Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 1): Since the Sirens (31 page)

He wasn't willing to even entertain the notion right now.

He consoled himself by noting he barely felt anything at the
thought he himself could have it. Was it selflessness?

They watched as Hayes was discussing something with the roadblock
representative. He was very animated in his gestures, and paced back
and forth while he spoke. They could hear fragments of what he was
saying, even at this distance, because he was often yelling in anger
at his opposite.

Liam couldn't make out anything useful.

After about five minutes, Hayes got really agitated.

In the midst of his ranting and gesticulations, he moved around
the person with the hazmat suit and made as if he was going to walk
up to the roadblock. Immediately the soldiers leveled their rifles at
him. He was maybe ten yards from the soldiers, and over 100 yards
from Liam and Victoria—and Liam could clearly hear the rounds
being loaded into the chambers of several weapons. He could also hear
one of the soldiers—a leader of some kind—yelling “STAND
DOWN SIR OR WE WILL KILL YOU.”

Victoria did her little whistle, followed by, “I guess they
think he's a serious threat.”

“Yeah, if they won't let him over they'll never allow the
rest of us over.”

For a few tense moments Liam didn't know if Hayes was going to
back down. Any normal person would immediately back off, but Hayes
seemed to stand there for a very long time thinking about it. Enough
time that Liam could voice the question: “Is he trying to kill
himself?”

He started to slowly back away.

Victoria had been leaning forward when it happened, as if willing
herself to see and hear what was taking place so far away, but now
she leaned back. Liam also let out a little extra breath he had been
holding. The action seemed to have died down. Hayes was now talking
again to the person in the hazmat get up, though if Liam had to
assign a look to his posture from 100 yards away it would be
crestfallen
. Hayes was getting bad news.

They chatted for a few more minutes until Hayes started walking
away, back toward the end of the bridge where Liam and Victoria were
crouched.

“Do we stay here or try to get back to the train?”

Liam considered her question.

Is everything we do life or death now?

He looked at Hayes walking back, head down and moving briskly.
Then he looked at the soldiers at the roadblock. They still hadn't
moved from their menacing positions. Liam surveyed the train down
below the bridge and judged whether they could make it back without
being seen.

“I don't think we can avoid him at this point. We might as
well force his hand and see what he'll tell us.”

“Sounds good Liam. But let's meet up with him over on the
hill, so the train passengers can see us. We don't want to meet him
totally alone.”

“Very good thought!”

The pair moved away from the end of the bridge, and sat out in the
open so Hayes would not be surprised. Liam felt the best approach was
to be friendly, even if he didn't really feel friendly toward this
man who was clearly lying to them about who he was and what he knew.

He was hoping to change that.

It wasn't long before Hayes came around the corner.

He wasn't surprised. At. All.

“You dumb kids almost got me killed.”

Uh oh.

Neither Liam nor Victoria had any response.

“Ah, cat got your tongues?”

He came over and got directly in front of Liam, though he was
looking back and forth at both of them as he spoke.

“I knew you guys had followed me but I thought you'd have
better sense than to be seen by the Army guys up on the bridge.
Especially you,” he was pointing to Victoria, “since you
seem to have the brains in this outfit.”

“You guys might have not have realized this, but while you
were out on your nature walk you were under the watchful eye of
snipers. They probably even had a drone watching you from up above.
These boys are deadly serious about not letting anyone, and I mean
anyone, cross this river.”

Liam gained his voice first.

“Is that why they threatened to shoot you?”

Hayes looked at Liam, and then seemed to rethink his whole
approach. He sighed heavily and then sat down next to them in the
rocks, with the train below partially obscured by the trees on the
hillside.

“I can't help but respect you kids. You've done a better job
than most in staying alive. That is really the only benchmark that
matters anymore. Believe me I know.”

“But you have to realize this is much bigger than you are.
I'm not the enemy here. These Army boys are under orders—very
stupid orders if you ask me—but orders nonetheless. You can't
just go sneaking around under the watchful eye of those people like
this is some kind of high school outing. They will shoot you, shoot
me, shoot your Grandma, shoot the smallest babe on that train—just
on the off chance they can stop the disease from crossing this
river.”

“First of all, I'm not in high school anymore. I doubt Liam
will ever go back either. Second of all, with all the zombies walking
around and all the infected people, there is no way to prevent the
disease from crossing a simple river. Even a couple of
dumb kids
know that.”

“You're absolutely right. You share the opinion of most of
us at the CDC. But you do not share the opinion of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff, and with the President off doing god-knows-what, the
military is pretty much in charge of managing the pieces of the
nation that are still answering their phones.”

“But we saw the military killing zombies downtown. They were
helping us escape.”

“Well son, it may be true they were killing zombies. That's
their job after all. But I was there. Did you see any evidence they
were
helping
us escape?”

Liam thought back to the battle. Except for a few volunteers from
the Army and Marines, there were no troops on the St. Louis side of
the river during the battle. Only the rebel Abrams tank seemed to
help them directly, and that was only for a few minutes. Then the Air
Force came in and started the shock and awe. The bombs did drop to
the north at first, but later they dropped them further south,
including right on top of Captain Osborne. But maybe that was just a
mistake in the chaos of war.

“So it was just a coincidence the bombs, artillery and tank
fire helped us escape?”

“You always like to argue don't you? Why do you think I was
running so close to the lead guys trying to get out of there?”

Because you are a coward.

“Those bombs would have killed us just as sure as the sun
rises. We are all collateral now to the primary mission—which
is to prevent the spread of the plague.”

Liam reflected on that while Hayes stood back up and brushed
himself off.

“Right now our only avenue of escape is to the south. The
Army told me they are patrolling the eastern shore of the river, but
they have no presence anymore in the entire state of Missouri. We
have to get that train moving and on down the line before the Army
changes their mind about letting this unauthorized train continue
beyond their watchful eyes.”

He started down the trail, leaving Liam and Victoria by
themselves.

“Pretty amazing a truck driver can get a meeting with
soldiers up on some random bridge, huh?”

Liam thought about that for a second before replying, “Yeah,
whatever he does for the CDC it isn't driving a truck.”

Left unsaid was that they knew nothing more about the man. He had
talked for five minutes and told them absolutely nothing.

3

Liam and Victoria hung back on the way down, giving themselves
some room from Hayes so they could communicate. This time Liam was in
front of Victoria.

“Do you think we can trust him?”

“Absolutely not. We know he lied to us about what he does
for the CDC. Is he even with the CDC? He stopped an escaping
train—with a hundred living people on it—so he could stop
and talk to his friends on this bridge. At this point the only thing
we know for sure about him is that he has poor taste in clothing.”

That gave Liam a laugh. He hadn't really dwelled on the man's
fashion sense, but he had to agree it was pretty bad.

“He told us to head south because the Army was on the
Illinois side and wouldn't let us cross. They clearly wouldn't let
him cross, but what if they ordered him to go south? Maybe the only
reason he needs us is to help him complete his mission that way?”

“That doesn't make sense either. The Army could have tossed
him a boat or something and he could get downriver with no problem.
Why would they force him back on this train?”

Liam considered her words for a few moments as they continued
downhill. Every zombie story he ever read seemed to hint at multiple
layers of government conspiracy. He admitted to himself it was
probably crazy to even think it, and borderline insane to even speak
it, but he couldn't help himself now. He trusted Victoria to tolerate
his ramblings.

“You are going to think I'm wearing a tinfoil hat for saying
this, but what if those men up there weren't Army or CDC? What if
Hayes—or whatever his name is—is with another government
organization entirely? A boat would be out of the question because
real Army units would shoot at it. Maybe they needed to talk to him
in person, but they weren't willing to risk infecting themselves by
letting him back across the bridge? We really don't know anything
about the disease, the source of the infection, or how the government
is responding to this emergency.”

Victoria seemed to thrive on the conspiracy.

“Yes! That is why he told us the Joint Chiefs are in charge.
If the President is AWOL maybe he is being detained? Maybe other
parts of government are at odds with each other about how to best
fight this thing.”

Liam was similarly enthused by the line of discussion. This girl
was someone after his own heart. He realized his father's penchant
for conspiracy theories had a lot to do with that, but he wasn't
going to nitpick.

“If you say anything about a 'shadow government' I'm going
to kiss you on the lips!”

Victoria chuckled behind him.

“Well right now I'm fairly certain there is a 'dark-shrouded
government' out there. Maybe someday we'll discover the other.”

Liam walked in silence as they approached the bottom of the trail.
He was suddenly unsure of what just happened. Was she telling him
there was a government conspiracy afoot, or that she had feelings for
him?

Before he could follow up with her, she began walking quickly to
the engine at the front of the train.

“I'm going to get some answers from the engineer. At the
very least I want to know where this train is going.”

Liam ran to catch up. Impressed at the forthrightness of his
lovely partner.

They both saw Hayes climb into the engine compartment, so they
figured they'd follow him up the ladder and into the engineer's area
as well. As he walked along the side of the engine, he noted it had a
name. “Valkyrie.” It was stenciled in large black
letters, which made it really obvious on the orange paint of the
engine. He rubbed his hand on the letters as he walked by.

Liam's imagination had drawn the man driving the train as a portly
chap with a blue and white striped uniform and a funny little hat
that said 'engineer' on it. He'd spent too much of his youth watching
a TV show about toy trains.

When he followed Victoria into the compartment he was shocked to
see the engineer was actually a woman. Her hair had a touch of
gray—Liam had a hard time guessing the age of women—and
she was wearing blue jeans with a filthy white t-shirt. She looked
more like a mechanic than an engineer. Woman or no.

“Who the hell are you two?”

Liam expected trouble from Hayes. Could he have them kicked out?

But he actually helped their case.

“Oh they're friends of mine. They helped me get out of the
Arch.”

“I see. Well pardon me for not talking but I need to get
this train going again and I don't really know what I'm doing.”

Victoria took the lead in talking to her.

“You did great getting us here. Thank you sincerely from all
of us in the back.”

She let her compliment soak into the dirty woman before
continuing.

“We are just wondering where you're going? You know, since
we are a kind of a captive audience.”

She tried to make light of the situation.

“Listen. I'm getting this train as far away from those
things as I'm able. Going south as far as she'll go. But I have one
stop to make—besides this here stop for your persuasive
friend.” She gave a nod to Hayes. “I have to pick up my
husband. He's the real engineer. Before the phones went down he said
he was stuck in a massive traffic jam to the south. He was trying to
get the rest of our family out of the city. I was supposed to get out
by crossing the Mississippi downtown—but the Army shut 'em all
down. Anyway, when things looked like they were going to keep getting
bad he sent me a text message saying I should take his engine and
whatever cars were attached to it and meet him at Cliff Cave Park.
That is still to the south of us, but not far. He walked me through
some of the basics of getting his engine started—I even managed
a voice call with him which was really fortunate—and I was able
to get the thing moving, though not very fast. His engine was linked
to another that had some kind of issue with it, so we all get to
watch the light show as we push the blasted thing.”

She was turning dials and pushing buttons as she spoke.

“Bottom line is I don't know where I'm going besides picking
up my family. From there, the track points south. Now if you want to
get back there on your freight car I'm getting ready to blow the horn
so people know we're going to be moving again.”