Sirens of the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 2): Siren Songs (4 page)

They all agreed Hayes wasn't truthful, and they mostly agreed he'd
not put them in any actual danger since they'd met him. He even
claimed to have helped Liam and Victoria avoid getting shot by
snipers at one point. The lure of a quick ride home was powerful;
Liam wanted to see Grandma get to safety. If his parents were there,
they'd take care of Hayes for him.

As the military truck was turning around, an Arnold PD cruiser
rolled up. Phil and a partner were in the front. “Liam, I
thought about your offer and I'm in. Let's get you guys home.”

Liam looked at the Humvee, now pulling behind his car, and he
walked up to Phil's window. “We were just offered a ride by the
guys behind you. They are from the CDC, or so they say. But we'd all
feel much better riding home with you.”

“Well then jump in.”

Liam walked back to Grandma and together with Victoria they moved
her over to the rear door of the police cruiser. As they opened the
door, Hayes jumped out and walked around to where she was being
loaded.

“Hey, I thought you guys were coming with us?”

Phil opened his door and stood up.

The women were safely inside the car. Liam was left to face Hayes.
“Thank you. We really do appreciate your offer, but Phil was
there to help us cross the bridge so we feel we owe him. We want to
try to repay him, so we are going to let him take us home.”

Hayes had never expressed any negative emotions. He acted as if he
was above most of the fighting and excitement of the last few days.
He never shot a weapon or even held a weapon in Liam's recollection.
He claimed he was a middle manager for the CDC, more of a
“transportation roadie” than anything to do with fighting
diseases, but Liam was pretty certain he was less than truthful about
his job description. Taken together, Hayes projected an aura of
scientific detachment, which was why Liam was surprised when he got
right up in his face. He spoke so only Liam could hear him.

“Liam, please. You don't understand. Your grandmother could
hold an important key to solving this riddle. She needs to be
protected and I want to make sure she stays safe. Come with me and
I'll take you all somewhere I can
guarantee
your safety for
the duration of this disaster.”

There were a number of books swirling through Liam's brain at that
moment. There was always someone who enticed the unsuspecting victims
with safety, but then inevitably put them into even more danger...or
killed them outright. On the other hand, the real world was much more
fluid. Perhaps Hayes just had poor communication skills and his
mission really was to study the plague, and he really believed
Grandma could help with that cause. In that scenario, going with
Hayes would probably benefit everyone involved.

His father was the tiebreaker. His dad took pride in his
anti-government leanings, and he even kept his favorite quote in a
small frame near his home-office desk. Liam had read the quote his
whole life, but he never understood it until just this minute. He
could only paraphrase it, but it went something like, “The nine
most dangerous words in the English language are 'I'm from the
government, and I'm here to help.” It was spoken by a US
President from before Liam was born.

Now, the government was literally offering its hand to him. Though
not on the best of terms with him lately, he was going to trust his
father on this one. “Thank you, Mr. Hayes. Seriously. We will
be perfectly safe with the officers here. Good luck finding the cure.
Stay safe out there.”

He moved to get in the back seat, but Hayes grabbed his arm. His
voice was bordering on stern. “I urge you to reconsider. There
are so few...people...left, we have to husband them carefully.”

That's just what a government egghead would say.

“No thanks. See ya!” He yanked his arm and jumped in
the back seat, slamming the door.

Hayes and Phil were left outside facing each other. Liam wasn't
sure what to expect, but nothing dramatic happened. The two men may
have nodded slightly, and each returned to their respective vehicles.
No threats. No nothing.

Liam acknowledged either way he went he was getting into the
vehicle of the government. But he decided he'd rather get into the
car of a man regretful of his role in government debauchery than one
proud of it.

As they drove away he looked through the rear windshield to see
Hayes sitting inside his armored car, talking animatedly on his
phone.

This was his first big choice of the new day. Had he made the
correct one?

I'm thinking yes.

Liam felt relieved at getting away from Hayes, but all his
enthusiasm drained away once they got out of the woods along the
river and back into something approaching civilization. Almost
immediately he saw signs of conflict—burned houses, cars tipped
over, dead laying in the streets. He realized crossing the bridge out
of St. Louis wasn't leaving the plague behind, it was merely changing
one set of problems for another.

They pulled to the end of the gravel lane and stopped just before
the major two-lane blacktop road. He saw no traffic in either
direction.

“So how are we getting to your house Liam? Do you know how
to get there from here?”

Liam knew where he was, and how to get home. But what was the best
way home?

“On second thought, I have to do something first. If I'm
going to quit my job I want to do the right thing and ditch this car.
You mind if we swing by my house so I can get my personal vehicle?”

No one objected, so Phil put the metal down and forced everyone
back into their seats with the acceleration. He was heading into the
town that dreamed up the roadblocks, which Phil said would be
dangerous. Getting it done as fast as possible seemed sensible.

The car ride was torturous for the trio in the back seat. Phil was
driving at high speeds through narrow streets and along country
roads. He knew them well, but the back and forth and up and down
motions were tossing the rear passengers all over. Liam worried about
crushing Grandma between Victoria and himself.

As they approached the town of Arnold, more people were walking
the roads, more cars were mobile, and there were more signs of the
devastation of the ongoing societal collapse. Houses on fire. Dead
people in the streets. Gunshots.

At one point, on a nice suburban neighborhood street, someone
threw a rock at Phil's police car. It hit the passenger side rear
door just below the glass. Victoria let out a small scream. She then
shrank noticeably into her seat.

“I don't think these people like you Phil. These your
neighbors?” Liam was hoping to keep the mood light, but...

“These people aren't from my neighborhood. These are people
who broke through the Arnold blockade up on the highway. They are
none too happy to see Arnold PD. Crap. This may have been a mistake.”
Another rock clanged off the hood and chipped the glass on the front
windshield.

“Almost to my house. Let's just get this done.”

A few minutes and they were there. Phil's partner switched seats
so he could park the cruiser. Phil jumped out, ran to his garage and
opened it, and moved his car out. Phil's partner put the police car
into the garage and shut the door on it. Lots of people had to have
watched it go in.

After a frantic minute they were all inside, and could breathe
again.

“Thanks, guys. I didn't want to freak anyone out, but it was
critical we got over here to hide the car. Before I picked you up I
was listening to the reports on the radio. Not only did the refugees
get across the river up at the highway, but they've taken a severe
disliking to those who tried to keep them bottled up on the wrong
side of the water. Many officers and city officials were killed at
the roadblock, but I've heard people are attacking cops on the road,
shooting their vehicles, and stuff like that. I knew we'd be safer
coming here to swap cars rather than try to make it anywhere with a
car that attracts violent protesters. We have enough troubles with
the infected now.”

“But didn't they see us arrive at your house?”
Victoria's concern echoed Liam's.

“Definitely. We'll have to be fast.” While he was
talking he was putting together some foodstuffs from his cupboard,
throwing them into a backpack. He also grabbed some bottled waters
and handed them around. He ran out of the room saying he needed to
change his shirt, ripping off his uniform in the process. “Drink
up while you can!”

Phil came back with a light button-down shirt and full-length
jeans. He wore his service belt under his untucked shirt, providing a
degree of concealment for his arsenal. He then went into his garage
and came back with two big duffel bags, then excused himself to go
downstairs. “Billy, can you come down and help?”

Grandma was sitting at the kitchen table, while Victoria was
pacing nervously between the front and rear windows of the house.
Liam just bounced around the kitchen aimlessly. Fatigue was his
current nemesis. The water was divine.

A few minutes went by and the men were back up the steps. Each had
a duffel over his shoulders. Billy carried both out the front door.
“We're grabbing some supplies, but we have to go right away. I
have most of what's easy to grab but I have to leave so much.”

“I think we're already out of time.” It was Victoria.
She was looking out the back window, and speaking with a palpable
sense of dread.

They all went to see what had her rattled.

Phil's house didn't have a great view of the town, but it did sit
on a small hill in his neighborhood. They could see people running
around, and several nearby houses on fire. A few residents were
shooting and being shot by the arsonists. They were only a couple
blocks over—heading in Phil's direction.

“Yep, because of THAT. Those are probably the people from
the roadblocks. Torching everything in their path now. That fuel is
priceless and they're tossing it on a funeral pyre!” Phil
seemed more exasperated than scared. “Time to go!”

Phil threw his backpack to Liam. Liam flung it on his own back—

Holy hell this is heavy.

—and he helped Grandma get outside.

Phil's SUV already had its engine running while sitting in the
short driveway. The rear lift gate was open so they could throw their
gear in the cargo area.

Liam heard a strange whizzing sound. A second later they heard a
gunshot report.

“Run!”

They practically threw Grandma in the back seat. Liam and Victoria
tumbled in after her.

A loud clang rang through the truck. A couple more followed.
Reports were echoing off the garage doors of neighbor's houses.

Phil dashed into the driver's seat, followed swiftly by Billy on the other side. The
truck roared out of the driveway, turning right and then a quick
left, away from whatever was happening back there. Followed only by
three more clangs of metal.

“Everyone OK back there? That was a little too close for
comfort. Hoo boy! We got out of there just in time, eh Billy Boy?”
He looked over to his partner and was shocked to see he was dead. A
bullet must have gone through Billy's door and killed him instantly.
Phil seemed to slow down so he could take in what just happened to
his friend and partner—to say nothing of his home and
livelihood—but there was too much going on to do anything but
drive at that moment.

“I'm sorry about your friend.”

“Yeah, so sorry.”

Grandma closed with, “Rest in peace Billy.”

2

The people of St. Louis fought the much smaller city of Arnold,
and spiked the football. They were taking the spoils by looting,
pillaging, and then razing the berg as they moved through. Liam hoped
he was wrong, but nothing out his window suggested society was going
to be back anytime soon. Not here. He had to remind himself the wave
of St. Louis zombies hadn't even arrived here yet.

“If I was smart I would have parked that police car in front
of another house, maybe the Mayor's house.” He gave a strained
laugh at that. “Maybe driven it into a lake. Once they find it
in my garage they'll definitely burn the house to the ground.”

Liam thought he was being unfair on himself. “You did the
best you could. You got all that stuff out in a few short minutes,
giving us some valuable supplies to get to my house.”

“Yeah, well I've been planning for something like this for
weeks. Once it started getting bad.”

There's that phrase again. Liam had heard people say things had
“been getting bad” for a while before the plague exploded
onto the scene, but he couldn't for the life of him remember anything
that would have tipped him off to something as big as the collapse of
the world. Was he too self-absorbed to notice? He read about it many
times in his zombie books.

“When you don't have a family around you'd be surprised what
seems important to do at three in the morning.”

Grandma gave a slushy “mmmm hmmm” hum in agreement.
She probably had some free time herself over the years. It had been
decades since Grandpa Al passed on.

“So I used my time to organize my bullets, count my cans of
beans, and watch videos on the internet about how to survive after a
societal breakdown. The number of websites on survival is, or rather
was, nearly infinite. I admit though I never really tested much of
their advice. It never seemed urgent to try to tan a hide or pluck
feathers from a chicken—so I'm afraid I didn't train up on
much, beyond what I already knew.”

Phil went on to explain he had put his duffel bags of guns in
places he could easily grab them, so if he ever needed them in a
hurry he would be able to be in and out. He never dreamed this was
how it would end up.

Being a police officer had many perks, but the most relevant to
today was being plugged into the firearms community. He not only got
all the free training and range time he could ever want, but he also
tapped into low cost auctions of firearms—often before the
general public knew about them. He explained the various types of
rifles, shotguns, and handguns he had—though Liam wasn't really
listening.