’s level of experience, but separating us from him and Mom didn’t set well with Jewel at all. And with Sam monitoring our every move, even more so.

Our parent’s plan included a state highway through Lincoln, and another through Kansas until they hit Kansas City, Missouri. But before they left, Dad gave me the keys to the Explorer and a duplicate map. He said if anything happened while they were gone, we were to take the car, follow the highlighted route and meet up with them. I’d never driven the Explorer.

I’m pretty sure Sam made sure no one said a word about the radio message, especially the blood tests that everyone had to take. It was an all-day affair, people lining up from every street, taking turns by rolling up their sleeves. Jewel and I had our blood tested the night before, so we stayed home—with a guard out front.

Since I’d nearly attracted twenty or so Vectors into David City, Sam had me placed under some kind of house arrest. Boredom tends to bring out the worst in me, and cooping us up in grandma’s house all day made me want to break the rules. Jewel found a way to sneak over the back fence of our house, giving us a great opportunity to grab Kaylynn’s bat from the ball park.

I knew Sam would kick us out if they caught us, but I didn’t care anymore. If Kaylynn was infected, I had to do my part, too. She wasn’t a mindless Vector set on eating every living thing like the rest of those monsters. Kaylynn was no monster. She was human. I didn’t know how, but we were going to free her.

A few minutes later, I found her bat laying on the grass. I picked it up and held it carefully. As I felt the weight of her wooden bat in my hand, I understood why she was elusive. She was infected—and she knew it all along. I would’ve kept my distance from others just as she had, fearful of infecting them. I wasn’t about to give up. In a different way, she’d already infected me.

“What were you two doing out here?” Jewel asked me as we walked back to the compound.

I shrugged. “Nothing, really. Just hanging out.”

Jewel’s face beamed with a wide smile. “Mmhmm.”

“We played baseball. I pitched. She hit. That’s it.”

“Did she catch what you were pitching?”

“Ask her when we finish
Phase Two
.”

The first phase of our plan—finding Kaylynn’s bat—went without a hitch. And no one had bothered to check on us after we’d left the house. After a small dinner of soup and stale crackers, we prepared to infiltrate the healthcare center. I had a hunch on where we would find Kaylynn, and our stuff—behind the guarded doors. Since the place was mostly vacant in the evening, that was our best bet, but we’d need a distraction to get inside without anyone noticing us.

I untied the knot on Chloe’s leash. Her tail went nuts, so excited that she nearly knocked the lamp over.

Just before sunset, Jewel grabbed Kaylynn’s bat.

I swallowed. Time to commence Phase Two.

“Where’re you going?” asked the guard out front.

I held up the end of Chloe’s leash. “For a walk.”

To our relief, the guy bought our story, not that it was a complete lie. We just didn’t say
where
we had planned to go. He told us to hurry back in half an hour. In the meantime, instead of guarding a house with no one inside, he left to check on something—whatever it was. If luck stayed on our side, we’d make it back long before then, and find some place for Kaylynn to hide.